Recent reviews by Patrickres9

It's so close to being something good, here. There are a lot of concepts in this card-based RPG that are compelling, but where the game fails is they're all shallow and watered down. The item cards, the equipment cards, the skill cards, the enemy cards, the terrain cards, the NPC cards...all conceptually great, but are hampered by incredibly limited diversity and design. It's almost a proof of concept more than a deep compelling game experience. You can further see this in the tone of the story and the quality of the narration. They're both lifeless. Even the generic art is lifeless in that it does not tie together a vision at all. All of the peripheral elements, such as the art, the music, the story, the narration are just totally on an island of their own, and could be swapped out with something entirely different, as they add nothing to the cohesion of the game's elements. The game also suffers from far too many combat encounters that just make the game feel like a slog as you move through the chapters/dungeons. Despite some good ideas in the gameplay department, I can not recommend this game as anything more than a 5 dollar proof-of-concept experience and a reflection on potential and missed potential.

My issue with this game is the same I have with many "Kart" racers that don't strike a great balance. My driving skills had me in first for most of the match, but I was getting absolutely pummeled with unavoidable attacks just about the moment I got in first place. What's the point of mastering drifts, the tracks, and angles if it's impossible to keep first place? I understand trying to keep each round competitive, but driving should be first - items secondary to assist and add a layer of gameplay. If you have an MMR system like Rocket League, you can keep people with less ability from playing against people who are really good at Kart racing games. It's simply not fun to get blasted over and over out of first because the game is ham-fisted in it's balancing. The proposed solution would be to have ranking systems, and nerf the quantity of "destroy the guy/girl in first place" items. The game simply wont ever be as fun as It could be if 1st place is literally a timing event, a roll of the dice, on who grabs first right at the end, because whoever is in first will not be there for more than a handful of seconds due to the items.

Otherwise, the drifting is solid, the art/sound is cohesive enough, and it has the potential to be a solid game. I just can't get down with investing anything into the game until I can actually compete through skill.

Total abandonware! Completely barebones game with some half-baked mechanics and bugs. Literally just various inbalanced layouts/levels, with none of the other systems in place. It's been 2 years, so I'd say the odds of this getting resurrected and finished is just about 0%. Bummer.

Paid full price for this. No discounted upgrade to definitive edition? Ridiculous.

I don't write many reviews and I had to here. It's seldom a game induces the emotional response from me that this game did. The game is essentially a statement about escapism and how the momentary respite from your troubles through escapism won't resolve your problems. The game is mostly a "walking simulator" if you will. Figuring out where to go next is never really difficult, and your focus is on absorbing your environment and the dialogue within the game. Tensions rachet up as you go, and reach a crescendo by the finale. I found the finale to be particularly brilliant, because it really hammered home the illusory nature of escapism. Seldom does a game's narrative make me pause and think deeply. I couldn't shake Firewatch for days after I completed it. I still think about it on occasion. For that, I'd consider Firewatch to be borderline a masterpiece. For anyone interested in a compelling philosophical narrative, here's your game.

Fantastic side scroller. The game has such a distinct visual style. Clearly retro, but has almost a synthwave style baked into some of it's visuals and certainly into it's soundtrack. Nods are made to Ninja Gaiden and other retro side scrollers. The balance of action, control, and challenge is spot on in my opinion. The game then opens up into a very solid Metroidvania game about half way through. The story is silly at times (intentionally), but compelling enough. All in all it was easily worth the playthrough. I enjoyed it to the end and it finished just before it overstayed it's welcome. 9.5/10.

This game is stellar. It's such a throwback to SNES JRPGs in mechanic. It's not perfect, in that it does suffer from simiiar flaws as older JRPGs with a tad too much grinding - but all in all this was one of the best games I've played this year. A refreshing turn based combat system with a LOT of room for strategy. Randomly generated dungeons for higher replayability (and reasons to replay them) Plenty of exploration and side missions, a great story, secrets everywhere, a fun beastiary and fishing mini game, and on and on. 9.1 out of 10. A-. Second best game I've played in the last 12 months.

This is the absolute worst game I've ever played, which includes games like Doctor Jekyl and Mr Hyde and Superman 64. I wouldn't play this game if you payed me. If anyone out there has hundreds of hours, or close to a thousand hours of playtime or more in this game, they should consider a CT scan. Doubly so if their first name starts with an "R". I would rather shoot nail polish remover into my veins while listening to Bobcat Goldthwait read the fine print in my tax paperwork to me at 4 o clock in the morning on a Tuesday. I've had more fun getting ham-sandwhiched at an empty bar, eating Denny's aftwards, getting a tattoo of MAGA on my lower stomach, then passing out on my front lawn and accidentally crapping my pants. All that said, I might like it if I got more invites from friends to play it. I don't know :|

Can't recommend this game enough for anyone at all who enjoys cRPGs or tactical/strategic combat. Story is solid, environments are pretty, and there's plenty of room for exploration, but where this game REALLY shines is in the real time tactical combat. It's so thoughtful, I couldn't help but eagerly await the next round of combat to find clever combinations to dispatch mobs. One of the best games I played in 2018.

Board Game + Rogue-Lite! Challenging, but fun game. Doubly so as a coop experience. Can't recommend it enough.