Correctly Rating Older Games for Steam Sales

[maninahat]

We spend a lot of time trying to figure out whether new games are any good, or old games are over rated. But we are the an era of steam sales impulse buying, where we instinctively end up buying crap we passed up on release, but have now reconsidered two years later, now the "price is right".

So how about we quickly review games that you are likely to see in a flash sale/quarterly sale, to let people know if the fucking things are worth snapping up?

EG:

Mad Max
It's basically like the Arkham Asylum games, only with far less story and far more grind. Repeat the same shit to incrementally upgrade your car or to find bits to incrementally upgrade three bases out in the wasteland, owned by three dickheads who don't really pay you for the trouble. The game came out during Fury Road, yet criminally fails to include Furiosa or a war rig for you to drive. If you have never played a ubisoft or Batman game, give it a try, otherwise definitely skip regardless of the price.

Batman: Arkham Knight
Still working through this one. The story is completely bonkers, and the batmobile is a pain in the arse. It drives like you are controlling it from the backseat because the driver has passed out, and you're having to reach around them to get to the steering wheel, and you're also going into labour. The brawling is fine, and I like this new feature where you can seamlessly switch control over to your stalwart companion mid-fight. Might be worth a purchase if cheap.

Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Maybe I've spoiled it for myself by playing three open world games on the trot, but Deus Ex feels like a step down from Human Revolution. The story includes obnoxious, heavy handed parallel to minority abuse, but doesn't include an explanation for what the fuck is going on or why you should care. I never quite understood who I was working for in the game even though I'm sure I've been told a dozen times throughout. Prague is a cool setting that is fun to explore. Enemy boss fight is lame and causes the game to end abruptly. I can't really recommend it to Dues Ex fans because they've hated every game since the first one, but to everyone else it is... meh?

 

[sXeth]

Battle Chasers : Nightwar

Did you like SNES-PS2 ERa JRPGs like Final Fantasy? This is probably right up your alley then. A bit more tactical depth then some of those, but mostly retro-flavored take. Some retro-flavor comes with a bit of a bad though accurate taste though.

Spoiler

Primarily, the game suffers from the "Only characters in party get XP" virus. Which makes some of the later game characters fall way behind the curve unless you grind them up to snuff. Since the three later characters are the more tactically complex, this can be a deterrent if you're looking for a strategic depth. Also, one character is basically essential since they have a unique skill to strip enemy buffs, which is the only way to deal with certain highly obnoxious enemies.

The game also opts to use a Diablo-esque system complete with lootbox-style chests. No microtransactions, but this can concievably mean a bit of an annoying grind. There's a few ways around it, but they involve their own pseudo-grinds. So the otherwise top notch experience could be tainted by RNG.

Hob

A decent little Zelda-esque adventure. No dialogue, relying on animation and environmental storytelling, so that might be an offput. Also has a history of some technical problems, and the developer got trampled out by their publisher before fixing everything.

Spoiler

Hob is the story of a ??? fellow who ends up with the task of reassembling and repairing a cber-fantasy(?) type island thats disassembled itself and solving the corruption of a purple plant/ooze creep overrunning things. It has a sort of top-down/isometric esque combat with a sword and dodge rolls, and a few flavors of gadgetry similar to a 2d Zelda. While open world essentially, there are min-dungeons where you often find such gadgets and use them to further traverse about the open world, and occasional puzzles as you reassemble the island and gain access to more of it.

Warhammer : Vermintide

Left4Rats Early-Access Esque. Honestly, you could just get Killing Floor 2 or Shadow Warrior 2 (for some more mission oriented esque gameplay) and probably be better off. The sequels apparently improved, but this is more or less a half-baked prototype.

Spoiler

Recently on Playstation for 8 dollars, so I'm guessing it'll be similar on Steam sales and such, particularly with the sequel looming.

Its not terrible, but I'd say give it a pass if you don't have friends to play with. It is essentially a Left for Dead clone. Can't say how much of the control issues would apply on other platforms, but the PS version has some sensitivity issues, a very finicky sense of direction for the dodge mechanics, and auto-aim that is bizarrely inconsistent, sometimes giving you ludicrous free headshots, and other times having a miss at point blank for no apparent reason (comparable to the bizarre Miss Percentage mechanic in Shadow Warrior 2).

Mission designs hit and miss, and more miss. The last few levels in particular (which I think were a free update or something, they're distinct from the main campaign of sorts anyhow) throw large hordes in small corridors that completely annihilate any coherent tactical approach. Another involved finding keys that just randomize their appearance in crates in a room while rat swarms pour in, being just a slog decided as much by luck of the draw as anything.

The loot system is just trash. While not attached to monetizations or anything, its just a grindy mess of random rewards that you salvage into multiple currencies that are used to upgrade other stuff or reroll it, and the whole thing is just a heap of RNG and excessive grind. For what seems to amount to fairly minuscule perk advantages (many of which are just junk in their own right).

Watch_Dogs 2

More likeable but not as well designed as the first. And a weirdly lacking implementation of Ubisofts general formulas. And the multiplayer is just a bizarre mess of what seems like unfinished ideas and half***ed implementation.

Spoiler

Yes, Aiden Pearce was a nonsensical character half-bastardized from some other game (allegedly Driver) for this one with the charisma of floppy cardboard. Marcus and his crew in this one manage a bit likability (though they're also some distinct "Hollywood Nerd" stereotypes, which was a contrast to more interesting character like T-Bone, Jordi, or Iraq in the first game.

While Watch_Dogs 2 has a goofy charm more relatable to Hackers then the Punisher vibe its predecessor was trying for, its distinctly short where the first was drag-on long. Adding to this is that the story missions themselves, once the cutscene and exposition is done with, are Ubisoft's trademark digestable slices of gameplay. Small self contained stealth/puzzle/shooting options that can be mostly done in under 5 minutes (another area the first game has over it is some actual level and mission design). Also as an early heads up, the final mission throws out the "play your way" approach with a forced shootout.

The rest of WD2's sandbox is dotted with the usual spat of collectibles. Though these all give you skill points, so there's tangible purpose to procuring them. This can also be a problem, because barring some excessive grinding in multiplayer, you'll need *all* of them to fill out the skill tree if thats your thing. Most of these feature small puzzles using Watch_Dogs Pipe-dream esque circuit hacking, a few are in resticted areas that make up WD's version of outpost mechanics (though you can't clear/capture them, ever). Then some they clearly ran out of ideas because they're just random spots you fly up to with a drone and hack with no puzzle or enemies at all.

WD2 continues the series multiplayer invasions, where Dark Souls style, an enemy hacker (who will appear as an NPC, but does keep their custom clothing in this iteration, so leave the clown costume at home if you want to invade succesfully) and hack you for money and potential victory points (and pointless leaderboarding) while you scramble to locate them. There's technical issues with this still on holdover from the 1st that can alert you to someone coming in so you can stand out in the middle of nowhere, and a scattering of general balance issues as well that make it a poor game in the advanced playerbase still playing. Co-op missions exist, but they're the same basic "Go in enemy territory bit and pick up/hack whatever" that makes up the campaign missions, just without the backdrop. Online races that are adequate enough (the quadcopter being the only unique seeming one). A large update added 4 player free roam lobbies (a step backwards from the 16 in WD1, for those keeping score) but they're fairly limited. PvP only is available by voting on two of a set of 4 activities, and the 4 player co-op Robot-Disabling game wears thin quickly after you work out its simple gimmicks.

 

[CaitSeith]

Even if a game gets high praise at release, I rarely buy it at that moment. It may affect my decision on buying it when it's on sale; but it's usually my initial interest in the game itself (and the developer's recent history on game-breaking glitches) that makes me decide when to buy (not the praise)

Crypt of the Necrodancer. An indie retro rogue-like dungeon crawler with rhythm mechanics. The enemies and your character can move and act only at the rhythm of the music (and the music is pretty good). A must buy when it's on sale.

Spoiler: Some opinions about it

By the way, the background music in the review comes from the game itself.

The Witness. Only if you are into puzzles (not puzzle games, but just plain puzzles); otherwise anything more than $2 will feel like paying too much. The puzzles get interesting when the game uses the environment to give clues on the puzzle solution, and when solving the same puzzle in a different way activates machinery.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

Gotta say OP I pretty much completely agree with you on Mad Max and Mankind Divided. MM had a ton of potential but the open world grind turned it into a slog I wasn't interested in finishing. A tighter story would have made that game really interesting. Mankind Divided's story was a confusing mess but I enjoyed it by just eventually giving up trying to comprehend it. The immersive sim systems it has are fun to play with just like in Human Revolution and it was quite pretty.

I seem to have enjoyed Arkham Knight a lot more than you are though. The story is indeed bonkers but that's why I like it. Just give me all the villains and all the stakes. That bit in the chemical plant when Bruce is saying goodbye to Alfred choked me up because I'm such a sap and Kevin Conroy is perfect.

The Arkham Knight himself sucks though. I mean come on, we all knew who he was immediately. I agree that the Batmobile isn't perfect but just having the car for the first time finally gave me that complete Batman experience I was hoping for.


Prey
Bought it a sale or two ago and got a few hours in. I have no desire to finish it whatsoever. I suppose the premise is kind of neat but I'm just weary of these systems based audio log games. I know that contradicts what I said a little about Mankind Divided up above, but there's just something about Prey that feels off. I have not once though the controls or weapons or tools at my disposal have felt natural. It's an interesting premise for a game but I find the whole thing clunky and uninspiring.

 

[Squilookle]

With Mad Max I was more disappointed that you couldn't fly a plane or even an autogyro. Not everyone moves around the wasteland on 4 wheels, after all.

GOG.com

Whenever Steam tells me it has a sale on I get excited, because that means GOG usually has a sale on too, and if you buy stuff there instead it comes completely DRM free, with a price displayed in your country's own currency.

 

[maninahat]

The Arkham Knight himself sucks though. I mean come on, we all knew who he was immediately. I agree that the Batmobile isn't perfect but just having the car for the first time finally gave me that complete Batman experience I was hoping for.

I haven't got to the reveal yet, buy I'm desperately hoping the Knight is Oracle, and Batman is going to have a scene like the one in The Big Lebowski where he tries to drag her out of her wheel chair to prove she walks.

 

[JUMBO PALACE]

The Arkham Knight himself sucks though. I mean come on, we all knew who he was immediately. I agree that the Batmobile isn't perfect but just having the car for the first time finally gave me that complete Batman experience I was hoping for.

I haven't got to the reveal yet, buy I'm desperately hoping the Knight is Oracle, and Batman is going to have a scene like the one in The Big Lebowski where he tries to drag her out of her wheel chair to prove she walks.

I feel like this could be a deleted scene from BvS or something. Or I suppose whatever Batman movie Snyder would have gotten to do next when he decided it still wasn't dark enough for him.

Honestly I would love a message on what you think as you get farther in the game.