Invisible Inc (PS4)

Usually I really like these turn based tactical games and turn based isometric RPG's...I mean I REALLY like them, most of my all time favorite games fit into the genre- Jagged Alliance still the greatest game ever made IMO.

But this one I'm done with, it seems to have taken the formula and removed everything I love about the genre and left a shell. There is no grand overall strategic campaign. The campaign is very short, so short that you feel pretty much no progression during it. It's made worse that everything is so expensive and you get SFA money. So there are lots of equipment and character upgrades, but I was never able to buy anything despite trying to loot every damn safe during missions.

Time limits, each mission is effectively time limited by increases in security levels. This hugely discourages exploration of the enviroments, which doesn't matter too much i suppose, since each level is so small anyway. I suppose the game is trying to play to it's stealth angle, but it doesn't work for me.

I got teleport scrolls as a warrior...but the number seems to be limited (e.g. Saturas gave me a 2nd one, but after that I apparently couldn't get another one).
Anyway, I wouldn't say it's a bad game, and I did have some fun with it (after all I spent more than a day of my life on it...)...it's just that I felt the game didn't reach its full potential.

Tearaway Unfolded (PS4)

This one is crap. Sony fans apparently swear by the original version on Vita, but this PS4 version has me just plain swearing- constantly. It is basically a cutesy 3D adventure platformer, full of gimmicks to make use of the PS4 controller motion controls and touch pad...and the light bar...after 3 years with a PS4 and I thought the light bar was just for draining the controller batteries and lighting up the movie room when I'm playing a BluRay movie (I have to put tape over it).

The game isn't funny, unless your 5. The devs only seem to know one way to make the platform parts harder and that's the tried and true method of fixing the 3D camera in an annoying position at random times. I can't seem to go more than 30 seconds without the game taking control off me, fucking with camera or throwing up advice on what I should be doing.

But worst of all, my progress count says I'm up to 34% completion and I've already had 4 occasions where I've had to reload previous save points and replay sections because of bugs preventing me from progressing. Each time I wasted about 30 minutes just thinking I'm stupid and have missed something only to later find it was a bug stopping something from working. The latest one would not fix even reloading a checkpoint, it will require a chapter restart. Screw it, I'm done, wasn't having fun anyway.

This months complimentary PS Plus game, I feel like Sony owe me something for wasting my time.

Neo Scavenger

It's really cool and I'll probably try again someday, but after Cataclysm : DDA, I find the game a bit lacking in depth. I want more crafting recipes and items.

Yes, there are teleport runes, yes, they can be used by everyone and yes, they can be used unlimited times. You get them pretty late, though, and I don't remember exactly where and when. It will, in Gothic 2. ;)
Anyway, I can understand if people have problems with Gothic 1 today, but when it came out, it was groundbreaking. But yes, it has its flaws, however, most of them had been improved upon in the second game (and then they kicked everything out of the window in the buggy mess that was Gothic 3).

Topic: Don't know if I really quit a game this year already... maybe I am close to quitting Caesar III (for the second time, actually). I really want to love it and it has many, many qualities, but the way the game forces me to build very ugly and unrealistic cities with as few intersections as possible in order to force the people sent out by buildings to go where I want them to instead of just randomly running around all over the place kind of defeats the entire purpose of the game for me.

Nothing against a little challenge (especially since the Anno games are quite a bit more simplistic and for the most part not very difficult once you get the hang of them), but not if the challenge consists of working against the game's mechanics in this way.

Beyond Divinity

played for around 10 hours and realized it just wasnt fun. Fiddly UI, constantly having to readjust camera and reapply group follow, inventory nightmare, and a bizarre spell crafting mechanic which never explains what anything will do or how it works. I could handle all of those cons above but it was so damn boring, clear a similar looking dungeon of similar looking npcs and spend most of the time looting the same boring barrels and chests for even more boring equipment. oh, annoying voice overs of epic proportions. the devs took all the charm, fun, and pure enjoyment out of the franchise and broke it.

I also bought Gothic 2 on Gog and will probably play it at some time (from what I've read it seems to have more and deeper role-playing, choices etc.). Only thing that annoys me is that the Gog version automatically includes the expansion which supposedly makes the game extremely diificult. Will have to see if I can live with that or if I'll have to try one of the workarounds.

Off World Trading Company. Not sure why, i was into it and enjoyed it but it burnt out quickly for me. I just found myself questioning why I was playing and then stopped altogether.

Ah, that's right, the expansion does make it quite difficult I'm afraid. I never played it without it, but I had played through the first game more than once before I first played it so I was already quite familiar with the type of game, but it was still pretty hard at times. There appears to be a way to play it without the expansion with a mod, though. But I haven't tried that myself.

After 30 hours you've definitely given Gothic a fair go and I have no right to convince you to play further, so please take my reply in the spirit that it's more directed at other gamers who are sitting on the fence as to whether or not to have a go at Gothic, and there are some minor spoilers.

If you do give Gothic another go someday and pick up where you left off, then you'll encounter more areas underground, and Gothic does a good job of making them eerie and foreboding. You'll also get runes with unlimited use that teleport you to certain key areas.

The game is designed like this intentionally. You'll even encounter a character that tells you to do this. This is one of the reasons why I love Gothic. When you start the game as an inexperienced character, it doesn't matter how good your own reflexes are, your character is going to battle to hit a fly. At the beginning of the game you'll need to slowly, slowly approach a scavenger and try to lure it towards you in the hope that when it comes at you, you can get in a few good blows before it starts to make mince meat of you. Later in the game, you'll just run up to a group of them, take them out with one swipe each, and suffer no damage yourself. So it's a game that convincingly makes you feel like your character is getting more powerful. The first play-through is also challenging as one doesn't have a map at the beginning and the environment seems massive. But after a while you'll find the outdoor area starts to seem much smaller especially once you're strong enough to take on most of the wildlife as you can then just run directly from point A to point B without having to take circuitous routes to avoid certain creatures.

I've finished the game as a melee character, but you'll still need a little archery and magic if you want to complete the game. And even if you've invested a lot of experience points in boosting your strength, you'll still get enough experience points to boost another stat considerably such as magic (especially since you'll encounter potions later in the game that boost various stats permanently), so you could eventually switch your melee character to a magic user, assuming you haven't spent too many experience points on upgrading other miscellaneous attributes.

I personally found the quests quite varied and enjoyed all the dialog in the game being voiced. And whilst there are no waypoints which could be challenging to some gamers, the game handles this in a more realistic manner where other characters lead you to some important locations and effectively provide you safe passage and a little free experience at the same time. The trial and error approach with respect to when one is tough enough to take on certain monsters can also be a little off-putting to some, but I enjoy the anticipation of getting strong enough to eventually face those monsters to finally get to see what lies beyond them.

The game controls can also be a little jarring for some, and I battled for a while figuring out how to do simple things like open a chest, and inventory management is also handled very differently to many games - so I'd probably dock a few points for ease-of-use and the occasional crash... but I think not many games pull off what Gothic does, which is making you feel like an active participant in a living, breathing but brutal world and giving you a sense of evolving and having more control over your destiny as time goes by.

Thanks and +1 for the excellent review. You've certainly made me want to give it a go!

Quit the Star Trek: 25th Anniversary game. I gave up after many, many attempts at the final battle.
I'm always destroyed within 20 seconds no matter what strategy I use. Half of that time is spent on simply getting one of the ships into view.
My patience is long gone.
However, I'm still glad I played the game, the majority of it was fun.

Have you checked the mods in the official forum?
I haven't used it, so I can't speak about the mod quality, but this seems to be what you're looking for:
http://bluebottlegames.com/main/node/4235

Oh yes I saw a mod like that but I haven't tried it yet. I'll probably wind up finishing the game some day in its original form first, and only use a mod like that later for a second playthrough. But for now if I want another bout with a post apocalyptic survival game I'll return to Cataclysm : dda :)
Hopefully I won't want to anytime soon. I find it obscenely difficult to let go of one of those games once I get going :P

Abandoning jotun.... I feel it is a real chore instead of an enjoynment to play, so... Must be the camera travelling too far making the character so small, the environments beautiful but dull, empty all the more with that large view... The boring enemies throwing rocks... This "badass" forge boss killing me in a few blows... I, just, do not want to put up with this any more... If i was into viking mythology, but i am not. Good bye, jotun!