Recent reviews by XTwo

It's Arma 3 but with a much better movement/animation/driving system but only 1% of the content:
- Mainly a PvP multiplayer game focused on one mode (conquer the island) with no filter for coop/PvE or PvP games in the server browser. Important when joining usually means downloading 10GB+ of unnecessary pointless mods before even entering...
- No good mods/missions (especially when compared to Arma 3) and no Steam Workshop. Only an in-game mod browser full of mods devoid of any descriptions and listed in the wrong categories.
- Only two basic single player missions included (Difficult to find more due to the above).
- Barely any options/settings for customization of anything.
- No difficulty settings whatsoever. No map position indicators whatsoever. Meaning, hidden AI soldiers always spot and kill you from who knows where while you're trying to figure out where you even are. Neither you, nor enemies ever appear on the map which makes it extra annoying to have to find your way back to who knows where you died or how you even got there. Nor can you play with an AI squad to help you in single player either. Lack of map position is especially annoying in multiplayer when someone flies or drives you to who knows where.
- Annoying mechanic of being knocked unconscious almost every time you get shot and dropping your gun. Resulting in the pointless chain of being shot again and again every time you wake up, now unarmed, until you finally actually die.
- No pose indicator, you never know if you're crouched or standing.
- Weird complicated medical mechanics instead of just using a medkit after being shot.
- Equiping anything means scrolling through tons of items instead of having them be divided by categories. Have fun scrolling through endless versions of AKs, M16s, scopes, and other addons on modded servers...
- No Saving/Loading (except automatically upon exiting to main menu).
- Annoying/Pointless lanterns that can be turned on/off everywhere that waste time when looking at what's interactable at a base.

Great map, the empty dunes offer surprisingly good cover and encourage a strategic approach to objectives from the right high ground angle. Works great with Dynamic Recon Ops mission randomizer mod thing. Includes a good long squad mission in which you can switch to play any AI soldier at any time! Wish this was a standard feature in the game.

Full of annoying, overwhelming and endless menus within icons, stats and currencies, tons of items to use/consume/equip on multiple characters & ships while constantly filling up progress bars and being notified of level ups and rewards/achievements/points to claim.
Just play the old Uncharted Waters: New Horizons on SNES for a proper epic game of this kind which should have been remastered/re-released instead.

Set in a lame water world of random samey looking small islands. Doing anything but the main quest, with its constant cutscenes, is difficult since there is no proper map that shows ports or places of interest. You can't go buying and selling since you don't know where anything is even if you've already been there. The map just stays blank except for showing main quest related places. Also, gets annoying to constantly be tempted into picking up the tons of random loot in the water. Even more annoying to stop for it constantly when it's on land.

Ship combat is actually pretty good though and the game is often only about $2.

Highly recommend trying the old Uncharted Waters: New Horizons on SNES instead for a proper epic game of this kind.

Rather lame, linear and small. Just go where you're told to and shoot some ships along the way. Has some great retro visuals though. Wish it was used to remake Elite: Frontier since the flying and combat feels similar but much better. Too bad it's only used for one main quest story with no trading, mining or side missions that could have easily expanded the game further. Yeah, it's an open universe where you can go where you want but so what when there's nothing to do there.

Almost a total copy of Battlefield 2042. Feels and plays identically, based on the same stupid operator class and dumb gadgets gameplay but with fewer game modes (only 2?). All with much more convoluted menus and tons more battlepass type progression tier systems. Couldn't even figure out how to start playing since the Ready button is the smallest thing there. Yet, somehow people will praise this when it's inferior in every way (except that it's free).

Even when played solo (yes, majority of the play hours logged with this review were such), this is still one of the best and most epic Elite/Privateer type space trading/shooting games ever made!

The most annoying, frustrating, awkward, disorganized, convoluted submarine game ever made since you:
-Can't set time compression to a slow setting like x2 or x4 speeds, only real time or x12 speed and faster which is WAY too fast for close encounters or narrow areas/ports.
-Can't set time compression to stop automatically after certain actions are complete such as loading wreckage or survivors.
-Can't set time compression to max in some situations such as shallow water which means it takes FOREVER to swim out of certain areas even though there's no danger near by.
-Can't assign officer to always automatically listen for contacts whenever dive.
-Can't just click one button to do simple things like use the periscope or binoculars. Have to select officer and walk there, then go first person mode and then force your way out of that mode once done by clicking on someone else or the map view.
-Can't do some things sometimes with some officers but can at other times. Never clearly know what can and can't be done when or during which situations.
-Can't see how, when or why food is used. Especially when one time actually somehow spent a year at sea without anyone dying after it all ran out.
-Can't have all sub functions/devices from the same organized menu. Have to use UI icons for some, separate text menus for others. Even point & click icons in the actual sub rooms like in some adventure game for a few (such as checking how many torpedoes left)
-Can't see all sub steering controls/indicators at once. Have to click on dial icon to show it and then change speed, then click on another icon to see rudder direction and change it, then another for depth. JUST SHOW THEM ALL ALWAYS!
-Can't change the realism/gameplay settings EVER except by totally restarting the whole campaign/career. And there's no single missions in which to test them out either.
-Can't feel much immersion since it's more of a management game.
-Can't see any indication of depth on map which is just sea and land.
-Can't instantly see what multiple specialty skills/abilities each officer has so as to use/assign them properly.
-Can't just drink coffee, have to select officer, walk to food storage, coffee isn't there, walk to other item storage where it's actually at, click on it to drink it. Select another officer and repeat.
Went back to play Silent Hunter 3 or 4 for a sub game of peak immersion with an easy to use and understandable interface. It's such a relief to play after how needlessly complicated UBoat is.

Don't know how anyone plays this game when you can't see anything among the clutter of the terrible, hideous 3D terrain. Everything blends in! You can barely see what improvements are already there or what unit is where. Not to mention that the interface is horrible with tool tips/menu titles appearing always on the bottom left corner for some reason even if you hovering the mouse elsewhere. Whenever you're prompted to select a new building to construct, science to research or make some kind of decision the whole game locks up within that menu to prevent you from checking anything else that might help you make a selection. Just play Civ 3 or 5 instead which look much better, are more legible and have much fewer annoying issues.

One of the best F1 style arcade racing games ever made but it has some issues/missing features:
-No number of opponent setting, always 10 which can't be reduced/increased.
-No rear-view mirrors but good arrow indicators if opponents nearby/behind you.
-No qualifying sessions, always start at 10th place (except in career mode but only if use a perk).
-No race restarts in career mode (except if set a perk before the race).
-No crew photos in career menu, except when you get messages from them, making it more difficult to relate to who's who.
-No proper button used for upgrade screen: X button (on Xbox controller), instead of A which exits menu.
Nevertheless it has:
-Great custom championships option.
-Great controls and settings to turn on/off: damage, weather, pit stops.
-Great option of choosing the pace of the race based on eras (from slow speed 1980s to super fast 2020s with progressively higher top speeds & acceleration for each era).
-Great quick 1min or less lap times with pit stops around every 4-5laps which make for some fun, epic and strategic fuel/tire option races at higher lap counts (up to 99 laps).
-Great camera options, from a full cockpit view to a zoomed out forward angled top helicopter perspective.
-Great and unique career mode with crew happiness levels & perk bonuses that depend on text scenario questions/decisions between races.