Recent reviews by cjvexx

feel inspired by a fighting game for the first time in a while. this game is exciting, difficult, technical, rich, beautiful. STRONG DEFENSE. ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up offense. it's flashy and it's sexy but it's smart and calculating. worlds within worlds. shmix city. i love it thank you french bread you can grind on my grid any day.

A relentless exercise in tedium.

This is gaming soul food. I think you know whether or not this game is for you. But to elaborate, DO NOT play this game thinking it is a traditional rhythm game, or even a game that is designed around "beating" single player levels in some fashion. In fact, the "Campaign" as it's called, is a snail-paced tutorial that only serves to frustrate and annoy the user by interrupting the natural flow of gameplay while simultaneously blocking out some of the game's features (instruments & effects).

What you're REALLY getting here is a music tool, that enables you to be a DJ-lite. It's not the deepest thing ever, but it sure as hell is a lot more than I personally expected, and ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, it is incredible fun.

To decide whether or not you want this game, I believe you have to ask yourself: "Would I load this game up to jam out to my own mixes for 1.5-2hrs at a time?" If that answer is no, this game is not for you. If that concept sounds exciting to you, however, (and you aren't a salty dropmix player), then this game is like nothing else on the market, and really hits a special spot that brings endless joy to my face. Also, it could potentially be a way to have some music at a party, without all the overhead of an actual DJ kit, if you're into that sort of thing.

The other issue comes down to cost. Is this game WORTH $60-100? I'm not sure, and if it wasn't gifted to me, I would definitely have a hard time justifying the cost. That being said, if you are flush with cash and love this game, the DLC (songs) in this game are actually incredible value when compared to other music or rhythm games. Why? Well, because this game, being a freeform mixing game, actually has the excellent advantage of combinatoric mathematics. That one song you buy has 4 stems that can be combined with every other song in the game, meaning not only does one track have an incredible amount of potential packed into it, but also that each successive song becomes increasingly valuable. Not all songs are made equally, however, so be choice with your selections, and of course, not every combination is a winner. Just don't get shy about using some songs because you don't like them, because in reality, this game isn't about listening to your favorite songs back to back, but instead to create something entirely new out of their guts, so don't be afraid to drop in some songs that you might hate to listen to normally, you'd be surprised. Regardless, there is still plenty of content (songs) to enjoy in the base game that will keep you occupied for many hours, just be prepared to grind a little for everything. (There are ways to drastically speed up your XP Gain, and thankfully it isn't by doing the campaign).

In short, buy if you want what really amounts to a freeform music tool, don't buy if you don't think you'll get enough time out of it and/or just want a traditional rhythm game.

Serviceable hack and slash gameplay can't save this trash

The first thing I noticed about Transistor was the tremendous presentation. Every part of the game is coupled with a slick style and theme, and it’s so pervasive it’s like having a theme bukkake. The game is world is supremely beautiful, the menus are styled wonderfully, and you can stop at any time to hum along to the background music. Nothing is forgotten, and it makes the whole game aesthetically fantastic and immersive. I find myself wanting to take pictures of the game all the time, and I would occasionally find myself humming just because it felt right. There are terminals spread throughout the city and the abilities you use come with information on people who lived in the city, giving you no shortage of lore tidbits to read and to immerse yourself in, it’s a wonderful little addition.

The actual gameplay consists of a linear romp through Cloudbank, exploring it’s nooks and crannies, with spurts of combat. The combat sets you into an arena with a certain amount of enemies to defeat to proceed. The battles themselves are fairly simple, you can only attack when you are able to make a “turn” (the super slow down time planning phase) and using the turn allows you to essentially make a super attack by attacking 3 or 4 times before the enemy can even blink. Most of the time I felt that attack without using turn was not nearly as effective because the attacks are a lot slower and you leave yourself open to attacks much easier, however when you are waiting to get your turn back you can only run, making the combat have an uneven rhythm that ruins the fun in between turn sessions. The combat is made much more interesting by the abilities you gain, however. The transistor comes with 4 ability slots, which can be slotted with “Functions” that are gained by leveling up or progressing through the story. That is just the basis, however. Each function can be used in three ways, albeit only one at a time, the first to use it as a core ability, the second to use it as an upgrade for a slotted core ability, and the third to use it as a passive. This means you will constantly be switching up your abilities just to see what happens with the combinations, and you’ll be trying to squeeze out your memory (the limit to how many functions you can use) to get maximum fun and efficiency. This is the best part of the combat, and makes the other issues tolerable, but I feel that at it’s core the combat is still lacking, although it is significantly better than Bastion’s combat, which ended up feeling formulaic to me.

And finally, we get to the story. Frankly, the story is very poor. The game has an in media res beginning to end all in media res beginnings, and it doesn’t get much better. I never felt particularly attached to the characters, and I still don’t know how or why Red lost her voice in the first place. My biggest complaint though, is how short the game is. It is literally 2 hours, and probably less. I did some challenges and tried to get every terminal I could find so I ended up with a final time of 3 hours but cutting all the excess the game is likely 2 hours or less. I sat in disbelief as the credits rolled, and it killed my experience. By the end of the game I didn’t really care if any of the questions posed were answered, and I really only wanted to see more of the world and experience the beautiful atmosphere, but the game ends too quickly and therefore makes not only the story awful, but the experience cut shorter than it should have.

Overall, the game has an amazing first impression, but playing through the game reveals a supremely underdeveloped story and an awesome experience cut short. While not nearly as good as it could have been, the experience is worth a playthrough.

6/10

The best zombie bowling game I have ever played.