Recent reviews by Plain

Stab you friends in electrical. What more can I say?

I've been playing DJMAX since Portable 2, skipped a few games, and played Trilogy for the PC. RESPECT V encompasses everything learned from the years of Trilogy and keeps the spirit of the series alive. Multiplayer, songs from every game, and new songs that are even licensed with other game companies like Riot makes this a fantastic rhythm game. For those that have never played a DJMAX game, but are interested in the challenge of learning what they're all about, I'd pick this one up for sure and give it a whirl in free-play mode.

(Edited to reflect quick fixes post Jan 15th patch)

Edit: just avoid this game if you're a new player. Impossible to gear to the same level as old players. Still p2w.

There's so many things wrong with this patch I literally do not know where to start. It feels as if the developers of the game fail to understand what the players wanted, and what the players liked about the game and hated about the game.

I've talked with my friends about this patch, and they all agree it's akin to replacing the engine on your car when all you needed was new tires.

To explain this, I'll describe the types of players I've run in to in Kurtzpel as part of the community:
1. The PvPer - Primarily Does PvP
2. The PvEer - Primarily Does PvE
3. The Fashionista - Wants to look bomb af while doing whatever
4. Combination of some/all the above

The majority of players I've run into are typically exclusively type 1 or of type 4 with combinations 2+3, 1+3 , or 1+2+3.

It goes without saying, but to reiterate, this patch affects literally all categories of the above in staunchly negative ways.

If you're a PvPer, the game from E to A rank no longer feels competitive. In fact, it feels completely random as to whether you win or lose a 5v5 or 3v3 match when solo queueing. Hell, even playing with friends is sketchy because everything is just so chaotic. Making the barrier entry to 2v2 literally the highest obtainable rank in 5v5/3v3 is just asinine. How is one expected to learn to play pvp required for higher ranks in a mode that is simply pure chaos? The simple answer is, they don't. Thus E through A rank are no longer competitively relevant at all in assessing someone's skill level. I'm also going to throw in a gripe noting that it's very obvious deathmatch was/is by far the most popular PvP mode, and taking away player's choice to choose the mode to queue for is also a huge mistake even with loadout changes being able to be made in queue. Higher ranks often ended up queueing for CTF as well, as it promotes more aggressive gameplay since deathmatch favors passive gameplay.

If you're a PvEer, you're literally locked into doing 3 modes of the same bosses, on repeat. I don't know about anyone else, but farming the same random assortment of monsters on repeat for a day does not sound fun in the slightest, with only a random chance of getting the items you want from bosses for a box.

Lastly, the WORST problems of this patch come from the system level changes made to the game with substats and skills. These affect ALL players, no matter the type. DP as a system is limited to a per day amount for free, thus a player's actual, usable skills are time gated PER DAY and that just honestly makes the game, not fun. To really kill the cat, DP forces players to play both PvP and PvE to obtain the maximum amount of daily DP. What about the people that get PvP anxiety or really hate killing static bosses? They're forced to either pay money or take twice as long to grind out the skills they already know and love, or bite the bullet and do what they hate. MANDATORY ANTI-FUN. On top of this, this BEAUTIFUL game with a variety of characters and fashion items is limited by substats being ON THE ACTUAL ITEMS, AND NOT JUST ASSOCIATED WITH THE SLOTS. This limits player's fashionista fantasies and will make players NOT WANT TO BUY COSMETICS, SO NO MORE :heavy_dollar_sign::heavy_dollar_sign::heavy_dollar_sign:due to needing to roll stats again on said cosmetics and still having players be competitively relevant in pve/pvp. This problem increases doubly by the number of cosmetics a player buys, due to needing 2 stones (which may not even roll properly, so even MORE STONES) per item slot.

Honestly, this patch feels like it's just a cash grab and I don't think the playerbase will fall for KoG's shenanigans due to the game just not being fun due to the aforementioned problems.

Edit: This game is now a hot pile of steaming garbage. The devs refuse to update anything, don't listen to the community, and haven't changed their ways since release. Avoid like the plague.


Writing this review is probably the hardest thing I've written in a long time, as there's both a lot to say about Bless Online, and whether it's worth the buy or not.

Performance:
First off, the game lags like an old grandma in open world, no matter how good your system's hardware is. Needless to say, there are many optimization tweaks floating around the internet that improve the game, but sacrifice its looks for better performance. In dungeons, the solo experience has been largely well for myself, with my framerate hitting upwards of 120 fps stable.

Gameplay:
The gameplay is quite fun, being a hybrid of action mmos and traditional mmos. The biggest issue, is that the implementation of action combat is not in the game for all classes, and currently only the berserker class has the option of action combat. That being said, the prospect of action combat with the other classes is going to be amazing and fantastic, provided the release comes in a timely manner.

The game has standard dungeons, a typical gearing system with durability, and a player economy minus trading. Gear is primarily obtained through dungeons (so far via my leveling experience) and open world mobs tend to drop gear as well as uncommon drops. Most early game dungeons can be soloed for experience, but later dungeons require a team. Speaking on the dungeon experience, there is NO auto matchmaker to find parties for dungeons. This by far is the biggest gameplay con.

Community:
So far the new community has been helpful, though the highly restrictive chat filter seems to take the fun out of the social aspect.

Overall Experience:
Overall, I'd have to say that the game feels as if its in its infancy. Compared to more polished and seasoned games such as Black Desert, WoW, and FFXIV, the game claims its own identity role being a hybrid action-tab target MMO. If the developers keep up with the updates, content, and fix the performance issues on higher end machines, the game could be a stunning and wonderful to play within 6 months. However, hope alone is not often a selling point for MMOs and only time will tell. Will the devs pull a FFXIV and rise the game to glory? Or will they pull a TERA Online and forsake the community for years to come whilst using them as a cash cow?

So far, the game is a solid 5.5/10 in my book. Just enough to get an upvote rather than a downvote.

In 6th months I will review the game again and hopefully the issues above will be fixed.

After a few day one patches I feel like writing my review now would be best. No man's sky is very controversial compared to other games; people are very polarized about it, and they either love it or hate it. Because of this, I wouldn't reccomend everyone run to drop $60 on it as it costs right now. Yes, I am currently loving and enjoying the game. I love the feeling of vastness, smallness, and just seeing how big the universe of No Man's Sky is really brings a sense of beautiful futility to my life as a human being trapped on planet Earth.

I don't think this game is necessarily about beating it after playing it for some time. I think the whole purpose of the game is to simply bring about a philosophical change in people, and I can feel the game changing me. I'm starting to feel more at ease with just being alive as a person, and I'm more compassionate to everyone that I've been talking to lately. Maybe it's too much to say that this game has changed me that much though, however it has had me thinking about what my existence really means to me, and that in and of itself was well worth the purchase.