Recent reviews by Stumpus Maximus

Blue Prince is clever, engaging experience. It has great puzzle design and atmosphere. The story provides enough intrigue to keep you interested in finding out more. The central rogue-like mechanic—the blueprints that change daily—helps extend the more iterative puzzles beyond one-shots, but at the same time it does drag out the late-game story puzzles longer than necessary. Overall, I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a new puzzler.

At this point, if you haven't played it ever, it's probably not your thing. If you haven't played for a while, it's pretty much still the same game at its core with more ridiculous outfits. If you play it regularly, you probably play with a regular squad and complain about it every time. Its still full of jank, and there will always be sweaty try-hards that send you packing to the lobby early, but that said, even after all these years, I have yet to encounter a game that can recreate the absolute adrenaline rush of a late-game showdown that this one does. I wish I knew how to quit you, PUBG.

Good humor, visceral action, and tense moments. Might be frustrating or boring for the solo player, but much, much better with friends. Not really a game that will appeal to the hardcore grinders who want to rush and max everything out, because there's not much reason to come back once you've unlocked everything. That said, they add content regularly, so there's usually something to chase.

If you like Soulsbornes, I can’t think of a reason you won’t love Elden Ring. It’s all the things you’re familiar with in addition to an open world on the scale of something you’d expect from the Elder Scrolls series plus the cumulative quality-of-life improvements that From has implemented along the way. There is a LOT of content if you’re into it, but you also have the freedom to skip most of it if you want to. And that’s just the single-player—if pvp is your thing, there are plenty of opportunities. On the multiplayer note, non-boss co-op continues to be a less than satisfactory experience for most, but it’s an entirely optional experience.

Super fun bullet hell. I got this game as a gift but at $2.99 I'm definitely going to buy a few copies for friends. The mechanics are easy to learn and the challenge ramps up in a really satisfying way. Rogue-like elements keep it fresh--tons of replayability with plenty of unlocks. Just get it already and have fun!

It's a fun, decently balanced deck builder with roguelike elements. Easy to pick up, pause, or put down, and there's lots of replayability. Definitely worth it if you're into that sort of thing.

As of today, I don't see a lot of reasons to purchase Audioshield.

This was one of the first available rhythm games for SteamVR, and for what it was it was reasonably fun. It's always suffered a bit from the algorithm that maps the orbs you need to block to beats in the music. However, at one point, you could forgive its flaws because it had functionality that allowed you to import YouTube and other songs -- now it looks as though those features have been stripped out (likely for legal reasons, which is unfortunate).

Barring additional support by the developer and a significant redesign, you're better off choosing another option for your VR rhythm game needs.

I've played a number of the VR offerings out there, but so far no one shows the polish or the promise of VR quite like The Lab. Thanks, Valve!

Update for the remastered version: A few quality-of-life improvements on an already awesome game. If you are at all inclined to play guitar, this game has a lot to offer.

The 2014 version is superior in every way from the original. The menus and loading times are much more streamlined, and everything feels good from a design perspective. Even connecting to uPlay is a non-issue.

Learn a Song Mode is likely where most new players are going to spend a lot of their time. This is essentially gamified guitar lessons. There are missions and links to interactive lessons here.

Session Mode is probably the biggest new feature; constructing a virtual band that plays along with you... that's just awesome. The variety of instruments and other options is pretty amazing, and you can lose hours just jamming if you aren't keeping track of the time.

The Guitarcade feels like it got a lot of love this time around; there's a greater variety of games, and they have a lot more polish than in the original. For those of you that are unfamiliar, the Guitarcade uses familiar "retro" style games to teach you guitar techniques. My one complaint here is that quick replays of games/levels are delayed by the process of posting scores to leaderboards.

Score Attack mode essentially turns the game into something akin to Guitar Hero. It's kind of crazy to me that this feature is buried in the Guitarcade area rather than accessible from the main menu, but I guess Rocksmith is pushing the instructional approach over high score achievements (not a bad thing).

I'm a little sad they took out the career progression from the original, but the rest of the changes more than make up for it. Nonstop play mode (my favorite) is pretty great for getting your playing fix--it presents a random selection from your library, or a favorites list, and you play for a predefined period of time. Oh, and the Riff Repeater--being able to repeat any section at a comfortable speed/difficulty from anywhere in a song... makes my life so much easier.

All in all, I'm really happy with the new version. I highly recommend it if you want to learn to play or even if you already know how. My playing has improved dramatically since I started with the original Rocksmith. Pick up the original and buy the song-transfer DLC for a lot more good songs--it's a good deal.

If you liked any of the other Elder Scrolls games, I'm sure you'll enjoy this one. If you haven't played any of the other Elder Scrolls games, I'm not sure you own a computer.