Tag Archives: bethesda

Thoughts: Rage 2

rage2_shoot

Some of my friends have asked me why I even bought Rage 2, since I didn’t exactly enjoy the original and the sequel wasn’t looking like anything special from the previews. My answer to them was that I just wanted to blast things with a shotgun for a few hours, as that’s a genre that’s been somewhat underserved this year (so far), but the real reason is that I really, really wanted to open the review with a “You can’t spell average without Rage” joke.

Unfortunately this makes Rage 2 doubly disappointing, as it’s turned out to have fallen some considerable way short of even that rather dubious target.

Continue reading

Tagged , , , ,

Thoughts: Doom

doom_mancubus

I’m writing this review of Doom on a sunny Sunday probably less than 24 hours before the gaming sites get their own reviews up. I don’t know exactly what they’re going to say, but I predict they’re going to be fairly surprised at Doom’s proof that id Software do still know how to make a cracking FPS. I know I certainly was.

Continue reading

Tagged , , ,

Thoughts: Fallout 4

f4_constitution

Yes, we’ve made it to the fourth main outing of the inexplicably-populist post-apocalyptic open world RPG. Ever since Oblivion it seems that Bethesda have been incapable of doing anything wrong; each game they release experiences a couple of million more copies sold than the last one, and Fallout 4 doesn’t look like it’s in any danger of being an exception to that rule. That they salvaged the Fallout IP from the Interplay debacle and turned it into one of the most successful franchises in gaming is laudable; that their approach to Fallout 3 was to simply paste that IP over the top of Oblivion is less so. Don’t get me wrong, Fallout 3 achieved great success in splicing some of the core Fallout concepts together with the stock Bethesda open-world gameplay (guns, VATS), but this came at the cost of it being a noticeably shallower game than its predecessors in terms of actual RPG-ness. Even at the time I remember thinking that it was fine for a first outing, but that any follow-up should make better use of the setting and include such radical features as “an actual plot” instead of stunt-casting Liam Neeson and hoping nobody would notice it wasn’t there.

Continue reading

Tagged , , ,

Thoughts: Skyrim.

header

Most reviews of Skyrim, if they’re being honest, will start with some sort of disclaimer that states how far the reviewer has gotten into the game and what they have and haven’t done. This is fair enough; while I’d usually prefer that they finish it games journalists are busy people and Skyrim is a huge game. It’s simply not possible for them to see the whole thing if they want to get their review out while it’s still relevant. So most reviews of Skyrim, if they’re being honest, have been written on the basis of a dozen or so hours with the game.

playtime

Mine hasn’t.

Continue reading

Tagged , , ,