Quick Video Game Reviews (50-200 words)

[ladelsofgravy]

It'd be interesting if we could dedicate this thread toward us writing game reviews that are 50 to 200 words, quick to read but still thoughtful and detailed, with a quick rating at the end. I'll start

Also, we can make comments on each other's assessments. Don't worry about exactly meeting the word length, but it's a general guideline.

My personal review structure. I rate the game in context of it's release year, relative to other games of it's time, and I assume it's at it's full retail price. My reviews don't factor in patches, mods, updates, etc.

My rating is the 10 scale, rounded without decimal.
To put it short:
1-4 is simply bad and not recommended.
5 is slightly below average.
6 is decent, worth playing but exercise caution.
7 is recommended (and not a bad game at all)
8 is strongly recommended.
9's are hard to get (i dont believe in "anything under 9 is crap" mentality)
10 doesn't mean perfect, no game is perfect.

L.A. Noire (2011, Rockstar Games)
LA Noire is an authentic adaptation of 1940's LA, with it's visuals, sound, strong storytelling, and superb writing. You play as Cole Phelps, a rookie police officer who moves up the ranks as a detective, solving crimes. It's as much as mystery solving game as it is an action game, and it's greatest strength is the variety of gameplay. There are lethal stealthy shootouts, GTA-like car chases, adrenaline-pumping on-foot chases, among observing crime scenes and piecing together evidence.

The main appeal of this game is the interrogation of witnesses, where you must declare what they say to be truthful, doubtful or a lie, using your evidence and observing their fully motion-captured body language. It's one flaw: the game doesn't often deviate from the standard examine-interrogate-chase mission structure, which makes it get a bit repetitive, but it never loses it's fun. Despite the darkness and dishonesty of the world around you, Rockstar, finally, allows you to be a decent person who can help rectify society.
Rating: 8/10

[ladelsofgravy]

Okay, time for a negative review.

Resident Evil 6 (2012, Capcom Games)
Resident Evil 6 features numerous protagonists with separate campaigns in an intertwining story: Leon/Helena (in a survival horror campaign), Chris/Piers (in a military shooter campaign), Jake (Wesker's son)/Sherry (in a campaign full of action sequences) and Ada Wong (in a stealth campaign). The game is the largest most ambitious in the series, with gorgeous visuals, great cinematics, realistic sound effects and capable storytelling. These elements would have made a great movie, but as a game, the gameplay is severely lacking and weighed down with many flaws.

The camera is nauseating, quick-time events are far too frequent, pacing is disjointed, level design is rarely creative, enemy AI is poor, gameplay is often shallow and unstrategic, gunplay is weak, and there is no real innovation in terms of how you interact with the game. There's certainly pieces of a decent game beneath all of these flaws, but the flaws are simply too much for most gamers, even hardcore Resident Evil fans, to handle.
Rating: 5/10

[ladelsofgravy]

I do want to get to quick-reviewing all the 3D Zelda games.

Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker (2003, Nintendo)
Most obviously, The Wind Waker completely changes the art style and ambiance of the N64 Zelda games, taking a more colorful artistic cartoony cel-shaded approach, and it's successful. The ambiance of this game, is simply unmatched. The story and storytelling are excellent, characters are expressive, dungeons (which make the bulk of the game) are immersive, each location is varied, the sound direction is flawless, controls handle perfectly, and the great sea holds its share of secrets. There's a delicate balance in gameplay between puzzles, action, platforming, and exploration.

For the first half of the game, pacing is smooth and flawless, but during the second half, you must comb through a giant tedious triforce-hunting quest which was added only to pad out the length. This problem is compounded by the fact that sailing is slow. Compared to previous Zelda games, bosses are easy, dungeons are linear, and puzzles are simple, but this game is still much more ambitious than your average action-adventure game and recommended to Gamecube owners. Beneath it's flaws, Wind Waker is an overall brilliant game.
Rating: 8/10

[ladelsofgravy]

Pikmin (2001, Nintendo)
The premise is simple. You play as Olimar, a space traveler who crashes his ship into a lush green jungle filled with plant-like creatures called Pikmin. They aren't smart, but they will follow your every command. You need to find 30 parts to your ship within 30 in-game days to beat the game. An in-game day is 15 minutes of time, and at night-fall you must return your PIkmin into your ship or they will be eaten by the monsters that lurk the forests. There are different types of PIkmin which can peform different abilities, so you must breed them intelligently. All can carry objects and attack enemies, but you must command them wisely and learn to multi-task because they are bone-headed and will die otherwise.

With a variety of commands, such as separating, uniting, ordering, throwing, marching in specific patterns and ordering attacks, you are free to command the pikmin entirely as you please. In turn, you are responsible when they die, and as their spirits cry of death, you can't help but feel guilt and remorse. The only significant flaw in Pikmin is that the adventure is short (6 to 8 hours) and there isn't much else to do after you've beaten, but you'll definitely want to replay the game again to keep as many Pikmin alive as possible to get a better score. PIkmin is an excellent RTS game for consoles with a brilliant original concept that Gamecube owners should not miss
Rating: 9/10

[ladelsofgravy]

Hey Gravy shut your fucking mouth on RE6 I doubt you even played the game.

Game has the most interesting and polished combat mechanics in an RE game and everyone who was too fucking stupid to utilize them thinks the game is bad because all they want to do is stand around and shoot.

Yes, as a big RE fan I did unfortunately play it. The enemies react the same to a shot to the leg as they do a shot to the chest or the arm. They were a bit smarter in Resident Evil 5 and 4.

The combat would be nice if it had just allowed me to perform attacks and actions on my own rather than instructing me to waggle a stick and watch the animations do it instead.

[ladelsofgravy]

I needa tip that ladel over na mean nigga?

suck my nuts, bitch

[LIL_B]

I needa tip that ladel over na mean nigga?

suck my nuts, bitch

you cunty

#protect basedshady at all costs

[ladelsofgravy]

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (2011, Nintendo)
Skyward Sword is easily the biggest most ambitious game of the Zelda series, with likeable characters, remarkably good visuals and cinematic storytelling. With great precision, immersion and engaging combat, the motion controls do fundamentally change the way the game is played. In addition, there are 7 great dungeons, each full of innovative puzzles with new concepts that require your whole arsenal of items to conquer. On top of that, there are lots of entertaining optional side quests.

One problem is the pacing, where you are frequently required to backtrack to previous areas (worsened with slow transportation) in order to progress, not once but on dozens of occasions. Also, there is a lot of filler content, such as repetitive boss battles and long tedious unnecessary by-the-numbers quests just to add length. Of this 45 hour adventure, 15 hours could have easily been removed

Skyward Sword is worth playing for sure, but you will have to stomach a lot of inconveniences to enjoy it's best moments. Had all it's flaws been fixed, it could have been a real masterpiece, but for what it is, it's still a great game.

Rating: 8/10

[ladelsofgravy]

Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening (1993, Nintendo)
A Link to the Past, a year before, was a groundbreaking console game, and Link's Awakening brings a whole new adventure on onto the Gameboy. Link is trapped within the dream of a giant mythical wind-fish, in a surreal dream-world which bears many likenesses to Nintendo's other IP's, and must awaken himself by conquering the nightmares that lie within the dreams, one dungeon at a time. This game in many ways borrows from A Link to the Past and plays the same way, yet it introduces it's own share of new enemies and new concepts.

The world is free to explore, and there are lots of items within that will help you on your journey, but your main task on conquering the dungeons, moving yourself a step closer to unraveling the story. Very few adventure games have met this size, scope and detail before, but to have a world like this on a portable platform is unprecedented. A must-have for all Gameboy owners.
Rating: 10/10

[Snakebeast]

RE6 was horrendous. Gameplay wasn't bad, but it was about as scary as fucking Dragon Ball Z. Gritty gritty shooty shooty bang bang spunkgargleweewee level of garbage. Ugh.

[ladelsofgravy]

Actually, I didn't mind the new direction of RE6 at all. As long as the GAME ITSELF behind the concepts is good, it's perfectly fine. When you base your game on quick time events and resent the player's sense of control, freedom and interference, then it's not good.

[BileInjectVictimhaha]

Sorry Basedshady, Capcom killed Megaman, therefore anything they put out is utter trash because they're money grubbing jew nosed faggots.

Operation Raccoon city sucked the prolapsed asshole of a zombie raccoon btw.

[ladelsofgravy]

I think the best MegaMan game was Megaman Powered Up. Please don't shoot me.