Recent reviews by alright clanker

There's plenty of Backrooms games on Steam but this one is one of the nicer ones. Visuals are great, the handcam is a fun little gimmick, and the LiDAR level is probably the highlight for me though. The puzzles are a bit too easy if I'm honest and the enemies are not very threatening.

There's more complete Backrooms games available, although, what's here is fine. In addition to new levels (which 3 are confirmed for the next update), a difficulty tweak would probably go a long way.

Interesting little game, even if it is more like a toy in state that it is currently in. The visuals are fantastic, the game runs surprisingly well, at least on an RTX 3080 and an i7 8700. Not really a whole lot going on outside of just exploring, admiring, and throwing balls at things.

I had decided to try and find ways to break the physics because I had realised after 15 minutes, I had seen everything the game has to offer, and there's some interesting prop flying you can get working but only on certain props. I even managed to find functional lights in the front garden, even though you can't get there without prop flying over the invisible wall which keeps you from leaving the kitchen to get into the back garden.

Really hope we get some new maps, maybe some puzzle minigames which involve the visuals in some way, or even some kind of modding tool to mess around with. While I also would like to see VR, I think just having more maps or more things to do in the game is more important right now. Even if the game was updated to contain even more detail to the level in terms of intractability, sure the PC turning on is cool but can I flush the toilet? Or pull the covers off the beds? Maybe even implement a functional stove top? In any case, while fun for a bit, this is something you would likely only play for a little while, enjoy it, and then move on, because there really is not much here right now.

tl;dr its a cool little sandbox/toy simulation with some very good visuals but there's not a whole lot more going on, still interesting to mess around with for a bit

Profit quota: 512/513
Deadline: 0 days

The System Shock remake manages to capture the same tension and stress of playing the original game and, as you would expect of a remake, does it better. Of course, the original game was a DOS game which had the same visual complexity as a piece of graph paper and was intended to be played on a CRT with the resolution of an ant's knob, but even then, given the aged visuals the original game still manages to hold up even today.

I honestly didn't expect the remake to add nearly as much detail to the environments given the source material and it really goes to show how much creative energy went into this remake which makes this feel like a real passion project.

Meanwhile, the music is more ambient than groovy but the game still manages a serious amount of atmosphere emanating from it. With the dark corridors and distant cyborg mumbles, the music is what ends up being the big red bow which ties up the atmosphere into a beautiful recently bashed mutant corpse.

Even then, it is a bit of a shame that we didn't get full blown recreations of the original music. One of the highlights of the original game was how it manages to get the music to be so up beat yet manages to compliment a sci-fi horror setting. Some may argue the music was a little too much for what was going on and I would imagine that critique is what lead to the remake having a more quiet, ambient soundtrack.

Meanwhile, while I do feel that the visual style is a good fit for the remake, I'm not entirely with the textures having that low resolution look to them as to compliment the original game. Sure, its cute but with a game which has put the effort into completely modernising the visuals from the original game, it feels like a bit of a missed opportunity to make the environments feel more realised.

Granted, this pixel-ey look isn't always visible, especially at a distance, so its not like it disrupts immersion or anything (except when you notice it on your player's hands and weapons) but it feels that the visuals are being slightly held back by this decision, but that's whatever. Its usually going to be a per-case thing if you do or don't like this sort of thing, and in this case, I don't like it.

Another thing that really disappointed me was the Restoration Bays, or the respawn points if you're not sure what those are. In the original game, a simple yet charming text-to-speech voice announces that you have finally reached what is arguably the most important area on every level. Hearing that robotic voice say the words "CYBORG CONVERSION CANCELLED. STANDARD RESTORATION PROCEDURES ONLINE" is on the same level as reaching a safe room in a Resident Evil game or reaching an extract with 4 blacked out limbs with two tank batteries stuffed into your backpack in Tarkov. Although now, it's got proper voice acting, and while that may seem better, the new voice doesn't really give the feeling of relief the same way the original's did, but now that's just nitpicking.

In any case, this is a very good package. Its true to the original game and aims to preserve the original's design whilst also making modern improvements. There's also a lot of System Shock 2 influence in here too, maybe a little too much for someone coming from the original game though.

There's now actual inventory management and a scrapping mechanic that lets you exchange useless items for useful items at vending machines. What I found myself doing is picking up everything that wasn't nailed to the ground and acquiring tokens for my scrap collection but realised I wasn't even bothering to spend those tokens on anything.

See, once you activate the respawn area on each level and find a Sparc Gun along with memorising every recharge station on that level, you kind of don't have to worry as much about dying. And then I realised that the items I was picking up just weren't worth the time to scrap and then exchange.

I appreciate the idea of making previously useless items useful but given how quickly you can progress once you figure out what you're doing, I realised that I'd rather play an area out tactically and stack up on health items than to keep taking detours to navigate the almost maze-like level design. Yes, the original game was like this too but the original game had you backtrack for something you either missed or had to backtrack for.

Overall, it might be something newcomers to the series or those not too fond of the horror genre might find a bit too much to handle, not to worry because the game offers up the same difficulty configuration options that the original game had meaning you can play the game as relaxed as James May filing and organising drill bits or you can play the game like you had sat on an agitated wasp.

In the end though, the System Shock remake ticks off pretty much every box for a game of its genre and I can safely say, I'm quite satisfied with the base asking price, if you're not someone who knows a whole lot about System Shock, I'd say wait for sale. The remake caters to fans of both the original System Shock and the sequel and tries to do what it can to be as modernised as possible.

THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.
THIS IS NOT A DRILL.
YOU GET TO PLAY AS A CAT.

EIGHT

Best way to sum up this game:

https://youtu.be/_CYmhqVsgpk

With the latest season starting, Battlefield 2042 has had a lot of change with it since launch. A lot of weird, strange, and downright stupid design choices have been reworked into a much more enjoyable state. The map pool is slowly expanding, though, with each new release, we can see the BF2042 team is learning how to make the map blend with the gameplay seamlessly. New maps have a focus on cover and chokepoints, which is where most of the action happens.

In terms of the new Specialists, they’re designed well and seem to fit nicely in the game’s world. As for their actual equipment and gameplay, it varies. The first DLC Specialist which released in Season 1, Lis, features a remote-controlled rocket launcher… and that’s it. While the second DLC Specialist who just came out with the latest update, Crawford, features a mountable machine gun complete with a shield.
Not to mention, Crawford also can revive anyone on his team and also resupplies their gadgets. There is quite a contrast between the two newest Specialists, and it sort of feels like Dice still don’t entirely know what they want new Specialists to be. Lis feels like she is a good alternative to the existing launchers but doesn’t have such a huge impact as Crawford who can place a mounted gun, mow down a handful of players, then revive his squad and a few others on top. While we’re still quite early into BF2042’s life, Dice need to figure out how they want new Specialists to fit into the game.

Otherwise, with the latest slew of updates, the game has become surprisingly playable. Optimisation has been given a huge boost so now the game runs even better. Most of the maps have received reworks in some way, along with tweaks to the launch Specialists to make them feel like less of a win condition if you can spam their abilities quick enough. Not only that but the Specialists were redesigned to better fit the world, making them look far more fitting and sound like they're in an actual war and not a Marvel movie.

My original review noted that the game was a good “game”, just not a good “Battlefield game” after the first handful of significant updates that made the game better. The launch version of BF2042 was absolutely appalling especially considering they were asking full price for something very clearly unfinished. Though, we’ve come a long way from the launch version of BF2042, I still don’t think the game is worth what EA are asking for. Should BF2042 go free to play? I mean, it has microtransactions, it has a battle pass (which is much better implemented than the likes of Call of Duty and co.), does it need to cost the asking amount?
Regardless, the game is becoming much more enjoyable, and to be honest, a lot of people thought this was going to be the case and they were spot on. Yeah, there are some bugs here and there but honestly, I can barely name more than 1 off the top of my head.

I’ve spent a lot of time with this game since launch and I’m glad to say it’s getting there in terms of quality. Now, you may have noticed I didn’t talk about Portal or Hazard Zone, and its mostly because those modes haven’t really changed much. Portal is still getting a lot of community attention and Dice is still pushing community “experiences”, but I think if Portal is to really succeed in future, they need to step away from forcing players onto “hosted experiences”, which is code for “lobbies that act as servers”. Portal should be playable on the same platform the base game is playable on in addition to hosted experiences, at least as far as featured experiences go.

In any case, pick the game up on sale, or if you’re looking for something new to play, you might have a good time with this.

Hopefully, Dice can keep this momentum up.

Rockets scream before impact. Thank you rockets.

*sees a Witch*
*tells friends there is a witch*
*everyone turns their lights off*
*we keep our distance while walking past her*
*one guy needs to reload*
*reloads as loud as possible*

Stealth/10