Kali’s Game Recommendations on Steam

Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands is truly magical.
-Flawless voice acting!
-Interesting enemies, plus:
Undead skeletal gay pirates finding “spirituality”!
-Fascinating side-quests! Including:
Salacious serpentine sirens seducing cyborgs!
-Unexpected travel options after…
Blowing up the #@!$ing ocean with a god-#@!$ LUTE!

Perfect. Five Stars. No Notes.

1: Punch Flowers
2: Shoot Rocks
3: 。。　☆ 。　 SPAAAAAAACE! ☆。　 ☆ ☆ 。

This game took me from trying to survive, to base-building, to flying through space, to learning alien languages, to taking jobs as an interplanetary Uber-Eats, to assembling a fleet, to MORE base-building, to ship-trader, to town manager, to pirate, to savior or destroyer of the universe and a bunch of stuff in between. Also, the game is big. I mean REALLY big. You could fit the entire internet and everyone on Earth in this game – assuming you computer doesn’t catch on fire and explode first. Plus, with all the unexpected FREE updates, they will probably be releasing content for this game until the heat-death of the universe, so… you know… you’ll get your money’s worth and then some by buying this game.

All-in-all: Five Stars, Top Marks, kiss your family and loved ones good-bye as this game will consume you.

Disclaimer: A lot of people are giving bad reviews based on bugs and how it ran on their system. If you don’t have a powerful enough computer, it’s going to run like garbage – this is a given. I have a decent rig (which, incidentally, I built specifically so I could play this game) – so it ran smoothly enough for me that the bugs were not game-breaking – they were minimal, and even amusing at times. Should they have released it on older Xboxs or Playstations? Absolutely not – but I’m not here to judge their business decisions. With that in mind, my review will be based on the gameplay mechanics, story, and immersion. I also tried to be as spoiler-free as I could be.

1) Mechanics –
Basic Combat: Cyberpunk 2077 gives you a lot of options as to how you want to play the game, from a stealthy approach where you silently deal with your opponents from the shadows, to a soldier firing a wide arsenal of guns in a shoot-out, to a brawler with a more “hands on” approach. I tried all three and liked all of them – although it seemed my play style changed with my mood, which I find kinda handy if I’m tired and want to stealth my way through a level, or just had a cup of coffee and want to blow things up with my overpowered assault rifles.

Breaching/Hacking: I like the concept, but I didn’t really know what I was doing most of the time and there wasn’t much of an tutorial on matching the codes on the right with the random list on the left and why some where available and some where not. It was still satisfying when I matched the codes, but not as much if I knew how I was doing it. (ie the rules to that game.)

Driving/Racing: I loved the racing and I like driving, but more nuanced control of my vehicles would be nice. Each vehicle seemed to have a different response time to the WASD keys, some accelerating much faster when the button was pressed as compared to others, which is cool and appropriate, but takes more time to master in a bustling city. I ended up using the motorcycle 90% of the time because I could weave through traffic easier.

Braindance: A good mechanic, although based on the way they marketed it, I thought there would be more of them. Highly underutilized in my opinion. Could have been used in bigger, better ways. Still, super fun for detective work.

Crafting: I liked crafting. You get gear and you can wear/use it, disassemble it for parts, or upgrade it. Pretty simple, good mechanic.

2) Story –
Life paths – Street Kid, Corpo, Nomad: They don’t matter. At all. Seriously. The gameplay and the story won’t be affected in any way other than a few dialogue options, which don’t even change the outcome of a given mission. The only thing it affects, is your starting point in the game and how you meet Jackie. So if you don’t like your choice, just play for an hour and it won’t matter anyway.

Main Plot: Christ. What do I even say here? I have played through the entire game and completed three of the four endings so far. For some, it may seem over-the-top, but for me, it was beautiful, painful, hopeful, horrifying, and full of existential crisis – which, based on my experience with cyberpunk as a genre, is exactly what it’s supposed to be. High-tech noir dialed to 11. Five stars. I LOVED it.

Sub-plots: I thoroughly enjoyed each of them. They all tied up pretty neatly and gave a sense of completion when they were done. There are sub-sub plots too, but I don’t want to dive too far down the rabbit-hole with this review. You also pick up a lot of “shards” during the game that turn out to be little story vignettes that you can read in the menu system to give the game an extra layer of depth. You don’t need to read any of them to complete or even enjoy the game, but I found them to be fascinating.

3) Immersion –
This game is a beautiful work of art. (Assuming your video card can handle everything this game is going to throw at it.) Seriously, I was impressed. Maybe I’m not as jaded as some other players, but Night City felt alive to me. People walking around, having conversations, driving cars in traffic. The sheer number of objects that have to be rendered, shaded, and animated on any given street is impressive. The levels of detail in them are almost life-like to me. It handled weather exceptionally well too… Sunny days are easy, but the foggy rain, and sandstorms felt kinda magical to me. Don’t forget the in-game radio/music. This game has the largest soundtrack to a game I have ever experienced. I’m not getting any deeper than to tell you I loved it. Check it out for yourself – google it – its good! Side note: even the tv shows/commercials are impressive… I spent at least 10 minutes in an elevator watching tv when I first started the game. Just standing there… watching tv in a video game.

The voice acting was on point too. Especially Keanu Reeves. Yeah, yeah, I know he’s been the poster boy for cyberpunk as a genre since the 1990’s (Johnny Mnemonic, The Matrix Trilogy, etc..) but his disillusion with the world and anger at it in the game feels genuine and appropriate. The rest of the cast was amazing too. There wasn’t a single character that I felt didn’t belong there. They all brought the game to life.

TL;DR: This game is a perfect example of Cyberpunk as a genre. People with high-end machines will enjoy it as will run better – people with lower-end machines will have problems.
That said, I absolutely loved it and would recommend it to anyone with decent hardware.

I wanted to re-write my review because my previous one was way too short for such a complex and brilliant game. The characters are entertaining and three dimentional (not just in a graphic sense), the puzzles are challenging, but not condescendingly hard. The envionment is beautifully rendered and tells a story beyond what is communicated through character interactions. This game is so good, it actually helped me break my World of Warcraft addiction and explore other games again. I applaud you, Valve… you have given me my curiosity back.

BioShock Infinite is one of the very few games that lives up to ALL the hype that it received prior to it’s release. This game is visually stunning at almost every level – from it’s breathtaking skyboxs to the lush enviornments both inside and out of each of these meticulously rendered buildings. The sound design, from the voice acting and sound effects to the most minor, insignificant ambiant sounds create such an immerse gaming enviorment, that once you stop playing the game, you immediatly want to go back. The gameplay lives up to the accessability and ease of the previous installments of the BioShock series – which is also another reason why the game is so fun to play. Now that I finished the game, I eagerly await it’s DLC content.

Minor spoilers below:
Unlike the previous games in the BioShock universe, the player enters the city while it is still a living, breathing, thriving society. As the player progresses through the game, it slowly becomes what we are used to in the series – a mostly empty, former war-zone left with little more than scavangers and broken, looted buildings. Once I reached the point where the city was just as dead as Rapture (the city from the first two BioShock games), I actually felt a bit of nostalgia for the previous version of the now ravaged sections of Columbia.

The character stories were easy to follow at first, but as the game progresses, get significantly more complicated. I had to read the BioShock wiki page to understand the last part of the game, and even then, I feel I only barely grasp the concept. I actually think that’s a good thing. I know a game is good when I go looking for more information about it AFTER I have already finished it.

The story and people of the amazing flying city of Columbia will be one of my favorite gaming experiences for a long time to come. Highest marks. Bravo, Irrational Games, Bravo.

This game is brilliant. It’s mostly story-driven, so it’s more like a TV show that you play than a game. It does, however, makes up for the lack of amazing gameplay with a spectacular story-line that really assaults your emotions. You have to make tough choices and no matter what you do, you can’t save everyone. If you have any kind of feelings at all, this game will make you cry at least at a few points.

As far as independant games you can play on your PC or tablet, this game is pretty fun. It’s another tower defence game, but done in an innovative and entertaining way. The gameplay is engaging and the cut-scenes are great… Two thumbs up. 😉

Note to self: Re-write this lame stub-sized review. The game deserves better and you know it!

I’ve never really been into tower defense games before, but this one pulls it off pretty well. I fully enjoyed it. Good purchase. 😉