[Cecil Terwilliger]

Played some brand new little known indie games recently.

After starting it like two years ago, I finally finished Metro Exodus. I have some high praise but also some harsh criticism. I loved the immersion such as the in world map and weapon crafting, the setting and general story and quite a bit of the game play. Unlike the AC franchise, which has become a bloated mess with quantity over quality, this game was much more focused with smaller open world maps and far fewer time wasting stupid quests and treasures. It really helps keep you into the game and focused on the story.

On the other hand, the voicework wasn't great, nor was the writing. It also had way too many scenes that were unskippable and just dragged on forever. And while I liked the FPS and combat aspects, some of the gameplay was tedious. Some enemies were way overpowered and travel by boat was more of a hinderance than a feature. I was also disappointed to learn that there were multiple endings but the game never really told you which choices affected the outcome or how to change the outcome. Some things you didn't find out until after the mission was over that you weren't supposed to kill the "bad" guys. Granted the gameplay was all the same I think, just a few differences very short cutscenes.

Overall I'd give it maybe a 7.5. Could have been an 8 or 9 with some gameplay fixes and better a better script and voicework.


Then I played Uncharted 2 as part of the Uncharted remaster collection on PS4. I'd played 1 years ago and was maybe 3 chapters into 2 when I stopped. Playing this right after Metro Exodus really highlighted what good writing and voice acting is like. Night and day. Tons of fun from start to finish, amazing gameplay that was varied with a nice mix of exploration, puzzles and combat with great story mixed in. Got a little weak near the end but was otherwise phenomenal. Obvious why this is considered one of the greatest games of all time.


Then I immediately played Uncharted 3. I'm not sure how I'd feel if I'd never have played 1 and 2 but by comparison, 3 is total dog####. Just a huge pile of crap. It felt like it was mostly filler with so many pointless scenes and chapters. It was a 5 hour game they stretched to 9. Who in god's name thought it was a good idea to increase hand to hand combat by like 3000%? It was terrible and I hated all the new controls they added for it.

There were also multiple tedious dream/hallucinatory sequences that were awful and did nothing but frustrate me and fill time. Jesus that desert scene went on forever.

Then they added like half a dozen of these running/chase scenes. While a few of them weren't bad, they had too many and I ended up being frustrated with them. I felt like this was part of a bigger problem that the game felt underdeveloped with too much filler. Even the exploration and climbing, which can be quite rewarding and fun, felt lazy and rushed.

And don't get me started on some of the nonsensical camera angles they decided to use.

I genuinely disliked this game and would not recommend it to anyone. However since it still had a fair amount of the great stuff from Uncharted 1 and 2, I'd probably still give it like a 6. Maybe even a 6.5. I think part of it is that it just sucked compared to 1 and 2. And when it was good, it was quite good but the bad parts were really, really bad.


Now I'm playing Ghosts of Tsushima and after that I'll get to work on TLUS2.