Starfield – “Early Access” Pre-order

Starfield early access pre-order shenanigans must be one of the more disgusting anti-consumer things that spawned from the depraved minds of the games industry of late. In my case, if you pay 99,99€ for the premium edition of the game on Steam, you get a five-day “early access” to it, compared to the peasant who can only shell out a measly 69,99€. Have we reached a new low perhaps? Pre-order bonuses were already pretty bad, but this is just a new level altogether. I hope to God this doesn’t become a new thing. Also, I think Bethesda might have shot themself in the foot with this one since you can already pirate the game. I imagine the ones waiting for a legit 70 euro release now must feel like a true sucker.

However, I can’t blame Bethesda single-handedly for this since it works. I read something that about 200-300k already play it on Steam, which indicates that there are a lot of people out there willing to pay big bucks for an earlier taste, even if it’s only five days.

Continue reading →

Solasta: Crown of the Magister [User Campaign] The Forsaken Isle – Wrath of the Gorillas

The Forsaken Isle is a 1-12 level user campaign that you can download from Steam Workshop for Solasta: Crown of the Magister. It’s made by Artyoan and is the first campaign in a series of three, of which two are available. The third one is still being made, as I understand it. This campaign requires that you own the DLC Inner Strength for it to be playable. My overall opinion is that it’s a pretty good campaign, both in the sense of gameplay and story, but its combat is hard as nails. I will go into more detail after we have talked about the story a bit.

Continue reading →

Baldur’s Gate 3 – Cut Content

It seems Larian cut a lot of content from Baldur’s Gate 3, and while this is not a surprising thing when it comes to game development, it’s nonetheless an interesting peek into what could have been. Some of these things, if they were added would make the game much better with fewer broken narrative lines. Like for example, the whole epilogue was cut from the game, but seemingly still exists in the files and is fully recorded. You got to wonder what happened here. Time restraints, money running out, or maybe they just wanted to get the game out before Starfield? Who knows, and maybe it will be restored in the inevitable “enchanted edition”. We will see.

Continue reading →

Baldur’s Gate 3 – Additional Topics to Discuss

Welcome to yet another Baldur’s Gate 3 article – are you fed up yet? If not, in this post, I will talk about some additional stuff that I left out in my review – mostly because of space, and to be honest, some things I came to think about after it was written. There won’t be too much about the story here, however, I will talk about it, especially the ending – so here comes the spoiler warning. It will mostly be about the game mechanics and things of that nature that I think should be mentioned.

Continue reading →

Baldur’s Gate 3 – If Michael Bay made an RPG

It’s time to finally review this mastodon of a game after giving it around 150 hours on one-and-a-half playthroughs. For the most part, Baldur’s Gate 3 is a fine addition to the CRPG genre, and Dungeons & Dragons games overall. However, it’s not without issues, and issues it has aplenty. This rest on more than just gameplay and story, unfortunately, since there is a lot of polarizing content in it that takes the form of the current progressive zeitgeist. Your level of tolerance will affect your enjoyment of Baldur’s Gate 3, unless you are a firm believer, and sees this game as some kind of triumph furthering the cause – like mainstream gaming journalists. More on that later.

Continue reading →