Report #55

Divinity II is an action RPG. Other than their predecessor Beyond Divinity it has now complete 3D graphcis and is played with over the shoulder camera.

To be frank, I did not really enjoy playing this game. I wasn't able to get myself immersed into the game world. Everything starts out really nice, the first few missions are funny, diverse and with lovely NPCs. But the game quickly becomes much less engaging and apart from the first few locations the world felt quite empty to me. In addition, compared to the first two games of the Divinity series, there are a few new additions in lore, which are never really explained (mainly goblins and zeppelins). That was weird. The world therefore felt not only a bit empty but also alien, which should not be the case for the third game in a series…especially since I played the first few games only a few months prior.

The gameplay did not convince me either: Fighting was quite boring, I kept spamming left clicks and that was it most of the time. The skills systems was changed once more, but most of the skills you get as a fighter (which I played) are not that spectacular. Spoiler: Flying around as a dragon was much lamer than anticipated as well.

I know that the game has its fans, I however won't be one of them.

Bomber Crew is a crew management game set in WW II. You play the crew of an Avro Lancaster of the RAF flying a variety of missions over the course of the war.

I got the game for free and I did not expect to be blown away by it, just to have some fun. And it precisely delievered that. I had a lot of fun playing through the campaign. The concept of the game is simple yet interesting. I enjoyed outfitting my plane and crew, though the options are a bit limited -- don't expect an actual simulation going into this game. The mission design is good for the short campaign, I was on the edge of my seat on a few occasions where I barely made it back home! Oh, and the achievements aren't hard either, that's a plus for me as well.

As initially stated, don't expect too much of the game. Flying the same bomber over and over again gets a bit boring after a while. The customisation options are limited, the mission variety after some time as well. However, I don't mind that, because it's enough to get you through the campaign missions.

There are some DLCs which I did not play and am not interested in doing so either. This game was fun but I have no desire to coming back to it. In some ways that makes it the perfect game for backlog assassins :D

Most strategy fans will be familiar with the Heroes of Might & Magic games. It is a turn-based strategy game based in a fantasy world. There is a strategic map in which you move your armies, gather resources and capture special buildings which help you on your missions. Fights are played on a separate tactical map.

HoMM V is the first game of the series I played thoroughly. Judging from the internets, it is the second best game of the series. Personally I can't compare it to HoMM III, which is said to be the best, because I never played it. But just speaking from my own experience, I can clearly see why people enjoy this game. It it really fun to play!

Despite being quite old, I think the graphics still look decent (the game does not offer native widescreen support though). Both aspects of the game, moving on the strategic map and building up your army/economy vs. fighting battles, are enjoyable and offer a large variety of strategies. All of the six factions in the game are unique and fun to play (though personally I did not like Academy as much as the other factions). Not only that, even almost every single unit in the game is unique and offers interesting ways to play and facilitate it (some exceptions are to be expected with more than 40 different units).

I exclusively played the SP campaign, which is quite enjoyable. I was really keen to know how the story goes on after the game and couldn't wait to start the expansion.

Of course some minor complaints are there: I wish there was a bit more strategic and tactical depth to the game. For example, your units have no zone of control, enemies can simply walk by your units, which is annoying. At the end of the fifth campaign fatigue was a thing as well. The missions are quite similar after a while. And then there is one other thing: I found the game to be quite challenging. There were even a few missions I couldn't finish on 'normal' and replayed on 'easy'. Sometimes I was really frustrated by the difficulty, which felt unfair rather than challenging. And it made me a bit sad. I play video games almost all my life and still suck at gaming :( :(

Hammers of Fate is the first expansion to HoMM V. It features a new campaign and a new faction, the dwarves. They also added a new kind of "biome" to the strategic and tactical maps, dwarven halls, which looked beautiful and was accompanied by an even better soundtrack. The faction itself is fun to play as well.

The campaign missions offer more variety than the original game and are shorter overall. Which is exactly what I would have liked to be improved. I was really happy with all the changes made, so this is for me one of the rare occasions where I feel a game deserves the rare 5/5 rating.

Caveat: I don't think the game would work as well without playing the main game beforehand though.

Judging solely from a technical point of view, this is the best version of the game by far. Minor bugs have been fixed, it finally offers proper widescreen support, it has the most factions and introduces a ton of new units. And, last but not least, the cutscenes and little commentaries of your hero during the campaign mission improved as well.

Units, however, which you don't really get to know the same way you know the units from the previous games, because there are just so many new units. A faction (the orcs) which I sadly did not enjoy as much. Also the walking animations of some of their units looked really weird to me. And the mission were dragging on too long again, so that all in all, sadly, I did not enjoy this as much as the previous games. It's still playworthy though, no doubt about it.