A small free game about matching sounds with different objects. Made with a lot of love, really nice little game.

A free VN about a small village in the Netherlands and its dark past. Soundtrack is great, the story is okay, but some smaller things bugged me. I think the language was way too convoluted or as a Steam review put it: "The author should have put the thesaurus down from time to time."

Another free VN. 14 people are trapped in a time anomaly, doomed to relive the same day again and again. You try to break the circle by solving smaller riddles and interacting with the different characters.

Unfortunately I did not enjoy the game at all. Neither the graphical nor the musical representation were to my liking. The background stories of the different characters were really fleshed out, alas to a point where I did not bother reading everything anymore. And it takes forever. I can see some people enjoying this game, I did not however.

Age of Mythology is the last of the classic Microsoft RTS games I had not finished (not counting remasters and stuff). It's basically an Age of Empires with mythical units added to it. Think Minotaurs, Centaurs and so on. Those added an interesting new side to the gameplay and I greatly enjoyed the variety of different units. Every faction plays much more different in Age of Mythology than in the classic Age of Empires, another nice change of pace. And last but not least, the campaigns…those were really really good, had a lot of different ideas incorporated and told a rich and convincing story (well at least for an RTS!). Whilst Age of Mythology cannot hide the fact that it's an old game missing some Quality of Life features, I had a great time with it and really enjoyed playing it. In case you care about achievements: Those are really grindy and boring, but doable.

Fallout 3 changed a lot compared to previous Fallout games. Some people hated it, some loved it. I'm in the middle. Fallout 3 is a mix between Shooter and RPG. It offers a great open world with tons of stuff to discover, a lot of quests to solve and colorful characters in typical Fallout fashion. Adding in the expansions, this is even more true. Overall I enjoyed the game, but it has its flaws. I'm sure a lot of people have written about it better than I could, so to keep it brief: Mixing Shooter and RPG leads to some unsatisfying results. Gunplay is not good enough for a Shooter, the story is not good enough for a RPG.

But the real kicker in my eyes? Fallout 3 was released around the same time as the first Mass Effect and Dragon Age. And compared to those two games, Fallout 3 looses out in every aspect -- technical, visually, soundtrack, story, gameplay, you name it. Hence only an average rating for Fallout 3 in my book.

Figment was free as a promotion for the sequel. Cheap as I am, I of course could not resist getting the game despite it not looking like something I usually enjoy playing. Boy, was I in for a pleasant surprise! The game is great! The artistic realization is stunning. The graphical art style is really cute and has great ideas incorporated in the world building. The soundtrack is even better and each enemy has kind of an own theme song. The gameplay itself is nice as well. I was really impressed by the game. I can only recommend playing it.

Rome: Total War is one of the oldest Total War games. I'm reviewing the original game, not the quite recent remaster of the game. Rome Total War is set in classical antiquity right around the time before the first Punic War. You can play as one of the classical empires like Rome or Carthage, or a number of "barbarians" like the Gauls. The Steam edition also includes the Barbarian Invasion expansion, but not the Alexander expansion (see the following review for this expansion).

Sometimes games just instantly click with you. Rome was such a case. Loading in the main menu, I was sure I would enjoy the game. And it was more than true. There is no question on my mind, that this is one of the best Total War games. I liked the old fashioned graphics of the strategic map, I like the epoch the game is set in and I like the fact that you can finish a campaign in 15-20 hours -- at least a short one.

The Barbarian Invasion expansion plays at the time of the migration period of the germanic tribes and the subsequent fall of West Rome. I like this historical setting a lot less than the rise of the Roman Empire and played only one single campaign. It introduces a new Horde mechanic to model the migration, which changes the gameplay for the barbaric factions drastically. I prefer the classical gameplay by far though.

There are some highly praised mods for Rome, the most prominent are probably Roma Surrectum and Europa Barbarorum. Those add more depths and historical accuracy to the game. I tried Europa Barbarorum and like it very much. It does take forever to finish a campaign however (I'm about 50 hours into a campaign and far far far from finishing it...)

Alexander is a standalone expansion for Rome Total War. It is basically a special scenario for the game. Playing as Alexander the Great, you have to recreate his conquests in 100 ingame turns. There is no variation, no choosing factions, nothing. It's not a super hard task but forces you to concentrate on conquering provinces all the time and focuses less on developing your empire. Since I like the empire building parts of Total War games, I wasn't really happy with this way of playing. Also there is almost no replay value. I did not enjoy the game as I did the vanilla version.

When the original Mafia was free on Steam in September I immediately grabbed it. Mafia is a third person action game set in America's 1930s where you follow the rise of a cab driver to the right hand of a mafia boss.

It is one of those must-play-games, that I never played before and with the giveaway I finally got a good reason to start it up. It runs surprisingly well on a modern machine, I only had 2-3 crashes and no other problems with the game on Windows 10. For a 20 year old game? Pretty great! Of course the game is ancient, the 3d-models are awful compared to more modern standards. But apart from the optics, it plays like most modern games.

I really liked the different types of cars and the different characters in the story. I think that the story could've been a bit more fleshed out at times, but overall I was invested in it and a bit sad because of the ending…getting out of crime does not pay off it seems. I liked the missions and apart from the infamous race they weren't that hard, although I had to look up a guide two times because I wasn't sure where I had to go. Overall I really enjoyed my time with the game and I'm definitely going to check out the remakes and sequels at some point. I can definitely recommend classic Mafia, as long as you don't mind playing old games.

I'm not a VN expert like many of you are. The genre is kinda hit and miss for me. However, I'm open to broaden my horizon in respect to VNs. So when I read the announcement that planetarian was going to be retired from Steam because there is a HD version available, I was curious. As you might know, I play a ton of old games, so playing an old VN is right up my alley. I was specifically interested in the original version, to not only see how one of the first VNs (correct me if I'm wrong) was, but also to see the technical side of the original game.

It was very interesting to play (or read) planetarian. I think the story takes quite some time to pick up, but in the end it delivers. The game is really simple from the gameplay and UI perspective. I would not want to play such a game all the time, but it was a cool peak in the past and I would recommend the game if you're interested in the history of video games like me. Of course the original version is not available in the Steam store anymore…

Kingdom: Classic was free on Steam a few years ago and I finally got around to playing it. From what I hear it offers a much more basic experience than its sequels and people advise to skip the Classic version altogether.

That being said, I still enjoyed the game. It has cute graphics (the reflections in the water are great!) and a simple concept, which is still entertaining. Basically you run around with your main character, collecting gold coins for recruiting people which help you defend your home and destroy 4 portals from which enemies spawn. One run takes about 2-3 hours. After that, there is not much replay value. Most of my hours were spent working on achievements. They are not specifically hard, but take some time and many restarts.

So if you're not stubborn like me and don't care about the achievements it's a nice little game for a few hours. Otherwise it gets a bit boring with time, but I still liked playing it.

Fallout 2 is a isometric RPG placed in the Fallout universe. You start as a tribal setting out to the wastelands to get help for their starving village. On the way you get entangled in much bigger events, as always seems to happen to characters in video games…

I know the first Fallout game has a strong fanbase, I however did not enjoy the game. Fallout 2 in the other hand is a big stepup in all regards in my opinion. The world feels very alive, the story had several interesting quest lines and (biggest plus) the UI and controls are way better than in the first game. Add to that the great feeling of playing an absolute classic of video game history and you have a nice gaming experience.

What I didn't like: Although Fallout 2 has improved considerably over Fallout 1, it's still an ancient game. Without nostalgia (never played it before) I was frustrated at times by the gameplay and tedious controls. I miss QOL improvements of more modern games. In addition I found the difficulty to vary a lot. Sometimes you can easily overpower your enemies, sometimes you have to save/reload a lot in order to avoid defeat. Not ideal in my eyes, but maybe something which can be attributed to the time?

A debatable point: The game gives you very few hints and guidance. More than Fallout 1 (again), but I still relied on a guide on several occasions, both on deciding the overall strategy and for hints in some smaller quests I could not solve on my own. I depends on a person whether that's good or bad though.

In conclusion: I can recommend the game, but you should be aware of what you get yourself into. I can easily picture a lot of people disliking the game, which I myself did at times as well.

Company of Heroes is a RTS game set in World War 2. You follow a unit of US soldiers' campaign from D-Day to beating back Nazi Germany from France.

I've already played the "Legacy" version of the game and talked about it in report #46 back in 2020. See there for a proper review.

The "normal" version is the same as the legacy version, they just switched to a different mp system, hence the change. I wasn't as impressed by the game as the first time (well…I already knew everything…) but still enjoyed my time with it. This time I had an easier time beating the game, maybe I do get better at playing video games after all? :D

Fallout Tactics is a squad-based, turn-based strategy game akin to XCOM set in the Fallout universe, happening after Fallout 2. You play through a set of missions, starting as an initiate of the Brotherhood of Steel facing different new enemies spawning from the depths of the wasteland. As far as I understand it's not canon anymore? But I'm no Fallout buff, so someone else surely knows better.

The game basically takes Fallout 2 and throws away everything but fighting. Overall the game was enjoyable but too long for my taste. Without any RPG or management aspects, the missions get a bit repetitive and dull after a couple of them. There is just not enough variety for a game that took me about 60 hours to beat (I started my run on 36 hours which stem from previous attempts to beat the game). Very similar to Fallout 2 the game further improves the UI and adds a few QoL additions. Also very similar to Fallout 2 I had some issues with the harshly varying difficulty. At several points of the game new classes of enemies are introduced, which can easily one-shot your characters at the beginning, but are slaughtered with ease after you upgrade you weapons a bit (hint: energy weapons are good!).

While there is not much story telling, the small bits are at times humorous, at times grim: You have no control over the way the game plays out, but it soon gets pretty clear that you are fighting for a quite fascist supremacist organization…surely no coincidence.

Would I recommend the game? Again, as with Fallout 2, I can only recommend the game if you know what you're getting into. Despite rating both games 3/5 I think Fallout 2 is the better game though and Fallout Tactics can be ignored unless you want to play everything Fallout related.

Tell Me Why is a story focused adventure game, reminding me of Life is Strange in many ways. It was free during the Pride Month. I got it and started playing right away. The first scenes of the game immediately captured me. Beautiful graphics! The game is set in rural Alaska and the landscapes and scenery is just impressive. The soundtrack is well done as well, but pales in comparison to the aesthetics. The gameplay was fine as well, but nothing too special -- which isn't necessary since the game focuses on the story. And the story was interesting and captivating as well. I don't have a lot of points of contact with transsexuality in RL, so it was interesting to take a peek into this and its own set of problems. It was educating to see the insecurities but also prejudices on both sides.

In the end though, I think the game tries to be too many things at once. Is it about transsexuality and the coming out of one of the MCs? Is it a crime story? A family drama? A love story? Choosing to be all of that is a bit detrimental to the game as a whole in my opinion, at least for the medium playtime of about 13 hours.

All in all I can recommend the game, the beautiful Alaskan landscapes are reason enough.

AirLand Battle is not only the name of a NATO doctrine from the 80s but also the name of a military RTS set in the same time. It is the second part of the Wargame trilogy by Eugen Systems. You command a set of armies during a fictional military culmination of the cold war, where the Soviet Union invades Scandinavia. [Disclaimer: Yeah, I thought about whether it's appropriate to play this game during Putin's invasion of the Ukraine…but after all we play games about war all the time, so I think it's hypocritical to stop now -- it's not like there were no wars before.]

It adds to the first part in several ways while remaining the same game at the core. Newly added is a strategic map, where you can move your armies and deploy strategic strikes like air reconnaissance or naval strikes, before attacking an enemy, leading to a tactical skirmish. The tactical skirmishes are largely the same as in European Escalation with the addition of fighter jets. Funnily enough that's the aspect of the game I wasn't able to really get to work for me… The game offers quite a challenge and it took me a while to get used to the gameplay again. It's incredibly hectic and it's super easy to miss a crucial development on some part on the map while you are focused elsewhere. Combined with the often steep difficulty it lead me to rage quit the game on a few occasions.

I don't think this game appeals to everyone, but I can recommend the game, if you know what you are getting into. It depicts very well how the different parts of an army have to work together to achieve victory -- at least if you try to minimize your losses. Tanks are great, but there are many situations where they are useless without infantry support and vice versa. And so on. It also offers a huge variety of different troops and enough different skirmish maps to give you a new challenge again and again. Just be prepared to rage a bit from time to time ;)

Ballads at Midnight is a free VN. I don't have a lot of experience with the genre, so it would be interesting to hear what a VN connoisseur thinks about the game.

I enjoyed the art style of the game and I was intrigued how the story would progress. The protagonists are likeable and the (few) choices really make you think.

However, I have several complaints about the game as well. I did not enjoy the female voice actor, especially her singing. But mainly I had some problems with the writing: Good writing is not achieved just by using pompous words and injecting a descriptive adjective wherever possible. It bothered me greatly. In fact, I'm hesitant to recommend the game. I only give it an average rating because it's free. And somewhat short.

I very much enjoyed the previous HoMM V. Especially the Dwarves expansion was really enjoyable. But there were a couple of gameplay factors that I did not like, e.g. the way you recruit your troops from everywhere and the enemy constantly conquers your mines. Together with some other improvements these two points were vastly improved in the 6th Heroes. Overall, a lot of gameplay improvements were noticeable, some smaller, some bigger.

However, there were some downsides as well. It takes forever and some people don't have that much time. The difficulty varies too much between campaign scenarios for my taste. Some were incredibly hard, some were super easy. The biggest disappointment were the expansions though: I could not run them on my PC because I got an unsupported graphics card! Imagine that! You can run the main game (thankfully!) but not the expansions? The reason being that some specific graphics cards are not supported? A problem that's been known for years afaik but not remedied by Ubisoft?? I feel scammed!!

Conclusion: The basic gameplay is very enjoyable, but due to unacceptable technical problems I'm going to give this game a bad rating.

This game had the worst Steam ratings of all the unplayed games in my library, so naturally I was curious. And wow, those were deserved! It crashed about every 20 minutes (no autosave feature ofc), the UI was beyond terrible and the gameplay was boring as hell. Never ever get this game!

Shogun 2 features all the typical Total War gameplay elements, which makes it an overall enjoyable experience to me. I enjoy the mix of strategic and tactical gameplay. Shogun 2 is set in Japan and features several different phases of turmoil in the japanese history, ranging from the first matchlock guns to mid-19-century warfare.

The main drawback is that the factions feel almost identical due to the nature of the setting. I miss trying different playstyles depending on the unit roster of a faction. In my opinion this seriously hampers the replay value.

Another drawback are the achievements. Achievement hunters and completionists: Stay out of this one. The Singleplayer achievements are a bit grindy but fine. The MP however is awful. It's almost dead and the achievements are not only super grindy for the main part, but some are borderline impossible. One requires you to get the #1 spot in the MP ladder worldwide…which is…well… I've marked the game as beaten because I got all SP achievements by now. Any MP I can still get is a bonus and completion is more or less out of question.

All in all a decent game, but it has some flaws and I think it's my least favourite Total War game so far.

Dear Esther is a Half Life mod which turned into the mother of all walking simulators. In 2012 it was released as a stand-alone game, the Landmark Edition is a improved 2017 re-release. It was free on Steam for a short while and I took that chance to play this "historically" important game.

I'm not getting into the confusing story, you have to experience this on your own. The game is visually and aurally pleasing. The gameplay is very simple: You walk and listen to voiceovers, which trigger at certain points. The level design is linear, there is a lot to discover in each level though if you take the time to explore. Or, well, use a guide.

The atmosperic impression of the game was great, but did I really enjoy playing it? No, not really. I can appreciate the game on some levels, but I would not call this a great game, where it not for its significance in forming an entire genre. Overall I like a clear story and some more gameplay too much to find Dear Esther appealing on a gameplay level.

A funny sidenote: This is the 4th recently released game in my library despite being from 2019…shows how few games I activated in recent years :D

I played Gothic only recently for the first time, so nostalgia is not a factor when looking at the Gothic series. So fanboys can disregard my review if they want. I still have mixed feelings about this game. I think it offers some potentially interesting concepts, gameplay elements and lore. On the other hand I wasn't a fan of the fighting mechanics (well, that would fit perfectly though!) and I wasn't really invested in the game after the 3.5 hours it took for me to get through it. In addition the audio wasn't working properly for me, but hey, it's just a teaser.

However, seeing how this is a teaser for a game that won't happen in this form anyway, I think it's a moot point to discuss the details any further. The reason I played the game was for the achievements. They removed 4 broken ones at the end of last year, so I took the chance to complete a quick game as a break from grinding missions in HoMM VI :)

Shadow Burglar is a noir themed stealth game. It is a student project and free on Steam. Considering this, I think it's an excellent game! The visuals are pleasing, the game mechanics seem interesting and the musical score is very fitting, immediately transporting me in the 1920s.

Sure, it's quite short and the voiceover is subpar. But to criticize that on a free student project? They know themselves for sure.

Oh, and it's a quick perfect game, although the achievements are a bit wonky and some may trigger a bit prematurely.

Knights of the Old Republic (Kotor) is a classical BioWare RPG. I finished the game already once about a decade ago, but not on Steam. For my christmas vacation I wanted to play something nice as a treat, so I decided to replay the game on Steam. It was funny how some parts of the game were still quite present in my mind and I recognized them at once (e.g. Korriban or Rakata Prime) while I had absolutely no recollection of some other parts of the game (e.g. Manaan). Which was a good mix: I was able to enjoy the nostalgia, but still experience "new" things.

You can clearly see that this is an early BioWare game. Everything that made BioWare great (a long, long time ago 🙃) is already there. The writing is just superb. There were so many great lines of dialogue, which really resonated with me -- of course I've forgotten all of them by now. The companions were varied and mostly very interesting, each in their own way. As last time I was a big fan of Jolee. And I enjoyed the development some of them made during the game, Carth for example.

As it is an earlier work, some things are not working as well as in the later BioWare games. Inventory Management or controling your companions during fights was a bit too tedious. The game also has dated graphics by now, but as usual this did not bother me personally.

All in all it was a good decision to take this game up again. It really sweetened my christmas vacation. Personally I like Dragon Age or Mass Effect still a bit more (sorry MsKotor), but it is definitely a superb game, one of the best RPGs I have played over the years. Definitely a 5/5 rating.

Brigador is a top-down shooter riding on the retro-wave and quite successfully so. You play a variety of different mechs, tanks or antigrav vehicles which can be equipped with a plethora of different weapons. The game is a top-down shooter focusing on gameplay with a little bit of story and a bit of lore. I don't remember when I last touched such a game, but I did enjoy this one.

Trying out new vehicles or new weapons is fun, slaughtering countless enemies as well. I enjoyed the art style and I was blown away by the soundtrack. It was so good, I even bought it. It's also noteworthy, that the game received constant improvement and free updates from the devs over the years since its release.

However, there are also quite a few aspects I did not like. While it is fun to gun down enemies, it gets a bit boring over time -- at least for me. I would have wished for more story. Also I was overwhelmed by the sheer number of different vehicles and weapons to choose from. Yes, a lot of them were great fun, but in the end they all blended together and only very few of them stood out (the König for example, awesome soundeffects with this one). I realize that a lot of these points are probably intentional and "correct" for this genre, but this is about my personal experience. As I said, I enjoyed trying out something new, but I don't seek to repeat it soon.

The achievements are mostly easy to get, but often a bit stupid. They require you to do very specific things, so that you end up cheesing a lot of them.

Similar to Knight of the Old Republic I don't think Mount&Blade needs a lot of introduction. It is a well known sandbox open-world action RPG. You play as a mercenary forming their own company and helping different kingdoms to overcome their foes in a medieval (non-fantasy!) world, with hopes of earning your own title and land one day. I have played Warband and With Fire and Sword, but never the original game. So I thought I would dip into it for a few hours.

A lot of this game is great. Managing your companions, the regular troops, the inventory, riding around on the strategic map looking for opportunities to strike at your enemies and last but not least the battles themself. All of it forms a unique and really fun experience.

I had a bit of an issue with the progression though. The beginning is interesting, depending on your settings even challenging. Then comes a middle part, where you level up your character and develop your troops, also very fun. But after a couple of hours you hit a point where progression is almost coming to a stop and here is, where I lost a bit of the fun. And I remember it was similar in the other Mount & Blade games. You are strong enough to beat most single enemies without a problem, but you are still way to weak to really achieve something, e.g. conquer something on your own. Once I reached this point in my playthrough, I stopped with the game. Still, it's a great game.

Now, 17 hours is not much for such an extensive game. But why spend time on this when you can play Warband?

The FRAMED Collection contains two small puzzle games. You are playing as crooks who stole a suitcase and now have to flee not only the police but also some kind of competitor. Each section is represented by pages out of a cartoon. In order to complete a section, the individual panels have to put in the right order, so that the story can unfold. If you mess up, you get caught or die in some way.

The puzzles are rather easy, I could figure out most puzzles quickly. One single solution eluded me though. Maybe the game is not for someone looking for a challenge, but I was happy with it. I liked the art style and the music. I don't think the concept has enough stamina to last for several hours, but it was good fun to play for 2.5 hours. I can recommend the game if you're looking for something easy and relaxing to do.

11-11 Memories Retold is a very interesting and unique adventure game/walking simulator. It is set during the World War One and follows the story of a canadian war photographer and a german engineer. It focuses on the every day life of not only the soldiers but also the civilians during this time. It's main goal seems to be to show the horrors of war, without glorification or choosing sides. I even learned some things I did not know before, for example how massive the tunnel systems on the western front were.

The most striking feature of the game is the artsy style. Everything is rendered in paintstrokes, similar to impressionism. It's really unique and in my opinion fits the game very well. The musical score for the game is overwhelming. It manages to perfectly add to the scenery and paint (sorry) an impressive (sorry again) picture of the mood in the different parts of the game. The voice acting was good and depending on which side of the front you are the NPCs spoken language changed accordingly. I really appreciated that they chose native speakers for the different languages.

While the game does not offer too much in terms of gameplay, the story is captivating. I was anxious to know how the life of Harry and Kurt, the two soldiers we're following, will unfold and if they manage to survive the hardships of war. I won't go into the details, I have point of criticism though (spoilers!): I disliked the last part of the story, where Kurt decides to avenge his son. I think it destroyed the perfect setup of the protagonists as passive characters which are helpless victims of the horrors of war. Without this turn of events I would have given the game a 5/5 rating, but this somehow lessened my enjoyment, because I felt it did not fit the overall theme of the game.

Overall the game is an amazing piece of work and art. I think it is a refreshing perspective on World War One and it educates its players about the disastrous effects of war. I can only recommend the game if you don't mind slow paced gameplay and taking your time.

A caveat for achievement hunters: 2-3 collectibles are bugged and may force you to replay certain chapters. While there is a chapter selection it can get a bit on your nerves.

Disciples III: Resurrection is a turn based strategy game, very much alike the Heroes of Might & Magic games. It is the middle part of a trilogy of Disciple III games.

There is basically only one important thing to know about the game: It is virtually broken on Win 10. Visual bugs make it unplayable. My recommendation therefore: Stay away from this game!

I played this on an older machine with Windows 7 running, whenever I had access to it. But even without the Win10 bugs, there are still several other unforgivable bugs in the game, some of them even forced me to replay some campaign missions. And even without this second set of bugs, the game is not great, neither in gameplay nor in technical execution (the UI is terrible in many regards). There is one thing that I really enjoyed though: Every piece of 2 dimensional art, like the loading screens or the unit portraits. They had their own style to it and were well drawn. Everything else (unit models etc) wasn't of the same quality though.

Disciples III: Resurrection has a horrendous 33% positive ratings on Steam…and I think that is still too much ;)

Age of Empires II is one of the most iconic RTS games made to date. It is still being played by a small but dedicated community, despite the game being more than 20 years old by now. The version I played is a remastered version from 2013; there is a newer remaster available by now. I'm not going to review AoE II itself here. I guess most people know about it. The game is easily worth a 5/5 rating. It's unarguably one of the best RTS games ever made.

I have some serious issues with this particular remaster though. The first being the game's achievements: They are stupidly grindy and really idiotic. Yes, they can be cheesed, but they still take forever. This is arguably my own fault for caring about achievements, after all noone is forcing me to get them. But since I do care about achievements, I deduct one rating star for this. Secondly, the game introduces bugs into some of the campaign missions. A handful of missions cannot be won without the use of cheat codes. Like, seriously? A remaster breaks them? That should not happen. That's just enough for another deduction and therefore a rating of 3/5 stars.

I originally reviewed the game in Report #49.

About a year later, the game is finished in development and DLCs. The DLCs add new equipment, like waterbased emergency services, and a lot of scenarios highlighting those additions. Each scenario let's you play a few duties with a given overarching emergency (e.g. wildfire, plane crash or virus outbreak) and is supposed to work like a mini campaign. The important part here being "supposed to", because unfortunately those scenarios feel pretty much alike. And they highlight one balancing issue of the game: A lot of basic unupgraded emergency units always beat a set of fewer, but better upgraded units. Every scenario can be beaten by selling your high-tech stuff and buying a lot of cheap units instead. But what's the motivation to upgrade your units then and invest in more expensive stuff, like helicopters or protective gear for your police officers?

The basic gameplay and concepts are still fun and interesting, but for the lack of balancing and variety I leave my initial rating of 3/5 unchanged. Sadly. I was hoping for some improvement and I'd argue that there is a lot more to make out of the groundwork the game layed.

In Airline Tycoon 2 you're managing an airline: From hiring personell and buying your own airplanes to designing flight plans for those airplanes. The concept sounds interesting and it made me want to play a proper simulation game at some point again, but unfortunately the implementation is severly lacking. The controls are very basic, the user interface and menu structure cumbersome. Furthermore it is quite intransparent why some of your airplanes run a greater profit than others while this should be the most important part of an economical simulator. I could go on or into more details, but seriously, just don't buy this game.

Alan Wake is a horror action adventure where you play Alan Wake, a famous writer suffering from a blockade. He and his wife Alice are visiting a picturesque rural village named Bright Falls to take a break from their hectic New York lifestyle and maybe for Alan to find his inspiration again. However, soon after arriving, strange things start to happen. Some ancient evil has been awakend by their arrival and Alan has to battle the darkness to save his wife.

I don't like horror movies or games, but this one was rather spooky than really frightening. The gameplay is interesting, the fights are innovative and the gunplay mostly satisfying -- albeit some people complain about the repetitive nature of the fights, which is not unfounded criticism. The story is told well and is definitely a strong plus of the game. It drives the game and I wanted to go on to see how everything turns out. It also helps to hold the game together, something the sequel American Nightmare lacks. Overall the balance between story- and action-driven parts is well made, so that playing the game does not get boring.

While going through the game you can definitely see Remedy's fingerprint. The voiceover reminded me a lot of Max Payne and the reallife sequences (e.g. the movie collectibles) foreshadow Quantum Break. In addition there are some nice nods to Twin Peaks ("Damn fine coffee!"), which I want to rewatch now. (It may sound a bit strange, but I also got some Life is Strange vibes from the game, maybe I should play a good story-driven adventure or walking simulator soon again.)

All in all I was really impressed by the game. I had no real expectations going into it and was thoroughly surprised how much I ended up liking the game. I don't rate it perfect for two small reasons though: The graphics are really dated and unfortunately it bothered me a bit. Secondly, the two additional smaller DLC episodes were disappointing. Solid, yes, but miles away from the main game. Still, definitively a recommendation! The only one from this report.

This is the sequel to Alan Wake. However, it's an entirely different game. Instead of a linear horror adventure AN is a semi-open world action game, which changes the focus from the story to fighting. Unfortunately this ruins the game almost completely for me. The appeal of Alan Wake is missing from this sequel.

Although the graphics improved, the overall visual style is bland and uninspired. The same is true for almost everything else. There are some more weapons and more varied enemies, but this cannot outbalance the negative developments. The only positive thing were some tidbits of brilliant dialogue (esp. with Dr. Meadows), but even those drown in the insignificant rest of the conversations with the NPCs.

While the story lasts about 4-5 hours, the achievements need you to play the additional arcade mode, were you need to kill as many enemies as possible in 10 minutes on different maps. Some of the achievements are rather difficult, but thankfully the maps can be abused and seriously take the challenge out of those achievements. What remains is a bit of grind. All in all this was really disappointing and no recommendation from me for this game.