Recent reviews by Jageral

This review is from the pre-order beta, so the game is technically not released yet. Overall rating so far: 8.5/10 - will bump to 9.5/10 once bugs/issues are ironed out.

Really good first impressions of the map and level design. The world feels alive and rich in detail. Starting characters have fairly good diversity and it's nice to be able to provide some custom touches for your characters look. Seriously, the folks who worked the game design, levels, characters, enemies etc all deserve a pay raise - top class work!

For folks coming from Vermintide - this is definitely not Vermintide 1/2, the focus I've found is more on ranged FPS play but the melee still retains the fundamental feel and roots that made Vermintide a leader in the FPM (First Person Melee) game space. You can definitely play with Melee focus (similarly it's possible to play Vermintide primarily as ranged) but you'll need to think more about how and where you take cover.

Enemy AI so far is solid, providing different challenges on every play through. The Director seems to be fairly well tuned.

At the moment, there are bugs, game crashes, and cases where the backend services seem to be error prone but as I've seen in the case of Vermintides release FatShark has proven themselves capable and willing to address these misses. Keep in mind that this is a preorder beta, so there are going to be some rough edges, and FatShark is already releasing Hot Patches to address issues quite quickly.

Looking forward to sinking many hours into this game as well, but the great thing is, there's still time I want to put into Vermintide 2 as well - both have a place in the Warhammer Universe.

Look forward to seeing you in game!

ELDEN RING is a beautiful game albeit very challenging. It takes a lot of the core elements from previous FROM Software games merges it with open world dynamics and results in a more approachable and engaging experience. I've tried the previous games FROM has produced and couldn't stick with them, finding them too difficult and limiting with the relatively linear story progression, ELDEN RING changes this dynamic.

There's still a high degree of difficulty, especially with the bosses, but if you're having trouble you can instead choose to go off and do some more exploring and powering up. I've really enjoyed the multiplayer system as well, which doesn't stray far from what's been done in the past FROM Software games. You can choose to play offline and entirely treat the game as a single player experience, but you would be missing out on some of the great interactions and sense of accomplishment you get from teaming up and having others assist you, or vice versa. PVP does play a part with world invasions from other players if in a multiplayer coop session (you can't be invaded if you're not in coop and don't have the Taunter's Tongue active), but I've found that the odds of success heavily weigh in the favor of folks defending from attack especially if you purchase the White Cipher Ring and activate it to automatically request Hunter support. You can even volunteer to become a Hunter making yourself available to support others once you acquire the Blue Cipher Ring and activate it.

I was skeptical initially, didn't buy into all the hype with early reviews and Twitch streamers raving about the game, but I eventually decided to take a look and form my own opinion. I wasn't disappointed, the hype is real. I spent over 110 hours playing this game in my first two weeks, which was a little nuts considering I still had to go to work. No regrets, would do it all over again. Have started my next New Game journey to try find the things I missed before in first play through.

Highly recommend you check it out!

Played since early access, a lot of fun and well worth the money. The game is very polished, easy to pick up, challenging to master. Highly recommend playing this with mates, supports 4-player coop, grab some friends and have a blast!

I brought this game on sale with all the DLC's for under $50, so far it's been a bargain. If you're an FPS shooter fan expecting to be able to run and gun you're going to be very disappointed. If you're looking for more of relaxed, patient, stealth and stalking game this is going to be right up your alley.

The environments are beautifully crafted and the game engine does a fantastic job with rendering and bringing the great outdoors to life on your PC. Animals are well modded and it's surprising just how sensitive they are to smell and noise. You definitely need to spend some time learning how best to use the right weapons, lures, ammo etc. I found it easiest to get started by jumping into a multiplayer game and asking for some help after I'd had no success trying to hunt thing myself in the first hour (I was walking/running too much and not thinking about how to best approach and stalk game). I've never hunted before in real life, personally not keen on it but I don't begrudge others who do so, this is the next best thing to experience hunting virtually.

Pretty impressive, and I recommend it for folks looking for a slower paced game that still requires skill and technique.

I never played this when it was console exclusive until it came to PC but it looks to have been a great port, more than that it seems like it was made for PC. Great game, highly recommend it!

Completed the game in ~12 hrs, overall I enjoyed it and recommend it primarily for fans of the Cthulu lore and mythos created by Lovecraft in the Horror/Thriller genre. It's a slow burn, and not overly engaging in terms of gameplay and it's more like an interactive find, point, and click movie but that's what I was expecting and I enjoyed it a lot. Lots of cut scenes for events that occur, and I found the story and characters interesting. Would recommend it.

Updated 2020-12-25:
Changing my review recommenation from No to Yes. I went back and downloaded this as I noticed a friend had been playing it recently. Looks like this time around I was successfully able to get the game running, and it runs beautifully. I'm running on a super ultrawide monitor (3840x1080 px) with an RTX 3090, which is overkill, but the remaster so far looks fantastic. I remember playing this game fondly when it first came out (had brought it outside of Steam originally), and this remaster looks great in terms of the polish provided and updated textures etc. I've since updated Windows 10 Pro to version 2004 so it's possible there may have been fixes provided in the OS update that enabled this to run, I'm not 100% sure, but work it does!

Original Review:
I've been trying to get this game running on Windows 10 Pro (version 1903) and I've simply had no success whatsoever even attempting to make changes with compatibility, disabling XBox Game Bar, removing steam overlay etc that are recommended in forums elsewhere. No progress at all, game tries to launch then immediately crashes out no matter what I try.

I'm not recommending this game to folks who are on a more recent Windows 10 system. It may work for folks on older platforms so caveat emptor.

I've played this game prior to the remastered addition and it was great, would highly recommend, but essentially now it's no longer functional or working on Windows 10 - granted I know it's not listed in system requirements - so this is a warning for anyone looking to pick it up in future.

Overall I recommend the game, but there are some pretty strong caveats to consider.

Fatshark, the games developer, do tend to change core mechanics as major patches and DLC's launch. This to date has caused passionate members in the community to become split and vocal about what they do and don't like (myself included). There's usually a period of adjustment and minor patch releases to tune the game however and Fatshark does listen to feedback across various channels. I'm keeping historical entries for my reviews at different times below.

The reason why I continue to recommend the game is that Fatshark continues to demonstrate continued support and investment into the game. They take on board feedback and recognize areas for improvement. The CEO of Fatshark, Martin Wahlund, gets actively involved on Twitch streaming sessions and responds to questions asked and doesn't avoid the tough ones. Looking forward to seeing where the game goes next.

Update 2019-08-10:
It used to be good, until the Winds of Magic release came close, now what used to be a fast paced enjoyable coop game has been significantly changed at its core. As a player with 1500 hrs I'm feeling somewhat lost and disappointed with this shift in direction. These aren't even DLC related changes either. I've previously dropped money on every DLC Fatshark has released for VT1 and VT2 as soon as it dropped, but this is the first time where I've held back waiting to see what happens. The bugs and changes that have gone out to production for those of us that haven't even bought the DLC are ridiculous, quality has taken a backseat and the game is poorer for it. I don't want to reward Fatshark for this behavior this time around. I'm going to wait for the DLC to go on special, and even then I'm going to have serious second thoughts as to whether or not to purchase. As a long time player, and supporter of the dev's, this feels like a betrayal. I don't expect core gameplay to change for the worse and bugs to be introduced to a game that should be continuing to improve, not regress. Fatshark, please learn from this and do better!

Initial review:
I've got 1447 hours played so far on this game. It's good, 'nuff said!

Has been around for a while now but still a lot of fun.

Great game, spent many hours in the Borderlands, definitely got my money's worth.