Sorry for the long hiatus. Since I started this channel almost five years ago, I've basically only played the games that I've reviewed, which isn't many. So earlier this year I bought an Xbox and started smashing through the Game Pass. But not to worry, I hate games again and will return to making videos again. Here are some quick reviews of what I played:
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Incredible game. My Game of the Year so far. I think that's high praise from someone who doesn't like JRPGs. Going from LOTR: The Third Age to this was crazy. The presentation is almost immaculate. The voice acting, cinematography and soundtrack are among the best in the industry. I felt as though the story was a bit too intentionally vague in the beginning and certain concepts like the Gommage confused me (The Gommage followed immediately by the night time scene had me thinking that Gustave was taken into an alternate timeline or something), but it improved a lot once Lune is recruited. I was also worried that the game would be non-stop melancholy, but it certainly lightened up after a while. I liked every character, but Verso may be one of the most complex, well-written and tragic characters I've ever seen. The gameplay had me hooked with the parry system keeping me from autopiloting the battles (How common this aspect is in modern JRPGs, I will never know. Do NOT tell me), and although some attack patterns are absolutely BRUTAL, I still had a lot of fun. I also appreciate that your reserve team can finish the fight, though my reserve team were a pair of coughing babies compared to the hydrogen bombs that was my main team. I like that each party member has their own unique gameplay mechanics, but the tooltips which explain them are fucking atrocious, especially Sciel's. There are also some general game mechanics which I feel are poorly explained, such as the lumina and pictos. The menus are also particularly bad on Xbox. PC would probably be a lot better. That being said, loved the gameplay for the most part. Looking forward to what this team makes next, though this will be a hard act for them to follow.
South Park: The Fractured But Whole Can't believe that I played this directly after E33, but I unironically had an equally good time. Obviously it's not as thought provoking, but I knew what I was getting myself into. I don't really watch South Park, so a lot of the gags are completely fresh to me. I'm sure that this one and The Stick of Truth take a lot from the show rather than creating a totally new story, but that doesn't bother a non-fan like myself. I found it to be really clever in ways that I didn't expect, even though those things don't really change all that much. For example, a battle being interrupted by a passing car, or having a group of rednecks attack you every time you update your race, religion and alignment. I also can't believe some of the things that South Park can get away with. The gameplay itself is pretty standard and it was a bit buggy, but pressing on to see how far they would go with the concept was hilarious. Hopefully, the team goes back to the 2D RPG style games. Snow Day does not appeal to me at all.
Aliens: Dark Descent Loved it. It's basically modern XCOM played in real time with pause. Doesn't have the same slickness as modern XCOM, but is still great in its own way. The ingenious decision to make each map a persistent world that you can extract from and return to whenever you feel like adds an insane level of strategy. I adored this mechanic, though I felt that sometimes the return journey could be way too punishing in some missions. The path finding can be a bit iffy and sometimes a squad member would detach themselves from the squad for no reason and get butchered or kidnapped, which was a bit frustrating. The tutorial is also quite bad, and not really representative of the actual gameplay experience. The voice acting is hit or miss and the story feels a bit incomplete and anti-climactic, but it was a solid experience nonetheless. Hope we get more games like this in the future.
Wartales I'm a huge fan of Mount and Blade: Warband and I feel that this is very similar, but at a smaller scale and made with turn based combat. I played with region-locked exploration (Like a man should) and put a solid 60 hours into the game before calling it quits. I've only played the base game, and I feel like I've seen and done basically everything. There is probably more variety in the expansions, but I'm not sure I'm willing to pay more to find out. I think the early game is the most interesting part. Levelling your party, discovering the world and dealing with your party members issues are excellent fun. But eventually all the character moments dried up, I had found almost every class of enemy and visited most of the major locations. I will certainly return in the future (Maybe with the DLC installed), but for now I think I'm done with it.
DOOM: The Dark Ages I played the first four or five missions and dropped it. Seems okay, but not nearly on the level of DOOM 2016 or DOOM Eternal. Nothing narratively nor mechanically really grabbed me. I do respect the developers for trying something new, though.
The Alters Love the concept. Love a lot about it. I love that late 2000's era College Humor videos are regarded as pure kino in this world. But I found the resource management to be way too overbearing and got in the way of the sense of discovery and amazement I had exploring the world and meeting the Alters. I put it down after Trip 2. I may return, but who knows?
I'd like to thank everyone who watched my trilogy of LOTR reviews. Their success has really helped boost the channel, and I'm glad to see so many people who enjoy my sense of humour. However, I've spent the past 6 months thinking about LOTR games, so I'll need to take a break before I venture into Battle For Middle-Earth.
I have a weird (algorithmically unviable) video cooking right now, but after that I have a few reviews that I've already started writing or editing. What would you like to see the most?
Greetings, people. Do not be alarmed. It is I, Never Hard.
I'm toiling away at my Third Age video and aim to release it this month. I will make no promises, as I am weak of flesh and spirit. It's going to be my longest video yet, so I hope it's worth the wait.
My LOTR bideo from two weeks ago. I'm on a bit of a LOTR high at the moment so the next two bideos will be The Return of the King and then The Third Age. Looks like meat's back on the menu, boys!
Never Hard
After many months, I have returned with a new video. Enjoy!
https://youtu.be/lbV1FVm_9mY?si=hCP2_...
6 months ago | [YT] | 5
View 1 reply
Never Hard
Do not be alarmed. It is I, Never Hard.
Sorry for the long hiatus. Since I started this channel almost five years ago, I've basically only played the games that I've reviewed, which isn't many. So earlier this year I bought an Xbox and started smashing through the Game Pass. But not to worry, I hate games again and will return to making videos again. Here are some quick reviews of what I played:
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33
Incredible game. My Game of the Year so far. I think that's high praise from someone who doesn't like JRPGs. Going from LOTR: The Third Age to this was crazy. The presentation is almost immaculate. The voice acting, cinematography and soundtrack are among the best in the industry. I felt as though the story was a bit too intentionally vague in the beginning and certain concepts like the Gommage confused me (The Gommage followed immediately by the night time scene had me thinking that Gustave was taken into an alternate timeline or something), but it improved a lot once Lune is recruited. I was also worried that the game would be non-stop melancholy, but it certainly lightened up after a while. I liked every character, but Verso may be one of the most complex, well-written and tragic characters I've ever seen.
The gameplay had me hooked with the parry system keeping me from autopiloting the battles (How common this aspect is in modern JRPGs, I will never know. Do NOT tell me), and although some attack patterns are absolutely BRUTAL, I still had a lot of fun. I also appreciate that your reserve team can finish the fight, though my reserve team were a pair of coughing babies compared to the hydrogen bombs that was my main team. I like that each party member has their own unique gameplay mechanics, but the tooltips which explain them are fucking atrocious, especially Sciel's. There are also some general game mechanics which I feel are poorly explained, such as the lumina and pictos. The menus are also particularly bad on Xbox. PC would probably be a lot better. That being said, loved the gameplay for the most part.
Looking forward to what this team makes next, though this will be a hard act for them to follow.
South Park: The Fractured But Whole
Can't believe that I played this directly after E33, but I unironically had an equally good time. Obviously it's not as thought provoking, but I knew what I was getting myself into. I don't really watch South Park, so a lot of the gags are completely fresh to me. I'm sure that this one and The Stick of Truth take a lot from the show rather than creating a totally new story, but that doesn't bother a non-fan like myself.
I found it to be really clever in ways that I didn't expect, even though those things don't really change all that much. For example, a battle being interrupted by a passing car, or having a group of rednecks attack you every time you update your race, religion and alignment. I also can't believe some of the things that South Park can get away with.
The gameplay itself is pretty standard and it was a bit buggy, but pressing on to see how far they would go with the concept was hilarious.
Hopefully, the team goes back to the 2D RPG style games. Snow Day does not appeal to me at all.
Aliens: Dark Descent
Loved it. It's basically modern XCOM played in real time with pause. Doesn't have the same slickness as modern XCOM, but is still great in its own way. The ingenious decision to make each map a persistent world that you can extract from and return to whenever you feel like adds an insane level of strategy. I adored this mechanic, though I felt that sometimes the return journey could be way too punishing in some missions. The path finding can be a bit iffy and sometimes a squad member would detach themselves from the squad for no reason and get butchered or kidnapped, which was a bit frustrating. The tutorial is also quite bad, and not really representative of the actual gameplay experience.
The voice acting is hit or miss and the story feels a bit incomplete and anti-climactic, but it was a solid experience nonetheless. Hope we get more games like this in the future.
Wartales
I'm a huge fan of Mount and Blade: Warband and I feel that this is very similar, but at a smaller scale and made with turn based combat. I played with region-locked exploration (Like a man should) and put a solid 60 hours into the game before calling it quits. I've only played the base game, and I feel like I've seen and done basically everything. There is probably more variety in the expansions, but I'm not sure I'm willing to pay more to find out.
I think the early game is the most interesting part. Levelling your party, discovering the world and dealing with your party members issues are excellent fun. But eventually all the character moments dried up, I had found almost every class of enemy and visited most of the major locations. I will certainly return in the future (Maybe with the DLC installed), but for now I think I'm done with it.
DOOM: The Dark Ages
I played the first four or five missions and dropped it. Seems okay, but not nearly on the level of DOOM 2016 or DOOM Eternal. Nothing narratively nor mechanically really grabbed me. I do respect the developers for trying something new, though.
The Alters
Love the concept. Love a lot about it. I love that late 2000's era College Humor videos are regarded as pure kino in this world. But I found the resource management to be way too overbearing and got in the way of the sense of discovery and amazement I had exploring the world and meeting the Alters. I put it down after Trip 2. I may return, but who knows?
Fortnite
lol. lmao even.
6 months ago | [YT] | 7
View 2 replies
Never Hard
Hey gang, here's my latest bideo. Something a bit different from my usual shitty reviews.
But now with this one finished, shitty reviews are back on the menu.
11 months ago | [YT] | 6
View 0 replies
Never Hard
So it begins...
11 months ago | [YT] | 11
View 1 reply
Never Hard
Do not be alarmed. It is I, Never Hard.
I'd like to thank everyone who watched my trilogy of LOTR reviews. Their success has really helped boost the channel, and I'm glad to see so many people who enjoy my sense of humour. However, I've spent the past 6 months thinking about LOTR games, so I'll need to take a break before I venture into Battle For Middle-Earth.
I have a weird (algorithmically unviable) video cooking right now, but after that I have a few reviews that I've already started writing or editing. What would you like to see the most?
1 year ago | [YT] | 5
View 5 replies
Never Hard
The Third Age bideo is nearly done, then I can finally die.
1 year ago | [YT] | 8
View 2 replies
Never Hard
Greetings, people. Do not be alarmed. It is I, Never Hard.
I'm toiling away at my Third Age video and aim to release it this month. I will make no promises, as I am weak of flesh and spirit. It's going to be my longest video yet, so I hope it's worth the wait.
1 year ago | [YT] | 17
View 1 reply
Never Hard
My new LOTR bideo has just dropped. Give it a watch and if it does well, The Third Age review will be next.
1 year ago | [YT] | 10
View 0 replies
Never Hard
My LOTR bideo from two weeks ago. I'm on a bit of a LOTR high at the moment so the next two bideos will be The Return of the King and then The Third Age. Looks like meat's back on the menu, boys!
1 year ago (edited) | [YT] | 7
View 0 replies
Never Hard
Which LOTR PS2 game was your favourite?
Bideo on one of these coming soon.
1 year ago | [YT] | 6
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