Recent reviews by Jables

So this game has gotten some incredibly polarising opinions upon release and from update to update so in this review I'm going to try to remain as neutral about everything as I can despite my clear bias toward the series as an avid 40k nerd and somebody who played over 300 hours of space marine 1.

Space marine 2 is a game built specifically for people who loved the original whilst mixing some new ideas in to make the combat more engaging e.g. contested health, gun strikes on perfect dodges and perfect parries, new enemies and more. As someone who enjoyed the first game a lot I can honestly say that if you expect an honest sequel to that game with some expansion on the base mechanics whilst continuing the story and the overall heart of what made that game enjoyable, you are not going to be disappointed when playing this game. however if you are somebody who is expecting a reinvention or a completely different take on the idea of the first game, prepare to be disappointed.

Space Marine 2's story is an honest continuation of the first game's plot and it more or less does a great job despite certain grievances such as frustratingly unskipable dialogue and some levels having mechanics that don't quite work as well as you'd hope, really just the pyre blaster that thing is maybe the least satisfying flamer in all of gaming and I'm including the halo flamethrower, sue me I said it. The campaign is not very long so that's gonna frustrate some people but honestly some of the most cherished campaigns from the era that this game is clearly inspired by only last 8 or 9 hours for example Halo ODST, Halo Reach, Gears of war 1, Bulletstorm, Binary Domain (OoOoh not everyone likes that one hehe) and so on. So Space marine falling in at about 10 hours, is more then enough for me personally. The biggest issue with the campaign is by far the hub areas, going back to a hub area only to be forced into walking simulator section where you listen to dialogue that upon replay gets extremely old sucks and they need to not do this, genuinely this makes the campaign feels so slow and the first game didn't have stuff like this for a reason. Overall the campaign is fine for the first play through but I won't be replaying it, the second biggest problem with the campaign is that for people who played the first it can feel a lot like a reboot as it follows almost the exact same plot line you just replace the antagonists of the first game with Tyranids and Thousand sons, genuinely in both games Titus is sent into a planet that holds the same macguffin across both titles preventing exterminatus only to discover there is a plot involved by chaos to use said macguffin for nefarious purposes before Titus faces down the big bad getting hugely exposed to the warp only to be absolutely fine probably because the emperor is homies with him. it's just a little lame we don't get much new and that the tyranids of all factions are treated as second fiddle to chaos.

Space Marine 2's PVE mode called Operations is where the game really shines. 6 Classes (Bulwark, Heavy, Assault, Sniper, Vanguard, Tactical) and 7 missions currently. Now the lack of mission variety is a sore point and that is a weakness of the game especially since some of the missions available are kinda frustrating (fall of Atreus COUGH) however the perk system for both classes and guns keeps you busy. These perks however are not perfect and contain A LOT of underwhelming additions that leave you wanting especially in the classes, this is not to say that each class isn't fun to play (although they aren't made equally as you'll find out) but more that the way to play each class is somewhat limited due to a lack of viable options in the perk trees which is a shame.

Space Marine 2's PVP is extremely standard but it is suffering from pretty severe balance issues , this doesn't mean it isn't fun but still it does detract at times. However there is still fun to be had in the PVP and it feels like a welcome addition to the game as it has that old school death match vibe that the original space marine had minus dreadnought assault and some other game modes which is kinda sad.

overall my thoughts on the game? I've sunk 143.2 hours into this game at time of review and I can honestly say I don't plan to stop playing it anytime soon as what I've neglected to mention is that the hordes feel great. I'm a horde game fanatic and pushing back the relentless flow of tyranids as an astartes feels fantastic no matter what class you pick or if you're simply playing the campaign. I give this game a SOLID

7/10

yeah look, it isn't worth it. Unless you're keen on supporting devs who don't seem to learn their lesson between failed launches then don't buy it.

when you get a team together for this and get crushed into a meat cloud by an orbital drop thrown by a member of that very same team, you're experiencing the magic of Helldivers.

In case you weren't enough of a loser in real life

Looking for a pass time that will allow you to brown your pants with your friends for only $14.50?
look no further

YOUR MA'S A STUFFED BIRD!

This game is really chill and fun with friends or even just by yourself to chill out, very sexy

If you've played squad you'll know what's wrong with this game, but damn if it isn't fun to screw with this sweatlord community

Wait a couple of years till it's finished, still pretty good though if you like playing the same 6 or so missions over and over

Hunt is... well it's something you get to grips with and something you don't immediately understand at first (at least in my experience). I like to think of hunt as a game that's streamlined the battle royale experience into something that is relatively fast paced whilst maintaining the drawn out fights that can be found in most battle royales (PUBG etc).

I personally never enjoyed the idea of a battle royale because of a number of contributing factors such as: having to find your own loot which will ultimately determine how well you do against other players regardless of skill, the large map size that you need to traverse in order to get to the next 'circle' or 'zone', the drawn out process of starting a game in a plane or battle bus or what have you in order to choose your spot on the map and ,in the case of Apex legends and some other battle royales, the sheer amount of ammunition you need to pump into targets in order to kill another player. All of these are almost immediately mitigated or removed when playing hunt and as a result makes for an experience that takes the positives from a battle royale, removes the negatives and adds its own objectives and mechanics.

One of these mechanics which can be seen as a negative to some is the inclusion of AI enemies that don't replicate another player (like bots in pubg) but rather act as extra hazards that the player needs to be wary of. This particular point makes it so that even if you don't have a great game against other players you can still have actually done something that has progressed your character allowing you, to an extent, to lose upwards and still enjoy yourself whilst doing so which is something a lot of other games miss out on especially battle royales and I would even go so far to say that this is unique to Hunt in this category of games.

Another mechanic ,which is somewhat of an extension of the first, is the inclusion of bosses. Initially these scare the bejesus out of you but as you learn the game they become something that sets up adequate motivation for the use of certain pieces of equipment as well as allowing you to enter certain positions against real players. Something I always loved about games such as rainbow six siege was that in the early days you were given a scenario wherein there were defenders and attackers and this always gave me a sense of an objective I needed to uphold beyond the games parameters. this defenders attackers scenario that you are inevitably thrust into makes for some incredibly interesting moments that allow for you to shine as a team even if you ultimately lose and it's something that allows you to learn by your own mistakes, It took me a while to even gain base mechanics of hunt but situational placement is something that hunt forces you to consider whenever you play whether it's through sound traps or AI placement or just your location relative to other players which leads to the last point.

An emphasis on situational awareness, problem solving and positioning as a skill rather then reflexes and sheer luck. Hunt is unlike any other PVP game I have played because almost any engagement you enter you are given a chance to win because of how important situational awareness, problem solving and positioning is rather then just being good at aiming or flicking headshots, no matter how good you are at aiming you cannot compete with a player you don't even know is there because in hunt a single bullet is enough to instantly kill you and because of that bullets are valuable and so is your positioning. This all comes into considering your loadout as well but ultimately nothing beats playing hunt when you know you have the absolute drop on an enemy or when the roles are reversed and you still manage to salvage a screw up.

This game makes you think without punishing you too hard if you make a mistake because the next game is just a click away; no battle bus, no looting phase just you, your loadout, maybe a pal or two and the bayou. Hunt Giveth, Hunt most assuredly Taketh but Hunt is fun no matter what.