HIGH The critique of AI domination in society.

LOW The actual use of gen AI.

WTF The auctioning of bodies.

The games industry is in a crisis caused by generative AI, and its hype. The emergence of this tech seems to attract corporate greed, which in turn leads to the loss of jobs and creative work. Perhaps worse, the advent of games that are written, designed, and manifested mostly by AI is a daunting prospect.

Uncover the Smoking Gun piqued my interest with its premise – it uses actual generative AI as a conversational and investigational dynamic.

Speaking of myself personally, I might be gen AI’s harshest critic, but its implementation in game design deserves an honest evaluation. I was also intrigued by the prospect of examining the devs’ stance on gen AI’s and its use, as revealed via their sci-fi world. In both cases, Smoking Gun offers an excess of material for reflection.

In Smoking Gun, we play as a yet-to-be-known male protagonist, living in a classically-styled detective’s office. The area also functions as a hub world to the campaign’s five cases and a tutorial that allows us to uncover clues about the protagonist himself — such as a note from his wife reminding him not to forget his medicine, and a nearby award for excellence in solving criminal matters.

The setting of Gun reveals itself naturally by means of investigation. We live in 2030, and apparently it’s already game-over for most of humanity as robots have taken their place in most everyday jobs, including accounting, cleaning, curating, directing, and thinking. Humanity evolves alongside them, and scientists are working on optimizing the human condition in the context of a strong artificial intelligence presence. On cue, robots now show signs of resistance and evil intent — such as murdering their human ‘owners’ — which then stages the cases to be solved by the mysterious player-character.

In these cases, the player can explore freely, interact with objects point-and-click-style, and examine all sensory data as evidence, and the menu helpfully (or perhaps spoilery?) shows how many clues are left to be obtained. The detective dynamics are basic, but work well. Mainly, the player can interact with objects containing an interface to collect a hint. These hints can be linked manually, and the sense of player freedom in exploration and clue interpretation made most discoveries feel unscripted and hard-earned, which is satisfying in any detective experience.

Most of the encountered suspects are robots, and they can be interacted with and freely questioned using gen AI. Once the player feels as though they know enough, they can ‘solve’ the case, which then triggers a newspaper report that essentially highlights the facts uncovered (and missed) by the player.

The over-arching story is written by human developers (assumedly not AI) and the five main cases have the necessary overlap which ultimately leads to a general conclusion. While none of the writing is particularly brilliant in prose or world-building, the sense of mystery and impending discovery is built effectively, and I was not able to put the game down before finishing whatever case I was working on. (Each typically requires more than an hour to complete.) For example, one case involved a research lab with an assassinated professor, another the death of an artist in his own gallery. Both appeared to be murdered by robots.

The only significant shortcoming in Gun is — predictably — the generative AI.

While the chatbot function worked solidly for trivial matters (I could ask a bot what they thought of a book we had both read or the detective games they liked best) the interrogations went less smoothly. Bots would not interpret my questions correctly, even if specifically framed, and would give me answers which were explicitly underscored for signification at other times. This led me to avoid interrogation entirely for most of each investigation.

The newspaper articles at the end of each case appeared to be AI generated, offering awkwardly-phrased conclusions to my efforts, even when I got all the case’s answers right and there was only one way to interpret what happened. I’d much rather see a handcrafted final message, if only to stress the vital work of human journalists in capturing societal crises.

This leads me to a final reflection on the developer’s stance regarding AI. Going where many sci-fi tales have gone before, human/AI coexistence appears bound for catastrophe, yet, it requires human cooperation to get to this stage. The power vested in the player, and their opposition to the story’s human antagonists, tells us that the threat is looming, but far from out of our control. We have the ability to refrain from surrender to AI if we can resist its temptations of promised ease and luxury, while stressing the value of actual human work.

Thus, as a game, Uncover the Smoking Gun pits the player as a free-roaming individual against those harnessing the power of AI for a distorted idea of humanity’s future. In our role as the detective, we are reminded of the necessarily human skills of connecting dots and interpreting our world, and of protecting what is sacred to humankind. The same should go for the games industry, which demands courage to refrain from the temptations of AI and should double down on the more appreciable fruits of actual human creative labor.

Rating: 7 out of 10.

Disclosures: The game is developed and published by ReLU Games. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher. Approximately 7 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: Uncover the Smoking Gun has no ESRB rating, but its PEGI rating on the Steam Store states 12+. I would agree, as the game does not feature explicit gore, but implies some mature truths that can be interpreted as disgusting. Implications of violence, murder, and severe maltreatment are present. The audiovisual style is also catered to more mature players.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized. Audio clues are insignificant to the game’s progression.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable.

The post Uncover The Smoking Gun Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The smooth menu simulation UI.

LOW The lack of improvement in realistic representation.

WTF Tadej Pogacar is overpowered.

When I last reviewed (and played) a Pro Cycling Manager title, it was mid-2020, the world was in the grasp of a pandemic, and nobody was sure who would win the Tour de France. PCM, as a point-and-click simulation franchise, modeled the cycling world as accurately as possible in the post-Froome era, and seemed to point to Froome’s relatively young teammate, Egan Bernal (the winner of 2019’s Tour) as his successor.

The fact that 2020 saw the rise of a new era of Grand Tour champions, including Tadej Pogacar, Primoz Roglic, and a year later Jonas Vingegaard, exemplifies the unpredictability of road cycling. In PCM, where the present cycling season and potential sequential seasons get simulated, this unpredictability is definitely an advantage, as every outlined scenario has an inherent degree of possibility.

The PCM formula is simple but fertile — menu simulation in commercial team manager or pro cyclist career modes, where calendars with training schedules are planned for months in advance, to ensure peak performance in the most important races. These races themselves can be quickly simulated or more elaborately played out in a 3D format. In the latter, players can actively control their team’s riders, including how much effort they will put into their pace, when (and if) they attack, or whether they decide to closely observe and follow a competitor.

There are typically two playing positions in such a managerial sim, either start from the top, from the vantage point of a team (close to) competing for wins, or from the bottom while building a team or cyclist from a lower ranking in a process that takes multiple in-game years. The advantage to the former position is the possibility of simulating road cycling season 2024 from within the current peloton, whereas the bottom-up option allows one to imagine what the future of road cycling could look like.

Both positions also speak to the promise of realistic representation customary of annual sports franchises. In my playthrough, I played as a world class team manager for the 2024 season and as a rookie pro cyclist for a career far beyond that.

The menu simulation in both modes feels somewhat slicker than it used to. In the managerial sim, the player manages the riders’ (peak) fitness, schedules races and ideal team selection, and can even manage technical details such as bicycle settings. In the pro cyclist sim, these settings are similar, but catered to the cyclist’s personal development of numerically valued attributes such as climbing or time trial speed and stamina.

While simplistic and only marginally improved, the menu simulation serves as a solid background to the off-road aspects of cycling. Still, I think that the current template could use with an upgrade, mainly in terms of narrative elements. While it’s possible to see updates on injuries across the competition, as well as detailed results, there is no serious news or social feed that could really liven things up and stay true to sport’s increasing media-tization.

The main issue of PCM 2024 is its 3D racing. It’s simply not updated in any way whatsoever, even compared to a title four years its predecessor. This wouldn’t have been a significant issue if the current simulation would work wonders, but it has definitely not aged well.

Typically, road cycling requires patience, picking the right moment to attack, planning a sustained effort that does not have a cyclist overextend their stamina, and taking care of any unforeseen circumstances. Especially on intense mountain stages, gaps between riders can be minutes. For this reason, I prefer simulating stage races such as the Tour de France and playing as climbers with a chance to win it all.

In PCM, certain strategies are favored over others. Attacking is highly inefficient stamina-wise, so winning a mountain stage with an attack is unlikely, unless there are more than the usual fine margins between riders. At the same time, my pro cyclist, developing into a top level climber and stage racer, could not follow any attacks by punchier climbers, nor make up ground by a sustained effort due to the AI suddenly coordinating their efforts perfectly.

It’s understandable that a simulation of road cycling would initially struggle to condense multiple hour-stages into a format that may take as much as 30 minutes, while still remaining faithful to time differences typical in road cycling. The result remains unbalanced, however, with punchers able to take half a minute extra time due to carrying a stronger final sprint, for example, and the quick simulation featuring wholly different results in both bias and form.

Other than the inauthentic feel of the simulation, there’s the audiovisual representation. In the case of PCM, it has never been a highlight — until now, where it’s notably a concern. While I will be the last critic to ever judge a game for limited resources concerning graphics and sound design, PCM’s lack of polish disturbs the experience. The props look ancient, with historically significant stages making use of the exact same backdrops as other stages, with the difference a mere physical road taken or not taken. On the level of the cyclists, faces and motions have the effect of making everyone look identically dull.

The sound design is minimal, with hardly any classic cheering (nor a visual representation) of fans along the road. Commentary is very limited, unspecific and contains some ill-conceived phrases (e.g. “there are pretty ladies at the top.”) Generally, the sound does not add any value to races. If the game does not play like road cycling, look like road cycling, or sound like road cycling, the question can be posed whether it simulates road cycling at all.

In the last four years, road cycling has changed immensely. Pro Cycling Manager has not.

Rating: 4 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed by Cyanide Studio and published by Nacon. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 28 hours of play were devoted to single-player modes, and several seasons of these modes were completed. No time was spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, which most recently rated the 2020 installment of this franchise, this game is rated E with no descriptors. The official summary reads: “This is a pro cycling simulation game in which player assume the role of a professional cyclist or a team manager. Players can select and supervise their teams’ staff, calendar, and equipment as they compete in international training and racing events.”

Colorblind Modes: Color filters are present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: The only ‘subtitles’ are the text that can read in the menus, there are no subtitles in the 3D race mode. This game is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable. The entire game can be played with a computer mouse.

The post Pro Cycling Manager 2024 Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The visual style

LOW The crashes, bugs and glitches

WTF The infinitude of rare resources

The Settlers is a series at its best when the player is empowered to bring a miniature
civilization to fruition from beginnings of poverty and scarcity. However, The Settlers: New
Allies does the complete opposite by facilitating as many resources as possible, and the socio-cultural dynamics of civilization are cast aside for a focus on military-industrial production and warfare. Adding insult to injury, at the time of review it was buggy and prone to crashing.

New Allies, like its predecessors, is a real-time strategy city-builder with a top-down
view focusing on a combination of resource management, warfare and city planning. The
campaign mode has players controlling a refugee group fleeing civil war in their native
kingdom. With each new scenario, the people progress toward their objective of finding a
peaceful new home away from strife.

This basic premise is embellished with pretty visuals and a functioning resource
management system. Civilians (up to a maximum of 500 in every campaign scenario) either
function as soldiers, engineers, laborers (such as foresters, fishers, bakers and miners) or —
if no task is assigned — as carriers. Carriers bring resources (wood, wheat, stone etc.) to a
settlement’s most nearby warehouse. The limited amount of civilians available make
balancing their jobs a significant component of successful management.

This core gameplay loop is New Allies’ strength, as it was with its predecessors.
Unfortunately, this basic joy is soon tarnished.

First, being a Ubisoft game, New Allies requires an additional step to get launched via
Ubisoft’s own storefront, Ubisoft Connect, thus extending the procedure to boot the game.
Once launched, I frequently encountered crashes, failure to load maps, and bugs where the
UI wouldn’t load, forcing me to restart. These issues were as prevalent as they were severe,
and I had to restart the game at least 50% of the time I tried to play.

I also experienced various in-game glitches, including a particularly annoying bug involving a
malfunctioning autosave system, corrupting both the autosave and manual save. The result
was a forced restart without recently saved progress, making me replay large portions –
sometimes hours‘ worth. This technical inadequacy is simply unacceptable, especially from a
huge publisher like Ubisoft.

I’ve already mentioned that the basic elements are solidly crafted, and managing laborers,
engineers, soldiers and carriers in a balanced manner presents the player with a decent
challenge. Still, this is the only successful system in place, as all external challenges such as
resource scarcity and invaders are easily negotiated, and there’s little internal pressure to
keep the player on their toes.

Resources are plentiful — farms don’t require fertile soil, self-regrowing trees make lumber an
infinite resource, and mines (gold, gem, stone, iron or coal) also provide inexhaustible
supplies. If some resources cannot be claimed in a particular scenario, it’s easy as pie to set
up a harbor, sell whatever surplus exists and acquire material that cannot be harvested.

While stone and lumber are essential for residential and defensive buildings, all other mined
materials have a final purpose of army construction. This, then, is what nearly every scenario
steers the player toward. Despite their peaceful intentions, the settlers must inevitably claim
a structure, destroy a ‘barbarian’ outpost, or defeat an encampment. Bafflingly, New
Allies doesn’t offer any peaceful alternatives, nor any more creative solutions to conflict.

A potential saving grace lies in the story’s emphasis on making friends with several
indigenous groups throughout the campaign. However, these story elements are left under-
explored, with the people taking the shape of stereotypical tropes such as a Viking and
spiritual clan. The player’s people easily take center stage, thus colonizing both the lands
and the narrative. The ‘enemies’ of the campaign are referred to as ‘barbarians,’ a likewise
stereotypical name that is not given proper nuance, regardless of an awkward and forced
twist at the end.

The Settlers: New Allies is the latest entry in a beloved and longstanding franchise, and
carries an inherent advantage of starting with a greatly successful formula. However, there
simply aren’t any exciting updates or formula explorations here. The buggy quality of the
code at time of review and utterly flat narrative are salt in the wound, resulting in a game that
does not boast a single positive reason to warrant a purchase.

Rating: 1 out of 10.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Ubisoft Düsseldorf and published by Ubisoft. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher. Approximately 34 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game’s campaign was completed. 0 hours of play were spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB this game is rated E10+ and contains Fantasy Violence. The ESRB’s description states: “This is a real-time strategy game in which players help a group of refugees establish a new settlement. From a top-down perspective, players construct buildings, gather resources, engage in trade, and battle rivals and enemy raiders. Players can deploy military units (e.g., soldiers, mages) to protect their settlement, with combat depicted as large-scale skirmishes (e.g., sword battle, shooting arrows, spell casting). Battles are highlighted by sword slashing, bright visual effects, and cries of pain; defeated units collapse to the ground and disappear.”

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles can be altered and resized. Some in-game clues (such as “[army] recruitment complete”) are only available via audio, but the most essential information is covered by written dialogue and instruction.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

The post The Settlers: New Allies Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The wonderful animation of paper.

LOW The tedious puzzles.

WTF The main character looks like South Park’s Towelie.

Papetura is a point-and-click adventure. Without any overt narration (textual dialogue is omitted) this short story is about an unconventionally-shaped creature navigating an unorthodox habitat being threatened by an enigmatically-motivated evil, intent on setting the environment on fire. On the road to saving the place we meet a string of new friends who each help the main character progress this undefined journey. Ultimately, it ends up being a conventional ‘beat the bad guy’ kind of plot.

The 2D gameplay consists of navigating confined environments and solving local puzzles. A major tool, next to walking and climbing, is the interact button. Interacting with the right objects and inhabitants (and at times avoiding obstacles as they appear) is the key to success. Furthermore, a convenient slingshot-like item operated by our main character allows us to interact with some objects from a distance. Since the gameplay is minimal, Papetura’s focus appears to be on its atmosphere — more on this later.

During Papetura’s short runtime, the player is presented with a multitude of puzzles. Mainly, these are straightforward-yet-minimally-explained challenges such as a fishing minigame or a Pac-Man-like task. Peculiarly, none of these puzzles demand creative solutions — I found the answers to be so basic that they were easily overlooked, and they usually demanded excessive patience rather than clever strategy.

For example, one level requires us to traverse a body of water, and we’re presented with a sea monster, who is aggressive toward our character upon contact. Armed with our slingshot, we may get the monster on its back by hitting its fin-like appendages. Meanwhile, onion-shaped creatures perpetually fall from the ceiling. Our slingshot’s ammo bounces off these creatures, allowing us to make surprisingly-angled shots to ambush the creature. This, then, is what I at first attempted.

The actual solution? Lure the monster to a certain position by standing at its level and waiting for an onion-shaped figure to fall on top of its fin. That’s all there was to it, and it was far simpler than what I thought a properly interesting approach would be. Such a basic task represents the depth of Papetura’s overall design, and obstacles like these make playing through the adventure feel tedious, even with its considerably short runtime.

In terms of gameplay, there’s not much else to say about Papetura. However, there is one element which holds weight and value all of its own accord – the visuals are handcrafted, and the entire affair is created out of literal paper. Suddenly, there’s a new element to consider.

For starters, Papetura’s unorthodox characters are granted a new significance. They are no longer undefined and enigmatic creatures, but instead represent the very matter through which the animation arises. Even though their characteristics remain unclear (in fact, the main character resembles Towelie from South Park) we now know that in a way, they represent the spirit of animated fantasy itself.

The story, about a threat of fire destroying the habitat, also makes a lot more sense in this context. While it may still be too abstract to draw much thematic meaning from it, the cryptic symbols in Papetura‘s speech balloons (there is no actual text) now fits nicely within the material context. The slow pace of the game may reflect on the slow-paced process of handcrafting animation, bringing the player closer to the central theme of paper. But above all, the result is a wonderful-looking world that is precisely created for this specific journey, simple as it is, to take place in.

…And yet, it feels like being a videogame is not the right medium for this content. Despite the attractive appearance, I found the visual design confusing, with some environmental details obscuring the paths that could be taken, at times hindering my process. At more than one point, a subtle slide down or up was the only way forward, and it would take me more time than is reasonable to find it due to the graphical murkiness.

Furthermore, despite Papetura‘s interesting nature, the puzzles were not entertaining and the story lacked a strong central theme or premise beyond ‘paper’. As a demonstration of the craft involved in animation, Papetura is a wonderful artifact. As a videogame, it is considerably less successful.

Rating: 4 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Petums. It is currently available on PC, PS5, XBX, and Switch. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 2 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to PEGI, Papetura’s rating is 7+. Themes of fire, destruction, and even critical (yet not visible) wounds are present, but otherwise this is a title accessible to all ages.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game does not offer subtitles. There are no relevant audio cues, and text dialogue is lacking altogether.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable.

The post Papetura Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The innovative non-racing simulation elements.

LOW The eternal DRS train in all races.

WTF Ferrari winning the 2022 World Championship.

In a year of real-life Formula 1’s actual reboot, which introduced a new F1 car prototype and regulations, my main interest was what this year’s F1 game would do with this opportunity to change things up. As we’ve already seen in my F1 2022 Review, this chance was left underexplored, as the game felt like the first stale reissue of the known formula. Most of my hopes therefore rested with F1 Manager 2022, a second official F1 franchise that would enter the game industry this year — could this game provide the novelty that F1 2022 lacked?

In F1 Manager 2022, there is no player-controlled driving. Instead, we’re only controlling options outside of racing, mostly browsing menus and manually selecting management options such as which staff to hire, which car parts to design, manufacture or maintain, and also how our choice of team’s headquarters may be refurbished or upgraded. Herein, we see the influence of developer Frontier Developments, known for the beloved Planet Coaster and Planet Zoo series, which featured similar managerial elements.

However, a clear distinction between Manager and Planet games is that this time around, the simulation of action is separated from the managerial elements. In those theme park tycoons, we would see the immediate impacts of placing new props, shops and hiring new staff as our park’s visitors would immediately be able to visit them. In Manager, we have to wait to see the results of our managing kick in when the official F1 race weekends arrive, and this is always something more unpredictable as we compete with opaque AI-controlled competitors.

Generally, the game features a dual dynamic of managing the team structure outside of race weekends, and trying to impact the performance of the team’s AI-controlled drivers during competition. Often, this means that we’re stuck with the established level of our team within the pack, which in F1 is very much known — a lower-ranked team in the actual F1 season simply cannot be guided to victory in the first season of managing.

Still, the player’s impact is easily felt, as I was able to complete my first season by bringing the 8^th-ranked team of AlphaTauri to 4^th byand making the race podium several times, and we even managed to pick up one victory. This felt quite unrealistic, and even though Manager encouraged me to delve into the managerial aspects to try to develop the most advanced car and help my drivers prepare for their races, these results came too easily and too quickly to consider my achievements genuine.

Why? The dynamics of racing simulation. As players, we can only control whether our drivers should push to the limit or reserve tires, fuel and battery life, and when they should come in for a pit stop. Yet while this limits player input on the race, the fact that every race somehow results in unbreakable DRS trains makes it all the more impactful (and the races less realistic). I merely had to situate my drivers in the correct DRS train and charge past at the end of the race to outperform targets.

To explain, DRS means drag reduction system and allows F1 cars to gain immense speed boosts on straight parts of the track (there are usually two or three per circuit). In races, DRS is disabled unless cars are within one second behind the car in front, i.e. an overtaking position. This can also lead to DRS trains, however, as slower cars may follow faster cars due to straight line speed difference. However, in actual Formula 1, simply following cars within one second is much more difficult. Therefore, DRS trains hardly dominate races.

Here, however, DRS trains do dominate. They form at the very start of races, and can be as long as eight cars (out of 20 in total) which allows worse cars to stay in touch with the frontrunners. The fact that the AI also makes some questionably inorganic strategic decisions helps the player to make that final push to end up much more achievable than a realistic simulation would be. In other words, while Manager’s managerial side is engaging and feels realistic, the racing simply does not do it justice.

Therefore, Manager suffers similar issues to F1 2022, as races fail to feel convincing, and any immersion in realistic simulations is canceled out. These issues are somewhat exacerbated by lackluster presentation — the ‘commentary’ variation ahead of races and in-between weekend sections is embarrassingly nonexistent, and the visuals are also a step down from F1 2022. Also, the intrigue of managerial simulation as the strongest feature could just as well have been added to the latter title, which already (underwhelmingly) experimented with manager modes.

F1 Manager 2022 is a refreshing new take on F1 games, underscoring the intense out-of-racing dimensions to the sport, and the managerial modes are expansive and engaging. Still, the premise feels undercut by an unimpressive racing simulation. Therefore, the title’s path up the grid requires improvements in its immersive qualities — as much as playing manager is about putting in work behind the scenes, nothing is more satisfying than witnessing the results of all that effort on the track. 

Disclosures: This game is developed by Frontier Developments and published by Frontier Developments. It is currently available on PC, PS4, PS5, and XBO/X/S. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS4. Approximately 45 hours were devoted to the single-player mode, and over a career season of the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E, and contains Mild Language. The Rating Summary reads: “This is a racing simulation game in which players assume the role of a Team Principal for a real-world Formula 1 team. Players can manage the team’s facilities, set racing strategies, and race various cars on tracks. Some language in the game is partially censored by audible bleeps (e.g., “For [bleep] sake, man”; “Ah man, that was such [bleep]”; “I am a [bleep] idiot!”).”

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized. This game is menu-driven, so the vital information is readable. No audio cues are of relevance to the gameplay. This game is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable.

The post F1 Manager 2022 Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The supercar challenges ahead of race weekends.

LOW The lack of engaging innovation.

WTF Ferrari dominating the 2022 World Championship.

After the exciting chaos of last year’s Formula One World Championship, this season has seen a reboot of the real-world sport with technological regulations overturning most consistencies of the competition and every racing weekend providing new surprises. I was quite eager to see how the annual videogame series would negotiate this new era — does a reboot of the real sport also mean a reboot of the game?

I’m afraid the answer to that question is an unequivocal ‘no.’

The F1 franchise is a sophisticated racing simulator, featuring driver and management career modes as well as individual and multiplayer racing, with huge emphasis on a variety of options so that simulation settings, racing camera angles, and rules can easily be changed on a whim. Players can get immersed in their own F1 championship stories or just race for its own sake while tweaking many options that accommodate their preferences.

However, this foundation is an old and stable one that we’ve already encountered and covered in previous editions. The question most pertinent to annual franchises is always “What’s new?” Unfortunately, it doesn’t seem like much. What’s worse, some of my issues with previous installments have been cemented or even exacerbated, and some highlights removed with no replacement.

Let’s start with the biggest change. 22’s starting menu page is replaced with F1 Life, a hub from which to enter various modes, meant to be highly immersive to players via collectable non-F1 ‘supercars’ and driver accessories.

While this is a genuinely fresh layer, lingering in the hub did not appeal as I mainly play for the actual F1 competition while not being a more holistic car racing fanatic. Despite that, this would still be an inoffensive and even positive addition if not for the constant request to connect to EA’s servers. I never intended to do so in the first place, and reminders kept popping up every time I left a mode and returned to F1 Life. This ‘major’ addition turned into live service torment.

Other changes lie within the racing itself. Pit stops may now involve a QTE that impact the swiftness of the stop, AI drivers more often make race-ending errors and are more adaptive to the player’s driving, and a bunch of tracks have been re-added. Furthermore, due to F1 Life, collected supercars can be used in challenges ahead of race weekends in career modes, and these challenges are both welcome invitations to the tracks and more frivolous changes of pace from the intense racing.

These positives are far too little, however, when considering the lingering issues that have not been solved — or even worsened.

First, the AI is slightly more adaptive, but remains dreadful when compared to real drivers. I also noticed that the AI difficulty had to be reduced significantly compared to previous games, and not because my driving got worse — they’re very consistent with their lap times, hardly making any of the slips that human players make, and can only be matched on optimal one-lap runs.

I was able to eventually establish a challenging difficulty, but it remained frustrating to race AI opponents. Races are therefore less enjoyable, as the AI keeps a steady line and pace, but reducing the AI difficulty further would not remove the issue, as I would then easily beat the AI on good laps. The issue is not difficulty, but instead it’s the overly consistent, error-free driving. The only area where the AI deviates from this is in overtakes or duels. Ironically, the AI is reckless in these instances and will crash into the player or into the wall, taking themselves out. It’s not remotely realistic.

This recklessness is made worse by the lack of an adequate penalty system, which in actual F1 keeps drivers in check. Here, most bumps are resolved with warnings which do little to punish dangerous driving, and there is no setting to increase stringency in this regard.

I also find that other issues have to do with a lack of ‘fluff’ that could make the experience more immersive and realistic — things like more sophisticated press simulations (which have been mostly removed, and were never very convincing), more detailed driver animations, and more realistic office management simulation. The constant emails communicating that the driver MUST beat their teammate become very redundant, and they sound silly in the first place.

In F1 2021, most of these issues were omitted in an experimental — though not fully-realized — new driver career mode that came complete with cinematic cutscenes, scripted storyline, and even a hilariously accurate simulation of post-race Twitter discourse. I had desperately hoped for something similar with improvements, but there’s nothing of the kind here. In fact, there’s hardly anything story-wise to immerse the player into the culture of F1 — a shame, since narratives are what I like most about it.

F1 culture is highly peculiar, the drivers and cars are spectacular in the heat of racing, and there’s always a story going on, usually characterized by volatility — the cars can break down, drivers can make race-ending mistakes, teams can destroy their chances at victory with nonsensical tactical decisions (Ferrari’s underwhelming performances in the actual 2022 season provide an example) and world events can play spoiler, such as when Russia was removed from the calendar, or when drivers miss races due to COVID infections. This unpredictability makes everything about the sport perpetually fascinating and none of these peripheral elements are translated here.

This is the first installment of F1 since the reboot of the real-life competition, but it is also the first installment I’ve played that does not feel like a worthwhile reboot in the slightest.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Codemasters and published by EA Sports. It is currently available on PC, PS4/5 and XBO/X/S. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS4. Approximately 35 hours of play were devoted to single-player modes, and over a season of the driver career mode was completed. 0 hours of play were spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E and contains no descriptors. The rating summary reads as follows: This is a racing game in which players can drive Formula One cars on real-world tracks. Players compete in a variety of game modes that include Career, Time Trial, Championship, and Grand Prix.

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind modes are present, but only for the dynamic racing line (the ‘ideal circuit line’), not for the overall display.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized. While this game’s races are playable without sound as the distance to other cars has a clear visual indicator, I find navigating menus and contextual info onscreen, especially in the story mode, to be difficult because the text is very small.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

The post F1 22 Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The potential for sophisticated form and narrative.

LOW …not acting on this potential of its own accord.

WTF There were multiple endings?

I haven’t been playing much new for a while now. The prospect of starting the notoriously popular (and vast!) Elden Ring has weighed down (rather than encouraged) a swift return, but a relatively short, intense ‘walking simulator’ kind of experience usually rekindles my flame. Just what the doctor ordered, Ghost on the Shore proved to be a welcome, intriguing experience that got me back in the mood.

Ghost on the Shore, as a walking simulator, offers little in terms of mechanics aside from first-person exploring in a linearly-crafted 3D world with the odd dialogue choice. The genre has become a mainstay in the industry, and while I’m eager to try them out (especially after my recent hiatus), the type has become somewhat stale, as I highlighted in an earlier review. What makes walking simulators great is when they are either revolutionary in form (art style, mechanics), or have a phenomenal story backing up the limited gameplay. Fortunately, Ghost of the Shore shows good potential in both areas.

The main character is Riley, a British woman and an implied animal rights activist. She retreats from society because she is “not good with people”, and ventures with her boat along the Northern Isles of Great Britain until a storm crashes her into the fictional, deserted ‘Rogue Islands’.

After the storm, she discovers that a mysterious ghost identifying himself as a deceased inhabitant of the island named Josh now resides in her mind, invisible, but someone with whom Riley converses throughout her explorations, in both serious tone and casual jest.

It’s soon revealed that an aristocratic family ruled the island in the early nineteenth century. As the story progresses, Riley learns more about the history of the island’s culture, the inhabitants’ disappearance, and Josh’s part in past events. She brings with her a notebook in which she collects all the embedded info she encounters and uses it to construct character portraits, but also to make sketches of the scenery she admires. Most of the entries’ appearance in the book are determined by the player’s desire to explore the island’s abandoned houses and locations.

As she makes her way around, Riley will also collect artifacts such as letters, valuables and — particularly — different instances of alcohol. These give the most straightforward look into the old society, and also provide great clues towards understanding the complicated relations Josh experienced while alive. This is especially relevant since Josh struggles with amnesia, and the mention of some items evoke his memories.

While stacking the collected clues, it was great to unfolding the island’s mysteries while trying to reconstruct the past, and this is where the potential of Ghost on the Shore lies — its intriguing, historical society can be reconstructed through a somewhat impressionistic sketching of encountered artifacts, while supernatural events advance the plot and its leads. Both the story itself, and the manner in which its narrative ties are knotted are praiseworthy.

At about two-thirds through the game, things rapidly accelerate to a conclusion with a multitude of revelations. Both the pace and the contents of this drive to the end frustrated me because all of the detective work I had done, both in Riley’s journal and in my own mind, felt ill-treated as everything resolved itself with a bunch of tense moments, and not thanks to my own ideas determining or informing the ending.

Adding insult to injury, the final revelation is also quite anticlimactic — without spoiling anything, I can say that the character motivations are banal, and while I appreciate the ‘victim of circumstance’ motif, its application here felt terribly forced. If the complex connections and ties carefully and artistically sketched throughout the journey felt like playing detective in a museum, the ending was the equivalent of an extended bar fight.

In spite of this criticism, I still recommend a playthrough of Ghost on the Store. It’s an intense experience easily played in a single (or very few) sittings that delivers with an engaging story via fascinating narrative progression. I do feel the overall quality of the game was compromised by the lackluster ending, but the thrill of the promise has enough momentum to carry a player to the end.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Like Charlie and published by Application Systems Heidelberg. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 3 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: Ghost on the Shore has no ESRB rating, nor an equivalent enlisted rating. I think this game only works for a somewhat mature audience as it features mature themes of death, heartbreak, manipulation, family disorder and trauma, murder, decay, and identity crises. It also features curse words and foul, aggressive language.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles can be altered and/or resized, from a standard of 100% up to 150% size. All clues are visually advertised, and all dialogue is subtitled. This game is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable. It’s WASD to walk, (hold) SHIFT to walk faster/run, left mouse button to accept a (dialogue) option, to interact with objects. ESC to pause and present menu options.

The post Ghost On The Shore Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

The subject of this installment: Nemezis: Mysterious Journey III, developed by Detalion Games S.A. and published by Playway S.A. and Detalion Games S.A.

In my writing I’ve been wont to call out games for their strained relationship with intellectualism, literature and contemplation — they are far more likely to establish simpler connections to gore, greed, bombastic explosions and narrative spectacle.

To players who share my sentiments, Nemezis: Mysterious Journey III might initially seem to be a peaceful adventure with a focus on the cerebral, but there is a general tendency for ambitious titles to overdo things and sacrifice gameplay polish, audiovisual pleasantries and general accessibility in service of intellectual sophistication. In such cases, these titles may repel players that desire a more rounded experience. Nemezis: Mysterious Journey III is a perfect example of this type of project.

In this puzzle/adventure title we play as two protagonists, Amia and Bogard, both stranded on the planet Regilus in an alternative sci-fi universe in which teleportation is a reality. They seek each other out in this strange land while solving abstract puzzles and learning more about their predicament along the way.

Regilus is a colorfully-realized environment with extraordinary wildlife (or so we are told) but we have little means to explore it, as we are mostly contained to linear paths leading from one puzzle to the next. However, I quickly started to wonder whether the real difficulty was figuring out their solutions or trying to wrap my head around the logic needed to do so.

I found little context to the puzzles, and was left to figure things out for myself with only a hint tool that spouted nonsense and absolutely failed to clear things up. I was stymied by things like hints assuming the player already had knowledge of the problem at hand, or by other puzzles which refer to landmarks which weren’t distinctive enough to have warranted notice. Nemezis isn’t so much about challenge as it is about obscurantism, to the point that the challenges were so difficult and cryptic that they were almost a parody of the puzzle genre itself.

Nemezis is frustratingly obtuse to the point that I felt like it was wasting my time and injuring my mental health. It’s an impossible thing to recommend to anyone other than those craving the most annoying head-scratchers possible.

The post This Is Not A Review: Nemezis: Mysterious Journey III appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The devotion to its thematical premise.

LOW …This premise exacerbates the game’s dysfunctionality.

WTF Is this intentional??  

The Plane Effect depicts the depressing story of an adult man — father to a daughter and husband to a wife — whose workday ends where the game’s narrative begins.

What follows is a series of reflections on the melancholic monotony of everyday working life in capitalist society and its bureaucratic technologies, on loneliness and family alienation, and most prominently, on what a mess the game surrounding all of this is.

This dystopian isometric adventure starts well enough with the main character (named Solo) in in an empty, gloomy office. The simple premise is that he’s got to leave for home as quickly as possible and get to a family anxiously awaiting his return.

So, what does Solo need before he leaves? A coat, obviously. The necessary keys, surely. But also a paper plane to… throw through the office? Does that even make sense? In The Plane Effect, it does.

The Plane Effect’s core mechanic is walking from object to object in the right sequence to progress, similar to a point-and-click. Want to pick up the coat? Sorry, first pick up the keys. Narratively unnecessary sequences like this must be followed, or progression becomes impossible.

Luckily, there are three degrees of difficulty (read: stress and redundance) to choose from — a no-hint mode, a ‘vague’ hint mode which visualizes the character’s thoughts on what to do next, and a literal hint mode which points the player to the exact object that needs to be interacted with. As the game progressed and the arbitrariness and sloppiness of this strict sequential design became more frustrating, I eventually bumped it down to the full hint mode and tried to experience the game purely for its atmospheric, silent narrative — and this is by far where The Plane Effect is at its best.

The major (though implied) premise of The Plane Effect is that the work/home distance is increasingly expanding in contemporary consumerist society. Satirically, on the way home we encounter the craziest of obstacles hindering us from actually arriving at our loved ones’ place. If the game is read in this way, all the tedium the player must endure may be acceptably interpreted as thematical genius hitting the premise out of the park.

As for me, I tend to prefer cultural form over technological function, narrative over mechanics, and aesthetics over graphics in most games. Therefore, I’m thoroughly appreciative of the devs pursuing this theme to the fullest. At the same time, however, I can’t deny that the dysfunction and tedium of actually playing were so disruptive to the experience that any thematic sophistication was lost in translation.

The core issue involves the mechanics. Walking is annoyingly sluggish. The run function reacts slowly, inconsistently, or not at all. Jumping is void of any realistic momentum and timing, and the interact button functions only half the time, leading to an additional five seconds of frustration for each attempt.

These issues would be mere annoyances if this was an atmospheric walking simulator, but The Plane Effect is not. No, it wildly mixes gameplay modes including platforming and run-and-escape sequences in addition to the progression puzzles.

One-third of the way through the campaign, I had to take a long slide down during a chase scene, while also having to avoid obstacles — one touch and it was back to the start. While I can’t put my finger on whether it was the awkward controls, the unrealistic hitbox of the obstacles, or the poor functioning of the run key, the result was that this sequence and others like it almost made me quit.

Platforming is even worse. There is a serious lack of physics and momentum here, both of which are crucial to good platforming. Additionally, the platforms are vague and poorly scaled, making it difficult to determine where the player will land after a jump. Adding insult to injury, the checkpoints are unfriendly, forcing the player to re-do sections while also suffering through long loading screens between dying and respawning. These criticisms dominated my experience before I got even halfway through The Plane Effect, and the latter half only exacerbated them.

While I can’t excuse the frustration I felt playing through The Plane Effect, I genuinely sympathize with the developers, as I can sense what their vision was. I would argue it’s even possible to interpret their work as intentionally draining, as it metaphorically strengthens the theme. Unfortunately, it crosses a line and all I was left with was the urge to finishing the game as quickly as possible so that I could leave it behind.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Innovina and Studio Kiku and published by PQube Limited. It is currently available on Switch, PC, PS4/5 and XBO/X/S. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 6 hours were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E10+ and contains Fantasy Violence, Mild Blood, and Tobacco Reference. I agree with this rating based on my playing experience, although I would like to add that this game’s themes are probably only comprehensible at an even later age (e.g. 17+).

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game does not feature any spoken dialogue. As such, there are no subtitles. The game can be played 100% without sound and is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable.

The post The Plane Effect Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The epic animation and graphic design.

LOW The incongruence between animation and textual progression.

WTF The anxiety induced by the patience indicator.

The Last Survey presents a highly provocative issue packed in the calming experience of a text-based choose-your-own-adventure title. The proposed issue? The unnamed geologist we control has surveyed the Earth’s rare metal reserves and finds that little of them remain to satisfy the increasing demands of humanity, and they must inform a mining company CEO of this very fact.

This isn’t merely a fictional narrative to fuel a political simulation, this is a reflection of our contemporary reality and the geoscience behind the premise is genuine. In reality, there aren’t enough rare metals left to continue producing according to humanity’s demand for solar panels, electric cars and even videogames. What is to be done? A healthy solution is to listen to science, which is exactly the challenge central to the The Last Survey.

We’ve become accustomed to the fact that corporate greed and hypercapitalism are the enemies of sustainable resolutions to the ecological crises central to our times, and in The Last Survey this is emphasized. The whole game revolves around a simple sequence of scenes where we enter a mining company’s headquarters, walk towards the CEO’s office, and try to convince them to make the right call — essentially, to get them to quit their excessive mining operations.

Obviously we are met with the CEO’s resistance, and the objective of the encounter is to employ corporate language in such a way as to not make the CEO dismiss the geologist and ignore the advice. We’ve got to get the urgency of the message across while still adhering to business etiquette. This is a challenge which accurately simulates frustration, and instinctive replies might result in a quick dismissal and game over. However, even in success, it’s not entirely clear whether anything is ‘won’ at the end of the day.

As a very short experience, there’s not much more than what I’ve described to The Last Survey. That said, its presentation deserves special praise. While we see text doing the work of narration, a smooth, black-and-white animation gives a real noir tone and background to the story, and helps envisioning terrifying details of the company building, the CEO, and his office. Yet, while these animations are totally awesome in their own right, their rapid succession does somewhat disturb the overall pace, and I couldn’t read while the animations played. It’s a shame that there’s no voiced narration, which would’ve been a productive solution for players able to hear.

As dialogue choices determine its ending, I recommend several replays of The Last Survey to try things out, even after a successful first run. Unfortunately, I did encounter a gimmick which hinders the joy of a replay. There’s a ‘patience indicator’ which can be overburdened by the player progressing too quickly through the dialogue, leading to the geologist turning away from the office in panic. While the function is understandable from a narrative perspective, it’s a real pain when skipping dialogue that’s already been seen several times before.

The annoyances I’ve listed make for an uneven experience in an already-short runtime, but the truth is that The Last Survey presents something more akin to critical commentary in game form than what might generally be considered a fully-realized game. In light of this, the faults are inoffensive and I find that I must recommend this title nonetheless.

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Nicholas O’Brien. It is currently available on PC and Switch. This copy was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 1 hour of play was devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed twice. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Strong Language. The animation is quite innocent, and I have not experienced severely strong language in the dialogue. However, the game’s themes are definitely mature, although I would consider them easily accessible to mature teens as well.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized. (See examples above.) The game can easily be played without sound, there is no hindrance at all. I’d say it’s fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable. There is no control diagram. Navigation of text and menu on the left stick or directional pad, A to select and continue text. + to pause the game.

The post The Last Survey Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.