Recent reviews by Tonypoo

I want to start by saying that I am a HUGE Fallout fan and lore nerd. Now, I must admit that I have not played Fallout and Fallout 2 (I did pick them up in a sale, but I'm having the age old issue of finding time to play them). Now we all know the huge hype surrounding this game. Everyone's mind was running wild at the new additions and fixes Bethesda could have done to the series, to finally make it the be-all and end-all of all RPGs. However, Bethesda seems to have either forgot what people like about Fallout (even what Fallout is in the first place), or they just decided they don't give a ♥♥♥♥ about the fans, and made a dumbed down piece of crap for the masses to gobble up. Probably the latter. Due to its size, I think the best way to evaluate this game is by examining each of its aspects.

Shooting: Gunplay has certainly improved since Fallout 3 and New Vegas. It definitely feels significantly more responsive and punchy. However, its still lacking compared to other modern shooters. Besides, there's even been mods that improve the gunplay of New Vegas by adding some much needed recoil to the weapons, so I can't see anyone liking this game due to its guns feeling nice to shoot. It also suffers from having a pretty small variety of weapons compared to New Vegas, and of course the unique weapons look exactly like their common counterparts! Yay!

RPG elements: This is no doubt the worst part of Fallout 4. It's beyond me why Bethesda decided to remove almost every single RPG element from the game. In New Vegas there are so many different ways to differentiate your character, by picking from a huge array of traits, skills and perks, but it looks like Bethesda didn't get the damn memo on how to make a good RPG. Half the perk tree is devoted to just simple stat increases, like getting more scrap from stuff, or dealing more damage, and perks related to crafting more advanced mods for your weapons. And of course there's the obligatory completely useless perks such as seeing the path to your nearest objective! Gee thanks Bethesda! It just doesn't feel like your character progresses in any meaningful way in this game.

Exploration: Remember how good Bethesda was at making interesting worlds for you to explore? Well, they failed this time around. The Commonwealth feels incredibly bland in comparison to the Capital Wasteland, even the Mojave, and especially compared to Skyrim. There's just too many filler locations full of raiders and ghouls, with interesting places that you actually want to explore immediately after getting the first glimpse of them being few and far between. So many areas of the map feel almost identical to each other, giving you no incentive to just head out in some random direction to see where you end up.

Story and quests: This game's story is simply mediocre. Fallout 3's story is certainly better, with New Vegas being leagues ahead. Don't even get me started about the New Vegas DLC blowing this game's story out of the water. Since the beginning of the game, your character is forced into a very specific role, removing the freedom to make absolutely any character you would like. You always have to be a parent looking for their child. The ending is simply crap. Completely unsatisfying, and does not give you a nifty slideshow like Fallout 3 and New Vegas to make you feel that the choices you made had some impact on the world. Moreover, the vast majority of quests in this game are bland "go to this place, kill everything inside (and possibly grab some item) and come back for your reward". Was Bethesda really working on this game for 5 years, or was most of the time spent modifying the engine so it wouldn't die on them, and then put the quests in at the last minute?

Customisation: Now this is one aspect of Fallout 4 I really liked. I'm a sucker for deep customisation for your weapons and other equipment, and this game certainly has a lot of that. Probably the reason why Bethesda didn't include that many weapons was because they can all be customised to different extents, allowing you to personalise them for your own gameplay style. It's certainly nice to be able to stick to your favourite weapons throughout the game by upgrading them so they are still a viable choice down the line. Some more cosmetic customisation would also have been great, but what's already in the game is pretty good.

Power armour: I love power armour. It's one of my favourite things about Fallout. Seeing these images of people wearing these indestructible mech suits, transforming them into walking tanks, is actually pretty representative of how power armour in this game feels like. This is another thing I really liked about this game. The fact that power armour is no longer just a regular outfit makes it feel much more immersive using it, and looking at a dashboard instead of your normal HUD definitely gives you the amazing feeling of being a walking tank, blasting anything in your way with a hail of gunfire from your minigun. The modifications you can make to your suits is also very cool, allowing you tailor it specifically to your playstyle. Blowing people and creatures up (or smashing their skulls in using a super sledge) never felt better! It would be the best part of Fallout 4 for me if it wasn't for one little thing. Power armour is completely ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ neutered because of how Bethesda decided to put it EVERYWHERE. You get power armour right at the beginning of the game, and constantly bump into other suits, either abandoned at the side of the road (because if you came across power armour in a nuclear apocalypse, of course you would leave it exactly where it was, untouched), or more uncommonly used by raiders. The satisfaction you got from acquiring power armour and using it for the first time is completely gone.

Settlement building: I always enjoy being able to construct my own base and fill it with useful stuff and trophies I've acquired along the way in any game. Yes, I enjoy my occasional dose of modded Minecraft. Settlement building in Fallout 4 though? It's something else. Firstly, it's incredibly obvious that the UI was made for consoles. It's extremely annoying to use on a PC, constantly wasting your time digging through menus to find the stuff you want. As if it wasn't for that, it only "just works" whenever the ♥♥♥♥ it wants to. I've had countless issues with stuff not snapping to each other for no apparent reason, and with not being able to place stuff where you want even though it seems perfectly reasonable. Spend some time making a house, and as soon as you start getting ambitious about your build, you slam headfirst into the build limit, because consoles. Thankfully there's mods which fix that. I can't even count the number of times I've loudly exclaimed about the stupidity of Bethesda because the pieces provided are lacking in order to build a house that doesn't look like ♥♥♥♥, or other times not providing parts which would make building some stuff so much more convenient. For example, why are vaults the only structures you can build that don't require having 15 billion wires around so you can take power to where you need it?

DLC: This game's DLC is simply poop. Far Harbor and Automatron are the only ones really worth a damn. It just falls flat on its face compared to the DLC of New Vegas. Half of it could have basically been added by mods anyway.

Make no mistake, Fallout 4 is basically a first person shooter with RPG elements, and a pretty mediocre one at that. To be fair, there is a huge amount of mods available for the game, which is the reason why I spent so long playing it, as well as survival mode which makes it a bit more interesting. I know that I'll never replay it like I did with New Vegas and Skyrim though. I hope Bethesda have learned their lesson.

This mod was so damn awesome back in the day! Too bad almost nobody plays anymore. Definitely give it a shot if you can get a couple of friends together!

Ever imagined having to face a Xenomorph yourself, like Ripley? Well, you came to the right place! This game does an excellent job of immersing you into the world of Alien. It follows the movie extremely faithfully, as even the signs next to doors can be found in this game (Pro tip: By learning what those signs mean, you can predict the kind of room that it is and what can be found inside before even entering the room!). The game can get extremely tense as the alien's smart AI adapts to your behaviour, and constantly hunts you. The game encourages exploration (even though its quite risky) by the various terminals and logs littered around the place, which can give you some backstory as to what was happening previously on the space station, give you codes to gain access to some extra loot, or even logs from the Nostromo itself, voice acted by the actors from the film. That's not to say that the game is perfect, however. The other enemies in the game are much less interesting than the alien (even quite annoying to deal with at times). Also, there are some sections that can drag on and become a little boring, especially towards the end of the game where you pretty much explored most, if not all, of the space station. Even though I'm not the biggest fan of survival horror (the only reason I bought this game was because it was an Alien game), I can safely say I had quite a lot of fun with this game, and I would definitely recommend it to other Alien fans.

You may want to have some spare underwear ready, by the way...

This is a cool little indie game that you can play around in to pass the time. That said though, many may consider it too simple since it is essentially a runner. I would definitely recommend it on a tablet though (bear in mind that there is only an iOS version, not an Android version, which is a shame).

I won't lie, GTA V is a superb game! The singleplayer has definitely been one of the best experiences I have ever had in gaming. Its literally jaw dropping to see how much detail there is in Los Santos. It feels like a living and breathing city! I really liked the story and cared about all three characters when times got tough for them. The online component is also very good, with loads of heists, races and other missions to play with your friends. Be warned though, since the game uses matchmaking, you will have quite a few connectivity issues. Also, you cannot deny that there is a giant amount of hackers in the game. It won't be a problem if you just prefer friend only sessions so you can play with your friends, but you will definitely suffer if you want to play with random people. Overall, I must say I had tons of fun with this game, so I can't not recommend it. You might want to wait until Rockstar actually takes the hacker problem a little more seriously, however.

This is definitely one of the best (if not the best) competitive games of all time. It currently proudly wears the crown as the king of competitive FPS, and in my opinion will stay this way no matter how hard Ubisoft, EA and Activision try to come up with new competitive FPSs. This game should definitely stand proudly in everyone's game library!

A generic free-to-play game that is pay-to-win... I played it when it was released, and its still as ♥♥♥♥ as it was back then. Don't waste your time or money.

Having played this when it was in early access, I have to say I had an enormous amount of fun. I don't play as often now, but every now and then I get some weird ideas for the design of a rocket or plane, and this game allows me to try them out no matter how insane they are. Like everyone wanted as a child, you can now build your own rocket and pilot it to space! What more could you want? This is also one of the only examples of Early Access done right! Oh, and there's also mod support adding pretty much unlimited content to expand your game in all aspects!

You don't need me to say that this is one of the greatest FPS games of all time. There's countless other reviews that will tell you exactly why that is. All I will say is that, if games interest you at all, this is one of the essentials.

Definitely one of the best games I have ever played. In no other game have I ever been so involved in the story and actually cared about the characters as much as I did in this. Tears The Last of Us to shreads!