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A 2020 Review - Aliens Versus Predator (PC, 1999) Score: 3/10 Mediocrity Score: Makes Mediocrity Look Good. After twenty-one years, this once great action shooter fails to entertain. If only Aliens Versus Predator were as thrilling, exciting, and tight-playing as it was back in 1999 when it was released. Today it's dim, dark, and bland; being more of a mess than it's worth. Tags: A few words or tags that come to mind are: dark, disorienting, multiplayer, unpolished. Avg. Time to beat: 6.5 hours Quickest Speedrun: 1.2 hours Retail Price: $5 Lowest Historical Price on Steam: $1.24 I'm not going to sugar-coat it; the years between now and 1999, when Alien Versus Predator was released, have not been kind. Graphics, textures, lighting, sounds, UI, AI, and everything else unmentioned have all vastly improved during that time. All of this will become incredibly apparent as soon as you launch the game. AVP became a LAN party cult classic of the early 2000s through its chaotic multiplayer deathmatch. Players could compete between Aliens, Predators, and Colonial Marines (a fancy-pants name for Humans). Unique for its time, each race is completely different. Rather it be weapon selection, visual-modes, tools, or movement speed, each playable-race requires a different strategy and approach. It makes for a crazed deathmatch experience. Each race also has its own campaign to play through along with several bonus levels. Today, the majority of what made Aliens Versus Predator such a standout game of 1999 has been washed away. The improvements in gameplay, technical design/engineering, story, and multiplayer experience have all long since improved offering more than what was possible at the time. The AVP franchise has also seen more releases since '99 which have each sought to improve upon the original title. In 2020, AVP is more interesting as a retro-museum of what once was rather than a competent game worth your time. It's interesting on a component level, but not as a whole. Pros: - Fun, chaotic multiplayer. Offers multiple game modes. - Controlling the Alien feels crazy and is entertaining enough just running around the walls and ceiling. - Predator's vision modes is a really cool feature to play with, and is something we don't see enough of in modern games. - Nostalgic for some. Cons: - Confusing, dark, bland environment that runs together and makes navigation difficult at times. - Non-existent storyline and narrative. - Amateurish voice-acting. - With multiplayer being the primary source of value, there are very few available games online. Most often, none to be found. - Bare-bones, ugly UI.

A 2020 Review - The Age of Decadence (PC, 2015) Score: 4/10 Mediocrity Score: Mediocre at Best. The Age of Decadence is a strangely unbalanced turn-based CRPG. It rather uniquely takes combat out from being the main focus and pits the player into a scenario where you can take different approaches. Touted for being a game where "choices matter", the game somehow feels so linear - locking the player into a path chosen early on. Choices in the game will keep you on your toes, that is until you realize the pattern of don't trust anyone, ever. My advice before buying is - play the demo first. Tags: The few words that come to mind are: mediocre, unbalanced, dialogue-heavy, cheap. Quick Take: Play the demo first. For the intention of being redundant for effect, if there is anything you should do before buying, it is to play the demo. This game is both very difficult and very easy. Rather unique in its approach, within The Age of Decadence you can 100% avoid all combat in the game by taking a more charismatic-stacked approach in your character build. What they don't mention is how incredibly simple the game becomes when you go for this non-combat route. It turns into a dialogue-heavy, point-and-click game where if you make the wrong choice you likely will be thrown into a combat situation where you will surely, and cheaply, die. Go with the combat route, and you are faced with a stacked-against-you RNG-based combat which is difficult to the point of coming off as both brutal and cheap. The one thing both routes have in common is the smoke-and-mirrors masking the cheap game-ending situations it constantly throws your way. In complete fairness reading reviews, watching let's plays, playing the demo, or even the reading developer's own disclaimers - potential players have been warned that "there is a good chance that you won’t like it, precisely because we took too many liberties with the established design". I can't help but feel like this is akin to being told "Here's the really over-cooked steak you ordered. There is a good chance you won't like it, but since this is all intentional - we've taken an extra heavy-handed approach with its blackened design." Yet here I am, disappointed that I paid for a really over-cooked steak that has an impressive char-broiled aesthetic. Pros: - Has an honest demo. - Multiple routes may be taken to beat the game. - Incredibly funny and useful skill/ability descriptions. More games should take inspiration from this. - Some hilarious ways to find yourself dying, made out as a fool, or being separated from your money. - Budget-friendly in cost and in required/recommended system specs.  - NPCs are hilariously evil, greedy, untrustworthy, and always out to get you.  Cons: - A lot of cheap situations made to make you fail while masquerading as being a "choices matter" feature. - RNG in combat is grossly stacked against the player, and always in favor of the NPC combatants.  - The non-combat path becomes a trivial point-and-click game that leads to instadeath anytime you find yourself having clicked the wrong dialogue choice and end-up in combat. - Boring story with a boring end-conclusion. Dialogue becomes a chore. - The most important choice you will pick are your attribute points at the start of the game. Once you set yourself on that path, there is no deviating from it. You are locked in and cannot improve your stats in the game.  - Complete exclusion of black or dark-skinned racial choices. I mention this as it does let you choose skin shades, but only of the white variety. Take this as you like. It doesn't affect gameplay, just something of note. - Lacking equipment options to suit your character with. I felt it was far too shallow.