Game reviews – Page 48 – Savior Gaming

Leviathan

Miles beneath the Atlantic Ocean, a group pf miners lead by a geologist are harvesting minerals from the ocean floor. During a routine sea-walk, a pair of crew members stumbles upon a Russian sea wreck named the Leviathan. Within the confines of the ship, there were casualties, questions, and a flask of vodka. It isn’t long before the crew discovers it isn’t booze in the flask and not only do the crew members that drank from it die, but suffer a series of heavy genetic alterations, creating a beast unlike any other. Can the survivors not only survive the beast but the crushing sea waiting to destroy them?

Leviathan is a movie I grew up with, and off the bat I have to say it’s a pretty decent B movie. This movie is trying to be Alien and The Thing just underwater and it does pretty decent at it until you get the creature effects. Back in 89, I think the effects were fair enough but today, in 2021, the creature effects are pretty cheesy looking. I do have to give credit though, the underwater scenes and general atmosphere are impressive for the time and have a great sense of claustrophobia. The acting is pretty fair but admittedly Ernie Hudson was my favorite character in the movie and had my favorite line in it. The score fits and adds to the movie in a couple spots. In the end, while not great by any means, Leviathan is a decent B movie worth checking out. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Ara Fell Enhanced Edition (PS4)

Myself and the guys at Stegosoft Games actually have an odd history that I am 100% positive they don’t know or care about. A lot time ago when this game was about to release back on PC, believe it or not I asked for a copy of this to review and they politely and professionally said no I wasn’t big enough for them to do that sort of thing.

I’m not bitter about that, it’s totally understandable, the funny thing was however, my social media at the time was bigger than theirs. I just thought it was a funny story I would share.

Now for Ara Fell, this clearly retro inspired turn based RPG. The story is of a world above the ground in the clouds. A world where vampires hide in the dark and people live in fear of them starting a war.

The world is full of people and life and places to explore and lore to be found. All this would mean nothing if the combat was awful. Happy to say that is not the case. Every character has a sort of class with moves to learn and be upgraded. They also have set equipment and rather than trying to find new equipment you will be finding the materials to upgrade those items.

There are of course downsides to this JRPG style. The combat can get repetitive and the story while interesting does have all the usual clichès you would expect. But of you are looking for an older style JRPG that feels new, this is worth looking at. It took a few extra years to play this one, and I don’t mind that I waited a bit longer to get the full experience. Worth the time and money. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Road Fury Review (PS4)

Road Fury is one of those simple concept games with simple controls. There are only two options in fact, you can either use the movement controls of the controller itself or switch it in the options to work of the thumb stick/D-pad.

From there it is a simple matter of blowing up cars, collecting power ups, avoiding a few obstacles and killing bosses. You don’t even have to fire weapons, the game does this automatically for you. Just focus on the driving. Collect we much money as you can before you die and use that to upgrade your cars weapons, armor and power ups and do it again. You don’t even restart the game. If you make it 3 levels and die you will start on level 3. Go another 2 and die, restart on level 5.

This doesn’t make the game easy however. I found myself sometimes dying on the same board 6 or 7 times until I had enough money to upgrade my car enough so I could cause enough damage to beat a boss or simply hitting stuff because I wasn’t moving fast enough.

The game does have it’s limits of fun tho. With only 3 cars to choose from, 2 of which need to be unlocked and each far more powerful than the last I found the game far too repetitive around level 50, and I don’t believe there is an ending. The game is cheap tho so that helps. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

On The Road (PS4) Review

There is some good news and bad news that comes with this truck simulator. For example if you don’t have access to a PC or simply don’t like PC gaming but want an in depth truck simulator that allows you to drive all over a country delivering goods in a pretty realistic way and even manage a company, On The Road is the best you will find.

The bad news is, the bar is not very high at all. Graphically the game is unimpressive and the sound leaves a lot to be desired and the controls aren’t very good at all. I gave driven actual semi trucks with trailers,and backing up the real thing is a million times easier. And if you have double trailers forget it.

The news isn’t all bad, it is a relaxing experience and if you do want that truck driving experience without the PC this will do it. You will be planning routes and picking up loads from multiple places that you can drop off in one, or two in the same city and buying me trucks and hiring new drivers and planning their routes before you know it. The system for doing this is also pretty simple to get used to.

You just have to know going into this that American and Euro truck simulators on PC are still far superior games, but this will scratch that console itch, and I did enjoy my time with it. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Chicken on The Road (PS4)

This review will be short and sweet, and honestly is more for the achievement hunters in the group.

The game doesn’t really look good, though it isn’t bad. It doesn’t stand out in the sound department either. It doesn’t even stand out in gameplay. You will simply run over chickens to score points and try not to get into an accident. The game cost 99cents (united states) and you can get the platinum in about 15 minutes, or less.

This game however isn’t fun or good. Unless you are chasing platinum trophies, skip this one. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

The Human Tornado

I know in all my years blogging, I’ve talked about some some strange ass movies, books, games, and comics. I live for this strange stuff, pieces of art that undeniably stand out…so I’m pretty sure I can’t show the trailer here but believe you me, it stands out.

The Human Tornado follows Dolomite and his group of friends on the run. His crime? He slept with a bigot sheriff’s wife that is willing to do just about anything for revenge, including framing Dolomite for killing his wife. When while Dolomite has to lay all of those in his wake while helping some friends out with there own mess, but it’s just another day for the Human Tornado.

There’s so much I want to say but I don’t think I can. This is one of the few movies that NEEDS to be experienced, rather than told about. I can tell you the plot is disjointed, the fight scenes are really corny, and this movie is super politically incorrect- seriously, something like this would never get made today. But holy crap I loved this movie. Rudy Ray Moore is badass and hilarious. I love how unapologetic the movie is about nudity and language and simply how quotable it is. In the end, this movie sure as hell ain’t for everyone, but if you love WTF movies, this is for you. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus

Along time ago I wanted to do a massive phase 2 session of Bethesda reviews, this game being at the forefront ( Prey, Dishonored 2, Fallout 76, etc.) Well, things don’t always work out that way we want them too and here I am, reviewing a game I bought near launch, forgot I had, and remembered years later when I’m about to move (yes, seriously.) But the question I ask is was it worth the neglect?

So B.J Blaskowitz, “Terror Billy” to some, has essentially wounded the Nazi regime but they are far from ended. Especially when a disfigured and vengeful Frau Engel is hunting down a gravely wounded Terror Billy as he fights to regroup with his old friends. The goal is simple, to start a revolution in the US, but can Terror Billy and his friends face the might and hatred of the New Colossus?

Wolfenstein: The new Order surprised the hell out of me with it’s loadout of various play style options and challenging enemies. While the challenge remains the same, I do have to say as much as I liked this game it did a damn good job at pissing me off. This game puts you in a lot of situations where stealth would be appreciated but the abilities you gain aren’t no where as helpful as going all out and I feel like you get pushed into all out moshes when simple stealth would have saved a headache; you die very easy in this game. I feel like the tactical shitstorm gameplay here was a prototype to what we would get in Doom: Eternal which indeed did it better. Despite the negative of that, the game has a good story and isn’t afraid to embrace it’s batshit grindhouse side which is cool. I love Frau Engel as a sick villain that’s great to hate. I love the use and freedom of dual wielding weapons. In the end, Wolfenstein 2 isn’t as good as the first but it’s still a pretty solid game worth checking out. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Silence of the Lambs (book)

The Silence of the Lambs (novel) - Wikipedia

Clarice Starling is a promising cadet at the FBI academy pushing herself she can make it in the field. Driven and determined, she’s surprised when Jack Crawford asks her to question the legendary psychopath, Dr. Hannibal Lector. After the events of Red Dragon (book) he hasn’t responded to any questioning and his advice can become crucial in catching a disturbed killer called Buffalo Bill, who flays the flesh off of woman. When Buffalo Bill kidnaps a senator’s daughter, it’s up to Starling to try and discover the identity of this madman and save her, relying on Dr. Lector for advice and clues into the mind of madness.

So this book is pretty much what kids today would call a se-boot. You can pick it up just fine on it’s own without reading Red Dragon; their are callbacks to Graham and events of the first book but the info you get is pretty sufficient. While I personally like Will Graham better as a main character, Clarice is compelling in her own way and it is interesting to see how she interacts with familiar characters. Again, the villains steal the show. Lector is pretty damn memorable and Buffalo Bill is a creepy ass son of a bitch. The end comes together really nicely and there’s a lot of tension. The pacing is good and admittedly I never got bored with it. In the end I’d definitely say it’s well worth a read. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Curse of The Dead Gods (PS4 Review)

As always the first thing I want to do is thank the people at Focus Home Interactive for tossing me a review copy of this one. It is always a pleasure and this time is possibly more than ever.

First, this is one of those classic rouge-likes that is easy to pick up and play. In fact the first level will really give you a false sense of security. It isn’t overly difficult and with the controls being as simple as they are how bad can it be? You simply dodge with one button counter with another and have different attacks with different weapons or hold them for charged attacks.

This quickly turns on you as different enemies have different timing to defend or dodge, and many will attack you at the same time so you will have to choose what is about to happen to you. Do you just take one hit and dodge another? Do you block one and hope you times it right to avoid the damage all together?

There isn’t exactly a right or wrong answer, it all comes down to your play style and what rooms are coming up. Some rooms allow you to heal, but just like entering each room builds up corruption so will healing in this way. The more corruption the more curses you get hit with. Some are minor like you can no longer collect gold from chest, others are worse like you lose health every few seconds.

The graphics and sound are solid but nothing to brag about, but I also wouldn’t complain. The enemies are nice and having to get yourself some light to hold off enemies doing extra damage is a nice touch. The game is both fair and unforgiving of your mistakes with plenty of weapons and such to unlock but not so many locked to start that you are handicapped to start. Your skill will matter we much we your load out.

Death also isn’t much of a punishment, in fact it is expected. Each run gives you random weapons to start and allows you to spend assorted currencies to upgrade your game permenently. There are even daily events for when you want something new. This was one of the better rogue-likes I have played, and will keep playing it. A solid 8 out of 10. Best wishes and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Red Dragon (book)

Being a horror fan for my whole life, I’m almost ashamed to say I have no connections to Dr. Hannibal Lector. I’ve never seen the movies and only few months ago started reading the books. So after finishing the first story to introduce the legendary killer, are the stories worth the hype?

Will Graham was a talented FBI Investigator who had been pushed to the brink of his sanity by prominent psychologist turned killer Hannibal Lector. Graham never felt the same and was hesitant when his old friend and colleague Jack Crawford comes to him begging for help with a new case. There’s a new killer who violently slays whole families. Cunning as well as savage, Graham is at a loss, resorting to ask help from his old nemesis for advice, unaware Lector and this new foe deemed the “Tooth Fairy” may be connected. Can Graham stop this brutal killer before he falls victim to the madmen?

I really didn’t know what to expect and about half way through I was pretty damn engaged in this book. Thomas Harris is fantastic at putting you in the killer’s shoes and once we start seeing the story from their perspective, I was hooked in. Graham himself is a good protagonist I enjoyed following who seemed mentally burned out throughout the story and I could feel his frustration and obsession growing. As for Lector- he ain’t in there much. He is involved in the story but this far from his story so don’t go in looking for a lot of him. The story is paced really well but I feel like the ending fumbles. Red Dragon is pretty self contained which I liked (yes, I’m now currently reading Lambs). In the end, I enjoyed this story as a good psychological crime thriller I’d definitely recommend. May the gaming gods bring you glory.