So it's 4:45am, and I'm having a tiny bit of depression mixed with existential crisis,
AND THERE'S NO BETTER TIME TO START WRITING ABOUT STUFF TO GET YOUR MIND OFF OF THINGS !

So let's roll this shit out.
THERE WILL BE SPOILERS, SO FEEL FREE TO SKIP THIS WHOLE POST IF YOU DON'T LIKE THOSE.

So, I spoke about MGRR, I've sang it's praises and generally said that it's an awesome game.
What am I basing all that on ?
Well, first of all, playing MGR:R feels amazing.
The controls are spot on, and each press of a key, or a flick of the stick does exactly what you wanted it to.
The graphics, for what they are, are pretty damn good.
The character models are awesome, the animations are awesome, the effects are awesome, and they make the fights look that much better.

Now, taking into account that graphics in games is the LAST THING YOU SHOULD BE LOOKING FOR (and if you do, you need to turn your gamer-card in), MGR:R has some...not really decent texturing. A lot of the textures look sub-par, BUT that's understandable when you think about how good this game runs, and what it's meant to run on.

Remember, this isn't Crysis. You need to go elsewhere to try and find justification for that 1000$ graphics card you just bought.

The fighting in this game is phenomenal. It's no wonder the sub-genre is called "Spectacle Fighter".
Each slash of your sword feels so visceral, and every successful parry you pull off makes you feel like a badass.

The bossfights are a whole different story though.
Each boss has their own thing, and each of them has a different trick that can help you defeat them.
Mistral hiding behind her staff ? Give her a combo, then blademode her staff in half, and give the hot bitch some whoop-ass.
Monsoon is annoying, flying all over the place, can't be cut because he keeps splitting into pieces ? Throw an EM grenade in his face, then blademode his forehead. Turns it into a super easy fight.

This game has a good way of teaching you how to play it.
A prime example of this is the fight with Sundowner.
Right before it, you're once more reminded about the precise use of the Blade Mode.
A rematch with the clone body of Mistral and Monsoon specifically put there to remind you how to precisely swing your sword to cut certain pieces, which you then must proceed to use on the fight with Sundowner, or else your chances are slim to none.

While thinking about the game a while ago, I pulled parallels to another game I played a long time ago.

I'll finish this in Part 2, though, stay tuned !

Console ports are something a regular PC gamer fears the most.
If a game was not developed for the PC (alongside console versions) in the first place,
the chance that the (usually) inevitable PC port will suck on a variety of levels rises exponentially.

Whether it's piss poor controls, graphics issues or a simple lack of graphics options,
locked frame rates, there's usually something wrong with the console port.
That sadly means that PC gamers are deprived of some decent, and some more-than-decent titles.
Most often, it's the games from the far east, the land of the rising sun, that don't get the preferred PC treatment.

But sometimes, a gem slips through the cracks, and we get a very nice surprise, something that gives us hope, and lets developers and publishers see that there's this whole new world for them, ready to embrace them, and their bastard-lovechildren.

When I finally saw Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance appear on the Steam store as a Pre-Purchase, I was excited beyond words. I've followed the development of this game since it was first announced, then dropped, then picked up again.
I was thrilled knowing that it was Platinum Games, the makers of Bayonetta, that took the reigns of this project.
The game was originally hinted to come out for the PC as well, and I couldn't be happier.
Some of my most favorite games are from the action-adventure/brawler genre, so these,
 at the time, latest news made me as giddy and tingly as a schoolgirl at a Justin Bieber concert.
Now, of course, as it always is, happiness and dreams get shattered, and they ended up cancelling their previous statement, saying the game would come out for the running generation consoles only, and the PC version was going to be put on hold.

But then, in January of 2014... My heartfelt gamerection came back.

First of all, I must ask of all of you reading this right now, raise your hands up,
and give a round of applause for Platinum Games.
They stepped out of their comfort zone, and ported this insane thrillride to the PC.

Now if they would only do the same for their sexy, gun-totting Witch.

MGRR is an amazing looking/feeling/sounding game.
It feels like everything in this game is finetuned to make you, the player, feel like you're actually there.
The movement, the fighting, the mechanics and the music. Oh my god, the music.
The genre-sticker people slap on this game is "Spectacle Fighter", and I think that it suits the game perfectly.
Swinging your sword around, avoiding and parrying hits, slicing enemies into tiny, bite-sized bits with the game's Blade Mode, everything is there to put on such an awesome show for you. And all that in the VERY FIRST MINUTES of the game, placing a huge grin on your face that will stay there until the badass end.

You play the game as Raiden, a cyborg working for the Private Military Company (PMC for short) "Maverick", on a protection detail for a peace-propagating Prime Minister of an unnamed country.
After a brief introduction, the convoy is attacked by members of "Desperado", another PMC, who kidnap and execute said Prime Minister, instead propagating war and terror as opposed to peace for having a larger influence,a more meaningful impact on the advances in technology, and, in the end, a more positive side for everyone else.

Aaaand one hopeless, one-sided battle later, which leaves us with an almost-dead Raiden, we get equipped with a new, stronger cyborg body, and start trekking on a new path.

A dark path... a path of revenge...and vengeance... ¬.¬

God that was so cheesy.

Now, I shan't spoil the game for you, so I won't talk about the in-game story much.
What I will talk about is the mechanics and the gameplay.

As with most of these games, you have your light, and your heavy attack moves, and all the combo moves you can pull off with combining these two variants of attacks.
You have a variety of subweapons, like grenades, EMP (Electromagnetic Pulse) grenades, Lock-on and dumbfire rockets, as well as two variants of stealth items, the all-powerful CARDBOARD BOX, and a steel drum, which are by themselves a nod to the whole Metal Gear franchise, and its stealth gameplay, and more of a comedy relief than an actually useful item.
And on top of that, there are unique weapons that you obtain by defeating bosses, and researching and unlocking them in the lab.

Alongside the regular story missions, you have VR (Virtual Reality) Missions, which more or less serve as TUTORIALS for the game, showing you how some moves are done, how you can approach or eliminate enemies, and so on.
You need to pay attention to the VR missions, because they WILL teach you some of the things you'll NEED for completing the game, such as the use of the AR Visor, Ninja Run, Blocking/Parrying, Blade Mode and the Zandatsu.

The Augmented Reality Visor lets Raiden look for collectible items in his immediate surroundings, and even lets him see through walls. If you're a completionist nut, you'll want to keep using this mode as often as possible.

Ninja Running is achieved by moving while holding the designated button pressed. This allows Raiden swift unimpaired movement over uneven terrain, running over small fences, up walls, deflecting enemy bullets or simply moving faster than regular walking. Keep in mind that using Ninja Run will disable the AR Visor.

Blocking and Parrying are the moves that are going to save your life in this game.
Without a proper dodge move in the beginning, you're going to have to learn how to do these moves.
Blocking at the exact moment of impact of an enemies attack parries the attack, and leaves the enemy vulnerable to a devastating counter-attack, letting you finish them off,
or prompting you to enter Blade Mode with a blueish flash of the screen.

Upon entering blade mode, the time slows down to a crawl, and you're given the ability to either manually and precisely choose the direction and angle of Raiden's next sword swing, or slash swiftly in either the horizontal or vertical direction by pressing the light and heavy attack buttons.
Blade Mode allows you to precisely attack vulnerable enemies, slicing off their limbs, their shields, cut missiles and various flying things out of the air.
When in blade mode, and when finishing off an enemy, you'll notice a red rectangle somewhere on their body/frame. Cutting through this area will allow Raiden to perform a Zandatsu move, stealing the enemie's reserves of self-repairing nanomachine paste, and replenishing his own health and energy bars.

The game itself just feels amazing to play.
Everything is nice and responsive, the controls work flawlessly for a PC port, and even the on-screen prompts are replaced with the buttons you're currently using, whether it's a keyboard/mouse combo, or a gamepad.
I have noticed that it's slightly easier to get out of grapple moves by rotating or jerking the thumbstick than it is by mashing the keyboard keys, but that's not such a big thing, really, and I've actually found it easier to play the game using the keyboard/mouse combo than the gamepad, but I'm a fullblown PC gamer, so that just comes natural, I guess.

The boss fights are some of the most over-the-top fights in similar games, and each bossfight is accompanied by its respective boss theme, which makes it feel just that much intense.
And I'm not kidding with this, sometimes I'd replay a boss fight for their theme ALONE.

Now, I've dodged spoilers as much as possible in this review, but I'll do a few more additional entries about this game later on, and just gush about more of the amazing things about the game.
And there will be spoilers, so YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is available on Steam for 20$ or your regional equivalent, and includes all of the DLC released.
For 20$, this is an insanely good deal.
If you're even remotely into games like Metal Gear Rising Revengeance, games like Devil May Cry, God of War, Darksiders, you should get this game.

Because, for 20$, you don't have an excuse not to.
Allow Steam to perform a Zandatsu on your wallet, you'll thank me.
Also, who knows, maybe we persuade Platinum to do more PC ports of their amazing games.



Get it here, what are you waiting for !?!
http://store.steampowered.com/app/235460/

OOH, ALMOST FORGOT. WE HAVE FANART !!!

This awesome piece of a cyborg version of yours truly, wielding the Murasama HF Blade was done by "Chef" !
Thank you so much Sir !

Unlike its older siblings, Batman Arkham Origins wasn't made by Rocksteady.
The "brainchild" of Warner Bros Games Montreal, this game is inferior to its predecessors.

The game feels more like a pricey expansion pack for Arkham City than a full, stand-alone game.
Most of the gadgets return (which is kind of a paradox), with slight re-skins or tiny adjustments, to make them seem new.
The doublehook, or the ice grenade, for example.

They did try to expand the city, but for more than obvious reasons; to prolong the game.
But, because they were aware that most of the gamers out there would find it tedious, they implemented fast-travel via the Batwing, which then completely removes the point of a much larger city.

The inexperience of the crew that made the game shows so easily ingame.

One of the biggest design flaws that I noticed while playing was a simple pathing issue.
I'm kind of loose when it comes to said issues, I try not to hold it against the games I like,
and I WAS RATHER EXCITED for this game. You know, high hopes and all.
Why wouldn't I be, Asylum and City were way more than decent games.
But I just couldn't hide the disappointment with this game.

The problem manifests itself at about half the game in, where you enter a hotel in Gotham.

Spoiler alert.

You go through an amusement park-like contraption that our beloved Joker left for us,
you pick up some things, you make progress.
Now, the issue I was referring to concerns a balcony you end up on when you go through the whole ordeal.
There's a story-related trigger involved after this point that takes you out of the hotel entirely, and you never have to go back on foot, but when pathing back through this room (if you're a completionist, and you're chasing trophies and whatnot),
you can clearly see the doorway that you need to take in order to leave the room.
The doorway is unobstructed and the only logical thing you'd have to do is use your cape and simply glide to the door, and leave the room.
I guess that was too simple for WBG Montreal, and they decided "NOPE, YOU BETTER GO THROUGH THE WHOLE ROOM ON FOOT, BECAUSE WE CANT HAVE YOU TAKE A 2 MINUTE SHORTCUT, NO SIR".
When trying to glide to said door, the game triggers a pitfall event and puts you back on the balcony.

Sloppy game design. Very very sloppy game design.

Upon launch there were many, MANY bugs. Game crashing for no apparent reason,
unresponsive commands, game-breaking glitches (one of the broadcast towers simply locks you inside, and you cant progress unless you load a check point, leaving that one place unresolved), and so on.

Also WBG Montreal clearly decided to make the ratio of Combat-to-Stealth much higher, since there's so many goddamn fights involved, and not enough stealth sections.
It was so fun playing with thugs and hoodlums in Arkham City or Asylum, hanging them from gargoyles, tackling them from ventilation shafts and whatnot.
Here, nnnnnot so much.

I'm not sure if this was a game problem, but this is my own experience.
The fighting doesn't feel the same. It feels more sluggish, slower, unresponsive.
Some fighting animations could not be interrupted unlike in Arkham City,
and you'd just get hit by common thugs over and over.
I've had many gameovers by thug-beatdown because of unresponsive controls.

Like weapons, everything else in the game is recycled in some way, shape or form.
The Riddler trophies are back, and I'm fine with that. It was a nice little puzzle sidequest,
for when you felt like taking a break from bashing skulls in.
But there's stuff to scan again, there's the same find-all-signs-solve-all-things-to-make-a-mysterious-character-appear, and I personally have a problem with that.

To anyone who has played the other two Arkham games, its more than clear that WBG Montreal simply didnt bother with their game.
They sat down around a table, decided they'll just cash-in on an existing franchise,
recycle EVERYTHING from the previous game,
and use the rest of the budget they had to hire someone to write a decent story at least.

Half-assed villains with completely forgettable faces and personalities (I seem to recall there was some kind of a snake-girl or something, but meh), 
too much bloody fighting, not enough stealth scenes, bugs, and multiplayer.

Yes, you've read that right. A Batman Arkham game has MULTIPLAYER. 

Now, I have to admit, I did NOT finish this game. I got to about 70%, and then I just outright stopped playing.
The game didn't hold any interest for me, there was nothing pulling me back to play it,
no "leash-tugging", no promise of excitement, nothing.

For all of this, BATMAN: ARKHAM ORIGINS gets a

~WARNER BROS GAMES MONTEREAL / 10~

*Phew*
There, I'm done with this review. Fuckin' just, put it to rest, and let it die peacefully.
Now where's my 3DS and my Zelda games... *rummages*

~~~~ UPDATE ~~~~

FANART !!! BIT-RANT HAS FANART O_______O

Here's a Cali-Batman, making sure Gotham is safe, and all the criminals and thugs piss their pants before going to bed~
Also, the Moon is either derpy or lonely. Or whistling at the sight of Calibutt.

This awesome chibi-masterpiece was done by majortom, thank you so much !!!

Mini Reviews !!!

This is something I figured I'd do when either I don't have time,
or the game doesn't really have that much for me to talk about, but I feel that it still deserves attention.

So, without further delay, I'd like to introduce you to...

Steamworld Dig is a sort of a sandboxie game where you dig for ore underground,
surface back up, sell your wares, and go back deeper into the earth.
So, much like Motherload. Except SWD has a twist to it.

To put it sweet and short, it's like Motherload, Dig-Dug and Metroid had a bastard child after a wicked threesome.
You play as Rusty, a Steambot who arrives at a small desert mining town of Tumbleton,
ready to inherit a mine from his Uncle Joe. Yeah, I know, apparently robots have Uncles.
Driven by curiosity (and greed), you delve into the mines in search of truth about what happened to your Uncle, who hasn't been seen in quite a while.

Steam World Dig plays much like a classic platformer, with a few additions.
You run, jump, whack enemies and collect stuff.
Using the tools at your disposal, you're able to break blocks and uncover various treasure that you can sell in town, and buy much needed upgrades for Rusty.
During your underground expeditions, you will stumble upon caverns and mineshafts which either hold an upgrade for Rusty (Story related),
or caverns that hold valuable ore and resources you can use to purchase upgrades (optional).
The caverns are usually some form of a puzzle, and often require the use of one,
or more of Rusty's story-related upgrades to "solve".
Speaking of "story-related items", since Rusty is a Steambot all of his upgrades are powered by water, which can be found underground in small pools,
and jumping into said pool will make Rusty absorb the water, filling up his water tanks.

The game itself requires much backtracking,
because you end up going up'n'down whenever your inventory fills up.
Your backpack has upgradeable slots that hold the minerals you mine from the ground, 
and each kind of minerals uses up a single slot and stacks up to a certain number of units. 
Some stacks can hold up to 3 or 4, some only slot one single mineral.
You can, if needed, dispose of something already inside your backpack to pick up something new, but since the despawn time of mined items is rather large,
you don't really need to worry about it.
Killed enemies, on the other hand, drop one of three items; a health item, a water replenishment item, or an item that adds to the flame in Rusty's chest-furnace,
allowing you more time spent underground with the lights on.

Steamworld Dig, even if seemingly repetitive, is quite fun and I've personally been unable to drop the controller until I've finished it.
You're always curious about what you'll stumble upon next, and if you're a lootwhore like me, you'll want all the stuff you can get,
both from mining underground and surface shops.

Sweet graphics, easy-to-learn controls, fun gameplay and an interesting story should be enough of a reason for you to grab this awesome indie game.

It's available on Steam right now, for under 9 Euros and, while I'm typing out this review, 
it's on 20% off, for just a bit over 7 Eu's.
Not saying you can't google-search it or whatever,
but supporting the indie guys is always a good idea. ¬.¬

Steamworld Dig gets an 8 out of 10 on our indie-games scale.

http://www.steamworldgames.com/dig/
http://store.steampowered.com/app/252410