Support me on Patreon: patreon.com/underthemayo Mayo merch here! teespring.com/stores/underthemayo UA-cam Memberships to my channel now available, click the "Join" button. Follow me on Twitch at twitch.tv/underthemayo
Subbed! Really good stuff...I don't have Graven but I have Wrath Aeon Of Ruin(since almost 3 years now), Graven like Wrath has been in EA hell for a lot, the real problem is that 3D Realms gave us only update with images and that's it! How can you have feedbacks from the players? Also they've launched soooo many games at once, it's impossible to work on every of them.
4:32 Ahh yes the "Did the devs actually play their game?" problem. Sometimes it feels like you run into these issues because the developers aren't actually dogfooding the game the players will play. Instead if feels like they play with the debug console always on.
it is SO inspired by the old original graven artist from sidereal scourge, the band!!! Same thematics and even almost same music, Copy-paste ; CRAZY AHHAHA!!! the game is brand new ; when you dont know how to name your game; just pick a random artist name, thats it XD HAHAHAAHHA
The weapon limitations are probably there because this game has co-op multiplayer. It forces players to specialize. But yeah, it makes no sense in single player.
If I remember correctly Dark Messiah of Might & Magic also had a system where you had to put weapons, spells and potions into the quickbar to be able to use them. But it worked because the quickbar didn't care about the size of the weapon or item. A potion needed one slot, the two handed sword or the bow also just needed one slot. You could actually equip 10 different things.
The combat would have worked a whole lot better IMO if they took inspiration from Undying: magic with one hand, weapons in the other, letting you dual wield both options.
I mean, it feels like if they added a map system, fixed the inventory so it actually functions like a shooter and made it so reloading a save didn't return you to the hub, the game would actually be pretty decent. Those all feel like patchable things so I hope they do that, though it feels like stuff that should've been figured out for a 1.0 release.
@@Flameshadow22 I'm with you there, personally it feels like people expected this game to be something other than what it was designed to be. I think it's a game that will age well as people go into it with a better understanding of what it's trying to do. It's not a boomer shooter, it's as SplatterCatGaming said, it's like 70% FPS, 20% RPG and 10% Metroidvania. Mayo is complaining about the spells here but they're abilities, not weapons. It's not trying to be Hexen, the spells aren't meant to be your main damage dealers.
Kudos for knowing when to give up. As I've gotten older, I've gotten better myself at letting go when things just don't resonate strongly enough. I'll be keeping an eye on this after some patching, as I usually do for new releases anyway. Thanks mayo
I've found this the older I got with games. I'd usually just try and slog my way through to finish a game because I spent money on it but now I will just stop playing if I'm not vibing with it.
Idk man, being now 40 when I spend money...I must finish it, that's why I mostly avoid AAA games, I always prefer indie games like this one...still not sure about Graven though.
Didn't expect you to spend this much time with it , the reason I gave up on the game is cause it's super mixed . I encountered multiple bugs especially with softlocking . I really hope they fix the bugs , inventory , stamina and assign a key for the portions , if they do that I'll go in and finish the game . Great review man , I would honestly recommend the DLC for Amid Evil called Black Labrinth any day over this .
Thanks for doing this. Graven is a game I have wanted to like for a long time but the longtime unpatched bugs at release and downright confusing game design elements did make me put the game down after a while. That being said, the game looks and sounds amazing and the map design is peak. I hope that your video helps the devs move away from some of their design choices.
That's a real shame. As someone who loves the Heretic and Hexen games, I was really excited for Graven. But now, after learning about the issues that the game has, I'm now thinking that I should've waited for the reviews before buying it. (Sigh) Oh well!
Play it and make up your own mind for yourself. I am enjoying my time with the game and am very happy to have bought it. It does have some rough edges that need fixing. According to the faq they want to support modding so I would like to see more support for this game so we can have a modding community for it.
@@kivie13Ya, I really want to try it now despite the mixed reviews. There just aren't enough games like this these days. I grew up playing Hexen in the 90's and no game has given me that same feeling since.
@@j85grim4 I finally completed it and overall I liked it. Be advised there is a bug in the game in act 3 that keeps you from completing the game as intended. It is known as the mystic bug. There is a work around by drowning yourself (strange I know) so you can move further into the hub. There are other bugs people have complained about but I didn't encounter them. If you liked the clever level design in Hexen you probably would like this. It's easy to get lost in Graven and turned around which is something I like, and I like how the levels twist back on themselves to get back to the main hub. For the price I am good with the game. Don't go into it expecting a boomer shooter and I think that is where a lot of people got disappointed about.
@@kivie13 I'm kind of bored with most boomer shooters to be honest. Most of them don't offer anything new or interesting and more of just map packs and reskins for 90's games. Do you know of any other first person medieval dark fantasy games that are good besides Skyrim and it's endless mods?
I’ll agree with two of your criticisms of this game. The no map and the not restarting at a saved area, everything else though? crouch jumping is such a common boomer shooter mechanic. I’m all for graven believing players are smart enough to figure things out on their own without holding your hand on every little aspect. It’s refreshing not to have a single tutorial honestly.
Crouch jumping is like tank controls, completely outdated and entirely unnecessary. I've played around a dozen modern boomer shooters and none of them have crouch jumping, for good reason. There is no reason to include it. It does not make the game better.
@@torinsmith9867 It makes deathmatch in games more interesting by allowing greater/more nuanced freedom of movement and hitbox placement changes. But if there's no deathmatch then it's whatever.
Intuitively, seeing the obstacles that Graven expects you to crouch-jump over, I would just hold the jump button expecting to clamber over because I've never seen crouch-jumping used that way. It's always been just a way to fit into tight elevated spaces in any game I've ever played.
In Early Access the game had a map but it was broken and would reset every time you closed the game, guess they couldn't fix it and just removed the map feature
I hope they bring a patch game. Where they fix all of the issues here, and to make the gameplay better. Graven looks very nice, but it's a shame that three years of development it gave us some problems.
Can't you still do a sponsored video while being honest about the game? Just let the developer/publisher know ahead of time you won't hold back and if they give the green light, go for it. Hate for you to turn down money simply because you can't recommend the game.
Of course and I always am. I've done very critical sponsored videos before. But this is a case of me not being able to recommend the game to you guys. And when that happens, I'm not personally okay with doing it as a sponsored video. If it were early access, it would be another story.
@@underthemayowell I don't agree with all your opinions on every games you decide to play we all have different tastes but I do respect it when you have takes on trying games and what can be improved and I'm not saying you're in the wrong for throwing criticism on games because that criticism can be important for developers to understand what's wrong and to improve the Main things in games an improve upon them( if you do read this I appreciate it and don't mean this in any negative to Heart to your opinions playing certain games)
@@underthemayooh and just curious? would you be interested in trying out a game called God Hand I would like to hear your opinion on that game if you ever decide to play it!🙂
Graven was in development hell, which is why it is how it is. Many conflicting ideas and lack of direction. Also, crouch jump is in a ton of games, one should always try it whenever they can.
You've earned a lot of respect from me not taking a sponsorship you didn't think the game deserved. That must not have been an easy decision. I hope people see and support you for your integrity. Thanks for being honest. Too few reviewers these days are.
Thanks. Yeah, it hurt to say no because I had agreed to it 2 months before based on my enjoyment of the early access stuff I'd experimented with. So I was expecting it. Got the full game and after about 10 hours I just realized I couldn't do it. It is what it is.
I remember playing through the early access version and getting bored about an hour in. I was hoping that the full release would be a major improvement over the previous state, but sadly it seems that this is not the case. Too bad, there were some cool things about this game.
Yeah no map is also a dealbreaker for me…how can you not have a map in a game that rewards exploration and backtracking? Shame too, I love the aesthetic. Maybe I’ll grab it if they confirm it’s added in a future update
@@LuckyJensenn yup, truly. Someone made a comment that makes a lot of sense. Devs like this spend too much time QA testing in debug mode, while not actually playing the game the way players experience it from start to finish.
I make every word that Mayo said in this video about Graven, my words, I agree with everything (I speak from my experience with the game). I played the demo in 2021 for two days thinking it would have a similar vibe to Heretic and Hexen, I was wrong. The game save is annoying and tiring, I left the game never to play again.
I bought this back in 2022 and I'm excited to give it a go. I found combat a bit lacking, but really enjoyed the atmosphere and setting. It didn't feel like a shooter to me though and I don't think it aims to be. I hope they polished the combat since EA because I don't mind a slow paced adventure game. Like a medieval Blood West. Thank you for the review.
Hey there, I have a couple of answers to your questions. When the game popped out on steam it got a trailer that showed a slow meticulous game about magic, casting spells multitude of rituals and so on, very early on they changed almost all spells to look like guns and for some reason took a lot of magic copletely out, and relace it with whacking enemies in melee with a staff. The changes got so drastic that people got angry that the game no longer looks anything like its preview trailers, so they chnaged the trailers... to answer your question why it gone through play testing, I think they left it in from how the game looked previously, fantasy horror game with magic and investory.
when you dont know how to name your game; just pick a random artist name, stole and copy it from the art; thats it ; everybody dont buy this failure, just listen to me and keep your money. this is crap; you dont need 2 step in it ^^
The last few seconds of this video shows the one part that pissed me off more than anything in any game in the last two decades: You hop onto a magically appearing stone path floating above an insta-death height, when you reach the end you're rewarded with better than normal armor and some gold on a ridiculously small ledge. If you're like me you grab the armor immediately and try to side-shuffle to collect the gold. If you fall, which you likely will, the armor does not respawn, and the gold you collected will be deducted for dying. I fell three times trying to get the last bar of gold, at which point I rage-quit and went to go watch a review video to confirm my frustration. I agree with everything said here. The level design is high quality, but there are parts that feel like a masochist came in with a lifetime of nerd-rage and designed some fuck-you parts just for the hell of it. Did spend three hours trying to find the unknown sewer passage under the murky water in an otherwise nondescript area that you absolutely must find in order to progress? Oh well, fuck you. Did you not know how that you had to burn then zap the half dozen red glob things on the tree in that one room in order to destroy the vine barriers and progress? Oh well, fuck you. Those are just a few examples. Sorry for the rant. If you read all this, you're probably as pissed as I am.
3D Realms should just get rid of them already,They've made nothing but flops for 10 years now....ROTT Remake,Bombshell,Unfinished Rad Rodgers Game and Phantom Fury looks like it's gonna suck too
Guarantee given all the issues 3DR has had lately that someone came down on Graven & Wrath's dev teams and told them to ship them as soon as possible. What is there, in Graven at least, works, but it is clearly in need of continued polish... like an early access game. Let's just hope it can get that support rather than being tossed out as a bad job.
Too bad, when I saw the mixed reviews on steam during the EA I thought I would let them finish it because it looked good and promising. Like you say, really feels like passionate peoples were working on it. Each new trailer got me a bit more confident. But judging by your review, and Gman's one, I'll wait to try it, they still might improve things with further updates. Thanks for the review !
I wanted to play this one so bad but your criticisms are valid. Also there is a PlayStation 5 port that is legitimately broken unplayable and the dev team haven’t addressed the issues at all.
Heard about release version being around, was waiting for review videos starting to pop up! Sad you didn't like it, but also not surprised somehow - the game had some issues even during the demo phase.
Amid Evil exists. A near perfect 10/10 action packed shooter with amazing level design and an incredible, diverse (all useful) arsenal of weapons. If you can push past your medieval aesthetic aversion to play this game, then you 100% owe it to yourself to play Amid Evil. It's far and away my favorite of the boomer shooter genre. I'll just keep saying it and hoping it ends up here some day--one of my favorite gaming channels. Bummed about all these Graven issues. I always thought this game looked fun, but I have no interest in playing a game that goes out of its way to force me in to unfun and tedious situations. The backtracking from the hub sans map is a definite deal breaker for me. Maybe it'll get an overhaul?
AE is a game completely devoid of difficulty or a decent (consistent, well rounded) enemy roster. It runs afoul of all the game design stuff he preaches. I don't think he'd like it too much.
I think it embraces the idea of every weapon has it's use and balancing that really well. I also think it's the kind of game you jump to high difficulty right away--something Mayo always does. I'm no pro or speed runner, sure, but I found the high difficulty to be the perfect sweet spot.@@WolfShi3ld
I loved the demo a couple years ago despite mixed reviews and while the things shown are legitimate issues, none seem to be a dealbreaker for me and my admittedly overly high patience and peculiar tastes. One of my favorite games of last year was a metroidvania with no map lol. I definitely appreciate the integrity of not accepting a sponsorship from a game you can't in good conciance endorse, though.
Did you get early access to the 1.0 update that comes out on the 23rd or is this the early access version? I notice you didn't mention that update at all, I'm curious if it'll have fixes for any of your major gripes here.
Yeah the 2 only weapons sucks. Reminds me of Control where all weapons are rolled into one gun but can only equip 2 of its mode. It so annoying keep going into tab menu to change a mode with another its just makes unnecessary clunkiness.
14:35 "Literally no way to the elevators and softlocked" Its not quite a softlock if you can still progress, might have required unconventional methods to continue and probably something that should be changed but still not a softlock
Anything that discourages you from turning the game off and continuing later is on my absolute DEADLY GAME DESIGN SINS list. I still remember the anxiety I felt as a child playing games with bad / non-existent save systems and "having to" leave the PC running with the game on pause for hours to take care of something else in real life. Or worse, feeling compelled to keep playing even though you're not enjoying yourself or even though you have some obligation to tend to, just because you hope the next (actual) checkpoint will come soon and finally save you from having to repeat minutes of gameplay. This sort of thing was NEVER acceptable. There is NO excuse. The fact that they not only had a game in early access for several years but then declare it "1.0" with this issue completely invalidates any positives. Just like with Wrath I am simply baffled at these half-baked, abandoned nostalgia bait games from 3DR. Make a game or don't! Don't set all the wheels in motion and keep the illusion up for years and years only to pull the rug like this. I cannot imagine that this kind of scam is profitable for investors, considering the years of dev work involved. So it comes down to plain old incompetence. Whoever is ultimately responsible for how these two projects, Wrath and Graven, went down should be blacklisted from everything. I mean it. Stop putting up for sale shit that is years away from being playable. You can have a Steam page and collect wishlists without collecting money. This makes the difference between smart investing and a scam. It is smart to not commit 100% to a project that you don't know will find an audience. But you are tying your own hands into having to deliver, by selling copies of something that doesn't exist yet. You are also making it harder for the devs to actually create the product because all those shit jank early access builds are extra labor to create, plus having to deal with the constant negative reactions because you are selling broken garbage, pretending like it's playable already. P.S. I learned my lesson with Wrath 4+ years ago. Bought into early access to try it out, it was A JOKE so I refunded quickly. When Graven was announced I didn't fall for it and thank god. Now look at where Wrath is, again, years later. And Graven is shit as well. These projects are strong arguments for Steam to get rid of Early Access altogether. It doesn't even matter if they INTEND to be scams, they effectively, functionally are scams regardless.
I have no problem with progression systems when I play MMORPGs. I can’t stand them in old school boomer shooters. Economies and upgrade systems are a complete dealbreaker for me
Thanks for the heads up on the very annoying stuff in this game because it looks like one that I want especially as I'm on console I was glad it was available because so many other cool looking indie games are not on console, time to take it off my wishlist on ps5 and xbox
@@underthemayo oh I’m aware, they kept defending it as “the engineer who was working it made all THESE features, don’t you like those features instead of the map he ditched? Please?”
I was unfortunate to play this game in order to review it too... and pretty much everything you coverd here was constantly annoying me too. This is a game where I do like a lot of the ideas. In fact I do believe they put all of it in the game with good intentions, but it just never came together and in order to fix it, they would need to pretty much change a lot in the game. I got through all 3 areas though... and loved the final boss ... that was cool
@@PenguinDT I know, but the actual developer is Slipgate Ironworks, not 3D Realms. That seemed like the very frequent mistake of confusing the develope with the publisher. This is not "3D realms developed game" as far as I know.
@@Rodniikun The problem is, sponsors usually require you to lie so their product gets promoted. This game wasn't good enough to be recommended so Mayo treated it accordingly.
[15:20] "oh yes, of course, I should have known." uh, actually you should have. It's ingrained in me to try crouch in those situations ever since Half-Life. (i think quite a few games use that mantling technique without any apparent need of it.)
Oh please. So just because I've never played a game with this very specific jumping mechanic, it's my fault for not knowing how to do something the game never told me about.
Yes. Your condescendingly written "uh, actually you should have" was taken seriously. Don't speak that way if you don't want to be heard that way. @@Blackmark52
@@underthemayo "Your condescendingly written" Really? I knew you played Half-Life. You should probably ignore the comments if a fan can get under the skin so easily. I watch your videos because they sound so level headed. Don't ruin it for me.
Holding crouch at the end of your jump is just common sense in an FPS. Have you never played Half Life? I don't think a game like this is targeting people who are new to the genre.
In Thief I and II, while not strictly FPS games, you jump and mantle obstacles by pressing the jump key and keeping it depressed. That is convenient. And I guess it makes sense that you can jump higher by starting the jump from crouched position, but only then.
A lot of comments about crouch jumping... I think there is a slippery slope if genre conventions get to be implicit and the player is expected to know all of them and learn all of them by trial and error. If crouch jumping was optional, intended as a secret "trick", then it wouldn't need some mention in a tutorial. But since it is evidently needed (the shallow grave example speaks for itself) it's one of the mechanics that MUST be taught to the player explicitly. In this game! Not in some other game from 25 years ago. HOW the game teaches the player is an open question. I'm not a big fan of forced tutorials because they hurt the replay value of a game. I actually think a fucking text screen where it's written "you can jump and then crouch to make it up to slightly higher places" would be perfectly fine. I'm not demanding extra production value or so-called "cinematic" design - quite the contrary. But there needs to be an explicit acknowledgment of crouch jumping somewhere in the game. Back in the day games shipped with manuals and if the manual told you how to crouch jump that would also be acceptable. Nowadays with all digital publishing I suppose you could have an item "manual" in the pause menu. Nothing wrong with that. Very cheap to add. The alternative is that genres become more and more insular as the games in each genre become UNPLAYABLE for anyone who doesn't bring 10+ years of experience with the genre to a brand new game that isn't even a sequel. This alternative is no good for the medium so people need to stop making excuses for it. It's always a veiled pat on their own backs for having experience with the genre any way, never comes from a rational place.
It kind of did though. Don't pretend that there was never a time when you felt lost and went back to the same places you had been before for no good reason and wasted your time. Technically, no game ever needs a map since you can memorize everything if you try hard enough or just create your own on a textbook or something. That doesn't mean it's a good design choice.
All of this is valid. But... crouch jumping is probably the single most intuitive and established movement mechanic ever made. It's akin to raising your legs so you can hurdle over stuff. You wouldn't attempt to clear a picket fence IRL by keeping your legs straight during a jump unless you wanted to sterilize yourself for free. Granted, they should've made the very first jump in the game require it, so you knew you could manually change your jump height from the get-go. I think Half Life 2 introduced it like that.
I don't. And I haven't played half life 1. But Ive used crouch jumping in some games for a boost by crouching FIRST. And used crouched at the end of a jump in Cry Of Fear to get through a small opening. Never would I think that pressing crouch at the END of a jump would cause the jump to go higher.
It's funny how I was questioning your lack of a map complaint and then you mentioned the game had a HUB world and immediately I started dreading, I loathe overworld and HUB worlds in most games, it might as well be the part where the designers are like, "hey look up a guide now".
I knew game would be horrible during it's early access. I don't know why are you calling it "not a bad game" if it is, literally, garbage soulless piece of the code man. It's one of the worst games we had on this channel, it's Redfall kind of bad. You definitely held some punches about it i can tell. You should have been way more hateful towards it - game deserves all the hate. I hope whoever made the game is fired from 3D Realms and won't ever again make any games. The responsible for this mess should be fired for being completely unprofessional and talentless
I didn't hold my punches. I ripped it for the lack of map, the confused inventory system, the pointless stamina system, and stupid respawn system. What more do you want than me genuinely expressing my criticisms? I don't agree that it's a straight up bad game, and I certainly don't agree with "garbage soulless piece of code". There was a lot I liked about my time in Graven and I'm not going to lie about that to exaggerate some rage video.
You spend several minutes complaining about having to crouch jump up to a platform in a room that's actually filled with barrels and boxes you can use to jump up to it with, and also the 'intended' way to get up to said platform is to jump to it from another, also crouch jumping is an actual mechanic in the game and can be used to stop fall damage. You complain about stamina being low, not knowing potions refill it and also only having 107 max HP in act 2, meaning you either ignored or had no idea about the shines littered everywhere that permanently raise stats I also have a funny feeling you didn't raise any of the spells either because something like fire goes from 'it sets stuff on fire' to 'it crowd controls, and spreads to others and they explode on death causing even more fire' Impressive levels of getting filtered, you're a real games journalist. Congrats?
Gmans review was posted today and he trashed on it for the spells as well. Maybe its not something widly known that they can be upgraded for whatever reason since I didn't hear much about that in either review.
I found at minimum 6 shrines which eventually raised my health over 110. Just because you don't see that in footage doesn't mean it didn't happen. And not every shrine increases HP. Great advice about the barrels. I should have taken a barrel with me into the shallow grave so I didn't have to restart the game from not knowing about crouch jumping! I did, in fact, upgrade the fire spell but it took many many hours to get to that point because they require hidden special upgrade tokens and I found that very late despite heavily exploring. The upgraded was nice, but getting that upgrade already 17 hours in was nothing to write home about as I'd already soured on the game due to it's other bad design elements. And it doesn't change the fact that the fire is AWFUL for a long portion of the game. Potions refilling stamina doesn't excuse a stupid pointless stamina system being there in the first place. But hey, I'm glad this game has at least one defender! Maybe try to start a support group!
My personal policy is that I won't take money to promote a game that I can't recommend. I've done sponsored videos that are very critical but ultimately I still recommend the games. This was a case where it crossed the line for me. Maybe they still would have paid but I'm not personally okay with it.
@@underthemayoI think its a policy that shows a lot of respect. They want to promote the game and you only do so if you stand by the quality. Its fair to them and to your audience.
Most of the times yes. Especially if it's from a scummy triple A company that knows you have a huge audience of naïve children and they don't even want you to mention the fact that you got paid to praise the game. Do you understand now the gaming industry problem with all the shills ''reviewing'' these triple A games?
@@underthemayo So sponsored video means recommending something? I always thought that they pay someone to check out the game and review it. Now I get it, thanks :D
If an indie game, voice acting adds considerable cost and not just choosing anyone is ideal. I think people need to read more in the first place considering the literacy rate fallen like a rock, so text is fine. It can only be an issue if there is no atmosphere and music to fill in the hole.
Yo mayo. Since I saw you play mortal kombat 1. Why not give tekken 8 a try. Because it honestly feels like a very solid game and I would be curious how you would review it.
Support me on Patreon: patreon.com/underthemayo
Mayo merch here! teespring.com/stores/underthemayo
UA-cam Memberships to my channel now available, click the "Join" button.
Follow me on Twitch at twitch.tv/underthemayo
Subbed! Really good stuff...I don't have Graven but I have Wrath Aeon Of Ruin(since almost 3 years now), Graven like Wrath has been in EA hell for a lot, the real problem is that 3D Realms gave us only update with images and that's it! How can you have feedbacks from the players? Also they've launched soooo many games at once, it's impossible to work on every of them.
4:32 Ahh yes the "Did the devs actually play their game?" problem.
Sometimes it feels like you run into these issues because the developers aren't actually dogfooding the game the players will play. Instead if feels like they play with the debug console always on.
it is SO inspired by the old original graven artist from sidereal scourge, the band!!! Same thematics and even almost same music, Copy-paste ; CRAZY AHHAHA!!! the game is brand new ; when you dont know how to name your game; just pick a random artist name, thats it XD HAHAHAAHHA
The weapon limitations are probably there because this game has co-op multiplayer. It forces players to specialize. But yeah, it makes no sense in single player.
If I remember correctly Dark Messiah of Might & Magic also had a system where you had to put weapons, spells and potions into the quickbar to be able to use them. But it worked because the quickbar didn't care about the size of the weapon or item. A potion needed one slot, the two handed sword or the bow also just needed one slot. You could actually equip 10 different things.
Appriciate the honesty with this one. If you actually don't think the game is worth recommending, than you don't take a sponsorship. Respect that!
Are you gay?
The combat would have worked a whole lot better IMO if they took inspiration from Undying: magic with one hand, weapons in the other, letting you dual wield both options.
No the solution is much simpler, just have all weapons take one one space on the inventory.
It can be done right, like in Blood West.
@@semvisionor increase the slot count to 12 or 14
I mean, it feels like if they added a map system, fixed the inventory so it actually functions like a shooter and made it so reloading a save didn't return you to the hub, the game would actually be pretty decent.
Those all feel like patchable things so I hope they do that, though it feels like stuff that should've been figured out for a 1.0 release.
It's not trying to be a shooter though. It's trying to be an action RPG like Dark Messiah.
Well, if the devs won't fix them, maybe modders will? I gotta say, despite Mayo ripping on this, the game actually seems like a lot of fun
@@Flameshadow22 I'm with you there, personally it feels like people expected this game to be something other than what it was designed to be.
I think it's a game that will age well as people go into it with a better understanding of what it's trying to do.
It's not a boomer shooter, it's as SplatterCatGaming said, it's like 70% FPS, 20% RPG and 10% Metroidvania. Mayo is complaining about the spells here but they're abilities, not weapons. It's not trying to be Hexen, the spells aren't meant to be your main damage dealers.
RDR2 got away with all this
Kudos for knowing when to give up. As I've gotten older, I've gotten better myself at letting go when things just don't resonate strongly enough. I'll be keeping an eye on this after some patching, as I usually do for new releases anyway. Thanks mayo
I've found this the older I got with games. I'd usually just try and slog my way through to finish a game because I spent money on it but now I will just stop playing if I'm not vibing with it.
Idk man, being now 40 when I spend money...I must finish it, that's why I mostly avoid AAA games, I always prefer indie games like this one...still not sure about Graven though.
Didn't expect you to spend this much time with it , the reason I gave up on the game is cause it's super mixed . I encountered multiple bugs especially with softlocking . I really hope they fix the bugs , inventory , stamina and assign a key for the portions , if they do that I'll go in and finish the game . Great review man , I would honestly recommend the DLC for Amid Evil called Black Labrinth any day over this .
Thanks for doing this. Graven is a game I have wanted to like for a long time but the longtime unpatched bugs at release and downright confusing game design elements did make me put the game down after a while. That being said, the game looks and sounds amazing and the map design is peak. I hope that your video helps the devs move away from some of their design choices.
That's a real shame. As someone who loves the Heretic and Hexen games, I was really excited for Graven. But now, after learning about the issues that the game has, I'm now thinking that I should've waited for the reviews before buying it. (Sigh) Oh well!
Play it and make up your own mind for yourself. I am enjoying my time with the game and am very happy to have bought it. It does have some rough edges that need fixing. According to the faq they want to support modding so I would like to see more support for this game so we can have a modding community for it.
@@kivie13Ya, I really want to try it now despite the mixed reviews. There just aren't enough games like this these days. I grew up playing Hexen in the 90's and no game has given me that same feeling since.
@@j85grim4 I finally completed it and overall I liked it. Be advised there is a bug in the game in act 3 that keeps you from completing the game as intended. It is known as the mystic bug. There is a work around by drowning yourself (strange I know) so you can move further into the hub. There are other bugs people have complained about but I didn't encounter them.
If you liked the clever level design in Hexen you probably would like this. It's easy to get lost in Graven and turned around which is something I like, and I like how the levels twist back on themselves to get back to the main hub. For the price I am good with the game.
Don't go into it expecting a boomer shooter and I think that is where a lot of people got disappointed about.
@@kivie13 I'm kind of bored with most boomer shooters to be honest. Most of them don't offer anything new or interesting and more of just map packs and reskins for 90's games.
Do you know of any other first person medieval dark fantasy games that are good besides Skyrim and it's endless mods?
I’ll agree with two of your criticisms of this game. The no map and the not restarting at a saved area, everything else though? crouch jumping is such a common boomer shooter mechanic. I’m all for graven believing players are smart enough to figure things out on their own without holding your hand on every little aspect. It’s refreshing not to have a single tutorial honestly.
Crouch jumping is like tank controls, completely outdated and entirely unnecessary. I've played around a dozen modern boomer shooters and none of them have crouch jumping, for good reason. There is no reason to include it. It does not make the game better.
@@torinsmith9867 It makes deathmatch in games more interesting by allowing greater/more nuanced freedom of movement and hitbox placement changes.
But if there's no deathmatch then it's whatever.
So you like the godawful inventory???
Intuitively, seeing the obstacles that Graven expects you to crouch-jump over, I would just hold the jump button expecting to clamber over because I've never seen crouch-jumping used that way. It's always been just a way to fit into tight elevated spaces in any game I've ever played.
In Early Access the game had a map but it was broken and would reset every time you closed the game, guess they couldn't fix it and just removed the map feature
I hope they bring a patch game. Where they fix all of the issues here, and to make the gameplay better. Graven looks very nice, but it's a shame that three years of development it gave us some problems.
Can't you still do a sponsored video while being honest about the game? Just let the developer/publisher know ahead of time you won't hold back and if they give the green light, go for it. Hate for you to turn down money simply because you can't recommend the game.
Of course and I always am. I've done very critical sponsored videos before. But this is a case of me not being able to recommend the game to you guys. And when that happens, I'm not personally okay with doing it as a sponsored video.
If it were early access, it would be another story.
@@underthemayoIt's important to have standards. I tip my imaginary hat to you, good sir
@@underthemayowell I don't agree with all your opinions on every games you decide to play we all have different tastes but I do respect it when you have takes on trying games and what can be improved and I'm not saying you're in the wrong for throwing criticism on games because that criticism can be important for developers to understand what's wrong and to improve the Main things in games an improve upon them( if you do read this I appreciate it and don't mean this in any negative to Heart to your opinions playing certain games)
@@underthemayooh and just curious? would you be interested in trying out a game called God Hand I would like to hear your opinion on that game if you ever decide to play it!🙂
Definitely @@VileVeilt
Graven was in development hell, which is why it is how it is. Many conflicting ideas and lack of direction.
Also, crouch jump is in a ton of games, one should always try it whenever they can.
You've earned a lot of respect from me not taking a sponsorship you didn't think the game deserved. That must not have been an easy decision. I hope people see and support you for your integrity. Thanks for being honest. Too few reviewers these days are.
Thanks. Yeah, it hurt to say no because I had agreed to it 2 months before based on my enjoyment of the early access stuff I'd experimented with. So I was expecting it.
Got the full game and after about 10 hours I just realized I couldn't do it. It is what it is.
Just bought the game before 1.0, yeah, the inventory seems annoying but something they can fix with a patch
I remember playing through the early access version and getting bored about an hour in. I was hoping that the full release would be a major improvement over the previous state, but sadly it seems that this is not the case. Too bad, there were some cool things about this game.
I fear it will be the same for Wrath...an AEON of EA and the game comes out almost unifinished...it's pretty terrible.
Yeah no map is also a dealbreaker for me…how can you not have a map in a game that rewards exploration and backtracking? Shame too, I love the aesthetic. Maybe I’ll grab it if they confirm it’s added in a future update
But I remember a map being in the game tho ? Not on ur screen at all times but u can open it via a menu
@@snake41411it was in early access but the map was removed for the full release
So they had a map in early access and then it was removed in an update? lol that’s baffling
@@LuckyJensenn yup, truly. Someone made a comment that makes a lot of sense. Devs like this spend too much time QA testing in debug mode, while not actually playing the game the way players experience it from start to finish.
I hope Wrath is still good once its finished.
"still"?
I make every word that Mayo said in this video about Graven, my words, I agree with everything (I speak from my experience with the game). I played the demo in 2021 for two days thinking it would have a similar vibe to Heretic and Hexen, I was wrong. The game save is annoying and tiring, I left the game never to play again.
I bought this back in 2022 and I'm excited to give it a go. I found combat a bit lacking, but really enjoyed the atmosphere and setting. It didn't feel like a shooter to me though and I don't think it aims to be. I hope they polished the combat since EA because I don't mind a slow paced adventure game. Like a medieval Blood West.
Thank you for the review.
Hey there, I have a couple of answers to your questions. When the game popped out on steam it got a trailer that showed a slow meticulous game about magic, casting spells multitude of rituals and so on, very early on they changed almost all spells to look like guns and for some reason took a lot of magic copletely out, and relace it with whacking enemies in melee with a staff. The changes got so drastic that people got angry that the game no longer looks anything like its preview trailers, so they chnaged the trailers... to answer your question why it gone through play testing, I think they left it in from how the game looked previously, fantasy horror game with magic and investory.
when you dont know how to name your game; just pick a random artist name, stole and copy it from the art; thats it ; everybody dont buy this failure, just listen to me and keep your money. this is crap; you dont need 2 step in it ^^
The last few seconds of this video shows the one part that pissed me off more than anything in any game in the last two decades: You hop onto a magically appearing stone path floating above an insta-death height, when you reach the end you're rewarded with better than normal armor and some gold on a ridiculously small ledge. If you're like me you grab the armor immediately and try to side-shuffle to collect the gold. If you fall, which you likely will, the armor does not respawn, and the gold you collected will be deducted for dying. I fell three times trying to get the last bar of gold, at which point I rage-quit and went to go watch a review video to confirm my frustration. I agree with everything said here. The level design is high quality, but there are parts that feel like a masochist came in with a lifetime of nerd-rage and designed some fuck-you parts just for the hell of it. Did spend three hours trying to find the unknown sewer passage under the murky water in an otherwise nondescript area that you absolutely must find in order to progress? Oh well, fuck you. Did you not know how that you had to burn then zap the half dozen red glob things on the tree in that one room in order to destroy the vine barriers and progress? Oh well, fuck you. Those are just a few examples. Sorry for the rant. If you read all this, you're probably as pissed as I am.
first Kingpin Reloaded and now Graven, man Slipgate is fumbling hard...really expected more from 3D Realms.
3D Realms should just get rid of them already,They've made nothing but flops for 10 years now....ROTT Remake,Bombshell,Unfinished Rad Rodgers Game and Phantom Fury looks like it's gonna suck too
A mod to assign weapons to number keys is something I'll look forwards to when I buy this game in a fanatical choose your own bundle years from now.
Guarantee given all the issues 3DR has had lately that someone came down on Graven & Wrath's dev teams and told them to ship them as soon as possible. What is there, in Graven at least, works, but it is clearly in need of continued polish... like an early access game. Let's just hope it can get that support rather than being tossed out as a bad job.
Too bad, when I saw the mixed reviews on steam during the EA I thought I would let them finish it because it looked good and promising. Like you say, really feels like passionate peoples were working on it. Each new trailer got me a bit more confident. But judging by your review, and Gman's one, I'll wait to try it, they still might improve things with further updates.
Thanks for the review !
If there's one thing you DON'T want to remind gamers of...it's Daikatana
I wanted to play this one so bad but your criticisms are valid. Also there is a PlayStation 5 port that is legitimately broken unplayable and the dev team haven’t addressed the issues at all.
oh, man... i think i'll wait for a patch to fix all these issues before i start playing :(
Heard about release version being around, was waiting for review videos starting to pop up! Sad you didn't like it, but also not surprised somehow - the game had some issues even during the demo phase.
Amid Evil exists. A near perfect 10/10 action packed shooter with amazing level design and an incredible, diverse (all useful) arsenal of weapons. If you can push past your medieval aesthetic aversion to play this game, then you 100% owe it to yourself to play Amid Evil. It's far and away my favorite of the boomer shooter genre. I'll just keep saying it and hoping it ends up here some day--one of my favorite gaming channels. Bummed about all these Graven issues. I always thought this game looked fun, but I have no interest in playing a game that goes out of its way to force me in to unfun and tedious situations. The backtracking from the hub sans map is a definite deal breaker for me. Maybe it'll get an overhaul?
yes, he need to Play AE, game is amazing, especially playing it in the highest difficulty.
AE falls off hard when it becomes an jump-a-tron instead of a shooter in the latter half. Forges is the place of despair and not the good kind.
AE is a game completely devoid of difficulty or a decent (consistent, well rounded) enemy roster. It runs afoul of all the game design stuff he preaches. I don't think he'd like it too much.
I completely disagree--I love that entire world. I think it's a ton of fun. I was entertained the whole time.@@facepalmvideos1
I think it embraces the idea of every weapon has it's use and balancing that really well. I also think it's the kind of game you jump to high difficulty right away--something Mayo always does. I'm no pro or speed runner, sure, but I found the high difficulty to be the perfect sweet spot.@@WolfShi3ld
very well done video, very informative.
I loved the demo a couple years ago despite mixed reviews and while the things shown are legitimate issues, none seem to be a dealbreaker for me and my admittedly overly high patience and peculiar tastes. One of my favorite games of last year was a metroidvania with no map lol.
I definitely appreciate the integrity of not accepting a sponsorship from a game you can't in good conciance endorse, though.
Checkpoints should be considered a crime against humanity.
Slipgate have done some stinkers and the recent stinker Kingpin "reloaded" remaster. I tend to just stay away from their games now.
Did you get early access to the 1.0 update that comes out on the 23rd or is this the early access version? I notice you didn't mention that update at all, I'm curious if it'll have fixes for any of your major gripes here.
I was sent the full game last week for review. The 23rd update is for the public. The only thing it would change from my version is some bug fixes.
Yeah the 2 only weapons sucks. Reminds me of Control where all weapons are rolled into one gun but can only equip 2 of its mode.
It so annoying keep going into tab menu to change a mode with another its just makes unnecessary clunkiness.
14:35 "Literally no way to the elevators and softlocked"
Its not quite a softlock if you can still progress, might have required unconventional methods to continue and probably something that should be changed but still not a softlock
i think tge inventory idea is pretty good, kind of like loadout but freer
I always wondered why this game had mixed reviews on steam
Kinda weird that at first i kinda expected a arx fatalis\dark messiah from this. But no.
It was originally intended to be that, but then the direction changed.
@@theblobconsumes4859 They originally meant to make a good game but then they decided not to lmao
in the early access I was able to drink a potion with right click??
right click is alt fire
Man, your reviews are always honest and insightful. Thank you for de regular good quality content.
Looks awesome!
Anything that discourages you from turning the game off and continuing later is on my absolute DEADLY GAME DESIGN SINS list. I still remember the anxiety I felt as a child playing games with bad / non-existent save systems and "having to" leave the PC running with the game on pause for hours to take care of something else in real life. Or worse, feeling compelled to keep playing even though you're not enjoying yourself or even though you have some obligation to tend to, just because you hope the next (actual) checkpoint will come soon and finally save you from having to repeat minutes of gameplay. This sort of thing was NEVER acceptable. There is NO excuse. The fact that they not only had a game in early access for several years but then declare it "1.0" with this issue completely invalidates any positives. Just like with Wrath I am simply baffled at these half-baked, abandoned nostalgia bait games from 3DR. Make a game or don't! Don't set all the wheels in motion and keep the illusion up for years and years only to pull the rug like this. I cannot imagine that this kind of scam is profitable for investors, considering the years of dev work involved. So it comes down to plain old incompetence. Whoever is ultimately responsible for how these two projects, Wrath and Graven, went down should be blacklisted from everything. I mean it.
Stop putting up for sale shit that is years away from being playable. You can have a Steam page and collect wishlists without collecting money. This makes the difference between smart investing and a scam. It is smart to not commit 100% to a project that you don't know will find an audience. But you are tying your own hands into having to deliver, by selling copies of something that doesn't exist yet. You are also making it harder for the devs to actually create the product because all those shit jank early access builds are extra labor to create, plus having to deal with the constant negative reactions because you are selling broken garbage, pretending like it's playable already.
P.S. I learned my lesson with Wrath 4+ years ago. Bought into early access to try it out, it was A JOKE so I refunded quickly. When Graven was announced I didn't fall for it and thank god. Now look at where Wrath is, again, years later. And Graven is shit as well. These projects are strong arguments for Steam to get rid of Early Access altogether. It doesn't even matter if they INTEND to be scams, they effectively, functionally are scams regardless.
appreciate the honest review!
Are you going to do a review on the new ultrakill violence level?
Haven't watched the video yet but I just wanted to come here and say that I love the thumbnail xd
I have no problem with progression systems when I play MMORPGs. I can’t stand them in old school boomer shooters. Economies and upgrade systems are a complete dealbreaker for me
Thanks for the heads up on the very annoying stuff in this game because it looks like one that I want especially as I'm on console I was glad it was available because so many other cool looking indie games are not on console, time to take it off my wishlist on ps5 and xbox
have you tried blood west it is good
Damn, i was looking forward to playing this game, not anymore :(
video on episode enyo?
Graven apparently did have a map, they just removed it because it "wasn't helpful in the later areas"
It was more that it was too hard to implement so they gave up lol
@@underthemayo oh I’m aware, they kept defending it as “the engineer who was working it made all THESE features, don’t you like those features instead of the map he ditched? Please?”
I was unfortunate to play this game in order to review it too... and pretty much everything you coverd here was constantly annoying me too. This is a game where I do like a lot of the ideas. In fact I do believe they put all of it in the game with good intentions, but it just never came together and in order to fix it, they would need to pretty much change a lot in the game. I got through all 3 areas though... and loved the final boss ... that was cool
But would you revisit with some patching?
A true boomer would know about crouch-jumping from Half-Life 1, which is, uh, I'm pretty sure the only other game to have this mechanic.
Such a shame that it has such serious design issues. I really like the look and atmosphere of the game.
I just wanna play Wrath already.
"3D realms developed game"?
It was developed by Slipgate Ironworks, but maybe I'm missing something.
It's a shell game. Slipgate is owned by 3D Realms. 3D Realms is owned by Saber. Saber is owned by Embracer.
@@PenguinDT I know, but the actual developer is Slipgate Ironworks, not 3D Realms. That seemed like the very frequent mistake of confusing the develope with the publisher.
This is not "3D realms developed game" as far as I know.
Take them sponsorships dude. Get that bag.
Nah, Mayo is better than that
@@SolonGaming everyone needs money. No shame in making it doing his job. As long as he was honest enough that'd be fine
@@Rodniikun The problem is, sponsors usually require you to lie so their product gets promoted. This game wasn't good enough to be recommended so Mayo treated it accordingly.
im surprised u lasted 20 hours with this game lol, that's quite a lot
It's because there's a lot I like about it. The map design is really cool.
[15:20] "oh yes, of course, I should have known."
uh, actually you should have. It's ingrained in me to try crouch in those situations ever since Half-Life.
(i think quite a few games use that mantling technique without any apparent need of it.)
Oh please. So just because I've never played a game with this very specific jumping mechanic, it's my fault for not knowing how to do something the game never told me about.
@@underthemayo "Oh please."
Oh please, did you really take me that seriously? If I'm stuck in a wall I try using crouch and jump together.
Yes. Your condescendingly written "uh, actually you should have" was taken seriously. Don't speak that way if you don't want to be heard that way. @@Blackmark52
@@underthemayo "Your condescendingly written"
Really? I knew you played Half-Life. You should probably ignore the comments if a fan can get under the skin so easily. I watch your videos because they sound so level headed. Don't ruin it for me.
@@Blackmark52 hes supposed to do something because another game teaches you to do it? how about just make the jump work properly instead?
Holding crouch at the end of your jump is just common sense in an FPS. Have you never played Half Life? I don't think a game like this is targeting people who are new to the genre.
In Thief I and II, while not strictly FPS games, you jump and mantle obstacles by pressing the jump key and keeping it depressed. That is convenient.
And I guess it makes sense that you can jump higher by starting the jump from crouched position, but only then.
A lot of comments about crouch jumping... I think there is a slippery slope if genre conventions get to be implicit and the player is expected to know all of them and learn all of them by trial and error. If crouch jumping was optional, intended as a secret "trick", then it wouldn't need some mention in a tutorial. But since it is evidently needed (the shallow grave example speaks for itself) it's one of the mechanics that MUST be taught to the player explicitly. In this game! Not in some other game from 25 years ago. HOW the game teaches the player is an open question. I'm not a big fan of forced tutorials because they hurt the replay value of a game. I actually think a fucking text screen where it's written "you can jump and then crouch to make it up to slightly higher places" would be perfectly fine. I'm not demanding extra production value or so-called "cinematic" design - quite the contrary. But there needs to be an explicit acknowledgment of crouch jumping somewhere in the game. Back in the day games shipped with manuals and if the manual told you how to crouch jump that would also be acceptable. Nowadays with all digital publishing I suppose you could have an item "manual" in the pause menu. Nothing wrong with that. Very cheap to add. The alternative is that genres become more and more insular as the games in each genre become UNPLAYABLE for anyone who doesn't bring 10+ years of experience with the genre to a brand new game that isn't even a sequel. This alternative is no good for the medium so people need to stop making excuses for it. It's always a veiled pat on their own backs for having experience with the genre any way, never comes from a rational place.
I'm so fucking tired of stamina and video games
I feel like the game could be fixed with only 2 or 3 mods
Dark Souls didn't need a map 😅
Dark souls isn't open. The game directs you to the correct way.
dark sous doesnt force teleportd you to "firelink shrine" or Tutorial Asylum area everytime you load your save either
It kind of did though. Don't pretend that there was never a time when you felt lost and went back to the same places you had been before for no good reason and wasted your time.
Technically, no game ever needs a map since you can memorize everything if you try hard enough or just create your own on a textbook or something. That doesn't mean it's a good design choice.
Do you plan on playing the original half life anytime soon?
This might be a good year for it. I remember loving HL2
All of this is valid.
But... crouch jumping is probably the single most intuitive and established movement mechanic ever made. It's akin to raising your legs so you can hurdle over stuff. You wouldn't attempt to clear a picket fence IRL by keeping your legs straight during a jump unless you wanted to sterilize yourself for free.
Granted, they should've made the very first jump in the game require it, so you knew you could manually change your jump height from the get-go. I think Half Life 2 introduced it like that.
try to play witchfire.
Kinda reminds me of Heretic and Hexen...... remember those?
is exactly what this is, Hexen on quake engine, hence why they called it gRAVEN,
This game is bugged af from the start menu
You should play Blood West
“How Halo RUINED Graven”
I usually watch videos in chunks. I watch 5 min, bookmark the point and finish later, or laterer. Does this fuck up the author's metrics ?
What happens after 5 minutes? Does your brain shut off?
@@forasago
No, your mom gets naughty with her mouth
You should try out warframe, its free and id really like to hear your thoughts on it
14:58 - My brother in Christ, you play boomer shooters, why would you not try to crouch jump?
he really doesn't, it's why he is constantly comparing every fps to zoom eternal
Mayo
This game looks so weird to me (not bad tho)
"Where's south? I don't have a map or a compass!" American moment.
Oh, I know! It's DOWN!
XD@@underthemayo
you dont know how to crouch jump... really you just mean that you don't play Counter strike lol
I don't. And I haven't played half life 1. But Ive used crouch jumping in some games for a boost by crouching FIRST. And used crouched at the end of a jump in Cry Of Fear to get through a small opening. Never would I think that pressing crouch at the END of a jump would cause the jump to go higher.
op is crap talking. there is a map. always been
There is literally no map. It was in the early access versions and completely removed for the official release.
what the hell were they thinking? now this game is a no buy for me. how any one would guess where to go lol@@underthemayo
It's funny how I was questioning your lack of a map complaint and then you mentioned the game had a HUB world and immediately I started dreading, I loathe overworld and HUB worlds in most games, it might as well be the part where the designers are like, "hey look up a guide now".
I knew game would be horrible during it's early access. I don't know why are you calling it "not a bad game" if it is, literally, garbage soulless piece of the code man. It's one of the worst games we had on this channel, it's Redfall kind of bad. You definitely held some punches about it i can tell. You should have been way more hateful towards it - game deserves all the hate. I hope whoever made the game is fired from 3D Realms and won't ever again make any games. The responsible for this mess should be fired for being completely unprofessional and talentless
I didn't hold my punches. I ripped it for the lack of map, the confused inventory system, the pointless stamina system, and stupid respawn system. What more do you want than me genuinely expressing my criticisms? I don't agree that it's a straight up bad game, and I certainly don't agree with "garbage soulless piece of code". There was a lot I liked about my time in Graven and I'm not going to lie about that to exaggerate some rage video.
Why not take the sponsor money and then not recommend it? You're acting as if it was blood money or something.
You spend several minutes complaining about having to crouch jump up to a platform in a room that's actually filled with barrels and boxes you can use to jump up to it with, and also the 'intended' way to get up to said platform is to jump to it from another, also crouch jumping is an actual mechanic in the game and can be used to stop fall damage.
You complain about stamina being low, not knowing potions refill it and also only having 107 max HP in act 2, meaning you either ignored or had no idea about the shines littered everywhere that permanently raise stats
I also have a funny feeling you didn't raise any of the spells either because something like fire goes from 'it sets stuff on fire' to 'it crowd controls, and spreads to others and they explode on death causing even more fire'
Impressive levels of getting filtered, you're a real games journalist. Congrats?
Gmans review was posted today and he trashed on it for the spells as well. Maybe its not something widly known that they can be upgraded for whatever reason since I didn't hear much about that in either review.
I found at minimum 6 shrines which eventually raised my health over 110. Just because you don't see that in footage doesn't mean it didn't happen. And not every shrine increases HP.
Great advice about the barrels. I should have taken a barrel with me into the shallow grave so I didn't have to restart the game from not knowing about crouch jumping!
I did, in fact, upgrade the fire spell but it took many many hours to get to that point because they require hidden special upgrade tokens and I found that very late despite heavily exploring. The upgraded was nice, but getting that upgrade already 17 hours in was nothing to write home about as I'd already soured on the game due to it's other bad design elements. And it doesn't change the fact that the fire is AWFUL for a long portion of the game.
Potions refilling stamina doesn't excuse a stupid pointless stamina system being there in the first place. But hey, I'm glad this game has at least one defender! Maybe try to start a support group!
So to do a sponsored video you have to praise the game? Noted.
My personal policy is that I won't take money to promote a game that I can't recommend. I've done sponsored videos that are very critical but ultimately I still recommend the games. This was a case where it crossed the line for me. Maybe they still would have paid but I'm not personally okay with it.
@@underthemayoI think its a policy that shows a lot of respect. They want to promote the game and you only do so if you stand by the quality. Its fair to them and to your audience.
Most of the times yes. Especially if it's from a scummy triple A company that knows you have a huge audience of naïve children and they don't even want you to mention the fact that you got paid to praise the game. Do you understand now the gaming industry problem with all the shills ''reviewing'' these triple A games?
@@underthemayo So sponsored video means recommending something? I always thought that they pay someone to check out the game and review it. Now I get it, thanks :D
You understand it . Thats the problem
If an indie game, voice acting adds considerable cost and not just choosing anyone is ideal. I think people need to read more in the first place considering the literacy rate fallen like a rock, so text is fine. It can only be an issue if there is no atmosphere and music to fill in the hole.
Yeah, and I get that. Still, I can express my feelings that the lack of voice acting affected my enjoyment.
Yo mayo. Since I saw you play mortal kombat 1. Why not give tekken 8 a try. Because it honestly feels like a very solid game and I would be curious how you would review it.