Forums > Contributor Zone > Review of the Week, May 8-14 - Reptilian Revelry (and you)

It's time for yet another Review of the Week. The lateness of this article can be attributed to the fact that this dragon turned 3,664 years young last Saturday. For those of you who don't know, the festivities of dragon birthdays tend to go on for a while. In fact, all of those crazy weather patterns you've been experiencing in your respective countries are probably due to the wild party that we had over the Pacific last week. Picture a swarm of dragons with big wings, lots of flapping, and copious amounts of fire-breathing heating up the ocean... You do the math.

Anyway, there were six reviews submitted last week, not including my own Zydrate-length analysis of Titanfall 2, which Lord Robert of Robertshire will unfortunately have to endure for the sake of his ROTW article coming up. All in all, it was a lighter week and I am thankful for that, as I have been swamped not only with the social obligations of saurian festivities, but with the stress involved with starting a new job.

What? Don't look so surprised. Dragons gotta make a living too, y'know. How else will I afford to buy video games?


Third place: 3xA_lucky's Batman: Arkham Knight review (PC)

This game was an absolute mess when it was first released, and seeing an article about it a few years after the fact is very interesting in terms of seeing what where it has gone since then. I appreciated the analysis of all of the DLCs, the rundown of all the bugs that are unfortunately still there, and the inclusion of the latest price point to see what kind of value we're getting for our money. It's sad to see that Arkham Knight is still kind of a mess. 3xA goes against the consensus of Steam's reception rating of "mostly positive", but I am inclined to believe him, as he does a great job of backing up his arguments with facts and informed opinion.

With that said, this article does have some technical issues. There's a spelling error right in plain sight on the tagline, a few awkward sentences here and there, and some punctuation issues. I also had to look up what an "AR challenge" is because that was not obvious to me. An edit pass might've caught some of this stuff.

However, it is a pretty well-written piece overall. I am not a huge DC or Batman fan at all, but I managed to follow along with everything he said without getting lost or confused. It was very easy to read, didn't get bogged down in details, and had great screenshots (that Photo Mode obviously helped, and that was a great way to show it off, too!)


Second place: Phazonsmasher's The Caligula Effect review (Vita)

Mr. Walton provides us with a lengthy and somewhat dry analysis of The Caligula Effect. It is expertly written and technically flawless, but lacks the pizazz of EmP's article. That's really the only reason it took second place instead of first. Granted, it can be hard to inject pizazz into a 3-star piece, but I just felt this piece was sort of going through the motions.

Despite this, it is obvious that Mr. Walton is highly knowledgeable of the genre and the game's pedigree, which allowed him to make some sharp comparisons and judgments about it. It is a solid piece that accomplishes everything it sets out to do. Anyone who is interested in this game, or the Persona series, would be well-served by reading it.


First place: EmP's 199x review (PC)

EmP sets us up for a slam piece, then pulls the rug out from under us to explain why 199x is worthy of our time, despite the fact that it is a piece of RPGmaker trash that uses recycled stock graphics and has an annoying trigger warning. Personally, I tend to stay away from RPGmaker games (as aforementioned, most of them are trash), but like with any robust creativity suite, there are gems hidden in the rough. I was surprised that EmP gave this one four stars, but he explained exactly why he did with crystal clear prose.

I honestly don't have much to criticize here. Perhaps this piece was not as focused as some of his others, but he nevertheless stayed within his usual range of quality. Great job, sir!



I don't really have any witty parting words this week, but what I will say is that I appreciated taking on a lighter load this week. But I shouldn't be TOO happy about it, because that's bad for the site. Ah, the paradoxes of life...

Thanks for that - it wasn't as busy a week as we've come to expect, but it certainly filled out fast at the end!

Congrats to lucky and Phazon for rounding out the week. And congrats to me for getting # out of the way early. Take that, fellow Alphamarathon runners!

For us. For them. For you.