Forums > Contributor Zone > RotW: April 13-19, 2020 -- This is a week, this is a RotW

Easy week this time, with two reviews for the week and one EmP holdover. Would have had it done yesterday, but the site was down when I was planning to do it and when it was back up, I was locked into doing my own thing -- killing the hell out of machines in Horizon Zero Dawn. Or was it killing the hell out of Immaculates in Divinity Original Sin? Or Scavs in Borderlands Pre Sequel? Regardless, I was killing the hell out of stuff last night and that takes priority over reading and typing. The blood is the life.

No honorable mentions this week, which makes this fun and quick for me. Hopefully Jason gets through his move so I can have a review up next week!

THIRD PLACE

Brian's Stephen's Sausage Roll (PC)

Before anyone gets into the "yeah, but it was third out of three, so it's back-handed complements" thing, I will say that of your reviews I've judged, I do like this one the most, even if it was for a puzzle game -- getting me excited about those is like getting me excited about sobriety…NOT GONNA HAPPEN!!!. There weren't any lengthy asides that took me out of things and made me have to recollect my bearings and the only real issue I'd say I have it that it does lean a bit on the verbose side, as far as being in the "I know my way through a thesaurus!" that makes a review feel like it's running longer than it probably actually is. But I did think you did a great job of describing this game without giving too much away. The strongest part to me was how you were able to describe the game's mechanics and controls in a way that a person could get a decent grasp on what's going on, but without actually describing things in a way where someone could pick up the game and be like, "Well, that review basically told me how I need to think." So this is a strong review that does a good job of describing this game's merits, while keeping the actual mechanics vague enough that a person would still have to find things out on his/her own.

SECOND PLACE

Masters' Vapor Trail (Genesis)

Last time I did this, you were first and EmP was second; now the roles are reversed! And there ends my attempt to put TV-Sports-Style-Excitement into me writing about judging video game reviews. I can agree with how conversation about how if I played this game now (and not shortly after something atrocious like Silver Surfer), I'd have scored it lower. I mean, the only one of those four pics I even vaguely remember is the one with the blue background and if I can't remember a big-ass spider-tank, must not have been a memorable game! I liked the "son in room" book-ends to this review a lot and you did a really good job with the Raiden comparisons, showing a voice of authority with those "weaker version of a notable title" moments. And that voice of authority continues with a lot of the little details, such as how bosses don't give any indication as to how much life they still have. Man, I've done a LOT of shooter reviews and I don't know how often (if ever) I've brought that up, so good job on thinking of it. And you also got in a few lines on the digitized voices. That's the one thing I DO remember about this game, so I was glad to see you gave them some time, as well. Fun review of one of those "blast from the past" games I went through once, kind of liked and then forgot about.

REVIEW OF THE WEEK (aka: Overdrive Place)

EmP's Hero must die. Again (PC)

I agree with you on the title. Fancy ill-placed lower case letters have no place in my games! I also really liked your review. It was strong throughout and got super-strong later on in it. Particularly when you described picking it back up after taking a break and added in all those observations about how things can change in those New Game + re-tries. With how this is a shorter RPG (that looks like a minor upgrade over some of the better Kemco ones in those screenshots) relying on a gimmick, it's cool to get those examples as to how things change as you keep trying to reach your main goal. And you also did a really good job of describing the nuts-n-bolts on how things work as far as the 5-day gimmick goes. I especially liked the detail you went into as far as your character's funeral and how the angel that gives you an extra five days gradually kind of loses interest in your character, turning long conversations into her just bringing you back and leaving as quickly as possible. There were a lot of little nice touches like that in this review, which gives it the nod for first place this week.


Well, made it through the last month or so in one piece without contracting any plagues (even if my adherence to "stay at home" orders was, shall we say, very questionable), so let's keep the streak going!

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

Hey Rob, despite the fact that you got the order on the top two wrong, thanks for the RotW topic and the placement! Pretty thin week. But the one after yours is looking more lively already, so that's good (especially as it's not my week!). A reluctant congrats to Gary on his good fortune here.

I don't have to prove I'm refined - that's what makes me refined!

Dang it! I knew I screwed something up!!!!

I'm not afraid to die because I am invincible
Viva la muerte, that's my goddamn principle

Ignore him. Not because he's wrong (even though he is), just because he bears ignoring.

Props to Brian and Marc and thanks for the kind words. I was not thrilled to work though that game to begin with, but I ended up having an OK time that momentarily distracted me from the end of the world, Which may or may not be nigh.

Thanks/nice knowing you!

For us. For them. For you.