Deliver At All Costs was provided by Konami for review. Thank you!
There are so many games that I see every day, and I love discovering new ones, but Deliver At All Costs blew me away when I first saw it. It wasn’t the story or gameplay loop that hooked me at first, it was the physics based destruction. It looked like everything in the town could be destroyed with debris flying everywhere constantly, and I was immediately interested. Despite some misses with its story and overall gameplay structure, I ultimately enjoyed my experience and would recommend it to other fans of games with total destruction.
The game primarily has you completing missions, delivering packages from point A to point B, usually with some weird stipulation that makes driving more difficult. This can range from a firework machine shooting exploding fireworks at the road, a giant flopping fish, or a Seismograph that alerts to incoming landslides and rocks that stop the car in its tracks. It was almost always goofy and ridiculous missions and it kept things interesting while driving through the town.
The missions you take do feel varied and have a good chunk of creativity to them, but some just aggravated me. There’s one where you have to sabotage another shipping company and steal a package from them and deliver it yourself. Trying to manage the crane to steal the package while being bombarded by speeding cars made keeping the package on my truck and progressing near impossible. Every time I moved an inch, a car would slam into me and my package would fly off, and I had to reposition myself to get the package back and hope another car didn’t ram into me and make me do it all over again. And don't get me started on the mission delivering that atomic bomb.
This did also bring up some issues I have with the controls. The team did the best they can, but there are just some moments where I accidentally accelerated instead of backed up or turned the wrong way. There are two ways to control your car, and I think the recommended one (dual directions) is as much better, but it wasn’t enough to stop these moments from happening. This was exacerbated by the two camera angles, which depending on where you are, could completely obstruct view of the car or put it at a weird angle that makes it weirder to control.
There are some pieces of side content like new cars to find, optional quests to complete, locations to check out from afar, and parts to acquire to upgrade your car, but I didn’t find much motivation to actually take part in them. It just didn’t feel like they affected much in the grand scheme and the upgrades, while interesting, weren’t as gameplay changing as I hoped.
However, the near constant chaos and physics-based destruction was just so satisfying to witness. Nearly every building, structure, and person could be destroyed to some degree, and included giant bridges falling, buildings tumbling down, and structural debris flying everywhere. I don’t know many games where I can completely drive through a house’s ground floor and come out the other side, but I can here, and I was in love. Sometimes just driving around the city and watching bodies fly and buildings tumble was the best part of my playthrough.
It’s hard to explain just how much fun causing destruction was. There were times during my playthrough that I would only drive through buildings and not do any missions or other side content. I just wanted to see buildings get destroyed in satisfying ways, and I got what I wanted. That experience alone made the game worthwhile for me to play, even though it hardly makes for a complete gaming experience. I’m a sucker for physics, and that’s Deliver At All Costs’ bread and butter.
Most of the locations you can drive in are enjoyable, but there are some that I wasn’t a fan of. I mainly disliked any mission that took me to the volcano, which included very narrow, winding roads and lots of lava. With the way the game plays, I would consistently fall off and blow my car up, causing me to start over. It didn’t bring me back far and I was able to keep slowly progressing, but it was almost always a constant nuisance.
However, just when I was starting to get a little tired of the main map that we start out on, we get to a completely new one with new locations, and I found this to be extremely smart. It makes the game feel more unique and with more to do. And with how beautiful the visuals are, mixed with the satisfying destruction, I had such a good time exploring and plowing my way through.
The story is actually more interesting than I expected, though there are moments of rigidity. You play as Winston Green, a man with a very intriguing past, who takes a job as a courier for the company "We Deliver." He is finally able to catch a break, only to learn that the boss' son, Donovan, is looking into his past and tries to figure out who he really is. This starts a crazy chain of events, uncovering what Winston is really hiding.
Apart from some weird moments that didn't make a lot of sense and felt forced, but I was very interested in Winston's past and the world. His connection as an engineer is intriguing and I was so curious what he did to bring him to a new town that was so secretive. It was enough to motivate me to keep playing to experience the story and keep me interested.
However, some of the cutscenes had really poor animation and just didn't feel consistent throughout the game. Some had solid acting and animation, while others felt very forced with a random direction in the narrative that I found didn't make sense. It wasn't enough to take me out of the experience altogether, but I did notice it.
Deliver At All Costs is a great game to play on the Steam Deck, but there are a couple of minor issues that affect performance. Starting the game out of the box works decently well for performance, and we can hit higher framerates when driving around most of the time. I was able to comfortably hit 45 FPS, but it did drop into the mid 30s when there was too much destruction or in certain cutscenes.
As is, the game also only goes up to medium quality, which seems to be due to playing on a Steam Deck. When using the launch option SteamDeck=0 %command% to trick the game into thinking it wasn’t on a Deck, I was able to put the quality up to High, but I didn’t see a substantial difference in performance or visual quality. Because of this, I say playing without the command and running on medium will be a solid experience. There are no other graphical settings to change and nothing more advanced, so there isn’t much else we can do.
This is still a perfectly fine way to play, and I enjoyed it even at the 30 FPS lock. If you want the extra smoothness, you can increase to 45 FPS, but be ready for decent drops to 30 during cutscenes and when there’s a lot of destruction happening. I preferred the stable experience over a smoother one at certain points, but it’s an option.
You can change your game's language, toggle camera shake, vibration, slow motion dialogue, showing tutorials, rebind keys, and change audio levels.
The does support 16:10 resolutions as well as gamepads and cloud saves. There are no HDR settings.
Deliver At All Costs is a wonderfully enjoyable time with some mechanics that hold it back from being a masterpiece. The story is intriguing, while the variety of creative missions and physics-based destruction is just so much fun to play around with. However, the controls, fixed camera angles, and some missions can make the experience aggravating, while the cutscenes do have some moments with its limited animations that took me out of the immersion.
It also runs quite well on the Steam Deck, even with some smaller issues here and there. 30 FPS feels great and keeps battery drain below 15W at its highest. I would consider this a great portable experience and one worth enjoying on the Deck!
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
The Precinct was provided by Kwalee for review. Thank you!
Back in October of last year, there were a couple of games that stood out to me after the Next Fest event. One of which was a police sandbox that made me think of GTA Chinatown Wars, and I loved it. The Precinct wowed me at the time with its beautiful city to explore, sandbox elements to play around with, and fantastic driving mechanics, and I can say that, for the most part, it still holds up in the full release.
The Precinct may be a sandbox-style game, but there's a heavier focus on being a cop and doing your job. Each day, you take a shift that specifies where you will be stationed, what you'll be focusing on, and for how long the shift will be. Once there, you will roam around taking care of any crimes you see being committed or responding to 911 calls. You will arrest your perps, write up all of the crimes they committed, and then either take them down to the station or call for an escort car. Then, the cycle repeats!
It may sound tedious, but it's my favorite part of the game. Observing crimes, wrestling with the ones who resist arrest, checking their ID and possessions, and writing them up. It can range from something as simple as a fine for vandalism and diverge into an all-out lethal shootout or intense car chase. Not knowing what kind of crime you will have to stop next is part of the fun, and adjusting to the situation as it unfolds leads to some exciting moments that make me want to keep playing.
For example, I pulled someone over for reckless driving successfully and made them get out of their car. I checked their ID and used the breathalizer (and of course, they were over the limit). However, as soon as I tried to pat them down, they shoved me out of the way, ran me over, got into a car, and I had to chase them down. I ended up cutting them off and ramming into their car to tip it over, but they got out and made a break for it. I ended up tackling them to the ground and arresting them, adding more offenses they committed. It was exhilarating.
The Precinct's sandbox aspect makes it feel more alive and random, keeping the game interesting. It can sometimes feel like so many crimes are committed in one location, way more than naturally possible, but I didn't know what crime could happen next. I also want to make a special note of the physics when driving. Car chases were especially exciting because I could ram into stores, barricades, and gates and just plow through them. Having debris fly everywhere while chasing down criminals just pumped me up further.
Another great feature I found, utilizing more and more as I kept playing, was calling on support. You can call upon your fellow policemen for support when taking care of crimes based on a bar filling up as you deal with the crime. This can range from extra policemen to call on during combat, road blocks and spikes during car chases, or getting a Riot Van to back you up. You can even spawn in a new Patrol Car whenever you want to, which is extremely helpful when you are running around and lose your car.
However, combat itself walks a fine line between clunky and enjoyable. You have an over-the-head view with a line of sight to aim guns at enemies, which makes it hard to land any shots. It felt really satisfying when it did, but taking cover behind cars sometimes led me to shoot the car instead of the people because of how aiming works. This extends to melee combat as well, and taking cover in general, which I just couldn't enjoy. Combat has enjoyable moments, but it felt too clunky, with an odd camera angle for aiming, which made it hard to get into.
You also have your AI partner with you, and while they were useful here and there, I ended up feeling like they got in the way more than actually helped a situation. Every time you go out for your shift, you have to go with your partner, and he has to come along wherever you go. While this could lead to them being helpful, like taking care of the second of two perps to arrest, but I found they just get in the way most of the time. There were more times than not that my partner Kelly would just stand there and not get one of the suspects or take so long to get in the police car (since I have to wait for him) that I lost sight of a reckless driver, and they got away completely.
As you play, you will get experience points depending on the crimes you solve and how correctly you handle them. These level you up, unlocking new gear (like new guns), support options, shift assignments, cars to use, and more. You will also get upgrade tokens to unlock new perks on your skill tree. The system is very simple and easy to understand, and compared to a lot of JRPGs I have been playing recently, it was a welcome breath of fresh air. The perks were generally helpful, giving even more support options, a new weapon slot, more ammo, extra health, and more support bars.
Some upgrades and unlocks are so essential that they should have been given by default, like the Timed Breath to keep running without all stamina disappearing, Commandeering vehicles, and setting your own shift to decide what you want to do for the game, but it doesn't take long to get any of them in general.
There are some mini-games you can find throughout the world, like street races and looking for artifacts that someone has lost, so I always felt like I had something to do, even when I wasn't taking care of criminals.
While there are some interesting moments in The Precinct's storyline, I never felt fully invested in it. You play as Nick Cordell Jr., a rookie cop joining the force in Averno. Your father was the old chief of the police and was highly regarded by his comrades, but was murdered. So, on top of doing your job, you will have to work to bring down the gangs taking over the town, keep the citizens safe, and find out what actually happened to your dad.
In some ways, it feels a bit like I am watching a TV show drama about a Boston police station in the 1980s, which has its charm. There are some interesting moments, and I was curious about what happened, but I was never 100% invested. It just didn't hook me like I wanted it to, and I cared more about going out on shifts and arresting criminals.
The story advances as you take down the gangs. There's a hierarchy leading up to the big boss of each, and you have to collect enough evidence to unlock the missions to bring them down. It feels like targeted raids, which are quite fun as well when the combat is working, but I never found myself fully invested in the narrative and motivations behind the characters.
After initially testing The Precinct during last year's Steam Next Fest, I was quite excited to try out the full game. It already had Steam Deck-specific graphical settings, so I had a feeling the team was going to do what they could to optimize the game and give us the best experience possible, and I believe they did, for better or worse. I tested all of the game's quality settings and upscalers, and I found the Steam Deck preset to be the best and most stable way to play, which also includes a lock at 30 FPS.
While standing around and dealing with one crime, the Steam Deck can push a decent amount of power and hit higher framerates and higher quality, but as soon as you get in your police car and start driving, the framerate will tank. I also found that most 4-way intersections will also be tough on performance, so I did a majority of my testing during driving and at these spots.
During this testing, I found that the Steam Deck preset, which has a mix of low to high settings, was better performing than the Medium quality and better performing than the low quality with FSR 3 on Quality mode. So, this made the Steam Deck preset the best for a quality focus and battery life. As for framerate, I tested at the lowest possible settings with FSR 3 on Ultra Performance, and it would regularly drop under 40 FPS at these choke points, so 30 FPS will be the way to go.
I was hoping for better results, but it isn't the end of the world. It's still very playable, looks decent, and battery drain sticks to an average of 11W - 13W. There is some ghosting around our character that we can more clearly see when under the light, but for the most part, I never paid too much attention to it and didn't get distracted by it. It's a playable experience through and through, and there will be no issues that pop up other than the occasional battery drain spike, but it will be a solid 30 FPS:
You can change the difficulty, toggle camera distance and shake, dialogue flow, vibration, change auto aim, toggle large text, minimap size, subtitles, and audio sliders.
The game does support 16:10 resolutions, cloud saves, and controllers. It does not have any HDR settings.
The Precinct is an enjoyable police sandbox that is a blast to play a majority of the time. Being a policeman is a lot of fun, and I had a blast running through Aveno, stopping crimes and bringing perps in. I absolutely adored car races and the physics of driving through stores, lights, gates, and watching everything fly up around me. The story is a bit of a hit and miss, and combat can be a little clunky due to the way you aim and use cover, but it has its moments.
The game is also quite playable on the Steam Deck using their specific preset. I wish we could make it better with a higher framerate or higher quality settings that don't need upscaling, but it's at least playable and enjoyable.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Shotgun Cop Man was provided by Devolver Digital for review. Thank you!
I remember back in 2019 when I first played My Friend Pedro. I was blown away by how fun it was to jump around and shoot others in slow motion, while wall jumping and flipping through the air. So, when I heard that the developer of the game, DeadToast Entertainment, was coming out with a new game, I knew I was in for a good time! While I do wish there was a bit more to do, Shotgun Cop Man is a fun time that I can see being a joy to play, once players get their hands on the level editor.
Shotgun Cop Man is a simple game, but the beauty comes from its precise mechanics. You will run through levels to get to the other side, but you will use your guns to propel yourself around. You have your pistol in one hand, which is primarily used for killing enemies and jumping over small obstacles, and a powerful shotgun for thrusting yourself longer distances.
That's essentially the gameplay mechanics. It's easy on the surface, but the joy comes from how you have to use your tools to get to the end. It's simple to control, just use the left stick to move, the right stick to aim, and the triggers to shoot one of your two guns, but it doesn't need more. The entire concept exudes the simple to learn, hard to master mentality, and it never gets old. I had so much fun blasting through levels and flinging myself with shotgun blasts and shooting demons with my pistol. There are also other weapons you can pick up, like SMGs and scatterguns.
The level design and slight quality of life changes help complement the mechanics as well. Each of the campaign's levels feels unique in itself, and I enjoyed the changeup of normal platforming levels to the arena fights, where you have to kill a specific number of enemies, and boss battles. The levels also all have four different achievements to get, encouraging killing all enemies, speedrunning, and not getting hit. It wasn't hard to do, and the slight slowdown when shooting your pistol in the air and slight auto-aim helped a lot with killing demons as I flung myself around, but it was nice to have some reason to go back and try to get all the achievements.
There will also be user-designed levels and a full-fledged level creator in-game. It's easy to understand and fully compatible with a controller, which is great for those playing on a Steam Deck like I did. I definitely don't have the creativity to create my own levels, but I was able to understand without stress and try my best. It was terrible, but I did it myself, and I was proud.
The simplistic visuals and story aren't the main attraction for Shotgun Cop Man, but they do the job. You are a cop who goes to hell to arrest Satan, which sets the scene for the gameplay. There are some funny cutscenes at the start of each world, and the close-up of the faces of Shotgun Cop Man and Satan is hilarious, but it isn't anything deep. The visuals are nice and get the job done. Nothing to write home about, but not bad either. I generally like simple graphics and art for games like this, so I think it was a good choice to make.
When all is said and done, Shotgun Cop Man is a small game that is fun, but has me wanting more. I would have loved more replayability with the main campaign or online leaderboards, but I still really enjoyed it, especially on the Steam Deck.
Shotgun Cop Man is going to be a joy to play on the Steam Deck, but I wasn't satisfied when I first booted the game up. I noticed that at 90 FPS on the Steam Deck OLED, the battery was draining a little bit too much for my liking for this type of game. So, I decided to cap the framerate at 60 FPS, which brought down the battery drain between 9W and 11W on average for around 4.5 - 5 hours of battery life. LCD Steam Decks won't have this problem at all.
Otherwise, it plays pretty well out of the box. It drains a little more than I would like, but it stays stable at 60 FPS. There isn't much we can change for graphical settings, but there's no need in the end. It plays well and feels like a perfect fit for the Deck.
The game does have a specific Accessibility tab, which has options for repeat fire, auto aim lock, a jump guide, auto pickup weapons, and a slider to change the game speed. You can also change sound volume, toggle blood and gore, controller vibrations, screenshake, a timer, and change language.
It does support 16:10 resolutions, controllers, and cloud saves. There are no HDR settings.
Shotgun Cop Man is a short but sweet time. The shooting platforming gameplay is addictive and I feel like an action star while playing. The level design is great, and there are a lot of them throughout the main campaign, but I do wish there was more to do after its beat. Once players start populating the game with their user-created levels, it will be much better. Still, for what it is, it's a fun time, and I had a blast playing through it.
The game runs near flawlessly on the Steam Deck as well. I do wish it didn't drain as much as it does, but it's still okay and over 4.5 hours of battery life. It's a great game on the Deck regardless, and I can happily recommend it.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Warriors: Abyss was provided by Koei Tecmo for review. Thank you!
When it comes to games that I play when I need a break from the bigger experiences, there are two types that I gravitate to. The first is any games from Koei Tecmo's Warriors series (Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors, etc.), which is mindless fun killing thousands of enemies. The other is roguelikes, where I can play through an addicting gameplay loop while progressively getting more and more powerful. Never did it cross my mind that these two types of games would come together out of nowhere, but out of the blue, we now have Warriors: Abyss and it may be my favorite roguelike of all time.
Koei Tecmo found a great way to mold the Warriors formula into the context of a roguelike, still making it feel like a Warriors game but with some deeper mechanics that influence you as you keep going down into hell. You have your basic attack and charge attack, as well as a dodge and your usual powerful Musou attack. It's the usual Warriors formula where you have to kill tons of enemies on the surface, but the joy from Warriors: Abyss lies within its roguelike elements.
You start off each roguelike run with a basic character who only has their character trait and four-hit combo, but this will quickly change as you start to encounter the roguelike elements. First, we have hero bonding, where you will choose a hero to bond with. The heroes themselves can be summoned with one of your charge attacks and can be powered up based on the different heroes you have bonded with.
Each hero has Emblems and Titles attached to them, which can power you up further. There are 11 different emblems that can give different benefits the more you have of them. There are five elemental ones that can give your attack attributes, with six that can upgrade your attacks, range, how many summoned heroes you can utilize, Musou gauge, and more. As for titles, these are 1-5 identifiers each hero has.
Each hero has different abilities, and to upgrade them, you may need a specific amount of emblems or heroes with specific titles. For instance, when playing Guan Yu, you have an ability where he gets an extra 5% attack for every bonded hero with the Brave General title. On top of that, if you are bonded with Liu Bei and Zhang Fei, you get an extra 100% attack bonus. If you are bonded with Zhang Fei and have him equipped to use his summon ability, you can make it more powerful if you have also bonded with Liu Bei and have 10 Vigor emblems.
This premise makes strategizing with the heroes you bond with important since each emblem, title, and hero impacts your run. But that's not all. You can also change your equipped formation, which provides its buffs, improves some of your summoned abilities, and impacts a special attack you have that brings in your six equipped heroes for an all-out attack called an Assemble attack. I love this mechanic, and it made each run feel more unique since the heroes I bond with impact how I want to prioritize my upgrades and what kind of elevated buffs I want to go for.
I also appreciate that Warriors: Abyss has an option to automatically optimize your formation and summonable heroes with one button. Sometimes, I do like to manually pick and choose, but it's nice that if I just want something quick, I can press a button and let the game do the work. There is a total power number that goes up whenever you get a new hero or new emblems, and this makes it quick and easy to maximize that.
When you complete a round (or phase), you can choose where you go next. These choices vary between trying your luck to get heroes with a specific emblem, using the currency to buy new heroes and formations to use during your run or healing and increasing your maximum health. When selecting these choices, there will be options to get specific missions, which can give extra currency, and you may even get a text-box choice which can give you extra buffs.
You will keep doing this through four different biomes with eight rounds each, and the last round is the boss battle. I never felt like any run overstayed its welcome or was too short, striking a nice balance overall. If you beat the run, you will also unlock some new difficulty options to continue playing for a chance to get extra currency to unlock new characters.
I was pretty captivated with the gameplay loop, and I found it hard to put down the game once I started playing. I wanted to try new characters, build for different emblems, and find the characters that fit my style of gameplay. I found Guan Yu and Nobunaga Oda were my two favorites, but the other characters are a ton of fun to play with. I can see how the Warriors' gameplay of killing thousands of characters with mindless-ish button mashing isn't engaging, but I felt the roguelike elements made it more strategic.
As you play, you will get special currency to unlock new heroes, new formations, and permanent upgrades. There are 100 characters to unlock, and with each one being playable with different abilities and movesets, I felt there was a good reason to come back and try the different characters. There are also some permanent upgrades you can get if you keep playing as a character and leveling them up continuously, bringing their cumulative level up. You can also find character's unique weapons from completing missions, which can give them a second character trait.
Visually, the game is a mixed bag. While I love the colors that pop when using any charge attack, Musou, or summoned ability, the game overall has a minimalist style. On top of that, the color shooting out everywhere can be a little disorienting. I didn't lose my place often and was able to dodge the choreographed attacks without much issue, but I did get a little lost once or twice. The minimalist style with the neon-like colors is enjoyable, but don't expect the same fidelity we saw in Dynasty Warriors: Origins. However, for a low-budget spin-off, it works.
As for Warriors: Abyss' story, it may as well be nonexistent. There is an overarching story about being summoned to hell to save it from being taken over by some guy named Gouma, but I didn't feel any investment whatsoever. It wouldn't have mattered much to me if there was a story or not, but I didn't mind just skipping through dialogue and getting to the fighting.
Warriors: Abyss feels like the perfect portable game, so I was hoping that it would run decently on the Steam Deck, and I am so glad it does. Koei Tecmo has been fantastic when it comes to Steam Deck support for their games, with even the more demanding titles like Dynasty Warriors: Origins running well. This game is no different and even has a specific Steam Deck preset that is great. There are a couple of changes I would make to keep the experience as best as possible, but it will be a great time regardless.
I went back and forth with the settings I wanted to recommend, but in the end, nothing beat the smooth feeling of 60 FPS. And with Warriors: Abyss being able to handle 60 FPS at almost the highest quality settings without drops, it ended up winning me over. I do lower the settings a little bit to around medium to keep the game at 60 FPS as much as possible, but there could be some minor drops when using Assemble attacks with all the effects across the screen, but it will hold 60 FPS during general gameplay when it counts.
The only downside is the battery drain, which ranges from 16W - 22W for around 3 hours of battery life on the OLED Steam Deck. Usually, this would be a bit too much battery drain for me, but for a solid 60 FPS, I can't say no. I did try putting on a TDP limit, and while it can hold 60 in the beginning, it starts dropping more with tons of enemies on screen and big attacks with lots of effects going on. Because of this, I recommend not setting any limits.
While the 60 FPS settings pushes battery life a lot, I also wanted to find a way to balance that drain and play without sacrificing all of that smoothness. With a combination of the Steam Deck graphics preset and some changes to increase quality, we can play with a lower battery drain at 45 FPS, finding a balance between it feeling smooth and not draining too much. It sticks around 13W - 17W drain, so we get around 3.5 - 4 hours of battery life, which is definitely better.
Just like the recommended settings, I wouldn't set a TDP limit
I was considering a battery savings settings, but this would mean playing at 30 FPS which I feel makes the experience worse. It isn't unplayable, but after playing at 45 or 60 FPS, I can't go back to 30, even if it means saving the most battery or playing at the highest quality settings.
You can toggle the screen shake, showing damage and recovery numbers, displaying enemy health gauges, controller vibration, change keybindings, and adjust volume bars, but that's about it.
There is no 16:10 resolution support, but it does have great controller support and cloud saves. There are no HDR settings.
Warriors: Abyss has become one of my favorite roguelikes that I have recently played. It takes the addicting Dynasty Warriors gameplay loop and adds in roguelike elements to create a fantastic experience that is hard to put down. The progression systems for the roguelike parts are great to play around with, and with over 100 characters from Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors, it feels like there's so much to do. The story is near nonexistent, and some areas can look a bit bland, but the popping colors of the effects from your charge and summon attacks inject some much-needed vibrancy to it.
It also runs wonderfully on the Steam Deck. There are some changes to make to maximize the performance for portable play, but when you do, it is a must-have experience I can happily recommend to anyone with a Deck.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
As bleak and blase a statement as this may be, I can admit that to be a fan of Sonic the Hedgehog is to know disappointment. Don't get me wrong, particular moments throughout his 33-odd years certainly buck the ever-depressing trend of 'eh, it's fine' reactions to both game and video-based mediums. Unfortunately, we know what to expect with every release, yet hope never entirely dies in our chili dog-loving hearts. Occasionally, we are rewarded with an absolute beaut of a product. The most notable, to me, of this is 2011's Sonic Generations, a game that not only celebrated the franchise's history but also set a new standard for Sonic games.
It was and continues to be a celebration of Sonic as a whole, unabashedly showing off the highest highs of everything that had come before, featuring various re-imagined tracks from 1991's original Sonic the Hedgehog up to 2010's then-Wii exclusive Sonic Colors. This is a big reason why Sonic X Shadow Generations, a re-bundling of the original with some updates and new content, so exciting.
Each level is split into two distinct parts, with one being geared around Classic Sonic's 2.5D side-scroller gameplay, with some needed modernized modifications, such as a thankfully more accessible Spin Dash mechanic, and the other being for Modern Sonic, which focuses more on an extremely fast-paced and streamlined 3D design found in both Sonic Unleashed and the aforementioned Sonic Colors. 2.5D side-scroller sections can still be found in the latter's sections, though it never forgoes the above mechanics, ensuring the design language between the two Sonics remains distinct and separate.
As you can expect from a Sonic game, the story is largely non-existent and is purely there to push you from nostalgia-induced to nostalgia-induced level. Sonic and Co. are celebrating the titular character's birthday (this game was released to honor the 20th birthday) until the Time Eater, Generations' primary antagonist, creates numerous time holes that suck his many companions through. A brief failed attempt of an attack later, Sonic finds himself unconscious and, upon coming to, finds himself in "The White Space", an area that contains copious uncolored remains of regions from other Sonic titles that act as entry points to the respective levels.
It's serviceable, if not entirely bland, but it gets the job done. Again, considering this is a Sonic game, we aren't here for the story. We're here for a bloody good time. And what a time we had all those years ago.
The most well-received game since 2011's Sonic Generations is 2017's Sonic Mania (and by extension, 2018's Sonic Mania Plus), becoming the highest-rated game in the series for 15 years, and are seen in themselves as a celebration of the classics that had come before it, too. How can the celebratory magic of Generation and Mania be recaptured whilst offering the fans something new? Sega's answer is as simple as re-releasing Generations but giving it 100% more angst, 100% more Maria, and roughly 100% more content. Don't do the math on that, please.
Sonic X Shadow Generations is the answer, featuring the original game in all its glory and essentially unchanged, bar a few lines in cutscenes to keep more in line with the Japanese translations and a much-needed uptick in both resolutions and framerate, but now with an entire game dedicated to everyone's favorite edgy spiny mammal, Shadow. Shadow's section of the game features the same formula as ye olde regular Sonic Generations but improves on almost all aspects of the original in meaningful ways.
Put simply, the level design is some of the best work across all Sonic titles, with visual spectacle after visual spectacle callously forcing an unrelenting barrage of joyous pixels into our retinas. The potential complexity of each level is carefully concealed despite each one remaining approachable for newcomers, and regardless of whichever track you choose, the flow remains impeccable.
Shadow's entire arsenal of skills is naturally present, too, including some new ones that are unlocked throughout the 5-hour campaign and utilized in new and exciting ways. Moreover, unlike the original Sonic sections, where skills are separate from the original and "new" counterparts, Shadow retains his use of Chaos Control, homing attacks, and the like, regardless of whether it's in the 2.5D or 3D section.
The general hub world is significantly different from Sonic's approach. Instead of the side-scrolling level selection, Sonic Team opted for a fully explorable 3D environment with secrets and collectibles to discover. Various collectibles from the Main Acts and the Challenge Acts can also unlock their respective Collection Box in this world, containing artwork, music, and fragments of Shadow's History. However, I'm not sure which type of hub world I appreciate more based on how each game approaches its specific hub world.
It's not to say that Shadow's Hub World is an unsightly stain upon such a tremendous title; I would just prefer a more streamlined approach to get me into the main levels faster. Moreover, the wholly unnecessary Challange Acts do little to excite, merely feel like a bloat on an otherwise streamlined experience, and only further add to the time between the monumental adventures to be had elsewhere. It's the kind of audible sigh-inducing additive which, in fact, subtracts - the worst kind.
The technical experience between the two halves of Sonic X Shadow Generations is wildly different, too, considering that Sonic's section is a polished-up re-release and Shadows is entirely new and updated.
The Sonic portion is much simpler, with the game outputting an impressive and stable 60 FPS, regardless of how much was happening on screen. The low wattage was equally remarkable, often falling between the 11W-13W range, resulting in around 6 hours of estimated battery life.
Display settings-wise, there's little to alter, although nothing needs to change to achieve the stable 60 FPS here. Shadow Quality (high or low), Framerate Limit (60 or 30), Anti-aliasing (FXAA or off), and Bloom (on or off) round out the binary settings available. Still, they're all best left well alone. Sonic's portion will run beautifully from the get-go, with no configuration required, and look fantastic on the small screen.
Shadow Generations is a different beast entirely. With no changes, you'll find the experience bouncing between 40 FPS and 60 FPS from moment to moment, leaving it feeling wildly unstable, with an immense 20W+ draw on the battery. Thankfully, more options to dial in your graphic-facing settings now exist. With a higher framerate ceiling of 120 FPS available and the option to enable or disable both ambient occlusion and local reflections and set not only bloom but volumetric lighting, too, you can hone your settings to how you see fit. Despite the vast array of settings available, there are two avenues to take should a stable framerate be your goal, each with clear advantages.
The first is more straightforward, merely turning the shadow quality from high to low. This, in turn, grants a near-stable 60 FPS immediately, with minor fluctuations of but a few fps occurring for the odd second here and there. Ideally, a Sonic game, or Shadow, in this case, wants to have as high a framerate as possible to capture the feeling of unbridled speed, but this method still foregoes that sweet, sweet battery life. The 22W draw on the battery is still very much present, equating to a sub-2.5-hour battery life expectancy. It's not ideal, but it's a trade-off for the smoothest experience.
The latter relies on setting the frame limit to 40 FPS within the performance settings on the Steam Deck. Keeping the settings as they were above but making this one simple change reduces the wattage to between 13W and 15W, increasing battery life expectancy to between 3.5 and 4 hours. The smooth feeling that is ever-so-crucial in such a title is sacrificed, and one that I'm not sure is worth it, but it ultimately depends on how able and/or willing you are to sit near an available charger. There's very little outside of amending the frame limit that can drastically reduce wattage, too, with the more extensive suite of in-game display settings doing little to alleviate when appropriately fiddled with.
Whichever of the two recommended routes you take has advantages and disadvantages, and I believe they are entirely situational. If you're out on the go, do whatever you can to afford yourself some more battery life, letting you experience such a stupendous title for as long as possible. If you're at home, set the shadow to low, remove the frame limit, and marvel at its fast-moving beauty.
There are but a few settings to tweak regarding accessibility within Sonic X Shadow Generations, and it's very much the standard affair found in the vast majority of games nowadays. A standard assortment of camera controls and the like allow you to tweak to your heart's content, and subtitles can be toggled on or off. Disappointing, to be sure, but not surprising.
Given my surprise and cynicism when Sonic X Shadow Generations was first announced, what we have in our hands is truly one of 2024's best games. It's as simple as that. Expertly and meticulously crafted levels boastfully display Sonic Team's growth and learnings over the years, and a proper understanding of the fanbase and what they require and deserve from a story-telling perspective is exemplary. The latter may seem a given, but with the many well-documented shortcomings that have come before, the expectation for Shadow's portion may not have always been there.
It's still a game of two halves, with Sonic's 2011 re-release still relying on the nostalgic draw that Shadow's sections may not have to draw from, but the difference in quality between the two outside of that is night and day. And with the earlier two titles already being one of Sonic's best, it speaks for itself with how good the overall package is.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
KILL KNIGHT was provided by PlaySide for review. Thank you!
Are you ready for fast-paced bullet-hell arena battles with tight controls and cool aesthetics? Well, KILL KNIGHT might just be the game for you. In this top-down action arena game, you'll be facing off against hordes of monsters as you vie for a score to the top of the leaderboards, with each attempt allowing you to unlock new equipment and perks.
At first glance, KILL KNIGHT might appear to be a survivor-like game. While it does share some similarities with games like Vampire Survivors, it differs in key areas.
Firstly, you don't gain upgrades during the round. Instead, you collect gems from fallen foes to upgrade your "Kill Level." It's up to you whether you absorb these gems to gain a powerful attack that can allow you to regain health or simply pick them up to increase your Kill Level, making your regular attacks more powerful.
The Kill Level is a key part of the game, rising whenever you pick up gems from enemies and falling over time or whenever you get hit by an attack. It's important to keep your Kill Level as high as possible, as it makes defeating enemies much easier and quicker, and you don't waste gems by absorbing them for health instead of raising your Kill Level.
This sums up the big differences between KILL KNIGHT and a survivor-like; it's all very hands-on. Every time your weapon runs out of ammo and needs reloading, there's a quick-time event where you must hit the fire button in time with a reload bar on the screen. Hence, your next ammo clip is more powerful, so you can dodge it, use a powerful melee attack that makes enemies drop ammo, and use your heavy weapon with the ammo dropped by a melee attack.
All of these mechanics combined make the game feel much more skill-based. This is a bullet hell, but your "power-ups" won't protect you from incoming attacks here. It's down to you and your ability to perceive threats and position yourself accordingly. The power of your weapons directly results from how well you've done in the round so far. If you get hit a lot early on, you'll have a low Kill Level and will find the round much more difficult later on.
The movement is smooth, and the game allows you to go exactly where you want to. If you get hit or die, you'll know that it was your fault and no fault of the game's controls or movement. I could identify what I did wrong on each failed attempt, either through panicking and making a wrong move, resulting in me taking unnecessary damage, or simply not realizing an enemy was there until it was too late. This is exactly what you want from this kind of game.
The enemies in KILL KNIGHT are also varied. New ones are introduced gradually as you progress through the round and the arenas, ranging from simple "follow" enemies early on to ones that will dash at you, fire lasers at you, etc. You'll need to avoid environmental hazards, such as exploding rocks and lasers that operate on a pattern, requiring you to dodge enemies and their attacks while paying attention to your environment.
I felt that the progression does fall a bit on the slow side. It doesn't have the serotonin kick that comes from receiving constant upgrades. Instead, you'll likely get a new upgrade every few attempts, although the upgrades are usually meaningful. The first one I got was a Revolver, which made my pistol weapon pierce through enemies, making it much easier to fight against a crowd and whittle them down quickly. Upgrades aren't strictly necessary to progress; a skilled player could likely play through a lot of the game without any upgrades; they just make it a lot easier for us less-skilled players.
Your main objectives in KILL KNIGHT are the grade you receive on each arena, depending on how fast you complete it, your score, and your performance on the leaderboards. You can compare yourself against the world and your best buddies as you compete in a highly skill-based and tense environment. Keeping your kill combo up, avoiding damage, and playing on a higher difficulty setting gives you the best score, and besides progressing from arena to arena, of which there are 5, this will probably be where a lot of your satisfaction comes from.
KILL KNIGHT isn't too impressive visually, but it presents itself in a fine manner. I had blood turned off on my playthrough just because it made the screen a bit more cluttered, and I found it easier to discern enemies with it off. However, generally, there will be large amounts of blood strewn across the arena, which will mostly be flooded with enemies and gunfire.
The sound is also a bit forgettable, but I suppose choices were limited when the entire game involves constantly firing a rapid-fire pistol for several minutes. The sounds aren't irritating, and that's a blessing. However, I found the mix slightly off, so I lowered the sound effect volume, as it can be hard to hear any music over the pistol sound.
I found KILL KNIGHT to be a very enjoyable title. It's tough, even on the lowest difficulty, but it'll reward your skill once you get the hang of it. The unlocks are pretty far apart, but each one gives you a feeling of more power and pushes you to keep progressing to the next arena. If you want a top-down arena shooter, KILL KNIGHT is one of the best.
KILL KNIGHT has full controller support, and playing the game with a controller is recommended. So, Steam Deck users shouldn't have any concerns about how the game controls and the bindings are all remappable. The game also supports 1280x800 resolution, so there will be no black borders around the screen.
There isn't much in the way of graphical settings, and due to the fast-paced and precise nature of the game, I recommend you play it at 60 FPS. So, I'm only offering 1 preset for you today.
Set the SteamOS frame rate limit to 60, and your TDP limit to 10W.
As I said, there aren't many graphical settings to adjust in KILL KNIGHT. We're keeping the resolution at 1280x800, VSync off, the framerate limit at 60, Anti-Aliasing set to None, and Reflections and Ambient Occlusion disabled.
The graphical settings don't make much of a difference to how the game looks, and we can save a few frames and gain extra battery life by turning them off. The game mostly hovers around 60 FPS with these settings, but it can dip into the high 50s and occasionally into the high 40s. However, these instances are rare, usually when firing a special attack. They're also unavoidable regardless of the TDP limit.
The game's power draw stays moderately low, around 11W-14W. So expect around 3 hours of battery life from a Steam Deck LCD and about 4 hours from a Steam Deck OLED.
Temperatures are fairly low in the 60C-65C range, with no fan noise.
KILL KNIGHT has a few accessibility options, such as disabling Screenshake and blood, options to make the cursor more visible, emboldening and making text clearer, and reducing UI flicker effects.
KILL KNIGHT ticks all the boxes you'd want from a top-down wave survival game. Tight controls, clear visuals, challenging but not unfair enemies, and unlocks to make you feel you are progressing. If you do find the game too challenging, there are 3 difficulty options, although all of them are on the tougher side, and even if you fail, you will eventually be able to unlock new upgrades to make it easier.
Performance on the Steam Deck is nearly flawless. There are some unavoidable frame drops here and there, but they are minor and aren't really noticeable unless you are staring at the frame rate like I was. The game controls well, and I can heartily recommend KILL KNIGHT for Steam Deck users.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster was provided by CAPCOM for review. Thank you!
Eighteen years since the release of the original Dead Rising, CAPCOM has brought the classic back with Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster. So, how does this remaster stand up? Does it stick faithfully to the original? Is it perhaps too close to the original? Let's find out!
The storyline of Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is identical to the original. Zombies have overrun a small town in Colorado, and photojournalist Frank West has infiltrated the town to get his next big scoop. After getting into the town's shopping mall, where survivors are making their last stand, he now has 72 hours to gather evidence, rescue as many survivors as possible, and find out just what's going on in Willamette, Colorado.
This remaster sticks very closely to the original game in general. The cutscenes are all pretty much identical, except for the improved visuals. The survivors are in the same places, and item pickups/drops are in the same place. The achievements list is very similar, albeit a bit less gritty, and even the voice lines are the same, aside from being re-recorded with new voice actors.
That's not to say all the game is the same, however. As I mentioned, the visuals are greatly improved from the original, adding better shading, extra visual effects, and things such as hair physics on characters. The hair does have a habit of clipping through their bodies/clothes sometimes, which is a little odd. Overall, the visual improvement is nice, and while the game isn't up to par with the latest games around it, it certainly is leaps ahead of the 2006 original.
It's not just the visuals that are improved, either. The gunplay is better, allowing players to move while aiming and shooting firearms. The game retains a fairly "clunky" feel to movement and combat, which fans of the original might appreciate, but this makes the game feel a lot more modern.
The movement retains the stilted feeling from the CAPCOM games of old, and it's not always as responsive as I'd like. In this regard, the game feels very late 90s, but with slow-moving zombies and the game's somewhat unrealistic portrayal of, well, almost everything, the clunky movement feels acceptable. It's almost as if the original game was planned to follow the vein of the Resident Evil games.
The gameplay has its fun approach to the zombie apocalypse, just as the original did. With weapons ranging from the usual pistols and submachine guns to the zany, with mannequins, coat hangers, katanas, and more! You can even hop into a car in certain areas and rack up some serious zombie kills. Sure, the game isn't as fluid as it could be, but in terms of fairly laid-back fun (considering the apocalyptic situation), Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is up there.
The photo mechanic is back, and yes, you can just spam photos near the beginning of the game to rack up ludicrous amounts of PP and level up to unfathomable levels before the game truly begins. This mechanic is essentially unchanged from the original game.
Hit detection with melee weapons isn't the best, often resulting in Frank swinging through enemies, and the game likes to make bosses invincible at certain points, making the fights needlessly difficult. One fight halfway through the game was much more difficult than needed as the boss is often invincible, and there's only a short window where attacks will damage them. It's frustrating, but CAPCOM also decided to stay true to the original. The saving grace is that the remaster has an auto-save feature that saves before encounters like this, so you can simply retry them if you fail.
Another area that was a bit of a bugbear in the original release, and while improved here, is still not as good as I would have hoped, is AI pathfinding. The zombie AI is fine, but they do not do much pathfinding. But your fellow survivor AI still leaves much to be desired. A couple of things were redesigned to help the AI navigate better. Still, I found that the AI gets stuck on walls occasionally, and this is quite frustrating on what is essentially an escort mission each time you find a survivor. It's such a big part of the game that I would have liked to see more work done to fix this.
Some quality-of-life improvements are brought in with the remaster, such as the ability to advance time at save points. Various objectives and storyline progression become available at different times during the 72-hour game, so if you just want to experience the story or you've completed objectives ahead of time due to being an absolute gamer, then you now have the handy ability to fast-forward until the next objective becomes available, instead of aimlessly wandering like in the original game.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster doesn't fix all of the original game's issues, and a couple of them, such as AI Pathfinding, really needed fixing. However, the game retains the charm and silliness of the original title while improving various aspects of its gameplay and adding nicer visuals. As far as remasters go, this is one of the more worthy ones worth checking out.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster has full controller support, which would be my preferred way to play the game. It also supports 1280x800 resolutions, so there are no black borders for Steam Deck users.
While there are plenty of graphical options to choose from, the game is limited by the Steam Deck's CPU rather than its GPU, so we can't get above 30 FPS no matter what we do, but this does mean we can upgrade some of the visuals without losing any smoothness. Therefore, I'm only offering 1 preset today.
Set the SteamOS frame rate limit to 30. We don't want a TDP limit for this one.
In the in-game settings, I went with the "Prioritize Performance" preset, which you can select near the top of the graphics options menu. Then, I scrolled down and adjusted FSR 3 to "Quality," as I found that that smoothed out the frame times a little, especially when making a quick turn of the camera. Here are the exact settings I used for reference.
These settings hold 30 FPS the whole time, although you may experience slight dips here and there for a second or two when quickly rotating the camera, as the game can struggle to load objects that have been out of sight. If there's a huge number of zombies on the screen, it can dip into the mid-20s in parts, and very, very rare cases, I had dipped into the teens for a few seconds. There's not much we can do about that, but fortunately, it's not all that common, and the game remains playable. Thinning the numbers will increase the FPS fairly quickly.
Power draw held around 16W-21W mostly, with temperatures around 60-70C, depending on the area you're in, and largely based on how many zombies are about.
Steam Deck LCD owners should expect no more than 2 hours of battery life, and Steam Deck OLED users should expect around 2.5 hours.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster has many accessibility features, including a new "Casual" difficulty mode to make things easier. You can enable/disable subtitles and closed captions for different parts of the game, disable camera wobble, and allow holding a button to have the same effect as mashing it in case of quick-time events.
You can also adjust the size of subtitles. However, this only alters the subtitle size for cutscenes and "proper" dialogue. The flavor text of NPC survivors who randomly give hints and chit-chat with Frank can't be made bigger or smaller, which is a shame, as it is by far the smallest text in the game and quite difficult to read on the Steam Deck.
Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster mostly stays true to the original, for better or worse. While some improvements have been made to AI pathfinding, visuals, and quality of life, a couple of 20-year-old relics remain. For old players, this might fuel their nostalgia; for newer players to the series, it might just prove a little frustrating.
Regardless, Dead Rising Deluxe Remaster is not a game to be taken seriously, and if you can sit back and laugh with it, you'll have a good time.
Performance on the Steam Deck isn't the best, but it's to be expected when you're dealing with large amounts of AI, given the Steam Deck's weaker CPU. Although we can occasionally see dips into the 20s, most of the game runs at 30 FPS, and you can play from start to finish on the Steam Deck and still have a good time. Controller support is also excellent.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
MechWarrior 5: Clans was provided by Piranha Games Inc. for review. Thank you!
The MechWarrior franchise had been on a bit of a hiatus until recently, with the last clan-focused entry having released in 1995, but now we are back. If you're like me, you may have only played the more recent MechAssault games, with 3 of them being released after MechWarrior 4. But MechWarrior is a whole different breed of game, whereas the MechAssault games are arcadey in nature, MechWarrior leans heavily into realism, presenting us with a Mech Simulation, something we don't get to see too often.
MechWarrior, MechAssault, and other assorted game series and novels are all set in the "BattleTech Universe." As such, many of the events happening have already happened before, and MechWarrior 5: Clans puts a new perspective on it. In this case, you are viewing it from the perspective of a Star Commander (essentially a Squad Leader) among the Snake Jaguar clan, one of the clans that are waging war against the 5 Houses of the Inner Sphere.
And if you have followed the other games in the series, this is the first to feature the Snake Jaguar clan as the protagonists.
A lot of exposition is left out in the game. Despite the story having plenty of cutscenes, these mostly focus on the interpersonal relationships of your squad and command. The overarching story is left barebones, other than the fact that the Clans left the Inner Sphere long ago to avoid a conflict but are now returning as they believe the Inner Sphere Houses have found them and will want to fight. I presume the developers expect you to be versed in BattleTech lore to fully understand the circumstances behind all of this, as it is not explained in the game.
The story's cutscenes are all pre-rendered and aim for hyper-realism. Unfortunately, while the technology used is clearly impressive, it leaves you with that sort of uncanny valley feeling about some of the characters' faces. There's something just not quite right about how they look sometimes, especially around the eyes, and it left me a bit disconcerted in some cutscenes.
Ultimately, the story gives me very Warhammer-esque vibes. With the Clans feeling like they are "righteous" and doing the right thing by invading the Inner Sphere Houses, you are left questioning whether that is the case. You don't get to hear anything from the Inner Sphere Houses, with nearly all dialogue being from members of the Smoke Jaguar Clan. Therefore, you are only presented with one side of the narrative, which is always a red flag. But, you're a soldier, you're there to fight, not think.
That being said, I did enjoy the story. The voice-acting may seem off in places, but there's also a "proper" way to speak in the Clans, and it's possible this stilted way of speaking was a direction the voice actors chose to follow. But in general, I give it a thumbs up.
But, strange-looking warmongerers with dubious reasons for fighting aside, MechWarrior 5: Clans presents us with fantastic Mech simulation.
The Mechs in the game feel heavy. This doesn't play like your average Third or First-Person Shooter (you can switch camera views); you will be sliding your mouse like crazy repeatedly across your desk to get your hunk of steel to look 5 degrees to the left. Movement is slow, which means you have to think strategically. If you're facing the wrong direction, that's valuable seconds lost where the enemy is striking you, and you cannot strike back. Even using your Jump Jets to gain height is sluggish and momentum-based.
This feeling of heaviness translates into the weapons, too. Whether you're firing your missiles, your Gauss Cannon, machine guns, or one of the many lasers on offer, each shot feels like it has an impact and does real damage, even if you miss half of your shots. Having your screen fill up with visual effects from your different weapons all firing off is pretty exhilarating.
However, firing weapons is where things get a little complicated. Your weapons are separated into Weapon Groups, and the first Mech you pilot has 4 Weapon Groups assigned: one for machine guns, one for a laser, one for missiles, and another for melee. Unfortunately, as my mouse has no side buttons that I can use, I only had LMB and RMB assigned to 2 Weapon Groups, meaning I had to use the 3 and 4 keys on my keyboard to fire my 3rd and 4th weapons.
This isn't too bad when you're using WASD to move, but it's probably a recipe to get RSI in the future. So I would recommend you get a mouse with some side buttons that are easily pressable for this game or another control method that has lots of accessible buttons. The game does have controller support though, so if you decide to use a gamepad, it should feel relatively comfortable.
The combat in MechWarrior 5: Clans is easily the game's biggest highlight. With destructible buildings and objects, plenty of different weaponry, a diverse array of enemies, and the ability to both lose your parts and destroy parts off enemy mechs, the game shines.
Most missions don't offer you a chance to repair during them, so you'll want to play to your strengths. Have a laser setup that's long-ranged? You're best off hanging back and picking off enemies before they close in to minimize the damage you take. But if you're equipped with close-range machine guns, use buildings and terrain as cover to get as close as possible before the fighting starts, ensuring a quick end to the battle. Either way, at the end of the mission, you'll end up back on your ship, facing the consequences of any damage your squad took during the mission.
And now it's time to play XCOM! Just joking, but seriously, the base mechanics of MechWarrior 5: Clans are very reminiscent of XCOM 2. Upon finishing a mission, you'll be able to use Technicians to repair your mechs, including hiring more Technicians to do more substantial repairs. Any damage that can't be repaired is carried on into the next battle. Alternatively, you can buy a new mech, swap it out, and leave the old one in the hanger for repair.
The same goes for equipment and weaponry, which allows you to buy new gear for your mechs and swap out different components so you can get your load out just how you like it. Want to fit loads of lasers and heatsinks so you can deal mass damage in one blow? Go for it! Or do you prefer to fit machine guns along with ammo reels? You can do that too.
On top of this, you have experience points for both your Mechs and squad members, allowing them to level up and enhance their abilities and skills, such as turning rate (much needed), weapon cooldowns, and evasion ability. You can also research new technologies with your scientists, who function similarly to the technicians, and you can upgrade things such as weapon range, cooldowns, heat dissipation, and more!
You'll also unlock new mechs as you level up and progress through the game, unlocking higher classification of mechs beyond the "Light" and "Medium" mechs you start with, which essentially allows for more "tonnage," meaning more equipment and weapons can be fitted to them.
In some ways, MechWarrior 5: Clans is an in-depth Mech sim. The game aims for realism on all fronts, aiming for photo-realism with its pre-rendered cutscenes, realistic physics for its mechs, and a comprehensive system of upgrades and equipment load-outs to back it all up.
The game also has a 5 player co-op mode, letting you play through the story with up to 4 friends taking the place of your squad members. However, if you are playing alone, you will have AI on your team. Unfortunately, the AI is sometimes as dumb as a bag of rocks.
This is particularly noticeable on a stealth mission near the beginning of the game. While the friendly AI seems competent at fighting, they don't seem so competent at anything else. They did not attempt to hide themselves, thus triggering the alarm and making everything more difficult. While they do make some attempts to steer clear of alarmed barriers, they will sometimes just walk through them and trigger the alarm. It was infuriating.
As it is, MechWarrior 5: Clans is a difficult game. I played the first few missions on Normal difficulty, but even then, my AI teammates were still sometimes destroyed, and I got to a critical level once or twice. Veterans of the series will probably still face challenges from the hardest difficulty, and newcomers should be able to get by in Story mode or Normal if they feel up to a challenge.
It's also worth noting that the Story mode is the only mode in the game. There are no multiplayer deathmatches or versus modes, just the campaign, which you can play solo or multiplayer with up to 5 players.
I also experienced some crashes on occasion. They were always at the end of a mission and generally increased in frequency as I progressed through the game. Fortunately, the game always saves at the end of each mission, and the crash seemed to happen directly after a save, so no progress was lost, but it did require a reboot of the game after some missions.
The game is brutally difficult to run on Steam Deck, and while it does boot, I never got the game to exceed 25 FPS on the Steam Deck, thus making it unplayable.
Even on my PC, which I played on to write this review, which has an RX 6600 XT and a Ryzen 5600, which falls just under the "Recommended" system requirements, it still dropped below 30 FPS on the lowest graphical settings with FSR upscaling from 860p to 1440p. In extreme circumstances in later missions, it dropped to single-digit FPS for a few seconds here and there. This is likely a VRAM issue, as the RX 6600 XT only has 8GB of VRAM, and the game seems to demand more than that at times.
I'm unsure if there are some issues at play here, as the performance seems pretty dire, but one thing is for certain, I don't think we'll be playing MechWarrior 5: Clans on the Steam Deck in the future.
MechWarrior 5: Clans doesn't have many accessibility options, but it does allow you to disable camera shaking, aim assist, and subtitled dialogue in both gameplay and cutscenes.
MechWarrior 5: Clans is a Mech game for Mech fans. If you want a game that portrays these mechs for the whatever-ton steel beasts they are, then this is the game for you. The storyline takes a bit of a backstep, but the characters are interesting enough, and the gameplay more than makes up for a somewhat vague storyline.
There are some issues, such as the friendly AI doing some things that will make your life difficult, and the performance seems far worse than it should be, but if you have a PC to brute-force through the performance issues, the game overall is solid. I would have given MechWarrior 5: Clans an 8/10 for gameplay, but the severe performance issues and crashes lower it to a 7/10 gameplay score for me.
Unfortunately, the above-mentioned performance means that the game is unplayable on the Steam Deck, and given how poor the performance is, I don't think it'll just be a case of "a patch will fix it" for this one.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Undisputed was provided by Deep Silver for review. Thank you!
Undisputed makes it clear right out of the gate that this is a game for those who are really into their boxing. The fighting is designed to be nuanced and will overwhelm anyone unfamiliar with boxing. As will the menus, with many stats looking more like a management game than your regular sports game. If you aren't into your boxing, I wouldn't even recommend continuing with reading this review, but if you are, you are in the right place.
Undisputed gets you started by placing you in a practice ring to run you through your paces with a combat tutorial. It all starts fairly easy, talking you through moving around the ring with the left thumbstick before going into how to throw basic punches by jabbing the right thumbstick in certain directions. Jabbing the left thumbstick to dodge, pressing down the left thumbstick and jabbing it to slip, pressing the right thumbstick near your opponent to clinch, holding RT to block, holding RT and LB to body block, holding LT and left thumbstick to weave, then you have power attacks, stance changes, feints, headbutts.
There is a lot to learn in a very short amount of time. Even after running through the tutorial and starting up a career mode, I lost my first 3 fights before taking a break, given how frustrated I was with the game.
I couldn't tell if it was my lack of skill or just the way the game is, but everything felt rather slow, I can't say I watch boxing matches in real life, but from what I have seen, the swing of punches is usually very fast, and dare I say, somewhat precise. In Undisputed, it feels like even the fastest punches take half a second to connect, and once you've run out of stamina after 3 punches, your character moves at half the speed, which is just painfully slow.
In the end, for most of the matches, I ended up getting close to my opponent, wildly wiggling the right thumbstick back and forth to do left and right punches, and then backing off once my stamina was low, making vague attempts to block incoming punches if I saw them. I know this isn't how the game is intended to be played, but doing any form of "tactical" movement and strategic punching just seemed to get me KO'd even faster and barely put a dent in my opponent's health/stamina.
So, the combat wasn't my cup of tea. It seemed like it was trying to be a simulation with how complicated all the controls are. It also gave you 5 different options to protect yourself from attacks, which I had no idea how to read to know which to use. Sadly, the simulation-like controls didn't really match up to the gameplay, in my opinion, and it left you with a sluggish and unresponsive feeling game.
The career mode will most likely be where you spend most of your time, where you can build your character to become a champion or select from an existing famous IRL boxer to play as. Either way, you'll need to build up your team around you, train yourself, and improve your stats as you climb the world rankings.
This part of the game seems fine; you can hire a coach, cutman, and manager to handle your training, injuries, and contracts, and you can choose your training regiment to focus on which stats you want to improve. It's quite in-depth and it seems like if boxing is your thing, you'd probably have some fun specializing your skills into how you want to play. If only all of this wasn't training for the combat in this game...
Regardless, you'll be able to organize fights with other famous boxers that you'll recognize and fight across a variety of arenas. It can get a little repetitive, as this is boxing, and each fight is pretty similar. Although your opponents do seem to have slightly different personalities and tactics, some fighters are definitely more aggressive.
This brings us to the one area where I think Undisputed doesn't disappoint: the variety of content. Undisputed features over 100 real-life boxers from multiple weight classes and men's and women's boxing. It also features 19 different arenas to fight in, ranging from more personal gym environments to outdoor arenas and big indoor stages with spotlights and crowds.
You can't fault Undisputed for that amount of variety. If you're playing in the "quick fight" mode instead of the career mode, you can modify things such as the amount of damage dealt and the amount of stamina you have, making fights more interesting.
Visually, the game doesn't disappoint either. While I couldn't run on high settings on the Steam Deck, the game still looked appealing. You can see some details on the characters, such as more specular details on characters when they sweat, the reddening of the skin as the battle goes on, ripples on the characters' bodies when they take a punch, and the bruises and blood that you might expect. The environments also look varied and up to scratch.
So, Undisputed isn't a game for me with its overly complex fighting mechanics and oddly sluggish feeling gameplay, but if you have been starved of a boxing game and you want to try out a modern one with good graphics and fairly deep mechanics, then Undisputed should be a game that you look into for yourself.
Sadly, Undisputed does not support 16:10 aspect ratio resolutions, so the best resolution on our Steam Deck here is 1280x720, which means we get some black bars above and below the screen. The game does have good controller support.
Performance isn't too great on the Steam Deck. You can run the game at 30 FPS with some settings turned up, but with the game already feeling sluggish, playing at 30 FPS just made it feel even worse. Also, I found that having VSync enabled caused some pretty odd frame rate issues, with the game getting stuck at 27 FPS quite often, so we have to forego that.
As a side note, Undisputed requires an internet connection for your first boot of the game, although subsequent boots can be done offline.
In SteamOS, you'll want to apply a Frame Rate Limit of 40 and no TDP Limit.
In the in-game graphics settings, you'll want a resolution of 1280x720, disable V-Sync, and set your game framerate limit to anything; it doesn't really matter. The menu framerate limit should be 60 or above; do not select 30, as in my case, it limited the game to 30 as well, not just the menus.
Set anti-aliasing to Low, Shadow Quality to Very Low, Texture Resolution to Low, and Post-Processing to Low. Motion Blur is optional, although I left it on in these tests.
Visually, the game still looks fine on these settings, and it will hold 40 FPS well on some arenas. However, do expect some slowdowns to the low 30s on certain arenas.
If the slowdowns get to you, you can enter the "game" tab in options and lower the Crowd Density setting. If you have this on 0%, you can run most arenas at a fairly stable 40 FPS, but you do lose a fair bit of ambiance.
The game also uses an enormous amount of RAM. On Ultra settings, RAM+VRAM usage combined exceeded 20GB and caused severe issues. This is one of the reasons we keep all the settings at the lowest, including texture detail, which often has no direct impact on performance.
Power draw varies quite a lot in the game. It hovers around 15-20W for many matches, but some matches, depending on the arena, can reach 25W. This is primarily in arenas with many crowds, so reducing the Crowd Density setting can help here.
As expected, temperatures varied along with power draw, with 75-80C being the most common range. However, in the more intensive arenas, temperatures can go beyond 80C. At these points, the fan does become loud.
The only accessibility options in Undisputed are the ability to disable various flashing elements in the game for those with photosensitivity and disable camera shake/tilt to avoid motion sickness.
Undisputed is an unapologetically complex fighting game. With controls that will take some getting used to and AI that will proceed to beat you down until you get used to them, this isn't a game for everybody. But if you are looking for a boxing game and you've been starving for a good one for some time, Undisputed is at least worth giving a chance and seeing if it's the one for you.
The performance on Steam Deck is a little disappointing. We have to run at the lowest graphical settings to get the game up to 40 FPS, which is the minimal "playable" frame rate. Even then, we get dips close to 30 FPS on some arenas without removing all of the crowd. Undisputed can be played on the Steam Deck, but it's far from the best way to play it.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Rogue Waters was provided by Tripwire Interactive for review. Thank you!
I'm always in the mood for some pirating adventures. While Rogue Waters might not give you the freedom of games like Sid Meier's Pirates or Sea of Thieves, it does offer a great nautical-themed adventure that should delight tactical combat and pirate fans alike!
The story of Rogue Waters is one of classic betrayal, with your former captain turning against you in exchange for personal gain. Now, years later, it's up to you to form your crew and embark on a journey of revenge. Of course, when you were betrayed, you naturally gained immortality, as did the rest of your crew, so no matter how many times you fail, you can get up and go again.
This forms the basis for the "rogue" part of "Rogue Waters." In traditional Roguelite form, dying ends your run, but you'll carry over any currency you managed to loot to upgrade your ship and your crew and come back even stronger than before.
These upgrades take a variety of forms. Your ship always starts with some equipment, but using the currency you collect, you can open up additional cannon slots to begin with an advantage. You can also get more module slots to fit on your ship, which typically enhances your crew's abilities, such as giving them more HP or movement in the tactical combat section of the game.
On top of just equipment, your captain and the officers you recruit can also gain experience after each run, allowing them to level up and earn skill points. You can then spend those skill points to give your officers extra abilities and improve their stats.
Once you've got your crew and ship kitted out, it's time to take to the seas, and the game neatly offers you three choices of "raid" to embark on. These vary in length, slightly affecting the type of loot you might find and the ships' fittings you will encounter.
The raids take the form of branching paths, allowing you to choose what you'd like your next encounter to be, although often, there isn't too much choice going on here. It's quite common to be given 2 or 3 choices, which are all ship battles. Very occasionally, you will encounter an event, which is dialogue, where there's a chance to get some free loot or heal a crew member, but 90% of encounters are ship battles. Sometimes it feels like the choice is a bit of an illusion, with the only difference between the ship battles being the lootable item at the end of it.
When you do enter a battle, however, things get interesting. The first stage of any battle is turn-based naval combat, where you will command your cannons to direct shots at the enemy ship or fort, damaging their cannons, modules, or crew, depending on what makes the most tactical sense to you. Certain cannons can only shoot certain parts of a ship, with Cannonbreakers specifically targeting cannons, Decksweepers targeting crew, and Shipwreckers targeting modules. You can, of course, get general cannons that can fire at anything, but these often cost more command points to fire, and you have a limited amount each turn.
In the end, I found that Swivel cannons are invaluable. These cannons can only target crew, but they cost no command points to fire, meaning you can fire them every turn for no penalty, whittling down the enemy's crew, ready for when the next phase of battle commences, the boarding battle.
The boarding battle is where most of Rogue Waters' action takes place. This is turn-based combat, although it plays more typically like a tactical RPG at this point, with a grid-based field containing both your and the opponent's crew.
Positioning is everything in Rogue Waters. When you attack an enemy, most of your attacks will cause you to "advance," which pushes the enemy back a tile and allows you to take their place. But if the enemy gets pushed back against a wall, they take additional damage, and if they get pushed back against one of their allies, both them and their ally will take some damage. This requires you to assess where you want your crew positioned to deal the maximum damage to your opponents while considering where you'll be pushed if the enemy attacks you.
All of this, combined with the ship modules at play, ropes that allow you to swing extra distances across the battlefield, and a mixture of enemy types that you'll be facing, work together to create a great tactical experience. When you've got your crew in the perfect position and start to execute your turn, taking out enemy after enemy, it's a really satisfying moment.
Rogue Waters is also pretty nice to look at. The ocean/water effects are well done, and there are some good visual effects when ships are firing at each other with their cannons. While most of the game is played from a zoomed-out perspective, occasionally, when pulling off a melee attack, the camera will zoom in to show a rather gruesome execution of the move, which often involves a sword running through someone and plenty of blood being sprayed.
So, Rogue Waters does what it sets out to do. It's a linear-feeling game, as games of this genre often are, and the game is nearly entirely based around combat, which is saved by the fact that Rogue Water's combat is a strong foundation for the game to be built on.
Rogue Waters runs at 1280x800 and fully supports controllers, so we're off to a good start. The game has no black bars or controls, and it's just fine with the Steam Deck's controller.
Performance-wise, we have a bit of a mixed bag. The game can't hold a stable 60 FPS no matter what you do. While the game's map and naval combat tend to run fairly well, the tactical boarding combat is much harder to run, and therefore, both the options I'm giving you today are targeting 30 FPS.
I did encounter an issue where every time I rebooted the game, it would default to the "High" graphics preset, undoing the settings I had previously put in place. Hopefully, this will be fixed for the game's launch.
I debated whether to make these my recommended or the quality settings below the recommended ones. Still, I'm not keen on running my Steam Deck at high temperatures, so I've made these my recommended settings.
We have a 30 FPS Limit in SteamOS and no TDP Limit for this one. Then, in the in-game settings, we'll have VSync On, turn Anti-Aliasing Off, the Texture Quality to High, the Ocean Quality to Medium, and the World Details to Low. We set the shadow distances at 0 to disable shadows.
We could lower Ocean Quality to "Off" to save more battery life, but it genuinely looks awful. It turns the water into a flat blue plane with no visual effects or movement.
Visually, the game still looks okay. The omission of shadows is the most noticeable difference, but it doesn't make a huge impact. I think the game looks good enough, even without Anti-Aliasing or shadows.
The power draw is generally around 18-21W here, but it can rise as high as 25W in intensive combat. Steam Deck LCD owners should expect around 2 hours of battery life, with Steam Deck OLED users getting around 2.5 hours. The power draw drops dramatically outside of combat, around 12W on the world map.
Temperatures were about 70-80C, with the CPU running hotter. The fan noise ramps up during the boarding combat and will quieten during the rest of the game.
For this one, I'm prioritizing visual niceties over battery life. Regardless of what you do, your battery life won't last too long in Rogue Waters, but this probably isn't the kind of game you'll play for hours on end. With a 20-30 minutes long run, this preset should give you enough battery for 3 or so runs per charge.
Apply a 30 FPS Limit in SteamOS, along with no TDP Limit. You'll want VSync enabled in the game, too, as it gets rid of the input lag introduced by the SteamOS Frame Limiter. Then, you'll want to set the Anti-Aliasing to MSAA, the AA Quality to High, the Texture Quality to High, the Ocean Quality to Medium, and the World Details to High. Then, have all the Shadow Distances at half—that's 250, 100, and 100 for those.
With these settings, you get good-looking water, shadows throughout the game, and a clear and sharp image. I did try running at the absolute highest, but running at those settings, especially having the Ocean Quality on High, can occasionally cause performance to dip to the mid-20s. With these settings, I did, on odd occasions, see dips to 28 or 29 FPS, but generally, we can keep 30 FPS.
We pay the price of visual niceties with a killer power draw. However, with the game often taking around 20W-26W from the battery, don't expect more than 1.5 Hours of battery life from a Steam Deck LCD, and you might be able to squeeze 2 hours from a Steam Deck OLED.
Temperatures are very high, at around 80-90C during boarding combat. The fan will be loud during these sections, although temperatures and fan noise drop outside of combat. This is the main reason I'm not recommending these, as the CPU often creeps around the high 80s in combat, and I'd rather not stress my Steam Deck out that much.
Rogue Waters has some accessibility options. You can disable blood if that's not your thing. You can also disable camera shake and sway if prone to motion sickness. There is also HUD Scaling and Font Size, which I had set to 105 and 22, respectively.
Rogue Waters is a fun pick-up-and-play pirating adventure. It's not the open sandbox that most pirate games aim for, but it's a fun time nonetheless. If tactical gameplay is your guilty pleasure, then there's plenty to enjoy about Rogue Waters' deep and satisfying combat mechanics, and I'd recommend giving it a try.
Steam Deck performance is a little worse than I would have hoped for such a game. Graphics settings seem to have a minimal impact on performance, with the CPU seemingly the bottleneck here, so don't expect more than 30 FPS out of this game. Still, given its nature and the game's good controller support, it can play fine on the Steam Deck. The game also autosaves after every battle, so don't worry about exiting if your battery life is low.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
