Bragr
Banned
It was affected by the vibe of Marvel's Avengers and the character designs that didn't mimic the movie, and the reveal was received with a hu-hum as people expected it to follow another games-as-a-service model. Nothing can be further from the truth. While I can see how some would view it as too slow, I was impressed by it. There might be a reason to question if they should have presented the game differently when they revealed it.
The sales are estimated to be around 1.5 million. That is low for such a big game, but there is a groundswell of fan enthusiasm, the Steam reviews are "Overwhelmingly Positive", the Metacritic user scores are high, and I see people mentioning the game constantly. Hopefully, people still buy the game well into 2022 and it gets its due.
My impressions (23-hour playthrough on PC):
Good
- The best voice-acted game of 2021, absolutely massive amount of dialogue, a lot of different characters are voiced, all of it impressive.
- From beginning to end, the banter is more comprehensive than perhaps any other game. They talk to each other during the entire game rather than just popping in once in a while during some walking sections.
- Most of the dialogue is written well and pulls off the dynamic of the Guardians.
- The game looks great.
- There is a great scale to the environments, great vistas, cool places. Always interesting to land on a new planet.
- There are some interesting turns to the story that makes you want to see what's next.
- Apart from some of the facial animations, most of the work they have done on presentation is impressive, from audio to visuals. Good soundtrack.
- While the combat has some flaws, when it works it's fun, it's satisfying to line up massive combo-attacks.
- The game puts a lot of effort into making the team feel like individuals with their own wants and desires, it wants you to like them and grow on them, which you do.
- The teammates work well during combat.
- Some good ideas like the rally mechanic in combat, the refrigerator door not closing (IMO the best part of the story, you close it the entire game, then during one of the flashbacks you do it at home, creating a context for it, connecting the future Star-Lord to his home on earth and his childhood), the Storm Rider song in the bar, the crew singing Drax's war song.
Things I'm Skeptical About But Don't Dislike Enough To Call It Bad
- The game features a lot of sections where you walk around doing light environment puzzles, there are times where I felt they needed to cut down on some of that or come up with more unique puzzles, rather than the same ones over and over.
- The beginning is slow. The game ramps up the amount of combat encounters as the game move on, but the first missions can feel too slow.
- Sometimes you can get tired of constantly spamming abilities rather than focusing on fighting as Star-Lord.
- If you don't get into the characters and their constant banter, a lot of the exploring sections are likely gonna be tedious, maybe annoying with the constant talking.
- The combat from Star-Lord's side should feel more powerful or have more impact, or at least the shooting needs to be more satisfying, just holding down a lock-on and shoot button isn't that interesting over time.
Bad
- The last big mission is mediocre at best because they spam too many combat encounters, it ends the game on a low point. The combat can get tiring when you go from encounter to encounter to encounter.
- At times, there are barely any facial animations. There are scenes on the Milano where the faces barely move when they talk, it's very noticeable and awkward.
- Lacks the last round of polish, there is a good deal of bugs, at least on the PC version it's almost common that parts of the interface get stuck on the screen, making you have to restart the chapter to remove it. Other common bugs involve characters "shaking" when they stand in certain areas and things popping into view. (Not sure if this is the case on consoles.)
- Some of the missions feel too similar in structure, you land somewhere on a planet and spend 45 minutes walking to a boss or some sort of end sequence.
- The environmental puzzles, where you break down weak wall segments or power up some console and stuff like that, is not that interesting or engaging. They lean too heavily on these light puzzles.
- There were times when I was positive that the game was ending, only to last for another 6 hours or so. Even though that might sound like a positive, there is something about expecting an end and not getting it that feels slightly annoying, even if you like the game.
- A lot of the abilities you unlock were lackluster, they sound cool on paper when you read the description, but in practice, you usually stick with the most effective ones.
The sales are estimated to be around 1.5 million. That is low for such a big game, but there is a groundswell of fan enthusiasm, the Steam reviews are "Overwhelmingly Positive", the Metacritic user scores are high, and I see people mentioning the game constantly. Hopefully, people still buy the game well into 2022 and it gets its due.
My impressions (23-hour playthrough on PC):
Good
- The best voice-acted game of 2021, absolutely massive amount of dialogue, a lot of different characters are voiced, all of it impressive.
- From beginning to end, the banter is more comprehensive than perhaps any other game. They talk to each other during the entire game rather than just popping in once in a while during some walking sections.
- Most of the dialogue is written well and pulls off the dynamic of the Guardians.
- The game looks great.
- There is a great scale to the environments, great vistas, cool places. Always interesting to land on a new planet.
- There are some interesting turns to the story that makes you want to see what's next.
- Apart from some of the facial animations, most of the work they have done on presentation is impressive, from audio to visuals. Good soundtrack.
- While the combat has some flaws, when it works it's fun, it's satisfying to line up massive combo-attacks.
- The game puts a lot of effort into making the team feel like individuals with their own wants and desires, it wants you to like them and grow on them, which you do.
- The teammates work well during combat.
- Some good ideas like the rally mechanic in combat, the refrigerator door not closing (IMO the best part of the story, you close it the entire game, then during one of the flashbacks you do it at home, creating a context for it, connecting the future Star-Lord to his home on earth and his childhood), the Storm Rider song in the bar, the crew singing Drax's war song.
Things I'm Skeptical About But Don't Dislike Enough To Call It Bad
- The game features a lot of sections where you walk around doing light environment puzzles, there are times where I felt they needed to cut down on some of that or come up with more unique puzzles, rather than the same ones over and over.
- The beginning is slow. The game ramps up the amount of combat encounters as the game move on, but the first missions can feel too slow.
- Sometimes you can get tired of constantly spamming abilities rather than focusing on fighting as Star-Lord.
- If you don't get into the characters and their constant banter, a lot of the exploring sections are likely gonna be tedious, maybe annoying with the constant talking.
- The combat from Star-Lord's side should feel more powerful or have more impact, or at least the shooting needs to be more satisfying, just holding down a lock-on and shoot button isn't that interesting over time.
Bad
- The last big mission is mediocre at best because they spam too many combat encounters, it ends the game on a low point. The combat can get tiring when you go from encounter to encounter to encounter.
- At times, there are barely any facial animations. There are scenes on the Milano where the faces barely move when they talk, it's very noticeable and awkward.
- Lacks the last round of polish, there is a good deal of bugs, at least on the PC version it's almost common that parts of the interface get stuck on the screen, making you have to restart the chapter to remove it. Other common bugs involve characters "shaking" when they stand in certain areas and things popping into view. (Not sure if this is the case on consoles.)
- Some of the missions feel too similar in structure, you land somewhere on a planet and spend 45 minutes walking to a boss or some sort of end sequence.
- The environmental puzzles, where you break down weak wall segments or power up some console and stuff like that, is not that interesting or engaging. They lean too heavily on these light puzzles.
- There were times when I was positive that the game was ending, only to last for another 6 hours or so. Even though that might sound like a positive, there is something about expecting an end and not getting it that feels slightly annoying, even if you like the game.
- A lot of the abilities you unlock were lackluster, they sound cool on paper when you read the description, but in practice, you usually stick with the most effective ones.
