Tag: Callisto Protocol

Completed Callisto Protocol.
You discover that Warden of the prison is still alive. He prevents your escape by shooting down the ship. Then there’s a lenghty sequence where you have to sneak past blind zombies. It’s possible to fight past them even if you fail your sneaking, so it’s not a big deal. And it’s also possible to take them down stealthly. The funny part is just how much noise Jacob produces while doing so, without any zombie noticing.
The game starts to remind me of Order 1886. It is very compelling visually, has simple but effective mechanics, but doesn’t excel at anything in particular. The first boss, two headed ogre, is an example of it: it looks good, but all you need to do is to dodge its attacks and shoot it until it dies.
Because Dani mentions that you can relieve the memories through the chip you have, I was expecting a twist that it was all just a dream or someone else memory. But it is mostly what it is: shadowy organization seeking to evolve humanity discovering alien lifeform and experimenting on the prisoners.
The upgrade system plays a trick on you. Throwing enemies at spikes and fans is very effective, I got through the entire transporter arena by just throwing mutated zombies at the fan over and over again without wasting a single bullet. So you are tempted to upgrade telekinesys as much as possible. But it doesn’t work on bosses. Same goes for melee.
The final boss is good, despite its shortcomings. It’s so big you can hardly see what’s going around you, and what’s going around you are suicide zombies, which you supposed to throw at the boss, but if you don’t, kill you. Also, the boss kills you in one hit. But at least you can see where you need to shoot, and out of all “tyrants”, I enjoyed it one of the most.
Also, that’s the only encounter in the game I found automatic pistol to be useful, as the target is so big and you don’t need to save bullets anymore.
In the end, Jacob accepts that his smuggling operations is what allowed outbreak of the virus on Europa to happen, killing Dani’s sister (that’s all to the cube you’ve shown in your dreams, it seems). He sacrifices himself to save Dani. But there’s also a DLC where I guess he tries to escape, but I’m not gonna try it.

There’s no experience, but there are credits, used to upgrade the weapons and the telekinetic glove. Inventory is very limited, so most of the excesses should be sold, since there isn’t much backtracking.
Something I thought we got over with around 2010: transitions. Every few minutes you need to squeeze through some tight space, or crawl through an air duct, or slowly open a door with your bare hands.
Enemies start to mutate, and if you don’t kill them in time, become stronger. Resident Evil 4 used a somewhat similar system.
Once you get your suit and go out: that snow is really impressive. Not just a texture, but with a depth to it.

First part of the game we mostly guided on radio by another convict, Elias, who finds different reasons why he can’t come with us. So I fully expected him to betray us. But no, he just dies once we get out.

It’s Dead Space. I haven’t played the 2023 remake, but still. The colors, the camera, the movement, audiologs, body stomps, it’s all there. Nice introduction overall, explains neatly why protagonist has traffic light in the back of his head.
Impressive how sweaty characters are. And also some familiar faces among the actors.
Gameplay wise, it feels much more melee oriented. Luckily, without any Souls like influence. Blocking with “back” button is something common in fighting games, but I don’t ever remember seeing in third person action. Once you get a pistol, you also can perform a combo where you auto aim at a stunned enemy. Handy.
Of course there are upgrades for your weapons. Nice that the upgrades actually change the look of the weapon, and in a way that makes sense: stability upgrade adds a foregrip, for example.
You also get a powerglove to drag objects or even enemies like a Jedi. I remember this was popular in early 2000s games, but everything makes a comeback eventually.

Something very strange happened with this game. I had it bought on Epic Store (I actually received it for free), but when I went to my library to install it, it wasn’t there. So I thought maybe I didn’t remember correctly. I went to the Store page, but there it was saying “In Library”. I checked Library again, it wasn’t there. I contacted support, but by the time they responded, it reappeared again.