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JSchlansky

jschlansky
Member Since
15 Apr 2014
N/A
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681
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Recent ratings
2847
Minireviews
184
Starred reviews
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681
Games
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0
Recent ratings
2847
Minireviews
184
Starred reviews
Bio: I perform various production-related tasks
Recent Ratings
88 93%
Mixtape (2026) - Rated 17 May 2026
38 14%
Drop Duchy (2025) - Rated 31 Jan 2026
A pretty clever idea, but I don't think they delivered on the potential of the premise. Visually, it looks like Tetris, but it doesn't feel or play like Tetris at all, which is a huge disappointment and massive squandered potential. The combat and resource management side of the game is weird, too easy, and unsatisfying, and everything happens far too slowly without an option (at least not that I found) to speed things up and drop tiles immediately. This fusion premise deserves a mulligan
80 86%
Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
Extremely flawed in many aspects of its design and execution and both buggy and janky to the point of feeling broken and unfinished, but there's still so much here to love. It's an extremely ambitious game and pulls some things off that I haven't experienced in another game. But that extreme ambition is also it's biggest downside as the game definitely bites off a lot more than it can chew. It's a game that can be both incredibly rewarding and incredibly frustrating.
45 22%
Halls of Torment (2024) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
While it does have some of its own ideas, I consider this too close for comfort to vampire survivors in a way that borders on or bridges into rip-off territory. It can still be fun at times, but it's also pretty imbalanced and the levels usually end up feeling more tedious than challenging due to their length. I cleared the subsequent stages no problem, but the first level was the only one that I had trouble beating, mostly because the game kept fucking crashing as soon as I would beat the boss
40 18%
Dragon's Dogma 2 (2024) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
I really hate the whole pawn system, from the wonky pathfinding and unbelievably awkward/annoying things they say and do all the way down to the basic idea of having to spend time recruiting and managing these characterless faux companions. Horrendous storytelling, too, which killed my attempt to enjoy the exploration and combat components
77 82%
Ball x Pit (2025) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
Simple yet ingenious in a “How has nobody done this before?” way. Specifically, “Ball x Pit” owes just as much to 2022’s “Vampire Survivors” as it does to “Brick Out” and similar ball-bouncing titles. But unlike many other games following in the wake of “Vampire Survivors,” this one doesn’t feel like a complete shameless ripoff and instead brings plenty of its own ideas to the table.
70 69%
Yes, Your Grace (2020) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
Charming and easy to get sucked into. The characters are fun and the story is engaging though never surprising. Some of the mechanics feel a bit too shallow in implementation, but the basic resource balancing works, although there are too many times where you end up unable to help people not really through any fault of your own but just due to the order you are asked for favors, which takes a lot of the potential nuance out of the decision making
25 7%
Ready or Not (2023) - Rated 26 Jan 2026
The fact that it's presented as good and necessary to zip tie everyone, including people scared civilians and even the corpses of people you just shot through the head is insane. From what I saw of this sort of thing in the trailer, it seemed like there was a chance the game was doing all this as a critique, but in practice, it comes off as horrible copoganda that seeks to justify lots of awful, brutal police actions as being necessary, even if you attempt to play as non-lethally as possible
90 94%
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl (2024) - Rated 07 Nov 2025
Outside of the bugs, this game has a ton of problems but I absolutely love so much of what it's going for and accomplishes, and it nails certain things that I've always wanted from an open world post-apocalyptic game that I've never properly gotten anywhere else. It could be an extremely frustrating road to walk down sometimes, but I love this game warts and all and it's an experience that will stick with me
78 83%
Death Stranding (2019) - Rated 07 Nov 2025
It's a game only Hideo Kojima could/would make, which is mostly a great thing but does also mean that there are swaths of jargon and melodrama + plenty of eye-roll inducing dialogue (Princess Beach will haunt the dreams of an entire generation)