Recent reviews by Topples

Pros:
Exciting and satisfying combat, heavy hitting weapons, fun build customisation and extremely addicting game play loop.

Cons: poorly graphically optimised, too many menus that they sometimes get in the way and you don't know what layer of menu you're on, inviting friends to lobbies can be annoying if you haven't played with them before, your mount has a mind of it's own and needs multiple setting tweaks to be functional.

You like Monster Hunter and have the PC to run it? Buy the game, amazing experience.
Low rank completed in 12hrs, Post credit High rank completed in 12hrs, 24 hours for the whole story (can be much longer if you don't rush it or take your time fighting everything and doing all missions)
Late game has rng weapon crafting and rng decoration farming (armour/weapon gem slotting) this is fun to min/max builds if you want but the base game is easy enough that you don't need it and it's more for fun.

I have been playing Naraka on and off for the last few years always ranking between top 2%-0.4% and every time I come back to play I forget how amazing this game really is but also reminded why I stopped playing in the first place.

Naraka is best described for me as a Battle Royal 3d Fighting game with expressive movement and sword-play combat as the primary focus. I could have wrote an essay on how much there is wrong with the game many years ago but the Devs have been fine tuning this game over regular updates over the years it's been out and the balance is in a relatively acceptable place as it stands.

Pros - Expressive movement base game, high mind games, incredibly high skill ceiling at the later ranks. High levels of customisation, lots of events and rewards, cool characters and weapons, consistent map and loot placings. Combat feels fluid and incredibly satisfying once it clicks, good lobby system, customisation of games, lots of game modes and possibly the highest character customisation almost to date, rivals even SF6 custom character abominations.

Cons - They fixed huge amounts of the cons over the years. The match making placing you in 150+ ping lobbies is frustrating and unavoidable without a VPN. The net code isn't good enough to handle anything over 100ms. Queue times are very long in the later ranks but smooth games below plat. High level of bots in the lobbies of lower games to fill out numbers, circle closes in too slowly, would be nicer if it was 15mins games max instead of 20-35mins.

Reasons of me quitting was due to the match making which has mostly been solved.
Would I recommend this? yes for sure, if you're a fan of fighting games or BR games or sword based combat PVP games? absolutely. There is also PVE modes if you're garbage at playing PVP skill based games and can only deal with scripted fights with bots/NPCs.

A dice rolling, coin flipping, casino gambling, 4-way mix up, 50/50 based game designed around how well you can articulate your ridiculous oppressive pressure strings into explosive damage on your opponent's one small wrong guess or mistake. ------------------------------------This game is the epitome of "Just Do It; Casino Edition".------------------------------------------- Huge counter hits, massive damage, touch of deaths, most moves being safe on whiff, high octane, everything is plus, everyone is op so no one is type of game play. I personally hate this play style of game but damn is it fun when you're not on the receiving end. Ending full matches within 40 seconds is hilarious and the best part is most of your moves that are punishable only give them tiny damage with a knockdown or even better reset back to neutral.----------------------------------------------------Offence and Defence:------------------------- Making the right read on offence leaves you with the round win or a minimum 60% of their health into a coin flip 50/50 oki, however, making the right read on defence will reward you with 5-10% damage on their health and a nifty reset to neutral, the risk reward is completely skewed in the offence's hand which is fun for some that hate blocking. I sometimes take joy in watching pro level tournaments to see the best players get 4-way mixed and touch of deathed over and over whilst I watch the frustration and sadness in their face as they lose to another wrong coin flip guess on wake up and then after the game set is over, having to come to a realisation that they have to play this game for a living. -----------------------------------Neutral:------- You want movement and/or footsies like Street Fighter or Tekken? Forget that, That's try hard big brain stuff, instead just unga zug zug your opponent till they cave, no thought process needed! If you like a game that is about "how can I beat a move with a move" or the only way to get out of this block pressure is to make the right guess with a move for risk reward heavily not in your favour or the fact that you have to spend meter to create space? Look no more, this game might be for you! You can take joy in blocking for excessive amounts of time whilst waiting for your turn, just be careful though! one wrong guess at the wrong time will mean you lose the match!-----------------------------------------------------------------This game sucks, enjoy your gambling simulator. I'm off to play SF6 while I wait for Tekken 8.------------------------------------------------------Peace-------------------------------------------------------------

SF6 got announced in 2022, As of mid 2022 I decided to try SFV again. The new season is fun, I'm enjoying it. The new defensive options are nice and some characters got cool changes. The game as a whole is fun and it is currently exactly what I was looking for in a 2D game.I don't recommend this game in it's current state for any new comers though and the reasons are as follows;- First to two format: Having a ft2 format in BOTH ranked and casual is just outdated and poor game design. Forcing players to go back to the lobby after 2-3 games doesn't feel good, why does this game not want me to play the game? My reasoning is, picture yourself having under 500 hours and still learning the basics of the game. What do all the best players say to help yourself get better? their answer is for the most part "play more". I want infinite rematch against that guy that is stomping my head in and I want to have the option to rematch the close games I have with players of similar skill levels. Getting kicked out after 2-3 games and then forced back to the lobby into a long wait only to be match with the same person again is disrespectful to my time. There is a reason the ft2 feature got removed in Tekken 7 Season 2 and why GGST is so successful at player retention with their fast load times and instant rematch. I would be okay with the ft2 format if it was only ranked or a choice to ask for ft2/3 or 5, however, having no option to do so is very frustrating because of the wait time and loading times which leads me into my next point.- The game feels like a Battle Royal: If you suck at Battle Royals they take a long time to get into games and once you're in you can die in seconds, returning you back to the menu just to queue and repeat the cycle again, same thing if you suck at SFV. SFV boasts long queue times, long loading times and forced advertisements coupled with the constant matches against laggy wifi players, "one and dones" and characters you haven't played against before without having enough time or rematches to learn even the basics of their kit makes for a very exhausting and time consuming experience. Playing a match for about 3-5mins then having a queue time of 5-15mins all because of the forced ft2 format and no rematch button makes me feel like I'm playing a Battle Royal and not a fighting game. - The net code is terrible: Very laggy games are tilting, even when you know that the connection with the player is good in other games is just typical incompetence by current Japanese developers. Proper rollback should have been added years ago, even a fan made rollback system was added but Capcom were quick to patch that out. There is no way to tell if someone is on wifi and there is no real GGPO Rollback, at least there is a blacklisting system against laggy players I guess.- Regular throws are too safe: This is just a nitpick and SF6 have confirmed they're nerfing throw option selects and virtually removing throw loops which should have never made it to the game to begin with unless you're a grappler archetype. Some characters have enough walk speed to throw you and loop it over and over again, if you chose to V-Shift the throw you get punished, if you jump you get anti aired and if you back dash you're still in the corner and they're at advantage, you can't jab the throw attempt because it was meaty on wake up or a tick throw, so you have to tech and teching a throw leaves them so close to you they can just repeat the process or you just get blown up by a strike. Coming from Tekken and calling out throws and whiff punishing stuff feels excellent. If you call a regular throw with a jump you should be able to punish it with the full jump in, but currently if you try to tech a throw and the opponent jumps to try make a read or vice versa, you can whiff the throw and still have enough time to anti air them. I find it hilarious that you're forced into only using shimmy and I would personally like a second option to deal with it. - Menus: The current menus in the game is some of the worst I have ever seen in my life. Nothing is organised, you have no idea where the play button is at first, to add people you need to go through a slew of pop ups and windows and the same goes for if you try to message people. Please let me add them straight from steam for lobby games. Forced socialising and adding people is the only way to get a rematch button and have a consistent flow of games to learn. If these things don't bother you, or you only play locally then I'd recommend it, if any of these bother you then just wait for SF6 or Project L.

Wait for Tekken 8 release.
Alternatively,
Buy this game now, sit in practice mode and support your locals if you don't want your teeth kicked in online by some clueless wifi warrior when you decide to purchase Tekken 8.

I want to start by saying I do not hate this game, it's just unfinished.
At the current state this game is in, I don't recommend wasting your time.

Out of the 100 hours I've played, I feel like 20 hours of it has been fun and the other 80 hours has been wasted playing a loot simulator. Filling my head with remembering recipes, item locations, running around doing pve, getting timers and strats down pat, practising refined item collection routes until final zone is not only very taxing but feels very bloated. For a game that focuses on combat you sure don't do much of it. Things like getting around the map would be easy using the teleporter if it wasn't programmed so poorly. It sometimes just advances you into a zone just to be sandwiched between two enemy teams or enemy players and places your duo/squad mates that teled in with you at the same time in the same zone on the other side of the zone with no chance to help you.

There is so many problems with the game I don't know where to begin.
I'll start with the pros;
- cool map design
- animals and bosses are nice
- ability to make custom games with friends
- abilities are fun to use and combat feels smooth most the time
- heavy focus of teamwork and theory crafting
- time management is fun
- gets harder the better your mmr gets
- wins and killing is very addictive
- abilities are satisfying and 3 hitting someone is fun for the first few hours

Cons;
- takes too long to loot
- time to kill is way too short
- getting one hit while you're at full build, 5 levels above another team is demotivating
- solo queue has only a handful of viable characters
- duo queue is based on how early you group and how lucky you get with items in the first 4 mins
- squads are the same as duos except you have to group at 3-4 mins or you else you just die
- some characters are really bad and others are overloaded to the point it feels like you're cheating while playing them
- if your team mate dies, there is no chance to outplay two people in a 1v2 situation regardless of your build or level
- the damage is so high that fights are decided within the first 3 seconds before final zone
- it's a glorified loot simulator
- crafting is needlessly complicated and bloated however, didn't stop me learning it all
- loot is way too important and limited.
- loot is so important that no body fights from level 1-5ish
- watching players walk past you, craft in front of you and ignore you takes a while to get used to
- fighting early is a waste of time and hinders your build, it actively enables everyone else get ahead
- if you do kill people early the kill xp doesn't offset the time spent so now you are 3-5 levels behind others that have just stuck to looting
- game is too RNG based and there is too much luck is involved

This game has a great concept but execution is awful so far and I'm wanting to warn everyone that wants to try it to just wait until the devs fix the core problems.

Some honourable mentions about the game;
The tutorial sucks, there is too many secret things to learn about the game that settings or the tutorial will never cover.

The time it take to load into the game is way too long. It looks something like this;
10 second accept timer
30 second character and weapon select
into another loading screen for the map
then into the build and route loading screen finally letting you to play after you wait another 30 seconds for that screen to be done counting down. the waiting is too much and takes away from the game as a whole.

PLEASE SAVE YOUR TIME AND DON'T DO WHAT I DID!
LEARN FROM MY MISTAKES!