The End of Dyeus

This game may have released in 2021 but it's my GOTY for 2025

I was honestly blown away with the game and its depth when I first played. Imagine my surprise when a full 4 years later it gets an update. I hope they did something with the rings... If you love secrets, surprisingly good and varied combat, and an interesting story -- this is the next game for you!

A compact open-world adventure that makes good use of every inch of area and has more secrets than you can fathom. Maybe it's just my playstyle, but combat seems to favor ranged; any melee slip-up chunks your health, and healing is relatively scarce.

Don't listen to the morons giving this negative reviews after 20 minutes. This is a wonderful game just like the dev's previous title, Worlds. The dev is clearly very devoted to an open-ended design that completely refuses to hold the player's hand and expects them to use their brain. Give it a chance!

After fiddling around for 2 hours I killed a big bug boss and realized I had no idea where to go next that wouldn't put enemies that 2 shot me in my way Spoiler alert, there was unfortunately not. It wouldn't be so bad if of course shops didnt run out of arrows to purchase but those dry up fast I regret purchasing, I really wanted to enjoy it but I cannot. Update, finished the game. Through just running through enemies at most points. I recommend the game less for it, the issues I had before mildly cleared up when I found the cannon - which i had over 800 shots for by this point and it cleared the way through anything I had thought at the time I would get through the end of the game like this with the gear I've been using the whole time, I get through the funny funk gate with the other cannon guys (Super annoying by the way, I hated fighting this group in particular because of the shields/cannon combo and how you cant block their shots lmaoooo) but no, the fantasy world I played in for 4 hours was taken from me, and my whole inventory lost suddenly we're on earth somewhere in nevada, I have no inventory no nothing. My issue with resources becomes 100x worse for the next two hours, no armor so everything does 50-80 at a range to you, they all fire explosions, theres an 'infection' mechanic that you dont interact with at all because the areas it is present in kills you too fast - healing in this alt earth is abundant and drops from every human enemy, every single chest has rockets in it so I ended up with 500 rockets by the time I found the thing the boss of this area launches rapid rockets that are almost unavoidable, a field of bombs that is the same, a homing viral attack and a charge with a monster hunter hitbox. All of that for confusion at the end. I offer you a 3.5/10 with the tagline 'An aggressively annoying experience - It has the sauce but fails the taste test, you've earned yourself a fervent hater this day."

Extremely refreshing exploration game with snappy combat. It drops you into the world and then leaves you alone to figure things out at your own pace.

If you love exploration and mystery focused games, you have to give this one a shot. This is one of the most tightly focused games I've ever played in terms of creating moments of sheer discovery and awe. End of Dyeus doesn't waste your time. You get a single objective and it plunges you into the middle of a world to explore at your own pace. The game rewards curiosity and keen observation with useful items, odd secrets, and unique combat encounters. It's also beautifully paced, ramping up in terms of both combat difficulty and scale. As your arsenal and tactics grow, the game hands you harder enemies and bigger strongholds that require you to use everything in your kit creatively. Combat is very quick and deceptively strategic. It can get frustrating when you're stuck on one fight, but every enemy has a weakness you can exploit. The rapid strafe/parry/hit rhythm makes you feel like you're desperately fighting for your life, and nailing that timing with a particularly hard enemy makes you feel like a genius. The ending is pretty awesome :)

very good game :)

I was genuinely surprised this game had such little attention around it. It's a very well-realized open-world adventure game with a ton of secrets that you can easily sink a lot of hours into, and the sense of progression is really rewarding, going from avoiding most enemies to fighting them. Playing it made me realize I had never actually come across a game that had so closely felt like a first person Ocarina of Time. The one thing that I can imagine people finding negative about it is that it gives you very little initial direction: you're thrown into the world with a vague goal and meant to go from there. But reading the in-game books and notes tells you what to do. Edit after beating the game, with mild spoilers: still a positive review but the last ~2 hours of the game are a bit of a slog. I could see what the dev was going for with wanting to disorient the player but in practice it felt like brute-forcing a bunch of suicide runs until I was able to get to the next fountain. Still, a really fun 5-7 hours!

A total waste of time and total crap game.