Quantum Break

I played Quantum Break an episode a day over several days. I thought it was very well made with good characters and stories. Beyond the excellent video presentations with branching storylines, it has some interesting combat mechanics.

Stacking Attacks

This is surprisingly intuitive and satisfying to pull off. While freezing an enemy in a bubble where time stands still, any bullet you shoot will stop at edge of bubble, and launch all at one when the bubble shrinks.

It reminds me of times playing in the arcades where I had to smash buttons very quickly in order to whittle down tough enemy bosses. Except that at hard difficulty in Quantum Break you really need to combine all skills so that you can finish the episodes quickly.

Linear Item Collection

To achieve 100% completion, you must find all notes and Chronon particles. However, the timeline shows you exactly the sequence when the items appears. So while the map itself may be slightly open-ended, you always know the general room to search for the missing item.

Ability To Download Videos and Subtitles

With videos connecting each chapter, I am glad there is an option to download the video so that I won't have to stream them while playing. It is a shame that subtitles doesn't seem to render properly half of the time.

Subtitles are important because I usually play after my kids are asleep. I don't want to turn up the volume and subtitles make it easier to follow the story and conversation.

Time Fracture Graphics and Sound

It has an interesting broken glass effect, with healthy dose of chromatic aberration along the edges. Plenty of particle and glow effects make fantastic visuals. Character's proximity to time fractures also alters conversations and sound effects in the form of reverb and echoes.

A lot of scenes involve glitches of man-made constructs doing things that they aren't supposed to. They make up some of the worst trial-and-error segments of the game but at least they convey the sense of dire urgency the main character has involved himself with.

The game engine is able to desaturate and highlight object of interest. It also has some nice accessibility features so that it is easy to separate collectable items of interest from others.