I'm currently playing Ebola 3 and Monster Energy Supercross 4.
Ebola 3 is a low budget RE style survival horror game with UE 4 graphics. You are asked when first launching the game to report any bugs you find, but surprisingly, nothing major so far graphically or gameplay wise, just a bit of monster peek a boo moments as they partly no-clip through locked doors. The voice overs and animations are really the only things that stick out like a sore thumb as lacking polish. The game is in first person view, and has some challenging puzzles. It uses common RE features like recording tapes (reels in this case) to save game, many puzzles to get keys, weapons, etc, similar statues seen in RE games, and of course big eyes to shoot. It has it's shortcomings, but at $17, it's really not bad.
ME Supercross 4 brings in a new system of skill building via accruing XP points to spend on Abilities. Oddly enough though, one of those so called abilities in increasing your bike's brake power. Another is the Tail Whip trick, or Whip as it's called, which is not all all beneficial to racing. Another new feature is riding classes are now categorized as Futures, Rookie, and Pro. Futures is an amateur class trying to break into factory sponsored racing, and it even includes female riders. Futures has a very short 3 race season. Rookie class is basically the 250 West and 250 East classes, broken into a separate season for each as before. There are training sessions to hone specific skills, and training races, both of which can earn you skill points to spend on Abilities. I have already maxed out all my Abilities for Futures and Rookie classes, but Pro is locked until I start a Pro career season, which is 450 class.
One of the HUGE differences in SX 4, and one the developers clearly are not responsible for and have no control over, is most of the tracks are far more technical in this game, which follows the 2020 AMA Supercross season, as well as the track designs used in it. On top of that, even with abilities for the class you are racing maxed out, the things you can do with the bike have been nerfed considerably. Weighting back on jump takeoffs and landings only gives you a slight acceleration boost now, and you can't even pitch the bike forward or back in air unless you let off gas. This makes zero sense since you can weight back or forward while on ground no problem WHILE accelerating. You are also far more likely to crash if you don't land a jump perfectly, and it is also harder to steer sharp angles. This makes it really tough since you need to rail some berms well enough to hit triples out of them to keep up with even Med level AI.
Some of the crazy track features I've seen are small, oddly shaped tabletops used as sharp and dogleg turning points (Oakland), REALLY deep sand in hairpin turns (Tampa), hairpin turn right at the bottom of a big air double landing (Salt Lake), and it's common now to see really tough rhythm sections with steeply faced jumps that sap your momentum and seem to swallow you whole like Moby Dick. The Salt Lake track is the final venue for the 250 West career, and I call it the Geritol track (a supplement claiming to keep old people young). It literally feels like you're going in slow mo the whole way because you really can't get up much speed on it. I fully acknowledged the need to make Supercross 3 harder on Realistic mode, but these changes seem drastic and strange. All they needed to do was make the AI a bit faster and more consistent in rhythm sections. As I said though, the tracks matter a lot too, they are like the toughest opponent, and Milestone has no control over that. However I think they should have seen that the tracks for this season are far more technical, and that nerfing what you can do with the bike would only make matters worse because of that.
So far I am only racing on Very Easy AI, the lowest level. This is mainly to get the feel of the tracks and max Abilities without constantly battling AI. I have managed to win some races by 10 sec or more, but a lot of times I get knocked down to only a 2 sec lead at the end due to crashing or going off track. I have already won 250 West, but last night I spent a lot of time trying unsuccessfully to win the first race of 250 East, Tampa. It's kind of ironic I'm struggling so much at that one track after they just got hit by a massive hurricane. SO many people down there really bad off right now. I'm wishing I will find some way to master this game, but I feel like I'm clinging to false hope.
I get the feeling no matter how much time I spend trying to master this game, at best I might only be able to compete on season points, winning some races, losing others. While that is certainly more true to how real Supercross race seasons go, I'm not sure I can manage even that on Realistic AI, or finish 1st at the end of the season. It could very well come down to having to accept a season win, or even some podium finish, just on the default Medium AI. One of the things I'm not sure of is whether Pro level Abilities apply to Rookie class if you go back and race the 250 careers after obtaining all Pro Abilities. This is a key factor, because the 250 bikes have less power, and these tracks require power to manage some of the jumps. It would certainly help some if even in Rookie class your steering sharpness and degree of controlled lean would continue to increase, but I'm worried that increase will only apply to 450 racing.
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