game of the year all years

PAGE SEVEN (it's about time)
here are all the reviews from the last six pages (scores may be adjusted to be more accurate to how i feel right now)

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity (2020) - Switch [7.5/10]
Persona 5: Royal (2020) - PS4 [8.5/10]
Persona 5 Scramble: The Phantom Strikers (2021) - PS4 [9/10]
Kingdom Hearts HD II.8 Final Chapter Prologue (2017) - PS4
-----REVISITED: Kingdom Hearts: Dream Drop Distance [7.5/10]
-----Kingdom Hearts 0.2: Birth by Sleep - A Fragmentary Passage [8.5/10]
Pokémon Shield Expansion Pass (2020) - Switch
-----Isle of Armour [8/10]
-----The Crown Tundra [7/10]
Far Cry 5 (2018) - Xbone [5/10]
-----Far Cry 5: Hours of Darkness (2018) - Xbone [7.5/10]
Assassin's Creed: Origins (2017) - Xbone [7/10]
Persona 3 Portable (2010) - PSP [7/10]
Genshin Impact (2020) - PS4 [7/10]
Agents of Mayhem (2017) - Xbone [4/10]
Need for Speed Heat (2019) - Xbone [9/10]
Hades (2020) - Switch [9/10]
Forza Horizon (2012) - Xbox 360 [10/10]
Luigi's Mansion 3 (2019) - Switch [6.5/10]
The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles (2021) - Switch
-----The Great Ace Attorney Adventures (2015) [7.5/10]
-----The Great Ace Attorney 2: Resolve (2017) [2/10]
Forza Motorsport 7 (2017) - Xbone [6.5/10]
Psychonauts 2 (2021) - Xbone [9/10]
REVISITED: Just Cause 4 (2018) - Xbone [6.5/10]
Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age (2018) - PS4 [6/10]
Dragon Quest Builders (2018) - Switch [7/10]
Forza Horizon 5 (2021) - Xbone [9.5/10]
Pokémon BrilliantDiamond (2021) - Switch [7/10]
Kirby: Star Allies (2018) - Switch [7/10]
Lost Judgement (2021) - PS4 [6/10]
Middle-earth: Shadow of War (2017) - Xbone [6/10]
Assassin's Creed Odyssey (2018) - PS4 [9/10]

page 5:

page 4:

page 3:

page 2:

page 1:

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic (2003) - Xbox
I originally bought this game 15 years ago. Mass Effect was my first BioWare game, with Jade Empire coming second. I loved both of these games and have played through the multiple times. KOTOR had received many 10/10s and game of the year awards in 2003, so I thought it was a natural game I'd like. I've always liked Star Wars (aside from the Disney movies, but those came later)
KOTOR was immediately not the game I'd imagined. I didn't understand the combat because I didn't want to understand the combat. It's like I thought that if I tried hard enough, I could force the game to have real time combat. I'm not exactly sure how far I got in 2008, but I can tell you for a fact that I never got off of Taris, the tutorial planet.
KOTOR uses a weird-ass turn-based dice roll combat system. It's whack, and, at the end of the game, frequently broke on me in the fucking long-ass battles the final level throws at you.

To sum up my new 2022 thoughts on KOTOR: I liked it a lot. The combat gets fun (sort of) when you become a jedi, and visiting the different planets after the game opens up is great. I especially appreciate the ability for any character to use force lightning, regardless of alignment, because it's OP. (force choke sucks though)
I would have given this game a rock-solid 9/10, but then the endgame happened. The penultimate level was kind of lame, but the final level was absolute bullshit. The game kept spawning enemies everywhere, including coming from behind me at many points. I said earlier the combat became sort of fun, but that ended here, definitely.
The plot is great overall, but the characters aren't. I liked Jolee, Zaalbar, Mission, and HK-47 a lot. Shame the "main" companions are Carth and Bastila.
The villain of the game, Darth Malak, is a joke. Your first fight with him, the gimmick is that when you damage him enough, he runs away and locks doors behind him and you need to seek an alternate route. Your final boss fight against him, the gimmick is that when you damage him slightly, he runs away to refill his health. There is simply no way to take him seriously when his fighting style is "little pussy bitch".

8/10
bookended by its worst parts

Nice. I love KOTOR. The second one is a masterpiece too, and just came out on Switch, though I'd wait until they release the cut content DLC to play it.

In regards to Forza Horizon 5, I agree with pretty much all your sentiments. I think the soundtrack is total dogshit, though, and easily the worst in the series. I just play it with my own Spotify playlists. And the online still sucks.

I did not take your advice, and bought KOTOR 2 on Xbox for half price with my $5 free Microsoft bux they gave me for no reason.
I don't know what they cut out, but if they got rid of it instead of half the shit they kept in, it certainly isn't worth it.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II - The Sith Lords (2005) - Xbox
It plays pretty much just like the original. Force lightning is still OP, etc. etc.
The big new thing this time is that you can convert most of your followers into jedi, or even turn them evil and make them sith. Unlike KOTOR 1, where my alignment hovered around the middle the entire time, in KOTOR 2, my alignment shot up to the very top and stayed there, despite playing the exact same way.

The overall structure of KOTOR 2 is the same as the first: two tutorial worlds, then four worlds you can do in any order, albeit with a few wrinkles, then the endgame.
Peragus Mining Facility is the tutorial level, like if the scene aboard the ship at the beginning of the original lasted four hours. You know how some games are mostly great, but one part tends to prevent you from wanting to replay it? That's going to be Peragus. It drags on forever. It's supposed to be an "atmospheric" way to begin the game, but it's just kind of boring. Telos is the new Taris, in that it's mostly just a city that's fine. It's nothing special, but after Peragus, it feels so nice. Then the game opens up, and you still don't have a lightsaber. Instead of just getting one, you need to do enough bullshit to get three lightsaber parts and build one. From that point on, every quest that would have resulted in you getting a lightsaber part results in you getting a full-on lightsaber. It's a neat idea in theory, but then you spend three whole planets using vibroblades.

Scratch that bit about "one part", because here's a second. Most people seem to suggest going to Nar Shaddaa first. I am very glad that I didn't. Nar Shaddaa is the worst planet in these two games. It starts as a side quest sandbox where you need to do enough side quests to make the exchange "notice" you (and simply killing one of the exchange's bosses doesn't do shit), then you get a call from the boss man, and everything goes to shit. What follows are a bunch of sequences that require you to use one character at a time. At first, it's Atton, who I already had as a jedi anyway, then it's your main guy. But then they introduce your newest party member in just about the worst way possible, force you to play as her, and generally just have her completely ruin everything. After a maze, a combat segment where blaster chick gets gangbanged by swordfighters, and a scene where the robot needs to do a digital rubik's cube, you're forced onto a ship in orbit with just about the worst puzzles imaginable. All of the computer terminals are the same, except for this one that looks identical but is 100% required to progress. Nar Shaddaa is both the longest planet and the worst.
Dantooine and Korriban feel incredibly short, but are far better than Nar Shaddaa. Korriban is practically over the moment you arrive. Onderon is the only planet that feels both fully-realised and actually good, due to the build-up on Dxun.

Atris is under-developed, Darth Nihilus is under-developed, and the whole "return to Telos" section feels rushed as hell. It's pretty obvious that Kreia is going to betray you, and the "force bond" is a lazy cop-out for why there's no option to just kill the bitch and be done with it. The story tries to be "deep" and ends up being boring at best, because nothing ever goes anywhere.
The final planet is a mess of "oh shit we need to resolve these plot threads". Who thought it was a good idea to make you play as the tiny orb robot and backtrack over the ground you just covered, rather than just having an objective as your character to do the same thing?

After finishing the original KOTOR, I kind of wanted to start over and play it again, doing things in a different order, making different choices, and picking a different class. After finishing KOTOR 2, I never want to play it again. This game is lucky that it had Dxun/Onderon in it.
6/10

I probably should also talk about the games I played in May, as well.

Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy (2017) - PS4
I got this for $10 at Goodwill. Despite my love for Crash Team Racing, I was never able to get into the platformers as a kid. Spyro was my first 3D platformer, and CTR was my first Crash game, so I suppose I just wanted a more free-roaming game rather than a linear game. I believe I had a hard time taking games for what they are vs what I wanted them to be as a kid.
I was nervous that I would pop this game in, play a few levels, get frustrated, give up, and have the game on my card forever, no progress made. Surprisingly, I managed to beat Cortex in all three games. To be fair though, each game is easier than the last. The fact that I didn't beat Warped as a kid is simply telling that I never gave it a proper try.

Crash Bandicoot
The hardest one. The game starts as "tough but fair", but then that whole idea goes to shit at Road to Nowhere. The bridge levels (of which there are thankfully only two) are absolute bullshit and I'm never going to play this game again. I also had a lot of trouble with the jungle temple levels and, of course, Slippery Climb. This game's difficulty gets ridiculous toward the end, and I wouldn't criticise anyone for skipping it. It's good for what it is and when it came out, but
6.5/10

Crash Bandicoot 2: Cortex Strikes Back
I always want to write "The Wrath of Cortex", but that one came later.
Crash 2 takes a lot longer to get difficult, which is nice. The game is a fun romp through a surprisingly large amount of snow levels, but things go to absolute shit when hanging is introduced in those damn sewer levels. The death balls that move around on the hanging sections have massive hitboxes and I didn't fucking touch it you fucking piece of shit
The last area has two levels that feature BEES and dear fucking god I hate the bees almost as much as the hanging sections. I also had a lot of trouble with the frilled lizards on the ruins levels until I realised you can just slide into them, at which point I felt retarded. Other than that, Tiny Tiger's boss fight sucks and the jetpack is merely passable.
Everything I didn't mention, however, is a lot of fun, and Crash 2 is clearly when the series gets good.
8/10

Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped
The "3" is in the clock, you see
Crash 3 is strangely really easy. I think one of the future levels toward the end tripped me up a bit, but I never once got a game over in this one. It's a welcome cooldown after the first two games.
However, I had a LOT of trouble with the motorcycle levels. I'm glad they don't use up lives, because I would have gotten about a hundred game overs if they did. Such a cool level type and aesthetic, but I hated them because I simply couldn't ever catch the lead car. When I did, it didn't feel like I'd gotten better at the level, it just felt like the game let me win for some reason.
The bazooka is cool as hell, the time travel level themes are cool as hell, and I don't even hate the water levels. (they are kind of lame though)

Crash Bandicoot took the same general path as Spyro the Dragon did in its three games. The first game is simple, and has the core elements, but a very different structure and aesthetic than the other two. The second game sets the tone and structure of the series going forward (even when taken over by a different developer for the fourth game) and adds some important moves to round out the hero's moveset. The third game takes the second game and crams it to the gills with gimmicks and alternate gameplay styles.
However, whereas Spyro games got worse as they went on, Crash games only got better. With Spyro, it's an easy 1 > 2 >>>>> 3, but with Crash, it's an easy 3 > 2 >>> 1.
9/10

Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes (2022) - Switch
Koei-Tecmo made a Dynasty Warriors-style spin-off of Fire Emblem several years ago, which focused on three games in the series. Three Hopes narrows that down even further to focus on just one. It was the correct decision. FEW1's roster pleased no one, but FEW2's roster will at least please fans of Three Houses.
Three Hopes is an alternate timeline version of Three Houses. Instead of playing as Byleth and becoming a teacher at the academy, you play as Shez and become a student. Your new teacher, Jeritza, proceeds to accomplish more in two weeks than Byleth accomplished in a whole year. This accelerates the villains' timeline, and completely changes the face of Fodlan. Dimitri leaves the academy to become king, Claude leaves the academy to head the Alliance, and Edelgard leaves the academy to become Hitler. Everyone is in a much different frame of mind when Edelgard declares war on the church, which changes the plot significantly.
Very nearly the entire Three Houses character roster, students and teachers, is playable, plus a few extras, due to the movesets being class-based rather than character-based. This means that no matter who you liked, you're set on at least one route (unless you liked Alois). Shez, Dimitri, Edelgard, Claude, and Byleth all have unique classes, as a note.
I'm likely only going to get one playthrough of this anytime soon, just like Three Houses. It's hard to get through a different route when I hate Claude, Edelgard, AND Rhea all.

+ I like how recruiting characters is more Fire Emblem-like than Three Houses
+ You can make almost any unit almost any regular class (which may give you a use for all those swordsmen the game keeps throwing into your party)
+ You can save Jeralt and Rodrigue boys
+ Byleth actually has full voiced dialogue (and even gets support conversations with Jeralt)
+ Legitimately, I prefer the way the Blue Lions story goes in this game
+ Constance is a fucking delight (I never bought the Three Houses season pass)
- Alois is not playable
- There's a severe dearth of playable axe- and gauntlet-wielding units (by default) [the weapon triangle has returned in case that wasn't clear]
- Alois not being playable actually makes this worse, as he is an axe-wielder as an NPC, and (I believe) would be available on all three routes due to him joining Jeralt's Mercenaries
- Weapons being 100% locked to classes again means that women cannot wield gauntlets
- I wish there was some kind of free mode or post-game "unite all of Fodlan" mode (Fire Emblem Warriors Empires)

One playthrough of the Blue Lions campaign took me about 40 hours, completing every battle at least once. The game does not outstay its welcome, and is a fun little action game that provides a great alternate take on the story of Three Houses.
8.5/10
I'm willing to go so far as to say it's the best Nintendo Warriors game, but we'll see if that's just recency bias. If you look at my scores at the top of each page, a decent number of them go down with time.

Samurai Warriors 5 (2021) - PS4
I'll start with this: if you haven't played a Samurai Warriors game before, start with 4. SW4 is the major overview of the era, whereas SW5 is a character story focused on Nobunaga. SW5 is a great game, but it's not the one I'd start with.
Samurai Warriors 5 features a new artstyle and redesigned characters and movesets. Focusing on Nobunaga was a great decision, because they'd probably fuck up a whole era storyline. (see: Dynasty Warriors 7's perfect story presentation vs DW8's awful butchered one) The series should come back to full era stories around SW7 or 8, of course, but for now, narrowing the focus is a great idea.
Another note: the previous Samurai Warriors game was Spirit of Sanada, which was almost excellent, but ended up being drudgery. It also had the narrow focus, but decided to have mandatory stealth missions and other garbage between battles. SW5 has nothing but menus between battles, as God intended.

+ To start: the core Samurai Warriors gameplay is probably the pinnacle of the greater Warriors series (and adding "ultimate skills" from Pirate Warriors 4 was a nice touch)
+ Replacing the hyper attack combo enders SW4 had with simply transitioning into your main square combos sounds lame at first, but it's actually a lot better
+ Fun new movesets all around, aside from maybe kunai with chain and tarot cards
+ The new skill tree is cool
+ Using a character whose date of death is very ambiguous as the turning point of the story was a great decision
- The combo system being required for S-ranks is annoying as hell
- The trickle-feed of features is annoying
- Citadel mode is bit too vague in how the ranking system works, and it's a lot less interesting than chronicle mode in SW4
- Mitsuhide's chapters take place at the same time as Nobunaga's, but, for example, Mitsuhide's first chapter is unlocked after Nobunaga's third, killing all sense of narrative flow if you decide to play them alongside eachother (cont.)
- (cont.) which is something I believe the game intends for you to do based on unlock times and how citadel mode works
- As usual, the trophy list is full of dumb grindy bullshit
- If you receive a character early, then don't/can't use him much, it's hell getting him up to a decent level
- You can buy weapon experience and skill points with money, but not character experience, which is the one you fucking want
- Yoshikage Asakura is a wafer-thin character who legitimately seems kind of retarded in this game; he has no personality and his motivations make little sense

A nice focused entry of the series with an unfortunately middle-of-the-road side mode. Still definitely worth it for the $20 it's going for now.
8.5/10

REVISITED: Fallout 3 (2008) - Xbox 360
I have said in the past that Fallout 3 is garbage. That's not really true, more of a hyperbole. The things I was thinking about when I made that claim are subpar, no doubt. The story makes no sense, and the ending had to be fixed in a $10 expansion.
To sum up Fallout 3's plot: your father, Liam Neeson, was working on a massive water purifier, until your mother died in childbirth. He then absconds with you and brings you to the safety of a vault that was never supposed to open. You turn 19, and he leaves the vault, which sends the egomaniacal overseer into an autistic rage, and he begins slaughtering everyone. You escape, and eventually meet back up with Liam Neeson. Here's where it gets retarded: Liam Neeson wants to turn on the big water purifier to purify the Potomac River. Colonel Autumn enters the area, and says he, too, wants to turn on the big water purifier. Due to this overwhelming consensus, Liam Neeson floods the purifier with radiation to kill both himself and Autumn. Except Autumn didn't die, but whatever. The final boss fight is you vs Colonel Autumn, a clash of ideals. You want to turn on the water purifier, but the evil Colonel Autumn wants to turn on the water purifier. (Colonel Autumn is at no point aware of the modified FEV the president wants you to put in the purifier) Usually, heroes and villains clash because the things they want are completely incompatible. Fallout 3 subverts traditional storytelling and, indeed, common sense by making a hero and villain want the exact same thing.

The main flaw with Fallout 3 is, as anyone will tell you, its karma system. The game tells you what the developers believed to be the "right" choice. It presents nuanced problems like in the Tenpenny Tower quest, but tells you what to think about it.
Roy Phillips is a ghoul who wants to get into Tenpenny Tower, despite the fact that almost everyone inside said tower doesn't want ghouls in the tower. You can convince the residents to let the ghouls in, good ending, bingo bango bongo racism is solved. Except when you come back, the ghouls have slaughtered all of the human residents because Roy Phillips is insane. For avenging the people of Tenpenny Tower, you get bad karma. Where's Roy Phillips's bad karma? When is what he sent around going to come back around on him? The game hates the idea of avenging people, but that's my entire schtick when I play these games. Don't tell me Ian West is supposed to get a sunshine and roses ending after he killed his parents. (the whole "vampires" quest was fucking retarded anyway by the btw)

So what's good about Fallout 3? Why would anyone want to play this? At the end of the day, the Bethesda formula is just fun. You wander, you shoot, you loot, you sell, you wander again. Sometimes you're doing quests, sometimes you're not. Fallout 3 is just a fun game to find stuff in. But I will say that I legitimately don't care for the setting as a rule, I've realised. I enjoy the game the most when I'm fighting humans, robots, and super mutants. I hate the irradiated creatures. I'd rather deal with raiders again.
So the reason I vastly prefer New Vegas isn't just due to the story making sense, or the side quests being more numerous. It's because most of the game is spent dealing with humans. Think about it. On the intended route through the game for a first-time player, you're mostly fighting humans. The breaks are the ants side quest at the first NCR outpost in the southeast, the Repconn facility with the ghouls and nightkin, then way later to get to Red Rock Canyon and the fort. Most of the non-human encounters are off the beaten path, and during any playthrough, a conscious decision is made to go to places with non-human enemies. The Repconn facility is completely optional, and I usually skip it entirely. (I usually go back to Goodsprings after Novac and go up past Black Mountain) Compare to Fallout 3, where to get anywhere, you have to slog past scorpions and whatever else. No thanks.

I'm glad I replayed Fallout 3, but I may never play it again. I could see myself playing through the expansions again, because I didn't this time, and I still need a few achievements from them.
I'll end this by giving the game a solid
7/10

Dynasty Warriors 9 Empires (2022) - PS4
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $20 from FUCKING GAMESTOP
Dynasty Warriors 9 was poorly-received by almost everyone. Except for me, because I am the biggest contrarian. (I wish I wasn't sometimes)
Empires takes away DW9's open world, and segments it into stages. Once again, Empires tasks you with leading an army of your favourite characters to unify China by force or extreme coersion. Most importantly, the DLC weapons/movesets from vanilla DW9 are all included, so I managed to avoid buying them and still get to use them. My boy Sun Jian even got a new weapon, which is sick.

+ It's a new Empires game
+ You get all the new weapons they added to DW9 post-launch
+ The new "stages" they cut out of the open world work pretty well, and they're small enough chunks to not be annoying to traverse
+ They fixed the grappling hook without removing it entirely, in a way that doesn't feel completely arbitrary
- I wish battering rams were faster
- Being able to access the open world for a "stroll" is pointless and tacked on
- The clothing options in create-a-character are sorely lacking; I can't even have a pair of plain brown boots
- Seriously though where are Sun Ce's tonfas

At the end of the day, DW9E did pretty much exactly what I wanted. Due to this game's existence, I never have to play DW8E again. DW9 > DW8, and DW9E > DW8E
I would have liked to see a new character (like the last two Empires games) or more returning weapons, but whatever.
8/10

Kingdom Hearts: Melody of Memory (2020) - PS4
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $10 from FUCKING GAMESTOP
A Kingdom Hearts rhythm game with like two minutes of IMPORTANT PLOT INFORMATION because nothing can be inconsequential. I wasn't even thinking about this game, then I saw it on sale for $10 and said "let's just do it". If I don't play this, I'm positive that KH4 will make me regret my apathy, and $10 doesn't buy much in this world.

+ A fun little rhythm game worth $10 (but I'd be incredibly salty if I'd paid more)

Spoiler:

- No Winnie the Pooh, no Pirates of the Caribbean. NO FANTASIA (but fucking three Neverlands!)
- Once again, Sora is in his KH1 outfit and can't change to KH2/3/DDD (KH1 Sora looks fucking weird in KH2/3 levels)
- No level-specific costumes
- The angle of the notes in boss battles is really unnatural-feeling
- Goddamn this plot is getting more retarded by the second I mean fuck dude

6/10
it's a fun time but i doubt i'll be coming back to it much

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga (2022) - Xbone
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $30 from Best Buy
Not going to lie: this game looks dope. The trailers with the improved combat, the jokes using voice actors from The Clone Wars, etc. Shame that the DIsney movies are in it. You can start from any trilogy you wish, but I started with The Phantom Menace because I was born in the 90s.
So here's the million-dollar question: if you've played 2007's LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga, which features six levels from each of the six original pre-Disney movies, and you don't care at all for the Disney movies, why would you buy this? It's completely redone from the ground-up, in many ways. Back in 2007, LEGO games had a hub and then a bunch of levels. Since LEGO Batman 2 and LEGO The Lord of the Rings in 2012, LEGO games have had an open world hub, from which the proper levels are accessed. So to put it one way: some important events and such that were their own full levels in the original games are now open world traversal, and they now have room to make levels of other things.
FOR EXAMPLE, the first two levels in 2007's version of The Phantom Menace are escaping the Trade Federation ship and following Jar-Jar to the Gungan city, but both of those are now just traversing the open world, and we even get a playable Gungan city for the first time. The first "real" level in 2022's version of The Phantom Menace is the submarine escape from the big fish/bigger fish, which was almost entirely skipped in 2007.

+ Legitimately funny
+ The boxart finally, FINALLY gives Chewbacca a medal
+ I love open world checklist simulators (that sounds sarcastic but it's not)
+ Being able to start from any trilogy you wish is a godsend (and they even let you switch at any time)
+ Lightsaber combos are sick, especially since you can now just force push or throw your lightsaber whenever you want (melee combos in general are fun)
+ Free play features a quick select where you can choose a character from each class for the quick-swap menu (cuts down on menu time and lets you easily access your favourites)
+ They fixed protocol droids; they move at the same speed as other characters and can fight, and now they also have the ability to split in half and go into little shorty vents
- But they split in two when you don't want them to
- The scavenger class, and ONLY the scavenger class, requires you to unlock its abilities through story missions, meaning you either have to start The Force Awakens, or get all the way to Return of the Jedi's penultimate mission
- The Zam Wessel chase goes on for FUCKING EVER (and they didn't even include the death sticks scene)
- Whoever placed that porg in the Jakku village should be arrested
- Achievements won't pop if you use the quick resume feature (LUCKILY it gave me the achievement for clearing TPM when I restarted the game; I believe it's because I stayed at the "congratulations for beating TPM" screen)
- Intro line of dialogue every time you boot up the game is LAME and should 100% have been Anakin saying "this is where the fun begins" (or at least "I don't like sand")
- Downloadable characters don't have voice lines (even lines ripped from the character's show/movie would have been fine) [Rex doesn't even get lines when all the clones share lines to begin with]

GAME CRASHES:
1. Travelling between planets for a side quest (60 hours in)

I'm going to be honest, I've never seen the ninth movie, Rise of Palpatine. But let me get this straight: Anakin contacts whatsherface in the final battle to cheer her on and inform her that he does not like sand, and then she goes and buries his lightsaber IN THE SAND?! Shameful.

Open-world checklist simulator with fun combat, instant
8/10
It's just a shame that the actual levels are by far the worst part of the game.

The next LEGO game should be another Pirates of the Caribbean. In the same way as Star Wars had a few more movies since the last LEGO game, there's been another PotC since the first LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean. Also, LEGO PotC was an older LEGO game, with no open world and no voice acting. I'd love to be able to sail my LEGO pirate ship around the Caribbean sea, finding islands and such.

Ratchet and Clank: Rift Apart (2021) - PS5
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $30 from Best Buy
We all knew this was the game I'd get the PS5 for. I love Ratchet and Clank; I have since I was a kid. There's nothing quite like it out there. This is also the only real and true PS5 exclusive out at this point, aside from the pack-in game. As a note, this game came out on my 28th birthday.
Rift Apart features two playable lombaxes, Ratchet and Rivet. Each planet in the game is only playable as one of the lombaxes, and the ship menu remains unchanged, so if you're playing as Ratchet and select a Rivet level, you'll automatically switch over. They decided as well to have your weapons simply shared between them, so if Ratchet buys a gun, Rivet owns it as well. If Rivet upgrades a gun to level 3, Ratchet's gun is upgraded to level 3 as well. It's a little strange that when Ratchet picks up the rare lombax artefact hover boots, Rivet automatically gets a pair, but whatever.

+ Utilises the PS5 technology in such a way that I'm glad Sony didn't make Insomniac backport it to PS4 (because I would have bought it)
+ There's an overt Sunset Overdrive reference (please make a sequel)
+ A post-launch patch has added armour sets from Going Commando, Deadlocked, and A Crack in Time (aka the three best games)
+ You can change the colour of your armour, and swap sets back and forth as you'd like, meaning you're not locked into the (theoretical) ugly one that has the best protection
+ Honestly, being able to pretty much start with the basic automatic/shotgun/bomb weapons is really nice
+ The dimension-shifting mechanic in the two levels that use it is really fucking great (like the time travel levels in A Crack in Time)
+ The Clank segments are a lot better than they usually are
+ Those credits though
+ Glitch is best girl
- The game has Ratchet/Clank/Rivet/Kit tell you what to do too much (I just want to meander, okay?)
- Thugs 4 Less has been changed to the much less catchy "Goons 4 Less"; they're not integral to the setting at all, so if the word "thug" was offensive or whatever, why even include them? Just silently retire them and make a new group
- The intro brings back fan favourite characters with terrible new voices (Qwark, Skidd, Rusty Pete) [Skidd's voice isn't BAD, but it's a definite downgrade]
- The game tricks you into thinking it starts in the Bogon galaxy, our first visit since 2003, then WHOOSP IT'S THE POLARIS GALAXY AGAIN LMAO (I'd even take the Solana galaxy again because it's been so long, or, better yet, a whole new one)
- Sargasso is kind of a shit planet to be honest (which is accurate to its first appearance in Tools of Destruction, I suppose)

I have nothing to say about the plot. It exists. It's fine, gets us to where we need to be.
When this game is rolling on all cylinders, it's the exact thing I wanted when they said "Ratchet and Clank on PS5". And the game honestly doesn't really have any true lows. Rift Apart easily stands up there with Going Commando, Deadlocked, and A Crack in Time at the top of the series, at least after the first playthrough. This game is about even with A Crack in Time (at third place), which is really what my highest hopes were.
9.5/10

Final Fantasy VII Remake Intermission (2021) - PS5
Purchased Christmas 2022 for $15 from the PSN sale
When the enhanced PS5 version of the FF7 remake came out, they added an expansion campaign exclusive to the PS5. Luckily, the base game's PS5 upgrade is free if you already own it, and I was simply able to purchase the expansion on its own.
The main game covered the Midgar section of FF7, and Intermission runs parallel to that, and has you play as Yuffie. This was a smart move, because now her playstyle is out of the way for the next part of the remake, and the can focus on the rest of the party.

+ As in the main game, the combat is simply fun
+ Yuffie is fun as hell to play as (which is good because she's the only one you play as)
+ I highly appreciate being able to wear the moogle poncho through pretty much the entire first chapter
+ The sector 7 side quests are entertaining and don't overstay their welcome (which is important because it's collecting posters and a tabletop minigame)
+ The hitchhiking scene at the end (back with the main party) was cute
- The final boss feels like a final boss for an expansion pack when you fight him, sure, but he's so out of left field as a character that you're still in the mode of "don't use all the elixirs; the final final fight is next"
- Downer fucking ending

Since Intermission is "free" with the PS5 version of FF7R, it's a very nice addition for late adopters. But I'm an early(ish) adopter, who played the game on PS4. I suppose in my case it's a wash, because I paid about $40 for FF7R on ebay, so I'm still less than the $60 retail. If you played the PS4 version of FF7R and enjoyed it (like 8/10 or higher enjoyed it), then I'd recommend it with the understanding that it's just five hours long, give or take.
Considering price and length and whatever and whatever let's just say
7.5/10
It's good and you should play it if you liked vanilla FF7R.

Guardians of the Galaxy (2021) - PS5
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $15 from Best Buy
Since this game's announcement, I pretty much knew it was a Black Friday 2022 game. It looks like something I could really enjoy, but also like something I could immensely dislike.
This game is a linear action game focused on ordering your team around and listening to endless amounts of banter. If you are hoping for something more line Mass Effect, where you can go to a bunch of planets, explore and re-explore at your own pace, stop hoping for that.

The gameplay of this game is functional. I'm going to be honest with you: it's good enough to let the characters push the game forward, but it's nothing special on its own. Your enjoyment of this game will come down solely to how much you like this version of the Guardians of the Galaxy. I had a great time with it.

+ Genuinely funny banter (there's so much of it that something has to land)
+ Mantis is an absolute treasure
+ Drax is still the best
+ The game's version of Gamora is great (I've been decidedly neutral to all other versions of the character I've seen, but I actually like her this time)
+ The game allows decisions to be made that impact the game's events in just the right ways
+ Great soundtrack (as one would expect), containing such great tracks as this absolute classic
- It's so easy to interrupt one conversation with another
- Rocket is such a little bitch in this game, for over half of it
- One time, I used the huddle up move and everyone just stared at me forever and I had to restart from checkpoint

It's a real shame this game underperformed (according to Square anyway) because it's fucking great. They released that awful-looking Avengers live service game, which set this game up to fail. So in spite of everything, we're likely not getting a sequel.
8/10, somehow

REVISITED: The Witcher III: Wild Hunt (2015) - PS5
On December 14, CDPR released an update for TW3 that would allow it to have raytracing or 60FPS on PS5 and the new Xbox with the dumb name, as well as adding a bunch of new stuff. I've bought the game again to play it on PS5. Did you know that the complete edition of this game is still a whopping $40? I trawled ebay every day for a week until I found a copy for $20. I figured that would have been the base price by now.
The Witcher III is my GOTY 2015, but I've only played it the once. For some reason, I'd always think "yeah I should play that again sometime", but never really got the urge to make that time until now. I watched a YouTube video where the guy describes what happens if you do the major main quests in the order of 2 3 1, but watching that video raised the question of what would happen if you were to instead do them in the order of 3 1 2. Rather than asking or googling or whatever, I have decided to just play the game. So to sum, here's the gameplan for my second playthrough of The Witcher III, seven years later: grind for levels/experience out the gate, go to Skellige and have that as the first main quest I complete, then Velen, then Novigrad last. This will, of course, require me to get 1,000 gold and to at least level 17 straight away. Luckily, there are like a million side quests in this game.

If you're interested in the results of my experiment:

Spoiler:

As a note, I also did the Unseen Elder ending of Blood and Wine, rather than the fairy tales ending.

FIRST AND FOREMOST: The new casting system is a godsend. You hold the R2 to open the sign menu, then press a face button or L2 to cast the corresponding sign. It's quick, efficient, and perfect once you learn which button is which. Whereas in my first playthrough, I used igni and only igni because switching was a pain in the ass, I'm now using different signs as the situation calls for, like was intended. Also, because I've stopped being a moron, I'm actually using quen.
Because of my discovery of quen, I'm not only able to play through the game on the normal difficulty (cough), but also start out with Skellige a bit underleveled (level 13) and not have a rough time. (though I'm sure the fact that this time I took the time out to find the griffin diagrams and make the full set rather than use scraps I've found in the wild makes a difference as well)

The +/- will try not to regurgitate points I made in 2016; look at that review here if you need general gushing over the game:
https://ye-ye-ye.forumotion.com/t1382-game-of-the-year-2015
Note that not all points apply to this version (see below)

+ New casting system, seen above
+ Infinite sprint outside of combat (so nice that I hardly ever used the horse)
+ The new quest is neato (and if you didn't know it was new beforehand, you'd never suspect)
- If you have too many save slots occupied, the game refuses to save your settings, and makes you re-set them from the defaults every time you boot up the game
- And, let's be real here, the game has too few save slots to begin with even if you could use them all
- Having to scroll through every shitty level 13 crafting diagram you've acquired when trying to craft level-appropriate gear just sucks (especially if you need to then craft materials and scroll back through)
- FUCK that spy bitch in the Novigrad gwent tournment; I wish Geralt weren't such a white knight bitch and kicked her to the curb
- The Novigrad section of Act 1 is just filler really
- The wedding is the worst part of Hearts of Stone and I wish it wasn't there
- The writing of the gwent tournament in Toussaint is very heavy-handed
- Anna Henrietta is an unbearable cunt

Let's look at my old review, and see what points I'd change (or were changed in the remaster)
https://ye-ye-ye.forumotion.com/t1382-game-of-the-year-2015

- I ended up with like a hundred of these passes to get to the big city they just give them out like candy
This one I completely understand now. There are three of them, and each one makes sense. There's the main story one, the side quest one, and the one you can buy if you're an idiot.

- I found myself having trouble deciding what skills to put my level up points into after a while because I didn't particularly want any of them
This was a result of my playstyle being retarded. Now I actually keep getting potions of clearance to redistribute because I want to try out a bunch of different things (and they don't always go well)

- The default armour is by far the best-looking, but ends up being outclassed soon after you get to the second area
I have an addendum to this one. The default griffin armour is cool as hell, but all the upgrades are lame. Other witcher gear sets, like wolf and bear, look better at earlier levels than the final as well.
(also the Viper set added in Hearts of Stone is basically just the default armour with cool snake scales)

- "THIS IS WINTER'S BLADE FORGED IN AGES PAST BY DRAGON'S FIRE" and it's also worse than the unenchanted axe I got off a bandit's corpse
They fixed it, but it's still not as good as a crafted witcher sword of the same level. Makes sense, I suppose.

- The Wandering in the Dark mission could have stood to be a bit shorter (a lot shorter)
What even would past me have cut out? There's nothing wrong with it.

- Load times could also stand to be shorter (especially frustrating after dying to a boss or flaming barn six or seven times)
Fixed somewhat. The problem is the narration. Previously, it was used to disguise the long load times, but on PS5, they're significantly shorter, so the narration just makes them longer. The game loads much faster post-main quest.
Also how the fuck do you die in the flaming barn

- The Master Armourer is still in fucking Crow's Perch why wasn't there a fast travel point next to the Goddamn armourer it takes forever to walk up there and back
This one was fixed. There's a fast travel point at the Baron's castle, but it's only available after completing the Velen section of the story.



GAME CRASHES:
(hour marks are educated guesses)
1. White Orchard - leaving the small ruined village after defeating the noonwraith (3 hours in)
2. Skellige - just running north along the road after meeting a bugged out merchant (36 hours in)
3. Travelling from Novigrad to Skellige (freeze, not hard crash to home menu) (40 hours in)
4. Running around Novigrad doing its main quest (50 hours in)
5. During the first Ciri flashback in Novigrad (52 hours in)
6. After saving in the eastern wilds of Toussaint (105 hours in)
7. After saving in the middle wilds of Toussaint (105 hours in)
8. After the fist fight in the The Warble of a Smitten Knight quest (freeze, not hard crash to home menu) (110 hours in)
9. Blood and Wine, during the art festival thing (115 hours in)


TOTAL PLAYTIME:
after completing main story: 90 hours
after Hearts of Stone: 96 hours
after Blood and Wine: 122 hours


FINAL SCORES UPON REPLAY:
base game: 10/10
Hearts of Stone: 8/10
Blood and Wine: 9/10
all very good, but the expansions have their flaws
Blood and Wine in particular is CARRIED by the side quests (the main quest drags terribly in the middle)

Sonic Frontiers (2022) - PS5
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $40 from FUCKING GAMESTOP
It's no secret that I love vapid open world schlock. The idea of an open-world Sonic game intrigued the hell out of me, and after much research into the common complaints around the game, I dove in. I'm hoping for the Super Mario Odyssey of Sonic, but we'll see.
The game's progression is: tutorial -> get chaos emeralds -> fight boss -> lose chaos emeralds -> get chaos emeralds -> fight boss -> lose chaos emeralds, etc.

+ The game handles very well overall
+ Characters and story are handled well, if you care about that
+ The first and fourth (and kind of the second) overworlds are exactly what you'd want if the phrase "open-world checklist simulator Sonic game" appeals to you
+ The boss fights that cap off each overworld are fun (except the third one)
+ And that music in the boss fights
+ Fishing with Big the Cat (fun minigame as well)
+ Fishing lets you just get the collectibles you need to progress the game if, for example, you're
- FUCKING SICK OF ANGEL ISLAND
- What the fuck happened to Amy's voice
- Despite being marked on the map, there is no reward or even acklowledgement for collecting every item (because you need far, far fewer than are found in the world)
- The second overworld is a bit too big
- The third overworld can go fuck itself
- The third overworld especially loves to force Sonic into 2D if you accidentally hit one of the thousand boosters or springs cluttering the map
- The weird required minigames to get chaos emeralds are just kind of there
- Except the herding one in the desert; whoever designed that needs to be shot
- The pinball minigame drags on for way too long
- The star shower that happens every few nights absolutely sucks; the slot machine takes up way too much screen real estate
- The Elder Koko can increase your speed or ring capacity, but only does it one level at a time, and the cursor defaults to "exit upgrade menu" after every upgrade level
- With enough kokos in my inventory, it took HALF AN HOUR to get ring capacity from 1 to 99
- Final boss is a quicktime event lmao

I ended up taking a break halfway through and coming back to it later. If you just want to run around and collect shit, you'll have a great time, especially in shorter bursts.
This game has a lot of flaws, but it's still a fun time. Shame Sonic Team will decide to do something completely different next time rather than finally taking what worked and throwing out what didn't.
7/10

LEGO DC Supervillains (2018) - Xbone
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $6  from the Xbox Live Marketplace
I put off the purchase of this game for years after being really disappointed with LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2. (the review of that game is at the bottom of page 2, if you've got the default settings) For $6, I'm willing to hear them out, and see if those mistakes were a one-off.
The big news with this game was twofold: first, they got Mark Hamill back to be The Joker. Secondly, the main character of the game is your created LEGO supervillain. It's a bit lame, considering that your character is just a mute who tags along and gets called "rookie" or the dreaded singular they, but I get a kick out of seeing a random guy with a moustache palling around with the villains.

+ The Joker and the Thief as the title screen music works extremely well (and I Fought the Law as the credits music too)
+ Major villains have been overhauled from their previous LEGO game appearances to be much more fun and interesting to play as, The Joker and Harley Quinn being early standout examples
+ They got rid of LEGO Batman's costumes gimmick, meaning Batman is just a good character in many situations
+ More villains than just the A list get their chance in the sun, with Captain Cold and Killer Frost getting story roles rather than just using Mr. Freeze
+ Fun story (even if I wish it were just "bad guys being bad guys" instead of "bad guys fighting worse guys")
+ I like that the game lets you choose at the end whether your guy stays a villain or becomes a hero (I thought it was leading to my guy becoming a hero)
+ Open world Metropolis and Smallville helps break up the dark dinge of Gotham
+ Transformations return, but they're MUCH shorter than in LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2, and can be interrupted by switching characters anyway (AND you get to choose to start as the hero instead of the civilian you don't ever want to play as)
- The character creator is a bit awkward
- Why are Poison Ivy's henchmen mushrooms? Mushrooms aren't plants
- Lois Lane is annoying (and I can't really figure out why)
- There's some dialogue in the open world that is definitely tinted by modern politics; dialogue that would not have existed a few years prior
- Free playing the actual levels for minikits and whatever else is a chore, like with all modern LEGO games (the little scenes whenever you do anything are just annoying as fuck the second time around)
- There are some abilities you arbitrarily can't give to your custom characters; even if you have the boomerang ability, you can't do the target bouncers; even if you have super speed, you can't use the treadmills
- The shrink and grow ability is simply annoying on whatever character has it, and you can't give your created characters the ability to teleport through vents like Raven and Enchantress can
- Each ability has a default character the cursor automatically hovers over when switching characters, meaning it's Clayface for vents rather than the much quicker Raven/Enchantress
- Despite the ingredients always being the same, no one but Scarecrow can mix fear toxin, no one but the Joker can mix laughing gas, and no one but Poison Ivy can mix plant pheromones

It's better than LEGO Marvel Superheroes 2. LMS2 was the first LEGO game where I was sick and tired of the levels on the first play, to say nothing of free play.
This is a LEGO game that does not reinvent the wheel. If you've played one of these games since LEGO Batman 2, you know what to expect. It's certainly one of the best of its kind, but that's still just a
7/10

I really hope the character shortlist from LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga is a continued feature. Being able to select a single character to switch to for each ability would be a godsend in a game with hundreds of characters. I miss it terribly.

Spoiler:

Yu-Gi-Oh!: Legacy of the Duelist (2019) - Switch
This is the Yugioh game I always wanted as a kid. You can play every* major duel from the series, from either perspective, with either the deck that character used in the episode, or your own deck. It's a perfect idea. You can play any of the six anime series, and start from whichever one you wish.
This is a rerelease of a slightly older game. This version has cards up to 2019, of course, as well as the newest master rule, so Links don't fuck over every deck imaginable, just pendulums. I just want to play a really shitty Elemental HERO deck man

I've beaten every DM, GX, 5Ds, and Zexal duel so I'm just going to post this now. It's become increasingly obvious that I'll never finish Arc-V. Just throw this out there.

+ It was really satisfying using Joey's terrible earth beatdown deck to defeat Mai's 2015 Harpie deck
+ I beat Marik by Brain Controlling his 6700 Winged Dragon of Ra and running over his attack position Revival Jam
+ I liked losing to Bolt Tanner twice, then opening with two Magic Cylinders and letting him Jirai Gumo himself into the death range
- Why do none of the story decks have any way to deal with Swords of Revealing Light?
- The duel tips after every loss are fucking bullshit (oh yeah I should have used those cards THAT I NEVER SAW IN THAT DUEL)
- You can't launch your Gaia the Dragon Champion from the back of your Catapult Turtle to destroy the Castle of Dark Illusions' flotation ring
- The big Kaiba vs Pharaoh match where Kaiba almost kills himself is fucking bullshit, because the Pharaoh has MINI GUTS (I'd never heard of it until now, but I certainly hate it)
- THEY SKIPPED THE PARADOX BROTHERS (and Espa Roba and Joey vs Mako and Lumis and Umbra and Joey vs Kaiba)
- THEY SKIPPED T-BONE (and Jaden vs The Chazz for the school duel? what the fuck)
- Lunalight Cat Dancer features the text "If this card declares an attack: Inflict 100 damage to your opponent.", which makes this card FUCKING TERRIBLE AGAINST THE DECK THEY FORCE YOU TO USE IT AGAINST
- IT'S A PITIFUL AMOUNT OF DAMAGE; IT'S LIKE THAT LINE OF TEXT ONLY EXISTS SO YOUR DAY CAN BE RUINED BY DAMAGE JUGGLER

Legacy of the Duelist is a perfect game for those of you who want to play semi-accurate anime duels against AI, or want to take your own deck up against anime decks. It is exactly what it needs to be.
8/10

here's a list of all my campaign losses
i used the anime decks until i lost three times in a row at which point i scorched earthed it with a HERO deck

Spoiler:

GAME CRASHES:
1. facing challenge deck Bonz (using The Warrior Returning Alive)
2. Arc-V story vs Sawatari (using Wavering Eyes)
3. 5Ds story vs Aporia (using Call of the Haunted on Stardust Dragon to WIN MORE)

Hogwarts Legacy (2023) - PS5
It's no secret that I am a huge fan of open-world side quest simulators. Last year, I apparently put over 180 hours into Assassin's Creed Odyssey. I've also always liked the idea of Harry Potter, if not so much the execution. LEGO Harry Potter Years 1-4 is a brilliant game where I had fun exploring Hogwarts to 100% completion twice.
Hogwarts Legacy is a game that takes the open-world sidequest simulator genre and makes that open world Hogwarts and its surrounds. Some may be disappointed that it's not Bully at Hogwarts, but the gameplay reveal from last year showed me exactly what I didn't know I wanted: a game set in Hogwarts that tries its damnedest to be The Witcher III.
I took the wizardingworld.com quiz and linked my accounts (already having a WB account from Multiversus of all things), so I'm able to import my house and wand that the quizes decided for me. (image for those curious) Note that you can override the quiz's house decision in-game if all you want is the wand and the exclusive ugly robe.

The house decision's main impact is in a single main quest, where each house gets a completely different one. You can tell which quest it is because the achievement/trophy list has four separate achievements for finding the map room. I hope the inevitable sequel has more quests like this.
The way the spellcasting system works makes me very glad I got the PS5 instead of the new Xbox with the stupid name. I can't imagine the tap/hold system working very well without the slight stop the adaptive triggers give you. I'll admit, I thought this feature was pointless and dumb before I tried it, but I legitimately love it.

+ Exploring the castle is simply great
+ The castle is populated with named characters; you'll see classmates you recognise hanging around (even if they can't be directly interacted with)
+ Sebastian is bro-tier
+ The teachers are well-done and feel different from the ones from Harry Potter's time
+ After you've already started the game, the process of booting the game up and loading your save is the absolute QUICKEST I've ever experienced (and it's also easy to make another character if you'd like)
+ You can change your gear's appearance immediately back to whatever you actually liked (because I just want to wear my damn school uniform)
+ If two map markers are overlapping, hovering over one will separate them so you can choose the one you want
+ The game actually does give you the option to be a complete fucking asshole (a lot of side quests are fetch quests for items with no in-game use, but you can go up to the quest-giver and just be like "nah I'm keeping this")
+ The polyjuice quest, in its entirety (but especially the thing you can do at the podium in the great hall)
- That Hogsmede bartender's voice is weird as hell
- I wish more story events and side quests started in the classroom, to have more of a "you're a student attending a school" feeling
- Your character always accepts side quests in the most non-committal way possible (like I'm really interested, but my guy's like "eh maybe if I have time and am in the area")
- The (Ravenclaw) main quest has Olivander ask you to retrieve a family heirloom wand, and your guy says "those splinters must be Olivander's wand", and there's no option to pick it up or tell Olivander about it or anything
- The lockpicking minigame is really annoying and bad
- You will always be referred to by the dreaded singular "they" (apparently non-English languages use the equivalent of "he/she" so this sucks even more because it was a conscious decision, not laziness)
- The game dripfeeds you mechanics and spells very, very slowly
- Can Ignatia Wildsmith please, for the love of God, just SHUT THE FUCK UP
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!
- You have no idea how inconvenient travel was before I invented floo powder!

GAME CRASHES:
1. After grooming my animals in the Room of Requirement (27 hours in)
2. Fast travelling (41 hours in)


After a 47-hour playthrough, completing the main quest and every single side quest, I am thoroughly satisfied. Yes, I would have liked more school-based content, but this was a game that I was constantly thinking about whenever I wasn't playing it. I'm already excited to start again and see unique quest for each of the other three houses.
9/10

conjecture:

REVISITED: Mass Effect 3 (2012) - Xbox 360
It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.
We all know what happened, and I could go on for hours, but I won't.

To sum up what's going to happen:
I am going to replay ME3, importing the ME2 playthrough I did five years ago, and play the entire game. All of the DLC went on sale one week (10 Apr 2018), and I snatched it all up. ME3 is going to happen and I am going to play it. This will be the first time I have seen the "revised" ending. Thankfully, there's nowhere for it to go but up. lmao
Yes, I bought the DLC and didn't play it for five years. Yes, I teased this review on page 2 and never got around to it until now. A Mass Effect 5 has been announced, and I need to get my shit straight on ME3 before I can decide not to play ME5. Andromeda is like $5 on ebay so maybe? PERHAPS? It's a possibility? Perchance?

divided into six sections: main game / from ashes / leviathan / omega / citadel
from ashes, omega, and citadel are blind playthroughs, the other two I haven't played for 11 years

I played the game until the point of no return, played all four expansions, then stopped. Citadel is a perfect way to end the series, I really don't want to deal with dumb child avatar/created reapers to destroy organic life to prevent organic life from destroying itself/what the fuck ever. All the good parts of the game are done after Rannoch, but if you like Miranda at all, you've got to wait until after Thessia and Horizon to do the Citadel party.

MAIN GAME:
+ I'll just put this here for lack of a better spot: the multiplayer was fucking DOPE
+ The way squadmate dialogue is handled aboard the Normandy is a MASSIVE, MASSIVE improvement (less steps to be told that Garrus is doing calibrations)
+ You are no long arbitrarily locked out of using certain weapon types because of your class
+ Mordin's death is extremely well-done and I cannot be convinced otherwise (the "he was a good friend" dialogue option to Wrex made me laugh though)
+ Thane's death scene is extremely well-done (the hospital part at least)
+ Legion's death scene is very well-done
- At the end of the day, it's a mediocre cover shooter with a frustrating plot slapped onto it
- I still cannot keep the bumpers straight in my head; I always press LB when I want to use powers and RB when I want to change weapons
- Why does it take so long to check my harddrive every time I boot the game
- The intro is kind of lame to be honest
- The fake child thing is hamfisted and pretentious
- The game reintroduces you to Kaidan and all he does in the first mission is whine about Cerberus
- James Vega is kind of a shit party member, especially when he's the only non-paywall new character party member in the game (Anderson should have been a party member)
- The Dr. Eva chase is dumb
- "oh we've had the plans for a superweapon to defeat the reapers on mars this whole time lmao" (ME2 should have been finding the crucible plans, prove me wrong)
- The Citadel gets more lame with each game (it hasn't felt like an actual place since ME1)
- EDI getting a body is kind of dumb, let's be real here
- The salarian black market arms dealer interaction is fucking terrible with zero options for roleplaying; you can either appease his dumb bullshit or kill someone else who's done nothing wrong
- The "fight" against the reaper on Rannoch is fucking AWFUL
- The Quarians are fucking retards, and I'm glad they get naturally selected out of existence
- I miss the more open-ended structure of ME1 and 2's main plots, but I get why they did it this way

real shit: the seven party members for this game should have been
Garrus / Tali / Liara / Javik (as we have now), then also Anderson / Kirrahe / Miranda (cutting Vega / Kaidan or Ashley / EDI) (Anderson is full soldier to replace Vega, Kirrahe is full tech to replace EDI)
since Cerberus is such a huge part of the game, Miranda is a no-brainer to actually try and work with that angle, especially since her father and sister figure into the main plot
Anderson and Kirrahe are high-ranking allies that show how high-stakes everything has gotten
yes, Garrus, Tali, Miranda, and Kirrahe could all be dead by now, but that's a skill issue (to be fair, they spent time and resources on both Kaidan and Ashley despite one of them always being dead)
I'm not just choosing the characters I like because I left Wrex, Mordin, Thane, Legion, and Samara behind (I don't even like Tali but I understand she's a mainstay)

FROM ASHES:
+ Neat little lore additions; we finally get to learn who/what the protheans were
+ Javik is such an asshole but in a fun way; legitimately a perfect addition to the cast
- The mission you get is pretty simplistic to be honest
- Why wasn't this included in the base game (EA)

LEVIATHAN:
+ The point-and-click adventure-influenced opening in the lab was cool (legitimately wish there was more of it)
- It all boils down to another cryptic asshole who thinks too highly of himself telling you you're insignificant
- The way it happens basically confirms that if life goes on after the reaper invasion, everyone's going to be enslaved by the leviathans

OMEGA:
+ It introduced a nice assault rifle I used for a while
+ Aria's unique flare power is cool as hell (and you can unlock it for Shepard)
- Features nothing you liked about Omega in ME2
- Kind of boring honestly
- What kind of name for an enemy is "adjutant" that's just a dumb name that prevents anything it christens from being cool

CITADEL:
+ This is, without a doubt, exactly what the series needed to go out on; a big-ass party for all your boys (and girls)
+ All kinds of character interactions within the party scene (I like Kasumi more after the party than I ever did before it)
+ Wrex is back as a party member
+ THE SHEPARD SHUFFLE RETURNS
+ The plot being dumb and irreverent works because everyone knows going into this that it's supposed to be a fun send-off to these characters you've grown to love over three games
+ The "I should go" scene was legitimately funny as hell
+ Chekhov's Toothbrush
+ Thane and Mordin, despite being dead by this time, get nice little send-offs
- Nothing for Legion
- Whoever designed the pull-up contest against James is a fucking shithead
- Miranda not being able to come to the party until the end of the game is simply lame
- Even after all this time, they never let me buy a Tupari sports drink

It's been 11 years since Mass Effect 3. The trilogy is over and done with (cough), and I'm going to run down the series' expansions with a definitive list of how much I recommend each one. (except Arrival, which I never played)

ME1:
Bring Down the Sky - middling; it's an inoffensive little expansion that doesn't really need to be played

ME2:
Zaeed - free with the game; if you bought used: soft recommend, because he's a fun squad member
Kasumi - soft recommend; Kasumi's loyalty mission is unique and fun, but the character did nothing for me in ME2 overall
Overlord - HARD AVOID; worst piece of garbage ever
Firewalker - it's free; no reason not to get it
Lair of the Shadow Broker - middling; I suppose it's important to the plot, but it's just kind of there; soft recommend if you really like Liara

ME3:
From Ashes - hard recommend; Javik is the perfect new squad member for ME3
Leviathan - middling; some fun investigative segments, but the mystery does not resolve well
Omega - soft avoid; it's kind of boring, and features nothing that was good or interesting about Omega
Citadel - HARD RECOMMEND; if you haven't played a Mass Effect anything since ME3's ending, I HIGHLY recommend going back for Citadel alone; the party is the ending you always wanted for the series

ME1 - 8/10
ME2 - 8/10
ME3 - 6.5/10

Hello.
Do you have an hour to kill? Do you want to play a 100% legally actually free game with interesting characters, writing, and light puzzles? It's the flavor of the month right now, and you want to get in on it before its time in the sun is past. Or you could wait for the full version, but it's a fun hour, don't worry about it.
https://nemlei.itch.io/the-coffin-of-andy-and-leyley

The Coffin of Andy and Leyley [Game Jam Version] (2023) - PC
+ Fun characters
+ Great art for the main characters
+ Interesting plot
+ Fully engrossing for its entire runtime (of one hour)
- A bit of the old adventure game "I didn't know that was an interactable object" at the end

I just wanted to call attention to it before the full game comes out, and one of the following possibilities occurs:
1. the full game simply isn't as good as the demo
2. it releases for like $20 or something and I'm too much of a cheapskate to buy it

Street Fighter 6 (2023) - PS5
Street Fighter is THE classic fighting game series, spawning spin-offs, crossovers, a movie, etc. etc. etc. This is the second 2023 release I've played, after Hogwarts Legacy.
The big new feature this time around is the World Tour mode, which wants to be Yakuza/Like a Dragon/whatever they're calling it these days. You create a character and run around multiple open cities, picking fights and getting picked on for fights, meeting the Street Fighter cast and even having text message conversations with them. (side note: it would be hilarious if, after years of Tekken fans begging for Kiryu in Tekken, he got into Street Fighter instead)
Also, they introduced a more streamlined control system that forgoes the classic fighting game inputs if you're not a fan of having to quarter-circle forward punch. It's balanced out by the simpler control scheme doing less damage than the classic scheme, similar to how Ryu and Ken were implemented into Smash Bros.

World Tour:
+ Starting you off with Luke's style was a good move; it's pretty good and beginner-friendly
+ You can swap combat styles at any time in the overworld between the ones you've unlocked
+ You can earn experience toward pleasing your masters by fighting against their style rather than just using it
+ Continuing to use a style past it reaching max level doesn't just waste the experience; you can transfer the experience to any other style
+ Clothing items increase stats, but you can wear the ugly or girls' clothing and change its appearance to the clothing you like
+ Letting you access the construction site scene and Ken as a master before the story requires it was nice (especially because by the time I got to that point of the story, Ken's was my most-used style)
+ The text-message conversations with classic SF characters are absolutely brilliant (in particular, Ryu's, Cammy's, and Honda's)
+ Being able to choose your own squad for the rooftop 4v4 was pretty sweet; I chose the Donald Trump stand-in and he wrecked house (can't stump the Trump)
- Having ten masters that are in their own separate little countries is simply annoying
- In side missions where Alice and her boys tell you to do a reactive move that requires the opponent to act, WHY DON'T THEY FUCKING DO THE ACTION? THROW ME!!! I CAN'T REVERSE THREE THROWS WHEN YOU'RE JUST MOSEYING AROUND
- The roombas are pretty shit bro
- FUCK refrigerators
- The Infooencer is annoying
- Eternity
- Why is Kimberly so ugly

World Tour took me 35 hours, and I loved the vast majority. It's exactly what I wanted it to be. The story is kind of stupid if you think about it for more than two seconds, but it's a fun stupid rather than an annoying stupid. Listen, Bosch and I ate pizza and bought matching hats together. A bond like that transcends.
For the mid-to-late-game, I mostly swapped between the styles of Ken, Ryu, and E. Honda. My special moves (since you can equip anyone's) were Ken's hadouken, Ryu's shoryuken, Zangief's screw piledriver, and Blanka's rolling lunge; my super was Cammy's.

As for the other modes:
Arcade mode is your standard "choose a character, see an intro scene, fight a few battles, see an outro scene". It's good. I'll play more of this.
Battle Hub is existent. I can't play it because I don't pay for PlayStation Plus, but whatever.

For World Tour alone, this game is a
9/10
The rest of the modes are a nice bonus.

The DioField Chronicle (2022) - PS5
There is a demo for this game on PSN that allows you to carry over your progress. I decided to buy the game (albeit for $30) after playing the demo.
The DioField Chronicle is a small-scale medieval real-time strategy game by Square-Enix. You can tell it's by Square-Enix because the coverart and title font are exactly the same as Octopath Traveler and Triangle Strategy.
In this game, you play as a small force in a larger army, carrying out smaller-scale missions. You have control over your team composition and how to proceed with objectives. You are only in control of four characters in each map, but similarly to Fire Emblem: Three Houses, you can assign bench units to hang onto your four frontline units, allowing them to use their powers in battle.

+ The pre-main mission briefings where everyone goes over the plan and such are really nice
+ The difficulty balance throughout (without grinding, but while doing every side quest) makes it so you're usually just strong enough to finish the mission at hand
+ You can press right on the d-pad to speed up the game if you're grinding or walking a distance
- The characters exist and don't do much else; I didn't find myself really attached to any of them beyond gameplay utility
- Waltaquin is so annoying holy shit (can you PLEASE stop complaining about everything we do that isn't fighting the empire?)
- I always felt like I really wanted to take five characters out instead of four
- Enemies can spam the fuck out of attack skills way faster than you can (and there are way more of them than you usually)
- The game hates to give you information about the plot and characters; the entire plot is thrown out the window at the final plot twist right when the game ends
- The game does not make it clear enough if the Levantia thing is true or not, despite the protagonist definitively being able to know such a thing
- How the hell did Fredret make a mark of blessed convicing enough to fool everyone except Waltaquin?

GAME CRASHES:
1. switching characters mid-battle (17 hours in)

My main party was (for the none of you who will play this game)
Andrias (main DPS) b/w Rickenback (stun shot in a pinch)
Izelair (shield stunner) b/w Tremina (group attacks)
Catherine (shield stunner mk. II) b/w Hezeliah (healing) [Estalt until Hezeliah is recruited]
Umarida (ranged, group attacks) b/w Shivat (healing mk. II)
Zoruaq/Chappleman was my bench-swap

I have looked over my ratings of similar titles, and have come to a score of
6/10
it's
okay
it's got some neat ideas but the plot's presentation is fucking weird and not in a good way
they tried hard with their budget of two cents and a half a ham sandwich, but it didn't really work out

Valkyrie Elysium (2022) - PS5
There is a demo for this game on PSN that allows you to carry over your progress. I decided to buy the game (albeit for $30) after playing the demo.
Valkyrie Elysium is an action game reboot of the PS1-era turn-based RPG Valkyrie Profile (which I never played). You play as the titular valkyrie, doing Odin's bidding and all that. This is, thankfully, not a Dark Souls clone.
This game has four endings, and I decided to just get one. The only one that makes sense in-character without either being a moron or having precognition.

+ The combat is decently fun
+ The "normal" ending is really good honestly; the solution to the problem is extremely flawed, and would be extremely bittersweet if I cared about the characters at all
- The plot is kind of boring really, which lets down the otherwise great "normal" ending (of the four endings; I can't be bothered to do the other three, especially since the "normal" one was already perfect for the plot)
- I hate Fenrir
- There are multiple different weapons with unique attacks you can use, but none of them feel good to play except the default sword
- The game is based around every enemy having an elemental weakness, but a lot of your elemental spells fucking SUCK (especially for light and darkness)
- Hilde keeps being cryptic as fuck and calling you an idiot for not knowing specific information that you obviously have no way of knowing given your situation
- "this is our final battle for all the marbles", then afterward: "i've been defeated but i can't fall here; i must make my retreat" way too many fucking times ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEMOm1FAXWA )
- Half of the final mission being just the previous mission minus the boss fight SUCKS

6.5/10 it's fine

Just Cause 3 (2015) - Xbone
I got this game on sale for less than $5. I watched a video about how JC4 "killed the series", and all the things the guy bitches about were the things I didn't like about the game, so I'm hoping this one will be a lot better.

+ Running around and blowing shit up is fun
+ The missions are mostly okay and sometimes even good
- Long load times
- The northern island's strongholds send a shitload of guys at you, and then you die and have to deal with the long load times again and again how fun
- They never tell you what the controls are for the bavarium attractor challenge
- The achievement for beating the game doesn't pop lmao (only way to get it now is to start the game entirely over and pray it doesn't happen again)

GAME CRASHES:
1. During the bavarium tank mission (15 hours in)

GAME TIME:
to liberate all regions and complete all story missions: 30 hours

6.5/10
it's fun but kind of frustrating


Sky Fortress
The "air" part of the Land, Sea, and Air expansion. This one introduces the rocket wingsuit that lets you fly around and shoot missiles and shit at any time.

+ The rocket wingsuit is kind of fun
- But not when it's your only option to take out a base
- Taking out the airship's chaos objects is absolutely fucking awful
- The final mission is kind of garbage as well
- Once again, the achievement for beating the expansion didn't pop lmao

4/10
the tools it gives you are fun, but the missions they have you do with them are not


Mech Land Assault
The "land" part of the Land, Sea, and Air expansion.

+ The mechs are fun
+ The achievement for beating the expansion actually unlocked!!! COLOUR ME SHOCKED!!!
- But the prison break shit is garbage; the outposts are too spread-out and the "defend the outpost" at the end is just padding
- The first mission forces you via tutorial to replace your rocket launcher with something stupid gay and useless
- The last mission fucking sucks and is like an hour long
- The two side missions ("mech arenas") are absolute fucking garbage and last FOREVER
- You arbitrarily can't drop weapons and vehicles onto the island where this expansion takes place (but the game doesn't actually indicate this anywhere; if you set up a drop beacon, the button just won't work)

3.5/10


Bavarium Sea Heist
The "sea" part of the Land, Sea, and Air expansion. I'll be glad when this shit is over.

+ The best one of the three
+ The boat is fun
+ Both missions are pretty good
+ The story/characters are handled in a moderately entertaining way
+ The achievement for beating the expansion unlocked and everything

My expectations were rock bottom, but Avalanche delivered in the eleventh hour. Ends the game on a high note, against all odds (take a look at me now).
6.5/10, fuck it

TOTAL GAME TIME: 35 hours
gamerscore: 870 (should be 950)

Assassin's Creed: Valhalla (2020) - PS5
Purchased Black Friday 2022 for $15 from Best Buy
I really enjoyed Odyssey. I had bought it just to do side quests and ignore the main story, but I ended up actually really enjoying the characters and plot for some reason. For $15, I am definitely willing to try the viking sequel. I am not opposed to playing it like I did Origins, however, and completely ignoring the main plot while still doing every side quest.
One thing to note if you haven't heard it already: Valhalla takes place in its majority in England. The bulk of the map is England, with Norway serving only as plot bookends (kind of). It's definitely still a viking story, but it's about conquest abroad rather than in Scandinavia. When I say England, I mean England. No Scotland, no Wales, no Ireland (in Ireland's case, it appears in the expansion, Wrath of the Druids). There is also quest that takes you to Newfoundland, Canada.

+ It's a fun open-world checklist simulator
+ Dividing the game into mostly unrelated arcs means that if one is bad, the next one might not be
+ Combat is expanded upon from Odyssey, with new weapons that feel very different (and they're actually fun to use)
+ Minimal interruptions by the modern-day plot (and you can mash circle to skip all the dialogue!)
+ Somehow, at the eleventh fucking hour, the modern-day plot is made interesting
+ The Newfoundland/Vinland quest is fun, due to having to work your way back up from nothing with no equipment, and it doesn't overstay its welcome
+ You can dual-wield Excalibur and Mjolnir
- The intro should have been a cutscene; I have no desire to go outside into a bloody battle as a child
- Hate the stupid seer lady
- Why is there a character named Hytham? It's far too close to Haytham, the only good character in AC3
- In the conversation with Sigurd, Ceolbert knows more than he should; he'd never heard of Norway before, but he intuitively knows it's more than twice as large as England? He intuitively knows how old Harald is after just hearing his name?
- Animus anomalies are cool at first, but quickly become boring (and you get no real reward for it)
- Sometimes (rarely) the textures don't load in properly, but one time it completely fucked me over on a rock-stacking challenge because they were just pure black and I couldn't see how they laid on eachother
- The game sometimes calls Eivor "she" even though I'm playing as the male one
- One of the side quests has a "the cake is a lie" """""joke"""""; what fucking year is this? 2007 had so many classic memes, and you picked the worst one
- The side quest with the three kids and the wolf is fucking awful (and the little boy of course has to tell us that the wolf might be a lesbian wolf, because little kids in the 10th century are surely well-versed in gay issues)
- Did the two guys in London really need to be gay?
- I get to decide Lady Eadwyn's fate! Except I don't, because there's no "stick an axe in her forehead" option
- Complete and utter anti-climax of an ending

The game's plot and characters drag and kind of suck most of the time, but I am a sucker for open-world checklist simulator games. And this one has fun combat to boot.
7.5/10
TOTAL PLAYTIME: 103 hours
Assassin's Creed: Valhalla did the impossible. It's made me actually actively want to play the next game in the series. When I first saw Basim in this game, I wondered just why they'd make the next game about him. Then the eleventh hour came and now I want to see how it all connects. (luckily, they've said that the modern-day plot in Mirage only bookends the game)

Straight up and it's undeniable, however: Odyssey is a better game. They're pretty similar overall, but Odyssey just did everything better. Valhalla's plot is only interesting at the beginning and end, where Odyssey does a better job of making you care about the middle.
STAY TUNED for the season pass review (I bought it on sale)