Yoko Taro's NieR: Automata is a game that I've been aware of ever since it came out due to me watching Dunkey's video on it once or twice, but I didn't get the urge to actually go out of my way to play it until years later. Since I've mostly been focusing my attention on games from the 7th console generation and everything that came out before it, I put my search for a copy of NieR: Automata on hold for the time being, but when a friend of mine lent me her copy of the game back in December (shoutout to Catherine, by the way), I knew that it was the first thing I wanted to do when I got back to York in January. After spending a week beating the game's three main paths across a total of just under 23 hours, I can safely say that NieR: Automata blew me away on every level, and even with all of the praise that has been built up for it over the years, I really didn't expect to love it as much as I did.

Since God Hand is currently my fifth favorite game of all time, I was really interested to see what a studio originally comprised of people who worked on that game would be able to come up with on their own, and while I didn't actually realize that NieR: Automata was made by PlatinumGames until I actually booted it up for the first time, I don't think I could've asked for a better introduction to their body of work. In terms of its core gameplay, NieR: Automata works wonders as a hack-&-slash character action game that's equal parts hectic and buttery-smooth, as the amount of mechanics to manage and aggressive machines to keep track of made each enemy encounter feel just as exciting and tense as the last, and I found myself constantly countering moves and unleashing combos that were incredibly satisfying to pull off successfully. The game's implementation of RPG elements worked really well alongside this, with the unique plug-in chip upgrades feeling varied in their uses while also making my own approach to combat feel personalized. NieR: Automata was also very admirable in how willing it was to branch out and go beyond its respective genre, as its massive sense of scale was achieved brilliantly through its implementation of shoot 'em up and even text adventure sections throughout its more conventional character action missions. On top of just feeling great on their own, the slick, responsive controls made me appreciate the game's gorgeous artstyle and world design, and travelling around the game's open world made me feel just as excited to see all of the new, dilapidated vistas as it made me anticipate whatever new loot or sidequests came my way. Keiichi Okabe's phenomenal score is very easily one of the very best video game scores I've heard in a long time, as his music perfectly captures the melancholic, yet grandiose and profoundly emotional tone of the game itself.

NieR: Automata was one of those games where every element on display was terrific in its execution, but one element that especially impressed me would be its writing. Across its multiple pathways and shifts in perspective, NieR: Automata explores densely philosophical themes such as what it means to be human, the motivations that fuel violence and war, and the value of our own individual lives, and its navigation of these topics through the increasingly fractured psychology of its main cast was riveting. The story itself was already compelling in its twists, turns, and overwhelming sense of loss and tragedy, but the layers of existentialism that grew more prevalent as the game went on made for some outright heartbreaking moments, and it all made the game's stakes feel heavy and palpable. The game's structure involving multiple playthroughs worked really well for me, with the slight shifts and additions in gameplay being welcome changes that were a perfect fit for the recontextualization of certain events, motivations, and reveals. There's no doubt in my mind that NieR: Automata was one of the very best games I have ever played, and not only do I want to play what directly preceded it, NieR, but I also want to eventually play the game that NieR was a spinoff of, Drakengard.

Along with it being a genre-defining landmark of the first-person shooter genre, the birthplace of speedrunning, and a haven for a mod community that is thriving to this day, John Romero's Doom is also known for the slew of game consoles, calculators, thermostats, and pregnancy tests that it has been ported to both officially and unofficially, and while I did like how this gave me a ton of options to choose from when I decided to finally give the game a shot, it also made actually settling on one somewhat difficult due to how different some of these versions are. Initially, I played up to the 14th mission using the Doom 32X Resurrection hack of the Sega 32X port, but since that version wouldn't let me make any kinds of saves for some reason, I decide to cut out the middle man and play the original MS-DOS version after wrapping my head around how DOSBox worked (although not before accidentally downloading and playing through the shareware version). This was a very good decision on my part, as it meant that I got to play this awesome game the way that it was originally intended to be played, and I had an absolute blast while doing so.

Even with all of the innovations that have come to first-person shooters over the years, Doom is still as fun of a game as it's ever been in part due to its simplicity. Whether you're blasting the armies of Hell away with a shotgun, ripping them apart with a chainsaw, or decimating them with the iconic BFG 9000, the combat in Doom is consistently hectic, thrilling, and satisfying, and that applies to both the power fantasy moments of turning waves of demons into assortments of gory pastes and the more tense encounters where you're low on health and ammo and need to make every shot count. There were several times in my playthrough where I was so invested in the game's action that I was literally ducking and dodging my head in real life whenever an Imp's hell-fire or a Cacodemon's ball-lighting came my way, and I feel like that sums up just how fun this game is to play. Doomguy's blisteringly fast running speed not only made maneuvering around enemy attacks and even tricking them into fighting each other by luring them out feel responsive, but it also helped with the game's moments of exploration, as each level is filled to the brim with secrets that lead you to ammo dumps, powerups, and even hidden levels. Doom also features some immensely charming presentation, as the 2.5D blend of nightmarish 2D sprites and 3D environments ranging from futuristic military bases on the moons of Mars to the fleshy, rugged terrain of Hell were a great match for both Bobby Prince's blend of blood-pumping metal and ominous ambient music and the humorous text crawls that show up at the end of each chapter.

Before I got into Doom, one of my biggest worries about the game was that I would spend most of it just trying to look for where I was supposed to go next due to how often I've heard people make that exact criticism, but thankfully, that rarely ever happened. Because all of the halls and rooms in each level end up either looping back to a central hub or overlapping with each other, I pretty much never got lost (especially with how the corpses I'd leave in my wake ended up serving as markers for where I had already been), and I rarely even checked the in-game map because of how distinct every area felt. I will say that I wasn't that big of a fan of the more open levels that showed up later on, though, because while they were still good, the amount of empty space that they featured made them a lot less interesting to navigate than the rest of the game's levels. Despite this, Doom was still a fantastic first-person shooter that aged incredibly well, and not only am I excited to check out Doom II and Doom 64, but I also want to try out a few more of the earlier boomer shooters such as Wolfenstein 3D, Duke Nukem 3D, Quake, and Blood as well.

Aside from seeing its cover pop up in a few of Dunkey's videos, I knew next to nothing about God Hand going into it, but seeing its immensely high average rating on Backloggd and the reviews that were exclusively just quotes from the game kept me curious about what the game was actually like. Although I have played through a few of Shinji Mikami's games in the past (with the original Resident Evil 4 being one of my favorite games), there was so much about God Hand that made his other games feel tame and restrained in comparison, so when I found out that this was essentially his passion project, it totally made sense to me. Although it took me a bit to fully grasp everything about the game and its mechanics, I immediately fell in love with God Hand once everything clicked, and it was one of those games where I spent practically every waking moment thinking about how amazing it was.

God Hand is going to be celebrating its 17th anniversary later this year, and I don't think that a single game has come out in all that time with a combat system that even comes close to the one that is present here. This game's in-depth and hectic combat system is one that blends seamlessly with its high difficulty curve, as customizing your combos with new moves from several different martial arts means that you're constantly trying to find ways to take enemies down effectively while also trying to dodge as many attacks as possible. When you kill an enemy in God Hand, you practically send them into another plane of existence, as all of the moves both look and feel satisfying to execute thanks to their pure, raw aggression, with the pummels, stomps, suplexes, and spankings being especially fun to pull off with their flashy animations and use of button mashing. Despite how tough it can be at times, God Hand never felt outright unfair to me, as the lack of any real secret to being good at the game other than just knowing its ins and outs meant that every victory, no matter how small, felt immensely rewarding. This especially applies to the boss fights in God Hand, as the cranking up of the game's fast pace and focus on reaction time and positioning leads to some of the hardest, most pulse-pounding, and exciting boss fights I've ever seen in a video game.

In my eyes, the gameplay alone was enough to make God Hand an all-timer for me, but it also managed to stick the landing in so many other ways that I ended up loving the game even more than I could've imagined. Even with its challenging combat, God Hand practically never takes itself seriously, as its quirky brand of absurdist comedy made it so that my encounters with poisonous chihuahuas, punk rockers, and boss fights against lucha libre gorillas never felt out of place alongside the slapstick-heavy action, over-the-top storytelling and lovably campy voice acting. The game's stylish art direction made all of the environments and enemy types feel very memorable, with the major boss fights looking especially striking in their scaly, hellish designs. The music for each of the game's stages are all immensely catchy, and they also fit the tone and atmosphere of each stage really well. God Hand also allows you to gamble in between stages in order to potentially get closer to getting that next upgrade, and not only are the more conventional card games like blackjack and video poker already fun and laid-back to play, but you also get the opportunity to bet on chihuahua races, and while I lost money every single time I played that minigame, I still found it quite fun. There's no doubt in my mind that God Hand is one of the very best games I've ever played, and while there are still a ton of character action games that I still want to play, I don't think that any of them will be able to get any better than this.

Going into BioShock Infinite, the only thing I really knew about it was how it was very different from the first two games and also much more polarizing. I had a general attitude of "How bad could it be?" when I first booted this game up, and I had no idea that I was going to play a complete mess of a game that falls flat on its face with almost everything it sets out to accomplish. Before I get into all of that, though, I will give credit where credit is due and talk about how great and detailed the setting is. Not only is Columbia gorgeous to look at, but the floating city's steampunk elements mesh pretty well with the 1912 setting. That was the only thing about BioShock Infinite that I actually liked, though, as I found the rest of the game to be dull in terms of gameplay and frustrating in terms of plot.

In BioShock, the player pretty much had to use weapons and plasmids together in order to stand a chance against Rapture's Splicers and Big Daddies, and this was expanded on in BioShock 2 by placing a greater emphasis on mixing and matching genes in order to let the player experiment to see what worked and what didn't. Pretty much all of that was thrown out here in BioShock Infinite, because even with the occasional puddle of water or oil showing up in some of the game’s levels, the best strategy in every encounter is to just shoot the enemies. The guns do feel slightly better than they did in the other two games, but rendering plasmids (or vigors, as this game calls them) useless through the effectiveness of standing in one place and gunning everyone down made the gameplay loop of BioShock Infinite feel easier and more boring as it went along. The only vigor that I got any use out of was Return to Sender, and that was unlocked at the very end of the game, so you might as well never bother to upgrade or even use your vigors up to that point.

On top of the gameplay feeling much less engaging than the first two BioShock games, BioShock Infinite was a complete disaster from a storytelling perspective. The most egregiously stupid point that this game tries to make would be its attempts at making slavery and segregation seem double-sided, and that concept should be self-explanatory in how ignorant and irresponsible it is. Everything that the story tried to do involving timelines and "tears" just ends up making it feel even more bloated and incompetently told than it already was, and that especially includes the moronic ending that essentially exists to make Ken Levine feel really smart. I had zero fun with BioShock Infinite, and I find it really funny how the only real legacy that this game has would be how its fanmade porn apparently caused breakthroughs in 3D animation.

Truth be told, I had never actually heard of Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective before, but when I noticed its exceptionally high average rating on Backloggd, I decided to eventually give it a go. That was roughly a year ago, and despite how I've only just beaten the game a few minutes ago, that doesn't mean that I wasn't constantly thinking about how good it was all this time. Right from the very first frame, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective had me hooked, and I knew that I was playing something special long before I even reached the halfway mark. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective is one of those games where I can barely put my love for it into words, as it accomplishes everything that it sets out to do with flying colors and does it all in such a charming, unique and lovable way.

Above all else, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective is a combination of a visual novel and a puzzle game, and not only was I surprised by just how well this combination ended up working, but also how each of these two main elements of the game were executed perfectly. The gameplay consists of possessing and manipulating objects in order to save people's lives, access new areas, and just generally progress the narrative, and I thought that these mechanics were awesome. On top of being a brilliant use of the touchscreen on the Nintendo DS, the actual puzzles are all incredibly well-designed, and the amount of satisfaction that came from their "Aha!" moments made me feel like an absolute genius for solving them each and every time. Along with the fun gameplay and terrific puzzles, Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective features a gripping and superbly written storyline. Every single member of the game's cast is linked together in some way, and it helps that the characters were all incredibly likable and loaded with eccentricities. What starts out as a quest to find out more about the protagonist's past turns into a sprawling mystery filled with jaw-dropping twists, but despite just how many directions the game's story went in, all of its many plot points came together brilliantly, and the game's lighthearted sense of humor had me laughing the whole way through while still knowing when to be serious in order to have its emotional moments be as impactful as possible.

Although the mystery plot and the puzzle gameplay were the two core elements of what made Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective work so well for me, that doesn't mean that they were all that it had to offer. Like everything else on display here, the presentation of Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective oozes with personality, as both the music and the visuals were terrific in their own ways. This game has some excellent art direction, as the distinct character designs meshed really well with their lively in-game animations. Masakazu Sugimori's music here was also incredible, as pretty much every song is catchy and funky while still perfectly matching their context within the story and the puzzles. I loved absolutely everything about Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective, and I'm really glad that it's getting a multi-platform remaster this June, as it means that more people will get to experience this wonderful game.

I’ve been meaning to play Disco Elysium for a while now. Pretty much everything about it sounded appealing to me. A dialogue-heavy RPG inspired by my all time favorite game and the writings of Marx and Engels? Count me in! Even knowing all of that, Disco Elysium subverted a lot of my expectations, and as a result, I’ve experienced one of the most well written, engaging, heartfelt, intelligent, and overall best games ever made.

As I’ve said before, the main strength of Disco Elysium lies in its writing, and it’s almost overwhelming how good this game’s writing is. The macabre and fascinating world of Revachol is brought to life thanks to its detailed descriptions and lively characters, as well as the beautiful and unique oil painting artstyle. While I still do think that Planescape: Torment has the best writing in any video game, Disco Elysium is a very, very close second. I also loved how Disco Elysium’s version of perks and traits played into the way that Revachol was perceived by both the protagonist and the player. Rather than using traditional traits like a conventional RPG, the player has to manage 24 different aspects of their brain that are constantly fighting over each other, and that is an unbelievably creative and interesting way of giving the player an understanding of how the protagonist thinks and functions.

There is so much intelligence and beauty present in Disco Elysium, and while I could go on and on about it, I just want to end the review by saying that this is one of the best games I have ever played, and I’m not only incredibly excited to see what else Robert Kurvitz and ZA/UM have to offer, but I’m also excited to read The Sacred and Terrible Air, Kurvitz’s original Revachol-set novel, when it eventually gets translated into English.

In the three-ish years between my friend from high school snapping my barely touched copy of Dark Souls III in half after I gave it to him and me giving Bloodborne a shot and falling head over heels for it, I had always been interested in at least giving the original Dark Souls a shot, and after beating Bloodborne twice and Elden Ring once, I decided that I was finally ready to give that game a go. After hearing people call the 2018 remaster a disappointment due to it not fixing any of the original game's issues, I decided that I might as well play the original version of the game anyway due to it being the cheaper option, and so I snagged a copy of the Prepare to Die version of the game alongside some other Xbox 360 titles and then spent just over a month playing through it. My roughly 25-30 hour playthrough of Dark Souls was one that was filled with a lot of anger, complaining, and me wishing outlandish things on Hidetaka Miyazaki, but it was also an immensely fun and rewarding experience, even if I wouldn't consider it to be perfect like so many others have.

Even when compared to the terrifying Gothic streets of Yharnam in Bloodborne or the vast and varied Lands Between of Elden Ring, there was something about playing Dark Souls that made its atmosphere feel so much more oppressive and bleak, and I feel like that can be at least partially linked back to the game's controls. In Dark Souls, you have to commit to absolutely every attack, dodge, and occasional jump that you make, as your Chosen Undead's limited range, delayed movements, and inability to adjust where their moves go in any way eventually makes fighting even one enemy require lots of attention and patience. The jump from the tough, but fair combat of Bloodborne and Elden Ring to the brutal and punishing combat of Dark Souls was an admittedly jarring one, but it greatly added to the satisfaction of actually overcoming whatever was in your way, as having the odds be stacked against your favor made finally getting to the next bonfire or beating that boss feel immensely euphoric after being beaten down so many times. The game's grim setting was a great backdrop for the unforgiving combat, as the artstyle's blend of grotesque dark fantasy and medieval romanticism made for levels that were both gorgeous to look at and suffocating in how constant the presence of death and ruin were. Usually, I really dislike having to backtrack in games, but my appreciation for the game's interconnectedness was at its highest whenever I had to trek through levels before I got the ability to warp to bonfires, as those trips made Dark Souls feel thick with existential dread, especially with the game's few friendly NPCs being hopelessly insane (except for Solaire of Astora, bless his heart). Despite how haunting and depressing this game can be, there were several moments in Dark Souls that were overwhelming in their beauty, with my first arrivals in both the Firelink Shrine and the fight against the Moonlight Butterfly genuinely making me tear up with how enchanting they were amidst Lordran's constant strife and decay.

What's frustrating about Dark Souls is that, despite how much this game manages to get right so effortlessly, it is also rife with bizarre and even outright bad design choices that made playing the game feel either annoying, dull, unfair, or some combination of the three, and these moments ended up holding the game back from being the flawless masterstroke that so many people have praised it as. For starters, both the combat and the general movement felt very janky to me, and a lot of my deaths just ended up coming from my character doing a move that was in the complete opposite direction of what I actually pressed on my controller or even just slipping off of the platform that I was on for no discernible reason. Aside from the Moonlight Butterfly, Ornstein and Smough, and Gwyn, I never really struggled with any of the game's bosses (Bed of Chaos somehow only took me three tries), but quite a few of the levels that led up to them were filled with cheap enemy placements and annoying gimmicks, with New Londo Ruins featuring ghosts being able to kill you through walls and the Duke's Archives being littered with Channeler snipers sticking out to me in particular. There were also entire levels that didn't feature a single bonfire in them, and while it did add to the tension of trying to avoid getting hit to either keep exploring or to find the next boss, they also meant that I had to run a marathon from a totally different area every single time I wanted to attempt the level again, and this got old almost immediately. Even with all of these flaws, though, Dark Souls was still a great game whose influence and painstaking craft can still be felt to this day, and since I've heard almost nothing but horror stories about Dark Souls II, I'll probably come back to it after playing through Dark Souls III first.

Long before I got to actually play any of these games, I remember seeing an image online of a bargain bin with an entire stack of used copies of Max Payne 3 being right in the middle of it, and because I was only vaguely familiar with the titular character's name at the time, it made me curious to see why that game in particular was apparently so controversial. As I became a bigger fan of the series by playing through and loving the first two games, my intrigue towards playing Max Payne 3 only grew due to how divisive it apparently was in the fanbase, but hearing about how the game was made by Rockstar this time around rather than Remedy gave me the feeling that the game was in good hands. While Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne improved on everything the previous game had established, Max Payne 3 ended up feeling like a total evolution of what made the series so special to me, as it struck a great balance between retaining the soul of the previous two games and revamping the gameplay and presentation in ways that ended up making this game my favorite in the trilogy.

One of the most noticeable and controversial additions to the gameplay in Max Payne 3 would be that of the cover system, and while I do kind of understand why people were coming from (especially with how the game industry was horrendously oversaturated with third-person cover shooters at the time), I felt that it ended up working alongside the John Woo-inspired bullet time and shootdodge mechanics that made the series iconic rather than against them. Thanks to the reduced amount of painkillers, weightier physics engine, and limited weapon slots that have a built-in risk-reward system, the gunfights in Max Payne 3 ended up being so much more dynamic, intense, and engaging than the ones in the previous two games, as you're given more freedom to approach each encounter while still being effectively punished for being too reckless or not having a plan. In both Max Payne and Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, I killed pretty much all of the enemies in my way by dodging to the side in slow motion and holding on R1 until they died, but here in Max Payne 3, I would pull off stunts like dive off of a railing, headshot as many enemies as possible before landing on the ground, staying on the ground to pick off anyone I missed, and then rolling into cover to blind fire at the new enemies arriving in the area, and having those strategies go well felt incredibly satisfying. Although you can find optional clues in each mission to help make sense of what's going on, a lot of the detective work and especially the platforming from the previous two games were toned down in favor of focusing on the shootouts and cutscenes, but since the moment-to-moment gameplay is so fun and rewarding to experiment with (especially thanks to how good these guns feel to handle and how cruel the violence ends up being), it doesn't end up feeling like a loss at all.

Even before I got the chance to actually play Max Payne 3, I was well aware of its visual style (so much so that I remember referencing it in at least one of my movie reviews), but I not only felt that it was a perfect fit for the story and its themes, but I also thought that it was even more appealing to my own tastes than the presentation of the rest of the series. If Max Payne and Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne took cues from the noir genre, then Max Payne 3 did the same with neo-noir, as the comic panel cutscenes and grimy New York apartments were replaced with a sun-baked, yet sleazy São Paulo setting, an incredible soundtrack by HEALTH, and a barrage of woozy, hyperactive flourishes that feel straight out of digital-era Tony Scott films like Man on Fire and Domino. Max was literally never able to catch a break in any of the three games, but what he goes through here in Max Payne 3 felt outright depressing, as his intense and debilitating addictions to alcohol and painkillers added another layer of tragedy to a story and plot that are significantly darker and bleaker than the first two games. The game starts with Payne hitting rock bottom before having him somehow ruin every worst case scenario he finds himself in, and as the twists and betrayals stack up on top of each other, the fog of failure and self-hatred that clouds his judgement thickens right alongside it. James McCaffrey's performances in Max Payne and Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne were already brilliant, but he absolutely nailed it here in Max Payne 3, as he conveys just how beaten-down, exhausted, and bitter Payne has become with every line. Max Payne 3 was a phenomenal conclusion to what is easily my favorite video game trilogy (although I'd still consider Metal Gear to be my favorite overall franchise in gaming), and since Rockstar's focus has shifted towards making open world games over the past decade, I can't imagine them making something like this ever again.

Long before I started playing any of the games in the series, I assumed that the general consensus surrounding the Devil May Cry franchise was positive due to its sheer popularity, so when I found out that a majority of people actually hated Devil May Cry 2, I was both surprised and intrigued. Granted, a lot of my excitement towards playing this game was more out of morbid curiosity than anything, but I was still willing to give the game a chance to see if it wasn't as horrible as people kept saying it was, and I went into it with a half-joking "How bad can it be?" attitude. As someone who wasn't even that big of a fan of the first Devil May Cry game, I was baffled by just how much its sequel got wrong and just how incompetent it is, because while it wasn't outright unplayable (although it does border on that at times), Devil May Cry 2 was still an absolute disaster of a game that prides itself in being as dull of an experience as possible.

When I beat Devil May Cry on the last day of July, my thoughts on it were very complicated, but even with all of its flaws and odd design choices, I could at least say that the game wasn't boring. In Devil May Cry 2, though, boredom takes center stage, as it strips any ounce of challenge and depth from the first game's combat in favor of turning its core gameplay into a mindless shell of what came before it. In almost every situation you're thrown in, the absolute best and most effective strategy is to stand completely still and spam your gun button until all the enemies die, and since the melee combat is sluggish and unsatisfying and the enemies barely try to attack or even move towards you, this mind-numbing strategy ends up being your one answer to everything. Instead of trying to pull off flashy combos and alternating between melee and ranged attacks like in the first game, I was instead going from area to area and essentially mashing the square button until the battle music stopped playing while occasionally dodging an enemy's ranged attack, and the monotony of having to fight the same enemies using the same foolproof strategy while getting punished for trying literally anything else over and over again made playing this game feel more like Hell than the levels that took place in the actual Underworld. Speaking of which, Devil May Cry 2 replaces the Resident Evil-style exploration and puzzles of its first game in favor of making every single area in every stage take forever to get through, as Dante's slow running speed had me dodge rolling around these needlessly empty and bland locales just to get to the next section. Devil May Cry 2 also replaces the manual targeting of the original game with automatic targeting, and it not only made the boss fights (which were already a joke to begin with) take way longer to beat than they needed to due to your attacks constantly going in the other direction, but it also made activating the required switches nearly impossible with how the game would rather make you face the infinitely spawning enemies than the switch that you're deliberately trying to hit.

While the original Devil May Cry had some design choices that held the experience back for me, Devil May Cry 2 went beyond that and instead decided to add a bunch of features that were all completely superfluous, and I honestly found that to be more insulting. For some reason, Dante can run up walls now, and not only does he only go up a pitiful distance, but the only times where I ever actually used this move were all by mistake. The whole amulet mechanic is also useless, as the unlockable moves just ended up being incredibly situational during combat while also trying to sell the illusion of customization and player choice, and the required uses of each move for traversal both occurred exactly once immediately after they were unlocked. Despite all of these nonsensical additions, Devil May Cry 2 somehow managed to fail to fix one of the main issues of the first game, as the fixed camera is still disorienting to the point where it constantly obscures its objects of focus. On top of being absolutely miserable to play, Devil May Cry 2 also fell flat from a story perspective, as the nonsensical plot was made even worse thanks to Dante's personality being changed from a cocky goofball to a coin-flipping idiot that barely speaks. Having the second disc essentially be repeated content with a swapped protagonist was just an additional slap to the face, and this choice just screams lazy rather than giving the game any replay value. My hate for this game makes it so that even acknowledging its improvements on the original feels wrong, as the additions of an actual dodge button and the ability to swap weapons on the fly pale in comparison to just how bad everything else is in this game. Devil May Cry 2 was a chore of a game that felt atrocious to play, and since I've disliked both of the games from this franchise that I've played so far, I really hope that Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening makes up for it.

What's annoying about not having any next-gen consoles is that, despite how many interesting new games came out last year, I didn't have the opportunity to give any of them a shot, and so the only game released in 2023 that I got to play and review was The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. While that game was decent (albeit massively disappointing), I wanted to play at least one more game before the year ended, and while I missed that date by one day, I'm happy that I managed to snag a copy of Super Mario Bros. Wonder either way. Even with my excitement for this game, Super Mario Bros. Wonder managed to surpass my expectations with flying colors, and I'd honestly consider it to be the best 2D Mario game since Super Mario World.

After years of oversaturating the market with mediocre 2D platformers through the New Super Mario Bros. series and even making their fans make their own levels across two separate consoles (not that there's anything wrong with that, because I really like both of the Super Mario Maker games), Nintendo finally decided to make a 2D Mario game with some soul to it, and I'd say they succeeded. Instead of being gimmicky and forgettable, the levels here in Super Mario Bros. Wonder are tightly constructed and bursting with new ideas, as each stage features wacky enemies, memorable themes, and interesting mechanics that build off of each other as the game goes along. All of this is true even before you come across each level's Wonder Flower, and once you do find it, the level morphs into something else entirely, and it only amplified just how creative the levels were, how gorgeous the new and more expressive visual style was, and how fun all of it was to play. The Wonder Flower sequences were easily my favorite moments in the game, but they were taken to completely new heights once I started going for the Special World stages, as their more demanding and even wilder level design had me grinning from ear to ear. Aside from the more conventional platforming stages, Super Mario Bros. Wonder also features different kinds of levels such as Wiggler races, Badge challenges, enemy challenges, and search parties, and these provided some decent variety while also being charming in their own right.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is one of those games whose general excellence makes me feel bad to even consider saying anything negative about it, but there were some aspects of the game that could've been better. For starters, the new Badge system was a bit mixed for me, as I rarely felt the urge to use anything outside of the Parachute Cap Badge and certain levels pretty much requiring the use of certain badges (namely the Dolphin Kick Badge, which makes swimming actually fun to control) without saying so beforehand led to me begrudgingly restarting the level just to swap badges. Among other reasons, Super Mario Bros. Wonder marked a new era in the franchise through its (comparatively) extensive use of voice acting, and while Kevin Afghani was spot on as Charles Martinet's replacement for Mario and Luigi, I thought that the game didn't really need so many Talking Flowers, even if Mick Wingert's performance as them wasn't nearly as annoying as it could've been. 2D Mario games always got the short end of the stick when it came to boss fights, but even with the implementation of the Wonder Flower, the repeated fights against Bowser Jr. still left a lot to be desired, and they weren't distinct enough from each other to be all that interesting to me. All of those flaws pale in comparison to what Super Mario Bros. Wonder got right, though, as I'd easily consider it to be my favorite 2D Mario game to date, and I can't wait to go back and get as close to completing it 100% as I can.

Although I was aware of Metroid: Other M being the one main entry in the franchise that people straight-up hate, I didn't know just how polarizing Metroid Fusion was within the fanbase until I beat Super Metroid last month. Because it didn't have the highly influential and acclaimed status of its predecessor, I got very curious to see what it was about Metroid Fusion that made a sort of black sheep within the series, and seeing people compare it to a horror game only made me more eager to give the game a go. Even with my somewhat positive expectations going into it, I really wasn't expecting to love Metroid Fusion as much as I did, and while it does deviate from the formula in a number of areas and even straight up misses the mark in others, I'd still consider this to be my favorite Metroid game by far. Whenever I'd see people criticize Metroid Fusion, there's a good chance that they'd throw the word "linearity" around a lot (even if you could argue that the other Metroid games were technically linear to begin with), and while it is easily the most straightforward game in the series so far, I'd say that this choice worked for what the game was trying to accomplish.

Metroid Fusion adopts an almost mission-based approach to its levels rather than having you explore an open-ended area at your own pace, but since this game also has a much stronger emphasis on its narrative, these two elements ended up meshing together in a very interesting way. The shift towards forcing Samus Aran to take orders not only works in having some of the plot's events feel more unsettling, but it also makes for an integral part of her character arc with how she tries to make sense of this enigmatic mission, and the game ends up having some genuinely compelling things to say about what it means to be human and our own relationship with technology. Samus herself felt the best to control here, as her movement speed felt significantly faster and snappier, and the levels themselves actually favored her vertical jumps over her horizontal ones, which made platforming significantly less frustrating here than it did in both the original Metroid and in Super Metroid. Even with the increased dialogue, character interactions, and cutscenes in the form of gorgeous sprite art, the sense of isolation and powerlessness was much more prevalent here in Metroid Fusion, as the enemies and environments got significantly creepier in both their designs and uses of environmental storytelling, and the lack of control that you have over your objectives and even what powerups you get access to made me feel genuinely anxious to see what new monstrosity will try to attack me whenever I got access to a new door or path. I also really liked the use of the X parasites in terms of both gameplay and narrative, as having them replace the usual random health and ammo pickups made refilling them much more consistent and reliable (as well as making for some interesting platforming challenges by having an X turn from one enemy into another), and having the game lean towards body horror by having these highly intelligent parasites not only take over the body of its host, but also alter its genetic makeup was both fascinating and unnerving. The integration of the SA-X was a stroke of genius to me, as the moments were you had to hide and run away from this overpowered killing machine were some of the most tense scenes in the entire series.

As much as I loved Metroid Fusion, I will not act like it's a perfect game, as it featured some questionable design choices while also retaining old ones that I wasn't a fan of to begin with. For some reason, you have to defeat a Core-X after every single boss fight, and while the fight itself isn't difficult (especially towards the late game), this gets old after the second boss and only feels more unnecessary as the game progresses. Speaking of which, I liked how much faster and more chaotic the boss fights were, but the bosses often had hitboxes that were almost as big as the rooms where the battles took place, and that made avoiding them and trying to get to their weak spot boil down to luck rather than strategic positioning, and it made the fights against Nightmare and Ridley especially annoying. Thankfully, Metroid Fusion has much less backtracking than the other Metroid games I've played, but it still retained a lot of the cryptic "blow up a random block" progression that felt outdated by the time Super Metroid came out, and the lack of an X-Ray Scope made that issue just that much more annoying to deal with. Even with these flaws, I still had an absolute blast with Metroid Fusion, and while I do want to play the other 2D Metroid games by eventually giving Metroid: Samus Returns and Metroid Dread a go, I want to play through the Metroid Prime trilogy first and see what they're all about.

Like Hotline Miami, I spent a lot of time during the last 18 or so months playing Max Payne, but rather than aiming for the 100% completion route, I would instead pair it with DJ Shadow's Endtroducing..... and just replay my favorite levels on some of the harder difficulties. My love for the original game's writing and atmosphere are still there, but playing it this way for so long has oddly turned it into a comfort game of sorts, as I'd just sit back, turn my brain off, and blast gangsters away with dual Beretta pistols to the tune of songs like "What Does Your Soul Look Like (Part 4)" and "Midnight in a Perfect World". Because of how much I loved the first game, I was incredibly excited to check out its two follow-ups, and while Max Payne 3 did look the most intriguing due to how different it was from the rest of the series, I've heard enough people say that Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne was the peak of the trilogy to make me look forward to finally playing it.

At first, I found it somewhat difficult to compare this game to its predecessor due to how similar they are, but Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne got just enough right for me to consider it to be the better of the two games. On top of the gunplay and heroic-bloodshed-inspired bullet-time mechanics feeling just that much better and tighter, I thought that the levels were much more consistent in their design, as the first game's sudden difficulty spike towards the end was swapped out in favor of having each chapter get gradually more difficult while still feeling fair. The levels were also much more varied here in Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne, with the levels allowing you to play as Mona Sax being especially fun thanks to their tense sniper sequences. Although this didn't have the snowed-in atmosphere of the first game, I still thought that the presentation in Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne improved on what was accomplished in the original game, as the more detailed character models, comic panel cutscenes, pitch-perfect voice acting, and violin-heavy score complimented the grimy, run-down apartment buildings and decrepit funhouses that the game's shootouts take place in.

In terms of gameplay, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne improved on what the first game already did so well while still retaining that game's general feel, but I wasn't expecting it to also surpass the original game in terms of storytelling. Rather than diving into a national conspiracy, Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne focused more on Max's relationship with Mona Sax while still having its fair share of twists, betrayals, and battles against Payne's own inner demons, and this character-focused approach made the plot feel much more engrossing to me while still lining up with the first game's mood of hard-boiled film noir. Max Payne was an already dark game, but the tone here was even more bleak and cynical, as Max is constantly pushed to his mental and physical limits over the course of the story. Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne was a terrific follow-up to an already amazing game, and despite how it will be quite a while before I end up playing through Max Payne 3, that doesn't change just how excited I am to try it out.

Aside from the first two games, Grand Theft Auto IV has always been the black sheep of the series' main entries, as its shift towards realism ended up turning off fans of the PS2 trilogy's wacky, hyper-satirical sandboxes. Even with the amount of jokes about this game's driving physics and bowling-addicted cousins that I've heard over the years, I was still more curious about finding this game and playing it than any other game in the franchise, and since Rockstar decided to make it much harder to play the original versions of the first two PS2 games, Grand Theft Auto IV ended up being the only one of the older Grand Theft Auto games that I can actually play. Because of how many differing opinions I've heard about this game, I went into Grand Theft Auto IV hoping I'd at least like it, but I didn't expect for it to turn out to be my favorite game in the franchise by far, as it fixed some issues that I had with the other Grand Theft Auto games I've played while also carving out its own identity.

Rockstar has always been known for making open worlds that feel alive, but even with that in mind, I was still incredibly impressed with what they had accomplished here in Grand Theft Auto IV. The oppressively grey palette, dirty streets, and grungy textures greatly added to the grit of Liberty City and Alderney, and this more cutthroat setting also strengthened the game's dark and wholly engrossing story. Rather than being chock-full of explosive setpieces like in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Grand Theft Auto V, Grand Theft Auto IV instead has you battling it out in abandoned construction sites, underfunded apartment complexes, and sleazy strip clubs, and the traditionally eccentric and fun supporting cast was also replaced with seedy drug pushers, corrupt cops, and paranoid mafiosos. Normally, I'd be upset if a game's missions weren't as varied as its predecessor, but because everything was recontextualized through Niko Bellic's perspective as an undocumented immigrant, it all made sense within the context of the story. Not only that, but the smaller scale of the missions also made them more fun due to their decreased linearity and increased ways of getting in and on top of buildings, as coming up with ways to complete objectives on my own rather than relying on the game's exact instructions led to some really memorable and satisfying moments for me. I'd also say that the gunplay here is the best in the series, especially with how your limited arsenal was integrated into the world through the presence of underground weapons dealers, and the constant need to be alert while firing at enemies and the incredibly impressive ragdoll physics made for combat that was much more exciting than just hiding behind one spot of cover like in Grand Theft Auto V.

Along with the fun missions and immersive setting, a big reason why the game's story was so enthralling for me would be its protagonist. Not only was Niko Bellic's cynicism and cold-heartedness brought to life thanks to Michael Hollick's voice acting, but seeing how his past haunts him as he struggles to see any real future for himself outside of violence was very compelling, especially with the story's numerous player choices, and it made the game's plot evolve from being a critique of the American Dream into a look at the psychology of revenge, the effects of war, and the endless cycles of violence. Like I mentioned earlier, Grand Theft Auto IV has gotten a lot of flack for its driving mechanics and hangout sessions with the other characters, but I honestly really liked both of these features. The more realistic handling of the cars and bikes fit perfectly alongside the game's tone and world while still making for some intense getaways and chases, and spending time with the supporting cast made the story and the rest of the game feel more interconnected. Although Red Dead Redemption II is still my favorite Rockstar game, Grand Theft Auto IV isn't far behind, and I really hope that I can eventually find a way to play Grand Theft Auto III and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City without having to buy the so-called "definitive" edition that came out back in 2021.

SUDA51 is another one of those video game auteurs whose body of work looked really interesting to me, but aside from playing the first level of No More Heroes years ago before losing access to both my Wii and the game, I haven't been able to really get into any of his games. Much to my surprise, though, I managed to get access to Killer7, and while it only took a little over a week for me to beat it, I always looked forward to jumping back into the game and playing through it. Killer7 was a game that I knew was going to become my newest obsession long before it was over, and now that I've finished it, I can see myself thinking about it even more often than I already do.

Whenever people talk about Killer7, one of the very first things that gets brought up is its presentation, and for good reason. Pretty much every element of this game is unconventional in some way, but the cel-shaded artstyle, striking colors, energetic and stylistically varied cutscenes, and the superbly eclectic music by Masafumi Takada and Jun Fukuda made all of its different methods of experimentation come together naturally and beautifully. Killer7 features a stripped-down, minimalistic control scheme and on-rails-esque gunplay, and while it took me a bit of time to get used to how this game worked, I honestly loved how Killer7 felt to play. Not only did the combat itself feel great, but I also found myself switching between the titular assassins quite often, as they all had their uses while still being fun to toy around with on their own. Along with shooting Heaven Smiles and battling some really creative bosses, playing Killer7 also consists of exploring each area in order to solve puzzles and gain a better understanding of the game's world and characters, and this other half of the gameplay in Killer7 also really worked for me thanks to how it made exploration feel rewarding.

On top of having some terrific gameplay and an intoxicatingly chaotic style, Killer7 also features a fascinating, thought-provoking and thematically rich story about terrorism, violence, and Japan's role in American politics whose breadth of details and intentional obfuscation added to the game's neo-noir mood and over-the-top tone. Granted, I didn't grasp absolutely everything about it during this playthrough due to just how complex it was, but I still loved how the plot blended an international conspiracy with elements of surrealism, and piecing details together through details that I picked up on from the cryptic dialogue featured in both the cutscenes and the characters in each level made the experience of trying to understand the full picture feel that much more engrossing. Not only was Killer7 one of the best games I've ever played, but it was also one of the most wholly unique and idiosyncratic games I've ever had the pleasure of experiencing, and I don't think that the game industry will ever see anything like it ever again.

Since I wasn't that crazy about the first game to begin with and thought that the second game was astoundingly terrible in ways where I could barely believe the franchise even kept going after its release, I was unsure if I even wanted to go ahead and play Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening, and so I took a bit of a break from the series after playing the first two entries within two weeks of each other. As time went on, though, I heard quite a few people say that it was well worth it, and that made me decided to finally bite the bullet and play through the fan favorite of the franchise. Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening was one of those games that I really looked forward to jumping back into whenever I wasn't already playing it, because while it definitely isn't perfect in some outright frustrating ways, it was a massive improvement on Devil May Cry and especially Devil May Cry 2.

Before I even got the chance to control Dante, I had a feeling that I was going to like this game thanks to its cutscenes, because if there's one thing that Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening has in spades, it's a strong personality. Instead of being vessels for dull exposition, the cutscenes in Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening are loaded with hyperactive camerawork and editing, blood-pumping music, campy dialogue, and some immensely over-the-top action that made my jaw drop multiple times, and I looked forward to every single cutscene to the point where they were my favorite element of the entire game. The stylized cutscenes were complimented by Dante's much more lovable personality, fleshed out characters, and a genuinely compelling story (a first for the series!), and seeing how Dante's relationship with Vergil evolved alongside Lady's relationship with her father Arkham was compelling from start to finish. The gameplay here got a much-needed revamp from the first game's barebones combat and the second game being entirely dedicated to having you spam the square button forever, as the twitchy, fast-paced combat is bolstered by a combo system that rewards speed and a whole slew of weapons and styles to choose from, the former of which you can switch on the fly. Not only did the variety of options to choose from alone make for a lot of experimentation, but the weapons and styles themselves being genuinely really cool made me excited to unlock new items and moves, and I got to try pretty much everything at least once while still clinging onto my favorite playstyle. The bosses are also loads of fun to fight with how hectic and varied they are, and while I do wish that they were spaced out a bit more and I especially wasn't a fan of the unnecessary repeated fights (looking at you, Mission 18), their Gothic designs made every encounter memorable.

Pretty much everyone who has played Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening talks about how difficult it is, and while it is pretty challenging, I don't think it would be half as hard to play as it is if it wasn't for the atrocious in-game camera. I don't know what it is about this series, but I haven't been able to play a single Devil May Cry game with a genuinely good camera system, as it constantly jerks around to the point where you can't even see what you're trying to kill, let alone avoid their attacks. This also ended up impacting the still-clunky platforming, barely functional enemy targeting system, the gimmick enemies that break the flow of combat with how they can only be killed in one or two ways, and practically every boss fight in the game, as attacks constantly come at you from off-screen in ways where you don't even get the chance to react to them to the point where it makes certain fights flat-out annoying to play. Although I wouldn't really call Devil May Cry 3: Dante's Awakening the masterpiece that so many people have crowned it as over the years, it's still a great game that proved to be hugely influential to the character action genre, and while I'm not that interested in playing Devil May Cry 4 or DmC: Devil May Cry, I definitely do want to eventually check out Devil May Cry 5 when I come across a copy of it.