(Played Master Collection version)
Man... everyone told me. Everyone told me this would be one of my favorite games of all time. And they were absolutely right.
It's extremely hard to make a game this perfect in every area. A game where the gameplay and the story are both this good is such a rare occurrence but this really is one of the most perfect games I have ever played.
So the gameplay is absolute fire, but the story... I have no idea how Kojima topped MGS2, but he did. This is easily one of the most complex games ever made, with such a crazy amount of character dynamics, psychologies, tons of intertwining and unique themes, parallels, and plot threads that all get thoroughly explored with nothing left even the least bit underdeveloped. And all with Kojima's patented Movie-Quality Directing™, Crazy Twists™ and Meta Video Game Elements™. There's also the badass action movie sequences and even the best soundtrack out of the trilogy, for what that's worth.
The word "masterpiece" shouldn't be overused, and can't be awarded to a lot of games, but this is one of them.

revising my review because i play this game too much

so as of 2/7/24 we finally got an update that reduced how horrible the peeker advantage was. now it feels less like you get shot in the head by someone who straight up couldnt see you or instant transmission-ed into a wide swing from behind a wall and killed you instantly.

but sound is still fucked. shooting still feels weird and off in some ways from GO. SMGs and the XM are WAY too rewarding for how easy they are to use currently. premier still queues you into stacks constantly even as a solo while you have a team full of solos. MM/premier is still rife with cheaters to the point where blatant ones arent even getting banned. because of this, you're constantly aware of the cheater problem in every game - and it makes every match feel suspicious! it sucks, VAC needs to be better.

also the ELO changes in premier are fucking stupid. if you leave a game bc of a cheater or bc of griefers, you just straight lose 1k ELO - meaning people can easily just abandon 1-2 games in a day and come back the next day and have a smurf ready to go. this literally just hurts people who actually care about improving their rank and playing the game in best conditions. also wtf is with this loss streak shit? you'll lose 2-3 games in a row and be down to -400 or -500 points while only gaining 100. you get win streak bonuses but if you lose 1-2 games, you might as well just stop playing for the day if you care about your rank.

"well geez, isnt caring about rank that much stupid?" YEP! it literally doesnt mean anything because no matter the rank you're still dealing with cheaters, players who dont want to communicate, smurfs, and just general joey wheeler ass shitters who refuse to improve at the game. but it's your only measurement of progress outside of your mechanical ability, so it feels like all you have to set goals around unless you're able to set gameplay specific goals. and you need the gameplay specific goals to get there in the first place...

im just getting kinda tired of it because valve doesnt give a shit about people who actually want to improve at their game or play it in best conditions.

i hope they fix up mechanics as well as make premier feel less punishing for wanting to play. rn it feels like it's best to just play games until you lose one, then be done for the day. why bother if you're not playing well and you're going to lose so many points just for trying? crazy to me that they released the game in this state when it clearly needed beta testing for another year or so minimum.

Huge steaming pile of garbage. The game is impossible to enjoy without initially sinking ~60 hours into it, only around half of the guns in the game are actually viable, the players are beyond insufferable, and the anticheat is an actual virus, which PERMANENTLY slowed down my PC, and uninstalled my keyboard & mouse’s softwares. The mind-numbing gameplay consists of nothing more than either holding one angle for god knows how long, or two players peeking back and forth from that same angle, only describable as being like Footsies in fighting games if the characters didn’t have legs. The worst part is the players’ reaction if you try to deviate from the brain-rotting meta and have the AUDACITY to try and have fun. One time I was playing ranked with my cousin in the same room, and I was so sick of the fucking yoo-hoo gameplay that i ran into the bomb site, immediately got sniped, and my cousin got up and roundhouse kicked me in the head. 0/10 would rate lower if I could.

Not as bad as people make it to be really. I found the gameplay to be more fun than other typical Tactical JRPG. I think the triangular all-out attack is a great feature because when you play smartly, it makes the gameplay much more dynamic and snappy and you can beat a stage with surprisingly few turns. But this mechanics also overshadows most of the other RPG mechanics in the game including the persona system, making it more like a puzzle game than an RPG. The last 1/4 of the game also felt dragged out because it's basically just wave after wave of boss rush without anything new or challenging.

Disco Elysium is one of the best RPGs I've ever played, as well as one of the most advanced role-playing components I've ever seen.
The premise is as simple as it is intriguing: you are a cop who has to solve a murder, but you got so drunk that you completely lost your memory; and it is from a motel room that the adventure begins through the streets of Revachol.
The game is purely investigative: multiple choice dialogues and reasoning reign supreme. And it is in its supporting structure that Disco Elysium excels: a fine, complex, elegant, divinely written, and above all layered plot. Because yes, the tree of possibilities, expressing the concept of role-playing to its fullest, is infinite. Dozens of wonderful characters, thousands of possible dialogues, hundreds of consequences of one's actions.
And all this in a story that talks about political ideals, about social cohesion and clashes, about madness and depression, about building trust, and about love. Not forgetting the interesting world building.
The protagonist's 24 characteristics are meticulously constructed and balanced, to make him one of the most layered and moldable characters i have ever played in a video game.
Exploration, in addition to dialogues, is the other fundamental element. We are detectives, after all.
The areas that can be explored, artistically, take your breath away: the artstyle, which is expressed to its fullest in the locations and in the myriad of designs present in the interfaces and menus, is divine.
They are also quite complex, with several crossroads and places to visit. The only flaw: the choice to make all areas a visual masterpiece has led to far too many invisible walls, which often make it difficult to move and understand which areas you can actually move through.

I therefore conclude by repeating myself: Disco Elysium was one of the most authentic RPG experiences of my life, how you control your character cannot be done in other games.

Unfortunately, I must report, at least for the Nintendo Switch version, many technical problems: serious and frequent frame drops, and occasionally even bugs (which force the game to be restarted) and crashes. But still, the game was far more successful in keeping me glued to the screen.

Game #117: Devil May Cry 5

This game made me realize how much my taste in games have changed. I found DMC5's combat tiring and it's story boring. Even though this was not my cup of tea, I can see why this game is held in high regards.

6/10