Elden Ring is pretty fun generally. Very refined souls gameplay, taking the best from all the Fromsoft games prior. I genuinely do think the game is too long for it's own good, and the open world really hampers difficulty. Many of the "main" bosses are wonderfully designed, while the cloned bosses scattered around the map are boring, get stale fast, and make exploring a lot less exciting.

Were the game a more linear adventure, I think it would easily be the best souls game by far. But it's kind of a slog, late game is one shot city, and the more traditional areas only make me wish the entire game was crafted like that.

I do really love the lore though, the storytelling and background to the game's setting was really great, probably even better than the Souls games.

It's long, fun at times, frustrating a lot, but I would recommend if you like any other Souls games.

"Red Dead 2 is a slog to get started with." Is something I hear a lot and I really can't agree.

In terms of a compelling and enjoyable storyline, RD2 is top of the line, I really don't think many pieces of media even compare to the sheer amount of detail, effort, and soul.

Each character is unique and interesting, with a funny voice to accompany them so they're a joy to listen to, and you do get attached to many of them quickly, which makes the darker parts of the story all the more harder.

While RD2's story, presentation, and gameplay is top notch, it isn't perfect. The only real things I can criticize is that the game is linear to an almost ridiculous extent, some missions feel like you're a dog with a shock collar, and is probably why the early game is super slow and unappealing to some people.

Still, if you play your role and get invested, you will absolutely love where the story takes you, you will be awed by the sheer amount of detail in the world, and you will walk way a different person after the storyline. I highly recommend.

Doom 2 is the perfect game. But not because of the base game, the base game is just alright, perfectly serviceable classic FPS action. Where Doom 2 goes from good to fantastic lies in the dedicated modding scene that, to this day, creates maps, gameplay mods, and full on conversion mods you can play for FREE.

All you need is a copy of Doom 2, a modern source port such as GZDoom or ZDoom, then make your way over to Doom World and find some WAD files to download. Experiment, read what people recommend, and you will quickly get lost in absolutely top quality maps.

Some recommendations I can give are Scythe 1 and Scythe 2, Pirate Doom, Ancient Aliens, Going Down, and you can check the yearly "Cacoawards" to find more top quality maps.

I have sunk thousands of hours into hundreds of WADS, I can't recommend enough if you have any love for classic Doom gameplay.

Absolute fire that is important and fun to play, but completely overshadowed by it's sequel both in enemy variety, and modding options.

Would recommend for those curious, especially since it goes on sale for cheap all the time, just be warned it starts strong, and slowly gets weaker and weaker.

Episode 4 thankfully picks up again and closes the game out on a high note.

A really fun game that, in my opinion, has aged pretty horribly all things considered.

Dark Souls is important, there's no argument there, and I do love the game to death for it's gameplay and just the general vibes the game has.

Sadly a recent replay of this game made me realize this isn't the perfect Souls game some claim it is. Where Dark Souls really falters is it's boss fights and late game. Early game is tightly crafted, and you will haver a blast exploring it, finding short cuts and meeting random NPCs and bosses, but things begin to really drag once you reach Anor Londo.

It's aged, and it's shortcomings thanks to it's later parts being rushed are fairly obvious, still I do really love the game for what it is, it's imperfections only giving the game a lot more soul in my opinion. It's nice to see where it all started, but future titles pretty much perfect every idea that Dark Souls brought to the table.

The Souls game really do thrive on how unique each game is though, so if you like other Souls games or want to start somewhere, I still really recommend this.

This may be a controversial opinion but I do love this game. It is my favorite Souls game by far. Still, I'm not delusional, I'm well aware this game has problems, let's deal with those first.

Things like the interconnected world and the storyline from the original game are gone here, each area feels more like an isolated section of the larger world. To some this really matters, to me I really don't mind too much.

This game can be a gank fest sometimes. Enemy counts are high and you will be swarmed often. This can create very chaotic situations, and the game isn't much faster than the original, so keeping up with so many threats can be tricky.

Hitboxes can be bad, adaptability being a stat is confusing, and life gems can mess with the balancing.

However despite ALL those problems, it's still really fun.

Why? The freedom with gameplay, and the sheer variety of things in this game. You can wield any weapon in either hand, two great swords, two great shields, a sword and a dagger, it doesn't matter. This opens up so many fun builds, some not very viable, but you're allowed to do them. Powerstancing makes it's debut in this game too, making dual wielding even more fun and rewarding to use.

The area variety is stellar, while things are not as interconnected and some level transitions can be jarring, I really do love all the areas we get to see. Volcanic castles, poison valleys, dark forests, underground kingdoms, and snow covered wastelands. DS2 isn't afraid to experiment and get weird.

I do also need to praise the story, it really does try to be it's own thing and build upon the story that DS1 started. It's a shame in DS3 reverted back to DS1 stuff and mostly ignored all the interesting lore from DS2.

The art style and fashion is on point too, many cool sets of armor and a lot of variety with the various areas you explore with unique buildings and everything.

I will not lie, this game may not be easy to love, and I might be borderline delusional, but put some time in, enjoy where you're taken, and experiment with new weapons all the time, and you'll have a blast.

A great finisher to the Souls trilogy, that I think invests so much into it's bosses while making regular Souls gameplay of exploring and fighting regular enemies a bit worse.

Dark Souls 3 is a much faster game, making it a tad strange to pick up after the slower games beforehand, still the game is quite fun, although it often regresses into "spam roll to dodge" simulator since the pace is much quicker and the invincibility frames are so generous.

The gameplay itself regresses slightly, you cannot freely dual wield anymore, and the armor you wear is pretty much useless.

Where DS3 really shines is the bosses. This game easily has the best bosses Fromsoft has ever made. They are hard, intense, with beautiful music and set pieces, they make this game the perfect sendoff, and I'd recommend it to pretty much anyone, new fans and old.

Dusk is a masterpiece. Pure and simple.

Classic Quake-like gameplay with a familiar graphical style, but using the power of modern technology to turn everything up to 11.

It starts pretty barebones, enter a town and kill some cultists with a shotgun, easy. But the deeper you go the more Dusk surprises you, the maps get spookier and more intimidating, enemies get more grotesque, and thankfully your weapon arsenal is able to keep up with the horrors around you.

Each gun is useful and serves a purpose, and they're so loud and fun to shoot. Enemies are dynamic, shooting is snappy, it really is the perfect run and gun game.

If you have literally any interest in classical shooters, buy this game and enjoy yourself.

Doom 2016 was not the first Doom game I’ve played, that honor goes to the original Doom 2. But this game is absolutely responsible for getting me into the series and more classical FPS games as a whole.

Although being closer to a Quake successor than Doom, ID’s absolutely mastery of this gameplay formula is obvious. The levels are beautifully designed and rewarding to explore, with hidden weapons, suit upgrades, and runes to be found. The player can also find and upgrade weapon mods and complete challenges to make them stronger.

2016 is nearly perfect, I really do think it’s issues lie in it’s balancing. Competent players aren’t going to really fear anything if they use the right equipment and exploit the game for an easier time. Eventually you are just going to murder every demon on screen effortlessly, which may have been intentional, but it always kinda felt like the game blew it’s load too early and never really has “the big fight” that really tests you.

I guess you can always play on ultra nightmare and die immediately on the second level instead. Oh and platforming in this game is genuinely awful, Insta kill death pits do not belong in like any game ever, especially something as fast paced as this.

Other than those admittedly minor issues, Doom 2016 is pretty much a masterpiece, it revived the series and breathed new life into shooters. Play it for the love of God.

I’m gonna warn you right now my bias is insane.

Anyway Doom Eternal is probably one of the best games ever made, an absolute masterpiece of an FPS that ID poured all their years of game crafting into.

Firstly I will discuss two major criticisms I’ve seen.

People think the game is too “video gamey”. What does this mean? Basically pickups float around waiting for you to grab them, there’s random monkey bars and climbable walls around, things are brighter and glow a bit to highlight where to go and what to do. I personally don’t really see the problem in this at all. While the game may not be as “realistic” as Doom 2016 I think I really do prefer this more colorful and fictional style. It really makes enemies, weapons, and the levels pop, and I really appreciate how weapons and enemies were slightly redesigned to maintain their classic looks.

I’ve seen complaints about the story. It’s absolutely true that Doom Eternal has a lot of cutscenes, some can definitely drag on for a bit. But most of them can be skipped completely, rendering this complaint nonsensical. The story is enjoyable too, not sure why you would even want to skip.

Anyway back to gushing, Eternal takes the gameplay of Doom 2016 and makes it much faster. The game adds things like the dash and blood punch along with frag and ice grenades and a “flame belch” as well. These attachments, working with the glory kill system and chainsaw, give you the ability to get all the tools you need at any time. Armor, health, breathing room, and ammo.

Enemy variety is stellar. From aggressive and fast imps, to walking tanks like the mancubus, to the DPS shredding doom hunters, you will need to target different weak points and constantly swap weapons to deal with threats.

On top of all of that the levels are crafted beautifully. Some of the most gorgeous and creative environments I’ve ever seen in any game. They’re so much fun to fight and explore in, and explore you will since there are tons of secrets scattered around.

The base game is pretty much perfect, most of my genuine criticism lies in the after-release attention this game received. Firstly battle mode was a complete blunder. I don’t know a single person that played it, and I genuinely think they wasted resources even working on it at all.

The two DLCs were also incredibly in many ways but they have confusing difficulty. AG1 is arguably much harder than AG2 for the most part.

Finally the master levels, only about 5 or so were actually made. I’m disappointed since they seemed to put way more effort into the final few and I don’t think they should have bothered. If they just focused on making harder versions without all the challenges and bonus modes tacked on, I really think they would have finished all of them.

Hoard mode was also disappointing. A very confusing system where you randomly gain weapons, and a scoring system that completely ignores comboing kills, preferring extra lives instead.

Despite those complaints, I’ve replayed this game about 20 times already and it’s still one of my absolute favorites. Play it. Experience perfection.

As a huge fan of the original I was skeptical that I’d enjoy this remake, especially since I wasn’t a huge fan of how RE2R and RE3R played, the games really changed atmosphere a lot and I was nervous a lot was going to be dropped in this remake.

Thankfully, Capcom seems to have learned from a lot of their mistakes. RE4 Remake is a content rich, and action packed game that, just like the original, is filled with fun set pieces and arenas to run through, and the action never really seems to slow down until it’s all over.

Firstly I’ll praise what I really like. The story has been enhanced in many ways, I never had a problem with Ashley in the old game despite seeing a lot of complaints online, but she’s definitely a much more likable character in this game. Secondly Luis’s changes make him an even more enjoyable character in many ways, though I’ll fully admit I do miss a lot of his more cheesy one liners. The balancing for this game seems a lot tighter too, and maybe it’s just because I’ve played the original a billion times but this game is much harder too. Which I think is a good thing, as many bosses and hard areas in the OG can be easily cheesed with rocket launchers or certain safe spots.

Now that’s a lot of praise, I know, however I probably have even more to complain about.

The shooting is awful. Coming from the original which always had such fun and snappy interactive shooting, where enemies would recoil differently depending on where you shoot. Leg shots to trip them, head shots to stagger them, etc. The remake has elements of this but add things like weapon bloom, and recoil to make shot placement a bit more random, which is awful for a game that requires such precise shooting. In many cases this really isn’t TOO much of an issue but sometimes it can really fuck you over. This issue is much more prevalent in the early game where Leon’s pistol feels like a fucking airsoft gun that doesn’t even make enemies react as bullets and pumped into them.

Secondly, as I just said enemies don’t always react to shots. Now I’m not sure if it’s random or if there’s some damage threshold but this is a huge issue in the early game. You will be rushed by a bunch of villagers and headshots won’t really do anything to slow them down. Enemies being tanky isn’t a problem on it’s own, but they are also faster and more aggressive, and the game loves dangling ammo just out of your reach all the time. I don’t have any idea why they would make ammo less plentiful while boosting the amount of enemies and how much health they have. I suppose they wanted to increase the survival aspect and encourage crafting but all it really did was make me never use anything other than a pistol and shotgun because what was the point? All other ammo was too rare or too expensive to craft, and sometimes wasn’t even more effective.

Thirdly, all the bosses were gutted. Not really in terms of difficulty at all, many of them are better fights. I mean more-so their character and presence. You don’t have Sadler taunting you occasionally, no Salazar making fun of you and having a goofy back and forth with Leon. Even if their background lore was enhanced, they lose a lot of screen-time and I think that’s a huge shame.

Fourthly, the knife. I’ve seen heavy praise for the parry mechanic of the knife and I quite like that aspect, although knife durability and all that shit is so stupid. It becomes less of an issue as you upgrade your knife and find the merchant more often, but in the early game and especially long treks, your knife breaks and then you have nothing. No way to parry, no way to save ammo, which was the entire fucking point of the knife in earlier games. Instead the logic is “I better keep pumping handgun rounds into this guy, don’t want to damage my knife”. I understand it’s supposed to be a fail safe when enemies get too close, but it breaks so easily, you need it to finish off certain enemies too, which only makes it break even faster.

Lastly, and this is by far my biggest complaint, the stupid charms from the shooting range being RNG each new file is absolutely insane. These should be secrets you unlock throughout the game that scale with how far you are. Instead I roll shit like “eggs heal more” while I see other people getting charms that increase their handgun ammo drops and stuff. The game would have been better off without these stupid perks, balanced tighter and everything. Instead you need to roll the right charms or you just.. don’t get to use certain weapons as much, or move as fast, or heal more. It can make the game much easier for people out of blind luck while pretty much screwing over others.

That’s about all I have to say. Despite all my hefty complaints I do quite like this game for what it is. I am so glad it is very distinct and didn’t try too hard to be identical to the original. It allows both games to exist together without one necessarily trumping the other.

Despite the more controlled gameplay and more of a realistic approach that I’m not a huge fan of, I’d highly recommend RE4 Remake if you like survival horror games with heavy action and occasional B-movie cheese thrown in.

A good stealth game with a fairly predictable but well told storyline to match. Dishonored has long been one of my favorite games but I don’t think it has stood the test of time in my eyes.

Where the art direction and level design is very strong, along with the freedom most levels give you to tackle your objective, I do think the game drops the ball a bit in terms of gameplay.

Firstly, Dishonored is built around the mechanic of you being lethal or pacifist essentially, killing people makes the world worse so it’s good to avoid it if you want a better ending. It’s a tad disappointing that so many tools are pretty much nonexistent if you are playing nonlethal though. Grenades, guns, springrazors, incendiary crossbow bolts, sword upgrades, as well as interesting powers aren’t really reasonable to use if you aren’t going to be killing.

On one hand this does make sense, since a big aspect of the nonlethal route is that it’s about restraint, being reasonable and level headed in a time where many would resort to violence. At the same time this creates issues in the game where you basically run out of things to buy or spend runes on when you’re not even halfway through the game.

Once you have dark vision, blink, and possession leveled up, there really isn’t any other power you should be bothering with. Same with getting the silent shoe upgrades and maybe the crossbow zoom if you can justify it. Gold and runes become useless pretty fast, and that progression being so minimal for one route is a little lame to me, even if it was intentional.

Other than that one gripe, I think Dishonored really shines in its worldbuilding and NPCs. People love the guards from this game because they’re hilarious, well voice acted, and say the same shit over and over.

And the attention to detail is wonderful, I think it’s what really grabs anyone when they’re playing this game. I remember just sneaking around listening to the heart voice lines when I hovered over random NPCs.

The game’s morality meter, the “chaos” system, also does a lot more than you’d initially think. Increasing the number of guards, weepers, river crusts, and even changes the tone slightly by making the weather worse or the skies darker. Friendly NPCs respond to you differently depending on how you play too.

My gripe with this is that it’s essentially a difficulty slider as well, which means nonlethal never really gets HARD. There are way less guards at posts, which is annoying to me because I would WANT nonlethal to essentially be the hard mode.

Other than my issues Dishonored 1 is an amazing game and it is probably the only good Dishonored game because it’s the only one without fucking witches and tells an easily digestible story about some dude named Corvo who gets a boo boo on his hand and saves (or ruins) the empire.

I didn’t get around to playing Dishonored 2 for years, finally getting the opportunity to play the game a few years back, I remember walking away a tad disappointed. As time has gone on my disappointment has only gotten more extreme.

As usual, the art style is stellar, it’s cliche to say you can look anywhere and see a painting, but it really is the truth here, and the newer sunnier environments really show off how beautiful the game’s art style can be in the warm glow of a setting sun.

Gameplay is pretty much identical to the last game, though you now have two characters to play as, and both characters have new tools at their disposal as well.

Corvo is the same as the last game, same powers and everything, while Emily has a completely new set of abilities.

Firstly, I didn’t like a lot of Emily’s spells. They felt like gimmicky rehashes of Corvo’s abilities, which would be fine on their own but, to be honest I just find them all incredibly clunky and not much fun to use. This probably just comes down to playstyles but I found myself almost exclusively playing Corvo, who sadly doesn’t get ANY new abilities or additions.

Bone charms are randomized now. This is terrible, you get so many useless ones that do absolutely nothing for you, OR you get tons of useful ones. This is because you can craft new bone charms that are more powerful but to be honest I didn’t really bother with this mechanic, it requires you to break charms down to make new ones and you need to invest resources into it I really didn’t want to bother with. Charms were a good way to scale Corvo as the game went on and were really great rewards when you went out of your way to find them. Half the time in Dishonored 2 I’d track one down and receive “you heal more from food” for the 50th fucking time.

This is borderline nitpicky but the charm in this game is really lacking. Guards are way more boring this time around, not funny or interesting to listen to when they have dialogue, and most of it just frames them as hilariously evil idiots. Guards felt much more human in the last game, it was a real disappointing step down after how great they were. I will say I loved the Overseers at least, they had cool designs and great voice lines.

Map design was much more ambitious, sometimes to the detriment of the gameplay. I think this game was at its worst when you’re traveling the streets. The way guards are positioned and the general layout just makes them kind of a slog to explore. The smaller areas like the inside of Jindosh’s mansion or the hospital island are built much better meanwhile, and are the best parts of the game.

I have to complain about the witches and the Jindosh robots now. Witches are stupid and I hate them, they have annoying dialogue and tons of random mechanics that you really only figure out through trial and error like their bone dogs, or learning exactly where they’re sitting and teleporting. Guards that teleport are always an awful idea. The robots meanwhile seem very intimidating at first, but they can actually be taken down super easily, even if you’re doing a pacifist playthrough. Obviously killing a robot doesn’t count but it only bugs me so much because the game completely lacks enemies you can’t deal with nonlethaly, like the tall boys from the first game.

Speaking of nonlethal, they made it WAY easier. You can drop knock out, knock out enemies facing you if you catch them off guard, and these alone make things way easier. These are quality of life changes so I understand WHY they were done, but I still think they made things too easy. Perhaps drop knock outs shouldn’t work on alert enemies, or maybe they shouldn’t be silent take downs, I’m not sure but it’s ridiculous. Dishonored 1 nonlethal was all about getting behind enemies to choke them out, OR ignoring enemies and sneaking around them, now enemies are hardly a pain to deal with.

Lastly, I do not like where the story went, but this isn’t the fault of Dishonored 2 alone, Daud’s DLCs from the first game started this witch crap, this game was just where it all ended. The main villains in this game sucked and I did not care about any of the assassination targets. None of them had any decent buildup or presence.

Overall, Dishonored 2 is more of the first game with some cleaned up mechanics. I’m a bit of an old head and do not like some of these changes, but that is just me. Some people may have a lot of fun with Emily or may love the story. I dunno, it’s just not for me I guess.

It’s literally the perfect co-op game. You can do so much for your teammates, you can screw them over, you can save them, you can go nuts with an auto shotgun and murder them.

I guess the zombie killing part is good too, tons of enemy variation and AI that can be pretty cruel at times.

Oh and the voice acting and dialogue is top of the line, this game has that Valve dialogue charm where every character exchange is full of charm and is a joy to listen to. You really get attached to the survivors and every stay voice line is a fun glimpse into their character.

The gameplay is snappy. It’s hard to describe but it really just allows a good player to be good. You can coordinate with your team and avoid taking pretty much any damage. There’s a good variety of weapons as well that are all fun to use. Zombies blow up into bits or fall to pieces when you hit them with heavy caliber firearms.

The game utilizes amazing sound design and musical cues to warn players and to keep them listening. Each special has their little theme that plays whenever they spawn or are creeping around.

The steam workshop brings this game up from a 4.5 to a 5, no question. You want Coach to be Master Chief? Now he is. You want all the weapons to use reloads ripped from Modern Warfare 2? Now they are. You want custom campaigns that are either masterpieces or balanced so horribly you will have a blast going through them? It’s all there

Play this. Please. Play this with me. I will literally play this whenever it’s the best game ever made.

Deus Ex is truly a product of its time. I know that term gets thrown around a lot these days but this time it’s actually the case. A game like this couldn’t be made today, it just isn’t possible.

To be blunt, Deus Ex’s storyline is essentially a cyberpunk hellscape where every single conspiracy theory about higher powers and government overreach on an unprecedented scale are actually true and actively happening. The game’s story goes through many twists and turns as more of the conspiracy is unraveled before you.

While I think this is objectively one of the best games ever made, I do think that really comes down to the dialogue and writing, along with the art design. As much as I love Deus Ex, I can see that it’s gameplay is a little outdated.

Let’s get that out of the way now. Most of the game is about walking around open hubs and talking to people. There are main objectives and small things you can do on the side for bonus equipment or money. This is the best part of the gameplay, as the world is detailed, fun to explore, and filled with tons of NPCs that either give you interesting information that helps flesh out the world, or say the most ridiculous, batshit stuff possible to keep you entertained.

Now it’s time to discuss combat and stealth, these are the aspects that I believe are the weakest. Deus Ex lacks a lot of modern tools that make stealth combat more satisfying and fun, this mostly comes down to responsiveness and a general lack of understanding as to how stealth even works. It’s hard to tell if you’re ever truly concealed sometimes, and enemies will just immediately agro if you are noticed. With practice the mechanics can be learned and understood but this takes time, and a gameplay style shouldn’t be this difficult to grasp.

Next is combat. Deus Ex has a massive array of weapons, both lethal and nonlethal. What I really love is that a lot of weapons are tools, not just for killing. The GEP gun for example is a rocket launcher that is honestly way more useful for things like opening doors over any actual combat. Combat itself is very simple, you aim your implements of destruction at the target and click until they die. Weapons work differently and have their own funny quirks to them, like the sniper rifle being completely accurate while noscoping, or being able to use LAMs to climb walls. Enemy variety is.. honestly pretty bad. The AI isn’t very good either, they will mostly just circle around you and fire until they die. There are a couple combat robots in the game as well, though they are ridiculously annoying to deal with, and also incredibly easy to disable so there’s really no reason to engage with them. My biggest issue with the combat is how stale it gets. Most enemies will die from a single headshot as long as you’re leveling skills. Many weapons also seem fairly redundant or awfully balanced, never pick up a shotgun in this game. A lot of the tool tips and in game descriptions are just flat out incorrect too, listing incorrect damage numbers or mechanics that literally do not actually work.

Deus Ex is very open ended, and characters will say different things to you depending on how you play. Most tasks can be completely stealthily or loudly, and never require you to actually kill anyone if you don’t want to. This makes the game very replayable, and a good player that knows what to do can really speed through the game.

Lastly let’s talk about the upgrade system. There are skills and augments. Skills can be upgraded with skill points you acquire by completing objectives, finding secrets, and generally exploring. They improve your ability to use objects and generally interact with the world. Some of these skills are useless, and I think the game drip feeds you skill points too much instead of giving the player more to work with. Skill levels can really decide your build and what items you choose to use, so I wish the game gave the points more constantly and in a higher amount. Things like Swimming and Environmental skills are absolutely useless while weapon skills and things that let you get more value out hacking devices are incredibly useful.

Now, augments. These are found in the world or given as rewards for completing certain objectives. They are not made equal and some are just outright complete garbage because of how situational they are. Augments have a feature where you can only have one assigned to an F key and every key has two augments to choose from. I get the idea behind this, it’s supposed to give the player the choice to build the character however they want. In reality this just makes it way more annoying because you will often see two good augments or two trash augments since they will usually be similar to each other, and picking one just locks you out of the other. This feature would be perfect if you could simply select augments and equip them to the F key of your choice, because some of the keys are pretty annoying press while you’re trying to move or shoot.

Lastly lastly this game starts to REALLY fall off near the end. It devolves into constant combat and little to no character exchanges. The hub worlds are much more linear and are moreso combat gauntlets with occasional puzzles or secrets. The storyline will keep you going, but it’s really a slog near the end.

Despite my complaints about the gameplay I really do love Deus Ex, the storyline is interesting, fun, and keeps a good pace. Gameplay can feel a tad stale especially near the end, but there are always fun mechanics thrown in you can abuse to make things a bit more interesting. The game is an absolute meme, and an absolute masterpiece.