while waiting for this game to fully release I have (in no particular order)
-hit puberty
-been to a psychiatric hospital
-lost my virginity
-had a nephew and a niece
-started developing games of my own
-joined a cult
-left a cult
-had about 11 boyfriends, girlfriends and other partners
-endured intense psychological trauma
-become a completely different person
-shaved my head
-grown dreadlocks
-shaved my head again
-grew my hair out
-read the entirety of Homestuck
-watched Evangelion
-watched lain
-played chaos;head
-played subahibi
-got really into denpa
-become a horror movie collector
-grown out of whatever phase i was in when i was into games like this
-learned french
-started learning japanese
-learned the banjo
-learned the ukulele
-learned the guitar
-learned the violin
-learned piano
-learned python
-learned HTML
-learned how to draw
-learned pixel art
-moved house 6/7/8ish times
-learned how to sew
-aged about 9 years
-played AA2 (which is basically yansim if it was good)
-played Daigaku Gurashi (which is basically AA2 with less boobs)
-seen several attempts at remaking yansim come and go
-been hospitalized
-drank alcohol for the first time
-smoked a cigarette for the first time
-been to a party for the first time
-been 2 years clean from SH
-seen the fnaf movie
-made a backloggd account
(and that's just off the top of my head)

This is the ideal megawad. Not only emulating the style of the original games, but pushing it forward with new enemies, whole new areas powered by a brand new texture pack, and new design concepts. Level after level of this game took me back with its creativity. There's one early on that starts in a small hallway and, with every switch press, opens up into an ever larger level filled with hordes of enemies. That's a design I hadn't really seen before—this level that evolves and grows as you go through it. Not just opening individual doors, but bringing down entire connecting walls and opening up into a larger space. It's also not even the most interesting level in the game.

Barring some horseshit here and there (the second secret level is far too long for a Doom level! it took like 30% of my total playtime to beat it!), this is just an incredible piece of work. The team has my respect forever.

Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengance of the Slayer is a wonderful, goofy little shitpost of a game. A love letter to the sensibilities of bozo teen modders from the late 90s. It rules.

It's like a Duke 3D clone where the music sounds like you're playing through a Linkin Park AMV and one of the bonus levels is just myhouse.wad but set in groverhaus.

Look at one clip of this thing—hell, one screenshot—and you'll know if it's your deal. It was mine.

Psi-Ops is not a perfect game, but it might be my perfect game.

A wonderful, fun-first action game where the entire selling point is giving the player a thrilling set of powers that are actually fun to use. The giddy thrill of rag-dolling enemies with your superpowers eventually gives way to a much deeper experience. Levels are excellently designed, allowing you to really experiment in either chaos or fine strategy. I managed to skip an entire puzzle by using the game's unique mix of powers and physics, in a manner not unlike something you'd see in a twitter video of Breath of the Wild. Despite its short runtime, there is a lot of room for experimentation.

The story is nothing - or at least it seems that way at first. By the end, the cheese factor had won me over and I was genuinely a bit gutted to see it end on a cliffhanger. Not because of the characters, but because it just feels like this is a bygone era of games - and just like this story, we will probably never get back to it.

Despite some wonky set-pieces in the fourth quarter, this is a wonderful game that you could breeze through in one session -- and I hope some of you do.

It feels good to play within the moment, but the disappointment of Resident Evil 3 can be felt when you realize how there's so little to offer in terms of how the story has been remade from one generation of gaming to another. But at a certain point, I can't help but feel as if my biggest disappointments to be felt with Resident Evil 3 just feel like it's so short to the point that playing through it ends up making you feel as if you're rushing through it rather than being encouraged to come back.

With Resident Evil 2 already being short as is, at least it felt like there was always something fun to come back to whenever you went to backtrack. I can't really say the same for this because the linearity ends up feeling so restrictive, and playing through it feels more like going through Resident Evil's greatest hits.

But it's fun seeing Jill Valentine in action again.

Thief: The Dark Project is a really interesting case for me.

On one hand, it offers one of the most thoughtful and well designed stealth experiences the medium has to offer, completely putting most other takes on the genre to shame nearly thirty years later. This is something particularly shocking to me, considering Thief apparently wasn't even supposed to be a stealth game for most of its development.

And... it kind of shows. The full blown supernatural levels of Thief are the biggest sticking point for a lot of people, me included. Levels like the infamous Down in the Bonehoard are very interesting conceptually, but in practice feel mechanically incongruent an a way that can really drag down the overall experience for me. It's safe to say I don't really like these levels, but the way they work in tandem with Thief's overall tone is so well executed that I could never see myself ever outright disliking them.

Thief is extremely dark, brooding, and aggressively late 90's. And when I say that, I mean in the most sincere and endearing way possible. Stuff like the opening cutscene and Stephen Russel's portrayal of Garrett have this angst to them that does an outstanding job at setting the mood for the rest of the game. That combined with the fascinating setting and killer ambient tracks elevate this game to something that me and many others will look back on fondly for more than just it's revolutionary take on the stealth genre.

When Thief puts its best foot forward, it strikes me as one of the most immersive and standout games that I've played this year, but it doesn't really play things straightforward. A decision that despite being for better or worse, resulted in a game that was able to steal my heart in spite of it all.

Just played the story mode.

Not really sure how to evaluate the game, as I'm not much of a fighting game guy and was really just here to beat up on some AI and see the story. Even then, I struggled with a lot of the fights—this just isn't my genre!

But the presentation here is fantastic. It's a funny and engaging schlocky time travel story with some immediately compelling characters. Johnny Cage is, as always, my favorite, but everyone here gets a moment to shine. I like how every chapter of the story mode follows a different character's perspective; you're always bouncing around seeing different sides of the conflict. It's nice to go from the Johnny Cage chapter where he's a charming bozo to, say, the Sonya Blade chapter where you get to beat him up for being an annoying bozo.

Also, boy, can't really deny those transitions from cutscenes to gameplay. Really smooth every time.

If you're here, you already know this isn't just a house.

Playing through this blind is undoubtedly the best way to experience My House. Don't watch one of the rapidly-emerging, multi-hour video essays on YouTube about it: just get the link to the forum, download the .zip, and get exploring. If you're not too experienced with this stuff (like I wasn't), you want to drag-n-drop myhouse.pk3 onto GZDoom (NOT myhouse.wad). Obviously, "the end" is not the end nor your real goal: look around a bit and you'll be rewarded for it. Is that space a bit bigger than it should be?

I recommend getting to a point where you can't explore any further, and I won't explain what I mean by that, before reading something like this guide/wiki. You'll likely reach the same ending point I did, as my biggest problem with this map/level/experiment/tribute is that some of the items required to "complete" it requires some pretty arcane knowledge and skills, and at a certain point, against-better-judgement decisions. You won't be reaching the "best" outcome on your own, you can bet on that, but I think that's worth pursuing after your blind run as it leads to a lot more 'game'.

My House is good fun. Very different, spooky, and wildly creative. It wears its seemingly-biggest inspiration, "House of Leaves", proudly on its sleeve. The "closet" is a pretty big hint, but seeing the name "Navidson" is a dead giveaway. I love the book and highly recommend it, and it was pretty cool to see it (somewhat) in a game. Try out My House, it's a great adventure I recommend!

One of the most atmospheric, creative, and surprisingly hilarious shooters I've ever played. Everything from the ground up is built around this hyperspecific time and place of 1980s Czechoslovakia that makes it feel so personal. This is not the kind of game that would ever come from a committee, this is the work of one lunatic through and through.

The "game-feel" is one of the biggest challenges for retro shooters in my opinion and HROT nails it. The weapons aren't the most unique but they all serve their purpose well and are satisfying to use. Beyond the gameplay there's just so many bizarre and memorable things in this game that I could easily ramble about for hours but I'd rather not spoil them all. All I'll say is the amount of work that must have gone into one-off gags just makes them all the more hilarious to me. Play this game. It's legitimately one of a kind.

Doom WADs as punk political satire is something I can get behind.

Some cool reworkings of classic Doom monsters and weapons lurk inside a single, giant map. I'm not a huge fan of this style of Doom map but once it began to show how it all ties together it quickly won me over. It is essentially split into a load of different challenges within the big map. Some are better than others and these tend to be the ones that lean into the whole fuck the tories thing the most. The first firefight with a ThatcherDemon, for instance, was great fun.

My only issues were that I found some inconsistency in what surfaces were useable, either via the use key or shooting at them, and that there were a few sections that really dried up the ammo, which sucked the momentum out of the action for a bit too long. I thought this was because I was on UV, but I've seen similar things happening to people playing on lower difficulties too.

3D: Digital Doom Daddy has some of the most bullshit placement of Revenants and Archviles this side of Dario Casali, which is a talent that should be applauded and looked upon with sheer disgust in equal measure.

Ashes 2063's vision of a post-apocalyptic action/RPG Doom II fully realized. This one really benefits from all of the groundwork set by the (already quite good) original. Afterglow takes everything good about Ashes 2063 and blows it up to insane scale. From a 2-3 hour linear Doom-like to a sprawling, 10~ hour light RPG with sprawling massive explorable hubs, side quests, dialog choices, a weapon upgrade and crafting system that has your arsenal evolving as the game goes on, literal moral choices where which factions you pick in the world's conflicts determines how the story goes.

Ashes: Afterglow is structured around two massive hubs that you'll spend about 3-5 hours in each, depending on how much of the side stuff you end up doing. In each hub you'll have a main town full of NPCs to talk to, shops to partake in, side quests, etc.. Each town will give you missions that pull you out into the wider, open hub area which you'll explore either on foot or via your trusty bike (depending on area). The size of these areas gives meaning to the bike. No longer a cinematic traversal element tying together story beats like in the first game; it's a necessary traversal tool for the open wastes in Afterglow. The size of the world also gives meaning to the radiation system in the game, with some outdoor areas being especially hazardous requiring the player to strategically hop from safe building to safe building to minimize exposure to hazardous nuclear radiation.

Every idea from the first Ashes is expanded on and executed to a sheen of perfection. And it carries over all of the strengths: the wonderfully atmospheric art and sound, the powerful and satisfying arsenal, the Doom engine's classic speed.

It's an incredible game. The best Doom TC mod you'll ever play. Insanely enough, one of the best games I'll have played all year. An incredible "retro shooter" that stands up with the best of the genre.