This game actually surprised me in a very good way!

From the makers of the incredible metroidvanias Guacamelee 1 and 2 (both of which I loved), comes a... hack n slash RPG with lots of grinding? What?

Well, let me tell you that despite the unexpected premise, this game is amazing!

Most of the gameplay consists of just killing baddies, completing challenges and levelling up, and oh boy, if you're the kind of person that likes to just hit stuff and see NUMBERS GO BRRR, then this is the game for you.

The main feature that makes this work is the ability to unlock new forms (granting you unique powers) and COMBINE POWERS FROM DIFFERENT FORMS! The amount of fun builds and combinations you can make is absurd, and its incredibly enjoyable to try stuff out and find broken combinations. All the while you will almost never run out of challenges to grind, so there is always a short-term objective in sight.

In other aspects, the visuals are charming, the humor is silly and pretty great (even more so if you enjoyed other Drinkbox Studios games), there are dungeons with cool themes, the plot starts out "meh" but becomes surprisinly engaging the more you play.

Overall a great action RPG that actually makes grind work and will net you several hours of button-mashing baddie-killing fun.

I love Dark Souls, but I also think Dark Souls is not a great videogame in 2022.

Having played the original Prepare To Die edition on Steam about 7 years ago and then playing the Remastered Edition in 2022, there were things that were already pretty rough back then, and oh boy, the game did not age well at all.

Well, let's get the bad out of the way. This game has super frustrating areas (Tomb of Giants, Lost Izalith, Crystal Cave, Blighttown), the game's second half is clearly half baked, there are some long distances between bonfires and bosses, almost zero accessability, runs like ass on PC (seriously, I was expecting the remastered edition to be more optimized, but oh well).

I was surprised to find some of the things I remembered as being very good turned out to actually not being that great this time around... Everyone loves to say DS1 had amazing level design, but I... didn't really think that's true for most areas. I mean, sure, there's Undead Asylum, Undead Burg, Sen's Fortress, most shortcuts are really well placed, levels (usually) MAKE SENSE. Even still, I think for a game so widely praised on its level design, most levels were actually "meh" at best. Even Anor Londo was really disappointing. It's so big, but actually kind of just empty. If you think about the "bonfire->O&S" path, it's mostly a long and straight corridor with not that many interesting bits. I think the level design was fine when the original released, but it's really not that impressive years later. Enemy placement is another point that I found way worse and unfun than I remembered.

Even still, it's impossible to deny the impact this game had on videogame history, and how many of its novel and interesting ideas were later polished and expanded on new From Software games (and other games as well). The game's atmosphere is truly unique, it's hidden lore and secrets are so interesting they gave birth to thousands of analysis videos over the years, some of the bosses are so amazing and memorable, combat is (although very sluggish) usually very satisfying when triumphing, the music and sound design are out of this world.

I seriously love the good parts of Dark Souls, I just don't think I can ignore the bad parts anymore, and I wonder why they were largely ignored by fans in the first place all those years ago. Objectively thinking, if it weren't for me already being familiarized with and having nostalgia for the game, I don't think I would have actually had much fun playing this time around, and I bet most fans wouldn't as well.

This game os SO. F*CKING. GOOD.
It's like the definition of the phrase "more than the sum of its parts".

It's just REALLY FUN. I can't overstate how fun it is. Every moment from start to finish is just a joy to play.

Playing with a friend and/or partner is just an amazing experience, I highly recommend it.

Look, I have to be honest: this game janky as hell. There are a lot of rough edges. But goddamnit, it's also one of the best translations of D&D 5e from tabletop to videogame I've seen.

If you love the tactical combat from 5e and want more of that, but want it to be like XCOM, this is the game for you. It's an awesome simulation of the rules of D&D, spells are beautiful and impactful, rolling dice is always thrilling, enemies behave smartly and are actually challenging, you can se BIG NUMBERS GO BRRR while killing them.

Another highlight is the character creation and levelling system (which streamlines the whole experience and is frankly way better than flipping through book pages IMO), and the loot system (which I think never really worked in tabletop, but in digital it's just perfect). Exploration is also really well done, in a way that really would only work as a digital game.

Now, for the jank. It's worth noting this is an indie studio's first game, so I'm not holding these too much against them.

The campaign plot is basic, cliche fantasy adventure stuff. I thought it was fine, but I can see many people finding it really boring. It's used mostly to bring the party from town to cool dungeon A, back to town, back to cool dungeon B, etc.
The models and facial animations were very unimpressive, the voice acting was rough (although I actually really enjoyed the party banter, I think it was really fun and like a real life game), characters were really bland. I wish there was more classes and levels (although for one playthrough it was fine enough), and also more campaigns (hope they get added in the future?).

Overall, as a huge D&D nerd, I very much liked Solasta. It's a pretty solid tactical combat game. Get it if you like D&D 5e and/or XCOM-likes.

This game took me waaay by surprise. I've been hearing about it in 2021 GOTY lists, but it seemed like it's just a Skyrim mod, how could it be good? Well, I'm glad I tried it because the game is SO FREAKING GOOD.

It's an finely crafted mystery (very reminiscent of Outer Wilds!) in which you are tasked to uncover the secrets behind an ancient roman city, with only one rule in place: "The many shall suffer for the sins of the one". If one person commits a sin, everyone gets punished with death.

Every loop, it feels like figuring out a new piece of the puzzle and slowly but surely putting it all back together, only to find something that gets you totally by surprise and leaves you in awe. But the small moments are also amazing, when you finally figure out that little thing that didn't feel quite right, you feel like a genius.

I need to mention that the game is janky as hell, with visuals very reminiscent of Skyrim. It FEELS like this game was released in the 2010s. Nevertheless, this doesn't really take away from the enjoyment of the story and mistery.

Overall, I highly recommend playing it spoiler-free, it's an amazing experience that will leave you in reflection some time later.

Chaotic party game where you and your friends must remodel houses following blueprints, which includes: placing wallpaper, carpeting the floor, destroying/building walls, etc.

Not too hard, very fun with friends, fairly short with some variety. Lacking a good tutorial in my opinion, some of the new mechanics were learned through trial and error.

Overall a very good party game!

Pretty cool roguelike, reminds me of Enter The Gungeon but as a platformer.

Nice visuals and music, smooth gameplay, cool bosses. Making an overpowered synergistic build is VERY fun.

Runs are a bit too reliant on RNG, especially early on with grenades and keys. Each run is also very long, I feel more than other roguelikes, which makes starting over a bit disappointing. Items also don't make a lot of sense and have frequently repeated effects.

The amount of meta currency you earn between runs is very little compared to how many unlocks there are, even non-essencial ones, so I feel a bit discouraged to try to unlock everything.

Even so, when it's good it's VERY fun to play, so I would recommend, even if only for a few runs.

VERY fun co-op shooter, it absolutely lives up to Left 4 Dead's name as a spiritual successor.

The gameplay is great, shooting is tight, weapons feel powerful, levels and objectives are nice, and the card/buff system is actually pretty cool (even though it was a bit overwhelming at first).

As always, playing with friends is an amazingly fun experience.

SKATEBIRD! SKATING BIRDS!

Seriously, this game is cute and fun. A bit wonky, but very charming and an overall good time.

It's very reminiscent of old Tony Hawk (heh) games, where you go through various levels fille with ramps, pipes and rails, and complete simple objectives by doing tricks. It has great customization as well, and great lo-fi tunes with bird documentary voiceovers (that mesh surprisingly well!)

It has a lot of bird and internet humor, and I know this is not everyone's cup of tea, but if you like it, this game is for you.

Sometimes it's a bit hard to make the bird to what you want, which can lead to frustration, and a few of the collectibles are very hard to get to, but other than that it's a pretty good game.

This game surprised me, it's a very competent beat em' up with gorgeous pixel-art visuals.

The plot is fairly straightforward, two girls find out their boyfriends got kidnapped, and the go on a punching and kicking spree throughout the city, beating up delinquents and gang members on their own.

All moves are visually amazing and have proper impact, but the combat per se was okay, a bit repetitive later on. Bosses were cool and creative, but most enemies weren't that interesting.

There were some annoyances with clunky controls and lack of quality of life features, but nothing too bad.

The voice acting was actually pretty good, both girls were great, and all notable NPCs also did a good job.

The ending was kinda weird, but didn't matter too much. I didn't feel too incentivized to replay the game with new characters to unlock the other ending, but that's okay, I was still satisfied.

I didn't play the original superhot, but I quite liked this game, playing felt really good and exciting. Learning the flow and getting in the groove was really fun.

The problem is that it just became too repetitive near the end of the game. Most powers weren't really interesting or useful, and I ended up just using the dash one everytime.

Didn't really feel compelled to finish the game, but what I played was pretty cool.

This is SUCH a satisfying game to play. Very chill, very relaxing, very cute.

Everything you do in this game is remove house objects from boxes and place them in (almost) any appropriate place you want. Even still, it manages to tell a interesting story about the person that owns the objects along the years, following them through all stages of life.

If you just want to sit back and chill, organizing house stuff while some comfy music plays, this is the game for you.

Driving in Forza Horizon 5 is SO FREAKING COOL. The car controls are extremely smooth and responsive, and the visuals + audio completely support the feeling of SPEED and ADRENALINE.

The game drops you straight into the action and dots the whole map with fun activities. You are free to pick any one that is close or that seems fun and just GO DRIVE.

I'm not a car fan by any metric, but with the amount of different and beautiful cars available to collect, I'm sure other players can get much out of these systems than me. Strangely, even I had crazy fun collecting cars.

I thought the concept of the game was REALLY COOL, but unfortunatelly it didn't click for me.

The visuals and music are really impressive, but the more I played the more I got... bored of them. Levels are very long with little variation, and I didn't feel like I was actually interacting with the music at all (like a normal rhythm game). Instead it just felt like an infinite runner with some synchronized beats.

It's still pretty cool, but I think stopping after stage 3 or 4 is enough for me to be satisfied.

One of the most creative roguelikes I've played. It has a really good core gameplay loop, where the first few hours are an absolute blast to figure out new singergies, discover new cards, try out different strategies. It really is amazing for several hours.

Then the game gets a little repetitive and grindy, especially to unlock some of the late game content. It made me stop playing after trying the 4th level a couple times, but I'm still extremely satisfied with what I got out of the experience.

This is truly a must play if you value creative game systems.