Hellblade: Senua Sacrifice and Senua's Saga: Hellblade II when compared together, feel like a give-or-take duology that beautifully bounces off each other in a symphony.

The first game has the better story, thanks to its singular focus on Senua and her psychosis, while the second game comes just close to overtaking Sacrifice as it takes Senua singularity, and gives her a purpose larger than life, an almost shamanistic task of taking down the giants and lead a group of people, which inadvertently takes away the story's focus on psychosis as that plot thread was already resolved in the first game

Gameplay wise, I knew what to expect and got what I was l looking for, a story led interactive adventure game, but as a sequel, 2 makes some sacrifices that are both necessary, but some confusing to distinguish itself from the previous games. The puzzles, for example, are few, longer and simplistic to the point some didn't need to be here, like that hour-long hidden folk trials, and combat, which I admire how raw, visceral and violent it is, feels a bit sloppy when trying to time attacks, read enemy movements and the lack of charge stabs and kicks makes it the more confusing why the simplification when it would've actively contributed to the presentation

Speaking of presentation, this game is nuts. I would confidently call this a digestible spiritual successor to Kane & Lynch 2 Dog Days, as the game employs a ton of post-processing to make it as filmic as possible, like an anamorphic lens, black bars, chromatic aberration, distortion, film grain, it's immense the number of techniques employed for this as well as the character's fidelity, which is industry leading.

Had they not simplified some crucial combat mechanics from 1 and expanded on the puzzles, I feel it could've surpassed the first game

The one reason I don't hate this game like other people do is because I was never around the graphics controversy. I literally never heard of it until I saw it on a store shelf back in 2014 and bought it because of man with gun on the cover.

As for the game itself, still a great premise but with middling execution. Gameplay is stellar but with some weird difficulty spikes, but regardless one of the reasons that makes Watch Dogs unique and why I love this series, but the story is vapid, not really worth caring, but it has its moments, like Jackie's obsession with the pizza guy, the human trafficking ring subplot (which is unfortunately flat), T-Bone's entire existence and his cool ass scrapyard, and the set-piece involving Lucky Quinn towards the end.

It's just another Ubisoft game being a Ubisoft game fr fr

In all honesty, my love for Yakuza: Like a Dragon weighed heavily when getting in to Infinite Wealth and for sure, RGG writing sometimes is not always the sharpest, 4 being the worst entry in terms of consistency, so I was surprised just how consistent Infinite Wealth maintains itself through the story.

The stuff with the Palekana was kinda whatever because it feels so foreign to what this series is and how it doesn't feel well incorporated in the story, the humour is so effortless I was dying of laughter, Yamai the goat, Bryce was kinda sauceless and Ebina was alright, not as impactful as Aoki was, but serviceable.

Believe me when I say that Ichiban remains one of the greatest protagonists in gaming, the amount of compassion and confidence he exudes through all of his bravado and silliness makes him a force to be reckoned with, and Kiryu this time around breaks down that burden of flying solo as he was always and learns to be more cooperative and inviting to see this through his end, it wasn't just his death that loomed constantly, but he had a proper arc with a ton of depth not seen since Yakuza 6 to be honest.

Under the guise of dynamism, every single gameplay system cooperates with each other to not only deliver the best combat system the series has seen so far ever since the shift to turn-based, but also for the bonds you develop with your companions, from being invested in their weird personal things, like Namba fighting a raccoon once, Saeko getting a heavy cooking pan that beats going to gym, or Joongi being into films and forgetting to return the DVDs he borrowed, and consequently, how those moments influence the flexibility of combat, like tag team attacks, combos, and what have you. ICHIBAN QUITE LITERALLY HAS A "WITH THE POWER OF FRIENDSHIP" MOVE THAT DOES A FUCK TON OF DAMAGE, IT'S WILD.

Some of the big negatives from combat, however, is the excessive grind (again), especially in the last chapters, the rate at which you level up, which is ridiculously stupid, and how for me, turn-based games fall into this trap where once you're powerful enough, you can just rely on the most powerful moves constantly with no consequences, in turn making you rely less on the ones that output less damage. You may be thinking of the MP bar, but what's stopping me from chugging down another Staminan and keep going? I respect the decision to be open like this, but it kills the incentive to make use of all your tools when you can just rely on the best moves constantly

All in all, it's another great entry in the series, with some of the best dynamic turn-based gameplay gaming has to offer at the moment and a story that really does everything it can to honour both my Ichimans, the hero of Yokohama and Kiryu, the legendary Dragon of Dojima

Bon Voyage.

Remains as fun as it's ever been with sometimes funny writing, creative boss encounters and a surprise appearance of Akira Yamaoka on the soundtrack (I keep forgetting he worked at Grasshopper)

If there's one thing I hope RePop addresses is the combat's game feel. The entire system feels like it's constantly fighting between being animation-led or responsive-led and the lack of fluidity it brings between transitions or what have you is painfully felt and more times than 1 it makes some encounters atrocious to strut through

Also, playing this game on RPCS3 in 4K60 is eye-opening, and with patches to remove the vignette and film grain, the image pops up so much more, which makes it baffling why such a colourful game is suppressed by those two

(My full review: https://youtu.be/zsYC5EjZslQ)
AC 6 is an extraordinary game, that not only respects its legacy mechanically, but it also evolves said formula for something more modern, accessible, responsive and most important of all, challenging. Admittedly, it’s not a perfect game, as some minor issues plague the game, but only momentarily, as the rest of the package proves that this team still has the chops to make games outside of Souls, and that they should make more games outside of Souls because that is one very talented team that deserves the freedom to do more than what they’re currently doing.