This game caught me by surprise. It wasn’t on my radar until about two months before release when I saw the big gameplay reveal which impressed me and got me pretty excited. I was glad to have a new open world game to sink my teeth into, since it’s been a while since we’ve had a good new one, and I needed something to entertain myself for the rest of quarantine after TLOU2. And man, this did a good job of keeping me hooked.

This is some of the most engrossed I’ve been in a game’s open world ever, up there with Red Dead 2 and The Witcher 3. It looks absolutely gorgeous. The lighting, colors, variety of environments, everything. This is one of the prettiest games I’ve ever played. It pays heavy homage to the works of Kurosawa and the Lone Wolf and Cub series, and it channels what makes those works so beloved into the video game medium brilliantly.

There’s tons to explore in this world, and the game does a great job of instilling a sense of exploration and wonder in the player. There’s very minimal HUD, with no mini map or arrows pointing you in the right direction. The game instead favors a system called “the guiding wind”. Whenever you swipe up on the touchpad, wisps of wind and particles will glide by in the direction you need to go. This mechanic seems gimmicky at first, but you adjust quickly, and now I can’t imagine an open world game without it. I feel like this mechanic (or something similar to it) should be a new standard in open world games. Being able to confidently ride around the world with no HUD and never feel lost is an awesome feeling. It allows you to focus all your attention on the world around you instead of a mini map. As you traverse the environment you’ll also stumble across foxes and birds that will lead you to points of interest. These mechanics help not only make the world feel alive, but make you feel like you’re a part of it. I spent countless hours riding around the open world looking for secrets, and constantly being blown away by its beauty. GOT rewards much of your exploration with either cosmetics or charms to give you different abilities. Constantly hunting the best drip was something that really kept me going. Almost all the outfits are drippy as hell, and they give you different abilities incentivizing you to constantly switch things up depending on the scenario.

The combat in GOT is super satisfying. It’s kind of a blend of Assassin’s Creed and The Witcher, with the stances of Nioh or For Honor. Slaughtering hoards of enemies feels so nice, and combining different special weapons and moves you accumulate throughout the game feels awesome. This game does an impressive job of making you feel like a badass. The amount of times I said “oh SHIT let’s fucking GO” in this game is astounding. The stealth is overall on the easier side, and the AI can sometimes be kind of stupid, but the it still feels very smooth and immerses you in the idea that you’re “The Ghost”.

The story of Ghost of Tsushima surprised me as well. I bought this game more for the gameplay and world, not caring as much about the story, but it turned out to be one of my favorite parts of the game. It’s funny that it came out around The Last of us Part II, since it has many similar themes of revenge and forgiveness, and is riddled with grey morality. The side quests were just as interesting and essential as the main quests, and I enjoyed them all.

Ghost of Tsushima is the first game I’ve ever platinumed on PS4. Rarely do my completionism tendencies come out, but something about this world just made me want to explore every nook and cranny. This and TLOU2 back to back was the most fun I’ve had gaming in a long time.

I dismissed this game as trash when it came out, but my bro and I copped it on sale for $3 back in February because why not, and I was pleasantly surprised. It has a pretty solid core gameplay. The shooting feels nice and the different tech upgrades you get are pretty cool. The world looks great, and it felt cool to just walk around and pretend I'm in a near-future apocalypse. The loot in the world was pretty underwhelming for a looter shooter, and the Dark Zone (which is the PVP area where you fight for the best loot) was fine, but I wasn't super compelled to play it. I didn't give a shit about the story and I skipped every cutscene I came across after the opening sequence. The look of the world and the shooting mechanics alone were enough to keep me playing for around 20 hours, and I definitely got my $3 worth. If they make a Division 3 that was 60 fps on console and had improved loot and a more interesting setting, I'll probably cop it.

A decent little adventure. The Minecraft art style and assets were surprisingly well suited for a dungeon crawler, and environments were diverse and generally pretty. The gear and ability system is very basic (along with most of the mechanics in the game), but it did feel satisfying to plow through mobs of enemies with big colorful explosions. What was not satisfying in this game was the loot. A good dungeon crawler should constantly reward you with fire loot and new skills to keep the gameplay fresh, but in this game I only used a handful of different weapons since most of the loot I got was trash. l found branching paths and/or side dungeons that often lead nowhere or maybe to one chest with crappy loot in it. The best loot is found in the secret missions unlocked by keys randomly spawned in certain levels, but they require quite a bit backtracking through levels to find, which isn’t fun. I felt no drive to go back and try to find the keys. These should’ve just been fun side levels, not the only way to get good loot. This overall is pretty derivative of Diablo and other dungeon crawlers, and brings almost nothing new to the table other than art style, and even that reminded me a lot of Diablo III. I did still have some fun with it, and it could be a nice mindless co-op game to grind with your friends. I’d only recommend this if you have Xbox Game Pass though, it’s definitely not worth the full retail $20.

I’m fairly certain I like this more than the first game. It expands almost perfectly on its predecessor. It deepens the story to even greater lengths thematically and emotionally, and continues the plot in a way that feels necessary. It lives up to the subtitle “Part II”. It refines the simple yet effective gameplay, making the combat and environmental traversal more fluid and fun. It’s a technical marvel, with some of the most impressive graphics and lighting I’ve ever seen. The atmosphere is so rich and tragically beautiful, it’s sublime. You can’t help but get wrapped up in this world.

It has flaws for sure. The pacing of this in certain parts doesn’t feel as air tight and fluid as its predecessor. I feel like it runs too long, and could benefit from being 3-5 hours shorter. I found myself audibly sighing at parts. I don’t see many places they’d be able to cut things while still achieving the same goal, however, since this story has a lot to say and needs time to breath. So I’m conflicted on that front. Also the weapon and character upgrade system in this game feels dated and is pretty boring. I saw a clip from Girlfriend Reviews talking about this on Twitch, and I fully agree. Stopping after every encounter and during every explorable moment to collect an innumerable amount of pills, nuts, and bolts really slows down the pace of the game for me, and is annoyingly distracting. I understand it for ammo, health, and notes, but popping twenty-year-old pills from a random bathroom to upgrade your aiming stability doesn’t even make sense, let alone progress the gameplay in an engaging way. Having some kind of dynamic progression, like unlocking skills for weapons naturally as you use them, would allow you to tailor your play style to the weapons you like, without having to waste time collecting scraps. This would also help with the issue of needing to waste supplies on upgrades you don’t want to get to the upgrades you do want. This system would feel more dynamic, as Ellie would naturally get better with certain weapons after using them often, and would allow you to focus a lot more on the environment and story—the main focus of the game for most people—rather than keeping a constant eye out for loot to pad the game.

This is still an incredible game. It has some annoying things holding it back, but the parts that are good mostly outshine the parts that are bad. This is one of my favorite gaming experiences I’ve ever had, and due to its divisiveness, it’s an experience that will be thoroughly discussed for a long time to come.