Counting this as mastered, even though I only got four stars. I refuse to play through every single level four more times. Other than that, it was a pretty solid game. Took me the first few worlds to really get into it, and overall, I might even prefer 3D Land, but for everything that wasn't great before, it offers the excellent final world, with some unusually difficult challenges that were the most fun I've had with a Mario game since the final star in Super Mario Galaxy 2. Lower mid-tier 3D Mario game.

Took me a long time getting through this game. First, I couldn't play for more than 1-2 hours before my computer would overheat, but it wasn't just that, it's also the density of the game with its overwhelming amount of wacky side characters, plot lines and misleading clues. In some, actually many ways, this reminded me of Inherent Vice and even more so when it was over, and given that IV is in my Top 5 films of all time, it's more than just a good thing.

This month, I fixed the overheating problem and finally pulled through, played through half the game in one week and finally fully submerged into the game's surreal atmosphere. I put most of my skill points into inland empire and empathy, didn't actually put too much effort into internalising thoughts, and completely ignored certain skills like authority, esprit de corps, half light or savoir faire. I was amazed at how big your options are and how one skill point can already make a noticeable difference in the following interactions, really makes you feel like you can really do everything your own way.

Very deep and complex, philosophical and fascinating when it comes to the political stuff, the characters are extraordinarily well written and it's easily one of the most literary games I've played, bringing to mind Samuel Beckett and Thomas Pynchon among others. Absurdist but still with a lot of heart at its core. Some great meta humour as well, I died in the first scene on my first playthrough, then again when I sat down on Evrart's chair. Loved it, highly recommended to everybody who wants to play something that's intellectually stimulating.

I hate to leave this somewhat unfinished, but I can't be bothered clearing all the Paths of Solitude. I did, however, catch Arceus and complete any side mission there is, and had a lot of fun doing so. It's not perfect, but it's a great game and even with clunky battle mechanics, that I still didn't quite understand by the time I finished, it goes more in the direction that other Pokémon games of the last few years should have, and it succeeds in areas games like Let's Go Pikachu miserably failed, like removing core aspects of the Pokémon mechanics and make it work. Has a satisfying amount of side missions and more freedom than most Pokémon games. The story is weak as usual, but if we're going by Pokémon standards, it's actually not so bad. It's a refreshing take on the Pokémon formula.

Randomised team with

Houndoom
Azumarill
Ampharos
Unown (Hidden Power Ice)
Espeon
Corsola

Random team with

Nosepass
Seviper
Slaking
Sharpedo
Roselia
Flygon

Honestly a really good team for a random challenge. Nosepass is useless in the end game but not too bad before, Roselia dies at everything and Seviper, Flygon and and Sharpedo can't take a hit either, but Slaking is a monster and carried my team half the time.

I managed to make the game quite enjoyable for myself, but in a way that I can't really give the game any credit for, especially since I ditched Pikachu early on. The longer I played, the more it annoyed me, so many terrible decisions were made in the making of the game. One is going back to the days without abilities or carried items, something I believe nobody asked for, another is repeating FireRed's biggest mistake of not letting Pokémon evolve to their evolutions of later generations, and in this case, it's not even possible after beating the main game, which particularly bothered me in regard to my Scyther, which tragically, will never be a Scizor. Then you have the egregious and very un-fun catching mechanic. If you thought that the earlier games were repetitive in that regard, LGP makes it even worse. It's just the same throughout the entire game, no strategies, no weakening Pokémon, just throwing balls and hoping that the Pokémon doesn't run away. On top of that, I hated having to catch the same Pokémon over and over in order to level up, something that probably isn't necessary if you use your overpowered Pikachu, but that brings me to what made the game enjoyable for me, and it's a challenge I set for myself. Generation 1 has exactly six bug type evolutionary lines, and so I went through the game as a bug catcher. Been wanting to do that for a while now, and I really loved my team. Butterfree ended up pretty useless and by far the weakest link in the team, but I adored both Venomoth with Quiver Dance and Sleep Powder and Pinsir, the former getting me through the champ battle all alone (Mega Pidgeot was by far the biggest challenge in the game for my team). Beedrill was a decent sweeper, Scyther pretty reliable as well, and Parasect generally good, but often a victim of its weaknesses.

There are some things I generally liked about the game. The look isn't terrible, the Lavender Town Cubone subplot was updated the best story-wise, plus I liked most of the NPC dialogue, and as long as you're in trainer battles, this feels as dynamic and enjoyable as other games in the series. There isn't much else to praise here, and I could go on about the ridiculous HM replacement or how this game kinda made me hate Pikachu, but in the end, it's not a hateable affair, just middle of the road and the laziest Gamefreak have ever been. Glad I played it the way I did, couldn't imagine how bored I would have been, had I played it the intended way.

My expectations weren't even that high, but this was honestly such a spectacular game. Very creative level design, some really cool surprises and barely anything that didn't work for me, at least nothing I can think of at the moment. I loved the levels people tend to hate (probably out of frustration), like Muncher Marathon, and thought it was challenging enough, especially in mirror mode, which never got boring, despite adding a good few hours to the playtime. Some of the bonus levels and the Golden Temple stage took a while to beat, it's a level of difficulty that I'm definitely not used to from recent Mario games and I'm happy that this translated the spirit of the original games so well. Fantastic platformer, obviously not quite as good as the first two games, but no other Mario related 2D platformer is, so that's more to the credit of the first two games. Must play for fans of the genre.

200% completion, only got a few gold medals, but that'd be a bit much for now.

Randomised team with:
Relicanth
Kyogre
Camerupt
Manectric
Sableye
Dusclops

Kyogre saved me here in the Champ battle, Sableye was completely useless, the others somewhere in between. No surprises.

Loved the first Mario Galaxy and this was an excellent sequel, arguably even better than the original. It fixes some of the first game's issues and offers more creative galaxies with great challenges. The mechanics how comets appear has improved here, and the postgame, while not perfect and still slightly repetitive, is a lot better than the ridiculous Luigi star in the first game. The Grandmaster Perfect Run is one of the best (and hardest!) challenges in any Super Mario game and I thoroughly enjoyed getting all 242 stars, it's an outstanding game, possibly the best game for the console.

One of these games that make me hate being a completionist. Up until the 120th star, it's all good, an excellent creative game with unique mechanics and lots of variety. The few issues I have are the slightly annoying way that prankster comets don't always appear when you need them, which bugged me a bit during the last twenty stars (purple coin comets), but I loved playing through the game. To get the 121st star, though, you have to play through the entire game again as Luigi. All I knew is that you had to get all stars with Luigi so I thought that at least you had already unlocked everything, could choose which order you did them in etc.., but no, you actually start at the beginning and have to do everything again as Luigi, even moving annoying prankster comets or collecting star bits to pay hungry Lumas. Seriously, no idea what Nintendo was thinking. You can tell they didn't even put any effort into this, because the levels and world don't change at all, you're just playing with slightly worse mechanics, and you even have to save Luigi (?!) as Luigi. Other than that, fantastic game, but man....

A great game that obviously laid the groundwork for an outstanding franchise. Does a lot of things right, the music, the world design, the Pokémon design (mostly), the fight mechanics (that would still get a lot better in later games), the feeling of exploring a well designed area with some cities and routes that make the most of the limited options the Nintendo Game Boy offered. That said, there are some issues that significantly impact the enjoyment here, all of which have been fixed in later games or remakes. First, there's the frustrating PC mechanic, which sucks with both items and Pokémon and comes along with a small bag. Some of this can be excused with the technical limitations, but some of it is just bad design. Then there are smaller issues like the "very effective/not effective" bug that makes the game rather confusing for beginners, or the fact that you still can't see which Pokémon you already own in battle, or that you're not able to see which TM is which without selecting it.

I played through this several times before, but this time I wanted to complete the Pokédex, since this is the only game that lets you complete the National Dex without help of events, cheats or other complicated things. Thanks to the infamous Mew glitch (and the Missingno glitch which I only used once to get more money to buy Porygon, because doing this the intended way would be a serious chore), it's actually quite easy here, and I enjoyed it a lot, even if you don't get anything for it. That never bothered me, though, a full Pokédex seems like a big enough reward to me.

Oh, and I used a Plant only team. Worked pretty well, Parasect was the MVP in the early game, Venusaur and Victreebel more so in the late game. Tangela was useless, and I had to rely on sleep a lot, but didn't have any Pokemon above level 52 by the time I finished the game. The challenge here was having a movepool limited to very few types. Parasect's Dig and Spore helped a lot, Exeggutor's Psychic got me through Agatha's challenge, half of them had Razor Leaf and/or Acid, as well as Hypnosis or Sleep Powder.

Victreebel
Venusaur
Tangela
Vileplume
Exeggutor
Parasect

I'll defend Pokémon Sword, and don't think there's much wrong with this DLC either, but it feels like it's too much of a good thing. Been playing for a while now, Isle of Armor still looked fantastic, and parts of the Crown Tundra did too, but there are annoying characters, a really lame story, and in the end just not very much that would make this worth playing besides the fact that you can catch A LOT of legendary Pokémon in this one. I only finished the main story, caught Calyrex, Spectrier, Regirock, Regice, Registeel, Regieleki, Moltres, Articuno and Zapdos, but I couldn't be arsed to catch the Ultra Beasts or Swords of Justice. Maybe another time, this was more than enough Pokémon Sword for now. A great game, an average DLC.

Didn't like it enough to play through the entire postgame, I just finished the main story and Mt. Battle. But that said, it's still a pretty solid game that I enjoyed a lot, and that even gave me some things that I don't find as often in main series Pokémon games. It's a more tactical game, mostly because it's only double battles and fairly difficult throughout, you keep encountering trainers whose Pokémon are 5-10 levels higher than yours, but at the same time, it's a game that doesn't just let you grind mindlessly but instead offers enough options to get stronger in side quests (like Mt. Battle). It's a lot of fun and only gets a bit samey during the prolonged story parts with dozens of trainers jumping on you one after the other. The snag machine/Shadow Pokémon gimmick works well enough, even if purifying them all seems like a very annoying task. I also didn't feel like putting much effort into this game and so I went with the most basic team ever: Umbreon, Espeon, Ampharos and Meganium. Tried to train a Forretress until I realised that it can't learn a single good move, even Umbreon had a weak moveset due to a frustrating lack of (good) TMs. But as a whole, it's a great time and offers some nice changes from the regular games.