I've played through Horizon before on PS4 so I feel justified in giving my opinion on it now despite me not being able to get through my playthrough here. I remember enjoying most of Horizon back when I first played it but I can comfortably say I enjoyed it significantly less this time around. More than halfway through the story nothing hasd improved. The writing has consistently been either mediocre or straight-up bad. The narrative has compelling elements, such as figuring out how the dangerous world came to be, but the dialogue and character hold it back significantly. I can only say I somewhat enjoyed combat with how fast and slick it felt. It isn’t anything original or mind-blowing but I don’t believe that was the goal. I could tell this by how the rest of the gameplay was comprised of bog-standard open-world affairs. Collect items that have no real narrative or interesting gameplay purpose, clear out bandit camps full of lackluster AI and interact with lifeless NPCs for forgettable side quests. Audio logs and other lore-specific collectibles were the only worthwhile items worth exploring for. Even then, however, I had to swift through dozens of blandly written and mundane ones to get to the interesting stuff. That’s basically how I’d describe my whole experience. There were moments where combat encounters were visually and mechanically impressive while certain narrative beats gave way for intrigue. But those moments were not worth experiencing the dull writing, plain characters, and generic open-world activities. I’m hoping the sequel takes it up a notch in every area, but only time will tell.

When I first booted this game up I never anticipated myself shedding tears by the end of it. I mean this truly when I say this is one of the beautiful pieces of art I’ve experienced ever, or at least in a very long time. If this has piqued any unknowing person’s interest let me elaborate. ‘Outer Wilds’, not to be confused with ‘The Outer Worlds’, is an exploration-based sci-fi game where you traverse a small solar system to unravel its mysteries. If it sounds vague it’s because it kind of is at first. In the beginning, you get a small set of tutorials on how to use your tools and control your ship. Even these can be missed or remain incomplete, which represents the nature of this game perfectly. Once you have access to your ship you are free to explore any planet you see. There are environmental hazards that may trip you up and rogue notes that hint towards a larger narrative but it’s up to you to seek out the solutions and answers. Just like with tackling planets you can tackle any mystery at your own pace. It truly is as open as I describe it. I’ve never played a game that has held on to my attention throughout its entirety. Boredom was rare, only ever peeking when I had to wait for certain environmental shifts to be complete. Even then they patched in the ability to rest at camps to skip to the specific time you want. Beyond that there is so little wrong with this game it blows my mind. Spoiling anything would be a huge disservice to this game. I went in blind and hearing the music for the first time, solving each mystery on my own, taking on this journey was unlike anything I have played before. It’s funny how I just randomly decided to play this. You just never know when you might come across one of your favorite games of all time.

What a clusterfuck of a game...that I still somewhat, don't really, kind of like. After beating the 'Tresspasser' DLC I left ' Inquisition' with a more optimistic mindset narrative-wise. With all that it sets up the next entry in the series could be a knockout, but with how 'Inquisition' handled gameplay I am a lot more worried about the future. An emphasis on busy-work replaced once-great story-driven side missions. The gameplay was flashy but required less tactical play. The villain and climax were duds resulting in a story solely hinging on its characters rather than the basic plot. Luckily that's where 'Inquisition' was at its best, and with the good DLC, these elements managed to save the game somewhat. But I can't help but feel the direction this game took was one to follow trends rather than to honor the roots this series came from.

I forgot to log this one despite it being, potentially, my favorite in the series. I will always prefer the interconnect, atmospheric setting of the first game over the linear, sometimes, repetitive levels present here. However, combat is king in these games, and me replaying a game directly after beating it should indicate how good it is. There is so much to learn involving combat, and it just feels like it keeps expanding with so many intricate combos and moves to master. Its story may be messy and its levels may be visually repetitive, but with combat as good as this it's hard to not love it.

I'm not going to sit here and say that 'DMC' is a bad game, in some instances, it's far from it. In fact, I had fun with it. Sure I did, only when I wasn't partaking in trivial platforming, watching a terribly dull story play out, and sleeping through the painfully easy bosses. Let's see, oh yeah what I really enjoyed was the combat...which was nowhere near as expressive or deep as DMC4's but still a romp and a half. Stringing together combos were fun, and if the combat had been excellent I would have considered this game good despite everything else falling flat. Let's list some combat grievances really quick. The enemies requiring specific weapons to kill cut the combat freedom down to a peg, jumping feels too heavy, and enemy variety/design were disappointingly lame and grew boring towards the end. On top of that taunts, styles, and an overall sense of personality were straight up not here. I always down for some different interpretations of mechanics, but it's hard not to prefer the previous games overall.

I can't say I was absolutely in love with every aspect of 'Dragon Age: Origins', but I can say I thoroughly enjoyed it for a majority of its runtime. 'Dragon Age II' had enjoyable moments, moments that explored the more complicated relations in the Dragon Age universe, such as the Templars and Mages. It's how they constructed, and ultimately executed said examination that left me yearning for more. The game takes place in a single city and with the amount that changes throughout the narrative the world never changed with it. This left a stagnant world that, also, forced combat scenarios without any narrative significance. Speaking of which, although choices do matter (in fact more so than I initially realized), the dialogue system was stripped bare of its organic flow that was seen in 'Origins'. Gone are the multilayered conversations and here we have, mainly, three options. Diplomatic/helpful, cheeky/charming, and aggressive/authoritative are the central choices at your disposal. This led to static conversations at times, with another downside being the protagonist's voice being a bit wooden mostly. There were moments where I enjoyed conversing with people like my companions, who had backstories and information I wanted to indulge in. Sadly, the game never allowed you to converse with them outside of their personal quests which left me waiting until they had something they wished to discuss. I can go on and on but my final feelings on the game are empty. I could go on and on but what's the point of doing so for a game that left me with such little satisfaction outside of some characters and scenes. Great moments doesn't equal a great game.

Combat is definitely fantastic, despite my preference towards playing as Dante. Nero still controls very well, although his tools are limited to one gun and sword along with his Demon hand that has a few moves of its own. My largest problem isn't the core gameplay loop however, it's everything else. Levels may be visually inspired sometimes but design-wise they were so simplistic or overly frustrating. The story also never gripped me with how bland I found Nero to be and the serious tone the narrative adopted. This also leads to how underutilized Dante was. His set of missions have him backtracking to previous areas with lame gimmicks. I could tell the game wasn't finished, and that's unfortunate. Fantastic base gameplay, weak foundation.

Beyond its relatively basic combat (still enjoyable no doubt) was a story that was more consequential than I originally expected. This, in turn, left me more engaged, especially once the Landsmeet commenced. The companion characters also left me somewhat satisfied, specifically Morrigan and Alistair's differing ideologies. I'd say 'Origins'' greatest offense would be in its pacing. Many of the quest lines involving recruiting different groups to fight against the antagonistic force relied too heavily on overly-long stretches of combat. This eventually grew tedious, and often times undersold the urgency of the situation, especially since you can just dick around and explore. I can dive deep into many of the game's strengths and weaknesses but suffice it to say I had a great time, if not a bit of an excessively long one at times.

Truly fucking abysmal. I went into it expecting it to be bad, but I was not prepared for how terrible it actually was. I don't even know what to say, it's just plain awful. I mean if you want to know why let me quickly explain. They stripped down the combat system, erasing all of the unique moves that came with each weapon. Enemy variety was limited severely and most bosses require long-ranged attacks plus being butt-fucking easy. I used my sword so little in this game because guns were buffed so much making them one of if not the most viable weapon. I can go on and on but I won't...I endured enough.

Skip to the very last line if you want to know if the game is good...or you can just look at the score so never mind.

I feel like I've been sleeping on this era of gaming for far too long. Although DMC isn't perfect, especially it's the first game to strive for this type of action-orientated combat, I can't help but respect the hell out of it. Luckily my praises don't stop at respecting it, but I had a great time with it. I'll admit I am not an expert in the way of executing insane combos and the such. But no matter your playstyle you'll feel comfortable here since the game is easy to learn but hard as fuck to master. However, the combat is the main course here since the rest of the game centers around it which gave presented plenty of encounters to test out new abilities and practice. The locations you fight in and the arenas the bosses take place in are claustrophobic, which ideally would be an issue for an action game of this caliber...and it kind of is. Most of the time it worked because the camera utilizes a fixed system. But when the worst possible storm of weird camera angles and cramped spaces destroy your sense of anything then it's hard not to get frustrated. I have other praises and flaws such as how hilariously campy the story is (which is a great thing) but I don't want to keep rambling. It's really really really really really good.

Finally, the first VR game where I actually felt like I was playing a video game instead of a neat tech-demo. That being said, ‘Alyx’ still felt generally simplistic in its design and gameplay loop. Scavenging through cupboards and shooting zombies and soldiers was the name of the game, except now it’s you committing to these actions with your own hands. If this wasn’t the case then ‘Alyx’ would have been fine but VR absolutely enhanced it in every way. The mere act of grabbing a can of soup was on its own so amusing due to the several possibilities involving said can. You can throw it at an enemy to stun them or use it to distract them. This freeform way of dealing with situations made for an endlessly entertaining string of segments. This ranged from intense shooting skirmishes that had me ducking and weaving in real life to horrifically dark tunnels that were crawling with headcrabs. I always felt excited due to being completely in control of every situation. Now the only gameplay moments that did get tiring were the hacking mini-games. Disarming trip mines by moving a ball through small hoops was tense since if you failed you died abruptly but matching shapes with each other and moving a key through lasers never hooked me. To be honest, they were more interesting than most hacking mini-games from other titles but compared to the rest of the game they lacked any interesting concepts. Throwing that element to the side there’s only one other portion left to discuss; the story. If it weren’t for the ending this tofu block of a tale hadn’t done much of anything to hook me. Granted, at the time I was playing through this I had yet to play any of the other ‘Half-Life’ games. Though after I did play them all my perspective on most of ‘Alyx’s’ story never improved. The goal of the game is for Alyx to rescue her dad from the oppressive alien force known as the Carbine. Of course, there’s more that occurs towards the end but that was the basic outline and mission. So if this is your first ‘Half-Life’ experience then nothing will probably fucking matter since you don’t learn much of anything about Alyx’s father nor about Alyx herself. So motivation is fairly limited unless you play the previous games in the franchise. However, without spoiling it, the ending 1000% means Half-Life 3 is coming out because if it doesn’t I will swallow Valve headquarters whole. All in all, this was a great game and one that absolutely does not warrant buying a $1000 VR headset for so just freeload off your friend for their headset to play it. Bye-bye.

I don't remember my experience with the prior titles in this series, but I can tell you that they were a lot more enjoyable than this drivel. Because my pea brain cannot fathom dropping a game without completing it I dragged my feet all the way to the end and god my brain gave up on its goal. Metro prides itself on pacing and combat that's sluggish in order to draw you into the world. That's fine in a linear setting, but for a game touting its semi-open world landscapes, it dragged a shit ton. Not only would you have to trek your way across decently sized areas with the slowest movement possible, but many times the game gated progression behind waiting for NPCs to take their sweet fucking time to get going. Towards the end, it got so bad that it felt like a self-parody. On the other hand, the game threw you into many scenarios where tens of enemies would swarm you. The hilarious part is that since gunplay is slow the enemy AI was dumbed down as a compromise making each firefight effortless. Now I don't have evidence of that, but I don't care; my point still stands. To summarize my frustrations here I would describe 'Metro Exodus' as a game that maintains the stilted gameplay of its predecessors but expands far out where it can't keep up with itself. I guess that's what happens when you follow trends that huh.