What an amazing experience. Everything about the presentation and feel is just so cool. Gameplay is mechanically simple but very satisfying, and the variety of encounters is great and paced out perfectly. Everything about it is so elegant that it feels hard to talk about much other than just saying you should play it yourself if you haven't. The main reason I even wanted to write anything is to talk about my experience with trying it previously. I played the first level in the remake a couple of years back (also tried it in VR, which looked cool but did not play very well), and I thought it was neat but it didn't compel me to keep playing. Trying the original Dreamcast version it instantly clicked, it really feels like the way the game is meant to look and feel. Maybe not everyone's experience but I don't see anything about this that needs updating anyways. Anyways, absolute banger of a game, easiest 5 stars in a while.

This was a very pleasant surprise. I absolutely love the concept, aesthetic, and music. I had a good time overall, this is much more enjoyable than the PICO-8 Celeste games in my opinion, but I do feel like it has some shortcomings in controls and polish that I wanted to talk about. These aren't a huge deal for a very short game made in a week, but I just think it's interesting.

There's some clear issues with the controls, particularly relating to the camera, that become much more obvious doing some of the more difficult B-Sides. Edges of platforms also feel particularly slippery where I feel like other games would be more generous, and Madeline is all too eager to perform a ledge climb when moving along a wall even when there are spikes on top that will instantly kill you. Many of the jumps in this game require a lot of active camera management to see where you're going, and since you also want your thumb on the face buttons to be able to dash mid-air you're constantly moving your grip back and forth. There are no control options whatsoever, and in most games I'd settle for being able to put dash on a shoulder button. I generally think taking common actions off of the face buttons in games that use both analog sticks is a good idea and fully solves a lot of issues like this, but here it feels like it would still be a band-aid solution.

The problems with the camera go deeper. For one thing, I think putting the ability to zoom in and out on the right stick's Y-axis was a mistake, you're not going to be getting perfectly horizontal inputs every time you want to turn the camera, so over the course of a series of jumps with quick camera turns you can find the camera at a very different angle than you intended. This is especially annoying since the camera doesn't reset when you respawn and you almost always have to adjust it before each attempt at a section. It's also often very hard to judge distance, I found myself under or overshooting small platforms a lot of the time. I've played a lot of 3D platformers and this is not an issue I usually have, and I had to think for a bit about what the actual cause is, which I think comes down to a couple of things. I think the developers realized this problem as well, since they included a very exaggerated guide that's enabled by default, rather than the traditional shadow below your character there's also a dotted line that extends from you to the ground. I don't think this solves the issue however.

The camera does a lot less automated movement than the average 3D platformer. In Super Mario 64 the developers only had a single analog stick to work with, and were also designing for players new to 3D games entirely, so they made the camera movement largely automatic, keeping it at a good angle behind Mario as he moved, with buttons left only for larger adjustments. Even with the move to dual-analog controllers, most 3D platformers since have largely copied this behavior. Celeste 64 seems to expect the player to do a lot more of this camerawork on their own, which is a decision I can understand sounding good on paper but doesn't really work in this genre. An interesting side-effect of this is that I think a lot of how distance is perceived is through seeing the edges of objects or textures move as the camera moves, and when the camera is at a locked angle even though the player is moving this makes the scene appear flat.

While fixing that problem would go a long way, I think there's also just an inherent issue with the amount of air control expected from Celeste's mechanics when applied to a 3D space. Most 3D platformers give you a lot of control in how you start your jump, but once you're in the air you're mostly just expected to make minor adjustments to ensure you land in the right spot. Completely changing your trajectory in the air and having to use that precisely is a lot more challenging, and even as someone who has played many difficult platformers I think that type of challenge is more awkward than it is fun. It's still probably possible to make a better-controlling game around this idea, with a better camera and level design that keeps this in mind and tries to avoid the awkward situations, but I think this game shows how difficult that would be to make properly.

While I mainly focused on negatives so far, I did have a very nice time with this overall. The play area feels packed with secrets and I was really impressed with the number of B-Sides. The ideas taken from Mario and the way they're implemented is great, I love the inclusion of 64's side-jump, and the short B-Side levels as secrets fit in great with the more open exploration. Like I mentioned at the start the game looks and sounds great, especially so for something put together so quickly. For something that took me under 3 hours to 100% the downsides are easy to overlook, and I had a really fun time with it.

Chalk it up to this being another example of a game that is just so much a part of who I am that it would be fraudulent to not rate it this highly. This is undeniably one of my favorite games of all time. I still have such a blast revisiting it today to experience its incredibly immersive and captivating narrative, with a wonderfully written cast of memorable characters, raw, acerbic dialogue, a beautiful yet grounded world that’s rich in both atmosphere and vibrant attention to detail, complimented by timeless gameplay mechanics and the eclectic, awesome soundtrack. It’s more than evident that the devs at 2k czech (even through the game’s rather notorious fraught development cycle) poured genuine passion into this game and it effortlessly coalesces into a gripping final product that holds up brilliantly even 13 years later. I love the hell out of Mafia 2 and I seriously doubt that my fervent enthusiasm for it is going to waver anytime soon. What a flawed but immensely special gem this game is.

Was I full of shit when I originally gave this game a paltry 3 star rating and I rather glibly dismissed it as being largely boring? I absolutely was. This game is fucking amazing. What few gripes I do have with it are slight because this is seriously one of the most inventive, deeply original, and (for lack of a more apt descriptor) wonderfully weird games that i’ve ever played and I wouldn’t hesitate for a second to call it a masterpiece. The sheer leap in quality from Limbo to this game alone is nothing short of incredible. The levels are equally as tightly wound but far more creative and complex, managing to avoid feeling stiflingly linear while still remaining an incredibly focused and cohesively packaged experience, the mechanics feel weighty and smooth, aided by some fantastic controls and responsive animations, and the game features plenty of interesting and detailed environments that are consistently a treat to explore. The underwater levels are especially wondrous and they add a ton of flavor and tension to individual stretches of the game. From a technical and sensory standpoint the game is equally as outstanding too, sporting rich and captivating art direction, stark and beautiful visual storytelling, and a droning, atmospheric ambient score that’s coupled together brilliantly with the eerie and immersive sound design. All of these elements are just some of Inside’s many sumptuous delights. It also excels in regards to gameplay variety and it never once feels boring or uninspired. Nary a moment goes by here that’s not exciting or memorable in some way or another, the game masterfully blending and balancing platforming and puzzle solving, highly scripted but no less fun pseudo stealth sections, and equal parts engaging and thrilling action set pieces to great effect. The puzzles in particular deserve to be singled out for how surprisingly enjoyable they are. They’re unique, challenging, well wrought, and both immediately rewarding and immensely satisfying to solve, requiring genuine thought and skill from the player but never once feeling obtuse or oblique. The more trial and error driven gameplay segments from Limbo are still very much present here and they too are vastly improved over its predecessor. Not only are they utilized far less frequently throughout (on top of being generally less frustrating to play through due to very merciful checkpoints) but the game is so brilliantly designed and deftly paced otherwise that they are easy to discard as minor hiccups in the grand scheme of things. Bottom line? I had a total blast coming back to this game all these years later and it’s definitely much better than I had remembered it being when I first played it. It was frankly erroneous of me to have taken it for granted. It’s abundantly clear to me now that playdead studios are extremely talented game developers and I’m excited to see what they do next.

I’ve considered myself a fan of the Resident Evil franchise for a few years now and to say that I was ecstatic to have finally played the seminal classic that started it all would be a seismic understatement. Put bluntly? This remake fucking rules. It completely executes everything that it sets out to accomplish and it does so with aplomb, creating an incredibly immersive, deep, atmospheric survival horror experience that had me thoroughly enthralled from beginning to end. Couple that with a solid story that presents you with just enough intrigue to keep you engaged and gameplay that honestly hasn’t aged all that much. If anything i’d argue that the tank controls and the fixed camera system are only a boon to the tone that this game is going for rather than detrimental flaws that detract from it. From the expertly crafted and intrinsically connected level design, the deeply rewarding exploration loop, the puzzles that are simple, well designed, and immensely satisfying to solve, to the beautifully haunting soundtrack from the musical genius Masami Ueda which adds a ton of emotional resonance to the game. It’s all so deftly handled. Add to that the tight inventory mechanics, the resource and item management, coupled with the punishingly limited checkpoints, the frequent sprinkling of frantic combat encounters and set pieces, and you’ve got yourself one hell of a scorching powder keg, making for moment to moment gameplay scenarios that are both palpably intense and positively thrilling. The only aspect of this game that I’m not totally crazy about are the frequent door loading screens. They are incredibly archaic and they have a tendency to bring down the game’s otherwise flawless pacing to a languid halt at points. I also found the boss fights to be somewhat lacking (the final one is especially disappointing when you consider the build up prior to it) despite them being consistently enjoyable to play through. Otherwise though? Resident Evil is pretty much pitch perfect and it’s every bit the unassailable masterpiece that it has been hyped up to be.

I liked Papers Please a whole lot when I finally played it last year for the first time (holy shit does time fly) and I figured that it was only a matter of time until I played this game. I’m glad to declare that it completely lives up to the hype. The sheer level of detail in the storytelling here is nothing less than staggering, Obra Dinn conveying a deeply layered, richly complex, and utterly compelling mystery through a unique narrative structure that only pulled me into this world deeper as it went along. Learning more about this cast of diverse, colorful, and interesting characters is incredibly involving and engaging throughout, combined with the subtle and clever writing which deftly explores a handful of thematic ideas without ever feeling overwhelming or oversimplified. The core mechanics of investigation and puzzle solving are also nailed to perfection here, creating a thoughtful, consistently rewarding, and addictively thrilling gameplay loop. That aforementioned depth (both in regards to its story and its systems) is certainly part and parcel to what makes this game so special (and what elevates it beyond the majority of titles in the detective genre) but even the more surface level sensory elements are fantastic. The presentation and the production values are strong across the board, the art direction is refreshingly original and beautifully atmospheric, the voice acting is fucking outstanding and very believable, and the soundtrack (composed by Lucas Pope himself shockingly enough) is incredibly immersive and it’s always utilized to its maximum effectiveness. This game is an exceptional masterpiece that I would recommend to pretty much every gamer that’s worth their salt without an iota of hesitation. It’s one of the coolest games that i’ve played all year and it begs to be experienced going into it as blind as possible.