(Played on Series X via remaster)

This is the first time I've beaten Arkham City. I got a disc copy for PS3 when it came out in 2011 but my German Shepard puppy (who is now 13 lmao, shout out to Zeus) somehow got the disc out of the console and chewed it up. One whole dog lifetime later, I finally found the time to play through it.

As a disclaimer, I am doing a series playthrough so I didn't do any side content really, just an 8-9 hour mainline through the story. With that said, I liked City roughly as much as Asylum, maybe a tiny bit less. It feels like a one step forward, one step back type thing.

The better: I think the pivot from metroidvania to open zone with some Metroid flavor is a similarly successful pivot to the one the Jedi games made between Fallen Order and Survivor. It's a good evolution. The combat is more fun and has more impact, with thoughtful new tricks that iterate its now-legendary gameplay to solid effect. The story is better and more personal, even if the characters still vary in quality a lot. Better boss fights. Slightly less backtracking than Asylum. The high points here story/game wise are better than the equivalent points in Asylum.

The worse: Something big was lost in the shift from the cohesive, consistent, polished, perfectly paced structure in Asylum to City's downright strange pacing. City tells 70% of its story in 3 hours and then makes you spend another 4-5 hours on the last chunks. it has a tendency to make the story move too fast when it should take its time and then pad things out with enemies/puzzles when you're ready for the game to be over. City has good, real boss fights but it also has a bunch of really flimsy boss encounters that make it seem like Rocksteady ran out of money at the finish line.

Really good, important game -- just maybe shows its age a little bit more than I expected in 2024. As an aside, I played the BioShocks last year and the thing I realized is that PS3/360 era games now totally have a classic games vibe to them. It's so odd.

truthfully, i finished this game weeks ago, and truthfully i still find myself stunned on what to say.

the final stretch of this game is so absolutely magnificent that so much of my gut wants to rate this a 5/5. the final two chapters, and the post credits scene, are beyond stunning. they encapsulate the story beyond measure, leave me full of love and melancholy and feelings so full i don't know what to do with them.

but my brain knows this is not a 5/5. there are some biiiig flaws to this game that i just can't deny. some, if not most, of the new characters feel a little underdone, their stories rushed or cut off or just not as good as i know they could have been with a longer story. the engine's combat is just not for me, there's only so much ragdolling hilarity before i wish enemies would just sit still whilst i crush them LMAO

some bigger feelings i would have towards this game would realm too into spoilers for this review, but all in all, this and yakuza 5 are, to me, the Ultimate Kiryu Kazuma games. they are so good at dissecting him and showing him to be a man so full of flaws, and a man you just want to be happy. he is so beautiful, and after Y6 i think about him a worrying amount. he used to not be in my top5 yakuza characters and now he's battling it out for number 1. he really did it. i love him. he is the reason my heart screams for this to be 5/5 stars!!! kiryu!!!! !! aaaaaaaaaa!!! !!!! !!!

Stray if it was good. This is what happens when you actually stick to a vision instead of blowing your entire budget on Sonymaxxing.

It's a delightful mixture of Untitled Goose Game and Goat Simulator–with a little Breath of the Wild for good measure–wrapped into a delightfully dense, vertical, but manageable open world.

While the controls are a bit janky, it's hard to complain when the game purposefully lacks friction and instead gets by on the strengths of its exploration, tone, and quest design.

Super cute, sometimes funny, and usually pretty wholesome chungus. But this is definitely a game by people who actually understand cats. I remember soyfacing extremely hard when I came across a cucumber, and the cat jumped 16 feet into the air.

It's concise, confident, and a great way to spend an afternoon.

...Well this is awkward. This was such a shoo-in for GOTY for me. It had all the right pieces laid out and a whole bunch of incredible aspects that it seemed like it had in the bag. But.. there is something kind of missing with this game and I think I've finally nailed down what it is.

Obviously, though, let's start with the good. This may appear shorter considering it's an 8/10, but that's because the good things this game has are self-explanatory, even if you haven't played the first. Why yes, this is one of the best-looking games of all time. Why yes, it does have industry-leading sound design and performance capture. Why yes, the story is super intense and emotional and Senua remains one of the best lead characters in video game history. Of course, the soundtrack is really good. A good majority of this game is obviously excellent.

There are even some less obvious things that I honestly like more compared to the average person. For one, I kinda like the fact that it's only around 5-6 hours? For $50? Sure I can understand not thinking it's super worth it. But I honestly like shorter more concise games that don't have that much fluff in it (we'll get to that later). Additionally, the biggest criticism I've seen for the game is its combat. And while I do have some small disappointments for it later, I overall really like it. I like the weightier, more cinematic combat. It makes every sword swing feel deep and heavy in a super satisfying way. I also love the decision to make it only one-on-one fights now as it avoids a problem with the original where sometimes the camera lock-on would be finicky and you'd get stabbed by a random ass guy from offscreen while you're fighting someone else. Here, it's one-on-one with interactions between other enemies being kept to mid-combat events that add a sense of tension to it. These fights are also pretty challenging, especially near the end. There are also a handful of "boss battles", I guess, and these are super cinematic and memorably intense as well.

Overall, this seems like a slam dunk for me. It's the original Hellblade, but bigger, more tense, and with all of the original's strengths turned up to 11. But.. there are 3 things that sort of even it out to where I think I like this game about as much as the original.

First of all, while the combat is excellent, the exploration and puzzles I didn't find all that engaging. I'm not asking for stuff on the level of Viewfinder or Animal Well, but something at least on the level of Inside or Journey, where they're simple but still engaging. This game's puzzles are mostly similar to the ones from the first game which I was getting rather tired of by the time the end of that game rolled around, so I wasn't thrilled that they're back here. They do have torch-lighting puzzles and one particular moment stood out as being kind of interesting, but overall, the adventuring side of the gameplay isn't super strong IMO. Weirdly enough, this is a problem I had with the first hellblade too, I just wish it had been addressed a bit more.

Secondly, while the narrative, overall, remains very strong, I didn't really connect super strongly to most of the new characters introduced for this game. They mostly served as a way to show Senua's growth by having her interact with someone outside of the psychosis voices in her head. And while they do it well, they don't have enough screen time to be all that memorable, and I already forgot the names of some of these characters hours after finishing the game.

And lastly, and this is not something to knock against the game but it's just a personal disappointment, I felt like the game played it a bit.. safe compared to the first game. I was super interested to see what bold new themes it could tackle or how its already-known new themes would translate into gameplay sequences and mechanics similar to the first, but there isn't really much here. It feels like just Senua's Sacrifice but bigger and more, rather than something that could stand alongside its original on its own gameplay-wise. Again, this isn't inherently a bad thing, but considering we were waiting 7 years for this game I do wonder how it will be reflected on. I really hope that Ninja Theory's next game (which apparently was greenlit already) is NOT a new Hellblade game. It's super obviously clear that Ninja Theory is an intensely passionate studio with a whole lot of talent behind it, but I think that we've seen and heard about all we needed to from this story.

Am I glad that we got Hellblade 2? Absolutely. This series is better with this game than without it.

But, if I knew what this game was, would I have asked for a Hellblade 2? I'm not sure.

I know this game is in early access, but it’s nearly complete, and I don’t think its most significant issues will be resolved via player feedback and updates.

It feels like a massive step back from the first game in every metric.

The combat feels sluggish and less responsive, and none of the weapons are enjoyable. Hades I had this rapid ebb and flow to its combat that II lacks. You’re mostly just stunlocking enemies with larger health pools instead of zipping around frantically.

The biomes are less attractive, and some are straight up not enjoyable.

The new progression systems feel poorly thought out and are mainly added to differentiate itself from the first game.

None of the characters are endearing, and many come off like Battleborne versions of the Hades I cast. This was especially jarring because everyone in Hades I—as well as its world and narrative—was immediately captivating.

I think much of this stems from this template getting everything squeezed out of it in the first game. I know why they made a sequel, but I wish Supergiant hadn’t.

I now have two big regrets when it comes to gaming. The first is that I have gone through life having never owned a PlayStation 2, and the second is that I didn’t support and play Tango Gameworks’ Hi-Fi Rush before the studio was unfairly axed by Microsoft in 2024. The year prior was a crazy year in terms of the amount of quality game releases, and it was quite frankly, a tad overwhelming keeping up with them all. Despite all of the praise being given to Hi-Fi Rush, there were just so many other games that were coming out, or games that I wanted to get to, that I just threw it on the backlog thinking that I’d get to it eventually. Unfortunately, 2023 was also a year with a heartbreakingly large amount of game studio closures, and this is something that is continuing in 2024, with Tango Gameworks themselves being a recent victim at the time of writing this review, despite all of the success that Hi-Fi Rush had achieved the year prior. Coincidentally, the game also had gone on sale as part of a Humble Bundle around the same time the studio was shut down, and fellow Backloggd user duhnuhnuh had an extra key for the game that they were offering (huge shoutouts to him by the way, I’m extremely grateful). Given the timing of everything and an opportunity to play the game in a way that doesn’t directly support Microsoft, I leapt at the chance to give this game its due diligence, and I was absolutely floored at how much the game truly lived up to all of the praise people had given it.

Hi-Fi Rush is a rhythm-based action game that takes place in a city in the far future. It stars Chai, a sarcastic and oblivious slacker dude with a disabled arm who really wants to become a rockstar. He volunteers for a cybernetic limb replacement program being run by Vandelay Technologies on their very own campus. Shortly before the process begins, CEO of Vandelay Technologies: Kale Vandelay, a callous CEO stereotype, observes Chai’s records. Unimpressed, he harshly dubs him a loser before he carelessly tosses Chai’s music player away, causing it to fall into the testing site onto Chai’s chest. During the limb replacement process, the music player becomes embedded within Chai, giving him electromagnetic powers while also causing his environment to sync up with the music itself. However, this causes him to be labeled as a defect by Vandelay Technologies, whose security forces attempt to bring him in. As he flees, he meets up and makes a deal with Peppermint, a robotics prodigy with a grudge against the corporation, who helps him escape in exchange for helping her investigate them. Together, the two team up to uncover the shady secrets behind the scenes of Vandely Technologies so that they can expose them to the world and stop their plans from unfolding.

The gameplay is that of a character action game like Devil May Cry and Bayonetta, but with rhythm game elements that supplement the combat and platforming. Before I played the game, I heard a lot of people comparing it to Devil May Cry, but I wrote those comparisons off as an over-exaggeration, since I feel like a lot of people will compare any action game with combat they really like to Devil May Cry. I was delightfully surprised to learn that no, the game really is essentially Devil May Cry, but with rhythm game elements. You can perform a variety of combos that are dependent on the timing of your button presses, you’ve got a stiff yet highly vertical jump, you’ve got short platforming segments to serve as variety in-between the combat, you’ve got a ton of different upgrades and additional combos you can purchase with the game’s currency, and you’re graded on your performance after every battle and level with a letter ranking system.

Everything in the game is tied to the beat of the song that’s currently playing, and I do mean everything. The attacks and movements of your enemies, platforming hazards, sound effects, and even animations in the background are all tied to the music, and the game tests you on your ability to not only perform well while in battle, but doing so while also staying on beat with the music. I did find it a bit difficult to get used to timing my attacks to the beat at first, but I got better and better at it as time went on. I can’t tell you how satisfying it feels when you’re able to successfully perform attacks in sync with the rhythm. Just like in Devil May Cry 5, the music will add additional layers of instrumentation the higher your letter score, and the game will also play the sound of an audience chanting Chai’s name as well. The better you do, the more ecstatic the game feels, and performing really well during a fight can feel genuinely euphoric.

The rhythm game elements don’t stop at syncing your attacks to the beat, however. There are a number of quicktime events where you need to press the correct buttons at the correct timing, such as during certain special attacks Chai can perform. Additionally, when close to death, more powerful enemies and certain bosses can force you into a one-on-one segment where you’ll need to successfully parry or dodge their attacks, which are telegraphed to a series of specific beats that you need to replicate with your button presses, and successfully doing so allows you to finish them off with one final strike. As someone who is a big fan of character action games, it’s extremely surprising how fresh and satisfying adding rhythm elements to this genre’s gameplay makes the game as a whole feel. This melding of the genres works fantastically. There is a great sense of cohesion between the two, and for the most part, elements of one genre don’t overshadow the other.

There’s only one element of combat that I have some small issues with. As the game progresses, you will meet additional characters who become allies that you can call upon during combat to aid you in battle. They’ll perform a special attack that has a cooldown once it’s executed. Your allies become a pretty key part of combat, as these special attacks are needed in order to make certain enemies or bosses vulnerable. The issue is how inconsistently your allies’ attacks function. You can’t manually target enemies, so when you call on your allies to use their attack, they can sometimes use it on the wrong enemy, or they’ll miss entirely. If this happens, then you’ve just wasted that summon and you now have to wait for the cooldown to finish before you can summon your ally to attack again. This was especially annoying with Macaron, who needs to use his ability twice in order to break the shields of certain enemies, and whose cooldown takes twice as long compared to your other allies. If he misses or targets the wrong enemy, then you’re basically a sitting duck until his ability recharges, which can be very frustrating. You can purchase some upgrades to make the cooldown slightly better, but they do cost a lot of currency, currency I’d rather spend on other things that can enhance the gameplay experience for myself, like additional combos I can perform, or items that increase my health or special attack gauge.

The game’s tone is very playful, upbeat, and fun, complimented by a gorgeously colorful artstyle that’s inspired by a combination of western and eastern comic books/manga. It tells a story that is a not at all discreet criticism regarding how the leaders of corporations frequently interfere with, mismanage, and ruin the lives of those who work under them. It also goes into demonstrating how much this hurts when the job is something that people have aspired to do for much of their lives, and are very passionate about. The story is extremely straightforward, but you can tell it’s one that comes from very real experiences that I’m sure the folks that have worked on the game have gone through, and considering what ended up happening with Tango Gameworks, it’s a story that resonates now more than ever.

The characters are decent, they serve the story well enough. I will say I’m not the biggest fan of Chai, but he did eventually grow on me. He’s a huge dork who’s very self-serving, unmotivated, and oblivious to those around him. He does get better as he starts to take the situation at hand more and more seriously and comes to care more about the people he meets and works with to take down Vandaley, though his ego remains pretty big still by the end of the game. He’s not at all a bad character or protagonist, he’s just a little too white bread for my tastes. The other characters don’t get much of a focus during the game’s main story, but talking to them in-between missions at the hideout allows you to learn more about them and how they feel about the unfolding events of the narrative. I think I might’ve developed a stronger attachment to them if they had a larger presence in the main plot, but this is still a fine and fun cast of characters.

While I personally would’ve preferred the tone be a bit less playful and to have had a little more edge to it, like the old school Guitar Hero games or Brutal Legend, I feel that would’ve made the game somewhat of a harder sell, not just to general audiences but to get approval to make the game in the first place. The exaggerated, Saturday morning cartoon-esque personalities of the game’s characters (the villains in particular), really manage to offset how personal, and in a way, sad the message that’s being communicated under the surface is. The villain Zanzo in particular is an excellent demonstration of this. His manically over-the-top demeanor and constant Jojo posing, to a certain degree, masks the very real, outrageous, and constant demands the person in charge of a team may have, and how their ego can get in the way of seeing the project to completion, making the efforts of the overworked people underneath them all for naught. The game’s current tone isn’t at all a bad one either. I can see some folks not jiving with the comedy, and I can also see certain people writing it off as “reddit humor”, but even if the game didn’t necessarily make me laugh out loud, I still found it to be endearing.

I’ve really enjoyed the rhythm games I’ve played, but I don’t play too many of them because the vast majority of them don’t appeal to my taste in music, so I’m really glad this game exists. I played the game with its original soundtrack instead of the licensed music (in case I decide to one day stop being a coward and start making YouTube videos), and I gotta say, it was pretty fantastic. I’m more of a metalhead than a rock guy, but this game’s music is still really good. The soundtrack has a lotta groovy riffs and decent solos that are never tiresome or boring to listen to.

Hi-Fi Rush was truly a surprise for me. I went into this without much in terms of expectations, but its fluid and immensely satisfying combat and complete banger of a soundtrack kept me hooked the entire time. I’m heavily debating doing a quick second playthrough of the game even though I’ve finished it because I was just that hooked and enamored by its gameplay. If the game had a different tone and a heavier soundtrack, I genuinely think it would’ve ended up being my dream video game, but even as it currently stands, it’s a brand new favorite of mine. The irony of a game condemning the actions of corporate dickheads becoming a massive success while the studio that made it gets shut down a year after it launches is honestly extremely tragic. It’s not like my $30 was the $30 that would’ve kept Tango Gameworks from shutting down, but I still feel really bad after finally playing this game that I didn’t purchase it and support Tango while they still existed. If you haven’t played Hi-Fi Rush, I implore you to, and I also implore you to learn from my mistake and actually support those games that don’t get AAA marketing, yet gain an outstanding reputation via word of mouth. Don’t just put them on your wishlist forever and wait. I can’t stress enough how much we need more games like Hi-Fi Rush, and if we don’t make our voices heard with our wallets, we hurt the chances of these games being made in the future.

Forever and always: Fuck You, Microsoft.

If the stars could fuck would they choose to be a man and a woman?

Explore'em Up type game with a heavy emphasis on combat, specifically with enemy encounters and fight design. Fighting enemies plays like a chimera-fusion of turn-based RPG and rhythm fighting game and fortunately it's sick nasty. Fights are real scrap it out brawls.

It doesn't take long to get into the groove of encountering a new enemy and trying to put your hands on them and the animation and effects work really sell the spectacle, making it feel like one of them playable stick figure fight animations you'd see online. It's a bit hard to sell the creativity of attacks and telegraphs without seeing it yourself so just trust when I say if you got an appreciation for stylish 2d fighting you'll find yourself well treated on that front mechanically and artistically.

Which is why it's a bit of a letdown that the other half of it is just ok. Exploration and progression are pretty linear but also don't deliver any surprises. It tries it's hardest to make it interesting but it's just not enough. A biome will have little swings you have to use to get across pools of water that kill you, and one zone has boost pads that you have to actively platform your way with which was actually pretty fun, but everything else is pretty bland. especially since every zone only really changes by what fights are in it and the color it mainly consists of. The art in this game is pretty impressive for how little it uses to effectively communicate animations and flourishes and it's got plenty of Juice but the art is pretty double-edged when every zone is consisting of shapes that are not very distinguishable from each other.

Exploration was likely not a focus, from what I can observe from the design of the game (might even call it a metroidvania-lite). It's mainly about giving you a window of down-time from fight to fight accompanied by some well composed but forgettable music. Depending on your view this can either be a let-down or a key part of the experience.

Part of me wishes I could just go from encounter to encounter without the fluff of having to slowly waddle from point to point wishing I had something more interesting to do. But I also see from a design and pacing perspective why these exist and might even be necessary. I enjoy the fighting alot however so it's likely just an issue on my part.

There's a story that is barely told to you. It definitely exists but it's neither an enhancing or debilitating aspect. Something about stars and a war and finding balance which sounds nice but I can assure you there isn't much to even reach for.

Game's great if you know what you're throwing yourself into and I cannot stress enough that the end-game fights are real bangers. But I struggle to see myself revisiting this game for anything beyond the Boss Rush mode and my favorite encounters.

Shout-outs to warrior women and punch guys.

After doing four full playthroughs at over 60 hours, I think I've seen enough of this game to give my (contradicting) thoughts.

Like many others, I was looking forward to this back when it was revealed as Project Eve. Also like many others, I became viciously irritated when the coomers decided to make this game their personality (I don't mind sexy characters, what I really disliked was how weird people acted over Eve). I'm not interested in that trash, I'm all about the gameplay.

What I do take legitimate issue with was how the game was marketed as being like Bayonetta and Nier: Automata. I was hoping for a fast paced Platinum-styled action game but the combat is much weightier and more deliberate than I hoped. It's been compared to the Souls series, but I disagree to an extent (level design is very much Souls-y, the combat is much closer to Sekiro). Obviously it can be learned since the game is designed around this combat system, but I can't help but feel slightly frustrated when I try to instinctively cancel a recovery animation (I found it easier to pull this off by avoiding most combo enders unless an enemy was stunned). Thankfully there are accessories you can equip that make the combat much closer to a proper action game (my main build used three attack speed up gears + the exospine that made it easier to parry and dodge + def and shield boosts), and when you get into the rhythm of the combat it becomes pretty damn exciting. The boss fights are where the game shines, while they don't quite reach the peaks of Sekiro's roster (then again not much does), they're definitely some of my favorite bosses in the current console generation (I do few the endgame bosses could be SLIGHTLY nerfed. Hopefully the upcoming boss challenge update will let us fight any boss at any time, being able to practice them would go a long way).

The story has been criticized as being too derivative of Nier: A, and I don't disagree but I found it serviceable enough. The true ending does break into its own path and I hope a sequel builds upon this to make something super interesting and cool. The flavor text on the collectibles does a decent amount to make the world more fleshed out, and I think the story/lore is better here.

Side quests are pretty standard for the genre, ranging from fetch quests to outright hidden bosses. They're worth doing at least twice (once on NG and NG+) to get all the possible rewards, which brings me to another highlight.

The myriad of costumes is pretty great and there are a variety of cool outfits for Eve (and I don't just mean the super revealing ones). You can also unlock a barber shop where you can change her hairstyle and hair color, honestly playing dress up is half the fun in this game.

Platforming is another weak point of the game, the momentum and physics make certain jumps really finicky. A few moments in the endgame were genuinely awful designed (the Gears of War turrents section almost killed my first playthrough, thankfully if you drop on easy mode you only need to deal with one. I don't care if it's cheese, I refuse to play it any other way).

Still, in spite of the flaws I can't deny that I had tons of fun. I'd do yet another playthrough if I wasn't itching to clean up my backlog (I got Horizon Zero Dawn on my list next, I wanna get to it so I can make room on my PS5). I suppose this is my GOTY by default so far since it's the only 2024 release I've played so far (my copies of Infinite Wealth, P3R, and FF Rebirth are glaring at me). I hope Shift-Up learns from the mistakes made here and makes their next game an even bigger banger.

9/10

A worthwhile sequel to Valfaris. Switches format from "Contra but a bit more manageable and with checkpoints" to "side scrolling shmup but a bit more manageable and with checkpoints." Shorter, easier game than the original and fun overall, though it has the same issues as the first game where the levels can sometimes drag a bit.

Gorgeous game, similar biomechanical/heavy metal/stop motion style as the first but with in a 3D space this time. On the whole I generally liked this -- a fun action game with cool twists on established shooter action. Bosses were pretty slick.

However, I found it more frustrating than original Valfaris in some ways. Some of the enemies/patterns felt cheap given that they can shoot from offscreen (or at least the millisecond they get on screen) and I felt my character needed a small invincibility window after getting hit. The weapons were mostly cool, though I stuck to the first weapons I got for almost the whole thing.

I don't know. I got it for like $1.50 in a Fanatical bundle, I beat it, I liked it!

Significant step up in basically every way. Less time is wasted on tedious chores and the longer combat gauntlets near the end didn't tire me out nearly as much as they did in the first two titles.
The only major complaint I have is that the alternate weapons don't have much of an identity of their own. 3 of the 4 weapons use chains to extend their reach, and while their mechanics differ, they don't feel like they're wholly their own.
Luckily for me, this time the returning enemies have been tailored to not pose as big an annoyance while still putting up the same challenge they presented in 1 and 2.

If the first two games didn't sell you, mechanically, then you should still seriously give God of War 3 a shot. It's the first time I had fun the whole way through one of these games.