fun, janky FPS combat paired with some of the most embarrassing writing ever seen in a video game. two women follow you around who are both SO desperate for your boring actionman fantasyguy dick and never shut up about how cool and sexy you are the entire time. like they're not even characters outside of how badly they want to fuck, it's so overbearing that it's funny. it's on that anime mobile phone horny gacha advertisement shit. i don't think i've ever cared less about the story in a video game, it's the lamest kind of tabletop nerd fantasy, but i don't think anyone who's played this cares about it either. the game's encounter design and the way you, inevitably, end up using the arena's to score environmental kick kills is the core appeal. and it's fun!!!! i like kicking nerds into: pits, oceans, spikes, fire, and more! most of it feels pretty rough, though. movement and regular combat are very clunky and awkward, stairs are a nightmare, and it has some questionable collision at times - but the time you'll spend with your foot up a dude's rear end is good.

played with my wife (and one CPU) over the course of a week for 30 hours and was one of the most emotional experiences i've ever had with a game. we banded together against the CPU guy who, without fucking fail, ALWAYS rolled exactly what he needed to get where he wanted and had ungodly luck - until he was repeatedly sent to Brazil, foot-blistered, purse-cuttered, and killed only to revive back in Brazil. little did my gorgeous partner know, however, that i was only leveraging our mutual hatred of the CPU to get the heat off myself. i became an unstoppable killing machine, i got so rich Dr. Exile meant nothing, only to attain a hollow victory. i did nasty shit. evil shit. she got a cool shield that reflected attacks, i killed her and took it. i'm not proud. i don't love what i learned about myself through this game. i don't love circling around an exit for a week, the bullshit of unlocking the Acrobat and Hero, the way the cpu kept saying 'shazbot' making me cringe every time, or the music in the tower of rabble - but i do love my wife. and i loved the time i spent with her playing this. it was fun :)

it has come to my attention that Astarion is basically a tumblr sexyman who women think is very hot but i'd like to clarify: i am NOT like the other girls. Astarion should NOT be dominant, dangerous, or powerfully sexy. Astarion, to me, isn't a character whose appeal is having a really cut physique and an overwhelmingly domineering presence - he SHOULD be reading Garfield comics in the dentist's waiting room because he forgot to charge his phone the night before, he should be doing sketch comedy that never takes off, he should be saving memes of Spongebob being 'cunty' onto his phone, he should be begging to eat pussy politely, and he should be singing along to broadway musicals in the shower.

complaints about balancing here seem silly since this, to me, perfectly fills the role of an FPS Mario Kart/Party. it's not a very competitive game, it heavily relies on random chance and goofy shit, and that's good!!!!! it's just a fun lil 1v1 (or 2v2) shooter i can play with my wife and i love it for that. it does sorely lack in map variety, and i don't think its dialogue/characters match the charm of its aesthetics, but this is an adorable time with friends or wives.

also the devs could easily fix the dialogue/character issues by adding an opossum girl. then it'd basically be fuckin perfect.

finally - a PS3 gacha game released (here in NA) in 2023! after like an hour of awful tutorials i got into a game with only two connected teammates that ended in an infinite loading screen, when i restarted the game i got banned for 32 hours. one full gacha roll costs thirty-five (35!!!) real-world dollars, somehow. there's like five different currencies and you barely get any of each or know what most do. i got the 4* Moon Gundam and, to fully upgrade it, i would have to wait 72 hours for each upgrade 70 times. it would take me most of a year to upgrade one mobile suit - but you could always use your platinum tickets! i don't have any or know what those are, they probably cost enough to buy at least four real-life HG Moon Gundams. the very simple concept here is great but its kuso-charm isn't enough to warrant giving time to this. like i can play as my darling daughter, the MS-18E Kampfer, but her weapons feel like wet cardboard and the game hates when you try to play it. free my girl from this bitch of a gacha, please.

talking about the fans of a piece of media in your sincere criticism is silly, but with TF2 the social aspect is kind of integral to the overall experience. this isn't completely bad, you will get those fun matches where everyone will just decide not to play the game and do some goofy friendly shit or ones where you start beef with an enemy and focus them as Spy while they cry in chat. there's a theatrical potential here no other online shooter like it has ever come close to capturing, TF2 is a game where anything can happen. unfortunately, a lot of what does happen is getting called slurs. if you're playing this as a woman and even exist online you're gonna get vote-kicked, sexually harassed, and called slurs only remembered by cave-dwelling creatures studying forbidden scrolls from the dark ages. those rare, high moments of fun and comradery are hard to come by and nearly extinct if you're not a guy. instead, those highs and lows will be buried in an endless ocean of mic-spamming, meme-consuming, shower-avoiding, discord-grooming goobers who are more familiar with the ins and outs of reddit posting than with friend-having.

none of the playerbase's problems matter to the core gameplay, of course. it doesn't change how i feel about the actual game itself, just sours my mood with it sometimes. its unkempt, diseased community does sadly reflect the game's current state however. TF2 is a good 'ol Source title released 16 years ago, and while its timeless art-style and characters still hit hard as fuck today, its performance issues, market, UI, bugs, and all-around design definitely don't. this game introduced the world to loot boxes, it plays like the immune system of a child with every disease, and its gameplay is riddled with weird mistakes and design decisions but goddamnit, i still love it. no 'hero shooter' cast feels like it has half the variety TF2's mere 9 classes do. each have their own distinct role on a team, are more endearing than the vast majority of all fictional characters, and (sorta) have a surprising amount of depth and customization. each class has subclasses and an arsenal of alternative options that completely transform how you play. but for every battle engineer and market gardener, there is the jank of TF2's melee and hitregistry with the demoknight and huntsman sniper. so much shit in this game is broken to this day, either in the code (Scout's babyface's blaster) or just in design (the Heavy overall.) most of the maps are bad, new players will be confused and lost enough already with the game's default, outdated settings and UI but seeing them play on an uncurated map playlist is just cruel. the variety in its gameplay, the depth it can have, is enough to push past that sometimes.

i dunno. this game's foundation is cracking and it's not what it used to be, but no other game like it has a character as fun and creative as the Spy.

played this while recovering from a major surgery in a hospital. there's probably like entire underground societies and institutions dedicated to this shit, dudes out there formulating the perfect monkey situations and learning optimal placements on each map. there's gotta be like one guy out there with a balloons tower defense tattoo. to me, it's that game i played while bleeding and dying and watching red letter media videos. i don't wanna know it any more intimately than that. it was like a cast for a broken arm on my brain, bracing the suffocating agony of my white ass away from insufferable boredom and loneliness. for that week, i understood the life of the ipad baby.

this game is awful but don't think for one second that i don't love it. Virtual Hydlide is one of the very first 3D RPGs and it definitely feels like it, everything about the game is rudimentary and ambitious. none of it really works out, from its randomly generated worlds to its stiff combat and its sub-10 framerate, but a lot of it is seriously way ahead of its time. it's not just one of the first 3D RPGs, but one of the first open-world 3D RPGs with random generation and the ability to save anywhere. i do earnestly love its stinky, chunky FMV-aesthetic (the player character just makes me smile) and its corny fantasy score. this game is objectively terrible in basically every way possible, it has some seriously frustrating bullshit in it, but i can't help but admire it. it's so cute!!!!!

Hi-Fi Rush is one of the most exciting releases from a major studio in the last decade, not because of it being shadow-dropped on its reveal, but because it's so FUN. people say being "like a PS2 game" as an insult but this game's got the identity, creativity, and style of the best of that era with modern polish and some of the most gorgeously animated visuals in any video game. it's refreshing, it's the kind of game that you don't really see outside of the indie space anymore - something bold, confident, and unique. it doesn't feel like it was made to be consumed, it feels like it was made to be played and loved. Hi-Fi Rush radiates joy and it makes me do the same. very few video games go this hard, more should.

i've been following SLARPG ever since it was a different, worse project and i'm delighted to report that: it fucking rules and you should absolutely play it. SLARPG is one of the best RPGs i've played in years with some of the most fun characters, great writing, and tunes in a video game. i worry some people will write it off as a meme game or cashgrab targeting queer people but it's absolutely not that. SLARPG has, on top of being a great game in its own right, an incredibly earnest and heartfelt story with characters who's identities aren't played for drama, plot twists, or tragedy. shit's just casual and cool and sweet, it's really refreshing. the over-arching story is pretty simple on its face but it's mostly used as a wacky adventure for the cast to get fleshed out and developed. everyone's got some shit going on and it's the kinda shit that a lot of people are probably gonna go "damn she's like me fr fr" towards. it's also the best type of game - a satisfying 15-20 hour RPG that never gets stale and is only the good parts of a game. a real passion project type of game.

SLARPG is also the first RPGmaker game where i can call it an RPGmaker game and NOT mean it derogatorily. SLARPG's combat is remarkably great, even beyond the standards of its engine. each character has a ton of really creative moves that lead to fun experimentation and "oh, wait!" moments. on top of each character's normal moves, there's the spellbooks - a set of equip-able items that give a second moveset of sick magic to its owner. both of these interact with the star power metre, which fills as you perform your RPG role correctly and gives you access to the character's best special moves. the combat never got boring for me, even into the late game when you inevitably find the best way to kill everything it never feels static or tiring. shoutout to Allison's special move that plays one of the best songs i've ever heard in a video game.

i have two complaints. sometimes dialogue can just go on a bit too long, a few jokes don't land as well because of this (the capitalism comment from Allison at the kids' shop for example) and it can make the pacing a little weird. second, it sucks ass that the reaper spellbook has the 'make healing hurt enemies' spell but you can't even target enemies with healing as Melody. that's really it, though.