bro we could have had a cute witch girl as the taito mascot before she got replaced by two doofy-looking dinosaurs?!?!? I love bub and bob as much as the next guy but we've been robbed here

The game itself is a charming lil single-screen arcade game. Definitely more puzzle-platformy than the action-platformy type beats that bubble bobble would go on to have. Instead of directly attacking enemies, you turn them into cakes and can only defeat enemies by either pushing their cake form off an edge or by blasting them several times while they are still in cake form. The latter half of the game gets especially difficult as there are tons of trick levels where if you go about blasting things willy-nilly you can and WILL get yourself stuck until the hurry-up-or-you-die enemy shows up and kills you, and that's a way worse way to go than just dying outright. The game likes to play with its own very strange-yet-consistent hitboxes and jump arcs so you can definitely take advantage of cheesing levels by shooting through walls and floors you probably aren't supposed to. There are 101 stages which makes the game kind of an endurance test, and the game DOES pull some bullshit by letting you continue on any level except the last 3 so if you want to actually clear this either get ready to memorize the proper way to clear each level or just use save states like the rest of our sane modern society. The level design is pretty hit-or-miss but dangit i liked the vibes so I can't say it was all bad. bring ptolemy back taito you COWARDS

(CLAP, CLAP!) SHIP REVIEW!
Since there's two characters in Bayonetta 3, you get two different jokes. Hallelujah. This game is what I like to call the “Seven Sirens Syndrome” (a term coined by the wonderful @yuzrnaime).

…Bayonetta 3. What. In the absolute FUCK was pre-release period for this game??? Bayonetta 3 was announced at the nigh end of 2017, and while the trailer looked intriguing (most notably with Bayonetta straight up dying in the trailer, too), we didn't see any gameplay for over 4 years, only getting held over with the “Oh, don't worry, it's not canceled frfr”. And then out of nowhere, in September of 2021, we FINALLY got the first trailer, and yeah, I was pretty hyped. Time passed, Hellena Taylor hurled accusations at Platinum Games, no more Hellena Taylor, boycott Bayonetta 3 because she was underpaid, oh wait, she lied, revenge-buy Bayonetta 3. Oh, wait, THAT WAS A MISTAKE, TOO. This game's prerelease was a disaster, and that summarizes most of my thoughts on Bayonetta 3, unfortunately. You can tell that this game went through an extremely troubled development. For a game which took 5 years, it feels very... off-putting. Not bad, of course, it's still a Platinum Games title at the end of the day, but something just doesn't click with me that Bayonetta 1 and 2 did. But, with that being said, it's time to discuss why Bayonetta 3 is easily the weakest title in the series. Frequent rant warning, folks. This one’s gonna be a bumpy ride...

Right off the bat, Bayonetta 3 starts AMAZINGLY, much like the previous games. While it’s not as action packed, it leaves a surprisingly lasting impression that’s actually somewhat emotional. In the first battle, Bayonetta is doing her stereotypical Bayonetta thing. Fighting and fighting, until the bitter end against a dark entity, but UNLIKE usual, she’s eating straight ass. It’s a great contrast between the hyper action packed intros of before, as it has that action, but it’s definitely neutered compared to before. Fitting the tone, Bayonetta straight up DIES. Like, flat-out, shattered into the red orbs of Devil May Cry. Hey, point the gun away from your head, I want to hear Platinum out first, for as much as I can in this genuine shit show. Cut to Sigurd, some random soldier who I presume is close to Viola, a Saints Row 2022 looking-ass character, where Bayonetta’s… something is absorbed into Viola. The entity kills Sigurd off too, leaving Viola alone. With that, Viola retreats into… fucking Manhattan??? Hey, my dad grew up in New York, so I appreciate the shout out, but the city, alongside a girl who looks ODDLY like Cereza, and a guy who sounds AWFULLY like Enzo, are all completely fine, and that’s when I realized, that combined with the monologe about branching paths in the intro, that Bayonetta 3 is a fucking multiverse story. A MULTIVERSE STORY in BAYONETTA. Shit, man. Bayonetta 1 and 2 never had the greatest story to begin with (hence why I barely talked about them), so I’m flabbergasted as to why they even attempted this in the third entry, no less. But hey, let’s hold our “Shit Within”. Maybe it’ll actually be good? NOPE!!! Okay, so Cereza (we’ll call her that for the time being), and… Eggman, alongside… Rodin (i don’t have a good name sorry)??? are all New Yorker-ized, just your average day. But of course, this is a Bayonetta game, so shit gets WACKY! Rodin notices a storm approaching, and Cereza activates her Spider Within to hear someone calling for help. She says something about… a destined time and date to Eggman, as they arrive at a cruise ship dock. Cereza, being Cereza, dresses up for the occasion, and god. I can’t help but notice already.

These graphics are so disappointing, man. I’m gonna go out on a limb and say that even Bayonetta 1 looked better; hell, at least it had a consistent style from beginning to end. Bayonetta 2 followed suit, being extremely colorful with incredibly detailed environments, and made one of the best looking Wii U and Nintendo Switch games. 3 looks rather rough in comparison. It’s not ugly per-se, but it’s far below the quality of other Nintendo-produced (or at the very least ASSISTED) games on the Nintendo Switch. Shit, if you squint enough, it looks like Sonic Frontiers on Switch. The first 2 Bayonettas look great, and still do to this day, but 3 looks and feels a lot worse to play. The frame pacing in cutscenes is rather nauseating, the shadows look off on the characters, and overall, I’d say that the models fall far below the quality of Bayonetta 2’s. Not to mention, the really bad frame drops on Switch. I played on Yuzu as I’ve previously said, but I’ve heard horror stories about Bayonetta 3 on Switch. A shame, really. Because we have so many great looking games on Switch, some even coming from Platinum themselves. Astral Chain, Metroid Prime Remastered, Super Mario Odyssey, Luigi’s Mansion 3, Smash Ultimate, some of the best looking Switch games, with most having rock solid performance too. Hell, Bayonetta 3 is one of those Switch games that run at a sub-720p resolution in handheld mode and it looks REALLY fucking rough. I don’t understand why so many Switch games run at sub-720 in handheld mode when they support well above that in Docked Mode. That’s a leg up on Bayonetta 1 and 2 being locked to 720p Docked on Switch, but those games were also 720p on Handheld, the way it should be. You lose an incredible amount of visual clarity without it as the Switch is a decently sized display, and on Handheld, it just looks awful. And seeing Bayonetta 3 still struggle to run on real hardware with THESE kinds of visuals, noticeable pop-in in tow, is quite disappointing to me. Hell, emulators still struggle to maintain a solid FPS with it. Once again, I played on an emulator (using Ryujinx this time, Yuzu kept crashing), and while 2 maintained a solid FPS throughout, Bayonetta 3 was LAG CENTRAL. Hell, it stopped working at a certain point (I needed to enable Vulkan + Texture compression). Nintendo really needs to step up their hardware, because when it’s hurting such a high profile release, it’s very sad to see. But, gripes aside, back to the story.

Viola quite literally falls on Enzo, demanding to see Bayonetta once mor- SUDDENLY, FLOOD! How in the FUCK did nobody notice it until now? What, did Flood Watches not exist in this tim- SUDDENLY, RODIN! Comes up and smacks the ever loving fuck out of the demon who made the flood occur. Bayonetta rides the cruise ship on top of the flood, and you know the drill by now. Bayonetta dances her way through the enemies, clothes get cut, BAYONETTA COMBAT TIME!!! Oh, and Moonlight Serenade. Not as good as Fly Me To The Moon or Moon River, but I still really like it.

Bayonetta 3’s combat mechanics are… solid. At least, in theory. As said nearly a hundred times over at this point, Bayonetta 3 returns with the delay based combos, present in Bayonetta 2, 1, and Devil May Cry. Weapons return from Bayonetta 2, but the Umbran Climax has been reworked into a “Demon Slave” mechanic, summoned by the power of the left trigger. Bayonetta 2’s Umbran Climax was fun, but incredibly overpowered. Bayonetta received a constant stream of health, with her attacks all being turned into devastating Wicked Weaves. In Bayonetta 3, the strength element remains, but leaves Bayonetta vulnerable as the demon only stays out as she dances, while the monster attacks for Bayonetta. Hence the term, Demon Slave. I appreciate the added combat strategy, as Umbran Climax was far lacking in that, but Demon Slave is a bit more skill based, akin to V from DMCV, I felt rather disconnected from combat when I used it. It’s theoretically a little better than Bayonetta 2’s Umbran Climax, but… it still doesn’t feel all that great. If anything, I kind of preferred 2’s because you always felt like the badass slaying all of the monsters. Instead, you get a demon to do the dirty work? Lame! And that also somehow makes Bayonetta 3 BY FAR the easiest in the franchise. I barely died, outside of challenges and the like. It’s SUPER fucking easy, and I played on Hard Mode on my first playthrough, too. Bayonetta 3’s enemies are woefully pathetic. Even on Hard mode, they were shockingly slow and easy to kill. No longer do they resist you like Bayonetta 2, you can wail on them to your heart’s content, and by god, these designs just flat out suck. They all blend in, all being built on the same, boring, robotic designs. Additionally, they removed the item caps from the shop, a dumb as hell move on the developer’s part. And since, like Bayonetta 2, there are no punishments for using items, you can haul absolute ASS in this game. At least Bayonetta 2 tried to limit your items, and while that didn't solve the issue with items and scoring, it still felt well balanced. But with the currency divided between upgrades, costumes, and items in Bayonetta 3 (an idea that’s not bad on paper), items are of little risk to buy since your upgrades don’t suffer from it. Item prices needed to be tuned all the way up, or the items had to be severely nerfed for this to be a good change. Bayonetta 1 and 2’s currency forced you to understand the game’s combat in order to get more skills. If you were good at the game, the Concoction Menu still let you get items for free; hell, I bet some of you never even knew Concoction existed until now. Buying items directly takes away from your currency in which you buy even better techniques from. In Bayonetta 3, this fact is of no issue. I bought 20 goddamn MEGA herbs at the end of the SECOND mission, and still had a lot more money to spare. THAT alone proves how easy Bayonetta 3 is. Want 8 Hot Shots for practically nothing? There you go, you’re practically immortal, now! Because of this, I was basically on autopilot for the entire journey, because the game is so easy to break. Big hit? Oh, just use my 9 million Herbs that I have! Hard Mode, my ass. What we need is a “Witch Must Die” mode or something, as the Bayonetta series gets disappointingly easier with each game. As it stands, Bayonetta 3 is easily a contender for my least favorite in the series for this fact alone. Sure, Bayonetta was a pretty brutal game, and Bayonetta 2 had issues with scoring, but it always put up a good fight. Bayonetta 3, once again, fails to live to the standards of 1 and 2, by being one of the easiest games ever released. You could argue that Bayonetta 3 is meant to introduce newcomers I guess, but even then, Bayonetta 2 did a better job at that. This leaves Bayonetta 3 unengaging for a large majority of it's runtime, and it unfortunately only gets worse from here on out.

Although the Demon Slave has several fatal flaws, to give Bayonetta 3 a genuine compliment, they do something kind of cool with this, where your demons are linked to the weapon you use. Neat shit. It’s a bit more limiting than Bayonetta 2, as you had hands and foot slots, but I’ll… allow it to slide. JUST this once. The weapons themselves are as solid as Bayonetta 2’s, in my eyes, although the variety isn’t as strong. My personal favorite was the yoyos, which provide an excellent balance between close-quarters and mid-ranged attacks. I usually never used the big club, which did great damage but was slow as fuck, because unless you made Devil May Cry 5, it’s usually not my favorite pick for an action game weapon. But the rest are fun, and I did like experimenting with them. And, oh yeah. Torture attacks are now gone too, now you just press 2 buttons, and bam. It's better flowing, but it still feels… so unlike Bayonetta. I don’t know how to say i- SUDDENLY, JEANS! Sporting a more hippie attire, she fights with Bayonetta against this large, tentacle monster thingy, before promptly getting eaten alive by some Penis Flytrap. Damn, is this fucking Endgame? They’re killing everyone like it’s nothing! Oh, nevermind, Jeans is saved by Madame Butterf- SUDDENLY, GIANT FISH? Before getting smacked by a massive building, never to be seen again. What was the point of that??? Anyways, after the massive flood, Cereza, Eggman, Jeans, and Rodin retreat to The Gates of Hell to watch the news, or something. Yeah, Eggman straight up LOST his entire family in that flood. Anyways, Viola introduces the entire multiverse structure, they can't manually control it but they go to Thule where all of the universes lie... IDK. I was already tuned out, man. Anyways, soon enough, Variant Bayonetta in this universe, she’s a super high tech yoyo spider wield- aaaand she dies anyways. Cool. Cut to one of the worst minigames in the entire series, then, the Monster Fighting Game. I don’t know how they made a fighting game character with slower attacks than Ganondorf, but hey, you do you. Then cut to THE worst mini game in the series... FUCKING. KHAKI. JEANS.

Yes, in Bayonetta 3, there are fucking 2D STEALTH MISSIONS. Bayonetta, you sure are one mysterious destiny. Nope, we can’t make her playable in the mainline story, eat shit, Jeanne. All you do is walk around, one shot everything, bam, move on with your life while you do... stuff. Are these supposed to be funny or something? It’s not funny enough to warrant FOUR ENTIRE CHAPTERS to this braindead nonsense. It’s SO boring and tedious, that this is where I started to lose all hope for Bayonetta 3 EVER being better than 1 and 2. And unfortunately, Bayonetta 3 never gets better from those very lofty heights.

Because eventually, you have to play as Viola... and this is. Fine. Not bad, not great, just. Okay. Okay, so unlike Bayonetta, she wields a Katana, and only has one Demon Slave, Chesire, who automatically attacks alongside Viola. Okay... not really that different than Bayonett- WHAT IN THE FUCK IS HER WITCH TIME??? She has to PARRY attacks, which REALLY fucks with my muscle memory, and her combo game is bland. Unlike Bayonetta, who actually has fun mechanics, even in 3, Viola genuinely has NO SAUCE. No fun combo game, no other abilities, nothing! She’s so lame, man. She’s not different enough to warrant a whole ass character, and her playstyle is even worse than Bayonetta’s. Because of this, Viola is easily one of the worst characters in action game history. She’s so MID. Fuck, man. Each time I played as her, I let out a giant, massive SIGH, man. And BTW, she’s so FUCKING annoying. “my name is v-i-o-l-a VIOLA!!!!” Shut UP, man.

And, of course this wouldn't be a Bayonetta 3 review without mentioning the godawful story and ending. Oh my god, that fucking ending, man. It's so BAD. Okay, so after Jeanne dies (LMFAOOOOOO), Bayonetta fights Singularity, but out of fucking NOWHERE, is assisted by all of the Bayonettas from across the multiverse… before including two different Bayonettas... from BAYONETTA 1 and 2... and then Bayonetta 1 and 2 merge with 3- what the fuck??? Did Umbran Witches have this ability all along? And then Bayonetta 3 (the third incarnation of Bayonetta) dies after the fight with Singularity because she exhausted her strength (Persona 3, much?)so now all Bayonettas are dead, but then Luka... hugs Bayonetta... oh, Christ almighty... they both die... that’s it??? WHAT IN THE FUCK WAS THAT?!?!? Okay, first of all, the elephant in the room. Bayonetta’s sexuality. Folks, I know that Bayonetta was hailed as our Lesbian Queen prior to Bayonetta 3, where she flirted with Jeanne, LIVED TOGETHER with he- what the fuck??? You’re telling me after Bayonetta 2, after Bayonetta quite LITERALLY went to HELL and BACK just to save her that they’re just good FRIENDS??? Okay, I guess they never had an active relationship on screen, I guess, and I was mostly pissing around with the “lesbianism” jokes of the earlier reviews. But the same could be as equally said for LUKA, and before you say I’m bi-phobic or some shit (cough cough Gayming), hear me out, as a bisexual myself. First of all, I don’t object to Bayonetta having a heterosexual relationship, but what I DO object to is Luka’s lack of character development. WHO in the Story department put this fucking JIZZER with Bayonetta??? In Bayonetta 1 and 2, they never went past teasing, but Bayonetta did that with EVERYBODY. Luka made an ass out of himself because he WANTED that ass, but Bayonetta never felt the same way! That was the joke! Like Amy and Sonic, it was played off as a simple joke. But you're telling me that it's Knuckles and Rouge now? Bitch, please! They have borderline NO chemistry throughout the entire game. If Bayonetta and Luka were going to “Hit The Climax!”, let's say, then their relationship needed to matter a WHOLE lot more throughout the game. Better yet, why doesn't Viola chat with her Mother before she's banished to Inferno. No??? SHE JUST SITS THERE WATCHING ON??? OKAY!

Thirdly, this presents a fatal flaw in how Viola even EXISTS to begin with. Okay, so let's say, hypothetically, Bayonetta and Luka... fucked. Okay, that's one thing. But that presents a major problem. WHO'S VARIANTS ARE VIOLA’S PARENTS??? It CAN'T be the Luka we see; otherwise, why would Bayonetta 3 accept a kiss from a complete STRANGER? And, either way, if Bayonetta 3 was the mother of Viola, she would certainly recognize her own child in the prologue, no??? If in the grand scheme of things, Luka and Bayonetta were destined to be, and Luka and Bayonetta are destined to give birth to Viola (which isn’t even true based on the variant Bayonettas being seen without Luka), then where are Viola’s variants??? I’d doubt that Luka himself would be able to time travel, fucking everybody in the neighborhood, my guy just followed Bayonetta! Yeah, if you couldn't tell, THIS STORY FUCKING SUCKS. And I'm not done just yet, finally, WHERE DID THE OTHER TWO BAYONETTAS COME FROM? I can buy that variants exist in a multiverse story, believe me. Spiderverse 2 is amongst my favorite movies of all time. But isn't this the fated day where Singularity wins? You mean to tell me that Bayonetta 1 and 2 were two different timelines? THAT'S BULLSHIT. Bayonetta 2 takes place a few months after the first one. You mean to tell me that (the character) Bayonetta 1 time traveled a few months back only for Singularity to fuck shit up during that time? You mean to tell me Bayonetta 3 is a completely separate entity from the other Bayonettas? Sure, Bayonetta has done time travel before, but hasn't broken its own rules to such an extent. Maybe this has something to do with Bayonetta: Bloody Fate, but THAT’S an adaptation, NOT a different story line. Sure, in Bayonetta 1, Bayonetta did help Cereza go back to her own timeline, which was referenced in Bayonetta 2, but that was a ONE. TIME. OCCURRENCE! This is amongst the most PRETENTIOUS stories that I've ever seen in GAMING, with its head stuck up its own ass for most of the runtime. It GENUINELY pisses me off that they decide to kill off Bayonetta AND Jeanne, two INCREDIBLY PREVALENT CHARACTERS IN THE SERIES with ZERO payoff, nor EMOTION to this scene. Nobody gains ANYTHING from it, there’s no character arc completion, no shocking character revelations, NOTHING. Bayonetta dies, Viola cries, GET FUCKED. Well for one exception. Viola is Bayonetta now, hooray, and good lord, the franchise’s story is now ultimately fucked for what it's worth. This story is a crowning achievement of bullshittery that happens once in a few millennia. Bayonetta 1 and 2’s story were not impressive, yes, but Bayonetta 3 takes it to an astronomical level of pure awfulness that not even die-hard Bayonetta fans can appreciate for its absurdity. Just... WHY A MULTIVERSE STORY? It’s SO hard to get right, and when Bayonetta 1 and 2 weren’t great stories by any means, you’re only asking for the bitter disappointment of fans, and thats what fans got! We waited 8 YEARS, just for this. Bayonetta 3 is genuinely one of the worst stories that I’ve EVER SEEN. It’s ABYSMAL. They never do ANYTHING fun with fthe Multiverse setup. Outside of the first cutscene, there’s nothing interesting or intriguing about the world. Bayonetta and company just go through the motions because they’re the main characters in the Video game called Bayonetta 3 for the Nintendo Switch, released on October 28th, 2022, available for $59.99 MSRP. They don't give a fuck, clearly. Why should I? The only time I smiled at the concept was with the pseudo-rhythm game near the end of Chapter 12, but other than that, Bayonetta 3 humor rolls straight ones throughout its painfully short runtime. Who the FUCK cares about all of these different Bayonettas dying when we’ve only seen them for FIVE. SECONDS!!! There’s no payoff, no emotional impact, NOTHING AT ALL. “Ohhhhh, but they come into the final battle for like 3 seconds,” NEAT SHIT!!! And even if there was, we already KNOW what’s going to happen to all of them, because they all died ON SCREEN consistently. They NEVER do anything clever with this setup, maybe save for Bayonetta 3 nearly dying, but that’s supposed to happen. After all, the game is called Bayonetta 3! Not “Viola”, or “Rodin”! And, even then, if ANYBODY in the world cares about all these variants dying, I’ll be DAMNED if it was Bayonetta 3 (the character). She never goes, “Oh shit, with all of these other Bayonettas dying, I might be next!!!” She never runs in and tries to save the others, does she do ANYTHING of value? NO! She just carries along, lets the Bayonetta die, not even reflecting on any of the Bayonettas, when the first one she saw, got torn in TWO RIGHT, IN FRONT OF HER EYES! I don’t know how you go to HELL AND BACK to save your BEST FRIEND/LOVER (IN MY HEART), but lack ANY SORT OF EMPATHY, NOR THE BALLS TO SAVE THE OTHER UMBRAN WITCHES. Oh, what did Bayonetta do before, for the record? Defeat OTHER, stronger Umbran Witches and Lumen Sages, and beat Aesir and Jubelius’s, giant, GODDESS ASS! Is she fucking scared or something??? How did she fend for her own reality all this time??? It’s DUMB! It’s simply. DUMB. This story is fucking stupid, simple as that. Do yourself a favor, press Plus, Up, A whenever a cutscene pops up. It’s so awful and not worth subscribing to. Avoid it like the plague. It accomplishes absolutely NOTHING through it's 9 hour runtime, probably fucks up the future Bayonetta stories, too, and it just flat out fucking sucks overall. It's truly THAT BAD. Actually, back to that comment of “probably fucks up the future Bayonetta stories, too”, apparently, Hideki Kamiya, one of the founding fathers of the Umbran Witch, wanted to make nine entries in the Bayonetta series overall, but… uh oh! Kamiya left Platinum Games in September of 2023. So… yikes. Platinum Games got dealt the worst cards here. I really hope that with the release of future Bayonetta games, that they greatly improve the story. Apparently, Bayonetta Origins has a much improved narrative, but I haven't played it, so all that I can say is that we'll see. But now, it's time for the conclusion.

And folks, that story simply set me over the edge. I’ve never rated a game lower for its story alone, but call me petty, because Bayonetta 3 cleared that bar of absolute TERRIBLENESS, enough for me to rate it a 5/10, when the BARE MINIMUM was shattered. I didn’t care about the stories of Bayonetta 1 and 2, but if anything should be said about Bayonetta 3’s abysmal story, it's that it’s a one of a kind, absolutely nonsensical story that actually made me give a shit about how bad it was. But hey, if you skip the cutscenes, the game is like a 6/10 dw :). But, seriously, Bayonetta 3 is the low point of the franchise. Do I even need to say anything more at this point? I’ve already bitched about the story for several Google Doc pages on end, how it’s gameplay is good on paper but any substance nor appeal surrounding it, surprisingly more so than Bayonetta 2, which had “WIN BUTTON THE GAME MECHANIC”, and how it’s just a mess overall. Yes, there are several things I liked about Bayonetta 3. The combat mechanics of the older games are still there (albeit neutered), the level design is still solid as always, and the music is still great albeit different, but when everything else that surrounds those good elements is middling at best and when it's been done so much better in Bayonetta 1 and 2, I can only give so much praise, man. It’s definitely not the worst game I’ve ever played (hello, Super Meat Boy Forever), but it’s among the most disappointing, if not, the most disappointing. It has its moments, yes, in fact, the Chapter 4 Boss was really fun! But the good heavily outweighs the bad, and leaves me thoroughly mixed on the game as a whole. I don't have any urge to replay this game at all, hell, I didn't even go for the portals since it was so easy to abuse items, so I’ll leave it at that. I don't like saying “Why would you play this when you can play (another game in series)”, because that feels weirdly disrespectful in my eyes as most games still offer different experiences, but Bayonetta 3 offers nothing of value to the Bayonetta franchise. 1 and 2 are infinitely better, and more worth your time. For now, at least. Because next up is Bayonetta Origins, the one that not even Bayonetta fans played! And it's one that I haven't even played, either. I at least played Bayonetta 1 and 2 a bit and I watched videos on Bayonetta 3, so I knew what I was getting into, but I've seen nothing about Bayonetta Origins. Apparently it's a fun game, but you'll have to wait for the review on that one. So, until next time, folks!

Omne... save me...

BAYONETTA 2! Oh, where do I begin? Well, lets start AFTER the release of Bayonetta 1. After Devil May Cry 4 disappointed several folks (although I think its a solid game so far), Bayonetta rose from the ashes to create a legitimately great alternative for the character action game fans out there. Almost everyone loved Bayonetta when it dropped, critics, fans, dogs and cats, everybody. So it’d be a no-brainer to make a sequel with an even grander scope. This is also the first of the followi ng two titles in the franchise that were funded in part by Nintendo, and thus, are Nintendo-exclusive. No PC, PS4 or Xbox One version in sight. It's not an unexpected move, as Nintendo did fund the project after all, and hey, like I said, emulation is free. So, while the exclusivity did sting a little, it made sense. And, thank the lord, Bayonetta 2 looks and runs phenomenally on Wii U and the 2018 Switch port. It's a big step up from the Xbox 360 and- ugh, the PS3 version. You know, the one with a 30FPS cap (sometimes not even reaching that) and sub 720p graphics? That was a fucking mess. But with Bayonetta 2’s release on Wii U and Switch, they went out of their way to port Bayonetta 1 as well, and if you bought Bayonetta 2 physically, you got Bayonetta 1 for FREE! A great move by Platinum, and hey, the Wii U version is pretty good! Overshadowed by the subsequent versions, but there's some all new Nintendo-fied costumes. Bayonetta made the most graceful transition to the Wii U possible, but that’s to speak of the quality of Bayonetta 2 itself. Because, truth be told, Bayonetta 2... is AMAZING! Bayonetta 2 kicks off even greater than Bayonetta 1. After festive lesbianism occurs, the first level kicks off with Bayonetta and Jeanne riding on fighter jets. Show this to anyone who doesn't know what the hell Bayonetta is and watch their faces change and shift, as random shit just happens. But it’s a joy to watch. The cool shots, Bayonetta jumping up to the sky naked, uhhhhh yeah it’s GOATED. And when Moon River starts blasting, you KNOW your girl is back and better than ever.

Bayonetta 2 retains a majority of its predecessor’s systems. Like Bayonetta, the delay based combos return. For a quick rundown, punching, waiting, and then punching again results in a different, stronger combo compared to 3 punches in a row, with this philosophy applying to a majority of the combos. Spam is discouraged, therefore creating the perfect skill curve with combat. That was great about Bayonetta, and I'm glad to see that it returns in 2, however, Bayonetta 2 adds a new mechanic to make these awesome combos easier. The Umbran Climax is a rather controversial mechanic within the community, to be honest. But damn, if I can't help but absolutely love it. At the cost of a full magic meter, all of your attacks become souped up Wicked weaves, and tearing down a crowd of enemies never gets old to me. But I can't help but feel it's pretty unbalanced. Yeah, that's kind of the point, but I can't help but feel that it's a bit too braindead for my tastes. While the delay based combos are still present with Umbran Climax, they’re much less useful given the clear benefits of a strong AOE presence, so you’re incentivized to keep spamming attacks, because Umbran Climax only lasts so long. One last nitpick, taking damage while in Umbran Climax needs to have a better indicator. You don't take knockback during Umbran Climax, so it's usually hard to tell when you take damage. This only gets somewhat annoying for scoring purposes, but it's whatever if you're playing casually. I’m not saying to make her invincible, but some kind of score mitigation would be pretty nice. I'd also like to note that Bayonetta herself is also slightly weaker than the prior game to compensate for Umbran Climax, as well. To be honest, it’s not really noticeable in the game to game action, but Bayonetta does slightly less damage overall, including her Wicked Weaves. Adding onto this nerf is the ability for enemies to block attacks, which is something that I was surprised wasn’t in the original game. This keeps the player on their toes, and I really like how Bayonetta 2 still attempts to throw the player off at certain points. One of the better additions in Bayonetta 2 is the weapons.

Sure, weapons were in the original Bayonetta, but Bayonetta 2 greatly expands on this mechanic, as most of the weapons are cheaper and easier to get than ever before. I'm sad to say that I was never able to use the awesome chainsaws in Bayonetta 2, but the rest of the weapons are pretty great, at the very least. I really loved the Dual Swords at first, because you can charge it up and do an oh-so powerful slash straight through your enemies. But once I got the 3 Pronged Scythe, that’s all I used. At least on my Hands, because with my feet, I still wielded the Swords. The Scythe is awesome, if you hold it out for a bit, you shoot out 3 projectiles out of the Scythe a devastating attack for most foes, and it’s also fast as fuck, one of the best weapons in the game, here. I never took a liking to the Bow, as ranged combat in Bayonetta is pretty lame in my opinion, but the Flamethrowers were neat, and the whip is incredibly strong, too. Because of this, the combat feels a lot more dynamic and diverse, adding to the already high variety of Bayonetta 1. Also, can we talk about the improvements from Bayonetta 1? The bosses feel much improved here. No longer are they just massive moving hurtboxes, they actually feel a lot more fun to fight here. With Umbran Climax, it’s a lot easier to turn the tides in your favor, and the bosses feel so much more dynamic here. From flying in the sky, to surfing on a piece of board, Bayonetta 2 never stays in one area of gameplay for long, although there is a slight problem with Bayonetta 2’s combat. It’s highly reliant on Witch Time. Now, I love Witch Time as much as the next guy, but having it be almost mandatory to survive took a lot of the fun out of it. Nailing that perfect dodge was never necessary, but it was fun because it felt like a massive “up yours” to the enemy for being aggressive. Bayonetta 2 exhibits a similar feeling, but to a slightly lesser degree, as Witch Time is required to dodge certain attacks. It’s not too apparent, but it did feel a little lame when I noticed. But overall, Bayonetta 2’s combat is just as strong as beforehand, just like the fantastic enemy design of Bayonetta. It definitely has it’s issues, but yeah, this is great! But if there’s one issue I can point to with Bayonetta 2, it’s undoubtedly it’s difficulty.

The biggest disappointment is Bayonetta 2’s very low difficulty. Bayonetta was a very difficult game for newcomers, but very satisfying to master. Bayonetta 2 feels pretty tame in this regard. The difficulty has seen a severe drop from Bayonetta. I’d say Hard Mode Bayonetta 2 is more comparable to Bayonetta’s Normal difficulty. But there also lies an issue with Bayonetta 2’s score system. ITEMS. In Bayonetta, using items was a travesty upon your rank. It counted as a Death, but Bayonetta 2 entirely removes this aspect of scoring, a dumb as hell move in my eyes. Healing is fine to not count, as there’s a damage rank anyways, but being invincible, or super powered, or UMBRAN CLIMAX for free should absolutely be punished by the game. Sure, it definitely sucked to get Stone Ranks all of the time in Bayonetta 1, but it felt equally as great to do everything perfectly and get the Gold Rank. With Bayonetta 2, very rarely did I get anything below a Silver Rank. Does improving as a player have anything to do with that? Yeah, maybe. But even then, I made frequent use of items and still made it out with the game congratulating my for my efforts. In my opinion, for this to work, there either needed to be a significant item nerf, or items need to be made waaaaaay worse. But thankfully, the final boss is still just as difficult as ever, and now that’s my cue to to talk about the endgame

God, Bayonetta 2’s finale is almost perfect. No dawdling over some stupid, unfun Space Harrier clone, no boss rush, just constant, non-stop action throughout, and I love it. Rather than your typical boss rush, in Chapter 14, they go to the past, with you controlling a mech, and it's not just a fun distraction either. It still retains all of the same, delay based combos that Bayonetta has. Rather than changing up the gameplay style non-stop, they instead add to it, making Bayonetta 2 an incredibly focused game. The level design is so much more wider and expansive, encouraging exploration, but never slow down one bit. And this applies to the final boss, too. Like Bayonetta, the one on one fights with the Lumen Sage lead up to the final chapter, where another one on one fight commences before the second phase. And when the true phase kicks in, the fight against Aesir, it’s awesome. It’s another one on one fight, and for once in it’s runtime, Bayonetta 2 actually gets pretty damn difficult. I actually died a few times here, and I like that higher difficulty. But of course, like Bayonetta 1, a giant hair god, OMNE!!!!!, with womanly proportions (god, I love this game) is summoned, giving Aesir the good old Wizard’s Foot. Okay, last Smash Bros joke, I swe- SUDDENLY, JEANNE! Riding on a goddamn plane, too. She finishes the deal. summoning another hair demon, and fast forward a few months later, MORE Festive lesbianis- SUDDENLY, PLANE! AND ANGELS! Well, you know how this ends. LET’S DANCE, GENTLEMEN!


Despite my qualms with Bayonetta 2, especially when it comes to higher level play, Bayonetta 2 is a more than worthy sequel to the original. Each time I turned off the game, I wanted to hop back in as soon as possible, because the game is THAT good. The greater depth, the incredible visuals and music, and the awesome as hell combat left me satisfied and clamoring for more. It's hard to look at Bayonetta 2 without comparing it to it's elder sister, but I think it's a toss up as to which one I prefer. As a casual player, I found Bayonetta 2 to be a lot more inviting, but Bayonetta's high difficulty made me incredibly satisfied when I completed it. It's a very tough choice, especially as someone who's seen hardcore Bayonetta players compare it to the first game (completely understandable ftr), but I have to give the very, VERY slight edge to Bayonetta 2. Sure, it may be easier, but it's far from braindead, and the difficulty is more than made up for with better gameplay. Hell, that's my opinion, though. At the end of the day, I still love both of them equally, and I recommend giving each a playthrough for sure. Once again, a must play.

Well... the Bayonetta series has been going pretty well, but that positivity ends with Bayonetta 3. Spoiler alert, but if you've been stalking my log, you know I gave it a 5/10, and I have a LOT to say about it. Nothing good, though. So, yeah. Welp, I'mma get back to writing it. But I hope you enjoyed this review, it was a little delayed, but most of that time went into Bayonetta 3. So I hope you look forward to that, so in the meantime, I'll see myself out. Thanks for reading, and I'll see you later.

Continuing with my replay of the Mass Effect series comes everyone's favorite -- Mass Effect 2. It's been many years since I played it, so I was a bit surprised of the notable differences between it and the first title, both in how the game is structured and played. I was expecting to greatly prefer ME2, but I actually found the two about equal. I really prefer Mass Effect's more traditional RPG stat system and its heat-based weapons, versus ME2's approach to upgrades and limited ammunition. Mass Effect 2 I felt was much more character focused than the first title, with most of the "mandatory" missions being the recruitment and then loyalty missions for each character. It's a bit of a different story dynamic than I was expecting, but I grew to really enjoy this approach. I didn't do enough of the optional ME1 missions back in the day to really appreciate who they were setting Cerberus to be, and while I understand Shepard's reasoning for working with them better now, I do think they whitewashed them a bit in this -- they were injecting acid into POWs in the first game just to see what would happen after all. They could've followed the same basic story beats as the first Mass Effect, but instead they took their characters and story to a place that is less expected, but it paid off greatly for them in the end. Also I'll say it, I liked the Mako in ME1 and missed it.

(Male MC route)
I might as well get the negative parts out of the way. While the battle system is fine in of itself, typical rpg stuff, it gets repetitive really quick, especially thanks to Tartarus. Legit, Tartarus sucks. The idea of it is neat at first, but it quickly devolves into blandness and unfun dungeons that are worse than the original Dragon Quest. Some of the writing also isn't the best, specifically Kenji and the beach section.
BUT
None of that matters to me when the writing and characters are as consistently good as they are. Genuinely, this is probably my favorite cast in any rpg I've played so far. They all feel like real people with real personalities, and their personal stories range from heartwarming to heartbreaking. Heck, the game even managed to get me to care about the ones I didn't like much. The ending did feel somewhat abrupt to me, but it still had a sweet quality to it that I loved.
TLDR: battles and dungeons are poopoo, but the writing is so good that I don't mind. Play this when you get the chance, especially if you like rpgs. It's long, but the journey is worth it.

An altogether short and sweet mario 64 romhack. I would say that some of the stars were unbalanced but I realized that most of them came from me overanalyzing what I was supposed to do and trying to do more work than I actually needed to. There are only 30 stars, a decent-but-not-evil level of challenge, and the whole thing even runs pretty damn solidly on the actual N64 itself! No real reason NOT to give it a go if you are into mario 64 tbh. there's also mean bean machine music used for some reason

Finished it a couple days ago, but just went back to do all the golden puzzles and whatnot. Basically 100%ed this one! All puzzles and stars!

Talos Principle 2 is an amazing sequel. I sometimes forget how simple the first one was in comparison. You're not alone in a simulation anymore. You're in a massive, technologically advanced city that was built over centuries. There are actually other characters in the game. The locations are incredible and grandiose. The scale of everything is so huge, it takes quite a bit to walk between locations. But sometimes I would walk around these environments and soak in the views.

The story and world were great. I just loved it. New Jerusalem was super cool and I spent ages exploring every detail my first time there. I liked the whole civilization of robot people I thought that was neat. The social media was really fun! Glad to see they took that aspect over from Gehenna. All the talk around The Founder and The Goal and whether to expand or not was interesting to me.

The puzzles are still great. Buttttt after playing the first game, most of the good ideas have already been done. Overall, this game felt easier, which might mainly be because I've already done a lot of the puzzles in the previous game! They're all still fun, but I never got the achievement t for spending 20 minutes in a single puzzle. This sequel was definitely improved by removing some ideas such as the over-precise recording, and those fuck ass exploding robots. But how many light stick puzzles can you do before they get repetitive?

The thing is, Talos Principle 2 does add a lot of new items. Maybe too many. Some of them are pretty interesting. But quite a lot of them are quickly shoved aside and don't reach their full potential. They're prominent in the area they're introduced, but not so much after that. Hopefully there's a Gehenna-sized DLC which uses all of the new items more.

Really stuck between a 4 and a 4.5 for this game. After I digest this game I might lower it half a star.

It's a reasonably ambitious attempt to make an on-rails 3D space game on the atari, and for the most part it works. There are 3 different game modes at play:

1. The main game mode involves flying in a pseudo 3D space where you try to shoot enemy ships for points and see how many you can earn in the arbitrarily-set time limit of 2 minutes and 16 seconds. The enemies scale in size depending on your distance in a choppy-yet-still-understandable way, and there are asteroids that can't be shot and you just gotta dodge em. There are no lives, so your punishment for running into an enemy is getting stunned for a second or two as the game flashbangs you with blinking lights. You can change how quickly the enemies fly into you as well as whether or not they come one at a time or in pairs. It's okay!

2. There's a variant of the main mode where instead of shooting enemies the button speeds you up, and the aim of the game is to see how far into space you can go. The only enemies are the invincible asteroids so it's just a matter of dodging. I found it reasonably cheesable to just hold diagonally in one direction and only change if something comes directly your way.

3. There's a bonus game mode called "Lunar Lander" which takes place entirely in 2D. I thought at first this would be a conversion of the arcade game of the same title, but it's actually more just a game where you play as a moon lander and chase the moon itself around a blank empty space, and if you manage to tag it you get a point. Though with the atari graphics and tag-like gameplay it really feels less like you are a moon rover trying to make contact and more like you are a blue horse trying to take a piss on a giant cookie. You can toggle these moving squares that the lander needs to avoid if you want there to be a little extra sauce, I guess.

It's a pretty decent game, I can appreciate the ambition for the kind of perspective that they were going for which atari hardware generally doesn't lend itself towards. The gameplay even feels decent enough with the stiff-ass joystick controller as well, I didn't have to do the ol' mega drive controller trick to make it more playable. There are two player modes for the main game and the moon lander game (the moon lander version seems like one person gets to control the moon which could honestly be a fun time), but I wasn't able to try those modes out. And this game is a launch title?!?!? The only real thing is that the time-based nature makes it seem more like RNG to get a good score as you just gotta hope for as many high-ranking enemies to spawn as close to you as possible to get an impressive score, and even then generally your score will be the same throughout as the time limit and spawn rates for things are generally the same. They could have made it a lot more competitive if they stuck to the ol' life system and had the time mode as a side thing or something. Regardless, I really can't fault the ambition at play here nawsay, shoutouts to atari

below is my long thoughts on undertale yellow while i drink alcohol at 1 am on my 24th birthday. cool
SUMMARY: has some amazing art and animation but the storytelling/pacing is very underwhelming and almost nonsensical (and not in the funny undertale way, in the bad writing way).

the cast is where the problems lie the most— the amount of characters that interrupt your adventure to block your path or become important named npcs feels really overbloated and they become more like intrusions than characters i can come to like. undertale’s central cast is pretty small (I would say this is toriel, sans, papyrus, undyne, alphys, and maybe asgore. essentially all the characters onscreen in the true pacifist end) and you spend a good time with each of them, with some optional moments to make even more of a bond with them (dating sidequests) sprinkled over the game. yellow’s cast isn’t nearly as cohesive and they just keep introducing characters back to back that it’s hard to tell who you should be caring about and it gets… frustrating? in snowdin you have nearly back to back introductions for martlet, the ice pops guy, the usps whale, and the cupgame guys, the latter three just popping up right in the middle of your way and disrupting your gameplay almost back to back. compared that to snowdin with sans and papyrus who are the main characters you speak with/have fun moments with until it crescendos into the papyrus fight (there are some bosses but theyre bosses, vs sans and papyrus who appear frequently enough that you know they will be essential characters).

i think what also doesn’t help this lack of cohesion with the cast is lack of cohesion in motive. ex in undertale:
-toriel (does not want to let you go because she is scared about asgore)
- sans/papyrus (papyrus wants to be royal guard. wants to send you to asgore)
- undyne (royal guard. killing you for asgore)
- mettaton (under alphys’s command who serves asgore. killing you (to make alphys look cool but also) to take your soul for asgore)
along the way you also fight various knight characters who you can assume serve undyne/asgore and would take your soul to him/you to him if you lose. on top of enemies with just personal grievances (like muffet for being mean to spiders). they’re all united around the idea that youre a human, you are the seventh soul, you are going to die.
in yellow, i really feel like they forgot clover was a human a LOT and just threw random fights together because it was cool. dalv’s story was vaguely written and as a result not compelling or interesting (you can maybe guess that the human he saw was related to clover?? but he never appears again so it does not fuckin matter), martlet acknowledges you’re a human but they’re bumbling over themself so hard i can’t even tell what their motive is, the rhythm game guy came out of nowhere to do rhythm game things and just left, the people in the wild east sort of acknowledge you’re human but dont make any interesting commentary on how their king wants your soul (from what i remember???).

more spoilery thoughts:

clover’s keyword being “justice” (vs frisk’s “determination”) also feels flawed to me. on paper it’s an interesting idea, especially the idea of a child purposely falling down because other children have gone missing— the opening and item description for the missing child poster makes it seem like clover has the intent to find these children (or in the poster desc., i think the flavor text says “there must be justice” or something). but this motive of clover’s… is never expanded on?? it feels like they forgot about it, that they forgot about the whole ”looking for missing children” motive in favor of gushing about their ocs the whole runtime. really this game’s main issue is it feels like a game where you need to already know the ocs beforehand through lore you read in a google doc from a friend, THEN you play it.

“justice” feels forgotten about with the exception of the genocide route which honestly makes the most sense for me. but this isn’t really good. frisk’s “determination” can go both ways (determination to kill everyone, determination to save everyone. it’s about your mindset). the idea of “justice” feels firmly rooted in a negative kind of emotion for the person who is on the receiving end. i can’t imagine a time where justice was served where both sides of the situation both had positive experiences. especially so because clover is a cowboy— if you think of a cowboy who wants to get justice, you are going to think of a cowboy killing those that have wronged them. wild west style. But it’s an undertale fangame so you don’t WANT your motif to be something so outright negative. but then the motif is in full swing only in the genocide run. this feels very counterproductive.

(clover deliberately falls down to get justice for the five missing children but then in true pacifist comes to the conclusion to willingly give up their soul?? to the society that took the five children’s lives???? where is the “justice” here? and i think this could work if clover got blackpilled on the relations between monsters and humans like, if they went throughs some truly harrowing shit and found out it was all the humans’ fault, and the humans who fell down were evil, so then they give up their soul to aid the monsters as “justice” on the side of the monsters. the true pacifist ending just makes nooooooo sense to me when you try to tie it into anything we know about clover)

flower inclusion is also a bit… weird. his gambit is he wants to get you over to asgore’s asap so he can steal the human souls. i do not get the logistics of this to be honest. in undertale flowey’s choice to wait until six souls are gathered (and to use them to get frisk’s soul, so seven total) seems to be on purpose because that amount of souls will make him the Most Powerful. if flowey wanted power so bad, why would he drag clover all the way to asgore’s… flowey steals the souls offscreen in the undertale true pacifist ending so this implies he can just Do That If He Wants. why wouldn’t he just steal the souls and then smack clover upside the head to get their soul with his newfound power? is any of this making sense? i feel like they just needed a really contrived reason to get flowey to show up so much (compared to frisk being the last human needed (plot relevant) and frisk reminding flowey of chara (character relevant).
flowey talking at every save point is slightly grating because you know that flowey is not actually a good person so you’re waiting for the eventual betrayal reveal and thus all the “gee whiz! you’re the bestest friend ever!” text he has feels pointless to read.

the flowey boss fight w clay is cool. the everything else looks like sonic.exe

i think that’s every thought i had. the art and animation is great i just wish they had as many talented writers as they did talented artists. maybe i just “didn’t get it” but this failed to capture what made undertale’s story so great.