Shlork
Could be an eight depending on how I feel that day, but at the end of the day I am a bit of a retard, one could say, and really like the detailing options added in 3. I feel a bit constrained in this entry, like I can't truly flourish when I can't use three different colors on my paths. The simplicity is a benefit in many ways, but my immense talents of deciding how many pickles should be on the burgers I sell are immensely restrained here.
Despite not hearing much about this, this was perhaps the first mod I was tempted to put as on par in quality with its base game. Unfortunately its fatal flaw reared its ugly head near the end, that being taking a mod with intentionally slower gameplay, down to the weapon switch animations, and giving it a group enemy encounter every 5 seconds. I pull out my glock like a geriatric but these enemies think I'm Gordon.
2023
this game fucking sucks
2023
just one of those games where you'll try out a mod that makes some minor changes and end up playing through the whole game again
:)
Origins feels like a noticeably less polished Arkham City, but it does bring forth its own merits like the boss fights everyone loves and some welcomed lore additions. Ultimately it's not a very good open world game but is highly elevated by the Batman mythos and the Arkham gameplay, making it hard for me to not like.
Breath of the Wild is my favorite game of all time. Now of course there is a distinct lack of objectivity with my decision. When I played BotW it was at a point where most of my gaming time was spent slaving away at competitive first person shooters. I had been weaning back into the singeplayer scene when I played Super Metroid earlier that year (2017), and naturally Super Metroid made me realize how much I had been missing out on especially in the "retro" category. BotW went even beyond that, being a big-budget experience that was brimming full of visible passion from its creators, and was the first time I had been truly lost in a world since I played Skyrim 3 years before that. Most of my gaming time these days is spent with singleplayer experiences and I have a deep found appreciation for game design that I barely had before BotW.
That is my explanation for why I can recognize, in an objective sense, the "superiority" of Tears of the Kingdom, yet still view it as mildly inferior. BotW was a NEW sense of freedom and a NEW sense of adventure and a NEW sense of exploration, while TotK isn't new, just MORE or REFINED. I have immense respect for the trailblazers of gaming, even when what came after is by all accounts "better".
On its own merits TotK is a wildly creative experience that relishes in the player "breaking" the game. This seems to be a common consensus and was immediately obvious to me when I was given the ability to phase through any ceiling. All the new abilities are astounding and provide one of the few times where I am impressed by a game technically. There is the minor problem that fusing and ultrahand can be tedious at times compared to the more simplistic abilities found in BotW, and this becomes part of a larger idea I have where BotW still has its own merits partially based on its simplicity.
For the rest of the content, while the sky islands are a fun traversal challenge, and the depths are too, to a lesser extent, neither addition surpasses the quality of the Hyrule surface, which is a mild disappointment but are still additions on top of the game rather than subtractive, especially since both areas are hardly required. The temples are an improvement over the divine beasts in most ways (I still enjoy the creepy atmosphere and the map controls of the divine beats quite a bit) and the bosses are certainly an improvement, though I'm not sure if they are easier or if I just have more experience.
As I mentioned with the divine beasts, I was surprised how atmospherically different TotK and BotW ended up being. BotW has a much more serene and melancholy tone through the whole game as you see the destruction of Hyrule and the problems its last bastions of civilization are facing. TotK is a much busier game and thus lacks the tranquil aspects BotW features. Sure, the landscapes might have more to do in TotK but I fully believe the "empty" areas of BotW are 100% on purpose and I love artistic trade-offs that might be hard for most people to appreciate because it makes me feel smart and pretentious. TotK also ends up being much more of an adventure of preventing a disaster as opposed to BotW's recovering from the disaster. Really I just seriously want people to appreciate BotW's tone and how surprisingly sad (dare I say "dark") it can be if you pay attention.
Most of TotK's aspects I discussed are more so different to BotW than objective downgrades, so I can only imagine that if someone played TotK before BotW it must seem like the greatest God damn game ever made by a mile, but to me it is a highly expansive sequel that addresses most the common complaints people had about BotW but in return lacks some of the more artistic decisions in BotW and in general lacks the shear innovation that made me truly love BotW.
I clearly am not capable of reviewing this game on its own and that is because when I was playing it I couldn't help but compare it to my GOAT the entire time, but I can safely say that I still absolutely love the impressive ideas this game brought to the table and it ultimately brought me more BotW, which is exactly what I wanted.
That is my explanation for why I can recognize, in an objective sense, the "superiority" of Tears of the Kingdom, yet still view it as mildly inferior. BotW was a NEW sense of freedom and a NEW sense of adventure and a NEW sense of exploration, while TotK isn't new, just MORE or REFINED. I have immense respect for the trailblazers of gaming, even when what came after is by all accounts "better".
On its own merits TotK is a wildly creative experience that relishes in the player "breaking" the game. This seems to be a common consensus and was immediately obvious to me when I was given the ability to phase through any ceiling. All the new abilities are astounding and provide one of the few times where I am impressed by a game technically. There is the minor problem that fusing and ultrahand can be tedious at times compared to the more simplistic abilities found in BotW, and this becomes part of a larger idea I have where BotW still has its own merits partially based on its simplicity.
For the rest of the content, while the sky islands are a fun traversal challenge, and the depths are too, to a lesser extent, neither addition surpasses the quality of the Hyrule surface, which is a mild disappointment but are still additions on top of the game rather than subtractive, especially since both areas are hardly required. The temples are an improvement over the divine beasts in most ways (I still enjoy the creepy atmosphere and the map controls of the divine beats quite a bit) and the bosses are certainly an improvement, though I'm not sure if they are easier or if I just have more experience.
As I mentioned with the divine beasts, I was surprised how atmospherically different TotK and BotW ended up being. BotW has a much more serene and melancholy tone through the whole game as you see the destruction of Hyrule and the problems its last bastions of civilization are facing. TotK is a much busier game and thus lacks the tranquil aspects BotW features. Sure, the landscapes might have more to do in TotK but I fully believe the "empty" areas of BotW are 100% on purpose and I love artistic trade-offs that might be hard for most people to appreciate because it makes me feel smart and pretentious. TotK also ends up being much more of an adventure of preventing a disaster as opposed to BotW's recovering from the disaster. Really I just seriously want people to appreciate BotW's tone and how surprisingly sad (dare I say "dark") it can be if you pay attention.
Most of TotK's aspects I discussed are more so different to BotW than objective downgrades, so I can only imagine that if someone played TotK before BotW it must seem like the greatest God damn game ever made by a mile, but to me it is a highly expansive sequel that addresses most the common complaints people had about BotW but in return lacks some of the more artistic decisions in BotW and in general lacks the shear innovation that made me truly love BotW.
I clearly am not capable of reviewing this game on its own and that is because when I was playing it I couldn't help but compare it to my GOAT the entire time, but I can safely say that I still absolutely love the impressive ideas this game brought to the table and it ultimately brought me more BotW, which is exactly what I wanted.
XB3:FR where the FR stands for "fucking RADIO?!?!?"
2016
I have decided this as my gold standard for a 5/10 game. I have distinct remembrance for how I felt nothing after completing this, where the bad was perfectly weighted with the good. No happiness, no rage, just "well that was a game" after beating it.
2023
Close to a 9, as it does most aspects better than the original, but not by much. I don't think some of the enemies being bullet sponges on hardcore helped my opinion too much either. There is some weird censorship even when it makes no sense, like changing "kiss and tell" to "work and tell" because kissing is too sexual even if it makes the saying make no sense, so I am praying they don't go psycho-censorship when they remake 5.
2019
What begins as quite possibly a 9/10 experience just absolutely free falls with continuously some of the most lazy writing I have ever witnessed, villains I have no investment in, and decent gameplay held back by questionable choices like mementos and how my social stats seemed to just stop mattering with 40 hours of game left.
This game, despite what people might say, does nothing to separate itself from other JRPGs beyond the most surface level ways, like with its "super slick UI (which has bad readability at times)" and being set in a contemporary setting (while still featuring plenty of fantasy elements). I'd easily argue it does many aspects WORSE than the other dwellers of its genre, mainly writing and pacing. I could rant about the "twist" and how absolutely horrendous it is for possibly a full essay. Or how I feel the chemistry of the party deteriorates with each new member added, which shouldn't be happening for this idealized school life simulator.
Persona 5 Royal is a wannabe Death Note, no further elaboration needed on that statement. It is a dish where someone threw their entire spice collection on some overcooked chicken, a facade of flavor covering a flawed base. Is it a good visual novel? No. Is it a good JRPG? Well it's better at that than the VN part, but still no. Is this game one of the highest rated games ever made? No- wait, yes? What the fuck?
For how many times I had to hear the word "cognitive" in this game, I sure am feeling some cognitive dissonance over how this game is viewed! 4/10.
This game, despite what people might say, does nothing to separate itself from other JRPGs beyond the most surface level ways, like with its "super slick UI (which has bad readability at times)" and being set in a contemporary setting (while still featuring plenty of fantasy elements). I'd easily argue it does many aspects WORSE than the other dwellers of its genre, mainly writing and pacing. I could rant about the "twist" and how absolutely horrendous it is for possibly a full essay. Or how I feel the chemistry of the party deteriorates with each new member added, which shouldn't be happening for this idealized school life simulator.
Persona 5 Royal is a wannabe Death Note, no further elaboration needed on that statement. It is a dish where someone threw their entire spice collection on some overcooked chicken, a facade of flavor covering a flawed base. Is it a good visual novel? No. Is it a good JRPG? Well it's better at that than the VN part, but still no. Is this game one of the highest rated games ever made? No- wait, yes? What the fuck?
For how many times I had to hear the word "cognitive" in this game, I sure am feeling some cognitive dissonance over how this game is viewed! 4/10.
I actually enjoy the zombies of this title, though recognize its faults. The lack of campaign and really just the lack of the general DNA of the other Black Ops titles does negatively impact my view of the game as a whole though. This is one I will have to sit on a bit before scoring.
I'm rating this based on the complete DLC experience, the zombies, and my memories of the multiplayer back in ~2015. Now the campaign isn't very good, but CoD games have the unique situation of essentially being several games in one, and so while a better campaign would be prefered, Black Ops 3 still has one of the better multiplayer experiences in the franchise and the best zombies, period. This is probably the only older CoD game I can recommend actually buying and not obtaining dubiously.
2014
Fantastic atmosphere and setting that gets held back by the mild eurojank and boring set piece segments that sadly add some "generic 7th gen console shooter" vibes to an otherwise unique feeling FPS.
Now I want to know if there is a term to describe the close-quarters underground radiation-filled setting of this and Half Life's Black Mesa, because give me more of that please.
Now I want to know if there is a term to describe the close-quarters underground radiation-filled setting of this and Half Life's Black Mesa, because give me more of that please.
This is theoretically the best game in the series. Theoretically.