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Alan Wake
2010
Shout out to small rural towns overtaken by an evil or dark presence that corrupts them or brings hellish creatures. Gotta be one of my favorite genders.
Deemon, the incompetent reviewer, started off his write-off with one of his usual jokes, so unfunny that one might wonder if he was doing it on purpose or if he really has such poor comedy taste. He was trying to hide the fact that he really didn’t know where to start; the path to take might seem clear, but like the streets and forest of Bright Falls, it’s more deceiving than it may look at first, like a maze that’s also a downward spiral.
Deemon pondered, searching for a way to salvage the review, desperately trying to find out which step he should take, what words he should use. He sighed. He decided to let the words write themselves, to let out all the thoughts that had formed while the darkness and light of the town surrounded Alan Wake. He surrendered himself to the unknown, one that might be already written after all… Though he knows he had to talk about the music for sure, that selection of bangers had to be celebrated somehow.
Ambition almost killed Alan Wake, in more ways than one. I mean, I may not know much about Remedy Studios, in fact, it is the very first game of theirs I have ever played and beaten, but I do know the story of Bright Falls and how it was initially going to be something else, an open world of sorts, something that didn’t quite work, as it seems. Translating an already crafted open world into a linear style of game is such a monumental task that if I were in that predicament, I’d have considered outright scrapping everything and starting from zero, but that probably wasn’t even a realistic option for the team to begin with.
But that’s not even what I’m specifically referring to. Alan Wake, the game, the package, the copy made out of code and specific sections, is riddled with hiccups and bumps; it’s filled with padding, sections of trees and mist than don’t offer much aside from one or two manuscripts pages and combat sections that can feel overbearing at times, the remnants of its troubled production remain in aspects such as the barren areas and driving sections that don’t have much of a place and are so frustrating to playthrough even if you ignore any cars I just wish they were taken out —tho it’s kind of cute how it also uses the same light mechanic as the rest of the game—, the encounters with the Taken or the groups of mad crows often lack imagination and enemy variety or don’t jam very well with how the camera works in the case of the camera, and at one point I just kept thinking how much the experience would have benefited if some sections were repurposed in different ways or outright removed.
The imperfections of Alan Wake mostly come from this, factors outside of the game itself, of its story, but they still impact it negatively; I can’t scratch off the feeling of something being lost a bit when all of the boss enemies behave the exact same, the only thing that changes being the creepy lines they spat out and the character model. If the game wasn’t anything more than a series of levels where you shoot at things, then these issues would have rotted its pages…
…luckily, it has a dragon.
Wouldn’t it be funny if I started to praise the actual combat itself after spending two paragraphs criticizing some gameplay sections? Yeah, it would be hilarious! ... ANYWAYyeah I fucking adore the way Al controls. It occupies that same space as Simon from Castlevania, where how slow and imprecise it feels actually benefits the gameplay. You truly get the feeling Alan has never picked a gun in his life in any major capacity; he’s slow, clunky, imprecise, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. The tense dance of using light to weaken the Taken and gen emptying the chambers of them, or hell, simply using a flare and trying to activate the closest generator, it’s a super straight-forward system, and I love it. It’s incredibly satisfying to come out of encounters on top, because even if there isn’t much scarcity in resources (even if you start off each chapter with nothing each time), they are still somewhat limited, especially the most powerful weapons, and little things like mashing X to reload faster or the camera panning out to warn you of nearby enemies are things I didn’t know I needed until now.
It would be a far cry to call it a survival horror, but it’s tense; it’s tense to try to manage the purge while a bulldozer is charging full speed at you; it’s tense to try to outspeed a force you cannot do nothing against; and Alan gets progressively more and more tired. I can make the argument that there should be less of it or at least more variety in what it offers enemy-wise, but nothing will take away from the fact that the core itself is some fantastic shit.
Like… there’s something about fighting against waves of enemies on stage while the sickest rock tune ever plays in the background and the lights and flames fill your eyes that I can only call ‘’fucking awesome’’.
Deemon knew that wasn’t just it. He could talk about flaws and shooting Taken all he wanted, but something else lied within the light. He ran into it.
‘’But there’s something else’’, he said
But there’s something else.
A story already written, touched by the darkness. Written already as a part of it before birth, its muse trying to corrupt it. An ending yet to be typed out.
I have never seen a videogame story that trusts so much that the player will be intrigued enough by it to stick with it and engage with it all the way through. The tale Alan Wake, Alice, Barry, Sarah, and the whole town get tangled into is not intriguing; it is fascinating. I have never felt such closure from getting answers to questions I never realized where there in the first place. From being pretty disappointed about how Nightingale and Mott had such a poor presence as antagonists to being in awe of how their actions fell into place after the truth of this unfortunate series of events was revealed. Alan Wake offers a hell of a mystery. Alan Wake solves it.
The pages of the manuscript are as essential as the cinematics and interactions, so many pieces of the puzzle fit, it’s almost like getting spoiled before something happens, which in a way is exactly what’s happening. At first, I felt pretty disappointed that this would be a jarring light vs darkness story mixed with a thriller. Then it ended up being a meta-narrative within its own meta-narrative. The fact they did that without it feeling overcomplicated or screwing it up is ovation worthy.
But I also feel a huge sense of admiration for the micro-stories at play; hearing and talking to the inhabitants of Bright Falls, listening to Maine’s night radio, the echoes of the Taken and stellar ambience sounds ringing through my ears, the fucking incredible Night Springs shorts that had me HOOKED... It was the little things scattered in the trees and buildings and the small talk that gave this spiraling world even more meaning.
It ends with the darkness hungry for more, just like me. I’ve seen people call Alan Wake ‘’the most 6/7 out of ten game I’ve ever played’’, and even though I do not sympathize with that statement at all because it feels reductive in any context, I kind of get what people mean by it. Alan Wake is profoundly flawed, but most of them do not come from the game itself, but rather from the complicated production it had to go through. In the face of such adversity, I’ve never seen such confidence, such talent, or such a desire to tell a tale like this. Alan Wake isn’t just *a* story, there’s more to be written and read, but at the end of the day, it’s also its own story. And what a story it is.
Maybe this isn’t what the champion of light could have been if the circumstances were different, but the hardships cannot be avoided, and even after going through them, they really sold me on this novel.
Deemon, the incompetent reviewer, started off his write-off with one of his usual jokes, so unfunny that one might wonder if he was doing it on purpose or if he really has such poor comedy taste. He was trying to hide the fact that he really didn’t know where to start; the path to take might seem clear, but like the streets and forest of Bright Falls, it’s more deceiving than it may look at first, like a maze that’s also a downward spiral.
Deemon pondered, searching for a way to salvage the review, desperately trying to find out which step he should take, what words he should use. He sighed. He decided to let the words write themselves, to let out all the thoughts that had formed while the darkness and light of the town surrounded Alan Wake. He surrendered himself to the unknown, one that might be already written after all… Though he knows he had to talk about the music for sure, that selection of bangers had to be celebrated somehow.
Ambition almost killed Alan Wake, in more ways than one. I mean, I may not know much about Remedy Studios, in fact, it is the very first game of theirs I have ever played and beaten, but I do know the story of Bright Falls and how it was initially going to be something else, an open world of sorts, something that didn’t quite work, as it seems. Translating an already crafted open world into a linear style of game is such a monumental task that if I were in that predicament, I’d have considered outright scrapping everything and starting from zero, but that probably wasn’t even a realistic option for the team to begin with.
But that’s not even what I’m specifically referring to. Alan Wake, the game, the package, the copy made out of code and specific sections, is riddled with hiccups and bumps; it’s filled with padding, sections of trees and mist than don’t offer much aside from one or two manuscripts pages and combat sections that can feel overbearing at times, the remnants of its troubled production remain in aspects such as the barren areas and driving sections that don’t have much of a place and are so frustrating to playthrough even if you ignore any cars I just wish they were taken out —tho it’s kind of cute how it also uses the same light mechanic as the rest of the game—, the encounters with the Taken or the groups of mad crows often lack imagination and enemy variety or don’t jam very well with how the camera works in the case of the camera, and at one point I just kept thinking how much the experience would have benefited if some sections were repurposed in different ways or outright removed.
The imperfections of Alan Wake mostly come from this, factors outside of the game itself, of its story, but they still impact it negatively; I can’t scratch off the feeling of something being lost a bit when all of the boss enemies behave the exact same, the only thing that changes being the creepy lines they spat out and the character model. If the game wasn’t anything more than a series of levels where you shoot at things, then these issues would have rotted its pages…
…luckily, it has a dragon.
Wouldn’t it be funny if I started to praise the actual combat itself after spending two paragraphs criticizing some gameplay sections? Yeah, it would be hilarious! ... ANYWAYyeah I fucking adore the way Al controls. It occupies that same space as Simon from Castlevania, where how slow and imprecise it feels actually benefits the gameplay. You truly get the feeling Alan has never picked a gun in his life in any major capacity; he’s slow, clunky, imprecise, and I wouldn’t want it any other way. The tense dance of using light to weaken the Taken and gen emptying the chambers of them, or hell, simply using a flare and trying to activate the closest generator, it’s a super straight-forward system, and I love it. It’s incredibly satisfying to come out of encounters on top, because even if there isn’t much scarcity in resources (even if you start off each chapter with nothing each time), they are still somewhat limited, especially the most powerful weapons, and little things like mashing X to reload faster or the camera panning out to warn you of nearby enemies are things I didn’t know I needed until now.
It would be a far cry to call it a survival horror, but it’s tense; it’s tense to try to manage the purge while a bulldozer is charging full speed at you; it’s tense to try to outspeed a force you cannot do nothing against; and Alan gets progressively more and more tired. I can make the argument that there should be less of it or at least more variety in what it offers enemy-wise, but nothing will take away from the fact that the core itself is some fantastic shit.
Like… there’s something about fighting against waves of enemies on stage while the sickest rock tune ever plays in the background and the lights and flames fill your eyes that I can only call ‘’fucking awesome’’.
Deemon knew that wasn’t just it. He could talk about flaws and shooting Taken all he wanted, but something else lied within the light. He ran into it.
‘’But there’s something else’’, he said
But there’s something else.
A story already written, touched by the darkness. Written already as a part of it before birth, its muse trying to corrupt it. An ending yet to be typed out.
I have never seen a videogame story that trusts so much that the player will be intrigued enough by it to stick with it and engage with it all the way through. The tale Alan Wake, Alice, Barry, Sarah, and the whole town get tangled into is not intriguing; it is fascinating. I have never felt such closure from getting answers to questions I never realized where there in the first place. From being pretty disappointed about how Nightingale and Mott had such a poor presence as antagonists to being in awe of how their actions fell into place after the truth of this unfortunate series of events was revealed. Alan Wake offers a hell of a mystery. Alan Wake solves it.
The pages of the manuscript are as essential as the cinematics and interactions, so many pieces of the puzzle fit, it’s almost like getting spoiled before something happens, which in a way is exactly what’s happening. At first, I felt pretty disappointed that this would be a jarring light vs darkness story mixed with a thriller. Then it ended up being a meta-narrative within its own meta-narrative. The fact they did that without it feeling overcomplicated or screwing it up is ovation worthy.
But I also feel a huge sense of admiration for the micro-stories at play; hearing and talking to the inhabitants of Bright Falls, listening to Maine’s night radio, the echoes of the Taken and stellar ambience sounds ringing through my ears, the fucking incredible Night Springs shorts that had me HOOKED... It was the little things scattered in the trees and buildings and the small talk that gave this spiraling world even more meaning.
It ends with the darkness hungry for more, just like me. I’ve seen people call Alan Wake ‘’the most 6/7 out of ten game I’ve ever played’’, and even though I do not sympathize with that statement at all because it feels reductive in any context, I kind of get what people mean by it. Alan Wake is profoundly flawed, but most of them do not come from the game itself, but rather from the complicated production it had to go through. In the face of such adversity, I’ve never seen such confidence, such talent, or such a desire to tell a tale like this. Alan Wake isn’t just *a* story, there’s more to be written and read, but at the end of the day, it’s also its own story. And what a story it is.
Maybe this isn’t what the champion of light could have been if the circumstances were different, but the hardships cannot be avoided, and even after going through them, they really sold me on this novel.
Osman
1996
Creating afterimages to pummel giant Persian-influenced gods and mechanoloids is something truly special, though the inclusion of checkpoints at a few select stages puts this in a weird spot where you CAN credit-feed it but you'll be burning about 30-45 minutes routing out one specific boss rematch section, very bizarre
Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom hooked me from the trailer, and I'm glad to say that fully playing the game pleased me more than I thought it would. I ended up falling in love with the gimmick of figuring out how to maneuver through a platformer with no jump button, and I feel really confident in saying how it ended up being some of my favorite controls for a 3D platformer I've played ever. I've said before that I'm not a huge platformer person, and I'm not, but something with Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom hits me just right. Maybe it's my hidden obsession with tiny toy cars, maybe it's the way the bright colors mixed with the polygon graphics and music, maybe it really is those tight controls - all I know is I'm not a platformer person and yet I 100%'ed this game over the past couple of days. I have never had a platformer completely cloud my thoughts in the way Yellow Taxi Goes Vroom has to the point that when I wasn't playing it, I was just thinking about playing it. It's perfect: in control, design, length, story, everything! I finished the entire goddamn thing and I'm still thinking about when I can play it again!
Absolutely a shining star for new releases in 2024. Can't wait to see what else Panik Arcade has up their sleeve, because they have gained a very loyal fan.
5/5
Absolutely a shining star for new releases in 2024. Can't wait to see what else Panik Arcade has up their sleeve, because they have gained a very loyal fan.
5/5
Six Cats Under
2020
Six Cats Under is a short point-and-click puzzle game made as a game jam. You play as an elderly lady who’s just met an untimely demise, and must now use her limited ghost abilities to help her cats escape the apartment. Despite this slightly morbid tone, though, the game shines with a lighthearted sense of humor and a very cute presentation.
Your entire goal is to figure out which items you can or can’t interact with. You must then use them to gain your cats’ attention and influence their actions, causing a chain of events that will ultimately lead to the opening of the front door. The entire apartment, and the kitties themselves, essentially serve as one big puzzle.
This puzzle is much more difficult and intricate than I’d expected, too; I honestly had a tough time figuring out a few of these interactions. I definitely appreciate the creativity and complexity of the gameplay, but I do wish these parts were a bit easier so that the entire game didn’t drag itself out as much. I think it would help a lot even just to have a clearer way to tell what you can and can’t use. Over half of the items in the apartment serve no purpose, but you won’t actually know which ones matter until you’ve clicked through all of them. Sometimes it feels like you’re stumbling around blindly trying to figure out the next step. I was especially lost at the beginning.
Despite these flaws, the gameplay still has a really neat idea behind it and mostly satisfactory execution. It’s very rewarding to see the cats interact with their surroundings and the amazing animations that come along with that. And I still enjoyed most of the answers, anyways - it was just a select few that I took issue with. So I still think the creators did a good job!
As for the story, it doesn’t really extend beyond your singular goal. The game is about 15-20 minutes long, most of which is dedicated to figuring out the puzzle. It’s understandable, since again, this was made for a game jam - but it unfortunately still means that there wasn’t enough time for things like worldbuilding or plot progression. All you can really discover is a bit of information about each car by clicking on them. The apartment is a studio, so there’s not much room to fit items that would give more personality to our protagonist or her pets, either. There are definitely a few nice details - portraits of loved ones hanging on the walls, a yarn basket - but it’s pretty limited. One of the best details though is the main menu, which shows a framed picture of the elderly lady holding one of her cats.
Really, what makes everything work for me with Six Cats Under is the presentation. Even though it’s a simple setting, the apartment is still very visually pleasing. The pixel art is just so beautifully done and detailed. Its main color scheme is composed of warm browns and yellows that are accented by dark green, creating a very cozy atmosphere. Plus the kitties are, of course, particularly adorable!
As for the audio, it’s also quite well-done. The looped song is both cheerful and relaxing, and thankfully just long enough that it doesn’t become annoying. Besides that, there are cute little sound effects to accompany you or the cat’s actions (my favorite of which are easily the meows.) It’s all perfect compliment to the adorable pixel art.
Overall, I definitely think Six Cats Under is worth playing. It’s fun and endearing, and has a very strong vision for what it wants to accomplish. I honestly did feel bad about having to scare virtual cats in order to manipulate them, then allowing them to wander out of your apartment aimlessly - [SPOILERS] not to mention boiling your pet goldfish in the process [END SPOILERS]. But if you don’t think about it too hard, it’s a really delightful experience.
Visuals: 4.5/5
Sound: 3.5/5
Story: 3/5
Gameplay: 3.5/5
Worldbuilding: 2.5/5
Overall Game Score: 3.5/5 [3.4/5]
Your entire goal is to figure out which items you can or can’t interact with. You must then use them to gain your cats’ attention and influence their actions, causing a chain of events that will ultimately lead to the opening of the front door. The entire apartment, and the kitties themselves, essentially serve as one big puzzle.
This puzzle is much more difficult and intricate than I’d expected, too; I honestly had a tough time figuring out a few of these interactions. I definitely appreciate the creativity and complexity of the gameplay, but I do wish these parts were a bit easier so that the entire game didn’t drag itself out as much. I think it would help a lot even just to have a clearer way to tell what you can and can’t use. Over half of the items in the apartment serve no purpose, but you won’t actually know which ones matter until you’ve clicked through all of them. Sometimes it feels like you’re stumbling around blindly trying to figure out the next step. I was especially lost at the beginning.
Despite these flaws, the gameplay still has a really neat idea behind it and mostly satisfactory execution. It’s very rewarding to see the cats interact with their surroundings and the amazing animations that come along with that. And I still enjoyed most of the answers, anyways - it was just a select few that I took issue with. So I still think the creators did a good job!
As for the story, it doesn’t really extend beyond your singular goal. The game is about 15-20 minutes long, most of which is dedicated to figuring out the puzzle. It’s understandable, since again, this was made for a game jam - but it unfortunately still means that there wasn’t enough time for things like worldbuilding or plot progression. All you can really discover is a bit of information about each car by clicking on them. The apartment is a studio, so there’s not much room to fit items that would give more personality to our protagonist or her pets, either. There are definitely a few nice details - portraits of loved ones hanging on the walls, a yarn basket - but it’s pretty limited. One of the best details though is the main menu, which shows a framed picture of the elderly lady holding one of her cats.
Really, what makes everything work for me with Six Cats Under is the presentation. Even though it’s a simple setting, the apartment is still very visually pleasing. The pixel art is just so beautifully done and detailed. Its main color scheme is composed of warm browns and yellows that are accented by dark green, creating a very cozy atmosphere. Plus the kitties are, of course, particularly adorable!
As for the audio, it’s also quite well-done. The looped song is both cheerful and relaxing, and thankfully just long enough that it doesn’t become annoying. Besides that, there are cute little sound effects to accompany you or the cat’s actions (my favorite of which are easily the meows.) It’s all perfect compliment to the adorable pixel art.
Overall, I definitely think Six Cats Under is worth playing. It’s fun and endearing, and has a very strong vision for what it wants to accomplish. I honestly did feel bad about having to scare virtual cats in order to manipulate them, then allowing them to wander out of your apartment aimlessly - [SPOILERS] not to mention boiling your pet goldfish in the process [END SPOILERS]. But if you don’t think about it too hard, it’s a really delightful experience.
Visuals: 4.5/5
Sound: 3.5/5
Story: 3/5
Gameplay: 3.5/5
Worldbuilding: 2.5/5
Overall Game Score: 3.5/5 [3.4/5]
Children of the Sun
2024
Look im done with reviewing on this website so treat this as a warning this is the probably the worst designed puzzle game i've ever played.
Dread X Collection
2020
the pay is nice: ★
carthanc: ★
don't go out: ★★
shatter: ★★★★
hand of doom: ★★★
the pony factory: ★★★
summer night: ★★★★★
rotgut: ★
outsiders: DNF
mr. bucket told me to: DNF
this is really rough. carthanc and rotgut technically get a score of 0 from me personally, not really worth it for the few good entries.
carthanc: ★
don't go out: ★★
shatter: ★★★★
hand of doom: ★★★
the pony factory: ★★★
summer night: ★★★★★
rotgut: ★
outsiders: DNF
mr. bucket told me to: DNF
this is really rough. carthanc and rotgut technically get a score of 0 from me personally, not really worth it for the few good entries.
God Hand
2006
i've been thinking about my relationship with art, and my thoughts at the moment are that what i want in a piece is to feel something. it's not only about being entertaining, it's about catharsis. it's about feeling extremely happy or deeply miserable. it's about having the teeth grinding, the foot tapping, the head scratched. it's about going insane over the details. i want to feel alive. maybe it's a sick thought. maybe i should just live my own life, but i can guarantee, i've been living my own life a lot! much more than i would like to, sometimes.
all the games i've finished this year so far (very few) were a good time, some of them were amazing, really thought-provoking like anodyne 2, but none of them hit me like a truck. until GOD HAND.
GOD HAND makes you feel extremely happy, deeply miserable, with your teeth grinding, your foot tapping, your head scratching... pretty much at the same time! it's commonly known as a very difficult game and it's not an impossible one, but it does require you full commitment. starting with learning the controls: when action games were about swords and guns, with fast-paced movement, GOD HAND was about throwing punches while moving in tank controls. it's all about positioning, a 1v1 it's already a difficult task, but a 2v1? a 4v1? does not help when your crowd control movements are slow as hell! but don't be confused: GOD HAND is not a slow game! actually, if you can't keep up, you will pretty much ended up cooked lol, you have to adapt to the rhythm of the fight. it's all about learning and once you learn, it's about going wild.
and it's not a flashy game. you throw punches. real punches. punches that hit, than you can feel when it hits. GOD HAND it's a dudes rock game but every single dude is rocking on you (in a not-homosexual-way (unfortunately)), and you got rock on them instead. GOD HAND it's a videogame that loves action games. it's a videogame that recognizes the masculine archetypes about the action genre in overall media and at the same time it honors it and it also makes fun of it. GOD HAND is very "manly"! i mean, having blackjack and poker and dogs races as a way to make money makes me think that shinji mikami and the team are either the funniest guys ever or the most heteronormative of all time! and it's very funny either way.
what really matters is that GOD HAND is a videogame that made me feel everything, and in a year that is definitely NOT being my year, with a lot of work and study and personal problems as well, making me sometimes lost my interest in my favorite hobby, it reminds me how great videogames can be and how i can always just punch a son of a bitch when it needs to. you better watch out mf!!!
all the games i've finished this year so far (very few) were a good time, some of them were amazing, really thought-provoking like anodyne 2, but none of them hit me like a truck. until GOD HAND.
GOD HAND makes you feel extremely happy, deeply miserable, with your teeth grinding, your foot tapping, your head scratching... pretty much at the same time! it's commonly known as a very difficult game and it's not an impossible one, but it does require you full commitment. starting with learning the controls: when action games were about swords and guns, with fast-paced movement, GOD HAND was about throwing punches while moving in tank controls. it's all about positioning, a 1v1 it's already a difficult task, but a 2v1? a 4v1? does not help when your crowd control movements are slow as hell! but don't be confused: GOD HAND is not a slow game! actually, if you can't keep up, you will pretty much ended up cooked lol, you have to adapt to the rhythm of the fight. it's all about learning and once you learn, it's about going wild.
and it's not a flashy game. you throw punches. real punches. punches that hit, than you can feel when it hits. GOD HAND it's a dudes rock game but every single dude is rocking on you (in a not-homosexual-way (unfortunately)), and you got rock on them instead. GOD HAND it's a videogame that loves action games. it's a videogame that recognizes the masculine archetypes about the action genre in overall media and at the same time it honors it and it also makes fun of it. GOD HAND is very "manly"! i mean, having blackjack and poker and dogs races as a way to make money makes me think that shinji mikami and the team are either the funniest guys ever or the most heteronormative of all time! and it's very funny either way.
what really matters is that GOD HAND is a videogame that made me feel everything, and in a year that is definitely NOT being my year, with a lot of work and study and personal problems as well, making me sometimes lost my interest in my favorite hobby, it reminds me how great videogames can be and how i can always just punch a son of a bitch when it needs to. you better watch out mf!!!
God Hand
2006
Resident Evil 4 is one of the most important games of all time, everyone knows this and why that is; it is essentially, the first "modern" game as we think of them. And a brutally difficult question you will inevitably have to ask after experiencing a landmark title like that is of course, well, how do you follow that up? If you want a simple answer, Resident Evil 5 is probably your best bet. If you want the real answer, its God Hand.
If Resident Evil 4 is ushering in the modern age of games, then God Hand feels like a celebratory send off to a now bygone era. I doubt anyone would've known that at the time making it, but considering we're only just now returning to this style of game over fifteen years after the fact it harkens completely true. God Hand was made in a relatively short development period, very obviously using design elements and ideas directly from Mikami's now magnum opus and creating something so completely different out of it. It reminds me a lot of Majora's Mask funnily enough more than anything in that regard; taking one of the most influential games of all time and using that framework to tell something completely new and fresh. All of that is to make God Hand sound very legitimate and classy, and in some regards, yes; it absolutely is. But its also fucking God Hand; maybe one of the most batshit, off the wall experiences that we got of the sixth generation.
This is the kitchen sink of action video games. Absolute ridiculous nonsense, and absolutely revels in it. Capcom during this era were pumping some of the best action games ever made during this time, and God Hand truly does feel like a grand last minute after-party. It controls oddly, but when it clicks (and it takes like five minutes for it to) your life is never the same again. Everything is snappy and responsive, stylish and cool, and so intensely customizable and yet; simple, its stupidly impressive. This game is hardcore as hell, and while "this project couldn't be made today" usually makes my eyes roll, I'll say it for this. Playing this game geniunely makes my hands sore, and I don't care for even a second. It is absurdly addicting, every punch and kick has that over the top weight that makes you feel like a God among men. The game is hard, stupidly so, and why wouldn't it be after Devil May Cry 3 was such a landmark title for Capcom; but when you play well, you feel like you're on top of the world.
The absurdity of this game also seeps well into the games concepts too. What it lacks in environments, it makes up for by doing every gaudy over-the-top decision Capcom made and then some in this game. The first thing that happens in this game is Gene complaining to his partner that a bunch of mooks he is about to beat up are sexier than her; and then youre literally kicking them across the entire map not even a minute later. Trying to explain what happens in this game wouldn't do it justice; it knows what it is and it probably knows you love every second of it, and yeah, I do, and clearly everyone else does too.
This is one of those pieces of art that in the moment, it feels like the greatest thing to ever exist. And obviously, God Hand is not the greatest game of all time; but fuck it, maybe it should be. My hands hurt while writing this after beating the final boss of the game and I couldn't be happier.
If Resident Evil 4 is ushering in the modern age of games, then God Hand feels like a celebratory send off to a now bygone era. I doubt anyone would've known that at the time making it, but considering we're only just now returning to this style of game over fifteen years after the fact it harkens completely true. God Hand was made in a relatively short development period, very obviously using design elements and ideas directly from Mikami's now magnum opus and creating something so completely different out of it. It reminds me a lot of Majora's Mask funnily enough more than anything in that regard; taking one of the most influential games of all time and using that framework to tell something completely new and fresh. All of that is to make God Hand sound very legitimate and classy, and in some regards, yes; it absolutely is. But its also fucking God Hand; maybe one of the most batshit, off the wall experiences that we got of the sixth generation.
This is the kitchen sink of action video games. Absolute ridiculous nonsense, and absolutely revels in it. Capcom during this era were pumping some of the best action games ever made during this time, and God Hand truly does feel like a grand last minute after-party. It controls oddly, but when it clicks (and it takes like five minutes for it to) your life is never the same again. Everything is snappy and responsive, stylish and cool, and so intensely customizable and yet; simple, its stupidly impressive. This game is hardcore as hell, and while "this project couldn't be made today" usually makes my eyes roll, I'll say it for this. Playing this game geniunely makes my hands sore, and I don't care for even a second. It is absurdly addicting, every punch and kick has that over the top weight that makes you feel like a God among men. The game is hard, stupidly so, and why wouldn't it be after Devil May Cry 3 was such a landmark title for Capcom; but when you play well, you feel like you're on top of the world.
The absurdity of this game also seeps well into the games concepts too. What it lacks in environments, it makes up for by doing every gaudy over-the-top decision Capcom made and then some in this game. The first thing that happens in this game is Gene complaining to his partner that a bunch of mooks he is about to beat up are sexier than her; and then youre literally kicking them across the entire map not even a minute later. Trying to explain what happens in this game wouldn't do it justice; it knows what it is and it probably knows you love every second of it, and yeah, I do, and clearly everyone else does too.
This is one of those pieces of art that in the moment, it feels like the greatest thing to ever exist. And obviously, God Hand is not the greatest game of all time; but fuck it, maybe it should be. My hands hurt while writing this after beating the final boss of the game and I couldn't be happier.
God Hand
2006
So fun you almost forget that every other cutscene has something wildly offensive in it
" To be or not to be, that is the serious question " - Sam, the Serious
Hundred Days
2021
I want to preface that all of this may sound very unfair and nitpicky but please let me be flippant, this game is naff. Farming is a game genre that, much like the real-world application, is essentially all about math. I never did homework at school, and I don’t plan to start in my mid-twenties. https://i.imgur.com/P28ClZe.png
Hundred Days is the first victim of my Post-Sakuna: Of Rice & Ruin depression. Sakuna singlehandedly revitalised my interest in the farming genre because it was absolutely radiating in a level of reverence for its chosen craft that I’d otherwise never seen in a game of its kind. It took great strides to make sure that not only does the player have to partake in every step in the ricemaking process by hand, it also hid away much of the controllable and uncontrollable variables that contribute to the quality of the harvest until you finally hit that year-end stat page. It forced me to have a steady hand, examine my environment carefully and learn which cues require which actions to counteract. After handing the player a new tool, it took the time to explain their importance in the overall process, as well as a little of their history; each cog in the cultivation machine is shown to be as important as the other. Greedily, I think I NEEDED all of this to care.
I was hopeful about Hundred Days because it focuses entirely around the art and business of winemaking, to a level seemingly more detailed than Sakuna! The problem is that the very distinct dropoff in reverence to the craft almost hit me like a wet sponge - I’m willing to believe that the developers crafted this game out of genuine interest and passion for winemaking, but absolutely none of that verve made it to the final cut. You’re looking at your vineyard empire from a hot air balloon that only seems to become more distant as your empire expands. The higher up my perspective and scale of my empire got, the less the details mattered, beautiful fields of grapevines slowly camouflaging themselves into mere data points on a spreadsheet. The tutorialisation is as shoddy as the story, I barely knew how to navigate the UI, how to find all of the upgrades let alone know what each of them even did. Many of which are insanely expensive, so you just need to grind away to receive incremental boosts to production. Everything you can click on just brings up a new window filled with fucking numbers and percentages. Fun stuff man. Go outside and touch rice.
The rub is that the game starts with a Stardew Valley-esque “boring office life” introductory sequence, used to introduce the player to the basics of the core gameplay loop. Basically, placing cards with specific functions down onto your field grid. It then sends you to your winemaker’s paradise, an idyllic vineyard somewhere in the Tuscany hills or whatever, before making you do the exact same card-based grind. Guess the message here is that even your life’s dream can become a desk job if you aren't willing to give it some respect.
Hundred Days is the first victim of my Post-Sakuna: Of Rice & Ruin depression. Sakuna singlehandedly revitalised my interest in the farming genre because it was absolutely radiating in a level of reverence for its chosen craft that I’d otherwise never seen in a game of its kind. It took great strides to make sure that not only does the player have to partake in every step in the ricemaking process by hand, it also hid away much of the controllable and uncontrollable variables that contribute to the quality of the harvest until you finally hit that year-end stat page. It forced me to have a steady hand, examine my environment carefully and learn which cues require which actions to counteract. After handing the player a new tool, it took the time to explain their importance in the overall process, as well as a little of their history; each cog in the cultivation machine is shown to be as important as the other. Greedily, I think I NEEDED all of this to care.
I was hopeful about Hundred Days because it focuses entirely around the art and business of winemaking, to a level seemingly more detailed than Sakuna! The problem is that the very distinct dropoff in reverence to the craft almost hit me like a wet sponge - I’m willing to believe that the developers crafted this game out of genuine interest and passion for winemaking, but absolutely none of that verve made it to the final cut. You’re looking at your vineyard empire from a hot air balloon that only seems to become more distant as your empire expands. The higher up my perspective and scale of my empire got, the less the details mattered, beautiful fields of grapevines slowly camouflaging themselves into mere data points on a spreadsheet. The tutorialisation is as shoddy as the story, I barely knew how to navigate the UI, how to find all of the upgrades let alone know what each of them even did. Many of which are insanely expensive, so you just need to grind away to receive incremental boosts to production. Everything you can click on just brings up a new window filled with fucking numbers and percentages. Fun stuff man. Go outside and touch rice.
The rub is that the game starts with a Stardew Valley-esque “boring office life” introductory sequence, used to introduce the player to the basics of the core gameplay loop. Basically, placing cards with specific functions down onto your field grid. It then sends you to your winemaker’s paradise, an idyllic vineyard somewhere in the Tuscany hills or whatever, before making you do the exact same card-based grind. Guess the message here is that even your life’s dream can become a desk job if you aren't willing to give it some respect.
Part Time UFO
2017
Incredibly fun app - might be one I’ve had the best time with since the “Golden Years” of the Angry Birds, Plants vs Zombies, and Cut the Rope kinda phone-gaming era.
Part Time UFO was made and published by HAL Laboratory (of Kirby fame) wanting to focus on games made specifically for smartphones in mind. This is why I think the game works so well, and why its reminiscent of the games that I remember most fondly in smartphone gaming. Part Time UFO is made with the phone in mind, and tried its best to focus on making a game that worked with a smartphone’s features (touch screen, portability, etc) rather than fight against them. Phone gaming at this point has a bit of a bad name for itself, having mostly devolved into however cheaply a person can make a game that can quickly take a player’s money, infamously cover the gameplay in ads, and force the player away with pop-up after pop-up of MTX requests.
Paying around $4 in exchange for a fun game experience is extremely worth it in my opinion, with Part Time UFO costing around that. Early smartphone games usually only offered a demo for free, but a very kind $5 or less price for the full game. A cheap price for hours of uninterrupted fun, and for good games, too! Games made with the intention for the player to work with the smartphone’s touch and lack of buttons, rather than fight against it.
That is where I had to dock points from Part Time UFO though, as while the game clearly is well-intentionally made to be a phone game, and is leaps and bounds ahead of many other current smartphone games, it still has to rely on covering parts of the screen with a joystick and button. People often say that this game is a better experience on Switch, and I can believe it. Even though the game was originally made just for phones, the way they put a touch control joystick and button right in front of you immediately has the player start to fight against the phone’s capability, rather than work with it. It results in the player desperately wishing they had a physical joystick and button, which the Switch can happily provide them.
Even with that as a bit of a glaring knock-back, I do really love Part Time UFO, and find myself quickly losing my time when I open it up. It has quite a bit to offer, and has great replayability in allowing players to retry levels to get a perfect score, very in tune to how early smartphone games work in eating up your time. I really do recommend this game to anyone looking for a good find for their phone! It’s $4 and I think I’ve already spent 3 hours on it, and I’m not even done! The Switch version probably controls better, but it’s also double the price. I’m guessing they add more stuff or something to reason the price, but also maybe not! It is Nintendo after all lmao.
Oh well, check Part Time UFO out, you’ll have a blast. It’s cute, charming, and fun - and will absolutely eat all my battery away when I take the train.
3.5/5
Part Time UFO was made and published by HAL Laboratory (of Kirby fame) wanting to focus on games made specifically for smartphones in mind. This is why I think the game works so well, and why its reminiscent of the games that I remember most fondly in smartphone gaming. Part Time UFO is made with the phone in mind, and tried its best to focus on making a game that worked with a smartphone’s features (touch screen, portability, etc) rather than fight against them. Phone gaming at this point has a bit of a bad name for itself, having mostly devolved into however cheaply a person can make a game that can quickly take a player’s money, infamously cover the gameplay in ads, and force the player away with pop-up after pop-up of MTX requests.
Paying around $4 in exchange for a fun game experience is extremely worth it in my opinion, with Part Time UFO costing around that. Early smartphone games usually only offered a demo for free, but a very kind $5 or less price for the full game. A cheap price for hours of uninterrupted fun, and for good games, too! Games made with the intention for the player to work with the smartphone’s touch and lack of buttons, rather than fight against it.
That is where I had to dock points from Part Time UFO though, as while the game clearly is well-intentionally made to be a phone game, and is leaps and bounds ahead of many other current smartphone games, it still has to rely on covering parts of the screen with a joystick and button. People often say that this game is a better experience on Switch, and I can believe it. Even though the game was originally made just for phones, the way they put a touch control joystick and button right in front of you immediately has the player start to fight against the phone’s capability, rather than work with it. It results in the player desperately wishing they had a physical joystick and button, which the Switch can happily provide them.
Even with that as a bit of a glaring knock-back, I do really love Part Time UFO, and find myself quickly losing my time when I open it up. It has quite a bit to offer, and has great replayability in allowing players to retry levels to get a perfect score, very in tune to how early smartphone games work in eating up your time. I really do recommend this game to anyone looking for a good find for their phone! It’s $4 and I think I’ve already spent 3 hours on it, and I’m not even done! The Switch version probably controls better, but it’s also double the price. I’m guessing they add more stuff or something to reason the price, but also maybe not! It is Nintendo after all lmao.
Oh well, check Part Time UFO out, you’ll have a blast. It’s cute, charming, and fun - and will absolutely eat all my battery away when I take the train.
3.5/5
The Silver Case
2016
This review contains spoilers
In a game, let alone continuity, lousy with sharp, confrontational artistic direction, it’s one as simple as the back of the box that continues to work its way through me. It’s the illustration of Kusabi, Sakura, and Kosaka, in particular - Sakura’s exaggerated frown extends out of the image towards you while Kusabi and Kosaka converse around her. If you’ve played the game, you’re aware that this configuration can only happen in the events proceeding the finale (a massive torpedo-spoiler on the back of the box, funny!). By extension, this also means that the illustration is, to whatever degree, a reflection on the status quo after case#5:lifecut, i.e. the chapter of the game where everything boils over, a majority of the Transmitter cast straight up dies, and radical actions by the hands of the remaining cast occur.
I love this illustration for a few reasons - for one, Takashi Miyamoto captures a sense of mundanity so well. In game, you’re never really able to bear witness to a Kusabi at peace in ordinary life, and here he’s beautifully human in his pose - well-earned after his arc through the game. Secondly, through that same focus on the mundane lies a commentary on the dynamics these characters are engaged in. I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to imply that the gender dynamics put forth here can be seen as a disappointing reminder that leaving Kusabi (love ‘em as I do) as the sole surviving veteran of the HCU means that the same bitterness which ostracized Hachisuka, possibly enabling something within to give in to her inevitable death-filing and appearance as Ayame, is likely still in the air. But these observations pale, in my opinion, to the context.
As she continues ascending the 24th Ward’s crime department, after bearing witness to the very operation that almost(/successfully?) doomed her and the player character to a life of artificial personhood, and after witnessing the takedown of the two major antagonists of the game, Nezu and (eventually) Uminosuke, she still frowns at us, the player. Why? I thought danwa was a happy ending.
-
TSC is one of few games I can think of that really eludes simple genre description. Sure, it’s a crime procedural, up until it isn’t. It’s a conspiracy thriller... in spots. It’s Lynchian surrealist dystopia? Alright we’re just gonna say words now, I guess? The only thing that comes to mind for descriptors is, like, slipstream fiction, which, given 25W references seminal proto-Cyberpunk novella The Girl Who Was Plugged In, seems apt enough to settle on. I won’t even evoke the P-word. The one that rhymes with “toast auburn.”
But really, this thought exercise is all just a veiled move to get you to wonder about the limitation of genre fiction as it applies to TSC, and poke at its aspirations. For this to be a standard crime procedural, you’d expect the HCU to... function in some capacity? And conspiracy thriller’s a no-go considering the weight that spirituality and all other intangibles have here, in my opinion. The way I’ll continue from this point to put it is thus: the Mikumo 77 incident, the murder of Kamui by the underworld factions, and the ensuing Shelter Kids policy reverberate through the story on many different frequencies, and the effect of it all is so bleak that only genre convention can make the discussion palatable as fiction. But it doesn’t always cover it: the melancholic, ambling work of Tokio through Placebo, the brain-swelling conflict of information in Transmitter, I think both serve as a reminder that there’s no easy out from underneath the sin of government control. It’s no surprise, I guess, that the symptoms get much, much worse when we return to Kanto in The 25th Ward.
-
Kamuidrome thru danwa (and the equivalent reports from Placebo’s end) are so dizzying and hard to come to terms with that I have literally shaved my head since first playing this game. This is actually true! I have death-filed!
That said, I feel like an essential piece of advice I could give someone who’s in for their first time is to enact judgment on the information based on who and when it’s coming from. This is easy enough in some cases - I think most people are primed from birth to hate pedo-fascist Nakategawa enough to not mind his words. But even fan-favorite Kusabi, for instance... this entire game is a slow fade-to-white for him as he unlearns an entire ideology of criminality equating plague, one he’s enforced so much with violence, not just as a cop, but as a particularly fucked up cop. In the beginning, I wouldn’t blame you for sticking with the competent elder authority of the cast, but if the ending moments of Parade don’t convince you to question the prior chapters, then I don’t know what will. The state of this world can be figured out with relative certainty as long as you keep track of where you are in the game’s web.
Though deeply confusing (& not helped by a localization that I can only describe as “challenging” (no shade to Grasshopper James btw, I can only imagine trying to piece this together 😭)), this game masterfully tiers up its information in a way that makes the trek through the underbelly of the 24th Ward feel so uniquely haunting. While certain aspects (the bench-warming faction war at the batting center comes to mind) do feel a bit bizarre and maybe even underdeveloped as words on a (cyber)page, the thematic tapestry of this game is exceptionally rich, even among other lauded-for-thematic-richness games. I’m a lifelong MGS fan and even I have to admit that after coming to conclusions confident enough to type words about, I think we might be seeing a lunch-eating of unseen proportions.
I love this illustration for a few reasons - for one, Takashi Miyamoto captures a sense of mundanity so well. In game, you’re never really able to bear witness to a Kusabi at peace in ordinary life, and here he’s beautifully human in his pose - well-earned after his arc through the game. Secondly, through that same focus on the mundane lies a commentary on the dynamics these characters are engaged in. I don’t think it’s much of a stretch to imply that the gender dynamics put forth here can be seen as a disappointing reminder that leaving Kusabi (love ‘em as I do) as the sole surviving veteran of the HCU means that the same bitterness which ostracized Hachisuka, possibly enabling something within to give in to her inevitable death-filing and appearance as Ayame, is likely still in the air. But these observations pale, in my opinion, to the context.
As she continues ascending the 24th Ward’s crime department, after bearing witness to the very operation that almost(/successfully?) doomed her and the player character to a life of artificial personhood, and after witnessing the takedown of the two major antagonists of the game, Nezu and (eventually) Uminosuke, she still frowns at us, the player. Why? I thought danwa was a happy ending.
-
TSC is one of few games I can think of that really eludes simple genre description. Sure, it’s a crime procedural, up until it isn’t. It’s a conspiracy thriller... in spots. It’s Lynchian surrealist dystopia? Alright we’re just gonna say words now, I guess? The only thing that comes to mind for descriptors is, like, slipstream fiction, which, given 25W references seminal proto-Cyberpunk novella The Girl Who Was Plugged In, seems apt enough to settle on. I won’t even evoke the P-word. The one that rhymes with “toast auburn.”
But really, this thought exercise is all just a veiled move to get you to wonder about the limitation of genre fiction as it applies to TSC, and poke at its aspirations. For this to be a standard crime procedural, you’d expect the HCU to... function in some capacity? And conspiracy thriller’s a no-go considering the weight that spirituality and all other intangibles have here, in my opinion. The way I’ll continue from this point to put it is thus: the Mikumo 77 incident, the murder of Kamui by the underworld factions, and the ensuing Shelter Kids policy reverberate through the story on many different frequencies, and the effect of it all is so bleak that only genre convention can make the discussion palatable as fiction. But it doesn’t always cover it: the melancholic, ambling work of Tokio through Placebo, the brain-swelling conflict of information in Transmitter, I think both serve as a reminder that there’s no easy out from underneath the sin of government control. It’s no surprise, I guess, that the symptoms get much, much worse when we return to Kanto in The 25th Ward.
-
Kamuidrome thru danwa (and the equivalent reports from Placebo’s end) are so dizzying and hard to come to terms with that I have literally shaved my head since first playing this game. This is actually true! I have death-filed!
That said, I feel like an essential piece of advice I could give someone who’s in for their first time is to enact judgment on the information based on who and when it’s coming from. This is easy enough in some cases - I think most people are primed from birth to hate pedo-fascist Nakategawa enough to not mind his words. But even fan-favorite Kusabi, for instance... this entire game is a slow fade-to-white for him as he unlearns an entire ideology of criminality equating plague, one he’s enforced so much with violence, not just as a cop, but as a particularly fucked up cop. In the beginning, I wouldn’t blame you for sticking with the competent elder authority of the cast, but if the ending moments of Parade don’t convince you to question the prior chapters, then I don’t know what will. The state of this world can be figured out with relative certainty as long as you keep track of where you are in the game’s web.
Though deeply confusing (& not helped by a localization that I can only describe as “challenging” (no shade to Grasshopper James btw, I can only imagine trying to piece this together 😭)), this game masterfully tiers up its information in a way that makes the trek through the underbelly of the 24th Ward feel so uniquely haunting. While certain aspects (the bench-warming faction war at the batting center comes to mind) do feel a bit bizarre and maybe even underdeveloped as words on a (cyber)page, the thematic tapestry of this game is exceptionally rich, even among other lauded-for-thematic-richness games. I’m a lifelong MGS fan and even I have to admit that after coming to conclusions confident enough to type words about, I think we might be seeing a lunch-eating of unseen proportions.
• Art Book
Dragon's Dogma II
2024
"The world once shaped by the great will has come to an end.
It was a foregone conclusion. All is preordained.
If in spite of this you still have the will to fight, now is your chance to prove it."
This is a particularly difficult game for me to write about because I want to greedily compare and contrast every ballhair with the first title’s, just so I can diagnose exactly where my issues with it lie - why a game that is functionally so similar in DNA to one of my all-timers doesn’t hit the mark. Personally speakin, the long & short of it is that Dragon’s Dogma 2 is something of a sidegrade to the original title that distances itself too much from what I found spectacular about it to begin with.
Possibly my favourite element of Dragon’s Dogma 2 is one that could be felt from the moment you first gain control of your character. There’s a palpable heft to character locomotion, complimented by the multilayered textuality of the land itself & the threats of wrong turns into the unknown or slipping off a slick cliffside to your untimely demise - it leans wonderfully far into the concept of traversal being a battle unto itself. As was the case with DD1, being tasked to travel from safety to a marker deep into the fog of war is never a simple request. Goblins, ogres, harpies, and whoever else decides to grace you with their presence are waiting in the bushes to act as regular speedbumps to be carefully considered and planned for accordingly.
Where DD2 slips at this for me is in how little it reciprocates for what it demands. This is a sequel that has ballooned itself in scale to a dizzying near 5x the original map’s size, but hasn’t developed the enemy roster nor the environmental design acumen to make use of it. Take for instance that DD2 has fifty caves strewn around its tectonic world map, and I don’t think a single one is as impressive as one that could be found in DD1. Where the caves/dungeons in DD1 were concerned, there would be special objectives relevant to the overall story, a person you were going there on behalf of who represented a town or group, they would unlock shortcuts for faster world traversal and upon repeat visits you’d notice the location’s role in the world change for the denizens. They would be densely designed so that every corner was worth being scanned to the best of your ability for pickups, shortcuts, levers, climbing points - lending to the almost DnD-esque adventure core followed passionately by the game’s design. Hell, the locales would generally sound and look different too, built to purpose so as to become plausible enough to justify their utility in the world and lend credence to exploring them.
Compared to that, DD2 has shockingly little of this. Its myriad nondescript caves wallhugging the world could scarcely be five prefab rooms tied into a loop to house a few potions, or some equipment you could find at a store. No unique gimmicks or trials, only populated by a handful of gobbos and maybe a midboss as a treat. I feel that Dragonsbreath Tower was supposed to act as something of a callback to Bluemoon Tower from DD1 - it being a perilous journey across a handful of biomes towards a crumbling hanging dungeon that houses a flying peril, but it’s so bereft of pomp and confidence. A truly memetic core routine that made me think less of adventures and more of waypoints and upgrade materials. I want to use a Neuralyzer to remove BotW shrines from the face of the earth. And god why is none of the new music good.
DD2 implies at a big story, but to me it felt like nothing came together. I had no idea who anyone was supposed to be beyond Brant, Sven and Wilhelmina. DD1’s progression from Wyrmhunt -> Investigate the Cult -> Kill Grigori -> Deal with the Everfall -> Confront the Seneschal was great, and throughout all of that you kept up with characters like the King and got to see his downfall. The writing and delivery of the cult leader and Grigori himself far surpasses anything in DD2, despite having very similar subjects. Outpaced by DD1 in setpieces and pop-offs and thematics. There's barely any antagonistic people in the game and once you get to Battahl it feels as though the game trails off like it’s got dementia.
It's a completely different kind of design that, sure, encourages player freedom - but communicates it in this really loose way that I just don't care about. I spent much of my playthrough having no idea what I was doing besides wiping off the blank smudges of world map. What expounds this problem is that quest discoverability is astonishingly low here, oftentimes made worse by restricting itself to AI astrology, time of day, relationship levels (??). The duke could stand to commission a farcking quest board imo!!! I won’t kid myself and say that the quests in DD1 were even a bronze standard, but they worked and communicated exactly what they needed to do while also leaving open ends available for interpretation. But in DD2, they’re just awful, I absolutely hated the experience of trying to clear up Vermund’s quests before pushing Main Story progression and at this point I wish I cared as little as the game does. What need is there for almost all of them to have a “return to me in a few days” component in a game with such limited fast travel, do you want me to throw you into the brine? Frankly the game is never as interesting as when you're doing Sphinx riddles.
Combat’s good enough, I do enjoy how the interplay of systems would present the player with all sorts of unique situations, but even these can and do begin to feel samey when a very slim enemy pool on shuffle. What makes these emergent conflicts even less impressive to me is how I can't help but feel as though the ogres, trolls and chimeras in particular have had their difficulties neutered. The hardest time I had with the chimera was during a sidequest where you had to get the poison-lover to be doused in chimeric snake venom. They're barely a threat otherwise, and can either be chain stunlocked with well-placed shots or slashes, or get too lost in their own attack animations to really hit anyone. Comparing these enemies to DD1 where climbing was far more effective at dealing damage encouraged the player to get real up close to them and it felt like their AI knew how to deal with that. Like when I fought the Medusa it felt like they didn't have any idea where the party even was. I think if the hardest encounters the game has to offer is Too Many Goblins we have a problem. (Dullahan is very cool though)
I’m not miffed no matter how miffed I sound. When do people like me ever get sequels to games they love? I’ll tell u dear reader it’s Never. Dragon’s Dogma 2 is full of wonder & delight and I think anyone less fatigued by SCALE and SANDBOX than me has a home in it. I feel a little left behind, having spent 12 years wasting away in the waiting room rotating in my head the concepts DD1 confidently wields, and its further potential as a foundation for a sequel. A game that was absolutely 'for me', course correcting into sick-of-this-already airspace. I’ll be excited to see whatever news, expansions or the like the future holds for DD2. Right now, though? I think DD1 has a stronger jawline.
It was a foregone conclusion. All is preordained.
If in spite of this you still have the will to fight, now is your chance to prove it."
This is a particularly difficult game for me to write about because I want to greedily compare and contrast every ballhair with the first title’s, just so I can diagnose exactly where my issues with it lie - why a game that is functionally so similar in DNA to one of my all-timers doesn’t hit the mark. Personally speakin, the long & short of it is that Dragon’s Dogma 2 is something of a sidegrade to the original title that distances itself too much from what I found spectacular about it to begin with.
Possibly my favourite element of Dragon’s Dogma 2 is one that could be felt from the moment you first gain control of your character. There’s a palpable heft to character locomotion, complimented by the multilayered textuality of the land itself & the threats of wrong turns into the unknown or slipping off a slick cliffside to your untimely demise - it leans wonderfully far into the concept of traversal being a battle unto itself. As was the case with DD1, being tasked to travel from safety to a marker deep into the fog of war is never a simple request. Goblins, ogres, harpies, and whoever else decides to grace you with their presence are waiting in the bushes to act as regular speedbumps to be carefully considered and planned for accordingly.
Where DD2 slips at this for me is in how little it reciprocates for what it demands. This is a sequel that has ballooned itself in scale to a dizzying near 5x the original map’s size, but hasn’t developed the enemy roster nor the environmental design acumen to make use of it. Take for instance that DD2 has fifty caves strewn around its tectonic world map, and I don’t think a single one is as impressive as one that could be found in DD1. Where the caves/dungeons in DD1 were concerned, there would be special objectives relevant to the overall story, a person you were going there on behalf of who represented a town or group, they would unlock shortcuts for faster world traversal and upon repeat visits you’d notice the location’s role in the world change for the denizens. They would be densely designed so that every corner was worth being scanned to the best of your ability for pickups, shortcuts, levers, climbing points - lending to the almost DnD-esque adventure core followed passionately by the game’s design. Hell, the locales would generally sound and look different too, built to purpose so as to become plausible enough to justify their utility in the world and lend credence to exploring them.
Compared to that, DD2 has shockingly little of this. Its myriad nondescript caves wallhugging the world could scarcely be five prefab rooms tied into a loop to house a few potions, or some equipment you could find at a store. No unique gimmicks or trials, only populated by a handful of gobbos and maybe a midboss as a treat. I feel that Dragonsbreath Tower was supposed to act as something of a callback to Bluemoon Tower from DD1 - it being a perilous journey across a handful of biomes towards a crumbling hanging dungeon that houses a flying peril, but it’s so bereft of pomp and confidence. A truly memetic core routine that made me think less of adventures and more of waypoints and upgrade materials. I want to use a Neuralyzer to remove BotW shrines from the face of the earth. And god why is none of the new music good.
DD2 implies at a big story, but to me it felt like nothing came together. I had no idea who anyone was supposed to be beyond Brant, Sven and Wilhelmina. DD1’s progression from Wyrmhunt -> Investigate the Cult -> Kill Grigori -> Deal with the Everfall -> Confront the Seneschal was great, and throughout all of that you kept up with characters like the King and got to see his downfall. The writing and delivery of the cult leader and Grigori himself far surpasses anything in DD2, despite having very similar subjects. Outpaced by DD1 in setpieces and pop-offs and thematics. There's barely any antagonistic people in the game and once you get to Battahl it feels as though the game trails off like it’s got dementia.
It's a completely different kind of design that, sure, encourages player freedom - but communicates it in this really loose way that I just don't care about. I spent much of my playthrough having no idea what I was doing besides wiping off the blank smudges of world map. What expounds this problem is that quest discoverability is astonishingly low here, oftentimes made worse by restricting itself to AI astrology, time of day, relationship levels (??). The duke could stand to commission a farcking quest board imo!!! I won’t kid myself and say that the quests in DD1 were even a bronze standard, but they worked and communicated exactly what they needed to do while also leaving open ends available for interpretation. But in DD2, they’re just awful, I absolutely hated the experience of trying to clear up Vermund’s quests before pushing Main Story progression and at this point I wish I cared as little as the game does. What need is there for almost all of them to have a “return to me in a few days” component in a game with such limited fast travel, do you want me to throw you into the brine? Frankly the game is never as interesting as when you're doing Sphinx riddles.
Combat’s good enough, I do enjoy how the interplay of systems would present the player with all sorts of unique situations, but even these can and do begin to feel samey when a very slim enemy pool on shuffle. What makes these emergent conflicts even less impressive to me is how I can't help but feel as though the ogres, trolls and chimeras in particular have had their difficulties neutered. The hardest time I had with the chimera was during a sidequest where you had to get the poison-lover to be doused in chimeric snake venom. They're barely a threat otherwise, and can either be chain stunlocked with well-placed shots or slashes, or get too lost in their own attack animations to really hit anyone. Comparing these enemies to DD1 where climbing was far more effective at dealing damage encouraged the player to get real up close to them and it felt like their AI knew how to deal with that. Like when I fought the Medusa it felt like they didn't have any idea where the party even was. I think if the hardest encounters the game has to offer is Too Many Goblins we have a problem. (Dullahan is very cool though)
I’m not miffed no matter how miffed I sound. When do people like me ever get sequels to games they love? I’ll tell u dear reader it’s Never. Dragon’s Dogma 2 is full of wonder & delight and I think anyone less fatigued by SCALE and SANDBOX than me has a home in it. I feel a little left behind, having spent 12 years wasting away in the waiting room rotating in my head the concepts DD1 confidently wields, and its further potential as a foundation for a sequel. A game that was absolutely 'for me', course correcting into sick-of-this-already airspace. I’ll be excited to see whatever news, expansions or the like the future holds for DD2. Right now, though? I think DD1 has a stronger jawline.