I have no idea what it is about this game, but I couldn't put it down. I've played other Picross games before and I wasn't as engaged with them as I was with this one for some reason. There were only a handful of puzzles that I really struggled with and I don't really consider myself a great Picross player. That along with the great tools this game has to help players solve puzzles makes this a really accessible game. The almanac is pretty neat, I'm hoping that it will help me with my Story of Seasons games after I look through them. I think my biggest gripes with the game is the actual pixel art. A lot of the puzzles were very symmetrical, which kind of brought the satisfaction of solving the puzzle down a bit. Also, the art itself looked atrocious. Even after seeing the color filled in and the label identifying what I was looking at, there were times where I was scratching my head in confusion because the pictures were almost unidentifiable. I feel the need to point this out because I haven't had that problem with other Picross games. Overall, I think this is still an easy recommendation for people that like Picross.

Played this on Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection on PS3 with save states.

Pros: I like the level variety. One of my big complaints about the first game is that a lot of the levels didn't feel distinct, but this game avoids that by having less acts, but more zones so there's more diverse aesthetics. I like the addition of tails and multiplayer, it's nice to be able to be able to select your character and play with a friend. The spin dash is great addition, no more struggling to build up speed. Sonic felt slow and clunky in the first game, but he really does feel fast in this game. I think one of the best changes is that getting all of the Chaos emeralds gets you an awesome reward. Playing as Super Sonic kind of lets you bypass playing the actual game, which is pretty funny.

Cons: The level design feels cheap sometimes. The increased movement speed comes with the side effect of not being able to properly react to anything. This game loves throwing hazards, pits, and enemies in your way that you can't react to, so it basically necessitates memorizing the levels to go fast. This applies to both the standard and bonus levels. The bonus levels are cruel in this game because they are way harder and a lot easier to miss. I guess the trade off is the potential to access them multiple times in the level and actually being able to understand how to control Sonic. Another issue I had with the game is that enemies do a poor job of telegraphing their attacks, which is a big issue when there are more enemies that fire projectiles in this game. Also, I love the addition of Tails, but he's the embodiment of little brother mode. Playing as Tails in co-op is hard because the camera focuses on Sonic, and playing as Tails solo is like playing as a slow version of Sonic that can't go Super. On the brightside, Tails is so slow it negates the other issue I had with not being able to react to the stage. It just doesn't feel great to feel like you're walking through the levels.

Overall, I like Sonic 2 more than its predecessor mainly because moving faster just feels good. I found myself getting stuck less often since I was able to build up speed and actually progress through obstacles. The trade off is the occasional cheapness, but I think the pros outweighs the cons in this case. Next up will be Sonic CD. I won't be using save states with that one, so I hope I'm able to get through it okay. Thankfully, going forward I'm pretty sure all of the games have in-game saving.

This game is okay. Everything is functional, but I never really felt like I was having fun. Combat is whatever, exploration is tedious, and I wasn't big on the story or characters. This game embodies the worst part of Metroidvanias. The majority of upgrades felt like I was arbitrarily locked out of accessing certain areas instead of making me excited to see what I would unlock and changing the way I played the game. Still planning on playing Shadow of the Tomb Raider and I hope I enjoy that one more.

Played a game called Mrs.Cat Between Worlds on Switch. It seems to be a compilation of two games: Mrs.Cat in Mars and Mrs.Cat in Neptune. Each game has 51 single screen levels. I ended up being pretty disappointed with both because they both feel like mobile games (derogatory) and controlling the cat never felt quite right. Mars is mechanically bare and it is more about memorizing where hazards are (most of them become invisible shortly after the level starts). Neptune adds wall jumping and dashing, so it's a bit more interesting for me, but there's too much visual noise. The effects they added makes the visuals harder to read. I beat both within a hour, so I'm glad I only paid about $2.

I'll be talking about the Switch version of the game. I'm a big fan of the series. I've played every Shantae game that has been released so far along with their DLCs, so I was pretty excited to play the first game in the series. I ended up disappointed. World is too big, screen is too small, there's insta-deaths everywhere, and sometimes the NPCs will straight up lie to you about how to progress. This game is absolutely incredible on a technical level that it runs on the gameboy color, but I just didn't find it very fun to play. This is my least favorite game in the series.

Overall, I found this game to be a bit better than the first game. I really like the narrative of the grandpa telling his grandchildren stories. It's a good way to make a ton of adventures that have independent stories. As for the gameplay, this game takes even more things from more Zelda games: rolling, item crafting, bottle hunting, and sword skills. The trading and the side quests does a better job at encouraging players to explore and engage in things outside of combat. Both of these games scratch the itch for a 2D Zelda game. I do wish this game let you set manual map markers. There's a ton of things to keep track of in the overworld, but there's no way to track them all. Also, I wish there was more of a use for currency. Money becomes literally useless after awhile.

Played on Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection on PS3.

I played the vanilla version of the game. I went from the easiest classic Sonic game to the hardest. I love there's actually a save system unlock the other Genesis games, but that's offset by how brutal the levels are. There are a few mechanics like the cylinders in the 4th zone and the tops in the 3rd zone that do not effectively teach the player how to use them. The level and boss design really exacerbates the issues I had with the entire classic series thusfar. There are 3 buttons on the standard Genesis controller, why is only one used? Why can't one of them be for the spindash? Zone 2 act 2 really made me angry when I was trying to spindash, but couldn't because I wasn't at a complete stop and I end up jumping instead. The hit and hurt boxes on everything in this game isn't really intuitive, I just kind of have to guess.

The thing that made me the most upset were the glitches. All of the games I played had glitches, but I got to the point where I felt like I was almost softlocked in Sonic 3. These 2 glitches only occurred during my Tails playthrough and I'm not sure if this is something that happens on original hardware, if it's the version I'm playing, or even if it's something wrong with my disc. First up, when I was doing my 4th special stage, the game started playing like a slide show. It was pause and start randomly, and the special stage became basically unplayable. The second glitch I encountered happened in the same act as the first. In zone 5 act 1, I got to a point where I had to collapse an ice bridge and descend, but when I did that, the screen scrolled all the way to the end of the level and took out Tails. I eventually found a workaround, but I legit thought it was impossible for me to beat the game when I got to that point. I had to hit a checkpoint, let the game take out Tails, then I would be fine to progress on my next attempt. Super frustrating.

Now on to things I liked. I liked the screen transitions between acts and zones, it makes the world and levels seem more interconnected. I liked the 3 new shields that have their own defensive properties and abilities. I really wish the abilities (double jump, forward jump, and bounce) were standard movement options for the entire game instead of being locked to the shields. Knuckles makes a strong impression in his debut. The very first thing he does is knock Sonic out of Super form at base and that's rad.

Next up is Sonic & Knuckles (base only). After that, I think that will wrap up my playthrough of the 2D Sonic games for now.