12 years after the last mainline entry in the franchise, Doom 3, which unsuccessfully tried to take the series in a survival horror direction, Doom 2016 returns the series to its previous FPS roots. This alongside the return of Wolfenstein in 2014 rekindled my love for single player shooters.

Doom 2016 features a familiar story of the UAC mars base being invaded by the demonic forces of Hell. Many of the enemies and weapons from the previous titles make a return here and justifiably so since Doom has always hosted an excellent array of demons and weapons to kill those demons with.

Where Wolfenstein spends more time developing its story and characters, there are generally few long cutscenes or bits of dialogue as the number one focus in Doom is the fast paced action combat. The combat is bloody, chaotic, and addicting. Few games make you feel as powerful as Doom does and this power fantasy is kept across difficulties assuming you have the skill to keep up.

Levels are of good length and have a number of collectibles as well as combat challenges called Rune Trials that reward the player with ability upgrades. My only real (minor) gripe is that the levels feel somewhat samey when on Mars. This especially noticeable with one of the levels just being a remix of a couple prior levels. This is improved in the sequel in my opinion.

Can't talk about Doom without talking about the masterpiece of a soundtrack that Mick Gordon composed for it. The tracks that play during combat further play into creating that power fantasy and is why despite featuring horror elements, Doom 2016 is not a horror game. you should not fear the demons, the demons should fear you.

There is an arena style multiplayer mode also present reminiscent of the quake and unreal tournament days. I know a lot of people didn't care for it but I must confess it was a guilty pleasure of mine when it was more populated. It's faster paced than a lot of the multiplayer fps options these days and reminds me of playing UT2004 in my youth. That being said, the real meat of the game is the single player for sure.

Doom 2016 is one of the best fps experiences of the last 10 years and I can' recommend it enough. Check it out!

CLIVE GAMING

This game was phenomenal from start to finish and I loved everything about it. Such fun combat met with some of the best boss fights EVER and amazing visuals to back it up. The soundtrack is awesome, always playing the right track at the right moment and hearing Kenshi Yonezu at the end was peak I tell ya.

The ending hit so much harder after doing all the side quests, they take the character writing, storytelling and world building to the next level so definitely don't sleep on those because there are gems in there!

Absolutely kino, that is all.

I wanted to love this game but unfortunately there are too many annoying things throughout the game that ultimately drags down the experience. While the environment and atmosphere is great, most of the levels are very frustrating to get through and it's just not fun. Not to mention there isn't a lot of variety in the mobs so it's piss easy to wipe them with the exception of some elites. These freaks can sometimes be harder than a boss encounter and for what reason? Since I mentioned the bosses, let's talk about them briefly. I think majority of them are great but there are some random difficulty spikes that didn't really make sense. It didn't feel like these encounters were there to help you get better at the game and its mechanics like they do in FromSoftware games, it does not have THE CLICK. There's not that many gimmicky bosses which was nice and the difficulty was just about right. Will say that there are a bit too many delayed attacks and that brings me to the next point.

I love the addition of parrying but it was something that I couldn't quite master because of the amount of frames however it felt satisfying those odd times you do manage to parry a full combo. The parry window WOULD be fine if it weren't for all these delayed attacks and the constant animation locks. Overall I think it's good and maybe it's something I'd master on NG+.

The Skill Tree is pretty bogus though let me tell ya.. like why on earth are some of these dodges locked behind it? I didn't even pick them up because I want to PARRY attacks not dodge them but it just feels so counterintuitive. I also think it would've helped if there were video previews in the game showing you exactly what some of these things do. I don't wanna put my skill points into something that I don't even know what it looks like and potentially have no use for.

The story is pretty cool, followed up with a solid soundtrack and a good cast of characters. I also liked the quests, they're pretty easy to follow since the game tells you where things are on the Stargazers.

Lies of P is a good Soulslike game that unfortunately falls short of being on that FromSoftware tier. However I think it's a game that people should try and play. It's challenging and enjoyable with a lot of bullshit moments but that in itself adds to the experience.

It's time to lie, today is the day.

I have NEVER beaten a Mario game before but this was absolutely fantastic!

I loved it from start to finish, every level had its own charm and it doesn't stop there! Every time you pick up that wonder seed, the levels change, adding new layers of fun to them. Boss encounters were a bit disappointing because all of them besides Bowser were pretty much the same, feel like they could've switched it up a bit more.

Also being able to play online with other people from across the world was great, when you die you become a ghost and can tag other players so you get resurrected. This was really helpful for a beginner like me LOL

And I can't forget about the score because it's peak. I was vibing the whole time and I don't think there was a single track I did not enjoy.

Big vouch!

Ed, Edd n Eddy: The Mis-Edventures is the reason my dad owns a PlayStation 5 and became obsessed with The Last of Us for a year. I'm not shitting you.

The year was circa 2009, or something like that, and my brother was obsessed with Ed, Edd n Eddy. Kind of. Back then, we had a small collection of licensed games. There was a copy of the Robots game that I thought the House Fairy (my mom's way of getting us to clean up after ourselves) gave us once, and a copy of a weird Animaniacs game that I don't remember at all. Those are the two that stick out to me the most. So my older brother's frothing at the mouth at the thought of playing a game based on one of his favorite cartoons, and lo and behold, one exists. So he goads my dad into going to the nearby GameStop we bought a copy of Animal Crossing: City Folk and a mic for our Wii at. No cheddar. But they have a copy of it for the PlayStation 2. At this point, we're using our Wii as a glorified Gamecube and boot up Goldeneye on our dad's old N64 to scream at each other. All hope is lost for my older brother until he remembers that, 'wait, doesn't the PlayStation 3 play PS2 games?' Neither of us Google that, and the thought of watching my older brother play it inspires me to add a PlayStation 3 to my wishlist come December out of the blue. Cue the gift card my dad gets from work that Holiday season being the perfect amount for a new console; cue our brand new PlayStation 3 getting unwrapped next to a copy of Mind Flex that will gather dust in the years to come and a copy of The Beatles Rock Band for Wii that probably went to a Goodwill somewhere. Cue the memories spawned from my neighbors: the kids who went to our house for the trampoline we had in our backyard and LittleBigPlanet; the kid who lived right next to us who was so obsessed with Call of Duty that his birthday cake was literally the cover art of World At War one time; the copy of Assassin's Creed Brotherhood sold to my older brother for five dollars and promptly ignored; and, anecdotally, the kid who had to get sent to the ER after a pop-it was thrown at his head. That last one isn't related, but it comes up every time I remember these things.

If this game didn't contribute to my childhood, I don't know what did.

Too bad it kinda blows.

This game is really charming, but revisiting this after years, I can totally see why I always played this for the Chao Garden as a kid and never actually got that far. Put it this way: I don't recommend this unless you have built up a tolerance for early-3D platformer controls. Trying to beat the first stage again was genuinely headache-inducing. I'd want to go back to an area to collect rings I'd left behind, and the camera would be facing my back. Nooks and crannies were all but noticeable because I literally couldn't see them, and this problem only exacerbated itself when enemies and traps were nearby. Running on walls to collect rings also felt incredibly janky, to the point where both the controls for it and the bad camera controls combined in such a way that the game started spazzing out through the wall I was trying to climb at one point.

I don't want to be too negative on this. I genuinely want to know why this is heralded as a classic for so many and relive some of my fondest childhood memories. I'll probably get around to playing more of it soon, but right now, my head hurts.

I have never understood Fortnite.

I get why people love it so much. My siblings, god bless their hearts, fell in love with this thing a year ago, so I've played with them a few times and seen the dances they bought for their characters and the skins they've unlocked. And I get the appeal of that. I don't get the appeal of the game itself.

I like the individual aspects on display. The respawn mechanic would be a great idea in a game with smaller maps and more to do (See: The Finals). The little side-quests and distractions are cute and add a lot of flavor to what is otherwise a pretty bland experience. The art style is very well-developed, and each area on the map is distinct enough to serve as a fun little playground on its own. I love the shrinking circle mechanic—again, give me smaller maps, and I'll appreciate it more.

Put all of those aspects together, though, and... I don't know, it just feels kind of unfocused? There are certainly rounds where everything clicks into place, and there's a high-voltage rush to the finish line that permeates through every shot fired. But there are twice as many rounds where over half the time you spend playing is dicking around, waiting for conflict to happen. And then conflict does happen; everybody dies, game over, and the next round is the exact same fucking thing. Ad nauseam. The last five minutes of those rounds are suuuper fun, if you ignore the fact that everything before them was just whatever.

As someone who tried to get into Fortnite to play with my siblings, I also have to say that I'm not a fan of the bots. Listen, I loved playing botmatches on Unreal Tournament 3 and TimeSplitters Future Perfect back then. The thing is, I chose to have those experiences. I was given an option. It's called an option, a fucking option. If you want newer players to play around with bots so they get used to the game, encourage that. Please, don't hoist your 10 IQ, braindead bots on the siblings of those who just want to connect with their family. It's not fun, and it makes me appreciate your game less because it shows you have absolutely no confidence in giving me any choice. Also, what if I wanted to play with bots more often after I escaped the bot gulag? Why is it "We add bots to fill a lobby sometimes" and not, "Hey, if you wanted to play exclusively with bots, there's a mode for that"? You might say that Fortnite is targeting a much younger audience than Unreal or TimeSplitters, to which I have to respond that I played both as a child.

I don't know. I guess I like this game? But I don't love it. I can tell it's the sort of thing that's more fun after you've poured a ton of time into it on your own. The battle passes in this weren't influential enough for every multiplayer game following its smashing success to have one for no reason. But I dunno; I just don't feel like it. It doesn't click with me, and that's a real shame.

This was an experience. Adding this game to my backlog was purely for nostalgic reasons, I remember playing this on the GameCube as a young kid (mind you I didn't get very far then) and having a fun time, but now? Not so much. I found myself just constantly mashing the square button just firing away at an obscene amount of enemies in most levels, I know there are other gadgets but most of those require you to stand still or properly aim while enemies are constantly pushing you so I just preferred to jet pack/jump around while mashing square. It's an early 2000's game so I can't really bash it's outdated controls and graphics, but they are there nonetheless (A remaster would do this game wonders though)

Now it's not all bad as we have Temuera Morrison back to voice Jango Fett (which honestly was a surprise as usually an actor doesn't come in and voice the video game counterpart). I also really liked the side characters in this one (Roz especially) and also freaking Clancy Brown is in this as well. The settings the game took us were enjoyable, some classics and others that I wasn't familiar with, always nice to see another part of Star Wars.

Nostalgia aside, I had a decent time with this but found myself after chapter 3 just mindlessly shooting everything in sight hoping the end of the game was near, also the snipers in this game were cracked (I mean we're talking Halo 2 Jackal levels here).

Star Wars Ranking

Halo Wars is a nice change of pace into the games history as an FPS, delving into the RTS genre and for the most part it definitely works. This definitive version being a plus as you get all the DLC previously released all in one.

The game has a great story set about 20 years before the events of the chief waking up in the Pillar of Autumn following the likes of Sgt.Forge, Prof. Anders, and Commander Cutter. All of these characters (including the 3 Spartans) are great additions to Halo's cast and you also get a look at the previous Arbiter before THE Arbiter we all know and love eventually comes about. This series also has a good history of great soundtracks with this one and Halo 3: ODST being the standouts. The cutscenes were also pretty damn good, particularly one near the end that most Halo players definitely know about.

I believe this game is at it's best when played cooperatively but it's not the greatest, I wish the game gave you and your friend more freedom in terms of having your own separate unit count instead of having to split the same count. Making the units can also be quite a time slog as you can sometimes just be waiting more than a few minutes doing not much but counting down time for your resources to build up before your army building truly begins.

Overall, when you think Halo, you think first person so the wars games have a hard time at getting you into them (I know back then that was the case for me) but today, I can appreciate this game as a unique foray into this series that I love so much.

Halo Ranking