Toaster42069
2022
I have mixed thoughts on this game. While I preferred it over Pokémon Sword, it's still not at the level I'd expect from a billion dollar franchise like Pokémon. For example: the lack of voice acting is very disappointing. It's not like they can't add voice acting, at least for the cut scenes. Even Xenoblade has voice acting and that series isn't nearly as huge as Pokémon is.
Visuals were subpar when in the open world. The environments also seemed pretty generic. It's easy to tell where corners were cut like with the eating animation or the shops that are just menus. I still don't understand why this and Pokémon Legends Arceus were released in the same year, what were they thinking?!?
The open world is very interesting compared to the half step that Pokémon Sword made. Only problem is that there's no level scaling so you'll be jumping around the map a lot if you don't want to brute force your way through a tough fight. I would usually be fine with this, but there's nothing on the map telling you which level the Pokémon are in each area. I had find that information from IGN and not from the actual game.
Exploration is pretty fun when using Miraidon, though you probably won't get all of his movement options until fairly late into the game.
Conceptually, the idea of having three paths their own main objectives to do instead of just the gyms is cool on paper. Though in practice it falls on its face. There's eight gyms, five titans, and five Team Star bases. The titans and the Team Star bases should be a nice breather between the gyms, but the titans and the Team Star bases are just too short in my opinion. I was able to get a lot of the game done faster than I anticipated simply because there's not much to some portions of the game.
I like being able to send out my Pokémon to fight on their own. It made grinding go by a lot quicker.
Some fights in this game are difficult if you're under leveled, especially in the last game.
The story is pretty good on paper, but the lack of voice acting really makes the pivotal moments fall flat. Even if you can't include voice acting for whatever reason then you could at least do what Ace Attorney does. The sound design, music, and the text sounds for the dialogue really do make for the limitations of the Ace Attorney games. Just do something like that and it would increase my enjoyment by a vary large amount.
Overall, Pokémon Violet is a fun game. If you don't mind poor performance and messy visuals then you'll probably have a good time with this game. Don't let my opinion stop you from having fun.
Visuals were subpar when in the open world. The environments also seemed pretty generic. It's easy to tell where corners were cut like with the eating animation or the shops that are just menus. I still don't understand why this and Pokémon Legends Arceus were released in the same year, what were they thinking?!?
The open world is very interesting compared to the half step that Pokémon Sword made. Only problem is that there's no level scaling so you'll be jumping around the map a lot if you don't want to brute force your way through a tough fight. I would usually be fine with this, but there's nothing on the map telling you which level the Pokémon are in each area. I had find that information from IGN and not from the actual game.
Exploration is pretty fun when using Miraidon, though you probably won't get all of his movement options until fairly late into the game.
Conceptually, the idea of having three paths their own main objectives to do instead of just the gyms is cool on paper. Though in practice it falls on its face. There's eight gyms, five titans, and five Team Star bases. The titans and the Team Star bases should be a nice breather between the gyms, but the titans and the Team Star bases are just too short in my opinion. I was able to get a lot of the game done faster than I anticipated simply because there's not much to some portions of the game.
I like being able to send out my Pokémon to fight on their own. It made grinding go by a lot quicker.
Some fights in this game are difficult if you're under leveled, especially in the last game.
The story is pretty good on paper, but the lack of voice acting really makes the pivotal moments fall flat. Even if you can't include voice acting for whatever reason then you could at least do what Ace Attorney does. The sound design, music, and the text sounds for the dialogue really do make for the limitations of the Ace Attorney games. Just do something like that and it would increase my enjoyment by a vary large amount.
Overall, Pokémon Violet is a fun game. If you don't mind poor performance and messy visuals then you'll probably have a good time with this game. Don't let my opinion stop you from having fun.
I have no idea how I feel about this 'game' and what it's attempting to say. I guess the visuals are improved, but it's rather bland when compared to the unique look of it's predecessor.
This barely even feels like a game. You mostly just push a single button and read text.
Also the ending made zero goddamn sense. So I guess you could say that this game is neither good nor bad.
This barely even feels like a game. You mostly just push a single button and read text.
Also the ending made zero goddamn sense. So I guess you could say that this game is neither good nor bad.
2022
Just to be clear, this isn't really a review. It's more like an explanation of why I can't get into the game. I wanted to enjoy it, but the gameplay is actively keeping me from getting sucked into the atmosphere and the music. I'm sorry, but I'd rather watch somebody else play it. Is it bad that this makes me even more excited for the movie?
I played Iron Lung for about thirty minutes and lost all of my progress cause the automatic save kicked in before I got any objectives. That combined with the controls and the unhelpful map discouraged me from continuing the game.
It's cool that a game so short has automatic saves and loading, but if you're gonna go that far then you might as well go all the way and give the player the option to save/load anytime they want. Maybe I've been spoiled by the Ace Attorney Trilogy, but I wouldn't feel as frustrated if I had my own safety checkpoint.
Don't know if this just cause I played the Switch port, but the controls feel slippery. I think I saw an option in the main menu that fixes that, though I left the settings as the default cause I wasn't sure if I would need the settings changed. I only realized the issue after I started the game and I couldn't change the settings without exiting to the main menu. I guess that was my fault for not changing the settings right away, but can you really blame me for not expecting the default movement/camera speed to be a little too quick in a game all about meticulously planning your route and carefully avoiding obstacles?
I'm unsure how I feel about the map. I get that it's deliberately vague, it's just that my issue with the map feels unintentional. Any objectives on the map that aren't highlighted by the cursor have this dark color to them that blends in with the map. This issue ended up in me completely missing one of the objectives and having to backtrack after getting a different objective. Kinda frustrating ngl.
I played Iron Lung for about thirty minutes and lost all of my progress cause the automatic save kicked in before I got any objectives. That combined with the controls and the unhelpful map discouraged me from continuing the game.
It's cool that a game so short has automatic saves and loading, but if you're gonna go that far then you might as well go all the way and give the player the option to save/load anytime they want. Maybe I've been spoiled by the Ace Attorney Trilogy, but I wouldn't feel as frustrated if I had my own safety checkpoint.
Don't know if this just cause I played the Switch port, but the controls feel slippery. I think I saw an option in the main menu that fixes that, though I left the settings as the default cause I wasn't sure if I would need the settings changed. I only realized the issue after I started the game and I couldn't change the settings without exiting to the main menu. I guess that was my fault for not changing the settings right away, but can you really blame me for not expecting the default movement/camera speed to be a little too quick in a game all about meticulously planning your route and carefully avoiding obstacles?
I'm unsure how I feel about the map. I get that it's deliberately vague, it's just that my issue with the map feels unintentional. Any objectives on the map that aren't highlighted by the cursor have this dark color to them that blends in with the map. This issue ended up in me completely missing one of the objectives and having to backtrack after getting a different objective. Kinda frustrating ngl.
So I was originally planning on playing this right after the new game plus update was released, but I had my hands full with FF7 Rebirth.
Even with the new mechanics and tweaks, the gameplay is still very similar to the two previous Spider-Man games. Swinging doesn't really feel all that different, though I ended up using the web wings WAY more than I expected. Combat gives you a lot more tools to deal with enemies, though I'm disappointed that the gadgets from the first game have all been replaced with new gadgets that I barely used across my whole playthrough.
I do like how the game encourages you to explore. Your entire map isn't flooded by tiny icons this time around, the map icons only appear after you swing by their location. You get the ability to fast travel to a district if make enough progress in that district.
Pretty much all of the side content is good. Nothing feels too long or tedious to do. It's a big improvement from the side content in the 2018 game.
Honestly, I have a lot of problems with the story, but I can't go into detail without mentioning any spoilers. All the pieces are in place, though the big dramatic moments don't have enough impact cause there isn't a ton of setup. The third act in particular feels especially rushed. Another draft (or two) could’ve ironed out these issues with the writing.
This next part of the review isn't really a critique (I guess it kinda is considering the pacing is severely affected), but I thought I'd bring it up regardless. This game was clearly rushed. Even if you ignore the cut content that people 'found', the game itself just feels cut kinda short. For example: look at the amount of main missions in the game. The first act has 15 main missions, the second act has 10, and the third act has 6. When almost half of the main missions are in the first act alone, that's definitely gonna mess with the pacing of the story. It wouldn't surprise me if the third act was meant to have more meat on its bones, but it had to be trimmed down for time.
The fact that stuff like the ability to replay missions and the option to change the time of day took months to be added to the game (not to mention the bugs) only make it seem more likely that Sony rushed Insomniac to get this game out before the 2023 holiday season. Obviously this is all just speculation, but this kind of crap ain't exactly new to most big gaming publishers. I lost faith in the Triple-A games industry a long time ago.
Hopefully Insomniac has learned from this experience and takes their time with Wolverine (and any unannounced games) so that it can be the best game it can be.
Also I expected nineteen inches of Venom and yet he's barely in the game. We need more Venom!
Even with the new mechanics and tweaks, the gameplay is still very similar to the two previous Spider-Man games. Swinging doesn't really feel all that different, though I ended up using the web wings WAY more than I expected. Combat gives you a lot more tools to deal with enemies, though I'm disappointed that the gadgets from the first game have all been replaced with new gadgets that I barely used across my whole playthrough.
I do like how the game encourages you to explore. Your entire map isn't flooded by tiny icons this time around, the map icons only appear after you swing by their location. You get the ability to fast travel to a district if make enough progress in that district.
Pretty much all of the side content is good. Nothing feels too long or tedious to do. It's a big improvement from the side content in the 2018 game.
Honestly, I have a lot of problems with the story, but I can't go into detail without mentioning any spoilers. All the pieces are in place, though the big dramatic moments don't have enough impact cause there isn't a ton of setup. The third act in particular feels especially rushed. Another draft (or two) could’ve ironed out these issues with the writing.
This next part of the review isn't really a critique (I guess it kinda is considering the pacing is severely affected), but I thought I'd bring it up regardless. This game was clearly rushed. Even if you ignore the cut content that people 'found', the game itself just feels cut kinda short. For example: look at the amount of main missions in the game. The first act has 15 main missions, the second act has 10, and the third act has 6. When almost half of the main missions are in the first act alone, that's definitely gonna mess with the pacing of the story. It wouldn't surprise me if the third act was meant to have more meat on its bones, but it had to be trimmed down for time.
The fact that stuff like the ability to replay missions and the option to change the time of day took months to be added to the game (not to mention the bugs) only make it seem more likely that Sony rushed Insomniac to get this game out before the 2023 holiday season. Obviously this is all just speculation, but this kind of crap ain't exactly new to most big gaming publishers. I lost faith in the Triple-A games industry a long time ago.
Hopefully Insomniac has learned from this experience and takes their time with Wolverine (and any unannounced games) so that it can be the best game it can be.
Also I expected nineteen inches of Venom and yet he's barely in the game. We need more Venom!
I think most people who are interested in getting this game are aware of what it's inspired by and thus in on the joke, though I'll explain it anyways. So there were two games based on The Legend of Zelda series that were released for the Phillips CD-i called Link: The Faces of Evil and Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon. The cutscenes in particular were known for being bizarre and strange so much that they spawned countless memes and YouTube poops. Then, in 2020, these games were remade unofficially by Dopply who went on to make his own company called Seedy Eye Software.
You can just tell that a lot of passionate people made this game. This game isn't just a joke or a meme. The fact that this game even exists is proof of the amount of passion on display.
The gameplay is fine overall. There's nothing wrong with it, but it's nothing mind blowing either. It's kinda like a metroidvania in that you unlock new abilities and have to go back to old areas to progress. Only wandered around a couple of times, otherwise it's very good about leading you in the right direction.
The music is surprisingly good.
This next bit isn't a criticism of the game, but I thought it was worth bringing up anyway. A few of the cutscenes are clearly 3D. Sometimes there's no cutscene at all and instead there's just a dialogue box, though I'm pretty sure all those quests are completely optional. These things didn't happen often enough to dampen my experience, though I do believe that they're in the game for a good reason. It's simple, animation and voice acting cost money. I highly doubt that a spiritual successor to the Zelda CD-I games is gonna make much money or be very popular.
If I had to highlight one aspect of this game, it would have to be the cutscenes. The animation and the voice acting serve as a nice treat for making progress. You could say that it's FINE DINING.
Also I played this game on the Nintendo Switch cause I thought it would be fitting.
You can just tell that a lot of passionate people made this game. This game isn't just a joke or a meme. The fact that this game even exists is proof of the amount of passion on display.
The gameplay is fine overall. There's nothing wrong with it, but it's nothing mind blowing either. It's kinda like a metroidvania in that you unlock new abilities and have to go back to old areas to progress. Only wandered around a couple of times, otherwise it's very good about leading you in the right direction.
The music is surprisingly good.
This next bit isn't a criticism of the game, but I thought it was worth bringing up anyway. A few of the cutscenes are clearly 3D. Sometimes there's no cutscene at all and instead there's just a dialogue box, though I'm pretty sure all those quests are completely optional. These things didn't happen often enough to dampen my experience, though I do believe that they're in the game for a good reason. It's simple, animation and voice acting cost money. I highly doubt that a spiritual successor to the Zelda CD-I games is gonna make much money or be very popular.
If I had to highlight one aspect of this game, it would have to be the cutscenes. The animation and the voice acting serve as a nice treat for making progress. You could say that it's FINE DINING.
Also I played this game on the Nintendo Switch cause I thought it would be fitting.
1988
I know that nowadays the fact that this is a reskin of Doki Doki Panic is common knowledge in the gaming community, but that wasn't always the case so I wonder what people back in the day thought about this game. 🤔
It's interesting that the main mechanic in this game is picking up and throwing things. You do it quite a bit, probably about as much as you do platforming.
Having four playable characters instead of just Mario and Green Mario is a nice change of pace. It's funny that I never played as Mario in this Mario game, but I played as every other character. Peach makes platforming a lot easier, even the harder segments.
The bosses are pretty lackluster, especially Birdo. The normal enemies all have pretty neat designs, I like Shy Guy.
It's interesting that the main mechanic in this game is picking up and throwing things. You do it quite a bit, probably about as much as you do platforming.
Having four playable characters instead of just Mario and Green Mario is a nice change of pace. It's funny that I never played as Mario in this Mario game, but I played as every other character. Peach makes platforming a lot easier, even the harder segments.
The bosses are pretty lackluster, especially Birdo. The normal enemies all have pretty neat designs, I like Shy Guy.
After finishing FF7 Remake last month, I just knew that I had to play FF7 Rebirth as soon as it released. It's now been almost a month since I started playing this game and I put over 60 hours into it.
I will say that if you enjoyed FF7 Remake then you will likely enjoy FF7 Rebirth. This game doesn't really take anything away from its predecessor, just improves on what worked and adds more stuff on top. Even something simple like adding air combos and ranged attacks to Clouds moveset made my experience so much better.
Thankfully, most of my problems with FF7 Remake got fixed in this game. Each character now has just one skill tree. The difficulty is a lot more balanced, even on Easy. The pacing of the story is better, but I definitely felt the length towards the end of the game.
Wasn't expecting that one of my many highlights with this game would be the card minigame. Queen's Blood is incredibly addictive. It's frustrating to lose, but also it's so satisfying to win. I would probably get super addicted to Queen's Blood if it was its own standalone game.
You should know that this game is very beefy. Even when you're mostly focusing on the story like I did, you'll still spend quite a bit of time playing it.
I don't know why this game was marketed as an open world game when it isn't really. Sure, there's lots of stuff to do in each region, though they're all pretty separate.
This next part may sound unfair, but I didn't care for how traversal worked in the open areas. It felt like there wasn't much challenge or fun when traversing across the world. Even a simple jump button would make things more interesting.
I'd describe the story in a nutshell as both exactly like what you expect and nothing like what you expect at the same time. These two realities can coexist.
The final chapter was just incredible. Can they really top it? I'm not really sure, the ending was just so good.
Overall, the story is very good. I enjoyed pretty much every character, my favorites were Barret, Yuffie, and Cait Sith. I'm not quite sure that I can call the story perfect when it's not quite over yet. We'll see if the third and final entry in the FF7 Remake trilogy manages to stick the landing, though I'm confident that it will.
I will say that if you enjoyed FF7 Remake then you will likely enjoy FF7 Rebirth. This game doesn't really take anything away from its predecessor, just improves on what worked and adds more stuff on top. Even something simple like adding air combos and ranged attacks to Clouds moveset made my experience so much better.
Thankfully, most of my problems with FF7 Remake got fixed in this game. Each character now has just one skill tree. The difficulty is a lot more balanced, even on Easy. The pacing of the story is better, but I definitely felt the length towards the end of the game.
Wasn't expecting that one of my many highlights with this game would be the card minigame. Queen's Blood is incredibly addictive. It's frustrating to lose, but also it's so satisfying to win. I would probably get super addicted to Queen's Blood if it was its own standalone game.
You should know that this game is very beefy. Even when you're mostly focusing on the story like I did, you'll still spend quite a bit of time playing it.
I don't know why this game was marketed as an open world game when it isn't really. Sure, there's lots of stuff to do in each region, though they're all pretty separate.
This next part may sound unfair, but I didn't care for how traversal worked in the open areas. It felt like there wasn't much challenge or fun when traversing across the world. Even a simple jump button would make things more interesting.
I'd describe the story in a nutshell as both exactly like what you expect and nothing like what you expect at the same time. These two realities can coexist.
The final chapter was just incredible. Can they really top it? I'm not really sure, the ending was just so good.
Overall, the story is very good. I enjoyed pretty much every character, my favorites were Barret, Yuffie, and Cait Sith. I'm not quite sure that I can call the story perfect when it's not quite over yet. We'll see if the third and final entry in the FF7 Remake trilogy manages to stick the landing, though I'm confident that it will.
Let me just say that I had no expectations going into this DLC and I'm still disappointed. It's not bad or anything, but it's not great either.
One thing that I noticed before I even played this was that you can play it on PS5 and PC, but not on PS4 for some reason. My guess is that they did that so people would buy the Intergrade version of FF7 Remake. Still weird though.
Now onto the details of Episode INTERmission, starting with the gameplay. It plays very similar to the main game, but playing as Yuffie felt kinda odd so I didn't really get used to her play style. She's also the only playable character in this DLC, though you do have a second party member that you don't control directly.
The difficulty ended up being easier than the main game despite playing on Easy for both. Synergizing made enemy encounters easy as cake because I could simply spam attacks and win almost immediately.
Don't know how I feel about the story when there's no way of knowing how or if the events will tie into Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Some moments gave me big Lion King 1½ vibes. I'm not gonna explain what I mean by that cause it's funnier if I don't.
Overall, this DLC is a harmless addition to FF7 Remake, but I wouldn't buy it by itself.
One thing that I noticed before I even played this was that you can play it on PS5 and PC, but not on PS4 for some reason. My guess is that they did that so people would buy the Intergrade version of FF7 Remake. Still weird though.
Now onto the details of Episode INTERmission, starting with the gameplay. It plays very similar to the main game, but playing as Yuffie felt kinda odd so I didn't really get used to her play style. She's also the only playable character in this DLC, though you do have a second party member that you don't control directly.
The difficulty ended up being easier than the main game despite playing on Easy for both. Synergizing made enemy encounters easy as cake because I could simply spam attacks and win almost immediately.
Don't know how I feel about the story when there's no way of knowing how or if the events will tie into Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. Some moments gave me big Lion King 1½ vibes. I'm not gonna explain what I mean by that cause it's funnier if I don't.
Overall, this DLC is a harmless addition to FF7 Remake, but I wouldn't buy it by itself.
This review contains spoilers
I think this review will just be considered a spoiler review. Cause I think most of the people interested in this game already have it and I doubt I'd be able to convince anyone who's not interested. Let me just say that if you're expecting a 1-1 remake of the original Final Fantasy VII then you will be disappointed. It's not the exact same game that you remember, though from what I understand it's still respectful of the original Final Fantasy VII.
So I'm just gonna get my biggest problem with Final Fantasy VII Remake out of the way. My issue isn't with the story or the core gameplay, but the difficulty. I'm gonna explain specifically what I mean by that in a bit cause I've never had a problem with a game like this before.
A few years ago, I picked up FF7 Remake and played it on normal difficulty. Managed to get a few hours in until I reached a Cloud only fight and got walloped. After that defeat, I simply put the game back on the shelf. Years later, I bought the PS5 version on sale and decided to give the game a second chance, but this time on the easy difficulty. The difference in challenge was surprising, I was struggling on normal and now the game is practically a cake walk. Even bosses didn't challenge me much. What's happening here?? Is this just a skill issue or is the difficulty on normal not adjusted correctly?
The combat is a good mix of what people want and what people expect. It's real-time, but going into the command menu slows down time until you make your decision which is a nice middle ground between turn-based and real-time.
Being able to separately upgrade each weapon is cool at first until you realize that they all have their own individual skill trees that you have to upgrade one at a time. It was so tedious, I really hope they fix this in future entries and just give each character a single skill tree regardless of the weapons you have.
There's a little too much filler at times, it got to the point where I could obviously tell that there's padding. It wasn't too bad though as I enjoyed some of the filler. That chapter with Jessie was fun as hell.
Overall, I'd say that I really enjoyed the story. Cloud, Barret, Tifa, and Aerith are all great characters, but my favorite character is Jessie. 😭
As we reach the end of my review, it's time we talk about that final chapter and the ending. I know not everyone is on board with the ending, but is there really any other way to remake a game on such a big scale that means so much to so many people? When else would you have the chance to change things and explore ideas of fate and destiny? This just makes the future entries in this remake trilogy more interesting because we don't know what's going to happen next. Will Aerith live or will she still die? I guess we'll find out when Final Fantasy VII Rebirth releases.
So I'm just gonna get my biggest problem with Final Fantasy VII Remake out of the way. My issue isn't with the story or the core gameplay, but the difficulty. I'm gonna explain specifically what I mean by that in a bit cause I've never had a problem with a game like this before.
A few years ago, I picked up FF7 Remake and played it on normal difficulty. Managed to get a few hours in until I reached a Cloud only fight and got walloped. After that defeat, I simply put the game back on the shelf. Years later, I bought the PS5 version on sale and decided to give the game a second chance, but this time on the easy difficulty. The difference in challenge was surprising, I was struggling on normal and now the game is practically a cake walk. Even bosses didn't challenge me much. What's happening here?? Is this just a skill issue or is the difficulty on normal not adjusted correctly?
The combat is a good mix of what people want and what people expect. It's real-time, but going into the command menu slows down time until you make your decision which is a nice middle ground between turn-based and real-time.
Being able to separately upgrade each weapon is cool at first until you realize that they all have their own individual skill trees that you have to upgrade one at a time. It was so tedious, I really hope they fix this in future entries and just give each character a single skill tree regardless of the weapons you have.
There's a little too much filler at times, it got to the point where I could obviously tell that there's padding. It wasn't too bad though as I enjoyed some of the filler. That chapter with Jessie was fun as hell.
Overall, I'd say that I really enjoyed the story. Cloud, Barret, Tifa, and Aerith are all great characters, but my favorite character is Jessie. 😭
As we reach the end of my review, it's time we talk about that final chapter and the ending. I know not everyone is on board with the ending, but is there really any other way to remake a game on such a big scale that means so much to so many people? When else would you have the chance to change things and explore ideas of fate and destiny? This just makes the future entries in this remake trilogy more interesting because we don't know what's going to happen next. Will Aerith live or will she still die? I guess we'll find out when Final Fantasy VII Rebirth releases.
2022
This review contains spoilers
I was originally planning on reviewing this game with little to no spoilers like I usually do, but it's pretty difficult considering most of this game builds off of what it's predecessor did with it's story and gameplay. So here's what I'm gonna do, the first few paragraphs (not counting this paragraph) will be my spoiler free review and then everything after that will be my spoiler review. I'll still avoid mentioning major story stuff though.
I will say that God of Ragnarök is very similar to its predecessor, but in a way where it makes every aspect better. Like a true sequel should.
Kratos' gameplay feels familiar, though different enough. Unarmed combat is basically gone which isn't a huge loss to me, I got used to the change pretty quickly. You get the Blades of Chaos way earlier and now they can be used for traversal and puzzles which is cool.
The soundtrack is absolutely incredible, Bear McCreary outdid himself. I keep humming the Huldra Brothers theme. 😭
Every location in this game looks just stunning. They really made each Realm look distinct.
There's a lot more enemies when compared to GoW 2018 and there's more variety too. Not to mention there's way more boss fights, a big improvement ngl.
I thought about getting the platinum trophy for this game, but I decided against it when I realized how many collectibles and optional enemy encounters there are. Look, I love playing this game, but I'm not gonna do loads of side content if it just makes me like the game less.
The story goes by at much faster pace than you'd expect. Sure, the plot of this game feels less like a single journey and it's chapter based this time, but it makes God of War Ragnarök stand out more. The bond of Kratos and Atreus is what matters more than anything else and this game never forgets that.
⚠️ SPOILERS FOR THE GAMEPLAY AND STORY OF GOD OF WAR RAGNARÖK, PROCEED AT YOUR OWN CAUTION ⚠️
So I'll start this spoiler review with some of the smaller spoilers, with the bigger stuff in the back half of the review.
Atreus being playable surprised me at first and now it makes perfect sense. He feels different enough from Kratos that it benefits the games pacing.
I don't get why people dislike Ironwood and the search for the Norns. Neither of those sections are all that bad as people say, they're crucial for the games themes.
Freya is a pretty good addition as a companion. I ship her and Kratos.
The Draupnir Spear is a great addition to Kratos' arsenal. It's very fun to throw like five spears at a single enemy and then just detonate all of them at the same time. Though, I will say that it gets introduced really late into the main game and by that time I already unlocked most of the skills for the Blades of Chaos and the Leviathan Axe so there wasn't much a reason to even use the Draupnir Spear during combat.
Odin is an excellent antagonist and I like how he's acts more like a mob boss than what you'd expect. Manipulative antagonists are always more interesting to me than a big dude who just wants to destroy/conquer the world or whatever.
I love God of War Ragnarök's overall themes of fate and form vs nature. It's just so rich when you dig into it. It expertly builds upon what GoW 2018 set up.
I will say that God of Ragnarök is very similar to its predecessor, but in a way where it makes every aspect better. Like a true sequel should.
Kratos' gameplay feels familiar, though different enough. Unarmed combat is basically gone which isn't a huge loss to me, I got used to the change pretty quickly. You get the Blades of Chaos way earlier and now they can be used for traversal and puzzles which is cool.
The soundtrack is absolutely incredible, Bear McCreary outdid himself. I keep humming the Huldra Brothers theme. 😭
Every location in this game looks just stunning. They really made each Realm look distinct.
There's a lot more enemies when compared to GoW 2018 and there's more variety too. Not to mention there's way more boss fights, a big improvement ngl.
I thought about getting the platinum trophy for this game, but I decided against it when I realized how many collectibles and optional enemy encounters there are. Look, I love playing this game, but I'm not gonna do loads of side content if it just makes me like the game less.
The story goes by at much faster pace than you'd expect. Sure, the plot of this game feels less like a single journey and it's chapter based this time, but it makes God of War Ragnarök stand out more. The bond of Kratos and Atreus is what matters more than anything else and this game never forgets that.
⚠️ SPOILERS FOR THE GAMEPLAY AND STORY OF GOD OF WAR RAGNARÖK, PROCEED AT YOUR OWN CAUTION ⚠️
So I'll start this spoiler review with some of the smaller spoilers, with the bigger stuff in the back half of the review.
Atreus being playable surprised me at first and now it makes perfect sense. He feels different enough from Kratos that it benefits the games pacing.
I don't get why people dislike Ironwood and the search for the Norns. Neither of those sections are all that bad as people say, they're crucial for the games themes.
Freya is a pretty good addition as a companion. I ship her and Kratos.
The Draupnir Spear is a great addition to Kratos' arsenal. It's very fun to throw like five spears at a single enemy and then just detonate all of them at the same time. Though, I will say that it gets introduced really late into the main game and by that time I already unlocked most of the skills for the Blades of Chaos and the Leviathan Axe so there wasn't much a reason to even use the Draupnir Spear during combat.
Odin is an excellent antagonist and I like how he's acts more like a mob boss than what you'd expect. Manipulative antagonists are always more interesting to me than a big dude who just wants to destroy/conquer the world or whatever.
I love God of War Ragnarök's overall themes of fate and form vs nature. It's just so rich when you dig into it. It expertly builds upon what GoW 2018 set up.
1994
Look, I get why people love this game and I wanna love it too, but I just couldn't finish Super Metroid. I ended up putting quite a few hours into the game so don't say that I didn't try my damnedest.
The problem I have with this game is that the controls aged kinda poorly. Jumping and moving around is one thing, but the main thing that frustrated me was trying to walljump and space jump. For some reason, doing those two actions require precise timing. Though, the controls aren't why I stopped playing.
So when I got to Ridley, he wiped the floor with me. Not even rewinds could help me. There's probably multiple factors that contributed to my failure. One, I didn't really go out of my way to get missiles or energy tanks. Two, the stiff controls. Three, the camera that would only show one part of the room which lead to many missed shots and many deaths at the hands of Ridley.
I honestly don't see myself returning to this version of the game. Metroid Dread has made it pretty hard to return to the older games in the series, but that doesn't mean I won't play this game again. Now I'm just saying, but if MercurySteam made a Super Metroid remake then I would be there day one. Just putting that out there.
The problem I have with this game is that the controls aged kinda poorly. Jumping and moving around is one thing, but the main thing that frustrated me was trying to walljump and space jump. For some reason, doing those two actions require precise timing. Though, the controls aren't why I stopped playing.
So when I got to Ridley, he wiped the floor with me. Not even rewinds could help me. There's probably multiple factors that contributed to my failure. One, I didn't really go out of my way to get missiles or energy tanks. Two, the stiff controls. Three, the camera that would only show one part of the room which lead to many missed shots and many deaths at the hands of Ridley.
I honestly don't see myself returning to this version of the game. Metroid Dread has made it pretty hard to return to the older games in the series, but that doesn't mean I won't play this game again. Now I'm just saying, but if MercurySteam made a Super Metroid remake then I would be there day one. Just putting that out there.
1995
So I'm gonna be honest, I didn't care for Kirby's Dream Land 2. I don't like how it's way longer than the original Kirby's Dream Land and it lacks the magic that Kirby's Adventure had.
The animal friends are a neat idea on paper, but the execution leaves something to be desired. There's less copy abilities in this game overall because each animal friend has their own variation of every copy ability. The variations aren't really unique or interesting enough to justify the smaller amount of copy abilities in this game.
Now the thing about this game is that there's 7 Rainbow Drops, 1 in each world. You'll need all of them if you want to fight the true final boss and get the ending. I thought about doing this, but decided against it when I looked up how to get them. They really make you go out of your way, huh. Well, there's no way I'm doing that so I just watched the final boss and ending on YouTube.
Also I heard that people don't like the final world, but I liked it. It was the right amount of difficulty and it was funny how many japes were in those levels.
The animal friends are a neat idea on paper, but the execution leaves something to be desired. There's less copy abilities in this game overall because each animal friend has their own variation of every copy ability. The variations aren't really unique or interesting enough to justify the smaller amount of copy abilities in this game.
Now the thing about this game is that there's 7 Rainbow Drops, 1 in each world. You'll need all of them if you want to fight the true final boss and get the ending. I thought about doing this, but decided against it when I looked up how to get them. They really make you go out of your way, huh. Well, there's no way I'm doing that so I just watched the final boss and ending on YouTube.
Also I heard that people don't like the final world, but I liked it. It was the right amount of difficulty and it was funny how many japes were in those levels.
2011
Keep in mind that this review is focused on the single player for Portal 2. I've never played through the co-op mode cause I have nobody to play it with.
Portal 2 is the perfect evolution of its predecessor, but it still manages to stand out on its own.
The puzzles feel more complex compared to the first game, but are designed well enough so that even a ten year old kid can finish this game. Trust me, I know from experience.
Now, the thing that I love the most about Portal 2 is the humor. Probably the funniest game I've ever played, except for maybe Undertale.
Also both Portal games play well on the Switch. Hope the Half Life series get the same treatment one day.
Portal 2 is the perfect evolution of its predecessor, but it still manages to stand out on its own.
The puzzles feel more complex compared to the first game, but are designed well enough so that even a ten year old kid can finish this game. Trust me, I know from experience.
Now, the thing that I love the most about Portal 2 is the humor. Probably the funniest game I've ever played, except for maybe Undertale.
Also both Portal games play well on the Switch. Hope the Half Life series get the same treatment one day.
The setting and main gimmick really makes Planet Robobot unique from every other Kirby game.
Though, I find it odd that the story only comes in when you're already partway through the main game.
The final boss of Kirby: Planet Robobot is probably my favorite of the final bosses in Kirby other than Marx in Kirby Super Star.
Though, I find it odd that the story only comes in when you're already partway through the main game.
The final boss of Kirby: Planet Robobot is probably my favorite of the final bosses in Kirby other than Marx in Kirby Super Star.
At the last minute I decided to just get the last trophies I needed for the platinum as fast as I could. I'm honestly surprised that this didn't take as long as I thought it would.