the "friction" in this game is hotly debated but i think a lot of it stems from this fact that this game is pretty fundamentally flawed on a structural level. the insanely stunted fast travel is done entirely on purpose not to instill a sense of adventure in the player, but because walking across dirt roads and fighting the same three enemies is literally the meat of the game. that is the gameplay, and if you don't REALLY fuck with it then you have my pass to give up on it without feeling like you're losing out on your gamer badge of honor. fighting guys does feel really good but its hard not to feel like -- yet again -- im just playing the demo for the actual dragons dogma.

cant say that i or anybody else should be disappointed because a lotta folks are gonna come to find out thats just what dragons dogma is, but if this game is going to continue that tradition then i gotta come to the same conclusion i think a lot of people come to: dragons dogma is really just ok

I have an immense amount of nostalgia for Wii Play, and it was a lot of fun taking my friend through it for the first time. Our playthrough became this extremely particular time capsule - its sights and sounds unpicking locks in my mind which have very specific childhood memories behind them. I guess this is what nostalgia feels like.

But I also think that this is just an extremely well produced and joyful bit of casual software. The games are of an extremely uneven quality (Billiards and Laser Hockey are uniquely dull) but the most polished ones are a great laugh in multiplayer.

The package was thin but it was essentially pack-in software for the Wii Remote, and through that lens there is great genius to how it explains the controller in a practical way. This is simple, intuitive fun, as the best games in the Wii series were.

In my mission to clean up the last 2D Mario games I've never finished before Wonder (just 2 USA, Lost Levels and Land 1 to go now), I finally cleared SMB. Of course, I've played this game countless times across countless platforms, but I never actually completed 8-4.

The game still plays well and it's impossible to discount how groundbreaking its scale was in 1985. But SMB1 was relegated to the status of blueprint when Super Mario Bros. 3 released on the same platform - and that game remains a masterpiece today. SMB1, by comparison, seems like a napkin sketch.

That's not to discount how masterful its worldbuilding and mechanics are. The Mushroom Kingdom as we know it now still owes its identity almost wholesale to SMB1. That's a sort of visionary level of game design that asserts SMB1 as a critically important game, but nowadays also a largely uninteresting one.

It's hard to poke holes in a game this important and this airtight, but it's likewise difficult to provide a list of reasons why it deserves a revisit over literally any of the games that follow. We will always be indebted to Super Mario Bros., but I think we can pay our respects from afar.

saw a tweet that said something along the lines of "where pikmin 3 was a perfection of pikmin 1's formula, pikmin 4 feels like a perfection of pikmin 2's formula" and I wholeheartedly agree, but I also kind of feel like it goes beyond that. this game builds upon the ideas set in every previous game in the series (even hey! pikmin apparently since thats where sparklium originally came from I think?) and because of that, I can say with full confidence that this is easily the best game in the series. I mean, they actually made caves GOOD. WIZARDRY. it's still got a few flaws that are keeping it from being a 10/10 (weird timeline reset, underutilization of a couple pikmin types, etc) but it is damn close. entering the postgame, can't wait to play more.

ok so we can all agree that this is by far the best one right? You can argue that the Pikmin 1 had a better story, or that Pikmin 2 had more to do, but come on. the new pikmin types are awesome, the new QOL stuff is incredible (LOCK ON AHHHHHHHHH), the game just LOOKS gorgeous, the boss fights are the best in the series, the pikmin aren't nearly as stupid as they were in the first two, and it just plays better overall. I just wish it was a bit longer, but tbf there's still the side story stuff. hype levels are at a max for Pikmin 4, here's hoping that game is as good as it looks.

"It's Dangerous to Go Alone. Take this!"

The Legend of Zelda's influence on the American games market in particular was something I wish I could have beheld, simply because I think that if I played it back in its prime, I would have loved it as much as any other kid from the eighties did. Alas, a game that's as cryptic and at times bizzare as this does not really hold up relatively speaking. The Legend of Zelda faces an uphill battle for the average modern video game player, and this isn't me trying to dunk on the casuals. Far from it. Quite simply the game is too archaic that even if you think you can accept its age and what that could entail, you truly cannot grasp the absurdity that The Legend of Zelda will make you go through to progress through its arduous quest. If you are willing to brave the "Hyrule Fantasy" and can stomach its manys traps and failings, then by all means, enjoy. It is a cornerstone piece of the video game industry, just not one that I think can be truly accessible to everyone these days.

Pokémon Violet and Scarlet are the first great Pokémon games since Black 2 and White 2.

Right before Thanksgiving Break, my kindergartener brought COVID home with her. We're all boosted so it hasn't been anything serious, but we've all been sick since right after Violet's release. It has definitely sucked having the whole family sick during a holiday break, but I couldn't have asked for a better game to spend the past week and a half with.

Due to being off work sick (thank goodness for COVID PTO), I was able to put nearly 60 hours into Pokémon Violet in the first 10 days of its release. For whatever reason, when I'm sick, I normally can't just play one game all day. I always end up trying a bunch of different things. But Violet hooked me the way that no game has since Breath of the Wild.

The best Pokémon games (as far as I'm concerned) are the ones that nail that sense of adventure I felt when I played Blue Version for the first time in 1998. As the series has gone on, new generations have grown increasingly linear and hand-holdy. Sword and Shield had a map that was effectively a straight line, as if they had taken inspiration from the absolute worst board in the entire Mario Party franchise. Sun and Moon created a great world, but strictly limited where you were able to go. Pokémon X & Y famously stopped you from going through certain parts of Lumiose City due to a "blackout". All of these games lacked a sense of agency. You've always been able to pick whatever team you want, sure. But when a set path is enforced, you can only get so much variety into those 6 slots. This is why VS (Scarvi? Vioscar? I have no idea what the joint name will be for these two) taking place in a legitimate open-world setting makes all the difference.

The joy of exploration instantly washed away my disappointment with SwSh. THIS is the Pokémon adventure I'd been wanting for so long! The early inclusion of the box legendary as an improved bike was genius, ensuring that you're able to begin exploring wherever you'd like from the get-go. I played for 3 or 4 hours before I even entered Mesagoza, catching at least one of everything I encountered and exploring as far as I could in every direction. Throughout the dozens of hours that would follow, I was often impressed and sometimes overwhelmed by just how many Pokémon were on-screen at any given point. I'm obviously not saying this was impressive from a technical standpoint, but having completely removed random encounters and replaced it with a buffet where you can actually see every Pokémon you could run into made me absurdly happy. It's a bit of a shame that they didn't keep Arceus's throw-a-ball-anytime catching mechanics, but this is a perfectly enjoyable middle ground. I've encountered and caught two shinies thus far, and being able to see them in the overworld instead of just looking for sparkles in a random encounter made those moments more engaging than any shiny I'd caught in a previous game. (BTW if anyone wants a shiny Gallade, hit me up in the Backloggd Discord, I'm not crazy about this thing) Constant items to pick up were great for a DK64-pilled brain like mine, and the ability to send my little buddies out to genocidally auto-battle hordes of Skiddo into oblivion never got old. I do have to say that while I love the idea of using materials to craft TMs in theory, I've only actually crafted like 3 of them so far. Maybe I'll get more into it in the post-game!

The different rewards for the three different types of badges and challenges were great. Deciding what to do next became less about whatever was nearby and more about "Hmm do I want to upgrade Miraidon's riding abilities next, or do I want higher-level Pokémon to listen to me first? More TMs might be nice though", and I really appreciated having an actual motivation for going after those goals beyond just checking stuff off a list. The only issue I had with any of this was that there's no EXP gained from the Team Star raids. That felt like a rather stingy omission.

Besides checking the "Adventure" box, Pokémon lives or dies with its new monsters. And Gen IX easily has the goofiest batch we've ever gotten. (Some spoilers in this paragraph for Pokémon descriptions if you're going in blind and haven't played yet) I laughed out loud when my Tandemaus evolved from two mice hanging out into four mice hanging out. I felt hilariously conflicted when Dunsparce FINALLY got an evolution, and it was... that. There's a dung beetle! A dead puppy! A dolphin superhero! A cute pink baby thing with a giant hammer! A Godzilla that's even more Godzilla than Tyranitar was! An entire car! And most importantly, the Fire/Grass spicy pepper Pokémon I've literally been wishing for since like 2009! Clodsire and Annihilape are some of the best "new evolutions added to an old Pokémon" designs we've ever had. And these PARADOX MONS you guys. This is the one bit where Scarlet has a bit of an advantage over Violet, as I don't think Robot Delibird or Pokemon Rumble U Hydreigon are anywhere near as cool as Great Tusk or Roaring Moon, but they're all wins in my book.

Lastly, to touch on the ending with out any spoilers, I don't think any other Pokémon game has stuck the landing like Scarlet and Violet have. The three different story paths all converge for the climax in a way that 100% worked for me. SwSh were probably the worst offenders for having the game just fizzle out at the end, so the contrast here is night and day. (I considered a Sun and Moon joke here, but couldn't get it to not sound hokey) There are legitimate characters here that I actually cared about, and their involvement in the post-game has got me excited to take on the new challenges the game presented after I rolled credits.

The big question on my mind now is how Terastylizing is going to affect VGC. I hated Dynamaxing in my main playthrough of SwSh, but it ended up being one of the best, most balanced mechanics the competitive side has ever had. I'm so intrigued to see how players change their types to flip the metagame on its head!

I am elated by this new direction for main-series Pokémon. My playthrough was thankfully not affected by any glitches other than superficial visuals, but I still can't wait to see what they can do if they manage to get literally any kind of technical expertise into Game Freak!

EDIT 12/18/22: After 86 hours and change, I've 100%ed this game. Every trainer has been beaten. Every Pokemon Center prize obtained. Each teacher quest completed. Every final exam passed. All TMs acquired. I had completed the Pokedex right after I rolled credits, but now I'm finally done. What a killer game.

But I spent AT LEAST 8 hours just trying to get Sweet Herba Mystica from raids for Mr. Saguaro!!! GAH