I have heard a ton of great things about the Ori games and since I needed a short game to fill some time in my backlog schedule and was recommended this one, I thought I'd give it a go. It's clear to me now that that was a mistake. While Ori and the Blind Forest was a short experience it was a very miserable and frustrating one.

Lets start out with the good, the game is drop-dead gorgeous to look at. The artstyle and world just look stunning, even with the blurrier graphics of the Switch the game just looks great. The music is also very good and matches the tone of the beautiful environments it plays in. And to give the gameplay a slight compliment, the basic metroidvania elements of getting new powers and exploring the interconnected world were fun and I never once got lost which is a huge plus for me here. And the story, though a bit lacking, is pretty sweet and has good themes.

Despite all these positives, Ori and the Blind Forest falters with its moment-to-moment gameplay and makes for an incredibly irritating experience rather than a fun one. A lot of the game's problems come from how Ori controls. Ori is incredibly light on her (at least I think it's a her) feet and moves around the world in a really loose and fluid way, the problem is the world is clearly not designed around this control style and it leads to much frustration. The game asks for precision in its platforming and that simply not something that's very easy to do with a character that's so floaty, at times it felt like I was playing Super Meat Boy only that I can tell that that's not what the developers intended it to feel like. On top of that the combat is just incredibly awful here. Because Ori is so light and fragile she can't really take a lot of hits from anything before dying, and unfortunately the enemies in this game are really good at hitting you. This wouldn't be a problem of course if you had substantial means to defend yourself, but of course, you don't. What you get is a little orb that can shoot out three light projectiles before having to take a second to recharge, meaning combat boils down to using these attacks and then dodging the attacks the enemies throw at you but since you control so lightly and there's no shield or dodge button you kinda just have to try and jump away from their attacks which I found most of the time just led to jumping straight into them instead. Now clearly combat is not supposed to be a focus here, as proven by a lack of boss fights or enemy gauntlets but at that point I just have to wonder, why make the game a metroidvania at all? Why not just refine the platforming elements (they clearly need it) and make a pretty good platformer? Was it really part of the developers' vision to make a metroidvania that has unfair and unsatisfying combat, or were they just doing it because its what all the cool games were doing? Anyways moving onto my final gripe with the gameplay, the save system is a mess. Instead of just having a button on the menu or a certain room to go to in order to save progress, Ori's way of saving progress comes from an in game ability that has it's whole meter and everything. By holding a button and using one point from the refillable energy meter, you're allowed to save your spot on any flat surface in the game (as long as it's stable and there's no enemies within eyesight that is) and if you die you will respawn back to this point. Because the game provides you with the materials to refill this energy meter often it becomes a main part of the gameplay, this allows you to save your spot before a particularly tricky set of enemy placements or platforming section to make the best of this, which in my eyes kinda confirms that they knew that both of these main aspects were not great and instead of fixing them they gave the player the equivalent of a save state button to try and remedy it. All these things add up to make a game that is truly frustrating to play and makes me forget about all the good aspects it has while I'm playing it.

I wanted to really like this game, its beautiful artstyle, spectacular music, and touching story cannot be understated, unfortunately though the same goes for its unproportionate and unfun gameplay. The problem with Ori and the Blind Forest is that I can tell there was passion behind it, it just wasn't placed into the right areas unfortunately.

Resident Evil 7 is such a baffling game to me. It's a game that manages to be the best Resident Evil of the modern era in some respects while also the worst modern Resident Evil in others. Whenever I think about this game and its imperfections, I always find myself with a lot more to say about it than I think I did, so I decided to replay this game and it's DLC to finally be able to get it all out in words.

If you looked at just the gameplay and presentation of RE7 you would see nothing really wrong with this game. RE7 was the first RE game to shift to a first-person perspective and I think it works surprisingly well to the point that the third person perspective hardly feels like a series staple anymore. This first-person perspective also adds to the horror element of this game, which when paired with the setting adds up to make one of the scariest RE games I've played. The setting of the Bakers secluded and condemned Louisiana estate is a really good one, each area in the estate matches to one of the Baker family and they all have a different brand of horror to go with them, making each of these main sections feel unique and interesting. The puzzles, combat, and resource management gameplay are all really good here as well and what you'd expect from an RE game. The game is also just really good looking. The way the environments are crafted both visually and in terms of details just feels so real and that adds to the eeriness of the game as a whole.

So if the gameplay, setting, horror, and the presentation of the game are this good what's holding it back you may ask? Well, that'd be the story dear reader, the story is a fucking mess. To give it one thing, the basic plot setup and the way the game starts off. Ethan, being a normal guy who gets dragged into all the game's madness because he's looking for his wife is a good setup and the motivation for him to stay and try to save her is believable. It's in the unbelievablly stupid twists the game takes and the lackluster explanations of whats going on here that this game falters. This is where I get into spoiler territory so if you want to read on just press this link (https://pastebin.com/BhaFdRAE) and it'll take you into the rest of the story section.

The last thing I want to talk about is the DLC. I hadn't played the DLC prior to this playthrough, making it some of the only modern RE content I haven't touched yet and now that I've played it I can say it's alright. Starting off with the Banned Footage, which is where the main meat of this DLC comes from, I'd say this is pretty good. This shows the story of Clancy, another one of the Bakers victims that has to endure and survive their gauntlet of challenges. The Nightmare tape sees you surviving a hoard of nearly endless molded enemies as you try to survive until dawn in a sort of tower defense like mode, the Bedroom tape is an escape room of sorts where you have to use the items and clues available to you in the room all the while avoiding making a lot of noise to avoid attracting Margurite to the room and making sure to put everything back where you found it before she comes back each time otherwise she'll realise you're trying to escape, and the 21 tape sees you playing a few sadistic rounds of blackjack against another victim in Lucas' warehouse, the winner of which is allowed to go free and the loser of which is killed gruesomely. These are all pretty fun ideas that don't outstay their welcome for the most part and are neat little additions. The fourth Banned Footage tape works as a prolouge to the main story thatb shows us from Zoe's eyes the day that things went to shit, showing how Eveline corrupted the Bakers with her gift and how Zoe manages to escape meeting the same fate as the rest of her family, even if she can't leave the estate. There's also two other DLCs that serve as epilouges in "Not a Hero" and "End of Zoe", Not a Hero focuses on Chris Redfield going after Lucas Baker who turns out was much more evil than the game initially showed and is related to the Umbrella corporation, this mode is just a really short epilouge with basic RE gameplay that only really serves to tie the events of this game into the main RE story. End of Zoe focuses on Uncle Joe Baker finding Zoe in a crystalized state and searching for a cure for her all while a swampy version of Jack Baker follows him, the mode has you using Joe's bare fists and brute strength as weapons rather than guns and feels pretty fun and satisfying in that way, it's also nice to see Zoe's story get concluded so satisfyingly and brings closure to the events of the main game as a whole. Overall I'd say this DLC is mostly worth it, it's not a lot to write home about but it's something and if you get it on sale it'll provide you with a few more hours of entertainment if you liked the base game.

Despite its glaring story flaws that hold it back from greatness, Resident Evil 7 is still a really fun game and a good return to form as well as innovation for the RE series. The excellent gameplay, setting, and horror elements add up to what I believe to be the most genuinely scary Resident Evil
game and without it being made and returning the series to it's roots I probably wouldn't be such a big RE fan today.

My first introduction to Banjo Kazooie was in the E3 2019 Nintendo Direct when he was revealed for Smash. I had no idea who this character was or what the series was about, I just knew that a LOT of people were happy they made it, and I couldn't understand why. But having finally played the game I now understand the tears of the people that flow from the lack of this series in the modern day, they are now my tears as well.

The gameplay in Banjo Kazooie is simply phenomenal. The titular duo's moveset is extremely varied and gives you everything you need to master the game with. It never really felt like I hit a wall because of it, if there was a puzzle to solve I was always certain that I had what I needed to solve it at my disposal and the game rewarded me for that. On top of that the platforming is pure joy, the perfect mix of challenge and fun. And then there's just the collectathon structure this game employs to an excellent degree. In any other 3D platformer I would feel content just to get the objectives required to beat the game, but because collecting things in Banjo Kazooie is just so damn satisfying I found myself collecting everything. 100% completing this game not only felt really satisfying but it also felt like the intended way to play the game and enhanced the experience ten times more than it would have been if I just did the bare minimum required.

The other main thing I want to talk about here is the game's presentation. Despite being an N64 game I feel like Banjo Kazooie has held up incredibly well. The game's visual style, world, tone, and sound design are all just so damn charming. There's so much to love here, from all the charming characters and the funny dialogue between them, to the oddly kinda edgy sense of humor the game has (at least for an E rated game) like when they said Gruntilda does a striptease or when Kazooie heavily implied she was gonna shove a key up someone's ass, just jokes that I laughed a lot at because I had no idea how they got away with them. The worlds here are very unique and interesting as well. There are of course some stinkers (looking at you Bubblegloop Swamp) but for the most parts these environments are just interesting and fun in concept and a blast to actually explore yourself. They take basic level themes and add the game's charm to them to make some truly great levels that are some of the best I've ever played in a platformer.

Overall, Banjo Kazooie is a classic game that's well loved for a reason. The game's charm, pristine level design, and incredibly fun gameplay cycle kept me engaged and addicted the whole way through and turned me into a fan of this character and this series that I priorly couldn't care less about.

Final Fantasy XVI is my first Final Fantasy game (at least the first one I played all the way through) and though I am aware it's not really emblematic of what the rest of the series is like, it was still a damn good game and one that might serve as my gateway into the series' countless other games.

The setting and deep-rooted themes of Final Fantasy XVI are a big standout here, and something that I don't think I could get far in this review without first bringing up. The twin continents of Valisthea are afflicted by a plague and everyone in the land is worse off for it. Though the plague doesn't affect people directly, instead opting to sap up all the life from the land it touches and making it unhabitable, it's through the terror that this ever-spreading plague causes that the worst sides of man are brought out. The world of FFXVI is one where nations' clashing ideals are brought to the forefront as they fight to gain more land unaffected by the blight, and where oppression and slavery are unfortunately commonplace. They're mature and heavy themes for sure and the game handles them pretty damn well, paired with some interesting worldbuilding and a medieval-fantasy setting (for once in the series' recent history) and this game became one that I couldn't wait to keep playing so that I could just see more of what it had to offer.

The story of Final Fantasy XVI is the story of Clive Rosfield, a man who to say has had a hard life would be an understatement. Having lost his father and his younger brother, whom he was sworn to protect, as a child and then unbeknownst to him sold into slavery to the imperial army by his own mother, we pick up with Clive as a broken man just trying to survive and on a quest for revenge on his brother's killer. It's only when he learns that he was the one who killed his brother (albeit in the form of a large fiery beast that he had no control over) that he sets out on a journey to right the wrongs of the world, to stop the spread of the plague, to free those who like him have been oppressed because of their abilities, and to discover what the purpose of his life is now after living only for revenge for most of his life. Thematically, the decision to focus on Clive alone as the main character, even going so far as to have him be the only character you take control of in the game in a series that is known for it's diversity of party memebers in gameplay, is a really strong one. Part of Clive's personal struggles is that of not knowing and not being able to rely on others and feeling the need to take problems into his own hands and bare the burden of many things by himself, even when it harms him to do so. Throughout the story however he makes countless friends and allies and learns to rely on their help which is just a really touching transformation and gives him a great sense of personal stakes to want to see the world saved. If I had one main problem with the story however it would be it's main villain. While there are several minor villans that each play their parts in certain acts of the story, the main villain, Ultima, kind of falls flat in my opinion. He is a very loosely defined threat, and one that despite easily having the power to end things at any point, for some reasons chooses to wait until the very end of the story to step in. His plan and motives are unclear and uninteresting and admittedly he just talks way too much, which when it all sounds like fantasy jargon, just doesn't make any scene with him enjoyable or interesting. It's because of this that the whole final few sections of the game's story were a slog to get through, and though the game does have a really good ending, any part that Ultima is in is is a part that I find myself unable to enjoy.

Finally, I want to talk about perhaps the most important aspect of the game, it's gameplay. The base gameplay of FFXVI involves exploring vast and well-crafted areas and getting into fast-paced action RPG battles. The battles are really enjoyable giving you a wide base moveset to use against swarms of monsters or human enemies as well as various magic combat abilities in the form of Eikon powers that allow for a small form of moveset customization and more powerful attacks at your disposal in battle. You obtain several new sets of Eikon powers throughout the game which was something I found really cool as it kept the gameplay fresh and engaging. Perhaps the best part of the gameplay though are the boss battles. These are really cinematic and have several phases which really test your mastery of the games combat, leading to fun and satisfying fights that are an absolute blast from start to finish. These were easily my favorite part of the gameplay and something I always looked forward to at the end of certain sections when I could tell they were coming, adding another great layer of challenge and fun onto gameplay already racked with it.

Final Fantasy XVI was a great gateway into the world of Final Fantasy for me and one packed with a deep and mature story and themes, an immensely likable and relatable protagonist, and really fun combat and boss fights that kept me playing.

Oh, and you can pet the dog :)

A really short and sweet puzzle game. The ducks are cute and I felt incentive to save them just to hear the fun things they would each say. The gameplay is unique and doesn't outstay it's welcome. My only complaint is that the game neglects to tell you that you can move your vessel thing faster by pressing "B". I didn't find this a problem for most of the game but at a certain point it became required to beat certain levels and since I didn't know about it I had to look up a guide on how to beat the level, assuming I was just playing sub-optimally, only to be told of this crucial mechanic's existence, so that was fun.

I haven't finished Sonic Mania, but I played enough to know that whatever the incredibly talented team that made that did next was something that was going to be worth playing, and Penny's Big Breakaway is exactly that. From the moment this game was revealed in a Nintendo Direct last year, to when it was shadow dropped in a Partner Showcase this year I knew it was something I wanted to play, and now having done so I'm happy to say that it delivers on most fronts.

To start off with the world of this game is so vibrant with colors and a visually appealing artstyle that makes each level a joy to traverse. The level design here is great as well, world themes that would feel basic in other 3D platformers are done with an interesting twist here and it's absolutely refreshing. The main draw to the gameplay though is of course Penny and her expansive moveset, and while I for sure had fun with this aspect it didn't feel like it was made for me. Penny's moveset is off the walls, the number of tricks you can do with your yoyo to complete levels fast and in style is wild and while I would like to say I found this as intuitive and fun as other did, but personally I just never quite got the hang of this and felt like I was doing it wrong throughout the entire game. The only part of the gameplay that I think just didn't add up were the boss battles, they weren't particularly long or difficult, especially not the final boss which kinda just ended things on an anticlimactic note.

In terms of story the game is charming enough but I'd be lying if I said I was fully engaged with it. I liked the little penguin guys and some of the character designs, and the love story between Emperor Eddie and Taboo was cute I guess, but that's about all I remember lol.

Overall, Penny's Big Breakaway is a really fun and imaginative game from Evening Star and I still can't wait to see what they do next.

I still remember the exact moment that this game was revealed, I was ecstatic. Nintendo hadn't forgotten about Mario Strikers after all! They knew what we wanted and were gonna give it to us, and to make things better it was coming out in just a few months! I couldn't have been more clueless. Mario Strikers Battle League is to this day the most disappointing game that I have ever played and has little to no redeeming qualities.

Of all the aspects to dislike about this game that gameplay is the one that I hate the least, granted that means I still hate it quite a lot but it's not as bad as the rest of what makes this game bad. The general gameplay here feels like they completely forgot how to make a Mario Strikers game, because it just straight up doesn't have the balance or fun of those games at all. The captain and sidekick system are completely gone, now there's just a roster of like 16 or so Mario characters to choose from, none of which are all that surprising to see present or different in ways that makes them feel better. What's even stranger about this is that you can break all continuity and just choose four of the same character to fill your team, so if you want four Bowsers or four DKs you can have it, and nobody will say a thing. It's like if in real soccer four Messi's walked onto the field for a game, you'd think that would be bizarre and pretty unfair, but it's done completely straight faced here and it just shows that they really put no thought into this game at all. The way items are handled is really bad here as well, instead of the game giving them out to a team that fills the requirements to earn one in the situation, the game just drops random item blocks on the field from time to time. If the current match is at a neutral state an item block that anyone can grab will drop, if one team is at even a slight disadvantage though the game will drop team specific item blocks that only the disadvantaged team can get and will continue to do so extremely frequently until that team gets its shit together. Another feature done for the worse here is the Hyper Strikes, this game's equivalent of the captain specific special shots from the previous games. In this game you can no longer pop one of these whenever you want, you have to wait for a Strike Orb to appear on the field, grab it and then you'll have around 30 seconds to pull off a Hyper Strike. Pulling off a hyper strike is insanely easy, given that you get to a spot on the field with ample distance between you and your opponents all you have to do is press "A" twice on a meter that determines the shot's accuracy, if you press the button twice while on the smallest blue section your shot will go in no matter what and score you two points instead of one, the problem is that this timing is incredibly easy to hit leading to virtually no challenge when it comes to these other than finding a safe spot to use them. The fact that you can't use them whenever you want though and that any character on the field can use them, rather than just the captain, makes them quite useless in the long run. These kinds of shots were so useful in the other games because they were a risk and reward type scenario to use helpful for tying the game when you got desperately behind or pulling farther ahead, here they just show up to infrequently to strategize around and to be considered any kinds of useful.

Like I've already mentioned, I was extremely hyped for this game before it came out and bought it Day 1, I remember coming home and playing like 2 to 3 hours of the main tournament mode before inevitably getting bored and putting it down, hoping I'd never have to play it again. What's funny is if I had only played a like 2 more hours of the tournament mode I would have seen all that the game has and ever would have to offer in terms of content. Mario Strikers Battle League is easily the most barren and worthless Mario Sports game in terms of content and surprisingly enough it wears that on its sleeve unashamedly. I am not joking when I say that literally all there is to do in this game is the tournament mode, which consists of six tournament cups, each having a four-match bracket within it and that's all. Now there is of course also the online mode that Nintendo was clearly putting all their stock into when making this game but clearly after seeing how bad this game is everyone who bought it as a whole decided to forego the online and move on with their lives and I don't blame them. This is quite honestly one of the lightest games in terms of content that I've ever seen and it's absolutely shameful, then again perhaps I should thank it because if there were more content here I'd be forced to play this game longer.

Finally, we get to the most egregious aspect of Battle League, the presentation. I loved the style of the other two Strikers games and have already gone on in lengths about that in the reviews I've done for them, so you can imagine my distaste when I'm presented with a game that throws all that out the window. Battle League attempts to copy the former games' style visually and musically in some places but completely misses the point of it but toning things down and not allowing the characters to be unhinged like they were in the previous games. Instead of actually charming and funny win/lose animations like we got in the previous game we instead get the most homogenized cutscenes of Mario characters doing typical Mario character things that fit Nintendo's evergreen vision for them rather than one that makes them more fun and interesting because God forbid these characters be interesting. And it's not just the characters either, the stadiums are no longer fun or different instead just being basic stadiums with themed backsplashes that do nothing but change the color of the grass, the UI is abysmal and boring to look at, and the music tries so hard to be crowd-pleasing only to be the most forgettable few notes repeated that I've ever heard. It's because of this game that this series that I loved has lost its soul and Nintendo refuses to let it go and find it again.

I can say in confidence that Mario Strikers Battle League is the both the worst Mario Sports game and just one of the worst games I have ever played in general. It is a spit in the face to the legacy of Mario Sports games and those like me who grew up enjoying them and now that I have finished it, I am glad I will never have to play it again.

After Mario Tennis Aces proved my assumptions about the Switch Mario Sports games being generic and middling in their gameplay, I was kind of excited to play through Mario Golf Super Rush and see if it was any good, only to find out that my assumptions were true all along and Mario Tennis Aces is just an outlier. Now yes, overall I'd still say that Mario Golf Super Rush is a good game at the very least but there are several aspects that really hold it back from being anything more than that in my eyes.

The gameplay here is easily my biggest problem with the game. Instead of focusing on just making really fun and deep golf mechanics like Toadstool Tour did, the developers decided to tone things down in that area and instead decided to focus on the new feature of running to your ball after you shoot it. This feature is used throughout 90% of the game modes and it's really tedious as opposed to fun, you can use sprint to get to your ball but you have a stamina bar that runs out really fast, so you end up kinda just walking to it while you wait for your bar to replenish. I found this new feature to be incredibly tedious and the antithesis of fun, it's almost like previous games in the series left this out because they knew it wouldn't be fun. The base game courses here are kinda what you'd expect from these games, the courses added in free updates though are really fun to playthrough though, my favorite being the New Donk City course which feels straight pulled from Super Mario Odyssey and works surprisingly well as a golf course. And then the character selection here is also great, having all the characters you'd expect and some out there ones that are fun to see like King Bob-Omb and Ninji. As much as I enjoy the roster inclusions though, the playstyles of each character feel very much one in the same here and there isn't much reason to choose one character over another besides personal preference.

In terms of content there is quite a lot here surprisingly, but none of it is all that good. The main single player mode is Adventure mode, which again is refreshing to see rather than just another tournament mode where you play through all the courses in order to win. Adventure mode sees you taking control of your Mii character running around an oversold and completing golf challenges and tournaments on each of the game's various courses. Unlike Mario Tennis Aces before it however, Mario Golf Super Rush plays things incredibly straight with its story mode, no deep story, unique minigames and much fewer unique boss fights (though there are a few), it's just the generic and easy kind of adventure mode that you'd expect from one of these games and it's over before you know it. Apart from that there's the online mode (which seeing as this game came out in 2021 and was forgotten about in a few weeks is of course now mostly dead), the solo challenge mode which offers a few more challenges to hone your skills at the game but really isn't anything more substantial than filler here, and the basic golf mode and that's it.

With its removal of meaningful depth in favor of tedious gameplay mechanics and lack of substantial content and charm I cannot say that I found Mario Golf Super Rush to be a great game, still though it's courses and basic golf gameplay are slightly fun enough to me saying its entirely bad either. I really wanted to like Mario Super Rush more than this, I wanted to believe that Nintendo still can make really fun Mario Sports games like they used to, but with its mediocre showing and the incredibly disappointing Mario Sports game that I know comes right after it I cannot in good conscious believe that they can.

I had never actually played Mario Tennis Aces before now, but because of my short experiences with the other two Mario sports games on Switch and just the way that Nintendo currently makes their multiplayer party games like this nowadays, I wasn't really looking forward to it. As my rating would suggest however, Mario Tennis Aces was actually a really pleasant surprise of a game to me.

Starting with the gameplay, I'd say it's the best that Mario Tennis has ever been. There's a lot of variety in the kinds of basic shots you can do and each shot feels like it has a specific use as compared to another. Then there's the focus bar which builds naturally throughout the match and is used for several things being zone speed, zone shots, and special shot. Zone speed allows you to slow down time and move to where the ball is, it actively and pretty quickly depletes your focus bar as you use it though, so you have to be deliberate when you use it. Zone shots are able to be used when your bar is around a third of the way full and allow you to zoom in and use the gyro on the Switch to controller to aim directly where you want the ball to go, this is good for taking advantage of the spots on the court your opponent isn't covering and getting a point. Specials shots are nearly the same as zone shots, but you can activate them any time before you hit the ball and your gauge has to be completely full to do so, they do make the ball move much faster and are for the opponent to block however so there is reason to use them. Another unique mechanic in this game is the tennis racket durability system. Instead of being completely at your opponent's mercy when they use a zone or special shot you have the ability to block these by hitting the ball at the right time. The timing on this block is really strict and if you swing to hit the ball too early your rackets durability will go down, missing the timing like this three times will result in your racket breaking and the opponent getting an easy score because of it, this means that you always want to be intentional with how you're blocking shots like these otherwise it'll be detrimental to your chances of winning. In fact, the games and abundance of options makes it really stand out in the sea of Mario sports games, the depth when all of these skills are combined in a match is surprising and leads to matches that never feel like they play out the same way. The character roster in this game is also huge, you have your mainstays like Mario, Luigi and Peach but then you have the out there picks that I can't help but love like Spike, Fire Piranha Plant (no idea why it had to be the fire variety specifically but it's more random that way and therefore funny) and my beloved, Chain Chomp. If I had to say a weakest point of the gameplay though it'd probably be the tennis courts themselves. A lot of these are just basic tennis courts with no gimmicks but the ones that do have gimmicks don't really feel all that standout, this isn't a big complaint though as the gameplay is deep and fun enough to make up for the lack of outside factors effecting it.

I'd say the biggest thing that brings this game down though is its content or lack thereof. Like the other Mario tennis games there is a tournament mode here but unlike the other tournament modes (and to my great relief) that isn't the main single player mode here, that role is filled by the adventure mode. Adventure mode sees Mario hunting down five power stones across the island that this game takes place on in order to stop an evil sentient tennis racket that has possessed Luigi, Wario, and Waluigi, and I mean if that isn't peak storytelling, I don't know what is. This takes place across a top down large interconnected world map with challenges and different areas along the way. What was refreshing about this was that not everything was just a simple tennis match, there were tutorials, minigames, and unique boss fights along the way that were actually pretty fun and taught you the mechanics of the game in a way that felt natural. For the most part this mode was great, but my main complaint is that it was over just as it was getting started, to put it in perspective I started this today and finished it within 3 hours. Another minor gripe is that you have to play as Mario the whole time (except for a one doubles match where you play as Peach and Daisy), I would've appreciated a system that allowed you to recruit characters and change into them as you go but unfortunately that just wasn't the case, I'm sorry Chain Chomp, you'll get your spot in the sunlight one day. Apart from this there's all the other modes you'd expect in a game like this, free play, ring shit, and of course tournament mode but that's about it. A reason for this game being light on content is that this was the beginning of the wi-fi era of these games, meaning that the Nintendo would focus on pushing you to play online to get your money's worth here rather than actually filling the game with super meaningful content like in Mario sports games past, it's a bad excuse but there's nothing to be done about it.

Overall, I'd say I had a surprisingly good time with Mario Tennis Aces. The core gameplay is really deep and fun to master and the adventure mode, though short, was pretty good. It might be light on single player content and the online might be dead empty now, but I still had a decent amount of fun with the game for what it is.

Looking back now, I really, truly understand why Nintendo didn't make a new Mario Kart on Switch and instead opted to simply port the one from the previous gen and make it better, because honestly, how do you even begin to try and top Mario Kart 8? The pure levels of fun, innovation, and creativity present in this one silly Mario Kart game are insane and more than other games could ever even dream of. If Mario Kart 8 was on the brink of perfection, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was the push that got it there.

Starting out with the gameplay, it's the same old tried and true kart racing formula that's worked for the series for many years now, only this time with a few notable inclusions that refine it to feel the best it ever has. The customizable vehicle parts system from Mario Kart 7 returns here and it works tremendously, there's so many interestingly designed vehicles and so many combinations to try. Experimenting with different combinations till you find the one that's just right for you can be a fun process and switching it up every once in a while to try a different playstyle or to impose a challenge upon yourself can be fun too. Then there's the game's main new feature, the anti-gravity racing. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's tracks almost all have an element of anti-gravity infused into them, allowing you to drive on walls or ceilings of the tracks you're racing on which ultimately just leads to some of the most inspired track designs in the series. Some of my absolute favorite tracks in the entire series originate from this game and its legendary track design, such as Mount Wario, Toad Harbor, Wild Woods, Big Blue, and Shy Guy Falls just to name a few. The game is no slouch in its retro track selection either, choosing just the right amount of fan favorites as well as left field picks that got remakes that completely redeemed them. The base track selection is the biggest in the series as well and yet never at any point feels like it values quantity over quality, each track has the same expert amount of care and details put into it and that's what really sets this game apart.

In terms of content there's nothing really different from any other Mario Kart game here, but when the base gameplay is as fun and distinct as it is, I'd argue that there doesn't really need to be. The main mode is of course Grand Prix mode and there certainly is a lot to tackle here. There are 12 cups worth of races in the base roster of the game (being doubled entirely in the Booster Course Pass but I'll get there momentarily) which means you'll have a lot to do if you want to master them all over the game's five CCs, surprisingly though this process never felt tiresome or drawn out as it might seem to be (I should note that in this playthrough, I didn't go through and do all of this, as I had already done so and didn't feel like starting my file over again, I instead just opted to playthrough every course in the game once and call it a playthrough). The game combines the 50, 100, and 150 CC modes progress into one, meaning if you get the gold trophy on one cup's CC, you get it for all the corresponding CCs as well, meaning you don't have to tediously go through each grand prix three times and have roughly the same experience each time. The other two CCs are Mirror mode and 200cc. Mirror mode, being a staple of the series at this point, has you race through the courses on 150cc just flipped, so it does feel kind of similar but overall offers enough of a different experience to justify its existence I guess. The main event here though is clearly 200cc. 200cc is a blisteringly fast game mode that really captures the chaotic and fun vibes of Mario Kart perfectly. It made me not even care that I was completing the same tracks over again for the third time because the adrenaline pumping speeds made it a blast to play through. Apart from this there's also the online mode, which surprisingly enough for NSO, I've found to work pretty darn well. The online mode places you in a lobby with other players and allows you to choose between three different course selections or just choose random if you don't like any of the selections and honestly I've always been a fan of this system. In Mario Karts past the games online modes would allow you to choose whatever course from the roster that you want, the only problem being that everyone would always choose the same few fan favorite courses and there would be no variety, this system however lends itself to variety every time you play the game and lets you see more of the courses while playing online with people around your skill level and it's honestly just refreshing to see it work so well. In terms of unlockables Mario Kart 8 Deluxe takes a different approach than any other Mario Kart game before it. The game has every character unlocked already, which some might see as a bit of a bummer, and even I'll admit it does take a little bit of the excitement out of things but its also just kind of convenient at the end of the day. Apart from that the only other unlockables you get are car parts which you get by collecting coins in races and hitting certain milestones. While this is a bit disappointing as it doesn't really test your skill at the game, I can see understand why they did it and it doesn't bother me that much.

Finally I get to my last talking point about this game, being it's pretty great DLC in the form of the Booster Course pass. The Booster Course pass took the number of cups from the base game and doubled it in a massive expansion that's main goal was to bring back mostly fan favorite retro tracks from the series' past as well as sprinkling in some surprises like a few entirely new tracks, new characters, and extra game customization modes to really make this game the ultimate Mario Kart. This happened over the course of six waves of DLC, each introducing two new cups worth of tracks to the mix spaced a few months apart. This made the release of each new wave an event to look forward to and I have plenty of fond memories of waking up in the morning and seeing the reveal trailer on Nintendo's YouTube page of what 8 new courses would be in the next wave of DLC, it was a really exciting time to be a Mario Kart fan and one that I'm glad I got to experience as it happened.

Overall, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is just the definitive Mario Kart experience in every way and definitely one that has earned its great reputation and sales figures. The game achieves nearly everything it sets out to do by being just pure unadulterated fun and having so many good ideas that it doesn't know what to do with them. The game's longevity is a testament to its staying power and even in a few years when we have the next Mario Kart in hand (hopefully) I'll still always look back fondly and appreciate everything that this near perfect video game did for the series.

It was my intention to play this game for my marathon (I mean honestly does anyone actually play this game for any other reason than pure obligation?) but because my shitty Wii U disc reader refuses to recognize the completey spotless disc I guess I have to skip it now. I know I'm dodging a bullet here, but honestly I can't help but be a bit dissapointed tbh, if Nintendo was actually good at preserving their games, even the bad ones, I wouldn't have had to skip another game on this marathon like this.

I was really looking forward to playing Mario Sports Mix again. Like all the other Wii Mario sports games I had this one as a kid but for some reason or another either lost it or gave it to a friend in exchange for one of their games soon after getting it, and therefore don't really remember a lot about the game. After finally having replayed it though I can say in all confidence that this is it, this is the game where Mario sports games lost all their soul.

Instead of focusing in on one sport specifically like all the games in the Mario Sports subseries have before, Mario Sports Mix has four separate sports to play and master being Basketball, Volleyball, Dodgeball, and Hockey. I get that the point of the game was to make it a mix of sports as the title implies but in doing so each sport loses its depth and uniqueness, something that was very present in Mario Sports games past. Each sport has extremely simplistic controls that I learned within the first match and no real in-depth mechanics that you have to master to succeed. Of course there are the Mario sports game staples present here like items, character abilities, and different stadium gimmicks but they feel so toned down here and like they effect the gameplay very little. The simplicity of the gameplay just leads to an experience that is incredibly easy, once you know how to score nothing is stopping you from doing so, especially not the extremely easy to beat CPUs. Another problem that this leads to is each individual match feeling too long. In the sports that rely on clocks to end (Hockey and Basketball) it felt like said clock was going in slow motion and it only gets worse once you realize that every second you're scoring is another second that the clock isn't running, and because the game is super easy and the CPU's not at all challenging you'll be scoring a lot. In Volleyball there's no clock but you are required to get a whopping 15 points to win a set and you have to win 2 sets to win the match, combine that with the slow gameplay of the sport and it's not very fun either. This led to Dodgeball being my favorite sport of the bunch here as it's the only one where you're in control of the game's pace, instead of a clock the game relies on life bars and every time you successfully hit an opponent with the ball their life bar depletes and it goes until you've fully defeated both your opponent's life bars, you still have to do two sets of this but it's much quicker than the other sports.

In terms of content and unlockables the game certainly delivers, but I'd argue not in a good way. Each sport has three championship cups to go through, complete one and you unlock the next one, complete the final match of the final cup and you get the grand trophy for it. Upon getting all four grand trophies for all the sports you'll be treated to a special final boss fight against the Behemoth, a creature that looks ripped straight out of a Final Fantasy or Dragon Quest game and due in large part to Square Enix's co-development on this game. The boss fight incorporates moves from all of the specific sports and is actually a bit difficult, by that I mean I still beat it first try like everything else in this game, but it had me low on health a few times. Once you complete that you unlock another sport of sorts being the "Sports Mix" mode. Sports mix takes the tournament structure and just has you play a random sport for each match, where the CPUs are a little noticeably harder but that's about the only difference. I'd like to say this mode was an interesting and valid inclusion but really, it's just more padding to pad out an already heavily padded game. That's not all though because after you beat all the cups in each sport you unlock a hard mode for each of them, which surprise surprise, is once again only slightly harder and just more padding. Apart from the tournament mode there's one minigame for each sport but I didn't find these to be all that fun either if I'm being honest. And then there's the unlock system, which is quite frankly, just a mess all around. In order to unlock things you have to reenter a tournament you've already completed and look for secret paths on the map screen between matches, it's almost completely random if a secret path will appear after you win a match and it's also random whether a hidden character will appear along that path once you do get on it or of you'll even be on the right path to get that character at all because there are several different paths. Because all of this is random, I found myself constantly restarting tournaments to see if I got lucky that time and it was just exhausting and unsatisfying to complete. On top of this when you finally do unlock something it's only for the specific sport you're playing, meaning you have to repeat this arduous process 3 more times which is exactly where I said screw this and gave up on the game. The game has content in spades but none of it is meaningful or fun to complete, just tedious and frustrating.

Finally, I come to the game's presentation, and it's probably the most unlikable aspect of the whole thing to me. In sharp contrast to literally every other Mario Sports game up to this point, Mario Sports Mix is just so bland and generic. Where other games had fun and hype intro cutscenes Mario Sports Mix has a cutscene of Mario and friends playing the game's sports in a plain white void, where other games had various fun victory or loss animations with personality Mario Sports Mix has one very basic animation for each character when they score a point, where other games had stylish UI and music that matched the tone of the game perfectly Mario Sports Mix has sterile UI and so-so music, and the list goes on. Mario Sports Mix took the genuine fun out of these game's personality and replaced it with artificial fun, Mario isn't here playing these four sports because he wants to be he's here because he's contractually obligated to be.

Maybe I was wrong to look forward to replaying this game, it's gameplay was much worse than I remembered it being, the loads of content it offers isn't as meaningful to and adult with limited time as it was to a kid with unlimited time, getting all the unlockable is much more of a tedious process than a fun one, and overall, the style just feels like the heart is gone. The game can still be kind of fun on a base level, but for the miserable process of completing it and the bad precedent it set for future Mario Sports games, I can't in good conscious call this a good game anymore.