English/German below

Another great Star Wars game from Respawn. I'll start with the negative, the open world was a bit overloaded for me and distracted too much from the story progress.

Cal Kestis works best for me in a linear story adventure. Nevertheless, the gameplay was phenomenal again, it's just fun to experience progress, learn new things and, above all, you weren't completely at the beginning. The landscapes were breathtaking and pulled you into the great world of Star Wars.

Cinematically and in terms of story presentation, it was to my liking. Some characters deserved more time, but it was great to meet some familiar characters.

I'm really looking forward to part 3 and part 1 was the best so far for me. Star Wars offers so much and it's finally being used again.

4/5 lightsabers.

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Wieder ein tolles Star Wars Spiel von Respawn. Ich fang mal kurz mit dem negativen an, die Open World war für mich teilweise etwas überladen und hat zu sehr von dem Story Progress abgelenkt.

Cal Kestis funktioniert am besten für mich in einem linearn Story-Adventure. Trotzdem war das Gameplay wieder phänomenal, es macht einfach Spaß Fortschritt zu erleben, neue Dinge zu lernen und vor allem war man nicht völlig am Anfang. Die Landschaften waren atemberaubend und haben einen in die tolle Welt von Star Wars gezogen.

Cineastisch und von der Storydarstellung war das nach meinem Geschmack. Manche Charaktere hätten noch mehr Zeit verdient, aber es war toll einige bekannte Figuren zu treffen.

Ich freue mich sehr auf Teil 3 und Teil 1 war für mich bisher der beste. Star Wars bietet soviel und endlich wird es wieder genutzt.

4/5 Lichtschwerter.

Tears of the Kingdom is more Breath of the Wild. I loved Breath of the Wild, So I was very happy to fall in step alongside its successor, and launching the game and advancing through the Great Sky Islands was among some of my happiest gaming moments. I was over the moon to be able to experience the joy that was exploring Hyrule all over again. Everything has been made bigger, flashier, louder, crazier than you could ever ask for.

Which is why I feel so conflicted. Initially I was certain that I might be playing the greatest game ever made. But as the game moved on, I slowly and sadly realized that much of what I didn’t like about Breath of the Wild survived the transition just as handily as what I loved. Breath of the Wild was a deeply flawed experience held up by its masterful world and exploration, and now Tears of the Kingdom turns everything to eleven. Everything. The world and exploration are even better, which only makes the flaws even more glaring and confusing, considering Nintendo had six years to innovate and smooth out the edges. It almost feels unfair to criticize the game like this. I got everything I loved and more, but not the jaw dropping wonder I got the first time around. I’ve given the game a 9/10, and yet I'm frustrated that it's not a 10/10. Many of the deep flaws of Breath of the Wild are either still present or somehow even worse, which absolutely astonishes me. But it feels incredibly childish to complain that the game was only a measly 9/10 that I sunk 110 hours into. I’m torn between really liking the game that I got, and feeling disappointed in its missed potential.

Make no mistake, Tears of the Kingdom does a lot right. The new abilities make exploring and interacting with the worlds completely different experiences from Breath of the Wild, despite the overworld map being largely the same. Ascend and Recall are both very convenient and allow you to move very creatively if you can find a ceiling or moving object respectively, but the real game changers are Fuse and Ultrahand.

Fuse automatically makes every collectable item more valuable and, critically, more interesting. You have access to many more options for combat and traversal. Attaching two spears and keeping every enemy out of range, shooting a muddle bud and just having the enemies fight each other, putting a glider on your shield and doing a super jump straight over their head, putting a puffshroom on your shield to slip away in a cloud of smoke should you take a hit. The durability system in Breath of the Wild both made weapons unexciting rewards and limited resources that you were reluctant to use, but Fuse neatly fixes both of these issues. Weapons are now as exciting as you make them. And because weapons are all more common and can be fused in any number of ways, most fights are a net positive, gaining more items than you used.

So It’s heartbreaking how tedious digging through the inventory to find fusion items actually is. You will only ever use a handful of staple items because trying to find anything that isn’t at the top of the menu when sorted by either ‘fuse strength’ or ‘most used’ is a massive time sink. Trying to experiment is unnecessarily time consuming, to the point where I just didn’t bother. And this is compounded by some fusions just towering over others. Muddle buds and puffshrooms can let you clear out entire crowds with no risk to yourself, rocket shields can completely break many of the shrines, Gibdo bones on a strong bow eviscerate every single boss and miniboss that the game has. And all of this is really highlighted by the frankly unimpressive combat that has been ported, untouched, straight from Breath of the Wild. I tried to find clever ways to deal with enemies whenever I could in order to avoid having to deal with the frustrating combat, and as a result, I spent quite a lot of time scrolling through menus just looking for items to fuse.

One noteworthy change is the rework of one of the most important combat tools, abilities. And they are easily the most glaring step back made by Nintendo. Breath of the Wild’s champion abilities were simple and elegant, you hold down a button and activate the ability. Using the sage’s abilities in Tears of the Kingdom is downright painful. You are followed by an AI companion that you must run up to, press A to prime the ability, aim the ability, and finally be able to actually use it. To make this even worse, there are five sages who will be running around you, getting in the way of the one you actually want to use. You can disable them, but that means you will need to dig around in the inventory even more when you actually do need them, which is quite common. You’ll want Tulin, as he gets used every time you glide. Yunobo is mostly used to break rocks, which is pretty frequently. Sidon was useless. Riju was the only one who was actually worth finding and activating, her lightning was actually quite powerful. I loathed having to physically find the sages in order to use the abilities, so much so that I never bothered. Letting the sages run wild was always preferable as they helped out passively by attacking enemies. Sometimes. They were extremely inconsistent, sometimes they would lock down an enemy by themselves, other times they would do absolutely nothing. I almost wonder if they began developing a companion AI system for a separate idea that they ultimately scrapped, and then recycled into the sages in order to justify the developer time spent. Because I struggle to stomach that developers and designers as talented as the team behind this game could make such an awful design choice when they had it just fine the first time around.

To top it all off, the enemy variety still is not very impressive. While there are several new enemies to encounter, Breath of the Wild’s enemy variety was miniscule, so a handful of new monsters only raises the count from ‘way too small’, to just ‘too small’. The bulk of fights will still be with the core trio of bokoblins, lizalfos, and moblins, and the interest in fighting them left me long before the credits rolled. Food and Armor upgrades are just as abusable here as in Breath of the Wild as well, you can heal at any time and at no risk, and a few upgrades to your armor makes you take almost no damage. The many types of armor to juggle between adds even more tedious digging through menus. Combat starts out incredibly fun and experimental, but is still too easily broken with food and armor upgrades, and monotonous in enemy types to remain interesting for a 100+ hour game. By the end you will be functionally invincible, fighting with the same handful of fusions and Ultrahand constructs.

Ultrahand is the true star of the show. The suite of Zonai tools and the ability to combine them however you want really cannot be overstated. You’ve seen the clips; people have built everything from fully automated mechs to log towers that reach higher than the sky islands. The ability to auto craft using zonaite also directly ties Ultrahand to exploring the depths, rewarding you for filling out the map and gathering resources. The ability to create vehicles fixes another issue I had with Breath of the Wild, which is that the actual, physical act of running around is very dull. Running is almost always just downtime between points of interest, and over a 100-hour playthrough that adds up to be a lot. Not a problem here, just build a motorcycle or hoverbike. The hoverbike especially received heavy use throughout all of my playthrough. For the low cost of either two fans and a steering stick, or just nine zonaite, you can fly away from all your navigational issues. Plus, the Autobuild helps to offset Ultrahand's clunkiness, while still requiring you to build what you want at least once. The controls are not great and the framerate can really drop while using Ultrahand so this is a fantastic addition.

Both titles heavily reward intrinsic motivation, the idea that the act of doing something is inherently satisfying to do, and that satisfaction is a fitting reward. Nothing showcases this better than Ultrahand. If you are not intrinsically motivated enough to just goof off with Link’s greatest toy, you will just make a handful of creations over and over again because they are all you really need. But if you find a lot of satisfaction in simply making stuff Ultrahand could keep you entertained for the entirety of your playthrough. I think I am more intrinsically motivated than not, and I loved creating solutions to the various problems Link will face. I built automatons during the “saving Hyrule” questline, to help out the soldiers who seemed shorthanded. Even though mechanically this obviously did not work, and the automatons despawned long before I encountered the soldiers again to clear out the next monster camp. If you are not so intrinsically inclined, you probably won’t be impressed with how open ended so much of Tears of the Kingdom is. There’s a well-known quote by Soren Johnson that you’ve probably heard, “Given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of a game.” Tears of the Kingdom can be very optimized, and I suspect that many players won’t force themselves to experiment and will instead just optimize as quickly as possible. And in doing so, they are missing out on the intrinsic value of doing something your own way. While many puzzles have open ended solutions, most have one clear ‘correct’ solution. If you really enjoy the intrinsic value of finding a new way to solve something, this is great. If you don’t, then it probably comes across as rather lazy. Why build a new solution when you can just rocket shield over the puzzle again? These scenarios are scattered all over Hyrule, but are especially prevalent in the shrines.

The shrines of Breath of the Wild were one of its most criticized aspects, and for good reason. The vast majority of them were too simple and unrewarding. I desperately hoped that Tears of the Kingdom would improve on them but it did not. The puzzles are all still undeveloped and mostly just a chore to do, and the new type of shrine, where you bring a crystal to the shrine pedestal, are never more complex or challenging. And this may be recency bias, but I think the puzzles in these new shrines are even worse. To its credit, the only real change made is an excellent one. The ‘test of strength’ format has been replaced with Eventide Island-esque combat challenges, where you are stripped of your loot and forced to navigate various combat arenas. These are a huge improvement, and also allow you to gauge just how far you’ve come. In the beginning, these are very difficult. You are forced to learn the combat, along with whatever particular technique the shrine focuses on. These get easier and easier as your stamina and hearts grow, and by the end you can just brute force your way through if that’s how you prefer to take these challenges. Many dislike how every shrine looks the same, but I personally actually quite like this. I like how it takes me from the mindset of exploration to the mindset of puzzle solving, even if the puzzles are never worth it.

There are also two brand new maps to explore, the Sky Islands and the Depths. The Sky Islands are excellent, the act of actually getting to them was always an enjoyable challenge, and once you make it up you are greeted with some of the more satisfying puzzles in the game. The visual style is excellent, and it’s no wonder this is what Nintendo focused on in the trailers. I only wish there were more islands, as the Sky is by far the smallest of the three explorable areas. The Depths I'm not so in love with. In the early and mid-game, these are genuinely excellent. Fighting your way through the darkness and trying to find lightroots to give you a little sanctuary to heal from the gloom was challenging and rewarding. I’m truly sad to say that once i had a decent amount of lightroots found, my enjoyment of the Depths dropped significantly. You no longer have to light your way and visually the Depths are barren, not nearly as pleasant as Hyrule or the Sky Islands, and it basically just becomes a giant zonaite mine. At some point I noticed that the overworld shrines and the Depths lightroots aligned. Later on, I noticed that the entire topography of the Depths was just the overworld inverted, and this is where my enjoyment of this area died. I had enough lightroots that I was no longer fighting the overwhelming darkness, and I knew what the entire map had to offer because I could just look at the overworld map. This really feels like forbidden knowledge, and any future playthroughs are going to be forever negatively affected because I can never un-learn this. Even when I have zero lightroots discovered, I will always be able to tell what the land around me looks like. And this really sucks, because not enjoying the Depths means that I don’t enjoy nearly half of all the explorable world.

Tears of the Kingdom is generally much more streamlined than Breath of the Wild, and it’s not great at communicating what you need to do in order to advance the various systems it offers. I didn’t unlock Autobuild until over 40 hours in, and I had no idea what I was missing that whole time because I was playing how I played Breath of the Wild. Who cares about the story? I just want to explore. As I advanced, enemies progressively got tougher until silver enemies were common, and seemingly out of nowhere my gear had become very under leveled. I had already found The Great Fairys, but now they are locked behind a quest that has you assemble an orchestra to coax them out of the flowers, instead of just paying them like before. I spent some time actually finding the quest I needed, before rushing through it just so I could upgrade my armor and not die instantly any time a silver bokoblin landed a stray hit on me. I found the construct factory in the Depths, and spent well over an hour trying to figure what it was and how it worked. It was not until 70 hours later when I was actually doing the story quests that I finally got to figure out what it was for. Tears of the Kingdom feels as though there’s a correct way to play, or at least a correct path to take, far more than I ever felt with Breath of the Wild.

I’m very hesitant to even give this a score. The 9/10 I've given seems too forgiving of its deep flaws, but a lower score wouldn’t accurately show how much I loved its strengths. I believe that, like Breath of the Wild, my score is set to only go down over the years as the honeymoon phase wears off. Over the years I've realized that I'm the kind of person who values the highs of something much more than the lows it sinks to, I’m more than happy to accept and overlook flaws if the game has something else to offer if it's really that good. I think exploring the world of Tears of the Kingdom is that good, but as the genre and industry advance this may no longer be the case. Tears of the Kingdom carries the unfortunate, crushing weight of being a sequel. Nintendo had six years to learn from Breath of the Wild, so many of the flaws were left in or even doubled down on as a conscious choice by the developers which not only frustrates me from how much could have been changed from the first game. Breath of the Wild gets away with a lot due to its importance and innovation, but that does not apply to Tears of the Kingdom. Pushing the idea of an open world to its logical extreme is no longer novel, and I'm left with a bitter taste by thinking of what Tears of the Kingdom could have been. And then that bitter taste is washed away with the savory world, and I'm back to feeling conflicted.

Sure, present-day me has some qualms over the design and such, but Metroid Prime still stands as one of the AAA game industry's great achievements in pushing the FPS to new and interesting spaces. And it's a successful collaboration between an American studio and Nintendo, which is interesting. I love the relatively short 15-hour length, too, and the way the game's world feels just nonlinear enough that you're surprised when you can go to new depths, and it was always cool how well the scan visor slotted into the whole experience.

As for my design issues... I guess they're fairly minor, the game is strong overall. The musical and art direction are still amazing, over 20 years on!

The combat in MP is fun, when considered as a simple (and accessible!) FPS. And it's really cool when the game slips into a 'survival horror'-esque register - like going for the Thermal Visor or that late-game Phazon Mines gauntlet as you look for the Power Bombs (I think?). I feel like a modern Metroid Prime could look to various shooters like Amid Evil, DOOM mods, etc, for inspiration in enemy layouts in the more combat-intense sections, though. Or to modern metroidvanias in terms of structure inspiration? I always felt MP1 was really on to something.

At times the enemies feel too cut-and-paste - fire 4 missiles, aim a single super missile, etc. I also feel like a sparser experience, upgrade-wise, could be fun? To convey more of a sense of alien planet rather than perfectly laid out loop corridors that power you up. I always did feel the game shifted too much to exploring Space Pirate stuff as the game went on.

English/German below

I still decided to quit the game. Took a total of 5 hours 33 minutes and collected all achievements except one.

The game had made a really strong first impression, acceptable puzzles and an incredibly well staged setting. Disgust comes up here from time to time and the sci-fi horror touch had a cool look. Unfortunately, it fell far short when it came to the horror aspect, here it concentrated more on the disgusting moment.

2 acts have passed and the game has been playing in a good flow, but then comes act 3 (or was it 4, I can't remember) where more and more enemy "gameplay" comes into play. This is where I took my break because I just didn't enjoy running past the opponents. Weapon handling is so sluggish and imprecise, enemies deal immense damage and hit far better, I didn't need that aspect of the game. He even steered the game in a more negative direction at times, even for me.

It had good staging, looks fantastic in places and some of the puzzles were okay, but they would have preferred to leave out the combat gameplay. All in all, you can take the game with you in its brevity and play it via the game pass, but horror fans in particular will be disappointed here and the gameplay can get on your nerves at times. It tells a bizarre and painful story, which is also rather confused.

6/10 2,5/5 blood presses.

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Ich hab mich doch noch entschieden das Spiel zu beenden. Hab insgesamt 5 Stunden 33 Minuten gebraucht und alle Erfolge gesammelt bis auf einen.

Das Spiel hatte einen richtig starken ersten Eindruck gemacht, akzeptable Rätsel und ein unfassbar stark inszeniertes Setting. Ekel kommt hier das ein oder andere mal auf und der Sci-Fi-Horror Touch hatte einen coolen Look. Leider ist es aber gerade was den Horror Aspekt angeht viel zu kurz gekommen, hier hat es sich mehr auf den Ekelmoment konzentriert.

2 Akte sind vergangen und das Spiel hat sich in einem guten Flow gespielt, dann kommt aber Akt 3 (oder war es 4, ich weiß es nicht mehr) wo mehr und mehr Gegner"gameplay" zu Tragen kommt. Hier hab ich dann meine Pause eingelegt, weil es mir einfach keinen Spaß gemacht hat an den Gegnern besser einfach vorbeizurennen. Das Waffenhandling ist so träge und unpräzise, Gegner machen immensen Schaden und treffen deutlich besser, ich hätte diesen Aspekt des Spiels nicht gebraucht. Er hat teilweise das Spiel sogar für mich mehr in eine negative Richtung gelenkt.

Es hatte gute Inszenierungen, sieht stellenweise fantastisch aus und manche Rätsel gingen auch voll in Ordnung, aber das Combat Gameplay hätten sie mal lieber gelassen. Alles in allem kann man das Spiel in seiner Kürze mal mitnehmen und über den Gamepass spielen aber gerade Horrorfans werden hier eher enttäuscht und das Gameplay kann zwischenzeitlich Nerven rauben. Es erzählt eine bizarre und schmerzerfüllte Geschichte, die aber auch eher wirr daher kommt.

6/10 2,5/5 Blutpressen.

(Since my last review got removed)

I fully expected this game to suck since the creators have not done anything worthwhile but by god, they actually pulled it off. This is a legit a great open-world RPG. The graphics are fantastic and the combat is actually really fun and complex. I've been wanting a good triple A Harry Potter for a long time so I'm happy to say that it's finally here and it's terrific. I will say this though it does have its issues. It suffers from problems that most open-world games have and the story is fairly standard. But even with those problems the world and gameplay kept me satisfied. I hope the next game is even better. I feel like it has the potential to be a 10/10 game.

I am a millennial and Hogwarts Legacy is a 20 year old dream come true.

There are few worlds in fiction with as much depth, lore, imagination, and popularity as the world of Harry Potter. Whether you grew up with the books, the movies, or both, more likely than not you were captivated by the world that these books and movies have built. I can safely speak for most people when I say that since the moment we were introduced to Hogwarts and the wizarding world in the first book and movie, we’ve all fantasized about getting our Hogwarts letters in the mail, buying our first wand, broomstick, and owl, sitting at the dining table with the rest of our fellow young wizards and witches while anxiously waiting to get sorted into one of the four Hogwarts houses, then donning the team colors that represent the pride of our new house.

Over the years, and decades, we got a fair share of Harry Potter games. We got video game adaptations of every single movie. In fact, we got multiple versions of each of the game adaptations when you take into account all the various gaming platforms that the games were released on. There were even LEGO versions and other spin offs such as the Quidditch World Cup game. These games mostly ranged from decent to terrible, full of potential and ideas that unfortunately were never fully realized.

The year is 2023 and here we have Hogwarts Legacy. The entire premise of this game is that you are a young wizard who becomes a student at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. You get sorted into a house based on a few questions that the Sorting Hat asks you. Personally I was sorted into Slytherin, but like Harry himself, I said “not Slytherin” and I chose to join Ravenclaw, because the game doesn’t force you into the house that the Hat sorts you into. You have the option to join any house that you want. From that point forward the entirety of Hogwarts is yours to explore. You go to classes to learn new spells and interact with other students in the school. Hogwarts feels alive and truly magical. Everywhere you go you will see students going to classes, playing games, studying for tests, and getting themselves into mischief. You will see ghosts flying around while having conversations, and armored statues singing and dancing. There are cats everywhere who make Hogwarts feel cozy that you can pet. The castle is huge and I had a blast just walking around exploring it, while watching the NPCs and listening to their conversations.

To my surprise Hogwarts isn’t the only area that you can explore. I was impressed by how large the areas outside of Hogwarts are. You can visit Hogsmade, which is a cozy town outside of Hogwarts in which you can shop for clothes, brooms, wands, potions and many other things. You can hang out at cafes and candy stores. The music is cheery and visiting Hogsmade always gave my mood a boost. Outside of the town you can explore many other small villages, beaches, camps, dungeons, and forests, including the Forbidden Forest. I found what would-be-Hagrid’s house (this game takes place 100 years prior to Harry Potter) and it warmed my heart.

As I mentioned earlier, you go to various classes to learn new spells, how to brew potions, and how to grow plants that can be used in combat. You’re not on a schedule of any kind. These classes are only classes in name. They are basically just missions which usually involve the professor of each class telling you to do certain tasks, and once you complete these tasks, they will teach you a new spell or skill. Some of the classes in this game mimic scenes from the Harry Potter movies. The flying lessons class felt like it was taken straight out of the first movie. Speaking of flying, unfortunately there is no Quidditch at Hogwarts this year because someone got injured last season. That's what the game says. In reality the developers just likely ran out of time to develop any deep or meaningful mechanics for the game of Quidditch, which is fine and understandable. However, I was impressed by how well the flying felt and controlled. Vehicles and traveling can really be a hit or miss, even in the most highly praised games, but in Hogwarts Legacy flying the broom was not a problem whatsoever for me. That is why I hope that they can hopefully take some time and give us a Quidditch DLC of some kind. Maybe even with multiplayer? I feel like that would really put a cherry on top of this game.

There are 20+ spells that you can learn, including the three infamous unforgivable curses. Many of these spells can be used in combat, while a few others are used for puzzle solving, decorating your Room of Requirements, and taking care of the fantastic beasts that you can catch throughout your journey. The combat can take some time to get used to but once you get the hang of it, it's a lot of fun. Your basic attacking spell is mapped to the right trigger, so it feels like a shooting game at times, and you can have four spells mapped to each of the face buttons. As you level up you earn development points that can be used in five different skill trees. With this method you can unlock more slots for your spells, so at any given time during combat you can have as many as 16 spells ready to be used. Once you get good at the combat, it feels amazing to pull off a huge combo with various spells, while also dodging, blocking, and parrying attacks from enemies.

There is a story in the game. It's not amazing by any means but it's definitely serviceable and takes you down some interesting paths. There are plenty of side quests and stories with fellow students, my most favorite stories being the ones involving Sebastian and Natsai.

For a first attempt at an open world game set in the Harry Potter magical universe, the developers did an outstanding job. They went above and beyond filling this game with the charm and magic (no pun intended) that we have dreamed of and expected. The attention to detail all over this world is immaculate. I will say that if you’re not a Harry Potter fan, or don’t know anything about the franchise, then this game may not feel all that special to you. The enemy variety is lacking, as are dialogue options and story branches in general. It may feel like a pretty basic fantasy RPG and there is always room for improvement. Whether we get a sequel, or maybe some expansions for this game, I’m sure that us Potter fans won’t be disappointed.

I don't follow the NBA very closely so I tend to buy 2k every other year or so, and this year's 2k is like every year I buy 2k: whatever the newest 2k is is the best basketball video game there's ever been.

I don't want to sound too hyperbolic or anything; there's stuff in here that I don't like. But when it comes to the pure on-the-court basketball? Whatever the newest 2k is the best it's ever been.

Are the newest 2ks my favorite basketball games? It's tough to say, but probably no--that would go to Dunk Kids I think.

Basketball is a skill game--it's tough and wonderful and joyful to watch; I think spiritually it's America's soccer. But the sort of individual skill we see our favorite players display is incredibly had to replicate unless you've got a powerful engine. It's why, for as much as I love NBA Jam, you don't get to feel like those guys like you do in every newest 2k.

If you like basketball, grab this and have a blast. It's incredibly easy to ignore the obnoxious microtransaction stuff.