Oddly, the most fulfilling and simply fun VR game I have played. Poker with lots of silly props that maximize interactivity and being surrounded by other people in a controlled environment where the human gestures and interactions of VR truly shine. Watch people face palm in disappointment, a whole table lean in to see a high stake face up game, getting flipped off, first pumped, hugged or even having your cigarette lit. It's all a lot of simple fun that emulates the actual poker experience so the VR elements aren't just tacked on but essential to the core of the game.

Some games are more than just a game. When this launched in the summer of 2016 it was missing so many basic features and functions it was kind of embarrassing. But it was also such a social phenomenon that the unique shared experience was something not enough Niantic could ruin. The AR gameplay was novel enough to actual use the unique elements of a phone with a property where it actually made sense and executed a fantasy of my childhood: to see and catch Pokémon in real life. It's the perfect storm, by actually making that work on even a basic level, they couldn't fuck it up.

I always kept the camera mode on. Even though it decimated my battery, it was central to the experience. My wife and I would go from a restaurant to a nearby park where a rare Pokemon would spawn - a ridiculous thing to do after a dinner and a lot of drinks - but we did it anyway. And when we arrived there were 20+ other people already there doing the same thing. That moment passed after a month or two, but having those moments with friends and strangers are rare enough you can't deny what those game created, even if just for a moment. Our mayor had to beg people to stop playing near the ferry terminal (where a rare Pokemon appeared) because so many people were playing it was clogging the ferry boarding. Echoes of my elementary principal pleading decency in schoolyard Pokemon card trades, but on a comically larger scale.

The game itself was barbones, and I lost interest before any real improvements were made. But just the collecting Pokemon and connecting with strangers was enough to make this a truly one-of-a-kind game.

Good game, if unimaginative and ultimately disappointing. What little "plot" there is in Dark Souls is reduced to (what else) ashes with a plot so basic it lacks even Dark Souls 1's third act surprises and player choice of what they'll do with their new knowledge and which primordial serpent do they trust. There are no interesting characters or decisions here. This is just Dark Souls Mad Libs. You're the chosen _____ (Unhollowed? No, how about Unkindled!) tasked with collecting the ____ (Lordvessel? Lord embers!) Using the fill-in-the-blanks lore to allow the game to pull locations and characters for fan service and call it continuity.

For a series renowned for twisted imagination, I can't imagine a lazier direction.

That said, what Dark Souls really is about to me is the locations, even more so than bosses. Bosses can be fun, but frustrating. Locations make or break these games, they are fun and tense and scary to explore. New enemies are always full of mystery; true threats. In some ways, this is superior to DS1 which had several awful, awful zones. DS3 has only great zones, although perhaps a few forgettable ones. But the game is fun to explore, fun to build your character and discover new challenges.

The biggest problem is this is a game that exists in a post-Bloodborne world. And when you see the ingenuity of that world, characters, combat and weapons, Dark Souls III can only feel like a disappointment. I don't want to presume, but it kind of feels like fatigue at From Software having so many games that are more-or-less the same game on the go since 2011 nonstop. Sekiro was maybe a nice reset for them. DS3 is a culmination of a formula going stale. And yet, still an experience you just absolutely can't get from any other series or developer. Like the game world itself, Dark Souls III itself feels like we're at The End, the fire is fading, we're dragged out to reluctantly do the same task we've already done yet again, and despite it seeming against all odds, there's still fire in this ember.

As a huge Zelda fan, Skyward Sword was one of the very few games in the series I hadn't played and completed. I was so thankful that Nintendo upgraded it for Switch, and I still am, despite now knowing it's easily the worst 3D Zelda by a huge margin and likely the worst Zelda save for Zelda II.

The frustration of this game isn't apparent until later in the game. Early game is fun and beautiful. The watercolour aesthetic was ruined by the Wii's SD presentation, but gets to shine here. Although, the style has a kind of static lifelessness to it (especially facial expressions) which is surprising since Wind Waker innovated on Link's expressions so much, and even Twilight Princess maintained that personality so it's strange to see it regress here.

Initially, the gimmicky motion controls are kind of fun. The game goes out of its way to make puzzles and enemies and environments that you can tactically slice.

The problems arise when these systems start to break down as the gimmicks that they are. Look, even with the Wii MotionPlus, the fantasy of unsheathing a sword would not be realized until VR took off. A noble effort on the Wii's part, but this shit just isn't fun. By the end of the game, you are just waggling your hand around because there is no way to reliably play quick and accurately. Zelda games are often rewarding for fast, tight combat and combining sword fighting with items. Skyward Sword is too clumsy for that.

The late game is where things truly fall apart. The gameplay has, by now, become very stale and unenjoyable, the overworld is revealed to be even more empty and unfun than Twilight Princess, the traversal of flying is really tedious and annoying (seriously, musical instruments are key to this series as useful tools, the harp here is laughably pointless and the music you learn sounds awful). But most critically, the blatant repetition in the end game kills this game. With only 3 real areas (forest, volcano, desert) the game brings you back again and again. Forget the sense of adventure and exploration Zelda is known for. This game just unlocks a new area inside the three existing zones as you progress. It feels like a budget game in a lot of ways the way it recycles its world endlessly. Worst of all, late game is full of so much blatant padding it's actively insulting. "Oh, you're the hero of time? And you've done a ton of errands for me? Well I won't give you this critical item to save the world unless you go and... uh... find some musical notes for me!" Add insult to injury, this game throws in a late-game escort mission that must rank amongst the worst escort missions in video game history.

Often beautiful, a few good temples, but overall a completely frustrating game to play with controls that are an insult to the legacy of this great series.

Games like this live on as memories of simpler times in childhood. That's the only way they can, because no one is going to make the mistake of thinking Carmageddon II is a masterpiece. But, for me—and I'm sure many like me—fondly remember the ridiculous squishing of pedestrians and far-out power ups that were basically the developers having fun with engine tools and calling them a feature. The era of big head mode games when video games didn't take themselves so seriously.

For me, my uncle was my gateway to all the games that were not age appropriate. Carmageddon II was one of my favourites. Liberally inspired by Roger Corman's classic "Death Race 2000" the goal is to cause destruction and massacre the innocent. It really couldn't hold a candle to games like the Twisted Metal series, but I prefer it. The 90s were all about games that pushed the envelope with violence and obscenity and Carmageddon was one series that was really willing to "go there" with absolutely no shame. But it's fun and campy and should be treated as such. I think games were so eager to be violent because nuance was not something that translated well to primitive early game engines. I always hated Tomb Raider because when you kill an enemy they just fall over like a toy. You need gibs because only then you can really get the visceral response of absolute annihilation. Carmageddon II is about as visceral as annihilation can get.

Absolutely beautiful game using and stretching the medium to the limits that one could use games to convey time and memory. For what it's trying to do, it's basically perfect. The story is engrossing and where fact and fiction diverge it becomes impossible to tell which adds a real mystery and melancholy to everything. How much is real begins to not matter and the nature of the relationship bleeds into your own memory of relationships just like this one. A very direct, emotional descent into that longing feeling of not-knowing and missing something that was once new, exciting and promising and how it slowly faded from life into memory.

Absolutely loved this game. My two goals as a kid with an SNES were to find a great Dragon Ball Z game and a great Spider-Man game. I could find neither. Sure, everyone loves MAXIMUM CARNAGE but, honestly, I never understood wtf was going on in that game.

Spider-Man on N64 was the first time I felt like Spider-Man in a video game. Actually swinging between buildings was an honest-to-god thrill for me. Wall-climbing, webbing up bad guys. Truly the dream.

But this is also the game that made me realize I owned The Amazing Spider-Man #1 via collectables and that my mom had GIVEN IT AWAY at a garage sale. In the game, you collect comics and can view them in a gallery, where I saw the one I owned and was confused why it was the first in the list. I scrambled to my computer and looked it up and was blown away. I used to read issue #1 all the time! To this day my mom denies I ever owned it purely as a coping mechanism.