Anime is far more prolific and accessible now than it was when I was in high school. That's definitely a good thing, but there was a certain rush to being at the whim of whatever was available at the local Blockbuster that can't be replicated today. Being a 15-year-old and pulling stuff like Appleseed or Vampire Hunter D off the shelf made you feel like you were being exposed to something forbidden and strange. I still remember shoveling snow after watching The End of Evangelion - having not seen a single episode of the show - and just trying to process what the hell I watched. Sure, I could load up Crunchyroll or whatever and spin the Anime roulette, but Anime is of a more known quantity now, it's hard not to have a good idea of what you're getting into, and the charm of physically exploring the tiny Anime corner tucked in the back of the video store can't be so easily experienced today.

The 1990s adaptation of Berserk is one of those rentals that stuck with me, and its cliffhanger ending led to me seek out fan translations of the manga, which at the time was in the middle of the Millennium Empire arc. Unfortunately, enduring the lethargic pace of chapter releases in real time leaves you itching for more Berserk, which might lead you to play games like the non-canonical Sword of the Berserk: Guts' Rage. Nothing says "Berserk" more like sticking Guts (or Gatts, or Gattsu depending on how far down the alliteration hole you wanna go) in tight corridors where his movement is restricted and his steel girder of a sword constantly bounces off walls. What a great game that's totally not annoying to play at all.

Sword of the Berserk's sequel never came out here. Can't imagine why. But it's a shame, as (deep breath) Berserk Millennium Empire Arc: Chapter of the Holy Demon War - baller name - is not only directly based on the manga, but makes significant improvements over its predecessor. An English patch for the game was released several years ago, but reports that the patch caused issues with playing the game through emulation made me put it off until I was able to put the ISO on a hard drive and play it on hardware. The second Sign by Susumu Hirasawa started blaring through the tiny speakers of my CRT, I knew I was in for a proper Berserk experience.

Guts is perfectly embodied here. His weight, the heft of his movement, the lumbering swings of the Dragonslayer, the force of his arm cannon ripping into endless hordes of demons... it's spot on. Remarkably so given when it came out - not even the more recent Band of the Hawk captures Guts' physicality quite as well, despite the Musou genre being such a good fit for the kind of action present in Berserk.

The level-to-level gameplay typically sees Guts running between set objectives, zipping back and forth in large, labyrinthine stages littered with enemies that spawn endlessly. Tearing your way through monsters feels good for a while but grows tiresome as defeating them rarely comes with an actual win state, they're just an obstacle between you and your goal and you could, you know, just kinda run there and not deal with any of it. So much of the game is this, and it just drags, especially towards the end when the fog of war stars tricking you into running down dead ends, or when the game expects you to hop through portals that might just send you back to the start of a zone.

Conversely, the boss battles in this game are incredible. I mean just look at all the cool shit you can do! Games should let you do cool shit more often!! All these modern games with their precious stagger meters and tight parry windows that make you feel like a weak little frail baby boy, ohhhh please sir, can I do damage now-- a standard counterattack in Berserk Millennium Empire Arc: Chapter of the Holy Demon War lets you chop both of the boss' arms clean off and it rules.

Every major fight of the arc (before its perspective shifts away from Guts) is accounted for, along with some recurring fights against the former members of the Band of the Hawk, who are summoned by a game-only character named Charles that haunts Guts at various points throughout the story. I think this is a pretty smart way to integrate more of Berserk's backstory for less familiar audiences, and it provides necessary context for Guts' growth as a character. Unfortunately, the English patch seems to be a translation of a translation, which results in some goofy and grammatically incorrect dialog that took me out of the story. My brain is usually pretty good about auto-correcting stuff like this but the translation is rough and really only excels at making the game readable enough to be completed by someone who doesn't speak Japanese.

It really is too bad that so much of your time will get eaten up whaling on demonic trees so you can just move forward. Even then, I think it's an easy call that Berserk Millennium Empire Arc: Chapter of the Holy Demon War is the best Berserk game, edging out Band of the Hawk and blowing out Sword of the Berserk for the top spot. But, boy, pulling back and realizing that the best this series has gotten is a middle of the road PS2 game is really depressing.

Maybe Fromsoft will get to take a crack at the license someday, as seems to be the want of anyone who has connected the dots between Souls and Berserk, but for my money the right man for the job is Hideaki Itsuno. I just need more people to internalize this so it happens. Please. Please i need this

Third person shooters weren’t very frequent on PS1 and when they did come by they were usually pretty bad. Syphon Filter proved that you can make this genre work on the PS1. The game is still really fun today and was way ahead of its time. A well-done camera, great lock-on system, a decent story with memorable characters, a kick-ass arsenal of guns, and genius level design. Who would have thought a third person shooter would be this good in the late 90’s? Eidetic and 989 Studios did.

You play as super spy Gabriel Logan who is a CIA agent trying to stop a dangerous terrorist named Eric Rhoemer. A Syphon Filter virus that targets specific DNA demographics has been created by a man named Phagan and it is up to you to shut down their operations and stop them from spreading the virus. You start out in New York with the streets being shot up by Rhoemer’s thugs. There are objectives in each level to complete, but it is way beyond throw this switch, pull this lever or shoot this amount of bad guys. You usually have to kill a certain amount of scientists, administer vaccines to victims, disarm bombs, turn off power grids. The objectives vary, but what is fun is figuring out how to get there.

Syphon Filter has some of the most memorable levels I can remember. This is a game you play several times and remember where every enemy is, every crate location, and even how to kill each enemy. The levels vary with stealth sections, climbing, and timed areas. The game features a smart lock-on system because there is no camera control. It is surprisingly smart and follows you wherever you go. Enemies wearing flak jackets can only be taken out with headshots or very powerful weapons. This requires aiming in first person mode and taking them out. This flak jacket element is a staple of the series and will go on to be in every game. It is actually an element all on its own and not just body armor for you or the enemy. You can die very easily and if you don’t stop and aim for headshots you will waste ammo and/or die very quickly.

There are a couple of boss fights thrown in such as a helicopter midway and Rhoemer himself at the end. I found all gameplay elements to be evenly tossed up so you are never bored. The stealth elements need a bit of work and are probably the worst thing about the game, but it is very minor. Crouching and sneaking around works fine, but enemies tend to see you at unknown distances. Maybe a line of sight cone on the radar would help this. You also have to get in headshots otherwise they won’t die right away and alert other guards.

Weapon selection is also a bit flimsy because you have to hold down select and use L2 and R2 (strafe buttons) to select the weapon. I would have preferred a radial menu instead. Some levels can be a bit hard to navigate are too dark to see. Thankfully you get a flashlight you can equip because some levels are nearly pitch black. I found myself lost a few times because even though the level design is fantastic, some levels can look the same with confusing hallways and misplaced crates and boxes.

I actually learned about weapons as a kid from this game. Real world weapons are in here and some that I have never seen in any other game before. The weapons are almost a character all on their own because they feel so good to shoot in the game. The K3G4 will cut through flak jackets easily and is probably the only weapon that will do this. The G18 is a super fast sub-machine pistol, while the silenced 9mm is a staple of the series. The shotgun, combat shotgun, PK-102, BIZ-2, Nightvision Rifle, .45, HK5, and a few more are all excellent weapons. It was also the distinct sounds the developers used that make these guns so memorable. The game has a great sniper scope that was unseen in games back then. There are grenades and gas grenades which are great for taking out a group of enemies stealthily. There are a lot of great weapons in the game and they are very memorable, unlike most shooters.

While the game itself is amazing the graphics were pretty good at the time. Looking pretty realistic art wise, the game had some good lighting effects and a lot of detail everywhere. I also have many fond memories of this game as a kid. I actually accidentally rented Silent Hill because I forgot the name of this game. I got all the way to the Pharcom Warehouse levels and had to turn the game in. I rented this game many times over and played it to death as a kid. I purchased it a few times here and there and every time I play this it brings back fond memories. Syphon Filter is one of the greatest games ever made and every gamer should play this masterpiece.

Originally posted here: https://cultclassiccornervideogames.wordpress.com/2019/04/29/swat-4-the-stetchkov-syndicate-2006-game-review/

SWAT 4 must have sold pretty well upon it’s release, because less than a year later, an expansion pack called The Stetchkov Syndicate was released.

Unlike the base game, Sketchkov Syndicate has a single storyline tying all of the missions together. In this expansion, you’ll be tracking down the Eastern European crime family known only as The Stetchkov Syndicate, a mob of arms dealers. Throughout the campaign, you’ll be moving from people who’ve bought the weapons and drugs labs to dealing with the cartel themselves. It’s certainly nice to see some larger scale crimes being tackled instead of just small individual ones.

The gameplay for The Stetchkov Syndicate is pretty much the game as the base game. Picking up guns as evidence, taking down bad guys, handcuffing everyone you come across, and reporting it all back to HQ. The key difference between the base game and the expansion is several new types of equipment for you to take into a mission, but for some reason, they’re only usable in the expansion and not the base game.

Rounding out the new arsenal includes the 5.7x28mm Sub machine Gun, Colt Accurized Rifle, 5.66mm Light Machine Gun, and 40x46mm Grenade Launcher. The Grenade Launcher comes with the Triple Baton Round, which ejects three interlocking batons constructed of polymerized rubber, as well as projectile versions of the grenades, such as CS Gas Grenade Round, a Flashbang Round, and a Stinger Grenade Round.

Secondary weapons include the 9mm Machine Pistol and Mark 18.50 Semiautomatic Pistol, along with the Cobra Stun Gun, which is a new and improved version of the stun gun, and can hold two electrodes at the same time instead of the one.

The new Tactical Equipment includes the Ammo Pouch and Lightstick. Along with new Protection Equipment that includes Night Vision Goggles and the option to have no armor, which allows the player to be able to do things quicker, such as basic movement along with being able to do things such as lock-picking, door wedging, restraining people, etc, faster.

The Stetchkov Syndicate also introduces a new multiplayer mode, Smash & Grab. The suspects must collect the briefcase and take it to the exit before the timer runs out. The officers must stop the suspects from reaching the exit with the briefcase. If a suspect is arrested, 30 seconds are deduced from the game clock; if a suspect is killed or arrested carrying the briefcase, the case stays where it is dropped. Officers cannot pick up the briefcase.

Co-op has a few new additions too, you can run on custom missions and with up to ten players per game, which can further be split into two completely separate teams (red and blue) with a leader each. This is not similar to single player teams where an element leader controls both teams.

Since I couldn’t mention everything in the SWAT 4 review since it’s over 2,500 words long and it was already way too long for me to add even more too it, I’ll briefly go over some minor things here. The fake ads located around the levels are actually pretty funny if you take a second to look at them. The environmental detail is so good, that even the computers located around a level do stuff, like go to a screensaver if you’re in a level long enough, or blue screen if they’re near enough to an explosion or take bullet damage.

Unfortunately, just like the base game, Stetchkov Syndicate has a lot of the exact same problems as SWAT 4 does. SWAT members being taken out incredibly easily, accidentally killing a civilian when trying to fire upon a terrorist, enemies clipping through a wall and being able to kill you. There is even a level with bombs and a count down timer like SWAT 4.

It’s a bit disappointing that a lot of these problems weren’t fixed or smoothed over at all with patches or with the expansion pack. Maybe I wouldn’t be so angry at the level filled with bombs on timers if the entire game wasn’t ball-bustingly hard.

The amount of levels this expansion adds shows just how few levels the base game had, and that most of it’s length was entirely due to the previously mentioned difficulty. I just wish this expansion pack could have added some difficulty beyond the points required to finish a level.

If you liked SWAT, then Stetchkov Syndicate is definitely for you. But if the engagingly inconsistent AI of literally everyone makes you want to hit a hole into your monitor like the first game did, maybe give this a skip.

The boy is innocent. The boy is cruel. The clock is ticking and we are moving ever backwards.

The more I play INSIDE the less I understand it. The journey remains the same but the drama, the order, the sequence of facts and events leading me towards this beach keeps shifting in my head. Forest. Factory. City. Center. Conspiracy. Factory. Forest. City. The pig?

The pig is the first time I sensed danger within the boy. So far violence had only come from one side – foreground pushing against background, my corner of the screen under constant assault by hostile forces. But then you get to a barn. You put shapes through the grinder and the game plays a joke on you by revealing that it was in fact, merely, hot air. Moving. But then you progress a little further and there’s holes in the dead. The pig runs ceaselessly after you until it can’t anymore and a thread is pulled. Now it’s barely alive but you need its frame to move forward, to take control of the others.

I recently played the game with my little brother who kept referring to them as “veggies” first, before they themselves become engines of control, from which point on it was “the hanged men”. By putting our collective bodies on the line we become a voice for the voiceless. A King of limbs that can barely moan may nonetheless surge and thrive.

You can never discount the pleasures of INSIDE. Of watching this little skeleton getting blown to bits by a soundwave, teleported to start when the camera's done dwelling on its physics, succeeding this time because we've been here before, many ways actually and none of this matters but the ragdolley motions of the boy display not just an urgency of flesh but also clear playfulness, his turns a little too high-heeled and televised to reflect their imparted violence - he puts on a hell of a show for someone who never talks, doesn't he ? That is not to say the boy is without words but his language is plain and practical, never crossing beyond what the game requires of him which is to say a few actionnables verbs of command. Run. Jump. Grab the box and then break the necks of a few employees as we crash through the ceiling of this life-sized diorama. Everyone of us, complicit in unassisted murder.

.

Limbo was a sham because it refused to say something of its greatest moment - the spider. To make a fairytale you need to recognize the taint that's shared the moment a story is put into the world. INSIDE has many legs - many "spider moments" - to pull us astray but it consciously decides to cast its support to the boy in all instances. That's not just a matter of gaze, it has to do with every facet of play here and if horror at the fate of this particular body was the sole point, I'd be displaced. The voyeurism of INSIDE is nearly wholesome - I wouldn't go as far as saying this story is a fairytale but this is not a test for societal collapse and these are not warning signs. No, INSIDE best functions as a dreamlike object, something you'd see between the trees in a half-dozed-off car, or could touch through the cold iron, or hear on a late night before the moon's signal is lost, forever. What's translated is often not what was actually received yet here we are, playing still.

Radio static just makes too much sense for us not to exploit. It’s a tool of calibration containing the possibility of sound, for it to be simultaneously produced and heard in order to make sense of the narrative. Distorted echoes become distinct, likewise the back-and-forth of frequencies allows us to reshape the puzzle into a humane form of communication – manufactured, tempting but unreliable. INSIDE rejects the appeal of the static even though its world is littered with remains from a radio era that demands we go back to the soil, find the collectibles, make the protagonists and ourselves whole again by unplugging the progression bar, halfway emptied – always waiting. Who wonders about the shape of infinity in the age of capital?
The trap was thinking revolt was ever an option when the first death occured, and then stayed onscreen for a few seconds too long as the boy gets dragged into darkness and then we reproduced the inputs with a slight variation and this time the boy stumbled and lived but would kill by accident later down the line and finally by necessity because there's only one of two way this dance can end.

What's fair in this gamble is that I was never under any illusion of life - illegitimate or otherwise - bubbling under the surface of INSIDE yet I still cared deeply - but for who or what ? I mean who else than me right ?
I like narratives of death and rejection in games because they allow us to make sense of our place inside and outside their ecosystem of immersion. You can never lose if the game itself is telling you to touch grass. A guilt-free form of autoscopy. What the game is about becomes less important than the gesture itself (to go against the grain) projecting value, maybe even morality, towards the onlooker by way of sensations at the tip of our fingers. I barely made the jump, swerved a bullet and just, just escaped the clutches of the superstructure. Still, I got to experience it all. Fuse-out and curtains.
What remains with INSIDE for me is a lingering sense of doubt, in the shape of a space where we can't actually delineate the strings from our unique first-person experience. I have so many doubts about the boy, about this world, about its very real absence of façade. Where even am I ? John Battle said it best a while ago :

“I float all the way down there, most assuredly dead and if this is where I am to die, then, so be it. The game has shook me in so many ways that I feel so far from those woods, dogs and that warehouse… I’ve been taken so far down that I’ve entered the other side, a proverbial underworld. And then I move. And I’m not dead. And I did not drown, at least not completely.
Moreso now I can never drown.”

And so the stage is set, and I am in the forest once again.
All inside the immortality machine.

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Until I've gathered my thoughts on the subject enough to attach my own hyperlink to this.

I'm glad to inform that Inside's dystopic orwellian nightmare is still an effective demonstration of what strong compelling imagery and setting can do for storytelling, acting as spiritual sequel to what was an otherwise meandering experience that indulged on the worst tendencies and trends of the indie "games are art" landscape, trimming out most of the unnecessary fat that would get in the way of the actual meat of the "fragile boy going through a hostile environment" concept.

Beyond the immediately noticeable vast improvement in texture, color, sound design and animation work Inside has over Limbo's amateurish monochrome and blurred style, the addition of depth to its massive and imposing backgrounds that juxtapose with the main protag's railroaded 2D axis manages to instill a sense of bleakness and insignificance unmatched in videogame settings, and utilizing its industrial and desolate landscapes as the core instrument to tell its story, the limited dimension allowed to the player is enough to raise intrigue and curiosity as Inside deliberately ofuscates and limits what you glimpse off its distant and alluring backgrounds.

Tying it all up, you have a seamless and intuitive gameplay experience that manages to rectify the lanky and awkward controls that bogged down Limbo and that instead focuses more on the strengths of the cinematic platformer genre, conveying narrative through the pure act of constant movement. Replaying it again, Inside proves to be a much more exasperating endeavour, as you are stopped dead on your tracks to solve puzzles more often than you would like. Fortunately, the fluid animations and perceptible interactivity keep a brisk pace going and utilize said puzzles to reinforce the themes and narrative of the game with a level of craftmanship that Limbo rarely ever managed to pull off.

These aspects alone put Inside on a pedestal far and above Limbo's artistic aspirations, but it's the finale that elevates it beyond what people ever expected it to achieve all the way back in 2016. The centerpiece of Inside and what the whole game builds towards to, the abrupt shift it takes in its last act is still one of the most incredible and well crafted turns I have ever seen a videogame pull off, feeling simultaneously alien and second nature to control and barrelling its way into a catharsis that recontextualizes what came before it and fills its final note with poignancy by the mere act of taking control away from you for a few secs, as you flick the analog sticks one last desperate time.

Much has already been said about Inside's meta commentary on the nature of player agency and the illusion of control, interpretations that are made evident with the unlocking of the secret ending and the decoding of the game's plot, and while I understand that could lead to some people eye rolling as we get yet another postmodern game using the nature of the medium to exploit these concepts, I think Inside manages to pull it off solely based on the strength of its thematic cohesiveness that brings it all together at the end. And its impressive how Inside is able to balance its prevasive and easily understood authoritarian imagery with more subtle and easy to miss nuances that turn a motionless chick in the background into a masterclass of foreshadowing and establish a simple hidden in plain sight diorama as the game's version of 1984's "boot on a human face".

Regardless, Inside's ability to keep its subtext hidden in its scenery is its biggest strength, running instead on tone and atmosphere alone, telling all you need to know from the first moment you take control of the boy in red, and allowing the player the decision to be invested or not in its world, one you will desperately want to get inside of.

I always heard people talking about Inside and wanted to live this experience. Now that I played I understand why people love it.

The game don't tell you the story and left to you try to understand what's happening. Everything on the background is intersting and let you think what's going on.

The characters moviments are incredible for a indie game from 2016. The puzzles are also enjoyable.

Inside is a short game that every gamer has to play.

If you see Inside on sale or if you have Xbox Game Pass, play it.

Sights & Sounds
- I'll be honest, I love pixel art, but the visuals here are a mixed bag. The backgrounds, for the most part, look gorgeous, as do the sprites for the fire effects. Counter to that are the character designs, which are all tiny and a little generic. I understand the desire to show more of the level for gameplay purposes, but it does make the characters look a bit featureless and uninteresting
- Additionally, the level design can result in some ugly environments, particularly when you're underground. I just don't like 3/4 of the screen to be covered with the cross-section of a wall of stone. If the levels had been more compact and looped around on themselves, the game would have benefited in more than one way
- The soundtrack is actually pretty good and far better than I initially expected based on the visuals. Nice fantasy orchestral tracks with all the strings and woodwinds you could ask for

Story & Vibes
- Spoiler-free plot summary: You're just some villager living in a small town and preparing for a harvest festival when a meteor crashes from the sky. Naturally, you decide to go poke it, which gives you magic powers. That would be fantastic news if it weren't for the fact that the local ruler really wanted those powers and decides send her army to tear apart your village and kidnap everyone to figure out who has them. Now you need to stealth your way through the realm to save your friends and get revenge
- All in all, the story is pretty generic, but I think it suffices for a gameplay-focused title like Wildfire
- The vibes are hard to articulate, mostly because there are different objectives within each level that you may or may not be trying to achieve. If you're trying to go undetected, the vibes can be tense and calculated. On the other hand, if you're going for a speed run, things can turn sideways and become frantic very quickly

Playability & Replayability
- After finishing the prologue/tutorial, you're spit out on a Mario-style map of paths and levels. You'll need to stealth or speed run your way through them all, making sure to complete the primary objective
- The core gameplay feels good. The controls all make sense and the jump has a satisfying weight to it. Each level plays out somewhere between a 2D stealth platformer and a puzzle platformer. I know the "immersive sim" tag may get applied here, but I don't think there's enough environmental interaction to qualify (i.e., I can pick up a box and drop it on someone's head, but I can't stack up a pile of them to sneak into a fort)
- Beyond the primary task (ranging from stealing a mission object to saving a predetermined number of kidnapped villagers), each level also has a unique bonus challenge as well as checkmarks for going undetected, not killing anyone, and a speedrun time
- As you progress, you'll obtain the ability to control new elements, which comes in handy as the levels become more complex. Some of these skills can be creatively used in combination as well as with the level's objects and environments for some pretty unique solutions
- This open approach to gameplay really clicked for me when I grabbed a chicken, threw it behind a pair of guards, and lit it with a fireball. The ensuing commotion scared them off a cliff and opened the path forward. Sure, I could have just snuck through the bushes, but that's a much less fun way to approach the puzzles in this game
- I've seen some reviews criticize the difficulty by saying that it's too difficult to complete all of a level's objectives in one run, which in turn necessitates multiple successful completions of each level. That may be true, but I actually appreciated playing each level in different playstyles. I found it kinda fun to do all the "slow" objectives (main, bonus, no kill, and undetected) in my first attempt while keeping an eye out for shortcuts. I'd then use what I'd learned about the level to do the speedrun
- That is to say, this game is largely what you make of it. You can play it however you like, but some ways are more fun than others. I found my own method of alternating between calculated and chaotic to be pretty gratifying
- One criticism I would levy has to do with replayability and forcing it on players. I didn't like the fact that there's not enough upgrades to at least unlock every ability. I wouldn't mind not being able to level them all up, but I still feel like I shouldn't have to go through NG+ just to see what all the skills do. Sure, I could replay it to see, but it'll be some time before I return

Overall Impressions & Performance
- I didn't go into Wildfire with the highest of hopes. Sure, it has a nice Steam rating, but the number of reviews indicates that this title got criminally overlooked. It's such a shame; this is a really fun game with some cool ideas. Sure it isn't perfect, but I still happily got about 20 hours of stealth goodness out of it. Maybe I just have a soft spot for games that let you play them creatively
- Ran perfectly on the Steam Deck

Final Verdict
- 8.5/10. If you enjoy games like Mark of the Ninja or Gunpoint, you're almost guaranteed to have some fun in Wildfire. It may not be as stylish or complex as those games, but it's still a hidden gem for 2D platform stealth fans

So the Final Battle expansion adds a new chapter to the story mode which goes over a decent amount of season 3 of the anime among a few other things which I'll get to later.

Firstly the new story is good, however compared to the base game's story it is fairly weak for a few reasons. Reason 1: It's very short, each of the previous seasons in the game would be nice and long with a lot of detail thrown in there with every cutscene being beautifully animated whereas the season 3 story feels as if it skips over a few things, especially with the royal family stuff in the first half of season 3. Also only about half of the story is actually animated as a 3D cutscene, the other half shows the story in a picture book format akin to Sonic and The Black Knight, I really was not a fan of these and would often end up skipping these cutscenes. Instead of going through the little hub worlds to go from mission to mission where you could also interact with all different characters and do fun side things you know only have a linear menu to access the next mission which is pretty boring but at least the menu itself is very easy to navigate and looks very aesthetically pleasing. Instead of playing with your custom character in the story you take control of the anime characters themselves, especially Levi. Levi becomes the new main character of the game with you being forced to play as him for the majority of the story missions which isn't really that upsetting because who doesn't want to play as Levi? Especially in the mission where you have to fight the Beast Titan and it's just like the anime where you swing from Titan to Titan slaughtering each one as you get closer to Beasty and the misson where you face of against the Kenny Squad in the city where it's just you against like 100 squad members.

Speaking of missions, as short as the story is it for sure has some standout missions and some new enemies to boot. You face off against Kenny Squad with their Anti ODM gear which means they can zip around just as fast as you can and they can shoot you from a distance which makes them very formidable especially in large groups, it's a nice change of pace from the regular big and slow Titans. Also a very unique boss fight against the massive Rod Reiss titan where you go through different stages of battle is one of the most entertaining boss fights in the entire game including the base game. However, I will say there is one mission in the story i actively disliked where you have to escort horses from side of the map to another, it doesn't sound so bad right? there are a few escort missions in the base game and they're fine, while yes that is true, these horses are from Hell. They keep running off into the opposite direction and they get stuck on the slightest invisible wall and then you have to restart the entire mission, it took me 5 attempts just to get it done, did not like that mission. Every other mission is very enjoyable though.

Some new twists to the gameplay have been added which I quite enjoyed, You can know access the Anti-Personnel ODM Gear which is the ones with the guns that Kenny Squad uses, these new weapons do definitly take a little while to get used to after using just the regular ODM gear for the whole game but once you figure out how to utilise them properly they can be quite fun with the different manoeuvrability mechanics and the different types of ammo you can use from explosive to electric to smoke, the Anti ODM for sure keeps things interesting on the battlefield but more often than not i would rather stick to the regular ODM, but that's just me sticking to what i've stuck with for the whole game. you know also have the ability to acquire "Showdown Equipment" by helping characters out on the map who are in danger, Showdown Equipment is basically an ultimate weapon, depending which version of the ODM gear you are currently using your Showdown Equipment will change, if you are using regular ODM then you can use the classic Thunder Spears which are excellent for clearing massive crowds of Titans in one go, but not so great for one on one fights with bigger boss Titans. And if you have the Anti ODM gear then you get mini gattling guns strapped to your arms which are great for focusing on individual parts of big boss Titans and obliterating them. So both weapon variations have their own strengths and weaknesses and the ability to change them mid battle if you reach a supply base allows you to strategize even more around your current mission.

Your custom character is noticeably absent for the majority of your playtime with this expansion which sucks because your custom character was one of my favourite aspects of the game, HOWEVER, this expansion fixes one of my main issues with the base game which is post game content, the expansion adds ALOT to do when you beat the main season 3 story including mini side story missions to do where you play as side characters like Sasha and Hange which are pretty fun but the big boy addition, which you will honestly probably spend most of your playtime with this expansion playing like i did, is the new Territory Expansion gamemode. In this gamemode we are back with our custom character (if you want to you can pick other characters to play as in this mode but i missed my CAC) and we make our own custom regiment outside of the Scouts and etc and you are given your own base of operations. Once you've picked a character and set up shop then you can go on different expeditions outside the walls with each expedition having different objectives and different characters to meet, the more expeditions you do the further and further outside the walls you can go and you gather materials to build up your base with new buildings and weapons and you get different characters from across the AOT series to join your regiment so they join you in battle. This mode is incredibly fun and it's always a good time when you come across one of your favourite characters and recruit them into your new regiment.

Overall this is a really solid expansion with some solid additions, however if this was the entire game it would leave me wanting more... BUT IT'S NOT, this is an expansion to an already full game. You put these two together and you get one of the most amazing Attack on Titan experiences you could've asked for. AOT 2: Final Battle is one of if not the best anime game out there and I highly recommend it to anyone.

Now all we need is a sequel which covers the entire show with your custom character keeping to their key role instead of dipping after season 2, some more fleshed out playable Titan gameplay and maybe the ability to make your own titan? and we would have a perfect game. I hope we can get something close to that soon.

One of the most underrated games in my opinion, it has great visuals and controls really nice. It can be a mindless game or a really difficult resource management game depending on how you play it. There's also plenty of modes such as going through the story of the first 3 seasons as either your OC (which you can change up to have different weapons and gear) or many characters from the series. Want to mow down titans with two chainsaw blades or fire guns and explosives at them? Well, you can! There's also a post-game mode called 'territory recovery' which really leans into the resource management aspect. Your party members can become wounded and tiles that you reclaim from the titans within the walls net you resources to build up your base of operations. Really addicting - and really hard on eden difficulty.

I don't even know how to describe this game, It's incredible, from the first minute to the last!

Firstly of course, this game had a huge improvement compared to Rockstar's previous games, graphics, motion capture, music, map, mechanics, combat system everything is extremely well polished and wonderful!

Of course, there are certain problems in the game, very simple bugs that Rockstar never fixed even though the game was from six years ago, such as the camping bug, where you are unable to camp. Another problem is the very large and long loading screens, taking around 5 minutes to load a save.


Now something spectacular is how Rockstar managed to make this game run well and extremely fluidly on an Xbox One and PS4, it's incredible!

Speaking of the story, I don't even have any comments, the storytelling in this game is better than many films I've seen, the construction of characters and the development of the plot is extremely well made! for example, the game's side missions are important to the game's story itself, and it's almost impossible for you not to be interested in doing all of the game's missions.

I won't go into details of the story so as not to be a spoiler, but this is certainly a very incredible story and perhaps one of the best stories in a video game.

Dear Journal,

My name is John Marston and I’ve lost everything. The US government took them from me and promised my freedom if I helped this “establish a civilization” by catching the three crooks I used to ride with.

The first thing I noticed after I got off the train was how beautiful the country looked. Rolling hills, trees, animals roaming wherever you look. People on stagecoaches and even the occasional train. How I learned this new “civilization” was very interesting and even would make a good story.

Day 2

After getting shot by Bill Williamson I met this lovely lady Bonnie MacFarlane and she helped me along the way. Riding horses with her was a good time and it doesn’t seem to hard. If I kick it too hard with my spurs it will buck me off unless I bond with it first by riding it often. Keeping speed with her was easy since holding my speed kept me right next to her.

Shooting on the horse was a little difficult and using my Dead Eye was almost necessary since everything went by so fast. Controlling a horse and a gun at the same time isn’t very easy. When I focus enough everything seems to slow down and I can mark my targets with an X and blast away. I don’t know where I got this trait from, but it sure is handy.

She even showed me how to herd cattle by keeping pace behind the herd and making sure strays to leave. Taming horses was pretty easy since I just had to lasso them and keep my balance until they were broken. Today was a long day so I’m going to rest.


Day 3

I left Bonnie after helping her out on some errands. I just follow the yellow route line to my objective I put on my map and it ain’t too hard from there. I can even mark waypoints and travel to them via stagecoach or when I make a camp off the road or away from water. This makes things handy since traveling this vast land can get tiresome.

After shooting some thugs from the wanted poster I picked up I realized how each bullet affects every part of the body. Hit an arm and they drop their gun. Hit their leg and they limp away, hit their chest and they fall over and crawl away. I found this useful when having to catch criminals with my lasso. Shoot the sucker in the leg so he stops running!

I went to the local market (there are many) and sold some herbs I picked and after I hunted some deer, wolves, a snake, and some birds I sold all those parts for some cash and bought me a new gun. I love my shotgun, sniper rifle, revolver, and other weapons, but I just needed something more powerful. I did buy a new horse as well as some tobacco for focus and some medicine. I’m beat for now so I’m going to go purchase some property in this town and rest.


Day 7

I’ve learned a lot lately and one of the biggest things I learned was not to shoot other people or even run over them on accident. I had the law come after me and I now have a bounty on my head. I can get a pardon letter or pay the bounty, but if I get my honor and fame up by doing good deeds maybe people won’t be so hasty to tattle.

I tried some gambling to ease my mind today such as Liar’s Dice, Texas Hold ‘Em, Blackjack, Horse Shoes, Arm Wrestling and more. These games seemed pretty fun at first but after a few tries, it bored me so I was off hunting again. After I caught my kill I noticed a Stranger needing help so I marked him as a question mark on my map and a purple circle on the area where I can find him later. I’ll tell you to partner these tales and these people were something else.

There are so many things to do here I can’t describe them all. This place is huge even with Mexico to the south. Everything here just looks so amazing and you can see so far it’s stunning. Even when I got the snow-capped mountains and was hunting bears I felt like I couldn’t get enough of the scenery. The world also sounds beautiful with birds chirping and the sound of crunching dirt under my feet. It’s refreshing.


Day 28

Well, I don’t know what else to say. This world is so massive and expansive and gorgeous it’s like nothing else. There is so much to do here that by the end of my journey I’ll have felt satisfied, and even roaming around with friends can be pretty fun. So long partner and keep the West Wild and the Wild alive.

'The Legend of Zelda: The Missing Link' es un romhack del cacareado "mejor juego de la Historia": 'Ocarina of Time', que trata de conectar los hechos jamás narrados por Miyamoto y Aonuma entre el final de aquel juego y el comienzo de su secuela, 'Majora's Mask'. Una obra que sólo ha sido posible gracias al proyecto de decompilación del clásico de N64, que sirvió para conocer cómo funciona el juego internamente y cómo modificarlo para introducir nuevos assets, nuevas mecánicas jugables, y básicamente todo aquello que no fuese un simple lavado de cara. Si bien 'The Missing Link' fue fruto de una dedicada comunidad de fans de la serie, el proyecto como tal fue liderado por el alemán Kaze Emanuar (muy conocido por sus romhacks de 'Super Mario 64') y Zel, otro ingeniero inverso muy conocedor del hardware que maneja N64. Entre ambos armaron una obra muy breve (de alrededor ~3h de duración), con escenarios completamente nuevos (con mayor geometría y capaces de funcionar en la consola original), un control más dinámico de Link, nuevas mecánicas de juego, una renovada banda sonora, e incluso una nueva herramienta escondida en las profundidades de una mazmorra. Y por supuesto, tal cantidad de esfuerzo vertido en renovar un clásico del videojuego, fue recibido con un bonito Cease & Desist por parte de Nintendo. Ya saben, por eso de mandar avisos a navegantes.

Si hubiera que buscarle un equivalente a 'The Missing Link', podríamos echar un vistazo a cómo funciona 'Bowser's Fury' a modo de expansión del universo 'Super Mario 3D World'. Es una obra mucho más compacta, con mayor enfoque al combate directo, sin relleno ni grandes interludios en travesía. Con un inventario mucho más limitado que en el original al controlar únicamente a Link de niño, pero aprovechado con cabeza para darle protagonismo equitativamente y utilizarlo con la astucia que se presupone a todo jugador de la serie. 'The Missing Link' logra concentrar toda la esencia de 'Ocarina of Time' no sólo a nivel de jugabilidad, también en los pequeños detalles que componen la aventura. El jolgorio de sus personajes, la penumbra de sus parajes misteriosos, la progresión abierta de su mazmorra (¡chúpate esa, 'Tears of the Kingdom'!), las pequeñas misiones de recadero y acertijos tan característicos de cualquier Zelda. Se nota un enorme cariño y respeto por el material original, hasta el punto de saberse tan pulido como un producto comercial de aquellos tiempos…

…pero no deja de percibirse como una prueba de concepto, la base sobre la que podría construirse una obra completa que, probablemente, nunca vea la luz. En todo caso, reimaginar una conexión ficticia entre los dos títulos de N64 ha resultado ser una idea muy golosa, un divertimento muy adecuado para que Link parta en busca de su compañera de fatigas y carga de infinitos memes desproporcionados sobre su insistencia verbal. Quién sabe, igual en el futuro veremos a alguien intentando conectar 'Breath of the Wild' y 'Tears of the Kingdom', o recrear el tercer 'Oracle of' que fue descartado durante el desarrollo de Ages y Seasons. ¿Mucho esfuerzo? Por descontado, pero no será Nintendo quien tome la iniciativa para hacerlo realidad.

The Far Cry Elden Ring-ification of Breath of the Wild with a smattering of end-of-chapter Fortnite and New Funky Mode.

While BotW was content to let players roam free in a sprawling world, Tears of the Kingdom reins in this freedom considerably and hides the guardrails from the player with horse blinders. Link is still welcome to run around Hyrule at will, but the primary storyline holds the keys which allow actual exploratory liberation. My first dozen hours completely ignored Lookout Landing, leaving me without critical tools like the paraglider and towers. That was the most challenging TotK ever got, and the most it (unintentionally) forced me to think outside the box. I dragged gliders to the tops of hills labouriously, I used a horse and cart, I made elaborate vehicles simply to get around. I scrounged for rockets, fans, batteries, and air balloons to ascend to sky islands, making it to a few of the lower ones with great accomplishment. I committed to putting off the towers as long as I could, not realising they were an outright necessity. Seeing how this additional layer of the map functioned demystified it severely, rendering a challenge into a stepping stone for parcels of content.

The depths, like the skies above, are filled with potential. Many of its spaces are similarly wide open to encourage blind exploration with vehicles. Only there is nearly no purpose to any of it. Lightroots are a checkbox which dismantle the most compelling part of the depths -- their darkness. The depths are a place you visit to grab zonaite or amiibo armour and leave. As the Fire Temple is within the depths, and it being the first I tackled, I falsely believed there would be more dungeons strewn about below, simply a part of the world rather than instanced away from it. Sadly, it is the exception.

The other temples are obfuscated and inaccessible without their related storylines, which is itself fine (the temples are impossible to progress through without their associated power anyways) but this leaves the world feeling more boxed in, a selection of rooms in an overly-long hallway. A spare few rooms complement each other, most of them do not. The walls of the rooms must be thick. Whether it is shrines, side quests, or temples, the developers yet again seemingly have no way of knowing what abilities the player might have, what puzzles they have encountered, what skills they remember. All that they know is that in the Fire Temple, you have a Goron. In the Water Temple, you have Zora armour. The positive is, of course, that these things can thus be tackled in any order without a fear of missing out on anything. The downside is that there is never anything more to a shrine, a temple, or anything than what the player encounters the first go around. There is no impetus to return to a location when you have a better tool, or a wider knowledge of how the game's mechanics work. You show up, experience the room, and leave. With 300 map pins at your disposal, and similar issues arising in BotW, there's a sense that the developers chickened out near the end, too afraid to let the player (gasp) backtrack or (gasp) miss out.

Ironically enough, the lack of FOMO is what I miss most. When I was towerlessly exploring with a hodgepodge of trash scavenged from around the world, I felt free. I felt clever! When I discovered the intended mode of play, however, I felt I was putting a square peg in a square hole. There's a crystal that needs to be moved to a far away island? Before, I might have made a horror of Octoballoons and Korok Fronds with Fans and Springs to get it where it needed to go. When the Fruit of Knowledge was consumed, I saw the parts for the prebuilt Fanplane were right next to the Crystal. There's a breakable wall in a dungeon? Bomb Flowers or a hammer are right there. It is incredibly safe. It is a pair of horse blinders that you can decorate as you please. Go ahead and make your mech, you are still on the straight and narrow path.

TotK tries to bring back the linearity of Zeldas past within the BotW framework, but it ignores that the linearity was speckled with a weave of areas which expanded alongside your arsenal, rather than shrinking. Everything here is incongruous, a smörgåsbord of cool set pieces that simply don't go together. There is too much content (Elden Ring) that is too self-contained (end of chapter Fortnite) and too afraid that you will not experience it (New Funky Mode).

Did I have fun? Yes. But I had to make it myself.