Full spoilers ahead:

Alan Wake II is a game that immediatly defies analysis of itself by the player in virtude of the anomalous characteristics of it's main hypersticional plot device, the so-called Cauldron Lake. The plot becomes a surreal, Lynch-esque fight between the characters for control of it's literal narrative that sometimes utilizes real-life actors (and a real-life rock band, no less) in order to mirror this post-modern clusterfucky quest for authorship and the power to tell stories and manifest reality itself into the real, actual, real-life Cult of the Word, the game developers themselves.

This is enthralling storytelling to say the very least.

Remedy's own take of the SCP Mythos, the so called Federal Bureau of Control, is also a very present story backdrop and eventually joins the main plot as the "Twin Peaks-esque plot" develops.

On that note: It has a lot of Twin Peak references. Maybe it even goes a bit too far on them, relying on imagery and main plot points of Twin Peaks. Alan is Cooper, Scratch is Bob and so on and so forth. And even though the story feels a bit too much relying on Lynch to do it's heavy lifting, it is even more unoriginal in gameplay.

Ok, it's not bad. It was just an easy segway into the subject of gameplay: A really good mix of The Last of Us 2 and Resident Evil 2. But some UI elements lack crucial funcionalities. Navigation can also feel kind of wonky, especially in the less urban sections. But it's still a rock solid version of RE2 and TLOU2's gameplay, with it's very own surreal tone of dark, mystical (and yet sci-fi-esque) and downright philosophical.

Best Narrative of the Year, Baldur's Gate 3 be damned.

This was such a nice trip down memory lane. There's an argument to be made that I've played the original Resident Evil 4 in my childhood more than any other game in my entire life. I know every knook and cranny. I know every little secret. The "save room" music can move me to tears. RE 4 has been effectively imprinted into my fucking soul.

Well, they've done it again. It's RE 4 all right, but sharper. Movement feels great, my socks melted when I realized the amount of freedom of movement this game gives you compared to the original. And the parry mechanic, jesus, that is a god-sent gift directly from Dark Souls. I'm just happy this game exists.

My only pet-peeve is that they took out "No thanks, bro". Like why would you do that?

Signalis builds itself mechanically from classical survivor horror such as Resident Evil and Silent Hill, but goes above and beyond the literary aspirations of it's parents by mobilizing references like Hideaki Anno, Robert W. Chambers and Andrei Tarkovsky (just to name a few). It blends very well the classical combat and puzzle schemes of Resident Evil with the narrative and aesthetic depths of Silent Hill, but the way that it uses some of the tropes in Evangelion and Solaris is fucking brilliant. This is truly a survival horror modern instantaneous classic.

Is it just me or is it kind of crazy that only now, in 2022, full twenty-six years after the launch of Resident Evil 1, we finally have the first successful FPS homage to the big momma of the survival horror genre? Clocking at only two hours, Nightmare of Decay nevertheless would be my favorite indie game of 2022, were it not for the existence of a certain Vampire Survivors. Absolute must-play for fans of good old survival horror. And keep an eye on it's developer KIRA (@Stylish_Kira on Twitter), they also made Lost in Vivo and Lunacid which are pretty good games.

In many ways it's From Software's greatest game. In other ways, it proves to me something that I've felt since Sekiro: that I eager for games that are more mechanically focused than the standard action-RPG item-fest that Dark Souls established.

This variety makes it so that it's hard to fine-tune the experience. You need to account for so many possibilites when making a big baddie encounter. That makes it miss the mark sometimes. Sometimes it just fails entirely regardless of build choice - look no further than the atrocious Elden Beast.

And there's just... too much of it. So much of it that it starts to repeat itself. A lot. And open world is massive, yes, but It's not particulary rewarding to investigate The Lands Between more than once. I'd rather immerse myself in a smaller, more directed and profound mechanical experience.