Fun, stylish game with a neat hook and just enough room for experimentation to justify its runtime. After beating the main game, I turned all the cheats on to mess around in hard mode and clean up the remaining trophies. Surprisingly that was way more fun than playing the game legit. Having invincibility and unlimited ammo on, gave me the freedom to actually do what I had been trying to do in the base game. Music and story were also kinda cool but mostly half baked - wish there was a little more put into both.

Took me a while to finally get around to fully completing it but yeah, I've got to say this is the best Mario game and maybe the best platformer I've ever played. Super Mario Galaxy is as grand as its operatic score and as generously rich as its (still shockingly beautiful) visuals. Such an incredibly creative setup for a Mario game, everything was firing on all cylinders here. I could go on forever gushing about it but everyone already knows this game is magical and that we need to appreciate it because pieces of art like this only come around once in a lifetime (I've never played the sequel).

Playing this game in 2022 is such a surreal experience. Not only does it still look better than 99% of games that come out today, but it's nearly impossible to separate it from its place in history as maybe the game which had the quickest turn from "hyped to hated".

It is truly hard to believe how much shit this game got when it was released, genuinely historical. "The Order 1886" became the much needed whipping boy for large game studios, as at the time the general gaming public were in the midst of raging against the preverbal machine; frustrated by increasingly shallow experiences.

I have the empathy to take a step back and understand why someone in 2015 would feel jipped by paying $60 for a five hour game. However, seven years on I was able to buy this game for the first time for around $10 and once that discount was enacted a lot of the problems people had with this game started to disappear. As I wrote at the top this is honestly one of the most breathtaking video game experiences I've ever had. Not only are the environments seemingly endless and full for vivacious detail, but the facial animations are genuinely the best I've ever seen. While I'm on the topic of visuals I'll add in that everything from the character design to weapons help to create a wonderfully unique world.

The only aspect of this game that I'm not crazy about is the gameplay. For starters it kind of feels like shit to move, what I mean by that is the game tries to guide you along as best it can and one of the ways it does that is by gating how fast and slow you can move in certain areas. While this might not sound so back it can be incredibly frustrating to try sprinting only to find out you're not supposed to sprint in this one random open area for seemingly no reason. The gunplay also kind of sucks. While you do get access to plenty of cool weapons, a majority of them feel exactly the same and the actually cool ones are severely underused. Speaking of underused, the werewolves in this game are the biggest swing and miss of the entire console generation as far as I'm concerned. They show up a total of like three times and your method of dispatching them is so pathetically boring I almost thought it was a glitch. As essential as these may seem in a video game I don't think that lackluster gameplay can singlehandedly tank an experience.

Of all the things that would benefit from a reevaluation in the year of out lord 2022 (George Harrison's solo material, jnco jeans, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, etc.) I believe The Order 1886 would see the greatest improvement. I will gladly die on the hill that The Order is not a terrible video game, it is instead wildly mediocre.

I hate gamers so much man. The amount of shit they give any game that doesn't fall under their predetermined idea of "fun" is pathetic. God forbid a developer has different artistic intentions for their game than the average shooter/platformer/rpg/etc.

If you want to say that Everybody's Gone to the Rapture has a disappointing story thats fine, if you want to say the walking speed is too slow thats completely valid, but if you take one look at and say it sucks because its a "walking simulator" then you need to seriously reconsider how you consume art.

Again I'm not saying this game is perfect, or even great, I think it has a good amount of things wrong with it. What I am saying is that it, and games like it, get unfairly criticized by the general public. It just bums me out that so many people have such limited views when it comes to games, and I hope that doesn't hamstring the medium and cause less experimentation in the future.

Sometimes style can more important that substance. Oxenfree is a delightful enough adventure game, with interesting enough characters, an intriguing enough story, and satisfying enough gameplay. But where it goes above and beyond average is with everything else.

The visuals and music in this game are truly top notch. Everything, from the way you pick dialogue options, to the unique animations every character has, to the surprisingly fantastic voice acting elevates this game to something special.

It's not a perfect game by any means but does it justify its runtime/cost/etc? Yes, one hundred times over.

Superhot might just be the most "fair" game I've ever played. It's so rare to find a game where every mechanic works in lockstep with each other and actively makes the overall product better.

The "gimmick" of the game, where time only moves when you move is so addicting to master, and honestly they could have sold me on it if they just included that in an endless mode. But Superhot is so much more than the gimmick, for a game this visually sparse it is absolutely oozing in style. From the old school pc menus, to the crunchy audio files, to the hours of chat and randomly generated screensavers Superhot elevates itself to truly become something special.

I could play this game for hours (and I did, completing every optional challenge) comparing my gameplay when I first picked the game up to how I was playing only a day or two later was wild. For a game with no tutorial, Superhot makes it so easy to become fluent in its incredibly unique combat.

The metanarrative is also fun, and the hidden terminals do just enough to keep me intrigued without giving too much away. I would have liked a little bit more "story" in the main game but at the same time there's something really satisfying about piecing the story together yourself.

"Satisfying" is probably the word I would best use to describe this game. Finishing a tough level is satisfying, discovering a secret is satisfying, getting off a headshot from all the way across the map before an enemy even has time to fire a shot is satisfying. And after finishing the game I couldn't be more satisfied with my purchase.

Like Metroid but with more Catholic guilt.

I absolutely adored this game. The art direction is what's going to grab most people first and for good reason. I haven't played a game where I was so motivated by seeing what kind of insane environment was just around the corner since Hollow Knight (which this game will no doubt receive endless comparisons too). The pixel art is truly perfect, incredibly detailed backgrounds mixed with creative enemy design.

The gameplay is also probably perfect. It's always a good sign when a couple hours into the game you're sliding and dashing around like a speed runner. The movement is so comfortable and the combat is as satisfying as any 2D game I've ever played. Boss fights never felt unfair (except for some of the optional DLC ones but those don't count), every enemy had to be dispatched in its own unique way, and the customization through perks and spells are by far the best in any metroidvania I've ever played.

The narrative is also fantastic, I was so drawn into the lore through item descriptions, NPC interactions, or the rare cutscenes. Dark without being edgy or overbearing, much like the rest of this game it just fit in a way that felt natural.

This game just makes sense, everything it tries works and after beating it a couple times to unlock the secret endings I never once got bored. Nearly perfect!!