so much of this is great but so much of it isn’t. it feels like they took the perfect formula from Sly 2 and worked backwards, overcomplicating it and overworking it.

adding in a bunch of gimmicky characters but taking out clue bottles and treasure leaves it feeling both empty and bloated at the same time. it just doesn’t come together.

but then the standout moments really do stand out. the ship stuff, Holland and fighting the wuxia chicken on the bamboo are all series highlights. and it all ends so well, managing to conclude the trilogy with an actual emotional pay off.

shame they made Thieves in Time.

Replayed the PS Now version on a whim. managed to platinum it in a couple days, which is crazy because it took me months as a kid.

I still have my issues (the Mz Ruby chapter and god awful boss fight, the races, the twin-stick shooter sections), but I can’t deny this game’s charm. Muggshot and Panda King’s chapters are just a total blast and the art style still looks great. it’s definitely undercooked (especially compared to Sly 2) but it’s still really good fun. wish they still made games like this

Finally Platinum'd this. Offers perhaps the best level (in terms of design and gameplay) in the trilogy with Berlin, but the rest is more of the same - which, if you're a fan of the series, is hardly a complaint. Pretty great gameplay and I think it has overall the most consistently enjoyable run of levels (Hitman suffers in the middle, as does 2), but IO-I have really dropped the ball with all the stupid online features, the recycled elusive targets and, though I haven't bought them so can't say for sure, the "Seasons of Sin" (lol) are pretty underwhelming. Oh well. Fun game!

Played through as part of the Legendary Edition on PS4. Still a great story but mired in side content.

I've since started ME2, playing as a soldier like I did the first time around. I'm not finding it very satisfying getting the exact same experience and I keep planning to restart with a different character and do things differently, so I'm just going to restart from the start of 1. Honestly, I think playing through ME1 like you're actually on the clock (while doing some important side missions) instead of fart-arsing about the galaxy will be a more immersive experience.

it's fun but there just isn't enough. The Outer Worlds features approximately zero interesting characters, and you are very rarely given a reason to care about anything that's going on in a grander context. the Biting Satire on Capitalism endures until you realise that toothless jokes about clocking in and shoddy working conditions are pretty much the full spread. Obsidian’s trademark gallows humour is there in all its gory glory but few moments are really laugh-out-loud funny.

occasionally, you’ll meet an interesting NPC and some of their side/faction quests will be genuinely brilliant (the cannibals in the ruins side quest and the MSI-Iconclasts arc both stuck out) but they’re too few and far between. the crew that man your ship are neat riffs and variations on the archetypal gang yet they’re as void as the infinite space around you and nowhere near as intriguing.

perhaps the greatest feature in the entire game is the ability to firmly tell a crewmate to leave the ship permanently: nothing in the entire story gave me as much satisfaction as when Nyoka, the Very Badass bounty hunter, asked if she could become a permanent fixture on the ship and I told her to get fucked.