What can i even say about this game? My first Resident Evil game, the original PS2 game + the Wii edition are beloved childhood favourites that practically raised me lmao and I've bought it on every console I've owned since. I played the main campaign over and over, I played all the extra campaigns, I unlocked all the outfits, guns, you name it. I know the puzzle solutions off the top of my head. Ask me where any obscure piece of treasure is in this game and I can ~probably~ tell you where it is. To this day I still play it in my head to fall asleep sometimes, I know it THAT well lol so yeah I definitely have nostalgia bias. Still though, the general atmosphere and soundtrack of this game are unmatched even by today's standards imo. The way the characters look and their facial animations make it hard to believe it is from 2005 especially when you compare it to other games from that time, hell even a lot of games from way after that time.

The only things that f it up it a little are the janky textures which show up badly on modern TV's- they don't all look bad but tbh the good ones just show up the bad ones even worse :( especially in the HD remastered version. like, you'll have textures that look like they're from a PS3 game which is fine, next to ones that belong in a PS1 game. I find this is more noticeable in the later areas of the game for whatever reason. Apparently production on this game was chaos so maybe those are areas they had to rush to get the game out on time? who knows honestly, it might just be a symptom of me playing this it over and over and over and exploring every nook and cranny. but there it is if you are bothered by stuff like that.
Also if you are used to modern shooters (replayed this just off the back of completing Red Dead Redemption 2 and yikes), you WILL find this awkward and stiff to play at first, Leon controls like an old shopping cart. But hey we wouldn't even have modern shooters as they are today without this game so we can forgive it. The other thing that lets it down a little is the game kind of falls off a bit towards the end, but that is a pretty common complaint with Resident Evil games, and I wonder if it is to get you to replay the game to experience the earlier areas again lol because it works on me. Either way it really isn't a big deal because the game is still good. These are all just stupid nitpicks that barely matter honestly, and easily looked past in a game like this with so much more to offer.

Idk man, it's Resident Evil 4!!! Play it if u haven't, replay it if u have :). I aint played the remake yet, it looks good! but honestly I think something as iconic as this game can only happen once. The way they blended pure horror with cringe humour and still made it all so charming is expert writing and game design to me. Also objectively the funniest game ever made, unironically. Loved it as a kid, love it now, Leon Kennedy transed my gender. Can't give it less than 5 stars even with all the stuff I mentioned earlier. She's an icon, she's a legend and she IS the moment.

The words "this changed my brain chemistry" is thrown around a lot these days but man. playing this game as a lost 20something who'd just come home from university, spending the 2020 covid lockdown in my parent's attic in a dead-end small town. yeah let's just say this one hit home a lot.

Night in the Woods is- and allow me to be a little pretentious for a sec- less of a "game" and more of a playable visual novel using the medium of gaming to make a social observation about growing up in the digital age, making the fact that it is a game appropriate. I can see kids in English class 100 years from now discussing this text and how it reflected the experience of being a young adult in the early 21st century and late-stage capitalism, and as someone around the same age as the characters (are we called Zillenials? I like to call us Gen Void- we are u n m a r k e t a b l e), I can tell you it's pretty spot-on, probably even more so if you're American. It feels like playing through a great novel is what I'm saying.

Despite the 2017 release date this game feels a good few years ahead of its time, playing for the first time during the Covid lockdown really hit different and extra-hammered home the theme of "the world is broken and everything around you is changing and falling apart but you gotta find meaning and hope in it all and save what you can anyway" vibe, really added to it lol and was an experience I'm glad I had. Also Mae is literally me fr fr I've never related to a character more. her conversations with her friends and her mom were so weird to play through for me it was like the devs followed me around for a while. I am also short and kinda bug-eyed and am sometimes mistaken for a minor. I have an alcoholic father and am queer and adhd-coded with an array of mental health problems and kind of a disaster. she's sooo me guys. These characters feel way more human than a lot of other games and they are animals.

Some of my tips and advice for the game - explore everywhere and talk to everyone you can and exhaust their dialogue, this is a small game but has so much packed in and some of the best parts of the game are hidden in a secluded room or at the edge of the map or at the end of a seemingly obscure questline. Two playthroughs AT LEAST- Gregg and Bea routes- are recommended to get everything out of it but honestly I'm probably on my 6th or 7th playthrough and am still finding stuff.
Also play all the accompanying games- Demon Tower, the mini-game within the main game, is the Night In the Woods universe's answer to a souls-like game (dungeons, bosses, characters complain about how hard it is). It's a great game all by itself and does get genuinely challenging in the later levels (Finji you want to release Demon Tower as a separate game on PC, consoles and mobile sooo bad) Longest Night is a small game but adds lore to the characters and world. Lost Constellation adds even more obscure lore which is referred back to in the main game, but mostly stands as its own thing, acting as a story-within-a-story. I always play it around the holidays and it leaves me with a sense of hope going into the new year.

Night in the Woods is not a game I can recommend in good faith to just anyone, like you have to get it. Not everyone knows what it's like to be young and queer and mentally ill and directionless in a tumultuous time. Different journeys. But if you are a 20- or 30-something and lost, or even if you are older and still lost, or have ever been that person, well, this game won't offer solutions or change that. The only conclusion it has to an uncertain present is an uncertain future, which is way less depressing than it sounds, I promise (and for the people saying the game ends too abruptly- that's kind of the point?), BUT it might just change YOU, and maybe even save you a little bit. And eh even if it doesn't, you still played a fun game with great engaging characters and a cute artstyle, and a gorgeous soundtrack. And sometimes that is the same thing.

At the end of everything, hold onto anything

This started out as a scary game but has transitioned into a comfort game to me, as weird as that sounds. Sometimes to relax I will throw on a youtube video essay (Sherlock is Garbage and Here's Why is a favourite) and just blast through Leon or Claire's campaign. I think I know my way round that police station better than a lot of the places i've worked at this point lmao- it's like a second home to me.

On a first playthrough though, this is one of the few horror games to actually scare me. I LOVE horror games but they don't often really scare me. Whoever programmed Mr.X and how he moves around is a genius because it feels so random, which makes dealing with him on repeat playthroughs way more interesting. Sometimes I barely have any trouble with him at all and others it's as if he's lurking around every corner, you just never know. And the times his encounters are scripted, it's like they predicted exactly how the player was going to react, often leading them into even worse traps. Amazing game design.

One thing I will recommend if you can, turn on the option for the original soundtrack as you play. I have no nostalgia for the 1998 game outside of watching youtubers play lol, as it was before my time, but the music adds so much to the atmosphere, it makes everything feel so eerie and sad. and is also just great music on its own. I never play without it.