The remaster is fine. It's the first three tomb raider games bundled together in one to navigate and use package. So why am I giving this such a low rating, then? The EULA. I recommend you read it. Two things stood out. They reserve the right to own and sell any mods made by fans and they can terminate the agreement without any warning including taking away our right to play the game. Buying this game means you don't own it. So I suggest pirating it. Since you don't own it when you buy it, pirating it isn't stealing it.

I have a question for you: Do you have a "happy place" game? When you have had a bad day, nothing's gone right, and you feel dead to the world, do you have a game that you just turn on and suddenly everything suddenly feels like it's going to be okay? Donkey Kong Country is that game to me. Every Donkey Kong Country has that effect on me, but it's most keenly felt with this one.

The story is pretty simple. One dark and stormy night, King K. Rool has stolen Donkey Kong's banana hoard and locked Diddy Kong in a barrel. It's your job to save Diddy and the banana hoard. It is admittedly light on story, but most of the game's emotions are carried in the moment to moment gameplay. This is an incredibly challenging game for first-timers. Sure, I can beat it now no problem, but that's because I have over 20 years of experience playing it. Its difficulty actually enhances the quest. With how high stakes the atmosphere of the levels make it, combined with David Wise's frankly haunting soundtrack, it really feels like a quest into danger more than a simple platforming romp. Some nights, I will just put on Aquatic Ambience from the soundtrack and just contemplate my place in the world. The music and atmosphere of this game make me feel wonderful things that I am not sure I can even put into words.

The platforming itself is a ton of fun. An incredibly high skill ceiling means that it is always engaging, and there is enough mechanical variation to keep you entertained through the whole journey. The same can arguably not be said about the stage variety. They could have called this game "Donkey Kong Cave" for how much time you spend in them. This is one aspect where its sequels have it beat admittedly, but it never really bothered me personally. The same can be said of the bosses. Of all the various bosses in the game, only King K. Rool himself stands out as memorable. Fortunately, the final fight with him is arguably one of the best the Super Nintendo has to offer.

It should also be noted that this game arguably saved the Super Nintendo from losing to the Genesis in North America. While the Sega Genesis did still beat the Super Nintendo in sales in 1994 and 1995, it would prove to be the years that a Sega console would ever be on top in the region. Sega would move on to the Saturn in 1995 in America, more or less abandoning the Genesis, allowing the Super Nintendo to catch up and eventually surpass it in sales globally. The Donkey Kong Country games were a major reason why, and it all began with this one. This game would prove to be the second best-selling game for the SNES, with Donkey Kong, for a few years at least, supplanting Mario as Nintendo's most popular character. A lot of that had to do with the graphics. No one had ever seen graphics like this before. When you play this game on a CRT TV now, they still hold up. With the right filters on an emulator, you can get a similar effect.

This game was a risk that paid off. I am not sure modern Nintendo would trust a third party to handle one of their biggest IPs in such a way. Perhaps they should. With its colorful graphics, interesting and challenging platofrming, excellent animation, and amazing soundtrack that elevates the whole experience into something that is emotional and poignant, Donkey Kong Country is simply one of the finest platforming games ever made, and my "happy place" game. Give it a shot and who knows? It just might become your "happy place" game, too.

Everything people remember Goldeneye for being, Perfect Dark actually is. There's an intriguing mix of cyberpunk and X-Files alien espionage in the story, and the weapons are a lot of fun to use. The sound and music are excellent. Between this game and Banjo Tooie, Grant Kirkhope had a career defining year in 2000. Graphically, this pushes the Nintendo 64 to its absolute limits, and it shows. Even with the expansion pak, sub 20 FPS is common when there's a lot of action on the screen.

If you can get past that though, this game is feature rich. The campaign is long and engaging, and sadistic in its difficulty when you're playing on harder settings. The campaign can be played in co-op, or you can have up to 4 bots in co-op with you as well. It has a pvp campaign mode as well called counter-operative, where player 2 takes control of an enemy character. Even modern games don't do that. Combine that with a multiplayer mode that can be played with bots or up to four players across multiple different match types, and you have a total package of a game, and about as much fun as you could have with a first-person shooter in 2000. I wouldn't recommend playing this on a Nintendo 64 though. While I'm used to first-person shooter controls on the console, I also grew up with it. I know it's a tall order for most people, especially with those previously mentioned frame rate issues. I would instead point you to the remake Rare did for the Xbox 360 in 2010. That version fixes the frame rate issues and it's also compatible with the Xbox One and the Xbox Series X. If you don't have an Xbox console, some nice people did an unofficial PC port in 2023 that you can play instead. I will link the github at the end of the review for you to download it.

I feel like this game is incredibly slept on, given how much hype Goldeneye gets even now. This is better in every single way than Goldeneye and is the real best console FPS of the era.

Github for the unofficial PC port:
https://github.com/fgsfdsfgs/perfect_dark

Dare I say it: best racing game ever? Though the Metacritic score doesn't reflect its quality, this is the most fun I have ever had with a racing game.

Variety is the word of the day Setting a racing game in Australia was an inspired choice. We got beach racing, desert tracks, city street racing, racing towns, racing in rainforests, racing in industrial parks, and if you get the DLC, racing in snow and in fantasy Hot Wheels tracks.

There's over 500 cars to choose from, and the difficulty, control, and feel are all just right and completely adjustable if you are struggling. The graphics are incredibly beautiful. The team apparently spent some time in Australia taking reference photos just to make sure the skyboxes were right. The effort did not go to waste.

The soundtrack is an eclectic blend of genres, and you can always use your own music. The aforementioned variety is on display with the kind of racing you can do, too. You got high speed racing, truck racing, dune buggies, you name it, this game probably has it. Depending on how you adjust the settings, you can play it like an arcade racer or make it as simulationist as you want.

Other Forza Horizon games have come and gone since this one, but for its variety in setting and race types, its perfect difficulty curve, and just how fun it is to control, I think this is the best racing video game ever made. Give it a shot!

This was an excellent an influential game. Its combat proved to eb very influential. Combine that with the environmental puzzle solving and metroidvania exploration, and you've got a game I would much rather return to than say Arkham City's open world.

Graphically, it holds up pretty well thanks to its slightly stylized art. It really nails the look and feel of a Batman comic circa 2009. Its atmosphere is also unparalleled in the series. It borders on a horror game at times, especially if the Scarecrow sequences haven't been spoiled for you. The only thing preventing it from being a perfect game in my opinion are the bosses. All of them are very basic, and the final boss is so obnoxious that it sort of hindered my enjoyment of the ending. Still, this is the best comic book game ever made, in my opinion, and well worth your time even now.

This was a journey. I think it's possibly my new favorite action game. The combat relies more on reflexes than memorizing combos. Playing it was invigorating, but I was also reminded that games like this were a dying breed.by 2005. Having a simple story of revenge was quickly becoming passe'. Contemporary to Ninja Gaiden Black were games like Devil May Cry 3 and Shadow of the Colossus, both of which released in 2005, as well Half-Life 2 and Metal Gear Solid 3, which released a year prior to Black (The base game Ninja Gaiden released the same year as Half-Life 2 and Metal Gear Solid 3). All of them were doing more interesting things with how stories could be told in games. Ninja Gaiden's story isn't bad, mind. It's just simple, with plenty of worldbuilding, llore, ambient music, and atmosphere to soak in if one is so inclined.

And the game gives you plenty of time to take in the sights. The map is sprawling, with lots of collectibles to find, secrets to uncover, and puzzles to solve. It reminds me of a Resident Evil game or a Zelda game from the Nintendo 64 era in terms of level design, while also having a foot firmly planted in the glories of the NES. You have a Ninja that travels to an evil empire by airship, fights, using primarily a sword, bad guys with guns, other ninjas, zombies, demons, and dinosaurs, with the help of a beautiful woman. It's all stuff you would have seen in the 8-bit days. The aesthetics, plot, and gameplay would fit right in with that era, especially given how hard the game is to finish.

i won't try to sugarcoat it, folks: this game is hard. To the point where it might seem unfair. It has mobs, enemies that respawn, and even classic NES knockback into lava pits. This version of the game does have an easy mode, and it makes fun of you for using it. So naturally, I played on Normal, learned the moveset, got better, and had the time of my life doing so. Every weapon in the game has a use (except for the nunchuks, which are basically a worse version of the flail). In addition, the game is very generous with healing items, so make sure to stock up if you get stuck, and don't be afraid to use your magic. This game does have a ranking system, but the rankings don't seem to do much. Which is a good thing, as that means all the bonuses, costumes, and extra missions can be unlocked and earned simply by playing the game at your own pace.

In summary, this is a perfect reboot of an old franchise. Fun story, immaculate level design, a combat system that will really put a player's reflexes to the test, an interesting world to explore, and lots of bonuses to unlock make this an amazing game that could potentially keep a player busy for months. Probably the best Xbox exclusive not published by Microsoft themselves. Don't miss it. But ignore the remake of this game, Ninja Gaiden Sigma. Sigma eliminates a lot of the puzzle elements that made this game so interesting to explore, in my opinion. Sigma is a fine game on its own, but it is not a substitute for Black. There is no other game like Ninja Gaiden Black. And given the nature of video games now, there never will be.

When your vehicles controls are not the best, maybe don't have a mandatory escape scene in them to end the game. Call it a skill issue if you want, but I was stuck here for about an hour trying to just get through the last part of the last level. Spent three hours on Two Betrayals as well getting one-shotted by enemies I didn't have time to see because I'm playing on original hardware. Good thing the rest of the game is solid from a gunplay perspective, or I would be really soured on it. Keep in mind I was playing on the equivalent of the Hard Mode, so that could be the source of my problems.

Also, why is this game held up for its storytelling? Compared to what was being done with other games at the time (Metal Gear Solid 2, Final Fantasy X, Ico, Max Payne 1, Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal, Conker's Bad Fur Day, and Silent Hill 2 all also came out in 2001), Halo's story is nothing special.

Graphically speaking and from a sound perspective, this did set a bar that has yet to really be beaten. And the gameplay and story improve exponentially, beginning with Halo 2. I'd say play it, but you likely already have. If you haven't, there's a good game to be had here. Just on the easier difficulties.

This game is everything I love about computer roleplaying games. Deep, meaningful choices, fun characters, good music, crunchy, tactical combat, solid multiplayer if you wish it, and a compelling narrative. While the storytelling is not as interesting, in my opinion, as its predecessor, Baldur's Gate II, or Planescape: Torment, what is? This easily stands as the premiere gold standard for video games going forward. Any bugs and blatantly unfair combat sections that this game might have, I can easily forgive. Because when this game fires on all cylinders, there is nothing else like it. God bless you, Larian Studios. May you build on this into your next game and beyond. I'll be waiting with eager and bated breath.

All I have to say is wow. This game was created in the 1980s by a Caribbean French black woman named Muriel Tramis. You play as a slave on a Caribbean plantation in the 1700s. It is your job to rally your fellow slaves and stage a successful slave rebellion and escape to freedom. It combines strategy, combat from Sid Meier's Pirates, and a hint of RPG. It is also brutal in difficulty, and it does not shy away from the horrific realities that were faced by slaves. Given how this game deftly handles its subject matter with respect to history, I can't but feel like we might have regressed a bit in terms of narrative. in video games. Try it, play it in a DOS or Amiga emulator that has the option for save states, and experience one of the single greatest artistic expressions in gaming.

This is where Tekken really begins. Everyone got the lead out of their shoes, and compared to the first two games, Tekken 3 is blindingly fast. It's also really fun. It's stuffed with features that will have you coming back for more continuously. On Playstation, this game could actually hit 480i. Which is impressive for 1998. Every other Tekken has tried to capture the magic of this one, with decidedly mixed results. This game however is a certified classic. A game so good, it killed Virtua Fighter's relevancy outside of Japan. Even without the extra features of the PS1 version, it's a fantastic game. With Tekken Ball and the Beat-Em-Up side content, it becomes one of the greatest fighting games ever. Street Fighter 2, 3, 4, Soul Calibur, Virtua Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat 1, Marvel vs, Capcom 2, and Tekken 3. These are the most important games in the genre, in my opinion. So what are you waiting for? Enter the King of Iron Fist Tournament. Enter the Tekken.

Here I am, having finished up the whole of Mission Mode, looking at the gold title screen you unlock for doing so, satisfied. This was the game, in my opinion, that ended the arcade as a viable business option in North America. For possibly the first time, a console game surpassed the arcade counterpart in terms of graphics, sound, and gameplay. I can't stress enough how amazing this game looked in 1999. It still looks pretty good now.

Soulcalibur combines an interesting story for a fighting game, fun combo game, a decent meta, and lots of cool and interesting modes and unlockables. About the only thing I haven't tried yet is playing multiplayer with more people than just friends or family. Thankfully, this is one game that can be played on Fightcade, so I will definitely be checking it out. This is my favorite fighting game franchise ever, and given how much I liked its sequels, it is amazing just how much this one got right. Play it any way you can, but I do recommend the Dreamcast version for the Mission Mode and the unlockables.

The legend will never die.