Hogwarts Legacy isn't too far off your generic Ubisoft style open world rpg but with the Harry Potter IP slapped across it. This wouldnt be worth much, if not for the care and detail and sense of nostalgia that comes with that IP and it boosts the enjoyment of the game immensely.

This game does not reinvent the wheel for rpgs or open worlds, but it does give us a version of one that many people have longed for and I think does it quite well. Hogwarts as a building is unbelievable and you'll easily spend the first 10 hours just roaming its halls for secrets and places you recognize. The outside area isn't bad but its nothing too special imo.

The combat was my greatest fear going in to this but it was honestly a lot better than I expected. Its sort of hard to describe but its fun if thats worth anything. The main story is decent, some parts of it are boring and forgettable, mainly the two villains and their whole plot, but the stuff about the Keepers and the trials are memorable, and the side character relationship quests actually end on quite good notes, the game doesn't pull its punches at times.

Gripes include the repetitive nature of some of the open world elements, the lack of variety with some dialogue lines around fast travel and Hogsmeade, I think they could have cut some of the more generic side quests to focus on the main story, specifically some characters that I think would have benefited the final act if we had spent more time with them.

tldr if you like harry potter you will like this, if you dont like harry potter, there really isnt anything new for you here.

This was a lot of fun. When it was first revealed, I thought it looked cool but I wasn't gonna play cause I'm not a big fan of rhythm games and I didn't think I would enjoy being punished for having bad rhythm. Then people played the game and said how you don't actually need good rhythm at all really and how easy it is to keep on rhythm, and they were right!

In the best way possible, this feels like a Saturday morning cartoon mixed with the xbox 360 era of action platformers, and the combat even gives me some kingdom hearts vibes at times. The art style is great, levels are vibrant and a good mixup of fights and platforming with plenty of collectibles to find. I played on normal so I didn't have to overly dive into the combat but there is definitely depth there around the various combos and specials for people on harder difficulties.

I also really liked the characters and writing, I did genuinely laugh out loud at multiple points and I really liked both the final boss fight, and how the various characters tie into that fight and ending. My only real gripe is that sometimes the levels can be a small bit repetitive, like the tower climbing one, but overall its not a big deal.

I really hope no parents were tricked into buying this game for their kid, because unless you play on a difficulty lower than normal, this game can be fucking tough lol.

Lets start with the obvious, the games art style and graphics are beautiful. Its overused to say but its true, it really does feel like playing a Pixar movie at times. Its at its best when you are going through a shimmering forest or through the village, unfortunately the last act takes place in a darker area and while it still looks nice, I don't think it looks as good as it does in the brighter areas.

Peel back the "pixar botw-lite" layer of this game and you'll find babies first Souls game lmao. The boss fights and even some of the regular encounters in this game are deceptively hard, some to the point where its an annoyance more than a skill issue. A few times I debated lowering the difficulty but didn't need to in the end but a bit like Tunic, I don't think I'd fault anyone who did lower it as I think it can ruin some peoples fun with it.

Not much to say plot or character wise, probably one of the weaker points of the game. Kena doesn't really have much of a personality and the game is basically three mostly separate mini stories that somewhat tie in at the end with the main big bad, but its loose at best.

Overall its fun but I think its short length helps as I dont think it would have a lot of staying power if it was a longer game, but a great first effort from the people who are known for a majoras mask video. Definitely some design flaws in the game but I think experience will fix that for whatever they make next.

The first few hours of this are really fun, especially if you grew up on the Arkham games or even more recently, Marvels Spider-man, since the combat is an evolution and deeper form of that. But after a certain point, Sifu starts demanding almost nothing less than perfection from its players, and for some people that challenge is welcome and engaging, but for others, like myself, it becomes very grating, especially on a specific mid game boss fight where I shit you not, the boss has three combos, one of them you can't interact with, one you can, and one where you legit have to run away from her and trick the AI into finishing the combo because it can run forever if it thinks it can hit you, and thats all just for phase 1. Thankfully the rest of the game does feel more fair in comparison but that one boss fight in particular at the midpoint of the game really stopped a lot of positive momentum I had for Sifu.

Outside of that, the game is fairly simple plot wise, its just a revenge story. I do like its art design, especially in the museum level, and how the different bosses have a sense of theme around the elements.

Overall, you play this game for the combat, which is very solid and rewarding once it clicks, but its boss fights just are a bit too unforgiving as they require perfection, and even just surviving a boss fight can harm you for the next one.

Actually enjoyed this a lot more than I expected. It's basically Firered/Leafgreen with some minor changes to the game plot and layout, nothing too crazy but enough to make it feel somewhat fresher. Obviously the real draw here is the fusions, it really does add a new spin to a game I've played a dozen times, and once you get more mons and come across more of the custom art fusions, that's when it really becomes fun and legitimately difficult at times to pick a team lol. I accidentally played on normal mode not realising that modern mode gives you a larger pool of Mons so if I ever want to replay it, I have that option available to me.

Same score as what I gave the original re4, I think its hard to call one better than the other, when they both have different strengths and weaknesses. Obviously the remake is modernized and adds a bit more depth to Leons combat arsenal, but I feel like certain actions, like shotgun blasts and roundhouse kicks don't have the same oomph as they did in the remake. The knife changes are actually better than I expected. I think it does a good job of showing off memorable locations from the original with modern graphics and lighting, vastly improves most areas but I think some actually lose a bit of magic.

I don't think the remake manages to capture that feeling of "cool" that I had in my original play-through but it does flesh out more of the characters and story, and I think towards the back half is does a better job embracing the cheesyness of the original, when Leon has someone to talk to he hits more one liners and has some banter.

Overall I liked it and any fan of the original will also, some are much more die hard than myself so their mileage may vary but I don't think you can come away disliking RE4 Remake.

PS, they are absolutely setting up an RE5 Remake in this :O

I know a lot of this will seem like I did not like the game but thats not the case, its just easier to talk about the gripes a bit more but overall I did really enjoy Hollow Knight and it still gets a 4/5 as a game in a genre I don't really have any interest in. But I do have gripes that stop it from being any higher for me personally and they are as follows:
- I'm not a fan of this style of narrative/lore, like ik there's a lot of lore to this game, but from my perspective there was basically none cause of how it's told if that makes sense. It's kinda like botws plot where you aren't experiencing it as much as others are telling you that it already happened
- I think most of the fights I fought were fair and could be done in probably 5 or less attempts, which I think is a good sign of balance, but some are just a fucking headache and would make me want to self rope like the guardians and Traitor Lord
- I think part of this is just getting more used to metroidvanias but I think some of the games progression is a bit more abstract than I would have liked, I think maybe marking more points of interest on the map, specifically points where say you come across a door you can't open yet, so that when you get the key or ability required, you remember where to go, rather than the generic markers you can drop yourself

That seems like a lot, but in the grand scheme they aren't much, I still overall had fun playing, it's got great visual and style, good music, combat feels rewarding when you get into a flow, powerups and abilities feel useful and keep things fresh

This is probably my favorite pokemon inspired game I have played and I've played a lot of the big ones, nexomon extinction, temtem, coromon etc. What makes this better than all of those in my opinion, is that its what most resembles pokemon for me, but isn't afraid to improve where pokemon doesn't/won't, whereas sometimes in the other games it feels like they hold back in certain areas or make the same mistakes pokemon does. The main example of this is the gameplay flow for Cassette Beasts, its very similar in structure to Scarlet and Violet where there is a mostly open world map, and you have 2-3 core objectives to complete in order to beat the game. It even has unlocking overworld abilities to help you progress the map like SV does but its implemented better here imo. And overall that gameplay flow is done better here thanks to firstly the map design and secondly the level scaling implementation.

I'll start with the map design. While the game is marketed as open world, its not really, but in a good way. You are meant to do the right side of the map first until you complete enough of it to travel to the left side, and how you progress through that right hand side and what order you complete objectives is up to you. This is where the level scaling comes in. At the start of the game you are giving choices in how the scaling will be implemented, for example will bosses scale down to you, how will enemy AI move in the overworld etc. This level of tweaking is fantastic as it allows you to essentially make a custom easy/normal/hard mode, a sorely lacking pokemon feature. This is what truly helps the game flow, as you never feel over or under leveled, I left it on the default settings and while I never truly struggled like say in TemTem at times, I also couldn't just blindly mash away like you often can in pokemon and SV (depending on your order). I also really liked how none of the objective locations are just given to you immediately on the map, you either have to find them yourself or have an npc in town tell you as a quest, its a nice touch for those into exploration.

In terms of beast designs, I liked a lot of them, I feared that the roughly 120 count wouldn't be enough but it is and they are distributed well throughout the map. I also like the sticker move system and the star system for evolving, it makes having a rotating squad very feasible. The fusion mechanic is also cool, the algorithm used is very good in that it never feels like the fusions are just slapped together like the default pokemon fusions.

If I had any gripes, its that I wasn't a fan of how the companions quests are generally tied into a handful of the main objective boss fights, which means for about half of the Archangel fights you have a companion with you that can't fuse until you do the fight. Not a big deal but it came up as an annoyance once or twice. The other gripe is the awkwardness of swapping around beasts, especially if you want to take a beast off a companion to give them a fodder one if you are swapping, you should be able to remove your active beast from the tape inventory menu rather than having to back out to the party specific menu, it just becomes a hassle if you find yourself swapping companions a lot, which you will have to do some amount of due to the quests.

Overall, thoroughly impressed with this two person dev team and I'm glad its on gamepass as that should help with discovery a lot and even on steam its a very fair price of €/$20 I believe. If you are a fan of monster catching games, this is one to try.

PS the music is very good but sadly theres only maybe a handful of tracks, would have liked a few more but at least what we have is good so you don't mind hearing them often.

Not much I can say about this excellent game that countless others haven't said so I'll try not to repeat too much, but I'm honestly just blown away with how much more I liked this game compared to BOTW. I think it fixed almost every gripe I had on list against the original game and a large reason for that is just the open ended-ness of how to approach any given objective.

Shrines and side quests are a large example of this, shrines in particular in this game are lightyears better than botw shrines, and side quests, while still fairly basic at their core, feel more fun to do because of the wider sandbox approach of how to complete them.

I also much preferred the story here compared to botw. It still largely takes place in the past like the memories of botw, but it does feel a bit more immediate/impactful, because its sort of two stories playing out at once and you don't immediately know the outcome of the past storyline like you did in botw where you know they lose. The story does repeat itself a small bit however, all the temple cutscenes are basically the same. I also still don't love how memories can be unlocked out of order, I think its very easy to spoil yourself on big plot points early by mistake, I'd hate to have been spoiled on the conclusion to where is zelda and the location of the master sword.

In terms of gameplay, this one is a bit more of a mixed bag and part of what holds it back from a 5/5. I think exploration is vastly improved here, I do feel more rewarded for exploring because even basic resources are more usable now compared to botw, but I think the sky islands concept feels slightly underused and I don't think weapon fusing is the solution to weapon durability as it may initially seem, it just becomes another essential required process to keep up with the damage scale of enemies. I also wish the combat had been fleshed out more, its basically the exact same as botw and something just a bit deeper would have gone a long way.

Overall, an excellent game that proves that once you can see past graphical fidelity as the end goal, fun and interesting gameplay mechanics will always triumph over photo realism generic shite.

While I can definitely see the appeal of the game and how at its core design it has lead a new format/genre of games, and that the visual and control improvements of the remaster greatly improve the overall experience, this is still a game largely stuck in its 2000s roots and you painfully feel that as you play.

As someone with no prior metroid experience, I come into this completely clean with no nostalgia or understanding of the game, which means I had to have a fucking guide open as I played the game or else I'd have an extra 4 hours on my playtime running around to finish this game. My main complaints are:
- lack of fast travel/shortcuts around the map, makes backtracking in the latter half a pain in the ass.
- meta ridley boss fight is ass, the rock monster fight drags way too much, and overall the difficulty seems to just spike in the last 1/4 of the game
- some enemies are just fucking annoying, especially the face suckers and the jetback guys, legitimately just made me mad with how aggressive the room respawns can be when I'm trying to run through an area
- "plot" told through scanning random shit across the world = zzz

All that being said, it still gets 2.5/5 cause it doesn't overstay its welcome, and I did enjoy the visual improvements and the very very core design of powering up as you progress through the game is solid and popular as we see in the years to come.

For a game that seems to be splitting long time Final Fantasy fans and newcomers to the series between loving it or hating it, I managed to fall somewhere in the middle, leaning more towards like than dislike because while I have a decent list of gripes and issues with the game, it does still have a lot of excellent qualities and I think if it was willing to commit to those more and cut the fat, this would easily have been a top tier game for me.

For the cons, I've mentioned it a few times but I just did not care for the semi open world approach, the side quests were largely weak and unrewarding, and the RPG elements felt tacked on. I think the pacing isn't great at points either but maybe thats a side effect from doing most of the quests for the first 2/3rds of the game and not enjoying them.

For the pros:
- I mostly enjoyed the main plot. I don't really get the complaints about any sort of kingdom hearts-esque plot twist(s), it all seemed fairly tame if we are comparing it to that series. Maybe people were just upset it wasn't the GoT style plot they maybe expected but I was happy with the revenge plot and what it eventually became, though I do think it loses a bit of steam towards the end but thats just a JRPG trope I'm not a huge fan of anyways.
-I didn't dislike the characters but I can't say I loved any of them, didn't feel a sense of connection with them compared to similar games.
- I enjoyed the combat decently enough, I'm not fully sure why but it just never fully clicked for me, it was always serviceable but never much more. I think a lack of enemy variety that would encourage various playstyles and builds could have been a cause.

Overall, theres a decent mix of pros and cons for me. I think if it leaned more into the linear action adventure and could dive deeper into what worked and cut what didn't, this would be a top tier game for me as I mentioned earlier. Probably wouldn't have gotten this at full PS5 price if I could go back in time but at least it both motivated me to finish it and also this was probably the best window to play it due to the next few hectic months of releases.

All the pieces of Rain Code truly came together in the last two chapters for me. I debated whether to give it a 4 or 4.5 but I think with its consistency, music, aesthetic, characters, and plot, its strengths overcome the few weaknesses it has to justify the higher score.

If you liked Danganronpa I think its safe to assume you'll like raincode. The only reason you wouldn't is if you really can't stand the idea of a Miu x Monokuma style character being with you at all times cause thats basically what Shinigami is but I loved it and her eventual arc so it was fine by me. I don't think the characters of rain code will hit the personal highs a lot of people will have for various dango characters, but they also won't hit the lows of characters you despise, they are just consistently good at their role as allies/enemies/suspects. The protagonist Yuma is also probably the most fleshed out protagonist from out of any of these type of games I've played and honestly Shinigami is probably second.

Out of all the chunsoft games from this same vein, dango/Ai/zero escape etc, this probably has my favorite gameplay section after danganronpas class trials. While I think there was room for more mini game variety in the mystery labyrinths and the hallway walks were a bit annoying, what we got was good and reminded me a lot of the trials which I really enjoyed.

Speaking of trials, the mysteries of each chapter are pretty good here, like the dango games, some are better than others, but really theres only one weak one here in the 5 or 6 available. And while the overall plots mystery probably isn't as well sprinkled throughout the game as it is in other chunsoft games, it does come full circle in a way thats better than any of the others. In a weird way its the most fucked up but also the most likely/believable plots of any of those games lol.

Starfield is a weird one. Started off really enjoying it but the more I played the more the flaws started to show and wear on me. That being said, my final play time is almost 100 hours so it definitely did enough right to get me to keep playing.

To make a long review short, basically any of the procedural stuff like the random point of interests on planets and the mission board quests get very repetitive very early, and the menu travel really becomes a bore after 50 hours lol. Going from quest to quest is fine for the most part but there is some charm lost by missing out on that sense of exploration you'd get in fallout or skyrim. The companions are fine individually but the game really suffers from them all basically being the same morally good people, theres no variety in them in terms of how they react to your decisions.

As for the positives, the hand crafted side quests are quality bethesda so you'll enjoy those. The gunplay is also surprisingly good and the world is very detailed with its items and weapons and I like how the skills are setup. When you stumble across a planet with a colony of cloned people or a spaceship filled with people from earth who were in cryo sleep, thats when you get that bethesda feeling. As for the main quest, hard to say much without spoilers but it was decently interesting up until the very end for me personally.

Is it weird that playing this has made me want to prioritize finally playing New Vegas? lol