In some ways, Biomutant is on the cusp of truly being great. Elements and mechanics that help define many of the classic RPGs are featured in Biomutant. The customization for weapons and gear is extensive and makes the process of loot hunting worthwhile as the upgrades and the appearances are worth seeking out. The world looks tremendous and is extensive, offering lots of variety in its environments. Best of all, the combat is addicting. The variety of options in what you can do with the combat is incredibly enjoyable. With the ability to quickly bounce from psi powers, guns and melee attacks, you can be creative in your approach and go all out with a variety of different combos to customize how you like to fight. There are also plenty of opportunities to upgrade your character in a number of different areas, from character resistances to new psi powers to perks to help you out in the future. These elements helped brighten the game and make it playable for as long as I ended up playing it (30+ hours).

I usually like doing as many of the side quests as possible in games like this, especially if I really enjoy the game and feel motivated to do so. For a time, I was pretty committed to going through them. The more I did them, however, the more I noticed the general monotony of it all. While some side quests were rewarding in their gifts of experience, weapon add-ons and gear, they had a horrible habit of not standing out. The activities weren't varied and the rewards or adventure didn't justify the heavy time commitment. And this all boiled down to the core problem of Biomutant.

Biomutant feels both vast and hollow at one time. While the game presents a large world to explore, the story framework around the world feels flimsy at best. Nothing about any of the characters or story help make the world the least bit interesting. Every character's dialogue is in a squeaky, gibberish sound, with everything they say being translated by the game's narrator, the automaton that accompanies and assists you. The narrator's voice becomes incredibly irritating after a while, always hearing it and never anyone else's dialogue, especially when he just randomly starts saying random prophetic nonsense ("There are things out there, waiting for you") that offers nothing (There is thankfully an option to limit how much he talks, so I turned him down from 25% frequency to 10%, but the frequency didn't feel like it changed much). The irritation mostly comes from the inability to properly capture a character's feelings since you are hearing a translation from the same voice you've heard over and over again in the same tone. And most of the dialogue the characters have is mostly prophetic gobbledygook that makes every character feel exactly the same. You never feel like you're having meaningful interactions and the game feels like its repeating itself over and over with its dialogue. It becomes incredibly frustrating to continue doing any of the main story since every character's dialogue sequence plays out exactly the same as all the others. The dialogue selection option feels massively underutilized and almost worthless as a result. The concept of dark and light auras also feels underutilized, with it minimally impacting dialogue decisions and determining a couple different psi powers.

The main story boils down to saving the world through ending the war between the different tribes, defeating four monsters that are destroying the world and defeating the monster that killed your mother. The main story missions don't really offer much uniqueness between them. The tribe war missions mostly boil down to similar retreads of fort raid missions. Depending on the way the tribe war levels go, you can even end the tribe war early, but nothing comes of it really if you do. There's no benefit or meaningful impact in the story that comes from it, except expediting the game's story. Perhaps the best levels are the boss battles with the five major world ending monsters. The missions leading up to fighting each of them are nothing special, usually getting stuff for a character you don't care about to prepare for the battle. The early battles are definitely more challenging, and as a result, more engaging. However, if you do lots of the side missions before doing the story missions, the later main quest fights are quite easy from getting better gear and experience and offer a change of pace, but little change in challenge. The combat does feel different here as you have to use different vehicles to fight off each different monster, also blending the typical style of combat to make for some engaging sequences. There doesn't feel like a great sense of accomplishment any time you kill one. There's no particularly great build up and there's no interesting payoff for doing it. Nothing changes. You just feel like you're one step closer to the end. The game hinges on these fights for its story but when they feel like they lack emotional or story impact, then it undermines everything that the game is attempting to do.

Even Biomutant's lore and underlying background feels so underwhelming. Just a corporation that polluted the world and caused biomutation as a result of their waste. It's a simple concept that offers lots of opportunities to dive in deep and explore it, but the offerings of background information are randomly stumbled upon. All the lore is delivered by the narrator anyways, so you'll probably want to skip it.

Biomutant feels like it has potential to be such a neat, endlessly playable game. On its surface, it really is and it was able to hook me for hours on end. However, the game will eventually wear out its welcome if you're a completionist seeking out all of the side quests and collectibles. The quests feel the same or offer nothing special to them, and there's not much in the way of personality in its characters or story. Biomutant is so terribly unremarkable in its worldbuilding that it eliminates any chance of me ever wanting to play it again. That being said, I can't say I didn't get roped into the absorbing gameplay of Biomutant. It really helped overcome the depressing shortcomings of its writing. As a result, Biomutant comes out as a solid, enjoyable, but unremarkable RPG. It offers some good stuff to pass the time, but

Incredibly repetitive but strangely addictive at times, Maneater offers some nice and bloody shark violence in the back drop of a shark hunting reality show. The sense of humor keeps the game light and fun even after you've done very similar campaign tasks or side challenges over and over and over again.

It honestly surprised me that there was as much to the game as there was. The evolution elements don't offer a ton of customization but was a nice welcome addition. The infamy tracker is also neat, despite none of the shark hunters that hunt you down feeling distinct at all aside from the weapon they use. Some quips to go along with their Borderlands esque entrance would help.

Maneater thankfully doesn't seem to overstay its welcome but it's not I could really expect to come back to again.

It's hard to fault the EA line of Star Wars games for their visuals and level of immersion. Everything from the sound design and the distinct, detailed and varied environments make this game perhaps the ultimate way to dive into the world of Star Wars. If there's any drawback for the game in these areas, it's the use of music. The music itself is the classic Star Wars music we know and love, but it never quite seems to match the situations, with hearing stuff like TIE Fighter Attack or Duel of the Fates while on Hoth or Takodana.

The campaign is pretty barebones when it comes to storytelling and character development, electing to use a run of the mill imperial-turned-rebel tale where the transition happens in the first few levels of the game. The gameplay is pretty solid at least and there's a good variety of different elements put into the campaign to mix things up, such as vehicles, droid play and playing as classic Star Wars characters like Luke, Han, Leia and Lando instead of the main character. The spaceship levels are perhaps the biggest overall weakness of the whole campaign, as there's a decent number of them and there's absolutely nothing about any of them that stands out. They become frustratingly repetitive or overlong, resulting in the player wanting them to end rather than wanting to keep on playing.

The multiplayer, unsurprisingly, is the star of the game and is a blast that one can spend a good amount of time invested into. Co-op mode, in particular, offers seemingly endless fun with working together with friends in a lighter, non-competitive mode where you work together with up to three others against bots. I was surprised to find out how much it really was to work with friends to face the bots, and it definitely made it much easier to ease into the style of the game by using a less difficult co-op rather than diving right into the heated multiplayer modes. The multiplayer has some of the typical frustrations that come with these types of games, ones that can't be helped, but they don't hamper what is overall a really strong multiplayer mode.

Star Wars Battlefront II's chaotic multiplayer warfare in the Star Wars setting makes it such a fun time for many hours. I wish there could be a campaign that would feel more worthwhile and didn't just feel tacked in, a typical EA problem. Even one that mirrored the stories over the Skywalker films would be intriguing. Aside from that, Battlefront II is certainly a good time and has really grown from its disgusting days of microtransaction hell.

While its level design loses its awe factor later in the game, the first foray into the world of Halo still offers one of the most exciting and mesmerizing first few levels of a game of any I've ever played. The worldbuilding is so strong and the game looks tremendous, both in new and old graphics. I still get a smile every time I hear the now iconic theme song blaring, especially when searching for the Silent Cartographer. It's a shame levels like the Library are deflating and feel so lazy compared to the rest of the game, as they severely dampen the spirits of a super fun game.

Despite its great looks and cities with lots of activity, Assassin's Creed is unbelievably frustrating in its repetition and flatness. The story certainly has potential, particularly the story outside of the Animus. However, the biggest drawback for me was how bland Altair was, with his arc happening but it never feeling like I had any sort of connection with him. His actions remained the same throughout the game despite his supposed changing throughout, so the change that Altair is having that he and other characters are talking about never really feels present.

The game does a fine job with creating an immersive environment, with great looking worlds and lots of places to jump and climb about. The frustrating part is that none of the cities feel like they have any distinguishable personality. Jerusalem, Acre and Damascus all look and feel the same, with everything that you do in the city feeling the same pretty much. The lack of interesting environments piles onto the general repetitive nature of the game. Assassinating 9 different people, but always getting stuck doing the same types of investigations prior to the kills, the same types of people around the cities and the same type of action. It becomes mind-numbing after a time and certainly did not leave me excited to press on.

I will say that the story leaves me intrigued to see where it goes in the next games, and the changes in the story after the 9 assassinations definitely was more intriguing. But really, it ended up boiling down to the repetitive fighting that populated the rest of the game up to it. And a lot of it got really clunky and frustrating at times.

Assassin's Creed is a super neat concept that feels like such a bare bones game. The freedom to move around is worthless since the additional content like flag searching, saving citizens and climbing the towers doesn't really add anything; it's just filler to try to justify the open world.

I am looking forward to seeing how this franchise builds upon itself, especially the environments since the concept obviously has lent itself to blending in numerous different time periods and settings. The potential is there, and I am hoping that as I go through these games, it is fulfilled.

Totally distinct yet completely familiar at the same time, ODST is a nice change of pace and brings a new vibe to the classic Halo gunplay experience. The mood that Martin O'Donnell's score provided, particularly during the scenes as a lone soldier wandering the desolate streets of New Mombasa, is unbelievable and unlike anything delivered in a Halo game prior to this point. The alternating between wandering through New Mombasa and playing an action-packed level of classic Halo is a neat change of pace at first, before becoming a bit repetitive and New Mombasa losing some its intrigue as an environment the more it happens.

The dialogue and storytelling is amusingly cringeworthy and corny at times, but thankfully the game delivers on its exciting level design that feels just like the Halo I've come to know and love. While some unwelcome differences were evident, like a pointless new UI that felt like a serious downgrade from the other 3 Halo games and the inability to dual wield guns like the previous 2 Halos.

Halo 3: ODST brings some new elements forward that help the game stand out while still maintaining Halo's core style of gameplay. While it felt like some steps were taken backwards in some areas, ODST is ultimately successful in delivering a fun shooter that is short, sweet and doesn't over stay its welcome.

The beautiful settings and environments along with undeniably fun gameplay help make up for a painfully generic story. Predictable story beats and totally unremarkable and one note characters make for a pretty shallow experience that makes it hard to get emotionally invested. That being said, the gameplay is as rich as the first game, offering plenty of fun with puzzle solving, exploring and in combat. Even the simplest things as climbing in new environments is fun throughout.

Bugs here and there can add some unwanted aggravation, particularly with the climbing arrows which I found more cumbersome and time consuming to use than anything and dreaded any time I was forced to use them.

Rise of the Tomb Raider didn't quite have the punch that the first reboot game had, especially in its writing. However, the gameplay and look of the game are back and as strong as ever. Rise of the Tomb Raider overall succeeds for that. It's not something I don't think I'll ever be driven to play again due to a lack of any real emotional connection, but I'll look back on this game as a fun, scenic and at many times exciting adventure with one of gaming's most iconic heroines.

I was surprised by how challenging this game ended up being, even on medium. With enemies that hit hard and hit fairly accurately and some that take insurmountable amounts of damage, the gunplay can be pretty tough but also very rewarding once you get through a more challenging portion. That being said, unavoidable damage can be an issue at times and can become incredibly frustrating, especially when enemies see you and are shooting you perfectly through the sides of tents and buildings. Far Cry's biggest positive goes towards its action through the strong variety of interesting settings and solid level design, getting the most out of its island setting and opening the door for multiple ways to tackle a level. Each environment feels unique and distinct and the levels don't feel like rehashes.

Perhaps the greatest downfall of Far Cry is its writing, perhaps purposely goofy and over the top. It comes across as incredibly awkward every time Jack Carver utters a hammy, strange and out of place one-liner. Nothing about the voice acting or dialogue brings any emotional involvement or investment to any of the elements of the story, with it all being so contrastingly goofy with the intensity and grit of the game. Another downfall is the total failure of the stealth elements, where the game seems to encourage you to sneak up on enemies to get the jump on them, only for them to hear you from seemingly miles away and blow you away.

Far Cry succeeds in offering a fine, challenging FPS experience. I would definitely recommend a lower difficulty to start unless you like a true challenge. Just don't expect anything real meaningful beyond fun gameplay and good level design.

Filled to the brim with a lot of the classic charm that made Lego Star Wars such an endearing part of my childhood, Lego Batman offers much of the same fun with similar frustrations in its platforming and occasional annoying AI. The grind for 100% completion isn't too taxing or frustrating apart from a few overly challenging canisters, but the new puzzles that come with free play and trying to get 100% add some freshness to the levels you've already played. There is a solid variety of characters, but I wish there was some more variety or specialness in the vehicles to make them more worth your time. I also wish there were opportunities outside of levels to mess around with characters that rarely would get used during a mission, like police officers or goons. The game has some fun gameplay and level design overall, with boss fights sometimes being great and sometimes being repetitive and uninteresting. However, Lego Batman is a good time for what it is and as good as any game to aim for 100%.

While there is a fun charm to this mid-2000's shooter, I found myself getting more irritated by the game as it wore on. The number of enemies increases of course, and with that, the problems of the game are more noticeable. Examples of getting shot through doors before they are fully open, enemies with incredibly precise aim even on the easier difficulties and blind spots where enemies can hardly be seen with minimal cover to utilize provide lots of opportunities for the player to take unavoidable damage that can be immensely frustrating. The worst example of this was the second to last level as you scale the Eiffel Tower, a neat concept that sadly gets deflated by numerous instances of blind corners and moments that can't be avoided, making the level frustrating when health packs are minimal and the number of enemies feels endless. When enemies aren't assaulting you all at once, they sometimes go right into the open and make it incredibly easy for you to pick them off with a headshot, making for moments of weirdly uneven difficulty throughout certain levels.

Despite the gameplay being frustrating at times, the game generally runs smoothly aside from some glitches involving climbing up stairs that can mess you up if you're in combat. The sound is perhaps the best all-around element, with it roaring and providing a strong atmosphere, especially since it's THX certified. The cutscenes throughout are also gloriously cheesy, making for lots of unintentional humor throughout the game. The plot is barebones to say the least. As far as mission structure, several levels will make up a single mission. However, without any explanation most of the time, your loadout and the teammates you're with just randomly change between levels on the same mission. It makes for very odd and frustrating moments when you're expecting a certain gun and you no longer have it.

It's easy to have fun with this game at first, but the issues seem to compound more as the game goes on and one only desires to finish it for the sake of finishing it. There are some interesting levels and settings to go through, but the game just doesn't come together all around. I highly doubt I will ever play this one again.

While the story that strings everything together is very easy to ignore or forget about, the gameplay is a blast and the level design makes for some engaging and exciting strategy gameplay. A nice variety of enemies to fight, along with a number of different options to use make for an extremely engaging campaign. I wish there could have been some more variety in buildings to create, but what was there was useful for the campaign missions. One of the most annoying issues I ran into was grouping units and trying to move one group at a time. If they were in a confined space, no one moves. Also some random glitching that can cause units to get stuck in the base if a building is built while a unit is there. Despite some minor annoyances, though, overall, Halo Wars is a very seamless combination of RTS and Halo.