2019
An absolutely stellar gem of a game that takes the natural inquisitiveness that the medium of gaming can foster and lets you run loose with it, using masterful game and puzzle design to guide you towards many, many, MANY incredibly satisfying "A-ha!" moments. Guaranteed to leave you feeling as if a small light in your heart has gone off when you're done. At least I still have the DLC, but the idea of there being less of this jaw-dropping universe to explore and puzzles to solve, now, that I've finished it... ah, my heart... I can barely take it... One of the greatest gaming experiences there is.
I should preface this by explaining that I am a latecomer to this franchise. I picked a copy of the first game with the Tales of the Sword Coast expansion included up in 2006 or so, but I never really played it because the disc I had gotten had a scratch, so my first experience with Baldur's Gate has been with the Enhanced Editions. I started a game about three years ago on my laptop at work (graveyard shift at a hotel), and very recently finished it off and decided I'd follow the road by including this, even though many seem to dislike it.
Coming from Baldur's Gate 1, Siege of Dragonspear feels like a really high quality continuation with a lot of setpieces and moments of charming writing, which wasn't at all what I expected from all of the backlash I've seen. It isn't perfect by any means, but it's a really fun time, and I don't regret having played it whatsoever. I don't have the experience of Baldur's Gate 2 to compare it to, either.
So, that leads me to say that anyone who is coming to the franchise completely fresh: you probably won't hate this. It's a worthy pit stop in your Baldur's Gate journey. Now, onward to 2!
Coming from Baldur's Gate 1, Siege of Dragonspear feels like a really high quality continuation with a lot of setpieces and moments of charming writing, which wasn't at all what I expected from all of the backlash I've seen. It isn't perfect by any means, but it's a really fun time, and I don't regret having played it whatsoever. I don't have the experience of Baldur's Gate 2 to compare it to, either.
So, that leads me to say that anyone who is coming to the franchise completely fresh: you probably won't hate this. It's a worthy pit stop in your Baldur's Gate journey. Now, onward to 2!
2023
Decent graphics and interesting critter design is unfortunately not enough to save Garten of Banban from the limitations of poor design that undercut everything it tries to do, every step of the way. If it isn't running into invisible walls during dire chases, it's struggling to get the drone to land properly in the hitbox of the buttons.
2023
Although it improves upon its predecessor tremendously, the amateur nature of Garten of Banban II's development still overshadows just about everything the game does well despite an ambitious desire clearly poking through the seams. This series is begging for someone with a better directorial sense to take over and really bring it to the fullest potential. That all being said, certain scenes in this are super promising and show that perhaps this could get somewhere if it really wanted to, at least as a spooky experience somewhat like a nightmare.
2019
I have never played a game that has brought tabletop gaming to life as much as Disco Elysium. Truly a remarkable game, and the beginning of something that I think will go on to become even more mindblowing as budgets and ambition increase. One of the freshest games in years.
Naughty Dog's most superb game, with memorable, complex characters in a somewhat basic but still fleshed out post-apocalyptic world that also happens to be pure eyecandy, dazzlingly beautiful is an understatement. This is just about everything I would want a sequel to the first game to be, taking a few gambles that ultimately pay off, but unfortunately is hindered by a feeling of long-windedness through excruciating combat encounters that eventually begin to feel grating despite excellent and very thoughtful game design.
2005
A great starter to a very beloved franchise, but has weak points that really bring it down, such as repetitive, long, grating load times. If you want to experience the same story, Kiwami is a much superior method of delivery, but if all you have is a PS2, or maybe if you're just a masochistic retro devotee, it's still a very fun way to spend some tens of hours.
2009
The "beach episode" of the Like a Dragon franchise is a relaxing slow burn with an emotional plot and surprisingly tender moments. I wouldn't say that it goes as hard as it's predecessor, 2, and some may find that a detriment, but I think it's still a great entry and a worthy chapter in the saga of Kazuma Kiryu.
2006
Of the games in the franchise that I've played at the time of writing this review (all of 1-4 and some of Kenzan, 5, 0, and Judgment), this one probably has my favorite story. A title that improves upon its predecessor in every possible way, and features a gripping, complex plot that I think can stand toe-to-toe with the obvious hard-boiled Japanese and Chinese crime flicks that clearly influenced it.
I have yet to play Kiwami 2, but I do feel the need to mention that it exists, for those who have not experienced 2 yet and are considering it. It might be better, I dunno.
I have yet to play Kiwami 2, but I do feel the need to mention that it exists, for those who have not experienced 2 yet and are considering it. It might be better, I dunno.
The original Mafia is one of my favorite games. I spent so many childhood hours driving around Lost Heaven, admiring the incredible attention to detail and generally adoring the game's more in-depth approach to what was a newer style of game at the time, widely popularized only a year before with the groundbreaking smash hit Grand Theft Auto III.
What I appreciated the most was the dedication to realism: you could be pulled over for speeding or running a red light. The missions all felt like bigger deals, with a larger story context wrapping them essentially into the narrative, and characters that felt much more rooted into the world surrounding it, keeping it grounded. I always dreamed that the game would be remade someday, or something else made following in its footsteps. It is now 2020, and it seems someone in a boardroom somewhere has decided, "Gee, we should remake Mafia. But I don't think we should change the experience that much, more just port it over to our new engine and remake the assets, and maybe flesh it out a little bit. Not too much though. We don't want to change the experience. It should be a remaster, not a reimagining."
And therein lies the problem of Mafia: Definitive Edition. Moments throughout seem soulful, even the city can be gorgeous to look at from time to time, but the game shies away from taking the final step it needs to make this entry stand out. It sticks TOO closely to the blueprint outlined by the original, a game made when the technology available to developers was vastly different, and never manages to really WOW you as a result. At times, it feels like a stop-gap, as if it was done specifically and only so that a "Mafia Trilogy" SKU was possible, but then every once in a while you get something that really makes you see the possibilities of what could have been if only the game had gone a bit further.
I realize that I may be asking too much of a remake of an 18 year old game, but I just don't see much of a reason for this remake to exist. It's a fun game to plow through during a weekend with not much else to do, but you will forget about it immediately. Although it tries to expand upon the characters in a lot of ways (and occasionally succeeds), by the end I felt the relationship between the characters was something I couldn't really feel whatsoever. Mafia 2's characters and city had infinitely more charm and felt infinitely more alive. And when I try to go back to my memories of the original, it may just be because I was young and because the lower fidelity left more to the imagination, but I don't remember the game coming off to me this way at all. Something is missing here, but I can't put my finger on it.
As far as what to expect from the game as a newcomer: Mafia is a fairly short and linear third person open world-style game in which you play through a somewhat generic but ultimately captivating Mafia story, working your way up through the ranks from your introduction to the criminal underworld as a cab driver all the way to pulling off regular Mafia hijinx with ease.
The game can be completed in about fifteen hours, and it isn't too difficult. I played a lot of the game on Classic difficulty, save for the relatively infamous Race, which I decided to bump down after realizing I did not have the patience to do the race over and over until I finally got first place. No one has any time for that.
What else? The mission variety is solid. The voice acting leaves something to be desired. The moment-to-moment gameplay is inoffensive but somewhat bland. The music is utterly forgettable. The graphics can sometimes be gorgeous for a second but never really "come alive" the way it does in the 2nd and I kinda wanna argue the original.
The story unfortunately doesn't really end as well as it could, mostly due to not selling the relationships between the characters as I said before, and ends up feeling underwhelming even though I knew every story beat coming up. All of those beats could be kept, as far as I'm concerned, but the lack of spirit and gusto in execution really kills this game. It would have really benefited even from a handful of new missions designed to give even more context to the characters and world. There are very FEW moments of camaraderie within this title. We get all kinds of extra lines and scenes that give us new insights into the characters that didn't exist before, but we never have any larger content that takes advantage of those details or creates a bulk of new ones, so it gets stuck in that middle ground of "it almost went for it, but it didn't quite get there" and that sucks just about all the excitement out of it, like being handed a present on Christmas in a box that weighs like something you want, then you open it and there's just a weight and some crumpled pieces of paper.
Would love to see either a reboot that goes all the way, a Mafia 4 that returns to the 20s/30s as a setting, or the franchise to be passed off to a new team. I am very thankful this game does not have any repetitive busywork crammed in like Mafia 3, and hope they continue down this path. I think revisiting Mafia was probably a good exercise and hopefully will give inspiration for whatever is next, but these games have started to feel a bit "Ubisoft-y", which for me is a bad thing.
Why create such a beautiful recreation of this city if you're not going to do anything that makes it come to life? What is this game's greater raison d'être? Other than bringing in some funding and maybe a nostalgic revisit of a classic title, in terms of anything that would make this game a worthy piece of art, I don't think it has one.
Do I recommend buying Mafia: Definitive Edition? Personally, even with my undying love of the game as a childhood masterpiece, I only recommend this one on sale for $15 or lower. That's just how the cookie crumbles, I guess. Here's to hoping we get either a sequel trying to follow this line of thinking over Mafia 3's, or another remake of this in 15+ more years.
What I appreciated the most was the dedication to realism: you could be pulled over for speeding or running a red light. The missions all felt like bigger deals, with a larger story context wrapping them essentially into the narrative, and characters that felt much more rooted into the world surrounding it, keeping it grounded. I always dreamed that the game would be remade someday, or something else made following in its footsteps. It is now 2020, and it seems someone in a boardroom somewhere has decided, "Gee, we should remake Mafia. But I don't think we should change the experience that much, more just port it over to our new engine and remake the assets, and maybe flesh it out a little bit. Not too much though. We don't want to change the experience. It should be a remaster, not a reimagining."
And therein lies the problem of Mafia: Definitive Edition. Moments throughout seem soulful, even the city can be gorgeous to look at from time to time, but the game shies away from taking the final step it needs to make this entry stand out. It sticks TOO closely to the blueprint outlined by the original, a game made when the technology available to developers was vastly different, and never manages to really WOW you as a result. At times, it feels like a stop-gap, as if it was done specifically and only so that a "Mafia Trilogy" SKU was possible, but then every once in a while you get something that really makes you see the possibilities of what could have been if only the game had gone a bit further.
I realize that I may be asking too much of a remake of an 18 year old game, but I just don't see much of a reason for this remake to exist. It's a fun game to plow through during a weekend with not much else to do, but you will forget about it immediately. Although it tries to expand upon the characters in a lot of ways (and occasionally succeeds), by the end I felt the relationship between the characters was something I couldn't really feel whatsoever. Mafia 2's characters and city had infinitely more charm and felt infinitely more alive. And when I try to go back to my memories of the original, it may just be because I was young and because the lower fidelity left more to the imagination, but I don't remember the game coming off to me this way at all. Something is missing here, but I can't put my finger on it.
As far as what to expect from the game as a newcomer: Mafia is a fairly short and linear third person open world-style game in which you play through a somewhat generic but ultimately captivating Mafia story, working your way up through the ranks from your introduction to the criminal underworld as a cab driver all the way to pulling off regular Mafia hijinx with ease.
The game can be completed in about fifteen hours, and it isn't too difficult. I played a lot of the game on Classic difficulty, save for the relatively infamous Race, which I decided to bump down after realizing I did not have the patience to do the race over and over until I finally got first place. No one has any time for that.
What else? The mission variety is solid. The voice acting leaves something to be desired. The moment-to-moment gameplay is inoffensive but somewhat bland. The music is utterly forgettable. The graphics can sometimes be gorgeous for a second but never really "come alive" the way it does in the 2nd and I kinda wanna argue the original.
The story unfortunately doesn't really end as well as it could, mostly due to not selling the relationships between the characters as I said before, and ends up feeling underwhelming even though I knew every story beat coming up. All of those beats could be kept, as far as I'm concerned, but the lack of spirit and gusto in execution really kills this game. It would have really benefited even from a handful of new missions designed to give even more context to the characters and world. There are very FEW moments of camaraderie within this title. We get all kinds of extra lines and scenes that give us new insights into the characters that didn't exist before, but we never have any larger content that takes advantage of those details or creates a bulk of new ones, so it gets stuck in that middle ground of "it almost went for it, but it didn't quite get there" and that sucks just about all the excitement out of it, like being handed a present on Christmas in a box that weighs like something you want, then you open it and there's just a weight and some crumpled pieces of paper.
Would love to see either a reboot that goes all the way, a Mafia 4 that returns to the 20s/30s as a setting, or the franchise to be passed off to a new team. I am very thankful this game does not have any repetitive busywork crammed in like Mafia 3, and hope they continue down this path. I think revisiting Mafia was probably a good exercise and hopefully will give inspiration for whatever is next, but these games have started to feel a bit "Ubisoft-y", which for me is a bad thing.
Why create such a beautiful recreation of this city if you're not going to do anything that makes it come to life? What is this game's greater raison d'être? Other than bringing in some funding and maybe a nostalgic revisit of a classic title, in terms of anything that would make this game a worthy piece of art, I don't think it has one.
Do I recommend buying Mafia: Definitive Edition? Personally, even with my undying love of the game as a childhood masterpiece, I only recommend this one on sale for $15 or lower. That's just how the cookie crumbles, I guess. Here's to hoping we get either a sequel trying to follow this line of thinking over Mafia 3's, or another remake of this in 15+ more years.
A fantastic new entry in the series, with a great, intimate, fresh vibe that will surprise and delight both classic and new fans alike, but it runs a little bit leaner than it should.
2020
Tell Me Why manages to deliver boldly as an attempt at telling a touching, intimate story with nuance and careful representation that successfully removes the constant eye rolling (something I enjoyed, but something I'm also fine with letting go of because this shit, right here, is the kind of thing that is going to push the medium forward so that it actually can stand toe to toe with other, more aged mediums) that accompanied DONTNOD's previous efforts.
Although the main quest feels ultimately forgettable, XIV succeeds at being the ultimate time-waster game, a kind of meditation of tasks just monotonous enough that you can pull up a podcast or listen to some tunes without missing much, but just engaging enough that you're willing to sit there in this state and suddenly the day's turned to night and back to day again and that's it, that's the real MMO experience, that's the good stuff.
2008
Wow!!! Kara no Shoujo is such a massive step up from Cartagra, though I don't regret playing its predecessor (as there were multiple moments where playing it gave me a little extra somethin-somethin). Everything is better. Better characters, better story, better art, better gameplay that actually has you investigating and, more importantly, gives you the opportunity to get things wrong and watch how that plays out, which is something I almost NEVER see... this is considered one of the best VNs out there, and for good reason. Yes, you have to wade through a lot of offputting sexual and grotesque violent content (and a lot of it mashes the two up, which is disgusting), but I think the overall experience makes it worth it. My biggest complaint really is that the ending lacks that big "holy shit" climax that Cartagra and most other VNs have (though it does have multiple "holy shit" moments throughout the narrative that more than make up for it), instead opting to set up for the sequel. Still, you can't really go wrong with this one. Probably the best mystery VN that I've played thus far. 7/10.
WHAT. A. GAME. This is probably THE best mystery VN I've played, and that's been pretty much exclusively the type of VN I've liked to play for over a decade now, so seriously, WOW! KnS2 is a bit difficult at first, given how it decides to drop everything after a major cliffhanger and go for introducing a massive new cast in a flashback that feels as if it continues forever, but STICK WITH IT. Outside of the sex scenes which I always find gratuitous and annoying in VNs, every detail finds a way to be important, and you end up with a complex weave of mysteries that will surprise you with just how intriguing they are. As much as I loved the first game, this is a step up in every way. Waiting for the final episode to get an English translation is going to be a nightmare, let me tell you hwhat...