Immaculate vibes, man!

I will always have New Leaf as my preferred Animal Crossing game, but after playing this for a bit I really respect the origins of the series. Sure, its more simple, more rough around the edges. But that makes it interesting! It may not have the endless content of New Leaf, but its got a unique feel, I respect that.

I will definitely be playing this more. I may write more detailed thoughts once I play a lot more.

A game directed by Hideaki Itsuno, I should really like it, but I don't.

I'm honestly baffled as to all the praise this game gets, especially regarding its combat. I found it very clunky, unresponsive and not really complex. I've played a number of Action RPGs, and you can't tell me this is one of the better examples of combat in the genre. It's especially disappointing coming from the director of Devil May Cry 3 and 4, which have some of the best combat in any game ever.

One of the main gimmicks of this game is climbing onto huge monsters, which is apparently a feature first introduced in Shadow of the Colossus. Now, I've not played Shadow of the Colossus, but I have seen this feature in another game - Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. I didn't like it there, and I don't like it here. I don't really see why people find it exciting to turn a boss fight into a slow and tedious platforming section. It's awkward and frustrating, as the camera keeps shifting and altering your directional controls, and the monster keeps throwing you off before you manage to reach the head. In addition, if you play as a mage (which is the mistake I made on my first attempt), this feature is completely lost on you, because you're a ranged and vulnerable class that should stay away from the enemies and can shoot them in the head from a distance.

I mean, that's kinda a half-truth, because you can't really aim with your regular attack as a mage. Only with your skills, which it takes forever to cast. That is if your button presses register, which they might not, because the controls and animations are so ass. You have to hold down Ctrl or Alt and then click one of the mouse buttons (and hold it? Sometimes? I'm not sure tbh), and the skill ends up being cast when you release Ctrl or Alt, not when you release the mouse button. This is incredibly counter-intuitive. And because the animations are so long and can't be cancelled, sometimes you press Ctrl/Alt right after you released it but before the animation is done, and your character just ends up standing there. And you're just waiting for like a second for him to do something, because you can't tell whether the button press wasn't registered or it's just the animation taking up so long, or perhaps he ran out of stamina again, which he does constantly.

I hated stamina in Diablo 2, like most people, and could never understand its point in action-RPGs. I suppose here it functions as a sort of mana substitute. Except, the problem is, it's wasted on sprinting and blocking as well. What this essentially means is that ever action, aside from your standard attack, requires mana. And, I might be wrong about this, but I didn't see any way to tie potions to hotkeys. I have to go into the [extremely inconvenient] inventory in the midst of a battle, because my character needs a rest after every action, like he's 80 years old. Especially after blocking an enemy attack, leaving you vulnerable to a second attack.

But out of the three classes, it seems only the warrior can block enemy attacks, which is detrimental to the flow of combat. Every hit stuns you for a moment, making you unable to retaliate or break the enemy's attack-chain, and some hits knock you down, which will take you another couple of seconds to get up, during which your character doesn't respond to any button presses. If you're a magician, it's even worse, because your own attacks leave you immovable as well. You're a ranged class that can neither aim nor move while shooting. Which means you get hit and knocked down even more, which makes the whole gameplay extremely frustrating.

Kinda had more fun as a scout, who is more nimble and can actually aim and move when shooting arrows. Replayed the same portion of the game and a little more, and was surprised to run into all the exact same enemies. I kinda thought I had this many fights because I strayed away from the road (which the game warns you not to stray from), but no, you're still ambushed by enemies like every 30 seconds. And these are mostly the same types of enemies: bandits and wolves, and they're fought in the same way every time.

So after 3 boss battles and a shit ton of random encounters, you'd think there'd be some downtime for RPGing and stuff, but nope, an escort mission. I tried to force myself to play through it and died by accidentally falling off a cliff, and that's when I finally gave up. And while this death was totally on me, the level geometry in this game is pretty bizarre in general. There was a moment earlier where I slid down from a tiny hill, and then couldn't climb back up. It was about a 50 degree angle, only about a meter long, even a child could've climbed it, but not my character.

I can't really comment much on the RPG aspects of this game, but in my short time with it I barely encountered any. I leveled up a bunch of times and purchased one skill, but that is all. The game never offered me to manage stats or created a necessity to manage loot. Perhaps I missed something because I was skipping the majority of the tutorial pop-ups, but they were so goddamn annoying. 90% of the time the things they tell you are either obvious or something you had already figured out just by circumstances. Can't really say I cared about the story either. There was a bunch of generic fantasy exposition dumped on me, but I did not notice anything interesting.

I found the graphics ugly too, despite the fact they're using the same engine as Devil May Cry 4, which is a gorgeous game.

There were exactly 2 things I liked about this game: the customization and the music. That's it. Nothing else.

A modern masterpiece

Just finished the game about 30 minutes ago and I am just left speechless by everything I had just experienced. Never in my many years of waiting for Alan Wake 2 did I ever think this would be the sequel we receive. Everything about Alan wake 2 is handled to perfection which is why I believe this game will go down in history as one of the best ever in its genre. Not only is it an achievement for its genre it is now my GOTY.


A mind boggling story

This game is a trip from start to finish , every second oozing with aesthetic and brilliant storytelling. I would like to go into details on what makes this journey so brilliant but this is very much best played without knowing anything. Moving on , the cast is great from Alan , Saga to Casey with even some surprise characters showing up. I will take this quick moment to really recommend fans to play through Control if you would like to understand even more of the lore. Beyond that , I also recommend a replay through of Alan wake 1 as it would really make things a lot more coherent with 2. I will just leave the story part at that because you simply need to experience this game with as little information as you can but just know its an amazing story that will surely be diagnosed for years to come.

I will not be getting into ANY of the story bits in this review as I never do for games that are best played blind. Just experience this jaw dropping, mind twisting and mind blowing journey for yourself and you will understand why this story was masterfully crafted.



A beautiful looking adventure

Furthermore, the graphics are beautiful, the game just looks amazing on the PS5 so I can only imagine how it must have looked maxed out with 4K on PC. Many times throughout my playthrough I just saw myself looking at the scenery during the daytime and it was always magical.


Scary

This game nails the atmosphere, really giving itself a perfect creepy vibe. One aspect I wasn’t too much of a fan of was the constant jumpscares you will experience in specific sections. It can be scary but most of the time it just serves as a way to annoy me. Besides the jumpscares I genuinely found the game unsettling and creepy which is very rare for a game to accomplish for me nowadays. There were many times I would be creeped out traversing certain sections since the game always made you wonder about what could be down that hallway. It's simple tactics like that that will really give you the creeps as you make your way through the game. The story itself is just as unsettling and creepy in which once again I won’t get into so I just really hope you play it.

This game is true horror.

Gameplay

One of the more interesting aspects of Alan Wake 2 is its gameplay. Why? It's simple because there are many segments of the game where you won’t be doing much combat. I honestly really like this as it aids in really panning out its story more. Furthermore, it makes the moments you do engage in combat even more impactful and fun but this can be argued so just be aware you won’t always be in combat. The combat itself is very akin to Alan wake 1’s combat which is a good thing because I found it very fun. The big changes in the combat is through movement which is a lot more akin to RE4Rs movement. Dodging is fine but it can be a bit wonky against certain enemies but for the most part it was passable. The enemy variety is pretty basic sadly but I really liked the designs on them but be aware there isn’t a big pool of enemy types there are only a few types you will be battling against. Playing on hard difficulty the game provided a fair enough challenge but honestly wasn’t too tough if you are good about managing the resources you get. One of the more welcome editions this game has is how open and exploration centric the game is. It will not hold your hand and give you markers on the map telling you where you need to go. You will simply just look at your objective then look at the map to see where the spot you need to go is and on the way find collectibles. Speaking of collectibles there are multiple to look for in this game from Puzzles, lunch boxes to supply stashes. It is highly recommended to be on the lookout as all 3 collectible types will give you very useful resources. If you plan on 100% the game I HIGHLY recommend making save points near the end of the game so you have a save file to go back to. This can come back and bite you in the ass because once you hit a certain point you will not be able to explore the sections freely forcing you to replay the whole game again if you want to collect everything. The gameplay feels second to the story and I was 100% fine with that because the story of Alan wake 2 is phenomenal but the gameplay we do get here is very fun and combat that I hope is explored more in its DLCs this game will be receiving.


Some Issues sadly

I hate to have to bring up some issues I have with this game because I do think it's a perfect game….. But it has some issues. Luckily the issues I have with this game do NOT have anything to do with the core game, it's only with its performance. Playing on the PS5 version I experienced many frame drops and bugs and glitches throughout the game's run time. Glitches ranging from characters model glitching out all the way to soft locking the game forcing a game restart its moments like these that will set you back a bit. Picking up items can sometimes freeze your whole screen for a few moments making you wonder if the game crashed or not lol. Hell I even got audio bugs that would quite frankly bug all sound effects only leaving environment sounds to be heard. It is frustrating because the glitches happen more than they should have and I can only hope they iron out these bugs and issues with patches.

in the end

Usually I would have knocked this down half a score for all the bugs but Alan Wake 2 is truly a masterpiece. This game is an achievement in every aspect that should be played by ALL horror fans. Easily my GOTY currently and I really don’t see that changing now for this year. I would gladly wait 13 years for sequels of games if this the quality we will get over getting the garbage we usually get now.

100% recommend at full price.

"Why does everyone hate me?"

Louisiana hothouse horror meets a black comedy snuff film - rightfully a revelation when it came out, if not the masterpiece I was led to believe. Enemy design still sucks as much as the last game, get used to fighting a bunch of generic unicolored blobs again! If I have to play one more zombie game that does the whole "there's the normal one, the fat one, and the fast one!" thing again I'm going to be pissed. Plus the F.E.A.R. knockoff stuff here is largely hit-or-miss for me, feeling contrived even at its best. But where this thing really sails imo are in its deeply haunting themes of lower-class suffering at the hands of governmental incompetence - being chewed up, spit out, and ultimately discarded entirely for serving your exact purpose to the best of your abilities. Its undertones of having your desires warped into physical mutations and violent outward expressions, having no choice but to see them as gifts in order to cope with simply existing are just brutal - even in spite of its poorly implemented "choose-your-own-ending" misfire placed insecurely onto the end of them (only one is canon anyway, and the other one sucks). Plot twist is amazing though, genuinely pulled the rug out from under me right in plain sight. It's got eye-popping graphics and memorable characters (Jack Baker > Mr. X). All its DLCs are necessary imo, and add a great deal to this. Even as a staunch Resident Evil 6 defender, this really was the course correction the series needed badly at this time - balances scares, laughs, texture, and action very well. Plus this new engine runs like a dream. I have my gripes but it's a damn fine game. "You're about to see something wonderful." Jesus Christ I hope not..

First time I played Touhou, loved all of it, from the mechanics to the ost ( which is phenomenal ).

Gameplay is your classic bullet hell shmup but I feel as if it's more elegant than the classic arcade one, the bullets are also a bit slower than what I played before ( I feel so, might be wrong ), you can survive most of it on pure skills without learning patterns and that's mainly why I enjoyed it, because it's pleasant to play and doesn't feel too unfair ( depending on the patterns .... )

It doesn't have the QOL of Perfect Cherry Blossom but I don't really mind it as the game is still fully playable without it.

A good place to start Touhou ?

To get the obvious out of the way, this isn't a good Devil May Cry game and the writing in general trying to make the characters edgelords made going through the story a little hard in places.
There are other decisions which were questionable, like Dante's redesign making him look more akin to a highschool jock. And not to mention the game's ending. That came out of nowhere and was a travesty.
There also were some occasionally annoying camera angles which made things a little frustrating. Luckily, most of them were only present in mission 17.
Although it happend rarely, enemies got stuck in certain places and that make a few combat segments a little awkward.
Then there was the issue of being able to accumulate a high amount of style points simply by button mashing, which indirectly discouraged coming up with cool combos and sticking to more basic moves instead.


With that said, if you can ignore that this game is called Devil May Cry and try to treat it as its own thing, it's pretty enjoyable gameplay-wise. I personally had a pretty good time at least.

You have a pretty good variety of weapons and the game throws new stuff at you pretty often, which means it never gets monotonous.
Some weapons might not be your thing and that's alright, as you can, in most instances, remove weapon upgrades from one weapon and place them on another if you don't quite enjoy what you invested in.
While the overall combat isn't as deep as one might be accustomed to from this series (don't expect to be making that DMC5 combo video we all saw in this game) there are still some pretty neat things you can do with all the weapon variety.

The Overall level design is good. Areas, more often than not, have some pretty cool set pieces and visually look good.
Opinions, from what I've read, seem to be mixed on the platforming sections but I personally enjoyed them.
Bosses also felt fun to play against.

Overall, not a good DMC game, but a good game( though still with a bad story) when you try not to pay attention to the franchise it belong to. You could say that that puts it in the category of games like Quake 4 and Doom 3, in a way.

Started the Mega Man Legacy Collection since I saw it was on sale on Steam during the Fall sale. Remembered really liking this game and loving 2, but I didn't remember too much of this one, so how is it now replaying it? Well, I had a blast with this one! Sure some of the stages have really annoying segments (looking at you Ice Man), but the game has a difficulty level that I really like personally. It's still really difficult but it has enough simplicity to the point where I can think "yeah this is possible." The only issue I have is that most of the weapons here don't really feel too good to use. For instance, the Super Arm feels way too niche since it's only really used in the third Wily Fortress and against Cut Man. That or the weapons just don't feel too good to use like the Hyper Bomb or Fire Storm (I still like Fire Storm I just never felt like I needed to use it outside of a few moments). I mainly used the Mega Buster, Rolling Cutter, and Thunder Beam and only used the others when I needed to. Overall, I'd say for a starting point of an old series, this is actually really damn good even if it's not perfect.

Wow, this game perfectly exemplifies perfectly how level design affects gameplay.

I love Devil May Cry. This love is very similar to what the average Star Wars fan feels (loves SW, but hates 90 percent of the content about it). I love the combat, the interactions and the characters, I'm in love with Dante and Nero. The problem with DMC starts right there, everything beyond that is very mediocre. The story is pretty functional, it has its epic moments and all, the villain is pretty cool and Nero's objective is pretty coherent. Ironically, the biggest flaw is the gameplay.

Half the game is literally the same as the other half. You walk through the same scenarios, fight the same bosses and do the same things twice, once as Nero, once as Dante. This problem goes far beyond the terrible level design (which is already standard in the franchise), all the enemies seem to have been designed exclusively for Nero, to the point that facing them as Dante is even awkward.

Problems aside, I had a lot of fun playing the game, and my complaints are tiny compared to how much I love the combat and the characters in this game.