Football for the 2600 is... unknowable. The teams are seemingly comprised of cars with feet. After throwing the ball, it becomes the controlled playable character until it is caught. On defense, pressing the single Atari controller button seems to make your defenders flee from the opposing team. There is allegedly a way to plan your blocking formation before each play, but I couldn't for the life of me figure it out. And there's a clearly marked first down line, but I found no indication that the game counts downs at all.

EDIT: After more time playing, I discovered it does count downs, but it will flip possession seemingly at random well before a fourth down, leading to the initial confusion. It might be poor interception/fumble detection??

Truly a marvel, will play again with my kids. The game is broken. We had a blast.

This is as simple as a 1v1 sports game could ever be, yet similarly to the NES title Ice Hockey (which would release a full decade later), there's delightful competition to be found in the simplicity. The ability to steal the ball from the other player is crucial, and creates a manic back-and-forth which is nearly as fun as realizing that you can make baskets from the top or bottom of the court despite not being remotely lined up with the basket. There is no depth of field, and there is no depth of mechanics, but that effectively means the game is what you make it.

My son and I got SO LOUD playing this. We'll be coming back to this one for a long time.

Did you ever read Redwall books as a kid?

Tails of Iron absolutely RIPS. What an incredible little adventure! I didn't expect it to be what it was, and only tried it because it was a PS Plus monthly game. It's not a full-blown Metroidvania, but it borrows enough from the genre that, when combined with its solid combat-focused gameplay, it scratched the Silksong itch quite nicely.

I loved the setting and aesthetic, the art is perfectly grotty and messy, with rats, frogs, bugs, and moles cleaving heads and covering each other in viscera. The narration is also incredibly well-done, reminding me a lot of Bastion. Everything works together beautifully to create a compelling experience from start to finish, as you fight off invaders in your kingdom and rebuild what they've destroyed. The narration does a great job of describing everything from the rat protagonist's POV, and I couldn't have been more engrossed by the end.

Playing on PS5 was the right move as well, as the game makes great use of the Dualsense's adaptive triggers, and allows map navigation via the touch controls. I was a little annoyed by the rumble, however, as the intensity doesn't differentiate between getting struck by a massive boss or landing after a standing jump. But that was honestly my only negative of the entire experience, and at just under 5 hours to 100%, I wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who enjoys challenging combat.

Tren levels that took me over 30 minutes to get Gold rank on:

Long Tren Runnin - Hauling 14 cars through a course filled with swinging cranes and obstacles. No other level in the game exemplifies the balance between speed and not losing cargo better than this one.

The Infinite Track - Procedurally generated survival level. There are two of these in the game, but the first was far more difficult. You're being chased by spikey cars that will kill you if they catch you. Boost too much and have to wait for it to recharge? Dead. Hesitate for a spilt-second with a track switch? Dead. Get an unfair batch of randomly-selected modules without enough breathing room to get ahead of the death train? Believe it or not, dead.

Magnetic Attraction - What if a train was Spider-Man and had to spiderclimb all over a bunch of crazy tracks but also there were spikes everywhere

All About the Bolts - Arguably the best track in the game. It's filled with teeter-totter tracks that you have to manipulate in order to use them as ramps, and when you finally nail it, it's euphoric. Never unfair, this track requires all the skill you've built up throughout the game. Phenomenal stuff.

What a fantastic physics-based puzzle game! It is absolutely worth downloading Dreams just for this. I can't recommend it enough.

Look, Celery.

I'm sorry, but... I have to let you go.

I was immediately smitten with you from the start. The way you talked about food and flavors and how you could taste with your ears left me breathless. I laughed and curled my disgusting rat tail when you talked about your berry-infused hats. And when you tasted me with those ears... My heart was racing.

We made some incredible memories together. And that's what makes this so difficult. We could have been something truly special together, but... you've changed. You once were a passionate rat, eager to share your love of hear-eating with those around you, but you've grown cold. Pretentious. Maybe even a little full of yourself. I didn't feel valued anymore. I just can't be with someone who lacks humility.

I'm sorry.

Also there's this ghost rat and I'm kind of morally obligated to propose to her so she can finally move on to the afterlife, I'm sure you understand

Hoa is (1.) a stunning display of artistry, breathtaking in its peaceful simplicity, but also (2.) underbaked and boring and I don't like it.

If you've looked at any screenshots or footage, you'll already have thought "huh, big Ghibli vibes here", so we'll just skip that part. Beneath the lush, cozy art style lies an extremely basic rough draft of a game. Across 8 small "worlds" (if we can call them that), you control a cute lil triangle baby who catches butterflies to wake up giant creatures, each of whom remembers you from when you were an even smaller baby.

In practice, this is sort of like the most basic Metroidvania imaginable, with a map containing decent verticality, a small number of collectibles/currency in each area (we're talking single digits), 4 or 5 earned abilities that allow you to progress, aaaaaand that's it. Beyond the music and visuals, I truly mean it when I say NOTHING compelling occurs in Hoa. Bland, combat-less platforming leads to sparse, spread-out collectibles which lead to awkward and vague dialogue with the big critters which leads to a baffling ending sequence.

[Structural spoilers from this point on, but no story details:]

After the game stops repeating gameplay, you observe a fairly long chase sequence which would have been the most engaging part of the game, but for some reason you aren't allowed to participate. (Severe Halo 5 cutscene energy) This is followed by what could be a dream sequence or some sort of limbo maybe?? I tried looking up what it was supposed to mean and couldn't find a legitimate answer anywhere, only encountering theorizing redditors, most as confounded as I was. Then instead of giving any closure, the final cutscene shows events from before the game; events which have already been related to us by the big magic animals along the way.

If you've ever been on a date with someone you were incredibly attracted to, but after an hour realized "there is absolutely nothing going on beneath the surface with this person", eventually ending the evening in a deflated state of stupor, that's what it feels like to play Hoa.