DyslexicAlucard said:

I guess I should update this. I'm not at home, so I may miss something, but I've now also completed:

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow 2
Assassin's Creed: Syndicate
Bayonetta

Still need to finish Mad Max and DQVIII. I'm kinda putting them off because I don't want them to end, haha.

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Just finished INSIDE last night and... man, that ending.

Also closing in on the Stanley Cup in NHL 17, so I'll consider that title "complete" when I finish the season.

This is a Stealth game where you are given missions to infiltrate an area or compound and either take down a specific target or, as stealthly as you can, complete a set of objectives which are mainly to collect 2 or 3 items or some such.
The game suffers from irritating long loading times, which I think is because it is a Cry Engine game and loading all that data takes a while. This bothered me a lot esp. when I'd fail in a mission then I'd have to wait some 10 seconds to retry. At least the checkpoint system was lenient from time to time.
I oveall quite enjoyed it, but I settled for beating the main game and didn't do any of the side stuff, which I feel would've unlocked some of the better sniper rifles.

This is a PnC Adventure game where you investigate a murder in a swamp. The game has some nice animations and voice acting, though the overall puzzles are pretty easy.
Non the less I enjoyed my time with the game and it is a nice light game to play through.

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Decided to go back and replay this lovely Arcade beat'em-up from Konami. The game is based on an X-men cartoon pilot featuring an Aussie voiced Wolverine.
I loved playing this game back in the day in arcades, but we never got far. I am of course playing the PS3 ver. in this case as I had gotten it on release years ago (it is delisted now)
My go to character is Colossus, mainly because his Mutant Power has him yell 'OWWWAAAAAAGH!' while posing heroically. The MP only deals damage to enemies around him but it's fun just hearing him yell it.
Nightcrawler is my 2nd fav. and likely my first favourite X-Men character, he just looked cool to me. Helps that he has a cool looking MP in this game too and one that hits all enemies on screen.

People who have completed the challenge will be posted here, please remember to send me a PM once you’re done!

Tizoc

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#20: BYE-BYE BOXBOY!: 9.6 hours

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So I actually finished this game on the 27th of April and forgot to write it up. While that seems damning I actually enjoyed this final entry in the trilogy more than the other two, which I quite liked. This game adds more than the second game, which mostly focused on how being able to summon two sets of boxes interacted with the existing mechanics. This entry is constantly throwing new mechanics at you and it's better for it. The Boxboy concept honestly doesn't really lend itself very well to complicated puzzles and adding more mechanics is a good way to keep things fresh. Though like the previous ones this game still doesn't really fully develop them until the post-game worlds. Some of the new mechanics take the form of special boxes (rockets, bombs, etc) and that's a space the series hasn't explored before so that feels really nice too. All in all the series goes out on a high note but the games are all pretty interchangeable.

#21: Professor Layton and the Lost Future: 11.9 hours

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Not much to say here, it's another Layton game that follows the same general structure as the last two. It's good if you like the series, though the plot is a bit nonsense (even in the context of the other games.

Currently playing: I'm on Mission 7 of Dishonored 2, but I intend to play through it at least twice

This is a short PnC game with little dialog and mainly being puzzle based; you click on objects or characters in order to solve puzzles and progress through the game. It has some irritating click based puzzles where you need to click some stuff fast in order to progress, but otherwise it was a decent short game.

17. 9 Clues 2: The Ward (2 hours)
Another good hidden object game. Not much to say here.

Here's an update for me;

#14 Brandish: The Dark Revenant - Completed 4/4/17
#15 Persona 5 - Completed 4/13/17
#16 Kamiko - Completed 4/14/17
#17 Puyo Puyo Tetris - Completed 4/23/17
#18 The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky – the 3rd - Completed 5/6/17

Brandish - I've been sleeping on this one a while, I bought it on launch. Great game! It's pretty different as far as dungeon crawlers go, I'd definitely recommend it to get someone new to the genre acquainted.

Persona 5 - Loved it, I might have to go back to plat trophy it but man would that be a time sink!

Kamiko - This is the definition of short and sweet. I liked it, fun game, worth $5 Carrying keys is kinda annoying.

Puyo Puyo Tetris - Awesome, great, I love it. I was never really into either Puyo Puyo OR Tetris, but I've been having a fantastic time with this. Even after getting my review out I keep coming back to it. It's really at home on the Switch too.

Trails in the Sky - the 3rd - Fantastic send-off for Estelle and co. It feels like Falcom knew that anyone that had invested enough time into the franchise to get this far would have a bond to these characters so they went all the way with their backstories and some
really sentimental scenes that truly felt earned. I know folks seem to like SC better for the most part, but this game is easily my favorite of the bunch

OP

Game 15: The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (Switch) 03/03/17 - 07/05/17 110 Hours
This is my personal GOTY so far and I sure did take my sweet ass time playing and finishing it. Although I spent so much time playing it, I haven't 100% completed it as there are way too many collectables and I didn't do all the side quests but I did everything else you could in the game. I think I'll wait for the expansion packs/DLC to be released before I dive back into it and try to achieve 100%.

I've had this on my Vita for a while and went about to beat it. It's a decent Shmup but being that I am playing it on a tiny screen with dozens of bullets to dodge, it wasn't that easy an experience :V
Still I enjoyed playing it mainly because one of the characters is a dolphin flying a fighter jet

It has been a long while since I updated this(Thanks Persona 5) but I did nail two games since I last updated this.....



20) Donkey Kong Country 3(New 3DS) 3/27-3/31, Early April
(I lost the exact date of when this game was finished but it was a game I played throughout my train rides which is why I didn't finish this game so soon)

Well since getting myself a New 3DS, I owed it to myself to play all of the games of this iconic and amazing series so I felt like it was a must to conclude this series(At least the SNES games) by playing DKC3. It was a real good way to burn time on the train to and from work.

Now in comparison to the other two games, it doesn't have the same charm or appeal. I think the enemy designs are part of the reason which such needless and wacky choices like replacing the iconic Zinger with a Buzzer and the kremling overhauls which made them look uglier in this game. Another part of the reason is the needless reasons to overhaul to the duo attack(Such as not allowing Dixie to throw Kiddy which as much as that makes sense, very seldomly were there parts that opened because you threw Kiddy while as Dixie) and also the new DK Coin gimmick in this game. Unlike in DKC2 where you simply had to find and touch to get a DK Coin(very few exceptions to that) in this game you had to throw a barrel and time it right or projectile the barrel in a way to get the kremling to drop the coin.

I happened to think this was a case of if it wasn't broken don't fix it and I think that's really the theme of the game. By no means is it a bad game, I still enjoyed it and think it's still superb but of the big 3 games on the SNES but it's the worst of the three because they tried changes that I don't think were necessary. I would have been fine with a DKC2 similar enough game with very minor alterations but this game tried to put it's own print. Some of the gimmicks like the backwards controls were more of a nuisance more than anything else IMO.

I like that the bosses offered a challenge which the 1st 2 games very seldom provided and this game of the 3 was the most difficult for me so the challenge is much appreciated but playing this game after how much of a masterpiece DKC2 is.....is somewhat underwhelming.

Recommended: Yay or Nay

You know what, despite me sounding a bit pessimistic in my writeup of Donkey Kong Country 3, the game is still awesome and if you loved the 1st 2 games, you are going to still enjoy yourself for the couple of hours that this game provides but it is a drop off altogether from DKC2 but that speaks more so to how good DKC2 was. The game does try to be a bit different which to some is commendable for me I don't necessarily mind much of the same...........as long as the much of the same is quality which the 1st two games of this series were. The core gameplay is still there so it isn't a drastic dropoff but the few aforementioned reasons have this game 3rd in this series behind it's 1st 2 predecessors.



21) Gex: Enter the Gecko(PS3) 4/1-4/3, 5/1-5/3

It's tail time!

Ever play a game that the more you played of it, the more it just got on your nerves and you just began to laugh a lot of less each session you play of said game? This would be it for me.

Now don't get me wrong, the game has a lot of personality, I can't help but laugh at the one liners that Gex is throwing. They are so outdated and so 80's and 90's yet I get a good chunk of them that it's one of those they are so bad they are good sort of ordeals. So far the enemies have not given me fits but it's been more so Blindy vs the Camera throughout this game which is the root of the problem here: The Camera.

The camera is ridiculously obnoxious where you are routinely fighting against it which is quite of the norm for these types of games in the 90's but it is still nevertheless annoying. The most annoying thing of the camera is that there are jumps you need to make or else you have to start over from the beginning of the stage since there are no checkpoints in certain stages, thus making you start from the beginning. Thankfully the stages aren't too long themselves but it's still making me play 5-10 minutes of the same level again and again because the cameras do not cooperate with you as the player.

Another annoyance would be Gex's inconsistency to grab onto ledges, some parts he will make grabs as expected, and other parts he simply will not grab onto it even if you are hugging the platform, with you easily grazing the platform and falling down, sometimes to your death. The grabbing features will haunt you in some portions because it is practically death for floating & moving objects in the game as you continuously are in a grabbing the ledge motion due to the platforming rotating and it's 50/50 if you land on the platform or get thrown off. One of the last levels is the textbook definition of this frustration.

The reoccurance of level themes was a bit of a letdown though each level isn't the exact same but given this game is a 80's and 90's pop culture pokefest, I would have loved to have seen more level themes incorporated because the game does a nice job of poking at franchises like COPS, Looney Tunes, and Star Wars.

The game is a collectathon and you are required to replay the level two, sometimes three times to get the necessary red remotes that are at the end of a specific branched path which means you can never collect everything in one swoop, which can be a good and/or bad thing depending on how you view it. Without this gimmick, the game would have shaved off a couple of hours of it's overall length which is about 7 or so hours if you aren't going for every single item in the game. Me? I got all the red remotes but didn't play any of the 3 secret levels and I did not get every single optional silver remote but I would say I did enough to feel like I got through the game with tons done.

The bosses for the most part are easy and once you get their concepts down, can be taken down in mere minutes but the last boss is a pure RNG nightmare, you have to be lucky enough to be right at the vital switch in the final phase with it's last health or else it's a runaround and waste of time until you get such. Boss sucked and it was a 20+ minute time waster for me and I was able to breathe a sigh of relief to be done with that. Not sure who thought that was a good idea to give you mere seconds to be lucky enough to get near the necessary switch AND manipulate the boss to whack it(Which is a problem in itself since you have to be right next to the switch and often run the risk of getting whacked).

Recommended: Yay or Nay

This game reminds me of a Spielberg cartoon like Animaniacs, Freakazoid, Tiny Toons, Pinky and The Brain etc. Seems like a game that kids can easily enjoy and like but they have some puns and humor that older ages would also get and I happen to grow up with these cartoons so this game and series seems like something absolutely up my alley.

The American voice actor for Gex, Dana Gould does a terrific job with his celebrity impersonations that often got a chuckle out from me. Adam Sandler, SNL, Roseanne, Real World are not spared by this brilliance. Some of it still holds up oh so well, some of it might be outdated and some of it you have not a clue where it stems from but the tone and delivery of the lines are so good. This is Freakazoid/Deadpool esque so if you like that wacky type of craziness, you are going to absolutely love Gould's Gex. It saves the game in so many instances and it makes it worth playing to see all of these zany pop culture puns and one liners.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-17-qzIGslA
(It's worth linking here)

But games around this era like Banjo series and Mario 64 just do their craft so much better which is why I think there are other games that deserve your attention more than Gex. The game isn't bad and the humor will be real hit or miss for you so it isn't a total time waster but again it's a game as you keep playing, the lust and allure of the presentation run out and you're left with a frustratingly annoying game that repeats its jokes and levels one too many times.

70:23h. Maxed Lovers, Death, Chariot, Priestess, Sun, Moon, Hermit and Star. True Ending.

I don't really want to talk about this game because I would go in a rambling tangent. Suffice to say, it's my GOTY so far, and perhaps my game of the last 5 years. This is what all JRPGs should aspire to.

My Score: ✪ ✪ ✪ ✪ ✪

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17. Cosmic Cavern 3671 (Steam, 2017/04/15, 4.1 hours)

The background of this "arcade" game is pretty interesting. I've first noticed this gem on Steam's Greenlight. It looked like something from the Z80 era of arcade machines, reading the description turned my interest to 11. The original design was from a BASIC listing published in a Japanese computer magazine in the 80s. 6000 lines of code you could type into your MZ-80 (lol, it WAS a Z80 after all) to play this home-brew for free. The game gained lots of popularity, because its gameplay allowed a fair amount of creativity on "how to survive the longest" with sandbox like randomness. You have to protect your base from invading hostiles by digging a clever maze to slowdown the incoming threat and to reduce their numbers. There are some parallels to Dig Dug, Cosmic Cavern predates it by 2 years though. Fast forward 36 years and Cosmic Cavern was remixed and re-released with sprite work by Hiroshi Ono. Who made the pixel art for Dig Dug! Amazing how things went full circle. Cosmic Cavern and especially the "3671" remake are still a lot of fun. It's pretty much endless, score- and survival based. There's no finishing the game, so I marked this one as completed after getting 100% of the achievements.

18. INSIDE (Steam, 2017/04/22, 3.5 hours)

Perfect, this game is perfect. People who played Limbo will feel at home right away. Many similarities, INSIDE is also a side scrolling diorama with lots of platforming, physics and logic puzzles. The tone, premise, motivation and story do differ immensely. Playdead's new game is more mature, dystopian and bleaker. Moments of dark humor are still present though. The tech, powering the experience, also improved. The animation, and the physics of it, is on a whole new level. The visuals sport very little to no textures, but that's okay: lighting, spotlights and shadow casting are stars of the show. The audio design is mostly ambient and character driven. It's so effective, that I had to mute my DAC a couple of times. Just to check, if it was my heartbeat ringing inside my closed-back headphones. The flow of the gameplay is just a joy, INSIDE controls so well. Brilliant experience, which I will revisit for sure.

19. Gravity Rush 2 (PS4, 2017/04/30, 35 hours)

It's been a year since I've finished Gravity Rush Remastered, also at the end of March. The core gameplay wasn't changed much, especially at the beginning I was shocked by how little new there was. That first impression turned out to be false, new things just get introduced ... very ..... slowly. The rabbit hole goes deep, the universe got expanded massively, lots of new skills, new modifiers (talisman) system to further customize play style. The game sort of "forces" you to play till the end in order to see it all. I'm not complaining though, Gravity Rush 2 is a very rewarding experience from start to finish: so much story, character development and so many new places to explore. The sense of scale got upped, the world is more detailed and lively now. The dev team made good use of the PS4. The already stellar art direction was enhanced with tons of technical finesse. Objects break with proper physics, volumetric smoke, excellent use of particles are just a few examples. This game is a must for fans of the original, its continuation of the Kat story arc answers so many questions. They should have named it Gravity Rush - Part 2.

20. Shadow Warrior 2013 (Steam, 2017/05/07, 16.3 hours)

Flying Wild Hog know how to make wicked first person shooters. Shadow Warrior is one big party: corny 90s action movie plot, funny banter, bloody action, tons of guns, wicked katana melee and politically incorrect in the best possible way. They did such a great job on the technical side too. The game runs like a dream while being a looker. It's smooth, super smooth, no matter how crazy the mayhem and there's LOADS of mayhem. Can't wait to play Shadow Warrior 2.

[index]

OP

#9 Europa Universalis 4 campaign.



Conquered half of asia and knocked ming off their celestial throne as Japan after conquering burma and india as a powerbase, starting as a daimyo.
This patch of EU4 has some pretty severe balance issues so far in relation to ming, but overall the overhauls made to eastern religions and new daimyo idea sets were pretty awesome. AI being much more aggressive is also welcome.


#10 Stellaris

Played a shorter Stellaris game alongside the EU4 one.

It's getting there, peacetime gameplay has gotten a lot more engaging especially with how malleable societies can be across a campaign, but ultimately it still stumbles a bit with war frankly just not being fun enough for a strategy game of this scope.
Any large scale war is a slog to fight through, especially with blockade warscore not being much of a thing any more.


#11 Harvest Moon 64.



After having played RF4 earlier this year, went back to the earlier entries of the harvest moon series. Days that go by way too fast aside, and controls and UI that hasn't aged as well as I remembered them, this game also nails down why I think modern HM has really lost its way so much with how bright and outright happy everything is.

It touches upon heavier topics like depression, alcoholism, death, abusive relationships, emotional instability etc, and life in general, in ways the series hasn't really went into lately, all wrapped up in this really dysfunctional happy little village with cheery music playing. The rougher edges makes the whole experience a lot more relateable.

Huh...thought this game released in 2016. A short-ish PnC adventure game based on the Goosebumps franchise. I hadn't ever experienced the series but had heard of it.
It is overall a decent game and has a few scares but is otherwise pretty decent.

Ladekabel said:

April:

Game 18: Snake Pass (Switch): Delightful physics platformer. Slithering around is fun. Soundtrack is nice but a bit samey for me. Bit blurry in handheld mode. Quite frustrating in times when you feel it doesn't control like it should which get worse with the camera issues. 3/5

Game 19: Day of the Tentacle Remastered (PC): One of the few Point and Click Adventures I can bear to play. Presentation, soundtrack, story and jokes are still great. 5/5

Game 20: Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap (Switch): Never played a Wonder Boy or Monster Land game but I loved this. The amazing art is what drew me into this additional to it being a fun game. 4/5

Game 21: Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (PC): I like the Bad Company games for their campaign. I still enjoyed it though there were some garbage sections. 3/5


Currently Playing: The Persona 5 (PS4), PuyoPuyoTetris (Switch)

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Completely forgot to post my April update.

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I have this game on Steam and 3DS and figured I ought to go about beating it.
Overall I found it to be pretty uninteresting and bland. The gameplay is repetitive and boring with the one stand out about it is the Special Attack has a cop fire a bazokka at your location damages all enemies in the area.



This is a MUCH better game, visuals look brighter and more vibrant and the sound effect is ace, the hit sfx in particular is pretty cool. The enemy variety got repetitive by the 2nd half of the game but nothing a good ol 'GRAND UPPA!' can't fix.
If I have a major gripe about the game is that the early stages felt too long and overall the game could've benefited from stages being at least 1/4 shorter.
Overall though, yeah great great game.

19. Brutal Doom 64 - 5 Hours



Platform: PC (Steam)
Completed on: 5.5.2017
Rating: 8 / 10

Not as good as Brutal Doom, but i liked the darker atmosphere a lot.

Master Post

Axiom Verge (PS Vita)

Fantastic little Metroid-like from someone who really understands the formula. (Very impressive that it's all made by one guy.)
You get a real sense of progression as you discover new power-ups, while new weapons provide a nice "pastime" effect to keep things fresh as you go.
The music and story are also very well done. I felt both satisfaction and nostalgia when I completed it; like I'd finished a game from 20 years ago (in a good way).

Aiming to finish by June:
Dark Souls 3: The Ringed City (PS4)
Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number (PS Vita)

Fell behind due to family visiting and er...ahem...purchasing No Man's Sky, which I can safely say is not very backlog friendly.

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19. The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild - 110 Hours


This is an odd one. On one hand, this is the best Zelda game in almost two decades, and yet there is obvious room for a sequel to improve upon it. The core gameplay is basically perfect. The exploration and sense of adventure presented here is peerless; nothing I've played comes close to scratching that itch of wondering what is over the next hill. Other games falter by having little of interest in between towns/points of interest, but Breath of the Wild revels in distracting the player from their main objective with Shrines, Korok Seeds and the like. All that stuff is great! Where Breath of the Wild lets me down is the towns/settlements and NPC's. Very little of it feels particularly fleshed out or organic. NPC's are there to lead you to the next shrine or fetch quest (Oh god, the fetch quests) and little else. And with one notable exception (Hateno), most of the towns feel oddly separated and quarantined from the rest of the world they inhabit, designed to compactly fit into an area rather than sprawl out naturally the way a real settlement surrounded by nothing but empty space would. Going to these towns to talk to NPC's to unlock the next side quest feels perfunctory at best; overtly 'gamey' design in a game that otherwise goes out of it's way to not insist upon itself and let the player do what they want. It's still a fantastic game, and almost solely justifies the purchase of a Switch, but I hope the inevitable sequel/follow up overhauls those shortcomings in writing and NPC interaction the way Breath of the Wild overhauled the rest of the Zelda formula.

20. Bayonetta - 13 Hours


Platinum's 2nd best game (Yes, I prefer Vanquish, sue me!) comes to PC in a near-flawless port (As long as you don't have AMD hardware, apparently). Seven years later the gameplay here is still essentially best-in-genre, and this release is unequivocally the definitive version. Yeah there are some lame sections (Route 666, most notably) but they are easy to overlook when considering the entire package. If you don't like Bayonetta or haven't played it yet, you are a fool, point blank.

21. Kamiko - 3 Hours


A criminally simple game in the vein of 2D Zelda/Hyper Light Drifter. Though the focus of the game is in speed running and improving your completion time (Got mine down to sub-30 minutes- good enough for me) there is little to no reason to do so. An arcade-like scoring system would have done wonders for this game's replayability, along with hiding the sound test behind a 'good enough' completion time/score instead of the "collect the tchotchkes" form it ended up taking. In that regard it's slightly disappointing to see a game with untapped potential be relegated to what is essentially a filler game. Still, Kamiko is a very competently made game, and at the $5 asking price it's hard to complain about longevity too much.

Just finished Mafia 3 last night...

What a shame, some great things in it, but full of graphical glitches, mission objectives failing to load in and other general nonsense. There was a lot of potential here, but I'd imagine this has killed the series. I got the impression that 2K had grown tired of financing it and just wanted it out the door.

16. Danganronpa: Happy Trigger Havoc
~?? Hours
Had a lot of fun with my first experience of Danganronpa. While there are a surprising amount of mechanics at play, the game is fairly linear and straight-forward which I didnt mind. The cast of characters is mostly okay. The MC is a whiny little bitch, though and they set him up as a bit of a creep right away which was disappointing. Some of that can be explained as him having to grow but the game never made a particular effort so I ended up rather hating him. This especially mattered, though, when there was a discrepency between what I thought about a particular case or piece of evidence and what the MC made of it - or how the cast of characters treated the MC. In those cases the linearity and lack of balls of the MC hurt the experience.

Overall though, I can recommend Danganronpa. It is certainly a weird game, sometimes overly so.
3/5


Plan for the Future in the next few month
Final Fantasy VI
Final Fantasy XV
Yakuza Kiwami
Danganronpa 2 Reload

Still working on
Final Fantasy IV
Final Fantasy VII
Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Fire Emblem: Awakening
Danganronpa 2 Reload
Persona 5
Nier: Automata (NEW)

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A beat'em-up inspired by Sword and Sorcery from the 80s, heck 2 of the main characters are expies of Conan the Barbarian and Red Sonja.
I found it to be a rather bland game, but I give SEGA credit for the visual direction they were going in as the game has some nice fantasy ideas about it. Although the bluntness of the fantastical elements of the game came off quite funny.

Not getting close to 52. Damn bein grown up

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32. Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director’s Cut (~23 hours)
People on NeoGAF said that Shadowrun Returns was more of a prototype for the supposedly better games that followed: Shadowrun: Dragonfall, and Shadowrun: Hong Kong. Well, I can’t speak about Shadowrun: Hong Kong (though hopefully I will soon), but Dragonfall I actually found to be somewhat less enjoyable than Shadowrun Returns. What I like so much about Returns is it’s Philip K. Dick-esque story. In Dragonfall, the story takes a backseat for more of an action focus. It’s still a solid package, especially for it’s $15 asking price on Steam, but the game could have been perfect if the story was as good as the rest of the game.

To sum up Dragonfall’s story, you are basically a team of Shadowrunners collecting bounties on anything that will net them money. You’re accumulating money to gain information from a supercomputer to avenge your friend’s death. That’s about it for the beginning of the game. Your team needs a lot of money, and you’re taking any mission that will help you earn it. Though the story gets more focused later, It pales in comparison to Returns’ story.

To make matters worse, the writing is often lazy, resorting to using the F-word on multiple occasions. I know I’m being very hard on this part of the game, but I want to be clear: the story and occasionally the writing are the only bad parts of the game. It’s disappointing, but I guess the previous game’s writing and story are difficult to top.

The combat once again is a high point in this Shadowrun. You develop strategies as you go. Having a decker on the team is always good for hacking computer terminals or entering “the matrix”. Having your team dispersed across a room makes it less likely for a grenade to damage multiple allies. Winning battles results in karma points, which can improve your skill with a weapon, or in ranged combat, or boost your intelligence, to name a few examples. Even battles you lose a couple times are still fun, because you develop new strategies for when you restart the match.

Something nice is that your teammates never actually die. They go back to headquarters and get treated for their wounds. This is in contrast to Returns, where once someone dies, they’re gone for good. There are also a lot of opportunities to pick up items, keeping a full stash of useful goods for battles.

Something disappointing about Shadowrun Returns was a lack of side missions. Well, they corrected that mistake in Dragonfall. There are quite a few side-missions, earning you currency and easing the difficulty level by granting more karma points. It also adds an extra ten or so hours to the game which certainly adds to the value. I didn’t do all the side missions, but I really liked the game, so I might do them on a second playthrough.

Shadowrun Dragonfall is the most fun when you’re in combat. Sadly, the story falls short, but that’s really my only complaint about it. Harebrained Schemes created a fantastic RPG again that’s worthy of mention when talking about the CRPG revival currently ongoing. I really hope HBS keeps going with making Shadowrun games, but it seems they’re moving away with their newer titles. Regardless, they created two great games in the series, and more than likely it’s three great games. I just haven’t started Shadowrun: Hong Kong yet.
4/5

My main post.


13 | Clustertruck | PC
4 hours | Completed May 10th

A really crazy game, had a lot of fun playing through it. Reminded me of Mirror's Edge and SUPERHOT! I felt like there were enough levels and they had a decent amount of variety so I was okay with the game's length. I didn't mess around with the abilities too much, mainly sticked to the double jump + slow time combo. The very last level was pretty stupid... Wasn't a fan of that one to be honest. Very cool game nonetheless, recommended!

Man, this one took even longer than I'd expected:

#14. Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition (iPad)
Because we're in the middle of settling in in our new house I haven't had access to my consoles lately. Since I can't not play games this made me return to the only game I have for iPad: Baldur's Gate. Now, I have a looong history with this game going all the way back to pretty much release day and it's thus the oldest game in my backlog both in terms of release date and how long I've owned it. I've played it more hours than I could count, but I've become stuck in the pattern of creating a character and then playing for maybe 20-30 hours before starting over - never beating it before (or apparently even coming close).

I was frightfully close to doing the same thing this time after feeling a little disappointed with how things were turning out just before going to the big city but decided to power through all the same. Countless hours later my cavalier stands victorious over everything available in the game and I feel just a tad empty for it. I love the game, and always have, but it's strange to no longer have aspects of it that are unexplored. I guess I could play through it again with an evil character, but I don't feel like the conversation would make too big of a difference.

Now I need a bit of a break from the formula before doing the same with Baldur's Gate 2.

And done with Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.

I piloted a mech suit, jumped across moving buses on a motorway, rode a hover bike, had a shoot-out on a collapsing Golden Gate Bridge... I paid £4 for this game, 400 pennies! That's a good bit of gameplay variety,

I wonder why the series gets shat on by so many of us, I really, really enjoyed it. It's not GOTY material by any stretch, but they put a lot more effort into their single player campaigns than they need to, by rights. Managed to score 'Infinite Warfare' for £10 enjoyed this one so much that I'm doing a "franchise bang-bang" and jumping straight into that one.

EDIT - And, it's a really handsome game too. Wasn't expecting it to look as nice as it did.

Krooner said:

And done with Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare.

I piloted a mech suit, jumped across moving buses on a motorway, rode a hover bike, had a shoot-out on a collapsing Golden Gate Bridge... I paid £4 for this game, 400 pennies! That's a good bit of gameplay variety,

I wonder why the series gets shat on by so many of us, I really, really enjoyed it. It's not GOTY material by any stretch, but they put a lot more effort into their single player campaigns than they need to, by rights. Managed to score 'Infinite Warfare' for £10 enjoyed this one so much that I'm doing a "franchise bang-bang" and jumping straight into that one.

EDIT - And, it's a really handsome game too. Wasn't expecting it to look as nice as it did.

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Advanced Warfare and Infinite Warfare are the two best story-driven CoDs since Black Ops II. Both enjoyable romps.

Oh, and stay away from Black Ops III. It shits the best spectacularly. Say what you will about Ghosts and how bad and boring it was, but at least it tried something new storywise. Black Ops III has little-to-no relation to the two games before it and dramatically shit the story big time.

Agreed, Call of Duty campaigns can be pretty fun for the most part but I absolutely hated the Black Ops sequels. I'm not even sure which I'd call worse. Probably 3. Probably. Maybe 2.

Also, I was just convinced to pick up Infinite Warfare if I can find it for a cheap price.

I started Infinite last night and it looks great so far, Jon Snow is in it!

I'm not really up on them, I usually play them when the new one releases and last years drops in price, but here in the UK (at least) Black Ops 3 is more expensive than IW, I'm guessing people don't like the multiplayer in IW??

I can remember not particularly enjoying Black Ops 2, I found it boring. Again though - with the RTS style levels - decent gameplay variety. Credit to the devs really. Ghosts I've completely forgotten.

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So I finally get to play this game after all the praise I heard about it over the years. All in all I agree with the puzzle complaints as some make sense AFTER the fact.
Still I enjoyed the humor and characters and I can see myself going back to it again in the future.

Original Post

28-29. Bloodborne + Bloodborne: The Old Hunters
50 hours
Rating 9/10


I started this game in 2015, then restarted a year later in 2016. Then, for some reason, I stopped playing... but picked up that same save file from a year ago and went from there. I must say, I really enjoyed the game for the aesthetics and design aspects, but there are certain things that really rubbed me the wrong way, such as the Blood Vial system and the warping - things that had been done better in a similar game just a year earlier. Despite this, I am really excited for a potential sequel. Also, the DLC is some of the best crafted stuff. Coming off of The Ringed City, this is equally as relevant to the themes of the base game. Some of my favorite encounters are part of that, but the game as a whole is just fantastic.

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Well this was a little LESS bland than the first game but still bland overall. I kinda feel that the GA series' best games are, at best, mediocre. A shame as something COULD be done to make a decent Sword and Sorcery themed game.

#46 Catherine ★★★.5 PS3 - May 12th - 12 hours
Interesting game with a pretty enjoyable story (that goes a bit batshit in the final act) I'm pretty rubbish at the puzzles so I played on Easy but I do like the gameplay. I had a bit of a Tetris Effect where I saw Catherine-like puzzles in a real dream I had, not unlike the plot :S


#47 Nier ★★★ Xbox 360 - May 12th - 16 hours
This...is a weird one. On my first playthrough I sort of enjoyed it, the characters were fairly good and I was interested to see where it was going but the gameplay was meh. I knew that you were supposed to play it twice to get the whole experience but during the 2nd playthrough I was getting sick of the boring gameplay and just rushed through, the new added scenes were interesting but I honestly expected the game to change more in the 2nd playthrough the way people talked about it. I ended up watching endings 3 and 4 on YouTube. The story got very melodramatic too. I liked the soundtrack.

19. Destiny: I have fully completed the age of triumph book which is as complete as Y3 destiny can get. Still a fantastic social game and the raids are the best bits of gaming there are. The pvp is still a horrible broken mess rewarding people with sup par connections but the pve content is fun if repetitive.

20. Hidden Folk: A nice relaxing game that has you searching hand drawn animated environments to find specific things where's wally (waldo) style. There are only a handful of levels and they vary from simple 5 minutes to complete to epic scale scenes that can take a lot longer to complete.

Original Post

21) Halo 3: ODST - 6 hours - 5/13
I've been slowly replaying through the entire Halo franchise through the Master Chief Collection over the past few years and I finally made it up to ODST. This is probably the entry I've spent the least time with since I've only played it through when it first came out, but I enjoyed the change of pace by playing as the ODST squad and didn't even mind not feeling like a super solider all the time. Also, the structure of the story where you walk around New Mombasa finding clues about what happened to your squad before flashing back to see what they did after getting separated was a lot of fun. The only issue I had was that it kind of just ended without a lot of fanfare and it felt abrupt.

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#24 Homefront The Revolution + dlc (PC) - 11 hours


Some of the mechanics where a bit annoying but overall I was expecting it to be alot worse.

18. Bayonetta (10 hours)
My second playthrough of this game, and it remains a blast. The PC port has some serious stability issues, though.

OP

17.
Playstation 4

Can you give a game 100% based on its soundtrack? I know a lot of people say this was better than GTA3, but I have to disagree slightly. Maybe it's my nostalgia playing tricks on me, but I just liked the simplicity of GTA3 over Vice City. Don't get me wrong, the soundtrack, voice cast and story were great. But I just found some of the missions a bit irritating and the camera really jarring.
7/10

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

#25 - Mafia 3: Faster Baby!


#26 - Mass Effect: Andromeda (54 hours)


I liked it, but it's certainly could've used more time in oven. Gameplay is great, though I dislike removal of team management and very limited number of skills (I guess consoles are to blame for this).

#27 - The Walking Dead - A New Frontier Episode 3

#28 - Deus Ex Go

#29 - Black Mesa (15 hours)


Good re-imagination of Half-Life. What I didn't like was AI being overpowered (compared to original)

#30 - The Witcher 3 - Hearts of Stone

#31 - The Witcher 3 - Blood & Wine


Two very good pieces of DLC.

#31 - The Walking Dead - A New Frontier Episode 4

#32 - Prey (26 hours)


Liked it a lot, while it could've used more enemy variety, game is very good and actually allows you to use creative solutions.

I hope it gets continuation in one form or another. Will definitely do second playthrough later

#33 - Resident Evil 7 (9 hours)


Good Game. Bullet sponge bosses I didn't particularly care about, but thankfully they're rare.
Game looks nice and performance is mostly solid, though some times there are nasty stuttering/long pauses.

original post

Game 15: Shovel Knight: Plague of Shadows (3DS replay) - 5 hours

I booted this up while still waiting for the EU 3DS version of Specter of Torment, which seems to be the very last in the release line for some reason. It was still good and I finally want to continue.

Game 16: Kirby's Adventure (NES replay) - n/a

With Kirby's different abilities, each replay is always a little different. Other than Superstar, many Kirby games in the classic style feel redundant when these two exist.

Game 17: Mark of the Ninja (PC replay) - 7 hours

I got the DLC and thought I had to play through the entire thing again, but apparently that wasn't necessary. Not too much of a problem though, the game is still great.

Master Post

Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number (PS Vita)

I found this even more disturbing and violent than the first one.
The original is almost "tongue-in-cheek" in hindsight, while the sequel explores some darker themes and imagery.
It actually feels like these two games should be discussed as a pair rather than separate installments, as they offer something quite unique in terms of overall story and experience.

Aiming to finish by June:
Dark Souls 3: The Ringed City (PS4)
Nova-111 (PS Vita)

OK I don't normally do this, but I'm treating these 2 as separate games.
This is a light puzzle PnC adventure game about a young boy who goes to summer camp, befriends a 'sasquatch' called Biggie and go around solving puzzles as they try to find out Biggie's past.
The 2nd episode was released in 2014 and...nothing else since, which is irritating as it ends on a cliffhanger!
Each episode is quite short and can be beaten in an hour if you know the puzzle solution. The graphics could be better, esp. by removing that irritating blur in the background, along with some Anti Aliasing but I personally like its style.
I enjoyed the light humor and voice acting and the puzzles are quite nice too.
I will say though that Episode 2 had the most messed up 'death scene' I've ever seen in a video game.

Finished Call of Duty Infinite Warfare.

Didn't enjoy it as much as Advanced, but still had fun. I liked the optional missions on the map and hunting down the "wanted" board. I hope they bring some of that into the next WW2 game, maybe have Nazi commanders and bases that are completely optional to the main missions.

Kamiko
Platform: Switch
Time: 00:58
Date: 05.07
Score: (3/5)

I love the art, fluid movement and combat (although I wish there was more to it), but I'm not so crazy about the simple puzzle design of the game. If it took the same movement and combat, flushed it out a bit, and made the game into an action RPG, I would be in love. For what it is, it was an enjoyable hour.

Whenever I've seen this thread in years past I thought it was crazy, but I must be a little crazy this year since I thought I would give it a go. This is my first post but I actually started following and working on this in April. I'll add more detail to all these later but my completion list so far this year is as follows:

January

1. The Order 1886

February

2. Republic Commando

March

3. Ducktales Remastered
4. Castle of Illusion Starring Mickey Mouse
5. Dragon's Crown

April

6. Infamous
7. Tearaway
8. Rochard
9. Proteus
10. Banjo & Kazooie - Grunty's Revenge
11. Super Mario Land
12. Operation C
13. Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins
14. Jurassic Park: The Game

May

15. Ninja Five-O
16. Wario Land 4
17. Kinect Star Wars
18. The Gunstringer
19. Halo 3: ODST
20. Toki Tori 2+
21. Ico
22. Flower

June
23. The Unfinished Swan
24. Deadpool
25. Okami HD

July
26. Game of Thrones: a Telltale Games Series

Point and click adventure game bonanza!
I was planning on playing older games this month but then I got some strange craving and this happened. Oops!



Mafia - PC - Completed May 1



Amerzone: The Explorer's Legacy - PC - Completed May 2



Cognition: An Erica Reed Thriller - PC - Completed May 5



The Samaritan Paradox - PC - Completed May 6



The Book of Unwritten Tales - PC - Completed May 8



Jolly Rover - PC - Completed May 9



The Last Door: Season 1 - PC - Completed May 10



The Last Door: Season 2 - PC - Completed May 12



Dracula: Resurrection - PC - Completed May 13



Dracula: The Last Sanctuary - PC - Completed May 14



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Master Post

The game starts out fine but as you progress, the main missions tend to take a different approach from the Orc Slaying elements. It doesn't help that the more useful Upgrades are locked and require you to kill dozens of Orc Captains in order to get them.
While it has some good core mechanics, as it went on it got rather tedious. Being ganged upon by 20 or so Orcs at the same time makes it difficult to focus on the main enemy you need to kill esp. when you rely on using your Finishers for big damage.

Stardew Valley
Platform: PS4
Time: 242:12
Date: 05.16
Score: (4/5)

Stardew Valley is such a conflicting game for me. I played it for nearly 250 hours, so obviously I enjoyed it quite a lot. I've been a fan of Harvest Moon for a very long time, and this game does everything I've always wanted Harvest Moon to do and then some. Stardew Valley does so many things right but the biggest positive, as well as the biggest negative, is the way the game hooks you and leads you through the game.

Right from the beginning, there are elements around town that the player will see, but won't know what they're for or how to interact with them. I'm talking about things like a broken bus, destroyed bridges, and minecarts scattered around town. As time passes, the player slowly finds the threads to uncovering these mysteries. New features and areas are unlocked as a result, and this gives the game a really nice feeling of progression, as well as keeping the game fresh and giving the player something to look forward to. I absolutely love that Stardew does this, and it easily elevates it to tier above similar games.

Unfortunately, at some point these threads dry up. I finished my playthrough in year five, 242 hours on the clock, and three or four key items missing from key item screen. I have no idea what to do next, as every visible mystery has been uncovered. This is how the best feature in the game has turned into a mark against it for me. For roughly 100 hours, I've discovered almost nothing new in the game. I know there are elements to unlock still, but without turning to the Wiki I feel lost, and looking things up online is not something I like to do. Instead of going out on a high note, I dragged the game on for way too long while trying to figure out what I was missing. In addition to this, there hasn't really been anything new in the game for the past few in game years, which is a really big disappointment.

I still really like the game, but I can't say I love it anymore. If a sizable amount of content gets added in the future, however, I think I'll pick it up again and start a brand new farm. It really is a great game, it just dropped me at some point.