Feel super conflicted on this one, there's a fair bit to love here with a really cool Street Fighter inspired combat system, lots of enemies to learn the ins and outs of, and a decent arsenal that can offer some pretty gnarly combos with your melee punches and kicks. On a replay, this rating would probably improve as I continue to get better and improve, but here? Now? Distant checkpoints and a pretty limited supply of healing items makes a few levels an absolute chore.

I find the style of "death by a thousand cuts" health management extremely unfun, and although it was cool collecting as many of those heals as I could across the stage, the fact it restores a measly ~20% of your healthbar meant I was rationing them. Which is a shame, because there's a mechanic where if you overcharge your healthpool, you get a Super Saiyan-like mode where you hit really hard and have some overhealth, but very rarely did I ever have the opportunity to even activate it.

Graphically, it's a game from 2001 that looks not the best of the era, but there's some neat foibles (the glass shattering effects and general environmental destruction being chief among them). The two (intro and final cutscene) anime segments are really cool, and cutscenes across the game use JRPG-style portraits of the characters in different emotions which is a nice touch (in lieu of how little emotion the models themselves can portray).

The story? It's there. Extremely tropey, very predictable, and very hammy which strangely makes it enjoyable enough? The ending caught me off guard with how sudden and miserable it was, but it serves its role in the story well enough.

There's nothing particularly innovative in Oni, but what it tries to do it performs decently well enough. The anime-inspired action is definitely a big draw, and if you have a PC copy, I'd recommend the community-made Anniversary Edition which has a few mods that add some Quality of Life and plenty of fixes for modern hardware, plus a mod loader for plenty more Oni action!

6/10 - Ok, ok, don't frog blast the vent core!

A fan-made expansion to Myth II: Soulblighter, made with official Bungie support in production, Myth II: Chimera is a flawed, but decently fun, free expansion to a really good real-time tactics game. First things first, this expansion is hard, almost brutally so. I played Myth: The Fallen Lords and Myth II: Soulblighter on Normal, or Heroic if I was feeling particularly strong that night, but played the entirety of Chimera on Timid, and even then, some parts were a bit tricky!

You'll be asked to make some super precise troop movements, some really clever formations, and generally use every inch of Mythmastery you have at your disposal, all while managing a huge number of units and some special Heroes.

Unit variety is pretty dang great, there's some pretty unique new threats littered throughout you'll have to adapt to. Aesthetics are top tier, the levels look foreboding, the art has this wonderful sickly green overtone to it, and the UI gets a slight face-lift as well. Story and level design is about on par with Soulblighter, if a fair bit less polished and sometimes a tad repetitive. Although I enjoyed the novelty of hearing Doug Zartman say those classic BOB lines, a lot of those Bungie folks are not voice actors and don't sound... the best.

Considering that this whole thing is free and produced in part by fans, it's not a bad deal at all if you're looking for more Myth carnage.

7/10 - Thank God you're here!