For as much as it refines the gameplay of its predecessor it just as equally feels lacking in size and scope. Miles' venom powers up the tempo beautifully, yet the fewer gadgets are a disappointment. Venom jump makes the suspension matrix redundant, but the gravity well seems genuinely useless and I usually only ended up using the webs and remote mines, the latter exclusively in stealth mode. I also miss those special suit abilities from the first game (apparently you can do spider arm finishers, but I have no idea how to trigger it) and I'm glad that the upcoming sequel seems to have abilities mapped to L1 that function similarly. The non action "prestige tour" segments feel narratively congruent and not just an odd break in the action, yet the story as a whole reeks of being nothing more than a side adventure, told somehow more poorly than the already middling first game. But probably what I find most annoying about this game is how it presents itself as a champion of diversity with its proclamation by black and brown people that this is "our Spider-Man" and throwing up BLM murals whilst choosing not to engage one iota with the fact that its protagonist's father is a cop, nor does it really engage with police at all. It instead takes the imagery of police brutality and a "hands up don't shoot" scene with bystanders recording on their phones and relegates it to a private militia owned by an Elon Musk type billionaire. "They saw us as disposable" Miles laments at the end of the game, after a montage just as desperate as the first game to prove to the audience that Insomniac understands what the "real New York" is. The game does a lot of posturing but ultimately has nothing to say; another bland superhero story that won't even have any meaningful bearing on its sequel.

When it seems like the game is entering act II it's actually the beginning of the third; While it seems like a knock to say that it ends just when things are getting good, the fact that it leaves me wanting more speaks to how enjoyable the whole experience is. The opening of the game is so fun and thrilling and then the game opens up to this rich world, one that I could see myself exploring just to soak all the little details in. The game gear shifts into something that isn't quite what the intro promises, a mix of the action adventure plus the big RTS arena battles, all while doling out a narrative that only hints at the rich backstory of the world (pro tip: use earth shaker to unchain the legends and pyro for the bound serpents). Jack Black is fantastic as always and the writing humor is as sharp as anywhere else in Double Fine's catalogue. Watching the PsychOdyssey doc, it's fascinating to see the philosophy of design based around theme/narrative ideas in action. Everything in the game, from the world, the 3 distinct factions, your attacks and the whole RTS part of the game, are all consistent within this framework of this heavy metal world. Probably one of the best main menus in any video game.

Oh, look at that! AC Valhalla got a sequel this quickly? Weird name for it though, "Hogwarts Legacy".

Sorry for the meanness, but this is pretty much everything I despise about triple A games nowadays. A successful time waster, barren of any substance whatsoever. Hitting the usual Ubisoft clone faults:

-Awkward pacing all around
-Bland ass dialogue
-Mediocre gameplay
-Over the top UI
-Mind numbing collectathons
-Side quests = fetch quests
-Bloated open-world
-Plays like it should've come out in 2014
Etc, etc.

To be honest, I can completely understand if you enjoy it as a hardcore HP fan, but I personally found it very silly. And I'm probably being too harsh with my rating, but I don't have any patience left for these types of games anymore.

★½ – Unplayable ❌

(And oh yeah, Rowling is an awful piece of shit of a human. And no, that's not reflected in my rating. The game's just that bad as it is.)

Even in this crusty PS2 port (I realize too late I probably could’ve played this on my Mac), the art direction is strong enough that everything is still visually pleasing. The creativity in the look and design of the different levels is more than enough to compensate for some brief moments of annoyance in gameplay, and it’s a very well written, genuinely funny and charming game to boot. Double Fine seems to have a knack for making weird, genre hybrid games, this being a collect-athon x action Platformer with light adventure game elements. It’s real fun, and I’m glad I finally finished this game so I can catch up on Psychonauts 2.

Terminator 2: Judgment Day is a platformer developed by Software Creations, based on the film of the same name. Terminator 2 is filled with exciting set pieces, so it feels like a no-brainer to turn into a game. This game is a major improvement over Radical Entertainment's adaptation of the first film, but still doesn't quite hit the mark for many reasons.

Like the majority of movie-based games, Terminator 2 is a platformer, but not a particularly good one. You play as the T-800 and the first level consists of beating up bikers at the bar from the beginning of the film. You have to defeat every single enemy on screen to progress, but the game will let you move beyond where the enemies are, meaning you'll often just be wandering around thinking you can advance but be missing one or two enemies. The T-800 has these tiny arms which can barely reach anyone without being directly in front of him and this can lead to enemies ganging up on you. Level two depicts the motorcycle canal scene and it's frustrating as hell. You have to avoid fast-moving obstacles that you are barely given enough time to react to, while also shooting the T-1000's oncoming truck by mashing the button over and over before he leaves. It's frustrating and took way too many attempts to complete. Level three has you explore the Pescadero hospital in pursuit of Sarah Connor, avoiding security guards and the T-1000. This level isn't too bad, actually, and I can see it being part of a better game, but it's too repetitive. Most of the rooms have nothing in them and they're all the same thing so it's just a matter of chance whether you find what you're looking for or not. You're also supposed to only shoot the guards in the kneecaps, like in the film, but to my knowledge, there isn't any punishment for just killing them. From what I played of the next few levels, they're mostly the same, so I just dropped the game as I wasn't having fun. The game also gives you only four lives and zero continues, so if you die, it's back to the first level. Sure, you can collect extra lives, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating. It's a below-average platformer that, while not intolerable, doesn't do anything to stand out from an already flooded market of platformers on NES.

The presentation is somewhat mixed. The visuals aren't too bad but they're fairly average as far as the NES goes, and this late into the console's lifespan I expect a little more. Mega Man 5 was released the same year and looks miles more detailed and expressive in its sprite work and backgrounds. Granted, one is going for relative realism and the other stylization, but on the NES the difference isn't as large as with other platforms. The T-800 himself doesn't resemble Arnold Schwarzenegger at all and looks pretty small and wimpy, with many enemies being larger than him for some reason. I do like how the game actually tries to fill the player in on the film's story if they hadn't seen it before, but I do think the traced character portraits look a little bit off-model. If there's any bright spot though, it would be the soundtrack composed by Geoff Follin, which is very experimental and sounds more like something from a Commodore 64 game than the NES. He channels some musical elements from Brad Fidel's film score, such as the emphasis on repetitive percussion, it's atmospheric and kicks up exactly when it needs to. It's a surprisingly solid score for a relatively bad game.

Terminator 2 on NES isn't an awful game by any means but it's not good either. It's below-average, oftentimes bad, and while there are some interesting elements in isolation, none of them form a cohesive whole. Not recommended to anyone really, even if it improves heavily on the first game.