Immortality is not a game, but an interactive narrative told in a very unique way that I have never experienced before and probably won’t ever experience again. It’s confusing, both in its plot and in its delivery, but once you start catching on you won’t want to stop until you find out as much as you can. Aesthetically, this game is outstanding. Every scene feels like it could be a real clip taken from the period they take place in. I finished in probably 5 hours, but your mileage may vary. It’s rare for me to feel compelled to continue playing a game after rolling credits, but I will be finding everything this game has to offer now that I have finished. Even rarer is it that I write a review, but Immortality is something special that deserves to be talked about.

Real Time Strategy is not a genre I’ve really ever dabbled in, but Pikmin immediately captured me with its art style, music, and of course, gameplay. Charming is the perfect word to describe this series. I’m happy to say that after starting and finishing this game in one day, I’m a fan. Since this was a blind playthrough, I missed the good endings, but still enjoyed my time with the game. One thing to note is that I encountered a glitch with a mandatory ship part that made it unobtainable, so even if I would have otherwise completed all the tasks for Pikmin, I still would have received the bad ending.

Maybe the Fire Emblem was the friends we made along the way.




The music, combat, and world design in this game were all excellent, but the characters were just okay, and the story/dialogue were equally unimpressive and became very cheesy near the back third of the game. Engage is meant to be a celebration of Fire Emblem's long history, and it does it perfectly in my opinion, despite the flaws I think this game has.

The gacha mechanics were neat for a few hours, but around chapter 8 I pretty much stopped crafting rings entirely. Once you get enough rings to slot into a broad range of characters (one for a mage, archer, warrior, etc.) and some emblems you really don't need to keep dumping bond fragments into getting rings. I actually stayed away from a lot this game had to offer other than skirmishes and the main chapters, simply because the combat is Engage's strongest point.

Stray isn't innovative with puzzles or platforming, but it makes up for being pretty cut-and-dry in the gameplay department with an immense amount of charm and atmosphere. The three towns you visit are inviting and filled with characters that you’ll want to speak to, no matter how much or little they have to say. The exploration in the towns is fun and engaging enough, and the soundtrack is full of warm, lush synth pads/electric pianos, which are my jam. The levels where you do the bulk of your platforming and puzzle solving were good, but a little too simple and short. Strays narrative is also simple, but it is wonderfully beautiful, bittersweet, and heartwarming.

Papers, Please is a wonderful experience. The interactions are engaging and will make you question what the best course of action is constantly. It's made clear early on that you have to follow your rulebook so you get paid enough to simply survive. After understanding this expectation, your job duties continuously change, and your morality and empathy are tested hard in certain scenarios.

In terms of gameplay, Papers, Please is fine. What your doing is mundane, but it's like that for a reason. The beauty in this game isn't from the gameplay in my opinion, but from everything I mentioned before. That being said, if you are the kind of person who likes getting into the weeds and really going over everything with a fine-toothed comb then you'll probably find the document inspecting enjoyable.

UPDATE: After the news that PvE has been scrapped from this release, I’ve lowered my rating from 1 star to .5, the lowest it can go. I’ve never seen a company fumble a game as bad as Blizzard has with Overwatch 2

Before I get into my tirade I have to give some points because yeah, the base gameplay is good. Changing games to 5v5 and re-designing the more meta-centralizing characters were completely valid decisions and whether or not you like/dislike the changes are really up to the individual. I like them. Crazy how they would create two characters that arguably centralized the meta-game in a worse way right off the bat, but go off I guess.

That being said, what a shit show this game is. Failing to deliver on the biggest selling point for the new game (PvE) and then completely "overhauling" the item shop/rewards to put any new cosmetics behind a ludicrously unjust paywall is hilariously mind-boggling. Overwatch is legitimately one of my favorite games ever, it's the multiplayer game I have the most play time in, and is definitively my favorite multiplayer game I've ever played, so I can say from the heart that Overwatch 2 is the greatest disappointment I've ever experienced in gaming. No PvE? Oh well, at least I'll be able to play multiplayer and eventually the PvE will come, right?

The launch of this game was the worst I've ever experienced in any game, and I've played almost every Destiny expansion and Call of Duty update when they've launched. I'm used to having to wait for servers to be stable enough to even log into a game is what I'm getting at. For Overwatch 2, it was over 10 days, yes, 10 fucking days since "release" before I could log in and play a game. Even after this absurd wait time, it wasn't even guaranteed that all of your cosmetics would transfer over from Overwatch. I got all of mine, but I know others that weren't so lucky. This should've been my sign to just get out ASAP but I had to try and capture the joys of playing Overwatch early on.

Of course anyone reading this can tell by my review that Overwatch 2 does not capture the sheer competitive joy I had when playing the original, which is an absolute shame. This game is way less competitive and more toxic than the original, which is solely due to it being free to play unlike it's predecessor at launch. This was my sign to end it, I wasn't having fun, and neither were my friends. Oh well, at least I can go back to the original if I need my fix.

What? WHAT DO YOU MEAN THEY FUCKING DELISTED THE ORIGINAL GAME???? I watched in sheer terror as the icon for Overwatch on my home screen was deformed and mangled into the icon for Overwatch 2. I'm not lying when I say that these absolute nimrods TOOK AWAY OUR OPTION TO PLAY THE OLD GAME right in front of our very eyes. Imagine if Call of Duty did this shit. Battlefield. Street Fighter? In absolutely no way do I find this acceptable. I can't even begin to wrap my head around why they did this. I'm sure there is some reason regarding server upkeep, cross-progression and player profiles but come on it's just absurd to kill a game the second the new one comes out. I have no idea how this game is now, but with Blizzard’s asinine treatment of this game at launch, I will never download it again to find out.

I hate Overwatch 2

I never played the original Resident Evil 2 from 1998, but this remake 100% stands on its own as a juggernaut of survival horror. The atmosphere early-game is tense & mortifying, and only grows in scale the longer you play. The puzzles are a joy to solve, and aren’t so difficult that you have to stop to look up a solution. Gunplay feels great, and overall the level designs were really top-notch in my book. The story is intriguing as well, even if some (most) of the lines of dialogue are cheesy. I only have two gripes with the game; the fight on the crane and the game of cat and mouse you have to play with Tyrant during most of the police station. I swear, I did the right thing on the crane 6 times before it finally worked, but maybe I just missed something. I understand the point of Tyrant is to keep the situation tense and make players more alert to their surroundings, but most of the time it was just a massive inconvenience that had me running all over the place and hiding in safe rooms until he moved to another area.

Quantum Break is pretty enjoyable, but it falls just short of being great. The mixed media was neat, I guess, but I can't help but wonder if the TV show had such a high budget that it negatively impacted the rest of the game. It could just be my ignorance showing, but it's food for thought. At the time of this game's release, Alan Wake had already been out for a while, and is a more solid product from Remedy than Quantum Break is, in my opinion. That being said, the combat abilities are SO COOL and really make gunfights a blast. I only wish there were more combat sections in this game. Actually, I wish there were more good gameplay sections in general, as most of this game comprises of cutscenes, janky platforming, walking around (very slowly), and a TV show. The story was compelling and the revelations you get as the game progresses really keep you engaged, but man, I don't really feel like I PLAYED very much in my time with this game. I played Quantum Break twice for achievements and it was really cool to see how different choices you make during certain Junction points affected the story. I suggest tackling this one on hard difficulty just so you get the most out of combat.

A masterclass in graphical presentation and technical prowess, but an incredibly boring and hollow game.

I REALLY want to like this game, but I can't. I want to like it so much that even after I set it aside the first two times, I came back to try again, hoping the classic mantra of "third time's the charm" would ring true and I could see this game for more than I originally had. Obviously this didn't happen and I'm so disappointed by that, because I genuinely enjoyed Horizon: Zero Dawn at it's release. What makes Forbidden West different? By most accounts the two games are very similar, so it makes sense that I would enjoy both of them, right? I'm going to chalk this up to my tastes having changed a lot since 2017; so much so that Horizon Forbidden West could have never pleased me as I am today.

To me, this game is the poster child of the homogenization we've seen in the AAA space since the PS4/XBone era began. A third-person, action adventure, open-world, "story-driven" game featuring a "mascot" main character. Nothing about Horizon Forbidden West feels new, unique, or even enjoyable to me, except in how incredibly gorgeous it is. To say that every new game similar to this NEEDS to be unique or innovative is foolish. However, considering this game is coming from one of the greatest first-party studios owned by what many would consider the best publisher in gaming at present leaves me feeling disappointed. I think I've rambled enough about my general distaste for the game (and the greater AAA space), so I'm going to get more into the weeds about what I dislike about the game.

Firstly, I clocked in about 10 hours of playtime in Horizon Forbidden West and I have yet to feel like I've really PLAYED anything. The sheer volume of cutscenes and moments of exposition have greatly outweighed the gameplay sections, and half of the time I have actually had control of Aloy, I've had to spend it doing really boring and mundane platforming/puzzle solving instead of fighting the excellently designed monsters. Seriously, there are times where you watch a cutscene for 5+ minutes, walk 3 feet, and are met with another cutscene of equal length. It feels as if Guerilla (or maybe Sony/PlayStation) doesn't actually want you to play a video game, but rather have a story told to you. This is made even more apparent to me by the platforming/puzzle solving sections, which serve as a vehicle to move the plot forward with in-game dialogue like a cutscene, but have it disguised as "gameplay". Aloy is not fun to control in these sections either, as the platforming is so barebones and simple it's sleep-inducing. On top of this, she has as much likeability and personality as a 2x4, maybe less. Worse still, for someone who is incredibly boring, she sure has a lot to say about not shit. This game barrages you constantly with Aloy quipping about how to solve the issues you're facing in these sections, which takes any sense of agency and discovery out of the situation entirely.

Combat is always heralded as the best part of this game, which I completely agree with, but I don't find it good enough to carry the game to greater heights. Stealth is not a viable option in this game, because as soon as you let one arrow fly, the enemies can pinpoint your exact geolocation with 100% accuracy. You are forced to always be on the move and utilize your smoke bombs to stay in-cover, and at that point, I'd rather just approach everything "guns-blazing" so I'm not wasting resources constantly. I also have issues with the general combat system, as you have to breakup what should be fluid combat with a weapon wheel every time you need more ammo or to switch to a different damage type/weapon, and in longer fights you'll be doing this a lot.

I have many more things I dislike about this game, but for the sake of keeping this concise I'll just touch on the open-world nature of this game and close it out. I already gave the "doom and gloom" spiel of modern AAA gaming, but I truly feel like this game suffers from having an open-world with a seemingly endless number of things to do on the map. It's completely paralyzing to be faced with so many side-quests/menial tasks that are of no consequence to the overall experience.

For those that enjoy "map" games like Horizon Zero Dawn, Far Cry 5, and Assassin's Creed Valhalla, you'll surely appreciate Forbidden West for what it is, and will probably be completely enamored with the experience. But I can't keep trying to force myself to enjoy this game.

A monster-tamer with an interesting story, fresh battle/taming mechanics, and truly great character/monster designs. If you're looking for something to scratch that Pokémon itch while not just replicating the same tried and true mechanics, then Cassette Beasts is something you should give your attention to. Type-matchups don't influence damage in this game, but instead cause status conditions or stat increases/decreases. This was really neat to me, as it meant battles felt more dynamic than they have in other monster-tamer games, where maximizing damage output takes precedence. To expound on this even further, there are over 14,000 fusions in the game. Fusions combine the type of both creatures, meaning you could be facing a monster that will get both a buff and a de-buff depending on the type of attack you use. This will always keep you on your toes and wondering what the best course of action is.

In a game about cassettes and music, it's no question that the soundtrack for this game is important. Unfortunately, it's a bit underwhelming/repetitive. Despite having a good vocal performance on the tracks, there was no way I wanted to have someone singing to me for the duration of the game so I had to turn that part off.

All in all, I do highly recommend this game to fans of monster-tamers. For a completionist, this game overstays its welcome, but if you are only interested in the mechanics and playing through the story then Cassette Beasts* is well worth your time.