10 hours of a game pass trial is a very generous offer considering you need exactly 5 minutes hands-on to realize there's just not much to experience here. A street racing game that leans heavily into hip-hop culture would be a treat but instead it immediately commits Forza Horizon 5's cardinal sin of having a person constantly talk in your ears establishing how relatable and hip they are, while the painter tag SFX gimmick is exactly that — a gimmick, and could as well be a mutator in virtually anything else.

What's left? The most cookie cutter seventh gen open world racer you've seen. Doesn't feel good ripping it a new one considering the car handling is competent enough and there are at least glints of fresh appearance, but if you're a regular on this website you definitely played this game already.

Damn, spending a few evenings to read on the turning events of Bakumatsu and nearly mythical status of Sakamoto Ryoma in Japanese culture paid off in spades. This isn't simply a history lesson with cool Yakuza dudes – Ishin's entire shtick is a subversion and dramatization of events that turned the course of Japanese history around. The prior context is, in fact, so cornerstone to key reveals and emotional bits, you kinda see why developers were so wary about bringing the game outside of Japan? The more happy it makes me they trusted our curiosity to learn this context ourselves. When RGG storytelling dramatism and historical anticipations truly synthesise — it's a fucking riot.

Where it does kidna lose me is in the handling of Shinsengumi? RGG games can sometimes be conflicted like that, but more thought should be given to the fact that we work with literal fash secret police, be it history or not. The game doesn't even embellish them and fully elaborates on atrocities they commit. And yet the adherence to subvert Sakamoto Ryoma's legend is just so backbreaking, to the point we're simply required to accept that some boys in blue are ready to put their lives for the future of reformed country just as we are, and it's just so at odds with the rest of the story told. Love Majima and Mine as much as the other guy, but I'm just not buying it here.

As a digression I'd add that Kiwami remake is actually totally fine? In most shots it looks better than before (unless you enjoy the swelter of seventh gen piss filter), the trooper system is a fun additional thing to play around (and can be totally ignored if you wish so), and cast changes are mostly for the better (you're lying to yourself if you think Zhao sells his character worse than fucking Baba). If anything, it could change more.

The corporate incubator heading the design of Marvel's © Midnight Suns , checking steam reviews on release: "oh boy can't wait for all the
---{ Graphics }---
☑ You forget what reality is
☐ Beautiful
☐ Good
☐ Decent
☐ Bad
☐ Don‘t look too long at it
☐ MS-DOS

---{ Gameplay }---
☑ Very good
☐ Good
☐ It's just gameplay
☐ Mehh
☐ Watch paint dry instead
☐ Just don't

---{ Audio }---
☑ Eargasm
☐ Very good
☐ Good
☐ Not too bad
☐ Bad
☐ I'm now deaf

---{ Audience }---
☐ Kids
☑ Teens
☑ Adults
☑ Grandma

---{ PC Requirements }---
☐ Check if you can run paint
☑ Potato
☐ Decent
☐ Fast
☐ Rich boi
☐ Ask NASA if they have a spare computer

---{ Difficulty }---
☐ Just press 'W'
☑ Easy
☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Significant brain usage
☐ Difficult
☐ Dark Souls

---{ Grind }---
☑ Nothing to grind
☐ Only if u care about leaderboards/ranks
☐ Isn't necessary to progress
☐ Average grind level
☐ Too much grind
☐ You'll need a second life for grinding

---{ Story }---
☐ No Story
☐ Some lore
☐ Average
☐ Good
☐ Lovely
☑ It'll replace your life

---{ Game Time }---
☐ Long enough for a cup of coffee
☐ Short
☐ Average
☐ Long
☑ To infinity and beyond

---{ Price }---
☐ It's free!
☑ Worth the price
☐ If it's on sale
☐ If u have some spare money left
☐ Not recommended
☐ You could also just burn your money

---{ Bugs }---
☑ Never heard of
☐ Minor bugs
☐ Can get annoying
☐ ARK: Survival Evolved
☐ The game itself is a big terrarium for bugs

---{ ? / 10 }---
☐ 1
☐ 2
☐ 3
☐ 4
☐ 5
☐ 6
☐ 7
☐ 8
☑ 9
☐ 10s we're gonna get!!!"

Uncharted 1-3 are straight ass, but what's this? Well designed combat encounters that take advantage of Drake's innate agility and athleticism? Intriguing historical mystique that mirrors hero's personal journey? Naughty Dog holding back with destruction pageantry and urgent action sequences so a few times they do happen they can actually leave an impact? It's still simplistic to the core, but this has to be the first time Sony's 7th-8th gen prestige formula actually worked on me. All it took is some focus and restraint, qualities that these games nearly always lack.

Gouyoku Ibun, the 17.5th Touhou and the first sidescroller in the series. Community had assigned it so many red flags during the troubled development phase, the game finally crawls past the release date.... And it turns out to be such a unique startling thing I'm astonished how special it's shaping up to me.

Here, behind the usual touhou mysticism hides another modern fable that denounces greed as the biggest threat to environmentalism, but its tale is optimistic and uplifting in resolution. Brash dialogue and PoV heavy plot structure make up story layers that are such a delight to peel, building up the timeline of events with many moving parts and personalities that bounce off each other in a way that's full of energy and style. I seriously envy people that happen to go in this game unspoiled, there are such surprises along the way that ensure no touhou fan would be left feeling indifferent.

And on the other side of increasingly shiny coin is the culmination of over 15 years of Tasofro's experience of creating games where girls shoot A LOT of bullets and let you have elegant tools to JUNK them. Balancing between cautious evasion with chip potshots and rabid flurries of attacks isn't much unlike other sidescrollers, but all the haphazard mobility you have put against swarms of projectiles on screen leads to such a unique moment-to-moment dynamic, there's simply nothing else that plays like it. Coupled with how different playable characters feel – it's nearly euphoric. These playables share no identical moves or tools, their styles are different, their mobility is different, their resource management is different, their meters work differently... They shouldn't work all in the same game, but they do, and they fight the same enemies on the same stages. Where Kanako has to gallantly float around the field and invoke crushing forces of nature, Murasa haphazardly grapples herself all over the screen and setups air juggle combos. The mad playstyle distinction becomes the very means of character expression, it truly makes you feel like a wind goddess or a ship ghost with murderous tendencies, one could say.

And I ain't even gonna fully touch on the artstyle or music, how much it's doing with this few pixels and what a cool vibe the remixes of classic themes are. Gouyouku Ibun is such a sensation for me and I wish others get even a fraction of emotions I experienced. Maybe wait until the english patch is cooked to completion, but otherwise even if you're even tangetially interested in Touhou, you should pay attention to this game, you're in for a threat.

How do you carry on when your life in the running up to adulthood is, admittedly, a wreck? Is there a way to cope with depressive thought if the mask you put on to endure loss and abuse only attracts more anguish and misery? What to do when you keep pushing away the people dearest to you? A Space for the Unbound may not have the most sophisticated answer, but it excels in its wonderful sincerity. Cherishing your vision of existence, giving space to make amends with those who worth, and holding on to the most precious memories will go a long way towards healing.

Tatsuya Ukyo: my blorbo my plinko my poor little meow meow meow and also my glup shitto. Having had been a distrusting 17yo shithead myself, I know full well how much of a mind poison the worldview of total unbelief is. Hence, watching an edgy teenager turning this mindset around is just soothingly comforting — which is a hysterical quality to assign to what's maybe the most brooding and morose RGG game out there. A real gem in the series, and a really easy recommendation if you seek the grungy vibe of PS2 Yakuzas