Tren levels that took me over 30 minutes to get Gold rank on:

Long Tren Runnin - Hauling 14 cars through a course filled with swinging cranes and obstacles. No other level in the game exemplifies the balance between speed and not losing cargo better than this one.

The Infinite Track - Procedurally generated survival level. There are two of these in the game, but the first was far more difficult. You're being chased by spikey cars that will kill you if they catch you. Boost too much and have to wait for it to recharge? Dead. Hesitate for a spilt-second with a track switch? Dead. Get an unfair batch of randomly-selected modules without enough breathing room to get ahead of the death train? Believe it or not, dead.

Magnetic Attraction - What if a train was Spider-Man and had to spiderclimb all over a bunch of crazy tracks but also there were spikes everywhere

All About the Bolts - Arguably the best track in the game. It's filled with teeter-totter tracks that you have to manipulate in order to use them as ramps, and when you finally nail it, it's euphoric. Never unfair, this track requires all the skill you've built up throughout the game. Phenomenal stuff.

What a fantastic physics-based puzzle game! It is absolutely worth downloading Dreams just for this. I can't recommend it enough.

I played a ton of the first two Budokai games on Gamecube when they first came out, but tragically did not have a PS2 at the time. I never got around to playing Budokai 3 until just now, and MAN.

14-year-old me would have loved this so much.

I had a great time! It's really interesting thinking about this in terms of its original release window. Budokai 1/2/3 came out in late 2002, 2003, and 2004, respectively. Can you imagine DBZ having a series with annual releases now? That'd be madness. But in the early 2000s, the Buu Saga had just finished airing on Toonami, and we were all hopped up on Saiyamania, so diet-weebs in their early teens (like me at the time) were easy marks for these. What's most interesting is seeing how they iterated on the concept across the three games, and ultimately, I think 3 does the best job at everything.

The roster is great, but I'm not sure why there are any cuts here, since a lot of the models and movesets seem to be brought right over from the previous titles. Would it have killed them to keep Dodoria, Zarbon, and Android 19 in here? They even made the Cell Juniors and Saibamen playable! On the other hand, we got a couple of GT nods, which at the time still felt like something we cared about. Regardless of how bad that followup series was, the inclusions of SS4 Goku/Vegeta/Gogets and Omega Shenron are flat-out awesome. Also BROLY IS IN THIS. You'd better believe I stuck with that neon-fluorescent-haired maniac through each of the game's main modes.

Let's talk about Dragon Universe for a second. All three Budokai games tell the complete story of DBZ (with the first game stopping after Cell), with a different format each time. The first game does the most with cutscenes, which I was impressed by during my replay this year. The second game goes for the board game route, which I believe would be the best of the three if it didn't make you re-fight every boss so many times. Dragon Universe is the story mode in Budokai 3, and instead of containing a single main story, it chunks out the story bits and lets you play through 10 campaigns for main characters in the saga (plus a bonus Broly rampage campaign, which I completed on every difficulty level). You play from Raditz to Uub, but only participating in the events that are relevant to your selected player. This means that length varies greatly, with Goku's campaign obviously being the longest, Yamcha and Tien skipping the Namek Saga, and Gohan's three campaigns (Kid, Teen, and Adult) all taking different chunks of the story. It's a really neat way to handle everything! But the sheer amount of campaign content means that we're not getting in-depth cutscenes like in the first Budokai, it's just static talking heads now, albeit with solid voice acting from the original actors.

What's most interesting about Dragon Universe, however, is the existence of an overworld. Budokai 2 toyed with this idea, but limited you to a handful of selectable spaces on its board game-like maps. Dragon Universe opens up a small-scale version of the whole DBZ world (as well as Namek) for you to fly across however you see fit. It's pretty rad! The major hiccup is that there are a LOT of hidden secrets and alternate routes in here, and without a guide, you'd be sure to miss out on unlockable characters and moves. It's sort of like the first Legend of Zelda, where if you didn't know which bush to burn, you'd just never see some of what the game had to offer. But we've got gamefaqs, so we're fine.

Tournaments are back, but they're pretty much the same. The new inclusion of instant transmission (teleporting) to get behind an enemy at the cost of 2 ki bars makes it a lot easier to cheese though, as you can often wait by the edge of the ring, pop behind your opponent, and knock them right out of bounds.

Dragon Arena was really interesting. In both this mode and Dragon Universe, you gain Exp and can level up your characters' stats. Dragon Arena gives you 3-5 pre-made characters to fight for every level, from 1 to 100. It's a lot! It's an intriguing premise though, and I had a lot of fun with it.

Budokai 3 doesn't do anything incredibly groundbreaking. The combos and controls are still very simple, especially in a post-FighterZ world, but there's enough to chew on here that I was fully engaged. It felt great to fill in this gap, as I'd been wanting to play this game for nearly 20 years.

Speaking of which, I gotta give those Tenkaichi Budokais a fair shake now...

Hoa is (1.) a stunning display of artistry, breathtaking in its peaceful simplicity, but also (2.) underbaked and boring and I don't like it.

If you've looked at any screenshots or footage, you'll already have thought "huh, big Ghibli vibes here", so we'll just skip that part. Beneath the lush, cozy art style lies an extremely basic rough draft of a game. Across 8 small "worlds" (if we can call them that), you control a cute lil triangle baby who catches butterflies to wake up giant creatures, each of whom remembers you from when you were an even smaller baby.

In practice, this is sort of like the most basic Metroidvania imaginable, with a map containing decent verticality, a small number of collectibles/currency in each area (we're talking single digits), 4 or 5 earned abilities that allow you to progress, aaaaaand that's it. Beyond the music and visuals, I truly mean it when I say NOTHING compelling occurs in Hoa. Bland, combat-less platforming leads to sparse, spread-out collectibles which lead to awkward and vague dialogue with the big critters which leads to a baffling ending sequence.

[Structural spoilers from this point on, but no story details:]

After the game stops repeating gameplay, you observe a fairly long chase sequence which would have been the most engaging part of the game, but for some reason you aren't allowed to participate. (Severe Halo 5 cutscene energy) This is followed by what could be a dream sequence or some sort of limbo maybe?? I tried looking up what it was supposed to mean and couldn't find a legitimate answer anywhere, only encountering theorizing redditors, most as confounded as I was. Then instead of giving any closure, the final cutscene shows events from before the game; events which have already been related to us by the big magic animals along the way.

If you've ever been on a date with someone you were incredibly attracted to, but after an hour realized "there is absolutely nothing going on beneath the surface with this person", eventually ending the evening in a deflated state of stupor, that's what it feels like to play Hoa.

Look, Celery.

I'm sorry, but... I have to let you go.

I was immediately smitten with you from the start. The way you talked about food and flavors and how you could taste with your ears left me breathless. I laughed and curled my disgusting rat tail when you talked about your berry-infused hats. And when you tasted me with those ears... My heart was racing.

We made some incredible memories together. And that's what makes this so difficult. We could have been something truly special together, but... you've changed. You once were a passionate rat, eager to share your love of hear-eating with those around you, but you've grown cold. Pretentious. Maybe even a little full of yourself. I didn't feel valued anymore. I just can't be with someone who lacks humility.

I'm sorry.

Also there's this ghost rat and I'm kind of morally obligated to propose to her so she can finally move on to the afterlife, I'm sure you understand

Was this game marketed as a VN? It probably should have been.

The illusion of choice strikes again!! This is the most a point-and-click styled game has ever held my hand, to the point where it felt like I had no say in anything that happened. Dordogne is one of those games that happens to you, rather than allowing you to be an active participant. It's not a standard walking simulator, but it's about as interactive as a guided tour of a local museum.

Despite the dull gameplay, it is stunningly beautiful. The way the watercolor-painted textures are mapped to 3D models is often breathtaking, and was the key reason I played the game. The voice performances are quite good as well, but what really surprised me (having come to the game after seeing the reveal trailer, expecting a cozy happy game) was how SAD the game is. The story revolves around a broken family, alternating between glimpses of the protagonist's childhood and their present. And sure, it's about overcoming the issues that have affected the family, but I've been through plenty of those IRL, Dordogne is way too stressful for me to consider it recreation!

Anyhow, this game is beautiful enough that some people will be able to enjoy it for the visuals alone. It does paint a nice picture of a summer in youth spent at a relative's house (Sort of a French Boku no Natsuyasumi without any of the freedom), and that may have enough appeal for some players as well. The bottom line is that the setting and story's appeal is about as YMMV as it gets, the visuals are stunning, and the gameplay may as well not be there at all.

The most interactive segment was a bizarre minigame about brushing your teeth. Not for me!

After nearly two decades, I picked this one up again. Surprisingly, I was impressed by how competent the story mode is as a recap of the Saiyan-Cell Sagas, with a lot more cutscenes than I remembered. The combat is good but not great, and there's a decent amount to get out of the game through the World Tournament mode and unlocking everything, but I didn't have to motivation to do it all 20 years ago, and I sure don't now!

Either way, it's a completely fine DBZ game, and it's a lot better than most of its predecessors from the previous console generation. It's very simple, but I was having enough fun that I finished the story mode and did a handful of World Tournaments. The weird inconsistencies that really irritated me as a 13-year-old (yellow Spirit Bomb and Kamehameha, Cell's voice doesn't change mid-fight when he changes forms, etc.) felt more charming than annoying now, but that's probably because I've played better DBZ games since, and at the time this was the best we had. I wouldn't recommend anyone go out of their way to play this unless they're trying to go through every Dragonball game. It's fine!

It's a bit of a mess.

It's hard to say how much RPGolf Legends is trying to ape Golf Story. On the surface, I can see why it would seem that way, as you've got a chibi golfer protagonist exploring a pixelated island on a golf-centric adventure, doing wacky sidequests along the way. However, in execution, the two games are different enough that I didn't find myself actively comparing the two while playing, and not just for quality reasons.

RPGolf isn't just a bait title, they go hard on the RPG elements here, but twist them in the most aggravating ways possible. You walk everywhere to explore the overworld, but that even includes walking to your ball after every stroke. When you have a 1v1 golf competition, it's turn-based (obviously), but you also have to watch the NPC slowly meander across the course to their ball, while the screen reminds you to wait your turn before hitting again. There are LOADS of violent wild animals outside of the confines of towns and villages, and beating them up with your driver is a novel enough concept, but there's a cooldown on the use of any healing items (if you get poisoned by the omnipresent snakes and use an antidote, you can't use another antidote or ANY other healing items for 30 seconds) and the combat is wonky enough that I never felt like I could consistently avoid damage. When you die and respawn, you're left with a fraction of a single heart as well, which means you have to find a way to heal up before you try again. There are dungeons, which is pretty cool, but nothing inside them was compelling. The same goes for side quests, which are usually simple fetch quests or "do this thing 5-10 times" checklists, and have insignificant rewards.

But the absolute worst thing that the game does is its magic energy meter. Essentially, every hole in the game has a magical barrier around it, and you need your meter at full charge to unlock a single hole. You recharge this meter by getting par or better on any hole, and then going through a slot machine minigame, trying to land on a 25%, 50%, or 100% recharge of your meter. This forces you to replay the same holes over and over just so you can progress to the next hole. If the minigame always had a shot at 100%, that would be fine, but there were quite a few times where I had to beat a hole 4 times in a row, getting 25% at a time for my magic meter. It makes progression more tedious than anything else, especially since the actual golf mechanics aren't that fun or engaging.

My favorite thing the game does, however, is boss fights. You have a monster on a specific golf hole, and you have to beat it into submission repeatedly so you can finish the hole, as the game only lets you strike the ball when you're out of Battle Mode. It's a fun concept and was the clear highlight.

All in all, RPGolf Legends is an amateurish effort filled with bizarre choices (the same triumphant jingle plays when you get a birdie or a triple bogey) that reminded me more of RPG Maker 2003 games than anything from the past decade. Wouldn't recommend, especially not at the $29.99 asking price.

My mom banned me from playing this game when I found it at Grandma's house (left by a random cousin no doubt, Grandma only played Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy, and Super Scattergories) because the girl you rescue in level 3 has pixel nipples poking through her tank top. Replaying it as an adult, I'm kind of baffled that the mincemeat gore and ejected eyeballs weren't the issue. Conservative Christian Childrearing!

Holds up better than I thought though! The harder difficulties aren't really balanced, so I'd consider "Easy" to be the best way to play as it's plenty challenging. After playing Episode 2 and Episode 3 for the first time, I'm not sure if they were worth the 20+ year wait, but they're certainly better than a lot of their DOS contemporaries. Apogee was to DOS what Rare was to the N64!