The best RPG's feel like a real journey, and Xenoblade Chronicles 3 nails that bench mark. The story concept is out there enough to be unique, but resonant enough to hook you and keep you playing. The soundtrack pulls out all the stops and really aids in the emotional high notes hitting as hard as they do. The world is tremendous, packed to the brim with nooks and crannies to explore. The team building in gameplay is fantastic, giving you a huge degree of customization to make your dream team of warriors. If you've played any other Xenoblade games and liked them, you absolutely cannot miss this one.

Certainly the game isn't perfect, some things exist just to bloat the hefty run time, and certain aspects seem cool at first but way overstay their welcome (chain attack theme lol), but you can easily work past those. Just go with the flow of the game, and let your sense of adventure take over and you'll have a wonderful time.

This game is a buggy mess put together with chewing gum and edge. But there's something about it. Few things go as hard as Fear & Hunger while still maintaining a degree of respectability. This game is rich in obscure content, and if you're willing to devote time to it, you will find something more than rewarding for your efforts. This game is transparently unfair to you, and you have to love how the primary solutions are to be unfair back. Beyond that though, the game captures a level of tension and uncertainty that legitimately keeps me up at night if I think to hard about it, and I think that's the hallmark of any good horror game. If you can bear with obtuse mechanics and player unfriendly design, I think there's a lot to love about Fear & Hunger, and I'd strongly recommend both this and Termina to anyone who can vibe with them.

Hard to say if I like this or Halo 3 more. 3 definitely perfected the game feel, and I liked the enemy variety a bit more, but Reach is just as fun to play and has probably the best level variety of any game in the series. The space battle in particular was a nice addition. This is definitely one of the tougher game in the series, and be prepared to have some restarts tied to getting blown up by concussion rifles. If I were to recommend games in the series to people, this would be towards the top of my list, as in addition to being extremely well made, the game just oozes its own personal style with the actions of the Noble Team.

An SNES classic that time tragically has not been super kind to. The menus are laggy as all get out, half the mechanics don't work properly, the replay value is high but it takes half the game for playstyles to really diverge, and the balance is a mess. If you can slot yourself into the era though, you have a gorgeous game with a phenomenal OST and tons of options for viable-to-busted end game parties, and it's good fun to make a cohesive unit with the 3 characters you pick at the start. It doesn't light the world on fire like it did when it first got fan translated, but it's a quick and satisfying 16-bit romp with a handful of variations depending on your main character to keep things fresh. Highly recommend checking it out if the Collection of Mana goes on sale, or heck just check out the original fan translation at least once if you're a fan of SNES RPGs.

A certified classic and updated for modern audiences to enjoy! Now as a remake, there are definitely some missed opportunities to touch up or expand upon the slower or more anti-climatic parts of the original that they sadly passed up on. Everything great about the original is still intact though, and the new Chain system, party buffs, in battle character switches, and Triple Attacks add fun new dimensions to the battle system and gives everyone a time to shine! Unlike a lot of modern RPGs, Super Mario RPG also keeps it briefer and to the point, which is honestly kind of refreshing in an era where most rpg's shoot for eating up 80-100 hours of your time. A new post game option also allows for you to test your mettle against tougher boss rematches if you're eager for tougher opponents to cut your teeth against. On the whole, the game is pretty easy, but that also gives it the perk of being a great entry point to the RPG genre for newer players, as well as a great way to familiarize yourself with RPG's that use an action command system in general. Highly recommend checking this game out if you've never had a chance to play the original, it's always been a gem of a game and a chill way to spend a couple afternoons.

Phantom Rose is an interesting spin on a card battler with light trappings of Darkest Dungeon in the mix. This game focuses almost purely on combat with very light elements of exploration with event and search rooms. Overall, the game does gradually ramp up the challenge making things very stressful come Diamond 7, but once you finally clear all levels of Diamond Adventure, you find yourself with little to do beyond grinding to unlock every skin in the game. I enjoyed it for its run time, but it lacks much to keep you playing when all is said and done. The only other criticism I have is an erratic difficulty curve, the game is way too easy up until about Diamond 5, and quickly becomes very volatile as the compounding trial options force a necessity for good cards to appear or you'll have a nightmare that will swiftly come to an end.

Compared to its predecessor, Izuna 2 is a much more fleshed out and realized Mystery Dungeon game. In addition to having more of an actual plot, there's an expansive roster of playable characters, more dungeons to go through, tons of new weapons with interesting effects, and a useful super attack in the Tag Attack mechanic. Additionally the game has gotten a pretty good face lift as far as the sprite work goes. There are still quite a few rough spots though, with the game often feeling a little slow in progression despite how short it is. All new characters join at level 1 and there's no leaked experience, which heavily discourages using anyone outside of who you initially gravitate to. The game still also lacks staple mechanics of the genre like in dungeon shops. On the more mixed side, the game has retooled how SP works, having it drain overtime and penalizing you for staying on a floor for too long by making it drain faster and faster. Your mileage may vary on whether or not this was a fair addition to keep the game challenging. On the whole though, I'd say this was a step up from the first outing for Izuna, and I'm excited to see what they'll do with that reboot they're making.

Compared to Halo 3, I did actually feel the gunplay worked a little bit better, but ammo management was a huge hassle and the level design in the main missions felt really undercooked. Having open world interludes was definitely a cool idea, but I never really felt compelled to scrounge for the Audio logs. The overly dark visuals demanding use of the weird visor overlay also just felt more annoying than anything. On the positive side again, the soundtrack is amazing and the concept of playing a trooper instead of a Spartan is at least novel. If you liked Halo 3, then you'll definitely enjoy at least one playthrough of this, but I doubt I'll revisit it again like I would Halo 3. It's a much easier recommend these days since you can get it cheaply or in the Master Chief Collection, I imagine I'd be harsher to it when it was new.

Deadlocked strips the Ratchet and Clank franchise down to its core action and shooting elements with platforming and movement tech heavily de-emphasized. Naturally if you like well made platformers, this game will leave you a little underwhelmed. If you like blowing crap up constantly though? Then this game is for you. It's really good mindless fun, with enough depth and variety to keep you engaged throughout. It doesn't overstay its welcome either, so it's a nice way to kill a couple afternoons. Check it out if you love arena combat and constant explosions.

Of the mystery dungeon roguelikes I've played, this is definitely one of them. In all seriousness, Izuna does have a pretty good amount of depth to it on a mechanical level, but the game is really short and by the time you get to explore the more interesting aspects of weapon customization, it's already over. It's also a game you can easily bulldoze through if you have any familiarity with the genre and don't mind a little level grinding. It definitely has personality though, and I'm interested to check out the sequel as well as the reboot. And to be honest, it's nice to have an RPG that just gets to the point every now and again and doesn't take 80 hours to clear.

While Battle for Bikini Bottom is far from polished, it's a remarkably well made tie in product with loads of call backs to the source material created by people who really did seem to understand the show and the game genre they were making for. The 3D graphics are none too special, the audio balance can be off at time, and it has some of the weirdest knockback physics I've ever seen, but the level design is great and the platforming mechanics are done fantastically. Obviously worth a look if you're a fan of the show during its classic era, but I could even recommend it to those who are just enthusiasts of the collect-a-thon style of 3D platformer.

Just can't get enuf! An obvious attempt to play successor to Jet Set Radio, BRC hits all the high notes of those games while still bringing fresh (though not necessarily original) ideas to the mix. The aesthetics for this game are amazing, the soundtrack is slamming, and the sense of speed and exhilaration from nailing tricks is great. The game does have some flaws, from oblique elements that don't come across organically, a somewhat rushed conclusion to the story, and some flow breaking aspects to the tagging system. On the mixed side, the game is much easier to control than JSR and JSRF with less weight and inertia to your movement which makes it easier to get into but also makes it harder to judge what you are and aren't capable of. (On the non-complaint side, in can be hard to adjust to if you were playing the JSR games recently like yours truly) The pros vastly outweigh the cons though, and I while I personally find the game to be more of an equal to JSR than something that surpasses it , having more games like Jet Set Radio in the world is always good in my book and I'm sure I'll play this one multiple times just like I have JSR. Check it out if you love this style of game!

Halo with a fresh coat of paint but you'll likely revert the graphics to the originals anyway. Everything thing good and bad about the original Halo still holds true here, with gorgeous but at times repetitive levels and simple but satisfying FPS gameplay with a good variety in the enemies you face down. One con of playing this on PC is the default keyboard controls are horrible and I had a hard time finding something comfortable for me. It's a great time with or without a friend, and the multiple difficulty levels with added modification options and achievements to unlock give you plenty of reason to replay if you so desire.