There was a time that I was a big fan of animes. I watch 10 episode in one day, keep reading side materials to get the lore of it and have a really good time(until realizing most of the animes using the same handful of character stereotypes that started boring me to death and that realization came with when I was trying to understand why I don't enjoy fairy tail like everybody else).

In that time I found the "best visually looking" anime fate zero, of course I watched it and fell in love with it, both the story, visuals and characters was awesome, then watched fate unlimited blade works and somehow found it less visually, character and story wise. Then when I searched about it, I found that it was just one part of it's visual novel not the whole story, oh also that there were games about it as well! Of course I get excited and read the visual novel immediately, it was awesome. Then I read Tsukihime vn from the same writer, it was awesome too! Then I read Kara no Kyoukai novel and... it wasn't awesome for me because how it felt disjointed but that's beside the point. The point is, when I learned there was a fate game after finishing the anime that is about an alternate universe I wanted to play it of course.

It started as an strange game, where you are a limbo like school place, you need to choose one servant from 3 different servants(I choose Archer) and need to find information from npcs and enviroment in the school until the fight day comes, also you need to finish the "dungeons" before the fight day happens(I didn't play persona at the time but now looking back it's funny realizing that they just copied the whole structure with less content from persona). But it was such a slog.

I think I played near 10-15 hours and wanted to tell my experiences about it.

Combat
Combat is paper rock scissors simulator. That's all there is. Only strategy you can use is when fighting memorize your opponent's attack strategy(because most of the time same enemy type use the same attack type) and if you die, just use what you learned.. that's all there is. Also both enemies and dungeons are super boring. They are repetitive looking to the mindnumbing level. THERE IS NOTHING INTERESTING.

Probably the most boring jrpg combat system stretched to it's limit in my opinion. First 5 minute gameplay is equal to my last 15 hours of gameplay. That's all there is.

School sections
These are also a slog too. What you need to do is, interact "everyone" to find one helpful scripted character to learn about the new upcoming master fight, interact with your servant to learn nothing interesting and lastly, farm enemies to level up and also get to the end door of the dungeon before the next fight comes. My favourite activity (Sarcasm).

Story
From what I played it had an interesting premise, you are in a simulation that you don't know anything about or how did you get there or you don't even know who you are. But from what I played, story didn't move one bit. Probably "everything will be explained in the end" type of story this is. But also it made me run out of my patience. Also game have a lot of fanservice characters, but I suspected they are just a "simulation" and not important with how they force them to your face without no reason at all in the first place. Unfortunately I can't say anything about the story as a whole but if I talk about what I played until choosing the abandon is, it's a waste of time.

Lastly, I want to remind everyone that I am just talking about the experience I had until the 15 hour time(I think last place I was Nursery Rhyme fight), so if the game gets good or something like that I don't know. But I have a right to criticize what I played and the parts I had played wasn't just the worst jrpg experience it was also the worst and the most boring gaming experience ever for me to the point of abandoning a game(I rarely abandon games, I even finished drakengard 1 aka. the worst melee combat the game). It's unfortunate saying that but that's all I feel when thinking about this game.
Monotonous boredom simulator.

All 13 endings reached, including the 2 secret endings. In many ways, Elsinore is incredible, weaving an intelligently-told time-looping story around the setting of Shakespeare's Hamlet. The game sees the player taking control of Ophelia, who, after being killed within a couple of days, find herself waking up again into an ever-repeating loop, doomed to die repeatedly in some manner within at most four days. The task, then, is to explore Elsinore castle from an overhead perspective, interacting with its various inhabitants (via a point-and-click interface) in the hopes of working out what is causing the loop and, eventually, how to break it.

It's an engrossing premise, told with superb writing throughout and the level of detail and nuance available in the character interactions, alongside the huge range of permutations of events, is a highly laudable achievement. There's the occasional nod to actual Shakespearian dialog that's enjoyable to spot, but not overused and the game is perfectly accessible to someone with no knowledge of the source material. Of course, Hamlet is a tragedy, so don't expect happy endings to be in abundance!

It must be said that some extent of repetition is pretty much inherent in the time-loop premise, which can become a bit frustrating when exploring events that take place later in a cycle. A fast-forward control alleviates this to some extent, but a way to accelerate the text-based dialog further would have been appreciated. Just occasionally, the event logic breaks a little - so you might encounter, for example, references to a character who's just died as if they're still alive - but this is rare and honestly, with the complexity that's involved here, this is forgivable. These relatively minor shortcomings aside, Elsinore is among the strongest examples of a timeloop-based game that you could hope to find.

It makes me sad to see games like Citizen Sleeper because even though I'm aware of the fact that making a game is VERY hard, it just feels like games like these have huge potential still buried. First things first, it has amazing worldbuilding, and I love how cozy (for the lack of a better word) The Eye feels: A space station on the fringes of an interstellar civilization where greedy corporations exploit everything and everyone; born from the failures of that hypercapitalistic society. I found writing to be sometimes confusing or forced (for example when it describes MC's feelings, but we'll get to that), but still very much enjoyed it. However, I think the game has a big identity problem, and it affects everything. So let me say it out loud: THIS GAME IS NOT AN RPG. It isn't a bad thing in itself, of course, I loved the developers' previous game, In Other Waters, and it was a linear adventure with minimalistic gameplay.

The problems I had with CS comes mainly from its structure. It tries to be an RPG by giving you the choice on how to proceed, what to do and how to distribute your skills, with a system of using pre-determined dice rolls to interact with things and fix your decaying cyborg body. Problem is, after you get the hang of this dice system, everything becomes easy to achieve and when you get enough money to sustain yourself (which happens after 1 hour or so), you are able to do anything you want to do, and my biggest problem with the game shows itself: there are no consequences at all. No consequences if you do something, no consequences if you choose to not do something, and it's not just in the actions; it also doesn't matter what you choose in narrative parts either. Most of the time there are 2 choices with one of them being "stay silent" anyway.

Unfortunately, there are also almost no connections between storylines, so the game is more like a collection of short, self-contained and linear stories rather than a game where your choices changes things. Some of these stories are way too short to care about the characters, some of them just begin to unravel and ends. I think my favorite storyline is Lem and Mina's, which is the only one (other than the DLC storyline) that truly feels finished. Endings were also unsatisfying for me, I think there are 3 endings in the game in total, and they all felt abrupt. The ending decisions are also the only true decisions in the game, where you decide if you want to end the game at that point or not. So, it was quite unsatisfying.

In the end, I can't recommend the game if you expect a narrative heavy RPG (yes, like Disco Elysium, there, I said it). However, if you are interested in the setting and the stories it offers, give it a shot, and also definitely check out In Other Waters, I think they did a better, more focused game on that one. Still, I'm eager to see what Jump Over The Age will develop next, I know they have fascinating worlds to tell yet.

Call me a lunatic, but i'm pretty sure that if Thimbleweed Park would have been released in the 90s, it would be definitely considered as one of the greatest point and click adventures of all time.

If i could imagine a reason why Thimbleweed Park was a succesful game, one loved by many, that reason would probably be because of how good it is in creating a world of it’s own. This is not just pure atmosphere (which could be considered an aesthetical effect) but also because of how well written everything is. I feel like the obvious inspiration on X-Files and Twin Peaks is not just a matter of aesthetic and/or themes; actually i feel like the whole storytelling flows pretty much like a TV Series. The story being divided into episodes and the recurrent flashbacks are a proof of that, plus the emphasis on character development aswell as a couple of minor plot-twist. I don’t recall another point n’click adventure game being so effective in mimicking so many TV tropes. Also, i think that bitter sense of humor is worth of some compliment. But what really inspires me about Thimbleweed Park is it’s gameplay, and that’s my main focus in this review.

The game was promoted mainly as a spiritual succesor of Maniac Mansion. It’s an interesting fact that, considering Ron Gilbert’s involvement in many of the most succesful point and click adventures of late-80s/early-90s, this game was instantly attached to Maniac Mansion (which wasn’t really the most succesful graphic adventure of that period). But as an advertising campaign, it couldn’t be more truthful.

Maniac Mansion is well known for being the game that spawned a revolution within graphic adventures, by adding the point n’click interface and the verb system. These two inclusions basically defined the canonical gameplay for the genre. From that point onwards, Maniac Mansion has been fairly cited for these introductions. I feel like Maniac Mansion has always been credited for it’s influence, but never really appreciated enough as a game by itself. Maniac Mansion’s main features, compared to other classics, are essentially two: minimal storytelling, and most importantly, a brilliant puzzle design (in my opinion, one of the best of all time). Both elements were heavily correlated. The puzzle-design made a strong emphasis on freedom, not only because you could choose characters with unique habilities, but also because a lot of it’s puzzles could be solved in multiple ways, also having different endings. These freedom was also possible because the story provided almost no restrictions, it was only just a couple of tropes serving as an excuse for the gameplay.

It’s kinda curious to see how, considering Maniac Mansion’s influence, none of these elements were taken into consideration in the development of the adventure genre. On the opposite, the narrative became the dominant element, puzzles becoming more or less a requirement to make the story go forward. Also, when considering games based on comedy, you can notice how puzzles started to play mostly as a joke, therefore relying more and more on moon logic, to the point where they became imposible to solve without a walkthrough. Of course, all of these elements where the basis of the most glorious days of point n’ click adventures, aswell as the causers of their downfall. One can’t help but thinking what would have been if there were just a handful of games with enough marketing taking the simplicity of Maniac Mansion as their basis. Probably wouldn’t have changed a thing but whatever.

I feel like Thimbleweed Park’s attempt at being the spiritual succesor of Maniac Mansion can be summarized pretty much as an attempt of incorporating Maniac Mansion’s puzzle design into a more complex and developed story (This, of course, if we only focus in the correlation between gameplay and narrative, because there are obviously many other aspects to be compared). At times, it definitely succeeds at doing so. Other times, while still being great, the restrictions imposed by the story become very obvious. And one specific part of the game (episode) just feels very underdeveloped when it comes to the puzzles.

A lot has been said about how many things are left unexplained, about how many incongruences there are, and of course, many things have been said about the ending (which i’m not going to spoil, but i have to say that i’m okay with it). Of course, this game is the attempt of picking some key aspects of the Maniac Mansion style and mixing it with a more complex storytelling. But the fact that this game leaves so many things unexplained is, once again, the definitive proof that they were understanding the story as a mere excuse for the gameplay. Or, at least, that they consider gameplay as something equal or even more important than the story. And i applaud that, because that’s a brave design philosophy, specially within this genre, where the opposite idea has slowly degenerated in a market filled with visual novels disguised as graphic adventures.

The Beginner's Guide and Stanley Parable share both a problem and it all resides within their post-modern themes. I think both games showcase a lot of what kind of language and opportunities you could use within games that aren't possible in any other medium but both struggle to apply it to something. They are good art studies, not so much art pieces. They lack substance, there's very little that's tangible about them, so what I'm left with is kinda like the creative outcome of someone that went to art school, knows their shit, but has nothing to say. They have the wits, they have a lot of ideas, but they don't have the creativity to apply it to something, so instead they use the post modern metanarrative umbrella to let those ideas break lose without much of a meaning behind them other than being cool ideas.

But that's only half-true, as The Beginner's Guide tries to give it a tangible pseudo metanarrative by being... guided (heh) through different bit-sized games of a fictional developer by a narrator, who spoon feeds the player the meaning of every artistic resource the game showcases while also telling the story of said developer and their relationship. It's kind of a fake documentary in a way and I enjoyed how the concept was executed... on paper.

I hate the narrator with all my guts.

I hate the fact that the game spoon feeds the meaning of everything going on. I hate that every moment that's genuinely well crafted and made me feel something is quickly destroyed by his annoying voice. And I specially don't like his character.

Unfortunately, that's the game. That's the point. Without this frustrating character, the game wouldn't stand on its own because:

1) It's an interactive essay about language and meaning in videogames, and essays need a voice

2) There would be very little going without the voice, as it delivers necessary context. It would be like visiting a Vang Gogh exposition without context of who is Van Gogh and what he was going through while painting those pieces. In a museum the easiest and best solution is to provide the necessary context through annotations or some info panels and then let the visitant wander and let him take it all in and wonder what it all means if he wants to... but in this case it's all very abstract and barren, so it wouldn't retain most people's attention, and also the devs wanted to give you a very annoying guide because...

3) The game is also about the very annoying guide. So in the end it's also kind of a character study that delves in very exciting themes like: what's the relationship between the art analyst and the art? What's the line between artistic intent and personal interpretation? Does anything have meaning at all or is at all a fragment of the analyst's blablablablablablablablablabla...

I swear to good, this is the kind of game that makes you wanna say very mean stuff about millennials being snowflakes and that they should go and touch grass... and I'm a millennial too, but damn. This game is so far up its own ass about stuff that you get through in your first year of art school, and I'm sorry to say this because this is not only about the fictional developer and the fictional narrator... it might be about the real life author of The Beginner's guide and his complex relationship with art and meaning in videogames? Or maybe the way videogame analysts looked at his work when he made The Stanley Parable? Maybe the real meaning of the game is somewhere between all these layers?

I don't know. I don't care. This whole "roleplaying as someone else and having a monologue about art that's secretly about self-loathing" is frustrating to think about.

It's 2 hours so... if you're very impressionable about art discussion and you like this kind of very pretentious post modernism you might like it more than I did. Just like The Stanley Parable, I respect some of the ideas and its use of resources even if they are in service of what's ultimately a post modern uroboros.

This is a weird one because I definitely enjoyed my time with this game on my first playthrough but looking back on it and replaying it, this game has a lot of flaws.

First chapter is a great introduction to the aftermath of Half-Life 2. This chapter and chapter 2 are incredibly nostalgic for me as these were funnily enough some of my first encounters with the Half-Life series besides Half-Life 2: Deathmatch. Replaying the game made me remember the good times and brought me back. After going into the tower everything starts to slightly go downhill. While it isn't too bad in the beginning, it becomes increasingly worse later on.

I don't have much to say about chapter 2 other than I kind of enjoyed venturing around the reactor core through the different rooms, it was pretty good.

Chapter 3 and 4 were honestly pretty underwhelming. I don't wanna sound like 'that guy' but dude why are half of these chapters and rooms in complete darkness. It makes everything annoying to go through especially because there will randomly just be hordes of zombies and the occasional Zombine and you will have no idea where they are, where they are coming from, or where to escape to. It isn't absolutely terrible, but the dark rooms makes it kind of difficult and a bit annoying to go through.

The final chapter is an absolute joke. Literally you spend like 15-20 minutes just escorting rebels into a train and it felt like it was never going to end. The final chapter is supposed to be exciting and filled with action but the entire time going through this finale I didn't feel satisfied. It felt like a chore much less than a finale.

Overall the game is fine and I can see myself going back to it every now and then much like the other games in this series, but compared to the other games, this one lacks in a lot of ways. I still recommend going through it because there are some decent parts, but don't expect a masterpiece after finishing Half-Life 2.

For a game as enjoyable and fun as Jedi Fallen Order, I had my fair share of problems with it. The levels and environments were a blast to explore, the combat and force powers were awesome and the story was engaging. I ultimately rated it a 3.5/5 because of how much of a slog it was to navigate the levels (the map + no fast travel sucked), and the collectibles were pretty damn disappointing (BD-1 paint, lightsaber parts that were nigh impossible to notice in gameplay, and enough has been said about the poncho and its various colors). But ultimately for me, the game felt buggy and sloppy as hell; as someone that sank a ton of hours into Titanfall 2, Respawn clearly know how to make a polished, buttery smooth action experience. But Fallen Order was broken as hell at times, the sliding and jumping always felt off, and I can't count how many times I'd fall to my death or die from some random ass glitch or buggy movement.

I'm being hard on the game, but after playing and completing Jedi Survivor, I feel like I shouldn't have been, because this sequel has improved so much of what didn't work in the first that it's actually almost made the first game better.

For clarity, I played this on PS5, so yes - I experienced crashes, bugs, glitches, and poor FPS. This was not my entire experience, and I feel like I was too hard on the first game for this when I was sitting here grinning like an idiot at how much I enjoyed Survivor that it feels contradictory to excuse those issues when I was harsh on the first game. But those issues aside...

This is the perfect example of what a sequel should be; like God Of War Ragnarok, they took what worked in the first game, made it better, bigger, more intense, and packed a punch into their story. No spoilers, but I loved the villain and how it all played out. I got attached to these characters and the big moments that happen between them. This game really goes places and is not afraid to go there! It feels darker and more dangerous, with higher stakes than before.

The sheer amount of things to collect, bosses to find and defeat, puzzles and challenges to best, and not to mention really pushing the limits of challenging with some of them (some of these bosses and enemies will test you to the limit) is exactly what I want in a single player adventure game like this. Not too big, yet not small in any way.

And of course, the customization aspects are back with colors and materials for your lightsaber, gun (fucking LOVE the gun) and BD-1, but this time, full on Cal Kestis customization that I absolutely adored. The amount of incredible jackets here for Cal I was over the moon for. Armor vests, leather jackets, denim, robes, it's exactly how I'd want my character to dress if I was in a Star Wars universe. My Cal had the long "windswept" hair style and full beard for 75% of my playthrough as it felt the most canon in terms of his natural physical progression, he's getting older and a bit more rugged, and it also might have something to do with it being similar to how I look in real life too :)

When the game ran great on PS5, which was a majority of the time for me, it looked stunning. 60 FPS smooth combat in breathtaking environments with gorgeous lighting and crazy little details everywhere really showing how talented Respawn are. They truly get Star Wars, from the characters and creatures everywhere you either chat with, help, or cut down, to the planets themselves loaded with buildings, infrastructure, plants and terrain. They loaded every nook and cranny with lore, secrets, collectibles and just plain awesome stuff to look at. Walking, running, or getting a ride from an animal buddy through these worlds is never not a joy to behold.

In terms of a Platinum trophy review, this felt like a Sony Platinum (something like Spider-Man, Ghost Of Tsushima, God Of War, etc.) where if you do a bunch of cool combat stuff, find collectibles, do a few random fun things and of course do all side and main missions, you'll get the Platinum. Nothing here was egregious or a slog to do, aside from getting all the Priorite shards to buy everything in a shop, but once you get the map upgrade to show where it is (and it's only on 2 planets), it's not that bad. Of course, some of the challenges may really test your patience and skill level, but the difficulty can also be changed if needed. But sticking with your guns and beating all of the bosses and challenges without doing that feels like a true feat when done.

I'll be remembering this one for a long time and it's absolutely worked its way up into one of my favorite Star Wars games, one of my favorite Star Wars stories (Cal is so good in this, seriously) and it truly made me feel something. It'll be one of my favorite games of 2023, no question.

The sequel to the grandfather of what could be considered dating sims. It's an archaic format nowadays, sort of, but 1999 has never seen a visual novel of this grandeur.

What this game takes from its predecessor, takes it and gives it a nice spitshine. It sounds derogatory, but I don't think I have any other word to describe it. Mechanics are more or less the same, but with quality of life changes, especially with the dating system. You don't take notes as often, or at all, with this game, compared to the first one. It makes for a more streamlined playthrough where you get to manage your character and the girls you have to deal with, until one of them decides to activate bomb mode and ruins your plans for the next 3 months or so. That's the name of the game, and for some reason, I like it.

The characters range from pretty damn annoying to level headed, which doesn't mean much, but there are enough archetypes for the majority of people to find a character they "like", so long as you don't go for the teacher/childhood adult figure, you weirdo.

My main concern is over how easy it is to get a certain ending. No, not even the one where you don't get any of the girls, I'm talking about Hikari. She's head over heels for your character from day 1, so playing nice will most likely result in her ending, rather than another that you poured 90% more effort into. Tokimemo 1 had a character like this, but she wasn't the main poster girl. It feels weird to have your protagonist be a complete 180 from the 1st game in terms of route difficulty, making the game entice you perhaps a bit too much to be friends with her, leading to most likely a mistake.

I still got Kotoko though, so suck it.

At first I didn't like this quite as much as the first one but I think after finishing my first run I'm pretty sure I like it as much as Tokimeki 1. It's a bit slower paced, and it definitely doesn't want you to date as many girls as tokimeki 1, but I think it ends up making its own style that works out in the end.

Since I've only done one run I can't exactly go super deep into mechanical criticism but it definitely felt like they tuned Tokimeki 2 to be a bit harder to get the best results in. Relationship rating and stats themselves seem to raise a bit slower in this one, and unlike tokimeki 1 where I messed around and still got into a top-rate university, I was unable to even get into an average one in this. Don't really have a problem with this, it's just different from the first one.

https://imgur.com/KIgPFWd

The childhood prologue is interesting and provides some more reasons to care about the childhood friend this time around (I'll admit I ignored Shiori in Tokimeki 1.) It's mostly just walking around and examining locations/talking to people for about 45ish minutes, but it's a nice change of pace. I don't think it has any impact on the main game, but I could be wrong.

On the character side of things I don't have a ton to say although I do think it's interesting that your guy friends will end up dating some of the potential love interests if you don't spend time with them. I'm not sure if it's fixed who they end up with or not, but I kind of liked it. It always felt weird to me in games with romance options when everyone just remained single forever to avoid stepping on the player's toes.

https://imgur.com/WPn2c3n

When you finish the game there's a nice album feature that has images of various events and dates you had with whoever you ended up with. It's cute, and a very nice feature for this sort of game. Also, during the credits scene there's little epilogues for all the characters you met which I appreciate. Since this game felt like it wanted me to focus I didn't hang out with most of them but it was still cool to see what happened to them in the end.

Overall I enjoyed it, I'll probably go back and play tokimeki 1 again before doing a second run though.

Edit: I forgot to mention the Emotional Voice System which uses a synthesized voice program to have the voice actors say the name you input. I don't know enough about voice synthesizers to say whether or not the EVS is impressive for 1999 or not, but it seemed pretty well made for something meant to work on a PS1. Unfortunately it (in my experience, I'll admit I didn't mess with it too much) can only load one synthesized voice at a time so it ended up being more awkward than no voice acting for the main character's name at all. The voice itself of course sounds a bit out of place but I won't complain about that since it is a 1999 PS1 game after all.

All of the quintessential Zachtronics games have their shelf life for me. This is generally either through a bit too much repetition, or through the expanding scope growing too much to keep track of everything. But they are all so well-designed that they are fun while they last. This one certainly lasted the longest, and it did so while exuding a ton of heart. The variety of games and the trickle of notes made it a joy to bounce around when one set of mechanics started to bring out that perfectionist itch a bit too much.

It was a genius decision to have the downloads work in the background, as it definitely led me to tinker with games for longer than I normally would have (if at all). Those sections ended up being as well-crafted and enjoyable as any vignettes throughout gaming.

This game also balances humor and emotion as well as any text in games. We see the anthropological detail from Mr Chilly that 20th century soft-serve was clearly enjoyed at a temperature of absolute zero. We see the computer's original owner vulnerably offering up this hardware as a piece of himself, recounting the wistful what-ifs that we all experience throughout life, and celebrating the people who shape your life even as the decades pass since you've been in their presence.

This may be a game to play over the years, dipping in and out to complete more puzzles and find more notes. It may even eventually become its own wistful memory as we try to recount to the next generation who we were back before Zachmatics disappeared from the golden ages...

This game holds a special place in my heart. It’s the first RPG I ever played that wasn’t Pokemon and though I never finished it 5 years ago, it still left one hell of an impression on me back then. Now that I finally beat it, I’m happy to say that most of what I loved about the game in the past is still just as strong as I remembered it, even if the game’s flaws have become much more apparent to me.

For starters, this story is fantastic. I love how high-stakes the beginning is with how weak and outnumbered the cast feels compared to the Mechon. I love how the game cleverly uses Shulk’s visions to foreshadow future events. I love how the story explores the nature of warfare. I love the art direction, setting, and how grand the game feels. I just love it. I think it’s very well paced too since after every large area you’re rewarded with a climactic cutscene and the story as a whole is so thrilling that I was never really bored at any point. The thing that really elevates the story, and the game as a whole would be the OST. As far as I’m concerned, this is Yoko Shimomura’s best work. The soundtrack injects so much life into the landscapes and brings so much emotion to the cutscenes that this is easily the strongest aspect of the game for me.

The only part of the story I was underwhelmed by were the characters. They’re likeable and very well voice acted but there’s not a lot to them so I never really got invested. Most of them develop as the game goes along but I’d be lying if I said I found any of it to be very memorable. The game does have some compelling character moments in the form of Heart-to-Hearts, but the problem is that most of them take an insanely long time to be unlocked so by the time you get most of them, the game is almost over.

As for gameplay, I initially found it to feel very samey and it takes a while to open up, but once you get more party members and can experiment with different party setups, it becomes quite fun. The game also gets bonus points for letting you remove the MC from your party without it being a death wish. The only thing that I’m not fond of are the visions you see in combat. They’re a really cool concept but the fact you can’t skip them really hurts the pacing of battles, and you’re basically spammed with them whenever you fight a stronger enemy which just gets annoying.

Then there’s the side content which I initially completely neglected when I first played the game. This time around I tried doing as much of it as possible but I honestly regret it because the game really goes for quantity over quality with about 90% of sidequests being the same type of kill or fetch quest. Majority of these quests don’t even give you EXP, only money which you get more than enough of by just playing the game and selling outdated equipment which makes doing them feel like a complete waste of time. The Colony 6 reconstruction stuff was worthwhile though and there’s probably some better side content that I’m not aware of, but I’m still let down by this aspect of the game overall.

Heading into Xenoblade again, I was worried that my fond memories of the game could just be attributed to nostalgia, but no, this game is genuinely great and I'm happy to have finally beaten it after all these years.

Castlevania Bloodlines was known as Castlevania The New Generation here in Europe and I'm kind of saddened it doesn't have it's own page on Backloggd as we had the far superior cover art though I admit that may be just my hatred of the red Genesis strip not present here on Backloggd. We definitely got the better Symphony of the Night art though. My North American friends, you have my sympathy. (of the Night)

As for Bloodlines itself, it's easily one of my favorite classicvanias. The story is slightly more modern setting of 1917 and changes things marginally for a more interesting result. Rather than the usual 'Belmont clan goes to Dracula's castle and kills when he resurrects' him plot hook the series mostly runs on it instead has two protagonists to choose from at the start of the game. Admittedly they are both distant descendants of the Belmont's John Morris and Eric Lecarde who take up the call when vampire Elizabeth Barkley (based on a real countess who allegedly bathed in blood among other things) uses the global war to use the souls of the dead to bring back Dracula again.

Global is really the theme of the game taking place on stages set in Romania, Greece, Italy, England, France giving some cool stage themes and effects. One level has a constant water reflection as the characters move atop ruins, another with a rotating tower and another swaying which for the time were mighty impressive and aspects still look stand out today like light coming through windows in later stages or a semi 3D type boss that could fit into vector man. Honestly it both looks and sounds great. The music is the gothic flair you'd expect from the Castlevania series mixed with that bass and machine sound the Megadrive was known for.

The aspect of the gameplay I like most comes down to the two character choices as it's more than a visual swap. John uses the whip as you would expect of a Castlevania. He can power it up, attack downwards and also use it to swing. Eric uses the Spear of Alucard which has a much greater reach and he can use to pole vault straight up. these differences allow the character to diverge slightly in level paths (though it's extremely limited) as well as fight bosses in different approaches. Though the subweapons are generally similar of boomerany, axe and holy water they both also have an extra move if you press up with it for each one for both characters. I prefer Eric personally of the two but that could be because I am bad at these games and he feels more like easy mode due to his extended reach. When you get good enough though you can use the jump to avoid enemy attacks and land ready to attack yourself which is a neat mechanic when it goes well. Either character you choose it feels great to play, less stiff and cumbersome like it's contemporaries.

Bloodlines does have it's flaws though as much as I do like it though. I really dislike the level in Versaille where the pacing and enemy designs feel a little off with the rest of the game and not all the bosses are equal. John also not being able to diagonal whip attack except when jumping also feels off control wise to an otherwise tightly designed experience.

These are pretty small niggles to an otherwise great looking, sounding and playing Castlevania. Absolutely worth a play if you haven't and for those interested youtube channel StrafeFox does a great making of video on Bloodlines and Super Castlevania IV