Black Mesa is that remake of the cult classic FPS, Half-Life. Which took around 3 more years of development time than the actual game in order to deliver us a enhanced experience of the resonance cascade that took place at the facility in-universe, all while trying to fix all the rough patches that was the story of the game presented in its first iteration.

Now, its not any news that the original Half-Life had a few inconsistencies and overall narrative points that jump back and forth and eventually end up in a really big let down of an original end scenario (this being Xen), and this is mostly seen in retrospect because the original game was revolutionary for its time and, it did give free way in order for the genre to advance its environmental storytelling techniques. Then the sequel came and that's all history.

But, they've never really come back to the first one in a while, didn't they? That's how in 2012, after the infamous release of Half-Life: Source made people feel like they deserved an actual remake of the original, the very first Black Mesa: Source (this was the original title of the free mod) came together to reinvent and mostly reimagine the story and art of the original Half-Life.

And that's how 8 years later, Black Mesa was officially released! And the game is pretty damn cool, it's come so long from so many changes and the very awaited final chapter that honestly it reeks of polish everywhere you go. Everywhere in the facility and the surface looks so good and have a very neat art direction, coupled that with modernized sections of the game that go along with the original design philosophy of this one and one that reinforces the idea of subtlety telling you how things are going down in the facility through environmental storytelling. It's great and very well done.

Only complaints about it would be the fact that sometimes the detail is so much that it can be confusing and kinda hard to difference things that you can actually interact with (be it buttons or doors) compared to the decoration in the many different rooms of the Black Mesa facility, a case of so much detail that it actually got harder to go through some chapters, but nothing too fatal. The stability of the game is a worse problem that is just due sometimes because of the engine being almost 10 years old supporting such graphical effects as it does with this game, so I'll give them that one.

Xen is very good in this version. They actively made the place look like an actual planet and ecosystem something could live on. It now actually look like a breathing place instead of just chunks of rocks suspended in the air, and while the puzzles are alright they at least give you more things to do than just walking through Interloper like nothing.

Overall, the game is great. I especially like that it's just made to fit in with what Half-Life 2 shows us in the story making the game make sense entirely, and I think I would recommend everyone playing this over the original Half-Life if they so pleased, it's deserved.

Although I have yet to finish Final Fantasy VII, I have played up to where the remake leaves off. So though I may not have the full context of this remakes changes over the original, I feel like I had enough to give this game an honest review.

From the story to the gameplay, the devs really put a lot of work into bringing the beloved classic to a new generation. The story is expanded incredibly well, giving a lot more time to flesh out characters and locations that were mostly breezed through in the original game. Particularly, the members of Avalanche not named Barret or Tifa are all given a lot more time to flesh out, and with the expanded locations you can get a much better idea of what life is like in the slums under the plates of Midgar.

In addition to just adding more into the first major act of the story, there are some subtle changes made throughout that culminate into a big reveal during the final chapter. This isn’t really a 1:1 retelling of the story, though it can feel really close most of the time. If you pay attention to certain changes made throughout, the larger changes to the story dropped in the final chapters of Remake piece together in a fun twist on the classic tale.

Gameplay on the other hand is not to subtle, as it has been completely revamped into an action-turnbased hybrid battle system. Like FFVII, the active time battle (ATB) system is the crux of combat. Instead of waiting for the bar to fill up in a turn based style battle though, the ATB gauge is filled by attacking and blocking. This leaves item and skill usage tied to the ATB gauge, with the rest of combat focused on using your basic attacks, defending and dodging.

I actually quite liked the new combat system, perhaps even more than FFVII original take on it. Waiting for the ATB gauges to fill isn’t that interesting, especially in low impact battles (such as with random enemy encounters). By allowing the player to attack and defend in the meantime it actually made every moment of battle engaging, and by the end of my 40+ hour playthrough I was still craving more. In fact, I was wishing there were more mini-boss and larger boss battles to really dive deep into its systems more.

This isn’t just a remake. In a lot of ways it a reimagining of a classic that provides a lot of fresh experiences for newcomers and veterans alike.

This was a very conflicting game. I have never beaten all of FF7 but had finished the parts covered here, so I was very interested based on the changes it was showing as time went on. This is largely what kept me going, the nature of fate playing a role and the characters resisting and challenging that. An interesting idea for a remake, confronting the direct path the original follows in-narrative. The game around that though is a bit messier.

I feel like of the action rpg battle systems I’ve seen in FF games so far, this one is probably the best designed, though moment to moment I enjoyed ff15 better. But this connects you to the characters more closely and opens up for some interesting strategies and mechanics in fights. I think it does become a little difficult to work with when youre strapped for ATB and it’s going a little slowly to reload, putting you in unwinnable situations rather than being able to skill your way out of it. Which to be fair to it is pretty in line with an RPG like 7. Other gameplay things that were odd were the traversal. It felt bad to control sometimes when moving in the environment, which could be a hindrance transitioning into a battle, or doing a boring puzzle or trying to find something obscure.

I thought it looked fairly beautiful, capturing the scenery and atmosphere of the original well with some obvious upgrades and reinterpretations. It was a little uneven here, even with the ps5 upgrades, there were plenty of spots where the graphics were hiding a bit of jank in design.

The game also was very padded. I found myself loving the shit out of maybe every 3 fights, with the rest in between feeling like a chore. Which is weird as they wouldn’t change that much between them, though when there was a cleverly designed mechanical challenge, I had a lot of fun with those and felt fully engaged. Most side quests and other optional tasks were fully boring. Nothing really of interest in these.

Some story padding too, inconsequential moments that neither help service the original plot, the new thread it’s laying, or building the characters. And the characters didn’t feel too interesting. I liked the avalanche three, and I adored Barrett. He is by far the best character in this. Big tough guy with a gun arm was always cool, but they executed on his character extremely well. And he had the best motivations and emotional depth of anyone. I felt like the others had the same kind of weird stilted vibe that a lot of anime and game characters have. It was still fine, nothing horrible from any of them but they were largely uninteresting save for a couple moments here and there.


I’m excited to see where they take it, and perhaps being able to stretch their legs even further will make the next game have fewer of the problems in this one. I didn’t like it like I hoped, but there’s still enough good here I don’t really regret playing it, and had fun with it altogether, just with some deeper lows than expected.

Also I pray that red 13 is playable in ff7r2 because it’s honestly unforgivable if they do him dirty again.

When I did my 100% completion run of Ocarina of Time a little over a year ago I couldn't believe how perfect it was even now in the modern era and nothing seems to come close in game design so when I was starting my Majora's Mask 100% completion playthrough I thought for sure I was going to be let down because how do you follow something like Ocarina of Time? Especially when you only really had 2 years to develop it. I'm writing this review right after finishing it and I can tell you with not one doubt in my mind I think everything about Majora's Mask is better than Ocarina of Time which trust me I'm not saying lightly. The music, game world, characters, bosses, story, and game mechanics just jived with me better on this one. The three-day cycle premise is probably one of my favorites in video game history, and I hope Nintendo uses it again in some way one day. I'm all over the place, but basically, what I'm trying to say is that Majora's Mask is a masterpiece and deserves every single one of you guys' attention. If you like innovation in gaming, this is top of the line. The last thing I'll say is that if they were able to create something this good with only 2 years I have no doubt in my mind the 6 years they've had to make Tears of the Kingdom is really going to show and should have every one rest easy knowing that Nintendo care way too much for this series to just rehash stuff.

This was okay. Always thought about playing it since watching flash animations an listening to that one song as a kid. Fun to finally get some context.

I was enjoying it for about half the time. Game feels weirdly paced and uncanny. Action commands are nice but do not feel intuitive a lot of the time. I think the art has its charm but is mostly ugly. For all the hype I heard about Geno, that guy just kinda shows up with a mission and tags along doing nothing important. Hiding stuff away in invisible blocks is really lame. I hated every bit of isometric platforming and the shallow mini games you have to play. I know it's not particularly fair to say, but I found myself wanting to play any other Mario RPG that released after this.

I wouldn't say it's bad. I can imagine a world where I played this at age 15 instead of Earthbound or something and loved it like a lot people do. Didn't quite do it for me in 2023 though.

Took a break from the game and Monster Hunter in general shortly after beating the main story boss. Picked it back up about a month ago, and whew... Didn't even notice time flying.

About 400 hours later and after grabbing all achievements, Rise is definitely way up there in my personal Monster Hunter pantheon.

It's 1am and I'm sleepy as hell after nabbing the last achievement so I won't write a huge review. I'm just really happy with the game and super satisfied with all the time I spent on it.

It's not everyone's cup of tea, especially for those that started playing MH with World, but this is my kind of MH right here baby. Little to no bullshit in between hunts, just slicing and dicing crusty ol' lizards to make beeg sword, then slicing even bigger lizards.

It's not as immersive or environmentally dense as World, but I never gave a shit about that. Rise has style, a killer soundtrack, and one hell of an addicting gameplay loop. Doubly so if you decide to go for all achievements or have your own personal achievements like I do, such as using every weapon in the game 100 times or crafting every weapon/armor set.

Can't wait to see what the next entry in the series has in store. All I know is I'll be there day 1 for sure B^)

I liked this a lot. In the survivors genre, it can’t live up to the king, even though it predates it by a few months. I love the character design and aesthetic overall, but I wish there was more to its look. The white bullets drowning things out make it a bit difficult to perceive what’s going on sometimes, making stray bullets easier to land. I do like that in some spots it has more depth given that you have to aim and fire(though auto-aim bridges that). But its upgrades are fairly limited and its progression is a bit less rewarding.

Moment to moment it’s just as rewarding as VS, however. But given its combos and the way its synergies manifest, it’s a little harder to feel where the gap is between your choices and the offerings presented.

I love the reindeer transformation character, and the twirling Tazlike(who I finally was able to beat the three levels with).
One thing VS doesn’t do despite its sensory overload is cause a Tetris effect in me and this has.
Great game!

[Note: I played and reviewed this game in 2022]
Even though technically speaking Demon’s Souls was the first souls like game, Dark Souls brought this type of game out into the mainstream gaming culture. Having played the Demon’s Souls remake, Dark Souls improves on many of the ideas that started in the original. This game introduced the maze like worlds that FromSoftware is known for today. The interconnected world featured in this game also happens to be one of my favorites in all of the souls/borne games. I still have such a clear mental picture in my head of how this world connects together. The gameplay itself is (obviously) the most fundamental version of what make a game a soulslike. Slow attacks and movement and bosses that hit hard, but still feel fair overall. It’s all just so fun, and the bosses in this game do such a great job of testing your skills in a progressive way throughout the game. I thought the remastered graphics were fine, although I probably would have appreciated the original graphics more. I would be so surprised if I came back to this game at any point in my life and felt like it didn’t hold up. this is an incredibly important game in gaming, and I can see that it is for a good reason.

Ishin is a game that definitely feels old by this point. It feels a lot like 5/0, but on an engine that you can tell the team isn't nearly as familiar with. There are a lot of problems presentation-wise that weren't nearly as prevalent in any other games, like horrendous pop-in and some screen space effects not looking right during cutscenes.

Once you get past the technical issues, it still feels like an RGG game. The story is incredibly well told, both in the main story and in the substories. Every actor brings their all like usual. There was one line at the end where you could hear the booth that Ryoma's voice actor was in, but that was the only time I noticed it being anything but stellar. Most of the substories didn't feel very substantial, but there were a few winners. I really liked the one with the old couple that's looking for a place to bury their dog. That one tugged at the heartstrings a bit. I never bother with most of the side activities in these games because I'm scared of Mahjong, but the rhythm games are a little weak this time around. For some reason they seem to be locked at 30fps which makes it harder to track and doesn't feel as good as it should.

The combat took a bit to get used to, but once I did I was really into it. The brawler style is basically just the brawler style from 0, which is a massive detriment in a game where gear is very important, so it didn't get used very much. The swordsman style was mainly reserved for boss fights, but it felt pretty good during those. The gunman style was really funny, but I rarely used it. The wild dancer style was the one I got the most use out of. Once I got it leveled up a bit, it became incredibly broken. I rinsed one of the late game bosses just by spamming square until he died. There's a smoothness to the wild dancer style that just feels really good. Every move can be canceled into another move and it just feels really solid.

I can definitely see the places where the budget wasn't there, but overall this is one of the better RGG games. Being a samurai is just cool as hell. They also gave me a farm. I spent hours on that farm.

As with all the best early videogames, Final Fantasy is bursting at the seams with ambition. While its NES counterpart is understandably clunkier and less of a looker, it’s amazing how much Sakaguchi and co. nailed on their first entry.

Surprisingly there are no Chocobos, no bombs, no Malboros. Many of the series aesthetic staples have yet to be introduced, but the bones are there. Combat is engaging enough, exploration even more so.

Naming my party was a treat. I opted to use names of other FF protagonists, as this series tends to be like poetry (it rhymes). I went with the names Auron, Cid, Rinoa, and Vivi.

Final Fantasy is comparatively stripped-back and has some old-school design sensibilities and almost no story, but it’s still a landmark title (and an excellent remaster). I can only imagine being a child at the time of its release and embarking on an imaginary adventure to kill Chaos, but I tried to get into that mindset and found myself really enjoying the journey.

Plus, this is the first game I’ve beaten since my son was born. It’ll always be that to me.

Teenage me was a dumb asshole. Shadow Of The Colossus is one of the best video games that i have ever played. From the opening cutscene which firmly establishes the games narrative drive and thematic weight to the culminating gut punch of an ending that is just perfectly put together. It was abundantly clear to me that this game was something special, something truly profound, something unlike any other game i’ve played, an experience of elegiac beauty and gripping emotional power that i could only marvel at. Whether it be its simple yet effectively told story that always has something to say, to how it explores its themes with solemness and deep nuance, the incredibly varied colossus battles that are immaculate in scale and feel consistently engaging and fun, the gorgeously atmospheric visual style, or the musical genius of Kow Otani. This game is a masterpiece of interactive storytelling in the most unique of ways and I’m positive it’s going to stay with me for a long time.

Outstanding sequel that builds an ambitious narrative over the previously laid foundation.
+ excellent additions to the main cast along with well-written characterization for everyone else
+ serious plot about the future of a nation as well as more intimate stories
+ intricately developed and constantly changing region that can be explored quite freely
+ great execution of the usual "Trails.." gameplay loop with relatively minor repetition
+ spirited soundtrack as expected
+ small combat refinements and a balanced difficulty
- only decent ending that could have been elaborated upon

One of the most aesthetically pleasing games ever released even to this day, but one that when picked up and played isn't as perfect as I'd hoped.

There's a lot of awesome moments and setpieces scattered throughout, but there's also tedium and frustration to get through before you can experience the highs, particularly the level design. It's often way too mazy and windy, and left me yearning for the original game's level design more than I would've liked, but thankfully the gameplay, camera and presentation are a huge step-up from that title.

Still, I really hope Bomb Rush Cyberfunk combines the best of both games and curbstomps both of them in the process. One can dream...