A 10 hour RPG? In 2023? That was really enjoyable??? Nintendo hit it out of the park with this remake. The music was delightful and combat was quick and engaging.

I wish there was a bit more customization- often times your newest weapon was the best one. However, since the animation and timing of each attack was different, I would have preferred not needing to relearn my basic move timing every hour or so.

Additionally, I wish the game had full voice acting, but that might be asking too much these days...

Here's the thing; playing this game right after SuMo will ruin your experience with it. I waited six years to replay this title, and I think it might actually be my third-favorite main series game (after BW2 and PLA).

USUM is SO good when you don't have Twitter in your ear telling you its bad. Just by changing this game to "set" mode it has now become a comfortable level of difficulty. I actually had to implement strategies for major bosses and Totem Pokemon were not as much of a pushover as I originally thought. Even the final Hau encounter, which I never considered memorable all those years ago has suddenly been catapulted into the "Pokemon Battle Trauma" area of my brain next to Cynthia and RR Giovanni.

Is the story as good as SM? Probably not, but re-reading Lusamine's text in this game again functions fairly well in a vacuum. It's a bit awkward that her obsession with Necrozma doesn't fit with Lillie as much as Nihilego did, but since she's explicitly aiming for Cosmog more this time and not just destroying her family I think it works fine. Additionally, Gladion directly brings up Mohn, which I don't think was in the original.

The Pokemon variety pre- and post-game is excellent, and the final encounters with RR and other side modes (UB and Shiny hunting) are still very fun. USUM will not absorb your free time like BW2 or HGSS's post-game content, but I don't think that's a bad thing. As I get older, I have begun to prioritize games that value my time, and I don't need every title to trap me in its loop forever. It took 25 hours to beat USUM's main story again and I enjoyed my entire time through.

This was the first game Kazumasa Iwao directed, and he followed it up with PLA. Unlike SV or SwSh, USUM and PLA feel like "complete" games to me, and I cannot wait to see what he comes up with next when he gains full reins of the franchise.

BOTW is one of the few games on here I've given 5 stars, and it seems like it will continue to be an exclusive group.

TOTK somehow finds a way to reach higher highs and lower lows than BOTW. I loved all the new additions to the world, the dungeons, story, and expanded side quests. I barely scratched the surface of this games' content, and still finished it in around 60 hours. If you wanted Zelda to become your life, you really could make it happen with this game. Compared to pretty much everything Nintendo has published in the past few years, it makes sense as to why this was increased to $70, and I don't feel my money was wasted.

That being said, the more I played TOTK, the more issues I had. If the game wrapped up maybe 10 hours sooner, I would likely be giving this all five stars.

The biggest issue for me is the tedium of the shrines, UI, and Depths. The game cleverly places shrines that teach important Zonai devices near story-important locations, yet at the same time, places basic tutorials all around the map. After a while, each shrine became too hit-or-miss to be enjoyable for me; either it was a tutorial for throwing I got 30 hours in, or ANOTHER Eventide test. Combined with the constant loading screens in and out of shrines and the general time sink of using the Right Arm abilities (scrolling through hundreds of items for Fuse or fumbling with Ultrahand), the game felt genuinely exhausting by the end. It's a lot of fun when you get it working, it's just not for me. I love seeing all the cool vehicles and contraptions people are creating on Twitter, but since nothing required ever gets that complicated within the game, I don't really see the appeal for me PERSONALLY. Additionally, after activating all the sage abilities, the game really begins the chug, and functions as another reminder as to why the Switch feels like its holding Nintendo's developers back, despite the obvious technical marvel that is the physics engine of this game.

The idea of a three-layer BOTW map is fantastic, but the Sky Islands are really sparse and repetitive, and the Depths are thematically boring and annoying to traverse (until you get a certain sage power). I appreciated the variations in gameplay each section provided, and the overall movement between them, but Hyrule is just so much more interesting and fleshed out it makes the other two feel like something I would rather ignore than engage with.

However, I LOVE the final fight and the thematic parallels with Tears of the Dragon quest. Everything comes together so well in the end. Overall, an undeniably great game, and a reminder that Nintendo still has development wizards working behind the scenes.

Also shout-out for the being the second game ever to make me tear up at a title drop.

I started HeartGold as a linked Nuzlocke last January. I thought it would be fun to go back to the game and complete it as a single-player experience to end the year.

Boy, was I wrong.

The issue was that I was approaching this game as a modern title. I had just completed Pokemon Black last week, and while I was a bit underleveled at the end of the story, it was still a doable (and fun) challenge. I used a full team of 6 Pokemon, and would swap around the Exp. Share to keep everyone at the same level the best I could.

I attempted to do the same here, but it quickly became clear the game is not designed for a full team of 6 Pokemon. As of writing this review, I am in Claire's gym (the final one). All of my Pokemon are Level 31. Her ace is 41. The gym trainers are around 35.

The level curve has always been an issue, but the more Pokemon you try to balance the worse it gets. This sucks, because I wanted to finish this game again, but I just don't have the time or patience anymore to grind.

The easiest solution would just be to balance a team around four Pokemon and 2 HM users. I'm pretty sure that's what the developers intended for the player to use as well. Constantly running to the Pokemon Center to swap teams if you don't have an HM user is just frustrating.

Otherwise, the game has aged perfectly. It still looks and sounds fantastic. I want to emphasize how good of a region Johto is, as well. Pokemon was Nintendo's original open-world game; I beat Pryce before going to Cianwood for the first time, just because I could! I love the laid-back nature to Johto. This combined with the walking Pokemon feature really makes you feel like you're a part of the world. It's a down-to-earth journey through familiar territory. I just wish it was fun to play with a full team.

Played through Pokemon Black again after several years. My opinions on it haven't changed much. I wish there was more Pokemon variety, and that the options they chose all could reach full evolution before the Pokemon League. I was constantly under-leveled throughout my adventure, which was a nice change of pace from other games. The dialogue and story didn't age that well, in my opinion. But it's a Pokemon story, so that's not saying much. I still love Unova however, and I could see myself coming back to play through BW2 again sometime soon.

Finally got around to beating Splatoon 3's story mode.

A lot of fun the whole way through. I wish it played around with some more original concepts. Levels felt very similar to Octo Expansion (which isn't a bad thing!!!), but I wanted to experience something new. Final boss sequence was fantastic, but again, didn't feel too different from Octo. I found the aesthetic, and for a lack of a better term, "vibe", of Octo to be a lot more interesting than Alterna. I truly did feel like you were trapped in this psychedelic hell, which really made it stand out among all of Nintendo's other first-party experiences.

Oh yeah, and the multiplayer aspect of this game is great, too. Similar to the story mode, it doesn't feel that different than 2, but there's a lot of little things that when added up, make a big difference. The new weapons are fun, and I like no restriction on Salmon Run times. I wish there was a new ranked/casual mode instead of the card battle.

Pokemon Violet really made me appreciate Legends Arceus a lot more.

First, I'll start with the positives:
Paldea is a really cool region. While still just being a circle like Unova, there's a lot of verticality that makes traveling a lot of fun. You can always see the next Pokemon Center at a distance, which makes it easier to track your progress. It really is an "open" world, and fully upgraded Miraidon is a lot of fun, and just as intuitive as P:LA's mounts.
Paldea has a well-defined culture around the school and Mesagoza, which I appreciated. Getting the legendary at the beginning is a nice twist on the formula, and it's handled well. The final arc is excellent and I wish the whole game had that level of polish.
The Pokemon selection is stellar. There's always something new to catch and use, and could definitely see a lot of alternate potential teams for future playthroughs. Every new addition is fantastic. The translation/design team went absolutely crazy with some of their pun names this time, and I love it.
Difficulty was fine. I was actually a bit underleveled for the final bosses of the main three story routes. No exp. share has become normalized, so I didn't mind it. Let's Go mode made grinding easy for the little bit I had to do at the end.

My main gripes with this game are its performance and general gameplay loop.
I have nothing really to add to the conversation regarding this game's performance. Everyone knows it runs terribly. Pop-in is abundant, the camera doesn't function, and there's inexcusable amount of slowdown and graphical hiccups. The game even softlocked me before the fight against the Donphan titan. The battle just didn't start and I had to reset my game.
P:LA admittedly had its own issues, but none that really took me out of the world like in Violet. I care a lot about the immersion-aspect of Pokemon's environments (as I've mentioned in my previous game reviews for the series), and it's disappointing that I never really got that feeling here because Paldea is trying hard to not break at every moment. Additionally, I strongly disagree with the decision to go back to the old battle and catch system that was changed in P:LA. What I LOVE about P:LA is how FAST it goes. Everything is so snappy, which then in turn makes exploring much more fun. Since Violet is much slower (Oops! I touched a tiny overworld Pokemon, time to sit through 20 seconds of animations before I can run!!), I'm spending more time looking at the broken world, and the pacing really gets dragged down.

I did enjoy my time with Violet, but I couldn't help but think it would be better if it was developed fully after P:LA was finished. I'm excited to see where the series goes from here, it has a really strong base, and it will take a lot more than poor performance to stop me from being a fan.

As of writing this review, I beat the game 30 minutes ago. I have a lot of thoughts so this one will be pretty long, my apologies.

I have not been active on this site in months because of this game. I've barely played anything else since starting this game. Xenoblade 3 has effectively taken over all of my gaming free time.

The 55-hour romp through Aionios requires your full attention. Its opening chapter is excellent! The characters are lovely and unique, and I love their little moments of banter with one another. The previous games' cast will always hold a special place in my heart, but 3 is definitely the most solid all around.

How nice it is to have a Xenoblade game that's easy to recommend to newcomers! With plenty of quality-of-life updates and non-excessive fanservice, I could see this game being the entry point for a lot of people into this series.

XC:DE is in my top 5 games of all time, and 2, while incredibly flawed, is still one of my favorites. XC3's position as a finale to the trilogy is somewhat achieved, although I wish there was still a bit more of a connection between the 3. I'll discuss the plot a little more later, but tl;dr it was good if you don't think too hard.

This game sucks you in with its delightful soundtrack, engrossing story, and vibrant world. Then it keeps going. And going. And going. By Chapter 5, I was begging for it to end. By Chapter 7, I was struggling to stay awake for the mere hours I had to progress before sleeping. Now that I'm not a baby high schooler like when I played 2 or stuck inside during the pandemic for DE, I'm realizing just how much of a time commitment it is to beat a Xenoblade game. I wanted to see how the story ended so badly, and yet the game kept finding new ways to distract me. Sidequests abound, an absurd amount of plot threads that needed resolving, and bosses that just wouldn't die.

The combat system is extremely polished, and I love the freedom of class selection. However, this also means that each character is less unique as an individual. This becomes especially apparent during late game fights where it feels like I'm designing a team of classes and not characters to maximize my effectiveness in battle.

XC3 really DOES require you to min-max. Late-game fights are full-on HP damage sponges. The final boss took me 1.5 hours to get to its final phase. Then I died. And it sent me right back to the beginning. I nearly wanted to quit and delete the game from my system.

I love how this game is a time sink for those who are truly engrossed in its world, but for me (i.e. someone who plays the game for the story since I have other things to do during the day), it always felt like my time was being disrespected.

I could keep going on and on, but it still doesn't change the fundamental fact that this is a good game, just not one I could fully enjoy. Maybe in a different place or a different time I could've been so invested in this world that it became my favorite game of all time. But in this endless now, I don't think I'll be coming back to it anytime soon.