The sky streaks with incandescence, and the air is dragons and embers. A crackle from the dying kiln, a Lord of Cinder awaiting thee.
I remember being at GameStop years ago, I was picking out a game to buy and it was between a series I was familiar with and Dark Souls. It seems obvious now that I made the wrong decision then, but It's never too late to start. I think now was the perfect time for me. There's not much to say that hasn't been repeated a thousand times. Everything about Dark Souls is stellar. The story, world, music, art, gameplay, atmosphere, sound design, and so much more all leave me speechless. There is a slight washout of execution in the latter half of the game. Even still, those areas are a ton of fun. I can not consciously give this any less than 5 stars, Bed of Chaos and all. "Stay safe friend, and don't you dare go hollow"
Favorite area: Undead Burg | Honorable mention: Ash Lake
Favorite boss: O&S | Honorable mention: Artorias

Shenmue I & II are two of the most important games of all time and people who deny that go to Hell and burn alive. The amount of effort put into the games to create the most immersive game of all time at the time. Cyberpunk, Witcher, Fallout, the entire fucking current state of immersive sims. Shenmue isn't the first game to do all of its shit but it's the first to have that big of a budget on it to push these ideas enough to reach a mainstream audience and inspire literally every single game with any kind of slight open world. The LAD series getting massive in the states out of nowhere ruined discussion of this series because for some reason everyone thinks this is the LAD prototype now. Watch a Shenmue funny NPC dialogue compilation what are you reminded of? Not Yakuza Kiwami fucking 2 no you're thinking of Oblivion. Fuck you i hate everyone who plays video games