Cadillacs and Dinosaurs is what happens when you mix Final Fight with freaking dinosaurs. You get the great mechanics of Capcom’s original brawling masterpiece, drive a cool Cadillac, and then mix it with a world-ending plot featuring dinosaurs.

The dinos are fun and all that, but you’ve come for the brawling—and in my opinion you get a great one. The game feels as smooth as butter, especially with Jack, Hannah and Mustapha; as they just glide through the levels with a variety of running kicks, slides and jumps—it’s really a joy to play. Items like guns, bazookas, explosives etc., and your usual garden-variety knives are fun to play around with and enhance the gameplay experience.

It’s the hallmark of a great brawler when you barely feel like using the special attack and this game definitely has that feeling in spades.

Only FromSoftware copy their own homework and get away with it. From Demons Souls to Elden Ring, the iconic brutal combat gameplay remains, only midly adjusted with each title.
I'll admit I'm late to the game, quite literally, but Dark Souls is my favourite of theirs so far, and maybe an all-timer.

The same level of immense satisfaction comes from conquering seemingly impossible forces, but it is the connectedness of the world here that makes you feel existentially insignificant and all the more bold in exploring unknown territory.
Whilst a notch down from the visual flair of subsequent titles - Bloodborne, Elden Ring, etc - the level design here is still superb: I think it is the vast size and sonic emptiness of places like the Demon Ruins or Great Hollow that make them utterly terrifying, especially upon uncovery of the indifferent creatures that lurk there. And if you don't have that special fast travel item, you must traverse between these places, miles sometimes deep into lava pits underground or at the peaks of castles in the clouds; I can't express enough that wondrously epic scale acheived here through such variation - it's probably not as big as Skyrim but by god it just feels bigger.

Another key strength is character design: from smaller, comical side characters such as the onion shaped knight Siegmeyer of Catarina to otherworldly beasts such as the primordial serpent Frampt (almost shat myself when I first saw him).

But essential to the bleak atmosphere of Dark Souls, alongside the sparingly used music and foggy, dingy locations, is the abundance of characters who simply sit there, beaten and tarnished - they have truly lost. In a game that places so much emphasis on dying, this highlights the whole point (of Souls games and gaming in general): you can die as many times as you like, but you only lose when you give up.

This game deserves a better reputation than it has right now. It launched with a lie and was a bit messy and buggy but currently, in the year 2022, it's improved drastically over the launch date. One thing I particularly like about this game is the worldbuilding it has, there are so many interesting computer logs, diaries, letters, etc. to read and each one tells a story of a world gone by long before you ever stepped foot outside of your vault. My one big complaint is the introduction of humans later, was a mistake. Should've stuck to the original core value of the game.