Playtime:10 Hours
Score: 7/10

A decent follow up to the first game or the remake in my case. So I just finished playing the Dead Space Remake earlier this month and I wanted the fun to continue so I decided to replay this game as the last time I played it was over a decade ago, so a replay was in order. So what did I think?

Gameplay wise, this game really excels as many of the improvements they added in the remake of the first game came from this one, so the transition between the two games for me was pretty seamless on that front. You have all the classic weapons from the first game as well as some new ones like the spear gun, seeker rifle and detonator launcher. These were fun to use but I mostly stuck to the classic weapons. I came to the conclusion the other day that Dead Space hands down as the best combat of any survival horror game series, even more than Resident Evil! The amount of options you have from weapons to stasis to kinesis makes for a great combat sandbox to mess around with! While other games will make you feel weak and helpless, Dead Space empowers you and makes you feel confident that you can take on a horde of Necromorphs and boy will the game throw them at you.

The level design was a little disappointing though as it's very linear even when compared to the original first game. While I haven’t played the Callisto Protocol, I did see how people complained about the amount of vents you have to crawl through. Welp, it all started here as you will be crawling through a lot of vents, even with a similar looking animation to the former game. I don’t mind it as much as this game was made in the early 2010s, compared to Callisto, but it still feels very tedious. There's one puzzle room in particular even where you have to crawl through so many vents to get around that I just question why? If the doors were just open you could cut that puzzle time down in half lol

They introduce a couple of new enemy types such as the babies and kid necromorphs which can be annoying as well as the enemies that spit at you which makes your movement slower. Hate those guys! While these enemies can be scary at first, the horror does lose its luster after a while. The beginning areas were creepy indeed with one moment that shook me purely from the sound design. When I was walking through the hotel section, down the corridors, I heard the sound of a baby crying in one of the rooms that I couldn’t get into. It just freaked me out as I wondered if it was a necromorph baby or a normal baby and if so, where are the parents and is there anything inside the room with them? Beyond that though there wasn’t much scares to be had in this game other than some really nasty gore.

The final two chapters were awful though as you're just running away from a regenerator necromorph, as well as an army of others trying to stop you. I hated that section as a kid and I hated it now. The final boss was also disappointing from both a gameplay perspective and a narrative one. About the only challenge in it is not getting touched by the boss as they can one hit kill you, and avoiding the minions.

As for the story, it was very disappointing for me personally. I like Isaac and the one new character named Ellie, but beyond that I just found the other characters to be very annoying and forgettable.The bad guy was just the usual wannabe cult leader, and the dead girlfriend story I felt concluded great in the first game, but it felt really dragged out here. And there's just been so many horror games that have used the dead girlfriend/wife trope including the original Dead Space and that did it better. After a while I just stopped caring and I just wanted to finish the game.

Overall, it's an alright sequel. I remember loving this game as a kid and while it holds up from a gameplay perspective, it doesn’t in most other areas for me personally. Still glad I replayed it though.

All Games I have Played and Reviewed Ranked - https://www.backloggd.com/u/JudgeDredd35/list/all-games-i-have-played-and-reviewed-ranked/

Pep's Detective Deep Dive - Game 3
Did you expect me to give this a bad review? What, do you think I'm some kind of monster?

This is just what a sleepy Sunday afternoon needed. A zero-stakes, simple adventure game that didn't tax my braincells and frequently made me laugh. Each episode is more expansive than the last (and by "expansive" I mean that the second episode lets you put stickers on a notebook, and the third episode gives you a sick-ass scooter) and the twist in the third episode got me genuinely emotionally invested.

The only thing that kinda irked me was the occasional moment where the creator would literally insert herself into the game, interrupting the story to deliver some kind of "well, actually" message about how something a character said was wrong. I don't know if these moments were supposed to be jokes but they felt really weird to me, like the video game equivalent of a Twitter community note.

It's cute, it's fun, and it's on Game Pass. If you're looking for a short little adventure game where you don't have to think very hard then Frog Detective is perfect for you.

P.S. I'll play some actual detective games soon, I swear!

Two men approach a ledge. They are underground in an incredibly hostile environment that neither could foresee arriving in when they woke up that morning. They are tired, mentally frayed and have an uneasy trust in each other based entirely on circumstances. The first man reaches the ledge, after an awkwardly long second staring he finally drops down the 3ft drop to continue along the dimly lit path. The second man approaches the ledge but rather than drop down he freezes, staring at it whilst his comrade looks at him perplexed. The man walks away from the ledge before coming back to it freezing again. He refused to jump down to continue their trek. Was it fear preventing him? Had the ordeal and horrors he'd witnessed finally pushed his mind to far?

No, it's just that playing House of Ashes in online co-op was a miserable buggy experience.

You see I played this with a friend, we play together nearly every evening and are always looking for a new Playstation co-op experience. We had enjoyed Man of Medan despite some issues and heard this game was supposedly all around the better of the two. We ran into constant technical problems though. Characters getting stuck, locking up for no reason. The game taking forever to actually perform an action, even picking up an item to look at was a complete chore of waiting 10 seconds to see if they would actually move. We had to quit out and restart half a dozen times to get past various sections and by the end we were frustrated by it all. The thing is it wasn't just the technical problems but a variety of issues built up leaving a bitter taste in our mouths. We beat the game, kind of hated it and moved onto Wild Hearts. The thing is, I decided to go back to it to see if the game was better playing it on my own and my second experience has left me softer towards it overall though certain flaws continue regardless of player occupancy.

For those unaware The Dark Pictures Anthology is a series of horror games by developer Supermassive Games that are more like quick time event interactive movies. Your inputs decide the outcome and the wrong move at the wrong time can see characters permanently die and adjust the story outcome slightly. Our first issue with this game is the button prompts for these events. They are based on the PS5 controller with white buttons with the Cross, Triangle, Square and Circle symbols overlayed in grey. They aren't clear without colour to tell them apart and when you only have a second to work it out...well the design is awful. I went into the accessibility options to change them all to cross because it was implemented so badly when playing on my own. I will at least give them credit for those features.

A lot of the rest of the game has it's ups and downs as well. I really liked the setting going with a Mesopotamian historical influence which isn't something seen in games all too much. The modern plot setting there of the 2003 invasion of Iraq looking for chemical weapons however certainly is...a choice. It did allow a good relationship build up between two characters of Jason a lieutenant in the US marines and Salim a sergeant in the Iraqi army. Their characters and relationship are the two best parts of the whole game with some well written dialog and voice acting that bring them to life as being both professional and empathetic. If only the rest of the writing was as good or even competent because most of the other characters are just unrelatable buffoons. I didn't care for the forced interpersonal drama between 3 of them and was quite happy for them to die. They are needlessly confrontational, rude and in a lot of cases completely inconsistent. In one scene as an example:

Character 1: "What's there to think about? We go and save him"
Character 2: thinks about it for a second
Character 1: "He isn't one of us lets leave him"

It's like they are different people from line to line at times completely breaking immersion when they 180, never mind in the same conversation. Frankly except Jason and Salim they are all extremely unlikeable. I understand the developers want to build a varied cast that will leave difficult decisions for the player with conflict but they went overboard leaving a negative experience in a lot of scenes because I just didn't care about what happened to any of them.

The story also kind of lacks suspense and scares which I was surprised by. It has an interesting setting and atmosphere but it never really uses them to build up any tension or fear of the unknown. Except for a few scenes early on the game is more just a military shooter than a horror title. The magic is gone when the monster is revealed and the curtain gets drawn back. In this case it just happens all too early.

I will say my second playthrough was far more enjoyable overall regardless of the issues above. The only bugs playing solo was a trophy not unlocking (I had to disconnect from the internet and restart my PS5 replaying the scene to unlock it as a work around found by the community). I really like the visuals and general ideas presented here, they just needed more polish and to iron out the cast to a better degree. Still I am glad I went back to it as it has convinced me to play the second game in the series Little Hope which I had initially written off after my first playthrough of House of ashes, I just won't play it online...

+ Jason and Salim are great characters with an excellent comradery.
+ Visuals are gorgeous.
+ Mesopotamian setting is a nice choice.

- The other characters could all rot for all I care.
- Playstation quick time buttons are unclear.
- Online is a constant buggy mess and a semi bugged trophy.
- Not scary, no tension or build up.
- War setting is...a choice.

Zerei Skyrim incontáveis vezes no PS3, sem mods, e naquela época, era revolucionário para mim. Tantos lugares para explorar, NPCS para conhecer e inimigos para se enfrentar.
Hoje em dia, jogando as versões mais recentes no PC, tenho uma impressão ainda melhor do jogo.
Sim, o jogo é repleto de bugs, o que os MODS ajudam bem a melhorar, porém, não completamente. A maioria dos bugs de Skyrim são mais visuais e engraçados, com poucos sendo algo que quebra uma quest ou algo do tipo, e para os pouquíssimos assim, sempre existe um mod para consertar.
A trilha sonora do jogo é simplesmente sensacional, o dialogo com os NPCS, as side quests, tudo muito a frente de seu tempo. Uma obra-prima atemporal tornada divina com a adição dos melhores mods já criados em toda a história.
O combate original do jogo sempre foi meio paia, a maioria das pessoas sempre acabava apelando pro arqueiro stealth, porém, com adição de alguns mods, se torna um dos jogos RPG com o melhor sistema de combate de todos.
O que torna Skyrim realmente FENOMENAL não é apenas o jogo, mas sua insaciável comunidade, que até os dias de hoje, continuam tratando com amor e carinho essa íncrivel obra-prima de 2011.
Um jogo tão fantástico que, mesmo com a Bethesda sempre trazendo algum update pra ferrar com a vida dos criadores, seus jogadores se recusam a deixa-lo morrer.
Os diálogos de Skyrim são outro ponto impressionante do jogo, destacando alguns como os Greybeards, Paarthurnax, e até mesmo Alduin.
As vezes eu queria poder esquecer Skyrim só para poder joga-lo novamente, como se fosse a primeira vez.
Tempo de jogo: 554+ horas

San Andreas may not fully resolve every single little issue I had with 3 and Vice City but rather instead more than makes up for those shortcomings by creating an immersive experience with a scale so ambitious and insane that not only am I in disbelief of this thing being originally made for the PS2, I'm still in awe of it playing for the first time nearly two decades after its original release in a modern era of video games with sequels and competitors that have long since succeeded it. I'm not even sure Rockstar themselves could ever fully recreate an experience like San Andreas, with a level of understanding on how to make the player feel like they've gone on this massive journey with these gradual curveballs both in story intermixed with gameplay in how they progress and discover every new element of the map, the places and objectives that missions take you on, and the characters that you still learn to care about as much as CJ does on the wild ride he's thrown out on. Where 3 and Vice City were concerned about creating a sandbox that players could just drive and shoot stuff in for whatever weird violent sprees the player wanted to go on, San Andreas is concerned about making you want to better CJ as a character including lifestyle elements and minigames that, as simple and jank as they can be, give crucial variety and spice that was desperately needed.

I think even more importantly for me, and what makes San Andreas still stand out to this day among Rockstar's catalog, is just how innocent it is. There may be some of Rockstar's trademark cynicism and satire without a doubt, but it doesn't plague the game beyond a small smattering of surface level side character personalities and radio humor. Gone is the run down dreariness of 3's Liberty City or the pop culture referential appeal of Vice City's 80s excess and all the commentary found within both, and instead is a world and story where the characters are treated with genuine attention and time, and with a level of self-respect even towards clearly insane out there characters like goofy weed jesus Truth or the conspiratorial clearly making shit up Toreno. It felt like Rockstar would be winking at the player knowing that yeah, the insane batshit stuff you will eventually get up to in these missions is clearly nuts and silly, but without then rolling their eyes and going "wow isn't this cuh-RA-zy" like how I remember GTA V eventually becoming. San Andreas wants you to be immersed within its world, and it truly believes in the player coming along for a ride that they're meant to be having fun on even when things get serious. For the number of times where I would irritated with some stinky missions or the still occasional crapshoot AI behavior and spawning, there would be hours of just even quietly enjoying myself riding through the country-side listening to radio stations that were clearly custom tailored to that location and tone before riding out into the next city beyond for the next mission as the sun was setting and the dust clouds rolled in as I crossed that bridge into the desert. And for a game almost 20 years old now, it still remains unparalleled in that memorable experience.

(I just also wish that Rockstar would have done a better job of preserving the original PS2 experience, and not just because of Definitive Edition's unfaithful visuals and bugs; the original PC port is frankly hot garbage and is more needlessly fiddly to mod than it really should be. I don't have the greatest guide on hand to fix the ports issues, but bare minimum downgrade the game's version and try to install SilentPatch and SkyGfx to fix bugs and restore the PS2 visuals, then keep the game locked to 30FPS because important scripts and physics were tied to the framerate. I also wish I didn't have to eventually give up and enable cheats right at the very end of the game to finish the territory stuff because the game kept crashing and making me lose hours of progress right before I was able to do the final mission. I'm sure emulating the PS2 version is an option, but it also feels like a lame copout with its own issues. Someday I'll try DE for real to see how it fares these days, but take this as a small cautionary warning if you're on PC.)

I love the rainy fall vibe of the visuals and people just bustling about in the busy setting of Liberty City and how much the vibe immediately changes the moment you move from Portland Harbor where it moves from sleazy clubs and rundown streets to the noticeably fancier high rises and parks of Staunton Island. Rockstar's humorous cynicism of the modern era already shines brightly through the radio's mixture of tunes (most of which are pretty well picked even before they started getting access to much more well known songs in later games) and the constant ridiculously absurd advertisements playing as you drive through the city.

I just really wish GTA 3 was more fun to actually go back to and play because if you've played any of the games after this one, you're going to be used to so many things that you thought were basic essentials that turn out to be quality of life additions and improvements off the groundwork that this game sets. Two handed weapons force you into tank control aiming in a game where enemies mad dash either away from or towards you before you can even get a proper shot on them, driver AI is utterly batshit insane and not in a fun "look how bad drivers are in New York" kinda way as they make truly insane sharp turns in an instant in lanes that make no sense for them to be doing so, and in missions where you're getting chased can rubberband towards you at speeds that would make older Need for Speed games blush. Cops can be straight up suicidal on two stars being so desperate to ram you off the road that they will run over other pedestrians and even their own forces as you get blamed for it only increasing the insane pressure.

Frankly the biggest killers for why I'm shelving this for now is the combo trio of no mission checkpoints/restarts, no accessible map, and the mission designs themselves. While GTA 3 starts out pretty simple at first and tries to ease you into how the rules of this world work, it all too quickly starts to throw you into the deep end with missions that purposefully do dickish shit to you that you have no way of expecting on a first run which only gets worse by the time you're on Staunton Island when the drives to mission starts and the drives on those missions get increasingly longer. Not having a full clear map also becomes incredibly frustrating in a game that has so many similar looking buildings and roads on first glance. While it's fun to eventually get down these layouts yourself by memory and know what turns you need to make without a GPS telling you (GTA IV and V really spoiled me on this regard and it's neat going back to the 3D trilogy games which didn't have it!), GTA 3 goes a bit too far on this by not giving you any accessible full map that you can just browse and look at to figure out a route to where you need to be. It's especially bad with stuff like Ammu-Nation stores or Pay 'n' Sprays not being marked on the map when you're either in a desperate hurry or just trying to prep before a mission.

While I love the old early PS2 visuals and vibe of the original release (or at least on PC, as close as you can get with a mod setup using SilentPatch, SkyGfx, and Project 2DFX bare minimum to fix massive technical issues and restore missing effects with the bad PC port), I think honestly I'll just wait at some point to grab the Definitive Editions when they're on sale again. While those remasters butcher the art style and color grading pretty severely and have major issues of their own, I think GTA 3 is the one that, gameplay-wise, would benefit more from the GTA V-styled controls and mechanics alongside having an easy mission restart and full map for me.

Great dungeon crawler that improves on the Diablo-like experience. I know many will categorize this under "Diablo Clone", but its so much more. Back when I first played this game it was pre-Diablo 3 and I had just finished playing Diablo 2 for the first time. This game improved so much on that game's formula by adding the ability to have a pet who can both help you in combat and sell any junk items you picked up, so you don't have to go all the way back to town constantly. This quite frankly should be this game's selling point alone! Only downside to this first game, is that there is no co-op function which does suck as these types of games always encourage that.

Ive spent alot of time wondering why this game gets away with being one large ironic meme and other games dont as much, and I feel like Ive figured it out. This will sound crazy, but really think about it: the answer is restraint. It rides the line really well and thats how it elevates itself above its less memorable peers.

Just take the Mario segment for example. It is just an asset rip and naked reference to another popular preexisting game - and yet almost no one remembers it as that or feels that way about it. Clearly there was a transformative execution there.

I don't think I've been filtered faster by a game in my entire life. This game starts to stray from the few things I enjoyed from BK real fast, in pursuit of simply being BIGGER. Characters can't help but flap their lips with no end in sight, and the camera dramatically pans like I'm visiting the Eyewitness Museum every time I do one little thing. There's what feels like three times the amount of ground to cover, with no new movement techniques to compensate. Even with the game granting you all your abilities from BK at the start (a nice bit of continuity), I feel like there's nothing to actually use them on, so the game keeps piling on even further moves to compensate. Ooooooor, they'll just let you play as Mumbo, because there CLEARLY wasn't enough to engage with already. Sometimes the game gives up on pretending it's a platformer and just becomes a first-person shooter. I am constantly getting lost in these massive, labrynthian areas, even with the multiple warp pads.

It's really overwhelming, and I'm not having fun. I think it's best I leave it at that before I further trample all over the childhoods of the people who think this is an uber-masterpiece.

This DLC was much more fun for me than Octo expansion was. There is a difference in how the game difficulty works this time and it works wonders for my personal enjoyment of it. Instead of just being hard overall, it's hard at first, but then you can grind out the game to make it easier. For Nintendo's first perceived attempt at a roguelike, they did a really good job making the gameplay systems work and be really fun.
The overall new "Order" aesthetic really makes this DLC stand out in the splatoon world. The very bright and dull whites stand out and the ver glittery ink colors you use are really nice to look at. The boss stages also really stand out and look stunning, its crazy how good nintrendo can make their games look on the outdated old, hardware, and run at a pretty consistent 60fps, its genuenly a marvel. THE MUSIC ALSO SLAPS HARD ASF
Also the ending is very satisfying and is such a fun experience. The way this DLC tops off feels like how every roguelike should end.
Overall really enjoyable DLC that if you have splatoon 3 is a must-play. (8.8/10)