I'll preface by saying I'm not what I'd consider a Sonic fan. I never played any of the original 2D Sonic games and the only 3D ones I've played are Sonic Adventure 2 and Shadow the Hedgehog. I only mention this so that it can be clear I didn't have that high of expectations going into Frontiers since I've not followed Sonic for much of his journey into 3D.
That being said, I did have a lot of fun with Frontiers. This feels like what I would've wanted Sonic to be if games before hadn't already done something similar. Overworlds full of micro sized courses, the running around part feeling good, breaking open courses because you're running so fast that you circumvent an entire small course to get the reward early, rewarded exploration when really you were just running around, this is all great stuff.
I won't lie and say it was all good, though. Some 2 out of the 5 overworlds are fairly restrictive in letting you get around and 1 of the 5 is only there for a couple short minutes. The cyberspace courses are also pretty hit or miss, making them not too fun to replay to get all the missions cleared for key items you need.
These issues aside though, I did find myself feeling more positive about the game by the end than I felt while in the middle. This game's quality feels like a pretty perfect upside down bell curve, of which Sonic is perpetually running on with absolute head banging tier music playing as he goes.

And so my journey through No More Heroes comes to a conclusion. Not with a bang, but with a resounding "yeah alright". This game was probably the one I had the highest expectations going into. After seeing how disappointing No More Heroes 2 was as a sequel to No More Heroes 1, I thought maybe all the time since would give them an opportunity to bring in something fresh. Instead, this game felt like a half finished mess that every now and then did feel like a No More Heroes game.
Gameplay felt serviceable here but also repetitive in a way that I thought I would be used to by now with this series. The side jobs still aren't very fun or engaging, and the combat arenas I ignored almost entirely when I realized the entire game was going to just be the same looking combat arenas with remixed enemies.
The enemy variety does exist this time around but I didn't feel like it did anything too crazy other than throwing in a mish mash of different enemy types to keep it "fresh". Honestly I think the combat is just serviceable if I'm being charitable with that descriptor. I got excited when I saw the chip skills coming back from Travis Strikes Again, but all they do is drop all four of them on you and they never change or upgrade for the rest of the game.
The story was very nothing which feels worse than the other games by advent of trying to have a story at all. It works in No More Heroes 1 because all you need to know is Travis wants to be #1 so he can fuck Sylvia and that's all you ever really need. FU and Damon are terrible villains, and I can only take so many rug pulls of "oh you aren't actually fighting THIS boss" before I get tired. Part of me was hoping from the intro that Bad Man, Bad Girl, and Shinobu would play a bigger role this time around but that was never the case. They also ruined the cat by making him this obnoxious navigator that has to shout stupid things like "SUPER KILL" and "MONSTER KILL" every couple combos.
I'm coming away from No More Heroes 3 being more disappointed than I can really put into so many words. I'd had my eye on this series for a long time and felt that it was worth a deep dive, but now I'm not so sure I should've played any of these past No More Heroes 1. That first game feels like such an entity by comparison. Not quite lightning in a bottle, but a game that represents Suda51's style and doing everything it needed to do to be a memorable game for the ages.

I'm pretty sure my No More Heroes 1 review also says "if aesthetics can carry a video game". That statement couldn't be more true for a game like this one. I'm gonna be totally blunt: there is very little fun to be had in this game. The combat isn't as bad as No More Heroes 2, but what's there just feels so monotonous. More often I'd leave a stage thinking "Well the next one will be better, right?" Let me tell you. In this game's six stages, only one of them is good. Everything else is either just there or is terrible.
That all being said, man I love this series for it's aesthetic. I think going into this series was a big test for me to see what aspects of a game I value more than others. If I can love this game and No More Heroes 1 despite how whatever the gameplay is, I think it speaks a lot to how much I can dig a game for it's vibe alone.
Except for No More Heroes 2. That game will always be the exception.

It's hard to not talk about how rough this game was at launch. I was there day one on PC, fighting the graphics settings to try and get anything playable. Eventually I just fell off. The gameplay wasn't enough for me to keep going and I wasn't finding fun in the story. But now coming back after all of the fixes and post Edgerunners, my experience was a pretty good one.
The story is definitely the biggest stand out for me. All the philosophical subjects like the soul, legacies, loyalty, all coming together in a game where you get to have Keanu Reeves in your head 24/7. It's a shame to know all of these wonderful side quests were here from the start and the buggy launch dissuaded people like me from sticking with it. But I'm really glad I came back to finish what I'd started.

If aesthetic could ever carry a game hard, it's definitely this one. I'll be honest, this game really isn't all that fun to play. But you do start to develop a flow of doing side jobs before every ranked match that become oddly compelling. The story doesn't make much sense but it never really tries to either. There's probably some deep, underlying message gamers try to find about the cycle of violence mixed with the mundane repetitive society we're all subjected to day in and day out. But I think Suda51 just really liked light sabers.
I'd say if you plan on playing this game in the future, just go in wearing your good time hat and strap in for stupid.
Trust your force, and head for the Garden of Madness.

Never played Rogue Legacy but immediately loved this one once I started seeing how much fun the movement options are and how different the classes played (my favorite is Chef). However I don't think I can bring myself to finish it. A lot of the areas and bosses past the halfway point feel so oppressive with their difficulty and I don't feel like grinding out money runs to maybe have a better shot. Still well worth the experience for the first half, but I wish it wasn't so difficult in the later half.

I won't rate this game but man was I bored within the first couple of hours. I could go on about what I didn't like but I think it boils down to it feeling like just another point you in this direction open world game. A lot of the UI that I can turn off in the options doesn't feel like they intended for you to ever turn any of it off, so having all the notifications and markers on my screen at all time was a big turn off. Maybe there's a fun game hidden in here somewhere, but I certainly will never know.

If you like Pokémon for the part where you go out and catch/battle Pokémon, this game is your wet dream. If you like Pokémon for systems like EV's, abilities, and multiplayer, this game is your nightmare.
But seriously, this game might be really ugly but it's just about everything I've personally wanted from Pokémon in a long time. I'd hope they can make the areas a bit more fun to explore if they keep this model going forward. But knowing Nintendo, this could very well be the most successful one off they never try and keep moving forward.