Even though I act like a hardened veteran of old-school video games sometimes, the truth is, I’m a filthy modern gamer in the end. I prefer when animations are fancier and the graphic looks more comprehensible at one glance.

That’s one of the petty excuses why I abandoned System Shock 1 when I played it for the first time. I was intrigued by the fact that it was the father of the Shock series (and Prey2017) and the game that did the “Metroidvania” design before SotN, but then the Grimace Shake of UI design splashed over me and I died. Also, I was busy doing other stuff at that time too, so I just hopelessly abandoned the playthrough.

So, the remake is out. And even though the outcome isn’t exactly the same, I heard that the developer’s premise was not ignoring the value of the original and recreating the same contexts and systems with the modern graphical touch.
And a lot of people who played both said the remake is the almost-perfect conversion of the original System Shock.

With these gathered opinions, I’m going to think that the core value and the feature of both games are all the same.
I played it on difficulty “2” for every department and I didn’t use a guide from start to finish, except for one time when I didn’t know what the CPU nods look like (yeah I can be that stupid sometimes).

And I can say that even though there are some moments that made me feel exhausted, I really appreciated the game overall. And if it is true that the remake’s outcome barely changed anything from the original’s design sensibility, then I would also respect the old devs for nailing down the dungeon design at that time.

If you have been in some gaming communities, you may have seen some memes comparing System Shock levels and Bioshock Infinite levels. While that’s a surface-level sneering at best, (there are better reasons to hate Bioshock Infinite than that) it is true that the level design of System Shock is the most impressive part.
I would say, even if you set the combat difficulty modifier to 0, you will still find enjoyment in the level navigation alone, because the level is like a giant jigsaw puzzle that gets larger and more convoluted as you progress.
You walk down the new corridor and there are two vents at the corner, three locked doors leading to completely different areas, and four hidden traps waiting for you to step on. Oh yeah, and there are like five patrolling security bots charging up the laser beams, so good luck!
That was a little bit exaggerated, but something as unhinged as that case happened all the time and it made me tense throughout the whole game.
The Storage Room is probably the best example of this case with the sheer size of the level, the swirling multiple branches, and the vertical structure of the small rooms that make you aware of the 3D spaces. That stage was disgustingly confusing and at the same time really memorable because of that.

Until the end game part, there’s never been a time when I felt “I know it will be a smooth ride from now on.” even though the game features a lenient form of the quick save system and the revive mechanic. (I would also argue that the resources in this game are pretty generous that you don’t have to horde the items all the time, at least on the difficulty “2” modifier.)
But the point of this game is not about surviving in a minute-to-minute real-time action. It’s about figuring out how the whole gigantic clusters are interconnected while also juggling the busy work.
The anxious thoughts constantly whispered that I won’t be able to beat this game, not because of the combat, but because of the missing pieces I couldn’t connect in the gargantuan maze.
Even after you mostly clear out the level and reveal most parts of the map, it isn’t enough to get rid of the whole underlying anxiety.
Only after you see the Citadel Station getting exploded in the cutscene, you can feel absolute relief and it was one of the most satisfying feelings I had with video games. (And even then, there’s a comparably simple and yet challenging ending mission right after that. The game never lets you take a break lol)

And the experience is amplified by the omnipresent entity Shodan.
Technically, every video game is just about dealing with shit thrown by the omnipresent entity - the developer, but what I really liked about her is how she is(or the developer is) so on the nose about showing the hidden cards in the sleeves.
There’s a seemingly mundane problem, so you solve it. But then she summons the horde of cyborg soldiers behind you while mocking and insulting you.
You think you solved the main big problem, but then she directly calls you and introduces a new problem -something that requires another hour and hours of multi-tasking and puzzle-solving.
Even though Shodan is just conceptualized quest giver and surprise encounter, I would say her existence elevated the experience because I could kinda connect to the developer’s sadistic intent behind that character. You can even hear her monologue that she is a god damn SHINTO of the citadel. Yeah, sure thing, developer. You and the dungeon design are one and the same, you evil bastard.

To get to the negative bits, I have to admit that I was slightly disappointed by the fact that, while the level progression is extremely liberal, the solutions for the small roadblocks are limited to specific key hunting or puzzles.
When I was in the Executive level, I got stuck there for a long time, because I didn’t know that there was a second unlockable cyber lock in cyberspace. That specific part halted my progression for a really long time, so I got really frustrated.
In the ideal world, the game could have provided some way to bypass the cyberspace challenges like the puzzle-skipping device.
To be fair, System Shock shouldn’t be considered as a sand-box imsim like Prey. It should be considered as a classic dungeon crawling. But even then, I think multiple solutions for each locked-door-type roadblock could have worked out better for the game. After all, the strength of this game is connecting the dots in the large unknown places, not beating a specific shooter mini-game located in the tiny corner.

Oh yeah, and I can’t express enough how the final boss was a shitshow. Though, there’s never been a good “imsim” boss so it makes sense that the forefather of the genre suffers from the same problem.
But it’s still a shame because the other bosses like Diego and Cortex Reavers were serviceable as a combat challenge where you actually have to care about what you are doing.

Negative comments aside, this is still a work of art.
It shows that the maze-like levels are much, much more than just a tedious roundabout. It can be an amazing ingredient or even a main dish if the devs can weave them well.
If I could stomach the old presentation, I could have experienced this journey early on with the original 1. Sadly I couldn’t, but I’m so glad that the remake turned out to be a real thing in the end. My appreciation goes to both the old devs and the new devs.

People just easily throw the sentence “this game design didn’t age well” like some kind of experts, but if I’m being honest, if a certain old game is mentioned fondly by some people even nowadays, there is a chance that the only things that aged from that game were presentation and graphic fidelity, not the design method.
Unshockingly, System Shock was the case.

I never gave this game much thought from the glimpses I've seen of it up to release, but the quadruple combo of it being a shorter game published by Annapurna that got high review scores and is day one on Game Pass made it very hard to ignore. I'm glad I didn't as I can confidently say that Cocoon is so far my favorite Indie game of 2023.

The game never tells you how to do anything, which is one of my favorite things about it. It just feels intuitive, and its solely up to you to figure things out. I got stumped a lot but outside of something I'll get to in a bit, it basically never felt like the game was unfair. And even when things seemed impossible, every single time I found out the solution I was impressed with how clever the game was. The puzzle design is just simply excellent here and it feels consistently rewarding.

Now there is a reason this game is missing a star. A few smaller issues first: I didn't really care about the art style. It feels a bit generic but its not a bad looking game either so not really a negative. The soundtrack also exists. Its fine I guess, but I never really noticed it which feels like a missed opportunity. Also if this game has a story, its very vague. I'm sure there's some deeper meaning to everything but it very much takes a backseat. These three things are fine and didn't really bother me as the gameplay is still very engaging but they do stop me from fully loving it.

Now about the actual things I dislike about the game. It took me around 5 and a half hours to beat. This is a great length for a game like this, and the puzzles continued to expand and stay interesting the whole time. That being said, there were several moments that felt like finales where the game just kept continuing on after. It led to a conflicting feeling where I was enjoying the puzzles but still wishing for the game to be over. It was just a bit exhausting to be thrown for a loop that much. The only other thing I dislike about this game are some of the timed puzzles. For the most part these are perfectly fine, but in the last fourth there is three different timed sections each made up of three different parts. They're sort of like a boss battle but if you fail any part you have to restart the whole section. While other bosses do make you restart, at least they were based on skill, but this one is solely on timing. This led to a lot of having to redo parts I already knew how to just to get back to the part I was actually stuck on and it was quite frankly a pain in the ass. I don't like timed puzzles and this was a bad way to implement them. Otherwise the bosses are all sort of similar but still unique enough that their presence makes the game more interesting.

Overall, Cocoon is a fantastic puzzle game that's held back only by a handful of small things and the very occasional annoying section. None of its negatives take away from the fact that its highly creative and one of the best games I've played in an already stacked year.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far <3

Nancymeter - 85/100
Achievement Completion - 80%
Time Played - 5 hours 43 minutes
Completion #29 of September
Completion #192 of 2023

Final Fantasy XVI definitely exceeded my expectations and I couldn't be happier about it. I like how the game falsely leads you to believe it's going to be yet another revenge narrative but it swerves into oppression and revolution after they solve that issue. Some people might be disappointed if they go in expecting a complex political thriller, but what we get instead is a compelling narrative revolving around destroying a divine foundation and return mankind its freedom.

I also really like what they did with Clive. He is actually not half as edgy or bloodthirsty as I expected him to be. He never dives into blind murder territory, so excellent choice. Sadly, the same cannot be said about Jill. Don't get me wrong, I like her and was really hype for her after her arc, because I feel we learn why she was so muted before and placed priority on Clive's emotional needs over her own. But after her revenge they slipped her back into the role of Clive's love interest and echo of kindness. I hoped to see her be more of her own character than Clive's emotional crutch, so I'm bummed they didn't deliver on Jill's potential. Seeing strong female characters reduced to that is just a waste and a huge pet peeve of mine.

But overall, I'm glad I got to experience a highly immersive, mature and dark Final Fantasy game filled with phenomenal visuals, stunning cinematics, an immaculate soundtrack and a simplified but fun DMC like action gameplay featuring epic Eikon fights. You could tell the developers really cared about making this game great, which they did.

On a sidenote, it's interesting to see people try to define what a "true Final Fantasy" game is, because I feel like it's a franchise that has recreated itself on multiple occasions. There are some common threads of course, but gameplay style, plot style, etc. seem to always have morphed.

Hi-Fi Rush is - without a doubt - one of the funniest games I've played in a while. What a ballsy move to just shadow drop it out of nowhere. There are so many reasons to recommend this game: the combat is spot on, the cast is great, the overall story works well and the style... man, the style might just be the best part! You should definitely give Hi-Fi Rush a chance if you have Game Pass. And if not, then I would still recommend it, because it's simply that much fun!

And if you're afraid the game might be too difficult for you, then don't worry. It does an amazing job of teaching you the basics and giving you all the help you might need. A toddler could play it. Well... maybe.

It felt like this game, more so than MW2019 was just rehashing so many of the iconic moments from the original trilogy to the point where it felt like we was just playing through updated versions of missions like All Ghilied Up, Crew Expendable and The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday. Not that I necessarily think this is a bad thing, you couldn't choose better missions to use as inspiration, it just made it feel like they were playing it very safe with the campaign. Still very solid and I appreciated the variety it gave you throughout even if some things were silly like the abrupt ending, that reveal half way through and that very funny mission at the US/Mexican border which everyone knows about by now.

As for the multiplayer, it is a bit worse than MW2019 but I also believe it to still be very good and better than Midguard and Black ops Mid War. The maps aren't the best, the removal of red dots on the mini map when firing is not a good idea, the new perk system is taking me some time to get used to since it is so iconic and the progression system is very 50/50. On the one hand I love the fact it requires you to use all the guns as this really helps someone smoothed brain like me to keep playing. On the other hand, fuck using all these guns to unlock my 67th red dot sight for pistol 42 please it is silly.

Also need to mention that it has not launched very well, very buggy, crashy and not well optimised but hopefully season 1 fixes these issues, at the very least it is adding back hardcore which is fine.

Overall, its better then the last 2 and given its the first COD with a 2 year cycle, even with its rough launch I do believe it has the potential to be very good.

it really just feels like a step back from CSD 1 overall. in theory, i like most of the new mechanics like as the holding stations and pre-prepping food, it adds too many buttons to the mix, making the simplified control scheme of CSD 1 (one of its biggest draws for me) obsolete. it also really removes the money system as a whole, because now its only used to buy food the the main restaurant, and i hardly play that mode. which brings me to the best part of the game: the chef for hire shifts. they maintain a good level of difficulty and the earlier shifts well-suit you for the later shifts and its very fun to try and score golds on each of the shifts. overall, i'd still recommend it. heard CSD 3's supposed to fix a lot of these probelms.