Many reviews I read went into detail about this game being forgettable and unremarkable, claiming it was basically some sort of errand simulator. That bit I do agree on.

And it's undeniable. It always feels like you're just getting started in the game because of how mundane every mission is. There are 31 main quests, but many more optional ones. However, in the context of the story, everything fits. In terms of your character, it makes sense. In regards to the gameplay, it was very satisfying for me.

The loop is: receive a main objective, then go talk to everyone else to get some side missions that could get completed on your way there, then come back to report, level up, find new faces and learn that your efforts are expanding the settlement, unlock some fancy new movements, gear up then do it all over again. I got addicted to it. The writing isn't stellar though it is very charismatic. It isn't deep, but still manages to be interesting.

I was suprised by how much I ended up liking the story and connecting with the characters. I was blown away by how much the gameplay evolved by the end of it, in terms of movements available for each of the characters, as in the beginning it felt kind of clunky.

It isn't a difficult experience, only experienced some spikes here and there but the game is (generally) generous, except in the final stretch. I ended up playing very little of the post-game content and didn't finish all of the missions available before finishing it, as it was about to leave Game Pass. I may end up buying it later.

Played for 21 hours and 29 minutes through Xbox Game Pass.

Cute little indie game that's more of a walking simulator than a platformer. Sorry, it's a "cinematic platformer".

Don't take me wrong though. I had a blast, more than with any other cinematic platformer I've played before. Also, it has a little more action than many of said genre. Still, for me it fits that genre's common description as the platforming feels clumsy and there is almost no difficulty to it.

The dialogues I thought were really funny as well as the story overall. Nothing outstanding, just a very good time.

I was ready to rate it 3 out of 5, then I played the co-op levels. They were the best designed part of the game, leaning more to the puzzle platforming bits of the game. They were also very few and completely separated of the main game.

Finally, I had an issue post-game. Went back to my save file to try and complete some objectives. However, after catching a bird for one of those side quests, my game got stuck. No matter if I closed, reinstalled or even played through the cloud. Nothing worked. When I load my save, I'm stuck over the house in the spot I caught the bird on and I can't move. A real shame.

Played through Xbox Game Pass for 8 hours exactly, main story + co-op. Don't know why it took me so darn long.

I first played It Takes Two, from the same studio, some months ago. I was expecting to find some similarities between these two games. To my surprise, however, the similarities started right from the title screen.

There's much to applaud about A Way Out. I find their efforts for the, ahem, cooperative video games scene, so commendable. The experimentation in gameplay and mix of unique ideas is not just a selling point, it is the very essence of their titles. So for that alone, I'll always praise and play their works, because there are few studios working on that.

I still haven't made up my mind. For all intents and purposes, It Takes Two is the better game, if a little stretched thin. A Way Out has many mundane moments, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but if there were some more substance to the rest of the game, the mundane wouldn't feel kind of empty. So I don't know which one I prefer just yet.

Some years ago, thinking about a game I'd like to create, I envisioned something like the experience this game offered me. Varied concepts, an interesting story, changing gameplay mechanics, action set pieces. I'm no game developer by any means, but this game kind of made me realize that idea would be extremely difficult to pull off. So I hope they keep on refining their craft.

This isn't a mediocre game, nor is it a GOTY contender (It Takes Two should have never won in 2021), but is an enjoyable, emotional, if sometimes too in-your-face and unrealistic, experience. I have to say, I didn't see the twist coming and was genuinely shocked, so that alone made it a little better for me. And the way the ending is handled feels very unique but fell short of greatness.

Played for 8 hours and 33 minutes through Xbox Game Pass.

Played through the entire thing in splitscreen. Both of us have never played any other LEGO Star Wars game. Well, we've never even watched any of the movies or series. So story-wise, we were pretty much lost. Not a great idea in retrospective, but at least made us curious about eventually watching the movies, but we were very much confused the whole time and I personally found it a little frustrating, even though I understand this is supposed to be a festival of references for fans.

Moving to gameplay. Yep, it's a LEGO game.

Forcing me to elaborate, though. You guys complained back in the 90's about Donkey Kong 64 and the collectibles in that game, but give THIS GAME (or most LEGO games for that matter) a pass on that regard? What's wrong with you for real. I HATE they want to force us to replay the levels. I thought having a "more open" LEGO game was a good idea, but the concept of having to replay or BEING BLOCKED OF CHANGING CHARACTER IN SOME SECTIONS EVEN WHEN WE HAVE ALREADY UNLOCKED THE NECESSARY CHARACTER AT THAT POINT TO OBTAIN SOME COLLECTABLE... I wholeheartedly hate it.

I think this signals a big flaw of the LEGO games as a whole, not just this one. To add to it, I usually enjoy going out of the main path to collect and explore but this game made me despise that part of me. I wanted to break everything "just in case", wanted to explore every corner "to see if we can get something". And it is really time-consuming to break everything, even though they give just LEGO pieces and isn't very much necessary, but it's hard to stop myself.

I love 3D platformers, here however it was just tedious and repetitive ALMOST to the point of boredom. Boredom coming from "oops, you don't have this character just yet, guess you climbed all the way up here for nothing".

When playing on splitscreen, the resolution is mediocre, and that really has an effect on this game because it has somewhat realistic environments in some places, so I'd get lost sometimes because of everything looking the same. Also the camera was a real pain for me in some points, being too close for my liking.

I didn't hate the experience though. Some challanges were fun to complete. A final thing to say is, the Latin American Spanish dub, for all NPCs at least, is atrocious.

I'm not willing to replay this ever again. Played for 31 hours and 58 minutes through Xbox Game Pass.

I'm torn on this. This game has countless flaws all over it. The localization work isn't the best. You can clearly see the idle animations of characters not looping properly. Some UI elements are not properly aligned. Most of the time you're listening to the same 2 songs (there are more for some bosses and areas, all of it it's good at least). There's a little too much talking for a game of this kind. Some tutorials are shown multiple times, and they're usually very simple. Menus aren't necessarily bad but they feel like a first draft. Some ideas are thrown into the mix but never expanded. The game doesn't clearly state that each character has its own, separate campaign.

So I first started playing with Xiahou Xue, the girl, not knowing this was the harder of both stories. I struggled but persevered, until I hit a spike in the difficulty in the form of the boss called Tang Ming and his stupid bombs. After that? Yeah, I kind of broke the whole meta game with an ability that I can't recall its name. Demon slayer, maybe? Haha. Anyway, after landing some hits, I was able to activate it, then it powered me up for twenty-something seconds and from that point I was able to breeze my way up 'til the end of this campaign. Like, barely needing to parry or strategize anymore, as long as I kept leveling up the ability and myself.

There are some shared elements across both campaigns. For the most part, though, they're completely unrelated, which was kind of shocking for me when I started my playthrough with Lu Yunchuan. I was expecting to play as the brother of Xiahou, and see the events play from his perspective or be an alternate take of the story. That was not at all the case, as I've stated. Yeah, I didn't pay much attention to the artwork to realize the brother and Lu look nothing alike.

When playing with Lu, I got an equivalent (or maybe even it's called the same) ability through an optional challange, however the power-up would only last 13 seconds or so. So I was never ridiculously overpowered, but almost. For this reason, I felt I struggled this campaign the most. I also think it helped me understand the game a little better.

There are some mechanics that are introduced in Lu's campaign but completely, or mostly, absent in Xiahou's, such as talking to NPCs or explosive elements throughout the levels. This obviously points that the main focus of the developers was the Lu's campaign, even naming the game after his story. It was interesting for me, however, rediscovering new intentions in a game I had finished and thought I wouldn't find anything new anymore.

This is, surprisingly, not a metroidvania. It's some sort of boss-rush beat 'em up. There is plenty of combat outside of the boss fights, anyway, and some light exploration to do. Checkpoints are generous and I only struggled in few points with them. If it isn't clear yet though, this is very much a hard game, that can be cheesed but still.

I shouldn't have enjoyed this as much as I did. Objectively, though, it's very much not great. I still loved my time with it.

Played through Xbox Game Pass for... what? A total of 28 hours and 8 minutes?! I idled a lot, but this is ridiculous. I did all of the achievements except for one, and most of the challanges available, so that may be it.

IT'S SUPAH MARIO BROTHARS 2 BABYYYY

Now, seriously... wow. This was awful. You see everything this game has to offer in the very first level. Probably just once or twice I was surprised with a twist of the picking up/throwing mechanic, which I'd say wasn't explored to its fullest.

And I'm somewhat grateful for that, as this buggy, illogical hitbox, repetitive mess of a game was begging me to stop playing it. Almost every single level has a mini boss fight, and almost always it's against Birdo, or as this game's credits call... them, Ostro? That's kinda funny.

But this game certainly isn't. So many design flaws, of its time I guess. Yet there is so much influence of the title in the Super Mario series. Probably every single element from this game has returned somehow, somewhere, in the Super Mario series, except for its main gimmick. It's kind of a shame, yet probably for the best to keep the Doki Doki Panic essence away from the series.

I made use of the rewind feature shamelessly as there were many, many cheap deaths and unpredictable behavior all over the place.

For many years I played the first level or two, when I was younger, with so much joy. Now I wish I had left this title in the mystical realm of the unknown so I'd respect it a little more. At least I can say I finished it.

Go play Onion Assault. That's actually good.

Played for 3 hours and 4 minutes through Nintendo Switch Online.

You get what was promised. Besides some hiccups with the puzzles here and there, even needing to look up a guide twice, this was an absolute blast. I need more escape room games now.

Played the whole game in split screen co-op, and we ran out of time at least three times so I hope they do modify the timer for single and co-op games, because I'd say two would solve faster than a single person right?

Anyways, as much as the gameplay shines the story is certainly lacking, though serviceable.

Played through Xbox Game Pass.

Right from the get go it's hard not to fall right into place for the adventure in Ravenlok. I would say this the best-looking voxel game ever created, and the lightining goes a long way in helping it. You feel ready for an epic journey, the music is inviting, the game even has you go get yourself a sword and shield, slowly buidling things up.

Then you get to a fight and realize that's all it's gonna be. There's barely any depth to those mechanics, having only a single normal attack and a shield that doesn't seem to be useful at all. You eventually get 4 special abilities, each having their own cooldown and they do make the game more fun, but not more interesting.

The story is as shallow as it can get. To be honest, I was expecting it to be deeper, more grandiose, even maybe a darker take on the classic Alice stories. The dialogues are very basic, there's little of getting to know anyone or even yourself. I didn't find this to be very bad, anyway, it felt like a fairy tale, a fairy tale that played it too safe.

The missions are also instinctively simple. Exactly what you would expect, and everything is near where you need them. Except for some puzzles and some objects that were somewhat difficult to find, there's little complexity to be found.

Still, I found the world and overall structure of the game to be evocative, delightful and kind of exactly what it needed to be. Each area was a pleasure to explore and discover, though everything felt small when looking at the big picture. And the music has no faults at all, you could even dislike the graphics to some degree, but the music is as outstanding as the art direction is.

I encountered some errors, however, which is a shame. After buying some bombs, my character clipped through the floor and was leaning, thankfully it solved by just moving. The American Spanish localization, however, is less of a good thing, with countless mispellings and the translator, probably amateur or a machine, really struggling with articles.

Played through Xbox Game Pass for 12 hours and 30 minutes.

What to think about something that takes most of what makes it great from something else? These are more just my thoughts than a proper review.

There's this perception in art that highly values originality. We like new propositions. That doesn't undermine a derivative work, however. Concepts evolve, ideas change, gameplay shouldn't stagnate. Still, many dislike plagiarism.

For me, Stardew Valley firmly walks the divisory line between inspiration and plagiarism. Eric Barone, the developer of the game, has mentioned wanting to improve the flaws of the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons games was his main drive. I'd say it creates as many flaws as it fixes. Still, this is understandable as he was a sole developer.

It is important to judge a piece of art not just as its own entity, one should also consider the times, the environment, what came before it. That's why we still call Ocarina of Time a masterpiece and not just an outdated piece of software.

Now that Stardew Valley has become as influential as HM/SoS, it's worth asking... does it deserve all the praise? Or is it just a good, polished piece? There's a lot of merit in the creation of a good game, but maybe there's bigger merit in the creation of a genre.

Finally, I'd like to say I'm glad he decided to take what started as mere code training to this extent, and that he decided to make it his own, instead of some sort of mod for any HM/SoS game.

You know, I like my beat 'em ups. Didn't grow up with them, but it's a genre I've learned to appreciate.

If I'm being honest, the thing I usually like the most about a beat 'em up is they usually allow for local co-op. This game isn't the exception to that, being a game for one or two players.

The biggest sin of the genre is repetitiveness. This game also isn't the exception to that, but I gotta say it took a good chunk of the game for me to feel the gameplay was getting stale. Longer than many of the genre.

At the beginning I was very pleasantly surprised, thinking to myself this was going to be one of the greats, a true hidden gem. I was having a blast with the gameplay and truly felt it like a good evolution of the genre. That feeling did go away, but I had fun all the way though.

The story is whatever. It has a fine, consistent art style and enjoyed the unlockables, but we missed many of them.

We ran into some technical issues, however. There were some cutscenes that had the audio way far ahead of the video showing. There were some levels that had frame rate issues in specific places. However, the biggest offender was a particular level (can't remember which one) where the game would drop the frames to the floor and then crash. The first time we were playing in tabletop mode, then we decided to move to the TV but same thing happened. Then I thought maybe playing the level solo could help, and it did. It was the end of the level.

Bought this for dirt-cheap as part of a 3-games bundle in the eShop. Well worth the price all things considered. Took 5 hours and 19 minutes to beat.

Anyone saying this is a short game didn't play the hard levels. No, it doesn't just get rid of the markup feature. They are kind of mirror levels. Some are the same, some are similar but solved differently.

The core game does take around 3-5 hours at most to beat. The rest is made up of the hard levels and the final level of them took me like 2 hours by itself. It took me AT LEAST 12 hours total to 100% beat the game.

Going to the game itself, I was in awe. Ever since playing Picross and the hidden gem Sorry, James that I haven't been this engrossed by a puzzle-numbers game. Every 15 levels a new mechanic is introduced and I couldn't believe my eyes.

This is a work of genius. This isn't Sudoku meets hexagons, this is Sudoku meets God. If you love puzzles, that is.