dragon quest is by far my favorite series of all time, and even then i only hope i can one day love dragon quest as much as dragon quest 11 loves dragon quest. it hears everyone out there who ignorantly derides this series for every "this is too basic" criticism you could think of and simply says "even if you were right, who cares?", because dragon quest 11 is a game that adores the structure and stories of the games before while simultaneously knowing there's so much more that can and will be done with that structure going forward.
i'm really glad that i played all of the other 10 mainline games before 11, because it really does feel like a victory lap with all the little nods to the other games you notice along the way. i hope very deeply and sincerely that one day that this beautiful celebration of this momentous series's storied past will be looked upon as another step in its long history.

beautiful, amazing, and mesmerizing game. i hardly even feel equipped to talk about it much past surface level comments, but flower sun and rain is maybe the game that embodies "kill the past" the best to me. it's funny, it's thought provoking, and the way it ties into the silver case retroactively makes me like the silver case more. it's one of those games that resonated with me so heavily that i literally have nothing i can say about my time with it without it being a jumbled mess but i love it all the same.
fsr also has great vibes and an amazing soundtrack as well that really elevates everything that much further for me. sadly, the game is only available in english for the nintendo ds, but the presentation is so downgraded in every conceivable way and is how most people are going to play it until the inevitable remaster. i personally played with pcsx2 rendering to a desktop crt with a translation guide on another window and that visual and auditory boost was well worth it, especially with how short the game really is, but i understand how that might not be ideal for everyone. regardless of how you can or can't play fsr, as much as these are all great games i sincerely think that the initial kill the past trilogy of the silver case, flower sun and rain, and killer7 is worth checking out just for it alone, and i hope one day the remaster comes out so more people will play it and i can recommend it to people more readily

Note - as I did not beat this game, this write-up should be taken more as a set of observations than a genuine review.

Note - this game contains a couple scenes that may be triggering to epileptics

Played as part of the Mega Man Legacy Collection on Steam


Mega Man 2 is a slight improvement over its predecessor, though part of me questions how much of that came down to luck. If you read my review of the first one, you’ll know that the biggest issue I had with it was its hidden linearity - how you actually had to beat all the bosses in a specific order courtesy of certain weapons being mandatory against certain titans.

Well, given that the premise remains the same here of tackling multiple bots, the good news is I didn’t run into that problem and was able to complete most of the game. However, I just don’t know if I happened to get lucky in my selection -- see, once again, I noticed that certain robots were heavily vulnerable to certain weapons acquired from certain automatons, and considering I went left to right, top to bottom in my selection order, I wonder if that was, unintentionally, the predetermined pathway.

Regardless, even if that qualm was resolved, Mega Man 2 didn’t exactly fix the plethora of other cracks present in its forebear. For starters, the game is still very difficult and uses a password system, meaning no progress is saved and permadeath is very much a thing. Now playing on the Legacy Collection does grant you access to manual saving, as well as a rewind function enabling you to undo immediate mistakes - however, these come with their own setbacks: with the former, saving is only accessible within levels and is singular in-scope, potentially putting you up schitt’s creek if you’re doing it before every stage without the appropriate weapon; and regarding the latter, there’s a timer on how far back you can go, which would be fair were it not for the fact that it includes pause screen delays in said timer - if you’re called away from the computer for any reason, expect to unintentionally lose out on a chunk of your past (and yes, this happened to me).

With less than a year of development time, graphics and SFX have largely stayed the same from Mega Man 1. What has improved, though, are the enemy designs, most of whom are so good, they went on to become staples of the franchise in general. There are eight main worlds, each with their own theme, and I’m not lying when I tell you guys how blown away I was by the amount of new foes, from collapsible pillars and kamikaze birds to metal anglers and lightning-throwing Goros. While Super Mario Bros. holds the NES torch for enemy creativity, I definitely feel Mega Man 2 should be as much in contention for that title as it was a delight to witness.

Music has definitely seen a slight improvement as, while it’s still held back by the inherent-wonkiness of the Famicom sound chip, Takashi Tateishi’s beats managed to be infectiously catchy, riding that line between arcade action & synthetic harmony.

Gameplay continues the Mega Man trend of combining run-and-gun mechanics with platforming sections, and though different ammo types offer some variety, it’s fundamentally indifferent from its predecessor. That said, one noticeable thing about Mega Man 2 is how precise its jumping is -- it’s not used as much as it could or should have been (this is very much a shooter first), however, I was genuinely surprised by how precise the blue cyborg’s leaping and landing animations were(+) as you hop from base-to-base.

That aside, the big question you may be wondering is why did I quit when I clearly had a decent enough grasp of the game to beat its initial eight Masters? Well, in one of the six sections of the final world, you’ll come across a miniboss consisting of 5 blue orbs you must destroy with explosive grenades. That’s all well-and-fine, but the problem is I didn’t have enough ammunition for all five and consequently was forced to die. Okay, no big deal, I thought I’d just restart the level post-death and give it another go….except, the geniuses at Capcom decided to not have ammo replenish upon rebirth(++), meaning I was essentially softlocked into restarting from my last save point, which was too far back for me to consider doing.

In the end, there’s nothing else to say. Mega Man 2 might’ve been recommendable had it toned down its difficulty(+++), but when you’re forced to rely on an artificial reverse mechanic that still doesn’t rectify its core issues, you’ve got another classic that’s best left on the backburner indefinitely.



NOTES
+Ladders are the one thing you’re handicapped from doing extensive jumps off of.

++I’m not sure if this fetter was only for the final world or a universal feature. I will say you do regain all munitions between levels.

+++One part, in particular, literally has you falling down an everlooming shaft whilst one-hit-KO lasers fly from all sides, and I honestly have no idea how players back-in-the-day completed this without constantly restarting their progress.

-I will say the water physics and air bubbles Mega Man emits whilst submerged are nice additions. I don’t recall any underwater portions in the first game.

-It was sometimes hard to tell apart the firearms due to them only being identified by a single letter on the pull-up menu.

-You’ll have to contend with some slow text boxes after completing every level.

It's always hard to comment and review on story-driven games like this visual novel avoiding spoilers. Paranormasight is a well-put-together visual novel that provides a good narrative, interesting characters and plot, and an intriguing setting. The story and plot are interesting throughout the whole game and keep the player engaged in finding out more about the curses that are affecting the City and how the ultimate goal of the curses is/will be activated as well as finding out the story behind it.

Gameplay revolves around reading a lot and making decisions/asking questions to progress. Parts of the game involve a 360 panoramic view that allows the player to inspect different components within the view. There are some very clever uses of in-game files and observations that the player will have to use in order to progress through the game. The soundtrack and sound effects are very good and appropriate for the nature of the game and its setting.

All in all, this is a very solid visual novel that came out of nowhere and it's definitely worth exploring if you are a fan of the genre.

"Why do birds poop white?" son, they poop fire and ice, haven't you played Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards? I feel seen... Oh, it's the box art. Please look away, Kirby-san! This game is suffering from compulsive peak disorder and I'm the one diagnosing shit around these parts. A splendiferous last hurrah to many cultural remnants of the pink ball, like the little stars, the enemies, and a gimmick that gives you a shitload of ability combos that I actively seek out. Ado also comes back as a freind but that's her deadname don't use it 🤣 (she got one name for every clothing set). We will watch her shortlived career with great interest.

Like every old fart (anybody born before me) probably anticipated after the numerous jocular intermissions plaguing the series since its first entry, there are jocular cutscenes here, too! They are very delightful. I swear, jocular doesn't seem like a real word. In these cutscenes, we meet our allies: Bandana Waddle Dee (he's the only liddle dee that matters. Bro is him), King Dedede??! Yep what a turncoat, and the last is Ado who I have already mentioned. She serves a hearty meal of tomato once in a while, she's clearly doing her best. Waddle Dee, meanwhile, uses his suspiciously different colored feets to step on the gas of various machinery he does not have a license for. While they were all intended to be playable, it is finally King Dedede that you get to clobber dat dere enemies with.

I forgot Ribbon, anyways, look at those enemies. Kirby takes it one step further and can take them hostage, forcing them to kill their own family (swag) "Um i'm a biblical angel of death 🤓" stfu dioxygen I'm coming with the "Swiss Army" ability! <-- clueless. I will be taking Sephiroth hostage see how you parry this 😂 in true Kirby's Dream Land 2 fashion, the one combo I've used almost all game is the aforementioned Needle Needle ability. Press B to win! But I did replay afterwards to test out what I didn't get to test. Some of those are peculiar ngl, instead of using his cellphone to call a warp star, which he has never had to do before, he should have called Kirby reddit to give him even weirder abilities.

I cant believe Whispy Woods got kids bruh 😭 when did he find the time to settle down? I guess letting him walk in DL3 is letting him cook 🗣️ I guess Ripple Field went from the rainbow islands to a whole new planet? I do like the map design and environment of this game! One of the best in the N64 some might say. Despite the non-linearity of the path, it was easily navigable. Underwater sections have been known to be breathtaking at times too. The concept of room guarders is pretty weird, what are they guarding? Still, they became staples, there is no place for critic. One complaint I might have about this game is that I keep getting pit deaths! My name is not helping me at all, platforming be damned these Neo Star falling logs can muster a mean fall. The picnic shit at the end of levels is funny though. Look at my boy all sad and sobbing because he jumped on grass

Devil May Cry is a series I knew virtually nothing about before I played this, but if the rest of the series is like this game I can see why people like it so much. The Basic gameplay loop of fighting enemies by executing different moves and combos and collecting the red orbs they drop to get upgrades was pretty satisfying and addictive and the mission level structure felt pretty good and made sure no section outstayed it's welcome. The game's setting and atmosphere reminded me a lot of Resident Evil in ways, a secluded island with a large manor and evil creatures dwelling within it made for a really interesting place to explore and I was always wondering where the game would take me next. Probably my favorite thing about the game was just how damn goofy it was in the best way possible. Though he didn't get many lines seeing as the gameplay was clearly the main focus here, almost every word out of Dante's mouth was a riot, combine that with incredible early 2000s voice overacting, and I can see why people love this silly character so much. Apart from just Dante though, the story, dialogue, and overall vibe of the game felt cheesy in a way that felt endearing and I absolutely loved it. My only real complaint with the game were it's boss fights, some of them were ridiculously easy while others were punishingly difficult and there really was no in between. On top of that the game reused the same four bosses over and over and it just didn't feel that fun to fight the same thing over and over again as opposed to something original. Apart from that the game only allowed you to save at the end of levels (at least as far as I could find) meaning if you died in a level and didn't have any yellow orbs left to revive you then you had to restart the whole level over again which just took me out of the game a few times during difficult missions, overall this is more of a symptom of being an older video game rather than a problem with DMC specifically, but it still wasn't great. On the whole though, I really enjoyed Devil May Cry and look forward to playing more of this series.