I was in a nostalgic mood and felt like re-visiting this one via the remaster.

It's funny how this game has all of the same problems as I remember, yet I still like it. The atmosphere is cozy, Kat is a fun protagonist and the gravity powers are still unique. No game out there plays quite like Gravity Rush. For better and for worse.

The combat stinks. Going up in the air to either launch a special attack or divekick towards pink balls gets old real fast. I would have MUCH rather Gravity Rush omit combat altogether to having this system in place. The story is also just fine I guess. The comic book cutscenes have a lot of personality to them and do help in setting a whimsical tone to the game. The music also helps a ton in this regard. It's a fun world to be in.

The thing I enjoyed doing the most were the gravity obstacle courses throughout the game. They often required I use the gravity powers in creative ways and were a lot of fun.

I platinumed this over the weekend and had a good time. Here's hoping the Gravity Rush 2 PS5 remaster is real. I'd love to revisit that one as well.

One of the more interesting games I've played a good while.

Worldless is at it's core a turn based rhythm game where you need to master patterns (and how to react to them). When it's good, it's REAL good. Some fights felt downright euphoric once I understood how to tackle them. But god, sometimes it's just such a frustrating combat system to engage with. It's very unforgiving in the sense that it leaves very little room for error. If you fuck up, chances are, the enemy wipes you and you have to start the fight over. Which I'm of two minds of. On one hand, this lends to the hostile nature of the game and makes the highs feel higher. But it also makes the lows feel lower and occasionally felt akin to banging my head against a wall. I do appreciate what it's going for. TLDR; skill issue.

The metroidvania stuff is good. There's are fun platforming puzzle sections sprinkled throughout the map that made it interesting enough to traverse. But overall it's a little unremarkable in that respect.

Graphically, the simply cosmic art style looks great. The animations in combat look especially punchy. I dug it.

So yeah. Worldless is an interesting game. Not really an easy one to recommend but I'm glad I played it.

Easily the best 2D Mario since the NSMB era.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder is a dramatic increase in quality over the mediocre NSMB games. I feel kind of weird starting this off with such a blunt comparison but I think it's important. Wonder really goes back to basics and rejects everything that the NSMB games stood for and because of that it feels like a new fresh starting point for modern 2D Mario games.

Visually, the game is incredible. The animations are very expressive and so are the characters. Mario feels really alive here and that's great. No complaints. It's awesome.

There's something about the level design here that, while often good, never reaches anything more than that. Take the main gimmicks for example. The first one is Elephant Mario. Visually rad but basically just a Mega Mushroom. The other gimmick is the wonder effects that happen in levels. Some levels will have creative musical moments and other levels, the wonder effect will be the most mundane thing you've ever seen. Another thing that Super Mario Bros Wonder does is add a badge system that lets you alter the gameplay in a bunch of different ways. Most of the badges just end up being a way to get extra air time. It's not exactly a creative renaissance.

I was expecting Super Mario Bros Wonder to do to 2D Mario what Odyssey did to 3D Mario. Which is to reinvent the series for the modern day. It does do that to some extent, but it's just so much tamer than I would have liked it to be. Not everything needs to reinvent the wheel, I get that. Maybe the next one will be more than "just" a good 2D Mario game.