I'm so fucking tired of people claiming that Warren Spector coined the concept of Immersive Sims, when the man himself will tell you it was Doug Church, all the while these people bash the concept of such a genre even existing. Their arguments are uniformly rooted in prejudicial ignorance every single fucking time. Often making some idiotic remark about how the name is misleading because flight simulators have nothing to do with them, WHEN THE ACTUAL OG IMSIM DEVS MADE FLIGHT SIMS TOO. The entirety of the Looking Glass output were ALWAYS simulations. I'm inclined to believe that the people who were the original developers at the forefront of Simulation focused game development are right in attaching such a denomination in one form or another to their RPG and FPS outputs as well. There's a very simple litmus test you can employ to discern why the bulk of modern first person video games do not deserve to be brought up in conversation by halfwits mistakenly complaining about the genre being "meaningless" because "all games strive to be immersive" (lmao even) or what have you when that's clearly not true. The litmus is whether or not the game is implementing its mechanics via scripted interactions or SIMULATING systems to allow for a rationally comprehensible and predictable game world. Yet somehow people keep bringing up Elder Scrolls, Metroid Prime, et al, in conversation.
I suspect this is an unfortunate effect of general human neurology struggling with comprehending nuance and abstractions, all the while putting much too much emphasis on definitions. Thus the incessant roundabout arguments throughout all of history that often boil down to nothing more than fucking pedantry.

Anyway, as I see it what makes ImSims most consistently identifiable, rather than pedantic slavish insistence of finding individual shared mechanics, is observing how systemically implemented game mechanics end up informing and recontextualizing a game's Level Design.
I feel the need to point this out because I've seen far too many people think that statpoints and skill trees are of chief significance, when they're really just a tool by which developers can choose to allow players influence over their characters. Too few people have played the OG System Shock which is quite lacking in all the ARPG frills that have come to define a particular subset of this criminally misunderstood peak genre of PC gaming. A genre that arguably IS PC gaming.

Oh, yeah, the game. Deus Ex is okay. I made the mistake of playing on Hard and had to suffer through the mediocre gunplay. It was still good though and definitely a must-play. I willfully restarted the Hong Kong level a few times because I wasn't ready to move on before trying several different approaches just for the hell of it. Truly an excellent level.

For all my complaining of pedantry, I wish such widespread flagrant misunderstanding and misapplication of terminology didn't piss me off so much, but I simply can't tolerate besmirchment of PC gaming's most engrossing lineage.

BioShock is a corridor shooter.

"As a longtime fan of the Armored Core soundtracks I am tremendously underwhelmed by AC6." "seriously what happened to the driving anthems from the last four games?! Stargazer isn't enough, I need m o r e."
- One Eternity Later -
THE DARKEST STARLESS SKY
BEGGING FOR THE LIGHT TO SHINE
(unintelligible)
Go! We just have to move on, go!
WELL, WE JUST HAVE TO GO
ALL WE WANTED
ALL WE NEEDED
ALL WE WAITED
ALL WE'VE GONE THROUGH
takes me anywhere, I go~

Now see? That's what I'm talking about. PATHOS! Too bad it's not actually in the game though. AC6: 7/10.

An actually competent action-adventure marred by tedium and the odd asinine piece of "adventure-game-bullshit".
Once again, Zelda II is rather smooth sailing with only ingame hints until lategame. Wherein you have to "just know" that your hammer can clear these very specific unmarked forest tiles, one of which hides a village. Turns out the manual does actually mention this ability. Still obnoxious since every other hidden tile in forests so far has only required happening to walk over them.
- - -
As it turns out it's even worse than I thought. You are completely blockaded from completing the game if you can't learn the Enigma spell in New Kasuto. Which you can't learn if you haven't scoured the entire map for Magic Containers. One of which I've missed because I've not been methodically walking over every single fucking tile in the game. It's one, ONE, tile in the labyrinth I never walked over. If you do not walk over this non-descript tile you cannot finish the game.
- - -
Playtime is heavily padded out by mandating players perform a walk of shame back to each dungeon if they run out of lives. When Zelda II isn't pissing me off I found the moment to moment gameplay to be more engaging than that of its predecessor. If only there were an enhanced remake that refined the solid basegame into something less irritating.
- - -
Believe it or not, being made to play through the same stretches of level over. and over. and over. and over. and over. and over. and over. and over. Is not fucking fun.

Holy shit it has bullet drop.
Loading times and screen tearing (fixed by enabling v-sync via .ini edit) aside, damn this is so cool so far. A tacticool-retro-fps.
- - -
Simple magazine management, mantling, unlockable bullet time, and more cool stuff I won't spoil. Also the HUD can be disabled diegetically, nice touch. There's options to modularly reconfigure the difficulty, and also a toggle for the style of bullet spread you'd like to play with. Crosshairs can also be disabled, and this is the first FPS I've seen to actually pair meaningful Aim-Down-Sights with such an option. Hipfiring and ADS both have a place in your toolset, which is a balance I've been dying to see met in an FPS.
Two chapters in, and it's safe to say I really dig this.
- - - -
Nearing the end of the campaign, I maintain my position that this is a well designed game. However I'm starting to run into more consistent crashing. I think the black blob enemy giblets might be overloading the engine. Previously reloading or transitioning between levels would sometimes throw a memory access violation, but no progress was ever lost.
- - - -
Artistically the entire production is cast in somber tones. Most of the OST is laced with melancholy, offsetting the extreme brutality on screen as the mangled bodies of the enemy gynoids lay weeping in the aftermath of your firefights.
Excellent game, deserving of a higher score if stability is improved.
I eagerly await the sequel.
- - - - -
If you're seeing a lot of occlusion errors as you turn corners, you can try adding this:
[/script/engine.renderersettings]
r.AllowOcclusionQueries=0
to the end of Engine.ini in %localappdata%\the_citadel\Saved\Config\WindowsNoEditor\
It's a common UE4 graphical issue.

A gripping page-turner of an adventure. The entire experience is marred by poor animation transitions, or rather the lack thereof, and various instances of clipping fabrics, character heads spazzing out wildly, buttons on coats floating where they shouldn't, and whatever other minor presentation blemishes escape my present recollection. Such as the various instances of pop-in.
What I'm getting at is that this is a loveable piece of jank that I look forward to re-experiencing someday in order to angle for different outcomes.

I found the combat system very easy, even on Challenge difficulty, only wiping twice throughout the entire campaign, but it provided enough variancy in the encounters that I managed to keep entertained. I find random encounters so distasteful largely in part due to how rote and routine they become after the optimal series of commands is discovered. Thankfully Thaumaturge seemed to be comprised entirely of hand crafted encounters of admittedly samey ruffians. From one encounter to the next I often felt the need to evaluate for a moment before committing to a plan of attack that might be very different than the input order I employed in the previous encounter.

Wiktor was a wonderful protagonist to puppeteer. With plenty of opportunities to relish in substantiated pride, regret, compassion, a whole gamut of compelling emotional drama with which to weave a personalized journey through this lovingly detailed rendition of Warsaw wherein demons and warlocks are engaged in webs of intrigue.

It bears mentioning that beyond the combat there's little to no game here besides the dialogue tree. Investigation and deduction are performed automatically by the objective wisps, leaving "clues" to serve the purpose of flavor-text dispensers. It'll lack mass-appeal to the general gaming audience much like any other visual novel.

If this gets a round of polish patches I expect it to enshrine itself as being quite good. It's the sort of game that's best experienced when you're in no real hurry to get anywhere and want both a nice book and a nice mini-series to occupy your time.

I held off on playing Tinykin for an unduly long time because I think the protagonist has a stupid haircut. As it turns out, even the in-game NPCs tend to express similar sentiments. Amusing.

The enviro art looks great, and calls to mind many hours spent traversing the world of Chibi-Robo. While Tinykin is clearly Pikmin inspired, it lacks any of the task-management of the series, and instead plays as a very conventional collectathon. Just rummage over every inch of level geo and pick up all the glowing edible looking collectibles on autopilot and the game will complete itself. Tinykin coasts by on delightful style and amusing NPC dialog to create a pleasantly memorable experience.

I gave up on trying to 100% my save, and am dearly wishing for a pollen radar. This is why I really don't like collectathons, they tend to resort to tedium rather than challenge. At least the time trials actually put your management of soap-board and bubble-hover schmoovement to the test. Showing that Tinykin can provide satisfying platforming sequences.

I'm really starting to hate how I can just tell "Ah yes, this is a kickstarter game" the moment I encounter minibosses. Also the backer gallery was placed in the most obnoxious possible pace-breaking position.

Yes the pixel art is stunning, but the actual design of the game here is pretty average to sub-standard imo.
The health regen mechanic trivializes the bulk of the game until the very very end. I was at first willing to recommend this as a newbie friendly metroidvania, but the final boss difficulty spike is totally out of place with the rest of the game.

Also the game is badly written. The scene that supposedly explains the motivation behind why "the curse" was put in place? Total non-sequitur. Am I to believe the entire reason any of this shit happened is because some kid was upset by a painting? What am I not getting here? The scenes read like they were supposed to be revelations but they were incredibly flat "nothings". Characters make vague allusions to undisclosed bullshit and tell each other how they suddenly "understand" and then you're once again off to "wander" down the nearly linear pathways of Talos using your powerups in the exact order and locations that the developers have laid out. There's minimal exploration to be had, though thankfully player movement can feel pretty smooth so its not a total slog.
Sadly there's an entire backend to the campaign after you've acquired every ability (kinda) that does basically nothing to iterate upon 9 Years of Shadows' threadbare game design. This part is just needless padding that I suspect only exists because modern players throw a shitfit if games don't waste enough of their time to delude them into thinking they got their money's worth.

I was initially going to rate this 7/10, but the final sliver of the game sufficiently pissed me off to not do so. The game is fine, but I wanted Mahou Shoujo Super Metroid, not what feels like a middling action platformer with spritework that belongs in a better game. I can't be bothered go hunting for my remaining 6% completion.

The music is good though, I'll give'em that.

"Finally. Some good fucking food."
For modern players this is likely the oldest Zelda that is still palatable.
Structured to be a semi-linear experience as opposed to the mostly open-ended nature of Zelda I and the strictly segmented structure of Zelda II, ALttP keeps the guard-rails on until the Dark World has been unlocked for a while. Really only offering the option of swapping the order of a few mid-game dungeons around granting the opportunity to attain an upgraded sword early. For 26 years this would be the last time a Zelda game provided such freedom of routing to players. Anyway it's a super solid and laid-back romp through pixel-perfect Hyrule. Unless you're trying to pull off a no-death no-continues clear for a "perfect" save-file, there's minimal challenge to be had that can't be overcome with persistence. Making for an easy recommend to the general gaming audience.

"Mmm. How can we be needlessly obtuse this time... Ah yes. Let's force players to fire their hookshot off-screen in order to reach the third darkworld dungeon." The only reason this didn't trip me up this time was due to my distinct memories as a kid getting annoyed that the skulls to hookshot to have to be blind-fired at. That this is pretty much the extent that ALttP gets obtuse is a credit to its improved signposting for player directions.
It strikes me I forgot about the entrance to Blind's Hideout...

Fuck the digging minigame.

Some of the most satisfying weapons I've ever had the pleasure of wielding in an FPS. I just wish that the Chaos Space Marines were a little bit more threatening in order to better sell the power-fantasy that this game otherwise executes upon wonderfully well. An option to increase enemy projectile speed could also be nice. Even on Exterminatus the game is quite comfortable to complete and arguably too easy, though this is also largely in part to the frequent checkpoints minimizing frustration. I can already see that trying to pull off deathless clears in some of these long missions will be a nightmare.

It felt great to finally have an arsenal that plays super well with the crosshairs disabled after the disappointment of Wrath A.o.E.'s pistol and shotgun lacking trajectory feedback.

I eagerly await more 40k FPS outings done in this style. I wish this had a map editor and mod support. Would be pretty cool if Focus Entertainment/Auroch Digital were flooded with requests by the community...

Oh yeah, quick tip; sustained Heavy Bolter fire prevents Aspiring Champions from entering phase 2.
Ditto with the pinkies.