Poonthers
2001
It's a particular scourge on the video game industry that old games are not easily accessible without emulation. Since I don't have a PC build, I had to resort to paying more money than I should have to get just the PS2 disc with no case included. The Silent Hill 2 experience however was shockingly worth the hassle.
Silent Hill 2 is old and while it is one of the most prominent examples of its genre, psychological horror, you rarely ever see a game that looks quite like it. In game, the developers worked wonders with their use of shadow. Its impossible to completely hide that signature polygonal roughness that comes with the PS2 era games, but the first time I wandered the halls of the Silent Hill's apartment buildings I was completely blown away by how good the game looked. The fully rendered FMVs also work extremely well for this game. Graphically, they're leagues above what we see in engine, yet they have a surreal uncanny quality that feel intentional rather than a failing to capture realism. Silent Hill 2 is also rife with visual symbolism and absurdity that perfectly aligns with its visual style. Apartment doors leading directly into brick walls, basements below basements below basements, inky black pits that you must delve into over and over again, and water everywhere you don't want water to be. In this way, Silent Hill 2 creates a nightmarish vision that works because of the limitations on the hardware it runs on, not despite it. The visuals are also helped out a lot by the amazing audio work done for this game.
Out of all the things I was expecting out of Silent Hill 2, I was most surprised and floored by the quality of its audio design. I had previously watched a lets play of this game some 10 years prior to me actually picking up the game for myself, and while I remembered some of the visuals from that experience 10 years ago, I completely had missed out on the audio design. Despite not having headphones, this game still sounds amazing. I'm not just talking about the soundtrack produced by Akira Yamaoka, which may just be an all time favorite of mine now. While playing Silent Hill 2, you will experience a large range of sounds that get under your skin. At times you will hear a disorienting cacophony when faced with some of the monsters in this game, other times you'll be alone in the dark with the sound of dripping water that always sounds like its coming from the back of your real life room. Several times I actually paused the game just to make sure my house hadn't sprung a leak. It delighted me, it terrified me, it disoriented me, it made me paranoid. By even modern day standards, the audio design team deserves the highest of praises.
I don't want to conclude this review without at least touching on the story of Silent Hill 2, yet I don't want to delve to deep into either. It is easily the most interesting part of the entire game, but if I even dip my toes into it I know I'll lose the rest of the plot of this review by gushing over it. If you haven't yet played the game and would like to, just do it whatever way you can. The story covers extremely heavy topics so beware. I will say this: even knowing the big twist at the end of the game, I was still heavily invested in everything the game was presenting to me narratively. The effectiveness of the narrative is not placed in where it ends up, but rather the maliciously winding path it takes you on.
22 years late to the party, I don't have much to say about Silent Hill 2 that hasn't already been said 1000 times over. Everything that has aged poorly with the game has been outmatched by the wild success it finds with what it was trying to accomplish. Even by modern day standards this game stands above most psychological horror games. It's rare to see a game sync up audio, visual, and story telling themes so effectively to deliver one cohesive product, but Silent Hill 2 does it all.
Silent Hill 2 is old and while it is one of the most prominent examples of its genre, psychological horror, you rarely ever see a game that looks quite like it. In game, the developers worked wonders with their use of shadow. Its impossible to completely hide that signature polygonal roughness that comes with the PS2 era games, but the first time I wandered the halls of the Silent Hill's apartment buildings I was completely blown away by how good the game looked. The fully rendered FMVs also work extremely well for this game. Graphically, they're leagues above what we see in engine, yet they have a surreal uncanny quality that feel intentional rather than a failing to capture realism. Silent Hill 2 is also rife with visual symbolism and absurdity that perfectly aligns with its visual style. Apartment doors leading directly into brick walls, basements below basements below basements, inky black pits that you must delve into over and over again, and water everywhere you don't want water to be. In this way, Silent Hill 2 creates a nightmarish vision that works because of the limitations on the hardware it runs on, not despite it. The visuals are also helped out a lot by the amazing audio work done for this game.
Out of all the things I was expecting out of Silent Hill 2, I was most surprised and floored by the quality of its audio design. I had previously watched a lets play of this game some 10 years prior to me actually picking up the game for myself, and while I remembered some of the visuals from that experience 10 years ago, I completely had missed out on the audio design. Despite not having headphones, this game still sounds amazing. I'm not just talking about the soundtrack produced by Akira Yamaoka, which may just be an all time favorite of mine now. While playing Silent Hill 2, you will experience a large range of sounds that get under your skin. At times you will hear a disorienting cacophony when faced with some of the monsters in this game, other times you'll be alone in the dark with the sound of dripping water that always sounds like its coming from the back of your real life room. Several times I actually paused the game just to make sure my house hadn't sprung a leak. It delighted me, it terrified me, it disoriented me, it made me paranoid. By even modern day standards, the audio design team deserves the highest of praises.
I don't want to conclude this review without at least touching on the story of Silent Hill 2, yet I don't want to delve to deep into either. It is easily the most interesting part of the entire game, but if I even dip my toes into it I know I'll lose the rest of the plot of this review by gushing over it. If you haven't yet played the game and would like to, just do it whatever way you can. The story covers extremely heavy topics so beware. I will say this: even knowing the big twist at the end of the game, I was still heavily invested in everything the game was presenting to me narratively. The effectiveness of the narrative is not placed in where it ends up, but rather the maliciously winding path it takes you on.
22 years late to the party, I don't have much to say about Silent Hill 2 that hasn't already been said 1000 times over. Everything that has aged poorly with the game has been outmatched by the wild success it finds with what it was trying to accomplish. Even by modern day standards this game stands above most psychological horror games. It's rare to see a game sync up audio, visual, and story telling themes so effectively to deliver one cohesive product, but Silent Hill 2 does it all.
The Delicious Last Course is a great DLC that got me back into Cuphead yet again. Almost all of the bosses here are some of the best this team has put out yet in terms of charm and quality of animation, and most are incredibly difficult. My biggest criticism of this DLC is how they implement this difficulty. I love a good bullethell bossfight, but with some of these bosses the levels aren't as readable as I would like them to be. The complaint I'm voicing is NOT that its hard to dodge these bullets, the complaint is that its hard to see the bullets themselves. The last boss of this DLC is a particularly poignant example of what I am describing as your eyes struggle to read both the background and foreground at the same time. None of the fights in this DLC are ruined by this design, but when you inevitably lose to some of these bosses it leaves a more frustrating feeling than most of the base game fights. All in all I had a great time with the DLC, and if your a fan of Cuphead you should play this DLC.
2020
- This review is edited and now takes into account the epilogue added Patch 5. For a quick summary of the changes I am making, this patch addresses all of my issues with the games ending, so I have revised that paragraph. I decided to add extra notes as well about the performance patches for Act three, but as this is a review of MY experience with the game, I kept the majority of that part of the review the same.
Baldur's Gate 3 absolutely blew me away and ate up so much of my time this year. On the first week of the PS5 release, I sank an ungodly amount of time into this game, exploring every corner of Act I and trying to pick up on all of the diverse mechanics present. As someone who has never played DND before or any of the previous Larian Studios games, there was a bit of a learning curve, but that didn't matter; I was immediately immersed in everything Baldur's Gate 3 had to offer. For me, Baldur's Gate 3 offered an experience I so rarely have in games today. When I played Baldur's Gate 3, it felt magical.
Maybe it's odd to use the phrase magical to describe a video game, but I mean it sincerely. As someone who plays a lot of games and has had his fair share of experience with all sorts of RPGs, Baldur's Gate 3 feels special in the way that it is distinctly different from most of the other games in the genre. My largest gripe with most RPGs is the lack of consequences to the arbitrary choices they present to you. In games like Skyrim, you can be the Dragonborn, an assassin of the Dark Brotherhood, the Jarl of Whiterun, and the most powerful mage in the land. None of this means anything in the terms of the main narrative of the game. They are all side stories, disconnected in any meaningful way to the main storyline and your character's development/role within that story. Obviously I have played other RPGs since the release of Skyrim and this is a problem that permeates most RPGs at some level. There is simply no way to account for every single action you have taken as a player and have it meaningfully contribute to the narrative of the story. When I say Baldur's Gate 3 is magical, I say this because for a lot longer than I expected, I couldn't see this problem within the game. The game was a black box. Every thread I pulled on, even the most absurd ones, had some sort of worldly consequence, or was at least referenced back to in some meaningful way. It felt like this game was something that should have been impossible to make, and I absolutely loved it. The façade I'm describing does eventually show itself to be just that, a façade, the further into the game you get and the more choices and decisions you stack upon each other. As I progressed far into Act 2 and Act 3 it became a lot easier to make out the cogs in the system just as I had seen in all the other RPGs I had played. But at that point I was so sold on this game, so invested in the characters including my own avatar, that it didn't bother me. I was still determined to do everything and save as many people as possible on the Sword Coast, and after 140 something hours on my first playthrough I did just that. Unfortunately, the game does suffer a bit in Act 3, and really that is my only complaint with this game.
I had heard Act 3 of Baldur's Gate 3 did not stack up as well as the first 2 acts of the game. It was a long time until I reached the point where I could see it, but by the end of the game I had some noticeable experiences where I felt like the game could have handled its story threads better. The patch I was playing on at the time also had significant performance issues with Act 3 as well. It never ruined my experience, but at times it did take me out of the game. As I understand, these performance issues have been largely addressed post patch 5, but for the purposes of my review I was still impacted prior to this with Act 3.
Post patch 5, I absolutely love the ending of this game. The recently added epilogue was a much needed piece to the narrative. It brought each party members storyline to a much more satisfying end point, and it felt extremely personalized to me. It was exactly the ending I was hoping for and felt so fitting to my in-game experience and narrative I had been building in my head. I wish it had been there from the launch of the game, but I'm extremely grateful its here now.
I would also like to specifically compliment each of the writers and voice actors for the party members. Every single one of their storylines is compelling, and every single performance given is amazing. It's rare for an entire cast to knock their characters out of the park, but they all wildly succeeded. I loved them all.
To wrap this long review up: Baldur's Gate 3 was the most jaw dropping RPG i have played in a long time. My time with the game was some of my favorite in recent memory and I already feel that bittersweet sadness you experience when something you love has come to an end. It seems Larian Studios keeps adding things in updates to the game, so it'll be a game I continue to keep my eye on for a long time still.
Baldur's Gate 3 absolutely blew me away and ate up so much of my time this year. On the first week of the PS5 release, I sank an ungodly amount of time into this game, exploring every corner of Act I and trying to pick up on all of the diverse mechanics present. As someone who has never played DND before or any of the previous Larian Studios games, there was a bit of a learning curve, but that didn't matter; I was immediately immersed in everything Baldur's Gate 3 had to offer. For me, Baldur's Gate 3 offered an experience I so rarely have in games today. When I played Baldur's Gate 3, it felt magical.
Maybe it's odd to use the phrase magical to describe a video game, but I mean it sincerely. As someone who plays a lot of games and has had his fair share of experience with all sorts of RPGs, Baldur's Gate 3 feels special in the way that it is distinctly different from most of the other games in the genre. My largest gripe with most RPGs is the lack of consequences to the arbitrary choices they present to you. In games like Skyrim, you can be the Dragonborn, an assassin of the Dark Brotherhood, the Jarl of Whiterun, and the most powerful mage in the land. None of this means anything in the terms of the main narrative of the game. They are all side stories, disconnected in any meaningful way to the main storyline and your character's development/role within that story. Obviously I have played other RPGs since the release of Skyrim and this is a problem that permeates most RPGs at some level. There is simply no way to account for every single action you have taken as a player and have it meaningfully contribute to the narrative of the story. When I say Baldur's Gate 3 is magical, I say this because for a lot longer than I expected, I couldn't see this problem within the game. The game was a black box. Every thread I pulled on, even the most absurd ones, had some sort of worldly consequence, or was at least referenced back to in some meaningful way. It felt like this game was something that should have been impossible to make, and I absolutely loved it. The façade I'm describing does eventually show itself to be just that, a façade, the further into the game you get and the more choices and decisions you stack upon each other. As I progressed far into Act 2 and Act 3 it became a lot easier to make out the cogs in the system just as I had seen in all the other RPGs I had played. But at that point I was so sold on this game, so invested in the characters including my own avatar, that it didn't bother me. I was still determined to do everything and save as many people as possible on the Sword Coast, and after 140 something hours on my first playthrough I did just that. Unfortunately, the game does suffer a bit in Act 3, and really that is my only complaint with this game.
I had heard Act 3 of Baldur's Gate 3 did not stack up as well as the first 2 acts of the game. It was a long time until I reached the point where I could see it, but by the end of the game I had some noticeable experiences where I felt like the game could have handled its story threads better. The patch I was playing on at the time also had significant performance issues with Act 3 as well. It never ruined my experience, but at times it did take me out of the game. As I understand, these performance issues have been largely addressed post patch 5, but for the purposes of my review I was still impacted prior to this with Act 3.
Post patch 5, I absolutely love the ending of this game. The recently added epilogue was a much needed piece to the narrative. It brought each party members storyline to a much more satisfying end point, and it felt extremely personalized to me. It was exactly the ending I was hoping for and felt so fitting to my in-game experience and narrative I had been building in my head. I wish it had been there from the launch of the game, but I'm extremely grateful its here now.
I would also like to specifically compliment each of the writers and voice actors for the party members. Every single one of their storylines is compelling, and every single performance given is amazing. It's rare for an entire cast to knock their characters out of the park, but they all wildly succeeded. I loved them all.
To wrap this long review up: Baldur's Gate 3 was the most jaw dropping RPG i have played in a long time. My time with the game was some of my favorite in recent memory and I already feel that bittersweet sadness you experience when something you love has come to an end. It seems Larian Studios keeps adding things in updates to the game, so it'll be a game I continue to keep my eye on for a long time still.
2020
Persona 4 Golden was a game I was very excited to jump into. I would describe myself as a new comer to the series only having played Persona 5 Royal prior to this. Having played the latest iteration of the mainline game, it would be impossible to not draw some comparisons between P4G and P5R but I cannot and will not fault P4G for not being P5R. In a lot of ways it was fun to look mechanically at P4G and see so many of the things I really enjoyed in P5R in their earlier forms. This being said, I will never be able to have the experience of playing Persona 4 Golden at the time of its release, so all analyses will be coming from a play through that is far separated from its original debut.
Compared to the latest entry in the mainline series, Persona 4 Golden is a bright and colorful adventure. I love the vibe the game is going for. Inaba feels like a faithful recreation of a sleepy small town that’s always dappled in fading sunlight on non-rainy days. The attitudes of the locals carries that country laid back attitude mixed with concern of impending financial ruin that is always present in places filled with locally run businesses. "Heartbeat, Heartbreak" and "Signs Of Love" from the soundtrack really sell this vibe as you run around the small town pursuing relationships with the people around you and working part time jobs. This is the perfect setup for the juxtaposition this game imposes upon the player: there is something sinister lurking within the town of Inaba. People keep turning up dead, strung up in odd fashions with no clear cause of death. Even more mysterious is the ghostly Midnight Channel, an unlisted TV channel that plays on your old CRTV at midnight when its raining. It is genuinely unsettling to hear the song "Who's there?" come on when you watch the inscrutable Midnight Channel and realize that it is predicting the next murder victim. Because of this uncomfortable juxtaposition, the main quest and puzzle at the heart of this game are extremely compelling early on. While the pay-off of the entire story didn't quite live up to my expectations (I felt as though some of the characterization of the villain was not as strong as it could and should have been), I still had a lot of fun from beginning to end. During your pursuit of the serial killer within this small town you will encounter a surprisingly large cast of characters to engage with. The quality of some of these social links can vary heavily, however, the game has some really high peaks it achieves.
A large part of the Persona formula post Persona 3 is the life simulator elements. In Persona 4 Golden you are roleplaying as an exchange student from the city coming into this small town to live with your uncle and niece for the school year. During your limited time in Inaba you are able to and encouraged to build up your relationships with those around you. As a whole, the main supporting cast (specifically all the members of the investigation team and the Dojimas) is mostly well written and compelling. Save for Teddy, this games otherworldly companion (the Morgana archetype for those who have played P5R) who is difficult to watch when it comes to how he interacts with women, I enjoyed my time with all of the main cast S Links. Mechanically it is a shame that there are drastically less benefits of pursuing relationships outside the main cast, but I’ve already seen how they innovate on this mechanic later in P5R. Regardless, all S Link storylines reflect the main themes of this game, self-acknowledgement and acceptance, in ways that were sort of unexpected. Where the Persona 5 Royale confidants had story lines about self-determination and fighting against societal structures meant to keep them down, Persona 4 Golden goes quite the opposite root. Rather than have these characters have story arcs of self-determination, most of the characters instead decide to embrace their public perception and societal roles while accepting their difficulty to come to terms with it. It becomes interesting to look at because these characters are dynamic not in how they chose to conduct their life, but rather how they feel about their lot and life and choices. I'd like to call special attention here to Kanji's S Link as I believe his is the best done and most nuanced. Admittedly, the game does have some off-putting moments of mild homophobia between two of the characters and the game seems to want to include themes related to homosexuality without actually fully committing to the conversation. Ultimately this is something I was able to come to terms with and move around as it is a product of 2008 and I am approaching the game from a western perspective and background in the year 2023. All of that aside, there are two other issues with these life sims elements that I would like to touch on however.
A large problem I had within the life sim elements of P4G is related to the main character that you are roleplaying as. While I was playing, it was impossible for me to ignore that he has such a weak lead in and setup within the story that it makes it difficult for the player to actually roleplay and identify with him. Atlus seemingly wanted to give the player a blank slate to work with as they adventure, but the best protagonists of RPGs do typically have some sort of identifying characteristic lead-in that allows you to get into the character better. In Persona 5 Royale, Joker may be a blank slate for the player to toy around with in dialogue options, but he has a very well defined lead-in and compelling character arc. You start Persona 5 Royale as someone punished for doing the right thing. You are constantly put down and watched closely because you are labeled a trouble maker after you had used your judgement to try to save a woman being harassed by a high profile politician. Because of this lead-in to the P5R, while I may have been provided dialogue options I could freely choose between, it made my characterization much easier to grasp and role play into. The protagonist of P4G has none of this sort of lead-in other than loosely saying "he's a good guy". While mechanically I still get to make dialogue choices just like P5R, I have a lot less commitment to a character and do not identify easily with the protagonist. There is one S Link however that Atlus tries to nudge you towards that helps with this identity issue: Atlus seemingly wants you to establish a strong S Link with the niece, Nanako. Nanako's character arc revolves around her being emotionally neglected by her workaholic and emotionally distant father Dojima. She is a character you will spend a lot of time with within the course of the game, and Atlus is always eager to provide you extra opportunity to spend time with Nanako. If you pursue Nanako's S Link, you get the firm feeling that the protagonist wants to be, and is, a good big brother to a little girl who desperately needs someone in their life to pay attention to them. This is the only real strong identifying characteristic the playable character is given, and even then it is somewhat optional. I think if Atlus had put more emphasis on this as either a mandatory characteristic established at the beginning of the game, or provided one other identifying characteristic for me to latch on to during the introduction, I would have enjoyed playing as my character significantly more. The other problem with the life sim elements of P4G is that the game feels mechanically opposite of the vibe it’s trying to sell you.
Just like the latest iteration, P5R, Persona 4 Golden offers a lot of things for the player to do. This however feels juxtaposed to mood the game is trying to sell you. Inaba is purposefully designed to be a sleepy boring town, but for me there was always a wealth of things to do other than when it was raining. There is a strong story emphasis to the player that the other characters in the investigation team are barely staving off boredom in a small town. Yosuke explicitly says that this is a feeling that he thinks you should be able to relate to as someone from the city. But other than a few rainy days, I was never bored in Inaba. There was always something to do until the very end of the game. Due to what I assume were development limitations that would have been around at the time of its release relating to complex systems of choices and consequences, the game instead opts to offer you a million side tracks to follow with no deviation narratively. What this mechanically provides is lots of choices for things do while in the town of Inaba with no little to no flexibility in how those activities and relationships end up. This feels directly opposed to the game trying to sell you on the idea that you are living in a sleepy, past its prime town. I cannot stress enough that you have so many activities that you can choose to engage with. This system works in P5R because your living it up in the bright and busy streets of Tokyo, but in P4G it feels as though it thematically clashes. As I said earlier, I understand why they might have opted for this approach, but there still could have been more effort in other places to remedy it. For example: why are all the activities you can chose to participate in above board? One of the most consistent storytelling pairings with boredom is mischief, yet there is none to be had in the life sim activities. You are an upstanding citizen in a place that has limited activities, thematically you should be bored constantly, but you are not. Even if they had your characters hanging out someplace they shouldn't be in, or had them do one kind of mischievous activity once in a while, this would help alleviate this mismatch significantly. All of that aside, mechanically this game is sound but borders on tedious outside its life-sim elements.
Persona 4 Golden's combat is exactly what I was expecting it to be having played P5R, and despite it lacking some of the flair that would come later in the series it is still rock solid. Every combat encounter feels like a puzzle you're meant to solve by exploiting your enemy’s weaknesses in the most efficient way possible. It's a lot of fun on its own, but with the dungeon design it does tend to feel a bit tedious and grindy at times. Atlus made the choice to have dungeons that are not intentionally designed but rather a set of randomly generated hallways. This tends to make a lot of the floors feel very same-y and the repetition of many combat encounters and similar scenery can really be fatiguing by the time you reach the last floor of the dungeon. Because of this fatigue, I was always excited to go back to the game when I was in the life-sim portions, and I was apprehensive when I was in the dungeons. As I said earlier, the core combat is solid, so I never disliked the game mechanically, but my mindset was always that the dungeon was something I just had to slog my way through. Lastly before wrapping up this review, i would like to touch upon the "Golden" aspect of Persona 4 Golden.
Persona 4 Golden is essentially the extended directors cut of Persona 4 just like Persona 5 Royale is to Persona 5. The edition of the game introduces a new S Link and a unique dungeon. I don't feel as though any of the additional content is particularly compelling as I felt with the additional content in P5R, but it’s not bad either. With the additional content of P4G however, the game does overstay its welcome by a few hours by the time you reach the end. I swear the game was going to end about 5 times before credits actually rolled. I definitely enjoyed my time with the game, but I was ready for it to end.
Overall, I really did enjoy my time with Persona 4 Golden despite its age and flaws. If I was to recommend a game from the series, I think that I would still recommend P5R way before P4G. As a newcomer to the series and a fan of its mix of combat and life-sim elements, I'm glad I visited this title, and I’m excited to explore Persona 3 Reload when that is released.
Compared to the latest entry in the mainline series, Persona 4 Golden is a bright and colorful adventure. I love the vibe the game is going for. Inaba feels like a faithful recreation of a sleepy small town that’s always dappled in fading sunlight on non-rainy days. The attitudes of the locals carries that country laid back attitude mixed with concern of impending financial ruin that is always present in places filled with locally run businesses. "Heartbeat, Heartbreak" and "Signs Of Love" from the soundtrack really sell this vibe as you run around the small town pursuing relationships with the people around you and working part time jobs. This is the perfect setup for the juxtaposition this game imposes upon the player: there is something sinister lurking within the town of Inaba. People keep turning up dead, strung up in odd fashions with no clear cause of death. Even more mysterious is the ghostly Midnight Channel, an unlisted TV channel that plays on your old CRTV at midnight when its raining. It is genuinely unsettling to hear the song "Who's there?" come on when you watch the inscrutable Midnight Channel and realize that it is predicting the next murder victim. Because of this uncomfortable juxtaposition, the main quest and puzzle at the heart of this game are extremely compelling early on. While the pay-off of the entire story didn't quite live up to my expectations (I felt as though some of the characterization of the villain was not as strong as it could and should have been), I still had a lot of fun from beginning to end. During your pursuit of the serial killer within this small town you will encounter a surprisingly large cast of characters to engage with. The quality of some of these social links can vary heavily, however, the game has some really high peaks it achieves.
A large part of the Persona formula post Persona 3 is the life simulator elements. In Persona 4 Golden you are roleplaying as an exchange student from the city coming into this small town to live with your uncle and niece for the school year. During your limited time in Inaba you are able to and encouraged to build up your relationships with those around you. As a whole, the main supporting cast (specifically all the members of the investigation team and the Dojimas) is mostly well written and compelling. Save for Teddy, this games otherworldly companion (the Morgana archetype for those who have played P5R) who is difficult to watch when it comes to how he interacts with women, I enjoyed my time with all of the main cast S Links. Mechanically it is a shame that there are drastically less benefits of pursuing relationships outside the main cast, but I’ve already seen how they innovate on this mechanic later in P5R. Regardless, all S Link storylines reflect the main themes of this game, self-acknowledgement and acceptance, in ways that were sort of unexpected. Where the Persona 5 Royale confidants had story lines about self-determination and fighting against societal structures meant to keep them down, Persona 4 Golden goes quite the opposite root. Rather than have these characters have story arcs of self-determination, most of the characters instead decide to embrace their public perception and societal roles while accepting their difficulty to come to terms with it. It becomes interesting to look at because these characters are dynamic not in how they chose to conduct their life, but rather how they feel about their lot and life and choices. I'd like to call special attention here to Kanji's S Link as I believe his is the best done and most nuanced. Admittedly, the game does have some off-putting moments of mild homophobia between two of the characters and the game seems to want to include themes related to homosexuality without actually fully committing to the conversation. Ultimately this is something I was able to come to terms with and move around as it is a product of 2008 and I am approaching the game from a western perspective and background in the year 2023. All of that aside, there are two other issues with these life sims elements that I would like to touch on however.
A large problem I had within the life sim elements of P4G is related to the main character that you are roleplaying as. While I was playing, it was impossible for me to ignore that he has such a weak lead in and setup within the story that it makes it difficult for the player to actually roleplay and identify with him. Atlus seemingly wanted to give the player a blank slate to work with as they adventure, but the best protagonists of RPGs do typically have some sort of identifying characteristic lead-in that allows you to get into the character better. In Persona 5 Royale, Joker may be a blank slate for the player to toy around with in dialogue options, but he has a very well defined lead-in and compelling character arc. You start Persona 5 Royale as someone punished for doing the right thing. You are constantly put down and watched closely because you are labeled a trouble maker after you had used your judgement to try to save a woman being harassed by a high profile politician. Because of this lead-in to the P5R, while I may have been provided dialogue options I could freely choose between, it made my characterization much easier to grasp and role play into. The protagonist of P4G has none of this sort of lead-in other than loosely saying "he's a good guy". While mechanically I still get to make dialogue choices just like P5R, I have a lot less commitment to a character and do not identify easily with the protagonist. There is one S Link however that Atlus tries to nudge you towards that helps with this identity issue: Atlus seemingly wants you to establish a strong S Link with the niece, Nanako. Nanako's character arc revolves around her being emotionally neglected by her workaholic and emotionally distant father Dojima. She is a character you will spend a lot of time with within the course of the game, and Atlus is always eager to provide you extra opportunity to spend time with Nanako. If you pursue Nanako's S Link, you get the firm feeling that the protagonist wants to be, and is, a good big brother to a little girl who desperately needs someone in their life to pay attention to them. This is the only real strong identifying characteristic the playable character is given, and even then it is somewhat optional. I think if Atlus had put more emphasis on this as either a mandatory characteristic established at the beginning of the game, or provided one other identifying characteristic for me to latch on to during the introduction, I would have enjoyed playing as my character significantly more. The other problem with the life sim elements of P4G is that the game feels mechanically opposite of the vibe it’s trying to sell you.
Just like the latest iteration, P5R, Persona 4 Golden offers a lot of things for the player to do. This however feels juxtaposed to mood the game is trying to sell you. Inaba is purposefully designed to be a sleepy boring town, but for me there was always a wealth of things to do other than when it was raining. There is a strong story emphasis to the player that the other characters in the investigation team are barely staving off boredom in a small town. Yosuke explicitly says that this is a feeling that he thinks you should be able to relate to as someone from the city. But other than a few rainy days, I was never bored in Inaba. There was always something to do until the very end of the game. Due to what I assume were development limitations that would have been around at the time of its release relating to complex systems of choices and consequences, the game instead opts to offer you a million side tracks to follow with no deviation narratively. What this mechanically provides is lots of choices for things do while in the town of Inaba with no little to no flexibility in how those activities and relationships end up. This feels directly opposed to the game trying to sell you on the idea that you are living in a sleepy, past its prime town. I cannot stress enough that you have so many activities that you can choose to engage with. This system works in P5R because your living it up in the bright and busy streets of Tokyo, but in P4G it feels as though it thematically clashes. As I said earlier, I understand why they might have opted for this approach, but there still could have been more effort in other places to remedy it. For example: why are all the activities you can chose to participate in above board? One of the most consistent storytelling pairings with boredom is mischief, yet there is none to be had in the life sim activities. You are an upstanding citizen in a place that has limited activities, thematically you should be bored constantly, but you are not. Even if they had your characters hanging out someplace they shouldn't be in, or had them do one kind of mischievous activity once in a while, this would help alleviate this mismatch significantly. All of that aside, mechanically this game is sound but borders on tedious outside its life-sim elements.
Persona 4 Golden's combat is exactly what I was expecting it to be having played P5R, and despite it lacking some of the flair that would come later in the series it is still rock solid. Every combat encounter feels like a puzzle you're meant to solve by exploiting your enemy’s weaknesses in the most efficient way possible. It's a lot of fun on its own, but with the dungeon design it does tend to feel a bit tedious and grindy at times. Atlus made the choice to have dungeons that are not intentionally designed but rather a set of randomly generated hallways. This tends to make a lot of the floors feel very same-y and the repetition of many combat encounters and similar scenery can really be fatiguing by the time you reach the last floor of the dungeon. Because of this fatigue, I was always excited to go back to the game when I was in the life-sim portions, and I was apprehensive when I was in the dungeons. As I said earlier, the core combat is solid, so I never disliked the game mechanically, but my mindset was always that the dungeon was something I just had to slog my way through. Lastly before wrapping up this review, i would like to touch upon the "Golden" aspect of Persona 4 Golden.
Persona 4 Golden is essentially the extended directors cut of Persona 4 just like Persona 5 Royale is to Persona 5. The edition of the game introduces a new S Link and a unique dungeon. I don't feel as though any of the additional content is particularly compelling as I felt with the additional content in P5R, but it’s not bad either. With the additional content of P4G however, the game does overstay its welcome by a few hours by the time you reach the end. I swear the game was going to end about 5 times before credits actually rolled. I definitely enjoyed my time with the game, but I was ready for it to end.
Overall, I really did enjoy my time with Persona 4 Golden despite its age and flaws. If I was to recommend a game from the series, I think that I would still recommend P5R way before P4G. As a newcomer to the series and a fan of its mix of combat and life-sim elements, I'm glad I visited this title, and I’m excited to explore Persona 3 Reload when that is released.
2019
Previously I had reviewed Hunt: Showdown as a game I really wanted to enjoy but was put off by the poor performance on consoles. While the portion about console performance is still a large problem with the game, in its current state it runs in a much more acceptable state. I have put in significantly more time into this game since my last review, and I have had to reevaluate my thoughts on this game. Now, I absolutely adore this game.
At the time of this review, its been a little bit since the Tide of Shadows event has ended, and it was during this event that I put a large amount of playtime into this game once again. When I talk about this game to my friends in an attempt to get them to purchase the game as well, I always say the same thing: "This is probably the coolest game I have ever played". The commitment that the Hunt: Showdown team has put into nailing the aesthetic of this game is nothing short of phenomenal. There are very few games that dedicate so much of their efforts to nailing their specific style of how their game is portrayed that the only other close contender I can think of is Persona 5 Royal. There are a couple games that have had their take on Southern American Gothic Horror but none have been quite as well realized as Hunt: Showdown. From the map design, monster design, gameplay elements, perks, guns, and music; everything forms a cohesive whole that entrances me every time I play. The game is rot and despair; a hopeless fight against the odds. Even after mastering the systems of the enemy AI (which will still surprise you and manage to hinder your hunt countless hours into the game), your ears will always pricked up and head on a swivel for the other hunter teams in the Bayou with you. Its almost always a possibility that the back of your head is facing the receiving end of a rusty single shot sniper and you could be none the wiser. The folks over at Crytek on the Hunt: Showdown team have my immense respect for what they were able to achieve with this game artistically, with a special shoutout to the sound team and the Port Sulphur band, a fictional band within the universe of Hunt that always comes out absolute bangers. While for me the biggest draw in for Hunt: Showdown is their commitment to the aesthetic, the game is more than the sum of its artistic choices.
From a gameplay and mechanical perspective, this game also knocks it out of the park. It may have some of the well established extraction shooter DNA that has become a staple of the genre, but Hunt: Showdown manages to shake it up enough to feel as though it has its own distinct identity within the genre. Fighting through the dimly lit swamp with grandpa guns is both scary and thrilling on both the sending and receiving ends of conflict. Death is quick and punishing and emphasizes the players fragility as just a man amongst the decay and despair of the bayou. Sound is your greatest ally and the game is littered with sound traps that will trip up even the most experienced hunters and give away their position. With the game having such a heavy emphasis on sound, it impresses me how the Hunt: Showdown team plays around with its soundscapes to vastly changes the gameplay experience. From the last event, Tide of Shadows, they introduced the thunderstorm soundscape. In most games it would be a seemingly small thing to change the ambient weather of the game, but in Hunt when there is pounding rain and crackling thunder it provides unique opportunities for attackers to make more aggressive pushes on teams without being heard a mile away. The Hunt: Showdown team has also started to explore variations in how they approach boss design with the introduction of the Rotjaw wild type crocodile boss that came along with the Tide of Shadows event. It is a boss unattached to the main points of interest on the map and once found its a lower risk lower reward bounty for a player to pick up. Many developers are afraid to toy around with their established mechanics in such drastic ways, but the Hunt: Showdown team does it so boldly and with a purpose that even if it is not perfected yet at time of release its always fun and interesting to experience.
Hunt: Showdown is an amazing package that I'm always excited to see more from. Console performance aside, this is a game you should check out and keep an eye on in the future. It's already a great product, but the sky is the limit on its potential.
At the time of this review, its been a little bit since the Tide of Shadows event has ended, and it was during this event that I put a large amount of playtime into this game once again. When I talk about this game to my friends in an attempt to get them to purchase the game as well, I always say the same thing: "This is probably the coolest game I have ever played". The commitment that the Hunt: Showdown team has put into nailing the aesthetic of this game is nothing short of phenomenal. There are very few games that dedicate so much of their efforts to nailing their specific style of how their game is portrayed that the only other close contender I can think of is Persona 5 Royal. There are a couple games that have had their take on Southern American Gothic Horror but none have been quite as well realized as Hunt: Showdown. From the map design, monster design, gameplay elements, perks, guns, and music; everything forms a cohesive whole that entrances me every time I play. The game is rot and despair; a hopeless fight against the odds. Even after mastering the systems of the enemy AI (which will still surprise you and manage to hinder your hunt countless hours into the game), your ears will always pricked up and head on a swivel for the other hunter teams in the Bayou with you. Its almost always a possibility that the back of your head is facing the receiving end of a rusty single shot sniper and you could be none the wiser. The folks over at Crytek on the Hunt: Showdown team have my immense respect for what they were able to achieve with this game artistically, with a special shoutout to the sound team and the Port Sulphur band, a fictional band within the universe of Hunt that always comes out absolute bangers. While for me the biggest draw in for Hunt: Showdown is their commitment to the aesthetic, the game is more than the sum of its artistic choices.
From a gameplay and mechanical perspective, this game also knocks it out of the park. It may have some of the well established extraction shooter DNA that has become a staple of the genre, but Hunt: Showdown manages to shake it up enough to feel as though it has its own distinct identity within the genre. Fighting through the dimly lit swamp with grandpa guns is both scary and thrilling on both the sending and receiving ends of conflict. Death is quick and punishing and emphasizes the players fragility as just a man amongst the decay and despair of the bayou. Sound is your greatest ally and the game is littered with sound traps that will trip up even the most experienced hunters and give away their position. With the game having such a heavy emphasis on sound, it impresses me how the Hunt: Showdown team plays around with its soundscapes to vastly changes the gameplay experience. From the last event, Tide of Shadows, they introduced the thunderstorm soundscape. In most games it would be a seemingly small thing to change the ambient weather of the game, but in Hunt when there is pounding rain and crackling thunder it provides unique opportunities for attackers to make more aggressive pushes on teams without being heard a mile away. The Hunt: Showdown team has also started to explore variations in how they approach boss design with the introduction of the Rotjaw wild type crocodile boss that came along with the Tide of Shadows event. It is a boss unattached to the main points of interest on the map and once found its a lower risk lower reward bounty for a player to pick up. Many developers are afraid to toy around with their established mechanics in such drastic ways, but the Hunt: Showdown team does it so boldly and with a purpose that even if it is not perfected yet at time of release its always fun and interesting to experience.
Hunt: Showdown is an amazing package that I'm always excited to see more from. Console performance aside, this is a game you should check out and keep an eye on in the future. It's already a great product, but the sky is the limit on its potential.
2019
"This game is important." This is what I think every time I reflect on my time spent playing Outer Wilds. What I mean by this is that Outer Wilds is one of those games that I played at the right place, at the right time, and feels as though it has significantly impacted me in a way few games really do. I will keep this review as spoiler free as possible so that others may enjoy this game as I have.
The design philosophy at the heart of Outer Wilds is to give the player a large physics-based solar system sandbox, and let the player progress through their own self motivation. There is no path, there is no directive; just explore and take away what you learned. The culmination of all that you learn in Outer Wilds will ultimately lead you to the end credits. There are plenty of threads to pull on, each revealing an interesting part of the history, mystery, or mechanics of the Outer Wilds universe. But if you are worried about becoming too lost in this game, the developers have a system to address this as well. All of the story threads are cleverly catalogued in your ships computer, and will always provide a starting point for those who become "stuck" in the game. I put the word "stuck" in quotations because exploration and trying new approaches, even if unfruitful or uneventful, are core experiences of the game and can even be highlights of the experience. The game certainly gains momentum when you find the right thread to pull on and suddenly find yourself with the knowledge to pull another three, but your "failures" in exploring this universe never take away from your progress and are just as important to the experience overall. It's important to note that the key to progression in Outer Wilds is largely based on player knowledge. What keeps you from progressing to the end of the game is the lack of knowledge as to what the end game even is and how you could reach it. It's a truly brilliantly designed system that keeps the player coming back for more and makes all progress feel distinctly earned by the player. Even if you choose to forgo attempting to complete the story of Outer Wilds, the game still succeeds in being a massively fun outer-space physics simulation. Once you learn the fundamentals of it all, you are free to attempt any wild feat of physics you can imagine. This can allow you to get to places or see things in ways most likely unintended by the developers, and that alone for many players is exciting. I cannot praise this game enough when it comes to design philosophy or game mechanics, and I have to give similar praise to the art direction, sound design, and music as well.
Outer Wilds has an aesthetic that is equal parts comfy, mysterious, beautiful, and at times cosmically scary. These things would seem to conflict with each other, but Outer Wilds strings these things together beautifully. Your spaceship is a loving mix of ancient alien technology and wood planks. At some point you will switch your audio telescope away from the gentle frequency of a fellow explorer's banjo to hear an inscrutable Nomai signal. When you are admiring the universe around you, you will watch distant stars blink out of existence in beautiful showers that will ultimately leave you more alone in the cold dark of space. When you feel bold your sense of confidence and security will entirely abandon you when you leave your ship in the middle of empty space and you are left to float alone with just the sounds of your suit and your breathing to keep you company. It is truly a one of a kind experience that gives the large, miraculous, and deadly vacuum of space the considerations it deserves. The soundtrack of this game is in a league of its own and deserves to be considered among the best of video game OSTs. I often find myself putting on the Outer Wilds soundtrack when I need to peacefully drift off into sleep or reflect on something important in my life. Andrew Prahlow gave such a lovingly crafted soundtrack to this game and for that I am sincerely grateful to him.
There are more things positives that I'd like to include but I do not want to go detail for the sake of players who have yet to explore this game. Just know that the planet designs and take aways from this game are all wonderful and deserve their own separate analyses and essays (if you're interested I know there is a surplus of exactly these types of videos on Youtube).
My review is one of many that have universally praised this game in every way possible, and I'm proud to join that chorus of voices. Outer Wilds is a lovingly crafted experience that has been the subject of a lot of acclaim and romanticism from the community. The developers should be proud of what they created; it is truly in a league of its own. If you're still reading and are on the fence about getting Outer Wilds, please play this game. It has been one of my most significant gaming experiences in the last 5 years, and it could be one of yours too.
The design philosophy at the heart of Outer Wilds is to give the player a large physics-based solar system sandbox, and let the player progress through their own self motivation. There is no path, there is no directive; just explore and take away what you learned. The culmination of all that you learn in Outer Wilds will ultimately lead you to the end credits. There are plenty of threads to pull on, each revealing an interesting part of the history, mystery, or mechanics of the Outer Wilds universe. But if you are worried about becoming too lost in this game, the developers have a system to address this as well. All of the story threads are cleverly catalogued in your ships computer, and will always provide a starting point for those who become "stuck" in the game. I put the word "stuck" in quotations because exploration and trying new approaches, even if unfruitful or uneventful, are core experiences of the game and can even be highlights of the experience. The game certainly gains momentum when you find the right thread to pull on and suddenly find yourself with the knowledge to pull another three, but your "failures" in exploring this universe never take away from your progress and are just as important to the experience overall. It's important to note that the key to progression in Outer Wilds is largely based on player knowledge. What keeps you from progressing to the end of the game is the lack of knowledge as to what the end game even is and how you could reach it. It's a truly brilliantly designed system that keeps the player coming back for more and makes all progress feel distinctly earned by the player. Even if you choose to forgo attempting to complete the story of Outer Wilds, the game still succeeds in being a massively fun outer-space physics simulation. Once you learn the fundamentals of it all, you are free to attempt any wild feat of physics you can imagine. This can allow you to get to places or see things in ways most likely unintended by the developers, and that alone for many players is exciting. I cannot praise this game enough when it comes to design philosophy or game mechanics, and I have to give similar praise to the art direction, sound design, and music as well.
Outer Wilds has an aesthetic that is equal parts comfy, mysterious, beautiful, and at times cosmically scary. These things would seem to conflict with each other, but Outer Wilds strings these things together beautifully. Your spaceship is a loving mix of ancient alien technology and wood planks. At some point you will switch your audio telescope away from the gentle frequency of a fellow explorer's banjo to hear an inscrutable Nomai signal. When you are admiring the universe around you, you will watch distant stars blink out of existence in beautiful showers that will ultimately leave you more alone in the cold dark of space. When you feel bold your sense of confidence and security will entirely abandon you when you leave your ship in the middle of empty space and you are left to float alone with just the sounds of your suit and your breathing to keep you company. It is truly a one of a kind experience that gives the large, miraculous, and deadly vacuum of space the considerations it deserves. The soundtrack of this game is in a league of its own and deserves to be considered among the best of video game OSTs. I often find myself putting on the Outer Wilds soundtrack when I need to peacefully drift off into sleep or reflect on something important in my life. Andrew Prahlow gave such a lovingly crafted soundtrack to this game and for that I am sincerely grateful to him.
There are more things positives that I'd like to include but I do not want to go detail for the sake of players who have yet to explore this game. Just know that the planet designs and take aways from this game are all wonderful and deserve their own separate analyses and essays (if you're interested I know there is a surplus of exactly these types of videos on Youtube).
My review is one of many that have universally praised this game in every way possible, and I'm proud to join that chorus of voices. Outer Wilds is a lovingly crafted experience that has been the subject of a lot of acclaim and romanticism from the community. The developers should be proud of what they created; it is truly in a league of its own. If you're still reading and are on the fence about getting Outer Wilds, please play this game. It has been one of my most significant gaming experiences in the last 5 years, and it could be one of yours too.
2016
Slime Rancher is a fun life sim with an interesting world and fun mechanics. It's a game that scratches that farm management itch I have, and it was a great game to for me to play and unwind. While the game has all the ingredients to be a great game, it fumbles a bit on the execution.
The material grind that starts in the later half of the game, where you build drills, pumps, and aviaries in order to get building material for teleporters and other gadgets, is not fun. It is an RNG based loot system with mandatory wait times and no active participation from the player. I think that the idea of having a secondary resource grind in the later parts of the game is good, because it gives something new to do for players who are well established in their ranch. The execution however could have been done much better. In my perfect version in my head, materials would have to be gathered by some sort of active player action in specific areas of the game and this system could still keep some of that RNG that currently exists. I know certain material in the game already demands you place a pump or a drill in a specific part of the ranch, but it ends up feeling like you are just running through the environments in order to access your drills/pumps instead of meaningfully interacting with the area.
Later rewards in Slime Rancher also often end up not being interesting or fun enough to warrant the grind to get them. Color palettes are cool and all, but more steady upgrades to the vacuum pack, stamina, jetpack, etc would be much more incentivizing. Instead of 5 different colors of teleporter, give me some new interesting items to play around with.
Another aspect that could be improved upon is that this game would have greatly benefitted from giving the player a bit more options in terms of automation. I believe the intention is not to make it possible for the farm to run itself, but I think having a little more automation could have helped give importance and priority to the secondary material grind I had mentioned earlier.
Lastly, the world of Slime Rancher is really fun and cool to explore, but I wish there were more ways to interact with the environment. Most areas you end up running through feel more like a safari rather than wilderness for the rancher to tame. One thing that the later half of the game nails is the introduction of the Glass Desert. Its a dynamic environment where fire balls and fire slimes will occasionally rain down from the sky and this impacts how a player interacts with this environment without making exploration not fun. The glass desert also introduces some puzzles that if completed help you manipulate the surrounding environment. It's genuinely great and I just wish that more of the environments in this game had the same amount of interactivity that this one did.
Overall I enjoyed my time with Slime Rancher. The first half of the game is exceptional, and while it fumbles a bit in the later half, if you are a life sim fan I would have no trouble recommending this game to you.
The material grind that starts in the later half of the game, where you build drills, pumps, and aviaries in order to get building material for teleporters and other gadgets, is not fun. It is an RNG based loot system with mandatory wait times and no active participation from the player. I think that the idea of having a secondary resource grind in the later parts of the game is good, because it gives something new to do for players who are well established in their ranch. The execution however could have been done much better. In my perfect version in my head, materials would have to be gathered by some sort of active player action in specific areas of the game and this system could still keep some of that RNG that currently exists. I know certain material in the game already demands you place a pump or a drill in a specific part of the ranch, but it ends up feeling like you are just running through the environments in order to access your drills/pumps instead of meaningfully interacting with the area.
Later rewards in Slime Rancher also often end up not being interesting or fun enough to warrant the grind to get them. Color palettes are cool and all, but more steady upgrades to the vacuum pack, stamina, jetpack, etc would be much more incentivizing. Instead of 5 different colors of teleporter, give me some new interesting items to play around with.
Another aspect that could be improved upon is that this game would have greatly benefitted from giving the player a bit more options in terms of automation. I believe the intention is not to make it possible for the farm to run itself, but I think having a little more automation could have helped give importance and priority to the secondary material grind I had mentioned earlier.
Lastly, the world of Slime Rancher is really fun and cool to explore, but I wish there were more ways to interact with the environment. Most areas you end up running through feel more like a safari rather than wilderness for the rancher to tame. One thing that the later half of the game nails is the introduction of the Glass Desert. Its a dynamic environment where fire balls and fire slimes will occasionally rain down from the sky and this impacts how a player interacts with this environment without making exploration not fun. The glass desert also introduces some puzzles that if completed help you manipulate the surrounding environment. It's genuinely great and I just wish that more of the environments in this game had the same amount of interactivity that this one did.
Overall I enjoyed my time with Slime Rancher. The first half of the game is exceptional, and while it fumbles a bit in the later half, if you are a life sim fan I would have no trouble recommending this game to you.
2021
Having restarted my journey with this game recently on Hard Mode, it kills me to see this game not get the love I really think it deserves. The game is absolutely gorgeous to look at, and most importantly it is incredibly fun to play. Navigating through these environments as fast and stylishly as your character does it is always satisfying and rewarding. The movement mechanics are the heart of the experience with this game and it never gets dull. Every environment in this game is like a beautiful surrealist painting, and generally the art direction is a masterclass throughout.
For a game explicitly about the impending doom of your planet, the game offers a surprising amount of levity in world and character design that does not interfere with the story this game is trying to tell. The team at Heart Machine are top of their class in emotional story telling, and Solar Ash is no exception. The swelling music as you make your final runs at a boss will always stick in my head when thinking about this game; it's practically magical. By the time you come to the end of your journey in the Ultravoid, the game offers a deep meaningful take away message that I wasn't expecting but absolutely appreciated. What feels particularly great about playing a Heart Machine story is that the themes and story beats, while they may take place in far off alien places, feel incredibly personal to the developers and insanely human. The game is not perfect by any means and could certainly tighten up a few aspect relating to smaller enemy encounters and rewards given by exploring the environment. All that being said, this game is the first 3D title the studio has put out and in light of all the things the team absolutely nailed with this game, it should be far more celebrated and appreciated. It may not be as tightly designed as Hyper Light Drifter, but it is absolutely a majorly positive contribution to Heart Machines catalogue that I'll easily recommend to anybody looking for a stylish movement platformer.
For a game explicitly about the impending doom of your planet, the game offers a surprising amount of levity in world and character design that does not interfere with the story this game is trying to tell. The team at Heart Machine are top of their class in emotional story telling, and Solar Ash is no exception. The swelling music as you make your final runs at a boss will always stick in my head when thinking about this game; it's practically magical. By the time you come to the end of your journey in the Ultravoid, the game offers a deep meaningful take away message that I wasn't expecting but absolutely appreciated. What feels particularly great about playing a Heart Machine story is that the themes and story beats, while they may take place in far off alien places, feel incredibly personal to the developers and insanely human. The game is not perfect by any means and could certainly tighten up a few aspect relating to smaller enemy encounters and rewards given by exploring the environment. All that being said, this game is the first 3D title the studio has put out and in light of all the things the team absolutely nailed with this game, it should be far more celebrated and appreciated. It may not be as tightly designed as Hyper Light Drifter, but it is absolutely a majorly positive contribution to Heart Machines catalogue that I'll easily recommend to anybody looking for a stylish movement platformer.
2022
Tunic is a wonderful 2D Zelda-like that feels like a love letter to the genre. Between an extremely charming aesthetic, fun and interesting items, and being extremely packed with puzzles and mystery, it would be hard not to recommend this game to any fan of the genre. The inclusions of things like a made up language and the instruction booklet all work to great effect to simulate that feeling you had when you were a kid trying to play a game like Link's Awakening. Discovery is always well rewarded and always feel earned by the player. I feel as though there are very few handouts in terms of progression through the game, so even just simply navigating the world feels meaningful and accomplishing. Level design is top notch in this game and I love all the secrets and hidden paths they provide using the game's isometric view. I think the weakest parts of this game compared to its contemporaries is the mood of the game.
When you have a game like Tunic that is told mostly through actions without dialogue and supplemental text that would have to be translated in order to understand, it becomes incredibly important that you nail the mood of the story you are trying to tell. I think Tunic struggles to do this within its game due to how vague and convoluted story beats along with how the aesthetic and tone feel contradictory. Like Link's awakening, the charming aesthetic feels as though its masking some underlying emotions that the story is trying to tell, but for Tunic it never quite gets to that sweet spot. At the biggest turning point of the story when player engagement is at its highest, I feel as though it doesn't capitalize as hard as it could on this feeling. In the end it is not a total wash and does succeed in a lot of places, but I wanted more to really sell me on it. A good example of this sort of stylistic choice (no words, made up language supplementary text) working extremely well would be Hyperlight Drifter. Even if I didn't understand completely what was happening in that game, I always strongly felt the intended emotions implied by each scene.
Despite the criticism, I really did love my time playing Tunic and I love that it exists. At all times you can feel the developers love and passion for their own game, and that is wonderful. I would have no problem recommending this to others, and I hope to see more from the developer in the future.
When you have a game like Tunic that is told mostly through actions without dialogue and supplemental text that would have to be translated in order to understand, it becomes incredibly important that you nail the mood of the story you are trying to tell. I think Tunic struggles to do this within its game due to how vague and convoluted story beats along with how the aesthetic and tone feel contradictory. Like Link's awakening, the charming aesthetic feels as though its masking some underlying emotions that the story is trying to tell, but for Tunic it never quite gets to that sweet spot. At the biggest turning point of the story when player engagement is at its highest, I feel as though it doesn't capitalize as hard as it could on this feeling. In the end it is not a total wash and does succeed in a lot of places, but I wanted more to really sell me on it. A good example of this sort of stylistic choice (no words, made up language supplementary text) working extremely well would be Hyperlight Drifter. Even if I didn't understand completely what was happening in that game, I always strongly felt the intended emotions implied by each scene.
Despite the criticism, I really did love my time playing Tunic and I love that it exists. At all times you can feel the developers love and passion for their own game, and that is wonderful. I would have no problem recommending this to others, and I hope to see more from the developer in the future.
Fun novelty game to pick up for just a few bucks and play with your friends a couple times. Its good for a few laughs
I looked forward to every ending in this game. Its pure absurd meta-narrative fun.
2018
Celeste is a game that I just keep coming back to. I have beaten this game twice and have started a third playthrough. The difficulty of the main game is perfectly fine tuned, and the extra levels give players who are looking for more of a challenge a reason to come back. For me, the b-sides of these levels is the highest difficulty I'll attempt, but I am happy to see this game provide more for those players looking for it. A very human and simple story with razor tight gameplay mixed with interesting and fun mechanics. What more could you ask for in a platformer?
2022
Sifu is an unrelenting challenge that demands a lot of learning from the player in order to complete and later master the game. Its a daunting experience if you are unfamiliar with Sloclap's combat loop, but if you give the game and yourself enough time you will come to love it. This is a game that will inherently turn some players away by its difficulty. Similar to Sekiro its a game where there are no shortcuts to success: you have to learn the skills necessary to win. Combat is fast and flashy, and there is an incredible sense of empowerment when you dominate an enemy. I'd be cautious to recommend to friends who might not want to commit the time or effort, but for anybody who is looking for an incredibly fun and visually stunning challenge, look no further than Sifu.
2021
Returnal is a game I never thought I would beat. It's first stage and boss are so brutal I feel most players will spend most of their total playtime stuck here. Once you start to master the game and beat the first boss, the rest of the game starts to come significantly easier. Because of this extreme difficulty curve its hard for me to try to convince people who have given up on it to try again. They will most likely fail, and fail, and fail until hours later when they finally get it. I can't in good conscious say to those people struggling here that they have to or should suffer through this in order to make it through to the end. But, if somehow you do claw your way out of the first stage like Selene fighting through this impossible loop, I think the game is absolutely special and I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I beat it.
The art direction in this game is absolutely mesmerizing. Glowing flora and fauna in a dark rainy forest, a giant lifeless desert that hides a tall mountain among its rock formation and sandstorms, gigeresque city scapes that blend mechanical veins with stone, its all done fantastically well. I loved being in the ever-shifting world of Returnal, and I feel sad that the difficulty/pacing of the game had me spend so much more time in the forest rather than the later areas.
Gameplay is fast paced and addicting, and while it gets easier to overcome the more you play it, it never becomes easy. It demands your attention all the way through. The bullet hell attacks are done in cool shapes and styles and keep the pressure on always. The bosses, despite them being very few, were all absolutely fantastic in design and mechanics. After I beat this game, I wanted to play more. The story was also a very unexpected plus for me in the end.
I wont spoil the entire game's story here on a review, but while I was expecting much more concrete progression in the logical events of the story, I was instead given something more unexpected. The story is like the world, illogical and impossible to fully understand, but the focus of the story is much more interested in the emotions of the player and the character. Symbolism, allusion, and subtext are king when it comes to putting everything together. I haven't played a game that pulled off a story quite like this ever. It's very impressive with what they were able to tell with what little direct story telling they provide.
All in all I loved this game. I can't in good consciousness give it a perfect review because of the issues with difficulty and pacing I outlined in the first paragraphs, but I would have no problem recommending this game to anyone with a PS5.
-PS, the adaptive trigger alt fire is EASILY the best and most innovative feature I've seen with a controller ever and I'd love to see more of it.
The art direction in this game is absolutely mesmerizing. Glowing flora and fauna in a dark rainy forest, a giant lifeless desert that hides a tall mountain among its rock formation and sandstorms, gigeresque city scapes that blend mechanical veins with stone, its all done fantastically well. I loved being in the ever-shifting world of Returnal, and I feel sad that the difficulty/pacing of the game had me spend so much more time in the forest rather than the later areas.
Gameplay is fast paced and addicting, and while it gets easier to overcome the more you play it, it never becomes easy. It demands your attention all the way through. The bullet hell attacks are done in cool shapes and styles and keep the pressure on always. The bosses, despite them being very few, were all absolutely fantastic in design and mechanics. After I beat this game, I wanted to play more. The story was also a very unexpected plus for me in the end.
I wont spoil the entire game's story here on a review, but while I was expecting much more concrete progression in the logical events of the story, I was instead given something more unexpected. The story is like the world, illogical and impossible to fully understand, but the focus of the story is much more interested in the emotions of the player and the character. Symbolism, allusion, and subtext are king when it comes to putting everything together. I haven't played a game that pulled off a story quite like this ever. It's very impressive with what they were able to tell with what little direct story telling they provide.
All in all I loved this game. I can't in good consciousness give it a perfect review because of the issues with difficulty and pacing I outlined in the first paragraphs, but I would have no problem recommending this game to anyone with a PS5.
-PS, the adaptive trigger alt fire is EASILY the best and most innovative feature I've seen with a controller ever and I'd love to see more of it.
This is probably one of the best and most interesting single player Star Wars games to come out and its potential is exciting. However, every time I boot this game up to keep playing though it I get put off by either glitches or just general jankiness that happens when platforming. Facial capture also is off putting to me as well. Lastly, having played Sekiro within the last year (what I consider to be the best in class for this sort of combat style), it makes me want to play the mechanically better version and just restart Sekiro. While I mostly listed negatives about the game, this game does a lot of things well, it just could be a lot better.