In a bygone age where “See you in Rayman 4!” had yet to morph from an innocuous sequel hook into the cruellest lie since the Trojan Horse, Ubisoft were on a hot streak that few developers can claim to have had. It's not uncommon to scoff at them now, but much of the key talent that brought us so many instant classics of this era are still there, including Chaos Theory’s very own Clint Hocking. The personal touch of developers like him has become harder to parse with Ubi’s exponential growth and shifting priorities, but it’s hard not to retain a bit of goodwill so long as at least some of those who made Chaos Theory are still there, because it’s probably the best stealth game ever made.

Contrary to what one might think, Splinter Cell’s chief influence isn’t a certain other tactical espionage stealth action series, but rather Looking Glass. It’s not hard to imagine why – to this day, Thief has better sound design than any game that isn’t either its own sequel or System Shock 2, but the need for its state of the art reverberation system stemmed out of its first person perspective. If immersion is the name of the game, nothing sells it quite like having to track where enemies are through carefully listening the same way Garrett would, as opposed to having a disembodied floating camera that can see around corners do the work for you. How does Sam’s game measure up to that, given it’s in third person?

The answer is through a different kind of genius. In Chaos Theory, every individual part of Sam’s body is affected by light/darkness independently. You might not initially notice this until you arouse suspicion by peeking his head just a little bit too far out of a crawl space into a brightly lit area, or accidentally position him in such a way that his leg’s poking out from around a corner. Even now, it’s exceedingly rare for dynamic lighting to be anything more than window dressing, and yet Chaos Theory was making full use of its potential gameplay applications when N-Gage ports still existed. It goes further than this, too. Heavily armed enemies can not only light flares, but throw them in the direction they last saw or heard you, while others can flick on a torch that they’ll point at various angles as they follow your tracks. No other stealth game can match the anxiety Chaos Theory instils as you cling to a wall and hope that the guard a hair’s breadth away doesn’t turn in your direction while he's holding a light.

It’s important to note that despite its influences, Chaos Theory isn’t an immersive sim ᵃⁿᵈ ⁿᵒ ᴴᶦᵗᵐᵃⁿ, ᴹᴳˢ⁵ ᵃⁿᵈ ᴮʳᵉᵃᵗʰ ᵒᶠ ᵗʰᵉ ᵂᶦˡᵈ ᵃʳᵉⁿ'ᵗ ᵉᶦᵗʰᵉʳ ᵇᵘᵗ ᵗʰᵃᵗ'ˢ ᵇᵉˢᶦᵈᵉˢ ᵗʰᵉ ᵖᵒᶦⁿᵗ. It instead opts for a middle ground between their emergent problem solving and its own predecessors’ affinity for pre-baked scripted set pieces. This may sound eclectic on paper, but it works remarkably well in terms of pacing. Relax one moment as you clamber up and down several floors of an office block in any order and through whatever means you please, but be ready the next when you have to switch the power back on and quickly scramble out of the now gleaming room as a squad of guards floods in. Granted, there’s a slight degree of inconsistency in this respect. The bank level’s famously bursting with alternate pathways to accommodate more play styles than you can shake a stick at, while the end of the bathhouse level could drive even an actual Third Echelon agent to forsake his non-lethal playthrough, but this balancing of peaks and valleys overall allows for lots of creative, freeform solutions while still ensuring that there’ll always be segments which demand your attention even on repeat playthroughs.

The fact that Chaos Theory manages to stay so engaging from start to finish without giving you any new equipment along the way is a testament to this, but other areas of the game deserve as much attention as its level design. For instance, no matter how many people are aware of how much Amon Tobin outdid himself with this game’s music, it’s still not enough. This series of chords is Splinter Cell, as much as thick shadows and green goggles, and if it were distilled into a person they would assuredly be skulking about in the dark. The extra instrumentation which dynamically fades in and out according to enemies’ alertness level (my favourite example being this absolute tune) not only drives home his talent even further, but also acts as another way to communicate important information to the player if the increasingly copious sandbag checkpoints throughout the level hadn’t already clued you in. To put things in perspective, this may be the only example of Jesper Kyd’s involvement in a soundtrack not being the highlight.

Chaos Theory’s also a beneficiary of the time when different ports of one game would have exclusive features for no particular reason. I can’t speak for how it controls on console, but I can say that adjusting Sam’s movement speed with the mouse wheel is a fantastic alternative to the standard method of protagonists instantly becoming silent as soon as they crouch (to my surprise, it doesn’t work that way in real life). Combine it with a camera that gently shifts about to give you the best possible view depending on which direction Sam is moving in and the game feels like a dream to control. On PC you also have the added benefit of being able to toggle whether enemies speak in their native languages, a bit akin to Crysis’ hardest difficulty, which despite being such a minor feature seems like a really underutilised concept.

I’d be remiss not to mention the writing as well. While it’s fair to say that Chaos Theory probably isn’t a game you’d play for the story itself, it’s equally true that it wouldn’t be so beloved if its characters weren’t so charming, including the guards, whose responses to being interrogated are not just genuinely funny but also a glaring counterpoint to the notion that this series takes itself too seriously. Few voice actors understand their characters as well as Michael Ironside gets Sam Fisher. Every delivery of his is golden, whether grumbling in response to his support team constantly bullying him for being old or in the plot’s more cathartic moments. Given both that Ironside has now dabbed on cancer a second time and his recent-ish reprisals of the role in the form of Ghost Recon DLCs, one can only hope they get him to work his magic again in the first game’s upcoming remake.

Regardless of how that turns out, it’s nice to know that Splinter Cell has some kind of future again. Bringing back something old can have just as much value as creating something new, and while asking it to be as good as Chaos Theory is probably a tall order, all it really needs to do is be good enough to prove that pure stealth games still have a place in the mainstream. Sam has saved us from WW3 several times over by now, so hopefully he can also save his genre from the plague of waist-high grass.

Hedging my bets on this one – see you in Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell® (TBD)!

How to surpass 11 years’ worth of expectations in one fell swoop. Newcomers to this series are doubtlessly fortunate to not have to go through several of Erikson’s life stages before they can try DMC5 now, but I think it’ll always be harder to appreciate what an achievement this game is if you weren’t subject to the gargantuan wait for it. For this to exist at all is one thing, but to have ended up being the peak of not just its franchise but arguably its genre in so many ways after all that time is something else entirely.

All four of the main characters are drowning in so many unique mechanics that no amount of text really does them justice, but don’t mistake that for bloat or a lack of focus, because it’s anything but. Nero’s new caveman-like attacks and exploding Devil Breakers hones in on his reckless punky attitude and fleshes out his combat options in a way that finally makes him feel like a worthy heir to his uncle, while also helping him step out of his shadow – talk about ludowudo-whatever harmony. Vergil’s revamped Concentration meter, plethora of just frames and seamless weaving in and out of Sin Devil Trigger at no cost if you time it right feels like the fullest realisation yet of the devilishly precise fighting style that originally made him so popular. V’s characterisation as a squishy wizard differentiates him from other action games that have you fiddling about with multiple characters at once. Dante is Dante, no explanation required, but I will say that I hope Quadruple S does for modern action games what instant weapon switching did for them 20 odd years ago – you can’t help but wonder why every game with a ranking system doesn’t actively integrate it into the gameplay itself like this.

All these options wouldn’t mean much if the game around them wasn’t engaging, so it helps that the level design of DMC5 is staggeringly less obnoxious than all of its predecessors. One level might have you in a giant lift that collapses if you don’t kill the enemies on it quickly enough, revealing an alternate path through the level if it falls as opposed to making you start the challenge from scratch. Another presents you with some brief platforming challenges and doors that are about to shut on either end of them, encouraging you to make a quick decision about which way to go but not punishing you too harshly if you decide to take the path of least resistance. One even has a series of optional, demonic skating parks you can make your way through in multiple ways thanks to Nero’s obscene aerial mobility. The interconnected structure of the previous games’ levels has been shed, and yet, the levels have more ways to progress through them than ever; even the obligatory pick-up-this-item-and-put-it-here “puzzles” feel less egregious now that you can usually tackle them in different orders. A superb trade off for the dice boards and rotating towers of this world, to be sure; it's unfortunate that what's so clearly a series best in this regard is commonly written off for no reason other than that some of the levels look vaguely similar if you squint a bit.

This is true of the enemy design, too. Front to back, DMC5 has the most consistently non-annoying enemy roster in the franchise. No clipping through walls, no long periods of invulnerability that can’t be exploited, just every property of the combat system being stretched to the fullest in ways that feel 100% natural. My favourites are the two that get superarmour or teleport away if you launch them, and picking what moves to use against them becomes even more of a brain teaser when they’re accompanied by other types, who are varyingly more susceptible to being stunned or the hidden fear status effect or clashing with their sword or guard breaks or staying in the air or any number of other under-the-hood tools you have to experiment with. Between the campaign, Bloody Palace and remixed enemy placements on higher difficulties, I don’t think there’s any two enemies that aren’t fought together at some point. Not a single ounce of potential is wasted. The most capital G of gamers might feel that enemies could stand to be more aggressive or have more anti-air options to bring your fancy jump cancels to an end, but I don’t care who you are, because you have absolutely been killed by a stray Riot or Judecca at least once.

Similar credit goes to the bosses, among whom there are miraculously no misfires. Gilgamesh might seem to be on the weaker end until you remember that this is the same series in which Arkham, the Saviour, Nightmare 3 and all of DMC2 exist, after which you suddenly realise he’s either inoffensive at worst or actually quite cool. My favourite is Cavaliere, in part because the first and last of these sword clashes sent my dopamine centre soaring to new heights and it’s all downhill for me from here.

He or any other boss in DMC5 would be a standout if you drag and dropped them into most other action games, and the only reason they’re arguably not in DMC5 itself is because they in turn exist alongside Vergil. I used to prefer his DMC3 iteration – he didn’t define an entire archetype of boss fights for no reason – but as I’ve played this more and more, I realise there’s really no comparison between the two unless you put a lot of stock in presentation. There are more ways to attack, defend yourself from, clash or just generally interact with DMC5’s Vergil than in every previous appearance of his combined, down to him responding to your taunts or commenting on your performance. This isn’t to suggest that more is always better, but the key strength of Vergil has always been that he felt almost like fighting another player, and all these layers upon layers of extra mechanics go huge lengths towards simulating that.

The best games tend to be more than the sum of their parts, so it helps that every other aspect of DMC5 is about as strong as how it plays. The art direction is HUGELY undersold, juggling the weird bio-Gothic architecture of the Qliphoth with the most overtly horror enemies since DMC1 and westernised photorealism, marrying it all into a single oddly cohesive package. Bingo Morihashi ᴵ'ᵐ ˢᵒʳʳʸ ᴵ ᵈᶦˢᵖᵃʳᵃᵍᵉᵈ ʸᵒᵘʳ ʷᵒʳᵏ ᶦⁿ ᵃ ʸᵒᵘᵗᵘᵇᵉ ᶜᵒᵐᵐᵉⁿᵗ ˡᶦᵏᵉ ᵗʰʳᵉᵉ ʸᵉᵃʳˢ ᵃᵍᵒ reconciles the series’ trademark themes of family with a metanarrative about leaving red man vs. blue man behind us in ways that cement Nero as just as legendary as either of them. You already know what the soundtrack’s like, but you probably never noticed how underrated Unwavering Bravery is, so listen to that.

As per Dragon’s Dogma 2’s recent announcement, we’re at most a few years away from video games becoming a solved medium, but DMC5 should by no means be seen as just a pit stop on the way there. You can tell Itsuno threatened to quit if Capcom’s higher ups didn’t let him carry out this game exactly the way he wanted, because every last iota of it oozes passion both for the series itself and everyone who's ever worked on it. Dante has a taunt sourced from a Kamiya tweet, and if that isn’t love, what is?

“DMC is back,” and it’s such a satisfying outing that I don’t mind if it never is again.

How different games might be if we didn’t have it in our heads that the right stick must be for camera control. Part of the fun of early 3D games is how little about them was standardised. Jump between any given two of them and there’s a decent chance that few, if any, of the skills or habits you develop in one will translate to another. The lengths a unique control scheme goes toward accentuating this sort of variety and distinctiveness probably goes without saying, but Ape Escape also makes a similarly strong case for how much more intuitive it can be.

Being able to swing a doodad in any direction you want with a simple tilt of the stick, no matter your positioning or which way you’re facing, feels so natural it’s unreal. It’s the type of seemingly mundane thing you don’t realise is so rare in games until you first encounter it and, given how erratically the monkeys move upon being alerted, comes in so handy I can’t imagine the game controlling any other way. That would already be worthy of enough praise as is, but the game’s bolstered even further by how the gadgets get more creative as it goes on.

The RC car is a particular standout. Few platformers will get your proverbial gears turning as much as guiding both Spike and the RC car through two different sets of moving obstacle courses at the same time. It’s really, really striking how similar the car feels to some action games of recent years in which controlling multiple characters has become increasingly common – if there was ever a context where “ahead of its time” was 100% appropriate to use, this is it, though Ecclesiastes 1:9 also comes to mind.

Don’t let the revelation that Astral Chain is secretly an Ape Escape sequel distract you from how remarkably forward thinking other aspects of this game are, though. Past a certain point, platforming sequences will demand you quickly rotate between several gadgets in quick succession to get to the monkey on the other side, but this is a totally fluid experience thanks to how you can instantly switch between gadgets with the face buttons. You can even go straight to the equipment menu without having to go through the pause menu first if you’d like to quickly swap out your current gadgets. Excessive menuing plagues many a game even now, to say nothing of how this could easily have been compounded by memory limitations of the day, which makes it all the more impressive how effortlessly Ape Escape almost completely circumvents that issue.

The water net and the (very few) tank segments are more finicky, but some misses here and there are to be expected when you’re tackling such an ambitious range of level concepts. When you’re rigorously working your way through precision platforming segments in a castle floating in Earth’s orbit at the end, it’s easy to forget that this is the same game in which you were sniping monkeys with a slingshot inside the belly of a dinosaur just a few hours ago.

Beyond using the time travelling premise to the fullest, the levels – and the game as a whole – are great at letting you progress at your own pace. Only half of all the monkeys in the game are required to catch to get to the end, so it feels very much like a precursor to the Jak & Daxter school of “don’t like it, don’t do it.” This freedom’s aided by the levels’ complexity and nonlinearity, especially those later on in the game, full of optional rooms packed with unique challenges you’re not likely to see anywhere else. Because of this, there’s also plenty of incentive to revisit previous levels with gadgets you didn’t initially have, a bit akin to one of those veinytroids or whatever they’re called.

Do that and you’ll eventually unlock a bunch of minigames that’re a fair bit more interesting than they have any right to be, again thanks to the unique use of the right stick. I found it hard to not walk away from them wishing that we could get a fully fledged monkey-centric boxing or ski racing game that simulates those even more closely, until I remembered that Japan Studio (pbuh) went kaput and the concept of fun was forever cancelled as a result.

Tempting as it is to mourn them, the same infectious charm that courses through everything else they worked on is present in Ape Escape in spades, which helps cast it in a more celebratory light. I can’t imagine the Sony of today greenlighting a game this outlandish visually, tonally and mechanically any time soon, but at least they did once. Somewhere, sometime, someone at Sony decided we needed a sci-fi monkey hunting simulator which happens to feature the world’s finest turn of the century drum ‘n’ bass album as its soundtrack, and I’m delighted not just because we've gotten some fantastic games out of that, but also because this shows that somebody out there truly understands my needs.

When it’s all said and done, Ape Escape is as fun as a barrel of... you know.

The trouble with calling something “ahead of its time” is that it implies whatever made that something so special has become standard since its release. It’s easy to describe Fallout like that, or to say it’s “impressive for 1997” as if standards only ever improve over time, until you look around and realise how few RPGs since Fallout have even attempted to replicate what makes it such an excellent game, including its own sequels. Had they, it’s doubtful that Fallout would be subject to as many hyperbolic horror stories as it is today.

Among the most infamous and exaggerated of these is the time limit of Fallout’s main quest, which isn’t just arguably more generous than it should be even if you don’t choose to extend it, but also disappears halfway through anyhow. That makes it sound like a non-factor, but it’s an essential part of what makes Fallout a step above. No matter how generous it might be, the fact that it’s there at all creates a kind of congruence between player and protagonist that isn’t there in any other Fallout game, or many RPGs in general. Everything you do in Fallout is coloured by the underlying sense of urgency that it’s game over, literally and figuratively, if you spend too much time gallivanting about the wastes instead of on your core responsibility. The plights of Arroyo, Liam Neeson and Hoover Dam can wait until the Chosen One, Lone Wanderer and Courier feel like doing something about it, but unlike them, the world doesn’t revolve around the Vault Dweller. It probably doesn’t need to be said how much more synergistic this is with Fallout’s harsh setting than any its follow-ups, or how relieving it is when you finally get your hands on that water chip.

What this is indicative of is Fallout’s larger design philosophy – it isn’t afraid to let you make mistakes. Yes, you’re going to have a particularly hard time if you don’t dump points into your Agility, but why shouldn’t you? It makes sense that someone who isn’t quick on their feet shouldn’t be able to easily get by in such a hellish place. You feel the consequences of neglecting a particular S.P.E.C.I.A.L. stat more palpably here than in any other Fallout bar 2, most famously with how low Intelligence makes every single conversation in the game more strained (to say the least).

This design extends beyond character building, too. Fallout trusts players to figure out for themselves which dialogue options are affected by a high speech skill, instead of highlighting them for you as all of the 3D games do. Choose your words poorly upon meeting someone for the first time and their opinion of you can be permanently dampened for the rest of the game, signalled to you organically with a change in their facial expression, potentially locking you out of quests or causing others in the locale to distrust you. If things go really south, no punches are pulled in terms of everybody being expendable – you can go as far as to kill children, and making a good first impression with even evil characters becomes an uphill battle if you do.

In general, I don’t think killing things in Fallout is anywhere near as much of a drag as it’s often made out to be either. Weighing up how much AP to spend on either moving to get to a more advantageous position and reduce the amount of actions enemies can potentially take, or on attacking them definitely gets the gears in your head turning to some extent. Damage sound effects in this series never sounded anywhere near as satisfying after ditching the thumps and thwacks of this and Fallout 2, which make for some nice feedback on attacks when taken in tandem with the wonderfully gory sprite work. Being able to destroy or pry open doors enables ways for you to creatively manoeuvre through combat encounters and lets you progress quests in ways that you can’t in later titles, plus the amount of different hit reactions for each part of each enemy’s body is also pretty novel. You won’t be making any Combo MADs out of this, but if you don’t get even a hint of enjoyment out of seeing somebody gently slide across half of Los Angeles after they’ve been smacked with a sledgehammer, I probably don’t trust you.

What I do trust is Fallout’s ability to engross me in its world every single time I play it. Listen to how haunting this is, and then be aware that every other track in the game is at least on par with it. The ambient clicking and clacking of now ancient wartime equipment, the cosy boxed-in presentation of the HUD and its descriptive flavour text in its bottom left, the freaky architecture with all its giant heads... they all combine to sell the feeling of really being there, rivalling the best of any other game that predicates itself on immersion. When you encounter a voiced character and the music cuts you know you’re in for a proper event, bolstered by across the board stellar performances from tons of classic 90s voice actors that utterly command your attention. Meeting the Master and hearing him jolt his way through his iconic monologue about the Unity is like one long lesson in why he ended up defining the guy-with-good-intentions-does-the-wrong-thing-for-the-right-reasons-and-also-you-can-talk-him-to-death archetype. No Fallout antagonist has come close ever since (as cool as Frank Horrigan might be), be it in terms of motivations, the lengths you have to go to convince him that he’s in the wrong, anything.

Fallout is a remarkably pure translation of vision to game, and as another comment on here points out, it’s simply not given its dues as often as it ought to be. Even with this proverbial Vault of text, I still haven’t touched on everything it does well – for one thing, I can’t believe the Tell Me About feature didn’t become standard in every RPG made after this game’s release – but I hope this does it some justice all the same. Do give it a chance at some point if you haven’t already, and don’t be put off by any claims of “jank” or “clunk” or whatever other nebulous jargon you could just as easily apply to any of its much more recent successors. I first played Fallout well over a decade after it came out after being introduced to the series with 3, and even as a kid, I never found myself wishing it was more like the modern RPGs I was accustomed to. Quite the opposite.

I wanted to cap this off with a twist on “you’re a hero and you have to leave,” Fallout being the hero, but my Int is too low to make it sound clever. In the interest of avoiding a critical miss, I present a rare but thematically appropriate Todd. Will trade for either 20 caps or an iguana on a stick.

Franchise revivals have become big business across pretty much all forms of media, but rarely are they as good or as boldly willing to fly in the face of modern design trends as Streets of Rage 4, a short but sweet concoction that invites replays not just through brilliantly varied characters, the high of chasing better ranks or funky beats, but for how intrinsically rewarding it is to master its fighting game-esque systems. Look no further than this for proof that bringing back something old can have as much value as making something brand new.

I detest it when "modern" is used as if it automatically means "better," so be sure that when I call SOR old I mean it in the best way possible, i.e. that it’s cleverly designed around its limitations. SOR4 largely refrains from perceived-as-modern features like running not because the devs were too silly to consider it – they did – but because deliberately not including them makes things more interesting. If you want to quickly get from one end of the screen to the other, you have to consider whether to risk losing some health through a special move that lurches you forward, to use a different move that might leave you vulnerable or pick a character who has extra movement options like Adam or Shiva’s dashes (which also bolsters the variety between the cast). One of the best parts of SOR4 is that it’s an exercise in constant problem solving, which isn’t to say that it wouldn’t be if your movement was less limited, but that aspect of it is enhanced because it's the way it is.

Risk taking in general is something that SOR4 excels at encouraging. Being able to regain health after using a special move just seems less punishing on the surface, but it feels absolutely crushing when you get lose it all by getting hit after, and equally as relieving when you manage to get it all back. Using special moves has more layers to it than in its predecessors thanks to this balance of risk and reward. That, plus nothing sends your dopamine tubes on a rollercoaster ride quite like getting all the way up to the highest tier of the new combo system only to have it broken by a sneaky Galsia. It helps that it goes up much quicker if you vary your moves, a bit like DMC’s style meter.

There’s not much else to be said for other areas of SOR4 that hasn’t already been said to death. The hand drawn art’s nothing short of inspiring and the clarity of enemies’ animations means that occasions where you feel like you shouldn’t have gotten hit are impressively rare. The music lives up to the series’ legendary standards and then some. Smart difficulty design and the randomised nature of the survival mode means that it’ll take a long, long time before fatigue sets in. The only reason I don’t rate SOR4 higher is because of a persistent feeling that something’s missing.

It feels almost rude to say so, given that Mr. X Nightmare makes this one of the most feature-complete beat ‘em ups ever made right next to Fight ‘N Rage, but I find it hard not to wish that there was an alternate route through the story or something. While not every beat ‘em up needs Fight ‘N Rage’s 200 gorillion endings, I don’t find SOR4’s stages 5, 7 or 8 especially interesting compared to the rest of the game - I regularly forget stage 8 in particular exists despite having beaten the story six times - and they’d probably be more digestible if they weren’t mandatory. There’s even precedents for this within its own series. SOR3 has alternate stages, and SOR1 has really creative alternate endings where you and another player have to fight each other if at least one of you chooses to join Mr. X at the end. Just a little bit of extra flavour along those lines could’ve made what’s already quite easily one of the very best games of the 2020s even better, and maybe have prevented the occasional labelling of it as Streets of Rage 2: 2.

Let this be a reminder of why numerical scores are so arbitrary, that not every 8/10 is the same, and also that John Backloggd should steal Letterboxd’s like feature at some point. Regardless of a couple of small faults here and there, Streets of Rage 4 is exemplary and everybody with even a passing interest in beat 'em ups or action games should play it. Pop it in and be mesmerised as the system of your choosing becomes a souped up Mega Drive on command.

“Mass Effect will continue” sounds more like a threat than a cause for celebration at this point in Bioware’s history, but whatever turn the franchise takes next, I’m glad we got this one out of it. Mass Effect 2 was my introduction to the series, and my brother and I agreed at the time that neither of us could understand what people saw in it. When PS3 peasants like us were afforded the opportunity to play Mass Effect 1 years later and it culminated in spacewalking up the side of the Citadel with Sovereign looming overhead, though, I remember my brother watching on and saying “I think I understand now.” Revisiting it almost 10 years later, I’m with him on that one more than even then.

That isn’t to suggest that spectacle does the heavy lifting, however. Mass Effect probably doesn’t get enough credit for adapting the structure of a real time with pause RPG to the format of a third person shooter, and not just for the novelty of bouncing people around with biotics. There’s a satisfaction in moulding your squadmates from total jobbers into spacefaring John Woos via fiddling with their equipment and stats that isn’t really there in this game’s successors, at least not to the same degree. Both the level up and equipment screens look a lot more complicated than they actually are, but a couple of slightly cumbersome menus are worth tolerating for that rewarding, palpable sense of progression.

More conspicuous is the fact that supersoldier Shepard can only run for about 5 seconds before running out of breath, but he at least retains more manoeuvrability than a rusty schoolbus thanks to a significantly less rigid cover system than what would come later. Of all Cerberus’ crimes, their most egregious may just be making sprinting, vaulting & taking cover all share the same input in the sequels.

Shepard’s believability as a roleplaying template is also at its best here. Picking Paragon or Renegade options as the situation demands rather than going all in on one or the other feels more natural, since they’re less perfection personified versus petty prick and more diplomatic leader versus get-the-job-done-no-matter-what hardman. I played my Shepard going mostly Paragon before he eventually got fed up with aliens’ nonsense (especially b*tarians), realised that human supremacy is the only way to go and became accordingly irritable – compared to later entries, it’s pleasantly surprising how much it felt like an actual character arc of my own making rather than him being a schizo.

Believability in general is something Mass Effect’s writers were great at. Picking the Paragon option when Ashley mentions her faith to you is such an understated moment, and yet it demonstrates a better understanding of faith than any number of works in and outside of this medium to the extent that I can’t believe something like it exists in a Bioware game. What further helps your squad feel like real fleshed out people rather than dedicated quest dispensers is that they actually interact with each other really regularly, discussing and disagreeing on the current state of affairs after each main mission. This, plus Saren is by far the best antagonist this series ever saw, founded on the pretty reasonable motivation of trying to minimise the damage done by a seemingly undefeatable omnicidal threat, as opposed to trying to trick you into not realising what a moron he is by way of Martin Sheen acting circles around everybody else.

Every optional planet you can visit having the same three warehouses on them is a harder sell, as is how often the Mako or even just walking around civilian areas amounts to mindlessly holding forward for prolonged periods of time, but there’s probably a case to be made for it being the slightest of net positives in that tangibly exploring the galaxy is preferable to looking at it through a scanner. Granted, the sense of discovery is lessened a bit when you see a bunch of chest-high walls and immediately know what’s coming, but you get used to it. It was the 7th gen, you know?

As much of a drag as those things can be, Mass Effect becomes better the more I dwell on it. The electronic rock soundtrack’s a perfect match for the setting and otherwise far cooler than the standard fare orchestral stuff they’d increasingly rely on afterwards, speaking to Sovereign is an enthralling moment that exemplifies why Bioware used to be spoken of in the same breath as the likes of Black Isle or Troika, and in general there just aren’t a lot of space opera RPGs with this kind of scale or ambition or colourful, tight knit characters. We never got the Stargate SG-1 game I dreamed of when I was little, but I’m happy Mass Effect’s here to sort of fill that gap.

It only feels right to cap off with this - most credit sequences simply can't compete.

A masterclass in FPS goodness. A contemporary review of No One Lives Forever 2 once called it “The Godfather Part II of videogame sequels,” which becomes a more apt comparison the more I think about it. It takes an already great foundation, expands upon it in ways you didn’t know you wanted and even recontextualises the actions of certain characters in the first, all while matching the style and tone of its predecessor so perfectly they almost feel like one giant mega-film (or mega-game, in this case). If such a thing as an ideal sequel exists, NOLF 2 is a strong candidate.

The first NOLF overcame its relatively limited enemy roster through the fact that its AI was so clever it ended up being quite varied anyhow, but NOLF 2’s enemies retain their impressively dynamic behaviour while surpassing the original’s in both functional and visual variety. I was sold pretty much as soon as I loaded into the first level and was immediately pitted against ninjas who can jump all over the place, clash swords with you (particularly cool) and sneak away after being spotted via smoke bombs, but it only escalates from there.

Bulky, Tommy gun-wielding French mimes who take tons of punishment before going down? Check. Chubby Indian policemen who tire out from running too long and suffer from the crippling tendency to slip on banana peels, complete with that one sound effect? Check again. Henchmen compressed into cubes who literally roll around after you, serving as weird human attack dogs? Also check. That’s not even all the new enemies that’ve been introduced, either. Combining wackier enemies like these with Monolith’s trademark excellent AI that’s still constantly flanking you to kingdom come and doing anything it can to preserve itself feels like NOLF taken to its natural conclusion – the first game’s character design was already fantastically varied and expressive in terms of its main cast, but in 2, that artistic quality’s now been extended to the mooks as well.

Cate’s weaponry has seen a serious step up in creativity to match this. Although not being able to roundhouse people in the back of the head anymore is a bit of a bummer, her newfound talent for swordsmanship makes up for it. An explosive shotgun always helps, too. And even aside from the aforementioned bananas, there’s more tools to play about with in terms of manipulating enemy behaviour before you’re spotted by them. Trick a big group of guards with a bomb disguised as a noisy cat-shaped toy, burn them for little damage but a decent period of incapacitation with the world’s most glamorous welding gun, or knock them out with her new tranquilizer gun and steal their weapons while they’re out (which they actually comment on and adapt to accordingly). The first NOLF’s stealth was already pretty remarkable considering it wasn’t even a full on stealth game, but in NOLF 2, you really do have a toolbox that rivals the Sam Fishers and Garretts of the world.

There's a pretty good comparison to be made with the latter in particular, considering NOLF 2's environmental interaction has gone way up. Nearly any drawer or cabinet you see, you can open, which you're gonna be doing a lot since having a nosey through documents found inside of them now nets you XP to help make Cate even more of a superspy. RPG elements in non-RPGs rarely ever feel not tacked on, but NOLF 2 is a nice exception. In-universe, it makes sense that Cate would become a more experienced spy the more she snoops around, as well as be rewarded somehow for stealing any important documents she can find. Granted, nabbing somebody's grumblings about their boss or whatever probably doesn't correspond to being able to carry more ammo, but the system in place here still feels like more of a natural addition than most.

All that said, NOLF 2 isn't quite a universal step up over the first game - I think Kit Harris' voice was a better fit for Cate than the still-pretty-good Jen Taylor (these two respectively voice FLUDD and Cortana btw, fun fact), various dialogue choice driven segments in 1 provide an aspect of the globetrotting spy experience that 2 just doesn't, and there's also a disappointing lack of any monkey themed post-credits levels. The audacity.

These don't weigh it down much in the face of its qualities, though. The higher enemy variety gives more of an incentive to experiment with different tools and ammo types. Boss fights enjoy much improved presentation across the board on top of being a fair bit more challenging mechanically. The music's different enough to feel fresh while still maintaining the catchy, throughly 1960s sound that's integral to the series' identity. Being able to lean around corners is massively appreciated, the writing's still just as funny, yaddy yaddy yada. What are you waiting for? Go play it.

Just be aware that, in H.A.R.M.'s most nefarious plot yet, NOLF 2 may stutter like mad during combat if you play it at a resolution higher than 1280x720 and/or if the sound quality settings aren't at their lowest, so try adjusting its settings accordingly before you treat yourself to one of the best FPSs ever made. Also, type in the cheat code (remember those?) to go to the next mission when you get to the very end of the first India level, because you can't beat it on modern systems otherwise unless you uninstall your drivers. PC gaming rocks.

Absolutely floored by how good the AI in this is. Today, Monolith are probably more well known for Shadow of Mordor’s Nemesis system or the fact that F.E.A.R.’s AI is so clever it had a short MIT paper written about it, but you can see their talent for this sort of thing on full display in No One Lives Forever too. Ideally, when we wheel out the phrase “feels like it’s from the future,” we should reserve it for special games like this which genuinely outclass stuff being released over two decades later in crucial areas like these.

“Enemy variety” is often conflated solely with the number of different types of enemies a game has, and NOLF’s enemy AI is a good showcase of why that’s misleading. The vast majority of NOLF’s enemies are humans, mostly being differentiated via the weapons they’ve equipped or which parts of their body are armoured (accentuated by a really cool limb-based damage system), but it never, ever feels stale because of how versatile their behaviour is. They can duck, lean, dodge roll, sway from side to side, knock over environmental objects to create some makeshift cover, blindfire over that makeshift cover, work together with other enemies to flank you, even run in a zigzag motion to throw off your aim if there’s no cover nearby, and probably more that I’m not aware of. Combine these kinds of dynamic behaviours with level design that often presents you with more than one path forward plus all of Cate’s weird gadgets, and the sum is a game where any given encounter can play out in any number of ways. Bear in mind that this also came out an entire year before Halo CE flexed on the competition with its similarly brainy AI. The boss fights aren’t quite as flexible as the enemies, but considering how few FPSs even attempt to have bosses at all, it’s nice to have them here for the occasional breather. Y’know?

When it comes to sneaking about in NOLF, enemies are less consistent – their line of sight varies between a few feet and what feels like miles depending on which level you’re playing – but not nearly to the point where stealth should be a point of derision for the game. I can’t imagine looking at NOLF’s stealth with the mindset of “this doesn’t work as well as it could” instead of “it’s impressive that this works as well as it does.” Again, bear in mind that 3D stealth games as we know them had only existed for about two years by the time NOLF came out. Taking that into consideration along with the fact that it’s not even a pure stealth game, it’s ridiculously ambitious. We’ve got different sound levels depending on the type of surface you’re walking on, gradient light/dark levels, various gadgets to misdirect specific kinds of enemies, and don’t get me started on its sound propagation – apart from Thief, this is the only (pseudo)stealth game I’ve played in which you can rely purely on audio to reliably tell where enemies are. It’s pretty conspicuous that you can’t lean around corners (something Monolith themselves must’ve noticed considering they added that in the sequel), and more grapple points to reach higher places would’ve been appreciated, but those are about all it lacks.

What NOLF doesn’t lack is charm. Do you love anything as much as the guys who made this clearly love spy movies, funky basslines and the 1960s? Don’t be so sure. The writing’s so witty at times that one of my favourite parts of the game consists purely of dialogue choices, where you interview one of the clumsier villains who’s clearly in over his head with this whole terrorism business. The swing-y music’s a pleasure to listen to, but it also serves a helpful purpose since it dynamically switches between a bunch of remixes depending on whether or not you’ve been spotted. Cate’s a great protagonist and bounces off the funny, visually distinctive supporting cast really well. It even has a silly post-credits level of dubious canonicity themed around monkeys. Why do games not do fun stuff like that anymore?

Basically, if you’re hankering for an old-ish school single player FPS in the vein of Return to Castle Wolfenstein or Half Life which is absolutely dripping with soulfulness, you owe NOLF your time. The trouble is you can’t buy it anymore, but fortunately there’s a top notch fan revival site where you can download it, the sequel and the spinoff all for free, with support for modern resolutions and glitch fixes among other stuff. I don’t think the publishers will be too bothered if you do considering none of them are sure who owns it anymore. No One Lives Forever™, but thanks to the fans, this series hopefully will.

Capcom’s no stranger to top of the range action platformers and Demon’s Crest is no exception, which makes it all the more unfortunate that it was so overlooked in its day. I think you could release it today almost totally unaltered and it would gel quite well with the tastes of certain modern audiences, albeit probably at a relatively low price. From its good degree of non-linear exploration, gloomy atmosphere and reasonably tough difficulty level it has a lot of hallmarks of recent hits big and small, and yet it still feels like we have a lot to learn from it.

It’s impressive that Demon’s Crest manages to live up to Ghosts ‘n Goblins’ challenge despite how much more versatile its movement is. Explore a bit to find some crests and Firebrand can fly in any direction, cling to or climb up walls, shoulder bash his way through heavy objects, the works. The reason you can’t just dance around everything all willy nilly is because Capcom employed some sensible restraint. Firebrand has to position himself to push away from a wall before you can jump off of it (think Super Metroid), his shoulder bash has a hefty amount of start up before it kicks in and he can only jump so high before flying, a bit like in Kirby & The Forgotten Land. This is all great because, while Firebrand has enough weird and wonderful abilities to give you some semblance of a devilish power fantasy, you still have to be patient when using them. There’ll be plenty of moments where you have to stop and really analyse your surroundings, lest you subject yourself to repeated clumsy deaths and Firebrand’s “AH!” that seems to become more maddening each time.

Dying itself never becomes annoying thanks to the surprisingly generous double whammy of infinite retries and pretty brief levels. Don’t let the levels’ shortness trick you into thinking that Demon’s Crest doesn’t have some bang for your buck, though. Whether to find hidden levels and bosses by clearing obstacles with upgrades you didn’t have before, collect indispensably useful life upgrades or to unlock the true ending & final boss, there’s plenty of reasons to revisit each area. Action platformers had had branching paths and secret alternate levels before this, Rondo of Blood being my favourite example, but they didn’t let you crisscross between them all in whatever order you please on a quest to become the coolest demon on the block. Progression-wise I suppose the closest thing would probably be Mega Man, but even it’s not quite the same.

What would be truly demonic is if I didn’t draw attention to the soundtrack or the art. Cartoony horror tickles my fancy like you wouldn’t believe, and the only other game I can think of that does it so effectively is the also superb MediEvil. As with MediEvil, you’re in for a lot of moody church organs, and to that end, one of the first tracks you hear in Demon’s Crest is a masterclass in tone setting. Melancholic as befits a world where demons rule the roost and humans are all gone, dilapidated buildings littering the backgrounds of the game’s gorgeous sprite work, but there’s hints of vengefulness in there too, maybe even hope. Definitely piles on the atmosphere something fierce.

As excellent as Demon’s Crest is, I did say ‘almost’ unaltered, and there’s at least one niggle that you’re bound to notice – you can only switch between crests through the pause menu. It’s really quick in the grand scheme of things, but still. If it were ever to get the Ghosts ‘n Goblins Resurrection treatment, it’d be great if you could switch crests in real time, probably with the shoulder buttons considering they go unused. There’s also a more minor issue of the fact that one or two crests are a bit redundant, one in particular being a high damage weapon for Firebrand’s base form which you’ll probably only get after already having obtained his ultimate form that does higher damage anyway.

Neither of those are egregious, though, definitely not enough to be offputting. With Capcom throwing so many well handled franchise revivals our way in the past few years, I’d love to see Demon’s Crest join them sometime (I did buy two copies of DMC5 like the good little pay piggy I am, so y’know, throw me a bone, lads). There’s plenty else to love about it that I haven’t covered, but you should really try it and see for yourself. Just make sure to keep exploring if you get the bad ending in the span of, like, an hour.

While I don’t regret getting a PS4, it marked the first time I felt dissatisfied enough with a console to go back and hook up an older one. Part of the beauty of the PS2 isn’t just its gargantuan library, but that so much of that library is so "out there." It hasn’t had a new release since 2013, and yet I still find it exciting to think about all its underappreciated, oddball titles I missed out on when I was little which I’ve now got the opportunity to try for the first time. The first “new” game I decided get was Viewtiful Joe, and it was a rainbow V ranked decision.

Little did we know that cinematic-ness in video games isn’t achieved via claustrophobic over the shoulder cameras or unskippable cutscenes, but through sick action sequences with fancy window dressing. Weaving Joe in and out of swarms of enemies, most of whom attack simultaneously on higher difficulties, is best described as like playing through the corridor scene from Oldboy as a Power Ranger. It’s relentless, but you have just the right amount of tools to always be able to shirk your way out of sticky situations and look viewtiful while doing it. Ducking, jumping, sliding, using Red Hot Kick to create some space or automatically dodging in exchange for a hefty amount of your VFX meter ensures that things never feel unfair, while also making Joe a joy to control. Slap a cool cel-shaded art style and lots of film bars on top and you basically have your own playable, self-directed tokusatsu show.

All that stuff helps make Viewtiful Joe deceptively complex, which can be said for the combat too. Even standard punches and kicks have some nuance to them you might not initially notice, with the former always launching enemies straight up or across and the latter always launching them at diagonal angles. They also nudge Joe forward a bit on use and can be instantly cancelled into each other, which can help you stay in the air or with spacing whenever sliding is too committal. Important stuff for making the most of Rock On attacks (i.e. knocking enemies into each other), which apart from funny slapstick value are pretty integral for getting good scores. Like seeing numbers go up? You’re in for a thrill. You WILL grin the first time your score counter taps out at 9999 even though you’ve clearly gotten more than that, amidst enemies bouncing off walls and CMON BABY YEAHs echoing ever into the distance.

It’s impressively lean for a Kamiya game too. There’s only one part that could be considered a minigame(!!) and it isn’t even, arguably. All that really changes about the core mechanics in the Six Machine segment is that you can’t turn around or jump and you shoot instead of punching/kicking. I don’t mind most Kamiya minigames in the first place (maybe that’s my Stockholm syndrome talking), but this is probably his best for how it twists the gameplay in a way that keeps things fresh without deviating to the point of making you dread it on future playthroughs.

And you are gonna be revisiting this for future playthroughs. You’ve got your standard action game shtick of switching up enemy placements on higher difficulties (I call it “standard” but it’s leagues better than how most games outside this genre handle difficulties), for one. But it’s bolstered by the short runtime (not counting the time you’ll probably spend dying, a lot) and other clever ideas, like removing enemy attack indicators on Ultra V-rated, plus the fantastic incentive of unlocking a new playable character for beating each difficulty. This version specifically even has Dante. And not just any Dante, but Drew Coombs Dante for all you Reuben deniers out there. How about that? I doubt I’ll ever forget the time I finished off the final boss with Dante, pushed to my limits and one hit away from death on my last life, with this game’s equivalent of a taunt. Just like one of my Japanese Devil May Crys.

I play Viewtiful Joe and think to myself, “what about this would I change?” And I always come up short. There’s no level select, I guess? But it’s short enough that you can blast through to whatever point you want to play in less than an afternoon anyway, which also enhances its arcadey feel. I suppose it’d be nice if you could use Rock On attacks on bosses instead of zoomed in punches being the go-to for all of them? But the homogeneity of how to best damage them is more than made up for by the variety in terms of actually getting them to the point where they’re vulnerable; no two play alike in that regard. There’s not much else to be picky about outside of these. Music, art direction, pacing, humour, you name it – it’s all 10/10 stuff.

Kamiya isn’t my absolute favourite game director, but he’s up there to the point where I keep an eye on pretty much anything he works on, and not just because he’s literally me. This and The Wonderful 101 aren’t just two of my favourite games ever, I think they’re also both good showcases of what I can only assume he's really like beneath his coarse, Twitter-addled exterior. Goofy, free of cynicism and dedicated to putting a smile on your face.

And here we are! You’d think that they’d been been making 3D Kirbys all along. I came because I wanted something easygoing to relax with, and I stayed because someone at HAL clearly played Bayonetta during the making of this. With any luck, Forgotten Land’ll be looked to in the future as a chief example of how to slap an extra dimension onto your series, but it’s got more going for it than even that. Stuff like its bosses, music and level design are all superb from top to bottom and rightfully getting a lot of attention, but it also has lots of surprisingly understated strengths which deserve more.

One of these is the camera. I can’t imagine it being implemented any way other than the way it is, and not just because things like finding optional Dees or challenge rooms through side alleys and hiding enemies or collectibles behind certain objects would be totally trivialised if you could fully control it. It’s hard to describe how much having a fixed camera adds to Forgotten Land’s setting and art direction. Can you imagine how utterly deflated moments like the start of Alivel Mall or Battle for Blizzard Bridge would be if the devs had just thoughtlessly gone with the standard for 3D games and had it statically rest a few metres behind Kirby’s back at all times, letting you point it in any direction? The sense of scale wouldn’t be anywhere near as striking. It transforms the setting from what could’ve just been a surface level novelty in the hands of lesser devs into something that’s so absorbing at times I’d go as far as to call it a selling point.

And on the setting, the way Forgotten Land contextualises stuff into its world is the type of thing you never realised how much you wanted from a Nintendo platformer until you’re given it. I’ve always thought highly of Mario 3D World, but after Forgotten Land, I can’t help but think about how much it might’ve benefitted from making its levels feel like actual places rather than interchangeable floating blocks in the sky. Waddle Dee Town’s the obvious star of the show in this regard, and far more than just a glorified menu. It physically and visually changing over the course of the story makes it feel more like an adventure with a tangible sense of progress, and that’s without going into the charm of the Dees themselves. I would never bother rewatching cutscenes from some boring menu, but the novelty of going to a cinema and waving at my fellow blob-like cinephiles has led me to do it more than a couple of times in Forgotten Land. And the band you unlock after a while is fantastic. Did you notice that the Dees don’t play certain instruments at parts of a song which don’t feature them, or that the notes coming out of their instruments are different colours depending on who composed the song? Greatest sound test mode of all time, by far.

Forgotten Land’s movement seems basic on the surface, but thanks to abilities it has more to play around with than it’s being given credit for. Drill gives you what’s basically an air dash, Ranger lets you hover a bit without using up Kirby’s float, Needle gives you an initial speed boost, etc. But even if it didn’t have nuances like these, that wouldn’t be a knock against it – it’s not uncommon to see Rayman 2 brought up in the conversation of the best ever 3D platformers (rightly so), and it hasn’t much more to its name in this respect than his trademark hovering. That’s because its obstacles are packed together so densely that you’re never really crying out for a long jump or a slide or whatever else. Forgotten Land’s the same, except abilities are multifaceted enough that you have more wiggle room for player expression regardless. You’re not gonna be hitting those target times in Treasure Road without some tricks, kiddos.

Looking at Forgotten Land’s abilities in terms of how few there are also seems myopic considering how smartly they’re implemented. Yeah, there are “only twelve,” but those twelve each cover a bunch of niches that used to be spread across multiple abilities. Is Wheel really needed when Forgotten Land’s version of Needle does everything it did and more? Would Stone be much use when Mouthful Mode’s cone is basically that already, except it doesn't take away whatever ability you have equipped? The variety of older Kirby games is all here, it’s just been achieved with less. Chuck in all the different ability variants (which wisely aren’t just straight upgrades and have pretty distinct purposes) and you’ve got a formula that not only stays fresh throughout the whole game, but which also gives you even more reasons to revisit the top notch bosses and experiment with the sandbox of tools on offer. Fighting Meta Knight in 3D is everything I dreamed it would be as a kid, and he as well as others get even better in the post-game.

Part of me wondered if I’d put too much thought into all this, but Kirby shouldn’t be held to a lower standard just because of his target audience. As the excellent C.S. Lewis would say, “A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children isn’t a good children’s story in the slightest.” The quality of and care that’s gone into Forgotten Land’s obvious, no matter who you are or what you look for in games. In the best way possible, it really does have something for everyone, except maybe if you’re a conspicuously absent Waddle Doo.

Hey, Kirby... thanks for everything.

Raphaël Colantonio’s decision to leave Arkane stemmed from wanting to get away from the bloated-ness and inefficiency of AAA game development – he often used the example of how chairs would take 2 days to model during the making of Prey 2017, while during the days of Arx Fatalis it was closer to 2 hours. So how’s his first experiment in scaling down to the indie realm gone? Pretty well, all things considered. I’ve felt for a long time now that Colantonio is one of the best game directors currently working and I’m happy to say that Weird West is another solid attestation to that, with the caveat that it takes a good while before it clicks.

For anyone who’s familiar with immersive sims, the most immediately offputting part about Weird West is its camera perspective. I almost fell prey to this myself, but once you become more comfortable with the game, you’ll start to realise that all the juicy emergent goodness that makes this design philosophy (or, if you dare, this genre) tick is still there, even if you’re not witnessing it from the same point of view as your character. More than once, I set off an unintended chain reaction of events via independent but interlinking gameplay systems that ended up revealing a new path through an area or which allowed me to complete a quest in a roundabout, unscripted way, and these sorts of organic, player-directed experiences are what Looking Glass Studios ultimately predicated the term upon in 1997. Where so many games popularly touted as living up to the definition just don’t, Weird West surely does.

Environmental interactivity arguably doesn’t quite approach the craziness of Prey 2017, but Weird West’s integration of status effects into its physics engine gives it a leg of its own to stand on. I’m a huge fan of how soaked containers dynamically fill up with water for loads of reasons, but special mention also goes to the sheer amount of stuff you can set on fire, because there’s nothing quite like accidentally burning down an entire farmstead or patch of forest in the process of fending off an ambush. I like how these properties are applied to character abilities too because of the room for experimentation it allows, especially when you combine several at once. I particularly enjoy secreting poison pools as the Pigman and then setting them alight with explosive shotgun shells to make a porky mini-nuke on demand, but the beauty of games like this is that I'll probably look back on a current favourite tactic like that and eventually think of it as rudimentary compared to what's possible when you dig deeper into its systems.

Weird West’s story is more interesting than it’s being given credit for on here, but I don’t blame anyone for tapping out before it gets to the point where you can say that. I get the need to ease people into an unorthodox setting with a vanilla premise, but Jane Bell’s narrative hook goes beyond vanilla and pivots itself on something that you as a player have no reason to care about. Jane might be fussing about where her husband is, but I’m not. Who is he to me? It runs the risk of driving a wedge between the player and their character, but the other four protagonists (especially the one immediately after Jane) more than make up for this in terms of intrigue and how elegantly they fill the “blank slate player avatar” role, albeit not quite as perfectly as Morgan Yu.

In terms of niggles, the movement comes to mind. Dishonored 1 and Prey 2017 have some of the most liberating, intrinsically satisfying movement in the medium – you explore every nook and cranny of Dunwall and Talos I not because you're told to, but because it feels so good to do it that you naturally want to. Despite the impressive size of its world, I never felt that same enticement in Weird West because its movement options are so paltry in comparison. And how’s about those character portraits not matching their models? Like, at all? I’m willing to chalk this up to a case of “small indie company please understand,” because I can’t imagine anyone actively wanted lean, bearded, grizzled veteran gunslingers to share the same in-game appearance as (oddly abundant) overweight, alcoholic Asian women. It’s true that this camera angle allows for some mental abstraction on the player’s part – Fallout 1&2, both big influences on Weird West, use one animation for loads of different stuff – but past a certain point, I feel like I’m being asked to deny what’s in front of my eyes. Or even what’s happening around me, sometimes, considering how often my companions would try attacking invincible children or be rendered immobile by an ankle-high step, the deadliest of all the west’s creatures.

In the grand scheme of things, though, issues like these are probably worth looking past. Immersive sims have been around for longer than I’ve been alive, and in that time, there's not been nearly as many breakout hits or unambiguous commercial successes as you'd assume from the notoriety of examples like Deus Ex or System Shock; we’re pretty fortunate to still be getting any new spins on the formula at all. And as a new spin on the formula, Weird West’s definitely an impressive first showing for WolfEye, but also one with more than a few holdovers of the days when its staff were still under the watchful eye of Bethesda’s investors – hopefully their newfound freedom permits them to become a bit bolder and weirder from here on out.

It’s a mercy to forget, but you shouldn’t forget Jack’s game. Sweet music, a story that ends up being surprisingly affecting by the end and an accessible yet slick combat system all add up to form a legit great ARPG that’s much more than what the post-post-ironic meme culture surrounding it would have you believe. Comparisons to Nioh are easy, but leaving it there would be reductive; Stranger of Paradise has plenty of ideas that help it stand on its own two feet and which I’d like to see carried forward into future iterations of this genre.

The star of the show is probably the job cancelling system. Being able to instantly cancel special moves by switching to another job makes combat a real sandbox for creativity – the first time I remember instinctively saying “oh shit” out loud was when I scooped up a bunch of enemies with Aeroga, switched to Ronin and wiped them all out with one fully charged slash that would’ve left me vulnerable otherwise, but that kind of thing is only really scratching the surface of what’s possible. Throw in one of the more fun magic systems this side of Dark Messiah, customisation of your combo trees and party members, experimenting with enemies’ hit reactions (like launching them into the air or splatting them against walls), directional attacks, stealing enemies’ attacks like a human Kirby, etc. and you’ve got a really robust set of mechanics that invite replays just by virtue of how much variety’s on offer.

In particular, I like what an emphasis Stranger of Paradise puts on positioning. Soul bursting an enemy causes a small AOE explosion that damages nearby enemies’ break gauges and sends them flying, which gives you more to think about in terms of timing than just exploiting i-frames. Inputting a direction when you job cancel makes Jack dodge in that direction, which can and will often save your ass in a pinch on top of giving you the drop on your opponent (accentuated by the fact that you get automatic crits when hitting an enemy from behind). Bosses tend to have a specific body part or other quirk that can crippled in some way, rewarding you for being in the right place at the right time by staggering them or occasionally disabling some of their more troublesome moves. All good stuff that gives you a bunch to consider when it comes to the simple act of just moving around.

Anyway, how’s the music? I mean, good God. How am I supposed to not like a game that’s launching an all-out assault on my eardrums with a constant stream of phat beats like this, or this, or this? It’s sick, in other words, but it offers more types of tunes than even these. I’m a big fan of the Nier-esque choir that kicks in during the fight with Tiamat, for example, or the watery acoustic guitars that string you along through the two forest levels. Mizuta & co. knocked it out of the park.

I won’t give much away story-wise, because the whole second half really deserves to be experienced yourself, but I will say it’s nice to have one that gets better as it goes along for a change. By the end of Stranger of Paradise, which is well executed enough that even the initially weird timeskip at the very beginning starts to make sense, I was more eager to see what came next than with most modern games I’ve played which got a lot of praise specifically for their stories. Part of the credit for this surely goes to the voice actors, most of whom are surprisingly relatively new to the industry, because I can’t imagine Jack & f(r)iends with any voices other than the ones they have. Mocean Melvin in particular said he made a point of researching Final Fantasy to really sell his role, and I think it shows. Case in point: Lich's introductory cutscene is already legendary, and anyone who's played up to that point will know what I'm talking about.

This isn't all to say that Stranger of Paradise doesn’t have a few issues, of course. In contrast to internet hyperbole, the level design never really dips below ‘functional,’ but it could still stand to be a bit more interesting. 150+ hours on the PS3 version of Dragon’s Dogma has made me basically immune to caring about framerates, but it’s still worth mentioning that SoP is a little wonky in that regard (though never to the point where it affects parrying). Visually, it would’ve helped if the contrast had been dialled down a smidge too – I sometimes found it hard to see where I was going in the (still good) penultimate level in particular before I eventually caved and turned the brightness up.

Overall, though, it’s too enjoyable in too many ways for this stuff to weigh it down much. And it’s got heart, dagnabbit. Did you know that despite being introduced in FF2, Amano drew concept art of a Behemoth for FF1, which until recently was the only instance of it ever having wings? And then along comes Stranger of Paradise, FF1 prequel-sequel-reimagining extraordinaire, featuring a Behemoth with wings? Bellissimo, says I. A thousand chef’s kisses. That's not all in the way of small, lovingly crafted details either - pay attention to the colour of Jack's hand as he finishes off the final boss.

Between NEO TWEWY and this, I can only hope Square keep hold of whoever is greenlighting all these poorly marketed but really good ARPGs that feel tailor-made to my tastes. If Stranger of Paradise’s DLCs are at all comparable to the Niohs’ quality-wise, it’ll only keep going higher in my estimation and it’s already pretty up there. Can’t wait to see more of Jack’s antics, whether there or in future spinoffs (fingers crossed).

Until then, goodbye... Jack.

The only game company that always instils a tinge of excitement in me whenever I boot up a game for the first time and see their logo is, or was, Japan Studio. Even when a game they produced wasn’t necessarily great (and they often were), it was almost always a safe bet that it’d at the very least be different from everything else. They were the embodiment of the happy medium between creativity and just the right size of budgets & teams to actualise that creativity without corporate meddling getting in the way. Patapon represents the very best of this sort of thing.

There’s still nothing quite like it today, even conceptually. Who’da thunk that rhythm and strategy would go so well together? Unlike most strategy games, Patapon piles on the pressure via music – you have to issue a command to your army every four beats or else they’ll stumble over, lose their combo streak and be unable to accept commands for about a second. It creates this balancing act where you have to constantly juggle quick decision-making, precise timing and your ability to keep a cool enough head to follow the 1-2-3-4 rhythm while dealing with rival armies drowning your screen in projectiles and/or big monsters trying to nibble on your army of eyeball people. It sounds intimidating, but it’s made easier by the absolutely expert touch of having a small border around the screen that pulsates in time with the rhythm, meaning that the timing is always being communicated to you via your peripheral vision as well as the music itself.

There’s that, and there’s also the fact that Patapon rewards you for doing well in equal proportion. Issue ten commands in a row and you’ll enter the Fever state, significantly buffing your army, but you can get it as early as with three commands if you time your drumbeats perfectly (signalled with louder, clearer, relentlessly satisfying drum noises). Keep up the offensive against a boss for long enough and they’ll stagger, not only cancelling their next attack but also causing them to drop either money or rare items, which you can then use to make stronger soldiers. Regularly switch up the composition and equipment of your army and you’ll be able to exploit weaknesses of certain creatures that a lazier player might not even notice – burn the limbs off of a boss with fire weapons to remove one of its more dangerous attacks, for example, or get rid of your cavalry to more easily sneak up on game animals (since the scent of horses spooks them off). It’s deceptively deep in a lot of ways.

Patapon’s excellence doesn’t stop there, though. Another one of my favourite parts about it is the weather system. Different weather patterns occur randomly in almost every mission in the game, which means they rarely ever play out the same way. Strong winds can either limit or extend the range of your projectiles, while rain can mask your scent or put out fires, and lightning strikes can either help or hinder you in any given battle. The best part is you can (temporarily) manipulate the weather yourself, but you have to sacrifice your Fever to do it, adding yet another layer to the strategic side of things – is the temporary advantage worth becoming slower and weaker until you can get your Fever back again? Decisions, decisions.

This part probably goes without saying, but every ounce of the game oozes charm. Rolito’s art is minimalism done right. The Patapons aren’t much more than eyeballs with limbs and hat, but that’s all you really need to be able to convey their character – this even has an in-game purpose, since they start to look angry once they’re in range of an enemy. If Sony were actually capable of holding on to any of their potential mascots, these fellas would be a shoe-in; I have no data to back that up, but my mum has started to refer to them as “those wee people,” so I’d say they’re pretty recognisable. Market analysis aside, their little speech bubbles during battles always get a smirk out of me, the soundtrack is the perfect mix of bizarre and catchy, and the story has a nice storybook-like presentation that wraps it all up with a nice, adventurous bow. It’s got a ton of soul put into it for sure.

This ended up being a bit longer than I thought it would, but Patapon deserves being gushed about a bit - not just because its average score on here is bewilderingly low for how brilliant it is, but also because it's doubtful we'll see anything like it again any time soon. Japan Studio were always one for taking risks and bucking trends, or facilitating that sort of thing in cases like this where they were mainly producers, and Patapon’s a fitting addition to that lineage. Their dissolution was one of more than a few semi-recent things which pretty much confirmed that Sony are heading in a direction that isn't really for me anymore, but games like Patapon will always have a sort of archival value in that they hearken back to a time when they were bursting at the seams with creativity.

Don’t cry because it’s over, though. [Daba-daba-dabapon because it happened.]( https://i.imgur.com/kR3HKJs.png)

Why is it that the itty bitty sprite-based Fallouts let me blow up a locked door or pry it open with a crowbar, but this shiny, hundred million dollar PS4 game doesn’t?

I’m implying that Fallout 4’s more primitive than a game almost two decades its senior, but that isn’t being completely fair. In some ways, it’s the most complex one yet. Armour & weapon customisation is the most fleshed out it’s ever been, letting you not only personalise each of your character’s individual limbs or every component of a gun, but also the stat bonuses they offer. Power armour now requires some resource management just to wear it, while also being so heavy that you have to slowly walk underwater rather than swim, causing you to think more carefully about traversal than in prior entries. Settlement building lets you create custom-built homes nearly anywhere you want and set up trade routes between them via procedurally generated NPCs, not only helping the world feel more alive but also allowing you to contribute to its liveliness. So on and so forth.

This is all great; one might even say that it just works. But nearly all of the fresh ideas Fallout 4 introduces either come at the expense of something else or don’t fully capitalise on their potential. The deeper armour customisation would be more impactful if the RPG elements weren’t almost totally gutted, while weapon customisation is enormously lopsided in favour of guns. Power armour excludes you from using fist weapons, which is somewhat accommodated for by having arm pieces that boost your unarmed damage, but still feels oddly limiting and detracts from the power fantasy that it’s trying to sell. Creating settlements adds some much needed dynamism to the game world, but it’s at odds with the story’s urgency and environments are barely interactive otherwise, with invisible walls still regularly cordoning off the slightest of inclines – this one feels especially egregious considering Bethesda themselves already came up with the solution to this in 1996, i.e. Daggerfall’s climbing system.

Thanks to all of this, it’s tempting to think of Fallout 4 as a game which takes a step back for every step forward. A more unambiguous step back, though, is its use of a voiced protagonist. I’d carefully modelled my character after Waingro from Michael Mann’s Heat in the hopes of getting it on (read: being a murderous nonce), but my motivation to carry this out was killed pretty much off the bat. The Sole Survivor isn’t some malleable blank slate no-name from a nondescript Vault, or tribe, or post office – he or she’s very much their own set-in-stone character, a pre-war ex-military family man or woman with a tone of voice so affable it puts your local Tesco staff to shame and a love for their son so integral to their identity that it’s the catalyst of the story. There’s not much room for imagination. You have to set up a bunch of mental barriers before you can really treat Fallout 4 as an RPG, whether it be handwaving the fact that much of what you plan to do throughout the game is going to be grossly out of character or trying to ignore the inherent disconnect between you and the Sole Survivor if you happen to not particularly care about Shaun.

To this end, Fallout 4’s dialogue system’s gotten a lot of flack, but I don’t really mind it; if nothing else, it offers more variety on average than Skyrim’s did. Part of where it really falters, I think, is the contextualisation of skipping through dialogue. Interrupting people with bored “uh huh”s as they suggest where you might find your kidnapped son is kind of hilarious, but as far as immersion goes, it’s something the game would’ve been better without. The dynamic camera angles during conversations also could’ve used some work – my introduction to the mayor of Diamond City was an extreme close-up of a blurry turquoise girder, and the camera haphazardly cuts between first & third person often enough that it sometimes feels like watching Don’t Look Up with fewer random shots of Jennifer Lawrence’s boots. What doesn’t help things is that conversations themselves just generally aren’t up to scratch with the pedigree of this series; it’d be easy to look past all of this if Fallout 4 had any Lieutenants, or Masters, or Frank Horrigans, or Joshua Grahams, but it doesn’t really. At its peak, the dialogue and voice acting only ever feel vaguely acceptable, which is a bit of a shame considering it claims descent from the game that popularised the concept of talking the final boss to death.

I generally prefer to avoid being a negative Nancy unless I can use it as an opportunity to draw attention to things I love, which is why I keep bringing up Fallout 4's predecessors. I can't help but feel that Fallout used to be more than this. Fallout 1 was so laser focused on delivering an open ended role-playing experience that it’s (deservedly) credited with revitalising the genre; there are a lot of things Fallout 4 does well enough, but I don’t know if you can really say where its focus lies. It’s competent as a looter shooter to turn your brain off to, but it’d be a better one if it wasn’t also trying to be an RPG, and it’d be a better RPG if it had gone with just about any premise or protag other than the ones it has. Despite having so much more money behind it, it feels so cobbled together in comparison.

Looting plastic forks from decrepit buildings while fending off mutants and ghouls is fun, but if that’s the kind of experience you’re after, I’d recommend just walking around Belfast at night instead.