Persona is a really cool franchise because of its unique structure between the normal high school life and the go-save the-world dungeon crawler. You are constantly making decision after decision, effecting different parts of the game, which will then lead to new mechanics that mesh these parts back together so they don't feel separated from each other. Even when there is nothing interesting going on, you can usually just vibe to the great soundtrack. Still, there are some things about this game that are not as great as the rest of it. Generally minors should'nt be as heavily sexualized as here (or be sexualized in general), the individual arcs often feel underwhelming and most of the core issues that this game tackles are only presented superficially. Also the game is much to long especially compared to P3 and P4. At its core it is still a good game and very worth a playthrough.

I enjoyed the first Oxenfree game. It wasn't anything super special or something like that, but it was just a good experience overall. This one, for most of the runtime, just bored me a lot. It involves too much walking from point a to b for something interesting to happen and then returning to point a just to walk to point c then. This walking part takes up a lot of the game, and nothing really happens in those parts except a lot of dialogue between the two main characters. The finale was my favourite part of this game, as it strips away all the boring parts of it and just focussed on the good mystery and plot while tying the first and second game together. I feel like this game would have been much better if they had cut like 2 hours from it, so that it has a similar length as Oxenfree 1.

These Ace Attorney games really have it all. The story and particularly the ending is fantastic, the writing is strong from start to finish, the characters are uniquely designed and are as charming as ever and the music... chef's kiss. What I especially liked about it is how those different characters are integrated into this historic Victorian-era setting, which made the world much more believable in a natural way. As many have pointed out already, the pacing is probably the biggest weakness of these games. Everything just takes a bit longer than it should, and that is further amplified by most cases leaving a lot of loose ends that are left for the finale. The payoff is definitely there, as the ending is probably one of the greatest endings in all of video games, but the way to get there is very rocky. I kind of miss the character's already.

This remake of the Japan-exclusive spinoff brings the Yakuza series to feudal Japan. Instead of beating people up, you can now rip them to shreds with a katana or shoot them, or both at the same time! I really enjoyed my time with the story and characters, and as usual with Yakuza games, the side stuff is also great. I did not particularly like the heavy grind in this game, but I could ignore that part with the free sword DLC you get relatively well (otherwise this review would probably be a lot more negative). Also, the many bonding side activities were a bit too much for my taste. Other than that, I thoroughly enjoyed this entry, and I hope they bring Kenzan to the west too. Perfect game for the Steam Deck.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder marks the return of great 2D Mario games. The creativity displayed here is fantastic, almost every level has these wonder seeds which turn into very fun set pieces that are always unique. All the characters have much more expression to them, which made them feel much more alive than the usual random enemy number x. The variety of the levels is also great, and I never felt tired of certain mechanics. I kinda just would have like to see them do more with the badges, as right now they feel kinda tagged on. Also, the game was a little bit to easy for my taste, especially in the later levels they could have somewhat raised the difficulty a bit.

Phenomenally written game from start to finish. From the minute I booted it up, I could just feel the passion that was put into it. There really is no other game quite like this, a narrative game set in historical Germany in this very distinct art style and extremely close related to real world events (seriously it has a bibliography in the credits) while not being boring at all? And from a major publisher as well? Specifically, the structure of it is just as great because it is split in three different acts with major time jumps in between so that you can actually see how the choices affected different characters in their rural life. This is really a one of a kind project.

Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines is a weird game, that I enjoyed a lot in the first half of the game, but didn't as much in the second half. I think the biggest strengths it has are the (ironically) colorful cast of characters, the RPG elements, and the side quests. The main story is engaging at first, but kind of goes nowhere as the game goes on. I think my enjoyment also went down in the later parts because the game all of a sudden focused too much on combat, while I just wanted to soak in the strong world, atmosphere and characters. At the end of the day, it was still a good experience overall, and I definitely get why this games is viewed so highly.

I don't know who asked for Prince of Persia to become a repetitive collectathon, but this wasn't it. The structure of this game is very different from other PoP games as it is non-linear allowing you to go where you choose to go. The problem is that the four regions of this game are very similar in terms of their gameplay; only the scenario changes between them. After that, you need to randomly collect light bubbles until you can rinse and repeat the same thing over and over again. The abilities that kind of work as a reward are also pretty bad because all of them work pretty much the same. Sometimes when there is a platforming gauntlet thrown at you, it can feel pretty good, but overall, this was a very disappointing end to my 3D PoP journey.

It's Ark. You either love it or hate it, there is no in-between possible, as far as I know. I, for one, love it as I enjoy the gameplay loop of taming dinosaurs to gather more resources to tame better dinos to get even more resources. Obviously, it's still janky af. You will encounter a lot of bugs, the game can crash at any given point, and the performance leaves a lot to be desired. The remaster right now does feature a lot of improvements over the base game. Especially the base building is so much better compared to it. As the old content gets patched in, this will definitely be the better version of Ark.

Sunset Overdrive is definitely one of the... games I've played. I quite enjoyed the gameplay because when it clicked for me, I got into this flow state that only a few games managed to get me into. Movement is great, weapon and enemy variety is good, but honestly, I think the game would have benefited from a more linear level design such as Doom has. A linear approach could have amplified the moment-to-moment gameplay because as it now the unnecessary open-world elements distracted from the good gameplay. I also didn't enjoy the humor, quest design and low variety of scenarios. Aside from that, it's alright.

While I overall enjoyed my time in a new Fire Emblem game, I didn't come to love it anywhere close as I did with Three Houses. The cast of characters is great, the new engage mechanic opens up a lot of flexibility on how I want to play the game, and the combat animations really enhance the war fantasy that is portrayed here. On the other side, however, the game's social sim aspect is very superficial compared to its predecessor and the story is very cookie cutter RPG stuff. Let's see what the future holds up for Fire Emblem.

The Pale Beyond falls short because of three main reasons. Firstly, while the way the game presents itself with markers scattered across the current map at the time is fine, navigating it is sooo cumbersome even though it shouldn't be. Secondly, the save tree system doesn't work in a narrative game, with no easy way to skip all the talking. Thirdly, there isn't any feedback on how you are managing the resources, meaning that you could have already lost the game in week 15 or something but only find out until you're at week 24 hours later. I think there is a good game underneath all the dirt (or should I say the ice?) with the great concept, art style and setting, but the whole "game" part seems very lackluster.

Nobody Saves the World is an Action RPG made by the same studio as Guacamelee, which is perfectly reflected in the strong art style this game features. The art style really is the standout feature, though, as everything else is much more mixed. Dungeon design is very boring because there are minimal differences between them; exploration is hindered by a lot of roadblocks on the overworld, and especially the beginning felt very slow because there aren't as many options to play with. The way you can customize each class is pretty unique and offers a lot of different styles to play the game. Overall, I enjoyed it but will probably never touch again.