I remember being truly caught by the first trailer announcing Ravenlok, but it's taken until Xbox Games Pass told me it was leaving to take the punt and see how much its child-friendly design and aesthetic would hold me back. 4 hours later, I have loved this game.

A beautiful art style combined with a fun and well-realised world results in heaps of interesting, fun environments, cool critters and mostly very enjoyable bosses. There are moments of almost wonder; from the first time you enter The Void to the final shot over the balcony of your adventures. I was often caught and charmed, and actually took breath to take in what looked out in front and beyond me. The gameplay is serviceable but fun, though I never used my shield and I tackled the first two bosses without realising there was a level-up mechanic (this is crucial.) The soundtrack was also quite wonderful.

Short, beautiful, endearing, fun. I really look forward to what Cococucumber do next.

I'd been sitting outside the final boss for a good year so it was time to put this to bed; I was never going to go back to any DLC or secret portrait worlds any time soon.

I finished my first Dark Souls, my first proper Soulslike. That's a crazy feeling. I didn't always do it the hard way; I fought with NPCs, I fought with friends, I got guided to shortcuts and found bonfires I would have refused to have played the game without. But it still feels very special. Maybe for the next run, I'll try and play blind.

I doubt it. There's a shared experience that makes this invaluable to me, and my run feels like a shared achievement, and I'm genuinely like privileged to not have done it alone.

It's janky. The boss runs suck. i-frames are franky a ridiculous mechanic. It's too dense in its secrets; too much undiscovered, too much too complicated. Levelling feels pointless, upgrading equipment isn't obvious. I never saw a legendary weapon, I never wore a single piece of cool armor because slow-rolling was ass. Level design ranged from outstanding to incredibly, incredibly poor.

But it's an unforgettable experience in an unforgettable world. And I did it.

It almost feels impossible to review this without leaning into Letterboxd shitposting so really I'm not sure I should try.

That said, I played this game because of the allure of both:
1) getting the opportunity to date my favourite character from the last Doctor Who run
2) and to ironically indulge in the cringe.

Honestly, by the end, it wasn't entirely all cringe. The acting, at times, is a little immersion breaking, and one date in particular was too caricature to be believable, but for the most part I actually immersed myself in the running threads and genuinely began to feel things as my dates reduced to one. I was hurt when Shaina dug me out for being a "leftie", and when Grace dropped her hardened shell in our second date I regretted writing her off in her first.

I went for the girl I wanted and, unlike more horny games of the genre, didn't receive some big pay off for my time; I just got a relatively earnest look at back at what it was like trying to forge connection in a time when you couldn't leave your house, and empathising with my own experiences a little more than I ever had done. I went back for a couple more dates after that, laughed at some of the cringe, yes, but also asked myself: I wonder what that third date with Grace looks like. I imagine I will find out.