Unreal Life, a game about a girl named Hal who has lost her memories. She finds she can read an object's past by touch, through the help of a kind AI traffic light. She will then be sent to suffer through a gauntlet of the most obtuse, senseless, and slow RPGmaker style puzzles imaginable. All for a chance to meet her teacher, Miss Sakura, who is the singular link she has to her past.

Was it worth it? All those hours of slowly walking around aimlessly, trying to figure out what the game could possibly want from me? I suppose it was. The game has a very solidified style that it presents and it does it well. Visually, its perfectly crafted and beautiful to look at. The story it tells and the mystery that comes along with it was very interesting to me, and I appreciate how it tries to break the mold in several ways. For example, I really enjoyed how it presented Hal's memory flashbacks. They were confusing and violent and often unexpected, and I liked how they kept some vaugeness as to what exactly is happening until the very end. Stories like these where reality is clealry warped arent always best completely explained, as attempting to do so might just completely deflate any sense of electricty the plot has generated. I was worried this game was going to go down a stereotypical path (youre a serial killer!!! this whole world is fake and in your head!! Youre craAazy!!!!) but I'm more than pleased on the emphasis Unreal Life puts on the power of imagination and of yourself. The message the ending portrays and its resolution are a good one, and I'm glad to have read it.

However, this game is held back a lot by its gameplay. If you have a game that is mostly story oriented, any gameplay that occurs should work along with that and never obstruct the player too much. It would be a good thing, for example, to not add the most horseshit, time consuming puzzle you can think of and instead maybe just leave that out all together. I hate puzzles to begin with but I hate them even more now as they seem to love popping up in otherwise good games just to make them worse. The speed at which the character moves, the lack of direction or hints, and the general clunkiness of some of the puzzle mechanics introduced are all parts of the reason that these puzzles simply suck. The ones in the beginning half of the game arent so bad, but they always teetered on frustrating. While the later half of the game had me in tears trying to figure out just what I was doing wrong. Unreal Life would of benefitted greatly from some kind of hint system... considering you have a hyperintelligent AI with you, I dont think it'd be too unreasonable.

Overall, the story is very sweet and well thought out, except for the whole car crash thing which resolves in the same manner as a whoopie cushion deflates. Im pretty bummed this didnt have as big an impact as it could due to how frustrating it was to play, but I dont regret my time spent with it at all.

shoutout to the moss ball with the same name as me. Shes great. And round.

Going from Mario 64, to this...is a biiig step up in quality for me lol. I mean dont get me wrong, I liked 64 and appreciate it for what it is and I had fun with Sunshine...but this...this was both the perfect combination of pure fun, beautiful setting's, variety of levels and mechanic's and difficulty. Like some levels are just pure fun and easy, others later on are for those who want a little bit of a challenge kind of thing. And Mario in this game controls perfectly, even with my slightly dodgy controls. Not once unlike with 64 and Sunshine did I complain to Mario that he's not jumping high enough or curse at him. Because in this one, if I died or got hit, it wasn't the games dodgy mechanic's, it was usually my fault. Also the music in this game is just phenomenal, like, I could listen to it all day long. The number of beautiful or tense or happy or pure awesome tracks in this game is amazing, in fact I will probably go and save the tracks to my music library later.

The only downside I can possibly see is the wii controls (or wii like switch controls), if your not used to the wii controls for beginner users it might feel off or control weirdly but it wasn't a problem for me since the wii was basically my first console.

Honestly, I can go off on how great this game is for a long time and compliment every part about this game, because it is amazing and in my opinion, revolutionary for its time as a wii game and for how the game works but then this review would be way too big. So I will say, overall, this game is just the perfect mario game and it is a must play. It is so much fun, so pretty and unique in every galaxy you go to and is one of the pinnacle points for me in terms of Mario games. Cant wait to play Mario Galaxy 2.

Phantom Liberty. Let me start by being brief: If you own Cyberpunk 2077, you owe it to yourself to experience this expansion to the game. Why is that? There's a myriad of reasons, but the one I wish all 2077 owners could experience is Dogtown. Why Dogtown? It is beautifully designed. You'll first see it on the map, spanning just a couple of football fields out next to Pacifica, and you may think to yourself, "Dang. That is not a big area." On paper, it's not. But every INCH feels used for a quest or a hidden item or something. The verticality of places on top of places on top of places goes beyond anything that the base game has ever even tried attempting, and it just makes Dogtown feel so much more DENSE and alive than some of the busiest streets of Night City. It was something that I continued to play around with and explore for over 40 hours, hardly leaving to go into the base game. I hope the team takes the same approach as they expand Night City's innards, in the successor game.

But what of the story, the characters, the new mechanics, gigs, etc.? They're all fantastic. First, the main plotline. I thought this was done excellently. There are 4 endings to just Phantom Liberty, plus you can unlock a new ending to the base game. These are some of the best quests in the game, brought to life by the lovely combination of acting, writing, game design, and original score. Making decisions in Phantom Liberty feel like they matter, investigating characters beyond the required dialogue always feels relevant and rewarding, and the moments that are supposed to pack-a-punch, absolutely hit home.

I've played enough Phantom Liberty to have experienced all four of the expansion's endings, and all four of them are powerful. Their finales rival many of the base games' best moments. They all feel emotionally heavy, with their sense of gravitas. Not to mention the full-on base game ending, which surprisingly exceeded my expectations. Without spoiling much, I'll say that I do not like the new ending--but I respect the developers for being bold enough to take me there, a place I never thought I would be curious about. It is marvelously done. It is an ending the game needs. It is one you should experience.

The new character inclusions of Reed and Songbird are great. They have excellent dialogue. Their motivations are clear and clever. I think "spy-craft" was the perfect genre for this story and these characters, all the elements work well together. I didn't get attached to Reed/SoMi as much as say, Judy, but they both give powerful performances, enough to make me care about their characters and the story at hand. Other characters around Dogtown are excellent as well, and the stories told through gigs, and optional dialogue I thought were some of the better world-building in this entire game. The developers did a fantastic job.

Speaking of gigs, I think all of Dogtown's gigs are pretty fun and memorable. It's amazing how environmentally different the gigs are in such a small area. Dilapidated cyberware museum, overgrown greenhouse, construction site, fancy bar, I mean the variety of the locations is just awe-inspiring, I am so impressed that they were able to cohesively shove all of this in here, and they all make a big impact in helping each gig feel unique.

There are a couple of gigs that don't feel unique... after you've played them a few times. A bunch of airdrops land around Dogtown from time to time and spawn a bunch of difficult henchmen. These have some exceptionally great loot, and getting to it can be a bit of a challenge. While these constantly spawn, there is a noticeable finite amount of locations, so you're bound to experience all of the scenarios eventually. The other activity is this car-jacking gig that'll randomly appear, where you steal a car, and get it to a safehouse. This also has some random elements like, where to drop off, if enemies are chasing you, if there's a time limit, that sort of thing. These, like airdrops, are fun at first, but quickly wear out their welcome. I'm glad they both exist in the game though, for what it's worth.

Beyond all of this, there are some new abilities that you can get in Phantom Liberty that make V insanely overpowered. This, combined with the ripperdoc who sells iconic cyberware allowed me to kick things up a notch. It was really fun unlocking these, and becoming an unkillable cyberpsychotic god-being in Dogtown. No notes!

Overall, again, I can't express how excellent Phantom Liberty is. I've played over 200 hours of the base game, and I'm here to say this expansion is some of the best that it has to offer. That said, I encourage new players to play through the entire base game first, THEN purchase Phantom Liberty. It'll be much easier to appreciate the genius of the expansion after you've played it all through. For returning players... I wish I were you and could experience it all for the first time over again. This is something special. Again, congrats to the devs for making an extraordinarily fun, timeless banger of a video game expansion. Catch me on the streets of NC, and remember chooms: The Game is Fixed.

I'm shattered. No game has made me sob this hard. I often say "I'm crying" when I watch, read, or play something sad, but that's mostly exaggeration. I just tear up and very rarely actually cry, but no, I straight up loud sobbed after finishing this. I broke down. My face contorted and couldn't hold back a stream of tears for half an hour straight. My lips were quivering and I was groaning and I could barely breathe; I almost never respond this intensely to things.

Stories about apocalypses normally benefit from their own silliness. These narratives never feel real; they're either too fun, dramatic, or action-packed to have substantial weight. But Goodbye Volcano High is exceptionally hard to swallow.

These feel like actual teenagers. They have real interests, their diverse identities are relatable, their dialogue sounds genuine, they mess around naturally, their tabletop sessions have all these little details and comments that make them feel like the ones I've had, they have awfully relatable casual conversations, and their issues are grounded. For a game about dinosaur people, I always felt like these kids were human.

When you take some of the most real feeling characters I've met in any game and have them face the existentialism that arises from fears of an apocalypse, I was constantly on edge. This is a story where its characters have to grapple with the inevitability of their deaths, and at no point was I not deep in thought regarding their fate. Their happiness, each tuft of fun, and all of its love and positivity is carried by the gargantuan burden of questioning what will happen when that asteroid hits.

When characters make comments about "asteroid facts," describing things like "if you hit solid rock hard enough, it can liquify," it's some of the most disturbing shit I've seen in a game. It may seem tame in a vacuum, but when your world and characters are this convincing, the concept of a realistically approached end of the world is terrifying.

It's especially upsetting in the beginning, when everyone treats the asteroid as a joke, with folks making memes and using it as a crutch for humor. People claiming they wish the asteroid would just hit to get them out of certain situations is so painfully real. It's a behavior that actual people would showcase, and little moments like that make me think about our own existence and how little time we have.

Its narrative is tied to our most future-conscious period—senior year of high school, where we are expected to make definitive decisions on what we do for the rest of our lives—and those futures being shattered by an unavoidable natural disaster is heartbreaking. To see these kids lose their ambitions and dreams, and there is nothing they can do but accept their fates… it's far too fucking heavy for anyone at that age to have to go through. Just thinking about it nearly brings me to tears.

And I cannot put into words how much I relate to the protagonist. Fang failing to find acceptance from their parents, difficulties with their gender identity, conflicts and conversations with their brother, being pegged as the spoiled, selfish brat, and even something as simple as being Arabic... all of it feels so scarily relatable to my personal experience. Many people won't quite get that from it, and it is probably a huge contributor towards why Goodbye Volcano High felt so real for me, but I see myself in Fang more than I ever have in any fictional character.

Today, I'm flying across the Atlantic ocean to see my girlfriend for the first time. I can say a lot about Goodbye Volcano High, but the only thing that matters is that after finishing it, I want nothing more than to hug her as hard as possible. To value the people in my life and the short time we have. The few moments of happiness we can spare in something so ephemeral.

Goodbye Volcano High shattered me, but rather than it having a debilitating effect, I want to do better at cherishing the people I love.

Reggie Fils-Aimé famously said “if it’s not fun, why bother” during Nintendo’s E3 2017 showcase. For some, these have become words to die by. An easy phrase to parrot when the individual faces a system they can't come to terms with. Some see it as a harmless way of saying they don't enjoy what they're playing, but I have never appreciated its implications.

If your definition of “fun” equates to anything you like, this quote probably resonates with you. But I've rarely seen the word used that way, and instead, this obsession with fun’s necessity in games seems more damaging than anything.

“Fun” is fast, approachable, and easy to control. An immediate stoking of the attention span, constant engagement, or a light enjoyment lessened in friction. Some see Dark Souls as unfun due to its slow, heavy movement and methodical combat. Dark Souls 3 is “fun” because it's quicker and lighter; you can roll faster, further, and more often. Nothing is wrong with either approach, yet one is sometimes dismissed.

Not everyone defines the term this way, but I’ve seen it used to debase games with an unconventional design. Traditionally “unfun” foundations have a harder time finding their place in communities who won’t acknowledge its worth unless it’s immediately satisfying. I remember this phrase being used during Death Stranding. It was picked apart, labeled as “unfun” because it’s a package delivery walking simulator. Who wants to be a delivery man, right? Even “walking sim” has become dismissive, used to label things as lesser.

Regardless of Reggie’s intention in the full quote, which specifically emphasizes that games are also a journey, even inviting the player to “open their mind,” that snippet has shifted into a rallying cry for people to do anything but. If something must be “fun” to be worthwhile, and that definition of “fun” is remotely limited, it denies ideas that don't fit under a narrow bracket. It is a quote accompanied by frustrating ignorance.

Not everything needs to be fun. Other artforms aren't seen this way, so why are games different? Is it because they're interactive? Is interactivity meaningless without fun? Art is feeling, and there’s no single feeling a work has to evoke to be successful.

Playing Resident Evil reminded me of my stance on this.

It isn't fun. It's claustrophobic, stressful, and frustrating. No encounter, room, boss, or weapon is traditionally “fun.” It's an unforgiving, labyrinthian puzzle; a constant check of resources where memorizing rooms and locations is vital. Even saving the game is limited to a resource, one I often found myself without and had to make huge stretches of progress knowing one mistake could send me back an hour.

Bosses are a cold, calculated check of your mindfulness towards collecting and preserving as much ammo as possible. You enter a boss room, move only a little, and fire everything you have. They die and you move on. You wasted ammo, and that made progressing more difficult. No part of this balance between figuring out the path forward while wasting as few resources as possible was fun, alongside trying to figure out at what point the player should save.

Yet Resident Evil is enormously good and I’m enamored. I've reversed my tune on the Ink Ribbon system after years of avoiding it in other titles in the franchise. The fear that arises from knowing one mistake can ripple; your decision to not save means you're risking everything, or being too frugal by going nearly an hour without a save, brings rise to an unmatched tension.

Games don’t have to be fun to be worthwhile, successful, or good. Art is too complex, and limiting any medium in this way sucks. It’s not something to be afraid of, either. Fun absolutely rules, but I’m tired of people treating it as a necessity. I’m tired of being seen as lesser when expressing love for old, unconventional, or mechanically complex experiences. I’m tired of new things being inherently better because they’re faster, more fluid, and easier to control. No feeling is worthless and games can accomplish anything. Just keep an open mind, experience it, and vibe. Fun isn’t everything.

If you support that quote and think “that's not what fun is, it's just whether or not you like something,” then that's fine. We can disagree. But I’ve seen people use the requirement of “fun” to shit on non-traditional systems before. People shouldn’t be afraid to say something isn’t fun yet still love it. There's so much more to feel :)

Finally peace, at last...
I was looking forward to playing the full version of this game after playing the demo. But I was worried at the same time because I didn't really like the focus on parrying and the fact the enemies don't really get staggered.

Lies of P is a fairytale-inspired souls-like game which was not developed by From Software. There are many games that tried to capture the magic and feeling playing a From Software title but not many succeeded.
Sadly I have to say that I think that NEOWIZ & Round8 Studio didn't really succeed either. There are some cool weapon designs and the assembling mechanic is really great. It gives you the option to "customize the weapon the way you want it. With one exception, which excludes special weapons like those that can be purchased with the rare Egos. But if I have to decided I think I like the more badass design from Elden Ring's weapons more than a Wrench glued on top of a Police Baton from Lies of P.
The Victorian gothic city as a setting is pretty great and it reminded me a lot of Bloodborne which I just recently finished for the first time. But Bloodborne's setting is still superior. I liked that they included some easter eggs like the old Lady at the window. One small thing which I really appreciated was the symbol which shows up and tells you where you can complete a quest. The characters are all interesting but nothing too special and the lips are asynchron but that can be forgiven because this wasn't developed by the largest developer studio. Also, you can pet the cat once you become more human.

That's pretty much everything that I liked about this game, the boss enemies sometimes doesn't fit into the chapter. The whole chapter teaches you how to use status effects because the enemies of this chapter are weak to eat just so the big boss enemy is immune to it. The boss fights are also pretty unbalanced, some are bulletsponges and some are almost one hit kills. As mentioned above I just the Wrench combined with a Police baton and the fable arts attack does a ton of damage, up to 4-5 k damage.
But most of the time the fable arts attacks are pretty much useless because you have to farm them to fill up the attack bar. So I didn't use the fable arts against the fodder enemies or mini boss enemies but also didn't use them in the boss fights because either the fable arts bar was empty or I knew that I would die anyway after using the special attack in the boss fight. I think it would have been a lot better if the fable arts bar would be refilled completely after dying so you can actually use them in the boss fights. I know there is an upgrade but this only refills one bar and it's pretty much useless. As I said in the beginning, some enemies don't get staggered or knocked back when you hit them but they stagger you. Which ruined the gameplay a lot for me, sometimes an enemy staggers you so much that you can't really do anything. The arbitrarily attack chains were also a huge problem because sometimes the combos from the boss enemies are three hits long, sometimes 4 or even more. This way it was really hard to learn the pattern of the boss because I never knew how long his attack combo will last or when he hits me due to delaying his attacks. So I tried to block his combos but I was stunned after blocking 1 or 2 attacks so this wasn't an option so I tried to dodge but dodging 4-5 attacks resulted in a depleted stamina bar, leaving me unable to move and I still had to tank a hit or two.
When I successful dodged an attack I was often too far away from the boss too land a hit because the time window between the attacks is often too small. Or I have to use a healing potion after trying to parry and failing again due to these problems. The bigger the monster is, the more damage sponge it is becomes and it feels like it doesn't matter how much I upgrade my weapon, the healthbars still gets barely smaller. The AI from the specter is also really really stupid as hell, he runs in front of the boss and tanks every attack and is dead before the fight has really started. When I downed an enemy I often couldn't hit them when they were lying on the ground which could tip the scales. Pinocchio on the other hand falls to the ground so quickly and then the enemies will continue to be attack while you're lying on the ground so I often took a hit because your are stuck in animations for way too long. I also wasn't a fan of the fact that red attacks can only be parried and dodging was not viable, so I always ran away once I saw the "red light".
Many boss enemies rely on you to parry their attacks to break their block and there was no other option to fight them besides that. The disruption status effects which kills you immediately was also annoying like many boss fights like the second fight against the black rabbit brotherhood.

That concludes my little rant and yes I chose the "bad" ending so I didn't have to fight the last boss. Unfortunately I didn't enjoy this game as much as I wanted because you barely have any freedom to fight the enemies. If you were expecting something like Elden Ring, where you have dozens of ways to defeat the boss, then you should probably wait for a sale or skip this game and maybe try the new Lords of the Fallen which hopefully will be better.

Soulslike games ranked

Games finished in 2023 ranked

After 103 hours of playtime I have finally finished my first playthrough. I played it with two of my friends @Ruffy300 and @djoni1999 and only at the weekend that also explains why it took us 3 almost 4 freaking month to beat it. All of us have never play a CRPG before and even though we always wanted to play DnD we never did. One of the reason why I didn't buy it during early access was that I was really unsure if I would like this kind of game.

But oh boy did I enjoy it. To be honest I noticed that my concerns were pretty much unfounded after the character editor. The editor already demonstrated how many choices you have and me and my friends spend over 2h creating our characters. Even your race and background influences the world around you and how they react to you. One race may has an advantage in one of the goblin camps because this race in particular is seen as strong and the other doesn't has this advantage so you will be attacked immediately. Or you may decide to pick a jewelry because you like shiny objects. But it turns out that this jewelry is dedicated to a specific god and when you talk to Shadowheart about that she will tell you that she is mad/offended because she believes in a different god. These are just small examples of many big and small choices that will influences your game and these decision really make a difference, you feel and see that in the world around you and when you interact with certain characters. But unfortunately that doesn't apply for every race or class. I noticed quickly that some get left in the dirt while other are really strong. I love that all of the NPC's have voices and I know that this is not normal in this genre because it is a lot of work and money for the developers. As someone who hates reading long texts in games, I can say enough how much I appreciate that. It does so much for the immersion but also makes the NPC's feel more real. Shadowheart, for example, is such a well-written character with a fantastic backstory and the relationship which you can develop to here feels natural. Yes I romanced her and probably will always do that in every playthrough and the other which I liked a lot was Astarion even though he was in our party. The only reason why he wasn't is because you only have 4 slots. But I do have to say that once you have finished romancing a character or just finished their quest that character gets pretty lifeless. This means that my interactions with Shadowheart went from very frequent and almost after every battle or quest to almost never. The ending in particular was kinda disappointing, you get maybe one or sentences with the character you've just spent over 100 hours with and then it's over. I know that it would be almost impossible to include so many fleshed out endings for some many characters. But I still think that there could have been a better way to conclude the story with certain characters or give the characters more dialogue options with their favorite characters once they have completed the character specific quest. The thing that I made me laugh the most were the many hilarious moments which I and my friends had with Baldur's Gate 3. Doesn't matter if it's an enemy that my friend used as a weapon, throwing children at enemies or the one barn scene in act 1 (you know which one if you have seen it) which will probably haunt my dreams for the rest of my life. There were still many more moments and overall was the CO-OP fantastic with a few exceptions and I'm glad that it exists. For example sometimes we couldn't switch between party members or it was delayed, often one of us was stuck before or after a cut scene or the fact that the performance of the game wasn't the best while playing with friends. But these were just small details that rarely affected the overall gaming experience. Gameplay mechanics that seem unimportant or small often had an even greater impact on my experience, ice melts and turns into water, armor and your whole body gets bloody after a fight. For me these small details are very important for a great game. A game can be great without them but it often elevates a great game to a masterpiece and yes Baldur's Gate 3 is a Masterpiece and a miracle that it exists like this. The enemy design is also fantastic, one example is the Apostle of Myrkul and the world design in general is very detailed and you have a lot of places to explore, many of which I will probably be explore in my next playthroughs. The fights were a lot of fun once you found out which class you want to play but there are also a few fights which got really annoying due to the fact that the enemies decided to spam certain attacks like Cloud of darkness. The third act seems like them most unfinished act, the performance is bad due to the big city and the loading time is quit long, sometimes the sound was buggy during dialogues and the characters were silent, assets wouldn't load especially in the last big fights or the game decided to place the camera in some strange angles. Even with all of these technical problems and the lack of dialogue options for characters which quest you have finished, I still think that Baldur's Gate 3 is a masterpiece of game and it deserves every praise that it gets. The characters and questlines are fantastic and incredibly well written. There are some many ways of playing the game and you can do almost anything you could think of. This is a game an anomaly, simply because how much content you get,it's just an example of a top tier RPG and one of my favorite games of recent years. I even bought the game twice now, the PC version and the PS5 Deluxe Edition and I can't wait to discover more if this game in my next playthroughs. I can't thank you enough Larian Studios, thank you for creating this game, I will go back and play Divinity: Original Sin 1-2 now. Last but not least thanks to my two friends for playing this masterpiece for over 100 hours with me. I know I was a real pain in the ass every time I pushed you off a cliff or simply hit your summons because I was too stupid to notice who is my ally. It was an honor to experience this game together, THANK YOU

Edit by future me : I do appreciate it a lot that they also added a playable Epilogues.


Games I finished in 2023 Ranked

#2 in my List of Top 5 Games of 2023

Man, that last case is some bullshit. I pieced together the story events and understood what was going on easily enough, but putting the right words in the right spaces proved troublesome. I don't think the game is succeeding in the intended way if the real challenge is found in using trial and error to get the exact wording down when formulating a sentence. There were just too many potential variations with the noun selections. It didn't feel fair to me. And the hint system was useless because it was telling me things I already knew, so in the end I had to resort to an online guide. Yes, my pride took a major beating as a result.

Otherwise, business as usual. A really intriguing story told via only brief cutscene snippets and dialogue exchanges. Golden Idol does so much with so little. Analysing a scene, taking note of character interactions/visual cues and paying attention to all the minute details makes one feel like a true detective. I think the main game comfortably surpasses the DLC though, because it has plenty of those "Eureka!" moments, and when they come, piecing together the sentences in the Thinking screen usually goes smoothly. Also, I prefer the smaller-scale cases of the main campaign compared to the fewer-in-quantity-but-much-broader-in-scope cases of the DLC.

My personal GOTY for 2023. So much personality, so much charm, with phenomenal gameplay. The game basically turns the whole action game genre on its head with its rhythm mechanics. Controls are tight, precise and fluid, combo and special move executions literally always feel rewarding. The game is always keeping itself fresh by rewarding the player with exciting boss fights, a consistent flow of new mechanics that add to the game's superb action-rhythm gameplay, and charming characters. Lastly (and almost the most important part), the game has an excellent soundtrack. Play this game!!!