madeinheathen
2009
RESIDENT EVIL 5 is overall a strong and enjoyable multiplayer experience held down by occasional flaws, with a consistent flaw being how long some enemies take to kill its honestly crazy.
Some of the occasional flaws come in the form of bad puzzle design (specifically the lasers…), quick time events being scattered randomly throughout the game with no prior warning, bosses can be really confusing and have no obvious way to defeat them (especially the final boss, the correct method is not clear at all).
I definitely feel this game can wildly vary depending on who you’re playing with and if you are playing with AI or not so it makes sense why I’ve always heard a big difference in opinions with this game. But I’m glad I played it, was very enjoyable multiplayer and also made for a good first mainline Resident Evil game! I hope this gets a remake at some point in the style of how It Takes Two or Wolfenstein Youngblood work where you only need 1 player to purchase the game in order to play, it would probably be a hit.
Elijah’s review: https://www.backloggd.com/u/liquidddingle/review/1513245/
Some of the occasional flaws come in the form of bad puzzle design (specifically the lasers…), quick time events being scattered randomly throughout the game with no prior warning, bosses can be really confusing and have no obvious way to defeat them (especially the final boss, the correct method is not clear at all).
I definitely feel this game can wildly vary depending on who you’re playing with and if you are playing with AI or not so it makes sense why I’ve always heard a big difference in opinions with this game. But I’m glad I played it, was very enjoyable multiplayer and also made for a good first mainline Resident Evil game! I hope this gets a remake at some point in the style of how It Takes Two or Wolfenstein Youngblood work where you only need 1 player to purchase the game in order to play, it would probably be a hit.
Elijah’s review: https://www.backloggd.com/u/liquidddingle/review/1513245/
Truly the only game to replicate what it means to be a Katamari Damacy fan… overall outstanding stuff and builds upon the original game so much making it even more fun!!
I absolutely love games like this where you can just switch your brain off and have some mindless fun which also happen to be accompanied by a fun story! I loved the 5ish hours I spent with this and will definitely be checking the rest of the series out at some point! It’s not perfect it has its fair share of bugs and glitches which can be annoying but mindless fun so hey I don’t care.
SPOILER FREE UNTIL MARKER
The much awaited sequel to Final Fantasy VII Remake is actually real, wow. To kick things off I’ll say I really liked Remake and gave it a 8/10 on initial playthrough for reference.
I expected to dislike this game quite honestly and that was because of the pre release demo which was really disappointing and definitely doesn’t reflect the full game, it’s quite baffling to me it released in that form. My issues with the demo were generally the climb up to Nibel Mountain but also graphical issues which were quite horrible in performance mode which also stood true in the full game so I opted to play on graphics mode.
My favourite part about Rebirth is probably the combat, it’s excellent and feels so much more rewarding than Remake in the sense that the combat has so much more depth now and combat missions actually have you striving to play the best you can. I feel everything found in the combat is a heavy improvement from Remake but it also won’t make Remake hard to go back to, which I really quite like as I do plan to replay that at some point.
The rest of the gameplay can range from okay to great so I’ll break it down starting from ‘okay’. The segments where you are forced to walk at a slow pace are so excruciating I just wish they were all cutscenes, and it’s even worse when the ‘cinematic effects’ don’t even look good, this was also a big issue I had with Remake so I’m just used to it really but it’s no good going from a full sprint to a halt because your party member is saying what they think of the trees or something (i just made up an example but a lot of the time it’s meaningless). The overworld gameplay is fundamentally very good but I do have my issues with it, I loved the traversal it’s really fun and the modes of transport in the game are actually really fun, I was quite worried they would end up like the car in Final Fantasy XV which was basically on a track you couldn’t move. The world is mostly well designed but there are some oddities here and there, but that’s to be expected. Side content found in the overworld I personally found to be overwhelming so I stopped doing a chunk of it after the 3rd region in the game, but the quest trackers and map icons are really easy to understand so that’s not an issue at all, the non linear structure of the game also helps this compared to what you would find in Remake.
Without spoiling (that’s later, again, marked) I thought the story was great and had some deviations from the original story which we already knew going into this, and I’m quite happy about them. Something key I figured out myself to understand the story more is that the game is from Cloud’s point of view which is evident even in Remake due to some words Cloud is in denial about being redacted from the player, it’s interesting and there is more to support my claim here, but taking the game at face value I imagine you would find it to be really confusing.
I loved all the characters they’re all great just I wish Vincent was more present but I suppose that’s for the next game, just a bit annoying he’s with you for 3 chapters and he hardly shows up, which I suppose is the nature of his character but hey a quest would have been nice. Favourite characters were probably Barret and Cid, really liked what they did with them!
Music is excellent I’m quite literally craving for it to officially release it’s just that good. I quite liked the ending theme too but it’s definitely no Hollow.
Graphics were a grey area, sometimes they looked amazing and sometimes they looked like a mid budget PS3 title like Dead Island, personally it could be quite off putting at times especially when a flat texture is used as a background in a major cutscene (Midgar).
After this paragraph begins my spoiler section so I’ll wrap this up and say overall I believe this to be a really strong yet pretty flawed game, I’m on the edge between a 7 and 8 and you can’t give half scores on Backloggd so I’m going to settle at a 7 with Remake also being a certain 7 in retrospect.
SPOILERS BELOW
Again, spoilers!! Going into this everyone was wondering what was going to happen with Aerith pretty much and again spoilers!! I’m really happy with the deviation the story took in this regard with her being a ghost pretty much that only Cloud (and presumably Zack when he crosses worlds) can see, it makes a lot of sense since the ties the characters have together.
Zack’s segments are strange, they are all meaningless to me besides the opening and ending segments, the chunks found throughout the game should have just been one whole hour segment or something as I’m left wondering after every one if I get to fight as him again (which I was very happy about in the final boss!). Also something that has me wondering is Zack’s scene in Intermission, that has no place in the current story at all it leaves me thinking it’s just been retconned, it’s not too big of a deal but it’s certainly strange.
Sephiroth is really well portrayed here (and again it’s from Cloud’s POV, so there’s a lot of denial to be found) and his scenes in the final chapter are excellent it leaves the stakes so high for the third game that I’m quite sure that payoff for the wait is going to be well worth it.
The much awaited sequel to Final Fantasy VII Remake is actually real, wow. To kick things off I’ll say I really liked Remake and gave it a 8/10 on initial playthrough for reference.
I expected to dislike this game quite honestly and that was because of the pre release demo which was really disappointing and definitely doesn’t reflect the full game, it’s quite baffling to me it released in that form. My issues with the demo were generally the climb up to Nibel Mountain but also graphical issues which were quite horrible in performance mode which also stood true in the full game so I opted to play on graphics mode.
My favourite part about Rebirth is probably the combat, it’s excellent and feels so much more rewarding than Remake in the sense that the combat has so much more depth now and combat missions actually have you striving to play the best you can. I feel everything found in the combat is a heavy improvement from Remake but it also won’t make Remake hard to go back to, which I really quite like as I do plan to replay that at some point.
The rest of the gameplay can range from okay to great so I’ll break it down starting from ‘okay’. The segments where you are forced to walk at a slow pace are so excruciating I just wish they were all cutscenes, and it’s even worse when the ‘cinematic effects’ don’t even look good, this was also a big issue I had with Remake so I’m just used to it really but it’s no good going from a full sprint to a halt because your party member is saying what they think of the trees or something (i just made up an example but a lot of the time it’s meaningless). The overworld gameplay is fundamentally very good but I do have my issues with it, I loved the traversal it’s really fun and the modes of transport in the game are actually really fun, I was quite worried they would end up like the car in Final Fantasy XV which was basically on a track you couldn’t move. The world is mostly well designed but there are some oddities here and there, but that’s to be expected. Side content found in the overworld I personally found to be overwhelming so I stopped doing a chunk of it after the 3rd region in the game, but the quest trackers and map icons are really easy to understand so that’s not an issue at all, the non linear structure of the game also helps this compared to what you would find in Remake.
Without spoiling (that’s later, again, marked) I thought the story was great and had some deviations from the original story which we already knew going into this, and I’m quite happy about them. Something key I figured out myself to understand the story more is that the game is from Cloud’s point of view which is evident even in Remake due to some words Cloud is in denial about being redacted from the player, it’s interesting and there is more to support my claim here, but taking the game at face value I imagine you would find it to be really confusing.
I loved all the characters they’re all great just I wish Vincent was more present but I suppose that’s for the next game, just a bit annoying he’s with you for 3 chapters and he hardly shows up, which I suppose is the nature of his character but hey a quest would have been nice. Favourite characters were probably Barret and Cid, really liked what they did with them!
Music is excellent I’m quite literally craving for it to officially release it’s just that good. I quite liked the ending theme too but it’s definitely no Hollow.
Graphics were a grey area, sometimes they looked amazing and sometimes they looked like a mid budget PS3 title like Dead Island, personally it could be quite off putting at times especially when a flat texture is used as a background in a major cutscene (Midgar).
After this paragraph begins my spoiler section so I’ll wrap this up and say overall I believe this to be a really strong yet pretty flawed game, I’m on the edge between a 7 and 8 and you can’t give half scores on Backloggd so I’m going to settle at a 7 with Remake also being a certain 7 in retrospect.
SPOILERS BELOW
Again, spoilers!! Going into this everyone was wondering what was going to happen with Aerith pretty much and again spoilers!! I’m really happy with the deviation the story took in this regard with her being a ghost pretty much that only Cloud (and presumably Zack when he crosses worlds) can see, it makes a lot of sense since the ties the characters have together.
Zack’s segments are strange, they are all meaningless to me besides the opening and ending segments, the chunks found throughout the game should have just been one whole hour segment or something as I’m left wondering after every one if I get to fight as him again (which I was very happy about in the final boss!). Also something that has me wondering is Zack’s scene in Intermission, that has no place in the current story at all it leaves me thinking it’s just been retconned, it’s not too big of a deal but it’s certainly strange.
Sephiroth is really well portrayed here (and again it’s from Cloud’s POV, so there’s a lot of denial to be found) and his scenes in the final chapter are excellent it leaves the stakes so high for the third game that I’m quite sure that payoff for the wait is going to be well worth it.
Side Order is a stark contrast from the usual Splatoon campaign and I really appreciate that though I hope this isn’t the move going forward, I really did like this though, just prefer the formula of Octo Expansion of Splatoon 3’s regular story mode.
As a roguelike there isn’t any weapon centred levels and it’s quite unbalanced depending on what weapon you use, you’re going to struggle with a short range weapon a lot here not even to a fun degree. Regardless with the standard mid range weapons this game is really fun and challenging, picking the difficulty when given the opportunity was nice but also if you kept choosing easy or normal you get punished in the long run with rigourus challenges! I found myself going for hard missions most the time but if the ball missions were on rigourus I would always do that.
The story here is simple but let’s be real nobody is playing this for the story, they’re playing it for the challenge and fun. The skill card system is awesome but I found Pearl’s drone to be useless most of the time also I wish the new Splat 3 hosts were prevelant in this story mode but nope it’s Pearl and Marina for the 4th time, which yeah makes sense story wise but come on.
Overall I’m satisfied with this and had a lot of fun and rage with it at times but I don’t feel enough to do a full review here.
As a roguelike there isn’t any weapon centred levels and it’s quite unbalanced depending on what weapon you use, you’re going to struggle with a short range weapon a lot here not even to a fun degree. Regardless with the standard mid range weapons this game is really fun and challenging, picking the difficulty when given the opportunity was nice but also if you kept choosing easy or normal you get punished in the long run with rigourus challenges! I found myself going for hard missions most the time but if the ball missions were on rigourus I would always do that.
The story here is simple but let’s be real nobody is playing this for the story, they’re playing it for the challenge and fun. The skill card system is awesome but I found Pearl’s drone to be useless most of the time also I wish the new Splat 3 hosts were prevelant in this story mode but nope it’s Pearl and Marina for the 4th time, which yeah makes sense story wise but come on.
Overall I’m satisfied with this and had a lot of fun and rage with it at times but I don’t feel enough to do a full review here.
2011
This is genuinely an insult to the Super Monkey Ball series it’s insane. Such souless and easy level design with no substance whatsoever. This isn’t even a good portable game it’s just flat out bad. Uh, i can say the level themes are cool though.
Infinite Wealth (RGG8), the follow-up to one of my favourite games (Yakuza: Like A Dragon), is huge. That’s the best way to describe this game in basic terms and hence it will be extremely difficult to make a coherent review after first playthrough. Anyways I shall run through what I loved, liked and disliked in a bullet point format… (+ = positive, • = neutral, - = dislike)
+ Gameplay is exceptional, a giant step up from the already great gameplay of it’s predecessor. The strategy involved in the turn based combat is really fun and really rewarding! All the party members are great to play as, especially Kiryu, the way he breaks the turn based format is really good and very in character for himself and the series. You’ll also find yourself using items and poundmates a lot, really cool systems and way better than 7s versions.
+ The Dondoko Island minigame is actually fantastic, I heavily prefer it to business management from 7 and I LOVED that too, I did it in a few chunks completely seperate from doing story stuff. I loved it. Yeah.
+ The direction is excellent (performances, cutscenes, all that jazz), certainly the best in the series tied with the highs you find in Judgement (2018).
+ The maps you play on are really good, especially Hawaii as it is the main focus after all. The addition of Segways makes traversing these huge maps really nice! Kiryu’s Bucket List side story makes exploring the maps really fun too and it was quite emotional at times too.
+ I didn’t play all the minigames but the ones I did were really cool, especially Crazy Delivery and Miss Match!
+ The world always feels alive, even in the barren (at times) Yokohama, the new systems to engage the player with the world are very well rounded and never feel forced!
+ I loved the dual narrative split halfway through the game, but the pacing was really off in those sections which was quite annoying, regardless there is more than enough content to play with on both sides of the story.
• The narrative is great for the most part but it’s certainly hindered by the recent Gaiden game being written during or after Infinite Wealth’s narrative. Some plot holes can be found and at times it’s like Gaiden never existed, which is very disappointing for myself as I feel Gaiden has one of the strongest narratives in the series and was really looking forward to it’s meaning in Infinite Wealth, but oh well the overall narrative was amazing, that is why this is a neutral point.
- The game constantly set up ‘cameos’ on Kiryu’s side of the story but never seemed to commit to them even when it made NO SENSE not to in the narrative. This was really disappointing to me.
Overall, fantastic game and HOLY SHIT that final scene!! I feel I’ve only scratched the surface here too. What a game.
+ Gameplay is exceptional, a giant step up from the already great gameplay of it’s predecessor. The strategy involved in the turn based combat is really fun and really rewarding! All the party members are great to play as, especially Kiryu, the way he breaks the turn based format is really good and very in character for himself and the series. You’ll also find yourself using items and poundmates a lot, really cool systems and way better than 7s versions.
+ The Dondoko Island minigame is actually fantastic, I heavily prefer it to business management from 7 and I LOVED that too, I did it in a few chunks completely seperate from doing story stuff. I loved it. Yeah.
+ The direction is excellent (performances, cutscenes, all that jazz), certainly the best in the series tied with the highs you find in Judgement (2018).
+ The maps you play on are really good, especially Hawaii as it is the main focus after all. The addition of Segways makes traversing these huge maps really nice! Kiryu’s Bucket List side story makes exploring the maps really fun too and it was quite emotional at times too.
+ I didn’t play all the minigames but the ones I did were really cool, especially Crazy Delivery and Miss Match!
+ The world always feels alive, even in the barren (at times) Yokohama, the new systems to engage the player with the world are very well rounded and never feel forced!
+ I loved the dual narrative split halfway through the game, but the pacing was really off in those sections which was quite annoying, regardless there is more than enough content to play with on both sides of the story.
• The narrative is great for the most part but it’s certainly hindered by the recent Gaiden game being written during or after Infinite Wealth’s narrative. Some plot holes can be found and at times it’s like Gaiden never existed, which is very disappointing for myself as I feel Gaiden has one of the strongest narratives in the series and was really looking forward to it’s meaning in Infinite Wealth, but oh well the overall narrative was amazing, that is why this is a neutral point.
- The game constantly set up ‘cameos’ on Kiryu’s side of the story but never seemed to commit to them even when it made NO SENSE not to in the narrative. This was really disappointing to me.
Overall, fantastic game and HOLY SHIT that final scene!! I feel I’ve only scratched the surface here too. What a game.
The structure to this game is really weird, why is it split into 4 difficulties you have to beat individually, with the world themes being the same? Eh anyways, I did enjoy the challenge mode to this and will probably check out the other modes! It would definitely be nice to see this get a port as being locked to the PSVita is something I wish on no game at all. I imagine playing this with motion controls makes this a 1/5 game but I played with joysticks and it was enjoyable! Definitely not perfect, especially the Advanced levels but a well worth game for any Monkey Ball fan to try, if they can that is.
O!
Can’t rate this, it’s not fair. Absolutely stunning ‘game’, it baffles me how this idea even came about let alone into fruition.
Borrringgg
Enjoyed this a lot, a fair challenge for the majority of the game but the last world was horrible, the collision was all off. Oh and I don’t like the bosses, they don’t work in monkey ball.
I decided to complete Gaiden to the platinum trophy and wow shit that was amazing. Side content was amazing, especially the coliseum sub story. I’ve warmed up to this game a lot and now I’m even more excited for Infinite Wealth!
Not going to write a full review here but overall a very good game in the story department but everything else felt relatively lacklustre in my opinion, which given, this is a side game so I wouldn’t expect too much but the side content was pretty dimmed down compared to other LAD games which was pretty disappointing. The best section of the game was certainly the final chapter where the story crosses with Yakuza: Like A Dragon. Looking forward to playing the demo of Infinite Wealth now!
2023
As you would always expect and want from WarioWare it’s fun and weird. Though Move It! comes with a pretty big issue at times - motion controls, they’re unreliable and often desync, it’s annoying and detracts from some microgames but that’s really my only issue. I certainly prefer Get It Together, but this was a welcome follow up!