VideoGame_Discussion

justin_credible wrote:

Yeah man. Definitely grabbing P3 Reload day 1! P3 is my favorite JRPG ever and I still can't believe how big the series has become. I'm sure they'll remake 4 at some point. And maybe they'll get around to remaking 1 and 2 because I'd love to finally play those.

Heavyd814life wrote:

The thing about 1 and 2 I can't see how they'd add social links or the calendar to those games. Maybe they wouldn't need to but for me that's what makes Persona games Persona games now.

Fatum Betula on

I don't know if it counts, though. It's a 15-20 minute game with 10 endings and they expect you to replay it multiple times to see them all. I'm just not interested in doing that. The story is vague and I guess you can better understand it after seeing all the endings, but I don't give a crap enough to find out. Also the developer really nailed the PlayStation/Saturn circa 1996 ugly pixelated look he was going for, but he might've nailed it too well because it just looks like ass on a 50" TV screen and in the 32-bit era I don't think many people were playing on screens that big.

Beat Pizza Tower. It is a short platformer with high speed and difficult bosses. It is enjoyable breezing through levels once you get a hang of it. Skipping Super Mario RPG remake as there is a lack of new content and will be 100% Star Ocean 2's cave of trials. I cannot seem to justify spending $60-80 on Alan Wake 2 at the moment. Hopefully Walking Dead Destinies is okay else wise I might just buy Alan Wake 2.

Blasphemous II

8/10

While I much more enjoyed a lot of things present in the sequel here such as the ability to utilize different sets of weapons not only as offensive tools but methods of progression and traversal a-La Metroid, there were some things I could have done without. Like some of the cheap bosses once again present with multiple phases and crushingly brutal DPS. Even with the numerous amounts of prayers, beads and other items you can utilize to buff up your character, it just never seems enough for some bosses like the 2nd to last boss fight which took me a bazillion attempts at only to have the final boss be a cake walk in comparison. Alas, besides the various unbalanced boss fights, the game really is quite good and a step up from its predecessor in many ways, one of which mentioned above. Other mechanics such as unlocking moves like double jump, air dashing etc like Metroid were most welcomed as well. And the art style continues to impress with its gothic like undertones and dreary backdrops alike. And also there’s more quality of life improvements now such as progressing in certain side quests to unlock different methods of healing at an altar or being able to fast travel from any altar to the main city hub or clear out any guilt you’ve accumulated at an altar. I also liked the fact of hunting for collectibles to increase my HP, fervor, and damage dealt by unlocking new levels for the 3 game’s weapons you get. The game still retains that sense of wanderlust for clearing the entire map like any Metroidvania as well. Overall minus some difficulty balancing I rather enjoyed this sequel a little more than the original. I just hope if there’s a third game they’ll be able to tweak it a bit more in the difficulty balancing department.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Second to last boss fight was the most brutal. Other than that they weren't that bad

I wanted to toss my Switch out the window with the first penitent one boss fight.

Beat Super Mario RPG Remake. I played the OG game but got stuck and beat this within 10 hours. I played on the easy mode since my timing ability is terrible. There are a ton of optional mini games and Yoshi racing was difficult due to my lack of rhythm. It is fairly short but has decent RPG mechanics. Max level is 30. Giving up on 100% Star Ocean 2 as I would need to replay it for the other endings and avoiding Walking Dead Destinies. Will be getting Alan Wake 2 and then Avatar on the 17th I think.. Going to be a dry end of the year for me. Think I beat around 15-20 games.

Accounting+ on
This game was hilarious. Possibly the most F-bombs I've heard in a game, which I don't always mind in a game like this, I dislike it more when it's coming from a game or movie where the character thinks it makes him sound like more of a tough guy. This, like that Trover Saves The Universe game, pretty much had me laughing non-stop from start to finish. It's a bit strange then that I have absolutely no interest in ever watching Rick And Morty even though I like these games and they're by the same writers. I might end up going back for the platinum trophy in this one like I did for Trover.

edit: Got the platinum, it was easy and I enjoyed the game enough to spend that little bit of extra time to go for it.

Alan Wake II

8.5/10

Aside from some stiff acting and aiming controls that felt a bit sluggish at times, I thought this was a great sequel to the 2010 action/horror title. It felt like the best of both the Resident Evil remakes and what I imagine PT would have been if it made it into a full blown Silent Hill game. It definitely had an emphasis on survival horror too this time around especially if you play on normal or hard, limiting your resources and forcing you to conserve ammo and medkits etc. The graphics and sound quality were superb as well. The north light graphics engine did the job while playing in performance mode with minimal drops in frame rate. The sound, while playing with my surround system on, felt like the dark presences were in the room with me whether it was a door creaking or slamming or rustling of leaves in the wind I felt engaged and alert at all times. The story can be a bit convoluted at times like its predecessor and I think it tries to end on an ambiguous ending from what I can tell but I just enjoyed the ride and detective work throughout. Playing as both Alan Wake and newcomer detective Saga Anderson was a good tag team combo and each character brought something fresh to the table. Whether it was Alan’s light clicking and scene swapping ability which allowed him to rewrite scenes with more plot devices he uncovered or utilizing the clicker to suck light sources into it and install them in other places to change the environment completely, or Saga using evidence she finds to solve cases on her case board, the game was very unique and intuitive. The combat can take a bit getting used to though with some wonky controls here and there. I much rather enjoyed the case solving and scene rewriting sections over the combat in this one for sure and I’m glad once you got to the endgame there wasn’t much combat to undertake. Overall, Alan Wake II was a solid sequel and good survival horror game in its own merit and I just hope we don’t have to wait another 13 years for another installment.

I had a really similar experience to you with this. I also never watched Rick & Morty but thought that Trover and Accounting+ were hilarious.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:

Ghost of Tsushima on
Already typed up pretty much everything I could think of about this game in the review thread. It was fun, I enjoyed the journey, never once felt bored or like "I wish this would end already" like I do with some open world games, but I still have no interest in going for 100%.

Bleed_DukeBlue wrote:

Did you play through it more than once? If so, when you're asked to select a meme in the beginning and the narrator tells you to select carefully because each one makes important changes to the dialog and story, that's just part of the joke, right? Because I selected a different meme on the second playthrough and there was no difference at all.

Starfield via Game Pass

I need to preface this review by stating that I've never played a Bethesda developed game in the 'Fallout' or 'Elder Scrolls' series. With that out of the way, I don't think I've been this torn on a game for a while.

I started 'Starfield' just after its release. I played for about 12 hours, and between the weight management, restrictions on selling and glitches, I stopped hard and moved on. After finishing up a few other games, and waiting for work to come in, I came back to 'Starfield' with the intention of finishing the main quests and not worrying about picking up anything. Once I did that, barring another bug that almost prevented my progress, I was able to finish the main game. With the main game completed, I also understand why so many say the real game doesn't begin until New Game Plus.

I enjoyed some of the exploring and combat. At one point the story was getting interesting. Eventually, after leveling up some stats and settling on a weapon I liked, things mostly fell into place. But regardless, the game gets in its own way more than anything else.

The still shots during any "cutscenes" feel so out of date it's laughable. Early on, there's a mission where you have to talk down (or storm) some thugs in a bank holding hostages. Literally the whole conversation is a static shot of the intercom box. For someone like me, who used to be in film and TV, I just can't with this. Come on. Half the time whoever you are talking to has their back turned to you if you chose to interact with them from the wrong angle or they're talking to another character. Voice acting is fine, but most of the writing is simple OK. There's also bugs in characters' personalities that make no sense. Finally, the Persuade system seems broken, or at the very least, too random. No matter what temporary boosts or permanent boosts were applied, it felt like a crap shoot if persuasion worked. In one example, I chose logical points and failed at every one. After reloading my checkpoint just before the conversation, I started by choosing the same first point, got a critical, and immediately persuaded the guy.

On top of these, the game isn't optimized well enough for Series X. The PC has gotten two major patches to help with things like the picture, etc. but not console. HDR implementation is poor. Lip syncing is still out of sync. As I said, there were a couple instances where the game broke and impeded my process, like when a companion wasn't where she needed to be, and without checking in with her, the story couldn't go forward. It took about a dozen checkpoint reloads, including completely turning off my Xbox to no avail, until she appeared. The weight, selling and O2 systems are a very big hinderance in the early game that make it a slog. The story and story missions aren't terribly interesting, though a few side quests are, but the main missions don't take the player enough in the direction of key game elements. There's too much information in all the menus, and they aren't laid out very well to handle all the stuff. Simple things like when you reach the end of a list of items, pressing down once more does not bring you back to the top like it does in so many other things, so you're forced to scroll back up. The rarity system makes no sense. I can find a common version of a gun with better stats and add-ons than epic or even legendary versions of the same gun.

With all that said, if someone is more into exploring words and taking their time, this is a great adventure! Not a great story, but a great adventure, and I get that. But it isn't for me. There's a lot to dig one's teeth into, but it's almost all handled either sloppily or explained halfway. Also, jump on the "Y" button? Why? The attention to detail is also astounding! But the amount of things that can be picked up and interacted with actually slows things down too much, and is ultimately pointless in most cases. The one thing that kept me going during moment to moment gameplay was the atmospheric music. It felt soothing while fighting through menus and jumping from system to system for the umpteenth time. Eventually the latter works itself out a little better, but most of this was too late for me.

I finished the story, but have no desire to slog my way through 'Starfield' any further.



Jusant via Game Pass

Another perfect Game Pass game, as 'Jusant' took me less than five hours to complete, with only a handful of collectibles (and there are quite a few categories of collectibles) to seek out, if I so choose.

You play an unnamed child with a squishy side-kick being that uses what might be echolocation to traverse up this incredibly tall land formation, whilst reading a mountain of notes to find out what happened to both the water and the people that used to depend of that water. The notes definitely start to take a toll, because some are way too long, and most are parts of conversations but don't say too much. 'Jusant' is more a game about the journey rather than the destination, though, and the journey is accomplished by rock climbing everywhere.

For the most part, this can be engaging and even thrilling. Climbing has always been my favorite part of series like 'Tomb Raider,' 'Assassin's Creed' and 'Prince of Persia,' so to have a whole game around that mechanic was intriguing. And for the most part, it works. There's definitely some jank here though. Grabbing on to flat space ledges can cause your character to pause. Jumping can be imprecise, and the character in general moves around too loose even when walking. When climbing, the camera is designed to swing around to a position that feels the most cinematic, but often times that hinders judging distance and positioning of the character. The camera can be moved back, but because it automatically swings around in this moments, that means fighting the camera for a good angle to see what you're doing. There's a generous stamina meter and a pretty good length to your rope, which can also be karabiner-ed in up to three spots to allow for swings, etc. At times the loose controls get in the way, but for the most part the whole climbing system works well.

It is worth noting that it was common for the character to get stuck in the environment on simple geometry. I'm talking about things like walking on flat ground, going over a stationary item, and getting stuck. Usually repeatedly pressing "jump" can get the character loose, and none required a restart, but it happened way more than it should.

'Jusant' is recommendation. It's short, interesting, and has amazing music. It's a good journey to take.

I did play it more than once. I’m pretty sure the meme is a joke, and it’s the same regardless of which one you pick.

PizzaTheHutt wrote:

Beat Alan Wake 2 took around 4 4-4.5 sessions. It is 17 hours long if playing on story mode and 100% it for platinum. Being able to play on story and get the platinum is surprising, The story is good but felt it was a bit slow for the first hour. Combat has changed and found teleporting enemies to be somewhat annoying as I'd hope it be more like the OG games but understand the boost to horror elements that comes from it. It has a dodge which I could rarely if ever time properly. The case board mechanic was terrible a lot of times you already know the outcome. A ton of busy work but not much fun. It was not worth the $80 to me as it has no replay value and am hoping the season pass content changes that. A new game plus to get all the weapon upgrades would have been nice.

Waiting for Avatar which I might hate.

Pixel Gear on

Yet another typical run-of-the-mill VR wave shooter, like we don't have enough of those (though in this game's defense this was a very early PSVR release, so I guess at the time that genre wasn't oversaturated yet).

The graphics have an almost Minecraft-esque look to them, but everything is so low resolution that it is a bit troublesome if you're like me and trying to rack up combos by going for headshots, because you won't be able to see enemies clearly until they get close enough for you to tell where the head even is.

The game requires a PS Move controller and the tracking is spot-on, I have no complaints with it.

As is typical of VR games, the game can be beaten in an hour. There are only 3 levels, with each having 5 waves of normal enemies and then a boss fight. There are 4 difficulty levels and the default difficulty is too easy, so you might want to crank it up a bit. Unlike most VR games, this one actually offers a local mutiplayer mode.1-3 players play on the TV using DualShock 4 controllers and they try to sneak around the level collecting coins while the other player wears the VR headset and the PS Move controller to shoot at them and prevent them from getting the coins. I feel like there are way too few VR games that offer any type of local multiplayer, so this one at least has that going for it.

Fe on

I don't dislike this game, I don't even regret playing through it, but I feel like I would've liked it a lot more had I played it on PS4 or PC, because the frame-rate is freakin' horrid on Switch, to the point where a few times I had considered not even finishing the game. I'm not a frame-rate snob, I'm fine with 30fps as long as it is consistent, but the only thing consistent about this game's frame-rate is how bad it is. I'd question why they would even release it in this state on Switch, but since this is a 2018 release and Switch was the hottest thing going at the time, I figure they felt obligated to release it on Switch just for the easy money (it was published by EA and you know how they treat Switch owners, just look at their Fifa games).

Not saying the Switch version isn't worth playing at all, just that if you have the option to play it on another platform, play it that way.

Been in a madden kick…

07 - 7/10. Fun with pretty great presentation for back then. Went undefeated and destroyed the opposition (I think it was the Vikings or the Seahawks) in the Super Bowl.

12 7/10 - not much change honestly between the two games if I remember correctly. Went undefeated and won the Super Bowl.

23 cloud. 8/10. I guess technically it’s ea play but I launch from game pass. Lost two games and won the Super Bowl. Continuing the next season currently 3-1 lost to the chargers by 3. Presentation and the clock management qol stuff keeps me playing. Don’t really care about upgrading staff and I usually skip the draft etc… but it’s just fun if you don’t take so seriously. The one irk is there are a ton of dropped passes. Pretty much if you get hit any where I’m the air it’s dropped pass. Love the running though.

Mario Wonder was a lot of fun. Very imaginative, but not particularly challenging. It was really impressive how they kept surprising and subverting expectation in each stage. It's the first 2D Mario I've enjoyed since World. Plays much much better on a controller with a good dpad. I used a Dualshock 4 for my playthrough.

My friend and I just finished Moving Out 2 on
I will probably continue going for 100% on my own over the weekend.

Some dsiware clone-stlevania that I have had for goodness knows how long but only played it for the first time today.

Controls ok except for jumping. The timing for jumping off ledges feels too short, like you press jump at what feels the right time but it's actually tol late so you fall instead of jump.

Wait no the controls are not ok. B IS JUMP AND A IS ATTACK AND THERE IS NO WAY TO CHANGE IT.

The levels are decently designed for the most part, although there are a few trial and error instant death segments and some slightly too long auto's rolling levels (they were fun and unique, just overstayed their welcome)

There are a good variety of enemies and bosses too, although the second to last boss is a grind because you can't hit it very often (and when you can get multiple hits in in one of the phases, you have to jump out early or get an iinstallation.

The final boss "not dracula" was a bit of a pushover though.

I unlocked a hard mode but I don't know if it's worth going through it again.

It wants to be a real Castlevania game so much is adorable. Even the music at times is just different enough to not get sued

Even though I was just playing it a few minutes ago I already forgot the name because it's basically Castlevania.

It's mostly linear but within each level sometimes there can be some exploration.

If I remember the name I will post it, not that it matters because you can't buy dsiware anymore thanks to Nintendumb

Sonic Superstars

8/10

I really enjoyed the classic take this had on Sonic games of the past. Like Sonic Mania, it was a no nonsense for the most part old school 2D Sonic fest with 3D graphics. The music was pretty catchy and it was cool to be able to swap between Sonic, Tails, Knuckles and Amy between stages. There was even character exclusives stages as well which was a nice treat and catching those chaos emeralds by swinging around and launching yourself to them was pretty fun and granted you a new power up with each one you collect. The only drawbacks and they are kinda big for me would be the length of the game which can be toppled in about 5 hours, and the boss lengths are way too long than they ever needed to be. I never recalled an old school Sonic boss fight taking over 5 minutes to topple across several phases. It is a speedrunner’s nightmare I’m sure. But I think I enjoyed this one more than Sonic Mania of late because it wasn’t as crushingly difficult as Mania was in the final acts and the checkpoint system was very forgiving. Overall I say wait for this to be on deep sale like I did and nab it for half price and you’ll be in for a classic Sonic good time.

Archangel on
Really good game. Just had one of those weird moments where when I was playing earlier I was struggling a lot, so I just set the game down for a few hours and now came back and continued and just breezed through the second half of the game easily. If this was a non-VR game that end boss would've just been alright, but experiencing it in VR was pretty damn cool and maybe something I'll remember for years to come. I haven't put the effort/thought into making a ranked PSVR list, but I feel this just might be in the Top 10 if I did.

There's only six trophies in the game and I somehow missed one for not listening to all the "friendly chatter" crap after each level. Except I did listen to it all and went out of my way to do so (it's optional), so I don't know why they didn't credit it for me, but I'm not going back for it, I'm going to the next game which is currently TBD.

Detroit become human - 8/10

I really enjoyed this choose your own adventure movie. Top notch presentation! I felt a connection to Connor (I liked Connors swagger lol) and Kara, not so much with Markus. I just didn’t like his character from the get go. Sooooo many decisions to make and about 3/4 through I really started to think maybe I’d made some bad decisions along the way. The ending was a bit of a let down. For my ending which I guess would be considered a good ending; lacked closure. After spending all this time getting to this point in the game, I though it would have ended with just as much emotion or consequence as the main story presented. Rather I got the credit roll kinda unexpectedly and I was just left feeling like- that’s all you’re gonna give me. I suppose the other endings may garner a different reaction but not sure I’ll play through it again to see.

I really was hooked on the story and I felt it was beautifully laid out and well presented. I kind of want to play Heavy rain and/or beyond two souls now.

loztdogs wrote:

You and @kommie can never be friends again now

benstylus wrote:

Lol funny you mention. The thought had crossed my mind.

Tyranny

Super Mario Bros. Wonder

What an absolute joy! My fiancé and I played the whole way through, just missing a handful of seeds, large purple coins and a few more hidden levels. Yes, it's pretty easy, even the special world levels, but the amount of variety and the way the game keeps things fresh is rivaled only by 'It Takes Two' in recent years. And while I always found the 'New Super Mario Bros.' series to be lacking in style and even color in some cases, this game is bursting with it. Such a good time. I haven't been this excited about a 2D Mario game maybe ever (I was too young for the NES and SNES games when they were new). I can't wait to see what they do next!

loztdogs wrote:

Glad you enjoyed it! I know it's not really much of a game in the traditional sense, but games like Detroit are some of my favorite games of all time. I'm curious about the ending you got and the choices you made because there should have been an emotional payoff for all three main characters.

And yeah, you should definitely check out both Heavy Rain and Beyond since you enjoyed Detroit. But don't expect them to be as polished as Detroit is. Heavy Rain is a little rough by modern standards (it came out like 15 years ago, after all), but I have such fond memories of it. And Beyond is a tough one to recommend because I still haven't met anyone who enjoyed it as much as I did. I look back at all the games that came out in 2013 (one of the best years in gaming, imo) and I have Beyond really high on my list of best games of that year. It's far from perfect, but it hit all the right emotional notes for me.

Heavyd814life wrote:

From what I read it was one of the good endings. I tried to be mostly a pacifist.

I just played through the VR Campaign of TrackMania Turbo on
Short but sweet, I guess. On one track I even finished with a good enough time to place me in the Top 3 of the North Carolina leaderboard and around 3 or 4 other tracks I placed in the Top 10. I'll play some more tomorrow in the non-VR mode to see how much else the game offers, because the VR mode is pretty limited (it's basically just a time trial mode).

Spider-Man Miles Morales - 8/10

I only played the main missions since my trial sub for PSN will expire in a couple of days. This looked gorgeous on the legion go. I guess my only gripe would be it’s pretty dang short. Oh and miles as spidey looks like a pencil with shoulders. Other than that it’s great web slinging action. There were a couple of times when in a… complete this puzzle room to continue, I was confused as to what the objective was. The hints helped but I would fumble around enough that it pulled me out of the game. Also close quarters combat in some cases, was a little to close and I would lose my bearings. I really liked how they fleshed out the relationship between miles and phin without going overboard. I could relate to the turmoil the two shared. If I renew ps now I may go back and do the sides just so I can more spidey fix. Wont be play 2 anytime soon.

Dying Light 2: Stay Human

7/10

I've had this one in my queue for quite some time. Over a year and a half and I finally got around to it and I rather enjoyed my time with it for the most part but I would in no way replay it again unless it was in co-op on a new game plus perhaps. It suffers from the tired sandbox open world Far Cry like motif of checking off boxes to level up your character in the world, etc. Also, there's windmills like radio towers to take over and the fast travel system is terrible. You must pretty much do a quest within each metro station scattered around the open world city and only then can you fast travel to each one of them. Never have I ever quickly decided to skip fast travel in a game until this one and instead slogged around from one end of the map to the next. Traversal is okay but I expected more from a game heavily focused on parkour. They wanted you to spend all the time doing side missions, gathering resources, and what not to upgrade your traversal and paraglider and even then it still feels lacking in regards to getting around the big open world map. Some of the control precision could be a bit more tightened as well as I found myself falling to my death more times than I should have. And the combat had some cool ideas, like parrying and blocking at the right time to traverse over enemies and such, but I felt a lot of the time I was just mashing the right trigger while dodging left/right to kill enemies quicker that way other than the fancy ways they set out in front of me. But those grievances aside, the story was pretty solid about a guy in search of his long lost sister. I played the first Dying light years ago and I think it's the same dude from the first game. I stuck to mainly the story missions too and I'm glad so I didn't lose focus on the tale it was trying to tell. Upgrading the main character too lets you choose which function you favor upgrading, stamina or combat. I stuck with a balance of both but more so favored stamina to get more efficient traversal skills. And you can find special boxes hidden in the map or by progressing through the story to upgrade your health or stamina meter as well. Overall, the story and gore was enough to make me see it through to the end. The parkour was solid enough, albeit minor control issues, that it reminded me of Mirror's Edge from time to time, especially during some climbing missions and I love me some Mirror's Edge like traversal. If you want a new zombie first person action co-op game I will likely hope to suggest Dead Island 2 over this one, which I am about to play next and hear really good things about.

I beat and 100%’d (takes deep breath) Mario & Luigi: Bowser’s Inside Story + Bowser Jr.’s Journey, exclusively for the Nintendo 3DS family of systems. It was great!
[imgt w=1536 h=2048]https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GAetDv4XgAAN1Mf?format...[/imgt]
I haven’t played the DS original in about a decade, so it was nice playing this new version with a superior art style. Unlike last year’s Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions, which was similar to playing a completely new experience, BIS is a game I have nostalgic memories of playing—comparisons were drawn this time. The DS game is often heralded as AlphaDream’s magnum opus, which I mostly agree with.

A disease called the Blorbs infects the citizens of the Mushroom Kingdom. The villainous Fawful is the culprit, and he tricks Bowser into eating a Vacuum Shroom. This makes him suck up a bunch of stuff—including Mario, Luigi, Peach, and Starlow. With them out of the way and Bowser incapacitated, Fawful conquers Bowser’s Castle and brainwashes his army. Now Bowser has to thwart his maniacal scheme while the Bros. manipulate him from the inside.

It’s generally the most emotionally impactful M&L game, with a memorable cast of characters and an awesome collection of special moves to use in battle. The soundtrack is one of the best in the series, and journeying through Bowser is brilliant. Every area of his innerds looks visually distinct and creative, never gross. Some even have fun minigames to play, like bulking Bowser’s muscles or making him violently sneeze.

The bosses are great, too. They have boatloads of health and varied attacks you need to dodge or counterattack. They give you a good reason to whip out those special moves and practice with them. (The 3DS version made one of the bosses especially adorable.) There are even fights where Bowser grows massive and punches buildings in the face! Top it off with a killer finale and you have an RPG for the ages.

Now for the cons. My goodness, 75% of the new characters have obnoxious speech patterns. Fawful’s dialogue is expectedly bonkers, and he’s always entertaining. But the others just pile on, making half the text irritating to read. Midbus uses choppy sentences; the Emoglobins talk like artsy, medieval criers; Durmite drawssss outttt her wordssss; zee deux French garacteurs ‘ave exaggerated accents; Dr. Toadley speaks in questions followed by answers; and who even knows what Chakron the sage is babbling about half the time. I think they should’ve reigned it in a bit more, focusing on eccentric personalities that are conveyed through regular English.

It’s weirdly difficult to save your progress when you’re inside Bowser, because the only save blocks in him are characters who disappear when the scripted event you’re playing is finished. It feels like you see what there is to see in the world before halfway, and then they make you backtrack to previous locations instead of making new ones. The enemy variety can get a bit sparse, making you fight the same enemy groups constantly. Dr. Toadley tells you to “prepare for the final battle,” but then the game continues for about four more hours after he says that—the last area is traversed as the Bros. and Bowser, unlocks another inside-Bowser area, requires several mini games, and has five bosses plus a giant battle. Aside from the aforementioned killer finale, the area drags.

As for some remake changes, the art is better than ever and the music is largely improved. Many of the special moves were tweaked—some are now easier to execute while others were nerfed hard. You can restart a battle immediately if you lose, even dropping the difficulty if you wish. Any use of the DS microphone was ditched, which I’m fine with. The Giant Bowser battles were adapted by the infamous developer Arzest, which is why they’re now sluggish and low-poly. The overall difficulty was toned down on 3DS as well.

The most indefensible change is the title screen: The original had a simple image of Peach’s Castle on the top screen and Bowser’s Castle on the bottom, with one of Nintendo’s most beautiful tunes playing over it. It was an elegant way to highlight the duality present throughout the story: The Bros. and Bowser are enemies, but with a larger threat looming over them both, they’re now two sides of the same coin. The remake ditched this visual and melody completely, opting for a forgettable, militaristic tune playing over a picture of Bowser and Bowser Jr. standing near lava. It’s a hard downgrade that, no joke, made me skip the game at launch. (The credits and end card of the 3DS version still use motifs of the original title tune, highlighting how strange this change was.)

As for Bowser Jr.’s Journey, it’s an 8-hour strategy game that improves on the Minion Quest mode from Superstar Saga + Bowser’s Minions. You choose nine characters for your army and arrange them to defeat the advancing squads. The Best Fitness Friends villains are great here, and their dialogue is funnier than the main game. Bowser Jr. is insufferable through most of the quest, until he hits rock-bottom and has to mature. It’s a decent story, but the Minion Quest misadventure was more endearing. At least this mode did the unthinkable and made me kinda care about the Koopalings.

All in all, this game is worthy of your time. Play it on the DS for more difficulty and a wonderful title screen, play it on 3DS for superior graphics and sound, plus Bowser Jr.’s Journey.

Always liked the ending for Bowser's Inside Story, with Bowser waiting until his minions left before he opened the present from Peach.

BloodPuppetX wrote:
Agreed. Bowser deserved a nice reward for all that work he went through, even after his attempted Peach abduction at the end.

Dead Island 2 was fun.

TalonJedi87 wrote:

Paranormal Activity: The Lost Soul on
I'll probably post some thoughts about it in the review thread because I would like to play through it again tomorrow using the DualShock 4 instead of PS Move controllers this time and see which I prefer. Overall though, it wasn't a bad game, though it might just seem like that because admittedly I had low expectations going into it.

Beat Final Fantasy 16 Echoes DLC. It is about 2 hours long and not worth $9.99. It adds some new story beats and a boss and some mini bosses with some memorable music but not much else. I was hoping for a small hub world or area to explore. Considering the expansion pass is $24.99 I am hoping the Leviathan dlc is longer. Going to get my copy of Avatar today or Monday and Undertale Yellow is out now. Well January has Prince of Persia since Alone in the Dark got delayed so my backlog is bound to be empty again soon.

Spider Man 2 for PS5. Real fun game. A great sequel with some great storytelling, though I’m not sure where we go from here. That is overall a great thing, though. I did think the last boss fight dragged on a bit long but I can also understand why. I may or may not go for all the trophies.