You should know the drill by now. This list is to help keep track of the nonsense I spent my time on this year, so I can look back at it in approximately 12 months and say "Welp, probably shouldn't have done that."
A pretty fantastic Infinity Engine-esque take on a very ambitious Pathfinder module
A fantastic take on a Quake-era FPS. Do you like fast murder? Do you like Satan murder? Then I have the game for you!
Me with friend: Hey, you want to see a little bit of the worst old-school Resident Evil game?
Friend: Sure
*2 hours later*
Me: Whoops. I guess we need to finish this now.
Chuggin' my way through the Spyro games, which I would describe as the "most chillest-ass 3D collectathon platformers imaginable"
Back on the Tales train. I think the combat of Xillia is really top-notch, and I like most of the cast alright too. Both of those things compensate for some generic environmental design and occasionally... questionable English VA.
Finally, a very difficult, soulsish metroidvania with great sprite art and difficulty that makes me feel bad at video games.
Sometimes you need to replay an old game for the sake of playing its remake. I can confirm that Resident Evil 2 is a-ok by me.
The Resident Evil 2 remake is brilliant, and basically exactly the kind of game I wanted it to be.
Nexus could very well be the last 3DS game I ever purchase, but it's absolutely giving me the Etrian Odyssey fix I need
Oh hey, finally a Battle Royale game that I've been enjoying.
Of the approximately eight Tales games that I now somehow own, Vesperia seems like a pretty good one of those. On my switch.
DMC 5 is the best character action game since Bayonetta 2. There wasn't exactly much competition in that space, but trust me, it's good.
Get it? His name is Roxas, which is an anagram of Sora but with an X all up in it.
Hey, y'all like anime?
I'm pretty eSports, so I beat Sekiro.
Will this be the year that I finally beat Troika's Cult Classic RPG about the sexy vampires? I dunno, let's find out!
The prequel to Kingdom Hearts offers both a sense of impending, inevitable tragedy, and also a case-study for the technical limitations of the PSP negatively impacting game design.
Danganronpa 2 GOES FOR IT in a way that made me like it far more than the first one.
Bioshock had a sequel?
Don't you walk away,
You won't hear me say
Please, oh baby, don't go
Simple and Clean is the way that you're making me feel tonight
Is it weird to say that System Shock 2 accidentally makes the original Bioshock less novel in retrospect?
Buckle up fam, because we're getting back on the anime crazy train.
What if Crusader Kings, but interplanetary conquest? Sure. Sounds good to me.
Gears 3 isn't nearly as stuffed with crazy set-pieces as its predecessor. What it does have, however, is a consistently solid series of fun combat encounters. Also a story that I cannot take seriously for the life of me.
I like driving fast cars almost as much as I dislike listening to just about every single character in Forza Horizon 4.
Once you divorce it from the context of being a late-gen stopgap, Gears Judgment is a weird Gears of War Score Attack/Challenge Room compilation. Didn't hate it.
I figured it was time for me to throw my life down the toilet and start everyone's favorite long-running JRPG series where you talk to every single NPC after every single story event.
Finally got around to wrapping up my time with Original Sin 2. My thoughts on that game are well-established at this point, but I'll continue to say it's very good.
It's a Ninja Gaiden! It's a Metroidvania! It's a Ninja Gaiden Metroidvania! To be totally honest, for as much as I think this game is excellent, I also think it loses a lot of momentum around the point of the much vaunted "twist."
Beyond is absolutely going to be a topic of discussion in some sort of blog, so buckle up for that. It's profoundly stupid.
Sometimes you gotta go back to your roots. Sometimes you're reminded that parts of Might and Magic VII are hardwired into your brain, for whatever reason, and then it becomes slightly less exciting.
My most recent obsession is finding out that I'm very into Total War even if I'm still kinda bad at basic Hammer and Anvil flanking strategies.
I started playing my copy of Pokemon Black after getting excited for Sword and Shield, only to decide that I'm probably not going to pick either of them up. Gen 5 is neat though, even if going with an entirely new pokedex pre-Elite 4 means there isn't as much variety as some other gens.
Tetris, but drugs.
Tetris, but a constant, endless reminder that many people are very good at Tetris.
A place to make Mario levels that some members of the Giant Bomb discord have compared to war crimes.
NEW FIRE EMBLEM GOOD
Quantic Dream deserves commendation for making the most technically impressive "interactive experiences" with the hackiest writing possible.
Consider it "extremely telling" that I almost totally forgot to put Gears 4 on this list.
Imagine, if you will, a visual novel that blends the high-stakes terrorist plots of something like 24 with profoundly goofy Japanese-style comedy. It's, uh, kind of amazing.
Age of Wonders III was probably the last big 4Xish game I spent any significant time with, so it's good to know that Planetfall is probably going to be the next one.
While I don't think it really matches up to any of its inspirations, Remnant is definitely a game that benefits from being the sum of its (souls-y, Left 4 Dead-ish, vaguely Destiny) parts, horrendously generic title notwithstanding. But man, that shooting sure does feel satisfying?
Cyber Cop's Bizarre Adventure. Not quite sure how I feel about it in the grand scheme of Platinum's output, but I generally think it's quite good.
Did someone say "more gears?" Because this sure is more gears!
Also I played some Turok. It's a video game.
Playing through Until Dawn for the benefit of some friends is a good reminder that Until Dawn is a delightful romp, even if it's not quite as dynamic as it pretends to be.
"Anime Inception Cop" sounds like a ridiculous premise for a video game. It is, but it's also a pretty solid visual novel-ish adventure game with some great characters and mostly great writing. Definitely should've dialed down the horniness a notch or two though.
So of course, the only logical solution is to play every other game Kotaro Uchikoshi has directed.
I put 10 hours into The Bard's Tale IV and said "I don't know if I like this or not." Probably not the most ringing endorsement for a CRPG revival that's apparently somewhere in the 40-60 hour range.
Speaking of CRPGs, Disco Elysium is a pretty good, well-written one of those. I might have some issues with its tone and storytelling, but it's also basically Planescape Torment but if you were a disaster cop.
Until Dawn 2, but with a boat this time.
Could this be the new good Fallout game I've secretly wanted all this time? No. Actually, not.
I started playing Grimrock, because why not?
Someone find me a hotel bathroom, pronto!
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