SiN Reloaded Review

This was a game I always heard of certain places. One of those "cult classics" that would I would hear of from time to time. It's recently gotten the Nightdive treatment and I consider it to be a solid game. I'm not 100% familar with the differences between this and the original. With that said, it's often said how the quality is uneven and the game gets worse as it goes on? Yeah it's still true. I do find it charming enough to get through even with that quality decline.

Sin gets compared to Half Life a lot. It's always brought up that it released close to HL. If anything Sin feels like Medal of Honor, No One Lives Forever, Soldier of Fortune and Return to Castle Wolfenstein. The FPS that creates the feeling that you are in a dumb over the top action movie. With an an over the top protagonist and him chatting with his tech support guy as he goes on a mission tracking down the over arching bad guy.

The opening is really enjoyable in that you'll be thrawting a bank heist, infiltrating labatories, warehouses, missile silos, and eventually infiltrating an oil rig. Different objectives being completed can have the mission being affected in different ways but this could've amounted to more.

It's cool to see an early version of an FPS with more tangible locations with an action film narrative connecting everything. It can feel more like an adventure than a series corridors with a loose narrative.

Combat is just "fine". Machine guns aren't the greatest at staggering enemies. The shotfun feels better to use and the rocket launcher does a better job at killing enemies. Snipers can also feel better to use than the machine guns do since it enemies in few shots.

The health system is unique in that you have different hp in different body parts so it's different in other hitscan games. You can't hold medkits but it's not a game over if low on health well sort of. You can get different health packs for different parts of your health so enemies might hit you in a different spot instead of instantly getting a game over when seemingly on low hp.

I'll start with the negatives is that the ATV controls like garbage and while the villain does tend to have her fans, I didn't find her that interesting or have her actions amount to much of anything.

With all this said, the quality drop off does have different answers from people but for me it's when you enter the jungle. The levels go by very quickly, are connected in a very loose way and it feels like the game just wants to hurry up and end. There's a mechanic where John can turn into a monster but this is underexplored for the most part since it appears towards the end of the game. You also get very little health packs and then there is a giant monster that gets introduced out of nowhere.

At this point, the game feels like it just wants to wrap up already.

Overall, this remaster of Sin was a charming enough game and I can see where the quality drop off comes from but I mostly had fun with it until around the ending few levels.

Castlevania: Harmony of Dissonace Review

There's a new Castlevania that just came out and before it did, I wanted to round up all the CV games Koji Igarashi on worked before touching it. I briefly touched Circle of the Moon and absolutely hated it's controls that I dropped it in less than 15 minutes. I was expecting to drop Harmony of Dissonace as well but surprisingly, I did finish this one. After doing that however, I can see why Aria of Sorrow is the most fondly remembered of all the GBA games. I wouldn't consider this title to be terrible but out of all the games worked on by Igarashi, this one makes me ask, "what's the point?"

HoD can be summed up in "what if old school CV and SOTN were to combine together?" You get this. You kind of have the same movement physics as the games prior to SOTN and you mainly use the whip instead of different weapons.

When you overlook that, it's a title that's just "there" and needed to be made because Konami had a mandate of releasing a new game in the series annually or biannunally. Everything from SOTN is here like the stats, the gear, the XP system, the spells, and the various traversal upgrades.

You'll get more heart and health upgrades than any other game "Igavania" game.

It's not the difficulty of combat you will be struggling with since enemies are mostly easy and bosses can be killed with just spamming spells and sub weapons. The real challenge is knowing where on earth you are supposed to go next. There are many vocal people on the internet who get angry by the mere idea of hand holding in a game but I really do believe this game will make them challenge that belief.

Knowing what the next objective is often vague and you'll need a guide just for that but the end game fetch quest can truly drive someone's patience. One of the items you need to get to get the "real" final boss requires you to get a metroidvania upgrade that you didn't need for most of the game and then has an extra step of you needing an item to get past a barrier to get it.

The music is often a much maligned part of the game but I didn't think it was that bad, I did start to get sick of it the more I played the game but I can't tell if it was just me wishing the game would just end.

Overall, the game's just there. Circle of the Moon feels awful to play and Aria of Sorrow feels like the GBA CV that is worth checking out. Harmony of Dissonace is worth trying out of curosity since it doesn't have challenging combat and bosses, but if you stop out of boredom, I don't blame you.

Blood: Refreshed Supply(Playstation 5) Review

Blood is a game so good that I'm willing to play a game for a 3rd time. When I first played it, you could only emulate through Dosbox then they made a remaster and now they are doing it again and I can play it console now. It was the game that put Monolith Productions on the map and would later make more games I would enjoy like No One Lives Forever, FEAR, Condemned and Middle Earth Shadow of Mordor then they would later meet their unfortunate demise but that's the gaming industry for you. I still really enjoy Blood but I can't help but notice issues that I haven't before. It's still a highly enjoyable game and one of the best boomer shooters you can play released in this era especially before they went full 3D.

Anyways, whenever I booted up Blood before, I always dread playing Episode 1 but now lowering the difficulty to easy, I appreciate the design a lot more here. Yes, no doubt you will be overwhelmed by the the hitscanning cultists and the regular zombies before you even build up your wilder arensal of weapons. There is one thing Episode 1 teaches you and this will be learned even on easy mode.

Enemies using hitscan weapons tends to be a hot topic among people who talk about shooter combat design. Blood is very unique in that instead of just tanking hits and hoping you recover from it. You have a way to combat them: The TNT. If you even casually play this game, this is a weapon you will have to get accustomed to. What makes it so unique is that basically a hitscan cultist or a group will be either hiding in rooms, corners, or just in tight spots. If you can spot one or hear the sound barks, you can lob in some TNT and get some quick and fast kills on them with no need to even tank any hits.

As a result, Blood can feel a bit more on the conservative or tactical side. You get no health packs outside of portable medkits, enemies just randomly drop health upon death. It's more about lobbing in and being as careful as you can before you can use your more powerful weapons later.

Speaking of more powerful weapons, Blood has the most punchy, gory and memorable boomer shooter aresnals of guns you could ever have. You got a useful flare gun. You got the awesome Tommy Gun that can tear into enemies and it's alt fire that can attacks nearby enemies with it's spread. The amazing sawed off shotgun where one shot can do a lot of damage but feels very satisfying to fire both shots to defeat higher level enemies. The beastly Tesla Cannon that can make little work of the tougher enemies. Of course, one of if not the beast rocket launchers in all of gaming: the Napalm Launcher. Which casuses a huge explosion upon touching an enemy and can spread to other enemies and slowly burn away at their health. The Remote Mines are also a decent follow back weapon for the TNT.

With that said, there are gimmick weapons that are just there like the Vodoo Doll, Aeresol Can, and the Life Leech is just kind of there. I will say the BFG from Doom and the Devastator from Duke 3D does have the Life Leech beat in terms of gamefeel and use.

The main weapons feel so good to use that I don't mind this.

Level design is mostly good with the scenery and locals getting better with each episode. Episode 2 being the most memorable in that you have a creepy carnivale then you got a real cool homage to The Shinning where you the level have you begin in a maze outside of The Overlook hotel then you actual visit and go through the actual recreation of it. Episode 4 starts off in creepy labs and then you start go through haunted temple areas. Blood is often said to be a parody of horror media like how Duke 3D is to action films and Blood does a good job at it. The only big issue I have is how in the penultimate level E4, Kaleb somehow gets inside of a giant worm. I'm not strongly demanding stories in these games but I wish it was explained how he got there since it's so random.

The enemies I'm more mixed on this time around. I find some of them to be really annoying to fight like the Hellhounds where if they hit you even once, they can slowly chip away at your health and you better hope you kill an enemy that drops some. The Gargolyes will take forever to finally fly down and start attacking you. Spiders can mess up you field of view by touching you. Phantasms can be really be grating if you don't have Sawed Off shotgun rounds ready and hit with it's alt fire when it reappears. Hands can be annoying if you don't know the button to get them off you. The Hellhounds are especially annoying since being ill prepared could lead you back to the restart screen.

It's strange, Blood for the most part is a really well made game but there are just enemies in it's roster that makes me start groaning by the mere thought of fighting them again.

Overall, while Blood can be frustrating in places, it's still enjoyable to play just held back by some very irksome enemies to fight especially in the moment before learning of their placement in the levels.

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker Review

When I got the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection back over a decade ago, this was the game I remember playing the most out of all them. I really enjoyed it back then and I thought after being lukewarm on every MGS past the first Solid and especially after 2, a large part me thought Peace Walker might not hold up that much. After playing it again over a decade later, Peace Walker still holds up. There's a couple of things that hold the game back but after feeling almost nothing but apathy from MGS3 and 4, I'm surprised Peace Walker is even a game I still like.

Since it's an MGS game I'll begin with the story and for the most part I enjoy it. I really do enjoy the fact that the more or less seemingly retconned the 3rd game's ending. It was nothing more than the logical fallacy known as "appeal to emotion". What makes Peace Walker's story compelling is that Big Boss and by extension Hideo Kojima is on my side regarding this. What do I mean? Big Boss throughout the much of PW's story still hasn't accepted that fact what Eva told her is 100% truth since with MGS3's narrative, we don't really see that many scenes with "The" Boss and Eva. The latter ran away and gave you a tape recording saying, "take my word for it" in a long winded monologue of course. Having a story where Big Boss is questioning all this makes him a more nuanced character. The starting of the game does a great job at selling you on him as it shows how he is haunted by what seems to be a ghost of his former mentor. How Zadornov baits Big Boss into taking on the mission.

What is also refreshing is how great it feels for a Metal Gear protagonist to have agency again. Where Old Snake acts disinterested and dismissive, Big Boss in Peace Walker gives the feeling of wanting to find geniune closure. With the scene I mentioned and how he taunts Strangelove in the Torture Room later in the game. It's also great how Old Snake's long stretches of silence is gone and he gets into actual geniune conversations with his allies and foes. The "turning what you just said but saying it questioningly way" is toned down here a good deal.

The themes of deterance and peace are quite interesting in how AI should be used to handle firing nuclear weapons. This will do much of the story's heavy lifting outside of BB's plight since the characters outside of him, Strangelove and maybe Huey and Miller are on the underdeveloped side. There's not many bad guys outside of "Hot" Coldman and he's just there.

PW also gets very ridiculous towards the end even for MGS standards but that's if you do the grind in Chapter 5.

Gameplay despite losing actions like first person aiming and moving in prone. The gameplay manages to be the most compelling the series has been in a while.

Remember the tranq gun I kept on complaining about? Here it's used to recruit members for Mother Base rather be a bypass gameplay option. You are also encouraged to finish the level quickly and not die that much so you can get more "heroism" points so no relying on being able to respawn from the last place you died.

CQC slam is no longer an instant knockout. You have to knockdown on an enemy, wait for them to get up, then choke them out if you want to incapcitate them up close. Higher level guards will take longer to choke out.

It doesn't end there, the game also introduces new enemy types throughout the campaign. You got armoured enemies, guards with helmets(no first person aiming means you can't aim under them and you got to worry about activitating a quick caution phase), some that blend in with the surrondings and are also good at CQC, snipers using ghille suits, and game drone enemies.

Vehicle bosses can also be defeated using stealth.

This transitions me to negatives since the vehicle bosses on paper are a good idea only the APC boss is handled well since you know where enemies will spawn from. Later fights have random alerts and extremely random enemy spawns.

The AI bosses are okay but can be lengthy damage sponges especially Peace Walker. What makes it worse is that PW can go on for long that it drain that annoying psyche guage. Some of it's attacks can do it too. Then you have to do that obnoxious 7th gen left stick waggling nonsense.

While Chapter 3 starts off with a creative shootout where you have to watch multiple vantage points and are in a choke point where you can ambushed from left and right. The creativity in game design starts to go down slowly. You get only one whole main mission where you have to avoid a drone enemy and the rest is mainly just evading guards in industrial areas. Lacking the interesting enemy design of the outdoor levels. It's almost too easy to go back to tranq headshotting in the industrial levels before the Soviet Base.

Chapter 5 is a boring grind with a ridiculous boss and song at the end. A sequence where Big Boss resigns to his fate isn't worth grinding this much over. Also, that torture mini game is awful and can stump almost any first time player from getting furthur into the game. Why is there no accessiblity option for this?

Overall, PW was a surprise especially how apathetic to the series before playing.

Sprawl Zero Review

When I first heard of Sprawl Zero, I originally thought, "it's a follow up to that one game that wasn't really that great? Hope this time it's better". It was also interesting just how much it was going to borrow from the early to mid 00s FPS games. Games like FEAR, Halo, Dead to Rights and arguably even games like Psi Ops the Mindgate Conspiracy but most likely Half Life 2's Gravity Gun. There's also games like Project Snowblind and Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence for it's visual inspiration.

As a whole, I'd say for the most part, it lived up to my expectations of being better than the first Sprawl.

One major difference and a really big improvement is that weapon feedback feels MUCH better this time. Guns actually have a sense of weight and punch to them unlike the first game. Tearing into an enemy with the various weapons feels good to do now. Where the original game's weapons feels like you are firing BB gun rounds into enemies.

Another one is while the first game was FEAR meets Titanfall. Here it feels like a homage to the 00s and also the hitscan shooters of the late 90s. There's traditional cutscenes here and there but also telling a story with no cuts like in Half Life. There's also a leader npc giving you a rundown on the mission objectives something you'd find in an early Medal of Honor game.

The narrative is kind of just there but it does give you more context to what's going by comparison to the first game.

Actual combat of Sprawl Zero is a ballet of using melee, slo mo, grabbing a weapon that can't reload then throwing the gun or lifting environmental objects, and then picking up another weapon or getting health back from the damage you lost from the hitscanners.

There's some cool ideas Sprawl Zero has to it's own like being able to hold bullets or rockets and send them right back at the enemy. You can also do the aforemention throw an empty gun at an enemy and it feels super satisfying to do. It can feel reminiscent of Superhot.

It creates for a very fast and frentic combat system that's very satisfying and fun in the moment. You can also kill an enemy leader and cause nearby enemies' comms to malfuction similar to killing an elite in Halo. Speaking of Halo, there is a very obvious homage to the Gravity Hammer from the 3rd game. It arguably feels better here than it did in that game since the enemies gib a lot more when the attack connects.

Enemies also give health pick ups upon death which is a system I prefer vastly over regen health since it keeps you on the move rather than have you wait and be vunerable. One aspect of 00s FPS design I'm glad it stayed away from.

You even helicoptors being regular enemy types as opposed to be bosses. I did wish you had another way to damage them other than using the magnetic reflection ability.

This might as well transition me to issues. While I do like that enemies give health upon death, I did wish you got one health stim to fallback on since you could be at critical and want to run to the pick up but you might be dead by the time you reach it. The guns are hitscan so you can't just dodge out of the way. The enemy counts also starts to get really high and overwhelming so it would be nice to have one fallback healing item.

The burst fire pistol feels awful and weak to use due to how long it takes to get a kill, not a good weapon to ever have in a game where there's no reloading and all guns are a single clip.

Like Halo there's black bars that pop up when loading a new part of the level and while in Halo, it never gets in the way, here there are parts of the game where you are getting shot at while the black bars are around.

There are some awful levels here and there like Eden where you have to get past a sniper's alley, fight them in a single choke point and fight helicoptors twice with no health items or checkpoints. The final boss is also really bad since you have to do an enemy wave just to fight him and battling him can level your health bar and start a restart. There can be some really annoying firefights here and there but the checkpoint system can allievate much potential frustration.

Overall, Sprawl Zero turned out to be an enjoyable follow up to a game I was very lukewarm on and it's highly worth checking out. Wasn't expecting to enjoy it this much.

Marvel's Wolverine Review

I'm big fan of Insomniac Games and while their Spider-Man titles is not what I think when it comes to them at their peak, they are solid and enjoyable. I can say much of the same for this Wolverine game all though there are some surprises that this game gave me due to also being an intermidiate Marvel fan and superhero fan by extension. Well intermidiate fan from the perspective of a divorced wife but I'm getting off topic.

The story had quite a number "holy crap" moments upon first booting it up. Yes, there have been video games like the X-Men Origins Wolverine movie tie in where you get to play as an unhinged Logan tearing things apart with his claws but it was still shackled to the framework of a terrible PG-13 movie. This Wolverine game feels like it has the tone of a Marvel comic under the MAX imprint. Everything is bloody, gory and characters aren't afraid to curse and be overly mean to each other. It's surprising to see any Marvel adaptation like this let alone a game. Hearing Sabertooth say, the f word for the first time really caught me by surprise. It's a huge stark contrast compared to the writing in their Spider-Man games.

It doesn't just end there, it feeds into the story and writing itself, right at the start at the end of the first mission you kill Omega Red and how Logan himself isn't strongly against killing or anyone else in the story is for that matter. Later on, Jean Grey kills a bad guy in self defense and there's no "we are heroes, we don't kill" speeches to be found. The story officially sold me when Essex wanted to capture and keep Bolivar Trask locked up so he can keep torturing him but then Wolverine mercy killed the latter instead.

The whole story feels refreshing in that just because you are a supervillain, it doesn't mean you'll get beat up, locked up, cause trouble, get a "pardon" and get locked up again and repeat the process. It isn't even scared to kill off child characters like Leech too. No Charles Xavier and his endless idealism that goes nowhere and as much as I like Magneto, he's on the overused side and his origin is hard to reimagine for modern times without some anti aging device.

What REALLY sold on the story was the "sinister" villain Essex. He's the Xavier stand in and well I thought Insomniac was going to make him a sympathetic anti villain but instead it was just a red herring. He was ultimate a parastic self righteous hypocrite who only used his "helping mutantkind" for his own selfish ends. It hits close to for me now. The cutscenes with him might be a little underwhelming at first but it slowly starts to add up.

It's also nice to see elements of X-Men Evolution and Infamous in here too.

While I did enjoy the story I got some issues particularly with the backstory and how a disjointed and vague everything can feel. Wolverine did so much stuff over hundreds of years? He was also a hearld of Apocalypse? He was once had a relationship with Jean Grey a hundred years ago? Essex made him savage and then made him sane again? Feels like so much information happens and feel scatter brained.

Also some side characters like Mystique can feel a little underdeveloped if you don't hear her optional conversation with Tyger at the bar before the Hand shows up.

Combat is pretty good. Yes, it isn't going to reinvent the way video game combat is going to be done but it's fun enough regardless. You got combos with special enders with the triangle button, special attacks on cooldowns, parries, perfect dodges, a kick, the ability to reflect projectiles, a rage meter and critical strikes. It can be fun to chain combos together, use special abilities and then build up some rage to get critical strikes in.

You a solid enough toolset, the big issue is that the game on normal can be a little too forgiving with ability like channeling your rage into healing or the multiple second chances you get. The enemy roster starts to get more interesting when it introduces medium and larger enemies with larger HP and more attacks for you to parry, more projectiles and more area of effect attacks to try to perfect dodge. They start popping up towards the around the end of the Japan chapter so it can take a while for things to get interesting.

The latter couple chapters is where things start to pick up and the enemy count gets higher especially with the proto sentienels, more projectile enemies and long waves

Bosses are also good even if they are a few like Omega Red, and Sabertooth, and Essex. With different attacks and timings for dodges and parries. Sintenel boss being the weakest.

Environmental takedowns and lunging were handled better in X-Men Origins since the former you have a grab button and the latter isn't contextual.

The stealth is on the pointless side and some of the scripted setpieces aren't the greatest especially that bike chase.

Overall, I was expecting a solid time with this Wolverine game and got exactly that with a couple of surprises here and there.

Call of Duty: Ghosts Review

This was a game I played a few years back and knowing it's reputation of the worst CoD game more like the worst CoD game they are aware of but I digress. I remember it being a solid and enjoyable time, it had some memorable missions with the only big sore spot being the terrible ending. I'm more forgiving of bad endings in games since gaming encapuslates the idea of "the journey" better than any other medium. I still feel the same way years later, it's not the best CoD campaign but after recently replaying Black Ops 2, I can certainly say I prefer this game.

One thing about CoD Ghosts that is quite surprising is that it paces itself quite well. We get to live through the eyes of the main characters before the world gets completely anhillated and destroyed. It's also interesting to see a CoD game attempt some kind of bond of family. You got Riley and your brother while also needing to prove yourself to your father.

Some aspects on paper I also like one example being the villain Rorke. He can be pretty overpowered and often wrestles control away from the player for bad things to happen. At the same time, it's interesting because he's one of the former memebers of the Ghosts who got left behind. The plot twist of him still left behind and blaming other people for his problems also makes sense on paper since he spent years being in prison and getting tortured. The problem is that before he kills your father, the torture and imprisonment never gets brought up so it's just nothing more than me and my headcanon rather than something concrete. It was nice to see the game play with player expectations and have the part where the player character pulls a knife out and tries to overpower Rorke like with Shepard just for him to counter and beat you.

Another big issue is Infinity Ward and their insistence for the protagonist not to speak. It was showing problems as far back as MW2 and it still isn't helping the narrative now. Since this game is about familial bond, why doesn't the main character talk and form a geniune dynamic? This appeal to tradition at this point feels like Infinity Ward just refuses to move at this point. It made sense for CoD before MW2 to do it since you were one of many soldiers on the battlefield. Now there's more going on by comparison.

The ending is also random and terrible setting up a cliffhanger that never got followed up on.

Still, it's a moderately decent story and keeps more to the grounded military feeling than Black Ops 2 does.

You know the gameplay mechanics by now. Regen health, ADS, scripted sequences, throwables you might use on occasion, maybe some melee. The shooting is still rather a simple spray and pray shooting. The frustrating parts where enemies have line of sight on you while you are trying to find cover and at critical health or the cover is too small to hide and get a cheap death, it's all still there. I tolerate this stuff more than anything like an annoying family member or friend that I still hang around with.

This is still the same CoD but there are some memorable and enjoyable missions here. Like Brave New World, Struck Down, Legends Never Die, Federation Day, Clockwork, Into The Deep, Sin City, LOKI and Ghost Killer.

Brave New World has part where you have to defend a wall from enemies from above and on the ground. Struck Down has you mark trucks and then slowly destroy an enemy base on a baseball field.

Other missions like Legends Never Die even has you using the water as cover to enemy fire in combat. Into the Deep had underwater combat that has hitscan weapons indirectly become projectile. Ghost Killer has a level where you are on a train and have to maintain your balance while it's shaking.

It has things that makes CoD campaigns endearing like beautiful looking establishing shots and an incredible sense of scale where it looks like other battles are happening while you are doing yours and does a good job at breaking up traditional gunplay like I mention above.

CoD Ghosts does have some fair share of good missions. The problem is that there is a lot of recycled ideas and assets here. If you were on the gaming community around a decade ago, the CoD "Recycled Warfare" meme was said. Games like this can fuel that narrative. MW3 did that and it was charming in that game, here it enters into parody.

You got ideas from All Ghilled Up, a part where you are attacked by an attack chopper and then sneak around using a heartbeat sensor, you are defending a device while a progress bar is slowly loading, a mission on an oil rig. There's even one bizarre mission where it even borrows from Black Ops 2 where attacked a military ship that is your home base. The penultimate mission borrows from CoD2(2005), and MW1 where you ride a tank then a helicoptor and try to a missile from exploding while on a timer.

Overall, CoD Ghosts have it's interesting and novel moments, there's a fair share of derivative parts. Worth checking out in spite of it's reputation

Resident Evil 2(2019) Review

I remembered being so hyped by the very idea of this remake. Back in a time period where I was against tank controls and thought, "this remake will give what the original game had but with better controls". Little did I know, it didn't really give me that. The changes like the tougher zombies, camera shaking when grabbed, Mr. X no longer being scripted and especially A and B games being heavily gutted caused me to have a strong dislike for years to come. This was one of the games that did teach me to never get overly hyped for anything. I have bashed this game many times in my past write ups too. I decided to replay the PS5 version years later. I was dreading that I was going to have a miserable time but surprisingly I enjoyed it much more this time around. It still has the problems I mentioned but a lot of them aren't as big of deal breakers except the A and B scenarios being a red herring now. The best comparison I can make is that this is something along the lines of Tomb Raider Anniversary, a flawed but enjoyable remake.

REmake 2 keeps mostly everything that makes the original game great but what makes it stand out is how it plays with your expectations. If you never played the original, you'll of course get a new experience but if you did, there's lots new to find where it doesn't like you are playing the same game in a different perspective and controls.

RPD Police Station has been redesigned but the general layout remains the same. You still got the Main Hall that connects to a West and East side but the rooms are all fully rendered in 3D rather than the prerendered backgrounds of yester year. The order in which visit iconic places in the story changes too. For example, Kendo's gunshop doesn't appear until late game, you go through the RPD again but with Mr. X stalking you, or even a puzzle where you need different number keys to unlock certain doors in a weapons locker.

The spirit of the original game and the RE of old before 2005 is kept intact. You got inventory space and you have to make a concious decision of what to take with you. What do you prefer? Lots of healing items or ammo? Do you take lots of puzzle items instead? Do you try to try to fit in a few of each? A new addition this time around is that you can get hip pouches to add more space to your inventory.

You will backtrack, fight enemies, solve puzzles some being smaller ones within a giant puzzle.

This is the part where I address the combat and when I first played the game, I was annoyed by many of REmake 2's "quirks". The first major one being how the zombies take multiple hits and especially multiple headshots before dying. I discovered this time around that the game has a dismemeberment system especially when you shoot them in the legs. A common tactic was to immobilize them and then finish them off with either a knife or a few headshots. They weren't as annoying as I once thought.

Camera jerking became less of a problem because I got grabbed much less due to this said tactic. It does become a problem when surronded by many zombies by those scenarios are too few to even notice. Lickers do take a lot of damage but they don't pop up too much either and you'll be decked out with firepower to take them down easily. Surprisingly dogs were easier to run away from than to fight since the survival horror decision making of, "take some hits so you can save bullets" popped into my mind.

Mr. X? This was the biggest surprise, if you keep moving througout the map like you have a purpose, you won't really encounter him that much. Maybe at the library at the most but that seems to be his most common spawn point. It's rather surprising that what was once something I strongly dislike about this remake is barely an issue now.

With that said, it's not all sunshine and rainbows. The parts where you play as Ada aren't particularly interesting since they are mainly just scripted sequences that have nothing to do with the core gameplay. That and I'm not a big fan of the much longer and expanded on sewer section. The layouts can get very confusing and at times even labythrine. The map also isn't as helpful here as it should be do to the disjointed presentation of it. You also fight a lot of damage spongey enemies and super padded out plug puzzle.

Luckily the Labratory is where things wrap up and isn't as dragged out.

The biggest issue is how the A and B scenarios are red herrings this time around. Capcom added them due to fan backlash when they should've just stuck to their guns since there's this weird inbetween. The true ending is unlocked after you do Claire's run. This isn't worth it due to the contradictions in the story and how everything is mostly remixed as opposed to being, "what Claire was up to while Leon was on his adventure". I know I would get annoyed and looked up the final boss and ending on Youtube.

Overall, I'm much kinder on REmake 2 but the botched zapping system holds it back from being on par with the original.

Titanfall 2 Campaign Review

There isn't many if any games where I have played 4 times and I still enjoy playing it even now. Usually there'd be things I'd be more critical on or aspects about the game that just annoys me now. Maybe there's parts of the game I dislike or portions of the game I feel is underdeveloped but no. Everytime I replay the Titanfall 2 campaign every few years and every time I play it, I still find the same level and enjoyment and awe I do when I originally played. Sure there are some issues but every piece media has problems but they are minor in the grand scheme of things.

One major aspect I like about the game is the story but especially on how it's told. Titanfall 2 follows the Half Life logic of the player getting to play out the journey with no major cuts happening unless if it's a load screen. With Titanfall 2, it's more of the bond between Jack Cooper and BT-7274. As the game's opening cutscene eloquantly puts it, "what truly separates the pilot from all the grunts and machines on the battlefield is the bond between a Pilot and his Titan". The story is ultimately about Jack and BT as they are reluctantly paired up together to deliver a distress signal about doomsday weapon that can destroy Harmony. It's a simple set up but it's told very well with Jack and BT's banter and how it's interspliced at the right time.

What also helps is how the game forgoes the issues that many FPS games had where the player character talks during cutscenes but never speaks during gameplay or just not have the character talk at all. Here, Jack talks and while the dialogue options seem pointless, it keeps the player in the moment of wanting to participate but without taking control away from the player and it adds small talk during the down time sections especially.

Jack and BT go through so much together through their banter and with them learning to become efficient together as the game foreshadowed with the quote I mentioned, it's hard for me not to get teary eyed at the ending of "The Beacon" mission.

Gameplay of course carries everything. Right off the bat, Titanfall 2's gunplay feels snappy and punchy and the weapons feel and sound great. You also get a cloaking ability but considering how large the enemy count is and how quickly enemies can put you down, you can use it as a quick way to break line of sight and then relocate to get the drop on the enemy.

What also helps is the movement system since for one you can double jump and you can wall run. What helps the wall runs in this game is that they are easy to do and they can be endlessly chained as well. Double jump is a good to carry the fast paced momentum. There's also the slide which can be fun to use when chained into a sprint and get some quick kills.

Okay, gunplay is good, it's mechanically sound and movement controls are great. What about the levels? They also don't pull punches either. First you have a solid tutorial known as the "pilot's guanlet" that goes over gunplay and movement. Then you got the a rather simple but elegant tutorial as you do 3 of something to restore BT. After that you go to well a made sewer level which is a great series obstacle challenges as you fight soldiers and suicide bombing robots. There's a level where you go through an assembly line that tests your platforming ability as you fight off hordes of enemies towards the end. Effect and Cause being the amazing level where you traverse through 2 different timelines and learn about the doomsday experiement. What's cool here in that it even encourages you switch when there's stage hazards too so what could kill you could help you progress through a level. The Beacon is a great downtime level where it is foreshadowed where you need to be at the start of a level as you slowly progress doing shootouts, puzzles platforming to get to that part. "Trial by Fire" a titan only level. The Ark where you have to platform through moving ships as you kill enemies and having BT do the throw again. It all culminates in The Fold Weapon where you get reign fire with the smart pistol.

Best part of all this? While this is no doubt a short game it never FEELS that way due to how amazing all these levels and everything is in the moment. The weakest level here is Trial by Fire and it's not because it's bad but because it's a Titan only level.

Might as well go to the negatives. The Titan parts while empowering can get boring during extended periods due to how simple it can feel compared to on foot combat. Bosses aren't that great while more going on that a lot of bosses in the genre, they suffer from the weak framework Titan gameplay has. The AI can also be rather stupid too constantly having them run into things or have no idea where they even are. I also find it disappointing that the grapple hook can't be used during single player.

Overall, these issues are minor in the grand scheme of things. Considering how much TF2 is a killer no filler campaign that I enjoy after beating 4 times is surprising.

Shadow of the Colossus(2018) Review

Shadow of the Colossus is a rather strange game to review. Not because it's terrible but because a lot of the games I tend to play multiple times and write reviews on tend to not lean so heavily to the "artsy" side of gaming. Playing SotC feels like a game you are meant to play once or twice at the most but a third time can enter into the realm of diminishing returns. You play it the first time back on either PS2 or the PS3 HD version and then a 2nd time with the Bluepoint's remake of it and then stop there. It can be said for a lot of games but it feels most apparent for me here. There is still a lot of enjoyment and thrills to be had from SotC, it's just not the kind of game you play because of how "fun" it feels to play.

The story is interesting in that not much of it is told through cutscenes. What cutscenes are here are very brief and the storytelling itself is either inferred through details with the sparse dialogue or in the environment. If you are one of those, "every storytelling medium should use the strengths of it's medium" people, I got a feeling you would no doubt champion SotC and Team ICO's games by extension.

What the story can be boiled down to is that you play as a nameless Wanderer and ride his horse Agro as you traverse a forbidden and empty land as you kill monsters who have done nothing to you to resurrect a dead girl. Is she your girlfriend, your sister or an innocent woman he helps out of reluctance? Up to intrepretation. It's an interesting way to tell a story over multiple hours without overly relying on cutscenes and dialogue by extension. It can be an intriguing story to ponder on.

Gameplay is what carries any game and I respect SotC in a lot of ways. Remember those overly long and drawn out enemy waves that plagued ICO? Gone. There's no combat to be found here which to me is the developer realizing their limitations. They know making another game with poor combat wouldn't cut it so they made a boss rush title instead.

I also respect the game for how much it carries itself on these boss battles since outside of these moments, you'll be spent traversing a large, barren and empty world with barely anything to do or even find.

So no enemy waves and no explorable world. The game is ultimately a boss rush game broken up with long horse back rides. Your time is mostly spent fighting these super large "colossal" giants and gameplay is spent trying to find their weak spots and performing the most painful acupunture on both the giants and yourself.

There are two aspects that help sell you on how epic it all feels: music and controls.

The music is almost a character in of itself. I'd say without this soundtrack, the game would fall apart almost immediately. Hearing the haunting music pieces as you are trying to get on to the collosi but then when you get on, these super heroic and triuphant songs start playing and it gives the player the feeling that he is barely hanging on to dear life. It adds so much to the thrill.

How Wanderer controls also plays a role and this divides many. You of course got the grip guage but the way Wanderer platforms around or how unpredictably he can move creates a sense of unpredictablity to the gameplay. Wanderer could struggle to move the way you want him to, he'll fall when you least expect it or the him refusing to grab on to a ledge the way you intended him to.

I argue unlike ICO's terrible combat that there is some delibrate aspects to this since it's supposed to create a feeling that Wanderer is this small insignificant being climbing on a creature that is way bigger than him. It makes the title feel less "gamey" and makes the act of climbing more tension. I dislike using either of them as defenses but considering how SotC has no explorable world and no enemy waves, might as well try to something dynamic to the gameplay.

As a result even if the gameplay does become diminishing returns after a 2nd time, it can still feel amazing to defeat a collosi with the gripe guage almost depleted and with that music playing.

The game isn't absolved of issues. For one using the light sword can be cumbersome since there's a lot of dark areas and the sword is useless when the player is under them making these empty horse rides last a little longer than expected.

Wanderer takes forever to get back up after getting knocked down. It could take about a minute and if you are fighting smaller collosi, you could get hit again and repeat the process.

Since SotC is a puzzle game, you'll get more out of it if you're a speedrunner since if you already know the collosi weaknesses beforehand much of the boss fight gameplay is cut in half. You are meant to slowly think and ponder on how to beat them.

The final collosi is the weakest since by that point, SotC becomes an actual platformer and the collosi itself can feel gamey in how scripted it can add plus the controls needing you to be precise now.

Overall, SotC is still enjoyable but can run into issues

Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resyncned Review

This remake is a rather fascinating one on paper. You could say the idea of a Black Flag remake sounds "pointless" since one could argue that it plays "well" even know but I'm not sure if you could really say that about the original game. The story is good and is easily one of the series' better tales, many aspects of it's gameplay especially combat and stealth weren't that great even back then. A modernized version of the game does sound it could help make an okay game, a solid one.

Since I already praised it, the story especially for a franchise that has some characters I geniunely loathe(Ezio Auditore and his entire cast of characters) is surprisingly good. It was rather obvious that Ubisoft was trying to make a more "likeable" lead character again after the divisive if not outright negative reception Connor had at the time of Assassin's Creed 3's release. It worked here since while Edward Kennway is a charismatic lead, he isn't so likeable to the point where he can come off as someone who could never do any wrong or is always right like Ezio was.

For one, Edward starts off the game as someone whose broke and down on his luck and the interesting part is that his wife Caroline doesn't really seem to mind as long as he has him. Edward wants to change his down on his luck status and become more of a made man. He resorts to piracy and throughout the story, that slowly starts to become less of a viable option. He's becomes obessesed with the "Observatory" and he thinks that will get him out of that status. What really sells me on the story is how it can almost at times come off as a deconstruction of the AC series. Where Edward like the audience doubts the significance of the Creed but the more the story goes on, he becomes more accepting of it and views it more of a guide to help him out in life.

It's how all this happens throughout the game and how it feels like a journey is what sells me on the story. How Edward starts off as a no good greedy pirate to trying to make amends for all the wrong doing he did. It's kind of like the first Assassin's Creed with Altair but Edward Kennway has more of a clearly defined backstory this time.

The gameplay itself while certainly an improvement over the original game is nothing overly exemplary. With that said, an improvement is still an improvement.

You have an actual crouch button now instead of the stalking zones of the original game. So now, stealth feels like something that is actually possible. That does depend however since much of it can a game of getting to bush to bush and especially abusing the whistle feature and having enemies getting close enough to you to those said bushes to kill them. The only real way to be caught during these sections is if Edward kills a guard but he doesn't conceal himself and the dead body in the bush right away.

Since stealth in the original game wasn't really a high standard even for it's time with games like Splinter Cell Blacklist releasing the same year, this can be overlooked. I would prefer to have easy but doable stealth than having no crouching button and sprinting to bushes.

The frequent tailing missions are thankfully gone now. I don't mind a few tailing missions but the main story missions of the original game relied on them a little too much.

Combat is also better and arguably seen the most improvement. For one it's counter based and it's not nearly as easy to go on a chain killing spree and wipe out an entire small army. You need to parry and also guard break into order to effienciently kill enemies now. You can guard break through sweeping, kicking into walls, using Edward's guns, smoke bombs can help thin out the herd too. The only issue with combat is that the counter window can be very finicky and some bosses like Roberts can take an insane amount of damage to kill. I had to lower the difficulty here.

I'm describing the on foot combat a lot here but why is it that? For all of Black Flag's reputation of being a "great pirate, bad Assassin's Creed" game tends to be. That can be rather false. Many of the main story missions tend to be the on foot AC affair. Only a couple of the story missions at the most tend to involve the Jackdaw or anything sailing the high seas. Since this is the case, I'd rather put ship combat to easy and occasional get materials to loot to upgrade the ship due to infrequency of story missions that involve the Jackdaw.

Another massive boon this remake brings is that the modern day portions have been completely removed. So no more annoying pace breakers or reimagining plot points that never went anywhere like Juno dying in a comic book.

Overall, this remake did what it set out to do. Pick the AC game that isn't too fundamentally difficult to overhaul and refine that game. It's a decent game, now more of a solid one and is one of the couple games in the series I enjoy.

Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight Review

When this game was first announced and it was said to be a Lego game based on Batman movies, it was going to be like the Arkham games and Rocksteady was co developing it, I said to myself, "this is Batman Arkham: The Force Awakens". After playing through it, that's exactly what the game was. By no means is it something I consider "bad", if you ignore it as an "apology letter" for games like Gotham Knights and Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League, it greatly loses it's luster for me. It also serves as sort of a "back to basics" reboot since Lego Batman 3 was going overboard with the greater DC Universe and it might've rubbed off the Batman only people the wrong way.

The narrative is kind of interesting on paper where it combines various aspects of Batman's on screen appreances like the live action movies, 90s animated series and the aforementioned Arkham Games into one narrative. It does kind of feel more interesting in concept than execution. You'll start the campaign doing Bruce's training in Batman Begins and Talia's there at the start this time unlike in the Nolan Trilogy. After that, you'll go through the Burton films and surprisingly even the Joel Schumacher Batman movies are featured here. You'll get into some run ins with some of Batman's comic villains but were in the Arkham games like Firefly and Black Mask. It all culminates with a homage to the following the Joker sequence in Arkham Asylum and one big homage to the Dark Knight Rises. There's also a shot for shot sequence of the Batman TAS intro too.

It can all feel very haphazardly put together since it combines various different Batman media with different tones and styles all into one narrative. Sure Talia is at the start this time but then she no shows for a while and you'll have different side kicks like Gordon and the Bat Family along for the ride. You also got Jack Nicolson Joker just out of nowhere turning into Heath Ledger Joker and there's even a weird tie in to the Killing Joke prior to the former.

The game's story can almost feel like a Batman history highlight reel than something fresh featuring Batman. This was definitely the point but it also goes back to my comparison to the Force Awakens I made earlier.

Gameplay itself is interesting in that it was more or less what the advertising entailed in that it was "Batman Arkhamlite" which while is true for aspects like on foot city traversal and the Batmobile.

Surprisingly, the actual combat and stealth shares a striking resemblance to the Spider-Man games by Insomniac. It was hard to unsee it. For one, remember how in the Arkham games of yester year required the player to use stealth with some degree of profiency in order to avoid Bruce getting pummeled by hitscan machine guns? Now, it's just large enemy waves where you can't even clear a room using stealth and it's just there to thin out the herd, like the Insomniac Spider-Man games. Enemies now give health drops in the middle of combat even on the highest difficulty. Health regain did work differently in Insomniac Spidey but the fact that you can get back health mid combat is something you couldn't do in past Arkham games. You had to clear out an enemy wave to get health back. There's also area of effect attacks that are marked with a circle or an enemy having a line of sight to shoot you to get out of the way. Enemies will also have try to shoot you from a higher vantage point too like in those games.

As easy as it is for me to throw in a "gotcha" moment for all the years when Insomniac Spider-Man was said to be an Arkham "ripoff". It just tells me that when Legacy of The Dark Knight isn't borrowing from past Batman media, it's borrowing from the very games that borrowed from the Arkham series itself. It can give the game the feeling of being "souless" especially if you don't hold care for or hold games like Gotham Knights or Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League with an extreme level of contempt.

Dark Knight difficulty feels quite superfluous in the grand scheme of things since you'll have to try hard to get an actual game over or if you die to the buggy platforming or misunderstand the solution needed to damage a boss. Not that I'm demanding challenge out of a Lego game but I thought this whole thing would amount to more.

The puzzles are just kind of there. You just activate detective mode, look at what's highlighted and then break the lego items to build them. Lego games of the past at least had you just keep smashing things to find what you need to build the level progressing item or choose a character who had the right skill set to build them but that's streamlined now too.

Overall, I don't dislike Lego Batman Legacy of the Dark Knight, it's a perfectly serviceable and enjoyable game in the moment but it's existence and how it's made is hard for me to not look back upon my time with it an immense cynicism. I can say it's more consistent as a whole than Skywalker Saga was which is a complement I'll give.

Halo: Campaign Evolved(Playstation 5) Review

When this remake was announced and it being on put on Playstation no less I was like, "you could've just ported the Master Chief Collection instead". A remake like this does sound redundant on paper since the original Halo CE is often cited as an old shooter especially on consoles that still holds up today. With that said, while the existence of this game is rather questionable, playing it in the moment is "fine" at least for the for the first half of the game. It's not as nearly as much of a souless remake as the Metal Gear Solid Delta is. There's some interesting cutscene changes and some fun bonus missions here.

The best way of describing "Campaign Evolved" is that what if you had "Combat Evolved" but with the gamefeel of the 343's Halos and modern additions like sprinting, vehicle jacking and Halo 2's regen health. You also have the quest markers be there at all times rather than having them pop up at random points instead.

Story is much of the same but there is newly recorded voice acting and some cutscene changes. For one Miranda Keyes gets established early on as opposed to coming out of nowhere like in Halo 2. There is one hilarious cutscene change of two Hunters getting crushed by a Covenant ship at the end of the Truth and Reconcilation. Fohammer's model is actually shown and a really cool one of Chief fighting off Covenant before boarding the ship to get off Halo at the end of the game among others.

It's much of the same as a whole so it's basically just an excuse plot where it has slightly more going on than games like old Doom and Duke Nukem. It can be summed up like this: Covenant find Pillar of Autumn, Chief and Cortana crashland on Halo, find Captain Keyes, they find 343 Guilty Spark, there's a the flood, Halo is a doomsday weapon meant to kill them, blow up the Autumn and get off. It's as simple as I described similar to the vein as the original Star Wars before being retractively called a New Hope. There's not much in the way of interesting characterization and themeatic richness to be found here. It's as simple as I described it.

It's "fine" in the moment but it can be very simplistic and barebones compared to the multimedia franchise and expanded universe the series ultimately ended up spawning. The fact that much of the story was in a tie in novel would no doubt get scruntized if Halo was a brand new IP released today. World building without needing supplementary material was something even A New Hope had. There's no fun, destable or interesting villain here either.

Halo is an FPS after all and you came here for gameplay and for the first half of the game is quite good. Aspects of the game compared FPS of yester year is how streamlined everything is. No need to collect ammo since you just need to pick up weapons already on the ground or off dead enemies. Health management? No longer needed since your health regens so no need to worry about health pick ups.

Enemies are a lot smarter by comparison to those games where Covenant Elites will flank, move out of the way or will try to come up and ambush you if there shield isn't depleted. There's also the shield and flesh system where bullets drain flesh and plasma drains shields.

Vehicle sections are here too to break up the pace all though it's awkward to see the controls changed here since it now controls like a vehicle in anyother game

The environments are a mixed bag on the positive side, they are a lot bigger compared to the corridors and round circles and squares of shooters prior to this but at the same time so much of the design is copy and pasted which can lead to samey areas and bloated maps. You can tell that the devs of this remake are aware of this so they added nav points at all times now.

Some aspects I appreciate more now like how during the one section with no gun, it's there so the player can get used to controlling the camera. The first level is also meant to train you for the larger maps like Halo and also with higher enemy count and stronger enemies like in Truth and Reconcilation.

Assault on Control room is going through the same triagular areas 3 times and from then on the campaign gets weaker.

The 2nd half of the game is still very weak. If you didn't like the first half the game, then stop at 343 Guilty Spark because after the Library it's just the first half in reverse. You fight the Flood and all they are is that they swarm you and that's it. You point, you shoot, get hit, regen health, reload and then throw grenade every once and a while.

There are people who boil down FPS and shooters to "point and shoot". That's what these Flood sections are. They are very dull. The addition of sprint means that these sections are over faster and you could run past them on lower difficulties. The inconsistent checkpoint system is still very annoying but that is a Halo staple at this point. 

I did enjoy the extra campaign missions but they have more environment variety than the 2nd half of the game and there's no Flood battles.

Overall, questionable remake but still fun in the moment for the 1st half.