Initial D Anime Review

Initial D is a strange show for me, I am not really into cars or street racing and I tend to have a bias towards stories with high stakes but watching Initial D from 1st Stage all the way to 3rd Stage was a surprisingly an enjoyable and engaging time. However, the Project D sections of the show especially past 4th Stage were so dull, tedious, and monotonous that it makes Initial D a hard show to reccomend as a complete whole. If I were to reccomend the show, I'd say stop at 3rd Stage and ignore the Project D sections or go at your own volition while expecting a massive quality in writing drop by 5th Stage. I also watched Initial D 1st Stage 5 years ago while I am glad I watched 2nd and 3rd Stage but I always felt 1st Stage felt the most standalone of all the seasons to a major issue that I will mention later that shoots it in the foot for it engaging you long term. Anyway on to the review. 

What makes 1st - 3rd Stage so engaging despite it being a show about something I don't care about is how the races are contextualized and how Initial D in many ways feels like a well structured video game. The show is basically about a teenage boy named Takumi Fuijiwara and some could find him to be a dull character, I find his personality in this part of the show to work for the coming of age themes that the series is going for, he's basically a bored teenager who is a very good driver that finds driving and cars so boring that what is interesting to his friends is dull and every day chores to him, and it works so well for how the races are contextualized. Another aspect about the show that helps contextualizes the races is his car the AE 86, it's a car that isn't that great and the characters and his rival racers will constantly chastise him for using, but this along with how much the show throws in new gimmicks in every race is what makes the show so engaging. The constant throwing in of new gimmicks in every race is what makes Inital D feel like the well structured video game like I said earlier. For example Takumi will race against Keisuke Takahashi who very much feels like the inductory level of a video game, then he races a car that is better than Keisuke's, then he will race in a car that is worse than his 86 and the cars he races are better than that, he will race in the rain, he will race in a course that he is unfamilar with, he will race with one arm taped on the steering wheel and then Ryosuke Takahashi feels like the final boss of sorts. Then there is  how the races are presented, where the cars will race(with weird CGI), you will see the driver's internal monologues, then the bystanders will say a bunch of car lingo that will give the viewer a better idea of what is going on, and of course when the races really heat up the show will play it's iconic eurobeat music and it just makes the races even more energetic. These songs might be memed to death but they give the races so much energy that it's hard to picture the series without them. 1st and by extension 2nd and 3rd Stages aren't just races, they also help flesh out the characters and serves a breather inbetween every race. The biggest issue with 1st Stage and I alluded to this earlier is that Takumi beats Ryosuke in the final race of 1st Stage, this sort of works at making 1st Stage feel standalone but as a long running series, this is the worst thing you could do from writing standpoint, since now, Takumi has beaten the very best the street racing scene has to offer and if Takumi lost instead, you could potentially step up more seasons with Takumi learning how to be Ryosuke but instead now the series raises the stakes in rather silly ways with Takumi constantly racing pro racers and cars that are better than his 86 just for him to barely scrape by and the series will do this for the it's entire run. Takumi never loses clean once, when Takumi does "lose" it's due to unforseen circumstances than skill. 

2nd and 3rd Stages are decent follow ups and it does expand on what 1st Stage does, and 2nd Stage does have Takumi "lose" but like I said before, it's due to unforseen circumstances rather than skill because of his engine blowing out. 3rd Stage feels more like an epilogue movie than a complete season and it works well for it. 2nd and 3rd Stage also does a good job at developing Natsuki as a character and she starts to grow on you which unfortunately the Project D sections of the show ignores. My only big issue with 3rd Stage is that Takumi's race with Kai Kogashiwa felt pointless and was only there because the movie needed one more race, I also felt Kai could've amounted to more in the series in general since Takumi and Kai's fathers are archrivals but it never amounts to more than a superhero beating up a jobber supervillain. 3rd Stage ends on a solid note and if the series ended here, I'd consider Initial D to be a good series, but no. Project D gets alluded to in 3rd Stage and instead of being left up to the imgination of the viewer, the Project D sections of the show plays out on what is basically a forced continuation of Takumi's story. 

4th Stage is okay, but the season is only carried because of Keisuke Takahashi, he feels more like the underdog that the series wants Takumi to be since Keisuke did lose clean to the latter making him feel more believable. That and he's also the most honest character in the whole series, he doesn't want to have girlfriend because he knows he can't give her an honest relationship compare that to Takumi's friends where they whine about being single one minute and then claim "racers don't need girlfriends" the next and Takumi himself acting like Natsuki doesn't exist and then dating Mika a much less interesting love interest by comparison and it becomes more apparent Keisuke is the most honest and respectable character in the series by comparison to everyone else. Keisuke also feels even more like an underdog where at one point in the show he gets his car busted and needed to ride Kyoko's just to race. Outside of Keisuke, the season is just okay, the CGI for the races are better but it, just becomes a repetitive game of, "go to region, races guys there, win". The series' formula starts to become more obvious and the illusion slowly starts to shatter. 

Now Fifth and Final Stage are by far the dullest parts of the show, I had force myself through these parts, basically where 4th Stage is okay because of Keisuke, now, the series is just race, after race, after race, where there isn't much character development and it's just the Project D crew going through the motions, and the races are one note and montonous too. They race, monologue, bystanders say car lingo, Keisuke and Takumi lose for a bit, then eurobeat plays and either they get the upper hand or win the race. Takumi's turning off the headlights might as well be his finishing move since he wins so many races using this tactic. The series, does try to throw in one wrench into the mix with Ryosuke having a love triangle with a girl in med school and one of the racers he is racing in the last region but it feels forced since this comes out of nowhere and enters into the realm of  "pointless retconning". I don't mind retcons as long as it can add something to the characters or stories despite the lack of build up but this doesn't. It's a pointless sub plot and love triangle that adds nothing to the show other than pointless drama. I wouldn't mind this if Ryosuke did die and Project D would have to win a race without his guidance but the series doesn't commit to this and it comes off as all the more pointless. Sure it would be weird, if the series introduced murder for the first time, but I would prefer this over it adding nothing. This part is relatively disliked but I felt like it could've added more if not a whole lot considering how tedious this season was. Now Final Stage, it's basically one big race, and it's hard to get invested in any of it since the series' "final boss" is basically a teenager who has a hard on for Mako Sato a character who hasn't shown up for a while, everything this teenager does is to impress and after how many pro racers Takumi beats throughout the series, this is just disappointing, and it would've been better if Ryosuke was the final boss and everything Project D was for was to have a rematch with him. 

Overall, if you do watch Initial D, stop at 3rd Stage and watch the Project D portions of the show at your own volition, anything after 3rd Stage depends on how much you like street racing and cars. 

Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare Review

CoD Infinite Warfare is a game I like in concept rather than execution, while it easily plays the best out of the furturistic CoD games, I still feel like the game could be much more. I prefer it over Advanced Warfare and Black Ops 3, but the potential still feels only quarter realized. I do get some enjoyment out of this game but not without saying to myself, "this could be so much more". I'll start with the story first then gameplay.

The story much like the game itself while good in concept feels half baked. I liked the begginning of the story and it has much more nuanced politics than something like Modern Warfare 2 does and I prefer it's setting over the Modern Warfare games since intergalatic space politics stories to me has the potential to be more deep than the generic wannabe action movies of the Modern Warfare and Black Ops games, and I do really think the game starts off strong with the good guys being arrogant by starting an invasion of the Settlement Defense Front with a 4 man unit instead of invading with an army, and Salen Kotch showing the more character he ever shows throughout the rest of the game and how there is a slow build up towards the war with Sef Def, it kind of feels like a classic space opera sci fi show like Babylon 5, Battlestar Galatica, Legend of the Galactic Heroes, and Mobile Suit Gundam, but then the actual game starts and while it isn't terrible and the character interactions are decent enough, I don't think the story ever reaches the heights of those opening few hours. It has side characters and content and as a result, if you only do the main missions, it feels shorter than your average CoD and it the story gets wrapped up super quickly. Salen Kotch barely gets any screen time and has some monologues and he gets taken out before the game is even finished. Nick Reyes and the supporting cast are decent characters, but the whole campaign feels like you are going on a bunch of errands and then the good guys come with a plan to beat the Sef Def out of the blue. It feels like what you get if the first Mass Effect game where it takes 5 hours and in the last hour they suddenly come up with a plan to defeat Saren and Sovereign. I also feels like it was quite a shame to have all the character fleshing out at the end credits instead of during the game itself. The story in this game I like on paper but the execution could've been much better.

Now the gameplay, it has all the same issues as the AW and BO3, good mechanics and makes attempts to add more depth to CoD's shooting, but it doesn't go far enough to be anything worthwhile. You have wall runs and double jumps, but the level design is still your traditional CoD shooting galleries and scripted sequences. The health system still makes you take shots with ADS, hide behind cover, and then regen health rinse repeat. I will admit, there is more attempts at situational depth like windows that can break and have airlocks open, zero gravity sections with a grappling hook, mech fights where you damage it's weak spot in order to do a finishing kill, but they feel too few and far between to be anything worth of note. The weapon selection system is a cool concept but eventually you will run out of of ammo and use the guns the enemies are using and there are going to be moments where you can't stick to your preferred load out at all times. The enemy variety is better than your typical CoD but still could be better, you still fight your generic CoD few bullets to die infantry and you fight robots from time to time but that's it. The enemy variety and the situational depth never combine together for anything truly standout, the shootouts generally feel like CoD2 but with a sci fi skin. The aerial combat does a decent job at breaking up the pace, it's basic but gets the job done, they are meant add more variety and they do a good job at doing that. Feedback is solid and while tailing enemies ships is automated, it does a good job at engaging people not into flight sims. With all that said, Titanfall 2 which came out the same year had much much much more going for it regarding it's campaign than this game does.

While this game isn't bad and is probably one of more memorable CoDs, it is more so due to what could've been than the actual execution itself. I still say it's worth trying out and has more going for it than the acclaimed CoDs do, I still feel like the game could've been better. It's a shame CoD dropped the futuristic direction after this game because with less publisher meddling and a more developed single player could've made for a great game.

Trigun Stampede Review

The 90s Trigun anime series is a show I don't remember all that well and it's been 11 years since I last watched it, my memory of it is hazey at best but I do thank Trigun's popularity because if it hadn't been for that Gungrave would've never have gotten made and spawned one of my favorite anime of all time, but with all that said, what I do think of this latest reboot?

I am going to be honest and say that the show COULD be pretty good but it's just held back by one major issue: it's protagonist Vash the Stampede. I am not a big fan of pacifist characters in fiction but Vash is a character so insufferable that I was starting to miss Batman and his monologues of, "if I kill my villains, I will become them", but I will describe more of that later on.

I'll start with the good, the characters outside of Vash and Meryl Strife are pretty solid and entertaining, my favorites are Nicolas Wolfwood, Knives and Roberto De Niro, in fact most of the characters are solid and are pretty solid and colorful. Knives is a solid villain in this version and has far more character than he did from what I can recall in the 90s Trigun, I actually rooted for him in this version of the show since compared to the main character, I felt Knives' motivations and convictions actually made sense and was far more reasonable, Wolfwood is such a good character I wished he was the protagonist of the show, and Roberto being a detached cynical old man I couldn't help but find him entertaining. His interactions with Wolfwood and the villains are also really amusing since he is so jaded attached compared to them. The music while nothing I want to listen to on Youtube is pretty solid during dramatic scenes, the animation is solid, the designs for certain characters particularly the villains I like, and the worldbuilding and how much it combines sci fi ad westerns is something I kind help but find interesting and cool as a fan of both. It's fun seeing them get mixed up like this.

Now, I'll get to the bad, Vash the Stampede has to be one of the most insufferable protagonists I have ever come across in a long while, I detest almost everything he stands for. He's almost everything people bash Goku and Superman for being. My big issue with Vash's pacifist morales is that nothing he ever does accomplishes anything. Villains are trying to kill him and instead of neutralizing the threat before the situation gets worse, he constantly screams like a little kid in a vain attempt at trying to difuse the situation, he feels like a censored cartoon character where he isn't allowed to be violent due to angering parents, but it goes at odds with the fact that Trigun Stampede isn't a censored kids cartoon and the show can be quite brutal. Vash doesn't even have good negotiations skills either, he just screams, "stay back" or "run away", every time violence is involved, like that will do him any good. The worst of this is during the episode where a kid Vash makes an empty promise to gets turned into a cyborg monster and all Vash did was hope that he was alright even though the monster was trying to kill him and his friends, and when he learns that the monster is that kid, he doesn't even end his suffering. Since the kid would want that, Vash still somehow thinks there is hope for him and after Wolfwood kills the kid, Vash actually has the nerve to take the moral high ground and act like he was better than Wolfwood. The way Vash acts all polite really gets on my nerves too, he acts like he is so pure when he is just a self righteous hypocrite.

It doesn't end there either, Vash is an immortal who can't age, and yet somehow despite seeing the worst of humanity, he still believes there is hope for them, I find this to be so unrealistic since the only people who treated Vash with any geniune kindness are Meryl, Rem and Luida. That's far too few people to be all pro humanity over and act like they are worth defending and worth taking their wrath over.

Anyway I can be here all day, but I feel like I would enjoy Stampede way more if it had Wolfwood as the protagonist, I could enjoy the show overall but Vash just ruins any consistent enjoyment I could get from the series. I normally don't like constantly reviewing anime but this show's protagonist was so clumsily written that I ended up writing this. I do sort of feel like rewatching 90s Trigun to see if Vash is as insufferable but I am not rushing out.

DC's Justice League: Cosmic Chaos Review

DC and by extension WB has been making questionable decisions for years now when it comes to all mediums, I don't even know where to start really and I don't want to go on a rant revealing my hardcore biases but to keep it short, my patience with WB and the DC brand by extension is wearing thin. So with all that said how was this game?

For a kid's game, it's decent and I do like some of the things this game does but I can't help but feel like for everything this game does well, the Marvel Ultimate Alliance games do better.

I'll start with the good, the story and writing is enjoyable. The bantering between Superman, Wonder Woman, Batman and all the other characters are humorous and it does a decent enough job at keeping me engaged. The voice acting is directed well enough to the point where it feels like the actors are doing a good job selling me on the material. It parodies DC characters a lot while also having it's share of more serious moments. Speaking of Superman, it's great that WB finally made a DC game where you play as Superman as a good guy as opposed to making him evil like the Injustice games and the upcoming Suicide Squad game, it's a shame it took a kids game to do it, but I am glad it's here at all. I also like how this game has a Superman villain in it and it's not Lex Luthor or Darkseid which I swear the amount of Superman and JL media coming out now especially the JL, you'd think Darkseid was the only villain the JL has. I do think Mister Mxyzpltk is portrayed pretty well here, his voice acting and material does a good job at selling me on a villain that can't really do anything overly harmful for a game made for kids and he's a pretty solid choice to have for the game's tone. I am however not so big of a fan of Starro showing up because of his recent appreance in the Suicide Squad movie but he's decent enough.

And now here comes the bad, outside of the writing and story which I find to be charming and entertaining, the actual gameplay itself while not bad just feels like a worse Marvel Ultimate Alliance, I'd even goes as far to say the DC Lego games are more enjoyable. My big issues with the combat is the lack of button combinations which I will admit, I don't make a big deal out of as other people but it does head into the realm of questionable when the triangle button isn't even being used for anything. So as a result a lot of combat is spend mashing square and on occasion holding square to shake things up, doing special and ultimate and rinse repeat. There is no team attacks and your special attacks mainly consist of doing 2 moves, you can't even do team attacks like in later MUA games. Points to the game's favor, the game does shake things up with exploration and parts where you get a super powerful weapon to hold to kill enemies faster to avoid the game from being too monotonous but even the levels start eventually get reused a lot. Another issue I have is that enemies don't give health drops when killed, this is one thing I prefer Marvel Ultimate Alliance over X-Men Legends over, and this game having health packs be shared makes the parts where you fight large waves of enemies to be a long battle of attrition until you lose all your health packs, I eventually started playing on easy and then story difficulty due to how many same and overwhelming amounts of enemies the game throws at you. Don't let that fool you however, you can still possibly get game overs if Starro face hugs your entire party on Story difficulty. Add to the overwhemling enemies waves that they are also damage sponges too with the bigger enemies especially and if it weren't for Story difficulty, I wouldn't be able to beat this game. The final boss is just crazy with how many enemies you have to contend with plus the final boss, and you can get a game over if your party gets face hugged. I only won because of a glitch where I got my party face hugged but I knocked the boss' health bar in time for the final cutscene to activate.

Overall, if you are a DC fan, I say try the game out, if you are not, wait for a sale, it's one of the more tolerable products WB has made in recent times but don't expect this game to reach the heights of the Batman Arkham games, Insomniac Spider-Man, Guardians of the Galaxy, Marvel Ultimate Alliance or even the Lego games.

Blackwind Review

There is a good game buried beneath here but I feel like the developers were a bit too over ambitious for their own good. For a random game I bought at a convention vendor which I knew nothing about, I did get more enjoyment out of it than I was initally thought but there was plenty of frustration to go along with it.

When I started up Blackwind, I actually really liked the mechanics of the game you got a dash, a special move, melee options as well as being able to shoot enemies and switch between melee and shooting seemlessly. It controls decent enoughly and I do like how the game has the God of War and new Doom games' scripted melee takedown to get health system. I always liked this since it encourages players to be aggresive and it doesn't want to make you want to cower or run away. The story is also unintrusive which is good for a game like this.

With all this said, there is plenty of things that actively hamper the experience. There isn't a whole lot of enemy variety or at least the tactics in which you dispatch them often consist of the same thing. Shoot melee enemies, use special ability, melee projectible enemies, damage them to do enough to do a scripted melee takedown, dashing constantly to create distance from enemies and on occasion, do the God of War style rage ability by clicking both analog sticks to defeat large enemies. You fight bugs and soldiers but a lot of the enemies types are analogs for one another like one melee, shooting, smaller enemies that shoot, bigger enemies and so on despite all this I did enjoy the game's combat to some degree mainly due to gratification I get from seeing the takedown animations and the enemies are somewhat varied to the point where you won't be doing one very specific tactic over and over, it's just that you will be doing 3-4 tactics over and over which is okay but nothing special. I also dislike how melee enemies can kill you very quickly and they don't react to when you shoot them which gets in the way of good feedback for your weapons but what prevented me from finding this too irritating is that checkpointed reasonably enough which helped me get through the game.

With the combat being okay, how else is the experience hampered? Well combat isn't the only thing you will be doing you will also be puzzle solving, platforming and backtracking and this is where I think the game faulters, the big issue with the level design is that it has this Halo CE and Castlevania Curse of Darkness problem of everything looking the same throughout. You even get a map in this game like you do in the latter which tells me the devs knew this so this is how they compensated for it. Puzzles can be rather obtuse for example, you will be piloting a drone a lot and one minute you can activate switches with a button press and then you need a passcode, and speaking of passcodes for the longest while I had a hard time telling which code opened which door and I had to guess a lot of the time. The platforming also isn't that great and actively get in the way of the mostly decent combat. It's too automated while at the same time jumps are floaty and aren't as precise as I want them. The time platforming sections are the worst since you need to activate switches you to get past that one annoying jump you were stuck on.

I feel like if the puzzles, backtracking and platforming were removed I'd enjoy the game more. If it was twin stick Serious Sam, I'd have more fun with it. Remove all the aspects I mentioned and spiced up the enemy variety and you could make a game that is easier for me to reccomend but overall, it feels like it could be enjoyable game but it's over ambiton gets in the way. The glitches also get had to make restart a few times. If you play this game be warned for many low points along the way. If you are unable to beat it and drop it at some point, I get it.

Sonic Frontiers Review

Sonic Frontiers...this was a game I was intially negative on and I ranted on it many times but truth be told I do enjoy the game, maybe not a whole lot but just enough to make me see it through to the end and yes, this includes me getting the true ending where you have to raise the difficulty up to hard mode to get which the game does not tell you btw and can catch first time players playing on easy or normal off guard.

But on to the game itself, I'll start with the good, the open world and sense of discovery to the game has a relaxing atmosphere to it. It feels like a very chill experience with the soft orchestral music playing in the background all the way to how you move at fast speeds discovering new areas on the map to unlock. I made the mistake of initally starting the game doing Cyberspace levels first and then unlocking the map but instead I realized I should be unlocking the map first and then maybe doing the Cyberspace missions after. The fishing mini game with Big the Cat is well done too, I normally do not give two shits for fishing mini games but this was relaxing and simple enough and it was easy to get so many rewards that I couldn't help but find it oddly addicting. I did this towards the end of the game when the Vault Key and Memory Token requirements started to get too steep for my liking but the Big the Cat mini game made that an enjoyable experience. I wished I discovered this before but I am glad I got to to this at all. The challenges for unlocking the map are generally simple but engaging enough to make getting the full map not feel like a chore. Just finding random areas on the map to unlock was a blast. The true ending shump section was good, and it feels challenging without getting furstrating, I wanted to get better each time I died.

I also want to briefly talk about the story, I don't care for the story in Sonic games and I am too much of a casual fan to know about the lore and history of the series, and the most interesting thing I find about the Sonic mythos is how much it has weird parallels to Dragon Ball but at the same time, the story here was captured my interest. Sage and her interactions with with entire cast is surprisingly endearing and it wasn't filled with cringe at all. Her character development also felt natural and her interactions with Sonic do a good job at selling you on Sonic and the bond he shares with his friends.

Now, on to the bad. Pop in shockingingly bad for a game in 2022, I get Sonic is super fast but seeing this much pop in for a 2022 game is rather appalling considering this a AAA game. The Super Sonic bosses can be rather obtuse at first since it forces you to use the parry which I barely used as regular Sonic except for the few map challenges, as a result sections that are supposed to feel empowering can feel cumbersome due to the camera and the game not telling you to actively parry titan attacks. The platforming can still feel awkward, unpolished, and too automated, I hear this has been an issue with 3D Sonic for a while especially for certain games. There is some weird difficulty spikes like the Shield Escape. The makes wants you to have unlimited boost for this sections as well as max ring power but it never tells you, so you will die a lot to sections you think you should be able to win but it turns out to be a red herring. It never tells you at least need unlimited boost in order to not die, and it's the hardest part of the whole game. The hard mode shump section was easy by comparison to this. Pinball was also super easy by comparison to this section and I can understand someone dropping the game at around this part. The Cyberspace levels aren't that great and are mostly pretty boring since it's just old Sonic levels, I am glad 100%ing these parts isn't nesscary to beat the game.

Overall, as a casual Sonic fan, I had a good time with this game with some occasional rage quits along the way. I am not a big fan of the series or open world games in general and this turned out to be a solid time, I get why this game gets it's praise and hasn't gotten any kind of hype backlash even though I have my issues with it.

Short Game Reviews and Thoughts: April 2023

Blaster Master Zero:

Pretty solid 2D metroidvania, I didn't get the true ending and from what I did manage to beat, I do think the game is solid enough. Level design is decent if a bit too segmented for my liking with it being seperated to "areas" rather than being a seemless world but I was fine with it, until you have to backtrack several areas to unlock the next level since it feels like it's stuck in an awkward crossroads of having linear level progression and metroidvania.

I also like how the tank parts are broken up with on foot sections that does a decent job at spicing up gameplay. Since tank combat would be a bit one note if it was the whole game since all you do is just fire blasts and double jump. Another issue is that the on foot sections during the pseudo 2D sections could be better since it feels like you can shoot in all 8 directions but move in those said directions. Outside of that, they are decent but I didn't like the heavy emphasis on stealth later in the game even if it's not the worst example of stealth segments in a game, it just feels at odds with the fast paced nature of the game. One final thing I didn't like that I wished hover and special weapons had their own meter since some enemies in the game need you to use homing missiles in order for you to kill them and partner that with jumps where you might need the hover and there might be excessive waiting for your special meter to recharge since there might not be pickups, it didn't get in the way of my experience too much until later in the game like that level with the heavy emphasis on stealth.

Bosses can also be beaten pretty quickly which is surprising for a game like this, but I didn't mind all that much since I came to this game because I heard it was short and easy.

Overall, not a bad game and a pretty enjoyable time, I don't like how you need to go out of your way and look for items in order to get the "true ending" but I found the default ending satisfying enough and I didn't care about the story to want to get the "true ending". If you want a mostly easy, short and enjoyable metroidvania game, you can't go wrong with this.

Saints Row: The Third:

Playing this game again feels weird after playing SR2, while I do like that game and I do like this one too. This feels like a point where the series got it's whole, "GTA but batshit insane" mantra that it's known for now. SR2 while can be silly at times, felt far more grounded compared to this game. In SR3, you will be going through crazy set piece after crazy setpiece, fighting pro wrestlers, falling out of airplanes more than once, using predator missiles, and even going to airships and fighting hi tech mercenrary armies and so much more. People who liked SR2's grounded approach will probably find this to be offputting, and I don't blame them but at the same time, I like how silly this game is and how committed it is to being that. The game just throws something crazy and over the top at you almost every few missions and as a result, it's a game I can't say I can call "forgettable".

The gunplay is okay, but it can be one note since the silenced assault rifle and rocket launcher were my go to weapons for much of the game. While I kind of liked that the respect system is gone, it also feels like it falls under the trap so many open world games do where you just need to play main missions and the whole open world feels like an over glorified hub world, I will give the game credit for having the world be quick and easy to get around in so it's not an open world where you spend most your time driving or running to the next mission. Vehicles also control pretty decently too.

Issues with this remaster include some freezes on the convoy decoy mission where it happened twice and Cryrus' face being messed up.

Overall, I do like this game even if it feels very different from 2, but I think it does the wacky over the top crime sandbox idea pretty well even if the game at times, the game teter into the realm of too silly for it's good, if you never played SR2 this might be a non issue for you.

Spark the Electric Jester 2:

I am not really familar with 3D Sonic or the Sonic franchise as a whole but this game I enjoyed but I can't help but feel like it's not 100% my kind of game while I get the appeal, the game just moves at such a fast pace that it's hard for me to keep up. The fact that the player character moves at such a fast speed while you have to anticipate every movement on the analog stick while he is moving so fast can lead to rather stressful and challenging gameplay especially on your first time through the levels. The last few levels in particular were some of the most challenging 3D platforming gameplay I recall playing in a long while. I remember just feeling sigh of relief every time I got to a checkpoint. I was barely making it through the levels. If this game had limited continues, even furthur spaced out checkpoints, and was longer than than the 2-3 hours that it lasts, I don't think I'd be able to beat the game at all.

From the 3D Sonics I have played, I can say that those games are kids games compared to this. Where 3D Sonic can have plenty of 2D sections and can feel on rails and automated for their own good, Spark 2 is just pure 3D movement and jumping at super fast speeds the whole way through. It's surprising that the bosses are a lot easier than the stages by comparison. The bosses aren't a complete calkwalk and you might die a few times before beating them but it's mostly just block and dodge while building up your combo meter to do more damage, it takes a little time, but once you get the rhythmn down, they are generally easy unless you have that weird glitch where the camera goes into first person and it's hard to get a view of your surrondings, but I eventually got past this.

The story is just there, I barely paid attention since the dialogue wasn't voiced and I sort of had some clue but it was hard for me to care since I came for the gameplay.

Overall, if you wished 3D Sonic was less automated and didn't shove in 2D sections, then this game is for you. It's not my kind of platformer but it's enjoyable for the 2-3 hours that it lasts probably even shorter if you didn't die as many times as I did.

Deliver Us The Moon:

Okay game overall, I was expecting it to be a walking sim of some kind and it ended up being more than that. I will admit, I didn't like the puzzles that much and the game to me was at it's best during the platforming and avoiding obsticles parts game or the timed parts, but it has a solid and interesting atmosphere focused on isolation and I liked the space adventure feel of the game with you needing to go up into space first then needing to get down to the moon, and then exploring the moon space station for the rest of the game, it felt like an adventure even if the loading screens that cut from the player character got in the way of that to some degree. The first person space station exploration sequnce was kind of tedious due to the awkward controls of constantly realigning the character to see properly and knowing what to do before you got a game over with the limited oxygen but once you play from the 3rd person perspective everything became more manageable and interesting since I got a better sense of where to look. The game also knowns when to shake things up to remain interesting. It has platforming, puzzles, vehicle sections, timed sections, and even a stealth section towards the end. It's not amazing but I do like that the game keeps things varied enough for the duration that it lasts.

I don't think the game is amazing but I had a decent time with it. If you want a Dead Space or System Shock style game without the aliens or overly stressful gameplay or combat, then might be worth checking into.

Pac-Man World: Re-Pac:

Playing this game just reminds me of why I am not a big fan of playing late 90s 3D plaformers. Limited camera control making it hard to have a better view of where and where not to jump. There are times where I keep wishing I can turn the camera due to how limited the view is, it feels like it is stuck between being a 3D game and being a 2D side scrolling platformer, having the lives system just makes the game feel antiquated since lives is nothing more than just padding to make you plow through the easy parts over and over just so you can get back to that hard part you were stuck on. There are also other issues I have like how you can't have seperate buttons for double jumping and ground pounding which makes the controls feel like it is stuck on an awkward middle ground before games discovered you can have them be seperate button presses. The level design isn't that great since it can randomly change from being simple platforming to being a puzzle section out of nowhere, and I could've sworn you just need to go forward but nope you need to a do a puzzle. That and for the life of me I can't figure out what makes Pac Man's super charge jump move fast enough to reach certain platforms. I keep going furthur back and I still fail to reach the platforms.

Overall, I really wish this remake added more refinements instead of being the same game with better graphics.

Splatoon 2:

Not a bad game and I can get some fun out of it but playing the single player really makes me feel like it was a tutorial for multiplayer. The hub worlds for the levels are a pain to explore and I just wished it was a level select menu instead of it being a series of puzzles to get to the next level. I wished the hub world design was more like World 1.

Another issue I have is the limited continues on the levels while I like you get them back, I don't really like how continues are connected to your life bar, it just feels like padding to me to get over halfway through a level and just to lose your life bar and start from the begginning.

Now, my biggest issue with the game: the loadout system. To me, this system is a red herring, the game says you can carry any weapon you want to a level just for the level to make you play with a specific gun instead this really tells me that this game is basically a tutorial for multiplayer and I don't like the low fire rate of the basic hero shot gun and the game makes me use it so much, this isn't a bad sp by any means and there is fun to be had, but the game always finds a way to shoot itself in the foot and be a dull experience.

I am glad I got this game at a discount or as little of a discount a Nintendo game can go for and I might play the 3rd game but only at a discount like I did with this game. I am hoping the 3rd game improves on the sp.

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Turtles in Time:

Solid old school beat em up, not much to say that it's enjoyable and it can be challenging at times but the rewinds help it from being too frustrating. Some enemies do high damage and they are usually the non foot ninja enemies and the robot enemies in general are pretty annoying since they have hard to avoid attacks and can do high damage to you. I also don't like how special attacks drain your life bar, I get why they did this but at the same time, I can't help but feel like limits options during combat. This was par for the course with Konami beat em ups.

Overall, I say it's about on par with Konami's X-Men beat em up game.

Starhawk:

Pretty enjoyable and well made single player campaign for a game with a heavy mp focus, I was expecting it to be pretty bad considering how games like Battlefield 4 has one of the worst single player shooter campaigns I ever played but this game is not like that.

What I liked about the game is that the game always knew when to break things up. You'll be engaging in tower defense levels one minute and then dogfighting in space the next while also having jet packs. The game throws enough different scenarios at you for it's short campaign that it never gets dull. I am not even big on tower defense games but I do like how the tower defense mechanics gives the gameplay more depth by having choose the various between turrets, beam turrets, supply bunkers and so on, it helps makes it stand out from hitscan regen health shooters at the time and the fact that there is no cover system only adds to it because you aren't sticking to a wall and waiting for health to regen, here you are out in the open and shooting your enemies. The dogfights are decent but I found the enemies and the various things you had to takedown to be way too spongey even on easy mode. They do a decent enough job at breaking up the on foot combat. The game basically reuses multiplayer maps into single player but the game does a good job at hiding by decent situational depth and repurposing it's mechanics for single player. The voice acting, and setting are also really good if the latter underexplored. The music also fits the setting and gameplay really well.

The only major gripes is that the story is underdeveloped and the dogfighting can have enemies and targets that are spongey but it's a solid campaign and is worth checking out if you like shooters and are looking for a "hidden gem" of sorts.

Guns, Gore and Cannoli 2:

Pretty good sequel overall, reminds me of Max Payne 2 in how it changes the style of shooting and the difficulty drop compared to it's predecessor despite it being a 2D game all though this game gets pretty challenging on easy towards the end with some intense enemy waves and a final boss with way more than 3 phases but other than that, I still really like this game, I prefer the aiming and control in this one mainly because it's easier to aim at specific targets and it's a lot snappier making the game less frustrating as a result.

The combat is still as satisfying as ever and the game does a good job at shaking this up too. Only major gripe is that the bigger enemies don't react to getting hit by the rocket launcher and weapons aren't as wacky since there is no lighting gun and there is too many interchangeable machine guns but the game is still as good and as fun to play as ever before. The short length is fitting for the kind of Metal Slug style arcade experience that it is.

Afro Samurai the Game(2009):

This game just isn't very good at all. At first, it didn't feel that great but I enjoyed it for how mindless it was. I liked the dismemberment system, the visuals were pretty solid and nice to look at, and the voice acting was pretty solid. I thought this was going to be a "style over substance" kind of game with not much challenge to it but provides a decent and enjoyable power fantasy but the more I played the game the less apparent this became.

My first big issue is that I dislike the health system, I am not sure if health regenerates or you need to find healing items because the game goes away with a traditional health system of it being shown on the HUD and instead just has damage be shown through how "red" and covered in blood you, this sounds immersive at first but when the challenge starts to ramp up later in the game, it starts to get extremely grating in that it was hard to tell if I was close to death or if I still had some health left to take more damage.

My second issue is how during the half way point of the game it starts to spike in difficulty to the point, where the other issues like the lack third person camera getting in the way of where enemies are attacking, getting blind sided constantly, and the game having so many enemies that block your attacks and the aforementioned issues being so prevelant that you start relying on dominant strategies like abusing the focus slash. Every fight later in the game is, "combo, combo, focus slash", it's basically this for so much of the game. The game also throws an enemy gaunlet so big that I am surprised I was patient enough to get past, it takes way too long to get past, and then it throws in a super buggy platforming section later which the platforming wasn't that great to begin with since it's mostly contextual with finicky controlling since you can wall run and it won't work and then you can jump and Afro will jump to places you don't want to. Enemies also lack any kind of variety too and are just the same groups of people you were fighting at the beggining, regular goons, agile goons, monster goons, and big goons, its that for the whole game.

Third, and the big reason why I haven't beaten this game is that the game forces you to know bullet deflect by the end of the game which the game does a terrible job at teaching you and is just a chore to pull off since the timing is so strict and unclear. The fact that I had to use a mechanic so late in the game even though I hardly used it up untill that point is already enough of a bad sign.

Finally, the checkpointing of the game is so far off combined with the aforementioned issues and the game is very frustrating and is no longer the decent power fantasy the early parts of the game was.

I can't reccomend this game even to those who just looking for a random melee combat game to play or an anime game that isn't your usual fighting game or musou game fare.

The Bouncer:

Ngl, this game isn't very good at all but I can't help but find it to be charming. I get why someone wouldn't like the game but for me, I couldn't get my eyes off the game for it's batshit insane and stupid plot, while the voice acting isn't really good, having Steve Blum was enough to carry me through to the end.

The combat isn't very good at all. The camera is bad and you can't turn it, and it doesn't give you a very good angle on the action. You have no combo attacks you can chain, on top of that combat mainly consist of mashing kicks and hoping it connects to the enemies while not doing much to get in your way. You got no evade command and blocking you will only do on occasion during the game's more occasionally challenging fights. You never need to manage health, there is no exploration, and the fights themselves last less than 3 minutes most of the time.

Yet after saying all this, why I do I even somewhat enjoy it at all? To put it simpily, I haven't played a game that felt so "bad it's good" since Rogue Warrior. And coincidentally this game is also as short as Rogue Warrior too. The beat em up gameplay while not good, is at least easy enough to make the a somewhat relaxing experience while I view the super stupid story, there's little if not any difficulty spikes, the levels are short and you get health refills in between. If anything, this game feels like a dumb anime movie with interactive beat em up sections. That and I can make the argument that the short gameplay sections while an issue, never last long enough to the point where the awkward combat becomes infuriating.

The easy and awkward combat, the beautiful visuals, the stupid plot, the awkward voice acting, really just makes this a bad game that I say is worth checking out. I rarely if ever call a game "bad" but this game fits the bill of being that as well as being so bad it's good. If I paid money for this at around the time of release, this might be something I consider to be a rip off, but for a game I just randomly decided to emulate it was worth the hour of mostly cutscenes and weak combat.