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Just finished up Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy. Played as one of the featured games in the Game Pass Game Club where we pick a game each month to play and discuss. I really loved this game. Mainly set 15 years before the other games, tells the back story of Sophia, but also starts with her childhood and then jumps way back and forth to an ancient civilization also. The action adventure shift for this game worked well with melee combat using parries and dodges with abilities unlocked along the way. Between this and the chase sequences mixed with puzzle rooms, it has sort of an Uncharted feel, with combat with the army at your heels between unlocking new ruin areas to explore. It doesn't have the stealth focus of the other games, but there is a bit of sneaky/hiding in there too.There is also a horror element with the thing chasing you, but it doesn't end up being too scary for those who don't handle that stuff well. The characters and story are great and kept me engaged throughout. The environments are beautiful with some great effects, and ran nice and smooth on my pc. So ya, I'd highly recommend going through, and you don't need to play the other games first, you just won't catch some references. It took me around 13 hrs to finish.

Played this as our monthly game in the Game Pass Game Club where we pick a game each month to play and discuss, and with the theme of Unusual games this month this sure fits! A jazzy detective noir narrative adventure that shifts to black holes and revelations about universe origins, this kept the weird stuff flowing throughout. And even a surprising section of creating free form jazz, this made me thankful weird little games like this can find a way to get made. I definitely recommend it, and only took me around 6 hrs to finish.

When this first came out I was 21 and didn't have a GameCube, and to be honest when I saw the style I thought it was too kiddy and wasn't interested. Years later I meant to get the Wii U version but never got around to it, so finally decided to play through it now on a PC emulator. And actually that worked out great because got to play it at 1440 res and 60 fps.I liked sailing around between places and enjoyed the flow of the game. The Art style I ended up actually liking a lot with it's cartoon colourful graphics. The story was your basic Zelda story, nothing too deep, but that was expected. There were a few parts I had to look up what to do next as some of it was not very clear, but the difficulty itself I was actually surprised that it wasn't very challenging, I don't think I died on any of the bosses or **** ya glad I finally got around to playing it, 24 years after release, lol. It was a great adventure.

I finished Mixtape: This was one of the monthly picks in the Game Pass Game Club where we pick a game to play and discuss each month. This short narrative adventure about a group of teens final day together before they move away was interesting. It doesn’t clearly state what the date is, but somewhere in the late 90s by the burned cds and Silverchair’s Freak being one of the songs they listen to. But I guess it’s not supposed to be so set as there are a lot of 80s references also, and some of the flashbacks are set years before but they all still look the same, and they also uses phrases way more modern too. Anyway, I had to stop thinking about that and just go with **** main character introducing each song as it went was cool, and the 90s stuff like Portishead and Smashing Pumpkins were great for me as the 90s were my teen years, so a lot of this nostalgia hit for me. The older songs didn't hit with me as much, but some of the 80s alt stuff was good too. Each of the flashbacks had some sort of little mini game to do to keep things interesting and I thought that worked well. Lots of fantastical flying and stuff to show that this is all the things of nostalgic memories of the past rather than real things. Overall I really enjoyed it, perfect game pass game with it being so short as I finished it in under 4 hours.

This was one of the picks this month in the Game Pass Game Club, where we pick a game each month to play and discuss. When it opened, I was immediately reminded of the old Out of this World and Flashback games and sure enough, these are mentioned as inspirations by the devs. I have a real soft spot for OotW so that made me like this more than it might deserve full credit for. I loved the atmosphere, music, and the world here. The mix of 2d low res sprites with 3d background and lighting effects gave it a cool look. It went back and forth between slow story sections and the traversal and combat sections to break it up, which worked well for me. The combat sections were all pretty similar so it could have used with a few fewer fights but ya. There were a few parts where some checkpoints caused me some grief with some running sections, and had to look up that dying put you in a bad spot and you need to manually reload the checkpoint. One thing I thought they could have done better is make the gun charge states more clear between the 2, as one is just a red outline and the other is a red fill of your gun icon. But the sci-fi post apocalyptic alternate 80s setting with the AI story was cool enough to bring it up a few points for me. It took me just over 12 hrs to finish on normal.

This was one of the picks this month in the Game Pass Game Club, where we pick a game each month to play and discuss. I really liked this one. The Zelda inspired map with dungeons to go through along with the twin stick bullet hell was a nice mix. I'm not great at games like this sometimes, but managed to get through it all on normal mode. Some of the later bosses gave me trouble and had to retry a bunch of times to finish, but I loved that you never lost xp for dying, so you could add upgrades as you go after a few attempts on a boss to be more powerful to finish it. Minimal story here, but the music was nice and the graphics were serviceable. I started on PC but I was getting this weird stutter so I just switched to playing on Xbox instead and it was fine there. I cleared 83% of the map, which is good enough for me. I tried to go back to caves that weren't clear but some I just couldn't see whatever was left in them or where to go. Took me 9 hrs to finish.

4 short hours of darkness. A story of a Russian nun questioning her religion with the devil speaking to her in her head. Weird 8 bit style mini games thrown in there, and weird gameplay ideas all thrown in there randomly to be used once and that's it.

I finished Terminator 2D last night on PS5. I'm a big fan of the movie, like one of my all time favourites, so this caught my attention. I read it was super short and probably not worth the money but I borrowed it for free from my local library so that wasn't a concern. But ya it's super short, you can finish it in under an hour for it's 12 levels. I had to go through it twice actually because I ran out of continues on the last level. But ya it was fun seeing this snes style take of quickly running through all the parts of the movie plus a few extra story points thrown in there.

Loved it, the back and forth between the first person horror stealth tension as Grace and the 3rd person action with big set pieces as Leon worked great to break up the pace of the game. The graphics and environments looked amazing. Grace was great as a new character and Leon's lines always make us laugh. Highly recommended.

I really enjoyed the setting of this, no jedis and lightsabers, just blasters and a heist story set in between episodes 5 and 6. Got a few glimpses of characters from the movies but not directly involved. Going around on the speeder and the space combat sections were fun to break things up, while the main missions gave you a stealth option but didn’t care if you went guns blazing instead. The characters were all great and the story kept things moving along nicely, while all the planets looked great and gave a different feel for each. The lockpicking rhythm based thing was fun and the hacking of the terminals was satisfying also. I read there were a bunch of bugs on release so it’s good I waited this long to play as I didn’t notice hardly any now, so I don’t have much negative to say about it. I did most of the main side missions but didn’t collect all the treasure spots or anything extra like that and it took me around 30 hrs to finish. I’d definitely recommend it.

Just finished Creatures of Ava. This was one of the monthly picks in the Game Pass Game Club. I liked it, nice, sweet story of trying to save creatures on a dying planet, taking photos of them, and collecting enough in each area before moving on. Some light "combat" to tame each before saving them to give a small challenge. The alien creatures you talk with had fun conversations that moved the story along as you went. The areas looked beautiful to go through. Took me about 11 hrs to finish.

Finished Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden last night. This was the monthly pick in the Game Pass Game Club, where we pick a game to play and discuss each month. The Good: The story revolves around ghost banishers in the 1600s solving hauntings with a main theme of dealing with death. I really liked the characters, they had a great loving relationship, and the acting was great. A lot of the game was solving these hauntings and these were all little stories to go along with each of them. I enjoyed each of these, even though there was no real puzzle to solve with each, it was nice to experience each of these stories. The environment was nice, all these wooded areas with camps and villages were nice. The Bad: It was too long. It took me 57 hours to finish doing all of the hauntings and most side quests, but not full collectables or achievements so I thought it easily could have been trimmed down from that. There were some performance issues, on my XSX there were multiple bad slowdowns, mostly at area transitions, but a few places even running around in a village had chops and even audio drops. The combat got tedious after a while, with it mostly being the same few ghost enemies to clear. I saw some people comment online to drop it down to easy just to make the combat end quicker so you can get back to the story, but I didn't find it that bad. Overall: Initially I was thinking a 7/10 but the ending was powerful and had watching the rest of the multiple endings afterwards made it even more so, so I'm bumping up to an 8.

I really loved this game. Played as one of the monthly picks in the Game Pass Game Club. It's a heavy narrative adventure, so gameplay itself is mainly going around the areas to talk to people, with a few sections of like zooming between these waypoint things, but honestly those parts almost felt like they were there just to add a bit of "action" and I would have been fine if those were just walking sections **** story is what really shines here with a sci-fi post apocalyptic setting that deals with multiple generations and jumps between timelines in a non-linear way. It's super interesting and keeps you guessing and wanting to figure out just what happened here and why. It's a trip that has a special impact with the way it reveals the details to you. It took me around 15 hrs to finish.

Finished Metaphor: ReFantazio last night. For the most part I thought this was really great. A big jrpg fantasy with great characters, story, areas and systems. I had bounced from Persona 5 after 10 hrs due to the characters there being annoying teenagers, so I was a little hesitant going in with it being another Atlus game, but this being more grounded is definitely my sweet spot. The class system was really cool with being able to share abilities between them after learning them, and progressing through the trees was satisfying. Also, the system of having battles stay in the overworld view and be quick kills if you were levelled higher than the enemies was super nice. All of the stories from all of your party characters you meet were nice and I enjoyed going through all the bonding with all of them. The game had a great art style and everything looked and felt great. The main story had some nice twists and was very compelling to progress through. I did have some problems with the difficulty for me though. Early on I dropped it down to Easy after struggling with some of the fights, and that was great for most of the game. I thought I was over leveled myself. I did all the side quests except for the 3 towers. All the bonds. I even did a bit of grinding on the crystals that spawned enemies that I could overworld kill, which I almost never do in a game, but because they were super quick I did some. So some of the dungeons near the end were only overworld kills and I did feel good going into the end. The end of the game the ending seemed too drawn out and I was feeling fatigued from going through a whole other area, and having the boss fight never actually be the end one for 3 times, but I felt good going in. But I guess I didn't have the right combo of build and strategy, and I hate having to look up something like that outside of the game, I was on Easy! It should be a challenge but not need the exact right strat. I couldn't beat it and had to drop to story mode to be able to respawn me after he wiped me again even on story mode! But besides being a little soured on that I still thought it was really great. It was a huge game and took me 97 hrs to finish.

I finally finished up Baldur's Gate 3. After delaying buying it for far too long, being cheap and waiting for a better sale, I started this in Jul and finished now in Dec. And maybe the delays helped get it all patched up nicely anyway, but this was amazing. I loved every minute of it. All of the world, the characters, everyone in the game being fully voiced, the story, all of the dialog options, all of the branching paths with so many side quests to do, the combat, the graphics, music, sound, were all amazing. I think I'm going to put this up in one of my top favourite games of all time for sure. It took me 115 hrs to finish.

Finished up Donkey Kong Bananza last night. While I enjoyed this quite a lot, it definitely didn't match my expectations. Maybe it was the high review scores going in, or expecting it to be more like Mario Odyssey. With that one my wife really liked watching me play through and finish it and so she was excited to watch this one, but it quickly lost her interest and I ended up finishing it on my **** levels were cool, but something about them all being underground, or the tunnelling you kept doing just made it feel cramped and claustrophobic to me. Also, I'm not one for collectibles, so I just got some side bananas as I went and skipped most of the challenge side stages. I think in the end it said I had 260 bananas. Most of the game the main bosses were super easy but the last few did give me a challenge. Some of the songs were a little too Disney for me, but whatever. It looked great and was fun to play so overall it was still really nice.

I finished Alice: Madness Returns as one of the picks in the Game Pass Game Club as a Spooktober themed pick. It definitely had a dark tone to fit that theme, with a story based around abusive mistreatment from Alice’s physiologist as she goes back and forth from Wonderland to dealing with the death of her family.This is a Xbox 360 era game so it shows its age now, with the platforming being finicky with easy to miss jumps and annoying invisible platforms. The combat is pretty basic but the camera sometimes fights against you. But the levels have a lot of variety and were interesting with a few jumping over to other side scrolling genres. Overall the story, the Alice in Wonderland characters and levels made up for the flaws enough to keep this one interesting enough to keep going to the end.

Finished Little Nightmares II as one of the monthly game picks in the Game Pass Game Club this month for a Spooktober theme. I never played the first game before this so was jumping straight into this one wondering a little if I was missing some context of why all these things were trying to kill me, but from what I looked up afterwards, I wasn't missing much if any real explanation, just missed out that Six was the main character in the first game but in this game you are someone else, Mono, and Six is sometimes with you helping you. (Even though they don't say the character names in the game at all since there is no dialog, only read this **** this had a feel like Limbo and Inside with the sidescrolling death traps and light puzzles to solve, along with a creepy setting. This had a few tense chases also which were fun. I enjoyed the gameplay for sure.I did hit one soft lock at the end of the 3rd chapter where an elevator wouldn't trigger after a death and loading the last checkpoint still had this stuck. I read online others had this same issue and nothing you can do except drop back to chapter select and replay the whole chapter. That **** but luckily it wasn't too long. Also there was some stuttering of framerate down hard even when running it on a higher end **** overall I quite enjoyed it, a good creepy vibe. The whole game only took me 6 hrs to finish, so it's quite worth your time.

Finished Silent Hill f. I'm a big fan of the Silent Hill series. I can't remember if I finished the first one on PS1, but definitely had 2 on the OG Xbox, and then 3 on PC, and then either played some of or finished most of the ones after that. The recent remake of 2 was excellent so we were looking forward to this one a lot. (My wife loves to watch me play this series also).Overall I found this one great too. The story and atmosphere were nice and creepy and I was fine with it being set in Japan in the 60's. I'm not one to care that this isn't actually set in the Silent Hill town of other games. I played on the default difficulty settings and the combat and puzzles were a good balance for me. The story had some creepy turns and left you thinking **** combat did get a bit frustrating at time with a lot of enemies overwhelming me and I died a few times for sure, but overall it wasn't too bad once I got used to the new mechanics of it. The puzzles were good and I think I got stuck on one or two that I had to look up.I'd say this was a great entry to the series and I highly recommend it, even to someone new the series or not. It took me around 10 hrs to finish. There are some extra endings but I just watched them on youtube after.

I finished Mirror's Edge Catalyst as one of the picks this month in the Game Pass Game Club. It was alright I guess. I really liked the traversal through the city, and the open world which left multiple paths to choose. Getting in the zone with a big run was super nice, and the big set piece missions were exciting to go through. The visual style was nice and still holds up pretty well even though it's a bit old now.I finished the original but ages ago so didn't remember anything from the story, but apparently this is more of a reboot of the story, which I didn't know until just now, haha. The story was just serviceable I guess, it didn't seem to draw me into caring very much about what was going on. The ending was disappointing for sure, open ended trying to leave it for a sequel to resolve it, which we never **** combat parts that were forced in a few areas left me a little stumped and I had to look up some strategies of how to properly handle them to continue. I guess it was sort of obvious after I read, but oh well. And I neglected to take the fast climb upgrade which got me almost stuck in one part where I was struggling to get away from some gun fire fast enough.I only did a handful of the side tasks, but there were a ton of them scattered over the map if you were really into it. As is, it took me around 10 hrs to finish which was plenty for me.

Finished this and it was only ok. In the end it didn't seem to explain much of the "story" but was focused around therapy and it didn't seem to explain fully. Took only around 6 hrs to finish so made it ok, and splitting it in small sessions made it better. The puzzles were sometimes nice, sometimes really easy. They definitely should have made the other character auto run to the start of the next puzzle so you didn't need to switch back and forth so much. The music was nice, but the voice of the child was grating, dunno why they did it like that. I thought it seemed like someone who had never acted before but I guess it was actually a known actress.

I finished Crypt Custodian last night, as a friend of mine put it, a cozyvania, and that sums it up perfectly. Unlocking new abilities and areas in this top down map was a cute and charming adventure. It was already pretty forgiving with keeping area progress and currency intact when dying and not having to make long journeys to retry a boss again, but I still turned it down to Easy mode because I ****, haha.I liked that the map you could leave markers on to note places to come back to once you unlocked whatever you needed. The map actually ended up being a lot bigger than I thought it was going to be for a game like this. Not that it was a hugely long game though, it took me 12 hrs to finish. Being able to buy a hint of where to go next in the game was also super helpful.Some of the themes were a bit sad with this being the afterlife for animal deaths and the goal being able to see the people that they left behind again, but there was also some humour in there to break it up and overall it was very enjoyable.

I just finished Kingdom Come: Deliverance. I've been playing it here and there since December. It was a rough start to get into it as it really throws you into things with not much help. The combat was really hard for me, so I ended up installing a bunch of mods to make things **** once I had those to make things easier, and got into the swing of it all, I found it a really immersive world. I read one thing that helped also is to think of it more of a simulation than an RPG. All of the towns and characters felt really authentic. And there was something special about the way they did the wooded areas that made me feel really like I was walking in the woods in a way no other game has ever done for **** the end I really enjoyed the quests and story and everything the game had to offer. I did most of the side quests, but not much side mundane tasks. It took me around 42 hrs to finish playing it this way. 8/10 for me.

I finally finished Alan Wake 2 after plugging at it here and there for months. It was really great! I loved the crazy story going back and forth between Alan and Saga, all of the video segments mixed in, and the musical section! The tie in to the Control/Remedy universe, and all of **** looked beautiful and was tense throughout. I did get lost in a few of the parts, like the loop parts, but overall I really enjoyed it. Took me around 21 hrs to finish.

Just finished Another Crab's Treasure, one of the games voted for this month in the Game Pass Game Club, where like a book club, we choose games to play and discuss each month. I'm not a fan of souls type games, at all, so I turned it a step easier on the first boss and then down to story by the 3rd boss. I had fun with the gun for a little bit and then turned it off for the rest of the game. So at this point it was just an action platformer which is more my speed. The characters were cute, and the levels were actually pretty varied and interesting for it all being underwater. However I did find the level design to be convoluted more than a few times, with the path to take not obvious at all, with a lot of where do I go next from here moments. There was also points of falling through tiny cracks and other janky platforming weirdness. In the beginning there seemed be weird quiet areas with no music but it seems it was maybe just those areas as it seemed to be better for the rest of the game. Overall I only found the game to be okay. The story wasn't very interesting, some frustrating stuff, but still an interesting concept. It took me around 13 hrs to finish.

Just finished the Ghost Bear: Flash Storm expansion for MechWarrior 5: Clans. It was excellent. 12 missions with the same high level of quality as the main game campaign. We play as a different clan than the main game, so all new characters, fully voiced, cut scenes between missions, etc. The missions were all great, with new locations, mechs, and the elementals joined with you and against you were a nice addition also. Highly recommended.

Just finished The Alters. I loved this one. The base management, and navigating the planet around your base, mixed with the stories of your alters, and the struggle to get back home was great. I loved the sci-fi stuff and all the side stories to finish for each alter, as well as the discussions between all of them, discussing what these changes in their lives meant to all of them. The little movies you could watch with them were funny also. I had a few bugs on pc, but nothing too bad. Took me around 32 hrs to finish, doing all the side quests that I got. Seems some of the alters didn't trigger their stories though so not sure why they didn't continue on to finish for a few of them.

Just finished Doom: The Dark AgesI had a blast with this one. I really liked the huge levels with the outside areas. The shield melee mix worked well for me. I know some people are writing about not liking the changes compared to Eternal, but honestly I'm fine with changes, and it's been over 5 years since I finished Eternal so I don't remember much anyway. The stages where you did the mech thing and the dragon flight added a cool variety to break things up and I had a ton of fun with those **** story I sort of lost track of so I guess it's pretty forgettable, but it's doom, so whatever. I played through on normal/hurt me plenty and it took me around 18 hrs doing some side areas, but not full collectibles.

Just finished MechWarrior 5: Clans. I really enjoyed the strong story focus of this one compared to Mercenaries. Hell it's been since the MechWarrior 4 games in 2000-2001 that we've even had a story based MechWarrior game. Took me around 37 hours to finish, on PC.

Just finished Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door on Switch. I really enjoyed it. I never played the original so I'm always glad when remakes come around like this. This is my first Paper Mario at all actually. Took me around 36 hours to finish, quite a longer game than I thought for something like this.

Finished The Oregon Trail remake with my wife tonight. Finished the main game just barely, one person left alive, lol. Nice remake for sure, kept the main flow of the game while adding a ton of stuff to it, people, quests, encounters etc. Says it took us 7 hrs to finish.

I finished Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn last night. It was alright. It was too hard for me so I lowered it to easy then I enjoyed it more. It was mostly pretty linear but had some open areas with side quests and stuff. Took me around 12 hrs to beat doing most of the side quests.

I just finished Citizen Sleeper. It was really nice. A mostly text based narrative adventure but with dice rolls for actions, and a cool sci-fi sort of cyberpunk setting. Looks like it had multiple ways to finish it also. I'd recommend it for sure. Took me under 7 hrs to finish.

Just finished it. I'm sort of mixed on it I guess. The TV show episodes were kind of weird to throw in there. I went back and forth between XSX and PC, and actually didn't have any problems on PC except for the episodes being missing there so I made sure whenever Junction came up that I went back to Xbox. I read having vsync off helped someone so maybe that's why I got lucky. The combat was fun. I died a few times for sure, but nothing that took me more than 3 tries I think. Which is perfect for me. I don't mind retying a few times if I can get it after a few tries. The powers were fun to use. The time travel story was cheesy but good enough. So ya, not amazing but decent. Took me 10.5 hrs to finish.

I just finished Final Fantasy VII Rebirth. It was really nice. Interesting departure from the original game. Actually, going into this one I didn’t even know this wasn’t the last game of the remake and there will be a third. It took me 81 hrs to finish with doing most of the side quests.

I just finished Senua’s Saga: Hellblade 2. It was pretty short, took me about 8 hrs to finish, but I really enjoyed it. Looked amazing, I was back and forth playing on PC and XSX as it has cross save and looked great on both. Definitely play with headphones as they do this sound effect of voices in your head that is cool.

Just finished Tales of Arise on Game Pass on XSX and cloud. Nice JRPG. Interesting story, characters and world. Took me about 58 hrs to beat, doing a majority of the side quests.

Just finished Diablo 4. Did campaign and any side quests I found on the way. Really enjoyed it, campaign was great, looked great and was fun. Took me around 53 hrs to finish.

I just finished Turnip Boy Robs a Bank. It was a silly little twin stick shooter, a completely different genre than the first game. But ya was fun. Only took around 5 hours to finish.

I finished Spider-Man 2 last night on PS5. Man, it was awesome. Looked and felt great, and was pretty intense throughout! Took me around 31 hrs to finish. Oh and with my new Atmos setup it sounded amazing too, lots of great surround sound. I sort of didn't realize games supported Atmos too. I would have upgraded sooner!

So I finished Jusant last night, and I'm kind of divided on it. On one hand it was a nice chill game, but I think the climbing mechanic I got tired of quickly, like I said above, looking for a way to just climb without thinking about it. Honestly if I unlocked a "Hold A to climb" I totally would have used it. And I had to google after to understand what happened at the end, lol. I saw references to a few of the letters explaining it, but maybe I missed those ones. I read all the ones I came across but didn't go out of my way to find them all.

I just finished Venba. Nice little story, kinda sad. It's just like an hour and a half.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

Just finished Sea of Stars. It’s an RPG in the style of an SNES one like Chrono Trigger. It was really good! Great characters and gameplay. Took me around 33 hrs to finish.

Just finished Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition on Switch. It was a nice RPG, originally came out on Wii but this is the first I played it. Took 52 hrs to finish.

I finished the Cyberpunk DLC Phantom Liberty and wow, it was awesome. The spy theme was cool and Idris Elba was great in it. Took me 31 hours to finish, nearly half the time that I took to finish the base game! Such a great value for a DLC pack.

Just finished Cocoon. It was this nice short puzzle type game, like 5 hrs to complete, made by the guy who made Limbo and Inside. Looked really nice, and had this worlds inside worlds mechanic which was interesting. I'd give it like 8.5/10.

Loved the world with the multiple levels, and the device building was cool. So much to see and do!

Nice chill little game to climb a mountain to get cell reception. Nice characters and environment.

Just finished Cassette Beasts. It was nice. I liked the music theme a lot and the songs got stuck in my head. The style was nice and the map was cool to unlock. Took me about 20 hrs to finish.