johko

This is not a great game. Maybe it was overhyped for me. Maybe I just can’t get into AAA games. It has all of the pitfalls of a big name game: clumsy walking, way too many “collectibles” and achievements, NPCs yelling “What’s your problem?!” when you walk past them, accidentally hitting the wrong button and starting a civil war. That kind of thing. But let’s get to the specifics of what makes this game bad. Red Dead Redemption 2 is a glorified horseback riding simulator. You see how many hours I have on this game? Half of those hours were spent on my phone playing Pokémon TCG while I waited for my character, Arthur, to get to his destination while making very uninteresting conversation with some very uninteresting characters. Every so often they float an option to choose a conversation topic and ask about one thing or another, which is about as interesting and meaningful as the aforementioned conversations. And this doesn’t even count the travel I had to do to get to the mission in the first place. Thank goodness Rockstar was self-aware enough to add a cinematic mode that takes the reins so I could at least play some Pokémon while I wait. What went wrong? What made Half-life 2 so revolutionary was that the story was happening all around you while you were still playing the game. There are no cut scenes and they never take control from you, unless they are literally strapping you down for a lab procedure. Now, I’m not saying that every game should be like this, but Red Dead Redemption 2 takes a half-measure approach that fails miserably. It’s like they liked the idea of giving the player the freedom to do what they want but they realized that it clashed with their other objectives. You’ll approach a mission zone and Arthur will automatically dismount and start walking. You can’t run in the base camp. I guess it’s rude or something. Sometimes your horse will even be completely controlled by the game and you won’t know it unless you try to move in another direction. It’s just not always clear what the rules are and being teased with freedom to have it be continually yanked away is frustrating. The game does have its merits though. The environment is incredibly rich and the spirit of historical accuracy is astonishing. This game made me genuinely interested in outlaw life during this time period. I also really enjoyed hunting (almost as much as I enjoyed lassoing and hogtying NPCs). And there are loads of really cool customization options for your outfit and your horse. One of my favorite details is the fact that your facial hair will grow and you have the ability to shave it the way you want. The characters are incredibly well-acted as well. It’s a shame that the quality acting doesn’t have a story to match. Moral choices are always an interesting mechanic to me. The struggle to do good when you have so much to lose is at the heart of the human experience. Clearly, this is an overarching theme in RDR2, with the good boy/bad boy meter. But this theme is executed with another half-measure approach. Throughout the game, Arthur is given the option of donating money to the Church, or letting a man live, or helping a damsel in distress. These are not exactly difficult moral decisions to make. But that’s not the problem I have. The problem is that while you make these choices, the game requires you to kill, beat, and rob others senselessly to make progress. And then Arthur portrays himself as some kind of misunderstood antihero. And I just don’t believe him. If you treat this game for what it is, a glorified horseback riding sim, it’s the best one out there. Verdict: BAD

Pushing around rocks. Enemies with deterministic movement that only triggers when you move. Switches. Digging up blocks and moving them to other spots. Avoiding falling into the void. This is 99% of what you'll be doing in Void Stranger. Still reading? Okay. Look, for what it's worth, Void Stranger has some fantastic puzzles to scratch the itch of a riddle-loving brain. I sat there addicted to these puzzles. I don't know why. I have never played a Sokoban-style game before, other than some room in an old Zelda game, probably. It took Void Stranger for me to realize that when this kind of puzzle game is done right, I actually really enjoy it. Void Stranger is a great Sokoban game. Still reading, eh? Alright. Void Stranger is more than just a giant Zelda puzzle. There is interesting lore that encases the whole experience. BUT remember what I said earlier. 99% of what you'll be doing. Pushing rocks. Stuff like that. That's still true. But there is some sort of mystery to discover here. Yakkocmn said it best. This is an archaeological dig. For those of you who like to think, experiment, play with your environment, theorize, hypothesize, and just try things - this game might be for you. I don't want to spoil anything but the game definitely rewards you for progressing with many interesting things. It's not a typical game and I really commend it for that. I really really commend it for making me spend over 50 hours pushing around rocks and stuff. If you're a thinker like me who can't let go of unsolved riddles, you'll likely find something enjoyable about this game. It's cool. That said, the story as a whole was not compelling to me. I didn't fully get it, it didn't fully explain itself, and while it was interesting, it felt like it was lacking something. Very creative, but maybe lacks a unifying theme. But the puzzles are cool. No, really, they are pretty cool. Verdict: GOOD

It pains me to give this game a thumbs down, but although the overall quality of this game is actually better than Pony Island (which I gave a thumbs up for its novelty:brevity ratio), The Hex is a heftier time investment and needs more justification for its playtime, which it fails to meet. Thus, for what it's worth, I don't think this title is really worth a play unless you are in the mood for a quirky "game experience" a la Daniel Mullins. There are some cool surprises in this game that make you go, "that's nifty," and there are fun references that make you go "heh," but there are also pacing issues with not-too-entertaining dialogue, slow walking around the same old environments, and no actual entertaining game play substance to it all. At the end of the day, The Hex is less a game and more a toy. The game aspects are so easy that it feels more like an interactive movie. It has a Newgrounds feel in some of its art and style but elevated to where if it were actually on Newgrounds, it would have been the best thing there. But there's a reason gamers have moved on from playing browser-based flash games. After Inscryption, I have confidence that Daniel Mullins can create a more straightforward game with solid game mechanics paired with a good story and hope that he moves away from his consistently "meta" approach that if he were to repeat once more would start to feel to reliant on a gimmick. The Hex is intriguing, The Hex has its moments, but The Hex just doesn't satisfy. Verdict: MODERATELY BAD

At the game's core, Pony Island is 3 games: a mediocre run-and-gun, a mediocre puzzle game, and an interesting meta-game. The value of Pony Island lies in its creative use of misdirection and subversion of expectations. It is a multi-media experience that is more than the sum of its parts and is entertaining enough from start to finish. It it nowhere near the masterpiece Mullins would later create in the roguelike card game, "Inscryption" but is an engaging introduction to his game design ethos. I enjoyed Pony Island, but I am also thankful that it did not overstay its welcome. At its best, Pony Island is a quirky magic show of game design elements, featuring paradigm shifts and programming tricks that are able to sustain the shallow game play for the couple of hours that it takes to beat it. Verdict: MODERATELY GOOD

I'll be honest. I was very much on the fence about whether I wanted to play the full game after trying the demo but I sure am glad I did. Inscryption is more than it appears to be on the surface and did not fail to delight me all the way through. The card game itself is fun. It is pretty much a stripped down version of Magic: The Gathering or Hearthstone, but the rogue-like campaign format suits it well as you can beef up your deck in ways that would be considered game-breaking in a traditional CCG against human players. If you ever fantasized about having OP cards in these types of games, Insrcyption can very much fulfill that fantasy. The drawback of that is that perhaps it allows a bit too much freedom; if you are at all familiar with the fundamental principles of CCGs and have some basic understanding of deck building and card value, the game will not be a challenge to you. But I liked that. I honestly did not need the game to be challenging for it to be entertaining. I got to play it the way I wanted to play it, and that was fun for me. The difficulty curve is a bit wonky and it does somewhat lessen the impact by failing to provide a steady increase of difficulty, but this is a minor complaint on my end. The good thing is that it is highly unlikely that you will feel stuck or frustrated at this game for not being able to get through it. The focus here is on the experience rather than the challenge. Inscryption actually has a pretty elegantly integrated hand-holding system to nudge you in the right direction without being overtly obvious about it. I have to praise the tone and atmosphere of this game. The music and sound design is perfect and the visuals set a unique, haunting tone. Even the camera movements bring about a sense of nostalgia without making the game feel clunky. There are certain parts of the game I would like to review but I am trying to keep this spoiler free, so I'll just say that it never gets boring and that there's always something new to delight your eyes and ears. The weakest part of Inscryption is probably the "puzzles." A lot of these can be passed just by pure random guessing and maybe that was the point. If puzzles aren't your thing, you don't have to worry because they're quite frivolous. Take your time with this game and savor it. Be creative. It's a good one. Verdict: EXCEPTIONALLY GOOD

Clearly, this game was made with a lot of love. If you ever want to experience what the internet used to feel like in the 90s and early 2000s, this is one of the only ways to do it. If you were a web surfer in that era, you’ll often run into areas of the game where you’ll say, “Oh yea, I remember that was a thing.” The graphics are cool and the writing is funny. There’s a lot of variety in this virtual mini webspace. But I couldn’t get through the game. As many goodies as there were to find, at a certain point, I just wasn’t having fun. It’s a cute toy, but the puzzles and tasks are uninteresting and sometimes tedious or unfair. Verdict: BAD

Disco Elysium. What does it mean? I still don't know. But I do know that it is a game that pushes the genre in ways that I have personally never experienced. The best way I can describe it is that it's an interactive novel. No, not a visual novel. This is far above that. This is literature. I'm not kidding. The dialog, descriptions, snippets of poetry, and occasional absurdisms are expertly crafted. If you isolate the text, it's something that I would find myself flipping through out of the political sci-fi section at Barnes & Noble but would have nowhere near enough patience to actually read the thing. Disco Elysium is a master class in world-building and a vigorous study of human nature. It's about as dense as actually reading a book - but one where you can stretch your legs, walk around, and become invested. Oh yea, and do drugs or punch inanimate objects. And if it weren't for the top class voice acting, I may have had a very different opinion of this game. There is no one voice mis-cast. Each character has a distinct flair, a unique subtlety to their accent and demeanor that makes the game so fresh every time you talk to a new face. With dialog this thick, the voice actors are heavyweight lifters who carry you through the story without making your eyes burn off. But back to the writing. All I can talk about is the writing. This game IS the writing. Sure there are items. There are places you can walk to. There are mysteries to be solved. But it's all just a conduit for the words. You could re-skin this game and change all the words so that they "get to the point" and you can "get on with the objective." Sure, the game would still be a game. But it would not be Disco Elysium. It might as well be a Flash RPG from the 2000s. And it's not just the quality of the writing that makes it so good. It's the way the writing sits at home in this specific format of media. The main mechanic of the game... the voices... is so unique that I honestly think it's genre-busting. This game is anything but one-sided. It's like a disco ball, shining, glimmering, reflecting the world all around the karaoke bar in different colors. Now that I've made clear that I do love this game, I have a few minor complaints to make. One is that the game uses a faded color to indicate a dialog option that has already been said. This is great, except for the fact that underneath some of the faded lines are non-faded lines. They're hidden in there and you just have to check or you won't know. In addition to that, there are different types of dialog trees in this game. Some are more informational; they're almost meant to be explored top to bottom before continuing on. Others are more like forks where you need to make a choice. Now the game does do a good job of distinguishing these two for the most part with a little indicator that says "(Proceed.)" to indicate that the last line of the conversation will close the tree and move on. But I did still feel it was too vague at times. Perhaps it was on purpose. But the way I play these games, if I don't think it's a "choice" that I'm making, I like to read through all of the dialog. I couldn't resist clicking on every line, and sometimes maybe you weren't supposed to. It's ok. I think it was a design choice. Another thing is that the game isn't without bugs. There were a couple of UI hiccups and my journal was not very helpful because it had a lot of objectives that were no longer accessible. And there was also the occasional misalignment of text and voice acting or the odd line that was misspoken, but considering the sheer volume of text content in this game it still probably leads to about 99.9% accuracy. Forgivable. Finally, although I do like the way it ended, I was hoping for some more closure, specifically with the characters with whom I had formed relationships. Basically all of them felt like I had an introduction, a middle arc, but no finish. Perhaps there's room for a Disco Elysium 2? Not only that, as the game died down and the quests got checked off one by one, the game lost a little momentum for me as it came to a close where I basically ended the game because I ran out of things to do. If you like the idea of reading an interactive novel where the writer is clearly a writer and not just a game developer who decided to write for the game, this game is for you. If you like the idea of playing Dungeons & Dragons with a full cast of voice actors and a professional writer to guide your campaign, this game is definitely for you. If you can't stomach a lot of reading and you're the type to skip all the dialog in order to get to the "fun" part, stay far, far away from this game. But you know, this game made me realize how much of our experience is lost when we forget to use words and we focus only on images and sounds. We can try our best to develop the very best graphics and lighting effects that our e [Sorry, the rest of this review is cut off due to Metacritic's character limit.]

Life Is Strange is a blend of some of my favorite video game genres. I am a huge fan of the Telltale games and I love games with some kind of time manipulation mechanic. I enjoyed the game and I looked forward to playing it, but the plethora of issues it has in both story and game play dimensions leaves me to just barely recommend this title. This game has a lot of great qualities bogged down by not-so-great qualities. The voice acting is stellar, but the writing is really awkward. "Wowsers." The game does a great job of creating a cinematic atmosphere, except when for some weird reason the character's lips stop moving or the voice actor was told to shout their lines because they're at a loud party... except it's a scene in the bathroom where the music is a lot quieter. The time control mechanic is nicely implemented, except that the "shift" to rewind faster button hardly seems to do anything at times. Some of the dialog choices are interesting, but they're often so nondescript that you can't even tell what you're opting to say. There are just a lot of issues with this game getting in the way of things. Overall, my main critique comes down to the pacing. I almost stopped playing after episode 1 but after seeing comments about things getting more interesting, I gave it a shot. To its credit, things did get more interesting. However the slow pacing issues it had from the start never went away. The game is constantly trying to set a mood with ambient lighting, music, and emotional voice acting, but it doesn't have the writing to back it up. Some of the scenes are too long and lack substance or significance. I found myself bored quite often. It's tedious to listen to all the dialog and content in the game but if you skip through everything it kind of defeats the purpose of what I'm playing. It's a dilemma I found myself in time and time again. The story is somewhat interesting in that it at least adds layers the more you play, but at the end of the day I found that Life Is Strange more often tells you how to feel instead of letting the game play and writing speak for itself. Verdict: MODERATELY GOOD

Have you played Limbo? This game is basically Limbo HD. If you loved Limbo, you'll love Inside. If you haven't played Limbo, I'd say skip Limbo and play Inside. It's a beautiful puzzle game with a lot of attention to detail in the environment and animations. It's rare to find a platformer that flows so smoothly between states. It has a distinctly dark mood as I'm sure you've noticed, which can be interesting at times, but I personally found it at times a little unnecessarily macabre to the point of it being a gimmick. It's not super over-the-top or anything, but stylistically I found myself asking, "did you really have to do it like that?" Aside from those decisions, the game is expertly crafted and always keeps you moving through novel situations. The mechanics of the game don't get old as they reinvent new ways to keep you entertained. However, as I played through, I found myself struggling to keep interest in the game. There are interesting story points scattered through the game, but it has no depth that pulls you in. The game has an almost uncompromising darkness and I found myself asking, "am I in the mood to watch a 2D child get violently killed today?" whenever I booted up the game. All that said, the game is a work of art with stunning visuals, impressive animation, seamless immersion, and creative puzzles. Verdict: GOOD

Note: Review written long after finishing playthrough. This is one of my favorite games. The art is beautiful, the voice acting is top notch, and the story is a very unique experience. If you like point-and-clicks, this one is an absolute must! I can't give an honest critique because it's been so long since I've played it, but I only have fond memories. Verdict: SUPERB

I love this game. I'm sad that it's over. I wish I could spend more time in the beautiful world of The Forgotten City. The game is stellar from multiple angles – the writing is expertly crafted with a stunning amount of historical depth and character, the voice acting is consistently and astoundingly good, and the graphics are just gorgeous. But those are just details. The game is full of wonder and meaning and heart. It will make you think, it will excite and exhilarate you, and it will widen your eyes. The Forgotten City gives and gives and gives, but when it's over, you still haven't had enough. This game is a gem. Verdict: SUPERB

The Walking Dead: Michonne recycles all of the tropes and cliches of the other games in the Telltale line of games without the proper character development and storytelling needed to live up to the high standard set by the other titles. The Walking Dead Season 1 by Telltale is one of my favorite games of all time. The tale of Lee and Clementine will always hold a special place in my heart. Naturally, I had to play all of the games in the series. The Walking Dead: Michonne marks the last of The Walking Dead games that I've played, and unfortunately it is a strong candidate for the weakest of the bunch. The hauntingly portrayed lost daughters in this episode definitely casts some strong emotive moments, but overall there was just not enough time to properly present a meaningful story and cast of characters. You've got the big bad community dictator. You've got the kid you need to take care of. You've got the troubled past. Every ingredient of a The Walking Dead game is here. But it's really just a skeleton of the other games. Unless you're a die-hard fan of this series like me, skip this one. Verdict: MODERATELY BAD P.S. Quick time events were never cool.

For years I had been eyeing the infamous Cuphead, the notoriously difficult run-and-gun platformer that made everyone throw their hands up and say "this game is hard." I was never all that into run-and-gun games – the only ones I enjoyed were I Wanna Be the Guy and Valorant (hah). Megaman wasn't really my thing and I always associated the run-and-gun genre with confusing hitboxes and awkward controls. I knew that Cuphead was visually stunning -- I could never stop looking at it – but I just wasn't sure if it was fun. Still, its reputation of being a truly difficult game drew me in and I gave it a shot. And it's fun. Really fun. I'm not good enough of a writer to give Cuphead the praise it deserves in the art and sound department. It's a masterpiece. Tasteful, clever, delightful, pristine, maybe even flawless – these words come to mind when I think about what Cuphead looks and sounds like. But you knew that because you've seen the trailer and the promotional art and probably also watched some streamer or Youtuber play it. So read on to learn more about how the game actually plays. One aspect of the game that I didn't expect to enjoy so much and also enjoy more and more as I play the game is the customizable loadout feature of the game. Being able to switch weapons, ultimate abilities, and charms seemed unnecessary at first, complicating what could have been an elegantly simple game. But I had so much fun switching out my weapons and abilities to suit my playstyle for each level that I can't imagine playing Cuphead any other way. One of the coolest things about Cuphead is the strategic element. Make no mistake: Cuphead is first and foremost a skill-based game. You won’t be able to “strategize” your way up to the Devil if you don’t have some basic platforming skills, at least not on “regular” mode. However, I’d venture to say that you’d have an almost equally difficult time if you don’t use your brain. I went into Cuphead expecting it to be a muscle-memory trainer in that I’d just play each level that was impossibly difficult over and over again until my fingers somehow learned how to dodge every attack and get the win. But I noticed that I could make a boss considerably easier just by studying the patterns and strategizing the most optimal moves. Where are the safest areas of the screen? When is the best time to switch weapons to maximize damage? Should I hang up in the upper portion of the screen to lob torpedoes or hang back to preserve my life? I found that I could magically make certain sequences that initially seemed impossible into cakewalks just by playing smart. And that is not a bad thing. Cuphead is not only an action-packed finger gym but also a game about experimentation and creative thinking. Now, I'm going to start nitpicking. My main gripe about the actual gameplay of Cuphead is the frustrating RNG projectile moments. If projectile A is coming at me and I jump to evade it... and projectile B launches while I'm still in my evasion arc from projectile A and collides with me, I get frustrated. Now, you might just tell me to "get good" or whatever because there are probably Cuphead-heads out there that can 100% the game without taking a tick of damage but at my level, I have definitely felt robbed of my life just due to bad luck. It’s not a big problem, and I get why the RNG is in there but that didn’t make it any less frustrating. Another small detractor from the game was the order of difficulty. Maybe I found a style of gameplay that made certain bosses easier, but I felt that some bosses were way out of order in terms of difficulty. Not a huge gripe, but why is the Devil easier to beat than some of the earlier bosses? All-in-all, I love Cuphead. My plan for this game was simply to beat it so I could tell people that I beat Cuphead. I didn’t need all the perfect scores or anything like that, I was never one to be attracted by the idea of 100%-ing a game. I was going to beat it once, write this review, and be done with it. But I’m still playing. I can’t stop. I don’t know what I’ll do if I stop playing this game. Verdict: SUPERB

This game is full of goofy gags and is an overall good time. As far as point-and-click adventures go, the puzzles in The Secret of Monkey Island are not as often about critical thinking as it is about finding things. It almost gives the game a "Where's Waldo?" feel, as it challenges you to click every single pixel on a screen in case you missed an object or an interaction. The game is generally intentional with this style of gameplay, however I did find myself stuck in a way that the original game developers probably did not intend. For example, not knowing that you could walk to the edge of a particular screen and reveal an entirely new section of the game. There is one segment of the game that is particularly annoying in this regard, and it involves an overhead "map view." You'll know what I'm talking about once you get there, but make sure you click and explore every nook and cranny of that overhead view as you're playing. As the puzzles are generally not going to give you great "aha" moments, I think that using the hint button is a viable option in this game. Overall, I enjoyed this game for its writing and playful game mechanics even if there were several clunky parts of the UI and user experience. As for the Special Edition, I personally preferred the original graphics (which you can toggle freely during gameplay) as well as the UX of the original. Having the actions and items readily available to click at all times allows you to experiment and try many things very quickly, whereas the updated controls are quite a nuisance when you want to try multiple things. The pixelated look of the original was also much more appealing to me over the weird "flash animation" look of the new remaster. The only thing I sort of liked about the remastered edition was the voice acting and audio. If I could just toggle the voice acting to be on while I played with the original graphics, that would be perfect. I am a big fan of point-and-clicks, and The Secret of Monkey Island was a lot of fun. Verdict: GOOD

This game is full of goofy gags and is an overall good time. As far as point-and-click adventures go, the puzzles in The Secret of Monkey Island are not as often about critical thinking as it is about finding things. It almost gives the game a "Where's Waldo?" feel, as it challenges you to click every single pixel on a screen in case you missed an object or an interaction. The game is generally intentional with this style of gameplay, however I did find myself stuck in a way that the original game developers probably did not intend. For example, not knowing that you could walk to the edge of a particular screen and reveal an entirely new section of the game. There is one segment of the game that is particularly annoying in this regard, and it involves an overhead "map view." You'll know what I'm talking about once you get there, but make sure you click and explore every nook and cranny of that overhead view as you're playing. As the puzzles are generally not going to give you great "aha" moments, I think that using the hint button is a viable option in this game. Overall, I enjoyed this game for its writing and playful game mechanics even if there were several clunky parts of the UI and user experience. As for the Special Edition, I personally preferred the original graphics (which you can toggle freely during gameplay) as well as the UX of the original. Having the actions and items readily available to click at all times allows you to experiment and try many things very quickly, whereas the updated controls are quite a nuisance when you want to try multiple things. The pixelated look of the original was also much more appealing to me over the weird "flash animation" look of the new remaster. The only thing I sort of liked about the remastered edition was the voice acting and audio. If I could just toggle the voice acting to be on while I played with the original graphics, that would be perfect. I am a big fan of point-and-clicks, and The Secret of Monkey Island was a lot of fun. Verdict: GOOD

Firewatch is a "walking simulator." That is, it's a game where most of the gameplay is just walking around from point A to point B (like Dear Esther or Gone Home). The graphics are quite pretty, the dialogue is well-written, and the voice acting is very high quality. But for a game that has so few gameplay elements, it's a little hard to believe how badly they were implemented. I should not have to point my cursor at a one-inch segment of a rope to be given the cue to climb down. It should not be that hard to set a book back down on a table without throwing it like a monkey. Not to mention that at one point, my walkie-talkie just decided to turn invisible. These seem like minor gripes for any other game, but if the entire point of the game is immersion in the created environment (and that there is literally no other gameplay I could critique) then these are major pain points. I could forgive these things quite easily if the story was compelling enough. I did not find that to be the case. Although the characters are well-written and well-acted, I did not feel that they matured, developed, or learned in anyway throughout the game. In addition, the events that occur throughout the game felt so disjointed from the main character's struggles, I could not find the relevance of any of it. It's true to life in that sense; things happen and there's often no meaning that connect events. But that's not what I expect out of a written piece of art. All in all, the questions that arise from the game all seem to lead to unsatisfying and bland answers -- that is, if any answer is given at all. Amid all the serious topics that are covered in this game, I couldn't help but constantly look at my in-game body and feel like I'm Wreck-It Ralph. Verdict: BAD