toxicitizen

The Evil Within. Man, this is a tough one for me to evaluate. On the one hand, it's really, really good. I thoroughly enjoyed it on its own merits and I don't want to judge it unfairly, i.e. for what it's not. But on the other hand, it's pretty much a direct spiritual successor to one of my favorite games of all time, Resident Evil 4. And that's where I thought it fell a little bit short. I suppose it's still a fairly strong compliment to say that the most disappointing thing about The Evil Within is that it did not exceed my expectations. It met them for sure, and in some ways I actually didn't expect, but it didn't win a one-way ticket to join its older brother RE4 on the list of my all-time favorites. In other words, it's not an instant classic. I had some reservations about it so I went in with reasonable expectations, which the game had no difficulty living up to. But deep down, I was really hoping it would be another home run for Mikami and it's not quite on that level. But enough about the negative, what's good about it? This is true fucking survival horror, that's what's good. Well, the horror part is arguable but I'll get to that in a little bit. First and foremost, this is the first true AAA survival-horror game I've played in years. This isn't Dead Space or even modern Resident Evil, resource management is a real thing here. I never felt overpowered nor equipped to face the threats I was facing. Whenever the game gave me a bunch of ammo, I just knew bad shit was about to go down because 90% of the time I was constantly on the brink of running out. At one point I was worried I'd have to restart the current chapter, that's how fucked I was. I usually hate running from enemies in games, perhaps because it feels like the game is getting the better of me or that I did something wrong. But about halfway through The Evil Within my attitude shifted. "Fuck this! I ain't dealing with your shit, game!" became my new mentality. Being able to flee from enemies and conserve precious ammo started feeling like a fucking victory. The focus on stealth also helped drive home how powerless you are and how precious your ammo is. Whether it's by running away, sneaking by enemies or even going for a stealth takedown, you're gonna want to take every opportunity you can to avoid shooting. This is where The Evil Within truly shined for me. The game rarely devolved into the dumb action that the RE series is now known for and on the few occasions that it does, you're likely to burn through your entire ammo reserves. Then you're essentially fucked and it creates a whole lot of tension in subsequent sections. So in that regard, the game strikes a fantastic balance. One area where the game arguably fails is the horror side of things. Like I said, it clearly takes inspiration from Silent Hill but it doesn't quite pull it off. It manages to create a confusing and, at times, very tense atmosphere. But I don't think I was legitimately scared a single time. For the most part, it's very style over substance. Great style, mind you. But I dunno, it just didn't really work for me. The only parts that were legitimately nerve-racking were the encounters with the Keeper. Seriously, fuck that guy. I mean, just look at that fucking asshole. Anyway, all this to say that The Evil Within is very, very good and, unlike most recent entries in the genre, it can actually claim to be true survival-horror. Just don't go in expecting a modern days Resident Evil 4. That's exactly what it is in some ways but in others it also really isn't. I have no idea how well the game sold (though seeing it on sale for 20 bucks a mere two months after launch isn't exactly encouraging) but I really hope Bethesda keeps the IP going. I would definitely love more of this. Until then, I suppose the upcoming DLC will have to do. Oh and thanks again, CrowKnow! You couldn't have possibly picked a better game to gift me!

If, like me, you're one of the five people who still don't own Borderlands 2, it's on sale for 10 bucks over at MacGameStore. It's a SteamPlay title, so you get it for Windows/Mac/Linux. This deal is noteworthy because it's as close to a real Complete Edition as the game is likely to ever get. It's not just the GOTY Edition, this is the GOTY + all the worthwhile DLC Gearbox greedily didn't include in it. As far as I can tell, the only stuff you don't get is pointless cosmetic crap. I'm really hesitant to give money to Gearbox these days but shit, even I couldn't say no to that price.

I don't own a 3DS, if I did then there would definitely be 3DS games on my list. I was planning on getting one a few months ago but I ended up not going through with it. At this point I figure I might as well just wait until the New 3DS comes out in NA.

If we're thinking of the same thing, I think that was debunked. It didn't seem too likely to begin with since, if it was coming that early, they would've announced the date by now. This is Konami's cash cow after all, you can bet they wanna ride that hype train all the way to the bank. Plus, I think a Konami rep straight up denied it on NeoGAF. I think the earliest we can expect it is early summer, like MGS4. I'd love to be wrong, though.

Damnit, what am I supposed to do now?! Announce that release date already, Kojima! Soon would be good!

Holy crap, my list comes at whopping 59 games beat! Though, unlike Ethan, I do count games I'm replaying. Even if I'm replaying them multiple times during the year, but with the arbitrary condition that I played something else in-between (i.e. if I beat a game on normal and then go on to play it again on hard right after, it still only counts as one). I think the only two games that show up twice are Revengeance and Ground Zeroes, both of which I first played on PS3 and then again on PC a few months later. I also enjoy keeping a list of everything I beat but I don't keep track of as insane an amount of information as Ethan. I do intend to try and note completion time next year, though. I don't keep a strict backlog, either. Mostly, I just went through my Steam library and noted everything I actually intended to play. Then I narrowed it down to "stuff I want to play in the near future" and hardly ever scratched anything off of it. 2015 should be better in that regard, though. My CPU upgrade means I can finally play all the games I already own that I've been putting off because they didn't quite run as well as I'd like. Really looking forward to finally playing Far Cry 3 and Saints Row The Third, in particular. Anyway, here's the list. An asterisk marks a game that I've played before.

Dailies ended today so it was time to grab everything I was holding off for. And this one was a few days ago, I just completely forgot about it. That should pretty much be it for me. I probably spent a little bit more than I should have. The only other purchase I'm eyeing is Shadow of Mordor, because it showing up in pretty much every single GOTY list made me really want to play it. But there's no way in hell I can justify paying 30 bucks for it right now, so I'm farming card drops to see how much I can make to put towards it. Already up to almost 15 bucks!

Well, last game I beat in 2014 is Escape Goat 2. At first I only intended to play it until I got all my card drops so I could sell them, and keep the rest of the game for later. But I ignored most of the optional sections and pretty much ended up clearing the game just as I got my last card drop. I still intend to go back and do all the rooms but yeah, I guess I accidentally beat it.

A Bird Story. I kinda don't want to shit on it but, uh.... meh. The first 20 mins or so felt incredibly boring and pointless. I guess the middle part was slightly more engaging because by the time the credits rolled I didn't entirely regret the hour I spent on it. The one positive thing I can say about it is that it does some pretty neat surrealist stuff with the map design. That alone was almost interesting enough to make it worthwhile. Almost. I generally don't agree with the idiotic "it's not a game!" criticism often leveled against titles like Gone Home and Dear Esther. So keep that in mind when I say that A Bird Story is even less of a game than those. It somehow has less interactivity than To the Moon. And when it does have interaction, it just hits you over the head with keyboard prompts. "You may move now!" "See the arrow? Yes, go there." and so on. What's kinda mind-boggling is that most of the time the game actually does the walking for you. It's like, this map is not only linear as fuck but also pretty damn small. I'm pretty sure I can find my way to the next bit! If you're interested in A Bird Story because you liked To the Moon, it's nothing like it. It's basically just a short story in video game form. And the worst part is that the entire time the guy was making this, he probably wasn't working on the follow-up to To the Moon, which is teased at the end as "Coming One Day". Sigh...

Oh my God. This is amazing.

Shadowrun Returns. This was pretty damn good, even more so than I expected. There were times when I kinda wished it had higher production values but overall it was fine. The art is gorgeous, the lack of voice acting never bothered me and I hear Dragonfall is a little bit more open so I have that to look forward to in the next one. It also seriously scratched that cyberpunk itch, and that's always nice. Cyberpunk is probably my favorite kind of setting/genre for RPGs. I've been vaguely familiar with the Shadowrun setting for years but this was my first actual experience with it. I've never played the tabletop version or past video games based on it. I loved it so much that now I'm really tempted to just jump right into Dragonfall. And Harebrained recently teased a kickstarter for their next campaign, so that's another thing to look forward to. Other than that, it's been too long since it came out for me to remember the main issues people had with it, so I can't really comment on those. All I remember is the lack of manual saves thing and they've since rectified that with a patch. And holy shit, I can't even imagine playing this without the quick save button. It would've been so goddamn frustrating! I only actually died once or twice in the entire game but some areas/fights were pretty long and I can definitely see how having to start over from the autosave would suck. One thing I really appreciated was the ability to rewind a save to a previous state. I kinda hate having to keep a ton of backup saves in RPGs in case I screw something up so this was a very welcome feature. I can't believe I've never seen any other game implement it before.

I guess I'm doing a double entry here. First off, Styx: Master of Shadows. Finished it early yesterday but, since I ended up having to put it on hold for a few weeks, I wanted to let it sink in a little bit before doing my usual write up. This game is pretty rough around the edges but if you love true stealth games and can look past floaty jumping/controls, map re-use and generally low production values (most cutscenes are just drawn art with a voice over) then holy fuck are you in for a treat. Stealth games don't get any more legit than this. Forget all that "stealth-action" bullshit, Styx is the real fucking deal. If you get spotted, you are going to get fucking murdered. It's very possible to survive combat against one guard but any more than that and you might as well just hit that quick reload button. It just felt so good to encounter this kind of unapologetic stealth focus without having to replay the first two Thief games. Like I said, it's a bit lacking in polish and was clearly developed on a tight budget. The way Styx jumps and (sometimes doesn't) grab onto ledges kinda makes you appreciate how Assassin's Creed has the auto-climbing thing. But man did the team behind Styx just get stealth. Environments are wonderfully open and have a ton of verticality to them. It makes most maps incredibly satisfying to explore and sneak around in. You can just sneak around on the ground but there's almost always "air vents" tucked away in corners and other high paths allowing you to sneak above guards, whether it's a series of ledges and catwalks or chandeliers and the likes. The first few missions kept blowing my mind with how much fun it was to discover hidden paths like that. As for the map re-use, it's always disappointing when a game does it but Styx somehow manages to do it intelligently and circumvents most major problems that come with it. For one, it doesn't treat you like a fucking idiot and pretend it's a difference place. When a map shows up again, it's because you're going through the same place again. Usually in a different direction, too. Sometimes I'd only recognize the maps once I spotted a recognizable piece of scenery. Considering that the entire game takes place in one gigantic tower-like structure, it just kinda works. Especially when you end up using a different exit that leads to a completely new area. Obviously, more map variety would've been better but the devs clearly put some thought into how to do this properly so I wasn't too bothered by it. So yeah, if you're a fan of pure stealth then definitely give Styx a shot. You won't be disappointed. Next up, Bioshock Infinite: Burial at Sea - Episode 2. Finally got around to playing it today, mainly so that I could free up the 40+ GBs that Infinite was taking on my hard drive. But goddamn, now I'm kinda kicking myself for waiting this long to play it. This was so fucking good! I really loved the focus on stealth, it actually made me realize that I kinda dislike the combat in Bioshock in general. I guess that's why I was never able to play Infinite for extended periods of time. Sneaking around and picking enemies off stealthily was much more fun for me. There really isn't much more to say beyond that, at least not without getting into spoilers. It's nice to see the series being nicely tied up like this, though, especially considering what happened to Irrational. I'm kinda curious to see where the series will go next but if Levine isn't involved then I can't say I'm all that excited about it. :/

Alright, good to know, thanks. I do tend to favor harder difficulties when normal is considered too easy.

Alright, guess I'll check it out then.

Oh, well that sounds good too. I haven't quite finished Styx yet but I've enjoyed it so much that I'm glad to hear there's any amount of stealth in this one as well, tbh. edit: 20 bucks on GMG and a voucher brings it down to 16$. Not bad at all considering that's almost 50% less than the base discount Steam has on it. Been hearing really good things about it, too.

Was gifted to me by an irl friend a few days ago. Really loved the world in Styx so I'm looking forward to seeing a more expanded view of it in a proper RPG. Should be fun!

Well, looks like I was right about my CPU being the culprit for ACIII being unplayable on my PC. After my upgrade, it runs pretty smoothly. CPU usage reported by MSI Afterburner was actually insanely high, my cousin was with me at the time and he couldn't believe it. What a load of shit, my old one clearly met the recommended specs. Anyway! I already played the game on PS3 a few months ago but since I own the season pass I was wondering, is the King Washington DLC worth playing at all? I'm tempted to just move on to Black Flag but I don't wanna skip it if it's good.

Since no one answered my question, I'll do a bit of a cross between the two and pick one indie and one major release. It always feels kinda weird to me to try and compare the two, anyway. I tend to favor high production values but there's always some great indies that I want to acknowledge and they simply can't compete in that area. Choosing one of each makes it easier for me. Looking at all the games I've beaten this year, there were a lot of games that I really loved but that I wouldn't really consider GOTY material. First off, the ports: Resident Evil 4, Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance and Valkyria Chronicles. All three were mostly solid ports and are some of my favorite games ever. I was really happy to revisit them all on PC but picking a port/remaster as GOTY is just kinda boring. So I decided not to consider them, but they get an honorable mention because if I had then they would've dominated over almost everything else. As far as actual new releases go, I simply didn't play too many of them. Ground Zeroes was great once you really dug into the Side Ops,but the idea of picking a glorified demo as my GOTY is laughable at best. Reaper of Souls was an oustanding expansion to Diablo III but failed to keep me playing as long as the base game did. Thief was great simply by virtue of being Thief, but it was also the worst Thief and kinda buggy. That leaves only South Park and Dark Souls II. South Park was a ton of fun, very true to the show and actually felt like more than just an expanded episode. Its gameplay was simplistic but it was way better than a South Park video game had any right to be. But unfortunately for South Park, it's going up against Dark Souls. As disappointing of a sequel as it was, it's a testament to the series quality that any criticism of Dark Soul II is almost always preceded or followed by "but it's still better than 90% of what's out there". There were only two games this year that kept me hooked for almost 100 hours and Dark Souls II was one of them (the other one was actually Dark Souls I). So, Dark Souls II is my GOTY for major releases (although I reserve the right to potentially change my pick if I manage to beat The Evil Within before the end of the year ). Honorable mention: Styx: Master of Shadows. PC issues got in the way of me finishing it so it got put on hold for a little while there. I only started playing it again tonight, so I haven't finished it yet. But man, I fucking love this game. It's a bit rough around the edges but it's a very legit stealth game, much more so than Thief was. Guards will fuck you up if they spot you, it's absolutely fantastic. As a big fan of the stealth genre, games like Styx are few and far between and are something to be treasured. As for my indie pick, Shovel Knight was a very strong contender but ultimately I simply loved Transistor more. Put any form of turn-based strategy combat into a game and you're basically guaranteed that I will love it. This was more of a real-time with pause and action points hybrid but any amount of turn-based will please me greatly. The beautiful art direction, amazing soundtrack and intriguing story were all just icing on the cake. Honorable mention: Door Kickers. I only bought this one a few days ago but I've already sunk almost 10 hours into it. Again, this one is a real-time with pause kinda deal. Remember the planning phase from old-school Rainbow Six games? Expand that to an entire game and that's Door Kickers. If that sounds interesting to you then go for it, you will not be disappointed.

Trials Fusion. This took me way longer than it should have. I had stopped playing last spring because I got frustrated with how it ran but after I installed my new parts yesterday I figured I'd give it a shot. Oh man, dat 60fps! Plays so much better that way. Anyway, I guess I had already played through most of the base game's content because it only took me like an hour before I made it to and cleared the final track. There's still a bunch of optional stuff to do, though. And I'll probably grab the season pass now, since half the content is already out. I'm just waiting for a daily deal.

The thing is that you're comparing a gen's first year with another entire gen. Those games didn't all come out in the same year, far from it. Look at the PS3's first year and I'm sure you'll find something comparable, probably even worse. 2015 is already looking significantly better. Back on topic, are we supposed to make a list or pick a single game?

Santa CrowKnow decided that Christmas wasn't spooky enough so he got me The Evil Within! Thanks a lot, man! So stoked to finally play it!

Also that ending. I loved the game but that was a seriously WTF place to end it. Pretty much makes everyone go "Oh! Shit's about to really get interesting!" and then credits. But yeah, Rage is criminally under-appreciated. The way the mutants ran and jumped all over the place while coming at you made for some of the most fun and satisfying gunplay of the entire gen, imho.

I really need to play Burial Ep 2. Meant to do it over the summer but never got around to it. I think I even uninstalled Infinite.