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Add games you beat as you beat them. And remember, if you don't post about beating it, it doesn't count as beating it. Dragon Quest I HD-2D Remake Didst thou best thee worst Dragon Quest? Thy deeds are those of a hero, indeed! And let none say otherwise. Right glad I am that thou didst finish thy RPG? Sure. No but seriously, the whole 1 character thing is hard to pull off in this day and age, I don't envy Square Enix's position here. Change too much and the hardcores will riot. Don't change enough and you've created a tough experience for anyone else to get into. Personally, I would have had Princess Gwaelin become a party member after you rescue her, as she talks the whole time after that. As it is, with only one party member but not a very deep combat and levelling system, you end up with a pretty frustrating game where you spend a lot of your turns healing yourself and then attacking, repeat. The final dungeon of the game is also rich with liquid metal slimes, so you end up getting way over levelled by the final boss, even without trying to farm them. Fortunately the game doesn't overstay it's welcome and you're able to power through it pretty quickly. I just wish they would tone down the old timey speak, jfc. Onwards to Dragon Quest II HD-2D!

Fuck it, one more!! Very vague spoilers below Assassin's Creed Shadows Apparently I was about 99% done this game too. A pretty decent game, I think both Naoe and Yasuke were the best protagonists this series has had in a long time, from a gameplay but also personality/back story too. For a game with a lot of bloat it just sort of ends unceremoniously. It didn't feel like it really built up to anything. Yasuke even claims to have started a war before the epilogue and then in the last mission they're both like "we're done!"

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 Ok, I see it's appeal now. This game is awesome and deserves all of the accolades. What else can I say about it that hasn't been said? I will say, I played it on my Deck streaming through GeForce Now, which is so good it's kind of nuts. EDIT: And another one! Red Dead Redemption 2 So I played through most of this game in what I thought was a few months ago, turns out looking at my Steam profile I put 156 hours into it between January and March I got deep into the epilogue and, I can't remember why, but I got distracted with something else and never went back, even though I meant to. Knowing I was close and wanting to finish off one more game in 2025, I finished the last few missions tonight. I beat the game on PS4 when it came out and this time played through it on Steam Deck. After some tweaking it ran pretty good on Steam Deck, I got a solid 45fps. There must have been some sort of an update because it ran horribly tonight, textures taking forever to load, you could see right through the game world a few times. Forced my way through to have it polished off. I will say this: Arthur Morgan is the best video game protagonist. I thought that in 2018, I still think that now. I really hope we get another Red Dead in the next few years. That brings, according to my spreadsheet, my completed 2025 games to: Unless you count unlocking mirror mode as beating Mario Kart World, in which case you can add that on too. Other than that I'm not sure what I was doing between 99% of Red Dead 2 (mostly in January) and Super Mario RPG in June

Metroid Prime 4 Beyond Honestly I thought this was pretty solid. It seems like a lot of people wanted The Force Awakens of Metroid Prime and this is not that. If you can accept that they tried to do something different and appreciate it for what it is, I think it's a solid FPS with Metroidvania elements... maybe sometimes even some Zelda elements (dungeons). I do have a few nitpicks: Samus should talk and it's weird that she doesn't. Since you can't see her mouth move, I do fully believe she had lines at one point probably late into development and they removed them. It's fine to have her be a bad ass woman of few words but when people ask her general questions like "where are we" "what do we need to do" etc it's weird when she's just silent. It's not like Zelda where it's implied Link is talking sometimes. The green crystals... I have a few left and can't find them anywhere. Fuck those crystals. I don't mind the characters talking at Samus, even over the radio, but we could probably scale it back slightly. Let me ride around smashing crystals on my motorcycle, Miles. Fast travel would be nice. I hope they get a chance at Prime 5, I feel like they have a lot of stuff here with potential that just needs some refinement. Having a fresh start without inheriting some other studio's work would be good for Retro, I think. As for a score I think somewhere in the 8s would be appropriate. I need to reflect on it more.

Chrono Trigger DS My first time ever beating Chrono Trigger. I don't know what to say. It was really good. Maybe the best Square game I've played? Loved FF6 and FF9 but Chrono Trigger...! Works great on the AYN Thor, lovely to play it with two screens. Score: 11/10

Hollow Knight Hey I know I'm like, seven years late on this but, yeah this game? It's pretty good. Solid A+, really. Tons and tons of content. Though, it wasn't always clear what was the main game, what was optional, and what was DLC... but everything is pretty rewarding, unless you wait too long to fight the Mantis Lords like I did.... There was some times, especially in my first 20ish hours, where I wanted to throw my Steam Deck out the window thanks to some boss fights. But the more you keep up with it, the more strategies you try, the better you get at the game. Not to mention unlocking upgrades... by the end it only took me two tries to beat the (default) final boss. Yeah, I did the default ending. Apparently there's another and I could do that but it would require a bunch of platforming so... I mean, maybe one day. 93% though, I feel pretty good with that. For now, I've gotten my full. I did buy Silk Song, to support the devs and to see what it's like but I don't think I'll actually play it yet... who knows though. As always, I reserve the right to change any of my non-Uncharted 3 opinions.

Final Fantasy IX No but seriously. As I said in the discord, this game is fantastic. Maybe the best in the franchise? Great characters, great story, great combat... just the perfect Final Fantasy. Give me that remake, now! Is there an equivalent of the Moguri Mod for FFVIII?

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island Behold! Another SNES platformer that I, previously, had never finished (despite being very familiar with the first few worlds) At times, this is the best Mario game. At other times, it's kind of frustrating. Allow me to explain with some random thoughts: First, the bad. I think most of these levels are way longer than they have any right to be. You could trim some of them down by 50% and they'd be much better. Not every level, but more than a few. I don't know how you go from SMB3 with short, perfect levels and then two games later end up with levels that never end. And then when they do end, some of the time, they just kind of peter out. In Super Mario World I feel like I could always tell when the level was about to end by the way everything intensifies. Now that does happen here but not all the time, often I was surprised by the ending circle. Also, I think the music is a big step down from the rest of the franchise at this point. Lastly, what's up with the racism? Holy shit I know it's 1995 but still, for the only depiction of indigenous people in Mario/Nintendo don't do them like that. All that said, this game has some really cool ideas and fun levels. The skiing, the boss fight that is obviously an inspiration for Galaxy, the psychedelic effects, and plenty more. When it's good, it's some of the best Mario platforming there's been. When it's getting long in the tooth? Well that's when it stops feeling like Super Mario World 2 and starts feeling like the first of series of platformers that Nintendo never bothers to develop themselves again. This game is beautiful too, sprite gaming perfected. It's really too bad the push for 3D games stopped Nintendo from making games in this style. It's ridiculous how much better this game looks than virtually every N64 and PS1 game that came after. I still can't believe Mario Maker 2 didn't have this style in it, talk about a wasted opportunity. And can we talk about this BULLSHIT ending? I know a lot of this sounded negative but I really did like it a lot. Also: Poochy, one of the great Mario characters. Give him his own game, Nintendo!

Donkey Kong Country My friends had this game when I was growing up and I feel like we played it all the time. But half way through, the levels stopped feeling familiar. Clearly, no one ever beat it. However, on Sunday, I started and beat it in one evening. I don't feel like it's a great platformer but it certainly has it's charm. I can't help but wonder now that Xbox is going third party or something, would Rare still have these assets? An HD remaster would be really interesting. Donkey Kong Country 2 Hey another game I beat in one night (plus about 30 minutes the next evening). This game, I think, is a much better platformer than DKC1. However, by the last few worlds there's definitely some parts that feel unfair. Say what you want about the difficulty in Tropical Freeze but it's always fair. Anyways, finished every level as Dixie Kong, the best Kong. I feel like we don't talk about her as one of the defining guitarists of the 90s and that's bullshit. I did beat Donkey Kong Country 3 as a kid and I think once more maybe on the Wii Virtual Console, so I don't really feel like going back to that one even if, hot take, I think it's the best of the three.

Donkey Kong Bananza Yeah @toxicitizen basically said it all. This game is fantastic. There's something really cathartic about turning on the Kong bananza and just smashing the shit out of everything.

Yeah if you know where you saw it, I'd pick it up again next time it's on sale!

Super Mario RPG Outside of Zelda, I basically stopped playing games on my Switch in the past few years, in preparation for the inevitable Switch 2, which I was reasonably sure would contain a performance boost for games and maybe even be more comfortable to hold. Lo and behold, it did! Admittedly, not that Super Mario RPG needed a performance boost. Truthfully, I might have just been not very excited to play this. Which was dumb because this game is as charming as it is fun, which is to say it is both very charming and a lot of fun. Probably shouldn't have waited nearly 30 years to play this game. Super Mario 3D World At least I consider it beaten. I rolled credits last night but it unlocked a secret bonus world. I also need to go back and get all the green stars. But I think I'm done playing it as my main game for now. The game didn't make a great first impression, I started it and played the first world or two on Wii U back in the day. I also played it when it first came out on Switch and got about the same length in. But that was a year or two after Odyssey which I felt like was a much more inspired game. Not to mention the early levels are easy and kind of boring. Simply put: 3D World is the New Super Mario Bros of 3D Mario platformers. By that I mean it's a really great game that doesn't really try to push the boundaries of the genre. It plays it safe. When I played Odyssey, Galaxy 1+2, even 3D Land, I could constantly feel the inspiration from the developers but nowhere near as often in SM3DW. Of course there's still some levels that are amongst the best in the series, and that's when the game really shines. A lot of those levels are locked behind green star gates, so make sure you seek them out. EDIT: Also, a few levels into the special world now, and these levels are all fantastic. Ultimately, it feels like they took what worked so well for 3D Land and transitioned it to console. But everything fantastic that 3D Land did, it did as a 3DS game, in 2011. 3D World was released as a HD console game in the 'modern era'. Yes, everything is bigger and looks nicer, but it's iterative. Wait a second. Did 3D World initially come out 12 fucking years ago? Jesus Christ. My eagerness to play games on the Switch 2, got me to pick this game up over the past few nights and finish it off and I'm glad I did, there is some really good level design in here. Just don't go in expecting to see the majesty of Galaxy or Odyssey. But the game still is a ton of fun. Bowser's Fury Now this, is an inspired 3D Mario platformer! Boss fights between Super Sayan Cat Mario and Kaiju Bowser are as ridiculous as they sound and I love it. The various islands instead of cut off worlds works well and is an approach I'd like to see a full length Mario game do in the future... open world Mario platforming, let's go. The controllable camera definitely makes it feel more like Odyssey than 3D World which I appreciate.

I bought Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, but then I realized it runs like hot trash on the Deck. Fortunately Valve makes it really easy to request and receive a refund. It's believe it's time for a Steam Deck 2.

Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare Want to talk about vibes? This game has vibes. The gothic surf rock, especially with this song, is so fucking good. I never finished this back in the day and I couldn't recall why... until about half way through I hit a familiar spot. You have to grab 10 flowers (two types, five of each) for West Dickens and there's no other missions at the time. The flowers are a pain in the ass to find. Still not worth dropping the pack for, but definitely something that should have been adjusted to one of each. I probably had to wrap the game up early to play Uncharted 3 or something. Outside of that the game is a ton of fun and definitely earned it's reputation for being one of the best expansion packs of all time. It's too bad Rockstar refused to do anything like this for RDR2.