TheMightyEthan

UVS Nirmana This was a cool Zach-like, much better than Kaizen imo. It was a little short, but it was also $12 so I can't complain about that too much. When it ended I felt like it was only just starting to build to the really hard puzzles, so I would have liked to see a second set that continue to grow the complexity. But what's actually here is good, and fun, and I recommend it if you like Zachtronics games. Grade: 4/5

Saros Everything I was afraid of based on the pre-release media is true, they completely wrecked the balance of the game with their effort to dumb down the difficulty. The modifier system is technically optional, except as a practical matter you have to use it for the last part of the game because of [spoilers]. Okay, so whatever, they claim you can add stuff to make it harder to offset the ways you're making it easier, which is fine in theory, except that the system is so horrifically unbalanced that it's super easy to make the endgame a complete cakewalk for yourself without even meaning to. I never once did a run with a total modifier level below 0 (adding things to make it easier subtracts from your score, things to make it harder add to your score, 0 is the default) but still absolutely roflstomped the final boss. Eliminating the challenge at that point in the game just sucks, it completely steals the thunder of the ending. The narrative also isn't as compelling or well-told as Returnal, the weapons are less varied and less interesting, the skill tree means your runs are less varied from each other, the worlds have less randomness to them which also means your runs are less varied... everything about it is just designed to make it less interesting and more repetitive. The one thing it does have going for it is that the moment-to-moment combat and movement still feels great, it's very fun at that level. And if I stop with the Returnal comparisons for a moment I did have fun with it on its own merits, it's just disappointing as the follow-up to one of my favorite games of all time. Usually you expect the second game to improve on the problems of the first, but this did the opposite. Grade: 4/5

It uses render to texture. Basically the game spawns another camera that looks out at the room through the mirror like it's a window, renders what that camera sees (at a lower resolution, and I think with lower graphics settings but am not 100% sure of that part) and then pastes it on the mirror as a texture before rendering the main view. It can't do curves like RT can, it only works on flat surfaces, but it works extremely well for those.

Score! *Edit - Double score! You can get an extra discount by "completing the collection" if you already have Kaizen.

I just have no interest in doing the challenge rooms and stuff. Also, after posting that I went and looked up the true ending and now I'm especially glad I didn't bother doing it myself.

Yeah I looked at what was required to get the true ending and went "no, no I won't be doing that..."

Pragmata I also really liked this game a lot. It didn't blow me away, but it was solid throughout, and like Toxic says there was no filler, this is the first game I've played in a long time that I didn't feel like overstayed its welcome. It earned every second of its runtime, and when I was ready for it to be over it was. The story is as good as it needs to be, Diana's performance is incredible (she'd better be nominated at the TGA's), the gameplay was fun and different from anything I've ever played before. Overall it's just a really good package through and through, with no real negatives to speak of. It's also pretty as hell. Grade: 4/5

And Diana is so frickin charming! It would have been so easy for her to end up annoying, but luckily they seem to have avoided that.

I also broke down and grabbed Pragmata.

Yeah the Hotwheels DLC is my favorite part of that game, so much fun.

I'm playing Donkey Kong Bananza and really enjoying it. At first I was finding it kind of tedious, but once I started resisting my completionist urge to just flatten all the terrain in every level and instead follow the objectives like a regular platformer I started having a lot of fun.

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Imprisonment I really liked Age of Calamity, and was looking forward to this one since it actually tells the backstory of the imprisoning war. However, sadly, I just don't think it's as good as Calamity. It's not bad, per se, it just kind of is. With the exception of Zelda, Rauru, and Mineru, the characters don't feel as much like characters as they did in Calamity, and it's just so damn long. It took me around 25 hours, and I was ready for it to be over around the 2/3 point. That said, I did enjoy my time with it, and if you want a Zelda musou game it's certainly that. Score: 3/5 (I'm attempting a new 5-point system, no fractional points)

You don't want to know what I had to do...

I didn't technically buy Crimson Desert, but I had RAM issues so I replaced my CPU, mobo, and RAM, and got a free key for the game with the CPU.

I was thinking that about the wristbands. Like, it's on my wrist, that shouldn't take an inventory slot.

Resident Evil Requiem I really liked this game. After the first half I was at a 10/10, but that got dragged down a little (not a lot) in the back half because it was more Leon-heavy, and I liked the Grace/Leon balance of the first half more. The last section is great though, everything I want from a Resident Evil game. Grade: A

Resident Evil 4 Remake: Separate Ways Okay, this was badass, I liked it quite a bit more than the main game. Playing as Ada was fun, I felt like stealth was more viable, the story moved faster, it was just better in basically every way. Plus there's ! Grade: A

I just finished RE4R on Sunday, and now I'm trying to get through Separate Ways before Requiem launches, but it's gonna be close.

Resident Evil 4 Remake I bounced off this game on Gamecube back when it first came out, but this time the remake clicked with me way better. I'm partial to the Raccoon City incident, so the fact that this is largely unrelated to that is a bit of a ding, but it's fun game and I enjoyed my time with it. Grade: B+

Ditto.

Dual-screen Android emulation handheld. https://www.ayntec.com/products/ayn-thor

The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds I'd tried and failed several times to get into A Link to the Past, so I thought I'd give this a shot instead, and it really hooked me. It's a great Zelda game, reminiscent of the old 2D ones while feeling much better to play. I was a little worried about the item rental system, but even that ended up not really bothering me, though I do think overall I prefer the classic dungeon item unlock system. This is definitely a fun game and worth playing though, and I highly recommend it. Grade: A Side note: Playing it on the Thor felt great, like that's where it was meant to be played. It looked great too, running at a solid 1080p 60fps.