TheMightyEthan

Immortals Fenyx Rising: The Lost Gods Of the base game and three DLCs, this was my least favorite, but I think that's more me than the game itself. For The Lost Gods it changed into a top-down, more old-school action RPG, and that just isn't really my cup of tea. I was always annoyed by my inability to see very far due to the top down angle, and I was annoyed by the fact that everything cost resources (fast travel, saving, everything). But again, I don't think that's the game being bad so much as it is me not liking what it's going for. The only really "objective" negative I have for it is that I didn't feel like the gods were very well developed as characters in this one, and I didn't feel the overall plot terribly compelling. I will say for it though that it really stuck the landing, I really liked the final boss fight and associated story progress, and so I came away at that point feeling fairly positive about it. Overall though I don't think it was enough to overcome the blah-ness of the rest of it. 3/5

I think the mainline games were declining, but then Warzone came out and started printing money. But yeah, eventually CoD will lose its luster, so it's really stupid of Activision to put all their eggs in that basket.

Yeah, the really shitty thing is that Crash 4 actually sold really well, it made them a lot of money, it just wasn't CoD levels of money.

I was on the fence about Rift Apart, I liked R&C 2016 okay but wasn't super in love with it, but goddamn this looks fun, I think I'm gonna get it.

Knives Out Holy shit this movie was good. The kind of mystery that really keeps you guessing, but that also feels solvable if you just pay enough attention. In fact, about 20 minutes before the end I paused and told my wife what was going to happen so she'd be impressed when I was right (turns out I was only about 75% right though ?). I highly recommend it. Also, best line of the movie: ?

Active Neurons This was a fun, if short, little puzzle game. Basically you're sliding around a box in a 2D environment trying to activate various switches and whatnot to clear each level, but the surface is frictionless so once you start moving in a given direction you don't stop until you hit something. I enjoyed it enough to buy Active Neurons 2 and 3 (all three are on sale on PSN right now). 4/5 Immortals Fenyx Rising: Myths of the Eastern Realm This was more IFR, which is what I wanted, so that was good. I do think it hewed a little to close to the form of the main game though, even taking into account it's set in China. The basic structure of the plot is the same: a chaos being broke a mountain, you have to collect magical whatsits to help gods so they can fix it. Like they started with the same outline and just dropped in different names to fit the Chinese theme. There are only two gods/realms to help in this one, but the smaller scale it to be expected in a DLC versus the main game. It was actually made by a Chinese studio though, so that's cool. 4/5

Returnal I was waiting for reviews for this game, and they're pretty great all around. It sounds like it has the kind of sci-fi/supernatural horror that I absolutely love, and wish we had more of (especially in movies). I'm slightly worried that I might find it too frustrating based on the way people are describing it, but that's why I got a physical copy, so if it's not for me I can sell it to someone else. I'm also pretty sure this is the first purely next-gen game I've gotten, everything else has been either last-gen or cross-gen. *Edit - This is probably related to it being a true next-gen game, but reviews are also saying it makes excellent use of the DualSense features and 3D audio (perfect for my new headphones ?), possibly the best out there besides maybe Astros Playroom (but since that game was specifically designed to show off those features it's hardly surprising it's still king).

I'm still playing Surviving Mars, but watching all the little drones go everywhere carrying resources around has made me realize I really really want a city builder where you're an ant colony.

Well, it's been nice knowing you...

I believe we were sending AZ vaccines to Canada because they're approved there but not here

Hisense 55" H9G The TV in our main room bit the dust, so we needed a replacement. I did my research and this TV looks like it's in the sweet spot where you get the best bang for your buck. There are better TVs out there, but they're close to twice as expensive, if not more, and they aren't that much better. As a bonus (because I wasn't looking for gaming performance since I don't play much on that TV), its game mode is really fast, like less than 15ms of input latency, which is getting into gaming monitor territory. The only thing it doesn't do is 120Hz (it has a 120Hz refresh rate for response time, but won't actually take 120Hz signals), but since I wasn't looking for gaming I figured that was okay.

@toxicitizen I enjoyed it, but it was very much AA. It was like budget Persona.

Blue Reflection was... interesting.

Is it honest toxic masculinity, or a critique of toxic masculinity?

I platinumed Detroit: Become Human last fall, and I legit enjoyed that. Sure it's hokey and has a very naive outlook, but it's fun if you take it on its own terms.

I think Heavy Rain was the first game I ever platinumed. Looking back I don't know why I did it...

Goddamn, I don't know if my adrenal system could handle that many survival horror games in a row.

Steelseries Arctis 9 headset. I'm tired of my current headset's cords always being everywhere, so I wanted to get something wireless. This set's bespoke wireless connection works natively with PS5's 3D audio, can connect to Switch when docked, and can do DTS:X 3D audio on PC, plus it can connect to bluetooth devices, and has an analog input to connect to whatever else you want (like Switch undocked or Xbox's controller headphone jack). It can also listen to any combination of the 3 inputs (bespoke wireless, bluetooth, and analog) at the same time, and control the volume mix between them. The ability to mix game audio and phone audio was the reason I'd stuck with my current wired headset so long, it's great for listening to podcasts while playing. It's not supposed to get here until May 4 though...

Surviving Mars This is such a great game. I love city-builders, but "realistic" ones like Sim City, etc, have always seemed kind of boring to me. Give me something like this though, or Frost Punk, with a cool world and cool aesthetic, and I'm all in. Surviving Mars especially seems very well thought-out, and while there is a little bit of silliness (like the domes), fundamentally it's a semi-realistic take on a Mars colony, and I love it.

Prey Normally I don't count games I've played before, but this is on a new platform for me (PS4) so I figured I'll go ahead and count it. This game is just as great as I remember, though I was honestly surprised to learn it's less than 4 years old, it seemed like it came out longer ago than that. I'm a sucker for immersive sims, especially the ones made by Arkane. I love getting to approach each area how you want to, and all the different, naturalistic ways the powers and abilities and environment interact. Talos I reminds me of Rapture in all the best ways, except the station feels like more of a real place than Rapture ever did. Bioshock always had a tension between the story/lore making it out that there was still a semi-functional society occupying the city and the gameplay segments where there's nothing but psychos and big daddies. In Prey everything that happens on the station makes sense with what's happening in the story, and it's great. I loved it enough that I actually went and platinumed it, although you can do that in just 2 playthroughs and a bit of cleanup if you're clever with saves. 5/5

I basically don't go for the platinum on anything rated harder than like a 3/10, unless I really love the game. ?

Yeah, the best trophies/achievements are ones that have you do interesting things, not ones that have you do hard things. And multiplayer ones are the worst, because like Thursday says they require other people's "cooperation" to some extent.

I think pretty much anything from the PS4/Xbone era, even really early games, just needs a 4k60 patch and call it good. They don't even need "remastered" per se, let alone remade. Stuff from PS360 era could stand full remasters, but remakes still seem like overkill.

This makes me think of something I once read about the bronze age invasion of the sea peoples. The only really good records we have of it are the Egyptian records, because they're the only existing civilization in the Mediterranean that really survived more or less intact, even though really they lost the wars. Their records consist primarily of records of military victories over the sea peoples, but for some reason those victories keep moving deeper and deeper into Egyptian territory...