Canon
Fire Emblem: Awakening · Pokémon Pokopia · Baldur's Gate 3 · Cyberpunk 2077 · Monster Hunter Rise · Final Fantasy VII Remake · Crusader Kings III · Metroid Dread · Marvel's Spider-Man 2 · Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door
One of my favorite games of all time. I love kids mechanic and wish a modern Fire Emblem would bring it back. Love Chrom, Lucina, so many characters here.
Life-consuming fantastic. When I heard about this I thought it was a crazy idea. Turned out to be excellent, a better Animal Crossing than Animal Crossing. Really looking forward to revisiting when more of the new content has come out.
One of the greatest games of all time and a perfect heir to the throne. Builds on what came before and adds more, more than I ever thought possible.
One of the greatest rpgs of all time. Imaginative, free, and stylish as all hell. It feels like a world that could be real, not too far off from where we are now, for good or bad.
This is the Monster Hunter I spent the most time on and was best at I think. I still miss Wirebugs.
Tremendous.
A fantastic grand strategy/sim game. I love how personal it feels because you're dealing with your own lineage.
The best Metroid, but not perfect. It's great at instilling that titular sense of dread, it controls so well, and it does the best job of making you and Samus feel both afraid and powerful. It just feels good to play overall.
An amazing action game that pays off what it would be like to be Spider-Man.
A classic JRPG that's light, fun, and satisfying.
This game feels so...welcoming and cozy at times. The sector 7 slums section really just feels like hanging out with friends getting to know each other after a long time which, it is. I also think Tifa's theme feels so warm.
I think the music is definitely doing so much work in this game. Aerith's theme is also so good and comforting. I also don't understand what the church is for. Does Midgar have Jesus? The combat is fun though I consistently feel like I'm just scratching the surface of competency with it.
Still cranking through at a good pace. It's really fun. I feel like I haven't quite gotten combat mastery but it's just a fun game.
One thing I dislike about these kinds of games is the ludo narrative dissonance of having to look for items in every nook and cranny. Quick, they're going to drop the plate! Okay, hold on while I look everywhere.
Got into the first section I think is kind of slow and laggy, the barrage of side quests after the sector 7 plate drops. It's just a weird moment to stall the game out before it really starts to accelerate into the end game.
Didn't finish the pull ups thing. I'm proud of me? I struggled because I was like I should do it now. And then I was like well, I could come back and do it after! I realized though that I would never do it, and not doing it meant I wouldn't get the achievement.
That's okay. Who cares?
Unsure if I'll redo the Yuffie dlc. I feel like I can sneak in finishing a game before Star Wars Zero Company comes out? I'm not saying I'll get it, but it's the first thing I'm very interested in.
I'm not sure the shinra building needed to take longer
Hojo is the fucking worst. "She came of her own free will, what is she your property?" He's just some sort of bad faith internet troll and he sucks so hard.
It's been a minute but the back half of the Shinra building, I think basically after you get Aerith back is when it really starts kicking into high gear. The first time, the Sephiroth being here, everything with the whispers really led to this tension of I don't know exactly what's going on here, but it was exciting to feel like that.
It's like the decision for adaptations not to follow too closely so fans of the thing can also be along for the ride. I think that's a really risky decision, you can turn those fans away, but done well you can really breathe new life into it and I think that's what this succeeds at.
The decision to have the Sephiroth reveal at the Shinra building in Hojo's lab and then the long pointless party switching phs stuff is mind boggling to me. Like there's so much narrative momentum and excitement and then we're just going to waste time dicking around? I literally was like "you know what? I did this once already. I could be done with the game."
I persevered though and got to the glowy Jenova blood trail so now it's really all downhill from here.
One thing that always trips me up is that Cloud is supposed to be some elite Mako infused SOLDIER and then randos like the Turks or Rufus Shinra can go toe to toe with him no problem.
I do like the boss rush nature of the endgame.
Fuck me I died at the motorcycle boss and had to put the game down and puts you all the way at the start of chapter 18 that's so fucking annoying. Why?
Alright, I've beaten it now. Didn't mean to, just didn't realize there was literally no saving after you step through the glowy portal.
I think this game is a rare jrpg that earned it's insane epicness. It makes sense to fight fate here, much more than it made sense for high schoolers to fight the god of control. It seems that by cashing the checks it wrote all those years ago. We understand why these characters have to fight fate and why here, this time, it's appropriate.
I really like this game overall though. I'm not even someone who's that nostalgic for the original. I played it once in high school and thought it was fine!
Probably won't roll directly into Rebirth after? Before I didn't think so for sure, but the ending is so epic it just makes you want to keep going. Might just do Jedi Fallen Order. I might wrap up a few things in Remake too. I have a couple more battle intel to turn in, I could knock out a few achievements. But I'm not really an achievement hunter guy? I dunno, I'll sleep on it.
This is my second time having beaten FFVII Remake and I just really like this game a lot. I don't even have a particular ton of nostalgia for the original, but this game grows it out of you. It's done with such love and care for the old game, it feels like FFVII came alive. The characters look and sound the way you imagined they would when you played it originally, the soundtrack bigger, fuller, meeting the grandness of the story. The game makes you understand why people fell in love with it so long ago and why it holds such a singular place in Final Fantasy and gaming canon.
read →Yep we started this right away.
Already I am getting Good Feelings from it. I started playing this a long long time ago, I'm not sure why I stopped. My progress was like 50% of items.
It feels good and looks sharp and like it has all the best things of Samus Returns. Let's see if it keeps the worst.
I've beaten the first boss, the decision to keep Morph Ball from you seems Very Intentional. Like you get the spider climb first, which is usually a Morph Ball thing.
Also the EMMIs are so fucking creepy and they nailed that. The designers know that the creepiest things are human shaped but act in ways humans don't. They're theoretically bipedal, but move on all fours with ease and contort their bodies in uncomfortable ways.
Got in about 45 minutes of this and it remains great. I think this is a strong frontrunner to be favorite.
Had a cute clever girl moment with an EMMI. Was charging the beam waiting for it to come so I could blow its face off and then it showed up behind me. You little fucker.
I dunno how I feel about super missiles superseding regular missiles! Seems like a skill gap! Also it makes them feel less impactful. Now it's just a "keeping up with the joneses" thing, things will become more powerful to compensate. And obviously they did in the other games, but they probably didn't assume as many missiles.
The X being out seems canonically bad.
Getting the ice missile directly after also makes it seem quite pointless. I actually think I have that issue with a lot of the upgrades. The pulse bomb(?) is nearly immediately outclassed by the power bomb. I know it's not limited but it feels like it supercedes.
The disliked Aeion Pulse returns. It doesn't feel as bad this time. I'm not sure why.
I have reached the point of no return. I'll go find some more stuff before ending.
I really don't know how I feel about this. I felt like maybe it wouldn't hold up, due to the pulse, the item acquisition issues (again, the pacing is weird, changing how they work), and the fact that it feels maybe a bit too hand holdy. It seems like it just directly shuts off other ways to go, it funnels you strongly.
Despite that, it feels really good. It looks good. The fights are great, they feel fair and I can feel myself learning them. Even the repetitive fights (the EMMI, the brain things, the X spear fighters) aren't too often, too clustered together like the metroids in Samus returns and they're kept fresh.
Like the EMMI are fucking annoying and I hate them...which means it feels great to beat them finally. There is a tension and a catharsis to beating them, beating them doesn't feel perfunctory, it feels like a triumph. I feel like an action hero, Ripley or Sarah Connor, having finally defeated this terror by the skin of my teeth, panting and exhausted in victory.
For all the flaws, it feels like this game gets Samus and the tone and atmosphere of what these games should be totally correct.
Did some roaming around to gather some upgrades, now it's on to the final fight.
UGH, that second phase threw me for a loop! At least let me pick up from the midpoint cutscene!
I've been trying to think about why in spite of some of my gripes Dread succeeds in a lot of ways and I think he's a real contender for my favorite of the series. I think it comes down to storytelling. One thing I was mulling over was that I mechanically have issues as a player with how Samus gains her powers. I think the missiles, super missiles, ice missiles thing is the clearest example of how the progression feels weird but in the story Samus's progression feels really satisfying.
I think that's because really this is the most well-shown Metroid. We can feel the power that Samus feels and we can see her face as she gains these powers. I think the most notable example is when she defeats the EMMI and is able to absorb that power directly and then looks at herself with wonder. The advancements in being able to show real cutscenes with great detail help because Samus is so silent and the beats are so subtle.
We beat this. What a really good game. The ending really gets at what I was saying yesterday, it makes Samus feel powerful. That moment when she beats Raven Beak and just has that primal scream is so intense.
I listened to a podcast recently, Triple Click, and they had the concept of a canon that they would come back to: ten games that are an example of what they like in games so someone could understand their perspective. I thought this was a fun idea! Another thing I liked was that this was a living document, it was meant for you to come back and update it to show how you've changed.
read →Metroid Dread tells you, right from the title, that it gets it. We're here because we want that feeling of exploring a space station alone. We're frightened and everything has gone to shit but there's no way out but through, and through we'll go. Like Ellen Ripley, Samus is a survivor. She'll find a way. Metroid Dread masterfully dances between making you feel powerful and powerless, flipping between Alien and Aliens effortlessly. That's what makes Metroid Dread the best Metroid game.
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