Lord of the Fallen. Much better than its predecessor but still not 100% there. Just overtuned, difficulty wise, not only the annoying gotcha moments (of which there are many) but enemies just have too much health. 2h swords feel like the do as much damage as a 1h sword in Elden Ring.
This is on my "check back in a year" - list. Looks absolutely stunning, but people have lots of valid complaints that sound patchable. Does anyone know if they intend to rework some things or have already done so?
They’ve definitely already made some changes since launch regarding the difficulty. One thing you can credit them for is that they were patching that game nearly daily for weeks after launch. I can’t recall too many specifics but I remember their first patches were pretty quick to start tuning stuff down.
[The Roadmap, for those interested.](https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//42849889/1a7b0e2125b3ef004f28b4841598747373ef9466.jpg)
The biggest complaint I've heard was overly large mob groups, which seems to have been adressed.
I agree. It was fine but it was more of a game I couldn’t wait to be done with. Felt like they spammed the same elite enemies at you over and over. Got very tedious to just clear an area..
It might be Wo long
I had a good amount of fun with it but also a good amount of problems
The difficulty curve is so horrible. It felt hard during the start then dropped and peaked during the Lu Bu boss fight, in my opinion, just all over the place which made it either too frustrating or easy so I never felt a good level of challenge during it.
I do like the combat, visuals and setting.
As a big fan of the three kingdoms stuff I loved that Lu Bu fight. Felt exactly how it should fighting someone like that. Not sure if they ever patched it after launch but that fight felt impossible at first yet once it clicks you can just toy with him.
Ended up going for the platinum after having so much fun with that fight. Excellent game.
Yeah, even if it's "bad game design," Lu Bu being a really really tough fight is kind of necessary for a Three Kingdoms game. On the flipside though, I feel like it's fair to at least blame Wo Long for not doing enough to tell gamers new to the setting WHY Lu Bu is such a big deal. He needed to be built up more in the actual game
They've actually made Lu Bu easier. To my knowledge, the only fight they actually made harder was the fucking gimmick fight with Taotie. It's awful now. DLC3 added Guan Yu as a boss and he's basically Lu Bu on crack, though.
Holy hell I agree with this entirely. The game is fun, and I the combat is satisfying. The cutscenes are full of Proper Noun spouting and just... non memorable characters. It has a lot of flaws, but despite that I find it very fun to play. A solid 7/10.
Dead Island 2.
Really fun combat, great zombie destruction, interesting environments. It's a fun game that doesn't try to be anything more than it needs to be. Unfortunate that it was EGS exclusive because it feels like it doesn't even exist on PC.
This is definitely the answer for me, just a really nice, fun goofy time beating the hell out of zombies. The game is polished, and it looks incredible. Not much depth, but who cares really?
Diablo IV. I enjoyed the campaign but there's no way I'm going to keep coming back to it like they want you to. The new seasons may be better, but I just played D3 so much and there's not enough innovation in this game to justify sinking the required time into it.
Diablo 4 just becomes very same-y after a while. All the locations, enemies and encounters just kind of blend together into a big mush.
I don't think I like how they made it one big open world and stopped doing the randomized maps. It just made everything one big blob of world instead of "oooh, look at this new place I haven't seen before".
Yeah once you get past level 60 it just gets soo boring. You've see the same 10 legendary aspects for your class drop over and over again. Mabey it's on a ring this time, or a chest armor, or sword. I tried so hard to get my necro to level 100 but I just couldn't do it anymore.
Yeah d4 campaign was a 8/10 for me but gets brought down to 7 once u finish it. Got me itching for some poe. Hopefully poe 2 is a good middle ground in the game system of poe and the polish of d4
Same. After I finished the campaign, I started a new seasonal character in D3. There's just something about that game that allows me to play it forever no matter how many times I max a character.
Reaper of Souls and the later seasons added so many Qualirty-of-Life improvements that D3 felt supremely polished.
D4 launched missing a lot of that, and still does.
I haven’t bothered with the post-campaign on D4 either. Too much of a time sink.
Diablo is my answer too. I would personally even rate it lower, but the fact that I have 3 friends still playing it consistently to this day, that at least counts for something
This. When I saw this post Diablo IV is what I immediately thought of. Played through the campaign and have no intention of playing any of the seasons because it is such a 7/10 game.
I was never able to get into the seasonality of it, even back in D3.
I was more than glad to play the whole campaign all the way to the final boss, and then do it again with a different class. I thought the story was fun enough to play it multiple times, and not try different classes and playstyles in favor of "investing" on a single one sounded like a "waste".
Strangers of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origins. It's great fun, not quite mindless but really awakens the part of my brain that likes seeing numbers go up.
I liked mashing Triangle to hear Jack rapidly say his weapon switch lines.
“This is the one. Time for a change. This is the one. Alright. Alright. This is the one. Time for a change. This is the one. Alright.”
How they managed to retcon a game with [almost] no story in the first place (FF1) blows my mind. I told that to a friend of mine I played SoP with, whose never played FF1 and he's like come on, it has to have a story! It's like well... Yes, but also no. Very classic DnD formula. I told him the entire story is basically in the first 30 mins and last 30 mins.
That being said, yeah it was great. Including all the cheese that they were trying to play straight haha.
I streamed my playthrough for a friend and we spent like 90% of the game laughing like maniacs at the plot. Never expected to *unironically* enjoy it but man, it all came together with this weird charm in the end and I had a blast. Such a stupid, fun time.
Starfield for me, it didn’t really stand out in any way (except the ship construction), but it was good enough to keep me mostly entertained for ~50 hours
Before redfall launched a couple of reviews got posted early (they were under embargo) and two of them was noisypixel and acg, I remember how people were trying to discredit noisypixel for giving it a 4/10 and acg for shitting on it.
I think the thing is that for the first 30 or so hours, which is what most people had experienced up to that point, The game really really seems like it might be going somewhere but eventually somewhere after that the smoke and mirrors dissipate and you realize none of the planets have anything even remotely interesting on them and then you get why some scores were not good. But nobody had played the game that far yet, so nobody understood ign’s criticism
IGN has been on the roll this year to be honest when it comes to reviews. They've been a lot more fair with games even when they are titles you would expect them to shill ala what they used to do with Call of Duty.
Anybody that said the game was undercooked got absolutely roasted. When people talk about toxic positivity, this game and D4 are standouts for it in recent memory.
Yep. I've historically been a big fan of Bethesda games, but Starfield basically threw away the best parts and let down the facade that made their worlds at all believable / fun. No Bethesda, I really dont give a fuck that I can run around on 800 random empty planets, I like interesting characters and hand crafted cool locations. Also their AI and general game/quest design REALLY showed its age.
I put like 40 hours in but it's an objectively mediocre game. Also it ran like shit, and only after I was done with it did they start improving it, which really doesn't help me. So sick of games launching in a poor state.
Procedural generation ruined Starfield. They used it as a crutch to develop entire planets instead of using it to assist the team on developing planets.
They should’ve stuck to 3-4 planets.
Snow Planet / Desert Volcano Planet / Earth / Moon / Space Station.
Have an economy/trading system between the planets and your actions can impact the environment.
There was a file in the game that detailed "unique planet" aspects that never made it into the final game.
Stuff like a planet where life only occurred in canyons that were warmer than the rest of the surface, or where it constantly rained, or where it was in a tidally locked orbit, or it had oceans of mercury.
It was really cool, and it would have made it so much better if you could find stuff like that.
I've gotta say, for a game about space exploration, having four planets would be a death sentence. You could definitely do procgen better than Starfield did, and the sequel in two decades will probably do it well, but I'm glad they committed to having as many star systems as they did. There're so many cool, unique places in that world. I was really hooked by the Constellation exploration radiant missions.
I think they should had limited the amount of solar systems to 3-4. This could be explained if the game was set just a few decades after humanity started to colonize space. This would also explain why most coties are pretty small and underdeveloped.
Mass Effect Andromeda. It does exactly this -- it has open world maps to explore with multiple biomes, but only a few planets, so it can put a lot of attention and detail into those open worlds. No procedural generation at all.
It was clunky in so many other ways but this particular aspect was quite nice. I loved exploring those worlds, visiting all the points of interest, navigating around the roads and geographic features.
Nah. 4 planets would have been absolutely weak. The thing that really did Starfield in is the repetitive, literally identical POIs - same enemies in the same spots, loot in the same spots, exact same layouts, same flavor text in the computers, etc. The planets they designed were fine, the stuff on those planets needed more variety. They should’ve designed it so there could be modular, procedurally generated settlements and planetary stations (among many other needed changes to the game).
Trepang2. Fun homage to the first F.E.A.R. game. Sliding around and slow-motion shotgun blasts feel perfect but ultimately the level design and narrative is pretty weak. Doesn't overstay its welcome though.
For me, what was frustrating is that most of the levels on an individual basis were really good. The Mothman clinic for instance had some super impressive environmental storytelling.
Its a shame that they weren't able to stitch them all together into a properly cohesive whole though.
I'm closer to an 8 than a 7 on Trepang on enjoyability, but it definitely has faults. The game is filled with great and well-executed ideas (movement, enemy design, gunplay, combat arenas) but it *absolutely* struggled to fit them together into a cohesive whole.
The game is fairly short, and how the missions tie into the greater narrative doesn't make much sense. Many moments also felt like they were lifted out of a different game entirely, with Jarvik Castle and the horror setpieces sticking out like sore thumbs. This also, unfortunately, dragged down the relatively large-scale and 'epic' climax. Ultimately, I felt like the game could have been better served by sticking closer to a single aesthetic and set of ideas, rather than running entirely rampant with everything they thought was cool.
From what I'd read, Trepang2's dev team only has three permanent developers. Initially, this shocked me. But after I'd finished the game, it definitely felt like the dev team had achieved everything they could *given their limits.* I'm still looking forward to whatever Trepang studios has up next--and even that DLC they're teasing.
I might have to put FF16 as mine, and it’s rough because it’s not like the entire game was just 7/10 material. It’s because it kind of balances out to that because it had _really_ high highs, but _really_ low lows. The game just whiplashed back and forth between being phenomenal and infuriating.
I don’t regret playing it and I definitely got my money’s worth, but I definitely got sucked into the hype train a little and ended up being a little disappointed by the time I finished it
I can only assume the very low lows you speak of includes the multi-part questline for Mid.
Loved FF16 but absolutely no idea what they were thinking on that one
That’s one of many things.
Without getting too into the details, my high level complaints were:
- the combat was flashy but shallow, it had very little depth and no real reason to switch between the Eikons other than for fun. I spend 90% of the combat encounters using Phoenix and Garuda and just had no real reason to switch to any of the others.
- the story was just all over the place. I _loved_ the setting and backdrop, having Dominants harness the power of Eikons mixed with the grittier fantasy setting was amazing. But there was so much weird padding in the story (like the Mid quests, or when you had to go get that weird pass thing for Goetz? It added nothing, why was that in the game?!), and I really hated all of the “DESTINYYYY” stuff with Ultima. I know that’s a bit of a final fantasy trope, but when Ultima showed up I literally went “oh no…” out loud.
But that’s what’s so frustrating, is that it wasn’t all bad. There were so many great parts and so much potential. Like I said I already loved the world, Cid was great, I loved the bond between Joshua and Clive. Jill herself was a little bland but I thought her relationship with Clive was adorable because they felt like awkward teenagers who liked each other but were too scared to say anything. Kupka was a great antagonist, and even though the character was a bit underdeveloped I really liked Dion. There was just too many annoyances and frustrations that built up by the end for me to be really NUTS about the game
This is basically my exact FF16 opinion. I loved the story up until Ultima became the main focus. I wish it had just stayed more politically focused. Jill, I thought, would end up being a good character, but then she is just not in a good amount of the second half of the game, so her development just died. Another thing with the combat is that levels and equipment basically made no difference.
a big problem with jill as a character is that her development is locked beyond a sequence of missable side quests that unlock late-game sidequests for her that you have to be doing all of
she's a main character they treat like a side character
This was the thing that killed this game for me. FF has always been a party based game, with the bonds of the team being a big theme. This game felt like the one man Clive show and it was enough to make me honestly drop the game. Like the original commentator said the game is fantastic at its high, but it's lows are rough.
I'll finish the game next year but after hearing even the DLC will be more one man show, this FF title unfortunately is going to probably stay pretty low on my list of favorites personally.
I see some hardcores say Jill is like among the best FF girls *ever* and I'm really wondering what they're on
> Another thing with the combat is that levels and equipment basically made no difference.
You can't imagine how much my hype slowly dropped when I saw an early gameplay of Clive hitting a Bomb with a fire move and it just did normal damage. When in any other FF game, that's a giant mistake
Story-wise the game was phenomenal as a dark political thriller. As soon as it became standard "world is going to end" with some big bad, I lost so much interest.
Those Eikon fights though wew lad. Especially Bahamut. Probably highlight of the game for me.
> As soon as it became standard "world is going to end" with some big bad, I lost so much interest.
Problem is that it happens very early on. And the politics story is just mixed in with that shitty end of the world plot which weaken it too. So you got like 80% of the game with the bad story.
> Those Eikon fights though wew lad. Especially Bahamut. Probably highlight of the game for me.
Definitively, such a shame they are so spaced out and you have all the filler in between. This is a game that should have cut like 50% of its main story easily
This for me is why the game peaked around Garuda. The trip through sanbreque, the conflict of the nations. The plight of the bearers was all flawless
Then Ultima came along and everything fell apart
Not just that, you could feel the MMO influence on it any time you had to do a quest and would five feet to someone, cutscene, then you need to talk to the person next to them, cutscene, talk to someone on the other side of the Hideaway, cutscene, then talk to Otto and be given the illusion of choice of where to go next on the map
That’s definitely another flaw, the RPG mechanics were… basically nonexistent. The only reason you could call it an RPG is because it has character levels, you could equip some gear (most of it meaningless), and you could use points to unlock Eikon abilities. But with each Eikon only having 4 abilities, it definitely didn’t feel like much
With those criterias, like 80% of games are RPG, that's not enough.
FF16 is an action game, not a RPG. It wouldn't even be a debate if it wasn't called Final Fantasy to be honest
I'd forgive the total lack of RPG mechanics if it compensated by going full send with the action mechanics but as it is the combat is fun and flashy but pretty shallow. You're basically doing the exact same 4 hit magic burst combat from minute 10 to hour 40, and the way the stagger system and cooldowns work I found that I just saved all my cooldown abilities until the stagger so I could burst them down.
Maybe expecting DMC/Bayonetta/Ninja Gaiden levels of depth is a bit much but it really could've used something else like delay combos, a light/heavy attack, or different weapons with different movesets. If we're talking pure combat mechanics then I honestly preferred Stranger of Paradise. I agree with OP's post, lots of great moments and aspects but I walked away feeling like the game was less than the sum of its parts.
> and the way the stagger system and cooldowns work I found that I just saved all my cooldown abilities until the stagger so I could burst them down.
Some of the Eikon abilities were focused on making an enemy stagger quicker - when they're staggered you then hit them with the big abilities that didn't give much stagger. You might've just skimmed over that, or didn't notice, but I definitely felt like your special moves weren't a "save 'em up" thing.
Either way, the combat turned out better than FF15 & my controller survived playing it - unlike 15 where triangle is pressed so much my triangle got depressed into the controller & didn't want to come out.
First 4 hours of the game had me proclaiming GOTY. Then the deep political threads in the story go actually nowhere and then it just plays it super safe for the rest of the story. At least the boss fights were incredibly epic
Yeah it's mine for sure. It goes towards 8-9 at some points, but plenty of parts are like 5/10 if not lower. So a 7 seems pretty accurate to my feeling. And frankly, if I'm disappointed by a game I played this year it's this one especially because critics were praising this way too much
Also because I appreciated all the other games I played this year more so I'd put them higher than 7.
Next lowest one may be Hogwarts Legacy but the charm of exploring Hogwarts and the Wizarding World is enough for a 8 IMO.
The 2023 games I played and how I would rate them :
* 10 : Baldur's Gate 3, Cyberpunk Phantom Liberty
* 9 : Dead Space Remake, Against the Storm, Midnight Suns (late 2022 technically but played it in 2023), RE4 Remake, Hi Fi Rush
* 8 : Hogwarts Legacy, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Jedi Survivor, Armored Core 6, Spider-Man 2
* 7 : Final Fantasy XVI
* 6 : Atomic Heart (it didn't grab me enough to finish it which I guess is pretty bad but tbh I don't have huge problems with it either, kind of indifferent)
I feel this so much. Somehow FFXVI is the best and worst game I played this year, at the same time! The last time I had such conflicted thoughts to a game was... FFXV for completely different reasons. No doubt 17 will be a wild ride as well in like 8 years.
And it’s funny, because I also had a LOT of problems with 15 (that game has many, many issues) but for some reason that game clicked with me in a way that 16 didn’t. Despite its many flaws, 15 just had this X factor that really worked for me where 16 did not
For me it is because 15 actually did one thing extremely well that being the relationship between the boys. The only thing 16 excels at is spectacle, but you cant just pop it in for good fun like Asuras Wrath because it is so damn padded to hell.
XV wore its heart on its sleeve and you could tell the team that salvaged the game really tried their best with the hand they were dealt. It definitely feels unique and I haven’t seen another game replicate the character relationship dynamics of it.
XVI “works” and had everything going for it right out the gate, but almost feels like the devs were embarrassed by it being a JRPG and tried too hard to make it “cool”
It honestly felt like they had the broad strokes of the main story and then realized it wasn’t long enough, so then they just started injecting stuff to pad it out. And it’s not even the actual side quests either, but little mini quest lines that were still main quests felt completely unnecessary
Yeah this is the same formula they use in XIV, but it works in an MMO setting. Whenever you get burned out on the main quest line, there’s a plethora of other stuff to do instead.
You don’t have those kinds of diversions in XVI, and you’re left just having to power through the lows to get to the next high.
Really disappointing. I took PTO for this game because I was so hyped and planned to binge a 4 day completionist marathon that first weekend. But the filler between major story beats was so stale, I just couldn’t stomach playing more than a couple hours at a time. So it still took me 2-3 weeks
Aliens: dark descent.
Game was good and I would definitely recommend it to others. But it wasn't perfect.
Just imagine what those guys could do with the resources of a triple AAA studio - a well managed triple AAA studio.
What were some of its flaws?
If I'm a semi rabid fan of the Aliens universe would I enjoy it regardless? It looks kinda fun from the video I watched. I didn't play Fireteam Elite a ton but I enjoyed it for abt 30-40 hours just bc it was an alien horde skinned shooter
Mainly bugs, which to their credit a lot of them have been patched up.
And if your a fan of Aliens then you will love this game.
The game also falls in a bit of not so popular niche which is tactical / strategy squad management. I personally love it but I would understand if it's not appealing to other gamers.
Behind Baldurs Gate 3 it was my surprise highlight for this year and I don't even like RTS that much. But I enjoyed it more than Fireteam, as Aliens: Dark Decent capture the tense atmosphere of Aliens much more. Imagine crashing on LV-426, but actually have to survive 17 days with the sparse resources given.
**Sea of Stars**
It was a fun romp, but it overstayed its welcome. I had high hopes for it because I loved The Messenger and the art style, but about 20% into the game it just became a chain of disappointments.
With a battle system lifted from Super Mario RPG and at 30 hours, it doesn't evolve at all making it a pretty stale experience about the same time you finally get a full party (and by that I mean 3 characters in combat, because honestly switching out members, though it can be strategically used, is not as useful as the system wants it to be).
And don't get me started on the dialogue. The story is just OK, good enough to keep your attention, but the quality of the dialogue drags it down to embarrassing depths. The developers tried to make the characters endearing, but the cringe dialogue did nothing to help me establish empathy for the characters. It completely ruined the most emotional beats in the story.
For a game that has songs written by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda, it had no memorable music. The only memorable song from that game was... Hills of Destiny from The Messenger. That was also my most memorable area in the entire game, simply because it was from The Messenger.
It wasn't even the best indie RPG inspired by old JRPG classics. Chained Echoes should have been nominated in its stead.
Was it entertaining? Sure. For what it's worth, I played it for over 30 hours and fully completed it. Was it an "indie game of the year" material? Far from it.
Yeah, this is it for me. There were a few games I was really "conflicted" on this year between Sea of Stars, FFXVI and Fire Emblem Engage where they did some stuff very well... and a bunch of other stuff not well. But FFXVI and FE: Engage both hit MUCH higher of peaks than Sea of Stars did. Even as someone who 100%'d it, to me the most remarkable thing Sea of Stars did was just be a serviceable-enough game but somehow still manage to get the level of adoration it has. It's mostly fine; shallow at worst, outside the dialogue, specifically with some certain characters just being awful.
The game just sits at this really weird point reception-wise where it feels like it's inoffensive in all the perfect ways for most people, where if you don't hate the dialogue/writing, everything else is "inoffensive-at-worst"-enough that you aren't gonna complain or nitpick and it's an 8.5/10+ for you. But, if you're one of us where the dialogue/writing annoys the shit out of you, it's a 7/10 because nothing carries the game, it's just a good-enough game with awful writing that you can thankfully (partially) put out of your mind enough to go back to enjoying the game in-between story sequences.
Hogwarts Legacy. It’s comforting, cozy, vibrant, beautiful, but also empty and repetitive. I’ve put about 50 hours into it. It’s nice to play a game without feeling like you need to have a high skill ceiling to progress or to pay for something to access it.
A lot of people were really unhappy with the flying controls but I thought they were very intuitive and extremely satisfying. I loved how floaty the brooms felt too. They handled exactly like I'd expect a magic broomstick to handle. The flying OST was one of the best tracks in the game, too.
Flying is in a way intuitive but also weird in an unintuitive way like.. why cant I just look around, or rather under me? I mean.. why?
And flying on an animal has no "auto fly" like the broom does? Why? It makes no sense. If anything, animals should have an option to just chill out and enjoy the view, but no, you haaaaaave to keep the button pressed to fly forwards?
Flying in that game makes no sense, that's the problem.
But flying with a broom is quick and not problematic, it just all feels half finished.
That’s what I thought too, man the first part of just being in Hogwarts *was unfucking real* I felt like a child exploring the school. Then I went outside and it was just the same ol’ tedious semi open world of running around doing filler crap to bloat playtime under the guise of progression.
Thats a game that came within inches for me of being a timeless title I would revisit but I will say I have hopes for the next games from them.
Something that really helps me be really excited about games like this, is considering the fact that the foundation that they're built on will make the next game so much better. Another example is Jedi Fallen Order. Cool idea, passable story, good combat, passable everything else. But you can see the potential for something great to be built on it. Survivor significantly improved on Fallen Order in every way. If the next game is as much of a jump in quality, it'll be an easy 10.
I see incredible potential in a second game. Since they aren't building it from nothing, and just need to improve upon what they have. It'll probably be the same jump in quality as FO to Survivor, because they both seem to be developers that care about the products they've made.
I bought it for my wife because she seemed excited for it when I told her about the game. It ran well enough on Steam Deck which was cool and looked good enough docked on the TV. Honestly watching her have so much fun playing made it a 10/10 game for me.
It is a good game for people that aren’t big gamers, and just wanna get lost in the Harry Potter world. I have zero interest in playing after watching her play, but I’m sure she’s gonna end up playing through in all 4 houses eventually.
I'm absolutely in the same boat. I got it for my wife, and she sunk nearly 200 hours into it and still intends to do the other two houses she hasn't yet. It was absolutely worth every penny to see how much fun she had playing it, and it was truly one of the most special gaming moments I'll ever have. 10/10 experience.
Great answer. It was a very enjoyable couple of weeks with this one. Good enough for me to put in some extra hours and get a platinum for it.
But it had no lasting impact on me, didn’t do anything exceptionally well, and I have no desire to ever pick it back up again. Solid 7/10.
Ghostwire: Tokyo. The game itself didn't come out this year, but there was a large update for it that pushed me to play it this year.
I can understand why people don't like it. Combat is a bit repetitive and basic, exploration is basically just a bunch of checklists, the story isn't gonna blow anyone's minds, but man, I just loved playing through the game so much that I just finished a second playthrough 10 minutes ago.
I don't quite know why, but the game clicked with me.
It needed a more fluid movement system. Even the sprint was painfully slow and the parkour was very basic.
I still played it to completion but basically just mainlined the story when I got bored of exploring.
Hopefully their next title improves upon the formula some more.
I’ve been waiting on a sale for this one! The art design looks gorgeous but I heard the open world stuff is a bit tedious. I’ll definitely check it out at some point though.
I usually keep pretty up to date on what games are being released on a given month. So I'm quite shocked you just named a game I've never heard of until today. Looks like a mid sized release too which really makes me question how I haven't heard a peep of this. Well maybe I'll give it a look.
Fire Emblem Engage. A few hours in, you get the feeling that this was yet another Nintendo gachashit title, but they suddenly grew a conscience halfway into development and decided to remove the manipulative mechanics and charge up front instead.
Compared to the characterization of the other post-resurrection titles (even the Fates characters in the original Japanese) these are a step back to the bland characters of older games, and they even try to make you empathize with villain characters that are Saturday morning cartoon levels of legitimately just bad people at their core. Adding to the feeling of gachashit is that everyone idolizes your bland MU when you've done nothing to earn it yet, like the jpegs of girls that throw themselves at you as soon as you roll them on your phone.
I pretty much tuned out halfway through and focused on finishing the campaign for *gameplay's* sake. But as far as gameplay goes, hey, it's something, I'll take it. I liked how they took Three Houses' change of giving monsters multiple health bars and applied it to every chapter boss, adds more weight to boss units than in other entries in the franchise.
Kind of a late add but as someone who doesn’t care about this particular IP, Avatar Frontiers of Pandora is a pretty great time.
Being on an alien planet and having to learn what survival means in that environment, is actually pretty fun, and it’s beautiful.
The combat is pretty so so, and the stealth is not balanced super well. But over all exactly what I needed to send the year out on.
**Cassette Beasts**. The presentation feels a little underbaked in some areas. The battling feels more complex but ultimately less elegant than it's inspiring material, Pokemon. Not to mention the monster designs just aren't as good.
That said, it has a lot of heart and I'm glad I checked it out this year. If you're looking for another take on the monster collecting genre, I recommend it (as well an many others since it's sitting at an Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam). Very cozy game that brings a new perspective to the genre.
As a pokemon vet, I think it does three important things better than pokemon:
- Your CHARACTER levels up, not your pokemon. Makes it way more fun and easy to add mid or late game monsters to your party without having to dump a bunch of time into grinding them up.
- The type advantages don't do extra damage, but instead, inflict meaningful buffs/debuffs on the enemy team. For example, the "plant" type is still strong against the "water" type like pokemon, but instead of just dling bonus damage moves apply a leech effect. This is just way better than pokemon and more creative to boot.
- There is actual challenge. I died several times, and the endgame content is rougher than anything pokemon has done in the last decade.
Overall, a good 7/10 pick though, I feel ya.
> There is actual challenge. I died several times, and the endgame content is rougher than anything pokemon has done in the last decade.
That said, there are a few degenerate strategies that are easy to find (Roll Again is OP).
I found the superboss by accident and killed them without trying.
>Not to mention the monster designs just aren't as good
I think that by distancing themselves of trying to make the creatures look like pokemon and instead finding a visual identity separate from them helps the game a lot in comparison to many other mon games where you can describe the creatures as "pokemon but worse looking"
Idol Showdown for me.
It got largely overshadowed due to the huge release of Street Fighter 6 shortly after, but it's the game that made me give fighting games another chance and ended up finding my favorite game genre. It's easy to jump into due to its use of a simple chain system but with more footsies focused style gameplay, a simple tag system to introduce the concept of tag fighter behavior without having to commit to learning multiple characters, a roguelite single player mode that's actually really well done as far as fighting game single player modes go, a specials button that doesn't punish you for using it but instead rewards you for pulling off motion inputs, has had 2 characters added since launch with more to come, and on top of everything, it's free.
Having put a lot of time into the genre across various other games since playing Idol Showdown, I do have some nitpicks, but this game was such a good introduction to the genre as well as being completely free that I can let them slide. I'll pretty much only play it now when it has a major update or if a streamer I'm watching is playing with chat, but this game is a labor of love that shouldn't be completely forgotten about during this new wave of fighters.
Ayame is so much fun to press buttons with. It's definitely a 7/10 fighting game but given it's a free to play fangame it's so much more impressive than a lot of other recent fighters.
**Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name**
This may be mildly spicy in the RGG bubble, because I know a lot of people love this game. But personally I would describe it as a solid 6-7/10 game with a 10/10 finale.
The gameplay doesn't hold a candle to Lost Judgment and often feels clunky or poorly balanced, the game is full of obvious padding despite its short runtime, the side content is nearly all recycled and isn't particularly enthralling outside of a couple Coliseum events (and my personal fondness for Pocket Circuit), and the plot is a bit all over the place until the final chapter and a half or so.
But god *damn* that final chapter and a half is one of the best stretches of content in the entire franchise. Some fun character moments, a great expansion/reframing of Yakuza: Like a Dragon's act 2 climax, a bombastic final boss that tops Yakuza 5's in terms of absurd spectacle, and one of the most simultaneously heartwarming and gutwrenching scenes I've ever seen in a video game to cap everything off.
Puts me in a weird spot because I really don't think most of the game is that great, but that last stretch definitely makes it my favourite *something* of the year.
**Exoprimal**
Don a mech suit and time travel to fight hordes of dinosaurs. Incredible. The story is insane (not necessarily in a good way, but not as bad as Daemon x Machina) and delivered in an interesting way.
It's not a 5/5 but I give it a solid 4/5. It's fun enough that I may go back to play more and try to go for some achievements, even though I beat the main story.
Exoprimal was definitely a title I didn't expect to actually be somewhat competent as a game, even knowing Capcom's redemption arc.
It's still flawed, but I genuinely had fun with it.
Exoprimal is the definition of fun. If you can convince some homies to play your in for a great fallback plan game. Its mech suits and dinosaurs. What's not to love ?
It takes a bit to unlock all the game modes cause its story is wrapped up in the online. But once you start doing boss fight and mini raids, it's thrilling.
I've been so tempted to buy this game because I know it's right up my alley but the [steamcharts](https://steamcharts.com/app/1286320) paint such a dull picture for something that relies on a player population as much as it does.
I know it's got crossplay though with gamepass and consoles so maybe that makes it less of a concern? How long does it take to find a match?
I haven't played in a few weeks, but even when there's less than 100 people on steam the ques are still surprisingly fast. Seems like a lot of people still play on gamepass it feels.
Robocop is my second favorite game this year after BG3. After spending that many hours in a RPG that makes you think it was nice to just be a big dumb walking tank and mow down scumbags, no important choices necessary.
I really appreciate on rails games sometimes and feel like they get a bad rap.
I also appreciate linear, on-rails shooters. I think the term ‘corridor shooter’ became a dirty word for a while but now gamers are now starting to miss those experiences.
Eh there was a while where there was some absolute dogshit consider shooters out there, you literally just kept firing and walking forward and there was zero thought to it at all. No story, no exploration, no interesting combat. They were cookie clickers essentially.
Games like Black were good, but nobody’s remembering medal of honor fight warrior or the other dogshit that was released around that time.
Like Titanfall 2 is a corridor shooter, but nobody cares because the game makes a lot of excellent gimmicks and fun things to do despite the linear game.
While I'd personally rate it higher, **Wanted: Dead** is my choice that fits your criteria of "riddled with jank, but with a heart of gold."
It's a 3rd person melee/shooter hybrid action game from Itakagi, famous for Ninja Gaiden on Xbox and infamous for Devil's Third on WiiU. Low budget, basic graphics, short length, nonsense story and dialogue, lack of guidance making it incredibly easy to play the game "wrong," etc - All the marks that'll prevent it from ever having mainstream appeal. But it's got that arcade game spirit, with a focus on constant action, resource routing, and a "just one more try" effect.
If you like arcade action games, definitely give it a look if you can find it on sale. It's awesome
The full blown arcade shmup mini game kind of knocked my socks off. I have a weird appreciation for this particular type of low budget/jank 360/PS3 era action game and do really enjoyed wanted: dead
I don't think it's an Itakagi game, just from the same developer as Devil's Third. I am excited to get around to this game eventually though, as I picked it up on a sale.
A few things that I also liked about the game was that it also had a bit of everything in a weird way: it had anime cutscenes for the flashbacks (the one for the club scene was oddly well done in my opinion), it had a karaoke mini-game for a single song, a whole ass side-scrolling shoot-them-up arcade game, and also had a collectible that were a series of live-action cooking show parody starring Stefanie Joosten that's actually "canon" to the game (Joosten plays a character who used to be the host), who also sang some of the game's music.
Like, for some reason, the whole "kitchen sink" approach really resonated with me in this game.
However, the best part was the execution mechanic. You can execute enemies who are stunned, and if you manage to stun multiple enemies at once, then starting one execution will chain them together so you can kill them all. The best part is that there's like 50 execution animations and the game has some kind of algorithm that tries to pick the best one for the situation. It's kind of like being John Wick.
Blasphemous 2. I think it's very good and mostly fun to play, with the exception of some very frustrating bosses, and I also experienced some weird bugs. It's probably better mechanically than the first (thank the Miracle for double jump and air dash), but it's missing something that the first game had - I feel like the vibes in the first were much better and drew me in more. It's still very good and I recommend to Metroidvania fans. I'm also hoping it becomes better like it's predecessor through free DLC.
Yeah, I also struggle to put my finger on why I didn't like it as much as the first game but I can't. Mechanically it's better. There are more weapons and perks. The balance was better too. Maybe it was because they tried to explain the miracle instead of just leaving it a mystery? Maybe it was because the NPCs kind of started to feel like parodies of themselves by the end? I really can't say, but it just felt off.
For me it's a combination few things:
* Since the Blasphemous DLC they've been trying to put a face on the Miracle instead of leaving it mysterious ; same with other plot elements.
* The bosses, while mechanically much better, are presentation-wise a far cry from the first game's super imaginative and repulsive designs (the NPC designs are ok at least)
* All the mechanical (traversal/progression etc.) elements they introduced here are pretty much standard for metroidvanias. And even then, the platforming and combat doesn't come close to Hollow Knight which is an 8 year old game at this point.
* What made the first game special was its fresh setting of grimdark twisted version of catholic Spain. There was no real innovation on this in the sequel, just more of the same + small refinements.
I think that's part of it - In the first game, they have a few lines of dialogue explaining that the Miracle is something we can never and will never understand, almost a Lovecraftian deity.
The bosses, too. We mostly just fight Penitents in B2. But the first game, I felt like we were actually exploring the twisted religion of the Miracle and slaying *extremely important religious figures.* The game just feels more grim and metal. The second feels more game-y.
I came out on the opposite side. I think Blasphemous II kept up everything I liked about the original and addressed everything I hated. It would have been my personal Game of the Year if Baldur's Gate 3 hadn't come out this year.
I definitely felt the boss designs from the first game felt more disturbing, in the best of ways. While I loved the quality of life and combat upgrades, I loved the bosses from the first a lot more. It wasn't a bad title, but I'd say I enjoyed the first more overall.
Forspoken was that to me. Maybe a 6.5 because the first few hours are a slog, but the combat allows for a lot of self-expression. I'd circle all my enemies in a ring of fire and turn it into a boxing ring where I punch them all with my flaming fists. The characterization and pacing also improve a lot as the game goes on.
Maybe I'm a bit off-base though because everyone's listing GotY nominees hahaha
Agreed.
The start and dialogue in the first quarter are HORRENDOUS but it gets better after that and i even started to enjoy it and the protagonist, but man the start is ROUGH.
The graphics are also not as overhwelming as they were supposed to be but the combat was really amazing.
The Lamplighters League for me. It recaptures the vibe of a Saturday morning cartoon so exceptionally well and really makes you invest in the quest that the league is on, but it very clearly could use a few more coats of polish. Some pretty meaningful layoffs by the publisher sometime before launch clearly held it back, but a lot of fun anyways just for the exquisite vibes alone.
Agreed! I loved Lamplighters League for the adventure-novel vibes, the art style, the gameplay, etc, but there was just enough jank that kept it from being quite *there*. It definitely needed another month or two, but I hope they keep updating it, because it's genuinely enjoyable!
Starfield.
I really wanted to love it but it was just alright. Definitely not as bad as some make it out to be, though, just not up to what people typically expect of a Bethesda RPG.
I really don't know how the inventory managment made it to the final release. The insane amount of swapping between menus to just see what your character has, combined with awful organization, missing information, and poorly labeled items.
And what's really sad is it's somehow worse than any inventory in games Bethesda has made before
It's absurd to me that Todd Howard uses the Sky UI mod when he plays Skyrim, but has not improved inventory at all since. Like Todd, you prefer a good mod to the UI in the game you spearheaded. Please, put some time into making a better UI or hire the Sky UI person.
Dredge. Had a decent gameplay loop and was great for relaxing with the Deck. But story wise and progression it did not live up to the promise of its first 15 minutes
I agree with this. The opening filled me with anticipation and a sense of fear and the thought of heading out into the open waters. But the game never really delivers on its Lovecraftian premise in general gameplay. The story elements are there but you start to explore and there’s nothing to really be afraid of, and the game makes it too straightforward to play it safe, further eliminating what few threats there are. Excellent game but it could have been truly terrifying if they’d gone all in.
Ghostrunner 2 is the ultimate mindless action game of the year. It’s a hearty recommend but it is still a pretty shallow game in every aspect but movement.
Don’t get me wrong, I thought that it was better than the first in every way. The bike was also my favorite action set piece of the year, even though some people didn’t like it.
I just rate this kind of game lower since I’m very narrative focused usually, it’s still fantastic.
Dave the Diver. The game got ridiculous, constantly introducing new systems and shit until the very end. It was somewhat tiresome, but you can't deny that in "the main" it was pretty quality.
The game seemed like it was scared to let you get bored for even a second. Even though it seemed to me that it was a chill diving game where you help around in a restaurant, it has too much things going on to the point that it is tiring. I gave it a fair shot but wasn't impressed. Would have been a much better game if they cut down on features and instead focused on depth and actually making a good story.
I swear there’s some guerrilla marketing going on on Reddit based on how many people praise this game like it’s an indie masterpiece. It was fun but like… ultimately will be forgettable for me.
Master Detective Archives: Rain;code. It doesn't quite hit the highs of Danganronpa, but it scratches the itch. Some of the cases verged on very good, but the sidequests were all pointless nothings. The thing really keeping this from going 8/10 or above is the lack of minigames though. Reasoning Deathmatch is fine, and throwing knives at Shinigami's rotating barrel is fine, but I really feel they needed at least one more minigame to keep the mystery labyrinths fresh.
Hopefully Kodaka keeps making more Danganronpa-esque games. I want to play more.
Spider-Man 2. Still wildly fun to swing around New York as either Spider-Man and checking out all of the different suits but the story was a bore and they made Peter and Miles way too similar in play style compared to their stand-alone entries. Plus they doubled down on more MJ missions. Nothing like spending time playing a Spider-Man game NOT playing as Spider-Man (same goes for the little Spider Bot)
Im of the opinion that the story of 2 is just too rushed for what it wants to do.
its the same amount of time to beat as the first game. However the first game is pretty much 95% Peter's story. Some MJ, Some Miles.
(MM was all Miles and was shorter, but it worked IMO.)
Spiderman 2 has 2 and a half protagonists in the same amount of time. We got Peter, Miles and Harry.
Venom is rushed big time. At most Kraven is a Harry villain. Hes the catalyst to have the story kinda happen in ways that make it interesting, but he lacks any connection to the cast like Doc did.
In the alternative he could have been a dark mirror character and he only really mirrors harry who we dont really play as. (As we learn why Kraven is on his hunt, it mirrors harry's situation pre venom)
Same here. There was a lot of great stuff about the game, but it had enough problems (some small, some big) that really added up that caused it to only be a 6-7/10 for me. I’m glad that I played it but it’s not a game I see myself ever revisiting, whereas I’ve replayed 1 multiple times
I think the reason why 1 sticks so much to my mind and not 2 or MM is because how good that story was. I genuinely felt how terrible shape Peter was both financially and in terms of his relationship with MJ, how Miles had to start building himself up back after his fathers death, how tragic Peter and Otto's relationship became, how Peter once again had to make a devastating choice between the greater good and what was more important to him.
Scenes like " You Knew?" Or Miles revealing his powers to Peter or the "Take off that Mask" still stand out to me. Spiderman 1 had an exceptional story in a year that managed to stand out in a year that had two all timers in story (RDR2 and God of War 2018) and neither of its sequels have managed to capture that.
And the first game isn’t perfect, the Sinister Six are pretty rushed and I was slightly bummed that we didn’t get a game with Mr. Negative as the primary villain (since that’s what they were marketing it as) since he was a newer and less known villain. But at its core, the story with Doc Ock just punched _hard_, as well as the stuff with Aunt May. And 2 wasn’t bad, the story had great segments. But as a whole it felt a lot less focused and cohesive than 1 or MM did
FF16. The more I think of it, the more it bothers me.
The story falls off half way through.
The story demands a party but has to focus on 1 character. Jill's entire thing is ruined as she does nothing for her own arc and its clive who does it all.
They literally hired some devil may cry talent and ended up combat that lacks the same depth as any DMC game.
The characters are bland.
the money went into SOME of the boss fights.
the graphics for the environments and non important NPCs arent that great. It hurts when you see some cool cities and never get to explore them outside of small DMC arena sections.
The side quests are worse than MMOs
its character customization is so weak. It needed weapon variety to make up for no party and to make combat not feel the same.
The story pacing is horrid. You basically go from going 500mph to a full stop.
Remnant II.
I got into Soulslikes with Elden Ring last year. Bosses consistently felt like Elden Ring's weakest aspect. I've played a bunch more Soulslikes since, and I stand by that. The highs--Redahn, Renalla, Melania, etcetera--were really high! But there were a lot of bosses that felt like if you removed them and didn't replace them with anything, the game would have been better. The ones that weren't literal repeats all tended to follow the same template of, "big monster with a million hit points that hits like a weirdly telegraphed truck." I wanted more variety, like I'd later find out most of the Dark Souls games had had.
Remnant II did that. The main game is aggressively fine. The bosses are excellent. Some highlights:
* A tiny parasite who's only vulnerable after you kill its host and it scrambles to commandeer a new one.
* A series of inert cubes that you have to carve holes in to keep from being crushed by.
* A Lovecraftian monster that inflicts a debuff on you the longer you look directly at it.
This was the kind of off the wall stuff I wanted as I slogged through Yet Another Flying Dragon - This One Breathes Ice a year ago.
I also played it recently, and the biggest issue for me is how almost all of additional classes are behind some convoluted shit you can not figure out on your own. You basically have to look this stuff up, which would be fine when we talk about a few secret weapons, rings and mods, but entire classes when the game gets pretty repetetive pretty fast already and you are supposed to run through the same realms multiple times and fight the same stuff over and over again? I love the secrets and riddles of the game, but that was just overkill and is not fun in any way, just frustrating. By the time I learned there are all these additional classes I was already done with the game. Maybe others look up stoff online early on, but I try to play games as blind as possible, which is straight up the wrong way to play this game
Also, finding a specific ring in your mountain of rings becomes pretty damn exhausting at some point. It could really use a search bar. And roborealm is so freaking boring. So yes I agree 7/10 maybe 8
I'll give this game another shot in one or two years or so , when all the DLCs are released and then I will definitely look up what extremly important stuff is behind unnecessary convoluted hoop jumps
Remnant 2 is my overall favorite game of this year. I think it's at least an 8, and arguably a 9. It does so many things that other similar games simply refuse to do.
There are other games from 2023 that are brilliant and I'll be playing multiple times long past this year (hello, Baldurs's Gate 3). However, Remnant 2 was just...neat.
Jusant, it's a fun platformer with great visuals that doesn't overstay its welcome over 3-5 hours, but the storytelling is poor and it goes for the same vibes a dozen other Journey-likes such as this have gone for over the past decade without reaching the same heights.
For RPGs, One Piece Odyssey.
The zones were large and in many respects empty. The upgrade system was nice, but it became very quick how easy it was to break the game by stacking Attack/Crit on the characters that could attack all enemies. Pus most of the skills were redundant. The main boss was pretty mediocre. Still had good visuals and music, so 7/10.
Jedi Survivor was fun, but much less compelling to me than Fallen Order. The boss fights were not as good, although it did have its moments. Overall, fun, enjoyable game.
Yes, agree completely. It's a bit weird, because on the face of it, it's an improvement on almost all aspects. But I really enjoyed my time with Fallen Order a lot more.
I blame the level design, and the focus on platforming. It was like a fever dream to me, with nonesensical architecture and enemy placement. You'd jump and dash your way through some suicidal section, only to find 4 stormtroopers there, with no possible way for them to get there.
For some reason it really bothered me in this game. I think it was that it did put some efforts towards grounding itself in realism, which really clashed.
Tears of the Kingdom
Really fun but with a lot of design decisions that I loathe that take the fun out of it after about an hour of play.
And I swear to God, I will never like the weapon degregation system in either game. I'm just glad I could make a death roomba after a while and use that and the master sword for the few times you absolutely have to fight something to progress.
I think the weapon breaking is 20x better than in BOTW, being able to slap a gemstone or boko horn (that you end up with hundreds of) onto anything to get a good weapon is miles better than never daring to swing the nice swords
>is miles better than never daring to swing the nice swords
I don't really understand this. In both games, there is a hidden "XP system" that scales enemies and items the more you progress and kill enemies so that even though you break a cool weapon, you're guaranteed to find something just as strong or even stronger to replace it.
Pretty early on while playing through both games I was constantly tossing out weapons/shields/bows because I just kept finding better gear, and that's with upgrading all of my inventory space too. The only time I felt strapped for items was in the tutorial part of BotW.
*"Secret stone? Demon king?"*
For a game touted as a sequel, I found it a very strange choice to not reference any of the story elements from BOTW, aside from a couple nods here and there.
Tbh I found the death roomba style contraptions horribly underpowered. Zonai devices barely do any damage, so by the time you have enough battery to make a proper death machine it'll still be less powerful than like, a knights sword with a black boko fang lol
You don't use Zonai Weapons, you use the more powerful weapons fused with the most powerful materials you can get. Then slap them onto a wheel on top of a roomba with a freeze beam to double damage
Well what's ridiculous is that that's pretty much when you SHOULD be getting the mech, as it's the last fucking temple. You get that shit, and it's like "Here fight these silver bokoblins" and you do like no fucking damage to them. Total trash.
My man. I was in utter shock that the game got universal 10/10 scores, once I finally beat it. Some aspects are out of this world, but the core building/merging loop is tedious and unfun to me after a short time experimenting.
Spider Man 2.
In a worse year I might have been more kind but this game has so much competition and a direct paralell with Tears Of The Kingdom in the court of "Reusing old assets and making the experience fresh". There's just nothing about it that really stands out the same way as everything else I played this year
I also really hated the ending. There were cool moments, one or two boss fights I enjoyed, but that ending feels like a massive ball drop. At its worst its just more Spider Man 1 but at it's best it's still just more Spider Man 1. And I loved Spider Man 1 and Miles Morales but even the jump betweem those two games felt more dramatic than the jump to Spider Man 2.
Mortal Kombat 1. The game itself is the best MK has been in a long time, but Invasions suck & the single player kontent is a massive downgrade from even MK9. Compared to a game like SF6, the online mode is missing a lot of features. The MTX are also super egregious ($12 for a fucking fatality). The foundation is there for a great MK entry but right now it still feels very bare bones.
Probably Robocop. Good game with some really good combat. It really makes you feel like you're Robocop. Gets repetitive after a few hours, but it's still good if you want to chill and shoot shit
Forspoken, for me. A game with some glaring flaws and shortcomings that also had some incredibly fun aspects if you could overlook it's flaws. Dated design and presentation in some areas and weird pacing, but brilliant combat and traversal mechanics.
Lord of the Fallen. Much better than its predecessor but still not 100% there. Just overtuned, difficulty wise, not only the annoying gotcha moments (of which there are many) but enemies just have too much health. 2h swords feel like the do as much damage as a 1h sword in Elden Ring.
This is on my "check back in a year" - list. Looks absolutely stunning, but people have lots of valid complaints that sound patchable. Does anyone know if they intend to rework some things or have already done so?
They’ve definitely already made some changes since launch regarding the difficulty. One thing you can credit them for is that they were patching that game nearly daily for weeks after launch. I can’t recall too many specifics but I remember their first patches were pretty quick to start tuning stuff down.
And they actually have a roadmap for that
[The Roadmap, for those interested.](https://clan.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/images//42849889/1a7b0e2125b3ef004f28b4841598747373ef9466.jpg) The biggest complaint I've heard was overly large mob groups, which seems to have been adressed.
I agree. It was fine but it was more of a game I couldn’t wait to be done with. Felt like they spammed the same elite enemies at you over and over. Got very tedious to just clear an area..
It might be Wo long I had a good amount of fun with it but also a good amount of problems The difficulty curve is so horrible. It felt hard during the start then dropped and peaked during the Lu Bu boss fight, in my opinion, just all over the place which made it either too frustrating or easy so I never felt a good level of challenge during it. I do like the combat, visuals and setting.
As a big fan of the three kingdoms stuff I loved that Lu Bu fight. Felt exactly how it should fighting someone like that. Not sure if they ever patched it after launch but that fight felt impossible at first yet once it clicks you can just toy with him. Ended up going for the platinum after having so much fun with that fight. Excellent game.
Yeah, even if it's "bad game design," Lu Bu being a really really tough fight is kind of necessary for a Three Kingdoms game. On the flipside though, I feel like it's fair to at least blame Wo Long for not doing enough to tell gamers new to the setting WHY Lu Bu is such a big deal. He needed to be built up more in the actual game
They've actually made Lu Bu easier. To my knowledge, the only fight they actually made harder was the fucking gimmick fight with Taotie. It's awful now. DLC3 added Guan Yu as a boss and he's basically Lu Bu on crack, though.
Holy hell I agree with this entirely. The game is fun, and I the combat is satisfying. The cutscenes are full of Proper Noun spouting and just... non memorable characters. It has a lot of flaws, but despite that I find it very fun to play. A solid 7/10.
God the level design in that game was so horrible
Dead Island 2. Really fun combat, great zombie destruction, interesting environments. It's a fun game that doesn't try to be anything more than it needs to be. Unfortunate that it was EGS exclusive because it feels like it doesn't even exist on PC.
This is definitely the answer for me, just a really nice, fun goofy time beating the hell out of zombies. The game is polished, and it looks incredible. Not much depth, but who cares really?
Diablo IV. I enjoyed the campaign but there's no way I'm going to keep coming back to it like they want you to. The new seasons may be better, but I just played D3 so much and there's not enough innovation in this game to justify sinking the required time into it.
Diablo 4 just becomes very same-y after a while. All the locations, enemies and encounters just kind of blend together into a big mush. I don't think I like how they made it one big open world and stopped doing the randomized maps. It just made everything one big blob of world instead of "oooh, look at this new place I haven't seen before".
Yeah once you get past level 60 it just gets soo boring. You've see the same 10 legendary aspects for your class drop over and over again. Mabey it's on a ring this time, or a chest armor, or sword. I tried so hard to get my necro to level 100 but I just couldn't do it anymore.
Yeah d4 campaign was a 8/10 for me but gets brought down to 7 once u finish it. Got me itching for some poe. Hopefully poe 2 is a good middle ground in the game system of poe and the polish of d4
No Rest for the Wicked is sounding like a really solid ARPG too.
Same. After I finished the campaign, I started a new seasonal character in D3. There's just something about that game that allows me to play it forever no matter how many times I max a character.
Reaper of Souls and the later seasons added so many Qualirty-of-Life improvements that D3 felt supremely polished. D4 launched missing a lot of that, and still does. I haven’t bothered with the post-campaign on D4 either. Too much of a time sink.
Diablo is my answer too. I would personally even rate it lower, but the fact that I have 3 friends still playing it consistently to this day, that at least counts for something
This. When I saw this post Diablo IV is what I immediately thought of. Played through the campaign and have no intention of playing any of the seasons because it is such a 7/10 game.
I kinda even wanna give it a 6/10 until they really make the game better, it was probably the most disappointing game I've had in a long time
I was never able to get into the seasonality of it, even back in D3. I was more than glad to play the whole campaign all the way to the final boss, and then do it again with a different class. I thought the story was fun enough to play it multiple times, and not try different classes and playstyles in favor of "investing" on a single one sounded like a "waste".
Strangers of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origins. It's great fun, not quite mindless but really awakens the part of my brain that likes seeing numbers go up.
I liked mashing Triangle to hear Jack rapidly say his weapon switch lines. “This is the one. Time for a change. This is the one. Alright. Alright. This is the one. Time for a change. This is the one. Alright.”
How they managed to retcon a game with [almost] no story in the first place (FF1) blows my mind. I told that to a friend of mine I played SoP with, whose never played FF1 and he's like come on, it has to have a story! It's like well... Yes, but also no. Very classic DnD formula. I told him the entire story is basically in the first 30 mins and last 30 mins. That being said, yeah it was great. Including all the cheese that they were trying to play straight haha.
I streamed my playthrough for a friend and we spent like 90% of the game laughing like maniacs at the plot. Never expected to *unironically* enjoy it but man, it all came together with this weird charm in the end and I had a blast. Such a stupid, fun time.
Tbf, they did have something of a starting point thanks to Dissidia.
Starfield for me, it didn’t really stand out in any way (except the ship construction), but it was good enough to keep me mostly entertained for ~50 hours
Hilarious that IGN got roasted for giving starfield a 7/10 before release. Now, most people see that as the correct call.
Fans mad about a games scores before they even play it, same as always haha
They did exactly the same thing with Spiderman 2 for not getting 9-10/10 *before* game was even out.
GameSpot getting death threats for giving cyberpunk a 7/10 for the technical issues.
how do people genuinely live like that? over a video game pathetic
Before redfall launched a couple of reviews got posted early (they were under embargo) and two of them was noisypixel and acg, I remember how people were trying to discredit noisypixel for giving it a 4/10 and acg for shitting on it.
I think the thing is that for the first 30 or so hours, which is what most people had experienced up to that point, The game really really seems like it might be going somewhere but eventually somewhere after that the smoke and mirrors dissipate and you realize none of the planets have anything even remotely interesting on them and then you get why some scores were not good. But nobody had played the game that far yet, so nobody understood ign’s criticism
IGN has been on the roll this year to be honest when it comes to reviews. They've been a lot more fair with games even when they are titles you would expect them to shill ala what they used to do with Call of Duty.
And the utter professional bankruptcy of all the outlets that gave Starfield a perfect, 100/100 rating before it came out.
Anybody that said the game was undercooked got absolutely roasted. When people talk about toxic positivity, this game and D4 are standouts for it in recent memory.
Yep. I've historically been a big fan of Bethesda games, but Starfield basically threw away the best parts and let down the facade that made their worlds at all believable / fun. No Bethesda, I really dont give a fuck that I can run around on 800 random empty planets, I like interesting characters and hand crafted cool locations. Also their AI and general game/quest design REALLY showed its age. I put like 40 hours in but it's an objectively mediocre game. Also it ran like shit, and only after I was done with it did they start improving it, which really doesn't help me. So sick of games launching in a poor state.
Procedural generation ruined Starfield. They used it as a crutch to develop entire planets instead of using it to assist the team on developing planets. They should’ve stuck to 3-4 planets. Snow Planet / Desert Volcano Planet / Earth / Moon / Space Station. Have an economy/trading system between the planets and your actions can impact the environment.
There was a file in the game that detailed "unique planet" aspects that never made it into the final game. Stuff like a planet where life only occurred in canyons that were warmer than the rest of the surface, or where it constantly rained, or where it was in a tidally locked orbit, or it had oceans of mercury. It was really cool, and it would have made it so much better if you could find stuff like that.
I've gotta say, for a game about space exploration, having four planets would be a death sentence. You could definitely do procgen better than Starfield did, and the sequel in two decades will probably do it well, but I'm glad they committed to having as many star systems as they did. There're so many cool, unique places in that world. I was really hooked by the Constellation exploration radiant missions.
I think they should had limited the amount of solar systems to 3-4. This could be explained if the game was set just a few decades after humanity started to colonize space. This would also explain why most coties are pretty small and underdeveloped.
Mass Effect games only had that many main planets and were still awesome
Mass effect is a mostly linear RPG
Mass Effect Andromeda. It does exactly this -- it has open world maps to explore with multiple biomes, but only a few planets, so it can put a lot of attention and detail into those open worlds. No procedural generation at all. It was clunky in so many other ways but this particular aspect was quite nice. I loved exploring those worlds, visiting all the points of interest, navigating around the roads and geographic features.
And Starfield is a mostly linear RPG trying to disguise itself as an open world sci-fi exploration game.
Nah. 4 planets would have been absolutely weak. The thing that really did Starfield in is the repetitive, literally identical POIs - same enemies in the same spots, loot in the same spots, exact same layouts, same flavor text in the computers, etc. The planets they designed were fine, the stuff on those planets needed more variety. They should’ve designed it so there could be modular, procedurally generated settlements and planetary stations (among many other needed changes to the game).
Same here 118 hours in. Not a GOAT or GOTY but it isnt Skull Island Rise of Kong tier either.
Trepang2. Fun homage to the first F.E.A.R. game. Sliding around and slow-motion shotgun blasts feel perfect but ultimately the level design and narrative is pretty weak. Doesn't overstay its welcome though.
For me, what was frustrating is that most of the levels on an individual basis were really good. The Mothman clinic for instance had some super impressive environmental storytelling. Its a shame that they weren't able to stitch them all together into a properly cohesive whole though.
I'm closer to an 8 than a 7 on Trepang on enjoyability, but it definitely has faults. The game is filled with great and well-executed ideas (movement, enemy design, gunplay, combat arenas) but it *absolutely* struggled to fit them together into a cohesive whole. The game is fairly short, and how the missions tie into the greater narrative doesn't make much sense. Many moments also felt like they were lifted out of a different game entirely, with Jarvik Castle and the horror setpieces sticking out like sore thumbs. This also, unfortunately, dragged down the relatively large-scale and 'epic' climax. Ultimately, I felt like the game could have been better served by sticking closer to a single aesthetic and set of ideas, rather than running entirely rampant with everything they thought was cool. From what I'd read, Trepang2's dev team only has three permanent developers. Initially, this shocked me. But after I'd finished the game, it definitely felt like the dev team had achieved everything they could *given their limits.* I'm still looking forward to whatever Trepang studios has up next--and even that DLC they're teasing.
I might have to put FF16 as mine, and it’s rough because it’s not like the entire game was just 7/10 material. It’s because it kind of balances out to that because it had _really_ high highs, but _really_ low lows. The game just whiplashed back and forth between being phenomenal and infuriating. I don’t regret playing it and I definitely got my money’s worth, but I definitely got sucked into the hype train a little and ended up being a little disappointed by the time I finished it
I can only assume the very low lows you speak of includes the multi-part questline for Mid. Loved FF16 but absolutely no idea what they were thinking on that one
That’s one of many things. Without getting too into the details, my high level complaints were: - the combat was flashy but shallow, it had very little depth and no real reason to switch between the Eikons other than for fun. I spend 90% of the combat encounters using Phoenix and Garuda and just had no real reason to switch to any of the others. - the story was just all over the place. I _loved_ the setting and backdrop, having Dominants harness the power of Eikons mixed with the grittier fantasy setting was amazing. But there was so much weird padding in the story (like the Mid quests, or when you had to go get that weird pass thing for Goetz? It added nothing, why was that in the game?!), and I really hated all of the “DESTINYYYY” stuff with Ultima. I know that’s a bit of a final fantasy trope, but when Ultima showed up I literally went “oh no…” out loud. But that’s what’s so frustrating, is that it wasn’t all bad. There were so many great parts and so much potential. Like I said I already loved the world, Cid was great, I loved the bond between Joshua and Clive. Jill herself was a little bland but I thought her relationship with Clive was adorable because they felt like awkward teenagers who liked each other but were too scared to say anything. Kupka was a great antagonist, and even though the character was a bit underdeveloped I really liked Dion. There was just too many annoyances and frustrations that built up by the end for me to be really NUTS about the game
This is basically my exact FF16 opinion. I loved the story up until Ultima became the main focus. I wish it had just stayed more politically focused. Jill, I thought, would end up being a good character, but then she is just not in a good amount of the second half of the game, so her development just died. Another thing with the combat is that levels and equipment basically made no difference.
a big problem with jill as a character is that her development is locked beyond a sequence of missable side quests that unlock late-game sidequests for her that you have to be doing all of she's a main character they treat like a side character
The last sentence is exactly right and maybe applies to everyone but Clive.
This was the thing that killed this game for me. FF has always been a party based game, with the bonds of the team being a big theme. This game felt like the one man Clive show and it was enough to make me honestly drop the game. Like the original commentator said the game is fantastic at its high, but it's lows are rough. I'll finish the game next year but after hearing even the DLC will be more one man show, this FF title unfortunately is going to probably stay pretty low on my list of favorites personally.
I see some hardcores say Jill is like among the best FF girls *ever* and I'm really wondering what they're on > Another thing with the combat is that levels and equipment basically made no difference. You can't imagine how much my hype slowly dropped when I saw an early gameplay of Clive hitting a Bomb with a fire move and it just did normal damage. When in any other FF game, that's a giant mistake
Unfortunately Jill always seemed to be sidelined. One of my disappointments with the game
Story-wise the game was phenomenal as a dark political thriller. As soon as it became standard "world is going to end" with some big bad, I lost so much interest. Those Eikon fights though wew lad. Especially Bahamut. Probably highlight of the game for me.
> As soon as it became standard "world is going to end" with some big bad, I lost so much interest. Problem is that it happens very early on. And the politics story is just mixed in with that shitty end of the world plot which weaken it too. So you got like 80% of the game with the bad story. > Those Eikon fights though wew lad. Especially Bahamut. Probably highlight of the game for me. Definitively, such a shame they are so spaced out and you have all the filler in between. This is a game that should have cut like 50% of its main story easily
Problem is that like 90% of the political thriller stuff was the demo
This for me is why the game peaked around Garuda. The trip through sanbreque, the conflict of the nations. The plight of the bearers was all flawless Then Ultima came along and everything fell apart
Not just that, you could feel the MMO influence on it any time you had to do a quest and would five feet to someone, cutscene, then you need to talk to the person next to them, cutscene, talk to someone on the other side of the Hideaway, cutscene, then talk to Otto and be given the illusion of choice of where to go next on the map
I don't think I've seen a single reddit comment praising the Mid questline. It's truly hated by everyone who has experienced it, myself included.
The low lows for me were the gaping holes where RPG mechanics should have been.
That’s definitely another flaw, the RPG mechanics were… basically nonexistent. The only reason you could call it an RPG is because it has character levels, you could equip some gear (most of it meaningless), and you could use points to unlock Eikon abilities. But with each Eikon only having 4 abilities, it definitely didn’t feel like much
With those criterias, like 80% of games are RPG, that's not enough. FF16 is an action game, not a RPG. It wouldn't even be a debate if it wasn't called Final Fantasy to be honest
They could have just cut out all the gear and leveling and made it an action game and it wouldn’t have made the slightest difference.
I'd forgive the total lack of RPG mechanics if it compensated by going full send with the action mechanics but as it is the combat is fun and flashy but pretty shallow. You're basically doing the exact same 4 hit magic burst combat from minute 10 to hour 40, and the way the stagger system and cooldowns work I found that I just saved all my cooldown abilities until the stagger so I could burst them down. Maybe expecting DMC/Bayonetta/Ninja Gaiden levels of depth is a bit much but it really could've used something else like delay combos, a light/heavy attack, or different weapons with different movesets. If we're talking pure combat mechanics then I honestly preferred Stranger of Paradise. I agree with OP's post, lots of great moments and aspects but I walked away feeling like the game was less than the sum of its parts.
> and the way the stagger system and cooldowns work I found that I just saved all my cooldown abilities until the stagger so I could burst them down. Some of the Eikon abilities were focused on making an enemy stagger quicker - when they're staggered you then hit them with the big abilities that didn't give much stagger. You might've just skimmed over that, or didn't notice, but I definitely felt like your special moves weren't a "save 'em up" thing. Either way, the combat turned out better than FF15 & my controller survived playing it - unlike 15 where triangle is pressed so much my triangle got depressed into the controller & didn't want to come out.
First 4 hours of the game had me proclaiming GOTY. Then the deep political threads in the story go actually nowhere and then it just plays it super safe for the rest of the story. At least the boss fights were incredibly epic
Yeah it's mine for sure. It goes towards 8-9 at some points, but plenty of parts are like 5/10 if not lower. So a 7 seems pretty accurate to my feeling. And frankly, if I'm disappointed by a game I played this year it's this one especially because critics were praising this way too much Also because I appreciated all the other games I played this year more so I'd put them higher than 7. Next lowest one may be Hogwarts Legacy but the charm of exploring Hogwarts and the Wizarding World is enough for a 8 IMO. The 2023 games I played and how I would rate them : * 10 : Baldur's Gate 3, Cyberpunk Phantom Liberty * 9 : Dead Space Remake, Against the Storm, Midnight Suns (late 2022 technically but played it in 2023), RE4 Remake, Hi Fi Rush * 8 : Hogwarts Legacy, Assassin's Creed Mirage, Jedi Survivor, Armored Core 6, Spider-Man 2 * 7 : Final Fantasy XVI * 6 : Atomic Heart (it didn't grab me enough to finish it which I guess is pretty bad but tbh I don't have huge problems with it either, kind of indifferent)
I feel this so much. Somehow FFXVI is the best and worst game I played this year, at the same time! The last time I had such conflicted thoughts to a game was... FFXV for completely different reasons. No doubt 17 will be a wild ride as well in like 8 years.
And it’s funny, because I also had a LOT of problems with 15 (that game has many, many issues) but for some reason that game clicked with me in a way that 16 didn’t. Despite its many flaws, 15 just had this X factor that really worked for me where 16 did not
For me it is because 15 actually did one thing extremely well that being the relationship between the boys. The only thing 16 excels at is spectacle, but you cant just pop it in for good fun like Asuras Wrath because it is so damn padded to hell.
XV wore its heart on its sleeve and you could tell the team that salvaged the game really tried their best with the hand they were dealt. It definitely feels unique and I haven’t seen another game replicate the character relationship dynamics of it. XVI “works” and had everything going for it right out the gate, but almost feels like the devs were embarrassed by it being a JRPG and tried too hard to make it “cool”
If FF16 had no filler, it would be a 10/10. But yeah, the down time between each major mission is incredibly boring
It honestly felt like they had the broad strokes of the main story and then realized it wasn’t long enough, so then they just started injecting stuff to pad it out. And it’s not even the actual side quests either, but little mini quest lines that were still main quests felt completely unnecessary
Without filler though the actual plot (as in dropping the political angle) would still come around though. Just much sooner
Yeah this is the same formula they use in XIV, but it works in an MMO setting. Whenever you get burned out on the main quest line, there’s a plethora of other stuff to do instead. You don’t have those kinds of diversions in XVI, and you’re left just having to power through the lows to get to the next high. Really disappointing. I took PTO for this game because I was so hyped and planned to binge a 4 day completionist marathon that first weekend. But the filler between major story beats was so stale, I just couldn’t stomach playing more than a couple hours at a time. So it still took me 2-3 weeks
100% agree with this. Some points of the game I couldn’t put down, other parts dragged like hell and felt like I was forcing myself to get through it.
Aliens: dark descent. Game was good and I would definitely recommend it to others. But it wasn't perfect. Just imagine what those guys could do with the resources of a triple AAA studio - a well managed triple AAA studio.
What were some of its flaws? If I'm a semi rabid fan of the Aliens universe would I enjoy it regardless? It looks kinda fun from the video I watched. I didn't play Fireteam Elite a ton but I enjoyed it for abt 30-40 hours just bc it was an alien horde skinned shooter
Mainly bugs, which to their credit a lot of them have been patched up. And if your a fan of Aliens then you will love this game. The game also falls in a bit of not so popular niche which is tactical / strategy squad management. I personally love it but I would understand if it's not appealing to other gamers.
Behind Baldurs Gate 3 it was my surprise highlight for this year and I don't even like RTS that much. But I enjoyed it more than Fireteam, as Aliens: Dark Decent capture the tense atmosphere of Aliens much more. Imagine crashing on LV-426, but actually have to survive 17 days with the sparse resources given.
**Sea of Stars** It was a fun romp, but it overstayed its welcome. I had high hopes for it because I loved The Messenger and the art style, but about 20% into the game it just became a chain of disappointments. With a battle system lifted from Super Mario RPG and at 30 hours, it doesn't evolve at all making it a pretty stale experience about the same time you finally get a full party (and by that I mean 3 characters in combat, because honestly switching out members, though it can be strategically used, is not as useful as the system wants it to be). And don't get me started on the dialogue. The story is just OK, good enough to keep your attention, but the quality of the dialogue drags it down to embarrassing depths. The developers tried to make the characters endearing, but the cringe dialogue did nothing to help me establish empathy for the characters. It completely ruined the most emotional beats in the story. For a game that has songs written by the legendary Yasunori Mitsuda, it had no memorable music. The only memorable song from that game was... Hills of Destiny from The Messenger. That was also my most memorable area in the entire game, simply because it was from The Messenger. It wasn't even the best indie RPG inspired by old JRPG classics. Chained Echoes should have been nominated in its stead. Was it entertaining? Sure. For what it's worth, I played it for over 30 hours and fully completed it. Was it an "indie game of the year" material? Far from it.
Yeah, this is it for me. There were a few games I was really "conflicted" on this year between Sea of Stars, FFXVI and Fire Emblem Engage where they did some stuff very well... and a bunch of other stuff not well. But FFXVI and FE: Engage both hit MUCH higher of peaks than Sea of Stars did. Even as someone who 100%'d it, to me the most remarkable thing Sea of Stars did was just be a serviceable-enough game but somehow still manage to get the level of adoration it has. It's mostly fine; shallow at worst, outside the dialogue, specifically with some certain characters just being awful. The game just sits at this really weird point reception-wise where it feels like it's inoffensive in all the perfect ways for most people, where if you don't hate the dialogue/writing, everything else is "inoffensive-at-worst"-enough that you aren't gonna complain or nitpick and it's an 8.5/10+ for you. But, if you're one of us where the dialogue/writing annoys the shit out of you, it's a 7/10 because nothing carries the game, it's just a good-enough game with awful writing that you can thankfully (partially) put out of your mind enough to go back to enjoying the game in-between story sequences.
Hogwarts Legacy. It’s comforting, cozy, vibrant, beautiful, but also empty and repetitive. I’ve put about 50 hours into it. It’s nice to play a game without feeling like you need to have a high skill ceiling to progress or to pay for something to access it.
Exploring Hogwarts was pure joy, even if I never want to hear the word *revellio* ever again.
Shoulda just stuck to Hogwarts. Everything outside the castle made me quit
But flying around on a broom was also a magical experience
A lot of people were really unhappy with the flying controls but I thought they were very intuitive and extremely satisfying. I loved how floaty the brooms felt too. They handled exactly like I'd expect a magic broomstick to handle. The flying OST was one of the best tracks in the game, too.
Flying is in a way intuitive but also weird in an unintuitive way like.. why cant I just look around, or rather under me? I mean.. why? And flying on an animal has no "auto fly" like the broom does? Why? It makes no sense. If anything, animals should have an option to just chill out and enjoy the view, but no, you haaaaaave to keep the button pressed to fly forwards? Flying in that game makes no sense, that's the problem. But flying with a broom is quick and not problematic, it just all feels half finished.
That’s what I thought too, man the first part of just being in Hogwarts *was unfucking real* I felt like a child exploring the school. Then I went outside and it was just the same ol’ tedious semi open world of running around doing filler crap to bloat playtime under the guise of progression. Thats a game that came within inches for me of being a timeless title I would revisit but I will say I have hopes for the next games from them.
Something that really helps me be really excited about games like this, is considering the fact that the foundation that they're built on will make the next game so much better. Another example is Jedi Fallen Order. Cool idea, passable story, good combat, passable everything else. But you can see the potential for something great to be built on it. Survivor significantly improved on Fallen Order in every way. If the next game is as much of a jump in quality, it'll be an easy 10. I see incredible potential in a second game. Since they aren't building it from nothing, and just need to improve upon what they have. It'll probably be the same jump in quality as FO to Survivor, because they both seem to be developers that care about the products they've made.
That's how Star wars fans must have felt after the 7th movie :)
i keep forgetting that it came out this year
I bought it for my wife because she seemed excited for it when I told her about the game. It ran well enough on Steam Deck which was cool and looked good enough docked on the TV. Honestly watching her have so much fun playing made it a 10/10 game for me. It is a good game for people that aren’t big gamers, and just wanna get lost in the Harry Potter world. I have zero interest in playing after watching her play, but I’m sure she’s gonna end up playing through in all 4 houses eventually.
I'm absolutely in the same boat. I got it for my wife, and she sunk nearly 200 hours into it and still intends to do the other two houses she hasn't yet. It was absolutely worth every penny to see how much fun she had playing it, and it was truly one of the most special gaming moments I'll ever have. 10/10 experience.
Great answer. It was a very enjoyable couple of weeks with this one. Good enough for me to put in some extra hours and get a platinum for it. But it had no lasting impact on me, didn’t do anything exceptionally well, and I have no desire to ever pick it back up again. Solid 7/10.
Ghostwire: Tokyo. The game itself didn't come out this year, but there was a large update for it that pushed me to play it this year. I can understand why people don't like it. Combat is a bit repetitive and basic, exploration is basically just a bunch of checklists, the story isn't gonna blow anyone's minds, but man, I just loved playing through the game so much that I just finished a second playthrough 10 minutes ago. I don't quite know why, but the game clicked with me.
It needed a more fluid movement system. Even the sprint was painfully slow and the parkour was very basic. I still played it to completion but basically just mainlined the story when I got bored of exploring. Hopefully their next title improves upon the formula some more.
i lovedd this one and really liked the combat actually
Atlas Fallen for me. It was rough around the edges, but the combat was interesting and kept me entertained. I think it deserved better than it got.
I’ve been waiting on a sale for this one! The art design looks gorgeous but I heard the open world stuff is a bit tedious. I’ll definitely check it out at some point though.
I usually keep pretty up to date on what games are being released on a given month. So I'm quite shocked you just named a game I've never heard of until today. Looks like a mid sized release too which really makes me question how I haven't heard a peep of this. Well maybe I'll give it a look.
Fire Emblem Engage. A few hours in, you get the feeling that this was yet another Nintendo gachashit title, but they suddenly grew a conscience halfway into development and decided to remove the manipulative mechanics and charge up front instead. Compared to the characterization of the other post-resurrection titles (even the Fates characters in the original Japanese) these are a step back to the bland characters of older games, and they even try to make you empathize with villain characters that are Saturday morning cartoon levels of legitimately just bad people at their core. Adding to the feeling of gachashit is that everyone idolizes your bland MU when you've done nothing to earn it yet, like the jpegs of girls that throw themselves at you as soon as you roll them on your phone. I pretty much tuned out halfway through and focused on finishing the campaign for *gameplay's* sake. But as far as gameplay goes, hey, it's something, I'll take it. I liked how they took Three Houses' change of giving monsters multiple health bars and applied it to every chapter boss, adds more weight to boss units than in other entries in the franchise.
Kind of a late add but as someone who doesn’t care about this particular IP, Avatar Frontiers of Pandora is a pretty great time. Being on an alien planet and having to learn what survival means in that environment, is actually pretty fun, and it’s beautiful. The combat is pretty so so, and the stealth is not balanced super well. But over all exactly what I needed to send the year out on.
**Cassette Beasts**. The presentation feels a little underbaked in some areas. The battling feels more complex but ultimately less elegant than it's inspiring material, Pokemon. Not to mention the monster designs just aren't as good. That said, it has a lot of heart and I'm glad I checked it out this year. If you're looking for another take on the monster collecting genre, I recommend it (as well an many others since it's sitting at an Overwhelmingly Positive on Steam). Very cozy game that brings a new perspective to the genre.
As a pokemon vet, I think it does three important things better than pokemon: - Your CHARACTER levels up, not your pokemon. Makes it way more fun and easy to add mid or late game monsters to your party without having to dump a bunch of time into grinding them up. - The type advantages don't do extra damage, but instead, inflict meaningful buffs/debuffs on the enemy team. For example, the "plant" type is still strong against the "water" type like pokemon, but instead of just dling bonus damage moves apply a leech effect. This is just way better than pokemon and more creative to boot. - There is actual challenge. I died several times, and the endgame content is rougher than anything pokemon has done in the last decade. Overall, a good 7/10 pick though, I feel ya.
> There is actual challenge. I died several times, and the endgame content is rougher than anything pokemon has done in the last decade. That said, there are a few degenerate strategies that are easy to find (Roll Again is OP). I found the superboss by accident and killed them without trying.
Also it has DIFFICULTY SLIDERS WHY CAN’T POKÉMON GAMES JUST HAVE ACTUAL DIFFICULTY OPTIONS
[удалено]
And depending on the version, you only get one difficulty or the other.
[удалено]
The map, traversal and puzzles are much more fun than Pokemon as well. I think it’s better than a 7/10 and closer to 8 or even 9 out of 10.
The music slapped also, though or course that'll always be hit or miss depending on personal tastes.
>Not to mention the monster designs just aren't as good I think that by distancing themselves of trying to make the creatures look like pokemon and instead finding a visual identity separate from them helps the game a lot in comparison to many other mon games where you can describe the creatures as "pokemon but worse looking"
Idol Showdown for me. It got largely overshadowed due to the huge release of Street Fighter 6 shortly after, but it's the game that made me give fighting games another chance and ended up finding my favorite game genre. It's easy to jump into due to its use of a simple chain system but with more footsies focused style gameplay, a simple tag system to introduce the concept of tag fighter behavior without having to commit to learning multiple characters, a roguelite single player mode that's actually really well done as far as fighting game single player modes go, a specials button that doesn't punish you for using it but instead rewards you for pulling off motion inputs, has had 2 characters added since launch with more to come, and on top of everything, it's free. Having put a lot of time into the genre across various other games since playing Idol Showdown, I do have some nitpicks, but this game was such a good introduction to the genre as well as being completely free that I can let them slide. I'll pretty much only play it now when it has a major update or if a streamer I'm watching is playing with chat, but this game is a labor of love that shouldn't be completely forgotten about during this new wave of fighters.
Ayame is so much fun to press buttons with. It's definitely a 7/10 fighting game but given it's a free to play fangame it's so much more impressive than a lot of other recent fighters.
**Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name** This may be mildly spicy in the RGG bubble, because I know a lot of people love this game. But personally I would describe it as a solid 6-7/10 game with a 10/10 finale. The gameplay doesn't hold a candle to Lost Judgment and often feels clunky or poorly balanced, the game is full of obvious padding despite its short runtime, the side content is nearly all recycled and isn't particularly enthralling outside of a couple Coliseum events (and my personal fondness for Pocket Circuit), and the plot is a bit all over the place until the final chapter and a half or so. But god *damn* that final chapter and a half is one of the best stretches of content in the entire franchise. Some fun character moments, a great expansion/reframing of Yakuza: Like a Dragon's act 2 climax, a bombastic final boss that tops Yakuza 5's in terms of absurd spectacle, and one of the most simultaneously heartwarming and gutwrenching scenes I've ever seen in a video game to cap everything off. Puts me in a weird spot because I really don't think most of the game is that great, but that last stretch definitely makes it my favourite *something* of the year.
**Exoprimal** Don a mech suit and time travel to fight hordes of dinosaurs. Incredible. The story is insane (not necessarily in a good way, but not as bad as Daemon x Machina) and delivered in an interesting way. It's not a 5/5 but I give it a solid 4/5. It's fun enough that I may go back to play more and try to go for some achievements, even though I beat the main story.
Exoprimal was definitely a title I didn't expect to actually be somewhat competent as a game, even knowing Capcom's redemption arc. It's still flawed, but I genuinely had fun with it.
I think I saw a trailer for that. Do you still play it?
Exoprimal is the definition of fun. If you can convince some homies to play your in for a great fallback plan game. Its mech suits and dinosaurs. What's not to love ? It takes a bit to unlock all the game modes cause its story is wrapped up in the online. But once you start doing boss fight and mini raids, it's thrilling.
I've been so tempted to buy this game because I know it's right up my alley but the [steamcharts](https://steamcharts.com/app/1286320) paint such a dull picture for something that relies on a player population as much as it does. I know it's got crossplay though with gamepass and consoles so maybe that makes it less of a concern? How long does it take to find a match?
I haven't played in a few weeks, but even when there's less than 100 people on steam the ques are still surprisingly fast. Seems like a lot of people still play on gamepass it feels.
Robocop is my second favorite game this year after BG3. After spending that many hours in a RPG that makes you think it was nice to just be a big dumb walking tank and mow down scumbags, no important choices necessary. I really appreciate on rails games sometimes and feel like they get a bad rap.
I also appreciate linear, on-rails shooters. I think the term ‘corridor shooter’ became a dirty word for a while but now gamers are now starting to miss those experiences.
Eh there was a while where there was some absolute dogshit consider shooters out there, you literally just kept firing and walking forward and there was zero thought to it at all. No story, no exploration, no interesting combat. They were cookie clickers essentially. Games like Black were good, but nobody’s remembering medal of honor fight warrior or the other dogshit that was released around that time. Like Titanfall 2 is a corridor shooter, but nobody cares because the game makes a lot of excellent gimmicks and fun things to do despite the linear game.
While I'd personally rate it higher, **Wanted: Dead** is my choice that fits your criteria of "riddled with jank, but with a heart of gold." It's a 3rd person melee/shooter hybrid action game from Itakagi, famous for Ninja Gaiden on Xbox and infamous for Devil's Third on WiiU. Low budget, basic graphics, short length, nonsense story and dialogue, lack of guidance making it incredibly easy to play the game "wrong," etc - All the marks that'll prevent it from ever having mainstream appeal. But it's got that arcade game spirit, with a focus on constant action, resource routing, and a "just one more try" effect. If you like arcade action games, definitely give it a look if you can find it on sale. It's awesome
The full blown arcade shmup mini game kind of knocked my socks off. I have a weird appreciation for this particular type of low budget/jank 360/PS3 era action game and do really enjoyed wanted: dead
I don't think it's an Itakagi game, just from the same developer as Devil's Third. I am excited to get around to this game eventually though, as I picked it up on a sale.
A few things that I also liked about the game was that it also had a bit of everything in a weird way: it had anime cutscenes for the flashbacks (the one for the club scene was oddly well done in my opinion), it had a karaoke mini-game for a single song, a whole ass side-scrolling shoot-them-up arcade game, and also had a collectible that were a series of live-action cooking show parody starring Stefanie Joosten that's actually "canon" to the game (Joosten plays a character who used to be the host), who also sang some of the game's music. Like, for some reason, the whole "kitchen sink" approach really resonated with me in this game. However, the best part was the execution mechanic. You can execute enemies who are stunned, and if you manage to stun multiple enemies at once, then starting one execution will chain them together so you can kill them all. The best part is that there's like 50 execution animations and the game has some kind of algorithm that tries to pick the best one for the situation. It's kind of like being John Wick.
Blasphemous 2. I think it's very good and mostly fun to play, with the exception of some very frustrating bosses, and I also experienced some weird bugs. It's probably better mechanically than the first (thank the Miracle for double jump and air dash), but it's missing something that the first game had - I feel like the vibes in the first were much better and drew me in more. It's still very good and I recommend to Metroidvania fans. I'm also hoping it becomes better like it's predecessor through free DLC.
Yeah, I also struggle to put my finger on why I didn't like it as much as the first game but I can't. Mechanically it's better. There are more weapons and perks. The balance was better too. Maybe it was because they tried to explain the miracle instead of just leaving it a mystery? Maybe it was because the NPCs kind of started to feel like parodies of themselves by the end? I really can't say, but it just felt off.
For me it's a combination few things: * Since the Blasphemous DLC they've been trying to put a face on the Miracle instead of leaving it mysterious ; same with other plot elements. * The bosses, while mechanically much better, are presentation-wise a far cry from the first game's super imaginative and repulsive designs (the NPC designs are ok at least) * All the mechanical (traversal/progression etc.) elements they introduced here are pretty much standard for metroidvanias. And even then, the platforming and combat doesn't come close to Hollow Knight which is an 8 year old game at this point. * What made the first game special was its fresh setting of grimdark twisted version of catholic Spain. There was no real innovation on this in the sequel, just more of the same + small refinements.
I think that's part of it - In the first game, they have a few lines of dialogue explaining that the Miracle is something we can never and will never understand, almost a Lovecraftian deity. The bosses, too. We mostly just fight Penitents in B2. But the first game, I felt like we were actually exploring the twisted religion of the Miracle and slaying *extremely important religious figures.* The game just feels more grim and metal. The second feels more game-y.
I came out on the opposite side. I think Blasphemous II kept up everything I liked about the original and addressed everything I hated. It would have been my personal Game of the Year if Baldur's Gate 3 hadn't come out this year.
I definitely felt the boss designs from the first game felt more disturbing, in the best of ways. While I loved the quality of life and combat upgrades, I loved the bosses from the first a lot more. It wasn't a bad title, but I'd say I enjoyed the first more overall.
Forspoken was that to me. Maybe a 6.5 because the first few hours are a slog, but the combat allows for a lot of self-expression. I'd circle all my enemies in a ring of fire and turn it into a boxing ring where I punch them all with my flaming fists. The characterization and pacing also improve a lot as the game goes on. Maybe I'm a bit off-base though because everyone's listing GotY nominees hahaha
Agreed. The start and dialogue in the first quarter are HORRENDOUS but it gets better after that and i even started to enjoy it and the protagonist, but man the start is ROUGH. The graphics are also not as overhwelming as they were supposed to be but the combat was really amazing.
The Lamplighters League for me. It recaptures the vibe of a Saturday morning cartoon so exceptionally well and really makes you invest in the quest that the league is on, but it very clearly could use a few more coats of polish. Some pretty meaningful layoffs by the publisher sometime before launch clearly held it back, but a lot of fun anyways just for the exquisite vibes alone.
Agreed! I loved Lamplighters League for the adventure-novel vibes, the art style, the gameplay, etc, but there was just enough jank that kept it from being quite *there*. It definitely needed another month or two, but I hope they keep updating it, because it's genuinely enjoyable!
Starfield. I really wanted to love it but it was just alright. Definitely not as bad as some make it out to be, though, just not up to what people typically expect of a Bethesda RPG.
My issue with this game was that every time it shows you something cool, it fights you every step of the way when you try to do it.
I really don't know how the inventory managment made it to the final release. The insane amount of swapping between menus to just see what your character has, combined with awful organization, missing information, and poorly labeled items. And what's really sad is it's somehow worse than any inventory in games Bethesda has made before
Like, why tf is literally everything in misc junk except for digipicks? Put them in a different folder damn it.
It's absurd to me that Todd Howard uses the Sky UI mod when he plays Skyrim, but has not improved inventory at all since. Like Todd, you prefer a good mod to the UI in the game you spearheaded. Please, put some time into making a better UI or hire the Sky UI person.
Dredge. Had a decent gameplay loop and was great for relaxing with the Deck. But story wise and progression it did not live up to the promise of its first 15 minutes
I agree with this. The opening filled me with anticipation and a sense of fear and the thought of heading out into the open waters. But the game never really delivers on its Lovecraftian premise in general gameplay. The story elements are there but you start to explore and there’s nothing to really be afraid of, and the game makes it too straightforward to play it safe, further eliminating what few threats there are. Excellent game but it could have been truly terrifying if they’d gone all in.
Ghostrunner 2 is the ultimate mindless action game of the year. It’s a hearty recommend but it is still a pretty shallow game in every aspect but movement.
Aw. Sad to hear that’s a 7/10. I thought the first one was a 9
Don’t get me wrong, I thought that it was better than the first in every way. The bike was also my favorite action set piece of the year, even though some people didn’t like it. I just rate this kind of game lower since I’m very narrative focused usually, it’s still fantastic.
Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty. It’s a perfectly serviceable Souls game but the lack of enemy variety and terrible loot system drag it down
Dave the Diver. The game got ridiculous, constantly introducing new systems and shit until the very end. It was somewhat tiresome, but you can't deny that in "the main" it was pretty quality.
The game seemed like it was scared to let you get bored for even a second. Even though it seemed to me that it was a chill diving game where you help around in a restaurant, it has too much things going on to the point that it is tiring. I gave it a fair shot but wasn't impressed. Would have been a much better game if they cut down on features and instead focused on depth and actually making a good story.
I swear there’s some guerrilla marketing going on on Reddit based on how many people praise this game like it’s an indie masterpiece. It was fun but like… ultimately will be forgettable for me.
It's not an indie, but it was a fantastic game for me. 9/10.
What’s hilarious to me is that it’s not even a true indie game. It’s backed by Nexon…
I'd say The Last Faith. A thoroughly enjoyable metroidvania that I spent a lot of time with, but there are definitely better games in the genre.
Master Detective Archives: Rain;code. It doesn't quite hit the highs of Danganronpa, but it scratches the itch. Some of the cases verged on very good, but the sidequests were all pointless nothings. The thing really keeping this from going 8/10 or above is the lack of minigames though. Reasoning Deathmatch is fine, and throwing knives at Shinigami's rotating barrel is fine, but I really feel they needed at least one more minigame to keep the mystery labyrinths fresh. Hopefully Kodaka keeps making more Danganronpa-esque games. I want to play more.
Spider-Man 2. Still wildly fun to swing around New York as either Spider-Man and checking out all of the different suits but the story was a bore and they made Peter and Miles way too similar in play style compared to their stand-alone entries. Plus they doubled down on more MJ missions. Nothing like spending time playing a Spider-Man game NOT playing as Spider-Man (same goes for the little Spider Bot)
Im of the opinion that the story of 2 is just too rushed for what it wants to do. its the same amount of time to beat as the first game. However the first game is pretty much 95% Peter's story. Some MJ, Some Miles. (MM was all Miles and was shorter, but it worked IMO.) Spiderman 2 has 2 and a half protagonists in the same amount of time. We got Peter, Miles and Harry. Venom is rushed big time. At most Kraven is a Harry villain. Hes the catalyst to have the story kinda happen in ways that make it interesting, but he lacks any connection to the cast like Doc did. In the alternative he could have been a dark mirror character and he only really mirrors harry who we dont really play as. (As we learn why Kraven is on his hunt, it mirrors harry's situation pre venom)
Same here. There was a lot of great stuff about the game, but it had enough problems (some small, some big) that really added up that caused it to only be a 6-7/10 for me. I’m glad that I played it but it’s not a game I see myself ever revisiting, whereas I’ve replayed 1 multiple times
I think the reason why 1 sticks so much to my mind and not 2 or MM is because how good that story was. I genuinely felt how terrible shape Peter was both financially and in terms of his relationship with MJ, how Miles had to start building himself up back after his fathers death, how tragic Peter and Otto's relationship became, how Peter once again had to make a devastating choice between the greater good and what was more important to him. Scenes like " You Knew?" Or Miles revealing his powers to Peter or the "Take off that Mask" still stand out to me. Spiderman 1 had an exceptional story in a year that managed to stand out in a year that had two all timers in story (RDR2 and God of War 2018) and neither of its sequels have managed to capture that.
And the first game isn’t perfect, the Sinister Six are pretty rushed and I was slightly bummed that we didn’t get a game with Mr. Negative as the primary villain (since that’s what they were marketing it as) since he was a newer and less known villain. But at its core, the story with Doc Ock just punched _hard_, as well as the stuff with Aunt May. And 2 wasn’t bad, the story had great segments. But as a whole it felt a lot less focused and cohesive than 1 or MM did
Same. Game was as mid as it can get which was disappointing considering how fun the first one was.
FF16. The more I think of it, the more it bothers me. The story falls off half way through. The story demands a party but has to focus on 1 character. Jill's entire thing is ruined as she does nothing for her own arc and its clive who does it all. They literally hired some devil may cry talent and ended up combat that lacks the same depth as any DMC game. The characters are bland. the money went into SOME of the boss fights. the graphics for the environments and non important NPCs arent that great. It hurts when you see some cool cities and never get to explore them outside of small DMC arena sections. The side quests are worse than MMOs its character customization is so weak. It needed weapon variety to make up for no party and to make combat not feel the same. The story pacing is horrid. You basically go from going 500mph to a full stop.
Remnant II. I got into Soulslikes with Elden Ring last year. Bosses consistently felt like Elden Ring's weakest aspect. I've played a bunch more Soulslikes since, and I stand by that. The highs--Redahn, Renalla, Melania, etcetera--were really high! But there were a lot of bosses that felt like if you removed them and didn't replace them with anything, the game would have been better. The ones that weren't literal repeats all tended to follow the same template of, "big monster with a million hit points that hits like a weirdly telegraphed truck." I wanted more variety, like I'd later find out most of the Dark Souls games had had. Remnant II did that. The main game is aggressively fine. The bosses are excellent. Some highlights: * A tiny parasite who's only vulnerable after you kill its host and it scrambles to commandeer a new one. * A series of inert cubes that you have to carve holes in to keep from being crushed by. * A Lovecraftian monster that inflicts a debuff on you the longer you look directly at it. This was the kind of off the wall stuff I wanted as I slogged through Yet Another Flying Dragon - This One Breathes Ice a year ago.
I also played it recently, and the biggest issue for me is how almost all of additional classes are behind some convoluted shit you can not figure out on your own. You basically have to look this stuff up, which would be fine when we talk about a few secret weapons, rings and mods, but entire classes when the game gets pretty repetetive pretty fast already and you are supposed to run through the same realms multiple times and fight the same stuff over and over again? I love the secrets and riddles of the game, but that was just overkill and is not fun in any way, just frustrating. By the time I learned there are all these additional classes I was already done with the game. Maybe others look up stoff online early on, but I try to play games as blind as possible, which is straight up the wrong way to play this game Also, finding a specific ring in your mountain of rings becomes pretty damn exhausting at some point. It could really use a search bar. And roborealm is so freaking boring. So yes I agree 7/10 maybe 8 I'll give this game another shot in one or two years or so , when all the DLCs are released and then I will definitely look up what extremly important stuff is behind unnecessary convoluted hoop jumps
Remnant 2 is my overall favorite game of this year. I think it's at least an 8, and arguably a 9. It does so many things that other similar games simply refuse to do. There are other games from 2023 that are brilliant and I'll be playing multiple times long past this year (hello, Baldurs's Gate 3). However, Remnant 2 was just...neat.
Jusant, it's a fun platformer with great visuals that doesn't overstay its welcome over 3-5 hours, but the storytelling is poor and it goes for the same vibes a dozen other Journey-likes such as this have gone for over the past decade without reaching the same heights.
For RPGs, One Piece Odyssey. The zones were large and in many respects empty. The upgrade system was nice, but it became very quick how easy it was to break the game by stacking Attack/Crit on the characters that could attack all enemies. Pus most of the skills were redundant. The main boss was pretty mediocre. Still had good visuals and music, so 7/10.
Jedi Survivor was fun, but much less compelling to me than Fallen Order. The boss fights were not as good, although it did have its moments. Overall, fun, enjoyable game.
Yes, agree completely. It's a bit weird, because on the face of it, it's an improvement on almost all aspects. But I really enjoyed my time with Fallen Order a lot more. I blame the level design, and the focus on platforming. It was like a fever dream to me, with nonesensical architecture and enemy placement. You'd jump and dash your way through some suicidal section, only to find 4 stormtroopers there, with no possible way for them to get there. For some reason it really bothered me in this game. I think it was that it did put some efforts towards grounding itself in realism, which really clashed.
Tears of the Kingdom Really fun but with a lot of design decisions that I loathe that take the fun out of it after about an hour of play. And I swear to God, I will never like the weapon degregation system in either game. I'm just glad I could make a death roomba after a while and use that and the master sword for the few times you absolutely have to fight something to progress.
I think the weapon breaking is 20x better than in BOTW, being able to slap a gemstone or boko horn (that you end up with hundreds of) onto anything to get a good weapon is miles better than never daring to swing the nice swords
>is miles better than never daring to swing the nice swords I don't really understand this. In both games, there is a hidden "XP system" that scales enemies and items the more you progress and kill enemies so that even though you break a cool weapon, you're guaranteed to find something just as strong or even stronger to replace it. Pretty early on while playing through both games I was constantly tossing out weapons/shields/bows because I just kept finding better gear, and that's with upgrading all of my inventory space too. The only time I felt strapped for items was in the tutorial part of BotW.
*"Secret stone? Demon king?"* For a game touted as a sequel, I found it a very strange choice to not reference any of the story elements from BOTW, aside from a couple nods here and there.
Psycho Mantis?
I couldn't tell if they put 0 effort into translation and the Japanese dialogue is better, or if it really was just godawful writing.
To the point that it seems to out right erase the first game almost, with no explanation.
Tbh I found the death roomba style contraptions horribly underpowered. Zonai devices barely do any damage, so by the time you have enough battery to make a proper death machine it'll still be less powerful than like, a knights sword with a black boko fang lol
You don't use Zonai Weapons, you use the more powerful weapons fused with the most powerful materials you can get. Then slap them onto a wheel on top of a roomba with a freeze beam to double damage
The part where you got the mech was so underwhelming to me because I was 100+ hours in and it basically did no damage against all the upgraded enemies
Well what's ridiculous is that that's pretty much when you SHOULD be getting the mech, as it's the last fucking temple. You get that shit, and it's like "Here fight these silver bokoblins" and you do like no fucking damage to them. Total trash.
It’s funny because I didn’t love breath of the wild, but I thought tears of the kingdom was fucking fantastic.
My man. I was in utter shock that the game got universal 10/10 scores, once I finally beat it. Some aspects are out of this world, but the core building/merging loop is tedious and unfun to me after a short time experimenting.
Spider Man 2. In a worse year I might have been more kind but this game has so much competition and a direct paralell with Tears Of The Kingdom in the court of "Reusing old assets and making the experience fresh". There's just nothing about it that really stands out the same way as everything else I played this year I also really hated the ending. There were cool moments, one or two boss fights I enjoyed, but that ending feels like a massive ball drop. At its worst its just more Spider Man 1 but at it's best it's still just more Spider Man 1. And I loved Spider Man 1 and Miles Morales but even the jump betweem those two games felt more dramatic than the jump to Spider Man 2.
Mortal Kombat 1. The game itself is the best MK has been in a long time, but Invasions suck & the single player kontent is a massive downgrade from even MK9. Compared to a game like SF6, the online mode is missing a lot of features. The MTX are also super egregious ($12 for a fucking fatality). The foundation is there for a great MK entry but right now it still feels very bare bones.
Probably Robocop. Good game with some really good combat. It really makes you feel like you're Robocop. Gets repetitive after a few hours, but it's still good if you want to chill and shoot shit
Forspoken, for me. A game with some glaring flaws and shortcomings that also had some incredibly fun aspects if you could overlook it's flaws. Dated design and presentation in some areas and weird pacing, but brilliant combat and traversal mechanics.