Games Completed 2022

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MattL
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by MattL »

(July) God of War (2018), PS5: It was a good, if a bit over-hyped. The combat system had real potential, but I feel like they spoiled that with the gear level requirements. You have to be within one or two gear levels of the enemies to do any damage. If you're more than 2 gear levels below an enemy, it becomes tedious trying to chip damage the enemies to death, while avoiding the instant one-hit kills. I think opening up the quick travel options earlier would have also helped my enjoyment of the game. I felt like there was a lot of boating filler to contend with. I also had to adapt to the camera, which I felt was overly zoomed in.

(July) Dragon Quest 11S Definitive Edition, PS4: I really enjoyed it. It's my first DQ game in years. I think the last one I played fully was a fan translation of DQ6 on a SNES emulator about 15 years ago. There's something comfy in the familiar. That being said, it might have been a tad too easy, given my extensive knowledge of the series as a whole. I was able to look at the skill trees and I immediately knew what skills to bee-line towards, while ignoring the fluff. If I ever replay it, I'll try it with some of the Draconic mode modifiers.

(July) Sonic Mania, PS4: I "beat" this not long after it originally came out. I was just in the mood to clean up a few trophies, particularly collecting all the chaos emeralds. I don't know why, but I did not click with the special stages in this game. Replaying the Sonic CD and Sonic CD-inspired stages also reminded me why I played this once and never played it again. I hate Sonic CD.

(June) King of Fighters 15, PS5: I played through all the story modes and tried my hand at some online fights. As I expected, I don't have the skills to compete against anyone other than my friends in some good old-fashioned local couch co-op. I suppose if I wanted to lab for 300 hours with one character, I might get to the point of being able to play online, but I would rather play a variety of games and just occasionally dip in and out of a few favorite fighting games for some short term fun.

(May) Deathloop, PS5: Dollar Store Dishonored. Play Dishonored 2 first. And then play Prey 2016. And then maybe this, if it's less than $20. Playing this also reminded me I bought Prey Mooncrash a while back when it was on sale and I have yet to try it.

(Feb) Demon's Souls 2020, PS5: It's prettier Demon's Souls. That's all there is to it. I'll be honest, the first time I played the original Demon's Souls on PS3, it felt pretty outdated compared to it's progeny, which by that point included Dark Souls 1 and 2 and Bloodborne. Playing the remake now after Dark Souls 3, Sekiro, and Elden Ring, it feels outright ancient. If I ever play this game again, I'm going with the Royalty starting class because you need magic and range options in this game and if you don't have them, you have to bee-line for them anyhow.

(Jan) Days Gone, PS5: Very good, but very bloated. It could've been like 25% shorter. That last chapter with the religious zealot general, who was obviously going to go nuts could have been shortened significantly and one of the two intro regions could have been cut because there did not need to be two tutorial zones. All in all, I'm sorry I skipped out on this when it first released. It might've been zombie fatigue or open world fatigue. I typically only play one zombie game or less per year, because of how tropey and predictable they are and I typically only play 1 or 2 or less open world games per year because of how bloated most of them are.
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stvnorman
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by stvnorman »

4 July: VVVVV TIC 80 Demake (Tic-80)
6 July: Cotton 2 (Arcade)
12 July: Return of the Jedi (Amiga A500 Mini)
15 July: Vampire Savior: The Lord Of Vampire - Morrigan (Switch)
19 July: Panorama Cotton (Mega Drive on Switch)
24 July: Progear (Arcade on Switch)
27 July: Silent Hill 2 - HD Collection (Xbox Series X)

Something eventually came of the three Darkstalkers games I’ve been playing all month on the Capcom Fighting Collection (although I really should try another character sometime!) and after a couple of months on Cave’s horizontal bullet-hell Progear, I’m pretty happy with the number of credits that now takes to beat! Otherwise, a load of stuff including a load of Cotton (nothing new!), another Amiga Mini completion and a cool demake, but nothing massively exciting. And I won’t even mention Silent Hill 2 again!
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ColinAlonso
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by ColinAlonso »

Spoiler: show
Jan 10 - Final Fantasy VII Remake (PS5)
Jan 16 - Final Fantasy VII Remake: Intermission (PS5)
Feb 3 - SNK vs Capcom: Card Fighters Clash - SNK version (Switch)
Feb 13 - 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim (PS5)
Feb 19 - Bravely Default II (Switch)
Mar 20 - Universal Paperclips (Android)
Apr 12 - CrossCode (PC)
Apr 17 - Chicory: A Colorful Tale (Switch)
May 31 - Inertial Drift (PS5)
Jun 6 - CrossCode: A New Home (PC)
Jun 17 - Psychonauts 2 (PS5)
Jul 14 - Blaster Master Zero 2 (Switch)
Blaster Master IN SPACE!

A good follow up to a decent game. Adds extra mechanics to its side scrolling action and I've liked these games enough that I'll probably buy the third in a sale in a year or 2.

Jul 23 - Dodgeball Academia (PS5)
I was hoping this would scratch an old itch, namely a cutesy arcadey sports game in the vein of Everybody's Tennis PSP with an inconsequential story pushing me along and this doesn't quite get there.

I think my issue is that the RPG elements take away from the skill of the game a little bit and the feel of the Super Dodge Ball style gameplay isn't quite polished enough to be satisfying.

An ok game but not much more.
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markfm007
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by markfm007 »

Jan 7th - Little Nightmares 2
Jan 15th - Final Fantasy IX
Feb 3rd - Deathloop
April 29th - Last of Us Remastered
June 1st - Marvel's Spider-Man
June 30th - Elden Ring
July 15th - Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time
July 30th - What Remains of Edith Finch
August 7th - Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

Ran through on new game plus to get the Shura ending, aka the bad ending. That nets me a few trophies and sets me up to farm the upgrades and skills I need to get the platinum. I'll take my time with that, do a little bit at a time, as the skills in particular are a bit of a grind. There are a couple of new boss fights in the Shura ending, both enjoyable and pretty tough. For a second I thought I'd be in for the long haul, but then I had a surprisingly good run and finished them off.
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MattL
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by MattL »

Jan 2: Days Gone, PS5
Feb 27: Demon's Souls (2020), PS5
May 8: Deathloop, PS5
June 9: King of Fighters 15, PS5
July 4: Sonic Mania, PS4
July 16: Dragon Quest 11S Definitive Edition, PS4
July 22: God of War (2018), PS5
Aug 10: Elden Ring, PS5: I finally finished ER after starting it way back at on or about it's release day. This was a big game. I had to take breaks to not burn myself out on it, as you can see from the other games I completed between February and now. I save scummed to get all three endings, but my canon ending is the Ranni Age of Stars ending.

As to my thoughts on the game, people who want to get into Souls-likes, but have struggled with the difficulty in prior games should give this a shot. It's much easier to alleviate the challenge in this game compared to a typical Souls-like, including (1) multiplayer is easier to engage with, (2) if you can't get help online, you can use the ash summons, and (3) the open world let's you leave a challenging area any time you want to level up in easier locations.

However, as a Souls-like vet, I don't think the open world formula really added much, because I don't think an open world really shows off Fromsoft's strengths; those being level and encounter design. That being said, the legacy dungeons do show off those strengths and I was particularly awe-struck working my way through the Raya Lucaria Academy, the Haligtree, and the underground sections. BUT, the open world means those amazing levels, when compared to prior Fromsoft games, are both (1) farther apart from one another and (2) fewer in number. However, I understand they went the route of open world games to provide for the accessibility it provides new gamers, as discussed above, so I don't really fault them for this approach. I just hope they don't decide to go the Ubisoft route and make every game after this an open world.

In summary, it's an excellent game. I just think maybe Fromsoft missed some opportunities to throw in some more excellent legacy dungeons and really show off their talents.

Let's get a Sekiro sequel next, Fromsoft! That combat system was too fun to not be refined and expanded upon.
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Jobobonobo
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Jobobonobo »

Spoiler: show
Jan 23: Yakuza 3
Feb 12: Wonderful 101 Remastered
Mar 25: Freedom Planet
May 22: Psychonauts 2
July 24: Yakuza 4
August 13: A Hat in Time

This was an absolute joy from start to finish. Taking elements from various 3D platformers and mixing them all together to create its own unique little flavour, AHIT seems like a celebration of the genre at its best with a range of collectables that encourage exploration but do not overwhelm, diverse abilities used for navigation, combat and puzzle solving, charming characters and a diverse range of locales to visit. Hat Kid herself is one of the most adorable protagonists I have controlled in quite some time and exudes charm. The presentation both visually and audibly are incredible with title cards lovingly illustrated for each act, decent voice acting and a top notch soundtrack. Story is simple and gets you into the action straight away as a good platformer should. Boss battles are really high octane affairs, requiring you to think on your feet and engage the move set exquisitely, Snatcher and the final boss being particular highlights.

Despite my gushing, there are some flaws with this title. While the camera for the most part is perfectly usable, there are sections in tight areas where it really does not want to cooperate. It is rare it really screws you over but you need to be careful how you operate when the camera misbehaves. This can be especially problematic when you need to make certain wall jumps and the camera just won’t move to enable you to set up your wall jump correctly. The Arctic Cruise chapter was also comparatively disappointing where you are mostly an errand girl, delivering this and that. It was nice seeing certain characters return when they board the cruise but that was it really. The other DLC chapter, Nyakuza Metro was better with faster pasted platforming but it was disappointing you never had a proper showdown with the Empress.

However, these flaws really are minor at the end of the day and I completely recommend this to anyone who is a fan of 3D platformers and who wants to support indie developers. A Hat in Time shows beautifully what happens when a team of passionate people put time and effort into a project. Wonderful title, I really should have picked this up sooner.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Truk_Kurt »

Metroid Dread

Despite being a huge fan of the metroidvania genre, this is actually the first Metroid game I have ever played. To begin with I was a little too hard and was constantly getting lost and put it down not thinking I would go back to it. But I decided to give it another shot a few weeks ago before getting rid of it and I'm so glad I did as it has ended up being my favourite metroidvania. Samus feels so wonderful to control and the way you unlock new abilities and just generally explore the environment is an absolute joy from start to finish. The highlight though is the boss battles, I remember doing the first boss and thinking I would never be able to complete this game as I thought it was hard enough but only the first boss! Thankfully I just got better at the game and how to utilise Samus's various abilities to defeat each boss. The last boss in particular was a great final battle to have.

You can count me though as someone who didn't enjoy the EMMI bits, I have heard the arguments in favour of them and I can see why people like those sections but personally I just found them frustrating blockers to any progress and not much fun. 9/10.
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Scrustle
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Scrustle »

Spoiler: show
03/01 - Halo 3: ODST (Master Chief Collection)
06/01 - Halo 3 (Master Chief Collection)
09/01 - Hotshot Racing
25/01 - Halo 4 (Master Chief Collection)
29/01 - Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
03/02 - Heavenly Sword
05/02 - Need for Speed: Carbon (Battle Royale)
09/02 - Enslaved: Odyssey to the West
20/02 - ICO
24/02 - Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD
25/02 - Halo 5: Guardians
05/03 - Asura's Wrath
09/03 - Shadow of the Colossus HD (Normal mode)
30/03 - Shadow of the Colossus HD (Hard mode)
30/03 - Forza Motorsport 3 (100%)
01/04 - Muramasa: The Demon Blade
11/04 - Forza Horizon 2 (100%)
17/04 - The Darkness
20/04 - The Darkness II
25/04 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Normal)
29/04 - Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
29/04 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (X360)
06/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Hard)
07/05 - Castlevania: Lament of Innocence
10/05 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PS2)
18/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Very Hard)
21/05 - Umurangi Generation Special Edition
27/05 - GRID Autosport
29/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Revengeance)
02/06 - Lost in Random
03/06 - Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
12/06 - Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition Remix
13/06 - God Hand
25/06 - Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams
28/06 - Gungrave
30/06 - Zone of the Enders HD
01/07 - The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap
06/07 - Gungrave: Overdose
07/07 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II
15/07 - Bunjingai: The Forsaken City
23/07 - Leaving Lyndow
01/08 - Genji: Dawn of the Samurai
01/08 - Eastshade
17/08 – The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay (Dark Athena version)

This is a game that has been on my radar for a long time, but I never got around to it until now. Shortly after first playing The Darkness I had my attention drawn to this game as it’s from the same developers, and I heard it supposedly shares a lot of that game’s positive qualities. While they definitely do share some things in common, I didn’t end up liking this one very much in the end.

It’s mostly a stealth game, and one I didn’t much care for. I knew going in that it was a major part of the game, but it turned out to be even more focused on that than I was expecting. Only at the very end do you really get to do anything resembling a full on shooter, and even then it doesn’t feel like the game was meant for that style of gameplay. The stealth mechanics are pretty basic. You don’t have many tools to use, and the rules around when enemies can detect you are vague. There’s a lot of waiting around for long patrol cycles, and pathfinding isn’t very consistent. The controls are really awful as well. The camera always feels like it’s both too sluggish and too sensitive at the same time, making trying to actually get a bead on something an exercise in frustration that often feels very random. Movement is slow and stodgy, and you frequently get stuck on objects. You’re also very fragile towards the earlier half of the game, before you have a chance to upgrade your health much. So encounters usually involve struggling with these awful controls, leading to a lot of very fast and unfair feeling deaths.

There are also a few moments through the game where you spend time in a non-hostile area. Where you progress by talking to other characters and trying to find some way out of the situation you have got yourself in. These aren’t bad moments, but they don’t feel as fleshed out as they could be. Something of a prototype to the similar overworld sections in The Darkness. In that game these moments did a good job of fleshing out the world and making it feel like a real place. In Riddick they feel much more basic and rudimentary in comparison. When it comes to the characters you meet in The Darkness, you get a sense from them that they have their own things going on. They have their own lives, their own opinions on things, and their own relationships that extend beyond the events of the game itself. Both with the protagonist and others. Riddick doesn’t really have that. Every character you come across has little purpose beyond their immediate interactions with you.

Artistically this game is pretty decent though, and an area where it stands up better in the comparison with The Darkness. I played the version of this game that is included in the sequel, Assault on Dark Athena. So the visuals are on a similar level, using early 7th console generation tech. That kind of post-Doom 3 style. It has that similar look of inky black shadows, punctuated by stark, overbearing lights. A muted colour palette with gritty, grimy surface detail using lots of normal maps and specular highlights. A bleak and oppressive industrial hellscape, made of imposing structures of concrete and metal. It has a vibe, and it certainly nails the look it’s going for, but it can be a bit monotonous too. Only at the very end do you get to see anything slightly different. The Darkness pulled off that sort of presentation, but in areas that felt like they had much more life to them. I suppose that makes sense when you compare the setting of an impossibly huge sci-fi mega prison against a densely populated modern city. But the latter ends up making for a richer setting that is much easier to connect with.

It does suffer from some technical issues though. I played this on PC, and it came with a bunch of quirks, as was not uncommon with ports from console at the time. The game has a weird resolution issue where if you set it to 1920x1080, and then reboot the game, it will be zoomed in to the corner of the screen for some reason. It’s fine if you just change it to something else and back again, but that’s an annoying ritual to have to do every time you boot up the game. It also forbids you from using anti-aliasing and ambient occlusion at the same time for some reason. It’s very strange. Controller support is also awful. It can detect an Xinput controller just fine, but it doesn’t change the button prompts at all. It also doesn’t allow you to press both triggers at the same time, meaning you can’t zoom in to aim and shoot with the triggers. They cancel each other out. I tried using various work-arounds to get them to work, but the game just wouldn’t play nice.

With that I’ve now sampled more or less all of the games in this Starbreeze/Machine Games development lineage. I don’t plan to go on to Assault on Dark Athena. From what I’ve seen, it’s basically more of the same, and I’ve already had enough of that. Out of all these games, only The Darkness has stood out as the one that really clicked with me to be honest. The biggest flaw they all share is their wonky aiming controls, and that has tended to be the main thing that keeps me from being able to fully appreciate them. Even as they have got a bit better over time, they never stopped feeling bad. Even The Darkness has this issue as well, but I think I was able to overlook it there because that game has a very generous health recharging system. It’s a lot easier to not get hung up on playability problems if they don’t persist more than a few seconds at a time.
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Alex79
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Alex79 »

Alex79 wrote: February 16th, 2022, 7:37 pmJAN - Universal Paperclips (Android)
JAN - Halo 5: Guardians (Xbox)
JAN - Brothers: A Tale Of Two Sons (Switch)
JAN - Mass Effect: Legendary Edition (Xbox)
JAN - Forza Horizon 5 (Xbox)
JAN - Halo Infinite (Xbox)
JAN - Hitman (Xbox)
FEB - Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Nintendo DS)
FEB - Max Payne 2 (Xbox)
FEB - The Walking Dead: 400 Days (Xbox)
FEB - Hyper Sentinel (Switch)
FEB - It Takes Two (Xbox)
FEB - Overboard! (Android)
APR - Hollow Knight (Switch)
APR - Sagebrush (Switch)
APR - Saints Row IV (Switch)
APR - Sonic The Hedgehog (Genesis on Switch)
APR - Grand Theft Auto V (Xbox)
APR - WarioWare: Get It Together! (Switch)
MAY - Cadillacs and Dinosaurs (Arcade on Xbox)
MAY - Super Mario 3D World (Switch)
MAY - You Must Build A Boat (Android)
MAY - Untitled Goose Game (Switch)
JUN - The Secret Of Monkey Island (PC-CD on Android)
JUN - Street Fighter (Switch)
JUN - Street Fighter II: The World Warrior (Switch)
JUN - Street Fighter II: Champion Edition (Switch)
JUN - Street Fighter II: Hyper Fighting (Switch)
JUN - Super Street Fighter II (Switch)
JUN - Street Fighter Alpha (Switch)
JUN - Street Fighter Alpha 2 (Switch)
JUN - Disco Elysium (Switch)
JUL - Portal (Switch)
JUL - Poinpy (Android)
JUL - Dishonored: Definitive Edition (Xbox)
JUL - Portal: Still Alive (Switch)
AUG - X-Com 2 (Switch)

What a fucking brilliant game. Absolutely outstanding. I had so much fun with this. I'm not usually in to strategy games, but for whatever reason I clicked with the first game I played back on Vita, and this was just that but improved in every way. Very few games are absolutely flawless, but I can't pick a single fault with this, astonishingly good!

Now I'm going to play it again with all the War Of The Chosen stuff included.
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Jobobonobo
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Jobobonobo »

Spoiler: show
Jan 23: Yakuza 3
Feb 12: Wonderful 101 Remastered
Mar 25: Freedom Planet
May 22: Psychonauts 2
July 24: Yakuza 4
August 13: A Hat in Time
August 14: Dragon Quest VIII

My third Dragon Quest and I can see why this one gets a lot of love. Small but memorable party of characters, big world to discover, an addictive monster battling minigame and a simple story with a fun antagonist in the form of Dhoulmagus. In many ways this is a proto DQ XI with the item creation done in the alchemy pot, a small selection of costumes for different characters and a simplified skill tree. Also playing this on 3DS came with a boatload of improvements such as quicksave anywhere, enemies visible on the map, photo mode and instant use of the alchemy pot. The only major drawback of the 3DS version is the MIDI soundtrack which really pales in comparison to the gorgeous orchestral score of the PS2 version. Even still, compositions like Strange World, Mysterious Tower and Great Battle in the Vast Sky are major highlights even in their MIDI form.

While I did enjoy this a lot, for me it is still second to the greatness that is DQ XI. That game just refined and improved so much of the features DQ VIII had that some elements felt like the scaffolding of something greater. The skills system is very barebones and does not allow for much flexibility. Decided that you would rather be a skilled archer than a master swordsman? Too bad, you spent all your points on archery and you are stuck with it. As a result, you have to think hard about what you want to invest in; otherwise you could be stuck with a build that you find unsuitable for your playstyle. Not to mention, the more you level up, those skill points come in dribs and drabs. By the time you reach Level 50 and over, you are getting one or two skill points which means you have to grind a lot more. This combined with the rigid skill point allocation really make this inferior to the skills tree of DQ XI. I also preferred the little minigame that came with using the Forge in XI in comparison to just combining items and it automatically making your new equipment in VIII.

If there is one thing in which VIII does do better than XI is that it gets into the main story very quickly. Within the first five minutes, you have got the gist of what is going on and you set off! With XI, there was a lot of exposition and pottering around your home area before the adventure properly starts. I appreciate that VIII respects your time enough to get into the meat of things fairly quickly. While the story itself is nothing groundbreaking, it flows well and things rarely drag on for too long.

So overall, if you want to get into the Dragon Quest series, I would actually suggest VIII as your first title. Not only because it is a great adventure in its own right but also if you like it, odds are you are really going to dig XI as it greatly improves so much on what this game does. VIII is not too harsh a throwback that it has aged terribly, far from it, but you will definitely miss those QOL improvements if you go to this after playing XI. But overall, a charming RPG that still looks gorgeous to this day. Cel shading really makes games age gracefully, doesn’t it?
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markfm007
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by markfm007 »

Jan 7th - Little Nightmares 2
Jan 15th - Final Fantasy IX
Feb 3rd - Deathloop
April 29th - Last of Us Remastered
June 1st - Marvel's Spider-Man
June 30th - Elden Ring
July 15th - Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time
July 30th - What Remains of Edith Finch
August 7th - Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice
August 21st - God of War HD

Just finished this one. The original, not the reboot, I hate it when companies give them the same name. My only previous experience with God of War was the reboot, which I liked but wouldn’t say I loved. I recently upgraded my PS Plus to premium, as I’ve got a lot of months of subscription stacked up, meaning it wasn’t too expensive. Looking through the streaming catalogue and this one caught my eye. Streaming was fine, no issues while playing, although a few of my trophies don’t seem to have come through, which is a bit annoying. I’m not going to use PS Plus in place of games I want to own, but it’s a nice way to catch up on older titles like this.

Overall it was pretty good. Best aspect of it was the combat, which I enjoyed more than the reboot. It’s just more fun when you can see all the way around you, whip the blades of chaos around and more easily plan your next move. New moves and powers are added at a nice pace, so I felt comfortable learning and mastering each one, and by the end was enjoying even the most chaotic rooms full of enemies.

The story is nicely paced, and I liked how they slowly dole out bits of Kratos back story. I was curious if I could imagine this Kratos becoming the Kratos in the reboot, and I’d say I could, just about. It isn’t quite as far-fetched as I thought it might be. There’s also some platforming and puzzling bits. I mostly used a walkthrough for the puzzles. The other stuff I enjoyed at first, but got annoying by the end. One puzzle I flat out used a glitch it was so stupidly hard, and some of the swimming and climbing bits.. why are they so hard? There’s also a room full of conveyer belts you have to fight on that’s a nightmare. Then again, it could be a clever ruse to make the player as sweaty and pissed off as Kratos is by the end of it.

Overall I’d say I liked this God of War, but got a bit annoyed by the end. I'd like to try some of the others if they’ve improved some of the annoying parts. It's quite a quick playthrough too, only about 10-12 hours for me.

Three word review - square, square, triangle.
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raisinbman
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by raisinbman »

  • Persona 5 Golden(I technically need to go back and fight the hardest boss, but that's the ONLY thing left. And ROI ain't looking great)
  • Kingdom Hearts: Re:COM
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MattL
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by MattL »

Jan 2: Days Gone, PS5
Feb 27: Demon's Souls (2020), PS5
May 8: Deathloop, PS5
June 9: King of Fighters 15, PS5
July 4: Sonic Mania, PS4
July 16: Dragon Quest 11S Definitive Edition, PS4
July 22: God of War (2018), PS5
Aug 10: Elden Ring, PS5
Aug 15: Marvel's Spider-Man: Miles Morales, PS5
Aug 21: Marvel's Spider-Man Remastered, PS5


Wow. What a ride these two games were. I haven't enjoyed any superhero games this much in years. Since these two games are mostly the same in mechanics, my response here will be more general and then I'll add more specifics as to Miles Morales in the thread for its upcoming episode.

I don't think I've ever enjoyed traversal in an open world game as much as I did here. Web-slinging feels natural and has an incredible sense of speed once you get moving. Playing the VRR 120hz modes I'm sure helped with that. Combat felt like it took the Batman Arkham games as a base and refined and tweaked it to feel more like Spider-Man. The story and universe felt familiar with just enough alterations to keep things fresh. I also really appreciate that we entered this universe at a time where Pete has been Spider-Man for some time and we didn't have to rehash his origins. I think my only gripe is that The City Never Sleeps DLC just felt kind of flat after the main game. Spidey versus Li and Octavius, his role models/heroes, felt more impactful than Spidey versus the cyborg Mafia. Oh, sorry. Maggia. I kind of wish they had skipped it and devoted more development time to Miles Morales.
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Scrustle
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Scrustle »

Spoiler: show
03/01 - Halo 3: ODST (Master Chief Collection)
06/01 - Halo 3 (Master Chief Collection)
09/01 - Hotshot Racing
25/01 - Halo 4 (Master Chief Collection)
29/01 - Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots
03/02 - Heavenly Sword
05/02 - Need for Speed: Carbon (Battle Royale)
09/02 - Enslaved: Odyssey to the West
20/02 - ICO
24/02 - Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker HD
25/02 - Halo 5: Guardians
05/03 - Asura's Wrath
09/03 - Shadow of the Colossus HD (Normal mode)
30/03 - Shadow of the Colossus HD (Hard mode)
30/03 - Forza Motorsport 3 (100%)
01/04 - Muramasa: The Demon Blade
11/04 - Forza Horizon 2 (100%)
17/04 - The Darkness
20/04 - The Darkness II
25/04 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Normal)
29/04 - Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
29/04 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (X360)
06/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Hard)
07/05 - Castlevania: Lament of Innocence
10/05 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (PS2)
18/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Very Hard)
21/05 - Umurangi Generation Special Edition
27/05 - GRID Autosport
29/05 - Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (Revengeance)
02/06 - Lost in Random
03/06 - Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
12/06 - Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition Remix
13/06 - God Hand
25/06 - Onimusha: Dawn of Dreams
28/06 - Gungrave
30/06 - Zone of the Enders HD
01/07 - The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap
06/07 - Gungrave: Overdose
07/07 - Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II
15/07 - Bunjingai: The Forsaken City
23/07 - Leaving Lyndow
01/08 - Genji: Dawn of the Samurai
01/08 - Eastshade
17/08 - The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay (Dark Athena version)
26/08 - Need for Speed: Most Wanted (2005)

Had this game on my mind again as it seemed to coincidentally keep popping up in online conversations recently, and I was feeling a bit underwhelmed by the few racing games I was playing at the time, so I had the urge to ditch them and go back to this old favourite instead. I don't think there's much to say about the game itself that I haven't talked about already on here. Still a blast, great racing, and an unmatched police pursuit system.

I did have some more thoughts on aesthetics this time around though. Last time I played this game, it was a heavily modded version that tried to recreate the visual style of the 360 version, while also adding in a bunch of new cars, to create a sort of fan-made remaster. This time I went with a mostly vanilla run, with only a few small QoL mods. The look of this game has been pretty controversial over the years, many people repeatedly bringing up the colour filter, etc. But honestly I think it looks great in this untouched form. This kind of earthy, muted colour palette works really well. It looks natural, and gives the game a sort of gritty, almost rustic look. It works well with the tone of the game, and it gives it a very autumnal feel, which I always like. The lighting effects in the moments when the sun is low are pretty nice too, filling the sky with an orange glow, and reflecting off the road. The old, PS2-era graininess to the textures also add to that earthy feel of the game too. The PC version lets you disable the visual filter, and I did give that a try at one point. Previously I've always been very against doing so with this game, thinking it totally ruins the look, but honestly I thought it was okay. It isn't quite as unfitting as I thought it would be. It does still drain the game of a sense of aesthetic personality though, and it also doesn't affect how the sunlight looks, so it makes for weird scenes where the sky is still very yellow, but that isn't reflected in the world at all. So I'm still very much in the camp that this game looks best with the original art design intact.

It makes me miss games like this. Not just grainy, earthy PS2 games, but specifically when racing games weren't afraid to do something with their aesthetic. Seems like every racing game now goes for the same thing. Hyperrealism, with colourful shiny cars that look like they just rolled off the factory line. I don't even dislike that look, there are plenty of games that use it that look great. But that's basically all you get these days, and a fair few of them feel like they're not doing it because it's a clear part of their aesthetic identity, but just because that's how racing games are "supposed" to look. I wish racing games would be braver with their visual styles. Not just with this more gritty style, but all styles in general. Like where are the cel shaded racers? With how influential stuff like Initial D and Wangan Midnight are to racing games, why don't we see more of that? I'm among those who love to bring up Auto Modellista at any given opportunity, but surely there's got to be more than that.
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Tolkientaters
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Tolkientaters »

Just beat Rollerdrome's campaign, and it was incredible, definitely my game of the year so (didn't expect anything to beat out Elden Ring). I still got some challenges to complete but wow it's just a blast all the way through.
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Indiana747
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Indiana747 »

(Jan) Terminator Resistance(platinum) - PS5.
(Jan) Call of Duty: Cold War - Series X.
(Jan) Dishonored 2 - PS5.
(Jan) Aliens: Fireteam Elite - Series X.
(May) State of Decay 2 - Series X.
(June) Chorus - Series X.
(June) Shadow Warrior 3 - PS5.
(June) TMNT: Shredders Revenge - Series X.
(July) TMCC: Halo Reach - Series X.
(July) The Dark Pictures: Little Hope - PS5.
(July) Tiny Tina's Wonderlands - Series X.
(July) Far Cry 6 - Series X.
(July) Road 96 - Series X.
(July) Trek to Yomi - Series X.
(July) Stray - PS5.
(July) Toy Soldiers: Cold War - Xbox 360.
(Aug) Avicii Invector - PS5.
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DeadpoolNegative
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by DeadpoolNegative »

Batman: Return to Arkham- Arkham City XBox One, 1/16- This plays great, looks great, has so many things to do, and is well acted but ye gods, the story is WRETCHED. I think it suffers from a classic case of too much ambition- it tries to fit in so many Batman concepts that weren't part of Arkham Asylum. Every villain you missed in the last one is here in this one, whether they're needed or not. And I'm gonna get into hardcore spoilers here but:
Spoiler: show
Protocol Ten, as far as I can understand it, is rounding up all the criminals in Gotham, and for some reason all the people who worked on it, even though that's MANY innocent citizens whose disappearances would likely be reported, and since Arkham City was legally approved by, as far as I can tell, an overwhelming majority of the citizenry, why are they dong this?- and then blowing them all away with helicopter gunships while they're all trapped in Arkham City.

And THIS, somehow, is meant to FINALLY provoke Batman into finally going to work for Ra's Al Ghul. I... think? That's the idea, right? Why else would Ra's be backing Hugo Strange?

Oh and what the Joker's doing is totally unrelated, he just wants to poison the Gotham reservoir with Joker toxin.

My head hurts.


But the game is wonderful to play, just like the last one. and addicting, just like the last one. I do wish there had been more time to spend with Catwoman- Grey Griffin is so delightful in the role.

Mass Effect Legendary Edition- XBox One, 2/5 Thanks, XBox GamePass! Playing this game again after so many years- my first play through (I think?) as a male Shepard, believe it or not, and once I heard Mark Meer's voice again I remembered why I was FemShep 4 Life. He's not TERRIBLE, but he's weirdly detached in a way that Jennifer Hale is not. This game, I'm gonna say it, is the best of the original trilogy.

It's not just that the writing is much more coherent, it's the shock of the new, the idea of this world and its hundreds of years of history and places, people, and things that are only hinted at that capture the imagination. Yes, some of the mechanics feel slightly complicated (Compared to the following games at least) and some of the design looks dated, but It continues to be the game my mind returns to the most when thinking of the trilogy. And the other two games contain some truly great moments.

I also think the pacing is solid- we have three big missions to take care of, then have a bunch of little missions, and slowly but surely it all comes together. And the final reveal before the finale- that the Citadel itself is a relay-- still ranks to me as one of the top ten video game twists of all time. Maybe top five. It's seeded all throughout the game, too. This wonderful place, that just so happens to be the center of galactic trade and diplomacy- isn't it funny how no one knows who built it? Or where the Keepers came from?

And the finale, the zero gravity march on the Citadel itself... what a game.

Telling Lies- XBox One, 2/6 Thanks, XBox GamePass!

The game puts us in the shoes of a mysterious woman who returns to her apartment late one night to play with a bunch of video clips, trying to piece together what happened to the people on the clips.

It's a remarkably bleak story of a man, David Smith (Logan Marshall-Green) who... has a interesting job, somewhat secure marriage (to Halt and Catch Fire's Kerry Bishe), and he's also taking up environmental activism as a "hobby", along with his fellow activist (Alexandra Shipp from Tick Tick Boom). It turns out the man has somewhat ulterior motives for taking up such a "Hobby" and that his marriage isn't quite as rosy as it seems. There's also another woman (Westworld host Angela Sarafayan) with a connection to David that he probably doesn't want the other women to know about. The mysterious woman plays clips made by these four until the full picture becomes clear.

I've not played Her Story, the previous game from this developer, but I suspect that game was more challenging- if you're attentive you can piece together a rough timeline of what happened and why long, looooong before the game actually wants to move you ahead in its story.

The problem is, the man at its center is an utterly unsympathetic human being. He's a narcissistic monster, and the game seems truly incurious as to why that is, which wouldn't be so much of a problem if we weren't forced to spend so much time with him. Even his gesture toward redemption makes things so much worse. The game doesn't want to interrogate the motivations of the man or the man's... associates, which may be good for your confirmation bias but doesn't make for compelling drama.

Mass Effect 2 Legendary Edition 2/20, XBox One- Thanks, XBox GamePass! Well, this is the one everyone loved at the time, including me, but the intervening twelve years have not exactly been kind to Mass Effect 2. It may be the fault of me reading Shamus Young's blog, but the fact of the matter is, the main story of Mass Effect does not move at all when you play this game. The Collectors are a side story, and I suppose this is an aftereffect of the series' original writer Drew Karpyshyyn leaving the project midway through. I mean, the Collectors are a FUN side story- I even like that ridiculous boss fight at the end. And the game introduces many characters that are part of the reason the series is still so beloved. The Reapers are still out there at game's end, and we're no closer to defeating them, or figuring out a way to defeat them, than we were before.

But who cares about that when there are so many cool side quests and stories to do? This Mass Effect, more than the other two, feels like your own little playground, traversing from world to world, mining stuff and hoping a wild little quest appears. All the new characters are well drawn, but Thane Krios especially stands out as brilliantly developed and acted. It's kind of sad how nothing more was done with the Drell in the 3rd game and Andromeda, though in the latter that would have been very difficult.

It still strikes me as odd that Yvonne Strahovski lent her likeness to Miranda, as well as her voice. I hope to god she never googled the character with safe search off.

The game basically becomes a cover shooter this time around, and while it's a good cover shooter, I do miss some of the more complex RPG mechanics of the previous game. Then again, the simplification of the combat accentuates the ticking clock nature of the plot.

Whiskey Mafia: Frank's Story XBox One, 2/28 This bizarre visual novel/slash sort of game is an easy ticket to 1000 points but there's little else to recommend it. A guy named Frank during the 1910s isn't doing to great at his post office job, so he plans to open up a bar with a friend. That proves to be a bit difficult, so he turns... to CRIME.

The game has you delivering letters. Hot mailing action! Very slowly. And doing a drink mixing and bartending section that's no Root Beer Tapper. And then there's some embarrassingly clunky shooting and melee action. But before I could get really annoyed with the game, it ended.

The Dark Pictures Anthology: House of Ashes- XBox One, 3/14 this is the third Supermassive game I've played- the other two are Until Dawn and Man of Medan- but this is by far my favorite of the three. It feels like the sort of lean, mean chiller-diller feature that would have played in the dog days of August, made a small profit, but would have gotten a more sterling reputation on cable and DVD years later (and shit reboot from Blumhouse) I'll admit That it's a bit hard for me to buy Ashley Tisdale as hardened CIA field analyst, but the woman is definitely making an effort. The rest of the cast is solid even if I didn't recognize them besides Tisdale.

The character writing here is well done- the racist, rah rah Bush era caricature of the American soldiers turns out to have more depth than expected, while the script doesn't let him off the hook for being kind of an ass. The game lets you decide how Rachel, Eric, and Nick's love triangle plays out, and I liked how there was no clear "bad guy" there. The plot gets increasingly ridiculous (How in the world could that epilogue happen?) but I appreciated
Spoiler: show
how there actually WAS monsters this time and it was not a fakeout, or a fakeout on top of a fakeout.
I haven't said much about the gameplay because it's the standard point and click interspersed with quick time events, and one problem I had is that sometimes I could go so long without an event that I momentarily had put my controller down and was distracted, then got someone killed. But the events are challenging and there are no easy outs. The final sequence is a serious nail biter, and ranks among the best work Supermassive has done. I was practically losing my mind trying to keep characters alive.

Mass Effect 3 Legendary Edition- XBox One, 3/23- Thanks, XBox GamePass. I'm not sure if there's anything anyone can say anymore about the ending of this game. It's been ten and a half years. A very, very long ten and a half years. I think that ending caused a permanent fracture in gaming. Or rather, helped cause the permanent fracture that came later. But this is probably the wrong place to have that discussion. All I will say is this: It's not good. I still remember the first time I beat Mass Effect 3 I had leigitimately no idea what actually happened. My form of protest was not screaming at an EA secretary, no sending cupcakes, I just didn't buy any of the DLC.

So it's ten years later, and I finally have gotten to play the DLC. And it's pretty damn good. The Leviathan DLC does alleviate the HOW and the WHY of what the reapers are doing. It was nice that they did that. The Citadel DLC lived up to the hype and was very awesome. You could really feel BioWare's desire to make up for the ending and give all the characters a proper sendoff. I appreciated it.

As for the main game itself, I appreciated the pockets of character writing, and all the little stories we find throughout the Citadel. I liked the sense of dread. I didn't like the fact that the side quests are are essentially fetch quests, to get up to an arbitrary number for the war assets so we can get a slightly better cut scene at the end. The cover based shooter gameplay is fine. Nothing new is introduced, but I can't be bothered by that too much, since the game was essentially made in 13 months. I wish I had gotten a chance to play with the Firewalker again.

Overall, the Legendary Edition was a great package and I'm glad I played it again, warts and all. The landscape has changed so much I'm not sure how 4 will shake out, or, based on Anthem, if it will even be playable. Guess we'll find out.

Marvel's Guardians of the Galaxy XBox One, 4/13- Thanks, XBox GamePass! Eidos Montreal and Square Enix try to recover from the train wreck that was Marvel's Avengers (which I'd argue isn't QUITE the disaster it's been pitched as but it's not great either) with a straightforward riff on the movies. Like the Avengers it's all slightly to the left of the movies, this time with local Canadian voice talent instead of American veterans. They're all all right, but are stuck trying to emulate the actors, which doesn't serve them well, particularly the actors voicing Gamorra and Rocket.

What I found weird about this is that the whole man-child Star-Lord, the whole wall to wall 80s soundtrack, in the wake of Peacemaker, it all feels... wrong somehow? Because Peacemaker plays with the 80s nostalgia to depict someone dealing with serious emotional issues and it's not as funny or as fun as it was in the Guardians films. That's not Eidos Montreal's fault, of course. It's a weird effect that it has on me, and probably me alone.

The game itself looks great, is well produced, has some strong mechanics, and has a story that makes an effort at emotional resonance and an arc... but in the end, never rose to much more than above average for me. The third person run and gun is fun at first but becomes repetitive and the whole Huddle mechanic, while neat, just makes me wish I had the opportunity to play the other characters and not just Star-Lord (Really, when you see them pull off so many sick moves you wish you could try them). I think I'm being a bit unfair- there are some dynamite sequences in the game, but by the end I was just kind of tired. I also hated that
Spoiler: show
Peter doesn't turn out to be Nikki's dad, which makes the whole thing pointless to me. But there's nothing about this version of Peter that we see that made me think that Ko-Rel wouldn't bother telling him he was Nikki's father, he's not as irresponsible as the movie or comics versions. The whole drama fell flat for me Also it's yet another genre story where someone's mom dies, so Nikki can join the team. The cosmetic change to Nikki, which is something someone who only read the original Guardians comics would get, gave me a huge belly laugh though.
Transformers: Battlegrounds Digital Deluxe Edition XBox One, 4/16, Thanks, XBox GameP-WHAAAAA? I already owned this? Yes I do, I bought it on a black friday sale only a few weeks before it hit GamePass. Boy do I feel stupid! But hey, I get all these boss character skins!

This is based on the seemingly little seen Cyberverse animated series which you can watch on Netflix. It's a pretty entertaining series, at least from a visual standpoint- the writing is strictly kids stuff, starting out initially as a two-hander between Bumblebee and Windblade being hunted by the Decepticons until the rest of the cast eventually joins in.

The gang's all here in Battlegrounds- the player character isn't an Autobot or Decepticon, but a human who's been tasked with helping out the Autobots in their battle to destroy some evil forces. Really, the game starts and the characters talk to an unseen player character who's riding a Teletraan-1 drone and giving orders. It's so contrived they barely mention it ever again in the story.

What follows is extremely solid, if very familiar, turn based strategy gameplay, over various maps- city, desert, forest, finishing with a big ass fight on Cybertron. All the characters have fun unique moves, especially Grimlock (who spends most of the game in his dino form). The biggest flaw in the gameplay is all the maps have two kinds of goals- either defeat all the Decepticons, or move to the other side of the map. And that's literally it. And yet, the simplicity of the gameplay was appealing to me. Trouble is, the game is about 7 hours long. it's what we oldsters would call a "weekend rental".

(Yes, I have even more games that I've beaten to talk about, but I figure right now that's enough. this took a while!)

--Dan
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Tolkientaters
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Tolkientaters »

Just finished Immortality or at least got to the credits, but I'm still kinda of piecing everything together and looking for some more clips I haven't seen yet.

I really like the way the story's presented, the fact that each movie looks distinctly different with some pretty clear parallel themes helps it stick in your head.
Spoiler: show
the horror twist you get from rewinding certain clips definitely loses its effectiveness as you see more, but piecing everything together stays engaging
It's absolutely worth going in on if you're looking for a fairly expirememtal game with a lot of creative ideas and the less you know going in the more you'll get out of it.
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Truk_Kurt
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Truk_Kurt »

7. Grid Legends (PS5)
Simply put this is the best arcade/sim racer I have played since Dirt 2 on the 360. When it comes to racing games the most important thing is how the cars feel to drive and whilst I know it's down to personal taste, to me the handling of cars in this game felt pitch perfect. There are 22 locations in the game with loads of different variations leading to 130 tracks in total and lots of different racing disciplines, everything from Minis, touring cars, electric cars and even Artic trucks. All this means that there is a lots of diversity and I never got bored, which is a problem I felt with Codemasters last non F1 game Dirt 5 which I was really disappointed with.
The game also has a story mode with live action cut scenes. This would be the only negative I can put at the game as whilst I really appreciate it being in there and hope future games do too, it was just that it was the cheesiest story you could hope for. So cheesy that non of the characters felt real, like the 'evil' racing team felt like they were out of a fairytale story. A shame as generally good. Overall though, I highly recommend this game for any racing fan, casual or otherwise and apparently it has just hit Game Pass. 9/10
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Kos or some say Kosm
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Re: Games Completed 2022

Post by Kos or some say Kosm »

Elden Ring - 10/10 - as a massive Soulsborne fan there was no way I wouldn’t love this game! Masterpiece

Final Fantasy 7 Remake - 8/10 - after listening to the podcast on this game it made me really want to replay this game! Really enjoyed getting the platinum.

Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales - 7/10 craving some gwent and this scratched my itch! Really cool game.

Rime - 9/10 Wasn’t expecting much with this game but it managed to blow me away. I have never cried during a video game over 20 years of gaming but Rime was my first. The conclusion blew me away and recommended this game for anyone interested in a light puzzle game with a beautiful world and a lovely story once you reach the end!
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