Hitman: Definitive Edition {2016} (PS4): Cold Blooded.

I've always had a mild affinity to the stealth genre as a whole. As I've stated more than once on this very blog, I feel like the Assassin's Creed series started off on the right foot to scratch that itch, but ultimately got bogged down by it's own story and cinematics that I never really got to feel like an Assassin stalking my prey. 

Now, I was familiar with this series from seeing my old boss at Gamestop play it more than once. It looked cool, but tricky as hell. I was never very good at these games so I never really dove all that deep into them. It wasn't until SquareEnix picked up the property and gave it a new glossy sheen, put in a hand holding mechanic, and pretty good story and suddenly I found myself to be a fan. After watching Funhaus play the new installment a bit, the stealth itch was begging for a scratch.

HITMAN: DEFINITIVE EDITION (PS4)

The prologue to Hitman serves as prequel to the introduction to the series as a whole. Shortly after Agent 47 escapes his initial handlers in the start of Hitman: Codename 47 he is brought into the International Contract Association (ICA) to undergo initiation to work for them as a hired assassin. It is here Agent 47 first meets and befriends his long time handler, Diana Burnwood.

47 makes child's play of the tests laid before him, and with a sketchy untraceable background it makes the head of the ICA Erik Soders very uncomfortable. So to force 47's failure, his final mission was meant to be a recreation of an impossibly done bit of historical espionage. 47 again completes his task and begrudgingly brought officially into the ICA with Burnwood as his official handler.  We see a montage of 47's greatest hits (ba dum tss) throughout the Hitman franchise before we catch up with him in 2019 for the first level of this installment. 

So despite the Hitman franchise having a continued narrative, this is probably one of the few games that I honestly couldn't care less about a the story when I pick up to play it. It's not to say that the story is bad, or poorly told. But if you come to play Hitman then you really aren't here for the narrative. You are here to find your target and figure out how you can kill them without being noticed or without leaving a shred of evidence behind you.

I will say that compared to the game before this one, Hitman: Absolution the story feels less important for progress. The characters in Absolution were definitely a major focal point, where in Hitman we get some framing cutscene between quests but the story tends to be brief before dumping you right into the next mission. Perhaps because of the new episodic release schedule for this version of the game the story is told it shorter polished chunks.

Now, I distinctly remember the older Hitman titles having some pretty wonky and frustrating controls. I had distinctly remembered having difficulty specifically in Hitman: Blood Money and Hitman: Contracts. Not so much that the controls were difficult, they just never felt very tight. It wasn't till Squenix came in and polished up the series in Hitman: Absolution where I really started to find my groove with the game.

While proficient in hand to hand, you will be heard doing it.
Best avoid getting into dust ups if you can help it.

This particular installment feels like the controls of the older Hitman titles with only a few splashes of some of the new mechanics. This is going to be one of those games where every button as a purpose, so you are going to need to get real familiar with the controller. They brought back 47's "heightened senses" mechanic, which is essentially the same kind of sonar hearing they used in the The Last of Us where you can see silhouettes of everyone around to find your target, or intractable pieces of the environment. It's handy to give you an idea of where you should be headed without spoiling the nuance of the surroundings. Just seeing the target 100 yards away doesn't tell you what surrounds them.

What they did take away though, was "point shooting" system from the Absolution. Essentially this was a bullet time sequence (think John Marston's dead eye aim in Red Dead Redemption), which if used at the right moment and with quick enough reflex you could use to quickly dispatch an entire room when things got hairy, or if there were enough spaces completely remove the bodies prior to being noticed. It certainly made Absolution easier and I'd be lying if I said I didn't use it for all its worth to finish that one. But I'm not unhappy to see it gone.

Thats.... Not exactly subtle, 47.....

But at its core, Hitman returns to its the roots of its gameplay. From the campaign you select your location and you are treated to a small cinematic of Diana explaining your target(s) from who they are, what they do, and why the contract is out on them. She explains some of the situation you will drop into and what you can try, and then "leaves you to prepare."

And from that point, you are on your own (kind of). As you move around the map to case the area, you will stumble across hints and opportunities that Diana can expound upon to give you a path to try. Many of these help you build level mastery and are used to completely level specific challenges. But really, it's 100% optional. The real fun of Hitman is your first blind run: Just trying to get to your target without being caught, killing them, and bailing without dying.

That's some pretty pro level blending in.

You start missions with a pretty limited inventory, but you can always pick up items around the locations to provide more options. Some missions have multiple objectives but the majority of them just require taking down your mark. Once you get a feel for a stage it's worth your while to go back to the level and try to complete the specific challenges and opportunities you are presented with. Doing so completes the aforementioned level mastery, and what this does is this allows you to start the missions in different areas with different disguises, and allows you to bring or stash additional weaponry and tools to being with.

Most of the controls are pretty 3rd person shooter standard so there isn't a lot to go on for that front, but like I mentioned before it feels very much like the old ones specifically in regards to the face buttons. These are usually used for the item interaction and the big thing to remember is that they are not just presses, but holds. So say you take down a bystander, if you stand over their body you will be prompted with a few commands, X to change disguise, O to drag body, Triangle to pick up or interact. You need to remember to accommodate for those extra few seconds. It could make or break you getting caught.

Sometimes you don't even need to be near the target

Levels are pretty much completely open from the word go. Depending on what you bring with you (based on your level mastery) you might have means to get around locked doors from the start or have the necessary keys to get past locks, or even invited in as a guest. Regardless, it's always a great idea to just spend some time wandering around the level. Get used to what path the target follows, find out who he talks to, learn what situational things might be happening to get you close or provide distraction. Perhaps you might find an errant soldier that looks exactly like the guard that get into the building the mark frequents.

But you need to be careful about how you play dress up, sometimes specific people know who is on their staff, so if you wander into their eye-shot and you don't blend in immediately or get out of sight they will become suspicious and follow you, or alert the guards. If you don't move quickly and quietly, situations can escalate in a hurry. You can always run and gun your way through levels, but it really does you a disservice for what makes this game satisfying. It's funny to create a pile of bodies in a doorway, but not long after you will just restart your save and try again.

Upon completion of the level you are rated by how well you did and given a total mission score. This is essentially just for bragging rights and do nothing towards beating the game or unlocking more mastery items, but it does give you a quantifiable number for how you are doing as an assassin. If you run and gun your way through the level, sure you will probably be able to move on but you'll get slapped with a "dunce cap, zero star, thanks for trying ribbon for idiots" at the end of the level.

Looks like it's.... Lights out for you... (YEAAAAHHHHH)

But to get an idea of how satisfying being an assassin could be, allow me to go through a scenario I played through that just made the game for me: I'm in Sapienza, and I've currently snuck into the compound of Silva Caruso. He's been working on a viral weapon with Francesca De Santis. I need to kill both of them. After sneaking onto the compound as a gardener, I'm eavesdropping on Caruso during his golf lesson. I learn that his golf instructor has been having an affair with De Santis, but the instructor denies it.

After the lesson I follow the instructor and catch him making a call to De Santis about a date. So I size the opportunity knock him out, steal his clothes, and stash his body. With his phone, I call Francesca back to meet up for our date. I set some mood music and lighting, add some rat poison to the champagne set that was waiting for us, and take a seat in the lounge chair in the shadows. Franscesca comes in, worried about these trists and explains that she's actually been spying on Caruso, and that I risk my life by continuing this with her. She's clearly nervous but wanted to be straight with me about the risks.

I started a empathize a little as she took a nervous drink of her champagne, it didn't take long for her body to start reacting to it. She quickly rushed to the restroom as I slowly rose from my chair to sauntered after her. I opened the door to see her vomiting over the shitter and felt a little bad because this was a horrible way to go, but I have a job to do. I slipped behind her and forcefully held her face in the bowl until kicking and bubbles stopped, dropped her body in the clothes bin, hopped out the window, and was off to find Caruso for his turn.

"Farewell, my love...."

None of this pontificating of Assassins and Templars, No wiping a feather on their neck bullshit, no 20 minute monologue of a death rattle about how I don't understand shit. Just cold, emotionless execution. It probably says all sorts of fucked up things about me as a person that having things go that smoothly felt so incredibly satisfying to do. But this, THIS is how Hitman is intended to be played. When you can go in and get the job done with nobody being the wiser, it makes all the effort and time spent tracking your mark worth it.

I purchased the definitive edition of the game prior to season 1 going free to PS+ members, and I'm glad that I did because it allotted me two extra campaigns to play. They all use the same maps but the targets are different. There are also a large number of increasingly difficult challenges that you can use to improve your mastery and also just generally get more play out of a level. Which in turn gives you more memorization that you can use to play the main campaigns to get better masteries. I honestly don't think you can get the Silent Assassin rank without a couple higher rank mastery tools.

On top of these missions, there is a whole online contract mechanic that I never even delved into which is basically user made custom levels, so if you for some reason you completely dive into this one 100%, you can still find use created kills to continue to stretch your dollar out on this one.

I guess stealth doesn't always mean quiet....

If I have complaints, they are pretty minimal. First and foremost is the same problem I generally with every installment of this series, and that is that Agent 47 is basically a non-character. Like Master Chief, Agent 47 is basically a blank slate that has no tonal range, no emotional expression, no physical personality to his movements. In some cases he's even worse because he doesn't even string one liners during gameplay. Now, you can argue that this contextually fits in the story since he was essentially a test tube grown clone, so his human interaction was nil.

Two, the story itself to this game kinda sucks. Like I said at the top we get a brief greatest hits prologue explaining how we got to now, but as we play through this game we end up following the actions of a character I don't actually think is ever named. He seems to know who Agent 47 is and seems to be a hand behind a behind-the-curtain war between the ICA and a shadow group called Providence. The ending, without spoiling, basically is a teaser for the upcoming Hitman 2 which is kind of frustrating.

It's most egregious problem is that this load times in this game are just unforgivably long. Especially for a title that will cause you to reload the level or reload your saves regularly, any load time that takes longer than like 15 seconds is pushing itself to be too much of a noticeable wait if you have to constantly do it. It's not as bad as Bloodborne's original 30-60 second load times, but at this point Dev's really should find ways to have the game constantly loading or able to quickload to get you right back into the action.

"Ahem, Don't mind me..."

I'll be the first to admit that the game can be a little samey after a while. Especially when doing challenge missions because it is very easy to get into a rhythm of using the same tools to secure kills in different missions. I can't think of how many times I've used rat poison in a drink to take down a target in this one.

And while the controls are polished to be as responsive as this game needs to them to be, there still feels like a degrees of innate awkwardness to them when trying to change outfits, drag, or pick something up. It doesn't feel as broken as many of the old Hitman games seemed to be, but in the early going there is going to be a curve to pick up the nuance of them before they start to feel natural.

Ultimately though, I like Hitman and I like it a lot. I've said hundreds of times that this is how the Assassin's Creed series should have played. I play it off and on quite a bit still and it scratches the stealth itch for me in all the right ways. Or I can just melt down and try to see how many people I can kill before getting taken out.

Hitman is one of those games I like to play when I want to zone out and focus simultaneously. It's generally low stress to play and I can spend well over an hour just wandering around a locale, taking in the surroundings before plotting my attack. There is just something immensely satisfying about playing this game to me. The adage of "If you liked, then you will like" applies here. If you liked the other Hitman installments then Hitman 2016 is going to satisfy in all the right ways. If you are looking for a fast paced run and gunner, then this is not the game for you.

I had to walk the catwalk in Paris for a mission.

That alone made this game worth it.

Resident Evil 2 (2019) {PS4}: What's Old is New.

This one was one of those E3 megaton's that developers drop to bait older gamers like myself.  And while the fourth installment of this game is the one that is a lot of peoples favorites and probably (rightfully) the most important one of the series, the original version of this one is probably my favorite because my introduction to the series. 

Remakes like these are always a roll of the dice because its difficult to please everyone. Do you produce a new experience and risk having fanboys complain that everything is different? Or do you keep it faithful to the original and risk having people complain that its the same game they've already played. It's a fine line to walk, so let's see how Capcom did with.....

RESIDENT EVIL 2 (2019){PS4}

Resident Evil 2 takes place two months after the events of the original in 1998, where Raccoon City police S.T.A.R.S unit members Jill Valentine, Chris Redfield, Rebecca Chambers, and Barry Burton escaped the mansion outside of the city limits where Umbrella Pharmaceuticals had a secret facility to create the zombie producing bio-weapon, the G-virus. The mansion was destroyed but the it did not halt the outbreak of the virus.

It's Leon Kennedy's first day on the police force, and he's driving into Raccoon City to meet his new team and department. But on at a fuel fill-up just outside the city he notices the station to be surprisingly desolate. Investigating the gas station, he sees an attendant nursing a nasty wound and the man weakly points into the back. Another police officer is restraining a zombie, but as the officer tells Leon to stay back, the zombie lurches forward and kills him. Leon begins to work his way out of the station, but just before getting out the door, he covers the back of a young woman with a zombie encroaching behind her.

Her name is Claire Redfield, she is driving into Raccoon City in search of her older brother Chris. They decide to escape together and that heading to the police station would be a lot safer than staying out side. But they quickly learn that city is just overrun with these things as their car is quickly surrounded. They try to back out, but an injured truck driver tailing them is about to ram their car, forcing them to bail out. The resulting wreck and explosion separate the two, but they agree to meet up at the police station and get out of this mess.

Alright, I tend to find myself when it comes to remakes like this wanting to see the core tenets of what made the original good stay the same, but not delivering them in the exact same way, thus allowing us to have a new experience with the game, even if I know how the story might play out. The introduction of this version of the game provides a pretty excellent example of this. 

Right out of the gate the story managed to hit all the major points of the original one in a pretty faithful 1-to-1 recreation. There is some minor differences to how the events play out, but all the of the major beats are there, and they call back to the original animatics first meeting where Leon shoots over Claire's shoulder to cover her back. The dialog and delivery is different, but it doesn't feel alien. The objective is the same, but the starting map is not. Good start so far.

Credit where its due, Capcom has really been upping their game on the graphical front. After the the stellar looking Resident Evil 7: Biohazard the graphics are just pushed even further to where video games are literally just motion captured movie roles. Using mo-cap for both body motion and facial reactions, the characters are so lifelike its getting pretty difficult to distinguish if they are actual a real person or not. It's crazy, but we are getting closer and closer to producing CGI live action.

This burger looks so gross, but also delicious?

The character design is appropriately modernized as well. While the game is still set in 1998 (around when the original version came out) the clothing worn by the characters actually looks realistic and reasonable for the time. Hilariously, Leon and Claire's original outfits are unlockable and if you didn't think their old looks weren't stupid just wait till you seem them in realistic textures.

Resident Evil 2 does feel like this one borrows a number of elements from various different games in the series. The inventory system in this game is a blending of 2 and 7. It uses the familiar over the shoulder camera angle that made Resident Evil 4 famous, but I would say that it controls more like a traditional 3rd person shooter does like you would see in the less popular Resident Evil 6.  Fans just need to come to terms already: The tank controls are a thing of the past, and probably should have been since the advent of the analog control. I tried using them again in Resident Evil: Revelations and they were awful. It's a relic of a time when controls were D-pad directional.

They did a pretty good job with the map layout as well. It's core layout is almost exactly how I remember the original Resident Evil 2 but when you start to actually navigate around the map, you will find doors or stairs in different places. Major rooms right where they should be, but new or different rooms scattered around on the way there. For example if I said to go to the dark room, you would know to go right where the safe room at the bottom of the stairs is. But along the way, you would find a new weapons locker room that you will need to make several trips back to get all the contents of.

via Gfycat

More importantly, despite taking inspiration from the blueprint of the previous iteration, the game still manages to keeps it focuses tight and scary. Even though I have a general idea of where I want to move in the map, the surroundings are still unfamiliar and it does an excellent job of building tension from relentless enemies and jump scares. And boy is there tension, because zombies in this one don't feel like as harmless a threat as they used to be. They have much more sporadic movements, they can move much quicker on you, and worst of all they seem almost impossible to put down. I don't feel like I was every lacking in ammo, but trying to kill everything will certainly make it feel like it.

Cutscenes play out similar but differently as well. Most notably when Leon meets officer Marvin. Again like the main introduction it hits a lot of the same points but is completely different and new dialog. He mentions the party, at one point pulls his gun to get Leon to leave him. But this doesn't happen in the first and only scene he was in like in the original. A lot of these characters actually get a couple more scenes than I remember from the original. It's nice to see because any longtime fan of  this franchise knows that the lore of this one can get confusing.

via Gfycat

Additionally they also kept the "side" system you might remember from the old PS1 version. How it worked before was there was really no disc 1 or disc 2. If you started the game from the Leon or Claire disc you would start a new game with them as the primary lead. It affected how the game played a bit and how some of the items dropped. This more or less returns as you can choose who will lead off in the main story first, and who will follow in the supplemental chapter. So essentially each selection has 2 parts each.

Speaking of things that they kept, completing the game will also unlock the "4th Survivor" mode.  You may remember this as where you play as faceless umbrella operative Hunk with a set amount of equipment, and essentially need to run a gauntlet of all the baddies you encountered during the game to try to set the best possible time you can. Complete this, and you unlock the ridiculous Tofu mode, which is more or less the same thing, but the equipment changes. There are multiple versions of Tofu to unlock as well.

via Gfycat

And I can't believe I am saying this, but kudos to Capcom for the free DLC update. This is the store of thing I fully expected them to charge and additional 5 bucks a pop for but they released 3 additional mini chapters called the "Ghost Survivors" that give smaller but similar tight experiences with some of the smaller nobody characters from the game. They are a welcome edition and stretch my dollar with this game out a little more, which is nice because by credit roll I already had felt like I had gotten my money's worth already.

If I have any complaints about this one, there are very few of them or there are nitpicks at best. Like I said prior, the most baffling part of how the story is delivered is the fact that after Claire and Leon part ways for the first time, they basically don't talk to each other again from that point forward. There is one short scene in the early game, one scene in the late game, and then not again till the ending of the game. It's strange because I remember there being more interaction between the two of them in the PS1 version.

There is also a bit of inconsistency if you play both quests, both ways. Both G Berkin and the Tyrant appeared in the previous version of the game, but they were separated by who's quest you played. That way each character is resolved by another. But in this one, they are both in both quests. So while in one path one of them might be a difficult ending boss, in other they might be dispatched early and not relevant to the true ending. It's a weird way to deliver it. Not a huge issue, but it is noticeable.

via Gfycat

No bowgun in this installment of the game. Which is simultaneously disappointing and a relief, because if you played the old game its about as effectively damaging as trying to spit snot at a baddie through a drinking straw. Sure, it's become somewhat iconic to the game and the concept of zombie killing at this point in zombie culture, but ultimately I really don't mind that its gone.

Going through Hunk, Tofu, and trying to S+ rank is incredibly frustrating for me because I can't get the knack of properly side stepping zombies not matter how many speedruns I watch, but that's more of a "git gud" problem than it is a complaint about the actual game, but I will say the frustration in trying to do so was enough for me to put the game down and move on to something else.

via Gfycat

A number of people complained about how the character models looked for both Leon and Claire in this one but honestly, if they were to shoot a new (actual) Resident Evil 2 movie in the coming year, this is exactly the type of look Hollywood directors would cast for said role, it really feels like a complete modernization of the concept in every aspect.

I fizzled out pretty quickly on this one too after I played it. Which is strange because I was very excited to dive into this one. I powered through both variants of both campaigns, beat 4th survivor once, and after a few attempts at Tofu mode, that was it. I was kinda done with it. These modes don't seem to scratch my itch like the Mercenaries mode does, so I did find this one very easy to put down.

via Gfycat

But like I said, half of these barely register a complaint. The short and skinny of it is that if you are going to do a remake of an timeless old game that everyone loves? This is exactly how you to do it. There ARE ways to stay true to the original without changing the core of what it is. The graphics are new but familiar, the maps are the same but different, the monsters are acting the same but behave differently. It completely felt like I was playing Resident Evil 2 while still completely feeling like a brand new experience to me.

In the very early stages of my playing, I had said that the was the some possible game of the year potential out of this one. And I suppose technically this is still true, but I do have the tendency to get really excited with some early of the year games (see Tales of Berseria). It's entirely possible that it can be game of the year, but there is a LOT of games to look forward to this year. But even if its not, I can say with certainty that I felt Resident Evil 2 absolutely delivered on what it needed to be. It was a solid pick up, worth every bit of time I spent on it, and is a must have for 2019. Highly recommended.

Hey SquareEnix! Pay Attention!
This is how you need Final Fantasy 7 to go!

Valkyria Chronicles 4 (PS4): Treading back to familiar ground.

So. Remember when I was all excited for Valkyria Revolution? Man, I do. Thought literally nothing of putting that one on preorder without a second thought and eagerly dove right in. Although I had seen a gameplay trailer and knew it wasn't the game I was hoping for, I was still going to give it a chance to live up to the lineage of the game I loved.

I shouldn't have. It was total dogshit and it got rightly panned by myself and every other reviewer who played it. Well, apparently the team at Sega must have seen this coming because not long after the release of Valkyria Revolution they released another trailer as if to say "uh hey, we are working on this too?" This one had design more like Valkyria I remember. Had tanks, similar art design. Looks like it played like it was supposed to. I was skeptical now, but still willing. So after waiting for what felt like forever, I finally sat down with.....

VALKRYIA CHRONICLES 4:(PS4)

Valkyria Chronicles 4 takes place within the same timeline as the original Valkyria timeline, but further south of the original nation of Gallia. The Empire of the east has been pushing westward against Federation territory in an attempt to claim more land and in doing so more Ragnite, the material that is used as a power source for the nations and their military equipment. 

We assume control Claude Wallace, a wet behind the ears but competent star military recruit who joined up with the federation army with his childhood friends Raz and Kai. After some initial friction as a unit, the team eventual gels and passes their training to join the Ranger Corps, which is an elite squad within the federation army, and Claude is awarded the rank of Captain of Squad E.

After some initial strong showings as a team, the Squad learns that the empire is taking ground from the federation, and that they are marching towards Gallia and their small hometown of Hafen. The federation makes the decision to put all their effort into Operation Northern Cross: a massive offensive push to the capital city of the empire, Schwartzgard. Squad E is to take part of this offensive as one of the federations stronger weapons.

I can thankfully say that this time around Sega has learned from their mistakes because this iteration of Valkyria Chronicles is once again built on the same gameplay framework as the original. The wonderfully unique combination of tactical RPG, JRPG, third person shooter, and first person shooter. There are a handful of little differences put into this version, but it otherwise is a stone for stone rebuild of what made the first one great.

As you did before, you start off by selecting your squad for a given mission. Then each turn you have a set number of actions to use. Once selecting a character, you zoom into a 3rd person mode and then get a limited amount to move them across the battlefield to your desired location. During your move opposing forces are able to take pot shots at you so move quick and use cover. Once there, you can zoom again to a first person angle to line up and take a shot of your own, if it doesn't kill your foe they get to counter attack. Once you have used all your actions you end the turn and then enemy gets their phase to do the same.

How the game differs this time is in addition to the order system that was in place, the special commands for stat buffs you could spend action points to use, you now also have series of support commands from the main forces you can use to open the map locations, bring in artillery fire, and other support actions. These are story based so you don't always have them, but there a nice bit of options to have.

There are handful of new squad mechanics too. In addition to having some tanks to control, you also have an APC unit to control. I foolishly ignored this for the first part of the game, but this little guy is incredibly useful in getting some initial moves on the map done safely. On his turn, he can pick up a number of troops and essentially move across the map without taking much in the way of damage from anything that isn't a tank or anti-tank artillery. Once in position you can dispatch units at the cost of their normal move. This is fantastic for troops like Shocktroopers or snipers who do not get a lot of initial movement. 

There are two big new aspects to the squad too.  One of them is the new troop class, the grenadier. Their job, as you might expect, is a slow moving portable artillery. They take a minute set up so they are risky to bring right into the lines of enemy fire, and they can be somewhat inaccurate. But they can provide big damage to turrets, tanks, heavy soldiers, as well as provide smoke cover. When used properly, they can be a very effective force. And one of them is a major character, which will provide you an additional action.

The other is now each turn, you get a single command point. By spending this point, some characters can basically take command of two other troops in a single move. This is incredibly useful for a number of reasons. For one, like the APC, it can be used to move two troops a significantly longer distance. But while they can take damage as if they were on a normal move, they aren't the targeted enemy. They also are just in range for to possibly join in for a joint attack. So for example: if I use a scout to use the CP command to pull two shock troopers, those troops basically get to move double the distance they could have by themselves without expending their own move yet, and if I take a shot at a nearby enemy, I essentially get a 3 man attack to mow down whoever I was aiming at. It is incredibly useful.

In that initial game summary I provided more of the overarching narrative for Valkyria 4 because while it does coincide with the original Valkyria Chronicles it really could be its own game if they had changed the names of the territories. I will say that the original Valkyria was more cut and dry because it was one army vs another army with a focus of smaller characters having a smaller side stories within them.

Valkyria 4 however feels more like the main story is there only to provide the framework for all the characters stories which are the much bigger focus of the plotline. Through out the game you the military is basically part of two major operations and if that ended up being the focus it would be very one note. By making the focus more about the characters in the squad themselves, I feel that the narrative is actually stronger for it because it allows for more faces to take the stage.

While the primary characters are the source of the main narrative, this story focus is best displayed on the brighter spotlight on the lesser members of the squad. As you might remember from the first game, they released some DLC packs where you got take control of Edy and a number of other squad members. It was a fun little aside and got to give you more depth to the rank and file troops you have been using. Before, you only got to read a little blurb about their history and that was all you got.

Now between chapters, you also get "squad stories" where a small number of the squad has some interaction with the main cast. These little asides give you some backstory to these character and completing them allows you to turn some of their negative quirks into positive bonuses, so it is more than worthwhile to do them. I feel that the story as a whole in this game is pretty good, but it does have a few anime cringe moments that feel are in there for the sake of being there.

The visual design for the original has come back as well and thankfully for it it this time around. It's a well proportioned anime style done in that washed out yet colorful watercolor look that the first one had that made me feel like I was watching a well produced anime (which was sorely missed after the video gamey look of Valkyria Revolution). Sound effects are accentuated by animated onomatopoeia such as the "ratta ratta" of guns. Even has some cool weather effects for some missions.  They have added some better transitions for when troops trigger their quirks and flaws. Generally better cleaned up this time around.

It has a pretty exceptional classical soundtrack. Much like before it feels very fitting of a military story that give a lot of the missions and scenes a feeling of "epicness" but they also fit in a number of rearrangements of tracks from the original game that sneakily felt iconic to it. I couldn't hum a few bars of the main theme right on command for you if you asked me too, but I'll be damned if I didn't notice that song immediately when it crept in on a major scene.

Unfortunately for Valkyria 4 by being a stone for stone build of the first game, a lot of the bad aspects of the series also make a return as well. First off, this game like its predecessors is notoriously talky.  Because of how the natural flow of the actual "game" element is, it doesn't allow for a lot of narrative to actually take place during missions, so much of it is crammed in between the missions of the game. Like you can with most modern games, you can always skip them but this is a narrative based game so I don't know why you would want to.  

But this does bring us back to the biggest complaint of the Valkyria games and it's something they should have fixed. But in between every single story segment, the game brings you back to the book menu. The book menu is what you can use to flip through all your various options of the game like skirmish missions, R&D to make new weapons, proceed with the story, adjust your squad, etc.  As a base framework, it's fine. But for some reason after every single story transition it brings you right back to the book and asks you if you are sure you want to proceed with this chapter.

Literally every time you want to advance the game, you have to select this.

I appreciate the need to confirm that I am making the decision, it's fine for almost any of these functions so I don't accidentally go into a menu I don't want to. But in the context of following the story it's an absolutely pace killing nightmare. If I start going through the story segments, what SHOULD have happened is it would play through all of the necessary story bits until I tell it to stop. Let me pause and either skip and go back to the book menu at MY whim so I can pick up were the story left off. Then after it completes the story it then would go back to the book on its own so I can prepare for the coming mission.

This is how it SHOULD have worked. This is how it should have been implemented from the second game onward. But it's not. So now after every couple minutes of cutscene (and sometimes even less than that) it just yanks me to a loading screen and then back to the book so it can ask me if I want to see the next part of it, and then wait for the loading to finish to continue the story I didn't ask to stop in the first place. It's arduous, completely unnecessary, and it makes a game that doesn't exactly move at a break neck pace go even slower.

The additional unit types do allow for more strategy, but at its heart this iteration of Valkyria can be won in the same fashion as the first game. That means with the right defensive buffs, and the right moves, almost every single mission can be won on your first turn. Yes, a handful of them do require some very specific strategies to survive, but there was a lot of times where I would use my raise all defense buff, command a pair of shocks with a scout to dash towards my goal, and then finish off to take base with my two troopers. Inside of a few missions I was "A" ranking all of the story missions and skirmishes.

That being said, Valkyria 4 did a better job of making all the ranks way more useful. In my last review I said that you shouldn't waste your time with medics, lancers, or snipers. Now the missions have a lot more different nuances to them so it is to your benefit to play around with it all and bring at least one of everything to the table. You have no idea when you might need a snipers long range accuracy or a lancer to bring out a frustratingly placed tank. The only class I ended using the least was actually new grenadiers. They had use but not as much as the other classes did, at least when I played it.

R&D can be a grind to do sometimes. Up to three tanks in the game and 3 branching trees of weapon means a lot of upgrades to do if you want everything. This too is muddled by the support character reacting every time you build a new weapon with one or two lines. This also should have been changed to only react as you were leaving R&D, so I could speed through my upgrades without having to stop to cancel this reaction. Instead, like the book, the progress is slowed for unnecessary pause

And like the first Valkyria a significant number of the upgrades are worthless. More damage is nice and all and so is clip size. But this is a game that rewards head shots so it doesn't make sense to use anything but the starting weapons because they have the best accuracy and that ultimately is the strongest stat in the game. They thankfully now show on our squad screens how accurate each solider is so now you can change things accordingly, and admittedly some of the weapons you find are indeed better than the base weapon. But so long as you keep upgrading center of the tree, you will have little issue progressing.

The last thing I want to bitch about is one enemy in particular, Klaus Walz. As a character, he is fine. He's a foil to Claude as being their big enemy tank captain. But he he specifically is bullshit because outside of having a fast and maneuverable tank that is next to impossible to bring down, he is one of two units that break one of the rules of the game. His tank is able to just have generic machine gun fire that triggers WHILE he moves. So if for some reason he is making a turn around where one of your guys are standing, he just completely obliterates their health bar without even taking his turn.

And one of the missions you fight him, he gets the first turn! So after you carefully set your troops up to start the level, he just blows through 1 to 3 of them before you even get to take an action. It's one of the few missions where you might have to restart it just because you got fucked before even take a turn. Even the final boss lets you get a goddamn move in first.

Ultimately the question is, is this good or better than the first Valkyria Chronicles? Well, that's a tough call because it's working against nostalgia. If I take them from a mechanics standpoint I do have to say that Valkyria 4 is better due to the additions to the games and minor improvements. I do love this cast and this story, and it had some great moments in it. But it does feel like there is a bunch of wasted potential because they had 3 previous games to fix some quality of life annoyances that could have made this game superb.

Instead, I have to lave with the somewhat unimpressive rating of "If you liked Valkyria Chronicles then you will like Valkyria Chronicles 4."  Which is true and by no means a mark against it. I frick'n loved this game and would certainly recommend it for its uniqueness. But it feels like it could have been so much more polished after all this time. But I am not looking a gift horse in the mouth. They messed up a series and I liked and then fixed it with a proper installment. If I get an Valkyria Chronicles 5 then I am more than happy to see it.

I will say that this one kind of messes up its own
lore about the Valkyria, but it was a nitpick at best.

Mass Effect: Andromeda (PS4): What's New is Old.

July review of a game I played in March. Good pacing, Chris.

As we all know, I generally have a pretty hate/hate relationship with the majority of science fiction. There are a handful of shining examples through various media that will grab and in some cases even hold my attention, but they tend to be pretty few and far between. With games that is just as relevant. If it has star or space in its title I'd say 70% of the time I don't even bother giving it a second glance. I don't care what color Spock's beamsaber is in Battlestar.

Which is what made it so surprising that this series managed to actually engross me to the point of being a fan of it. Because to be totally honest I don't think I actually even really liked the first one, I didn't think it was a great game. I had just bought a XB360 at the time and was told this was a game worth getting. But once I actually got into it I'll be damned if I didn't fall for this universe. I still feel the second one was the best in this series and it sure felt like the book was closed on the third one, but here we are with a new game in this franchise. After the lukewarm ending of the third, I'm ready to see how Bioware writes themselves out of this one.

MASS EFFECT: ANDROMEDA(PS4)

In between the events of Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3, in a joint initiative between the Quarians and 4 races of the Milky Way galaxy have collaborated on an expansion initiative to the Andromeda galaxy. Over 20,000 of the collected races partook in a 600 year journey across space in search of "golden worlds" on massive ships called Arcs. Each race's Arc is lead by a Soldier with an embedded AI unit called a SAM, and they are tasked to find suitable planets for colonization. In this case, the human pathfinder, Alec Ryder.

You control either one of Alec's children, Scott or Sara Ryder (Sara in my case), and unfortunately after being awakened from cryo-sleep to find out that their targeted golden world isn't quite golden.... or even habitable, as it surrounded by this harmful dark energy being called the scourge. The scourge knocks out the ships power, and renders one Ryder sibling comatose. A scout team goes down planet-side to confirm if they planet is habitable or not, and they are met with resistance from a hostile alien race called the Kett.

While investigating the remains of a previous alien race, Ryder and Alec find an alien monolith and activate it. The explosion from it sends them reeling, smashing Ryder's helmet. Alec sacrifices himself to save his child, and makes them the new pathfinder by transferring the SAM AI to them. With the pathfinder lost, all that's left is to return to the centralized space station for the Andromeda Operation called the Nexus and continue the mission. But the Nexus is in shambles, none of the other arcs made it, and it's barely functional. So it's up to Ryder's team to figure out what happened, and get the Andromeda initiative underway.

So as you can tell from the plot synopsis here, we are getting no resolution on the events of the previous Mass Effect Trilogy. It's essentially so far down the timeline that the majority of the characters from original series would have died from conflict or age. They essentially wipe the slate clean sans from a handful of messages from Liara T'soni warning about the impending purge of the Reapers.

Anyways, Andromeda. I'm going to be a little hard pressed to review this one because I'm months behind writing this, they've already patched a bunch, and honestly I can't really think of a lot that has changed in this one in comparisons to the rest of the series.

First off, let's talk character models. Bioware, I'm willing to give you a pass because the majority of the cast are aliens, but some how a significant portion of them seem to look more humans than the actual humans. It was a pretty significant issue with how poor an number of the characters looked that they had to patch in design upgrades to make the humans (specifically women) look less tired and more detailed. Every character with a humanoid form still looks like their eyes are trying to pop from their heads.

The character creator is still a plate of hot garbage. I spent hours try make Velfir Ryder appealing for me to look at only to have it look like she has neon face paint the moment she left the creator, because shit looks differently in different lighting engine. Despite the incredible amount of customization to this game, you really only get one crack to make your characters so you better be confident in them when you finish up. Or, you can do what a significant number of people did and just try to make the shittiest looking characters they can come up with.

Kotaku had people send in their bad character screens, and some of them are horrifying.

Thankfully, when it comes to abilities you don't really get locked into what kind of character you have this time around. Andromeda lets you play around with all the aspects of your characters pretty fast and loose, and it makes incredibly cheap to reboot and make adjustments. So if you are playing the game as silent stealthy sniper and decide mid-way through the game you'd like to be a heavy wielding thicky with biotic powers? A quick trip to you ship and a couple of credits and you can respec however you like. I ended up liking what I was rolling with and didn't end up doing this.

Andromeda has kept the somewhat cover-based 3rd person shooter engine it laid down in Mass Effect 2 pretty much intact. If you've ever played a Mass Effect game before or even any modern 3rd person shooter, the controls should feel natural at this point its been around for well over a decade. The combat really on changes up depending on what traits you've taken and will dictate what kind of attack you will use.

Andromeda gives you lots of freedom with your specs, so play around.

In my case, I was a technician with effective sniping ability, so I would basically rain down headshot fire target after target from hundreds of yards away, and if they were foolish enough to get closer they would be burned with a incinerate fireball, then exploded with an electric overcharge. If they were dumb enough to push closer, they were ripped down with a laser assault rifle. I could clear out entire bases without ever needed to step foot in them till it was totally safe. I've seen some pretty interesting high damage builds, but I never really needed to explore them.

The only real thing different about the combat that I can think of is now there is an addition of a rocket jump and a dodge. The dodge I found useful for whipping around a cover for tense firefights. The jump is really only about as useful as the games platforming segments require them. Sure you can jump and then dodge to dash, and it helps with exploration a little bit but otherwise the game could have not had it and it probably wouldn't have affected things much.

Paw Rifle: unlimited ammo, perfect accuracy, shreds shields.  Yes please.

The cast? Ehh, cast is alright I guess. As is with most Mass Effect games there are characters I really liked like Peebee and Drack (the Asari and Krogan, go figure), and ones that I didn't like Cora. But because of your ability to overhaul your skills team composition never really felt like it was a real determining factor. From my build, it seemed like I wouldn't have needed a character like Ja'al because of the same skill set, but I rarely noticed any impact if he was on my team or not.

It feels like Andromeda tried to mix various elements of the previous games that worked in the hope of a vastly improved experience. It's better for it but I don't know how much. Maps for example are big and explorable again. It feels like they have taken a page out of the build of Dragon Age: Inquisition and set up the maps for individual questing areas. As much as I hate to say it, Skyrim really set a precedent for open world questing that's probably going to continue to be a staple for years to come. Thankfully, In addition to the return of being able to drive around the maps, it also implements a fast travel for landmarks you have already hit to save time. But it's still viable to drive since you are able to mine resources from the car as well.

Dem Duke boys is crazy

Which makes me wonder why the hell we still have to scan every single planet still. Either for meager resources or map completion there very rarely is any functional reason to do it. There are handful of areas where you scan that adds areas of interest to the map. These should be the only things we need to scan for, the rest is just pointless fluff.

It was especially bad before the initial patch where every time you wanted to transition from planet to planet or from galaxy to galaxy you had to watch this extended interspace travel sequence. Prior to the patch, there was no way to skip these sequences that basically slowed down planet exploration to a crawl. I'm sure this had to do something with load times but there are only so many planets you actually set foot on. Thankfully, this got quickly adjusted and once you are in a new galaxy, you are able to skip most of these flight sequences.

The transitions are so long that 15 seconds of gif isn't enough to show a whole one.

Speaking of patches, I found this one to be especially bad when it came to glitching in general. I would have tons of problems of animations bugging out, interactions messing up, falling through floors mid fight, things bugging out that wouldn't allow me to finish off the quests, and one situation where backing my PS4 to a new drive almost ruined my progress. Thankfully the majority of these were able to be fixed by simply restarting the game, but it gave the entire game a very unpolished feeling to me.

There really isn't much to add about the multiplayer. If you played it on Mass Effect 2 or 3, it's basically more of the same. There is a new companion app for you phone that you can use to earn more research points to unlock more weapons or equipment, more characters of the online mode, but I only really dabbled with it a few times and it destroyed me on the easiest setting, so I didn't really bother with it.

I'll give Bioware this, they always manage to leave me totally confused at the start of a Mass Effect game as they drown me in terminology, backstory, and massive opening map locations, but by the time I get rolling in the game I am completely dialed in. The story in this one is pretty straight forward for the most part, and while there aren't a terribly bountiful amount of boss fights (a handful of architect fights really), it does still get pretty exciting by the end of it.

But the one thing they got very right is that they finally did away with the stupid Paragon/Renegade system. Typically when you play this series you pretty much make the decision in your head at the onset if you are going to play this game good or evil, since there is generally no real benefit to play things neutral. You generally needed to be all good or all bad to make certain decisions, and the game suffered for it.

I liked Peebee a lot. Lived in an escape pod in the event the other shoe dropped.
Kept everyone at arm length. Behaviors I could certainly relate to.

Now instead of those options, you have conversational choices of formal, logical, emotional, or casual. I like these options better because while they aren't exactly clear what that logical response could be, it allows me to better play to the character I am talking to. Most of the time I just went with casual because I tend to be a bit of a smart ass, but in more harrowing moments I could shift to emotional and it made sense. Or meeting a new race of aliens, formal made more sense to me. Conversational trees felt better in this one, more natural.

But the biggest thing I applaud them on this front is not the conversation trees, but the decisions. Again in older Mass Effects it was: Do you want to save the box of adorable kittens? or do you want to light the box on fire. I always hated that there was no middle ground or if there was it was not worth picking. Not so in this one. In a large number of critical moments during the game you are presented with two opposing, but equally viable options. No good or evil, paragon or renegade. Just two varied grey possible options. And they fucking killed me to the point where I would sit and agonize over what selection I was going to make. It made it truly feel like my decisions mattered, and would leave me with consequences of those decisions. It really was the best aspect of this game.

So did I like the game? Yeah I guess so. When the narrative got going I was able to see it through to the finish.  There were certainly enough characters I liked to want to see their story through, and even the ones that I didn't care for I cared enough about the story to do their missions as well. But ultimately, when the final credits rolled I was with the distinct feeling of "Whelp, this certainly was a Mass Effect game." It's certainly not a game I felt I needed to keep playing the moment I had finished it.

Mass Effect: Andromeda feels like a cash in to try to draw back a fan base that felt scorned by the ending of Mass Effect 3.  I enjoyed that it took the story back in a new direction and honestly I didn't mind a return visit to this universe. It was met with somewhat lack luster reviews and similar sales. It's certainly not the greatest one in its series, but it's certainly playable.  It pushes no boundaries and breaks no molds. It simply was just a another game of the series.  If you are a fan of the franchise you certainly will find yourself enjoying your time with it. I don't think it's a must have or can't miss, not sure if it's a hard sell for new fans, but I wasn't unhappy with it.

Seriously, how long does it take to set up a goddamn movie night?

Ragey's 2016: The Rage Quitter Year End Wrap Up.

This years Ragey's will be a tad more bared boned this year because with the X+Y thing I didn't get as many written as I would have liked to. Still though, this year had its series of ups and downs and while all of the games I've played might not have gotten site reviews, I still played an awful lot of games. Hopefully I'll have a slew of games to review in January and those that don't I'll make a new omniderp video to cover, but until then please enjoy.....

The 2016 Ragey's
Seriously, Who does a nobody have to blow to get a sponsorship for their blog???

10: The "Empty Best Friends Photo Frame" award for "Game I wish I got to play" goes to....

Attack On Titan (PS4)

Originally, this was Persona 5 because it keeps getting delayed. But it's coming soon so I just need to hang on. Instead, I found myself rather infatuated with the Attack on Titan game that came out earlier this year. I enjoy the show so all I really wanted to see out of this game was flying around in the 3d gear and killing big naked titans. And I'll be damned if that's not exactly what this looked like. It looked like it really maintained a lot of the fun swinging around in the old Spiderman 2 on PS2 had, so I look forward to actually sitting down with this one.

9: The "Jesus Christ, People actually voted for Trump" garbage award for "Biggest Disappointment" goes to.....

Nights of Azure

I'm a huge fan of Gust games, and the trailer made this seem so damn cool with fast moving action and combos. It was Gusts first attempt at a more action based game so I was willing to be kind with it, but I have to call a spade a spade here. At best, this game was decidedly average. The music is good and the action is ok, but the combat all feels very mashy and loose. There's no real weight, the side quests seem trite, it doesn't have a lot of clear direction in what it wants to do, the story tries to be tragic and heartwarming but it never seems to do a good enough job explaining the stakes, and if I'm being honest it was incredibly easy. 

I beat the game expecting there to be more to it but apparently I had little struggle with any boss in the game. It wasn't a terrible game, it was just incredibly underwhelming. That said, If they revisit this and change some things, it has potential to actually be something I think.

8. The "Holy Shit, Cleveland Actually Won a Championship" award for "Biggest Surprise" goes to.....

Doom 2016

Sometimes, people just get it right. And that is exactly what happened here. As guy who is lukewarm to shooters I came into this wanting just to shoot iconic baddies with iconic weapons on mars while moving really fast. Not only did Doom deliver on all of those fronts, but it also handed me one of the most bad ass soundtracks I've heard in a game in a long time. Honestly it might been the best soundtrack this year (but only because another item on this list came out at the end of last year.) I enjoyed my time with Doom so much that I considered it a must own. I haven't even bothered with the multiplayer and I still want to go back and play it.


7. The "Esports Tourney Grand Finals Match" award for "Most Hyped game" this year goes to.....

 Overwatch

I don't like putting this one here because I consider "overhyped" be a negative connotation, and despite what I thought, Overwatch is really a great game. But if there is any game that had a hype train building around it, it definitely was Overwatch. So this year, I'm removing the "over" in this years award. A lot of people were very excited for this game, and when they started putting out all the nifty trailers to promote the game, it even got me to take notice of it.

Blizzard didn't reinvent the wheel here, nor did they make something truly original I feel. But I would be an idiot to deny what a cultural force Overwatch has become. Comics, cosplays, fan dominated alternate character story lines, hilarious misrepresentations, I Hanjo, and even an dedicated pornography fanbase and bdsm community (this actually isn't surprising, but the fact that major sources highlighted it is). Overwatch was an exceptional game and earned the hype it generated. Credit where its due on this one, Overwatch generated a hype machine and deserves all of it. It got a guy who doesn't like shooters to play it all the time.



6. The "Another Marvel Movie" award for "Flash in the Pan" game of the year.

Uncharted 4: A Thief's end

Uncharted is a very good series of games. But when you start rehashing the same game over and over, all you can really change are the maps and story. I don't feel Uncharted was wearing out its welcome but it was getting to the point where they weren't exciting me anymore and when you do the over the top blow up action movie as your base model, that's a problem. Uncharted 4 was not a perfect game because a lot of the things that annoyed me in the other games still hold true here.

But what this game does very very right? Is that it closes the book on the Nathan Drake story, and does it satisfyingly so. When this game ended and I did the epilogue sequence, I was left feeling very happy with how things shook out. I was able to put this series to bed and be happy to do so. I hope naughty dog sticks it too. Uncharted 4 doesn't break the mold but it does what it does, and does it well. Just another solid entry in the action adventure genre. 

5. The "2016 Cleveland Browns Season Ticket Package" award for "Worst Value" goes to....

Street Fighter V/Guilty Gear Revelator

Street Fighter V and Revelator get to share the worst value award because despite being technically sound fighting games that are very good, they both went the bullshit cash grab route. SF started off promising by telling people that anything was in the game you could unlock by playing it. I was happy to hear that. I was immediately unhappy by learning that the ways to do this were so arduous and time consuming that I lost interest in the game before I actually unlocked a character. This is Capcom though, so this is to be expected.

Guilty Gear however should know better. It was almost 10 years before we finally got a new iteration of the game and I was pretty stoked about it, even with the 2 extra paid DLC characters. But what seemed like not even a year later, they put out a new full priced version of the game with a few more characters, but no English dialog even though the last one had it. Sorry, the stuff that got put in could have just been a DLC update. That's a cash grab. Bad year for fighting games.



4. The "15 Dollar asking price for this game" award for "Best Value" goes to....

Stardew Valley (pc)

The Internet actually went insane when this game came out in February. People who pirated the game loved it so much they went back and paid for it honestly. People who loved the game actually paid for copies of it for pirates to have when they couldn't afford it. I never got to play Harvest Moon growing up but always wanted to. Then I saw Kotaku posting about this game very frequently so I decided to check it out.

And what followed was close to 200 incredibly chill hours taking care of my hilariously immature named farms, fighting monsters down in the mine, courting the many singles of Pelican Town, marrying the lovely Abigail (the of course fictional perfect woman for me who doesn't fucking exist.), and harvesting dem blueberries. I still sink hours a day playing Stardew Valley and am ready to buy it again when the multiplayer mode gets released so I can infect my sisters with it too.

3. The "Because I don't hate myself enough" Honorable mention goes to....

Darkest Dungeon (PC)

Similarly, another steam game that ate and is still eating a significant chunk of my life goes to this mother fucker. A game that quickly teaches you that progress is not linear, and that everything you knew about RPG grinding is wrong. The game is relentless, merciless, and in a lot of ways fucking hopeless. This game deals a lot with the occult, which is fitting because it has no soul. And by the end of it neither will you.

I struggled so much to progress. Caught in chains of trying to keep dead weight characters alive because I didn't want to start over, Trying to hang on for one more room to finish a dungeon instead of getting out when I should have and losing 2 or 3 people. Preparing teams for near hours for a high level dungeon only to get completely fucked inside the first fight. Or most recently, having the perfect set of circumstances break your way in a dungeon before an approaching boss fight only to have mean nothing and STILL get your shit ruined at the end.

Darkest Dungeon changes a lot of the rules on how RPGs are played, and not everyone is going to get through this game. The only reason I still play it, is I've hit an ironclad state of "Fuck you game, you will not best me."....... But I've been wrong before.

2. The "Pretty Much ALL Of 2016" award for "Worst Game of the Year" goes to.....

Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness (PS4)

Ugh, Someone at Tri-ace really dropped the ball on this one. I don't think I've ever played a Star Ocean where I was so underwhelmed and bored at the onset that it killed any desire I had to play it. Shakey camera, poor acting, awkward controls, unlikable characters, droning unskippable cutscenes, and this is the flipping opening of the game! How did it all get messed up so badly? Why does square insist on trying to reinvent something that worked and worked well. Even Star Ocean: The Last Hope for all its hokey acting and flaws still was fun to play all the way to the finish. I couldn't even get this one started.

I might go back to it to see if it gets better later, but literally any other game I had available to play took precedent over this. If you want to play a Star Ocean, play literally any of the other ones. I'm pissed I paid 60 bucks for this.

1. The "Game that surprisingly isn't Dark Souls 3" Award for "Best game of the year" goes to...

Undertale (PC)

Of course its Undertale.

I was a little late to the party with Undertale. Something I wholeheartedly regret. If I had played it around when I actually bought it, it had an honest shot of being my game of the year last year. It's time to make up for that. Undertale as it stands alone is a JRPG/Bullet Hell hybrid with some very quirky characters and exceptional music. But that's not what makes it great. The game pitches itself as the game where nobody has to die.

And that, my friends, was the whole fucking point. The game's creator, Toby Fox, took great care in crafting the opening tutorial area of the game. It's entire point was to put you in the mindset that sympathetically designed monsters are just making the best with what they have and may attack you, but don't really want to fight. Adhering to this lesson treated you to one of the most emotionally satisfying games I've ever played in my life. To the point where I actually shed tears at its true ending (and still do every time I see it). If you ignored Toriel's advice and resorted to violence, you are treated to an unfulfilling neutral ending. If you took the effort to do a genocide run, You were treated as you should have been: the only real monster in the game. It was fucking brilliant.

So many people I tried to get to play this game, and almost all of them killed monsters and ignored the story and never saw what I did. Missed out on so many of the emotional punches. And its a damn shame (although some did eventually see the light, so credit to those few.). That's really my only complaint about the game: All the bullshit reasons people tell me why they won't. "I don't like the graphics", "It's too quirky", "I don't use steam", "It sounds stupid", "I don't like the fandom". Conglaturation, you missed out on something truly special for very stupid reasons.

THIS game could have won most overhyped, but I feel it deserves every single bit of hype it gets and then some. Almost everything about this game is perfect: The music, the story, the characters, the play time, the fan created AU's, the merch. I love Undertale. It might be one of my favorites of all time. Easily, EASILY my game of the year. Fuck, I'd give it game of the year for the next 10 years. It's that good. If you want any more proof, its the game that got me to stop talking about Persona 4. A copy of it was given to the Pope for fucks sake.

Can't believe I'm still writing on this thing considering how little traction it gets. Here's to the next year of it. Thanks for reading.  -- CannonMan ┌∩┐(◣_◢)┌∩┐