Topic: Games You Recently Beat?

Personally I try to beat two games per month. Though some of the time RPG's tend to take up my gaming slot of the entire month. The most recent game I beat was Metroid for the NES. This is both the first Metroid and NES game I've ever beaten. I have to say I'm fairly surprised how intriguing it was to go through all the corridors and fight the aliens on that planet. Very impressed by what was pulled off through the limitations of that console. Now on to Metroid: Samus Returns!

I beat the Great Ace Attorney. Well the first one out of the two you get. I always underestimate how long the final cases go on and end up playing longer than usual at the end (except for Apollo Justice lol).

Also, by sheer coincidence, the only two long games I beat this year had me far more invested in the very end than the rest of the game.

Anyway, it is an Ace Attorney game than isn't the first Edgeworth game or the spinoff so the fact that it was great is the least surprising thing in the world. Ace Attorney is great, and has remained mostly consistently great (even those two games I just mentioned are merely just "good") for a long time now. Nintendo levels of consistency, but with less hit or miss attempts at innovation. So the only interesting things to even bring up are what made this one different from other games.

I would say the surprisingly different pacing of the cases compared to past games (which only work at times) is the big negative compared to usual and the big positive is that its almost certainly the best looking game in the series, particularly for how it uses its animation. Especially since it lacks the awkward attempts the mainline 3DS games had of trying to bring the original characters into 3D. But the pacing wouldn't be much of a problem if it wasn't clear that this just doesn't feel as much like a complete story like past games. Like it gets most of the way there, but it ultimately does feel like the first half of a bigger story. Which is fine since the other game is right there to play, but I don't want to play both games back to back and ignore my other games anymore.

I will say, I'm not sure if I've gotten better at this or if this game is easier or more predictable somehow (I don't think it is?) but I did get more "omg this is what happened!" realizations than I normally do in these games. Like I'd realize something even before I have to bring it up, and all of them were really cool twists to figure out, is what I mean specifically (since figuring out plot twists is already part of this game's gameplay essentially :V).

I finished Castlevania: Dracula X. I did enjoy it, but it feels a lot like an NES Castlevania that just happens to be on SNES. And that makes it really awkward. Based on it being a port of another Castlevania, that might explain a lot. And at times it feels like too much of the annoying parts of the NES Castlevanias (well 1 and 3, it has not much to do with 2) and less of the best parts. But its still there, its still close enough to those games that I had a good time. But I'm also glad it was an extra among other games. Being a lesser Castlevania 1/3 (or to be more exact, a lesser Rondo of Blood) is still plenty compared to the majority of actual NES games.

I did use save states, but half the time it was because I just wanted to take my score all the way to the end. But it did also help me at points (especially stage 6) not wasting my time between the actual challenging parts. Otherwise I wouldn't have bothered beating it (at least not any time soon). There's also at least one alternate route apparently, so I might try that at some point.

I've still been slacking on this thread, but my schedule has been insane lately. In reverse order:

Shovel Knight: Shovel of Hope (Switch)
I picked this up on sale relatively recently. I realize Treasure Trove would've been a better buy, but I've really only ever been interested in the main/base game and didn't really want to play through all the campaigns. I also have no interest in Shovel Knight Showdown.

I recognize it for what it is: a very good game. Fun mechanics, clever writing, an interesting story even if we've seen it before, really neat pixel art, amazing music, and some unique, fun characters. It's also a very challenging game. Most of the time, the challenge level felt fair, but there were more than a few times where it felt like the game intentionally trolls the player with some enemy placement or within a scenario. I particularly hated the scrolling in Tinker Knight's stage.... There are insta-deaths via spikes and falling into pits. The player loses some gold, and there's a way to lower that amount, but if one dies over a pit....Yeah, you usually aren't getting that gold back. Said gold is used to purchase armor and equipment upgrades, health and magic upgrades, and relics that give Shovel Knight more abilities. There are checkpoints scattered throughout each level, but unfortunately the game doesn't save until you actually clear or leave a stage or point of interest. This system isn't entirely portable-friendly.

This one is easy to recommend for those who love and/or are nostalgic for challenging, charming platformers. Just be aware of what you're getting into before buying.

Luigi's Mansion 3
The latest in the Luigi's Mansion franchise, and my primary Halloween game for this year. This title features Luigi, Mario, Princess Peach, and three Toads being invited to the Last Resort, a 17-floor hotel nestled in a mountainous region. It turns out this is a ploy by King Boo to capture everyone and frame them in portraits (Seriously, what is up with Nintendo villains and paintings?). Luigi narrowly escapes this fate and works to free everyone else...as well as Professor E. Gadd, who was lured there under similar circumstances.

As with previous installments, Luigi must work to vacuum up ghosts and explore the environment he's in using the Poltergust G-00. There are plenty of puzzles in place to solve in order to acquire cash and, occasionally, gems. New to this game, players can also slam around ghosts for some extra damage as well as utilize Gooigi (Luigi's Flubber-like clone, who returns from the Luigi's Mansion 3DS port) to explore otherwise unreachable areas and solve some puzzles. The game is absolutely gorgeous in HD, both during normal gameplay and the cinematics. Most of the hotel floors follow a theme, and each adds something unique to the game. Most of the boss fights are fun, and there are plenty of gems and Boos to collect on each floor for added game longevity. There are plenty of fun moments and some catchy music to boot.

This is a low-key game oozing with the franchise's (and thus, Nintendo's) charm. It's easy to recommend for all ages as a nice way to unwind before bed...at any time of the year.

Dragon Quest Heroes: Rocket Slime
A spinoff of the Dragon Quest franchise, this DS action title is probably one of the best spinoffs I've played. The player controls Rocket (or whatever they want to name him), the only slime remaining after the Plob (Platypunk + mob) kidnaps all the other residents of his kingdom, Slimenia. The plot doesn't take itself seriously and is a fun romp throughout, full of great writing, punny names (per Dragon Quest charm), and hilarious moments. The gameplay mechanics are fun, from collecting items (and monsters) out in the field for use back in town to trade for gold or use as tank ammo, to participating in tank battles. Tank battles are the meat of the game and take some strategy; you have to manually load your ammo and try to time your rounds to deflect those of the enemy, hit the enemy tank, and cause various effects. The game gives the player ways to upgrade their tank's HP and ammo, as well as customize the crew that helps you. The game is also graphically charming. It references previous DQ titles, particularly Dragon Quest VIII, but it isn't necessary to play any previous games to enjoy this title.

This one is easy to recommend for Dragon Quest fans, those looking for something unique for their DS collection, or those who just want a short, fun action title (~15 hours) to keep them busy on a trip. Be warned that this title was only released in Japan and North America, so those in other regions may need to rely on importing.

Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice

The penultimate game in my Soulsborne marathon, Sekiro was the first one that felt like a major departure from established setting and gameplay design. Gone are the vaguely medieval fantasy settings, and it took the stamina bar and dodge rolling with it. Instead Sekiro is set in civil war ridden Sengoku period Japan (although it incorporates supernatural elements for good measure) where sword duals ruled the land, and if you don't learn the deflect mechanic then you won't travel very far I'm afraid.

Combat is the focus in Sekiro, almost to a fault. There's no leveling, no equipment, no schools of magic. As a journeyman Souls-player this flummoxed me. How come I keent destroy the baddies what with the only weapon I've ben given? Why is my dodge as ineffective as a "no means no" at a Cosby mixer? Why does everybody keep getting sick when I die? Better get used to that folks, because (true to the Fromsoft tradition) the game retrains you via choke-chain to learn the ins-and-outs. At one point I'd made up my mind to quit before I invested too much time in something that I wasn't enjoying. Then, miraculously, the third boss fight Genichiro Ashina was where it fell into place for me. He forces you to interact with him via deflect like no boss prior. This made the boss fight go from "i don't know how to do this" to "kind of easy". And the satisfaction you feel from that, well.....it's the reason to play these types of games. Once you learn how to defend yourself, you'll begin trying out your various shinobi tools to see what's most effective at creating an opening with your opponent, breaking their posture, and landing the deathblow.

However, while I love the clashing of steel it isn't all a shower of lovely sakura petals - the game reuses bosses of both the mini and standard variety entirely too often for my liking. I haven't checked but i'm pretty sure it's the lowest unique boss count for a Souls game. To compound this, some of the areas are revisited too (and not in a voluntary "back-tracking for loot" kinda way). Fortunately the improved mobility imparted by stealth, grappling, swimming, and a proper darn jump made traversal engaging almost all the time for me.

The story is functional. It gave me enough motivation to contemplate flavor text and NPC dialogue but it's not a lore pit to dive deep into. That's not to say the characters are poorly done. Matter-of-fact one of my favorite things was finding different types of sake to share and have a conversation over. It's such a little detail that doesnt really earn you anything, but it's those things that engender caring for a character (it helps that I like sake a bit too). Minor spoiler: there are a few different endings and how you interact with characters influences the pathways to those endings.

I didn't think it was gonna turn out this way but Sekiro ends up being one of my favorite Souls games. It's one of the few I immediately considered replaying. It has some obvious superficial flaws. And the first 5 hours or so will be hard whether you've played Souls games or not (although after that I found it to be easier than the average Souls game). But it's a great change of pace for Fromsoft. It's different enough but not so much so that it feels alienating. By cutting the extensive skills and equipment the game can focus on the intensity and fun of combat.

post summary info:
-hardest boss for me was Demon of Hatred. Felt like a Bloodborne boss.
-it felt shorter than its ilk.
-areas where very pretty.
-There's no co-op or summons in this one, so if you're struggling there's no way to make this one easier.

I beat Metroid Dread. I'm not gonna say its the greatest Metrroid/Metroidvania game ever, but it is pretty much what I expected when MercurySteam no longer were chained down by having to have their game be the 2nd best remake of Metroid 2. It's a really great return to form, and I like how they handled most things in the game. I loved the difficulty and the weird ways they cut back and forth between areas throughout the game, in terms of things that made this game stand out. I thought the EMMI sections were done really well, even if the 2nd to last one was maybe a bit of a cheap way to make them feel deadly again. But even when I knew what to do, they never lost the sense that I needed to be careful and/or quick.

So its an awesome game, but I do have a couple of issues. I wasn't as into the story as I would've hoped, even if some of what happens (particularly late game) is pretty cool and even a bold direction to go (especially if Metroid 6 comes out in less than 19 years). But while they did their best to do more subtle storytelling, which I appreciated, I didn't always love how they did it. That also is part of my issue that it felt like ALBW to me. In that it tried to take this classic, simple style of gaming and mix it with modern gaming sensibilities, and in both cases, there are just points where the mix of old and new just ends up feeling more meh than the rest of the game. I'm also still not hugely into the graphics. Like its fairly high quality for a Switch game, and its not bad, but outside of a few moments and enemies, nothing about it makes it live up to the GBA games tbh. It's hard for me to explain why to be fair, because a lot of it is technically well done and far more impressive than those older games could even hope for. It's not like Pokemon where I'm begging for sprites to come back or NSMB where its art style is nothing. But despite their best efforts, I just got more out of Super and the GBA games in terms of how they look, on average.

But otherwise, great stuff. I mean, Shadow Complex had a far more boring art style, and that was basically a great Metroid game on its own, so this is plenty.

Doki Doki Literature Club (PC) - This visual novel...is very hard to talk about without spoiling anything. Normally, I'm not into dating sims at all, but word of mouth piqued my interest. Suffice it to say that this game is much more than it appears. Please, PLEASE do heed the content warning. Specifically "This game is not suitable for children or those who are easily disturbed."

If you, dear reader, have the slightest bit of interest in this game, just dive in and play!

Just completed Yoku’s Island Express, which I purchased a while ago on sale but only recently got around to playing.

It’s a really sweet little adventure. I actually ended up enjoying it more than Metroid Dread. Not that they’re really comparable, apart from both being side-splorers, but I’d just beaten Dread previously, so it’s still fresh in the mind.

I found that Dread rarely felt truly confined and claustrophobic, nor genuinely open and exploratory. The gating was very on-the-nose (you do not have power up X and therefore cannot advance here yet), and the lack of puzzles or technical platforming sections meant that it lacked the cerebral element of, say, Zelda’s dungeons, or the pure kinetic thrill of something like Celeste. Again, completely different genres, but they both contain examples of larger areas segmented into connected ‘rooms’ which need to be overcome through skill or ingenuity, and this keeps things interesting.

I sort of felt like the rooms in Dread were much of a muchness, with the challenge mainly coming from boss fights. Boss fights are rarely my favourite part of any game, and Dread didn’t really change that with its mantra of ‘die until you learn the patterns, after which the fight turns somewhat rote and repetitive’.

Yoku on the other hand doesn’t have a whole lot of gating, and you’re free to hurl yourself around the map with reckless abandon. It feels like the map is opening up more organically, and the range of characters and challenges seamlessly woven into the world make it feel much more alive and interconnected.

So, err… there are my thoughts of two wildly different games. If there’s another crazy sale on Yoku, I’d thoroughly recommend it. Even without a sale, I’d recommend it to anyone looking for a really novel side-sploring game, whether they’re pinball fans or not.

@Maxz I've heard on multiple occasions Yoku is a great game. I'll have to pick it up sometime. Likewise, you nailed my Metroid Dread concerns right on the head: I don't really find the obligatory gating due to not having a certain ability engaging anymore. I haven't bought it yet, and that's pretty much why.

I was gonna do a big write up on the Demon's Souls Remake and then I thought better of it. An exclusive on a hard to acquire console, who's fansite i'm not even on....well it just felt arbitrary. Regardless, a few things stuck out to me:

-it was the easiest and shortest Souls game for me, by no small margin. Play time was under 30 hours and I bested almost all bosses in one or two attempts (with two exceptions). However, the areas are still pretty challenging depending on the order you choose to explore them.
-The remake by Bluepoint to me (someone who never played the original) is fantastic. Looks great, plays great, and I personally enjoy the aesthetic changes and the redone soundtrack. The soundtrack in particular is one of my favorites from the series. All of my grievances are related to original design.
(Those grievances are:)
-forging better weapons is a mess in this game. You need so many different types of stones to upgrade your weapon it becomes overwhelming. And to upgrade your weapon to a boss weapon it needs to be at a specific level (+6? Perfect! +7 you've gone too far).
-Multiple healing items becomes too fussy. This really made me appreciate Estus Flasks. Having a finite, but refillable, number of healing items means you dont have to farm or buy "potions" anymore but instead you have to manage when to use them since they're gone until you can rest at a bonfire. While having access to a lot of healing, combined with item encumberment, becomes a bit of a pain. I had like 30lbs of grass on me in Demon's Souls (grass being the token healing item). I think that's a felony.
-Very little lore in item descriptions. This may be a "me thing" but I would always go out of my way to get a shiny because, at the very least, I'd get a small snippet of story. Even if it wasn't something I was gonna use I enjoyed the world building aspect of it. Demon's Souls doesnt have that and it frustrated me. Why is there a giant armored spider down in the mines!?! Tell me game!

It's worth mentioning that I enjoyed experiencing these things, even if in hindsight I think they're improved on in later games. That's what Demon's Souls was for me - a point of comparison between the starting point of this series and its future trajectory. And I got my money's worth. It might be a good starting point for someone who wants to get into the series, but it's not worth buying a PS5 over (whether they're available or not imo).

Guess that was a long post anyway 😂

A SURPRISE ENCOUNTER WITH ZERO TIME DILEMMA EMERGES

I played and finished Zero Time Dilemma recently too. This was my second time playing it (first was at launch) and it went better than I expected but it still doesn't stick the landing. Having the story broken into selectable fragments that fill in the flow chart is pretty clever in theory. In execution however, it eventually bottlenecked into a moment where it looked like i had done everything but then no fragments proceeded to open. This same thing happened to me during my first playthrough, too. It kind of kills its momentum. And the game obviously falters when it comes to puzzle rooms, direction, and story. It comes off like a B movie that's trying really hard. It's endearing but underwhelming.

@Losermagnet I liked the flowchart approach, honestly. It was an interesting way to structure the story. The bigger issue for me (besides the obviously terrible writing in spots, lame new characters, underwhelming twists, and fundamental failure as a follow-up to VLR) is that they didn't have the budget to make the cinematic approach they took with this game work properly. The 3D models are just dreadful looking abominations.

@Ralizah the storytelling through fragments is the best part of the game. It kind of comes off like a 'Memento'-esque experience but with multiple timelines. Specifically what bothered me was when Eric points the gun at Sean I had to let the timer run out to unlock the 4th ending, and then the next fragment. Thats on me mostly, because for some reason I didnt think of that being an option. But that the game completely stopped until I did that was a bummer. Whereas in my first playthrough what happened was I had to select both options during the acid bath fragments with each team. Somehow I remember that from 4 or 5 years ago, but that's how engrossed I was I s'pose. Not saying it's bad, but maybe more of a pacing thing.

The 3d models are awful. They're so limited in what they can do. It feels like a regression from Virtue's Last Reward's way more animated models (although 999 has my personal favorite design). I'd forgotten that we basically weren't suppose to get Zero Time Dilemma, so I'm just happy it exists. I never expected Uchikoshi to be able to write himself out of the spider's web of a plot he spun anyway.

Edit: expressive. Thats the word I wanted to use to describe VLR's characters. While they have a limited number of animations themselves and it's only visable through typical visual novel portraiture combining that with the excellent voice acting really gives you a sense that those bits of code are a real thing. ZTD is just....awkward to watch.

So I recently returned to Shantae and the Seven Sirens in light of the "Spectacular Superstar" update that released for it, as I wanted to judge the impact of the balance improvements firsthand.

The meat of this update, arguably, and what I'll primarily be discussing, is the way this updated version of the game (now dubbed the "Definitive" version, although the older, unbalanced version of the game is still preserved in a Legacy Mode) rebalances certain aspects of the game. The biggest improvement address my biggest complaint about the game: the food drops. For the uniniated, Seven Sirens featured a mechanic where food would drop from enemies and could be consumed from the inventory. Sounds fine at first, but food dropped way too often and healed tons of health.

Food drops WAY less often now, and heals significantly less damage than it did previously. This seems like it should be a small thing, but it really is transformative to the experience, as the player can no longer casually tank endless amounts of damage because they have giant piles of food in their inventory to rely on. Additionally, the player seems to take more damage from small enemies, and bosses have been made more aggressive in their attack patterns. All this adds up to a more satisfyingly challenging dungeon-crawler, as the player will actually need to deliberately stock up on restoration items if they want to make it through a dungeon without seeing a Game Over. And the player will see this a lot more, frankly.

Now, the game can still easily be trivialized, as the player seems to be able to still buy endless amounts of health and mana restoration potions, auto-potions, upgrades that reduce damage taken and dealt, etc. I'm not a huge fan of being able to easily buy enough materials to tank damage endlessly. But, see, here's the thing: before this update, I never even bothered buying health portions, because I always had tons of food drops to lean on. The vastly more balanced food item drops now make it where I actually had to stock up on materials from time to time, and could even talk about this aspect of the game as a result.

If the player is swimming through this game by tanking damage now, they're making the deliberate choice to stock up on tons of items to do so. It's extremely accessible, but also easily makes it where more skilled players can still experience a challenge without feeling like they're gimping themselves or not engaging with the game's mechanics (like, the game would be difficult in any mode if you never increased your health, for example, but at that point it just feels like you're handcuffing yourself in order to be able to enjoy the experience).

And, frankly, that's not always even a guarantee. I stocked up materials as needed (not a crazy amount, but far more than I did in the rest of the game) before the final boss, but the increased difficulty meant I'd burned through the majority of my resources and was actually at risk of dying by the time I made it through the final dungeon and confronted the last boss. That's... nice. Shantae games aren't the Dark Souls of Platformers or whatever, but they have traditionally demanded a modicum of skill from the player. This update brings Shantae that much more in line with the best games in the series.

It's probably worth mentioning that bosses have a bit of dialogue and actual character portraits now. These don't add a lot to the game (you get, maybe, 10 lines of new dialogue overall per boss encounter), but it does add that tiny little extra bit of polish to the experience. It's appreciated.

On top of this, three new modes have been added, although they... don't do much for me. Full Deck mode allows the player to start the game with a full deck of monster cards. As I mentioned in my review, those don't tend to dramatically alter the balance of the game, so I'm not fussed about this. Rule Breaker mode allows the player to equip as many monster cards as possible at once (up to 50). This seems like it might be fun to experiment with if you're into experimenting with different set-ups, but it primarily just makes the player character vastly unbalanced again, which isn't really appealing to me. Finally, an easy mode was added, which seems... unnecessary to me, but I guess it might be good for small children. Legacy Mode is already easy enough, though.

While this will never be my favorite game in the series, developer WayForward has done a good job of fixing the core issues I had with this game. It was already a very decent Metroidvania, and now it's an extremely decent one. Really enjoyed my time with this update.

I beat Winback. I can't justify having spent all the time I did to beat Winback, but I did it!

It's a weird game. It's a way too dated version of a genre I don't generally like, that probably wasn't the best even when it came out, that I eventually relied upon save states. I enjoyed my time with it anyway, but I can't possibly say it was good. It was more an amusing trip through to see an early, bizarre attempt to make a 3rd person cover shooter. It almost was really cool at points with what it tried to do in places, but those cool things could be done infinitely better now.

The worst parts of the game were the camera during boss battles and the two sections of the game that heavily re-used areas and were backtracking poorly disguised as new levels. That's when it stopped being amusingly dated and just became annoying.

I beat Tiny Tina's Assault on Dragon Keep yesterday and I can see why everyone says this was the best DLC for Borderlands 2. It was a joy to play and it wrapped up the story of BL2 beautifully.

It is basically more Borderlands 2 but the added Dungeon and Dragons flavor to it did make it unique and refreshing and it's easy to see why Gearbox decided to sell this one as a standalone for Tiny Tina's Wonderland but if you are expecting this one to be drastically different then Borderlands 2 it isn't. It will be interesting to see what they take from this game and incorporate It into Tiny Tina's Wonderland.

As for difficulty it's not to hard enemies are scaled down for the stand alone so if you never got around to playing the game on BL2 due to not being high enough level or never playing BL2 but are Intrested in Dragon's Keep this is a perfect way to play it.

If you do everything the first play through takes about 30 hours or so and once you finish it the first time you unlock the next level of difficulty which gives you better loot drops as in the case with games like this. There is a raid boss too if you are interested in grabbing some friends for that as well.

In the end this game isn't to much of a departure from BL2 but it is unique to stand on its own and as a setup to Tiny Tina's Wonderland.

Recently I beat DooM 3 (the original campaign) on the Switch. I played DooM 3 before but never beat it.

The atmosphere of the game is really nice. In comparison to the other DooM games here you really feel vulnerable.

I will play some other games and return to its expansion packs for sure.

Felt like playing F-Zero X on the VC - just finished the last cup in the game (Joker Cup). Though, I did all the cups on standard. lol

Pokemon Shield - Finally got around to this almost two years after initial release, though I'm glad I waited until the physical carts with all the DLC dropped. Overall I enjoyed my time with this one, though it does suffer from some of the same issues plaguing more recent Pokemon titles.

(I'm not going to go off about "Dexit" since it barely phased me, and I can understand this from a dev perspective, though it did seem mildly unfair that some fan favs were locked behind the DLC; not an issue here, but I feel for those who had the vanilla game and had to grab the DLC separately.)

Positives

• I liked many of the new Pokemon designs, and this batch of starters isn't my least favorite by any means. This is one of a handful of times when I opted for the water starter (Sobble).
• A solid soundtrack, if a bit safe at times.
• I really enjoyed how the gym challenge is framed as some huge sports circuit. The cheering crowds and stadium dynamic for the gyms really adds to the atmosphere IMO.
• The Wild Area is, quite frankly, one of the better things to happen to the series. They took this further with the Isle of Armor and Crown Tundra by not gating most of it into a small area like in the main game.
• The Crown Tundra is fun, varied, full of legendaries and interesting quests (I particularly enjoyed most of the material related to Calyrex and its steed), and I love the dynamic between Peony and Peonia. The Max Lair is also fun for farming Pokemon.
• Some QoL improvements were quite welcome. For example, the game allows you to skip some (though not all) tutorial dialogue.
• Some neat designs for some areas, particularly Hammerlocke

Neutral

• Most characters weren't very memorable, though I'm a fan of both Sonia and Marnie (Does the latter mean I should be on Team Yell?)
• Dynamaxing and Gigantamaxing, while fun, flashy, and occasionally useful, feels like a one-and-done gimmick. I think I prefer Mega Evolution.
• The Isle of Armor was meh overall. Sure, there was plenty to explore and new Pokemon to enjoy, but there wasn't really much that interested me. The plot was pretty one-note, and Diglett hunting only keeps one occupied for so long.
• The post-game, while interesting, didn't have much to it; this probably would be a negative if I didn't dive into the DLC right away. The business involved in obtaining the cover legendary is all well and good, but this could've been executed better (Who names their child Swordward or Shielbert?). At least the player gets a decent battle with Hop out of the deal.

Negatives

• Team Yell. While I felt that Team Skull was a step forward in Sun/Ultra Sun/Moon/Ultra Moon after the train wreck that was Team Flare in the Gen 6 games, this bunch was two steps back. They weren't villains, or even good punks. They're basically just glorified progress blockers with little purpose other than being loud KISS superfans.
• The plot, or lack thereof. There really isn't much of one outside of the segments with Sonia as she goes on her own journey, which I did find interesting. Seriously, whatever happened to "You're of age and responsible now, go out and explore the world with your Pokemon"? Now it's more "Go and focus on your journey. Let the adults handle all the world's problems."
• Hop is seriously annoying. While I appreciate how they tried to handle him being unfocused/borderline depressed after his loss to Bede, I feel this could've been portrayed a lot better.
• Seriously, what is Bede's deal? Who spit in his bean curd? (Brownie points if you get the reference)
• When online functions are running, there's a significant amount of slowdown and pop-in in the Wild Area. I'm surprised this hasn't been patched or remedied by now. For reference, I played almost exclusively in docked mode.
• Whatever happened to the GTS?

There's still plenty here for Pokemon fans to enjoy, as long as they're playing this game for the monsters and gameplay. The DLC is certainly worth it, though more for the Crown Tundra. Anyone expecting a plot deeper than a puddle and a plethora of engaging characters should look elsewhere.

Beat Terminator 3 Redemption on the Gamecube - what a fun game

I beat Oxenfree. It was very good, though it apparently sure does want me to play it again. Maybe someday...