September 2018 Progress

A brawler with JRPG elements, heavy focus on story and lots of minigames. Not similiar to Grand Theft Auto, despite being called "Japanese GTA".

Yakuza 0 was one of the wildest rides I've ever been on. The story is amazing. It keeps surprising you with twists and turns that you don't expect. It's easily one of the best criminal dramas ever made. It might be super serious, but once you start digging into the side content… Oh boy.
I hired a chicken to be one of my real estate managers. I watched two women slap the crap out of them in a underground fight tournament. I sent a TV host to Area 51 to fetch me some weapon parts. I played bowling, sang karaoke and raced miniature cars despite the fact that an entire yakuza family wanted me dead. There's enough side content in this game to make you forget that the main storyline exists - dancing, managing a cabaret club, baseball, mahjong, fishing, even arcade games like OutRun! On top of that, there's a lot of funny and bizarre sidequests (called substories in-game) to do.
As for the main gameplay (fighting enemies), it starts simple. You have a small moveset and no weapons, but as you go further, you'll unlock new moves, new fighting styles (both protagonists have 3 styles + 1 secret style) and you'll be able to craft weapons, firearms, armor and accessories. Beating up enemies is extremely fun. You can pick up stuff like signs, trash cans and bicycles and then smash them on some poor thug's head. You can also perform special attacks that are brutal and sometimes just downright hilarious.
For a game originally released on PS3 in 2015, it looks very beautiful, especially during nighttime. The PC port is quite good. It runs well on low-end PCs and has plenty of settings. Most of the issues present at release were fixed too, but some remain unpatched. The game is fully playable with a mouse and keyboard, but a controller is heavily recommended.

In conclusion, Yakuza 0 is an excellent game that is well worth the $20 it's asking for. The main story alone takes around 30 hours and getting all achievements will take you at least 110 hours. I can't wait for Yakuza Kiwami already.

Oh, and since it's Otterly Cute September, here's a picture of my employee of the month:

A standalone release of two of Grand Theft Auto IV's add-ons: The Lost and Damned & The Ballad of Gay Tony.

TLaD and TBoGT expand GTA IV by giving you 2 new protagonists with new storylines that take place during GTA IV's story, new missions, weapons, vehicles and activities.
TLaD just gives you more GTA IV, differences being that it's shorter, has slightly better bike handling and doesn't have annoying friends that invite you to bowling every 5 minutes.
TBoGT, on the other hand, feels like a big improvement over GTA IV. It has crazy missions, weapons that are fun to use (explosive shotgun, sticky bombs and the gold SMG are the best!), parachutes, underground fights and nightclubs.
Just like IV, EFLC suffers from terrible performance and the fact that it uses Games for Windows Live. I recommend installing this mod pack, which fixes some issues, greatly improves graphics without impacting performance, removes GFWL and restores removed music from radio stations.

I recommend Grand Theft Auto: Episodes from Liberty City to anyone who played and enjoyed GTA IV and wants more. Both expansions are quite solid and I had lots of fun, especially in TBoGT. Completing the main story in both games will take you around 15 hours. Getting 100% completion in both games takes at least 35 hours.

Since there are no Steam achievements for this game, here are 100% completion screenshots:

A physics-based puzzle game.

A pretty short game with quite interesting mechanics. The puzzles are pretty good and easy enough to figure out without a walkthrough. The story is OK, though it seems unnecessary. I also couldn't understand some words because there are no subtitles. The Against the Qlock mode is a nice bonus. It contains 10 new levels that you have to complete as fast as possible. Speedrunning through them is pretty fun, as there's a lot of secrets that you can use to complete levels even faster.

A good choice for those who are looking for a first person puzzle game. The game is around 3 hours long. I would not recommend getting 100% completion, as some achievements are very grindy.

A puzzle adventure game.

This game has a unique and beautiful art style. The city in this game was built in real life and then digitized. It looks so well, you may think it was generated entirely with a computer. The puzzles are hit and miss, though - some are clever and some are too obscure. Luckily, if you ever get stuck, you have a manual that'll help you out. It kind of sucks that the manual gives you a complete solution rather than just a hint, but looking up the solution in the manual is a puzzle by itself - since the manual is huge, you have to figure out which page has the solution you need.

It's worth picking up if you can look past the obscure puzzles. The game takes around 4-5 hours to complete.

A tower-defense game, but the sides are switched - it's you who is attacking.

Gameplay is innovative and addicting. It made me go "Just one more level…". Missions are pretty short, so you can play during a short break or when you're waiting for the bus. The story is basic and the voice acting is pretty good.

If you like strategy, tactics and tower defense games, you'll like this game. It takes around 3 hours to beat this game.