Another big gap with updates. Played a few games from December-January, then had a bunch of things happening that ruined my desire to play anything (intense stomach pain for a few months, followed by the illness[lung cancer] and ultimate passing of my cat, Velvet).

Quick update

(December 23-January 27)

• Alwa's Awakening - I'll be honest, I can't remember much about this one. It was over 5 months ago, and was really forgettable. The only thing I can recall was that while it was a mediocre metroidvania, with nothing standing out about it. The platforming was fine, but the abilities were boring. Very middle of the road


• Cat Quest - Fun little action game. The humor was definitely hit or miss, but the gameplay was solid, if easy. Going through dungeons to get gear is rather quick, and the exp gained seems to be a bit high. It didn't take long before I was one-shotting most enemies with the spike spell+slowdown combo. I imagine hard mode is where the game truly begins, but will save that for another time


• Dust: Elysian Tail - The story and characters honestly felt like they came from a middle-schooler. None of them were likeable, and everything felt forced. When the characters weren't acting manic with their emotions (especially the underground creatures... Good lord, their attitudes changed just about every sentence), they were complete dullards. Outside of the god-awful writing though, the gameplay itself was solid. Mute the game, skip the dialogue, and the game itself is fun.


• Shovel Knight - Awesome platformer, and totally worth the praise it gets.


• Shovel Knight: Plague - The plague-knight campaign, however, felt a bit off. While dashing around with the scythe (edit: jumping around with the explosions) was fun, it also made maneuvering around rather difficult.


• Super Puzzle Platformer - super chill game, good for just unwinding. Once you get the rhythm of the levels, it becomes very calming just jumping around and shooting.


• Pixeljunk Eden - Another chill game. Some of the later levels, however, were less so, once they introduced fluctuating gravity, but excluding those, it was a nice game


• Kevlin and the Infamous Machine - Disconected, the game. An alright point-and-click game, but I wish they had put more effort into making the levels feel more connected. As it was, it felt like a cheap imitation of Day of the Tentacle. Once you finish a time-period, it's suddenly "oh, there is a problem somewhere else now", with no real rhyme or reason to it.


• Bit Dungeon 2 - The game looks like a zelda-like game, but outside of the dungeons that you explore, is nothing like it. You kill mobs on your way to dungeons, level up, enter the dungeon, get to the boss and annihilate him to unlock a piece of the door to the final area. Rinse and repeat 8(?) times. The catch, however, is that you only have one life, and if you die, it's back to square one, with each door-piece now lost. As long as you loot the caves, and buy the weapons, you shouldn't have too much of a problem.

(January 28-May 6)

• Started up Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters and played through the first few planets. Some of the controls are wonky, and it definitely missed some polish, but no where near as bad as the R&C fans make it out to be. In fact, the last planet I completed had some incredibly fun minigames (basketball, lemmings, and robot wars)


• Shadow of War - Definitely missing some of the charm of the original game (not to mention some of the OPness from certain skill combos, which have now been reduced to "either or" skills). Definitely more difficult, which is a major plus - no more attacking a stronghold, then retreating for health 10 feet away. Though, the difficulty modes need some balance. The difference between normal and hard is miles apart. On hard, orcs will adapt to your moves almost instantly, making it so you have to change your strategy against them multiple times. Some captains, based on their perks, become practically impossible though, what with their healing and invulnerabilities. Haven't completed it yet, but have yet to see the major "grind" people complain about...
  

(May 7-May 14)

• Just Cause 3 - This game definitely plays like a continuation of a previous Just Cause game. However, having never played any of the other games in the series, I feel as though I missed out on some important connection with the characters. Perhaps the story will better resonate with people actually familiar with the games, but for me, I didn't care for it. It also didn't help that once the whole country had been liberated (spent a few days doing this first), the story missions themselves could be completed in under 5 hours.
  As for the gameplay, it was extremely repetitive and rather frustrating. Certain skills and features that should have come standard required tedious grinding to unlock (ex: After you get fast-travel, you may only use it once before restocking the feature at a supply depot... unless you spend hours liberating towns to gain access to mini-games that allow you to allocate skillpoints to increase your "max fast travel" slots...Then you have 3, or eventually 5)... After a while, once you unlock the best helicopters, and the ability to fast travel multiple times, it gets better. Having more options to liberate towns and plow through missions makes it almost worth the time investment.