Hello, folks! Long time no see. I haven’t felt like writing til this week because of 2 very different games I played: Final Fantasy XV and A Plague Tale: Innocence both from the xbox pass I noticed something: my taste in games has changed. I fell in love with those big open world areas during my teens after playing San Andreas. I couldn’t get enough games like that. I’d spend 100h-200h+ in each of them. On the other hand, more linear games would bore me and would just consider them not worth the price.

After starting FFXV soon after Plague Tale - story-driven game with a plot that does not stray from its path - I felt incredibly disconnected from FF’s story because of the amount of extra “work” between important missions. I dreaded every single fetch side quest. TBH, it’s not entirely the game’s fault. Both are good games, but I’ve been dreading those stupid marks on the maps for a couple years now. Every single time, I have to climb a “tower” or whatever the game uses to reveal a part of the map and pin 300 more marks, a piece of me just dies. I see them and I start thinking to myself “ain’t nobody got time for that ”.

Honestly, I don’t know if it’s a lack of time or motivation, a growing concern about the size of my backlog or simply a change in taste, maybe a bit of all of them but I’m starting to avoid games when I see the “open world” tag almost as much as I already avoid the “crafting” or “survival” tags. These 3 combined are like the unholy trinity for me. In contrast, linear, story-focused, short games are becoming more and more appealing to me. (Although I’m still having a hard time to accept that paying $30 for a good 2h long game is better than spending that same amount for a game that is 10x longer, when 90% of it is just utterly boring. I guess, years and years of indoctrination are hard to erase. xD)

TL;DR: I used to love open world games and all those 300 fetch side quests where I could just get absorbed in the lore and spend 100h+ in it and I always thought linear, story-driven games were boring and overpriced. Now, I hate big areas, towers that I need to climb, pins on a map, quest markers and everything else related to open world games, meanwhile, a story that can grab my attention for 2-3h is just

Anyway, IIRC I’m supposed to post the games I’ve played these last 7(?) months. It’s not a long list, I haven’t played that many games on steam since they keep adding a lot of good stuff to the xbox pass. Looking forward to playing the new Ori game next week :D If you wanna know more about any of the following games, let me know. (expect Trails of Cold Steel, I’m still playing it)

• Ken Follett's The Pillars of the Earth
  

  15 hours playtime

  41 of 41 achievements

• Life is Strange 2
  

  13 hours playtime

  46 of 46 achievements

• GRIS
  

  5 hours playtime

  17 of 17 achievements

• The House of Da Vinci
  

  4 hours playtime

  6 of 6 achievements

• The Suicide of Rachel Foster
  

  4 hours playtime

  11 of 11 achievements

• The Haunted Island, a Frog Detective Game
  

  56 minutes playtime

  6 of 6 achievements

• Total War: WARHAMMER II
  

  48 hours playtime

  30 of 152 achievements

• Total War: WARHAMMER
  

  39 hours playtime

  34 of 185 achievements

• The Legend of Heroes: Trails of Cold Steel
  

  32 hours playtime

  11 of 51 achievements

• Masquerada: Songs and Shadows
  

  19 hours playtime

  24 of 27 achievements

• The Talos Principle
  

  16 hours playtime

  26 of 40 achievements

• Iconoclasts
  

  12 hours playtime

  6 of 11 achievements

• Baba Is You
  

  9 hours playtime

  10 of 18 achievements

• Primordia
  

  6 hours playtime

  19 of 29 achievements

• Inked
  

  5 hours playtime

  24 of 30 achievements

• Why Am I Dead At Sea
  

  4 hours playtime

  21 of 27 achievements

• The Cave
  

  3 hours playtime

  12 of 27 achievements

Xbox game pass for pc

Ok. Since I spent most of this month playing games from the Pc Pass, I decided to write a bit about it. I bit the bullet a couple weeks ago and subscribed. It costs $1 (It includes regional pricing options - I paid 25 cents instead of a dollar thanks to that) the first time you sub and the value is out of this world. I thought I’d wanna play 2-3 games, but there are many more I could see myself trying in the next couple months. Let me talk a bit about the games I’ve played this month:

• Metro Exodus

  This is the game that got me to sub, so I had to try this one first. Let me say that this game is amazing. It’s the best post-apocalyptic I’ve played and A LOT more immersive IMHO than Fallout 4 and others games in this subgenre. I’m not good explaining stuff, so I’ll leave this video here from Game Maker’s Toolkit where he talks about the game It’s really a shame so many people won’t even try this game because of the whole EGS vs Steam controversy. It does have some flaws: the story starts a bit slow, the second map is a bit too big for its own good and therefore might bore completionists. However, none of these small flaws, ruin the experience at all. Overall, it’s still an amazing game and a very solid 8 or 9 out of 10. It took me a week or so to beat it (13-16h, I’d say)

• Guacamelee 2

  It improves almost everything when compared to the first. The writing is even funnier. I laugh out loud at lot playing this game. The gameplay is still solid with a mix of combat and platforming. If anything, it’s a bit easier than the original. The “Git gud” yes, it’s called like that area is way easier. Same for achieving the true ending by collecting golden key pieces Another great game. (9-12h long)

• Super Lucky’s tale

  I didn’t like this game and stopped playing after the third level. The main character is awful to control. Very slow and clunky. It’s heavily inspired by Donkey Kong - you even collect letters to form his name -, but without anything that makes DK games so good. It’s probably longer, but I couldn’t get past the first hour. I do no recommend it.

• Recore

  I haven’t finished it yet, but I liked it so far. It’s definitely not the system seller MS might have expected, but it’s a decent game. Since I read Fnord’s post yesterday, let me warn you that this game is FULL of gates that won’t let you continue unless you go grind for a couple hours. You need to collect crystal balls to advance. If you focus on the main quest, you won’t have enough to open some vaults that are required to continue. I had like 17 balls and needed 30 to continue. I had to do a bunch of repetitive shit and I’m still missing 5. I just wanna hear the rest of the story. T_T

Overall, I’m quite happy with this offer. It has a few problems For example, by default, the game language is set to be the same your Windows 10 uses. For most MS Studios games that cannot be changed. I hadn’t play a game in portuguese for more than 10 years. It was weird. xD, but the insane value for your money more than makes up for that.

What about you guys, have you tried it? If you have, what should I play next? I appreciate suggestions! :)

I wasn’t gonna write a post just for Sekiro, but I love and hate this game so much that it deserves one.

First of all, if you think Dark Souls is hard. You clearly haven’t tried Sekiro yet. Not only it’s way more brutal than DS, it turns everything you learn in that game against you.
You wanna block against a boss? Dead. Maybe roll? Dead! Mindless spamming or cheesy tatics = 99% chance of dying. So you might ask, what am I supposed to do? Parry and you better git gud. The game is about swords clashing and it shows. Unlike DS that you just had to deplete your enemies HP, in this game, depleting his posture is by far the best way to kill him and you do that by parrying his attack at the correct time. Honestly, Sekiro is as much a Souls game as it’s a rythmn one. If you learn the flow, you learn the game… but it’s for fucking hard…. It took me around 15h just to learn this. I was around the 10th boss Genichiro when the combat finally clicked.

The game has some interestings improvements over DS. The first and biggest addition is the introduction of sub-bosses. They’re are as tough as regular bosses, but usually with less health. Honestly, some are harder than main bosses. Fuck those Ashina Spear guys >.<. Second, you don’t use souls to upgrade your stats. Only to acquire skills. Attack power is increased by killing main bosses and life/posture through sub-bosses and hidden throughout the map. Third, the inclusion of colors other than black and grey PRAISE THE SUN. Seriously, it’s so colorful and beautiful. Look at this: (Last picture might contain spoilers)

Btw, have I told you that the story/worldbuilding isn’t told through enigmatic items/conversations, but cutscenes? I didn’t have to watch any 2h long youtube video to understand everything that I missed!!!!! If that’s not an improvement, I don’t know what is. Seriously though, I always loved Souls games - and I think Miyazaki did an amazing job developing those games -, but imo Sekiro is clearly superior and harder, be warned! than all 3 of them. (Never tried BloodBorne, since I don’t own a PS4)

Edit: Ok, I lied. I’m too lazy to start another post, therefore, here are some other games I played this month: I’m sorry, please don’t hurt me xD
The Room 3: Bought and finished yesterday. It’s 3h long like the previous one. The first is still my favorite. It was a new and clean concept: a bunch of puzzles in a room. The third is still better than the second, but I’m into multiple endings in puzzle games because you’ll be doing the same puzzles 4 times if you wanna complete the game. That’s a nope from me.
Figment: Interesting puzzles that are repeted a bit too much and a phenomenal soundtrack. The story sometimes is really deep and sometimes very childish. It seems the devs didn’t know which path they wanted to take and decided to go for a middle ground. It didn’t work.
Smoke and Sacrifice:I found this game incredibly boring. It was almost a chore to play it. You click and missclick a lot. The story isn’t good enough to hook you into the game. The hand drawn art is nice. The game froze after I killed the last boss and died at the same time, so I decided to give up. I’ve played it enough.

I’ve been playing Xenoblade Chronicles 2 on the Switch as well. 30h in and I’ve been enjoying it a lot! Amazing rpg so far.

Lots of travel and my notebook is awful = not so many games played this month. T_T
I started the first 2 last month, only Rusty Lake should be here, tbh. But shhh, don’t tell anyone

Praey for the Gods

8.3 hours, no achievements
Early Access

More

Yakuza Kiwami

20 hours, 24 of 55 achievements
SG win

More

Rusty Lake Paradise

3 hours, 48 of 50 achievements

More

I also brought my Switch with me and tried to play Pokémon Let’s Go, Pikachu!, but I gave up. The introduction of Pokemon Go mechanics ruined this game for me. It made the game unbelievably boring. The starting pokemon is so OP that you don’t need to catch anything. If that wasn’t enough, the whole team get xp when you fight AND when you catch pokemon (which is just throwing a pokeball on them lame). I defeated Brock (Rock type leader) with a Pikachu. Let that sink in. I hope they don’t add any of that in the Sword and Shild versions.

After re-watching Kimi no na wa (Your Name, in english), I’ve decided to watch the complete works of Makoto Shinkai. Let me say, they’re amazing. My favorite is Kotonoha no Niwa, which honestly is a damn masterpiece and only 45 minutes long. Go watch it. You won’t regret it. I also really liked 5 Centimeters per Second. I hope to watch both Children Who Chase Lost Voices and Voices of a Distant Star this weekend.

I finished The Chalk Man. Honestly, I bought solely because of the cover. It’s one of the best covers I’ve seen in a while. You can’t see in the picture, but the pages’ outlines are black with details to simulate chalk. The book itself has a few good moments, but it falls flat. The big reveal was poorly written, imo. One could see it coming from miles. Well, never judge a book by its cover, kids!

On the other hand, I’ve been reading The Woman in the Window and so far, it’s been great! I saw that a movie with Amy Adams and Gary Oldman is being released later this year and decided to give it a try. Let me just say that it’s a best seller for a reason.

My reading backlog is empty for the first time in forever. I’d appreciate some suggestions. My favorite genres are Mystery/Thrillers, Fantasy and Classics. I’m always up for some detective books as well. Thanks!

Short post. I didn’t play many games this month.

DARK SOULS™: REMASTERED

24 hours, 22 of 41 achievements
9/10

More

Europa Universalis IV

58 hours, 88 of 295 achievements
Total Playtime: 630 hours

Flowers for Algernon

0 hours, no achievements

More

Long post because it’s been a while. Ops. xD
At least I got a bunch of new, cool screenshots:

If you’re interested in one of the games, you can find the list of games used here
Link for the Screenshot community challenge

• Switch screenshots look bad because Nintendo won’t let me transfer high quality pics to my pc. I had to post them on Twitter and take a screenshot. It’s stupid.

Steam

Injustice™ 2

11.6 hours, 34 of 74 achievements

BATTLETECH

40 hours, 58 of 128 achievements

Valthirian Arc: Hero School Story

7.5 hours, 20 of 30 achievements

Rusty Lake: Roots

6.2 hours, 12 of 16 achievements

Yoku's Island Express

7.1 hours, 25 of 31 achievements

Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap

6 hours, 11 of 13 achievements

Non-Steam

Axiom Verge

9 hours, no achievements

Octopath Traveler

38 hours, no achievements
Nintendo Switch

Barakamon

Anime 12 Episodes

A friend recommend me this because I was looking for a "feel good" slice of life anime. I have to say this it's exactly it. It's simple, it's fun and you feel good after watching it. Solid.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Animated movie 117 minutes

Probably the best animatd movie I've seen in a while. It's a fresh take on the Superhero origin story movie. It's surprisingly funny and well-written.

In Cold Blood

Book 343 pages

I always liked thrillers/crime books, so I decided to try the True Crime genre. I haven't finished yet, but so far it's an amazing book. I can definitely see why this book is a classic.

Link for the Screenshot community challenge

My Screenshot challenge is coming up very nice:

If you’re interested in one of the games, you can find the list of games used here

• Switch screenshots look bad because Nintendo won’t let me transfer high quality pics to my pc. I had to post them on Twitter and take a screenshot. It’s stupid.

Steam

Return of the Obra Dinn

8.3 hours, 14 of 16 achievements

Minor games played:
Burly Man at Sea: It’s a very short game with a focus on multiple playthroughs to unlock different story paths. It’s not very good. I was bored after my second playthrough. I still got to a fourth one, but I couldn’t bring myself to play anymore.
Far from Noise: The whole game feels like an excuse to get you to read dialogue while you listen to the sound of nature. Rain and wave sounds are always appreciated. Dialogues are really good too. Unlike, Burly Man at Sea, I enjoyed the 2h I spent with this game.
Elegy for a Dead World: I expected something completely different when I read its steam page. It’s a game about writing stories and reading other people’s stories. However, UI is terrible. I couldn’t find anything and the achievements are completely crazy. You need to get 1000 people to read your story in each world, but there were only 2 people playing when I tried. TL;DR: Game is dead and devs are crazy.

Non-Steam

What Remains of Edith Finch

3 hours, no achievements

And here’s the where I spent all my free time this month:

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

Finally completed this game after 105h!
Let me start by saying that Ocarina of Time is my favorite game ever and this game got really close to top it. It was also my first Zelda since Majora’s Mask, which I didn’t like very much.
Unlike previous Zelda games, it’s an open world game. I’ve played thousand of open world games - 10 ACs, Far Cry, both Mordor games, etc, etc -, but I’ve never experienced such freedom in a game. I think, I finally get why people love open world games. I mean, you still have to defeat Ganon and save Zelda, as always, but in this game

ain’t no mountain high enough
Ain’t no valley low enough
Ain’t no river wide enough
To keep me from getting to you Zelda

Because you can climb, swim and walk literally everywhere.

Unlike previous open world games, towers aren’t there just to unlock a part of the map. Since the game doesn’t add icons on the map, you have to use these vantage points to find all the hidden things in the map, and trust me, there are a lot of interesting things hidden all over the place.

Combat was really good. Controls are very tight and the fact that the weapons break, means that I had to try a lot of options and think about which weapon I was gonna use against every enemy, even trash mobs. It’s good to break this tradition of owning 1000 weapons while only using 1-2 in games.

TL;DR: This is definitely the best game I’ve played in a decade. It’s clearly a system seller. If you have a chance to buy/rent/borrow a Switch, you must play this game. Honestly, I can’t remember the last game I played for more than 100h just because I refused to put it down. Even after 100%’ing it, I still feel like booting this game up. I gotta be strong and stop myself because my backlog can’t take more hits like that. >.<

PS: I got both Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and Octopath Traveller. Anyone has played any of them? I don’t know which one I should start next. xD
PPS: I almost forgot. I’ve also been playing a lot of Dota Auto Chess. It’s a custom game inside dota 2 that is a lot of fun, even if you never tried Dota 2.

Link for the Screenshot community challenge

My Screenshot challenge is coming up very nice:

If you’re interested in one of the games, you can find the list of games used here

• Switch screenshots look bad because Nintendo won’t let me transfer high quality pics to my pc. I had to post them on Twitter and take a screenshot. It’s so stupid.

Steam

My Memory of Us

4.6 hours, 17 of 23 achievements

Remember Me

10 hours, 39 of 50 achievements

Non-Steam

Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle

26 hours, no achievements

A new year demands a new community challenge!
I’d like to thank a lot of people for the ideas, especially Blue and Ninglor.

How does it work?

• There is no set game list, run the games that you believe that will give you the best chance of getting an amazing screenshot
• There are 26 letters, so you’ll have to take at least 26 pictures. Each one should feature something started with a different letter.

If you think the challenge above is too easy for you, you may create your own theme. A theme that all pictures will have to follow.
Examples:

• A blue theme: All pictures will feature something blue or blue will be their main color
• An animal theme: There will be a different animal in each screenshot, corresponding to each letter - Rat, Zebra, Lion, etc
• Winter theme: Santa, Pine cone, Gingerbread, etc

You get the idea. Be creative. Create your own challenge!

You can use this as a template to post your screenshots
[A](screenshot) | [B](screenshot) | [C](screenshot) | [D](screenshot) | [E](screenshot) | [F](screenshot)
[G](screenshot) | [H](screenshot) | [I](screenshot) | [J](screenshot) | [K](screenshot) | [L](screenshot)
[M](screenshot) | [N](screenshot) | [O](screenshot) | [P](screenshot) | [Q](screenshot) | [R](screenshot)
[S](screenshot) | [T](screenshot) | [U](screenshot) | [V](screenshot) | [W](screenshot) | [X](screenshot)
[Y](screenshot) | [Z](screenshot)

FAQ:

Can I used games that I already played before?
Sure. It’s all about being creative! It’s not an official theme, there are no “rules”. No one is forced to participate as well. I was gonna do it alone, but I thought it would be more fun to transform it into a community challenge.

I have another question!
Which part of no rules, did you not understand?! xD But seriously, do whatever work best for you!

I was gonna write this post next week, but I’m not sure I’ll be at home to do that, so I had to do it now. Unfortunately, I haven’t finished many games, so be prepared for a lot of half assed reviews! yay!

Steam

I barely played games on my PC this week. The only thing I’ve tried was Sunset Overdrive. I haven’t finished it yet, but so far the game has 2 big qualities: a sense of freedom and mobility + a great sense of humor. After playing games where the protagonist moves really slow, it’s a breath of fresh air to have a protagonist that is always jumping and grinding through the city. Running around is a delight in this game. The last game I remember the main character being so agile was Prototyp, but even that game wasn’t as fast-paced as Sunset. I can never blink twice in this game. I like the humor as well, but it’s kinda dark. I can definitely see why so many people didn’t like that aspect of the game.
On the other hand, the Story is just dumb: A crazy company created a soda that turn humans into zombies. Yes, it’s that stupid.

Non-Steam

I know that my Non-Steam could be called Nintendo Switch these last couple weeks, but it’s the only thing I’ve been playing lately. sorry! xD Anyway, I finally “completed” Super Mario Odyssey. What a game! I’m still humming that soundtrack daily. I got all the 883 moons for the completionist ending. There is also another ending if you grind enough coins to buy more moons from the shop. It only adds a fireworks cutscene + the original Mario victory theme Definitely, not worth the time imo. I just sold my sold my copy for $50. I had forgotten this about buying physical copies. It’s so good to resell games! At the end of the day, I paid $10 to play a AAA game. Amazing!

I bought 2 games from the eshop. Goetia because it was just $1 and Cat Quest. Goetia is kinda boring and the hint system is terrible. Some of the puzzles make no sense. I caved halfway through and started using a walktrough. Cat Quest on the other hand is actually quite fun. If you like cat puns, this game is purrfect for you! :P

On more exciting news, I got both Mario + Rabbids and Octopath Traveler for ~$60! Both digital, but still :D

Natsume Yuujinchou (Natsume's Book of Friends)

Anime 13 Episodes

This anime seems highly regarded, but I didn't like it. Honestly, it was boring to me. I think the premisses are interesting and I like the dynamic between Natsume and his cat sensei, but the whole story falls short. It never reaches a point where you just wanna binge the whole season. There are some nice episodes though (loved both episodes with the little fox and the also the firefly episode), but overall, I felt most episodes were just boring. There are at least 5 more season, so people must really like this series. Maybe it gets better later. Dunno.

Seishun Buta Yarou wa Bunny Girl Senpai no Yume wo Minai (Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai)

Anime 12 Episodes

I haven't finished this yet, but I'm really liking it so far. It has THE most stupid anime title EVER, but it's a very high quality anime.I won't spoil the story, but it's really good. It starts a bit slow and the first and second episodes might have one too many lewd jokes, but if you like slice of life animes, give it a chance. Don't judge it by its stupid name or cover image.