ActRaiser

(Emulated. :/ I probably shouldn't count these, but I did -technically- play them, so why not? I don't do this stuff anymore, thankfully. I guess it helps not being into video games as much as when I was in grade school. Also, morality.) This is game is, of all things, a super fun fusion of city-building and platforming. I haven't played it in so long, I hardly remember it now, though. Someone should really make a sequel true to this crossing of genres, or else a new game that does this.

ActRaiser 2

(Emulated. :/ ) Some graphical improvement over the first one, but moot since it's just a boring platformer now. Disappointing, unless one likes this style of platformer, I guess. I have encountered some who really like this game, but I couldn't get into it. Don't remember how far in this I got...Graphics aren't bad too.

Aero Fighters 2

(For Neo-Geo...emulated :/ )

Aero Fighters 3

(For Neo-Geo...emulated :/ )

Age of Empires

Borrowed this from a friend back in middle school. I was spoiled by AoE II's graphics, if you can believe that, so I didn't get much into it. Shame, as the Roman world might be my favorite era of history. One of these in the style of AoE3 would've been awesome, but I think Rome: Total War more or less accomplished that. That game's not really my style though. Yeah, it's more accurate and realistic, but that's not really why AoE why was so enjoyable for me...thinking on this now that AoEIV - which is basically AoEII Mark II - is out, I'm wondering if they'll release another Ancient/Antique World game. Age of Mythology is now almost 20 years old as of writing...man, that's depressing to think about.

Age of Empires II: The Age of Kings

(Including Conquerors expansion and recent HD version) Played this like crazy back in Middle School. I was really bad at RTS games back then (and only slightly better now) so I cheated CONSTANTLY. Good thing I didn't play online. Not like I could anyway. Didn't get broadband until just after 9/11. I regained some interest when I encountered the HD edition on Steam when I first got my new PC. While it was cool to see them update it after a decade and a half and add some new cultures, I saw how truly burned out I was playing it. Even beating missions didn't give me much of a buzz. Plus, I couldn't beat the first mission of Prithviraj's campaign as the game glitched out. Uninstalled it and have no idea what to do with it now since I played longer than the Steam return policy would allow. I see there's now a "Definitive Edition" out, but I obviously have no interest in it.

Age of Empires III

Also really enjoyed this one, though playing it upon its release (or soon after...I *think* my PC at the time could handle it...maybe I started it, abandoned it due to poor performance, and then picked it back up around 2008 when I got a better PC...), I found I wasn't getting as into it as when I played Age of Mythology. How much one changes after high school. Oh well. Anyway, this remains a fun game I'm sort of revisiting right now (early 2020s; I should really get back to AoEIV or just go back to this or AoM instead), though some things are a bit weird. For one, despite the game taking place between 1500 and 1850, the British units speak Olde English, even in the third part of the story campaign, which takes place shortly before the Civil War. In America. It's so weird. Secondly, and I imagine this was the result of some heated discussions in board rooms, there are no Black Africans in the game, likely to avoid upsetting (or, *sigh*...encouraging) people with depictions of slavery. This is made all the more awkward since you can build a plantation, where you can task villagers to work and generate gold. Hm. Seeing as one doesn't actually *pay* these villagers...well, whatever. Thirdly, in what I thought was a bug but appears for some bizarre reason to be a feature, the music doesn't play when you load a saved game. Only when you click on the "Home City" button and cut away to a city in the Mother Country (that perhaps commenters of a certain political view would feel disgusted by, as it shows a European power reaping the benefits of New World exploitation :P) and then cut back, does the music start up again. It's very odd, and happened on the original DVD-ROM version of the game I had, the Extended Edition I bought on Steam back in 2017, AND the Definitive Edition released in 2020. No idea why they made it that way. I doubt they overlooked it; it's hard to miss unless everyone's been playing through missions in one sitting. Weird. Just a weird game overall. Still, I like it a lot. Kind of feeling a desire to go back to it, writing about it right now...

Age of Empires IV

Age of Mythology

(Not sure why I can't put the Titans expansion on this list...this drop down menu thing is seriously annoying. Then again, it is an expansion pack. I also have the Extended Edition on Steam) LOVE. THIS. GAME. For a long time, whenever I read about Greek/Egyptian/Norse mythology, I had the urge to play this again. A little over it now, but I still love it...which made finding the Extended Edition on Steam bittersweet. I was happy to pay for it and play it again, but even trying out the new stuff, my heart's not in it anymore. I swear, getting old is the worst.

Art of Fighting 2

(Emulated :/ ) Took a look at this out of curiosity back in my enthusiastic emulation days, but didn't bother with it for long. There's nothing really all that interesting here. The game plays pretty much like Fatal Fury, with far less interesting characters. I suppose it is interesting how the series looks like it started as a prequel to FF set in the 1970s or something, but they don't do much with this premise. It's weird that SNK got three installments out of this. The third, while well-animated, looks slow and completely uninspired in terms of character design (except Kasumi, though despite her decent design and fighting style, it bewilders me how she made it into so many KoF games, as well as SvC: Chaos. Why were people so into her?)

Asterix & Obelix

(Emulated...:/ ) Obscure European SNES title whose title probably won't be recognizable except to a few people who know the French comic it's based on. I have French relatives who sent me French and later English version of these comics, which I loved reading as a kid. The comics and game follow the adventures of two Gauls (Asterix and Obelix, their names are, of course, puns) who live in the last free village in Gaul (ancient France) that was not conquered by the Romans. (This is nonsense; in reality, ALL of Gaul was conquered by Rome, and the modern French that Asterix and the gang act like [there is some French nationalism at play] are the descendants of not only Gauls, but also Romans and later Germanic peoples, mostly the Franks some might recognize from AoEII :P). What keeps them from being subjugated is their local druid's ability to make a magic potion that makes whoever drinks it incredibly strong and able to beat hordes of Romans that don't seem willing to use their spears or swords much. It's a bit ridiculous (for one thing, why doesn't anyone else in Europe, let alone Gaul, have this ability? Heck, why don't the Romans? Their pagan religion had magical elements...) but it's a fun comic for the flashy action scenes you might imagine, as well as a surprising amount of wordplay that survives translation really well, as well as a lot of sly humor that adults are likely to catch onto more than kids. As for this game? Well, being a SNES game, it doesn't have a lot of room to go dialogue-heavy, and the kids this was aimed towards would have been easily bored by it, so the result is a lackluster beat-em-up. I played through a good deal of it before getting stuck in a bizarre part of the game in which you need to free prisoners in a bank vault. I remember running around the level endlessly after freeing what I'm pretty sure was all of them, but could not for the life of me find what was supposed to end the level. The cartoony style isn't bad overall, and it's far from unplayable, but it's a pretty flawed title at the end of the day.

Baba Is You

I was really charmed by this game when I saw folks streaming it around the time it came out, so much so that I went ahead and bought it. My GOODNESS, what a brutally difficult puzzle game. For the last several months (possibly a YEAR by the time of writing this in mid-2023), I have been stuck on four puzzles, and am too proud to skip them or look up the solutions. I have no idea when or if I will ever get past them. Problem is, I'm so stymied I don't think I'm really enjoying the challenge...but I still really love the presentation of this game: the cute and endearing characters, the simplistic but charming design, and the absolutely fantastic music by the game's truly talented (if rather diabolical) creator, Arvi Teikari. "Cog is Push" (a.k.a. "Solitary Isle") is one of my favorite VGM tracks of all time now, and the warm, calm, ethereal sound reminds me so much of the summer of 2019. The last normal (ish) summer. Man. What a different time that was. Anyway, really like this game, even though I doubt I will EVER finish it...

Bahamut Lagoon

(Emulated...:/ ) Liked what this game was going for. I liked its wide ensemble cast of oddballs and heroic types (not exactly uncommon in RPGs, but it was a bigger cast and I dug it). The story was interesting, the graphics were pretty astonishing (that layering!) and the battle system was pretty engaging for a Strategy RPG. I don't usually like that genre but this one was fun enough and mixed the typical turn-based system I liked from FF6 in, even if just for one turn if you encounter an enemy on the map. I also liked the dragon system, in which a player can feed weapons, armor and items to their dragon pets to boost their stats and, in turn, bolster the magic and stats of the human characters. One can even mix and match human team members to strengthen attack magic, healing magic, melee combat, etc. There were two things I didn't like, the first was how complex the dragon-feeding system could be and easy it was to screw up. The other thing was how dull it got towards the end (or at least where I stopped...not sure how far from the end I was). SNES/SF games weren't exactly the best written things. Not a total failure, but enough to kill my interest. Still, I remember it fondly, but probably not enough to pick it back up. With Live-a-Live getting a Western re-release/update not long before I'm writing this, I hope this one is re-considered by Square-Enix as well.

Bayonetta 2

Played this briefly at my friend's place in 2016. My first Platinum game! Obviously, the visuals and fast-paced gameplay were certainly impressive, but I couldn't really get into it. There was a bit too much going on and I wasn't finding much to truly *latch* onto. Maybe if I could sit down and try and take it in, but I'm not interested in spending the money or even the time on it, really. As for the whole "Bayonetta's sexist" angle, I find points to consider on both sides, but it ultimately seems pretty harmless. I find the industry is evolving here anyway, which is good, but there always seems to be obstacles...

Beyond Divinity

I think I played a demo version. Does that count? Eh. It's just a Diablo clone, and not a very memorable one at that. The demo also had some lousy voice acting and little personality anyway.

Beyond Good & Evil

Not very much of it, at a friend's house. I'm not really one for action-oriented games, and this one didn't hold my interest. I'm glad Jade is a compelling female protagonist, though. Shame about the cartoony style, and its lukewarm commercial reception...hear a sequel's coming out, though that was a good while ago and now people are starting to sneer at the idea of it ever being released. Wonder what they'll do with it, if it ever sees the light of day.

Blackthorne

(Emulated. :/ ) Played this one a bit. As said elsewhere, I'm not *much* of an action gamer, but this one had an intriguing, broody atmosphere that especially appealed to pretentious teenage me, and a simple but fun strategic aspect to its fights where the player must switch between dodging and attacking. Playing this got kind of stale after a while, though.

Bloodborne

FINALLY got a chance to play a Souls game, at my friend's place once we reconnected. I had a lot of fun with it, too! It's obviously super hard, but everything about it was so cool. The gameplay's a bit tricky to get used to (and I certainly didn't in the hour or so I played), but it's really fun, challenging and rewarding. I love the aesthetics of it too: the excellent graphics, the color palette, the atmosphere and sounds, all really amazing and well done. Again, I didn't have much time to play it as my friend wanted to move on to something else, but I was really drawn in! I thought I'd be unenthused since I saw two complete LPs of the game, but playing it and experiencing it for myself is a whole new, exciting thing for me. I almost debated getting a PS4 for that reason, but...nah. I would totally buy it for PC, but that port is almost certainly never going to happen. Sony wouldn't dream of losing exclusivity money, despite HOW MANY PEOPLE THEY'D MAKE HAPPY. They'll probably release a 10th anniversary remaster in 2025, and even then it would probably only be for PS5. If I even wanted to, I doubt I'd be able to get my hands on one of them even then. Screw this world.

Bomberman 64

I remember playing this at a friend's sleepover party waaaaaaay back in 1998. Lot of fun back then. I never really got into Bomberman, though. It doesn't strike me as hugely rewarding for a "puzzle" game of sorts. Probably better with people, really.

Breath of Fire

(Emulated. :/ ) The presentation might seem antiquated to just about everyone now, but I think it's got some charm. There were some cool boss fights and areas in this, too.

Breath of Fire II

(Emulated. :/ ) My god, the official translation for this. What a disaster. Otherwise, I still prefer the original to this one. This had some cool ideas and an interesting, actually kinda sad plotline, but it's a little scatterbrained tonally and presentation-wise.

Breath of Fire III

Ha! Finally, BoFs I own. Not sure for how much longer, though. This one would've been awesome had I played this back in elementary/middle school, but it did not age well. It also doesn't have much personality, and not in the forgivable way the original does.

Breath of Fire IV

Better than BoF3, but still pretty childish. Not likely to go back to this, thinking on it in 2014.

Burnout 3: Takedown

Played this at a friend's house. Had a lot of fun with this one and Revenge. Setting up those "crash courses" or whatever they were just hilarious. Sounds like its sequels weren't as good, though.

Burnout Revenge

Played this at a friend's house. I don't remember it that well. I don't recall it being as fun as Takedown...

Byzantine: The Betrayal

Weird edutainment title I was actually pretty into late in elementary school into early middle school. My dad was a history teacher and liked talking about it with me, so I gained an interest in learning about historical stuff through him. This game was produced by the Discovery channel and is an intriguing tour of contemporary Istanbul, exploring its history from its Roman/Byzantine beginnings to its Muslim conquest. Half of the game is set in the real world, with photographs and live action movie sequences with actors. Mostly bad actors. Almost all Turkish, many of whom probably couldn't act very well in Turkish, let alone English. I later learned many of them were active in the country's television soap opera scene, which says a lot. I think there are only three decent actors in the whole game, two Turkish, the other British. One of whom later became a decently famous actor in movies. Anyway, the story is interesting: you play an ambitious journalist invited to Istanbul by your friend Emre on the promise of a major scoop. Upon arriving, Emre disappears and you talk to his friends, family and other, less wholesome, associates to find out what happened, especially once he turns up dead. There's an unsavory business deal regarding smuggling antiques out of Turkey at play, and some of the details were actually kind of hard to follow, as a kid. Otherwise, you also find things out by going to historical landmarks, learning about some of their features and then taking pictures of these and other things for use in the other major feature of the game. In this, you go to VR-simulated historical landmarks, co-created by Emre in the story, which you explore (with progression unlocked by data created by the pictures you take in reality, which is a bit primitive here, but still super cool to me), uncovering more historical details and, through this, learning more about what Emre was involved in. The game's super ambitious, but it is pretty limited, which some boring stretches, a lot of difficult-to-understand plot details and puzzles, and, of course, the ridiculous acting. Still, this was a pretty fascinating game to young me, and a pretty interesting way to teach people about often misunderstood Turkish history. I've since replayed it (see the "Games I Own" Stack to see how; it's rather difficult to do so on newer operating systems) and actually found it holds up pretty well for all its dated qualities, as the story is pretty intelligent and, for all the restrictions they had both technologically and in terms of how they could establish the setting, the world and plot feel sufficiently full and well-realized. It was a fun replay, and I was happy to find that it was worth a revisit.

Capcom vs. SNK

Sold this to a friend in high school along with my first Dreamcast, which I regretted probably a year later when I started having withdrawal! Don't really miss it now, though I like the presentation of this one WAY more than CvS2's. A lot more stages, and with intros! I don't care for 3D stages in 2D games, at least not as boring as CvS2's were. Otherwise, people largely ignore it in favor of the sequel, and while I don't know enough to defend its gameplay, I vehemently defend its presentation. Not gonna lie, though: more characters did not hurt at all.

Capcom vs. SNK 2

Owned this for a couple of weeks. Just wanted to check it out, really, but I had no one to play it with or anything. The presentation was a bit dizzying, and like I said above, lame stages. The new characters were pretty cool and I understand it's a joy for combo lovers and tourney people, so that's nice. Sadly, not my thing (though I do like seeing combo videos). I'd still really like to see a third installment some day, and there's been both optimism and pessimism over such a thing happening again over the past few years...Writing this in 2019, I can't help but fear it'll be too much like SFV and MvCI, i.e. made into a lifeless, e-sports title that disdains allowing new or even longtime players and fans from engaging with the characters and aesthetics more than being judged as a good player or not by your crass, unworthy peers. It's hard being an aesthetic gamer now. ...Then again, writing in 2022, there's been more discussion about appealing to casual gamers in the wake of SFV's troubled reception and the increased popularity of more accessible, crowd-pleasing games like Multiversus. SF6 looks to be courting new players and rumors are bubbling up again about Capcom and SNK being on good terms...well, we'll see.

Castlevania: Dracula X

(Emulated... :/ ) For a little while, I don't remember exactly when (might have been after high school), I was interested in checking out the Castlevania series, but I only really had my emulators (with no money to really buy SNES cartridges...though I suppose some carts would have gone for relatively cheap...), so I just checked out the SNES ones (didn't bother with NES emulation; I was never drawn to the 8-bit era, spoiled as a kid by my SNES). I never got very far in them; they are notoriously difficult. This one seemed manageable, however. It's actually probably the easiest of the early Castelvanias (though Castlevania 2 looks more vexing than frustrating, from an LP I saw), though I have since heard the opposite is true. I dunno. I don't remember it super well, but I recall not having much of a problem making progress. Then again, it *was* emulated, so I was no doubt using save states. I actually can't remember if I made it to the end. I doubt it, so I won't put it in that stack. Otherwise, I think the music was alright and the gameplay was fairly enjoyable. I honestly don't remember. How strange.

Chrono Cross

For the life of me, I cannot get into this game. I hate how shallow it makes me sound (though I've encountered many who agree), but those graphics are not terribly attractive to begin with, and I can't understand the battle system to save my life. I've tried starting this game maybe four times and I just can't figure it out, or have enough fun to keep going with it. It's especially frustrating as it's the sequel to the amazing Chrono Trigger...and this website gave it a perfect 10 rating! Why?! What is good about this game? I just can't understand it.

Chrono Trigger

(Emulated...:/ ) There aren't enough words, let alone original praise, to lavish upon this magnificent game. While now I think it's short and a little juvenile, back in the day this was an incredible gaming experience. The "in-world" battles are clever, fun and awesome once combination techniques come into play. The story deals with time travel in a way that isn't confusing or pretentious, and the characters, while simple, are endearing and compelling. The graphics by Akira Toriyama, who I usually hate, are excellent for a 16-bit game, and the music by Yasunori Mitsuda is masterfully written and rightfully iconic. Next to Star Ocean, FFV, Tales of Phantasia and Earthbound, I'd definitely say this is the best RPG on the SNES/SF. Wonderfully done, Square. Shame I can't get into the damn sequel...

Clock Tower

(Emulated...:/ ) One of the few survival-horror games on the Super Famicom, and it's really well-made. Despite the less sophisticated technology, the sound design and atmosphere are pitch perfect and it's very difficult not to get creeped out even early on playing this. There's tons of endings so it's got plenty of replay value. It's a shame this never got released here; I think it would've gone over pretty well.

Command & Conquer

I barely remember the first C&C, really. I recall the two major factions: The Brotherhood of Nod and the...Alliance? I could look it up, but I couldn't care less. Obviously, the more evil-sounding one was the more interesting. They had cool architecture and more personality than the good guys. But I've no memory of the combat or anything. I also got the expansion, Covert Operations, but whatever that added to the core game and whether I experienced it, I've long forgotten. When I first wrote about this, I lamented how there was no digital version out that I could check out to see if I might rediscover it. Well, a new updated version is out now, but seeing some gameplay footage...nah, I'm good.

Command & Conquer: Red Alert

LOVED this game back in middle school, back when RTS games appealed to me despite my being horrible at them. Never could beat this, though. I mostly messed around in the map editor and even dabbled in modding the game.

Commander Keen: Aliens Ate My Babysitter!

Ah yes, the Commander Keen series. I think I borrowed all but one of these from friends or friends of my sister's. So one may be...sketchy. Loved playing these back in the day, though I don't think I beat a single one of them...I was always pretty lukewarm about platformers. They were inviting, but kind of easy to get bored of before long. Only SMW and Donkey Kong Country had me interested enough to finish. It didn't help there was a glut of platformers on DOS and SNES, many of them mediocre. Can't really remember this one. Was *this* the one in the spaceship?

Commander Keen: Goodbye, Galaxy!

This was the first one I played, and the one I played most. I remember dying to know what was in that secret pyramid. Sadly, it was pretty much like the other two pyramids! I remember this game having a lot of wit and a good sense of humor, which is much appreciated. There really was an ineffable charm and beauty to these early 90s games. Most of them. It's hard not to be sentimental about it, though that's my being super young and carefree tied to the experience of these games talking.

Commander Keen: Invasion of the Vorticons

Barely remember this one either...maybe THIS one was the one on the spaceship...

Commander Keen: Keen Dreams

I remember not liking this one. A little -too- weird, maybe? Guess Id Software just wanted to get extra strange with this one...

Condemned: Criminal Origins

Playing this around 2011 or so reminded me how bad I am at FPSes. Yeesh. Otherwise, very effective survival horror action. Shame the sequel apparently failed to recapture the magic. Though I have encountered some who like that game, so I dunno.

Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure

Freeware version or something. Obviously MANY many years ago. Just a standard platformer, otherwise. Liked it as a kid, though.

Crimson Skies: High Road to Revenge

Played this with my friend when I hung out with him in high school. Fun little flight shooter that had a decent multiplayer that, unsurprisingly, I wasn't very good at. If he played the story mode or similar in front of me, I have no memory. Don't remember much of this, if I'm honest.

Crusader: No Regret

Cheesy 90s presentation and acting aside, THIS GAME IS AMAZING. This was my game in elementary school along with the DKC trilogy, (U)MK3 and Super Mario All-Stars + World. Finally playing it again on GOG in 2017 was wonderful, and this game is still really fun, even with the age it's really showing now (how is this game over 25 years old now?! Where did the time go?!) Shame they can't finish the series, what with Origin defunct and EA very unlikely to resurrect this franchise. Probably good they didn't; they'd probably make it an unremarkable FPS or shooter; especially *this* EA. Damn. Maybe sometime in the far future, someone might do it justice. Then again, would I really be into it?

Crusader: No Remorse

Played this one a good while after Regret, maybe as late as high school? I still prefer Regret, but this one is still really great. The currency system and finite weapon selection were more balanced, for sure, but getting rid of them still made Regret non-stop awesome. This one had lulls (no, not LoLs, save a couple), but was still freakin' sweet. Like with Regret, playing this again years later on GOG was fun as heck. I think the best thing about these games (and why a sequel wouldn't really work, thinking on it again) is the pure, rebellious 90s cheesiness. It's just so ridiculous and cringeworthy and makes me happy, 90s kid that I was. Those truly were the days, bad as they actually were the more you study them. Sigh. I'd go back in a heartbeat though...

Crystal Caves

Aaaages ago. Almost certainly the Shareware version. I loved this game, though. Having the oxygen system in a space mine a hazard you can accidentally destroy was a smart touch. I say that because it's the only thing I remember clearly, haha.

DOOM

Played this at my friend's place back in 2016. While the hype for this game is well-deserved - the graphics, speed and solid gameplay are incredible - I myself was never one for FPSes. So, in addition to being really bad at this, I just wasn't all that into it. It's a damn fine game, though, so no contempt for anyone who dug it. Seeing more footage of it in the lead-up to Doom Eternal's release, I really think the gameplay design is masterful, as is its only slight upgrade in the sequel. They did a good job on these.

Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair

So, towards the end of 2020, as everyone adapted to the lonely misery of the pandemic and the drama of the recent American election cycle appeared to be at an end (if only...-_-), my favorite LP channel, Game Grumps, started a playthrough of the first Danganronpa game. Until then, I had only encountered a few things about the series; the only rundown I had really gotten of it was from the YouTube series Honest Game Trailers, whose characteristically snarky and ridicule-ridden summary wasn't very encouraging. All I really gleaned was that there were some kind of mystery and dating sim elements, neither of which really appealed to me. But GG's LP...in addition to being incredibly hilarious, I was absolutely riveted by the mixing of story, social interaction, and info-gathering gameplay. While it bears the usual anime tropes, the writing was pretty excellent, and the characters were compelling. So once GG ended their LP in early 2021, I was deeply interested in playing the second game (never ended up buying the first, dunno if I ever will). So I did, and greatly enjoyed it. Not sure what else to really say about it besides that. As someone might be able to tell from the rest of these write-ups, I tend not to like summarizing a game's plot unless I suddenly get a compulsion to, and given the fact that characters die left and right in this series, AND there are enormous plot twists, I feel even less like doing so here (even though no one reads this), even though the story is an inescapably major part of the game. I guess I can say it's pretty good; playing this while another favorite LP channel of mine, WoolieVersus, went through the incredible 13 Sentinels (arrrgghhhhhh Sony/Vanillaware, PLEASE put that on PC eventually; I'd love to properly play through it myself and don't want to buy a PS4/5...) was interesting, at the risk of revealing a major spoiler for both games there. Again, the presence of so many anime/YA tropes could get a little grating, but the cast of characters was pretty likable on the whole, though some were admittedly rather uninteresting at the end of the day. It doesn't help that a lot of character development is buried in one-on-one interactions the character can choose to engage in or not, so characters might come off as not terribly complex without them. As for the *dating* part of it...I mean come on. I'm in my mid to late 30s playing a game involving high school students, so...yeesh. That said, I did find myself falling pretty hard for Chiaki (despite another YouTuber not incorrectly pointing out she comes off as a little less interesting than other characters), which may or may not have made events later in the game *quite* traumatizing. Speaking of the later part of the game, I'm not sure what I feel about how it handles having hope in the face of what felt to be an inescapable and incredibly grim dilemma. It felt forced and, given the inevitable reliance on anime tropes, totally ridiculous. Apart from that, I'm not sure what else to say here. Music's pretty good, though - probably from age and where I am with music now - it's not anything I'd listen to in my spare time. All in all, a pretty fun and engrossing experience, and I guess I recommend it.

Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony

After Game Grumps concluded their incredibly enjoyable LP of Danganronpa 2 around mid-2022, I went ahead and started playing Danganronpa V3, once I had gotten a new computer (my old computer started acting up at this point, with the performance starting to noticeably suffer during the trial portions, where it really SHOULDN'T as it messed with my ability to react). V3 is a *much* different beast from the first two games, not just in presentation and how the player can interact with the world, but also in theme and how it treats its characters. I don't want to go too much further into that, as I don't want to spoil anything (also, it's a bit hard to explain...), but it was wild to see how they changed things up. I ultimately liked this cast of characters more than the second game's, as I felt the death of just about every character who snuffs it in this game way more than the previous one (with one exception I am trying VERY hard not to spoil from the second game). The characterization is admittedly a lot weirder and maybe a little less deep than the previous as well; every character in the second game seems to have a turning point of sorts whereas it happens less here. I also did not find myself crushing on anyone unlike in the second game :P. I liked Kaede, Maki, Himiko, and Kaito a lot but never to a romantic degree (slightly related sidenote: there's also a COMPLETELY uncomfortable and thankfully missable [though I still accidentally encountered it -_-] shower scene that made me profoundly creeped out. Seriously, I dunno if I have *ever* been that uncomfortable playing a game like that). Moving on, I'm not sure how I'd compare the mysteries of this game to the previous two. Maybe about the same? They're not the most amazing murder plots I've ever encountered (IMHO, that distinction may belong to the British mystery series Jonathan Creek, if one chooses to ignore Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle), but they're fun. They're also just not easy to devise no matter how you look at it, so the writer(s?) have my respect. The music remains pretty strong, though again I'd never go out of my way to seek out. As for the elephant in the room, the plot twists of this game. The one early on really upset me, though I respect them trying to shake things up a bit. I was still pretty pissed off about it for the rest of the game. The one at the END that got everyone riled up...I didn't mind it? I kind of get why they reached that point, though it is a bit regrettable that there wasn't any way it COULDN'T upset the fanbase. Maybe one or two more times going through rewrites? Eh, probably wouldn't have made much difference. I respect them for it, and honestly, even if it played out differently, where the heck else could this series go? Going any further would have led to even more contrived and less creative directions for the narrative, in-game or overarching, so I seriously don't blame them for getting crazy with it. In the end, I liked V3, probably more than 2, but I'd hesitate to recommend it depending on how someone may have enjoyed the first two games.

Dark Half

(Emulated :/ ) JRPG I got into back in the emulation days. Here you spend part of the game as the equivalent of the devil come to Earth, and you kill humans to take their souls and stay alive, and also fight monsters on the main world and dungeons for some reason. I dunno. It was an interesting gameplay mechanic, but I couldn't really get into it. Can't remember why; I think it was maybe a bit slow?

Dark Law

(Emulated :/ ) Weird JRPG I got into back in the emulation days that had an intriguing premise that I've long forgotten. I remember the first dungeon was hard to grind in and money may have been hard to get? Can't remember.

Dark Souls

Another Souls game (a "proper" one, I guess) I finally got to play at my friend's place. It was pretty cool. I didn't get very far as he got bored watching me and wanted to do something else, but I felt intrigued enough. Dunno if I'll ever buy it for myself. The game has effectively been completely spoiled by me through YouTube LPs and theory videos once I got interested in the story, but the actual experience of playing it is still pretty alien. Even then, I doubt I'll ever actually pick it up.

Demon's Crest

(Emulated... :/ ) This game is really cool. You play as Red Arremer/Firebrand from the Ghosts n' Goblins series, in a setting that's more mysterious and grim than the "spoooky" and campy GnG series. And I mean mysterious and grim. It's practically Dark Souls levels. There are no humans; the game implies they either live elsewhere or have been wiped out (probably the former, what with Arthur) and you explore several ruins in order to regain several gems to increase your power and fight a greater evil than yourself. I forget most of the plot actually. Sadly, the whole "fetch the gems" angle has been done to death, so that's unfortunately a point against the game. Otherwise, it's still enjoyable and interesting, with a challenging play style. The gems change your character's form to become stronger, go underwater, break certain stage elements, etc, without making the game easier overall as a result. The music is also entirely eerie, sublime organ music and is well done on the whole. The derivative nature of its plot and, admittedly, its play style probably made it forgettable to many, but I encountered people revisiting it on YouTube/LPs/streams...

Descent 3

This game (or franchise) seems to be more famous than it seems. I hear people talking about it, but few people actively saying they like it, which is sad. It might be my narrow gaming experience, but I really like this game. I think the only other space shooter I played was Star Fox, which I didn't like much, but this one blew my mind. Being rooted more in reality was probably what attracted me more? I actually found this to be actually fun while still being really challenging, unlike Star Fox, which just felt tedious... Anyway, you play an unnamed (I think?) "Material Defender", or a space fighter pilot who protects cargo by fighting off other ships. I think there's some continuity from Descent 2 (which I never played) but otherwise, you start off about to crash into the Sun when you're rescued by a group of scientists who then ask you to check up on a research facility that has appears to have been attacked. You reluctantly agree and you start off on an adventure that pits you and your rescuers against your former employer, the corrupt mining company PTMC. There's so much I love about this game. Despite the primitive graphics, the worlds are still pretty extensive and fun to explore, with some neat secrets and nice set-pieces. The enemies are all pretty challenging to fight (some on the right side of annoying, if that were possible) and are all pretty well designed. The boss fights can be a real pain, but I like them anyway. The music by Jerry Berlongieri (who I think goes by "Autopilot" here?) is absolutely brilliant. In addition to being really good, it's also ingeniously "broken up" across a level. One part of the track (of sizable length, so it doesn't get too bland too quickly) plays for one part of the level, with more - or a different part - of the song playing once you progress. There's a great use of leitmotif, with the game's theme being used in every track without being overused or gratuitous. It's just such great use of music, and I even have most of the tracks on my iTunes. The atmosphere of the game is also a strong point, with a lot of quiet moments aided by lulls in the soundtrack and breaks between tense enemy rushes, and the player's on the edge of their seat as they explore a new area. I also love the weapons, with some fun guns, some great side missiles (one, the "Black Shark" creates a kind of "black hole" effect that sucks in enemies and tears them to pieces) and even some tertiary bomb items that draw fire or help attack enemies (though they only seem to work haphazardly in my recent playthrough...could be a bug?). The story's a little thin, unfortunately, and sometimes the difficulty admittedly gets a bit tiresome, but it's a truly fun, fantastic game. I wish they made more like this...and apparently they have! Overload is apparently a spiritual successor to Descent, with many of the same creative team and musicians, which is neat! Can't wait to give that a try!

Diablo II

(Guess I can't put Lord of Destruction here...) Loved this game more than I should have back in high school and DEFINITELY more than I should have throughout college. I wanna say it's a classic, but I have a feeling it'll be largely forgotten someday. Diablo III apparently being crap upon release didn't seem to help.

Diablo III

(Reaper of Souls edition) Played it co-op with some friends, as this game's version of the paladin. Not as bad as people had me believe, but it lacks the flavor of Diablo II that drew me in, with its zoomed-out 3D graphics (though I did play it on a large widescreen TV from some distance, so that's not really saying much) and its smaller levels. So I wasn't really taken by it, but I see it's a better game than I was led to believe. It's just not as revolutionary as Diablo II.

Disco Elysium

I have yet to really dive into this one. I heard amazing things towards the end of 2019 when it started showing up on End of Year "Best of" Lists, and it being story-driven intrigued me. I played maybe two or so hours of it. It is certainly odd, cerebral, and *quite* wordy, so I'm glad a voice-over narrator was added. The RPG elements look a bit complex, so perhaps that intimidated me out of playing after a while. It's on my list of games to eventually get to, so I'll definitely get to this before long.

Divine Divinity

Demo version also...don't remember this one as well as Beyond Divinity. Not remarkable, I recall. I also hate that name. Did they even try?! The game itself was somewhat more interesting, but I had my fill of the Diablo style of game with...well, Diablo. I have heard good things about the latest game in the series, Original Sin II, as well as that its quite a complex game systems-wise...eh, I doubt I'll ever play it.

Donkey Kong

(I mean the 1994 version for the Gameboy, which I played on Gameboy Pocket.) Pretty fun, but very very frustrating. I actually broke my GBP in anger playing it. Sadly haven't outgrown those stupid anger issues. I think I've broken at least seven PS2 controllers and something like three XBOX 360 controllers. Sigh. No SNES controllers, thankfully. Otherwise, that awkward subject aside, this game's puzzles were pretty clever, thinking back on it.

Donkey Kong Country

I may be over platformers, but I go back to this series every now and again. Mostly when my sister's over and we relive old times. Haven't done that in a while, though. I think we're too old now. Anyway, I like the other two more than this one as they streamlined a lot of things, like the bonus areas, but this one's still probably the most challenging (though I can't decide if DKC2 is tougher...I think this one's more primitive qualities made it a little more difficult). That music, too! So good.

Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest

By most "objective" standards, the best one of the DKC series. The most challenging (maybe!), the best music, the most united by theme, and the most driven storyline. I have to say, though, I still prefer...

Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!

I like the lower sense of urgency! It's more relaxing without completely removing the challenge, even if it it wasn't *truly* difficult until later in the game, especially the Lost World. And yes, I know it's still really easy. So was DKC2. Except for that level where you play as all of the animal buddies. Ugh. I will admit the lack of a unifying theme (i.e., unlike DKC2 with its pirates) is a bit disappointing compared to its immediate predecessor. I guess its theme is environmentalism, like DKC1? Meh. Also YES, I know Kiddy Kong is stupid. I don't care. He's kind of adorable, and made some game mechanics fun. I don't blame them for not bringing him back in later games, though. Totally understandable. Still, love this game. LOVE IT.

Dragon Quest III

(Emulated. :/ ) Don't remember this one too well. I think this is the one where you can create other player characters and recruit them from the inn at the start of the game, or something? If so, kind of a cool mechanic, but it didn't really capture my interest.

Dragon Quest V

(Emulated. :/ ) This one I played the most. It had a very interesting story in which you play as an illiterate child at the beginning of the game, following your itinerant father, who is admired by many townspeople and is hinted to be a king of some kind. Even though the father is a huge badass, the kid you play goes on a fun little adventure with a girl in one of the towns where you take on a haunted castle. I thought that was so awesome. But then, predictably, tragedy strikes and your character grows up, the narrative and world become more open and a new mechanic is introduced where you recruit monsters to fight for you. This is where the game got less interesting to me, probably because I screwed up recruiting monsters and got frustrated. I think. It was a long time ago. I was also never a Pokemon fan so I wasn't all that interested on a fundamental level. I've since learned a lot more about it and yeah, this was a pretty clever game, and it goes in creative directions for a JRPG. I'm much too old now, but I wish I'd gotten a little more into it as a kid.

Dragon Quest VI

(Emulated. :/ ) This one was a nice step up, aesthetically. The graphics are souped up, the Super Famicom's hardware was further utilized to create some really beautiful music tracks, and the enemies and some other elements are actually animated now. The story is also pretty neat, suggesting there are two worlds layered on top of one another and your characters have different roles in both of them. Maybe. I actually didn't get very far in this game, though I would've liked to. I hear there's an interesting jobs system, which excited me as an FFV fanboy. Alas, I just lost interest in this at one point. Not sure why. I think there was a stretch where it got somewhat dull? Can't remember. I recently checked out an LP of this game and saw that it ultimately would not have been my thing. The job system is pretty far off FFV's and looks a lot more complicated and dry. Oh well. Music's still excellent.

Dragon Quest VIII: Journey of the Cursed King

I have GOT to beat this someday. Replaying it, I'm aware how childish it is in retrospect, and I'm not crazy about Akira Toriyama's art (though I'm surprised I didn't catch Chrono Trigger was his work! Seems so obvious now), but I still really like this game. It's well written, for the most part, pretty well voice acted and very balanced. The challenge is also welcome, even though it intimidates the hell out of me sometimes. No, I must beat this. I've never beaten a DQ, and this one has such an interesting story, though I'm sure it's predictable for the most part. I like the characters too much to want to know what happens! SOMEDAY!

Dragon Warrior I & II

(Emulated :/ ) Having had my mind completely blown by Final Fantasy early on in high school via emulation, it only followed I would try out their most notorious competitor, the Dragon Quest series. Other than DQVIII years later, I never really got into the series. Silent protagonists tend to bore me (with Earthbound being a proud exception), as I usually like as much story as possible in my games. A silent hero removes a potentially interesting character arc or study, though that rarely happens as a whole in games as juvenile (or in this case, arcane) as these. Gameplay-wise, they were interesting but never fully took me in. The battles are simple, but somewhat more challenging than the FF series, though it varied. However, I like seeing my player characters on the screen during battles (thank you DQVIII...and again, Earthbound is a happy exception). Otherwise, I liked the aesthetic and music of the games well enough. Speaking of the music, shame about Koichi Sugiyama's involvement, as his political stances and opinions were downright despicable (heinous, even) but...his music is undeniably incredible. I even have DQVIII songs on my iTunes. Sigh. It's like if John Williams was a Nazi sympathizer. Anyway, this two-in-one game is freshest in my memory, though I didn't play the second game very much (similar to what happened with me and Final Fantasy Origins years later). As the open world and loose narrative make it somewhat unremarkable, I don't have much else to say about this one.

Drakan: Order of the Flame

Doubt I'll ever go back to this, despite owning it, as the Warcraft style Medieval setting doesn't really spark my interest anymore. I did like the exploration and what I could glean from the battle system, though. Still have the disc, and while it *can* be played on my PC, one has to level skip and not even play it the way it was intended. Ah well. It's not very fun anyway.

Dreamfall: The Longest Journey

Ah, an excellent adventure game. Smart, very well written, excellently voice acted, fun to explore, beautifully rendered and realized, and with fun puzzles (albeit easy, for this Myst player) all on top of an intriguing storyline. With almost NO answers. It didn't help that I didn't play the original (at the time I first played it), I'm sure, but there was enough set-up to reintroduce and endear old characters, that I was as annoyed the story didn't wrap up more things as the people who played TLJ. I was dying for years after I beat it as a sequel was so uncertain, but my prayers have been answered...though reviews for Chapters are not wildly positive...

Duke Nukem

Ah, the DOS days. I don't remember this one enough to comment on it, really.

Duke Nukem 3D

God, the stuff my parents let me play in middle school. This game was pretty fun at the time... Wouldn't be caught dead with it today, though. I saw an LP of a modded version of it and actually felt a little bit...sick? Not sure how to explain it. Almost felt a little embarrassed or something. Weird.

Duke Nukem II

Might be the best one, actually. Loved playing this back on my family's first computer. It was great when I finally got the music to play when I, er...pirated it [covers face in shame] in middle school on a better computer. Even seeing the occasional video about it YouTube? Still looks pretty fun. That said, I *highly* doubt I'll get back into it.

Duke Nukem: Manhattan Project

Borrowed this from a friend in high school. It's actually pretty fun! Nothing revolutionary, though (and apparently really buggy, though I don't remember running into any issues). If they stopped trying to hype up Duke Nukem: Forever and just focus on individual releases, the franchise would be taken a lot more seriously. Not that the franchise needed to, or that this game needs any kind of hard-earned recognition. It is pretty forgettable, but shows a more simple kind of fun could be had, instead of trying to make a boring, bawdy FPS.

EarthBound

This game is something close to a masterpiece, if not an all-out one. I think its more juvenile themes might keep it from a very high status, but by god, it is really close. What could have been a silly Dragon Quest spoof is something so much more. A cosmopolitan, satirical, surreal take on modern life and growing up with an offbeat script that is by turns hilarious and sublimely moving. The battle system is a psychedelic riff on DQ's, but is has depths and treasures of its own. The music by Keiichi Suzuki and Hirokazu Tanaka runs the gamut of genres, but fits the games comical and wondrous tones when it needs to, and does it with aplomb and real art. The characters are mostly silent, but their stories are well fleshed-out, with colorful and likable NPCs supporting them and the larger story beautifully. It's just a jewel of a game, deceptively simple and jejune but very sophisticated and brilliant when one takes a very close look at it. It's a shame the marketing was so badly bungled and it was so misunderstood and undersold when it came out. It deserves its accolades and should be hailed for years to come.

Fatal Fury

I actually briefly owned this on the SNES when I was a kid, but was disappointed that it wasn't more like Fatal Fury Special. I think I got crabby with the woman who sold it to me at a hobby shop and my mom was angry at me, haha. One of those times I wish I was older in the early 90s, I guess. People still call this game crappy compared to its sequels, which is hardly surprising. It's basically SNK's Street Fighter 1, along with Art of Fighting 1. There was a little more variety here than in Capcom's game, though. Not that that was difficult. Then again, this was released around the time Street Fighter II was, so...

Fatal Fury Special

(SNES version! Not gonna lie, I did try out the Neo-Geo version on emulator, though. Just wanted to know what was different!) I rented this so frequently from Wherehouse and the like. The character designs and the music gave SF a run for its money, especially as this had SUPER MOVES, for pete's sake. SF had the better endings, though. But that's not enough to make SSF2 better than this game, even though I also played SSF2 like crazy! Yeah, this was a good game back in the day. Sweet 90s memories.

Final Fantasy IV

(Emulated. :/ ) Could never get into this one...I know this one is supposedly the first to make FF narratively deep, but it seemed so dry to me. Personally speaking, it had nothing on V, which was a lot more fun and interesting to explore, and VI, which had a more enriching storyline and characters, uninteresting as they are to me now.

Final Fantasy IX

The childish tone and antiquated graphics kept me from really committing to it once I bought it for PSX, but I had a guilty desire to play it for a long time. Then during the early pandemic I watched an LP/Stream of it and finally saw what it was all about. And you know what? Doesn't seem like a game I want to play anymore. I'm satisfied. Shame, though. This was absolutely a game I would have super been into in middle school. Oh well.

Final Fantasy Origins

Despite how I said in my (now deleted) blog that I don't want anything to do with this, I picked it back up in 2017 and played a good deal of FFI. Not super remarkable, and the mechanics are weird. I was surprised the thief class didn't do anything, but I guess he didn't in the original, and he becomes a ninja later on anyway, so having him steal for half the game doesn't make any sense? I dunno. They probably never intended to program that in anyway. Regardless, I guess I'm just used to the newer games and how they did things. I doubt if I'll ever beat it; it is extremely dry and the last dungeon is a total slog. As for FFII, it's pretty weird. I know people generally hate it for its bizarre combat system, but it didn't bother me that much, in and of itself. I did stop playing, however, when it became apparent that I needed to level up considerably before reaching the second land area, which was annoying. At least there's a somewhat character-involved story, but I doubt I'll be getting back to it anytime soon.

Final Fantasy Tactics

I could never really get into this game. In my emulation days the only Strategy RPG I was into was Bahamut Lagoon and that thrived mostly on its personality and graphics than anything else. I couldn't even get past the first level of this game! Nothing grabbed me, it was bizarrely hard (at least for me) and the graphics were the typically unremarkable, washed out PS1 variety, even with its sprites. It's a shame, I hear great things about the story (and it having the same world as FFXII), but I have a feeling it's still something I'd have preferred to have gotten into back in middle or high school.

Final Fantasy V

(Emulated. :/ Now I have it on Steam, at least!) God, I love this game. My second favorite FF at the moment after XII and before X. I'm sure I'm angering people by saying that (not that anyone actually reads this...), but I don't care. The job is system is fun, the story - while less interesting or even as deep as FFVI - still captivates me in all its simplicity, and the presentation is pretty good, *despite* its simplicity. I guess if I had played this as much as FFVI, I wouldn't like it so much, but as of now? Still love it. I've since bought it on Steam TWICE to make amends for playing it emulated for so long. Might even play it again someday...

Final Fantasy VI

(A.k.a. FF3US.) Emulated. :/ I've since -hopefully- made amends by buying the Steam version, though I still REALLY don't want to play it now (that version of the game looks kind of ugly, for a start) [and the Pixel Remaster, which I also got after writing that]. It was pretty innovative to have no central character, the story was compelling (though rather threadbare now, as an adult...), the battle system fun (albeit simple) and the overall aesthetic was charming and innocent and yet so grim and moody. I loved the hell out of it as a kid, and played it goodness knows how many times over the course of seven or more years. Playing it so often was like chewing gum losing its flavor. Still, it was just so good back in the day, wasn't it... I suppose I wouldn't mind a full on, FF7-style remake of this. I can imagine in a few decades when hard copies of the game no longer work, the idea may appeal to people. But then, I doubt I'd play it. I've definitely moved on.

Final Fantasy VII

(PC version! A burned CD-ROM my friend gave me in high school in the mid-2000s) It's groundbreaking, for sure, but apart from -some- things that stay with me, I never got super into this game like other people. It was great back in '04 or '05 when I finally played it, but really, I played it once and was more or less set. I tried to replay it some years later and get everything I couldn't the first time through, but I lost interest (and my temper) once I reached that insane Chocobo breeding sidequest. That was infuriating and too much of a time-waster, even for younger me, who certainly wasted time way too much for his own good. The remake's out, and I while I entertained the idea of getting them when they were first announced (*many* years ago now), the interest has died completely. I haven't even caught LPs of the first episode yet. I'm just not really feeling it...

Final Fantasy VIII

I genuinely hate this game. Mostly because of how disappointing it is. The battle system is too complicated though obviously not impossible to use, and isn't all that satisfying at the end of the day. As for the story, if it was as awesome in the second half as it was in the first, I'd be a lot nicer to it. Then again, the game's characters aren't very endearing from the beginning. Other than Squall's irritating angst (which I related to WAY more as a teenager than an adult), nobody's really that memorable to me, as they aren't really given that much room to develop past very strict "supporting" roles. It was an experiment, and it yielded mix results. All in all, though, if I as pressed to say something nice about it: not as bad as some games.

Final Fantasy X

It's definitely pretty aged now, but I still like this one a lot. Yeah, it can be laughably easy (barring some bosses here and there) and Tidus as a character and James Arnold Taylor as his voice are quite annoying, but I got really invested in the story and the characters. It's decently acted (if not unevenly voice directed, but only in some instances), remains very pretty, and is a fun and effectively satisfying experience. I think I've played as much as I can play for a lifetime after beating it for the second time in 2013, but it still holds a place in my heart.

Final Fantasy X-2

Really didn't like the shift in tone away from what I mostly liked about FFX, so I sold it not long after I got it. It's so weird to see a fast paced game with FFX's aesthetic! It's also strange to see Yuna acting much more assertively, though it is good to see her coming out of her shell. Her "virtuous Japanese woman" timidity was pretty infuriating in the original, though she broke away from that a few times. But anyway. Really, though, FFX didn't need a sequel. It ended so well, so beautifully, by itself. It was a gorgeous, poetic, mysterious ending, and the campy fan service of this game cheapens it. Then again, I haven't beaten it, so there might be a chance I'm wrong, but I doubt it.

Final Fantasy XII

Playing at the moment (the base NTSC version on PS2 when I first wrote this sentence, since then I've been playing the Zodiac Edition on Steam) but I still feel like this is my favorite FF. Yeah, an English major went crazy over the game's script, but I actually really like this, even if does make the game kind of inaccessible to a lot of people. It really invigorates an otherwise conventional story (marred somewhat by the largely unsatisfying ending designed to open the way for a sequel), and this is well aided by the game's great sense of exploration. I actually think the battle system is good on its own; I hardly miss the old turn-based combat (though there are still technically turns), even if it can get a bit bland in long areas with no personality (stupid Tchita Uplands; only slightly improved in Zodiac with unique zone music), but there are few of those for me. It's challenging, I love the mark system as it makes fighting strong monsters make sense within the game's world, and on an epic scale to boot; the Espers are awesome (even if they are do have very limited usefulness) and even though it robs characters of a good deal of their individuality, I like the diversity of weapons and abilities and how anyone can do anything (in the original version, less so in Zodiac Edition). It made FFV (which I think this game looks up to, in a way) fun and diverse, as well as extremely egalitarian towards all its characters. It does give battle a lot less personality than in FFX, but I don't mind given how much there is to explore. Characters aren't super poorly written anyway: I like how Vaan has a lot to learn and isn't "super important" to the plot, how Ashe is effectively the second main character (one might argue the -actual- one), and how wonderful Balthier's dialogue and character is. It's a shame that Fran, Penelo and Basch don't really stand out as much. It is a far from perfect game, but it's really well done and rewarding to play. I wish it was enough to rehabilitate this game's image. It gets way more flak than it deserves in my opinion. Perhaps it will be re-examined more favorably in the future. Saying more about Zodiac Edition, it's a pretty good upgrade; the game still looks really good and limiting the characters to two "job" boards makes it a lot more challenging. That said, now that I'm older, I now found some of the characters grating, the story - while still more sophisticated than those of the previous games (if one chooses to ignore the incredibly awkward homages to the Star Wars prequels) - a bit weak at parts, and the game's tone wavers a lot as one notices how Square Enix maybe tried to make it funnier and more accessible, and not always successfully. I've heard that there were problems with development and there were multiple directors on the project, which makes sense, though I should look into that more. I'm still enjoying the heck out of it and pumping as many hours into it as I have in the past!

Final Fight

(Emulated. :/ ) Played this and its sequels like crazy back in 8th grade "Wintercession", in which my year-round middle school gave magnet students all of January and February off! It was nice, but having few (i.e. no) friends and easily finishing off my winter homework made it a little dull and lonely after a while. God, middle school sucked. Anyway, I liked this game more than FF2, below. Sure, it's primitive and there's about as much to do with characters here as there is there, but the music, level design and enemy design was more interesting, memorable and convincing to me (thanks in part to some of the music tracks, as well as Sodom, Rolento and Guy making it to SFA/2). Shame it lacked Rolento and his stage. The censorship here is also just ridiculous. Removing patrons in a bar?! Kids knew what bars were! The early 90s were so ridiculous. But a great game, and true classic.

Final Fight 2

(Emulated. :/ ) I dug this one when I was first playing it back in 2000/2001. I soon grew very tired of it. There's just nothing interesting here! There are no real special moves other than Haggar's trusty piledriver, so he's the only character that's any fun to use. Carlos and Maki are bland and the former's role in the story is barely remarked upon. In the game, anyway. He barely even uses that damn sword! Maki got cooler in CvS2, but even there she's just Guy with her own crappy moves made much more interesting. Here she's so lame! What is that combo?! That jump kick at the end is hideous! Ugh. The stage design is okay, but the music is tinny and even shrill at times. The difficulty does curve, unlike FF3, but to me, it's still not very fun. Also, as some people have pointed out, how on Earth did Mad Gear get big enough to set up shop in Europe and Asia?

Final Fight 3

(Emulated. :/ ) This was my favorite one. Even if there's more of a challenge in FF2, I liked the characters in this one (Dean and Lucia are way better than Carlos and Maki), the fact that you can play alongside the CPU, the branching stages (even if this wasn't the best use of it), the music appealed to me more, and there were super moves! Again, though, the difficulty curve is non-existent and the game is basically the same difficulty throughout, with only boss health being a significant problem. Which isn't to say the game isn't hard at all, but it's easy to adapt to its tricks. The enemy design is also really boring, compared to FF1's iconic foes. Even FF2 had some memorable designs. But here? Who is that final boss?! You forget him the moment you defeat him! Lame. Shame they didn't really continue this franchise. I saw an LP of Streetwise and that's...not a good FF game. Not even -spiritually- does it succeed the first three. Yeesh.

Front Mission

(Super Famicom version...emulated, of course. :/ ) Like I said when talking about Bahamut Lagoon and FF Tactics, I could never get into Strategy RPGs, and this one didn't change that. People extol this series like crazy but as I also said elsewhere, I'm not really one for games with giant robots. I just find them boring.

Gang Beasts

Garfield: Caught in the Act

(PC version, included in the "Sonic and Garfield Pack") I remember liking this game back in 2000 or so. It's a pretty ho-hum platformer lacking any of the sophistication or good design of the Mario and DKC games, and as a result is pretty hard without being all that fun or interesting. I was pretty into Garfield back in elementary school for some reason. Dunno why; the comic is total garbage designed to appeal to lonely, jaded white-collar workers that became popular with kids like me for some reason. Who knows. I remember the music for this game could actually be pretty good, including a lavish jazz score for a somewhat creative black and white "film noir" series of levels. Other than that, not a great game.

Golden Axe III

I thiiiink I played this one. I played one of them at a party once. Thought it was kind of fun. I liked using one of the special moves where the dwarf(?) summons a swirling ring of flames to kill off all the enemies on screen. That's all I remember, really...

Grandia

Man, I would've loved this if I'd played it as a kid in elementary/middle school when it first came out. Now, it's a Saturday Morning Kids Game, only with REALLY bad voice acting. The batt;le system was alright, but I got to this after playing Grandia II, which made a lot of improvements. Missed the boat on this, I guess. I still have it, so...eh. Doubt I'll ever give it another go.

Grandia II

This one, though? Much better, even if it does achieve a more "adolescent" tone, which is only slightly better than Grandia 1. I haven't played it since I was 18, and revisiting it in 2016, I was definitely looking back at it with how I felt back then (although I loathed Grandia III when I started it back in '06, the year I played both of them). Still, a great battle system and a pretty gutsy story, even if it has been seen in other games and anime to some degree. Certainly liked the way it was done here, though!

Grandia III

Jeez, what the heck happened, Grandia?! I played this when I was 18 also, and even then I could tell it was already TERRIBLE compared to Grandia II. Talk about horrendously badly written characters and an ungodly saccharine and absurdly derivative story. And after all that, a pretty good battle system! But not one worth sitting through the story for. What a waste. The level design and music weren't too bad either, but seriously, the faults *strongly* outweighed the strengths of this game. It seems everyone in the world agreed, as the series is dead as a doornail now. Shame, it might benefit from a reboot. At any rate, got rid of this one pretty quickly.

Guitar Hero

Played it at my friend's house. Don't really remember it.

Guitar Hero II

Also played this at my friend's house. I remember "Carry On" and "Free Bird" were insanely fun to play. To my shame, I used to have "Free Bird" on my iPod! I liked the guitar work, thanks to this game! But I got over it; the lyrics are brainless and Lynyrd Skynyrd's Confederacy worship is disgusting.

Hades

I love this game. Back in middle school I got into Greek Mythology *hard* (hence why I was so into Age of Mythology later), and just when I thought I finally outgrew it, I saw videos of this game and fell completely in love. You play as Zagreus, an invented (i.e. not in actual Greek Mythology) son of the titular god of the Underworld, who learns his mother is not the kindly and supportive Nyx, the Goddess of Night, who lives in Hades' palace in the Netherworld, but Persephone, who left for the surface long ago. Zagreus longs to meet her, but Hades forbids it, driving Zagreus to fight his way out of the Underworld, past monsters and wandering souls, the Furies, the heroes in Elysium...and Hades himself. It's an absolutely brilliant idea for a rogue-like (or -light, strictly speaking), a genre I never really played before apart from Diablo II, and while I have yet to beat it even once as of writing this in early 2023, I'm having a great time. The amount of variety with weapons and abilities, how they combine, the characters and staggeringly impressive amounts of dialogue and side-content...it's incredible. I did get ever so slightly burned out after playing for a couple of weeks without success, so I'm taking a break at the moment, but it's easily my favorite game of the 20s so far (though it did technically first emerge in 2019 under Early Access), and one I will certainly go back to time and time again. Fantastic job, Supergiant Games.

Halo 2

Also mainly multiplayer with some friends, and co-op with my friend, who usually killed me by letting me go ahead and then hitting me with the butt of his gun. That jerk. Good times, though. Again, whatever with story and whatnot.

Halo: Combat Evolved

Multiplayer with some friends. So much fun. Whatever I could glean from the story didn't impress me. Again, action games, especially FPSes aren't really my thing, and I'm very picky about what Sci-Fi I like.