Finished a few games since last time:
- 04/21 - Monster Prom: A date game with a lot of endings. I played a few times to the end but did not find it very interesting in the end.
- 04/29 - Asterix & Obelix XXL 2: Only for fans as it is a very repetitive beat'em all.
- 05/10 - Fahrenheit: Indigo Prophecy Remastered: Quite the same as the original game. Only for QTEs fans. Also, the ending is still a huge letdown.
- 05/13 - Jones on Fire: A basic endless runner that I ended playing much more than originally anticipated.
- 05/14 - DuckTales Remastered: Very enjoyable. I played it on easy with my 7-year old daughter, helping her when needed.
- 05/20 - A New Beginning: Final Cut: An average point'n click with an interesting story.
- 05/24 - Aladdin: A good platform game. It finished the game thanks to the remaster additions like quick save/load and god mode that I activated for the final fight against Jafar.

Full list [url=here]https://www.gog.com/forum/general/games_finished_in_2021/post38[/url]

Just tapped off Resident Evil 6.

This was a years long project, sort of. The various campaigns are varied in quality and there is enough retread ground to make following them up all that close a little difficult. The difficulties also introduce some issues.

First, best campaign is easily Leon's. It's the most Resident Evil (at that time) and is paced the best. I liked Helena as a character but would have easily preferred an established character instead. Next is Sherry's (at least that is who I played as) which is okay. It's not as good as Leon's and is not quite paced as well but it's somewhere between Leon and Chris's campaigns in tone. I liked both of them very much. Next best is a kind of a tie between Ada and Chris. Chris and Ada's campaign feel poorly balanced. On a low difficulty they feel too easy, on a harder one you don't have anywhere near enough ammo to do what they ask you to do. This was a small problem in Leon and Sherry's campaigns but not nearly as much. Chris' campaign had decent themes and a story that, once more, I wish they used established characters (I wanted Sheva or Jill to return, but oh well.) instead, once again.

The only other thing I wanna say is that I actually like this game a good bit, being more fond of action than survival but the main issue is the emphasis on multiplayer is obvious when you play this game by yourself. Revelations and RE5 feel fine without another player but this one has you sit and wait a lot, even when you play as Ada when she opens certain doors and "waits" for the other player.

Another issue, a grip I will grant, is that I really liked the laser pointers from RE4, RE5, and Revelations on 3DS. This game is a decent compromise that I don't think was strictly necessary but at least it's better than the plain, bog standard crosshairs in RE Revelations 1 and 2 (both very good games so far) on the Xbox and PS4.

Not a problem strictly but it took me so long to beat this game I really do not know what the story was for the game as a whole.

Here is my ranking for the extra modes (Mercenaries and Raid) in the series so far that I have played all that much: RE5, RE Revelations 2, RE6, RE Revelations, and lastly is RE4. I have Mercenaries 3D and would put it about with RE5 but that's the game. RE6 is in the middle because the emphasis on melee is much stronger in this mode than even the campaign, which is kind of high. The character roster is a little weak with not very many kits or characters and no characters from outside the campaign. Combos are positively necessary in this game, even more than RE5 to the point where if you do not have at least one two digit combo going of some kind you are just going to be frustrated and stuck. It took me this most recent try to get used to the Mercs mode enough to actually start having fun with it. It helps that both Helena and Sherry have significantly more fun loadouts than Leon, Chris, or... Jake? I think his name is Jake... it's Jake. (Actual trouble remembering his name... odd, I did not think he was a bad character. I guess he is a little forgetful though.)

All in all, the game looks great even to this day on the Xbox One, plays very well, and has quite a few gameplay modes to chew on. As a package it's actually quite excellent, even if the campaigns are a little repetitive.

Maneater (XSX Game Pass)

I've always wanted someone to develop an open world RPG where you play as a dog and have doggy skill trees like leg humping and you could have a quest called Hunting for Bitches without the developer getting in trouble. This game is not that, but it's still a good idea. Play as a juvenile Bull Shark in a quest to get revenge on the shark hunter that killed your mother. Eat everything, including stuff you shouldn't, grow, evolve and mutate.

It's probably less of an RPG and more like a Saints Row game where you play as a shark. It was really fun though. Some reviewers criticize the game for becoming just more of the same after the opening few hours...but you can 100% the game and finish the story in under 14 hours. In my opinion it's just about the right length for the amount of game play content. It also looks really good and ran perfect.

To the Moon, May 30 (GOG)-An interesting premise and a game that's more story than gameplay. The story itself was rather bittersweet with an unexpected twist about midway thru. Walking and interacting with things was a little clunky. The music was excellent. The bonus content was both quite a bit darker and lighter than the main game. But overall I liked it.

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RiME

Very reminiscent of ICO, Shadow of the Colossus, and Journey, and equally beautiful, or even more so. Puzzles and platforming are simple but I found them satisfying regardless. It's really calm and relaxing for the most part, with few potential for frustrations, plus it has fantastic art direction and a great accompanying soundtrack. I also liked that everything was pretty self-explanatory or easy to figure out on my own, without needing words or many prompts; the game managed to guide me throughout the journey without actually holding my hand all the time. I hardly ever felt lost but also not pushed into anything.

Exploration on the side was cool as well, but eventually I stopped hunting after collectibles, when it became clear that I would not find them all on my first playthrough anyway, and that they didn't really have much weight either; more importantly, the further I got into the game, the more distracting it felt to look for them. You can go back to explore specific chapters/areas afterwards from the menu, but after I'm done with the story, I don't really feel the need or motivation to search for the collectibles I missed.

The theme of the story is not exactly new in games anymore, it's pretty standard fare for indies by now, and I'm usually rather fed up of it. Still, contrary to some other games I've played, I thought the implementation of this theme was actually quite well done and self-consistent in RiME. The few silent and environmental story-telling there was worked fine, and the mysterious, fantastical setting was intriguing. The whole experience was awe-inspiring, first magical and cute - which made me think it would be a good game to show to the kids at first, because they would have loved these parts -, later a bit dark and eerie though, yet still of a sad beauty.

All in all, I was quite enchanted by it all. I thought it was both a work of art and enjoyable to play. Technically, it mostly ran fine, even though it crashed on me one time, but I guess I just got unlucky, and I didn't lose much progress because of it.

Bravely Default II - True Ending.

Thanks for the summary. I've been considering this game recently and would appreciate additional info.
How long, roughly, it took you to finish it and have you found it to be the appropriate length?

Anyway, I continued my FPS binge and finished 2 more games.
First Unreal II.
The game is meh. It is mediocre continuation to very good game and it doesn't have much to stand out. It is as if someone made barebones first person Mass Effect with all of the quality stuff missing. The crew stuff is weak with no real interactions and certainly no choices and while you can walk across ship there is no reason to. The guns are decent but not great and the same can be said for enemies. What's sad is that all more interesting enemies are overshadowed by humans with guns that take too much of the space and are much more dangerous with their powerful hit-scan weapons. The game have decent visuals for its age. It would be good visuals but the colour palette is not the greatest.
I've got to say, it was brave decision to make main hero have arthritis in his legs and to walk accordingly. Brave but I don't appreciate it. The game is fairly short and it would be even shorter if you weren't playing snail.
Another game, right after Far Cry where the biggest challenge and chore was to walk somewhere and I was losing my patience with it.
5/10

Then the same day Area 51.
It's FPS hooter from 2005. It is very short game and quite low-budget one. It is quite short, it features basically only 3 types of enemies and its story is badly acted non-sensical mess. The weapons are so-so and special powers you get there are crap except for specific fights. What I liked was how creepy The Grays were in the game. If only they managed to make the rest of the game the same way.
What I hated is that you get only little indication you are being hit and you get none whatsoever if someone attacks you in melee.
4/10 (thanks to it being so short)

Also, the same day as I completed these games I got halfway through my "Get fully vaccinated" quest and I am looking forward to completing it in July. I hope you are all playing the same game and intend to finish it.

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I played the GOG version without Galaxy, so I didn't track the time, but on average people seem to complete it in 5-6 hours. The game has four bigger chapters/areas and a short epilogue, and I played one area per evening, mostly in one sitting. The game saves automatically at certain points or on quitting, but I never really paid attention or worried about that, I just played on and on until the next chapter because I felt like it. For me, the game had the right length. It didn't overstay its welcome, I would probably have been fine with another chapter, but I also wasn't disappointed about it ending too soon.

There are people complaining about its short length compared to the price, but I got it in a GOG sale promo as a "free" bonus, so that was not a consideration for me. Other complaints are that it's "70% walking, 20% simple platforming, and 10% easy puzzles", and that's not completely wrong either; it is a bit like a walking simulator with some more gameplay, like Journey and ABZÛ, not a full blown open world action platformer with combat or whatever you might think looking at the screenshots. But I did not mind, for me even the walking (well, running actually) was fun, because the scenery was so magnificent to me. Some players seem to find it boring though. YMMV.

Finished Resident Evil 4 on the Switch again after finishing it years ago on my PS2. Completed Professional Difficulty and I am hesitant to work on the Mercenaries mini game like before. Having the Chicago Typewriter already helps with the game immensely.

Last Thursday several stores in Poland got another batch of PlayStation 5s. A colleague was so kind to instantly inform me and so I placed an order right away and got my console the very next day, just as I got accustomed to the idea that I won't get a PS5 for another year or two. Oddly enough there are still units left so I guess at least in Poland the demand for PS5s is already pretty well-covered.

I already beat my first game on the PS5 which is Astro's Playroom, another free game from PlayStation's cute Astro series. This one's a pretty great albeit short 3D platformer that mostly serves as a demo for some of the PS5's features, most notably the new DualSense controller. It's also a pretty beautiful trip down memory lane for players who have been with PlayStation for a long time.

It's a pretty basic platformer with cute little robots where you have to go through four linear worlds that are themed after the PS5's different hardware components like its GPU or SSD. It's a surprisingly well-designed game that's not particularly challenging but just feels nice and I almost wish it were at least twice as long, though it takes a bit longer if you go for all the collectables. Each of the worlds looks and sounds very differently and has a bunch of unique features, most notably sequences where Astro puts on a suit that completely changes how the game plays and e.g. runs around in a hamster ball or climbs like a monkey by grabbing little ledges.

The game is almost an orgy of DualSense demos. Every step results in fitting sounds and vibrations from the controller, sometimes you have to pull a cord until it pops and you can really feel the tension and release. Of course the game also demonstrates the triggers' resistance. It is pretty impressive, though the feature is hard to enjoy for me because I always imagine that it's putting a ton of stress on parts of the controller that will wear out pretty quickly (especially since some people have had that kind of experience). But assuming that one day there will be more resilient models of the DualSense: yeah, this stuff's a real game changer and truly feels like a new generation of controller to me.

Anyway, I guess what I really love about the game is that it's a love letter to PlayStation's history. All over the worlds robots are re-enacting scenes from many many classic games ranging from oldies like Final Fantasy VII and Silent Hill 2 up to more recent games like Days Gone or Ghost of Tsushima. And there are collectables that fill a special room: puzzle pieces decorate its walls and, more impressively, (almost?) all officially released PlayStation hardware appears as gigantic and sometimes interactive 3D models. That of course includes all the consoles but also peripherals like the PlayStation mouse and PSVR. To "outsiders" it's surely just shameless product placement but to me (and probably many others) it's a beautiful nostalgia trip that brings back many nice memories.

Sadly the game takes no more than about 2 hours to beat, perhaps 4 hours if you want to get all collectables, but still, it's a very nice experience and a nice first stop for new owners of a PlayStation 5.

I don't mind it being mostly walking if there are thing to look at, to experience and learn. I was not thrilled with AER I played recently as I felt it to be quite empty and I hope this provides more substance.

I got it for free as part of some promo as well so I don't mind price/length value either. I don't expect this kind of games to be much longer anyway, so I don't mind that.

Thanks for the informations. I think I'll try it fairly soon.

To cross another FPS off the list, I finished SIN Episodes: Emergence.
It is basically knock-off Half-Life 2. It is made in Source engine, you get young woman companion, it is episodic, it has no ending, there is level where you are being chased through docks
Unfortunately, unlike Half-Life, there is no robot dog, there are no interesting aliens (there are boring mutants, though), there is no good story, there are no interesting weapons, there is no gravity gun and physics play, no Ravneholm, vehicles to drive for yourself (you are shortly being driven in car though) and there are not that many interesting environments to fight through.
There are only 3 weapons so there is not even place for some interesting one. There is handgun, shotgun and assault rifle. All very unremarkable. There is also qutie a low variety in enemies and 90% time you get to fight only 2 human types. Regular one and armored with minigun.

It is quite short game and I haven't been happier to be done with any weapon as this one. It was partly my doing but I still blame the game. The thing is I chose fairly high difficulty (it's on slider and I chose about 7th out of 10 notches). For the first half it was difficult but manageable, although there were some quite tough spaces. Unfortunately about half-way through, likely to make up for the short length the difficulty spiked to extreme and it was absolute slog to get through the second half and get to the finish. The enemies hit hard and there is a ton of them. 2 jump from behind the corner, I killed them, 3 more popped up, I killed them as well, then 4 mores to top it with another 2. The same likely repeats at next corner. Where it would be fine to have 3-4 enemies to fight there were 15 and I started to hate it very soon, quicksaving literally several times a minut to get through it.

What is weird about that is that I looked afterwards at some video of max difficulty gameplay and the game was much easier for them. Like infinitely. Where I had 30 enemies they had 5 and each of the mine could eat through my health in matter of seconds while they barely made a dent into the health of the person in video I cheched.
For me enemies were often spawning from nowhere to ludicrous levels. Office part I had to just rung through as enemies were coming on and on while in the video I checek they are enemies there but to manageable amount.
Elswhere I entered wall covering big enough for 2 people, where there was an enemy. I killed him right away and from that cover fought with naother enemies. Suddenly I died only to see enemy standing just right behind me in that cover. I got quite stuck on that part and had to reload there at least dozen times and some time enemy just spawned right behind me and other times he didn't.
Weird and certainly not appreciated.

I don't know what was going on with the game and I guess many people had much better experience but I simply hated the second half. Could be part of my doing but it doesn't change fact I had bad time.
I'd rate it only 4/10 even though it is possibly better than that for most other players.
Objectively, it is better game than Area 51 by far but I had so little fun with it, that I can't rate it better.

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Hard to judge. I liked AER well enough myself, and there aren't *that* many puzzles and activities in RiME either, but it's definitely more focussed than AER, and nicer to look at, too.

Toonstruck, June 2 (GOG)-Well that wraps up my playthru of Toonstruck. This game was a lot better than I was expecting. The voice talent was good. There were a couple weird pauses as if Christopher Lloyd forgot his line but they only had budget for one take and other places where the lines didn't quite line up with the animations. The puzzles were mostly pretty good with the exception of just a couple due to pixel hunting, a couple due to weird logic, and one due to lack of feedback. The plot was wild and zany as you would expect a from a cartoon you watched as a kid. Just a fun and funny game.

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Valfaris. This is basically a sequel to Slain and is generally bigger and better in every way. It's the cover to a death metal album that you actually play. Slain was more melee-focused, but in this one you have a sword and a gun, plus another special weapon that I usually forgot to use. Slain was sword-and-sorcery, but this one is sci-fi with a gothic vibe that is very old school Warhammer 40K (I'm not sure when it happened, but it seems like sometime after Dan Abnett started writing 40K books that the whole universe got a lot more light-hearted). In Slain, when you got a new weapon, the guy would start windmilling; in this one, he does a straight vertical headbanging. It's totally different!

It's quite difficult, but fair in that checkpoints are frequent - you're asked to choose if you want to activate a checkpoint or keep the items to level up your weapons, but I never skipped a checkpoint and still had enough left over to fully load a couple of my weapons for the final level. You still need to git gud and master the attack/defense system, though, because you can't just button-mash or luck your way through the game.

Much like Slain, the graphics are really nice pixel art. The soundtrack is by one of the guys from Celtic Frost (you can tell the creators are especially big Celtic Frost fans - the main guy is named Therion for one). My only complaint is that as nice as the graphics are, there are some sections where I felt the art direction overwhelmed the gameplay a bit. For instance, there's a boss fight against a blood-drinking plant in which I kept losing track of where my guy was because of all the stuff happening on the screen. But a good game, overall.