The thing about Dreamfall (and the series in general) is that while gameplay is never great, the story, world and characters are incredible. The first one was a classic point and click but this one is a more accessible 3rd person story focused adventure. Maybe because it's more associated with the Xbox many here missed it but I wholeheartedly recommend it.
While playing through Mass Effect 2 LE I played the Shadow Broker DLC for the first time. I'm amazed by how good it is. I'm not much into getting DLC but this might be one of the best ones, no?
Sadly is not backwards compatible on Xbox, I could get the 360 version for 10€ here in Portugal. There's a psp version too for the same price.
https://pt.webuy.com/product-detail?id=5030930047856&categoryName=psp-jogos&superCatName=jogos&title=godfather-the&referredFrom=boxsearch
I know nothing about this game and now I feel bad. Looks awesome.
I tried several times get into Dead Rising but it's just not my kind of game. I can see why people like it, killing zombies in creative ways - at least on paper - can be fun.
Starfield - 91
God of War: Ragnarok - 92
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League - 81
Dying Light 2: Stay Human - 83
Sifu - 77
Gran Turismo 7 - 88
A Plague Tale: Requiem - 85
Forspoken - Delayed
Pokemon Legends: Arceus - 83
S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chernobyl - 81
Kirby and the Forgotten Land - 78
Saints Row - Delayed
Babylon's Fall - 73
Redfall - 77
Marvel's Midnight Suns - Delayed
Elden Ring - 92
Ghostwire: Tokyo - 83
Ark 2 - 71
Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora - Delayed
Bayonetta 3 - 90
The Callisto Protocol - 80
Gotham Knights - 82
Hogwarts Legacy - 70
Mario + Rabbids Spark of Hope - 90
Sonic Frontiers - 75
Horizon Forbidden West - 91
Splatoon 3 - 82
Lego Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga - 80
MultiVersus - 77
Stray - 81
Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin - 81
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge - 75
Open Roads - 77
Tchia - 83
Untitled Breath of the Wild Sequel - 95
Here is the list of Wildcard Games:
Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines 2 - 83
Hollow Knight: Silksong - 91
Haunted Chocolatier - 85
The Lord of the Rings: Gollum - Delayed
Skull & Bones - Cancelled
Where's Scorn???
Halo Infinite 87 - 12
Outriders 75 - 8
Back 4 Blood 81 - 5
Psychonauts 2 84 - 6
Gotham Knights Delay - 5
Gran Turismo 7 88 - 0
Ratchet & Clank: A Rift Apart 85 - 7
No More Heroes 3 73 - 7
Hitman 3 86 - 12
Death Loop 80 - 2
Kena: Bridge of Spirits 83 - 8
Returnal 85 - 9
Resident Evil Village 81 - 7
Ghostwire: Tokyo 77 - 0
Vampire: The Masquerade -- Bloodlines 2 80- 0
Scorn 84 - 0
Bravely Default 2 73 - 5
Horizon Forbidden West 83 - 0
Hogwarts Legacy 77 - 0
Monster Hunter Rise 83 - 5
The Medium 79 - 6
Scarlet Nexus 76 - 6
Chorus 79 - 5
God of War 2 (Ragnarok) Delay -5
It Takes Two 83 - 4
Shin Megami Tensei V 85 - 9
12 Minutes 81 - 4
The Good Life 75 - 0
Persona 5 Strikers 80 - 7
Sable 87 - 0
Wildcards:
Lord of the Rings: Gollum 70 - 0
Dying Light 2 84 - 0
Far Cry 6 77 - 12
Skull & Bones 75 - 0
Axiom Verge 2 87 - 1
Tales of Arise 88 - 9
Rainbow Six Quarantine Cancelled - 0 <- We need a renamed category
Hollow Knight: Silksong 91 - 0
Bayonetta 3 - 92 - 0
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 - 96 - 0
Total 166
Lake
Tried the "E3" demo last summer and it seemed like an interesting game that needed some polish before being released. Disappointingly nothing really changed and it should have stayed more time in the oven.
It's basically a mail delivery simulator. It does a good job at telling a story that flows organically without the need of gimmicks but it's a shame that it's kinda of ugly and towards the end the quality of the writing drops. To the point that right at the end I made two choices that should be incompatible and the game just ignored it.
Really disliked the music. If there was more variety it would be tolerable but I ended up switching off the radio most of the time.
No doubt a developer I want to see grow. Would be interesting to see them working with a bigger budget.
6.5/10
Metroid Prime 4, Bayo 3, Zelda botw2, Stalker 2, Scorn, Starfield and... ELDEN RING!
Stardew Valley
Kinda forced by my GF to play this. She has hundreds of hours on her phone so with it coming to GP we had to play co-op.
It's a near perfect game where we dropped 30 something hours without noticing. Although I don't think I'll play much more but it's a really chill game that came with perfect timing to compensate our disappointment with It Takes Two. (nothing really wrong with itt, mostly my gf didn't adapt well to the gameplay and we weren't enjoying the writing and characters)
Taking care of crops and going through the mines are my favourite things to do. I don't care much about offering stuff to the villagers mostly because I don't like how you have to navigate menus constantly to see who's who and what they want. A lot of minor quality of life adjustments needed.
8.5/10
Mass Effect Le
My favourite ME kinda hurts with the update. It surely looks and plays better but it also exposes how dull and dated the level design is. Still my favourite. I love the writing, how it deals with sci-fi and mystery. And how well it establishes characters and universe for the series.
My first hot take of 22. I really love the Makko. Clunky as fuck but... Being able to visit desolate exoplanets never fails to move me. Specially because although very simple stuff, the writing in the descriptions is great and ignites my imagination as an astronomy nerd.
9/10
Weed, a ton of Christmas sweets and Mass Effect LE. Can't complain.
The Gunk
OKest game of the year.
You vacuum gunk on an alien planet as a way to unlock your progression. That's the game.
Runs smoothly, looks fine. Everything else is just the most average game I can think of and it is so in a way that feels almost intentional.
Disappointing, I was hoping for something better, a good sci-fi adventure with a chill mood. Music is cool but goes nowhere, same with level design, characters, story and gameplay loop. Again it not bad in anyway, just a flat line.
6.5/10
Halo Infinite
How weird is it that 343 not only managed to make something out of the apparent disaster that was Infinite but they also ended up releasing a goty contender while elevating Halo's gameplay to best ever in the series?
There's definitely some rough edges here but outside from the stuttering on the cinematics most of them require a cynical eye to be a real concern, I say this because usually I was just too busy with the brilliant emergent combat and completely drawn in the moment to moment elegance of Infinite. From the bigger battles to the smaller encounters, the amount of memorable unique moments that emerge from the systems in place is just a thing of beauty.
Sound design and music are superb. The dialogue lines from the Grunts are honestly one of the most brilliant things I've seen in a game. Such diversity and wonderful comedic writing.
As negative. Towards the end as you abandon the open world it falls in the same trap of more repetitive locations and fights the series always had since its inception. Characters are not great, particularly the Banished are straight up Saturday morning cartoon trash.
Story is OK, some parts are good others not at all. It generally works. It doesn't gets close to Reach but it's kind of on par with the rest of the series (from CE to 4).
9/10
Hard to give it a score, but gameplay being so great makes me inclined towards a 9, although an 8.5 would be more correct.
