Castlevania: Belmont's Curse

• Genre: Exploratory Action Platformer (MetroidVANIA)
• Spoiler Free Review: Pretty much.
• Time Played: 20 hours.
• Too Short/Long: It's pretty solid where it's at.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Really good. It's definitely a little bit different than most Castlevania soundtracks, but it's also much more removed from most Castlevania games in terms of when it was created, but I thought it was for the most part really good.
• Why I played: Castlevania. I've always been a huge Castlevania fan and it's been a long time since we got a "proper" Castlevania - 18 years in fact. I actually do enjoy the Lords of Shadow series, but it's definitely something apart from the standard series.
• Jank: For the most part it's pretty solid. One or two instances of the character having to be replaced somewhere by the game because they were stuck under or above something, and just a couple moments of frame rate drop. The bigger problem I experienced, and I'm not sure if this was a bug or like a memory leak or something, but the game did crash on me like 5-6 times. It was always while interacting with the map, and usually pretty close to, if not right after a save, so no, or very little lost progress, so just booted the game right back up. I played on Switch, and I assumed there would be a Switch 2 version/upgrade and am very surprised there's not. It probably would have run a bit smoother had it been.
• Difficulty: This was pretty solid. There was a good deal of variety in level design, so a lot of the platforming challenges felt challenging at first, but then fun enough to navigate once you learned them. The combat also felt pretty well balanced to me. Some boss fights were maybe a bit too short, taking only a minute or two first try, but I prefer that to them being drawn out.
• Something I liked: The backgrounds visuals really popped and were far more captivating than the backgrounds of the majority of 2d games, I found myself constantly admiring the backgrounds. I also loved the Arcane whip and it's essential part in the gameplay of this game.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm extremely pleased. I played a few other metroidvania's this year after having fallen off for awhile (0 in 2024, only 2 in 2025), and while they were fun for what they were and each had a gimmick of their own, this is in a class of it's own.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would. This is among the best Castlevania games. It's definitely a much more modernized Castlevania, while still playing tribute to the past. It has a lot of a fan service for long-time fans, but you don't really need to know anything to pick this one up right away.
  

I finished Castlevania: Belmont's Curse last night and I'm still kind of processing it, and usually that doesn't happen unless a game really blows me out of the water. I'm not sure it blew my mind like that, it certainly isn't life changing or really breaking any new ground. It was just really fun, a really good time. It's a good game, and I enjoyed it the whole way through.

Wicked Plague

• Genre: Action Platforming (Metroidvania)
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: I have no idea, the game doesn't log it, the console doesn't log it, and I played it over a long period of time... 10-12 hours?
• Too Short/Long: It was about right for whatever amount it was.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Pretty cool for limiting itself to Game Boy Color sound.
• Why I played: Back when I grabbed Dragonyhm I grabbed a few other games since they were doing a bundle deal, this was one of the others. I played it a good bit here and there but I wanted to finish it before I picked up another game boy game.
• Jank: It's mostly pretty polished. I think I saw some typos in the final product but that might be the only big complaint there.
• Difficulty: It can be pretty difficult. Bosses act quick and in a small space and have plenty of hit points, so they can be especially tough. Your health isn't auto-refreshed at any location and when you "continue" you are only provided with a couple hit points rather than full health, so you always have to buy your health back up. That's kind of annoying, but I guess it helps balance things a bit, it might be too easy if you were always getting topped off.
• Something I liked: The character designs were pretty neat, bosses were mostly pretty unique within the context of the game, and more or less learnable even if pretty difficult at first.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm pretty please with this one.
• Recommend to others: I believe at first it only had physical cart for Game Boy Color, but this now seems to have a digital version available on itch.io, and I think it's free? It might require you to load it into a game boy emulator, I'm not sure, but I would definitely recommend this if you think it looks/sounds fun.

Wicked Plague feels like a modern metroidvania, more on the 'vania side, even though it's made with the limitations of a game boy color game. I literally played it on a game boy color cartridge, but all in all it feels pretty smooth. There is some design clunkiness due to the limitations of having only a couple buttons, but they did a great job within the limitations. I'm not sure there is a better metroidvania at that level.

I started playing it not long after I finished Dragonyhm, but only finished it just now because I had the motivation of another game I wanted to put in, but liked Wicked Plague enough I wanted to finish it first. One issue I had though, was playing Wicked Plague on my GBA SP. It's a GBC cart so I can't play it on any version of a DS, which have far better screens than my SP. I also have the original SP, not the one with a true backlit screen. The original SP release is technically front lit, you can even see the lights if you look at the screen from the side.

Unfortunately Wicked Plague is a pretty dark game and I found it an eye strain to stare into the darkness, and try to differentiate between the details of the game. I don't have ModRetro's Chromatic, nor the popular Analogue Pocket which why I'm sure are great little devices, I find hard to justify spending the money on to play a game that at some point in history was playable on a system that cost less than 50 bucks. What I could justify though, at a fraction of the cost, is a screen upgrade, so I replaced one of my GBA SP screens with a new IPS screen and wowie kabowie did that make all the difference in the world. The game actually looked like the screenshots now. Not just the brightness, but the lack of scanlines, are a huge help. Now I know in some cases scanlines may be preferred and since it's not one of those newfangled systems I can't change the screen mode, but if I ever think that scanlines are more important than brightness, I have several other GPA SPs to use.

I don't think the brightness, contrast, and clarity are going to be beaten out by the pixel diffusion though. Apparently there was a wire I needed to solder on to get more controls. A+ screen upgrade, now brightness has 15 different levels, there are different color modes, different scanlines, etc. etc. 10/10


Regardless, that was the extra push I needed to finally finish the game, but I kind of wish I had it the whole time, considering how dark the majority of the game is - I may never have taken the break if it wasn't such a strain to see.

The characters are neat but it kind of throws you in the situation as if you're expected to already know them and there is a lot of other stuff going on in the world. It's not like it's too much to follow or there is a ton of dialog, but it's enough that makes it seem like the creators fleshed out the world beyond that game, and I hope to see more of it.

Triple-A Minesweeper

• Genre: Sweeper-like
• Spoiler Free Review: I tried my best not spoil it, but there may be some implications in my screenshot and descriptions of my experience.
• Time Played: 10 Minutes, but honestly I could probably put a 1000 hours in it easy. It has infinite replayability.
• Too Short/Long: Considering the near indefinite time you could play this game for, but the fact you can end it any time, it's perfect.
• Did I cry: More than any game that game before it.
• Soundtrack: Just absolutely stunning. It perfectly fit the mood. Every beat just resonated with my soul.
• Why I played: Because AAA games are the best types of games to play.
• Jank: What jank? This is a AAA game. AAA games are jank free.
• Difficulty: Whew, it was pretty tough. Thankfully they had handy way points to help me know where to sweep the mines, but it was still pretty challenging to sweep one, and then have to sweep another.
• Something I liked: I liked sweeping the mines most of all, but jeez, it's more like - what didn't I like? Absolutely nothing. Every aspect of this game is gold.
• Pleased/Disappointed: Please beyond belief, I'll tell you what. I don't know if I'll be able to stop thinking about this for the rest of the year.
• Recommend to others: I would absolutely recommend literally everyone see this game all the way through. There is nothing quite like it and I think it's an instant classic that will not soon be forgotten.
  

Triple-A Minesweeper is the type of game all other strive to be. From it's resonating score, to crisp clean art direction, emotional breadth of the storytelling, and truly just smooth engaging gameplay. You really feel like YOU are the Minesweeper. I never truly understood what it meant to be immersed in a game until I played Triple-A Minesweeper. I forgot what my name was for a brief period and when Clyde called out for Sweeper I went "Huh, what?" out loud. I almost entirely forgot I was playing a video game. I was just completely immersed in an experience.

I can't be without criticism, even though this game doesn't really deserve any criticism. It's a AAA game, and I'd have to say it's missing a couple things core to the experience. First off, the lack of tutorials - I really struggled figuring out what to do at first, that said - I guess that could be why it felt so immersive. Just like Minesweeper waking up in a daze thrown right into the action - so was I. The other thing, and I know, it's a single play offline game, but the lack of any cosmetic microtransactions is a true disappointment. I mean, thankfully I fit into the exact niche of character Minesweeper is, so I didn't feel the need to personalize him, but I truly just love giving AAA games more money for arbitrary things I'm not going to use. They deserve every dime they can squeeze out of me. Other than those very minor complaints, it's an absolutely perfect game.

It was no cake-walk though, as we've come to expect from sweeper-likes. I almost gave up at the 8th swept mine, but I knew I had to push through, and oh boy the payout of the twist the story takes from there was just worth more than anything money can buy. This is why you play AAA games. No other medium, no small indie studio, no retro game is going to be able to provide an experience like this.

Wall World

• Genre: Action Roguelite
• Spoiler Free Review: Not much to spoil.
• Time Played: 13 Hours?
• Too Short/Long: It would have been fine if I didn't have to play more than I needed.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: It's fine but very much in the background and hardly noticeable. 
• Why I played: I think I got this around the same time I got Ocean Keeper, and I think they are both in the same tree of games of inspiration. Dome Keeper inspiring this and maybe this inspiring Ocean Keeper. There is a spider mech, I like those.
• Jank: It's very janky. Not so much until you start getting speed upgrades and I guess the game just can't keep up with you? So you get stuck in a position where you can't do anything because the world won't load. It happens in a smaller degree with just a little bit of fast paced traveling, where you need to hover around a mine entrance and eventually you can enter it - if you just go as fast as you can through several biomes - consider your run forfeit. Unfortunately I didn't realize this was going to be a persistent issue.
• Difficulty: It's a little difficult at first, making it feel like you never have enough time, and really it never gets much better but like most rouge-lites, the upgrades that carry over from run to run in addition to figuring out how to better optimize your time make it easier and easier.
• Something I liked: I liked the core gameplay loop, which is probably why I was willing to return despite my frustrations with the game essentially crashing 2/3rds of the way through an hour run several times.
• Pleased/Disappointed: It's fine. I enjoyed it. I'm just a bit bitter because I feel like I wasted a few more hours than I needed to.
• Recommend to others: I would if it didn't have that one big glaring flaw. You're on a time limit with this game so you need to try to be as efficient with it as possible, but if you are too efficient the game becomes unplayable, so it's gonna be a no.
  

Wall World looks cool and had some really fun design choices. The gameplay loop of going into mines and coming out to fight off monsters between a couple phases of the boss coming out is pretty fun. I kept feeling like it could be just a little more generous with the time, but I guess the point of it is - you aren't necessarily supposed to do everything each run, just what you can. Had I known, I could have tried exploring the world a bit different and cut some time down outside of the crashing issues, but I was being hard headed and determined I could do everything faster and could do everything in a run.

It was wholly unnecessary though, because as it turns out, the end is just a little bit anti-climactic and I wasn't going to really need much once I met the requirements to end the game.

I will say I did only find like 3 of it's dozen weapons useful at all and a lot of the upgrades just aren't that great. All passive upgrades are great, but a lot of the active use items you get through each run just aren't worth it - in my opinion. There could be some issues with balance there, or just my style of playing, but I felt a little limited and didn't even use most stuff most the game because you're on a time crunch, and I was trying to utilize it as optimally as possible.

Dragon Ruins

• Genre: RPG
• Spoiler Free Review: Not much to spoil.
• Time Played: 2-3 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's fine for what it is.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: There sure are sounds in this game - I wouldn't exactly say they're memorable, but they're serviceable.
• Why I played: I wanted something to play I could zone out a bit more while playing and didn't have to think too hard or read much while playing.
• Jank: Not really much jank to speak of.
• Difficulty: Not too difficult.
• Something I liked: The art is really cool.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm pleased enough. I'm not disappointed, it filled a gap where I needed it to.
• Recommend to others: Probably not. Not that it's bad, it's just a very specific thing I'm not going to go out of my way to tell people they should play. People are into this kind of nonsense already know they want to play this.
  

I played this on Switch and don't recall if this shop description matches, but on it's little blub under it's title banner on Steam, it simply reads "A dungeon crawling microgame for tired people." and I couldn't possibly describe it more accurately.

It's a dungeon crawling game. I was tired when I started playing it, and all I had to do was move around and stuff would happen. It's somewhere between an auto-battler/idle game, and one of those games with bump combat where, in some cases, the combat is more of a puzzle than an action challenge. Ys, Hydlide, Fairune all come to mind.

In fact, it would seem that the developer made a game almost exactly like those, another game I played; Ringlorn Saga, so I would say it's probably the intent to a degree. You just walk around, automatically fighting enemies until you need to heal/level up, return to level up and such, and go walk around some more. There are just many different paths and what you may be able to fight at any given time may be too strong until you level up some more. You pretty much just walk around until you win and that's the whole game.

I'm sure it could be a better game if it had more stuff involved, but I guess there are already tons of dungeon crawlers that have more stuff and are they better games? I don't know if they all are - they're certainly different, but that also means that this was different from all those others ones, and hey that's something.

Puppergeist

• Genre: Music/Rhythm
• Spoiler Free Review: Mostly, not much to spoil.
• Time Played: ~2 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's fine.
• Did I cry: I audibly bawled within the first half hour, to a point where Naga was concerned, got up from her place in the corner and laid next to me, causing me to bawl even harder.
• Soundtrack: For a music game it's uh... not the best. It's not "bad" by any means, it's music, there are rhythms. But they're more just like little jingles for you to play to for the most part.
• Why I played: I wanted to play something thematic as we approached the Halloween season and it looked cute.
• Jank: I would say there is jank in how it handles/responds, but really that's the only thing I can call out and I'm not positive it's not the way it is by design and I'm just bad at it.
• Difficulty: While it's certainly not the hardest game, it did frustrate me at certain points.
• Something I liked: The art was very cute, it was overall just a little sweet game.
• Pleased/Disappointed: It's fine, it met expectations.
• Recommend to others: Not exactly. Unless you look at it and like me, immediately think you have to get it, regardless of it's actual contents, then sure. If you wanna cry about dogs, sure.
  

Puppergeist is a harsh reminder how bad I am at rhythm games. Even the ones I enjoy most I'm not particularly good at. "Real" music games that have like a 1-10 skill rating, or 3-5, whether it's numbers, score, stated difficulty, are not games I generally am able to play on the higher difficulties, like at all. I understand the skill ceiling is ridiculous. People play music games like people play games for competitive tournaments, sinking hundreds, if not thousands of hours into individual music games.

I avoided earlier music games partially because I didn't find earlier music games to have very engaging mechanics and I was also just not super into music until I was well into my teens anyway. When I got my first car, I owned 3 CDs - in a time where those were the dominate technology for over a decade. (Fun stats: ~95% of the market share a the time, more than digital music media has today at around 85%, that's including both purchase and streaming revenue)

Final Fantasy Tactics - The Ivalice Chronicles

• Genre: Strategy
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: 100+ Hours
• Too Short/Long: It honestly didn't really feel too long, but there are things I did and some choices I made that I would have done differently to cut that playtime down a bit.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: It's okay. Sometimes even pretty good, but due to the nature of the game, there are some tracks you will just hear far more than others and it feels a bit repetitive.
• Why I played: Final Fantasy Tactics miiight have been the first Final Fantasy game I actually played. At least it's the first one I remember playing. I never finished it though, and The Ivalice Chronicles gave me a good reason to revisit it.
• Jank: It's mostly polished, as they've "cleaned up" the game in certain aspects. I think a little bit of jank remains in game design that shows it's age, but it mostly holds up well so it's not very distracting.
• Difficulty: There are times when this game is damn difficult. It keeps things balanced pretty well and does a good job of making everything a challenge. Making it feel... tactical. You can't just steamroll the entire battlefield and call it a day. You can't just go back to old levels and grind with your eyes closed - and grinding doesn't really make your character more powerful necessarily, it just gives them more options(which in turn can make your build stronger, but a character rarely outclasses enemies, generally speaking)
• Something I liked: I kind of already address it just above - but I really appreciate the effort that went into keeping the game balanced. While at times frustrating, it is also probably what kept me engaged.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very pleased. It definitely remains one of the best Final Fantasy spin-offs, and I can see why some people say it's their favorite of all. It kind of makes me want to play other games that take place in Ivalice.
• Recommend to others: I would definitely recommend it. Sooner to strategy fans than Final Fantasy. While it does have a number of the Final Fantasy mainstays, it's generally pretty different in feel. Sure there are chocobos, you can summon shiva and ifrit, class changes and a story about gathering crystals, but the tone and style are very different from most Final Fantasy games. Except maybe 16, and probably 12 considering the setting - but 12 is the one I've played the least of(only about an hour).

As I mentioned Final Fantasy Tactics is likely the first Final Fantasy I played, probably not long after it's release considering I know I also played and finished FF7 in 1998. Though, I was borrowing it from a friend and didn't get it myself until after playing several more Final Fantasy games and just didn't get super far into it. Maybe I finished Chapter 1 previously, but as soon as I hit Chapter 2 this playthrough, I started seeing things that seemed wholly unfamiliar.

I got a lot of strategy games back in the day, but honestly I don't know if I beat very many at all. I think I just liked the plethora of characters they would have - especially if they let you use monsters on your team. Nothing has changed in that respect, I've always wanted to have or be the monsters.

Sea Fantasy

• Genre: Fishing RPG
• Spoiler Free Review: I did kind of say screw it and have some pretty spoilery screenshots because that's the only way to make this game look cool, but otherwise no real spoilers.
• Time Played: 26 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's pretty solid where it's at.
• Did I cry: Probably a rare RPG where I didn't.
• Soundtrack: It's serviceable, but rathe unmemorable for an RPG. There are maybe a couple standout tracks.
• Why I played: I can't remember exactly what prompted me to get this one. I think I just saw something about it being an underrated hidden gem or something, or maybe I just looked at it and thought it might be worth a shot.
• Jank: There is a little bit of jank. Mostly in translation errors, but there were a couple bugs I encountered that required me to restart the game to reset.
• Difficulty: It has a pretty solid balance of keeping the difficulty/progression. Whatever you encounter that's new offers a little challenge while stuff you've already completed you get to flex on. There a few optional very tough things too for those looking for a good end-game challenge.
• Something I liked: I liked just... how much there was. It was way more than I expected. It never strayed far from fishing but there was always a lot to do and variety in game play.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm extremely pleased with Sea Fantasy. I didn't expect it to be anything more than a little gimmicky distraction, but I was underselling to myself.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would try to, to anyone who might enjoy fishing minigames in rpgs. Unfortunately I doubt I'd have much luck reeling in anyone to play this game, but honestly it's ya'll loss.
  

The humble fishing minigame goes hand-in-hand with rpgs. My favorite long-dead RPG series Breath of Fire pioneering the tradition - though oft credited to another favorite, Link's Awakening. I personally don't consider Zelda games RPGs in the traditional sense. I know the definition of RPG is muddy territory, but I consider them Action Adventure, and any arguments for it being an RPG basically push every game where you play as a character into an RPG, and if everything is an RPG, nothing is an RPG. Anyway - Breath of Fire came out first - by a few months, and considering the scope of the game - probably had a much longer development time too.

These aren't the earliest examples of fishing in games, but the first I'd connect to "RPG minigame", or even "minigame", as I believe most examples of fishing predating that are tied to core gameplay, not quite a "minigame". To get back on track and bring it full circle here... Sea Fantasy is a game wholly centered on it. It's a Fishing RPG, and not fishing first, not rpg second, not the other way around, but in conjunction.

Pinball Spire

• Genre: Pinball
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: I don't know, no time on Switch yet, 3-4 hours?
• Too Short/Long: It's fine.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: It gets the job done.
• Why I played: I like games where balls bounce around.
• Jank: I think the only real jank is in design, just sometimes it feels like things could have gone smoother and been a little more fun.
• Difficulty: It's not entirely difficulty as there isn't really a way to lose, but it is pinball, so it may take a lot of tries. A lot.
• Something I liked: The power-based progression - and because I'm bad at pinball the very fact you cannot lose and just have to try again and again.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm pleased, it wasn't bad.
• Recommend to others: I would probably recommend it to anyone who likes Pinball, but I wouldn't get adventurous outside of that.
  

Whether physical or digital, I am pretty bad at pinball. But I like games where you throw or hit a ball and it goes bouncing around. Marble Blast, Peggle, Breakout, Pong, - I have a entire folder/category on my switch dedicated to such titles that usually catches the interest of anyone browsing my Switch, titled "Ricochet", which sits firmly between the much more traditional genres "Racing" and "Roguelike".

Pinball Spire is certainly that. It's a bit of a pinball adventure game where you progress through one giant pinball table spanning many screens. More like the old NES Pinball Quest. If Yoku's Island Express is a similar game in any way, one that is an adventure that uses pinball as a mechanic, this is a pinball game that uses power ups and mana - it's p. We're not getting too fancy though. Bumping the table to move the ball a little bit at a time. Slow down time and see trajectory, fireball to light lamps, passthrough/destroy multiple enemies and at least one clever "puzzle" use of it, and a dash to suddenly get a burst of speed in your current direction... also to break through special objects.

It does annoy me a little because like Slots & Daggers not really being a roguelike in any real way, this also describes itself as a Pinballvania, which is something I might call Yoku, but definitely not this. This is explicitly linear progression. It has "gating" as the kids like to call it, but the gating is always right before the key. That's just how progression works in... any game? Oh no I have to beat the boss before I can go to the next area. That's "gating", it's a metroidvania, nearly every game is now a metroidvania.

I have a friend who has always hated the terms roguelike and metroidvania, and I'm starting to agree. Anyway, it's a decent game.

Beast of Reincarnation

• Genre: Action
• Spoiler Free Review:  Pretty much.
• Time Played: 32 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It probably would have been perfect had I not done so much backtracking to look for things it turns out you get in abundance.
• Did I cry: Multiple times.
• Soundtrack: Amazing. It's not quite on the level of certain vocal osts of similar ilk, it's a little more repetitive in a way that makes it more atmospheric background music, but it's still really good and I'm comparing it to some of my favorite soundtracks of all time.
• Why I played: Dog. A lot of people make a big deal about this being a non-Pokemon game by Gamefreak, but they've always made non-pokemon games and I've played most of them. This one just got attention because it doesn't look like a silly random indie title.
• Jank: It's kind of... very janky. There are bugs and here and there that are pretty minor - my sword was invisible until the next time I fast traveled. Texture pop-in or... pop-out even? Invisible walls and infinite falling pits galore. To be fair those last two are usually when you're trying to access the more or less obvious out-of-bounds areas of the game, but sometimes the "infinite falling" just happens when a tree branch meets a fence at an angle and you decide to land between them. It only takes a couple seconds to respawn nearby but it happens more than it should.
• Difficulty: It's a bit of a mix. It's pretty difficult early on, but got pretty easy later. Which sure, experience and skill alone could do, but I think I out-leveled the later content. I don't know if the game leaned to in designing for New Game + or what, because there were still so many skill I never got, or fully leveled up. I barely fully leveled up any skills, putting in my points into my best efforts to at least acquire one of each. In theory that would give me plenty to still earn in a New Game +... but I don't think a game should be designed around that. Personally.
• Something I liked: I realized that a lot of my longer reviews end up nitpicking aspects of the game just because I spent more time with it and am "analyzing" the game so to speak. It can make it seem like I didn't like the game. Also I might not get a chance to slip it in naturally. So we'll see if this section fits in moving forward. I liked Koo, obviously. The grappling while only a "partial" grapple mechanic had so many grapple points it still felt pretty good, you could also create grapple points both in and out of combat, even Koo can! The parrying mechanics actually felt really good as enemy attacks were almost always well telegraphed. Once getting enough abilities I liked the combo-into-specials system a lot.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm extremely pleased, despite some sections where I felt it drag, despite some lack luster aspects, despite some jank and lack of polish, I loved the game.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would - especially to those who like the Nier games, or action games that lean heavy into parry-mechanics.
  

Beast of Reincarnation is what I would call a Near-Nier. The third of it's ilk after Stellar Blade and Ultra Age. There could be more I supposed, but I would hope to know about them. I keep up with a lot of games, but obviously I can't play them all and I could have seen something that didn't look like a Near-Nier, but feels like a Near-Nier.

I'm sure there are a lot of frenetic action games that could potentially feel like Nier, but not really feel like Nier - if you know what I mean. Regardless, it's possibly my favorite genre. The Nier games are pretty high up in my list of favorite games of all time, and these games fill a void for me. I wouldn't want Nier games just pumped out without care every couple years, but a game that is Nier-like, a "we changed it up a bit", something that captures the mood and atmosphere, recognizing some of the good aspects and makes an attempt to appeal to that - that's what fills the void.

Slots & Daggers

• Genre: Strategy... roguelike?
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes. 
• Time Played: I have no idea to be honest but I'll guess 4-5 hours?
• Too Short/Long: It's fine.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: It's more about the sound effects than the music.
• Why I played: I just happened to see it on some indie showcase video and thought it looked interesting enough to give a shot. Saw a few people say it's better on mobile(and also half the price) so I grabbed it on the phone, but it's on PC and consoles. It's not a service game.
• Jank: I think there are so typos or something in some of shop upgrades. Certain items don't reflect their bonuses properly in the upgrade text, but that's about it.
• Difficulty: It's not really difficult at all. It's not really "roguelike" but other people classify it as such. Progression is strictly limited. The only "roguelike" elements, are what appears in the shop/when, and there isn't exactly enough variety that you won't happen upon such items. I wouldn't call a randomly generated shop to be a roguelike when nothing else is random about it... except the fact that the main mechanic is a slot machine.
• Pleased/Disappointed: It was fun for a little while, I'm pleased for what it was.
• Recommend to others: I might recommend it to someone who likes say, Balatro, just because of the similar theming. They're not really similar from a gameplay perspective except for the game being about manipulating a gambling mechanic in a not traditional way.
  

Slots & Daggers was a fun little distraction for a little while. It's kind of a small game that I feel could be explored much further. There is just enough variety in abilities to keep it entertaining for it's runtime. I did what I thought seemed like the best way to approach the game, tried the opposite, and then did something completely different and won.

I'd personally sooner compare it to an incremental game than a roguelike, as your on-going upgrades increase your power on an incremental level from run to run. It's surely impossible to win the game without any upgrades at all considering enemies would straight up do more damage than you have HP in a single attacks later on, and you can only do a fraction of theirs in the meantime. However, strategies where you don't solely rely on the randomness of the slots and purposefully utilize your items are valid, so it's not quite on the level of an incremental game as a "clicker" either. Somewhere between I guess. Though I still say it's almost not "roguelike" at all, but I guess I don't get to decide that.

Revolgear Zero

• Genre: Shmup
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: 2 Hours?
• Too Short/Long: It's normal.
• Did I cry: No
• Soundtrack: Excellent.
• Why I played: No particular reason, was just trying a few Shmups I had.
• Jank: It's pretty polished, no real jank I can recall.
• Difficulty: It's actually kind of easy, I was able to beat it on my second or third try.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm pleased, it's a good enough shmup with cute art.
• Recommend to others: To shmup fans, sure.
  

Unfortunately as of writing this I think I beat this nearly a week ago? I think I forgot to get any screenshots and then I just didn't feel like writing anything until now and because it's a rather short game I have gaps in my memory of the experience already. It is a little on the easier end for a shmup. It's not like, too easy, but it's not too hard either. Of course - I could always try harder difficulties if I was just looking for more of a challenge. I'm just speaking on - as I usually do, the default difficulty.

It doesn't do anything entirely unique on it's own, but it does borrow several elements from other series, specifically R-Type and Gradius. It does a pretty solid job at combining them, has missions, training, a bonus mini games and pretty much all the standard extras you could ask for and overall I'd say it's a rather good shmup and since it has so many unlockable and modes I'll probably give it some additional runs down the line.

Chronicles of the Wolf

• Genre: Action Platformer (Metroidvania... emphasis on the vania.)
• Spoiler Free Review: Pretty much.
• Time Played: 12 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It was pretty solid, actually a bit longer than I expected but didn't really wear out it's welcome.
• Did I cry: Nah.
• Soundtrack: Way better than I expected it to be, the music went pretty hard.
• Why I played: It looked like they were really going for that classic Castlevania-style gameplay, but more wolf-centric, what else did I need?
• Jank: There are some aspects about the platforming I could nit-pick a little. Some things I think I could do before I was meant to do, and times where the controls feel a little finnicky - not as responsive as they should be, such as when trying to climb a rope, but for the most part it's not really a problem.
• Difficulty: It's not too difficult overall, but there are some ridiculous difficulty spikes and upgrades that level things out passed those progression barriers - I usually reexplored areas enough to always be the most upgraded I could be at whatever point of the game I was in, but there were a couple bosses that were pretty tough.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very pleased. Overall, I think the game was very well thought out and while very traditional and not really modernized in any ways - did an excellent job of recapturing that classic Castlevania feel.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would. This goes toward the top of games for people who "wish there were more Castlevania games". I mean thankfully we're getting at least one pretty soon, but it's been a bit of a dry spell for some years. This definitely fills the void in the way games like the Bloodstained series do.
  

Chronicles of the Wolf surprised me a few ways. I didn't expect it to have voice acting at all, and most story dialog is voiced. Most of the music is pretty solid, but some tracks are especially good. There is a day/night cycle, which does have an effect at least on a few situations in the earlier part of the game. The puzzles, riddles, etc. are generally well thought out, a couple maybe ruined by them more or less telling you, but it really fleshed out the environment to have so many little things going on. Speaking of which, I thought the game was maybe going to be a few hours, based on how much of the map there was, then when getting to a specific section, I thought "oh this will be the same size as the others", only to really learn that I hadn't even explored half the game and it truly was a Castlevania game in all but name.

Pretty much just full of pleasant surprises. I do wish that the pacing was a little better as far as upgrades. Some of the "upgrades" barely feel like anything because they're only used to access one or two little areas and are used for nothing else, and that kind of takes the spot of more useful upgrades you get late game. By late game I had everything I expected, but there was a long time I felt like "I must have missed something" and kept retreading all the prior locations hoping to find a secret I missed. I didn't miss many secrets throughout my playthrough, the upgrade progression is just tilted a little bit in the wrong direction.

Overall a very minor complaint. It's a great game, a great classic-style Castlevania. No stamina bar, no parries, technical combat, no secondary equipment systems and crafting, no gem slotting, no farming materials(maybe just a little gold to buy all the shop items), no ridiculously low item drops requiring farming enemies to get special abilities. Just a straight forward game that is fun to play and has a lot of neat little environmental puzzles and riddles.

Dragon Loop

• Genre: Action Platforming (Metroidvania)
• Spoiler Free Review: Pretty much, normal allusions to progression.
• Time Played: ~24 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It may run just a touch too long, but that could have been my fault for being obstinate about trying to get stuff and apparently pseudo-sequence breaking rather than wait for the easier methods to do things.
• Did I cry: Almost got me.
• Soundtrack: This is actually the weakest part of the game, to it's detriment just a little. It's not that the music is bad, but the... loops are a little short and it gets to feel a bit repetitive, for a game of this length.
• Why I played: I just thought it looked really cute. I think I added it to my Steam wishlist before it even had an english version and had just been kind of following it for a bit. It was released on Switch so I grabbed it immediately.
• Jank: Not gonna lie, this is a janky ass game. If there is a type of bug, this game has it. Times where I couldn't use certain moves, times where I can't access the menu. Weird stuck collision with game objects. Lines missed in localization. There are times when you can't actually navigate the menus you bring up. Most of the time going to a checkpoint will resolve these issues(except for the neglected translations), but there are a couple areas this seems to be consistent issue with. Maybe it's not as bad on the Steam version, but that's not what I played. It just came out on Switch so hopefully they release a patch.
• Difficulty: It's pretty much just right, with a caveat. There are times where things seem to hard, times where they seem to easy, overall it's well balances enough. There is a problem with it's attempt at balancing the game I guess to prevent it from getting boring, and that's basically done by tying how much damage you take to your overall progression. This means even weak early game enemies can take a good quarter of your health away late game - even after you have 15 upgrades to your HP! It can be a bit frustrating that basically you always have to focus a certain amount of upgrades on your HP or else you'll be one shot by even early game enemies. It kind of makes sense why they did it this way because of how you can progress in the game, but it doesn't mean I have to like it.
• Pleased/Disappointed: Despite the jank and the weird choice for game balance, I actually loved this game. I wasn't so sure in the beginning and thought I may just play a little to try it out and move on, but it ending up grabbing me not too long. I just wish I didn't replay the first hour thinking "I skipped stuff", whoops.
• Recommend to others: It's a tough recommend because it's so janky, but it's very clever, has a lot of cool abilities that are utilized in interesting ways, and how it handles navigation is unique - seems tedious at first, but I actually found it pretty clever as I moved on and learns how to navigate better. I want to recommend it, but you have to be tolerant of issues. Maybe it has less of them on Steam? That might be the way to go.
  

For awhile I was on a bit of a roll with metroidvania-style games and could confidently say I played more than most people, but I feel like in the past couple years I've fallen behind a little. A lot of games that have come to be some peoples favorites are ones I haven't even touched - or barely have, if I started it.

Something about 2024, I guess. It looks like I played no Metroidvania's that year. I guess I got burnt out. 2024 was also a record low in game completion numbers in recent years as well. To be fair - I finished a lot of RPGs that year. 3 full Final Fantasy games, a Xenoblade game, Metaphor, Fantasian, and a number of others. Several of which I know were at least 100+ hour games.

Anyway, so I've fallen off of what at some point I may have said was my favorite genre. It's still very up there for me, but I guess they've become a pretty popular genre for indie devs, and modern games I didn't entirely love like Hollow Knight have been a big influence on that market. That along with them trying to stick souls-like or rogue-lite into as many games as possible. I just felt tired of the formula. It was feeling repetitive, or at least not what I like out of the genre. A lot of them really want to be combat focused but neither Metroid or Castlevania really are outside the boss battles. You shoot or stab something once or twice, it's gone you move on. You're just trying to get from point a to be as quick and efficiently as possible.

I understand "metroidvania" is far removed from either of those games at this point. I constantly see social media threads from the youngins, mentioning how so many of them have never actually played a Metroid or Castlevania. Heck, a recent interview with a producer of the upcoming Castlevania: Belmont's Curse was cited saying he wanted to develop the game for this exact reason.

Earthion

• Genre: Shmup
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: 2-3 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's fine. Standard shmup length, especially considering it was made to play on Genesis.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Great high-octane classic 16-bit ost.
• Why I played: After playing Geppy-X, which I loved don't get me wrong, I wanted to play a shmup that actually felt good to play.
• Jank: None encountered, it's pretty polished.
• Difficulty: Pretty much just right, took me a few tries to get through a run. I only realized after that it has a "continue with all your upgrades" feature. Whoops.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very pleased. Some games made to run on old hardware show obvious signs of restrictions in design. You can't even tell with Earthion.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would recommend it to a shmup fan.
  

Earthion is a fantastic example of how to make a game that can run on old hardware without it feeling like they limited themselves. I've played plenty of games like this, but it always felt like it could have been a better game if they didn't self-impose that restriction. Earthion really shows how good you could make a Sega Genesis game with modern design knowledge/skill.

It feels fast paced, the music is great, the controls are tight, the gimmick is interesting. I don't know what else you could want out of a shmup, really.

70s-style Robot Anime Geppy-X

• Genre: Shmup
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: ~13 hours
• Too Short/Long: No complaints either way.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Amazing, absolutely amazing.
• Why I played: A shmup with 90's mecha anime art(even if it attempts to be 70's style), how could I not?
• Jank: It's definitely a bit janky in how it handles. I play a lot of shmups, and sure, maybe one from the 90's may not be as refined as modern shmups... is something you could almost say if some of the best shmups to this day weren't also released in the 90s. Granted, if it were one of the best, it would be much more well know.
• Difficulty: It's damn hard. I attribute a good portion to the jank. Unclear hitboxes for any of the mechs you pilot, and for the shots hitting you. I played the repeated pause game to be sure of it, but things absolutely contact when they shouldn't. It even says in the manual how Geppy's chest is the only part you will take damage from getting hit. Absolutely not true... or maybe it is and all the shots just have wider margins than their visuals. Not only that, but a lot of the patterns provide inconsistent openings. After playing through the entire campaign several times, I did learn some placement for cheesing certain attacks, but I'm not sure if that's by design and if so, I still don't like it.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very pleased at the overall package. Even if it's unfairly difficult and a mediocre shmup, the whole experience is very enjoyable.
• Recommend to others: I would probably only recommend it to those with a strong interest in the Super Robot genre, specifically that of the 70s-style Robot Anime. Who also at least kind of like shmups.
  

Geppy-X plays almost like a bonus shmup mini-game that is added to another game of a different genre. You know the kind(maybe you don't, I don't know your life), it's thrown as a bonus mode, mini-game, boss fight, etc. and feels a little loose, a little unfair, a little chaotic and unbalanced. Well, at least those ones are better than the alternative - which are the too-boring ultra basic, ultra easy shmup mini-games.

Thankfully, it still manages to standout due to it's overall package. Filled with a story line presented like a 70s super robot anime, openings, endings, commercials and all. It's fantastic and super fun. It made it worth me fully replaying and enduring it multiple times just to get little differences in the cutscenes with different characters.

It helps that despite the 70's inspiration, it was very very clearly made in the 90s. The character designs, even many of the mecha designs, are clearly 90s designs with very 90s artwork. I'd say they better nail the 70s-style design with the side-mecha, but to be fair, the titular Geppy-X while drawing obvious inspiration, is a little more original than it's almost carbon-copy secondary mecha.

There is a really solid amount of content in the game, especially for a 90s shmup. Not only does it have multiple, kinda-animated to more-fully animated between each mission, it has a good amount of stage bonuses and little easter-eggs and different cutscenes for finishing off each boss in a specific way, and a bunch of unlockable modes. That's what really sells the game. The gameplay itself could be a lot more polished, but otherwise you can't really ask for more in a shmup.

Look Outside

• Genre: Horror RPG
• Spoiler Free Review: A little. This is arguably one of those games it might be best to experience without having too much information. If you're already planning to play but haven't yet. It's best not to read too far in here.
• Time Played: 35 Hours
• Too Short/Long: Felt pretty good to me. I did the vast majority in a single run, but if I was playing a bit more linear, I could have knocked it out in half the time easy, and it's probably the way it was more designed to be played.
• Did I cry: Nah.
• Soundtrack: It's mostly pretty good, a little repetitive at time, but it has some bangers.
• Why I played: Alice insisted I play it, I kind of jokingly said I would play it after Adventures of Elliot with little intention of finishing Elliot any time soon, or playing something else and then saying "Yeah, and it will still be AFTER Elliot, even if I play 5 more games next", but I wasn't really feeling anything I've been wanting to get into so I just jumped right in.
• Jank: It's one of those games where you can easily click through dialog boxes and you may have to repeatedly read dialog, but that's partially on me for being impatient.
• Difficulty: Early on it's more about survival and using each resource carefully, but later on it's a bit easier - at least playing the way I did, so maybe combat isn't meant to be so easy. But the real difficult lies in the times where you need figure out how to proceed properly. It's a little difficult of a game overall, but nothing crazy.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very please with this. I'm not sure I expected all too much, and at first I just along for the ride, but eventually it clicked and I was very interested to see how things would turn out... at every turn.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would. I think a lot of people would get even more out of it than me. Especially people who don't feel the need to do every little thing and go full-completionist as they play through a game. People who are interested in the game enough to give it a couple playthroughs. There is definitely enough variation in how things turn out to have a couple, if not a few more or less wholly unique playthroughs if you're not trying to do everything. I also especially would recommend it to anyone who likes eldritch/cosmic horror.
  

The first thing I would do upon starting the game is Look Outside. I would find myself at many points in the game wanting to Look Outside. Maybe this is the time there will be an answer when I Look Outside. In a game where you awaken to a mystery of something beyond your comprehension, it's hard to talk about the greater theme of the game without being spoilery, but I feel like I can at least discuss some things I liked/didn't like, etc.

Look Outside has some really fun and clever writing. There are a lot of unique characters to interact with, and even when brief, they can often feel like characters more fleshed out than those that appear in many other pieces of media. It helps their design often strongly leans into their archetype in a unique way. Or perhaps something about them has changed so drastically, just hearing them tell their experience makes them feel more alive than so many others. There is a surprising amount of character dialog - and so much of it is entirely optional, or even missable. Another reason I think the game might serves multiple playthroughs better - as long as you're not trying to mimic your prior playthough, that is. I'm not planning to immediately restart it, but I can even see how I would approach things differently a second time just to experience things differently and likely get a lot of dialog I didn't previously. 

The Adventures of Elliott: The Millennium Tales

• Genre: Action RPG
• Spoiler Free Review: Kind of spoiler free up until where I say I'm going to do big spoilers but still round-about spoilers throughout, just trying not to be specific.
• Time Played: 30 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's not excessively long game, but the pacing/progression don't do it any favors. It feels way longer than it is because it seems like it's going to wrap up at multiple points and doesn't really offer anything new for a long time.
• Did I cry: It did manage to squeeze a tear or two out of me despite how my recount may sound.
• Soundtrack: It wasn't bad, but overall just a little too general cheery adventure music for me. When they "went hard" it felt forced and not exactly in line with the rest of the tracks. Individually there are no bad tracks, but it didn't have an identity of it's own - it was clearly just taking from what inspired it.
• Why I played: The visuals and the gameplay are both huge draws for me. I love the "H2-2D" look and I also really like Ys games, which this takes most of it's inspiration from.
• Jank: There were a few times I had to restart the game because the ability to use Faie just completely bugged out. Often during the worst possible times, such as doing this challenge gauntlet - which I still managed without the help of Faie mind you, despite some of her later abilities being kind of overpowered.
• Difficulty: Very low. I thought I saw something about there being special scene if you die at certain points and so there were times I purposefully died to see if anything special would happen, but it never did. Other than that I never died - I used potions to prevent death - it's not like I didn't take damage, but at least early on in the game I had the 99 combo going for so long I decided to just take it easier and play a bit more quickly/recklessly, which would actually lose my health, but nothing a potion didn't solve.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm not exactly disappointed with the game as a whole, just exhausted. I guess what I'm most disappointed about is the poor writing and lack of consistency when it comes to continuity and paradox.
• Recommend to others: I probably wouldn't recommend it over what it draws inspiration from. Ys, Mana games, Zelda games a bit, and then the many games that were also inspired them, such as one of my absolute favorites; CrossCode. I just couldn't help but feel like this was less good than so many other games in so many other ways - visuals aside, because those are still very fun, and it does have higher production values in other aspects too, but it just comes up short on how fun or interesting it is.

Overall I did enjoy it, but I was left exhausted of it by time I was done. I think that's the first misstep - the pacing/world design. On it's own, there is nothing wrong with the world - arguably even a decent - if not extremely generic world. You got your woods, desert, snowfield and volcano, and town all of which are so uninspired the ice land is literally called "White Area", and to the west of that? "West Area", though it's kind of funny having both Nothern West Area and Southern West Area, and Neverwither is a clever name for a forest place.

Regardless, across a millennium, nothing really changes for these environments. Not for the most part. Some bridges move, some ladders move and that's about 90% of it. Fallen trees that block your path somehow remain for a thousand years in some cases, or perhaps a tree falls in the same exact place after a window of it opening. Key locations have a couple switch ups, but for the most part you're exploring the same exact map 4 different times. Every dungeon has a collectable in every time too, it could be a useful life piece, or it could be an item that you already collected via the random gacha system the game has, but don't worry if you collect one you already have then they'll compensate you by offering exactly 1 of the item you need 5 of to perform a gacha draw. Wowie kabowie. You're telling me after I find 5 useless chests along an hour of treasure hunting I can do a SINGLE gacha pull which will likely award me... a duplicate item which will award me exactly 1 of the gacha currency.

Star Fox

• Genre: On-rails shooter
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: 5 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It is what it is, it's a remake. The campaign is pretty short but it has replayability with different routes and levels.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: Classic Star Fox music, it's a remake and it's iconic but it's nothin new or too special.
• Why I played: I love Star Fox, not that there are entirely too many, but I have finished every Star Fox game.
• Jank: The only jank I'd really say this game has is it's uhh.. choices for multiplayer. Not having any form of split-screen is a big miss. Star Fox's design from it's mechanics to the simplicity/high contrast of the models is built for visibility. There is little to no reason to exclude Split-screen. It can't, or shouldn't be a hardware issue either, considering it's a remake. Because of the point of view, you don't need super highly detailed environments. Also I don't know if this is just "true to the original" but it's annoying that enemies will fly "off-screen" even in all-range mode. I'm not sure if it's because the camera is too restricted or they're just going to high and stuff, but it definitely feels wrong and unfair.
• Difficulty: By default it's not too hard with a couple of exceptions. However the challenges of earning medals has always been quite a requirement. It doesn't make it less playable, and at least there aren't multiplayer options locked behind it this time.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm Pleasappointed. Like it's Star Fox and I'm happy to get more Star Fox even if "more" is the same. There is more characterization, additional scenes, etc. This and that. It's not as much as I would have expected though, and I do feel they didn't fully realize their multiplayer as they should have.
• Recommend to others: I would if you like Star Fox and just want something to play in that regard, but I'm not going out of my way to do so. It's fine and I had fun with it, but it's not wholly something new either.
  

This other than it's more or less the remake it sets out to be. It's Star Fox 64 with just a little more. No reimagining, no changing things, just adding bits here and there. It's neat, it's cute, and I wouldn't have expected anything more when it comes to the campaign. Like they could have kept that 1-1 the same and I'm totally fine with that. They add some quality of life features like replaying a mission immediately if you miss the route you were going for, and a free mission select that gives each it's own challenging, it's nice but an unnecessary addition. What I did hope for was for them to take the opportunity to do something really cool with the multiplayer - which they almost did.

It's 8 player, and it's not just a boring old deathmatch where you just loop around each other constantly(like fighting Wolf on Venom), as you are provided with some cannon-fodder npcs, perimeter turrets, and unique objectives for each stage. I think those are all really cool additions to modernize the dog-fighting of Star Fox 64. I think it absolutely missed the mark by not including ANY kind of split-screen. I think 3 levels just isn't enough variety. Considering how much effort they put into having other little customization for the multiplayer and having avatars and stuff like that - you would have thought they would have actually put more effort and focus into it. Honestly I expected this remake of Star Fox 64 to be more of a multi-player game that happens to have the Star Fox 64 campaign attached as an extra little bonus. I couldn't be more wrong. The multiplayer feels half baked and more like one of those single-player games they tack on multiplayer as an afterthought. Even the co-op feels more like an attempt to promote-force the Switch 2's mouse capabilities. It offers local shared-screen or even game share, but regardless what you do you have to use the Joycon for player one and the mouse-mode joycon for player 2. Makes it a little hard to play the Switch in handheld mode. You could prop it up, sure, but who actually wants to do that? You'd also need a smooth surface to use mouse mode. Why not just allow for uhh regular controls? These even have all the capabilities of normal motion controls so why not also point and shoot as an option? Once again - half-baked multiplayer.

It's unfortunate, and what's more unfortunate is I feel like this game was potentially being used a barometer to gauge peoples interest in the series and maybe we would get some great new Star Fox content in the near future should it perform well, but I fear it just doesn't offer enough to capture a new audience and did too little to impress long-term fans, even those who eat up every crumb.

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

• Genre: Action Adventure
• Spoiler Free Review: Yes.
• Time Played: ~30 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It feels a little long for what it is. Not that the gimmick grows tired but there is a point where you've more or less done all you can with everything you have. The dungeons are generally pretty short though, so it's either something about the way I did everything, or maybe there are just too many of the rift areas that feel a bit redundant.
• Did I cry: No.
• Soundtrack: I would say probably the weakest part of this. Zelda soundtracks are usually pretty good, but nothing really stood out, and most tracks sounded like they were just general background noise from a hushed orchestra. Not that nothing was good, it just didn't stand out like Zelda usually does.
• Why I played: Usually I wouldn't feel I need to explain why I played a Zelda game, but it took me a good bit to get to this one. The Link's Awakening Remake just wasn't what I hoped for/imagined and I felt with this being in the same style of that it was going to be a let down as well. I happened to be talking to someone playing this while I was playing Mina the Hollower, talking about puzzles, and they had a pretty positive perspective on Echoes of Wisdom that inspired me to pick it up next.
• Jank: It's not really janky. There is some weird stuff you can force with your summons if you're really trying to brute force things, but generally it's a pretty smooth experience.
• Difficulty: Echoes of Wisdom isn't that difficult overall, it gives you a lot of options. There may be some puzzles those who struggle to think outside the box may struggle with, but I think it's cleverly designed in a way that a lot of things can be approached various ways.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm actually very pleased overall. My hesitations were misguided and this is another great Zelda game. In some ways I think it's the most well designed Zelda game yet.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would. Especially to those who love Zelda and hesitated to play it like I did.

Just like I took so long to play it, I took so long to write up my review. I finished early in the week. Sunday? Monday? Here I am finally considering what to say the better part of a week later. It kind of leaves me with not too much to say at first. It was a really solid game. It had surprisingly clever puzzles, many of which can be approached in many ways. It's odd because it leaves you feeling like your broke the game, or did something you weren't supposed to. I've played few games where I wondered "Is this what the devs intended?" as I progressed through the game.

Even after completing it, I think the answer is yes. I think the devs intended for you to "make shortcuts", even when those shortcuts weren't in fact shortcuts. After completing the game and getting everything, and then looking back, some parts you begin to realize there was no other way to proceed, or if there was - what you could have done different ultimately would have left you with the same feeling of "Am I supposed to do it this way?" "Am I allowed to be here - the way I got here?" and for some reason that makes me feel like the game is well designed. It makes you think you're getting one over on it, but you're just playing as intended.