Signalis

• Genre: Survival Horror
• Time Played: 13 Hours
• Too Short/Long: It's probably a bit short for most peoples tastes, but for me, it felt long.
• Pleased/Disappointed: Undecided. Somewhere in the middle.
• Why I played: I mostly wanted to play because of the visuals in the game. The harsh use red, the awesome character art in the scenes, the red and black robot lesbian. I waited so long to play because I am too scared to play horror games, but a friend implored me to do so.
• Recommend to others: I don't know if I'd really recommend it to most. Maybe if you like to spend time theorizing about things.

I don't usually play survival horror games. I can barely handle horror sequences in non-survival horror games. Metal Gear for instance, usually likes to stick a horror sequence in each game. I tense up at those and really have to push through them.

To be honest, Signalis is probably the lightest Survival Horror game there is. There aren't really jump scares, and while the atmosphere is generally creepy, it doesn't do much dynamically to shift the atmosphere to make the moments more tense. You can clearly see when an enemy is coming up to "surprise" you, and you have plenty of time to react.

You can't go guns-a-blazing mind you. Each area and the game as a whole has finite ammo, and enemies don't have drops, but enemies do respawn at what seems like random intervals. Some seem to respawn multiple times, while others not at all. So this could eventually drain you to the point where you have no weapons at all. In most cases, that could be okay because there are actually a lot of areas where you can just run past enemies, and you can always take a few hits, and there are plenty of restorative times(but also finite).

So while it's pretty low level on the survival horror aspects, it's still just about too much for me. I powered through because I dig other aspects about the game. Gameplay wise, it's damn near almost a puzzle adventure game - but I guess a lot of survival horror games probably have this element, I just don't play them. But you do get a decent amount of puzzles to solve, even if some are just connected the dots on what means what.

The action could be a bit more dynamic, but I'm coming from a place of not usually being into these types of games. For instance on the enemies "respawn" when they are getting themselves back up, or when enemies are crawling out of vents, I feel like you should be able to run over and kick them while their down. "kicking them while they're down" is already a mechanic, so why can't I use it in more situations?

While I understand inventory limitations are a way of making things more tense, I can't help but feel it was too limited, to the point of just making the game more tedious. 6 item slots the whole game, and yet sometimes you have a door that specifically has 6 keys. So you either only carry the keys or make multiple trips. There are just a lot situations where I found myself unnecessarily running back and forth - and nothing really happened in those instances where having smaller inventory enhanced the moment, even in a way I wouldn't like. There should have been 8 slots.

Stellar Blade

• Genre: Action
• Time Played: 50 Hours
• Too Short/Long: Pretty much just right, could have trimmed the time a little if some areas weren't so unnecessarily large.
• Pleased/Disappointed: I'm very pleased with it.
• Why I played: Once it was released I kept hearing that it was like Nier and looked a bit into it myself and it just made me want to play more and more.
• Recommend to others: I definitely would recommend Stellar Blade. It was a really good game.

Stellar Blade is definitely a Nier-like, or Near-Nier as my wife coined. Off the top of my head, I have only played one other game so directly and blatantly inspired by Nier, and that would be Ultra Age, which I loved, and I loved this. It might not be one of the games I love the most, but it's like the next tier. Just on the outside of that range where I would consider it one of my absolute favorites.

It comes up short in aspects I wish it was more like Nier, with some more variation in the game play that I really thought they were going to use, some more varied locations and boss fights that really feel different. It also feels like every area is just too big and there is too much and they go on just for the sake of it. They do have some gun-only sequences by maybe they didn't click with me much because they're kinda survival-horror style, which I don't do well. But hey, there is fishing.

Don't get me wrong, it's not like they make bad use of the space, and don't give you variety in exploration. The amount of side quests feels about right, and what they do, is very polished. I just felt like like each zone was bigger than necessary. I felt like I got plenty of time - more than necessary, to fight each different type of enemy in each different type of situation.

The combat is really good, so, it didn't really wear out it's welcome, but it did take awhile - like, half the game, before I really synergized with the combat. It could benefit from being just a touch more forgiving with the timing. In a game based around parries, and more or less perfect timing, the window for that perfect timing could be a little more open considering the dozens upon dozens of attack patterns there are in the game, and every enemy has several, bosses several more, and some will look very similar, so getting the timing down just perfect is quite the task. They could have telegraphed a little more, or gave you a little bit more breathing room. I would have been fine with that.

But it mostly clicked, and I had a really fun time with it.

Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir

• Genre: Action RPG
• Time Played: 55 Hours
• Too Short/Long: A little long, it can get a little repetitive and monotonous.
• Pleased/Disappointed: Very pleased, it's one of my favorites.
• Why I played: After playing Unicorn Overlord I wanted some more Vanillaware flavored games. I tried playing a Vanillaware inspired game, but it just made me want to play Odin Sphere. So I played Odin Sphere.
• Recommend to others: Odin Sphere is probably a game I would recommend to everyone. It's just a great game, and even if it has some flaws, I think it's worth everyone trying it.

Earlier this year I had revised my favorite game list to include some stuff I had played in recent times, and Odin Sphere got bumped just off the list, scoring only 19 of the required 20 points or more. I reevaluated Odin Sphere now, with it fresh in my mind and bumped it back up to 33 points which coincidently places it alongside some very similar games.

When Leifthrasir came out, I played a little bit(apparently around 15 hours according to my old save) but didn't finish it because it felt all too fresh in my head. I supposed it was less than a decade after the original version's launch. But now, 17 years later, I got to the point where I only remembered certain aspects(and maybe the first dozen hours). The game can be a little long and feel a bit grindy at moments, like you're just kind of doing combat over and over again, but, that is also kind of the point. While I would still classify this as an "action rpg" the emphasis is on the action.