52 Games Challenge 2021

[Cartagia]

Game 9 - New Super Luigi U. (Wii U) - 2 player co-op, 6 hours
[...]
Unfortunately, New Super Luigi U. is a very anemic and underwhelming experience. It recycles the entire world from the first game, including the same story and bosses. If you thought the original was derivative, then this game is even more so. What changes are present all make the game worse in my opinion. Luigi and co. are given a floatier jump with less traction on the ground like in older games, and it makes playing through the levels harder as a result. On the topic of difficulty, all the levels have a 100 second time limit now, so you have to play fast and reckless pretty much at all times, and it lead to some frustrating moments. All of the levels were very, very short as a result too, which made many levels feel over before they even started.

I was very excited to try this one out when I heard it was supposed to be a more "difficult"/"hardcore" experience for the New games, but this was basically the impression I walked away with, too.  The designs are bland, and they didn't do enough to differentiate it.  Sure Luigi is a bit harder to control, but not so much so to really change the underlying game at all.  And the lower time limit actually made things feel easier to me, because I just zoomed through everything.

[telly]

Game 9 - New Super Luigi U. (Wii U) - 2 player co-op, 6 hours
[...]
Unfortunately, New Super Luigi U. is a very anemic and underwhelming experience. It recycles the entire world from the first game, including the same story and bosses. If you thought the original was derivative, then this game is even more so. What changes are present all make the game worse in my opinion. Luigi and co. are given a floatier jump with less traction on the ground like in older games, and it makes playing through the levels harder as a result. On the topic of difficulty, all the levels have a 100 second time limit now, so you have to play fast and reckless pretty much at all times, and it lead to some frustrating moments. All of the levels were very, very short as a result too, which made many levels feel over before they even started.

I was very excited to try this one out when I heard it was supposed to be a more "difficult"/"hardcore" experience for the New games, but this was basically the impression I walked away with, too.  The designs are bland, and they didn't do enough to differentiate it.  Sure Luigi is a bit harder to control, but not so much so to really change the underlying game at all.  And the lower time limit actually made things feel easier to me, because I just zoomed through everything.

I think for me it was because I played with another person that the game was harder, and that was the case with the original as well.

[bikingjahuty]

27. Night Slashers (Arcade)

I found out about Night Slashers while doing some research for a youtube video I was working on, and prior to that i'd never heard of or seen this game in an arcade ever. I played it a little after discovering it and just from the first couple levels I knew I had to revisit it soon. Well, I just did and it's awesome...for a beat'em up that is. Night Slasher's is essentially 80s Horror Movie the beat'em up and just has that undeniable, over the top charm that many 80s horror movies possessed. Gameplay-wise...it's a beat em up. It plays very similar to Final Fight, Streets of Rage, and many of the other Beat Em' Ups of the late 80s and early 90s. This game's presentation is where it really shines however with both its visuals and OST. Like most beat'em ups I was ready for it to be over by the time I was 2/3 through the game, but at least Night Slasher's theme carried it a little more than most other beat em ups I've played. Definitely a hidden gem. (5/27/21) [35/50]

[tripredacus]

32. Middle Earth: Shadow or Mordor

I've complained about stealth missions for prior games, but not for this one. First of all, I think that there are very few forced stealth missions, and of those I encountered, maybe only a couple are required for beating main quest. That being said, this game does stealth right and it is actually preferable (to me) to run stealth nearly the entire time. I was stuck near the end and almost thought I wasn't going to beat it because I could not for the life of me figure out how to kill a Graug. I had "killed" them before, but they didn't count. Unlike where you can use the environment to kill Orcs to count towards goals or get XP, killing a Graug with the environment does not assign the kill to you. With Orcs I can understand because they have XP of their own and they can level up during fights (usually by killing teeth icon monsters) which can get slightly annoying at times. There is a second circumstance where Caragors can (and often do) kill a graug but they have no level system. This is the one enemy where you MUST kill the thing yourself in order for it to count.

For the orc levelling system, an orc that is an enemy killing say a teeth icon monster (usually caragors) can be an issue because they level up like I said. And when they level up they gain a skill. Using caragors to attack enemies is usually fine unless they have certain traits such as Monster Slayer or Battle-Hardened. When the enemy levels up during a fight, their health goes to 100% and then they get a skill. The skills they can typically get are: Invulnerable to combat, Invulnerable to Ranged, Invulnerable to Stealth. Those are the player's 3 main ways to get kills. Outside of that, the other 2 ways to get kills are using mounts (attacking while riding a monster), explosions or fire. Those are very situational and you can get into a situation where you facing an impervious foe with nothing to explode and no monsters to ride. I ran into one such situation early on where an enemy had levelled up during a fight 4 times and was impossible to kill and I only was able to deal with him much later on.

Later on in the game things get easier the more skills you unlock. Most of the useful skills are unlocked via the storyline and not just by playing. The ability to mount Caragors, Shadow Strike (and Shadow Strike mount) and brand are game changers. Especially brand because you can turn the enemy into an ally. There seems to be a cooldown on the grunts but the ranked orcs you can keep forever presuming they survive. Enemies have red names and friends have blue names. Here is one of the better Captain I ended up getting which you can see why based on my previous paragraph.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2499859347
For these super strong enemies that are basically invincible, sometimes you can get a stealth brand to convert them.

Overall it is an enjoyable game and it lets you keep playing after main quest. There isn't a whole lot to do besides achievement hunt. Also there are some other campaigns that I can do later because of the DLC.

Now onto the bugs.
- There are situations where the tough enemies do not take any damage. This orc for example is the one I talked about earlier that levelled up multiple times in combat because he killed Caragors. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2493056321
Despite the fact that it says Damaged by Ranged (which is normally correct) it was not working on this one. I had to wait a long time to come back around to this guy, get better damage and skills, etc. This is the only situation I ran into an invincible enemy, but fortunately it didn't last. I don't remember how I killed this guy but he isn't alive anymore so I'm not complaining.
- Sometimes you can brand or stealth brand Captains before they retreat and sometimes you can't. There is no indication in game or anything as to why. Usually you can't grab or brand a Captain before their intro cutscene (this is super annoying btw) but you can kill them with stealth or with ranged, explosion or monster if they don't see you.
- AI detection is kind of weird and can be exploited with few exception such as warchief in stronghold after alarm is raised. Say you had to fight a captain like in the pictures I posted so far but they had vulnerable to stealth. The process of confronting the enemy so their cutscene plays (because usually you want to make the attempt to brand them which requires the cutscene, getting their health down so they flee and then grab them) getting their attention (so they follow you) then climb up a wall and hide for literally 2 seconds. They will lose sight of you and as long as the other orcs can't see you, they go into "search mode" and this can be done with anything. BUT their line of sight is not based on say "their eyes can see your body" (well it is) but instead it is based on the angle of the in-game camera. So you can move the camera in such a way that the orcs can no longer see you even though they should. Anyways, since you can evade and they lose sight very quickly, you can hide for 2 seconds, stealth kill a guy and repeat constantly. Because the enemy can't hit you during the stealth kill animation and even if there are 50 enemies all around you, you can usually escape back up that wall without dying.
- For me there were problems with getting some actions to work, such as having Caragors bite something or Graugs to eat an orc. It is because the key assigned for that action is also the key for ADS and 99% of the time when I'm trying to get a monster to heal, I'm going into ADS. Rarely it would work properly and when it did or didn't did not give any indication as to why. I thought maybe I'm not facing the correct direction, maybe the orc needs to be downed, maybe the orc needs to be standing, maybe need to be behind. Never figured it out. It would just work sometimes and usually didn't.
- You can get stuck on the terrain constantly. In the beginning it is super annoying because it means you can't get away from a fight. Sometimes it is a rock, sometimes there's nothing there and you can't move, sometimes some object's hitbox is bigger than the texture. There are some walls that have the appearance you can climb them but you can't. This issue mostly goes away once you get the Vault skill which means you can jump over enemies. But before that it can be super frustrating.

Overall the game is good but the post end game content in the main game can get a bit lacking and repetitive. I can see the possibility of not having much to do if you end up branding all of the captain. Haven't gotten to that point yet but maybe some day.

[dhaabi]

22. Coffee Talk || PlayStation 4 || 05.29.21

Starting my playthrough in the late-night hours as it rained on a weekend night to myself, I found out that my conditions were perhaps the most ideal environment to become acquainted with Coffee Talk. Set in a fictional setting of present-day Seattle, you play as the barista/owner of night-exclusive coffee shop. The music is relaxing. The outside rain is calm. Your ingredients are fresh and prepared with care. You understand your patrons, both old and new.

Living alongside humans, all sorts of fantasy-like races exist. From werewolves and vampires to elves and orcs—they all exist, and they're all simply trying to live their lives and overcome the challenges that life presents to them. As the barista, you're here to mostly listen to their stories as they interact with other patrons, while, of course, serving them their hot beverage of choice.

As an adventure game, the gameplay is more of an interactive novel. Throughout each segment, you will be tasked to create a few drinks. Aside from that, reading is all that there is. Which, to me, Coffee Talk succeeds in its storytelling and its character development. The game is not groundbreaking, but it certainly offers an enjoyable experience. With a short playthrough of around three hours, Coffee Talk doesn't overstay its welcome with the stories and characters it presents. However, I did finish playing wishing that a new ensemble cast could be introduced, but perhaps that longing could be resolved from a sequel.

For adventure fans, Coffee Talk is recommendable. And, I highly recommend listening to the game's soundtrack as well, although perhaps it may be best to reserve a listening experience in the evening hours.

[telly]

Game 10 – Kingdom Hearts II: Final Mix (PS4) – 40 hours (Critical mode)

~Spoilers~

If you had asked me 10 years ago what one of my favorite games was, I would have said Kingdom Hearts II. Since then, my gaming tastes have refined and expanded significantly, and I'm afraid I can’t say that this game remains among my top 10 of all time. However, I still think it’s an excellent game, and my favorite Kingdom Hearts game that I’ve played so far.

Upon starting up Kingdom Hearts II, I already knew that I was going to enjoy the combat immensely based on what I remembered from since I was a teenager. That was absolutely the case here. Everything from the first game is improved upon. The game plays much smoother and cleaner than the original, the magic, limits and summon system is improved, synthesizing items and the drive mechanic are welcome additions, the AI is more sophisticated... everything just feels better. In addition to the combat, the game sports a larger variety of interesting worlds, and is brimming with additional content, minigames, and secret bosses to find. It’s all incredibly well done. The only aspect of the game that I did not like was the Atlantica stage. I don’t think anyone particularly likes the horrible minigames and cringy, god-awful singing that you have to bear in that world. Thank goodness it’s over quickly.

As for the story, I remembered not really caring much for it much the first time I beat the game. Of course, I hadn’t played Chain of Memories or 358/2 Days at the time, and so playing this for a second time I understood about 90% of the game’s story. I think the Organization is one of the best aspects of the story and the series in general. Though they aren’t exclusive to this game, they have a compelling motivation that you can sympathize with, and their mysterious and elusive aura was interesting to me both back then and now.

HOWEVER… I still needed to read up a bit on some of the game’s story components. My biggest complaint throughout this series so far has the co-existence of Roxas and Sora in Chain of Memories and KH II. After it is established that Roxas needs to die in 358/2 Days for Sora to come back, and he seemingly does just that at the beginning of KH II, you still fight him near the end of the game. I had to look up that fight online to learn that it was internal and not actually real, but the cutscene was so sloppily done that it did not convey that important detail to me at all. That is just one example of many cutscenes that had either no temporal reference point or are laden with a lot of metaphorical nonsense that makes it difficult to parse out the big picture. I have more to say about the narrative of this series that I think I’ll save for a reflection/recap deal, but in general, there was a fair share of confusing, unclear, and very cringy moments that held back the story, though it’s not as bad as I remember.

So with KH II done, I think I'm going to go back watch the cutscenes from Riku's story in Chain of Memories, then watch the RE:Coded cutscenes, then it's on to 0.2 BBS A Fragmentary Passage!

[vivigamer]

@ telly - That Roxas battle was horrendous, it wasn't even in the original game but the difficulty spike was far more than any of the following bosses in the games story. The digital battles against the Organization are on a whole 'nother level! I'm proud to say I managed to even beat them all! I need to go back and clear up the Gummi-Ship Missions and trophies to get the Platinum, I just never cared for it much

16. Final Fantasy: Dissidia NT (PS4)
I've been tinkering with Dissidia again, I still don't think it's a great game but I wanted to at least beat it! The structure of having to grind the arcade mode to get points to progress the story is beyond at chore - Still there is a way to spam the game using the FF14's female character on the Core Battle Mode. The story isn't even worth mentioning, nor the character interactions which often didn't even make sense - Like Kuja helping out the Heroes then being on the Villans side at the end, or Jetch blindly even being on the Villans side (I like Jetch but they should have got Seymour for this).

The combat is okay, however the nature of the 3on3 battle system can be problematic - especially if 2 characters are ganging up on you. I also found that sometimes the AI would just float away far to the distance and it would become tedious chasing them. The one area the game truly shines is the visuals, each character looks fantastic and are great renditions for their modern console counterparts. There's a little bit of post-game missions to do which I might try out, I did like some of the boss battles, even if they all felt similar - Apart from the last one which required you to use mages.

[kamikazekeeg]

Returnal (PS5 2021) - BEAT - I'm not gonna spoil anything for the story, but I did hit credits and that was enough for me.  I'm personally not a fan of the story, it's all too vague and interpretive, and that kinda hurt the game for me towards the end, it's this specific kind of scifi I'm not a fan of.  The good aspect of the game to me was definitely the gameplay, it's a pretty solid third person shooter rogue-like, with metroidvania styled elements, where you progress and eventually pick up gear that'll help tackle obstacles or open new paths that you'll come across upon fresh lives.  Visually it also looks quite good and runs great.  Not that I feel like this is a game that could only be done on PS5, but a game like this does need a smooth 60 fps to deal with all the bullet hell going on.

Aside from the story, the only negative I had was that some of the weapons felt really awful to use.  Like if it wasn't the carbine, the shotgun, or the machine gun (I'm forgetting their specific names lol), I always had a harder time with the game or didn't feel like they did enough to justify me using them, though one or two weapons I know are just very situation specific.  I guess this isn't all to different than Hades in that regard, but at least with Hades I'd always pick the weapon I wanted to start, since weapons are random in Returnal.

Overall, as a game itself, it's pretty solid, I just didn't love the story enough which made the games grind sorta frustrating towards the latter end of things.

[telly]

Game 11 – Super Mario Sunshine (Switch) – 18 Hours

86 shines (15 from blue coins), 150 blue coins total

Ended up finishing a second game over this long weekend! I’ve already finished and written a review for this game a few years ago, so I think I’ll just add to what I already said here. This time through I tried to at least find more shines and blue coins than I had found in my first playthrough, without resorting to a walkthrough.

Super Mario Sunshine is a game with some great ideas, but some flaws that hold it back somewhat. The game presents a gorgeous island aesthetic with memorable setpieces, enemies, bosses, and music that create an unforgettable experience. I still love what FLUDD adds to the game too, and it provides so many different movement options that (for the most part), mesh well with the game’s environmental design. When it works, it’s fun and exhilarating, but when it doesn’t work, it’s frustrating and stressful.

Unfortunately, Super Mario Sunshine is not a very stable experience. I had multiple collision issues or other glitches happen while playing, and it really detracts from the experience. The physics are also quite wonky on some of the items in-game, like the infamous boat ride. Yoshi in particular has quite a bit of jank in his jumping controls. These little things add up a lot over time and detract from the overall experience. The only other criticism that I had was with some of the repetitive missions, particularly the red coin and “catch shadow Mario” missions.

All that being said, I still enjoyed my time with Sunshine, and I'll probably still pick it up from time to time looking for those secret shines. I'm really excited to jump into Super Mario 64 and Super Mario Galaxy, both of which I have never played before!

Previous review of Super Mario Sunshine: https://vgcollect.com/forum/index.php/topic,5879.200.msg99132.html#msg99132

[Cartagia]

May Update

Games Beat in May

Divinity: Original Sin 2 (PC) - One of the best RPGS, nay games, I have ever played.  2017 was truly a year of total masterpiece games.
Super RubberRoss World - A Super Mario Maker 2 world from RubberRoss / RubberNinja.  Made to be difficult and trolly.  Didn't find it that hard until the last couple of levels.  Frustrating, but I enjoyed my time with it.
Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse - The Japanese version of CV3.  Great game.  Found the characters I unlocked maybe a little pointless as I spent 95% of my time as Trevor.  Think I prefer the original, but that is likely just nostalgia talking.

Games Played in May

Ghost of Tsushima - The best Assassin's Creed game never made.

[ignition365]

Main List
Previous List

bold games are games that have been beaten, previously beaten, or are unbeatable.
italicized games are in progress.
standard games are games I am not currently trying to beat.
strikethrough games are games that have been abandoned.

115. Mega Man 5 (PS5)
This game introduced the plate collectibles, which I didn't realize were a thing until I had already missed two levels worth of them.  This made the endgame stuff more difficult because I think they expected you to leverage beat to make the fights easier.  This one returns the trope where Protoman is the enemy, but he isn't because he's a pawn, but also I think he's a clone, not the actual protoman?  The final fight of this one is very similar to the final fight of the last game, but like I said, you don't have the pharaoh shot, so you just have to have good timing and hit him with a charged buster shot.  I think as I finished this game my wife made some off handed joke about Mega Man chasing down a defenseless old man and that I'm the real villain because all she saw was the ending where you chase Wily off and he starts begging and pleading.  I got a bit of a chuckle out of that.
Rating: Soft recommendation

116. Mega Man 6 (PS4)
More of the same, I suppose.  I recall playing the X games and noticing an obvious decline in quality of the games, but the OG Mega Man games don't really have that.  Some bosses aren't intuitive or great, but the quality is about the same across the board so far... and this game... this game has one of my favorite Mega Man song's, Flame Man's stage music.  Honestly, it makes me wish we could get something a la Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix where the soundtrack is from OCRemix.  I would absolutely love to play these games with those songs in them, but especially Flame Man's stage's Turn the Flame higher.  It wasn't until Flame Man's stage that I really thought about this, and I'm just kind of salivating at the concept.  The best thing I can say is, after having played Mega Man 2-6, I still want to play more Mega Man games, whereas when I was playing X-X6, I was hating playing the games towards the end and X7 I played for about 20 minutes and then didn't touch another Mega Man game for like 3 years.  As much as the majority of my life I claimed to love the X series over the original, the original is so much better overall (at least so far) and while Mega Man X is my favorite 2D Mega Man game, the series goes downhill way too fast, whereas the original keeps a steady flow of comparable quality titles.  I'm a bit excited to play the first non-NES entry in the original series when my copy of Legacy 2 comes in, but I'm also keeping my expectations in check, because I expect the move to a new platform will inevitably introduce polarizing concepts.
Rating: Soft recommendation.

117. Mega Man X7 (PS4)
I had been putting off this entry for the longest time for multiple reasons.  The main one being that I wanted to earn the platinum trophy for the overall X Legacy 2 collection, but the trophies for this game in particular are really tough to get and the game is quite terrible.  Sony killed their rewards program, so I lost interest in earning Platinum trophies.  This game is just so terrible in general I didn't really want to subject myself to it without any form of incentive.  But I'm sitting here waiting for Legacy 2 to show up and I wanted more Mega Man, so I finally pushed myself to play this one with the incentive that I'd stream me playing through this terrible game.  Very quickly I realized the tranfer to 3D didn't do well for this franchise, similar to how 3D didn't do well for Sonic either... which also pushed the comparison of X = Sonic, Zero = Knuckles, and Axl = Tails, which honestly hurt me and the franchise in my eyes    The voice acting in this is also very terrible.  The levels are frustrating in so many ways, I nearly abandoned the game, not even at a boss fight, but the intro to a level because I kept dying due to some pretty terrible physics and level design.  I'm a robot, I'm pretty heavy, if I'm standing on a moving platform, I should move with the platform, not stay in place while the platform under my feet starts sliding out from under me.  Ignoring that I'm a powerful robot, that's still just a terrible design choice.  Then on top of that, the platforming in general is quite frustrating as wall jumping doesn't work as nicely as it did in the 2D entries and the platforming doesn't work that well when you can't see how high you need to jump to know if you even need to wall jump or not, so I kept falling off the level and dying.  Even ignoring that, the boss fights are pretty terrible, very cheap, and honestly super difficult.  Adding on top of that that camera control is L1/R1 and not the right analog stick, but the right analogue stick switches weapons instead of L1/R1 I kept switching weapons while I was trying to turn the camera which constantly screwed me up.  I might have been able to swap the control scheme for the game to fix this issue, I didn't even think about it until I started writing this up, and afaik I can't change the scheme, but regardless it should've been the other way by default.  Things like this show why people stick to what you know, because a team of 2D developers are probably going to have trouble making the transition to 3D.  That said, I gave up pretty quickly once I fully embraced the fact that I wasn't earning the platinum trophy and turned on Rookie Hunter mode and just kind of blew through the game as quickly as possible.
Rating: Hardest of passes.

118. Mega Man X8 (PS4)
Once my kid went to sleep for the night I sat down and decided I'd stream and play through this game as well, hoping to get it done in one stream as well.  I've been told by a lot of people to just skip X7 and just go straight to X8, because X7 is an abomination, but I knew the series was downhill in general, so forcing my way through X7 might make me appreciate X8 more, because going from X6 to X8, I might be able to perceive a downhill trend, but going from X7 to X8 there is nowhere to go but up.  That said, I was so fed up that I just wasn't willing to put myself in a position to abandon, so I started with Rookie Hunter mode and Easy from the start.  I regret this decision and put the blame on X7 for being so terrible.  This is one of those games where you can't even get to the true final boss on Easy, you have to be playing on Normal or higher, and with Rookie Hunter mode on, I really didn't need to play on Easy.  I'm not going to replay the game to get to the Lumine fight, I'll just watch a youtube video.  While this game doesn't play infinitely better than X7, I feel like I'm in agreement with my initial assessment that this is probably still worse than X6.  I might need to give this game another chance down the line and play on Normal with/without Rookie Hunter, but right now I just wasn't having it after playing X7, and I don't see myself ever giving X7 another chance.  This entry reverses the normal Mega Man trope, so the whole game you're thinking Sigma is running the show behind the scenes, but in actuality Lumine is actually pulling Sigma's puppet strings.  Voice acting seems a bit better.  Overall still not a good game though, and honestly, I can see why Mighty No. 9 was destined for failure.
Rating: Hard pass

119. Mega Man Legends (PS1)
I've beaten this game before in that I beat Mega Man 64 for sure, and I'm fairly confident I beat this on OG PS1 back at some point, but my backloggery doesn't show it.  To be fair, I know my backloggery doesn't have much in the way of entries for old stuff because I don't remember what I've played and I haven't gone through old memory cards to confirm what I did and didn't beat.  Like I know I beat some GCN/PS2/PS1 stuff back in the day, I just don't remember exactly what until I go through old memory cards.  But you know what, I don't mind replaying this game.  This is one of my all time favorite games.  It doesn't have a ton of replay factor like a lot of my other favorite games, but I have such fond memories of this game and truly enjoyed revisiting it.  This game just makes me really want Tron Bonne merch.  I have a Mega Man Volnutt/Trigger figure and a Roll Caskett/Data figure, but I have nothing Tron Bonne.  I can try and go out and buy an old toy of her, but I'd love to have something like the Nell figures I have.  All that said, I played this on my Vita and I remapped the controls due to the vita not having L2/R2 buttons.  I moved the mapping for the screen and the rear touch pad, I mapped L1/R1 to the right analogue stick and mapped R2 to the L shoulder button and [] to the R shoulder button.  This worked fantastically, because it made the right stick control the camera as games should, and the L button aim and the R button shoot.  Worked absolutely fantastically, like better than the original as far as I can remember.
Rating: Solid recommendation.

120. Mega Man 7 (PS4)
A lot of my complaints are going to largely be driven by opinions on the collection as opposed to the game itself.  The 1st Legacy Collection had rewind, save states, and other emulator features.  Legacy 2, and the same goes for Legacy X 2, has no emulator features.  Doesn't even have a save feature for this game.  Just a checkpoint system.  The checkpoint system is honestly the bare minimum they could've done to give it some quality of life because in essence you can have unlimited tries as long as you reload at the checkpoint, but that does carry whatever you were at the save of the checkpoint, which screwed me more than once, check point saving with 1 health.  Back on the title itself, I never did figure out what to do with the bolts I collected throughout the game.  I just looked it up, apparently there was a shop you could get to somehow to buy tanks, lives, and such.  At least I didn't miss out on something useful.  Though final boss would've been easier with one more E-tank.  First boss you fight (with the guide I used) has an instant death mechanic baked in, so I'd get through the majority of the fight and then hit the spikes and have to start over.  That's another thing, Legacy 2 has no feature to make the spikes not instant death like all of the other Legacy Collections (X included).  Honestly, super disappointed in this collection, it really makes me want to just play on SNES/emulator so I can "enjoy" the experience.  Like, yeah, I'm proud of myself for powering through, but it was more frustrating than fun because I kept having to redo pain in the ass instant death sections to get to wherever I'm dying over and over.  It demoralized me so much that I only got through a level or 2 in Mega Man 8 before I was like "Yeah, I'm gonna go to bed early tonight".  I just don't see a single game in this collection getting a recommendation because of the lack of QoL changes.
Rating: Soft pass.

121. Mega Man 8 (PS4)
This one actually has a save system, which is nice, and stupid that the other didn't.  Even the X collections had save systems that overrode the password system.  This collection is so lazy.  The save system for this one is the baked in PS1 Memory card save system, not something collection specific.  I'm just hoping, this being the most "modern" entry in the Mega Man series, it'll have the most QoL.  I say this because I know that 9 and 10 are designed to be NES style, so they probably don't have any QoL stuff expecting to be tough as nails. .  I'm at the tail end of the game and I spent nearly 2 hours working on one platforming section because it is long, brutal, and has no checkpoints in the middle of it.  If you're wondering, it's the "snowboarding" section of Wily Stage 1.  I can't quite decide if this game took me so long because of my pain or because it just was that unenjoyable of a game.  I like the art style, not love because it could be better.  It has that almost hand animated style that looks so smooth, but the quality is pretty low for that unfortunately so it can only look so good.  This game did some interesting things, especially by throwing in some other genres by doing little shmup like sections, but this game is another one that would have benefitted from modern emulator features missing that were in the first collection.  The voice acting is terrible and makes me wish I had played the Japanese version, but I still appreciate the cartoon scenes, even if they are quite quiet.
Rating: Soft pass

122. Mega Man 9 (PS4)
Started this right after finishing Mega Man 8, didn't really expect to beat it in one sitting, but here we are, me writing up my paragraph about this game after beating it in one sitting.  This game is a full on throwback to the OG, Mega Man 1.  No sliding, no charged shot, no wall jumping (not that Mega Man ever did, the chump).  Allegedly this release has some QoL over the original release in that you take less damage per hit.  Frustratingly this game both could've been a legitimate NES game (Missed opportunity of a homebrew imo) and could've easily had emulator features since they did it for the NES games.  I get it's not an NES rom but a ported modern game, but like you did it for the NES games, why not this?  Game was actually quite good though, I rather enjoyed it even without emulator features.  I will say Tornado Man and Splash Woman's stages were pretty bullshit, to the point that I nearly quit for the day on each of those, but I got to a point where I said "1 more good run at this section and then I'm done" and I managed to complete the section, so I kept playing.  Honestly, I'd almost consider recommending this game as it's quite good, much better than 7 or 8, but without the QoL stuff, it's still hard to justify.  I do appreciate that the ending totally calls out that Mega Man is a chump for constantly not killing Wily.
Rating: Soft pass

123. Mega Man 10 (PS4)
This one was such a surprised by how pleasant it was.  It was everything 9 should've been.  A fantastic OG Mega Man experience, full of QoL improvements, nostalgic throwbacks, and accessibility features.  Still no emulator features, which is a let down, but still a great experience even without it.  I won't say it's the best in the franchise or anything, but definitely a worthwhile entry in the series, better than 7-9 for sure.  I do feel like the game probably had an intro that explained the early plot that I must have missed because I didn't really get any exposition until after the 1st and 4th boss I think.
Rating: Soft recommendation

124. Mega Man 11 (PS4)
I started this one off on casual difficulty because I wanted some challenge, but didn't want to hate myself or for this game to take too long to get through.  I got about 2 levels in and realized this was going to be a really slow play and I was going to hate it.  So I restarted the game, because you can't change the difficult after starting, and did the easiest difficulty just to see what difference it would make.  Huge difference that allowed me to get through the game in one sitting instead of multiple plays on multiple days.  Game has no emulator features, just a pure straight forward Mega Man experience.  You get frequent checkpoints, but limited lives, so you die, you reload in the room or near the room where you died, but once you run out of lives, game over and start the whole level over.  Easiest difficulty has infinite lives, so you always start with some progress.  Very few instant death mechanics on easiest difficulty, and this game is just jam packed with instant death traps, feels like way more than in previous games, 9 possibly excluded.  The gear system feels like an unnecessary complexity, but after getting used to it I can see it being a good thing.  That said, I don't believe I ever truly got used to it, because while in boss fights I'd remember to do the power gear, during regular gameplay I'd always forget that speed gear exists and there are a lot of sections that absolutely require the speed gear to proceed.  Not a terrible game, even the voice acting wasn't the worst, but just feels off in so many ways.  It doesn't help that the art style makes me think of Mighty No. 9.
Rating: Soft pass

125. The Misadventures of Tron Bonne (PS1)
I'm gonna mark my progress in Zenny, because that's the only true objective to the game iirc.  I have started this game multiple times over the years.  I played it on PS1, I bought it for PSN and played it on PS3, and now I'm playing it on my Vita.  I have always made some progress in the game, but I know I've never beaten it.  I've enjoyed my time with the game, but it's always so daunting all of the management stuff you have to do in the game.  Even now, I want to play it, but I'm constantly deterred by the thought of having to manage which Servbots to use and worry about.  That said, I fully expect this to be a game I will absolutely love and adore by the end of the game.  Tron Bonne is one of my favorite characters of all time.  I really wish they'd make some figures of her.  Finally finished it, and it is a fantastic game.  The game is broken down into several styles.  You have the overall micromanagement of servbots which is actually pretty minimal, but by doing it and upgrading the bots, you make the game easier for yourself overall, this involves chatting with them, training them (which is comprised of multiple mini games), giving them items, sending them scouting, and taking them on missions.  The training minigames is a carnival shooting game, a game to pass out food to servbots as fast as you can, and a torture mini game where you torture the servbots so they stop being lazy.  The rest of the game is about earning money doing missions, which breaks down into a puzzle style set of missions, Mega Man Legends treasure hunting/bank robbery/animal thefting missions, and getting to send your favorite servbot to a casino to gamble mission.  Like Mega Man Legends, the game has little replay value as there is no incentive to keep playing and you'll get nothing new on additional runs... plus you can't even replay missions once you've beat them other than the ruin mission because it's replayable and not a set mission.  I hadn't replayed it, but I imagine it's not procedural.  The fact that this game doesn't add much to the series, I won't push so hard on the recommendation, but I personally loved this game because Tron Bonne is one of my favorite characters.
Rating: Soft recommendation

Next List

[tripredacus]

34. Aliens: Colonial Marines

It is better than Alien Isolation IMO. Whatever Steam installed was not the janky broken version that was originally released, although I was kind of looking forward to being able to play that. Things I notice is that CPU teammates barely do any damage, but they can kill things. Enemy human players can shoot through walls. Hit detection is completely terrible. It took a bit to realise it but the guns have range issues, however there is no long range option. I get why it is like this, the game is not designed for you to try to fight at range, maybe they didn't playtest accuracy at range. Also there is certainly a aggro distance that you can take advantage of in the outdoor areas where the enemy will not do anything and just die.

Hitboxes on the enemies are not what they seem. Shoot the feet to get body shot. Shoot body to maybe hit the head but usually miss entirely. Headshot gives more damage but can't shoot it reliably. Didn't know that there was a weapon inventory until 3/4 through the game. About half way I had no ammo and was using the pistol which has infinite ammo but had no attachments. I had Gorman's Pistol before level 10 and level 10 is when you can start to earn points to add attachments.

Loadout is best use laser sight if you are going to use hipfire. Suppressor always if possible or if not use stock. I finished with the base gun with suppressor and ACOG for medium range (as I noted, there does not seem to be a long range option, unless it is the Battle Rifle which I never got) and the SMG for short range with stock. SMG is probably the best weapon but is useless at medium range. Shotgun was OK but fires too slow, and reload is too slow especially since the cover system doesn't work as expected. Cover only works when using crouch behind an item on the ground like a box. It might work if you crouch behind anything, such as a wall, I never got to that point.

Game got very simple once I learned about the inventory and recognized the range issues. Music was good as an ambience (I turn music down to 50% usually). The stupid issue where the game opens by itself after you exit still is a thing. Didn't bother with multiplayer and not interested in replaying the campaign to get more guns. Didn't have DLC and you can't piecemeal DLC anymore, only buy the complete game again.

[Cartagia]

32. Middle Earth: Shadow or Mordor
[...]
Overall the game is good but the post end game content in the main game can get a bit lacking and repetitive. I can see the possibility of not having much to do if you end up branding all of the captain. Haven't gotten to that point yet but maybe some day.

Not copying the whole review, because it is... a lot, but I do generally agree with what you said throughout.  It's a bit difficult to get into, but as you get your powers the whole game opens up more and lets you kind of walk all over it, but it does get repetitive by the end.  The Nemesis system was cool, but never quite lived up to it's potential.

34. Aliens: Colonial Marines

It is better than Alien Isolation IMO.

And now I hard disagree! LOL  Alien: Isolation is one of my favorite games based on a movie, and a terrific survival horror game, but is maybe a bit too long.

[tripredacus]

I wrote a review about Alien Isolation earlier in this thread, and the reasoning for why I think Colonial Marines is better is because it doesn't force you into scripted segments as much. They are completely different games of course, with Colonial Marines being an FPS.

[telly]

Game 12 - Kingdom Hearts 0.2 Birth By Sleep: A Fragmentary Passage (PS4) - 3 hours, proud mode

Geez that is one mouthful of a name. Anyway, this game is basically a demo, so there's not a whole lot to say about it, but still includes some important story elements, and does serve as a nice glimpse into what the gameplay might look like in Kingdom Hearts III. It felt weird playing a game with different visuals than the 5-6 games before it from the same PS2-based engine, but the graphics are in fact quite lovely. There was a fair amount of stuttering however, which I hope they iron out in III.

Despite the framerate issues, the game was still fun to play. It sort of combines the best elements from KH I and II with Birth By Sleep and it's a joy to play. It felt really fun to explore, jump, and fight, and there are some nice quality of life improvements like being able to cast magic while moving. Other than that, there's not a whole lot to say. On to Dream Drop Distance!