Games I've been playing lately - Fall 2023 edition

I haven't completed many games lately but have certainly been playing quite a few:

-Ray'z Arcade Chronology. Having a ton of fun playing Raystorm, one of my favorite shmups and one that I have fond memories with as a child in the early days of Playstation. It's been a blast to play Raycrisis too, a game I've always wanted to play but the price of it has always put me off.

 

-TES: Skyrim. Having a lot of fun jumping back into the game and who knows, maybe I'll finally complete (does one actually complete Skyrim?) it.

-Gran Turismo 7. New SPEC II update has been a lot of fun for me and the new Sophy AI races are surprisingly fun. Still wish there was a standard championship mode like in GTs of old but I'll take what I can get.

 

-Pokemon Pinball: Ruby & Sapphire. This and the GBC Pokemon Pinball are such great games. I didn't play this when it released but it reminds me of a simpler time and that's good enough sometimes. Not to sell the game short though, easily the best pinball experience on the GBA.

 -SSB: Melee. Thanks to Slippi it's been a lot of fun getting destroyed by randoms in Melee. I'll never actually be good but that's okay

-Reel Fishing II. Welp, I'm officially into fishing games. There is something I love so much about the full motion video backgrounds. Couple that with relaxing music and catching some fuckin' fish and I'm all aboard.

 

 

-Mario Kart 7 and 8. We're always playing Mario Kart in some capacity in this household.

Completed: Super Mario Bros. Wonder

What a game. Easily the best 2d Mario since Super Mario World and is absolutely on the same level as that and SMB3. As has been said in nearly every publication about the game, "wonder" could not be a more apt title for the game. Had so much fun with MY WIFE completing and 100%ing the game. Time to play it again!

Completed: Perfect Dark

Technically the superior game to Goldeneye but I'd say a little less focused. That being said the amount of additional content in this game was incredible at the time especially with the AI bots in multiplayer. Still though I had a blast playing it. Will probably move onto playing the Timesplitters series since I enjoyed these Rare FPS classics.

        

Completed: GoldenEye 007

A game I've spent countless hours playing in various stages of my life at various friends houses but have never beaten the thing front to back. I love linear FPS games and even in 2023 this game is still awesome to play. A shame the true remaster for the 360 will likely never be released.

Completed: Halo Reach

And thus ends my journey with the original set of Halo games developed by Bungie. Reach was definitely my favorite. Really enjoyed the variety of missions and it just felt like the most polished Halo experience.

Completed: Halo 3 ODST

This took me about a day to beat, certainly feels more like an expansion pack than a full game. Enjoyed it nonetheless (aside from the stupid love story) and it was a nice change of pace. Onto Halo Reach

        

Completed: Halo 3

What a great game, feel a little sad I missed out on this experience back in 2007.Thoroughly enjoyed every bit of this game. A little sad I only have ODST and Halo Reach left for the original games by Bungie but I'm savoring every moment. Onto ODST next.

 

 

 

 

Completed: Spryo 3: Year of the Dragon

My first ever Spyro game and I loved it. As a kid I was put off by how kiddie it seemed and I was more into Crash Bandicoot (because it was the 90s and you HAD to pick a side when it came to gaming mascots). How stupid I was. I wanted to play it on PS1 as opposed to the HD remakes to see what it was like back then and I was not disappointed. This is easily one of the most polished PS1 games I've ever played and as a fan of collectathons it's a bit silly it's taken me this long to play it. Would definitely like to play the rest in the trilogy at some point.

Loved: Pretty much everything. Definitely an all-time classic collectathon platformer

Meh: Playing as other characters could get old and feel forced but as the third game in the series I get why they added that to keep it fresh considering all three games were released in a 3 year span.

Completed: Batsugun

Another shmup and one that's considered the first bullet hell at that. I'm definitely not good enough to be playing bullet hell games but this one is way more manageable (I still died like a million times in the later levels). Power ups for all 3 characters are great, you can really blow up shit all over the screen with these fuckers, swear.

Completed: Cotton Reboot

I've been playing some shmups lately and had a lot of fun with Cotton Reboot. My first time playing a "cute'em up" and despite its cute look it is definitely a challenging game. I love all these re-issues of classic shmups since they allow for accessibility when it comes to lives and continues, however this game isn't that difficulty, especially if you put in some time to remember patterns of enemies. That being said I certainly continued multiple times before I beat the game.

 

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