Game #1278: ExZeus The Complete Collection

 Well... no Zeus can help me now, this was brutal.

 I didn't know what ExZeus was, but after a quick search I discovered the Arcadiest Arcade game I've seen recently, so I decided to buy ExZeus: The Complete Collection from Limited Run Games. It's a collection of two nigh identical arcade shooters in which you are constantly flying forwards, trying to mow down everything in your way.

 In the original ExZeus you get to pick between three robots, the only thing that changes between them is their design. Gameplay is simple, but tough. You mash the shoot button to rapid fire your main gun, but you also get bomb, missiles and a big laser. You have to keep track of four gauges, the lock-on gauge, which lets you use your missiles, the Laser gauge, that lets you use the powerful laser by holding down the shoot button, the shield gauge and the health gauge. It's a lot to take in at first, but once you get in the groove of things it becomes second nature. In between levels you can use money to purchase permanent health and shield upgrades, or restore your bomb stock or other gauges.

 ExZeus 2 is pretty much identical, but you lose the laser, and instead of bombs you get three different types of special weapons. Stages are much longer in this one, and you get brief on-foot segments and bike segments which weren't so good, but adds to the action, as this is a very high-octane, frenetic game. The store has expanded to include permanent gun upgrades.

 So, so far so good, they sound like games right up my alley, super simple, high on action and simplicity, right? Well.... they are brutal. And there's no way to turn down the difficulty... as well as limited continues. As a matter of fact, ExZeus allows for ZERO continues. This is absolutely ridiculous on an Arcade game re-release, what's the fun in having a quarter muncher but limited virtual quarters? That's no fun.

 Bottom line is... ExZeus, both games are a load of fun, but this collection should've done more for Console players.

 6.0

Game #1277: Bayonetta 3

 Bigger, badder.... but not better. 

 For a change, I was actually really hyped about Bayonetta 3. Not only did I absolutely adore Bayonetta 2, but I was digging what little I allowed myself to see about Bayonetta 3, including Viola, who seemed like a banger new character, analogous to another character I adore, Nero. Well, maybe my expectations were too high or maybe Platinum aimed too high...

 You shouldn't play Bayonetta for its story, but, hey, at least this time around we don't have a dumb child character tagging along. Instead, Bayonetta goes through the Bayoverse, meeting all sorts of Bayonettas from other dimensions. It's super stupid, but damnit if I didn't like the alternate Bayonettas! A lot of noise has been made about canonizing Bayonetta as straight, or bi-sexual at least... and who cares? She's never been queer-coded in the games, and I'd argue that the official sapphic art was just Japanese fanservice. I'd complain, however, about her love interest being the biggest loser in the series, now that is something to complain about. Plus, the ending... I absolutely hated it. Much like DMC V, it's a passing the torch type of story, with Bayonetta/Dante passing off the torch to Viola/Nero, and as much as I adored Viola, the way they went about it.... didn't gel well with me.

 Now what really matters, the combat. It has changed quite a bit... One of the things I loved about the Bayonetta franchise, and something I liked over DMC, was how you could equip different weapons on Bayo's hands and feet, thus allowing you to toy around with mixed movesets. That's gone. Every weapon is stand alone, and as much as I enjoyed the variety... I think Bayonetta lost some of its DNA. To be fair, every weapon is fairly unique, and with each weapon comes a different transformation for Bayonetta, accessed through certain moves, and each transformation changes her dash and her jumping abilities. That said, having a paltry 2 different weapon slots to toggle is very limiting, three would've been the perfect number. For instance, if you like the Train Sword(Yeah!) and the Magic Cane(Weapons can get crazy in this game) you lose vertical movility, since their third 'jump' is a forward dash. Allowing for a third slot would've been just the right.

 There's a new emphasis on Giant Battles. Basically, there are larger enemies than ever before, and to battle them, Bayoneta can now summon her own giant beasts. And it's kinda cool, you hold down ZL and you lose control over Bayonetta, who gets rooted to her place, and now you take control of the giant monster. It's a great idea, and if you are savvy enough you'll realize that you can queue actions for the monster and quickly go back to controlling Bayonetta while the creature does its thing. It adds a whole new dimension to the combat, and I kinda like it.... except that when you do this, the framerate takes a hit, and even worse, often times it's easy to lose track of where Bayonetta is among the giant enemies. It kinda sucks getting hit by stuff you don't know you should've dodged because either you lost track of Bayonetta, the giant enemy(Who turns translucid when too close to the camera) or because your view of Bayo was obstructed by a giant being.

 Viola is the new playable character, and I adore her. I love her personality and her looks. Much like Nero, she offers a simplified combat system. She can't change weapons, only fighting with her Katana and darts, and holding down ZL summons Cheshire, who moves on his own, as long as you hold down ZL, and Viola gains a new fist-and-kick moveset. Unlike Bayonetta, who enters Witch Time when dodging at the last moment, she gains it when blocking at the last moment, this makes getting witch time as Viola is harder, plus, how much Witch Time you get depends on when you blocked, and you can get less than a second of witch time. Plus, mashing block will get you nowhere, because double tapping block while holding down a direction will make her dash. The one thing I didn't like about Viola is that she gets about a fourth of the total amount of stages to play. You can, however, use her on any of the bonus unlockable mini-challenge stages or in the Witch Trials, but I would've liked being able to play as any character on any stage 

 Jeanne is back too, and she is unlocked when you finish the game. That said... she gets four mandatory 2.5D stages built around... stealth? And one is a bike stage. Regardless... I hated her stages. I wanted hardcore, fast-paced 3-D character action combat, not... 2.5D Stealth. Thankfully, only the first stage was lengthy, the other three are mercifully short and don't place as much emphasis on avoiding enemies. Regardless, I despised the fact that her stages were mandatory, I didn't sign up for them.

 There's another gameplay element, yes, they went bonkers with Bayonetta 3, which are Giant Boss Battles. Most of these are awful, particularly when forced to use Gomorrah, because, in an attempt to make them feel like Godzilla... they are very slow paced. I hated this, absolute pace-killers. And they aren't any fun either.

 Honestly, the core gameplay in Bayonetta 3, despite a few small issues, is as good as ever, it's all the extra gameplay shifts that really bummed me out. Instead of focusing on what they've always done fantastically well, instead, they added these elements that they thought were cool(2.5D Stealth, Kaijuu battles) but don't really gel well with Bayonetta. And you can tell that they had an enormous budget this time around, besides all the new gimmicks, they finally removed all the stop-motion cutscenes. About time!

 Since they went all out with the budget, environments are much larger than they've ever been, and there's a gazillion different collectibles to find. Some are useless, such as gallery items, but there are also the usual health and magic upgrades. Most important among them all are the Three Umbran Tears, if you find all three in a level you'll unlock a mini-challenge stage. There are also a lot of interesting costumes to buy, since every Alternate Bayonetta's look can be purchased, as well as various different color variations, heck, you can even change Bayonetta's hair and glasses colors!

 Another brilliant idea was dividing currencies into three: Rings are used to buy cosmethics, Green droplets are used for items and accessories while red orbs are used to purchase new moves for both Bayonetta and Viola. 

 Despite all my gripes with Bayonetta 3, it's still a great action game, and there's a lot to like here. The grander sense of scale, multiple gameplay shifts as well as all the alternate Bayonettas does add some sort of celebratory feeling to the whole thing... but I feel that some of them actually take away from what Bayonetta has always done so well. In the end, it's another great game... just not as good as the previous entries.

 8.5

Game #1276: God of War Ragnarok

 Ragnarok wasn't averted.

 Not gonna lie, having played the previous God of War game, I was a bit irked seeing just how many awards God of War: Ragnarok received, but I made sure to come at the game without any bias, I mean, as homogeneous to every other modern adventure game as God of War was... it was still a fun time. Well... Ragnarok was disappointing in more ways that I would've liked.

 The good news? The combat is slightly more fun. While it's pretty much identical to the previous game, the juggling is more generous, so you can do more fun stuff. Unarmed combat was stripped bare, so you don't get much more than just punches and kicks, however, this time around you start the game armed with both the Leviathan Ax and the Blades of Chaos. For the most part, the function pretty much identically to how they did before, but the 'hold down button' attacks were changed completely, and the 'stance switch' was removed from the Blades. It's alright, the stance switch moves were always rather unwieldy. And, midway through, you get a new weapon, a lance-type weapon, and I was surprised at just how much I liked it considering I don't like lances. So yeah, while it's still a bit basic, the combat feels weighty and I liked the new juggling. The new weapon is a blast, and this game didn't have as many enemies that broke your lock on them, so me using Rage by mistake was a thing of the past. Speaking of Rage, now you can pick between three different types: GoW style, Valor, for Healing, and another type for dealing a ton of damage in one blow.

 Repeatedly using most moves eventually lets you spend XP to enhance them, by adding more Stun, Damage, Elemental Damage or super armor, which is a neat idea. Defensively, now shields come in two different types, favoring blocking or parrying, which was also a neat idea. Certain armor pieces now change as they rank up, which is pretty cool already, but you can alter the look of any armor so as to look as the armor that you like!! Atreus and Freya get alternate costumes too.

 But more interesting than anything... now Atreus gets his own playable segments. He only gets his bow, but he has his own unique moveset, based on speedy bow whacks and ranged bow sniping. He is definitely not as fun as Kratos, and during his most extensive chapter he becomes a bit boring, since his moveset is limited, but I enjoyed the variety. He is just an extra, however, so you can only play as him when the game demands it, and during the post game you can only use Kratos. Speaking of Atreus, now both Atreus and Kratos get different companions, and while they are very basic(Tap square to have them shoot, hold square to have them use their special move), it's still pretty interesting, plus, of course they have the now mandatory Uncharted banter between them.

 As for the plot... It's alright. I found it more interesting than the previous game, for sure, but all the emotional stuff they went for... it just didn't do it for me. They tried, they tried so hard to pull at your heartstrings, but barring a few moments... It didn't do it for me. And that's the thing, they went for this type of character moments to score high with critics, because if you remove every emotional bit... the overall story is nothing special. Sindri's development was very well done, and I love what, and how, they did with him. There's a plot twist near the end, and I've seen people call it brilliant, heck, Gamesrank called it one of the best plot twists in recent games and.... seriously? It's not that shocking, it isn't even a smart 'everything changes now' plot twist, it was more like a simple plot development than anything else. The foreshadowing was neat, but nah, it's not that amazing.

 What probably pushed me away from the overall narrative is how... Marvel the dialogue feels. Ratatosk gets reintroduced as a cute Rocket Raccoon type of furry NPC, and I couldn't help but wonder just what the hell was the plushy doing in God of War. The first playable Atreus segment was absolutely dreadful, as the whole pre-pubescent romance tease with Angrborda felt very, very forced and cringe, like something out of a cheesy Marvel movie. It's also a huge exposition dump interspersed with moments of slowly riding a cow-thing while collecting fruit, it's a huge pace-killer. Speaking of pacing... the walking-simulator bits felt more intrusive than they did in the first game, and more frequent too. Thankfully, as the game pushes forward the combat, exploration and story telling balance themselves out a bit better.

 The exploration... is nigh identical to the original game, but now instead of just rowing a boat you also get to drive wolf-sleds. Every side activity from the original game returns, finding lore markers, opening a ridiculous amount of worthless chests, Rune Chests(Which didn't feel as annoying this time), killing Odin's Ravens... pretty much everything is back. Instead of Valkyrie super bosses there are now fallen soldier super bosses. You also revisit every realm you did back then, although, thankfully, most places are completely different, only reusing small bits to show you that it's the same realm. It's a much larger game, frequently the game will just drop you into a new section and a ton of sidequests will pop up, and the post-game seems pretty meaty too.... if only I could've finished.

 For you see, this is one of the buggiest games I've played recently. By far. It's absolutely shameful how Sony released the game in this state. And sure, I could've patched the game, but I always play games unpatched, because that's what's in the disc, so that's what I'll always have access to. Here's a small list of just a handful of things I experienced, and I took videos of most of them:

 - One time, when collecting am Yggdrassil Tear from the boat, it didn't count as collected even though Atreus animation grabbing it played out. When I landed on a beach, Kratos was sitting on air, NEXT to the boat, instead of getting off. Had to restart the checkpoint.

 - Minor, but at least twice I got off the boat on a coast but the angle didn't let me walk into the land, had to get back on the boat and land again.

- When reaching the Gram boss fight, the camera went crazy and afterwards Atreus was invisible. Had to restart the checkpoint.

- Both Freya and Atreus, as companions, sometimes showed ineptitude when following me, and I had to exit and re-enter the room to fix their AI

- In Alfheim there are puzzles involving bouncing your ax on crystals. Sometimes, the trail that showed how your ax would bounce disappeared just because.

 - In the first Atreus sequence, there's a blue pick up, if you pick it up, you won't collect it and it will float on thin air.

 - This is a common one, there are threads on reddit about it, sometimes, certain audio sounds, such as breaking walls or the such, will just stop playing, and this even happens with VOICES. What's even better, not even the subtitles will appear!!! The only solution is to exit the game entirely, not just 'quit to main menu', but quit to the dashboard. This fixes it. This one is vexingly common.

- After fighting a Valkyrie I had to reload checkpoint because I couldn't trigger the mystic Gate.

- I went to grab a flower, a collectible, but it's your companion that has to grab it. Well... the AI got stuck running towards it. Not fun. Speaking of this, during Alfheim, Tyr LOVED running against walls. Not game-breaking, but immersion breaking.

 - In the Dwarven realm, upon revisiting it, you can clearly see a traincar flying over thing air. Looks dumb.

- In Muspelheim, after doing the big main challenge, trying to trigger the smaller challenges will fail and you have to reload checkpoint. This one is ridiculous.

- Evasive Storm move, with the Leviathan Ax, is bugged, sometimes Kratos throws the ax towards the ground or above the targeted enemy.

- The worst one, by far.... I was doing the side content, reached Vanaheim and... I couldn't exit. Every attempt to open the door back to Freyr's camp would fail because Freya wouldn't follow me, locking Kratos in place as he waits for Freya before starting the animation. This one was heart breaking, as I planned on finishing the post-game.

 Yeah... God of War Ragnarok wasn't all that spectacular. Don't get me wrong, the game is fun to play, but the story is nothing to write home about, and the enormous amounts of bugs really made my time with the game less than enjoyable. Plenty of times I was wondering if something was actually supposed to be happening or if it was bugging out again.

6.5

Game #1275: Xenoblade Chronicles 3

 Xenoblade 2's harem ending CONFIRMED

 Y'know, I've been here from the start, since the very first Xenoblade game released on Wii, and the struggle to get it overseas since it was a Gamestop exclusive. Xenoblade X is a Wii U exclusive, so until it gets a port, fat chance I'm playing that one. And then Xenoblade 2 came out, which for as many things it got right it also featured one of the most annoying main characters ever made as well as stupid amounts of fanservice. Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is out and it seems they learned from XC 3, as not only did they remove the fanservice, but they also got what's probably the best cast of characters yet and some of the most fun game mechanics in the series, for what is probably the best game in the franchise yet.

 Well, the basics remain the same as with the rest of the games in the franchise, you get a HUGE world to explore, filled with sidequests, monsters and special monsters to battle. It borrows a lot from MMORPGs, as combat takes place in real time, with you character automatically performing basic attacks and you being able to pick the special attacks and reposition them around the battlefield. Roaming through the huge lands are enemies too strong for you to handle at first, so you have to avoid triggering them, etc. If you've played Xenoablade before, you get the gist of it. It's a huge game, same as it always been, and it does feel bloated at times, by hour 70 I was already feeling a bit burned out.

 The story I felt was very engrossing, it involves 3 characters from Keves and another 3 from Agnus, two warring kingdoms, who have to make fast friends in order to survive since now both kingdoms are after them... and along the way discover that there might be yet another force pulling the strings. It's much more involved than that, as people here live only 10 years and are born in factories, so to speak. Regardless, the story was super interesting, as well as a bit tragic, and all 6 party members were very likeable, a far cry from annoying children like Rex in XB2. What's even better, the fanservice has been turned down to a minimum, which is fantastic as the female characters don't look stupid anymore. The plot was very interesting, and it has a ton of little character moments here and there to make you fall in love with the heroes. Oh! And it ties together Xenoblade 1 and 2, not that you need to play those before, so if you been playing these games since the start you'll get even more out of it.

 Combat has changed plenty, Blades are a thing of the past, and now you control a six-member party at al times, with a seventh spot for Heroes, characters that join you but feature a much reduced move pool. Combat takes place in real time, as per usual, and the AI controls the other six characters, although you can swap at any time which character you are playing as. Each character has access to seven different skills, X, Y and B are allocated to class-specific skills, the A button is your super special move and the UP, RIGHT and DOWN buttons trigger learned skills. Oh, but you see, in these game there are Classes, a whole bunch of them, divided in three categories: Healer, Attacker and Defender, and each class has their own set of 5 skills. As you level up these classes you can master some of these skills so that you can then equip them on the UP, RIGHT and DOWN buttons on another other class. It's a brilliant system that incentivizes you to have everyone try every class, plus, getting a class to level 10 unlocks it as a costume. To be fair, costumes are rather lame most of the time, as they only change the upper torso of a character, and some of these don't fit very well on some characters, heck, some are quite clearly designed for breasts, but they didn't bother removing the crevices and folds of clothes on the chest, so the boys look as if they had very, very flat chests when wearing some of them.

 How battles progress is pretty identical to previous games, in this game, positioning is important as different skills have better damage output depending on your position relative to the enemy. The same status effects as before are here: Break, Topple and Daze, but now you can finish a Topple chain with a Launch instead. Don't worry if these make no sense, they are just a way to incapacitate enemies for a little while. There's a new feature, CHAIN attacks, as you fight you fill a gauge, which fills faster if you use the status effects, and once full you can land special moves back-to-back on enemies, and it feels like a mini-game that you have to try to keep going by selecting the right attacks.

 But it doesn't end there, remember how characters from warring factions join up? Well, characters got paired in twos, and due to a certain story bit, they can INTERLINK together... which translates into fusing into a giant mecha-looking thing for a short while. These forms are very powerful and look amazing. Each pair of characters has access to two different forms, and you can switch form mid battle. This adds another neat wrinkle into the combat, as well as much spectacle!

 Combat has two small issues. One is, just like with previous games, due to the nature of the game and how it plays like a MMORPG... enemies can simply take too much damage. When I was in the level 90s, it took me more than a couple of attacks to defeat level 50 enemies. Eventually I turned down the difficulty to easy because I was spending too much time fighting enemies there was absolutely no chance they'd even get any of my characters killed. It felt like a waste of time, and the game is already long enough. And tied to this... I hit level 60 when I was on chapter 2. It's incredibly easy to over level yourself if you, like me, need to explore every nook and cranny in the game. By chapter 5 I was already on mid 90s but the story missions were barely reaching level 50. Barely. But this is tied to another issue... the XP you obtain is relative to the level difference between enemies and yourself, fair enough, but this is also tied to Class XP. If I wanted, and I wanted, everyone to obtain a new class and then level them up to 10... it meant I had to defeat stronger enemies than I had access to.... which means I had to explore and seek out harder enemies, which in turn overleveled me even more. And between explorations and the in-game mechanics that can boost experience points earned with a 700 multiplier...  it's way too hard no to accidentally overlevel yourself and screw yourself with class upgrading. And nothing in the game tells you about how earning classes works and how it's tied to Class Experience, which is ALSO tied to the level difference between you and your enemies.

 And since I'm at it, the tutorial is incredibly invasive. It forces you to go into menus, and has to have text pop up to FORCE you and tell you step by step how to do something as basic as equipping and item. There's no good reason as to why I'm not able to just skip the tutorial lesson if it's so stupid. And it forces you to equip items maybe you didn't mean to, and then exit the menu only to go back and equip it again. Ridiculous.

 But I don't want to end on a sour note, I really don't, because despite those issues.... the game is brilliant. The story was great, and combat is a lot of fun. Plus, I don't understand how they managed to cram such a massive game inside a tiny little cart, so many cutscenes, a world so large, and so much variety in environments and enemies and NPCs... it's a HUGE game, for good or bad, and I think it might be the best Xenoblade out there. It has fantastic combat and a fantastic story, with a few minor issues, but nothing too bad. 

 9.0

Game #1274: God of War(2018)

 Now you can call him daddy.

 Took me a while, but I finally decided to try God of War(2018) and check out how Kratos' story continued. I've always been somewhat taken aback by how people quickly forgot just how well crafted Kratos' and his descent to villainy was, being a perfect tragic protagonist, since, much like I thought before playing the games, thought Kratos was just an angry guy. Well, can't say he is an angry guy anymore!

 The story picks up hundreds of years after God of War III, Kratos now lives in Midgard and has a new son, and the entire game is about them fulfilling Faye's, Kratos' new wife and Atreus' mother, last wishes: Having her ashes spread from the highest mountain in the nine realms. Of course, there are more wrinkles to the story, as nordic gods come a-knocking, quite literally, to Kratos' door and they want a piece of him too. Kratos' new focused, calmer demeanor feels like a direct progression of how his character would grow if he decided to change after all the rampage, and his relationship with Atreus, a son he barely knows, was interesting to witness. Some things were a bit dumb, like how Atreus thinking he was a mortal when he was a god made him sick, how does that make sense? And his personality shift midway through was done too abruptly, but overall, I'd say it was enjoyable. That said, the game was clearly made as critic bait, so there's a ton of ill-fitting Marvel humor in here. All the humor that comes from Kratos' and Atreus' interactions makes sense, but the rest? There's a dwarf that starts gagging when he sees or thinks about gross stuff, completely out of place.

 Back in the day, everyone wanted to be God of War, now God of War wants to be everyone else. The original game, while not as deep as other hack and slash games such as Devil May Cry, kept things simple, bloody and mashy, and thus, spawned a ton of games that wanted to ape it, such as Conan, Dante's Inferno or Castlevania: Lords of Shadows. It had an identity of its own. That identity is now gone, this is the game-est game out there. Now we've got RPG elements, different armor and equipment pieces, a weighty combat system in which you attack with the shoulder buttons like modern Souls-inspired games, it's open world-ish, so you get a checklist of of things to collect and chests to open, to open for materials so that you can craft more equipment, etc.

 Thankfully, the combat is decent. At first you can only fight with the Leviathan Ax and your fist/shield combo. The Leviathan Ax can be thrown and retrieved as will and deals plenty of damage, while your fists deal more stun damage, and filling an enemy's Stun Gauge lets you perform a brutal maneuver that usually kills them. You can press Square to have Atreus pepper the enemy you are aiming at with elemental arrows(Shock or Light), or have him summon a phantom being to help you. As for you, you can equip two different Runic Attacks on your ax, and there's a wide variety of them. Sadly, the combat is a bit... limited. The third-person, over the should camera isn't the best, when an enemy is coming from behind, all you get is a tiny red marker and Atreus screaming 'behind you'. Enemies are way more nimble than you, and it kind sucks, particularly when fighting bosses such as the Valkyries, who very easily break your lock.

 The attacks you can learn for the ax are rather limited too, usually being about holding down a button instead of mashing it. You have a single unique attack string, R1 R1 R1 and R2 and that's it.... and just as you start getting a bit tired of the Ax, Kratos retrieves his Blade of Chaos. Most of the original combos returns, and thanks to its wider attack angles, its a much more fun weapon to use than the ax, albeit slightly weaker. You can swap weapons at any time too! The combat is nothing special, but once you have access to both weapons it becomes much more enjoyable. That said, Spartan Rage is done with L3+R3, as per usual, L3 is dash and R3 is locking on... I can't count the times I accidentally triggered Spartan Rage, when all I meant was to target the enemy that broke my lock and dash towards it.

 Rounding up your abilities, you have a dodge, which is used to avoid red, unblockable attacks, and a shield that can block or parry yellow attacks. Spartan Rage is back, but it's kinda weak, however, it regenerates your health, so it's still a mechanic you'll rely on for tough bosses. I'll give it this, God of War has always been about spectacle, and this game is no exception. Some of the boss battles are amazing, featuring arena transitions and what not, plus, they removed QTEs, THANK YOU. This is how you can tell that even though it's quite different from the previous games... the people involved knew what God of War was all about. Kratos is true to himself, the Blades of Chaos retain their combos, and they exceeded the previous games in spectacle.

 As for the rest of the game, it opens up once you finally get into a boat, and this will be your main means of traversing the nine realms. You are free to explore the many islands for optional sidequests and optional loot, and why not do it, more loot means more upgrades. The really good upgrades are usually hidden behind puzzles, some more irritating than others, as its usually a matter of finding devilishly hidden statues or switches to to select the right runes. These really wore out their welcome, and I had to look up online just where some of these were hidden. Challenging in the wrong way.

 Another small issue... the map isn't very good. How some areas connect isn't clearly explained, and the checklists could've been done better too. For a game like this, built around exploration, built around getting upgrades that let you clear obstacles you couldn't before... the map should've been done better.

 Assuming you aren't tired of all the bazillion other games that do the things this one does too.... God of War is a great choice. It's disappointing seeing how God of War, as a game, lost all of its personality to become another part of the whole homogeneous mass of modern adventure games, but at least it does everything it tries to do really well, despite a few shortcomings.

 8.0

Game #1273: No More Heroes III(Playstation 4)

 Travis takes another stroll outside Nintendo.

 I've already written about No More Heroes III back when it first released on the Switch, so I'll try to keep things relevant only to this new release as a port, as there's no reason to tread old ground!

 First and foremost, the game runs beautiful. I only noticed a few framerate drops in a few battles, but overall, in and out of battles, the game runs really well. And I'll make it short, THIS is the ideal way to play the game, not the Switch original, as much as it hurts me considering how much I love the Switch and how this used to be an exclusive. The overworld is as barren as always, but dude, I found a new appreciation for how pretty it can look. I actually enjoyed riding the bike, or just walking from place to place, since Santa Destroy and the other mini-cities are kinda nice to look at.

 The mission cleared jingle is fantastic, could never get tired of it... and while this is clearly a Switch game, as the graphics weren't touched up, it looks BEAUTIFUL, which speaks volumes of the game's art direction. And with the smoother framerate, it's much easier to appreciate.

 Being separated from all my expectations and the hype... I like the game now more than I did before. Losing some customization options and not having different Beam Katanas is still disappointing... but not as much as I felt it was before. The combat is super satisfying, despite how simple it is, so I loved slashing and slicing every alien to bits. What's more, I was hooked right from the start, once again, I couldn't just stop and drop the controller, once I got into the No More Heroes III, there was no stopping it.

 That said, I also noticed some design elements that weren't very good, for instance, I finished the original not knowing how to unlock the missing alien battle(Defense) missions... well, you have to return to previously cleared battle icons on the map and maybe, depending on your story progression, a new mission icon will be on the floor next to the original. This is dumb, and nothing in the game tells you that this is how you find the other fights. And it's surprising, because so much of the overworld is empty, they could've peppered these icons throughout the city and have them pop up, in a different color(showing that you haven't attempted them yet) as you defeat bosses. It's a very minor thing, but hey, it's something that should've been done better. And Suda 51 did it better before, by having a list to select these missions from in NMH1.

 Yeah, No More Heroes III is fantastic. And this version runs better, so it was easier to appreciate, this time around I found pretty much every collectible and even found sidequests I didn't know existed in the original. So yeah, there's never been a better time to play No More Heroes III.

 9.0

Game #1272: Conan

 Say what you will, Conan wears a skirt.

 So, yeah, another PS3 hack and slash game I missed back in the day, here we have Conan. In a few words, it's another take on the God of War formula, but with more boobs. Funny story, this one has been really hard to find, either it wasn't complete in box or it was way too expensive... a few weeks ago I found it, complete in box, for dirt cheap.

 Conan, a hack and slash action game, wears its God of War inspiration quite close to its heart. Weak and strong attacks, alongside a grab button, insane amounts of QTEs(Even to open doors), red orbs for Experience points, Green Orbs for Health and Blue orbs for magic. And to keep things similar, the right analog stick is used to dodge. Remember how Kratos had a sex-minigame per game? Well, Conan can rescue topless women who'll reward him with red orbs, the cringiest one-liners("Where are my clothes?", "CRUSH ME WITH YOUR LOVE") and a 'sexy' get up animation that looks very dumb. Conan the Barbarian is known for being a bit mysoginistic(Which makes sense considering it's a barbaric world), but this adds nothing to the game and looks dumb, they could've added some topless enemies or NPCs walking around and it would've had the same effect but not look as dumb.

 It's not entirely devoid of any originality, for instance, Conan has three movesets: One handed Sword(With or without shield), Two handed Sword and Two Swords, and every style has its own strengths and weaknesses. It's a pretty neat idea, however, you always start each level with a single sword, and you can't use the other styles until you find another weapon from a fallen enemy, which can be a bit annoying if, like me, you tended to ignore the one-handed style. There's another wrinkle to combat, the Song of Death, by landing hits and not getting hit you'll fill a yellow bar, once full you gain extra power and speed for a while, and this too is affected by your weapons, dual blades will fill it very quickly due to its swift combos, while using a two-handed blade will mean you likely won't trigger it.

 The issue with combat is that it can be sorta clunky. It's not too bad, and it works decently, however, whenever you initiate an attack, Conan will slide next to the closest enemy you are aiming towards, and this is an issue with slower attacks because enemies will jab you out of your attack. Using the two-handed style can sometimes be a pain in the rear because of this unpredictable slide. Eventually, when handling enemies, you have to take into account, when initiating attacks, that the distance between you and your enemy is not what it actually looks like, so, maybe, you have to start attacking further away from the enemy so as not to initiate the slide. It looks silly and it's not much fun. Plus, eventually the game introduces a few enemies who'll just jump out of hitstun and attack you through your combo. It got so bad that I just started relying on the two-handed spinning sword boomerang(physics be damned) attack just to be safe.

 Mind you, it's not all bad, the game IS fun despite its flaws. When the combat works well, dodging and attacking is satisfying, plus, you can dismember your enemies which looks really cool. You can also explore around to find upgrades to your health and mana bars, as well as bonus red orbs to purchase more moves. It is a fun hack and slash, it's just flawed.

 As a God of War clone, it's also got QTE's up the wazoo, which aren't much fan when failing them restores HP to the boss. I read on TVTropes that the final boss is considered challenging... he's not, he really isn't. It may seem a bit luck based since your hitstun is kinda egregious, but you can get through it if you play it smart...and boring, spamming safe, area-clearing attacks like the aforementioned boomerang blade.

 Was Conan worth the chase? I dunno, in some ways yes, in others it wasn't. I will say that the good overweighs the bad, but it's not worth going out of your way to get this one.

 6.5