Recent reviews by Snakes

Take all the best parts from the Dark Souls trilogy, throw the formula headfirst into an open world, and the result is Elden Ring.

An absolute masterpiece of a game, this game has more flavor and variety than ever seen before. The biggest improvement in Miyazaki's approach is undoubtedly the flexibility the game extends to the player. Almost every basic weapon you pick up throughout your journey can be molded to the fit your build. Want to wield a giant-crushing hammer while casting sorceries? Not a problem, just apply an Ash of War and pick the scaling of your choice.

This is most obvious in the game's magic system. The amount of sorceries and incantations flabbergasted me, and after 4 playthroughs, I find myself still experimenting with them. There's just so much variety that the possibilities feel endless.

Then, of course, the cherry on top: the art direction. While there is something to be said about the game's somewhat outdated graphical basis, the art direction more than makes up for, and it brings every continent, every nook and cranny, every grotesque abomination, and every castle and city come to life. The legacy dungeons of each area channel previous FromSoft design conventions and elevates them higher than ever before. Full-scale cities are explorable now. No longer are you limited to a single cathedral or path like you were with Anor Londo or Irithyll. From the rooftops to the sewers, how much you discover is only limited to how thorough YOU want to be.

So yeah, this game slaps.

A good-not-great Star Wars game that effectively borrows elements of metroidvanias and souls-likes with decent execution. This is one of those odd games that, while not particularly wowing me at any given moment (other than causing my Star Wars inner fan to nerd out when TIEs were flying overhead int he opening), it never stops being a solid experience the whole way through.

The story and cast are both exceptionally solid, with an engaging villain and fun little secondary antagonist that happens in the game's B-plot. While pretty fun, the combat at times can also feel a bit limited, with most enemies all being able to be handled in the same way. Dodge and parrying times are 90% of the equation. While it's not a bad thing, I'd like to see it expanded on a bit in the now-announced sequel.

My main complaints are two things: no fast travel and a terrible map system. While these don't make the game an unenjoyable experience, they CAN combine to absolutely kill the game's pacing as it become a bit of a chore to constantly backtrack, pull up the map (that you cannot do via your HUD), and then realize you made a wrong turn two minutes ago and are stuck retreading ground.

That aside, I'm very happy that we have a melee-oriented Star Wars game with solid combat and story. It's a niche that has gone unfilled for far too long. If you like the universe, odds are you'll love this.

Highly competent metroidvania with a wonderful soundtrack, interesting lore, and a dreary atmosphere. Ender Lilies doesn't attempt to break the mold or innovate in any particular way, but it embraces the genre's formula and everything it sets out to do, it does really well. Highly recommended and an engaging 20 hours worth of gameplay.

Pros
-Challenging, but fair, platforming with super-tight controls
-Incredibly fun combat that makes the most out of a rather simple control scheme
-One of the best boss rosters you will find in any game
-Subtle, deep storytelling with many mysteriously poignant moments throughout
-Diverse, memorable cast of NPCs, each with their own storylines that contain satisfying endings
-Sprawling world design packed with beautifully rendered environments, each with their own unique feel
-Excellent soundtrack that makes an already memorable experience stand out that much more

Cons
-Players new the genre may find the world difficult to navigate and may find the compass a necessity as a result
-I really stretched for the first con, here

Summation
I do not exaggerate when I say Hollow Knight starts as a good game and winds up being one of the GOAT’s. From the very first area you enter, you’ll find yourself constantly learning new abilities, perfecting your platforming, and then repeating the process right up to the very end. When you aren’t discovering new secrets or sweating your next series of jumps, you’ll find yourself pausing just to take in the world Team Cherry has built for you. Be it lush greenscapes, hauntingly dark corridors, or crystalline workshops, the visuals never stopped surprising me at how excellent the devs did in creating this world.

Hallownest runs deep, literally. Secrets are numerous, sometimes being a simple wall break, sometimes being platforming challenges that demand mastery of the game’s controls. It’s very possible to finish this game and find that you’ve only discovered half of what is has to offer (niftily provided to the player prior to the final boss). Combine this with the fact that you’ll likely never take the same route twice on a playthrough and you have infinite replayability.

I can’t recommend this game enough. Whether you’re a veteran of the genre or a player looking for a new experience, Hollow Knight will have something to offer you. If you’re at all curious, buy it. Buy it now.

Words cannot describe what an incredibly moving experience this game was. Without any use of traditional narrative or a sliver of dialogue, it still manages strike you down to your emotional core and provoke feelings that you may not have even experienced before.

Artistically gorgeous game anchored by an incredible soundtrack. Even without an active threat, you can't help but feel compelled to overcome any obstacle that gets in your way so you can be free of whatever it is that anchors your character down. Even the 'bosses' are merely symbolic challenges, nigh-cutsenes that help you navigate to safety as you flee from the monster that is your own grief.

Haven't been moved by a game like this in a long, long time. 100% recommended.

If you're looking for a way to sink hundreds of hours into your life relaxing and unwinding, I can't think of a better way to do it. Sure, it hits you with the occasional feels, but continuing down the storylines will always lead you to a better place.

It's basically Uncle Iroh as a video game.

An honest-to-goodness heir to the old Roller Coaster Tycoon games that took everything you love about the old games, added a plethora of new features, and then made it complete stable on modern systems. The feature I've enjoyed the most are the nigh-completely customizable architecture. You want a multi-level, Victorian-themed food court? Sure, build it. A coaster that weaves in and out of a Medieval castle? Have at it. It's insane how many themes you can work around and how many ways you can make fresh, unique constructs.

Other features that are a-okay in my book are the supply management and staff training aspects of the game. They've been worked into the formula without being made draconian, which is such a relief given new features in these games can often go too hard to soon.

The campaign mode is a good time throughout. There's a lot of scenarios that are obvious homages to the original RCT, but I don't mind that at all. It was a great template, so why not update and modernize it for the modern world? If nothing else, I'll never have to sit and watch my park for a year for a scenario to wrap up again, and that alone is worth it. That every completed scenario becomes available as a sandbox mode once you're done? The cherry on top.

Must by for fans of RCT and the genre in general.

This game has stolen my life and I want it back.

EU4 is an incredibly deep, super-complex, pausible real-time grand strategy game set in the dawn of the modern era. You pick a nation (from HUDNREDS) in the year 1444 and try to guide it through centuries of conquest and survival to the year 1821. The simplicity of the objective - to blob or be blobbed - is turned on its head when you realize that you can manage just about EVERYTHING in your nation economically and militarily. You will learn to love the 6/6/6 and hate the 0/0/0 and loathe the very existence of hunting. It takes a solid 100 hours just to get used to all of the mechanics and another 1000 before you realize just how much you can bend and break before your county collapses.

That said - and trust me on this - the game is not playable on the current patch without, at a minimum, 2 of the DLC's (Common Sense & Art of War). It's incredibly frustrating that essential aspects to this game's enjoyability are dug underneath a paywall and I would wholly recommend buying a bundle during a BIG sale for the sake of your wallet.

That said, this game is amazing when Paradox isn't shooting itself in the foot and months of your life will melt away to finding new ways to destory the big blue blob.

Cave Story never stops being a gem - you can argue this for many different reasons. I mean, sure the soundtrack is amazing and the gameplay is genius in its seemingly simplistic nature. If this game just had that going for it, it'd simply be a good game.

Then you dig deeper into the game and start to find the minutae of it's genius. Its indie charm resonates even deeper when you realize that this game (arguably) began the indie craze. It's constructed, top-to-bottom, by a single individual over many years of hard work and dedication. How Pixel found the time to create a surprisingly deep, and shocking, narrative is another matter entirely.

This game is impressive in every way a game can be. I'll never stop enjoying it no matter how many times I play it, and completely recommend you give it a whirl.

A fantastic little puzzle game. Think of Minesweeper - got it? Okay, now take away the blind clicking at the start, add several dimensions, then throw in a lot of variation in the execution. Four hours to perfect the game and it felt very rewarding to do so. If that's not why I play games, then I'm just not sure what I'm doing here.

Also - special mention to the music. Sooooo soothing.