Here, you'll find up to 20 of the most recent posts from the people I follow. Only public results gleaned from the last 200 overall posts to HG Blogs will be displayed. If you see no results below, that means I'm not following a lot of people, or the people I'm following haven't been active in a long while, or they simply aren't sharing their posts.
 | The $80 price tag for premium games on the shiny new hardware does not have folks feeling delighted. |
Nintendo today revealed a lot of the most pertinent details about its upcoming Nintendo Switch 2 console and a few launch games. One thing it didn’t touch on was the price for the hardware and its first games, which launch on June 5. However, respected game influencer Geoff Keighley quickly tweeted on X to let fans know they should expect to pay $449 for the hardware itself, and $80 for digital games. That sounds like a lot, especially for the games, but shouldn’t we have seen this coming?
 | A test of failing memory more than a discussion of video games. |
Alone in the Dark.
I wrote this series off after Illumination. I said so in my review of that game. There's no coming back from this, I said. But it did come back. Here's the twist ending: I'm glad it did. This is a good game. No one saw that coming.
Batman: Arkham Knight
Knight is probably my least preferred Arkham game. It invests harder in being a sandbox and loses a lot in the process. There's no grand boss fights, for example, but it does surprise in other ways. Gradually filling up the jail with random thugs and defeated super villains is really satisfying.
BROK The InvestaGATOR:
Little known fact - I love a good pun. This is a game about a P.I. alligator, taking on small sleuthing jobs in a point and click that also is a side scrolling brawler.
Deep Fear
| Talk about setting a DEAD-line.... |
It's fair to say I've not been the conveyor belt of reviews that I was once upon a time, but I always kind of made an effort for dropping a horror review on Halloween. And this year is no different; that was 100% my plan. The only issue is the seemingly perfect game I picked up to write about is a cringy bowl of arse, and I don't want to play it anymore (which is a statement of itself when I limped through Heavy Rain one year). So, to try and salvage something, I'll present a list of the applicable horror games I've played in recent memory enough below. Instead of voting - because maybe two people will read this in the first place - whoever gives the best reason for covering one of these games will make it my choice. Feel to also say nothing, and I'll carry on playing through the Lucas
| Some people feel differently about Zelda than I do. They are wrong and I am right. |
I have no way of knowing what the person next to me is thinking, and I can’t possibly hope to know every thought and preference of a stranger I meet online. Even my own tastes and preferences change over time. With that said, I’m pretty sure I’ve never met someone who played and really liked the original Zelda games but thinks that The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom “isn’t a real Zelda game.”
Please don’t roll your eyes!
| Part 1 - Let's see how long I keep this up. |
Star Wars Unleashed.
Force powers are ridiculous overkill, which makes up for the bland lightsaber combat in spades. Lot of imagination in the alien worlds and set pieces, worlds apart for the dull mess modern Star Wars has become.
Kuon.
Just the 20 years post-release. Kuon is clumsy mechanically, but is an aesthetically excellent horror. It's subtle and clever in how it creeps you out. As an experience, it's great. As a game, it's bumpy.
Dreamweb.
Dreamweb's gameplay never quite reaches the potential it sets up for itself. A regular guy starts hearing voices that he has to kill seven evil people to save the world. Is he a savior for doing so, or just a psychopath? DW plays around the edges of the concept, but never truly commits.
Helltown
| I'll go ahead and assume I won't need to do one of these again this year. |
For the most part, my gaming habits is simply to attack the backlog I've accumulated over years, no longer buying games I think I'll get around to and focusing on actually playing those games in the past I'll assume I'll get around to. I've tried to write about them a little because I want to try and find a way where I can still write a bit in enough moderation to not be in constant pain. 2010 Gary would call me a pussy. I may do this more next year, I may do this less. I don't know what the future holds. However, what I do have is three lists talking about the games I've played this year and, to test if anyone still reads the things I write, I propose this. The first person to post a game they would like to see me review in these lists, I will attempt to do so. First come, first se
| The always inferior sequel |
BERSERK and the Band of the Hawk
It's fine for what it is. Most of the time, the Warriors template works because Guts mowing down endless cannon-fodder fits, but it's such a toned-down retell of the forever manga.
Griffith remains an encourageable rascal.
Forspoken
Never -- NEVER -- has my pathological need to play famously shit games burnt me as hard as this did. Its reputation, dear friends, is richly deserved.
I Made a Game With Zombies In It
Those glorious bastards; they released this cornerstone of the excellent XBLI scene on Steam and have done it for free. Finding this carving a new playerbase has made me very happy.
Lost Door
| I've declared war on my backlog again this year. The graveyard is as follows: |
11th Hour
7th Guest was a better realised haunted mansion game, but 11th Hour is more self aware. Better written, better acted and (occasionally) purposefully funny.
Not a particularly good port.
7th Guest
The B-Movie horror point and click game. Weird live action actors and bizarre puzzles made this a game I adored back when it was released, but the steam ‘remastered’ is not great. It’s just a port of the mobile port. Why does this keep happening?
Batman Arkham Origins
Last Xmas seemed like a good time to play the Xmas Batman. It might be the black sheep of the Arkhams but it's still a lot of fun with some stand out ideas. The crime scene examinations, for example, are great.
Batman: Arkham Origins - Cold, Cold Heart
| A funny thing happens when you buy almost no video games for a few years... |
I like video games, but I've not done a great job lately of buying the ones I want. Going back several years, I've told myself, "I'll get that eventually," and then I haven't. The trend kicked in hard in August of 2020, when I made a conscious effort to focus more on writing my fiction, but the neglect had already started ahead of that.
Anyway, I've now fallen WAY behind. So I decided to make a new wish list, which I'd not done in a long while, and I limited myself to 52 titles (one for each week in a year) that I'm most irritated about not yet acquiring. Here it is:
Atelier Ryza 3: Alchemist of the End & the Secret Key (Switch)
Atelier Sophie 2: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Dream (Switch)
Bayonetta 3 (Switch)
Blue Reflection: Second Light (PS4)
Bravely Default II (Switch)
| I have so many games in my library at this point that it feels like a total waste to not play them at least occasionally. Yesterday, I did! |
Ever have one of those random days where you just feel like playing old video games? I have them periodically, but usually I don’t act on the impulse because I have other things on my agenda. Yesterday, I ignored my other agenda and got down to some gaming. I thought maybe I would play and review a game, but none of yesterday’s sessions reached the point where a review is imminent. So instead, I’ll talk about them here.
First up, I had been wanting to finally play the first Shantae game for a long while. I’d purchased every game in the series (and even backed one of them thanks to a Kickstarter campaign) when my finances were in a better place. The series is so clearly up my alley, and yesterday was my moment to finally dip my toes in that water. I… wish it had gone better.
| I just thought I'd give you all my take on the impending 3DS/Wii U eShop closure, since no one asked... |
Over the years, I have made very clear my passion for Nintendo games. The NES didn’t introduce me to the medium, but it came close. Mario Bros. was the first game to truly capture my imagination and make me the gamer I am today, before I had even heard of Nintendo. My obsession with the media has expanded to include games on all sorts of consoles, from Sega and Microsoft and Sony, but I always pay slightly closer attention to the big ‘N.’ Which is why it always bugs me when I find myself at a virtual precipice, looking over a kingdom’s worth of games that are about to disappear from the marketplace in one huge event.
| I've just published the first entry in a new series that I think some of you might like. |
I don't post often here about my fiction because I'm mostly here to talk about video games, but sometimes I make an exception. Today is one of those days, as I've just released the first book in a new urban fantasy series for which I have high hopes.
Death and the Shifter introduces Molly Coyle, a young private investigator working in Salem, Oregon who recently died but now has been revived as a reaper who works for Azrael, an angel of death. Alongside her trusty talking feline companion, Fuzzy, she must hunt down and execute various deserving targets. Her first potential victim is a wolf shifter. But as you might expect, things don't exactly go as planned.
| Containing 50% more games you've actually heard of |
In 2020, I decided I was going to stop buying new games and declare war on the backlog. Much like the majority of gamers, I own more games than I can ever play in a lifetime but countless games I want to play get shuffled further and further to the back while the endless stream of new stuff gets stacked on top of them. It was a success! Aside from cashing in steam vouchers over Christmas that I had received as a gift, I purchased exactly zero new games, and the backlog was sufficiently injured. Any current year games I played were at the behest of constant backlog enemy Jason Venter, who even now is plotting ways to trick me into playing more visual novels. THE GOAL: Do the same thing in 2021. Block Venter. Profit.
| So many horror games. So little time. |
The post Halloween update means there’s a lot more activity than other updates because gotta play all the horror games and fill out the month. It’s also been the breaking of an unwritten rule to try and not have more than one main game in progress at once, so I have to actually finish the bloody things so I can move on to the next. I started playing a few horror-y games that I could have rushed through and got a review out to, but it turned out I didn;t need them, mso I pumped the brakes on them. I’ll talk about them anyway
| To the surprise of no one, I play some pretentious video games. |
To the surprise of no one, I play some pretentious video games.
Hellblade is something I’ve been meaning to play for a long, long time now. It’s living up to my expectations thus far; the game is purposefully designed to stress the player out at almost all times. Deconstruct it as a video game, and it’s a corridor of uninteresting puzzles and lacklustre combat burdened by enemies who take too long to kill. But as a complete package, it’s fascinating. The most anti-fun I’ve had with a game since Spec Ops.
| My first new book in a very long time is available on Amazon, and you may not even have to pay to read it. |
This is a video game site, so I try not to post often about personal things unrelated, even though this is my blog. However, this is one of those times when I'm going to make an exception because how could I not?
As this post's title notes, I've published another book. The last time I did that was in the year 2000, when this site was much smaller and (as far as I can recall) I didn't know any of you who are likely to read this post today. A lot can change in over 20 years.
| JRPGing like it's 1999 |
In 2020, I decided I was going to stop buying new games and declare war on the backlog. Much like the majority of gamers, I own more games than I can ever play in a lifetime but countless games I want to play get shuffled further and further to the back while the endless stream of new stuff gets stacked on top of them. It was a success! Aside from cashing in steam vouchers over Christmas that I had received as a gift, I purchased exactly zero new games, and the backlog was sufficiently injured. Any current year games I played were at the behest of constant backlog enemy Jason Venter, who even now is plotting ways to trick me into playing more visual novels. THE GOAL: Do the same thing in 2021. Block Venter. Profit.
| Containing 50% more games you've actually heard of |
In 2020, I decided I was going to stop buying new games and declare war on the backlog. Much like the majority of gamers, I own more games than I can ever play in a lifetime but countless games I want to play get shuffled further and further to the back while the endless stream of new stuff gets stacked on top of them. It was a success! Aside from cashing in steam vouchers over Christmas that I had received as a gift, I purchased exactly zero new games, and the backlog was sufficiently injured. Any current year games I played were at the behest of constant backlog enemy, Jason Venter, who even now is plotting ways to trick me into playing more visual novels. THE GOAL: Do the same thing in 2021. Block Venter. Profit.
| I'm selling off most of my physical library of PS4 games, many of them unopened, and that starts... NOW! |
Recently, I moved from one apartment to another and the process made me realize I have way too much... stuff. A lot of that stuff, admittedly, is games. And I do like games. I like owning a lot of them physically, even. But I've realized I need to be more selective about what I buy and keep, and I've accepted that a lot of the great games in my collection would give greater joy to other collectors while I shuffle priorities. So I purchased a lot of digital versions of games I own, and I went a little nuts and now I need to sell some stuff in a hurry.
| Wherein I play a mainstream game! Released in 2010 |
8Doors: Arum's Afterlife Adventure Had a slight hiccup with this one; my save file seemed to get corrupted and I lost about 2-3 hours of progress. It’s one of those Metroidvania things, so the good news is, now I know where I'm going, I managed to catch back up pretty quick. It has you going through purgatory, based on Korean folktales. Also, a frog with a cowboy hat sits on your head and offers bad advice. Very good stuff so far.
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