@Ralizah Awesome collective piece! And on a topic overlooked by many, I'm sure. Exactly as you say, my partner downloaded Tetris 99 for about a week. I played a match and crashed out with the first twenty-odd players, despite having a healthy history with Tetris and its ilk (my university days were packed with Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo tournaments and Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine, and straightforward Tetris is the only game my Dad truly enjoys, so I've played plenty of it with him over the years, from the original GameBoy all the way through to whichever incarnation was on the Wii). I think its success as a battle royale game proves the versatility and universal appeal of the gameplay, which remains utterly genius; people always wanna play Tetris, no matter what. I watched the video you embedded and, despite it just being yet another game of Tetris, found myself edging forward and grinning like an idiot.
That whole 35th Anniversary celebration for Mario was peak Nintendo weirdness. I'm pleased to see you say that the battle royale concept didn't work well in something which has subsequently ceased to exist, as it means its absence is no great loss to gaming, but it does make me curious to know how much revenue was generated by such "weaponised FOMO" (awesome turn of phrase). I hope it wasn't a lot, otherwise they'll just do the same for future anniversaries.
Pac Man 99 feels like the most bandwagon-y of the three to me. Despite your detailed breakdown and overall praise of its numerous gameplay tweaks to fit the battle royale mould, I'm left scratching my head and thinking "Yeah, but who asked for this?" which, at least, is a question you hinted at having asked yourself before playing a few matches (but then I'll admit, I never really got Pac Man anyway, so I merely recognise his brand power from afar). I'm sure it won't do the same numbers as Tetris but, given the strange state of Nintendo's online service anyway, it'll likely be successful enough regardless, which means there'll at least be hope for that Galaga 99 game someday!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@Foxy-Goddess-Scotchy My thanks, Foxy! As always, I'd encourage folks to make up their own minds about the games, and there are many out there who continue to praise ME2 as one of the all-time greats, so you may find that you completely disagree with my conclusions as / when you come to play the trilogy for yourself. I'd still highly recommend ME2 to anybody who's curious, just not as a standalone game. It only works as the middle of an epic story, even with the amazing DLC folded in.
I'm not as familiar with the history of BioWare as I am with other developers, since I was a latecomer to both Mass Effect and Dragon Age. I always get the dates mixed up (and it doesn't help that DA: Origins feels even more simplistic and regressive than ME1, making me think it got made a couple years before Commander Shepard started out, not a couple years after). Spinning so many plates can't have helped either project, mind. It's amazing they turned out as well as they did, considering!
Anyway, thanks for your kind feedback, on both my writing and my screencaps!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@Th3solution "Bound" is so under-the-radar that I somehow even missed your review of it when it was posted. My bad.
I just looked up the trailer for it, and, yeah, it really does look like Journey with a girl doing ballet through it! Your thoughts on the gameplay kind of echo my issue with Journey in general: it was pretty, but shallow, and felt more like an art piece than a game. I think that's probably an issue I'd have with most of these art-house Playstation indie platformers. Although it's nice to hear that the developer tried to incorporate some replayability into it.
It sounds, at least, like Bound succeeded in engaging you with what narrative there was.
Good contribution, as always! And I really like seeing people talk about some of these less-known games. I'd likely have never heard of this either if I hadn't seen your review.
@RogerRoger Thanks! Yeah, the genius of Tetris is how its gameplay can be recontextualized pretty dramatically without feeling forced, and how its minimalist, and almost abstract, presentation allows for different developers to add their own unique flavor to it. Despite being based on the same game, titles like Tetris 99 and Tetris Effect couldn't possibly feel more different. And while I'm not an amazing player, the basics of the game have always jived with me in a way many other puzzle games haven't (I've never been able to get beyond the first two levels of Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine; I did, in fact, muscle my way through the Puyo Puyo stages in Puyo Puyo Tetris after forcing myself to sit down and learn the basics of the game, but something about the gameplay has just never clicked with my brain!)
SMB 35's delisting is indeed, IMO, no great loss for future generations, and it's only interesting insofar as it'll forever be that "one weird battle royale version of NES Mario that Nintendo made disappear forever after six months!" That's kinda reflected in the screenshots. I didn't screenshot the results screen to gloat: it was literally the only snap I bothered taking of the game at all. I'd be a little sad about SMB 35 disappearing if its existence and gameplay wasn't already heavily documented on Youtube. It'll be a MUCH sadder day for me when my PS4 hard drive eventually fails and I'm never able to play P.T. again, IMO.
The Pac-Man game is absolutely bandwagon-y, and it probably shouldn't work as well as it does. Tetris 99 feels like a genuine evolution of the Tetris formula, whereas Pac-Man 99... yeah, even trying to describe it was kinda rough, because a lot of the gameplay mechanics sound very strange and random, with trains of sleeping ghosts and all that. I actually was pretty down on it when it first came out, but the more I learned about how much the new gameplay mechanics alter the flow of the experience, the more I came to accept that, as stupid an idea as it was, they somehow made Pac-Man 99 work out. Now I'm just kinda hoping they keep coming out with these absurd battle royale versions of old NES games. They beat the increasingly pitiful ROM dumps of random NES/SNES games every six months or so when Nintendo remembers they're supposed to be updating the classic console apps.
The games in my next two pieces are also going to be somewhat non-traditional as well.
As always, I appreciate you taking the time to read and respond!
It’s been a while since I’ve been in this thread as I struggle to keep up with it while flitting on the site on my phone but had to check in after @RogerRoger warned me of his impending ME2 review.
@Ralizah Ah, that's interesting that you never clicked with Puyo Puyo. Perhaps my supremely average skill level across the entire diverse range of stacking games is because my head just lumps them all together, despite their individual nuances; I end up pushing the same buttons in the same order and sorta waiting to luck out. I have no doubt you'd clean my clock in some Tetris multiplayer (not least because I haven't got a clue what a T-spin actually is).
That speaks volumes, that you only captured one screenshot of a limited-time game for preservation and posterity. And you're right, huge thanks to YouTube for ensuring that nothing disappears forever! I suppose there's a visceral immediacy to playing horror games but, even so, you could still watch P.T. or play one of its many spiritual successors, should that fateful day ever arrive.
As much as I'm not really a retro gamer (in the classic sense of the definition; am pretty sure the PSone is considered pretty retro nowadays), I hope that these rejigged battle royale versions of older games aren't in lieu of proper, playable re-releases. Honestly, if I ever got curious about Pac Man, I'd hate for my only option to be some stressful competitive version in which I routinely get my backside handed to me by pro gamers in the first thirty seconds. I'm sure that isn't the case, but it could be the direction things are headed, should these trends continue.
Here's to your next reviews; sounds like they'll prove quite interesting!
@Thrillho Didn't know you were such a big ME2 fan, Chris Jericho!
@RogerRoger Nah, none of these games are in any danger of disappearing. Tetris is basically video game cancer and will multiply indefinitely until the end of time. Pac-Man less so, but the original is always in some sort of retro collection, and then there's usually a number of weird spinoffs that release every once in a while.
T-spinning is when you fit the T-shape tetrimino into places it shouldn't otherwise be able to go by rotating it in tight spaces. In Tetris games with a focus on scoring, it's usually worth doing because the games like to reward players for pulling it off, but it has always felt like a bit of a worthless flex to me. Although, in the hands of a master, it's just another tool in the box, so to speak, and can be used to clear multiple lines at once.
But yeah, any sort of combo preparation in Puyo Puyo basically breaks my brain. Something about it just deeply confuses me. Although I've gone from being almost totally incompetent at it to being able to set up basic combos after playing Puyo Puyo Tetris. Which, I found, is forgiving, because when I booted up the Game Gear version of Mean Bean Machine afterward, I still got stomped. Oh well!
Yeah, I think PSOne is retro gaming at this point. 80% of what I play is fairly modern, but there are some older games I love returning to from time to time. Tetris, Pac-Man, Galaga, and Arkanoid basically never get old.
Actually, I can't believe I hadn't thought of that! Battle royale Arkanoid/Breakout! I'd play that so much it'd be disgusting.
@RogerRoger A lot of what you said about the context of the game was interesting and I am curious to see whether I still feel the same about it now.
I’ve always been slightly reluctant to replay Witcher 3 for fear that it doesn’t play as well as I remember (well, that and the incredibly long play time).
@Ralizah That's true. People joke about DOOM and Skyrim being on everything, but Tetris has them beat by quite a few extra generations.
Oh, that's what T-spinning is? I always thought that was just cheating!
Most of my combos in Mean Bean Machine were happy accidents, for sure. I can usually engineer a three, sometimes a four if I'm lucky, but otherwise my greatest moments were not by design. It's where I started to fall apart in Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo multiplayer, because I wasn't playing against a computer, but rather a smarter human who got tactical.
Here's hoping Nintendo are reading this, and add Arkanoid to the ongoing list!
***
@Thrillho In all seriousness, I really hope your fond memories of ME2 hold up when you get around to it, and that you're not reminded of my downbeat thoughts whilst playing. I'd hate to have inadvertently impacted (or flat-out ruined) an experience for somebody.
And yeah, it's annoying when such long games are so good, isn't it? There aren't enough hours!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
Played via the new Mass Effect: Legendary Edition release.
Platform: PC, PS4 (version played) and XboxONE Release Date: March 2012 (original game) / May 2021 (remaster)
***
We all love a good ending.
The best have an undeniable weight to them, a permeating atmosphere of anticipation or dread which heralds the finality of whatever you're reading, watching or playing. Think about the final season of a long-running television show, or the final crossover movie in a cinematic universe; whatever's actually being said or done, whether it's a comedy or a drama, there's a melancholy undercurrent flowing through every scene. Actors catch one another's eye and share a silent realisation that they might never share a stage again. In many ways, you're watching a family break apart.
BioWare always knew that Mass Effect 3 (shortened to ME3 in the coming paragraphs) was going to be an emotional experience, irrespective of its concluding status. It's a game which pays all the debts of its predecessors; it revisits and wraps up every loose narrative thread but, most importantly, does so whilst being a relentlessly bleak portrayal of total war. The apocalyptic Reapers, threatened for two long games, arrive in the first five minutes. They force our Commander Shepard to beat a hasty retreat from a broken, burning Earth, and provide a constant backdrop of death and destruction on every other major planet you'll subsequently visit during your quest to defeat them. No matter your choices, whether you're Paragon or Renegade (or a blend of both), your situation will become increasingly desperate. At one point or another, you're going to lose something... or someone.
This is a game constructed entirely of consequences, of your consequences, carried forward from your previous save files and thrown at your feet for a final, fifty-hour judgement.
What's In a Nameplate: Some of these will have been tragic losses, others will have been calculated verdicts, but you'll still get reminded of them anyway.
Ironically enough, ME3 makes you face up to your choices by rationing them. One of my criticisms of the previous two games was the sense that a lot of the supposedly personal input was merely an illusion, and that dialogue trees might boast ten branches, but they all came from the same trunk and pointed at the same sky. I'd rather watch a scripted story unfold, taking control when it's necessary instead of when it's a gimmick, and it would appear that ME3 agrees with me. A lot of its cutscenes play out without direction, instead using the context of my Shepard's history to have him say what he was always gonna say, whether I had to push buttons or not. You get to decide on the major beats, on the tonal turning points, and then you sit back and watch things unfold. There are no more frustrating failed attempts to change a conversation's course and, with so little time left on my character's clock, I welcomed this newfound balance. I think it's the smartest approach to the technological realities of choice-based gaming.
ME3 saves asking your opinion for when it really matters. There are some gut-wrenching decisions to be made here, evenly spaced throughout the game's runtime. You hold the fate of individual characters, whole planets and entire species in your hands, in moments which, again, finally deliver on the whispered promises of your previous adventures. You're no longer listening to history lessons about the krogan genophage, or comforting a quarian admiral's guilt about the geth; you're shaping the future of these issues, a future you're then asked to go and fight for.
Every so often, the game sends you on a mission which feels like a finale. Whether it's thanks to an immense sense of scale, or whether it's because of certain emotional resonance, the spectacle and sorrow is never held back, nor is it saved exclusively for a traditional last boss and epilogue, like in so many other games. There was a heroic sacrifice made by a beloved character at the end of the story's first act and then, after dodging them in a couple of places, I finally went toe-to-toe with a skyscraper-sized Reaper roughly two-thirds of the way through the core game's unfolding events.
Giant Enemy Crab: I will give no prizes for guessing where this thing's weak point is, which you obviously have to hit for massive damage.
And suddenly, the penny drops. Forget every controversy you've ever heard about the last twenty minutes of the game, about the fact that ME3 has a "bad" ending. It's not possible for ME3 to have a bad ending, because the entirety of ME3is the ending. If you want to condemn the conclusion of the original Mass Effect trilogy, you have to condemn all of it... and, as far as I'm concerned, I'd only expect such widespread dissatisfaction from the most bitter of Twitter jockeys.
It's worth noting, however, that I'm saying all this as somebody who never experienced the game's original cut which was, by all accounts, somewhat abrupt (it would later be expanded by a patch which, along with the rest of the game's DLC, is included by default in the Legendary Edition). Even so, I do like where BioWare take the closing sequence. It breaks your immersion in the fiction somewhat, but it manages to make a brave comment about the illusion of choice, as well as become a risky reinforcement of the attachments you've spent three games forging. It never fails to trigger a period of self-reflection, either; whenever I've seen it through before, it's ended up tugging at my conscience for days, and this time has been no different. But still, broadly speaking, it's a mere epilogue to everything that's come before, and that's what should matter.
I could spend the rest of this review discussing such cerebral ramifications but hey, c'mon, ME3 is ultimately still a videogame, and an action-packed one at that. It's here where I could start to get negative, especially in light of my previous reviews because, in terms of gameplay, ME3 is a third-person shooter, plain and simple. There's no vehicular mayhem to speak of, no boldly going to strange new worlds, just a heck of a lot of waist-high cover keeping spare ammo in its shade. If this is what I eviscerated the last game for, surely I should take ME3 to task as well, right?
Wrong. This time around, the combat has come good, in more ways than one.
Free Hugs: Anybody stopped to wonder whether this is just an alien's way of showing affection, and that maybe we shouldn't shoot them so much?
For the most part, ME2 felt like it stumbled into being a shooter. It was afraid to fully commit to its genre; the mechanics felt half-hearted, and therefore kept the action basic (and boring). ME3 has no such fear, and sets out to be a good third-person shooter, rather than just a playable one. Controls are responsive, allowing for silky-smooth traversal with tons of minor refinements. We now have contextual cover manoeuvres, a dodge roll, and two types of melee attack to employ, the heaviest of which turns the series' trademark wrist-mounted omnitool into a glowing blade. In most other games from the era, such stuff would've come as standard, so raving about it here feels kinda weird, but it demonstrates how much was lacking before.
There's also a better intermix of RPG elements, finding a comfortable compromise between the hardcore inventory-shuffling and customisation from the first game, and the bare-bones generalised resource upgrades from the second. Weapons have five tiers and two modification slots, but they also have weight limits. Trying to carry one of everything into combat becomes a cumbersome affair, with Shepard's speed and ability recharge rates severely hampered if you get greedy... oh, and speaking of abilities, they're once again consigned to some standard progression meters to begin with, but then open up into binary choices over whether to improve specific aspects of them. Again, it's the best of both worlds; simple on the surface to start with, but offering some say in how to evolve your preferred skillset down the line.
The most generous mercy is the complete eradication of the mind-numbing, pace-killing hacking minigames from the game's code; they're nowhere to be found. You do have to scan some planets, but it's been made a singular affair, signposted for your optional convenience. And whilst I did say that there aren't any vehicles to pilot, you can hijack an occasional giant mech suit and stomp around some levels in a satisfying bit of power fantasy fulfilment. Particularly when coupled with much more downtime between firefights, and set amidst some truly stunning environmental design, the game's action feels earned, and rarely outstays its welcome.
By the Goddess: At least the new Photo Mode helps to preserve such locations for posterity, minutes before a Reaper indiscriminately blows it all up.
I included a quantifier in that last sentence above the screenshot because there is one sizeable chunk of ME3 gameplay which falls flat, and criminally comes across like a leftover chunk of ME2 reheated and inserted into the wrong game. It's the "Omega" DLC, in which Shepard decides to press pause on intergalactic extinction (?!) in order to help a mafiosa steal back her nightclub. It's a bizarrely inconsequential sojourn which peppers very little plot in between its might-as-well-be-endless shooting galleries, none of which boast any visual diversity to write home about. Worst of all, it locks you into finishing the whole thing once you're underway, and drags on for hours. There's just no good point to stick it.
At least, regardless of personal taste, the other DLC packs have the decency to break up their content into individual missions, allowing for freedom of approach. "Leviathan" has you bouncing back to an abandoned laboratory, piecing together clues to track down some missing scientists scattered across the galaxy, and can be intriguing and creepy in equal measure. Meanwhile, the "Citadel" DLC is... well, there's no other word for it. It's perfect. Seeming to offer up a slice of self-aware nonsense that frequently slips into parody, it subtly shifts gears until, before you can even realise what's happening, your heartstrings are being pulled like a set of church bells. Save it for last, because it's unquestionably the best.
And crucially, it highlights the bond you'll have likely developed with an extended cast of characters during your many, many hours since the start of the whole saga. You'll have gotten to know some better than others, and there are even more newcomers being added in this final chapter, but, as I mentioned earlier, nothing gets left behind. Everybody and everything gets a resolution. The sheer complexity of ME3 is daunting to try and comprehend, considering how many major and minor impacts you might've made to its construction, and how certain story events still had to proceed, with or without certain people present. Seeing it all masterfully condensed into the "Citadel" DLC's final surprise isn't just a treat for us players, it's a victory lap for BioWare, and a well-earned one at that.
Plus, they finally gave me a romance option. Two of them, actually, but one is one of those aforementioned newcomers and, whilst sweet and genuinely well-written for 2012, he doesn't pack the same emotional punch as my trilogy-spanning preference.
I Ship Shep's Shipmate: I'm often amazed by how I think "yeah, this stuff is just window-dressing that doesn't matter" when I can't access it, and then obsess over it when I can.
I'm sorry if I haven't written enough about the gameplay, or if I rushed through it when I did. Looking back over that section, it scans kinda generic. I know why. ME3 has always been the last note of a full trilogy playthrough for me, never a standalone game, and, as such, it always hollows me out. Not just once it's done, but in the last couple of days before I see the credits roll, as well. It's like saying goodbye to a close friend; you know you'll see them again someday, but it takes a while for that realisation to overcome the immediate pang of loss. I'm really gonna miss my Shepard, and I really do love his crew.
Because of that connection, I tend not to think of ME3 as a game. Oh sure, I could try to bend or break its choices, or approach its combat with a different class of specialisation, but I never do. I once stopped a FemShep Renegade run of all three games after ME2, partly because of burnout but also because I couldn't bear the thought of seeing an ending other than mine. This may seem like an odd thing to admit about a series which, as I've noted before, trades on the mere illusion of choice, but such shortcomings don't seem to matter as much during ME3... at least, not to me. Maybe it's because BioWare finally got the balance right, or maybe it's just Stockholm Syndrome taking (mass) effect after well over a hundred hours spent with these characters, fighting for their fictional futures.
Given its war-torn subject matter, ME3 can be maudlin, morose, melancholy and any other M word that means roughly the same thing... but it can also be uplifting, hilarious, victorious and hopeful, as well as plenty exciting, as all action games should be. It can be cheesy at times, hammy at others, and barely original to boot, but it doesn't matter. It knows what it's doing. It's the final season of the show. The knowing glances between the characters have all been programmed in. The voice actors, each presumably recorded in isolation, fake a few cracks when delivering certain lines. It's the big goodbye.
And when wielding such emotional power... heck, it doesn't even have to be any good.
Because it sure is special.
Mass Effect 3 = 10/10
***
Now y'see, this is why I don't usually score things.
When scrutinised with dispassionate analysis, ME3 is a solid eight. The "Omega" DLC should knock off a point, and its resolute decision to stick with walking, talking and shooting does make some of its smaller moments feel samey... but no, I just can't. It means too much to me. I can't score it anything lower than a ten. In my view, the goodwill engendered by the legacy it carries, and continues to shape right up 'til the end, could paper over the Grand Canyon, let alone any other size of crack.
If you haven't played the Mass Effect trilogy yet, please be warned. These are nothing more than my personal opinions. Your actual mileage may, and almost certainly will, vary.
But if you're easily engrossed by such things... well, that's another sort of warning entirely.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@RogerRoger I'm glad they finally added proper same-sex romance support in this one. Even if it really is just window-dressing, that's also an important aspect of art. And life, really. Take a room, remove all sense of decoration and customization from it, and you have a perfectly functional area of internal space that nevertheless has something of a prison cell quality to it.
You really seem like you love this game to death! It's good to hear about the better balance of RPG aspects, and the way it makes choices more meaningful by restricting them to important story moments. And yeah, if the game must be a cover shooter, it's better to be as good a cover shooter as it can be.
Well-written as always. The enthusiasm is infectious, for sure.
Considering how dependent this experience apparently is on previous games in the series, it really makes it all the weirder (bit of a historical digression here) that EA chose to release ME3 by itself on the Wii U around that console's launch, instead of the entire trilogy.
One thing you should know about me is that I’ve been an Xbox gamer for most of my life. I’ve missed out on many creative and fun experiences on Playstation consoles like PaRappa the Rapper, Spyro the Dragon, inFAMOUS, Ratchet and Clank and Jak & Daxter. That all changed recently when I got my PS5 as none of the series X exclusives interested me all that much. I got Sackboy, Bugsnax, Astro’s Playroom and Spider-Man: Miles Morales. The latter of which included a code for a remastered version of a game I’ve wanted to play for a while now, Spider-Man (2018). I played the game and adored every second of it. I’ve put about 40 hours into it. I have a lot of thoughts about it. So, here’s a review of my 3rd favourite game of all time, Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered.
Game: Marvel’s Spider-Man Remastered
Played on: PS5 (also on PS4) The Story
Like every piece of superhero media, this game has a story. What do you think this is? Hiking? The game has the same sharp, witty writing of any other Spider-Man story and can actually get pretty funny at times. This game stars a slightly older, more experienced Spidey. He has a job with Dr. Octavius, he takes on bigger threats in NYC, he’s getting over a break up with MJ, he evades his taxes. At the start of the game, he defeats and locks up the KingPin, AKA. Wilson Fisk. With him gone, everyone wants a shot at being the new big crime boss. This includes Martin Li, villain alias Mister Negative. Martin also helps Peter’s aunt/mother figure May run a homeless center which creates some… complications. I won’t spoil too much but at one point in the game, a pandemic grows across the city… forcing everyone to… stay at home as outside isn’t safe anymore. Ok, this is hitting way too close to home so I think I’ll move on to the gameplay. The Gameplay
This game takes place entirely in an open world New York City where you can go anywhere. There are always crimes to stop and civilians to help. One of my favourite missions is Helping Howard. In this mission, you help a homeless man find his friendly pigeons around the city. It’s just fun to swing around and all of a sudden “HOLY CRAP A PIGEON! C’MON, GRAB IT SPIDER-MAN!” Another fun mechanic is photography. Around the city, there are loads of New York landmarks to snap pictures of. While you swing, you can press a button which brings up the camera. When you zoom in to take a picture, time stops and you can angle your picture until it looks just right. Then, snap the picture and keep swinging. I’ve written an entire paragraph and I haven’t even mentioned the fantastic combat. This game has two main combat styles, silent and stealthy or loud and open. When you’re being stealthy, you have to be quiet, make distractions and perform silent takedowns. With the more open style, you’re way more hands on with the enemies. You have lots of different web types like trip wires which grab enemies and tie them up and impact webs which launch enemies. Square and Triangle are your attack buttons. Square is your button for actions like swing kicks and punches while every web related attack like web strikes and web grabs. There are also segments where you do puzzles at Octavius Enterprises where you create… things to make electronics work. I called them things because the puzzles are probably my second least favourite parts of the game. My (and many other people’s) least favourite parts are the M.J and Miles stealth missions. In these levels, you move very slowly and try to not get spotted by the enemies in the enemy base you’ve snuck into. M.J has these distraction bombs while Miles can hack things to distract people. These are super boring as they involve zero fighting. This is until later in the game where M.J can call spidey down to web people up and tie them to the ceiling.
Well, that was a long paragraph wasn’t it? Time to move onto… The Music
This game has one of my favourite theme songs in gaming history next to other bangers like “I am Astro Bot” and “Jump up! Super-star!”. While you swing, epic orchestral music plays. When you swing, it gets louder and more instruments join in. Every song on this OST is amazing now that I think about it. Seriously, the soundtrack’s on Spotify, apple music, etc. Listen to it. The other things that I couldn’t put into other paragraphs because they either weren’t long enough to fill an entire section, felt to long or I had no idea which paragraph to put them in so here they are let’s goooooo
Voice acting: This game is super well acted. Yuri Lowenthal does a stellar job in the titular role and so do all the other voice actors.
The Graphics: On PS5, this game is drop dead gorgeous. The ray traced lighting is stunning when it shines off of the NYC buildings and the reflections are amazing.
Peter’s face: I didn’t wanna touch this subject with a 50 foot web sling but it played on my mind so much that I might as well mention it. For the remastered version of the game, Insomniac decided to change Peter’s face model. Reasons? None. Angry fans? A lot. I’m about to make a lot of other marvel fans want to kill me right now but screw it. I like the face. He doesn’t look too old to the point where he’s in his 30s but isn’t so young that he looks 12. The old face looks pretty old for a character who is in his mid 20s.
Conclusion
Overall, this is a masterpiece. Easily the best marvel game ever made and my second favourite piece of marvel media (next to my favourite, Guardians of the galaxy (2014)). It plays well, it has an amazing soundtrack, it has beautiful graphics and an amazing story. Sure, there are the puzzles and M.J missions but who cares? The pros out-weigh the cons by a landslide.
Pros
-Amazing Graphics
-Banging soundtrack
-Fun Combat
-Massive, detailed world
-Great Writing
-Great Voice Acting
@Ralizah Thank you for the feedback; I'm glad I was able to successfully convey my feelings without coming across like a hyperventilating fanboy who'd lost all reasonable perspective (because that's always a danger, given that I'm not-so-secretly just a hyperventilating fanboy at heart).
I also love your prison cell analogy, because it helps contextualise my feelings towards the "romance" (term used lightly) in these sorts of games. It might just be another customisation option, same as armour colour or biotic power preference, but such things make a difference when they're designed to... well, to make that difference. And yes, when I haven't played it in a long while, the Mass Effect trilogy does become a bit of a gaming black hole for me. I wanted to take breaks, but couldn't.
Oh yeah, I forgot about the random Wii U port! Wasn't that around the console's launch, when Nintendo were desperate to convince everybody that they were a contender in the third-party space? And there was also that bespoke version of Arkham City or something? I wonder if ME3 on the Wii U received all of the DLC packs, because otherwise... well, if not, poor Wii U players!
***
@Jackpaza0508 What a way to welcome yourself to PlayStation consoles! And y'know, your reviews get better and better each time, the more you inject your personality into your writing. You've done Spidey justice here, and I couldn't agree more with your conclusions! I like how you've highlighted some of the smaller, individual components of the game that others (myself included) often overlook, like helping Howard with his pigeons; that side quest always made me smile! And yeah, even though I first played it on PS4, I actually prefer Pete's new face, as well. The original was good, but I totally get why Insomniac wanted to update it. Great screenshots to accompany a great review! Thanks for sharing!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@mookysam I've actually played a lot of the games I missed out on through stuff like the PS Plus collection! Specifically, inFAMOUS, Ratchet and Clank and PaRappa. I still have yet to play Jak and daxter, Sly Cooper and Spyro but I will get to them eventually.
@mookysam Thank you, for the generous feedback and for also agreeing with me regarding the overall direction of ME2 (this topic has been a real eye-opener on that front)! You're right, in the first game, picking the Renegade option usually resulted in some sarcastic exasperation from Shepard, so I could carefully use it to add humour in places. In the sequels, it became way more dangerous, and the list of Renegade moments I felt comfortable triggering became super-short as a result. Whilst it's cool to see we agree on so much, it makes me nervous for your forthcoming replay. I hope you still have a great time with ME2 (because hey, it's still Mass Effect, right?) and there is a lot to love in there, particularly those DLCs; have you played them before? If not, you're in for a treat and, hey, at least you won't melt your crew this time! Unless you want to, of course. They do all work for Cerberus, after all.
And you're definitely gonna love "Citadel" in ME3, I can practically guarantee it! You can drop its story mission in whenever you want, but save its final activity 'til the very end, for sure. Please do share how you get along with it, and with the whole game in general, because it sounds like you're gonna have a blast, and be able to do a lot of new things this time around. Just grin and bear "Omega" and I'm sure you'll be able to survive its charmless charms. I rushed it through in a couple hours.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@mookysam Oh yeah, for sure. A solid seven is still a great game as far as my criteria's concerned; many of my all-time favourites would get a similar score. I think you're right, I think individual people's legitimate issues get drowned out and forgotten about when the reply is always "...yeah, but it's still great, though" from everybody else. I'm sure your forthcoming replay will still be enjoyable, not least because Shepard is infinitely more controllable than N64-era Mario, trust me!
Yeah, that confrontation with Kaidan in ME2 absolutely needed some shades of grey, as did a few other major turning points, as well. It's just the reality of programming, I suppose. As much as you wish it could, the story can't go in forty-seven different directions.
Brace yourself for "Overlord" as it's a real gut-puncher. "Arrival" is less devastating. And yes, glad to see another fan of Doctor Chocolates! She's absolutely the best, I love her. Here's to your reviews!
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@RogerRoger I really enjoyed reading your much anticipated Mass Effect 3 review. I had been holding out to see what memories it brought back to me, as we discussed. And I have to say, you did a pretty good sales job there. 😄 I feel thoroughly convinced in its greatness. I especially like the notion that the last few minutes isn’t the measure with which to judge the game, rather the whole game is the ending, when the series is taken into account. That’s a good way to look at it.
And seeing the nuance between ME2 and ME3 through your eyes is an education to me. I honestly didn’t feel very big differences between the two games other than the slight tweaks in gameplay and a new story and characters. But I can see now the significance of some of those seemingly minor changes.
It’s an interesting point about the narrative logic issues and I think maybe I skirted past those things on my first (and only) play of ME2 due to the large suspension of disbelief I put into Sci-Fi as a whole. Now that I’m older and have a more critical and educated eye, I’m finding movies that I liked a few years ago don’t resonate as well with me, and I suspect ME2 will probably suffer the same fate. Not to mention playing it in a vacuum without ME1 made for easier forgiveness of the narrative dissonance. Anyways — great job with pulling out my memories for reconsideration and some good nostalgia. 😄
I also can totally relate to your sentiment of having difficulty replaying a game to make different narrative decisions which conflict with your own personal internal canon. It’s an issue I’ve struggled with on many choice based games. Once I see it through to the end, I typically have trouble seeing the story any other way.
“We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.”
@mookysam Thanks! While it's not my favorite iteration of Tetris this generation (nothing can really touch Tetris Effect, IMO), 99 really brings an interesting new approach to the table, and it does strengthen the value proposition of NSO for me. And I generally don't play f2p stuff, but it works really well in this instance, and is completely lacking in predatory monetization.
Pac-Man 99 is absolutely worth a try if you're a fan, although I think you'll be surprised by how different it feels once you grok the new mechanics. I've been jumping back and forth between OG Pac-Man and the battle royale one, and I definitely marveled at how different two games could feel despite being largely identical in terms of the actual presentation and gameplay.
@RogerRoger Eh, I appreciate genuine enthusiasm. Especially considering so many people seem to just want to be angry about stuff when talking about games. For me, hobbies are inherently meaningless and only matter insofar as they bring a sense of joy to one's life, so even if I acknowledge the bad things, I prefer to focus on the good. So your passion for the game is appreciated.
Yeah, the customization and optional stuff adds flavor to games as it does to life. I guess someone could technically create a version of Mass Effect that eliminates all of the non-essential stuff and reduces it only to what it needs to function, but would you even enjoy a game like that? I do think it'd be cool if the developers could find a way to make romance options impact the gameplay more, though. Maybe Bioware will remember how to create great games again someday.
Yeah, ME3 was part of Nintendo's "We have third party stuff too!" push on Wii U, which backfired so spectacularly that big companies spent years ignoring the Switch out of fear that nobody would buy their games again. The problem is that 90% of the people who bought the Wii U are people who are hardcore Nintendo fans and only buy first-party games, since everyone else avoided the console.
Admittedly, if EA wanted to appeal to a new demographic, porting over the last game in a story-heavy trilogy probably wasn't the way to do it, although I don't think it would have mattered much.
To answer your question, that version only came with the From Ashes and Extended Cut DLC. So, yes, I feel bad for the five people or so who decided to pick up this late, full-priced port on that ill-fated console.
@Jackpaza0508 Nice piece on Spider-Man Remastered! You must be swamped with choice having never owned a PS4. It's probably the ideal way to jump in with the PS5 at launch, though, since you're able to play a bunch of these exclusives you missed out on early in the gen while support is still somewhat sparse for next-gen content.
The game really does look nice (nice pictures). I have no opinion on the changed face, having never played the original game, although I do think this new Spidey looks a bit younger than mid-20s to me. And yeah, even having not played it, I suspect it probably is the best Marvel-related game ever made, since it's a polished AAA open worlder, and there's not a lot of competition otherwise (I guess the Marvel Ultimate Alliance games are a thing, but the recent one kinda looks like a mobile game to me; not attractive at all).
Your writing is becoming better and better, by the way!
@mookysam I completely agree, and that's why I rarely put scores on things (when I do, it's usually to try and stop my enthusiasm running away with itself... emphasis on "try" there). I love how we had completely opposite reactions to that hanar; I said it was stupid, but then purchased its documentation, in order to let it stay and preach! Gotta love a good enkindling!
And yes, you've played "Overlord" before. Make sure "Arrival" is the last thing you do!
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@Th3solution Much appreciated, buddy! And I'm glad my points came across well, particularly the one about the whole game being the ending (because it really is). When y'all are replaying the trilogy, I just hope I haven't coloured any personal impressions, favourably or otherwise. It might just be me! But it really makes a difference playing them all sequentially, and in such close proximity to one another, so approaching them in that way might end up challenging a few long-standing opinions, as well.
We all change, given time. I'm the same as you with certain movies, television shows, books and comics, as well as certain games, and I put a heck of a lot of stock in the power of nostalgia. I'm sorry to have made you doubt yours, and I really do hope you still love ME2, honest!
And yeah, whilst I do enjoy replaying old favourites, I doubt I'd ever replay a Telltale game, or Life is Strange or something. Not to make different decisions, at any rate; maybe for atmosphere, or to treat it like a linear story and make all the same judgement calls, to enjoy "my" story once again. Whenever I discuss stuff like Mass Effect and people tell me about their different choices, I swing wildly between mild discomfort and total horror... and, whilst I think it's awesome, I'm also glad to hear that it's not just me who keeps his own path on lockdown.
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@Ralizah That's a great way to look at things, thank you!
Yeah, you're basically describing Mass Effect: The Movie (which I think is a thing that's been in development hell for the better part of a decade; long may it stay there). Your wish for a romance which impacts the story reminds me of another BioWare game from around the same time, Dragon Age 2. I won't elaborate on that point in case you've never played it, but... yeah, as you say, BioWare have done a lot of truly brilliant things over the years. Here's hoping they remember how to again. With more Dragon Age and Mass Effect currently in development, my fingers are crossed.
And oh blimey, even if it was only played by five Wii U owners (wow, all five of them?) that's no way to experience ME3, not with so much content missing. I always thought Nintendo's big third-party push during that era was a hollow, headline-grabbing PR stunt, and stuff like this kinda proves it. What a disaster! Shame that its shockwaves are still being felt, although I feel like the Switch's success has started to turn things around for the better in recent years. Even if Switch versions of major games aren't technically the "best" versions, at least they're playable, and therefore an option.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
@RogerRoger It’s interesting because in some artistic arenas like video games and movies, progress has absolutely improved the media that is produced, and yet sometimes I’m amazed at how games and movies have regressed due to the reliance on technology. When I look back at some artistic media I see a larger focus on weaving good characters, good narratives, clever uses of techniques to cover up technical shortcomings, and wonderful music; while in a lot of modern media the reliance on computer generated effects and modern advanced procedures makes for shallow end products. The era of remasters we’ve gone through has really highlighted this duality. Some remakes are properly brilliant when you take a fantastic game and then spit shine it to its highest luster, whereas sometimes it exposes the fact the game was just good for its time but hasn’t aged well. In the case of Mass Effect it appears that we have some examples of both scenarios.
@Th3solution Good point, well made. It's how a PS2 game can still be enjoyable nowadays thanks to having something as intangible as a great atmosphere, even when its camera is being a pig and its textures appear smeared with Vaseline by modern standards.
And it's real interesting to see the remastering trend catch up to the seventh console generation, because that's the generation I reckon the shift you describe started to take hold; lots of games became shorter and shallower, placing a priority on technological gimmicks. Take some of those examples and whack their resolution up to 4K, and it'll just make their shortcomings even easier to spot.
I doubt we'll be saying the same about Horizon: Zero Dawn - Super Ultimate 16K Upgrade when it releases for the Nintendo Lightbulb, the Xbox Season XYZ and the PlayStation 7.
"We want different things, Crosshair. That doesn't mean that we have to be enemies."
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