Naruto: Rise of a Ninja Review

Naruto: Rise of a Ninja

Publisher: Ubisoft Developer: Ubisoft Montreal Platform: Xbox 360 Release: 2007 Players: 1-2 Genre: Adventure / 2D Fighting Rating: 7.8 \ 10.0: Satisfactory

Above is Naruto exploring the outskirts of the Hidden Leaf Village.

Licensed games are well known for typically being half-baked cash grabs, and licensed games based on anime are no different. Of course, there are occasional exceptions, and in an era where most major anime games are middling Bandai Namco-published arena fighters, I was intrigued to learn of an older title that broke the mold. Naruto is far from my favorite anime and manga franchise, but it's one that could suit various game genres and has unfortunately been limited almost exclusively to fighting games. When I discovered that Ubisoft Montreal had developed two action-adventure Naruto games, I was eager to try them.

Naruto is the story of the titular Naruto Uzumaki. When the Hidden Leaf Village was attacked by the Nine-Tailed Fox, the village leader, the Fourth Hokage, sacrificed himself to stop the beast and sealed it within the body of an infant Naruto. Twelve years later, left orphaned by the attack and feared by the villagers due to the fox stored within him, Naruto is a trouble-making ninja who craves even negative attention and dreams of one day earning respect and becoming the village Hokage. This game adapts the first 80 episodes of the anime, which are primarily dedicated to Naruto's training and his first missions with his teammates, Sakura Haruno and Sasuke Uchiha.

Rise of Ninja's gameplay is split into three distinct styles: Exploration, combat, and minigames. The main hub is the Hidden Leaf Village, which has been faithfully recreated, but condensed to prevent it from being overwhelming to explore. Here you can accept missions, purchase various upgrades, spar with Naruto's teammates and mentors, and collect the many hidden coins scattered throughout. Each story mission is set in a different area of the Land of Fire, only some of which are taken directly from the source material, and several side quests are set in each of these locations. At the start game, the majority of the villagers you encounter will shoo you away, but as you complete missions and build up your reputation, less and less of them will be repelled by your presence. Garnering the respect of the villagers and being able to navigate the area more swiftly as I progressed was a very gratifying feeling.

Both the main and side missions mainly consist of travelling to a destination, fighting several bandits and hopping between trees along the way, gathering items or racing through rings under a time limit once you arrive, and warping home. The story missions tend to have sequences of exploration in which you can gather coins to spend at the village, a small amount of clunky platforming, and conclude with a plot-related battle. Having to travel to the same places, hop across the same trees, and fight the same enemies wore thin after awhile, and although I did find these missions mostly enjoyable, I am grateful the game ended when it did, as I was fast approaching the point of boredom. There are also a variety of minigames that can be played within the village to earn more experience and money. These include delivering ramen to various customers in the village with a strict time limit on each delivery, racing around the village, and playing hide-and-seek with Naruto's mischievous sidekick Konohamaru. The latter of these games is extraordinarily easy, but the delivery and race minigames got progressively more difficult, and I was impressed with the number of meticulously designed paths that were created within the village to facilitate these activities without making the Hidden Leaf Village feel too much like an obstacle course rather than a town.

Although this game may seem accessible to those who haven't watched or read the series, its plot would be nearly incomprehensible to such people. Only key events from the first 80 episodes are depicted, and any moments that do not considerably advance the story are either skipped or only shown briefly in edited-down clips from the anime. A vital plot point that occurs during the final adapted arc is even saved for a post-credits scene.These changes are understandable, as most of this content either would be difficult to adapt into unique gameplay or would cripple the pacing by filling the game with nonstop fights. The gameplay dedicated to events that are explicitly shown in the series takes up only a couple hours, so original content has been added to make the main quest sufficiently lengthy. Unfortunately, these filler missions feel like borderline side quests, and mainly revolve around travelling to a location and dealing with some bandits or fetching items. These missions are also the only interactions that Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke have outside of a handful of story missions, which is an unfortunate missed opportunity to have interesting original content.

The combat, while far from amazing, is satisfactory enough to remain engaging for the whole duration of the game. The fights have the structure of a traditional 3D fighting game, being exclusively  one-on-one and taking place in a small arena. There is a basic list of combos that expands as you progress. These combos, in addition to dealing significant damage when executed, knock enemies down, and give you a chance to perform your Jutsu. Each playable character has three Jutsu they can use, but Naruto is the only character who is usable in the story mode, so this number can feel quite limiting. Some have immediate effects, such as disorienting your opponent or granting a temporary damage boost, but others deal damage via a brief minigame that usually involves timed button presses. Combat feels limited in the early game due to Naruto only having access to low level combos and Jutsu, but as you level up your abilities and encounter enemies who have access to Jutsu of their own, the dynamic of battle gets much more interesting. Finding the right time to use my abilities and interrupting enemies from using theirs was satisfying, and the appeal only began wearing thin for me once I was far into the game. Another notable touch is that the framerate is increased from 30 FPS to 60 during fights, a greatly appreciated touch that improved the flow of combat.

Rise of Ninja's presentation is great, held up mostly by its excellent cel-shaded visuals. The colors are vibrant, the lighting is excellent, the textures are detailed without clashing with the anime style, and the water is some of the prettiest I have ever seen in a video game. My only gripes with the graphics are with the character models, which for some reason are on par with sixth-gen games in quality, and the generic original enemy designs, which clash with Naruto's art style and look as if they were from another series entirely. The anime has no shortage of original filler characters that, despite often looking generic, fit the look of the series, so this issue perplexes me as well. The soundtrack mostly consists mostly of iconic tracks from the anime that are used to great effect, as well as ambient original tracks that suit style. I'm unsure if this applies to the Japanese audio track, but almost every voice actor from the English dub of the anime reprises their role for this game, sounding as good as ever. The only notable exception I could notice is Jiraiya, whose fill-in actor is rather unfitting, and whose performance is only made worse when contrasted with the anime clips that are often used in place of in-game cutscenes, in which his original actor can be heard. The voice acting is solid overall, and I was especially surprised to find that almost all of the dialogue from the generic villagers was voiced, a detail that even full-fledged triple-A titles sometimes omit.

Rise of a Ninja isn't a must-have title, but it is a commendable effort, especially given the time of its release. Despite its flaws and repetitive nature, its fun gameplay and strong presentation make it worth checking out for fans of the franchise.

Ups

Entertaining minigames
Satisfying progression
Engaging combat
Gorgeous visuals
Mostly solid voice acting

Downs

Highly condensed story
Underwhelming original story content
Activities can become very repetitive

ESRB: T Content: Blood, Suggestive Themes, and Violence Price: Varies by seller*

*Most likely as a result of expired licensing agreements, this game is not available digitally and can only be purchased used from third parties. I was able to acquire my copy for about $20, but prices will vary by seller.

Halo: Reach (PC) Review

Halo: Reach (PC)

Publisher: Microsoft Developer: Bungie (Original) / 343 Industries Platform: PC Release: 2019 Players: 1-16 (Varies by mode) Genre: First-Person Shooter Rating: 9.0 \ 10.0: Excellent

Above is the game running at a high field of view with a centered crosshair, which is only possible in thus port.

NOTE: This review will mostly be comparing the original version of Halo: Reach to this port, rather than evaluating Reach as a whole. For my more detailed but slightly outdated thoughts on the game, check here.

I've been a huge Halo fan for years, but my interest in console gaming, especially when it comes to Xbox, has significantly reduced since getting a gaming PC in 2016. Because of this, I was absolutely thrilled by the announcement that Halo: The Master Chief Collection would be coming to Steam, now including Halo: Reach, my favorite first-person shooter of all time and the only main game in the series to have not yet been added to the compilation. The prospect of being able to play one of my favorite games at a high resolution, framerate, and field of view with my preferred method of input on my current favorite platform was extremely exciting, and I felt more anticipation for this port than I have for most other games. My sky-high expectations were not quite met, but I am definitive satisfied with the end product.

Almost every bit of content from the original release is present, including the great campaign, every multiplayer map (DLC included), and the excellent horde mode, Firefight. The only significant omission as of the time of writing is the map-editor, Forge, which will be added in the future. Other minor features, such as the File Share browser, the campaign co-op and multi-team matchmaking playlists, and the daily challenges have also been left out, but these are by no means deal-breaking changes. The most disappointing exclusion, and one that is not guaranteed to return like Forge mode, is split-screen play. Given the sheer number of indie games available on PC that are intended to be played with friends by your side, it surprises me that PC ports of triple-A games more often than not choose to omit the ability to play in split-screen even when it is available in the console versions, and Reach is sadly the latest victim of this trend. This may not be a necessary feature, but Halo is a series that is much more closely associated with local multiplayer than most others, so I was hoping that it would return in this port.

The most obvious changes in this port are the technical improvements; as mentioned previously, you can play the game at a high resolution and framerate if your PC can handle it, and the game has run without any hitches for me. It even performed smoothly on my fairly weak laptop, which was a present surprise. Although this is a well optimized port, the lack of graphical options is baffling - the only settings that can be tweaked are the resolution and the overall graphical quality, which is ridiculously bare-bones in a day and age in which most PC ports allow to modify every aspect of thee visuals, from anti-aliasing to texture detail to shadow quality. To give the developers some slack, the lack of options may bee a result of how difficult this once Xbox 360-exclusive title was to make compatible with hardware it was never meant to run on, but it is disappointing nonetheless.

One of my favorite additions, and one that applies to all games in The Master Chief Collection, is the ability to search for multiple game types at once. I enjoy most modes in Halo, and being able to search for whichever modes I feel like without searching for only one at a time keeps the gameplay varied and reduces queue times. I was mildly annoyed by the fact that selecting any of the variants of Slayer in my search practically guaranteed that I would be placed in nothing but Slayer matches, but this is simply due to the mode's immense popularity.

For the most part, my online matches were free of noticeable lag, but there has been an issue that has appeared in far more of my matches than I would like - kill trading. Despite the majority of the game's weapons being hitscan (meaning that, rather than simulating a projectile, the bullets are programmed to immediately hit their target when the trigger is pulled), it is possible for two players to kill each other at the same time with these weapons. This has happened to me only a few times, but a much more common issue is melee trading - if two players attempt to land a melee death blow at about the same time, it's more than likely that both of them will die. This has happened to me dozens of times, and despite not seeing many reports of this phenomenon online, all my friends with whom I've played the game have experienced this as well. This isn't a game-breaking issue in my eyes, but is could definitely turn PC players who are less tolerant of technical issues like this away from the game.

Some features have been altered rather than removed, most notably the progression system. Reach has many detractors for a variety of reasons, but one aspect of the original game that was near-universally liked was the credits system. Players earned credits for playing every mode in the game that functioned as both experience points and currency. These credits were spent on new armor pieces for players' customizable Spartans, and more pieces became available to purchase as players' leveled up by earning more credits. The prices of armor pieces were unreasonably high at times, but this is still a functional system. Some major changes have been made to the progression system in this port; you can earn experience points exclusively through matchmade games, and will receive one season token upon leveling up. All the armor pieces from the original release are still present, but they are now unlocked in an entirely linear order reminiscent of the battles passes present in a variety of contemporary titles. One season token can be exchanged for a piece of armor that is unlocked in a set order. You must buy a piece to be able to buy the next, thus rendering the tokens a completely pointless middleman. Although I am grateful that Reach's excellent customization was not compromised for its MCC remaster in the same manner as Halo 3 and 4, I am disappointed by this new unlock system that removes all the player agency that was present in the Xbox 360 version.

Overall, the PC version of Halo: Reach is absolutely worth purchasing. It has its issues, but the already excellent gameplay has been enhanced by the visual upgrade with very few downsides. Whether you've played the game extensively or never touched a Halo game before, this is a port that is definitely worth checking out.

Ups
Keyboard and mouse controls feel fantastic

Support for uncapped framerates, 4K, and high field of view

Almost all gamemodes, maps, and DLC are present
Multiple multiplayer modes can be searched for at once
The gameplay has remained practically untouched

Downs
Minor features from the original release were omitted
Lack of graphical options
Completely linear armor unlock system
Server issues lead to frequent kill trades

ESRB: M Content: Blood, Mild Language, and Violence Price: $9.99 (Digital)

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island Review

Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island

Publisher: Nintendo Developer: Nintendo Platform: SNES Release: 1995 Players: 1 Genre; 2D Platformer Rating: 8.6 \ 10.0: Fantastic

Above is the game's opening level.

The Super Nintendo is home to many games that are often considered to be the pinnacle of their respective franchises, and among those that I've played, Super Mario World  one of my favorites. I've been well overdue to finally experience its sequel, and I'm glad I did, because despite its significant shift in gameplay, Yoshi's Island manages to live up to its beloved predecessor and is one of the finest games on a system overflowing with classics.

The plot is as simple as you would expect - a stork is delivering baby Mario and Luigi to their parents, when it is suddenly attacked by Kamek, who successfully kidnaps Luigi and doesn't notice that Mario is plummeting to the island below. Fortunately, Mario lands on the back on a Yoshi along with a map that the stork was carrying. Meanwhile, Kamek, now aware that he missed one of the babies, dispatches minions to search the island for Mario. The Yoshi brings the baby to his friends, who are made aware of Luigi's location through Mario's bond to him, and decide to escort the baby to his brother via a relay system and depart and depart on an adventure.

Yoshi's Island is a sequel mostly in name rather than gameplay. You still platform from left to right and jump on enemies like you would in any other Super Mario game, but the mechanics vastly differ from the series norm. This game introduced Yoshi's staple abilities to flutter jump and turn enemies into throwable eggs, which are prominently featured in the game. Eggs are not only useful for dispatching enemies, but can be also be used to collect coins, break through fragile terrain, and pop the many question-mark clouds found in each level. This was also the first Mario platformer to feature the ground pound, a move that has been present in every main game in the series since. Another notable change is the lack of power-ups and the altered health system. Rather than finding mushrooms and flowers in blocks, you come across colored watermelons that allow you to either spit seeds in succession, breath fire, or freeze enemies with a blast of cold; and rather than shrinking upon taking damage, baby Mario flies of your back and begins floating away on a bubble, and your ears will be assaulted by his now infamous cries until you come to his rescue. There is a timer that counts down while Mario is not on your back, and he will be kidnapped by Kamek's minions when it hits zero. This timer can be increased to a maximum of 30 seconds by reaching checkpoint rings or collecting small stars that are acquired in a variety of ways.

Yoshi's Island features many of the tropes of other Mario games - many levels are centered around a gimmick or unique obstacle, such as Chain Chomps falling from the sky or avoiding floating Fuzzies that temporarily disorient you upon contact; there is a castle with a mid-boss in each world and a harder castle with a tougher boss at the end; and caves, snowy plains, and platforming-heavy "athletic" levels make frequent appearances. This is far from a negative, as I feel that this game executes these tropes more strongly than any Mario title that preceded it. A reason for this is that although certain types of levels are common, none of the worlds except for the sixth and final one have a distinct theme. This is not inherently positive or negative feature, but it works in Yoshi's Island's favor -  the strong focus on well-executed mechanics that are present in no more than a few stages and the great variety of levels within each world makes almost every stage highly enjoyable and memorable. There were a handful of levels that I found tedious, such as the two in the final world in which you explore maze-like environments, but I had a blast with nearly all of them.

One of Yoshi's Island's main additions to the Mario formula was the introduction of optional collectibles in each level, which in this case are twenty red coins and five flowers. The flowers are very similar to the Star Coin, Star Medals, and Green Stars present in Mario titles released later down the line. You'll often find them in secret areas but will also frequently see them in plain sight in areas that are slightly tricky to get to. At the end of each level, a roulette wheel is spun, and the likelihood of it landing on a winning space is increased with each flower you collected. If you win, you will get to play a brief bonus game that can potentially award you extra lives and items. Tracking down each red coin can be a bit of a hassle because they can be easily missed - most are placed in plain sight alongside normal coins, and they can be identified by their slightly darker color; sometimes they are held by Fly Guys who you only have a few seconds to knock out of the air with an egg. The requirements for getting a perfect score of 100 on a level are finishing it with a full 30 second timer and collecting all flowers and red coins. I initially assumed that I would be able to replay a level find anything I missed on my first run, and I was struck with a baffling realization - your score is reset to zero upon restarting a level, which means you must meet all the requirements for a perfect score in one run, unlike in the New Super Mario Bros. games in which any Star Coins you collect never need to be tracked down again. It was at this moment that I abandoned my goal of completing the game 100%. While still manageable, this quirk makes the completion process unnecessarily tedious. Doing everything there is to do in a game ultimately isn't necessary, so although this is an annoying flaw, it can and most likely will be ignored by most players.

The presentation of Yoshi's Island is one of its strongest aspects. Despite being nearly 25 years old, the game's visuals have aged excellently thanks to the gorgeous hand-drawn art style. The meticulously detailed environments, varied color palette, and incredibly charming character designs make this game perhaps the most visually pleasing of all the 2D Mario titles even a quarter-century later. The soundtrack is also terrifically catchy, as is expected from Koji Kondo. The number of tracks is relatively low, but the variety is significant, ranging from the calming opening theme to upbeat and iconic athletic theme to a metal final boss theme so intense that it almost feels like it belongs in another franchise.



Ups
Decent challenge
Gorgeous art style
Catchy and varied soundtrack
Great level variety
Level gimmicks don't overstay their welcome

Downs
A few tedious levels
Frustrating 100% completion process


Also available on Gameboy Advance*, Wii U*, Nintendo Switch

ESRB: E Content: Comic Mischief Price: N/A*

*Due to the closure of the Wii Shop Channel, the only way to acquire a legitimate digital version of the original Yoshi's Island is to subscribe to Nintendo Switch Online for $19.99 per year, which grants access to dozens of NES and SNES games including this one. However, Yoshi's Island: Super Mario Advance 3, the mostly unchanged Gameboy Advance port of this game, can be purchased for $7.99 on the Wii U eShop.

BioShock Review

BioShock

Publisher: 2K Developer: Irrational Games Platform: PC Release: 2007 Genre: First-Person Shooter / Horror Players: 1 Rating: 9.3 \ 10.0: Outstanding

Above is the player fighting a Spider Splicer using Plasmids

Of the many great games released in the past couple console generations, few are as lauded as BioShock.  It's a game rightfully praised for its interesting setting and iconic moments, and although I would not consider it amazing, it has held up strongly over the past dozen years for a wide variety of reasons.

BioShock's opening few minutes are among the most memorable I have experienced in a game. It b begins with a plane crashing into the ocean, with a large large tower in sight as you take control and swim through the wreckage. You enter this tower and are presented with a bathysphere which lowers you deep into the ocean. A projector then begins playing a monologue from Andrew Ryan alongside an excellent orchestral, who explains that Rapture, the massive underwater city you see before you was created by him for the purpose of allowing society's greatest minds to escape the grasp of the world's governments and be entitled to the rewards their hard work deserves.  As you immediately find out upon exiting the bathysphere, this plan to create a utopia has utterly crumbled, as Rapture is falling apart and is infested with viscous Splicers, former citizens of the city whose minds and appearances were warped by the abuse of gene-altering drugs which grant superhuman abilities called Plasmids. You are quickly contacted by Atlus, who explains that his family is trapped in a submarine somewhere in the city and asks if you would kindly assist him and saving them so you can all escape the underwater hellscape, thus beginning a memorable journey.

BioShock's gameplay is relatively simple. You explore sprawling levels with a set objective, encountering all sorts of splicers along the way. It's not a strictly linear game like many of the games in its genre, but it's not an open world, either. You can always simply choose to follow the quest arrow right to your objective, but exploring the many areas that you're never required to set foot in will reward you greatly with more money, ammo, and potentially gene tonics, which are small perks that can increase your proficiency in combat, improve your physical traits, or make hacking easier. You will encounter many security systems and vending machines in each area that can be hacked through a simple but fun mini game in which you click on tiles on a grid to reveal pieces of a pipe that you must put together to form a complete path from one side of the grid to the other, all while water flows through the incomplete pipe, thus pressuring you for time. Although I did enjoy this mini game, it got a bit dull and repetitive by the time I was nearly finished with the game's nearly 15 hour-long campaign, and on very rare occasions I would be faced with a pipe that simply could not be completed due to the flaws with the random generation of the tiles in the mini game.

Combat consists of switching between a decently sized arsenal of weapons each with alternative ammo types, such as a Tommy gun and crossbow, and your Plasmid abilities such as the ability to shoot lightning bolts, fling fireballs, summon hordes of bees, and tricking security bots into targeting Splicers. Your health is fixed and can be restored with first aid kits that you can only carry a handful of, and using Plasmids consumes Eve, which can be restored by collecting syringes of the substance. The game may seem to have some survival elements at first, but by the end of the game, I had plenty of ammo for every weapon and was almost never short on first aid kids or Eve syringes, even on the highest difficulty mode. I almost wish that the game forced me to be more conservative with my resources on Hard mode, as I never enjoy having to handicap myself in a game to get more out of it. The weapons don't feel amazing to use, but the wide variety of Plasmids and gene tonics kept combat fun and interesting throughout the whole experience. Expanding my aresnal as the game progressed was very satisfying, but the enemies I faced unfortunately did not step up their game nearly as much, causing the last couple hours to be easier than the first few, but still far from boring.

BioShock excels in both the audio and visual departments and creates a setting that, as unrealistic as it may be, is incredibly engrossing and well realized. Even today, the game's visuals have aged remarkably well on both a technical and artistic level. The textures are intricately detailed, lighting is used excellently to create suspense and horror, and the intricately designed areas are full of well thought-out props that help sell the setting and sometimes make for excellent environmental storytelling.  When it comes to visuals, my only real complaint is that the bloom effects can sometimes be intense to the point of becoming mildy obnoxious. Sound design is another strong suit. Almost all of the game's jingles and sounds are firmly engraved in my memory, from the voice lines that play fro the various vending machines to the buzz of an active security bot to the groans of  a distant Big Daddy. Other small details such as the disturbing ramblings of nearby Splicers further enhance the atmosphere. The game's original soundtrack is used sparingly, but is usually reserved for the many scripted moments of horror, and, while not particularly memorable aside from the track that plays during Ryan's opening monologue, serves its purpose well. Licensed music is also used to great effect. The lighthearted songs from the '50s that play in many of the game's abandoned stores create a somber tone by contrasting with the horrific destruction and, when paired with the many areas that are damaged but not completely destroyed, causes me to envision what Rapture may have been like in its prime.

It would be remiss of me not to mention BioShock's audio diaries, a feature that did not originate from this game but was popularized by it. While the idea that numerous people would choose to record their thoughts on devices only to frequently leave them lying in the middle of public places is a silly one, I am willing to suspend my disbelief for the sake of enjoying these logs that make the setting of Rapture even more interesting. Most of these audio logs are entirely optional to look for, but are well worth listening too for the fascinating insight they provide on the philosophies and motivations of the various interesting characters you meet in each area such as Andrew Ryan, Brigid Tenenbaum, a scientist who formerly worked under Ryan, and the crazed artist Sander Cohen. Many of the logs also shed light on the reasons that the city is in its sorry state.

There is another trend that was somewhat started by this game, one that I am not particularly fond of, and that is binary moral choices. Each of the game's main areas is home to several Little Sisters, young girls who have been genetically altered for the purpose of harvesting Adam, the substance used in Plasmids and gene tonics to alter genetic code, from the corpses of Splicers. They are guarded by Big Daddies,  mysterious behemoths in diving suits. Fighting them can be a significant drain on your ammo reserves, but finding creative and quick ways to kill them by using the using the environment to my advantage with Plasmids like Telekinesis often made for a good time. Upon defeating a Big Daddy, you will have the option to either harvest or rescue a Little Sister. The latter option turns them back into normal girls, while the former kills them but rewards you with more Adam than saving them does, but prevents you fro achieving the good ending. Adam is used to unlock new Plasmids, upgrade the ones already in your arsenal, unlock new gene tonics, and increase the maximum number of tonics you can equip, so this is a hard choice in theory. However, you receive periodic gifts from the Little Sisters if you choose to spare them all, and these more than make up for the  lost Adam, and even when playing on Hard mode, I had so much Adam near the end of the game that I wasn't sure what to do with it, and I didn't harm a single Little Sister to obtain that amount. Ultimately I can't get too mad at this basically meaningless choice because it didn't directly impact my enjoyment, but it did inspire a generation of games to include similarly pointless or obvious choices.

The highest point of BioShock is its narrative twist that occurs about two thirds of the way through the game. This scene has become so iconic that it is likely that many reading this are already aware of what I am referring to regardless of whether they have played the game yet, but I wouldn't dare spoil it for those who aren't already in the know. It's an excellent moment that brilliantly betrays the idea of player agency and defies what players have come to expect from the vast majority of shooters. I'd argue that BioShock is worth playing just to witness this, because the true impact of the twist cannot be fully felt without having investment in the game's plot. Unfortunately, the same praise cannot be given to the game's good ending, the one that most players will probably see, as it felt highly anticlimatic, as well as a bit cheesy and out of place in a game that is for the most part very dark in tone.

Although BioShock is not quite what I would consider a masterpiece, it is a special game that I would advise that anyone even slightly interested in it should play at some point. Its excellent setting and atmosphere are more than enough to make up for some minor gameplay shortcomings, and the half-baked ending doesn't quite diminish the otherwise engaging story. I strongly recommend it.

Ups
Stellar presentation
Engrossing atmosphere
Rewarding exploration and combat
Intriguing world and characters
Incredible late-game plot twist
Satisfying progression

Downs
Shooting mechanics could use some work
Some tedious segments
Hacking and research minigames can become repetitive
Mediocre ending

Also available on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4

ESRB: M Content: Blood & Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes, and Use of Alcohol and Tobacco Price: $19.99 (Retail / Download)

Bastion Review

Bastion

Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Developer: Supergiant Games Platform: PC Release: 2011 Genre: Action / RPG Players: 1 Rating: 9.2 \ 10.0: Outstanding

Above is the kid battling a Gasfella.

I’ve played my fair share of indie games throughout my decade of gaming, but it somehow took me until 2019 to finally play what is often considered one of the best titles ever produced by a small team. After finishing Bastion, I can safely say I agree with this sentiment.

The game immediately captivated me without the need for a lengthy cutscene. It begins with a boy rising from his bed atop a floating piece of debris in a void. You gain control of him within seconds, and platforms begin appearing before the boy as you move him forward. The moving soundtrack by Darren Korb starts to kick in alongside gruff narration from Logan Cunningham. Soon enough, the kid, who is never referred to as anything but, meets up with Rucks, the source of the narration and the only character who ever speaks outside of the game's several vocal songs. He explains to the kid that he has arrived at the Bastion, the heart of the city of Caelondia, and that he must retrieve the cores scattered throughout the city in order to undo the effects of the Calamity that broke apart the floating landmasses and turned all but a few survivors to ash. This plot eventually thickens, as survivors of the calamity are introduced and the reasons for why the Calamity occurred are hinted at more and more.

Bastion plays like a linear dungeon crawler, with an isometric viewpoint and pieces of the levels floating into place as you progress and hordes of enemies appearing as unexplored areas are unveiled. The path you travel along is quite constrained, but every so often there are small optional segments that contain extra crystals, the game's currency. Near the end of each level is one of the cores that are needed to reverse the Calamity, and upon returning to the Bastion with a core, a core can be spent to build a new structure that can be accessed between levels. These include the refinery, which can be used to equip an additional stat boosting beverage each time you level up, the forge, which is used to upgrade weapons with crystals and crafting materials, and the shrine, where you can enable idols that increase your experience gain in exchange for raising the game's difficulty in various ways.

This idol system is a fantastic way to allow players to adjust the difficulty of the game as they see fit. For example, if someone was best accustomed to the damage and health levels of enemies on normal difficulty, but wanted a greater challenge without jumping all the way to hard mode, they could enable the idols that increase enemy attack speed and cause enemy corpses to explode. I find this preferable to something like Halo's skull system, as many of those individual modifiers are enough to drastically change the experience.

You’ll be spending the bulk of your time in Bastion battling enemies, and this is where the game  shines. The combat isn't very complicated - you can wield two weapons, unleash a special move by consuming black tonic, heal by using a health tonic, use a shield, and roll to evade attacks. Almost every encounter is well balanced - there are usually many enemies, just enough to make avoiding damage challenging but fair; there are a wide variety of foes with unique attributes and attacks, but unlike many games I've played where this is the case, not one of these enemy types was annoying to fight. The game's various weapons all felt distinct, and finding ideal combinations of weapons, special attacks, and tonics was entertaining. Fights are often fast-paced and fierce as a result of their immaculate design, and combat is rarely boring. The only time that the battles even approached being dull was during the several optional side stories which can be accessed from the Bastion in which you face numerous waves of enemies in the Kid's dreams while the fascinating backstories of each major character are explained. Bastion has all the hallmarks of a great action game, and with a good story to boot.

For being released early in the late-2000s indie surge, Bastion's presentation has aged remarkably well. The environments are hand drawn in remarkable detail, and although the 3D models used for characters initially looked a bit out of place to me, I eventually grew to find them aesthetically pleasing. The aforementioned soundtrack amplified the fantastical atmosphere to great heights during the more peaceful moments of exploration, and increased the intensity of combat. It's difficult to describe what the soundtrack sounds like - the composer describes it as "acoustic frontier trip hop", and I very much enjoyed listening to it. Cunningham's performance as Rucks is perhaps my favorite element of the presentation. Even when delivering exposition, he does so in an encapsulating manner, and the brief comments he makes on certain actions, such as the kid falling off a platform.

There are few qualms that I have with Bastion, but the game isn't perfect. One of my issues is with the game's arsenal. Most of the weapons were great fun to use, but several of them, such as the mortar and the sniper rifle, are overly situational and impractical to use outside of the levels they are introduced in.  This is hardly annoying because you are free to use whatever weapons you choose for the vast majority of the game, but the variety of weapons that are always useful is lower than I would have liked. Additionally, the optional mastery challenges for each weapon often require borderline perfect performance in order to earn the highest rewards that you can receive from them, but this is also is a mere nitpick. Another small complaint is that much as I enjoyed the story, I was disappointed by the lack of characterization that some of the game's few characters received, especially the completely silent Kid. Their backstories were interesting, but they were not.

Bastion is an all around excellent game. From its beautiful visuals to its exciting combat, there are few areas in which it falters. It is easily one of the best indie games I've ever played, and I would strongly recommend it.

Ups

Beautiful visuals
Invigorating soundtrack

Simple but satisfying combat
Intriguing story
Idol system is innovative
Excellent narration

Downs

Several overly situational weapons
Optional challenges drag on too long
Lack of characterization for the kid

Also available on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 4, and Switch

ESRB: E 10+ Content: Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence, and Use of Alcohol and Tobacco Price: $14.99 (Download)

Hollow Knight Review

Hollow Knight

Publisher: Team Cherry Developer: Team Cherry Platform: Switch Release: 2017 Players: 1 Genre: 2D Platformer / Action Rating: 8.7  \ 10.0: Fantastic

Above is the Knight fighting in the Coliseum of Fools

I admittedly have always had an aversion to games well known for their crushing difficulty. I am, however, drawn to indie platformers with great presentation, and Hollow Knight met both of those prerequisites. Although Hollow Knight is part of  the exploration-driven Metroidvania sub-genre that I'm not well acquainted with, I was still drawn to it from the gameplay I saw, and if I hadn't overcome my skepticism, I would have missed out on an absolutely fantastic experience.

Hollow Knight sparingly reveals any explicit details of its story or lore to the player. All that is immediately clear is that you are exploring a fallen kingdom of insects, and it soon becomes apparent that this downfall was caused by an infection that devastated the population. Partway into the game, you are given one explicit goal: to defeat the three Dreamers that are sealing the entrance to the Black Egg Temple where the vessel of the infection lies. Their locations are marked on your map, but the explicit path to reach one is not clear. This prevented me from ever feeling completely lost or from feeling overwhelmed with things to do as I might in an open world Ubisoft game.

Once you acquire the ability to dash from Greenpath, the second major area, the game truly opens up. Not since playing Breath of the Wild  have I been so engrossed by a game's world. Hollow Knight is absolutely packed with content, and unlike many other massive games I've played, hardly any of the the activities feel pointless, repetitive, or boring. I always had a small goal in mind, and even once I
had seemingly uncovered the entire map, there was more to do and discover. This is helped by simple but satisfying combat and systems that reward exploration. When you begin the game, all you can do is swipe your blade in each direction and heal by consuming a portion of your soul meter, which is refilled by striking enemies. As you uncover more of the map, you will acquire abilities that make new areas accessible and increase your combat prowess in typical Metroidvania fashion, such as a double jump and the ability to slide down and jump off walls. You will also discover spells and charms. There is one spell corresponding to each attack direction, and by using them you will consume part of your soul meter without gaining any back by hitting enemies with them, which forces you to carefully consider whether using spells is worth delaying your next healing opportunity. Charms have a great number of effects ranging from simply boosting the amount of damage your spells do to generating a shield that circles around you or summoning a group of minions that will fly towards enemies and explode. Each charm requires a certain number of notches to use depending on their power, and coming up with ideal charm combinations as I expanded my maximum number of notches was a consistent source of fun during my many hours spent with the game. Should you die, you will awake at the last bench you sat at. These serve as the game's save points, and there are a few dozen scattered across the Hallownest. You will have no money and one third of soul meter will become unusable, which limits your healing and spell usage, until you kill your shade, the ghost that is left behind at the location of your death. Once you slay the shade, your money will be returned and you soul meter will be replenished, but if you perish again before defeating it, all your money that you were carrying will be gone for good. This system created some very tense situations, but due to the great distance between each bench, it often led to me spending multiple minutes backtracking my way to my place of death, which was hardly ever enjoyable.

I previously mentioned that few activities in Hallow Knight felt repetitive, but there are a couple exceptions, and those are uncovering the map and unlocking fast travel points. As you explore new areas, you will come across trails of paper scraps that, when followed, will lead you to a map salesman named Cornifer who is located in every major area. Before finding him, you will be unable to see exactly where you are in each area, and if you come across him without possessing enough money to buy a map, you will have to return to the town of Dirtmouth on the surface of the Hallownest to buy it from his wife's shop. Each area also possesses Stag stations, where you can summon a large bug, the last of his kind, to ferry you from one station to another. The dialogue with these characters was amusing and interesting, but encountering them began to wear off its welcome after I found each of them well over a dozen times.

The bulk of Hollow Knight's challenge comes from its numerous boss battles, and this is what intimidated me the most going in the most. While I died more times than I can count throughout my encounters with the bosses, almost each one was a pleasure to fight. They were entertaining tests of reflexes that rarely felt unfair and were accompanied by fantastic music. Healing requires standing still, a factor that was seemingly insignificant during exploration but resulted in many near-miss moments during boss battles that were downright nerve-wracking. Figuring out which charm combinations was a blast and never felt like tedious trial and error because the fights are often designed in ways that prevent any charm combination from being truly useless. However, the aforementioned backtracking issue affects a great number of boss battles. While there is sometimes a bench placed right next to the arena and the dream battles place you right next to the boss when you fail, many bosses have at upwards of several minutes of backtracking to do between them and the nearest bench. While I did enjoy the fights themselves, having to retread the same steps over and over to finish some of the harder encounters slowly eroded my strength of will by making the prospect of trying again seem like a worse option each time.

Beating the game is as challenging and time consuming as you choose to make it. Large portions of the map can be completely ignored if your sole goal is to enter the Black Egg Temple. Many bosses and abilities can be ignored, but will make your confrontation with the vessel easier. When I arrived at the temple after 30 hours of gameplay, the final battle was disappointingly easy, and it accounted for only one of my many dozens of deaths up to that point. However, there are multiple endings that are reliant on interactions with certain characters and the amount of essence you have, a substance acquired by defeating the spirits of warriors and the extra difficult dream versions of defeated bosses located throughout the map, and one of these endings involves a final battle that is significantly more difficult.

Defeating this boss was one of the most triumphant moments in any game I've played, and I unfortunately may not have experienced it I wasn't in contact with friends who had spent dozens of hours in the game. The path to achieve this true ending is incredibly obscure, and given how many extra hours I put in in order to reach it, I have no idea why. Once the aforementioned essence requirement is met, you must travel to two unspecified spots on the massive map to get two halves of a charm, then access a previously inaccessible area that is opened in another unspecified location, and you must do so while wearing the completed charm. All of these steps are merely hinted at, and while a process such as this would be acceptable for smaller side quests, having a true ending be so hidden is excessive.

When it comes to presentation, Hollow Knight is no doubt one of the most impressive indie games ever released. While I do enjoy the pixel art that's incredibly common among indie platformers, this game's stunning hand-drawn art is refreshing. The graphics and music contribute to a wonderful atmosphere that ranges from peaceful to somber to unsettling during exploration, and increase the intensity of the many boss battles. The game's wonderful audiovisual elements impressed me even more when I discovered that the art was solely worked on by one person, Ari Gibson, and the soundtrack was composed by Christopher Larkin alone.

Hollow Knight is a superb experience almost from start to finish. It manages to look and sound amazing despite being worked on by so few people, it manages to stay consistently engaging despite having a colossal world, and it manages to be very challenging but rarely unfair. I haven't played many Metroidvanias but I can safely assume that it will be one of my favorites for the foreseeable future and I would strongly recommend experiencing it for yourself.

Ups
Stunning art style
Excellent soundtrack
Engrossing atmosphere
Hard but fair boss fights
Charms are fun to mix, match, and use
Numerous secrets to uncover
Highly rewarding exploration
Satisfying combat

Downs
Excessive backtracking
Frequently cryptic optional objections
Several mildly irritating boss battles
Some slightly repetitive tasks

ESRB: E 10+ Content: Fantasy Violence and Mild Blood Price: $14.99 (Digital)

Super Smash Bros Ultimate Review

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate

Publisher: Nintendo Developer: Nintendo Platform: Switch Release: 2018 Players: 1-8 (Smash), 1-4 (Online), 1 (Spirits) Genre: 2D Fighter / 2D Platformer Rating: 9.6 \ 10.0: Masterful

Above are four players fighting on Mooray Tower.

For as long as series has existed, no Nintendo home console has gone without a Super Smash Bros. game, and it is momentous occasion when one is finally added to a console's library. When the announcement for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate finally came, I was more excited than I've been for any other game. My expectations were set so high that they couldn't have possibly been fulfilled, but the final product ended up surprisingly close to my pipe dream.  The prospect of a portable Smash game with easily accessible local multiplayer was already incredible, and Ultimate goes above and beyond to be capable of providing hundreds of hours of fun without getting stale.

The updates made to Smash's mechanics are all positive and help to make it the most competitively viable game in the franchise since Melee. SSB4 had the best over game feel of the series at the time of its release in my eyes,  but Ultimate has made nothing but improvements in this category. The overall speed of gameplay has been considerably increased, directional air dodging has been added, and repeatedly dodging on the ground is now punished, as the amount of time required to dodge again increases with each time it is performed and resets after several seconds of inactivity. General game feel has been further improved thanks to wonderful sound design that make hits greatly satisfying to land, and the visual indicator of a critical hit which is usually accompanied by the camera zooming in (when two players are left in a match) makes victory feel sweeter than it ever has before. These mechanical improvements aren't very noticeable in chaotic matches with three or more players, but one-on-one fights are the best they've ever been. The added speed and intensity makes every battle incredibly thrilling, even when using the bulkiest characters in the roster. Never have I played a multiplayer game that simultaneously excels so greatly on both a casual and competitive level.

Quality of life changes have also been made to greatly increase the ease of setting up play sessions. For the first time in the franchise, you have the ability to save highly customizable rulesets that can be chosen from a list before selecting the stage and characters. Everything from the launch rate to the stages that can be chosen when "Random" is selected can be tweaked. This allowed me to create my own wacky rulsets, such as a battle royale mode, without the hassle of spending a couple minutes browsing menus each time I wanted to use them. Additionally, you can press the B button within a second of selecting a stage to cancel it, which greatly eases the potential annoyance of having to return to the previous screen if you accidentally choose the wrong stage out of the list of over a hundred - almost every single stage from the whole series has returned, and they're all placed on a single grid that's a bit of a visual mess until you realize that all of the stages are organized in order of their introduction to the series. The flat Omega forms of each stage from SSB4 have returned, and new Battlefield forms (which mirror the design of the flat stage with three platforms of the same name) have been added to offer even more options to players seeking to have as fair a fight as possible. For those who wish to test their skills with multiple characters in the same match, a mode called Squad Strike has been added in which each participant can select a group of either three or five characters, choose the order in which they will use them, and fight in a battle in which they have one life per character.

The roster consists of a whopping 70 characters, echo fighters not included. Every single character from past games has returned, along with several newcomers. The Smash bros. series has always served as a celebration of Nintendo, but this game also features eight third-party guests: Sonic, Snake from Metal Gear, Mega Man, Pac-Man, Ryu from Steet Fighter, and Cloud from Final Fantasy VII return from Brawl and Smash 4, and Simon Belmont and his echo Richter from Castlevania, as well as Ryu´s echo, Ken, are new additions. Other newcomers include the Inkling from Splatoon, Chrom from Fire Emblem Awakening, Isabelle from Animal Crossing, Incineroar from Pokemon Sun and Moon and the long requested Donkey Kong Country villain King K. Rool and the recurring boss Ridley from the Metroid series, who has appeared in every previous Smash game to some extent but has never been playable. A roster of this size is bound to have some balance issues, but it is possible to excel with any character, and those who were once considered to be on the verge of overpowered such as Chrom and K. Rool have had some of their strongest abilities weakened since launch. The newly added characters don't have the experimental movesets of Smash 4 newcomers like Duck Hunt Dog and Wii Fit Trainer, but many of these fighters rank among my favorites in the series.

Like SSB4 before it, Ultimate features various online modes. The previous game's For Fun and For Glory matchmaking option have been replaced with Quickplay, in which you can select a set of preferred rules and match only with players with matching preferred rules, or Elite Smash, which has a strictly competitive ruleset and only allows each player to user character that they have achieved a high Global Smash Power with. Although this problem has become less severe since launch, many players have reported being placed in matches that used rules that were vastly different from their preferences. The ability to play with friends in lobbies called Battle Arenas has also returned, although the feature has been both improved and downgraded. It is now possible to host public battle arenas for random players to join, which can be quite helpful when no friends are around to play with locally. However, it is sadly no longer possible for multiple players using one console to join a Battle Arena with open player slots, which is something I often did in the Wii U game.

Perhaps the largest new feature is the Spirits mode. Spirits are the replacement for trophies featured in the previous three games - a massive collection of characters from every series the game represents, both obscure and iconic. There are even Spirits from a few franchises with no playable characters, such as Shantae and Rayman. Unfortunately, these Spirits lack the descriptions featured on every single trophy from the past games, which left me without any clue of who some of the more obscure characters were. Additionally, they are not represented by highly detailed models as trophies were, but instead by official art from the source games, a change I have mixed feelings on. Unlike trophies, however, Spirits can influence gameplay. Each Support Spirit offers a stat boost or special effect such as brief invincibility at the start of a battle, starting the battle with a certain item equipped, or increased special attack power, and these can be combined with Primary Spirits, which sometimes have stat boosts as well, to create loadouts to use against enemies in Spirits mode. These enemies have have stipulations attached to the fight, such as modified gravity, the enemy being giant or metal, a team of weaker enemies being present that essentially make the encounters a successor to the Event mode from the past three Smash games which is no longer present by name. When the enemies in Spirits mode are defeated, their corresponding Spirit is added to your collection. Spirit battles can be completed either through the Spirit Board, a constantly changing selection of battles, or through the adventure mode, World of Light. I adored SSB Brawl's Subspace Emissary and was expecting a follow up to that mode's Kirby-style platforming and wonderfully produced cutscenes when the new adventure mode was first announced, but that is unfortunately not the case.

In World of Light, the world of Smash Bros is threatened by an all-powerful deity named Galeem who uses his powers to possess everyone on the game's roster and create numerous clones of them - all except for Kirby, who manages to escape Galeem's initial attack. Now Kirby must defeat Galeem and free his fellow fighters from possession. The gameplay revolves around travelling a massive map, engaging in hundreds of Spirit battles to clear the path to Galeem. Many of these fights are optional, and if one wishes to finish all of them, it can take upwards of 25 hours. This quest was not a bad one overall, but the constant Spirit battles began to overstay their welcome after several hours. The main saving grace of this nonstop string of fights is that many of them contain clever and amusing references to the Spirits' source material. For example, the Guts Man Spirit battle has a possessed Mega Man constantly using grabs and throws while using the alternate costume which corresponds to the Super Arm weapon from the first Mega Man game, which belongs to Guts Man and is used to lift and throw large rocks. My favorite instance of this was the dedicated Street Fighter area of the World of Light map, a series of fights with increased gravity and limited health of exclusively flat stages which are mean to replicate the gameplay of that series.

Although it took a few months after launch to be added, the Stage Builder has returned, and it's better than it's ever been before. The variety of materials you can use to sculpt stage geometry has been greatly expanded since the last game, which has allowed creative builders to make plenty of crude yet charming art using this mode. You can also now change the properties of objects in far more ways, such as modifying the speed of wind currents and causing platforms to rotate. ditionally, for the first time in the series, your creations can be easily shared online. Custom stages, Mii Fighters, and replays (which can now be edited) can all be shared online for anyone to download, which eliminates the need to assemble your own versions of stages that are used for popular user-created modes. Creating absurd stages to mess around on was one of my favorite parts of the last two Smash titles, and Ultimate's iteration of this mode does not disappoint.

Despite being a predominantly multiplayer series, the past few Smash games have had a wealth of single-player content, and it doesn't stop at Spirits mode. The Classic mode, in which you play through a series of fights with special conditions in a similar vein to Spirit battles which concludes with a bonus stage and boss fight, has been revamped in a way I greatly enjoyed. This time around, every single character has a personalized Classic mode. The fights are all tailored around their series and personality traits, which often resulted in clever references like those that many of the Spirit battles contain. In the past, every Classic mode run ended with a fight with either Master Hand, Crazy Hand, or both at once. This time around, many of the Classic modes end with new boss battles which will pleasantly surprise fans of certain franchises. While there are still quite a few Master Hand fights in the roster, this is definitely my favorite variation of Classic mode in the series so far.

Other options include the Training mode, which remains a helpful tool for serious players who want to carefully study the impact of certain moves and items, and the Multi-Man Smash mode from previous games in which you face a horde of weak fighters. However, some modes that were present in Ultimate's predecessors have been unfortunately excluded. These include the Home Run Derby and Target Practice modes which I admittedly hardly played, and All Star mode, which has been replaced by a variation of Multi-man Smash which replaces Mii fighters with the entire roster.

Super Smash Bros. Ultimate may not be the definitive Smash experience in every way, but it is an excellent game regardless. Its numerous improvements to the franchise more than make up for its omissions, and it will not doubt be one of my go-to multiplayer games for many years to come. It is unlikely that a better local multiplayer experience will ever be available on the Switch.

Ups
Expansive yet balanced roster
Newcomers are very fun to play
Large amount of single player content
Countless clever references
Multitude of quality of life changes
News mechanics to make game competitive
Nearly every stage has returned from past games
Celebrates the history of many third-party franchises
Fleshed out and highly versatile stage builder

Downs
Lack of stage builder
Frustrating lobby system
World of Light can become tedious
Spirits lack the charm of trophies

ESRB: E 10+ Content: Cartoon Violence, Comic Mischief, and Suggestive Themes Price: $59.99 (Retail / Download)