Finished this tonight in one session. Not sure why I was expecting a turn based RPG, but was surprised to instead find a Zelda clone.

Enjoyed the short and sweet game.
Difficulty was good, a little on the easy side but I'm not complaining.
Collected all the docs and 100%ed.

A decent experience: 7/10

Guys I forgot to vote on the tie breaker but I am so glad this game won lol.

Had it on my wishlist and it'll be a nice short palate cleanser after I finish my epic Morrowind playthrough which should be this week!

Since I've decided 2025 is the year I finally get into the Elder Scrolls series, I nominate Morrowind

I finished this game a couple years ago and found it to be a decent but simple and mediocre experience. The writing was a high point - light hearted and humorous.

7/10

Last minute nomination! Morrowind

Beat the DLC today. Got the true ending. Similar thoughts as with the base game: amazing concept but poor execution.
Spent many hours just running around helplessly lost and getting nowhere, all the while becoming more and more frustrated. Eventually caved and looked it up.

I feel bad for rating it this low considering how much love this game receives, but this has to be my most disappointing gaming experience I've had in years. Thankfully I bought it on sale.

6/10 (Base game)
5/10 (DLC)

I've completed the main game, saw two endings - a good one and a bad one.
Going to move on to the DLC tonight.

The base game has an amazing concept, but it's execution is terrible. Two thirds of my play time was spent either repeating the same things ad nauseum, or simply waiting around for time to pass (as most things are time dependent). The gameplay lacks basic QOL features and does not respect the player's time.

I ended up using a infinite oxygen and fuel mod as that alleviated some of the frustration. It boggles my mind why the designers would even limit your oxygen and fuel - it's an exploration game, but they restrict your ability to explore! I also needed to use a guide because some of the puzzles were too obtuse.

6/10

I am about 8ish hours in and really struggling to enjoy this game - on the verge of quitting or getting a cheat mod. Sheer stubbornness that I haven't done so already.

Just not seeing what the fuss is about, between the irritating controls, lack of checkpoints, endless repetition, lack of guidance, and slow restarts.

I don't mind difficult games, but I can't stand it when the game doesn't respect the player's time.

I'll probably give it one more session, and if still not making decent progress, I'll just cheat my way through.

Yes!
The kick in the rear I needed to finally get around to this game. Hopefully the high praise doesn't set me up for disappointment 😥

Loved this game. Bigger and badder (the good kind) than the 2016 one.
Much temped to join you guys for another romp through this masterpiece..

Time flies when you're playing games!

I nominate Resident Evil 1

Death's Door

100%ed this tonight and got the true ending.

Pretty cool game with satisfying challenge and creative boss fights marred by at times frustrating difficulty, lack of QOL features (namely no map), and excessive backtracking.

I played this on Switch and the load times were pretty bad as well.

7/10

I'm a couple hours into Deaths Door and I echo what others have said so far.

1. Game could really do with a map to keep track of places I need to backtrack.
2. The game throws waves at you, can get frustrating at times redoing the same waves over and over.
3. Not sure if this is due to playing on Switch handheld but details are so small - it's hard to notice things!

The difficulty is higher than what I expected, and not really into the retry again and again type gameplay. Though the upgrade system is a sort of crutch and I've noticed a single upgrade can make a significant difference.

I played Inside and it was just alright, I'm not sure if I'm really into trial and error cinematic platformers.

Never played Death's Door despite it being an impulse buy.

I do remember liking RE7 but RE is a franchise I kind of don't like talking about since people who play RE tend to be REALLY into the series and are borderline yanderes over it. When it comes to the series there is so such thing as liking the games and disliking others, it's about people getting into face off to see who is more obessesed with the franchise and people who have unpopular opinions towards the franchise are viewed as heretics. The series being "scary" is something I never understood either. I don't even get what is scary about games, the only thing that scares me is anything that effects my status quo for living, a game can never scare me, it needs good gameplay and RE7 I'd say does have it.

It's irrelvant towards the game itself but I haven't played RE7 in a long while but I remember the mansion being the best part and the tanker section being dull and it really dragged on after the boss fight in the mansion.

I dislike trial and error type gameplay in general. Maybe I had more patience for that sort of stuff as a kid, but these days it just frustrates me. It's probably the main reason why I don't enjoy Zelda games as much as I'd want to - because a lot of the boss fights you need to experiment to discover the mechanics and weak points, and that means a lot of backtracking.

On a brighter note, I am looking forward to playing Death's Door this month!

In that case, I nominate the first game in the collection: Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow

I nominate Castlevania Dominus Collection.

I also want to add that as I've gotten more disposable income, I became more snobbish with graphics and performance - to the point it became detrimental to my ability to enjoy gaming.

E.g. Witcher 3 can't play on Switch because PC is better. But then can't play on PC because they released a new gen ray trace update with higher requirements. Or feeling like I'm missing out by not having a high refresh rate OLED screen.

So in recent years I've tried to ignore influencers and content creators who always talk about the latest gadgets and games, and just learn to enjoy what I have. Honestly once I'm actually in game, I stop caring that it's not the 4K definitive version running at 120 FPS with Ray Tracing on an OLED etc.

As a PC and Switch owner I think gaming has never been better. The accessibility, quality, and quantity of games coming out is absolutely spoiling me.

There's so much good stuff out there that I feel zero compulsion to chase new releases - I'm still working my way through older titles, saving me $$$ too. Maybe I'll get a PS5 when the PS6 comes out.

The only thing I am somewhat concerned about (and even that is a minor issue) is the trend of releasing unfinished games and also excessive DLC/microtransactions. But to be fair, games have barely inflated in price over the past couple decades, and I generally welcome the additional content - especially if they bundle everything into a 'Ultimate collection' a couple years down the line (which is when I usually buy my games anyway).

Finished my Main+Extras playthrough with about 12ish hours.

Bully was a mediocre experience, with a few laughs, and some great nostalgia moments.

The gameplay is subpar, feels like a collection of quick time events and simple mini games. It hasn't aged well.

The characters, writing and missions were really creative - that was the most enjoyable part.

7/10

— 09/02/2024 9:07 PM
Did errands for the kitchen lady and hide booze for the english teacher. MAde it into town and won the boxing championship. Preps tried t get out of paying me 1000 bucks so they gave me a coselation prize... a lighthouse. Feel I did alot better with that

Game crashed on me and there some wonky controls for the skateboarding. Also finding that the music overlaps with the audio and really like the some subtitles. With these issues still enjoyng the game and getting some laughs out of it
— 09/03/2024 7:47 PM
Not much today just did some jobs around the area
— 09/04/2024 9:47 PM
took pinky on a date, started the bike races and egged tads house
— 09/08/2024 9:27 PM
okay had one more session:

Defeated the preppies and reached the third chapter

So enjoying bully for what it is however there are some annoying outdated design choices which hampering the game for me. The big one is a lack of either an autosave or a universal save (i.e. save anywhere). My game has since crashed a extra two more times (in the last session). Luckily the first I had early on so didn't lose too much but the second I lost the last of the bike races and kart race so will have to repeat. Not sure the cause but it's putting a damper on the games fun.

The good however is I think this showed that it was possible to change the settings of the GTA games and it still worked. It's got the same style of humour as the old GTA games. Bit hit and miss some parts feel outdated but unlike Sunset overdrive I feel the humour can stand on it's own. Missions are short and work itself into the time frame between classes. The time functionality works well and punishes in a non determinant way for truancy (still possible to do things without the people getting in the way). I hope I can get through the game without losing too much progrss cause I am enjoying the game and looks I've made decent progress already in the game

Regarding the constant crashing, I would suggest getting the patch below. It fixed my crashing, also you can change FPS for smoother experience

https://github.com/CookiePLMonster/SilentPatchBully/releases

I'm playing my first session, and the school life nostalgia is hitting hard. I have a good feeling about this game from what I've experienced so far.

I do agree with other comments about missing QOL features. Also the camera seems kind of off - not sure if this is going to become a major annoyance, we shall find out!

FYI for people I link to the first game if there are remasters so things like the scholarship edition will not be displayed in your post but the original Bully will be. I can change this in the future if people would be prefer to invert it (i.e. link to the latest)

I am playing the Scholarship edition on PC so would prefer that.

The first thing I do when starting a game is to turn on subtitles, I'm better at reading than listening.

Definitely keen to check this one out!

Just as soon as I'm done with Wargroove 2.

Finished the game tonight. Played blind, but a few of the sections I looked up (reviving undead chicken - no idea how you're meant to work that one out from the vague ingame hints) and also 2 frustrating boss fights requiring trial and error to figure out mechanics (got sick of refilling faery jar and heart blessing every attempt so I looked them up as well).

Also got the colour outfits and the Koholit sword which was nice.

Pretty mediocre experience, same with every other Zelda game I've played (LTTP through to Twilight Princess HD).

I don't get why the series garners such high praise, the gameplay is formulaic (dungeon>keys>boss>repeat), the music though catchy gets repetitive, and the plot is juvenile.

The experiences weren't bad, just disappointingly average. Maybe the franchise just isn't for me.

7/10

I have mixed feelings about this. Don't you think it tends to trivialize a lot of things and makes the game a little too easy? Not that I'm a menuing addict :)

Nope not all all. I play games for fun and enjoyment, quality of life features go a long way to facilitate that.