New games I played this year:
Super Mario Bros.: Lost Levels - 1986, Famicom
Let’s not play. This game is absolutely terrible. So bad that they decided not to bring it over to North America after its original release and instead released ‘Super Mario USA’. The fundamental problem? The game basically just expects you to be psychic, requiring you to hit very obscure secret blocks in order to fulfill its challenge. It feels like it was designed by someone who decided the SMB1 was too accessible and easy, and made a game that would make you throw your controller out the window. It is Bad. Do not play it.
Why did I play it in 2023? Because I am very smart
Super Mario Wonder - 2023, Switch
Ooof. I did a full series replay before I played this game, and honestly the game is just lackluster in terms of its stage design, difficulty, and its powerups are nothing to write home about compared to previous games. Honestly I kinda forgot I even played it like two months later, and only remembered the next day after I was compiling a list of things I played this year.
The game obviously has a lot of love put into it. The animations are crisp, the music is nice (although the sounds are kinda weird), and I love that you can play as a diverse set of characters and the story isn’t just rehashed ‘save the princess’.
But Mario is a gameplay game and its stage design and powerups are the draw, and Wonder does not deliver.
Advance Wars 1: ReBoot Camp - 2023, Switch (original game 2001 for GBA)
Advance Wars 2: ReBoot Camp - 2023, Switch (original game 2003 for GBA)
These two are basically the same game. They feature the core mechanic of generic units, buildable units from a base, and minimal, rudimentary plot. The maps vary from “cool and interesting” to “holy shit these is way too long and grindy for an obvious outcome. The generals’ powers are fun but only a few really push into interesting.
2 gets the nod over 1 by virtue of having more playable characters and being more on the side of good maps rather than long and grindy, but not enough to move the needle all that much.
I’m not sure how much the reboots changed from the original games, since I never played them.
Dark Deity - 2022, Switch (original game 2021 for PC)
I dove into a variety of different SRPGs this year. Dark Deity models itself pretty directly off of GBA Fire Emblem, with a few major twists that make it different.
1. Dark Deity features more branching promotions and skills accompanying these promotions. Obviously FE8 started this but Dark Deity’s potential setups are much more elaborate.
2. It has a huge amount of supports available and allows you to build them by being in battle with the two characters, rather than the incredibly clunky GBA system where you have to have characters stand side-by-side in order to support.
3. While I don't think the game fully succeeds at its goal to create a compelling storyline, I do think that the game has some attempt to write a real plot as opposed to Advance Wars 1/2 which basically don’t.
My biggest beefs with the game is that a) the game’s balance doesn’t really keep up with your power level, and often combinations of the really good abilities can just overwhelm entire maps, b) the game’s writing, while there is a lot of it, most of it is pretty paint-by-numbers, and c) there are a lot of weird bugs and glitches that happen, especially the targeting which seems to be quite buggy.
It’s not as good as FE7/8, let alone later games in the series which improve on the FE formula, but it’s an interesting game and worth playing if you are invested in FE as a series.
Metal Gear Solid 3 - PS2, 2004
Honestly, Metal Gear Solid 3 would be a great game if I didn’t have to, you know, play it.
I hate stealth games. I hate sections in games that require stealth and pretty much always try to bash through any stealth sections if bashing through is a possiblity. So MGS3 is objectively a terrible game for me to play because it’s basically all stealth.
It’s an incredibly interesting game writing-wise. The first hour and the last hour are both absolutely show-stopping, very good, well-plotted, great plot twists. Unfortunately, the game does suffer from the important question of “When The Boss isn’t on screen, everyone should be asking, “Where is The Boss?” She’s a show stopper. A crazy, magnificient bastard. The cringe miniboss squad who can barely muster a gimmick, the incredibly gross General guy, get these bitches out of my face. Where is the Boss???
She is sensational. I love her. Her monologue at the beginning of the game when the other characters are explaining basic gameplay functions, while she’s explaining the nature of betrayal and the fleeting vision of ideology. Beautiful. 10/10. Chef’s kiss.
I like the main character as well. He’s fun and super socially awkward! The ending with him is very neat. Ocelot is funny once you realize he’s a total fucking ham. The comic chaaracter in the game that actually works!
The rest of the characters? Thumbs down honestly. The general guy is so generic and the quirky miniboss squad is just super lame. Eva is a very weird character but not a huge fan.
I can see why people like this game, but it’s very not for me.
Pokémon Scarlet - 2022, Switch
Pokemon Scarlet is probably the game on this list that I have the most trouble placing a ordinal ranking or score to, since I have pretty complex feelings on it.
Let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way; the game’s performance is total dogshit and the fact that it shipped in its unfinished state is totally wild. It really feels like it needed another six months or a year in the oven.
Past that, i think the game does quite a lot right. Nemona is an incredibly cute and endearing character, and I think having the rival be a mentor who is also just super nerdy about Pokemon is fun twist on the whole concept. It has a lot of other endearing characters too — the cute Eevee-stan Penny, the ever-loveable old man yaoi duo in Brassius and Hassel, and the delightful Rhimes. The cast is definitely my favorite in the series (admittedly a pretty low bar.) And Clive/Clavell got a few laughs out of me with his ridiculousness. The plot is silly but it’s Pokemon so whatever.
I enjoyed the idea of doing three different types of missions, rather than the rinse and repeat fighting Gym leaders thing that the old games do. I thought all three types of challenges were pretty fun, although I do think that the non-linear nature of the game means that you might potentially do things in a totally wacky order, which means that some things you will encounter will be unusually difficult and others quite easy. I ended up doing a small amount of FAQing just to have a guide about the levels of each challenge, and I felt like that was a good decision to increase my enjoyment of the game. I disapprove of this on general principle though.
One thing I really like about Scarlet is the availability of Pokemon which were often rare or hard to get in some earlier games. The Eevelutions, for example, you can catch in the field, which is a great change. Giving players access to a large amount of Pokemon without insane degrees of effort really suits my playstyle well, since I am old and too lazy to both with jumping through hoops to get a Pokemon. I also liked having prizes for fighting Trainers rather than making it required, so you could customize the length of your game reasonably well.
I thought that the Elite Four and the Champion and the rival fight afterwards were all quite enjoyable and kept me on my toes. I felt like it was in a good place challenge-wise and generally was quite happy with that portion of the game. The game after that… is honestly a little wacky. I still enjoyed the final dungeon and the banter between the characters but I felt like the balance was a little off in terms of encounters there.
I feel like the game scratched my Pokemon itch for a while. Fun game, lots of really fun content, but I don’t really feel the need to revisit or play its DLC.
Mario + Rabbids: The Sparks of Hope - 2022, Switch
Sliding in finishing this the last two days of December! After playing the first Mario + Rabbids game a few years ago and being very impressed with it, I decided to pick up its sequel.
One thing that I think sequels can suffer from is feeling too derivative and not branching out enough. I don’t think this problem applies to Rabbids - it feels like it adds enough ripples to the battle system that the game feels distinct from its predecessor. The freer movement system, the Dash system being revamped so you can repeatedly attack the same enemy, the Team Jump mechanic having a real-time aspect, and the Sparks as equippable party resources all feel like features that make the battles feel different than the first game’s.
The quality of life improvement of both allowing Mario to be removed from the party and also just allowing us access to more characters earlier in the game. It also doesn’t have incredibly late joinining PCs like Yoshi, or dysfunctional ones like Rabbid Yoshi. The worst offender is in the other direction — not sure what they were thinking with Rabbid Rosalina, who seems like the clear gameplay designer pet character with the multitarget Stop move and the gatling gun attack that easily destroys cover. But the playable characters do all feel distinct, and you get to play as Bowser in the this game!
Now, is Rabbids 2 a better game than 1 overall? That’s a different question altogether. I felt that the game is less tactical than 1, even on the highest difficulty. It’s strange that they added a Hard mode and then made it easier than the first game’s Normal mode, although it’s not that dramatic. Much like the first game, it has maps with variable goals, which is a personal favorite thing of mine, but 2’s feel a little more trivial to fulfill. I’m a little sad that the Toad rescue missions haven’t returned, for all that they can be rather infuriating. I think the extra movement freedom makes the game slower, which is a negative in my book, and the map design isn’t as crisp or well-thought out as the first game.
Its plot is still what you’d expect from a Mario and Rabbids crossover — mostly filler, frequently humorous, and periodically cringe.
The game is still fundamentally enjoyable. It’s still tactical and engaging and has cool maps. I don’t think it quite lives up to the first game but the first game is one of my favorite SRPGs for gameplay of all time, so that’s not really an insult. The game is merely ‘pretty good’, rather than great. And I respect that it doesn’t feel like it is just the same game as the first.
Fire Emblem: Engage - 2023, Switch
Rise from a thousand years ago!
If Rabbids breaks away from its predecessor by implementing minor mechanical changes on top of a core base idea, Fire Embem: Engage radically departs from the previous game, with a mix of fresh and innovative gameplay ideas with the Emblem and Ring equipment system, and harkening back to yesteryear with its simple good vs. evil plotlines. You know my opinion on the predecessor so we can just skip to the point that I like it less, which is the most predictable thing of all time.
Much like Rabbids 2, I started the game on the highest difficulty. Unlike Rabbids 2, the game’s maps feel plotted with a great degree of intention. Each map feels like you as the player have to put a lot of thought into the strategy that you need to employ to win. There are a few maps that fall flat (Chapter 22), but overall I think the game has a lot of engaging maps that keep you on your toes without feeling grindy or excessively difficult. The Rewind mechanic (whatever it is called in this iteration) is always a great boon and sets it above old games in the series. I think the map design is stellar, second only to Conquest in the series.
The Emblems have an interesting warping effect on the gameplay, in that the characters with Emblems feel much more powerful than their allies, which for me is something that I dislike since I like characters to have roughly the same powers and to be able to be compared to each other. I think making the non-Emblem rings give great stat bonuses (and please not ran by gacha!!!). I also think that Canter and Canter+ are overcentralizing abilities and the characters that you can grab those for early are at a great advantage.
The character balance of the game is interesting. It feels like most of the Part 2 joining characters are just more powerful than the ones who join early in the game. Alfred is terrible, Diamant is mid, and Ivy and Hortensia kinda own your mages/healers from Part 1. It’s a bit of a baffling choice. One notable exception is that if you can grab Canter on someone before Chapter 11, it is great to do so and it makes that character better! When I used Clanne that’s what I ended up doing, and while he’s not an amazing PC, at least he can move two squares after acting for longer than other people! Hooray.
Only having two skills slots is definitely a bummer in this system, particularly because Canter will realistically occupy one of them since it’s both very powerful to change position after attacking, and also because it’s a fun ability to use compared to Speed +5 or whatever.
The plot is pretty dreadful. It veers beyond the Mario + Rabbids territory of irreverrence and unseriousness into “wow, this game takes itself 100% seriously and yet I do not understand how anyone could deliver something so cringe with a straight face.” It has a few good characters; I like Ivy and Citrinne and Yunaka pretty well, I think Fogado and Timerra are very endearing, but honestly I don’t think even Ivy really compares to the best characters in old games. The supports are boring and tropey. The Emblem introduction scenes actually make me want to crawl in a hole. “Shine on, Emblem of Beginnings”. Please just, put me out of my misery.
The character designs are hit and miss. Citrinne slaps, but I can’t say I’m into Pepsi-chan.
The game is pretty good despite the plot being a disaster. The second time through was better because I pressed the sceneskip button liberally.
at this point i kinda got tired of writing so....
Theatrhythm - Final Bar Line - 2023, Switch
It’s the same old Theatrhythm. I’m not even sure the game is worth putting on this list, considering that it’s basically the same as the other two games but has some extra characters and new songs. But I paid full price for it, goddammit, and played entirely too many hours of it, so here it goes. Final Fantasy music still rules face.
This Way Madness Lies - 2023, Switch
Next up is a game that was made in a test tube to make me specifically happy. It’s a game where all the playable characters are women, men barely exist, there are silly Shakespeare references, and all the characters dress in brightly colored themed outfits.
The premise is quite fun and the story, while nothing to write home about, moves the game along quite nicely.
The gameplay is very fun! The game manages to balance out the abilities and make the battle system that Zeboyd has been iterating on for the past several games to feel fresh and endearing. The characters all feel distinct from each other and each feels fun to play as. It’s about 10 hours long, which I think is a good length for the style of game. The enemies on the higher difficulties are both quite challenging and you have to be deliberate and thoughtful about how you fight against them. I really like the ‘Trait’ system, where you can choose abilities to use, balancing out the skill(s) that it buffs (sometimes they buff status attack, sometimes ice attack, sometimes they make a specific skill better) with the stats that it gives.
I would say my two biggest complaints are the fact that they got rid of the turn gauge (very weird, considering that CSC had it), and the fact that statuses are hard to see from the ally side. I think it is not as informative as it could be and the game suffers from that.
Otherwise, the game is a delightful romp! I played the NG+ on the highest difficulty as well and it was quite challenging. Very fun game. Would recommend.
Bravely Default 2 - 2021, Switch
If you like job systems games, this one is a banger! Thery took the same basic format of the previous games (the Brave and Default systems allowing you to adjust your turn order, job system), and added each character getting a turn as they come rather than traditional turn-based combat. I definitely think that it makes the game better than the previous two games because the gameplay is more dynamic and you can respond to threats more readily.
The skill system is dynamic and fun to combine with other skills. The game’s class balance isn’t perfect but many of the jobs are quite fun to use and experiment with. I played on Hard mode which challenges you to utilize your resources in the best ways possible. I really liked it!
The plot is serviceable. I like Elvis and think he’s a total riot. Everyone else I could take or leave, but the plot doesn’t really shit itself or anything.
Graphics are definitely nicer than the previous two games, but I’d still prefer to see them upgrade to a more modern style.
Metroid Dread - 2021, Switch
Metroid Dread combines all the things that make Metroid good (exploration, cool upgrades, well-designed bosses) and avoids the pitfalls (weird misfire bosses, too much grinding). It’s a great game — not too short, not to long — and it is really just throughly enjoyable to play from start to finish. I really enjoyed the Chozo Solider fights and the final boss slaps. The game’s plot is pretty mid, but who cares, it’s a romp. Maybe one day Metroid will have good plot, but I wouldn’t count on it. The game also looks quite nice for what it is, which obviously is not super fancy but very stylish!
Love this game!!!! If you like Metroidvanias, it’s the best I’ve ever played!!!
