Recent reviews by AviYinglet

Bought this to play with friends after learning it'd be delisted soon. 28 hours in we're still encountering UI problems that prevent us from successfully joining the same convoy and racing in events together; it just got to be too much, so we've quit in favor of other/better games. Flatout 2's OpenSpy implementation is more stable, and you can get into a race MUCH quicker.

Once you do get into a race it's fine, the problem is the window dressing surrounding the races is insufferable, unskippable(?!), and there's way too much of it (constantly taking control away from you to have the blandest people from a J. Crew catalog enthusiastically tell you about exciting events). When you finish a race in co-op you don't get to review your times or fastest laps, it's just point values based on placement, removing a thing that can encourage refinement and friendly competition in favor of saying "You won!". Is this intentional?

I might pick this up again to play singleplayer at some point, but in the meantime I'll be on the lookout for modern racers that have a better understanding of what's actually good about them.

VRChat has been massively beneficial to me in a social sense; it's given me the ability to talk face-to-face with others during weekly gatherings for my friend group, just catching up with people and telling them about my recent goings-on. While I had no personal need for the accessibility and optimization features afforded by client mods, several of my friends do, and now they can't attend because of VRChat's implementation of Easy Anti-Cheat. There is no excuse that justifies blocking all user mods outright. Because of this, while I recommend social VR in general, I can't recommend using VRChat until either its development studio acknowledges the needs of its userbase or its functionality is implemented elsewhere.

I'm in the middle of playing the Analgesic Productions' games in release order after being utterly wowed by the original Anodyne; I found Even the Ocean to be a mechanically surprising and thoughtful experience! I enjoyed its aesthetic depictions of man-made architecture at odds with nature, its story's willingness to portray social issues and personal struggles experienced by its main characters and the cultures surrounding them, and its choice to depict its simultaneously bizarre and familiar world in a down-to-earth and relatable way. The game comes with the ability to experience its individual gameplay styles isolated from another, depending on what you'd consider your cup of tea; as a 2D platformer it's reasonably challenging and chill, as an exploration/story game it's beautiful, serene, and sorrowful, as a complete package it's more than the sum of its parts.

Watch Dogs 2's campaign is secondary to the experience of roaming around its simulated Bay Area, getting into impromptu adventures, and interacting with its people. IMO that's a good thing, its story is centrist pop-culture snark roleplaying as leftist hacktivism; in my experience it doesn't diminish from the fun of moving around and finding new things. It's also greatly helped by the personality of its main character, which shines through even if you treat the story as background noise.

It's been years and the game still hasn't exhausted its mechanical value for me. Sometimes I'll fire it up with the goal of seeing some new scenery, racing through the wilderness, taking some selfies, finding a nice outfit, or inconspicuously ruining the day of some demonstrably awful person. Whether by accident or not, this game is great at supporting the generation of these stories, and it seems like it'll be a while before anything comes out that does a better job.

Anodyne is happy to leave you with the impression that it's a quirky little trip (and deserving of appreciation/analysis on that front) but also very willing to reward observation; its mechanics are simple for a top-down action game, and it tells its story in bits and pieces with wide gaps for the audience to fill in on their own. Combined, these aspects result in a campaign that's practically free of filler material, assuming you like what's on the surface to begin with and are willing to trust that the game knows what it's doing. I personally did on both fronts, and I now consider it one of my favorite games of all time.

My best hours with this were spent cautiously exploring new areas and sparring with difficult bosses (the DLC was especially great for this); my worst were spent grinding for resources and not knowing where or how to proceed. I still appreciated its lack of straightforwardness most of the time, considering in comparison how insistent many modern games are to restrict your ability to venture off the beaten path and make big mistakes. I don't think its approach is ideal, though; there's very little guidance on how to spec a character, and the lack of a respec utility had me questioning in the late-game whether I was dead-ending myself with my DEX build. Still, I was able to make it through, which should prepare me well for the next time I visit its world.

Super-quick experience built to get in, out, and leave an impression; despite that, the story is more upfront than I thought it'd be. I bought it for the art style, but the more appealing part of it ended up being the act of fullscreening it and letting it take me where it wanted to go.

Played this 2-player cooperatively/locally. The action is hectic and filled with interesting cooperative challenges that don't outstay their welcome, enough that we leapt into secondary level objectives immediately after credits rolled. My only real complaint (and it's not much of one) is that the dialogue is occasionally crude and overly referential, but like the recognizable elements in its soundtrack, it's complemented by more than enough craft and originality that it was hard for me to personally fault.

Windlands is still a satisfying ride in 2021, a colorful 3D platformer with easy-to-pick-up swinging mechanics and a brief (but sprawling) campaign that teaches you how to manage momentum to a surprising level of depth. It's also a pretty good way to get your VR sea legs, since over the course of my time with it (all comfort options turned off) I went from having to play in 20-minute segments (before I'd get too tense and borderline-nauseous) to spending over an hour in the game per session without difficulty. (Played using a Samsung Odyssey+ with WMR controllers.)

Getting Over It is a meditative experience that will either test or build your patience, depending on how you approach it. The game is an obstacle course where your control method and limitations are made clear from the start, and are consistent the entire way through; the only character growth to be had is in the level of finesse with which you learn to maneuver through this game. The experience of completing it will either be immensely satisfying or incredibly frustrating. My advice is to do it not for the reward at the top, or for bragging rights; do it for your own personal satisfaction, and only if you feel like meeting this challenge will provide that for you.

If you're capable of making quick, precise movements with your mouse (or trackpad), can deal with a little bit of playful antagonism, and are willing to accept several dozen instances of complete and total loss of progress (my first playthrough was ~16 hours -- definitely on the higher end of the spectrum), it is absolutely worth the full cost. I personally beat it earlier today; at the moment, I feel unstoppable.