Guardians of the Galaxy

• I was a little worried after the not so great Avengers game, but GOTG turned out to be one of the best games of the year.
• This is not a GaaS game, it's a single player adventure game that's a mixture of Uncharted and Mass Effect that lasts around 20 hours and has a new game plus mode.  
• The characters' voice actors are not the ones from the movies and honestly I think I prefer the game's voices to the movie actors.  I really liked their take on Drax. In the movies he's basically used as comic relief, but in the game he comes across as very intelligent and you really get to know his personality and what motivates him.  The same is true for all the characters as you find different mementos during a mission and when you return back to your ship you can choose to have a lengthy  dialogue and learn about each member of the group. 
• There is a lot of dialog in the game.  In the whole 20 hours it took me to finish there may have been 10 minutes where no one was talking.  I enjoyed the dialog and thought the writing was very well done. 
• You only play as Star-Lord which may sound disappointing, but the game feels like a leader simulator where your actions and dialog choices seem to have a huge effect on how the story and gameplay turns out so only playing as one character makes sense. 
• In combat Star-Lord has guns that do minimal damage with some modifiers that can affect the enemies in different ways, but the majority of the damage comes from your teammates and the actions you have them perform.   Since you are more of a commander than a powerful fighter it makes the fast paced combat interesting and somewhat tactical on the harder difficulties.  At certain points during combat you can assemble the whole group and can give them a pep talk. 
• Amazing graphics. It maybe the best looking game and the soundtrack is awesome. 
• The whole game is top notch and really shouldn't be missed. It was developed by the makers of the Deus Ex series so hopefully they will be able to continue that franchise for their next game.

Switch OLED

• I told myself I wasn't going to buy one since there were only minimal improvements from my original Switch.  I was going on vacation ​two week​s​ which meant time on a plane, so somehow I convinced myself to get the new Switch and I'm glad I did.
• I do like OLED screens and on the Switch it makes a huge difference as having true blacks and great contrast makes the graphics pop off the screen.  
• The screen is only marginally larger, but it feels bigger and it seems to be the perfect size for a handheld console. 
• They did update the battery in later Switches and the OLED uses the same one, but since I had the original Switch the extra battery life was very noticeable.  I got around 5 hours playing Metroid which was great.
• On the original Switch I found that my hands would cramp after 15 minutes of playtime so I bought a device that made the Switch a bit bigger.   The new Switch is a tad longer so it wouldn't fit in that device, but for some reason I didn't have any issues cramping on the new one and at times I played for a couple of hours straight. 
• The new dock has an ethernet port in it but since I don't play online it isn't that big of a deal and I didn't notice any faster downloading of games when I had it plugged in.  I bought an additional dock for my older Switch last year and luckily it works on the new one.
• Moving my data from my old Switch to the new one was the only downside and it's still surprising how backward Nintendo is on the software side.
• I wasn't sure that I was going to keep the new Switch so I didn't choose the option to completely move all of my data from the old to the new and moving it in pieces is a pain.
• If you subscribe to the online service then your saves are stored in the cloud and can be moved easily, otherwise they are stored on the internal storage and since they can't be moved to the Sd​ ​card moving them manually is a huge pain.  They use near field communication to send the save files so the Switches have to be close together.  Also you can only move one game at a time.  On the old machine you select the game and then select send, then on the other Switch you have to select receive.  The transfer takes about 10 seconds then you have to go through all the menus again.  Notice I keep saying moved as you can't copy your save to the new machine, they are deleted off the other Switch after the copy is successful.  Moral of the story, sign up for a month of the online service for $5 if you have a lot of game saves to move.
• Another backwards thing is that I had an sd card with a lot of games stored and you can't move the sd card to your new Switch without formatting it so I had to download all of the games again.  Ugh......
• Other than that I am really enjoying my Switch and I am happy I upgraded.  

 

It Takes Two, Legacy Bowl

  It Takes Two(Xbox Series X)

• The game is about a family that is at the point of divorce and the effects it has on their daughter. She finds a magic book and unknowingly turns her parents into dolls that sets them on a quest to return to their normal bodies and maybe rekindle their love on the way.
• From that description you are probably not excited or interested in this game and you would miss out on the best game of the year.  
• It's co-op only so you will need a partner on the journey, but only one person has to buy the game, the other person can play for free by downloading the friend's pass version. My only gripe is that the game is not cross-platform compatible. 
• I've played the developer's previous games, Brothers and A Way Out, which were both great games, but this game is just on another level. 
• The game starts off a bit slow as it sets up the story, but once the gameplay begins it's a thrill ride for the next 16 hours. 
• The world is like the Honey I Shrunk the Kids movies or the new grounded game where you get to experience it from a different perspective.  I was amazed at the number of levels in the game and each one was unique  and the amount of creativity felt like you were playing multiple games.
• Since it's co-op each character has different abilities that you need to combine to traverse the environment, solve puzzles, and succeed in combat.  Each level you receive different abilities so you are constantly doing something different and the game never becomes stale. 
• There are mini-games to find in the world which pit you and your partner against each other for really no other reason than bragging rights, but each time we found one we were compelled to play to win.  
• The combat encounters are awesome, especially the boss fights which leads me to another discussion about the story. 
• The story is about divorce which itself is a bit depressing, but this game gets dark, really dark.  During some of the boss fights we were laughing hysterically because what we were doing was so horrific that it was the only way to cope with what we were forced to do.  I still have nightmares....

Legacy Bowl(Steam)

• I subscribed to the EA game service for one year so I got to play the new Madden game on PC and just like always, I was kind of meh.
• It looks good, but not much has changed in the gameplay department and I'm not interested in buying packs of ultimate team cards which I think is the main issue with the stagnation of Madden. 
• I saw a review for this new football game and decided to give it a try and it's great and it has features Madden still doesn't have.  Can you believe it has Refs on the field??
• It's basically a reboot of Tecmo bowl with better AI and actual strategy. It's not licensed by the NFL, but on the game's discord channel you can download a mod that adds the NFL to the game so you'll have all the teams and players. 
• The play calling screen feels like Madden with tons of plays for offense and defense with an ask the coach option as well.  
• Since it's sprite based the game is quick and responsive.  Passing, running, and playing defense all feels good. Kicking is a bit tricky with the quick moving meter that caused me to miss a couple of kicks but everything just feels right.  
• The AI is good. The first couple of games I lost by 3 points each with both me and the CPU having realistic stats.  
• The game is missing a Franchise mode which is a bit of a bummer but you can play a full season which is still fun.  
• The game was in early access for awhile and just fully released a couple of weeks ago on PC so now that more people are playing there have been more feedback so there have been a couple of patches that have made the game even better.
• If you get the football itch and have a PC give this game a try for $20 you won't be disappointed. 

Resident Evil Village (PC)

• Sequel to the excellent Resident Evil 7
• Same first person camera perspective as RE7 and is the best playing Resident Evil game as the movement is fast and responsive and the shooting feels great.
  
• More action than RE7, but not as scary unfortunately.  A couple of jump scares, some enemies will chase you around the levels at times, and a couple of creepy locations, but nothing like RE7.  One caveat though, if you are a hand model then stay away from this game as it will freak you out.  
• The game looks great and the performance was pretty good. I had an issue where the  game would open up on my second screen for no reason which would mess up my HDR settings so I would have to redo the HDR  setup and that happened about 6 different times.  I also had a couple of massive frame rate hits in some mini-boss fights.  
• I like all the characters and the new merchant is great and of course the Tall Vampire Lady is awesome.   
• Tip:  Don't sell any of the meat you get, give it to the merchant and he'll cook you some nice meals.  
• I've never been a fan of the enemy transformations the characters go through when they are infected and turn into a boss character and this game doesn't change that.  They all have these weird tentacles and such and they are never very scary. 
• The enemies are varied and fun to fight and be sure to let each one of them kill you at least once so you can see the cool death animations. 
• The default difficulty was a good challenge.  There was one area that went on for a bit too long and had you fight too many enemies in a tight space that I was glad when it was over.   
• I completed the game in around 12 hours which is a decent length.  
• Definitely recommend the game. 

Mass Effect Legendary Edition (PC)

• The Mass Effect series was one of my favorites in the Xbox 360/PS3 era so I was excited to play through the trilogy again.  
• I replayed the first one a couple of years ago with a mod that let you use a controller on the PC version and I'm glad they added that feature to the remaster on PC.  
  
• They did a decent job of improving the graphics and the addition of HDR really makes the game look great especially with all neon and the views in space.
• The first game was more RPG than action shooter so the combat was always a bit clunky and they've improved it somewhat, but it's still not that great.  Your teammates are useless and will die pretty quickly even though you can tell them where to go. 
• I changed to the easy difficulty so I could get through the story which is the best part of the first game.  
  
• I'm about 3/4 the way through the first game so I haven't tried the 2nd or 3rd game yet as I don't want to spoil anything.  
• For new EA games you can sign up for the Origin Plus for $15 a month and play the game for a cheap price if it's something you will never play again. 

Ratchet and Clank: A Rift Apart (PS5)

• The first thing you notice is the awesome graphics.  I'm playing on the 30fps Fidelity mode since I want all the bells and whistles  and it's amazing.  There is so much detail in every scene and the world is dense with a ton of things happening in the background.  I haven't tried out the 60fps modes, but I haven't had any issues with 30fps as it feels very smooth. 
  
• The gameplay doesn't drastically change from the previous games which is a good thing as they always played and felt great.  You still get crazy weapons that have a ton of upgrade options and I like the instructional video you get for each new weapon as the voice over is really funny.  
• The big thing in the marketing was the rifts and how you would go through them and be in a totally different area with no loading.  The no loading is cool, but so far I really haven't used them that much. They are also in the combat arenas, but they feel like a grappling gun more than anything else.  I've only played a couple of hours so maybe they are used more farther into the game.  
• I was playing at a higher difficulty, but turned it down to the default after a couple of hours since it felt like the enemies were mainly bullet sponges and at the default difficulty it just felt better. I was also having a hard time knowing where I was getting hit and from what direction as there were usually a lot of enemies on the screen all around you. 
• The controller is put to good use as each gun  feels different when you pull the triggers.  There are also slight rumbles throughout the game that really add to the immersiveness, much like the rain you feel in Returnal. 
• When you play as Clank it's mainly puzzle sections that you are able to skip if you don't like them which is a nice feature. 
• The game is $70 which can leave a huge hole in your wallet, but I used BB reward points to lower the price.  
• Overall I'm enjoying the game, but it's not that much different from the older games so unless you want something new to play on your PS5 or really love the series I would give this a wait till it goes on sale.