RedShell

Nice! Thanks a lot for sharing. That was a fascinating read, if somewhat depressing too. Man, I really do miss the golden era of quirky video games. Also, I wasn't actually aware of Sony's part in all of that, guess I shouldn't be surprised though. Didn't think it was possible for me to dislike that pretentious company more than I already do, but here we are.

For anyone that might be interested (but perhaps not that interested ) this game has recently been made available on Game Pass.

Absolutely hate this trend on PC, so stupid. I already have Steam as it's where the majority of my games are, Xbox for Game Pass stuff, Epic Games for the freebies and GOG Galaxy because it actually offers some cool features and is attempting (at least) to unify things. But I have zero desire to install EA, Ubisoft, Rockstar or any other superfluous launcher on my PC. I'd actually prefer to just not play their games.

Been a while since my last update and I've re-subbed to Game Pass since then too, so got quite a bit to add. Slime Rancher: A game where you go around vacuuming up various slime creatures (and their poos) in order to expand and upgrade the storage for even more slimes and consequently... more slime poos. Yeah, weird game, but it was all very cute and also reminded me of Eledees on the Wii which I loved. Nothing spectacular about it really, but a nice game to relax with. Psychonauts 2: This one was a very nice surprise indeed. I'd previously made several attempts to play the original Psychonauts but struggled to get into it, no such problem with the sequel though, it was an absolute joy to play from start to finish! Amazing presentation, very funny (it actually had me in tears at some points ) and the gameplay was really enjoyable too. Enjoyed it so much, in fact, that I even stuck with it post-credits to get all of the collectables for 100% completion. Wouldn't be at all surprised if this were to end up being game of the year. Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales: My addiction to Gwent continues! Yeah, I thought it would be cool to play a single player story based game built entirely around Gwent battles, but unfortunately I didn't do enough research before buying this, and it turned out that the gameplay was quite a bit different to standard Gwent. A lot of battles were actually puzzles to solve and even the standard games were confusing due to cards having the same appearance but changed abilities from the multiplayer game. I ended up playing through on easy and skipping a lot of battles as a result, but I got the game on sale and it unlocked lots of stuff for Gwent, so it wasn't a complete let-down. The Forgotten City: This caught my attention when browsing what was available on Game Pass one day and while not really my kind of game in terms of genre, I did still quite enjoy it. Managed to get 3 out of the 4 possible endings, but despite the developers streamlining the process whenever you restart, things just got too repetitive for me to go for the 4th. Very impressive how this game was made by a handful of people though. It is a bit rough around the edges but considering the nature of the game it's a fantastic achievement for such a small development team. Zombie Army 4: Dead War: Originally my Halloween game this year was going to be Back 4 Blood, which I did start playing but after a few missions in both single player and co-op I wasn't really enjoying it all that much. Then I discovered this game and well, let's just say I never looked back. I found Zombie Army 4 to be infinitely more enjoyable, the style of the game is just so much better, the zombies, the humour, the way it plays, everything about it was super entertaining. It's like RE4's Mercenaries mode but on steroids! Really fun game. Forza Horizon 5: And last but certainly not least, Horizon 5, which I have been absolutely glued to recently. Initially the wow factor wasn't quite there, as it all felt very similar to Horizon 4, but the more I played, the better it got, and I have to say this is undoubtedly one of the best racing games ever! Super exhilarating stuff, I frequently get goose bumps during the more intense races! The sense of speed is frankly insane, the visuals are stunning and the gameplay is spot-on. It feels so good just to drive around. The amount and variety of cars on offer is also truly impressive (500+ I believe) and I was not expecting to see things like the DMC DeLorian or the 1977 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am of Smokey and the Bandit fame! I particularly love how every car is potentially viable too thanks to the custom tuning system, you can even soup-up a Reliant Robin three-wheeler so it does over 200 Mph! Just good luck keeping it on the road. It's not all turbocharged three-wheelers though there are some annoying bugs here and there, plus various issues with online play, and for a game set in Mexico an alarming lack of Mariachi. But yeah, everything else is just so great that it's easy to overlook the few negatives. I'll be playing this game for quite some time I reckon. Quick word on the Animal Crossing New Horizons v2.0 update, which has got me using my Switch and checking in on my island on a daily basis again. Such a fantastic update! There is so much new stuff to experience that it actually feels like paid DLC. Have been loving it. As for the actual paid DLC (Happy Home Paradise) well I've not picked that up yet, but with how much there already is in the 2.0 update anyway I'm more than happy to wait a while.

Well, so far I've purchased the best (most hilarious) looking car I could find, tuned it to a ludicrous level of performance considering its appearance, and found an excellent spot on the map to drive it off at insanely high speed: So I'm pretty happy with the game. Oh yeah, messed about with the custom livery thing a little bit too... Pay attention to my custom number plate before and after that jump.

Yeah, absolutely incredible news! Never thought they would be able to get it back from Sony. Now I just really hope they have a PC version planned.

Holy shit! That is fantastic news, thanks for the heads up. Really hope with Q-Games having the rights back they will bring it over to PC now as well.

Top-notch video @Glen-i & @Dcubed! That Sudden Death montage. Great comedic timing and nice use of camera angles too. I'm always impressed by stuff like that, knowing how cumbersome the editing feature is in Ultimate. Just the fact that you need to manually convert replays to video was enough to put me off ever really using it. No rewind either, which obviously doesn't help. And worst of all, no custom stages allowed. I do hope they keep the feature in Smash Bros. going forward though, just with a lot of improvements.

I didn't get FP2, so half of these opinions are based solely on playing against the 2nd set of characters and stealing their abilities as Kirby. Previous rankings in italics: Looking back now I'm really glad I didn't purchase the 2nd Fighters Pass. And while it is a bit of a shame to not have the complete version of Ultimate, I'm happy with the base game and some of the DLC at least. Speaking of... shout out to the only DLC announcement (other than Stage Builder) for me to ever get excited about during a Smash Ultimate Direct, the Goemon Mii costume! Gutted that it was only a Mii costume (no music track either, which is just crazy!), but I guess understandable given the current (and very unfortunate) circumstances of the Goemon series. The Bomberman and Cuphead costume reveals were cool moments too, but seeing "Goemon" finally arrive in Smash Bros. made this old fart very happy indeed.

I might have actually been tempted if the Animal Crossing DLC was included as a bonus that you got to permanently keep, but as it stands I'm in no hurry to subscribe to Switch Online again, Expansion Pack or standard. It is interesting how no online retailers appear to have codes available for the expansion though, what with it launching so soon now. I wonder if Nintendo has delayed distribution on purpose in order to maximise their initial profits? As if they won't be making enough profit with that ridiculous price increase!

Ever get around to doing that 3D mode playthrough you were planning?

Can't say for sure if this one is the best starting point, although I'd only ever played 1 of the mainline DQ games before playing this and I enjoyed it just fine. As for where to play it, well if portability isn't a big deal for you then I absolutely recommend avoiding the Switch version and getting it on PS4/5. The Switch version is very good, but again, unless you specifically want to play it on the go, then having a crisper image, smoother frame rate and possibly faster load times too (they were lightning fast on PC ) is much nicer.

That was a great newcomer party, cheers everyone! Shame it’s the very last one for Smash Ultimate, but they’ve all been a lot of fun. Glad people enjoyed my custom stage too. The fact that it kills all players at the end (making it a lottery as to who wins) is harsh, but undoubtedly amusing.

I'd love to see a fight between canon size Olimar and Ridley.

Ok, Vampire Waluigi is the greatest thing since London bus driver Waluigi. This almost makes up for him being snubbed by Smash Bros. Tell you what though, if he ever makes it into a future version of Smash then they are absolutely set for alt costumes.