I am maybe 5-6 hours into this game and while I love Monster Hunter to death (it's in my top 5 game franchises of all time) I simply cannot recommend this game in it's current state.

On my RTX 3080 Ti and i7-12700K the game is almost completely unplayable with the highest texture settings at 4K w/ DLSS on Ultra Performance. 1440p runs "Ok" with "High" textures which look on par with Monster Hunter Tri. Totally unacceptable.

Wait for performance patches before picking this one up - there are definitely some major issues with texture streaming here.

You just outta da crib, kid! Go suck yo momma's milk! 10/10

Leg's go Lan!

Gameplay and story are superb, and the writing can be quite funny at times! Love a game that doesn't take itself too seriously. One of the characters even comments on a mechanical flaw in the game, coming close to breaking the fourth wall. Such a great time!

The only con is that there should have been able to teleport to portals you have been to before to eliminate some of the backtracking. Aside from the that I have no complaints! Excellent game overall, and if you are interested in playing Sabotage Studio's next game, "Sea of Stars", then know that this game takes place in the same world, but in the far future.

Artistically speaking this game has some of the most beautiful pixel graphics I've ever seen, especially in 16-bit mode.

Highly recommended!

I first played MapleStory in December 2004. Back in those days, each town was teeming with life! It didn't really matter what you were doing - if you were buying potions, grinding monsters, completing quests, traveling around, or even just sitting still, odds were that at least a few people would cross paths with you. MapleStory did an excellent job at encouraging players to work together with fun and rewarding party quests. My favorite party quests, the monster carnival, pitted two teams of players against each other in a pseudo-PvP mode where you raced against the other party to kill as many monsters as you could before time ran out, and there were plenty of buffs you could get for your own team and debuffs you could cast on your opponent. Some of the greatest memories I have come from those duels. Each class was quite distinct from each other and while there were a few that were less balanced than others in terms of damage output and maneuverability, all were fun to play in their own right. Each server had a vibrant economy, with literally hundreds of players in the "free-market" at all hours of the day trying to buy and sell. The cash shop offered stores that you could leave open to sell items for you while you were offline. New content updates added new regions, monsters, and party quests that were always a joy to explore. Unfortunately, around 2010 a controversial update known as "Big Bang" was released, which re-organized the world map cutting out a lot of fan-favorite areas (R.I.P. Henesys Hunting Ground) and introduced a new system called Miracle Cubes. Up until this point, the only way to upgrade your gear was by using scrolls, a rare item dropped extremely rarely that would give you the chance to upgrade your gear. A 10% chance scroll would offer a large boost, whereas a 100% scroll would offer a small boost of maybe only a single stat point or two. With miracle cubes, which you have to spend real money on, you are able to re-roll up to three additional slots on your weapons stats. There's not much inherently wrong with this system, but the bonuses offered by these cubes cannot compare to what you could achieve before. Each slot can potentially give a bonus of +12% in a stat. Players that spent money on cubes were in another league than everyone else. This pretty much ruined the balance of the game and split the community down the middle. Not only that, but Nexon continued to disincentivize players from partying up. They implemented an EXP decrease if you were in a party with someone else and reduced the experience gain from party quests. New updates brought free, instant teleportation between continents (more or less) which pretty much meant that you wouldn't meet as many people as you were traveling from town to town. Solo-grinding became the fastest most efficient way to level up, so areas of the game that used to be brimming with life are now literal ghost-towns. MapleStory was once an excellent MMORPG, but now it is just a husk of it's former self. If you're able to find friends to play this game with, it might still be worth playing, but ask anyone, the glory days of this game are far, far, behind us.

You're a transfer high-school student who gets wrapped up in a murder mystery. While balancing your social life, your studies, and your friendships you must also investigate a mysterious dimension that only you and your new friends are able to access. In this parallel dimension you must fight "shadows" or the physical manifestations of twisted human emotions in order to save the next victim before they're murdered.

To combat the ever increasing threat of the shadows you must fuse your Personas together to form new more powerful ones. Newly fused Personas inherit skills from the old, allowing you to craft a party to fit a specific role. It's up to you to craft Personas that gel with your party members, whether it be by enhancing their offense/defense, casting debuffs on the enemy, covering their weaknesses, or a mix of the three. Chaining together "super-effective" moves is crucial to gaining the upper-hand in battle. When each enemy is knocked down, you can perform an "All-out-attack" with your teammates for massive damage. Combat is designed to be quick and responsive, and almost makes the game feel like an action game at times when you're giving your team orders in quick succession. The combat essentially boils down to Pokemon on steroids, and it's great fun.

When you're out of battle, the story progresses like a visual novel except you get to decide on what activities your character partakes in. Each of these choices can either augment your social stats, unlocking more opportunities for yourself, or increase your "social links" which serve as a measure of your bond with any specific characters.

Building bonds with your teammates unlocks different buffs and abilities for them in the "other world" as well as giving bonus EXP when fusing new Personas. The overwhelming majority of these bonding activities are much more rewarding than you might initially expect, with most social links actually tackling some mature issues.

The localization is phenomenal, and characters are voiced masterfully. The music is super catchy, emotional, and will be stuck in your head long after completing the game. The conclusion to this story is incredibly satisfying.

The only cons I really have are that it sometimes is annoying trying to run to each and every social link/activity. The "investigation" portions of the game are just pointless and you should look up a guide, but thankfully they only amount to a day or two in-game and you can quickly breeze through them. When you get "Skill level up" cards, sometimes your single-target skills can be changed to multi-target which can be frustrating. There are certain books that you can only acquire on certain days, so look up a guide if you want to get the achievement on your first play through. Yes, this game has a New Game+ which allows you to transfer over your social stats and compendium. If you're going for all achievements without cheating, this could take you potentially 2-3 play throughs if you don't use your time wisely.

If any of this sounds even remotely interesting to you, absolutely pick up and play this game. I don't say this about a lot of games, but this one is a definite masterpiece and a must-play.

Cuphead is platforming at its peak! If you grew up playing games like the original SMB, Super Mario World, & Crash Bandicoot and consider yourself even remotely decent at any of them you will fall in love with this game. Jumping, dashing, parrying, and shooting your way in between enemies, their many attacks, and the dynamic environments has never felt so great. This game is difficult yes, but in my opinion difficulty scales pretty linearly up until the end, and it's the difficulty that makes each win so damn satisfying! The hand drawn 1930's era cartoon visuals and original jazz/ragtime tracks combine to make a truly beautiful game and definitely proves that games are art. TL;DR - This game is a must own. GOTY material here.

Harvest Moon on steroids! Charming characters, dynamic gameplay, excellent writing, incredible soundtrack. A must own for anyone who grew up playing Harvest Moon. Still gets gameplay updates!

Simply put, Portal 2 is a masterpiece, just like it's predecessor. Valve makes clever use of the environment to reveal more about Aperture Science than you could learn in any of Rattman's hideouts from the first game. The puzzles, while seemingly smaller, are as complex and as fun to complete as in Portal. Each chamber feels fresh and builds on the last, and never feels like a recycled concept from the first game. Gone are the energy-balls and in their place are laser-beams and the new repulsion, emulsion, and conversion gels which add a new and exciting level of complexity to the test chambers. GLaDOS' is as sarcastic and witty as ever, and Wheatley, your personality core companion for the majority of the game is equally well voiced & written. My only complaint is that we didn't see more of the companion cube, and that the chambers felt smaller than in the first game. TL;DR - You owe it to yourself to play this game, Portal 2 is a an absolute masterpiece. There is a reason that Gabe Newell said that this was his favorite game to come out of Valve.