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Well, let's continue to dominate the vampires. Super Castlevania IV If the first three were released on the NES, then this one was released on the SNES. But essentially, it's the first part of that trilogy, which was graphically and technically improved, and also expanded in scale. First of all, it's worth noting the controls, as they have become more convenient and responsive, and the character has also become friends with ladders. The combat seems to have become easier, perhaps partly due to the length of the whip, which can also be used to hit in all directions. By the way, did you know that you can also spin it? Well, I didn't know (although I did it once, but didn't pay attention), but this technique would have been very helpful in some places. But never mind, I managed without it. As for the visuals, the picture has definitely become more pleasing, and some levels are very atmospheric, but the color scheme in a couple of locations and the character's pink skin bothered me. The latter is mainly because it sometimes blended in with the background, and not because of a hatred of pink-skinned people. Well, and I can also mention the size of the models as a partial drawback, but I recently realized that in many 16-bit games, the character models look large and therefore take up a lot of space on the screen. Although they are not as large here as in some other games, but if you compare them with NES games, there is a difference. As for the music, it didn't really stick with me (although I think there are remixes from the first part). By the way, I also found a secret room here, where a ghost of an old man walked with his aggressive dog. And when I killed it, he leaned over it and cried, and then disappeared... 😢 (I wonder how many secrets I missed) Castlevania The Adventure Castlevania II Belmont's Revenge There's not much to say about these games for the GBA, but I think they're quite good for their console. The second one looks better, but for some reason, I liked the first one more. Sometimes I even enjoyed it, but more because of overcoming the difficulties. In addition, there are some technical features here. But it's nice that they are short, and the playthrough doesn't take much time, although you can get stuck in some places. But this applies to beginners. In fact, you can just memorize almost any Castlevania and run through it without any problems. Kid Dracula There's even less to say here, as the game didn't really stand out in any way. It's just a lighthearted game that is mostly easy, but with a couple of difficult places, especially at the end. And I didn't pass the boss right away. Maybe I'm just a noob). Castlevania Bloodlines And the last part in my collection, which was released on the Sega. Visually, it is closer to the 4th one, as it is also 16-bit. But in terms of plot, it's already the beginning of the 20th century, which is partly noticeable during the game, and I personally didn't like it, nor did I like the game itself. I don't know, maybe I was just in a bad mood, but during the playthrough, I almost didn't get any pleasant emotions, and in some places I even felt disgusted. Although the first level was pleasant (maybe because it's almost the same in all parts), but the others didn't really appeal to me, maybe only two or three locations out of a couple of levels. But here you can choose from two characters, and the differences between them are easy to feel during the game. I only played as the guy with the whip. Maybe I'll play as the spearman sometime, as he looks cooler. I don't feel like writing about the game differences from other parts and how various things work, especially since they haven't changed much. The music is also so-so; the tracks from the first parts are more memorable. upd. I played as the guy with the spear. It turned out to be more enjoyable to play, and it seems to be easier. The weapon itself gives the opportunity to go a different way on some levels than the guy with the whip. Although, I guess you could have figured that out on the first playthrough, but I'm not very attentive). My attitude towards the game itself hasn't changed, although I passed it faster the second time. It doesn't reach the atmosphere of the first parts (including the 4th), and it doesn't reach the other aspects either. If I hadn't delayed with the post, maybe I would have remembered more, but I finished the 4th part back in March). Well, I think these are not the last Castlevania games that I played...

Chip and Dale, Chip and Dale 2, 1990.

Decided to reminisce about the past. I completed both Chip and Dale games on the second try. It was easy.

armored core 6 A brilliant creation from the brilliant FromSoftware, about running and shooting in mechs in a futuristic Norilsk. You choose a mission, get dropped onto a map, run for 20 seconds to a marker, spend another 20 seconds shooting, while simultaneously pressing A or D, sometimes the spacebar to avoid getting hit, kill all the mobs, the mission is completed, and you get sent back to the base. You can buy some gadget for your robot before heading to the next map. That's it. As you play, your boss mumbles something generic in your ear, which you can't really hear because his voice is drowned out by the movement and shooting, and I understood everything about the graphics and physics when, in the tutorial, I bumped a tree with my mech, and an entire cluster fell down immediately, and with a similar animation and the same lack of visible collision, any other object would fall. I didn't even play for two hours before deleting it. steamworld heist 2 I liked the first part, and they spent almost ten years making the second one, and it's terrible. In 2016, Two Point Hospital hadn't annoyed me as much as it does now, but I was prepared for it and decided to overlook it, because it's slightly different in format from isometric XCOM clones. But even so, it all boils down to calculating steps, small amounts of damage, and cooldowns. From all sides, endless reinforcements rush in like in XCOM: Chimera Squad, you have a timer for secondary missions like in XCOM: Chimera Squad, and so on. The only thing that's not like in XCOM: Chimera Squad is that the team doesn't join you in the story as well-developed characters, but you hire them for money in a bar, and they are randomly re-rolled every day. They have some minimal flavor in their dialogue, and that's it. And there's no point to them, because you can level up anyone into any class, and why – it's unclear, probably to look for some overpowered skill combinations, or to level up the whole team into the most powerful profession. And globally, you have to make circles on a boat in the sea, where there is nothing except random, typical enemy ships and typical debris with typical loot. Zero fun. conscript Darkwood (more like the first Resident Evil) about a trench and not only in World War I. I liked it, but there are only two stressful moments: that at the very beginning there isn't enough ink for saving, and that you have to run a lot and tediously. The running is due to both the deliberately decaying map design – many locations are designed so that you move as long as possible from one place to another due to locked doors, pits, and puddles on the road, etc., and you do this at a turtle's pace – and the small inventory. Suppose you take the minimum: a pistol and ammo, a rifle and ammo, a knife, a healing item, and you have less than half of your bag left. You get lost in three rooms with some junk like ammo for another weapon, a couple of rags, and a grenade, and now it's full – you crawl like a snail across half the map to unload it into a chest. And if you need to take something additional for the quest, like a gas mask, a key, or some tool, it's even worse. I got the feeling that it was all done to stretch the playtime. But overall, it's atmospheric and cool, with lots of interesting themes and events for fans of the setting.

Pualu, why does everyone think that World War I is something bad? It would be nice to be in a trench in such gloomy weather, in a personal bunker, closing yourself off from the artillery barrage with a curtain, reading a manual or an erotic magazine, or a letter from the rear. Then have some coffee with your comrades, take a puff of a strong cigarette, and watch how life is boiling in the trench, who is playing cards, and over there, the engineers are building barbed wire. Telegraph lines are stretched between the trenches, and reports and dispatches with intelligence data, orders, victories, and losses of the enemy are rushing along. Only a lonely prisoner of war sighs sadly in the dungeon, muttering something in his own language.

Colony Ship
Decent setting, good writing. Given that it was made by the creators of The Age of Decadence, I expected at least excellent results in these areas.
Moderately awful combat, an old system + tedious resource management, but it's very slow and completely uninteresting.
Zero variability. During the first blind playthrough, 90% of the content was covered. What wasn't unlocked can be easily guessed.
There are only four endings, and they are all quite obvious. For comparison, in the glorious era of The Age of Decadence, there were three dozen, and some required a deliberate approach from the very first chapter.
Now the game is party-based, the micromanagement of skill checks has been reduced, but what's the point if we're just following a set path? Whether you hack this cabinet or convince that idiot – nothing changes.
Okay. The pluses include the only atmosphere that fits the futuristic setting of utter despair, overall adequacy, and extremely rare positive moments of exploration.
Much worse than TAoD, but generally tolerable and concise.
6/10

keylocker Another Munan indie game; as a follower, I enjoyed it, although not as much as Virgi-Zodiac, mainly because in the first half, you feel like a rat in a garbage dump. There are 2.5 problems: sometimes the combat is frustrating – it's not always possible to perfectly time attacks/parries, and some completely random enemies one-shot you, which means restarting the fight; and sometimes the dialogues – there are too many of them; another 0.5 could be for the fact that the soundtrack isn't as catchy as in Virgi, although some tracks are great. The world is more well-thought-out, although for about the first half, it's unclear what's going on, but by the second half, the picture becomes clearer, the same goes for the plot – in my opinion, its key aspects could have been introduced a little earlier. Thematically, it's relevant, sometimes cringeworthy, sometimes generic, so you can conclude that it's not all that straightforward. Overall, I'd give it an eight out of ten, but you have to understand that I'm making a personal allowance here. However, I found myself, even after finishing the game and some time passing, still sometimes mentally returning to that atmosphere and aftertaste, which is also an indicator. kannagi usagi Still better than Tsushima, excellent visuals and style, you sit down and play, and what more do you need? Top-notch for the price, a ten out of ten. woke marine 2 It greets us with several quota-filled diversity squads of Ultramarines – "white-black-Asian" – and a strong, independent Pakistani general commanding a brigade of Cadians. I started on hard, but almost dropped out and switched to normal because the combat is tedious. Any random enemy can take out half of a superhuman marine's face in one hit, while you barely manage to do any damage, and there are practically no ways to defend yourself, and the few that exist don't work in a group. A couple of pathetic Termagants on a hill take down all your armor and health in seconds with their standard-issue assault rifles. It's probably fun to play online with friends, but in solo mode, the two dumb AI bots have a mediocre impact – they just distract the enemy a little, and even then, the enemies prioritize attacking the player. I feel sorry for gamepad/console players. On normal, it's playable. I only noticed two bases throughout the game: the Tyranids' red blood, and the fact that Chaos was again given an easy time in the second half, but fighting Tyranids isn't interesting, and Chaos is just Tzeentch against the Ultramarines again. The Rubrics don't even have blood, plus I saw this last year in Boltgun, and I'm tired of it. There are a lot of weapons, but half of them are the same. Several times, you have to defend some objectives with health bars – it looks very lazy. On a couple of maps, you get to fly around in a jump pack, but these maps are designed specifically for that – why couldn't they have given the hero more customization so that you could choose different ultimate abilities for any mission? The graphics are nice, but there's basically no music in the game. Since the Dawn of War 2 in 2004, I don't remember any good soundtracks in any of the Warhammer games, except for a couple of tracks from Mechanicus. The meaningless chatter of colleagues over the vox can't be heard or read during action moments, and there's nothing interesting there anyway. Because of the strong diversity accents, I had to switch to the Russian voice acting at one point, but the voice acting is mediocre anyway because everyone walks around without helmets, and the already unexpressive, untalented voices sound completely unclear, as if ordinary people are talking in a supermarket near the liquor shelf. It was also amusing how, as the commander of a squad, the hero can order the bots at the end of a dialogue – "we're going to take the elevator, press the button, do this, check that," but in the end, you have to do it yourself using the marker because the bots just stand there like statues. Visually, the atmosphere and design are pleasant in places, but this is more due to the source material it was redrawn from than the developers. A six out of ten, at best, just passable.

Blizzard gave away Warcraft 3: Reforged for free. Well, at least it’s some consolation after years of diligently subscribing to WoW. We played it a bit. The first time, I played as Orcs against Humans, and the second time as Undead against Humans. I won as Orcs, but, strangely, I lost as Undead. And I was playing on the easy difficulty level; the AI plays very well, constantly building up its defenses. I can’t even imagine what it’s like on the hero difficulty.

strangely enough, messed up.

Because now you are an Ogre, not a Lich.

A mighty warrior who loves women very much 9: The HeroesWorld Revolution
Before this, I played 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, and 8. An excellent continuation of a magnificent game series; as always — hilarious dialogues, cool worldbuilding, beautiful illustrations and music, lively characters, and an engaging story; the gameplay, since it differs dramatically from part to part, also didn't let me get bored. Just plain legendary. 

MiSide

I thought it was just some overhyped fun little game, but it turned out to be a genuine modern masterpiece.
- SCARY. Goosebumps ran down my skin regularly, the atmosphere is conveyed so vividly — the setting, imagery, story, and sound/camera work are top-notch.
- You're constantly doing something new, the game never stops surprising you, both in terms of gameplay and story. 
- The puzzles are perfectly balanced — you do have to think sometimes, but you never get stuck without a way to progress further.
- A charming heroine — she immediately wins you over and helps you immerse yourself in the story.
- A nice contrast between coziness and horror. 
- Based on my experience, it's a unique game unlike anything else.
Played with Japanese voice acting.

1, 2, 5

Skipped 3 and 4 because there were no remakes with improved graphics... casual...
Did the right thing, 3 is still decent if you ignore the graphics, but 4 is a completely bland and forgettable mess. In many ways, it was after 4 that I lost interest in the series.

I tried playing the remake of Heroes of Might and Magic III in Japanese, but it got tiring to constantly use a dictionary. On the other hand, it's not that bad – it gives me something to play in the future if I improve my Japanese or if an English translation comes out. As for the games I've played, none of them disappointed me; only the gameplay in Heroes of Might and Magic V was a little confusing.

Mortal Kombat 3 (1995, Sega)

An impossible game. Even on the easiest difficulty, I can't defeat the enemies on the first level, I only managed to beat it once. I tried playing as Cyrax, but I forgot how to set up the trap. I watched a compilation of super moves online, and it's just advanced mathematics; it's impossible to memorize. On Master difficulty, I lose immediately, no questions asked.

what is there to forget? back-back-attack
in my opinion, this technique is performed the same way in all parts of the game.

Wow, Aretz, you surprised me. Respect.

Added 18 minutes later
My bad, no respect. Your combo doesn't work; I just checked.

This is what your mortyr expert is like.

There are four different attacks. Either you're pressing the wrong one, or you're doing it too slowly. Here, everything works.