Recent reviews by Garfield

I loved Undertale as a kid. I was someone who adored the game and the fandom for a REALLY long time, and if you gave me a full week to info dump about the most niche AU's, general fan content, or things from the game itself, I don't think I'd get it all. I say this to preface that when I opened this up for the first time, I felt like that same kid playing Undertale for the first time, and how I fell in love with it so quickly.

Suffice to say, as of beating my 'pacifist' run of Deltarune up to Chapter 4, I'm convinced that I just played the best game of all time.

Toby Fox said that his creation of Undertale was a test run to see how game creation would work, which was inspired by a dream he'd had of the perfect ending to a story. We are watching that perfect ending unfold one chapter at a time and I will be here every chapter going forward to witness it all.

Please, for the love of all that is holy, for my sake, for the countless other people who've played it, for those who make content of it, and for Toby Fox himself. Please, play Deltarune.

If you asked me to choose what zombie survival sim I'd have to play for the rest of my life, Project Zomboid would be it. This is, without a doubt, the BEST game in this genre and it's not even close.

A lot of people turn to the graphics when trying to find things to complain about, but if anything I think it's one of the strengths of this game that add to its greatness. It makes it feel more like an indie game, something cozy and simple which is polarizing compared to the rest of the game. Of which, there's no bad aspect. The combat is superb, the customization for both your character and gear is amazing, and the scavenging is well designed and logical. Also the building, being able to construct walls and fortifications for wherever you choose to set up is well done. There legitimately isn't anything I'm able to complain about for this game, I love every aspect of it, and modding the game with the incredible community made content extends how great this game is tenfold.

Now, playing this game alone is good enough, but adding friends into the mix is where it gets SO much better. You can roleplay roles for your group, like having a medic and a cook so if feels like a real life survival group. You can work together to divide groups of zombies to make combat a little less stress inducing. And, with friends comes chaos.

One of my first days on this game with a couple friends of mine, my friend Blu and I were clearing out a horde from an area, and he got attacked. He recovered quick, said he just got a scratch, and we moved on. About an hour later, we're chillin in our base and he asks me to bring him some painkillers in another room, since he'd been reading for the past little while. I went upstairs with the painkillers, and opened the door. There was a puddle of blood in the corner, and I didn't see him in the room. I moved in a little bit, when his character, now turned, lunged at me. As silly as this is, telling this story to people is heartbreaking. Imagine walking up to your friend's room to check on them, and you find them turned with no warning... it's heartbreakin man. And it only makes me love the game more. There's no happy endings in Knox County.

These are the end times. There is no hope for survival. Buy Project Zomboid for yourself, and learn the story of how you died.

It's a genuine struggle to firmly determine where I lie with this game. I've been a die hard fanboy of The Last Of Us since the release of the first game, and I've continued that passion year after year just out of shear love for the immaculate storytelling, deep world-building, and incredibly well written characters. This game, as a sequel, does what sequels do best; expand upon the universe's characters, world and story in a way that doesn't detract from the first game. But the directions that this game took to get there, are contentious in the community for very good reasons. And as HBO is starting to release episodes for Season 2, I felt it was important to experience this story for myself instead of a live-commentary gameplay series that I watched when the game released.

The main problem that people raise with how the storytelling is done in this game is forcing the player to play as the "antagonist" for almost half of the game's runtime, which is a completely fair complaint. Watching Joel be murdered at the hands of this character, viewing her as a complete villain, then making the player play as her, is an experience that kinda sucks. I know a good chunk of people who played as Abby, that intentionally failed encounters or QTE's just to see her fail.

If the first game was completely about Abby and her story instead of Ellie, then made Ellie the "antagonist" of the second game, people would have done the same intentional failings because Ellie would have been the hated character. The intention with these gameplay decisions was to show that, from both perspectives, both parties are acting in their own sense of right. Joel may have struck first, but Ellie didn't see it that way. Abby avenged her father, but then had all her friends killed in turn. So her vengeance against Ellie felt justified on her side. The only true villains of the game are the Seraphites, Wolves, and infected. And the poison that revenge inflicts on the soul, but that's a little too introspective for most people to care about.

While the story changed significantly, so did the gameplay, and byfar, I think Naughty Dog knocked it out of the part with it. Everything has been upgraded, from the strategy, stealth, enemies, boss fights, almost everything. The only thing I don't like is the safes being hell to input codes into, from an intended overhaul to speed up code inputs that tend to be too responsive, more often than not making it slower. Aside from that, there isn't a single thing I dislike that's been changed.

The Last of Us Part II was a complete turning point for the series. A lot of people love it, a lot of people despise it. But understanding the story it conveys is heartbreaking, and incredibly impactful to those who understood it. I'd recommend playing it for yourself to see how you feel about it firsthand instead of seeing a video series on Youtube.

This game is Lethal Company with fragile (sometimes goofy) scrap, text to speech, and multiple quotas in singular days. You can revive dead teammates by surviving quotas and the shop has silly stuff as well as practical helpful stuff. Plus at the end if you all die or fail a quota, you end up killing your friends in a Last Man Standing fight.

I cannot recommend a game hard enough.

Grand Theft Auto 5, is without hyperbole, one of the greatest works of media in the history of gaming.

My dad bought this game on release day, back in 2013. I walked downstairs to watch him play it for a few minutes before he shoo'd me back upstairs because the game was not meant for me as an 8 year old. Even still, whenever he wasn't home or was otherwise occupied, I turned on our old Xbox 360 and ran with the game freely. Now, as a kid, I didn't really understand a large chunk of the story, hell I completely misunderstood the final mission and killed Trevor because I thought he was mean to me.

After so many years, playing this on my own Xbox One, and later here on PC, the story to me, is the greatest mediocre story ever written. It's good, very good, but it's no more than that. Doesn't have any standout problems, things are pretty cut and dry, characters are well written, etc. The story mode forever lives in my heart as a nostalgiac piece of media. However, where the real fun lived, where millions of others also enjoyed, was the Online mode.

From doing heists, screwing around in Freemode, and literally anything else you wanted to do, Online had it all. I remember as a kid meeting cool people, finding regular friends to have fun with. I remember doing a heist one day, and the loading screen got stuck but I ended up joining a party with someone from the crew, and we became pretty good friends.

Around 2020, I got my own PC, and didn't really have a reason to play on console anymore. I'd still hop on occasionally to play games I only had on my Xbox, but aside from that, GTA was kinda left as a part of old history for me. Until one day, I saw GTA was on sale, so I snagged it immediately and started reminiscing, grinding a new account, but it didn't feel the same as before because of how alone I was playing. I didn't have friends playing with me, no one doing goofy sh*t around me. No one telling me to, "look in first person real quick" and they're flipping me off.

That was until around last year, when a friend of mine bought the game and I had someone to play with. We treated GTA as more of a background game, somewhere where if we were bored, we could just hop on and do random sh*t if we didn't have anything better to play.

This all culminates to around two weeks ago. Another friend of mine bought the game, and us three started doing heists and working together to do missions, it was refreshing to be playing GTA again. I bought a copy for my best friend, and now we had a four-man team to work together in. It was great! Then.. GTAV Enhanced was announced, and I was hyped for it.

If you haven't seen my review for Enhanced, go take a look on my profile for it. It says everything you need to know.

Needless to say, I was incredibly disappointed. And after everything that's happened, I finally appreciate the GTA we had, and the memories I've made. I'm upset with Rockstar pushing out meaningless content for more money in their pocket. Etc etc, you've heard it all before.

Thank you GTA, I'll cherish you forever.

My friends and I all got into GTA again recently to just screw around, play heists, just have fun overall. It was a refreshing experience to have fun on GTA again after so many years, even if this game has been pushed out however many times in re-releases, continued content, etc etc. I've always liked GTA for its genre defining gameplay.

So, imagine my surprise when I see that GTA V Enhanced got announced in my library. I was hyped for it, incredibly so that I marked it on my calendar and woke up early to see what it would be like. Now, something like this has happened before with console versions, newer gens specifically (Xbox Series X/S, PS5). GTA got a standalone app for Online, for optimizations. Not really new content, just the same new rollouts Rockstar has set their standard with. As someone who used to play on old-gen console and never got to experience it, I didn't know what it would be like. My expectations were high. And nowadays, that's the biggest mistake you can make when waiting for a new release.

I woke up, downloaded it, and opened it. Steam's description for this "Enhanced Edition", describes it as having "stunning visuals, faster loading, 3D audio, and more, plus exclusive content for GTA Online players". I turned my graphics to the maxium, ray-tracing and all. The damn thing still looks like it was released in 2016. 9 f*cking years ago. I didn't notice any faster loading times, audio still sounds the same, and that exclusive content? Just more of Rockstar pushing out their same sh*tty subscription garbage that every game seems to have nowadays. I was hoping for HD textures, better character models, whatever else you would expect when something is advertised as "enhanced". That was not what we received. The only feasible benefit that I can see is that it's 25GB's smaller, but knowing Rockstar, that 25GB's of content won't take long to produce right back.

Don't get me wrong, GTA is one of the greatest games released in the past 20 years, and it's helped defined what games have been, and could be. If you don't believe that, look at the thousands of positive reviews of it made since it was released, even my own. But if you're expecting this "Enhanced Edition" to be any better than the now "Legacy Edition", as they call it, you will not have your hopes met.

Luckily, any player who owned the Legacy Edition on PC automatically owns Enhanced Edition, meaning I didn't have to shill out another $30 to Rockstar just to play their game, which I will add, good on them. In some form or another, they understand the simplicity of their players not wanting to throw more money at them. But advertising their new release as something big when it's not what we received, that is defined by law to be a scam, which is illegal. But who cares, if it means more money in the hands of greedy Rockstar executives.

Also as a final note, I cannot think of ANY good reason why text chat had to be removed. If it was for censoring purposes and making sure that your public chats aren't as racist/hostile anymore, THEN ADD A CHAT CENSOR. Who's idea was this? Lazy *sses.

Steam told me my review was 914 characters too long. So I'll give you the shorter version.

Characters are poorly written within the context of character building in prior games. Timeline of events is chaotic and makes little to no sense, and is incredibly hard to follow at times.

The movement and interactables are incredibly inconsistent, work when they're not supposed to and vice-versa. Death is meaningless and can be hand-waved away as long as you bleed out on the ground long enough.

Why the f*** did Skill Points need to be introduced? Why are there 42+ skills when you can only have 3 equipped at any given time, and you have 8 skill decks to swap between at any time? Resident Evil 5 had a perfect upgrade system, so why innovate for the sake of innovation?

That's the important stuff. I'm gonna ctrl+c / ctrl+v the last section here.

I am being 100% serious when I say that I wanted to like this game again. Every time I convinced my friend for one more session, every time I opened the game hoping to get a little further than before. I loved this game as a kid, and I wanted to love it again. But every single time I reopened it, saw the logo on my taskbar, I was filled with existential dread. Even now, as I continue to play Ada's campaign, there's moments where I'm genuinely so angry and tired with how poorly made and dog-s*** this game is, that I literally alt+F4 the game and go play something else because I genuinely can't tolerate it anymore.

I am going to continue to play this game until I get every achievement. And once I do, I'm closing the game, uninstalling it, and never playing it for another second for the rest of my life. For your own sake, your peace of mind, if you want to enjoy the Resident Evil franchise for yourself, I implore you, please do. This series of games is phenomenal, and I love them all (except this one of course.). Just, please. When you get to Resident Evil 6, please just watch a story breakdown or playthrough on Youtube. Do not subject yourself to playing this awful mess.

I'm just honestly glad that Koshi Nakanishi stepped in when it came to making Resident Evil 7. Any more releases like this would've made me cry.

This game, without exaggeration, is the greatest piece of media I've ever graced my eyes upon.

When I was a kid, my dad bought a PS3, literally just to play this game. When I finally got to play it, I fell in love with it instantly. When the game released, I was only 8 years old, and when you're a kid, understanding the plot and overall story of a game can be challenging. You'd figure games like Paper Mario, Legend of Zelda, y'know, Nintendo'y type games would be more my speed. But even as an 8 year old, I could understand the depth of the emotional storytelling that this game was putting down. Simple nuances like Joel being closed off and almost aggressive most times, and slowly becoming more open to Ellie as the game progresses, I was able to pick up on. Ending the game as a child, I understood the importance of emotional storytelling. And even if I didn't truly realize it then, over time, I would understand that this game would turn out to be my favorite game of all time.

I would continue to replay this as a 13/14 year old, with my mind developing over time, I only grew to appreciate the game more and more. Until, my PS3 copy of the game was damaged in some form or another, and loading any save past the hotel would permanently softlock me to the loading screen, no matter what I'd do. It sucked, royally. And a lingering wish to play this game again would build, year after year. I tried to emulate the game when I finally got my own PC, tried repairing my disc, nothing would work. I thought maybe I'd never get to play it again...

Until TLOU PC was announced in June of 2022. I'd like to say I was super hyped about it, but saying that would make me a filthy liar. I was kicking my feet and jumping around, screamin like a little girl like my dad bought me a pony.

I counted the days, waited 'till release, then.. pirated the first copy of the game I could get my hands on. I didn't have the money at the time and I needed it in my life, fight me.

I would later buy the game, and I've never regretted the purchase since. I love this game, and will continue to love this game until the day I die. And yeah, maybe the gameplay and combat gets repetitive, but that doesn't mean I don't like it.

When I was on the store page for this game, reading up on game details on what I was getting myself and my squad into, it deliberately mentions that this is a game meant for "Experienced FPS players in the mood for a SERIOUS challenge."

I saw this game years ago, when Markiplier played this with JackSepticEye, Lordminion777 and Bob (I don't remember his YT name) played it for a video or two. It intrigued me, and looked incredibly in-depth, and it touched my soul so deeply that it stayed in the back of my mind for so long, that I was looking at the Steam page for it a couple days ago (as of writing this review now), and noticed it was on a 50% sale, with only 48 hours to act before my chance was gone. So after deliberating with my squad, I bought it for all of us for like 110$ all in all. Credit card debt is a ♥♥♥♥♥, but considering the product I purchased, well worth it.

This game, is HARD. Like very hard. One of my friends and I tried doing a duo run of the first mission, playing as strategic as possible, and we just barely failed at the end after multiple attempts. And immediately it sounds like, "okay, it was two people, for a game designed for four. no ♥♥♥♥ you failed". But no, even with four players, this game is not a cake walk.

The enemies do a lot of damage and get alerted VERY easily, even the smallest of mistakes will ring the dinner bell for every goober in the room. Doing stealth to avoid all the enemies isn't an option either, because there are alarm doors that will awaken any enemy not already killed, and will spawn extra in areas behind you you've already explored. And as is for most good horror games, ammo and resources are not your friend, and are as valuable as every breath you take. Every shot you take has to be placed carefully, and every missed shot may cause the death of a teammate.

Speaking of your teammates, communication is CRUCIAL. By all means, tell your buddies to stop moving, suggest ideas for sentry placements and positions to hold, tell your buddies to stop moving, and above all else, tell your buddies to STOP. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. MOVING. Most of my squad's gameplay consists of strategically stealthing into rooms and taking targets one by one, and multiple at once if targets are clumped together, and all of our comms consist of either "shhhh" or "STOP STOP STOP, STOP MOVING". Talking to your team about if rooms are clear, which rooms you need, which items you need, what kind of enemies are in the room, all of which are crucial.

Speaking of items, the terminal is the first big thing to learn. If you don't know how to use the terminal, pray one of your teammates do. The terminal is a computer that can be in multiple rooms that is your main method of finding the mission objective, and keycards crucial to opening the path to it. Thank god me and the other tryhard in our group learned it, the other two neanderthals in our squad is more focused on calling dibs on kills. (no hate guys <3)

I could talk about this game for hours, certainly more than I currently have in the game. The weapons, consumables, tools, sentries, gear, on and on and on, everything feels so ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ good. I've made it no secret, and I'll reiterate it again; this game is NOT for the weak and ill-dedicated, this is a SERIOUS challenge for experienced players. And that's exactly why I love it. This game, is SO unbelievably good, and I am SO ready to see more.

Helldivers was at one time, one of the best games ever released. It was beautiful, to see Helldivers far and wide joining the fight in the name of Super Earth. Allow me to tell you my story.

Back when it was released, I saw it and thought little of it. Another title that seemed like it wouldn't interest me. One of my friends though was anticipating the release of the game more than his favorite holiday, and woke up at 3AM to buy it on launch, and after 3 days, sunk 35 somethin hours into it. It was appalling to see, but it showed me that there was something interesting just at the precipice of my fingers, so I bought it, and became a Helldiver. I still remember how clueless I was on my first mission with my friend.

Days had passed, and I started getting newsfeeds on my TikTok, daily posts reminding me about our warbonds and active missions, current liberation efforts, you get it, the community was growing at a rapid pace. One would say "For Super Earth", and another ten would walk in chanting the same. I bought the game for friends and they became Helldivers. I woke up early in the morning to join in-progress missions to assist fellow divers in their failing missions, telling them I was there to save them. The community started peacekeeping programs within our ranks, outlawing and hunting divers intent on sabotaging our missions. I heard radio signals from divers who were left behind in their missions. I was boots on the ground in Malevelon Creek every chance I got. I was, in my most humble opinion, one of our most decorated divers.

Then Sony had to step in.
Outlawing the enlisting of Helldivers in over 100 countries, our ranks slowly fell. I couldn't honestly fight as a helldiver, knowing Super Earth was preventing more reinforcements. Then, as I ran from the fight, fleeing in my starship to the outer reaches of the solarsystem where the war couldn't reach me, I was recieving word that Super Earth was sabotaging weapons, and was alleged to have been helping enemy forces in getting stronger defences (balance changes, nerfing weapons in PvE). Enough was enough. I left the Helldivers and hung up my cape. Even now, after I heard of weapons restoring function, enemies having their defences sabotaged, I can't willingly fight in the war knowing we have more helldivers being held back by the greedy forces of Capitalism.

I will forever cherish my time as a helldiver. And some days I stare upon my cape, thinking about taking up the mantle one last time. But knowing that forces beyond my control prevent more enlistings on masse, I can't, lest it weigh on my honour to fight an immoral battle. And until that changes, I cannot recommend Helldivers 2.