I certainly find it ironic that I'm giving this game with its absolutely goofy story such a high score, but I fully understand why it won Game of the Year last year. This game is an absolute delight to play. Its characters, controls, music, and activities are all built to entertain. They also highlight the abilities of the PlayStation 5 by using nearly every function that is available. The haptic feedback is particularly impressive.

Even better, I had no issue playing the game with my grandchildren watching. In fact, any time that they heard the music, they would stop what they were doing to come and watch the game. For that matter, it made me feel younger while playing it--especially as it referenced that I played and loved decades ago. This game is certainly a love letter to nearly every property that has been at some point exclusive to the PlayStation set of consoles. 

The only thing that holds it back from a perfect A (or even A+) is how difficult some of the more challenging levels get. With no checkpoints and (usually) only one hit kills, mistakes send you back to the beginning of some levels that require extremely precise skills. Even my grandchildren would often leave the room during those sections as it's not nearly as interesting to watch the same level over and over again as it is to explore in the rest of this action collect-a-thon.

I do think that this game is a "must-play" for anyone with a PS5. I especially believe this for anyone interested in interesting level construction and game design. However, this is just a fun game that can entertain nearly anyone.

There's a good chance that I would have liked this game more if I hadn't played Assassin's Creed: Shadows during the same year. In almost every way, this is a superior game. Unfortunately, Atsu's core story is nearly identical to Naoe's. Having played Shadows first made this game feel ... well, like I had already gone through the same character development of taking a woman whose family was murdered in front of her on a quest for revenge while ultimately creating a new family along the way. 

It also is not as strong of a story as Ghost of Tsushima, its predecessor. In that game, I felt more empowered as Jin was saving the island from its Mongol invaders. Freeing up the regions of the island of Tsushima was literally liberating--while dealing with the various forces of the Yōtei Six felt more distinct but less like I was making any real progress in the region. Jin also struggled more with his situation as clearing out Mongols meant embracing tactics that went against his samurai upbringing while Atsu was more single-minded throughout with almost no compunctions against doing anything to get to her targets.

Still, the game is absolutely beautiful and the gameplay is generally better than Tsushima or Shadows. In particular, I loved how Atsu was able to switch between weapons to deal with enemy strengths and weaknesses (much like Tsushima's stance system). This was tremendously easier to use than the way Shadows allowed players to switch weapons--which made it so that I hardly ever used anything other than the katana in that game. I also greatly appreciated how streamlined the open world mechanics worked. Not only does it continue the largely HUD-less natural interactions from Tsushima, it made the side content accessible and not overdone (unlike Shadow's massive and packed map). 

However, I'm more interested in playing Ghost of Tsushima again than I am this game.

This is a fantastic game, with an amazing story and (mostly) fun game mechanics that slightly fumbles with its ending. Despite some of the small quibbles that I have with the game, I've already started a "New Game +" (NG+) run as I want to see the story again now that I know the entire thing. I've already made it through the prologue--and so many of the lines make a great deal more sense now.

I cannot say much about this game without getting into spoiler territory. I can say that it is a unique fantasy setting with an interesting aesthetic, well-developed characters, plenty of interesting and useful in-game items to find, and a solid turn-based system with some action elements. It does have a few jumping sections with poor controls that are needlessly frustrating and a lack of a mini-map or a more interactive map to help keep track of anything that might be missed. It also has a lack of a teleportation system to get around the larger map, making for a lot of lost time due to the amount of backtracking that is sometimes needed for the main story--and frequently needed for the side content.

It's worth it to go into this game knowing very little, but I did find myself checking the Internet when dialogue options or other story choices popped up to make certain that I didn't miss anything. Similarly, I also used the Internet to help find items and side content as a lot of the side sections added even more story information and useful (and not so useful) items. There is debate about whether to do the side content before finishing the story, and my recommendation is to do so. Sure, it makes the final area less challenging, but it adds so much depth--and there's not an organic way to do so once the story is over--also, NG+ ramps up the difficulty.
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There's been a lot of talk about this getting game of the year--which would be a massive accomplishment for a game with such a small development team (something like 30 people). As much as I love this game, I can acknowledge that there are a few parts that show its rough edges. None of the problems are game-breaking, but I could see a game that has a higher level of polish edging this one out of the top spot.

​In the end, this is a great game that I would love to be able to talk to people about.

I was not planning on buying another Assassin's Creed game after Valhalla. As much as I enjoyed the series in the past (especially the three games with Ezio and Desmond), playing the games had become too much of a bug-filled chore. The only reason I was drawn to this game was that it gave me a chance to spend more time in Japan, having released soon after we had returned from our trip. In that main purpose, this game entirely fulfilled its role. It even made it so I would be willing to play a direct sequel with this setting and these characters. 

For I really liked the two protagonists. Naoe and Yasuke are both interesting characters who have engrossing character arcs that fit well with the historical narrative of late 16th century Japan. I quickly found myself invested in both of their entwining stories and never felt betrayed by their portrayals throughout the game. However, when it comes to playability, Naoe was certainly my favorite. Yasuke was just too clunky and slow for anything other than combat, and Naoe even seemed to have the edge there. Still, I liked how the game managed to get me to play as both of them throughout the 110+ hours that I put into the game.

The setting is also absolutely amazing! I was able to recognize historical landmarks from my trip (as much of the game takes place around Kyoto, Osaka, and Himeji-jo). This was a faithful representation that felt lived-in. On top of that, there is both a day and night cycle, a seasonal cycle (with distinctions as there is an earlier and later version of each season), and weather systems (which are affected by the seasonal cycle). These give this already massive world even more variety when exploring it.

Unfortunately, the game is plagued by the problems that have become ubiquitous with Assassin's Creed. The game is almost too large with too many useless treasure chests (which respawn) and numerous questlines to follow. It's open world structure gives players complete freedom, but this means that story beats often take place out of order. This is particularly an issue since multiple questlines require the player to travel all across the map, often putting encounters from other questlines in the path of the quest that the player is on. 

Even with fulfilling all of the questlines that I know about, I still know that I missed elements from the game. However, so much time was spent just travelling from one task to the next that I started to tire of the game even with the beautiful settings and intriguing stories. Still, I did have fun while playing the game and would not be too upset if I was pulled into playing it again.

There is one last issue that I think needs to be addressed: how does Shadows rank in comparison to my favorite Japanese game, Ghost of Tsushima? Basically, it falls short. Sure, Shadows is a more realistic game with many more options available in regards to gameplay, but Ghost of Tsushima is a true work of art where every aspect of the game worked together to build a greater-than-life experience. I enjoyed both games, but I'd be much more willing to play Ghost of Tsushima again--and I've already played through it twice.

This was a return to form for Zelda games while also providing something entirely innovative and unique. One of it's clearest differences from earlier Zelda games is that this is the first Zelda title where we actually play as Zelda instead of Link. Otherwise, the game holds to the basic structure of earlier top-down Zelda games while "fixing" the lore (such as explaining the different appearances of Zora people) and bringing in the unique gameplay technique of copying objects and creatures from the world and using them to solve puzzles and fight monsters. It also allows for class Zelda gameplay--albeit for limited amounts of time.

Basically, this was a Zelda game for people who just want to have fun playing a classic-style Zelda game with an interesting twist. There are some mild areas that could use improvement, but I had so much fun with the game that I don't even want to bring them up. I literally was laughing with delight as I played around with new materials or mechanics (although, I relied heavily on the water blocks  and beds to solve most of the puzzles). It was a fun, low stress, high reward game that was not overly long, but also not too short.