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[chewbop]

Hi-Fi Rush & Priority of Fun

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In 2023, video games are being confronted with the stark reality of a long gestated, mutated state. Live service games are being announced and shut down in months, companies are doubling down on sure bets, and mismanagement runs wild.

This is the world Hi-Fi Rush enters, and its existence feels like a borderline aberration. It's a game out of time in the best possible way. A super-coloured, cel-shaded shot of enthusiasm and joy popping off the screen. It has echoes from a very specific time in gaming, the PS2/GameCube/Xbox. It's an action game that draws from early Devil May Cry, Viewtiful Joe in addition to the style-is-substance panache of Jet Set Radio. It has one massive twist though, It's also a rhythm game.

Hi-Fi Rush is a game that has painstakingly animated every facet of its world to the rhythms and melodies of its fantastic soundtrack. Grunts slice their swords to punctuate back beats, laser beams pinpoint eighth note guitar riffs and Chai (Hi-Fi's MC) literally has rest attack combos. Yes, literally music rest attack chains.

Hi-Fi's marriage to rhythm and timing make it unlike any other character action game. A wholly unique, and shockingly brilliant set of systems which elevate it as a new genre classic. Its synthesis of rhythm and combat reciprocally makes rhythm games and combo-heavy action games more approachable by relying on each other. Hi-Fi's design  frames the necessary rhythm as the drive for attacks, and attack strings add effects to music; a masterful harmony. 

Its accessibility options are inviting. Its insistence on checkpoints and modulation of challenge, full of gentle yet decisive player-driven graces, is approachable. Games don't always come out feature complete let alone this well cooked. Hi-Fi Rush is one of the most well designed and consistent games released in a decade. At last, east meets west game design where both forces are made better with contact.

But above all else, this game is massively, massively fun. Its characters are charming, the writing is regularly funny and damn near every interactive piece of this thing feels spritely. This is a game going to war with cynicism and winning handily. The best Xbox game in an age, Hi-Fi Rush is already a landmark game for this generation and the highest point for Tango Softworks.

#hi fi rush #hi-fi Rush #chai #xbox #game pass #Bethesda #Tango Softworks #viewtiful joe #video games #chewreview

[chewbop]

Resident Evil 4 Remake & Redefining Brilliance

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Resident Evil 4 is not in short supply or hard to access. You could could boot up the OG on Nintendo's lunchbox and still play an all time great as it was initially conceived. You could also play an HD version on damn near every console under the sun. You can play it in VR. You can even play it with some Bush-era Nintendo waggle.

This is a game that has lived many lives and grandfathered many more. Some of these grandfathered games have gone on to become goliaths in their own right, like The Last of Us and Gears of War.

The minute RE4's 2023 remake was announced, there was elation, and then a question:

"Did we need an RE4 Remake?"

The answer is probably no, Resident Evil 4 didn't need a remake.

This statement is true, but after playing RE4R, that is simultaneously untrue and irrelevant all at the same time.

RE4R obliterates a lot of different marks. It respects the source material, it continues Capcom's impossible winstreak, and most importantly, it reimagines a classic as something simultaneously familiar and pungently different.

This remake emphasizes and cleverly reframes the original game's brilliance. It's an action game that is always communicating, always conditioning and always. It let's you know when to fight, when to chill, when to explore, when to be curious about ways you can fight, and it routinely likes to interrupt it's own rhythm just to diversify it's full course meal of gameplay.

More than most remakes, RE4R highlights how great the time-tested design of the OG is by adding new pieces to explore new dimensions of those older ideas. The Knife now adds parrying, making you a damn near Sekiro like killing machine. The ability to crouch, in addition to said knife, creates legitimately viable stealth in sections now balanced for that additional gameplay axis. Ashley is a wholy redeemed as a great character this time around with agency, has utility and adds a legitimate emotional foil to Leon's action hero this time around.

RE4R just never falters. It's manic, wildly deep box of toys marks it among the best still doing it. Smart opportunistic changes find different ways to relit well known set pieces and whole sections that make modern action games feel almost criminally deprived ingenuity. Capcom has found ways to take the visual character of the RE4 OG, and overcharge it with artistic menace; It doesn't miss a chance at a lighting change, character design or camera angle. It looks and feels different, and it feels different often because of how it looks.

RE4R is just sublime. A game so satisfying, so fun, so scary and so masterful. Almost 20 years on and one of the best games ever made, finds new ways to be one the best games currently available. Capcom keeps find ways to have their cake and eat it too, they just can't miss right now. RE4R is embarrassingly and effortlessly incredible.

#resident evil #resident evil 4 #resident evil 4 remake #leon kennedy #xbox series x #PS5 #Capcom #chewreview

[chewbop]

Citizen Sleeper & The Will to Survive

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As a game, Citizen Sleeper is a fundamental meditation on the human experience.

Citizen Sleeper taps into the gooey core of humanity; the gnashing, resistive realities that keep us awake at night and exhaust us at dawn. To this effect, Citizen Sleeper is a game with nearly unprecedented empathy and understanding of what it means to be alive, survive and thrive.

A narrative game built on multiple RPG systems (Tabletop, DND, traditional video game rpgs), Citizen Sleeper puts you in the role of a sleeper. In this game, a sleeper is a person who has signed the rights of their conscience and body over to corporations to work off insurmountable debts. Their minds and consciousness are emulated and then placed in a bio-robtic body to complete work. These bodies are designed with planned obsolescence, you need these corporations to keep your body going. As a sleeper, your life is constricted by capitalism, and even with your escape at the game's beginning, you feel the depleting effects of this oppression.

As you escape to the Erlin's Eye, a space station existing on the fringe of colonial governance, you are met with a game that fundamentally incorporates precarious living in its entire design. You begin every cycle or day, with 6 dice that determine different actions. Finding work, finding food, exploring, hacking, all of it is defined by these dice and the simple stats you set up in your playstyle.

Every day your body is decaying and you need stabilizers (hello planned obsolescence) to keep it together. The less condition you have, the less dice and less capacity you have. Here is the brillantly simple and very effective way CS blends theme and mechanics. Citizen Sleeper draws on experiences with chronic illness, disability and their intersections with capitalism and game-ifys it. Citizen Sleeper harnesses the careful balancing act of living on the margins. With elegant brutality, CS relentlessly connects your actions and choices to the limitations of life under capitalism. It is consistently presenting narrative nuggets, in-between beats that spark small moments to ponder the granularity of our humanness and contrasts that systemically with the need maintain or survive.

Where Citizen Sleeper elevates itself, where this gem truly radiates, is in its characters. This game's collection of characters are nuanced, well-developed and gorgeously human. This incredible constellation of characters comes together as a chorus of community and compassion. The characters of Erlin's Eye are often role models; people who have found light in the darkness. As you come to embody this Sleeper, these people welcome you, validate your history and present opportunities for you. In a game marked by the shadows of exploitation and marginalization, its characters shine as everlasting beacons of empathy.

When I finished the game, I sat in silence for about 10 minutes. I let it wash over me. I thought about who I am and who I was and then I said "thank you" out loud to no one. Ultimately, I was thankful for a game that never waivered in its humanity, never shyed away from the gnashing of existence and always reveled in the kindness present in the struggle. Thank you, sleeper.

#citizen sleeper #video games #capitalism #nintendo switch #xbox game pass #pc games #chewreview

[chewbop]

Jedi Survivor & Going Big

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In Rise of Skywalker's wretched shadow, there were 2 reasons to not completely question your faith in the franchise; The Mandalorian and Jedi Fallen Order.

Despite its flaws, Fallen Order was a great comfort meal of influences from mechanics in games like Uncharted, Dark Souls and Metroid. A great tribute act to better games housed in a rock solid Star Wars skin.

The sequel, Jedi Survivor, still has flaws. It still has some similar flaws from the first game, mainly sorta shoddy performance. Survivor's flaws however are completely dwarfed by its confidence, ambition and substantial evolution.

Jedi Survivor's leap over Fallen Order, it's biggest catalyst for evolution, is a it's totalizing cohesion. No longer is this slice of Star Wars a pretty good hodge podge of influences. In Fallen Order, Uncharted influences would move into clear Soulsborne influences with a dusting of Metroid. Things felt disjointed and lacked synthesis to truly make an original game. Survivor is now better aligned with the essence of the overall Universe of Star Wars. Survivor's influences are fueled by the distinct sensation of Star Wars-ness. The game uses its pieces to maximize a Star Wars experience and its limbs now feel attached to a cohesive, forward moving body. Everything is submerged in the idiosyncrasies of Star Wars and everything has a clearer and more distinct purpose.

With a massive boost to its world and level design. Cal Kestis' spelunking Nathan Drake influence is now properly elevated by level design that encourages Metroidvania exploration and the traversal abilities to make it satisfying and dense. Jedi's Souls combat takes places in much bigger spaces that have life and a sense of place which bolsters options of engagement and tools in fights.

The story, like nearly everything else in Jedi Survivor, is much better because of its exponential increase in layers. The plot itself is thematically darker but richer than Fallen Order. Cal steps out confidently as a much deeper and endearing character in this sequel. The cast is fantastic and deliver amazing performances to ground the world. The motivations are stronger in purpose and emotion. All of this is housed within areas and play spaces drenched with detail and consideration. Respawn have outdone themselves with these narrative pieces. They understand how to maximize these elements cumulatively to deliver a satisfying Star Wars experience in a narrative regard; one that uses every tool it can to deepen context and world texture.

Jedi Survivor is a huge leap for from promise to potency I haven't felt since the distance from Assassin's Creed 1 to 2. It's a visually stunning game that looks, plays and sounds far beyond the original. Really special work here, and despite its issues, Jedi Survivor's ambition is massive, exciting and passionate.

#video games #star wars #ps5 #xbox series x #pc games #jedi survivor #jedi fallen order #chewreview

[chewbop]

My 10 Favorite Games of 2022 Part 2 (#5-1)

5. Metal Hellsinger [Xbox/PC/Playstation]

Hellsinger takes rhythm games and blasts them with a Doom double-barrel. Featuring an armada of big time metal vocalists, Metal Hellsinger creates torrents of carnage and eye-searing flow states that pump pure blood and adrenaline into the grips of your fingers.

4.Deathloop [Playstation/Xbox/PC]

Arkane Studios' games are a gold standard in level design and Deathloop adds to those riches. Deathloop weaponizes information as an integral piece of its roguelite design. This is a game that puts you in control as a former chief of security, a roleplay which holistically bolsters all of the game's elements. A full damn sandwich.

3.Neon White [PC/Switch/Playstation]

Neon White has to be a lost or imagined Dreamcast game. With its chunky y2k menus, willfully cringy toonami aesthetics, and astonishing music and mechanics, Neon White presents a sublime force of speed and momentum that pays homage to Sega's greatest era. Truly an Indie marvel.

2.Pentiment [Xbox/PC]

Pentiment is the best Xbox game released in a decade. A beautiful narrative murder mystery that meditates on the nature of community, connection and the humanity of history and storytelling. The town of Tassing and its cast of characters are unforgettable, heartwarming and devastating.

1. Elden Ring [PC/Xbox/Playstation]

Fromsoft was once the outsiders looking in, now an industry moving force. Elden Ring is the culmination of From's decade of glory. This is a game that commits to mystery, player agency and environmental history. ER IS one of the most enriching and sublime open world games ever created. Fromsoft do the impossible on a regular basis, and somehow still have this paradigm shifting masterpiece in the tank. Unbelievable and astounding results.

#elden ring #pentiment #neon white #metal hellsinger #deathloop #pc games #xbox game pass #playstation #indie game #game of the year #fromsoft games #arkane studios #obsidian #chewreview

[chewbop]

My 10 Favorite Games of 2022 Part 1 (#10-6)

10.Wordle [PC/Mobile]

A simple, and devastatingly effective, piece of design. Damn near anyone can play and anyone can get it. Wordle is the pinnacle of game as watercooler. A brilliant little brain tickler that really only asks for about 20 minutes of your day at a time.

9. Vampire Survivors [Xbox/PC]

Vampire Suvivors is a deceitful dollop of dopamine. What starts as a borderline idle game becomes a demon-hunting, castlevnia-like by way of pacaman scrambling out of the proverbial pocket like a gothic quarterback. VS's depth is astounding, and it's screenfilling domination is absolute hijacking of the pleasure center.

8. Immortality [Xbox/PC]

Immortality is a fascinating expirement in narrative. An FMV game that directly distills the essence of film and game. The story of Marissa Marcel is a weird, wild and unhinged excercise in creativity.

7. Marvel Midnight Suns [Xbox/PC/Playstation]

The creators of X-Com: Enemy Unknown have spun out the most creative Marvel games to date. It's a bizarre stew; 1 part deckbuilder, 1 part turn-based strategy, 1 part Persona, 1 part marvel reality show. The result is a mechanically brilliant and wonderfully goofy game, that calls to a time before the MCU.

6.Citizen Sleeper [Xbox/PC/Switch]

This narrative, space, tabletop-lite RPG is strikingly human. Citizen Sleeper is deeply and reverently empathetic. It's story of disability, disenfranchisement, survival and community is among the most touching pieces of fiction in all of 2022.

#game of the year #vampire survivors #wordle #immortality game #marvel midnight suns #citizen sleeper #marvel #indie game #marissa marcel #video games #firaxis games #poncle #jump over the age #sam barlow #chewreview