Monster Hunter

Monster Hunter Wilds: Week One

There’s a new Monster Hunter game out now. You know what that means, right?

It means I probably won’t be playing much else this month.

Monster Hunter Wilds is the follow-up to 2018’s Monster Hunter World. It’s a slightly different experience than you’d get with the more Nintendo-y MH games; the MHW games are more focused on appealing to a wider audience to bring in new players and, being completely un-portable, only support online multiplayer. That’s already a knock in my book, because 50% of the fun of Monster Hunter is getting together with my brother to hunt locally.

That factor aside, I’ve had a lot of fun with Wilds over the first week. While not a single one of the pre-release trailers got me hyped in any way, I’m happy to report that the game is just as good as or better than any that came before it. Which is what you’d hope for from a sequel. It’s been a while since I’ve played either World or Rise, so I was a bit rusty at first, but I got back into the swing of things pretty quickly. At least as far as basic mechanics go.

Month End Video Game Wrap-Up: February 2025

~ Game Over ~

Wedding Witch (PC) – A horny Vampire Survivors clone that I bought and played for a joke, but then I ended up spending 10 hours 100%ing it. Whoops!

Silent Hill 2 (PC) – I’ve been itching to play the original since finishing the remake last year, and a co-worker recommended I try out the Enhanced Edition mod, so I did. It looks good for sure, and it was nice to revisit a classic. Really drove home how much bigger the remake is, too. Livestreamed the whole thing, too.

Mario & Luigi: Brothership (Switch) – Should have finished this months ago, but the whole let’s playing process really slowed me down. I liked the game a lot, but would have liked it even more if the dialog was cut down by 25-50% and it was like 10 hours shorter. That also describes how I feel about most M&L games that came after Superstar Saga.

A List of Viddy Games from the Old Year

Happy 2023!

Here is a big ol’ list of all the video games that I spent a significant amount of time playing in 2022. It’s not a comprehensive list, as I left off a few little indie games that were more “experiences”, games that I gave up on after a single session, and games that aren’t really games (like Rocksmith and Fitness Boxing). If you’d like to know how I felt about any of them, I included the month in which I started playing each one, so you can conveniently look up the appropriate Month End Round-Up post.

Of note is that of the 75 games listed below, 53 were eligible for my “Top X of 2022” list. I’ve narrowed it down to the ones I liked best, and I was left with fifteen finalists. Now I have the unenviable task of deciding if I want my GOTY list to just be 15 games, or if I want to try to figure out which five to cut to make it a nice, round Top Ten. Or, should I add seven more games to make it the Top 22 of ’22? Find out in… I don’t know, like a week or two, maybe? I’m going to try to get it done before February, anyway.

Nintendo Stats – 2022 Edition

I’ve grown to really enjoy how Nintendo compiles your play history and presents it in statistical data for the year. And apparently Steam did it this year, too!

Alas, Nintendo’s offering for 2022 was weak, with much less data than the last couple of years. What I got was a list of the 21 Switch games I played the most this year, and how many hours of each. No graphs, no in-depth breakdowns, nothing else. So, here are the top three…

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 takes the cake for sure, and I still have a ton of game left to play there. I don’t want to give too much away, but it’s definitely going to rank high on my 2022 GOTY list. Monster Hunter Rise got second billing because the Sunbreak expansion came out this year and I spent a lot of time grinding away at that with my brother. Lastly, and just squeaking in there at the end of the year, is Pokémon Scarlet, which is even a few hours richer than what it says above, because I’ve played it a bunch since these stats were delivered. Also, the assertion that I only played Pokémon on 10 separate days cannot be right. It just can’t!

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: November 2022

~ Game Over ~

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow (GBA) – What? Halloween season is over? Sure, but Castlevania is appropriate at any time of the year. Plus, this is my favourite ‘Vania, so there’s that. Is it still good almost 20 years later? Yeah! A little creaky in some ways, but still solid. Got the good ending and 100% map completion, but I had no interest in grinding for 100% soul completion.

ElecHead (Switch) – A very fun retro-style puzzle-platformer. Charge up platforms with your body and see what happens! Throw your head to charge up far away platforms! Fall and die on spikes many times! You know the type.

The Turing Test (PC) – Sweet first-person-puzzler that is highly reminiscent of Portal and The Talos Principle. Sadly, it’s rather short, and maybe even a wee bit too easy. I suppose it’s a good thing, though, when a game leaves you wanting more.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: September 2022

~ Game Over ~

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 (Switch) – It was a Xenoblade, alright! And an excellent one at that. I’m writing up some additional thoughts that may or may not ever get published, but the most important takeaway is that I enjoyed every one of the 100+ hours that I spent on it.

TMNT: Fall of the Foot Clan (GB) – A fairly simple platformer/punch-’em-up. Short, easy, and not especially special in any way.

TMNT: Back From the Sewers (GB) – Graphically, a huge step up from FotFC. On the other hand, it’s so brutally hard (on normal!) that I would have lost my mind without rewinds/save states.

TMNT: Radical Rescue (GB) – This one’s a mini-metroidvania, though a little more linear than that descriptor suggests. It’s not quite as unfair as BFtS, except for the bosses, who will absolutely make you pull your hair out.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: August 2022

~ Game Over ~

Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak (Switch) – Cleared all the story missions. While the Sunbreak expansion does seem a little bit light on content for the price, at least I know there are at least two more major (and free!) updates on the way. Moved onto grinding anomaly quests now, and I feel like that could honestly last a very long time if there weren’t so many other games to play.

Subnautica (PS5) – Still not a perfect experience, but significantly more stable than when I played the PS4 version last year. It didn’t crash even once this time!

Whisperwind (PC) – Indie spook-’em-up that is mostly walking, with some very basic puzzles. Got all four endings in well under an hour.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: July 2022

~ Game Over ~

New Super Mario World 2: Around the World (PC) – Completed to 100 percent, with many headaches along the way and some mild save-statery to smooth the especially rough parts. Generally speaking, a very good hack, though I cannot forgive the lack of the “beeooo-wip” sound effect when finishing a stage.

TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge (Switch) – Second playthrough as Casey.

Linelight (PC) – A simple puzzle game that provided me a good few hours of fun, and an hour of two of abject frustration. Frustration at how bad I am at solving simple puzzles. A YouTube series is on the way.

Monthend Video Game Wrap-Up: June 2022

~ Game Over ~

Monster Hunter Rise (Switch) – Worked my way up through the post-game elder dragons to prep for the Sunbreak expansion that launches… today!

LumbearJack (PC) – A cute indie game where you play as a bear, reclaiming the forest by destroying anything unnatural. My favourite part was slapping all the humans you meet along the way. YouTube video here.

TMNT: Shredder’s Revenge (Switch) – An exceptionally good throwback to the TMNT brawlers of the 90’s. Feels great, looks great, sounds great. I even recorded a playthrough for YouTube. 10/10 will play again.

~ Progress Notes ~

New Super Mario World 2: Around the World (PC) – World 14

Final Fantasy III (DS) – Cleared Goldor’s Manor

Elden Ring (PS5) – Exploring Leyndell, Royal Capital

Haunted Zombie School (Switch) – Stage 2

Another U-logy

Last week, I wrote a couple of blog posts that were spurred on by the news that Nintendo will be closing up the 3DS eShop. What I hadn’t mentioned was that the Wii U’s eShop is closing as well. It’s… less of a big deal. I think that I bought every game I wanted on Wii U while it was still Nintendo’s active platform. It’s not like there were a whole lot of them.

What I’m getting to here, is that there was also a statistics thingy for Wii U games on Nintendo’s website. Look at mine!