"Why NOT Switch 2!" - Zoidberg

 This post will join my collection of reviews and comments on the various PC handhelds flooding the market. You can go over to Ebay and do a little searching to see just how many of these things are out there....it's nuts, especially OneXPlayer which churns out high priced handheld variants like Games Workshop churns new Space Marine models. But they have a lot of competition in this space now, with some of it being higher end but still cheaper than what they have to offer (MSI Claw, Legion Go line) and some of it being cheaper (Steam Deck, Xbox ROG Ally Base Model, Legion Go S). It seems like $1,000 to $1,500 is the "prestige price point" now, and anything over that is the dominion of OneX. Meanwhile, you can still spend less than $600 and get a perfectly decent experience, even if not all of the PC games in your collection will run optimally.

All of this is moot, though, when if all you want is a convenient on-the-go gaming experience then you can get a Switch ($379 last I checked), Switch 2 ($450 at least for now) or good old Switch Lite ($229 new, I think?) and have pretty much all the gaming you can stomach, even if its restricted to the walled garden of Nintendo. So what are the advantages of going this route, and what reasons might you not want to do this?

The top advantage aside from price is that the Switch 2 is an actual console, so it and its predecessor is built with ease of use in mind. You can dock it and it just works on your TV. You can take it to go and it just works, unless you are using a second unit and then you have to connect to wifi to get it to handshake with Nintendo's servers before you can play digital games (card-based games will work enywhere, unless you are using one of the cards that is only a code on  Switch 2). You can pop off the joycons and do multiplayer. You can kit it out with all kinds of stupidly fun accessories. I love the Satisfye style grip handles, for example. You can play it, stop a game, shut it down and then start it up again right where you left off with game pause that actually works. 

It does, in short, all the cool things that make consoles a better user experience than a Windows 11 PC in console clothing can do. Even SteamOS which tries hard is still only about 85% of the way there.....though with that said, if you really want the closest experience to a Switch at the closest price point to a Switch then the Steam Deck is a no brainer.

The downside of course is it is a console. So you can't load all your Steam, Epic, Xbox and GOG libraries on a Switch, and if you don't like the types of games that tend to find their way on the Switch then you are out of luck (this is really less of a problem than it seems, though Nintendo's eshop is kind of filled with hentai garbage these days and cheap cash grabs, the Good Games do stand out from the chafe). 

Switch 2 games tend to be more expensive. Many come on game cards but are really just codes; if it says its just a code, don't bother getting it unless you want to take turns sharing that code with family, which I think is possible. Even then, one day in the future if you like having a device guaranteed to last a long time, odds are those codes will eventually fail as all console storefronts tend to go kaput when the user base drops low enough for the company to sunset everything. Likewise with the eshop....look in to how Nintendo closed down their DS/3DS shop for an idea on what its going to look like on the Switch in 5-10 years. 

A note on Switch 2 ergonomics: its got terrible ergonomics, though you can figure out how best to hold it, or go buy a grip attachment or silicone skin like I have to make it more comfortable. That said, all of this is moot as the mere fact that it feels like a feather compared to all the PC handhelds means it will be a much friendlier, easier device to play with for long sessions as a handheld.

All that aside, for many of us there is an expectation that we may not plan on playing all games on a device for the rest of our lives and that the hot newness of 2030 will be far more important than whether games on the 2017 Switch will still be available. So for that scenario....buying one now is totally fine.

Anyway, this is hardly a review of the Switch 2, but it is a moment of sanity that I wanted to shine on the month I do all these handheld reviews: PC handheld gaming is awesome and fun, and I love these gadgets, but if I was on a budget and wanted some on-the-go gaming, I would stick with a Switch 2 in 2026, or maybe also a Steam Deck OLED (or Asus Xbox ROG Ally base model). The Switch 2 is the benchmark by which all of these other devices should aspire to.

Random Things - Mothership, Vaesen, X-Box E-Waste, Switch vs. Steam Deck, Xenoblade Chronicles and So On

 For the last two years or so this has been just the sparsest, most random sort of blog. I used to be able to keep up! Three times a week, or even more....life has a way of making such commitments tough though.

Still, every now and then the urge to just write some fun nonsense overcomes me. Here are some random thoughts of note....

Time to get rid of e-waste! I think I can get rid of the Xbox Series X (and S). More accurately I may give my son the Series X and trade in the Series S. I'm just not doing anything with them. They have no meaningful exclusives that I can't get on PC as well, and I can't benefit from the Game Pass as I already own the games I'd want the pass for in the first place. My desktop and laptop PCs both out-perform the Xbox Series X consistently, which is not a good look. M'eh. At least this is one way I can cut down on electronic clutter in my home study!

Mothership Boxed is going to come out sooner or later, and a combination of new downloads has me pretty excited for the finished product....it looks like the new edition won't deviate as much from the 0E version as I thought it would, and the Warden's Guide is awesome. Speaking of which, for today only Tuesday Knight Games has 50% off 0E Mothership products if you don't already own all of them.

I've been diving more deeply into Vaesen. I think I will, contrary to early assessments, be able to run this game and quite enjoy it. The potential for some truly eerie gothic horror in a non-Lovecraftian domain is proving quite appealing. The Free League game system is just complex enough but also kind of stupid simple, and works well.

Steam Deck vs. Switch! I've had the Steam Deck for a couple months now. It has not buried the Switch, though I thought it might; I have still spent more time on the Switch when traveling than the Steam Deck. The reason, I realize, is because the Switch's game selection by and large caters to on-the-go, short stint play, and even the long games (Xenoblade Chronicles, for example) provide for a fairly quick in-and-out experience if needed. By contrast, I unwittingly loaded a bunch of hardcore games on the Deck, games which require time and focus to properly enjoy, so therefore make less than stellar game choices when on the go. My bad!

Speaking of Xenoblade Chronicles, I decided to at last tackle this series from start to finish (yeah you can check in at any entry, but I wanted to do it this way). I am about 35 hours in to the first Xenoblade Chronicles. It deserves a proper review when I finish, but I can state the following: casual mode is nothing to be ashamed about; I played it on regular settings until around 16 hours in when I was starting to find the combat really boring and repetitive. I read up on what Causal Mode did, and after trying it realize all it does is make the trite, boring combat go much faster. I could set it on hard mode, but the problem is I really just want to play this game to be a completionist; Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is the target goal, here. Anyway, the point is: Casual Mode is your friend if the idea of leveling up Colony 6 sounds like hell to you. If you are ready to drop kick the next Nopon that wants you to murder everything in the name of cuteness, then yeah, try Casual Mode, you won't regret it!

Skyrim and Fallout 4 on Steam Deck, though! Don't count it out, despite what I said earlier. I am getting further in Skyrim on the steam deck than I every have before, and random bouts of Fallout 4 on the Steam Deck are just great. Also, well worth checking out is Soul Hackers 2, which runs extremely well (so far) on the Deck. 

Isolation Reviews: Ape Out for Nintendo Switch

I grabbed this game on a lark back when it first came out. The premise sounds ridiculously simple: you're  great ape of some sort, and you're trapped in a facility which has been experimenting on you. Suddenly, an opportunity to escape arises, and you proceed to bash your way through wave after wave of scientists, technicians, handlers and eventually spec ops dudes gunning for you.

So...under most conditions this sort of game might at best be yet another forgettable isometric action fest, good for a few minutes until it rapidly gets boring. Ape Out defies this convention however by changing things up a bit.

First, it takes a stark contrasting style of simple tones and colors; you're not seeing a top-down world of apes and experimental labs; you're seeing a tonal universe that looks like it was ripped from a seventies record album cover, or maybe the intro to a funkadelic movie.

Second, it ramps up the beat with reactive music which flows according to the pace of action on the screen. The music from each level comes from intense jungle beat jazz music, and it's a major factor in setting the mood and tone of the experience. If you might notice, this is a common feature of good indie titles: attention to sounds and music. When your graphic design is limited, you can put some of the heavily lifting for the game's feel and tone on the sound design. Ape Out excels at this.

Third (and finally) it's style keeps things simple and to the point. New mechanics are introduced gracefully as challenges, and the levels are strange, complex, rhythmic experiences that beg to be re-experienced. Although the game offers four large stages, each of those stages has lots of replayability.

As a handheld experience Ape Out works great, but I played it almost entirely on the big screen. The sheer audacity and pacing makes it worth playing through more than once...it's a simple yet incredibly visceral, satisfying game to play. Solid A! If you want an action-driven isometric experience which is all about building a cadence of action, music, forward momentum and the victory of escape, then you will likely love this one as I did. A perfect Switch game experience.

Holiday Buying Guide Part II: Five Cool Gamer Gifts

It occured to me I'd better get another guide out on this since I did a "part 1" already.....time flies when you're working too much to keep on top of the fun stuff!

Here's Five cool gamer-related gifts you can consider if you need a last minute purchase. As I am a well-rounded gamer into a plethora of content, this list will reflect the gamut from video games to paper and pencil RPGs, but absolutely will not talk war or board games because for some reason I have just never been able to appreciate the subtleties of the genre. To be honest, some of these will look like no-brainers as suggestions coming from me; anyone who follows my blog or games with me knows my predilections...

Number Five: Disco Elysium (PC)

When I started playing this I was expecting another obtuse indie RPG which left me desperately wishing for something else, either more complex and realistic or more basic and down to earth.....indie RPGs are all too often extremly narrow in their taste range. Technically, Disco Elysium may have a narrow taste range, but this is by far the finest example of a well-thought out, excellently voice acted, graphically interesting RPG experience that is absolutely unlike anything you will have experienced. It has trace elements of other film, game and literary genres running through it, with your protagonist being a drunkard who may or may not remember being a cop while his inner demons literally hound him, to a deep, intense focus on a single region of a city in deep dystopian trouble. If you have ever watched Twin Peaks, read Blake Crouch, played Deadly Premonition and enjoyed it, then you owe it to yourself to pick up Disco Elysium. If you like complex and interesting character driven RPGs but will punch the monitor if it's yet another story of a sixteen year old blonde kid about to go on his world saving quest.....then you really need Disco Elysium, the ultimate palette cleanser.

Number Four: Alien RPG

I just got my physical copy of the core book, dice and GM screen, but this is a graphically amazing game, a true coffee table set piece for fans of the Alien movies as well as an actually decent RPG. As I told my gaming group: I now have a game which by default lets me tell the stories I normally hack into my Traveller games anyway, but with lots of excellent, visceral art and specific details of the setting's universe. I will write more about this soon, but an excellent book releasing late in the year and well worth hunting down.

Number Three: Astral Chain (Switch)

The only downside to Astral Chain is that it's a Switch exclusive, so if you don't have one then this is not going to be a useful gift suggestion. That said: if you have a Switch, or someone you are buying for has a Switch, and they don't have this game, then you simply can't go wrong. Astral Chain is a futuristic dystopian cyberpunk action title focused on a world in which a handful of trained agents with the ability to harness the powers of extradimensional beings that are invading Earth use that very power to fight the invaders. It's complex, interesting, has a compelling narrative and excellent mission structure and is just so hard to stop playing. Easily my favorite Switch game purchase this year, in a year absolutely crammed with good stuff.

Number Two: Cypher System Revised

This is my permanent go-to system now for multigenre gaming, really weird settings, pretty much any game with my son (who is much better at understanding this game than any of the D&D-alikes), and it's the only system I feel like running these days aside from Pathfinder 2nd edition. Go figure! The Kickstarted revised edition was well worth the asking price, and is fully retro-compatible with the first edition; this changes nothing, just adds lots of extra good stuff and aims for a reorganizational approach to Cypher that allows for a bit more design flex while still being ridiculously easy to get in to. The first major support setting "The Stars Are Fire" also now out, focusing on SF gaming in Cypher.

Number One: Pathfinder 2nd Edition

This has rapidly become my discerning preference for D&D-like gaming. Pathfinder's focus on refining the numeric shenanigans of its predecessors have led to an interesting level of depth, design and lethality that values my time as a GM, provides a wealth of options to the players, but still delivers hardcore on "adventuring is a dangerous business." Encounters can be rough, and we've had more deaths in PF2E than almost any other edition, but the encounters won felt actually earned. The game rewards strategic thinking in play, and while the character generation is robust it eschews the "hours spent min/maxing" headspace of PF1E in favor of getting down to the nitty gritty of doing things in actual play. And play is where it's at; my group can't stop playing PF2E, and we just can't get enough of it.

Switch Lite vs. The Original Switch - a Switch Off???

For most of my computer gaming/video gaming forays into this corner of the broader gaming hobby I have never considered myself much of a Nintendo guy, but I've had my moments.....specifically I once did own a Nintendo 64 specifically so I could enjoy Shadows of the Empire and Goldeneye, and later on I had one of those Gameboy Advances to keep myself occupied during a period when my jobs seemed to require a lot of waiting around between driving. I recall nothing of the GBA other than it existed, though.

Later on the Gamecube arrived and that most definitely was worth getting, although for every good game on the Gamecube its competition had 3 more so the machine was, while neat, not exciting enough. We got a few really memorable titles for the day on it (Resident Evil 4 when it was still an exclusive, and Eternal Darkness, may the short-lived but awesome franchise R.I.P.) In the end though it was the Xbox which won the day.

I missed the entirety of the Wii phase of Nintendo, and later dabbled only at the end-of-life on the Wii U when I could get a cheap console and games just to experiment with it and play its handful of good exclusives. I only ever owned a Nintendo 2DS briefly, and found it amusing but not quite as awesome as the PS Vita for what I needed as an adult human gamer; finding DS games that were more engaging for adults* was possible but took digging and effort.

So a year and a half or so back when I decided to grab a Switch to see if a portable system that's key selling point was you could dock it with the TV for a bit more processing power, it was mainly from a "this is an interesting tech/gadget" perspective, and only a few games were out for it yet which I really had interest in. As it turns out....here I am a year and a half later, and I think the Switch is the defacto video game machine in my house right now, right behind the PC itself. How on earth did this happen?!?!?

Now, here we are in September 2019 and a Switch Lite is on the loose. I snagged a grey edition, and because this is a thing even though I don't do the tweets or whatever, I guess I'll start the #greyguys movement for this particular console color. The Switch Lite is like the Switch Regular except for the following:

   It is smaller and lighter (it is bigger than most DS models I have seen but distinctly more petit than its bigger cousin);
   It does not have detachable joycon controllers;
   It does not dock to a TV station (thus does not, if you will, "switch");
   It does not get along well with Nintendo Labo although given you can still pair joycons to it anyway I am not sure why;
   And lastly it can be bound to your existing account but if you plan to maintain two switches on the same account will require some Nintendo-level unique juggling of save files and wifi connectivity to work as intended.

So what's the appeal? Well, to address each of the above distinctions:

Smaller means more portable. You can fit this thing comfortably in a pocket and the carry cases are like 1/3 the size of the standard Switch carry case. If you're looking for something a little more discreet and slim, this is it. Some have reported that the slightly smaller screen makes small text harder to read, but here's the deal, speaking as a 48 year old gamer who needs his reading glasses for fine print: if you need glasses to see the current Switch, this one will be about as clear. The difference in size is sufficiently marginal that I am finding no meaningful difference, and the slightly smaller screen size honestly makes the image look a bit crisper to me.

No Detachable Controllers. You can still pair them up through bluetooth connectivity, but for many this is probably an improvement. I know both my son and wife are hard enough on their controllers that they have managed to get them loose during play on the regular Switches. How? I have no idea. On the plus side, I have larger hands and these built-in controllers on the Switch Lite feel just fine to me.

No TV Dock. Look, if this is the feature you want then pony up for the Switch Regular. I did, and I love it. The Switch Lite is the thing I will take with me on business trips or camping trips or pretty much any trip, really. The bigger switch and its dock is how I play my Switch 90% of the time at home, so it's absolutely essential to the Switch identity, but there is lots of room in here for a dedicated handheld-only version that takes up less space and costs less as a result. @All You Youtubers stop breaking your Switch Lites open and trying to mod them to work on the TV, it doesn't have the guts for it (literally).

No Nintendo Labo. I don't know much about Labo, my son is too in to Beyblades and Fortnite to care about it, so I am the least informed person to comment on this. My guess....give Nintendo time, if Labo was a big seller I bet they'll make a kit for the Switch Lite.

Multiple Accounts. So I've personally been messing with this part. Here's what you need to know to do this:

Copying the SSD Contents: you can't just copy data from one SSD to another and stick it in your new machine, it has to be downloaded. Only saves can be transferred. I learned this the hard way by plugging my MicroSD in to the PC, migrating the data to a new MicroSD and then having the Switch tell me the data originated from an evil foreign machine (my docked Switch) and therefore it must be expunged. Sigh. So now I am manually loading the collection to the Switch Lite, all 400+ GB of it.

No Duplicate Saves, No Easy Cloud Saves:  Nintendo's odd method of control is to only allow one save on a machine at a time; even if you're loading to the cloud it appears the save is also "local" and therefore you can keep a save on only one machine at a time. There are some exceptions: you can still play the game on both machines, sure, but it will be two different saves at that point. Presumably the cloud save will backup from the primary console, but I haven't confirmed that yet.

Playing the Same Game on the Same Account on Two Machines: (UPDATE!) You can't play both machines at once, regardless of the game. So You can't try playing any game on one account with two machines, you need a second account to do that. I tried this out tonight under the impression this was not an issue and....surprise. In defense of Nintendo I can't do this on my Xbox One or PS4 Pro either.

Save Juggling: The save juggling is what you need to remember. If you plan to take off on a trip, take your Switch Lite and transfer the save from your docked machine to your travel machine. When you get back, you can load the save back to your docked machine. Easy enough, right?** You can also make sure your Switch Lite has games on it which benefit from or are not hurt by having saves going on two or more machines. For example, I have a whole different save going for different characters on my copy of Torchlight II on both Switches, and I am fine with that.

So...is this machine for you? This is the question all sorts of bloggers and vloggers have been asking over the last few days because the Internet is full of this stuff, and I'm bored and happy to contribute to the clog. Here's my assessment:

Are you a tech/gadget person? Then yeah this is a fun console to own.

Do you travel a lot and like a slimmer portable machine? Then totally, yes.

Is your interest mainly in playing on the TV and engaging with the Switch in ways that benefit from the removable controllers? Then the Switch Lite will disappoint.

Have you always wondered how awesome it would be to have a portable version of an Xbox 360, but even better? Then hell yeah any version of the Switch is right for you, especially as its current and imported game library has grown enormously and includes a ton of "classic" era 360 titles and updated ports such as Bayonetta, Saint's Row III, Dragon's Dogma, the Darksiders series, Dark Souls, Resident Evil Revelations I and II, Assassin's Creed III (with IV and Rogue on the way), and many more. What the Switch can run is frankly shocking.

Do you love RPGs and especially isometric American RPGs? Then you are a criminal for not owning a Switch. You can, as an example, play all the usual assortment of JRPGs on the machine, but you can also play Divinity II Original Sin, Pillars of Eternity and action RPGs like Torchlight II, Titan Quest and Diablo III. More importantly: in the next month we will see releases of Baldur's Gate I and II, Icewind Dale and Planescape: Torment. Holy cow. I hope those last few are enormously good sellers because the Switch would be a great place for the Shadowrun titles to land as well as Torment: Tides of Numenera. Future releases include Pillars of Eternity II: Dreadfire and I understand  Neverwinter Nights I as well. That's a lot of classic RPG goodness.

Now, the down side is so many of these are retro ports that you may or may not have already played some, all or even just the ones you wanted to and are good where you're at. But if you're like me and you have found that moving such games to a portable medium with a dedicated gaming experience and real controllers is actually the best way to give you the tools (if not the time) to play these games.....then you might want to consider it.

So....is it worth it for me? I'm happy to have a compact portable console and love the ownership of uselessly fun gadgets, so I guess so. But the incredible difficulty I have in being able to seamlessly play on either Switch without having to manually cross saves is almost a deal-breaker. Right now, for me, the practical solution is to designate some games (the ones I prefer to play big screen) on the classic Switch, and other games (which make for a better portable experience) on the Switch Lite. But I shouldn't have to do this; the cloud save feature should be better than this, Nintendo. Seriously.

Okay, Switch rave off!



*What I mean here is not actual adults, who do enjoy the DS line, but "Adult gamers who are not in to Pokemon, cutesy anime stuff, chibi, cartoon characters, or hypercuteness." Grimdark and gruesome stuff did exist on the DS/3DS lines, but you had to dig into the dark underbelly of Nintendo and Gamestop to find it. Dementium for example, or RE: Revelations. But not enough warrant keeping the machine.

**Actually it is a pain in the ass. Fix this Nintendo! The 21st Century and Cloud Data is a thing and you should just accept it.

Classic Doom, Doom II and Doom 3 on Switch

This happened out of the blue:



And honestly, this is really very cool of Bethesda to do. You can now play the full run of the core Doom games through to the current game on Switch, which is honestly a great platform for this style of shooter, especially the originals. It also helps bolster Switch's modest array of FPS style shooters, of which there are a few good ones but not nearly enough.

Switch is rapidly turning in to a premiere system not only for fans of indie games and Nintendo properties, but for fans of  nostalgia and retro gaming (if we interpret nostalgia to mean anything from the 90's to the 00's and think of even Xbox 360/PS3 era titles as worthy of this title) these are great titles to have access to. But...hey, it works; I may be long done with Saint's Row the Third on PC, but the opportunity to play it in portable form at my leisure today on the Switch is great.

The classic Doom titles are priced reasonably (Capcom take note) at $5 apiece for I and II and $10 for 3. I'll continue to state what I long feel is probably an "exception to the norm" opinion that Doom 3 is the best and most underrated of the titles....Doom I and II were great for what they did, but Doom 3 was the game that actually got me seriously in to FPS gaming on PC, and the frenetic style of the 2016 Doom may be welcome to fans of the original, but Doom 3's attention to atmosphere and horror as well as story remains the best in the series for me. Playing it on the Switch is a very cool experience.

Anyway....Switch continues to be the most oddly enjoyable console I've got, mainly due its embrace of these retro ports (and no doubt other games if you're a more traditional Nintendo fan). It still suffers from having a ton of crappy indie titles on its roster (sure, there are good indie titles, too but you have to wade through a lot of garbage to find the gems), but with these tried and true classics on Switch it continues to be a fantastic console experience.

Now: Bethesda, release all the Quake titles on Switch next! Pleeeeaaaase! Doom is fun but Quake is better, and I'd kill for a good port of Quake 4 on Switch.

2018 Computer Gaming in Review

Like the tabletop RPG gaming post, I find myself amused by the fact that far less of what I did this year with computer gaming was actually from 2018. Even worse, I have indulged in plenty of 2018 releases, but to be honest....not too many were all that impressive. This is not a great year for gaming, to be honest....especially not AAA gaming.

So without further delay: here's the Realms of Chirak Household Gaming Top Six List for "Things we Played and Liked" in 2018:

#6: Vampyr
 
   I think this came out a year ago, but it is notable for being the only 3PS role playing game I have bought this year that is not a distinctive Sony exclusive. It's a great story about Victorian London during a rash of sickness and plague and the physician who finds himself an unwitting vampire. Very much enjoying this one, check it out!

#5: Fortnite

   As a family we have played a lot of Fortnite in the last year. It's ironic because back in 2017 (or was it 2016?) I bought the zombie-killing fortress building retail version of this game for my son and I to play together. We weren't so excited about that mode it turns out, but Battle Royale ended up getting us back in to it.
   This game has the following features going for it:
--it's basically family friendly as shooters go (if you mute the snotty kids in squads)
--you can group up in the game as a team (great for mom, son and dad to play together)
--it's Battle Royale mode is free (but yes you will end up wanting to spend money on v-bucks Just Because)
--just when you get tired of it, a new season starts; also, if you give up the idea of actually being good at it you can instead play the "challenges and achievements minigame" which is honestly the only way to get anywhere in Fortnite anyway unless you are aged 15-25 and stream on Twitch.

#4: Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon: Wildlands

   Did I review this game last year? I played a lot of it, but I kept on playing in 2018 and finished the full campaign then dived right in to the weird DLC. I don't know if this game is ultimately a "reccommend to all" sort of deal, but Ghost Recon: Wildlands uniquely exotic and fun version of fictional Bolivia is a pleasure to explore, and filled with interesting open world content. I continue to revisit the game even months after completing the content.

#3: Watch Dogs 2

   Yeah, over two years since it was released and I finally finished this game, but continue to love it. The theme of millennial hackers vs. the evil cyphers for Google and Facebook is a fantastic open world experience, and I really appreciate that the game let me play a non-lethal character for 95% of the experience. The multiplayer component is singularly unique and digital San Francisco was loads of fun to explore. I am done with it now, but I spent a lot of time getting to this point in 2018.

#2: Diablo III Eternal Collection

   Speaking of family games, Diablo III Eternal Collection on the Switch has also proven to be a household hit. Remember, the family that slays demons together stays together! We all have copies, and have engaged in lengthy demon-slaying sessions. I think my wife and son are way ahead of me, however. Once again, though....this game is several years old, but thanks to a new release of a very good port to a dedicated handheld-optional game console, it's well worth playing again.

#1: The Switch

   This location gets reserved for the portable hybrid console which Nintendo has championed. The Switch is loaded with content that just works for fun entertainment, as only the Switch can deliver. There are games on the Switch (such as Dead Cells, Bayonetta and Octopath Traveller) that I will happily engage with on the small screen in the comfort of bed or on a lawn chair that I would never bother with on a big screen with a regular console. And when I want to play the Switch on the big screen, or on co-op with the family? Piece of cake. I started with one months ago, and now we have three Switch consoles in the house, one for each of us.

Dishonorable Mention:

A lot of new and ongoing franchises just crapped the bed this year. In no particular order I feel that AAA gaming did itself little justice....at least for me. Here's the list of shame:

Call of Duty Black Ops IIII: buggy, crashes often, and needs lots of tweaking to make the Blackout mode ultimately worth my time as a filthy casual who can't compete with the hardcore leets. I load it up periodically and think about how cool it would be if they had a single player campaign I could enjoy, but then remember that they decided I am not their target demographic (solo player who likes a story with his FPS game). I need to make sure not to buy CoD anymore, it's like the game dumped me, but will still take my money.

Destiny 2: well, the problems with Destiny 2 are many, and I think they stem from the fact that Bungie doesn't know how to do a living world MMORPG. The fact that Destiny 1 content is gated off from the new game is an example of how they fail to do this right. The newer game has too much hardcore content and not enough stuff for filthy casuals who just want to do missions, have fun and NOT grind for armor and weapons. It has too many locations on odd worlds, asteroids and moons that are singular in their lack of interesting details (contrast with the much more interesting locales in the first game), and a restructured questing format that is just not at interesting as it used to be. I'm still playing, but only barely.

Star Wars Battlefront 2: As this game chugs on it continues to avoid re-introducing loot crates after the debacle last year, but they have added more content. Unfortunately most of the content is just not as good, and often leads less to strategic and interesting experiences on the map and instead leads to confusion and random nonsense. I am sure, if I had the energy, I could find the sweet spot for this one and get it to click, but I find it interesting that I found Battlefront 1 so accessible and fun, and the sequel is just so.....painful and random. I may delete it entirely (although my son might object so maybe not).

The Future:

There are a few games I look forward very much to playing in 2019, but I haven't gone far enough in to these games in 2018  to be able to speak on them much yet. These include:

Pathfinder: Kingmaker -- a computer game in Golarion, with Pathfinder rules!
Numenera: Tides of Torment -- I have it, and my interest in the RPG will get me to try this at last
Assassin's Creed: Origins and Odyssey -- yeah I'm two games behind on this now, still trying to finish Syndicate, but both of the new games I would like to visit in 2019.
Anthem: please EA don't let me down here.
Resident Evil 2 Remake: I can't stress how much I desperately want this game.
Division 2: absolutely looking forward to this one.