This was a great year for gaming. Coming out of the worst of the global pandemic studios were able to finally get together and release some stuff as well as chip shortages loosening slightly. We saw Valve release their first-ever handheld that exploded in popularity and acclaim, Sony released a bunch of fantastic exclusives, a new PlayStation subscription overhaul, and announced PSVR2. Nintendo keeps releasing solid exclusive games and slowly building up NSO. PC gamers continue to receive cutting-edge technology and amazing software tech. Nvidia also launched their 4000 series GPUs with DLSS 3.
This is the best thing to happen to gaming since the PSP. It feels like Valve took Sony’s torch and carried it. The upside is that Valve has completely unlocked the Deck for all to use at their leisure. It’s a powerful machine capable of amazing things from emulation to running the latest PC games. Valve also did an amazing job getting these to people during the height of the global chip shortage, had fantastic customer service for RMA, and constantly releases updates on a weekly basis.
While it may not seem that there were as many exclusives for Sony’s platforms this year it’s because they don’t have the PC realm. We saw a bunch of amazing ports to PC this year, but Sony laid down their last card with a confirmed release date this year. Sony can still prove that their own IPs rock and people want them.
What can I say? The game has to be played to do it justice. The acting is impeccable, the story is exciting and full of adventure and wonder, the combat is tight, responsive, and addictive, exploring the vast world is a blast. The visuals are fantastic. There’s not much here that can’t be liked. It’s almost a perfect game.
There were quite a few great Switch exclusives this year with even a few third-party ones popping up. Nintendo has had 5 consecutive years of greatness on the Switch with fantastic exclusives year after year. It doesn’t seem like Nintendo is slowing down either.
Bayonetta 3
Bayonetta is finally back. After a long hiatus and rumblings of cancellations she made her debut on Switch. It didn’t disappoint. Fantastic visuals, advancements in every system, bombastic set pieces, and fun characters. It was well worth the wait.
Once again Microsoft has pretty much merged Xbox and PC together into one seamless ecosystem. The Xbox Series X is a mid-range PC with every game having been ported to PC by now. This year was probably the strongest for Microsoft in a long time. While Xbox exclusives are absolutely zero for just that platform the ecosystem as a whole was very strong.
While this is not on Xbox, the PC is the only way to play here and you need a mouse and keyboard to play this game. It’s wholly unique to that control scheme. Not only that, but this is one of the best FMV video games ever made and one of the funniest. With multiple playthroughs you’re bound to find something new that you missed.
Many people use video game reviews to determine how to spend their hard-earned dollars. While as an adult I don’t take this as seriously and I now make my own money I am more forgiving of games that aren’t perfect. As kids or teens, we have limited money and are usually picked through gaming magazines to determine if that one game was worth the money because we only got a few a year. For me, it was only during Christmas time that my parents bought games. I mostly rented mine throughout my childhood and teen years. Even for rentals, I was picky as I didn’t want to be stuck on my weekend with a dud of a game. Even a 7/10 or 3.5/5 would be considered a waste of time. This was the last generation in which AAA title after AAA title would be considered fantastic and with so many exclusives it was hard to keep up with. The HD era of gaming would see budgets balloon to insane heights and game releases slowed down as a result.
In my eyes, 7/10 or 3.5/5 games are mostly ignored. These aren’t always considered hidden gems either. Some are, but some are just considered forgettable. Not awful or good, but just passes under everyone’s radar. These aren’t the “so bad it’s good” type of games either. A few of these games have cult followings while a few I had only heard of while compiling this list and some I played myself growing up. I compiled this list from Metacritic with games between 74-70. I feel that’s the true blue 7 range. 79 and 78-rated games usually only have about 25% of the critics giving it a 7 to bring an otherwise 8 score down some. These games are at least rated by half the critics as 7/10. While I know a lot of people don’t listen to critics and some might feel this game should be rated higher or lower is subjective. Like it or not, critic reviews drive sales and it may be the reason why you might find a few games on this list you’ve never heard of, thought was talked about worse than you remember, or something along those lines
Naruto: Clash of Ninja – 2006 Naruto: Clash of Ninja 2 – 2006
This oddball Gamecube exclusive Naruto game was a beat ’em up rather than a fighting game. It was released very late in Gamecube’s life, but it was a popular series for the younger crowd. It was simple yet fun.
Most Recent Entry: Naruto X Boruto Ninja Tribes – 2020 (AND, iOS)
1080 Avalanche– 2003
A great follow-up to the Nintendo 64 classic, however, there isn’t much here. The game can be finished in a few hours and there’s no reason to go back to it. Nintendo has yet to resurrect this series.
Pokemon Colosseum – 2004
This a small update to thePokemon Stadium gameplay. It looked the part and kept fans interested, but wasn’t anything drastic or exciting. The series would be killed off with the final entry on the Wii.
Most Recent Entry: Pokemon Battle Revolution – 2007 (Wii)
Sonic Adventure 2 Battle– 2001
This was essentially an updated version of the Dreamcast game. With two new characters, it was essentially the same which disappointed fans of the original. If you haven’t played the original then this is a good jumping-off point. The series would see more re-releases and never get a true sequel.
Most Recent Entry: Sonic Frontiers – 2022 (PC, PS4, XONE, XSX, PS5, NS)
Swingerz Golf– 2002
A one-and-done Hot Shots rival by Eidos. It had the same wacky characters but wasn’t anything new in the golfing department. It’s still a cute alternative to Sony’s series.
Lost Kingdoms– 2002
A unique, yet strange series on the GameCube was quickly forgotten about. The card battling system was fun and the game had a great world to explore but was rough around the edges. The sequel improved on a lot of this.
Most Recent Entry: Lost Kingdoms II – 2003 (GC)
Phantasy Star Online Episode III: C.A.R.D. Revolution– 2004
The Phantasy Star series is a popular series for Sega and has been on many consoles in many forms. It’s still going on today, but the odd choice to have an online game on GameCube was strange indeed. This version used a card battling system. Critics praised the music but kept comparing the game to Culdcept.
Most Recent Entry: Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis – 2020 (PC)
Cubivore: Survival of the Fittest– 2002
This is one of the quirkiest and oddest games on the system. It’s also one of the rarest. It’s also an Atlus game so it has a cult following. It’s cute, unique, and fun, but incredibly simplistic to the point of boredom.
NBA Courtside 2002– 2002
Nintendo attempted to have its own NBA franchise on its system. It would be the last in the series that started on the N64. It was lambasted for its real-life inconsistencies but praised for its visuals and gameplay.
Mario Party 4 – 2002 Mario Party 6– 2004
The series was growing very stale at this point. It’s also a game that’s only fun with other people. The single-player was criticized and the lack of innovation was apparent.
Most Recent Entry: Mario Party Superstars – 2021 (NS)
Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg – 2003
One of the most unique games on the GameCube and from Sonic Team. It’s a cult classic that fetches a high price as well. It was loved for its unique charm, gameplay, and visuals, but had some iffy controls that some couldn’t get past.
Wario World– 2003
While it garners high praise today, it was considered second-rate to Mario‘s mainline adventures. People considered it too easy and short in comparison but praised its quirkiness and weirdness.
Harvest Moon: Another Wonderful Life – 2005
While the series has seen more downs than ups, Another World Lifewas an expansion of the original game. The cute graphics stay, and some new additions are added, but this was mostly for newcomers and not original owners who won’t find much value here.
Most Recent Entry: Harvest Moon: One World – 2021 (PC, NS, PS4)
Brain Age was an incredibly popular game for the DS. It was the system’s Wii Sports. Everyone, young and old, got a DS just to play this game. The portrait-style mode plus the need to only play for a few minutes a day were great for casual gamers. While this is seen regularly on mobile phones these days, it was a new concept in 2006. Instead of expanding on that game more, Nintendo thought it was a good idea to make another game that’s just the testing part, and you can do it all day if you want. Sure, that’s great, but it needs to have a lot of content due to the gimmick being taken away.
You’re going to notice this just 30 minutes into playing. You set up your profile (not as robust as Brain Age either), and you take your first test. You are tested in five different categories to see how much your brain weighs. Thinking, Memorizing, Analyzing, computing, and Identifying. Each category has three mini-games that are mostly similar. The memorization category has you matching things from the top screen or playing a form of Simon Says. Thinking has you drawing lines to solve fast puzzles; analyzing has you doing similar tasks, such as solving math problems. There are other mini-games, such as counting currency as fast as you can and picking the one with the highest amount. They’re simple problems, but the game loses the charm of the Brain Age games quickly. No portrait mode, less handwriting, no use of the mic, and the analysis of your brain seems silly and trivial. It doesn’t feel like a brain-training exercise.
That’s also quite a shame because this could be the WarioWare of thinking games, and it could work. With only 15 mini-games, the content feels old fast, and the puzzles are dry and not very fun. I felt like I was taking an entrance exam due to the lack of pizazz and flashiness that dress up these kinds of games. Sadly, there aren’t even any other modes besides verses and practice. It feels like a demo or a portion of a much larger game. The difficulty is adjusted on the fly as you play. Answer correctly, and harder questions appear, but fail, and they get easier again. While you can’t memorize answers due to their randomness, you can at least get better at these tasks over time.
The presentation is also lacking. It looks colorful but is dull and boring. There are minimal sound effects and music, and it feels like an early mobile game, to be quite honest. I can’t see this being fun for kids, and adults will grow tired of it quickly. The best part about this game is multiplayer, as these kinds of games are best played with others. However, solo players will grow bored in about an hour. The staying power that made Brain Age games so great is gone here. Anyone who paid full price for this game would probably be upset due to only having a couple hours of gameplay, if that. At the end of the day, what you’re left with is a brain-teasing sampler with fun multiplayer.
The DS was made for rhythm games. The touch screen is a perfect way to implement fun new ideas, as physical interaction with music is usually a good mix. Ontamarama tries this with cute visuals and the touch screen combined with buttons. Sadly, it doesn’t pan out quite how the developers wanted. The game is just too distracting and causes artificial inflation in difficulty when the actual rhythm part never gets very hard.
The combination of using the face buttons and the touch screen isn’t designed very well here. You have to tap the Ontamas that pop up on the touch screen to fill the buttons scrolling across the bar. Using just directional buttons to trigger the actual note This just doesn’t work. While you tap the creatures, you can’t keep your eye on the scrolling bar either. Slower notes work fine, and you will notice this during the first few songs of the story mode. However, adding other things like needing to double tap notes, drawing circles around groups of Ontamas, and avoiding black Onatamas that lower your performance is just too much.
Eventually, songs get so infuriating because this combo is just not working out. The songs aren’t hard themselves; if only I could keep an eye on both things. There is also stuff happening on the top screen that I can’t even look at for a second. I also felt the circle drawing wasn’t forgiving enough. If you draw the circle too big, it won’t register, and the same is true for too small. Often times, I just barely made it through the song before failing. There’s no way practice can make this game better unless you memorize each button placement and note, and that’s a good way to master a rhythm game. It should be about mastering the mechanics and having your reflexes honed.
It would be kind of worth it if the songs were good. These are just loud clashes of instruments that don’t sound good. There are no catchy beats or tunes. It’s just generic-sounding music that just sounds like awful noise. If the music was really good, then trying to master this frustrating system might be worth it. Now, I’m not saying the game is horrible. It’s a unique take on the genre, and the developers really tried to do something new. When it works, it’s a lot of fun. The visuals are cute, but the story is complete nonsense and silly. Sadly, there are only about a dozen tracks, so once you beat Story Mode, that’s pretty much it.
I can see how this game didn’t sell well and failed. It isn’t the near perfection of Elite Beat Agents with its licensed music or Guitar Hero with its unique peripherals. The DS didn’t have a fantastic run of rhythm games, but they were all unique and tried something new, and I can appreciate that. I feel that if you really want to scratch a rhythm itch, pick this up for a challenge, but don’t play it for the music.
Match-three puzzle games are a weakness for me. As long as there are some good visuals and addictive gameplay, I’m hooked. Meteos is a unique take on this, as the game lets you drag blocks anywhere in their column, and you can match three horizontally or vertically. This allows the game to drop blocks at a breakneck pace. You need to strategize and line up blocks, but that’s not all. To clear them, the matched blocks launch themselves and all blocks above them into the air. Continue matching blocks below that set, and it will exit the screen and clear.
Of course, there are some items that help you clear the stage, such as a giant hammer and bombs, but if the game is going too slow for you, there’s a speed-up dial as well. The main mission mode has three different stages. In each one, you have to work your way to the final boss, Meteo. Each and every planet has a different tile set and way to clear blocks. One planet required matching two sets nearby in order to get the blocks to launch. Some planets will launch every set all the way up in exchange for making the entire round faster. This is a simple concept, but it’s hard to master. Match-three games like this always require strategy, but I found that some luck comes into play here. I would restart one round nearly a dozen times only to win really quickly thanks to blocks falling in a certain pattern that allowed me to keep my screen clear.
Every time you defeat a boss, it’s really satisfying. The fast pace of needing to look ahead and make sure blocks are always lined up gets tough, but you learn over time. I wish you had power-ups like in some games like this, but what’s here is fine. There are a couple more modes, such as an endless mode and a custom mode. Modes are ideal for games like this that don’t have a ton of missions, like Puzzle Quest. However, I really do feel a more robust mission mode would have been better. After about an hour, I wanted to stop. The game is only fun in short bursts due to its arcade-like nature. While the game can be addictive at times when you actually win, it can also be exhausting because of the fast pace and luck-based nature of each match.
For an early DS title, the game looks good. There are some nice effects and lots of colors, and the touch screen responds well to the small blocks. I did find some tilesets hard on the eyes, but I eventually got used to them. Overall, Meteos is a fun puzzle game on the system and takes the genre in new directions despite the lack of a more robust mission mode.
LucasArts’ SCUMM engine games hold a great fanbase for those who grew up in the 80s computer gaming scene. They were bright and colorful. revolutionary for their time in terms of gameplay and art. They were also later updated with voice acting, which was some of the first of its kind. While the games were short (running around 6 hours per game), they were memorable and had a special sense of humor that was considered top-notch. The series got a much-anticipated remake, starting with the first game. While not much was really added, the entire game was redrawn from scratch with all new lines of dialog recorded by the original cast.
The game definitely plays like an old point-and-click adventure of yore. Clumsy controls (which were never really fixed), slow pace, obtuse object hunting, and no puzzles That’s not to say the game is bad. While it doesn’t feel as modern as The Longest Journey or even David Cage’s games with quick-time events and button pressing, that’s part of the charm. Thankfully, the game has a hint system that slowly gives you more specific hints, including full-on arrows pointing to the exact spot you need to be. This was really helpful and a must-have for first-time players or those who aren’t familiar with this era of adventure games.
The game has two main areas. The first one consists of some small areas, a town, and a large overhead map to get to these areas. Most of the game is spent gathering items and figuring out where and how to use them. You have multiple commands, such as talk to, push, pull, look at, use, open, and close. These are used by pulling up an action command menu, and then you have your inventory. To use these commands, you need to pull up the command menu and then the inventory. This is cumbersome and took a while to figure out. You control Guybrush by clicking around on the ground, but his walk cycle is pretty slow. There’s a lot of backtracking in this game, and this slowed the progress a bit. One thing I didn’t like was the insult for sword fighting. You have to lose to pirates to learn their insults and comebacks. You need to learn enough to defeat the first “boss”. There was a lot of trial and error doing this, and it got really frustrating.
The stars of the show are the characters and the writing. The salesman Stan, for example, is hilarious. Using overexaggerated arm waving and an obnoxious coat to look like a sleazy salesman. The pirate LeChuck doesn’t get much on-screen time, but neither do most of the characters. The main character, Guybrush, is who you will get to know the most. There is an optional dialog for most characters to get to know their personalities more than their backstories. There just isn’t enough time to get to know them more. So, it makes up for funny writing and witty humor, which the game does solidly.
I liked the visuals in this game. The hand-drawn art is beautiful and still captures the classic LucasArts look. Some of the animations feel a bit stiff still, but again, that all adds to the charm. The voice acting is awesome, and there are some funny uses of items and small tidbits of humor thrown in that did make me chuckle. I have to say that this game won’t hold everyone’s attention. It is slow to build up and takes a while to get going. A lot of people might feel lost clicking on everything and not realize what order to do things in, but the hint system makes this game much more enjoyable. I highly recommend this classic remake, but it won’t be to everyone’s taste.
Here we are again. At least Activision let three go between releases this time, and it’s been paying off. I had high expectations for Modern Warfare II‘s campaign, as 2019’s was pretty damn good. A lot of elements carry over, such as the fantastic acting, fun on-screen characters, and bombastic mission design, but there are a couple of new things thrown in borrowed from Black Ops: Cold War and tweaked slightly. You play as various well-known Modern Warfare characters such as Soap McTavish and Ghost, with Captain Price returning as well as some characters from 2009’s Modern Warfare 2. If you hadn’t guessed, this is a prequel to that game and a direct sequel to Call of Duty 4. Starting to see a pattern here? 2019’s Modern Warfare was a prequel to Call of Duty 4. My guess is that Modern Warfare III will be a prequel to Modern Warfare 3. Why are we doing this? Why is there a Call of Duty multiverse?
Sadly, the campaign isn’t as good as 2019’s and still doesn’t teach any lessons. It’s a fast-paced, rapid-fire campaign that doesn’t focus on its strongest points. The story is interesting enough thanks to the fantastic acting, and the on-screen characters are interesting and fun to watch, and I wanted more of them. Instead, we’re rushed through a bare-bones campaign full of the same stuff we’ve seen before. On-rails vehicle missions, stealth missions that don’t require you to really use stealth, some weird puzzle with a missile laptop that isn’t really a puzzle because Infinity Ward thinks every player is dumb Yeah, the game treats you like you’re stupid and does everything for you. I really wish this would stop. Stop being scared of challenging us. Sure, the gunplay is, bar none, some of the best out there. The weapons feel great, and the animations and various minute things like ADS time, scope switching, and all that jazz feel tweaked and more responsive than ever. It’s a blast to shoot things and use various weapons.
The only new thing here is screwed up, which is the worst part of the game. The final act has you crafting items and sneaking through a city to escape the enemy. Yeah, crafting in Call of Duty I never thought I’d see the day. It’s poorly implemented because the level design is terrible. I constantly got turned around and went in circles, causing me to restart numerous times. You have no way to deal with enemies until you find a sharp object, which is towards the end of the first objective. You can craft smoke bombs, pry tools (which are essential to finding a gun and better weapons), and various small traps, but finding these items is a chore. I had to go into every single house and search everywhere just to get enough parts to make a single item.
Getting caught required numerous restarts, which seriously halted the game. It’s later introduced in an even worse situation in which you are in a single office with no weapons and have to scrounge for a sharp object and make items while also being on a timer to disarm a bomb with that same laptop puzzle thing. It’s stupid and not fun. The thing is, there are only two enemies in the room. Why would I need to craft all of these objects? Find two glass shards under the tables and duct tape them out. In fact, you can just stay under here and disarm the bomb without being seen. What were they thinking?
The campaign is about 5–6 hours long, and it ended on a cliffhanger leading to 2009’s Modern Warfare 2. So after this, go play the remastered campaign of that, I guess. I was left wanting more of what there was less of and wanting less of what I got. The beat of the game is well done. I felt entertained enough by the story and characters to keep going, but those horrible stealth sections really slowed the game up, and it makes me not want to play the campaign again. 2019’s campaign is worth replaying. It’s fun and varied.
The visuals are fantastic. While only a small step up from 2019’s engine, it looks amazing and is a well-optimized engine that can run on lower-end hardware. While there’s no ray tracing right now, I can’t wait to try it out. It’s one of the best-looking games out there and is a treat to look at.
The Multiplayer
This is where I was most excited. I actually really like Call of Duty‘s multiplayer suite. After 2019, the game just perfected it. It’s addictive and fun, and the customization options are pretty large. However, this year’s game is a grind. I didn’t think 2019 was really bad, but I feel like without a Battle Pass, you will be grinding a lot here. The biggest complaint is the new UI. It sucks. There are no more notifications (the green dots) on what you have unlocked. I have to quit a match search so I have time to go in and figure out what I unlocked. The armory itself is a bit confusing. I wish they would have just ported the 2019 UI over. It was perfectly fine.
Even the menu where you pick the match type is confusing. It feels like a mobile UI shoved onto a console. With that out of the way, the game plays pretty much the same. Movement is a bit more refined, guns feel even better than before, and there are more of them and a larger variety. You still get your five main classes and can customize your own, which, by the way, is a confusing mess thanks to that terrible new UI. New perks like strong arm, which lets you see the trajectory of a thrown item. There are now perk packages that let you select two base perks and a bonus perk. I found this really felt better than picking separate perks, as it forced you to mix things up.
The maps themselves are the star of the show, and there are some good ones here. I feel like these are way better than the Cold War‘s maps, but not quite as good as 2019’s. Still, there were only one or two maps I didn’t care for, but they weren’t terrible. The same modes and playlists return, but my favorite is always team deathmatch. I do play a few other modes occasionally, but TDM never gets old. I didn’t really get into Warzone 2.0 or any of the 32v32 maps, as I prefer smaller battles in this game.
With that said, Modern Warfare II doesn’t take the series in new directions but provides more of what made 2019 work, and that’s fine. The campaign isn’t as good, but the new characters bring a lot of life to the series, and they are fun to watch on screen. Sadly, the stealth missions bring the entire campaign down and hurt the replay value. After the short campaign is over, it’s on to the multiplayer that we’ve grown to love, and if you liked 2019’s, you will like what’s here. A new perk and field upgrade system tweaked controls and animations, and all new maps are pretty good. I just wish the UI wasn’t so awful.
thebinarymessiah.com 
Try multiplayer. A lot of fun !