July 2026
It’s too dang hot to be playing games. Makes me consider something as pricey as a Steam Machine. Something more compact and less heat producing than my oversized space heater of computer. Managed to get a few of my Steam Summer Sale games out of the way… though I still have far more awaiting and my backlog has more or less stayed the same size, so… hooray to small victories? Well, the latest FFXIV patch just dropped so I’ll be grinding out the latest content and will hopefully get back to finishing FFXI as well as picking up several other games I’ve had to set by the wayside. Though there are many anticipated games around the corner, I’m glad I made the progress I did and looking forward to keeping a rhythm to my momentum. Notable games this month: Retro Rewind, Guilty Gear Xrd -Sign
In truth, I did not realize this was a collection of handheld YGO games, so I can understand many peoples disappointment with this collection. Due to being a kid who always had to travel between parents, a few of these were my lifeblood so I have a touch more forgiveness for this plus it is like… 14 games. Several of which never previously made it out of Japan. Now the handhelds have their limits and issues in terms of what games and devs were capable of. Some notable trends I am seeing as I get through each game. However, I can’t deny the vision and creative liberties it took to get a still developing card game could be on the go with limited space.
-YGO Duel Monsters (Gameboy) 3/5
Like most early gameboy games, devs struggled to realize it’s potential. Games often struggled to fit much in there and were vastly limited in mechanics or even visual capability. This is very true for this entry. Super basic designs, limited card quantity, deck has to be exactly 40 with a tedious add/remove card system. You HAVE to play a card each turn and HAVE to either attack or put in defense. No spells or traps. Only extra cards exist through fusion and it is through trial and error of stacking cards. This means if the fusion fails, your previous monster is discarded and your new monster takes the place. You only draw cards for the amount you have used. Each stage has a few duelists that randomly drop cards from a pool when won with a guaranteed drop every 10 wins. 5 wins of each character moves you to the next stage. If you could get a few decent cards and know some key fusions, you don’t have to grind too much though some legendary cards exist only in the win 100 drop which can take a while. The AI is also pretty dumb as it will always attack left to right on it’s side only if it can destroy the monster (it will NOT risk taking any lifepoint damage) and will replace it’s stronger cards if it is in the left most spot with a filled board.
Of course, if you just want the achievement, you only have to get to like the third stage, no game beaten required.
Should you use cheats? Honestly, as long as you have a fusion guide (great one on Steam btw) you can get by with just playing the game. Maybe a few rewinds but honestly don’t think I need to much.
-YGO Duel Monsters II: Dark Duel Stories (GB) 2/5
More or less an improved version of the previous game, it implements a lot of the same ideas of stages, win 5 times, guaranteed drops, fusion, etc. Now, there are trap cards, though you can only play one and they only stick around for one round (your turn and your opponent’s). Not only do you have a card limit but you also have a duel level and “power” limit which is assigned to each card. So, too many powerful cards when you have a low power limit means you have to take some out and replace with weaker cards. The power system sucks simply because you can get some decent cards early on that you will be nowhere near being able to use even if you somehow managed to get your duel level high enough. It’s just an annoying gatekeep to keep you more restrained especially since you are still stuck at a 40 card limit. Fusions are also far less defined which means more possibilities but often harder to keep track of or predict. However, when you fuse correctly, you do get to play an additional card. This makes it possible to fuse multiple times or to better setup your field with more cards instead of risking it all. This is especially important due to the alignment/type advantage where a card that has type advantage over the other completely destroys that monster even if it is far weaker. Meaning a Kurboh card could kill a Blue-Eyes if the card advantage permits it so. It’s an interesting way to keep the game more exciting. The game also seems to run much slower than previously between turns and just misses out on the simplicity of the first.
The achievement for this not only requires you to beat the game but to fight all of the secret bosses which are SUPPOSED to rotate out after a duel (small chance) but it literally never happened without enhancement usage.
Should you use cheats? Rewind for sure, especially for detrimental fusions/fusion testing (there is just a lack of a fusion guide out in the wild). Unlock all cards is a bit unnecessary due to the amount of grinding you will need for duel and power levels.
-YGO Monster Capsule 1.5/5
Though I didn’t particularly enjoy this one, I will give it credit for trying to be more unique. Not only is it a tactics based game but it creates it’s own story with the characters within the YGO universe. That being said… the gameplay absolutely sucks. Bet a star chip and defeat the enemies monsters. You can only move and attack with one monster per turn, which really loses the strategic side of things. Monsters have different attack spreads and abilities. Different tiles offer different bonuses. If your monster dies, it’s gone for good. You must roll for your attacks, certain numbers allowing you to attack, miss, critical, or damage itself. You can get more monsters by spending a star chip for a gacha roll. If you win, you get a star chip. You need several star chips to proceed and lose them when you do. You might have an idea of the problem here already. It’s the star chip system. It’s so slow to get star chips to not only proceed but then to roll for potentially bad monsters. If you could bet multiple stars or face enemies that have higher bets this may not be so bad, but weak or strong, enemies give you the exact same star chip reward. The slight difference is that stronger enemies TYPICALLY give higher xp bonus though there’s only really a handful of solid experience givers. XP is used to level up your monsters which increase stats and potentially allow for special skill unlocks/evolutions. Though evolutions are laughable as they take so much grinding to get your monster level high enough only for it’s level to reset upon evolution… in which case you gotta hope it doesn’t die in the next encounter(s).
The story has you go through a game tower and defeat several dark masters before the final boss. Each Dark master pits you in a Dungeons and Dragon like mode where you must traverse their one shot story and resolve the issue while engaging in the tactic like gameplay.
Achievement? Beat the game, there is some post game you can do (not needed) but frankly if you are going for EVERYTHING, it’s going to take a long while.
Should you cheat? Rewind is a must with how abysmal dice rolls and gacha rolls can be. The game even cheats it’s own way. When your turn starts, the game pre-determines if you get a regular roll, a critical roll, or a fail roll. The last two meaning, it will only ever cycle between a few numbers that are guaranteed to be bad for you (i.e. the enemy will crit you, or you will damage yourself) no matter how much you rewind that turn. If you rewind before hand, you can potentially cancel it out when it goes to your turn again but it’s super annoying and sometimes gotta fight it. Balance is also kinda crazy dumb and requires A LOT of grinding to get even some of the stronger monsters to move forward without losing them. I’d almost recommend the infinite star chip just so you can roll at your leisure or not worry about having to grind for progression and worry more about levels.
Asura's Wrath 
Picked this up before the 360 store shut down as it was something that I always had my eye on but was never available… that and the questionable implementation of it’s gameplay and DLC. Though this comes of as an action game, which it is, it is far more of an interactive anime than it is anything else. Outside of a few small arena and boss battles, you’ll primarily be engaging in cutscenes with QTEs as Asura exacts his wrath and gets revenge on those that betrayed him. The game has heavy Hindu and Buddhist religious influence as it uses aspects and god figures from both blending it with a bit of sci-fi and cybernetics. CyberConnect, the dev, really show their portfolio with sound design and the QTEs that were frequent in their Naruto Ultimate Ninja series. Honestly, the game is just a power trip that lets you really enjoy the absolute insanity of the battles with each cathartic blow, and I’m all for it. The actual action battles are alright as it’s relatively basic and ends when you fill up your rage bar. The neat part is it uses your health, rage, and special gauges as part of the story telling (i.e. if Asura gets more angry, his rage meter will sometimes build up). The characters are great with a lot of stand out voice actors and takes plenty of surprising twists in this episodic narrative. What REALLY stood out to me were the after episode narrative sneak peaks that made me nostalgic with the similar old 90’s and early 2000’s anime outros they used to do as you waited a week for the next episode.
Replayability can be a bit rough as you literally can’t skip the cutscenes since they ARE the gameplay and you’d have to go through quite a bit. Again the actual ground battles are pretty basic so they don’t offer nearly as much variety as a DMC game might. Though I thought I was thorough, I completely forgot that the final story chapters were actually DLC and never managed to pick those up before the store closed. So, despite completing the “main story” I am still missing a much wanted continuation and finale. Also, you have to unlock the final true scene by replaying the final chapter all over which is pretty annoying.
All in all, I loved the power trip it sends you on, the story of over the top revenge, early anime vibes, characters, and just Cyberconnect doing what the do best… creating insane large scale animated action sequences. Sadly, the game didn’t get ported much and I think is only available as backwards compatibility on XBOX and the game didn’t do particularly well so it’s not likely ever to come back in any legal way.
Though there are updated versions that improve upon the game with more characters, in no way should this be overlooked and not receive it’s praises. Immediately the change from the series’ usual pixelated sprites to cel shaded models is staggering but it looks FANTASTIC and is still used in games like Strive. Detailed, unique, and still carries the unique stylishness of Guilty Gear. Cutscenes are in game so during arcade mode you do get to see your character in your changed color palette. With the inclusion of roman cancels, best state of Instant Kills, blitz shields, and (admittedly underused) clash system incredibly open up the freedom in playstyles and interesting fast action gameplay. Something in particular I enjoyed is how the game penalizes players for playing too safe by reducing their special gauge if they don’t attack frequently enough, encouraging more aggressive tactics.
Story mode is entirely a visual novel which felt a little odd not having some battles in between but if you treat it like an episodic anime you can get through it comfortably. It doesn’t have quite the same complex story of sibling series Blazblue, it instead redirects that insanity into it’s character designs with obtuse weird weapons and JJBA-like styles. Characters have fun and unique mechanics, if not sometimes confusing, but you are likely to find a character you enjoy. This game also includes an English Voice cast …in which I’m a bit mixed about. There are fantastic performances but there are more than a few that the voice didn’t either fit or felt didn’t give the energy I thought the character needed. It only really feels as bad when this is the case for a main character like Sol Badguy. Arcade mode is pretty standard by is used to flesh out the story of story mode. It’s nice, but a bit disappointing as only a few characters really add much to the narrative while others seem to get only a few additional lines. It also means we don’t get particularly unique or “what if” ending scenarios that normal arcade modes often offer. Also, DLC/extra characters get no scenes despite being in the actual story mode. M.O.M. mode actually captured my interest giving a sort of RPG like experience with earnable skills and battles. Couldn’t/Didn’t try any multiplayer though like most it is probably not as much of an active scene these days.
Recommend? If there’s any game that is responsible for making Guilty Gear what it is? It’s probably this. It finds and refines what it wants to be and does it WELL. Strive will later reach wider audiences but this setup a lot of the basework for what makes the series really rock! Certainly worth the buy even if you own the updated versions.
Preferred characters: I-No, Slayer, Ramlethal
Note: TRY THE DEMO FIRST!!!
I was so ready to give this a negative review throughout my entire playthrough but I think at some point I developed stockholm syndrome as here I am giving it a positive review at the very end. Don’t get me wrong, even if it was a negative review I would have many praises to give. Unfortunately, even with it’s high of highs the lows are equally lower. So, let’s start with the praises. Great artstyle that balances cool and cute. Wonderful song selection that varies song styles while still feeling cohesive. Interesting take on the rhythm game genre though this is where it starts to get really divisive and why I can’t stress enough why you should try the demo first. There is a story mode which is alright. Character interactions were fun and having the opposing/friendly character react to how well you are doing is a nice touch. Mini-games help change up the gameplay into a simple, cute, and fun rhythm experience. Harder difficulties if you actually manage to feel the flow of the game and a remix mode that changes the type of enemies for each attempt, modifiers to further challenge yourself. There’s tons of DLC from all sorts of properties and artists, even some unique. Not only do DLCs add songs but include characters or character costumes that stand across from your character giving even more interaction to the great crossovers. Most of the added songs I enjoyed with only a couple packs being a personal miss though varying feelings on the actual design of the levels but mostly positive.
I was damn sure I was going to love this game between the art style and it being a rhythm game. Yet when I started playing it… it just does not click. This is due to how it actually functions as it really isn’t a “normal” rhythm game. Notes are replaced by enemies. Each enemy has a unique mechanic that you’ll have to remember and there is a fair bit of them. Some are more easily recognizable, most can be hard to remember. It is then further complicated by changing what each enemy does depending on what color they are. Each enemy can be further modified by their shadow, which is by far my most hated, which causes them to move off beat at varying speeds depending on the shape of the shadow. Lastly there are environment modifiers that when passed through can cause effects like moving at increased speeds or moving which lane they are in. It’s… a lot to be honest and if you aren’t playing consistently, hell even if you do play a lot, it’s easy to forget what to do for each enemy especially with everything else coming at you. It almost becomes easier to just memorize the song as it will be easier to understand the specific patterns than it would be to remember the actual notes themselves. Unfortunately this just makes it harder to pick up and play any song. In addition, both a plus and a minus, the game will sometimes use the environment effects as visualizers prioritizing flare over functionality which can become quite distracting especially if it causes obstruction of enemies and even cause them to clip inside each other given some circumstances. DLC is a bit confusingly listed in the store and has even showed owned DLC packs as not owned causing me to purchase one of them twice (KDA).
As a more middle of the road aspect the game does reward for being better but the rewards is kinda… eh. You unlock profile glamour for your account which really don’t do anything for me and I wonder how many people are actually looking at another person’s profile for this to be a thing. I suppose you gotta make yourself unique but I think leaderboard status should be sufficient and then give us rewards to outfit and stylize the character, tracks, effects, enemies, etc.
Recommend? Honestly I can’t either way, not truly. Though I’m not amazing, I do enjoy rhythm games and this should have been an incredible hit… but I never found the flow, it simply is not for me. I imagine for those that it does hit for will hit HARD and it’ll probably be your favorite thing in the world (or something like that)
Another copy of a game I have played many times since it’s release and still enjoy it every time. A solid character action/hack and slash game clearly inspired by the likes of Devil May Cry, God of War, and Legend of Zelda set in an abridged version of catholic mythology (focusing on Heaven, Hell, the apocalypse, and the 4 horsemen). This focuses on War, a horseman that is wrongfully accused of starting the apocalypse and must prove his innocence by finding the true culprit. War is a bit clunky but makes sense for a powerhouse brick house of a horseman he is. There is also a lot of noticeable filler content, particularly early on when having to do trials to progress. The Zelda influence really shines in it’s dungeon-like areas that will have you solving puzzles, platforming, and using newfound gear to progress. Boss battles vary in quality but are mostly fine.
This port does have various issues that I do not remember having with the Warmastered edition. This includes potential crashing, troubles getting controllers to map/read, and some freezing. Achievements have crazy imbalance including one that took hours of tedious travelling for hours past the initial completion of story.
Recommend? Well, the Warmastered is easily the improved version but you get this one with the purchase of the Warmastered so… you’ll have it either way.
I’ve never had much interest in the “shop sim” genre of games but this one really stuck out for me. Finally, I am able to relive my nostalgia of growing up with blockbuster. Stocking physical VHS, having trailers and movies play over the TVs, bright and decorative environment, having imaginary conversations about movies and recommendations with the customers, and just the 90’s/early 2000’s nostalgia. Though not terribly different from other shop sims, it does feel like this does get a bit more love. Plenty of unlockables include concessions, movie genres, arcades, etc. Expand your store, buy more movies, scan and rewind videos, serve food, and more. It’s very interactive. All the movies are either a random combination of images that will produce an associated title or for New Releases a parody of hit movies from decades ago. What I’m really excited for and started doing is modding in actual movies to REALLY relive those youthful years and get to stock recognizable and beloved movies truly creating the experience. The modding scene is only growing and I’m hoping the dev continues to update the game as it does eventually plateau but I don’t mind popping back in to check on my store and run a few days.
Characters are a bit more cartoony than I imagined and there are limited channels to flip between (despite there being several folders in the game folder) but I am hopeful and confident these will be later updates.
Absolutely Recommended.
Beat the Steam version as RE9 was releasing and figured I’d go straight into the completion, more specifically the Professional S+ runs. A first run through of the main game was pretty smooth while going for some other achievements along the way. It’s only natural that when I went for the S+ that fate deemed everything should go wrong as much as possible even including Leon falling through a map after a particularly long segment of no saves. Separate Ways DLC, though it had a couple lynch-pin moments, was a one-and-done Pro S+ run due to it’s much shorter run time and more lenient save limit. I still have to check out Mercenaries but I also have a lot more in game content and challenges to unlock so I’ll return eventually and maybe even try a few randomizer mods as well. In no way replaces the original but still a fantastic remake to put alongside it.
Other Games:
Smilers Den Deluxxx
-Rating: 7/10 Steam Review
-Quick Notes: A more genuine FNAF/Backrooms/Observation duty-like than you’d expect. Creature design is far more ridiculous than actually alluring then again…