Games
Video games! The vast majority of my pastime...
Assassin's Creed Odyssey
A beautiful game which well and truly completes AC's conversion into an RPG franchise.
Assassin's Creed Origins
The start of AC's RPG reboot series, Origins is an immersive, wonderful experience of both Egypt and an impressive story for a franchise that previously wasn't a full-fledged open-world RPG.
Assassin's Creed Valhalla
A disappointing follow-up to the prior two instalments, Valhalla is a visually stunning game providing a wonderful take on medieval Britain. Alas, the story really puts me off this one, and I much preferred Kassandra and Bayek of the previous games as protagonists...
Baldur's Gate 3
A Larian RPG to truly follow-up DOS2, BG3 is an incredibly good rendition of the D&D 5e Ruleset into a stunning video game. The writing is characteristically witty (... and in no small part horny...) and interesting, the visuals are Larian's best yet with fully-animated in-engine cutscenes, and - despite the bugs in later Acts, which are present - playing solo and co-op is a real blast. Truly one of the games of all time, and that's without even acknowledging the wonderful soundtrack (with a particular villainous standout...). Impeccable.
Control
The poster child for ray-tracing, Control is an incredible experience, wielding an impressive grasp of cutting-edge technology to produce some stunning visuals, paired with a curious and intriguing story. The gameplay ain't half bad either!
Cyberpunk 2077
A huge open world RPG, filled with absolutely wonderful (albeit heartwrenching) storylines. Unforgettable and highly recommended!
Dark Souls III
My first mainline Souls game, DS3 is absolutely incredible. Engaging, enjoyable combat; a rich, deep world; and that feeling of accomplishment is stunning. 100% worth playing.
Destiny 2
Incredible storylines. Stellar gunplay. Impeccable soundtracks. The only good forever-game I've found yet.
Diablo 3
A fun RPG with incredibly well-rendered cutscenes, and a good story to boot! I didn't play the postgame, however.
Divinity II
A classic indie RPG from Larian, filled with humour and a good storyline! It's a shame that every playthrough I tried wasn't finishable thanks to bugs, though...
Divinity: Original Sin 2
An incredibly fun take on a turn-based RPG from Larian, which has a huge depth to its story and is fun both solo and with friends. (I think two playthroughs are best - one solo, one coop!)
DOOM (2016) & DOOM Eternal
The reboot of the classic first-person shooter, a fun, engaging experience set to Mick Gordon's hallmark metal sound.
Dragon Age: Inquisition
My favourite game that BioWare has ever produced... That I've played, at least. An entertaining classic RPG experience.
Dragon Age: The Veilguard
My favourite game that BioWare has ever produced... That I've played, at least. An entertaining classic RPG experience.
Elden Ring
Oh, Elden Ring... Absolutely stellar. Similar combat to DS3, but the game is substantially more accessible. Plus, the open world felt like how I wanted Skyrim to feel all those years ago...
Enotria: The Last Song
The tutorial is frustratingly designed, and fails to provide sufficient variety to how you are allowed to approach the game.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake
Visually stunning, interesting story with a cast of neat characters! What's not to like?
Final Fantasy XV
Heartwrenching story, incredible graphics. Honestly, this achieves what it set out to do, and I adore this game. A lot.
Final Fantasy XVI
I really enjoyed this! The story is well-written and enjoyable, with some truly spectacular boss fights (Bahamut's is likely my favourite narrative / cinematic boss fight, ever), and an incredible soundtrack (my favourite Final Fantasy OST to date). Alas, it is slightly marred by an outright atrocious bossfight near the end of the game, which genuinely felt like an unreasonable combination that simply hadn't been playtested - plus some unnecessary use of spiders, which I count as an accessibility failure in any game that does so.
Forspoken
A game centered around some absolutely stellar parkour gameplay, with some really fun combat that genuinely does feel like you're controlling a cutscene. It's honestly incredible, and a real shame that it was overshadowed by performance issues. The story is passable (simple, but there seems to be a decent amount of surrounding lorebuilding). The 'In Tanta We Trust' DLC is very fun - combat continues being tight, fun, and flashy, and the pacing is alright (~4h total). Most performance issues have been resolved post-launch, though VRAM usage will climb unbounded during gameplay, eventually requiring a reload from the main menu to fix textures and recover performance. Very fast loading with DirectStorage *definitely* mitigates this. I honestly really like it, despite the shortcomings.
God of War
God of War (2018) is an incredible open-world RPG, with a couple of rough edges from leaning too heavily into the RPG tropes (many pieces of gear can get overwhelming...). God of War Ragnarök expands upon the 2018 entry with yet more stellar storywork, plus refined gameplay. Overall, I do recommend playing both of these! It's an amazing journey.
Metaphor: ReFantazio
NieR Replicant ver.1.22474487139...
Much like Automata, Replicant is a masterpiece in all the same categories. A beautiful, heartbreaking story, paired with beautiful music, all over some pretty good gameplay. I prefer Automata's combat, but this is fun too!
NieR:Automata
I absolutely adore this game. Play it, then play it again two more times (you'll understand why), then cry when Weight of the World starts up. It's a masterpiece in narrative, music, and the gameplay's honestly great too!
Persona 3 (FES & Portable)
Beautiful. I recommend playing P3FES first for the animated cutscenes and Answer epilogue, which is an absolutely incredible experience (even if it's not visually very pretty, given its age), then following it up with a playthrough of P3P for the FeMC route, which is also a neat different perspective on the story (which remains the most tragic story in the 'reboot' Persona series). The music, for the record, is addictive regardless of which version you play!
Persona 3 Reload
A masterful remake of Persona 3, with drastically improved gameplay and stellar visuals - both bringing it well and truly in line with Persona 5 - and even some extra interactions with your companions. I'd replace my recommendations for P3FES with Reload (especially when the Aigis DLC launches), and then continue as normal with my P3FES/Portable review.
Persona 4 Golden
If you liked Persona 3, then this is another Persona game! But this time, we have slightly better graphics, an entirely new - but still incredible - soundtrack, and a cast that feel like a bunch of friends for a lot more of the game. I really love the characters in P4G, and the game is overall stellar. So, par for the course for a Persona game!
Persona 5 Royal
Again, another Persona game. Massively improved visuals this time, with another new soundtrack (again, addictive as all hell), and another really good cast of characters - featuring one that feels Autistic-coded to me, which is really nice, even if it was (apparently) unintentional.
Starfield
Starfield's writing is stellar in some of the side quests and optional content, but the main story is, in my honest opinion, some of the worst writing I've seen in a video game. Much of the dialogue remains tedious and uninteresting, and combat is basically the same as Fallout 4 (not a fan!). The performance, too, is abysmal: it often plays as if it's raytracing when it emphatically isn't, even if it is still a step-up in visual quality for Bethesda.
The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind
An aged, classical RPG. I recommend modding it to work around some poorly-aged design decisions (I'm not a fan of RNG to hit, personally) and maybe improving the graphics while you're at it, but it is a fun game with some of the best writing in the TES series, in my honest opinion.
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
An entertaining romp through Cyrodiil, Oblivion features a genuinely well-written, entertaining main story - paired with the best Dark Brotherhood storyline I've played yet! Plus, I really dig the Shivering Isles DLC...
The Elder Scrolls Online
Oh god, I barely have time for this one since it's an MMO, but the storylines are really well-written, with fun combat, and a surprisingly welcoming community for a multiplayer-only game!
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
It's a fun world to spend time in, though I'm not as fond of the writing in this one compared to prior instalments - it's very bland, to be quite honest.
The Outer Worlds
A humourous first-person RPG that's actually tolerable to me, unlike Fallout 4 or 76. I recommend playing it at least once!
The Witcher 3
A masterpiece of a fantasy RPG, set in Andrzej Sapkowski's rich and compelling world, while giving it the respect it deserves. Marvellous.