Board 8 > The Great 2021 Video Game Challenge

(+) Yeah! (+)

Did a little shuffling!

6. Beat a game in a completely new series
Ys I

11. Beat a game made by a developer you like
Ys II

50-52. Beat three games in a series
The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky SC
The Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky 3rd
The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero

15/52

---

49. Choose a random page on TVTropes and beat something from the video game section
Portal 2

MZero posted...

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SequelEscalation

Good variety here, but I was planning to play the Portal games anyway since I got them from the Secret Santa (thanks again ESY!), but there's a lot of other stuff here too

Pretty impressive how they managed to expand it from the first one. Really enjoyed both games! spaaaaaace

16/52

---

20. Beat an action game

Gravity Rush 2

So uh this game was a bit of a mess. I liked the first one a lot as a cute little game with unique gameplay. This one felt really hit and miss though. There was a ton to like, but I also feel like there were some major flaws. Especially in the pacing and gameplay variety, but I definitely need some more time to dwell on it.

---

4. Beat a game released between 2011-2020

Cyberpunk 2077

47. Play a technically unbeatable game for at least six hours

FIFA 10

---

27. Beat a game with mystery as a central theme
Hotel Dusk: Room 215

31/52

36. Beat a game that's been in your backlog for a long time
Gunman Chronicles

Since about 2005. It's not great which is probably why i never beat it before now.
28/57


---

15. Beat a puzzle game
Pokmon Trozei!

32/52

16. Beat a rhythm game

Crypt of the Necrodancer

52. Beat three games in a series (Third game)

Mass Effect 3

Gonna switch to doing /52. Moved Mass Effect 1 and 2 to first game/second game.

32/52

---

42. Beat another user's favorite game

Disco Elysium

Third time finishing it. The final cut didn't really change how I felt about it, but considering how much I already loved it, it didn't really have to.

33/52

---

TheArkOfTurus posted...

4. Beat a game released between 2010-2020

Danganronpa V3

So a couple weeks ago someone made a strangest game you felt the urge to immediately replay topic. I think this is pretty high up for me. Not because it's a strange game to want to replay, but because I didn't actually want to replay it at all; I wanted to replay the board/gacha/dungeon crawler mini game. I didn't have a completed DR3 file anymore, though, so I replayed the entire game to get to that. I am weird.

27/50

Well now I feel extra dumb for doing this.

---

lmao

---

3. Beat a game released between 2001-2010

Shantae
---

17. Beat a first-person shooter
Borderlands

33/52

9. Beat a remake or enhanced port

Robotics;Notes Elite

12/50

---

I was going to wait on this one but I won't be able to so...moving FF8 and FF12 to allow:

50-52. Beat three games in a series

Final Fantasy VIII Remastered
Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age
Final Fantasy X HD Remaster

For FFX, this was a 100% run, which I've never done before until now. The grind was real! I was working on FFX-2 100% to get the full platinum, but unfortunately for some reason the game crashes every 20 minutes without fail. Not sure why it never happened with the first game, but as it is now it's impossible to finish. I'll give it another go when I eventually get a Series X if it's still on Game Pass by then, but for now I'm moving on.

---

25. Beat a game with horror as a central theme
The Evil Within

A reviewer I follow is a massive fan of The Evil Within 2, so I thought I'd try the original. I was pretty disappointed, sadly. The writing was pretty bad, interesting setups here and there but there's no good payoff and nothing comes together. Like all the stuff we learn about the main character just... doesn't even matter, he's pretty unimportant to the actual plot. Maybe I was expecting too much. The characters are pretty bland overall, there's some cool atmosphere in spots but the game never takes advantage of its strengths. By the last act the game completely abandons any concept of horror and fully becomes a generic zombie shooter that feels like it's from the mid '00s rather than 2014.

It's not a bad game or anything, I guess I just expected more. Probably won't bother with the sequel. A shame!

---

13. Beat a WRPG
Fallout: New Vegas

34/52

The PS3 version is really really bad

50. Beat three games in a series (First game)
Mass Effect
---

4. Beat a game released between 2011-2020

Pic-a-Pix Classic 2

13/50

---

24. Beat a game with romance as a central theme
Lovers Smiles 2

48. Beat a game that starts with the first letter of your username
Blake Stone: Planet Strike

LS2 had far too many brain-dead simple levels while Blake Stone was long overdue being a mid-90's game i'd never played through til now (although i did play the first game back in the day).

30/57

---

29. Beat a game with comedy as a central theme

Super Time Force

27/50

---

18. Beat a third-person shooter

Returnal

My game of the year so far! ...Out of the three non-remake/rerelease games I've played this year, one of which I just moved to the under 70 metacritic category. Still, I enjoyed it a lot. The gameplay was about what I expected, aside from being easier than I had heard (I think they may have changed some things in patches,) but it was a lot more compelling narratively than I expected. I still need to get a true ending, though, I think.

34/52

---

46. Beat a game you received for free or through a paid subscription service
New Pokmon Snap

35/52

41. Beat a game with a Metascore above 90
Portal 2

holy fuck what a game. wow
---

46. Beat a game you received for free or through a paid subscription service

Little Misfortune

Got this in one of KCF's code giveaways (thanks for always doing those!) I enjoyed the developer's previous game (Fran Bow) quite a bit. This one is similar in some ways, although unfortunately I preferred Fran Bow in every aspect. Still, it was an enjoyable playthrough. I'm surprised I could also put this in the <70 Metacritic slot if I needed to. It deserved much better than the 57(!) it got.

35/52


---

2. Beat a game released between 1991-2000
Yoshi's Island

Played this a bunch as a kid but never got very far. I assume this is an unpopular opinion, but Yoshi's Wooly World was way better. Baby Mario sucks.

17/52

---

Making a change

2. Beat a game released between 1991-2000
Mega Man 4

50. Beat three games in a series (#1)
Mega Man 3

and that leads to

38. Finish a game in one day
Mario Golf: Super Rush

36/52

26. Beat a game with revenge as a central theme
Asura's Wrath

37/52

45. Beat a game that features historical events or people

Warriors Of Fate

28/50

---

3. Beat a game released between 2001-2010???
Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors

Not sure where to put this, the spreadsheet splits the decades into different years than the first post does. And it came out in Japan in 09 but the west in 10.

32. Beat a game with a non-white lead
Slime Rancher

Fun game, even if it's a little rough around the edges and the platforming isn't great. Didn't feel super polished. I was disappointed how little there was to find by exploring the pretty simple environments with the jetpack. And the framerate collapses when you have a lot of slimes on screen. Fun ranching times though! Except for the Boom Slimes, they just never behaved for me.

---

andylt posted...

Not sure where to put this, the spreadsheet splits the decades into different years than the first post does. And it came out in Japan in 09 but the west in 10.

whoops! fixed the spreadsheet to match the first post

in regards to Japanese vs Western releases, either is fine as far as I'm concerned. I usually use the western release date because most users here are in that region but it's not a big deal

---

MZero posted...

whoops! fixed the spreadsheet to match the first post

in regards to Japanese vs Western releases, either is fine as far as I'm concerned. I usually use the western release date because most users here are in that region but it's not a big deal

Thanks! That makes it much easier. I will try to avoid games on the borderline of two decades in the future lol

---

27. Beat a game with mystery as a central theme

Kotodama: The 7 Mysteries of Fujisawa

14/50

---

1. Beat a game released before 1991

Castlevania

29/50

---

43. Beat a game based on licensed stories/characters

Record of Lodoss War -Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth-

The most Symphony of the Night looking game I've played since Symphony of the Night. It does enough with some of its own gameplay systems to differentiate itself, though, and it feels very good to control. A bit too short, and a bit too easy not to have a hard mode or any postgame stuff, but overall a very solid metroidvania.

36/52

---

4. Beat a game released between 2011-2020
Let Them Come

A pretty good non-scrolling horizontal shooter.
Most of the games i've beaten lately don't fit into any category that i haven't already used so i'm falling behind a bit.

31/57

---

10. Beat a game made by a director/composer/artist/etc that you like
Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney

38/52

27. Beat a game with mystery as a central theme
AI: The Somnium Files

god. really good
---

31. Beat a game with a child lead

Song Of The Deep

30/50

---

48. Beat a game that starts with the first letter of your username
Metroid: Zero Mission

Not only does it start with the first letter of my username, but there rest is in there too!

Never played Metroid growing up but Hollow Knight got me into Metroidvanias. I liked it up until Chozodia which was kinda meh. Sadly, I think that's the extras they added, so maybe they should have just gone for a 1:1 remake. Anyway, overall positive experience.

18/52

---

23. Beat a sports game
Mario Golf: Super Rush
---

12. Beat a game made by a developer you've never tried
Blue Reflection

39/52

30. Beat a game with a female lead
Fire Emblem Warriors

40/52

6. Beat a game in a completely new series
7. Beat a game in a series you've already played some of

FRAMED
FRAMED 2

Really great, well executed puzzle game. Not entirely sure when this ended up in my Steam library, but I'm glad it did.

41. Beat a game with a Metascore above 90

Metroid Fusion

39/52

---

14. Beat a JRPG
The Legend of Heroes: Trails to Azure

The easiest category for me every year

19/52

---

4. Beat a game released between 2011-2020

Streets of Rage 4

Did a quick playthrough of Story mode to try out the new characters. Max and Estel were fun, but I stuck to Shiva after trying them once. He's probably my favorite character overall, now.

40/52

---

4. Beat a game released between 2011-2020
Mini Metro

this game isn't like, technically beatable? but i unlocked and played through every level up to a score of at least 500 so that's what i'm counting
---

There is a category specifically for games that are not beatable
---

39. Finish a game that took you at least twenty-five hours to beat
Okami

Been meaning to play this one for so long, and thankfully it lived up to my expectations. What a great game! It's a shame they haven't done more with the franchise (I will look into Okamiden), but man I had a great time with this. There's couple of things they could iron out- I played the Wii version so the motion controls were a bit off sometimes- but I would say this might be better than any Zelda from around this period.

---

30. Beat a game with a female lead
Metroid Fusion
---