August 24, 2025: Robocop: Rogue City

I got this game after watching gameplay from an "E3" presentation a few years back. This has been on my wishlist for some time, and got it at a great discount. What made me want to play it, outside of the obvious of it being a FPS RoboCop game (awesome), was how the game presented itself as very different for an FPS. With modern FPS's having you jump, slide, fly at the speed of sound around the arenas, Rogue City aimed to to something different...Deliver an authentic RoboCop experience.

RoboCop cannot jump, sprint, slide, or do anything close to acrobatic. The game plays as if you are driving a tank. You WALK, quite literally, through the levels destroying everything in your wake. It's awesome. A power fantasy in such a different way, not only does Robo seem unstopplable in the movies, he FEELs unstoppable in the game. Armed with his trusty Auto 9, the only gun you could ever need, RoboCop blasts his way through hordes of goons, robots, military, and the occasional ED 209. Everything just felt right, the gunplay mechanics were kept original with PCB boards that allowed you to change how the Auto 9 functioned, the perk system let you tailor your experience, the story and cheesy one liners felt right at home for a game made about an 80's movie, and the story had actual choices that impact the ending you recieve, an unexpected surprise, but a welcome one.

Speaking of surprises, the thing that surprised me the most about RoboCop was the amount of actual cop/detective moments you experienced in the game. When I bought Rogue City, I was under the impression I was going to get a short FPS romp where you mindlessly roll through hundreds of dudes to get to the main bad guy. Nothing wrong with that, and I would have been happy with that as a game in general, but the slow sections where you actually feel like a cop on beat really pulled you into the universe and made this game into something truely unique. From questioning citizens about recent crimes, to investigating murders, to handing out parking tickets (yes, that's actually real), RoboCop took what could have been a fun, yet somewhat repetative game, and turned it into something surprising in all the right ways.

I was happy all the way through my roughly 20 hour playthrough, including a decent amount but not all side content, and I am not finding any negatives really to talk about. Overall a fun experience despite being a little corny at times. I hope to play the standalone DLC one day when I get that RoboCop itch again!

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August 12, 2025: The Legend of Zelda: Links Awakening

A throwback with a new cute coat of paint. Link's Awakening truly does feel like a game from the early GameBoy days, however the quality of life changes they've made to the games have made it feel less frustrating (in parts), but still maintains that Zelda level of crypticness.

I quite enjoyed exploring and discovering throughout the lands, which gave me the energy to continue the game at a hyperfixation pace. The classic, you need an item to get through to the dungeon, and you use the item to defeat the dungeon boss is very clear here in this game - and I was happy to see that design again. While the game isn't necessarily "hard", the real challenge comes from the dungeon puzzles, which have you backtracking and thinking "hmm - am I fucking something up right now?", in which many times was the case!

Notoriously, I got stuck multiple times either in a dungeon or following the game's trading quest, and had to just step back out of frustration. But, after a little more time in the oven of my brain, and a refreshed point of view, I was almost always able to beat what previously stood in my way. Albeit I did have to watch a walkthrough, specifically for the Grotto and Bird dungeon, because of 2 wildly different reasons.

The Grotto dungeon I got caught up with the word clue, "First defeat the imprisoned Pols Voice. Last, the Skeletal Stalfos...". First, what the fuck is a Pols Voice. Second, what the fuck is a Stalfos. Unlike the days of yore, games no longer come with manuals that give you a little more information about the world and enemies in it, and you have to look up what enemies were called to understand that puzzle to finally beat it. The bird dungeon is infamously difficult, and mostly just required a lot of lot of backtracking and some time away to finally beat it.

Overall, Link's Awakening was a quite enjoyable experience despite showing a little age in its game design. As a package, its complete and there is something for everyone to enjoy. There's exploration, discovery, action, puzzles, music, art, and humor! I'm glad this game got this remaster treatment, cause I probably wouldn't have gone back to play the original without it. I'm happy with the time I spent with it, and wish I played it sooner.

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