Games Beaten - August 2025

Pretty decent month for me in terms of completions. I finished the A-Z Challenge early in the month so I was free to play a few other games I'd been wanting to get to. There were no bad games this month, and I hope that trend continues throughout the year.

8/02 Yoshi's Woolly World (Wii U): 10:50 7/10 -- WORST
8/03 Sniper Elite: Nazi Zombie Army (PC-Steam): 5:18 7/10
8/04 Sniper Elite: Nazi Zombie Army 2 (PC-Steam): 4:36 7/10
8/05 Zombie Army Trilogy (PC-Steam): 14:54 7/10
8/09 Double Dragon Gaiden: Rise of the Dragons (PS4): 2:11 7/10
8/10 Disco Elysium (PC-Steam): 18:24 8/10 -- BEST
8/13 Slay the Spire (PC-Steam): 20:54 8/10
8/22 Doom: The Dark Ages (PS5): 22:59 8/10

Yoshi's Woolly World is a decent 2D platformer with nice visuals and music. I'm just not really a big 2D platformer guy.

Zombie Army Trilogy was the final game of the A-Z Challenge so I tried to beat that as soon as possible. I ended up having a lot of fun with it, this is probably my favorite 7/10 game. It just feels great to try and rack up a huge combo by headshoting zombies from far away. This was the exact type of game I needed to end that massive challenge.

This is gonna sound weird, but I feel the same about Disco Elysium as I do the movie Gone with the Wind. They both have great writing, visuals, and acting; but I don't agree with them politically. Now, those are two pieces of media that are on the opposite ends of the political spectrum with Disco Elysium being pro-communism and Gone with the Wind being blatant Confederate propaganda, but I still like them both. I also really enjoyed Disco Elysium's gameplay. It was fun investigating the murder and getting closer and closer to the truth. The dice rolls could be really fun or really annoying, Beating the odds and successfully rolling a 20% chance feels great, failing a 90% check does not. I think it's a great game that everyone should check out.

I got addicted to Slay the Spire. The gameplay loop can be really fun. I just got abhorrently unlucky during my ruins. I'd fail to get good cards, run into the hardest bosses, get shit relics, and just stuff like that for 20 hours. Then I got an insane run as the Silent that ended with me being completely overpowered. I'm definitely checking out the sequel when that comes out.

Doom: The Dark Ages is a weird one for me. I started out not liking it, but it grew on me. I think the game focuses way too much on the story. I don't really give a shit about the writer's 40k fanfic, and the game can't make me. I miss when Doom 2016 kept the bigger story in the logs, it allowed for the game to focus on what matters: killing demons. This series strives when it has a simple story. Doom 1: The demons are invading mars, kill 'em. Doom 2: Those fuckers killed our rabbit (and humanity), kill 'em. Doom (2016): THEY'RE INVADING MARS AGAIN, kill 'em. I had this complaint with Doom: Eternal too, but it's much worse here. The mech and dragon levels are also kind of boring and the game would be better off without them. At the end of the day though, the core gameplay is really fun. Not as good as Eternal, but better than 2016.

Just two for me this month:

The Beekeeper's Picnic - a pleasant short point and click focused on Sherlock in retirement

Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones - a replay but it's been ages since I last played it. It was a fun revisit and the first Fire Emblem I finished again since my less than stellar time with Fates.

Tomba! 2: The Evil Swine Return - PlayStation 3 - August 30th, 2025
Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart - PlayStation 5 - August 24th, 2025
13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim - PlayStation 4 - August 13th, 2025

Not bad for me, I had fun with all three and two were a forum challenge.

This month, I've spent all my time on playing a couple of loooong RPGs, and finished only two games, one of them rather short, to boot.
6th - Final Fantasy VII
31st - Evoland

Not much to talk about, as you see. I've already said everything I wanted about FFVII in my review, but to reiterate, it's a rather shallow game with good (for the time) graphics and a nice style. I wouldn't really pick it over most other RPGs nowadays, but it's definitely important in a historical context.

I beat a few more games than I expected in August.

Date: Game - Rating
Aug 3: Saints Row: The Third - 8/10
Aug 10: Donkey Kong Bananza - 9.5/10
Aug 11: Saints Row IV - 5.5/10
Aug 12: Saints Row: Gat out of Hell - 6.5/10
Aug 17: Final Fantasy VII - 9.5/10
Aug 18: Saints Row (2022) - 5.5/10
Aug 23: Donkey Kong Country - 6/10
Aug 26: Donkey Kong Country 2 - 8/10
Aug 30: Donkey Kong Country 3 - 6.5/10
Aug 31: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - 9/10

My favorite game that I beat in August was Final Fantasy VII, and in close second Donkey Kong Bananza. An honorable mention is Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which was close to being a 10/10 but has a few too many issues. Saints Row 3 and Donkey Kong Country 2 were decently fun. Donkey Kong Country 1 and 3, and Saints Row Gat out of Hell were all mediocre. And the two worst games I played in August were Saints Row IV and Saints Row 2022.

In September I'll be finishing Final Fantasy VIII, and starting FF9. I'm also going to be playing more Donkey Kong games. I'm also going to start Hollow Knight so that I can play Silksong after it releases.

August 05 - MiSide - 4h 09m
August 31 - Stellar Blade - 36h 37m

Both good games I bought this year that I kept procrastinating to play until now. MiSide was a treat, but wish there was more replayability with more choices or paths to make use of the extra skins and language packs they offer. Stellar Blade I bought on release when it came to PC because a fusion of Nier and Sekiro with booba sounds amazing. Story not as mind-blowing as Nier Automata and gameplay doesn't feel as smooth as Sekiro in my opinion, but this game does look straight up cinematic in the levels and boss fights once you get the groove in the gameplay going.

Haven't had this occur in awhile, but I had 4 completions this month! Thought about sneaking in a short 5th but I think I'll save playing that for another night since I'm tired. But here they are:

8/20 - The Simpson Arcade Game (Arcade)
8/20 - The House of the Dead 4 (Arcade)
8/20 - Time Crisis 5 (Arcade)
8/24 - Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (GameCube) - 63h 15m

The first three were all in the same day, which me and my girlfriend went to an arcade where the machines were in Free Play mode, so we could push our way through to the end without having to input tokens to continue. Definitely was a fun time, none of the games we beat were particularly phenomenal, but they were fun and I enjoyed the experience! Path of Radiance I have had going on and off since last year, so I'm glad to have finally beaten it, definitely was a top tier game in the series I felt!

Games
8/06 Monster Hunter Rise
8/14 Fear and Hunger
8/21 Elden Ring Nightreign - All new Everdark Bosses beat.
8/27 Astro Bot
8/30 Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

DLC
8/13 Mario Kart 8 Deluxe - Booster Course Pack
8/28 Splatoon 2: Octo Expansion

Pretty busy, but also a quite good month in terms of completions. Honestly, I don't think I beat a single game this month that I didn't like this month. The only real unfun thing I played this month was just some of the new Everdark Sovereign bosses added to Elden Ring Nightreign, with the new Libra fight being one of FromSoftware's worst bosses, I think ever, but the game itself is pretty fun. My favorite game this month is a tie between Fear and Hunger and Astro Bot. Astro Bot is an absolute joy of a platformer to play and is among the best I think on the market. This game was an absolute blast to 100% complete and is a game that I think everyone who owns a PS5 should play. Fear and Hunger on the other hand is a game that I wouldn't recommend to everyone due to its extreme subject matter, but if you can handle it, I think this is one of the best turn-based RPG / horror games I have ever played. This game is absolutely grueling and brutal from start to finish, but it also somehow managed to completely grab me and have me invested maddeningly until I reached the credits. I genuinely felt like I was going insane at points due to stress and just sheer discomfort with the visuals, music, and gameplay, which is something I found quite surprising since I have a hard time getting invested in turn-based RPGs. I highly recommend this game if you can handle some extreme subject matter.

Bad month for gaming after no gaming at all in July. Just cleared two pending games and it wasn't a lot of playtime.

05/08 Disney's Donald Duck: Goin' Quackers (PS2) | not tracked | 50%
05/08 Disney's Donald Duck: Goin' Quackers [Replay] (PS1) | 4h10m | 65%

I have played the PS1 version in my childhood and after trying the PS2 version, which is entirely a different game, I can say that the PS2 got the worse version.

Extremely slow month for me. I only managed one game this month.

Black Mesa - PC, 08/15, 7.5/10

I finally got Black Mesa done after all these years. I'm mainly mixed about it. Xen is WAY too long for it's own good and has too many inconsistent moments, the Marines are just Combine with a Marine Skin so they act more unrealistic than they did in the original Half-Life, voice acting is much worse than in the original game, the gunplay I felt was weak compared to Half-Life 2 as well. But this is a amazing looking game, especially the exterior areas which are all incredible. Everything in Black Mesa itself has been revamped sometimes for the better, the music is really good and it proves to be a much smoother transition to HL2 and it's episode due to actively having certain events and continuity in this one going from this to HL2. I'm rather mixed on the game but overall I'm glad I played it.

I don't know what I'll complete next, so let September decide!

Beat 1 game and 1 DLC this month. The game was a 3 minute shitpost game jam itch game, so the DLC was the real completion for this month. It also derailed my gaming plans for this month, the only reason I played Episode Aigis now was so I could finish it before P3R left game pass. I've spent the rest of the month getting the most value out of my subscription, although I haven't finished any of those other games yet. Hopefully I can squeeze in two quick ones before my game pass expires.

August 16th - Persona 3 Reload - Episode Aigis: The Answer - 44h 20m - 7/10 - Main+ - Started September 22nd 2024 - 328 Days Taken - Beat the dlc, did all Elizabeth requests, completed 94% of the compendium and did two bosses in the Monad Chamber.
August 19th - SOUP (2025) - 3m - 4/10 - 100% - Finished same day as started - Got a score of 6.

The best game this month is Episode Aigis. It's almost entirely combat, luckily didn't get tedious for me due to how good Persona combat is. The story is intriguing with some shocking twists and turns. Not nearly as bad as the community made it out to be.

The worst game is SOUP (2025), since it's not much of a game in the first place.

1. Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 2(replay) - 6/10
2. Twisted Metal 4 - 5/10
3. Gungrave Gore(replay) - 7/10
4. Kane and Lynch: Dead Men - 5/10
5. Robocop: Rogue City - Unfinished Business - 8/10
6. Solar Ash - 6/10
7. Senua's Saga: Hellblade 2 - 6/10
8. Spider-Man 2 Movie tie in game(replay) - 7/10
9. Final Vendetta - 7/10
10. DmC: Devil May Cry Definitive Edition(replay) - 8/10
11. DmC: Devil May Cry: Vergil's Downfall(replay) - 7/10
12. Genji: Dawn of the Samurai(replay) - 8/10
13. Mafia: The Old Country - 7/10
14. Gears of War: Reloaded - 6/10

Pretty solid month, I wanted to wrap everything up with Eriksholm The Stolen Dream but I couldn't finish it before 12 am.

Best game was DmC and Genji

Worst game was Twisted Metal 4 and Kane and Lynch

Weirdest game was Gears of War. I say that because Act 2 might be the best part of the game where you have to shoot propane tanks to get the kryll off you while enemies are shooting you as well. After that, the game never reaches this peak again. Act 4 and 5 is just drawn out cover shoot out after drawn out cover shoot out. The latter is spent trying to lower a drawbridge. You know everything after Act 3 is bullshit when the characters are questioning the script's logic. That and you don't even get an answer as to why Marcus Fenix was in jail at the start of the game. Raam is a terrible and boring villain where his boss fight is based entirely around RNG.

Gears 1 is just a primary example of how back before 2015 you could get away with making mediocre first games to popular franchises. Now, you can't do that anymore. It's a shame how you could forgive mediocrity before 2015 but now it's viewed as a crime against humanity.

Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 - PC/Steam/Geforce Now - 10/10
Neva - PC/Steam/Geforce Now - 7/10
I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream - PC/GOG - 7/10
Colin McRae Rally 2.0 - PSX - 8/10
The Saboteur - PC/Steam - 8/10
Half-Life: Alyx - PC/Steam with Quest 3S - 8/10
Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine - PC/Amazon Game app - 7/10

Expedition 33 is amazing, but I got impressed with "The saboteur", I did not play this one when it was released and it is pretty good on my opinion.

Regards!

On August ___ I beat [or retired] ___ and gave it a score of ___.

Beat
06 - Bramble: The Mountain King - 75%
28 - The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood - 95%
28 - Chrono Trigger - 75%

Retired
22 - Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - 75%

Best
I loved The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood and highly recommend it if you like a creative, thought-provoking visual novel type game. I anticipated enjoying it (I liked The Red Strings Club), but thought that the Tarot stuff would throw me off. That wasn't the case at all. I'm even considering a replay!

Worst
None of the other three were bad. I recognize that two of them are classics that I was trying to evaluate on their own terms and not judge by 2025 standards. Still, I definitely found the least enjoyment in Chrono Trigger. I'm glad to have played it, and appreciate all the mid-90s JRPG innovations, but am glad it's over (and hope Chrono finds his mom and his cat).

(Switch) Kirby and the Forgotten Land- 100%
(Xbox) 50 Cent Bulletproof- 45%
(Xbox) Shrek Superslam- 100%
(Xbox Series X) Funko Fusion- 40%

I'm in this weird limbo area where I've got 3 games basically completed (either end game or reached the end) but want to continue playing before clearing (either completing there DLC or the post game content). Well in general only one game this month:

25th August - Fallout: New Vegas - Old World Blues - 8h 32m 7s

Ranking:
1st - Fallout: New Vegas - Old World Blues - The weakest New Vegas DLC so far it relies too much on humor and talks to mmuch and all the quests result in only fetch quests. It does have some fun weapons though

Doom: The Dark Ages (PC) - August 24th, 2025 - Nightmare difficulty. 100% Completed. Everything done in every level (Secrets, Challenges, Collectibles, Gold). Acquired all Demonic Essence Upgrades. Acquired all Shield Base, Shield Rune and Melee Weapon Upgrades. Acquired all Weapon Upgrades. - REPLAY

Anticipated to beat more games this month, but only managed a replay of the amazing Doom: The Dark Ages.
Next month will hopefully see more completions, but only time will tell.

Happy gaming for September!

The games i beat this month are:

Completed:
Wild hearts
Warhammer Age Of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin
Final Fantasy VII: Remake/Integrade

Replays:
Game of Thrones: Telltale Games
Risen
Risen 2: Dark Waters
Risen 3: Titan Lords

Just a couple of completions since I've been on holiday and busy moving in with my partner:

- LEGO Star Wars II: The Original Trilogy [Replay] - GBA - 12/08 - 08:00 h
- Mario Kart 7 - 3DS - 16/08 - 10:39 h

Not my favorite games, but I just played them in short bursts. I enjoyed LEGO Star Wars, especially because I finally figured out how to complete it 100%. I thought there was a bug in my copy that prevented a trigger, but I noticed an alternative path had opened up. My younger self would be proud.

I also found Mario Kart 7 more boring compared to other games in the series.

A well-planned month in which I managed to deal with house improvement, keep up with my fitness and complete 4 games: 2 large ones and 2 medium-sized ones.

05-Aug-2025 – Child of Light (PC) - 18H49M
18-Aug-2025 - Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration (PC) - 24H00M
21-Aug-2025 - Dead Effect 2 (PC) - 10H15M
29-JuL-2025 - Memoria (PC) – 10H06M

Some of the biggest games in my backlog are RPGs, and I am beginning to take them on. Child of Light is not one of those – at 15 to 20 hours, it’s rather short, but I remember really liking the art direction in its trailers and bought it on a discount. The game is a perfect introduction to the genre, featuring pastel-coloured environments, a simple yet well-executed combat system, and a fairy tale story that doesn't overstay its welcome. On the other hand, it also features a rhyme-based dialogue structure that is not very good and a basic soundtrack.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration is an action-RPG, and what a game! I would not know where to start. a perfect blend of platforming, missions, side activities, challenge tombs and combat. Beautiful environment and character animation, great voice acting. There is even a bit of Metroidvania elements in there, where new equipment opens paths that were blocked before. Sure, on the standard level, the game is on the easy side, but it’s just balanced so well that nothing feels bloated or unnecessary. Many people compare this to Uncharted. Well, I played Uncharted 2 just a couple of months ago, and Rise of the Tomb Raider is simply on another level. As close to perfect as I could have even imagined, and I was sorry to see the credits roll.

Dead Effect 2 is one of those First-Person Shooters with RPG elements that was first made for mobile and then made its way to PC. I purchased both 1 and 2 in a bundle, and to be fair, this one has much more interesting mechanics than the first. Still, the game loop itself is too repetitive, the graphics are of low quality, and it has the worst voice acting in known history. I did manage to get through it, somehow.

I used to like point-and-click adventures, and I have a few of them in my backlog, but over the years, I've grown tired of obtuse puzzles that don’t really make sense at all. Daedalic Entertainment has a decent record of doing point-and-click right. I disliked Deponia, but I enjoyed Anna's Quest and loved Edna & Harvey: Harvey's New Eyes. Memoria was closer to the latter than the former, with mostly fair challenges. The story was also interesting, and at 8-9 hours, it respected my time.

The one more thing I was deep into was Sniper Ghost Warrior 3, but at a particular point in the game, the game shut down my machine. Not just crashes, but it completely turns off the computer. It always happens at the same point – so for the time being, I am putting the game aside. An upgrade to Windows 11 and a more powerful PSU will soon go into my desktop, so I hope that will resolve the issue.

As I’ve been doing for the last 20 months or so, I buy one new game for every 4 I complete. Remember Me was on my Wishlist for a while, so I grabbed it for a fiver on a sale.

My Game Size Guide:
Tiny (0-2 hours), Small (2-6 hours), Medium (6-14 hours), Large (14-30 hours), Very Large (30-62), Epic (62+)

I have finished a few things this August, mostly things I started a while ago, but still.

Rune Factory 3: Special - In itself, a fine game, but as a modern remaster, I found it woefully lacking in QOL improvements.

Witch on the Holy Night - It is pretty decent, the production values especially, but otherwise, it wasn't really my cup of tea. At least it's fairly short.

Yumina the Ethereal - I really wasn't a fan of the gameplay, and honestly cheated my way through to game to avoid it, but the story is engaging and the characters are fun.

Ended up being very active in terms of gaming in the month of August, with this month being tied with the months of June and July in 2023 for the most. A ton of these were a long-time coming as well, with me either starting them a bit ago and finally finishing or getting to a game I have meant to get to for a while, with me having had mostly a good time this month.

Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles - Aug 2
Mario Party 3 - Aug 11
Punch-Out!! - Aug 11
Deltarune: Chapter 4 - Aug 18
Resident Evil 3 - Aug 24
Castlevania - Aug 25

Finishing the final of the classic Sonic games in the form of Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles, with me doing the combined version because that’s how it is presented within Sonic Origins. This is my favourite Sonic game so far. I found this one absolutely fantastic, with great level designs, cool level transitions, amazing music and just the best playing of the classic quadrilogy. Getting everything was a struggle as Sonic, with having to replay the game several times, but by getting help with finding the Special Stage rings and getting good at the Special Stages felt very amazing. Playing as Knuckles was really fun and managed to do all of that very smoothly with him and was a great way of finishing this playthrough. Also finished the last of the Nintendo 64 Mario Party games after starting this one all the way back in January. Playing through all the different boards with friends was a very good time, with it being yet another fantastic entry after Mario Party 2 and many of the new additions are just great. The Story Mode was a bit of a slog to get through unfortunately with just playing all the boards with CPUs very much showing the luck based nature of these games, but after a good while I cleared it and could finish the final board with my friends. I was intending to get through Punch-Out!! in the Summer of 2020, but Mr. Dream (or Mike Tyson) felt like such an impossible roadblock that I had to stop. This time I decided I was finally gonna clear it, with getting through most of the game still being a struggle but it was doable and eventually reached Mr. Dream again. This is one of the hardest things I’ve done, but after fighting him for over 10h (yes it took that long to master for me) I finally took him down which I’m proud of. Unhappy with how long it took me to finish Deltarune: Chapter 4, but eventually did get to the second of the two new chapters and it was phenomenal with how it takes the story and introduces new gameplay elements and might be my new favourite chapter. It did take a bit longer because I had to do the regular route twice due to missing things my first time, and getting through the Weird Route but it was all well worth it and I am now highly anticipating the upcoming Chapter 5 in 2026. Resident Evil 3 I played after finishing Resident Evil 2 a few months ago and it is clear how much it has borrowed from it, mostly not in a positive way. It does improve the controls and Jill is very fun to play as, just was not fond of the structure of the game much and felt that the game peaked in the first few hours. Was also the shortest game of the franchise so far by only having one campaign, but overall I just wish this package was stronger because it was a bit of a letdown compared to the previous games. The final game I beat was another classic NES game and my first ever game by Konami, the original Castlevania and this was very difficult. I struggled quite a lot over the course of this playthrough, especially with some of the levels, but finally clearing them felt pretty good and learning the final Dracula fight was a good experience. This style of Castlevania probably is not quite for me, but I'm still looking forward to experiencing the future entries.

Probably will also end up getting through quite a few games next month. Playing the first 3D Sonic game with Sonic Adventure, which will be more of an investment to fully complete than the previous games but so excited to fully experience this that I am sure it’s going to be good in the end. Aside from that I’m replaying my next Lego game with Lego Pirates of the Caribbean which is not one of my favourite entries from my memory but a good time that I’m still nostalgic for. Finally also getting to Metroid II, the other classic Metroid game that should be an okay enough time and not take overly long to get through. Also planning on continuing to play games in franchises by getting to Resident Evil Code: Veronica, Mega Man 7 and Castlevania II. Probably will be playing quite a few games so could also reach a decent number of completions that month too.