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Year 2015

This year started with my playthrough of Heroes of Might and Magic 2 - one of my all time favorites - followed by a few weeks of #GamerGate controversy and my involement in it. Although I support #GamerGate, it took many months of gaming from me. It wasn't until Pillars of Eternity that I went back to playing games again. Up to that point I really had time only for a few parties of Chess, and although my chess skills have improved considerably, it barely qualifies as gaming. After Pillars of Eternity, my nostalgia kicked in and I started playing some old console games. I really enjoyed revisiting Wolfchild and Batman Returns on Sega Game Gear, while Super Mario Land on Gameboy and Wolfchild on Sega Genesis were completely new to me.

Witcher 3 returned me to triple A gaming when I almost gave up on the more mainstream titles, but unfortunately I haven't finished it due to vacation bringing huge expectations from my wife about spending some quality time together. I am also planning on buying a a better computer somewhere next year, so I will definitely revisit this title. Still, my wife was nice enough to let me play some games on my android phone, so I managed to finally finish Kokotoni Wilf, Pepper's Adventure in Time and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream! The latter two games left me slightly disappointed, but I am glad I managed to finish them nevertheless.

After my vacation, I went back to MMORPGs with vanilla World of Warcraft on Kronos private server and BatMUD just to see where the whole MMO genre came from.

Shadowrun: Dragonfall was the biggest and the most pleasant surprise, while Shadowrun: Hong Kong turned out to be the biggest disappointment. I ended the year by playing Ghost Control Inc. and long overdue Ecstatica.

I also played some games in between the ones that are mentioned here, but I either didn't play them enough to warrant an entry or I am waiting to do a proper playthrough once the director's cut gets released - Divinity: Original Sin, Dark Souls and Wasteland 2 need to be mentioned here.

Final thoughts about the year 2015

It was a good year that saw the renaissance of some old school design values, but I am still waiting for a new game to capture my interest to the point of some older titles. Hopefully the next year will be even better with the new Torment: Tides of Numenera coming out as well as the newest Baldur's Gate expansion: Siege of Dragonspear!

Stats

Games played: 20

Games finished: 12

Game of the year: Shadowrun: Dragonfall

Could have been better: Pillars of Eternity

The biggest surprise: The Witcher 3 and Shadowrun: Dragonfall

The biggest disappointment: Shadowrun: Hong Kong

Waste of time: Pepper's Adventure in Time

Ecstatica (PC)

27/12/2015 21:29

I have been waiting to play this game ever since my teenage years. I remember seeing the screenshots in one of the gaming magazines back in 1996 and immediately becoming interested. I managed to get the game from one of the local pirates, but unfortunately it was "ripped" and came...

Ghost Control Inc. (PC)

13/11/2015 21:29

I bought this game as a result of impulse purchase on Steam sales and it turned out to be a good investment, although it is a bit simplistic for my taste. The reason why I bought it was not because I was looking for an X-COM clone with ghosts, but because ever since I was a kid I wanted to...

Shadowrun: Hong Kong (PC)

15/10/2015 21:28

Let me start this short unofficial review by saying that I really wanted to give this game a thumbs up, because I loved Shadowrun: Dragonfall so much. However, Hong Kong does not deliver and we need to be honest about it. I am not sure what changed in the development of this game, but the...

Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut (PC)

27/09/2015 21:27

Shadowrun: Dragonfall really took me by surprise, especially because I was not too impressed with it's predecessor. Namely, I never finished Shadowrun: Returns because I found it to be too linear and simplistic with some very strange design decisions, and by the time I began...

BatMUD (PC)

05/09/2015 23:25

BatMUD was one of the games I wanted to try out when I was writing my World of Warcraft analysis. MUD stands for Multi-User Dungeon game and MUDs were our first attempts at creating Massive Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Games such as previously mentioned World of Warcraft! BatMUD was...

World of Warcraft: Private Vanilla Server (Kronos) (PC)

25/08/2015 21:35

I am just one of many World of Warcraft players who maintains that the game has been declining in quality with each released expansion, however I was always reserved about expressing my opinions on the matter, because I was not sure if nostalgia was clouding my judgement. Now, do not get me...

Pepper's Adventures in Time (PC)

26/07/2015 14:48

This vacation is actually turning out pretty well and I managed to finish the third game within a month. Unfortunatelly, I didn't enjoy Pepper's Adventures in Time all that much and I was really expecting a lot more from a Sierra title. Actually to say that I was disappointed is an...

I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream (PC)

13/07/2015 14:46

Luckily, my wife is giving me some slack when playing games on a smartphone next to her, so I managed to finish a game I was planning to play for years. I kept hearing adventure fans recommending this game as one of the best adventures ever made and I couldn't wait to give it a...

Kokotoni Wilf (ZX Spectrum)

06/07/2015 15:25

Unfortunately, I had to stop playing Witcher 3 before I finished it due to my vacation. This might sound a bit strange, but I always dread this time of the year because it usually involves my wife demanding that I spend more time with her. This year was no exception, so I had to sacrifice...

Witcher 3: Wild Hunt (PC)

29/06/2015 13:09

I wasn't too thrilled about the new Witcher game to be quite honest. The things I saw in the trailers, gameplay videos and reviews made me think this is going to be another dumbed down, streamlined triple A game like so many others today. Still the curiosity got the better of me and...

Super Mario Land (Gameboy)

12/06/2015 11:34

My nostalgia drive is still full-on so I decided to grab Super Mario Land on Nintendo Gameboy. This is a console I never owned, because my parents bought me Sega Game Gear when I was a kid. Game Gear was definitely a more advanced system and this is why one could argue I was one of the...

Wolfchild (Sega Genesis)

04/06/2015 23:37

After finishing the Game Gear version I felt like I didn't really test myself enough, so I grabbed Wolfchild on Sega Genesis and decided to give it a try. Although I wouldn't call the Genesis version diffcult by old-school criteria, it still took me around a week to finish it. The...

Batman Returns (Sega Game Gear)

26/05/2015 09:07

My nostalgia kick continues, so I decided to grab another game I used to play hundreds of times as a kid. It was time for Batman Returns on Sega Game Gear, which is in my opinion a pretty decent platformer on that system. It is certainly better than Wolfchild, which I finished a few days...

Wolfchild (Sega Game Gear)

23/05/2015 13:02

Today my nostalgia kicked in, so I decided to play some games from my childhood. I was very curious if I can still finish at least some of them since I haven't been playing them over a decade. Thus, I turned my attention to Wolfchild which was the first game I ever played on Sega Game Gear....

Pillars of Eternity (PC)

05/04/2015 23:14

After being obssesed with chess for two weeks, I decided to give it some rest and grab a real video game. It also just so happens that Pillars of Eternity was released, so of course I immediately bought the game and gave it a go. Anyone who knows me can testify what a huge fan of...

Chess

27/03/2015 09:57

After finishing my Heroes of Might and Magic 2 playthrough, I first intended to start playing Leisure Suit Larry - Lounge Lizards, because I never finished it and I am getting really thirsty for good adventure games. Then after watching some Bloodborne trailers, I was almost certain...

Keeping busy and #GamerGate

10/03/2015 10:28

I haven’t really had the time to play Heroes of Might and Magic 2 lately. As much as I wish to finish the game for the fourth time, the last mission will have to wait until I find the time to do it properly. Not only have I begun working full time, but my personal life has been...

Heroes of Might and Magic 2 (PC)

05/02/2015 01:28

It has been 17 years since I was introduced to the Heroes of Might and Magic franchise and I remember that at first I didn't really understand what all the fuss was about. You see, back then I was 16 years old and I have just gotten my first personal computer. For someone who was...