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I played through The Lost Legacy a couple times now. It is just excellent. I loved it. On top of everything I praised before it has these two perfect sequences. One is one of those slower downtime moments that Naughty Dog does so well. It felt made for me. Really made my heart sing. And then I think it has the new high water mark for action setpieces. It isn't as original as some of the others, but the design is just superb and it is full of little unique moments. Incredible. Don't have much bad to say other than that I one of the photo collectibles bugged on me and won't register! Going for the platinum and that is a bit of a stick in my spokes.

Beat Lost Legacy. Damn fine game. Actually gives 2 competition for my favorite in the series. Can't think of any sequence I didn't really like actually. Even some of the stuff I thought I wouldn't care for didn't bother me here.

Playing FFXII: The Zodiac Age. I'm actually enjoying it even more now than I did when it first came out, and I loved it back then. Such a good game. I might make it my second ever Platinum trophy if I can beat a couple of the super-hard bosses.

Playing a bit of the new Madden. I am looking forward to trying that story mode thing they added. Seems pretty interesting. I have the Mario + Rabbids coming in from GameFly too.

Still chipping away at FF14. I think I'll be doing that for the rest of my life. Game has so much content, and that's not even touching the two other expansions.

Everybody's Golf is great. I never played them on PS1 or PS2, but so far this one is better than the PS3 and Vita version I played. I really enjoy the RPG aspect of it. There's nothing better than chipping in a 30+ yard shot.

Still undecided on Destiny 2 launch day purchase. I want it, the only reason I might not is because I'm really trying to commit a lot of time to FF14. I'll probably cave though.

I started playing Mario + Rabbids. It looks really nice and has some great music. There was at least one great remix of a Mario tune I noticed so far. The art direction is very pleasant and really consistent despite mashing up two series. I know Odyssey will be technically superior, but I think I prefer overall look of this better. The gameplay seems pretty good, but I don't have much to compare it to. They keep adding little tweaks to it that I enjoy. I usually can only do a couple battles before I put it down. It isn't like an action game or shooter where I'm exactly excited to play more battles, but that is probably just my lack of care for the genre. I'm not sure if it will lose me before I finish as I hear it is 15-20 hours long, but it is pretty cool so far.

I'm also playing the Madden Longshot mode. Not a huge fan so far I guess, but they have been letting me play a bit more as it has gone on. The drills have real random controls though and they just throw you out there and expect you to know how to do each. I've restarted a couple drills because of that. Seemed a bit unfair, I don't know. Even showing a little box with controls before the start of the drill would be nice.

Sounds like that mode is a big rip off from FIFA. It's the story mode right? In FIFA they tell you in the loading screen how to do the drills. Plus when you play Career Mode you can assign players different drills, so from that you typically know how to do them too.

I've played some of the story mode in FIFA, I'm just not a fan of the league they put you in. English soccer is the most popular so it make sense, but I'm a fan of the Italian game.

What position do you play as? I'm assuming it's something offensive related, since that would probably be the most fun and easiest to build a story around.

Yeah, it is a story mode. The gist of the mode is you play as a top high school prospect who drops out of college early on. Then four years later makes a run at the NFL through a combine they have for longshot prospects. You are a QB. It is basically a mix of Telltale dialogue options (they quiz you on some football stuff which is cool, have you memorize playcalls, etc.), drills, and then actual football (mostly high school flashbacks so far). It has grown on me after playing some more today. Now I know most of the drills I guess. There may be a way to play them outside of the story mode to get to know them like you said, but I just played a couple exhibition games before trying this.

That's an interesting idea. Bare minimum it's cool they're trying something new with Madden. I decided to pick Nier Automata back up and try to knock it out, but forgot too much of the story so started a new game. Fortunately this game has a damn great opening level. Hoping I can beat it this time then give the NG+ modes a try.

I finished Mario + Rabbids. I really liked it. The movement abilities during combat are really cool. It is a bit like a puzzle trying to figure out how to handle things. My favorite character to use was Rabbid Luigi. He had these really cool vampire dashes where sliding through enemies would steal some health. Rabbid Yoshi was the funniest character though. The way he ran cracked me up. Outside the battles, you get to explore/solve some puzzles. There isn't much story, but there were some pretty funny moments. I really liked the third world boss. I downloaded Invisible, Inc. (it was on PS+) and added the upcoming Mario and Luigi remake to my GameFly queue based on your guys' recommendations.

I started up Sonic Mania. Pretty cool so far.

I beat Sonic Mania (not all the Chaos Emeralds yet though, so sort of I guess). Really fun time. Very nostalgic. It is interesting to start in a level that is so familiar and then see it go in new directions. I'm kind of mixed on the new platforming gimmicks and boss fights. Some were great. Some I could have done without. The music is incredible. Probably my favorite gaming soundtrack of 2017.

I started up Life is Strange: Before the Storm. There are some many things that make it feel different. I'm not quite as comfortable playing as Chloe (Max was more like me I guess). The rewind was really cool for me. And it took a bit getting used to Chloe's new VA. It's a shame the strike prevented Ashly Burch from doing it again. I love the music though and the new talkback thing is pretty neat. I have only played maybe an hour.

I started Destiny 2 as well. Just did the intro. It has a lot more story it seems so far (though perhaps any amount of story would be a lot more story). I made a new character. A robot hunter this time. Seeing my old human hunter he looked a little lame. I wanted to try again. I mostly got this to play online with people as I miss playing online with buddies and chatting with them, so I will mostly do it for that.

I should get Metroid from GameFly tomorrow. Getting Dishonored on PS4 too. I started it, but the disc was messed up, so had to send it back. Should be busy on the gaming front!

I have a lame human hunter too. I just kept my original character from the first game. Kept my robot warlock from the first game as well. When I play the Titan class I'll make one from scratch. More than likely it'll be a robot, because I just think they look the coolest and Cayde is the best. If I'm feeling frisky, I might make a female character. I rarely ever do that. We'll have to play sometime. You have to get to a certain point before you can play with others just so you know. Takes about 2 hours.

Note: Not that I hate woman or that I'm sexist, I usually just like to play as a male because I can relate more.

Figured I'd make Cuphead one of my few full-priced purchases of the year since I like to get in early on indie stuff and one of my classes this year is History of Animation. Wasn't really feeling the bosses at first, they felt like the dragged on too long. The last one I did was really great, though. Also, it's a shoe-in for the best looking game of the year.

Finished Uncharted: LL last night. An enjoyable campaign that fleshed out the personalities and histories of the two main characters; more Chloe is always welcome but I liked how this game made a stronger case for Nadine than U4.

I've been playing a lot of Final Fantasy IX, and it's everything I've been hoping for the past 2 years. There's only two problems with it though, and that is that it is a port of the iPhone/Android version that was released about a year or two ago. So the controls are wonkier than they should be (seems like this could easily be remedied with an update). The other complaint is the battle menus. They use the blocky version from the phones as well, so it takes up a big portion of the screen. Other than those two complaints, I'm really enjoying my second favorite Final Fantasy again. Unlike VII, I've only beat this one 2 times, so I don't really know everything that is gonna happen in this game. Plus, never really did any of the side quests on previous plays, might do more this time around.

The game definitely looks better here for HD TV's, but it really looks great when you play this on the Vita. I would never say no to Sony doing this kind of remaster for PS1 games and making them available for the Vita with trophies and improved graphics. Here's just a quick wish lists of games I'd want.

Final Fantasy VII, VIII, and IX
Metal Gear Solid
Resident Evil 1-3
Brave Fencer Musashi (such an under appreciated game)
MediEvil

Managed to sweet talk my way into a free copy of Hollow Knight so I'll probably give that a shot.

Shame to hear about the FFIX PS4 version drawing from the phone version. Lazy work from Square Enix if you ask me. Honestly, given that I'd probably not support it and just emulate (can do the speed up functions on it and it will look pretty good). Only thing I'd be missing is the achievements and you know...the legality. It's a moral gray area if I'm pirating my own copy though, eh?

I've always thought emulating games you've already paid for should be perfectly legal. It's basically like watching an old dvd you bought on a better tv. Though for newer stuff like the Wii-U I guess there's a real grey area if you haven't bought the system as well

Well, Nintendo and PSN stopping backwards compatibility has made piracy even more morally ambiguous than it already is...but ANYWAY! I wonder why Square Enix used the mobile version?

One thing you might like is that 5(eyes an option to stop battle entrances, which should speed up the battles. I haven’t tried it yet, but I don’t recall 8t being there on older games.

This time I changed the battle speed from normal to fast. Although I love this game, it’s battles are so slow for whatever reason. Haste is gonna be my favorite spell for sure!

Just made it to level 20 with my Hunter in Destiny. I'm really enjoying it. I still haven't finished the campaign. The story is a lot better. There is this really funny robot character. I guess she is reminiscent of other robot characters in fiction, but she cracks me up. All the other voiced characters are very well done too. Many more cutscenes and dialogue for the lot of them. I still wish it had cool vehicle segments like in Halo. I think I only had one so far and it was just an escape. I'm really looking forward to playing more multi whenever I finish the campaign.

I think I am at or very close to the end of Metroid: Samus Returns. I like it, but don't love it I guess. I'm not the biggest Metroid fan in general though. I love the whole ability progression/exploration/map setup portion of the game. A lot of Metroidvanias today kind of miss key elements of the structure that this series does not. It makes getting lost/stuck work in a way few games can. The combat is kind of eh for me. It just gets really repetitive I guess. I rather like the bosses (mini-bosses I suppose), but after they repeat them a few times, they lose their luster. At least where I'm at now, I am powerful enough to kind of blow by most combat.

Started up Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga. Pretty fun so far. The story can be pretty funny. I like that there is still an active element to the combat and that turns move pretty quickly. I'm about three hours in so far.

I'm enjoying Hollow Knight so far and what I'm not enjoying is probably because I'm playing it on an Xbox controller.

Beat Mario + Rabbids. Pretty fun game. I actually like the Rabbids too so thought it was pretty funny. Liked how battles were quick and the game wasn't too long also, since long battles and games are my two biggest issues with the genre

That's true. I love X-Com (thought admittedly kind of suck at it) but there's nothing more frustrating than slogging through a fight for 45 minutes only to get creamed.

I am mostly still working on Superstar Saga. I love it. The story is super fun and it reminds me a bit of a 2D Zelda game. I know I have only played about ten RPGs, but this is definitely one of my favorites. I'm excited to have a whole bunch more of these games to play.

I started up the second episode of Life is Strange: Before the Storm. Only a tiny bit so far though. I also bought Alienation when it was on sale. I'm not sure why. I tried to get through Dead Nation on several occasions only to quit. And this is a lot like that game. Hopefully I get more out of this one.

Really hoping I can rent Hidden Agenda next.

Yeah, I always got the 2D Zelda vibe from SS also, which is why I thought you'd prefer it over the other Mario RPGs. The others still have puzzles, but they don't add new abilities as much as that game which was a shame. Can't complain too much since it's because they go in different directions with abilities and puzzles, but still liked SS's progression. Just beat that game this week. Just as fun as I remembered, still has one of the best final levels in any game I've played. Also getting past that last boss is quite the feat.

I managed to get The Witcher 3 on company dime, and started it up...you know, for research purposes. Two things I'm surprised by:

1. As someone who didn't like the first game and was lukewarm on the second, I'm really enjoying it so far. Don't know what they did to change up the formula but it worked. I think it was one of you who said that might be the case.

2. I'm shocked at how well it's running on my PC. For a game that looks so good it sure does run smooth with almost everything turned up to high and ultra. I even turned on Nvidia's fancy hair physics!

Still working through Hollow Knight as well, but it's nice to have a new RPG to play.

I finished Superstar Saga. Not much to add to what I already said, but it joins The Witcher 3 as the only RPGs I have loved so far.

The second episode of Life is Strange hasn't really grabbed me like the first did. I hope it ramps up.

I've been playing a lot of Destiny 2's competitive mode which I am having a lot of fun with.

Kind of just waiting for Mario on Friday now mostly. I have both slots on GameFly open, so I'm hoping to rent two of these three as well this week even if I may not get to them right away: Wolfenstein II, Hidden Agenda, and Assassin's Creed: Origins.

So jealous, that new Mario looks so great.