You are on to something for sure. As RPG fatigue leaves me grossly intolerant of padding, and aware of how heinously common it is (particularly attribute-dependent quest barriers), I notice the trend especially in the 2010s seemed to be one-note atmosphere. I'd guess we have Skyrim to thank for that, but either way I imagine it was inevitable as developers tried to make games bigger and bigger. Maybe since criticisms of emptiness popped up so quickly, the workaround was to sacrifice variety instead? I will say the most noteworthy exceptions are Witcher 3, BotW, and apparently Elden Ring... and hey BIG SURPRISE, they're held in the highest regard!

Thinking about SMT availability has me realizing so many of them are somehow only on DS and 3DS. But considering Nocturne HD's array of ports, and how much more innately accessible SMT5 is than its predecessors, expanding its presence to other platforms feels like a no-brainer. Plus modded emulation has proven that the game can easily run much better with just a little extra hardware, something that had also been preemptively achieved with NMH3, so c'mon! Let's go!

How was The Quarry? I do intend to get around to that when I'm in the mood, which could be a while. But I remember Until Dawn so vividly that I must've been pretty engrossed in it and would certainly like to recapture that.

I've neglected to mention this for years, but feel the need to since it was our original threshold: You ever checked out any of the Back to the Future comics? All the ones I've read are fun enough to be worthwhile, but in particular there's a run called Citizen Brown that adapts the game and basically fixes everything that was odd and awkward about it! Definitely the palette cleanser we needed, if a bit of a niche one.

You're absolutely right; the fatigue I have with AC being repetitive merely stems from playing more of them at once than most other people have. When there's been time to forget one experience, it's much easier to forgive another being so similar. Having toyed around with Origins now, I do appreciate that it (as expected) fills the grind with meaningful sidequests, like sometimes with fully animated cutscenes even, which justifies the forced longevity a lot better than its predecessors. And it is still the same at its core, though for that exact reason I'm not confident that I'll ever finish it.

What's most fascinating about diving into Dragon Age is the uneven retrospective. All three are mixed bags, but for entirely different reasons. I think overall I appreciated DA2 the most for keeping it simple—knowing that it was a low-resourced side project and adjusting my expectations helped with that, not to mention the satisfaction of it fixing a lot of the clunkiness that made DAO so agonizing to get through after a while. Inquisition though? Wow, what an elaborately programmed way to waste my time!

Yeeahhh, figured Wonderful 101 was a flip-flopper considering how polarizing it is just to look at. Guess I'll stay away from it for now since I'm still sore about Bayonetta 3. Hi-Fi Rush, on the other hand...

Dunno if Prey 2017 interests you at this point or if you've already played it, but I can confirm that it is, in fact, much better than Deathloop despite being its predecessor. That said, it doesn't resemble Dishonored or Deathloop that closely. Instead it's somehow the fourth BioShock, but with more of a System Shock setting obviously. Easily the most intriguing of my recent game streak despite being an afterthought purchase. Good news is the Prey team appears to be behind Redfall, so fingers crossed?

Hey! I see you’re playing Scarlet Nexus. How are you enjoying it so far? It was definitely one of my favorite games of last year. I still need to go back and buy the game so I can replay it as Kasane. I hope you’re enjoying it ^^

Not sure what it is, but there's something shared between the layouts of 2000s WRPGs like KotOR/DA:O, VtM Bloodlines, and Oblivion/Fallout 3 that charms me dearly. Makes me wonder what else I've been missing in that pool.

Right! Though my immediate complaint was about low key grinding coercion, the real irritation might be that Black Flag is when I got tired of playing the same game over and over. Even the best naval combat can't disguise that. The next few entries are hardly any more promising with how samey and er, poorly optimized they appear to be, but Origins and Odyssey do still interest me due to being more PS5-friendly and maybe actually having some cool sidequests to occupy that forced level gap? I just might give those a go!

In the meantime, Dragon Age progress has been slow but intriguing. Having only finished the Origins main campaign (plus in-campaign DLC; working on Awakening and other DLC now) I've found that, just like in KotOR and Mass Effect, my favorite part of the experience is simply chatting with party members and getting to know the world through their diverse perspectives. Sounds like that continues to be a positive staple in the sequels too, if perhaps the only one. Definitely worth it either way.

That's exactly what I gather Bloodborne is like — glad it was such a good time! I did technically finally grab it from the PS Plus Collection since that's going away, but there's no timetable for actually starting it up since I'm still willing to be upsold on a newer version and, again, I want to do Elden Ring first.

Hope The Wonderful 101 is going well. I always feel torn when I try to check it out because there are parts that look like peak Platinum material, but just as many parts that look not so fun.

My initial crash course has mainly been doing just the main campaigns of the Bethesda stuff (blasphemous, I know) to get a tutorial-ish feel for each with the intention to revisit the ones I like for side content. With that in mind:
• Morrowind has an outstanding world and plot but... isn't so fun to actually play nowadays, and I'm with you on Skyrim boredom for sure, but Oblivion actually had enough variety in its scenarios and environments that I enjoyed every second and am intrigued enough to get back to that one!
• As for Fallout, I can see why New Vegas is the fan favorite as it's the most open-ended, with its crux being about determining whether to ally/oppose each of the key factions with various interconnected outcomes depending on the timing of how you treat each side and how they feel about each other. F3 easily had the winning atmosphere for me though, in a Metal Gear kind of way. F4 could've been the best with its QoL updates and personal conflict, but it obnoxiously emphasizes combat and that's not so appealing when I've been trying to play them like Deus Ex up to this point.

I've stalled on Dragon Age though because I got back into blazing through Assassin's Creed. The whole Ezio saga benefits hugely from having a fantastic main character with an emotionally engaging life story, and as you mentioned a glorious setting, which is why even though I think AC3 is as good at the core, it bears the disadvantage of having to follow Ezio and Romeaissance. (On the other hand, 3's DLC was surprisingly great!) Then again, Black Flag has been a worthy turnaround so far; next it'll be on to Freedom Cry and Rogue—let's see how much longer I can last! EDIT: Not long at all, actually; turns out I'm being punished for not messing around enough to afford upgrades, and I understand the grind is only going to get worse in later entries, so I'm hanging up for now. Good news is, it's finally Dragon Age time.

Now spill it. What's the Bloodborne verdict?