ADACA and Signalis just came out last year so not far behind but they were fun. ADACA is billed as Half-Life meets Halo meets STALKER by reviewers and it’s a fun, light FPS. (although I couldn’t get into the more open Zone Patrol mode)

Signalis though, that oozes atmosphere, an excellent soundtrack, and offered feels in a neat fleshed out world. I enjoyed the gameplay quite a bit, a callback to top-down survival horror from an era I never really played. I really appreciate a lack of jump scares except one enemy’s presence when you enter a room making your screen/radio go haywire but hardly FNAF material which I will only watch.

Welp, we’ll see if it is actually promised and then if they actually follow through.

I remember a lot of moments like this, the sheer time I had to mess with systems, how things weren’t taken for granted and all seemed new - Halo 1’s Flood reveal blew me away and the driving physics were incredible - it changed on ice and the Warthog’s turret ejected casings that bounced and accumulated on the ground! And then Halo 2/Half-Life 2’s physics impressed me, etc. But of course going back to some things from today’s perspective makes them seem primitive. Starcraft’s 12 unit selection limit? Skyward Sword’s lack of direct camera control without hitting a button?

But most recently I’d say Outer Wilds, Titanfall 2 and the recent main Zelda games threw the most wonder at me.

Outer Wilds for being a completely fresh onion of a puzzle/space exploration game, plenty of video essays with varying levels of spoilers there.

Titanfall 2 is on the surface a sci-fi FPS but the shift in scale between on-foot and in-Titan is unique combined with inventive levels and mechanics.

Breath of the Wild amazed me with the reveal of its scale and world.

Tears of the Kingdom amazes me with how polished it’s physics and sandbox is, I haven’t seen things work as well and without crazy quirks like I have in this game.

I can’t say if it’s what the person you’re responding to had in mind but I noticed Macs have shorter supported lifespans than a comparable Windows machine. Of course there’s factors like Windows being more hardware agnostic but it effectively means that today, no Mac older than 2013-2014ish/that aren’t supported by macOS Big Sur isn’t getting security updates. They do have options in terms of Windows (potentially), Linux, patched versions of newer macOS releases but for a user that’s non-technical I think that’s too soon. I was able to end my college career in 2019 by pressing my 2008 ThinkPad and Windows 10 into service. (albeit hi-res video and 3D games were naturally out of the question, it was up-to-date and got the job done - EDIT: but now that I think about it I did need patched Intel integrated graphics drivers…)

Of course, Microsoft’s ditching of so many machines with the jump to Windows 11 and putting a 2025 expiration date on many machines (without bypassing or Linux) is abhorrent too and potentially renders part of my complaint moot but I still hope the ARM Macs have longer supported lifespans but too soon to say if anything will change.

I don’t have a problem with the core concept since it can technically be done well (Fortnite, despite it not appealing to me personally) but since everyone wants the “live service” staying power and money without putting in the “live service” effort it’s become a red flag to me to prepare for an unfinished, buggy, likely money-grubbing “game” with a shaky future - case in point, Halo Infinite’s campaign pretty much going nowhere and being Act 1 of what will be pretty much nothing now since all the campaign staff went bye-bye.

I was coming in ready with a snarky comment about helicopters but I was wrong, that was pretty cool.

I remember debating the superiority of my LifeDrive versus a first or second-gen iPod touch at the time. And also eyeing a Galaxy Player. What a throwback! Oh how simple those times seem now.