It's more of a sequel really.
The events in the first game do not occur in the second.

Redshirt: Finished 3 days ago, played one game and lost due to bugs. Played another game and won despite how buggy this game is.

Half-life: Opposing Force: Finished a few hours ago *finally* after 15 years.

Grim Fandango: I bought this game, remembering it was great and I found out ....... it's still great. The characters, the story, the film noir aspects, the music, the voices are all very enjoyable. I ended up watching "The making of Grim Fandango" movies and I replayed a small part of the game with director's commentary enabled.

About the remasterd version.............
I don't remember well the original version, but in the remasterd version you can easily swap the new graphics with the old ones by pressing a key. I played with the remasterd graphics because it was basically the original, but with some better textures, sharp edges and better lightining system and shadows.

Some people pointed out the music is different now and there but I haven't noticed it.

I played with the new point and click interface instead of the old tank control (I never liked it anyway).

In conclusion I found out the remasterd version to be exactly what I wanted: only small changes and all for the better, with the option of playing the original version with or without the tank controls.

I had only one bug, but major. I had to reload an old save because I got stuck underwater trying to use the schyte when I was floating above the conveyer belt.

Cons: even with the improved graphics the 3D characters don't look so good.
Some puzzles aren't so intuitive,

Pro: everything else. Great game, highly recommend.

Tomb Raider Anniversary (360)

The sort of remake of the original TR. Overall it's a good one. I started playing all of the TR games at regular intervals (in game release chrono order) exactly 2 years ago and this is where i'm up to, just Underworld to go now. Yes, i even played and completed Angel of Darkness.

Anniversary is a good one overall. Since i played the original relatively recently, i couldn't help make a few comparisons. This remake is HARDER. For me anyway. The original game was challenging for sure, but once you worked out that the block world consisted of standardized measurements and worked out the basic moveset, the actual platforming was really easy. The originals difficulty came from working out what the hell you actually had to do. Anniversary is not block based and is a far more "analogue" world, meaning it's a bit harder to always set up jumps that work first time everytime. In other words, Anniversary has harder platforming. That's balanced out by the puzzles being a bit less convoluted- so it's easier to work out what to do, just sometimes a bit harder to do it.

I started up the original and loaded a few saves to compare the general look. Anniversary went for a more gritty "washed out" realistic look on top of it obviously having a more modern graphics standard. The original, though primitive, looks more vibrant and colorful. It still holds up well for it's age- 20 years old this year, Anniversary is almost 10 years old...so they're both old in video game years.

Overall, Anniversary is pretty decent and tough (much harder than Legend, which was a doddle in comparison) modern 3D platformer.

64th Street: A Detective Story is a beat-em-up made by Jaleco in the early 90s. I wanted to play it because, as a fan of hard-boiled crime fiction, the concept looked appealing. As it turns out, the late 30s setting is really just a facade as, outside of the two playable characters, everything in the game comes across as typical of the genre, with various goons that look more like Mad Max and music video rejects and a bizarre story that involves transforming people into robots or something. I didn't mind this. It's entertaining, but just in that typically insane video gaming sort of way, rather than the "detective story" it's advertised as :)

Unfortunately, it's not very interesting to play. The controls could be better in terms of consistently pulling off moves and the game just feels uninspired with bland environments. The graphics are nothing special, and the game's main credit-munching tactic is that you don't get a reprieve if you're knocked down, which becomes important in boss battles because some of those guys, once they knock you over in one hit, they'll keep knocking you down the moment you get up and before you have a chance to pull off a move.

#4 Loren, Amazon Princess (Drm free version)

Really enjoyed it for the art style and the story telling. Admittedly, I have really only played one story line through (Elenor - Karen) but I thought the dialogue and the multiple developing relationships were well done. It also rewards and punishes certain story decisions you'll make.

CRPG elements aren't super deep, but still lots of opportunities for customization, and the game does mix things up by forcing you to change party size/composition for certain fights and sequences.

Overall I'd give it an 'A.'

Will keep it installed and will probably at least view some of the other relationship story lines. Now, there is an 'uncensored' version, though I'd say at first blush it's more like a strong PG-13 / soft-R.

Might and Magic III - Isles of Terra

Compared with the first two Might and Magic games this one felt much more modern. Greatest improvements:

- Decent automapping which makes drawing your own cards unnecessary
- No more random encounters; you can see the monsters beforehand and attack them from the distance
- You can destroy monsters' breeding places and unable respawning by doing so
- Character portraits that display your condition
- Spells are better implemented; you no longer need the manual to remember them

What didn't change is the fact that it's all about exploring the world and slaying the monsters. The story is once again very spare and nearly redundant. There are more quests and sidequests though, but none of them are rich in content.

Battles are less strategic than in the former games. You can beat the whole by using might almost exclusively, there's hardly any need to use magic (except for the Terminators in the last section and some protection spells in the fire area). This has probably to do with the fact that the battles are much smaller. While you had to fight parties of up to 255 monsters in Might and Magic II, you will never meet more than 6-8 monsters at once in this game (and most of the time you will be able to kill half of them from the distance).

Difficulty is a little unbalanced. In the beginning the game is very hard (a single rat can kill your whole party without any problem) while in the end it's far too easy (I was able to kill dragons in minotaurs with a single blow). Some of the monsters give far too much experience to the heroes, in the end I only stopped leveling up, because I ran out of money.

All in all I had a great time with this game and enjoyed every minute I spend with it (I would say that it took more than hundred hours to beat it). I'm looking forward to play Might and Magic IV and V -Worlds of Xeen in the future (but I will take a break before doing so).

Complete list of finished games in 2016

Oceanhorn: Monster of Uncharted Seas

A fun Zelda-ish game. The graphics are cute, the music is fine and it has a nice little story and a few interesting puzzles. So when looking for a game to just have fun with and relax, this is a good game to choose. When looking for a challenge, it is not. Really easy game, even the bossfights. Most of my very few deaths were not in fights, they were because I tried to swim around islands and drowned :D
It is also not a very long game (ingame time tracker showed I needed a bit more than 12h). But overall I enjoyed that time.

Royal Envoy - Campaign for the Crown

It was a nice, relaxing time management game. Pretty much the definition of a casual game. Can't think of anything else I could say about it.

Complete list of finished games in 2016

Deadlight

Deadlight is a side-scrolling survival horror game developed by Tequila Works and published by Microsoft Studios for Xbox 360 and Microsoft Windows.
The game looks and sounds good, but the gameplay is terrible.
Jumping is a total mess, you can't grab onto an object(like ladders, pipes and edge) while jumping towards them, however you can grab onto objects (like ladders, pipes and edge) while jumping from a wall. You can't just jump and get up, you have to position yourself just below it.
There are a few bugs, for example there was a part where I was supposed to get a crate into an elevator and use the elevator to get up. So I did, but during the ride, I got on top of the crate, the result was that I couldn't get down, and I had to load back. Also, there was no visible obstacle in my way.
Another problem with the gameplay is the difficulty, there are a few chase sequences, the problem is that you die at least once at every step, there is no time to think or look ahead, and sometimes the distance between checkpoints is pretty long.
Lastly the game has one more major problem, almost every time I paused the game, it doesn't open the menu, it just freezes, for about 30 seconds, and then it finally opens the menu.

Complete list of games finished in 2016.

Just finished Rats - Time is running out!

Excellent top-down hybrid of stealth, Pac-Man and Heist genres. Lots of levels, great music and art design. Quite challenging by the end of it.

Firewatch

I'm completing this game about 5 hours (yeah I took it slow and didn't rush my play-through).The story was okay in my opinion (linear) which mean any answer or actions you choose doesn't makes any impact to the main story it self, it just give you another dialogue option other than that its lack of interaction and other in-game activity. Most of negative reviews addresses the price, my advice's wait until discount for a better price.

Just finished Rayman 2. Unlike the classic first game, which is sort of like a really charming serial killer in how it seduces you with its beautiful graphics and family-friendly image only to break your hands and disembowel you when you actually start playing, Rayman 2 is very challenging but merciful. There are plenty of checkpoints and "dying" usually just means being sent back with a minor loss of health. The biggest challenge, I guess, is if you want to 100 percent it, but I didn't do that because I'm lazy.

It's a really good game. I wasn't sure what to expect but the graphics make it look like Rayman was going Mario 64, but in reality it's more of a linear level-based design than Mario. You're generally going in one direction, getting past obstacles, and then hopping to the next level. The designers are also fond of on-rails "racing" sections, like Rayman sliding really fast down a curving slope, or making you ride a robot steed that can only go forward really fast. I wasn't as keen on these parts but, like I said, even if you fail it's not a big deal, so I just kept plugging away until I worked past them. There is some frustration in that I sometimes found the controls weren't responsive in certain situations, and the camera can sometimes get weird on you, but for the most part it plays crisply.

Holy crap is this game gorgeous! For a 3D game of that generation, and considering how it shifted the direction of the series from 2D sprites, this game has held up very, very well in how it looks. It might even be better-looking than the first game, which is saying something because that was a great-looking game, too. It's a triumph of art design over technical limitations. Even the lettering is beautiful. And the world and general atmosphere of the game just makes you feel good and happy, even when you're going through a frustrating part. Michel Ancel knows his stuff.

Driftmoon

A fun little action RPG, that doesn't take it self too seriously. Game time was about 11 hours. I enjoyed it, but I found a couple problems. My firefly kept disappearing into walls as he circled, causing my light to suddenly disappear and then reappear. This got old, real fast. Combat is ok, nothing special. The writing was fine, but it seemed like every plot twist was really telegraphed. It wasn't like they were bad twist's, it was just that you saw them coming a mile away, because they were foreshadowed a mile away. It's certainly full of memorable characters, some of whom I wish had played more prominent a role. For instance, the main female character (that's on the game cover) you don't meat until... more than halfway through the game?!
In general I feel like it's a good game for either younger players, or someone looking to take a break from the load of dark games being released.

Got it a long time ago on an IndieGameStand deal, back when it was on Alpha or Beta and it had Mac and Linux versions.

Time passed, the final version got released, and despite the devs' promises, there's still no Linux version (neither on Steam nor on IGS). At least the Mac version is available on Steam...