Chroma Squad is a bit of a paradox. A good one, though.

The game is unabashedly "indie," with its zoomed-in sprite art, unpolished grammar, overlong pre-battle animations, and spotty or absent tutorials. But, it takes itself un-seriously enough that these rough edges actually feel charming -- especially when the game's cast pokes fun at their own narrator. More often than not, Chroma Squad comes across as "in" on the joke - the joke that is the real history of Power Rangers - instead of falling into a parody trap.

It's filled with mechanics, like, definitely too many mechanics: not just strategy RPG tactics and character progression and TV studio management, but also item crafting! and mecha battles! and a branching narrative!? The scope of Chroma Squad is so sprawling that of course a lot of it doesn't pan out, and it's hardly surprising that, for example, the crafting UI can't indicate whether an item is an upgrade or a downgrade. But, the critical path - increasing fanpower, generating income, buying new weapons and armor - works well enough that the rest is, well, easy to ignore.

Its narrative is pretty silly, gleefully blurring the lines between a Super Sentai fantasy and a TV production about that fantasy. At face value, Chroma Squad's plot is unremarkable, and its "characters" are just farcical props. But, the fun that they have with sending up genre tropes and with a Deadpool-esque disregard for the fourth wall is surprisingly compelling.

There's a lot going on in Chroma Squad, and even ignoring the parts it doesn't explain, much of it doesn't work very well. To that point: my biggest obstacle in the final boss battle wasn't the boss, and wasn't his minions, but was stairs. I don't think any previous encounter had stairs, so their effects on movement and targeting were an unwelcome surprise.

Chroma Squad is an ambitious game, and far from perfect.

But, it nails - or gets close enough to nailing - a core loop of fighting, upgrading, and lampooning that it works. There are opportunities to improve for sure (which the developers sadly seem to be uninterested in), but even in this unrefined form, the concept is proven: managing a fake Super Sentai team is pretty fun.

Better than: Massive Chalice, Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut, SteamWorld Heist
Not as good as: Shadowrun Returns, South Park: The Fractured But Whole
And it helps: that the soundtrack is damn catchy.

Progress: Finished a campaign on "Interesting" difficulty.

Like From Dusk Till Casa Bonita, the Bring the Crunch DLC tells a self-contained South Park story and shows off a handful of new gameplay ideas.

This time, the kids are off to summer camp, and it's haunted - yes, this is a slasher film parody - but the "monsters" you run into are clearly adults in Scooby Doo outfits. And your new class is the "Final Girl" movie stereotype, using makeshift weapons like garden shears and saw blades to survive.

It doesn't reach the "highs" of its predecessor: the story doesn't evolve much from that promising setup (aside from a bizarre alien twist near the end), and its new mechanics are hit-and-miss -- laying saw traps is pretty neat, while the "mint" buffs and "berry" debuffs feel ... unnecessary.

But, this is still like an episode of South Park in videogame form, which is pretty good.

It does make some strides in micro-sized open-world design, with a map!, and an optional collectibles quest where you take selfies with ghosts.

This is a perfectly satisfying and fun story DLC, just not quite as good as the other one. And since it looks like there might not be another, well, it's not a bad send-off for the South Park RPGs.

Better than: the same stuff that From Dusk Till Casa Bonita was better than, Mass Effect 3: Leviathan and South Park: The Stick of Truth
Not as good as: South Park: The Fractured But Whole - From Dusk Till Casa Bonita
While the name "Lake Tardicaca" hasn't aged well: this chapter does treat its differently-abled characters respectfully, so, there's that.

If The Fractured But Whole was comparable to "some of the show's best multi-episode arcs," then From Dusk Till Casa Bonita is like a great standalone episode.

It's a fantastic parody premise, adapting the idea of From Dusk Till Dawn to South Park's vamp kids and the - believe it or not, non-fictional - Casa Bonita restaurant. This sets up some pitch-perfect "South Park moments" juxtaposing the dark and supernatural with a food court and a mariachi band.

Especially the final boss, where an attempted summoning of vampire Corey Haim from The Lost Boys instead resurrects the cartoon's version of Michael Jackson and induces "Thriller" dance moves, feels like peak South Park.

As for gameplay, this DLC benefits from keeping itself constrained: it restricts you to one new class (with in-theme abilities), locks down your party (including newcomer Henrietta), and uses but doesn't change your fart-time powers. It strikes a great balance between new and old ideas and streamlines the game's pre-existing sprawl of class and party options.

Its "world," that is, the Casa Bonita restaurant - including an arcade and Black Bart's Cave! - does lack the main game's open-world scale and its abundance of South Park references. But it does still manage to fit a little non-linearity into this small space, allowing you to collect some vampire relics in whatever order you like.

From Dusk Till Casa Bonita is a short, but functionally-complete slice of gamified South Park. I'd love to see more self-contained stories like this one.

Better than: Mass Effect 3: Leviathan, South Park: The Stick of Truth (yeah, the full game!)
Not as good as: Mass Effect 3: Citadel, South Park: The Fractured But Whole
Spoiler alert: There's only one more self-contained story like this one.

South Park: The Fractured But Whole is a slower "burn" than Stick of Truth was, but I'd ultimately call Fractured But Whole (hhhehehe) more fulfilling and more entertaining than its forebear.

The game can be off-putting, at first, in large part because of its Mega Man Battle Network-like combat system: the battle grid and attack options look complicated, but really aren't (just deal damage!); and Quick Time Events for attacking and defending are simple and flat. So, battles can come across as dull and slow.

Also, literally, you can't run very fast -- and it's quite a jog from one map location to another. The distance inbetween is usually dense with activities and collectibles, except, the abilities you need for them ... aren't unlocked until you make more story progress.

These problems make the game's early chapters feel pretty uneventful. But if you stick with it - because, like last time, you dig South Park's absurd quips and farts - Fractured But Whole gradually opens up (hhhehehe) and everything starts to come together.

Combat becomes more interesting as you get more characters and more moves to experiment with, even if it never gets very "tactical." Story beats unlock new points of interest, new abilities to navigate obstacles, and the solutions to those previously-locked overworld puzzles.

And, most importantly: this is still South Park.

It's got the kids playing pretend and swearing at each other, it's got adults acting negligent and irresponsible, it's even got Towelie giving you in-game hints (like "don't trust the government"). The game is a perfect conduit for South Park's flavors of irreverence, creativity, and commentary.

In fact, while Stick of Truth kinda felt like fanservice-y (but fun) sidequests wrapped around a haphazard main story, Fractured But Whole's core narrative develops the same gravitas as some of the show's best multi-episode arcs. It has twists!, not just for the sake of another reference, but which actually tell an engaging tale of their own.

(But there's still room for plenty of referential content, like dealing with the Raisins girls, and a ridiculous Crab People scheme.)

South Park: The Fractured But Whole takes some time to warm up, but it eventually meets - and exceeds - the narrative and gameplay bars of Stick of Truth. It's still not perfect, but even when its shitty Flappy Bird parody is going on too long -- it's fun, and a meaningful step forward for comedic RPGs.

And most importantly: no missable collectibles! So you can actually complete those sidequests in the post-game. About time.

Better than: South Park: The Stick of Truth
Not as good as: Mass Effect 3
Maybe even as good as: Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut

Progress: Finished on Heroic (normal), mastered all the toilets, collected all the, uh, fanart.

As an RPG, South Park: The Stick of Truth could use work: some combat features are wildly unbalanced (like the Screwed debuff), inventory management is a chore, skills and perks don't feel very significant, and - while I love that it has real-time combat prompts, like Mario & Luigi and Paper Mario - the timing windows of those prompts are staggeringly inconsistent.

But it gets away with these flaws because, even when the game isn't "fair," it's (usually) easy to button-mash through.

And, more importantly, because Stick of Truth isn't really about refined role-playing mechanics -- it's about South Park. I'm not that upset by how awkward it is to control overworld abilities; I'm amused by the fact that those abilities use alien anal probes, and explosive farts.

At its best, when you can freely explore South Park and meet its wacky cast members, running their errands is like watching multiple self-directed episodes of the TV show. Stick of Truth's absurd quest objectives and flippant writing are exactly in line with what South Park fans know and love. (Not to mention its boatloads of fanservice references, from collectable Chinpokomon to a ManBearPig hunt.)

It's unfortunate that the game's back half has fewer opportunities for self-directed activity (favoring an on-rails series of story missions), and especially that a bunch of optional events and items are permanently missable. That puts a bit of a damper on post-game sidequesting.

Nevertheless, Stick of Truth is a fun and funny jaunt through South Park, and that it leaves me wanting more is hardly a bad thing. Especially since there is more.

Better than: Mario & Luigi: Bowser's Inside Story, Penny Arcade's On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3
Not as good as: Mass Effect 3, Shadowrun: Dragonfall - Director's Cut
But, uh, keep its release date (2014) in mind: because some of the game's "classic South Park" humor, like nonchalantly dropping the word "retard," hasn't aged especially well.

Khimera: Puzzle Island is a good example of how adding characters with strong personalities can spice up an otherwise-rote game design.

I mean, not to overly impugne Puzzle Island's roteness - it's got solid controls, and a large amount of puzzles - but it certainly doesn't have big enough grids or unique enough mechanics to stand out among your Pictopixes or your Voxelgrams.

What it does have is a cast of, uh, monster girls? who develop adorable friendships through a bizarre puzzle-filled misadventure.

Puzzle Island's "story" isn't taken seriously; cutscene dialog is filled with lighthearted gags and silly puns. The whole package is just fun, from the option to replace grid icons with hamburgers, to the loading screen's Loadin' notification.

There are some definite shortcomings in Puzzle Island, like the fact that most of its puzzles aren't even part of the "story" mode (a few large mosaics are split up into almost 200 small puzzles), and, while its soundtrack is pretty good!, each "stage" only has one track which inevitably becomes very repetitive.

But the quirky charm of these awkward monster girls really makes the game, and made me more than happy to click through even the most tedious of their puzzles.

... oh, and there is one pretty neat mechanic in the final boss battle, using rapid-fire timed puzzles to implement attacking and defending. I kinda hope that a sequel explores this idea some more.

Better than: PictoQuest: The Cursed Grids
Not as good as: Piczle Cross Adventure
Different, but basically as good as: Murder by Numbers

Alternative title: "2021 in Review: Different Year, Same Bullshit"

... but, like 2020, 2021 had an upside: lots of opportunity to catch up on my videogame backlog.

Not all of that catching-up made it into the Glog -- more and more, I'm rapidly trying and discarding games, without wasting time on write-ups. (I'll get to the hard data on that later.)

In fact, 2021 saw my first multi-game post!, resulting in more games played than posts written for the first time in Glog history (ooh, ahh). I consider that a good omen for my future gaming activity: less writing, more playing!

Anyway, my continued focus on backlog-busting also meant I paid less attention than ever to demos (Copy Editor being the sole exception), although ...

... just as in 2020, I did feel a frequent need to cleanse my palate, by replaying known-good games.

Setting aside Darksiders II and Deadly Premonition - which were in my backlog to re-attempt, and which I've now finally abandoned - that Replay count consists of some really satisfying "comfort food" remasters:

• Mass Effect Legendary Edition, despite the first game's awkward start, reunited me with truly endearing space-scoundrels in its second and third chapters.
• Saints Row: The Third Remastered was a great excuse to re-wreak havoc in Steelport, even though its DLCs (Genkibowl VII, Gangstas in Space, The Trouble with Clones) overstayed their welcome a bit.
• And although I'll never be able to re-experience the astonishment of its narrative reveals, Horizon Zero Dawn and The Frozen Wilds were nevertheless wonderful to play through again on PC.

Coincidentally, one side-effect of replaying those particular games (Mass Effect 2, especially) was the most DLCs and expansions I've played in one year:

I've already mentioned Saints Row 3's DLCs, and Horizon's Frozen Wilds; then there were Mass Effect's Bring Down the Sky, and Mass Effect 2's Zaeed - The Price of Revenge, Kasumi - Stolen Memory, Firewalker Pack, Overlord, Lair of the Shadow Broker, and Arrival (phew!) ... which were all pretty underwhelming, and never struck me as critical to the overall Mass Effect epic.

So it was a pleasant surprise that Mass Effect 3's From Ashes, Omega, Leviathan, and Citadel felt so substantial and rewarding. Citadel, especially, was a stupendously heartwarming send-off for Shepard and her eclectic gang of misfits.

Borderlands 3's DLCs, meanwhile, didn't fare that well; Moxxi's Heist of the Handsome Jackpot was a fresh little side-adventure, and Guns, Love and Tentacles spun a fun yarn as well, but Bounty of Blood and Psycho Krieg and the Fantastic Fustercluck didn't bring much new or interesting to the table. And the so-called Director's Cut was simply not worth the price of Season Pass 2.

Finally, The Talos Principle: Road to Gehenna may have failed to measure up to its main game's "wow" factor, but it was certainly a clever and worthwhile experience all its own.

As for my gaming platforms in 2021, well, "platform" would be more appropriate; as ever, the overwhelming majority of my playtime was on PC. My singular non-PC playthrough last year was Ghost of Tsushima on PS4.

Which might be my last PS4 game, depending on how the upcoming God of War and Horizon sequels perform on the now-"old" hardware.

But if this is the end for my PS4, then it's going out with a "bang," as Ghost of Tsushima ranks among the small number of Awesome games I played in 2021.

That ranking also includes:

• The Talos Principle, which had been sitting in my backlog for seven years!
• Two nonogram-style puzzle games, Piczle Cross Adventure (which is also an adventure!) and Voxelgram (which also has a third dimension!)
• And my aforementioned replays of Horizon Zero Dawn and Mass Effect 2 (which was even better the second time around!)

So - also like 2020 - it's a little disappointing that my top-rated games last year were so principally "puzzle" or "something I've played before."

But, I'd be remiss if I ignored some of the Good games I played in 2021, too, like those Mass Effect 3 DLCs; a much-needed Ace Attorney installment from The Great Ace Attorney: Adventures and Resolve; the enchanting world-building of Shadowrun Returns, Dragonfall, and Hong Kong; and ...

What had been one of the oldest games on my backlog, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, turned out to have aged surprisingly well. (Granted, it did need some modern tech support.) Bloodlines was a satisfying reminder of why I keep a backlog: sometimes, a game I've missed is actually worth catching up on, and lets me experience something cool that I haven't seen before.

Of course there's still plenty of chaff in my backlog that isn't so worthwhile ... and I did better, in 2021, at not wasting so much time writing about that chaff. Check that "hard data" above: a marked decline in No Rating posts. If the game isn't remarkable, then why bother remarking on it?

Hopefully, as I continue burning through my backlog in 2022, I'll stumble across more of those praise-worthy missed gems (and will avoid sinking time into the rest). Here's to some positive progress - in my backlog, if nothing else - this year!

Thesis statement: Red Dead Redemption 2 is a $450 million (source) wildlife simulator.

I could go on, and on, and on, about how slowly RDR2 tends to move. Not in the same way as John Marston's story, that is, Arthur Morgan doesn't need to herd cattle or break horses for two hours before something interesting happens... but.

He does need to ride his horse from point A to B, for minutes at a time, in and between practically every mission. Sometimes the narrative scripting skips this ride, and sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes a riding companion will provide dialog, and sometimes they won't. Sometimes there's a "fast travel" option at A to go directly to B, and usually there isn't.

And I could similarly go on and on and on about the absurd number of gameplay mechanics in RDR2 - 20 hours in, the game was still tutorializing new activities (like fishing!) - as well as how player-hostile the controls for those mechanics are.

Letters and books share inventory space with animal meat ... except when they don't, depending on which vendor you're talking to. Some guns need to be cocked inbetween shots, which is done with the fire button. Sometimes the aim button gives you dialog choices, and sometimes it points a gun, removing dialog choices. I missed a cutscene because the "run" button is the same as the "skip scene" button.

And don't get me started on how fidgety and fiddly position-sensitive button prompts can be.

And, I could continue going on!, about how these and other problems interfere with RDR2's storytelling -- from attempts at re-watching cinematics getting stuck on infinite loading screens, to the (spoilers) final story mission actively punishing attempted gameplay. ("Stay behind cover. You aren't meant to shoot [the guy] here.")

The story of Arthur Morgan and the Dutch van der Linde gang is good, but it's 20 hours of good story stretched out over 50 hours of actually playing it.

What's shocking about these various shortcomings is that they all sabotage the very "sandbox" formula that Rockstar is known for: optional activities are frustrating to play, exploring the map is overly laborious, and it's impossible to move through the story at your own pace. Like, literally, there are so many scenes where you can't run! and so many other scenes where NPCs yell that you're walking too slowly!

While Red Dead Redemption 2's story can be good, and its shooting can be fun, and its optional activities can be interesting, the game goes out of its way to prevent you from focusing too much on any of those.

Therein lies my conclusion: the only thing that it doesn't prevent you from focusing on, in fact, the thing it frequently forces you to focus on, is watching varmints and livestock and other cowboys run through the wilderness as you're on your way to some mission objective.

And the quality of those floral and faunal animations is top notch. So, for a wildlife simulator, Red Dead Redemption 2 is pretty great.

For an epic narrative, it's pretty good, except when it's slowing itself down; and for an open-world sandbox, it's simply not open enough.

Better than: Red Dead Redemption
Not as good as: Grand Theft Auto V
Hard to be sure, but probably better than: Grand Theft Auto IV, since this game at least has checkpoints.

Progress: Finished the epilogue.

Let's get an important warning out of the way, first: don't buy the Borderlands 3 Season Pass 2. It is an absolute rip-off.

If you bother reading into it before purchasing - which I, admittedly, didn't - it should be obvious why: this isn't a collection of extended story chapters, like the first season pass was (and like Borderlands 2's season pass was!). The majority of Season Pass 2's content is new skills, new cosmetics, new arena challenges, and new raid bosses; superfan stuff, which a superfan would already have via an Ultimate Edition or some similar bullshit.

The only new narrative content is a quartet of missions in the Director's Cut add-on, which sure doesn't seem like a "season" worth of content to me.

Alright, so, here's the good news: those Director's Cut missions are actually pretty fun! Moreso than the morose and melodramatic Bounty of Blood and Fantastic Fustercluck, these investigations on behalf of Ava's "Mysteriouslier" podcast demonstrate the kinds of irreverent humor and thrilling pacing that are peak Borderlands.

There's even a solid film noir aesthetic in its intro mission, which, well, is an instant "win" for me.

It's over relatively quickly, at about 2 to 2.5 hours, but "Mysteriouslier" manages to pack some pretty respectable quality into those hours.

Better than: Borderlands 3: Psycho Krieg and the Fantastic Fustercluck
Not as good as: Borderlands 2: Sir Hammerlock vs. the Son of Crawmerax
But, and I can't stress this enough: this content is not worth Season Pass 2's $20-30 price tag, or even the Director's Cut itself at $15. Just consider it a nice bonus if you've already bought "everything" for Borderlands 3.

I liked Massive Chalice a lot more than I expected to.

Its broad, "Grand Strategy" scope; its deep, statistics-drenched, micro-management combat; and its randomly-generated characters and events; these are all significant turn-offs for me. But!

I was pleasantly surprised to find each of those concerns tempered by a light, fun attitude. Its bickering voice cast brings an entertaining personality to the otherwise-sterile empire-building premise, and holds your hand through tutorializing combat and asset management. Even the randomly-generated content is pleasantly silly, assuming you choose the "Humorous" content option (instead of "Thematic"); then you, too, can recruit brave warriors like Catkicker Cooke-Gallagher.

And, at least in my initial campaign, I rarely had to sweat the intricate details of dynasty optimization or character loadouts. When a regent died, the game suggested replacement candidates to me; when I researched new equipment, my vanguard equipped it automatically. By my campaign's end, selecting the best new hero or the best new researcher or et al was a triviality, every time.

This isn't a genre I ordinarily get into, but for exceptionally well-polished entries like Civilization and its "just one more turn" addiction loop. So I was surprised to find that Massive Chalice tapped into that same addiction; every time I finished a battle, or placed a new regent, I was eager for the next thing, the next event ... whatever that might happen to be.

I won't be starting a new campaign anytime soon, and I'll never forget how repetitive Massive Chalice's combat encounters and empire planning got by the end. But I had an unexpectedly fun time learning those limits, and I won't forget that fun, either.

Progress: finished a Normal campaign.