God of War. That was bloody brilliant - unexpectedly so. I'd expected it to be a straightforward if spectacular action romp, in line with the older games, that would act as a palate cleanser between larger titles. And while it was indeed a very successful action game, with real weight to the attacks and a satisfyingly nuanced combat system, it was much much more than that. Longer and more open-ended than I expected, with huge areas opened up by side quests that didn't form part of the main story at all. Superb characters, consistently excellent voice acting and spectacle on a level I've not seen before from any game. And an almost Metroidvania approach to the whole thing, with lots and lots of collectibles and quests still open at the end of the game that I'm looking forward to going back and investigating.
But mostly it's the themes of the game that will stick with me - and I didn't expect that at all, least of all from the God of War series. OK, so a story about a disaffected father struggling to raise his son is going to strike a chord with men of a certain age, me included; but the game has a lot more to say about things like regret, and redemption, and it does it all so well. Both Kratos and Atreus are superb, well-rounded characters that get real development over the course of the game and the whole thing feels, for once, like a game written by adults, for adults. I say it again: this is God of War. I didn't expect that.
I actually like it more and more the further I get from it, weirdly. I think I might need to check up on how the NG+ works and go back to it in the not-too-distant future.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn - I tried to explain this to my girlfriend last night and realised it just sounded like the jabbering ramblings of a crazy person, but I promise it's a wonderful game. Think of it like a murder mystery where you're trying to work out what happened to the entire crew of a seemingly-abandoned ship, except it's a story with Spoiler - click to showmonsters, mysterious treasure and a massive fucking kraken ripping people in half. Lots of twists, red herrings and other things. I managed to finish it properly, so I saw the whole thing and loved it totally, despite there being a few places where I was sure I'd got it right and had to fiddle about with a few things. Missed one secret achievement, but it's a ridiculous one that would require me to start all over again and do the game completely wrong (yeah, I know), so I won't be bothering with that.
Mario Golf World Tour
Red Dead Redemption 2
Titanfall
God of War
Yoku’s Island Express
Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall
Dishonored: The Brigmore Witches
It was more Dishonored (with the pleasing little twists to Daud's gameplay versus Corvo's), so I liked it, and if I'd played it when it was new I'd probably have loved it; but even as is I'm glad I've (finally) played it, even if I am a little glad it's done with now.
Dishonored 2 is now downloaded for when I'm finally ready for it, though seeing as how I'm going to try and get the Spider-Man DLC done (before Sekiro comes out on Friday), and there's few things I want to get played in the meantime, there should still be a nice little break (and a palette fully cleansed) before I feel the need to play it.
If we're doing DLC:
Assassin's Creed Odyssey: Legacy of the First Blade: all three episodes completed and it never rose above mediocre, sadly. It's just more of the same, with a terrible storyline that's dreadfully mishandled and completely undermines the main character and his/her motivations. The middle episode is the best of the three - it's set in the most interesting area, and the various quests overlap in a vaguely satisfying way - whereas the first and last episodes are just point-to-point runs through mission stories and the same old fort/ship/cultist quests. The actual game remains fun on a moment-by-moment basis, and the world is a nice place to hang out in, but they badly need to do something better for the upcoming Atlantis DLC.
If we're doing DLC:
I thought I would, dependent on size - I did the first part of the Spider-Man DLC last night, but won't put that on this thread until I've done all three (making up the whole of 'City Never Sleeps'), as it seems appropriately-sized once put together, but not worth referencing each chapter.
In short - if it feels substantial enough I will put it in here (assuming there are no objections). Arbitrary self-imposed rules FTW.
Mario Golf World Tour
Red Dead Redemption 2
Titanfall
God of War
Yoku’s Island Express
Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall
Dishonored: The Brigmore Witches
Spider-Man: City Never Sleeps
I started this in the same mode as I'd played the main game in, and completed the first Act to 100%, but by the end of Act II I'd pretty much had enough, and was just trying to get to the end of the story. Unfortunately the DLC's idea of ramping up the difficulty (in every area) was the same as the main game's had been,taken to its illogical extreme - throw more and more of the less intuitive/fun to fight enemy types at you. This does not make for a consistently enjoyable experience, sadly, and a couple of the later boss fights (or larger scale battles) were wars of attrition, or just seemed poorly balanced..
The base game remains great, but in hindsight it also turns out it was also well judged; a sizeable game that never really outstays its welcome, all the way through to getting the Platinum. Add City Never Sleeps on top though, and it seems like some elements reach saturation point (and then keep going), making for an unnecessary addition to a otherwise fine game.
Resident Evil 2 Remake
GOTY Contender, possibly even equally as good as DMC5 is in its own right. It's absolutely the gold standard for any remake I've seen/played, I mean what else is there that has a bigger before/after? Spyro? Yakuza? The original Resident Evil's remake? Speaking of which, this game could have been just another game in that style, keep the tank controls, update the visuals to the same insane degree (Old Remake still holds up IMO) maybe add a new mechanic like the Crimson Heads and then sit back and watch the assumedly high scores roll in. But they went several steps beyond that, while still keeping the spirit of the original game.
It's so faithful, it even has a similar amount of replayability and content the PS original did that made it such a beefy PS1 game. Aside from the fact that Leon and Claire's playthroughs, already fairly different in the original, are even MORE unique now, there's also Hunk/Tofu mode back and they added new scenarios for free. There's a lot of game here.
Anyway, easily best Resident Evil game including Resident Evil 4.
I think the Resident Evil series is pretty unique in terms of how old it is yet how good it continues to be. Its new entries are good (RE7 is fantastic), its spin-offs are good (Revelations 2 is great) and its remakes are exceptional (the original REmake has barely aged a day). And I love the way they've never rebooted the storyline. It's still essentially the same mad shit it was back in 1997, with every new instalment just adding more and more layers of craziness to the whole thing.
I really need to play this RE2 remake, first price drop it gets and I'm all over it.
It's worth its current price imo. But yeah, what a legendary series, long live Biohazard.
As a side effect of playing mostly open-ended games like Elite and Sea of Thieves, or an obsess-em-up like Hitman 2, I've only just completed my first game of the year: Crackdown 3. Nineteen hours, three thousand, seven hundred and twenty-six kills, 621 agility orbs, and one hell of a good time.
and one hell of a good time.
Thank god for that. I thought I was cracking up.
cracking up
I think you mean….. cracking……. down
Pokemon Let's Go
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Yoku's Island Express
Yakuza 0
AstroBot
Crackdown 3
Ni No Kuni 2
Spiderman
Mario Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
What Remains of Edith Finch: That was a brilliant, lovely, funny, heartbreaking and uniquely wonderful experience. I'm sure most of you are way ahead of me on this one, but if you haven't had the pleasure yet, buy it now. It can be completed in one (film length) sitting.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony - The story, anyway. Weird ending. Like, super weird. Still got a loooong way to go for the Platinum but, having tried out the other modes, I have no idea what I'm meant to be doing in any of them. Not feeling them at all, so it'll be a slog to push through for it. Will read up on the quickest way and then see, but some of the random elements make me wonder whether it's worth it.
Just under the wire for March last night…
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered - It's GODS! The old Bitmap Brothers game from the Amiga (and SNES and Mega Drive)! So, immediately, you know what you're getting. For some godforsaken reason, the developer decided to 'remaster' the visuals into HD and they look utterly shocking… I mean, it's really, really crap, because they've created new arts that has to adhere to the movement models of the original and it just looks awful. However, since clicking the right analogue stick changes everything into full-screen version of the original and absolutely gorgeous pixel graphics instead (with widescreen support AND 60FPS), you can make it look lovely. Game is identical too with no quirks aside from some long loading times between certain levels, so it's rather nice. Got all the trophies bar one - finish the game in 60 minutes - so I might be out unless I can speed-run it tonight. It's a surprisingly short and not-that-hard game… I remember it being more challenging!
Pokemon Let's Go
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Yoku's Island Express
Yakuza 0
AstroBot
Crackdown 3
Ni No Kuni 2
Spiderman
Mario Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
What Remains of Edith Finch
Halo 5 – Thoroughly enjoyed that. It's very much a corridor shooter (the push to get 60fps seems to have been at the expense of more open worlds), but it's a very good one. It's also the first big-budget game I can think of that runs at 4K 60fps on the enhanced consoles.
Got the GODS Platinum, finished the game with four minutes to spare. Not adding it as an April completion though. 
Pokemon Let's Go
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Yoku's Island Express
Yakuza 0
AstroBot
Crackdown 3
Ni No Kuni 2
Spiderman
Mario Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
What Remains of Edith Finch
Halo 5 – Thoroughly enjoyed that. It's very much a corridor shooter (the push to get 60fps seems to have been at the expense of more open worlds), but it's a very good one. It's also the first big-budget game I can think of that runs at 4K 60fps on the enhanced consoles.
Is there something you have to do to get Halo 5 running at 60fps? Like a toggle in a menu - I'm sure it isn't, but I could be imagining things.
Or is it natively 60fps?
Nope 60fps just happens. Even on the original Bone it's 60fps, but much less pretty as a result.
I think the cinematics switch to 30fps.
Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair
Well that went slightly batshit at the end there.
Great game though, easily as good as the first, and I'm very intrigued to see where they take the story from here.
(And, bloody hell, I've just looked up what I need to play next, and apparently there's a shit load of animes and novels I have to get through for any of it to make any sense at all. Maybe I should just quit while I'm ahead).
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode - I already finished this on Switch with my girlfriend over Christmas, but we were talking about it yesterday and I realised it was out on PS4. She added it to my account, since she knows I'm a trophy whore, and then we played it together over the course of a few hours. It's such a lovely little co-op puzzle game. It's not online, but Share Play meant we could still play it together, which is also awesome as we couldn't do that on Switch. Not sure I'd recommend paying £17 for it (which is massively hypocritical of me) but, when it comes down in price, it's well worth a look for those who like such things.
Hyrule Warriors Definitive Edition - well, the story ("Legends") mode at least, which is only a fraction of all the stuff there is to do in this game but is still pretty chunky, especially compared to the original Wii U release: in addition to the original Link and Ganondorf sections there are now mini-campaigns for Linkle, Cia and the Wind Waker crew, and the whole thing, even third time through, took me the best part of twenty hours to complete.
Now the real game begins, Adventure mode, a seemingly endless series of challenges and unlocks. The Wii U original had a single Adventure map offering up a couple of hundred hours of fun; this version has ten so, erm, yes, it's a bit big. First priority is to get the rest of the characters, and then the various weapons for each - that'll last me plenty long enough in itself.
Oh, and I was wrong about it being unplayable in handheld mode - the framerate is certainly a lot lower but (cutscenes aside) it's actually pretty consistent and even the biggest, most frantic story mode levels are perfectly OK to play. You need to squint a bit to read the map, but there's always the pause screen. It's fine.
Completed Banner Saga. Had to put it on easy as couldn't do the 2nd part of the end battle as hadnt levelled up enough. Looking forward to the 2nd and 3rd game now and then will have a replay of this most likely.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode
Yoshi's Crafted World - What a lovely game. Perfectly pitched, not too hard but not too easy. And so much content! I'm putting it here as completed because I just beat the last boss and managed to do all the tasks on all the levels (20 red coins, all flowers, over 100 coins on a level, all Poochy Pups in the time limit, all souvenirs found). Except now, the credits have rolled, there are NEW tasks (find a hide and seek character in every level, various things on boss stages) AND a whole new area has opened up that looks to be challenging stages. Good thing I've still got two more days until I start work…
Pokemon Let's Go
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Yoku's Island Express
Yakuza 0
AstroBot
Crackdown 3
Ni No Kuni 2
Spiderman
Mario Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
What Remains of Edith Finch
Halo 5
Far Cry 5 – Really enjoyed this, despite it having some pretty big issues. The story is nonsense. It pulls you out of the open world around 12 times to force you through repetitive, corridor shooty bits. It's incredibly mean-spirited in places for no real reason, other than to show you "bad people are bad". It uses religious extremism and US gun culture as plot points despite having absolutely nothing to say about either. It's part of that awful Ubisoft ADHD movement, where fun has to be injected into your eyeballs at all times.
And yet, the core gameplay loop is so enjoyable, it's actually possible to forgive most of that guff. Stalking an enemy camp, sniping them from afar or going in guns blazing, is just SO much fun. Solid 7/10 game, with moments of brilliance balanced against moments of facepalm.
Crackdown 3 - can I join the "this was really fun" bandwagon please?
I mean, it shouldn't work. It's the most "more than the sum of its parts" game ever, given that all of its parts are individually pretty terrible. It's clearly had a huge shift at some point in its development from being a cutting-edge AAA title to a fairly perfunctory remake of the original game, and the cracks are plainly visible. Its first half-hour is full of terrible cut-scenes and incongruous swearing and the other twenty hours are Crackdown. I've seen it described as the Netflix Original of videogames and that's exactly what it is - something that's not quite good enough to stand on its own two feet but which is being used as an incentive to sign up to a subscription service (in this case Game Pass).
But I bloody loved it. It feels like a short game but I've spent more time on it already than a lot of full-price titles and I'm going to keep going back to it to hunt for orbs and level up my Agent's skills. It's fun, it's straightforward, it's funny, you jump around and shoot stuff and sometimes that's exactly what you need. If there was a second city in the game I'd do it all over again, no question.
If you've got a PC or an Xbox One you can sign up for three months of Game Pass for a quid right now and be playing Crackdown 3 by lunchtime. You know it makes sense.
What Remains of Edith Finch - I enjoyed this but not as much as I thought I would given all the gushing it's inspired. It's almost an experiment into how an (essentially non-interactive) story can be told as a videogame; it switches styles regularly and it's clever and imaginative. Sadly though the actual story it's trying to tell isn't particularly profound, it's essentially just a series of vignettes of unfortunate people dying in a variety of grisly ways, and where I was expecting the ending to tie it all together it just kind of ended with a shrug. As a PS+ freebie it's worth a shot, but it won't be everyone's cup of tea.
There's some interesting stuff been written about some sinister undertones you can read into. Definitely helps to link the stories, so they're not just individual vignettes, and it casts a certain character in a new light.
Ah, thanks for that. I found a great article on Giant Bomb which opened up a lot of the game's themes and makes it seem a lot stronger in retrospect. Link is below, but don't read it obviously if you haven't played the game.
https://www.giantbomb.com/profile/gamer_152/blog/epitaph-what-remains-of-edith-finch-and-death/119580/
Spoiler - click to showYeah when you start to wonder whether Edie was subconsciously causing some of the deaths to continue the legend, it all gets a lot darker. Look at the graveyard; that wasn't just a nice memorial, she was essentially fetishising their early deaths. Away from the main 'plot' I just love all of the little details. The way you disappear into [forgot his name]'s fantasy in the cannery, still chopping fish with your right hand. The mysterious 12pm rumbling in the fallout shelter, which in hindsight was just the midday train being delayed by a few minutes. (I disagree with the article above on this death, I think he was just killed by the late train in a bit of dark humour. Don't think his was suicide.) The whole thing felt so rich, so lovingly made.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode
Yoshi's Crafted World
MAY
Pool Panic - It's ridiculous, clunky and kind of broken in places, plus leaving so much unexplained for you to deduce on your own is a bit much. But I liked it a lot. Shame that there's no bonus for doing everything… the ending was exactly the same when I had two levels unfinished than when I had none. Bit of a swizz.
Forgotten Anne - Never have I been so bored by a game that looked so pretty. Visually, it's nearly like playing a Ghibli movie, although much less colourful; nevertheless, it's very nice to watch. But the controls are clunky as hell, Anne is a pain to move about with much accuracy and the few puzzles there are aren't much fun to solve at all. The story thinks it's being intriguing and meaningful too and, in places, it's relatively well done. However, then you get to the end where you're in a library and there are real-life books to look briefly at where the central plots are all threads in the game; it feels like the scriptwriter took out a hammer and repeatedly hit me over the head while yelling plot points and going 'DO YOU SEE? DO YOU SEE WHAT I DID? AREN'T I CLEVER, ADMIT I'M CLEVER'. It's awful. And the ending(s) sucked. So, I played it, it's done, it goes on the list, but it's several evenings I won't ever get back. Ugh.
Pokemon Let's Go
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Yoku's Island Express
Yakuza 0
AstroBot
Crackdown 3
Ni No Kuni 2
Spiderman
Mario Rabbids: Kingdom Battle
What Remains of Edith Finch
Halo 5
Far Cry 5
Red Dead Redemption 2 – Went through a lot of different emotions with this one, and it took me a good six months to finish. But on the whole I'd say it was a great experience, that ended on a high.
Spoiler - click to showThe last 20 hours of the main story were so emotionally draining, I'm not even sure I enjoyed myself to be honest. When I knew that all I was working towards was Arthur's death, I had very little drive to carry on. Although when the moment actually came it did make me cry (more the goodbye to the horse than Arthur himself), which makes it maybe the first videogame ever to do that.
Spoiler - click to showAnd then the epilogue. I fell back in love with the game during the epilogue. I had a mission, a purpose, a clear goal to work towards. It wasn't unremittingly bleak. And as much as I loved Arthur, it was nice to spend some more time with John.
Mario Golf World Tour
Red Dead Redemption 2
Titanfall 2
God of War
Yoku’s Island Express
Dishonored: The Knife of Dunwall
Dishonored: The Brigmore Witches
Spider-Man: City Never Sleeps
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter
(Bloody hell, was the Spider-Man DLC the last thing I finished? I know I've been playing Diablo 3 and Borderlands 2 on and off, but I still feel like I've missed something…)
This pleasing little mystery/walking simulator grabbed me enough that I finished it two sittings (that nearly blended into one, so short was the interlude) on Saturday. It's nicely presented, well put together, the story was interesting, surprising, and satisfying, and the puzzles, while a bit linear in one or two cases towards the end, were mainly very good.
It's also currently about £2.50 in a PSN sale, I believe, and I'd absolutely recommend it to anyone with any interest at that price.
I've had that for at least a year, and never got round to booting it up. It's on The List.
I tried to play it, somehow missed the very first puzzle, and wandered around in the woods for absolutely ages with nothing to do. I assume it's quite good if you're not an idiot like me.
I actually got to the fourth puzzle without solving either of the first two, or being entirely sure that I’d completed the third. After that I started to get a better handle on what I was doing/how to spot I was moving onto the next section too early, so I actually just sprinted back to the beginning and started trying to do it “properly”.
Once you realise that, while there’s plenty of very well-realised, convincing world to explore, the puzzles themselves are actually quite self-contained, you stop wandering too far on before you figure stuff out (even though you aren’t really punished for just moving forwards anyway).
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode
Yoshi's Crafted World
MAY
Pool Panic
Forgotten Anne
Splatoon 2 - Finished the main single-player campaign with all scrolls and sardine things. Went straight into the Octo Expansion and hoo boy, that's tough. Like, the difficulty curve is so steep it's fucking vertical. Got as far as only the second set of challenges and nope, I think I'm out already. Hmm. Might come back at some point but for now, I'll go do something else.
Come on Mart. My 9-year-old beat the Octo Expansion, then went back and did every level with every weapon, for fun. Man up for fuck’s sake.
It's hard. Too hard for me currently. Have YOU finished it, Mr 'Old Man, Not A 9yr-Old Prodigy'?
Steam World dig - done - Brilliant game. Can't believe I had never tried it. Going to grab the sequel now which is also on sale.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode
Yoshi's Crafted World
MAY
Pool Panic
Forgotten Anne
Splatoon 2 (main single player campaign)
Shakedown Miami - Meh. Disappointing. And no Platinum, which is fucking mad… there's no reason to NOT have one unless you actively decide against it. Stupid. Deleted, moving on.
JANUARY
Starlink: Battle For Atlas
The Spectrum Retreat
A Rubik's Cube
Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
FEBRUARY
Guacamelee 2
Rogue Aces
The Gardens Between
MARCH
Gris
Return of the Obra Dinn
Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony
GODS Remastered
APRIL
Pode
Yoshi's Crafted World
MAY
Pool Panic
Forgotten Anne
Splatoon 2 (main single player campaign)
Shakedown Miami
Retro City Rampage - Went back to this after finishing the sequel, because I realised I didn't have all the trophies. Turns out I hadn't finished it properly either! Dunno what was going on in my head, but this isn't nearly as good as I remember it being the first time round. Shame. Done, all trophies earned, deleted.
Layton Mysteries: Katrielle and the Millionaires' Conspiracy - Had this for absolutely ages on my phone (it's identical to the 3DS version, just cheaper) but never finished it, so I powered on through and got it done. Not the best Layton by a long shot, since it's quite bitty (the story plays out over multiple seemingly-unrelated cases, not one big adventure) and Katrielle isn't as good a character as her father is. Puzzles don't seem quite as good either. But it's decent enough. Makes me realise I never played the last proper Layton game though, so I'll have to borrow that from the work games library…
I have a vague memory of playing Retro City Rampage for ten minutes with cav and turning it off in disgust.
It's just not very good. The sequel's worse for creativity and sheer mind numbing repetition, but the original is just not much fun. God knows why it's got such a cult fanbase, but there's no accounting for taste I guess.
It was highly anticipated at a time when downloadable games were the new frontier. I think though that it was so bad people didn't trust their own opinion. Like, if it had been a little less bad they would have played it and said, "oh, that's a shame, I was looking forward to this." Instead, when they played it they were all, "It can't be this bad, I just don't understand it yet."
You know, like a Suda51 game.
You know, like a Suda51 game.
Like games from pretty much all 'auteur' developers, especially Japanese ones. None of Suda's games are that good, not even Killer7. Same goes for Swery (who only really has Deadly Premonition to his name, which is fucking awful). Only the original PSone Metal Gear is good, Kojima is massively overrated otherwise. Iga hasn't made a decent game in ages, a lot of the Castlevanias he touched are mediocre at best and Bloodstained isn't looking great. Nomura is utterly ridiculous (I'll never understand the love for Kingdom Hearts and there are better FF games than VII). Itagaki? Jesus wept, aside from the first 3D Ninja Gaiden, he's awful.
Only Inaba at Platinum has a consistent track record of good stuff, I reckon, though Kamiya comes close. Oh, and Miyazaki too - Dark Souls 2 and 3 weren't a patch on the original (and Demons Souls), but those felt like the publisher pressured for sequels where he'd already moved onto new ideas. In the west, I can only really think of a few decent auteur games, and even those are divisive. The Witness? Fez is good, despite Phil Fish being a bit of a prick. Dunno if Bioshock counts, Ken Levine doesn't take all the credit for that.
The puzzle games SWERY did recently, The Missing, was pretty good.
Bioshock definitely counts, it's shit too.
Who did Rez and Lumines? They were both great.
Fumito Ueda managed two great games out of three.
