Tag Archives: My Friend Pedro

Game of the Year 2019

Man, 2019 has been a weird one for me. Normally by this point in the year, I have a pretty clear idea of what a top ten games list looks like, but not so much this time around. That isn’t to say it’s been a bad year for video games, in fact, I bet there’s people out there who were spoiled rotten by many of the releases.

The problem wasn’t a lack of quality games coming out, it was just an issue of those games managing to keep me engaged long enough to power through them. So with all of that pretext, here are the top 10 (11) games that I played this year.

HONORABLE MENTION: RED DEAD REDEMPTION 2 PC

Before we dive into the list, I gotta pour one out for the PC release of Red Dead Redemption 2. Granted, it was an abysmal launch of a port in an age where PC ports have been pretty good, but returning to the old west that I fell in love with last year has been wonderful. Especially now that it isn’t running like utter garbage.

Technically it came out last year, so I can’t in good conscience put it on the list. Just know that it would probably be top 3 if it was.

10.) LATER ALLIGATOR

Later Alligator wasn’t a long experience, but it was a fun one. The hand animated, point and click adventure game that’s chock full of diverse mini-games really won me over this year. The writing was funny, the story and characters were all charming in their own ways, and the premise itself just oozed with ridiculousness.

9.) STAR WARS JEDI: FALLEN ORDER

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is a tough game to talk about because I feel so conflicted about it. On the one hand, it’s scratching that Star Wars itch so well for me, telling an interesting enough story in a world that I absolutely love. Yet on the other hand, it can kind of be a trial in tedium the further in you get.

That isn’t to say I didn’t have a good time with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, because I really did. It’s just unfortunate that as you progress further into the game, it starts to feel very repetitive and uninspired. It also suffered from a lot of performance issues which consistently made themselves apparent.

But even through all that, I managed to find joy in the world and story that Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order was doling out. The satisfaction of chaining together all of your force powers and light saber abilities is a delight, and gave me those rare moments of fulfilling a Jedi power fantasy.

8.) RING FIT ADVENTURE

I’ve never played a game that physically hurt me, but Ring Fit Adventure is a game that’s left me sore while rubbing in the fact that I haven’t actually done much. In case you aren’t aware, Ring Fit Adventure is the latest in Nintendo’s attempts to make you healthier. It comes with a Pilates ring that houses one Joy-Con controller, while the other goes on a strap around your thigh. You then do exercises to progress through levels, fight battles, and sweat profusely if you’re like me.

Even if we set aside the exercising aspect of Ring Fit Adventure for a moment, it’s a pretty fully featured game with various modes including a full on story mode, mini-games and custom routines. You also do things like upgrading your gear to make your workout attacks and defenses better, as well as crafting different smoothies which will give you certain buffs in battle.

Oh yeah, also you battle monsters in this pseudo turn based workout fight. Each enemy is color coded to match a type of workout that you can do. For example, a blue monster is weak to leg based workouts, so selecting squats or knee lifts will damage the enemy more.

It is wild that I’m describing the RPG mechanics of a workout game, but it’s actually a lot of fun and really effective at what it does. Ring Fit Adventure has been my go to for working out, not only because I can work up a sweat with it, but because it’s actually fun.

7.) PIKUNIKU

One of the first new games I played this year ended up being one of my favorites. Pikuniku was a delightful little game in which you stumble through a world besieged by an evil corporation that’s trying to take over everything. Through a light mix of puzzle solving and platforming you make your way across the land, solving all the problems you can in service of overthrowing said corporation.

It’s oozing with charm, it’s light and breezy, and it’s weird as hell.

6.) CONTROL

Control is a weird one for me. Early in the game I was completely enthralled, exploring every nook and cranny, reading every note and memo, and watching every video log I came across. Control does world building better than any game I played this year. But as I got further and further into the game, I stopped doing a lot of the side quests and stopped reading every piece of paper that wafted past me. The tension and intrigue that drew me in from the beginning began to feel rote and tiresome, and none of it because of any inadequacies in the story or world.

No, the real issue I had with Control was the combat and how frequently you had to engage with it. Every encounter became a chore that ended with me having to hunt down the one last enemy who got trapped behind a corner, or buried under some rubble. More importantly, the boss battles were the thing that eventually broke my back with Control. The difficulty spikes that usually centered around the bosses eventually made me stop playing the game all together for a while.

Eventually I came back to it and powered through to the end. The story manages to hold up its end of the bargain, but the combat never gets any better, even when you get some of the late game powers. It’s a real shame considering when it came out, I was ready to place it at the top of my list. Still though, Control is a hell of a ride despite its failings.

That being said, there’s a sequence at the end of the game that is absolutely incredible. Look up the “Ashtray Maze” if you’re curious.

5.) MY FRIEND PEDRO

My Friend Pedro is one of the few games I felt compelled to actually review this year, mostly because it’s just so damn cool. In another example of style over substance, My Friend Pedro isn’t the most elegant game to play, but it provides such an awesome power fantasy that I still will occasionally pop into just to get my Matrix fix.

It’s a game that really only has the one, slow motion, bullet-time gimmick, but it does it really, really well. It’s because of how well it does that gimmick, that I find myself coming back to it every once in a while, just to get that action movie feeling again.

The controls can be a little weird and cumbersome at times, but when it clicks, it just looks and feels so good to play.

4.) HEAVE HO

I’m pretty sure I pissed myself once while playing Heave Ho. It’s a game that’s so utterly absurd and preposterous, that you and the people you’re playing with can’t help but crack up.

Heave Ho is a physics based platformer, I guess? You and your buddies are these creatures with a face and two arms, each controlled using the triggers on the controller. You navigate levels using “teamwork” and your incredible climbing skills in an effort for everyone to make it to the goal.

It’s the kind of game that you need to play to really understand it, because describing it doesn’t do it justice. Do yourself a favor, get some friends and a copy of Heave Ho, and you won’t be disappointed.

3.) SUPER MARIO MAKER 2

Super Mario Maker 2 along with its predecessor, managed to tap into this primal horror that lurks inside of me – making people test their might in the crucible of my own design. I normally don’t engage with level creation based games, but with Super Mario Maker 2, I already knew the language of how everything interacts with each other from years of playing Mario games. I know what kind of blocks a shell with break and bounce off of, or what a super mushroom does, or that music blocks are evil. Knowing all of that just makes it so easy for me to dip into the creation suite and have a great time.

On the flip-side, I get to play near infinite amount of new levels, some of which are well designed, whenever I want. While the creation tools aren’t as easy to work with as they were on the Wii U, Super Mario Maker 2 has a permanent place on my Switch.

2.) THE OUTER WORLDS

It’s really odd that I enjoyed The Outer Worlds as much as I did considering my general apathy and dislike of the games it so clearly is building off of. Where The Outer Worlds succeeds as opposed to games like Fallout and The Elder Scrolls is in its refinement and focus.

The Outer Worlds isn’t about the scale of the world as much as its about packing it with (mostly) meaningful and interesting things to do and see. From brilliant writing, excellent gameplay, interesting characters and a well thought out and engaging setting, The Outer Worlds is a complete experience that doesn’t waste your time.

I’ve heard some people grouse about how this game is too easy or too streamlined, striping away some of the deeper RPG elements they love, but they can huff my shorts because this is the first time a game in this style has ever won me over.

Honestly I’m shocked that The Outer Worlds is a game I enjoyed, let alone put this high up on my list. I would’ve never believed you if you told me this earlier in the year.

1.) UNTITLED GOOSE GAME

Okay, so hear me out. Untitled Goose Game isn’t the best game I’ve ever played, in fact, it isn’t even that good of a stealth game. But, what it did was bring me a ton of joy and made me laugh.

I’ve had more fond memories playing as a nasty goose than any other game this year. Untitled Goose Game constantly kept me smiling and laughing as I fought against the purposefully cumbersome controls in an effort to throw a rake in a lake.

The truth is that Untitled Goose Game is just pleasant. Even when you’re traumatizing a kid who clearly is terrified of geese, or stealing a mans crops, or getting a guy to break his neighbor’s vase, the game still manages to just be fun without being overly complicated.

I genuinely enjoyed my time being a nasty goose and come back to it pretty regularly to try and sweep up the additional challenges that unlock when you beat it. It may not be what you’d imagine a traditionally good game looks like, but this game made me happier than any other game I played this year.

It’s short, it’s sweet, and it’s my game of the year for 2019.

@house_house_ pic.twitter.com/T8QhgJIUqS

— sorry ari (@ComboBroken) September 26, 2019

So that’s it everyone, Game of the Year 2019 is in the books. I hope you enjoyed the articles that went up this week, because they were a lot of fun to write. This is the last post going up in 2019, so I just wanted to thank you for sticking with me throughout the year. You have no idea how much your support and readership has meant to me.

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year everyone. See you in 2020.

Review: My Friend Pedro

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If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like if Spider-Man shot bullets instead of webs, then look no further than My Friend Pedro, a game about man, his guns, and his floating banana friend.

You take on the mantle of what has to be, the most potent killer of all time in My Friend Pedro, capable of slowing time, doing sick aerial stunts, riding motorcycles and using frying pans to overcome any and every threat. If that sounds cool, it’s because it is. My Friend Pedro arms you with not only the appropriate weaponry for dispatching your foes, but also puts you in situations where you’re encouraged to do more than just shoot everyone in sight.

Each level is broken up into rooms that more or less serve as tutorials for what’s to come. Say you’re dropping into a room with an enemy on either side of you at the bottom of it, that’s My Friend Pedro‘s way of telling you that you should consider splitting your aim to simultaneously obliterate both of them. Is that a frying pan in a room surrounded on all sides by bad guys? Just pump some bullets into it, and watch the ricochet take care of the rest. When things click in My Friend Pedro, it can lead to some of the most satisfying moments in video games.

But sometimes My Friend Pedro wants to fight with you and make things as convoluted as possible, requiring you to turn your hands into spiders capable of hitting all the right buttons at once. The default control scheme isn’t great, and often leads to your character coming out of slow motion at the wrong time, falling into a pit, or just getting shot in the dome. Every ounce of satisfaction you might feel, is prefaced by about nine moments of you sloppily fumbling through enemies and barely getting out alive.

You can press the left bumper to basically become invincible and dodge bullets by spinning around like you’re John Woo, but because of the default button placement along with some weird animation priority when you’re coming out of the spin, made it one of the least used moves in my arsenal. That is until the game would literally stop time as the final bullet that would kill me was rushing in my direction. That’s when My Friend Pedro will literally tell you that it’s time to dodge.

Oddly enough, for a side scrolling game, the camera sometimes serves as another obstacle. Often times the levels are just individual rooms of varying complexity, that are designed for you to conquer and move on to the next one. But that isn’t always the case, and these little shooting gallery puzzle rooms stretch out farther than the camera cares to show. The camera is zoomed in fairly close, which helps you navigate tight corridors more effectively and also see the dope shit you’re doing. But when you can’t see the wall of dudes with shotguns just on the other side of the room, and their flurry of bullets just keeps peppering you before you even know they’re there, it can be supremely frustrating.

But all of those grievances go away when you flawlessly erase a room without even getting touched. Every instance that I thought that maybe it was time to take a break, I’d do something outrageous, like skateboard through a window while doing a back flip, shooting two Uzis in separate directions. Or kicking a frying pan into the air, unloading ammo into it and watching one bullet hit an explosive next to a cluster of enemies. My Friend Pedro constantly puts you in situations where you could pull off awesome things, if you can manage to wrap your head around the controls long enough.

The biggest missteps My Friend Pedro takes are twofold though. Firstly, there’s a score they give you at the end of each level, ranking you from C to S ranks. Things like time and enemies killed are listed, but there’s literally no indication of what I could be doing better to obtain better rankings. I’m assuming the answer is just, “do cooler shit,” but some direction on that front couldn’t hurt.

Additionally, My Friend Pedro misses what might be my favorite feature of games like this, particularly Katana Zero, which is the ability to watch a full speed replay of the room or level you just went through. For all the slow motion coolness I pull off, I’d love to have seen what that looked like. It isn’t a deal breaker or anything, it just feels like a missed opportunity. They do cherry pick a moment from the level you can just export into a GIF which is nice, but you have no say in what moment it is.

All things considered, I enjoyed my time with My Friend Pedro. It was a short and sweet game that let me live out my wildest action movie dreams, albeit not as nimbly as I would have hoped for. There’s a lot less of me falling into holes and getting shot in the face in my imagination. But if you can deal with some often times floaty and loose controls, and really want to do some cool Matrix moves in a modern video game, My Friend Pedro is a pretty good compromise.

My Friend Pedro is currently available on Steam and the Nintendo Switch. This review is based off of the Steam version.