When I was a teen (back around 2005), I really got into video game magazines. EGM, Game Informer, Official PlayStation Magazine, Edge… I would sneak over to the corner store before church and get any issue I could find. In retrospect, I really should have subscribed to all of these, because I would have saved a ton of money in the process, but there was such a magical feeling in checking the magazine rack every Read More

And with that, we have completed another Love/Hate series here on IC2S! As soon as I finished Burial at Sea – Episode II and realized that I had no more Bioshock games left to play, I was just struck with how much I love this franchise. Sure, Bioshock 2 and Infinite could never live up to the original, but that first game was such a singular experience (and its sequels are still good games in Read More

Welcome back to the Bioshock Love/Hate series! In this entry, we’ll be covering the final game in the franchise (thus far), Bioshock Infinite. Disappointed that Bioshock 2 had been handed off to a different development team, Ken Levine and Irrational Games set out to make a more ambitious and revolutionary sequel that wouldn’t just rehash the ideas of the first game. The game ended up going through one of the most protracted examples of development Read More

Welcome back to the Bioshock Love/Hate series! In this entry, we’ll be covering Bioshock 2, a sequel commissioned by 2K Games while series’ creator Ken Levine was off working on a more ambitious follow-up. I have a bit of an interesting history with this game: I had always felt that Bioshock 2 looked like it was hewing a bit too closely to its predecessor, which had benefitted from its fresh setting and innovative design. Despite Read More

Oh hey, it’s time for another Love/Hate series here on IC2S! After writing the list of my 100 favourite games ever, I had an overwhelming itch to replay Bioshock. The last time I played it was around 2008 or 2009, back when it was ported to PS3. Obviously, I really enjoyed it back then, but I remember having some issues with it, which really made me curious how it would hold up on a replay Read More

And with that, we have completed another Love/Hate series here on IC2S! Suffice to say, this was quite the undertaking: I ended up playing nineteen games (most of them to completion) over the course of this series of articles. Even at its worst, it was a lot of fun! Playing the different versions of the games simultaneously gives you a different perspective on them, and I’m glad that I’ve got this little series to capture Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series! We’ve covered all the Ninja Gaiden video games that I could get my hands on, so we’re coming in with a bonus entry for the Ninja Gaiden anime film from the 90s which acts as a direct sequel to the NES trilogy! I knew literally nothing about this film going in, so I had no idea what to expect from it. Does this film hold up as Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series on IC2S! In this entry, we’ll be looking at the most recent Ninja Gaiden game (excluding re-releases), Yaiba: Ninja Gaiden Z, a strange spin-off featuring zombies and an asshole ninja protagonist trying to find and kill Ryu Hayabusa. Frankly, this game has a horrible reputation within the Ninja Gaiden fan community, and was blamed for killing the franchise (at least up until its recent revival). Given its Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series! In this entry, we’ll be looking at Ninja Gaiden 3 and its revised version, Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge. This was the first entry in the modern series without the involvement of Tomonobu Itagaki, who left Tecmo-Koei due to contract disputes. Ninja Gaiden 3 game was reviled on release and, while Razor’s Edge was generally considered a big improvement, it still was not looked on very fondly Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series! In this entry, we’ll be looking at Ninja Gaiden II, which was originally released in 2008 on the Xbox 360. This was the first Ninja Gaiden game I played, which means that, in addition to getting me into this franchise, it was also the catalyst for my obsession with the Dead or Alive movie and games. I liked it at the time, but does the game hold Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series on IC2S! In this entry, we’ll be looking at Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword, a curious little interquel released on the Nintendo DS. This game was very experimental, using the DS in unconventional ways to play the entire experience with the stylus rather than a traditional button layout. I’ve played enough gimmicky handheld experiences to be pretty leery about such experiments: would Dragon Sword turn out any better? Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series on IC2S! It’s finally time for the entry you’ve all been waiting for: the 2004 reboot of Ninja Gaiden! This game was actually the second Ninja Gaiden game I had played, but I absolutely adored it, to the point where it made the top 25 of my all-time favourite games list. It has been more than a decade since I last played it and, in the time Read More

Man, when I started this blog thirteen years ago, I never would have expected that I’d manage to reach four hundred posts! I had started a couple blogs prior to this one and those struggled to continue after the first couple posts, so having this monument to my writing, thoughts, and their evolution over time is just… well, it’s difficult to quantify, really. Knowing that I was approaching this milestone, I knew that I had Read More

Welcome back to the Ninja Gaiden Love/Hate series! In this entry, we’ll be looking at Ninja Gaiden for the Sega Master System! Once again, this is an entirely new entry in the franchise, despite sharing a name with (by this point) three other games released in a four year timespan. I was not too keen on the previous Sega-exclusive Ninja Gaiden game, would this attempt on the Master System fair any better? Read on to Read More