Resident Evil: Revelations 2 was one of the very first Playstation 4 games I bought back in 2015 and it took me a whopping three years to complete this game. There are a lot of positive and negative elements about the game even though I would overall consider it an above average to good game.

On the positive side, the twisted story is quite interesting. It takes place in two different timelines which is an interesting concept. There are also multiple different characters to control with different objectives which adds some change and pace to the franchise. The story revolves around the events on an isolated island where an experiment has gone terribly wrong and has had grisly short- and long-term consequences. The different chapters are very challenging, detailed and long. The opponents are at times tough to fight, especially the bosses. The most recent editions even include two bonus episodes among other elements. If you purchase this game, you will have numerous hours of game play as Resident Evil: Revelations 2 truly offers value for money.

On the negative side, I think the game is a little bit too long overall. The fight sequences are quite repetitive and fighting the bosses for hours and hours can become quite frustrating. I often played the game for a week or two, took a break of several months and then resumed playing. That's why it took me nearly three years to make it through this epic game.

If you like the Resident Evil franchise or intense horror games in general, you simply can't get around this game because it offers high-quality long-term entertainment. On the other side, you need to bring some patience to accept the challenge to make it until the very end.

Detailed rating:

Atmosphere: 9/10

Challenge level: 10/10

Controls: 6/10

Game flow: 5/10

Graphics: 7/10

Length: 10/10

Long-term fun factor: 7/10

Sound: 8/10

Soundtrack: 7/10

Story: 7/10 

Total score:  76/100

Life Is Strange: Before the Storm is a prequel to episodic graphic adventure video game Life is Strange which was released to critical acclaim three years earlier. This prequel focuses on two side characters from the original video game and takes place about three and a half years before the sinister events of Life Is Strange. It tells the story of Max's childhood friend Chloe who is acting tough, hanging around with shady people and listening to loud music in order to hide her loneliness, her lack of self-confidence and her pain regarding her father's death two years earlier. The broken teenager meets Rachel who seems to be quite the opposite: everybody seems to like her, she comes from an intact and wealthy family and she succeeds particularly well at school. Rachel however feels attracted to Chloe's craziness, honesty and spontaneity. The game revolves around the fact that appearances are not what it seems as Rachel's father has more than one sinister thing to hide from his daughter.

If you liked the dream-like atmosphere of the original game with its unique characters, intense storytelling and floating soundtrack, you will also like this sequel. It's particularly interesting to explore some characters from the first game further and to understand how they became the way they are. The two lead characters are intriguing teenage girls with bright and dark sides. As someone who grew up with perfect parents, succeeded well at school and appreciated most of his teenage years, I have always been intrigued by people who have experienced life differently. The characters in this game are authentic, deep and unique and all these elements will make you care about them and their fates.

There is only two minor reasons why I preferred the original game over the sequel. First of all, the original game has five episode while this one only has three. Secondly, the first game revolved around a truly sinister secret involving murder while this sequel is rather a family drama. On the other side, it was the right choice to tell a different story here to distinguish this game from the first one.

To keep it short, if you like authentic characters, dramatic storytelling and ominous atmosphere, you will like this game as well as the original Life Is Strange.

This game's limited edition includes some truly nice gimmicks such as a beautiful art book as well as the game's creative soundtrack on CD. 

Detailed rating:

Atmosphere: 9/10

Challenge level: 7/10

Controls: 7/10

Game flow: 7/10

Graphics: 8/10

Length: 8/10

Long-term fun factor: 8/10

Sound: 8/10

Soundtrack: 8/10

Story: 8/10 

Total score: 78 /100

Game Night is an entertaining ride but nothing truly memorable that needs to be revisited. It's an over-the-top comedy movie with a healthy dose of action and suspense. The story revolves around competitive gamers Annie and Max who recently got married and who organize game nights with their friends. After having been out of town for a whole year, Max's brother Brooks attends one of their game nights and offers to organize the next one himself. The couple reluctantly agrees because they feel Brooks simply wants to show off and humiliate his brother but they still want to give him a chance. On the next game night, Brooks announces that he has organized an interactive role-play game and that one of them is going to be kidnapped and that the others have to find that person. The price for the potential winner is a vintage car that Max really wants to get. Some time after, masked intruders get inside Brooks' house, beat him up and kidnap him. However, Annie and Max soon realize that things didn't go as planned and that Brooks was actually kidnapped for real. Along with two other couples and their strange police neighbor, Annie and Max try to save Brooks and uncover the mysteries behind the kidnapping.

Game Night has several things going for it. First of all, the plot is quite quirky and offers a lot of situation comedy, a solid dose of action and tension and a series of twists in the final third that are often predictable but still well-executed. Secondly, the movie has a great pace, spending only as much time as necessary to introduce all characters and settings before the final hour quickens up the pace and never slows down again. Thirdly, some of the characters have depth and are sympathetic which is the case for Max who has intense competitive struggles with his brother, his smart and tough wife Annie, his dishonest but repentant brother Brooks and the mentally unstable neighbor Gary whose beloved wife recently left him. Finally, some of the situation comedy is truly funny and memorable and especially the dramatic final twenty minutes are perfectly executed.

On the other side, Game Night also has some weaknesses. First of all, it's at times too exaggerated, for example when three twists building upon one another are revealed in a short period of time. That isn't confusing or funny anymore but simply lazy script writing at that point. Another problem is the fact that while the main characters are interesting, the side characters are extremely shallow. There is a black couple who argues about how the wife has slept with a celebrity. That's literally all you need to know about them and everything they discuss throughout one and a half hours. There is another couple consisting of a good-looking but extremely dumb guy and his more intellectual partner whose only character trait is that she is British. The fact that they don't have any chemistry leads to a few awkward laughs in the beginning but becomes seriously annoying throughout the entire movie. Another element I disliked were the boring and predictable moral lessons in the movie's more serious scenes towards the end. Protect your family, stand by your friends and live an honest life. I almost fell asleep.

To keep it short, Game Night is an entertaining ride with lots of humor, a solid dose of action and even an appropriate addition of tension. Instead of watching this film at the cinema, you should rent it and watch it with your friends at home. While the movie is great to watch once, it's nothing memorable that needs to be revisited again. There are similar recent party movies like the brilliant Happy Death Day that are much more original. This movie actually is like a party. It's fun while it lasts but the next day you just want to move on.

Annihilation is a calm, intellectual and surreal science-fiction film in the key of recent successes such as Arrival, Ex Machina or even Blade Runner 2049 to a certain degree. Based upon a recent novel by Jeff VanderMeer, it tells the story of a mysterious and expanding extraterrestrial entity known as The Shimmer that seems to transform, mutate and copy its natural environment. Several groups have gone inside The Shimmer to investigate the phenomenon but none of them have come back as all of them were apparently killed, killed one another or went crazy and got lost. One year after his disappearance, a soldier named Kane suddenly comes back home to his wife Lena. Kane doesn't seem to be himself however. He is emotionally distant, seems to suffer from dementia and suddenly starts to feel very sick. On his way to the hospital, a government security force intercepts the ambulance and brings Kane and Lena to a secret area near The Shimmer. The security force wishes to interrogate Kane but he is in a coma. The security force then decides to send one last group into The Shimmer, consisting of a worried Lena who is a biologist and has been working for the military for seven years, an obsessed and strict psychologist named Doctor Ventress, a physicist with borderline personality disorder named Josie, an alcoholic paramedic called Anya who has anger management issues and surveyor and geologist Cass who mourns the death of her daughter who died of leukemia. The five women set out on a suicide mission as they soon lose track of time and realize how the mysterious entity not only transforms their environment but also themselves mentally and physically. In a last ditch effort, the group attempts to find out the secret of the entity and annihilate it before it annihilates them.

There are several elements that make Annihilation a worthwhile experience. First of all, the film has a constant gloomy and mysterious atmosphere from start to finish. Secondly, the movie has an intellectual plot that makes the viewers speculate until the very end and beyond. Thirdly, the five female lead characters are very interesting in their own ways and their inner demons only add to the menacing tone of the movie. Fourthly, the overall calm film is occasionally shook up by a few sudden battles and gory scenes that never feel forced because they tell us more about the strange entity and the fate of the lost groups. Fifthly and maybe most importantly, the film is visually stunning. The animations, colors and light techniques make the extraterrestrial entity very spectacular and especially the film's climax is an unforgettable dream-like experience. Finally, the film's ending is quite controversial as some people might praise it while others could despise it. It's definitely something worth discussing. You should watch this film if you have an open mind for an intellectual experience. If you are just seeking passive entertainment, this movie is definitely not for you.

Annihilation also has a few negative elements of course. In my opinion, it's much too close to movies such as Arrival and seems to jump on the bandwagon. This might also be the reason why I happened to find the movie's twist quite predictable which lowered its intensity quite a bit. Even though I'm aware that this is fiction, I disliked the fact that five characters that would never be chosen for this type of mission in real life got teamed up together. Some of them, like the extremely selfish psychologist that would clearly need a psychologist herself or the overtly aggressive paramedic who is a danger to herself and anyone around her, feel sketchily exaggerated, even given the circumstances that the extraterrestrial entity has an impact on the characters' psyches. Some more subtleness regarding the characters would have suited the movie's tone better.

In the end, you might appreciate Annihilation even more if you haven't watched movies such as Arrival and Ex Machina before because it would be your first impressive contact with this type of intellectual science-fiction movie. If you have watched those two movies and others of its kind before, you will probably realize that Annihilation is inferior to those films and simply a good intellectual science-fiction movie. The visual components and the intellectual story are still good enough to watch this movie at your local cinema but the film's impact isn't as big as I would have expected beforehand.

After releasing one of the very best entries in the franchise with the sinister Zatoichi's Revenge, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man is one of the weakest films about the blind masseur. It tells how Zatoichi gets arrested for illegal gambling and meets a prisoner who is about to get sentenced to death for crimes he claims he didn't commit. He asks Zatoichi to help him by meeting his boss as well as his sworn brother who could clear his name. Zatoichi is first reluctant to help but once he does, he realizes that the prisoner got set up by his two friends and tries to set things right.

Despite being one of the weakest entries in the franchise, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man still has a few positive elements to point out. The pace of the film is rather quick as the story unfolds coherently and the set of characters is introduced step by step. This film certainly isn't boring. An interesting element is the idea to include an impostor who claims to be Zatoichi to get alcohol, money and women which adds some situation comedy to the film. The landscapes are particularly interesting in this film as Zatoichi travels to the ocean for the first time in his life and as the final duel takes places in an abandoned fishing village in the dunes which looks gorgeous.

There are a couple of elements that weigh that movie down. First of all, the sword fights are particularly wooden, especially since Zatoichi doesn't have to face a respectable opponent this time around. The idea of his opponents to use trenches and fishing nets to trick the lowly yakuza in the final fight sequence is the only remotely interesting element about the fight scenes in this film. The impostor who claims to be Zatoichi seems intriguing at first but quickly becomes very annoying as his only purpose seems to be to bring some comic relief in form of silly slapstick scenes. Aside of Zatoichi, most characters remain either shallow or are unnerving, like the woman who claims to know him and follows him around to give him useless tips. A final element that bothered me was the fact that the fate of numerous characters and side stories isn't even explained at the end of the movie. Maybe the makers of the movie believed some of the characters to be so generic that the viewers wouldn't even care about their fates which is strange but turns out to be accurate in my book.

In the end, Zatoichi and the Doomed Man is an entertaining and fast-paced entry in the franchise but ultimately overtly humorous and just not memorable. Collectors and fans of the franchise might appreciate the film for its atmosphere, locations and the sympathetic lead character but those who aren't too familiar with the blind samurai definitely shouldn't start their journey with this movie.