Polish is poison and refinement is a malediction. Fishy is seemingly simple minded in terms of its ambition, yet borderline inscrutable in its praxis. Taking heed of genre centric suggestions such as collectibles and point systems, while uncritically taking strides to eschew their importance in the most abrasive and disorienting manner possible. The spaces of Fishy are disorganized and jagged in their construction; never flowing right and always cutting harshly, like a series of flashing vignettes bespoken to no one. The platonic ideation of a platformer's constitution has never felt so frail.

Fishy feels like the result, the end point stemming from years of unspoken design contracts and conventions. A scattershot composition in which you could just as easily call its pointed vision a feverent blindness. Unwilling in direct proclamation, only to be believed and taken in by those who gaze into its melting pot of faded evocation and simulacra.

Blissfully cerebral by way of its soft ruminations on form and sense, Armored Core 3 is a game that permeates within the peripherals. Discreetly out of sight but never out of touch, it's cold embrace driving a sensory disconnect; as I build, build and rebuild my body again, just to feel it torn apart beautifully. To live in the Layered is to partake in a transactional state of flux, an existence deprived of will and permanence.

Armored Core 3 is a game that operates on systems upon systems of hidden information and mystique, unraveling through orderly message chains and mercenary work void of all emotional resonance. The governing forces of the world can be known, but never understood or reasoned with; the true reach of their administrative tendrils lying only within the realm of myth. A world free from this enchainment cannot be imagined, as such a notion drives terror of the unseen. Grasping for freedom like a cluster of nerves; the heavens shall fear me. For I have seen the sun once more.

Shin Megami Tensei If... feels like an inevitable game. While not being directly predicated upon the individual, Shin Megami Tensei II painted a scenario which emphasized the more cerebral, oftentimes intangible ripples of its dystopic setting. If... pushes the envelope by ditching all notions of the apocalypse entirely, with it's title being a sly wink towards that idea. Instead of Shin Megami Tensei's titular theme of reincarnation being used to examine a world in strained transition, If... uses this as a lens to touch upon the unraveling psychology of its main antagonist, and the blossoming form of its characters. Defined not by their present ideals, but their growth through death and subsequent rebirth.

By virtue of its emphasis on romanticism, If... is an incredibly onieric endeavor. The Expanse is a translucent rift free from reality's subjugation, like a midafternoon daydream steeped in liminality. It's the ultimate form of escapism, an exit from the mundanity of daily life, into a fantasy adorned with thorns and fascination. That adversarial relationship has been the crux of Megami Tensei since it's inception, as window into another world, but one that's far from comfortable or ideal. Dreary dungeon crawls, eroticism and vulgarity, and a harsh apathy in its engagement that's more captivating after the fact than it is during. Shin Megami Tensei If... is a game that upholds these sins all the same, now depicted as a permutation of the heart; not too dissimilar to the worldly corrosion of the past. The door to change is open the same as it always has been, wake up and be your true mind.