We're somehow at the end of the first month of 2026 and if I'm being honest I haven't been doing great. My depression's kind of gone into overdrive and I had some financial trouble at the start of the month (the two may be related) but I'm doing my best to manage. The country's still a hellhole and the news every day makes me feel... bad... but I've been distracting myself with all sorts of games and that's been a silver lining, at least. I've been playing a lot of games.
After over four years of playing the New York Times Crossword every day, I finally forgot and missed a day. Normally this wouldn't be an issue, but they track your streak on that site and so, after 1549 days, my streak reset to zero. In a way it's a bit freeing as I no longer need to pay money to that evil organization any more, but it also stings. Keeping that streak going has meant a lot to me and I'm sad to not have it any more.
I started the month by finishing Citizen Sleeper 2 and that was an excellent game. I adored the first game (it almost topped
my 2022 GOTY list and, in hindsight, maybe it
should've been #1) so I had high hopes for the second and it somehow managed to just about meet them. If you haven't played these, they're excellently written sci-fi RPGs about a synthetic human and the interpersonal connections they make as they try to survive in a world just as harsh and capitalistic as our own and there's really not much out there like them.
Speaking of excellent games from last year, I finished
my 2025 GOTY lists. I once again compiled a top 10 list detailing the ten new games I liked the most, as well as the ten older games I most liked, and I'd really appreciate it if you checked it out.
I even made it into a video if that's more convenient for you!
I'm still playing Fortnite (not pictured) but I wanted to mention that I've also been playing a bit of Marvel Rivals (pictured) and, you know what? That game's pretty fun. I played a bit of Overwatch back in the day and this has been reminding me of that, which has been nice. I've also been thinking about trying Deadlock now that they have a simpler mode, but... I don't know. It's still a MOBA so I haven't taken the plunge yet.
I decided to revisit a game I last played in 2022; I finished the PS2 game Drakengard. This is an action game that plays alright, but what carries it are its writing and vibes. It's a Yoko Taro game, a fairly direct predecessor to the Nier games actually, and you can already feel so much of (what I assume) people love about those games here.
I wrote more about it here.
I played through the original Final Fantasy this month.
I wrote about it here but if you want my general thoughts, well, it's decent. It's a by-the-books RPG that laid a lot of groundwork for future games so it's interesting as an artifact of its time, but on its own it was pretty unremarkable in the current year. I suppose now is a good a time as any to also mention that I finished Super Mario Bros. for the first time this month and that's a game I don't have a lot to say about. It's Mario.
I still haven't gotten to Kurohyou 2, but I played the next best thing: Super Monkey Ball Banana Mania. It's a pretty fun game, but the reason I played it (and the reason I'm mentioning it
here) is because Kazuma Kiryu is one of the playable characters. I'm not sure I have any real deep thoughts to share about this game (if you know what Super Monkey Ball is, well, this is effectively the first two games) but playing it as Kiryu put a smile on my face.
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