Mikhail's Digital Retreat

My Personal Gaming History

Just a little section to put games after they rotate out of my "currently playing" tab with a few brief thoughts. And links elsewhere if I did a thing about them. This is obviously not a remotely comprehensive list. While in the future I may add stuff going back further than the late 2025 when I created this site, I have been playing video games intensively since around 2000. No way I can remember all that.

2025
2026
  • Vital Shell - Probably my new favorite Vampire Survivors-like. Because robots. I did a short video on it.
  • Star Wars Republic Commando - A fun Star Wars game with a different perspective. Mostly at its best when your focus is on squad management rather than the shooting, though. Sections without your squad tend to be kind of bad. Also the ending is extremely underwhelming and left me going "wait, that's it?"
  • Robot Girl's Dream -Robot Battle Championship - A cute and short life-sim/time management RPG akin to Persona or something. Very cute. Another one I did a short video on.
  • Sonic Robo Blast 2 Infinity - A rather cool PSO fangame built as a mod to a Sonic fangame built on the doom engine. And because it's a PSO game, technically, I made a video. Also the developer commented and was super cool about it despite the fact I was a bit on the critical side.
  • Star Wars Jedi Knight II - Jedi Outcast - A cool classic Star Wars game, even if I think it's been surpassed since as a Jedi game by Fallen Order. Mostly it's held back by the fact most of the worst levels tend to be earlier on. I had to check a guide a few times, since to progress in some places requires the sort of thing that would be a secret in any other game. But once you get to Bespin and come to grips with your force powers, the game can shine.
  • Xenoblade Chronicles 3 - A great finale to the series. Though it's left me a bit sad to be finished after 2 years devoting myself to the franchise. Working on an article about the whole series
  • Old School Runescape - I've done nearly all the Free to Play content, and in a few months I'll probably get membership and sink my teeth into the full game. It's pretty great and I see why people still play it, though it isn't the most social MMO. But I find older MMOs often do a lot better a job at realizing the genre's potential. Expect a video on that in the near future.
  • Sigma Star Saga DX (Also on other platforms) - A fun little retro game at a pretty fair price. It's one of the many games I recall reading about in Nintendo Power 20 years ago but never got to play. It's good, but not flawless, but if you're into exploring interesting old games, it delivers on its concept well enough. It's one of those old games where even if it has its rough edges, it has its ambition and ideas.
  • Bravely Default - Despite the link, I played the 3DS version. While the game is fun, the endgame just gets so repetitive, combined with sudden difficulty spikes, that I lost interest in finishing it.
  • Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War II - Mostly playing the Last Stand wave survival mode, after a friend got me the game. It's a very fun little mode and quite addicting - as evidenced by the fact that I never really have trouble finding matches, even so many years later.
  • Thief Gold with Tfix - It was cool to finally explore a classic. When it works? It really works. But unfortunately a lot of the levels felt like they crossed the line into frustrating for me. Maybe it just didn't click as much because I'd already played a lot of the best stuff that Thief influenced? But I still recommend trying it. Just know you do need a healthy bit of patience for older games and frustrating sections.
  • Team Fortress 2 Classified - Mostly playing on custom weapon servers, but it's the most fun I've had with TF2 since I was a teenager. It's rather great that TF2C lets you have these custom weapon servers that radically expand the game - it's great for a fresh take on a game that isn't getting any new items. Or there's always playing it properly for a more "back to basics" approach to TF2. Although the few custom items that are in the base game do run into some balance issues - mostly melee items where the stock melee weapons are usually of little value and thus any replacement is going to be an upgrade.
  • Digimon World: Next Order - This was a really fun game, and nostalgic for me since Digimon was one of the first Japanese media series I ever got into as a kid (the first anime I ever watched, in fact). While battles are hands-off, raising your partners is satisfying, as is having your partners you raised carefully destroy all in your path. And the game is ultimately more about exploration - finding your way into new areas to meet and recruit new Digimon for the town. The Digimon World games are pretty unique in that way, and I can highly recommend this one for being quite unique.
  • Mina the Hollower - While the opening hours are a bit rough while you get used to it - I had to restart in part becuase I didn't like the weapon I picked - once I hit my stride I was in love with this game. I love the GBC Zelda inspiration (some childhood favorites), and it wound up being really fun to explore.