It does, just nothing from the first 90% of the game.

The Witness.  Thought I'd get bored of the puzzles, but the well balanced difficulty and wide variety of puzzle types keep it engaging.
The gorgeous environments, plus hidden statues, audio clips, and puzzles, keep exploration enjoyable.
The game disappears up it's own arse sometimes, especially with the video clips (ain't no one gonna trick me into watching more Tarkovsky), but they're optional, and I kinda like the vaguely spiritual vibe.
8/10

Used a walkthrough 3 times. One the solution turned out to be blindingly obvious. Another I didn't understand even after seeing it.

They should have provided the reading list before I started the game.

Observation (Xbox One X Game Pass)

Brilliant concept, adequately executed. Really intriguing story told in a novel way. Loads of little hidden ways of telling the story. The puzzles were... fine. Ocassionally irritating trying to work out where to go or what to do but just used YouTube and was well worth it. This will stay with me for a while, will be thinking about ways to interpret the story for a while.

edit: Beckett looks very interesting, will add that to the list

Silke wrote:

No worries, I'm here to do that for you.

Beckett (PC)

While not the latest Just completed, it is the one that still lingers, the complex taste that remains in my mouth. Repulsive yet exciting, a taste of civilization itself. 

The game is a game of words, of sights, of sounds. An audiovisual performance with a real sense of style, though the prose’s fondness for simple dramatic effectiveness somewhat undermines its full potential. It’s not Beckett, in other words; it could be a character of Beckett’s, stuck in the shittiest of shitholes, without any hope of a future, of free will - seemingly being stirred on by circumstances out of his own control, since you do need to fulfill some kind of purpose. 

But yeah, it makes an impression, it stays with you, and not many games I can think of have really tread these dire human grounds before.

Heh, I worked on that game. Did QA work and some script editing.

Plot is totally garbage as well, offensively stupid in places.

Djornson wrote:

Observation

Yep, still thinking about it.

The sequel will likely earn that [9].

Second one is much better, the especially the combat

The escape sections are gone, which was one of the biggest complaints that he had.

Beyond that, I really didn’t find myself dying that often, due to spike traps, particle effects, scenery or anything else.

To be honest I didn’t struggle that much with the escape sections in the original either, I didn’t find either game particularly tough, but the sequel was easier.

I'm sure I remember two or three escape sections in the sequel.

There are definitely escape sections in the sequel. Every boss has one. Or most of them anyway.

Code Vein PS4

I'd finished Bloodborne, didn't like DS3, but wanted to play another Soulslike and this was in the sale.
I also enjoyed the God Eater games, and there was a real novelty to playing an anime style soulslike. The NPCs were fun and it was nice to have a story rather than lore.

The blood code system was good - my first playthrough was heavy melee build but I've the option for build respecs that I'll do on NG+, especially as I've got materials to upgrade other weapons. On the other hand, if you want you can respec as often as you like.

The levelling system does unbalance the difficulty, though, as it's ridiculously easy to over level. Coupled with the AI helper, I rarely died to anything other than a boss, and probably only lost my accumulated haze (souls) less than a dozen times, meaning I had masses of currency.

Despite this, the game was still fun, the level design was interesting for the most part, though some levels suffered from a lack of variety in scenery, but I personally liked the comic book post-apocalyptic aesthtic. The level that ripped off Anor Londo wasn't fun, though.

The other grumble is that the combat lacks weight with very floaty weapons after the visceral loveliness of Bloodborne.

Overall though, if you want a soulslike that isn't overly challenging but still fun and that great for players who can't make up their mind about what build the want to run (and also want to build a hot anime main character), this is a solid game that I found really playable with a lot of charm.

Finished Bioshock Infinite last night - really, really liked it. Gameplay wise it was getting a little bit samey towards the end but the story, setting and action was compelling throughout.

What a trilogy of games.