Didn't have internet for a while, so I kept busy with some classics.
Played through seven Tony Hawk games, notably THPS3, THPS4, THUG, THUG2, THAW, Project 8, and Proving Ground. The last two were underwhelming, with Proving Ground being especially rough to even run, and there was something I noticed over the progression of going through them allβthe pre-made parks drop significantly in quality (except Montana; can't ruin perfection). It's like, over time, the devs of each subsequent game stopped caring as much about letting players design their own parks (with the exception of THUG and THUG2, but even then, the quality does dip). Additionally, just the career portion of the games drop off drastically at Proving Ground. Project 8 does kind of keep the same sort of gameplay as the other games, but it was very clear that Proving Ground was made as an answer to EA's .skate, and that answer rang hollow.
Also played through the first three games in the Onimusha franchise. Solid games, but the gameplay does get more difficult in later installments. I enjoyed the story all throughout, especially in the third one. Jean Reno makes a damn good character model. I will say, thoughβthe inclusion of his voice work in the beginning, only for pretty much all foreign actors getting removed with the addition of Ako and her ability to not only make the characters understand each other, but also them being replaced with English voice actors... kind of an eyeroll, but to justify it in my mind, Jean Reno was probably expensive at the time.
I also finished Enter the Matrix: Path of Neo. An absurdly awful game. I have no idea how the general consensus is that Path of Neo is better than the original Enter the Matrix. People who truly believe that are baffling.