I’ll definitely play it at some point! I plan to play through all the series, just slowly.

Pokémon is the easy answer for me.

Especially post-Black & White, the series has regressed so much. It’s absolutely insane that critics still gave Sun/Moon and Sword/Shield high praise. And the only reason Scarlett/Violet didn’t receive critical acclaim was due to the performance. But those games have SO MANY glaring issues besides just performance. I genuinely can’t wrap my head around the praise that the series still receives. I perfectly comprehend the popularity and sales, but the critical praise is beyond me.

I probably agree with this for the series of FromSoft Souls-likes as a whole. FromSoft games are so odd to me.

Like, Elden Ring is without a doubt one of the greatest games I’ve ever played. However, the original Dark Souls is without a doubt one of the worst games I’ve ever played. And most of the other entries fall in the middle between ‘ok’ to ‘good’. I’d never thought of any FromSoft game to be above an 8/10 until Elden Ring, which is a legitimate 10/10 for me. I haven’t played every entry in the series, but I’ve played Bloodborne, Dark Souls, and Demon’s Souls with each one of these varying in quality for me. Bloodborne being solid, Demon’s Souls being genuinely pretty good, and (again) Dark Souls being terrible.

Critics and fans seem to never rate any single FromSoft Souls-like game lesser than a 9 or so. But I just don’t get it. The quality is not at all that consistent.

Yakuzaaa

I haven’t played Skyrim so I guess I don’t know. But everyone seemed to talk about BotW’s open world being a new and innovative type of open world. And that’s the way Elden Ring’s open world is as well. So that makes me assume that most people don’t view Skyrim’s open world as the same as ER/BotW.

Again though, haven’t played Skyrim. I do plan on it soon tho with it being on PS+!

It’s the first game to successfully follow the formula of BotW’s open world, but did it better. Everything you see in the distance that looks interesting is interesting. You can travel to it immediately if you’re skilled enough and the sense of wonder and discovery is arguably the greatest in any game ever created.

It’s innovation is a bit more subtle because it’s really innovating on top of BotW’s innovation. Like, for me, Elden Ring is more-so revolutionary than it is innovating. But regardless, it truly is a once in a generation type of game.

Imo, RDR2 and Celeste were both equally deserving of GOTY over GoW.