After taking a year off (mostly because I was completely addicted to my first time through the Mass Effect universe in Mass Effect: Legendary Edition this time a year ago), it’s time to do Four in February again! This is a challenge to beat four video games during the month of February, as the name implies. There aren’t really rules beyond that: it can be games I’ve never played before, games I’ve already started, or anything else really!
UPDATES
02/26/2023 – Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling beat! Mission accomplished!
While my post wasn’t until 02/27/2023, I got to the end credits a few hours earlier and was wrapping up some side quests.
02/19/2023 – Doom (2016) and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy beat!
02/08/2023 – Far Cry 6 beat!
Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling
Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling is an indie game that draws heavy inspiration from Paper Mario – particularly the first two entries in the series that were turn-based RPGs with QTEs to get bonuses on attacks and defense. While the Paper Mario series may have moved on from this style of gameplay, with entries on the Wii and later introducing new gameplay styles for each entry, it’s clear there are fans that didn’t move on, including some that eventually said, “we’ll do it ourselves!”
Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling – PC Release Trailer
Uncharted: The Lost Legacy
Fun fact: the only Uncharted game I’ve played is Uncharted 4, but I loved it and I fully expect to love The Lost Legacy as well. I recently purchased the Legacy of Thieves collection on PC, so it’ll be great to experience the game for the first time on the best version of the game. Even better, it looks like the game is only 8-10 hours to complete, so it should be a nice easy one to squeeze into the shortest month of the year!
Uncharted: The Lost Legacy Story Trailer (PS4)
Doom (2016)
Doom, any of the Doom games really, is one of my gaming blind-spots. I’ve never played any of them, but they are so critically acclaimed it feels like I must play them! It seems like there’s no better spot to start than the 2016 iteration and if I like it then I could move on to Doom Eternal on Game Pass if I want to.
Doom (2016) Launch Trailer
Far Cry 6
Is Far Cry 6 more or less the same game as Far Cry 3, 4, and 5 before it? It sure sounds like it. Is that a problem for me? Not at all – I’ve loved my time on a tropical island, in an Eastern mountain-covered nation, and in nutjob Montana, so I’m looking forward to my time in not-Cuba too. Enough time has passed since I played Far Cry 5 that I think I won’t burn out on the open world before the end, especially if I can exercise enough restraint to not do all the map checkboxes.
Far Cry 6 Story Trailer
In Conclusion
Will I be able to complete these games in just a single month? Especially when a couple of them are pretty long? Only time will tell! Updates on my progress will be posted as I beat each game, and you can follow along as I will try to stream my progress on Twitch if I feel like it.
It snuck up on me, but it’s February, and that means it’s time for Four in February again! The goal is to beat four video games in the month of February. This year I want to take advantage of the different platforms and/or storefronts I have games on. So, I’m going to pick one of the free games I’ve claimed on the Epic Games Store, one from Xbox Game Pass for PC, and two from Steam.
Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair
Epic Games Store
I’ve put about an hour into this game so far, but it’s time to actually complete it. By all accounts, it’s a competent 2.5D platformer, and it’s been quite some time since I’ve completed a 2D platformer. Time to revisit this genre and enjoy the level design that always shines in this genre!
Halo
Xbox Game Pass
I once played through the campaign of the original Halo: Combat Evolved on a pirated copy for PC back in my freshman year of college. Now, it’s time to play through a legitimate copy! I don’t know for sure which Halo game I’m going to do from the Master Chief Collection yet, but it’ll probably be Combat Evolved so I don’t have to worry about missing any lore.
UPDATE: I completed Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary at approximately 12:45am on Feb 21st! That still leaves me 2 games to complete in roughly one week though.
Sam & Max Save the World
Steam
For my money, the Sam and Max games are some of the greatest to ever come out of Telltale Games. Recently, a remastered version of the first “season” of the series was released by some former Telltale games staff (and it looks like they plan to remaster the other seasons as well). Though there is a minor controversy about some jokes in the game being changed and one character’s voice actor being replaced, I’m glad this remaster exists because the original versions were well on their way to becoming unplayable on modern systems due to their age.
UPDATE: I completed Sam & Max Save the World Remastered on Feb 14th! That means I’m only… checks calculator… half the speed I should be in this challenge having completed no other games yet. Oops.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
Steam
For some reason, I didn’t really get into Shadow of the Tomb Raider when I first purchased it despite loving the first two in this trilogy. So, I’m going to give it another shot!
Those are the four games I’m going to try to complete in February! Due to how long it’s been since I last attempted each of them, I’m going to be starting over on all of them (except Sam & Max – I’ve already done the first of the five episodes, and that was recently so I remember the events well).
Maybe I’ll even stream some of my gameplay! Or maybe not! If I do, it’ll be over at twitch.tv/lazyrivr.
An annual tradition started by Mike Suszek while he was at the now-defunt Joystiq, Four in February is a challenge to just complete four video games during the month of February.
I’ve attempted it a couple of times before and came close. I’ve decided to try it again, because lately I’ve been starting a lot of games, but never finishing any. Check out my picks below! I also plan on streaming some of my attempt: I don’t know if I’ll be streaming on Twitch, YouTube, or Mixer (or even all three simultaneously), but you can follow me on those platforms to find out.
I picked up Marvel’s Spider-Man on Black Friday, but I just haven’t gotten more than a couple hours into it yet. It’s not that the game is un-enjoyable – it’s very good from what I’ve played so far! I just haven’t made the time for it yet, so that’s what I’m going to do – make the time to play it through in February. If I speed through it quickly enough, I might even try to do the DLCs as well!
Update (Feb 2): I was right about it being very good! So good, that I completed the main story over the weekend! One game down, three to go. My progress will likely slow during the week, due to work, but I hope to get an hour or so of Pokemon in each night.
In what is a recurring theme for my Four in February picks, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice is another one I just haven’t gotten to. By all accounts, it’s a beautiful, important, and well-acted game. The Game Awards trailer for Hellblade II was disturbingly great too. I can’t wait to put on my headphones for this one.
I got The Outer Worlds free with my CPU when I built my new computer (I should write about that!), but I’ve only put an hour or so into it. I was worried about putting an Obsidian-developed RPG in my list, as they can take a while, but then I saw it’s actually a fairly short one – only about 12-15 hours or so! So it’s time to give this a proper go!
I bought Pokemon Sword on launch day, and I got Pokemon Shield for Christmas, but I’m only a couple gyms into Sword, and I haven’t even started Shield. I tend to start a new Pokemon game very excitedly, but then rarely actually complete it, so it’s time to change that. I don’t know if I’ll just continue my Sword save, or if I’ll start a new save file on Shield, but either way I want to get through it. This will be a good one to play in bed on my Switch, so I can just tackle it a little at a time.
I’ll try to stream as I play these games (except for Pokemon, since I don’t have a capture card), and Twitch will be the primary platform with the PS4’s integrated support!
An annual tradition started by the now-defunt Joystiq, Four in February is a challenge to finally play a few of those games that we all just have lying around collecting (virtual) dust. The goal is to complete four games during the month of February.
I attempted it last year and came close. I successfully completed three games: Rise of The Tomb Raider, Far Cry 4, and Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People. I think I would have met the goal, had I not been sick for almost a week! I’m going to give it a try again this year. Check out my picks below! I also plan on streaming as much of my attempt as I can, so I’ll update the information below with archives of the streams as well!
Yeah, season 3 just came out. I’m a season behind, which is all the more reason to fire up season 2 and play it! I “enjoyed” season 1 (as much as you can enjoy a story like that), so I don’t know why I haven’t gotten around to playing season 2 yet. I recently picked it up when it was free through Twitch Prime though, so there’s no more excuses. It’s time to enter this tough and depressing world again.
This is a short one. I’ve heard it only takes one sitting to complete, but I’ve also heard nothing but good things about it. This is one that’s been sitting in my library for quite some time, but I just haven’t taken the time to play it. I’m going to finally fix that.
I’ve actually played about 4 hours of Darksiders II before, but then I just never came back to it. I remember thinking that it scratched the same sort of itch that the Legend of Zelda series did for me, so I think it’s time to give it another go. I’ll be starting over since I don’t really remember anything about the story or how to play the game, plus I’ll be playing on the newer Deathinitive Edition as it will hopefully be a little more compatible with Windows 10 than the older version. This one’s my long pick, as I expect it will take up to two weeks to complete.
That is why Undertale is my final pick for Four in February. I attended AGDQ 2017 a few weeks ago and was in the room for the Undertale run; the finale of the marathon. It looked pretty good, but when you’re skipping so much stuff, you don’t get a good sense of the story. So it’s time to play this game. I don’t even own it yet; I’m going to buy it specifically for this.
I haven’t been playing very many video games lately. Sure, I got sucked into Fallout 4 for about 40 hours, but then a whole lot of nothing. It’s time to break out of that. It’s time to actually play a few of the (very) many games that are lying untouched in my library.
4 in February is a yearly event, started by (the now defunct) Joystiq, challenging people to complete four unplayed video games during the month of February. The idea isn’t to go buy four new games, but to make it through four that you already have, but haven’t gotten around to.
With that in mind, it’s time to tackle a little of my backlog. Here’s my 4 in February.
Rise of the Tomb Raider
Conveniently, Rise of the Tomb Raider makes its way onto PC on January 28th, just a few days before the start of February. Given just how much I love the Tomb Raider reboot (I’ve played through it twice), it’s no surprise that I want this one on my list to beat in February.
It’ll be very nice to look at as well – this Christmas I upgraded my PC with a new GTX 970, and that’s the card for the recommended spec!
Mission Accomplished!
That wasn’t quite as long as I expected. It only took about 12 hours to complete, and I powered through it in just 3 days. I streamed the whole thing – check out the recordings to the left!
Just Cause 2
Just Cause 3 just came out, but I think I’m going to wait for that to go on a better sale. In the meantime, Just Cause 2 is languishing in my Steam library, not even 2 hours played. I don’t remember much from the brief time I’ve already spent with the game, just that I think it was fun, and that it sure looks like it’ll be a lot more fun when I dedicate a proper amount of time to it.
Strong Bad’s Cool Game for Attractive People
Remember that great website HomestarRunner.com? The one that’s showing signs of coming back to life? Well, back in 2008 they partnered with Telltale Games to make a series of point-and-click adventures! This was back before Telltale’s games were basically just dialog trees and tough moral choices – they were legit point-and-clicks. I did play most of the first episode at one point, but there’s no way I remember how to do it at this point. It’s broken into 5 episodes, so I think I’ll just play one all the way through each night till I finish it.
Time Gentlemen, Please!
This is actually a sequel to the studio’s previous game Ben There, Dan That, but I won’t play that one first unless I’m making really good time on the others during the month. It’s an absurd comedy point-and-click adventure game, but most importantly it’s kinda short. It’s only about 6 hours long according to user submissions at How Long to Beat. With two big AAA games in my lineup this month, I’ll need a shorter one to serve as a palate cleanser.
So there it is. The four games I’ll be trying to tackle in February. I think I have a good mix, even though two of them are point-and-click adventures. I’ve got a little snack-sized game, an episodic game with easy stopping points, a sandbox mayhem generator, and an epic action adventure. I’ll probably be streaming my time with these games when I can on my Twitch channel (or maybe YouTube instead). We’ll see how I did on March 1st!
It’s only about a week before I go back to school, but I still have a massive Steam library of games that I haven’t played yet (though that’s been true of my Steam library the entire time I’ve had a Steam account!).
That’s why, every day this week, I’ll be playing a game I haven’t played before every single day! I’ll be trying to include genres that I don’t usually play either because I want to branch out a bit. And just to make sure I give each game a fair shot, I’ll be playing each game for a minimum of 2 hours.
I’ll be streaming at 11am Pacific each weekday this week. You can watch at twitch.tv/lazyrivr or at my gaming blog lazyrivr.com.
Here’s the (tentative) schedule for the week:
Monday
Avadon: The Black Fortress
Perhaps best described as an old-school RPG, this is a game I’m hoping will surprise me. I’m not a huge RPG fan, especially the old-school kind. They’re awfully slow, and I tend to want to overthink when playing an RPG with all those stats and equipment slots. This is mainly why I’ve got the two hour minimum.
Tuesday
Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3
Here’s another RPG, but with a little more modern twist. It aims to be old-school, but it’s got a funny slant, instead of being all “steeped in mythology.” So I think I’ll enjoy this one a little more.
Wednesday
Jurassic Park (Telltale Games)
I first sat down and watched Jurassic Park (the movie) all the way through a few months ago while it was in its theatrical 3D re-release. It sold me. Great movie (short on plot, but big on fun). I’ve heard some… not-so-nice things about Telltale Games’ adventure game based on the franchise. I haven’t played it, so I guess I’ll find out if it’s as boring as people say it is.
Thursday
Alan Wake (subject to my computer’s awfulness)
Alan Wake looks like it’s pretty awesome. Moody and atmospheric, I’m just hoping my computer will be up to the task of playing it and streaming it at the same time (spoiler alert: the graphics setting will be on “really really low”).
Friday
Retro City Rampage
Friday is a time to just shoot things up. And that’s what I’m going to do. Mayhem! 80s references that will go above my head because I was born in ’89! Stopping the evil good guys! I hoping this one will be a blast!
Each day after I’m done playing, I’ll try to pull out a few highlights and write up some thoughts about the game.
Here’s to making that Steam library more worth the money!
