VIRTUAL BASTION

Reminiscing Over the Duck’s 2025 Year in Gaming

Every January, we each pick our choice for Game of the Year and discuss what exactly made it stand out above the rest. But this is the very first year since the tradition began that I, well…I didn’t play any new games. Sure, I did play a lot of games. Just none that were released…

Listmas 2025: Five False Starts Worth Revisiting

Like most folks who play video games, I maintain a perennial backlog of games that I want to play…someday. In recent years, a growing portion of my backlog is becoming populated with games that I started but never finished. Sometime me and the game at hand didn’t click; other times, I dropped these titles in…

Listmas 2025: Ranking the Bosses of Kingdom Hearts

As you can no doubt tell, I’m in a big Kingdom Hearts mood, which means I’m ending my Listmas posts with yet another KH list! Today, I’ll be ranking the boss battles from the first game, ranging from the absolute worst to the most fun. Pretty simple, right? Except, since there are so many bosses,…

Listmas 2025: Top Songs from Games Played This Year

One of the newest additions to my music roster is a playlist of favorite songs from games. It’s something that was a long time coming, too! I listen to gaming soundtracks regularly, but until recently, I had never put together a playlist of individual songs from them that stood out from the rest. It contains…

Listmas 2025: Ranking KH2.5’s Data Battles

Keeping with the Kingdom Hearts theme, I have been playing the Final Mix versions of the first two numbered games in the series, which features new boss fights, including battles against the members of Organization XIII who had originally appeared (and perished) in Chain of Memories. This is great because I never enjoyed CoM’s card-based…

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #422

Up this week: Happy holidays from all of us here at Virtual Bastion! YouTube Highlights is taking a small vacation over the next two weeks and will return in the new year on January 9, 2026. Join us then for lots more gaming goodness! Connect: wegameunited@gmail.comWatch: YouTube ~ Video BastionShop: Spreadshirt

Listmas 2025: Four Flaws Applied (and One I’m Trying for) in The Outer Worlds 2

Whenever I play an RPG, especially for the first time, I tend to err on the sides of advantage and power when it comes to skills. That’s to say, I pick skills/abilities/etc. that will give my character a leg up in battle and make them the most powerful person in the room. This means I’ll…

Listmas 2025: Kingdom Hearts 2 World Ranking

Last week, I wrote a world ranking about the very first Kingdom Hearts game, and now it’s time to cover its even more impressive sequel, the aptly named Kingdom Hearts 2. This game has some really good worlds…and some really dull ones. I’ll be ranking these based off of everything, the general theming, the story,…

YouTube Highlights, Weekly Edition #421

Up this week: Connect: wegameunited@gmail.comWatch: YouTube ~ Video BastionShop: Spreadshirt

Listmas 2025: Top Spots in skate.

If someone had told me six months ago that one of my most-played games of the last quarter of 2025 would be a skateboarding game, I’d have called them crazy. And yet, it’s true! I’m talking about the new and not-without-controversy title, skate. Released by EA in mid-September, skate. is a live-service, online game that’s…

Listmas 2025: Kingdom Hearts World Ranking

One of my favorite game series of all time is Kingdom Hearts, a mashup of Disney and Final Fantasy that is surprisingly deep and works far better than you’d expect. With memorable characters and lore that rivals that of Five Nights at Freddy’s, the first two numbered games of the series in particular will always…

The Jumping Donut: Demo Review

I don’t usually do much research when I download demos. They’re free, so there’s really nothing to lose but a little bit of time. With that said, I didn’t expect much from The Jumping Donut, and I didn’t get much, either. I guess I’d kind of describe this game as a puzzle-platformer. As the name…

Happy Home Paradise is any Budding Interior Decorator’s Dream

Animal Crossing: Happy Home Paradise is the DLC for New Horizons for the Switch. The premise is simple. You get a job on a tropical island separate from your own, where you design vacation homes for various animal clients you meet on the island. After picking a location amongst various settings, including mountains, sandy beaches,…

Cozy Grove is Like Animal Crossing with a Plot

Cozy Grove is, to put it simply, kind of like Animal Crossing, but with a greater emphasis on story. You play as a Spirit Scout and must help out the ghostly bears that inhabit the island by completing various fetch quests for them. Along the way, you’ll feed your sentient campfire Flamey with logs to…

Unravel 2’s Smooth Gameplay is Unravelled by a Weak Story

The original Unravel was a sweet and unique platformer where you play as a little creature named Yarny (made from yarn, as the name suggests) who can solve puzzles and traverse photo-realistic environments (spanning natural Swedish landscapes to industrial locations) using yarn. You can swing from yarn, make bridges with yarn, and even make trampolines…

Spooktober: Animal Crossing’s Tarantula and Scorpion Islands

The last game you’d expect to be discussed during Spooktober is most assuredly the cute and relaxing life sim, Animal Crossing. After all, what could possibly be scary about decorating your house or meeting new animal friends? Well, ever since the franchise’s debut on the Nintendo GameCube, there has been one, no, make that two…

Spooktober: The Many Traumas of Outer Wilds

Outer Wilds is a fantastic game where you discover the mysteries of your galaxy, while a supernova occurs every 22 minutes. (And time travel is involved or else it would be a very short game indeed). Nothing else can truly compare, making this one of my favorite games of all time. There’s just one teensy,…

Spooktober: Just How Far Will the Aberrations in Dredge Spread?

Whereas some horror games have you getting chased by terrifying monstrosities that scream and moan as they shuffle or outright bolt after you, the horror of Dredge is far more understated. In fact, the game could almost appear relaxing on the surface. You play as a new fisherman who just moved to the island of…

Spooktober: The Time Hogwarts Legacy Turned Into a Horror Movie

Hogwarts Legacy is a massive Harry Potter RPG that I played off and on for roughly a year, spanning 80+ hours. The world of Harry Potter is, undoubtedly, a spooky one indeed, with giant spiders (the acromantula is just the worst!), undead inferi, super sus dark magic, and lots of ghosts and poltergeists. To my…

Barely Scratching the Surface of Undertale Easter Eggs

Undertale was groundbreaking in its time. A game that broke the mold, where you had the potential to spare every enemy instead of fighting them. Filled with lovable characters that you may or may not have chosen to massacre depending on the route you were taking, this game also boasted a jarring mix of quirky…

Hat’s GotY 2025: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33

Yup, Sandfall Interactive’s Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 continues to collect Game of the Year picks, even from small time bloggers like myself. I guess this was always going to be the outcome too, now that I think about it. This wasn’t exactly a super stacked year in terms of game releases, you know? I think…

There’s No News, So Let’s Talk About Skate Story Instead!

One great thing about the end of the year is that there’s not much news to deal with. Yeah there’s still the ongoing RAM shortage stuff and all, but not a lot of new game or business announcements. We are all, for the most part, collectively chilling, which is something that I really enjoy about…

Listmas 2025: Five Consoles That Felt Like Magic

I’m more or less current with my game equipment and enjoy it all quite a bit, but this time of year has a way of turning my attention towards and the game consoles of yesteryear. I don’t always revisit these the past systems every time December rolls around, but I still think of them and…

Xbox Series Outsells…the Sega Genesis

Yeah. The Xbox Series systems have (only just) out sold the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive. This, ah, news was brought forward by VGChartz.com, which reports that the Xbox Series X/S has sold around 34.10 million units during its lifetime so far. For comparison, the Sega Genesis / Mega Drive sold 34.06 million over the course of…

Listmas 2025: My Favorite Levels for Donkey Kong December

It’s not officially Donkey Kong December here at Virtual Bastion, but it’s something I wind up observing on my own every year regardless. Well, it’s more like “retro” Donkey Kong December now, as those are the games that pull me back year after year. It’s not necessarily that I play all the old games all…