Disney Dreamlight Valley: Wishblossom Ranch Deluxe Edition, Now With Horses

DLC Review · Purchased November 21, 2025 · $71.67 CAD via Xbox.com

Key art for Disney Dreamlight Valley: Wishblossom Ranch Deluxe Edition
Disney Dreamlight Valley: Wishblossom Ranch. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Background

Following last year’s Storybook Vale expansion, Wishblossom Ranch takes Dreamlight Valley’s formula in a horse-focused direction, sending players to the Wishblossom Mountains to restore a neglected ranch affected by a mysterious phenomenon called the Decay, while befriending iconic Disney steeds like Maximus, Khan, and Pegasus alongside characters including Snow White and Tinker Bell. The Deluxe Edition adds 10,000 Moonstones and exclusive items, including Mount Sven from Frozen.

Living With It

This is a bigger swing than last year’s expansion, which mostly extended the existing formula with new realms and character storylines. Building out an entire horse-focused ranch, complete with new companion mechanics for riding and caring for named Disney steeds, gives this expansion a distinct identity of its own rather than feeling like the same core loop with a new coat of paint, which was my main criticism of Storybook Vale.

Mount Sven specifically is a fun, well-realized inclusion for anyone with fondness for Frozen, and the Decay storyline gives the new area a bit more narrative stakes than the average Dreamlight Valley content drop, without straying too far from the game’s fundamentally cozy tone. The Deluxe Edition’s Moonstone allotment is generous enough that it meaningfully offsets the price difference over the standard edition if you were going to spend on cosmetics anyway.

The core loop is still recognizably the same farming, decorating, and friendship-building systems that have defined the game since launch, and whether that’s a positive or a negative at this point depends entirely on how much of that loop you’ve already gotten out of the base game and its prior expansions.

What I Liked

  • Horse and ranch focus gives this expansion a more distinct identity than last year’s
  • Mount Sven and the other Frozen-themed exclusives are a genuine highlight
  • The Decay storyline adds a bit more narrative weight than usual
  • Deluxe Moonstone allotment offsets the price gap if you’d spend on cosmetics anyway

What I Didn’t

  • Core gameplay loop remains fundamentally unchanged from the base game
  • Value depends heavily on how much of the existing formula you’ve already played through

The Value Verdict

Rating: 4/5

A stronger, more distinct expansion than last year’s, thanks largely to the horse-focused hook actually changing up the moment-to-moment gameplay rather than just adding more of the same map to explore.

Where to Buy

PowerWash Simulator 2: Same Great Grime, Better Toolkit

Game Review · Purchased October 23, 2025 · $37.50 CAD via PSN

Key art for PowerWash Simulator 2
PowerWash Simulator 2. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Setup

After an entire year of buying nearly every crossover pack the original PowerWash Simulator put out, picking up the actual sequel felt less like a purchase and more like an inevitability. The sequel drops the fictional town of Muckingham on players, with new locations including Sponge Valley, Power Falls, and Lubri City to scrub clean.

The Review

The core loop is exactly as satisfying as it’s always been, which is the correct instinct for a game this beloved for its simplicity, but the sequel adds real mechanical texture rather than just reskinning the original with new levels. Multi-stage jobs give individual cleaning tasks more structure than the original’s more single-note approach, and new tools like an abseiling rig and a cherry picker open up verticality that the first game never really had a good answer for.

The bigger structural change is multiplayer: split-screen co-op alongside online play for up to four people turns what was always a solo, meditative experience into something you can genuinely share with friends or family, and it works well without disrupting the low-stakes, relaxing tone that made the original a hit in the first place. Small additions like a customizable home base and a cat companion are the kind of low-effort, high-charm touches that this series has always been good at.

Coming off a year of buying five separate crossover packs for the original, this sequel makes a genuinely strong case that it will be worth doing the same thing all over again once its own crossover content starts arriving.

What I Liked

  • Core cleaning loop remains as satisfying as ever, with real new mechanical depth
  • New tools like the abseiling rig and cherry picker add welcome verticality
  • Split-screen and online co-op meaningfully expand how the game can be played
  • Small charm additions like the customizable home base and cat companion

What I Didn’t

  • Still fundamentally the same core loop as the original, for better or worse
  • No crossover content yet at launch, which was a huge part of what kept the first game interesting all year

The Verdict

Rating: 4/5

A genuine improvement on a game that didn’t strictly need fixing, and the new co-op options alone make this an easy recommendation for anyone who enjoyed the original with a friend looking over their shoulder.

Where to Buy

Dying Light: The Beast, A Standalone Sequel That Earns Its Own Name

Game Review · Purchased October 18, 2025 · $89.59 CAD via PSN

Key art for Dying Light: The Beast
Dying Light: The Beast. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Setup

Originally planned as DLC for Dying Light 2 before growing into a full standalone release, The Beast follows Kyle Crane, the protagonist of the original Dying Light, now carrying both human and zombie DNA after years of captivity and experimentation. Set in the new, zombie-infested valley of Castor Woods, it blends the series’ trademark first-person parkour with a new dual playstyle built around Crane’s monstrous abilities, plus up to four-player co-op.

The Review

The parkour, the series’ defining strength since the original game, feels as good here as it ever has, fluid traversal across a genuinely well laid out map that rewards momentum and vertical thinking over just running in straight lines. Bringing back Crane specifically, rather than a new protagonist, gives the story a sense of continuity the more recent mainline entry sometimes lacked, and the new beast abilities add a satisfying second layer to combat that goes beyond the usual crafting-and-melee loop.

Castor Woods as a setting strikes a good balance between the series’ urban roots and something a little more open and rural, giving traversal a different rhythm than the tightly packed cityscapes of past entries without losing what made the movement systems fun in the first place. Whether this fully justifies growing from planned DLC into a full-price standalone release is a fair question, but the amount of new content and the strength of Crane’s return make a reasonable case for it.

What I Liked

  • Parkour and traversal remain the series’ strongest asset, and it shows here
  • Bringing back Kyle Crane gives real narrative continuity
  • New beast abilities add a genuinely fresh layer to combat
  • Castor Woods is a well-designed change of pace from past settings

What I Didn’t

  • Started life as DLC, and the full-price ask reflects some growing pains from that transition
  • Newcomers without prior series context may miss some of Crane’s return’s emotional weight

The Verdict

Rating: 4/5

For longtime Dying Light fans, this is an easy recommendation, sharp parkour, a satisfying new combat layer, and a genuinely welcome return for Crane. Worth checking current pricing before buying, since it launched at a premium for what began life as an expansion.

Where to Buy

Destiny 2: Year of Prophecy Collector’s Edition, A Statue That Finally Justified the Price

Toys & Collectibles Review · Purchased May 6, 2025 · $434.16 CAD ($315.00 USD) via Bungie.net

The Destiny 2: Year of Prophecy Collector's Edition contents, including the Guardian classes statue
The Year of Prophecy Collector’s Edition contents. Photo: Vice

The Background

After last year’s Final Shape Collector’s Edition left me with mixed feelings about Bungie’s physical tiers, I pre-ordered the Year of Prophecy Collector’s Edition anyway, tied to the launch of The Edge of Fate and the start of a new saga for the game. This one includes a 1/8th scale resin and PVC statue of the three Guardian classes in their classic super poses on a weighted, logo-etched base, a “classified documents” folder of in-universe letters and diary entries building out the expansion’s backstory, and a metal badge styled like something out of a secret government operative’s collection.

At $315 USD before conversion, this sits close to last year’s Final Shape edition in price, which made it a useful direct comparison point for whether Bungie’s collector’s editions are trending up or down in quality.

Living With It

The statue is the clear centrepiece, and it earns that role. All three Guardian classes rendered together in their classic super poses gives it a sense of scale and occasion that a single-figure statue wouldn’t have managed, and the paint work holds up well under close inspection, with battle wear and armor detailing that reads as deliberate rather than sloppy. The weighted base, etched with Guardian phrases and logos, gives the whole piece the kind of finished, gallery-shelf presentation that last year’s Final Shape statue mostly delivered too, but this one felt like a genuine step up in sculpt quality.

The classified documents folder is a nice bit of world-building for anyone invested in the Edge of Fate storyline, letters and diary entries that reward reading rather than just being packaging filler, and the metal badge is a small but well-made touch that fits the espionage angle of this year’s narrative. Taken together, this is a collector’s edition that feels like it was actually designed as a themed set rather than three unrelated bonus items bundled under one price tag.

The same caveat from last year’s review still applies in full: none of this means anything without existing investment in Destiny’s world and characters. The documents only land if you care about the lore they’re building, and the statue only justifies its price if seeing your classes rendered this way actually matters to you.

What I Liked

  • The three-class statue is a genuine step up in sculpt and paint quality over last year’s edition
  • Classified documents folder is well-written world-building, not just filler
  • Cohesive theming across all three physical items rather than a grab-bag of extras
  • A noticeably stronger collector’s edition than the one I reviewed last year

What I Didn’t

  • Still entirely dependent on prior investment in the franchise to justify the price
  • Pre-ordering physical collector’s editions remains a leap of faith on final quality
  • At $315 USD, this is a serious purchase even for a longtime player

The Value Verdict

Rating: 5/5

This is the collector’s edition I wanted last year’s Final Shape tier to be: a cohesive, well-sculpted, genuinely display-worthy set rather than a handful of loosely related extras. Still strictly for existing Guardians, but for that audience, it delivers.

Where to Buy

PlayStation Plus Essential: The 12-Month Plan I Should Have Bought Last Year

DLC Review · Purchased February 21, 2025 · $106.39 CAD via PSN

PlayStation Plus Essential tier artwork
PlayStation Plus Essential. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Setup

After reviewing last year’s single-month PS Plus Essential top-up and explicitly calling out how much worse the per-month math was compared to the annual plan, I actually followed my own advice this time and bought the full 12-month Essential subscription upfront.

The Review

The service itself is unchanged from last year’s review: online multiplayer access and a rotating monthly selection of free games, delivered exactly as advertised without incident. What’s different is purely the math, and the math is genuinely better here. Paying once for the full year works out to meaningfully less per month than the single-month purchase I made in December, which is the whole reason this review exists as a kind of quiet correction to last year’s entry.

There isn’t much drama to a subscription renewal done correctly. It’s the boring, sensible version of the same purchase, and boring and sensible is exactly what you want from a recurring cost like this.

What I Liked

  • Meaningfully cheaper per month than paying monthly, exactly as expected
  • Same reliable online access and monthly game claims as always
  • A rare case of actually taking my own advice from a previous review

What I Didn’t

  • A larger upfront cost, even though the per-month value is better
  • Locks you in for a full year rather than leaving room to cancel if your habits change

The Verdict

Rating: 4/5

If you use PS Plus regularly, this is simply the correct way to buy it. Nothing new to report on the service itself, just a smarter purchase than the one-month top-up from last year’s list.

Where to Buy

The MOC-56649 Modular Tatooine: The Biggest Single Build I’ve Ever Attempted

Toys & Collectibles Review · Purchased January 15, 2025 · $788.51 CAD via Vonado

The MOC-56649 Modular Tatooine City Space Wars build, an 18-building modular Star Wars diorama
MOC-56649 Modular Tatooine City Space Wars. Photo: LetBricks

The Background

MOC-56649, designed by fan builder gabizon, is a modular Tatooine cityscape built from 18 separate buildings that connect into one continuous Star Wars street scene, at a claimed 9,585 pieces and a finished footprint of roughly 60cm by 40cm. It is, by a wide margin, the single largest build I have ever taken on, easily eclipsing last year’s Star Destroyer for sheer part count.

Kicking off 2025’s spending with a purchase this size was either a bold statement of intent or a sign I never really learned my lesson from the 2024 Vonado hauls. Given how this list is shaping up already, I suspect it’s a bit of both.

Living With It

Eighteen individual buildings sounds like it would make this build more approachable, broken into bite-sized chunks rather than one continuous slog, and in practice that’s mostly true, each structure is its own manageable session. Where the scale really hits you is once several buildings are finished and sitting next to each other on the table: this is not a shelf piece, it is closer to a diorama that needs its own dedicated surface, full stop.

Several of the buildings include opening panels and interior detailing, which is a nice touch that keeps a project this long from feeling like pure repetition, cantina interiors and market stalls tucked behind facades that look plain from the street side. Piece quality held up consistently across the full set, no obvious drop-off in tolerance or fit between the first building and the eighteenth, which is genuinely impressive at this scale from a compatible-brick manufacturer.

The honest tradeoff is time and space, in equal measure. This is not a project you finish in a weekend, or realistically in a single week if you have anything else going on, and once complete it demands a genuinely large, permanent display area that most people simply do not have sitting empty.

What I Liked

  • Modular structure makes an enormous build feel approachable one building at a time
  • Genuine interior detailing on several buildings, not just facades
  • Consistent piece quality across the entire 9,500-plus piece set
  • The most substantial single display piece in my whole collection once assembled

What I Didn’t

  • A genuinely enormous time commitment, easily multiple weeks of sessions
  • Requires a large, permanent display footprint most people don’t have available
  • The most expensive single item to open this year’s spreadsheet

The Value Verdict

Rating: 5/5

For anyone with the space and patience, this is one of the most ambitious and rewarding builds available in the compatible-brick space, official LEGO included. Just know exactly what you’re signing up for before you order it.

Where to Buy

PlayStation Plus Essential: 1 Month, The Subscription Top-Up That Taught Me a Lesson

DLC Review · Purchased December 19, 2024 · $13.43 CAD via PSN

PlayStation Plus Essential tier artwork
PlayStation Plus Essential. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Setup

A single month of PlayStation’s entry-level online subscription tier, required for online multiplayer access and monthly free game claims, purchased as a short-term top-up rather than a longer commitment.

The Review

There is genuinely not much to review about a subscription service doing exactly what a subscription service is supposed to do: it granted online access and monthly game claims for the month I paid for, without incident. The real lesson from this purchase is entirely about math rather than the service itself: paying month to month like this works out to meaningfully more per month than committing to PlayStation’s 12-month plan, which is a common subscription trap across basically every service in this category, not unique to PlayStation specifically.

What I Liked

  • Does exactly what it promises, no complaints about the service itself
  • Useful as a genuine short-term top-up if you only need a single month

What I Didn’t

  • Noticeably worse per-month value than committing to a longer subscription term
  • Easy to accidentally overpay if you use PS Plus regularly but keep buying single months out of habit

The Verdict

Rating: 3/5

Only makes sense as a genuine short-term top-up. If you use PS Plus regularly, the 12-month plan is meaningfully cheaper per month than paying monthly the way I did here.

Where to Buy

Life is Strange: Double Exposure, A Solid Sequel That Does Not Quite Match the Original

Game Review · Purchased December 22, 2024 · $44.99 CAD via EB Games

Key art for Life is Strange: Double Exposure
Life is Strange: Double Exposure. Photo: PlayStation Store

The Setup

Double Exposure catches up with original Life is Strange protagonist Max Caulfield years after the first game, swapping the original’s time-rewind mechanic for a new parallel-timeline system: rather than rewinding a single reality, Max can shift her perception between two diverging versions of the same moment.

The Review

Having replayed the Remastered Collection earlier in the year specifically to prepare for this, I went in about as primed as a player can be, and the writing and voice work that made the original resonate are clearly still present here: grounded character moments, a strong sense of place, and performances that carry a lot of emotional weight. Where reception, and my own experience, landed more mixed was the central mystery plot and the new parallel-timeline mechanic itself, which several reviewers and I both felt was less tightly constructed than the elegant simplicity of the original’s rewind power.

It is a game that clearly wanted to evolve the formula rather than just repeat it, and I respect that instinct even where the execution did not fully land for me the way the original did over a decade of hindsight and cultural conversation behind it.

What I Liked

  • Strong writing and voice performances consistent with the series’ reputation
  • New setting and older Max give the story fresh emotional territory to explore
  • Genuine attempt to evolve rather than repeat the original’s mechanics

What I Didn’t

  • New parallel-timeline mechanic feels less tightly constructed than the original’s rewind system
  • Central mystery plot underwhelmed compared to the series’ past narrative highs
  • Best appreciated with real prior investment in the series

The Verdict

Rating: 3/5

For existing fans of the series, this is a worthwhile continuation, but if you are new to Life is Strange, start with the Remastered Collection first rather than jumping straight into this one.

Where to Buy

The Casting of Frank Stone: A Well-Made Detour Into Dead by Daylight’s Universe

DLC Review · Purchased December 21, 2024 · $41.93 CAD via PSN

Key art for The Casting of Frank Stone
The Casting of Frank Stone. Photo: Steam

The Setup

A standalone narrative horror game set within the Dead by Daylight universe, developed by Supermassive Games in the same branching-choice, cinematic style that defines their Dark Pictures Anthology work.

The Review

The Supermassive DNA is unmistakable throughout: strong atmosphere, solid voice acting, and a branching-choice structure that gives individual playthroughs a genuine sense of consequence. As the last purchase of my entire 2024 spreadsheet, it closed the year on a reasonably strong note, atmospherically at least. Where reception, including my own reaction, landed more mixed was on how well the story actually capitalized on its connection to Dead by Daylight’s established lore, several reviewers felt the link to that wider universe was more surface-level connective tissue than a substantive deep dive worth the price of entry for existing Dead by Daylight fans specifically hoping for real lore payoff.

What I Liked

  • Strong atmosphere and voice acting consistent with Supermassive’s other work
  • Branching choices give real weight to individual playthroughs
  • A solid horror narrative on its own terms

What I Didn’t

  • Connection to Dead by Daylight’s lore feels more surface-level than substantive
  • General narrative-horror fans without franchise attachment may want to wait for a discount

The Verdict

Rating: 3/5

Reasonable for horror and Dead by Daylight fans specifically looking for more narrative context on that universe, general narrative-game fans may want to wait for a sale before jumping in.

Where to Buy

PS5 Pro: The Most Expensive Way to Notice a Frame Rate

Hardware Review · Purchased December 9, 2024 · $1,075.18 CAD via EB Games

PlayStation 5 Pro console
The PS5 Pro. Photo via Best Buy Canada.

This was the single biggest console purchase of my year, and it is also the one I have gone back and forth on the most while writing about it.

The Background

Sony announced the PS5 Pro in September 2024 with Canadian pricing set at $959.99 before tax, positioning it as a mid-generation refresh rather than a true next console: better and more consistent ray tracing, higher and steadier frame rates in supported titles, and a beefed-up GPU, all while keeping the same basic PS5 software ecosystem and game library rather than starting over. It also ships with a built-in 2TB SSD, up from the base model’s smaller drive, which mattered to me given how quickly modern installs eat through storage.

I picked mine up at EB Games in early December, and the total I paid ($1,075.18) reflects tax plus whatever accessory or bundle got attached at checkout on top of that base $959.99 price. By the time I bought in, launch week chaos had settled and stock was reasonably available, which was one small mercy in an otherwise expensive month.

Living With It

The honest starting point here is that the PS5 Pro is a real, measurable upgrade, but only in games that specifically support its enhancements. Sony calls this “PS5 Pro Enhanced,” and through the back half of 2024 that list was still filling in rather than covering the full library. In supported titles, the difference is genuinely noticeable: steadier frame rates during busy scenes, meaningfully improved ray-traced reflections and lighting, and in some cases the ability to run performance-mode frame rates at what used to be quality-mode resolution. In anything outside that enhanced list, you are playing the exact same experience as a base PS5, just on more expensive hardware.

The built-in 2TB drive is a genuinely welcome quality-of-life improvement on its own, and it means less immediate pressure to add an internal expansion drive the way base PS5 owners often need to.

Where this purchase gets harder to defend is the price-to-benefit math. Going from a base PS5 to a PS5 Pro costs roughly the same as buying a second console, for improvements that, outside of enhanced titles, you will not notice at all during actual play. This is squarely a purchase for people who already care about frame pacing, resolution, and ray tracing fidelity at a level most casual players simply do not track moment to moment.

What I Liked

  • Noticeably better and steadier performance in PS5 Pro Enhanced titles
  • Meaningfully improved ray tracing quality where supported
  • Built-in 2TB SSD solves the storage anxiety base PS5 owners deal with
  • No ecosystem changes, every existing game and save just works

What I Didn’t

  • Enhanced title support was still incomplete through the back half of 2024
  • No visible benefit at all in non-enhanced games, which is most of the existing library
  • At over $1,000 CAD out the door, this is priced like a luxury upgrade, not a necessary one
  • Requires you to already own or be replacing a base PS5, so the real cost comparison is steep

The Value Verdict

Rating: 3/5

I do not regret this purchase, but I also cannot recommend it to everyone. If you are the kind of player who genuinely notices frame pacing dips and resolution compromises, and you have the specific games in your rotation that support the Pro enhancements, this delivers real, tangible improvement. If you are a more casual player, save the money and put it toward the games themselves.

Where to Buy