Look, it’s been six years. We don’t need to beat around the bush or hedge any longer. Stardew Valley was a phenomenal game that had an enormous cultural impact on gaming and the indie scene in general. You might be about to point out that this is not the game I am reviewing today, and
Despite what seems to have become de rigeur for the gaming industry, making a game a roguelike is not actually cruise control for making it a game with endless content. In fact, I can think of a lot of games lately that have tried to keep themselves engaging by making themselves into roguelikes when neither
For better or for worse – probably worse – the late 80s into the early 90s were a real time that actually happened. Some of us lived through them. And there was a time, perhaps not so long ago in memory, when there was a real sense of a sun-drenched lush paradise ruled over by
I do not, to this day, remember how I first learned about Recettear. But it remains, years later, one of my favorite games and an absolute delight to play through front-to-back. Sure, most of the characters were broad archetypes rather than being well-developed individuals with rich inner lives, and it was clearly a small title
Despite what it may seem like, I am actually not an enormous Fire Emblem fan. I am, however, an absolutely unreserved massive fan of Fire Emblem: Three Houses. This isn’t to say that I traditionally have disliked Nintendo’s long-running second-party series of strategy RPGs, just that they have rarely risen above “well, that was fun
First and foremost, I think it’s important to look at Power Chord as it presents itself compared to what Power Chord actually is. Because I believe that it’s easy to get swept up in the game’s presentation in such a way that you lose sight of the fact that the game itself is actually simpler
If you’ve been reading my reviews for a while, you have probably noticed by this point that I periodically make a point of picking a game up that I am in no way qualified to review. This would be one of those times, because quite frankly? If there’s one genre I tend to actively dislike,
Oh, hello there! Welcome, welcome, everyone, it’s so good to see you here! We’re happy to welcome you to this unprecedented moment of gaming journalism excellence, because it’s high time – high past time, some might say – to welcome you to Gamer Escape’s Review of The Stanley Parable Ultra Deluxe! At long last, you,
It takes very little effort – bordering on no effort – to get me interested in the prospect of a cat cafe. My two cats are two of the most important living things on the planet to me, and I love cats in general. They’re stupid furry pillows full of knives who vibrate and make
Let me tell you, one of the best feelings of being a reviewer is when you get your first impressions of a title from screenshots, video, and early release info… and you’re wrong. See, the thing is (and this is a deep secret of being a game reviewer) that when you’ve played a lot of
On January 28th, 1998, Square-Enix released Final Fantasy Tactics to a North American audience. People who played that game have spent twenty-four years looking for more. I open with that because I feel it’s very important to note my biases at the very least. When I first heard about Triangle Strategy my immediate dream was
So, confession time. I am terrible at real-time strategy games. I know this intellectually, but I also know that every time it comes up I’m drawn to them like a moth to a flame. I can’t help it. Ever since I played Warcraft II I have a deep-seated need for these games to be shot
You know what series is deceptively difficult to make work? Mega Man. The thing about the Mega Man franchise and its derivations is that all of them are based upon a rather simple template. You go around and fight a few bosses, acquiring weapons from each of them, then you go through a fortress stage
I swear to whatever deities you care to name, there was a time when “action RPG” did not mean that you were making a game specifically to take on Dark Souls. And I’m going to be honest here when I say that the flood of these particular titles is starting to wear on me. Now,
Here’s the thing about any kind of gaming chair – it’s simultaneously one of the least important and most important decisions that you’re going to make when it comes to your personal setup. On the one hand, well, it’s a chair. It’s a place to sit. It’s not a game, it doesn’t make your PC
I’m going to die. I don’t care about that. I care about what it means. It happens. I consider myself decent at video games, and I rarely get particularly angry with games. It’s part of my job. Sure, it might be a bit annoying to get stunlocked and killed, but there’s no reason to get
Before I begin this review in any sort of proper context, let me just say how I am deeply and personally wounded by the fact that this title is not Educator’s Creed. I thought of that joke when I was first told that this was a thing to be reviewed and I am, in hindsight,
The thing that you have to understand about Actraiser is that it’s a classic game that is at the same time so unique it’s never really had a proper sequel. (Yes, I’m aware there’s an Actraiser 2, I’ll get to that.) The game is already a blend of two different genres in a melange of
This is a weird review for me to be writing. Not in the sense that it has to be a negative one or anything like that, but in the sense that this is the first time that I’ve reviewed a game I previously previewed. As soon as it was clear we would be getting a
Here’s the hidden secret about Metallic Child: It is perhaps best understood not by what it claims to be on the cover but by a series of otherwise ornate references to other games. At a glance, this game is a roguelite, and indeed that’s what it claims to be right on the cover when you
