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
While I tend to lean more towards fantasy over science fiction in video games, there has been the odd franchise or two with the latter type of setting that I’ve gotten into. The Metroid series comes to mind here, along with some sci-fi based shooters. Bearing in mind the relatively neutral perspective I have on
Few games have been as much of a roller coaster for me as Weird West. What first caught my attention was the developer, Wolfeye Studios, being made of former Arkane Studios developers. Weird West is also an immersive sim just like Arkane’s previous titles Dishonored and Prey, but this time departing from the usual first-person
At the tail end of last September, I had the opportunity to check out the demo for Young Souls, a previously Stadia-exclusive beat ‘em up developed by 1P2P and published by The Arcade Crew. By and large, the general takeaway from my several hours with it was an exceedingly positive one, and I found myself
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,
In October of 2017, German developer Piranha Bytes asked a question: “What would an open-world RPG that mixed worldbuilding elements of both fantasy and science fiction look like?” The provided answer to this question was ELEX, an acronym representing the words Eclectic, Lavish, Exhilarating, and Xenial.
There’s nothing quite like a good beat ’em up. Tricks of the trade guarantee things like fast-paced action, in-depth combat, and side-scrolling mayhem, with aesthetic flourish typically being the cherry on top. When a developer can successfully integrate all four of these elements into a cohesive whole, it’s easy to find yourself with a pretty
It’s hard to review major DLC for the Assassin’s Creed games. I noted this back when I was reviewing the first piece of major post-launch DLC for Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, since on a simple level you have the fundamental problem of taking a very big game and giving you more stuff to do in it.
So here it is, the sequel. It’s not exactly a mystery that The World Ends With You became a cult hit on its release, and with good cause. It wasn’t just that it had a very different setting than normal, setting itself in the beating heart of a stylized version of Shibuya with a cast
After playing the current early access build for Lost Epic, I have mixed feelings. Or perhaps more accurately, my feelings about the game varied a lot depending on whether I was at a part of the game that felt particularly polished or one that still felt like it had most of the game’s rough edges
The problem of expanding a game in the Assassin’s Creed series, at this point, is that usually the base game is already so fully stuffed with stuff that it’s difficult to really see obvious places to go. Of the criticisms you could offer for Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, a lack of content was not one of
The thing about Yoko Taro games is that there’s nothing else quite like them. And that is, to a certain extent, the problem with Yoko Taro games, because among the things they traditionally haven’t been is very good. Drakengard was the first Taro game I played, and that was a janky mess that got widely
Nioh is one of those series I’ve been a big fan of that rarely seems to get the love it deserves. It takes a familiar action RPG formula and layers complexity after complexity onto it. It’s full of depth, interesting monsters, ties to historical figures in Japanese history… so of course I was excited when a
It’s always interesting to look back at a long running series and see how its changed through the years. Final Fantasy going from turn-based fighting to its “Active Time Battle” style, now experimenting with real-time nowadays. The Tales series taking the same basic battle engine and putting new spins on it with each new entry.
Chronos was an oddball title when first released: A third-person action game released on a VR console. It’s now been released in a more accessible format for everyone who may have missed it the first time around. Released December 1st, 2020 for PC via Steam by Gunfire Games, Chronos: Before the Ashes is a remake
In a way, Morbid: The Seven Acolytes is a very simple game to review. This is a game somewhere on the greater Soulslike spectrum, so the question is just a matter of whether it succeeds on that spectrum or not. If you like that point on the spectrum and it works, you’ll like this. Simple!
The Assassin’s Creed series is, in some ways, kind of odd to review. You don’t need me to tell you that. The series has been going with a frankly astonishing regularity since 2007, and in some ways the games have wound up being a cross-section of the general gaming culture through the years. They’re also
The Ys series is an odd one in the annals of JRPGs. On the one hand, it is very much in the original school of these games, with the first installment coming out in 1987, and there was a definite push to bring it to North America. Unfortunately, due to a variety of different factors,
I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Matrioshka Games’ Fallen Angel, a top-down adventure game that, for better or worse, is a mix of nostalgic elements from yesteryear combined with newer design philosophies. Right from the word go, it’s clear they’re going for a nostalgic aesthetic. The graphics are detailed pixel-art and, while
In many ways, this game is the easiest game to review that I have ever been handed. Here is the review: Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning but with some improvements and a different subtitle that is no longer sensible English but some bizarre portmanteau. There. Review over. I am available for
