Gnosia is a game that's going to test your deduction skills, imagination, and ability to lie like a cheap rug. It's a game that I will definitely keep around if I want to knock off a quick loop on a break, or even if I need to warm up for the next time I have tasks to do on stream. Don't cold sleep on it.
Maybe it's because of my age, but Crimzon Clover: World Explosion is one of the non-Ring Fit games where I felt exhausted after a session. It's surprisingly demanding if you're not used to these kinds of space shooters. I can see why the hardcore fans eat this game up, and it's a very well designed game. It's just not something I'd recommend for relaxing after a tough day at work.
The Famicom Detective Club has the feel of a modern adventure game, even if the gameplay still dates back to a time when I was in grade school. It's well voiced, looks great, and is a good if brief ride that shouldn't tire you out before we fall back in time about a century and a half in a couple of months.
That said, Stories 2 might end up being the game I get the closest to a "perfect game" in. There's plenty to play with here, and honestly I'd like to double back and check out the original to fill in some of the gaps in the story. This JRPG July is off to a pretty good start.
Although it's coming out at a packed time of year, Neon White should definitely be on the radar of Switch owners. Whether trying to stay ahead of the story, ripping off a stage or two in between games, or trying to shave a few hundredths of a second off your level time to get up the leaderboards, there's always an excuse to shoot up heaven.
Now that it's been cleaned up, Norn9: Var Commons is one of the stronger romance novel entries on Switch. With a neat plot, no time to get bored with a suitor because there's still plenty to go, and just enough hints to guess where the common ending will go, it'll be worth some time heading to meet The World.
undefined.The common Gloomhaven community standard is to keep things secret - particularly the per-map side quests, which the game only reveals at the end of the map - so the Switch is fundamentally a great platform to play the digital version on. It can kill a lot of time; each map takes about 45 minutes to an hour, even with or perhaps because I was playing with someone who knew how to manipulate the AI. But I never felt the game dragged at all, and would vastly prefer this digital copy to having to schlep around something bigger than every game console I've ever owned.
I never got into Mario + Rabbids despite multiple attempts, mostly due to the Rabbids, but throwing characters I care about into this formula worked really well for me. Persona 5 Tactica is certainly the most replayable Persona game in years for someone who doesn't try to see every romance option, and if Atlus can get out from the crunch for Persona 3 Reload to fix up the load times this could be a sleeper for best strategy game on Switch.
If I had written the review after I had cleared Day 1, I would have been ready to give Badlands some awards. The frustration of the later levels and all the level skipping that I did to see if it would improve really left a sour taste in my mouth. There's a really good game here, just know your frustration point and be ready to jump out when it gets there.
I'm glad that I got to see the series through to the end. Though it answered some of the questions I had while replaying the prior games, the execution of Zero Time Dilemma itself has some rough patches and relying on our message boards/GameFAQs/other places of ill repute is going to cause a lot of problems for those playing it day one. If you haven't played the two prequels, at least play Virtue's Last Reward first.
Baseball Stars 2 is a solid contender for now while the Super Mega Baseball series avoids starting its service time clock.
Noitu Love seems like it could easily fit on the Sega Genesis if someone retrofitted a touch screen into the controller. A great game is nestled inside of this package, but some of the quality of life deficits that may have been acceptable in the Genesis days are a bit of a sore spot now. Still, there’s not a lot like it on Wii U so it’s worth taking for a spin.
Mixing brawler and role-playing aspects is a common design choice, but River City: Tokyo Rumble veers far closer to the brawler side. It’ll be over quickly, but so was the original. A few little things keep this from being an all-time classic, but it’s a fun break from the heavy role-playing games the 3DS has had this year. This is one trip to the Far East worth hopping on.
With the big Nintendo-related hack and slash franchises (Fire Emblem and Hyrule Warriors) already present on Switch, the Fate/EXTELLA titles don't usually get a lot of attention. But the Fate series is sneakily popular, largely due to the popularity of the Grand Order mobile game, and fans of Fate will find a good time here. For everyone else, your enjoyment of Fate/EXTELLA: LINK will largely depend on your tolerance for anime stereotypes.
They've addressed a few complaints about the game, especially in handheld mode for me, which is pretty impressive for a year and a half turnaround between games. If the initial load and maps themselves weren't so long as to make it a chore to play in bursts, this could be an all timer. It's not a general, but sometimes you need staff sergeants.
If you're down with all sorts of in-jokes and spent way too much time online in the late 2000s, you probably already picked up Treachery in Beatdown City. If you're still on the fence, it's a brisk experience with a unique style of gameplay, and the dialogue is as skippable as you need it to be. It's a good debut game from a studio I'll be keeping an eye on going forward.
If you've got any doubts about visual novels in general, Root Double isn't the best starting point on Switch. The structure is going to be intimidating at first, and the environment is as oppressive as the design suggests. But if you've gone and turned a Switch Lite into a visual novel reader, Root Double will keep you up late at night trying to get to that next ending.
A lot of people missed Tadpole Treble the first time around, but it's definitely worth doubling back to now that it's been rescued and brought to Switch. There will be moments of frustration (thanks, piranha) but I spent more time smiling and bouncing to the music than I have in most of the games I've played in the last year.
Suda-written games have a lot of author appeal in them; the wrestling fandom (he used to write story modes for Fire Pro Wrestling games), violence, and language are definitely Grasshopper trademarks. The Silver Case 2425 puts it into a unique package, and it's worth digging into if you're already predisposed to digging into some good mysteries. Just maybe play with headphones and not in front of younger people.
There's been a fair few games where I've thought about the events of the game for a while afterwards. Maybe it's my choice of romance games, but Olympia Soiree is the first time the good route of a game still caused me to have a nightmare when I went to sleep that night. If you're ready to deal with this kind of story, then take the plunge.