Alana Hagues's Reviews
Fantasian Neo Dimension is Hironobu Sakaguchi and Mistwalker at their boldest and bravest, culminating in a JRPG love letter that both delights and frustrates. The stunning world and exploration are a true highlight, and the challenging and rewarding combat will enchant some, but it lacks some of the magic that the game is aiming for and the pacing is uneven. Normal difficulty makes things more accessible for the curious, but make no mistake, this is an RPG for those who want to lose themselves in the mechanics.
That doesn’t change the fact that if you own Vampire Survivors, Ode to Castlevania is utterly essential. It’s easily the best DLC for the game, which acts as an incredible tribute to one of our favourite franchises while retaining and expanding on Vampire Survivors' endlessly addictive loop. The pile of secrets waiting for you is anything but miserable, and we guarantee you'll be gobsmacked.
The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom should be the new standard for top-down Zelda going forward. Rather than abandoning the classic formula, Zelda has shown that the old and the new can come together and produce wonderful results that reward experimentation and reinforce the joy of play. This is easily in contention with A Link to the Past and A Link Between Worlds as one of the best top-down adventures in the series, and we hope we don't need to wait another 35 years for Zelda to take a starring role again.
When everything comes together, Mika and the Witch's Mountain is definitely far from the worst witch – the premise is pleasant, the visuals and art are cute, and short runtime means there's no fat that needs trimming. But it's almost completely unmemorable at every turn. Delivering parcels as a witch should be fun, but lacklustre characters and too much back-and-forth make this delivery service simply adequate.
The Garden Path is a labour of love for both developer carrotcake and the player. It targets for a specific audience that is accepting of a slower pace and a soft, cosy vibe. Unfortunately, that meticulous, mellow life is both The Garden Path's selling point and its weakness, with vague directions, advice, and control issues on Switch weighing down the experience even more. The Garden Path may grow on you over time, but whether you have the patience for that will be the real test.
Arranger: A Role-Puzzling Adventure dares to be different, and it succeeds with aplomb. By interweaving a heartwarming and inclusive story with addictive gameplay, Furniture & Mattress teaches us that puzzle games can be more than just a vehicle for making the cogs in your brain turn. If you're looking for pure puzzling, then the game won't be for you, but a simple story and simple gameplay loop are both elevated to new heights because of the thought and care that's gone into them.
For 20 years, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door has been held as the best Mario RPG of all time, and the Switch remake proves it has earned that title. This is a fantastic RPG adventure, whether you're a Mario fan or not, with some best-in-class combat, brilliant writing, and a few little creases ironed out to make this the definitive way to play Thousand-Year Door. We wish there was a little more to do post-credits, but there's no doubt about it, this is a beautiful-looking Switch remake and a must-play RPG.
Even amidst a huge strategy RPG boom, Unicorn Overlord stands out. It's a smorgasbord of visual delights, intricate systems, and addictive gameplay loops that all come together to create a delightfully thrilling and deep tactical RPG. It's so easy to get absorbed into everything the game offers, and we lapped it all up. Vanillaware has long been known for creating beautiful-looking games with unique twists on genres, but with 13 Sentinels and now Unicorn Overlord, this developer should be on absolutely everyone's radar.
The Indigo Disk takes a few steps forward for Pokémon Scarlet & Violet. There's some genuine challenge, a nice variety of activities, and a fun new world to explore in the Terarium; if you love Pokémon, you'll absolutely enjoy what's on offer here. But the DLC drops the ball in terms of narrative, offering an unsatisfying and rushed conclusion to Scarlet & Violet's story, along with the grindy BP system and those ever-present performance issues. It's fun at best and disappointing at worst, with a lot of missed potential left on the picnic table.
Super Mario RPG is here in all of its weird, wonderful glory for a new generation to experience, and sets a new standard for how to do a faithful remake right. Delivering a beautifully preserved, pure experience for fans of the original and an accessible entry-point for genre newcomers, the game's infectious charm, writing, and polished gameplay do so much to elevate this beyond what might have been merely a simple RPG starring Mario.
It's impressive just how AstralShift has managed to weave together all of these different parts so effectively in Little Goody Two Shoes. The atmosphere is unmatched and the story is genuinely intriguing, with Elise making a great protagonist who – despite appearing selfish and bratty – just wants a better life for herself and whoever she falls in love with. We're so close to being in love with this game, but a few frustrations just hold this game back from having a fairy-tale ending for us. Still, for the unique ideas alone, we'd recommend checking this out.
The Teal Mask is a fun diversion for Pokémon Scarlet & Violet players that builds on the base game's strengths, but also exposes its weaknesses that much more. Fortunately, those strengths sparkle and Terastalize into a breezy, fun experience that delivers some rich regional storytelling, great characters, and some fantastic new Pokémon. We wanted more, though - more love and care put into the visuals and the battles. The Indigo Disk has a chance to build on the foundations The Teal Mask has laid, and we hope that's exactly what it will do.
Capping off the Crossbell and Cold Steel arcs with a nice little bow, The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie hits some high highs – such as with C and the True Reverie Corridor – and when it does, it's an RPG fan's paradise. But as an overall package, it feels like an easy excuse to get a huge number of characters together rather than do something meaningful with them. It's far from the series' best, but fans will find a lot to love here, even if we'd recommend seeking it out on another platform for the best experience, or waiting for a patch.
It's impossible to talk about everything that makes The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom so incredible, and making many of those discoveries yourselves is part of the magic. It's also impossible to overstate just how much there is to do in Hyrule this time around. Much like its predecessor, this is your playground for the next however many years to come, with a little sprinkling of that older Zelda fairy dust mixed into Breath of the Wild's formula. It's a glorious, triumphant sequel to one of the best video games of all time; absolute unfiltered bliss to lose yourself in for hundreds of hours. We can't wait to see what the world will do with the game.
The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Azure takes everything that's excellent about Zero and runs a marathon with it. It's one of the best-paced games in the series, with some of the best characters, best music, and easily the best setting. The Crossbell Arc is a hugely compelling two-parter that captures everything that makes the Trails series what it is perfectly, and Azure in particular deftly balances high-stakes drama, political intrigue, and poignant character moments. This is one Switch RPG we won't be feeling blue about anytime soon.
Theatrhythm Final Bar Line is an utterly addictive, perfectly tuned celebration of all things Final Fantasy. It's a deceptively simple-looking game that, once you get under the hood, you'll discover it has teeth and demands practice and patience if you want to unlock everything. It gives back what you put into it, and we're struggling to put it down even now. We couldn't think of a better way to celebrate the series' 35th anniversary, and this makes it a must-buy for Final Fantasy fans and rhythm game enthusiasts. How other storied, sprawling game series' haven't followed suit with their own rhythm games is baffling when the results can be this magical.
It's a smaller step than many may have hoped for, especially considering what Pokémon Legends: Arceus did, but it's definitely one in the right direction.
In a series renowned for its stellar writing, twisting plots, and wonderful characters, The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero is a stand-out RPG. Narrowing the focus of its story to one state, and honing in on a smaller cast of characters, makes for a fantastic and engrossing adventure that is about both intimate relationships and huge, secretive scandals. The fact that this is just one half of a duology means that, while the story wraps up nicely here, we have tons of questions that we're itching to get answers to in Trails to Azure. If you haven't played Trails, it's time to overcome that barrier, because there's no better place to zero in on this fantastic series than in Crossbell.
Live A Live has been well worth the long wait. This remake reintroduces an influential, unique JRPG to the wider world with aplomb, with a cacophony of different gameplay styles, music, and visuals that somehow hang together beautifully. Despite looking like Octopath Traveler and perfecting the HD-2D visual style, you'd do well to remember that this is still a Super Famicom RPG, with many of the frustrations that come with ‘90s RPGs still intact in this remake. Still, we admire that Square Enix decided not to change too much with this remake, instead delivering an authentic and faithful update to the game that the majority of players outside Japan missed nearly three decades ago. This is a piece of gaming history we have loved getting to experience for the first time.
Loop Hero will put you in a spin—but it's the kind you won't be able to stop going round and around in.