My only recommendation is that if you're coming to this looking for multiplayer fun, consider buying copies for friends too, because from day one the community for the game has been fairly limited. But it's a cheap game, so even if you decide to stick purely with the pre-built levels the developers threw in with the base package, you're still going to have a good time with this.
Modern board game design greatly de-emphasises the importance of dice rolls in favour of systems that are more predictable and strategic, and I've got to say that I much prefer this brave new world of strategy over luck that we have in our board games now.
My overwhelming experience over the entire course of Grumpy Reaper is that it's pleasant as a casual puzzle game.
This game simply drips with atmosphere in a world that manages to transition from one darkly beautiful sight to the next.
There are those that enjoy it for its quirkiness and originality, and then there are those that simply find it too different to really resonate. For my part I really appreciate what Idea Factory has achieved with this game, and, while the theme is quite dark, it’s presented in that same bright and cheerful, satirical space that we’re so used to with this developer/ publisher that it’s charming and irreverent. It’s always nice to play games like that.
This game has been more meaningful to me and had a greater emotional impact on me than any game I've played since Nier itself, and as far as I'm concerned that means it's as close to perfection as games can get.
The solution is always obvious, and never elaborate enough to be truly entertaining. In other words it’s pointless busywork.
What’s left is a competent, but wholly remarkable and uninteresting hack-and-slask JRPG. There’s plenty of loot to reward the grind if you can handle how overwhelmingly generic the experience is, but, I wasn’t really going in for loot. I wanted a game that was like Muramasa: The Demon Blade; a game that would take the aesthetics of classical Japan and really do something with it. Instead, Sadame proves itself to be vapid and uninspired in the extreme, and so very disappointing as a result.
It’s irredeemable.
Senran Kagura: Estival Versus is great fun, combining the rawest of Japanese-style raunch humour with a tight and mechanically sound combat system. Frankly, I don't think there's much else the developer could have done to nail the brief on what this game set out to achieve, and the PlayStation 4 has a new king of exploitation entertainment on it.
Lacrosse 16 captures the soul of the sport. In the moment-to-moment play this is a fast, energetic, entertaining sport and that is exactly what Big Ant have offered in its take on it.
Ultimately the success of Samurai Warriors 4 Empires rests on how well it has been able to merge action and strategy together, and while I feel this veers strongly on the side of action, compared with even the Dynasty Warriors Empires series, there’s still enough thinky stuff to do between battles to add nuance to the overall experience. For that, Samurai Warriors 4 Empires has become my preferred Samurai Warriors game, though I would strongly recommend people play one of the previous Samurai Warriors games to get a proper feel for the characters and setting before digging into the more abstract and cerebral experience on offer here.
Strong narratives don't age, and this one has a strong story to tell. Throw in quality port work that gives the art direction the detail and clarity that it really deserves, and Twilight Princess is a classic that has scrubbed up well enough to be a worthy Wii U title in its own right.
I’ve long been a fan of how clean and slick Nnooo’s art direction is, and this game is no different. Blast ‘Em Bunnies might be simple – no, it is simple – but it’s simple in the right way, and that’s something to be impressed with all by itself.
Screencheat is my favourite local multiplayer game on the PlayStation 4. It's a nice, small, download that I'm going to leave sitting on the harddrive for whenever I have friends over, and while that might not happen on a weekly basis (I like my space, okay), each and every time I pull the game out, it's going to more than validate its worth. Because it is simple, silly, fun, and it's a great start for Aussie games on the PlayStation 4 this year. [OpenCritic note: Matt Sainsbury separately reviewed the PC (3.5 stars) and PS4 (4 stars) versions. Their scores have been averaged.]
Heavy Rain is very much the kind of game I like to play; it's smart, interesting, different and highly focused. Cage might be a one-of-a-kind game director and thinker, and I do wish more developers paid attention to how he approaches his storytelling.
Mitsurugi Kamui Hikae has all the makings of a game that I would love to play, but it's only halfway there.
I have a real soft spot for The Witch and the Hundred Knight. I find that the complexity of its systems add a nice layer of strategy that most "Diablo clones" could benefit from. More than that, though, I find the narrative to be delightful in the way it revels in the Grimm Brothers' sense of villainy, and then sticks you right in the middle of it and left to figure out for yourself if you're comfortable helping a monster that completely evil.
Minor issues aside, I do think this is the best Far Cry game. Far Cry 4 did a lot to refine the formula and make it as enjoyable as possible. Stripping back the game to the fundamentals, limiting the resources and focusing the action does wonders for a franchise that was in danger of becoming too sprawling.
Street Fighter V looks and plays exactly like how you'd expect any instalment in the series to, but there's something unfinished about it, something that makes you feel the series has taken a giant step backward.