By all accounts, Cartoon Network: Battle Crashers should be the hilarious mash-up that oozes fan service and charm from its every orifice. Unfortunately, this couldn’t be further from the product that was actually delivered.
To put it bluntly, sitting through a Tijuana back-alley dentistry that would be more enjoyable than this disaster. Unless a major patch hits soon, this is a procedure that has graduated from terminal to dead on arrival.
There's still plenty of room for Decay of Logos to mature into a quality experience. However, it's hard to shake the feeling that with these many issues, it had no business being released at this point in time. Through diligent work and keeping a keen ear to the community, these missteps can be overcome. But really, the paying audience shouldn't have to be your QA team. Unless you are fond of the "early access" style of unpolished releases, you should absolutely steer clear of this cataclysmic clusterfuck.
For all that Weeping Doll manages to achieve successfully, such as providing an interesting sandbox for the player to explore, it botches on the execution of so many other key elements. I genuinely believe that the game’s premise could have made for a terrifying experience. However, virtually every aspect of the design feels like something that was torn away from the developers before it was complete. Poltergeists beware! The only terror this will be inducing is from the poor folks that purchased the game before reading this review.
It would be hard to say that Kill Strain isn’t at least ambitious. The game was a studio’s first outing in a relatively immature genre, which attempted to take a dramatically different approach to many of core mechanics that define MOBAs. Though carefully calculated, these risks fall flat in execution, resulting in a confusing and joyless experience. Too bad that infected class couldn’t contaminate the other factions with a little fun. Now that would be a character class worth paying for…
Despite faint glimpses of the greatness that could’ve been, you’d be better served waiting for the proper reboot that this franchise absolutely deserves.
What could have been a genuinely interesting new chapter for Jaffe and company, ultimately ends up falling flat under the weight of its own potential. Though there is plenty to like in the art style and core level design, there are many other key elements like merely passable controls and unfulfilling combat that drive home its lack of polish and balance. On paper, enthusiastically diving into a sophomoric world of teenage angst seems like an fun concept. However, it doesn’t take long to realize that there’s a damn good reason why most people grow up. Maybe Drawn to Death should do the same. It needs to report to detention, immediately.
While Ace Banana puts an amusing foot forward at first, it is hard to remain supportive of the end product. When bugs derail an experience so dramatically, it is extremely unfortunate. As much fun as the title looks to be, I cannot in good conscience recommend a game that has this many genuine issues. Hopefully this is something that can be resolved in a later patch, but as of right now, it would be best to leave this jungle unexplored.
Whenever new technology is introduced, it usually takes a fair amount of time before developers grow accustomed to the capabilities and nuances of the hardware. Not everything is a hit right out of the gate, and The Assembly is no exception to that rule. Despite providing an interesting showcase for the equipment, it is blatantly devoid of anything that’s unique to virtual reality as a platform. Even in two dimensions, this is a title that would be hard to recommend due its mediocre story and bland puzzles. Hypothetically speaking, if this were an experiment being conducted by an underground research organization, trying to determine the validity of PlayStation VR as a platform, it would be deemed rather dramatically inconclusive.
Unless you are a passionate fan of pre-historic underwater exploration, Time Machine VR is not worth your time. Despite the premise being interesting, the gameplay and overall design fails to deliver on any of its promise. The resulting experience feels like a soggy slog through a minimalistic proof-of-concept, that somehow managed to make its way onto the PlayStation VR. If you can pick up the game up at a deep discount and are hard up for a new PSVR experience, feel free to give it a try. Just be warned that won’t take long before you experience grade school flashbacks and everything begins to feel like homework.
Despite being the second go-round for Chronos, Before the Ashes does feel like a decent take on the popular From Software Souls formula. It's stripped-down design, while somewhat rewarding, does tend to leave a bit to be desired in the depth department. And though it may have been a welcome sight in the barren VR landscape of four years ago, trying to simply re-release the same experience without progressing the gameplay any further ends up leaving quite a bit to be desired. Unless you are extremely invested in learning more about the back story of the Remnant universe, you'd probably be better off dodging this skirmish entirely.
On one side of the coin, Outcast: Second Contact is a warranted revisit of a beloved title. It has a fantastically well-constructed narrative that's a genuine treat to delve in to. However, on the other side of the coin are the terrible combat controls, embarrassingly low-fidelity voiceovers and a bland, bug riddled world design. Being retro is no excuse for recklessly disregarding the quality of the end product. This may be one of those nostalgic experiences that are better left dead and buried in the past.
For all of its promise, Dead Alliance falls frustratingly short of its full potential.
Make no mistake, AereA is an interesting take on dungeon crawlers that has an interesting conceit. With the game's theme centered around orchestras is something that I have genuinely never seen before. Unfortunately, this is where the innovation ends. The final product is a reskin of a paint-by-the-numbers dungeon crawler that is devoid of motivation, originality, or replayability. If you are looking for an action RPG to steal hours of your life, you may be better off taking a look at a certain other release from last week. The only thing that the two games share is a hellish undertone. Being boring as hell counts, right?
When compared to previous installments in the series, Farming Simulator 17 is a drastic improvement. However, there are far too many rough edges to really recommend the game to anyone that isn’t hardcore into the digital farming scene. There were obviously ambitious goals that the developers were striving to achieve in this iteration, most of which they genuinely managed to accomplish. Unfortunately, when you add new features and forget about the fact that a game still needs to be fun, your priorities are ultimately being invested in the wrong place. Unless you are down for hours of aimless fieldwork, it may be best to avoid this rustic chore.
Purely when looked upon as an educational vessel, Chernobyl VR has a genuinely compelling story to tell. Unfortunately, the overall lack of visual polish undermines the ambitions of the developers. It may be a bit much to ask $9.99 for an experience that has such a short run time and lacks any substantial replayability. I genuinely like what the developers are trying to accomplish, but it falls short of justifying the price tag. Unless this is a purchase for classroom purposes, you should probably just wait for Ken Burns to decide to cover Chernobyl in a future documentary.
If you are looking for the next groundbreaking first-person shooter on PlayStation 4, Hawken is probably not going to live up to your expectations. The game does deliver an initial burst of exhilaration, but this is unfortunately unsustainable beyond a few outings. When the dust settles, what remains is a run-of-the-mill class based shooter, set in a series of drab environments. This is a genuine case of getting what you pay for.
I genuinely appreciated what We Happy Few was trying to accomplish. Its unique perspective to storytelling and compelling setting kept frustrations at bay for far longer than they had any right to. I even think that the game has the potential to course-correct though their future DLC. However, this doesn't change the fact that the game has serious issues that make this full retail release feel more like a second round of Early Access. I cannot in good conscience encourage anyone to purchase the game in its current state. It would be best to revisit the game in a few months to see if things have improved. Now if you will excuse me, I have to pop a pill and pray to God that my entire memory of this game will just go away.
As much as I wanted Night Book to be good, not even FMV can salvage this otherwise lackluster experience. Despite solid acting performances from the entire cast, it isn't enough to elevate this paint-by-numbers slog to the next level. It's probably best to leave this tome on the shelf where it belongs.
Though it has all of the hallmarks of a solid remake, Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX likely sticks a bit too close to the subject matter to resonate with a modern audience. Don't let the lush visuals fool you. It's unapologetically brutal design, combined with control issues and unexplained mechanics galore, all make for an uneven and unrecommendable experience.