Vostok Inc. is a moreish slice of rampant capitalism, an adventure in both space combat and middle management, sewn together with cute ideas and clicker-style mini games. Once you have that initial bump you'll be hooked, but if you can go cold turkey for even a short time you might struggle to go back, even though it felt amazing. Vostok Inc. is here for a good time, not a long time.
Survival, that most impermanent of genres, seems to have found permanent residency in the last few years, yet in a crowded space, Mojo Bones has made a mark. Impact Winter is dream-like and transfixing; it’s frustrating and brittle; and there is something truly special here you can just make out through the ice. If only it was given time to thaw.
This would have been better as a complete package, with all three chapters sewn together. Considering it’s a plan that Tarsier has had all along – teasing its DLC, as it did, long ago – its merits and additions would be more sating had they been swallowed by The Maw, along with everything else, from day one.
There's a rough-cut, lo-fi patina to Get Even that adorns its good ideas like graffiti. With its edges scuffed and its heart in the right place, it feels like that now endangered species: the AA release. Long live dirty, flawed experimentation. This one’s different.
There's something Faustian about it: in striking a deal to carry such a powerful banner, it's gotten attention that games of its class would never get. Ironically, it's that banner that invites the most bitter criticism for a game that certainly could have done a lot worse.
The Sexy Brutale nods back to ancient tradition while wrapped in the trappings of the 20th century, taking notes from some of the best adventure games there have been. At the same time, it looks forwards, unwinding to its own tempo, creating a game that feels distinct from any other.
Transient, vague, and awash with macabre sights and sounds, Little Nightmares is aptly named. Its gameplay is rote and minimal but its skew of images will stick in your craw like the fleeting fragments of a nightmare upon waking. The rest will fade.
If you were a fan of the main game then you can't go wrong with the £3.99 this will set you back, but it's by no means essential.
When your time with The Final Station comes to an end, you might feel like those pistons – firing over and over until you reach your terminus, bound by looping gameplay as they are to the track. Though it might thirst for challenge, it’s a surreal tour through a beautiful, brutal world – one underscored by loving attention to detail and an atmosphere unlike any other I’ve played. Despite the mechanical motions that get you there, the journey and the destination stay with you long after you disembark.
What's here isn't bad at all; it's by no means best in class, but it does deliver on its premise. There is satisfaction to be gleaned from the battles if you buy into the strategy and tactics; there's a lot to take in here (well upwards of 30 hours); and it's dressed up in sumptuous art. If you're a sucker for a dungeon-crawler or for JRPGs, then this will sate your thirst two times over. There isn't much here to recommend to the uninitiated though.
Despite this generous clutch of problems, there is an odd charm to the game. Its schlock is part of its allure, and each time I loaded the game, I felt as though I was returning to a well-thumbed piece of pulp horror trash or sliding an old VHS B-movie slasher into the machine – its cheap ghouls awash with scan lines.
It’s a game made by a small, four-man Swedish studio called Elden Pixels, and one that doesn’t contain an ounce of cynicism or irony; it’s made by retro enthusiasts who genuinely want to relive the glories of yesteryear. On the game’s Steam page, it is billed as a “retro game in a modern coat.”
This had ‘perfectly fine’ written all over from when I first booted it up, but then it muddied the waters with a forgettable plot and tried to drag me away from the eye-reddening, ‘I should probably stop playing this now’ core of the game. Should you get it? If you like match 3 games then it’s a decent one, but then, if you like match 3 games you can get lots of them for free on your phone – which is surely a better home for them anyway.
All that to one side and what I’m left with is a passable, extremely repetitive game that offers up brief bursts of catharsis muddled in a misguided sea of queasy colors, and all wrapped up in a convoluted and uncompelling plot. The game isn’t terrible: there is, mechanically, nothing all that wrong with it, and if you like Musou games – and have exhausted the likes Dynasty Warriors or Hyrule Warriors – or if you’re a fan of the Fate series, then there’s some service here for you.
It may not be beauty that lives in the eye of this one, but Beholder does have some intelligent moral conundrums to levy at you. Unfortunately, the repetition and dull play leave a big hole in the middle where the game’s heart should beat.
Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun will have you plotting the art of war like a master tactician. You will forge elaborate plans and test them in the fires of a a beautifully realised Edo-period Japan.
Islands: Non-Places is a game for certain kinds of players, and if you’ve read this review you may well have an idea that it might speak to you; I implore you to go and play it.
The puzzles are very simple; the set-up and plot have all been done before; point-and-click has been done before, but that isn’t the point. The point is that when lovingly-crafted animation, when warm and sharply-written characters and lines of dialogue, and when simple, uncluttered play converge, you’re onto a winner.
If you’re a console gamer and you haven’t played these, then The Collection is an easy one to recommend.
These additions have been layered on top of a very old chassis, and while they do stave off boredom for a little while, it feels like chugging cheap energy drinks to prolong the inevitable crash. When there are games out there like Rez and Geometry Wars that reinvent that chassis, it’s difficult to play something like Xenoraid and feel… well, much at all.