Puzzles are a divisive element in many Survival Horror games. When you need to justify and expand game time for an experience mostly driven by vibes and avoiding awkward combat, what else can you do? Clearly, one easy answer is to add backtracking in order to sniff out keys and doohickeys to fit into mysterious slots powering absurd door-locking mechanisms. It works for Resident Evil, at least. But there’s a balance in making this stuff actually work. A balance the subject of today’s review struggled with, to say the least.
It was a fun game about a bald man who shoots guns at the floor to do Mario Things while Satan says mean words at him from a distance. It is never more or less than exactly that. I had a great time for around three or four hours, and will probably never think about it again. But that’s okay, because I don’t think Shotgun Cop Man intended to reach beyond that outcome. Shotgun Cop Man simply is, and I respect that about him.
There’s a lot of yelling about “politics” being involved in video games out there on the internet, but here’s an example of that actually happening in broad daylight – a cool video game being used as a glaringly unsubtle vehicle for propaganda to not just prop up some real life homies, but “sportswash” a deeply problematic reputation in the process.
Skin Deep is a neat, little game that takes recognizable gameplay conventions from immersive sims and repackages them into something smaller and sillier.
In The Hundred Line -Last Defense Academy-, the visual novel and combat parts hit that target, but the social and resource-gathering elements don’t. And those parts happen to eat up a ton of extra time that grows increasingly obnoxious as you explore the narrative.
At the same time, this game might make you think about what you find important in your own life, or what it might be like to grow up seeing the world differently than people older or younger. This one is gonna stick for a while.
For the most part it’s a success, opting for more of a restorative, hands-off approach meant to make it look like a literal widescreen conversion of a PlayStation game. There are some unfortunate pain points that keep a great re-release from being a total slam dunk, but the other side of that is a brand-new dub that makes up for the awkwardness with its high quality and reverence for the original.
This might not crack the top of my SaGa list, but it’s still a worthy entry in my favorite cult RPG series. Frankly though, I’m glad I waited for the remaster to try it.
Bleach Rebirth of Souls makes an excellent first impression, with cool, loud menu UI, amped-up music, and in-game action that looks fast and furious from a distance.
I see and respect what Bubble Ghost Remake attempted here. Take an obscure game, reimagine it, make it big and beautiful, and offer something fresh to puzzle fans. But as it turns out, “bigger” was a crucial mistake.
Atomfall has a lot of interesting ideas and an admirable disinterest in playing by the usual gaming rules. But there are aspects that feel like an identity crisis, and those moments take up a lot more raw time.
When I saw that Coulombe was involved in the cult classic, Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden, I knew I was in for a ride simply by association. But I wasn’t fully prepared for the depths of creative madness I was gazing into with Look Outside.
Just like its impressively long and unwieldy title, Atelier Yumia: The Alchemist of Memories & the Envisioned Land is a messy game. But it’s a messy game with lofty ambitions and a lot to like, even if which pieces you end up liking are not the pieces you expected or wanted to like, especially if you’re a returning Atelier fan.
WWE 2K25 is fun to play, fun to dig into, and it’s even kind of fun to disparage the parts carelessly thrown in to be “best for business.”
The Hungry Lamb: Traveling in the Late Ming Dynasty is a fascinating, challenging, and compelling story that uses its form as a visual novel to tell a story about normal, flawed, and vulnerable people.
Carmen Sandiego is a fun romp through a genre that I had figured was lost to mobile marketplaces and predatory YouTube channels.
If it wasn’t for the tortuous combat I probably would’ve loved Omega 6: The Triangle Stars. It’s weird, it’s funny as heck, and it has ample Nintendo charm despite not being a Nintendo game.
This is not a game with ambitions to stand up and box with Hades, and it obviously isn’t “the next Warriors” by any means either. It’s a fascinating experiment that misses as many targets as it hits.
Stories from Sol: The Gun-Dog is a remarkable tribute to PC-98 visual novels and hard sci-fi anime of a specific vintage. The visuals are pitch-perfect with multiple settings that offer different vibes, and the soundtrack is a complex beast of speaker-straining chiptunes that enhances the mood even further.
It’s a clever core concept that doesn’t wear out its welcome with additional complications or gimmicks, opting instead to deliver the best experience possible based on that core.