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Gianluca Arena


Favorite Games:

278 games reviewed
76.8 average score
79 median score
60.4% of games recommended

Infinity Strash Dragon Quest The Adventures of Dai is a dull and repetitive action RPG with little to share with the Dragon Quest franchise, that just couples half of the story of the anime series with a very simple (and very boring) gameplay.

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Oct 4, 2023

Assassin's Creed Mirage is a divisive trip down memory lane for Ubisoft: it's a retelling of the origin story we've heard many times in this franchise, and a re-enacting of the same mechanics and moment-to-moment gameplay the saga was known for before Origins. It's up to personal tastes if this is enough or not, but we were expecting more.

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Oct 2, 2023

Even if very conservative in its nature, Disgaea 7 is a very solid entry in the franchise, thanks to some new ideas (such as the Kaiju-like transformation and the online asynchronous multiplayer) and hundreds of hours of content. But beware: the latest ones come at the cost of a lot of repetition and grinding.

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Sep 27, 2023

We're not sure if this is the best Rune Factory game available on Switch, but what we're definitely sure of is that the changes to the DS version are all for the better and that the game is still as enjoyable and relaxing as it was some 14 years ago.

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Sep 25, 2023

After a disappointing remaster dedicated to Tales of Symphonia, Bandai Namco gives the Baten Kaitos franchise the treatment it deserved, gifting us with a solid remaster of two of the most obscure but also most appreciated GameCube JRPGs.

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8.3 / 10.0 - Hearthstone: Titans
Sep 17, 2023

Titans is certainly the best Hearthstone expansion for some time now, not so much for the number of innovations introduced but, rather, for their weight in the game economy: the legendary minions that give the name to the expansion prove to be extremely powerful, but also add a strategic element to the matches, since they are helpless on the battlefield for at least three turns.

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Unscored - Baldur's Gate 3
Sep 11, 2023

Baldur's Gate 3 for PS5 then reveals itself as an extremely valid option for those who do not have a good gaming PC, also thanks to the security of not missing anything, in terms of content and adjustments by the development team in the coming months.

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We are not at the levels of the expansion dedicated to Donkey Kong of the first game, nor to the excellent ones of the base game, which remains one of the pearls of the rich softeca of Nintendo Switch, yet Mario + Rabbids: Sparks of Hope - Rayman in the Phantom Show is a fun and carefree DLC, which will not engage veterans too much and could paradoxically please newbies or those who, Like us, he missed the most beloved eggplant man in the history of video games.

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6.3 / 10.0 - Atlas Fallen
Aug 9, 2023

It's a shame that Deck13 new IP it's so generic and confusionary, because there are also bold new ideas in it. Nonetheless, as it is at the time of writing, Atlas Fallen is a by-the-book action RPG with a problematic targeting system and just a handful of open maps to explore, with so much better choices on the market.

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8 / 10.0 - Remnant II
Jul 31, 2023

Remnant 2 is the classic "bigger, bolder, better" sequel, that iterates on the formula of the previous game making it much better in almost every way. It's a very solid effort and a recommended option for a lot of different categories: looter shooter fans, Soulslike lovers and people who like to replay their games as long as possible.

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9 / 10.0 - Pikmin 4
Jul 19, 2023

Pikmin 4 is simply the biggest, most ambitious and good-looking title of the franchise yet: it offers the well known and loved gameplay of the series with a lot of twists and surprises, and at least three times the content squeezed in Pikmin 3. Definitely a must play for Switch owners.

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Jun 30, 2023

Master Detective Rain Code is not as complete and original like the Danganronpa trilogy, but it is, nonetheless, an enjoyable and well written point and click adventure that wil appeal to all of the existing fans of Kazutaka Kodaka.

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We would really like to see the crew at Falcom get a bigger budget to give full speed to this world, this characters and this combat system. Trails into Reverie is a tremendously solid JRPG and a worthy follow up to the Erebonian tetralogy. Just beware: you need to have played some of the previous titles to really appreciate the story.

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Jun 27, 2023

Ghost Trick is both another brilliant little game from another era and another lazy remaster that doesn't add anything really new to it. It is still recommended to anyone who never played the original, yet it's a bit on the pricey and the short side.

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Jun 7, 2023

It may have its appeal to the public who, as a neophyte, look for an unpretentious JRPG, but overall The Caligula Effect: Overdose fails to do enough to stand out and be remembered.

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Jun 6, 2023

Like the single games when they were first released, the Etrian Odyssey Origins Collection is not a product for the masses: it's pricey (too much so), hard and very lenghty, but these are exactly the reasons why some old timer fan wil appreciate it.

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The Xenoblade Chronicles trilogy comes to a close with a great piece of DLC, that offers a lot of quality content and gives a couple of much needed answers to long-time fans. Our only concern regards its nature and the fact that a lot of people could potentially miss this one and all of the important story beats it comes with.

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May 19, 2023

Despite the discreet work done by Falcom and NIS America on the PS5 version of Ys IX Monstrum Nox, we are forced to recommend players who already own the PS4 copy of the game to "settle" for the free patch that brings the one to 60 fps, instead of buying from scratch the one reviewed here.

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May 18, 2023

On the one hand, it might seem that there is nothing particularly wrong with the 145 new cards of the Festival of Legends, on the other hand the latest expansion of Hearthstone is stained perhaps with the most serious sin, that of having slipped into indifference just a month after launch, due to very few new archetypes introduced in the meta game and in the almost total absence of them in the most significant rungs of the ladder in Standard mode.

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7 / 10.0 - Redfall
May 2, 2023

Redfall shows some good ideas (especially in its level design), but they are not enough to compete with the brilliant previous works that Arkane gave birth to.

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