In this special reviewcast: Kevin is joined once again by returning guest and Food Network Star Justin Warner as the two of them review the latest game from Adult Swim Games and Trinket Studios – Battle Chef Brigade
Thimbleweed Park is a fantastically odd nod to retro adventure games of old, and I loved EVERY SECOND of my strange journey. But before I get into it, lets go over the basic info you should know: Thimbleweed Park is a point and click adventure game developed by Ron Gilbert and Gary Winnick, the game was revealed back in 2014 along with a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign with a goal of $375,000, and was released in March 2017. The game is a spiritual successor to Gilbert and Winnick’s previous games Maniac Mansion (1987) and The Secret of Monkey Island (1990) and is designed to be similar to graphic adventure games in that time period, both visually and gameplay-wise.
Hey Pikmin is a great nod to the more traditional format of these games on other consoles. While not being able to be the same type of game there is enough meat on this bone to keep players satisfied while we wait for Pikmin 4.
In No70: Eye of Basir, a manor in disrepair holds the key to secrets long forgotten. Armed with nothing but the mysterious Eye of Basir, you’ll need to stare darkness in the face to avoid the terrors lurking in the shadows – solving intricate puzzles to save your brother and reveal lost childhood memories.
Have you ever played Hotline Miami and thought, well this is just too messy and sloppy? You’d think he could be a bit neater while going on a mass murder spree? Perhaps instead, you’d rather be cleaning up in the aftermath? Well then, Serial Cleaner might be for you!
OK, I know what you are thinking…didn’t they already review this game? And the answer is yes, but not on the Nintendo Switch. We wanted to take some time and test out this title again on Nintendo’s hardware. Kyle reviewed this one originally, and now it’s time to get my take on it. I did not read Kyle’s review again before reviewing this myself, so lets see how close we both felt on Oceanhorn.
Tight controls, slick visuals, and unique additions to traditional fighting games make Injustice 2 an easy game to recommend, even if you are not deeply knowledgeable about the DC comic universe.
NEET: Short for “Not in Employment, Education, or Training.”Typically considered to be underskilled shut-ins who live by themselves in humble yet comfortable apartments, NEETs are known to mooch off their parents’ good will to play video games and watch anime all day instead of looking for work.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a generational leap in game design for open world games. It's not perfect, no game is, but the new take on Nintendo's beloved series coupled with the expert polish and risk taking make Breath of the Wild truly a special game.
Orwell takes place in a country called the Nation, led by a modern-day authoritarian government known as The Party in the capital of Bonton. In 2012, the Party passed the Safety Bill, a law expanding the government’s ability to spy on its citizens in the name of national security. As part of the bill the Ministry of Security, led by Secretary of Security Catherine Delacroix, commissioned a covert surveillance system code named Demiurge (later renamed Orwell). Orwell allows investigations into the private communications of people of interest, but doesn’t allow any one person full access. Instead, Orwell’s operation is run by two groups; Investigators, persons outside of the Nation working for the government who search through the communication of target persons and upload items of interest (represented as “datachunks”), and Advisors, people inside of the Nation who use the received datachunks to determine the course of action and to recommend actions to the authorities.
If you are a fan and still play retro: worth your time, it's very faithful to the series, almost too much If you are not: probably pass on this one, you'll just be angry.
Gameplay: This is where the game shines for me, it harkens back to the old turn based combat I used to love so much, while it doesn't always work in modern day gaming, I enjoyed Earthlock. Instead of having meters fill up to let you know when your character was getting ready to make their move there is a string of icons to the right of the screen showing who is coming up next whether it's you or the enemy which allows the players to strategize as to what needs to be done next. (should I heal now or can I make it until the next round, etc) The leveling up system allows players to customize the characters to how they want to play, focus on close or long range combat, is defense more important than attack, etc. The game does require some old-school grinding at points though in order to be a high enough level to tackle some of the bosses otherwise you will die, a lot. The only thing i didn't care for in the gameplay was the ability to help your enemies, for instance there was a few times while using my healer when trying to select the right person to heal I would accidentally heal my enemy, I know it's dumb it's my fault but just something that annoyed me. However if you heal a ghost enemy it does a large amount of damage, and if you hit a stunned ally it'll snap them out of it so it is utilized as part of the gameplay.
Well worth the small price of admission if you like stories
It’s like Goldeneye met and fell in love with Portal, then they had a baby with a little bit of crazy Smash Bros-like unpredictability.
While overall short, mild control issues, and a little bit of repetitive puzzles solving it delivers a bizarre and fun ride. This game begs to be fleshed out into something much bigger. But if you are a puzzle fan and would enjoy a short endeavor into Small Radios Big Televisions, grab your tape deck and press play.
The music and sound effects instantly take you back to a simpler time in gaming, which while it might be a little lost on a younger generation I 100% could appreciate its authenticity. There is so much to unlock as well, additional characters with unique stats, new panels (for the side of your screen to look like an old handheld), new color schemes for your screen (I prefer the pea green hue from my Gameboy just fine), and tons more. This game gives you more than enough reasons to go back again and again to try and beat your high score.
Jazzpunk was a pleasant surprise for me, and I cannot recommend it enough for anyone who just wants to kick back for a few hours and really have some light hearted fun with a game. Bring on the sequel!!!
Overall this experience I had with this game was quite enjoyable, the story, which you basically put together yourself was gripping enough to leave me wanting more. While I won’t pretend I understood all of the symbolism in the game I think I pretty much got the gist of the story. My ONE complaint with this game which is kind of a major one for me was the “ending”. For a game that tells a great narrative in a very unique way all building up to a major payoff doesn’t quite get it ever at any point. It almost seems like they didn’t know how to end this tale and took a major cop-out with how it wraps up and took a very “artsy” approach. While it didn’t ruin this game for me by any means did instantly knock it out of scoring in the 90s for me to where it is.
Poncho, a game that a week ago, honestly I knew nothing about. It however was highlighted on Nintendo’s eshop update this week along with a trailer and it instantly hooked me. We at PSVG reached out the to the development team and they were gracious enough to supply us with a review copy of the game. I played the game on the Wii U entirely on the gamepad (just felt right) but it is also available on PS4, Vita, PC and Mac.