Adrian Burrows's Reviews
Blazing Chrome is so close to achieving what it's sets out to be – a fun retro 2D arcade shooter. There's sadly just too many issues to be overcome by the player to find the fun. If the development team are willing to put additional time into Blazing Chrome with patches and updates, then this could be well worth a punt. As it stands, Blazing Chrome is both too limited and too frustrating to recommend.
Splicing dino DNA with a very old school style of RTS, Warparty has plenty going for it conceptually, but it comes up short. Even if the gamepad controls weren't an obstacle to your success, the three races aren't balanced and it's all too easy to fall back on massed army tactics. A refreshing setting is not enough to drag this tired old school RTS out of the past.
There's a great deal to like about Fimbul, from its luxuriant vector inspired visuals to the solid combat and an interesting interpretation of Norse Mythology. Whilst the delivery of the plot in a comic book format disappoints, it is the failure of the frame rate that provides Fimbul's fatal and final blow. Without this issue being remedied, despite the many reasons I like the game, Fimbul is difficult to recommend.
8-Bit Hordes has attention grabbing visuals but little else on offer. This is Real Time Strategy by the numbers and entirely forgettable, though other developers would do well to remember and adopt the 8-Bit series control scheme. In that regard at least, Hordes might have some of its own ideas pilfered, rather than liberally borrowing everyone else's.
Somewhere, deep in the heart of Subaeria, there is an exciting and action packed puzzle game. Unfortunately, just like the dystopian underwater world the game presents, it is so deeply submerged that you'd never see it from the surface. Rather than the deep blue ocean though, it is a roguelite structure that hides what works about Subaeria, rendering its achievements impotent with toxic pacing and progression issues. It's a shame, as Subaeria showed promise.
Aces Of the Luftwaffe: Squadron does a lot of things right over its short duration. Tight gameplay, small innovations to the shoot 'em up genre and terrific local co-op. Unfortunately, the grind to level up characters and lengthen the playtime turns what was once fun into a tedious and frustrating slog.
Outcast: Second Contact is an eighteen year old game that's been given a makeover. This is absolutely fine if you're a fan of the original and want to play it again on modern hardware, but if you don't have the nostalgia quality there's absolutely nothing that you won't find here that's done far better elsewhere. For a steep price tag of £39.99 on PS4, that's just not good enough.
Ink Stories should be congratulated on their tackling of a much misunderstood historical event and doing so with such accuracy, clarity and impartiality. However, with a glut of gameplay issues and a short game length that prevents the opportunity to explore some interesting ideas further, there's far too much incentive to give 1979 Revolution: Black Friday a miss. This is best viewed as an educational tool, rather than a satisfying interactive experience in its own right.
Torn Away is a peculiar game. Numerous technical issues do their determined best to spoil an otherwise powerful narrative; one that is elegant in its simplicity. Those haphazard controls, visual limitations, and laughable stealth sections will succeed in turning many players away, but, if you manage to put up with them, you'll find that Asya's tale is one to relish.
When it comes to co-op rogue-lites, This Means Warp doesn't do anything particularly new - so you certainly won't be going where no man has gone before - but what it does do it does with aplomb. Gather your crew, try to do the tricky Spock hand gesture thingy, and shout out 'Beam me up' at random; This Means Warp will provide the rest of your Star Trek fantasy.
Born of Bread may look unique but in reality, this is your run-of-the-mill action RPG. Some decent ideas can't disguise the formulaic ingredients on offer. In terms of bread, it's more supermarkets' own than an artisanal sourdough. When it comes to bread-based games, you deserve butter.
Crash Team Rumble is an accessible and terrifically enjoyable online platforming battler, and as more seasons of content are released, it could become a pretty essential multiplayer game. In the here and now, though, it's a bit too limited and features too little content to be anything more than throwaway fun.
Helvetti has buckets of charm, offering delightful 2D visuals that will impress any player with ease. Unfortunately, the feathery, button-mashing combat is less appealing, whilst the uninspired rogue-like mechanics never really click.
Little Witch Nobeta makes for a fun old-school action shooter. It's just a shame that this particular witches' brew is filled with so much unnecessary and bland garnish that serves only to dilute the taste.
Where the Heart Leads offers a supremely compelling and fascinating overall narrative, one that is filled with genuinely meaningful choices – surely a rarity in video games? Unfortunately, its tall tale is also bogged down with numerous presentation issues that result in dull characterisation. Overall an uneven experience that's both brilliant and boring – sometimes at the same time.
Gravity Heroes is a curious proposition. The core gameplay elements are rock solid, the four-player gravity switching leading to plenty of chaotic fun, but the concept as a whole feels under-explored and the intense difficulty will can soon become a joyless slog.
YesterMorrow is an entirely competent and mostly sound platformer. Sure, there's some issues around the occasionally finicky controls, but these are mostly balanced out through the exemplary level design. The main issue here is that the gameplay experience is so very hum-drum. YesterMorrow is a mish-mash of many other better games that we've all played before. As such it struggles to build its own identity and never becomes a compelling experience.
There's a lot to like about PAW Patrol: Mighty Pups Save Adventure Bay, particularly when it comes to how accessible it is for its target audience. This is a game that even the most novice of gamers can pick-up, play and enjoy. It also looks great, my son delighting in seeing all the pups and their vehicles. On initial play my son declared he "super loved" it and gave the game two thumbs up, but over the course of only a couple of sessions, the game's obvious flaws began to dampen both his, and my, enthusiasm. Far too soon, this latest Paw Patrol video game had been entirely forgotten about as we've gone back to playing with Lego instead.
9 Monkeys of Shaolin is so close to being a really good side-scrolling brawler that it physically hurts. Hurts worse than a rolling cartwheel kick to the soft and delicates. There's a truly brilliant, satisfying, fun and deep combat system here, but whether you can see it beneath the shadows, silhouettes, staircases and stupid Green Tea meters is another thing entirely.
There's a lot to like about HyperParasite; bombastic action, smooth gunplay and literally thousands of 1980's pop culture references are all good fun. It's just a shame that its spoiled by an overly punishing roguelite structure, asking you to play thorough the same content again and again to make any noticeable progress, rendering the pacing of the game an interminable slog.