Lee Mehr's Reviews
For all the pustulous boils and decrepit flesh, Invader Studios put out something I subconsciously feel they hoped honors a well-beloved series. Wishing can only get you so far though.
Jumbled, infuriating, and unfinished are a few choice adjectives I can attribute to Doug Hates His Job. The panoply of gameplay styles it wants to flex should be treated as a canary in the coal mine for other young developers. The mockumentary approach makes its dull humor more of a mockery than of the white-collar job climate it’s lampooning. As a result, Super Villain Games succeeded in helping me relate to Doug's plight in one crucial way: hating my reviewing job — if only for a short time.
Pixel Reef's origami-filled adventure consistently maintains its audio-visual splendor, but often folds under closer scrutiny of its gameplay.
Cyan’s latest is another confident puzzle adventure you can't help but appreciate—even if there's some Myst potential.
A robotic-themed adventure game composed of well-oiled and rusty parts.
Separation is an apt title to illuminate its central problem. The adventure beckons you to experience a desolate world, utilize a VR headset, tingle your sensory stimuli in a way you can almost touch, and engage with a narrative tackling uncomfortable emotions. But, despite this magical potential, all of the accumulated shortcomings reveal the integral quality it sorely lacks: authentic connection.
Slender launch content aside, Ninja Theory's first venture into competitive multiplayer ranks among the most joyously-frenzied brawlers of this generation.
Moons of Madness demonstrates adaptation mismanagement of Lovecraft’s method to leave you haunted by his story’s horrific implications.
In the end, The Suicide of Rachel Foster feels like the quintessential first draft of a horror/drama flick latched to a graceless gameplay template. The excitement and deliberate pacing early on suggest learning from the industry’s best exemplars. Ominous warnings suggest ghosts are roaming The Timberline’s halls. As it progresses, however, uncoordinated game design and tonally-tangled storytelling turns that engagement frozen stiff. Like walking through a grand hotel with years of decay, you can’t help but wonder how it could fare under new management.
Uneven storytelling and unexceptional gameplay makes this quaint Scandinavian mystery one you can a-fjord to miss.