Connor Nichols's Reviews
Gleylancer is an outstanding port of a fun Mega Drive shooter, presented with pretty much every quality of life feature you could possibly ask for! From SRAM Hi-Score saving, to dual-stick controls, to weapon and speed swapping on the fly, this revision is easily the best and most accessible Gleylancer has ever been by far.
While it is a bummer than both Castlevania Legends and Symphony of the Night are missing (especially since both of those relate to the three advance games more than Dracula X does), what’s here is excellent, and the quality of life and scaling options make this $20 value an absolute must-own, whether you’re new to some or all of the games or someone who played these to death, there’s lots of fun action to be had here, and it’s a great starting point for this explorative style of Vania.
Nevertheless, games get bigger as they’re followed up on, and with hidden buttons to collect, pages to find, and secrets to discover, this game will take significantly more time to go through than the original Squidlit, leading to Super Squidlit to be worth the asking price. The variety in gameplay, the bigger scope, and continuing the funny and charming nature from the first game all leads to a worthwhile experience that fans of the Game Boy Color should check out, despite some details in need of fine tuning.
Bitmaster is just average at best, with me finding the overall loop to be serviceable, but not much else. The roguelike aspects of grinding levels and constantly trying again to gain gradual upgrades and new characters seem cool at first, but the slow pacing just doesn’t work for a scorechaser like this, and I found these aspects to be more discouraging of future run attempts, rather than motivating me to go for yet another attempt to see how far I can survive.
After 100%ing Blaster Master Zero 2 and watching the cliffhanger, I was so longing for the end of this epic tale, a situation that 10-year-ago me would have completely disbelieved would have happened in relation to the NES game which terrified the crap out of me! But now two and a half years later, that cliffhanger has concluded, and I have to say, it really surpassed my expectations, working great as a throwback to the rest of the series and the pinnacle of the constantly evolving level design and boss fights, leading to some of the most challenging, yet fair experiences I’ve had with a metroidvania in a very long time.
In fact, since this variant focuses on the arcade experience, rather than the original console stuff CS introduced, that means you don’t even have the ability to play 16:9 formatted stages, making the lack of any visual options even more frustrating. Still, with four player co-op, a variety of great ships, and the same great Darius fun to expect from the series, this manages to be a very fun romp for scorechasing and boss rush fanatics, even if it doesn’t have much else for casual players just wanting to reach the credits and call it a day, though it at least leads to being an accessible entry point for co-op action, and is a game I can definitely recommend to people with access to a four-player setup, especially since you can’t really play the arcade game in person here in the US.
Truly, this game ended up being the best surprise gem for me in years, and when it contains all the aspects of my favorite games of all time, with great characters, world building, soundtrack, writing, and addictive gameplay loops, Fuga creeped up from behind and led to an unforgettable adventure, where the saddest part for me was when it all came to an end.
Regardless, the gameplay is just too dull and boring for me to keep my interest, and when the other half of the game (the story sequences) are so agonizing that I found myself skipping through some and literally missing nothing when going back to check if I missed anyway, that’s not a good sign of a fun game at all, regardless of platform.
You’ll still have a lot of fun with the shooting action here, even if I feel reboot mode goes into overdrive with the flashy effects, and cotton fans should absolutely pick this up, while scorechasing fans will find the mechanics in Time Attack mode to be an amazing dream come true. Still, considering how the import version got neutered for this translation, I can’t help but feel a bit disappointed with the quality of this localization effort, and how it absolutely wasn’t worth the five month wait for this level of text quality. Super great scorechaser, subpar localization effort.
From short stages, speedrun-friendly level designs, simple one-handed controls, and great pacing that rewards high skill, it easily is a game I see myself going back to fully complete, whereas the Wii U original was enough to leave me content after beating it normally.
At the end of the day, the game is still immensely fun, and a great action RPG, though it’s still best played on the PS5 (and PC, depending on how that port turns out), of course. Still, for a downgraded version, this is one of the better weaker Switch ports I have seen lately, even if a lot more work should be done for improving the exterior areas (which seems to have been already done, thankfully!), and I say for those who enjoyed the VIII port on Switch, you’ll enjoy this port just as much, if not a bit more.
Mom Hid my Game 2 is a level pack in all but name. That isn’t exactly bad, since the first game worked perfectly fine as a funny experience, and more of what isn’t broken is not a bad thing, but this is really just another set of 50 puzzles to solve with a tiny smidge of replay value in the form of the gallery. If you liked the first and want more, then you’ll probably already have this. If not, then start with the first, and then get this, as both are equally worth your time for a fun afternoon.
Disgaea 6 was easily my favorite Disgaea game in a lot of aspects: amazing quality of life features, a great 3D style change, good music, engaging story, lots of content, and funny characters. But in some aspects, it feels like a regression from the rest of the series, with the lack of boss battle variety, lackluster maps, and slim character classes being the biggest gripes I had.
With a super adorable art style, plenty of fun puzzles to solve, and quick pick up and play pacing, Piczle Cells ends up being another solid and entertaining game for the Switch eShop, easily worth it if you’re a fan of either the Piczle or Quell series, or just like buying every last multi-stage puzzler you can get your hands on.
Puzzle Tale is a puzzler that you’ve no doubt seen before, and you’ll no doubt see again. While it is fun to replay stages to get coins and unlock the extra levels, it is pretty irritating how a lot of the main story levels are just so tight on moves, to the point that it feels like there’s little room for a-ha moments of your own. While I do enjoy the extra replay value the coins and bonus levels offer, I can’t help but feel the main game just suffers from being a basic brainteaser that has been seen many times before, and the progression gating based off diamonds feels more like padding rather than incentive for replay design.
In conclusion, I can sum up this game as “the title I bought a $300 headset for that doesn’t even work with it anymore”, and that’s a big shame, as the core RPG here is pretty decent at best, but even that feels weirder compared to prior Neptunia RPGs, with some changes to the usual formula that don’t really feel that great.
Pixeljunk Eden 2 is a very strange game for me, since it was originally one I bounced off of hard, due to the simplicity of the controls and basic help menu not really giving me much of a direction to go off of at first, with me flying around aimlessly for several attempts before I finally cleared a garden. Yet once I got the gameplay loop of absorb, flick, absorb to hook on me, I was enthralled with the nature of this game, and honestly just had a bunch of fun exploring each of the gardens and watching new pathways and areas grow, even mindlessly exploring and collecting pollen long after I needed to.
Even if you bounced off the original for whatever reason, I do feel that Asha in Monster World is a much more approachable way to experience this wonderful adventure, and for those who are fans of the original and worried this would drain the charm out of it, there’s no need to fear on that front, either, as there’s plenty of charm here to go around! Definitely one of the biggest surprises of the year for me, and one that makes me honestly hope Monster World III gets a similar treatment!
Infinite was an OK game, one that’s really boring and uninteresting to play solo, but a lot more fun and engaging in co-op, with simple controls, pick up and play stage design, and interesting stage gimmicks that keep you interested. While it definitely took a long while for me to try the local co-op due to you know what, I am very glad I did, as Infinite makes for a surprisingly fun and enjoyable co-op adventure, even if the main game is still a basic platformer that’s not too engaging solo.
R-TYPE FINAL 2 is a great shump and a worthy series revival, but definitively feels like a WIP in some points with balancing that still needs to be done. It’s incredibly accessible though with the multiple difficulties, and it offers tight controls and fun levels to play through, along with a bunch of ships to unlock and mess with, even if the irritating material grinding makes it nowhere near as impressive as the original Final in that regard.