Nick Mangiaracina's Reviews
I think if you even have an inkling that Bloomtown: A Different Story is your jam, you owe it to yourself to try it out.
Yars Rising gives you a straightforward experience with enough side content to add layers to customization without giving the player too much power in the end. It was a great experience and I had a really great time playing Yars Rising.
I loved Vampire Survivors on release but with everything added since Vampire Survivors is just as addictive and enjoyable as it was on release and well worth the buy now that you can enjoy it on any platform of your choosing.
Demon’s Mirror didn’t vibe with me, and while I appreciate the effort to mix up these two gameplay styles, the friction between the two left me annoyed and drained.
Overall, I have to say I’m pretty disappointed with Umamusume: Pretty Derby - Party Dash. The game is quite good looking and has a lot of fanfare for fans of the Uma Musume series but provides an extremely hollow experience full of basic UX missteps and a complete lack of depth. Golshi’s Grand Adventure 2 isn’t enough to save this game and the price tag for what’s being provided is absolutely absurd.
While not my favorite Shin Megami Tensei game, I cannot recommend Shin Megami Tensei V enough. And with the Canon of Vengeance included, it’s a must for any RPG fan.
Cat Quest III offers a decent amount of gameplay for the price, a colorful, consistent, and fully realized art style, and a game that can be completed 100% with a friend.
Thank Goodness You’re Here! is an incredible experience in both humor and execution. This is what a game looks like when it’s firing on all cylinders, it’s a tour de force of art, music, platforming, and puzzle solving.
A thought-provoking experience that had me questioning the reality Karra was living in throughout most of the game, Nobody Wants to Die is a must for mystery, adventure, and noir fans.
Being free-to-play, it’d be hard for me to tell you not to give The First Descendant a try. Even after forty hours, I’m still looking forward to spending more time in Ingris and unlocking more Descendants.
Until Then isn’t the best narrative adventure game I’ve played but it’s definitely one I’ll remember for a long time. Don’t sleep on Until Then, it’s a worthwhile experience.
Still, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door’s remaster is an exceptional game, remaster, and tribute to a revered entry in a popular series. Sleeping on this entry, as an RPG fan, would be a big mistake.
As for Read Only Memories: Neurodiver, it’s a very tight, focused experience that’s a lot of fun and has a great style and flair for its setting, and I loved it. I just wish there was more to it.
While I can’t recommend Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengance of the Slayer, the game is simply too novel a concept to not talk about and at the very least, deserves your attention. What you choose to do with this knowledge now is up to you.
Dread Delusion fills a specific niche that hasn’t been touched in decades. While I wouldn’t recommend this game to just anyone, Dread Delusion sets a high bar for adventure RPGs and utilizes its art style to perfectly capture the era of gaming it draws inspiration from.
Offering an incredibly fun story, lovely characters that will stick with you, a timeless art style, and a vast open world that will suck in hours of your time. Sand Land made its mark on my year and you should make room for it to make a mark on yours.
To say I’m surprised by how much I’ve been enjoying Hundred Heroes is an understatement. Truly, I cannot wait to not only finish this game. I’m also really hoping the passing of the great Yoshitaka Murayama doesn’t slow Rabbit & Bear Studios down because I would really love to see more RPGs in this vein.
A stunning visual feast for the eyes that managed to create a fun and challenging set of gameplay rules that carried me through to the end in a few days.
It wasn’t a gripping experience, I wasn’t enthralled playing Open Roads, but it succeeded in what it attempted narratively and gave me a pretty satisfying conclusion and truly, that’s all I could ask for. Open Roads may not be an exciting experience for all but it was for me and I’m pretty satisfied with it.
Hot off of 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim, I was hoping for something a little more narratively deep but even with the story’s simplicity, I really enjoyed my time. More importantly, there’s a new strategy RPG on the market, and one that’s approachable enough to bring in new fans to the genre to hopefully bolster it. Unicorn Overlord does so much right, I feel grateful for having experienced it.