Overpass is as rough as the terrain they are trying to make you traverse. Badly implemented systems, boring gameplay and a slew of technical issues make this a painful experience from start to finish.
Panorama Cotton is a nice museum piece. It’s nice to look back and appreciate what the game was back in the day. It isn’t, however, a game worth playing. Its main draw is and was its visuals, and they simply haven’t held up. The gameplay isn’t as refined or as playable as Cotton’s 2D ventures, so all that really leaves is a good soundtrack and the occasional interesting boss. Give this one a miss.
Neptunia ReVerse is a bad game. What few redeeming qualities it has, are completely overshadowed by the sheer weight and magnitude of its negatives. This is a bland, repetitive, and sometimes disturbing jaunt through a world that is not worth experiencing. Neptunia can ReVerse out of my PS5 and find sanctuary in the nearest bin.
Sun Wukong vs Robot is a mess. It looks bad, sounds worse, and plays pretty poorly to boot. The only reason you would play this is if you were desperate for a Metroidvania and only had a fiver to spend. Even then, the game is not worth that price, especially when some of the best games in the genre can be bought for slightly more off sale, and less on sale. It’s the 10 pence mixup of the gaming world – disappointing, cheap, and it barely registers on the serotonin scale but might give you diabetes all the same. Hard pass.
Woodsalt is a mystery wrapped in an enigma tied together with a riddle. A bizarre little title that doesn’t quite know what it wants to be, and therefore has a tendency to elicit a sense of confusion as to why it exists in its current form at all. Its story is genuinely interesting at times - despite pacing issues - but I think it would have been better served as a visual novel. What really killed the game for me, however, was the numerous bugs that took me out of the experience. They halted progress and inevitably broke the game and prevented me from achieving even one of the many endings this game seemingly offers. In its current state, I simply cannot recommend it. If it ever gets fixed, then this might be worth a look
Maid of Sker is a competently made game (cornea searing visuals aside), but an awfully executed horror title. From start to finish it struggled to garner, let alone maintain, any semblance of interest of intrigue. The only scare comes from its title and the physical pain it caused was irritating to say the least. As a result, I can safely say that it is not a game worth your time, and you should absolutely give this one a solid miss.
A daughter raising simulator set in a post apocalyptic future is an idea I would have gotten behind if it had been competently executed. Unfortunately repetitive gameplay and narratively inconsistent plot left me wanting to abandon my daughter on the desolate surface of the earth.
Many Faces is marred with a myriad of issues spanning graphics, mechanics, controls and overall content. This is a game to avoid.
Hunting Simulator 2 has many, many problems, but the biggest one being it is a hunting simulator. This inherent flaw starts you off on the wrong foot as the act of hunting is typically slow and fairly uninteresting. When that is combined with everything else the game stumbles with, you are left with a crawling simulator with guns in it. I cannot recommend this game to anyone but the most hardcore of hunters, and I suspect that audience won’t be reading a review about a videogame.
Battle Axe is a game that contains around 40 minutes of unique content and struggles to keep its gameplay interesting for even half that. It’s boring, repetitive, short, and uninspired. It also comes with a shockingly high entry fee of £25 (or $30 USD), which is beyond egregious for the amount, and quality, of the content on offer. Visuals, controls, music, and big-named contributors are not enough to save Battle Axe from crushing mediocrity.
I did not enjoy my time with Pathfinder: Kingmaker for the most part. DLC aside, if you wanted to play this game to completion you are looking at a whopping 200 hours or so of content, but when you factor in padding, bad game design, slow everything, and pacing issues then that 200-hour mark feels like a lot of wasted time – which is Pathfinder: Kingmaker in a nutshell really. What this game does well is dragged down by the myriad of things it does poorly. This is simply not a game I can recommend.
As a retro throwback, Knightin misses the mark. Making a game based on the worst parts of its inspiration unsurprisingly leads to a mostly negative experience.
If someone was to ask me how I’d describe Labyrinth Legend in a single word, it would be: underwhelming. This is a button-mashy dungeon crawler with next to no depth. The game feels clunky to play, and the content here simply isn’t interesting enough to hold much attention. That being said though, the music had me bopping along like a mad man. It’s almost worth a look just for that.
Overall Monster Harvest is an average entry into a genre that, for the most part, is oversaturated with average entries. It tries to emulate the genre patriarch and does a respectable job in terms of the farming mechanics, overall feel, and presentation. The town, the folk, and the whole monster thing hold the game back, however. There is very little reason to invest your time and money into such a temporal vacuum when that game is merely adequate.
Xuan Yuan Sword 7’s biggest sin is that it’s boring. Really boring. It might look nice, sound great, and be steeped in culture, but actually playing is closer to a chore than anything else. It’s also really long, coming in at 20+ hours. The gameplay on offer here can barely sustain a game half – or even a quarter – of that length. This is scratching at the heels of mediocrity, and it’s not with the time.
NIS Collection Volume 1 is probably not worth buying, and it pains me to say. One of these games is one of the best turn-based strategy games to release on the PS2, and all it needed was a tiny change to its speed. Considering that PC players have been using cheat engines to add in 2x speed increases since the mid-2010’s it’s baffling how this wasn’t just included as standard. Even Soul Nomad could have been redeemed. Alas, what we have here is a cheap cash grab that does nothing obscure that intent. If you must play Phantom Brave on Switch, then this might be worth it on sale.
Overall, the Ninja Gaiden Master Collection is possibly worth considering. Ninja Gaiden Sigma 1 is still a fantastic game, and Sigma 2 is not a bad game, despite being a downgrade. You are still being lugged with Razor’s Edge of course, but that may be a tax worth paying. Unless you’re on Switch. Switch owners should stay far, far away from this collection. Ryu Hyabusa deserved better and we can only hope he gets it on the other platforms.
Kingdoms of Amalur Re-Reckoning is, in my opinion, not worth playing. It doesn’t do anything egregiously bad, it just doesn’t do much above passable either. In a world with a seemingly infinite supply of games, there are better ways to spend your time than trundling through a mire of mediocrity.
Wonder Blade is far from a bad game. In fact, it was a very enjoyable experience for about an hour. The overall lack of polish in the games finer designs undermine its smooth gameplay and gorgeous visuals, whilst the absence of multiplayer hamstrings its longevity. With a bit more spit and polish, and a couple of mates brandishing Joy-Cons, this could have been quite the hidden gem. Alas, it was not to be.
Cotton 100% is alright. It’s a fun romp, but when put up against most modern shooters, and practically every other Cotton game released this year, it just feels a bit lacking. The existence of Cotton Reboot really invalidates this game’s whole shtick, and the fairly basic gameplay has since been expanded upon in games like Cotton 2. It’s not bad, it’s just there – it exists.