Justin Mercer


38 games reviewed
68.2 average score
70 median score
47.4% of games recommended
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Nov 2, 2021

It says a lot that the best way to experience this game is grabbing its original cartridge and plunging it into a Sega Genesis/Mega Drive rather than buying it digitally on PS4 or Switch, and the price for this experience is almost humorous given its release proximity with Gleylancer. One would hope this monumental shortcoming can be fixed with a patch, but as it stands, this port of Panorama Cotton—a blast of a game in its original form—is a nonstarter.

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May 25, 2023

Lord of the Rings: Gollum struggles under its own weight from the word go. Any benefit from a grimmer, more unvarnished look at the characters of Middle-earth from an atypical perspective is immediately undercut by a bevy of technical issues, clunky controls, unexciting game design, and stilted presentation at constant odds with the player.

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4 / 10 - Blackwind
Jan 19, 2022

It’s difficult to recommend on a story basis thanks to its generic narrative, and even harder to recommend on a gameplay basis thanks to the slew of glitches, loose controls, and boring progression. With more time and refinement, Blackwind could very well have been an enjoyable experience, but alas, it didn’t seem to be written in the stars.

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Oct 21, 2021

In spite of a unique aesthetic and passable puzzles, Tandem: A Tale of Shadows struggles to keep itself exciting. The almost complete lack of narrative thrust and droning gameplay progression drag it down from the moment it begins, and its failure to capitalize on its more attention-grabbing elements guarantees a disappointing experience out of a game that could have easily been more.

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4 / 10 - FORECLOSED
Aug 12, 2021

I wouldn’t go as far as to say that Foreclosed is a complete waste of effort to play. It’s clear the developers were trying to make something cool here, but whether you’re looking for a third person shooter, a cyberpunk game, or a story-heavy game, your time would almost assuredly be better spent elsewhere. Every system presented to the player works on a functional level, but their implementation simply isn’t up to par with what’s required to make an engaging video game—even one that’s only about four hours long—and this culminates in an experience that ends up being more half-baked than hard-boiled.

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Hello Kitty and Friends Happiness Parade is one of those games that simply struggles to stand out. It’s an endless runner/rhythm game hybrid that has great potential in theory, but its monotonous gameplay, uninteresting art style, and grindy moment-to-moment loop make it a difficult recommendation. If the game were to offer something more than exactly what justifies its existence, it could have been a great time, but instead, Hello Kitty and Friends Happiness Parade provides an unexciting rhythm game with Sanrio characters and absolutely nothing more.

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Mar 25, 2024

South Park: Snow Day!’s most prominent issue is one of fundamentals. The game’s namesake is very much intact and handled exactly in the way you would hope as a fan of the show, but the meat and potatoes of the actual gameplay leave much to be desired. Its humorous, surprisingly robust roguelike elements and attention paid to its source material simply aren’t enough to offset the detriments to its simplistic combat and repetitive structure.

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6 / 10 - Foamstars
Feb 22, 2024

But with things as they are now, there are a few too many issues that come to the fore once you try to settle in for a longer player session. Visual clutter causes unnecessary confusion, movement feels unrefined, playing it in longer sessions borders on monotony, and its monetization leaves much to be desired. And despite it all, I’d like to see Foamstars succeed. There are good bones here, and ones that could easily lead to a strong title were they to get beefed up over the course of balancing and patching the game. With things as they are, however, Foamstars just doesn’t make as large of a splash as it needs to.

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Oct 18, 2023

Either the novelty wears off after only a few sessions (Dodo Re Mi, FixyText) or the game simply runs on too long (Hypnotorious), and Tee K.O. 2 is exactly what it says on the tin with only minor improvements. With everything accounted for you’re still in for a fun time with friends, but it nevertheless remains a weaker experience compared to previous Jackbox offerings.

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Apr 24, 2023

Its plot goes in one ear and out the other, its visuals are nothing to write home about, and its combat is more shallow than its highly customizable stats system implies, but it’s still an enjoyable enough action RPG at its core. Trinity Trigger fits the bill if you’re looking to turn your brain off and save the world for a jaunt, but don’t expect it to leave a lasting impact.

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6 / 10 - Colossal Cave
Jan 18, 2023

It’s a very level game—enjoyable at first, but not very exciting after you’ve spent several hours with it. When you combine this with its emphasis on replayability over length and a paucity of mechanical revision, you get a lacking game with a highly contradictory price tag. These drawbacks are hefty, and they cause 2023’s Colossal Cave to be a difficult recommendation for those who aren’t already enamored with its text adventure roots.

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6 / 10 - Astronite
Dec 1, 2022

Thanks to sparse placement of save rooms and challenging enemy locations, the player will be constantly hitting walls to their progression and replaying the same paths repeatedly (and in both directions). Tragically, the only reward for triumphing over these is often a predictable, meager upgrade or another equally difficult stretch of rooms, thus forcing Astronite to be a monotonous experience. The quality boss fights simply aren’t plentiful enough to make up for its shortcomings.

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Oct 21, 2022

After so many Dragon Ball games repeating the same story arcs and putting players in control of the same characters, it’s a fun and refreshing experience (at first) to see what events on the scale of Dragon Ball Z would feel like from the perspective of a regular joe shmoe on the street. It’s a novel enough concept that makes for some great fun in the first few days of play, but it doesn’t take much longer for the cracks to start showing. This take on the asymmetrical multiplayer genre makes sense and there’s some appreciable execution outside of it simply being a Dragon Ball game, but it’s hard to see The Breakers really grabbing players thanks to its dearth of content, multiple grinds, and matches that start to feel a bit too familiar once you get past the new player experience.

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6 / 10 - Cris Tales
Jul 29, 2021

Cris Tales is the type of game you really want to love. You see the gorgeousness on the screen and hear the lovely score… but then you remember you have to play it. The visual and auditory elements are so stand-out in quality that they cause the more simplistic gameplay and unexciting narrative to feel stunted in comparison.

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7 / 10 - Astro Duel 2
Mar 6, 2024

Astro Duel II is a quintessential example of a title providing exactly what it says on the tin. It’s a multiplayer-centric space combat fighter that sports a decent learning curve which thoroughly rewards mechanical skill and twitch reactions while still being easy to pick up and play. This naturally makes for a great time with friends, whether you’re working through its co-op stages together or going head to head with one another.

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Nov 16, 2023

It’s hard to deny The Last Faith its place as a solid entry into the greater canon of metroidvanias, but its successes aren’t without any caveat. There’s no shortage of content, but that content is somewhat inconsistent in how fun it is to play through. Boss fights are addictive to learn, but leave the player wanting for more variety in their patterns. The standard metroidvania progression is fun, but the soulslike elements can feel tacked on. This is all to say it’s well worth the time for even seasoned metroidvania enthusiasts, but it can be hard to ignore the areas that needed a bit more refinement while spending said time with it. The Last Faith is a strong title with some clear stumbles, but quality still wins out more often than not, and I’m eager to see Kumi Souls Games’ next effort as a result.

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Its adherence to the cartoon is also its saving grace, as excising the IP from this title leaves you with little more than a simplistic, passable platformer. If nautical nonsense be something you wish, SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake will absolutely deliver enjoyment on par with the cartoon itself—just don’t expect there to be much of anything you haven’t seen before.

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7 / 10 - Scorn
Oct 14, 2022

Which is exactly why it pains me to remember that Scorn was a long time coming, and while the visuals suffer nothing for it, the mechanical design of the game at large feels outdated and incongruous with its aesthetic triumphs. Despite a solid (if somewhat superficial) iteration of survival horror mechanics, the lack of enemy variety and an archaic checkpoint system guarantee multiple spots of unnecessary frustration. These sections end up being little more than forced time away from the game’s proper strengths of puzzles and atmosphere. Scorn is still a journey worth taking for its appearance and environments alone, but I would have traded away every single repetitive combat encounter for just one more puzzle to sink my teeth into.

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7 / 10 - Steelrising
Sep 7, 2022

Steelrising has the clearly defined bones of a great Soulslike. It features development team Spiders’ most well executed and fluid combat to date, offers players a plethora of build options that feel meaningful in customizing their approach to combat, and delivers on its unique historical aesthetic well. Unfortunately, these obvious positives are dragged down by level design sorely lacking in verticality, enemy encounters sorely lacking in variety, and a narrative sorely lacking in investment. It’s one of the more admirable attempts at the Souls formula in recent memory, but it doesn’t have every piece of the puzzle.

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Jul 19, 2022

Had more steps been taken to engage the player in the minute-by-minute gameplay or encourage replayability, the number below might have been a notch or two higher. As it stands, however, Endling is a game where the gameplay and mechanics are readily outclassed by its theming and presentation. It’s certainly an experience worth having, but not one that lives up to its full potential.

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