While the N. Sane Trilogy is by no means the perfect and/or flawless remaster fans and interested onlookers may have wanted, there's no denying that a lot of Vicarious' microscopic and macroscopic attention to detail alike is demonstrated sufficiently well in Crash's current-gen revisit.
Fire Emblem Echoes: Shadows of Valentia, by no means a flawless entry in the nearly three decade-old franchise, may well be the closest the series has gotten to somehow finding a happy medium between past legacy and contemporary appeal.
Mr. Shifty knows how to keep you on the edge of your seat yet tentatively conserved all the same.
Rezrog will no doubt stand as one of the lesser-talked releases of the year, yet one that poses a quite resonant and important question on the principle of planning/thinking before one acts.
All in all, the line on the graph that is PES' progression as a series has gone up with Pro Evolution Soccer 2018.
While not allowing for the subterranean trek through SR388 to fully flourish in its own individual right, Metroid: Samus Returns is nonetheless a highly enjoyable remake of one of the series' more overlooked and forgotten entrants.
Overall, Tokyo Dark stands as yet another impressive and surprisingly gripping entry into Square Enix Collective's portfolio of diverse titles, given its scale but more prominently its tone.
While the actual RPG elements may initially appear thin at times, the well-delivered and genuinely funny writing is not only one of Golf Story‘s hidden traits, but something that will keep Sidebar's entrant a much talked-about title, even for a console that has already garnered a fair few highlights.
I'd be lying if I said my playthrough of A Hat in Time wasn't chock full of that same familiar sentiment on enjoying a game purely on its controls or even its tone which the developer paints in large and confident strokes.
It's clear, beyond the obvious limitation with resolution and frame-rate, that DOOM for Switch has had to make some restrictions.
Even so, Dandara‘s seemingly-impossible feat at combining elements of platforming, combat and strategy within its explorative template takes some doing and is almost an accomplishment in of itself.
While it may not be adding tricks at every turn to the platformer genre or making a name for itself with its minimal puzzles, Forgotton Anne will surely win many over with its gorgeous, animated visuals and more importantly, its sense of wonder.
Few games can tout that their frustration, difficulty and somewhat teasing attitude is what makes them so enjoyable, but Choice Provisions prove once again that the only thing more palpable than failure is the inevitable triumph.
Obvious it may be that Valkyria Chronicles 4 proves to be more of what made the original Valkyria Chronicles so enjoyable in the first place — its conservative approach this time round preventing it from achieving essential status — that's not to say that the careful-and-considerate style of tactics, complete with its unique approach to turn-based/real-time style of play, have in anyway resulted in a lesser iteration a decade on from the original.
It takes some doing to find a middle-ground between two such conflicting genres, but Dontnod have done a terrific job marrying Adventure and Action RPG elements into a pleasant and modestly cohesive whole.
Despite the confinement in bog-standard AAA conventions and set-piece tropes on occasion, the same can not be said for the execution of its story and of its characters, which — barring the next six months — may go down as one of the best and most surprisingly unique examples you're likely to find this year.
When taken as an overall package, there's no getting away from expressing how brilliant and addictive the card-based approach to RPG combat is here.
HAL Laboratory's quadrilateral little protagonist (and co) may be dishing out the same escapades as he's done for what is the fourth entry in the studio's still-young puzzle-platformer series, but BoxBoy! + BoxGirl! proves the series is just as charming and as enjoyable as it's always been.
There's an argument to be made that Judgment does at points let the familiar get the best of itself — confusing the mere sake of additional features and mechanics for those that genuinely feel like fresh changes.
For those looking for an extra bit of challenge — not to mention one heck of a sequel-bait left to linger right at the very end — The Messenger: Picnic Panic fits the bill of tasking players to prove their worth with every and all skills they've accumulated from the base game.