Victor Vitório's Reviews
Probably the word that best describes Islets is "pleasant," which applies to everything this game offers. Even though it's a metroidvania without any major innovations or risks, the experience is always lovely and enjoyable, with humorous writing, competent and well-paced exploration, and good boss fights with bullet hell elements.
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Playing the metroidvania Plus Ultra: Legado, it's up to individual preferences whether the refined historical setting and great comic book aesthetics make up for the basic gameplay and imprecise controls. For me, the balance manages to be somewhat positive, but the unintuitive exploration and unbalanced boss fights remain the biggest drawbacks of this Spanish colonialist adventure.
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Hidden Cats in Tokyo is the best title in the series, featuring the illustrations of playful creativity and much more content than its predecessors. It's lighthearted and simple fun, packed with interesting details that make it great for relaxing or enjoying with children.
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Cats and Seek: Kyoto takes two steps forward with its coloring mode and prettier art than its predecessors. Having only two stages is a step backwards that makes the enjoyable experience even more fleeting, and even the low price isn't well-proportioned in comparison to similar games from the same publisher. In the end, it's pleasant and relaxing enough to make me hope the follow-up, Cats and Seek: Tokyo, already available on PC, also comes to PlayStation.
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Excelling in its intuitive exploration of an open world, Ghost of Yōtei gives you the freedom to explore a Japan of stunning landscapes and secrets to discover. Thus, we find two protagonists: the warrior Atsu and the land of Ezo itself, which perfectly suits a story that's as much about revenge as it is about homecoming.
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As a great remake, Yooka-Replaylee is a well-deserved second chance for a game from 2017 that hadn't quite reached its true potential. Besides the graphic improvement, Playtonic has successfully modified the campaign for the better, removing obstacles for a more fluid, open, and fun progression.
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The peaceful journey of two little bricks dreaming of outer space makes LEGO Voyagers a beautiful and captivating experience with its world of building blocks, specially designed for two players. This means there's no option to enjoy it alone, but fortunately, those who purchase it can invite a companion to join the adventure through the Friend’s Pass. With plenty of playful interactions and cooperative puzzles, it's quality time to be enjoyed together.
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Hollow Knight: Silksong is bigger and better than its memorable predecessor. While its "bigger" nature brings side effects inherent to its excesses, the gameplay changes and the meticulous attention to detail are important motivators that keep us persevering through the numerous challenges of a rich, deep world filled with secrets that invite exploration for those curious and eager to dedicate themselves.
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With varied gameplay in its minigames and alternating perspectives, Makis Adventure is a pleasant and entertaining first game from a solo developer, but it doesn't reach its potential and ends just when it could have deepened its good ideas. The three-hour running time is worth it for those curious and enthusiasts of compact adventures with metroidvania elements.
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Boxville 2 is a charismatic, relaxing, 3 hours point-and-click adventure to fire up your brain and have fun for an afternoon. The beautiful, hand-crafted visuals and variety of puzzles are the highlights of the experience, but it fails in some quality-of-life aspects, especially the lack of chapter selection and hint system.
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Viewed only as a puzzler, Mind Over Magnet is casual, fun, enjoyable, and polished — but don't expect it to be memorable, surprising or even long. Those qualities will only be appreciated by those interested in seeing the game from the perspective of a solo developer's project tracing winding paths of learning, and problem-solving. This is the audience that will benefit most from exploring the game along with the creator's commentary contained in it, and the videos that portrayed the three-year development process.
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With beautiful visual presentation and exemplary pixel art, 9 Years of Shadows doesn't quite achieve the same level of refinement in its gameplay and story. Some boss fights are truly fun and challenging, but the rest falls into the realm of average quality. This is a game I would recommend to anyone looking to indulge in the aesthetic beauty of sophisticated pixel art, as that's where it truly excels.
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Time Flies is a humorous, existentialist philosophical exercise that has us flying like flies, trying to make the most of our short lives. Each time, we have just over a minute to explore the areas, find points of interaction, and decipher simple and creative tasks, until we manage to complete them all in a single, ephemeral race against the clock. It's a game I wish would last longer, reflecting the bittersweet truth of each person's journey: it may be good, but it's also brief.
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Much shorter than most metroidvanias, Trash Quest manages to take advantage on every moment of its brevity and minimalism to deliver a polished, fun, and aesthetically pleasing experience. The platforming action wastes no time and challenges us with its efficient cyclical structure, resulting in a game that feels like a draft of something greater, but that is in itself well worth a good afternoon's play.
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With its high points outweighing its low points, Primal Planet sets the platforming action in the harsh survival of a Stone Age populated by dinosaurs and invaded by alien ships. The mid-campaign, with its narrative emptiness and trivialization of some mechanics, gradually loses the emotional strength and gameplay dynamic of the beginning, which is compounded by the poorly functional mapping. However, those who enjoy facing dinosaurs and exploring the corners of dangerous, interconnected 2D worlds will have reason enough to venture into this prehistoric world.
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The low-resolution textures don't detract from the sheer beauty of Wuchang: Fallen Feathers. Being a proud Souls-like game, it offers challenging combat — with unpleasant difficulty spikes — and exploration through interconnected environments, but character progression goes beyond the genre's formula, featuring a large skill tree that centralizes the various aspects of evolution and can be redefined at will to modify your approach and experiment with different builds.
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Somber Echoes pleasantly surprised me with its beautifully crafted visuals, the rewarding exploration deepened by its detailed mapping system, and the very effective ability to propel Adrestia into the air in any direction, acquired early on. Combat could be better implemented, especially with more interesting enemies and more monstrous boss fights, so those focused on this aspect of side-scrolling action will likely find it less satisfying than those more interested in exploring a beautiful, well-structured world.
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Wonder Boy: Asha in Monster World is a good addition in the form of a remake to keep alive a classic series that has its merits, but doesn't go beyond a visual overhaul and minimal gameplay improvements. While unimpressive, the cartoonish charisma, effective simplicity, and accessibility will appeal to those who enjoy action platformers with a retro RPG feel, as well as children.
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The best thing about Shadow Labyrinth is the unusual idea of transforming Pac-Man into a metroidvania and also a minigame that reinvents the classic format we know. The adaptation in itself is successful and the execution delivered a competent game, but one that lacks relevant highlights that make it above average in the genre, marred by unnecessarily long areas and low-quality visuals.
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No More Heroes 2 is more than just a 3D version of the previous games. The variety of weapons and scenario conditions deepen the strategic aspect of the gameplay, and the freedom to choose any level to play from the beginning provides a very welcome openness, ranging from accessible to challenging. The presentation is quite generic, lacks any story and has some UI elements with positioning issues, but what matters most really works: the cooperative fun for up to four people to coordinate amidst the good old chaos of playing as a team.
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