Cubed3's Reviews
While far from bad, Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot + A New Power Awakens is a hard sell for anyone who is not already a fan of the series. Even then, franchise diehards will likely notice the changes and omissions in adaptation to the point of annoyance. Combat also leaves much to be desired, lacking in depth and devoid of real strategy more often than not. At the same time, overworld exploration is surprisingly relaxing, side content outside of side quests is engaging, and the story mode does make for an enjoyable way to revisit Dragon Ball Z thanks to stellar cutscene direction. Those who connect with the gameplay will also be delighted at the sheer amount of content available, from the three DLC packs to new playable characters. Kakarot is a Dragon Ball love letter that often forgets to be an action RPG, but never loses the unique charm that has defined the series.
Tetris Effect: Connected is a beautiful game and a great multiplayer-focused refresh of the initial PlayStation 4 game. The visuals are gorgeous and deserve to be experienced in VR. Depending on the display, HDR or SDR colour ranges might not look right until some tweaking is done outside of the game. However, once it clicks this is one of the best puzzle games and definitely a fantastic way to play Tetris in its modern format solo or with others.
Those who are expecting 'Resident Evil with Boobs' will be disappointed. Red Colony 3, like every single installment before it, is nowhere near Capcom's classic in terms of gameplay, and no amount of jiggly digital mammaries can change that. So, no, don't come in expecting a great survival horror experience. Come in for the b-movie-esque, camp feel it has, the pleasantly bad writing, and the bonkers plot. Red Colony 3 is not a very good game, but it is still enjoyable despite that.
FILMECHANISM feels like a classic puzzle platformer at its finest. It is impressive how many clever and genuinely difficult puzzles are in it just based around one simple mechanic; it truly pushes the concept's boundaries in the best of ways. Each world adds a new gimmick that makes the puzzles more complex and challenging, and the difficulty curve is done in such a way that almost anyone can beat the main game if they put their mind to it. While some quality-of-life features could improve the game, what is already present is a great experience and is a snapshot worth remembering.
Although Sam & Max: Beyond Time and Space doesn't hit the same highs as Save the World or Hit the Road, Skunkape Games has managed to offer up yet another compelling remaster. Purists are bound to baulk at some of the changes, but nothing is to the point where Season Two outright suffers. If nothing else, Beyond Time and Space is a better remaster than its predecessor, which bodes quite well for Sam & Max. Telltale has come a long way since the mid-2000s, but Sam & Max: Beyond Time and Space Remastered radiates a sense of style, charm, and ingenuity the studio lost with time.
The 2D side-scrolling adventure is a far cry from the original NES version, which was known to be not kind to new players. The lack of tutorial, control explanation and random game crashes fail to detract too much from the overall charm of A Boy and His Blob which is a heart-warming tale of friendship, cooperation, and puzzle-solving. Game completion time will head into double digits especially if completionists want to collect all the treasure, or if player skill level for puzzles and platforming is not at expert proficiency.
Without a doubt KEMCO seems to have created its best JRPG ever in Chroma Quaternion. From start to finish it is a solid experience which never gets dull. Exploring all the eye-catching areas is a joy, the character dynamics coupled with an intriguing storyline, and easy to use, hard to master job system, makes the game's end the only true drawback.
This Is the President grows more tedious with each multiple-choice dialogue sequence, and there many of those here. The tactical aspect is almost nowhere to be found, with your choices barely affecting the game, the narrative/writing is mediocre, and the characters/story forgettable. As for the political satire on offer, it's very, very weak, as it avoids saying anything more thought provoking than "politicians suck!"
The stunning watercolour style combined with unexpected story twists and plentiful humour makes Lynn, The Girl Drawn on Puzzles utterly delightful to play. Despite an initial lack of direction on how to access the helpful advice available for each chapter, once understood it is relatively easy to work out the new mechanics introduced in each chapter. Working on obtaining all the fox orbs in order to unlock the interesting extra contact means there is more to this than simply completing the main story. It feels a perfect fit on Switch with the portability making it easy to fit in a puzzle on the go, or playing docked to appreciate the beauty of Lynn's world on a large screen.
Post-apocalyptic settings can be many things, but boring should never be one of them, and The Uncertain: Light at the End is unfortunately exactly that, with its mediocre to bad writing, forgettable world and characters, and okay-ish to lacklustre puzzles. Even the best thing on offer, which is the design of each area, fails to leave an impact. The graphics are nice, but visual appeal and atmosphere are almost non-existent.
It is a case of same old story for FIFA 22 unfortunately. Without any hint of a change in the way the Switch ports are approached, there is very little to recommend. Purchasing this would only add to the EA mentality that a 'Legacy Edition' is a perfectly acceptable option in today's market. If you've never owned a football game on a console, this is probably the way to go, gameplay is thankfully passable and there is not another out there with such fully comprehensive licensing domination. For everyone else however, until the whole mentality of EA changes in regards to showing respect to what fans deserve if gaming on the so called 'lesser' consoles, this is a clear own goal.
Geared primarily towards the series' fans Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- The Prophecy of The Throne is also the perfect match for newcomers to enter Suburu's world without being overwhelmed on where to start. The action parts are more infrequent than anticipated, and may not be enjoyed by all, but this excels in the visual novel elements. In the future it would be good to see the original visual novels brought to Nintendo Switch, until then this instalment of the series exploring Suburu's unusual ability and how it helps Emelia be a royal candidate will more than suffice.
Yes, Decay of Logos is that bad. Underneath a generally good-looking bonnet, lies a pile of half-broken machinery, leaking tubes, and tangled circuitry. This soulslike has a lack of balance, is not very fun to play, and most importantly, is broken. The fact that almost three whole years after its initial release have passed, and the developer still hasn't fixed its many bugs, says a lot about the quality of this bad attempt at a budget Dark Souls.
Overall, there isn't particularly much to say about Centipede: Recharged. For the most part, it succeeds in what it sets out to do, remastering an old Atari classic with a few neat bells and whistles attached. Items, co-op, challenges, and widescreen are all appreciated additions, but they aren't exactly thrilling, either. There's no big 'sexy' hook for this rerelease-it's Centipede, but better. Nothing more, nothing less. That isn't inherently a bad thing, though. It may not be reviving the IP on a huge scale or drawing in new audiences, but hey, Centipede is fun. A recharged version of it with a few minor upgrades is fun, too.
OlliOlli World is one of the finest skateboarding games around. The gameplay is fun, intuitive and simple enough for newcomers to enjoy while having complex layers that will have skate veterans everywhere grinding to master. With plenty of items to unlock the incentive to replay levels goes beyond beating a high score. The multiplayer modes are simple but highly effective, keeping skaters busy long after beating the game, which will be no easy feat thanks to in-level quests and score challenges. Even when the story begins to drag as the game goes on it barely takes away from how incredible OlliOlli World is. Riding through Radlandia is a trip well worth taking.
Final Fantasy VII Remake Intergrade is a stellar product, one that has a magnificent soundtrack, superb voice acting, wonderful graphics, and a battle system that is totally moreish. The plot is initially quite zany, but stick with it, and the characters and events certainly do grow to be one of the finer video game stories developed. On PlayStation 5 it loads incredibly fast, almost wiping out any load times at all, and having gameplay look so good at 60fps will delight many. The path that is trodden feels incredibly linear, at points repetitive and reused, not that this is a crime. It is easy to spend over 50 hours on the first run, including the DLC, and this isn't even the entirety of the original game which shows a great value. Fans who already played through the PlayStation 4 version may not get too much out of this experience, but for newcomers this is certainly a must play.
Poor performance mars what is otherwise a stellar Disgaea experience with some fantastic new 3D visuals. The new modes and features of Disgaea 6: Defiance of Justice paired with a nice new story and interesting characters puts this high on the SRPG recommendations for all fans of the genre; a great addition to the series and a decent Nintendo Switch implementation of the game.
Giraffe and Annika is not a good game, which is a sad thing, as it feels like there is something missing. It's very rough, and is reminiscent it is one of those Unreal Engine 4 demos made by students. There are some redeeming qualities, like the charming character design, and a unique battle system for bosses, but it's so overshadowed by technical bizarreness and a lack of cohesive feeling that it's simply impossible to recommend to anyone but the biggest fans of Annika's design.
Solomon's Key is undoubtedly one of the better action-puzzlers of the NES era, but sadly it lacks that extra… something that could turn it into something better than just a 'good' title to spend some evenings with. With that said, it's far from a bad experience. The way the action blends with the puzzle-solving is pretty neat, and there are usually multiple solutions to a problem, raising the replay value a bit. Just be ready for a very, very challenging ordeal. This won't show you a single ounce of mercy.
Can cute/sexy anime girls be mixed with the dark fantasy world of Dark Souls and the like? Sure… but that's no promise of a fine product. Now, there are many indies out there that try to sell through fanservice alone, but Lost Ruins is actually not one of those. Yes, it has waifu bosses with big bouncy assets, and they drop swimsuits as the reward, but to be perfectly honest this isn't the main thing here. Actual effort has been made during this title's creation, with the fanservice (or whatever you want to call it) being just the cherry on top of it all. It's just that the end result isn't really a good, or finely polished game, with the slow, cumbersome combat definitely taking the biscuit.