Thumb Culture
HomepageGreat combat, goblins, angry birds, common cold, and who knows what else being thrown at you, Outward is a great game and I see myself coming back to it well after this review comes out and trying to perfect the combat roll! It is a great game and except for a few graphics issues (which once again I am being picky) it is a solid game. I am happy to give Outward the Thumb Culture Platinum Award and look forward to seeing it’s future!
I personally think Earth Defense Force: Iron rain is pretty good, maybe not so much my style of gaming as I didn’t feel the “nag” of wanting to go back and play it more like I usually would with many other games, the storyline is nice but I also think if I were to play the previous games I would understand the game and enjoy it more! I am going to give this game the thumb culture silver award as it did open my eyes to a whole new genre of gameplay, I just didn’t have the ” I NEED TO PLAY NOW” feeling towards it.
Vaporum has around 15 hours worth of gameplay to conquer and many secrets to discover. Will you solve the mystery of the tower and get out alive? or will you succumb to the monsters that lie in wait for you? Having played Dungeon Master when I was young lad along with gems such as Bloodwych, Eye of the Beholder, heck even the original Doom, I love grid-based dungeon crawlers. Playing Vaporum brought back the nostalgia and to have it in a gothic steampunk setting really made this game something special for me. Breaking from the shackles of PC and launching onto multiple platforms, Vaporum brings back the genre both immersively and beautifully. Vaporum earns the prestigious Thumb Culture Platinum Award!
Zojoi Studios have done an excellent job bringing Shadowgate up to date without adding or removing its original appeal. I would recommend this game to anyone looking to experience either something a little different or looking to recapture that magic from their childhood. My biggest concern for this release is the attention it will get from gamers. Being a remaster of an older point & click game, I fear that a lot of people will simply overlook it in favour of other titles (I sincerely hope not). Shadowgate fully deserves the Thumb Culture Silver Award and I hope to see more of this kind of game making its way onto modern consoles.
I thoroughly enjoyed this game but can see that after a good few games you could get fed up of it, I find it’s a nice game to break away from the usual games I’d play, something I can just pick up and spend what seems like five minutes but is actually an hour on! I feel this game may not be one everyone enjoys but it is fantastic if you do enjoy your dual-stick gaming, or even a fun game to play on the sofa with your family or friends – no blood, minimal violence (you’ve hurt more veg cooking than you will on here) so it’s fun for all ages! I feel it would be more enjoyable if you had options for online or even a second chance at life via bobs spin!
Lets not sugar coat it. The Division 2 is an excellent example of what a games company can do if they try. While I think Ubisoft have dropped in some really bad games over the last few years filled with bugs. This however for me is not one of them. Yes, I had one or two issues launching drones and turrets but since the last update I haven’t had any so I’m happy. Reviewing this game was a joy and I will carry on playing this game probably long after my friends have stopped but I don’t care. I love this game and accept it for what it is. A cover to cover shooter with an absolute mountain of activities and content.
Generation Zero could have been a much better game than it actually is. I feel like it’s almost too simple to just collect ammunition and medpacks. If they had added some sort of hunger system or survival mechanics I would have had a much more enjoyable time. Randomizing item placement in the world would have been a plus aswell. The world seems to be static for the most part. I also encountered a handful of crashes while playing that seemingly reset some of my progress, but those can and will probably be patched quickly. To sum up, gameplay was fun for a few hours, but once I put it down I had a hard time wanting to go back to it. It’s nice to look at albeit a bit drab in the color department. The style of music Avalanche has chosen to go with is something that appeals to me. So Generation Zero has pros and cons to it, and it has a lot of potential if they add some DLC down the road.
ChromagunVR is a game worthy of your time and money. It’s a game that won’t break your piggy bank. It’s a fun game to play. The downside is there is no new content in ChromagunVR from the original. This is the original game but in VR. It does the job well and I didn’t experience any bugs, glitches or tracking issues. If you are a VR fan or a puzzle fan then this is a great game for you and a must buy. So yes it is aimed at a niche market of gamers.
In the end, I feel like Attack of the Earthlings is worth your money if you’re in the market for an XCOM like game and you’ve already played both XCOM games to death. For £14.99, it’s just at the right price. Any more for this fairly short experience would tip the scales in a negative way. It’s a hilarious, fairly well made XCOM like that will have you laughing out loud more than once. I don’t think it’s a game for everyone, especially if you need a meaty story to sink your teeth into, but it’s definitely worth a go.
I personally think despite crimson keep being released already there is still a lot of work to be done on it to ensure it’s not a broken game, they need to fix their game so you don’t crash, they need to give you better chances of having food, and health to ensure you can survive that little bit longer otherwise you’re going to get bored real fast of doing the same exact stuff, I guess if you’re lucky enough to get past a certain point it won’t be so bad.. that is until you get crashed to the main screen over and over again. Co-op would really help this game, two people playing would make it a hell of a lot more fun than one person playing, dying a few hundred times and then moving on to the next game, Merge games have stated they have no plans for a co-op within crimson keep but if they get desperate enough for players I’m sure they’ll soon drag their feet back and create a mode for this. The game would be amazing and has so much more potential if it wasn’t a broken game, so I will not be giving any form of award for this.
Overall, I think Pixel Crow has put together a fun game that reminds me very much of the game Papers Please! In the way, it handles challenges and time management. Could it be better? Definitely, and it wouldn’t take that much to improve either. Remove some of the jokes and perhaps include a bit more of a variety of characters and don’t paste the cultural stereotyping on so thick.
If you love LEGO Worlds then you will no doubt absolutely love this game due to being able to free roam and more or less construct and destroy anything you wish, your imagination is the limit. For me it feels a little rushed and unrefined. It is as if somebody remembered that the film was launching soon and needed to get a game quickly ready, “oh yes lets reskin LEGO Worlds, throw in some movie cutscenes and away we go.” There is a degree of awkwardness and certainly clunkyness when playing the game that I can’t help feel could of been addressed through a bit more playtesting, resulting in a better quality of game that has been produced. If you are an inquisitive human, or a child, then buy this game. If on the other hand you detested the format of LEGO Worlds, then steer clear!
All in all OlliOlli: Switch Stance on the Nintendo Switch is a great game to play. At £13.49(Nintendo eShop) If you own a Nintendo Switch, you should own OlliOlli: Switch Stance. It’s THAT fun, and for the reason that I’ve become incredibly addicted to its gameplay very quickly, I’m awarding it the highly coveted Thumb Culture Platinum Award. So go buy it. Go buy it now! It has an incredible dollar to time spent playing ratio and you shouldn’t miss out.
This really all depends on whether you enjoy doing the same thing over and over again. Personally, after writing this review, I honestly can’t see me going back to the Switch version when I can power up my PC and play a deeper version of the same game, albeit made by different developers. This “lite” version of the game, however, will be fine for newcomers to the series to get a taste of repairing cars and earning some steady cash.
Overall I believe the forest has and is continuing to be a survival game I have thoroughly enjoyed to play both with friends and alone. a very scary eerie world with many possible outcomes and situations that will happen will be sure to give you hours of enjoyment.
I won’t lie, I feel really let down by Riot: Civil Unrest. I felt like a kid at Christmas who was excitedly looking forward to opening a present under the tree to realise it was a potato and not what I had wished for. On the face value of it, I was intrigued by the concept and what I was going to discover, however, the way the game has been designed and drawn lets it down majorly. With polished graphics, better sound and a tutorial that helps you understand what the hell you are doing, this game could have had so much potential. For me, it is currently being deleted from my console. Harsh I know, but it is for the best.
The game offers you so many different things to do such as levelling up, new maps, new modes and new guns and effects meaning you could sit and play for however long suited, although it did get very repetitive and not very enjoyable after a while for me, well four games to be exact. This could be the case it just wasn’t my game, or maybe the fact that despite sitting in lobbies for hours - coming out and then re-entering again I never once caught another online player and therefore had to sit and play training, or wait on people coming around to see how we enjoyed the game - we ended up turning it off after testing the maps to see what we liked (spoiler, there weren't any we liked). There are 18 different maps on the game if you can sit and play training games to your heart's content to get all of them unlocked, then go for it! I sure couldn't hack however many hours it may take for it.I believe this game could of worked out really well if there were more people who played and you could actually get into an online game, You can play against bots so you could just play that way but I think the value for money with only having access to local play and training just wasn’t enough for me.
Pode is a wonderful and at times tricky puzzle game which really gets you thinking. My wife and I loved playing through all of the chambers however it only took us around 6 hours to complete. Ok, there are collectables along the way in the form of fireflies that require one of the characters to use their ability to explode a plant pod or rock in order to release them, however as far as the main story goes, it is quite short.
Hitman HD Collection is a remaster of two classic games. You have to take this into account when you purchase this one. It is slightly higher priced than a lot of remastered games on sale at the moment. Although I think this is a great buy and should be in everyone’s collection if you enjoy Hitman. For me these are polar opposites regarding gameplay style and worthy of everyone’s time.
Anthem as a whole is a very ambitious undertaking from a company who hasn't dabbled in the always online co-op shooter genre. I have high hopes it will be a successful game. I'm personally enjoying every minute I get to play it, but I have heard complaints about the endgame becoming a grind. I feel if you have a team of friends to play it with it'll be a great time. Friends always make games more fun. For those who would probably be matchmaking with randoms, it might not be nearly as enjoyable. Overall, I think Anthem is a great game and will continue to improve.