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I appreciate everything that the developers were trying to achieve with Rollercoaster Dreams, but this game should be a real lesson in working within your means. The best, most well-resourced developers in the world would struggle to make a quality simulation game with online sharing, VR support, and the ability to fully explore and interact with your creations. This is the work of a small indie developer that should have focused on getting a few things right, than throwing in everything and failing at it all.
Nubla is a work of art based on many other works of art. It is able to capture the feel of the very museum it is based on, it allows anyone to come along and pick it up. The ability to explore the game at their own pace without dragging out too long is appreciated. It is a beautiful, calming game that many should try out. Many will probably buy it for the quick Platinum trophy, but hopefully once they're in they discover something that makes them sit back and reflect too.
On the whole, Nitroplus Blasterz Heroines Infinite Duel is a quality 2D fighter, even if it lacks the narrative in needed and the characterisation that would have made it more effective as fanservice. All I can recommend is that you give the game a chance until you've managed to topple the boss, because from that point on you'll probably find yourself with a game that has a combat system you'll quite enjoy.
Planet Coaster is everything I could want in a simulation game of this type. Good management tools, good building tools, and most of all, it is extremely fun to play. It's the best amusement park simulation we've seen yet, and any complaints that you might have with the variety of rides that it offers are mitigated brilliantly by the use of Steam Workshop to allow the community to broaden the experience. In this way Planet Coaster feels both nostalgic and yet eminently modern.
This is well worthwhile picking up if you've got a New Year's party to host, or attend.
Xmas Shooting is a delightful little game, and a great way to get into the spirit of the holidays. For the hardcore shoot ‘em up fans, it won’t bring anything new to the table, but it has plenty of challenge and fun to offer in a bite-sized package. Despite the difficulty, I'd even recommend it to people who don’t normally like the genre. The sense of silly fun and surprisingly poignant story are reason enough to give Xmas Shooting a go and try to overcome the challenges that it throws at you.
I’ve never felt weaker than in a game that literally casts you as an alien overlord.
The unfortunate thing about Battalion Commander is that if it was one of those free-to-play mobile games, I’d probably have fun with it I could see some others even enjoying it enough to toss it a couple of coins in support. Sitting on trains or in doctor's waiting rooms, or standing in queues, I often go to my phone to keep me occupied and this kind of game would have fit the bill perfectly. But if I am to sit in front of my PlayStation 4, I’m not going to want to play something that requires minimal effort, no narrative and five minutes of my time. Simple as that.
The bits I liked (multiple colours, classic puzzle gameplay) are completely overshadowed by those I don't. There is a severe lack of preset puzzles to keep me returning for more, a fact that two additional modes don't actually manage to compensate for.
Now I genuinely do not feel the need to own a physical pinball table, which was something I had been contemplating before. That’s how good this is.
This game’s obvious new feature is its HD art, and, more than just being beautiful, the ability of this art to enhance the characters and world makes Shantae: Half-Genie Hero the most impressive take on the whole fantasy Middle East setting since the utterly brilliant Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.
It's definitely not my cup of tea and will be an unfamiliar journey for anyone who's a fan of so called "hardcore" platformers, and yet I don't see Feist appealing to fans of narrative platformer fans either. Pick this one up if you want something different, but be warned – it's got barbs.
Crystal Rift possesses all the potential in the world, and I certainly hope the game performs well enough that the development team is able to go back to the drawing board and come up with a more comprehensive and nuanced structure for another crack at the VR dungeon crawler. Because, as I said at the start, for all its many flaws as a game, Crystal Rift has absolutely sold me on the idea of the VR dungeon crawler.
Dead Rising 4 takes a few steps forward in terms of the gameplay mechanics, but also takes a giant zombie-infected shamble backwards in regards to the narrative elements. Taking away the ticking clock, making the maniacs nothing more than a mere annoyance instead of the stuff of nightmares, and having civilians easily rescued really pulled away from what I liked in the previous games. Dead Rising 4 is fun, but it’s also a little hollow and it’s lost a significant chunk of the series’ soul.
Laser Disco Defenders is missing a lot of components from being a phenomenal game or even a fantastic top down shooter. Some of the groundwork laid by the developers leaves room for excitement, but there just isn’t enough carefully crafted content to back up the solid mechanics. It’s a dance which ends too soon, and it comes as a hard recommendation.
Like any sort of anti-art, it shatters the foundations of the medium so that we can look at those pieces, in isolation, and understand their value as a whole. It throws a spanner into the whole argument around games as art, paradoxically affirming the artistic merits of the medium in a way that few other games ever have.
The gameplay itself is vintage Shin Megami Tensei and doesn’t really need to be anything else.
Unfortunately, pretty pictures aren’t enough to save it. There’s a premise with a lot of potential in Enigma, but it’s squandered on cliche characters, uneven pacing, and rough localisation.
Home consoles aren't great platforms for hidden object games, but as we saw with the Mystery Case Files game on the Wii some years back, it can be done. Clockwork Tales' inconsistent tone, lack of self-awareness, and generally poor presentation let down an otherwise standard example of the genre, which means you'll need to be a really big genre fan to derive much value from this.
Super Mario Maker for Nintendo 3DS is in almost every way a better quality release to the already-superb Wii U game. A better introduction and tutorial, and the superb Super Mario Challenge mode show that there’s been significant work done to this version to improve it over the Wii U title. However, the inability to upload and share levels that you’ve created is unforgivable. It rips the soul of the original Mario Maker right out of the game, leaving a shell of a game that does very little to encourage you to make interesting courses