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Valkyria Chronicles is, simply, one of the best tactical games you’ll ever play. It’s serious, but doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s emotionally compelling while never losing sight of the fact it’s also a game. It’s a popular and well-regarded game that, for whatever reason, people simply don’t talk about it enough.
It’s heavily exploitative with those school uniforms, and that might put you off it, but for existing fans of the girls and their antics, this is another very worthy and thematically spot-on feather in the cap. It also represents one of the stronger efforts at storytelling in the series, aside from Idea Factory’s own work, and that's a good sign for the future development of the series.
[I]f you have any interest in the genre at all, there is no reason not to give Duelyst a try and see if its distinctive stylings suit you or not.
Blues and Bullets is without a doubt the most true, and also most effective, crime noir game we have to date, with a masterful understanding of the themes and visual motifs that comprise a noir tale, and an understanding on how to work within those without being clichéd or trite.
In terms of giving the fans what they want, I'm certain Naughty Dog has nailed every part of the brief that it was given. Uncharted 4 shows a truly masterful eye for detail and is near perfect in mechanical execution.
Overall it's hard to recommend this game as it feels unpolished and very repetitive. I went in expecting some dark humor but it turned out to take itself too seriously as a game to do that.
While most people have given up on this lovely handheld, I’m glad there are still some studios who are willing to take a chance on the Vita. Severed is a great game with a lot of depth that will have you thinking about it for a long time to come. On a console that is absolutely loaded with the dungeon crawler genre, it's no mean feat that this one manages to stand out.
If the RPG mechanics are your main attraction, you'll probably be disappointed, but as an experiment in choice-driven narratives, Stories is clever, impressive, and well worth a look.
Writing a critique of NORTH was a lot of fun, and I do feel glad that Outlands decided to take all the risks involved with developing a game like this.
t’s a good game, with some clever, creative puzzle design that takes the Lemmings-like inspiration for the series about as far as it would be possible to push it, and all those different amiibo special abilities do give a lot of variety to the puzzles, but it’s little nasty for Nintendo to hold back a full experience unless you’ve got over a hundred dollars worth of toys.
Platforming is tight and varied, and the plot matches the lighthearted tone of the rest of the game. Shantae and the Pirate's Curse is a spirited little game, and by far the best 2D platformer on the PlayStation 4 to date.
It's easy to recommend The Collider 2 as something that is a lot of fun to play. Whether or not you enjoy tunnel racers, and even if you hadn't heard of the unofficial name for this "genre" until now, it doesn't matter: the game strikes a near-perfect balance between challenge and familiarity that players of all skill levels can learn to appreciated.
In other words, it’s a RTS game without any strategy, and a town building simulator with endless timers to deal with. The fact that I needed to use premium-currency gems within the first hour of play or be stuck having to exit the game to wait for the cash to build up to do something else. And a game you need to exit every half hour is not really a game that works on a console.
Alienation is a hugely enjoyable game, but it's one that's playing the ball a little too safely, and resting too heavily on the successes of games that have come before it. Ultimately I don't think this will be remembered as a classic, and it doesn't need to be; what Housemarque has created is a bit of fun with friends around, no more, and no less.
Western Press is a silly game, but there should always be a market for silly games, and at a discount price it’s great for a laugh between friends.
I take all my hats off to Experience Inc. for what it has done with Ray Gigant. This is a breathlessly creative and fundamentally interesting game, and it, along with Stranger of Sword City, cements the developer as one of my favourites out there at the moment.
For someone that wishes to learn about the 1979 Revolution, or Iran in general, this game will provide a cursory understanding that could supplement further reading. Taken on its own, this may be one of the most important games created in terms of historical significance, and in blending life events, narrative and cultural immersion, captures the essential truth of the human experience.
I love when developers take risks, that's when we get some incredible games. By itself, Quantum Break wouldn't have been as successful as it is. The gameplay is not strong enough to stand alone. But in collaboration with the TV series, the stunning cast, the script, the set and character design all work so well together that it elevates Quantum Break for just an interactive experience to an interactive collective.
Kemco produces JRPGs on a budget that are designed to give people a momentary throwback to the 16-bit era of the genre, and while I don't expect anything mind blowing when I do go into these games, I find things this soulless and unimaginative very, very trying indeed.
I found the soul of Langrisser to be well and truly in the right place, and while I don’t believe it is a classic game, I also don’t believe for a moment that it deserves the commentary it has been getting to date. It’s an ugly-as-sin duckling, but we know how that story turns out.