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In conclusion, Retro Brawler Bundle sets A new gold standard for gaming compilations, taking untranslated Japanese games and just fully translating them from start to finish, while also improving upon every game whenever possible. From a bunch of achievements to unlock, the extra quality of life features, to rock-solid emulation, this is a must-own compilation for fans of Technos, Kunio, or even Double Dragon. (despite only one of the three games here being a must-play, due to the unfortunate lack of DDIII’s Famicom version)
However, the game is still very basic and doesn’t feel offer much that wowed me over compared to the many other twin stick games I’ve played. Combine that with the infuriating fact that if you so much as try to pause, you’ll get booted to the level select menu, and you have a decent shooter that isn’t anything special, but is still a fun ride as it lasts, and definitely a good local co-op afternoon.
While Depixtion still has nothing that drastically makes it better or worse than any other picross game out there, it definitely is one of the more polished ones, and in my opinion, it’s the best picross on Switch that wasn’t made by Jupiter. There isn’t really any bonus modes or anything to really note, just 96 well-made puzzles that work great with the presentation. For the typical $8, that’s all you really need if you want to stick to a good formula.
1917 is a poor example of a vertical shooter. Trying to be a tribute to the games of old, it may look decent, but it certainly doesn’t play nearly as well or as tight as any of the classic games from devs like Psikyo. The strange, excessive blood and gore, poor level design and lackluster powerups make The Alien Invasion a very poor choice for a vertical shooter.
Psikyo Shooting Stars Bravo is another great compilation of Psikyo games, this one being better than the last due to featuring two of the best shooters Psikyo had ever released. Props and praise cannot be said enough for Tengai in particular, which is now available in a physical format for the first time in decades. On the other hand, you also have oddballs like Gunbarich, interesting looks at history such as Samurai Aces, and the weird glimpse into the dark future known as Sengoku Cannon. None of the games here are bad, even if Sengoku Cannon is horribly unbalanced for a shooter, but again, I still really feel like we should have gotten some museum material or some sort of bonus features from this compilation, rather than just a plain game select menu.
Glass Masquerade 2 is a fairly fun puzzler that is exactly what it shows on the tin. It’s a puzzle-piece game where you build an image out of glass shards, and while it has elements of Tangram games, I found this to be a lot more enjoyable and easier to get into than the Tangram game already available on the eShop. The controls work fine, it’s the perfect background game if you’re wanting to binge a lengthy movie or video, and it’s just pure puzzle solving fun.
Code Shifter is unfortunately, a big bag of missed potential. On one side, you have some of the best chiptune remixes to grace any video game, and it’s clear Arc gave it their all to represent each character in their own special way, nailing the crossover aspect in that regard. But on the other hand, the majority of the game sports this absolutely dull art style that honestly feels as if it belonged to another game before Arc characters were thrown in at the later stages of development. Combine that with some confusing design decisions such as the lack of D-Pad support, character themes getting interrupted by bosses, to even the 8-bit minigame lacking so much as stage, music, or CPU select options, and you have a mess of a crossover that barely feels like one, and isn’t even as fully realized as it easily could have been.
Fairy Fencer F is still a pretty decent RPG, containing a lot of the same fun mechanics that make quite a bit of the other Idea Factory RPGs work so well. However, it all comes down to the gameplay loop in the end, and unfortunately, while the combat is great fun and exploration is fine, the repetitive nature of traversing simplistic dungeons over and over again is just a big bore, as even with the boosters and free DLC the game lets you use to power through the story if you so desire, it still feels like you’re just going in boring circles and not doing much of anything, even as you recruit new party members, gain access to alchemy and sidequests, and have lots to do. When it just feels like busy work, it’s tough to recommend this older game over one of IF’s newer RPGS.
I really was pleased by what I played in this pack, and while I don’t think this has as much bang for your buck as the other William packs, this definitely paves the way as a good chance to get more licensed tables. Could we possibly get some of Williams’ other best licensed tables, such as Popeye, Terminator 2 and Star Trek this way? Here’s hoping that this is a good sign for things to come in the world of Pinball FX3.
Psikyo Shooting Stars Alpha is a fantastic compilation in terms of quality, packing five outstanding games and one good game into a single package. While it’s depressing that none of the games have any sort of history features or in-depth manuals, I was pleased to see that this compilation offers a great value compared to buying each game by itself on the eShop, and having the whole Strikers series in one place makes it a really great holdover until Strikers 2020 launches this year.
Considering the tight controls, the great soundtrack, and the outstandingly faithful recreation to the hardware, this came as quite a surprise to me, considering how it originally seemed like Squidlit was just trying to ape the style of Mr. Tako. In the end though, I found myself vastly preferring this squid platformer over that one, and while both are solid platformers, this one’s shorter length and simplistic, fun platforming makes this a must-have for the $2 pricepoint, as the game manages to make a name for itself and stand out on its own.
Link-a-Pix is yet another entry in Lightwood’s puzzle series that works just as well as all the others. As the developers continue to make minor QOL tweaks and bug fixes to the engine, it’s the puzzles themselves that make each package worth the buy or not, and I’m happy to say that this game is on the higher end of quality, right next to Block-a-Pix as one of my favorites in the series.
New Super Lucky’s Tale is a fantastic 3D platformer, polishing up a game in such a fashion that it becomes nearly unrecognizable from the original, despite not being a sequel or really doing much else. In a way, New Super Lucky’s Tale could be compared to the jump between Street Fighter II and Super Street Fighter II, in that the game still feels similar to control with the same outline, but nearly everything else about it is polished and tweaked for the better, leading to a far more engaging platformer that’s perfect for anyone to get into, yet has enough to do in order to satisfy the completionists or older players.
Gotcha Racing Second is a racing game that reeks of genericness. Barebones presentation, generic music, boring track layouts, and little reason to keep more than one vehicle around, since you can replace your worst parts with better newer ones and just keep improving on the vehicle you already have.
The Adventures of Elena Temple: Definitive Edition is a rerelease done right. While I was very impressed by the original game for the sheer fact that it was the developer’s first ever game, this rerelease feels like that developer used his knowledge from the past year and a half in order to polish the game up and keep what works while tweaking what might have not.
With that being said, the core gameplay loop may be fun for a while, but there really isn’t much of a surprise to some of the endings after a certain point, since a lot of them are obtained by dying, befriending, or killing NPCs. The more creative ones happen to be what produced a laugh out of me, but after a while it grew tiring starting over and over and over again. I kinda feel some more variety would have been much appreciated, and the gimmick wears out far too quickly.
Williams Pinball Volume 5 is a great bit of DLC. While the other packs are great in their own way, I feel that Volume 5 is the best of the table packs since Volume 1, due to two of the tables being of outstanding quality while the other one is just average. Either way, you’ll have a lot of pinball scorechasing to enjoy from this pack and I really do give this DLC a good recommendation.
It’s a shame too, since if this had a bit more tweaking to be a more exciting multiplayer game, this could stand as a very addictive puzzler just like what inspired it, but as it stands now, only the single player aspects succeed in that regard.
In The Hunt is a pretty OK game. Coming off as a generic and typical 16-bit shooter, the game’s art is really the most memorable aspect of it. However, the multiple endings and the competitive co-op multiplayer are still really cool things to see here, and shooter fans will find enough to enjoy throughout multiple playthroughs, even if the first stage is a drag and the entire game has crippling slowdown.
"I can only really recommend this game for fans of the original machine, or for those who love score chasers, button mashers, or have the sort of USB controllers I’m referring to and want a game that makes good use of them. But for the $8 pricetag on offer, it’s a tough buy for anyone else."