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So here’s to you, Leo, and to Leo’s Fortune. The game may be older than my children, but it found purpose in coming back to the public eye a decade after release, and now floated its way onto the Switch in the long shadows of the console’s twilight. If you’re remotely curious, the price is right and the Switch is where it should be played, giving players an opportunity to enjoy the mobile aspect but with full console support. You’ll have a good time, even if not a long time, and who knows?
I think that the best way I can describe Empire of the Ants is to compare it to a BBC biology documentary. Sure, it’s boring, but the presentation and delivery make the product feel more interesting than it really is. It’s a jaw-dropping gorgeous experience with an additional layer of scientific research and information to be delivered to whoever plays it.
I imagine this can still be salvaged with a handful of desperately needed updates. When Asobo finishes fixing this game, then Flight Simulator 2024 might actually end up being worth your time. The potential is there, you can clearly see it. As it stands, however, I really don’t care it’s pretty, that it has more content, or a fully-fledged career mode; it’s simply too glitchy and unpolished for me to bother.
The immersiveness, great production values and excellent plot made up for many of its shortcomings. At times, Metro Awakening feels borderline revolutionary, offering AAA-quality storytelling and attention to detail to a small device like the Quest 2. Sadly, the gameplay is a bit too clunky. Between the camera limitations and poor combat, I was mostly enjoying the plot and fooling myself into believing I was inside the game’s setting, not the horror or combat sections themselves.
Even though Europa didn’t turn out to be what I’d hoped for, it’s still worth your time if you’re looking for a completely casual experience. I think I was lead astray by the trailers, which make it look more curious and puzzle-centered than it actually is. I was expecting something more along the lines of Omno or RiME, but what we got was something more akin to a Journey knock-off. It’s not bad by any means, just not quite what I was hoping for.
The multiplayer is fun, although just like it’s been for years, the skill-based matchmaking is horrendous still and the maps are generally not great overall. Zombies modes are my bread and butter and it feels like this is as “back” as zombies can be. Hopefully, they’ve learnt to new mess around with this anymore, every time they try something massively different, it absolutely kills off the player base for the mode. The fatigue is officially gone, I feel myself wanting to sit down and play a Call of Duty game daily again, and I’m not complaining at all.
It might not be as intuitive as the non-VR original, but Trombone Champ: Unflattened is still a pretty fun musical game for the Quest. If anything, it just shows how well Flat2VR is able to port games to a brand new ecosystem, making them feel even more immersive than before. I didn’t mind the fact it was a bit uglier and confusing to play. At the end of the day, I was pretending to play a trombone with a dumb smile on my face, missing most notes, without a care in the world. I just can’t wait to see what else these VR wizards are up to in the near future.
Divine Dynamo Flamefrit is a very brief experience, but one that’s quite enjoyable while it lasts. Its brevity might actually be its biggest weakness: I legit wanted more from this Zelda-lite adventure, with decent PS1-ish visuals, actually competent voice acting, straightforward controls and surprising sense of humor. I would have been able to live without the unnecessary first-person Megazord boss battles, though.
Once again, this is short, sweet and sometimes subtle, but Platform 8 delivers on all fronts what a followup game could be. Players who have come from Exit 8 may discover a bit of an easter egg towards the end, so be sure to stay locked in and accomplish everything in this well crafted, oddball world. If and when there is a third game, I’ll be there. If there’s a VR version, I’ll absolutely jump on it.
This is now the second major exclusive game that Meta has dropped for its Quest 3 headset and just like Asgard’s Wrath 2, Batman: Arkham Shadow is an absolute hit and must-play for any VR fan. The absolute care and quality Camouflaj has put into this title is breathtaking. Being able to fully adapt every aspect that the series fans expect from Arkham games into VR is astonishing. As well as being able to fit in a full length, unique story into the timeline without ruining the other games should be applauded.
I’ll give the devs some credit; Albatroz is a really unique game, and it’s also better than their previous game, Distortions. But it’s also a really buggy, unpolished and unfocused experience. I didn’t jive with the story, and the gameplay got on my nerves at times. It’s not entirely bad, though; you can clearly see the devs cared about the game like a passion project of sorts. It’s just a clear case of feature creep on something that should have been a lot simpler, a lot more straightforward.
I understand that most of these issues are fixable, and if they end up being patched, I will then firmly advocate for everyone to buy Metal Slug Tactics on the Switch (or the Steam Deck if you have access to one). As for now, however, that’s not it. I love the gameplay loop, the presentation, the perfect mixture of tactical combat with arcade-like sensibilities, but I expected a lot more from this game in this particular platform, which felt like the perfect home for it when it was first announced.
I by no means think Nikoderiko is a bad game. On the contrary, I think it’s a lovely little piece with some strange missteps (the voice acting feels unnecessary) but an overall strong presentation. Yet the execution, particularly on the Switch, is just not a spectacular piece. It janks in weird places, the fluidity is ruined by the limitations of the hardware, and sometimes the perspective changes are too frequent and too unexpected. I adore the chances and swings, and, when it works, it works so very well. When it falls, though, you really feel the weight of it all and the legacy it’s trying to carry.
As a whole, Threshold is a delightfully bizarre and engaging little game, but the odd pacing and structure might not be to everyone’s liking. The core main gameplay loop borders on tedious, and there’s a frustrating amount of bugs, however, it’s getting to the bottom of that mystery that makes it an utterly engaging experience. If you’re looking for weirdness, you should give this one a go.
Softie is a short, occasionally cute, occasionally creepy, but constantly obtuse point-and-click adventure. Even if its runtime isn’t mean to last for an hour, I got stuck once or twice due to some confusing puzzles and a lack of a hint system. Regardless, it was a merely passable pasttime for a day, one I don’t regret tackling, but not exactly one I’ll remember.
An epic of longtime investment, I was pleased to see that I could pick up and play a handful of turns at a time, blow through an hour or so, and then put down the game to come back to the saga another day. It’s engrossing but not consuming, and it weaves a long, exciting tale like the source material. Highly recommended for fans of the genre.
It doesn’t surprise me that Tetris Forever is so good. This is the fourth playable documentary by Digital Eclipse, and those guys take gaming history and preservation to an outstanding degree of love and care. The interviews are great (Alexey is just the most huggable uncle), the documents are neat, the easter eggs are a nice addition, and the sheer amount of versions of Tetris included in the package will please each and every single fan of the franchise.
The best thing I can say about Don’t Let Him In is that, sure, there was an honest attempt at making a Silent Hill-esque indie horror experience on a very small budget. Sadly, this would have been a more acceptable attempt if it were a movie, not a piece of interactive “entertainment”. Even if there were microscopic glimpses of hope coming from the premise, the game is bogged by terrible controls, a literal couple of terrible combat sections, a minuscule runtime, and really bad execution.
To be fair, what is actually disappointing about Shadows of the Damned: Hella Remastered is that, as a remaster, it’s not the most impressive piece of work out there. The colors are drab, the particle effects are still dated, and the gameplay, whilst pretty good, should have received an extra layer of polish. With that being said, I had a bit of fun with it. Everything that had to do with Shinji Mikami’s side of the project, namely the gameplay, worked wonders for me. The Suda51 side of things was a mixed bag at best.
A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead is a better game than I expected. It’s good, but it could have honestly been a lot better, even great. The developers have, for the most part, successfully managed to translate the movie’s unique and engaging premise into game form. However, uneven level design and repetitive gameplay holds it back from being truly great. I hope we get more from A Quiet Place, as there’s so much untapped potential in bringing it to gaming form, but this is a solid enough first effort.