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Hours upon hours will slip away as you attempt to stop Chronos, and with each run you’ll want to reach the endgame more and more. From start to finish, Hades II is a masterpiece.
Once it sinks its hook into you, it can be hard to put away. It embodies the true “One more time” experience in all the right ways.
While the title has elements of multiple genres, it doesn’t excel in any genre. Some parts of the role-playing experience are boring, and the shooting sections feel generic. While the sound and art are consistent and do a job, nothing about this title really captures the imagination in the way that a space-based role-playing game should.
I really love being genuinely surprised by a game and Ariana and the Elder Codex did just that. The magic combat was fluid and engaging and I found myself wanting more of the characters and the world that I explored over 20 hours, within which in my books is a genuine achievement.
Legacy of Kain: Ascendance is a linear 2D action platformer that is fun to play through, but some will call it a missed opportunity. The simple slash-em-up gameplay is addictive, but it is all a bit mindless.
While at its center, it’s a third-person action game, it’s more than that. It’s a journey of bonding for two characters from opposite walks of life. Mostly, it’s just a fun game, something that can be replayed over and over again, while only getting better.
With the hiccups that the Marvel MaXimum Collection brings, it feels like a sidekick rather than a true hero for the classic age of gaming.
There are parts of Hozy that make it seem like there could be more to its systems. On the other hand, what Hozy offers is simple enough to fill the niche of cozy relaxation. It ends up falling in a place where “more” is the first thing that comes to mind.
Finally, there is an extraction shooter that not only competitively inclined gamers can enjoy, but narrative-loving players as well. There is a crossover here that takes an immense amount of polish, quality, and consistency to pull off.
It wasn’t my favorite video game so far this year and it won’t nearly be my least favorite, but it may end up being the most memorable. It has been a long time since I’ve played a new game that puts art at the forefront of its creation, and Project Songbird was a refreshing venture back into that sentiment.
Homura Hime is a fun game. At its best, it’s a unique and distinct blend of Ninja Gaiden and bullet hell systems that forces you to develop a rhythm and dance to it. At its worst, it tends to drag out it’s welcome and stutter under what is a fairly light load. But it has heart, and it loves a genre I love and doesn’t ask much up front.
Super Meat Boy 3D is a bold and largely successful evolution of a beloved formula. It takes the core elements that made the original so compelling — tight controls, punishing difficulty, and clever level design — and translates them into 3D with great confidence. Its greatest strength lies in its identity. It’s not for everyone, and that’s also its selling point.
In its current state, it’s a mostly smooth ride with a few bumps in the road. A fun game night with friends, for sure.
Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun is a very entertaining strategy game that is consistent, deep, and challenging. It is consistently fun while pushing you and introducing new elements and it dials up even more in the Aiko’s Choice expansion.
The excellent animation, amazing boss fights, and the solid combat can’t save the game from being a mediocre metroidvania with the skin of God of War.
If you are looking for a decent, new simulator, then Docked is an option on the table. However, the performance issues paired with odd mechanic choices and no sandbox/post-game do limit the experience for players.
Starsand Island is a nice experience. I am personally very excited to see how it grows, and am very hopeful that we start to see this shift towards 3D cozy life sim games more. It is addicting, fun, and most surprisingly to me, it makes players crave not only the game but the genre itself in indescribable ways.
Lost and Found Co. is a modern take on a historied genre that shows just how far you can take a “simple” genre when a studio understands game design and develops a game with love and care.
The horror and atmosphere are gripping and never let go, and the action is some of the best I have seen from the series since Resident Evil 5. Resident Evil Requiem is going to go down as one of the most impressive games this year and I am so excited for the other games that Capcom has cooking up.
Demon Tides’ unique, memorable style and its abundance of gameplay elements to explore and experiment with will bury itself in many hearts.