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Again, 7th Dragon III Code: VFD isn't a game you want to get into if you aren't the type of person who puts a lot of time into party preparations. If you want a rich, engrossing story with unique characters that grow over time, turn around and walk away now, as this is very much a niche dungeon crawler that will only speak to specific members of the community. But for those people, it's a good enough RPG respite in the sense that it actually allows you to play a role in the way you see fit.
Some of the boss designs feel uneven or underdeveloped, and the dialogue misses about as often as it lands, but when Furi is good, it's real good. I am surprised by how well its fusion of action and shooting works. Just make sure you have the patience necessary see the game through to the end.
The Battle Cats POP! is a game that's as fun as it is weird. When it's not putting you in time out with the energy meter, it can be addictive as hell. Too much of its free-to-play roots are still present, but even with those elements it's still a worthwhile time killer.
None of these niggles do much to detract from the overall experience, though, and despite them Brigador ends up a thrilling, hectic vehicle shooter that's quite a bit deeper than the forebears that inspired it.
BoxBoxBoy! has a simplistic elegance to it. You can look at one screenshot or watch several seconds of video and understand what it's trying to convey. For that reason, it never really dives into new territory in any significant way, but it does everything so well that you won't really notice it. I'd love to see another iteration that takes the formula even further (BoxGirl?), and I hope this series continues to thrive on 3DS, which has fostered so many new and great IPs for Nintendo.
As something that Capcom essentially had to be shamed into doing as a sort of post-launch apology, it’s a different story. The blemishes are raw and sore, the flaws impossible not to gawk at. This is what took another five months? It’s a damned shame that only adds to the increasingly sad story of Street Fighter V -- an amazing fighting game that is almost impossible to recommend.
At this point, I'm torn on whether or not the season pass is worth it for lapsed Battlefront players who are thinking of returning. The game is coming into its own, but if you've held off for this long, it's arguably better to continue waiting until more of these expansions are out and/or the pricing goes down. For folks still entertained by the base content , it's probably safe to upgrade with the assumption that the next two expansions will at least be decent. After Bespin, I'm fairly confident they will be.
LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens still feels limited in nature, but it's a better, more pointed effort than Marvel's Avengers, which was all over the place. It might feel a little more stretched if you didn't go bonkers over Abrams' film, but if you're really anxious to hang out with Finn and the gang again, this is a good opportunity.
The parallel to Limbo feels necessary when talking to people who haven't yet played Inside; after finishing it, it feels wholly unnecessary. Inside stands on its own merits as a superbly captivating and moving experience, one that's bound to be on your mind in the time you spend away from it. Someone once told me that the games you can't stop thinking about when you're not playing them are the truly great ones. I'm inclined to agree. Inside fits that mold even though we've seen others of its ilk before.
Drawful 2 is a phenomenal vehicle to waste away an entire evening with your friends doubled over in fits of laughter. It's hard to care about the lack of real innovation when tears are blurring your vision and you can't catch your breath from laughing so hard.
Regardless, I really enjoyed this installment of Rhythm Heaven -- the lighthearted story and silly characters gave it even more charm than its predecessors, and I reveled in its dopiness. I didn’t even mind playing through the old games I had conquered many a time previously. Similar to Katamari Damacy, WarioWare, and other inane Japanese creations, the heart of these games are really in their core, catchy repeatable gameplay. You will laugh, you will cry, you will perfect, you will try again -- but most of all, you will find heavenly flow.
Star Ocean: Integrity and Faithlessness is a weird game in that it's a by-the-books RPG one minute, and a completely new feeling the next. Any future iterations after this one will be a tough sell, but if this is where its journey ends, it had a good run.
P.S. Here's a bonus gif, where I wear a Leon mask, crawl at super-speed while reloading, and pistol-whip a zombie dick. It's the best part of the game.
Heart & Slash is a hardcore game built on top of a niche genre, but I think a lot of people will appreciate it. Even then, those same folks won't dig the frame rate and camera issues, but the juice is still worth the squeeze.
It's just a shame there isn't way more game here. If this truly is the start of a franchise, I'd potentially be up for more titles, but I can't deny how much this sparse pilot entry leaves me wanting.
"Sameness" defines 256. It's Pac-Man, with its classic gameplay intact, twisted to the side with an endless runner tint instead of a level-based progression system. It's good, but could have done much more and built on the killer advancements that were made in Pac-Man Championship Edition DX. Maybe that's expecting too much, because for five smackeroos, you could do a whole lot worse.
This is filler, pure and simple. This is contractual obligation padding out a Season Pass. It isn't terrible, it isn't offensive, but it isn't much fun either. The greatest value of this DLC won't come from actually playing it, but in watching some YouTube physics wizard design the perfect Brahmin slaughter house, or a machine that automatically launches bowling balls at a captive Raider. This is DLC designed to manufacture ten-second .webm files. If you're not absolutely crazy about the settlement building aspect of the game (or trying to build an online empire of clickable content), this is a hard pass.
Zero Time Dilemma is nothing short of a flawed masterpiece.
If you don’t like visual novels or more intimate stories, will you like VA-11 HALL-A? I think so, yeah. I honestly believe there is a game in every genre for everyone, so you should give it a shot. VA-11 HALL-A is a damn fine video game, and that’s the bottom line.
Almost like a diet Persona of sorts, Tokyo Mirage Sessions FE doesn't feel like Atlus took any half-measures, but by that same token, it doesn't do anything spectacular either or expand upon its previous work. While folks probably won't be rushing out to buy a Wii U for it anytime soon, the famed publisher has once again proved that it is at the top of the food chain when it comes to JRPGs.