Leonardo Faria's Reviews
I knew this was going to be a good game, considering its dev team’s track record, but even then, Mina the Hollower surpassed my expectations. It is a bonafide masterpiece of a game. Not only does it pay homage to the Game Boy era of Zelda, I’d go as far as to say that it surpasses its main source of inspiration. It’s colorful, it’s charming, it’s incredibly well-written, well-designed, with a great combat system and a dense world that just begs for you to explore every single corner.
Yoshi and the Mysterious Book innovates on a stagnant franchise by being a really interesting mixture between platforming, puzzle-solving, and zoology cataloguing. Collectathon enthusiasts and cozy gamers will have a blast with this low-stakes experience. It’s super easy but not condescending, adorable to look at (in docked mode, that is), chock-full of content, and best enjoyed in smaller sessions.
This is still, by and large, the pinnacle of the racing genre, a game with a sheer ludicrous amount of content and quality. It is just a game released after the franchise had already peaked, so there’s no other direction but downwards for it. It could have done a bit more with its Japan-centered setting, and its progression system is starting to get a bit old at this point. With that being said, I’ve been playing it for nearly a hundred hours up to this point. There’s a lot to love in it. Looks great, sounds fantastic, controls like a dream. There’s still nothing like a Forza Horizon game. Even when it’s inferior to its predecessors, it’s still much better than its peers.
Rugrats: Retro Rewind Collection is, once again, a respectable Limited Run Games effort in terms of preservation of some older, less acclaimed games. Don’t expect gems in this collection: for the most part, the games included in this package are mere licensed shovelware. I can’t particularly recommend them if you’re not a fan of the beloved Nickelodeon cartoon, but if you are, then you’ll probably be able to put up with their many issues.
Bubsy 4D is indeed one of the biggest surprises of the year, not because it’s a masterpiece or anything, but solely due to the fact that it is a Bubsy game that doesn’t suck. Atari and Fabraz weren’t messing around with this project: they knew the franchise sucked, yet they were dead set on proving the world that you can, in fact, make a decent entry in the series, with somewhat decent production values and actually pretty good controls. It’s not perfect, its protagonist is still an insufferable twerp, but it is what it is: a good game that just so happens to star Bubsy the freaking Bobcat. There must be a god after all.
This is a pretty straightforward conversion. R-Type Dimensions III is not as exciting as its predecessor, as it’s only covering one game, instead of two, and said game just isn’t as iconic as the first few classic R-Types. It gives you all the (optional) presentation overhauls and accessibility options that you would expect and want.
I expected less from Fruit Mountain Party. It’s a clunky, somewhat repetitive puzzle game with just enough content and charm to justify the occasional ten to twenty minute gameplay session on a portable. It features charming visuals, decent performance, and a handful of different modes to experiment with. I still think that playing 2048 on a phone is less time-consuming and more cost-efficient of a solution than actually investing money on this title, but there’s nothing overly wrong about it.
In no moment did I feel annoyed whilst playing This Is Fine: Maximum Cope, to my absolute surprise. It was a competent, somewhat well-designed metroidvania, with decent level design and boss battles to make up for underwhelming visuals and a generic combat system. Is it my favorite metroidvania? No. I also doubt I would have ever considered playing it if it wasn’t for this reviewing opportunity, as I have zero interest in the meme that inspired the game as a whole. But I’ll be honest with you: I expected a LOT less from it.
You’re done with it in less than three hours. Local co-op can make the experience less aggravating, but won’t help make the gameplay feel exciting. There’s just no magic in this game about fairies.
Everything is Crab succeeds because it manages to feel fresh and creative in a genre known for feeling bankrupt of ideas. It’s a really simple roguelite with superficial combat and basic visuals, but its take on biological evolution and ensuring your adorable little freak will survive against predators is actually quite engaging and addictive.
Instead of being just like every other safe and overbudgeted action adventure by the company, this is a gameplay-first experience, just like how Returnal had done five years prior. It shows, once again, that Housemarque might actually be Sony’s most important internal development team, masterfully mixing arcade-like controls and an endlessly replayable gameplay loop with higher quality visuals and cinematic storytelling.
There’s truly no other racing game like Screamer, and I commend how innovative it is. Furthermore, it’s got great visuals, excellent voice acting, and it miraculously manages to blend in a heavy visual novel narration into its story mode, without ruining its pacing. It’s just quite complicated to control, however, requiring you to basically forget everything you’ve ever learned about driving cars in a videogame in order to get used to its bizarre mechanics.
Wax Heads checks all the boxes with gusto. It takes the simple concept of recommending songs to people and transforms it into a clever puzzle game that not only revolves around knowing a bit about music, but also tests your logic and attention skills. Then, when the gameplay loop starts getting a bit samey, the game stops it for a while, transforms into a visual novel, and captivates you with a surprisingly well-written story until the next chapter starts.
Even if the prospect of wanting to play a game about shoveling snow and dealing with the darkness of winter might not be the most interesting idea in April and May, Moomintroll: Winter’s Warmth is a pretty game with an easygoing gameplay loop which will provide you with a good time. Granted, don’t expect it to be the coziest, most inviting children’s game in existence, with some slightly heavier subject matters being tackled every now and then (loneliness, overcoming adversities, dealing with the prospects of people dying), but it’s a beautiful, well-put adventure, still worth your time.
Let me reiterate that, from a presentation standpoint, Mouse: PI For Hire is absolutely fantastic. It’s so good, in fact, that I’d go as far as to say that you should give it a go for its visuals and style alone. As a game itself, it’s also good, don’t get me wrong, but there’s nothing I haven’t seen before in other, more entertaining first-person shooters. It’s competently made, but bog standard, going through the motions with an easygoing but unmemorable gameplay loop.
What you are really here for is to know if the Switch 2 port of Subnautica is a vast improvement over the previous Switch version. It certainly is, and if you’re not the owner of a Steam Deck or a beefier ROG Ally, this is, without a doubt, the best portable version of the game ever released. If that is enough for you to either buy it or merely update your older port is up to you, as there isn’t anything novel about it anymore (the Switch port is already half a decade old).
As obvious as it may sound, Legacy of Kain: Defiance Remastered is the kind of re-release that will feel like a godsend to fans of the franchise (again, if they decide to ignore the mess caused by Ascendance), but one that won’t be a mandatory playthrough for those who aren’t well-versed in the franchise’s sizeable lore.
Hozy is a relaxing and straightforward refurbishment simulator that isn’t trying to reinvent the wheel, nor is it trying to demand too much attention from you. It features just enough elements to keep you entertained (good visuals, decent controls, a gameplay loop that won’t bore you) while you’re listening to a podcast, for instance. Whilst I think they should have given players more freedom in terms of how much stuff you have to shove into a room before a level is complete, it is so easygoing and devoid of stakes, you won’t end up minding about this issue that much.
Tales of the Shire is too boring of a game, too boring of a slice-of-life simulator, and its weak usage of Tolkien’s license makes it feel even more disappointing. Sadly, I don’t think its premise would have worked that well right from the getgo, but even the mundane life of a Hobbit should have felt less boring than this.
Beyond Words nails its premise and its mixture of gameplay styles. Literally labelling it “Balatro meets Scrabble” is the best praise it can receive; it has the potential to become something as addictive as its sources of inspiration. All it really needs to do, in order to truly shine in the future, is tweak some of its overly demanding scoring thresholds, which can be a bit frustrating at times, making you rely more on luck than your actual vocabulary skills. Nevertheless, this one is a delightful breath of fresh air.