Journey to the (Forbidden) West Full disclosure: Horizon Zero Dawn is my favourite game of all time. The first chapter in Aloy’s epic tale, set in a post-post-apocalyptic world, is a beautiful marriage of science fiction plotline and tribal-esque combat using unique, primitive weaponry. After finishing the Frozen Wilds DLC, …
The Tecmo Bowl comparisons are inevitable, and while its inspirations from Tecmo’s groundbreaking game are clear, you’d be mistaken for thinking Retro Bowl is a simple throwback to a bygone era. Beneath its nostalgic homage is a game that combines deep on-field strategy and team management with the pick-up-and-play ease …
If there’s one thing you can say about Edge of Eternity, it’s that it’s not lacking ambition. While most indie JRPGs tend to go for nostalgia and classic appeal, here’s one that seems to take its inspiration more from the likes of Xenoblade Chronicles as it shoots for graphical splendour, …
Grappling: good. Dogs: good. Combine them and you get Grapple Dog, a fun platformer with plenty of ideas and a whole lot of charm. Grappling hooks. Is there anything better than a good grappling hook? You throw it at a ceiling then fling yourself across a gap, feeling the rush …
As the debut effort from a relatively small indie studio, The Letter is more than a little impressive: a lengthy visual novel that unfolds through the perspectives of seven different characters, their stories all interwoven through a branching structure that gets increasingly more complex the deeper you go. Even if …
Monster Hunter games have always been for a very particular audience. While the marketing behind the franchise’s more contemporary releases would have you believe that accessibility has been a key focus for developer Capcom, the reality of the final products often couldn’t be further from those claims. 2021’s Monster Hunter …
Few games establish a sense of flow quite like OlliOlli. The combination gnarly skate tricks, wild combos, high-speed traversal, and platformer level design—Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater by way of Rayman Origins, if you want to get reductive—is a rush that only ramps up as you master its intricacies. This is …
I tend to be wary of “roguelike shoot-’em-ups”. Maybe I’m just old-fashioned, but I like the appeal of a classic arcade shmup: five handcrafted levels (and maybe a second loop), with consistent enemy layouts and meticulous patterns that you can practice, master, and build a strategy around. I like roguelikes …
Halfway through the third stage of Castle of Shikigami 2, a boss called “Freyr” shows up. With a name like that, shoot-’em-up genre conventions, and the few other bosses under your belt by that point establishing the game’s dark fantasy style, you’d probably expect some huge, threatening mech or a …
Blue Reflection was one of the most uplifting, joyous—dare I say wholesome—games of 2017, even if that point seemed to get lost on a lot of folks. A story about an aspiring ballet dancer who suffers a career-ending injury, and then finding new meaning in a life that she’s mostly …
