Review: One Eyed Kutkh (PS4)

Posted on March 5, 2018 by geelw

Charmingly abstract and somewhat brief, One Eyed Kutkh comes highly recommended as a game that’s just as entertaining for kids as it is for adults looking for a nicely non violent bedtime story experience. Developer Baba Yaga Games and Sometimes You bring their inexpensive Unity engine indie to the PS4 and it’s a winner despite that short play length. Hey, sometimes you just need a tiny bite late at night, as a big full meal can often leave you with a rumbly tummy afterwards.

The story’s a simple one (and yes, so simple I’m swiping this from the official site because the PlayStation Network page isn’t up just yet):

A single traveler on his way home crashes on a mysterious planet. To continue his journey, he’ll have to get to the ninth heaven, deceive the Sun and the Moon and steal their space-boats.

That’s pretty much it, except the game uses no words at all save for intentionally alien noises coming from a few characters.

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Review: NORTH (PS4)

Posted on February 27, 2018 by geelw

While it’s under an hour in length (or maybe just over an hour if you get stuck or play at a slower pace – hey, I’m old and slow!), NORTH is a pretty unique and memorably weird game from developer Outlands Games ported by Sometimes You to PS4. A first person game about the pathway to immigration as presented in a surreal land inhabited by some bizarre-looking alien lifeforms, it’s also an interestingly timely game experience that’s also intentionally visually unsettling. Imagine David Lynch, David Cronenberg and Fritz Lang teaming up to make a ‘walking simulator’ with light adventure game elements and you’d be somewhat close.

The game’s brevity is noted at the beginning and you’re also told you can’t save your progress because the story is meant to be played/told in one sitting. There are also no options to change the game’s brightness level and you’s better be comfortable with the non-configurable controls as well. The game places intentional restrictions on the player as he attempts to make it through the intentionally confusing mix of exploration and mild to maddening puzzle solving required to eventually secure asylum in the strange world he’s ended up in.

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Review: Aperion Cyberstorm (Nintendo Wii U)

Posted on February 19, 2018 by geelw

Yes, I know this one’s out for the Switch and STEAM, but for those of you who still only own a Wii U, you’ll be very pleased to know Aperion Cyberstorm is also available on your console of choice, it’s pretty darn good and definitely a game you’ll want to check out if you love arcade-style dual-stick action.

Featuring a solo campaign and some fun couch co-op and great versus multiplayer modes, this is a fantastic little twin-stick shooter that makes for plenty of nostalgic blasting action in campaign mode and plenty of mayhem as a “grab up to four other friends and have a total blast” manner in the mutiplayer modes. Indie developer aPriori Digital has made a very challenging and really solid experience that’s going to make quite a few Wii U owners very happy to see there are still signs of life left in the system.

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Review: Dragon Sinker – Descendants of Legend (PS4/Vita)

Posted on February 19, 2018 by geelw

KEMCO and ever-busy developer EXE-CREATE along with a few other studios have been whipping out dozens of mobile JRPGs for years and fortunately, a bunch of them have been slowly but surely arriving on home consoles, a great thing if you happen to be a fan of “old-school” dungeon dives. Dragon Sinker – Descendants of Legend is one of their latest and it’s a wonderfully, intentionally rustic style of gameplay that recalls the early Final Fantasy series as well as bits of Dragon Quest and a few other well-aged classics.

Granted, the game is going for more of a very solid homage to 8-bit JRPGs than it goes for the gold standard in terms of its familiar plot points. But between the clever use of the Unity engine to deliver appropriately chunky sprites and the developer implementing elements of its other role-playing games to great effect, this one’s a time-sink worthy of your time.

While deceptively short if you follow the main quest and stick to it like glue, as with other EXE-CREATE games, the true depth lies in players seeking out side quests and late to post-game content. Sure, you can blow through the game in about a dozen or so hours, but you very likely won’t see everything or find some fun secrets that require more time leveling up for some fairly tough battles. This is one of those rainy or snowy weekend games where you plop down on something comfortable and only come up for air and food when required. Continue reading →

Review: Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology (3DS)

Posted on February 13, 2018 by geelw

Radiant Historia PC

In a weird way, history is more or less repeating itself with the release of the brilliant remake/remix that is Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology. The original game popped up near the end of the Nintendo DS life cycle and received pretty solid reviews overall, and this newer title slides into the eShop and at retail as Nintendo is slowly but surely planning to phase out the 3DS line (despite the handheld pretty much being the showcase for portable JRPGs in my humble opinion). Does Atlus have a hit the second time around with the same impact? In short, yep.

If you’ve never played the first game, this one’s a must. If you’ve played the first game and are on the fence, I’d still recommend this for a few good reasons. There are new story elements, a great ‘Friendly’ difficulty setting, a new character with her own storyline (which is actually a fun excuse for assorted dungeon running exploits), full voice acting for all the main characters, sharper visuals, and all-new character portraits. The latter seems to be something a few fans dislike, but as we’re in the age of DLC, you can feel free to spend a few extra bucks for those original images and exchange the new art for the old if you like.

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Tokyo Xanadu eX+ PS4 LE: Falcom’s Box Of Fun Now Available

Posted on February 9, 2018 by geelw

tokyo xanadu

If I had the room in my still too large game library and the funds to spare, I’d be all over this like a pack of piranhas chomping on some slow-moving tourists in a sinking canoe. Nihon Falcom’s critical darling Tokyo Xanadu eX+ has been on my backlog radar for a while now, but seeing this lovely looking Limited Edition made me want to go build a shelf and think about selling off a few things just to have that nice big box to ogle when I’m not busy doing a hefty bit of dungeon crawling.

So, what’s in the box, you ask? Well, let’s see now…

Tokyo Xanadu eX+ Limited Edition includes:

Tokyo Xanadu eX+ PS4 game with additional game content – new side stories, characters, modes, dungeons, quests, and more!

9-inch Deluxe White Shroud Figure – top-quality, hyper-detailed poly-resin sculpture of the mysterious White Shroud character, fully assembled and painted, with detachable display base.

60-page Exclusive Art Collection – full-color book featuring over 300 of dazzling images of characters and settings plus important information on the world of Tokyo Xanadu.

Blade Card Game Deck – includes boxed set of 44 printed cards and 2-player rules, so you can take the Blade game into the real world!

CD Soundtrack – with 10 music tracks from the game, including the opening song “Seize the Day” (lyrics by Kyo Hifumi).

Collector’s Box – everything immaculately packed, including a separate printed carton for the White Shroud figure.

Note: If you already own the game on Steam, you’ll also get a free Japanese-language update (nice!), but the physical version shown above is only for PS4 owners. Go grab this from one of the retailers listed on the Aksys Games site and maybe be prepared to go build a shelf or move a few books around if you need to.

-GW

Red Dead Redemption 2 Gets (Re)Dated (and Fated)

Posted on February 1, 2018 by geelw

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Dear All,

We are excited to announce that Red Dead Redemption 2 will be released on October 26th 2018. We apologize to everyone disappointed by this delay. While we had hoped to have the game out sooner, we require a little extra time for polish.

We sincerely thank you for your patience and hope that when you get to play the game, you will agree the wait will have been worth it. In the meantime, please check out these screenshots from the game. We look forward to sharing a lot more information with you in the coming weeks.

With thanks,
Rockstar Games

Yes, moseying on is a good thing. Take your time, Rockstar. I know it’ll be worth the wait.

Yep, it’s now an October surprise for Rockstar Games’ upcoming western action/adventure Red Dead Redemption 2 and it’s fated to be a huge hit based on the interest in it worldwide. See what I did there? Good, because this news got me bouncing out of bed and somewhat cheerier than usual. Go check out these screenshots and feel free to go find your jaw on the floor if it tends to get too loose when viewing wondrous visuals such as these. I’m guessing there’s a new trailer coming as well and I can;t wait to check that out. And neither can you, I’d reckon.

-GW

Review: Mutant Football League (PS4)

Posted on February 1, 2018 by geelw

Okay, confession time (again), For the record, I really don’t care for most professional or what’s positioned as “professional” sports these days. Now, I’m not completely against your own sports or sports entertainment choices, mind you (if you love what you watch, I’m not stopping you at all). I actually used to be a lot more physically active and have played a bunch of team sports over the years and yes indeed, even had a few favorite pro teams for a number of decades. That said, as I’ve grown older I’ve found myself not caring about overblown, over-hyped event sports as bread and circus spectaculars in the grand scheme of things partly because it only takes a few crazed fans acting up to kill interest in what should be a less mentally stressful entertainment experience.

That said, I could play Digital Dreams’ killer Mutant Football League (MFL) all day and not grow tired of it. This one’s a “Shut up and buy it!” game if there ever was one and if you’re a fan of more arcade-like games in the NFL Blitz vein or recall playing the well-aged but still hilarious Mutant League Football back on the Sega Genesis, this one’s going to be right up your dark alley and waiting to club you on the head and swipe $20 from your wallet before skipping away whistling. Since your cell phone wasn’t lifted, when you’re back to a conscious state, do call up a friends and invite them over for some solid co-op action, online play or hell, even just to spectate and cheer at the mayhem on screen.

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Review: The Aquatic Adventure of The Last Human (PS4)

Posted on January 26, 2018 by geelw

While I suspect the “melancholic exploration adventure/arcade-style twitch shooter” isn’t going to be the next big thing anytime soon, if you want a game that fits that bill exactly, you’ll really want to snap up developer YCJY’s The Aquatic Adventure of The Last Human on PS4 (or Steam) at some point. It’s a great and intentionally gloomy game with solid controls and some pretty (and pretty colorful to pretty dark) underwater environments where exploration is somewhat languid until you accidentally or with intent pilot your little gray submarine into brutal boss fights that give you a run for your money.

The game is a somewhat thoughtful and dour (but overall excellent) look at the last survivor of the human race crashing back on earth after an extended space flight only to find the planet covered in water and ice with dead cities full of clues under the sea and assorted sea life. As you explore the non-linear map you’ll discover most of the creatures are harmless, but as noted, you’ll be in for a more than a few jolts when you get into those tough boss battles. It’s more or less a depressing version of Darius done in the versatile Gamemaker engine with some solid pixel art that recalls a nice hybrid of 8 and 16-bit art styles with some modern lighting effects.

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Review: Energy Invasion (PS4)

Posted on January 20, 2018 by geelw

I could be a really sneaky bum of a guy and start this short review with the following blurb-friendly pull quote: “Energy Invasion is the first Breakout game of 2018!” and actually be completely correct. Well, the game is a sort of clone/homage to the classic arcade game with a bit of Arkanoid and a teeny-tiny dash of Space Invaders wrapped into a twin-stick shooter for good measure. While not flawless, overall, it’s a pretty decent game from the ever busy developer Sometimes You (Evgeniy Kolpakov) that should appeal to fans of those older games looking for something new to hop into for a spell.

You get three game modes (Invasion, Linear, Endless), online leaderboards if you want to chart your score, and a surprisingly cool soundtrack from someone named Nick R 61 who packs the game with some pretty solid cuts. While the game isn’t the most impressive visually, you do get some neat background effects and a mix of retro and modern visual touches courtesy of the Unity engine. Gameplay is a bit more complex than Breakout as your ball can shoot at enemy blocks rather than the paddle at the bottom of the screen like in some Breakout/Arkanoid clones. It’s a bit tricky to get the hang of at first as you end up having to watch the ball as it ricochets around the screen while trying not to get distracted by the shots. On the easiest mode, you don’t need to worry about enemy shots at all. But crank up the challenge and it’s time to play Artful Dodger as the enemy shoots back.

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