Matt S. is the Editor-in-Chief and Publisher of DDNet. He's been writing about games for over 20 years, including a book, but is perhaps best-known for being the high priest of the Church of Hatsune Miku.
I have wanted to get back into Final Fantasy XIV for quite some time. I am a massive fan of everything it offers, from the art direction to the scope of the world and adventures that are held within it. I love the way that it handles narrative within the MMO format, and the massive range of locations to visit.…
Was Defender of the Crown the first “4X” strategy game to come from Western developers? I know it’s not a proper 4X, as several of the “Xes” are severely undercooked or nonexistent, and Japan’s Nobunaga’s Ambition beat it to market by several years, but when you look at it, you…
There was a time when visual novels were a rare thing in…
It’s been three years since the last Fire Emblem (Engage). In a…
Before there was Bubble Bobble, there was Snow Bros., and the original remains the best. I should explain. Bubble Bobble did actually come first chronologically, but Snow Bros. (the “clone”) was the first single-screen platformer I personally played. Way back on the Game Boy, there was a shrunk-down version of…
Read MoreI’m a big fan of itch.io for the freedom and open platform that it allows for developers to be creative, experimental, and directly canvas the audience for feedback for games that are not yet ready for primetime on Steam and its ilk. In addition, itch.io allows you to be transgressive,…
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The Dee Dee Zine is a magazine for people who love games, music, film and art from Asia and independent artists. Every month we produce a magazine filled with essays and culture… and have we got a cracking issue for you this month! In the May 2022 magazine: – 13…
Read MoreAnd today’s eShop nasty is… Beach Girls: Don’t Lie In Summer! Like Hentai Uni and Waifu Impact before it, Beach Girls landed on the Switch eShop with a minimum of fanfare and little but the promise of sexy fan service. Its goal? To flog it off to a few people…
Read MoreIdol Manager sounds like a pervy fan service-focused thing, but it’s actually quite a genuine simulation, dealing with the incredibly complex world of Japan’s idol industry. From dealing with the dynamics and personal relationships between group members, to managing the girls so that none of them gets burned out, organising…
Read MoreOtoko Cross is basically a reskin of the Pretty Girls Mahjong Solitaire. There’s a Mahjong Solitaire grid there on the screen, and you match pieces to clear the board. Then, after a few rounds, you also see the character on the left-hand side of the screen change into something skimpier.…
Read MoreThe release of a The Legend of Heroes game is always an exciting event. This series has, over quite some time now, bubbled along as the JRPG for the most committed JRPG fans, with rich worldbuilding, character writing, and classical JRPG combat coming together to produce something that isn’t necessarily…
Read MoreAI: The Somnium Files is one of the best games of the last generation, and it has been a real snowball-down-the-mountain deal. It launched without too much fanfare, but after the first wave of people played it and absolutely loved it for its taut writing and incredible characters, word of…
Read MoreNacon and Spiders have announced a sequel to GreedFall, GreedFall 2 – The Dying World. It’s set in the same world as the original, and features much of the same intent, because GreedFall was a most excellent game and one of the smarter RPGs that has been released in recent…
Read MoreBig Bad Wolf, the developer behind 2018’s The Council, was the right developer to tackle Vampire: The Masquerade. The execution of Swansong isn’t perfect, but the effort to recreate the pen-and-paper experience is spot-on, and so, the team at Big Bad Wolf have achieved something that’s increasingly rare in video…
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