News by Matt S. Utawarerumono Zan 2 is coming out in Japan on PlayStation 4 and 5 soon – July 22. We don’t have an announcement of a western release as yet, but NISA did bring us the first one and, as we wrote in our review, it was actually…
Read MoreVideo by Matt S. The second Monster Hunter title to land on the Nintendo Switch in a matter of months, Monster Hunter Stories 2 is a very different experience. This game is a pure, true JRPG, with turn-based combat and the full narrative experience. And I absolutely love it. As…
Read MoreReview by Matt S. I have no idea how I missed the original Monster Hunter Stories on the 3DS, because the idea of Monster Hunter, but in turn-based JRPG format, is very much my jam. See, as much as I enjoy the aesthetics, design, and concept of Monster Hunter, I’m…
Read MoreVideo by Matt S. It’s fan service, it’s satire, and it’s fun! Akiba’s Trip took the whole hikikomori trend in Japan, as well as the social and cultural concerns that have come from it, and spun it into an entertaining PSP game about a decade ago. Now it has been…
Read MoreNews by Matt S. One of the nicer (if smaller-scale) announcements that came out of E3 this year was that Square Enix was going to do new re-releases of the first six Final Fantasy games. This “Final Fantasy Pixel” remaster series was going to be closer in tone and aesthetic…
Read MoreReview by Matt S. As I was playing Legend of Mana, I found myself constantly wondering at just how innovative and beautiful this game must have seemed back on the PlayStation, where it originally released in 1999 (2000 in North America). On its art and aesthetics alone, this is one…
Read MoreReview by Matt S. Disgaea faces a big problem, which Disgaea 6 exposes; when you’ve got a series that has parodied JRPGs through raw exaggeration, how do you keep that series’ energy going? How do you take something that is already hyperbolic to an almost grotesque degree, and build further…
Read MoreReview by Matt S. It has been great to see Taiwan become a growing force in video games, in no small part because culturally and aesthetically there are synergies between it and Japan that has meant that many of the games that come out of Taiwan do great things with…
Read MoreNews by Matt S. Dragon Star Varnir has been one of Idea Factory’s successful experiments on PlayStation 4. The dark fairy tale-infused JRPG offers excellent, original combat, a rich narrative and, of course, Idea Factory’s usual fan service infusion. Now it’s coming to Nintendo Switch, and will launch in North…
Read MoreVideo by Matt S. Bandai Namco’s Scarlet Nexus is a blistering-good game with a compelling theme. In this video I discuss the broader implications of the narrative and those themes; why it’s relevant and allegorical to today’s world, and why more and more artists, across all media forms, are making…
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