Tove Jansson’s Moomin characters long ago stepped outside the pure world of just their books; even when Jansson was alive she was experimenting with different forms such as comic strips and limited merchandise. That has extended into video games in the past with very mixed results, though I did rather adore 2024’s Snufkin: Melody of Moominvalley. Hyper Games, the developers…
Did you know that, while mazes are designed to confuse and confound you by messing with your sense of direction and location, there’s actually a very simple way to escape from any of them? Put your hand on the left side wall and don’t take it off. Eventually, you’re going…
After playing (and largely enjoying) the second Greedfall game in early access…
The Run is the latest FMV game written and directed by Paul…
Ball x Pit is excellent. Can I end this review now? No? The editor guy, Matt, is telling me to do my job before I can go back to playing, so I guess not (yeah, I’m a total dictator like that – ed.) Dammit. Very well then. Conceptually, Ball x…
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Last year, a humble Ukranian developer released Light de Deux, a sweet little romance visual novel about ballet dancers that I absolutely loved. The dance theme got to me, of course, but it was also well-written, well-drawn, and the characters inspired me so much I arranged with the developer to…
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Last year’s Duck Detective: The Secret Salami was one of my highlights of the year. A wonderfully slim yet totally fulfilling 2-3 hour noir satire, the game offered just the right balance between quality humour, puzzles that were both puzzling and made you feel good about yourself, and the all-important…
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There is a very fine line between homage and something that is just outright theft of an idea. A good example of the former is Wargroove, which is clearly inspired by Intelligent Systems’ Advance Wars, but has its own identity through storytelling, unit design, features, presentation and so on. On…
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COVID lockdowns broke us all a little bit (or, at least, those of us who endured actual lockdowns). Huddled in our little spaces while we waited for the government to assure us that the threat was passed and we could, again, go out and experience the world. At its core,…
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There was a brief period of time where the tower defence genre was a big deal and just about everyone was trying to get on board with it, right through to the biggest publishers. It’s easy to understand why – the games are relatively easy to develop, and it’s relatively…
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The games we play when we’re young absolutely do shape our appreciation of gaming when we’re older. If you had asked me when I was about 14 what the best game in the world was, the answer would have been easy. Bubble Bobble, and obviously that’s still scientifically true, but…
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Talisman is one of those iconic, classic board games that has been doing the rounds for many years now. The original Talisman is 41 years old now, having been released way back in 1983! That makes it somewhat more contemporary than Monopoly, Risk, and Cluedo, but puts it in the…
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It’s such a tough gig to be an indie VN developer. It’s a niche genre at the best of times, and the resources that you have to dedicate to it are going to be limited. It’s a question of what you throw money into to try to make your project…
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It’s easy to wonder why Square Enix would go to such great effort to remake one of the oldest Dragon Quest titles. After all, the HD-2D engine they’ve applied to Dragon Quest III would have made the SNES trilogy positively sparkle, and those titles are far more renowned for their…
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