To start this review with something very personal: My father passed away last week. It’s been difficult, to put it mildly. The reason I bring it up is that Dad absolutely loved Ten-Pin Bowling. Had his own ball, ball bag (I had no idea they made bowling ball bags), shoes, the works. He competed in social leagues all over the…
To start this review with something very personal: My father passed away last week. It’s been difficult, to put it mildly. The reason I bring it up is that Dad absolutely loved Ten-Pin Bowling. Had his own ball, ball bag (I had no idea they made bowling ball bags), shoes,…
Read MorePeople who play board games are familiar with Dominion. It is considered the “gateway drug” to deckbuilding card games (and was indeed the first example of one), being both light and accessible and very good at showcasing the basic mechanics of this particular genre. It has sold millions and millions…
Read MoreTemirana: The Lucky Princess and the Tragic Knights is a little bonkers, and that makes it delightful. The very concept of the thing is silly, funny, and charming: Cecilia is the third princess in a family that, generally, hates her. She’s also meant to be “unlucky” but has a mysterious…
Read MoreSugoroku is, as far as the mechanics go, not the most exciting board game. In fact, it’s not far removed from Snakes & Ladders, and no one really plays it for the tactics or challenge. But it is a piece of Japanese culture that anyone with an interest in the…
Read MoreI’d never heard of Rammy’s Great Adventure until its remake landed on the Switch eShop. So I went and researched it, and here’s a brief history lesson. Okay, so Rammy’s Great Adventure was originally a Japan-only release, and it was released on GAMEPACK, back in 1995. Now, GAMEPACK was a…
Read MorePuzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords is an enormously important game – arguably, you could trace the lineage of so many puzzle blend RPGs back to Puzzle Quest (Puzzle & Dragons, for example). The game itself, released way back in 2007 on the PSP and Nintendo DS by the same…
Read MoreLego Party is a Mario Party clone. Let’s not beat around the bush about that. It is what it is, and the development team at SMG isn’t for a second trying to claim otherwise. The problem is that Mario Party is a pretty challenging formula to get right, and… well,…
Read MoreLet’s get this out of the way up front: Varlet very badly wants to be Persona. It’s a game about dungeons that form out of people’s wayward “desires”, and those desires just happen to offer an opportunity for personal reflection while casting a broader analysis on society. It’s not a…
Read MoreOf all the many golf properties out there, Everybody’s Golf has reliably been the best of them. It’s also a series that has gone through a fair few developers, starting with Camelot (which would go on to develop the Mario Golf series), then Japan Studio and Clap Hanz for many…
Read MoreWhile I’ve never been much of a FPS fan, and even the mighty Doom and Quake I’ve respected but had little patience to play myself, Heretic and Hexen are the exceptions to the rule. It’s amazing what a simple change in setting can do. Despite being only minimally different to…
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