One of the finest examples that I can think of that highlight the differences between Western and Eastern game development, and some of the weaknesses that we as a collective industry have in critiquing video games, is to look at Dante’s Inferno and El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron side-by-side. They were released at around the same time (Dante’s Inferno…
It took a little over 15 years to get Kamiwaza localised in the west, and while this is an incredible niche title, it’s well worth trying. To this day it comes across as overly ambitious to what developer, Acquire, perhaps had the resources to deliver, but this game and its…
Read MoreIf you enjoyed the very famous Steins;Gate, or the much loved Robotics;Notes, then chances are you’ll like Chaos;Head Noah. It’s certainly a more extreme experience than those two, but this was the very first entry in the “Science Adventure” series, and it offers excellent, intense storytelling similar to its later…
Read MoreIt’s difficult to write within the fantasy genre in 2022. On the one hand, it’s painfully easy to write something so self-serious and overwrought that it comes across as a desperate and doomed effort to channel Tolkien. Writing fantasy that people will take seriously is monumentally difficult because fantasy by…
Read MoreRabbits are the best pets. They’re fluffy and funny and it’s only when you have them as pets that you realise they’ve got big personalities that fill the home with their energy. We don’t get anywhere near enough games that make rabbits the focus, and many of those that do…
Read MoreIt’s really disappointing that Square Enix would dump the third Voice of Cards release in the middle of such a jam-packed schedule. Even from Square itself. The company has released DioField Chronicle, NieR Automata on Switch, and Valkyrie Elysium in the span of just a few weeks and it has…
Read MoreWhite Day: A Labyrinth Named School has proven to be quite the enduring horror property. Remakes and remasters of this thing have been appearing on consoles, phones and PCs since its original release way back in 2001. And now it’s on Nintendo Switch. Perhaps the best platform for it of…
Read MorePenko Park is simultaneously one of the most original games you’ll ever play, and also something so shamelessly derivative that it’s hard not to wish it could have been more ambitious. Thankfully, the creative bits are the ones that matter to the overall quality of the game. Related reading: We…
Read MoreA deluge of Harvest Moon/Rune Factory/Stardew Valley-likes have come out of nowhere, but there really has been a lot of them in recent months. Perhaps it is something cultural. Perhaps developers are observing an increasingly tired and agitated community around them as the ongoing terrors of climate change, pandemics and…
Read More“Fire Emblem meets Baldur’s Gate” is certainly a five-word phrase that will get me to pay attention to something, and that’s exactly what DioField Chronicle is. With some incredibly gorgeous production values backing it up, this is a game that, almost by stealth, has come through to be one of…
Read MoreI am super into farm/life sims lately. I spend a shocking amount of time playing Disney Dreamlight Valley and Animal Crossing daily, and that’s before you even get into all the others I’ve had to enjoy. As such, I’ve been keeping an eye out for games that fall into that…
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