Reviews
Reviews of the games I play, aiming to quickly encapsulate the game’s essence and quirks. Most games have an audience; my goal is for the review to make it clear to you whether you are part of a game’s audience (whether or not I am).
A genre-defying supernatural thriller that has you playing as a handful of characters investigating a murder mystery from different sides. Controls are nontraditional and designed to immerse the player in the game’s world and the characters' emotions, and the player’s actions result in bends and branches in the game’s story.
A building game based on LEGO and featuring powerful tools that allow you to build brick by brick, quickly plan buildings by dragging paths for the walls, copy and paste arbitrarily large or complex objects or structures, and recolor or shape the terrain as desired. It’s an impressive foundation but unfortunately it isn’t put to good use.
A game played by visiting BBSs and exchanging messages in an alternate 1988. The player interacts with the desktop of a fictional computer and progresses by clicking icons and buttons, reading lots of text, and typing in passwords and phone numbers.
As a story-telling method, the interface is a mixed bag.
A rhythm game in which you play along with pop music by tapping, dragging, and spinning on-screen targets at the right time. It is essentially an Americanized version of the Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan games by the same developer released in Japan.
The titular agents are essentially a government agency of cheerleaders - when someone has a personal crisis and calls on the agents for help, they show up and dance to motivate the person to succeed.
A Musou game based on the setting, events, and cast of Romance of the Three Kingdoms. The main story mode is split into campaigns that focus respectively on the Shu, Wu, Wei, and Jin factions, plus a handful of other scenarios grouped as Other. None of the factions are really “good guys” or “bad guys” - they just have conflicting goals.
The third mainline Danganronpa game with the same structure as its two predecessors - a visual novel in which you investigate murders and then solve them in courtroom sequences. Sixteen high-potential high schoolers are once again held prisoner in an unusual school by recurring mascot villain Monokuma and forced to play the killing game, in which the only way to escape is to murder a classmate and not be voted the culprit at the trial.
A darkly comic FPS with experience- and loot-based RPG progression. Level up by shooting a variety of enemies with a variety of guns, collect drops and loot containers for currency, ammo, and mostly-trash-but-sometimes-better-than-what-you-have equipment, rinse and repeat. There are a few character classes available, all starting with the same basic abilities but having different special moves and skill trees that allow for distinct builds as you level up.
A co-op dungeon crawl with hack-and-slash action for up to four players featuring surprisingly deep class design. The four classic heroes (plus a new one available as DLC) each play quite differently - the aggressive Warrior wades into groups of enemies and mows them down, the vigilant Valkyrie positions herself and her shield to prevent damage, the nimble Elf dodges attacks and picks off valuable targets from afar, and the versatile Wizard has a spell for every situation.
A co-op dungeon crawl with hack-and-slash action for up to four players and a surprising amount of scale and complexity. There are many stages to brawl and shoot your way through using a mixture of attacks and combos, an extended leveling system for becoming more powerful, and tons of hidden and not-so-hidden items with varying effects.
A 3D platformer with varied gameplay and a lot of collecting. The structure is roughly hub-and-spokes with a handful of areas each containing several levels. The main collectible (“time pieces”) unlocks new areas at a brisk pace (the final boss is unlocked at 25 out of 40 time pieces). Side collectibles include yarn (which allows for the creation of new hats with new abilities), a currency called “pons” (which can be spent on badges that enhance or modify your abilities in various ways), and new skins and color schemes for the hats and the player character.