Kaiserpunk is a weird game, starting with the genre. Like the hot new strategy game from the timeline where Civilization merged with Sim City, Kaiserpunk distinguishes itself from both city builders and grand strategy. The strangeness continues with the daily grind of ruling an early 20th century city where workers riot when their town of 100 illiterate souls doesn't receive the daily newspapers.

Running the city, big or small (and they all invariably become big), is an act of balance run with the sensibilities of slapstick comedy. Completing a chain of production means overextending your reach and destabilizing the whole economy, the only cure being overextending in the opposite direction. You’ll fix a crisis among laborers by building a factory and hiring a bunch of manufacturers, who need fancy new luxuries, or they will literally riot. You do what you can to keep them calm and begin production on gramophones, which require new factories and new manufacturers.

Congratulations, you just made the problem worse! Now you’ll definitely have to find that oil to refine into rubber, mix it with other materials in new factories, and make lots and lots of radios for the worker class that now dominates your city. Trying to satisfy the needs of a group multiplied its members tenfold and made the tax revenue penalty for not meeting their extra needs a death sentence.

Kaiserpunk (PC, [reviewed])

Developer: Overseer Games

Publisher: Overseer Games

Released: March 21, 2025

MSRP: $29.99

The chain of production

You might think, based on the scenario above, that that this is a city building game about society and its need, not just workers and resources, like so many tabletop strategy games. You couldn’t be further from the truth. Anything regarding humans in Kaiserpunk is laughably abstract. Let’s look at the basic worker: the laborer. They only need two luxury goods to be happy and max out their tax output, clothes and newspaper. Let’s ignore clothes for now, or we’ll be here all day.

How do you make a newspaper? Of course, the answer changes depending on what you mean by “newspaper,” the kind of population it will serve, and the technology available. But this is Kaiserpunk, so of course we use an early 20th century industrial process to serve a population of 100 people who presumably can’t even read.

So, how do you make a newspaper? Well, first you need paper. Actually, first you need cellulose. Actually, first you need wood, and to make wood you need a forester. Not a lumberjack; a whole building dedicated to harvesting and cutting down trees. You’ll then need electricity (a miraculously effective windmill, in this case), then a cellulose factory, then a paper mill, then a printing press, and finally a… wait, the printing press makes newspapers? How do you make books, then? That’s the best part, you don’t!

What about the distribution and the writing of the newspaper? That’s not part of the industrial process, so in Kaiserpunk, it might as well not exist. To be fair, making a newspaper is already complex enough and I’m not asking for it to be even more complex. But it seems strange to keep the cellulose factory and not the part where you infuse a lifeless material with what makes it valuable. Cellulose is here only because the game is very interested in how one resource slots into the complex system of industrial production. Cellulose is an essential component in the production of newspapers, but also ammunition. To make newspapers and not weapons is to throw away precious synchrony between the two production systems.

That’s also why workers are here, as a resource with extraordinary needs and functions that encompasses the entire economy. They’re present in farmland and industry, they're both producers and consumers of the luxury goods that make up many of the resources in the game, but they don’t feel human at all. The ostracization of the workers’ involvement in industry from their humanity permeates the entire game. You unlock jazz clubs long after gramophones and radios because jazz clubs seem more modern, even though live music obviously predates those technologies. Drinkable water serves no role in your city until you introduce chemical processes, even though people (and crops, and forests) need water, too.

In a way, the strangeness is part of the fun, and Kaiserpunk is in on the joke. The few cinematics in the game make fun of it constantly. What’s not fun is trying to stay behind this Jenga tower of an economic system with the few tools that Kaiserpunk gives you and within the strict time/performance ratio it expects.

Chasing perennial growth

Kaiserpunk expects great things from you. Ever greater things, always improving until you’re so far ahead, you might as well cut the game short. You’ll always have a need for growth, even if you make the enemy AI completely incompetent. Let’s go back to our newspaper example from before and take a closer look at cellulose. This material is extracted from wood and is used to make the paper used in magazines, but it’s also one of the ingredients that go into creating ammunition. Every few in-game hours, those two chains of production consume five cellulose each. In the same timeframe, a cellulose factory makes 24 bits of cellulose.

Once you build a cellulose factory, it will consume lots of money and electricity to make way too much cellulose. The only way to justify the expense is to make lots of paper and ammunition, then feed the first to the workers and the second to soldiers. To not waste newspapers you need more workers, and those new workers need a job and other goods to satisfy their other needs. To use ammo, you need to go make militias, and to not waste militias you need war, which requires many interconnected chains of production, each as intricate as the one of cellulose.

Reaching a balance is extremely difficult and, more importantly, inefficient. You’re always propelled forward by a new type of worker with needs you can’t satisfy, or a surplus of material that’s going to waste. If you approach Kaiserpunk as a grand strategy game with intricate production lines and conflict that mimic the war of attritions of the early 20th century, you’ll find yourself right at home. If you were looking forward to a city builder set in the second industrial revolution, where internal politics and worker morale is tracked by social class, this might not be for you.

What Kaiserpunk is missing

I didn’t personally enjoy chasing the ever-faster growth of my city and empire as much as Kaiserpunk would want me to, but I can see how someone could love this constant pressure to improve. I can’t imagine anyone so much as tolerating the tools available to chase this kind of efficiency.

Many of those problems are small things that could be fixed in the future, from unwieldy menus with no sorting or search ability to the tiny thumbnails acting as resource icons (you try to distinguish a laborer from a manufacturer when the portraits are 20 pixels squared). Individually, those would be missing quality-of-life features. Together, they make it genuinely difficult to act on the simulation with the type of control and carefulness that Kaiserpunk demands.

The occasional crashes and weird audio bugs don’t exactly sell the fantasy of a well-oiled system, either. Had it not been so punishing and intricate, it would be easier to forgive those issues. On the other hand, perhaps the grueling process of learning the ins and out of this system through imperfect information is the point, and it does fit a game about building a new empire in the interwar period.

There’s a lot to do in Kaiserpunk, but dealing with it won’t always be pleasant. It’s up to you to decide if this bump in the road to complete mastery of the system is a problem or the point of the game.

The post Review: Kaiserpunk appeared first on Destructoid.

As much as I've loved every new entry in the mainline Xenoblade Chronicles series, there's something special about Xenoblade Chronicles X. While it's technically not a spin-off, it's certainly its own thing, favoring a more futuristic sci-fi world and story compared to the fantasy setting of the main series.

Nearly a decade after originally releasing on the Wii U console near the end of its lifecycle, Monolith Soft and Nintendo have released Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition, a remastered version of the original game modernized to run and look good on the Nintendo Switch, with some new content to boot.

Typically remasters go in one of three directions: a simple port of an old game to a more modern system, a port that also has some improved visuals, or a complete graphical upgrade that may also add more content to the original game. Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition falls in the latter category, adding a trove of new features and content while upgrading the graphics for the Switch.

Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition (Nintendo Switch)
Developer: Monolith Soft
Publisher: Nintendo
Released: March 20, 2025
MSRP: $59.99

Despite using the Xenoblade Chronicles name, the story of XCX is completely separate. Sometime in the future, humanity is forced to flee Earth after the planet is caught in the middle of an intergalactic war. As two alien species wage conflict in space above Earth, humanity launches a series of colony ships as a last-ditch attempt at survival. One of the ships, the White Whale, successfully evades the warring species' but is tracked down by one of the species and shot down years later, causing it to crash land on the mysterious alien planet of Mira.

The world of Mira is where Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition takes place, and it is absolutely massive. For comparison, the total size of Mira is 154 square miles which is bigger than the world of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild at 140. You'll traverse the entire gargantuan world throughout the many story missions that stretch over several narratives starting while figuring out how you crashlanded on Mira and surveying every nook and cranny of the planet.

Exploration of Mira is not only a core part of the narrative in XCX: Definitive Edition, but it's further amplified by an in-game system called FrontierNav. As you explore Mira you can find spots to drop down various probes as part of the FrontierNav system, contributing towards the surveying of the planet but also allowing you to accrue various materials including money and Miranium which you'll use to upgrade your gear.

While side quests are often side-dressing in most JRPG's, in XCX: Definitive Edition they are arguably more important than the main quests. Of course, you don't have to do side quests to progress the actual main storyline and get through the game, but the real meat of the storyline including details about the characters, the world of Mira, and what exactly is going on are mostly fleshed out through the side quests.

Even though XCX: Definitive Edition is vastly different from the other mainline entries in the series in terms of story, world, and setting, the one big area of similarity is the combat system. Both in story missions and when traversing the open world, you'll encounter various enemies of different types that you will engage in real-time combat.

You influence the combat by utilizing an arsenal of skills while in combat, including both melee and ranged. The skills vary from dealing damage to applying negative status effects to your enemies or positive status effects to yourself and allies as well as healing. At a glance, the combat system may sound a bit simplistic, but it's far from it. Most of the skills have various bonuses that are applied when you meet certain conditions such as attacking an enemy from behind, from the side, etc. This creates a very dynamic yet fluid combat system of maneuvering around the field to ensure you're attacking your enemies in the most optimal way.

To make things even more interesting, the world of Mira is harsh and punishing. For example, one of the early zones has a massive Level 55 dinosaur trampling around next to various Level 3 and Level 4 creatures. It's not just there for shock factor either; engaging in combat with the dinosaur early on when you first reach this zone would be an absolute death sentence. But it further adds to the vast amount of content in XCX: Definitive Edition. There's something special about finding a higher-level enemy early on that you remember many hours later when you're strong enough to come back and take it on.

Alongside leveling up, there are two other major points in Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition that are pretty big game changers in terms of both gameplay and exploration of Mira. After Chapter 6, you'll gain access to a Skell, a weaponizable mech/exoskeleton that will surely give you Gundam vibes. You can traverse the world of Mira much quicker in a Skell than on foot, but you can also use them in battle, making quick work of smaller enemies and giving you the ability to take on more hulking enemies with ease. Then, after Chapter 9, you unlock the Flight Module for the Skell, allowing you to fly around for even faster travel and opening up previously inaccessible areas.

If what you've read so far in this review sounds great, I have good news: this is essentially Xenoblade Chronicles X before it got the Definitive Edition treatment. As a whole, the Definitive Edition mostly amplifies everything above in one way or another, but also adds more content.

First off, the graphical upgrades are solid across the board in XCX: Definitive Edition. The shiny plastic-looking character faces from the original are long gone, replaced with sharper and more defined models. The creature textures and the world have also been updated, as well as the lighting. Obviously, you have to keep in mind that this is still the Switch we're playing on, so don't expect PS5 or Xbox X|S-quality graphics, but I'd argue that while the original Xenoblade Chronicles X essentially pushed the Wii U to its limits graphically, the Definitive Edition appears to be doing the same thing on the Switch. There are a few areas, mainly for the much-larger-than-normal creatures, where I've noticed a few spots of blurry textures that look like they either didn't scale correctly or weren't updated from the original, but this was only a few times and was really only noticeable when I got up close and personal.

Story-wise, the Definitive Edition is a meaningful addition that fleshes out various plot threads and character developments throughout the progression of the game. One of the few issues with the original Xenoblade Chronicles X is that it had somewhat of a cliffhanger ending that seemed to set things up for a sequel, but a sequel never happened. There's some extra story in the Definitive Edition that builds on it but don't expect that issue to be fully resolved. Hopefully this definitive edition leads to a proper sequel where we can see the cliffhanger find complete resolution.

In terms of content, Xenoblade Chronicles: Definitive Edition has plenty to offer, as well as many quality-of-life options that only make the game even better. There are two new characters, Neilnail and Leisel, each of which also have their own new Skell as well. There's also an entirely new zone, a floating continent that can only be accessed via flying. In fact, the zone is built specifically for traversal with the flying Skell, offering more verticality than the other zones. This new zone also has new creatures, story beats, and even FrontierNav points to explore and set up to create an even more efficient resource generation pipeline.

Quality of life has been vastly improved. Mission Item Markers have been added to the map, showing you where to go to take on missions and more importantly where to farm various items required for fetch quests, a major issue in the original game. BLADE Levels, a separate ranking system from your level that you had to grind out to access certain missions has been removed, allowing you to access missions simply based on Level and Main Story progression. You can also now swap party members quickly and easily at any time via the menu, rather than having to trek all the way back to the main city like in the original game.

Perhaps the most important new addition is an all-new cooldown system. Your skills — called Arts — have their own specific cooldowns after use. However, this new system allows you to build up a separate cooldown meter and then consume it to instantly bypass your Art cooldowns and use the Art anyway. This adds another element of gameplay where you can manage your new cooldown meter to pull off even more deadly attacks based on skirting past lengthy cooldowns, or executing a clutch heal in a pinch.

Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition is how I wish all companies handled remastering its games. Xenoblade Chronicles X was already insanely good, and I would have been perfectly fine with just a graphical update and a port to the Switch. Its massive and immersive world is like no other and shows what peak exploration in a game should look like, finding a way to stay fun, mysterious, and rewarding even after 100 hours.

But instead of going the easy route, Monolith Soft went the extra mile and added meaningful new content and quality-of-life features that actually improved on what was already a masterpiece experience. The Definitive Edition treatment makes Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition one of the best JRPGs on the Switch, and a must-play for fans of the genre.

The post Review: Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition appeared first on Destructoid.

WWE 2K25 is the "Ultimate Warrior" of wrestling video games with an expansive suite of modes and characters to choose from. Unfortunately, one of its most promising additions for this year, The Island, feels a bit like a money grab.

That's because there's a low amount of currency being offered for playing the game and completing missions/objectives. But you can always buy some currency, right? Despite this, it's still a great game, and here's my review.

Can you smell what 2K is cooking?

WWE 2K25 offers so many modes that it may feel overwhelming, and for a yearly product, it's pretty impressive. There's the Showcase that represents the Samoan dynasty throughout multiple generations from The Rock's grandfather Peter Maivia to this current era's Naomi and Roman Reigns.

Paul Heyman alongside members of the current Bloodline like Roman Reigns gives a great description of each wrestler featured in the showcase. You get to know these wrestlers' history, the impact they've made on the industry, and knowledge of the growing hype for each match featured in the Showcase.

Each match seems to be more streamlined with fewer objectives, and the in-battle cutscenes are all seamless. There's no jarring transition between live-action and battle anymore, which is a huge plus. Except for the intro, we finally won't see the referees' faces or WWF logo getting blurred out during live-action sequences in the matches themselves.

WWE 2K25 does a great job of explaining each objective in the Showcase mode, but something I find annoying is the limited-time challenges. If you don't complete them, you'll miss out on the majority of the unlockables like Rikishi as a playable character. At points, it feels like you're not given enough time, especially if your enemy is able to counter your strikes or you get stuck in a punching animation (more on that later).

The Island is marred with microtransactions

The Island is WWE 2K25's biggest new offering. The overall concept is sound. You're exploring a well-designed theme park-like area, in which you challenge foes to be the very best and get yourself a WWE contract from Roman Reigns.

It makes you want a WWE theme park to explore in real life. You'll get all manner of quests to complete, such as defeating Gunther in a badass mech suit (I'm not kidding). These can be fun scenarios to finish as your custom character, even though the storytelling is made through a cheap PowerPoint-like production with static images and text.

Unfortunately, the in-game microtransaction system will leave your wallet just as empty as going to Disneyland or Universal Studios. The currency VC is given to players slowly and is required to upgrade custom wrestlers in the Training menu. You'll get 150 VC per match you win and 75 VC if you lose. Each stat point increase varies around 80-200, depending on the level. Despite this game being multiplayer-focused, you can pay-to-win as you can purchase VC for $99.99 which gets you 400,000 VC, and can drastically change your character, while $9.99 gets you 32,500 VC.

As you explore The Island, there are many cosmetics to purchase in various shops. In Becky & Seth's Driporium, you can get Rollins' ridiculous gnome-like red boots for 18,000 VC. To get this from in-game progression only, you'll need to complete 120 matches. That's a bit rough, and encourages players to purchase VC in my humble opinion. You can get VC from leveling up your rank, finishing challenges, and completing quests, but it's still a slow affair.

Free players will just have to ignore the cosmetics for now. Upgrading your wrestler is arguably more important than looking cool.

The Island is a genuinely fun mode, but the microtransactions do get to me a bit. Additionally, it isn't available offline, which is a shame. Another annoying factor is that you can't play The Island on PC, PS4, or Xbox One systems; it's only available for PS5 and Xbox Series X|S players.

MyRise is fantastic

My two favorite modes MyRise and MyGM return in WWE 2K25 and show significant improvements. The storyline with MyRise is gripping as it tells the narrative of current and former NXT stars trying to take over WWE and end Raw and Smackdown. This time, you get assigned male and female superstars to represent the two main shows.

It does a great job of encouraging multiple playthroughs as the personality type you choose for your character (brash and bold or comedic) offers different story missions. The relationship between the male and female characters also changes depending on your choice, and it's constantly referenced.

The cool thing about MyRise (which makes it better than The Island) is that everyone is voiced. You'll be led by CM Punk during the beginning of the campaign and run into Jade Cargill if you choose that your character comes from a rival promotion. The voice acting from the wrestlers themselves is actually not that bad, and you'll get pulled into the backstage drama of WWE. There are some unexpected moments within MyRise, and it's entertaining to see a new story that differentiates from the Bloodline-obsessed WWE creative team of the last four or five years.

An improved MyGM

Next, MyGM has received some major improvements. First, you can play this mode with your friends online for the first time. However, it comes with some caveats. You can't use Custom GMs or rosters, in addition to losing the ability to play and spectate matches.

Second, MyGM now lets you use up to $4 million for the drafting process. The number of wrestlers you can pick up has greatly increased, letting you pick the superstars you want on your roster more easily. Third, the AI has been improved, especially during the draft. For example, if the AI picks Angelo Dawkins, it is more likely to complete the team by selecting Montez Ford, his teammate, next.

Fourth, MyGM has an expanded list of GMs from last year, increasing the number to 19. They each have their own perks at your disposal. Nick Aldis can add 10 weeks to a contract's duration, and Ava can prevent your superstars from getting injured during two separate shows. The mode's really been expanded. Lastly, there's an all-new approach to PLEs. Your wrestlers are fighting stars from other brands to get special perks for your brand. While it would have been nice to have the option to have normal PLEs like the last few years, it's a neat addition. You'll resolve rivalries on Week 4 and Week 5 now as you have one slot for a match on PLEs.

Despite missing the option to have regular PLEs, which should be added by the way, there are far more options for MyGM players. Likely inspired by YouTubers such as partsFUNknown, you can now place a timer on each player in-game. If someone goes over the time limit, they'll lose fans. Additionally, you can choose between the Hall of Fame trophies and the number of fans as the pre-requisite to win, adding more freedom to the player.

MyFACTION and Universe additions

MyFACTION and Universe have also returned in WWE 2K25. I have less experience with these mods as I usually touched Showcase, MyGM, and MyRISE in previous years. MyFACTION seems to be a fun experience as you collect cards and complete quests in the World Tour to proceed. It is annoying, however, that the game forces you to pick weaker cards in your line-up rather than giving you the freedom to pick the cards you unlock via VC or in-game progression from the get-go. The microtransaction system seems to be just as wild as The Island as you can use VC to get new card packs. There's a reason why I avoid MyFACTION like the Plague.

Universe has been improved in multiple ways. While the WWE superstars aren't talking during these segments, you can finally have them work on a promo in front of the crowd. The announcers weirdly explain what your wrestler is saying to their rival. It's certainly an improvement, however, as it gives you more customization on your booking experience. Plus, you'll be able to customize where each battle takes place. You can have a multi-day PLE, change the dates of specific shows, or simulate the Monday Night Wars once again and have two brands slugging it out on the same day.

WWE 2K25 plays well for the most part

But after all this, how does WWE 2K25 play? It's a mostly thrilling experience. Each move feels powerful and you'll likely wince at the punches, kicks, and suplexes these men and women dish out on each other. It's fantastic that you can finally have intergender matches and have a man and woman like Drew McEntire and Bianca Belair fight in the ring against each other. This is so long overdue.

Most attacks register perfectly in the game, but some eccentricities need to be worked out. Some attacks, when you feel like they're about to land, somehow miss the enemy, especially if there's an object blocking their path. The hitbox of some attacks is also quite strange as some wrestlers zoom from one side of the squared circle to the other in a flash. Sometimes strikes from a weapon that should hit your foe don't register, leading to an awkward few seconds of animation. Most of the time, it's fine, but you may be scratching your head at times.

Mostly stellar production value

The graphics of WWE 2K25 are stellar. You can really tell if a battle is getting to your rival. The blood and the sweat mix together in a natural way and look impressive on each model. You can see the scars on their body, showing the damage you've dealt to each other in the ring. Lighting seems to be improved across the board, and some of the facial animations when opponents get struck look impressive. The likenesses of most of the WWE superstars are spot on as well, and their entrances are simulated perfectly.

However, it has been said that Jey Uso's entrance from within the crowd is regrettable as members of the public do the YEET motion in the most robotic, unnatural way. Speaking of the crowd, they can be genuinely creepy to look at with their blank faces. You'll also notice your ringside managers performing actions at exactly the same time, taking you out of the game. It's genuinely creepy at points. There was also one point when my custom character's face was blackened and had a weird white shine during an entrance as well.

Something else of note is the sheer amount of commentary added to the game for different scenarios over multiple different modes. It's impressive.

WWE 2K25 improves upon the formula

WWE 2K25 is one of the biggest leaps in the series so far. While the Island is disappointing, the sheer amount of content in this game is unmatched. You have over 300 wrestlers with more DLC on the way, plenty of fun modes like the highly improved MyGM and the story-focused MyRise, and gameplay that still feels satisfying to pull off, even if the animations can be weird at points. It's just the microtransactions that really pull this game down.

The post Review: WWE 2K25 appeared first on Destructoid.

I have a soft spot in my heart for business-oriented games. Whether running a cafe or becoming a freelancer, something about gamifying real-world concepts makes things fun. Despite this existing in The Sims for a while, The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies has some interesting ideas to play with.

Building on features like retail stores and veterinary clinics from previous packs, The Sims 4's Businesses and Hobbies expansion pack kicks it up a notch by introducing all-in-one ways to create and customize your business without jumping through hoops. Some things are missing, but it's pretty solid overall.

The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies (PC [reviewed], PS5, PS4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S)
Developer: Maxis Studios
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: March 6, 2025
MSRP: $39.99

By far the most important aspect of The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies is, of course, making your own business. Rather than only having one or two business types, you can customize nearly every aspect of your company, from its activities to your fees and target audience. If you want to make a high-class, Michelin-starred restaurant, you can focus your business activities on cooking, eating, and drinking. If you're more into teaching, you can make an entire school and set your activities to attending classes, letting you turn your household into a family of professors, teachers, or researchers. There's even cross-pack compatibility if you want to make a cat cafe, University Commons areas, or anything else that comes to mind. Your options are nearly limitless as long as you have the creativity (and packs) to bring them to life.

Don't worry if you're not creative, though. Although you can customize every aspect of your business to fit your preferences, there are also presets to make things quicker and easier. That way, if you have an idea but don't quite know how to execute it, there's a good chance you'll find something similar to set up right away. I loved using these when I was first learning the pack and its new features, especially when I noticed how much cross-pack potential there was.

There's a lot to making a small business in this pack. Rather than just buying a lot, setting your prices, and hoping for the best, you've got all kinds of pricing strategies, customer satisfaction systems, and design aspects that all play into whether your company succeeds. Even if you have a Sim with level ten painting selling masterpiece-level art, having trash piles everywhere or being rude to your customers will annoy them, and they won't hesitate to tell you. Similarly, a mid-level character can build up their business from scratch. As long as you're friendly and keep things clean, you'll get positive ratings. It all adds up, and I'm all for it.

Businesses and Hobbies also take things a step further with features like business perks, alignments based on your behavior with your customers, and employee management. These can drastically change how you run your company, from giving your employees bonuses to setting your business' lot on fire for insurance payments. Everything has consequences, just as it should be in business. Employee and customer behaviors are sometimes finicky, but it was still fun overall.

One of the most handy parts, though, is the reintroduction of room management that originally came with For Rent. If you run a business from home and don't want customers randomly sleeping in your bedroom, you can set public and private rooms to separate these from your business's operating spaces. You can even have one massive room available to the public and a tiny house on the opposite side of the lot you live in if that's what you prefer. When I say there's limitless potential in how you run and design your business, I mean it.

You may have noticed I haven't mentioned the "Hobbies" part of The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies yet. This pack strongly focuses on monetizing your hobbies by creating a small business rather than introducing new ones. It doesn't expand much on new hobbies or ones that already exist. That said, we're introduced to two new skills in this pack — tattooing and pottery — with supporting lots and business presets that help you monetize them quickly and easily. These two skills might be my favorite part of this expansion, especially with how in-depth you can go with customizing tattoos and creating pottery. I do believe there was a missed opportunity to add piercings into the mix, but maybe that'll come in a base game update one day.

Speaking of tattoos, we now have custom tattoos for our Sims. I didn't realize just how great this could be until I spent some time diving into CAS a bit deeper and checked out Paint Mode for tattooing, but this may very well be one of the most interesting features I've seen in The Sims 4. Although you can always use a preset introduced in this pack or past ones, having the freedom to create your own and upload them to the gallery for others to enjoy is very satisfying.

Beyond that, the CAS additions are pretty standard, with Build Mode having a mix of functional items for your small business and generic decorative items. I was surprised how few business-related furniture items there actually were, making it feel like you have to rely heavily on other expansions and game packs to get the right feel for your business. I don't hate it, yet there were plenty of chances to add items like cash registers, clutter objects you'd find in an average shop, or even more variety in general rather than a dozen variations of string lights.

The aspect I had the most trouble with by far was Nordhaven, The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies's world. It's a very stylish European-styled area that I enjoy exploring, with 12 lots to customize however you wish. What's the catch, then? Four of these lots are empty, one is an unowned residential home, and the rest are a mix of community lots and other households. I appreciate there being a default tattoo parlor and pottery business to showcase these skills and the pack's small business functions, but there was a ton of potential to have small shops, extra community lots, or several residential spaces that challenge you to set up your business in particular ways. The few available lots look great and fit the vibe well, yet this is noticeably smaller than many previous packs, and one-third of the lots are empty, which raises a few questions about why this happened.

Overall, The Sims 4: Businesses and Hobbies takes pre-existing mechanics and ideas and amps them up by turning just about any activity into a paid business. The thrill of creating a business and managing your expenses while keeping customers happy is exciting, and the way this pack implements this idea works well. I had a blast playing through this expansion, even if part of it was watching my employees and customers dance rather than buying products or getting the services I was providing. Opening my business is challenging and exciting, but closing my doors for the night and venturing into the town reminds me that that's all there is to this.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: The Sims 4 Businesses and Hobbies appeared first on Destructoid.

It's you, two knights, and an archer in a cramped room, just how you like it. You're starting to relax, given it's your third time going through this exact fight. You force an enemy to move towards your warrior, slice him and his friend with a sweep attack, and advance towards the small knight. With a Front Kick, you pushed— what do you mean "cannot be pushed?"

You tough this was the small knight? What a shame. Maybe you should have taken the time to check. Oh well, nothing to do but to pass the turn and immediately get pushed out a window. Sorry, you died! You should have rotated the camera, you know, to make sure there wasn't a window there. If only you had activated advanced camera mode, we wouldn't be back to the start of the game. Oh well, just get through the first chapter again, and you'll be swimming in fun new scenarios in no time. See you in a couple of hours!

Knights in Tight Spaces Review (PC [reviewed])
Developer: Ground Shatter
Publisher: Raw Fury
Released: March 4, 2025
MSRP: $19.50

Knights in Tight Spaces is a turn-based tactics roguelike with near-perfect information and deckbuilding elements. It also features party management, map exploration, a story that isn’t procedurally generated but feels like it is, and a striking art style that does nothing to support a game so complex.

Knights in Tight Spaces (KITS, from now on) starts simple: you control a single character, outnumbered about one to ten. This is the core KITS experience, born as it was from the one-against-many Fights In Tight Spaces. Each turn, you draw a hand of cards that represent actions like movement or attack. You play those cards by spending energy and try to deal as much damage before retreating in a safe spot.

To help you overcome the odds is a healthy dose of too much information and some classic roguelike improvements (or is it a roguelite?). At the start of each turn, you’ll learn who and how the enemies will attack, which ones react to your actions, and even where reinforcements will spawn. Between each fight, you will be offered cards to add to your deck, new pieces of equipment, or additional party members.

Knights in cramped spaces

Things start simple, and they stay so for a long while. It's easy to understand why: as soon as fights become a little more complicated, every system in KITS begins crumbling under its weight, starting with the art style.

I like the art in KITS, especially the maps. With their detailed dioramas on abstract watercolor backgrounds and one-tone character models, they create an immediately iconic style that's stunning in motion as well as in stills. The character models don’t do as well with their monochrome tint, but you could argue that this choice makes them stand out from the board. And you would be wrong.

One of the first problems you’ll notice when playing KITS is how hard it is to tell one enemy from another. We’ve already gone over the importance of using the perfect information you’re gifted at the start of each round, but the game doesn’t make this easy. Some of it, like health and damage, is readily available, while some is hidden in the extended description that pops out when you rest your cursor on an enemy. And some enemies, thanks to their monochrome palette, are indistinguishable from one another. Is this the archer that ignores shields, the one that does double damage against shields, or neither? That is a real question you will ask yourself at the start of every turn when there’s more than one archer on the board.

The pretty colors and nice framing of the diorama come at a cost, and it’s not just convenience that bears a price. Most fights happen in tight spaces, as you’d expect. Often, this is the corner of a small room. However, the game really likes how its rooms look when they’re hovering in the center of the screen, with no empty space on its sides. It likes it so much that you can’t pan the camera to where the action is by default and have to stare awkwardly at a tiny corner of your screen the whole time.

Even when you enable panning by ticking the advanced camera mode in the menu (a thing that should not exist) you can only reframe a scene once you’re so zoomed in, it doesn’t matter anymore. You can’t uncramp those knights. Why? My best guess is that it looks better this way, but that’s not a good reason. Those scenes come out beautifully in screenshots, but that only makes it harder to explain how awkward they are to play in.

So, what is Knights in Tight Spaces about?

KITS promises a wide range of options for a roguelike tactics game. A glance at the excellent turn-based strategy game Into the Breach tells us this genre doesn’t need so much variation, but surely it won’t do any damage either, right?

At a point, variety starts looking like hesitancy, a reluctance to commit to what works. Is this game about positioning, enemy manipulation, and shoving people out of windows, à la Tactical Breach Wizard? Or is it about optimizing my party and triggering support combos? Being a roguelike, KITS tries to be all this and more, just not at the same time. But while they are presented as equal options, not all those strategies are so interesting to warrant a dedicated 4-hours long run.

This is another aspect that is bound to be divisive. When played on medium or higher difficulties, KITS is quite brutal. Runs can end with one wrong move or a single misclick. Nothing bad about that — except the misclicks, I could do without those. But what if an average run after the second was four hours long? What if the mandatory prologue/tutorial alone took one hour to complete each time? That would certainly change things.

Don’t worry; KITS’ prologue only takes 30 minutes. No, it’s the first chapter that’s an hour long and is just as mind-numbingly easy. The problem isn’t dying after four hours of progress; it’s being hit with an hour and a half of busy work every time you start over. It wouldn’t be so repetitive if the combat scenarios weren’t the same each time or if they were more memorable. As it is, they are indistinguishable from the sea of procgen roguelikes, without any of the benefits. And while the early game isn’t challenging, you must take it seriously if you want the equipment and deck upgrades necessary to survive the mid-game. It gets very repetitive very soon.

A handcrafted roguelike

There doesn’t seem to be a lot of procedural generation in KITS, and even randomness is quite limited. As we just saw, there are some good reasons why roguelikes often employ those techniques. While the tighter design of bespoke fights could have been its selling point, it didn’t work out well. But how does the rest of the game fare under this no-randomness decree?

Discrete dialog for every interaction, a story that isn’t made of randomly assembled beats, and combat scenarios that represent what’s going on in the story; all of this is in the game, but none of it is very good. What could have been KITS’s strength is one of its worse weaknesses. Dialog is the worst offender, not just because it’s always the same but because it feels trite the first way around, too. The barman is detached but worried, the bandit leader is arrogant, and the spy is wise but shady.

The impression given by a character's title and image describes them as much as their words do, so why even talk to them? Like them, the first impression given by the game is correct. A lot of potential was consumed by an overambitious, unfocused project.

[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]

The post Review: Knights in Tight Spaces appeared first on Destructoid.

Josef Fares' games have held a firm spot in my heart for years. I haven't finished my Brothers playthrough, but I thoroughly enjoyed A Way Out and watched some friends play It Takes Two. Those games are already stellar, but Split Fiction is an absolute masterpiece.

I went into Split Fiction with high expectations, knowing I had enjoyed Fares' and Hazelight's previous games. I wasn't expecting a game that raises the bar for what a cooperative multiplayer game can look like. What started as curiosity and mild excitement turned into some of the most memorable and enjoyable gaming nights I've ever had with my long-time best friend, who shared similar sentiments.

Split Fiction (PC [reviewed], PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S)
Developer: Hazelight Studios
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Released: March 6, 2025
MSRP: $49.99

Split Fiction follows the story of two aspiring writers, Mio and Zoe. One is a sci-fi author who's reserved and practical, while the other is a bubbly, outgoing girl who's all about mystical fantasy stories. As the two pursue their passions of getting their first publishing deal, they're instead roped into a seemingly inescapable simulation that steals their ideas. When the two of them accidentally end up in the same simulation, it's up to them to traverse their own ideas, use their similarities and differences to their advantage, and break free from this trap.

Split Fiction is also a purely cooperative game. Much like A Way Out and It Takes Two, you play alongside another person, with each player's point-of-view shown through a split-screen display. It's a formula that, although not new, is expertly implemented by the team at Hazelight. Their previous titles already used this presentation to their advantage in a satisfying way, with Split Fiction making it even more captivating, especially as you enter the game's latter half.

Each level in Split Fiction feels like its own game. In one level, you play as a cyber-ninja wielding cool swords and whips. The next, you're a puzzle-solving shapeshifter thrown into the middle of a magical forest. While each level fits into sci-fi and fantasy themes, they all have unique traits to distinguish themselves. Both the main and side stories never felt dry or repetitive, even as we approached the end and experienced most of what Split Fiction offered. If anything, things only got better the further we progressed, and there were multiple times when we got a chuckle out of some of these story ideas.

Speaking of story ideas, Split Fiction introduces an interesting dynamic to its plot. Every level comes directly from Mio and Zoe's own ideas. They themselves wrote each of these stories through various periods of their life, and you gradually learn more about their personalities and personal traumas as you progress. These make for some peculiar and, at times, hilarious encounters, as one character is familiar with the plot and its conflict while the other is completely clueless. Beyond that, you see some genuine friendship-building and connection that, given their circumstances, felt natural.

This isn't even mentioning the Side Stories, which were equally as impressive as the main levels. Side Stories are completely optional objectives you can pursue to experience, well, more of what Split Fiction is. These were easily some of my favorite levels in the whole game, both because they introduced some familiar gameplay elements and, more importantly, I had some laughs with almost every story.

Although the amount of Side Stories present made sense, I still felt myself wanting more. Even if you're the type of person who speedruns the main story and doesn't care about side content, these are levels you don't want to miss if you enjoy Split Fiction's story and gameplay. Even if you don't love the story but just want a quick chuckle, there's a good chance you'll find something that makes you laugh considering how goofy a few of these are.

And then there was the ending. I'll avoid spoiling exactly what happens, but oh boy, it left my friend and I in awe. We kept asking each other how Hazelight even managed to pull it off and, to this day, feel it's among the most impressive endings we've ever seen. I've seen many great (and awful) story conclusions in my life, and very few have felt more rewarding than this. I already loved Split Fiction well before reaching this point, but this solidified its spot in my heart as both a pleasant and memorable experience that's difficult to surpass and a game that completely reshapes the cooperative action-adventure genre for the better.

Even now, as I'm writing this review, I have no idea how Fares and the team at Hazelight came up with some of these level ideas. Some are your standard mix of medieval adventures and epic intergalactic robot battles, while others are very out of the ordinary. On several occasions, I wondered who had the creativity to design these ideas and was more than slightly impressed that they managed to tie them into sci-fi and fantasy themes. They're almost dream-like, and I mean that in the best way possible.

Split Fiction is also a beautiful game. While it's challenging to compete with the breathtaking displays of realism and adorably cutesy art styles in modern games, it still has tons of screenshot-worthy moments that had my friend and I staring at the scenery in admiration. While Split Fiction has a core style it sticks to, it isn't afraid to step outside the box and experiment. These moments are much more prevalent in its Side Stories, but even the main storyline has some art style changes that were both surprising and entertaining.

That said, I had some gripes with a few finicky gameplay mechanics. Although most of the game played great and fairly smoothly, others were a little challenging to control, even while playing with a controller. I mostly noticed these tricky mechanics in a few sci-fi levels that, at times, caused a bit of frustration with both my friend and I. Thankfully, we didn't notice any game-breaking bugs or problems that significantly hindered our playthrough; at most, it was brief annoyances that we were able to get past with some trial and error.

Split Fiction feels like the culmination of what Josef Fares and Hazelight Studios' team have learned since making Brothers and A Way Out. Both were solid games, and It Takes Two's success was our first glimpse at what the studio was truly capable of. Split Fiction is everything I could ever ask from a cooperative game and more, easily making it another solid game of the year contender. I wish I could go on about each level and its intricacies since I could easily ramble on numerous incredible moments for a while. This is one of those games that thrives on surprising you at every corner, and hearing my friend's reactions was just as fulfilling as experiencing my own.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Split Fiction appeared first on Destructoid.

Imagine, if you will, a trip through the stars. Imagine a mission to find a new planet Earth. Imagine having to battle hordes of angry aliens with nothing but your Rock Paper Scissors skills. Right, enough imagining. Time for the real thing.

In this unique retro RPG, designed by Takaya Imamura (who, among Majora's Mask and having designed Captain Falcon, also gave us Tingle), we will explore strange planets in search of clues and answers to finding a new habitable planet for the human race. Along the way, we'll meet strange creatures that make you feel like a Starbucks barista at a spaceport in a Star Trek episode. But is this RPG for everyone?

Omega 6 Triangle Stars (Nintendo Switch, PC, [reviewed])
Developer: Takaya Imamura, Happymeal, Pleocene
Publisher: Clear River Games, City Connection
Released: February 28, 2025
MSRP: $29.99

Somewhere in the distant future, a wormhole has appeared near Mars. An influx of aliens has appeared through it and they all would like to live on Earth. Before people could wake up and vote for their favorite alt-right politician in power, all the major cities on Earth were occupied by those illegal... uh, aliens.

Now it is up to two androids, Thunder and Kyla, created by Dr Victor Franklin, to step aboard the Omega 6 spacecraft and find a new habitable planet so that human beings can escape the alien tourist menace.

Omega 6 feels like a retro RPG through and through, almost like a re-release of a long-lost Turbografx-16 RPG from the early 90s. And I don't mean it simply in the "pixelated graphics" sense, but all the systems, the presentation, and the mechanics feel downright old. That feeling would be hard to place for most Western gamers who perhaps grew up with Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest.

Takaya Imamura's first game since 2016, when he worked as a supervisor on Star Fox Zero, feels rather indebted towards lesser-known classics such as Shining In The Darkness. In each town or planet you visit, the menu-based interface will allow you to perform various actions, such as "Move" or "Talk", even though often you will have to "Call Over" the character you want to speak with.

In other places, you can "Buy" or "Sell". On the other hand, "Inspect" will allow you to interact with the locations by using a pointer-based interface, just like an Examine button in an Ace Attorney title, but for the most part, you're restricted to shuffling through choices.

And the game never really abandons this vintage framework, not even in the combat which is quite peculiar in its design. I'm not sure if this is a nod to the Rock Paper Scissors boss fights in Alex Kidd in Miracle World, but Thunder and Kyla will fight enemies by using cards with Rock, Paper, and Scissors signs. Each turn, you and your enemy pick a card and whoever wins gets to perform a successful hit.

But things are not as easy as they seem, since most of the enemies' cards are usually hidden, depending on the character you're fighting, so you will have to employ a strategy between random guesses and trying to use your cards at the best possible time. While this works at first, it tends to get repetitive quite fast, since there's no real variety to the combat and there's quite a bit of it which can't be skipped.

Pretty soon in the game, Thunder and Kyla, along with their robot friends such as Headless, will be required to earn as much money as possible and the main way you will get to do it is by hunting down wanted criminals. And yes, you guessed it, when you capture one you will have to fight them.

The writing, overall, keeps things light and quite amusing, even though there is not much that sticks out as particularly funny or memorable. It's a light chuckle situation, not really a barrel of laughs. The banter between the androids and the robots in the player team form the best part of the dialogue, at times almost reaching Cowboy Bebop-quality levels.

Indeed, the best part of Omega 6 is the character designs which are always unique and amusing. In this, the experience of Tamamura shines. The game is an adaptation of the original Omega 6 manga. Not to mention, also, the great Super Nintendo-like soundtrack that will keep us company on our journey through the stars

I like how there aren't just random NPCs around, but each character feels like they bring something of interest, despite our interactions often being short and limited. Still, Omega 6 is a tough recommendation for anyone who hasn't dreamed of playing a retro first-person RPG, as there is not much that would convince someone to drop their second playthrough of Baldur's Gate 3 or that run of Avowed to join the crew.

Still, I am pretty sure Omega 6 deserves its own dedicated audience and, why not, a little cult following. I just wished it had something more, in terms of gameplay, narrative, or combat, that could transform it into a wholehearted recommendation outside of that small niche. See you, space cowboys.

The post Review: Omega 6 Triangle Stars appeared first on Destructoid.

Of all the remarkable titles in Capcom's impressive portfolio, the Monster Hunter franchise stands out, with Monster Hunter: World at the forefront, boasting millions of copies sold. The next chapter in the saga has come with Wilds, an epic RPG that promises to be the series' most extraordinary adventure yet.

Although I joined the Monster Hunter series a bit late, having only played World in recent years, I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to start as a relative newcomer. Jumping into a long-running series like this can sometimes be overwhelming, but fortunately, that wasn't the case with Wilds. There's no lore dumping to throw you for a loop, nor do the mechanics veer into overly complex territory. Everything is easy to understand, even for someone like me who isn’t the best at RPGs.

Monster Hunter Wilds (PC, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 [reviewed])
Developer: Capcom
Publisher: Capcom
Released: February 28, 2025
MSRP: $69.99

The monster-slaying journey begins with the captivating story of Nata, a young boy in need of rescue after fleeing from a fearsome beast. You'll find him at the borders of the Forbidden Lands, a place once thought to be uninhabited, yet this child claims to have lived there. As a member of the Hunter's Guild, you're tasked with helping Nata find his way back to his lost village and uncover the secrets behind the enigmatic monster that has been tormenting him. Joining alongside you is Alma, your personal Handler who keeps you on track with quests, and Gemma, the smithy extraordinaire who takes care of weapons and armor.

You'll then dive into the one aspect every RPG player has lost themselves in for countless hours: character customization. It's pretty amazing how detailed the Monster Hunter Wilds avatar system is, covering almost every aspect of coloring down to the hue, saturation, and brightness. Sizing is also thrown in there, letting you determine different parts of the body both horizontally and vertically.

Veteran players will encounter classic armor sets, including Leather, Chainmail, and the newly introduced Hope gear. While I am impressed by the realistic designs of the game's characters, the feline companion, Palico, is the real seller. They captured my heart in World, and now they've done so again in Wilds, bringing an adorable charm to its monstrous world. I'm a sucker for cats; what can I say?

Once the avatar customization is taken care of, you'll jump straight into the action as you control the new mount, the Bird Wyvern Seikret. You'll use it to guide you to a tremendous monster showdown, giving you the power to wield one of the 14 weapon types. It's almost impossible for you not to find a weapon designed for your playstyle, from the high-damaging Long Sword to the ranged Heavy Bowgun.

I went with the Dual Blades, one of the best tools any mobile enthusiast could ask for. Wielding it made me feel unstoppable, effortlessly darting across the battlefield and unleashing a flurry of devastating strikes. The moveset to inflict a monster's wound, in particular, is a marvel to watch as you perform a spinning attack across a beast's body. It almost reminds me of the legendary takedowns in Attack on Titan.

Whenever I defeated one of the many creatures in the game, I was ready to tackle the next one immediately. The combat is not only captivating but also incredibly addictive, leaving me craving more after each fight. Initially, I thought the concept of repeatedly defeating monsters might become tedious. However, in all my hours in Monster Hunter Wilds, it never got old. One of the biggest reasons for this is the fact that each monster is different from the last. They all have their own weakness, combat strategies, and a unique environment to switch up the pace every single time.

One moment, I’m locked in a brutal showdown with the octopus-like Black Flame amidst the blistering heat of Oilwell Basin, and the next, I’m soaring through the electrified chaos of Windward Plains, facing off against the fearsome Flying Wyvern, Rey Dau. The battlefield is relentless and ever-changing—like I’m Gandalf, standing tall against the Balrog in The Lord of the Rings.

You can bet that each battle becomes more challenging than the last, especially when the monsters are capable of one-hit kills. Luckily, you can rely on support from the multiplayer system or the Palico, who has the makings of one of the best companions I've had in a video game. They always come in clutch with healing and find ways to knock the enemy off their feet with a trap. Plus, you can use the environment to your advantage, from bringing down a pile of rocks onto enemies to using an elemental bug to counter a weakness.

It all becomes even more worth it when it's time to carve up some new gear with the monster pieces you've acquired. I love the anticipation of seeing what new outfit I would unlock with every fight, including a furry armor from the Doshaguma and the reptilian gear of Chatacabra. However, I will admit that the clothing can be unusual, especially with the Palico's K-Pop idol-like outfit. But, hey, a little weirdness never hurt anybody.

When you’re not caught up in the chaos of battle, you’ll find some well-deserved downtime at the Base Camp, where you can explore the vast, sprawling regions. The map is quite massive, offering unique locations like the molten forge of Azuz Village, the secretive Wudwud Hideout nestled deep in Scarlet Forest, and the winter wonderland of Iceshard Cliffs. Each area is teeming with hidden treasures, whether it’s a perfect fishing spot or the thrilling discovery of a new monster. I particularly loved scavenging ingredients and unlocking fresh recipes that added new flavors to my cooking adventures.

The Seikret mount turns travel into a seamless experience, particularly with its handy auto-run feature. Whenever I didn’t need to take in the sights, I’d just mark my waypoint, kick back with some videos on my phone, and let the Seikret do all the heavy lifting. Look, sometimes my attention span can wander during those long treks, so having a feature like this is a lifesaver.

It’s not that the world of Monster Hunter Wilds isn’t breathtaking—it absolutely is. I love how every region shifts and evolves with each biome, adding a variety of colors that blend together quite nicely. The cast of characters also breathes some life into each destination, where there's always a story to uncover at every corner. It's been a treat getting to know the residents across the Forbidden Lands and seeing how each approaches this monster lifestyle differently.

So, whether you’re eager to dive into the Monster Hunter universe for the first time or you’re a long-time fan seeking a new adventure, Monster Hunter Wilds offers everything you need for an unforgettable experience. Capcom has truly outdone itself with yet another exceptional game that you won't want to miss. I enjoyed every minute of my playthrough from start to finish, and there's even more stuff to discover with its fun-filled end-game content.

The year 2025 is shaping up to be a remarkable time for RPGs, with hits like Avowed and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. Monster Hunter Wilds will likely seal the deal, and I wouldn’t be surprised to see it take the top spot in Capcom's collection.

The post Review: Monster Hunter Wilds appeared first on Destructoid.

The second Tomb Raider trilogy and the third entry in Aspyr's grand Tomb Raider and Soul Reaver restoration effort is now out. It's time to find out if the developers treated this divisive batch of Tomb Raider games well enough to see them soar to never-before-seen heights.

In my review of the I-III trilogy, I discussed the great, the good, and the lackluster about the remasters — which was very little, it turned out. I could afford to do that as the three games were very similar. This time, however, I'm covering the base elements that carried over from the previous remaster trilogy, then doing a necessarily separate look into each of these three distinct titles.

Tomb Raider IV-V-VI Remastered review (PC [Reviewed])
Developer: Aspyr, Crystal Dynamics
Publisher: Aspyr
Released: February 14, 2025
MSRP: $29.99

Aspyr's remaster standard

The original remaster trilogy set the gold standard for what a modern remaster should achieve. Everything looks better courtesy of new models, beautiful new high-res textures, and improved lighting. Don't like the cool new graphics? No problem, as a toggle allows players to go through the entirety of the games looking like they did upon release.

The games also benefitted from allowing players to enjoy the game through the original control settings, or via a revamped modern control scheme and a bunch of quality-of-life improvements such as indicators of interactable objects.

Most of these improvements carry over to the second remaster trilogy, with some exceptions in the third game.

Now let's look at what makes each of the new remasters interesting.

Tomb Raider Chronicles Remastered

Though I'm going over Chronicles first, I must remind you that this is actually the middle entry in the second trilogy — Tomb Raider 5, if you will. I'm doing that not to keep up with the disjointed spirit of the trilogy but because it makes sense. Chronicles is a rather simple game, and the one closest to the original trilogy in terms of structure.

Chronicles was born out of Core Design's necessity to release one Tomb Raider entry each year. 5 years in, you can see how tired everyone was. The result is not a cohesive narrative but a collage of four different gameplay and story segments glued together via the thinnest plot thread imaginable.

Chronicles' original release felt like a B-side collection that Eidos sold as a new album. Two of the four parts play like middle-of-the-road Tomb Raider adventures. The first one, Rome, is easily the blandest of the bunch — the first bizarre choice for a game with no narrative obligations. The second one takes place in Russia and features some pretty decent claustrophobia-inducing action as Lara ventures into a doomed war submarine.

The two final segments, however, are where the little magic Chronicles has to offer lies. The third one has you play as a young version of Lara, one who's yet to be allowed to use her famous dual pistols — or any sort of weapon, for that matter. This forces players to engage the game in a completely different way, and, even though something's missing — not just the guns, some more mechanics to make things more interesting, perhaps — it remains a valiant effort in tinkering with the formula.

The final segment is easily the most memorable one. It has Lara breaking into a high-tech complex and using primitive stealth to steal an artifact from her mentor. You feel the Metal Gear Solid influence, and it has players using cool tech gadgets to mess with the enemy's advanced security system. It absolutely doesn't play as well as MGS — or even as well as the best regular Tomb Raider levels — but it is the most entertainingly daring deviation from the formula inside the two original trilogies.

Naturally, it also oozes the most try-hard Nu-metal "cool" you can only find on an original release from the early '00s.

Chronicles wasn't a great game at the time of release, and likely won't gain any new fans just because it now features the quality-of-life improvements Aspyr had previously put in the original trilogy.

Now, regarding the visual remaster work itself, Aspyr either did an even better job than it previously had or did the same job but wielded even better results as the 5th game's slightly superior tech allowed for it. I believe the latter is the case, and I intend to prove it in my next segment through screenshots that I believe will absolutely blow your mind.

Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation

Tomb Raider 4 was the first one to attempt a bigger deviation from the norm, and the one that got better results out of it.

Aside from a short tutorial set in Cambodia, The Last Revelation takes place entirely in Egypt. This is by far the largest game in the series, so the solo setting could end up wearing out its welcome quickly – but that doesn't happen courtesy of varied environments coupled with some pretty original challenges. TLR features some of the best temples, traps, puzzles, and overall locations in the entire series. It's also the first game to make each level less of an episodic thing by having most of the game be a huge hub area. That decision worked to make the game's scope feel even larger, though the hub lacks the beautiful interconnectedness we would later see in Dark Souls, which might make the big picture feel emptier and more disjointed than it should be — like Dark Souls 2.

Still, while this trilogy is weaker than the original one, I'll die on a hill defending that The Last Revelation is better than Tomb Raider 3 — In fact, make it a pyramid.

Even though this is definitely an inferior set of games, this trilogy looks even better than the previous one. On top of the field-of-view upgrade over the original, the remaster offers a much-improved skybox and that does a lot for this game, especially. The sky in the first remastered trilogy looked heaps better than the one on the original games — like, the OG Tomb Raider release didn't even feature a sky box — but The Last Revelation will hit you with one of the most beautiful skyboxes I've ever seen in a game. It's a thing of beauty that not even the best screenshot will do justice to, since what truly sets them apart is the movement.

Those factors add up to allow TLR to pull off scope incredibly well:

That's the Great Pyramid level, both still the greatest achievement in the series scope-wise, and the most interestingly daunting level in the game. Staying true to TLR's theme of playing with the formula, the Great Pyramid does away with any key-finding or block-moving mechanics. It just wants players to jump their way near the top. The problem? players will have to carefully analyze every block they decide to jump to, as picking the wrong one will cause them to fall all the way to the beginning, or their deaths — also, there are traps.

The Great Pyramid level was impressive back in 1999 and is somehow even more impressive nowadays — not enough games enjoy this type of scope these days. The callous inventiveness of this level would likely make even the maddest Pharaoh from the sleaziest Egyptsploitation movie feel so seen.

With all that, it should come as no surprise that TLR proves the perfect match for the remaster's photo mode.

And that's where things take a tumble.

Tomb Raider: The Angel Of Darkness

In the weeks leading up to this release, I wrote a piece called "How do you even remaster Angel Of Darkness?". Long story short, it's about my skepticism towards the concept of fixing a house with no walls via one single beautiful coat of paint.

A game can suffer from various types of problems, and AOD's original release is a perfect collection of all the problems other games have ever suffered from. An extremely tense development cycle resulted in missing elements, new elements that didn't work, and neglect toward the series' staple elements that prevented them from keeping up with the times.

The remaster does a brave job of restoring a lot of cut content. Some of it is useful; some of it is nice to see. It also does a commendable job of making the original control scheme somehow work better than the modern one. Still, the game remains too clunky for its platforming, gunplay, and melee action to feel anything other than highly frustrating. Missing a difficult jump is something that can occur in a Tomb Raider game. AOD's clunky controls, however, combined with the game's still-awful camera and level design, leave Lara looking like an untrained clown forced to perform acrobatics in a professional circus.

On the visual side, this remaster is surprisingly weak. Though AOD is the only game in the two trilogies made for the then-superior PS2 hardware, it ends up being the worst-looking out of all the remasters. Dare to guess which of the screens below shows the "Original" visual mode and which shows the "Remastered" mode?

Don't fret it. Even I know the answer only because I know which filenames I gave each screenshot. By looking at Lara's model from the front, it's easy to spot which is which. If you're looking at her while you normally would during gameplay, it'll be a guessing game as the remaster seems to do some upgrades, but also some downgrades. AOD's control scheme is also more complex, so it got me to sometimes accidentally toggle between the old and new graphics modes without noticing.

Overall, though it features some serious improvements over gameplay that will feel great for fans, the AOD remaster falls short of anything meaningful enough to allow this game to keep up with the times.

Anyone trying to play AOD for the first time via the remaster will likely go through as much pain as we all did back in '03, and I believe preventing that was the bar this remaster really needed to clear. Unfortunately, The Angel Of Darkness remains a poor experience overall, though this is definitely the best way to play it so far.

If you're a true fan of the series and you're just looking for a more playable version of this game, I'd recommend this. If not, however, then maybe skip on this remaster.

All in all, I don't blame the developers for AOD's shortcomings. This one was just too broken to ever fix. I find the other two remasters more than enough to justify the trilogy's asking price if you are a fan. If you aren't, then you're better off getting into the series via the first trilogy, or by giving the 2013 reboot a shot.

The post Review: Tomb Raider IV-VI Remastered appeared first on Destructoid.

When I first stepped into Avowed's wondrous world during my preview, I was mesmerized by its ever-changing combat system and breathtakingly beautiful world. I was sure that it would have the makings of one of the best RPGs of 2025, and now that statement holds true with my full playthrough.  

Obsidian Entertainment has once again released a masterpiece, continuing the phenomenon that is the Pillars of Eternity series. Although Avowed isn't the third entry of the series that we had hoped for, it still captures the look and feel of this franchise by bringing us back to the enchanting world of Eora. Even if you aren't familiar with Eora and the events of POE, you don't have to worry about getting lost in its lore, as Avowed is more or less considered a standalone piece. Avowed begins like any other dark fantasy, where the threat of great evil plagues the world, corrupting animals, people, and the Living Lands. As both a Godlike and the Envoy of Aedyr, you must use your deity powers to end a contagion known as "Dreamscourge."

Avowed (PC, Xbox Series X|S [reviewed])

Developer: Obsidian Entertainment

Publisher: Xbox Game Studios

Released: February 18, 2025

MSRP: $69.99

You can think of Dreamscourge as a zombified fungal plague with a fantasy twist, similar to The Last of Us' Clickers, but slightly more colorful. While their designs are pretty grotesque to look at (that opening shot of an infected creature still haunts me), there is some beauty in it. Particularly, the Godlike features shown in character customization allow you to use this fungal-like design to create a hero unlike any other. This mechanic alone is one of the reasons why Avowed's customization is different from other games, placing vibrant spores on your face and hair. It can be a bit distracting, but fortunately, you can turn it off to get a good old-fashioned RPG character look, should you wish.

There are classic role-playing backgrounds, from an Arcane Scholar to a War Hero. Each origin story heavily influences the dialogue choices you get, which can either benefit you or lead to some trouble. Regardless of the background you choose, everyone receives the same starting weapon and equipment. There will be plenty of tools to unlock during the beginning stages, which I immensely enjoyed as someone who often has difficulty picking a single one.

The diverse array of weapons, abilities, and classes is exactly why I hold Avowed in such high regard. Too often, we are restricted to our classes in RPGs, limiting our strategies and making the experience feel tedious with the same tools over and over again. Avowed plays out much differently, where you can switch between loadouts and combine weapons that usually never mix together. A perfect example of this is my go-to "Wizard with a Gun" build that places a grimoire in one hand and a gun in the other. It made me feel like I was playing a Call of Duty-like fantasy RPG, a concept that I never would've imagined before playing Avowed.

When this build didn't come in handy for specific combat scenarios, I would just switch to my other loadout to better fit the situation. Is there an enemy too far away? Just swiftly change it to your bow and arrow loadout, and voilà, you are now a wizard-turned-archer. I've said it once before in my preview, and I'll say it again: this mechanic is something I've always desired in RPGs, and all video games, for that matter. I've run into too many scenarios where I wished I had a bow and arrow or some magic to take advantage of an enemy's weakness. With Avowed, I don't have any problems with this, especially since you can hold a ton of weapons at your disposal and swiftly send things over to the camp with a simple click of a button. Being encumbered has always been the bane of my existence, but thankfully, it won't be an issue in this title.

Though you'll have plenty of weapons to use, enemies can still be overwhelmingly brutal. I felt fairly confident in the beginning stages of Dawnshore until I reached the ruthlessness of the second region, Emerald Stair. This area makes the game a lot more challenging than it already is, but there's no shame in lowering the difficulty when the going gets tough. I'll admit I was struggling on Easy mode at this point, despite grinding and collecting upgraded gear. It just goes to show how challenging Avowed can be, whether with a significant increase in enemy numbers or the sheer strength of one opponent's strike. I'm sure many Pillars of Eternity fans will appreciate it, given that POE and POE 2's combat experience was definitely harsh at times but still satisfying when you come out victorious.

On the bright side, you'll have the help of your four companions in Avowed, all of whom have distinct powers to add to their uniqueness. While Kai can clear out debris with his fiery skill, Marius can ease the stress of the hunt by showing points of interest nearby. Giatta is my personal favorite, as she has helped me out of a pinch more times than I can count. Support characters can sometimes be a hit or miss (I'm looking at you, Donald Duck from Kingdom Hearts), and Giatta certainly falls under the former. Companions, altogether, are an eccentric bunch that frequently conversate with each other at camp and in battle. I found myself listening to their conversations many times, as it provided much more insight into their backgrounds and personalities.

One aspect that I particularly enjoyed about the teammates is how they put in their two cents during major decisions. Every time I was stumped on a choice, there was typically an option to ask for their opinion on the matter. If I wanted someone who was a bit more level-headed with decisions, I would go for Kai. But, if I felt like being chaotic, I would see what wild thing Yatzli had to say.

I was impressed at how impactful decisions ended up being in Avowed's storyline. There are a lot of opportunities to be evil or good, affecting how characters react to you and the outcome of quests. Even a minor choice you make during the tutorial phase influences a future side quest, either making it easier to complete or adding another objective to the pile. Companions will also comment on how you approach specific situations, expressing their feelings towards your actions.

Besides the decisions, I was also surprised by how much is packed into Avowed's map, where not even 25+ hours could scratch the surface. I was always getting caught up in its many side quests, including deciphering treasure maps and helping the locals take out a formidable foe. Plus, free-roaming events frequently appear that don't tie into any specific mission; they're just there to give you more content. I was walking around and stumbled upon some folks gravedigging, which led me to a powerful new tool by the end.

You'll encounter a significant amount of these scenarios wherever you go, and it's made exploration much more inviting. I like having an extensive map with hidden treasures and storylines rather than one that looks big and beautiful but somehow feels empty. This is not to say that Avowed's world isn't visually pleasing because it is, as every region comes with its own unique charm and environmental features.

There are many more topics I could go on about the game, but it's probably best for you to experience it for yourself. Avowed is one of the best RPGs I've played in 2025, and I'm not even much of a role-playing genre fanatic. If that's convinced you enough, hop into the game on Xbox Game Pass Day One or PC.

The post Review: Avowed appeared first on Destructoid.

Almost exactly seven years ago, Czech developer Warhorse Studios released the original Kingdom Come: Deliverance. It was the studio's first project and aimed to be part open-world RPG, part medieval life simulator. An ambitious endeavor, but one that Warhorse Studio proved very capable of pulling off.

With the sequel, Warhorse Studios has essentially doubled down on every aspect of Kingdom Come: Deliverance refining the core systems that made the original great while also adding some new ones as well.

Let's be real, if you were a fan of the original, you probably just want more KCD. And Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is exactly that, and then some. Many of the issues in the original game have been addressed. And as a result, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is a truly remarkable open-world RPG.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 (PC [reviewed], PS5, Xbox Series X|S)
Developer: Warhorse Studios
Publisher: Deep Silver
Released: February 4, 2025
MSRP: $69.99

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 continues the story of Henry of Skalitz, the protagonist you play as in the original. Things pick up shortly after the events of the first game, following Henry as a more experienced warrior on a quest for vengeance against Sir Markvart von Aulitz, the antagonist of KCD responsible for burning down Henry's village and murdering his family.

Playing as Henry this time around is similar, but also very much different. He's no longer just the son of a blacksmith trying to learn the ropes as he goes. He's now a full-fledged knight, sent on an important quest along with Sir Hans Capon of Rattay—Henry's best friend in the original KCD—to deliver a message to Otto von Bergow. The quest goes awry, the pair loses the important message. This sets up the first part of the game where you must roam the Trotsky region of the Kingdom of Bohemia while trying to find a way to complete this quest.

The region of Trotsky is massive, with various villages and castles scattered throughout, connected by dirt roads that wind through dense forests and muddy rivers and streams. It's a beautiful region much like the map you explore in the original game. But later on, you'll gain access to Kuttenburg, an entirely separate region centered around the massive city that played a pivotal role in the early 15th century due to its silver mines.

Both regions are peppered with dozens of side quests that not only give you ways to level up, acquire some loot, and earn some Groschen (money), but also flesh out the immersive world of KCD2. Every piece of dialogue is fully voiced acted, and features perhaps the best voice acting ever in a game. Seriously, I wish every game had the quality of voice acting that KCD2 has. Have you ever been playing a game where the response from an NPC catches you off guard, but then you go, "Actually, I could see someone saying that if they were really in this situation!" Well, that's every line of dialogue in KCD2. It takes the immersion a step further, which you'll notice is a common theme throughout the entire game. Realism.

Speaking of the world, it's absolutely stunning. I'm playing on PC, on an AMD 7700X CPU and an AMD RX 7900 XT GPU with FSR, and for the most part, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 runs as smooth as butter performance-wise. It's very impressive just how good the game looks visually, and while I remember the original having a ton of performance issues, at least early on, that's not the case. There are some minor FPS drops here and there around Kuttenburg, but that's about it.

Of course, we have to talk about the elephant in the room: bugs. If you've played a massive open-world game before, you know bugs are simply part of the package. When you have so much going on at once, things are bound to break from time to time, and break they do. Most of the bugs I've encountered in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 were very minor; in fact, some added some extra charm and even welcome comic relief, like one I kept experiencing where my horse would for whatever reason consistently try to turn and run in on itself. No matter what direction I'd turn or look, as soon as I'd try to move forward it would snap around towards itself and continue doing so. This was a quick fix; jump off the horse and back on.

However, I also encountered some bugs that were pretty annoying, mainly due to Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's finicky Saviour Schnapps save system. It's the same as the first game, meaning you only save when you sleep in a bed or consume a limited consumable called Saviour Schnapps. You also get one single "Exit Save" that occurs every time you exit the game. I get why Warhorse Studios chooses to handle saves this way; it adds to the realism by preventing save scumming, especially when your choices mean so much.

But it can be quite annoying when you're traversing through a long quest only to have your character clip into a random doodad like a wagon and get stuck, unable to move. Or when you engage in combat with several enemies only to clip into one and get stuck in a perpetually never-ending rotation of the camera as it tries to pull your body out of theirs while the enemies continue to carve you up until you die and have to reload and lose some progress.

There are a lot fewer bugs in KCD2 compared to what the original launched with, and in the few weeks I've had access to the review build of the game, Warhorse Studios has released several patches fixing tons of bugs. Like I said, in a massively open-world game like this, it'd be silly not to expect some bugs. And for the most part, I didn't encounter anything too game-breaking, only variable levels of annoying.

I wasn't too far into KCD2 when I had somewhat of an epiphany. I had encountered a group of Cumans, which Henry has come to hate seeing as they were responsible for destroying the village in which he grew up and killing his family. After speaking with the leader of the group, I started to change my view on the situation a little bit. As he explained it, he was just trying to get by himself, serving a lord and doing what he was ordered to do. He was very blunt and direct about everything, while also having a comical tone. A very entertaining character, to say the least.

Not long after, I was with the Cumans at their camp, getting completely drunk, and sharing tales. Turns out that this group very well could have been part of the group that attacked Henry's village back in the original. After many drinks, Henry and the Cuman stumbled their way into the woods, where the leader eventually tripped and passed out, completely wasted. Curious, I looked at the Cuman lying on the ground to see if the game would let me loot him while he was drunk. I could, of course, but more interestingly, I had the option to murder him.

This revelation is what triggered my epiphany: a game like Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is one I often dreamed of existing when I was growing up watching a ton of medieval-time movies and TV shows. One where you get to actually make decisions, and have complete control over your choices, right or wrong. To help drive this point home, I feel it's important to note that this wasn't some main quest decision or anything like that. It was a side activity amongst many throughout KCD2, and I'm pretty sure someone else could play through the entire game and not even encounter this group of Cumans or have to make this choice. A true open-world RPG in every way.

If the open world is half of the formula for Kingdom Come: Deliverance, combat in that open world is the other half. A similar yet refined style of combat system is at play in the sequel, once again featuring a crosshair-style indicator over your enemy when engaged in combat. The indicator has been somewhat simplified; instead of a star-like indicator with five points, the bottom two points have been merged into one. This means that you still have the left, right, and overhead stances of holding your weapon, but the bottom choice now symbolizes a stab or thrusting attack with your weapon.

You'll spend much of the early game playing a sort of patient game of rock paper scissors, often waiting for your opponent to attack first, so you can block it, then following up with a counter-attack on the side they left unprotected. It's similar to the original, but also much more fluid. Attacks with your weapons respond immediately where they connect with their target, rather than seeming like a timed animation going through the motions. And much of the major combat-assisted systems from the original are still here. For example, a successful block from a shield will see that shield take some wear and tear, with wooden shields splintering and breaking over time.

It's such a satisfying and rewarding combat system, and I think the decision to make it mostly similar to that in the original was a good choice. After all, we're playing a more experienced fighter this time around with a more knowledgeable Henry, and with all the enhancements to the combat system, it naturally feels that way.

There are some new weapons as well including one of my favorites, the Crossbow. I wasn't a fan of the bow in KCD, probably because I sucked with it. But in KCD2, the Crossbow feels a lot more accurate and effective. You still have to account for uhh... bolt drop, of course, but it feels as though you could focus primarily on using the Crossbow and have decent results with it. I chose to use it alongside an axe and the occasional longsword, as the combat style is so different with each weapon that it was fun to switch it up from time to time and get better with a variety of weapon types.

Speaking of which, alongside just practicing and getting better at combat, there are two other major ways to improve your combat prowess. First, there are multiple combat experts throughout the world that you can visit to train with. Doing so will unlock new combos and skills that you can use in combat, some of which really change things up.

You'll also increase your skill level with each weapon type and gain Perk Points as you use that weapon type. There are six combat skills in total: Warfare, Swords, Heavy Weapons, Polearms, Unarmed, and Marksmanship. Each combat skill has over a dozen perks you can learn for them that make you better at that specific type of combat. For example, Polearms have a perk called First Strike that makes your first attack in every fight with a Polearm weapon 35% stronger. The Heavy Weapons combat skill on the other hand features perks like Shieldbreaker that make your heavy weapon attacks harder for opponents to block as a shield, as well as increases the damage you do to shields with your heavy weapon attacks.

Combat skills aren't the only skills with perks in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, however. There are skills and perks for Thievery, Survival, Stealth Scholarship, Houndmaster, Horsemanship, Drinking (yep, drinking), Craftsmanship, and Alchemy. Speaking of which, Alchemy and Blacksmithing have their own new and more intricate systems.

For Alchemy, you can collect herbs and other materials before visiting an Alchemy Bench and concocting various potions and elixirs. It's a pretty complex system, with most recipes requiring you to use a certain liquid as a base, and then bring it to a boil over a pot before adding a specific amount of ingredients and boiling it for a specific amount of time. The better quality materials you use and the closer you are to the exact boil time, the better quality the potion you make will be.

Blacksmithing isn't as complex as Alchemy, but is a fun and honestly relaxing reprieve from gallivanting around Bohemia. Once you've gathered the necessary materials for the recipe—oftentimes various metals—you can head to an anvil and begin the Blacksmithing process. First, you'll have to heat the metals over a furnace, bringing the metals to a bright yellow glow. Then, you move the metal to an anvil before shaping it with your hammer. The goal is to spread out where you hit the metal with your hammer, though it can be tricky to do without any sort of indicator of where your hammer swing is going to land. I actually made a good bit of Groschen throughout my playthrough by heading to the anvil in between quests and blacksmithing what I could with the materials I found.

Overall, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 exceeded my expectations in every way. Henry has cemented himself as one of my favorite game characters, and the world of 15th-century Bohemia that the developers have crafted will certainly be one I will always remember. Many games these days proclaim to have a living breathing world full of choices that matter, but few actually do. Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 gives you that lively and immersive world full of choices and then implores you to make the wrong ones, and it's a hell of an experience because of it.

While Kingdom Come: Deliverance was a solid title worthy of being called a great open-world RPG, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 essentially redefines what it means to be a great open-world RPG. It's one of those worlds you not only want to tell your friends about, but you want to watch them explore it as well. I'm so torn on what I want to see Warhorse Studios do in the future. On one hand, I'd love to see what such a talented studio can do with another setting. On the other, they're absolute masterminds at crafting such an immersive and realistic early 15th-century medieval world that I just want more of it. The year just started so it's too early to be talking about GOTY, but for me, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is already at the very least a contender.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 appeared first on Destructoid.

The Civilization series has long reigned supreme over the turn-based 4X strategy genre. Even though the genre has recently become more populated with games like Humankind, Old World, and Endless Legend—all of which are great, by the way—none have reached the same level of gameplay that Civilization offers.

Realistically, that's to be somewhat expected. After all, Sid Meier's Civilization is a series that's been around for over three decades with the original releasing all the way back in 1991. Over the years, developer Firaxis Games—and Micro Prose, back in the 90's—continued to build on and refine the 4X formula leading up to the series' seventh mainline entry, Sid Meier's Civilization 7.

Unfortunately, when you're the master of a genre, you can really only refine it so much. Civilization 6 is great, but other than the addition of districts, the argument could be made that it really just felt like an updated Civilization 5.

With Sid Meier's Civilization VII, Firaxis has managed to find a way to really push the series forward in the form of its Ages system. Interestingly enough, the Ages system resolves a lot of long-stand issues with the series, while also offering more for long-term fans of the series and at the same time making the intimidating genre more approachable to newcomers.

Sid Meier's Civilization VII (PC [reviewed], PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch)
Developer: Firaxis Games
Publisher: 2K Games
Released: February 11, 2025
MSRP: $69.99

In a nutshell, Ages breaks Civilization 7 into three sections: Antiquity Age, Exploration Age, and Modern Age. At Standard game speeds, each of these Ages will last between 150-200 turns and span anywhere from 3-5 hours, depending on how long turns take you. By breaking the game into these three Ages, players have the option to play a single Age-based game that begins and ends with a single age, or they can opt to play out a longer game across all three Ages that will stretch out over a dozen hours or more.

This one change actually does a lot of Civilization. For starters, Civ players often end up on one side of the coin when it comes to game length. Some complain that the games take way too long, while others wish they could do more, and really mold their empire over the course of a long game. Sure, you could mess with game speeds and lengths in Civilization 6 in an attempt to do so, but that more or less just artificially increased the length.

Now, with the Ages system, players opting for a shorter game can play through just a single Age, while those looking for longer bouts can grow and shape their empire how they want over all three Ages in a much longer game. With the new system, each Age is also more refined to offer somewhat different gameplay, as well.

While each Age can be seen as its own sort of self-contained game, a playthrough that stretches over all three Ages will have its own self-contained goals as well. This primarily happens through the natural gameplay flow of Civilization—laying the foundation for your empire in the Antiquity Age, exploring the world and coming up with a gameplan based on your opponents in the Exploration Age, and then executing your gameplan in the end-game of the Modern Age.

The potentially shorter games of a single Age are a big welcoming point for new players, but so is a revamped tutorial system. I'm the kind of person who usually skips a tutorial, then either learns things on my own or ends up having to go back and suffer through the tutorial anyway. In Civ 7, the tutorial isn't a set of pre-built instructional scenarios or a bunch of videos or even text documentation like most games in the genre. Instead, enabling the tutorial simply adds extra instructions when you're first starting the game as well as explaining new systems or features as you unlock them, including when you reach new Ages.

Pretty much every core system of Civilization has been enhanced or improved upon in Civilization 7 as well. Visually, Civ 7 is far and above the best the series has ever looked. Not just from a directly graphical standpoint; after all, that's to be expected seeing as Civ 6 is almost a decade old now. But with Civ 7, the game takes a more realistic approach than the previous installments, which often favored a more cartoony look. This results in a vibrant and colorful landscape that really evolves as you progress through the ages.

It's always been absolute eye candy to watch the spot of land you chose to plop down your first settlement change and your empire grow over the course of a game in Civilization. With the more realistic graphics, this progression looks even more amazing. It's cool to watch your settlement advance in technology and sprawl out while keeping your Wonders through the Ages. Seeing a modern city built around the Colosseum is still always a fun sight to behold.

The soundtrack for Civ 7 is top-notch as well. This has always been a strong point of the series, and I was happy to see that each civilization still has its own unique music tracks. It really sets the mood for playing each civilization, and I'm looking forward to playing each one eventually for their scores alone.

In terms of content, Civilization 7 launches with 24 Leaders to choose from, and over 30 Civilizations across the three Ages. I believe there are a couple more unlocked by linking your game to a 2K Games account, as well as through various collector's editions. While I'm not a fan of content like this being locked out and not available to everyone, it's worth noting that there are Leaders and Civilizations available for all players of all playstyles: Cultural, Diplomatic Economic, Expansionist, Militaristic, and Scientific.

In my main playthrough across all three Ages, I started as Augustus and naturally, as Rome is my civilization, in the Antiquity Age. Typically, Rome is a Cultural Militaristic civilization. However, I ended up really taking a liking to my only close major opponent (Hatshepsut) and over the course of the Antiquity Age found myself focusing less on my military due to not really needing one, and more on science, especially because I was actually located in a perfect spot geographically for it with plenty of buffs to science to be had by working the lands appropriately.

Naturally, as I reached the Exploration Age, I shifted my civilization to Abbasid, a choice that still catered to Cultural but also Scientific over Militaristic. By the end of the Exploration Age, my dear friend Hatshepsut was consistently being sieged by Xerses and Charlemagne, leading me to shift back towards a Militaristic approach both to aid Hatshepsut but also to defend myself more efficiently. This led to me once again changing course in the Modern Age, and adopting Prussia as my civilization. Despite going into the late game in a three-way World War, I was still able to secure a Scientific Victory.

This type of flip-flopping between playstyle focuses really isn't much of a possibility in previous Civilization games. But in Civilization 7, you not only have the option to change up your focus with each Age, but you're also not penalized for it. In fact, in most cases you'll still retain a lot of the advantages from previous Age focuses even if you shift into something different in later Ages. It's a great change to the series and I can't wait to see what people who are much better than me at these sorts of games end up doing with all the possibilities within this big change.

Legacies and by extension Legacy Paths further complement this change. This new system basically gives you tasks to complete while you're in an Age. Completing them will give you buffs for that Age based on the focus the tasks were part of. For example, building a Wonder in the Antiquity Age will grant you a Cultural Legacy Point and a Diplomatic Legacy Point that can be used in future Ages. But you also receive the option to put one of those points into a specialization of Culture in a future Age that will grant you +1 Culture and +1 Happiness for every Wonder you own. This allows you to further tailor your build to your desired playstyle as you progress through the Ages.

For the most part, Civilization 7 runs great. I'm currently using an AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT and for some reason when using DirectX 12, my game ends up crashing after some time. Sometimes it's after just a few minutes of play, other times I can go up to an hour without issue. Thankfully, there's also the option to launch using the Vulkan API instead of DirectX 12, and I've had no crashes with it. If this is like previous issues I've had with an AMD card, this is most likely more of a driver-related issue that will be fixed when AMD drops a Civilization 7-specific driver update, but I did feel it was worth pointing out.

Slight technical hiccups aside, I also feel as though the Modern Age feels a bit less fleshed out compared to the other two Ages. The tech tree alone for the Modern Age feels a lot smaller and contained. There are also fewer branches in the tech tree compared to the prior two, and it feels like a pretty narrow progression towards the end. It's not unfinished or anything like that, but definitely noticeable.

Furthermore, I tried starting a game directly in the Modern Age, and it felt a bit rough around the edges. You get to select from a pool of starting staple points for your empire, like a city, a town, some military units, and some tech. Basically it tries to jumpstart you into a game as though you've already built up some in the first two Ages. But paired with the more lacking scope of the Age, it felt a bit off to actually play starting from the Modern Age. This may simply be curtailed by having more playtime and an overall understanding of everything going on on a systematic level, but at the moment I definitely recommend everyone starts in the Antiquity Age at the very least until you've got the game down.

I'm excited to see what direction Firaxis and 2K go in terms of post-launch content for Civilization 7. The current roadmap for the future already talks about new Leaders, Civs, Events, and Wonders, but I'm curious if there are plans to add any new major features much like the early expansions in Civ 6 did.

Regardless of my minor gripes with the game, Civilization 7 is a ton of fun. The Ages system is a major game-changer and really enhances the genre in a big way. Firaxis probably could have gotten away with a safer approach with this installment, opting for just better graphics. Instead, it boldly revamped a lot of the core systems to make the entire game more streamlined for both newcomers and veterans alike. I'm glad Firaxis is still finding ways to improve a genre it has mastered over the years, and as a result, Sid Meier's Civilization 7 has the series in its best shape yet.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Sid Meier’s Civilization VII appeared first on Destructoid.

Sanrio is near and dear to my heart. Although this world of Hello Kitty and her friends only recently entered my life, I have several friends and family who adore these guys. I've lost count of the times my siblings have mentioned Hello Kitty, Kuromi, or Cinnamoroll in random conversations.

For me, this was a blind playthrough of Hello Kitty Island Adventure. Although I'd known about the Apple Arcade version through several friends, I'd never played it myself, making this a fresh start rather than a direct comparison. I mainly thought the characters were cute, but playing this has since made me develop an unexpected appreciation for them and the Sanrio universe, leaving me satisfied for a while.

Hello Kitty Island Adventure (PC, Nintendo Switch [Reviewed], iOS)
Developer: Sunblink
Publisher: Sunblink
Released: January 30, 2025 (Switch/PC)
MSRP: $39.99

When I first booted up Hello Kitty Island Adventure, I was half expecting to see the Switch get yet another game about small animals occupying an island and going about their business. There was a part of my mind that feared it'd be the same game, either simplified or changed to be less appealing, giving my first few minutes a peculiar feeling of unease. Thank goodness, it only took a few minutes for me to realize there was more to this adventure than just a quick copy-paste.

Instead, Hello Kitty Island Adventure immediately greets you with the game's main cast, and Hello Kitty herself guides you through your first few minutes. Things start simple: you're on a plane with each Sanrio character, giving you an opportunity to talk to each one and learn more about their thoughts on your upcoming adventure. It's a nice way to introduce you to their world without shoving lore and exposition in your face. Or, well, you can skip this part entirely if you just want to hop onto the island and get started right away.

Speaking of the island, this map is massive. Its scale isn't apparent at first, but as you run around and discover the world around you, you quickly realize just how much is here and how much each character will rely on you in the days to come. It's sometimes overwhelming while equally exciting, especially if you prefer exploration over menial tasks.

Don't worry, though. There's plenty of questing to do if that's your thing. The only thing that overwhelmed me more than the size of this map is how many quests Hello Kitty Island Adventure tosses your way within the first few hours. Beyond story missions, you'll get all kinds of friendship quests, random side adventures, and even daily tasks to keep you playing. It's easy to log on, blink a few times, and suddenly realize you spent the past few hours doing fetch quests for the characters. There are even minigames and puzzles everywhere to get your brain going and unlock some neat little trophies.

Are these quests full of grand adventures and entertaining moments, or are they mostly mindless chores and fetch quests you can finish on auto-pilot? If anything, it feels like a mix of both. Advancing through the main storyline is satisfying, especially as you open more areas of the map and meet new characters. Between that are hours of farming materials, raising your friendship with the Sanrio cast, and occasionally having to wait a real-world day to make meaningful progress because you're one friendship level away from unlocking another quest. It's much less noticeable early on when progression is simple and quick, but it starts to drag later on at times.

On the topic of friendships, Hello Kitty Island Adventure has a peculiar system that I'm mixed on. Every day, you can give up to three items to each character to raise their friendship levels. The points you get change depending on the item's tags and a character's preferences, so giving the same item to Hello Kitty and someone like Tuxedosam will have different effects.

This game relies heavily on gift-giving for progression, with nearly every quest locked behind a specific level. You're also limited to three gifts daily for each character, forcing you to wait until the following day unless you reset your counter with a rare item. There's a part of me that likes thinking about what gifts I want to give someone without feeling tempted to speedrun the game in a few days, but another part that gets overwhelmed by the need to give out dozens of items every day. Needing several days to unlock one quest can suck sometimes, but with how much content is available, I barely noticed it until I progressed later in the game.

Even as friendship limitations make questing a little awkward sometimes, the interactions between you and each Sanrio character make things fun and interesting. They all have the same personalities and cartoony animated expressions I'd expected from them, but there's something about their style and attitudes that makes me smile every time I play. Sunblink nailed their look, personalities, and overall vibes, even if the lack of voice acting is a missed opportunity.

I'm pleasantly surprised by how much Hello Kitty Island Adventure lets you do outside questing and chatting with other characters. It has your standard skills like cooking, crafting, and fishing with some more advanced activities you unlock later down the line. A lot is locked behind quests and friendship levels, but unlocking these opens up many opportunities to explore the island in different ways without following linear paths or going into autopilot the entire time. I don't know about you, but I tend to sidetrack from quests a lot to cook some food or fish for a couple of hours, even if it doesn't help much with progression. The only difference this time is that everything you do in this game helps in some way, mostly with gifting or crafting quest items.

Hello Kitty Island Adventure is a wonderful game that distinguishes itself from the crowd and stands tall as a densely packed, enjoyable experience. Although it can use improvements in some areas, the Switch version of Hello Kitty Island Adventure is absolutely worth picking up if you've been looking for an Animal Crossing-like game to try out and either don't have an iPhone or are on the fence about getting an Apple Arcade subscription and prefer one-time payments. It plays well with no major performance issues — at most, I found a slightly long loading screen. Considering the game's size, though, I can easily forgive this.

With updates coming out every month and recurring events changing things up, every day feels different on this island. I'm looking forward to seeing how Hello Kitty Island Adventure's future unfolds.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Hello Kitty Island Adventure appeared first on Destructoid.

I’ve certainly had worse jobs than the one given to you in Dead Letter Dept. I’ve worked in retail. I’ve worked in I.T. I know a thing or two about cursed computers.

Right there, I connected with Dead Letter Dept, especially since I like typing. I probably would have been happy if I was just playing Data Entry: The Game. But, as it turns out, there’s more to it than the simple satisfaction of a job well done. There’s also some effective but unconventional horror.

Dead Letter Dept. (PC)
Developer: Mike Monroe, Belief Engine
Publisher: Belief Engine
Release: January 30th, 2025
MSRP: $14.99

Cursed computers aren’t necessarily a new thing. Pony Island, Home Safety Hotline, and I know that there’s an obvious one I’m forgetting. Don’t let that dissuade you. While the concept might not be the most unique, Dead Letter Dept still has a lot to offer.

You’re cast as a young person who is moving to the city by themself for the first time. You’ve not only got some new digs, you’ve got a new job. And that job is to examine undeliverable letters and transcribe the correct address if you can read it. These letters are stained and ripped, and some of them are just written by people with horrible penmanship.

But the transcription is what it literally is: busywork. It’s not really a challenge. The letters aren’t small puzzles that you need to decipher. They’re mostly a storytelling tool. Proofreading addresses start giving way to stranger things, like bitter or tragic postcards and odd, alarming messages hidden betwixt. I mean, obviously something is going on underneath. Obviously. This is a horror game.

Before each work day, you start off in your horrible apartment. Your bed sucks, you haven’t finished unpacking, and there’s a locked exterior door that the landlord says leads to the fire exit, but that seems suspect. There isn’t much to do in the apartment, so you leave and take a walk to work. It’s truncated a bit, but the walk still does a good job of building the hopeless atmosphere.

As you go through your workdays, things just get stranger and stranger. At two or three hours for a playthrough, things escalate rather quickly, but the pace feels just right. It doesn’t play coy for very long. A couple days in, and the jumpscares start happening. And when I say “jumpscares,” I don’t mean that monsters start grabbing your ass at the water cooler, I just mean that sudden noises will start occurring offscreen or the computer will glitch out suddenly. It is what it is, but Dead Letter Dept capitalizes on it quite well by gluing you to the computer screen. If a sound seems to be coming from behind you, you can’t just turn your head to look at it, you just have to go on working, and working while spooky stuff goes on around you is one of my favorite styles of gameplay.

And while jumpscares may be cheap, that’s not all Dead Letter Dept has. It also has immaculate environmental storytelling. Its atmosphere is heightened by a disturbing lo-fi fuzz filter, careful use of lighting, and a very selective and surreal color palette. It leans heavily into cool colors that you wouldn’t normally associate with specific environments. Interior hallways, for example, are almost entirely a sickly green color.

It’s hard to fully communicate it in writing, but the visual and audio aesthetic of Dead Letter Dept allows it to drive above the legal limit. At its core, its gameplay is simple; limited, even. It’s clearly the work of mostly one person. However, it nails its atmosphere so perfectly that you can’t see the seams. It’s better executed than most big-budget productions without losing the fingerprints of its creator.

And while a single run is only 2-3 hours, that’s not the whole story. It’s made for multiple playthroughs, thankfully not using a roguelite format. Instead, there are just multiple endings. It’s not simply based on decisions made throughout the game, either. Instead, it’s just up to you to figure out how to derail things in different ways, and that’s a rather interesting wrinkle. There are hints on what you need to do, but nothing overt, leaving you fighting for your life in different ways… But, you know, within the confines of data entry.

The downside is that, while there are some random elements, there perhaps aren’t quite enough letters to keep things fresh on each playthrough. I guess there are only so many ways you can obfuscate an address, but – and I can’t believe I’m complaining about this – this job could use a smidge more variety.

Mike Monroe and Belief Engine really know how to get a lot of mileage out of a simple idea. It would, perhaps, be accurate to say that Dead Letter Dept is better than the sum of its parts, but, truly, I think that fails to illustrate just how great its parts are. The simple joy of data entry is wrapped in a soft tortilla of a well-communicated atmosphere and a well-executed aesthetic. Through its medium, it finds the horror in mundanity and uncertainty. It’s a message worth receiving.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Dead Letter Dept. appeared first on Destructoid.

Basketball has never been better in video games than it was in NBA Jam. Unless you count Acclaim’s run in the game around the millennium, which unfortunately makes up most of it, but when NBA Jam is NBA Jam, it’s the best. It’s just unfortunate we haven’t seen it since (holy crap) 2011.

It’s expensive (I assume) to license the names and likenesses of NBA players, so while RoboDunk lacks flesh, it has it where it counts: dunks. 

RoboDunk (PC, Switch, PS4, PS5 [reviewed], Xbox Series X|S)
Developer: Jollypunch Games
Publisher: Jollypunch Games
Release: September 25th, 2023 (PC, Switch), January 21st, 2025 (PS4, PS5 Xbox Series X|S)
MSRP: $14.99

RoboDunk lifts the brutality of NBA Jam’s 2v2 gameplay (technically built off of Arch Rivals) but puts its own twist on it. Most prominently, there is no shooting. I mean, some of the robots have firepower, but they won’t throw the ball unless it’s to pass. The only way to score is to dunk. To make up for the lack of three-pointers, you can charge your jump, and the higher the charge, the higher the jump, and the more points you gain. 

Like NBA Jam, violence has no repercussions, so you’re encouraged to throw elbows and shoulders to dislodge the ball from your opponent’s grasp. Alternatively, when you have the ball, you can also throw up a temporary shield around your robot that shocks anyone who tries to touch your ball. Each bot has its own special weapon that works on an ammo system. Some will drop turrets, others shoot lasers, and some just have a different type of tackle. You get money for doling out punishment, so there’s no reason to not make the competitors go home in tears.

RoboDunk’s central mode bills itself as a roguelite, which essentially means that you take on runs, progressing through harder and harder matches until you eventually fail and have to start over (though you can pay to start from a more advanced stage. With the money you earn from matches, you can buy more bots, upgrade them, or unlock new perks that appear randomly before matches.

The core gameplay is solid. It’s as brisk as its main influence, never really stopping gameplay as you push toward the enemy net and get pushed back in return. The charge-dunk system provides some good risk and reward, as charging up your jump leaves you exposed but allows you to pile on the points faster.

Each match in the roguelite mode has different modifiers, including what hazards hit the court, such as rolling spike logs and random meteors. They also run at different lengths and for a varying number of rounds, making it important to actually look at the setup before diving in and adapting to what’s in front of you. Taken entirely based on the core gameplay, RoboDunk is simple but entertaining.

The actual roguelite framework, however, I’m not all that hot on. It’s presented as a progression where you’re given a choice of three matches, each of which offers two semi-permanent perks and features different rulesets. While this works from the perspective of being a roguelite, it takes away from its feel as a sport. It feels like progression only in the literal sense, but it doesn’t feel like you’re accomplishing anything meaningful.

More importantly, however, the perks are over-crowded, and money comes so damned slowly. You get a payout depending on how high you score, how hard you hit, successful shielding, and your use of weapons, and then this is subtracted or increased by the difficulty of the match. On a good match, I’d see around 50 of the in-game currency. This can be boosted by choosing bots that you don’t use frequently. As the robots sit on the bench, they’ll gain a percentage boost, so you’ll get a higher payout. This is actually an interesting wrinkle since it means you won’t just stick to one robot and pour all your upgrades into it.

However, since you’re spending money on new perks, new robots, and upgrades for those robots, actually making meaningful progress feels extremely slow. What’s worse is that the difficulty modifier is extremely small, so it never feels like you’re getting adequately rewarded for winning harder matches. It really deadens the drive. There’s less compulsion to push harder and further since it feels like everything is at a constant rather than a curve.

There’s one complaint that I feel weird about, but I think I can explain it: robots have no place in basketballs. Hear me out. Part of what made NBA Jam’s more outlandish elements more effective is the fact that you were watching real NBA players dunk from great heights and hit the floor. It’s less effective with robots. I completely believe they’re capable of superhuman dunks because they’re not human. I have no idea whether or not getting shoved into the concrete would hurt these particular machines. Visual feedback was used to communicate impact, but because there’s no skin in the game, I always felt a disconnect in watching things unfold.

The robots themselves, and even the arenas, are supported by a surprising amount of background lore, which does a lot to flesh things out. There's a lot to do and discover, but it struggles to feel worthwhile. It never really feels grounded. Being able to connect is a key part to enjoying sports, not just in video games, but in reality.

Having another player join you really helps things since, rather than being a random assortment of machines, it’s you and your chum playing basketball. As multiplayer often does, it lessens the complications caused by the slow progression and adds more meaning to the matches. You can also strategize better with one player handing defense and the other going in for the dunk. Co-op also demonstrates how well all the mechanics work together.

And that’s kind of the bottom line: RoboDunk works quite well on a functional level. Its dunk-centric basketball is a quick, enjoyable snack. Its toy-like aesthetic and minimalistic stop-motion animation is effective. However, the framework just doesn’t support it quite right. Barring my (possible superficial) thoughts about robo-dunkers, the roguelite setup doesn’t provide a compelling experience. It’s a decent game to pick up and play, but it’s not the slam dunk it should be.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Robodunk appeared first on Destructoid.

The metroidvania genre is all over everything these days, especially in the indie sphere. A dime will get you a dozen. I get the appeal; it’s one of the best ways to tell a narrative in a 2D game. But when there are so many coming out at any time, which one do you choose? It’s easy to feel burned out on them.

So, I’ve been ignoring a lot of titles that boast the metroidvania label in their press releases. I’ve probably missed out on some good ones, but I just can’t look at another rectangle-dominated map screen. Okay, one more, I guess. Blade Chimera caught my attention because it’s created by Team Ladybug and WSS Playground, the folks behind Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth. Not my favorite game, no, but solid and dependable. Plus, it’s cyberpunk this time around, so that’s always a win in my book.

Blade Chimera (PC, Switch)
Developer: Team Ladybug, WSS Playground
Publisher: Playism, WSS Playground
Release: January 16th, 2025
MSRP: $19.99

The plot in Blade Chimera is strikingly boilerplate, but the setting is at least unique. It takes place in a near-future Osaka where demons run amok. 30 years previous, people started transforming into monsters of folklore and legend and caused a ruckus. During that time, The Holy Union, a pseudo-religious group, overthrew the government of Japan and took control in an effort to protect people from the demons.

Now, this is where it gets kind of trite. You play as Shin, a guy recently found cryogenically frozen, and because of his prolonged stasis, has no memory of his life before being frozen. However, he kicks ass, and quickly ascends the ranks of the Venatars, The Holy Union’s enforcers. However, he’s principled and frequently questions if indiscriminately mowing down demons is morally correct, especially after he meets one that can turn into a sword.

So, from the start, you can kind of guess where this all is going. I wish I could say that the characters and situations make up for its predictability, but that would only partially be accurate. There are some fun moments, but it’s clumsy at best.

That’s starting off on a bad note, but that’s the biggest problem out of the way, and it’s nothing huge. The game itself is butter. Like Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth, it’s tangibly Castlevania: Symphony of the Night-inspired. Forget the Metroid part; its entire framework is Symphony of the Night. Its protagonist even sports long white hair.

However, Shin is proficient in firearms. You wind up with three attack buttons, two being whatever you want them to be, and the last belonging to Lux, the aforementioned big sword. The game suggests that you use one button for ranged weapons and the other for melee, and that’s sound advice. Before Blade Chimera even verbalized it, that’s how I designated the buttons in my mind.

Lux is more than just a big sword; she’s also your source of magic attacks. You unlock these through an upgrade tree, and using them effectively can make all the difference in boss battles. As a sword, you can plant her in the wall or ceiling to hold a button or act as a platform. She also had the ability to exploit “time rifts” that were scattered around. These do an inconsistent variety of things. They’re often used for simple puzzles, but mainly, you find them as grappling hooks, bridges, or hidden pathways. It’s all simple, simple stuff, but it works as a way of mixing up things a bit.

Uniquely, Blade Chimera doesn’t really use traversal powers to gate off your exploration. It does to some extent, but mainly for secret areas. You unlock powers like double-jump and dash by leveling up, so it’s up to you how they’re prioritized. Instead, you’re mainly gated off using actual gates that you don’t have the keys for. However, the actual locked doors are rare enough that they don’t have the chance to really feel artificial.

It’s also very good at incentivizing exploration. This is largely through its 56 hidden jigsaw pieces. Throughout the world, you’ll bump into doors that can only be opened if you have enough of the pieces. If you go to the effort of rooting them out, you’ll find some of the best weapons and items behind them. It strikes me as being the bluntest way of hiding such goodies, but it’s strangely satisfying.

It’s maybe the art style that does such a good job of covering such artificialities. I hadn’t paid much attention to the marketing, and the Blade Chimera doesn’t overtly talk about it until later, but just based on the enemies and environments, I could tell it was future Osaka. Considering that, like most metroidvania games, you’re exploring an abstract 2D world, it says a lot that a cities culture can be communicated so clearly, even to someone who has only visited the place once.

But the pixelated sprites are where it truly shines. There’s an incredible amount of detail in every frame of animation, breaking away from its Symphony of the Night inspiration. The same variety of huge bosses that were so prominent in Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth make an unmistakable appearance here and are just as thrilling. But more importantly, to a geek like me, Ladybug doesn’t commit any pixel-art faux pas. There isn’t a mixel to be seen, and everything seems to move on integers, which keeps things looking authentic. It also speaks to the underlying passion when an artist goes the whole mile to present a specific aesthetic, and it’s so well executed here.

To stretch the gameplay out a bit, there are side missions you can take, but it’s here that you find another soft spot in Blade Chimera. I initially went about trying to complete every side mission, but I found they come in two flavors: Interesting story asides and onerous grinding. The vast majority belong to the latter category. It will task you with eliminating demons within certain criteria, such as in a specific area or ones that are a specific color. What this often boils down to is finding a point in the map where these demons exist, then exiting the screen and re-entering to respawn the enemies and taking them out until you reach the goal. Ideally, you take on these tasks alongside your main objective, but these only lined up for me in a few instances.

The other side quests are more worthwhile. They usually involve helping citizens out by seeking out items or investigating crimes. More importantly, they feature moments of character development. The most interesting is perhaps between Shin and a particular rival. You can generally identify the side-story missions because they have a much higher payout than their grind-centric counterparts. I feel like the busywork could have been completely excised without compromising anything since I ended the game with far too much money, and I felt the runtime was appropriate for the genre.

Blade Chimera is exactly as I expected: solid and dependable. It’s not the most remarkable game I’ve played in the genre, nor is it very inventive. Despite its cyberpunk leanings, it perhaps leans a bit too hard on its Symphony of the Night aspirations, which hamstrings its attempts to find its own identity. Not to mention that its narrative is so predictable, the only thing that kept me guessing was whether or not it was trying to be subversive or if it was actually that obvious.

However, it’s done with a lot of skill and a tangible amount of passion. If it’s something of a clone of Symphony of the Night, it’s less plagiarism and more “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. It makes itself worthwhile with solid design and enjoyable combat. It hides a lot of its flaws beneath a communicative art style that captures its setting and its characters so well. It’s maybe not what I’ll reach for first the next time I’m in the mood for a metroidvania, but it’s a symphony in its own right.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Blade Chimera appeared first on Destructoid.

Originally released as a Nintendo Wii exclusive in 2009—and only in Japan—Tales of Graces was eventually remastered and brought to the Western audience on the PlayStation 3 in the form of Tales of Graces f in 2012. Now, almost 13 years later, the JRPG has been remastered once again and made available on pretty much every modern platform with Tales of Graces f Remastered.

Nowadays remastered can mean a lot of things when it comes to games, anywhere from basic ports to a more modern system to a complete remake like Final Fantasy 7 Remake. In the case of Tales of Graces f Remastered, it means updated graphics to look better on modern displays, alongside a plethora of quality-of-life additions ranging from small to huge.

Most of the additions simply make this over two-decade old JRPG more accessible and fun to play, while keeping most of the experience authentic and true to the original. Which, I'm not afraid to admit, is one of my favorites in the 'Tales of' franchise.

Tales of Graces f Remastered (PC, PS5[reviewed], PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch)
Developer: TOSE Co. LTD
Publisher: Bandai Namco
Released: January 16, 2025
MSRP: $39.99

Yup, you heard that right. If I had to pick an absolute favorite, it would probably be the most recently released Tales of Arise. But before then, I'd put Tales of Graces f up there alongside Tales of the Abyss as my favorite, mostly because of its fun high-speed battle system that was a standout in the series. Thankfully, developer TOSE Co. LTD has left the battle system fully intact from the original.

The story of Tales of Graces f Remastered takes place in the fantastical world of Ephinea, a world divided into three different countries: Windor, Strahta, and Fendel. At the start of the game, the main protagonist, Asbel, and his younger brother Hubert find a peculiar purple-haired girl named Sophie near their town. Sophie is suffering from amnesia and has no idea who she is or why she is there. Asbel and Hubert take Sophie back to their village, only to encounter Prince Richard, the future king of one of the other three kingdoms. The four become friends before an unexpected tragedy results in the group all going their separate ways.

From here, Tales of Graces f Remastered jumps forward seven years to a time when the three kingdoms that were all previously at peace are now under the threat of war due to a series of events that transpired over that period of time, resulting in the childhood friends reuniting during rather trying times as the three kingdoms are under the threat of an all-out war.

Like most JRPGs, the story of Tales of Graces f Remastered is an important part of the game. I think the reason I enjoy the story of Graces so much is due to the constant tension brought on by the element of political intrigue, something often absent in JRPGs and, more specifically, in the 'Tales of' series. It's not without its faults—it certainly suffers from some of the usual JRPG cliches, especially with its characters—but the constant twisting and turning of the story due to backstabbing and politicking sets it apart from other entries in the series.

While I enjoy the story, it's important to highlight that I very much recommend you play through the optional 'Lineage and Legacies' after completing the main story. It was originally a DLC that actually serves as the ending to Tales of Graces, resolving a lot of ongoing subplots and overall puts a nice finishing touch on the main story as well. The Lineage and Legacies DLC, as well as all the other DLC that was released for Tales of Graces f other than a few pieces of license-restricted cosmetics, are included in the remastered version.

Tales of Graces f Remastered utilizes an action combat system where running into enemies on the world map will send you into a real-time battle against the enemy. You can run around the battle map as well as block or dodge attacks, all while attacking your foes with a variety of attacks, including A Artes (physical special attacks) and B Artes (magical special attacks. Using a system called Chain Capacity (often referred to as CC), you can combo Artes together to deal massive damage. As you progress through Tales of Graces f Remastered, accomplishing various achievements will unlock Titles for each of your characters that also grant new Artes.

I remember trying to get the platinum trophy for Tales of Graces f which required you to get 100 Titles for each of the playable characters. This was a huge time sink, as many titles simply required you to grind them out mindlessly. With Tales of Graces f Remastered, you get full access to the Grade Shop, a special shop that allows you to enable and disable certain systematic changes to the game on the fly, such as Double Item Drop chances, increased experience and currency gains, and more. Believe me when I say some of these will really cut down on the grind, especially if you're looking to get all the Titles. In the original, you could only access the Grade Shop after completing the game. For those who have played previously and are looking to have a less grindy experience, this is a very welcome quality-of-life addition. And for those who don't want it, you can simply choose not to enable any of the buffs from the Grade Shop.

Alongside the Grade Shop, here are some of the other quality-of-life additions in Tales of Graces f Remastered. On the overworld map, you can toggle your run button into a dash button to more quickly traverse the world. You can also toggle enemy encounters on or off via a simple setting in the options menu, so if you want to avoid battles and just progress the story for a bit, you can do so. All cutscenes and dialogue skits are skippable (thank god) and destination icons for your next main story quest destination have been added when on the overworld map.

At the end of the day, Tales of Graces f Remastered is everything a remaster should be: graphical upgrades that make an old game look better on modern platforms, a trove of quality-of-life additions that make the game better while staying true to the original version, and inclusion of all the DLC for the complete package. It's really solid value, especially for those who have yet to play Tales of Graces in either of its previous two forms, since this is essentially the ultimate version. Now I just hope Tales of Xillia 1 and 2 or maybe even Tales of the Abyss are next!

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Tales of Graces f Remastered appeared first on Destructoid.

After a hands-on preview of the first three chapters of Dynasty Warriors: Origins back in November 2024, Origins became one of my most anticipated releases of 2025. The first three chapters got me hooked, and I not only wanted more of the fast and simply fun-to-play combat I'd come to expect from the franchise, but I was genuinely looking forward to continuing the story.

Admittedly, this is not quite something I had expected going into a Dynasty Warriors game, especially once again telling the tale of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms, a tale the series has already told man,y many times. But I found the angle of placing the story and its direction more in the player's hands an exciting and enjoyable way to push the hack-and-slash series forward in terms of storytelling.

Thankfully, developer Omega Force doesn't let its foot off the pedal after the first three chapters, and in fact, things only get bigger and better as Dynasty Warriors: Origins progresses, both in terms of battle size—arguably the franchise's staple feature—and absolute scale.

Dynasty Warriors: Origins (PC, PS5[reviewed], Xbox Series X|S)
Developer: Omega Force
Publisher: Koei Tecmo
Released: January 17, 2025
MSRP: $69.99

Dynasty Warriors: Origins kicks off at the beginning of the Yellow Turban Rebellion, a period of peasant revolt and uprising in Chinese history that is essentially the progenitor of the fabled Three Kingdoms period. Players take on the role of The Wanderer, a formidable warrior experiencing amnesia at the time the events of the game kick off. Now, typically, I'd argue that an amnesiac main character is a bit bromidic in nature, but it fits what Omega Force is doing with the essential reboot of the franchise with Origins.

Even though the Romance of the Three Kingdoms saga has been told time and time again in this franchise, using an actual single player character rather than having you play as various historical leaders and soldiers from the period opens up unique narrative points for Omega Force. Throughout the game, you'll make friends and enemies with characters from each dynasty and are often given the choice of who to side with and join on the battlefield. It's a much-welcomed and pleasant surprise to play a Dynasty Warriors game where you get to make some choices that actually feel like they matter and have some weight behind them.

As someone who's always appreciated the historical period in which the series takes place, this is the first time I've felt an actual bond with the characters rather than just assigning a "good guy/bad guy" label based on whether they were an ally or foe on the battlefield. Speaking of bonds, there's an actual Bond System at play that allows you to grow your relationship with various lords and officers from the Three Kingdoms era, unlocking unique story events with them as well as unique rewards. Maxing out a bond with a character leads to a special cutscene highlighting the bond between you and that character.

While I do think the unique player-created character being the MC was the right move, it did, unfortunately, affect the overall connection I had to the main character in a negative way. Throughout most of the campaign, your character is rather reserved and unemotional, mostly due to the fact that he doesn't even remember exactly who he is which is. As you progress through the story, your memories return, but in the end, I found myself more interested in the connections I made with the various other major characters rather than my own character.

There are ten weapon types throughout Dynasty Warriors: Origins, most of which unlock as you play through the campaign, with the Halberd unlocking after completing the campaign. The weapon type you use dictates your playstyle, Battle Arts (essentially skills in battle), as well as the combos and attacks of both your Heavy and Light attacks. Each time you use a weapon of a specific type, you'll build up your proficiency with it, unlocking new attacks and combos with them. It also progresses your overall Rank, increasing your character's Health, Attack, and Defense, meaning changing it up and trying out new weapon types can still build your character strength even if you end up not sticking with it.

I found myself drawn to the Twin Pikes weapon type, massive axe-like weapons that your character wields in each hand. I felt like a full-on berserker, cleaving through hordes of enemies with ease while occasionally jumping into the air to leap slam down on my opponents with the Twin Pikes. They deal a ton of damage—in my limited testing, possibly the most overall outside of the late-game unlocked Cresent Blade and the post-game unlocked Halberd—and come with a ton of AoE attacks to really mow through battles.

Each weapon type also has some unique cadences that you can learn and execute to give you even more of an edge for dedicating the time to learning the weapon. For example, with the Twin Pikes if you hold Guard and then initiate a Heavy Attack and continue to spam the Heavy Attack button, you'll spin around whirlwind style—like I said, a berserker—continuously. If you manage to time your final Heavy Attack press right as the attack lands, the final attack is empowered, dealing more damage and resulting in a cool enhanced attack animation.

Thinking back on my childhood experiences with the Dynasty Warrior franchise, it's easy to remember what made them stand out so much: the massive battles. With Origins, Omega Force redefines massive battles, with some maps hosting up to 10,000 soldiers on the screen at a time. As you progress through the campaign, the battles not only get bigger but more intense as well. Along the way your army will grow as well, giving you access to new Tactics that will allow you to issue commands to nearby soldiers in your army. The Tactics you can use range from issuing a charge to cut off an advancing army or launching a targeted arrow strike to thin out numbers.

This added gameplay element felt like a refined version of the system in Bladestorm, another series by Omega Force and Koei Tecmo that features massive battles, and it's a welcome addition. There are also times when the Tactics you issue are incorporated with major development points in the historical story of the battles you are fighting in, resulting in sweeping changes to the battle and even the battlefield. The ability to so fantastically interweave the storytelling into warfare is impressive and a big step forward for the narrative approach of the series that until now has been rather lacking. And, it's all done without holding back the core strength of the franchise: its fast-paced hack-and-slash combat. If anything, it amplifies it.

Completing the Dynasty Warriors: Origins campaign unlocks a New Game Plus mode that allows you to continue building your character from where you ended the campaign while going back and exploring the various choice points throughout the game and giving you the opportunity to see how things differ based on your choice. You can change which faction you join, to see how the entire story would have unfolded had you joined that faction instead, all while continuing to level and power up the same character. In this sense, the NG+ mode feels more like the classic replayable grind of the series and one that I actually look forward to doing, which hasn't been the case since Samurai Warriors 4 for me.

Everything that makes Dynasty Warriors great has been built on and amplified in Dynasty Warriors: Origins. The fast-paced combat is more fluid and satisfying than ever, and I think the decision to allow players to build up their own character is the right move for the franchise moving forward. I wasn't sure how Omega Force could take a series coming up on three decades old and make it appealing to newcomers while appeasing long-time fans, but they found a way. For me, this is the best Dynasty Warriors yet, and I'm excited to see what's next.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Dynasty Warriors: Origins appeared first on Destructoid.

It was difficult to be a Nintendo fan during the Wii years. The initial hype around its motion controls died pretty quickly when it became clear its real-world application was extremely limited. Worse, Nintendo seemed to be looking to gain favor with a broader audience and it seemed that its output suffered.

What sucked most was that it felt like motion control was being shoehorned into everything. Mostly because they were. I think 2010’s Donkey Kong Country Returns is exemplary of this. Retro Studios did an admirable job continuing Rare’s legacy, but the absolutely baffling decision was made to incorporate controller shaking. In particular, you had to shake the controller to get DK to roll. Rolls were necessary as a form of attack, but more importantly, rolling was used to extend jumps. Precise jumps, specifically. Jumps that you would see in the hardest levels. And it didn’t matter how simple the motion was, it was unreliable.

There was no reason for it, it could have easily been bound to the same button as “pick up/grab,” you know, just like it was in earlier games. You couldn’t turn it off. The mere fact that it had to be this was frustrates me to even talk about, but actually playing the most difficult levels with this hamstringer drove me insane.

So, anyway, Donkey Kong Country Returns HD doesn’t use motion controls and is better for it.

Donkey Kong Country Returns HD (Switch)
Developer: Retro Studios, Forever Entertainment
Publisher: Nintendo
Released: January 16, 2025
MSRP: $59.99

Technically, you could play Donkey Kong Country Returns without motion control on the 3DS already with Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D, but I feel like this sort of game needs a bigger screen.

The original Donkey Kong Country series was a heavy-hitter on the SNES, practically putting Rare on the map. If someone tells you that those games were only loved for their graphics and had standard gameplay, they were clearly in a Genesis household. Rare may have fronted with the lavish 3D-to-2D sprites, but the level design was top-notch. Sometimes maddeningly so. Loads of variety across its worlds.

After Nintendo and Rare had split, it seemed unlikely the series would continue in any form, so it was a surprise to see it again in 2010, and even more surprising to find out that it’s every bit as good as the original trilogy (motion control frustration aside). Honestly, while I prefer the vibes of the SNES titles better, the levels in Donkey Kong Country Returns reach offensive levels of creativity. From riding rockets to avoiding giant rhythmic hammers, it’s a master class at setpieces. It provides a stiff but fair challenge across its eight (main) worlds, and constantly finds new ways to surprise.

One of the first things that greets you when you start up a new game is a difficulty setting. There are two, and they’re hilariously named “Modern” and “Classic,” which made me wonder what year this is. “Modern” is easier because I guess COVID caused our thumbs to atrophy and our patience to thin. You have three hearts by default, and Cranky’s shop carries more items.

Beyond the fact that something from 2010 is considered no longer modern, I find it amusing that there’s an easier difficulty because Donkey Kong Country Returns already has difficulty options. It caused a bit of discourse at the time, even before the Dark Souls Easy Mode debate. There’s the Super Guide that plays the level for you if you screw up a few too many times, something that became insulting after the motion controls let me down during difficult segments. There are also potions that make you invincible for a while. But, yeah, extra difficulty options never hurt. I just wish they didn’t also make me feel old and worried for the new generations at the same time.

The story of Donkey Kong Country Returns is somewhat divorced from the original series, which was an escalating fight against an insane lizard. Donkey Kong’s banana horde is stolen again (as Cranky Kong points out, “So, who hasn’t stolen your bananas at this point?”), but this time, it’s by a strange army of tiki idols that can hypnotize the wildlife. Thankfully, DK’s advanced primate brain is immune to hypnosis, so he sets out to reacquire his bananas, assumedly before they turn brown.

Much of Donkey Kong Country Returns feels like a re-tread of the first game. You have all the barrel blasting and mine carting that made that title stand out. Moreover, the heaps of tantalizing secret items that are dangled just out of reach make a return. While it’s a linear platformer, Retro Studios followed Rare’s example of sticking extra challenges and hidden nooks to find as you race to the goal. More importantly, you’re rewarded for searching things out, with additional levels awarded, mainly for collecting all the KONG letters.

The view is zoomed out a lot farther, and climbable surfaces have been added, which allows levels to have a lot more verticality to them. This also means that minecart sections require fewer split-second reactions. Personally, I never had a problem with the minecarts in the SNES game, but I know some hate those levels, so maybe this is less vexing? If it’s not, you’re going to hate the rockets.

Alongside the minecart segments, there are levels where you ride a rocket barrel through a forced scrolling section. These require you to press the jump button to pull up and raise your altitude, so it requires a bit more awareness than, say, a scrolling shoot-’em-up. It requires a feel for the responsiveness of the rocket, and there are some really narrow parts that might end up frustrating. I loved the rocket segments each and every time; they may be my favorite part of the whole experience. There’s something to be said about the simplicity, but Retro Studios was still able to put in some incredibly thrilling segments around your rocket-propelled journey.

The bosses are a bit more of a mixed bag. Each one is heavily pattern-based, and there’s a lot of variety between them. Unfortunately, that same variety means that some are better than others. I had difficulty even figuring out what I had to do on some of them. Adding to that, the collision detection in Donkey Kong Country Returns is questionable a lot of the time, and this seems to manifest most when it comes to bosses. I’d find myself taking damage when I was clear of danger to the point where I captured a video of one moment, then viewed it and confirmed that the two models didn’t intersect. What the hell? I’m not sure if the shaky collision was this way in the original version. It’s only a minor annoyance overall; it just seems like an out-of-place loose thread in an otherwise tight and polished game.

The graphical glowup in Donkey Kong Country Returns is pretty understated. It’s mostly what it says on the tin: a higher-resolution version of the original. Donkey Kong has some added fuzz, but it’s clearly set before Tropical Freeze since he hasn’t yet discovered the amazing conditioner that gave him his incredible coat in that game.

The best comparison I can give is to say it’s like Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD. Nothing has really changed art-wise. The lighting is better, but it’s far from astounding. The textures are sharper, but they haven’t really changed. Backgrounds are largely untouched. It’s not the same magnitude of upgrade that Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door got, it’s largely just Donkey Kong Country Returns with more pixels.

It was nice to revisit the game. I find that with platformers, unless they’re extremely unconventional, they kind of get sectioned away in my brain. Even when they’re particularly well-executed, as is the case with Donkey Kong Country Returns. But actually sitting down and playing them, I find I can still appreciate them.

And while Donkey Kong Country Returns HD doesn’t revolutionize the game, it still manages to become the definitive version of the title. If you haven’t played it before, you owe it to yourself to try it out. Retro Studios outdid themselves. They took what came before and expertly expanded and improved on it. It’s an astounding display of creative level design that is near unmatched in sidescrollers. And now you can play it without having to shake your controller.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Donkey Kong Country Returns HD appeared first on Destructoid.

Oh, I’ve been waiting for this. My Summer Car has been in Early Access since 2016, and I’ve eagerly awaited the chance to review it for real. It’s finally here, which means there’s no escape. It’s time to pull this bad boy apart.

But I want to be upfront: My Summer Car is wildly unconventional. It has an almost incomparable design philosophy, completely shirking the evolution of games that came before it. As a result, it’s clearly for a specific type of person, but I can’t tell you what that type of person is, nor can I tell with any certainty if you would fit in that category. At best, I hope I can get you curious enough to try it. At worst, you won’t get what I’m talking about.

My Summer Car (PC)
Developer: Amistech
Publisher: Amistech
Released: January 8, 2025
MSRP: $14.99

My Summer Car transports you to rural Finland circa 1995. You’re dropped into the shoes of a young adult left unsupervised for the summer. You’ve got a moped, a front-end loader, and a car that has been busted down to its individual components. The obvious focus is getting that car put together, but the end goal? Ehhh.

There is technically a way to roll the credits without dying, but doing so relies on arcane knowledge. Personally, I’d say the end goal of My Summer Car is whatever you make of it. There are a lot of things that you can do, and some of them result in rewards. There are also a lot of ways you can fuck up, and many of them result in death.

Yeah, death. Rural Finland is a dangerous place and My Summer Car loves to see you suffer. It prominently features a permadeath. This can be turned off, but that comes with its own inconveniences. Alternatively, if you’re savvy, you can create backups of your saves so you can resume later in case of catastrophe.

It’s down to preference as to whether you’ll accept permanent death. I always leave it on because it adds much weight to how you interact with the world. You will buckle your seatbelt and drive more safely if you know that slipping off the narrow roads can undo your progress. However, it’s a cruel game. If any of your mortal stats completely deplete (hunger and thirst, for instance), you can drop dead. There’s a chance you’ll be killed if you pick up the telephone during a thunderstorm (I looked it up, and apparently, that can happen in reality). I once died because I didn’t flip the master breaker before changing a fuse.

Oh, apparently, you can die if you piss on the TV. I don’t know why you’d try that. I guess if you felt the need to just hose down the living room so your parents know you now own the place. I’m not sure why someone would go to the effort of designing and programming that particular way to die, but that demonstrates the developer’s bizarre priorities. One of the new threats is that if you leave the door to your house open, a wasp can get inside. The player character is allergic to wasp stings.

Even if you have death turned off, My Summer Car has many ways to punish you. If you leave the stove on when you leave the house, there is a chance your house will burn down. That's it. No more house. Technically, you can still survive homeless, but I’m sure you can understand why this would be inconvenient. You can also be thrown in jail if you try to evade police or murder someone (either accidentally or intentionally). Otherwise, there’s always the risk of getting in an accident and totaling your car. The worst part of that scenario is the long, long, very long walk of shame you have to perform back to your home.

Wrecking your car isn’t necessarily the end of your Finland adventure. You can drag it to the local mechanic, Fleetari, to repair. As far as I know, you can’t permanently destroy anything, but it’s hard to tell with this game. Fixes require money, however, and economics are difficult. There are a lot of odd jobs you can do, including chopping and delivering firewood, picking strawberries, sucking septic tanks, and selling homemade alcohol. However, they aren’t always available and some of them have roadblocks of their own, such as having to pay for the septic truck’s gas.

If My Summer Car has anything like what you’d describe as a gameplay loop, it would be work, get money, spend money on car maintenance. But that kind of breaks down when you realize that building the car is mainly for its own sake.

Johannes Rojola has the design sensibilities of a seagull full of cocaine. Efficiency is a foreign concept, and almost nothing added since the start of Early Access has been to the benefit of the player. My Summer Car is a nest of side activities, sub-plots (as if there’s a main plot), and cruelty. He goes into minute detail about some of the strangest things. This might be the most complicated simulation of a sauna that humanity will ever create. I’m not sure who else would think to allow you to piss on the stones.

The whole car construction thing is a real work of effort, though. Each piece is affected by physics, so you’re literally picking things up, moving them to where they need to go, snapping them together, then bolting them on. Like almost everything in this game, it’s temperamental. It’s not the most efficient or intuitive way to do this, either. It works, the depth of it is incredibly satisfying, and you would probably never see this in a big-budget production.

One of the strangest quirks of its design is how much it allows you to clip through objects, and it’s stranger still that you’re practically required to do it to find all the bolts on the car. Many games go to great lengths to keep things corporeal and avoid letting the player phase through the geometry. My Summer Car just says, “fuck it,” and makes it a feature. If something important falls through the floor, you can find it at the landfill.

But, as weird as the design can get, it’s all in the service of some steadfast commitment to realism. While a lot of death in the game can seem unfair, everything fatal is rooted in reality. Yeah, maybe you don’t expect to die just because you’re chopping wood while filled with more alcohol than a brewery, but common sense would tell you it’s a bad idea.

It’s also realistic in the sense that rural life is boring. There’s nowhere to go, there’s nothing on TV, there’s nothing to do. Work is sometimes slow to come in, and much of it requires you to plan your day around it. It isn’t efficient to go and suck out one person’s septic tank; it’s better to wait until all your customers require the service and then do a circuit. You can fill the trailer full of firewood all you want, but the guy who buys it will only request it once a week. The dance pavilion is only active on one day of the week, repairs and orders take time to finish, and the drunk who needs a ride home only calls sporadically.

Also, make sure you pay your phone bill. I was wondering why no one was calling with jobs, then realized that the phone company had cut me off.

If anything, the real challenge of My Summer Car is finding ways to fill your time. Frankly, part of my over 200 hours of playtime was spent idling in the game world while reading something at my desk. If you ask me, it’s boredom by design. It really lets you feel the ennui and makes the simple feeling of getting in the car with somewhere to go feel impactful. Every accomplishment is magnified. Weird, weird stuff.

If there’s one place I’m less enthusiastic about, it’s that absolutely nothing in My Summer Car is explained. In 2016, I figured out how to put a car together by rubbing stuff together and finding out how it fit. But that only gets you so far. It won’t help you tune the engine or tell you what to do when you blow a cylinder. There’s also nothing in the game that tells you that you shouldn’t piss on the TV or that you can cook sausages on the stove by placing them directly on the burner.

This means you must rely on outside information, such as the My Summer Car Wiki. In a way, this makes up for the fact that you can’t just converse with the folks around you to learn things. In reality, you might be able to bring up in conversation that you can only stay awake if you drink a cup of coffee every five minutes and be told that you have caffeine addiction. You might mention to the store clerk that you want to piss on the television, and they’ll say, “I wouldn’t do that, friend. That’s how my uncle died.” That’s kind of outside the boundaries of what’s feasible in game design.

Especially since everyone speaks Finnish in Finland. As you’d expect, a lot of this is subtitled, but not all of it. The stuff that is subtitled might be subtitled poorly. There are talk radio programs, and I can’t help but wish I knew what they were saying. It does lend to feeling like you’re living in a country that doesn’t speak your native language. Although, since your character is canonically Finnish, the exchange student excuse doesn’t make much sense. On the plus side, I now know how to swear in Finnish.

Though, really, if there’s one thing I absolutely hate, it’s the constant degradation of your Satsuma’s individual engine parts. I’m not just talking about the oil and brake fluid, but the alternator and pistons. You can’t just buy new replacement parts, only Fleetari, the mechanic in the area, can fix them. It’s expensive. You have to pull the entire engine out of your car and hand it to the mechanic; he won’t just do it himself at his, y’know, garage. It also takes a little while for him to finish. That would be bad enough, but they degrade so quickly.

It can feel like you’re driving a machine made of gossamer. Even if you don’t bump it around or drive it hard, it’s going to need to see the car doctor way sooner than you’d want. You can drive the van instead, which doesn’t degrade or break down, but it feels weird playing a car-building game and having to take it to a different person to repair behind the scenes every couple of weeks.

There’s a popular supplement for the game, MSCedit, which lets you open your save file and modify it. Cheating, essentially. Well, cheating overtly. However, there’s a point at which the game’s obstacles start to get in the way of your enjoyment, and for me, it’s having to worry about whether or not a piston is on the verge of blowing because I drove Grandma to church one too many times. It’s a step too far and probably should have stopped with replacing fan belts, spark plugs, and gaskets. I get that it's part of the game's intentional design – the Satsuma is supposed to be a piece of crap – but I hate it.

As I said, the endpoint of My Summer Car is extremely nebulous. I’m not sure how you’d really reach it without knowing the criteria in advance because it gets pretty specific. Yet, despite this, there are pretty lofty goals to achieve along the way. Getting your Satsuma certified as road-worthy is one. Winning the rally or drag races would be another. Helping the drunk guy move into a new home is a big event. You only get there by simply existing and surviving in the harsh environments of Finland.

There are plenty of lackadaisical simulators out there that revel in their own awkwardness. I’ve stared into the dead eyes of enough Unreal Engine assets to last a lifetime. But My Summer Car is not that. For all its ugliness, its rough edges, and the way it shirks conventional design, it’s a completely earnest product.

Rojola has said that he is “developing dream games for [his] own enjoyment.” Whether or not it’s your dream game is another matter. For me, it very much is. It’s one that I’ve returned to frequently since its Early Access life for another taste of its brutal depiction of Finnish rural life. The friction it creates with its harsh punishment provides meaning to those peaceful moments as you drive along its winding dirt roads. It might strike some as boring, too cryptic, or too unwelcoming, but regardless of whether or not it’s your kind of ride, it's exactly what it intends to be. There is no experience quite like My Summer Car.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game purchased by the reviewer.]}

The post Review: My Summer Car appeared first on Destructoid.

I have fond memories of the original release of Freedom Wars back in 2014 on the PlayStation Vita, as it felt like one of the more unique exclusives on the platform. Fast forward to today, over a decade later, and developer Dimps and publisher Bandai Namco have brought the action RPG to the modern console and PC market in the form of Freedom Wars Remastered.

When it comes to giving a title the remastered treatment, Freedom Wars may just be the ideal candidate. Even though over 700,000 copies of the original were sold, being exclusive to a handheld console still meant many never gave it a try, even if it seemed right up their alley. It's a game that even in over a decade ago I felt it could potentially feel and play even better on a console, so it's great to finally have that opportunity.

Freedom Wars Remastered (PC, PS5 [reviewed], PS4, Switch)
Developer: Dimps
Publisher: Bandai Namco
Released: January 10, 2025
MSRP: $39.99

If you didn't have the privilege of playing the original back in 2014, Freedom Wars Remastered takes place in a dystopian post-apocalyptic future where all of humanity exists inside enormous underground prison facilities called Pantopicons. At birth, every human is sentenced to one million years of imprisonment simply for existing in a time where resources are scarce, and the surface of the planet is inhabitable. By completing missions for your Panopticon—typically going out and slaying giant monsters called Abductors Monster Hunter-style—you'll reduce your lengthy sentence and earn rewards for doing so to incentivize you to keep chipping away at it.

Of course, you can easily add to your sentence, as well. Stand around too long while you should be actively completing your mission? Here's an extra decade to your sentence. Have the audacity to waste your Panopticon's time by failing a mission? Here's a few thousand years. Your sentence is mostly just dressing to the events going on in Freedom Wars Remastered, but I have to admit the gameplay loop feels even better when you see the fruits of your labor result in that sentence going down.

I found the story of Freedom Wars Remastered to be quite intriguing a decade ago, and it probably holds up even better today than it did then. In 2014, it seemed a bit too farfetched, but as we head into 2025 many aspects of the grim reality of the title's setting seem to hit home just a bit harder this time around; themes of government surveillance, a punishing social credit system, and the value of human life and freedom being reduced to a mere number are just some that echoed with me more.

The gameplay loop of Freedom Wars Remastered is simply yet enticing enough. Choose a mission from your Panopticon, then head to a preset map to complete said mission with some simplistic but fluid action RPG combat. You have both ranged and melee weapons—which of course, being a Monster Hunter-like game, you'll upgrade using parts you knock off the monsters you defeat—but can also jump around and also even quickly traverse the battlefield through the use of an item called a Thorn.

All Sinners (the name for those serving a sentence to their Panopticon, so pretty much everyone) has a Thorn which is essentially a lasso mixed with a grappling hook. It allows you to try and bring down certain enemies but, more commonly, is used to quickly sling around the area. There are even some rather unique aerial attacks you can pull off by using your Thorn appropriately, which is both fun and rewarding as they often allow you to target otherwise hard-to-reach parts on the Abductors.

Freedom Wars Remastered is also a fully functional multiplayer game in more ways than one. Most importantly, you can team up with or even do battle against up to seven other players at once, either working together with a team of four to take on Abductors, or in a PvPvE style setting against another team of four.

Another cool multiplayer element is that when you start the game, you choose from one of many locations as the Panopticon you represent. At the moment, it looks like only Japan's 47 prefectures are available, but I know in the original Freedom Wars there were also some generalized Panopticons for various countries, which may be the case when full release hits. Your sentence serves as your "score" and is compared against other players, both globally and in your Panopticon, in the form of a leaderboard. It's a cool feature that also ties in well with the societal narratives of the story, which is fun.

Overall the combat of Freedom Wars Remastered is fast-paced and fluid like you'd expect from a game taking inspiration from Monster Hunter, but it's a bit more simplistic than MH. But it still manages to stay fun and rewarding feeling throughout the entire story and campaign.

The main upgrade of the remastered version is the visual enhancements, allowing for up to 4K resolution and 60 FPS on PlayStation and PC, as well as upgraded textures. The improvements are definitely noticable—remember, this was a Vita game originally, after all—but don't expect anything revolutionary. The upgraded textures make things look more modern and overall crisp, but some graphical elements such as facial animations and various animations during cutscenes don't seem to have received the same amount of love and still show signs of a past generation (or two).

My main complaints after my roughly 30-hour adventure through Freedom Wars Remastered echo the same complaints I had over a decade ago when I played the original on Vita. The story is intriguing and mysterious enough to have kept me hooked, but the end result is extremely disappointing. It's about as much of a cliffhanger as it gets, and certainly sets things up for a sequel that never happened. Hopefully, the remastered treatment is a hint that a sequel is finally coming, one I'd certainly welcome with open arms.

Crafting and upgrade weapons have received a bit of a rework in Freedom Wars Remastered, but some of the bigger flaws like very few actual worthwhile stats worth pursuing on your gear and a rather lackluster pool of end-game options still exist for those that look to continue their play after the credits have rolled.

Despite the issues, though, Freedom Wars Remastered is a fun time, especially for anyone looking to sink their teeth into an action RPG with the loop of slaying big monsters for parts to upgrade their gear. The story is intriguing and engaging, and overall worthwhile to experience even with the cliffhanger ending. The combat is engaging and fun, and sure to scratch that Monster Hunter itch. Even over a decade later, Freedom Wars Remastered is an extremely satisfying endeavor with the constant reward of seeing your million-year sentence drop lower and lower as you progress, a feeling that's been a bit absent in this 10-year window since the original.

The post Review: Freedom Wars Remastered appeared first on Destructoid.

2024 was another huge year for games, with enough to keep everyone occupied for the foreseeable future. Despite constant decision paralysis, though, the eight hours I spent with the deranged, demolition-happy Dynamite Anton and his coworker Annie in Antonblast were the most unabashed fun I had playing games all year.

Ever since Summitsphere's buckwild platformer was first announced, I have been preparing myself to play the spiritual successor to some lost Wario Game Boy Advance game. I wasn't, however, prepared to play a Sega Genesis game. That's exactly what this is; it has a very specific, and I say this with love, funk to it that you only get from the library of Genesis or Sega CD. Perhaps, in some alternate universe, Antonblast dropped in the mid-90s on both Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo, the latter version playing a bit more brightly with some rigid edges. Mayb e with fewer belches, screams, and profanity-laden proclamations.

Our gruff title character is on a side-scrolling mission to get his coveted spirits back from Satan, who wants Anton for himself so he can become the reddest person in the world. Anton and Annie — both playable from the start — set out to stop Satan with some assistance from a beleaguered casino owner named Brulo. To do so, they'll need to blast through 12 stages, seeking out Anton's spirits, setting Brulo's detonators, and getting the hell out of there before the whole damn level explodes. 

Antonblast (PC [Reviewed], Nintendo Switch)
Developer: Summitsphere
Publisher: Summitsphere
Released: December 3, 2024
MSRP: $19.99

Despite the distinct aesthetic, Antonblast wears its Wario inspirations loud and proud. Hopping on specific pads lets him leap in and out of the foreground with ease. Anton can charge in a similar manner, too, paving the way for momentum-based platforming that comes in especially handy at the end of each stage. Once Anton sets off the detonator, IT'S HAPPY HOUR, and he has a few short (but relatively generous) minutes to go back from whence he came in the most explosive way possible. These escapes are often the most challenging and thrilling sections. While Antonblast is generous with checkpoints throughout the main stages, you'll still probably find yourself attempting some of these move-it-or-lose-it escapes multiple times before succeeding. 

Everything cribbed from the Wario Land series is amped up by an order of magnitude. And for the record, there's always room for more like it. Bricks, dumpsters, and discarded bathtubs burst and shatter as Anton plows through them, the screen screeching to a split-second halt each time to heighten the impact. Enemies standing in your way go flying off the screen with a cartoonish whizz, one of dozens of Saturday Morning sound effects that make playing Antonblast feel like a spoonful of sugar-coated cereal shot straight to the veins. Even by the time the credits rolled, I never found myself tiring of Anton's exuberant shouts, or the way he sounds like a bomb dropping from a B-52 whenever he does a nose dive from an improbable height. 

The stages are all spread across a small hub area, complete with shops that contain exorbitantly-priced health power-ups, some single-use items, and other superfluous knick-knacks. Anton will eventually be able to afford most of it with the way he tends to rack up casino chips along his path of destruction. All you really need is maybe a single extra heart to help deal with the damage, especially on the increasingly tough boss battles scattered through the hub. 

The bosses are truly a delight. They all have their own absurd gimmicks, and none of them feel like retreads, even when you end up squaring off against more than one jacked-up mole. It's clear they put a ton of thought into them, from the first wrassling ring showdown to the multi-stage final battle with Satan. It's Treasure by way of Earthworm Jim. You'll likely die and retry a lot as you try to figure out the best strategy against each foe, but thankfully, the longer fights have checkpoints before each new form. This is one of those little slices of grace that keep Antonblast from sliding over from fun to frustrating. 

Thanks to tight controls and a move set that's exciting to master, barreling Anton through all these challenges is an exercise in haphazard glee. There are certain areas that call for more precise platforming, but most problems can quite literally be solved by ramming your head into them repeatedly. The overwhelming visuals fit this style of play nicely. It never seems as if Antonblast is overdoing it, because nothing else would make sense. When Anton or Annie turn into a pinball or set off on a rocket swordfish — two of many stage gimmicks that refuse to wear out their welcome — the cacophony of screams and violent environmental eruptions that ensue feel right. 

All of this madness combined with a pitch-perfect soundtrack from top to bottom to make a piquant spirit that widened my eyes more than a few times. That's ultimately what impresses me most about Antonblast. It is such a tightly-realized vision that you can't help but appreciate and respect it. The energy levels are absolutely through the roof. There are no doubt a small handful of frustrations to be found and some of the saltier, the fully-voiced dialogue might keep you from showing it to the younger members of the family; none of that should hold you back.

Everyone should play Antonblast at least once, but good luck with that. There are still spirits to collect, and I'll be riding this rollercoaster again in no time. Now, bring on the speedruns; this is gonna be a… I'm not gonna say it, but you get it.

^{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Antonblast appeared first on Destructoid.

The Legacy Of Kain series has finally risen from its tomb once again after 20 years of slumber. True vampire behavior, sure, albeit not the one originally intended by its creators.

Crystal Dynamics tried to follow up on 2003's Legacy Of Kain: Defiance with the spectacular-looking Legacy Of Kain: Dead Sun, but it ended up being canceled for what I must believe were dark reasons. What we now have is not the full-fledged continuation of the story, or even the now classic soft reboot.

It's a remaster of the two classic Soul Reaver titles by Aspyr, the same studio behind the damn good Tomb Raider original trilogy remasters, and it does not disappoint!

Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 1 & 2 Remastered (PC [Reviewed])
Developer: Aspyr, Crystal Dynamics
Publisher: Aspir
Released: December 10, 2024
MSRP: $29.99

Looks-wise, Aspyr once again makes fans an offer they cannot refuse. You can swap between the remastered graphics mode and the classic ones on the fly. If you're only here for the newer graphics, you will be very happy as both games — especially the original — got a very respectful glow-up.

This is not a remake, rather seemingly Aspyr's attempt at making the original games look as good as they ever could. As a longtime fan of the series, I'm quite satisfied by the approach. The only possible downside is how it might fail to capture the attention of new players for not featuring current gen graphics.

I wasn't too keen on the first trailer Aspyr showed. Some of the enemies — Melchiah, the first boss, especially — looked a bit too colorful for the monstrous pile of decrepit flesh he was supposed to be. I'm very happy to announce that Aspyr saw it as well and ended up doing a welcome glow down to the game's enemies. The first Soul Reaver is now just a bit more light and colorful than it once was, but it sure does remain by far the most beautifully foul-looking of the two.

If you just want a modern way to replay the classic one, this is also the game for you, as you can now enjoy the original graphics in never-before-seen high-res. On PC, at least, this remaster surpasses even that of the Tomb Raider trilogy. Even though the Tomb Raider PS5 remaster's classic graphics mode introduced higher res, it forced players to "enjoy" the game at the original PlayStation's choppy framerate. Not here, though. Both games run silky smooth on either graphics mode even on far-from-prime PC hardware.

Quality of life improvements are aplenty, as well. Whereas the gameplay of either Soul Reaver has aged far more gracefully than that of the Tomb Raider's OT, it could still do with a revamp — and it sure did get one. The camera is now fully modernized, allowing players to control it with the right thumbstick, providing much more intuitive controls, and leaving the shoulder buttons free for other functionalities. There are also graphical indicators popping up whenever you come close to an item that you can interact with. It might strike some as too much hand-holding, but, at least in the original format, some of the game's important visual elements could prove a little too difficult to tell from mere scenery.

If you look at the screens above, you'll also notice the presence of a compass. That's also an addition made by the remaster. I originally laughed at the idea, as the compass in Tomb Raider has always been one of the most clowned-on useless features in the history of gaming, but I didn't have the full picture. That compass actually works pretty well when combined with the map, which is another new feature. It had only recently come to my attention that some players found the world of the original game to be a bit labyrinthian, so this is sure to help create a smoother experience.

Another thing playing in the remaster's favor is the story — one of the elements you can't really change much — because it remains as fantastic and engrossing as ever. Ditto is responsible for the game's voice performances and music. All the most important and less-fixable features of this series have truly aged like good old blood — of the kind you need not fear.

This remaster also has a lot of extra stuff that fans will absolutely love to dive into. Whereas Soul Reaver 2 had a less-troubled development cycle, courtesy of following-up on one of the original PlayStation's best games, the development of the original was famously chaotic.

While you'd never tell from just playing the game, the original game was the result of a very rushed development cycle. It was never meant to spawn a series but to tell a one-and-done story. Though I'm glad in ended up growing into something bigger and better, I — and so many others — spent years wishing I could visit the vast amount of material that ended up cut.

Now, on top of a lot of cool concept art, fan art, a lot of written lore to help guide players through this world, players can also access a bunch of cut levels for the first time. These areas aren't available with the remastered graphics and don't have enemies or functioning puzzles, but fans will understand just how great it is to finally visit places that had gone down in history as myths.

Aspyr is showing their craft and care, which fills me with hopes that studio truly is the one to finally make the upcoming remaster of the second — and wonkier- Tomb Raider trilogy work.

_{[This review is based on a press build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 1 & 2 Remastered appeared first on Destructoid.

Almost four years after being announced, the next canon adventure for Indiana Jones is here with the release of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle. This isn't Indy's first foray into the gaming world, but it's been a decade and a half since the daring archaeologist had a playable adventure.

Now I'll admit, I'm not a diehard Indiana Jones fan. I've seen all the movies and enjoyed them—yes, even Kingdom of the Crystal Skull—but it's not a franchise I've found myself rewatching many times over the years like Lucasfilm's other IP, Star Wars. However, I am a huge fan of Wolfenstein and, therefore, developer MachineGames. I didn't realize just how awesome the concept of a MachineGames-developed Indiana Jones would be until the developer, with publisher Bethesda Softworks, revealed the title in 2021 as being a developer in close collaboration with Lucasfilm Games.

Across my roughly 20-hour journey, I explored dark tombs and ancient archaeological dig sites while fending off Nazi soldiers and navigating deadly traps. And while the journey wasn't flawless, it was a lot of fun. From its gameplay and mysteriously grandiose story, to the witty and quirky quips you'd expect from Indiana Jones, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is the most authentic playable version of Indy yet, and one I'm happy to have experienced.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle (PC [reviewed], Xbox Series X|S)
Developer: MachineGames
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Released: December 8, 2024
MSRP: $69.99

The story of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is set in the year 1937, between the events of the original Indiana Jones film, Raiders of the Lost Ark, and the third film, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. After a brief intro where you explore a South American tomb and get introduced to the controls of being Indy, which, of course, includes you making use of his trusty whip and escaping a giant boulder that comes tumbling after you, Indy returns to Marshall College only to find it's been ransacked.

After cleaning up the place, Indy discovers one of the artifacts he previously found is missing, and with only a medallion referencing Vatican City being left behind. And thus the events of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle begin, with Indy heading to the Vatican to track down the stolen artifact and determine why it was stolen in the first place.

While the argument can be made that developer MachineGames has historically taken a gameplay-driven focus in its previous titles (Wolfenstein and Quake), with somewhat of a more backseat approach to the story, that's not the case in The Great Circle. With four hours of cinematics, the storyline is the focal point here, and it's a good one.

After tracking down the stolen artifact, Indy realizes a long-standing secret order in the Vatican is working with the Axis powers (Fascist Italy led by Benito Mussolini and Nazi Germany led by Hitler) to try and uncover and bring to life some sort of spiritual event that is connected to a series of sites built throughout history that form a perfect circle around the world, AKA The Great Circle.

Look, I'll say it, this may be the best Indiana Jones story yet. Throughout The Great Circle, you'll encounter classic staples of the franchise, like comical quips and deadpan stares from Indy, all while exploring beautiful parts of the world like the Great Pyramids in Egypt and the ancient Sukhothai Kingdom in Thailand. I was worried that the plot taking place in the year between two movies would make it feel rather redundant. After all, logically speaking, if this story mattered so much wouldn't we have heard about it? But thankfully, that's not the case, as the story continues to ramp up throughout Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, culminating in a rewarding and impactful ending that, in my opinion, leaves its mark on the franchise. This is canon, after all.

My only gripes with the story were essentially afterthoughts by the end, but is certainly worth mentioning. The pacing of things is a bit off at times, especially at the beginning of Indy's adventure. After the introduction, you head to Vatican City, which I expected to be a quick way of further setting up the story before heading out on an epic Indy adventure. However, your visit to the Vatican is far from quick. You'll run around Vatican City interacting with various characters and uncovering hidden tombs for a while—for me, it took about four hours—before heading to your next destination.

Don't get me wrong, Machine Games created a beautifully dystopian Mussolini-controlled Fascist Vatican City, it just feels like you're there a bit too long, and I was definitely ready to leave well before you actually do so. In the end, the events in the Vatican are important, and it does introduce you to a lot of the characters you'll continue to interact with over the rest of the game, it just felt a bit offputting to be kick off the adventure running around the Vatican for a few hours.

Of course, a proper Indiana Jones outing can't rely on story alone. At its core, Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is a stealth-focused game. As you sneak into various Fascist-controlled tombs, dig sites, and even entire cities, you'll have to do so while navigating around patrolling guards and soldiers.

As someone not so good at stealth games, this was a bit daunting at first. But thankfully, stealth isn't necessarily required in The Great Circle. If you manage to get spotted, you initiate mostly hand-to-hand melee combat with the soldiers. You can block, parry, and even dodge attacks while managing a stamina bar to swing back at your opponent. Of course, the noise will often attract other nearby soldiers, so you'll often end up taking on a small army before you can proceed. But while this is often a near-impossible task in most stealth-focused games, The Great Circle is very fair at letting you fight your way out of blowing your cover and still get back to the task at hand.

You'll also find a ton of melee weapons scattered throughout every area where you can pick objects like a shovel, a pickaxe, a hammer, or even just a plunger and use it to stealth-takedown or even engage in melee brawls with your opponents. There are various guns you can find as well as loot off of enemies you defeat, but they are often very limited in ammo. Oddly enough, the gunplay in The Great Circle feels very tight and well-designed. I didn't engage in many firefights as Indy, but when I did, they were a lot of fun although a bit short-lived.

Overall, the combat in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle fills its purpose: to provide some fun gameplay elements while exploring Indy. It's nothing game-changing, but it works. With it being a lesser focus compared to the story, exploration, and puzzles The Great Circle has to offer, I think it was a great choice by MachineGames to make combat less hassle and more fun. It's nice not being forced to stealth or feeling like you're doomed when you get caught.

The real gameplay strengths of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle, though, is its puzzles and exploration. Each of the three main areas you explore—Vatican City, Giza, and Sukhothai—are open-world hubs. You're free to roam around them as Indy as you wish, taking on side quests, exploring on your own, or progressing the main story. There are actually quite a few optional activities available in each of the three hubs. I did some of them, which resulted in my roughly 20-hour playthrough. For the most part, they will build on backstories for certain characters or areas, but the optional content doesn't really affect the main story. If someone wanted to ignore all the side content, I expect they could get through The Great Circle in 10-15 hours, whereas a completionist looking to do everything might be looking at upwards of 30 or more. There's plenty of content here, and it's up to you how much you want to explore.

Regardless of how much you explore, there's one thing you can expect to find in both the main story and optional side content: puzzles. I have to hand it to MachineGames, every puzzle was unique and assuming I missed out on some through the optional content, there are a ton of puzzles in The Great Circle. For the most part, they get more and more creative as well, as you progress further through the game. There are a couple that were tricky to solve, but using a Camera item you get early on, you can take pictures of key parts of the puzzles, and Indy will essentially think out loud, which provides you with clues on how to proceed through the puzzle.

At times, the puzzles were so easy I thought for sure I was missing something, only to be shocked to see that I had the right solution and that was it. At other times, I found myself really scratching my head on how to proceed. In all of those moments, however, taking a picture with the Camera provided enough of a hint to get me thinking in the right direction, and I never had problems progressing.

Aside from the early pacing issues, I did encounter a handful of bugs. Nothing game-breaking, thankfully, but they often ranged from silly to annoying. More than once, I'd be engaged in hand-to-hand combat with enemies, and they would seemingly just get overwhelmed and stand in place. It's like I broke them, and no matter what I did they would just stand there and let me hit them while circling around me.

Another very comical bug I experienced early on while in Vatican City at least made for a good story. After sneaking around Vatican City doing tasks for an Indiana Jones-ally named Antonio, I returned to his location to find him sitting in a chair with an object impaled through his chest, staring at me, eyes open wide. Assuming he was murdered for working with Indy as part of the story, I moved forward to try and get a better look at the situation when suddenly Antonio spoke: "Well, Indy, did you bring me any photographic evidence?" Turns out that somehow, an interactable melee object had just glitched out and was just clipping through him.

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is an incredibly authentic Indiana Jones experience, and MachineGames really makes you feel like you are Indiana Jones. If you're looking for an epic journey of exploration with a fun and mysterious story, that's exactly what you'll get with The Great Circle, and with a high level of polish to boot. The combat can feel like window dressing at times, but it doesn't really take from the adventure. The exploits of Indiana Jones are all about exploring, puzzle solving, and having some laughs, and there's plenty of that to go around in Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.

The post Review: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle appeared first on Destructoid.

I remember reading a preview for The Thing in a magazine back before its release. The game, I mean, not the movie. It’s certainly a game that sounds interesting on paper. So, it’s been stuck in the back of my mind for decades, but I never really made the move to play it.

Why would I? I hadn’t watched the movie, and reviews at the time of launch were lukewarm. I knew it developed something of a cult following since then, but even among fans, I heard the same thing: The whole psychological element was too ambitious and didn’t actually work very well. I’ve been left to imagine its failings.

But I rarely miss a remaster from Nightdive Studios, and since they’ve taken on the task of polishing up The Thing, then the stars have certainly aligned. I even went and watched the movie while running a fever and cuddling with my dog, just to make things memorable and a little awkward. But you don’t necessarily need to have watched the movie to understand what’s going on in the game. I think you should, though, because then you will truly appreciate how completely daft this game is.

The Thing: Remastered (PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox Series X|S, Switch)
Developer: Nightdive Studios, Computer Artworks
Publisher: Nightdive Studios
Released: December 5, 2024
MSRP: $29.99

The end of The Thing: The Movie was left pretty ambiguous. I don’t really want to spoil it for you beyond that. It’s a great movie. And since its ending was left so open, a narrative follow-up had a lot of room to breathe. A story could be really delicate with things and even heighten the mystery of the original. That’s not what The Thing: The Game does, however. It stomps right up to the movie and starts breathing down its shirt. The only mystery it heightens is how this wrecking ball got here.

This was 2002, and the standards for video game storytelling couldn’t get much closer to the floor. This is especially true for shooters. It was a time when Half-Life was still naively hailed as having spun a tale rivaling Citizen Kane. So, I probably shouldn’t have expected much, but The Thing: The Game has the sort of narrative I would come up with off-the-cuff if I was trying to make fun of the concept of a sequel to The Thing: The Movie.

You play as Captain J.F. Blake who sounds so much like Kyle Travers from Final Fight: Streetwise, I actually had to look up the voice actors to convince myself it wasn’t. It takes place right after the movie, so it’s still the 1980s, but he has one of the most popular hairstyles of the late ‘90s, right down to the spiked-up bangs. He’s Special Forces, and that’s all there is to him. He’s the only competent person in the universe, and he knows it. There isn’t an ounce of humanity to the guy; he’s just a brick. A big, grumbly block who wears forest camo pants in Antarctica but won't put on a hat because it would mush down his hairdo.

It starts off interestingly enough. Blake’s Team arrives at U.S. Outpost 31 from the movie and start sorting through the wreckage. It’s a very understated time in the game, as it mostly just introduces you to the concepts of the game while allowing you to visit set pieces from the movie. It’s kind of quiet and tense, which is so uncharacteristically restrained for the game in hindsight.

The team did consider what made the movie great when they came up with the design. The one thing they added that I think works well in the game and doesn’t get enough credit is the fact that you can’t linger outside for long. It’s winter in Antarctica and nobody brought a toque. You’ll freeze if you don’t find shelter. This gets squandered when 80% of the game is in tight concrete corridors, but the hostility of the open air is a nice touch.

What gets the most marketing hype is the trust/fear system, which is just… I get why they’d focus on it in advertisements, because it’s something that makes the game unique, but it’s so poorly implemented that it might as well not be there at all. The Thing: The Game is a squad-based third-person shooter, and the idea is that you need to keep your squad from freaking out when any one of them could be a thing in disguise. The idea is that you, as a player, don’t know who to trust.

The fear aspect works the best, but it’s not very impactful. Your squadmates start getting nervous when they’re around gore and dead bodies, but the problem is that the areas you traverse are absolutely lousy with corpses, so it's hard to tell when you're in a fear zone. It usually only becomes a bit of a problem if you stand around in a room with a mess on the floor. Once (and only once), I had to physically push a squadmate out of a room so he could get a breather and get a grip. So, it kind of works; it's just really clumsy.

When I completed the game, I got an achievement that said I never let a single squad member reach maximum fear level. That means I actually don’t know if something cool happens when they completely lose it because I was apparently a really soothing presence for those around me. Maybe it’s because I constantly live in fear and anxiety, so I know how to empathize with others feeling it.

The trust system is completely pointless, though. Sure, some dudes will refuse to follow you because they think you might have a thing in your pants, but getting them to come around is just a matter of shoving ammo into their pockets. Their trust is only between you and them; squadmates always trust each other unless it’s for story reasons. They don’t need to kiss and trade ammo. For that matter, it's hard for them to distrust you once you've loaded them up. They’ll only start feeling iffy again if you keep shooting them. They don’t seem to think it’s weird that you obsessively check every notepad and carry an armory on their back. Ammo is the only thing they trust.

The whole idea that any one of them could be a thing is the least meaningful layer. It’s true, some of them will sprout tentacles. You can do a blood test to see who’s human, but it doesn’t really work. Like, at all. Dudes you already tested might turn out to be full of things anyway. That doesn’t matter though, because the moment they start to change, all your teammates will suddenly snap and start shooting at them before they’re even done transforming. Even if they didn’t, the friend-things aren’t any tougher than any normal thing. They aren’t a threat. So, who cares if you can trust them?

That’s the biggest problem with The Thing: The Game’s superfluous systems; it doesn’t try for tension. You play as some generic good guy. Practically a super-hero. At the best of times, The Thing: The Game is a dumb shooter. It smells like the early ‘00s. It’s not really a horror game; it just has some gross bad guys.

Your squad isn’t consistent, either. They get swapped out at almost every loading screen. They don't have charming personalities to get attached to. It doesn’t matter if Simmons exposes his thing. Simmons wasn’t special. There’s an identical dude down the hallway.

It’s a good remaster, though. Absolutely solid. You can tell the tech folks at Nightdive had fun working on a post-millennium game since they loaded it up with all kinds of fancy lighting effects. True to their M.O., they kept it looking like something you’d expect from the era, but it’s not hard to see and appreciate the glow-up. It also ran flawlessly on my PC.

There isn’t as much in terms of extra material as a few of their previous releases. You can view the game’s original trailer and there’s some concept art, but not a whole lot that’s insightful. I was kind of hoping that a game that looks to have fallen apart in production would have more of a story to tell, but if it does, it won’t be found here.

They clearly couldn’t do anything about the game’s weaknesses. That would take more than a remaster. It’s not just that the fear/trust/infection systems were buggy or weren’t fully implemented. No, the original developers had some high-concept ideas and tried to put them into a dumb shooter, and they didn’t fit. The dumb shooter was the prevailing force, and there’s no undoing that.

I also ran into a lot of glitches. I’m not sure which ones were already there and which were introduced in the remaster. I’m also not certain which ones will be fixed by the time you’re reading this since I got to touch The Thing early for this review. And really, the glitches I ran into were mostly just hilarious. I did have to load a recent save to undo a bug a couple of times, but more often, they were just funny, benign things.

The best one happened early. Your squadmates will sometimes throw up when they’re in a bad situation. I can relate; anxiety makes me throw up, too. However, one dude apparently started the puking process right as a cutscene started. The camera snapped back to show the two of us walking into frame, he continued the process of throwing up, but it wouldn't interrupt the animation. Instead, it played the retching noise, and all the vomit came out from between his legs, so it looked like he was violently evacuating his bowels onto the floor. I laughed so hard. I still giggle whenever I think about it. I caught it in my gameplay capture, and I keep watching it.

Really, as much as I think The Thing: The Game is kind of terrible, I did find it entertaining. The story is just so braindead and full of cliches that I wanted to see more to find out if it was going to be so obvious the whole way through. It definitely has reverence for the source material, but it wasn’t exactly gentle when it came to building on it. To be fair, I would have been surprised if it had even come close to matching the movie in terms of storytelling, so it’s maybe what I should have expected from a 2002 licensed title.

I still applaud Nightdive for this remaster. They’re the only ones with the guts. Regardless of how I feel about the game itself, they gave it the same loving attention that they normally do. More importantly, it’s a licensed game, and those tend to be the most unlikely candidates for a re-release.

Part of me wishes their effort was spent on a better game, but the other part is happy that I got to experience the absolute mess that is The Thing. I know it sounds weird to hear, “This is a mess; you should totally check it out,” but that’s what I’m saying. The Thing is a fascinating cluster of missteps, and a completely unconvincing facsimile of its source material. But it’s hard to look away when it turns itself inside out.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: The Thing: Remastered appeared first on Destructoid.

Every so often, I get the urge to play puzzle games just to see if I am as smart as I (sometimes) think I am. I don't usually pour too many hours into them since my brain can only handle so much. Yet, my experience with Dungeons of Dreadrock 2: The Dead King's Secret was the complete opposite, as I constantly lost track of time with its many puzzles. I even had to force myself to put it down, with the thought of "just one more puzzle" lingering in my mind. 

DoD2 continues off from the original narrative, featuring the same retro-inspired art style. I'm new to the series, but understanding its storyline wasn't too much of a stretch. It's your classic adventure where the hero, aka the sorceress, ventures into a treacherous place to find the Crown of Wisdom.

Dungeons of Dreadrock 2 - The Dead King's Secret (Switch[reviewed], PC)

Developer: Christoph Minnameier

Publisher: Christoph Minnameier

Released: November 28, 2024 (Switch)/December 5, 2024 (Steam)

MSRP: $14.99

While playing the game without the original is possible, I recommend putting in the time for the first one. The two stories are heavily connected, with key characters from Dungeons of Dreadrock frequently appearing. In fact, there are several split-screen moments when the characters clash together in an effort to thwart the Dead King's evil plans. It's a cool concept to see, and it's made for some pretty unique gameplay. But, of course, the true highlight of The Dead King's Secret is the puzzles. There are about 100 levels to clear, each containing a complex challenge to decipher and a few enemies to keep you on your toes.

What I greatly admire about this game is how different each puzzle is from the last. It's not a typical rinse-and-repeat process in which puzzles start to blend together. Every challenge feels carefully crafted, making them stand out individually. On one level, you'll have to memorize specific movements of enemies, while another can revolve around reconstructing a skeleton.

The puzzles are also unlike anything I've experienced before. They all have a unique charm that goes beyond traditional puzzle games. One prime example of this is how levels can connect. A trapdoor you passed by earlier can be crucial for later, requiring you to drop a weapon to help you out on the following floor. Even enemies must be lured to the next stage to assist you with other foes. I like this concept that makes you rethink what you did previously, and it's got some brain gears moving that I didn't know were there.

The farther you go down the levels of DoD2, the more challenging it gets. Fortunately, you can use cheats to skip stages or unlock hints to explain what you need to do in detail. You'll get one clue to help steer you in the right direction, and if you need some extra guidance, you can continue to unlock the rest to complete the level. I tried my best not to use it just for the sake of pride. However, I admit that I had to rely on it during the later stages.

It almost felt impossible to finish some levels without the hints. Maybe it's merely a user error on my part, or perhaps you actually do need to use them every once in a while. I'd be curious to see if anyone out there could accomplish it without 'em. I know it's a tall order, but it would be a nice challenge if you're looking to shake things up.

Besides the puzzles, there are numerous battles you'll go through each stage. I will say that it's not the most intricate system since it's mainly just the sorceress unleashing a single strike directly ahead. On the other hand, the game does mix things up a bit with the various tools you acquire during your journey. For instance, you'll gain a flute that can deter enemies, followed by an ability to turn into a bat. It helps make combat feel less tedious, giving you more ways to take down your enemies.

The boss fights also feel like a puzzle in their own right, where you'll need to strategize your movements and time your attacks. The final stage, in particular, was the ultimate puzzle-solving test, forcing you to remember patterns and not providing many hints to help you out. Like many levels, this one will have you doing things over and over again until you get it right. It can sometimes be frustrating, but once you overcome it, you'll feel pretty accomplished. The music makes you feel even more victorious with its epic medieval-like soundtrack. I found myself dancing along with it, celebrating the feat of every passing level.

The ending to The Dead King's Secret is worth the time needed to clear 100 levels, which is 10 hours or so. It would've sucked to go through all that just to have a subpar conclusion, but luckily that wasn't the case with DoD2. One of the main reasons why it was so remarkable is the fact that there are two endings. I never expected to see this feature in a puzzle game. By its conclusion, I already had to jump back in to see what other choice I could have made.

Dungeons of Dreadrock 2: The Dead King's Secret is a must-play for puzzle gamers. Challenges never feel the same, and they'll have you thinking outside the box to try to solve them. The victorious feeling after completing puzzles can get addicting, and you may have a hard time putting it down, just as I did.

Plus, if you enjoyed this game, you can look forward to another entry, as it's already been confirmed to be a trilogy. I'll undoubtedly be there for the next one and have plans to tackle the original to play catch-up.

The post Review: Dungeons of Dreadrock 2 – The Dead King’s Secret appeared first on Destructoid.

How good are you at following instructions? How about while you’re under a timer? What about when your life depends on it? Me? Maybe not so great. Maybe.

Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is probably the last game I’ve been anticipating for the year. Well, that’s assuming a couple of them that have been quiet for a while aren’t going to drop. Anyway, playing the demo, it’s hard not to fall in love with its tricky diagnose-replace-repair gameplay laced with dark humor and a severe potty mouth.

So, I voraciously ate into it when I finally had it in my hands for this review, but after all the time I put into it, I still haven’t hit the credits. After, urgh, 25 hours, I still haven’t found the bottom of Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop, but I’ve seen enough to tell you that you should definitely play this game if you think you can withstand the punishment.

Uncle Chop's Rocket Shop (PC)
Developer: Beard Envy
Publisher: Kasedo Games
Released: December 5, 2024
MSRP: $19.99

Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is, on the surface, a game about repair. Folks drop in with their ailing spacecraft, and it’s up to you to diagnose problems and make repairs. Each ship is separated into modules, and each craft has a random variety and number of them. The modules range from fuel, oil, and oxygen to AI, reactors, and just one big lever. You’re told what needs fixing, so you don’t need to figure out which of them is broken, but each of them breaks in different ways, so it’s up to you to figure out what needs to be repaired and what it looks like when everything is working.

This is all handled through a tactile interface where you pull levers and push buttons. Once you find something broken, you have to head to the store (right next to the repair bay) to buy a replacement and slot it in. You can get a welder that will restore shattered parts, but I found it somewhat unnecessary, as parts are relatively cheap. It’s a game that feels similar to Papers, Please, but with less paperwork and more refilling blinker fluid.

To help, you’re provided an all-inclusive instruction manual that goes over everything you need to know… mostly. You usually don’t have context for what is going on until you’ve seen the module itself and have gotten to know the various parts. Even when you do, it’s not difficult to make a mistake. You might get a pancake wrong or forget to close a hatch when you’re finished. Personally, I’ve never gotten to the point where I’m completely confident in front of a reactor. But then, if you get a step wrong, they blow up in your face and take, at the very least, you along with them. Possibly the neighborhood, as well.

You play as Wilbur, a hapless guy with a four-eyed fox head. He’s just the latest in a line of mechanics employed at Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop. Hints are dropped at what happened to the previous ones, but you can probably guess. You’re given free rein of the shop. Most of the profit you make is yours, but every three days, you need to pay Uncle Chop R.E.N.T. to maintain your employment.

However, before you even really get grease on your hands, some dude shows up and blows your (fox) head off. It’s a good indication of how things will go from here.

You’re saved by a coworker who also happens to be the living personification of death. You’ve made an impression, so he will “zoop” you back to the start of your employment every time you screw up bad enough to die. The purpose of this isn’t completely clear at the start, but it’s nice to have job security. Also, yes, this is technically a roguelite.

There are two modes of play in Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop. The first has the day passing by in real time, leaving you to try and fit in as many jobs as possible before bedtime. This means there’s a lot of pressure, and you’ll have to flip through that manual of yours pretty quickly whenever you’re faced with something you’re not completely familiar with. It also leaves more room for mistakes.

The second way of playing removes the time limit. You’re given room to complete three jobs and can take as long as you want on them. Making a mistake (or “fucking up,” as the game puts it) results in heftier penalties. However, in my experience, it’s a far easier way to play. When you’re given as much time as you need, it’s easier to complete a job without any mistakes whatsoever.

It doesn't necessarily feel like the intended way to play. However, it also feels like a necessary compromise. Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is brutal. It throws new stuff at you all the time, practically smashing you directly into a wall. It can be cruel about it. Just wait until the first time you see a reactor. Yeah, you read that manual in advance. Go ahead. It won’t help. You’re one forgotten switch away from nuking your face off.

Sometimes, after the first R.E.N.T. is taken care of, a dude will land with pipe bombs strapped to his ship. It doesn’t matter whether you’ve got the day timer going, you’ll have one-and-a-half minutes to deduce what wires you should snip using the Venn diagram from hell. I got really good at bomb defusal. I’m a wiz at reading Venn diagrams.

Even when you’ve got all the time in the world, one fuckup can be all it takes to gutter a run. Some customers have the “Perfectionist” trait, which means that if you make a single mistake, it will completely negate everything you got correct and leave you out of pocket. It’s a gamble since you only need to leave one too few shots left in their identification module to lose all your hard work. If you miss R.E.N.T., your job being terminated is the least of your concerns.

There’s also the chance that a customer will show up requiring a fix you can’t provide. This sometimes happens before you have the “Pancake” machine required for building specialized parts, but I also had one that needed a fuse that wasn’t available for me to purchase yet. I’m not sure this is intentional design. The game will sometimes let you know when you don’t have the machines needed to fix a ship before you take a job, but it doesn’t work every time. I’ve learned to just buy the Pancake and Encoder machines immediately at the start of the first run and avoid rebreathers on the first day.

But even still, my last run was ended because I took a job from an armed customer. He tried to rob me, but when I refused to empty my pockets, he shot my brain off. This is Fuck Around and Find Out: The Game.

It’s okay, though. Every time I got my run nuked, I’d just slump my shoulders and decide if I had time for another run. The only aggravating part about it was that my deadline was coming up and I like to have a game beaten before writing the review since you never know when something will shake apart at the last minute. However, I think I’ve gotten to what is essentially an end (there appears to be multiple). I just know that there’s a tonne left hidden because the places you can stick your fingers to find secrets are on display at all times.

What made it so hard to stay mad at it was that, even after restarting dozens of times, I was still being presented with new stuff. Not necessarily modules; I know how to fix a rebreather in my sleep. It’s the interactions with customers and coworkers. Every time one gets out of their ship, you never know if they’re going to give you a hug or complain about how you smell like wet dog. Visiting the speakeasy before or after work also gives you the opportunity to see more of the station’s denizens and pick up side quests.

But it’s maybe the fact that Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop doesn’t lean entirely on cruelty to Wilbur that makes it more tolerable. As much fun as it is to see a hapless protagonist suffer, and it feels appropriate in a workplace environment, it can get tiresome. Instead, most of the characters have a softer side. Droose, especially, outwardly seems to care about Wilbur, and some moments with him are endearing. He and some of the customers will offer frequent words of encouragement, even if others are deliberately trying to blow you up.

Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is a lot. It’s a lot more than it has to be. While its design is tight and well-executed, it offers an obscene amount of variety and seemingly endless things to see. Which is good, especially if you’re like me and you find yourself in a hellcircle of 11th-hour fuckups that prevent you from witnessing the final clock out. And I think it says a lot when, despite how badly I’ve been savaged by its unforgiving nature, I’m happy to start up a new run and try again.

It’s pretty clear that not everyone will think that way. A game about throwing levers and getting blown up repeatedly isn’t going to gel with some. And while there is some permanent progression, the only thing you carry over between runs that will help you is what you were able to learn. A fondness for troubleshooting will get you far.

But regardless of whether or not this is the type of game you think you’d enjoy, it’s clear that Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop is exactly what it wants to be. It’s an expert mix of cruel work-a-day tinkering and dark, vulgar humor. A bottomless well of savagely comedic moments, beckoning secrets, and puzzles that require Ikea furniture-level manual comprehension skills. If you’ve got room in your skull for some truly useless knowledge and can tolerate having your face stomped on a few times, you’ve got a friend in Uncle Chop.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Uncle Chop’s Rocket Shop appeared first on Destructoid.

In 2021, developer Mistwalker self-published an RPG titled Fantasian, helmed by fabled studio head and founder Hironobu Sakaguchi.

According to Sakaguchi, development on Fantasian began in 2018 after the developer had recently replayed Final Fantasy VI, one of the popular RPGs from the series that he had worked on. While the idea of a Sakaguchi-led and Mistalker-developed RPG piqued the interest of many RPG enjoyers—myself included—the RPG was released as an Apple Arcade exclusive, playable only on Apple devices.

Now, three and a half years later, those like myself who don't have an Apple device finally have the opportunity to check out the RPG on consoles and PC. Mistwalker and Final Fantasy developer and publisher Square Enix have worked together on Fantasian Neo Dimension, an HD version of the RPG with upgraded graphics, English and Japanese voiceovers, as well as various gameplay adjustments and enhancements.

Despite the upgrades, I had fears going into Fantasian Neo Dimension that the transition from being built purely for iOS to consoles and PC could be a rough one. But while there are some noticeable signs and reminders throughout Fantasian that the RPG was clearly originally developed for mobile devices, such as simplistic yet big blocky UI and some limited mobility on certain maps, overall, the Neo Dimension version plays well and does a great job of hiding the fact that this was originally a mobile game.

Fantasian: Neo Dimension (PC, PS5 [Reviewed], PS4, Xbox Series X|S, Switch)
Developer: Mistwalker
Publisher: Square Enix
Released: December 5, 2024
MSRP: $49.99

If you're a fan of previous Mistwalker RPG gems like Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, and The Last Story, you'll know that creative storytelling and unique gameplay features to the genre are the developer's strong suits. Fantasian Neo Dimension starts off with the main character, Leo, finding himself suffering from amnesia in a strange machine-inhabited world—properly named the Machine Realm—that serves as the tutorial and introduction to the game. Accompanied by two peculiar machines that are helping him, Leo manages to use a strange portal device to return to his own world, the Human Realm.

As the story progresses you'll learn more about the strange and fantastical world Leo lives in, where the people who live there reside alongside a strange Mecha Infestation that has started to plague it. Along the way. You'll meet new characters that join Leo in his journey as well as learn about Leo's past and exactly what he was doing that resulted in him ending up with amnesia and in the Machine Realm.

The story of Fantasian Neo Dimension is a unique and worthwhile journey that fans of classic Final Fantasy titles like FF6 will enjoy. There are even segments where various characters' backstories and pasts are explored in artistic scenes overlaid with full voiceovers where the character relives memories from their past, which, if you have ever played Lost Odyssey, will feel quite familiar.

Speaking of art, Fantasian utilizes stylized dioramas that look very crisp and detailed with the 4k upgrades of the Neo Dimension version. Paired with the epic score by legendary composer Nobuo Uematsu, the world of Fantasian Neo Dimension is an immersive and fantastical one that's reminiscent of JRPGs with massive creative worlds to explore. And for Final Fantasy fans, one of the additions to the Neo Dimension version is that players can swap out the background music for battles with the battle music from various Final Fantasy games, including FFXIV, FFXVI, and FF7 Remake/Rebirth. The battle music in Fantasian is great, but it's nice to have the option when you want to change things up!

In terms of gameplay, Fantasian is a turn-based RPG similar to what you'd find in Final Fantasy 1-10. However, each character has skills and attacks with varying trajectories that you can manipulate to hit multiple enemies and really change the tide of battle. For example, the main character Leo has a skill that shoots in a straight line, so if you can line it up just right you can hit multiple enemies. Another character, Kinacan bends her trajectory in a curved line. It's an added element to the typically straightforward combat system of turn-based RPGs that added some extra nuance and strategy that really innovates the system. It's like Super Mario RPG where you can do a little more to make the combat more engaging and fun.

Another effort to shake up the traditional turn-based RPG trope is a system called Dimengeon. Early on in Fantasian, you unlock this system, which allows you to essentially "skip" any random battles you would otherwise encounter randomly while traversing the world. Instead, the enemies you would have fought are placed in your Dimengeon Machine. Once the machine is full or if you choose to manually activate it before then, you will engage in battle against all the enemies stored inside. Special gimmicks can appear inside the Dimgengon battles that give you various buffs when attacked. Pairing this with the trajectory system allows you to store up a bunch of enemies in your Dimengeon Machine before wiping them out in mass. It's a convenient system for skipping battles when you just want to quickly get from point A to point B as well as to more easily kill hordes of enemies at once.

My only issues with Fantasian Neo Dimension are quite paltry and mostly stem from the RPG originally being made for mobile devices. As I said before, the UI, and therefore menus, dialogue, and world map still shows the foundation of being on a mobile device. Things are blocky and clearly made with the ability to tap on things easily in mind. Neo Dimension all obviously works with a controller, but I do feel like an updated UI that looks less blocky and simplistic would have gone a long way for a world that is otherwise rather detailed and beautiful.

Fantasian Neo Dimension takes all the great things about classic JRPGs and finds ways to innovate on them while still keeping the innate charm and feel the genre is known for. And while there have been plenty of great RPG releases in recent years, there's something special about Fantasian Neo Dimension that melds the old with the new to create an enthralling and nostalgic journey in a unique high-fantasy world that's simply a ton of fun to play.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Fantasian Neo Dimension appeared first on Destructoid.

I really enjoyed the grab bag that was Taito Milestones 2. It featured some predictable hits but then flanked them with some hilariously dreadful games, or, as I put it in that review, “bad in an almost impressive way.” So, I’ve been looking forward to Taito Milestones 3 for another injection of titles.

This collection is dominated by a coalition of the Bubble Bobble and Rastan series. But, like before, there is also a smattering of more obscure titles. However, this time around, I wouldn’t say any of them are “impressively bad.” But rather than just talk about them vaguely in the preamble, I’m going to take the approach I’ve started doing with arcade collections, and I’m just going to do a short review of every game in the collection. There are 10, so brace yourself.

Taito Milestones 3 (Switch)
Developer: Hamster
Publisher: Inin Games
Released: December 10, 2024
MSRP: $39.99

Bubble Bobble

Bubble Bobble is the best game that lets you play as a bubble-blowing dragon that can turn people into corndogs. It’s the most known quantity in this Taito roundup, one of their longest-lived properties. I have a certain affinity for the game, having owned the Game Boy version (where the hell did it go?) and encountered it in arcades a few times, once at the hockey arena in Bobcaygeon of Tragically Hip fame. Another time was at the Toronto Union Station, where it beckoned me from across the arcade with its chirpy music.

The only problem with Bubble Bobble being on Taito Milestones 3 is that it’s one of those games where you might already own multiple versions of it. Few Taito-related collections drop without its inclusion. That’s not an issue for anyone who doesn’t own it already. If you’ve somehow avoided it, you should totally have it in some form. If you already own it, it's a bummer that it’s taking up room here. If you’ve never played it, wow, guy, get on that.

It’s great with two players (in fact, if you want the best ending, you have to beat it with another person). However, if you’re used to the console versions, you might find the lack of continues to be a bit jarring. There’s actually a secret to avoid starting over. To continue, you need to cram more credits into the machine, then hold the start button as you’re losing your last life.

Rainbow Islands

Rainbow Islands is technically the sequel to Bubble Bobble, but they’re rather dissimilar. Following the events of the first game, Bub and Bob have been transformed from radical corndog-conjuring dragons into diminutive Fatty Arbuckles who piss rainbows. And rather than try and process every monster on the map into food, the rotund twins have to climb to the top of a series of platforms.

You can use your rainbows to walk across, and stacking them up is the key to climbing. However, if you jump on them, they shatter, but this can take out enemies below you. Directly hitting enemies with rainbows will also just remove enemies; they’re deadly. Throwing rainbows at certain spots will spawn food. I haven’t seen a corndog appear, which is unfortunate.

It’s a pretty solid game, except for the bosses. The bosses just suck, barely putting up a fight and following patterns that are typically easy to exploit. The two-player mode is also alternating instead of Bubble Bobble’s simultaneous cooperative, which is extremely lame but not the collection's fault.

Rastan Saga

Rastan does not feel like a real game. I’ve described a couple of games like this previously, but pretty much every cartoon in existence had an episode where the protagonists get sucked into a video game, and it’s always way off when it comes to video game logic. Like, it’s obvious that the writers and animators know nothing about video games aside from vague concepts. That’s Rastan, except it’s a real game.

Which isn’t to say it’s bad. It’s just the fact that the protagonist is a generic, muscled, Conan-like barbarian who walks with a stiff upper body and swats at enemies with various classic weapons. The music is good, but it’s crunchy and meanders about. 

But for something that is so generic it’s almost surreal, Rastan is a pretty fun game. Its usage of pester enemies, especially during platforming and climbing sections, can get pretty vexing, but it has good flow and pacing. The bosses are surprisingly entertaining, as well. It’s not the best game, but in terms of the shirtless barbarian genre, I can dig it.

Rastan Saga 2

I think Taito Milestones 3 heard me making fun of Rastan Saga’s appearance, so it came at me hard with Rastan Saga 2. By that, I mean that Rastan Saga 2 is magnitudes worse than the first game. I’m not sure what happened. They made the sprites bigger, which was how 2D arcade games tried to flex back in the day, but they’re all low-detail and dopey looking, and there are only a few frames of animation to most actions. The bosses are all ridiculous slapfights, and the hit detection is just cruel.

But the level design is horrendous. Unlike the various scrolling methods of the first game, these are all flat and cut out of big blocks. What really ground my goat was some of the jumps they expect you to make. There are places with a ceiling directly above your head, and you’re expected to jump up and over a pit. This means that, to not hit your head and stop all upward motion, you need to scooch out until you’re hanging on the ledge by a pixel, then jump up and over. 

After making one such jump on the second level, I realized I had to play through to the end of the game in that sitting because I wasn’t willing to suffer it a second time. Unfortunately, that’s not the only instance of those shenanigans getting pulled in this game.

Champion Wrestler

I left Rastan Saga 2 in a frustrated daze, so if I’m a little too positive on Champion Wrestler, that’s why. It’s great! Well, kind of. It’s a pretty typical setup of shortening your opponent’s health bar before going in for the pin. What I like best about it is that it’s really mashy. When you get pinned, you mash the two buttons to try and get free, and when you pin, it’s the same thing. I think that’s what makes a good arcade wrestler: enthusiastic mashing.

It also has Rastan as one of the characters, so I got to beat him up a whole bunch. It turns out I’m actually really good at Champion Wrestler (at least on its default settings). After getting a feel for the controls, I didn’t lose again until after winning the title. Maybe it’s just easy, but if that’s the case, don’t tell me. Let me have this.

Each round is capped off by a detailed portrait of the winner and loser. The winner always gets to do things like drive around in a sportscar with a bikini-clad woman and rub themselves with money, while the loser often finds themselves picking through the trash. It’s, uh, sometimes kind of depressing.

Cadash

This is another one that I had prior experience with because Cadash is rad. Well, okay, Cadash is kind of basic and clunky, but it ties in RPG systems like stat building. In a way, it feels more like Dungeons and Dragons than the actual Dungeons and Dragons game that Capcom put out. That’s partially because the levels have some degree of exploration to them and there are NPCs to talk to. It satisfies arcade operators by keeping you on a timer you can replenish using items and spells.

The original version supported four players, but only by linking two cabinets. Pulling off in this version would have been impressive, but the extra mile wasn’t taken here. However, the two-player mode can still be fun if both players understand that there may be a bit of grinding required to stay ahead of the game.

I like Cadash. It has that classic tabletop RPG feel. It’s extraordinarily clunky and has a habit of screwing you over, but its inclusion of stat progression makes it a welcome change from straightforward action games. The timer system, as much as it's there to make you empty your pockets, is lenient enough to not feel rushed. It’s not the most intricate game, but it has it where it counts.

Thunder Fox

It’s easy to get some real Rush’n Attack/Green Beret vibes from Thunder Fox. It’s a run-and-stab shooter, mostly, but there are a lot of little side vignettes where you fly dopey-looking vehicles or ride them across the water. It’s, uh, not quite as good as, like, any number of games I could compare it to, but it’s also not awful.

It’s so unremarkable I’m having trouble thinking of anything else to say about it. Yeah, I guess we’ll leave it at that. It’s a pretty generic cross between Contra and Rush’n Attack.

Runark (Growl)

Weirdly, the title screen presents this game as Runark (the Japanese title), but when you launch it, it’s Growl (the international title). I guess it doesn’t matter since I don’t think there are any major differences beyond the title, but it struck me as a bit awkward.

In any case, Growl is a wild game. It’s a beat-’em-up where you play as a ranger trying to violently stop poachers. Up to four players can rip their shirts and join in, and it is chaos. Growl throws heaps of bad guys your way, and the rangers aren’t afraid to pick up guns to use them in the service of protecting animals. Just hordes of dudes and these women who are dressed like they’re using their bare legs to climb the corporate ladder.

Absolutely hilarious. You walk through a series of same-y backgrounds, freeing wild animals who will then assist you. Enemy limbs can be liberated from their bodies with a well-placed explosion. There are some incredibly funny digitized voice samples. It’s really not the best beat-’em-up, but it makes up for a lot of its deficiencies with its ludicrous premise.

Warrior Blade: Rastan Sage Episode 3

Taito really went all-out for the third game in the Rastan series. It was originally available as a double-monitor arcade cabinet, like Taito’s own Darius 2. The characters are huge, which, as I’ve already said, is the way arcade developers like to flex their graphical horsepower. And the sound and music were clearly mixed around the idea that you’d be sitting on a subwoofer.

Surprisingly (especially after playing the last game), it’s also quite decent. Rather than being an action platformer, it’s a straight belt-scrolling brawler. There are three characters to choose from, and you get to pick from four levels to decide your route through the game. The combat itself isn’t varied, so instead, you’re put through a lot of different set-piece levels where you ride on a dragon or fight while sliding down a hill. The hit detection is a lot more fair, and the bosses are huge.

Even more surprisingly, it isn’t all that difficult. That might be because the cabinets it would come in would often charge more than a dollar to play, but that didn’t stop Darius from being tough. Warrior Blade might not be the best beat-’em-up I’ve ever experienced, but it’s enjoyable in its own right and a welcome apology for Rastan Saga 2.

Dead Connection

Here’s an interesting one. Its inclusion is a special treat since, if I’m not mistaken, this is the first time that it’s been ported or re-released. It’s also a somewhat unique game, as it’s a single-screen shoot-’em-up where you run around movie set-like dioramas gunning down thugs. Apparently some FBI agents have had enough of crime and have decided to just take down Marlon Brando’s lackeys using whatever force necessary.

If I saw Dead Connection in an arcade or laundromat (and I never did), I’d definitely slot a quarter. There’s something captivating about the way it’s zoomed way back from the action. Your bullets tear through the scenery as enemies pop up behind cover. You’re free to roam as necessary to flank your foes or just explore.

The main downside is that aiming sucks. It’s eight-direction, and you need to rely on its auto-targeting since there’s no nuance between those directions. It’s also hard to tell when your shots are going to collide with obstacles, and sometimes, it feels like your bullets are lodging themselves into thin air. Enemies don’t have that issue, so you just have to keep diving to avoid incoming shots while trying your best to find good vectors. It can be a bit frustrating, but it’s something you get used to with repeated playthroughs.

I almost forgot to mention, the version here is the Japanese release. I don’t know why, but it means the text isn’t in English. This doesn’t matter when you’re in-game, but it does mean that the cutscenes are still in Japanese. That’s lame. It’s possible they’ll patch it on launch day, but I’m not certain.

The Collection

As it was last time, Taito Milestones 3 is actually just a collection of games in Hamster’s Arcade Archives series, some of which aren't yet available individually. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I don’t have much to complain about with Arcade Archives. Except maybe the price, and Taito Milestones 3 relieves that a bit by allowing you to buy in bulk.

But what I'm trying to stress is that the collection is a launcher for individual games with the Arcade Archives wrapper. It’s a bit awkward, especially since the emulator itself has gone through a few iterations, and that’s reflected here. They’re consistent enough, but some of them have a softening filter by default that you need to turn off if you want crisp pixels. Unlike an individual Arcade Archives release, you don’t get all the regional versions. This is the strangest when it comes to Growl, which is called Runark on the title screen, and Dead Connection, which, for some reason, uses the Japanese version. Weird stuff.

Despite that, I’m happy with this iteration of Taito Milestones. It’s nowhere near Capcom Arcade Stadium in terms of features and content, nor is it as robust as past collections like Taito Memories. But I’ve played enough sub-par collections recently that I’ve come to appreciate this level of care.

The post Review: Taito Milestones 3 appeared first on Destructoid.

There’s always been some debate around whether or not games are art, but in the late aughts and early ‘10s, some decided to really push for it. Sometimes, this resulted in kind of mostly successful experiments like Citizen Abel: Gravity Bone or Limbo, while other times we got more unfortunate, pretentious attempts like The Path.

It was a really insecure time for video games. We seemed to want some sort of permission to take this hobby seriously, so it’s like, collectively, as players and developers, we tried to prove video games were something they weren’t. Oh, they’re totally art. You can see that in games about flipping eggs and trimming hedges. But it’s more about harnessing the interactive element to get that piece of yourself across. A developer might try to capture how they think or see the world by asking you to live it. I’m not sure what The Path was supposed to say. Don’t do what you’re told?

We’ve largely moved past that, or at the very least, games that are 100% message have more of a purpose. A self-assuredness. It often feels more earnest and less pretentious. Which makes Miniatures something of a blast from the past.

Miniatures (PC [Reviewed], Switch, Mobile)
Developer: Other Tales Interactive
Publisher: Other Tales Interactive
Released: November 14th, 2024
MSRP: $5.99

Now, I’m not actually saying Miniatures is pretentious. No, I'm the pretentious one today. But, it’s at least making no mystery of the fact that it’s a digital art exhibit. What I mean is that it is only interactive-adjacent, and it is very art. I wouldn’t even call it narratively focused because the stories are pretty abstract. You’ll either connect with them, maybe just find them amusing, or maybe you won’t.

For me, it reminds me of extremely late nights of being bored in front of Teletoon. Nights when my parents were out, so I had free reign of the TV and could watch whatever bizarre concoction was on the station in the later hours.

Teletoon would often air things from The National Film Board of Canada, which was actually the butt of a Simpsons joke back in the day (not while they were still good). Very cultural stuff, but a lot of it was extremely strange. Sometimes, it would be something relaxingly amusing. Other times, it would be a piece of Canadiana, with the deepest of it being something from our aboriginal cultures. When you’re a pre-teen at 11 pm, it doesn’t matter what it was. Any attempt by an animation student to stretch their legs would hit like some sort of forbidden fever dream.

That’s what Miniatures took me back to; a decaffeinated Saturday night in my father’s La-Z-Boy. It’s four short chapters that sometimes make you poke the screen. On Switch and mobile, you can literally poke the screen, but here I was just poking it with my mouse pointer. Clicking, if you will.

I’m not trying to be dismissive, but the interactivity is very basic in Miniatures. One of the chapters has you trying to arrange a band of small sand-critters in a little sand-critter town in an extremely roundabout way. This was by far the most amusing one for me, as you largely press on places you think something should happen and then watch while that something happens. It’s well-animated and amusing, so that’s something.

There’s one where you pan the screen around to follow a story, and every so often, you need to click on something in the environment to uncover a trigger that allows you to move on. This one was my least favorite, not because of the lack of interactivity but because I didn’t connect with it. As far as I could see, it was a directionless story that wanted to look like it had something to say but didn’t say anything at all. Or maybe I just didn’t see the message.

As for the other two, I can at least understand what they’re trying to communicate, but I think a lot of Miniatures fails because it will elicit a feeling and then not do anything with it. They don't use that feeling to deliver any sort of message. These are short, short little chapters – miniature, if you will – so if they want you to just soak in the feeling, then there isn’t much time to do so. One strength in the artistic side of video games is that by having the player take part in something, you can hold their head beneath whatever you’re trying to convey, and when they're good and soaked, hit them with what you want to say. Miniatures neither has a point nor does it drown you for very long.

But, with those last two, I at least got the vibe they were putting down. One seemed to focus on childhood loneliness and discovery, while another gave a sense of tension and dread. I’ve found I’m typically able to pick up on subtext, even in games that aren’t taking an art-first approach, so I’m not deaf to what’s going on in Miniatures. I mostly have two problems. Number one: I don’t think it leverages the advantages of an interactive medium for conveying ideas. Number two: I don’t connect with the ideas that are here.

This makes it kind of hard to review a game like this because its effectiveness will vary from person to person, and I can’t speak to what you’ll feel. Maybe you’ll see yourself reflected in one or all of the games here. What I can say is that from an interactive standpoint, as well as a narrative one, I find Miniatures lacking. In comparison to other games that I would applaud for their contributions and approach to the art form, this wouldn’t be high on the list, but I wouldn’t throw it away wholesale, either.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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