Author Profile
Kerry has contributed to publications such PC Gamer, Retro Gamer and Sega Forever, and runs her own site, Kimimi The Game Eating She Monster.
Mini Review Gynoug (Switch) - Switch Takes Another Fine Shmup Under Its Wing
Flappy bird[man]
It’s obvious from the moment you start Gynoug that this is another release from the same team that recently re-gifted the world Gleylancer, presenting players as it does with the same options using the same interface, just with a different Mega Drive shmup running underneath it all. This is great. As we mentioned in our other...
Soapbox Can We Please Retire The Phrase 'Lazy Devs' Already?
A tough job under difficult circumstances
There’s one magic word that gets trotted out all the time in this hobby, a handy term used to describe all digital ills — lazy. ‘How did this bleh of a game end up on the eShop?’ ‘Who couldn’t be bothered to finish this puzzle / minigame / character’s face properly?’ ‘How much more effort...
Review Blazing Rangers (NES) - A New NES Game In 2021? Youbetcha, And It's A Good 'Un
Toasty!
Gaming is not short of NES-like experiences these days; titles filled with 8-bit-style blocky pixels, beepy music, and some controllable character for you to take from the left side of the screen to the right. These games tend to chase the past from a comfortable distance, the harsh technical restrictions of almost 40 years ago something to...
Feature The Scariest Game On Every Nintendo Home Console
Almost forty years of fear
“Family friendly” is a term often used to describe anything and everything Nintendo touches, but we all know better than that, don’t we? The famous Japanese card maker’s consoles have been knee-deep in the dead for as long as they’ve existed. So! In the spirit of this spookiest of seasons we’ve selected some...
Review Cotton Guardian Force Saturn Tribute (Switch) - Great Games Let Down By Poor Ports
A slightly troublesome trio of tributes
This trio of retro shmups — Cotton 2, Cotton Boomerang and Guardian Force — have released under the “Saturn Tribute” umbrella (bundled together on a physical cartridge in Japan that's recently been announced for the West, or available individually via your local eShop at the time of wr
Mini Review Gleylancer (Switch) - A Brilliant 16-Bit Shmup Sparkles With Mod Cons
Stick to it and believe in your power!
Retro re-releases falling outside the familiar safety of the M2, Hamster, or Code Mystics stables are usually one thing and one thing alone — a plain ROM bundled with some inoffensive but unspectacular emulation options. It’ll work, it’ll be official, and... that’s about it. If those bland goals had...
Soapbox What Makes A Game A Good Metroidvania Anyway?
Similar differences can make the genre hard to pin down
You’d be forgiven for thinking that nothing could be simpler than working out the secret formula that binds all of the great games in this popular genre together — the clue’s in the name! They need to be just like Metroid, with all the shooting and the aliens and the sci-fi-ness and the...
Review Espgaluda II (Switch) - Localisation Issues Can't Spoil This Superb Shmup
There’s a fly in the full extent of the jam
Espgaluda II’s originally a 2005 arcade game by legendary developer Cave, responsible for the already-released Switch ports of Mushihimesama and Progear (via Capcom Arcade Stadium), the upcoming Deathsmiles I & II collection, and before that a string of high-quality arcade shmups stretching all the...
Feature Game Boy Games We Probably Won’t See On Nintendo Switch Online
Custom cart complications
Rumours abound that Game Boy games are finally coming to Nintendo Switch Online and we’ve been busy daydreaming about all the classic games we might be able to play again — and all the ones we won’t too. The record-shattering dominance of
Talking Point It's A Golden Era For Video Game Music Fans, So How Do You Listen?
When you're not playing the games, obvs
Being a fan of Nintendo-based video game music has historically been pretty tough. Older aural aficionados would cling tightly to their Killer Cuts CDs, dedicated collectors wept at the triple-digit pricing of rare Japanese CD sets containing most, but never quite all, of a popular '90s RPG soundtrack, and...
Soapbox Spin-Offs Can Be A Way In Rather Than A Sell-Out
Playable windows into other worlds
Ah, spin-offs. The cynical shareholder-approved cash-grab created for a series that’s got a little too big for its boots. The desperate last-ditch attempt at trendy relevance for a fading favourite. A shoddily resurrected IP’s woefully undercooked stab at attracting a new audience. They’re the “Grandma...
Soapbox Nintendo Switch Online's Library Is A Snapshot Of '90s Gaming Shelves
Nintendo took its rose-tinted specs and threw them in the bin
Another trio of classic games have just been announced for Nintendo’s subscriber-only Virtual Console replacement, this time Claymates, Jelly Boy, and Bombuzal. They all have one very special thing in common: They’re all games nobody asked for, and nobody wanted. Nintendo could have...
Matters Of Import Fuuraiki 4 Is The Perfect Holiday For People Who Can't Go On Holiday
A write good ride
Fuuraiki 4 is a recently released “travel adventure” for the Switch (and PlayStation 4), and the latest entry in a series that debuted on the original PlayStation all the way back to 2001. The game casts you in the role of a writer travelling around the Gifu region of Japan during the summer, aiming to outperform your peers in...
Soapbox Super Metroid Showed Me I Had The Right To Exist
Samus & Me
My first experience with the Metroid series was relatively unremarkable: I just bought Super Metroid for my SNES, back when a brand new SNES game was something you could just walk into a local shop and buy. I took its oversized box home, flipped through the glossy Player’s Guide, and noticed something odd — Samus Aran, the...
Soapbox Why Harvest Moon 2 GBC Is Still The Best Farming Game Around
Less is more
We recently published our reader-ranked top 50 Game Boy Color games, and we've taking a look back at a handful of our favourite GBC carts. Today, Kerry reminisces about her very favourite farming sim... There have been a lot of Harvest Moon games ove
Feature More Than Just Pokémon - Japan’s Secret World Of Game Boy Color
Hidden handheld happiness
The Game Boy Color was the immensely popular home of a wide range of handheld classics, from multi-million sellers such as Pokémon Gold and Silver and Link’s Awakening DX to the now painfully expensive Metal Gear Solid, not to mention the non-Color original Game Boy library it play
Soapbox Resident Evil Gaiden Is Good, Actually
“Good luck Barry”
We recently asked you Nintendo Life readers to rate your favourite Game Boy Color games, and as we're preparing to publish the Top 50 results, we're taking a look back at a handful of our favourite GBC games. Here, Kerry defends the Resident Evil game that NL readers voted the worst in the series... A long time ago we were...
Soapbox After 17 Years, Monster Hunter Rise Finally Made Me Kind Of Competent
Rising up
Soapbox features enable our individual writers to voice their own opinions on hot topics, opinions that may not necessarily be the voice of the site. Today, Kerry looks at how Capcom's latest Monster Hunter game empowered her for the first time to feel adequately skilled when it comes to hunting big ol' monsters... I have been terrible...
Feature Resident Evil At 25 - A Shambling Corpse Never Felt More Alive
It just won’t die
It’s now been twenty-five years since S.T.A.R.S. members Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield first burst through the front doors of the Spencer Mansion and found themselves standing in one of gaming’s most iconic opening areas. Resident Evil’s fixed camera angles revealed the full scale of that grand hall, as well as the...
Guide Best GBA / Game Boy Advance RPGs
Advance to portable adventure
The SNES-like power of Nintendo’s GBA made it the perfect home for a fascinating collection of convenient ports of older favourites as well as enhanced remakes and all-new titles, running the gamut from colourful adventures to carefully woven tales of revenge and war. The list below represents what we think are some...
Feature A Brief History Of Nintendo’s Home Hardware Add-Ons
A multi-format menagerie
Nintendo’s handheld console upgrades were so common for so long you could practically set your watch by them: the leap from Game Boy to Game Boy Color via the Pocket; the GBA’s evolution from its original battery powered form to the blazing intensity of the Micro’s beautiful screen; the more recent range of DSis, XL
Guide Best SNES / Super Nintendo RPGs
Flame spells at the ready!
The expansive software library of Nintendo’s 16-bit powerhouse wasn’t short of any of the most popular genres of the '90s, and perhaps least of all RPGs. Intense strategy, whimsical adventure, tear-jerking goodbyes to characters you’ve spent months with… the SNES has it all. And that makes compiling a list of ten...
Feature Forget Saving Hyrule, Zelda: Ocarina of Time Is All About Fishing For Me
Lure of the wild
To celebrate the 35th anniversary of The Legend of Zelda, we're running a series of features looking at a specific aspect — a theme, character, mechanic, location, memory or something else entirely — from each of the mainline Zelda games. Today, Kerry admits that she didn't always stick to the proposed path when playing one of...
Feature After Fire Emblem And Famicom Detective Club, What Comes Next From Nintendo's Vault?
Raiders Of The Lost Games
Between the eclectic selection of NES and SNES games served up as part of everyone’s Nintendo Switch Online subscription, Fire Emblem's long-awaited (if time-limited) English language release thirty years after its Japanese debut, and the upcoming remake of their Disc System adventure game Famicom Detective Club, it
