Switch eShop Game Reviews
Review Wargroove 2 - A Must-Play Tactical RPG And A Worthy Successor To Advance Wars
Warfare has never been this cozy
2023 has been a good year for tactics games on the Switch. Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot marked the return of two classic GBA games while Fire Emblem Engage brought the series's focus to its strategic roots. Chucklefish and Robotality's Wargroove 2 is the next SRPG joining the fray, and while its adorable pixel-art...
Review TY The Tasmanian Tiger 4: Bush Rescue Returns - Aussie Platforming Legend Takes A 2D Turn
Fair dinkum, mate
Back when the 3D mascot was in its prime in the early noughties, Aussie developer Krome Studios' Ty the Tasmanian Tiger was going up against big shots like Mario, Sonic, and Crash Bandicoot thanks to the backing of third-party powerhouse Electronic Arts and, eventually, Call of Duty publisher Activision. TY would fall out of favour...
Mini Review Bud Spencer & Terence Hill - Slaps And Beans 2 - Basic Brawling But Fun For Fans
God Forgives… I Don’t
There’s going out on a limb and then there’s blind faith, and while the Bud & Terence games fall into the latter of the two, they are at least a labour of love. If you don’t know — and there’s a good chance you don’t — Bud Spencer and Terence Hill were a movie duo popularised in the '60s and '70s for their...
Review MythForce - A Decent Roguelite Buried By An Absolutely Dire Switch Port
MythFarce
With its bright, cel-shaded models and notably more tame environments, MythForce targets nostalgia for Saturday Morning cartoons from the 1980s like He-Man and Thundercats. A lot of people don't remember just how poorly a lot of those cartoons hold up, though. They have their die-hard fans, and they're fun to look back at with your tongue...
Review Trombone Champ - A Hilarious Party Game That Blows A Big Raspberry At Perfection
Night bird
The 17th-century German rationalist philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz wrote that “Perfection is the harmony of things.” If that’s the case then our discordant parping in Trombone Champ is far from perfect – despite the multipliers received on maxing out our 'Champ' gauge. But you don’t need to achieve perfection to enjoy...
Review F-Zero 99 - A Brilliant Battle-Royale Revival That Plays To The Series' Strengths
Got 99 problems, but F-Zero ain't one
What do you get when you take the first entry in one of Nintendo's most overlooked franchises and cram it with battle royale mechanics after nearly 20 years of dormancy? You might expect a shambling Frankenstein's monster of a game held together by nostalgia-baiting stagnancy. Instead, F-Zero 99 is a clever...
Mini Review The Many Pieces Of Mr. Coo - Short, Obtuse, But Spectacularly Presented
Surreal Madrid
Games have, over their history, often sought to become interactive movies or cartoons. There is the general decades-long race towards realism in Triple-A games running on higher and higher-specced hardware, the labour-intensive, hand-drawn aesthetic of many indie games like Cuphead or Hoa and, of course, that art form traditionally...
Mini Review Raindrop Sprinters - A Compellingly Pure (And Brutal) Arcade Throwback
Crying's not for me
In the most positive sense, it’s amazing what gets approved for release on the Switch. Raindrop Sprinters is an indie title that could well be a mobile phone game in everything except its aesthetic, which accurately resembles an early '80s arcade title. You play a cat represented by a bobbing paw, tasked only with crossing a...
Mini Review Summum Aeterna - A Rough-And-Ready Roguelite That Gets The Job Done
More than the sum of its parts
Summum Aeterna, a prequel to 2022’s Aeterna Noctis, riffs on a Dead Cells-style genre fusion, mixing roguelite elements into the tough Metroidvania structure of its predecessor fo
Mini Review Full Void - A Tight Tribute That Falls Just Short Of Cinematic Greatness
Another Another World
Full Void, a narrative platforming puzzle game from London indie studio OutOfTheBit Ltd, wears its love of cinematic platformer classics on its sleeve. Bringing along core gameplay ideas from early entries in the genre, it mixes in some modern influences and introduces a few new ideas of its own. You play as a hoody-up teen on...
Review Pokémon Scarlet & Violet - The Teal Mask - DLC That Offers More, But Not Enough
Matcha the mood
As a series, Pokémon is one that has held onto tradition pretty firmly. In the 25+ years since Red & Blue’s release, the fundamentals of the game haven’t really changed – you explore a world, you fight Pokémon, you catch Pokémon. Last year’s Pokémon Scarlet & Violet was the mainline series’ first big attempt to...
Review Mugen Souls Z - Way Too Wordy, With Long Gaps Between The Fun Bits
We hope you like walls of endless text
Gaming often takes itself entirely too seriously. There aren’t enough games that embrace ridiculous, silly ideas and run with them without coming across as shallow and one-note. Mugen Souls Z half succeeds at this; its opening scene includes a spaceship transforming into a giant robot for an epic space battle...
Review Gunbrella - Witty, Winsome Action-Platforming With A Great Hook
Rain 'n' gun
Gunbrella opens, as so many noirs do, with a murder. Our protagonist, who goes unnamed until the second act of the game, sees his house aflame while he’s on his way back from gathering mushrooms. He rushes home to a gruesome, albeit pixelated, scene: his wife dead in a shock of blood. From there, we jump right into our hero’s...
Review 30XX - Excellent Mega Man X-Style Run 'N' Gunning, With A Roguelite Twist
Zero to hero
Though Capcom hasn’t necessarily abandoned the Mega Man brand as a whole, it’s indisputably reduced how often it produces new games in that celebrated franchise. For example, it’s been 19 years since the last new Mega Man X release (and let’s be real, X8 was a rough entry to end on), but that series now lives on in the efforts...
Review WrestleQuest - A Wholesome RPG That Struggles In The Ring
Toys with dreams of wrestling greatness
If you’ve ever had the oddly specific dream of rising through the ranks of a toy-based wrestling world, then you’re in luck. WrestleQuest enters the ring with a deadly combo of late-'80s wrestling nostalgia and mid-'90s JRPG mechanics, celebrating both while not quite managing to deliver the three-count at...
Review Thunder Ray - Imperfect But Beautiful, Bloody, 'Punch-Out!!'-Inspired Pugilism
Punching up
Nintendo’s Punch-Out!! was one of the most iconic arcade and console fixtures of the early '80s, migrating from coin-op to the NES, where it was remoulded as Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out!! and bestowed a Rocky-esque narrative around up-and-coming challenger Little Mac. Since Super Punch Out!! and the Wii’s original entry, however, it’s...
Review Chants Of Sennaar - Enchanting Anthro-Puzzling With A Side Of Frustration
Chants of Sennarrgh
Your character wakes up in a sarcophagus. At first blush, you seem alone as you guide your cloaked character, wandering through gorgeously rendered arches and passageways. At last, you chance upon another person. Finally! A chance to absorb some exposition about what the heck's going on. Maybe you'll even get a quest! Not quite...
Review Fae Farm - A Thoughtful, Utterly Gorgeous Farm Sim, But Avoid The NPCs
Farming, fishing, friendship... faeries?!
Let's cut to the chase. You're here because you've most likely got a hankering for another farming-type game in your life. In fact, you've probably played most of them already, from Stardew to Harvestella, and you've most likely been burned a few times by games that didn't quite scratch the itch. Now, you're...
Review Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge - Dimension Shellshock - Totally Tubular DLC
(rock)Steady, this is another (be)bop
When we first got our hands on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge last year, we were by no means of the impression that the game was lacking in the content department — this is, after all, what we deemed to be "the best Turtles scrolling beat 'em up ever". A little over a year later, the game's...
Review The Making Of Karateka - A Great Start For Digital Eclipse's Gold Master Series
Everybody Do The Kiba-Dachi
Digital Eclipse, following on from Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection, is continuing its trend of going back to the past to rekindle the games that kicked ass. While the Cowabunga Collection was wrapped in comic book paraphernalia and finished with a lick of...
Rayman is raving
2017’s Mario + Rabbids Kingdom Battle had one of the best DLCs we’ve ever seen a game starring Mario receive. The Donkey Kong Adventure story expansion saw Donkey Kong and Rabbid Cranky team up with Rabbid Peach to take on tons of reworked enemies and tons of tight, tactical challenges. It proved Ubisoft knew how to make a...
Review Sea Of Stars - An Instant Classic, So Much More Than A Chrono Trigger Throwback
Your wish is granted
About five years ago, a no-name studio called Sabotage wowed audiences when it put out The Messenger, a creative and innovative action platformer that quickly set itself apart from the deluge of similar retro-flavored titles releasing in the indie space. Empowered by that game’s deserved success, the team then began work on...
Review Bomb Rush Cyberfunk - Bleeding Cool Style But Always In Jet Set's Shadow
A turf battle against nostalgia
Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is an immensely conflicting outing that capitalizes on nostalgia by drawing water from the same punk-as-hell city tap as Jet Set Radio. Sometimes the cup runs over. Others, rusted pipes bleed into the water, poisoning the experience. Jet Set Radio casts a low-poly shadow over any game about street...
Review Shotgun King: The Final Checkmate - Chess With Guns? Definitely Worth A Shot
"We will send unto them... only you"
Chess is one of the most ancient games in existence, and while we continue to eagerly await the fabled release of the completely real Chess 2, it can be fun to see how modern game makers choose to iterate on the classic design. In Shotgun King, the latest release from Headbang Club and developer Punkcake...
Mini Review Xtreme Sports - A Switch Return For Some Gnarly But Limited GBC Minigames
California dreaming
2D sports titles have had their place since Konami’s Track & Field rattled arcade screws loose with its fiercely competitive button rapping. WayForward’s Xtreme Sports draws influence from California Games, a summery seaside boardwalk of hip events and addictive tap-a-thons. You have two characters to choose from, dude or...
Review Red Dead Redemption - A Fine But No-Frills Switch Port, For A Fistful Of Dollars
For a few dollars more
Cast your tired minds all the way back through the mists of time to the year 2010. It was a truly great 12 months for video games, with the likes of Super Mario Galaxy 2, the best Mass Effect – AKA Mass Effect 2 – and the juggernaut that is Xenoblade Chronicles all arriving on the scene. It was also the year that David...
Review Blasphemous 2 - Bloody, Brutal, And Even More Brilliant Than Its Predecessor
A right rollicking resurrection
We're big fans of 2019's Blasphemous, The Game Kitchen's exquisitely dark and gory action-platformer that saw players assume the role of The Penitent One as he faced off against the eternally damned Denizens of Cvstodia. With top-notch hack-and-slash action, grotesque bosses, an intricately animated pixel art style...
Review The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood - A Bewitching Narrative Deckbuilder
Shuffle the hand of Fate
Note: The review text below makes only very brief mention of this game's heavy themes without going into detail, but please note that this game contains references to suicide and self-harm. The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood is the latest gem from Deconstructeam (The Red Strings Club) and it’s a spellbinding narrative...
Review Vampire Survivors - Kiss Healthy Sleep Goodbye With This Must-Play Roguelike
Something to sink your teeth into
Vampire Survivors is a singular game. Kind of a roguelike, kind of an arcade game, kind of a bullet hell, but at the same time nothing like what you probably think of when those genres come to mind. After all, there's a reason it captured the hearts and minds of gamers and won handfuls of awards on other platforms...
Mini Review Flutter Away - An Ephemeral Indie With A Dash Of Pokémon Snap
Flutter bye
Over the past few years, there’s been a rise in ‘cozy’ games popping up in the indie space, offering an alternative to the typically achievement-based design of pretty much everything else. While these games do require a different mindset due to their generally short nature and simplistic gameplay, there’s something to be said...
