Latest Reviews
Review Namco Museum Archives Vol 1 - A Great Way To Rediscover Namco's Classic NES Titles
A fun dig dug through the vaults
There has now officially been more Namco Museum games over the years than there are actual museums in the world (probably). There’s even one already on the Switch: simply titled Namco Museum, it contains 10 classic Namco arcade games as well as a port of the GameCube title Pac-Man Vs. At first glance, then, Namco...
Mini Review Jump Rope Challenge - A Noble Attempt To Get Switch Owners Active
Jump up in lockdown
Reviewing and putting a score on a free game that’s been created in a limited environment with the sole purpose of helping the public improve their physical well being during a global pandemic is… well, it’s a tough one. Do you critically analyse it and pick apart its faults and limitations? Or do you simply view it for...
Sweet victory
The 3D platformer was very much a ‘fad’ genre back in the day, as game companies all over the world figured out ways to get their colourful mascot collecting all sorts of MacGuffins strewn around big playgrounds. During this era, a game based on the popular SpongeBob SquarePants show was released called SpongeBob SquarePants:...
Mini Review Pokémon Smile - You've Gotta Brush 'Em All
"Mee-outh, that's white"
Brushing your teeth is boring. It’s dull when you’re an adult and it’s even worse when you’re a kid, because you’d really rather be playing with your Thunderbirds toys or Cabbage Patch Dolls, or whatever cross-media property young people are into these days (look, we don’t know, we haven’t been kids for a...
Review Invisible, Inc. Nintendo Switch Edition - Beautifully Accessible Turn-Based Tactics
You can't see me, the time is now
We're tempted to give Invisible, Inc. an instant 10/10 for its pun-tastic title. That is truly good stuff. Unfortunately "giving ten out of ten for liking the name of a game" is on the secret journalists' charter of Things You Don't Do Ever, so we have to measure our praise. Thankfully, not much measuring will be...
Review Warborn - Solid But Unspectacular Advance Wars-Style Action
Unadvanced Wars
Raredrop Games' Warborn is a traditional turn-based tactics affair that takes the thoroughly tried and tested gameplay of the likes of Advance Wars – and, more recently, Wargroove – and adds great big sexy Gundam-esque mechanised robots and a generous dollop of '90s-style overwrought anime backstory to the mix. Fans of the genre...
Heaven is a race on Earth
If there’s one genre of gaming where the Switch is arguably lacking, it’s open-world racing. In fairness, that’s because there aren’t too many of them in general, but whereas other systems have their Forza Horizons, Need For Speeds and The Crews, the Switch is almost entirely bereft of free-roaming driving. That...
Review Pokémon Sword & Shield - The Isle of Armor - A New Wild Area Worthy Of Your Interest
Fits the base game to a TT
Whenever a series attempts DLC for the first time, you’re sure to find a select few individuals pining for the olden days when you got a whole game in a single package – conveniently forgetting the fact that Street Fighter II had no less than seven different iterations – but if a game sells well and there’s enough...
Review Ruiner - An Exceptionally Stylish, Brutal And Bloody Top-Down Shooter
Get them, Puppy!
Originally released back in September of 2017, Reikon Games' Ruiner is an ultra-stylish, ultra-violent isometric action affair than flings its players unceremoniously into the role of a nameless, faceless cyborg assassin on the trail of his missing brother in the future metropolis of Rengkok. This is Hotline Miami filtered through...
Review Demon's Tier+ - A Pacy Roguelite Which Comes Alive With Two Players
"You may be a king or a little street sweeper..."
We had to restart Demon's Tier+ from scratch. Not in the sense that it's a roguelike – we mean literally deleted our save data. Over and over again we journeyed into the depths of its randomly-generated gauntlets of monsters, spikes, explosions and the Reaper himself; we slaughtered enemy after...
Review Summer In Mara - Alluring Presentation Hides A Fundamentally Flawed Adventure
A bit of a shipwreck
In February of last year, a promising project called Summer in Mara was released on Kickstarter. Appearing as something of a cross between The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker and the Harvest Moon games, many fans were quickly enamoured by the cute art style and seemingly wholesome story. A little over a year later, Summer in...
Mini Review Poopdie - Chapter One - Like Poop, Butts And PewDiePie? Then You're In Luck!
Everyone else, not so much...
At first glance, Poopdie - Chapter One is an enormous rip-off. Every aspect of its presentation calls to mind Edmund McMillen and Florian Himsl's seminal roguelike The Binding of Isaac. Taking a step back, we gave it a second glance, and yep – this game wants to bite Isaac's style so hard it's on the verge of drawing...
Mini Review Super Toy Cars 2 - A Cute Racer Saddled With Technical And Balancing Problems
Diminutive returns
Racing around everyday domestic environments in dinky toy cars isn't a fresh concept for Switch owners. Not only have we already had the original Super Toy Cars, but Table Top Racing: World Tour - Nitro Edition, too. Super Toy Cars 2 doesn't exactly have novelty on its side, then. Unfortunately, it doesn't have an awful lot else...
Mini Review Awesome Pea 2 - Old-School Challenge With Vintage Visuals To Match
Tricky petit pois
Awesome Pea 2 is a simple game. In an effort to pay homage to retro titles, it’s a 2D platformer from developer Pigeon Dev Games that completely lacks any semblance of plot, but more than makes up for this with immediately engaging, addictive gameplay and fun visual effects. You play as, well… a pea, and must navigate a series...
Review Rigid Force Redux - This Will Tide You Over Until R-Type Final 2 Arrives On Switch
R you my Type?
By the time the fifth generation of hardware arrived, 3D polygons in video games were nothing new. What changed was the available home consoles' power to manipulate them, forcing developers to adapt and evolve. Overnight, hundreds of 2D game series had full-3D makeovers with mixed success, but for the humble shmup, the move was more...
Mini Review Potata: Fairy Flower - A Welcome Change Of Puzzle-Platforming Pace
Potato, Potata
Potata: Fairy Flower is a whimsical platformer in which you take on the role of a novice witch who must venture away from the safety of her home and into the dangerous surrounding woods. There, you’ll encounter creatures big and small, procure weapons, fruit, and keys, and solve a variety of different puzzles as you explore...
Review Arcade Archives Sunset Riders - Japan's Take On The Wild West Is A Must-Have On Switch
Yee-haw!
Well, it's about time. Not officially available anywhere since making its arcade bow (outside of the well-intentioned but obviously weaker home ports on the SNES and Mega Drive, at least), Konami's phenomenally good Western-themed run n' gun Sunset Riders has finally been re-released as part of Hamster's superb Arcade Archives line. The...
Review Adam's Venture: Origins - Uncharted For Switch? You've Got To Be Kidding
Nothin' Drake
Oof. There's no reason to beat around the bush with this one; Adam's Venture: Origins is an ugly, ugly game. In fact, graphically, it's one of the worst-looking titles we've ever seen on the Switch. It's muddy, glitchy and aesthetically dull. There's constant shimmering, shockingly blurry low-resolution graphics, appalling textures and...
Review Project Warlock - A Fantastic Tribute To The Very Best '90s FPS Classics
Retro Witchcraft
Originally released on PC back in October of 2018 and the brainchild of high school student Jakub Cislo – who saw his game through several early iterations before putting together the small team that make up Buckshot Software in order to get things polished to the standard we see here – Project Warlock is very obviously a true...
Review Do Not Feed The Monkeys - An Enjoyably Oddball Adventure Laced With Real Tension
The human zoo
Voyeurism isn't a theme that's new to video games. In fact, one of the most controversial games in the history of the medium was the Mega CD's Night Trap (now available on Switch in remastered form, incidentally), a game ostensibly about watching people through cameras. And now, here's Do Not Feed The Monkeys with a very similar...
Review Synaptic Drive - A Fun But Bare-Bones Custom Robo Successor
Customless Robo
Delve in the uncomfortably long list of Nintendo game series published in Japan that never really had a chance to shine in the West, and you will undoubtedly stumble upon Custom Robo. This game series developed by NOISE began on Nintendo 64, offering tight solo and multiplayer arena fighting action with customizable robots. The...
Review BioShock: The Collection - Three Of The Best Single-Player Shooters Ever, All In One Place
"Would you kindly...?"
It’s rather fascinating to see how the first-person shooter genre, which began as a mostly single-player thing, has gone on over the years to become much more focused on multiplayer. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, but it’s a little disappointing to see memorable, narrative-driven adventures tossed aside in...
Review Skelattack - A Likeable Platformer Suffering From A Bit Of An Identity Crisis
Dem bones, dem dry bones
Skeletons are brilliant. Their clickety-clacking, rattle-me-bone structures are unambiguously fun to look at, and – best of all – no matter how terrible the fate of the fleshy prison surrounding a skeleton, they always look really happy. It's always a treat to dive into a game like Skelattack that features skeletons so...
Mini Review Game Tengoku CruisinMix Special - Jaleco's Answer To Parodius Flies Again
Mix and match
Jaleco might not be as well-known as the likes of Capcom and Konami with today's gamers, but it was big enough company back in the '90s to create its own parody shooter, taking inspiration from the likes of Parodius and Star Parodier. The result was Game Tengoku – or Game Paradise, as it's also known – which hit arcades back in...
Review Space Invaders: The Invincible Collection - 40 Years Of History In One Package
Invaders Must Die
Considering we have been shooting them out of our virtual skies for entertainment over the past forty-two years, any sentient extra-terrestrial life form might not be too keen to drop in to say “Hello!” these days, and with good reason – Tomohiro Nishikado's original 1978 Space Invaders didn't just kickstart a cultural...
Mini Review Indiecalypse - A Deeply Unpleasant Game About Games
That joke isn't funny any more
Humour is highly subjective, so we're quite willing to concede that you might – might – find Indiecalypse hilarious. We only wish we could say that you'll find it fun to play with the same level of confidence. This bawdy adventure sees you taking control of three nerds as they bid to make a video game. It's a...
Review Minecraft Dungeons - A Simple Action RPG That Relies Too Heavily On The Minecraft Name
Block party
Minecraft has become an institution since its inception as a humble indie game, having since become the best-selling video game ever while also solidifying a new genre that’s been iterated on countless times in the years since it released. It would stand to reason that a brand with that kind of power would go on to generate all kinds...
Mini Review Fly Punch Boom! - A Fantastically Frantic Fighter That Barely Gives You Time To Think
Superpowered Smash Bros.
You're not ready for Fly Punch Boom. No really, you're not. You might think you were born to play a game that essentially throws you into an anime royal rumble, but neither your eyes nor your reactions are up to the task. Not yet. It's going to take time to acclimatise to Fly Punch Boom's level of madcap hyper-kinetic...
Review Borderlands Legendary Collection - A Triple-Helping Of Classic FPS Action
Three tickets to the gun show
It's safe to say you've probably already played Borderlands in some form. The open-world looter-shooter franchise has made an appearance on pretty much every console since the original game released in 2009. This isn't even the series' first appearance on a portable system – Borderlands 2 saw release on the...
Review The Outer Worlds - Obsidian's Fallout-Style RPG Is Worth A Look On Switch
Halcyon Days
Obsidian's The Outer Worlds was very well received when it originally launched back in October of 2019; it's a satirical and darkly humorous RPG that takes the first-person Fallout experience and blasts it into orbit. However, as much as it has in common with the Fallout games, it's also very much its own distinct affair; a remarkably...
