Switch eShop, Switch Game Reviews scoring 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 or 6/10
Review Arcade Archives 10-Yard Fight (Switch eShop)
8-16-Nintendo 64. Set… Hut-Hut-FUMBLE!?
American Football! We don’t ‘get it’ on this side of the pond, but that’s okay because we do know that the sport translates to excellent video games. However, translating the action of gridiron to the hardware available in 1983 was no easy feat. Irem took on this task and the end result was the very...
Marriage or mirage?
Deadbeat drug dealer Butch wakes up in the trunk of a car and climbs out into a top-down urban hellscape. It’s up to him, with the help of his mysterious handler ‘Anaconda’, to battle through the Garage, an underground mall formerly owned by shady corporation Smith Investments. Cue horrific encounters with mutated vermin,...
Review Timberman VS (Switch eShop)
Timber!
Timberman VS is Digital Melody's Switch enhancement of its free-to-play arcade title first released on Android and iOS devices in 2014 (and eventually ported across to Steam in 2015). If the name wasn't already enough of an indication, it's a game about chopping trees as fast as you can until your hands hurt. Given its mobile roots, the...
Review Cast Of The Seven Godsends (Switch eShop)
Hellspawned
Raven Travel Studios clearly has a lot of love for classic 16-bit platform games, but can its old school platform homage to Super Ghouls’n’Ghosts possibly live up to the source material or even stand up to the best among the current Switch library? Gods be with us. The Kingdom of Dareca is about to fall to Emperor Zaraaima. Prince...
Review Bouncy Bob (Switch eShop)
Weebles wobble but Bouncy Bob trips and falls
There’s something to be said about the simple things in life. Every now and then, the uncomplicated and downright straightforward is greeted with open arms - especially when it comes to video games. As gamers, a lot of us have grown accustomed to memorising finicky controls that, when a title has...
Review Asdivine Hearts (Switch eShop)
Shock to the heart
Kemco’s prolific JRPG output was a staple of the 3DS and Wii U eShops, and continues apace on the Switch, with the initial release of last year’s Revenant Saga followed by Dragon Sinker and now Asdivine Hearts. A port of a 2014 mobile release by Exe Create, Asdivine Hearts is an old-school JRPG that’s entirely competent but...
Review Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 02: Robot Kit (Switch)
Robot rock
Nintendo is clearly in for the long haul when it comes to Labo. The first pack – dubbed the 'Variety Kit' – is all about exploring the possibilities of Labo via a range of different 'Toy-Con' builds; it's an effective demonstration of just how versatile this system is, even if the resultant flood of cardboard contraptions...
Review Arcade Archives Ninja-Kid (Switch eShop)
The kid is alright
The online leaderboards that HAMSTER includes with their retro releases provide some replay value as you compare (then try to improve) your point-scoring against players from around the globe. They work better in some games than others and they work particular well with old arcade titles, where in lieu of an ending sequence to...
Review Ghost Pilots (Switch eShop / Neo Geo)
Eject! Eject!
SNK may be famous for its fighting games, but in 1991 the Japanese firm decided that it wanted a piece of the 'shmup' pie that Capcom had been munching all to itself thanks its superb 194X series of WW2-themed shooters. Using a 4:3 ratio and replacing the more classic WW2 propeller planes with generic seaplanes, Ghost Pilots...
Review Zotrix: Solar Division (Switch eShop)
Star command
From wars to foxes, there’s nothing like a good old battle among the stars. In the wake of more cinematic titles such as Manticore: Galaxy on Fire and the upcoming Everspace, Zotrix: Solar Division has snuck on to the eShop in an attempt to carve out its own hybrid take on intergalactic altercations. A hostile alien race known as...
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"You ain’t outta control, you ain’t in control"
Picture the nightmarish scenes on a race track if the cars didn’t have brakes. Chaos would most certainly ensue. This is the basis of the Switch eShop title, Brakes Are For Losers. It’s a classic top-down arcade racer for up to eight people featuring cars that obviously don’t have any brakes...
Review Pirates: All Aboard! (Switch eShop)
Straight to Davy Jones’ Locker
Few game concepts are as timelessly cool as pirates. From the tongue-in-cheek mystery of The Secret of Monkey Island to the open-ocean warfare of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, a pirate’s life is definitely for us. It doesn’t, however, make you a great game by proxy. Slapping the word ‘pirate’ in your...
Review Gururin (Switch eShop / Neo Geo)
Hell is other people
Neo Geo fans never had to look far when feeling the need to get on some puzzle action in order to take a break from all the fighting, thanks to many an excellent offering from Taito and Data East. But even nowadays, Gururin remains the odd puzzler out. So why did Face’s 1994 offering leave no mark in MVS history? At its...
Review Shelter Generations (Switch eShop)
Lynx to the past
Charm goes an awful long way in gaming, partly because it's often in such short supply. Many a mechanically sound shooter or platformer has fallen at the final hurdle by being hard to warm to. Shelter Generations doesn't suffer from such a problem. It's absolutely lovely to behold, with charm practically oozing out of every pore (or...
Review The Way Remastered (Switch eShop)
The way we were
Originally released for PC back in 2016, The Way’s Kickstarter success was fuelled by an affection for iconic puzzle-platformers Another World and Flashback. Those Delphine Software games appeared on multiple platforms in the early '90s and drew attention with cinematic narratives and a distinctive art style. Following an...
Bare-bones
If you’re already a fan of the Gal*Gun series then you’ll likely have a pretty firm idea of what this game is all about; if you’re not, you’ll still probably have a pretty good idea based on the screenshots and artwork currently covering this page. Gal*Gun 2 is actually the fourth entry in this fantasy, over-the-top world, with a...
Review Masters Of Anima (Switch eShop)
The more the merrier
It’s no secret or surprise that Nintendo fans are longing for the next instalment in the Pikmin series. Hey! Pikmin on 3DS was met with outspoken, lukewarm reactions from fans as Nintendo unexpectedly steered it down the 2D platformer path last year. Masters Of Anima, however, might be the game to scratch the micro-minion,...
Review Devious Dungeon (Switch eShop)
We're going deeper underground
There’s something to be said for a game with a simple concept. A piece of software that knows what it does, does that thing well and never tries to be anything else. It’s both a comforting constant and a reminder of just how grander and deeper said game could be if it mixed its recipe up a little bit more. It’s...
Review ClusterPuck 99 (Switch eShop)
Puck shop
Since its inception, the Switch eShop has developed a strong library of smaller-sized games ideal for short play sessions in between bigger releases. Many of these titles happen to be multiplayer games. ClusterPuck 99 – developed by PHL Collective and published by Coatsink – is exactly that, a compact arcade conversion of ice hockey...
Review Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists And The Mysterious Paintings (Switch)
Wrapping up the trilogy
Note. In April 2021, Koei Tecmo released Atelier Lydie & Suelle: The Alchemists and the Mysterious Paintings DX and subsequently delisted the original version of the game on the Switch eShop that this review refers to. While the bulk of the information will still be relevant, it's worth keeping in mind that the review...
Review World Heroes 2 Jet (Switch eShop / Neo Geo)
Woo-oo-oo oo-oo-ooo
Unsurprisingly, World Heroes 2 Jet is a lot like the regular World Heroes 2. Utilising the same two-button setup (one punch, one kick; hold for a stronger attack), the same 14 playable characters return along with two newcomers: the clawed Jack and halberd-wielding Ryofu. There’s also been a speed bump and the addition of...
THIS. IS. SPARTAAAAAA!
The legacy of King Leonidas is once again subject to adaptation, but this time instead of a historical epic based around the Battle of Thermopylae, you've got an arcade platformer that promises to test your mettle among your Spartan peers. But will you be kicking your Switch down the pit instead of Persian emissaries?...
Review Arcade Archives Star Force (Switch eShop)
A shooter from older and tougher times
Released in 1984, Star Force sticks you in control of a space ship as you go through levels blasting a variety of enemy types. Yes, it’s yet another retro shmup on Switch, this time set across 25 levels and offering quite a stripped down shooting experience. In Arcade Archives Star Force your ship (the Final...
Review Gekido Kintaro's Revenge (Switch eShop)
Advance-less Revenge
Update: Version 1.01 has been rolled out and along with bug fixes it now allows you to map the digital D-Pad for movement, greatly improving your character response to inputs. When the original Gekido Advance released on Game Boy Advance back in 2002 it took many by surprise. It featured beautiful side-scrolling brawler...
Review Castle of Heart (Switch eShop)
Made of stone
While the developers of Castle of Heart have done little to encourage it, it's easy to see why this Switch eShop release is being dubbed "the Dark Souls of platformers" by some in the Nintendo community. It boasts a very similar medieval aesthetic to the beloved Souls series and contains gameplay that is often punishing and...
Review Arcade Archives Heroic Episode (Switch eShop)
Middling experience
HAMSTER may not release titles in its Arcade Archives series as frequently as with its ACA Neo Geo one, but it does similarly seem determined to release whatever it can. R-Type is on the way, but before then there’s this lesser-known Irem title. Originally released in Japan as Yōjūden, Arcade Archives Heroic Episode puts you...
Review The Long Reach (Switch eShop)
Something strange in the neighbourhood
Most horror games on Nintendo Switch (and gaming in general) tend to be of the schlocky supernatural jump-scare variety. There's nothing wrong with that, as Resident Evil Revelations Collection and Outlast: Bundle Of Terror will attest to, but there's ample space for a more subtle, psychological brand of...
Review Scribblenauts: Showdown (Switch)
Pure (un)imagination
Ever since the series first debuted on DS back in 2009, Scribblenauts has offered something few games ever could: an experience limited only by the boundaries of your own imagination. Even up to Scribblenauts Unlimited on Wii U in 2012, the antics of Maxwell and his magical notepad have remained fresh and bubbling with...
Review Coffin Dodgers (Switch eShop)
Race for your life
Whenever a kart-racer is released on a Nintendo platform it’s pretty impossible to avoid comparing it to the Mario Kart franchise; the mustachioed plumber’s sublime series of games is almost incontrovertibly the best option available in the genre, and it would take something pretty special to knock it off the podium’s top...
Review Midnight Deluxe (Switch eShop)
Driving at something different
Midnight Deluxe is a swift follow-up to last year's slight Switch eShop platformer, 36 Fragments Of Midnight. While it looks nigh-on identical, however, it's actually a very different game indeed. If 36 Fragments of Midnight was a fairly traditional bite-sized 2D platformer, Midnight Deluxe has more in common with the...
