Arc System Works Game Reviews
Review Double Dragon Revive (Switch) - Nice Ideas, Uneven Execution
Not much of a revival
The beat ‘em up genre has experienced something of a renaissance in the last generation, with original titles like Fight’n Rage (2019) and more recently Absolum (2025) finding new ways to move the genre forward, while releases such as Streets of Rage 4 (2020) and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge (2022)...
Review Dear Me, I Was... (Switch 2) - A Bold, Heartfelt, Wordless Visual Novel
Crying speedrun (Any%)
A common complaint levied against visual novels is that they’re some of the most text-heavy games one can find on the market. Who wants to spend hours upon hours reading dialogue during precious gaming time? Answer: me, and plenty of other people, but it’s a valid perspective to consider. Visual novels are generally wordy...
Review Guilty Gear -Strive- Nintendo Switch Edition (Switch) - A Fine Port & A Bold New Step
Smell of the game
Since Guilty Gear first arrived on Sony’s PlayStation in 1998, singeing the air with furious guitar shredding, it’s always been a head turner. While graphically, its goth-rock anime stylings have dazzled with each iteration, Arc System Works’ foremost achievement is in managing to differentiate itself from Capcom’s heavily...
Review Library Of Ruina (Switch) - Potential Aplenty, But Just Doesn't Stack Up
My library's in ruins
This review text has been updated to include additional narrative impressions and late-game thoughts. Library of Ruina is less than the sum of its parts. While this visual novel's dialog sets up a well-established, deep world with interesting characters, its grindy repetitiveness eschews plenty of opportunities to make the...
Review UNDER NIGHT IN-BIRTH II Sys:Celes (Switch) - A Deep, Addictive Anime Fighter
EXS to impress
Japanese developer Frenchbread's phenomenal anime fighter, Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late, impressed the heck out of us when it dropped in its final revised form on Switch back in 2020. Nabbing a 9/10 score in our review, it quickly became one of those very special games that we just straight-up refuse to ever delete off our SD cards...
"We have Persona 4 at home"
Welcome to Atlus, Switch fans, the company that really doesn’t want you to play any mainline Persona games, but does want you to play their canon sequels. Last year, we got Persona 5 Strikers, a surprisingly great Warriors-style follow up to the seminal Persona 5. This year, we’re getting Persona 4 Arena Ultimax, a...
Review River City Girls Zero (Switch) - An Authentic, Endearing 16-Bit Brawler Romp
Hit and run
The first entry in the convoluted Kunio-kun saga, localised in 1986 as Renegade, is considered the progenitor of the scrolling beat-em-up. While later efforts would evolve its arena-based model into the classic belt-scrolling format we know today, it was Technos that established the genre’s significant hallmarks: damsels in distress,...
IMMORTALIZE!
Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late is the third iteration of the indie visual novel/2D-Fighter from developer French Bread which was first released in Japanese arcades all the way back in 2012. An update in 2017 added four new characters, a bunch of new modes and gameplay tweaks for console versions, and this latest iteration adds yet...
Review Double Dragon & Kunio-Kun Retro Brawler Bundle (Switch) - A Stunning Retro Collection
Come for the Dragons, stay for the Kunio
Being a Kunio fan in the West is tougher than the mean streets Kunio and his friends come from. We've had to endure butchered localizations and dozens of titles being missed because they were simply deemed “too Japanese for Western consumption”. In fact, even nowadays, few Western gamers might realise the...
Review Code Shifter (Switch) - This Forgettable Franchise Crossover Is A Missed Opportunity
By the numbers
Though it certainly occupies a niche, it’s tough to dispute the level of clout and influence held by Arc System Works. The studio positively thrives on 2D fighting games, with franchises like Guilty Gear and River City being among its more well-known work, and its 30+ year lifespan has seen the introduction of plenty of new games...
Hot-Blooded Tough Guy Kobayashi Side Story
Unless you are a hardcore Kunio fanatic, there's a good chance that "Kobayashi who?" might be the first thing that goes through your head as you read this, so it's best we start off this review with a small introduction. Kobayashi Masao is both leader and strongest member of Reihō Academy’s Shitennō –...
Review River City Melee Mach!! (Switch) - A Retro Trip That Should Satisfy Longtime Kunio Fans
Barf once again for the Renegade master
If you have been around video games for long enough to remember the success of Renegade and Double Dragon it is also highly probable you stumbled into one of Kunio’s numerous 8-bit Famicom outings, perhaps even disguised in the West with some hit-and-miss localisation efforts like River City Ra
Review World End Syndrome (Switch) - A High School Summer Holiday Murder Mystery Love-In
The world ends with you
Ah, young love! Fixing eyes in freshman class… Inventing excuses to meet your crush… Daring to hope they like you back… Collecting and cataloguing candid photos of every girl you know… World End Syndrome successfully bottles the bristling potential of the summers of youth: before school’s back, perhaps you’ll...
Review Guilty Gear 20th Anniversary Edition (Switch) - An Essential Purchase For Fighting Game Fans
Heaven or Hell?
Arc System Works’ Guilty Gear series first chaos-attacked its way onto the gaming scene back in 1998, immediately making a name for itself amidst the more established giants of the fighting game genre with its beautiful hand-drawn roster of twisted manga combatants, hardcore rock soundtrack and insanely fast, combo-based pugilism...
Review BlazBlue Centralfiction Special Edition (Switch) - Well Worth The Wait For Fighting Game Fans
Don't be Blue
In the world of virtual fisticuffs there are 2D fighting games and then there are 2D fighting games, those series and franchises that are often the richest in mechanics and delicately-balanced subsystems, filled with equally convoluted plots and backstories. On the flip-side, that usually means said games are super-niche in their...
Review Dragon Ball FighterZ (Switch) - A Stunning Switch Port That Will Leave You Breathless
What you Super Saiyan?
Nine months after release on competing platforms, Dragon Ball FighterZ has finally made its way to Switch. Back in January, when our sister site Push Square reviewed the original release, they gave it a glowing 9/10 score, and for good reason. Even by PlayStation 4 standards, FighterZ is breathtaking. So, how does one of...
Review BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle (Switch)
Ragna the Bloodedge, Yu Narukami and Hyde Kido walk into a pub…
It is hard to believe that Arc System Works’ Blazblue franchise is already turning a decade old. Even more baffling, it took those ten years for one of the series main entries to arrive on Nintendo hardware. Yet as you can probably gander from the title BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle is...
Review Gotcha Racing 2nd (Switch eShop)
No race for second place
When Gotcha Racing arrived on the 3DS back in 2015 it received particular praise for its simple pick-and-play setup, the unexpected depth dictated by luck of the virtual Gashapon car parts and that moreish Micro Machines-esque gameplay. Three years later and on new hardware, will lighting strike twice as Gotcha Racing...
Review Damascus Gear Operation Tokyo (Switch eShop)
Putting the mobile in ‘Mobile Suit’
When Xenoblade Chronicles X arrived on Wii U, it not only offered an exceptional JRPG experience but also instantly cornered the mecha game niche genre by offering a complete, fully-customisable and satisfying mech-building meta game. One year into Switch's lifespan and not a single developer has tackled the...
Review Fantasy Hero ~unsigned legacy~ (Switch eShop)
A Vita throwaway
Fantasy Hero ~unsigned legacy~ arrives on Nintendo Switch four years after its original release on PlayStation Vita, where it received a rather middling reception at best. Some praised its varied stats, skills and upgrade customisation, while others criticised it for a bland plot and uninspired combat mechanics. So in 2018, how does...
Review Of Mice And Sand -Revised- (Switch eShop)
“Tell me about the mice, George”
If you were about to go on a huge exploration of a vast, wild desert, especially one known for housing terrifying sand monsters that can eat you whole, it would be understandable if you considered mice to be an unwise choice for your crew. As it turns out, though, these mice are wonderfully hard workers and your...
Review River City: Rival Showdown (3DS)
Come get some!
Following on from last year’s River City: Tokyo Rumble, Natsume is taking the rough ‘n’ tumble Kunio-Kun out for another spin in a follow up action game. River City: Rival Showdown largely follows the same beats as its predecessor, but refines many of its ideas down into a tighter and more enjoyable experience. Though it still...
Review Double Dragon 4 (Switch eShop)
Double trouble
Double Dragon is one of the most famous fighting games of all time, but it's very of its time, too. For a side-scrolling brawler in the '80s, it set the bar high with a complex move-set, loads of enemies on-screen at once and a great soundtrack; its status was amplified by some excellent NES ports and the almost compulsory terrible...
Review Boost Beast (Switch eShop)
Pairing Paws
Arc System Works may be best known for its hardcore 2D fighters, like Guilty Gear and BlazBlue, but it's also got a softer side, publishing several smaller titles like Shephy and New Frontier Days on the Switch eShop. The latest of these is Boost Beast, an animal-themed match-three puzzler from Yoshi's New Island and
What right does a sheep have to play God?
Taking a deck of cards to pass the time whilst traveling is not uncommon, though with the Switch now taken everywhere it's nice to see various game types emerge on the system. Card games are a genre still as popular as they were twenty years ago, with games like Gwent being a recent success. Offering its own...
It's all black & white
In most traditional board-games, the player holding the black game pieces is the one who performs the first action. This leads many players to gravitate towards playing as black, as it instils a confidence for an offensive pursuit that can intimidate the other player. However, even if you're playing first, your decision is...
Review New Frontier Days: Founding Pioneers (Switch eShop)
SimSettlers
Along with the epic adventure of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, explosive action of Super Bomberman R, and one-on-one battles of 1-2-Switch, the Switch's launch lineup hosts some smaller surprises and gentler pursuits. New Frontier Days: Founding Pioneers — a cheery town-building simulation from ArcSystemWorks — fits nicely...
Review River City: Tokyo Rumble (3DS)
Straight out of the '80s
River City Ransom was a fantastic NES brawler that - in many ways - was a pioneer for the then-fledgling genre, and has gone on to achieve something of a cult following. It was actually part of the much larger Kunio-kun series, though this perhaps wasn't so easy to keep track of due to spotty localization and a lack of...
Review Conveni Dream (3DS eShop)
An inconvenient truth
When I was a child, I once told my mother that I wanted to work at a gas station when I grew up. I don't know why this was my aspiration at the time, and I don't remember my mother's response, but I never did live up to that goal. I went on to do other things: I went to college, worked a few different retail and customer...
Review Super Strike Beach Volleyball (3DS eShop)
The Family that Plays Together
You wouldn't be wrong in thinking that the art in Super Strike Beach Volleyball looks familiar. You also wouldn't be wrong in thinking that the art looks like it was ripped completely from games such as Family Tennis 3D or Family Fishing. Make no mistake, this latest all-ages outdoor sport title is part of the Arc...
![Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[cl-r] (Switch) - One Of The Slickest And Most Accessible Fighters Ever Made](https://images.nintendolife.com/30e3e2aae5f56/250x183.jpg)
