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Not just for @bellow, but in general. With the recent multi-platform re-release, it is as good a time as any for those looking to return or jump in for the first time to one of the least contentious fan favourites in the series. With a little something, to set the mood... (Yes, this was a real thing)

Wasn't sure whether to create a new thread for this or put my thoughts in the original MK8 thread so I'll put my impressions here for the time being, mods can merge with the original thread if they'd rather Been playing quite a lot since I got it on Friday, exclusively Online Race. Played for 2-3 hours on Friday with the old man, another few hours later in the evening, more the next morning then I played it drunk when I got in last night So yeah, haven't been able to put it down for long truth be told, that crack level addictiveness of MK is definitely still here in spades, constantly find myself saying 'just one more race', 'must end the session on a high' and things like that. Been tougher than expected to get into the swing of things, took me a hell of a long time before I eventually won a race, was usually running 7th-10th (playing it drunk doesn't help things either) but seem to of got better today and have been finishing 1st-4th most of the time. Not tried the battle mode yet to be honest, don't remember playing it much on the N64 so I'm not sure whether I'll like it or not, will give it a go but race will always been my main priority. The new tracks are all decent but not overly impressive apart from the Zelda and Excitebike ones, absolutely love the Zelda one with the rupees instead of coins, master sword jump and the little sound effects throughout the course, the others haven't really impressed me though, good but not great, may need to race on them more before I get used to them though. As far as negatives go, had lots of issues getting disconnected from races, changed my DNS settings and that seems to of rectified the issue, unfortunately I'm not able to join friends games though , just gives me a 'couldn't connect to users console' error message so that's been quite annoying.

I’m not much in due to illness but I thought I’d get the ball rolling. Firstly I thought they couldn’t recreate that wow moment from botw. The one so many have done themselves, before and after. But they absolutely nailed it. The first part and exploration I’m in love with as much as I was before. With some new twists and mechanics that you don’t have your hand held and guided through. Just you have this now. Go experiment, or don’t. Go there now, or don’t. The tutorial guys are so sweet and humble. I want to know more about them. I hope for a quick recovery so I can proper deep dive into Zelda again. It’s back in a big way and I couldn’t need it any more. 2023051118232200-CC47F0DEC75C1FD3B1F95FA9F9D57667.mp4

I've been trying to get into the competitive part of Pokemon a bit lately so having this fresh version of it that is so much easier to build teams for is an amazing way to learn. Despite it being limited to about 200 pokemon there is still a massive diversity of teams. I get caught out all the time and don't feel like I'm close to having a solid knowledge of everything to make reads and exploit my opponent. I have an okay selection of pokemon because I pulled some from Pokemon Go, Omega Ruby and Sun (but moving pokemon from the pre Switch games is an ordeal 😮‍💨). I must have had some from White 2 but they're all legendarys that aren't in the current format, and from some competitive I've watched they are never used. They've been power-crept I assume. Filling out my collection has been easy enough with more recent pokemon. There is a gotcha system in the game where it rolls 8 pokemon and you pick one out of the set (you can do this once a day no cost but after that you need an ingame currency which I do have lots of but I'm being careful with it atm). I didn't mind the system at first but when you start looking for specific 'mon it becomes a bit frustrating. I wish there was a way to gain something specific. Garchomp is something I think would be good for my team but it isn't turning up. Speaking of my team: Not a great pic but it'll have to do. Its not great but its mine. I know there are Youtubers who show strong teams but my experience with the TGC I'm always better with my own teams because I know my stupid mind and how it works so I tend to pilot teams by others badly. This has got me to the high end of Great Ball rank but I know it needs a lot of tinkering.

I'm around six hours in so in the scope of these games that isn't much but I have some stuff to say I guess. So you play a kid in a Tokyo high school and some strange murders are happening and you and your friends who is trying to investigate it like a YouTuber would gets sucked into this world after Armageddon happens. Its posed to you that it's twenty years into your future and Tokyo is destroyed and buried in sand as well as demons hanging out pretty much everywhere. You also kind of fuse with a demon who talks like an android. There is a slight change of circumstances for our boy. I've spent all my time running around this glittery, sandy area so far; fighting demons and helping out some others. The areas are kinda big and make me think of Xenoblade Chronicles more than anything else. I say that because they have these hidden areas with fun secrets and are quite intricate. They're quite a bit smaller but they have similar ideas in how they're built. It's unexpected compared to the fourth game {and I'd imagine the ones before that} as they are dungeon based having you explore these tight areas. The other reason It reminds me of XC is there are tough enemies that are meant to be fought way later roaming around blocking areas and just generally keeping you on your toes. Exploration has this constant pressure though as the combat even with basic enemies can be dangerous if you don't have the right team so it can get a bit stressful when loads of enemies are around a place you want to be. Combat is still strong in this game as it was before because with the right attacks and spells you easily dominate a fight but the flipside is so can the enemy if you let them in. You essentially get another turn if you hit with a critical hit or hit an elemental weakness. This can be easy once you've found those weaknesses but going into a new area with new enemies or bosses make you try to stay safe while you experiment with different moves. I've been finding the game still pushes you hard into really thinking about using everything you can in a smart way. What's working for me so far for the boss I beat so far and harder enemies is having one of the last demons in my squad have a sleep attack so after I've got all my attacks out I just use that then they miss a turn and I can go through my bullshit again. Yes, you have a squad of demons. You have three in a fight and can carry six but that can increase as the game goes on so yes it is a bit like Pokémon. But here you can fuse two or more together to make new demons so that's what I've ended up doing so I can make room for more. But you don't catch them in a ball you have to talk to them and convince them to come with you. You have to try and asses what personality they'd have and basically tell them what they want to hear and bribe them. There's probably an optimal way of doing it but as long as I have enough stuff I just give them what they want and hope they aren't complete arseholes and just bounce {they've not done that yet here but I know it's a thing they can do}. Oh, and a tip; don't try to befriend a demon with a higher level than you because they don't come with you then, but I did have one situation where when I fought the same enemy in the same area it did come with me once I talked to it at the right level with no convincing. I don't have much to say about the story so far as its early and sploilers but it seems pretty typical of the series but I'm about to go to where some angels live so maybe things will start picking up there.

I played 30 minutes of it. It asks you to create a bethesda account before even being able to play which is really annoying but you can get around by setting steam to offline. Anyway it seems good. Kind of more focused on just murder arenas from the look of things. But I'm totally ok with a game like that. You can turn HUD off but it's hard to play. The HUD is a bit much tbh, I need to spend some time figuring out what parts I can turn off. Playing on ultra violent

Oh my word, it's glorious! The smile on my face in the first world was pretty wide. Then the remix came into effect and it gets even better. Finally a Sonic game made by people who understand what a Sonic game should be. Also, I'd heard that the second zone's boss was something special for long time fans and it really didn't disappoint. I won't even put it in spoiler tags at this point but you'll know.

Mine turned up today I immediately turned the sleeve and it's lovely. Only two hours in (obviously barely anything) but I have to say it's better than I was expecting. The world is large but not bare. There is plenty to find and monsters to grind with. The voice acting is.. It's ok.. It's kinda nice to hear different british dialects at least. I imagine americans usually notice differences in most games with american actors too but as a brit you all sound the same There's an overwhelming amount of things to see, do and collect. I can imagine the side missions alone will take me to the Wii U launch. For someone not used to playing or liking this kind of rpg it can be dizzying but the ease of the fighting system keeps me happy to stroll along at my own amateurs pace.

I've been playing this on the side since it came out on Switch, as it's a really good handheld title. It's out on everything though, IIRC on PC since last year. Oddly very little talk online even though it ticks all the boxes for a hit. I don't know if it's the lack of a mascot and it having a rather 'faceless' presentation, or just multiple unlucky release timings. In any case, this is a bit of a mix between various games and genres, like Tetris and Carcassone put into the roguelite corset, but in combination plays like none of them. Explaining this will be a bit boring, but it generally revolves around building a landscape on a playing field by putting Tetromino-shaped blocks on it. The blocks themselves fulfil certain functions: plains, forests etc. generate produce like wheat and wood, others help increase said production (a farm for example), while the third group, military units, bolster your troops in case you land on a field with an enemy. Unlike Tetris the blocks don't fall automtically (at least up until the higher difficulties), but reaping your rewards does require completing a row. The Carcassone element comes into play because it's generally advisable to logically combine blocks of the same type by building a forest, a mountain range or a river, as a lot of production and military facilities work with multiplyers linked to large biomes. The roguelite part of it, meanwhile, is that it features three areas you have to go through and your 'deck' of cards/blocks grows with every stage you beat – even though, to me, it feels more like a classic arcade game than a modern roguelike. Think of a shoot'em up, but instead of shooting enemies you lay out the land and instead of powering up your weapons you unlock new lands. You do unlock some permanent upgrades by fulfilling certain conditions though. I realise this probably sounds very unexciting but it's quite a fun game. There's a lot of depth to it, especially after unlocking secondary factions. The first one, the eponymous Duchy, is a relatively straightforward agricultural deck which is designed around harvesting large fields and interlocking them with military outposts that generate units based on the fields surrounding it, for example. But every other deck has its own unique gimmick they bring to the table: the Order is a religiously-themed, crusading faction that benefits from building and using 'faith' as a currency, the North cannot combine miltary units during its combat phase but can pillage production units for larger benefits, while the Tribe is designed around strategic runestone placement, so that it's central stone momunemt can harness the produce of as large an area as possible. There's also a truckload of additional cards/blocks you can unlock, which are independent from the factions, and add their own little twist on things ('nobles', for example, are very powerful but can't be rotated). But if you don't like some of these, you can banish them, effectively removing them from playthroughs. Combat is a rock-paper-scissors affair, so carefully ordering your units to attack can lead to victories vs. numerical advantages, as seen in the little screenshot below (I won a 162 vs. 180 with 1 unit left). There's a ton of stuff to do here, too. After about 20 hours I'm still not done unlocking all the aforementioned cards, but there are multiple difficulty settings, a trial mode, an endless mode etc. It takes a while to click, because it really showers you in information early on, but when it does it's genuinely good fun. Reading through dwarf's Titanium Court topic, this basically seems like the more approachable little cousin of that game.

Dropping the trailer to introduce this one seems like the best course of action here, to be honest. Remember Muramasa? That awesome PS3/Vita/Wii title? It had gorgeous, 2D, hand-drawn visuals, a stunning colour palette, and was a fantastic Metroidvania-style action game? Yeah, this gives me all those vibes. It's beautiful in movement, the design of the characters is great, and it plays really nicely. You're tasked with repairing books. You do this by hopping into said books, finding tears in the pages, and painting/stitching/magicking them back together. Along the way there are perils to test your reactions and battle skills. There are certain areas you can't access straight away because you don't have the powers. Like a ground pound, for example. You know the drill by now with these games. I'm only a couple of hours in, and had my ass handed to me repeatedly by a rock boss. I knew the attacks but just couldn't get the patterns down, so it took me 5-10 attempts, but I finally got through it last night. One thing that's super-cool - the map is essentially colour-coded. If there are still things to do on your current screen, the map is in greyscale. Once you've repaired that screen/page, it goes to full colour. Makes it really easy to reference what you need to do, figure out where you need to go, all that good stuff. Honestly, if you were a fan of Muramasa, or - and this is a game I've been trying to remember the name of for days but it's only just popped into my head - Odin Sphere: Leifthrasir, I reckon this is worth a go. It's gorgeous and plays nicely.

The reviews aren't lying. This is without a doubt fast becoming my favourite Zelda game of all time. The very first mission you complete for the old man is in itself a sprawling adventure despite never leaving the starting area. I don't want to say much because spoilers but I'll lay down some control impressions. At first I could see why people felt they would need a pro controller. The joy cons feel small and it's jarring after having a dualshock in your hands. However the controls were never problematic and after an hour of learning the buttons I was able to do everything I needed without a second thought. You do not need a pro to play botw any better than you can with the joy cons. The system itself works as has been shown for almost 2 months now. Everything is clean and crisp. It's lacking Nintendo charm to the ui that both charmed and put people off the system but there's still no doubting this is a Nintendo product with the little touches it has. Screen shot works great. Much much faster than ps4 as is going from the home menu to back to your suspended game. It's immediate. Images below are from my gameplay. Finally I was worried Zelda might look a bit jaggie on my large screen much like the WiiU did but I'm happy to report it's actually more gorgeous than any stream I'd seen. Now if you'll excuse me I have a plateau to leave.

Maybe a premature topic as I only played this for an hour or so but it seems very good. It's a classic platformer channeling the feeling of an N64 or maybe early PS2 game, where you play as a funny-looking frog who gets catapulted into different dimensions. Movement feels extremely good and responsive, so classic platforming actions like dives and jumps are satisfying to pull off. Because it's a cartoon frog, you can, of course, also use your tongue and use it as a grapple, to gather items and to interact with switches. One interesting feature where it deviates a bit from the classics are the fruits and seed you can find, which open up the level design a bit. The two I found so far allow you to grow mushrooms (help you jump higher) or vines (which can be attached to any wall and allow you to climb up). There's still a place for curated level design so they're not available all the time, but whenever they are they open up the world in a rather meaningful way, not unlike the climbing on BotW would, though of course on a smaller scale. Interestingly it doesn't have enemies, which I just noticed after my first hour with it concluded. Needless to say it doesn't feel like it's missing something, but still wanted to point it out. Technically it's flawless on Switch 2 (even in handheld mode thanks to the recent update), can't speak for how it runs on Switch 1 but I don't think anyone here is playing on that anymore anyway. PS5 and PC should have no issues whatsoever with it.

Started the demo last night. So far I’ve played two levels and there’s another to do, which is I believe a boss level of some kind. Only a small taste of the game obviously, but I’m impressed with it so far. The world is like a cartoony The Last of Us, but still manages to be really colourful and full of vibe with loads of vibrant enemies and characters popping up. The way it plays isn’t anything ground breaking, it’s a relatively of the mill 3D platformer but it’s so jolly and charming that I really didn’t mind. I will say though that it is ridiculously easy so far, a platformer like this you expect this though but I do hope the difficulty ramps up as you get towards the end of the main game. So yeah, so far so good. A lovely, jolly place to be and a really interesting, charming world to explore from my brief first impressions.

Is there really no thread for this?! I started it last week. Still milling around and exploring and I am a few in-game days in. Usually running out of energy by 9am and left with little to do for the day. So far I found a couple of ways to avoid this and so spend a lot of time fishing and wondering if I should really just turn it off and do something else with my life It seems like a cute enough game, not like what I remember of Harvest Moon A Wonderful Life, man I loved that game. I can't decide if I like it and am also looking back to playing more. Time will tell.

Continuing my Indie binge with Hollow Knight. Heard lots of good things about this game earlier this year and saw a Let's Play from Easy Allies of the first two-ish hours of it, has been on my Steam wishlist ever since. For those that don't know, it's an Indie Metroidvania game set in an eerie melancholic bug-world. I've enjoyed it quite a lot, being new to the Metroidvania genre I didn't really know what to expect, I've seen an awful lot of great indie Metroidvania games and kind of got turned off them in the past as there's just so many, I'm glad I gave this a go though because it's now a genre I'd like to explore more. For starters it doesn't hold your hand at all, you get a very brief control tutorial and are then left to explore the world. It doesn't explain anything at all, and if I hadn't of watched the EZA Let's Play I would've been a bit lost on where to go and what to do, luckily that gave me a brief idea. It was still a bit disconcerting exploring areas and not knowing where the fuck you are in the slightest, no map, no idea where the next Rest point is, no idea where the entrance to the next area is or anything though. Luckily you realise how the map system works pretty early on and then discover a vendor to add new areas to it, mark your location on the map etc. All incredibly useful. The gameplay loop is pretty similar to Souls I guess, if you die you loose all your 'Geo', you get Geo by killing enemies. The most innovative mechanic is that when you kill enemies you get souls that you then use to replenish your health, which adds to the whole risk/reward system of the game as it makes you want to attack more in combat in order to get more Souls to heal in the heat of a battle, it is a balance at times as your Soul supply can be used for other things too. You use a small sword for the combat (called a 'nail') which enabled you to hit enemies in any 360 degree direction, there's a lot of enemy variety on offer, when you go into a new area you have to learn their mannerisms all over again, there's a few areas with traps for you to fall into (similar to Souls) too, it always feels fresh and involving. It has that Souls feeling about it to about worrying where the next save point is, knowing you've got 1000+ Geo on you and whether to venture into the next area where a boss may be waiting or head back to a previous area and save. I won't give too much away but new mechanics are introduced as you go along that unlock new locales, one changes the platforming significantly and one changes the combat to a significant degree as well, the game never points you to these so presumably you could go the entire game without discovering them. There's also a system similar to the rings in Souls where you can get slightly more Souls when you defeat an enemy, a bit more health etc. but the slots are incredibly limited at this time meaning you have to choose very wisely which you want to equip. The game looks absolutely stunning, it has a really unique art-design about it, it's cartoonish but the backgrounds and levels managed to look realistic and give a very lived-in, ancient kind of vibe. By far and away the best thing about the game is the music though, it is just absolutely incredible and makes the each area feel special and meaningful, when you go to your first town and a certain song plays it's just so melancholic and haunting at the same time, it really is very special. The noises the characters you meet along the way make are fantastic too, they put so much personality in them just from gibberish and grunts. A few pics:

As i kinda explained in the new purchases thread this is rogue-like RPG dungeon crawl/deck builder mash up that is currently in early access. (it's about 12 quid) When start the game you choose from 1 of 3 characters all of which have different perks and attributes, then another perk/gift much like in rogue-likes/Dark Souls/Hearthstone etc. Your aim is to get to the end of the game without dying as it's perma-death. Game over. I think there currently 3 Acts at the moment and in each map you're given a map and have to chose one of 4 starting points at the bottom, with the boss at the top finishing the act. Once you've chosen you get to pick the next step to move along that path... like this.. - Unknown is Unknown . It's a story event. I could end well (with a new passive perk or something) or badly. - Merchant is a shop where you can buy new cards or items. He usually has some sales too. - Treasure is a treasure chest - Rest you have the option to gain some of your heal back or upgrade a card. - Enemy is a enemy. - Elite is like a mini boss. You see this map even before you set off so you can plan a bit. Do i go after that treasure or have a rest on the other path?.. etc Risk/reward, it's cool. Ok, now the turn-based combat. It's all card/item based. Looks like this.. Like Hearthstone/most card based board games, at the start of each turn the player has a certain about points that they can spend to lay cards. This can be modified with other cards/relics as you progress tho. And like Dominion/rogue likes you start off with very basic cards but after every fight you get to choose 1 of 3 cards to add to your 'deck'. So as you are progress and building your deck, your character is getting better. Enemies/bosses drop loot like money which can be spend at the shop or relics which give you a passive ability. Once you've spent you're points, you end the turn and the remaining cards are put into the discard pile. When your draw pile is empty, the discard pile is shuffled and you start again. That's it basically. It's simple but fuck, it's reeeally good. It merges the deck building with the rogue like stuff really nicely. I wish every turn-based RPG had the same combat/deck building loop this has. It's much more approachable and pick up and play than any card-based video game i've played too. Even more so than Hearthstone. But it still does a lot of the things i like about deck builders. So, yeah if you've ever thought of giving a card game a go but were scared off how impenetrable they can be. Then this maybe the gateway drug. Very addictive. Great game, still in early access too so it should only get better.

Terrible first impression. It starts with a big action set piece - normally I’m well up for that but it just does not suit the feel and control of these games. Especially if you’re mad like me & feel you have to scan everything. In which case all momentum and excitement is constantly ruined by switching visors and scanning. Think I’m going to have to force myself to stop scanning soon, there’s just way too much. Far more than I remember there being in other entries. Anyway, you get past that, lose your abilities and reach your first proper area. It’s gorgeous! & atmospheric. This is much better. Then you quickly reach Miles… he’s as terrible as everybody says. He genuinely ruins the rest of this area with his wisecracking and terrible dialogue. Thankfully this first area/dungeon is short. Before you know it you’re in the 2nd one. It looks incredible and Miles is no longer there. However my stomach sank when Miles started talking again via radio and told me where to go and I “can use an elevator to go down”. No shit Sherlock, thanks… But then it changes, immediately after that he can no longer get in touch with the you and you’re free to just explore and progress through this stunning area & it’s brilliant. It’s basically old Prime with new tech at this point which is exactly what I wanted. Then the desert opens up, it’s already ugly and dull. Made my way to another area and stopped there. Already know this is going to be a game of huge ups and downs. When it’s good, it’s brilliant. The rest of the time, we’ll see as I progress.

Well, this is officially out now, I got my code from CD Keys around 7:30pm yesterday. Pre-loaded straight away after that on GOG Galaxy (28gb install), and after I'd watched this week's Game of Thrones I fired her up, played the first hour or so (headphones ran out of juice otherwise I would've played more) can't really give any thorough impressions just yet but the combat still seems a bit shithouse to me (never liked it in The Witcher 2) and the graphics look pretty incredible (despite the downgrade) in almost fully-Ultra settings on PC. Just within that opening hour I've found myself wandering away from the main quest, exploring little villages and cubby holes so it bodes well for the rest of the game, shall give it a proper run-through later today.

I know it's out in just a few days, but I was looking for something to play and instead of doing like I said and trying Hollow Knight again I wanted to give this another shot, the early access. I've really turned around on it in this session I think, maybe it's due to updates or maybe the quality of the game is a lot better than Hades I, or maybe it's just that I'm better at the sequel. But I think it's really good, something is really clicking here this time. What I think it is that the battle systems are more intricate, cause of the shift towards this style of battle mage gameplay. It has more or less the same systems and mechanics as the first one, but with a stronger emphasis on finding harmony with your combat options I think. Your basic starter is a staff with decent range, you have a cast which binds enemies and you can stack boons on top of that obviously, and you have your specials which tend to be ranged moves, but not always. The cast is hugely useful for kiting enemies and grouping them, which benefits certain AOEs that like clustered enemies but it can also be used by you with certain boons to regenerate mana. On mana, it feels like a much more important mechanic than in Hades 1 I think, if I recall in that game the game didn't just recharge your mana in each room, but I might be wrong on this. In this game, they specifically tell you to spend all your magic in each room, there's a big benefit to speccing builds that regen mana passively or from certain attack combinations and I think this lends to combat feeling less mashy and more skillful, which is a problem I think I had in the last game, it always felt like I was mashing. Here it feels much more like I'm actually playing the game, but that might be just on me not really enjoying the first one. But I think the sequel's witchiness just produces more interesting kits to fight with and makes it feel 20 percent less unga bunga (but still pretty unga, all told) Another thing which makes high mana use important is the 'hex' mechanic, which is the same thing as the super mechanic in the first game but you proc it by spending mana. So if you're holding onto magic and not finding opportunities to use it up a lot, you are throwing away DPS and crowd control There's an absolute shitload of 'reagents' and things that unlock stuff in your home base, and it has the same gift system as before to unlock accessories you level up in your runs. It has some new mechanics like an armour system which buffs your cast speed, or makes you run faster or whatever, but you lose it when you lose your armour. My favourite weapon so far are these fireball staffs that let you play like a zoner, and they have a special which is about crowd control damage. You unlock boons for it that let you zig-zag the fireballs around when you dash around and things like that. If you've played Hades 1 there's not a lot to say, I'm sort of skimming through the dialogue cause you can't turn subtitles off, which means I kinda just read it quickly and move on. I'm not that interested in it, but there's a few exceptions. One thing is that there are way more Homeric inclusions here, characters like Odysseus and others I won't spoil, so it's stuff I'm more familiar with and I enjoy the stylish twist it offers. There's a boss fight in this I cannot spoil but it's the coolest boss fight I've seen in a game in a while, and Hades 1 really only had one good boss fight imo, the last one. Maybe the first one also, the other two were rubbish. So hopefully that's a standard it can keep up. Anyway, surprised it's clicking with me, as a Hades 1 hater. I think I read that your saves carry across to the full game, but if they don't then I'll just treat it as a challenge to push as far as possible with a low level character come release, and maybe I'll actually read the dialogues this time.

Ok then. So first play session done and this definitely feels like a sequel to Super Paper Mario. With the interactive battle system of TTYD or Mario & Luigi. I thought the battle system was a bit easy... Until one new enemy left me scratching my head long enough to discover there is a timer to your actions. Early impressions and all that, but the music so far isn't doing anything for me. Usually Mario OST are quite catchy and memorable. But the music original to this game... Meh. I'll go for a slightly longer play session tomorrow. But overall, I like it.

Balatro. What can I say about Balatro that will do it any justice...? For the uninitiated, this presents as roguelike poker. You're dealt a hand of cards and use your card counting skills, or your natural-borne luck, to build a game-winning combination. Everything from high card draws to the fabled royal flush will score points, and it's your job to work through eight rounds of three games. I've managed to get half way through a game up to now - ante 5/8 - before crashing out horribly. Like I said, though, it presents as poker. Realistically, it takes poker to a whole new place, and this is thanks to the store between rounds. You can buy a range of bonuses to increase your chances of reaching the end. Tarot cards apply specific bonuses to individual cards from your deck (this could be anything from giving you an extra $3 if it's not used by the end of a round to a multiplier if it's played and scores). Planet cards provide bonuses to specific hands - I'm a fan of bumping up my two-pair bonus, as it's one of the most common hands I play, and it can become especially prolific for points the more you increase its level. You can get packs that add more cards to your deck, and then there are Joker cards (that's Poker with a J... Coincidence?) that give you overall bonuses. The key to the game right now seems to be the Joker Cards. A two pair hand with two 10s and two 5s can score around 50 points as a base. But add in a Joker card that adds 4 to your multiplier if you play clubs, as well as the joker that adds 30 chips if you play a 10, AND a +4 multiplier for the same numbers, and that two pair hand quickly shoots up to almost 10,000 points. Skipping some rounds is an option, and will present you with a bonus if you do so, but this comes at the cost of making more money to go into the store with. Is that card pack, which is usually $6 worth accepting, rather than playing the round and getting to $10 so you can buy a new bonus card or a couple of new Jokers? In each round of three games, there's also a 'boss' match. This will add further complications to the gameplay. Some of the ones I've encountered include all face cards being dealt face down, specific suits being debuffed (so those awesome bonuses are completely negated) and even ALL dealt cards being handed out face down. These are super tough at times, and if you hit a bad run, you're essentially screwed. I'm under no illusions that I'm not great at this game, but it has a fantastic 'one more go' quality that makes you hop in for another round. I honestly can't express how much I'm enjoying it right now. I'm determined to figure out a way to get through all 8 rounds.

I think I'm in one of those ruts where I don't fancy playing anything too demanding on the brain, so I've gone from finishing PWSim2, to trying a game from the publishers of Onechanbara called Full Metal School Girl, to this. FMSG is fun, but it's an endless corridor shooter that wouldn't have felt out of place in the PS2-era, so in an attempt to pivot from that, I've tried this - a game about rolling a ball around environments that wouldn't have LOOKED out of place in the PS2-era. Anyway, this is apparently the first completely new Katamari game since 2011. It doesn't do much to upend the classic gameplay the series is known for, but progression feels a little different to the instalments I've played. For a start, you don't just get access to the next level straight after finishing the previous one. Sometimes you need to find crowns in the levels you've already played, and an arbitrary cumulative amount will give you access to the next level. Putting it blunt, it feels a little (ok, a lot) like artificial padding to extend the length of the game. But it's a game about rolling up shit. Give me the option of how much I want to replay levels; don't force me to do it. I mean, I'll eventually go back and do all the levels, because the platinum just requires finding all the crowns on specific maps, but still. Give me the option, let's not make it a requirement. The other thing that's weird with progression is the way it's set up. You go from era to era - I've explored a basic, modern day set of levels, the wild west, a prehistoric chapter, and now ancient Greece. But you have an era select menu, where the ones you've not unlocked yet appear as question marks. So right now mine appears as something like "Modern/?/?/Wild West/?/?/Ancient Greece/Prehistoric/?" (hopefully that makes sense) I imagine it's to clue you in to the different time periods you'll be traveling to, but I feel like there could have been a better way to communicate this. Especially when I'm trying to figure out the best time period and mission to go to next while I'm trying to figure out which levels need me to find more crowns to even get into, and which ones just need me to go back in and find the crowns. Looks-wise, it's very much PS2 in a super-charming way. It still has jaggy edges, characters are still blocky and don't have much animation. For anyone that liked/s Katamari for the personality, you'll find a lot to love here. It's also got those tanky controls that have always defined the series. Much like the visuals, this is either something you'll love for the level of control you can achieve, or you'll hate, because you can't quite get to grips with the intricacies of movement. I'm somewhere between the two right now, but that's normal for me with this series. I've kinda waffled about one of the dumbest game series that have ever been created, but it's also a genuinely fun game. The fact you have no real peril, the fun stuff you can roll up, the silly ideas and charming script all combine to give me exactly what I'm looking for right now. The short run time is also a bonus with these games, so I'm not complaining there either. Last night I went from playing on the PS5 with the big TV to playing on PS Portal, and I feel like handheld is the way to go with this game. On Steam Deck or Switch I can see it being a blast.

A cosy/creepy puzzle/adventure follow-up to Strange Horticulture. Once again set in a creepy fictional Lake District village, this time you're in a shop dealing in strange occult objects. You're ensconced in your comfy shop as customers come in bringing news of grim goings-on outside, and you examine the objects on your shelves and consult your reference books to give them the right item for their needs. You get clues and messages which lead you to locations in the town on your maps, giving you little bits of story/lore and additional items. They also help you solve puzzles in your shop for more items or additional help in identifying objects. I enjoyed Strange Horticulture, but I like these weird objects more than the plants in that game. As in the previous game there's' a simple pleasure in labelling and organising your stock on the shelves according to whatever system you come up with.

Found out about this by chance when I went through the Golden Joystick nominees and after watching its trailer I immediately bought it. Looked like it'd hit all the right notes for me and thankfully that proved correct. It's from a small French studio called Plane Toast (the food-puns seem to be all over the place) and seemingly their first project. You play as a young adult girl who receives an SOS signal from the ship her sister disappeared in six years prior, proceed to leave the space station you're currently residing at and start following the trail of the signal to a mostly deserted colony planet where you grew up. It's not the most unique setup, but it gives you an immediate emotional hook for what is essentially a purely exploration-driven open world game. And it mixes in some slight Dune-ish mystery elements via the titular Sand Witches and some subtext about environmentalism and corporate greed in there as well. The gameplay foundations are very light, there's a bit of climbing and platforming, there's a lot of driving around, and the only thing you find when exploring are either materials to build new tools or certain items you need to collect quests. Because there are still some people living on the planet and they're struggling to survive, so they're more than happy to have a newcomer there who can help out. Story progression is linked to the tools you build, as unlocking one moves the plot and timetable a bit forward. There's no combat, so when I say tools I mean a gadget to allow you to use ziplines or a scanner for your car to more easily find interactable objects, among them signal blockers which jam your map and are basically UbiSoft towers (they only reveal a couple of question marks on the map though, not a hundred). I can't put my hand on what it is exactly, probably just all the gears perfectly fitting together, but it's an incredibly engaging experience IMO. It's not a deep game by any means, at least mechanically. Think of it as a less obtuse version of Sable, or the bigger cousin of A Short Hike, and you get the idea. The world is densely packed and gives the impression of being vast, but you can drive around from one edge to the other in I presume less than five minutes. But it does evoke an incredibly sense of place, mostly due to the strong artstyle, great soundtrack and grounded, believable writing. It's also unmistakably French, and I don't say that with any kind of fun-poking subtext, because the media landscape has become very unified in recent years, so it's nice to see something European with a unique cultural influence for a chance. I guess part of why I like it so much might also be because it just came out of nowhere, which nobody reading this and deciding to pick it up will have the luxury anymore, but I do believe it's a really good 'experience' if you like more challenge-free games. I'm not quite through yet, but I suspect it will conclude at around the 10 hour mark, which seems like a reasonable length for a game without much mechanical depth. One last thing: I play it on Switch because I don't have a PS5 or a decent PC and I wouldn't really recommend that version. It permanently runs sub-30fps and has horrible pop-in and dynamic resolution drops. It speaks to the quality of the game that I'm still enjoying it, but unless you have no other option like myself, I'd strongly recommend playing it anywhere else.

So this is the action rogue-like from makers of Bastion and Transistor. It's a very good one. It has a lot of potential stuff in terms of weapons, buffs and abilities for a run that come together in some surprisingly interesting ways. I don't really want to go into it all, because there is so much and it's a bit of a spoiler, in a way. I do think anyone who likes Dead Cells will have a hard time not getting into this too. It's got the same kind of fast, dash-y combat but I'd argue the upgrades are probably more interesting because they're tied to more than your attacks. I guess Dead Cells has some of that but it's robust with a bigger variety of abilities that can tie to your dash, for example. But Dead Cells is better in some other ways. They're both cool and good; get both! I'm also quite enjoying the story more than I expected. It's set in Greek mythologies' underworld and done in quite traditional way in that it's mostly a family squabble the consequences of which is big, dramatic and violent fights and supernatural displays of power. It's kinda fun that you're trying to escape the underworld in a rogue-like and no-one really cares that you're doing that because they know you'll die and be back. Some give quiet encouragement or Hades himself just rolls his eyes as you leave. It's played pretty straight and it's cool to hang out in that starting area before the intense combat. I'm not sure how many stages there are but the best I've done is get to the third boss, who are a pair of cheaters. I dunno how I'm meant to do it right now. I think since I don't have a brilliant way to do a well synchronised build yet, just out of inexperience, but I'll get it.