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Picked this up last week after reading lots of glowing impressions and very positive reviews. It definitely hasn’t disappointed that’s for sure, I’ve had an absolute blast with it for sure and it’s definitely one of the best platformers I’ve played in recent years. The game takes on two dimensions. The 2D side-scrolling platforming takes up the majority of your time with it and I think the easiest way to describe how it looks, feels and plays is heavily inspired by Retro’s DKC series and Rare’s original DKC series, seeing the game at a glance in motion you’d be mistaken for thinking it’s one of Retro’s games. From the roll Yooka-Laylee do to the hidden coins dotted around the map, the similar way Laylee takes a hit through a level, the hidden doors into puzzle rooms, even the iconic barrels that rocket you around certain platforms. There is an awful lot of crossover here. Some may worry it’s a poor imitation or an uninspired clone but I assure you, to play, it’s every bit as good as it’s DKC counterparts. Worth noting there’s no rocket or mine-cart levels yet though. The second dimension to it and the biggest difference is the world map. With this the World Map is incredibly interactive and inviting, almost a game unto itself. It features a rather large Zelda-esque map filled with charmingly different locales, Pagie challenges, little puzzles to find tonics and new areas, little caves and mysterious little nooks and crannies. By changing the landscape in some way by doing the Pagie challenges you often reshape the landscape to unlock new areas to explore and alter the makeup of a previously unlocked level. A level variation is then created whereby a level can become frozen, overgrown, invaded by new enemies etc. Essentially creating an almost entirely new level to explore based on the outside environment of the world map and where the level marker is placed. The way it feels to play is incredibly reminiscent of the DKC games during the 2D levels, it just feels so incredibly tight to play and definitely has that same difficulty curve. But I think the Interactive World Map is almost just as compelling, you can completely lose yourself in the map just wandering around trying to figure where things fit together and where certain paths will take you. These two dimensions create an incredibly cohesive whole. If you’re getting bored of doing the levels then you can just wander off and explore to your hearts content, if you’re bored of exploring you can enter a level of platforming bliss in seconds. My only real criticism with it would be the level design really. The actual platforming is sublime but some of the level designs themselves are a little generic and nowhere near as joyful, varied, distinct and charming as the likes of DKC. I highly recommend it though, to anyone that’s into tough 2D platformer’s this is nirvana.

Ok. So, this game is awful. Sorry, but it is. I’ve loved the Contra series for a long time, ever since I started with the awesome Super Probotector (aka Contra 3) on the SNES. This is absolutely one of the worst entries to the series. Graphically it’s nothing special. I’ve seen worse, sure. But considering we’re at the end of this generation, it’s nothing to write home about. The effect where an enemy gets thrown into the screen, Turtles in Time style, is pretty laughable. The overheat mechanic is terrible. Your main weapon overheats in a matter of seconds, unless you hold off from keeping the fire button held down. Your secondary weapon is usually more powerful, but that overheats even faster. There’s quite often a ton of enemies on screen. So your natural reaction is to try to shoot them all. Except you can’t, because your bloody weapon overheats. Leaving you frantically rolling around, waiting a good 8 seconds before you can fight back. Within a few levels, content gets recycled. Hope you like seeing the same bosses and mini-bosses, over and over again. There is a store where you can buy upgrades, but it’s absolutely baffling. Huge amounts of stuff to buy, with not much indication of what it actually does. All of which cost an obscene level of cash to buy anyway. Oh, and if you die in a mission, none of the cash you earned gets kept. So that’s fun. You can’t pause a mission. At all. Even on your own. So you’d better not need a piss, or anything better to do for a good 30-40 minutes. To top it all off, it’s just bloody boring. The whole appeal of Contra is running and gunning your way through waves of enemies. Here, the overheat mechanic completely and utterly ruins the flow of the game. Reviews are tearing this game a new arsehole because of it. And they are absolutely right to do so. It adds nothing to the gameplay, instead it restricts you. Oh, and the spread gun? One of the most iconic weapons in the series. Here, it’s a temporary power up that you get to use for about 5 seconds. If you even find it at all in a level. Utter shite.

I thought there was a thread, there should be, Ape Out got a lot of coverage for a few days at release. It's a simple premise and a simple game. You're a captive ape and have to escape. Your captors are gun toting guards or various types, and you bound through the level smashing guards, grabbing them to use as shields, or flinging them into other people or walls. You can take 3 hits, every few sections you start a new level and get your health back. Killing the guards doesn't really do anything for you other than clear the way, there's nothing to stop you from just gunning it, which is what I tend to do and it probably does rob the game of something The thing that makes Ape Out stand out is the jazz soundtrack which is tied to what's going on in the game, and the old European cartoon look. It's a cool game. The problem is that there's not a huge amount to it. I like it but you're getting as much from it on disc 1 as you are on disc 3. You get new enemies and the challenge they throw at you changes, but it still amounts to you grabbing and splatting. For example, the game introduces enemies who smash through windows wearing body armour, they're more dangerous and more useful as weapons, but they still die from being twatted about by a gorilla

I've played a few areas of this, and it's... alright. It's not funny or quirky enough for that to keep you playing, there's not a lot to the gameplay that that's the reason you're playing, and there's a few frustrations that pull some of the fun out of it. I do really like how the goose moves though The gameplay loop is that you're locked in to an area and have a list of dickish things to tick off. The first area is the one you'll have seen from the early footage, you're tormenting a gardener, so the list includes things like getting him wet, getting him to switch hats, making a picnic. Some are easy enough, walk up to an, sorry, waddle up to an item, press the button to pick it up, then waddle back off with it. Some you have to set up, do something to get your target to change position so they're vulnerable. It's here where it feels most like a stealth game, or a game akin to Gregory Horror Show or an adventure game, it's also where it's the most tedious Goose Game doesn't have the tells of a traditional adventure game, it doesn't spell things out for you, which might be for the best. It reminds me a bit of Doughnut County, that was a game that never really got complicated enough to get interesting, all style no substance, if Untitled Goose Game was any easier it would be a procession. That said when you can't work out how to do the next task it's a boring experience, I'm not sure if the game starts focusing characters on the actions that will put you on the right track, but it should. Beyond that the only other criticism I can level at it so far is that it can be a bit fiddly. If there's a couple of items that can be picked up, 99% of the time it will pick up the one you don't want

so yeah, it's an old zelda (gb/gbc) game given new graphics, and some other changes i guess, not sure what they've changed, there's a make your own dungeon thing, and i guess any changes in the colour version (which i haven't really played) will be in there. this is one of my early gaming memories and one of my favorite zelda games, but haven't played it in a long time so not sure what i'll think of this new version. there's some stuff/puzzles that were pretty annoying in the original version which seem to have some more hints on what to do in there now (keep the sound on - the music is ace anyway) but it still seems like it could be pretty easy to get stuck, and it's hard for me to say as i do remember some stuff from playing it before. i've done the first 2 dungeons and they're pretty short and easy other than a few bits, and think i'm on one of the best bits of the game where you get iirc the difficulty picks up. the graphics are completely different, i think the new look is pretty cool, there's some framerate problems, as in it's not completely smooth but it's not really affected me. and yeah i'm enjoying it. anyone else get it, hows it going?

Only put about 1.5 hours into it but happy so far. Think Metroidvania X Dark Souls with some extra gruesome and stunning imagery and you’re about there. Feels a bit slower and more deliberate than what I was expecting - was thinking it was going to be more Dead Cells than Dark Souls in this respect - but most importantly it feels and controls really well which is essential because it’s bastard hard!!! Don’t know if I picked a particularly difficult route to take first (top left of the map) but I’m getting battered. Its got a upgrade system too and feel like I could do with a couple of the extra abilities. Got a fair amount of upgrade points but I’m miles away from the area where you buy skills. Hoping another opens up soon. Good game so far, recommend it if the Metroid x a 2D Dark Souls sounds appealing.

So I started this, played like a 2 hours or so. It's very anime. It's also way more action RPG than you might expect. Combat is fast but grounded and overall your options seem pretty limited early on anyway. Kind of like Nier Automata. Attack, dodge, attack, dodge etc. So far. I've not fully worked it out yet. It's hard to learn so far cause theres a lot going on the screen at once and the frame rate is pretty bad. It's got a cool style though. It makes me roll my eyes when people say "X is like Bladerunner" , but this is like that. But anime and not as dark. Your "legion" does it's own thing usually, but you can leash it around and have it counters attacks while your cop guy or girl does his own thing too. Like if you see a red beam on the ground then it's a tell for a charge attack. You send your legion over and you can catch them before it hits. Stuff like that seems like it could be cool. But honestly so far it's pretty mashy and hard to follow. The frame rate is a killer. I am getting D ranks tho so my rubbishness is definitely a factor Mission 2 boss is cool though.

This is £2.50 at the minute so I picked it up. What I wasn't really expecting was that it's kind of hard? Maybe I'm missing something but there's a couple of things I've tried on it that I just can't do, not helped that the controls seem backwards to me. The general set up is that it's Tony Hawk (on a scooter) meets Splatoon. So you need to Scoot around pulling off tricks, which earns you points, but quite often the way you win is to fling more paint around than everyone else. The level I'm struggling with, which I think you can just not do, is that, only one of the racers infects other people with his colour (you too if you aren't careful), meaning he's potentially got 4 other people colouring in the map, I've managed 2nd on it once Another event is picking up crayons, you get an indicator to show where to look which helps, the controls are more of an enemy there. Which brings me to that. Jump is on the analogue stick, down then up (or just tap up), boost is on B. The tricks are also on the analogue stick rather than face buttons, I think my old man brain still remembers jump in this kind of game being a button press, I'd rather that. Progress is 2-fold as far as I can tell. You earn medals for winning events, but levelling up gets you challenged, beat the racer who has challenged you and you climb the leader board, plus you open up new worlds to race events in The other issues are the loading and generally how long it takes to get in to an event. I'd rathe menus than a hub world really. It's not bad though, more work than I expected or wanted so I probably won't stick with it. I might try it on the tv at some point and see if that's a better experience than handheld

There's a new Picross RPG game that was both announced and launched today. @Hendo https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Switch-download-software/PictoQuest-1617140.html Currently 15% off.

Played it for an hour, walked around the monastery talking to the house leaders and each student. I love it so far. The anime cutscenes are beautiful and the music has been very good. A very enjoyable first hour.

Bit of a strange one, it seems a little like Wolfenstein's gameplay in a service game. It's not quite as punchy, the guns, particularly the shotgun, feel weaker. Enemies have levels, so far they've been low enough that the fodder have been easy to kill, but there's also some that have armour, and the boss took ages I really like the two girls, they're funny, we'll see where it goes but I'd be up for giving them another game.

Less than an hour in and from a gameplay perspective this is already deeper than any of the previous games. The levelling up system alone reminds me of FF X. You can block! You can dodge? There is something a bit off about the powers though. Which might be indicative of the One player experience. Your AI teammates don't automatically use their abilities, so the revamped combo system has to be done manually and it is a bit clunky as a result. Obviously not an issue in the slightest for those playing with others. Other than that, it is pretty good so far. At the first available option, which isn't right away, my team now consists of: Star Lord Hulk Drax Wolverine

Anyone have/picking this up? I've just got it on Switch to review and need people to play online with ?

So. Fairy Fencer F: Advent Dark Force. Brought to you by the geniuses behind the Mega/HyperDimension Neptunia series, it's a medieval JRPG for the ages. Ok. It's not. It's a bit of a pervy game wrapped in a lovely little Dark Ages anime art style. @Sly Reflex was asking me about it last night, and the only answer I really had was that it's inoffensive. Which I then immediately clarified by saying the GAMEPLAY is inoffensive. The story itself just seems to be an excuse to get questionably aged female characters into questionable states of undress. One character in particular, Harley (who thankfully, looks of age), has a particular comfort with herself, so gets herself into situations like this... Anyway, I've just discovered this game is a remake of a 2013 PS3 game. It uses a modified version of the Neptunia battle system, so it's a turn-based JRPG. You have a circular battle arena and your characters make their moves, then the enemy makes theirs (obviously depending on speed levels). When it's your turn, each character gets an area they can cover, where they have to get close enough to an enemy to make an attack. Or far enough away if you're defending/healing. It's easy enough to get to grips with, and as you progress they introduce more and more twists on the formula. You level up as per RPG rules, then also gain a kind of ability points that allows you to increase your attack, defence, movement and attack range, as well as the amount of physical attacks you can do in a combo. It's a nice idea and lets you personalise each fighter to your play style. The story involves finding swords - known as Furies - and using them to release the Goddess. Well, in my story that's what's happening. You can also release this other dude - he's a bad guy - or there's a third option. I'm not sure if you can release both or what. I assume so. A few other systems are in place, but that's the main gist of the important stuff. After about 10 hours of gameplay I'm around level 10-12 and have 4 characters in my party - Fang (the main character), Tiara, Harley and Galdo. All 4 have three hits in their combo, I've unlocked a few extra moves for all of them, and they all have a Fairy giving them benefits/bonuses. It's good. Not great. But there's enough there - besides the perviness - that's keeping me playing, so i'll carry on at some point this weekend.

This has probably been the biggest surprise of the year so far for me, this game is incredible. I’ve never much been one for making levels or anything like that and the most I’ve dabbled before was way back when I was a kid in Rollercoaster Tycoon and more recently with some of the LBP and Trials series tutorials and such. So going into this the making aspect is probably what got me most excited about the game but also apprehensive as I really didn’t know if I’d bounce off it again like I have done in the past, I just don’t consider myself a very creative person and am always more likely to enjoy levels made by others than actually be any good at creating my own. There’s just so many other layers to it than that though. It feels amazing to just play other people’s levels that they’ve shared on an FB Group or forum, I can’t quite describe it but playing through a level and admiring the work of someone else approachable and ‘real’ not some pro level designer feels so uplifting and joyous. I’ve only played a little of the story mode but from what I’ve played it’s another excellent 2D Mario game. It’s clever how they implement ideas from the Maker template to inspire you and get you thinking about how you can implement little bits and pieces from their Pro courses into yours. Then you can play in co-op with others online and against them which is just fun silly nonsense really. There are frustrating moments when you may lack the coordination to get past a puzzle and eventually have to give up but it’s just such a nice change of pace and another layer of depth the game has. I think the most amazing thing about the game is how creative it’s made me feel, playing through other people’s levels, playing the story mode’s levels or tinkering about in the Maker mode just gives me so many ideas for so many new levels I can create and how I can improve my level design skills and get better. Even when I’m not playing the game I find myself thinking about ways I could do a pipe level, a runner type level, a car level and things like that. To make someone who wasn’t creative in the slightest before think creatively about level design for the very first time is damn incredible, it has been quite the revelation for me this game and awakened a side of me I didn’t really know existed before. My two courses if anyone wants to try them out: Quick video of one here:

All these years later, and I finally get to play this, after coveting the super expensive MD cart when it came out. I never played it in the arcade or on an emulator, so the Switch version is my first experience of this. Firstly, really impressed with how it runs. I've heard that this 60fps was not on the arcade original but it's bloody smooth as silk. I was expecting it to look really old but it actually looks really stylish and I could imagine someone making a new game in this style and it looking equally great. The only time it looks bad is when you change the view to cockpit view and the amount of frames of animation for turning the wheel is comically low. Only 6 quid as well. A reasonably priced port that they've done a great job with.

This is a 2D platformer, run and gun type thing, where you can do all kinds of fancy things, such as shoot at two things at the same time, bounce bullets off things, skateboard, kick things/skateboards at people, slowdown time, and dodge bullets. when you're doing the cool things it's a lot of fun. i often forget to do the cool things and just run through a level shooting everything, which is still pretty fun. especially i find the controls for dodging bullets to be tricky so forget to do it, and slowdown time i keep forgetting to do but the controls for it aren't tricky. but the controls for shooting 2 things at once work well imo - you aim one direction and lock on by holding down the left trigger then aim elsewhere and fire with the right trigger. there's some gimmicky levels that are a bit different, they probably arent really any good but i really enjoyed the 2 i've done so far because of how over the top they are and they don't last long. the levels are very short but there's a lot of them, apparently it's quite a short game, think i'm about 2 hours in. you get graded for each level, i think that's where the game will come into it's own if you get into trying to get a better score/grade - so i think it's good that the levels are short for this. i'm not sure if i'll bother replaying it like this though, don't really know how the scoring works, i'll have to look into it. paid ~£13 which seems like a fair price for it. apparently was playing it in 4k, switched to 1080p and upped the graphics settings, couldn't really tell the difference. so yeah i like it so far and at times it's brilliant, but maybe doesn't live up to how great the trailers for it are (possibly it does but i'm not good at it). also a banana tells you what to do.

Got this through yesterday. It’s brilliant. Looks and feels great, always preferred this to Mario Kart and even from my short go last night I stand by this thought even more now. Loads better than Team Sonic Racing too. Transformed is a different matter though.. Anyone who enjoyed it back in the day get on it. Just as good as I remember it being. Negatives? It hitches every now and again surprisingly (playing on a X1X). & the load times are excruciating! I’m not one to normally complain too much about long loads as long as they’re infrequent but here they are frequent and seriously bad. To the point I could see it ruining the “quick go” and “just one more race” elements causing me to play it less. We’ll see.

I seem to remember @illdog posting about playing this, but I can't find the thread where it is. I'm a big fan of the original Megadrive game and this is basically that game but looking a bit better with added enemies and friends, online multiplayer and stuff. I don't think it's a sequel, seems more of a reboot of the first game. Anyway, it's a rouge-like if you haven't played it before and it is '90's as fuck. The music has always been great with extra funky basslines, and this one is no different. I was a bit concerned when they announced it that it would end up being shit, but a few hours of play on it so far and it's been fantastic. I'm not sure what people new to it would make of it, but for fans of the original, it's great. Level 0 is still there, so they didn't fuck that up.

Finally, after years of watching videos of other people play this, bought the Switch version and had my first go of this with a couple of mates. Initially, we had the bomb defuser holding the Switch out of the dock but as there are two couches in my mate’s living room, eventually just settled on sitting on the couch not facing the TV and either using a laptop or phone for the manual. If you don’t know what it is, one person can see the bomb and has to cut wires and press buttons. The other person (or people) either download and print out the bomb manual or view it on a screen and have to guide the bomb defuser by communicating what the bomb holder is looking at. Colours of wires, how many, etc. It’s a manic affair and best if you swap over a few times, as then the bomb defuser will know what information the manual guy is really after and which information is superfluous. On the PC and PS4, it’s playable in VR which is probably the best way to play it. But we figured out we could actually play it together on Skype with only one copy. It really starts ramping up in difficulty, throwing memory puzzles at you, morse code, etc and we got as far as extra modules you had to keep an eye on that couldn’t be solved from the manual. There’s these things called “needy modules” where they’ll be like a short timer on it and before it gets to 0 and blows up the bomb, you have to hammer a button to reset it. That’s along with the modules that will actually disarm the bomb. Plus the lights will occasionally go out for a few seconds. Or the alarm clock next to the bomb will go off really loudly so you have to put the bomb down and hit snooze on the alarm. It’s fantastic but I’m glad I played with people I have good friendships with!

I got the hyrule version today, seems like it’s supposed to be a bit easier, the amount of times I’ve died on the second screen is very high, I’m not sure if I’m getting better or it just seems that way because I’ve unlocked better weapons through perserverence. Also one time I found a shop but had no money, now I have money but I’m miles away from the shop dammit. I’ll die soon so that won’t matter anyway. Not really sure what I think of it yet, never got the original because I don’t like rogue likes, but I really like rhythm games, but it looked like I’d hate it, then they add Zelda music and make it easier so I got it, initially i was right and I hated it for a bit as I died over and over again straight away, as said I’m doing better now and not hating it as much, probably because I have better weapons and more hearts. Oh yeah I started off as Zelda, which seems to make it really difficult, started again as link and the shield not running out of power helps a lot.

So I bought this (Guessing by RF’s posts 2 years ago?) and have just started playing it and this is awesome. It’s a bit rough on the technical side, but it makes up for it in real playability. I just had to really put an effort in to pulling my self away from it to get ready for Nintendo. Clearly heavily inspired by A Link to the Past then dunked in that indie game, calming soundscape driven atmosphere it’s very easy to pick up and even more difficult to put back down. The big difference between this and a regular Zelda game is the map seems to be more Dark Souls inspired then Zelda. Meaning that instead of having an overworld to zig zag across to make progress it’s more linear with each area feeling unto itself and sort of like a big puzzle box/dungeon, and then once completed it spits you out at the Firelink Shrine equivalent and then you go to a different area. At at least that seems to be the case so far. Game play is very reliant on push this, pull that and less gimmick focused than a typical Zelda game, but it feels surprisingly good and is a game that really moves which I like a lot. I think this this is a prime example of a little gem. It’s not blowing my mind in terms of newness but it has taken me by surprise because of how fun it is.

Gato Roboto is a kind of miniature monochrome Metroidvania where you play as a cat who can hop in and out of a robot (and other machines). The cat itself is powerless and defenseless but can get to places where the robot can’t. Movement is very fast and compared to other games of the genre you’ll explore large areas of the map very quickly. I’m at 15% completion after one hour. So far it’s exactly what it looks like, plays very well and seems like excellent value for money.

Steamworld Heist is a game that’s out on everything. It was initially released on 3DS in 2015, and I’ve played it for a couple of hours on Switch. It’s a fun turn-based space faring rpg with an eye-catching visual style. Battles take place inside ships and the ship layouts are randomised. Missions are selected from a node-based map. I’ve been playing on the default “Experienced” difficulty and it seems like a reasonable challenge. I’ve had a couple of characters die during missions. When a character dies they don’t receive experience for that mission but they are resurrected when the mission is over. The game has all the features that you would expect from the genre - special abilities, equipment, loot, new characters to recruit - but it’s the visual style and the ricocheting of bullets (as you can see in the picture) that makes it unique and fun.

Was the thread for this deleted? I feel like there was one... Anyway I played a good chunk of this before I went home last Christmas. I booted it up today and continued where I left off, which led to me restoring the colour yellow to the world. And then I played on a bit more after that. According to my Switch profile I’ve played it for “more than three hours” so I’m probably near the end. The selling point of the game is the beautiful art and music but I’d forgotten how enjoyable the game’s gentle puzzles are to solve. You could describe the game as being style over substance, which it probably is, but I feel like the gameplay foundations of the game are pretty solid.