Comprehensive player reviews, video game backlog slaying, and thoughts on video game culture.
Hey, friends! It’s been ages and I hope you have all been well. While I’m still not in the writing mood very often, I wanted to show readers what hobby activities I’ve been up to this past year, which is mainly growing a LOT of houseplants, and also playing the tin whistle and making nerdy video game, anime, and film song covers!
Continue reading “Post-Pandemic Check-in: Orchids, tin whistle, and video game music! ♪”
The Autumn colors outside have had me feeling somewhat nostalgic lately and I wanted to expand a little on my older piece about how video games influenced the different phases of my life. It is less common than you’d expect for a non-sport hobby to stay with a child into their later adult life. What is it about video games that allow them to stick with us on such a deep, sentimental level for so many years?
Continue reading “Games of Our Childhoods”
Sayonara Wild Hearts incorporates all 22 Major Arcana of the Tarot in its fast paced, pop-arcade, cosmic wonderland. You can check out my full review of the game here. I cannot understate how creative and ambitious studio Simogo is to have given us such a spectacularly beautiful, mesmerizing rendition of the Fool’s Journey in video game form.
I wanted to do a deep dive into the significance of Tarot cards and their meanings are used in Sayonara Wild Hearts to add a hidden layer of depth for those in know, so that’s what you’ll find in this article! I’ll be covering the entire game from start to finish (including a short explanation of Tarot at the start) so please be sure to complete the game before reading to avoid spoilers. You can also watch a play through of the game here.
Let’s pop!
I wanted to make it easier for gaming writers to connect with the gaming blogger community, so I started the “Rising Stars” series where both veteran bloggers and readers can discover and welcome new or relatively unknown gaming writers into the community. I hope this will help to encourage and support individuals as well as maintain the health of the gaming blogger ecosystem overall!
You can find the previous Rising Stars posts here, and now let’s take a look at this week’s featured bloggers…
Continue reading “Rising Stars – Gaming Blogger Spotlight #4”
In a month overflowing with anticipated, high quality releases, Sayonara Wild Hearts is a shining gem you should have on your radar. This game is an expertly shaken cocktail of neon colors, trippy, dreamlike environments, a catchy synth-pop soundtrack, and skillful level design. While Sayonara is on the brief side with about an hour of total playtime required to complete the campaign, it is a truly magical experience that blew me away with its dynamic art style, captivating music, generous variety of mechanics, and heart-pumping action!
Continue reading “Sayonara Wild Hearts (Switch) Review – heartfelt, magical, and mesmerizing”
Untitled Goose Game is best described as the virtual, interactive embodiment of the AnimalsBeingJerks subreddit, and it is extremely entertaining! Not only is it is highly likely to linger in your mind as one of the most amusing titles you’ve ever played, but gameplay is also a blast to watch as a bystander. This deceptively complicated, low stress puzzle game hatches from a simple concept: You’re a gleefully mischievous goose who’s life’s mission seems to be to drive the residents of a small town completely bonkers.
Continue reading “Untitled Goose Game (Switch) Review – finding your inner HONK”
When I first saw the announcement trailer for Creature in the Well during the Nindies showcase earlier this year, it immediately piqued my interest with its derelict setting and intriguing pinball-based gameplay. When I tried the Creature in the Well at Flight School Studio’s booth at PAX West recently, I loved it and figured it would be a hit upon release. Now that it’s out and I’m going to double down on that opinion. Put on your dungeon spelunking gear and get ready to delve into the darkness of Creature in the Well, one of my favorite indie releases of 2019!
Continue reading “Creature in the Well (Switch) Review – the “pinbrawler” we never knew we always wanted”
Vambrace: Cold Soul, is a roguelike that caught my interest because of its highly stylized, graphic novel-esque art style and grimdark atmosphere. You play as Lyric, a young woman searching for clues about her late father’s mysterious past, who ends up trapped in Icenaire, a city surrounded by enchanted walls of ice that kill anyone who touches them…
Continue reading “Vambrace: Cold Soul Review (Switch) – icebound dungeon crawling”
Dear Readers,
I expect to be meeting with a number of developers at PAX West to discuss their upcoming or recently released games, and I want to include interview questions from you! I’ll happily incorporate as many questions as I can in any time I have with the devs for these awesome indie games.
Below, in no specific order, I’ve listed each of the respective studios and the games they are showing that I’ll be trying to speak with a representative about. You can look forward to eventual reviews for almost all of them!
Haven is one of the games I’m probably most excited about at PAX West. I’ve had my eye on it from the moment it was announced by the team that made Furi.
“Like Furi, Haven is about fighting for freedom.
Haven is about two characters, Yu and Kay, a couple in love. They escaped to a deserted planet to stay together. You play both of them, you live with them, you explore fragmented planet Source with them, gliding over the tall grass.
It’s a completely different pace. It’s a game that aims at making you feel relaxed, making you laugh, making you fall in love with Yu and Kay. It feels good for all types of players, skilled and less skilled. It’s a solo game that’s welcoming for another player to tag along, so you can explore and progress together. “
– The Game Bakers
Launching a strategy square tactics Switch game hot on the heels of the newest Fire Emblem release is a bold move, but Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark holds its own quite well! It is important to remember that this is not a triple A studio title, so I won’t evaluate it as such. Fell Seal is a solid entry in the genre, presenting an interesting story, a generous amount of customizable features, a memorable soundtrack, and a unique, beautiful, art style that appears as if hand drawn.
Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark is a great game that will appeal most of all to nostalgic Final Fantasy Tactics and Tactics Ogre fans and may be the successor they have been waiting on. Having not playing either of the games that seem to have inspired it, I enjoyed Fell Seal very much and would wholeheartedly recommend it to any lover of strategy-tactics games.
Backlog Crusader 