Tag Archives: Game Review

Pokémon: Magikarp Jump Review

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Time for another one of those quick mobile titles. I figured I’d give this one a quick shot because of how absurd the whole concept was and it’s actually better than I thought it would be. It’s the kind of game that you would need to stick with for the long term to actually get to the end though. Raising a Magikarp is a whole lot of work and it’s set up in a way where you will go through many Magikarps before you actually get one that is strong enough to take you to victory.

The simplicity of the game is part of what makes it so addictive. At the same time, it is clear that they are hoping you will spend money on this game so the grind gets longer and longer as you go on. Before long you will either decide that you want to be in it for the long haul or not. For me, there are just too many hype games to stay with any one title for long but they still did a good job with the title. I made it up to level 25 before calling it a day here.

So the story is straight forward as you raise a Magikarp and work to obtain all 8 Gym badges. In this world, Magikarp is the only Pokemon that is used for battling and so every Gym Leader has one. Whichever Magikarp splashes the highest wins. You then have to fight through a few trainers before the next gym leader and repeat the process. Gym Leader may be the wrong word though, I think the game just refers to them as champions but it’s basically the same concept in the end. You don’t actually control Magikarp during the fights so you just watch it splash. Each fight only takes about 5-10 seconds which is fast and if you lose the first time then you can just skip the animation the second time. You do have to start the tournament from the beginning each time you lose but you don’t have to re-complete previous ones.

The actual gameplay comes into the picture between battles. To get your Magikarp stronger you have to feed it a bunch of berries. They spawn every few seconds and then you tap on them in the screen. Rinse and repeat as you go through the game. As you get stronger you will unlock different training equipment which the Magikarp can use every once in a while. You will also unlock Pokemon who appear in the background to help out. There s even a sub genre for this game, it’s known as an Idle mobile game. So the idea is you just play it for a few minutes here and there when you have time and your Pokemon will keep on getting stronger.

Of course Magikarp will eventually retire and then you start from scratch. Your next Magikarp will always be stronger though based on your trainer level going up as well as his motivation. There is no way around losing at least 100 Magikarp or so as you go through the journey but eventually you will have one that is strong enough to beat all of the leagues. The game itself is effectively dead at this point so once you beat the 8 leagues you would be all done. There is no post game so you can just keep on getting stronger forever. I called it a day after beating 4 of the tournaments.

There’s a lot more on the details side I could mention here but you get the general idea. You have coins and gems to buy upgrades and the game essentially runs on a loop. It may sound a bit overwhelming but once you are playing the game, you won’t think that is the case. It’s a game that has an incredibly good UI so you always know where to go next. They did an absolutely excellent job on this one. I definitely can’t emphasize that enough. There’s not really much of a soundtrack here but the whole thing is going for a really peaceful vibe.

The graphics are pretty solid. Nothing that will rock your world or anything like that but the game looks and feels nice. Naturally there is a ton of replay value here and beating the main campaign will take a long while either way. Pokemon has definitely had some really strong hits over the years and this one is no exception. Hopefully they continue to make more Pokemon mobile titles in the future.

Overall, Magikarp Splash is a lot of fun. Almost deceptively so I would say since the actual sessions are really fast but you want to keep going back in to play some more. You could easily get addicted if you aren’t careful so you should definitely watch out for that. At the end of the day though I tend to gravitate to more story based games in the end. Pokemon Go is really the big exception to that. If you are looking for a fun little game to play though, this is a nice one to have on your phone. There are also no ads at all which is really nice. I always give the developers credit for that on not being greedy.

Overall 7/10

Battletoads in Battlemaniacs Review

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It’s time to look at the Battletoads, one of the big SNES titles of legend! This game is known for being super tough and after playing through I can definitely confirm this. The levels absolutely go hard and in particular the second last level is insane. That one took me tons of tries and you gotta appreciate how anyone was able to do it back in the day. You do get a good amount of continues but it’s not unlimited or it didn’t seem that way. Imagine getting a full game over and going to the start? Would be brutal unless I’m mistaken there.

The basic plot involves a girl getting kidnapped and even one of the toads ends up going down for the count. The rest of them quickly get ready to save the day but they will have to take out powerful opponents and get past a lot of dangerous obstacles. It won’t be easy but hey they are ready for this. They’re no strangers to danger after all.

So the basic gameplay here is that of a 2D platformer/beat ’em up. You punch away at opponents and move forward to the goal. Some levels are standard beat em ups while others shake up the gameplay style a bit. For example one of them has you in a ship blasting away at enemies. It’s the easiest one for sure though. The beat em ups are also pretty easy for the most part at least relatively speaking. Nothing about the game is downright easy but it’s not nearly as bad as the others. Let’s talk about that toughest level.

You’re on a scooter and you have this guy on a motorcycle after you. He is trying to slice you in two and you have to stay ahead of him. It’s easily the most violent level because when you lose it really gets intense. Now the reason the level is tough is because you have to hold the control stick in the direction of the road at all times and there are a ton of twists and turns. If you are late to switch by half a second then it’s all over. The screen also doesn’t show you a full view for most of it so you have to just react very quickly. The level itself is only around 2 minutes but let me tell you that trying to not make any mistakes for 2 minutes with so many twists and turns is incredibly difficult.

It’s all about the timing and the interesting thing is that the way the momentum works, you actually get penalized for using the rewind feature because it completely stops your momentum. So you have to even time your access points just right like during a jump where you can recover really quickly. It took me so many tries but when I finally beat the level it felt really satisfying.

Then while not quite as tough, this next one was also a real doozy. This time it’s a vertical race as you are starting at the top of a tower and heading all the way down. You are chasing the villain as he runs down and you have to really move perfectly because he is faster than you. You can hit him to slow the guy down for a moment but if you miss the hit then you will have just dug an even deeper hole for yourself. So that definitely makes things tricky as well. Stay strong and just keep on going but good luck on memorizing the spots. This one didn’t take me nearly as long but was also a really crazy level.

I’ve already said this several times but the game is definitely insanely difficult and lives up to the reputation. The fact that it could be difficult with different gameplay styles like this is definitely impressive. It may make for a high barrier of entry but at least it isn’t artificial difficulty. They’re just making a fun game that is really hard but you always have a chance to win. You could argue that the two chases are the only ones that break this mold as there are obstacles you could never possibly anticipate on your first run.

The graphics look pretty good and the artstyle in general has aged pretty well. It’s definitely the kind of game that really leaps off the screen. The levels also have a whole lot of variety throughout with different backgrounds in addition to the gameplay styles. They put in a good amount of effort here without a doubt. Meanwhile the soundtrack is also good. Battletoads definitely delivers on these fronts without any real issues. Mix that in with the fun gameplay and it’s easy to see why this is a solid title.

Overall, Battletoads is a pretty fun game. I’m not sure if I would have had as much fun without the switch online enhancements but it’s definitely a game that had a good amount of effort and creativity behind it. You can see why the series definitely got so well known over the years. If you have the switch online then I would definitely recommend checking it out. It’s one of the better ones on the console.

Overall 7/10

The Mystery of Atlantis Review

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It’s time for another really retro NES title. This one actually didn’t get translated but it’s a platformer so it’s not like there is really a lot of dialogue anyway. It’s a pretty fun title, they did a good job of emulating that classic Mario style. At the end of the day the fact that it isn’t sequential does hold it back a little and I prefer always having a straight forward level vs the puzzles but it lands way more wins than you would expect.

So I can’t really say much about the story but you play as a guy who looks like Indiana Jones and you’re wandering your way through a maze of 100 levels. Each level will have you running and jumping over obstacles. The only weapon at your disposal is the pocket grenades. The cool thing about them though is that they damage anyone on screen. So if you throw it and miss, the enemy will still take damage in most cases. Some enemies take 3 hits to take down but most go down in one hit or two. It can be tough to angle the weapon just right so this helps to alleviate that pressure a little bit.

There is a really fast timer that is going on the whole time so you need to keep that in mind though. If you forget about it for even a moment then you might be in trouble here. The time is just as deadly as any enemy you will face and in some levels I barely had any time left at all. When you jump, the momentum will keep you going the whole time so it is hard to change directions in mid air. This means one fall can set you back a whole lot or even when you bump into any of the walls. You need perfect control of your character in order to make it through these levels and it takes a whole lot of skills.

This game can be deceptively hard in that way. Then you also have the fact that levels have more than one exit. So this can launch you far into the future or it can even send you back at times. Imagine picking the wrong door and having to go through a level again? That would be rough and a lot of the levels are so relentless that one mistake will cause you to be completely defeated. There are also several “dark” levels where you can’t see anything. These levels were incredibly difficult for me to navigate. The trick in the end was to keep blowing up your grenades which causes the level to appear for a split second.

Of course this doesn’t make it easy in the end either though. You still have to time your jumps perfectly so one wrong step and you will end up falling to your doom. This is definitely a game for platforming vets. So why is this game good when it’s so difficult? Well, it feels difficult in a way that is generally fair the whole time. Additionally the levels being colorful and fast paced helps out a lot as well. You will never be just totally stuck waiting for something to happen.

So the graphics are above average for a NES game which is good and the music wasn’t bad. It’s no Mario though but it was good enough. The game feels very well balanced. It is not without faults of course but easily stands above most of its peers. If you are looking for a fun time then you should definitely play this while you have the Switch Online. Of course it would probably not be as fun without the rewind feature but that’s just how a lot of these classic games go. Each level is around 1-2 minutes so even with 100 levels it goes by quickly. I would even say some levels are under a minute because I knocked them all out in around 90 minutes. Of course, skipping levels helps quite a bit with this.

Overall, The Mystery of Atlantis is a good game. It gets a little too clever for its own good by the end with some of the gimmicks but it was certainly creative. I would say it pushed the NES hardware pretty far. Especially with 100 levels. Yes, they have a lot of levels that are pretty similar and reuse assets but this is still really impressive. I’ve played several games that basically just had one level after all so it’s not particularly easy or anything like that.

Overall 6/10

Sonic Dash 2: Sonic Boom Review

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It’s time to look at good ole Sonic Dash. I never actually played the original but I did try out the Sonic Forces title a while back which was a lot of fun. It was time to check out good ole Sonic Boom and as you can probably guess it wasn’t given quite as much attention as the others. It feels really barebones next to Forces although I can’t quite compare it to the original yet. Considering that the game has been out since 2018, it’s just surprising how few characters and stages there are. You’re really just playing the same stage over and over again except for one different one that showed up for the Shadow tie in. There’s just not a lot to this game.

It’s an endless runner type of game so the basic gameplay is really similar. You have to run as fast as you can all the way to the end of the stage. You can jump over obstacles and slide under others. When you have enough energy meter, you can turn on auto run for around 5-10 seconds to bust through everything and get more points. Then the level never ends so eventually you can intentionally destroy yourself to end the stage. After you’ve done that, you keep your points and rings which can be used to level up your characters. You can also get a handful of red rings to eventually unlock new characters but those take a while to get. You can only get up to 10 red rings in a day and it takes 120 to unlock any characters.

It makes sense why they would want to make this a slow process though because there aren’t many characters like I said before. There are less than 10 around which is definitely not ideal. You can unlock Shadow through his event at least and he actually has his own attack. All the other characters just slide while he can actually shoot his chaos spear to destroy enemies in front of him. That’s pretty cool at least.

Still, it feels like there should be more content here. I would like to see at least a basic plot, something to keep you progressing through the game. Maybe a lot of costumes or something like that if you couldn’t afford too many characters. Although since it’s just a character model running, I wonder how hard it really is to add more. It doesn’t feel like that should be very difficult at all. Maybe there isn’t much incentive to improve the game since Sonic Boom is basically dead but at the same time they are still doing a Shadow tie in for the movie so it’s not like the game is dead.

One of the biggest weaknesses for the game is also the fact that an advertisement plays after each level that you complete. For me this is always a dealbreaker because I just don’t want to be seeing advertisements like that. It doesn’t really make any sense. It should always be an optional thing like if you decide to earn extra rings or something like that. I’ve always liked the model of using advertisements for bonus power ups and things like that but not as a mandatory part of the game. That to me is when the game starts to feel super greedy.

Also, you have to keep in mind that you are playing tons of levels here so the advertisements add up very quickly. A game cannot succeed like that so this doomed it really quickly. To even try and get me tempted back into the game you would need to cut those out and add some actual content. Not every mobile game needs to be completely endless of course but you still need to have enough content to keep me busy for a while. I seems like I would already be out of content for this one very quickly unless they artificially ramp up the grind factor later on.
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I will say the most tempting part of the game is the fact that almost nobody plays anymore though. I was near the top of the rankings for the Shadow event despite barely playing at all so that was pretty cool. It’s the one big incentive about playing dead games and this only works when they don’t just add a bunch of bots to inflate the numbers. Fortunately that wasn’t the case this time. If they did that then you would never get to reach the top.

At least I can say that the graphics are really good. All of the character models are very sharp and look like their Boom counterparts. It would have been nice to have seen characters who weren’t in the show though so they could have had new designs. I suppose that was beyond this title though. The soundtrack is also good, just very limited due to the lack of stages. On a technical level I would say the game did what it needed to. The core gameplay is also really good. Granted, I tend to really enjoy endless runner titles so that’s no real surprise.

Overall, Sonic Dash 2 is just severely lacking when it comes to overall content. The fact that Miraculous Ladybug at launch had more content than this one did 6 years in is absolutely crazy. Sonic can and should have more content than what was represented here. It’s like they really weren’t trying at all and that’s unfortunate. So I would say to give this one a shot. I’d recommend the Sonic Forces dash game way more than this one. It puts in so much more effort.

Overall 5/10

Cobra Triangle Review

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It’s time for one of those old school NES titles. It’s been a little while since I played one of these so that was definitely nostalgic. You have to grant the titles some slack because they’re ancient of course but the NES has delivered some good ones over the years. This one just tries a little too hard to be the next big thing and ultimately doesn’t pull it off. I appreciate the effort though.

Basically there are around 5-6 different gameplay styles in this one. All of them involve you piloting a boat. The main gameplay style is that of a race. You have to drive through the course and make it to the end within a certain amount of time. During the race, other boats will be trying to blast you away so you need to take them down. As long as you drive fast you should be able to win this one. It’s easily the easiest kind of gameplay style in the title. Ironically it is also the final stage where I was stuck at. There are some jumps that are introduced later on and if you don’t have enough speed you will lose. The problem? You need upgrades to get to that level of speed so if you made it to that part of the level without any, then you’re sunk.

Another gameplay style is about defusing bombs. You have to grab a bomb and then push it over to your side of the field like a soccer game. The other boats will try to steal the bomb back and bring it to their side. So you have to really try zigzagging a lot to keep them off your trail. It’s not easy but you’ve definitely got this. As long as you shake a whole lot while driving they usually won’t be able to steal the bomb.

You’ve also got the boss fights which is the toughest ones if you ask me. Each boss has different patterns and touching them at all will cost you serious damage. It’s extremely hard to maneuver the boat without crashing at least a little bit and then usually the vulnerable part of the boss is very small. So you really have to adjust for absolutely everything which doesn’t really leave a whole lot of time to yourself to get things right. This took a whole lot of tries to get right.

Along the way you will also have to dodge more and more traps as the game goes on like whirlpools that spawn out of nowhere and a ton of glaciers that appear from underneath the sea. They really went all out like I said before but sometimes you can just overdo it and this is one of those cases. They should have taken it a little easier on all of this and that would have made things a lot better.

The graphics are pretty good for its time. There is a lot of color here and it is absolutely in better shape than I have seen for other titles. The soundtrack is pretty much nonexistent but the themes that were there weren’t bad. Nothing to write home about. There are 25 levels in the game so that adds up to a reasonable amount of value here. It’s not a game that you would just complete overnight or anything like that after all. Well..I guess if you’re really good at it then you probably could. Technically each level is only about 1-2 minutes long, you can just expect to die a whole lot of times before you get to the end. Particularly if you intend to try and beat the game without rewinding. Me personally? I don’t recommend doing that but if you really love the game then it is definitely a way to make it last longer.

While I prefer to be able to just zoom my way through the levels and pit my speed against some opponents, I know some people like to be able to experience a lot of obstacles and having to get through them. So for those cases, this will probably work out pretty well. It’s certainly different compared to most other racing games, I can tell you that much.

Overall, Cobra Triangle isn’t really a game that I would play again. The main problem is ultimately that it’s just not too fun and of course that is a huge problem to have here. Without the rewinds you’d be dying hundreds of times to the most random RNG-esque obstacles. There is always a whole lot of dodging so you rarely get to actually just drive and have a good time. You want to strike the right balance with a game like this and unfortunately Cobra was not up to the task.

Overall 5/10

Madden NFL 25 Review

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Madden has returned and their decision to already use the 25 title early definitely came back to get them. It was only a matter of time until 2025 showed up after all but either way I can say this is another top tier title. Madden 25 hits hard and continues to bring in the kind of content that we’re used to. Not much has changed so if you liked the last game a lot then I expect the same will be true of this one as well. It’s the kind of sports experience that you won’t soon forget.

There are a lot of modes here as always. You can jump into the practice sessions, franchise mode, etc. You can play Football in pretty much any kind of conditions that you want to. Additionally you can choose to play the full games, play as one particular position, or even be the coach. For me, I decided to go with a standard franchise while playing all offensive snaps. Switching from the full game to all offense was definitely one of the best upgrades that they did a few years back. It’s hard to go back from that.

Each game is rather quick as a result. On average I would say a game would take anywhere between 20-25 minutes, sometimes even a bit shorter. It would vary based on how much time the opponent drives would take or how quickly mine finished. I went with standard difficulty and did a full season. I played all the way through to the super bowl but I ended up losing that round. Their team was just way too powerful in the end and I got smoked. It was a fun ride though and I do like how the opponents actually get tougher once you reach the playoffs. It is really realistic with how only the best teams should be showing up there.

The gameplay is really smooth but can be a bit hard to describe unless you’re really into Football. What I’ll say is that it’s a very in depth simulation of all the different players and how the plays go. You control whoever has the ball at the time. When you’re throwing the ball you can aim high or low and where you move the control stick will also alter the course. When you’re running the ball you can try to avoid the other players or barrel right through them. Your odds of breaking away for a huge run there is much smaller than throwing the ball but it definitely can happen.

The graphics are pretty solid as usual. It’s got a good amount of detail considering how many things are happening on screen at once. There is no lag or any of that either which is impressive. The game really does run well and while it has become more simulation over arcade style over the years, the gameplay is still really fast paced and fun. You really need solid reaction times here to pass to the open receiver before you get sacked sometimes. One thing to remember is that the amount of players on both sides is the same so there will always be someone who is open enough to make the play or you can scramble up for some yards.

It’s this level of precision that makes the game fun. Can you spot the whole in the defense before you get clobbered? Then you also have a lot of fakeouts and other things to consider as well. One wrong move and you may end up throwing an interception and really getting clobbered. This was also the first game where they implemented the new kickoff rules that the real NFL will be using so that was cool. I guess you can say that’s at least one new thing they implemented. It definitely makes getting good field position super easy on each drive. Just run straight up and for sure you will get some good yards.

I do wish they would be more generous on the trophies though. Only getting 1 trophy after a whole season of games is really rough. It seems like they really want you to be a completionist all the way through which is crazy. Even if I wanted to earn those trophies legitimately, it would take a super long amount of time. We’re talking numerous seasons so this would end up being like a long RPG. That’s hopefully something they can fix one day since even the trophies they just import over and over every year.

There’s not a whole lot more to say about this one. Basically it is still the most complete experience for any Football game. It is an incredible experience and a lot of fun. I don’t see people getting much out of it if they’re not into the NFL but if you are into it then this is absolutely great. The presentations before the big games and all the little details really help to make the dream work. If they ever release a Madden on Switch I would have a blast with the online since I have that package but in the meantime I’m just in it for the offline experience here.

Overall, Madden NFL 25 is definitely an elite title. The franchise really has not lost a step at all. I’ll definitely be here day 1 for all of the adventures. This was the first Madden game that I got to buy day 1 and I could really feel the hype. With multiplayer it naturally has endless replay value but even on your own there is a lot to have fun with. Obtaining all of the trophies will take an incredible amount of time due to how the game is set up so you have to consider that as well. While it would be fun to see them fix more of the glitches and add some new content in, I never really run into the glitches so it’s not a big deal to me personally. I’d probably have to play for a significantly longer amount of time to really notice that.

Overall 9/10

One Punch Man: A Hero Nobody Knows Review

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It’s time for one of those games that looked just enough like a tie in where people had some reservations about it. The good news is that because of that you can get this game for dirt cheap nowadays. I always enjoy some good One Punch Man action so I was definitely eager to see how this one turned out. Fortunately they really held nothing back here. It’s a great title and one that is even carried a bit by the technical aspects. The combat isn’t the most fine tuned 3D title that you’ve ever seen but the menus and layouts are all just really solid and smooth. You’re constantly impressed as just how easy everything is to navigate. This is probably the kind of game I would point to when explaining to people why menus are so important.

The game roughly follows the story of season 1 but has you playing as a brand new hero. You are recruited into the hero’s association and work on rising up the ranks by saving people and crushing monsters. Along the way you run into Saitama and Genos. This results in your constantly showing up to fight off the big villains but typically Saitama is the one who will actually put a stop to the madness. It would be more effective if you actually talked during the cutscenes though. During gameplay your original character talks and even has some great lines so I don’t know why they didn’t keep that energy up.

Either way the story is a pretty reasonable length. It should take you around 6-7 hours to clear it and there is a lot of replay value aside from that. This is a fighting game title after all so you can have fun in multiplayer mode for many hours. Additionally in single player mode you have a ton of bonus missions and level ups to work on. You will want to max out each of the fighting styles for more trophies as well. The platinum trophy looks like it will take a while to unlock but at the same time it looks very achievable. So put in enough effort and you will definitely be able to complete this one.

When you level up you get to choose which stats to increase so I recommend putting everything in attack power. Trust me, that’s what you will be using the most by far. Use two quick hits, a low hit, and then your standard combo. It does a good amount of damage and you can recycle that comb for the entire game. A pretty tempting strategy to use if I do say so myself! You don’t really need to get fancy here. It is good to make sure you have a super attack that breaks through guards though. That is really handy for when they start blocking.

Ultimately I went with the power type for the whole game. Then my super attack was a grab so if the opponent blocked the opening moves of my combo, I would immediately use the grab and would deal the damage. It’s a really good way to cheese the opponent and so I kept up a win rate of over 90%. The tough levels tend to be ones where stage hazards show up. I died once because a meteorite was slamming me into the ground and it did massive amounts of damage. The hazards could probably be dialed back a little to be honest.

I could never figure out how to get up quickly though. This is the toughest part of the game by far as a result since the enemy only has to knock you to the ground once and then after that they can keep comboing you to oblivion. It meant that I would either crush an opponent without getting hit or just barely win because one hit has such a massive effect to it. I’m assuming there is something you can do but I just couldn’t figure it out.

Back to the technical elements, the map is super detailed and has icons for every kind of content around. There is an arrow always pointing you to where you need to go within the story and there is also quick travel. All of the menus have super fast loading times and really look natural. There is really no downside to be found here. Then the graphics are also really good. The game models look sharp and there was just a whole lot of effort put into this one. I have to give the soundtrack props next as the tunes are really good. It felt like everyone was proud to work on this game. It may not be a AAA title by any stretch but the technical elements wouldn’t be out of place in one.

Just touch up the story and gameplay a bit and this could have been the next big thing. Ultimately that wasn’t really part of the plan but it’s still a game that any fighting fan can really enjoy. I always love playing through a great fighting title and this one is really no exception. Anime fighters can get real immersive and I dare say this game feels like it had a much higher budget than even something like Jump Force which is crazy when you think about it.

Overall, One Punch Man really delivered with this game. I definitely had a blast here. The whole game definitely goes by real quick but it’s also one that I could feel like picking back up and playing at any time. I left a whole lot of content on the table as well so there would be a lot for me to do when I get back into the game. The fact that the whole game is dubbed and contains a ton of voice acting is also super impressive. It’s something I never take for granted because even nowadays games will come out without voice acting like this. So when it does appear, that’s just really awesome. If they ever come up with a sequel to this one then I can safely say that I will be there day 1. I definitely won’t be missing out on this and I recommend picking up One Punch Man whenever you can. It’s that good.

Overall 8/10

Final Fantasy X Review

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It’s time for one of the most well known RPG titles out there. Final Fantasy X is one of those games that was super well received and you can see why because they went all out here. The graphics are really good, the gameplay is on point, and the story is great. It’s definitely another elite Final Fantasy title that any gamer can enjoy. There is definitely a lot of content here as well so it’s also not a game that you will breeze through either. There is plenty to keep you busy.

The game follows a guy named Tidus who is probably the world’s greatest Blitzball player. This guy draws in huge crowds and has really made a name for himself. One day a giant monster attacks though and he falls into a whole new world. Blitzball still exists fortunately but otherwise everything is pretty different. He may even be in some distant future as his home country appears to be destroyed. He meets a girl named Yuna who is a priestess. Her job is to fight against monsters known as Sin and to do that she has to go to various temples and unlock all of the summons. This will allow her to beat Sin, at least for a time. She is protected by several guardians and so Tidus joins in with the bunch. This may sound like a simple mission at first, but there are definitely about to be a lot of complications.

This title is over 30 hours after all so that leaves plenty of time for tons of plot twists and different characters to show up. It’s one of the many things I love about RPGs. You really get to be invested into the story and everything. The characters are also pretty likable and so they have a good group dynamic going on here. Tidus is definitely very expressive and he’s not afraid to go against tradition which is always good. He’s got that aggressive main character energy going for him and I can always appreciate that. Yuna is a good heroine as well who has to make a lot of tough choices without looking back.

Her plans aren’t always good to be honest but she is trying her best and often has to think of things on her own. So you have to give her a good amount of credit there. Wakka goes through quite a bit here as he quickly realizes that things aren’t going to go over very well for him. He hits a rough patch for a while there but in general is a solid character. It takes some time for him to expand his horizons. Rikku is also a fun character even if it felt like she could have talked things out with Tidus a lot sooner and prevented some misunderstandings. Of course, everyone was generally keeping a lot of things from him so she is hardly alone in that.

Lulu probably has one of the smallest roles from the main cast. She is always around and is a good ally to be sure but doesn’t really have her own sub plot the way that the rest do. Auron certainly has a huge role and looks pretty good even if he falls into the same trap of keeping way too many secrets half the time. He has power though and the characters would have been doomed without him. Finally we have Kimahri who I wasn’t a huge fan of for a while there but he is loyal. There’s just not a whole lot to his character for a while there since he is the real quiet type.

At the end of the day, Yuna was definitely lucky to have a real loyal supporting cast with her. The rest of the summoners were generally not so lucky. The game does have one of the weaker main villains in Seymour though. The guy had a cool design and a solid enough intro but as the game went on his motives didn’t hold up as well and he lost a lot of hype. He’s tenacious but I was definitely ready to see him go down for a while there. He wasn’t really enhancing the story the way a better villain could have.

The level up system is a bit different here. When you level up, your stats don’t increase, instead you are given one movement point on a board that has stat boosts and new abilities. Each character has their own board which is massive and you can hop onto someone else’s board after you have gotten enough power ups. This means there are a ton of different variations you can make to each character’s skill set. It also means you can get a ton of level ups without actually feeling much progress if you always end up picking the wrong tiles. So just be careful which movements you make here. The level ups naturally get harder as you go on. Although if you get stuck at the final boss, the area before him is absolutely amazing for grinding! I got so many level ups there.

The gameplay is your classic turn based style but with a few twists. For starters, only Yuna can use summoning. The summons all scale to her personal stats so you will want to build her up real quick because these guys are absolutely deadly. Bahamut carried me through all the boss fights in the second half and that’s even considering that most bosses are set up to KO your summon in one turn. Even with that he could deal crazy damage. He knocked out 64K from the final boss in one hit which is how I just barely managed to beat him. Some enemies are too high to be hit with physical attacks which is when you need to break out your long range fighters.

So there is a ton of strategy here, I dare say even more than the classic RPG types. Make sure you power everyone up as you will need to be switching a lot. Or almost everyone I suppose. I didn’t really use Rikku or Kimahri at all. Rikku just super briefly for some of the robots. As long as you have one long range fighter at the ready and your close quarters specialists, then you should be good to go. The game is hard to be sure and it’s definitely one you have to focus for but it’s always in a fun way.

The graphics have definitely aged really well so you can really feel that this is a AAA title. The big budget cutscenes all really go hard and of course it’s no surprise that the soundtrack is also super good. There are a lot of fun battle/boss themes to play around with. In terms of replay value, the game’s got everything you could ask for as well. There are tons of post game dungeons and everything to keep you busy. They’re so high leveled it can be hard to imagine how much time you would need to complete them. I would definitely expect it to take at least another 20 hours or so.

Overall, Final Fantasy X is definitely a top tier title. It really does great in every area so I had no complaints here. It’s the kind of game where you can always come up with a new strategy if you lost a boss fight. There are many different ways to tackle each encounter after all so you never really have to limit yourself. Just keep on fighting hard and eventually you will have cleared the game to see the satisfying ending. I definitely recommend this to anyone looking for a good story or in general to anyone that likes the classic turn based combat.

Overall 9/10

Castlevania Advance Collection Review

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Time for the next Castlevania collection! This time we’re entering a more modern era with a bunch of GBA titles and I gotta say this works out pretty well. You can feel the quality of life updates oozing out of each title and all in all they do feel a lot more fun. I would also say generally speaking they do improve as they go on. Sometimes not unanimously in every regard but generally speaking they feel stronger. The games also increasingly have more story which always works out well.

So we kick things off with Circle of the Moon. Dracula is returning once again and he must be stopped but how do you beat a foe so powerful that he has the whole world on its knees? Well, Nathan will have to figure that out. This game has the classic Metroidvania type style here as you wander around a labyrinth gaining new powers and abilities in the rooms. With each new ability comes new opportunities and so you work to find out which areas have opened up for you to crack. It makes for some good fun in exploring but this is the critical make or break point for any game in the genre.

Here’s the balancing act. Naturally you want a lot of dead ends and such to encourage players to return later once they are stronger. However, the rooms can be quite large so what you don’t want to do is make the journey feel like a chore. The way to prevent this is by having fast travel in a lot of different areas so you can hop on that right away. It removes all of the excess running. Now, there is a level up system so beating the enemies gets easier with time. That is a good idea since proper progression is always a plus. It means that if you’re stuck at any point, you are given clear direction on how to get past that point which is really cool. Not just any game will do that.

So this one did it better than some of the other titles. Not perfectly mind you, but it’s a fairly good showing of the genre. I never quite understood the card gimmick though. You could use cards in different combinations to unleash powerful elemental attacks and such but I could never get any of them to work. You can still win without this but I imagine that the game might have been a whole lot easier otherwise. So I definitely did not make things easy on myself here. The graphics are solid and I liked all of the boss battles. There are quite a lot of them here so you really get to go all out.

Then in the second game Juste shows up to put an end to Dracula’s reign of terror. Defeating the king of the vampires won’t be easy but this guy is ready. It picks up a lot of the gameplay details and abilities from the previous game while also throwing in some new wrinkles. Gone are the cards (Which I’m 100% down with) and replacing them are magical super attacks. You are invincible while using these abilities which is extremely handy and the techniques themselves vary based on what sub weapon you have equipped. I chose one that let me shoot energy waves and I made sure to never pick any other sub weapons after that. This one was just way too useful but I can’t remember which one it was. I think the sub weapon looked like a book of sorts but I’m not sure of the name.

Either way there are a ton of sub weapons everywhere so it should not be hard to find these. Just keep searching and you will get them fairly quick. Meanwhile you still have the level up system so make sure you get those right away. If you beat all of the enemies you will get the level ups normally but especially securing some of them early on is an incredible help for you later on. You want to be able to easily dispatch all of the zombies and creatures that head your way to save health for the bosses. The bosses definitely do not hold back and really dish a whole lot of damage out.

The game loses some steam near the very end though as it does fall into the trap of the journey being a little too monotonous. As you approach the end game, there will only be a few passages left to check but they are in completely different sides of the map. So even though you have quick travel, it takes forever to get anywhere which is really the issue. This only really applies to the end game as it’s possible to miss power ups and then this cascades quite a bit as they are all linked. So just watch out here because missing things is really high stakes.

Then we have the third game, Aria of Sorrow. This one felt like it had a pretty good technological jump right off the bat. The graphics are extra clear, we have a whole new setting, and all of the gameplay mechanics are very sharp. You still have the level ups but now you have a soul system. Instead of finding the power ups for the most part, you gain the abilities through souls. It’s a fun way to go although there is a mild issue of having to pause and cycle through your abilities to keep on switching powers. That part’s a little dicey you know. Still, it’s a mild annoyance at worst, not something that will really be giving you a hard time here.

I liked the plot of several people being suspicious and you have to try and figure out who will be Dracula’s new vessel. It’s almost like a mystery game of sorts there so that was a fun angle. I think another way to put it is that the game had a whole lot of personality. It felt like the devs could have fun taking things in a new direction and it worked really well. It even felt like there was some true replay value here as you could clear the game while still leaving a lot left to be done. It’s the right balance of being a completionist vs just wanting to finish the game. Additionally, you gain powers like flight that make each room a breeze so that addresses my issue of moving through the map too slowly from the last game. This was definitely super solid.

Finally we have Dracula X. Well, Dracula is back and we have to take him down. Lesss goooooooo. The plot is super basic/nonexistent and the game feels like a super simplified version of the old ones. The fact that you can no longer jiggle your whip around or use magic attacks feels like a massive step back. It just went too far into being super retro. It’s not bad, the whole game is super short but very linear. It just doesn’t hold up compared to the big full fledged game titles. It was kind of funny to go back to this one.

The graphics for all of the games are pretty solid. Dracula X looks rather dated but all of the GBA ones hold their own. The soundtracks definitely vary from game to game but as a whole there are a ton of good tunes to listen to so you definitely won’t be getting bored at all. The variety is definitely here to stay and you might even recognize one or two from Super Smash Bros. There is a good amount of replay in trying to get all trophies and really ace each of the games as well. You will definitely need to tap into your inner Castlevania fan to pull that off but it will add some extra hours without a doubt.

Overall, Castlevania Advance Collection is definitely pretty fun. All 3 of the game boy advance titles are pretty solid and generally speaking are a step up from the retro styled ones. They all feel like complete games and I do think adding a full fledged level up system to the vania games is a real good way of keeping things from being too repetitive. Even if you get lost, at least you know you are making progress. I may still not be a huge fan of the sub genre but I can say this is on the higher levels in terms of quality. It’s certainly miles away from certain other titles that just feel like a grind. The final game may not hold up as much but I consider that to be more of a bonus title so either way there was no real pressure there.

Overall 7/10

Batman: Return to Arkham Review

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It’s time to return to the world of Batman games. Yes, this collection absolutely lives up to the hype and it’s been great playing so many elite games back to back! It’s really hard to see how DC can top this Batman series in the future because of just how well it nailed the mythos and atmosphere. Not to say we’re done with the Arkham series as there are still two games left to get but this was a fantastic start all around.

The first game in the collection is Arkham Asylum. Batman was undergoing a normal operation where he took down the Joker and arrested him but unfortunately the jail isn’t as secure as it should be. Joker ends up breaking out and takes over Arkham Asylum real quick. The inmates all answer to him now and they are united in their drive to destroy Batman. Batman will really have to call upon all of his knowledge and gadgets in order to take these guys down. Batman is heavily outnumbered by tons of opponents after all so this won’t be easy.

The game does a terrific job of embracing the combat elements of Batman along with his detective’s nature. It’s all really handled quite spectacularly and whenever you lose, you do feel like you deserved the death. The infiltration missions for example are difficult but never unfair. You have to watch the opponents carefully and if you are caught, take down the opponent as soon as possible. Often times I would get into a gunfight and die but sometimes I would pull off the win. The game felt very open with how many options you had and it was ultimately up to you to use them in the right ways. If you made a mistake then the game would punish you quite harshly for it and I didn’t really see any problem with that. It’s all on you after all.

For example the parry system is quite incredible here. The timing is tight but you always have a visual sign that someone is going to make a move. It’s possible to fight whole scores of enemies and not take a hit or you might have your timing thrown off by getting hit and then suddenly you’re panicking and taking a lot of blows. It feels a lot like a real fight due to this which adds a real layer of realism to the whole thing. I was definitely real impressed and it’s not something that you would see in a lower tier game. It’s all these things that add up.

The gameplay is something I could take about for ages. You have tons of gadgets in the game that allow you to strike at an enemy in a variety of ways. You can just keep on going and really overwhelm them by freezing them, stunning, using a batarang, normal blows, etc. The gadgets are mainly the same across both games but do change up a little bit. I liked each variation and they both ultimately do the same kinds of things. The gameplay is incredibly smooth in both titles so I wouldn’t really change anything. I played them back to back and had no complaints. The games have aged extremely well in either case.

Naturally this goes for the graphics as well. It all looks really HD and crisp. They have all of the little things like the cape fluttering and all of the textures. The artstyle is one that will age really well I’d say so even 10 years from now it will look great. The sequel also went all out in allowing you to change into a bunch of different costumes so I really had fun with that. They all work rather seamlessly into the gameplay.

Arkham City has Hugo Strange show up to take over the city. It was pretty cool to be playing as Bruce Wayne temporarily since he doesn’t appear very much in the video games. It was also the natural follow up with having the whole city being taken over this time around. It really helped to change up the scenery as well. I really liked the Asylum and the whole atmosphere there, but being able to be outside with all of the different environments was great! It may have been a bit easier to get lost at times but that’s just how it goes. It was absolutely worth the trade off.

Getting sniped by randoms on the roof could get a little tricky at times but hey…skill issue. Like I said, you are always really in control so if you lose then it’s on you. The only time where it felt like it would be hard for you to reasonable guess what to do was in the boss fight with Mr. Freeze where you have to use every gadget once in order to take out his health. You basically couldn’t injure him the same way twice. Now that was a super hard boss fight to win. It was extremely difficult but still fun. I also thought it was creative how he would foil any follow up attempts.

It goes back to the game feeling really vibrant and alive. The A.I. is years ahead of many other titles around. The grunts will actually team up and come up with plans to stop you. They’re not just wandering around and wondering what to do. They’re getting out there and doing what has to be done. If you make a wrong move they all gang up on you and cover all exits. It’s really fun and the reason I don’t mind dying a ton of times is how many checkpoints there are. You never lose a significant amount of time for dying which I extremely appreciate. These are the quality of life features that I absolutely live for. Nobody’s walking around talking about why check points make a game amazing but boy do they feel good!

It was also cool to actually play as Catwoman for a few levels in the second game. While the majority of gameplay should always be with Batman, I do think switching it up a bit to other fighters is not a bad thing. Emphasis on fighters of course, I don’t want to be playing as any civilians. Next time Robin should be playable as well. It was cool seeing his cameo and everything and I think they could really do a lot with his gameplay options.

Overall, These two Batman games are absolutely elite! The stories are real interesting and while the campaigns aren’t super long, there is a considerable amount of replay value here. Certainly enough to keep you really engaged. They didn’t rush any part of the experience here and so I can easily recommend this to anyone. This is AAA gaming at its finest and definitely one of the best superhero games out there. You owe it to yourself to play through this collection. There’s really nothing bad to say about the game, it is an absolute masterpiece in every sense of the word. The developers clearly knew what they were doing and had a lot of passion for the product.

Overall 9/10