I’m one of those people who is far more interested in seeing a games company take a swing on a new concept or idea rather than the endless barrage of sequels, spin-offs and remakes. Capcom has done really well for themselves over the last decade or so. But what excites me more about the company compared to others in the AAA space is their ambition to still take a swing with new ideas and smaller games. ExoPrimal, their take on the PvPvE genre was refreshing, albeit a bit repetitive, and if you looked past those crying out for a new Dino Crisis, it was a solid multiplayer experience. With Kunitsu-Gami: Path of Goddess, it almost feels as if Capcom is trying to channel some of that Clover Studio energy that made Viewteful Joe and Okami back in the early 2000’s. It’s a visually striking action game that blends Japanese mythology with tower defense and troop-management. While it may have fallen flat when it was released last year on other platforms, I sincerely hope that the Switch 2 version will breathe life into it once more, because I found it to be truly something special.
As the mountain Kafuku is engulfed by defilement, you guide a priestess named Yoshiro as her spirit guardian Soh. Armed with a katana you can take out the hordes of enemies, dubbed Seeth, as they come pouring out of the defiled Torii gates. It is your task to protect Yoshiro by night and collect as many crystals as possible, so that during the day you can carve a path for her to follow and purify the region. Along the way you are assisted by the local villagers who you can recruit as fighters to help protect Yoshiro. From simple woodcutters using their axe, to archers, banishers and even sumo wrestlers, at any point you can deploy these villagers or change their role on the battlefield. As you purify the regions, you can rebuild and restore the towns to their former glory and gain more trinkets and abilities to help you battle the defilement.
We can’t dance around this. Visually Kunitsu-Gami looks absolutely gorgeous. From the way the characters, villagers but especially the monsters coming out of the defilement are designed, to how Soh’s dancing blade becomes engulfed in what can only be described as tears in the world made by a kaleidoscope. It’s rare that a world that’s taken over by an evil otherworldly force feels so disturbed and twisted, but the defilement, with rotting appendages draped across the villages you encounter does such a great job at conveying this world needs purification. It all runs beautifully on the Nintendo Switch 2 in both docked and handheld mode. There’s a lot of spectacle in both the cutscenes and the fighters themselves. Especially as you improve the roles your requited army can perform and as you get to trips with the game’s inner mechanics.
Structurally this is where Kunitsu-Gami really sets itself apart. It’s a real-time strategy game with action-elements. Stages are divided into two types, villages and boss battles. When you arrive in a village everything is covered by the defilement. You’ll need to rescue villagers from their pods and assign them roles and position them along the path. The more defilement you clear out, the more crystals you obtain which can be used to carve out a spirit path for Yoshiro to follow. She will keep doing so until night falls, which means that you’ll probably never make it to the main torii gate that needs purging. This is when the monsters of the defilement will come pouting out. All you villagers will automatically engage the horde while you can freely run around and protect yoshiro or move the battle lines ahead. Interaction with the villagers is done via a command menu, where you can reposition each individual villager or reassign their roles.
It all makes for a super dynamic tactical combat system. Where you often are required to change your tactics and approach depending on where Yoshiro ended her purification ritual on the way to the torii. This gets even more hectic when new enemy types are introduced or there’s multiple points of entry for the defilement to approach Yoshiro. Nighttime never gets dull, but it can get overwhelming quickly. There’s equipment you can bring along and some special abilities that can aid you during the battle. As long as you can make it through the night there’s time to refortify your defenses, resurrect your fallen villagers and hope that Yoshiro has enough crystals to make it to the end. In later stages the fight takes multiple days, meaning that you’ll need to consider whether it is even smart to move Yoshiro at all, as she gets closer to the source of the enemies. While you’ll be repeating a lot of similar missions throughout the stages, I found the game throwing plenty of changes into the mix that would require me to change my tactics. For example, one enemy would make it impossible to use the command menu until it was defeated. Another stage sees you crossing a lake at night, while you’re being flanked by monstrous hordes from all sides. It’s these twists and layers to the formula that neatly balances Kunitsu-Gami’s ambition between an action game and strategy game that frankly I haven’t seen since 2009's Brütal Legend.
The other section of the combat are the boss battles. Horrendous monsters that are truly a spike in difficulty for you to overcome with a set number of villagers. While you are able to prepare before entering the boss’s arena, they use erratic patterns and ways of attacking. Meaning you’ll need to rely on your own skills to guard against incoming attacks, but also perhaps buff your specific villagers to have a chance against these creatures. From a gigantic centipede, for which you’ll need to spend valuable time and a villager to reignite the lights in a cave, so that your archers are able to shoot at it. To a floating scythe that can almost instantly cut down Soh and Yoshiro. At times these bosses felt a bit too unfair, with little time to practice and especially being limited by the amount of crystals at your disposal to convert all your villagers into the appropriate roles. Where the main stages feel like a true test of your tactical and problem solving skills, the boss fighters can be a tad too unpredictable and unfair at times.
When the fighting is over you have some downtime, during which you can rebuild the villages and areas you’ve just recovered from the defilement. Since the game is based on an in-game day and night cycle, you’ll need to put villagers to work to rebuild the shrines and buildings in the town. These give you rewards which you can then equip to improve or adjust Soh’s actions. It’s a system that flows pretty naturally. Stages aren’t simply for you to walk through and get out, it is your job to nurture them back to health and the game really nicely reinforces this idea of community. Especially when you can improve the roles of certain fighters. I immediately wanted to expand the arsenal for my archers, as they proved vital at taking out enemies from a distance. You’re also able to collect little notes on the defilement that are presented as little Ema’s (those wooden panels with wishes at Japanese shrines and temples), that have some fun writing and character to them. It just makes the world of Kunitsu-Gami feel whole as you explore and learn more about the Kafuku mountain and its residents.
I found Kunistu-Gami: Path of the Goddess to be a very big surprise. I was half-afraid that most of the time the systems would be overwhelming as I’m neither big on tower defence nor real-time strategy games. But the way in which Kunitsu-Gami eases you into its mechanics and world is incredibly enjoyable. I loved bringing this world back to life and tackling one or two stages every night for an hour or so. It’s a game best played in segments, rather than one long binge. While I did find the boss battles to be a bit too difficult and some of the core gameplay can be a tad repetitive, Kunitsu-Gami really manages to become a fresh combination of action and real-time strategy. It’s absolutely not for everyone, but if this combination or setting sounds like it may be something for you, you just may find a hidden treasure of a game here. It’s great to see Capcom taking a big swing with something that feels so original. Here’s to hoping that there’s more games from the studio that will follow this particular path.
Hitman: World of Asssassination may perhaps be one of the most ambitious games ever designed. Told across three games and more than fifteen locations, Hitman is an ever-expanding sandbox that rewards players for learning its elaborate stages in and out. The game makes paying attention to details matter as you will become bolder and more elaborate in your high-level executions. The Nintendo Switch 2 is finally graced with a proper port of the game, after the disappointing Cloud version of Hitman 3 on the original Switch. So it is time to once again adorn the suit and adopt your killing ways as Agent 47 in this Signature Edition.
For those unaware, Hitman: World of Assassination is the collective name for the games Hitman, Hitman 2 and Hitman 3 which were released over the span of seven years. We wrote an extensive ‘Worth Considering’ video about it before, so for all the details on what this collection contains, we recommend you check that one out. Every location in Hitman sees you carrying out a mission where you’ll need to take out one or multiple targets as efficiently as possible. Whether this is poisoning the drink of your victim, or arranging an elaborate setup where you don the guise of a bodyguard and stalk them until you find an opening to push them off a ledge, or shoot them from afar with your sniper rifle.
What makes Hitman so effective is that it combines stealth elements with an immersive sim as the world around you will react and respond to your actions. Not just when you’re seen dragging off an unconscious guard, but also by encouraging you to mingle among the targets. Whether it is replacing a golf-ball about to be hit with an explosive. Setting up an elaborate trap by rigging a vehicle about to be driven by your unsuspecting victim or disguising yourself as a member of the band and electrocuting the microphone of the lead singer (Jared Leto had it coming). In-between these moments the game becomes far too often unintentionally comedic. Whether it is NPC that is too diligent at doing their job and coming into the bathroom where you’re trying to drown someone, or you simply messing up your well-prepared kill and needing to find an impromptu method of killing the target and drop a broken toilet bowl on his head. Or through the dozens of outfits, costumes, unique weapons and other methods of interacting with the world that feel rewarding.
That reward is often reinforced as replaying levels is the ultimate form of appreciating Hitman. Learning the inner workings of Berlin leads to you not only being able to optimize your run, but also to tackling higher level escalation missions. These are separate from the main story and have an ever evolving list of requirements that you’ll need to fulfill besides simply firing the killing shot. What if you’re dressed as a clown the entire time and aren’t allowed to change your outfit? You did that well enough? Cool, how about you also pop 5 balloons without people noticing? As you embrace the elaborate levels you’ll see how brilliant the game design under the hood is and perfect your skills. Where first you’ll need to don a security guard costume to delete the surveillance footage of the server, you can also open the door and in a split second aim your gun and shoot that server instead. It’s never flawless, but saving and restarting are key to becoming the master assassin that Agent 47 is. Levels are varied, gorgeously detailed and convey a sense of mystery and exploration as you find secret rooms, interconnected buildings and NPC disguises that are somehow capable of walking into your target’s room without drawing any attention. This deeply layered system is something you simply cannot get anywhere else.
So I was ecstatic when Hitman was announced for Nintendo Switch 2. While the core experience is absolutely still enjoyable, it is disappointing that this version of the game is unable to keep pace with either the Steamdeck or other releases. Framerate drops are common, especially when entering areas with a high density of NPC’s. It never drops below the double digits, but shimmering between 20 and 40 happened far too often for my liking. We did want to compare the version of Hitman for the Nintendo Switch 2 with the PC version running at 1080p on slightly outdated hardware.
I wish it were possible to toggle to a performance mode, because while the game is designed for visual fidelity, I’d rather take that consistent framerate if possible. But the game lacks any graphical settings that might’ve made this a feature. For a title that was released fully in 2022 it is kind of a shame that it still seems too much of a struggle for Nintendo’s brand new device.
I’d also be remiss to mention the Hitman server issue. See, Hitman has been required to run via dedicated servers ever since its launch. This online connection is used to keep track of your agent level and unlocks rewards for missions and goals. Without an online connection the game shifts to offline mode, where progression is not tracked and rewards cannot be unlocked, even when you do reconnect to the servers at a later time. For a single player game that has been out for literal years this is still a big miss on IO Interactive and WB Games’ part. On the Nintendo Switch 2 this is a particular problem as every time you interrupt the game by suspending your system, or simply going to the home menu, or even losing your wi-fi connection because you’re taking the system with you on the go you will not get any XP or rewards for completing certain tasks. The offline mode removes any additional modes as well that aren’t part of the main story mode. Meaning that replaying levels is quite pointless as the rewards you get for these are absolutely necessary for completing the most difficult objectives. It would’ve been fine if progression for the Elusive Targets, Hitman’s live content mode that sees you having only one shot at completing a mission with a target that escapes forever otherwise, would be locked behind an online-only mode. But the Hitman server is seeped into every little bit of singleplayer mode as well and just makes an otherwise perfect game fall flat on its face.
Hitman: World of Asssassination reaffirms that it is the quintessential immersive sim from the last generation. There is something so satisfying about exploring and understanding these worlds, how the characters and targets fit together and the sheer sandbox that it becomes when every little aspect of the game can be used to complete your objectives. It is a shame then that the Nintendo Switch 2 version has to compromise on the performance aspect too often for my liking. A choice for fidelity or consistency would’ve been appreciated in the options of the Switch 2 version. For those with a spotty internet connection, or aspirations to play this on the go when you may be unable to get online, Hitman World of Assassination can be especially tedious for its required online features. The core game, its story and worlds are absolutely worth exploring, but the Nintendo Switch 2 version is heavily compromised. Perhaps it could be more effective to complete this game and mission while donning the guise of another games console.
Kaizen Game Works first dropped on my radar with Paradise Killer–A narrative game from 2020 that was almost as much fun to explore as to read its intoxicating prose while learning more about its world and vibrant characters. At first, it seems that their latest game, Promise Mascot Agency, shares little of its DNA with Paradise Killer. However, after spending almost twenty hours in its lovely world, it’s clear that Kaizen Game Works is a studio that shouldn’t be judged by its cover. While Promise Mascot Agency may reject any label applied to it, I would heartily recommend it to anyone looking for something wildly out of the ordinary and those who just love good games.
You play as Michi, better known by his yakuza title, The Janitor, who after failing a job miserably, is declared dead by his mobster family and sent away to a town that is said to have a curse that will kill any male yakuza visiting the place. This rural town in the Japanese province of Kyushu, Kaso-Machi, is home to a failing mascot agency that Michi is tasked with rejuvenating so that he can pay off his massive debt to the family. Now, you may wonder, what is a mascot agency? Well, you know how mascots are living breathing beings that come in all shapes and sizes? Yes, well they need employment too to promote events and bring attention to whatever the employer needs. It’s your job, alongside your assistant Pinky–a mascot resembling a cut-off pinky finger--to make the Promise Mascot Agency the greatest mascot agency in Japan. All the while you need to deal with the many secrets and stories of the citizens of Kaso-Machi.
Usually this is the part where I tend to draw comparisons between the game I’m reviewing and other notable titles that you may be aware of. But Promise Mascot Agency almost defies being compared to anything else. In a sense, it can be seen as a narrative adventure game, where you explore a compact open world and perform tasks for the community to recruit new mascots, upgrade the town of Kaso-Machi and assist the mascots in fulfilling their dreams. The predominant gameplay sees you driving around town in a beat-up truck to get to know the citizens of this little village. There’s no getting out of your vehicle, but you’ll never need to worry about fall damage or crashing into anything. Upgrading the truck helps you get around as you will be jumping, boosting and driving yourself off of hills or into the water. It is all part of the experience as you get to know Kaso-Machi better. The game doesn’t just lean into its absurdity but drenches itself in it, which ends up making the characters feel more relatable than I was expecting. From mascots like Trororo, who’s covered in yam and has a singular dream, namely promoting the enjoyment of Adult Videos (yes, really), or even the humans like the exchange teacher Miss. Wambui, who was assigned to this small rural town teaching English and can’t leave because of her love for the students and the countryside of Japan. The writing is excellent across the board and compliments the creative design of all the mascots, who become memorable in their own rights. It’s kind of ingenious that as progress with the agency, you’re asked to sell merchandise of your mascots to create additional revenue sources, because I now want nothing more than merchandise for To-Fu, Neko Roll and Koke-Maru.
Whenever you send out mascots on jobs, there is a chance that things will go wrong, which is where the game transitions into a minigame card-battler and you’ll need to use the citizens of Kaso-Machi as Support Heroes, who are able to deal with the problems. Problems range from badly placed boxes, to faulty vending machines and even obsessed fans that ruin the event that the mascot is promoting. You’ll get 60 seconds to decrease the health bar of the faulty object by strategically playing cards with specific stats and actions. You only get two action-points per battle, but as you chain together cards you can increase your actions to play more expensive cards or draw new cards in your hand. At first these problems can be quite a hassle, but you can upgrade your Support Heroes by helping them with their problems through town quests or chatting with them regularly. As you progress through the game, you start to understand how the systems interlink with one another. It’s not just your profits that begin to soar as you expand and upgrade the Promise Mascot Agency, but the town as well. Your connection to the town becomes central to the experience. The game may come off visually as dark and brooding, but I found the experience to turn incredibly wholesome. Exploration felt just great as I learned how to best navigate the town and understand its routes and locations.
It’s especially the small details that Promise Mascot Agency does right. While not the majority of the text is voice-acted, all the cutscenes are fully voiced, as well as the introductions to mascots, giving so much character to everyone you meet along the way. I especially love that whenever you get to make a choice as Michi, you’re not told the line that Michi will respond with, but rather the emotion or intent behind the dialogue. It is something I desperately want to see in other narrative driven games, as I’ve come across games so often where I wanted to respond positively, but the opposing character would react in unexpected ways. Here whatever Michi will say I know he’ll be either [supportive], [reassuring] or [direct]. It leaves the player with freedom of choice as well as giving the writers the freedom as to how to portray Michi and whomever he is talking to. As I was playing Promise Mascot Agency it started to give me the same feelings as Paradise Killer, which is probably the highest compliment I can give it. Kaizen Game Works has embraced its identity, and I think that Promise Mascot Agency is even better than their previous title. And my god, its soundtrack is especially fantastic. Utilizing the artist Alpha Crome Yayo who has this fantastic blend of lo-fi, Japanese City Pop and this ‘90s arcade feel that fits the atmosphere of Kaso-Machi perfectly at every turn. It’s the cherry on top of this extremely fun sundae.
The biggest downer here is that the Nintendo Switch version can be an absolute mess at times. An inconsistent framerate, a delay in rendering of either 2D or 3D assets, loading times and in particular pop-in when driving around the open world make it a rough sell for anyone who can only be playing this game on the Nintendo Switch. While I think it still suffices and doesn’t detract from the experience, if you happen to have another platform available to you, I’d recommend going with that. Just because the game feels like an homage to a different era of games doesn’t mean you should necessarily want the game to look like that. Two software crashes occurred for me while playing and the final act of the game in particular suffered a lot more from stuttering framerates and small bugs and glitches.
Finally, while I enjoy that the game lets you free to tackle the chapters and main quests whenever you want, I did find myself having so much fun driving around and completing all the side objectives early that I blazed through the last three chapters once the agency was running at maximum efficiency. Promise Mascot Agency doesn’t necessarily gate progression, but for anyone out there who is interested in playing this game, don’t leave the main quest hanging and aim to interact with your mascots whenever they have a ‘life satisfaction review’. I did all of these in a row (for all mascots) near the end of the game, and that’s something I wouldn’t necessarily recommend to the majority of players. Technically this is a little bit due to an abundance of systems that can be overwhelming to keep track of in the beginning. So take your time, talk to Pinky often when driving around the overworld and chat with persons of interest you come across on your adventure as soon as you can.
Promise Mascot Agency feels like a cult-game that was released in the PS2 and GameCube era. I say this with nothing but love, as you can tell that so much heart went into conveying a fun story, with lovable characters and a wonderfully designed explorable world. It’s rare to come across games these days that dare to be different: games that don’t default to comparing themselves to other games or studios. In an industry that is becoming more and more risk-averse, I was shocked by how refreshing Promise Mascot Agency feels. But above all that, Promise Mascot Agency is confident: confident in its ability to commit to its bizarre world and gameplay that defies norms with a story that is all about one fulfilling their own dreams. While playing I could feel the joy the creators had in making this world and shaping its characters. Promise Mascot Agency is unlike anything you’ve played before, but if you let it into your heart (and choose another platform if possible) it’s an experience that will stay with you for a while to come.
The Nintendo Switch 2 was thoroughly revealed in a Nintendo Direct presentation that aired on April 2nd, 2025. This presentation left quite a few details unclear and in the week since there’s been a rampant amount of assumptions, clarifications and a lot of misinformation spread online. With Nintendo leaving a lot of information unexplained or having details tucked away into a plethora of articles and shop-listings, we’ve taken it upon ourselves to create a substantial and sourced FAQ with verified information that is wherever possible based upon sources provided by Nintendo themselves or our own hands-on reporting with the Switch 2. This FAQ will be amended and improved as more information becomes available. If there are still questions after reading this FAQ, please let us know via comment on the site through Talkback or via a comment or message in our Discord server.
This FAQ was last updated on Sunday April 27th 2025.
The FAQ is divided into several pages. The contents are as follows:
You can traverse between pages using the page numbers at the bottom of the article, or by clicking on the above links. All articles are sourced whenever able, preferring Nintendo's official communication and our own reporting when possible. If you have additional questions for the FAQ, please post these in our discord group, via our socials or through Talkback.
PART FOUR: NINTENDO SWITCH ONLINE, GAMECHAT AND GAMESHARE
Is A Nintendo Switch Online Subscription Required for Nintendo Switch 2?
In order to play and purchase games you do not need to be a subscriber to Nintendo Switch Online. You can access the Nintendo eShop and download additional content without the need for a subscription. However, Nintendo is pushing Nintendo Switch Online as a dedicated service and is tying more additional features to Nintendo Switch 2 in particular such as GameChat, the ability to play first-party Nintendo games online and access the Nintendo Classic services. Nintendo Classics is the rebranding of their retro offerings through Nintendo Switch Online that allows Nintendo Switch Online users to play NES, SNES, SEGA Genesis and Game Boy titles.
What is GameChat?
GameChat is a service that is exclusive to Nintendo Switch 2. It is a feature that allows users to communicate via voice and video-chat in addition to sharing their gameplay on the screen with other users. Using the built-in microphone and by using the additional Nintendo Switch 2 Camera accessory, players can use the Nintendo Switch 2 as a hub to communicate with each other across systems even while playing different games. The developers have compared it to a ‘student lounge’ where people socialize and come and go as they please.[75]
To activate GameChat players can use the dedicated C-buttons on the Nintendo Switch 2 Controllers. Which opens a menu that allows users to share their screen, mute their microphone, view the screen of other players and broadcast themselves via the Nintendo Switch 2 Camera accessory. It’s been confirmed that you can use headsets to connect to Nintendo Switch 2, instead of relying on the speakers and microphone coming from the system or TV itself.
Is Nintendo Switch 2 GameChat free to use? There will be a limited time free trial called the ‘Open-Access Period’ for all Nintendo Switch 2 users for GameChat. Up until March 31st, 2026 you can use GameChat for free. After that time a paid subscription to Nintendo Switch Online is required to use GameChat.[76]
Do I need a Nintendo Switch 2 Camera to use GameChat?
No, the Nintendo Switch 2 Camera accessory is optional for using GameChat.[77] You will need to have an active Nintendo Switch Online subscription after the Free Trial period has ended.
What are the specs of the Nintendo Switch 2 Camera?
It’s a 1080p camera that comes outfitted with a stand and specifically a wide-angle lens that makes it easier for the camera to detect faces and bodies within a living room. The camera is also outfitted with a privacy lens that can cover the camera when it is not in use. It is optimized to recognize faces clearly and keep them in focus.[78]
Do I need a Nintendo Switch 2 Branded Camera to use Video chat in GameChat? No, other USB-C cameras are compatible with the Nintendo Switch 2.
With how Many Others Can I Use GameChat on Nintendo Switch 2? With Nintendo Switch 2 GameChat you can create a group session for up to twelve players.[79] Up to four players can share their screen via GameChat on the Nintendo Switch 2.[80]
Does the Nintendo Switch 2 Have An Ethernet Connection For Better Internet? Yes. The Nintendo Switch 2 Dock has an built-in Ethernet port for a wired internet connection. For Wi-Fi the Nintendo Switch 2 uses Wifi LAN 6 to connect to the internet, which is vastly superior to the Nintendo Switch.[81]
What is GameShare?
Only on Nintendo Switch 2 will certain supported games feature a new function called GameShare. GameShare can be used to, quite literally, share games with players that do not own a copy of the game themselves to play simultaneous multiplayer games. Only a Nintendo Switch 2 system can share the game, however, Nintendo Switch (1) systems can receive these shared games locally and play along.[82]
This does not mean that the receiving player has a copy or download of the game themselves. Rather, the Nintendo Switch 2 shares a video-feed with other players so that they can ‘play’ along on the dedicated system.[83]
GameShare can also be shared online with other players. For sharing games online, all participants will be required to use a Nintendo Switch 2 system and will need to be subscribed to Nintendo Switch Online to have access to GameChat. As GameChat is only available on Nintendo Switch 2. GameChat will have an Open-Access Period until March 31st 2026, during which time Nintendo Switch Online is not required to use the voice- and videochat service.[84]
Not all games will support GameShare to be shared online. For example, Super Mario Party Jamboree - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition + Jamboree TV can only be shared locally using GameShare. Nintendo has confirmed that the following titles can be shared using GameShare online:[96]
Big Brain Academy: Brain vs. Brain
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury
Clubhouse Games: 51 Worldwide Classics
Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
Super Mario Odyssey
Nintendo has also stated that: "Select Nintendo Switch games will become compatible with GameShare after free software updates."[97]
[83] This was confirmed via the Crossplay newsletter that clarifies that it is indeed a video-feed and not actual game data being sent via GameShare: https://substack.com/home/post/p-160470343
With the full reveal of the Nintendo Switch 2, it can be said that Nintendo has entered a new era. Last week Takashi Mochizuki wrote this wonderful article for Bloomberg that concluded with: ‘For many years, on the wall in the company’s headquarters hung a framed work of calligraphy depicting the brush strokes for “Ninten”, which roughly translates to leaving luck to the heavens. This embodiment of the company's founding philosophy has been consigned to the museum, an artifact from the company's 135-year history.That, perhaps, is the clearest sign yet that Nintendo is ready to move on.’.
And move on it has. The bells and whistles that the Nintendo Switch 2 (NS2) brings to the table are plentiful, but it is also the clearest sign that innovation in the games space wasn’t at the forefront of the creation of NS2. In fact, the head of development for Switch 2, Kouichi Kawamoto, confirms as much in their lengthy interview on the Nintendo Website: “After considering various new ideas, we decided it would be best to keep the Switch system's design and not make any “changes for changes' sake.”. In fact, the name Switch 2 was specifically chosen by the hardware team as to communicate clearly to customers that it is an improved Switch (they even forgoed the name ‘Super Switch’ as the Super Nintendo wasn’t backwards compatible with the NES, which was a design goal for Switch 2).
Getting these insights from those working on the system is important context, because in the end the Nintendo we’ve seen this week is a big departure from the Nintendo of old. The innovations developed for NS2 seem to all boil down to its improved processor and capabilities. It’s a ‘Switch Pro’ in everything but name, and the once so innovative Nintendo had to spend nearly ten minutes explaining that they’ve added voice chat and webcam support to their newest console. Games like Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza look stunning in motion, but are characteristically similar experiences to the Switch’s Mario Kart 8 and Super Mario Odyssey. There is some playful design to be found in titles like Drag x Drive, which sees users moving the Joy-Con 2 in mouse mode back and forth to move wheelchairs and score points via hoops (which I’ve personally dubbed as HANDS). But Nintendo Switch 2 Tour, an interactive guide through the hardware and specs of NS2, will be sold as a downloadable title at launch, something that rival Sony did through Astro’s Playroom in 2020 but as a free pack-in and extensive 3D platformer. Nintendo (Japan’s) strict rule on avoiding pack-in titles whenever possible still seems to hold true 40 years after releasing the Famicom.
But even alongside the flood of third-party support, with some varied looking games both in offerings and terms of quality, there is something here that feels at times like Nintendo being a bit lost with its own success. The four-part interview talks about accessories and the design goals for NS2 at length, but the excitement from the directorial team is interjected by their reaction to how the R&D responded to their ideas like the Mouse mode for Joy-Con 2 and GameChat as: “Ah yes, we’ve thought of that before”. Innovation isn’t something you can conjure up at a whim, but it needs to be inspiring for those in creative industries. The Wii didn’t just catch elderly homes by storm, but especially the internal design teams of Nintendo who went nuts with looking for creative uses for the Wiimote. From 1:1 swordplay to grabbing starbits and from playing the drums to shooting a crossbow. Switch mostly had its most inventive ideas paired with ‘exclusive’ peripherals like LABO, Ring Fit Adventure and even Mario Kart: Live. Tetsuya Sasaki even states it outright: “rather than equipping the new console with new hardware features, we thought we'd have the option to offer new gameplay experiences by packaging additional accessories together with games, just as we bundled the Ring-Con with Ring Fit Adventure.”.
This all flows back to this new era of Nintendo and it is one that cannot be separated from the biggest news that wasn’t in this direct. Let’s talk about price. Looking back at the Switch 1 presentation in January 2017, the price was revealed nearly up front for multiple regions. It framed the following hour of reveals and information about the original Switch quite differently. When you know a system will cost you a certain amount, viewing the following games and reveals places it all within a certain context. But the structure for the NS2 Direct left that answer ambiguous till after the presentation. A Nintendo gotcha, bringing the worst tendencies of the company to the forefront, upsetting expectations and not just that, but coming with a ton of asterisks for the releases, upgrades and requirements to access all features.
The system being such a high price isn’t that big a surprise to most. Inflation, world events and the increased price of resources made that inevitable. But the jump in price for both digital and physical software is Nintendo not just breaking the dam, but blowing it up with a grand display of fireworks. Digital prices for first-party games seem to now be standardized at about 10 USD higher than they were, with Mario Kart: World spanning the crown and jumping to 79,99 MSRP and in Europe the physical edition of Mario Kart: World will cost 89,99. I can say that rarely has my jaw dropped after seeing a price, but this shift is monumental. Where with most first-party Sony titles you can wait out a pricedrop, Nintendo will hold true to their mantra of retaining value for their games. It is Nintendo following in the footsteps of companies like Apple that will inevitably cause other companies to follow suit.
For those working in the games industry it’s not a surprise. Games cost millions to create, even for smaller companies and teams and it is simply not enough to offer these titles at a price of 59,99. It was always unsustainable, but few had the guts to rip that band-aid off. Sony tried this on PlayStation 5 with Spider-Man 2, but as players had grown accustomed to waiting out sales, it didn’t make that much of a difference. But here is Nintendo, the only company that has games at its core, using duct tape to rip this band-aid straight off the skin. And it will not just hurt for a little bit at launch, but it is safe to assume this will be the new base going forward. Possibly pricing out a lot of players that have been with Nintendo for decades. I’ve talked to so many die-hard Nintendo fans yesterday and a lot of them echo that the company is going down a path they cannot justify following. Let alone with the few offerings sprinkled throughout the presentation yesterday.
Unfortunately gaming is becoming a more and more expensive hobby. We’re taking this first hit now, but you can set your clocks that when Grand Theft Auto VI will announce their inevitable 89,99 or even 99,99 price tag, this will become a new normal for other publishers to follow suit. It may even become a necessity, given the massive layoffs and impacts from the financial crisis within the games industry. That is, if we consider this from the perspective of the major publisher. Indies may now be, more than ever, vital in keeping players engaged and entertained. It’s not a surprise to me that Hollow Knight: Silksong, Deltarune and (to a certain extent) Hades II were essential to showcase in this presentation. Not just exemplifying the massive success indies can have on the system, but immediately marketing them to Nintendo’s core fanbase. It’s incredibly difficult for indie developers to have their games catch the attention of buyers on the eShop and while there have been changes announced for the eShop on Nintendo Switch 2, I still think that indies will wait out the Switch 2 wave to see if their audiences are able to move on from Switch 1. Given the comments of ‘manually checking over 10.000 games’, simply ‘porting your game’ from Switch 1 to Switch 2 is definitely not a given. Paired with the rumors of very limited availability of developer kits, I am skeptical to see how eager this 3rd party support remains after their ‘older titles’ have moved over to NS2.
Nintendo is not about to radically change its approach, which stands in contrast with what we’ve seen during the direct. Three younger heads of development, that new generation that Nintendo’s been training for the last decade, were given the chance to make the next Nintendo system at the height of the company’s success. Their results come across as awfully safe and perhaps restricted by the many asterisks their work had to adhere to. It’s a Nintendo that has passed the crossroads and perhaps is seeking to build a canal from their blue ocean to a red ocean, filled with PC handhelds and third-party riches. What it will bring to this red ocean is clear, higher prices, more profits and a wider supported gaming ecosystem. But as I’m getting flushed downstream, I’m left wondering if I’d rather not get onto one of those other ships that’s sailing over there. Can we, as players, as media, as critics, leave the comfort of what used to be a Nintendo that was carefree of what others would think? It remains to be seen as June 5th approaches.
Disclaimer:Please note, The Chromatic by ModRetro has ties to controversial figure Palmer Luckey. NINWR LLC feels it is important to cover this software, but we do not condone the actions or opinions of any individuals involved in its production.
One of the more interesting tidbits when the Chromatic was announced was the ambition by ModRetro to do re-releases of obscure and hard to find retro Game Boy and Game Boy Color games. As part of their ModRetro Classics Collection, two new re-releases can now be bought and experienced for the first time by Game Boy fans. Since these games are technically re-releases we felt it appropriate to cover these titles as mini reviews.
Project S-11 is a pretty traditional shoot ‘em up for the Game Boy Color. You control a powerful flying Hmachine that needs to reach headquarters in order to transmit vital battle information that can help withstand the alien invasion. Across eight worlds you can shoot, blast and bomb anything that moves.
For a Game Boy Color title the gameplay is incredibly smooth. While I’m not the biggest fan of needing to repeatedly tap the button to increase your firing speed, instead of holding down the button, the battles are fluid. I will say that the backgrounds can be a bit too chaotic to spot incoming bullets. Most shmups are defined by their power ups and I think that Project S-11 does an admirable job with the variety of weapons that can change up your approach depending on the boss you might be facing. What I especially found helpful was the fact that you don’t just die from a single hit. Instead your ship has a shield that slowly regenerates, but allows you to take some damage before losing a unit. It makes Project S-11 feel retro, but definitely more accessible for newcomers.
The standout here is the soundtrack, which manages to perfectly capture the atmosphere of the different worlds you’ll travel across. In particular Planet Cephei and Bern Jungle are certified bangers. It can be a bit difficult to make out while you’re tapping the shoot-button like a maniac, but the soundtrack helps to make Project S-11 feel like a complete package. Don’t expect any major mechanical surprises, what you see is what you get here. But for that, you’ll get a pretty great shmup on Game Boy Color that’ll keep fans of the genre pretty entertained!
Disclaimer:Please note, The Chromatic by ModRetro has ties to controversial figure Palmer Luckey. NINWR LLC feels it is important to cover this software, but we do not condone the actions or opinions of any individuals involved in its production.
One of the more interesting tidbits when the Chromatic was announced was the ambition by ModRetro to do re-releases of obscure and hard to find retro Game Boy and Game Boy Color games. As part of their ModRetro Classics Collection, two new re-releases can now be bought and experienced for the first time by Game Boy fans. Since these games are technically re-releases we felt it appropriate to cover these titles as mini reviews.
Released in the US as a tie-in to the Disney film “We’re Back”, and later remade for the SNES as ‘Radical Rex”, Baby T-Rex is mostly considered as an overlooked and exploited title for the original Game Boy. As it was released in different regions with different licensing deals to appease a regional market.
The titular T-Rex is, mostly according to the manual, steeped in the nineties with his attitude and skateboard to get around. As an excuse to make a surprisingly fast scrolling 2D platformer, I’ve heard of worse settings. While you jump around, you can collect coconuts and other objects to toss at obstacles and opponents. Every world is capped off with a short boss fight against a dinosaur as you make your way to the wizard Sethron to save your girlfriend.
Jumping feels tight enough and getting to know the layout of the levels is key to making it to the end of the game. In a way it reminded me of a simplified version of Sonic, where keeping speed and momentum going is key to make it to the goal. Unfortunately the level design isn’t really that interesting or diverse to keep your attention for too long. There is also a two-player ‘mode’ which requires you to pass the handheld back and forth with another player to get the highest score. Riveting.
It’s almost refreshing to see such a simple game, one of the many many that filled out the Game Boy’s library, return in a premium package and more accessible form. But in truth, it’s hard to fully recommend Baby T-Rex at both this price point and the value of the game. There simply isn’t anything here that feels either replayable enough for the format of Game Boy, nor unique enough that warrants an extensive playthrough. I don’t think his radical attitude had much to do with why this particular dinosaur went extinct.
Last year Yu-Gi-Oh! celebrated its 25th anniversary, prompting players and old-school fans everywhere to age in an instant. Konami announced a continued celebration with this ‘Quarter Century’ of the famous card game. Yu-Gi-Oh! The Early Days Collection is the sole videogame that marks this specific occasion. A collection with 14-ish games from the early history of the card game series with entries from both the Game Boy, Game Boy Color and Game Boy Advance. As a, still, avid player of the Yu-Gi-Oh! card game I was morbidly curious about this collection. While I hadn’t played all of them before this review, my hazy memory recalled them being stiff and more into enticing those who’d seen the anime rather than those who played the card game. Turns out that hunch was correct, but the shock wasn’t as bad as I expected. This revisit to the world of classic Yu-Gi-Oh! will for most be a morbid curiosity, but for the true aficionados of the franchise there is definitely some charm to this package. You will need to dig deep to find it however.
So let’s get the big thing out of the way. Yes, this collection contains 14 full Yu-Gi-Oh! games that were released between 1998 and 2005. From the very first Yu-Gi-Oh! games on the DMG Game Boy, only released in Japan, based on the manga and now for the first time fully localized in English, to the Game Boy Advance world championship series that proposed to be an accurate battle simulator and even some wild experiments in between. From the outset that seems like a massive amount of games, but there are some caveats. For starters, the early Game Boy games are very much incremental updates to the card game and the rules that were still developing at that time. Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters II: Dark duel Stories for example, only adds in new rules and cards to balance out decks. And, the western, Dark Duel Stories (Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters 4 in Japan) only added in a single zone for trap cards. While this is a fun historical look back at how quickly the game evolved based on both the limits of the hardware and the growth of the card game (in Japan), playing them back to back will be interchangeable to most players. The progression in seeing how the game design evolves over time, especially in the UI and UX elements, is fascinating to me, but in truth after playing the game for a single match I quickly bounced to find the more accessible games in the collection.
The real surprise to me was Duel Monsters 3. This title, previously only available in Japan, follows the Monster World arc in which Yugi’s friends have been transformed into monsters and are stuck in a tabletop roleplaying game, with the antagonists serving as the game’s Dungeon Masters. This means that the game contains no trading cards whatsoever. You place monsters on a grid that resembles a very simplified version of a turn-based strategy title like Fire Emblem. Every monster has its own attack pattern and gets a buff based on the field it is standing on and if it is in range of friendlies. This means that every battle in this game turns into a miniature puzzle. In order to determine whether your attacks hit, two D10’s are rolled and the outcome determines if you miss or strike successfully. It’s a neat little system and the dice roll is even used to determine the encounter rate of random enemies during the boss segments. It is so unlike the other games in the collection that it immediately stands out.The same cannot be said for Dungeon Dice Monsters and Destiny Board Traveler. These two spin-offs focus on a more boardgame-like approach to Yu-Gi-Oh!. Dungeon Dice Monster is an attempt to digitize the oft forgotten spin-off game of the same name. Two players face off on an isometric grid on which they place cubes that can unfold in certain directions. The goal is to build a road to the other side of the field to attack your opponent’s dice master. In theory this sounds pretty great, but the game has no tutorials for the player whatsoever. All you’re left with is a very unappealing and overly complicated manual that you will need to pull up every time until you get the hang of the game. This is where I started to run into quite a few complications with this particular collection. The quality of life features of this collection aren’t bad per se, but there are some notable omissions. For starters, while you can open every game’s manual, each time you reopen the menu, the manual resets to the first page making it especially hard for the games where the rules are pretty hard to grasp (looking at you, Dungeon Dice Monsters). This goes double for the specific type chart that is deployed in the early games and the RPG titles, where monsters can be instantly defeated if they are facing an opposing monster type. This chart isn’t as straightforward as other systems, in particular since it contains types that do not exist in the actual card game, like the ‘dreams’ and ‘shadow’ type. While you can rewind up to one minute at any time during the game, there is no fast-forward. This would be particularly helpful in the duel simulator titles on the GBA, where the CPU needs quite a bit of time to think through moves.
Finally, there is the online support, or rather the lack thereof. There is only one game that supports dueling against opponents and trading cards, and that’s Duel Monsters 4. An interesting choice to say the least, as this is one of the titles that was only available in Japan. Even stranger is that all these games have cheat menus that help you to unlock both cards and avoid duelist point limits. Now this wouldn’t be an issue if Duel Monsters 4 wasn’t split up into three versions (one for Yugi, Kaiba and Joey’s decks). Meaning that while dueling between versions is possible, there really is no incentive to do so. It would’ve been far more interesting if the online support existed for games like Stairway to the Destined Duel or even World Tournament 2004, as this format is still pretty beloved by old school Yu-Gi-Oh! Players. It might be added at a later time, but for now the online feels like a limited afterthought that really doesn’t change the experience or make it a particularly compelling offer for those wanting to pick up the collection.
These half measures to Yu-Gi-Oh! Early Days is also felt by the strange inclusion of Duel Monsters 6: Expert 2. Now according to the marketing, this GBA title was one of the most popular games in the series at the height of Yu-Gi-Oh!’s popularity in Japan. So it would make sense to include it. But while every other game in this collection is translated, Duel Monsters 6: Expert 2 is here and it is in full Japanese. Now an argument can be made that this game was later adapted into the western release in Stairway to the Destined Duel with a modified ruleset to adapt to the English version of the trading card game. But it being here just feels like a weird inclusion as a separate game. While other Japanese versions are included with the other games, being able to select any language version in the main menu of the collection, this one has a category all its own. All the other previously Japanese exclusive games have been translated, so leaving this one here just feels really confusing.
And I think that shows the two halves of Yu-Gi-Oh! Early Days Collection. On the one hand, it is really cool to dive back into the strange history of Yu-Gi-Oh! Before it became an established card game, with all modern games following either the many animated series, or being a straight up duel simulator. But while the amount of games is impressive, there isn’t that much care and attention to detail put into the collection as there could be. It feels like a half baked anniversary collection at times. With quality of life features just not going far enough in their helpfulness, certain games being very hard to grasp without consistently grabbing the manual, one title being left in Japanese and only online play for a single set of games. There aren’t even additional artworks, concepts or design documents, which could’ve really added some value to this package for the true Yu-Gi-Oh! fans. Among the games, there are standouts, like The Sacred Cards, Duel Monsters 3, The Eternal Duelist Soul and 7 Trials to Glory. But the majority feels like incremental improvements to the series or completely throwing out any similarities to the actual card game out the window. It’s a historical document, but with surprisingly little care and love for the history on display here.
Who is Yu-Gi-Oh! Early Days for? Well those looking to relive the glory days of Yu-Gi-Oh! will probably find some enjoyment here. The amount of games looks impressive on paper, but in practice it is hard to say that these titles will keep your attention. I did find myself returning to a few as pick up and play experiences. Rebuilding decks and reinventing strategies for the tweaked, but ultimately same card games wasn’t really keeping my attention by the time I arrived at the later GBA titles. It could’ve been fun to explore this with a friend, but as only one game would support online play I’d find it hard to recommend to even the most dedicated of Yu-Gi-Oh! players. But lowering your expectations and going in blind, especially for some of the more unusual titles in the collection, could still be fun. Just know that there is a high likelihood that by the end you’ll be happy that you’ve moved past those early days.
Disclaimer: Please note, this company has ties to controversial figure Palmer Luckey. NINWR LLC feels it is important to cover this device and its games as pieces of hardware and software, but we do not condone the actions or opinions of any individuals involved in its production.
Last year I talked at length about the Chromatic, a new Game Boy device developed by ModRetro. Back in September, in my extensive preview, I talked about several of the games that ModRetro is officially publishing alongside the launch of the device. Now, it is important to note that these titles are compatible with original Game Boy systems, including the original GBC, GBA and some even are playable on your favorite old brick, the original DMG Game Boy. As such, in this article I’ll be reviewing six of the launch titles that have been released and in particular considering them from the perspective of original hardware, since that is what the majority of players will be able to play these games on.
Each title is developed by a different studio, but all are published under the ModRetro label. The games come with a nice little manual with illustrations and tips for the game, as well as a bangle charm that you can attach to your system. There’s a lot of variety in these first releases, and the company is releasing at least four more games in 2025, so Game Boy fans definitely have some new things to look forward to this year.
Dragonyhm - Spacebot Interactive. Works on all Game Boy systems.
Dragonyhm is without a doubt the most ambitious out of these six games. It is a large-scale fantasy RPG set in a magical world where the protagonist’s father, Kurtis, is the protector of the Dragon’s Seal. As his son, Kris, awakes one day to find his father has disappeared, it is up to him to take up the sword and protect the citizens of Archend from monsters, fiends and the return of the dragons.
The game takes clear inspiration and cues from traditional turn-based RPGs. If you like Dragon Quest you’ll pretty much feel right at home. In its writing and world-design Dragonyhm better resembles something like Link’s Awakening, with a lot of optional side-quests that can get you additional upgrades and weapons. At its core, you’ll need to find a way to enter several dungeons, defeat powerful bosses and solve puzzles to follow the story. The visual design is especially striking, with clear sprites and proper color usages if you’re playing on a Game Boy Color or Advance. I also really liked the music, with quite a bit of variety through the regions and battle scenarios you will come across.
I think my biggest gripe is the way in which you perform combat in the game. In particular early on, you’ll often struggle against enemies that are at the same level as you are and will be non-stop chugging health potions to stay in the fight. Grinding is the name of the game here and while there is an elemental system at play here, it tended to boil down for me to hitting with my strongest move and hoping I would not run out of mana or special attacks. I did like the way in which the game encourages variety in your approach for building your stats. If you defeat an enemy with a normal attack and gain a level up, your strength will increase. But if you do the same with a magical attack, your mana will improve (think Final Fantasy II). It is something I only found while browsing the manual, but I do like that player growth isn’t limited to a set scale, but rather based upon your preferred moves and actions. It can build tension and release within a single fight if you tend to favor magic over strength and need to face an opponent stronger against those stats.
But I think Dragonyhm really nails the tone and style of ambitious Game Boy titles like Final Fantasy Adventure/Mystic Quest, where you can see that years of development experience allow it to fit as much content as possible into this cartridge. Almost like a lost Game Boy game, that you hear about from cult followings. A few puzzles even require translating a cipher that you can solve using the manual, but if you’re really dedicated (or stuck on a train without the manual) you can keep notes of important events, clues and secrets spread throughout the world. That balance between puzzle design and turn-based adventure gives it a fun flair all its own. I will say that this game currently lacks any guides or tips, so it can be a bit tricky at times to navigate the world and find out where you should go next. But for those willing to get lost in a simple, but engaging RPG, Dragonyhm is highly worth seeking out!
8/10
In The Dark 2, Pearacidic Games and Grumpy Function. Works on all Game Boy systems.
This is one for the die-hard puzzleheads. In The Dark 2 is a direct continuation of a standalone game, called In The Dark (released in 2022) which is a combination of a narrative adventure and a straightforward puzzle game. What sets it immediately apart from other puzzle games or high-score chasers is that the game is surprisingly story heavy. After the events of the first game, which saw a virus spreading throughout the galaxy only to be prevented by the brave sacrifice of one of Captain Penn’s friends, Captain Penn is sent out to find the designer of the virus. Told through vivid and gorgeous tableaus and with especially well written text, the game sees you traveling to several planets and systems in search of the creator of the virus.
With this as a backdrop it does feel out of place that the game is really nothing more than a collection of light-fipping puzzles. Each puzzle you are presented with a grid of 3x3, 4x4 or 5x5 lights. Each light can be turned off by selecting the light, but doing so will turn on all the surrounding lights. The objective is the same every time, turn off all the lights to solve the puzzle. There are additional challenges such as finding out what the fastest solution is, mostly designated as ‘par’. But beyond that, don’t expect many surprises when it comes to the gameplay.
Now on its face, that is a really hard sell. Even puzzle fans will tell you that variety and building upon your knowledge is what sets a good puzzle game apart. With In The Dark 2, it does take a bit of digging on the player’s part to get to this point. As you complete more and more grids, you start to get a sense for how to achieve the solution, but getting to that point involves quite a bit of trial and error. There are no hints, except the indication of what the fastest move can be, but the ramping up of difficulty feels surprisingly natural. I was truly in the dark (pun intended) at first, just flicking random lights on or off. But in time I got much more grip and sense with how the puzzles were designed and used my experience to solve puzzles in fewer moves.
I think the story bits are a brilliant way to keep the player engaged. In between puzzles you can walk around, talk to your crewmates and learn more about the planet you’re visiting. There is a surprising amount of world building and character to what could’ve been a simple menu puzzle game. I don’t think it will turn into a mainstay for me personally, but I’ve picked it up every now and then over the past few weeks and solved a few boards while commuting to work. The additional modes—like a free play mode that presents you with randomized puzzles and the challenge mode in which you have to clear multiple boards in a row—are good time wasters. Though I will say that with those modes I did feel the distinct lack of the story and world that tie In The Dark 2 together. A proper puzzler that has a flavor all its own, it might be worth the pickup if you want some crunchy brain teasers.
7/10
Patchy Matchy Puzzle Surfing, Tom Sutton. Works on all Game Boy systems.
I’ve raved at length about how much I enjoyed Patchy Matchy in both my Chromatic review and my preview last year. Suffice it to say that Patchy Matchy sits in that beautiful middle ground of understanding exactly what the Game Boy was all about. Short and simple, but highly engrossing gameplay sessions that keep the action going as you get better at the game.
Patchy Matchy is a tile-matching game where you need to connect objects in lines of four to remove them from the board. Think bejeweled or candy crush, but in a much more compact form. Without power-ups, you are simply relying on your ability to move the cursor as quickly as possible to swap around the shells, stars and totems on the field. Bubbles can get in your way as obstacles that block other objects, but clearing a line besides them removes them from the board as well.
The speed ramps up over time, but if you can score 999 points you clear the game. Clearing the game, however, isn’t just limited to getting to the end. The true replayability is in unlocking the seventeen achievements, which require you to extend enormous combos and keep your score rising as much as possible.
As a score chaser game it is really dangerous, because I kept getting sucked back into playing some more of Patchy Matchy. It feels like a quintessential Game Boy game at times. In all honesty, as much as I love the version of Tetris that is packed in with the Chromatic, I’d have chosen Patchy Matchy as the pack-in (Patch-in?) title. It just works so well for these devices if you sit down and play it for just a minute.
The biggest sleight against Patchy Matchy is that it is truly designed for an original Game Boy. I secretly wish that the game had support for Game Boy Color with a bit more style and flair to its visuals. It is perfectly functional and doesn’t have any distracting visuals, but it can become a bit boring to look at for a prolonged play session.
Still, the core of the design is what counts here and the game is just a ton of fun to play. I put this cartridge back in my Game Boy again and again and I don’t think I can give it much higher praise than that!
8.5/10
Tales of Monsterland DX, Joel J. Games. Works only on Game Boy Color or newer devices.
If you’re talking Game Boy, you’ve got to have a platformer, and while the upcoming Baby T-Rex and Hermano look amazing, Tales of Monsterland DX is the only platformer in the launch lineup. The game takes inspiration from games like Monster Boy and immediately stood out to me with its lovely aesthetic. The story sees a boy wake up in a mysterious town. He doesn’t know how he got there but goes on a quest to find a way back home. The town is threatened by an onslaught of monsters and an evil wizard. As you explore, you find mysterious potions that transform you into several forms, including a wolf that can move boulders and a mermaid that makes it possible to swim.
Insofar as platformers go, Tales of Monsterland DX feels pretty good to control. The jump is pretty tight, with platforms and coins guiding the way you want to explore the land. There is also an action button that you can assign to either your sword or the actions of your transformations. It doesn’t try anything that can be considered too challenging, although I will say that some bosses could get a tad frustrating at times. But too often the game is lacking challenge and the difficulty stems from navigating your way through its world. Some guideposts can be a bit obtuse; in particular, finding the first potion was a bit of a hassle since I didn’t realise that you can walk through certain pieces of terrain. Aside from that I got stuck once, where I had saved only with one heart and no continues before the final boss, meaning I had to backtrack all the way to the town to regain my hearts and collect an additional power-up to beat the game. At certain times it feels like there are too many quirks in the design of the world and pacing of the game that hinder it from becoming truly great. Small visual glitches and longer than average wait times between menus. As well as a game over booting you straight back into the main menu instead of giving you an option to immediately restart from your last save.
That being said the music is definitely a highlight, with some great tunes that immediately capture the vibe and feel of the locations you visit. Whether it is the upbeat music when setting out on your adventure, or the dark tones of the wizard’s tower, the accompanying tunes always hit the nail on the head. The game isn’t that long, only a little over two hours to see everything, but it doesn’t overstate its welcome. With a nice hot cup of tea and a blanket on the couch I played through the game in one sitting, and while I don’t think it’ll have that much of a lasting impact, it was a nice time. I am hopeful that Joel J Games learns from this experience and gets to build another game that can deliver on its ambition. Tales from Monsterland DX is a step in the right direction, but a few stumbles make it fall just short for my tastes.
7/10
Toki Tori: Ultimate Edition, Two Tribes. Works only on Game Boy Color Compatible Devices.
Disclaimer: For my day job I have worked with the team from Two Tribes on archiving their games at the Netherlands Institute of Sound & Vision. I have no direct connection to the development or release of this version of the game on Chromatic, but keep this in mind with this particular review.
Let’s be frank, you’ve probably played Toki Tori in some way or another before. Though its original release was cut short by a late release on the Game Boy Color as the Game Boy Advance took the world by storm, Toki Tori lived on in its many re-releases on pretty much any device you can imagine. Even specialized limited re-releases of the original game for the Game Boy Color are available for those looking for the original experience.
So why go back? Why release yet another version of Toki Tori? Well, to hear the folks from Two Tribes talk about it: ‘How often do you get the chance to re-create your original work but in the way you’ve intended it for original hardware?’. It’s a fair point and by all means Two Tribes has definitely succeeded in putting the ‘ultimate’ in Toki Tori: Ultimate Edition. As stated through the disclaimer, I am intimately familiar with the original Toki Tori, so seeing a revved up version of the original was kind of exciting. You can notice the improvements almost immediately as Toki Tori runs faster, automatically climbs over ledges and the game’s presentation just feels that little bit more polished.
All that helps to re-establish and confirm why Toki Tori has remained such a staple for many lovers of the Game Boy Color. I think that few puzzle games do as good a job of teaching the player how to play as Toki Tori does. The levels are designed in such a way that you immediately get a sense of how to navigate its tricks and obstacles. I’ve played through Toki Tori so many times and there is this level in the first world that still tricks me up after all these years. The goal is simple, collect all the eggs that are spread out across the stage. Toki Tori can’t jump over enemies or gaps and only uses special power-ups a set number of times per stage. That one level in the first world always tricks me, with the layout guiding me a specific way to the eggs, but following that laid out route gets you stuck with a single egg missing. It teaches the player magnificently how to play the game and first plan out a route themselves rather than simply jumping every gap or climbing every ladder.
In that sense Toki Tori: Ultimate Edition is the final embodiment of Toki Tori’s original design. Playing the game like this felt like I could finally see all the intent and design that Two Tribes had in mind almost 25 years ago. Later stages in particular just flow so much better without the timer counting down and the large amount of backtracking you’re doing with this increased speed. It doesn’t get the honorific of being an ultimate edition as a way of marketing, but it earns this version. It makes one of the best puzzle-platformers even better and frankly, if you do not already own a version of Toki Tori for another device, this is without a doubt the best way of experiencing the game. The one caveat for returning players is to not expect any surprises, new levels or gameplay changes. This is still Toki Tori at heart.
9/10
Traumatarium Penitent, Eligos Games. Works on all Game Boy systems.
As popular as the Game Boy was, it was surprisingly lacking in a couple of genres. Aside from the Wizardry series, there weren’t that many dungeon crawlers on the original handheld. Traumatarium Penitent (try saying that five times fast), seeks to remedy this with its striking visuals and world design. You play as a knight making your way to a major castle while purifying the lands of evil monsters and other foul creatures. The game takes place in first person, with each screen showing your surroundings, the directions you can walk to and possible interactions such as townsfolk, boxes and carriages.
At its core, you’ll be handling your stats throughout the game as you explore. Your vitality meter decreases with each screen you explore, meaning you’re always on the lookout for food or inns where you can rest up. All the while you run into monsters and creatures blocking your way. Battling these takes the form of a static turn-based combat scene where you can defend, attack, consume an item or flee. Battles often boil down to figuring out the patterns to the attacks, as certain enemies may have a third attack that deals the highest damage which you might want to block. Dying resets the game, so be sure to keep a note nearby to track your passwords that record your progress.
Let’s get that out of the way first. Yes, this game uses a good ol’ password system. While these cartridges support FRAM saves, Traumatrium has chosen to rely upon passwords consisting of ten characters. I am still baffled by this decision. On the one hand, there is a certain charm and tension to seeing your vitality stat drop with no food and realizing your last password sets you back about fifteen minutes. But on the other hand, passwords were done away with for a very good reason as they take time, effort and above all are pretty inconsistent in keeping track of your progression. As a wink and nod to the struggle many players have had with the original Game Boy, it is cute, but in actuality it makes an already challenging game feel even more stacked against the player.
And challenging it certainly is. The only way to stay alive in this world is to resort to consuming your potions and food whenever you have them available to you. The game communicates these stats in a very obtuse manner. It took me quite some time to notice that when your vitality drops, your health points start to decrease after. Meaning at times I could easily explore another five screens, but other times I dropped dead after the second one. It all boils down to managing stats, pushing as far as your meters are letting you go and then rushing back to your inn to get a password and repeat the process.
The visual style is what truly sets the game apart. It genuinely has some of the most gorgeous backgrounds I’ve ever seen on a Game Boy screen. The game uses the original green and black palette to its fullest extent. Characters may lack animations but their designs are striking against the locations they inhabit. I also like how you are relying on the map to plan out your route through the world and avoid getting stuck on dead ends. At its heart it is a pretty simple game of exploration and inventory management. That is usually a plus when it comes to Game Boy titles, but the theming is pretty dour. Characters have little to say to the protagonist and following the story is quite difficult as it establishes its own world of orders and rulers that requires reading the accompanying manual to make sense about.
I don’t think that Traumatarium is a bad game per se. Its visual style and gameplay is very inventive. But it makes some baffling choices in both its save system and battle mechanics that make it difficult to recommend. For those who are persistent and stick through the game's quirks, you’ll find a true throwback to the old days of the Game Boy. Before save batteries and online guides. Relying on getting by in battles and exploration by the skin of your teeth. Personally I find the games’ flaws to be too much to bear alongside its dark setting. But there is an argument to be made that there is really nothing like this game on Game Boy. For better or worse…
5/10
And that wraps up these reviews, I hope you enjoyed them and might’ve learned a thing or two about new games on Game Boy. Are you considering picking up any of these titles? And which one looks the most appealing to you? Let us know in the comments!
Disclaimer: Please note, this device has ties to controversial figure Palmer Luckey. NINWR LLC feels it is important to cover this device as a piece of hardware but we do not condone the actions or opinions of any individuals involved in its production.
A few months ago, I was given the opportunity to go fully hands-on with the Chromatic, a newly designed Game Boy device, created by ModRetro. My extensive preview delved into what the device was promising as well as the way in which it wanted to set itself apart from the flood of new emulated Game Boy handhelds you can purchase online. ModRetro is making a big play here, with the ambition to publish multiple classic and new Game Boy games as well. The Chromatic is their flagship product, so how does one deliver a new Game Boy in 2024? Well, I am happy to report that the Chromatic is one of the most pleasing retro devices I’ve played in a very long time. For returning or new players, this is a device that embraces the original design philosophy of the Game Boy but polishes its modern tweaks to perfection. The Chromatic will allow anyone to (re)discover the amazing library of those systems, in the highest quality you can find.
Let’s talk about that design first. The Chromatic is available in several colors, each resembling color palettes from the Game Boy Color era. The device combines several design aspects from the original Game Boy and Game Boy Color. The overall shape is more reminiscent of the Color, but the power button is located at the top of the device while the link cable port is on the left hand side. It makes for an ergonomic design, complimented by its luxurious finish with a magnesium alloy shell. It adds a bit of weight to the overall device and is cool to touch–which I particularly like–since it is a metal, without getting hot or slippery during long play sessions. The speaker is located on the bottom alongside an LED-indicator for the power level and a USB-C port. The one new button you’ll find on the side is a menu button that enables you to change settings such as the brightness of the screen, view controls and change visual features for certain titles. Finally, there is a sapphire screen lens on top of the pixel-accurate 160x144 screen, making it resistant to surface scratches. When you are holding the device it immediately feels like a premium gadget. I was skeptical about the slightly smaller A/B buttons and a D-pad without its ridges and pivot center, but honestly it feels great to play and control games. The travel when pushing in buttons is just right and gives that little bit of forced feedback you are used to with more analogue gadgets.
As the Chromatic is dedicated to reviving the Game Boy experience, you will find no additional buttons on the device to play other types of games. There is no compatibility for Game Boy Advance or any other systems. This does not mean that the Chromatic does not use emulation, however; there is an FPGA core at the heart of the system that can be updated and adjusted over time via firmware updates. This might be a turn-off for some, especially in comparison to a device like the Analogue Pocket, another premium gadget aimed at making it possible to replay original cartridges in an accurate form. The Analogue Pocket is a great device, but in my experience it felt a little bit like it wanted to please everyone. The approach of selling expensive adapters to play a wide range of systems and the additional buttons on the device makes it a bit cramped for my taste. I think the tradeoff with the Chromatic, being just focused on playing Game Boy and Game Boy Color games, might be a difficult choice for some. For me, the premium finishes and this design being chosen for a singular purpose makes the Chromatic stand out from the Analogue Pocket. The Chromatic feels more durable with extended use. The choice to pick AA-batteries as its primary power source, though a lithium rechargeable battery will be released at a later time, makes it safe to say that in twenty years the Chromatic will be just as functional as it is today. But for the average consumer, the fear of losing power or progress through dying batteries is a valid concern; a powerbank and a USB-C cable do help you bridge that gap if you need it.
And then there’s that screen. I’ve gushed about it in my preview plenty, but the color grading, viewing angles and accuracy to the original Game Boy Color is unlike anything you’ve seen before. I wish I could accurately compare these two devices in this video, but this is incredibly challenging without holding the device in your hands. The Analogue Pocket is an admirable screen, but with its slightly larger dimension and warmer palette it does not hold a candle to the vivid and accurate representation of the original colors on the Chromatic. Even if you’re into modding retro handhelds, like myself, there is no aftermarket screen that comes close to capturing what Game Boy Color actually looked like. Comparing these devices side by side, I found the Chromatic to be the most authentic in its screen colors. The Analogue Pocket comes close, but its tint is a bit more over-saturated, even when adjusting the settings. The Chromatic in particular shines when it comes to the viewing angles, especially with a game like Kirby’s Tilt ‘N’ Tumble. Through the firmware, several palettes are available if you do want to go for a specific look with original Game Boy titles, such as the green shade on the original Game Boy or other color palettes. They aren’t for me, but the option is there for those who like to experiment with different looks for their games. The brightness of the screen is another matter entirely. At maximum brightness you can pretty much use it as a flashlight, but the lowest brightness is absolutely perfect for a short gaming session in a darkened room or in bed before going to sleep.
I did find that the current firmware is still a bit lacking for certain quality of life features. Accessing the color palettes is hidden via a shortcut at boot of a game, and there is no indication in the menu which palette is selected. Certain options aren’t explained very well, such as the frame blending and color correction, which is only active when connecting the Chromatic via USB-C to a PC for capturing gameplay. When it comes to that brightness, the system doesn’t remember which brightness you used last, so you may end up blinding yourself with the screen in a darkened room. Finally, there is no way to create save states or allow the system to go into a sleep mode. Turning the power off means closing your game and saving it beforehand. This was of course true of the original Game Boy as well, but for certain games this means bringing out the password-booklet, getting to in-game save points and yes, keeping track of your original Pokémon battery to make sure it won’t die on you over time. Firmware can be updated, and it seems that ModRetro does want to actively support and update the device over time, but it does require the end user to shift their expectations back to the early ‘90s when it comes to these features.
Each Chromatic being sold at launch will come with a new version of Tetris. It proves once again that Tetris is still best suited for a smaller handheld device and this version adds some welcome changes. T-spin, bag holding, seeing what piece comes next, ghost piece, soft drop and lock down are all here and make for probably the best version of Tetris available on Game Boy Color. I’d take this version over any other on Game Boy if it were up to me, but don’t expect any fun side-modes like in Tetris 2 or Bombliss.
Additional ModRetro published titles are also compatible with Game Boy Color. I was sent Tales from Monsterland DX, Patchy Matchy and Toki Tori: Ultimate Edition. Tales of Monsterland DX is a cute, albeit a bit unpolished, action platformer, with a banger of a soundtrack. Toki Tori: Ultimate edition is probably the best version of the original Toki Tori. Small design tweaks, like making jumping over ledges happening automatically as well a drastic increase in speed and removal of the timer, make it a joy to play through its many challenging puzzles. But my personal favorite was Patchy Matchy. This is a game that I just loved to pluck away at. It’s a simple tile-matching puzzle game, where connecting a row of four makes the row disappear, but just feels great to pick up and play. The real goal isn’t to get the highest number of points but to complete a set of over 20 achievements. This one got the most replayability for me and is even compatible with an original Game Boy.
And then there is of course the massive Game Boy and Game Boy Color library. Every title is compatible with the Chromatic, including some wild ones like Pokémon Pinball, Kirby’s Tilt ‘n’ Tumble and yes, the Game Boy Camera. I went out of my way to pick up the Game Boy Camera as the USB-C port makes it possible to directly capture gameplay from the Chromatic. So, yes. I can now use Game Boy Camera as a livestreaming webcam or as a way to get my photos easily transferred to my computer. While I think it will not be the preferred method of choice for the die-hard macro photographers, it does make for a very comfortable shooting experience. As of writing, audio passthrough isn’t available yet via OBS and the Chromatic, but it is a feature that is planned as an update at a later time. For now, you’ll need to connect a line-in to your computer to fully capture the audio. It is a great way to play Game Boy games directly while also using the footage for videos or livestreams.
The real question that hangs over this review is not the quality of the device, nor the compatibility with certain games, but rather ‘who is the Chromatic for’? It is a valid question, as there are nowadays plenty of ways to play Game Boy titles on a plethora of devices. From modern android-based emulation devices produced by companies like Anbernic, to the aforementioned premium Analogue Pocket and then also those who have dedicated themselves to building and improving original Game Boy devices through modding. There’s pros and cons to each of these methods/devices. I feel that the Chromatic defines itself not through addition, but subtraction and refinement. In every aspect of the design, interaction and compatibility it all comes back to a singular design inspiration, that original Game Boy experience. Where one would sit down with a single game for a long time, or in short bursts. The overwhelming amount of options and choice that Anbernic devices or even the Analogue Pocket offer is welcome for those who just want a one-in-all device. But I’ve always found that this hasn’t been able to grab my attention for a prolonged period. Games played on these systems become short distractions before something else comes along and it disappears in a drawer again. There is a point to be made that the Chromatic understands the appeal of these original games, and that much of it rests on the device itself as well. The simplified controls, limited color palettes and capability to just run two types of games didn’t feel like cheap compromises, but allowed the games themselves to take center stage.
In my extended time with the Chromatic I found that the device itself almost became invisible to the experience, because I just started focusing on the game and not the bells and whistles surrounding it. It is hard to describe but it just clicks. It understands where luxurious finishes were needed like in the screen and the shell, but also where the classic feel could be maximized by returning to a minimalistic approach. The buttons feel like magic, mashing and clicking away, never needing to worry about hitting the wrong button. Everything about the Chromatic is tactile and polished that I simply did not want to put it down.
Is that worth the premium price for most consumers? I’m not entirely sure. But for those who do not wish to mod their original hardware, but are looking for a method to play their original games in the most accurate way possible, the Chromatic is the best answer to experiencing the Game Boy library in the way it was originally designed.
ModRetro is aiming to use the Chromatic as a jumping off point to (re)introduce the general public to the magic of the Game Boy. A library of new titles is being released over the coming months and due to partnerships with stores like GameStop it might break through with a wider audience. The Chromatic hits, and it hits hard. Constraint is really difficult in an age where more features, additions and software updates are always expected. The Chromatic makes it clear that this is what the Game Boy always was and resets those expectations. Each time I go back to boot up another game, I get this jolt of excitement when picking up the Chromatic, feeling its weight, admiring its screen and knowing that this is the best some of my favorite games have ever looked. That to me, is worth the premium price, and for those wanting to experience Game Boy again, or passing those memories on to a new generation that did not grow up with these titles, the Chromatic is the closest thing to perfection as you can get.
I am of the opinion that Tetris is genuinely the singular greatest game ever invented. Yes, other games have influenced the shape of the industry, its culture and trajectory. But Tetris is the universal language of games. Simple in its execution, brilliant in its game design loop and ever malleable to our times. You can learn so much just by looking at how the game has evolved through the years about technological advancements, the cultural zeitgeist, and just how far games have come. That is in essence what Tetris Forever is all about. A celebration of Tetris in nearly all its forms, redesigns and adaptations throughout the four decades it has been part of our culture. With its third entry in the Gold Master Series, Digital Eclipse has honed its skill with preserving games and providing context and is recommended to anyone even if they have never played a video game.
Tetris Forever is dedicated to the development, history and impact of Tetris as viewed through its original creators and those who helped bring it to the masses. As with all of Digital Eclipse ‘historical games’, you can browse the game at your own pace. Context is provided through text, high resolution scans, photos, and video interviews. This is for me, the highlight of this package. Where Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter story at times felt scraped together from already existing documentaries, the team behind Tetris Forever got the chance to sit down with all the major creators of Tetris that are still around. Aleksej Pazjitnov, the original creator of the game, Henk Rogers, who managed to license the game for home consoles and handhelds, as well as Gilman Louie who was responsible at Spectrum Holobyte for the marketing and production of the international PC version and Maya Rogers, current CEO of Tetris Inc. The story is expertly put together and super easy to follow. The interviewers struck gold with some of the most fun people to see talking on camera about their experiences with Tetris. For the Nintendo fans out there hearing the stories of how Henk Rogers made deals with former Nintendo of Japan president Hiroshi Yamauchi and visited their offices with accompanying video footage is a treat.
The best way to describe Tetris Forever is an interactive coffee table book. It is something you can flip through at your own pace, but enables you to engage with the contents at an interactive level. This especially comes through in the games. Several versions of Tetris and its sequels are available in full here. Including a faithful recreation of the original Electronika 60 version that Pajitnov originally programmed the game for, as well as the Spectrum Holobyte PC version, Tetris 2, Bombliss, Hatris and Tetris Battle Gaiden. That last on is a real treat for fans as it is one of the most fun competitive/multiplayer versions of Tetris. However, I will admit there was a slight disappointment that a lot of versions of Tetris have been left out. It is the curse of a game-series that has always been tied up in external licenses and until 2005 wasn’t unified under a single company. While I know that I am the sole person desperate to play Tetris on Philips CD-i, shining in absence is the original Game Boy version, the Nintendo NES version and even later versions such as Tetris on mobile phones. There is no Tetris Worlds, Tetris X on PlayStation or SEGA Tetris for arcades. These games are shown in photos and videos, but you can feel that this collection is limited by the tug of war between preservation and external rights holders. I’d kill to get an expansion pack, much akin to Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration, but it does feel like a pipe dream at this point.
The games that are included however play excellent. The emulation quality is near perfect, with even accurate slow down accounting for the original versions. I adored seeing the small gameplay refinements in progressive versions and it makes you appreciate how far Tetris has come. This all culminates in Tetris Timewarp, a completely new Tetris game that celebrates the series history. In this version of Tetris, special timewarp pieces are added after clearing 10 lines. Removing a line with a timewarp piece, blasts you back to a different Tetris game from one of four decades. You only get a few seconds to clear a specific goal with the adjusted rulesets of these other Tetris versions, like the Elektronica 60 version with its relentless hard drop or a version of bombliss where you need to remove the big bomb. They feel like little puzzles that can massively increase your score. Placing Tetris Timewarp at the end of the collection feels like a real reward as you will recognize the different versions of Tetris when entering the timewarp. And while yes, the original Game Boy version is not playable in the collection, there is a dedicated ‘Game Boy Style’ mode in Tetris Timewarp that plays the original music with the color palette. While it isn’t quite the same, it is a nice gesture and acknowledgement of the impact of that particular version.
You’ve probably heard about the dire state of legal video game preservation over the last year or so. Last month the Video Game History Foundation alongside other lobbying efforts failed to gain an exemption on the Digital Millennium Copyright Act for the remote access to videogames for libraries and institutions. This comes after their report on the loss of 87% of classic videogames. Digital Eclipse is showing a path forward with their Gold Master Series, and Tetris Forever is really a highlight so far in this series. Providing all these eccentric versions of Tetris with context like marketing materials, home video footage and insights from Pajitnov, Gilman and Rogers makes for an easily digestible historical document. It gives me hope that collections like these are able to tell and preserve the wins and failures of video games and their cultural impact. In fact, the notable absentees in Tetris Forever make a great case why it is more prevalent than ever that we need worldwide laws with regards to the preservation of games.
To put it simply: Tetris Forever is required reading. Not just for those who engage with games on a daily basis, but especially for people who are unaware of why games are cultural heritage and deserve to be preserved and celebrated as more than just toys. The new inclusion of Tetris Timewarp makes for a fun Tetris variant and is particularly rewarding after learning about the series' wide and wild history. So put the game on like a documentary with the family, introduce it to your colleagues and make them understand that it won’t be just Tetris forever, but games forever as well.
Today, two major design bureaus, Lost in Cult and Cook and Becker, who you may know from publishing some of the most gorgeous and elaborate (art)books about games, games history and pop-culture revealed their next project. In collaboration with Enhance, the game studio formed by industry icon Tetsuya Mizuguchi, they will publish two luxurious boxed sets celebrating the ten year anniversary of the company. You may best know Enhance from their games like Tetris Effect: Connected and Lumines: Remastered, but of course games like Rez: Infinite and Humanity are also represented in this collection.
Two sets are currently available for pre-order on the Cook and Becker website. The first one is called Sounds and Visions: Enhance at 10, which is a set that consists of the book "Sounds and Visions: An Oral History of Enhance", which is a 300-page premium book that tells the story of Enhance, the games they worked on and their teams. It goes in-depth on all their projects and is accompanied by highly detailed artwork and photos, some of which have never been shared before. This book is penned by Simon Cox, former EIC at EGM and 1UP.com, who dives deep into the foundations of what makes Enhance tick. Alongside the book there is an hybrid Super Audio CD with a mix of several tracks put together by Hydellic, who are the in-house music designers of Tetris Effect and Rez Infinite. A glass sculpture of the Level 01 Rez Player and museum-grade art prints make this a premium set.
The second set is dedicated to the music of the games from Enhance. The Enhance Soundworks Collection Boxed Set is limited to 505 copies and contains a whopping 9 LPs with a curated selection from all Enhance releases. The set has individual numbering ans is personally signed by Tetsuya Mizuguchi. This set will be the first time that the soundtrack for Humanity is pressed on Vinyl. Alongside the enormous music collection, there is a 16-page liner booklet that has interviews with nearly all composers that worked on Enhance's games as well as an Iconography poster that is specially prepared to avoid creasing. A turntable slipmat and set of high-quality pins, featuring the same iconography as the boxset representing the collecting round out the collection.
Both sets are available for pre-order now via Cook and Becker and are in extremely limited quantities available. The price is also not for everyone, as these will set you back 259 USD (excl. shipping) for each boxset. Pre-orders are available until sold-out or the campaign ends on December 10th. Lost in Cult Records and Cook and Becker aim to ship these boxsets in the spring and summer of 2025.
Gamescom this year brought a lot of different games to play. In fact, I’m fairly certain that I’ve never seen the indie arena booth this packed in all my years of attendance. Though my time was limited for hands-on games, there were a few that I was really anticipating to get my hands on. This write-up serves the purpose of at least trying to share my first impressions from these games. Now most of the games listed here have not yet been announced for Switch. I have good hope that these might make their way to the Switch or its successor at some point, but do keep that in mind for these titles as of writing. All of the demos I played were on a PC and of early builds. Feel free to skip ahead to the games that excite you most!
The Knightling - Developed by Twirlbound, published by Saber Interactive. Release date: 2025
Disclaimer: For my day job, working on games preservation, I’m currently working closely with Twirlbound on preserving their first game Pine. I have not been involved in any way in their work on The Knightling.
Taking one look at The Knightling, you can’t help but be stunned by the amazing display of style and color on screen. The game is set in an eye-popping colorful world that takes its inspiration from a ton of different sources, like African masks and a backstory to the world that is very intriguing. In fact, if you want to know more, be sure to watch my full developer interview with studio co-founder Matthijs van de Laar.
The set-up is quite simple, you are a servant to a legendary Knight who carries around a mythical shield to protect the people of this realm. But one day the Knight vanishes and leaves nothing behind except his shield. So it is up to his knightling to find him and help the citizens of the realm.
Having a shield as a primary weapon seems like a strange fit for an open world action-adventure game, but it is exciting to see how many different uses the developers at Twirlbound have found for this shield. The first one you’ll notice is the way in which you can use the shield as a method of traversal. By jumping in the air and sitting down on the shield you can slide down any sloped surface. It becomes second nature to try to slide down everywhere and the world is truly accommodating for this design. From the ledges on the walls surrounding the villages to the hills that cover the valley. Combined with the ability to jump around, and even later in the game upgrading the shield to include a glide function, the game is really teaching and challenging you to get accustomed to its movement mechanics.
But the shield also functions as a weapon. Now at first this is pretty straightforward as you can bash, slash and throw the shield at targets and enemies. Whether you’re trying to solve puzzles by hitting targets from a distance or hiding behind the shield to avoid an incoming attack, the sheer variety makes it adaptable in most situations. While I did love the shield throw, especially the little slow-down that takes place when you’re throwing the shield mid-jump, combat was a bit trickier. Combining dodge rolls with blocks and striking when stunning your opponent can get a bit tricky. I found it particularly challenging against stronger and larger enemies, who required some pretty specific timing to break their stance and go on the offensive. In my 15 minutes with the demo it was hard to get a grasp on this combat system, but I’m certainly curious to see how this system will be elaborated upon in the later parts of the game.
Structurally the game is an open world that you are pretty free to explore at your own pace. Though the developers did inform me that the game is more divided into large open areas and will require upgrades and collectibles to advance to later areas. In my time with the demo I was mostly helping out local villagers with an animal that had gone haywire and escaped its pen. It involved a little bit of investigation to find out where the beast had run off to, and opening the different pens by hitting targets from afar with my shield. This side-quest had some quirky writing and fun worldbuilding going on in the background, so as an opener it felt pretty safe. I was told that the game does feature more elaborate dungeons during your adventure and looking at the B-roll footage provided, those areas seem more combat and puzzle heavy.
The comparisons between The Knightling and Zelda might seem obvious when watching the game in action, but while playing I think that The Knightling is truly carving out its own identity. The way of traversal is much more pronounced in this game than Zelda and I loved the way in which the shield is used as your main tool. With the promise of upgrades and dungeons later in the game that will challenge more of your skills and observation, I think that Twirlbound is working on something truly special. It of course remains to be seen how the game will perform on the Nintendo Switch as well as how varied the combat can get in the game. As a follow-up to Pine, Twirlbound's creative world design takes center stage in The Knightling and is now really one of my most anticipated titles for next year.
Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind - Developed by Digital Eclipse, Published by AtariRelease Date: 2024
I was a little bit hesitant going into Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind (MMPRRR) at first. While I am fully aware of the history and impact of the show and its characters, I never really watched it growing up. Thankfully, those worries were quickly taken away as Digital Eclipse has created a love-letter to the series, that is just as much fun if the references pass you by. The story is incredibly simple, with the arch-nemesis of the Rangers, Rita Repulsa using a time portal to travel back in time and team up with a younger version of herself to fight the ‘classic’ Power Rangers.
The game is a very classic beat ‘em up multiplayer brawler. You can control any of the five rangers and walk from left to right, defeating waves upon waves of enemies. Dashes, grabs, juggles, combos and special moves, you know what to expect. The visual style is delightfully retro, with some absolutely gorgeous pixel art that immediately invokes the feeling like you’re playing a classic arcade game. I was reminded of games like TMNT IV: Turtles in Time and that’s probably the highest compliment I can give.
While I wasn’t able to play those levels myself, I was informed while playing that the game does try to spice up the gameplay by switching genres in the later levels. Because obviously, you can’t have a Power Rangers game where the rangers don’t hop into their Megazords at the end and combine their powers. These fights look spectacular and shift control from the individual rangers to their big vehicles. This is also where the curtain will be lifted and the game will play with your expectations. Segments that function as on-rails shooters with fast-moving and rotating backgrounds are really interesting and show that Digital Eclipse is using their experience on creating the TMNT Cowabunga Collection to put something truly original together. Alas, it was a shame I was not able to play these segments myself, but for fans of the Power Rangers and retro-style Beat ‘em ups, this should have you really excited.
The most fun while playing is really in the multiplayer aspect of the game. Whether it is one player distracting a big boss while the other smacking it in the back, or each taking on a wave of enemies on each side of the screen. The game adapts based on the amount of players involved, so especially if you’re playing with the maximum number of players you should be in for a ton of fun on the couch. It’s a shame we can’t fast forward to Rita’s Rewind, but it will release later this year for Switch and all other platforms.
King of Meat - Developed by Glowmade, Published by Amazon GamesRelease date: 2024
Keen readers of Nintendo World Report will already have seen a preview of King of Meat by Alex on our site. Alex got a chance to play the game before its announcement at Gamescom this year. I also got my hands on the game during Gamescom and played about three matches while being guided by the folks from Glowmade. Much like Alex I was unable to try out the dungeon-building aspect of the game, but I did have quite a lot of fun playing the game with others.
A quick refresher: King of Meat is a co-op party game in which you compete in matches in order to traverse dungeons that are built by other players. Your goal is to collect as many points as possible and keep the audience watching this fictional game show engaged, which multiplies your score. The game has a large focus on collaboration and customization and is very colorful. While this PC build did sometimes struggle a bit with a few bugs when jumping around, the core foundation is extremely solid.
One thing I did like that Alex did not mention in his preview is the fact that while the game is co-operative, I found that you can easily just ignore whatever other players are doing. This isn’t a team game like Fortnite where you have to actively work together as a squad. Rather, these dungeons require some teamwork for missions, but you do not need to communicate every second with your teammates. I think that is a true strength for people like me that like to occasionally play a multiplayer game but don’t want to go through the trouble of getting the same group of people together every time. I was easily able to ignore my teammate and go out platforming to collect the most crowns. Now initially, I thought this was because there would be a winner at the end of a match, but no, all scores are tallied for the team. This meant I could just focus on the parts that I was good at, and leave combat and throwing bombs to my teammates. It’s a small distinctive difference, but really helped me to stay so engaged with King of Meat that, once I’ve left the booth, I would be totally down to play another round. That’s probably the highest mark I could give to a multiplayer live-service game, so let’s hope that Glowmade sticks the landing and that the Switch version of the game can compare to the other versions!
Wilmot Works it Out - Developed by Hollow Ponds, Richard Hogg and Published by FinjiRelease: October 23rd, 2024 (PC/MAC)
Wilmot’s Warehouse was one of the biggest puzzle surprises when it was released in 2019. It has slowly gained popularity over the last five years and even has a super cool looking board game coming out later this year. But an even bigger surprise is that the Wilmot franchise is expanding with a pretty unorthodox, and yet perfect, follow-up.
You know that Wilmot works at a factory all day, but did you ever think to consider what he does in his free time? That’s right, Wilmot is an active fan of puzzles and receives boxes full of puzzle pieces every single day. So in this game that’s what you do. You open up boxes in your living room that contain puzzle pieces and you fit them together to make paintings that you can hang on the wall of Wilmot’s room.
Unlike other jigsaw puzzle games, you don’t move individual pieces around in a grid, but rather control Wilmot as he picks the pieces up and moves them around. You also do not need to rotate pieces in the game, which makes the puzzling experience super relaxing. That truly is the key word here, relaxing. The comparison I made while playing was a game like Stitch, that was released earlier this year. There are no time limits, you don’t get more points if you finish a puzzle more quickly, but just see the pieces strewn about on the floor and put them together. It sounds boring when writing that out, but fits so well in the Wilmot franchise and is a joy to play. Perfect as a focused play session or to keep your mind occupied while listening to a podcast or having a show on in the background. During the demo I was told that you can upgrade and unlock cosmetics to dress up Wilmot’s house and make it all your own.
While the game is releasing soon, there is no word yet of a port to Switch or other systems. Needless to say, I will be exercising some self-restraint to not double dip with this and a steamdeck version, because Wilmot Works It Out seems perfect after a long day of work.
A free demo of Wilmot Works It Out is available on Steam for a limited time!
Cairn - Developed and published by The Game BakersRelease date: 2025 (PC & Consoles (TBA))
The Game Bakers have a pretty great track record. First jumping onto the scene with the boss-rush game Furi and then followed up by the narrative heavy exploration game Haven, both of which we reviewed at NWR and found to be excellent in their own right. But Cairn looks to be on a whole different level as it aims to be a survival climber game. Now, I’ve never been climbing in real life, but I am a big fan of climbing as a game mechanic. From Grow Home to last year’s excellent Jusant and of course the ability to climb anything in a game like Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. So when I was given the controller for this demo I was eager to jump into my first climbing wall. But this wasn’t as straightforward as climbing had been made out to be in other games. With what can only be described as playing a 3D-version of the game QWOP I fumbled around making my way up on that first wall. Not a great start for either my expectations or getting to grips with the game.
But once I managed to climb up the third wall and was greeted by an actual mountainside, something started to click. The direct movement of limbs as you guide them upwards while holding on to the smallest grips and ledges started to feel natural. It’s hard to explain but the way you decide which limb you move by tilting the joystick really helps you to come to grips with how to control Aava’s body. With the help of her little Climbot, you can also install pitons on the mountain, but since these are incredibly limited in supply, you want to be careful with not wasting them. The tension between navigation, positioning and keeping an eye out for your stamina and health really makes you connect with Aava, as she starts to pant and scream while hanging from ledges. The haptic feedback from the controller also plays an important role here and I am incredibly curious to see how this would feel on a controller that supports more advanced rumble than the Xbox controller I was using to play.
In-between climbing areas you have a backpack and tent with you to rest up. Here you can manage stats for Aava’s wellbeing like drinking water, eating food and dealing with the extreme temperatures you’re faced with on the mountain. I love how the UI for the backpack shows all the items tumbling around in the backpack and I hope that there will be some interaction with objects to make it truly a survival experience. That survival aspect wasn’t the focus in the demo, but you can easily see how this can become a challenge in harsher environments where you need to scavenge for water, food and other materials to help you make your way to the top.
Where Haven was a narrative heavy experience, Cairn is going back to a more mechanics heavy game for The Game Bakers. It truly is climbing like you haven’t experienced in another game. But as intense as scaling these mountains will be, the visual beauty of the mountain and stunning sound design promise to make it an incredibly memorable experience. It remains to be seen how this game will make its way to the peak of Mount Kami, but the first steps of this journey leave a mighty fine impression.
Usual June - Developed and published by FinjiRelease Date: 2025 (PC/Mac)
Finji has been on quite a roll lately. Not only did they publish some amazing titles like Tunic, Chicory: A Colorful Tale and I Was A Teenage Exocolonist, but the style and ‘vibe’ of their games is always something to behold. Usual June really leans into these features while trying to tell a story about death, the afterlife and June wrapped up in all of this.
My demo dropped me in the middle of a scene where June and her friend are exploring an abandoned building. June, who is able to see ghosts and travel, tries to hide from her friend that she’s seeing the person who’s notes they are trying to understand. But suddenly she is taken away to the other world to find the source of corruption.
Visually the game sports an incredible style that often reminded me of animated films like Spider-Men: Into the Spider-Verse, with characters moving every other frame, while still feeling quite smooth to play. The demo was split into a narrative half and a combat-focused half. In the narrative you go around rooms and talk to characters and try to find clues about a mystery that’s been hidden in the town. It’s fairly straightforward with a ton of charming writing and characters speaking in an animal-crossing/sims-like language instead of being voiced.
But the combat really piqued my interest. I was expecting something akin to combat arena’s, dodge rolls and short encounters, but what surprised me was that the combat features a building system. As you defeat enemies, you gather orbs that can be used to create items to ward off opponents. There’s throwables that damage the creatures directly, but you can also place walls to prevent them from getting close to whack them with your sword. The rhythm in combat makes Usual June feel pretty distinct from other third-person action games. While it is a bit of a barrier of entry, I do think that this system will provide players with a lot of versatility.
This demo was still quite new and while it gave me a good impression of what to expect of the game, I am mostly curious about the larger narrative and story to really get pulled into the world of June. Thankfully the game is still quite some time off from release, but the initial impressions are solid. Especially if you love visually pleasing games you’ll have a great time exploring this mysterious world as June.
Usual June has a demo available on Steam until September 2nd.
Neon Blood - Developed by Chaotic Brain Studios, Published by Meridiem Games, Astrolabe GamesRelease date: 2024
Neon Blood is a stunning looking narrative adventure game developed by a new indie team based in Spain. The three developers, who were kind enough to provide context during my time with the demo, started working on the game as a graduation project. I played about thirty minutes of the game and can say that for those of you who love to get swept away in a visually stunning world with engaging writing and characters, this is one you should definitely keep an eye out for.
You play as Alex McCoin, a detective who lives in Bright City. The city, controlled by a mega-corporation, is filled with inhabitants, most of whom are cybernetically enhanced and either/or addicted to Spark. Alex deals with this himself as he is down on his luck at the beginning of the demo. That is until he is roped into a murder mystery, of an assassin going around killing people around the city. It is up to Alex, to figure out why these murders are taking place, who is responsible for them and how he finds himself at the beginning of a revolution.
While the plot in the demo was a bit convoluted, though the main writer kindly explained where I was starting in the story, it immediately sets the tone for the atmosphere in Bright City. Above all, you will be stunned by looking at the impressive visual style that the team behind Neon Blood have managed to craft. The game uses high quality pixel-art for the characters and objects, but for the world itself it uses a voxel 3D-style that is reminiscent of PlayStation 1 and N64-era graphics. What makes this especially impressive is the blending of these two styles. The characters sitting on chairs, next to doors or just walking around never feel out of place with the overall style. Combined with some seriously impressive lighting, I found it just engaging enough to walk around Bright City, as I was chasing clues and fugitives. The game mostly takes place in a 2.5D world, so you can walk back and forth in the background, while you traverse across the screen. The developers have spared no effort in making the city come alive with background animations, pedestrians walking on the streets and even some fun interactions Alex can do when not investigating.
Gameplay wise Neon Blood does not reinvent the wheel. It is a linear narrative adventure game and you will be walking and running from place to place talking to suspects, witnesses or chasing criminals. I think that playing a game like this at a major event is quite a challenge, because it is hard to keep yourself focused on the narrative in a limited timeframe and while chatting with the developers, but I did quite like the way in which the writing was portrayed. More surprising was that the game features turn-based combat, that mainly uses dice in a roleplaying game fashion to progress. The combat didn’t really click with me, as it mostly boiled down to rolling dice to attack and hoping that enemies would roll badly. I hope that the final game will play a bit more with this and perhaps introduce some variety in the moves and status ailments one can afflict. I was told that the game is about 75% narrative and 25% combat, so you probably will not have to deal with it quite that much. But some more flexibility and creativity is something that would spice up the gameplay.
Neon Blood is shaping up to be a visually stunning and narratively gripping game. The developers are aiming for the Switch version to run at a locked 60FPS, so it should really be something that fans of narrative games can keep an eye on. Whether Neon Blood will fall into the trappings of repetitive gameplay and its slightly unengaging combat system remains to be seen, but my first impression is really solid. I can’t wait to see what stories Bright City will hold when Neon Blood launches this year on all platforms.
There’s probably few names in the fighting game community that ring more hallowed than Marvel vs. Capcom 2. The fighting game debuted in Japanese arcades but became a true classic when it released on platforms like the Dreamcast and PlayStation 2. For many it is the headliner of the all new Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection that contains all the arcade-releases that Capcom made with the Marvel license. I managed to get my ass kicked for about thirty minutes during a special hands-on preview at Gamescom. While I am still really bad at Arcade fighters, I am fairly certain that this collection will be everything fans are looking for and more.
A quick overview for those not in the know. Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics features seven fighting games in one packages. Both Marvel vs. Capcom 1 and 2 are in there as well as X-Men: Children of the Atom, Marvel Super Heroes, X-Men vs. Street Fighter, Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter and The Punisher. I got to play all of the games except The Punisher and Marvel Super Heroes vs. Street Fighter. While there is a lot of overlap between these games and mechanics, it is clear that every game brings its own distinct style to the fighting game formula. While MVC2 will be the main attraction for most players. I will break a lance for X-Men vs. Street Fighter, which is a much more straightforward fighter, but was the first one to feature 2-on-2 matches. The combat is fluent and each character has their own fighting style that still comes through. The roster can be quite small for that game, but I do think that it aids in getting to grips with the characters easily.
I will be the one to first admit that I have very little experience playing fighting games. I know the very basics, but get my low and high punches/kicks messed up all the time. Let alone swapping between five games at a very rapid pace, was quite a bit to get my head around. Thankfully the presentation of the collection makes it fairly easy to get accustomed to the different games. Each game comes not only with a dedicated moves list per character, but it can also display the marquee card that was featured on the original arcade machines. This feature is delightful, as it not only shows some awesome additional artwork, but presents these games in context and can be a quick overview if you’re familiar with fighting games, but not a specific one from this collection.
But the star of the show without a doubt will be Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes. This is the original arcade version so it features 56 characters, all the stages and of course the soundtrack that has had players grooving for over two decades. The game plays really well and I was personally happy to see that there is now an option for a dedicated difficulty settings for both the CPU and using One-Button Specials (be aware that this feature is unavailable if you’re diving into ranked matches). My time with the demo only featured local play, but the final release will also feature rollback netcode for all titles in the collection, which will help MVC2 fans kick ass for years to come.
My main gripe with the game was the applied CRT-display filter. Perhaps it was because I had to sit so close to the screen, but the filter was just really bad. The combination with the flickering attacks, while reduced from the original, gave me a headache at the end of my play session. Now I’ve been told this CRT-filter can be turned off, so thankfully it is optional, but I did find it weird that for a game that wants to adhere to its arcade roots this choice of filter was actively hurting the experience. I was also not yet able to see the museum gallery, that contains high-resolution artwork of all characters, level designs and design documents for each game. But if the previous Capcom collections are anything to go by, this should probably be a fantastic ride through this particular history of the company.
Overall Marvel vs. Capcom Fighting Collection: Arcade Classics should be exactly what you get. A responsive, pick-up-and-play experience for some of the most revered fighting games from the 1990’s. The rollback netcode is enough to justify this game for puritans who’ve been anxiously waiting to dive back into Marvel vs. Capcom 2. But I feel that this collection overall has enough to satisfy anyone with a passion for fighting games. Just be sure to turn off the CRT-filter and practice in training mode to get your bearings before going online and I’m sure you’ll have a wild ride.
Willem Hilhorst talks to Matthijs van de Laar, Co-Founder of Twirlbound about their next game. The open world action-adventure game The Knightling and what their design goals were for the game. Matthijs also talks about designing a game for the Nintendo Switch, lessons learned from developing PINE and the hope for Switch 2.
This video was shot/edited by Willem Hilhorst during Gamescom 2024.
Atari's CEO Wade Rosen talks to Willem Hilhorst about the Atari brand, their recent acquisitions, games in the company's backlog, their walkback on NFT's and the future of the company.
What makes genres malleable? I think when looking at all sorts of media, we like to consider genre as a sort of comfort. When watching a horror film, we can prepare ourselves with a specific mindset before watching the blood spatters fly across the screen. When playing a platformer, the feeling of control through movement is what drives us to explore levels and find collectibles. But what immediately peaks my interest is when genres are bended, merged and broken. 1000xRESIST bends, breaks, and builds its world, setting, and characters in so many ways that it is hard to describe what mindset you should prepare going into it. Even after rolling credits I am still unsure as to how to categorize this game. But what I am certain of is that this is a story that needs to be told and deserves to break all the rules.
The world in 1000xRESIST starts out fairly abstract. You live in a futuristic commune where you and your many identical looking sisters are tasked with serving the Allmother. A benevolent figure who holds the key to immunity to a disease that has taken hold of the world. She has given command to six sisters, with each their own domain and a given name: Fixer, Bang Bang Fire, Knower, Healer, Principal and you, Watcher. Unlike the other sisters who serve a clear function, it is Watcher who is tasked with observing and understanding what is going on within the commune. Her relationship to the other sisters is therefore complex and even more strained when she has to prepare a special ritual called a communion, in which she can travel to distant memories that are part of the Allmother’s story. As you learn more about who the Allmother is, and weave together her history, that of her parents and how the commune came to be, Watcher starts to question her role and who the Allmother is.
1000xRESIST is primarily a narrative driven adventure game that is played in the third-person point of view. As Watcher you traverse between different memories and learn more about the sisters living in the commune. A lot of this boils down to you walking around and talking to people, but the highlight are the communions in which you explore memories set in different time periods and can swap freely between them. Sometimes this means zipping around between floating orbs in space, but it also gives Watcher the ability to view certain scenes from different perspectives. The game is entirely lineair, with a couple branching story choices. But it is that narrative that kept me fully engrossed into the world of 1000xRESIST. The themes are masterfully woven together and relate to topics such as the abuse of power, fighting oppressive forces, the influence and consequences of parental decisions and how one’s self is defined. A major element in all this relates to the experience of immigration and fleeing political persecution. I wish I could speak to these themes more broadly, but aside from the relative spoiler-sensitivity, I also feel it is not my place to talk about this subject as a white man who’s lived in western Europe for his entire life. I do encourage people who have played through the story to seek out writing by others who have a better understanding of this topic as I think it is vital to getting to terms with why 1000xRESIST is a story that needs to be told. That is something you can rarely say about stories in video games, but like a good drama RESIST embraces its themes of dealing with occupation, control and hierarchy, while letting the player experience this throughout the story.
Presentation wise the game has a fully voiced cast and they deliver an excellent job. Some of the voicework shifts and adapts throughout the game and while at first it left me feeling confused, by the end it helped make these characters come alive. The game also has a striking visual style. Here however is where some of the issues on Switch become apparent. The Switch version really looks quite bad in the visual department. Jagged edges on character models, mediocre resolution and in particular visual effects have been massively downgraded. I played most of my time in handheld mode and while its visuals do not subtract from what's most important here, the story, it did feel like I was playing an early PSP game at times. I also found navigation to be quite cumbersome. There isn’t really a map to find your way around the commune and while you do have the option to enable waypoints, it takes quite some time to learn where to find and meet the cast of characters. I also had one game-breaking bug in a later part of the game. Thankfully the auto-save was fairly frequent, but after that I did save after nearly every conversation to make sure I did not need to redo them. Finally the loading times are frequent enough and can last upwards of twenty seconds, which can really take some of the urgency away from the narrative.
Like I stated at the beginning of the review genres are malleable and 1000xRESIST fully embraces the freedom that a genre like Science-Fiction brings. Every aspect of the characters, world and setting are used to tell a story that feels more relevant than ever in our global climate crisis and countless political issues. It focuses on the stories we often lose when talking about grand narratives, in particular that of the diaspora. As a narrative 1000xRESIST is perhaps one of the greatest accomplishments of the year so far, with a tale that will stay with me for quite some time. It paints in a canvas that is similar to stories like 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim and reminded me so often of rebellious worlds like that of Umurangi Generation. As a game however, and in particular on Switch, it falls short at times. Visually in particular, but also the trappings of the narrative adventure game that can get a tad repetitive over time without too many moments that shake up the gameplay. This all does not subtract from the astonishing writing and performances in 1000xRESIST and I urge those who are looking for boundary breaking storytelling to truly dive into this world blindly. It may even help you find the strength in these times to learn what it means to resist.
I can tell you right now. If you have seen or read anything on Lorelei and the Laser Eyes that even remotely intrigues you, that is all you need to know if you want to pick up this game. I am dead serious that going blindly into Lorelei and the Laser Eyes has been one of the most profound gaming experiences I've had in the last five years. This review will not reveal puzzle solutions or spoil what is actually going on in Lorelei, but I will need to talk somewhat about the structure and genres that Lorelei plays in. This game is truly best experienced without prior knowledge, so leave this place while you still can. If you're still here, then let me address you directly. Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is a masterpiece in puzzle, horror and game-design. It is the culmination of all the years that Simogo has been making interactive art, and without a doubt their crowning achievement.
You play as a woman who arrives at a hotel in a European wood. Why she is there is pretty unclear, but you've received a strange letter from someone who wishes to meet you here. As you explore the rooms of the hotel, strange things start happening. Small stuff at first, like a sense that you're being watched, but slowly the feeling seeps in, that this hotel is definitely out of the ordinary. Rooms with strange statues, locked doors with unusual keys and computers with an eerie red glow. What is going on, why are you here and who are these figures with mazes for a face that come chasing you out of the walls?
Gameplay wise, the best way to describe Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is a combination between the original Resident Evil, with its locks and keys level-design, blended with titles such as Rusty Lake’s The Past Within or The Room Escape series games. From the word go, the game actively encourages you to keep track of puzzles and strange clues with pen and paper. At first I thought this to be a cute wink from the developers, but as I discovered more and more puzzles in the game I was shocked by how important my little notebook had become. Scribbles I'd made in the 3rd hour suddenly became massively important as I made connections between all the different locations of the hotel. Puzzles tend to range from alphanumeric codes, to dialing specific telephone numbers to noticing objects in the background. A sliding door here, a padlock there and some hidden mechanisms make the hotel even after 10 hours refreshing to explore.
But it is its combination with the unsettling visual design of the game that makes Lorelei leave a haunting impression. From the reflection of the rooms shimmering across the floor, to notes and cryptic messages being directed at not just the player character but the player themselves as well. The absolute highlight is when the game flips itself on its head and transports you to a whole other game entirely. These segments are magnificently crafted, leaving you with a sense of dread and being on edge. Some of these left me with actual goosebumps, whether purposely submitting puzzle solutions or running into the solutions by accident. Whenever I found a new cipher or had my “AHA!” moment, the game managed to unfold another layer to its world, story, characters, and even gameplay. Enhanced by its atmospheric sound design. The sound of your footsteps echoing across the hallways, the slow fading in of songs that play on record players, and the sheer terror whenever an anomaly begins to show its face, or even lack thereof. It hits the nail on the head every single time and I have been absorbed, transformed even by the way the game plays with both time, space and its relation to the player.
At its core you will be connecting dots, understanding a wide range of clues and applying what you have learned throughout the game. Most impressive is that the game itself is largely conveyed through text and visuals, reveling in its desire to leave you as much in the dark as possible. This means that from a playing perspective, most of the solving of puzzles will be done in your head. I am fairly certain that some sharp players will instantly understand some of the more elaborate puzzles, and I found some of them to be incredibly hard to solve. But once that moment clicks, Lorelei and the Laser Eyes ascends to the rare level of games like Tunic and Immortality, where the game takes place mostly inside your own mind. It is astonishing how well this design philosophy is applied, because at every turn, once you figured out the solution to a puzzle, it is so incredibly obvious that you had not realized it before.
That is not to say that the entire experience is without its small hiccups. For one is the controls and the UI. The game only uses directional inputs and a single button to confirm an interaction. From a design perspective this makes the game incredibly straightforward. It is not like that infamous puzzle in The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass where you need to close the DS system in order to proceed. All the solutions are always relying on the same type of inputs. That does mean that navigating menus and interacting with the world also uses the same single button and directional input as well. Again, this compliments the overall design and leaves little room for confusion for the player, but this also means that you have to manually go to the ‘exit menu’ buttons and that there are no shortcuts that you may be accustomed to. Even when playing in handheld mode, the touch screen can not be used for easy access. It makes certain moments frustrating, such as navigating to a particular memory or mental note you might want to brush up on when attempting to solve a puzzle. It took me a good few hours to get accustomed to it. Additionally, while the game keeps several logs, mental notes and directions I had gotten lost quite a few times on my journey through Hotel Letztes Jahr. There are no clear aids or directions that are able to help you out when stuck and I am afraid for those who are resorting to a guide to reach the finish line. The solutions are always there, but because certain dots are connected in a slightly more obtuse way, a few more concrete methods of asking assistance would’ve been welcome.
Even so, all these complaints did not deter me from playing as much of Lorelei and the Laser Eyes as possible. In my near twenty hours playing the game I can say without a shadow of a doubt that this is one of the most expertly crafted mazes I have ever seen. I experienced shock, awe, goosebumps and have been truly engrossed nearly every minute of the experience. The unique blend of puzzle game, escape room and psychological horror was something I wasn’t quite ready for. For Simogo to follow up their colorful and playful games with something so starkly different is impressive. How well they have managed to craft together this experience is no less than masters at work. Lorelei and the Laser Eyes is every Zelda Dungeon, Resident Evil Mansion and Escape Room honed to its finest edge and plays with the player as much as the player plays the game. In a year already stacked with impressive indie games, this will be the one that is going to haunt me for years to come. I could not be more excited about seeing others experience it for themselves.
Diegetic gameplay, very simply put: games that teach their player without the aid of a text-box, is a rare occurrence nowadays. Perhaps it is the fear that confusion and a lack of direction will alienate most players or simply because a combination of game mechanics can get confusing rather quickly. I was therefore pleasantly surprised that while playing ANIMAL WELL, the only text boxes that would pop up were that of confirming whether to save or not. ANIMAL WELL is shrouded in mystery and designed with a clear intent. While not every cog in the machine flows as smoothly, it makes for a memorable metroidvania-like experience that sets itself apart from the competition almost every chance it gets.
ANIMAL WELL does not feature a lengthy text crawl, or a description of where you find yourself but immediately drops you into the middle of a dark and sprawling dungeon, it's titular well. While a lot is left in the dark, literally and figuratively, your main objective is to retrieve four flames located all around the map. Armed with nothing but a jump, you will need to solve puzzles, find paths to proceed and activate switches to open doors and locks. All the while darkness envelopes the depths of the well and its animalistic inhabitants.
The vagueness in that description is really just my personal, “spoiler-free” interpretation. The creator of ANIMAL WELL has stated his intention of keeping many of the games' secrets hidden and the game does a pretty good job at that, even at times to its own detriment. I cannot tell you the events of what happens in ANIMAL WELL. Unlike Hollow Knight where a thread is laid out for you to follow, ANIMAL WELL is truly all about the vibes. And man, what vibes they are. Looking like an old 8-bit or 16-bit game, with accommodating scanlines, the game manages to look absolutely gorgeous at nearly all times. Its strength especially is in the lighting and depth of field effect in the backgrounds. From droplets falling from the ceiling to the lighting of firecrackers that fly off in colorful trails and all directions. If you play the game on a Switch OLED model in handheld mode or an OLED TV it looks stunning due to its use of blacks.
Lighting and your own field of view becomes key as you navigate the twists and turns inside the well. The locations of flames are all easy to tell apart and feel distinctive in its setting and atmosphere. From the watery depths at the bottom of the well, to the growth that has taken over the higher reaches. With some clever tricks and those aforementioned secrets the game quickly becomes about learning how to navigate the well while solving puzzles. As you go about you obtain items that serve as power-ups. For example a stairwalker, that when dropped on an elevated surface will start to move downwards and can hold down switches. Another item is a Yo-Yo that can be used to reach long distances or even attract animals to move around to specific locations. Combined with the instantaneous traversal between screens, which is something I didn't know I needed in my metroidvanias, it makes combining all the pieces together incredibly satisfying.
You may have noticed that I have not used the word enemy once yet. What genuinely surprised me is that ANIMAL WELL does not feature active combat whatsoever. Where Samus can fire beams at will to defeat enemies or interact with the world, ANIMAL WELL relies just on timed platforming, positioning yourself and distracting obstacles or aggressive animals. It is a bold choice, especially since the game features several what could only be described as “boss battles”. Where during the exploration it is fun to run around and figure out methods to get rid of obstacles or attacking Animals, these bosses really felt like they broke with the core identity of ANIMAL WELL. Since you are unable to directly attack bosses, they tend to resort to discovering patterns and trying to survive for as long as possible. These were really some of the most uneven and frustrating difficulty spikes of the game. One boss chases you through a long stretch of the level as you have to make your way to a specific spot. It can be fun to plot out the route, but having to retry this over fifteen times became dull and frustrating. On the other hand, the final confrontation was surprisingly anticlimactic and short, leaving me wanting more.
There are a ton of hidden secrets and collectibles you are able to obtain as you learn better and better how to navigate the well. Using your map is just as essential as learning to time your jumps. All this makes ANIMAL WELL memorable in ways that cannot be said for other recent metroidvanias. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown has an enormous map and fairly in-depth combat system, whereas ANIMAL WELL is short and concise in teaching the player how to explore. Metroid: Dread is about segmented gameplay chunks, where each biome relies on another skillset. In ANIMAL WELL I felt that the game never felt the need to withhold information but wanted me to almost sequence break from the word go. And Hollow Knight revels in its atmosphere and world building, but ANIMAL WELL is set on unnerving the player by not explaining a single thing. It makes the game exciting, it feels tense to play at times and even when committing myself to only a short 20-minute session I found myself getting sucked into its mysteries and refusal to enlighten me. That is a tightrope that not a lot of games can walk, but ANIMAL WELL does it masterfully.
It is not perfect however. The aforementioned boss battles can be tedious and frustrating. Some secrets or passages were a little too obtuse at times. And one thing I was particularly not happy with was a segment where caged up animals, cats in this case, made such an awful sound of pain and anguish that I resorted to muting the game entirely. I would love it if the developer could add these particular “animal distress sounds” as a toggle in the sound options. Finally, the game is surprisingly short if you aren't set on finding all the secrets and collectibles. I'm sure there are players that will have a field day with this and can easily expand their playtime. But just when I had found most of the items and defeated the final challenge I was hoping for a bit more meat to the game. I guess I'll have to go back and hunt all those Easter eggs.
ANIMAL WELL is really unlike anything I've played. At first glance it looks like a stylish and gorgeous metroidvania that harkens back to a retro feeling. But under the hood, the game juggles so many ideas at once that slowly engrossed me into the experience. By the end, it felt like I've seen what the future of the metroidvania genre could hold. Even though it drops a few balls while juggling all these mechanics together, such as the boss battles. Still, ANIMAL WELL is a brilliantly put together game that I'd highly recommend to anyone who wants to get lost in a small but intricately designed game. I am quite convinced that both designers and players will be delving down deeper into this well over the coming years.
Frequent NWR guest and contributor Syrenne McNulty was involved with the PR for Sokobond Express. The review was written and edited without any input from anyone who works with Syrenne.
I have always been absolutely terrible at understanding exact sciences. Whether it was physics, biology, or chemistry, something about combining math, abstractions, and the natural world always seemed to elude me. So flipping the periodic table on its head and forcing me to face my high school fears was not something that was on my bingo card for 2024. While Sokobond Express is presented as a clean and straightforward puzzle game, I ended up falling into the same trappings that stumped me as a kid, for better or worse.
Sokobond Express is a level-based puzzle game in which you need to guide a group of nuclei to the goal. You are presented with a grid that contains colored letters and need to connect these in such a way that they fit inside the grid when connecting the end. But much akin to chemistry, these nodes will only attach to one another if there is an available positive atom to connect the two. Early levels start out straightforward, tasking you with connecting two H-nodes to an O-node, but the tension quickly escalates as nodes can contain multiple atoms, need to be charged with positive energy, and the routes become winding along the grid.
The presentation is key here. The game feels akin to something like Mini Metro, with a clean UI and interface that does not distract from the puzzles. You will not be coming to Sokobond Express for a story, but after completing a stage you are presented with a little fun fact about the element you just put together. It helps tie the experience together and feels sufficiently rewarding after completing a puzzle.
The puzzles themselves can be hit or miss. While the level structure presents itself fairly linearly, I found the difficulty to be wildly fluctuating. One moment I breezed through a puzzle on my first attempt, but the next I was stumped for a good fifteen minutes. There are some good attempts at variety, such as the aforementioned positive ions that need to be added to your connecting line. But overall you will be drawing and redrawing lines during the entire game without too many mixups.
I do think a flaw of the clean and straightforward presentation of the game is its hint system during puzzles. When requesting a hint the game will show you how the final shape of the connected nodes should look. It's up to the player to figure out how to trace the line in such a way that it looks like the hint. I think it is a good way to communicate a hint, but it does mean that the hint button tends to turn into an “instant solution” most of the time. I'd have rather seen that the game builds up its hint system so that you can still figure out part of the solution yourself. I admit it is a tight balance, but in a game that relies on you getting better at understanding its puzzles, I did lose myself in the abstraction of it all.
Sokobond Express is pretty much exactly what you see. If you enjoy slightly abstract but “think-heavy" puzzle games, there is a lot to enjoy here. It is easy to pick up and play while looking to pass the time for a few minutes. Though its difficulty spikes and slightly too revealing hint system are at odds with its design, I found it to be a delightful puzzle experience that even taught me a few things about atoms and ions. While I am not head over heels for it, there was certainly some chemistry to be found.
Do you ever stop and think about why video game reviewers, writers, and critics mention a game like Super Mario Bros. all the time? Sure, it is a classic video game that was not only a commercial, critical, and cultural success, but it has also become a story that is so well told that it has become ingrained into videogame history. Any video game made in the 80’s could’ve been the example set by a game like Super Mario Bros., but Nintendo in particular has made sure that Mario’s story has been told, retold, and re-experienced time and time again throughout the decades. If you ask me, that is video game preservation. Making sure that future generations have access to the stories, documents, and most importantly the games and are able to view it in context. Digital Eclipse has struck gold once again with their most recent attempt at providing us with video game history in context in Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter story. Whether you grew up with home computers or are learning about this lovable programmer for the first time, the second game in the Gold Master series shows that Digital Eclipse are at the forefront of preserving and telling the story of videogames in interactive form.
If you’ve either played Atari 50: The Anniversary collection of The Making of Karateka, you may know what to expect. For those unfamiliar, these games can best be described as interactive coffee-table books for videogames. You learn about a specific topic through video-interviews, the ability to view photos and documents in incredible detail, and of course, by playing the games. The presentation is slick and simple and the information shared is not only highly informative but entertaining as well. The game, for a lack of a better word, chronicles the journey of lauded videogame developer Jeff Minter. In the 1980’s he became emblematic for developing games for the home computer market with a true sense of authenticity and authorship. His games feature flashy and psychedelic artwork, but also a wide array of animals (to which he lovingly refers to as beasties) and arcade greatness. From Attack of the Mutant Camels, to Gridrunner, his early VIC-20 Arcade-clones, and even the famous Atari Jaguar version of Tempest 2000, the collection presents the widest array of versions and compilation of Llamasoft’s games up to the mid 1990’s.
What makes this game stand out is that it is not only filled with some great interviews with not only Jeff but other collaborators and writers as well, but that it pays meticulous attention to how Jeff was able to stand out in the crowded home computer market from the 1980’s. I adore the plethora of photos of Minter being at computer conventions selling his games, to incredibly well made scans of his original ‘Nature of the Beast’ newsletter that he sends out to fans. In a way, it makes the indie-developer scene that most people associate with the mid 2000’s look like an imitation by comparison. This is a piece of history that I was only familiar with through games like Tempest 2000 and stories being told of Jeff, but this collection just makes it incredibly accessible to those who wish to learn more about games history at a time where that was rarely documented.
The games themselves will most likely appeal to those who are already familiar with Llamasoft’s output, but for those who are new, expect a great collection of arcade-style games. Most of them are what we would today describe as shoot-em-ups or grid-based arcade games, but only a few have really become outdated. A large selection of additional features and options, like the ability to instantly open up the game's instructions or to view the controls help you get familiar with every game, even if you only play them for a few minutes. That’s the beauty of the way Digital Eclipse presents its Gold Master Series. You can learn all you can about the creator and dive into each painting, photo or text document, or much like a museum you can browse at your own pace and decide how much time you’d like to spend on a certain title. The game is easily divided into era’s, so I liked to tackle the game one era a night for a week. It made for a fantastic time that balances well between games and seeing the influence that Minter has had on the games industry and its culture. What you end up doing with that information is eventually up to you the player, but if you know people that played a lot on home computers, this might just be a fantastic way to strike up conversations.
I will say that, for how well the game and the collection itself is presented, I do think that Digital Eclipse can improve in the future with these collections. For me a primary fault was the lack of diverse speakers during the video interviews. Yes, the 1980’s are emblematic of the image of the stereotypical games, but out of the ten or so people interviewed, including only two women and no people of color does impact the way in which this story is being told. I think that especially for historians, archivists, and those wishing to preserve history, it is vital that other voices are heard especially in collections such as these. The other complaint is something that I wasn’t aware of before learning about Jeff Minter, but it is his passion and focus on music visualizers. These abstract light sensations that are shaped and form based on music and input is something that Minter has chased for decades and was something that I really wanted to learn more about. Only one visualizer is included and I’d have loved it if this game went the extra mile to show some of the later versions that Jeff Minter worked on. This is probably primarily a rights issue and skews up to the line of what is a game, but since the story itself references it often, I was hoping there’d be more to play around with.
But, as a games-archivist myself, I cannot commend Digital Eclipse enough for having the ability and access to keep telling these stories in interactive and accessible formats. If you never grew up with a Commodore 64, I know how hard it can be to learn of this part of history. But the creators of Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter story allow you to make it as easy as opening an app on your phone. Not only that, but thanks to these additional contextual materials it allows the games to be understood and studied in the context of their time. It is something that archives, cultural institutions, libraries and perhaps even lawmakers should take note of. It shouldn’t be as rare as it is, to learn about this medium’s history from sources other than PR-firms or the fans that follow these games and their creators. Llamasoft: The Jeff Minter Story shows us a way forward and presents why the history of games is ever evolving and that it is vital to the future of the way games are played and created.
One final note: At the time of writing I also experienced a de-sync of audio and video in the interviews. I was informed by a representative of Digital Eclipse that this is a bug in the Switch version and will be fixed in a patch soon after launch.
I think if you were to ask any person about their favorite period in history, barely anyone would mention the European dark ages. This historical period has usually been presented as drab, depressing and dour, unless a fantastical element is involved. It's often referred to as the Dark Ages because there is a significant lack of historical records that can be traced back to this period. At least, that is what the common assumption is. Much akin to real European history, Pentiment is a tale that shines a light on what life and society were like in this often forgotten bout of time. But what is especially astonishing is that for a time centered on religion, memento Mori and the division between church and state, Pentiment finds and presents humanity in all this. Part detective story, part roleplaying and part adventure game, it is a title that revels in its world and characters and goes to the effort of letting the player live between the margins of the page.
Andreas Maler is a painter from the city of Nuremberg. Unmarried and in the pursuit of finishing his masterpiece, an artistic depiction of November in a scriptorium, he resides in Kiersau, Austria where he works at one of the last traditional abbey's at the beginning of the 1500’s. It is a turning point in history, as the true medieval times come at a close, the town of Kiersau is caught between the wishes of those who own the land and the will of the Abbey that has persisted all this time. The player controls Andreas Maler and is able to forge his path as you learn more about the village, its citizens and the history of Kiersau. There is a fair amount of background and character building you can do as Andreas. His education, upbringing and personal interests play a large part in how certain people will respond to your questions and actions. In that sense, Pentiment follows Obsidian’s tradition of engaging roleplaying games where storytelling and choice is always front and center.
At least it would be, were it not for the jaw dropping presentation of Pentiment’s world and characters. The visual style is like a manuscript come to life, with characters drawn fairly detailed against soft, almost watercolor backgrounds. This storybook is breathing with life and even though animation is minimal and animated off-frame with intent, it never fails to amaze. The characters are clearly recognizable and understandable, which is important as there is a large cast of characters who change during the game. Yet I rarely felt truly lost, thanks to the schedule and notes you're able to keep track of in the journal. The soundtrack feels appropriate as well. Most of the time there is just ambient noises, since the game tries to depict a sense of realism. But then you'll enter the church where one of the monk’s is singing in the hall, or you learn about a story from one of the sisters in a gorgeous dreamlike sequence. It makes every moment feel earned and never failed to surprise me.
In a sense, gameplay feels almost like sidequests in a game like Majora's Mask, but with a sense of urgency as there is no rewind option. As you explore new areas, talk to people in Kiersau and decide to pursue certain activities, time progresses. There is not a real-time clock, but every in-game day is divided into segments during which you can only interact with a specific group or person. As you want to learn more about the habits and activities of individuals, you’ll need to choose between what leads to pursue. Will you go dining with the Drucker family or would it be smarter to sit in on a sewing session to hear town gossip? Is it a smart idea to go out hunting with the suspect of a crime or would you rather go into the woods to find out why the blacksmith is angry with the stonemason? All these dilemmas may sound simple on paper, but these can be truly maddening decisions as you wish to learn more about certain individuals and can not be sure what is the “correct” path.
As you might be able to tell, I'm keeping story details to a minimum as much as possible. Going in blind really is the best approach, but trust me when I say that once the story gets going you will be unable to put your controllers down. That being said, this is a game that is heavy on the reading. Thankfully the developers added this handy dictionary feature. Every time a word or phrasing comes up that refers to a place, time period, background detail, religious text or even characters in-game, you can press the minus-button and are taken to the margins of the page. Here each word is explained and even characters are presented with a small portrait so you can learn who they are. That last bit can be overwhelming at first, but after the first chapter I was pretty familiar with everyone and could easily find my way around Kiersau. There is quite a bit of walking back and forth and not an easy way to backtrack, which can be a tad frustrating at times. It feels genuine and representative of the time period and the research put into the world, but does clash with the gameplay experience at times.
The Switch version overall is a solid experience. The framerate is prioritized over resolution and feels consistent across the game. The most notable drawback are the loading times. These are present on every version of the game, including the Xbox and PC version, but on Switch it does seem to take a second or two longer to load between different areas of Kiersau. It can be a bit of a drawback when trying to find your way to the next quest or exploring the town and talking to its inhabitants. Which isn’t helped when the loading screen is framed like flipping a page and needs a few more moments to be flipped. But considering every version has been designed with a loading screen in mind, you can get used to this in the Switch version just fine.
Pentiment left a deep and lasting impression on me. Not only does it use its world and characters to present a time period that has been neglected far too often, but it makes a point of reinforcing why this is a story that needed to be told. I love how you aren't playing a strong knight, a ruler or a brilliant scientist here, but Andreas Maler, who is above all a person, like you or me. His interests, but especially his vulnerabilities and struggles make for an unusual protagonist in an even more unusual story. But throughout the adventure every step of the way, the gameplay, its visual design and story feels justified in saying that people in the Dark Ages were after all people. They weren't dumb or ignorant, but lived in different times. So rarely do we see this type of life portrayed in this particular way in games, let alone let a player walk their own path through it all. The twists and turns will keep you engaged and by the end Pentiment left me feeling with a sense of joy, purpose and appreciation. I am quite certain that if you enjoy adventure games, story driven games or roleplaying games, you will too.
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