<![CDATA[A-to-J Connections

<![CDATA[A-to-J Connections - Gaming]]>Thu, 02 May 2024 10:37:28 -0700Weebly<![CDATA[Game Review: Tell Me Your Story]]>Thu, 02 May 2024 17:30:30 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-tell-me-your-storyBy J,D,

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PC

Tell Me Your Story is a new cozy puzzle game released by Red Deer games. It tells the story of Amelia, who along with her dog Peanut, goes to visit her grandmother Rose. Rose has been on plenty of adventures over the course of her long life, and her house is filled with mementos. By digging through these mementos, Amelia bonds with her grandmother and learns of just a few of her past adventures.

Sorting through all these mementos and memories takes the forms of puzzles. Some are fairly easy like matching objects with silhouettes. Some are more difficult, but still understandable like one that plays like the boardgame Master Mind. And finally, two I found so frustratingly obtuse, that I began to wonder if this was the kind of game for me.

None of the puzzles have any form of guidance so it’s up to the player to intuit the rules and/or solution. For most of the puzzles it’s pretty easy, but for whatever reason on those two, I just could not get what the developers wanted me to do and that makes me feel more frustrated than cozy. Thankfully the game does have a hint system, but it seems players are only allowed three hints per playthrough and I had already used mine up by the time I got to the most frustrating puzzle.

If there’s one thing that stands out about this game, it’s the art. They definitely convey the cozy feel of the game along with the music, and together they tell the story of the game without a word being spoken. However, there is some text to give context to where Rose’s adventures took place. For example, her second adventure story is about her trip to the Yunnan region of China which makes it a bit weird when the dish made afterwards is Japanese onigiri. I’m not sure if this was something I missed like “Rose went to Japan after her trip through China” or is simply an oversight by the developers. It gives the story an appropriate picture book vibe like one that might be read as a bedtime story. Like a bedtime story, this game is over nearly as quickly. Even after my hard time with some of the puzzles, it only took me about 2 hours to finish the game.

Makeup design is my passion.

Finally, all those years of screaming at kids on "Legends of the Hidden Temple" pays off!

Overall, if you’re a fan of the kind of cozy puzzle game, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with your time playing Tell Me Your Story. he art and sound make the game as cozy as a summer trip to a beloved grandmother’s house should feel even if like those fleeting summer days of youth, it is sometimes frustrating and over before you even know it.

Check Out Tell Me Your Story on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1415570/Tell_Me_Your_Story/

Overall Rating: B+

Pros:
+ Art and sound convey the cozy feel
+ Most puzzles are easy to figure out

+/- Short at around 2 hours

Cons:
- One or two frustrating puzzles

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: Alterity Experience]]>Wed, 01 May 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-alterity-experienceBy Al

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, XBox, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC

What do you get when you bring together aliens and a closed-door adventure game? You get Alterity Experience of course! Having released on just about every major platform by way of publisher Delores Entertainment a couple years ago, we're going to be taking a look at the Nintendo Switch version today. I'm always ready for a good adventure game, and this one has some horror elements that I love to see. Speaking of seeing horror elements, it looks like those pesky lights are trying to break in again, so let's skip the intros and dive right into the review!

All because of this corn...

That can't be good...

Alterity Experience places you into the shoes of Anton Cornwell, a farmer whose corn crop has recently become infected by a strange substance that causes it to glow purple. His financial livelihood at stake, Anton decides to get to the bottom of this and look into things more closely while his wife and kids go out for a night of fun. It doesn't take long for strange things to go on at the Cornwell Farm though, and Anton learns that there is something very strange indeed behind the purple substance. Maybe it even has something to do with all the strange lights in the sky that have been reported by other local farmers... At least the Cornwell Farm has a great security system! From there the story moves into sci-fi and horror elements that you expect, but it also takes some twists and turns that'll most likely leave you surprised. Nothing is as it seems, and the alien menace turns out to be a much closer to home than you first realize. Though the story did keep me at the edge of my seat, it is a rather short experience overall. Alterity Experience's brevity makes it hard to discuss more of the plot without going into spoiler territory, so I'll just leave it there and move on with the rest of the review.

The game would be so different with a gun.

There's a bomb shelter in this house?

While I would definitely classify Alterity Experience as an adventure game, there are actually two distinct gameplay modes at work here. For much of the game you'll be exploring the house, looking for keys and documents, and slowly uncovering what is actually going on. Alterity Experience makes heavy use of atmospheric storytelling, so expect to get key plot points in the form of notes, articles, diary entries, and other scattered bits. While it's this aspect of the game that feels most like an adventure game, it doesn't feature other adventure game staples like a large inventory to manage. Instead of an inventory, you have a set of keys and codes that you must find in order to open up new parts of the house to explore. These are all used automatically, and you'll have to eventually find them all in order to progress. Why there are so many locked doors in Anton's own house is beyond me, but let's not think about that too much. Seeing as the entire game takes place in this one house, there isn't a whole lot of space to get lost in. Small space or not, the game does do a great job of slowly unveiling new areas to explore. Exploration is rather enjoyable too as there are a lot of references and optional plot points to pick up on if you're thorough. Admittedly it's a rather simple game, but I appreciated the way it streamlined adventure game mechanics that might feel a bit too esoteric for the average player.

The other half of the gameplay in Alterity Experience is a bit harder to describe. If I had to do it though, I'd say that it feels like a take on the Five Nights at Freddy's formula. Though that game has a static protagonist, here you'll also be moving around in real-time. At various points in the game your house will come under attack by mysterious floating objects in the sky. They will try to enter your house by way of the windows and doors, and you'll have to stop them by using the security app on your cell phone. It's not a simple task of just hitting the breached area on the on-screen map to close its shutter, as you also have to move closer in order for it to re-activate. You also have to close the now open window or door, and you'll only have a few seconds to catch your breath before you have to do it again. Things can get rather frantic during these invasion segments, and I'd be lying if I didn't admit that they can be quite challenging. You have to move with a sense of urgency too, as failing even once will result in a game over. I initially found these parts of the game to be a bit unfair, but once I learned the layout of the house, and after I got a grasp of the controls, they became my favorite part of the game. While I don't think it would've been much fun if the entire game were centered on this style of play, the invasion segments did offer a nice break from the exploration and key finding.

I want to read this!

Why is this in the bathroom?

Even though there isn't anything here that's anywhere near hardware-pushing, I think that Alterity Experience has some rather impressive visuals. Much of the game has an "asset flip" feel to it in its everyday objects that does give the game a budget look, but there's a level of detail to everything that I think surpasses that. The scattered books and magazines, the things that are left running on the computers and TVs, and the many posters that line the walls really made the house feel lived in. The realistic house layout even got me to eventually overlook oddities like the bomb shelter located in the sub-basement. Oh, and the first-person switch to the strange alien machines was always intense and totally unexpected. Sound design fares even better, as every bit of it seems to complement the main game. The music feels like it was ripped straight from an old sci-fi movie, and the sound effects do a good job emulating that sound and style too. Everything was suitably atmospheric and creepy, and the soundtrack always felt on point. The look, feel, and sound of the game in particular reminded me a lot of the 1982 Creepshow segment "The Lonesome Death of Jordy Verrill", and I mean that in the best way possible. Though not perfect, every aspect of Alterity Experience works to bring together a great game.

I like to use the analogy of some shorter games feeling like they're interactive movies, and I think that's most true of Alterity Experience. You can beat the entire game in about an hour, and probably even speedrun it in about thirty minutes once you know what to do. Even though I personally don't think I'll give it additional playthroughs in the future, there are some elements that might entice other players to do so. Besides the fact that there are multiple endings that I don't want to spoil, there's also some randomness to the adventure game elements. It's not the deepest of systems, but keys and codes are placed randomly in each playthrough. Though things largely stay the same, I can see how it'd be fun to see things play out differently a second time around. Even I personally didn't go this route, I still feel that the single gameplay experience is more than worth its price of admission. Speaking of which, at just $9.99, Alterity Experience is priced perfectly to go along with the vibes of picking up a sci-fi thriller to wrap up the evening.

Lots of mystery here.

They're coming!

Despite the fact that this isn't a game that's going to keep you occupied for days on end, it was one of the more memorable experiences I've played in recent memory. I may not play it again anytime soon, but I won't be forgetting it for a long while either. It's fun, it's spooky, and it has several gameplay elements that are rather unique. Fans of adventure games, horror games, and maybe even the Five Nights at Freddy's series, will want to pick this up on whatever platform they can. Better hurry though, I hear an alarm going off near that window...

Check Out Alterity Experience on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/alterity-experience-switch/

Story: A
Gameplay: B+
Graphics: B
Music/Sound: B+
Value: B

Overall: B+

Pros:
+ A fun closed-door adventure game that features unique gameplay elements.
+ The invasion segments can be quite thrilling and keep the game feeling fresh.
+ The atmospheric storytelling is spot on, and uncovering the story will feel very natural despite the lack of on-screen characters.
+ Though the graphics aren't exactly the most impressive, the level of detail in the game's world is.
+ Features a soundtrack that is spooky and atmospheric in all the right ways.

Cons:
- No matter how great the experience may be, there's no getting around this being a very short game.
- While there are randomized elements and multiple endings, there isn't much reason to return to the game once you've beaten it.
- The invasion segments can be a bit unmanageable once the house completely opens up.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

I need a beer after this!

#AlterityExperienceConsoleEdition

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: The Mildew Children]]>Tue, 30 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-the-mildew-childrenBy Manuel

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, XBox, PC

Adventure games and visual novels are genres that have a lot of crossover when it comes down to gameplay, and today we'll be looking at a game that mixes those two gameplay concepts a bit more than most others. The Mildew Children is a dark fantasy visual novel that also features some adventure game-style gameplay, as well as quick-time events. It's developed by The Glowing Stones, published by Valkyrie Initiative, and it recently arrived on the XBox and Nintendo Switch following an earlier PC release. We have a lot to cover in this one, so let's dive right into it!

The hardest part of the day.

A journey indeed.

The Mildew Children places you into the shoes of Kyrphel, a witch who is something of an outcast within her village. The village she resides in is very unique, as it's populated solely by children. These children have established a rural ritualistic pagan society that sort of feels like what you'd get if you crossed Lord of the Flies with Children of the Corn. There's even a bit of Logan's Run mixed in when an early scene shows what happens to the children who've grown too old. In this setting, we get a plot that revolves around a Ritual that must be performed regularly to ensure the survival of the village. Said ritual requires four witches to perform it, but one of Kyrphel's witch-sisters has recently passed away. The remaining three witches have various ideas as to how they plan to resolve the deadly serious situation that only they know of, but it's ultimately Kyrphel that comes up with the best solution. They must find the current reincarnation of a previously dead witch, and they must do it fast. There's actually a lot more I can outline regarding the plot, but seeing as it's probably the best aspect of the game, I think I'll leave it at that for now. The Mildew Children has a dark fairy tale feel to it, and it doesn't ease you into things as you might expect a tale of this scope to do. I'd be lying if I said I understood how every aspect of the world of the game works, but it does do a great job of worldbuilding in spite of this minor storytelling setback. Leaving some details up to interpretation, or just leaving them out altogether, is a great way to keep up the mystery regarding the happenings of the game. While I plan to circle back around to discussing the game's plot later on in the review, I have to say now that The Mildew Children features one of the best stories I've ever had the pleasure to experience.

This is quite the opening scene.

Speak in riddles.

While I described the game as a mix of an adventure game and a visual novel earlier, I also have to admit that it doesn't really feel like it plays like one or the other. Visual novels are often static affairs with text boxes occupying much of the screen. They rarely involve character movement, and when they do, it's usually very light. The Mildew Children has a rather large 2D world that you're mostly free to explore at any time. There isn't a lot to do in this world, but there are a lot of sights to see, and a few optional dialogue sections available to you if you're thorough. It may be an odd thing to nitpick about, but I wasn't a fan of the way to game displayed its dialogue. Rather than show dialogue in a series of text boxes that changes with each set of lines, you instead get a text scroll that occupies the right side of the screen. This admittedly has the bonus of letting you see past text without the need of a dedicated menu to do so, but it just never looked appealing to me. Rather than feeling like I was experiencing a conversation between two people, I'd instead feel like I was reading from a teleprompter that displayed lines for an actor. There's also a lot that goes on within this text sub-screen, as it's also where you'll make many in-game choices, and perform in-dialogue minigames. The choices thing is rather self-explanatory, but the minigames were something I was not expecting to encounter in a game like this. While you are able to change the difficulty of the minigames, or even turn them off entirely, putting QTEs in a dialogue box, during dialogue, has to be one of the worst gameplay decisions I've seen all year. These minigames include keeping a shifting meter in the middle of a life bar, playing a rhythm game to pull off a spell, or even moving a character's behavior towards or against you via specific dialogue choices. I get how this might've felt like a way to insert more actual "gameplay" into an otherwise text-heavy game, but it made actually reading and enjoying those parts of the game to be rather difficult.

Visual novel stuff aside, let's see where else The Mildew Children dabbles in adventure game style gameplay. While there is a bit more to the adventure side of things than just character movement, it's best not expect anything too extreme like inventory management. While you do have some puzzle solving and escape room type situations, you won't ever have total control of your characters actions as you would in an adventure game. The Mildew Children is divided into twelve chapters, and each chapter has its own set of quests and goals. Though it can sometimes be a bit confusing as to where you're expected to go next, the map within the pause screen shows your current location, the next goal, and even a brief outline of your current tasks. You'll sometimes carry items from location to the next, or from person to person, but all the gameplay involved with interacting with objects or the world is done automatically for the most part. You'll often be given choices via the text box that can change certain parts of the outcome, but that's not a very deep system either. While choosing to play Kyrphel as a certain way is a lot of fun, there doesn't seem to be all that much that happens if you make different or even "incorrect" choices. I tried out a few different outcomes out of sheer curiosity in a brief second playthrough, but other than some of them sending me straight to an actual game over, there wasn't much that I noticed to be different.

The map screen.

Bits of the greater world are revealed.

There were a lot of things I love about The Mildew Children, but there were also a couple things that keep me from truly gushing over it. Obviously the story is the strongest part of the game, and I have to say that the writing is extremely on point, with all the characters and their motivations being very well-written. You really feel the agony of the fate of the witches in Kyrphel's actions, and you even get to experience the rather extreme nature of her witch-sisters. Then there are characters like Littlegrave, Natt, and Oplucea who made me want to learn more about the world they live in, especially since they all represent roles within the village that aren't exactly explained in detail. I don't know how much of the story is based on actual folklore or fairy tales, but the entire setting felt very unique. There are several bits and pieces here and there that felt like they may have been inspired by other media, with me even mentioning a few earlier, but despite this there was nothing in The Mildew Children that didn't feel totally original. I sped through most of the game in two long sessions, and that was due to the fact that it was a story I just couldn't put down. It really goes places, and it's a tale that stuck with me after I'd completed it. I probably would've placed it in the my favorites list right away if it weren't for the handful of things I mentioned earlier that made the game less enjoyable than it could've been. While there a few other things that I'll get to later on in the review, I want to circle back around to the QTE events that happen during certain dialogue sections. For the purposes of this review, I didn't turn them off, but there were several times where I wish I had. I actually had to eventually turn them to Easy because there is a repeated one that you have to successfully clear multiple times or else Kyrphel dies, which leads to a game over. I still don't know how one is expected to clear this minigame on Normal or Hard, but it gave me more than a few headaches trying. Since I can only assume that playing them on the more difficult setting was the way the developers meant for the game to be played, it meant that I was always confused as to why they'd make them feel so punishingly hard. The world of The Mildew Children is cruel enough, we don't need that being passed onto players too.

Put fist in mouth.

I want to learn more about Natt.

Even though there were some aspects to the visuals that I didn't much care for, like the text box being an ugly scrolling wall, the visuals in The Mildew Children were quite impressive overall. The entire game takes place in a flat 2D world, but there's a lot of layers and detail that are hard to see outside of the game in action. Though you'll sometimes need to rely on the map to get around, you will more than likely learn the layout of the village through its several distinctive landmarks. Then there's the character models and designs that are all top-notch and impressive. The witches all have their own look, the village warriors look imposing, The Mistress gives off an air of foreboding that is hard to explain outside of the game, and Kyrphel emotes through everything that is going on. Me noting that each character has a beautiful on-screen portrait is one thing, but what is hard to relay in screenshots is that there are several variants that are used to denote changes in health or mood. The shifting of these portraits helps give every conversation and scene weight and emotion since the character models themselves aren't exactly the most animated. There are some other neat effects worth mentioning too. The burial grounds look sinister and full of secrets, the trees and plant life sway in the background with the wind, the interior of buildings are lit in ways that look surprisingly realistic, and there are even times where the game almost jump scares you with its cinematic camera pans and scene transitions. There really isn't a whole lot I have to complain about. One thing that I feel that I have to point out regards the platform I played it on: the Nintendo Switch. While I'm not sure what exactly caused it, there were times where the game didn't seem to like being put to sleep using the system's sleep mode. Twice the game would slow down to only a couple frames a second when I tried to play it again, and it was so bad that I was actually amazed it didn't just crash. Both times the issue was solved by restarting the game, but it's something I can only assume has to do with the graphics themselves. There's a very PC-like option to turn down the graphic detail within the options menu, and I can't help but feel that its inclusion has something to do with the problems I experienced. (I turned the graphics option to the lowest after the first time I had to restart it.) Those hiccups aside, I have to say that the visuals stand right up there with the story itself.

Sound is an odd topic to discuss, as I'm not exactly sure what the developers were going for. I sure hope it was silence though, because that's what we get the most of here. Let me start by saying that there isn't much in the way of sound effects, typing sounds, or anything like that with The Mildew Children. There's also no voice acting at all, so get all those voices and noises out of your head. This probably sounds like the game would just be all music, but my next point is that there is very little in the way of traditional music as well. I played the second half of the game with the volume turned up really high so I could hear the music better, and I'm now convinced that about half the game has no nearly no sound at all to it. Sometimes a shock stinger will play, or an atonal melody will drift in when things are getting intense, but there isn't a single music track in the game that I can speak of in detail. I guess one could use the term "atmospheric" to describe the game's sound design, but there isn't a lot of atmosphere either. There's just a lot of silence. With that said, there were times when I felt this really worked in the game's favor. Playing late at night, only hearing the occasional soft sound or melody, gave off vibes that most horror games would kill to achieve. In spite of this not exactly being a horror game, it played well into the dire situations unfolding on-screen. I do wish there was voice acting though, as it really would've sealed the deal on the excellent story. It's probably asking too much for a game of this scope to have full voice acting, but the idea of hearing some of the crazy things said by the characters being spoken out loud is too exciting to not want for.

The Mistress is an imposing figure.

That mask is kind of creepy.

Neither the adventure game genre, nor the visual novel genre are known for long gameplay length, but somehow The Mildew Children manages to clock in at about 6-8 hours depending on reading speed and how thorough you are in each chapter. I guess now is as good a time as any to mention that the game relies solely on an autosave system, and I don't think there's any on-screen notification as to when this happens. This meant that there were several times when I was scared to turn off the game for fear of having to replay certain sections again, and other times when I wished I could go back but was unable to due to the game having saved at the end of the last scene. It sets players up for a somewhat inconsistent experience, and also makes it hard to revisit parts of the game to see different outcomes. I mention all this because I'm not exactly sure as to how replayable The Mildew Children actually is. You can definitely go through the story again with a better understanding of the world and its characters, but I can't see many players doing that. This isn't really an issue though as I feel that the game does a good job providing a story-rich, single play experience. Also, at just $9.99, the game is priced perfectly for the amount of content you receive. Think of this as watching several half hour episodes of a short-run series and suddenly the pacing and price will all feel perfect.

The ritual is as deadly as it is secret.

Death is always an option.

I may have been a bit negative here and there throughout this review, but I think it's rather obvious that I give The Mildew Children the fullest of recommendations. It's one of the best visual novels I've played in a long while, and it has a story that will stick with me for a long time to come. It's worth picking up for fans of visual novels, adventure games, dark fantasy stories, and even those just looking for one of the most unique games of the year to add to their collection. Pick it up on whatever platform you can, and help Kyrphel go about the thankless task of saving her village! I hope that we can someday get a follow-up to this game, and I know I'll be here to review it!

Check Out The Mildew Children on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/the-mildew-children-switch/

Story: A
Gameplay: B
Graphics: B+
Music/Sound: B
Value: A

Overall: B+

Pros:
+ A well-written story that feels like a cross between Lord of the Flies, Children of the Corn, Logan's Run, and even Game of Thrones.
+ Mixing visual novel and adventure game style gameplay makes The Mildew Children one of the most unique games I've seen in a long while.
+ The setting feels very alive, and the cast of characters will make you care about the fate of the game's world.
+ Besides a few issues with the overall presentation, the visuals are simply amazing, especially the character designs and portraits.
+ The atmospheric soundtrack gives off a vibe that would make any horror game envious.

Cons:
- The difficulty of some of the quick-time events, and their placement in the middle of dialogue sections, can make those sections of the game rather annoying.
- Having the text all placed in a scrolling window, rather than a series of text boxes, felt a bit off at times.
- While I enjoyed the story fully, I do wish a few things were given more clarity. Even if only for the sake of worldbuilding.
- Though you are given a lot of in-game choices that feel very important, they usually don't change much, or simply lead to a game over screen.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

My work here is done.

#TheMildewChildren

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 DX: Dumpster Fire Rebirth]]>Sat, 27 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-epic-dumpster-bear-15-dx-dumpster-fire-rebirthBy Al

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC

There aren't very many games that leave me at a loss for words when it comes time to describe them, but that's exactly the challenge I'm facing right now. Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 DX: Dumpster Fire Rebirth is an action platformer that arguably features more jokes and silliness over good gameplay, but it does it in a way that intrigued me enough to play it to completion. It's out now on the Switch, PS4, PS5, and PC, and we're going to be taking a look at the Switch version today. Do the jokes land or do they fall flat? Can this bear save Canada? Is this a good game? What do dumpsters have to do with all? Hopefully we'll answer all those questions and more in this review. Let's dive into it!

I know nothing about the Dumpster Bear franchise, or if it that's the best term to describe it, but this is apparently the third game in a surprisingly long-running series. Our titular hero apparently just returned from a time travelling mission to put an end to the corporate interests that are making Canada a living hell of dumpster fires. I guess his mission wasn't exactly successful, as not only have those corporate interests began to make a mess of things yet again, but some familiar faces are starting to pop up again. It's once again up to Dumpster Bear to put a stop to all the nefarious happenings, and maybe even meet up with his past self once again. Throughout his journey he'll face a lot of old foes, and even the Prime Minister of Canada himself. Dumpster Bear didn't choose the dumpster life, but he's definitely going to make the most of it! It wasn't until I was sitting here writing those couple of sentences that I realized that I have very little idea as to what the plot of Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 actually is. While I can say that it's mostly unimportant, I don't want to make it sound like it's boring or badly written either. What I mean is that if you're taking notes to remember the plot of a game called Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5, then you're probably playing it wrong. It's best to just go along for the ride, and not think about it too much. Also, the story is all over the place and wacky, so why not just make stuff up along the way along with the game? Chances are you'll still fall short of the sheer insanity that goes on in the game itself. Though I may sound like I'm being dismissive, I actually enjoyed the story a lot, and think that it's the single best aspect of the game. It may not be prize-winning literature, but it will almost definitely see you through to the end of the game.

At its heart, Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 is an action platformer, with a surprising amount of emphasis on the platformer part of that equation. There are seven worlds to explore, and each of them have 5-7 levels between them, including some boss battles and even a few bonus stages. Dumpster bear can run and jump, sometimes in a way that feels extremely uncontrollable, and he can attack. What attacks are at Dumpster Bear's disposal has to do with the current power-up he has equipped, but he has a dash attack by default. Touching enemies means you'll be taking damage, so it's best to always be on the offensive. Speaking of taking damage, Dumpster Bear can only take two hits before he dies. There are infinite lives, but the only way to increase your health bar is to buy an extra hit after a death using in-game currency. Unfortunately this upgrade isn't permanent, so it ends up feeling rather useless. Considering he's a bear that lives in a dumpster, Dumpster Bear is very nimble. Not only can he jump, but he can also double jump, and even perform wall jumps and wall hangs to some degree. The latter two are a bit more finicky to get working to your advantage, but that can probably be said about most of the controls in this game. You can gain other skills, like the ability to throw bombs, slide curling stones, or simply become invincible, via power-ups, but these are mostly locked to individual levels. There are lots of collectables to collect, with coins probably being the most important. These coins are used to unlock the bonus stages mentioned earlier, and they remind me of the ones found in Sonic the Hedgehog 3. Even though there is a lot of level variety, the goal each one is to simply reach its end. The end of each level has a target for you to land on, though I never seemed to be able to properly stick the landing.

There isn't a whole lot more to discuss when it comes to gameplay except maybe for maybe fighting bosses. Bosses are usually very challenging as they have multiple lives you have to go through in before they're dead. You still only have two hits until you die, and some boss battles become a marathon of simply trying your best to stay alive. Though I found a few of these encounters to be borderline unplayable, with victory often coming by way of random chance, they were humorous enough that I rarely minded the annoyance. The bosses are mostly other animals, and they all seem to have a past with Dumpster Bear that I know nothing about because I haven't played the previous games. Besides boss levels there's the Bonus Stages, and these can be extremely hard thanks to the increase of speed, the addition of one-hit kills, and a 3D perspective that somehow controls worse than the main game. I did dig the aforementioned Sonic 3 vibes, but that wasn't enough to make me ever want to play them. I was only able to beat one of these during my time with the game, and I don't think I'll ever bother with the rest. I guess that pretty much wraps up the gameplay discussion, but I don't think gamers will be expecting much from a game called Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5.

If I had to choose one word to describe Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5's gameplay, it would be "jank". The controls feel very loose, a lot of the deaths feel cheap, and the fun is occasionally forgotten once the frustration settles in. One of the big problems with the game has to be the fact that there is only one checkpoint in each level. This means that dying can send you back very far, and death comes quicker than you think thanks to the messy collision detection and wonky controls. Thankfully things like that bad collision detection sometimes work in your favor, but it rarely seemed to play out like that. Next up would have to be the random difficulty spikes that come out of nowhere. There would be worlds where I was struggling with a level or two, only to pretty much run through every other level on my first try. Oh, and I've already mentioned this a few times so far, but there's also the borderline broken controls to contend with. Though I most often died due to the tough platforming sections, I was pleased to note that players are given full control of Dumpster Bear's mid-air movement. If it wasn't for the sheer ridiculousness of what was going on, I probably would've given up on the game, but thankfully the game delivers in the humor department. I actually want to refrain from talking about the story more, or showing off some of the crazier cutscene moments, as the story never goes where you think it will, and I don't want to spoil anything for those who might be interested in picking it up. The plot seems written by someone using a random number generator to choose what the next plot twist will be, but there was enough talk that centered on "corporate interests" that kept me entertained. Though it was the game's comedic elements that kept me around, I'll admit that humor can be a bit hit or miss, and definitely subjective. While I'm sure that there are a lot of people who will be like me and keep playing just to see what craziness is coming next, there will also be just as many who put the game down after its opening cutscene.

I went back and forth debating whether I thought the graphics and music were good in Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5, but I ultimately settled on the fact that they were far better than I was expecting. Obviously the models have that "I found these in a pre-made asset store" look to them, but there is something to be said about putting it all together in a way that isn't just a mess. Well, I guess it still is a mess, it's an intentional one at the very least. It's really a matter of proper expectations, and I think everything looks great for the type of game that the title promises. I'm willing to bet most players won't think they're getting an Elden Ring-style experience here, and the graphics reflect that. I have far less mixed things to say about the music, but I also couldn't help but wonder if the music was all original, or picked up from a sound library. There's nothing wrong with the latter being the case, but I feel a bit uneasy praising the soundtrack too much if that's the case. Either way, the music was a fast favorite, and I was surprised to find that there were a variety of tracks throughout the game. They could've simply used a track or two for each level type, but there is a decent variety on display here. Even if these tracks were pre-made assets, I commend the developers for putting in music that fits each world and level. Closing out the sound discussion, I was a little let down by the fact that a lot of actions seemed to be missing sound effects, but I guess a bit of jank is to be expected.

If you can get beyond the bad controls and uneven difficulty, then you'll find that Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 has a lot to offer. The full game will take you hours to complete, and those bonus levels are no joke. Completing the game unlocks Epic Dumpster Bear: Dumpster Fire Redux, which I believe is a remake of the first game in the series. I'll admit that I went into this thinking that it would provide maybe an hour or two of fun at most, but I ended up spending an entire day on it before I knew it. While mileage will vary across different players, I think there's more than enough to enjoy here for those looking for a game that doesn't take itself at all seriously. Then there's also the fact that it comes in at a very impressive price point of just $4.99. This might not be a AAA experience, but it's priced so affordably that I don't even care. Considering you get two games for that five dollar price, I can't help but suggest grabbing it for the lols alone.

Giving a game like Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 DX: Dumpster Fire Rebirth a strong recommendation might seem a bit odd, but that's exactly what I'm going to do. It's unpolished, it's poorly balanced, and there are times you'll question why you're still playing it, but there's a certain charm that just worked for me. Its low price makes it an easy sale too, and I think it's worth picking up if you're even the least bit interested. Grab this on whatever platform you can, and save Canada!

Check Out Epic Dumpster Bear 1.5 DX: Dumpster Fire Rebirth on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/epic-dumpster-bear-1-5-dx-dumpster-fire-rebirth-switch/

Story: A
Gameplay: C
Graphics: B-
Music/Sound: B
Value: A

Overall: B

Pros:
+ A fun, silly action platformer that features everyone's favorite Dumpster Bear.
+ Offers up a lot of content, and even an entire unlockable game.
+ The music and graphics may not be the most original, but they do a good job adding to the overall janky vibes.
+ The "plot" is just wacky enough to keep players invested to the very end.
+ At just $4.99, this is worth picking up for the lols alone.

Cons:
- Probably not for anyone looking to play a well-made action platformer.
- When I say "jank", I mean it. There are a few moments of the game where it feels only a step above broken.
- Difficulty spikes are all over the place, and things can get more than a little frustrating at times.
- Since much of the fun relies on the game's humor, there are definitely going to be some who simply don't find its antics funny.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

Is this REALLY the Canadian Prime Minister?

#EpicDumpsterBear1Point5

]]><![CDATA[Things Only Get Better From Here!: The Devil Within: Satgat (Early Access Examination)]]>Fri, 26 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/things-only-get-better-from-here-the-devil-within-satgat-early-access-examinationBy JT

Players: 1
Platform: PC

After my original review of the pre-beta version (Which can be found HERE.), it’s safe to say that getting a full release feels not so far away at this point. The Devil Within: Satgat fixed some notable grievances I had with the demo, continued from where it left off, unlocked some more features and skills, and added more weapons and enemies. There was already a great game underneath it all, and there's always further potential to unlock. Now, let’s add a little more icing on this cake and take a quick look its Early Access release.

The Devil Within: Satgat comes highly recommended for those who want to wet their feet with a new adventure. The more the story goes on, the least you might care for it, but the gameplay is what will keep you engaged. Since the game still has a way to go before its full release, not everything is unlocked, but more will be added over time. The developers seem to really want to get this one right, and to that end they're taking legitimate feedback to heart. Something I would have likely noticed pre-beta was a rubber chicken being used as a sword. The developers had taken plenty of community feedback to come up with something as simple and fun to use as a rubber chicken. If it had special abilities, that would be another story.

Being the naïve person that I am, I went into The Devil Within: Satgat without knowing the full extent the developers had given me with the pre-beta version. This caused my game to crash, and in most cases my PC to reboot due to overheating. Little did I know that the root cause was not beginning a whole new game after the Early Access launch. Either way, I wasn’t going to be deterred, because it's a great Dark Souls-like experience, and I'm here for that kind of thing. If people are looking for me to rip into this game, that’s not what I do unless it is warranted. People place a game in front of my face, and every so often I receive a gem. This is one of those times.

As someone who is closely keeping watch over The Devil Within: Satgat, I look forward to seeing what a full release will bring. Put the game in front of me for a few hours, and it looks like a small indie game, but one with a lot of charm. At $20 for a shorter Early Access title, it does feel a little pricey, but the game is solid. Overall, it’s one of the better games to come through to me and I hope to play it more as it continues its road to full release. Hopefully by that time it won't crash my computer multiple times. I think that's a simple thing to hope for.

Check Out The Devil Within: Satgat on Steam:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1802880/The_Devil_Within_Satgat/

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: Felix the Cat]]>Thu, 25 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-felix-the-catBy Manuel

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5

Limited Run Games and Konami have a new two-game package out now for the Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 5, and it's probably one that most people were not expecting to see. Originally released back in 1992/93, the Felix the Cat games are 8-Bit platformers that were originally developed by Hudson Soft. This collection packages the NES, Game Boy, and previously unreleased Famicom versions into one neat package, and we're going to be taking a look at the Switch version today. There are three games to discuss in this review, so let's just get right into it!

While it makes the most sense to review each game in this collection individually, I wanted to talk a bit about what's included first. If you came into this collection thinking that you'd be getting a lot of bonus content, sort of what Limited Run Games is known for, then you're going to be disappointed. This is a pretty bare bones package, and there's nothing notable included beyond the games themselves. Each title does have a rewind feature and save states, as well as various graphic options, but that's all you get beyond some new backgrounds and an admittedly charming title screen. I do have to give special shout out to that rewind feature though. While I don't like using rewind features much in action games or platformers, I have to say that the one in Felix the Cat has to be the smoothest rewind that I've ever encountered. I'd even say that it's better than the official Nintendo one. Sadly, that's all there is beyond the ROMs themselves. While this is obviously a big missed opportunity, and something we'll circle back around to later, at least we can rest assured that the games included are great. Right?

Felix the Cat (NES)

Yes, this is a great game. As a matter of fact, where has it been all my life? I have lots of memories of seeing Felix the Cat cartridges at swap meets when I was a young child, and I always assumed that there was no way that the game could be good. Even at a young age I knew that licensed games were usually bad, and this wasn't even anywhere near what I would call a "good" license. I'll admit that this bias even went into starting this review, and my first thought was "Why re-release this game?" Though I still have to get into the actual review, you can probably guess that I'm trying to say that it turns out that I've been sleeping on one of the best 8-bit platformers of all time. That may sound like hyperbole, and maybe it is to a small degree, but I had so much fun playing this that I felt like I'd wasted decades of my life ignoring it. Anyway, with that bit out of praise out of the way, let's move on to the review.

Felix the Cat is a 2D platformer in the style of the original Super Mario Bros., but it also has mechanics that reminded me of the Adventure Island series. You run, you jump, and you take out enemies until you get to the end of the stage. The end of most every third stage ends in a boss, and then you move on to the next world. Felix isn't Mario though, so jumping on enemies actually will harm you, and actually kill you if you're not powered up. Instead of jumping, Felix attacks with various weapons. The current weapon he has at his disposal is determined by the current form he's in, and this is where a lot of the fun comes into play.

Throughout the course of the game you'll find Felix heads scattered about. Collecting five of the drops milk, and collecting ten drops a heart that powers up Felix to his next form. In his most basic form, he's a cat with a punching glove, next he's a magician who shoots out stars, then he hops onto a motorcycle and takes out enemies with his horn, and finally he enters a tank and shoots cannonballs. Each of these attacks that are better or worse than each other, though I think the motorcycle is the best of all. Each subsequent power-up also acts as an extra life of sorts if Felix gets hit. Each hit takes you down to the previous form, but that's not the only way you can power-down. All power-ups have a heart meter that slowly goes down, with the only way to raise it being getting another heart, or collecting milk. While this describes the biggest mechanic in the game, it only applies to the "normal" platforming stages. Felix the Cat features levels that take place in the sky, in the ocean, underwater, and even in space. All of these level types have their own versions of the power-ups, and they in turn feature their own weapons. These are all unique to themselves, but this system is what reminded me so much of the Adventure Island games. You even get to ride a dolphin at one point, and that felt close enough to the animal riding from that series. This power-up system ultimately means that there are over ten versions of Felix that you can see over the course of the game. I know I compared it to the first Super Mario Bros. game earlier, but that's some great Super Mario Bros. 3 stuff right there!

It's not just power-ups though, as the core game is just so much fun to play. There is admittedly a sort of floatiness to Felix's movements, but you have so much control over stopping or changing his jump trajectory that it never felt like the controls were "bad". There are nine worlds in the game, and 25 levels between them, with all of them feeling unique in their own way. There's also a story about Felix's girlfriend Kitty being kidnapped by The Professor, but I assume that only means something to those who are familiar with the Felix lore. Even though I never cared for the story much, it is rather neat that there are cutscenes in between some of the worlds that update you on what's going on with The Professor's plan. Besides story and the hard-to-describe platforming excellence, Felix the Cat also has some of the best graphics and music I've seen in an NES title. I literally have no complaints about either, and you know a game is good when it starts making you wonder what its source material must be like. Then again Hudson Soft is known for producing amazing games, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

I beat the game in a single session, and it pretty much instantly ranked high on my list of favorite 2D platformers. I don't know if I'll ever play it again, but I had a lot of fun discovering one of the best hidden gems of the 8-Bit era. I know you will too.

Rating: A+

Felix the Cat (Game Boy)

I actually grew up with the Game Boy, and early on I came to the realization that most Game Boy games fell into one of two camps. They were either good/great games that were developed specifically with the hardware limitations in mind, or they were watered down ports of their console big brothers. Felix the Cat on the Game Boy falls hard into the latter category. I honestly don't have much to say about this game as it plays very similar to the NES version, but worse. There's only about half the stages here, they're all a lot shorter, and the music and graphics take the expected hit in quality. I probably would still think this was at least an alright game if it weren't for the massive slowdown issues. I'm not sure if it's a fault of the emulator being used, or if this is how the game always ran, but things slow to a crawl when there are more than a couple enemies on screen. Then there's odd little quirks that just make it feel like the "bad" version of Felix the Cat. Why the developers made some enemies in this version impervious to Felix's weapons, and what made them get rid of boss knockback, are questions I'll probably never get the answer to. It's still not the worst Game Boy game I've ever played, but I don't see why anyone would play it in this day and age when the NES version is right there.

I admittedly used the rewind feature a lot in this particular run, and I still couldn't bring myself to finish the last couple stages. If anything, this is exactly what I imagined a Felix the Cat game would be like all those years ago when I chose to not ever pick it up. I guess I was half right after all.

Rating: C-

Felix the Cat (Famicom)

I don't think there's any difference in this version of the game outside of the cutscene text. Part of me thought that it ran better than the NES version, but that's probably only because I played immediately after playing the bad Game Boy version. I wish I had more to say about this one since it basically is one third of this entire collection, but I can't think of anything to add to this part of the review beyond what I already said earlier. I guess I can't help but wonder why this version was included in the first place, but I guess there's the novelty of it apparently not being released that might intrigue some players.

Rating: A

Even though you only really get one game worth playing in this collection, I have to say that it's a very good one. Is a single 30 year old game worth paying for on its own though? That's the question, and it's one that I actually have an answer to. Yes, yes it is, but not at its current price. Felix the Cat comes in at a rather insane $24.99, and that price point feels about three times too much. When you boot up the game there are a lot of logos. Konami, Universal, DreamWorks, and Limited Run Games. I can only assume a bunch of hoops were jumped through to bring us this game, and that a lot of hands are reaching out for a piece of any money it brings in. That shouldn't just be shouldered onto the consumer though, and it makes one wonder why this release was put out at all if it was going to come at such an insulting price. I wouldn't even mind it so much if it fully featured either, but there's nothing here. There's no bonus content, no manuals, no sound test, or anything that makes this feel like anything more than three ROMs bundled together. There's not even a lot of reason to go back to the games once you've beaten them, and they're pretty much all variants on a single game. I've seen a lot of discussion online that these should've just been included in the Switch Online service, and while I'm not saying anything that drastic should've happened, I will admit that the free NES games available via Switch Online make the price point feel even more ridiculous. I don't think this collection should've been priced any higher than the $7.99-$9.99 range, and I can't recommend anyone pay full price for it today.

I have a lot of mixed feelings as to how I want to close out this review. Felix the Cat is a great game, and I had a lot of fun playing it. Putting the price aside for a second, I do think this is the best way to play it today, and the only official way to do so on modern consoles. The problem is that its price is just too high to really suggest picking it up. I give it a full recommendation, but only if you're somehow able to find it at a very steep discount. Either way, play Felix the Cat in any way you can if you haven't already. Don't make the mistake I did in ignoring it!

Check Out Felix the Cat on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/felix-the-cat-switch/

Overall Rating: C

Pros:
+ One of the best NES platformers returns, and you can play it in three different versions.
+ The platforming is tight and precise, and the level variety is a nice surprise.
+ The graphics are the best you'll find in a game of this era, and the music is all on point too.
+ While I didn't really bother with them, the rewind feature and save states are a nice addition.
+ This package is focused on the NES version of the game, but you also get the Game Boy and Famicom versions as well.

Cons:
- The Game Boy version of the game feels almost unplayable at times due to slowdown in the more intense sections of the game.
- The Famicom version is pretty much a carbon copy of the NES one, but with Japanese text in the cutscenes.
- There is no bonus content to speak of. No manuals, behind-the-scenes interviews, stills, etc., at all.
- Since this collection is essentially based around a single 8-bit game, there isn't a lot of reason to come back to it once you've beat it.
- The $24.99 price tag feels rather insulting when you factor in the amount of content.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

#FelixTheCat

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: Risky Chronicles and The Curse of Destiny]]>Wed, 24 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-risky-chronicles-and-the-curse-of-destinyBy Al

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, PC

Risky Chronicles and the Curse of Destiny is an action platformer that's inspired by similar games from the '90s, and maybe by a certain whip-wielding archeologist you may have seen in movies. It's out now on the Nintendo Switch and PC, and we're going to be taking a look at the Switch version today. There's lots to explore, so let's get right into it!

I'm not really sure how to tackle discussing the plot of Risky Chronicles, as I'm not totally sure that it has one. You take on the role of Risky, an Indiana Jones-like adventurer who is exploring exotic locales like an Aztec temple, a pyramid, a prehistoric cave, and so on. He's not so much collecting treasures in these areas, he's simply killing the wildlife and magical creatures that live within, and generally trespassing. He even has a motorcycle that you'll see in a few of the game's levels. Other than that implied premise, there's nothing more to the story as far as I can tell. We never learn what Risky's motivations are, nor are we ever really given clarification as to what is causing all these mystical areas to suddenly be filled with fantastical monsters and the occasional literal god. I'm going to assume that the story in this game is just an afterthought and move on with the review.

Gameplay is a much simpler topic to discuss, as there isn't a whole lot to it. You run, jump, and have various attacks at your disposal. You can shoot a gun that has limited ammo, throw bombs, and even use a knife when all else fails. None of these skills help you out much though, as it only takes a single hit to take out Risky. You're given a decent amount of lives, and you seem to get extra ones rather quickly, but half of this game's issues could've been fixed if it had something resembling a health bar mechanic. Things are made more annoying when you realize that there are enemies that are extremely hard to kill since they're too low to the ground. (I'm looking at you snakes!) They're are also lots of traps that have some of the worst hitboxes that I've ever seen. Checkpoints are frequent in the first stage, but you'll find that subsequent stages are marathons where you have to accurately remember every single movement required to not have to redo the entire section again. Each level also ends with a boss fight, but these are probably the worst part of the entire game as they all have big life bars that require dozens of hits to take out. Risky Chronicles claims to be inspired by action platform games of the 90s, and it does seem to be capturing vibes of Pitfall: The Mayan Adventure, but it has nowhere near the polish needed to make a game this hard anything other than frustrating.

While I'm willing to admit that there are some people who might find the game entertaining purely as a game that offers a high level of challenge, I have to think that there are better difficult games out there. There's no shortage of tough platformers, and just about all of them play better than Risky Chronicles. I mentioned the hitbox issues earlier, and there are several traps in the game that seem to have a square hit box even though they're round. This is a hard thing to explain in writing, but you'll quickly realize what I mean after you die several times from a circular saw blade that's nowhere near you. Then there's the weirdness of the jumping. Every platform in the game seems to be JUST far enough away that it'll take your full jumping arc to clear, and the controls are nowhere near precise enough for this kind of thing to be the norm. There wasn't a single time where I felt confident my jump would clear a gap in platforms, and that's not even taking into account the fact that you'll probably be blindsided once you hit the other side. If everything I said wasn't enough, there are traps and unseen enemies around every corner. Arrows and projectiles come from off-screen, enemies can fall from above, and Risky can barely outrun even the simplest of obstacles. If I wasn't writing a review, I would've given up without even completing the first stage. I very nearly gave up again in the second stage once I realized that checkpoints were suddenly in short supply. The entire level felt like a grueling endurance run, and I didn't have a single second of fun. I ultimately gave up once I reached the third stage, and I don't regret it one bit. Thanks to a rather generous continue system, I do think that the game can be beat if you have patience, but that's just not something I ever see myself doing.

I find it rather odd that I think that Risky Chronicles has some rather nice presentation in spite of its many gameplay issues. It doesn't have the best title screen or in-game options menu, but near everything else presentation-wise is fairly well done. The level select screen, the stage intros, and even the graphics and music themselves all look great, even if they have something of a mobile game look to them. Then there's the graphics themselves that DO remind me a lot of PC platformers I used to play in the late '90s. I don't want to make it sound like this game is a graphical powerhouse, but the designs are neat, and everything is suitably colorful and cartoony. Also, not that I was really expecting anything otherwise, the game runs perfectly fine on the Switch. Things get better once we talk about the game's soundtrack. Even though part of me wonders if the music in Risky Chronicles was made for the game, I have to admit that it's all pretty good. As a matter of fact, the soundtrack was the one aspect of the game that I truly enjoyed without much issue. While I do wish the same attention to detail was given to the sound effects, the death scream Risky and the human-like monsters make is silly enough that I'm willing to overlook that many actions have no sound at all attached to them. That's probably the only thing the game really gets right: its silly, but decently executed, presentation. Risky Chronicles never takes itself too seriously, and that's a good thing considering the state the rest of the game is in. The big question though is whether decent graphics and music can make up for an otherwise borderline unplayable game, and I'm not really sure they do.

I'll admit that I only put in about two hours of gameplay during my time with Risky Chronicles, but that two hours represented maybe 15-20 minutes if it weren't for the constant cheap deaths. Judging by the level select screen, there seem to be 9 stages, most of which I never saw outside of screenshots from the game's press kit. I'd normally give games like this a rather mid rating because I have to think that someone out there will enjoy them, but the game's $9.99 price tag feels just a bit too much for a game of this quality. I know that it might sound wild that I'm claiming a ten dollar price tag to be too expensive, but I've played several games of this caliber for half the price. At the very least, I can assure everyone that you'll more than likely be playing this game for hours and hours on end, even if those hours are spent trying to inch your way closer to the current level's end.

While there were a few parts of Risky Chronicles and the Curse of Destiny that I liked, I don't think I can give it much of a recommendation. If you're looking for a tough-as-nails platformer, this might be for you, but I also think that there are better games out there still. Everyone else is probably better off just staying away from this one, or only picking it up at a steep discount. I really wanted to like this game, but it made it hard to do so. As it stands, I can't see myself finishing it. Thankfully the same can't be said about this review. See you all in the next one!

Check Out Risky Chronicles and the Curse of Destiny on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/risky-chronicles-and-the-curse-of-destiny-switch/

Story: N/A (???)
Gameplay: D
Graphics: B
Music/Sound: B
Value: C

Overall: C

Pros:
+ A challenging action platformer for those looking for that kind of thing.
+ The character and enemy designs are well done, and the colorful and cartoony graphics look great.
+ The soundtrack is probably the single best part of the game.
+ There's a certain humor to everything that is rather enjoyable.

Cons:
- The one-hit kills ruin what could've otherwise been a fun game.
- Infrequent checkpoints mean that one mistake will have you redo long stretches of the game over and over again.
- Unfair boss fights, off-screen traps, and hard-to-kill enemies make the game near unplayable at times.
- The controls and hitboxes are way off for a game so reliant on platforming.
- Seems rather over-priced for the quality of the game.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

#RiskyChroniclesAndTheCurseOfDestiny

]]><![CDATA[Choosing Between Life and Death: A Bio Inc. Redemption Review]]>Tue, 23 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/choosing-between-life-and-death-a-bio-inc-redemption-reviewBy Manuel

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, XBox, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC

Have you ever wanted to play doctor and save the lives of patients afflicted with all sorts of real-life illnesses? What about play as Death itself and take out humanity one person at a time? Well, then Bio Inc. Redemption is the game for you! While I'm not familiar with the original Bio Inc. release, Redemption is apparently a remake of a game that came out in 2017. This all-new version is out now on all major platforms, and we're going to be taking a look at the Nintendo Switch version today. There's a lot of patients in the queue already, so let's get right into it!

As serious as a heart attack.

This isn't horrifying at all.

Bio Inc. Redemption doesn't really have anything resembling a story, though it does feature two distinct campaigns that will place you in various scenarios. You can either "Choose Life", where you'll be saving the lives of patients under your care, or "Choose Death", where you'll be essentially killing those patients by way of diseases. There is a bit of background given for each mission, but these aren't characters you'll be helping or hurting, and there's no over-arching plot at all. I'll admit that I was a little disappointed by this, as I went into this game thinking it might be something like a non-anime version of the Trauma Center series. It actually couldn't be anything further from that if it tried, but that's really no fault of the game itself. Besides those two modes there's also a Sandbox Mode for you to play around with, and that mode takes away even the small bit of narrative that the Life or Death campaigns have. Not having a story in a game like this isn't exactly a bad thing, as it does leave things open to make the simulation part of the experience the best it can be, but I do think it's something of a missed opportunity.

Always eat a salad!

So many diseases.

There's really no easy way to describe gameplay in Bio Inc. Redemption, as I don't think I've ever played a game like it before. If I had to put it into a genre, it would be a simulation game, but there's really a lot more to it than that, and it never really gets too hands on for it to really earn that genre title. Whether you're playing the Life or Death campaigns, the main game screens operate mostly in the same way. Health and body systems are located on the left side of the screen, the right side shows information related to treatments of ailments, and the middle section is a representation of the current unfortunate person that you're trying to save or kill. All in-game actions require bio points, and you get said points by going to each system and collecting the cells or germs that spawn there over time. This is the only part of the game where time is of the essence, as you'll lose the chance to acquire bio points if you take too long moving between systems to get them. Also, some systems are easier or harder to harvest points from. Systems like renal (kidneys), digestive (stomach and intestines), and respiratory (lungs), have smaller areas to deal with and are easier to harvest multiple points at once. If you have to gather points from systems like immune, muscular, or skeletal, you'll have a harder time as these systems encompass much of the body and you'll have to move a decent amount of distance for each point. Bio point pickups each have different values, and you can actually increase the amount you get by them from levelling up. Levelling up requires bio points of course, but is more determined by specific goals that have to be met. This all sounds rather normal so far, but the more complicated aspects of the game come when you deal with the Biomap.

No matter which mode you choose to play, the Biomap is probably where you'll be spending most of your time. It's here that you'll use your accrued bio points on things like testing and curing illnesses and disorders, or inflicting them if you're on Death's side. It might come as no surprise when I say that playing as Death is easier than playing as Life. Barring the harder difficulties where the AI is doing everything it its power to keep the patient alive, it's pretty easy to just go after multiple systems until things get so uncontrollable that death is all but inevitable. Things in Life far more complicated as you'll have to first figure out what exactly is the cause of the patient's symptoms. This is done by choosing a symptom from the current list and making a random (or sometimes educated) guess as to which disease it may be. You then have to spend points to run tests that only detect specific illnesses. Thankfully you are able to run up to three tests at a time, but each of them costs you bio points. After a short time you'll get the results, and if any of the tests come up positive, you'll want to begin treatment right away. That's not the end of it though, as some treatments can fail and sometimes negative results can change to positive ones over the course of the game. As long as a patient is has some percentage of health available to them (indicated by a heart in the upper left) then they're still alive. Some stages have different goals, but for the most part you'll want to reduce that meter to 0% if you're Death, or raise the recovery meter (on the right side of the screen) to 100%. It is rather odd that you can score a win as Life even though the patient might have several failing systems, but I guess that's just how things go sometimes.

There's never any talk of insurance here.

Not another one!

There's actually more to the game than I just described, but the rest is probably a little too complicated to explain in a review. One thing I will briefly bring up are the other things you can spend your bio points on, lifestyles and risk factors or recovery and intensive care. The former are basically character traits you can assign to the patients that help or hinder progress, and the latter are direct attacks or bonuses to specific systems that raise or lower their percentage greatly. Either way, I have to say that Bio Inc. Redemption really nailed a level of realism I wasn't expecting in a game like this. It's not a hands on simulator, but every symptom and disease is real, as are the treatments for them. Once again, I went into Bio Inc. Redemption expecting something far more light-hearted, but was surprised when I found how grim and dark everything actually was. I've played similar games where things were approached in a sillier fashion, namely Plague Inc., but this game doesn't really go in that direction. I guess it would be hard to find something like inflicting a patient with cancer funny, but that sort of is my biggest problem with the game. While I'm not saying that the realism was a deal-breaker for me, it did keep me from truly enjoying the game. There were just too many little things that just felt wrong to me. Why would they leave something like naming a patient up to me? And seeing the insane results for diseases that came from what seem like otherwise mundane symptoms gave off big "I'm going to go to WebMD to see what I might have." vibes. There's a lot of fun to be had here gameplay-wise, and there's some surprisingly deep gameplay here, but I can't help but ask the obvious question: Who exactly is this game for? While I don't have an answer to that question, I can continue on with the review instead.

Why do they let you name them?

Time for a random heart transplant.

Moving away from gameplay a bit, let's discuss the games visuals and sound. Admittedly I don't have a lot to discuss about either, but I can at least say that they fit the style and mood of the game. There's a level of creepiness that comes from looking at a human sans their skin, and you get lots of variations of that here. I wouldn't call anything here particularly gory, but I also wouldn't recommend playing if you're at all squeamish. Then there's the sound effects like ambulances, and the beeping of a heart monitor that just felt a little too real for my liking. Once again, nothing about them felt off or wrong, they just rubbed me the wrong way. Putting my personal reactions aside, I have to admit that everything presentation-wise is rather spot on. The Biomap menus can seem a bit cluttered, but the icons help tell things apart, and I'm amazed at how much info they managed to cram into the main screen of the game. Everything may look a bit too busy and messy, but you get used to where things are after a while. I guess I would've appreciated more music in the game, but I'm not exactly sure what they could've added in that department. I'm sure slice-of-life easy listening for the Life campaign would've felt strange, and adding in more intense music for Death might've come off just as bad. I still wish there was more to listen to then just breathing, coughing, and dying, but that's just me I guess.

I'm not exactly sure what platform this game started life on, but it feels very much like it was created with either a PC interface in mind, or a mobile one. The menus and screen layout seem arranged in a way that only a mouse or touch controls really make sense, and there's a big learning curve when it comes to playing this on consoles. Just about every button on the controller is used, but in ways that just don't feel very intuitive. A perfect example is how you select things in certain menus. The D-pad is used for moving between body systems, but only up and down, left and right do other things. If you want to select options in the Biomap, that's the analog stick. Want to move between treatments? D-Pad again. What about symptoms? That's the shoulder buttons. It all feels very random, even if you eventually get used to it after a while. I'm not sure I could've done a better job of mapping the game to a controller, but I am positive that I couldn't have made it any more complicated than it already is. Eventually learning it or not, I'd still find myself occasionally pressing the wrong button no matter what. Thankfully this isn't an action game or a platformer, so wonky controls aren't exactly the biggest of issues.

Setting up a Sandbox Mode game.

Don't be promiscuous!

There's a lot of game players to enjoy in Bio Inc. Redemption, but the question is if you'll actually want to play it. I have to come clean right now about the fact that I only gave the game as much time as I needed to in order to write this review. It low-key weirded me out more than a little bit right off the bad, and it only got worse the more I played. Every time I'd think I was having fun, I'd then come across actual diseases that have caused harm or death to people I know in real life, and suddenly I didn't feel like playing anymore. I know that's weird to say about a video game, but the way things are laid out in very dry, informative manner just makes it easy to be taken that way. That's probably just me though, and I'm sure that this is a game that can provides hours and hours of gameplay if you're able to play it without it getting to you like it did me. I didn't mention it much in the review, but the Sandbox Mode lets you play any scenario you like, and set just about every single in-game parameter. This is the true endless mode that'll keep players invested long after clearing the main campaign, but even if you forgo it, you're still looking at very long experience for the very reasonable price of $14.99. Unfortunately for me though, this is one experience I can't wait to have behind me.

I didn't even mention skills.

Oh to be young and healthy again!

Recommending Bio Inc. Redemption is something that I don't think I can do whole-heartedly for the reasons I mentioned above. It ultimately was not the kind of game I thought it would be, and it's one that I don't think I'll ever play again. That said, it's not a bad game by any means. What it does, it does very well. If you're looking for a medical sim to try out, or if you think Plague Inc. was a bit too joke-y for your liking, then this might be the game for you. Everyone else? I guess you can join me in going back to Trauma Center: Under the Knife once again.

Check Out Bio Inc. Redemption on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/bio-inc-redemption-switch/

Story: N/A
Gameplay: B
Graphics: B
Music/Sound: B
Value: A

Overall: B-

Pros:
+ A surprisingly deep simulation in both fighting disease, and causing them.
+ The Life and Death campaigns really feel like their own games.
+ The attention to detail with the real-world symptoms and illnesses is a nice touch, as are the extra mechanics like lifestyle choices and risk factors.
+ Can be rather fun once the game starts going.
+ Though a tad on the creepy side of things, the graphics and sound design are very well done.
+ Very affordably priced for a game that can provide countless hours of gameplay.

Cons:
- The idea of inflicting actual diseases on patients is a little too morbid for my tastes.
- Seeing all the possible diseases that might arise from something mundane like a cough made me more than a little anxious.
- Though it can be fun, the main gameplay loop can become rather repetitive.
- The lack of an actual story in the main campaigns felt like a missed opportunity.
- Definitely not a game for everyone, "everyone" meaning me.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

I guess this is a little funny.

]]><![CDATA[Through Insanity And Beyond: A Lunar Lander Beyond Review]]>Tue, 23 Apr 2024 07:00:00 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/through-insanity-and-beyond-a-lunar-lander-beyond-reviewBy Manuel

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch, XBox, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Atari VCS, PC

Atari has really been on top of things when it comes to releasing new reimaginings of their classic titles. Pong, Berzerk, and Gravitar all got remake treatment recently, and now it's time for Lunar Lander to take the spotlight! Lunar Lander Beyond is a totally modern take on the classic arcade game, and it's out now on just about every platform imaginable. We're going to be taking a look at the version available on the Nintendo Switch, but I'm sure that everything I'm about to say will apply to all other versions. While I've enjoyed many of the recent Atari releases, I can't help but wonder if that streak will continue here. There's only one way to find out! It's time to dive in!

Who needs training?

Oh no, that can't be good!

Lunar Lander Beyond puts you into the shoes of a newly-recruited captain of the Pegasus Corporation. It's your job to make sure your crew fulfills whatever tasks the company needs you to complete, and you'll quickly learn that Pegasus is not afraid to admit that it puts profits before people. While the game starts out with you guiding your roster of pilots in rather mundane busywork, things escalate quickly when a cosmic anomaly seems to warp the very fabric of reality itself. Suddenly you find yourself performing more rescues and defense missions than the company may have initially wanted, and the ship's crew grows with each passing mission. While there are rather generic pilots that come and go, the main cast help move the story along. There's a bit more to the plot than just company work and cosmic anomalies, but I don't think it's worth outlining more than I already have within a review. That said, I was surprised to find such a well-written story in a game that I assumed wouldn't have one, but that actually outlines of the first issues I have with the game. Even though Lunar Lander Beyond is a reimagining of a classic arcade game, there is no other mode available to players besides the main story campaign. Not including a standard Arcade Mode seems almost criminal in a game like this, and it really would've helped in getting new players acclimated to some of the odd ways the game plays. Even though I think the main campaign is well-executed and paced, it's just the first of many places where the game comes up a bit short.

I have very limited experience with the original Lunar Lander arcade game, but I remember hearing tales about its insane difficulty and complex control scheme. While I can't really compare either of those to Lunar Lander Beyond, I can say that the difficulty has apparently remained intact despite the intervening decades. Fans will probably be glad to hear that there's even a complicated control scheme, but we'll get to that in a minute. Choosing difficulty in Lunar Lander Beyond is one of the most important decisions you can make, as it'll determine how playable the game is for you. I tried out all the difficulties for the purposes of this review, and I honestly can't figure out exactly who the harder ones were made for. Let me start by admitting right off the bat that the only playthrough I completed was on Easy, as even Normal proved to be too much for me. I'm not one to balk from difficult games, but there's something about controlling your ship in Lunar Lander Beyond that just feels like the entire game is stacked against you even on the lowest difficulty. If you want to set things to insane, I'm not going to stop you, but rest assured that the game will become nearly unplayable. I don't know what kind of masochist would want to put themselves through the hardest difficulty, but I have to guess that there's at least one person who thinks this game is way too easy. I bring up the fact that I played in on Easy mainly because I wanted to frame everything I'm going to say about the game around that. If you think I'm describing a game that sounds far too hard and complicated for its own good, then rest assured that it's actually even MORE difficult than I'm probably letting on. And if you're looking for a game that will make you tear your hair out in frustration, then you might want to stop reading this review and just buy it already.

Running out of fuel is instant death.

It does feel good clearing stages.

As the name implies, you'll be doing a lot of take offs and landings in Lunar Lander Beyond. This usually means picking up or dropping off cargo or passengers, and trying to keep your ship in one piece along the way. Your ship can only take a certain amount of damage before it explodes, but chances are something else will force you to restart long before you reach that point. Harder difficulties give you penalties if you repeatedly die in a mission, but you can pretty much do that to your heart's content on my favorite easy mode. Besides ship health, you'll also have to worry about fuel, and if you fly outside of your mission area your ship will explode. In short, there's a lot of ways to die, and not all of them are fun. You eventually have a group of pilots that each have their own skills, and you also have four ships that each have their own speed, controls, and abilities as well. Most of what I'm going to lay out next goes for all pilots and ships, so we'll just take a broad overview of things.

Controlling your ship is not at all what players of other space games might expect. Instead of controlling the ship directly, you adjust its direction in a 360 loop, and then use your thrusters to launch the ship in the direction it's currently facing. You can adjust your movement from there, and even provide more thrust, but you're pretty much locked into whatever path you chose. The only way to really control your ship is to wait for your thrust to run out, and adjust your trajectory manually. This leads to controls that feel far more complicated than they need to be, but I can understand having them in this game since the original was notorious for its controls. There are also several abilities/power-ups you can apply to your ship to help movement. These can be boosters that shoot you in your currently facing direction even faster, tractor beams that grab survivors and items that are near your ship, and the most important of them all, the stabilizers. You get the stabilizers early on, and it's these that truly make the game playable. They not only can fully stop your ship in its tracks, but they're also used to slow your descent when you need to land. These would be a saving grace of the control scheme, but like all power-ups, they use a lot of fuel. Fuel management will eventually become the bane of your existence, as many later missions will force you to land and refuel multiple times before completion. While I do understand making these power-ups limited, tying them to a gauge that's just as important as your life bar just feels cruel. I found that I rarely used them as just dying and restarting from the last checkpoint was often far less time consuming and troublesome then finding a source of fuel in a level.

This opening cutscene is great.

I thought I was able to land there...

There's one more important aspect to discuss when it comes to gameplay, and that's the sanity meter. Taking a page from Eternal Darkness' playbook, Lunar Lander Beyond has a sanity meter that rises each time you take damage. All sorts of strange hallucinations start to appear as this meter goes up, and it'll eventually top out the more damage you take or if you accidentally interact with any of the hallucinations. This eventually can lead to you crashing your ship, but you are able to regain some sanity by picking up pill power-ups. This is a very cool system when it's first introduced, and it is a very interesting idea, I quickly found that I didn't like the fact that sanity never goes down on its own. Finishing a level doesn't reset it to zero, and the only way to get it down is to send your pilot off to a psychiatrist, or to pump them full of pills. I'm not even joking about that by the way, this game literally has space psychiatrists. The problem with quick treatments is that they cost a lot of credits, and the longer ones put the pilot of commission for several missions. You do eventually get more pilots, but I wonder how this works in the harder difficulties that include pilot permadeath. Also, the fact that sanity rises with ship damage, but health pickups are far more common than pills, means that the sanity meter actually becomes far more important than your ship's life bar. Even though I thought it was one of the coolest aspects of the game at first, I eventually grew to hate the sanity system as it would force me to use pilots I hadn't properly leveled up. Like a lot of things about this game, it falls just short of being well-implemented.

I have a lot of mixed feelings as to how good a game Lunar Lander Beyond actually is. There were times where I felt the entire thing was broken, and there were just as many times where I found myself having a lot of fun. The problems arose when I remembered that I was mostly playing the game on easy mode, and that things were probably just as unplayable as I imagined them to be in the other difficulty settings. This still doesn't make Lunar Lander Beyond a bad game, but it did make me have a lot of mixed feelings about it. The biggest saving grace for the game had to be the sheer variety it offered, and its surprisingly good story. There's a surprising amount of level variety, and I actually found it somewhat strange that you rarely seemed to do the same thing twice in-game. Missions can be rescues, dropping off cargo or supplies, defending a base, outrunning something, navigating a tight cave, and so on. And like I said before, there's even the variety in the ships and pilots. The game was never boring, and I appreciated the fact that it did a lot in its relatively short runtime. The story also kept me around as I grew to like most of the characters, and there's a dry humor to everything that was right up my alley. Once again, I found myself wishing that the game had some sort of Arcade Mode where you could do challenges without any story interaction at all, but that's probably more of a nitpick than anything. Then again, wishing I could just drop in and out of the gameplay quicker probably speaks volumes about how much I enjoyed the core gameplay despite my complaints.

Be careful going insane.

I wonder who pays for their insurance.

Even though I go back and forth regarding how much I like the gameplay, there's no denying that Lunar Lander Beyond has some amazing graphics and animation. The animated cutscene that opens the game really sets a stage for what's to come, and the entire game has a scope that's hard to describe in writing. You may notice that there are some screenshots where the ship seems almost miniscule, and those come from when the game pulls the camera way back and shows off more of the current planet you're on. These parts of the game do a good job of making you feel like an insignificant cog in a big machine, and I'm not joking when I say that it goes along with one of the central themes of the story. Then there's the level of detail in the backgrounds, with each planet feeling truly alive. Structures look functional, there are landmarks, and you even see workers on the ground. There's a hand-drawn smoothness to everything that's hard to see outside of the game being in motion, but there were several times where the graphics very nearly took my breath away. Also, in case you're wondering, the game ran very well on the Nintendo Switch, and I barely noticed any issues worth noting. Character designs are great, even simple things like the menus look sharp, and I honestly can't find very much to complain about when it comes to the visuals. Rather than try to find some small negative to harp on, I guess I'll just move on.

I probably have less to say about the music in Lunar Lander Beyond than the graphics, but I was impressed by what was here nonetheless. I have to admit that there weren't any tracks that I would say stuck out to me in particular, nor can I recall any memorable melodies as I write this, but every part of the sound design added to the game's atmosphere. As you might expect from a game like this, much of the music is electronic, and a lot of it has a very John Carpenter-esque synthesized vibe to it. Some tracks sound moody or almost scary when they need to, others are the right level of energetic electronica that kept me in the game, and others still echoed the insanity I was witnessing on-screen. The music is perfectly placed in the game, even if it's not a soundtrack that I'm going to run out and buy as soon as I'm done with this review. Then there's the game's voice acting. Straight to the point, the voice acting in Lunar Lander Beyond is some of the best I've ever heard, and every single actor puts in a commendable performance. I like to point out in reviews for smaller titles that adding in voice acting is probably the easiest way to up presentation and production values for the casual player. Having good voice acting does wonders for smaller indie titles, and I have no complaints at all on that front. The ship's dry delivery is one of the funniest things I've ever heard, and it really drives the game forward.

RIP the city I guess.

Am I one of the drunks?

Before I wrap up this review, I want to mention my two other problems with the game besides its questionable gameplay: its price and its replayability. Coming in at $29.99, I can't help but feel that its current price point is just a bit too high. I will say that the production values to meet that price point are mostly there, and I can agree that not every indie title has to be priced under $20, but I don't know if the amount of content here is worth that price. Lunar Lander Beyond will definitely eat up hours of your time simply due to you dying over and over again, but it isn't a long game by any means. Some players are sure to find replayability in tackling the challenge of a higher difficulty, but beyond that I'm not sure why you'd go back to it once you've beaten it. You can of course play any stage you've already beat if you want to do better, try out a different ship/pilot combo, or simply give it another go, but the lack of a standalone Arcade or Free Mode really hurts the overall value of the game. I don't want to go too hard on something like a game's price point, but I do think that it's an easy way to make picking up a game a sure thing for potential players who might be on the fence.

This was one of my favorite early missions.

I hate tight spaces in this game.

Even though I don't think I can give Lunar Lander Beyond the widest of recommendations, I can say that I think it's worth picking up if you come into it with the right expectations. If you're looking for a brutally tough game, or if you like your space adventures to be lighter on the shooting but heavier on the insanity, then this is the game for you. Obviously if you're an Atari fan, or just a fan of the original arcade game, then you're going to want to pick it up as well. Everyone looking for something a bit more laid back or chill? You're going to want to stay away for your own sanity. After all, it's not just the pilots in-game that will start to see hallucinations when the game starts throwing nonsense at you. And not all of us can get those ever-necessary pills.

Check Out Lunar Lander Beyond on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/lunar-lander-beyond-switch/

Story: B
Gameplay: B-
Graphics: A+
Music/Sound: A
Value: B-

Overall: B

Pros:
+ Captures the original Lunar Lander gameplay and gives it all sorts of new twists.
+ The story is far better than I thought it would be, and features several memorable characters.
+ Smooth animation, colorful graphics, and cutscenes that look amazing are just some of the things I love about the visuals.
+ The atmospheric music really adds to the gameplay experience.
+ There is a lot of variety in the missions, especially considering the rather simple premise.
+ Even though it made some parts of the game far more annoying than they needed to be, the sanity meter was a neat addition.

Cons:
- There is no simple arcade-style mode for those looking for a more retro experience.
- Difficulty is all over the place, and playing on anything above Normal feels near impossible.
- Fuel consumption feels completely unbalanced, especially when factoring in equipped ship abilities.
- Though I did enjoy the sanity meter, having to sideline your pilots so they can recover was rather annoying.
- The permadeath found in the hardest difficulty just seems cruel.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

He is very high on his own supply.

]]><![CDATA[Game Review: Gladiator's Arena]]>Tue, 23 Apr 2024 04:02:36 GMThttp://a-to-jconnections.com/gaming/game-review-gladiators-arenaBy Teepu

Players: 1
Platforms: PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, PC

Gladiator’s Arena is a roguelite top-down shooter. This is a genre that is flooded with games lately, so the question is: does Gladiator’s Arena stand out enough to make it worth playing?

In short: no. Even with the low asking price, it does extraordinarily little to even try being different. It is as generic as it can get away with. The setting is fine, which is exactly what the title says. The issue is that there is absolutely no variety in the environment, it’s the one arena for the entire game. There is also no story to speak of, not even something simple at the start to give context. I will say that the monster sprites are animated well, even if most of them aren’t too unique. The music is grating, and the sound effects are not bad or good, they are just sort of there. Aesthetically, the game is quite the bore.

Let us be real though, you aren’t here to play a game like this for any of that, you want an engaging gameplay loop that keeps you wanting to play. You start the game being able to select from a couple weapons, with each weapon having its own distinct quirks that make it worth trying. As you play and complete certain milestones, you’ll unlock more weapons to use, which gives incentive to keep playing. You have a sword, which is short range and powerful, or a bow which is long range but weak, among others. There is a decent enough variety of weapons to choose from, and unlocking more by playing is a nice reward.

The actual gameplay is quite lame though. As you defeat enemies, you get currency which you can spend on upgrades. Naturally, the enemy’s HP and enemy variety increases as you get through more waves, so you need to be smart about how you build your loadout. After every wave, you are given a set of three random upgrades you can purchase, assuming you can afford them. As well as that, there is a shop you can access from the main menu that allows you to buy some permanent upgrades to give you a leg-up to last longer in your runs, all of which are quite helpful.

The game sounds like it has the makings of a solid entry in the genre even if it isn’t original, but things fall apart the more you play it. With some smart upgrade choices, it starts to become impossible to die quite early. There were times I started getting really bored and would just stand still waiting to die so I could quit playing, and I didn’t die until many waves later of not buying a single upgrade. If you consistently buy at least one upgrade every wave you can, you will be overpowered very quickly. I tried four different weapons, and I had the same problem with all of them. Once I bought about half of the permanent upgrades the game became too easy to be worth playing further. There is an extremely poor progression of challenge in the game, which makes it very boring.

To make matters worse, you hardly have control. Most games like this you have to aim what direction you are attacking as well as move your character, but you have no control over the attacks, it auto attacks and auto aims, all you need to do is move your character to avoid being hit by enemies and projectiles. I kept playing for a bit hoping for a bit of a challenge because the core ideas are not bad, but I never reached that point.

In the end, Gladiator’s Arena fails to keep the player’s attention to be enough of a distraction from far better games in the genre like Vampire Survivors. I had the platinum trophy within 10 minutes and felt like I had seen everything worth seeing by the time I got to Wave 50 within 15 minutes. Unless this game is on sale for unbelievably cheap or you want an easy platinum trophy, I would suggest you look elsewhere to fill your needs in rogue-lite top-down shooters.

Check Out Gladiator's Arena on PlayStation 5:
https://store.playstation.com/en-us/concept/10008853

Story: D-
Gameplay: C-
Graphics: C
Music/Sound: C
Value: D

Overall: D

Pros:
+ Decent variety of weapons to use.
+ Animations are smooth.
+ Upgrades allow for interesting builds.

Cons:
- Stale setting.
- Extremely easy.
- Too automated.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

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