It may be a lil game, but it has a lot of heart. Maybe best described as “My First Open World” or "Breath of the Wild Jr" and this is not as much of an insult as it may sound.

Two points I know I like to know when hearing about a game I can tick off almost instantly in this review are the questions “is it any good?” and “how long is it?” by simply telling you that I finished the game in one sitting that took around three hours and the only thing that stopped me immediately cleaning up everything the game had to offer was it was time to feed the dog.

Once that had been done and I ate dinner myself I spent around another hour doing the rest.
So yes it’s good, and roughly 3-4 hours in length to do everything.

This may not be enough information to satisfy your interest so I will elaborate.
Lil Gator Game is a small open-world game mostly based on movement, some simple platforming, swimming, climbing, floating about and more thanks to a range of interesting items your hero picks up along the way.

Structure wise you are free to roam in whatever direction you like once you’ve completed the quests on the small, BOTW-like, tutorial island, in which you pick up the key three ingredients a hero needs - a sword, a shield and a hat.
About the island are many NPCs that you are aiming to befriend to create a town hub for everyone and impress your Big Sis, but more on that later.
Each of these would-be friends will have small quests for you, some range from clearing out nearby enemies, to classics such as fetch-quests or multi-part adventures where you’re needing to help separate folk to get the attention of one specific pal.
There are weapons, your sword of many varieties and later some ranged tools but the enemies… well they are cardboard cutouts so they don’t put up much (any) resistance.
“Combat” is really just a way of collecting things in the vein of coins, rings, rupees or whatever.

As mentioned earlier Lil Gator Game is more about movement. You can climb anything and, again like BOTW, have a stamina gauge that can be upgraded. Your shield has no need for defense as you can’t be attacked so instead you can use it like a sled, but as the first example of many, just sliding, is not all that the shield does movement wise and this shows the surprising depth Lil Gator Game has with its mechanics.
Different shields can slide in different ways, on top of this jumping while on the shield at the right point can bounce you further and this even includes some quite satisfying skimming along water.
None of these techniques are essential, you’re under no stress, you don’t need to go anywhere in a particular order or under a time-limit but the freedom of fun and discovery is there.
As you collect more items these movement abilities you have expand in the ways you would you expect, like better climbing, gliding and more, but also expand in a couple of fun ways you may not expect such as, minor spoiler, collecting a ninja headband that makes you Naruto run - which is faster.

Lil Gator Game doesn’t have every element or the sheer scale of a Breath of the Wild but it condenses a lot of what the joy of that game is into a tight package which has a cute, child-like aesthetic.

The aesthetic of big blocky colours, speech bubbles, googly eyes and cardboard cut-outs really work as a pleasant vibe that reflects its narrative.
You Big Sis as mentioned earlier, is back on a break from college and you want her attention. You see, as the game reveals from the start, you and her used to play and she was great at making rules for fun games and you were both heavily inspired by (for legal reasons not)The Legend of Zelda.
Sadly for our protagonist, time has passed, you’ve both aged and your Big Sis is busy with assignments and doesn’t seem to have time to play.
Your quest, to get her to remember the fun you had and grab her attention.

Lil Gator Game does a magically wonderful job of capturing a lot of what being a child feels like, and does a good job of giving you a view of this world through a child’s eyes.
The dialogue is fun, it isn’t minimised to monosyllabic words or baby sounding pronunciations though, if anything I wonder if a failing Lil Gator Game might have is that it presents itself for kids but is more for adults with nostalgia when considering how much dialogue there is throughout.
The ending especially, I will not describe the feeling as to not spoil, but it did make me a little glassy-eyed, an effect I don’t imagine it would have on a child but perhaps their parents.

Lil Gator Game is exactly as described in my opening sentence and it does it very well but this does leave stages feeling a little too simple and potentially repetitive.
I will take a moment to applaud the post-game as “cleaning up” in open-world games is a task for the sick honestly, but “gamer brain” does mean that an 87% for example, must become 100% or I can’t sleep and this title makes it as easy as possible.
It isn’t quite doing it all for you but it gives as much a helping hand that if anymore would mean you could just put the pad down and line, they manage to hit perfectly and give you a small reward for your time which feels as sweet as the rest of the experience.

For all of its child-like fun and wonder in design and aesthetic, Lil Gator Game is maturely put together, well-crafted and feels truly sincere. If you need a short game for a palette cleanser, but you still want a sense of play and not just story - you can’t go too wrong with grabbing this title or playing it for “free” via GamePass.

I will start by saying Return to Grace isn’t great, but it is good. It’s a walking simulator that I know isn’t a genre that appeals to everyone, but it’s short and sweet with enough little bits of interactivity to keep the pace steady and not monotonous.

You take control of a future space archaeologist, Adie Ito, who’s ended up on Ganymede (one of Jupiter’s moons) at the resting place of Grace: an AI seemingly worshipped as a god.

Here there is no life left but you quickly discover a piece of Grace.
The first of which represents her logic processing and is quickly dubbed Logic as expected.
Throughout searching this retro-future facility you have different aspects of Grace come into existence all with distinct personality traits.
These characters (I guess technically character singular) are excellently presented, with a great variety of voice acting and all give different and interesting perspectives on what may have happened to Grace, her purpose and views on Adie herself.

Presentation isn’t just from great voice acting, Adie has a little computer mounted on her left wrist which is used for some puzzles but mostly shows simply differently expressive and coloured faces to represent each of these personalities you interact with.

Other interactions involve climbing, pulling levers, small button puzzles and a couple more interesting things that I don’t want to spoil from this game’s extremely short run-time.

Graphically the game is neat, smooth and shiny. Quality lighting and the aesthetic is somewhat 60’s sci-fi but with a good variety of interesting locals to keep you engaged.

If you enjoy walking simulators and especially if you have access to Game Pass this is worth a pick up.
It took me a little over two hours to get through and I did reload some saves to check out alternate choices which can end up with a couple of different endings.
Strangely Return to Grace is more full than you’d expect a two hour story to be in terms of little touches, variation of locations and characters but also feels fairly basic too.
It isn’t doing anything new or particularly innovative and the story is good but it’s a little predictable.
Return to Grace doesn’t feel like the clearly talented staff stretch out further than what they know they can do but while it means it doesn’t necessarily excite it does do everything to a level of quality that’ll not have you upset if you spent a couple of hours with it.

Downton Abbey meets Gardeners’ World in what is essentially an Escape Room style puzzle video game.

To me, that’s the pitch of Botany Manor and whilst maybe that’s far too strange sounding I feel it hits all the points of how I’d explain the game more fully.
Botany Manor is set around 1890, as you can expect from the title you spend time in and around a manor. As a location, it’s quaint, colourful and pleasant to be around but is also much like a National Trust building you might visit somewhere in England.
It has all those positive aspects, but it also feels quite pompous and for me a little overbearing in areas. This tone is amplified by the little bits of story scattered throughout in various letters and other reading materials. It is a setting and style I know many will find enjoyable but I find fairly difficult to mesh with.

That’s the Downton Abbey part.
The Gardener’s World part, well really that’s just me throwing the first obviously gardening themed television show title that comes to mind - the Botany part of Botany Manor.
The main driving force of the story is that your protagonist Arabella Greene is a retired botanist who is exploring her old manor and of course gardens to fill out a blank herbarium by (re?)discovering the ideal situation for these, fantastical (fictional) plants to grow and by the end get a book deal out of it.
This gimmick does feel a little conceited, there’s a lot of hand waving in how the things in her own house are set up for these wild and magical plants, why no one is there but it’s recently lived in.
It is, as you may expect, not a barrier to enjoying the puzzles themselves but another small fence that I personally found hopping over to engage with the story a little difficult.
One thing that I did find intriguing that is sewn throughout the story is Arabella’s difficulties in getting a book deal and simply put, how much harder being a woman in that time period was, to even be listened to and respected.

So Botany Manor takes place in a manor and about botany. Exactly what it says on the tin.
Gameplay wise your objective is to fill out the blank pages of that previously mentioned herbarium.
Each segment of the house gives you things to interact with and some conveniently placed tables that include pots, soil and a set of drawers for the seeds you have found.
I’ve called these plants magical and fantastical because although things can grow in all sorts of circumstances the gamification and simplifying means what you grow is less about slowly feeding, waiting and pruning and more about the locations and the environments plants may grow in and recreating them.
To keep things exciting it may be a plant grows near a volcano, perhaps in lightning storms or together with specific animals.
I won’t give too many more details than that because I’d be ruining the thrust of the game.

The puzzles and the structure of the game is where my escape room comparison comes in.
Clues and items for each of the plants you must grow to fill the pages of the herbarium are found by searching rooms, occasionally interacting with parts of them to obtain key items and throughout the length of the game solving these will gain you access to more parts of the manor and its surrounding gardens, by either keys to unlock doors or revealing paths to connect areas in an enjoyable labyrinthine way.
The tension isn’t there, unlike an Escape Room there is no risk of losing outside of getting stuck, bored and closing down the game but whilst I played Botany Manor it felt a lot like other games I had played in the past.

As an aside, it reminded me of the MC2games series of Escape Room puzzlers, but with more budget giving it a slightly clearer story and nicer presentation.
Some of those games I have reviewed here on backloggd and although I don't rate some of them super highly, do enjoy them for what they are and the shorter, respectful, amount of time they want from me. Enough to scratch an itch.

Compared to these other games though, mechanically is where Botany Manor has a few issues for me. First off is the size of the place, it’s a large English Manor house so it is somewhat expected, I do also applaud the almost Dark Souls-like shortcut unlocking that makes traversing a little easier but even with that, for my liking, there is too much running back and forth.
The size of the setting and the annoyance of navigating is mostly due to the poor inventory and note taking management the game has.
Each page of the herbarium you can collect clues for, once you have selected the correct clues the description of the plant will change, filling out the story a little more.
The herbarium itself has maps which are nice and also a page on clues collected, but, significantly has no notes outside of where you found these clues to what they said.
If you find a pattern or numbers that you realise are useful elsewhere then you better have your own blank page to fill out in the real world because Arabella must have photographic memory as she doesn’t bother.
It’s a simple issue solved by real life note taking and that is not something I am opposed to typically, but in this setting, the amount of information surrounded by fluff, and with a blank notebook in-game hand it created a barrier to my enjoyment, a false way to lengthen the game and simply another thing that took me out of the setting.

The further you get into the game, the larger area you have. It is kind enough to not make you run back and forth throughout the whole house but this “escape room” ends up feeling a little more like an escape warehouse which might sound cool until I say that the size change does not mean the difficulty or even the amount of clues to find increase at the same rate.

One final complaint as a footnote is that interacting with items, the simple form of clicking to pick up and place down, is oddly too free. You can put things down anywhere which could cause you to forget where they are. This was not an issue I came into, but I did have a bug where I picked up one item, placed it on a shelf next to another and they became fused and then suddenly non-interactive. A minor bug like this would usually not be worth mentioning but that item, it was key to one of the final plants to finish the game and I was almost soft locked.
Botany Manor only has a single save and no chapter restarts, so if I could not unlock this fusion of items I would have to start the entire game again.
Thankfully with some extremely janky movement I was able to pick the item up again (clipping through a wall outside of where I could normally touch it) and finish the game.
I held off on putting down my thoughts about this title too fast because as you can imagine the annoyance and the time wasted on out bugging a bug soured me further. Now I can look back and laugh but it’s another small mark against the title as a whole.

Botany Manor is a pleasant time, the puzzles are perhaps too easy but fun and creative, it’s a fantastic title to have as a part of game pass but between some very strange design choices and a story and setting I did not gel with I didn’t really find that I enjoyed myself more here than I have playing much cheaper - at asking price and budget - equivalents on Steam.

There’s something you see online often that has become a parody: “Nintendo, hire this man”.
Typically this will be alongside Mario in a “photo-realistic” latest Unreal Engine world and have virtually no artistic merit what-so-ever.

However, I find myself thinking that stupid line, or at least thinking that I wish Nintendo would do more things like this.

Vikavoltius is a fan-made shmup in the style of Prodius and its ilk. Where instead of a spaceship you are controlling the Bug/Electric type Pokémon from Sun and Moon: Vikavolt.
The game is pay what you want and really it is so very short (1 stage) that I wouldn’t blame someone for paying nothing at all.

The single stage has you shooting down other Pokémon that fly in different patterns, some that fire projectiles and finishing off with a boss that I won’t spoil but I am sure there are pictures all over the page (it looks like a UFO).

Quantity there is not, but quality is where Vikavoltius makes you feel like the experience was a good use of your time. The sprites are fantastic, the remixed classic themes are brilliant and the simple but elegant power up system is enjoyable enough to do a small handful of runs without being bored to tears by the repetition of a single level.

It’s a shame there isn’t more as I feel there are a few other good Pokémon that could be transferred to a shmup and fit in perfectly.
Vikavolt themselves evolves from Charjabug and I’d love a road based level to start with, for reference it looks a bit like a bus.

I’ll finish as I started though. This may be a short-sweet proof of concept more than anything but I do miss having these mini-games from Nintendo themselves. DSiWare is long gone but Pokémon loves to shit out all sorts of other stuff and has done many other genres in a fuller form but in a much lower quality than Vikavoltius.

Cosy, wholesome, zen. I don’t outright hate these terms when discussing video games but as discussed on The Computer Game Show trying to use those terms as a genre title feels, incorrect, possibly disingenuous.
Horror is a genre, not “scary”, the decision of what something feels like is up to its audience.
It may sound redundant but acting as if cosy is a genre is the equivalent to filing a game under “fun”.

I have definitely used these words to describe games in the past. I am a fan of having games that I can relax with, zone out a little and not feel pressured or even stressed.
A Little to the Left aims for a feeling of being cosy, simple and just nice. Organising varying objects into a tidy manner as a simple puzzle, while along the way introducing a long-haired white cat to add to the everyday wholesome feeling the game is aiming for, using this cat as a game mechanic to either mess with your tidying or as a theme to the puzzles.

I love cats, but I feel that, let’s just call them “cat people”, end up elevating a lot of things that include cats to a pedestal they do not deserve.
This again just added to a feeling which may make me sound miserable, of being told I should like something which had me push back against it.
I will decide whether the game is wholesome, not the game itself.

As far as the organising and puzzles, A Little to the Left fails to do either in a way that really landed with me.
In terms of organising, the feeling is enjoyable for a moment and quickly repetitive. These items other than feeling quite “everyday” don’t really do anything else but act as icons, there is no story within them unlike Unpacking - the game I would say really pushed this subgenre.

The puzzles again are repetitive, organise by size, organise in a colour gradient, make something symmetrical, there is really not much else to them other than this.
Once you understand the game’s language, what it decides is organised, you can solve each puzzle within seconds, maybe replaying for different solutions but quickly moving on.

Another issue with the puzzles themselves is the interactions of simply picking up and putting stuff down never feels precise enough and also doesn’t feel marked out enough to do quickly.
Many times I would have items in the right order but the game had me fiddle with the items until lined up perfectly and that in my eyes, doesn’t feel relaxed or cosy, it feels annoying and like busy work. I will also add here that one puzzle the game would not allow me to solve even though I had everything correct (I ended up using the hint and then guides to check) but because it wouldn’t progress I spent minutes fiddling for no gain.

Sadly repetition is the biggest flaw of A Little to the Left and the finale really ramps this to a stage where I found myself saying “I don’t care about this cat”.

Perhaps there is an argument that I should have played this game in shorter bursts and to a degree I agree with that assessment. However, this further enforces the final point I’d like to make about this game. It’s in the wrong format.

This title is on PC and all the modern consoles, and outside of the Switch and maybe the Steam Deck I don’t think this fits. It has “mobile game” written all over it and whilst I don’t intend that to be an insult it does make it feel wrong playing on a bigger screen.
Multiple stages with tiny puzzles and little in the way of connective thread throughout them just reminds me of the classic games on iOS such as Angry Birds, Cut the Rope or even Monument Valley although that feels more narratively driven.

A Little to the Left is a Little Disappointing.

After I recently played VideoVerse and also having listened to them on The Back Page Podcast I knew that I could trust Lucy Blundell’s writing.

In a way this game has passed me by but I will also admit here that the title conjured up something in me that put me off. It wasn’t thinking about one night stands themselves but when videogames attempt to be sexy, more often than not it’s a miss, sometimes cringe and potentially offensive.
This title is not.

One Night Stand is a very short experience but one that encourages you to try it again to discover the different outcomes your decisions can make, surprising revelations and ultimately rack up a selection of different endings.

Each of these are full of wonderful writing, full of realistic and relatable notes. If there is any moment of cringing it is something you have opted to see. There are very few characters involved as you’d expect and the main being the woman you have found yourself awake next to - even their name is a spoiler.
She can be funny, sweet or even cold but again, feels real.

Replaying the story you can skip text and the options are quite diverse considering the, almost, one room setting. These retries also gave me a light feeling of a good detective game, discovering evidence and piecing separate dialogue together with a mental red string that not only painted a much fuller picture than I could visually see but one with some good “ah ha” and “oh shit!” moments.

Speaking of what I could see visually, I love the art style. A simple pencil sketch looking feel that gave me Hotel Dusk vibes. Great facial expressions from your one-night stand and lots of brilliant details within the room that again enhances the feeling that this story is not purely fiction.

In the end however, I feel a little conflicted about this title. It is smartly written, beautifully presented and executed well but whilst I do not dislike short games playing the same short game over and over made me feel contradictory views of wanting more but also finding getting the last few endings more of something like busy work than the mild detective feel I had gotten earlier.
An argument could be made to just get a few endings and put it down when you feel you’ve seen enough variation, but having a screen full of blank squares you know you can fill, boxes you can check - it’s hard to do that when you know the effort, at least in terms of time, is so low.

I enjoyed my initial ending with this game, I played it “as if” it was me and was pleased. It made me want to see more of the world and that is good.
I enjoyed doing things I would definitely not, going for things I felt were possibly the stupidest decisions and having a good laugh at them.
The writing carries this game and it is definitely worth a play considering it's about the price of a coffee - ultimately I’m just not sure that this format of short with a dozen endings is my vibe compared to long with a few endings, but that is fine. There is space for all types of storytelling and I’m happy that we get to experience them.

Bigger doesn’t always mean better. A cliché to kick off the review but it’s a fitting single line summary of how I feel when speaking about Lone Sails sequel.

FAR: Lone Sails was a special experience for me, both in just watching it streamed as mentioned in my review of that title and playing it for myself.
To this day I still play the OST while writing journals for my education, and occasionally depending on mood and my writing subject the music takes me to a place that I find myself getting very glassy eyed.

To hit that high again with a sequel was probably an impossibility and it pains me to say that in fact, it was.
Changing Tides is still a fantastic game in its own right, cleverly keeping the formula of controlling a vehicle, exploring an interesting unknown land and going on a journey, whilst changing up the types of scenery and the vehicular partner enough to be fresh.

Every review I write may be the first of mine that someone has read and I can only apologise if I lack the words for explaining this game, but rather than repeat myself I feel that as important as it is to play these games in order, it is to read my thoughts on them.

Changing Tides, rather than having a “car” like the first, you have more of a “boat”.
You’re still collecting junk which can be used for fuel or saved if you like, you still have nature as a pushing force as well as engineering and the places it goes in terms of travel are arguably more interesting and diverse.
However again, bigger doesn’t necessarily mean better.
I found this vehicle a lot more hassle, this not only gives some unwanted friction but doesn’t help build the bond I found myself having in the first FAR title.
What also doesn’t really help with this is I felt like I spent much more time away from my motorised-mate in this game than I did the first.
Swimming beneath the sea and doing some mild puzzles and platforming isn’t bad, but it isn’t great either. Puzzles are predictable, some reveals are astounding and that scale is one place where Changing Tides does trump Lone Sails but the emotional connection to the journey feeling less didn’t help those moments stick.

Joel Schoch returns to play another beautiful, lonely, sometimes sad and sometimes uplifting OST and much like Lone Sails I can see myself listening to this when writing in the future.
An issue though, not of the music itself, is the weird lack of it in places.
There are points where silence is powerful but it felt too often, almost as if maybe the game was broken.

FAR: Changing Tides may not hold a place in my heart like Lone Sails did, but I had a lovely time and the ending, which I will not spoil, will at least be something that does stick with me. Powerful stuff.

Changing Tides is worth your time, but sadly it does almost everything worse than its predecessor, not terribly so but enough that it loses some magic.
I can only theorise that perhaps the four year gap between games gave the studio time to overthink what they wanted to do, what they wanted to say and what they were making.

I will take a FAR 3 though. Please and thank you.

Variety is the spice of life and whilst this game concentrates on one seasoning executed very well it never forgets that.

Pepper Grinder see’s you control the drill totting Pepper, burrowing through dirt, under the water, between lava and crumbling ice.
Many of the platforming level archetypes are here but due to the rapid drilling versus precision platforming Pepper Grinder finds a way for this classic imagery to feel original in many places.

Holding the trigger on your controller of choice has you bury deep into dirt with constant momentum, with movement and turning circles reminiscent of Ecco the Dolphin, one of the game’s many inspirations.
It is key that any game feels good in the hand and this genre can live or die on it, thankfully the feeling of flow you find yourself in drilling, flying through the air into other bits of ground, avoiding obstacles and using varying devices or gimmicks is exactly where you want it to be.
Occasionally the speed can feel frantic, the turning circles may not feel tight enough, the distance you jump may seem too much but rarely does it ever feel like it’s anything but a mistake of yours and the game is very forgiving with its checkpointing.

A small area where the fault does not feel like it is on the player is the questionable hitboxes of enemies. Nearly all of the Narlings, the small narwhal-goblin hybrid type enemies are splatted in a single hit, but they occasionally wield equipment to halt your progress. Expected and not unwanted but the consistency of who hits first and where the enemies are vulnerable doesn’t always seem to watch and that perfect flow state hitting a brick wall is an irritation this game would be better for without.

Speaking of enemies, the bosses of Pepper Grinder are fun and varied. A lot of pattern remembering as expected but diverse in style, looks and set up with the difficulty of them rising to a real peak for the final encounter.
The only disappointment is that there aren't many, an issue the game has as a whole.

I find it difficult to complain about a game being short, especially when it is so tight.
Each stage in Pepper Grinder brings new and interesting ideas, a strength of variety that the best Nintendo games have and something I loved about last year’s Pizza Tower.
Being left wanting more is a good thing, but I can’t help but feel like this game is one world and a handful of stages too short.

Pepper Grinder does however give you a reason to go back. Each level has five hidden skull coins, a staple of any platformer and with these you can unlock some palette swaps and a hidden level in each world which are typically some of the more fun and gimmick heavy driven stages in the game.
The treasure you collect, this game’s equivalent to Sonic’s rings and the like do not help you survive but allow you to buy stickers.
Stickers and sticker pages are Pepper Grinder’s fun take on a 2D photo mode but act like the sticker books you had as a kid, just with more variety, less permanence and glue-mark based mess.
The annoyance here though is you unlock stickers with coins using a gacha machine and trying to fill the pages feels too time consuming and at time of writing I don’t believe there’s a trick to stop getting repeats outside of trying again and again.

The stickers give you a reason to return to levels to grind treasure but as each stage is finished a time-attack is unlocked and for this podium of prizes additional special stickers and music tracks are obtained. The time-trials are where the game truly becomes “hardcore”, and this is one title I cannot wait to see in the hands of experienced speed-runners.

I mentioned music tracks and Pepper Grinder’s OST composed by XeeCee is one of its highlights. The tracks may not be as catchy as some classics but the variety from mad drum and bass to more lo-fi tracks depending on the stage are welcome and something I find myself wanting to go back to.

Pepper Grinder is a fun and sometimes furious, drilling platforming experience with interesting ideas and fun mechanics spread throughout. To spoil what the game brings in variety would spoil it but as well as stage variety Pepper gets to do a little more than you’d expect a drill normally would - at points making me grin from ear to ear as I realise what is happening.
A little too short with some minor annoyances in hitboxes and the curse of gacha but otherwise an early contender for GOTY and an easy recommendation.
One that may only slide down the mental list of good games this year because it is so brief and hasn’t quite changed the game or blown me away the way the previously mentioned Pizza Tower did. It comes close though, I’ll take a dash of pepper with my pizza - thank you very much!

When it comes to what I look for in a game, it is much easier for me to state what I would avoid over what I like. One recurring thing that I love though is innovation, fresh new takes and great ideas. I would rather a game was inventive than be a shiny blockbuster that doesn’t bring anything new to the table.
Metroidvanias are a genre that has been extremely popular, especially in the “indie space” so seeing any sort of true innovation there is a pleasant surprise.

Invention and innovation are Ultros’ greatest strengths.
At a glance you would maybe first say it’s the stunning art of “ElHuervo” the same artist behind a lot of Hotline Miami’s unique look.
The art is beautiful, the world is full of colour and feels squidgy and organic. The character and monster designs are great, and it is a part that truly does stand out.
However, I cannot say it is the game’s greatest strength because sadly it can cause irritations. The game even admits to this by giving you options to make things in the fore and background look more separate because sometimes the visual splendour is too much to parse.
Many background items and things you can break (with no real gain) look too much like items that can be picked up and whilst the assets are good this causes some friction within the gameplay that does not need to be there.

The organic feel of Ultros ties greatly into its themes and mechanics which is where I find putting the game on a pedestal much easier.
Ultros is a Metroidvania but it is also a time-loop game, it has some sparing roguelite elements with an upgrade system that can be locked to permanent after a time but the real intrigue with the game when a loop happens is how you interact with the world.
In a surprise twist that I didn't see coming when I first booted up Ultros is that the game has gardening mechanics.
Throughout the world there are patches of land where seeds can be planted, different seeds create different plants and these plants can help the protagonist traverse.
Much like in real life though, plants and trees grow over time and when you first experience a time loop you quickly realise that you may have started from zero but the plants have continued to grow. Some of these may be as simple as taller tree-like obstacles that can now be used to reach higher points you couldn’t previously reach, sometimes these plants grow vines that can be swung from or break through barricades that originally blocked your path.
These additions to traversal not only open up more of the game’s world to you but speed up your progress making it simpler to do the earlier parts that you have done before such as obtaining your blade.

Speaking of blades, Ultros is a close quarters combat game. It has an enjoyable dodge and quick strike mechanic and a slew of fun upgrades that allow you to juggle and dive kick your enemies amongst other things.
The combat is smooth and feels good to use but sadly never really hits much of a challenge.
Throughout the game are boss style encounters, a couple of which have some fun gimmicks to them but for the most part play out as you’d expect and sometimes just feel like a lengthy standard fight - they’re good but not so much of a highlight.

One mechanic the fighting does bring though is a great encouragement to change your styles up and not repeat the same combos. In Ultros, in order to heal and upgrade the protagonist eats - sometimes these are fruits of the plants you find and grow but others are meat and morsels of the enemies you’ve slain, to get the most tasty and nutritious parts you must use a plethora of attacks or else spamming the same buttons will give you some red goop.
Having the food tied into an upgrade system is a nice addition because it also means at points there is risk/reward for eating to level up versus saving for survival, while also later the opposite holds true where eating to clear up your inventory and level up doesn’t feel like you’re putting yourself at too much risk.

As I mention the inventory I feel I have to explain one of my biggest issues with Ultros.
Confusion.
I have already mentioned how sometimes the visuals do not help, the presentation of the story is also hard to understand and things such as the inventory do not clear up matters lore or mechanics wise well enough either.
Whilst playing Ultros, understanding the outline of the story it is trying to tell but being confused by its language I thought to myself “is this what Dark Souls is like for some people?”.
Yes, a Dark Souls comparison, the cliché of all video game reviews but one here that felt quite specific.
The obscure and ambiguous nature of Ultros had me struggle with its narrative but at times made the game difficult to play too, with a specific example of something I feel Dark Souls does that this doesn’t and to its detriment.
Item descriptions - planting seeds becomes far more important in the late game and knowing what each seed will grow to be is only really clear from its art. That should maybe be enough and arguably it is, however some things are so similar this isn’t enough.
Each seed has a different name but they aren’t really a clue to what they do, item descriptions here would not only help build the world but aid the player into moving forwards knowing they are doing what they are intending to do - instead each seed has the same “can be planted” description as one another.
Overall there is a line where you want a world to have its own language but not one that is so foreign the player cannot understand and sadly Ultros goes over it.

From this point on I will be spoiling part of Ultros, something that needs to be spoken about because it ties into its greatest strengths and weaknesses.
I will be speaking about endings, not specifically what happens but the journey to them and if you’ve understood the organic, killing, growing and time-looping themes of the game these are probably quite obvious but if not, and you want to discover for yourself, this is the time to leave.

Two words explain your quest in Ultros Destruction and Connection.
As you travel through Ultros you are searching for Shaman, green folk sat in coffin type displays.
Each time one of these is destroyed a new loop is triggered, some things change but your objective is clear, whilst the map may not be filled out where these shaman are is marked very early on so you need to get to all eight you can see.
Throughout these loops you are made aware that you want to sever the ties of these shaman as they tie-in to the summoning of the big interdimensional space monster Ultros themselves.
The simplest way to save the day being the destruction of these eight shaman through your knowledge gained during the loops and the upgrades you get to a small drone called an extractor.
The extractor is, without revealing specifics, where the metroidvania elements truly come in through a whole host of ways, some of which are very exciting and original, allow you to access places you previously couldn’t and tackle obstacles that got in your way - a few of these tied into the gardening.

Not each upgrade to the extractor is equal in terms of excitement but each does give you a great feeling of progress and spark thoughts in your mind of what you can now do.
Sadly though this feeling comes to an end when you’ve got them all and that may be earlier than you’d expect.

If Destruction is one way to end the game through destroying the shaman then it’s probably somewhat clear what Connection is about.
Returning to the point in where you found the shaman you can actually start to connect them to the centre, this is done via a “living network” which if the shaman are the nodes, the plants you have grown along your journey are the connectors.
This completely changes the game into something not combat focused at all. Rather than killing enemies you are encouraged to befriend them, feeding them so that they no longer attack and may also reveal new spots to garden - and this pacifist style extends to all elements of the world.
You’re rewarded for this in some areas as the living network being reconnected can also open doors and whilst it may be simple for you to find your way back to somewhere you have been you need to build this network without gaps and that is where the challenge lies.
A challenge or sadly, a faff.

The alternative “true ending” is something that I really applaud the game for as an idea, it turns the game on its head. It gives the story more interesting purpose and a better moral message than most.
In reality though, it becomes a slog too quickly. Having to start loops to see the consequences of your actions, changing what you have planted in fiddly ways with little help in terms of how things are marked or described. Spending so much time retreading the same ground over and over, it adds length to the game which may be viewed as value, but for me felt like it just outstayed its welcome to show that it was smart.

Metroidvanias at their best have a great flow of progression and sadly because all the major upgrades of the extractor are found when you’ve done the Destruction finish, you’re no longer getting those endorphins for what is 200% more game.

In the simplest terms my feelings on this game peaked at a 4.5 and came crashing down to a 3 as I struggled and grinded to get the last few plants down in the places the game wanted without guidance. As my playtime went from 7-8 hours for one ending to 20+ for the other, I questioned why I was even bothering and if I even liked the game.
Ultimately I do but I resent the game as much as I adore it.

Ultros is a recommendation from me, but purely because it does do so many smart and interesting things that are worth checking out.
The difficulty I find finishing here is giving advice on how someone else should finish the game.
It would be easy to say that if you do not connect with the gardening aspect in a significant way, play to the destruction ending and leave it - I just worry you’re missing not only things the game wants to show you but the things it’s trying to teach you too.

After Tetris you would think that there were only so many tile matching style score-attack puzzle game systems that exist. Whilst it’s a subgenre that hasn’t had the hugest innovations over the years it is a well that has been repeatedly visited by games over and over again and one that I will quite happily take a sip from each time.

Back in 2005 it was Kirby’s dad Masahiro Sakurai’s turn and alongside was the dual screens of Nintendo’s handheld system of the time.
What he came up with was fairly innovative, some good fun but ultimately for me, not one I can see being in my rotation of puzzlers to go back to and relax with.

Meteos like many of its kind before have blocks drop from the top of the screen, you cannot turn them but with the stylus slide a single block up and down columns where you please.
One big difference here is matching does not instantly delete blocks (in most cases), match three vertically and the entire column fires up like a rocket, match horizontally and they become platform lifting all the blocks above them.
Ultimately you are sending the falling blocks, or meteors, back into space and potentially towards an enemy's planet - this being the main theme throughout the game.

Sakurai has stated that the game wasn’t initially targeted for DS but says, and I agree, that use of the stylus made the block sliding and matching feel much more fluid and faster than via a d-pad.
From my perspective I really appreciate sending the meteors off the top of the touchscreen and seeing the explosions and results at the top, but when the game picks up speed and difficulty I find myself not seeing any of it which is a shame.

Meteos interplanetary theme brings in a few other innovations and a surprising amount of variety in what is a well covered genre.
Each planet has different block rates, each has their own rules, be that being faster, slower, vertical or horizontal combinations being more powerful or other slight changes to the feel of play.
As you would expect each planet has its own background and even different block art but however much this fits the theme I found many of these quite ugly to look at, some being more difficult to match at speed than others and when that is your primary objective it isn’t ideal.
Overall I never fell in love with Meteos presentation but I could not call it bad, the menus have a very Smash Bros. feel which isn’t surprising and keeps even the menus feeling exciting yet simple to navigate.

Sending falling blocks directly back up rather than destroying them is definitely an interesting innovation. The feel of lining another horizontal row of blocks as your original struggles to reach the top, causing a small boost, is quite enjoyable but not as snappy and as satisfying late Puyo colour match or a T-spin.

If, like me, you enjoy falling blocks then this is definitely one you should try and the DS is a fantastic way to enjoy the genre. However you’ll probably find your way back to Puyo Puyo, Panel de Pon or the Daddy which is Tetris in no time.

When people speak about Nintendo fans, they tend to assume that their fandom is wrapped up in nostalgia, that these fanatics can’t let go of their love for the SNES, N64 or whichever console they may have grown up with.

I would admit to being a Nintendo fan, however I do not have this history. Whilst I have spent time with those machines I never owned a Nintendo home console until the Wii.
My main adoration for Nintendo comes from, not just their typically high quality but how they approach different genres with their own, usually family friendly, approach and innovate rather than just attempt to make a perfect version of titles that have come before.

Splatoon as a series is that for me. An online shooter that outside of some of its controls and the simple interaction of aiming a target and firing, could not be further away from what most people imagine of when thinking about the genre.

Side Order, to a lesser extent is Nintendo doing the same with roguelites - a genre that has grown in popularity over the past few years and one I find myself playing quite a lot.
The innovations here aren’t as big as a Mario Kart or Pikmin but the approach is different and interesting.
In Side Order you are climbing up a tower floor by floor, picking up power ups along the way, having a different build each run you make and fighting varying versions of the same battle each time, with a selection of bosses and the lite elements of permanent upgrades you can apply to help you reach the peak more efficiently and more often.
This is standard rougelite action.

One change to the approach is a reduction in randomisation.
First come the upgrades, in Side Order known as Colour chips for your Palette.
Each run you pick a Palette for the returning Eight of Octo Expansion, Palettes are your character build - a set weapon, sub and special based upon existing Splatoon regulars such as Callie, Marie, Pearl, Marina and more.
As you rise up the tower you are awarded Colour chips to add to these Palettes, which in game look like a MIDI pad of sorts and can be played like one, depending on your Palette choice certain Colour Chips are more likely to appear. This reduces the randomisation which is one thing that gives Side Order a lighter feel but also means you aren’t frustratingly getting things you do not want.
The Colour Chips themselves are buffs to your weapons and gear in the ways you would expect, more damage, faster firing, more paint, a lot of the things you can do in normal multiplayer and like there these can stack, but to degrees where you can eventually create insanely powerful weapons which you will need to keep away the hordes of enemies.

Randomisation of these chips is further reduced by picking what your reward will be each floor.
This isn’t particularly different from a lot of other games in the genre, but you are also picking in your choice of three, what mission type you are doing and what map and difficulty setting they will be.
As you would expect Easy will pay you less in game currency than Rigorous, the hardest difficulty but knowing the mission type and sometimes the map itself will make runs easier as you get an understanding of not only what your loadout is good for but what you find easier yourself.
These missions come in a few flavours. First are destroying portals, spawn points for the enemies - the Jelletons. Next is an escort style like Tower Control in the main game, except here rather than riding the device you need to constantly fill it with paint to get it to the end of its journey. There are also Splat zones and the two final mission types involve pushing large balls into their goals and chasing down fleeing enemies.
All of these will have Jelletons spawning from portals or drains similar to where Salmonids spawn in Salmon Run.
Much like Salmon Run there is a great variety of enemies, from little jobbers who just rush you to springing enemies and Beyblade-like spinning ones which leave handy devices behind as they are splatted. It doesn’t take long for you to see the entire variety quickly but depending on what enemies are more regular can truly switch up how you will play each mission.

Overall between the different enemies, exciting bosses, varying missions, a great variety of upgrades and more Palettes to unlock as well as “hacks” (the permanent buffs) Side Order gives you many reasons to play through again and again or just have a really enjoyable time getting to those final credits the first time.

However, the praise for variety is deserved but it does feel lacking in one way - especially as a single player campaign when we compare to what has come before.
With this, it’s the levels themselves. It is not the biggest gripe because for the game type to work it cannot diverge too often but the innovation seen in Octo Expansion isn’t quite here.
Many levels are the same place with a different objective and all stages due to the aesthetic look similar. This VR missions vibe is on purpose and goes with the theme, but I would not be able to write this without saying that it was a little disappointing.
Really though Splatoon 3’s Rise of the Mammalians is where level innovation is if you want it so it’s not as if Nintendo has kept us starved. It’s just a shame because outside of the bosses Side Order doesn’t feel as clever as other single player things this series has done before.

If you’re a fan of Splatoon it may be obvious to say that more of the same is going to keep you happy but Side Order really does do that job extremely well.
As a continuation of the series it builds upon the lore, bringing back characters from Splatoon 2 to the forefront and playing with a story that comes off the back of that game’s final Splatfest.
It really does show that Splatoon is its own universe and that has been invested in and planned with, references are not purely Easter Eggs, they are developed characters, world building and more and it’s enjoyable to witness.
Side Order does what Splatoon does best with nailing great music and aesthetic. The monochrome world of the “memverse,” the virtual space you are residing in, strangely feels colourful. It’s exciting even with blacks, white and shades of grey - sure part of this is from the paint you spread yourself but even that being muted it doesn’t matter, the splashes, the sounds, even the shapes and backgrounds of the levels just make everything jump out of the screen.
The music has some playful tunes that become harsher sounding on more difficult levels and the ambient theme inside the lift as your progress up the tower becomes distorted the closer you are to the top, adding to the feel and theme.
The bosses are exciting, the dialogue is interesting and fun and the cutscenes (although not always skippable which is bad) are fairly epic and definitely get you excited especially around the finale.

Side Order is not the very peak of what this series has had to offer but it’s a great, interesting new addition to the series that does feel worthy of being a new separate piece of the Splatoon puzzle just as Salmon Run did before and I hope we see more of this in a Splatoon 4.
Considering the relatively young age of this series it already has its hooks fully in me that seeing the Splatoon 2 characters and the hub again made me feel nostalgic… nostalgic for a console I was actually still playing and a game I still have on my shelf, but that is the power of the world they’ve built.

Side Order for some may be their new favourite mode, others will just want to try it out but I believe all Splatoon fans will at least have a great time ascending to the top of the spire at least once.
For me, I just need to prepare to tell myself enough is enough as I collect every little goodie this DLC has to offer.

This is what you do to yourself when you are a fan of something so deeply, you put money towards something you know is going to be no good. Not on the off chance that it is, but on the off chance it’s fine, “enjoyable enough”.

Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition reaches that low bar.

TFEE is a third-person action adventure with small open-world hubs that you explore as Transformers poster child, Bumblebee.
To briefly explain for the non-transformers marks, Earthspark is the latest TV series which is based in a time after the long war between the Autobots and Decepticons.
In this series, Megatron is a friend of the Autobots and not the big bad villain. Some rebellious Decepticons still exist, either as criminals, having old grudges or whatever - none of that is really relevant to TFEE.
The big spin on things in Earthspark is that the new batch of Transformers this show adds are born on and from Earth, linked to the human protagonists. These are the Terrans.

Post-war Bumblebee, typically the scout and younger member of the crew is the one with seniority and teaches the Terrans everything they need to know about being a Transformer.
The villain of the series is a Dr Meridian also known as Mandroid who uses his smarts and Cybertronian tech for evil.
In TFEE he is believed to be defeated but is somehow about and going to cause some big destructive plan that can only be stopped by the hero Bumblebee collecting three cubes that are part of an Energon Activator from where Mandroid seems to be mining.

In even simpler terms, you play Bumblebee - a yellow robot who becomes a car and you search three different places for magical cubes.

The story is fine, it has some small twists and is written well enough.
I would say the dialogue is good but here are two caveats just to start.
First, the voice acting isn’t bad per-say but it’s based on an existing TV series and the characters do not have the same voice actors and worse still some don’t even sound remotely close to how they do in the show.
Optimus Prime for example sounds nothing like any version of the fatherly figure I am used to hearing, it was so off putting that it caused me to read faster to skip through dialogue as quickly as I could.
The second part is that there are repeated lines. Games used repeated grunts and phrases all the time but the repeated lines are sometimes ones that are particularly long and used again in different levels with large gaps between and it is very jarring - it’s one of many things that feel like this game was cutting as many corners as it could.

The game play is basic, the big positive is the form the game takes - although there is not enough of it.
Bumblebee can drive, jump around and fight enemies across the different small open worlds, finding collectibles, clearly out camps of enemies and doing small side missions for the Terrans who are dotted about each map.
It’s open world gaming boiled down to an early 00’s feel, which isn’t fantastic but is greatly enhanced by unlocking abilities in a Metroidvania style way and encouraging you to dive back for extras… or not. One thing TFEE does well is respect your time, the levels never feel too big, there aren’t hundreds of things to find and it is never too taxing to get to things you can see on the map as long as you have the unlocked abilities to get there.

As a skeleton, the hub leading to a few open worlds with similar missions that add some increasing complexity as you progress is a very good one. Sadly the skin and the insides are of a basic to sometimes rotting quality.

Within these worlds you are doing two main things, fighting and traversing.
Neither of these are offensively bad but they all feel very simple, stripped back and something you’d have expected as a budget game fifteen years ago.

The combat has punch and kick combos, you can unlock more as you progress.
Bumblebee can shoot to fill a stun bar on enemies to get attacks in easier and dodging along with a Witch-Time style upgrade makes you think for all of a nanosecond that this may be as fun to play as Platinum’s Transformers: Devastation.
It is not.
Combos can lock you into odd animations, the feedback from being hit to doing a special attack feels lacking and the special moves you can unlock add virtually nothing, the combos adding a little more than nothing but not enough.

Traversal mostly involves driving which is all done on the left stick, no driving controls or extra buttons outside of a nitro you gain later. It feels acceptable but never good or exciting, it does however feel preferable to the very floaty and imprecise jumping which thankfully the game doesn’t make you do too much of.
Transforming on one button is nice, and the metroidvania-like unlocks are good in their ideas but boring in execution.

A better, further developed game would see things like the one-button conversion be implemented directly into the combat alongside all the bonus abilities, not just the one.
Thankfully the game feels so light and simple that I never felt the combat became completely tedious but I could see many others not feeling the same way and I would totally understand.

Corners don’t feel cut simply in voice acting, combat and exploration.
The graphics are fine, it looks quite basic and I would say “early PS4” but by no means bad.
The sound however, the car hum is unsatisfying, the music outside of the opening menu is virtually non-existent and some of the sounds you have when doing what is meant to be a devastating special attack are pathetic.

Transformers: Earthspark - Expedition is a game with an obviously low budget, aimed at a younger audience with I can only assume the hopes that all is basic gameplay and cut corners won’t go noticed by the kid that just bloody loves them transforming robots.
It is hard for me to call the game terrible, it’s barely bad, really it is just poor - serviceable but lazy.
As a fan you will take things that are less-than if you love the franchise enough. I never once felt bad or annoyed playing the game but thinking about the fact I spent money on this rather than something else makes me regretful.
Looking back on my time with it, it was a fine distraction but to analyse any part of the game is to put it in a bad light.
If you love Transformers, maybe give this game a go but do not spend any “real amount” of money on it because you’ll kick yourself for doing so when there’s so many other much better games out there.

Videoverse is a beautifully written love letter to many things, the early 00’s, the Internet and Video Games themselves.

Taking place during a fictionalised version of 2003, similar to our own, we take some control and see the eyes through the world of 15 year old Emmett or eMMe-T_T as his name presents himself online in a fashion very much of the time.
Born in England but living in Germany, Emmett spends a lot of his time on his gaming machine the Kinmoku Shark - an dual screen, laptop come Wii U type console which he plays his favourite game Feudal Fantasy and engages through an online community via the titular Videoverse.

Although the Shark and the often very similar sounding video games people are playing are fictional, the world itself feels so real and gives a great sense of nostalgia. I’d have been a little older than Emmett in 2003 but I still had similar loves and concerns.
I was a nerd into anime and video games, I had friends online I speak to and see less often than I’d like, really the only difference between then and now is the tech and that I’ve had romantic relationships - something Emmett is clearly interested in and a large potential piece of his story.

The interface of the Shark feels so real, with its own start up theme, advertisement banners around Videoverse, liking, sharing and more with posts. Outside of the machine itself Emmett’s desk has a calendar, a couple of notepads (helpful for the player) and usually food wrappers and a magazine that gives you a greater impression of the greater gaming world outside of Emmett’s desk. I could go on about every little touch, graphic and animation but simply put Videoverse really sells itself as something that has happened and is lived in.

Nostalgia isn’t the only feeling Videoverse has strongly stirred up inside of my soul, at time of writing we’re all probably quite familiar with how Twitter is dying and for some of us, myself included, although not a perfect place - losing it would be a real upset and a hard adjustment to make.
Much like myself with Twitter in real life, Emmett has been on Videoverse for years.
They’re made many friendships there and it is quite possibly their main point of social interaction. This is where the drama comes in, as much like Twitter seems to be going the way of the Dodo the Videoverse site, which again is like a - twitter, discord, Wii U Miiverse-alike, is closing down.
Within the game’s universe, it isn’t because an idiot billionaire has taken it over and run it into the ground but much like the Wii U, a clear inspiration on the game, the Shark is being replaced by a new console - The Dolphin.

Alongside the new generation of console is the closing of Videoverse for “Ocean Online” and that uncertainty of the future, what may be lost with the change due to a whole manner of things, be it financial, general interest or whatever else causes some turmoil in Emmett’s life and many others.

Videoverse’s main view is a group of Miiverse looking communities that people can post words, pictures and which can be liked and replied to. There are four groups that Emmett interacts with, one off-topic and one general but a pair linked to his interests in Feudal Fantasy and art.
These community forums are very reminiscent of what you may see in real life, people clearly making friendships, others being antagonistic to straight up problematic, people airing their drama and people just wanting to have fun and having little idea about what else is going on.
Your control here is liking posts where you see fit, making new posts or replies based on a trio of choices and hitting that report button on what you would like to see less of.

To talk over every scenario would spoil the game, but the game deals extremely realistically with every possible Internet drama you could imagine and although you do not completely shape this world your interactions will directly push you into (or out) of specific scenarios with occasionally heart-wrenching and thought provoking outcomes.

Without spoiling every one of them, one of the other main points of interaction are between Emmett and the wonderfully realised characters from friends to regular posters.
Some of these Emmett will go away from the forum and privately chat, with the Shark having a personal messenger that uses text and a webcam.
Emmett will get conversational choices as the chats move on, sometimes with locked options depending on how your Emmett has acted.
These parts paint great amounts of colour into the world, his friends which you can be as warm or cold to as you like will act differently according to what you’ve said and how you’ve interacted with the public side of Videoverse.

Between these two parts of Videoverse and Emmett’s fandom of art and Feudal Fantasy, he discovers and befriends someone new named ViVi.
Much like any interaction with new people online this sees Emmett faced with many questions, of who they are, where they’re from, their gender, their age, profession and more.
As you’d expect most of these mysteries are quickly answered by befriending ViVi but that leads to the even more grounded feeling of showing yourself, maintaining a friendship, dealing with expectations, your own values and more.

Much like I said the world of Videoverse feels real and lived in, so do these interactions.
There’s a strange nostalgia as although these are Emmett’s experiences they feel much like ones that I have had and I imagine reflect things from the developer Lucy Blundell’s past too (something that could also be delved into more but I already know the word count here is going to be high).

Throughout the game there are twists and turns, all dramatic but realistic, at times I felt truly upset, annoyed, happy, gutted and more and this is all down to how well everyone is written and realised and how grounded this fictional world really is.
The only points where the game really threw some barriers between my connection with (or as) Emmett was when he would say things without choices that I would have left unsaid or not even thought about - an issue that is realistically impossible to fully get over, after all we are playing a role of this 15 year old lad, we are not actually them, but one that does not stop feeling bad when things don’t play out how we’d like.

It is easy to categorise Videoverse as a Visual Novel.
VN’s are a genre that I enjoy but have struggled with when it comes to lack of interaction but Videoverse absolutely nails its pacing and flow in story and gameplay.
Checking the forums each day, liking posts, making replies and responding to interactions feel engrossing in the way any social media platform does when it is at its best.
You gain some endorphins on the way not only from the responses the game gives you but the small themes you unlock on the way and all of this is just tasty filler between deeper private conversations with a whole game wrapped in small cutscenes from Feudal Fantasy that give Emmett’s life more realistic structure and also keeps involved in his universe just that little more.

Peaking at the game's trophies it is wonderful to see that so many decisions can branch off in very different ways. Once I was done however this did make me feel a little torn.
I don’t care so much about checking those lists off but much like looking at my own past it made me wonder about the “what ifs” and whether I would actually change decisions or not and because this is a video game and I can at least see those, I was very tempted to but - will I?

It’s a double edged sword having these types of narratives forks in the road. I love that my Emmett may not be the same as someone else’s, but the tease of the possibilities blocked by the time it would take to see them is a nasty cut to the heart.

In conclusion, I loved Videoverse. This truly deserved to be placed in many people’s top games of 2023. Looking at my own, the nearest thing was Paranormasight and whilst I prefer that game for its spooky themes and presentation, Videoverse made me feel more, kept my attention better and in general is an easier recommendation.

A completely inoffensive little puzzle game that gives The Room vibes (the video game not the Tommy Wiseau joint).
Free on Epic games, I played this over three days but could see mobile being the better format for it by adding a little extra enjoyment to the whole thing with a small sense of tactility.

To sum Doors up, you have little Door based dioramas that you can interact with, pick up items such as levers and keys, find where they are placed, turn or twist and so on until the door opens and you’re done. Each stage has two hidden gems and a scroll to add a little more challenge or replayability to the bitesize puzzles and collecting those gems unlocks extra stages at the end of each chapter for a total of just under sixty “door-o-ramas” to enjoy.

Doors strength outside of being a nice breezy experience is the inventiveness in some of its stages, themes ranging from steampunk to ancient aztec to pirates and more give some interactions you wouldn’t have expected and a somewhat fresh experience each time.
I say somewhat because the level of the puzzles is very simple and also quite similar, matching puzzles, tile sliding etc.

A weakness however in Doors is its attempt at a narrative, unlocked through reading scrolls. It’s all quite vague, “Chaos vs Order” and really just feels unnecessary. I can see the inspiration from The Room here but whilst the plot was never the biggest draw of that series it actually felt intriguing and not like total filler.
Another small annoyance, a specific issue for me and my terrible short term memory is that there is no mark on the screen for whether you’ve found the scroll or either gem.
These tasks are so small there feels like no reason to pass them, but getting through a stage to find that actually, you didn’t get the blue gem, because a lot of it blends together in the mind is truly an irritation that would be overcome by the smallest of UI.
Lastly some interactions via clicking feel either too precise or imprecise, giving you the assumption that you can’t do something you can or whipping you around the diorama because you’ve hit a pixel through a gap to the otherside.
These annoyances are all very small and not deal breakers but they do damage an otherwise extremely relaxed experience.

If you’re a fan of The Room or just want a small puzzly game to fiddle with in bitesize chunks, Doors: Paradox is worth a go.
Free on Epic and free but with in-app purchases on the phone (it may be broken down into three titles on that format) is the best price for it.

For a good while now I have made it evident that I am huge fan of the Zero Escape games, I have persuaded many friends to play, go back to or even stream the game series and it easily sits within the echelon of GOATs for me, including my top 5 games here on backloggd.

AI: The Somnium Files, was a game I was very excited for - bought on launch (or thereabouts) and whilst it didn’t hit quite the right notes for me, I did thoroughly enjoy it.
Since then I’ve been chasing that Zero Escape level of enjoyment.
I started the Danganronpa series, which I feel off of for a combination of reasons. Watched more Japanese and Korean crime tv. The nearest anything has got to it was 2023’s Paranormasight.

So, why has it taken me so long to play nirvanA Initiative? Honestly, I have no good reason.
Sometimes games pass you by and for me wanting to pick it up after launch it took me a while before finding it at a price, I was happy to pay for an “old” game. Told you I had no good reason.

I’ll start here as I speak about the game by saying, I really enjoyed it. The first AI didn’t really stick with me, but this one has me much more excited to spread the good word and I think thanks to Uchikoshi pulling a few more Zero Escape style tricks, this game will be on I think about for a while.

AI 2 takes place in the same universe as the first, a near-future world with many similarities to our own but with some key differences in the jobs and technology our protagonists are involved with.
In this title we get a duo of protagonists in part due to Special Agent Kaname Date from the first title taking his holidays. Instead, we play as Kuroto Ryuki and the Date’s adopted daughter Mizuki. They’re job is the same as Date’s before, they work for “ABIS” the Advanced Brain Investigation Squad - in short they are police but also “Psyncers”.
If like me you enjoyed The Minority Report, with its precrime etc. you’ll enjoy AI’s main gimmick.
To put it simply the Somnium of the games’ title refers to a dreamscape, Somnium being Latin for dream after all. The agents can “psync” with someone to explore their dreams, see things from their past or unveil secrets they may be hiding.

The Somnium as a game device is genius before we even think about it mechanically.
It allows the game to give us very interesting and varied locations to explore that don’t need to make sense as they all follow dream logic.
Secondly, because these are dreams of an individual, we get the narrative device or unreliable narrators throughout as to how things may look or seem are from the dreamer’s perspective.
Without spoiling the plot or the many surprises this game has I can confidently say that these Somnium spaces will go places you do not expect, some fun, some dark, but all entertaining.
Within these different mechanics can be bought in and thrown away and the game itself can even slightly change its own themes and genre due to them.

The other main gimmick of the AI games are the AI-balls themselves.
Date’s partner Aiba returns in the left socket of Mizuki, while we are introduced to Tama - Ryuki’s partner.
These little AI robot-things give our main protagonists skills in the outside world, some things like zooms, video playback, x-ray vision and more to make them better detectives and give a great in-world reason to give the player lots of varied and interesting tools to solve things or simply engage with the story.
Within Somnium is where we control Aiba or Tama as they are the ones to physically (if we can call it that) navigate those dreamscapes.

Outside of the Somnium we also get VR sections, where the AI-ball can fully recreate a crime scene so that the detectives can check things without interference and in-game allow them to recreate what they conclude has happened to better understand it and show it to the person playing.
Where Somnium has its own rules and very strange, sometimes whacky interactions, the VR crime scenes feel a little more grounded and straight-faced… to a degree.

I say to a degree because one thing that I am not the biggest fan of but at times did enjoy is AI’s comedy. There’s a lot of gags, some great comedic dialogue and strange characters but the thing that typically puts me off is the weird-horniness that I have felt creeps far too often into any narrative based Japanese game.

The horniness is still here, you can see it straight off the bat with a lot of the character designs.
In the first title Date had a “porno-power” gag that at best made me smirk, which thankfully is mostly not here but that doesn’t stop many conversations leaning towards people being perverts or being accused of it.
Everyone is going to have a different line with how much of that type of comedy they will be ok with and the fact I mention it shows that I have a line but I would say this game rarely crossed it.
In fact it does many things that I was pleasantly surprised by, that being its handling of romance and also LGTBQ+ people.
I will also state clearly here that I don’t believe the horniness ever gets in the way of the many serious conversations and subject matters the game hits upon - which is a fear I have when playing something like this that I am enjoying.

To step back into speaking about the protagonists, again without any major spoilers, the game has two characters because the main plot involves a story, the HB case, in which Ryuki and a younger Mizuki were involved with and the serial killer seems to return six years later - where we get to investigate as an older Mizuki (with Aiba).
The HB case is the Half Body murders. It is as strange as it sounds and leads you into meeting a vast array of people and friends from the past, including a failing comedian, children from an orphanage, gene-scientists and cult leaders.
If you enjoyed Zero Escape for its, let’s call it education, then you will enjoy this too as this game uses many different ideas, historical happenings and philosophies that you will feel you have to go down a wiki hole about them - thankfully the game itself also contains a file on trivia, a highlight for me as there are multiple pages that explain wrestling moves.

AI 2 isn’t without faults, thankfully most of these sit within the boring technical side of things.
I played this on Switch and had four separate crashes to Home. The game gave saves often and ZR allows you to fast forward so it never took too much time getting back to the point I was at but obviously it’s less than ideal and can really break the immersion.
The other two much smaller technical issues that can break immersion also are the characters, specifically their heads in the lower-third to show who is speaking would sometimes have glitchy things like bouncy or clipping strands of hair. The second is the frame rate, this game isn’t one where that matters greatly but either when showing videos, transitioning in and out of Somnium and sometimes when changing those talking heads - the game visibly chugs.

The other fault for me is that the combat sequences, while kind of fun are more often than expected, narratively play out almost the same every time and the QTEs are just crap.
They’re never too taxing but they also don’t have a great logic to when they do and don’t appear and really don’t add anything to the scenes except a chance to fail and have to repeat.
Admittedly you can change the difficulty but I simply don’t think it’s an element this game even needs.

Overall AI The Somnium Files: nirvanA Initiative is fantastic, especially so if you are Uchikoshi-pilled like me. It’s a great story, with amazing twists, wonderful characters and a believable if sometimes silly world that will make you think about it once you’re done.
It has a decent amount of in-game rewards and achievements if that is something you crave and come in at a reasonable playtime of 20 hours give or take a few depending on how quick you are to solve things and how much you want to dig.

Finally getting around to AI2 makes me feel good, as I look at the past and towards the future.
I look at the past and now consider even more heavily trying some of Kotaro Uchikoshi’s previous VN series, and I look forward to the future as this shows that Zero Escape was not a complete fluke and that we can get more of that same goodness I crave.