Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

Symphony of the Night was the game that had everything. Quick combat, exploration, aesthetic style, RPG elements without merciless grind, and a variety of combat styles to tinker with. It is rightfully remembered as one half of the games that have an entire genre named after them, to the degree where even if you haven’t…

Warhammer Quest 2: The End Times

Sometimes, keeping it simple is best. And nothing is more simple than a turn based strategy game without strategy. Perhaps that’s being a little harsh on Warhammer Quest 2, but it’s not being inaccurate. The concept is incredibly simple- you go into dungeons, you open rooms which have enemies, you kill those enemies and then…

Trails of Cold Steel III

Contrary to popular belief with jrpg developers, pacing is important, doubly so in the first five hours of any game. I have to give them credit though, they stuffed about as much anime cliché into those first five hours as the lovechild of Naruto and Gundamball Z. Upon first impressions, I was inclined to call…

Super Neptunia RPG

Parody is one of the easiest forms of comedy to understand. You take an existing cliché, trope or caricature and make a satiric mockery of it. With the amount of redundancy in the video game industry, the Neptunia series has lots of material to work with, which leads me to the question of why it…

Fell Seal: Arbiter’s Mark

As someone who ranks Final Fantasy Tactics as the best game on the PSX, and loves the turn based strategy RPG genre, there’ve been only a few games to be happy about in the decades since. I don’t think I’ll see another one of that classic style that can truly compare, but at least I’ve…

Sword and Fairy 6

Final Fantasy XIII ended up being one of those love it or hate it games, changing up many aspects of the series that had been fairly recognizable at least up until X-2. While we’ve seen indie studios attempt to replicate just about every sort of Square Enix game under the sun in recent years, several…

Vaporum

When I first heard of this game my impression was Lands of Lore meets Bioshock, and while the game proves itself a homage to the latter in spades it is more heavily weighted towards hidden objects and puzzles than combat. The first thing you’ll notice when starting the game is the plethora of customization options…

Disgaea 1 Complete

Fifteen years later, and this game is still as enjoyable as the first time. If you’ve played it before, this is the Afternoon of Darkness port with upgraded graphics; which adds several additional demon types, multiple extra characters to recruit, and Etna mode which consists of a story from her perspective and is about a…