DENNIS GAGLIARDOTTO
Solo: Islands of the Heart Review
The idea of experiencing your limited days with someone as you adventure through life, finding solitude, and continuing your legacy through the generations that follow… Solo: Islands of the Heart explores the theme of love on a personal level, and while it’s a well-intentioned game that explores love on a level more personal than other games that have tackled the subject, its lack of variety in puzzles and heavy performance issues make for an experience that elicits a feeling of animosity rather than endearment.
Sairento VR Review
Sairento VR takes some of the best ideas from various science fiction properties and puts them all into a mission-driven, frenetic, and stylish experience that puts players into the shoes of Chieko Hatsuri to live out their cybernetic ninja action flick with plenty of adrenaline pumping moments and satisfying choreography.
Layers of Fear 2 Review
Layers of Fear 2, much like the first, does such a great job at keeping you uncomfortable as you go through the tale of a troubled actor, that every moment is felt like intense improvisation as you try to quickly decipher what to do next before the walls around you seemingly close in, making Layers of Fear 2 a worth successor to the first, which is arguably the most elaborate "haunted mansion"-esque experience to date.
A Plague Tale: Innocence Review
Titles like The Last of Us, the recent Tomb Raider titles, God of War, Telltale's Walking Dead series, Life is Strange, and classics like Haunting Grounds and Silent Hill are considered deep and evocative experiences that have connected with us for years and continue to be talked about, but an important aspect that all of these share and the reason why they latch onto us is down to one thing: companionship. A Plague Tale: Innocence is very much in the same vein as these, following the lives of siblings Amicia and Hugo as they try to survive what we would know in history as the beginnings of the Hundred Years' War and Black Plague.
Moero Chronicle Hyper Review
Almost six years to the date, JRPG and dungeon enthusiasts around the world can finally experience Moero Chronicle in the form of Moero Chronicle Hyper on the Nintendo Switch instead of importing an English copy on Vita. While the game may sound or look updated at face value, however, there isn't much of a difference from how it originally was, and this includes the enhanced port on PC in 2017.
Corpse Party: Sweet Sachiko's Hysteric Birthday Bash Review
Seven years after its initial release in Japan, the rest of the world can finally experience the one Corpse Party title that was elusive to most of us for so long. Sweet Sachiko's Hysteric Birthday Bash is different yet familiar, bringing back all that's made Corpse Party so great for decades, but this time with the stipulation that we must do a romantic comedy or die.
The Caligula Effect: Overdose Review
Fast-forward to 2019 and Caligula Effect loses its Vita exclusivity and makes its presence known now on Nintendo Switch and PlayStation 4 as The Caligula Effect: Overdose. Surely with an increase in power on both of these systems, all the issues that held the Vita version back should be cleaned up and addressed, but unfortunately all we really get here is a feeling of déjà vu made to be covered up by a new story route, avatar, and content that are practically negligible.
Death end re;Quest Review
Death end re;Quest finds itself touching upon the idea of what it would be like to truly find yourself in one to the point where receptors and any action you take mirrors the real world on a neural level, but with a more scary twist than the typical "what if we get stuck in here?" scenario by implementing the idea of a game so early in development it's filled to the brim with bugs - some of which could have corrosive and fatal effects in-game and out.
Gungrave VR Review
With its short length and bare-bones approach to VR tech and gameplay, Gungrave VR doesn't offer much to breakdown and take away as it feels uninspired and more of a way to bring the name back into the modern age for the sake of publicity and remembrance than any kind of merit.
Persona Dancing: Endless Night Collection Review
Persona Dancing: Endless Night Collection is the ultimate package for fans of the Persona and Shin Megami Tensei series to celebrate a history of some of the greatest and unique music to ever appear in a role-playing game. Having a great cast of characters from decades of adventures and stories crossover and dance is as goofy as it is exciting and enthralling, and with some of the finest music around, it makes perfect sense for Persona to revisit the dancefloor just like it was done for Persona 4 Dancing back on Vita in 2015 not with just one or two, but THREE massive releases compiled into one beautiful package that rivals the discography of some of music's most iconic artists.
Corpse Party: Book of Shadows (2018 PC Release) Review
For nearly two decades after its initial release, Corpse Party has remained unique in its design, characters, and perception of horror that is still unparalleled to this day. From the ever evolving lore to the personalized experience each game gives you, Corpse Party sticks with those that play it with tailor-made playthroughs and memorable moments that are as shocking and sad as they are mysterious and profound.
Home Sweet Home Review
What Home Sweet Home does within the genre is almost a blend of what works and doesn't work within the genre - a mix of playing it safe, trying out new ideas, and executions in some areas that may or may not have worked out. Home Sweet Home is unique in what it tries to do and the inspiration behind its Thai folklore helps, but in a lot of cases it finds itself bordering a forgetful experience that starts off strong but quickly becomes a frustrating and unrewarding mess.
METAL MAX Xeno Review
With Humanity on the brink of extinction, its unique view on how technology ruined the world - almost Horizon Zero Dawn-esque - keeps things intriguing for the player throughout, and while the world is empty - understandably so - that feeling of hopelessness and scarcity lingers with the player as they traverse through Dystokio.
Walden, a game Review
It is without a doubt that throughout American history, Henry David Thoreau is one of the most recognizable names in classic novels alongside George Orwell, Mark Twain, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Thoreau's Walden, which dates way back to the 1850s, seems like one of the last things you'd expect to be adapted into a video game, yet the small team at USC Games managed to pull off a decent game that gives the book more depth, serving almost as an educational and interactive companion to making Walden a more personal and relatable experience.
Heroine Anthem ZERO Review
Who sang the song that calmed the seas? Heroine Anthem ZERO is a stunning game that has lots of great qualities about it and gets you interested from the get-go of its adventure thanks to its captivating art and score that caresses your ears and eyes and makes you feel warm all around, and while the adventure at its core is a delight, the mechanics and gameplay of Heroine Anthem ZERO unfortunately diminish the experience and ultimately leaves more frustration than pleasure.
Gravel Review
Gravel sees Milan-based racing enthusiasts and developers Milestone SRL come back to the off-road and showcase their expertise in a title that favors a more arcade approach to the off-road experience, having an almost Sega Rally Championship vibe fused with a bit of Dirt - two amazing series that I feel sometimes get overlooked on the topic of some of racing's best. Milestone SRL is certainly no stranger to racing titles either. These guys have done nothing but, in fact, giving us majority of the MotoGP and WRC series. While Gravel has some of the best track designs I've seen in a long time that keep it consistently fun, the overall presentation of the game keeps it from becoming a game you should undoubtedly pay attention to.
Dynasty Warriors 9 Review
Dynasty Warriors 9 is a fresh take on the long running series, giving it a more expansive environment thanks to its new open-world approach, as well as tons of characters and weapons to choose from in a historical setting that, outside of Assassin's Creed, is unfortunately rarely seen. While it's great to see games like this have a different outlook to keep things from getting stagnant and predictable, the open-world focus of Dynasty Warriors 9 ends up doing it more harm than good.
Tokyo Tattoo Girls Review
Tokyo Tattoo Girls is misleading in a lot of ways. For those like me that saw the trailer earlier in the year, we were all a little dumbfounded as to what exactly was going on. It just showed slideshows of the characters in the game that would occasionally switch to a shot of them getting tattooed. Makes sense I guess, I mean, these are girls. In Tokyo. Getting tattoos. The name speaks for itself, but unfortunately, beyond this and what was shown - or the lack of it for that matter - there isn't much beyond that.
Cyberdimension Neptunia: 4 Goddesses Online Review
Nep-Nep and the gang of console inspired heroines return to bring players into a brand new landscape of virtual MMO goodness that takes inspiration from the likes of .hack and Sword Art Online while of course having that Neptunia charm players have grown accustomed to over the years. While many Neptunia games have either seen simultaneous releases with the Vita or future ports, Cyberdimension Neptunia: 4 Goddesses Online is built from the ground up for the PlayStation 4 and makes sure to deliver a Neptunia experience unlike ever before, with fresh combat, increased quality in animations, and so much more without having to dial things down a bit for parity.
Trulon: The Shadow Engine Review
Taking the simplistic and inevitably addictive nature of card games and incorporating them into an RPG sounds like a great time to be had, giving the feeling of, "What if Yu-Gi-Oh! was an adventure game or something along the lines of the Pokemon Trading Card Game on Gameboy Color, but for the modern age on current-gen consoles", and while Trulon: The Shadow Engine does well to give a bite-sized RPG, its use of cards isn't so much a focal point as you'd expect, and comes with a lot of technical mishaps along the way.