The Silver Case Review

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Release Date: April 11th, 2017
Developer: Grasshopper Manufacture
Platforms: PS4 and PC
Price: (PC) $19.99 / (PS4) $29.99

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Visual novels are just gaining steam here in North America, but they've been a staple in Japanese gaming. The Silver Case, which was originally developed by Grasshopper Manufacture in 1999 for the PlayStation, adds a little extra flair to the genre by including first-person point-and-click adventure style gameplay. 

The game takes place over the course of five different cases all which are somehow related to the legendary serial killer, Kamui Uehara. The game is divided into two different scenarios: Transmitter and Placebo. Transmitter follows a rookie cop who joins the 24 Districts Police Department while Placebo follows reporters who are piecing together details to write about the Transmitter events. At first, I thought that the Placebo portion was just a small little side thing, but it actually helps expand on the events of the main story and definitely deserves to be played. 

One of the interesting things about The Silver Case is the fact that it's an HD remaster of a PS1 game. When playing, it almost feels like you're playing a new game that's trying to be retro. With PS2 or PS3 remasters they can easily be modified to look like a modern game, but PS1 games were all blocky and weird looking. With that being said, this adds to the charm of The Silver Case and makes for a unique experience. 

The controls in The Silver Case definitely took some getting used to. You have to press triangle to bring up a menu and select an action. This is something that you have to do whenever you want to move, interact with something in your inventory, or look at something. This is one of the drawbacks that could potentially happen when you remaster an old game. 

While the majority of the game does a good job moving you along, there are a few parts that define the word tedious. There is a part particularly towards the end, where you have to thoroughly investigate 10 towers. All the towers have the same layout, but it's very easy to miss something. Furthermore, every time you enter a tower you have to pull up your menu, select move and then move forward. Ideally "move" would just always be the default setting, but that is not the case. 

Another thing that might turn people off is that The Silver Case is pretty vulgar. We keep The Gamers Lounge family friendly so I won't write any of the words here, but it will be interesting to see how people feel about the language when they play it. There are even a few sexist parts, which I personally feel is actually about the characters and their behavior, than a reflection on the developers. The main reason I am bringing all of this up is because it shows how different games were in 1999 and even how different games are Japan. This is refreshing though, because it's nice to know that the developers kept the game in its original form. 

Overall Grasshopper Manufacture's remastered version of their first game will take you about 15 hours to complete. For anyone who is a fan of Suda 51 and company, or if you're looking for a game that gives a unique experience, The Silver Case is definitely worth a playthrough. 

Pros: 

• Interesting Story
• Unique experience
• Rich characters

Cons:

• Can be tedious
• Controls are outdated

The Silver Case was reviewed on the PlayStation 4. Thank you to NIS for providing us with the code.

FATED: The Silent Oath Review

Mass VR is still relatively new, which means that we are going to see a lot of experiments and different approaches to types of games. FATED: The Silent Oath minimizes gameplay and focuses more on an interactive cinematic experience that puts the player right in the middle of a beautiful 3D animated movie. 

In the beginning of FATED, you find yourself on a carriage near death. A god comes to you and tells you that she will trade you your life for your voice, meaning that going forward the only way you can communicate is by nodding yes or no. This way of interacting felt new to me although I don't think very much changes based on your choices. 

As the story starts to develop, you begin to discover that the lives of everyone you know have been shattered by the return of angry ancient gods. Everyone in the town, including your family, is feeling a sense of dread, so it's your mission to bring everyone together while protecting your family. 

As I mentioned before FATED is more focused on a cinematic experience rather than gameplay, but the few gameplay moments all work incredibly well. You'll find yourself hunting for food, driving a horse and carriage, and solving a few puzzles over FATED's five acts. While none of these parts are extremely long or very challenging, it does help to push the story forward. 

Another nice aspect is that graphically FATED is one of the best PSVR games that I've played. The scenery is gorgeous and the characters have a cartoon quality that's a bit Pixar-esque. The only drawback is that this experience lasts just over an hour, so while you may fall in love with the world FATED does end a bit too early. Without spoiling anything, I, unfortunately, have to say that when the game ended I was completely caught off guard. A major dramatic event takes place then the credits roll leaving you wondering what happened? It honestly feels like the end of a TV episode and that you have to tune in the next week to find out what's going to happen to these people that you've become attached to. This is a real bummer because the entire game is focused on the story and to come up short really hurts the experience. I even played the fifth act a few times to see if there were multiple endings just to be sure, but I always got the same results. 

FATED: The Silent Oath does a great job introducing the concept of interactive cinematic experiences to the PSVR, but with the abrupt ending it feels more like a long tech demo rather than a complete game. The world is gorgeous, the interactions work well, but you will most likely be let down by the ending. 

3.25 stars out of 5

Thank you to Frima Studio for providing us with the code. 

Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin Review

The PlayStation VR was easily one of the more anticipated pieces of technology last year. There were plenty of reasons to get excited about it, but since the launch, there haven't been too many must-have games. Fortunately, Double Fine has stepped up to the plate and hit a homerun with Psychonauts In The Rhombus of Ruin. 

The story takes place after the events of the original Psychonauts where we find out that the Grand Head of the Psychonauts Truman Zanotto, has been kidnapped. The main character, Raz, and the rest of the crew discover that Truman is being held in underwater at the Rhombus of Ruin, a former Psychonauts lab. On their way, their ship crashes and the crew is separated. Raz has to use his psychic abilities to gather his powers and save Truman Zanotto.

Right from the beginning, you can tell that a lot of time and effort went into creating the world. There are an impressive amount of fine details that most other VR games seem to neglect. At one point I picked up a record and flipped it around to find an actual tracklisting for this fake album. These little inclusions make feel like you're a part of the world rather than a spectator. I feel that I have a lot of experience in VR and there were even times where I almost reached out to grab something that was in front of me. 

The gameplay is a lot different than the previous Psychonauts. Instead of being a 3D platformer you use Raz's clairvoyance ability to jump into and out of the minds of the surrounding people or creatures. In fact, you don't walk around at all, and to interact with objects or to jump in the mind of something you simply look at them press a button. The game essentially plays like a point-and-click adventure, where you have to solve puzzles moving objects or combining certain objects. None of the puzzles are overly difficult and with a little bit of trial and error you'll figure them out in no time. 

As I mentioned before, to interact with things you have to look at them and press a button on the controller. This generally works fine, but there were a few times where I really felt like I had to stretch my neck and turn my head quite a bit to discover where I had to go to next. This was really the only issue that I had over the three and a half hours that it took me to complete Rhombus of Ruin. 

Overall, if you're looking for a new PlayStation VR game, I couldn't recommend Psychonauts in the Rhombus of Ruin enough. The world that Double Fine created is amazing and the characters are as lovable as they've always been. Do yourself a favor and pick this game up!

4.75 out of 5 stars

Thank you very much to Double Fine for providing us with the code.

Tales of Berseria Review

The Tales series is back with another installment, but things are a lot darker than they've ever been before. The story features a young woman named Velvet who is raising her little brother, Laphicet. One day when Velvet is away from her home the town is struck by a daemonblight that turns all of the citizens into "daemons" (prounced demons.) Amongst the chaos, Laphicet goes missing. Velvet tracks him down to only find that her brother-in-law Artorius is sacrificing Laphicet as a part of a ritual. Artorius attempts to sacrifice Velvet, but she is able to fight him off. Unfortunately for Velvet, she was somewhat affected by the daemonblight and is partially turned into a daemon. Velvet then sets out to avenge her brother and kill Artorius. 

One of the highlights of the Tales series has always been the combat system. While a lot of JRPGs use a variation of turn-based combat, Tales of Berseria uses a live-action system that is much more frantic than other RPGs. You also have four people total that are fighting with three of them working completely independently. You can adjust their behavior with a simple button command, but this never felt necessary. Additionally, Berseria doesn't use mana for special abilities, but rather a Soul Gauge that depletes as an ability is used and regenerates as you either stun an enemy, kill an enemy, or just over time. This unique system is great when you're kicking butt, but can be a pain when fighting a stronger enemy. I appreciate it when any developer attempts to freshen up old mechanics, but I wouldn't miss this system it if it didn't show up in the next game. Your companions also use this.

One of the big drawbacks that I felt with Berseria is that the fights, for the most part, are incredibly easy on the normal difficulty. Unlike other JRPGs you can see the enemies in the field and can choose to either fight them or ignore them. It's logical to think that you should fight every enemy so you can level up, but the fact is that you can do a minimal amount of encounters and be fine. There were times where I was working my way through a dungeon and discovered that I was absolutely dominating every enemy. After a while, I became bored with encounters and just wanted to advance the story. I'd recommend that after about 10 hours if you find Berseria to be too easy, that you should either increase the difficulty or switch to any character other than Velvet. You can always switch back later.

Speaking of the other characters, you eventually have six people to choose from. One thing I really enjoyed about this is that the majority of your characters are in your party within about 12 hours of starting the game. This doesn't cause any inconvenience later on down the road of someone joining your party at say 30 hours, meaning that you have to buy all new gear for them or start leveling up their skills. Each character has a set of "Artes" and the more they use specific Artes, the better they become. This is also true for equipment. There's actually a lot to level up in Berseria, but most of it just happens naturally without needing to pay attention to what you're doing so you don't need to focus on it. 

As I mentioned before, the dungeons are pretty massive. There are tons of corridors, breakable walls, and puzzles that you have to run through. Now, when I say "dungeons" you get the image of some dark, dank scary place, but in Berseria most of the dungeons are actually outside. Aesthetically this is a nice change of pace because it's more fun to run around a beautiful forest than a dingy cave, right? One issue is that one of the puzzles is repeated a few times and it's kind of a pain. There are color coded floating objects that you have to touch to deactivate colored doors. The issue is that when you change one color you activate another, so this may mean that you need to run back to another part of the dungeon to deactivate another color. This wouldn't be bad if it was just one dungeon that did this, but there are at least three where this happens. No one likes doing the same puzzle mechanics over and over and I am not an exception.

The story itself will take you around 50 hours to complete, but there are plenty of things to do outside of the story. There are mini-games, side quests and an awesome real-time ship simulator where you can find ingredients to cook with. Cooking is actually a pretty awesome feature that allows you to get extra perks, as well as automatically heal yourself during combat, as long as you reach certain perimeters. I definitely recommend partaking in the extras because the benefits are absolutely worth it. The story also features an amazing amount of hand drawn anime cutscenes that are always fun to watch.

Overall, Tales of Berseria is a good game for people who are both experienced and inexperienced with JRPGs. The fact that the storyline is much darker than any of the previous installments will excite people who are looking for something that breaks away from the usual "good guy" story. 

3.5 out of 5 stars.

Thank you to Bandi-Namco for providing the code. 

Dexed Review

If you happen to be a PSVR owner you know that the library of games is fairly limited. At launch, it looked promising, but it's slowed down quite a bit. Lucky for PSVR owners, Ninja Theory, who is developing the much-anticipated Hellblade, supported PSVR with their latest release, Dexed. 

Dexed is a rail shooter where you use fire and ice to defeat enemies. The concept is simple enough - ice kills fire, fire kills ice, but as you may expect, it's not always that easy. The main goal of Dexed is to get the highest score possible. If you accidentally shoot ice at an ice enemy, your score will freeze and if you shoot fire at a fire enemy your score will burn and decrease dramatically. 

There are a total of five levels (including a boss fight) that can be played on easy, normal, and hard. You will have no trouble completing the entire Dexed experience in a little over 30 minutes. The first time I played a level I played it on easy, but for the next four levels, I played it on hard. This didn't make Dexed all that difficult because you can't die or lose, but there is that added pressure of trying to destroy every enemy to get the highest score possible. 

Although I finished the game fairly quickly, I did go back and play levels over and over to try to improve my scores. Dexed is a fun enough experience that you would want to play through it more than once and it would be a great game to compete against one of your friends on the leaderboards. The trophies in Dexed are also pretty tough, so if that's your sort of thing you'll find even more replayability. 

Overall Dexed is short but does offer a great amount of replayability.  Dexed is currently $9.99 on the PlayStation store which is the perfect price point, especially if you're looking a new PSVR game. 

3.5 out of 5 Stars

Thank you to Ninja Theory for providing the code. 

Robinson: The Journey Review

Crytek is known for making visually stunning games, so I was pretty excited when I found out they making a game for the PlayStation VR. Robinson: The Journey is an exploration puzzle game that takes place on a distant planet that's covered with dinosaurs. You, your floating AI HIGS unit, and your pet Tyrannosaurus, Laika will work together to try to discover what happened to your ship, as well as sending out emergency signals out into the universe. 

Graphically, Robinson: The Journey looks as good as a game possibly can on the PS VR, but unfortunately the hardware restricts Robinson: The Journey from really shining. With that being said, Crytek has done a wonderful job creating a rich prehistoric world. One of the things that you can do is collect information on a variety of different creatures using an item that looks sort of like a move wand. In most games, this might be a drag because it feels like a pointless collectible, but in Robinson, it feels like it would be a necessity for actual survival. 

The world isn't that large, but the variety in scenery makes up for a lack of areas to explore. When you are inside the area you will get hints from your HIGS unit, but outside of that, you are pretty much on your own. There are no breadcrumbs or mission indicators that hold your hand to your next objective - you are truly living in this world and must figure out what to do next. This can be both frustrating and rewarding. The sooner that you're on your own the more you will start to enjoy Robinson: The Journey. 

The puzzles in the game are pretty straight forward. You'll either use the HIGS unit to distribute power to different items, use Laika to scare dinosaurs into moving where you want them to go or dropping items, or use the item that looks like a move want to pick up objects and move them. You might also be able to say that there are puzzles that have to do with the actual act of exploring. When you are climbing trees or scaling mountains you'll find that there are multiple paths. Some of these will lead you to your goal and others will lead you to a dead end. This is a nice touch because it makes Robinson a lot less linear. 

The entire experience can take anywhere between 3-5 hours depending on how much exploring you do. If you take your time and collect all the data on the animals it will take you over 5 hours. Anywhere between 3 and 5 hours is the perfect amount of time for any VR game, but what makes Robinson: The Journey tough to recommend at the current digital price of $59.99, but GameStop and Amazon both sell the physical version for $39.99 and I think that is the perfect price. 

Overall score 3.75 out of 5. 

Thanks to Crytek for providing the code.

The Assembly Review

Whether or not you are a believer in the staying power of virtual reality, it is here now and we must embrace it. The early games that we're going to experience may not always be the most mind blowing experiences, but what we are seeing is paving the way to the future. The Assembly by nDreams is a game that introduces a deep narrative that follows two characters through the end of one journey and the beginning of another. 

When we are first introduced to the characters we find out that they are both scientists. Caleb Pearson and Madeline Stone are both at a critical time in their lives when they must make a serious decision that will not only affect them, but possibly change the world. Caleb is working on trying to escape The Assembly, while Madeline is attempting to become their newest scientist. 

Both Caleb and Madeline have very different styles of gameplay. As Caleb, you are attempting to smuggle out classified material. This takes a lot of thinking and discovering all while making sure that no one finds out. Luckily, there are no real stealth elements to the game and it's pretty much narrative driven. This keeps the player going forward in a story that you really want to find out more about. Madeline's story is a little darker and is more like a puzzle game. You must pass trials and make moral decisions that will greatly impact your character's future. 

The Assembly uses the Dualshock 4 and doesn't have an option for the PlayStation Move. I was a little disappointed at first because you really want to try out all of the cool new options of the PlayStation VR, but after awhile I didn't think that the Move would add anything beneficial to the experience. One awesome feature of The Assembly is that you can change your movement style. You can walk fast, slow or snap to locations. I originally put the game on walking fast (which is actually called normal) and found myself getting motion sickness. After playing with the control options for awhile, I found the perfect fit for me. I can't really knock the game for motion sickness because not everyone is going be as sensitive as me, however, I do recommend that you play with the options to find the optimal settings to prevent this from happening to you. 

As far as exploring goes, The Assembly has a fairly large world. You make your way through plenty of different areas in this massive laboratory that is partially underground. This prevents the player from getting bored of the same old locations and even though the labs may look the somewhat the same, there are plenty of layouts and different rooms to go into. The variety in the lab and the bouncing back and forth between characters really helps drive the player forward. 

There are a few minor annoyances with The Assembly that could have definitely been improved upon. I've played a few VR games and I have the PlayStation Gold Wireless Headphones which feature the ability to hear 3D audio. The audio in The Assembly doesn't utilize the spatial sound which would create a much more immersive experience. Another issue I had is that there isn't a lot to interact with in the world other than what's related to the story or things like drawers and cabinets that you can open that may or may not have something important in them. There are a decent amount of voicemails that you can listen to on phones, and computers you can log into to read people's emails, but it would benefit the world if the player was able to just pick up an object and toss it. This doesn't necessarily affect the gameplay, but it does help the immersive experience. 

I finished the 12 chapters of The Assembly in just over 4 hours. I, unfortunately, had to stop twice because of motion sickness, but if that didn't happen I could have easily finished the game in a single sitting and been fine with it. Right now with the limited number of VR games out for the PlayStation, I would say that the $29.99 price tag is completely fair and that it is an enjoyable experience. If you like narrative driven games then I could comfortably say that The Assembly is one of the better choices for PS VR right now. 

4 out of 5 stars

Thank you to nDreams for providing the code. 

Mark McMorris Infinite Air Preview

Do you spend your days dreaming about cruising down a mountain on a brand new snowboard? Mark McMorris Infinite Air aims to deliver the most authentic snowboarding game to date and it absolutely succeeds.

The first thing you’ll notice when you get dropped into the massive mountain range is that you can go anywhere – and I mean anywhere. By simply summoning a helicopter you are able to search for the perfect place to start your next run. What happens if you can’t find a place to shred that sweet, sweet powder? You can use the incredibly in-depth world editor to remove objects, increase or decrease the elevation, and smooth out the ground. You can then set up rails, ramps, jibs, pipes, buildings, and more. Once your epic run is complete, you can publish it to share it with other members of the Infinite Air community.

Most snowboarding games are all about impossible tricks and getting millions of points. Sure that’s fun, but Infinite Air reinvents the snowboarding genre by delivering realistic physics. The entire game uses the thumbsticks and triggers to perform tricks, but that doesn’t mean that you’re going master Infinite Air in just a few minutes. Once you finally get a solid grasp on the controls, every trick feels like an accomplishment. These mechanics may seem familiar and I think it’s easy to say that Infinite Air is the Skate of snowboarding games.

One of the most impressive aspects of Infinite Air is the amount of tricks. Even though you only use the triggers and thumbsticks, there is a ton of variety. I found myself getting comfortable with a few tricks before moving on to something more difficult. After a while I had a nice collection of tricks memorized that I would use on runs. When it comes to Infinite Air, practice definitely makes perfect.

Infinite Air is the snowboarding game we’ve been waiting for. The possibilities for runs are literally endless. You can spend all day designing mountains, checking out player generated runs, or relaxing in a newly discovered slice of the snowy paradise. There’s no doubt that Infinite Air is the real deal.

Infinite Air will be out on October 25th for PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4.

Thank you to Maximum Games for providing the code.  

Fenix Furia Review

Jump, dash, die, repeat. That's pretty much what you're going to be doing over the 4-6 hours of Fenix Furia and you wouldn't want it any other way. 

Fenix Furia is one of the most frustrating and addicting games I've ever played. As with most games, the beginning is fairly easy, but this doesn't last long. There are 10 worlds in Fenix Furia, each with 20 levels, as well as an Arcade where you can unlock extra games. Your objective is to use your unlimited jump and dash abilities to weave in and out of enemies who are moving up and down and all around. I would say once I reached the later levels I would die around 10-15 times guaranteed with a high of being 48 deaths on one level.

There are five modes when you select a level: Easy, Rage, Two, Challenge, and God. Easy mode gives you an extra hit and there is no time goal. Rage mode has one-hit kills as well as a time goal to beat. Two, which is the multiplayer, puts two people in a race to finish the level. Challenge restricts the amount of jumps and dashes you can use. God mode makes you invincible and you have to kill all the enemies on the map before time runs out. When you successfully complete these different modes, you are rewarded with stars. You can use these stars to unlock mini-games that are actually fun. 

Along your journey you will also find cookies - that's right, cookies. Collecting all of these cookies will unlock 10 Fenxi Furia themed recipes. Just let that sink in for a moment. Besides earning trophies you can get a delicious recipe. How cool is that? 

The only real issue I had with Fenix Furia is that the levels in each world don't progressively get harder. You may come across a level that feels like it's impossible and the next level you breeze right through. I don't feel like this is something to knock points off the games total score for, but at times the difficulty does feel inconsistent. 

Fenix Furia is an absolute blast. My stats show that I died over 2500 times and I have no issue with that. The game is challenging and rewarding and that's exactly what you want from a game. I'm holding out hope that one day Fenix Furia makes it way on to the PlayStation Vita because I think it would be the perfect console for it. Do yourself a favor and buy this game!

5 out of 5 stars

Thank you to Green Lava Studios for providing the code. 

Hands On With Loot Rascals

The first thing you'll notice about Loot Rascals is the colorful classic cartoon look, but once you get over the pleasing aesthetics, you find a rich, turn-based, roguelike game. Your character moves around a procedurally generated world on hexagonal tiles. Your goal is to find the exit on each level before exceeding the amount of moves on the turn counter. If you do exceed the move limit, stronger enemies will start to appear around the map. If you want to hang out and explore, you can, but this is not advised. 

Loot Rascals has a day / night cycle that affects if you or the enemy will hit first in battle. You always want to try to get the first hit, but if you're feeling pretty good about your situation, it's not too big of a deal to let them hit first. The time of day changes every five moves, so you definitely want to be aware of this as you're moving around the map, especially when you're desperate to attack.   

One of the biggest parts of Loot Rascals is the card system.  You can have a mix of ten offensive and defensive cards equipped with six in your inventory. Certain cards have bonuses that affect other cards, but are required to be in certain slots, positions, or rows. Loot cards drop all of the time so you are always switching them out. Once you find yourself with too many cards, you can decompile them for currency. 

There are also cards that you can place on other cards that give you extra long distance attacks or self heals. To use these attacks/ heals you simply select them from a pin wheel and drop a cursor on an enemy or yourself. You get so many cards that I don't think it's absolutely necessary to save your attacks for when you see a tough enemy, but you should definitely keep a few attacks handy for when you're near death. 

One of my favorite aspects of Loot Rascals is when you die the enemies will steal your card, which drops it on the server and will show up in someone else’s game. That person can then choose to send it back or keep it. If you find someone else’s card during your game you can choose to keep it or send it back. If you choose to keep the card then the person who lost the card can send an enemy to fight you. When you first start playing the game, the other player’s cards will be from strangers, but once you have a few that you’ve found, you’ll most likely be matched with the same select players. Hopefully if everyone is nice to each other you’ll receive the cards that you lost, but if you lose a good card you better cross your fingers. 

Loot Rascals will be coming to PC and the PlayStation 4 Q1 of 2017. 

Kick and Fennick Review

Kick and Fennick originally made its debut February 3rd, 2015 on the PlayStation Vita. It launched as a free PlayStation Plus game, but was overshadowed by the critically acclaimed Transistor and Rogue Legacy, which were also free that month. The fact that it was developed by a small studio without a long history, published by a company not a lot of people know, and put it on a console that doesn’t get much attention, you find a recipe for a game that is bound to go unnoticed. Now with Kick and Fennick coming to Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and Wii U it’s getting another chance to find a place in the hearts of gamers.

After waking up in a mysterious place, Kick meets the flying robot, Fennick. After Fennick saves Kick from a large robot that is set on destroying everything that it comes into contact with, the pair realizes that Fennick’s battery is broken and they must find a replacement. You basically get an introduction to a story and then it’s never developed into something bigger. It’s easy to overlook this while playing on the Vita, but console gamers may not be so forgiving.

The game spans over 5 worlds and 45 levels. Your main tool is a gun that both propels you through obstacles and shoots enemies. Precision is the key to Kick and Fennick. There are times when you’ll need to launch yourself through lighting rods, bounce on moving platforms, and slide along rails that move you at a high rate of speed. Whenever you miss your target and fall to your death you are respawned at the nearest platform, but if you die too many times you have to restart the level.

At the end of each world, you are confronted by the mech that is set on annihilation.  Luckily, Kick and Fennick can get creative and use their wits to outsmart the silly, psychotic robot. For the most part, the boss fights use the skills that you develop over the course of your adventure, but the final boss fight throws something completely brand new in and it’s really confusing. I’m not going to spoil anything, but this didn’t set well with me. By the time I reached the final boss I was roughly 5 hours into my journey. I had played Kick and Fennick before on the PlayStation Vita, so I knew what to do this time around, but without any indicators that something new is required will leave some gamers confused as what to do. Also, the jump mechanic gets really extreme at the end of the game and it’s hard to get your bearings for a little bit.

Overall, Kick and Fennick is a fun adventure that will take you around 5-7 hours. The lack of an engaging story is biggest shortcoming of Kick and Fennick, but even without that I do think that this is a game a lot of people would enjoy.

3.75 out of 5 stars

Thank you to Abstraction Games for providing the code. 

14 Games That I Am Happy I Got To Try At The Playstation Experience

1. Alienation

Developer, Housemarque, (Super Stardust HD, Resogun) is working on Alienation, the “spiritual successor” to their smash hit, Dead Nation. When you first jump into Alienation, you instantly want to rush into battle, but you’ll quickly learn that’s a huge mistake. My three teammates and I were tasked with setting bombs in three different tunnels and then moving to evacuation point. Being the gamer that I am, I decided to go rogue and try to take on all of the alien scum by myself and was swiftly met with the slimy hand of E.T justice. This is due to the way the game scales when you have more people in your party. If you’re a solo gamer, Alienation will be much more manageable and provide you with a great experience.

If you’re a fan of top-down shooters, you’ll definitely want to keep your eye on Housemarque’s Alienation in 2016.

2. Dead Star

Trailers and videos can give you a good representation of a game, but there are certain games that you really need to play to get a full understanding. Armature Studio’s, Dead Star, was an incredible surprise that I wish I could have kept playing. The twin-stick style shooter puts you into 10v10 multiplayer battle in an area of space called “The Wastes.” Every match has procedurally generated maps that have outposts, hazards, and other secrets that you and your team must find in order to fight another day.

My favorite part of Dead Star was teaming up with a few of my team members to take down one of the larger ships. Our tiny ships trying to do damage to the large enemy shop felt like a boss battle. Eventually we were destroyed and the other team won, but that’s okay. It made me want to redeem myself, but there was a long line of people waiting for their chance to achieve interstellar dominance. 

Dead Star is slated to come out early 2016 on PS4 and PC and I can’t wait for my chance to return to the fight.

3. EarthNight

When I first saw Cleaversoft’s runner, EarthNight, at E3 I was instantly hyped. I love the challenge of trying to exceed my highest distance run, while picking up collectibles and completing objectives. This however is not exactly what you will be doing in EarthNight. During the game you’ll be running down the back of a dragon using Stanley, a freelance photographer, or Sydney, a 14 year-old girl with a very useful double jump ability. The goal is to get to the head of the dragon where you will have to stab them in the head repeatedly using timed attacks. These timed attacks add an extra challenge to the game, because you can’t just mash until success.

Another critical feature to EarthNight is that you can speed up or slow down your character by pressing forward or backward on the directional pad. This gives you a little more flexibility while trying to jump on platforms that are in the air or when trying to kill/avoid an enemy. The ability to speed up and slow down can also get you in trouble because you may try to avoid an enemy just to be damaged by another.

EarthNight may seem like a traditional runner, but the little tweaks to this genre change the game enough to give you an enjoyable, yet challenging experience. EarthNight will be cross-buy for Playstation 4 and Playstation Vita hopefully by late 2016, early 2017.

4. FutureGrind

Have you ever come across a game that appears so simple only to find that it’s incredibly challenging? Well, FutureGrind is exactly that. What should be an easy task of matching the specific color wheels to certain color tracks proves to be difficult for even the most seasoned gamer. There are times when you are speeding along, feeling pretty good about your last landed trick only to crash and burn on the next one. At every “death” you get a result screen that tells you just how far you made it. My average was about 60-65% before I inevitably died a fiery death. This simple, yet addicting and challenging game has the same difficulty of OlliOlli. Sure you could blast through the course barely getting any points, but it’s so much more fun to be a savage racking up some serious multipliers.

FutureGrind is being developed by Milkbag Games and is coming to Playstation 4 and Steam in 2016.

5. Ratchet & Clank

One line that was surprisingly short was Ratchet & Clank. I figured that gamers old and new would want a crack at the newest iteration of what was once a critical part of the Sony arsenal, even if it is a re-imagining of the first game in the series. As you may expect, you’ll find yourself blasting enemies with wildly creative guns while platforming your way through obstacle. Gamers that have played any of the R&C can rest easy knowing that this classic series has returned to it’s true form while gamers that have never played it can finally know what all the fuss is about. 

Insomniac Games is planning on releasing the re-imagining of Ratchet & Clank in the spring of 2016.

6. RocketsRocketsRockets

Radial Games’, RocketsRocketsRockets may be one of the smoothest games I’ve played on the Playstation 4. I played a multiplayer game with one of my friends and was sort of disoriented at first by the speed and fluid movement, but after a few matches you really start to develop the necessary abilities to take out your opponent. The rockets also have three different attacks, each with their own strength and weaknesses. This adds a bit of strategy to the game and really makes you think about what you should do next.

According to the Radial Games website, RocketsRocketsRockets has a multiplayer, singleplayer, and Zen Mode “where Rockets learn to love.” I don’t know how in depth the singleplayer mode is, but my multiplayer experience is enough to buy the game when it comes out on the Playstation 4 sometime this year or early 2016. One quick note, if you can’t wait to get your hands on RocketsRocketsRockets, you can pick it up on Steam.

7. Shadow of the Beast

Heavy Spectrum Entertainment Labs’ Shadow of the Beast was definitely the bloodiest game I played at the Playstation Experience. In this side-scrolling beat em up you find yourself controlling the savage beast, Aarbron, who will literally rip apart anyone or anything who stands in his way. Besides the graphics and the smooth gameplay, I’d have to say the quick time style rage chains were the highlight of my experience.

Once you fill up your blood meter you can activate a combat mode that allows you to chain together attacks. The more you chain together, the quicker the QTE’s have to be. I know a lot of people hate these sort of button prompts, but if you fail one it’s no big deal.

You can expect Shadow of the Beast to be released in Q1 of 2016.

8. Headlander

Double Fine has a lot going on these days with developing Psychonauts: In The Rhombus of Ruin, Psychonauts 2, remastering Day of the Tentacle and Full Throttle as well as publishing GNOG and Gang Beasts, it’s surprising that they have time to develop Headlander, but lucky for us gamers, they are. Headlander at first seems like it is going to be a slightly serious game, but within the first few minutes the Double Fine charm sets in. To solve puzzles you must launch your head off of your body and float around the level to find solutions. Your head also gains powerups such as a vacuum that can suck the heads off of the bodies of enemies. You can then land on those bodies and use them to help you progress. If you love Double Fine games, then Headlander is right up your alley!

Headlander is being published by Adult Swim Games and will be out in second half of 2016

9. Super Impossible Road

Super Impossible Road was another delightful surprise for me. What seems like a simple racing game has an incredible amount of strategy that adds intensity to every race. You start off racing against five other balls and to win you must fall off of the edge to the track below, but there’s a catch. You only have 5 seconds of free failing time to reach another portion of the track or else you are sent to the last checkpoint. One of the nicest features of Super Impossible Road is if you fall off of the track and don’t think you will make it to the next part within 5 seconds you can press a button to respawn and try again. This makes it so you aren’t committed to every move you make and allows you give it another go. I was racing against another player and was basically in last place the whole time, but once I got the hang of the game I finished in 3rd place, which was well ahead of my opponent. This just goes to show that no lead in Super Impossible Road is safe until you cross the finish line. 

Super Impossible Road is being developed by Kevin Ng and is coming to the Playstation 4 hopefully sooner than later.  

10. Trillion: God of Destruction

As an RPG fan, I feel that there have been a ton of strategy RPGs lately. This is especially true when it come to the Playstation Vita, so when I hear of another strategy RPG I tend to groan.  Luckily the line for Trillion: God of Destruction was reasonable and I needed a rest. Trillion’s premise is that the final boss has 1,000,000,000,000 HP and you are chipping away at him as you progress through the game. The strategy of the game comes from it’s unique movement system. You get a certain amount of points that allow you to move/use special abilities. If you go into a battle with low points because you moved too much, you’ll struggle through the battle. This prevents users from just wandering around and makes you really think about your next move. This twist on strategy games was enough to keep me intrigued, because it’s not the same old style game I’ve been playing since Ogre Battle.

Trillion: God of Destruction will be out in the Spring of 2016.

11. Fallen Legion

One of the games that you heard a lot of people talking about around the show floor was Fallen Legion. The game was so popular that it was one of the few games that actually had one station set up on each floor at the Moscone Center.  This action RPG has a shakes up the genre by adding a unique combo system. You queue up attacks for four characters using triangle, square, x, and circle. The twist is that you just can’t mash the buttons. You have to make quick decisions to ensure maximum damage. While all of this is going on you have to block your opponent’s devastating attacks. It may take gamers a few encounters to get comfortable, but for anyone who enjoys side scrolling beat em ups or have experience playing Dragon’s Crown will really enjoy Fallen Legion.

Fallen Legion is set to release the summer of 2016.

12. London Heist: The Getaway

The one word that comes to mind when talking about London Heist: The Getaway is “wow.” I knew VR was going to be pretty cool, but I never expected it to impress me as much as it did. In the London Heist demo you are sitting in the passenger seat of a van cruising down the highway. The small details like being able to change the radio dials, open and close the air vents, pick up soda cans, open the glove box, and even open the car door and lean out allowing you to look behind you gives the user an experience like no other. All of this is serious amazing, but I haven’t even got to the shooting yet.

Eventually enemies ambush you and your driver. The driver tosses you an Uzi and then it’s time to take care of business. One of the greatest features of the game which was made the entire experience feel much more realistic was the manual reload. As your gun empties the clip falls out and you have to pick up another one and place it in the bottom of the gun.

There is no release date on the Playstation VR which is fine because I just want the first version of the device to be as close to flawless as possible.

13. Tumblestone

If you’re into puzzle games, look no further than Tumblestone. The goal is simple, match 3 like color squares and move on, but as time goes on this of course becomes more difficult. There are a lot of times where you find yourself stuck and you have to refresh the level. I say refresh instead of reload because you don’t have to start from scratch, you just have to reset the game board. I played a four player match with two other people and an AI and at first we all sat there thinking about our moves more than actually removing blocks. By the end of the session we found ourselves neck and neck in intense color matching battles. If you love games like Puyo Puyo Fever, Tetris, and Dr. Mario then Tumblestone is definitely something you want to check out.

The Quantum Astrophysicists Guild’s Tumblestone will be released on Steam, Xbox 360, Xbox One, PS3, PS4, PS Vita, Wii U, iOS, Android, Windows phones, Facebook, and Ouya in the summer of 2016. 

14. Horizon Chase

As soon as I saw Horizon Chase I was reminded of being a kid playing Rad Racer. This throwback to old school racing games may not push any consoles to the limit, but the awesome update to the classics runs smooth looks great. None of the tracks that I played were too difficult, but the speed in which your car is moving can sometimes throw you off of your game. I don’t mean to say this as a knock on the game by any means and in fact it the intensity was a welcome change from the modern racing games that have been coming out lately.

The Horizon Chase that is currently out on iOS and Android has 72 tracks and I expect all of those tracks to make it over to the Playstation version when it comes out (hopefully) in 2016.
 

The 2016 Playstation Experience was an absolute hit. Gamers may have been disappointed with some of the announcements or lack of announcements at the keynote, but video games aren’t just about the multi-million dollar blockbusters. Most of my favorite games were the smaller titles with independent teams that were trying to make a name for themselves in an industry that is stacked with heavy hitters. It would be unreasonable to ask anyone to buy all of these games, but any of these games in this article are worth your time and money.

Thanks for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below in the comments section.