Haven Park [Fabien Weibel] (Nindie Choice!) - As much of an action and shooting game junkie as I am, looking for games that challenge me and provide thrills, a great game that moves in the precisely opposite direction can very much grab me. Whether something like Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, or other titles out there, sometimes slowing everything down to enjoy some Zen-like calm can be very appealing. For me, Haven Park absolutely nailed the sweet spot for about 5 hours of my time and once I had started I simply had to see it through to the end, which can be difficult to do with as many games as I tend to play and review on a weekly basis. Your goal is a pretty simple one, to restore, improve, and find the many hidden secrets of this park you’ve inherited the responsibility for from your grandmother. This is an experience focused on exploration, the joy of discovery, a bit of puzzle solving, and taking the time to follow every path, check out every hunch, and simply enjoy yourself. I would say that towards the end of the game I did wish for an ability to set something up to allow myself to port around the map more quickly as I shored everything up but it’s a relatively small quibble, if you enjoy games that help you slow down and unwind this comes highly recommended.
The Falconeer [Tomas Sala]
(Nindie Choice!) -
Games where dogfighting takes a central sort of role have been around for
quite some time, and while there are some stand-out excellent titles like
Everspace out there that can give you that fix on Switch they still feel few
and far between. Many titles have taken the approach of stripping down story
to focus on combat, or some have been pretty in some way but relatively
shallow overall, leaving genre fans without an abundance of choices. While its
setting is more on the fantastical side, with you commanding a fighting falcon
as your steed, rather than set in space or in some sort of aircraft, The
Falconeer makes a serious attempt at providing both engaging combat and an
overarching story to add intrigue. While it doesn’t venture into the grand
territory of the likes of a Wing Commander title (though, sadly, nothing
really ever has) this is a well-made game with satisfying and somewhat unique
combat, a sense of flight that feels pretty good (though I’m thankful for the
ability to warp ahead rather than glide along for a few minutes between
objectives), and a story that may have some familiar beats but provides some
color to the action and some incentive to see things through to the end. It
isn’t perfect, but if you’re starved for this sort of experience it’s among
the short list of better options available on the eShop.
Dreamscaper [Afterburner Studios] - As a bit of a roguelike
action/shooter junkie I’m always fascinated to see new titles come into the
fold that are determined to do things their own unique way. As you may have
guessed, Dreamscaper does just that, and it does so on numerous levels which
include its dreamy and ethereal look, and its surprising attempts to build
more of a world than the norm with some rich character development. This all
helps to set it apart, for sure, but unfortunately I’d say not always in
positive ways. The visual style of the stages is really cool, no doubt, but
too often I found that the sparkly nature of things was confusing. Is that
something I’m supposed to pick up, a visual cue for something I should be
concerned about, or just random sparkles? Far too often, and even after
playing the game for a bit, I found myself wondering that and, wasting time on
nothing, being sure to try to check anything sparkling out. While the
character interactions provide flavor, and I’d think games like Hades would
inspire this approach, getting around feels slower and more cumbersome, the
conversations not as engaging, and the fruits for your time spent less
rewarding. There are glimpses of greatness here, and if you’re a sucker for a
cool visual style you’ll likely have fun with it, but it’s not as easy to
recommend as some of its peers, though with some tightening up and patching it
could get closer to the mark.
Castle of Pixel Skulls [2ksomnis] - Low-budget fare can always be tough
to score since there’s always a question of where to put the bar. In the case
of Castle you could argue it’s just meant to be a retro platforming romp,
keeping things simple for a reasonable price. The issue may just be how simple
and how it stacks up with its peers on the system. One note I would make
is that the timing intervals of platforms and moving (or disappearing)
elements don’t appear to be synched, so I’d imagine it would be speed runner
kryptonite to some degree as well, and can result in some long pauses as you
wait for things to line up a bit more in your favor. This has actually become a
pretty crowded space and unfortunately I’d say on roughly all sides it gets
trumped in quality. It isn’t the toughest, the prettiest, the most creative,
the most fun… it’s just decent but entirely forgettable.
Corpse Killer: 25th Anniversary Edition [Screaming Villains] - When
bringing back any game from the past for another look the prospects will
always tend to be dicey, at best. Bringing back a FMV game that was featured
on the Sega CD? That’s a whole different level of ballsy for a multitude of
reasons. So now that we have Corpse Killer on Switch we can really take a
moment to appreciate the nuanced performances of the actors involved… kidding,
the acting here is approximately 10 miles below the bottom of the barrel. The
crisp remastered video at least looks great… KIDDING even more, the artifacts
and outright tearing of the video make this look like a shot-on-video horror
show that simply can’t be made to look better. But at least the overlaid
shooting gameplay is engaging and exciting… sorry, I keep doing this. Wow, it
is pretty unresponsive and laughably funky. Aside from pure masochistic
nostalgia I can’t imagine any reason to pick this up, it’s just a mess on so
many levels.
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