John Rairdin
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Writing For
Nintendo World ReportLatest Reviews
If you’re craving classic 3D Zelda, Darksiders is the game for you. Despite originally releasing almost 10 years ago, it has held up remarkably well. Even playing it my third time through, I still found it absolutely delightful. While its original weak points remain present in this remaster, so to...
Windscape
Windscape is an incredibly ambitious game and developer Dennis Witte deserves a lot of praise for pulling it off as well as he has. While there are certainly areas, such as combat, where things have been kept simple, the vast majority of Windscape represents a thrilling adventure that is simply...
Warplanes: WW2 Dogfights is a perfect example of how not to port something to Switch and is somewhat damning to the mobile game environment in general. You cannot simply throw a freemium cell phone game on the eShop, break the progression system, and expect it to meet the expectations of...
Aragami is a perfectly adequate stealth game. The gameplay loop is short, as it often is in stealth titles, but that loop generally works well. Enemies exhibit nothing in the way of complex behavior, but that doesn’t make pushing through a group of them, silently killing as you go, any...
I found ARK unplayable in handheld mode. I just couldn’t tell what was going on most of the time. Coupled with both online and offline crashes it just didn’t feel like a finished game. Things improve somewhat docked, and that's why I refer to it as borderline unplayable. When docked...
Everspace is the most open ended space shooter on Switch. It is highly replayable and there is still plenty more for me to see and do. The segmented, sector-by-sector gameplay is perfect for on-the-go play. It employs its genre better than most and manages not to feel too repetitive even...
Trailblazers
Trailblazers is has well defined visuals and plays great, with an interesting mechanic that unfortunately doesn’t support the weight of a full game. Had the paint mechanic been merely one element in a grander design, things may have turned out differently. As it is, Trailblazers stands as a great proof...
While Battlezone’s core gameplay stands tall and fits surprisingly well with a handheld playstyle, the absence of VR is more than a missing gimmick. This is an experience built for VR and while it would certainly be possible to adapt simple elements like the HUD to a standard display, the...
Xenoblade Chronicles 2: Torna ~ The Golden Country, despite technically being DLC, is a remarkably accessible adventure to new players. For those viewing this simply as a DLC, I expect you’ll be floored by just how new it all feels. As a separate experience it has some very real pacing...
Planet Alpha shines some much needed light on a very dark genre. It stands in stark presentational contrast with its contemporaries in the best way possible. Stealth segments do drag down the experience somewhat but are the exception not the rule in otherwise compelling gameplay. From a technical standpoint, the...
Mushroom Wars is a fun take on the real-time strategy genre that would be perfect for portable play if it weren’t for some technical issues. Pacing can be a real annoyance, especially early on, but gradually fades as you progress further into the game. On the bright side, it is...
Wolfenstein II is a deep and varied shooter. Its story, with few exceptions, is excellently written and performed. A reliance on long, pre-rendered cutscenes may bog down the pacing now and then, but even in those moments the story was compelling enough to keep me going. The Switch is clearly...
