Elise Avery
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The EscapistLatest Reviews
Thirsty Suitors
The game’s art is stylish and coherent, and the music, animation, and effects all support this. There’s plenty to do in Thirsty Suitors, as you can skate as different characters, including a cat and dog, and you can also unlock songs and outfits for Jala. The game took me 9...
Moonstone Island
Sadly, I experienced quite a few softlock bugs during combat, meaning I lost progress several times. The only holographic spirit I ever found was lost due to a softlock. That said, I don’t have a tonne of criticisms of the game. I wish there was more to the romances, but...
Aliens: Dark Descent
Aliens: Dark Descent gives off a bad first impression, but I came away from the game impressed by the quality of its gameplay and the great graphics and voice acting. If you like the sound of an XCOM-esque real-time tactics game in the Aliens universe, you should give this a...
Planet of Lana
If you’ve enjoyed other cinematic puzzle platformers, you’ll probably like this one, but there isn’t anything particularly new to recommend it other than its beautiful visuals. If you haven’t liked other games in this subgenre, this won’t change your mind.
Darkest Dungeon II
Despite all the things I don’t like about it, Darkest Dungeon II isn’t a terrible roguelike. It’s just fairly middle of the road, with plenty of replay value, but gameplay that fails to distinguish itself from the crowd or live up to its predecessor. If you like your roguelikes hard,...
Everspace 2
Despite the frustration of the level system, and the repetitiveness of some of the side content, I had a good time with the combat and flying at the heart of Everspace 2. This feels like a return to an older style of game, and I’d recommend it if you like...
Curse of the Sea Rats
Curse of the Sea Rats hews too closely to the Metroidvania formula. Anything I describe from the game is essentially the same as any other Metroidvania, and it doesn’t have a unique twist of its own, except for the 4-player co-op. It’s fun, but not outrageously so. I enjoyed the...
Clive 'N' Wrench
At the core of Clive ‘N’ Wrench, there’s a clear love of platforming that translates into the game. It’s fun to jump around in this engine, despite the bugs. But it’s hard to recommend a game that has terrible combat and is such a technical mess, even though it has...
Aka
Nothing about the game is so awful as to render it unplayable, and there’s a core of something interesting here. A cute exploration game with farming elements about recovering from the aftermath of a war is a great pitch. But Aka fails to match similar games in quality, despite its...
Batora: Lost Haven
Batora is admirable for its blend of button-mashing combat and a story with moral choices that takes itself seriously. But with the story as bad as it is, I can only recommend the game if you’re really into top-down action games and are willing to look past the story’s flaws...
Lost Eidolons
As far as minor quibbles go, there’s a 20-plus turn limit for every map, which is an absurdly long amount of turns, but I can imagine it annoying some players. I wish the class diversity in the early game were better. Optional battles could do with more variety, and the...
Card Shark
The moments when the story takes an unexpected turn or the gameplay allows you to influence the story are engaging, and they show the promise of the game’s fusion of card tricks and intrigue. But those moments were too few and far between to keep me excited. In short sessions,...