Latest Reviews
More than 20 years after Kirby Air Ride zoomed onto the Nintendo GameCube, the cult classic racing game has gotten a sequel. This time around, Kirby is joined by a plethora of allies and foes for an over-the-top racing experience. Kirby Air Riders takes everything that made the original game...
Namako explodes into a fountain of blood for what feels like the eighth time, and I open the menu and select Restart Battle. I’m fighting a giant skull and a pair of hands that looks like what I imagine Ocarina of Time’s Bongo Bongo would be if he were a...
After taking a year to get 'Naughty,' Jackbox Games is back to its normal Party Pack schedule. The Jackbox Party Pack 11 features a fresh batch of five games and the best word to describe them this year is "eclectic." For the first time in years, there is no returning...
Seven years after AdHoc Studio was founded by former Telltale Games, Ubisoft, and Night School developers, the studio has released its debut title. Dispatch is an original interactive narrative game that takes heavy inspiration from the games that made the genre a mainstay, and builds on them to deliver one...
Here at Shacknews, I’ve talked about Atelier a few times. GUST and Koei Tecmo’s item synthesis and cozy vibes RPG series has had a lot of ups and downs over the past few decades. If you’ve read my previous reviews, you might have a skewed perspective, as the most recent...
Enhance has been making games for many years, but the team cemented its place on the gaming map with its mixture of puzzle games and stirring musical accompaniment. Tetris Effect remains a generation-defining reinvention of a classic franchise and, with that success in its pocket, now Enhance has given the...
Nintendo and Koei Tecmo have made a fairly loyal fan of me over the course of several Warriors collaborations and spinoffs this last decade and then some. I’ve been particularly enamored with the fact that KT isn’t just strapping fan favorite characters to the Musou formula. Instead, it is augmenting...
Mortal Kombat has been around for so long, it's easy to take it for granted. NetherRealm's newer fighting games have hit so consistently, setting the standard for what fighting games could be in terms of competitive contests and single-player stories. Older generations may have forgotten the series' humble beginnings, while...
Obsidian Entertainment has built a mood with The Other Worlds series. It’s one that positions corporations, executive manipulation, and rampant consumerism as a plague that haunts humanity well into our future in space, but in dark comedic fashion. The vibe continues into The Outer Worlds 2 where those nasty old...
Sometimes you see a game when you’re just scrolling through the eShop and you see the potential for a life-changing experience. Sometimes it doesn’t pan out the way you’d hoped, but you still have a few laughs along the way. That’s what happened when I tried Full Metal Schoolgirl, the...
I put a lot of stock in replay value. When I was a kid, my parents tolerated more than supported my love of video games, so I only got new titles for my birthday, Christmas, and during the weekends when we’d make trips to the video store. That meant replaying...
I have to hand it to FuturLab. The developervery good at one specific thing, and that is creating structures absolutely caked with grime that only a good power washing will fix. The developer decided to stay with what works and build upon that with a sequel. PowerWash Simulator 2 is...
