Slant Magazine

“Mewgenics has so much that its sluggish meta-progression feels designed to get you to see as much of it as possible, albeit at the cost of satisfying pacing. Even when you’re technically earning something new on each new run, the goal remains nowhere in sight.”

“A sense of environmental storytelling similarly drives MIO, justifying the scale of the massive biomes and the sometimes frustrating ways in which you have to backtrack through them. It’s necessary to force players to repeatedly take a minute-long elevator ride into and out of The Vessel’s depths, because it drives home just how big (and how empty) it is. Hopeless as things may seem, even the comparatively small Mio is still capable of carrying a spark of hope.”

“Thankfully, even if some of the emotional bits, philosophical musings, or political parallels don’t land in the midst of all that chaos, the overall vibes never miss.”

“This is Lumines in its most perfect, evolved form.”

“Clearly the game is taking aim at the Disney Princess archetype, but the shots fired are all so clunky and obvious: One girl accidentally drops her manifesto for women’s liberation in front of the teacher, and later she reads from a book that just lists the names of accomplished women throughout history. If horror is meant to elicit strong emotions, the most that Bye Sweet Carole can manage is cringe.”

“What stumbles there are, though, do little to loosen The Drifter’s sturdy grasp of the genre. With a steady stream of plot twists and storytelling intrigue, the game is a propulsive and polished example of the form, every bit the satisfying pulp adventure it sets out to be.”

“Much like all the products you assemble, the disparate components of Kaizen all come together into one elegant whole.”

“Folks, Gordon Gekko had it wrong. It’s not greed that’s good, but the yoyo, which “clarifies, cuts through, and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit.” And if those words sound as hyperbolic as they do in Wall Street, just wait until you get your hands on Pipistrello and the Cursed Yoyo and see how gloriously right this weird, wonderful yoyo-centric adventure is.”

“But To a T remains a life sim, lavishing idiosyncratic detail on its ground-level view of the world. Flight is just one stop along a broader, sillier journey that depicts Teen’s growing comfort in their own skin.”

“Ultimately, there’s too much work involved for not nearly enough reward from the world or the narrative, despite the occasional interesting twist and turn.”

“In the end, the only relevant log in the game is the one that recognizes its own worthlessness, a system of recording that “only values information deemed beneficial to the mission,” with no regard for emotions. Why? Because when Bionic Bay stops trying to explain the science at its center and lets its environments speak for themselves, in everything from the monochromic backgrounds to the starkly foregrounded contraptions, you may just be filled with awe.”

“But the greatest shortcoming ends up being the game’s fuzzy grasp of its own mythology and how the story should resolve. Lost Records: Bloom and Rage is a wonder of slice-of-life storytelling, but that’s in spite of its supernatural elements rather than because of them.”

“For as big and ambitious as its levels may be, the most reliable way to progress in Commandos: Origins is a tedious process of luring each guard to his doom, one at a time.”

“And while Monaco 2 sometimes stacks the deck too heavily against solo players (it seems better with a full house), striving to straighten out each new wrinkle in the plan makes for addictive, cheek-flushing fun.”

“Perhaps the base game is just the tutorial and the real game is what awaits players after they return to the main hub and are reminded of the weekly battle arena challenges and the levels that can be accessed inside the Hillbert Hotel created by other players. So for those predisposed to wanting to see everything all at once, maybe that will be transcendent enough.”

“Negative emotions may not be so easily dispelled for us as they are with Cadence’s magical guitar, but music can help us to motivate ourselves, making this a feel-good game in more ways than one.”

“In an impressive feat of adapting an established format for a unique setting, The Stone of Madness is cleverly attuned to perseverance through incremental progress.”

“Eternal Strands does its best to make each of your return trips through its seven main maps as interesting as possible, slowly throwing in stronger enemies, changing up the epic monster encounters, and varying the extreme weather and time of day.”

“Indeed, a single level like the Mad Mall feels more inventive—between you having to scramble through a ball pit maze, race on a Segway-like device, and solve a shooting gallery puzzle—than the entirety of other platformers.”

“This atmospheric Metroidvania is mechanically, emotionally, and philosophically electrifying.”