amphibious_ReViews

Super Kirby Clash released as an upgraded version of a 3DS title that I had already played a little bit. Because of this, I already knew most of what I should expect. However, I'm a sucker for free spinoffs; there's something about little side-experiences that I enjoy, so playing this game was practically inevitable. The gameplay loop is simple - choose a fighter class, team up with three other Kirby's , fight a boss, then upgrade your gear with the rewards. This is fun at first, especially since local multiplayer is an option. Unfortunately, after a little while, I found that it got pretty dull. This is exaggerated by the fact that the gear upgrades are gated behind a premium currency, making progression slow. Super Kirby Clash partially makes up for this by adding an additional game mode not present in it's predecessor. Although it is almost identical in gameplay, it does have different bosses and challenges to mix things up. Both modes have energy bars attached th

Utilizing the fancy Super FX chip in the game cartridge, Star Fox brought true 3D to a system that shouldn't have been capable of it. For that alone, this game is novel and exciting. The next console generation brought native 3D to the table, and with it a quasi-remake of this game with the same story and massive gameplay improvements. However, there is a strange magic to playing something three-dimensional on the SNES . Star Fox is an on-rails space shooter where you play as an anthropomorphic fox attempting to stop an evil mastermind and save the galaxy. Each level is pretty straightforward, tasking players with dodging obstacles, defeating enemies, and protecting allies before taking on a large robotic boss. The game mixes things up a little by providing players with different levels depending on the difficulty they choose, so you have to be skilled to see everything. I definitely found the game to be challenging, but I thought it was well-balanced as a whole, and the environ

The Tetris series has more than it's fair share of spinoffs, so it's never much of a surprise when a new one is announced. However, I don't think anyone saw this one coming. Tetris 99 released while the battle royale genre, led by the likes of PUBG and Fortnite , was absolutely exploding. Every online shooter was trying to capitalize on the last-man-standing action. Then Nintendo blindsided the world by announcing this gem as a free title exclusive to subscribers to their online service. Competitive Tetris games have been around for awhile, so the basic concept wasn't profound, but the fact that Tetris was diving into the battle royale scene was enough to draw plenty of attention. I picked up Tetris 99 right away, because I like Tetris , I was intrigued by the concept, and the price was right. After trying to get my Tetris fix from the Puyo Puyo Tetri s demo, this was a welcome change. It complemented my style of playing in short, intense bursts, and the multipl

  Robotron 2084 places the player in the middle of arena-like battlefields surrounded by dozens of evil robots and a few helpless humans. Your job is to protect the last survivors and destroy the waves of robots for as long as possible. Like all arcade games, Robotron is designed to give you a taste of glory, and then kick your butt for your quarters. To keep a long story short, it does it's job well. When I first picked the game up, I was immediately reminded of my childhood favorite, Smash TV . Both share a similar hard-as-nails, arena-focused, run-and-gun style, and, although it is more basic, I had fun playing Robotron . However, I did find myself wishing for something more. Fortunately, I have options, just not from this title. Playing Robotron 2084 was a fun few minutes, but that's all it really took for me to get what this game had to offer. I appreciated that it contributed to the genre that birthed games like Smash TV, but it's no longer the best option. It'

Picross is a prolific series of nonogram puzzle games, and I'm constantly surprised that they're able to come up with hundreds of new puzzles for each title. Although it's not the first entry in the series, Picross DS can be credited with bringing the series back to the West after Mario's Picross flopped, and I'm grateful that it did! Picross has become a go-to series for me thanks to the simple pick-up-and-play style, and the addicting buzz from solving each puzzle. Picross DS is loaded with cute grid-based drawings to uncover, and it has enough content to last for ages. I think part of it's success can be attributed to it's accessibility. The game guides players from easier puzzles to harder ones, allowing them to learn the ropes and develop strategies as they progress. It also allows play via the buttons or the touch screen, depending on player preference. As I prefer using buttons, I'm glad that touch screen play wasn't forced as it was with

Easily the definitive NES entry in it's series, Super Mario Bros. 3 improves upon just about every aspect of it's predecessors. Sprites have gone from obvious blocks of pixels to something resembling actual drawings. New powerups and a wider range of enemies provide more variety to the gameplay. An overworld provides a unique level of control over the adventure, which has an improved plot with new kingdoms to save and additional antagonists to defeat. I also found myself smiling at how clever some of the levels were designed, which I hadn't really done with Mario's other 8-bit adventures. Functionally, Mario 3 has a lot in common with the first game in the series, and players who are used to stomping on koopas or picking up mushrooms will feel right at home here. However, the designers seemed to have a full grasp on the capabilities of their hardware by the time this game was made, and it shows. No longer are there only four levels in each of the eight worlds, as m

This is where it really gets good. This is like the Captain America: Civil War of Cube Escape games. It's not the grand culmination that we can look forward to in Infinity War , but everything we have seen so far is starting to come together and make some sense. Plus, new revelations about the game's universe are abundant (and gladly accepted!). With the best puzzle structure so far, and a story that creates as many new questions as it answers, Case 23 is an absolutely phononenal title. Playing as detective Dale Vandermeer, you are tasked with investigating a murder (the victim happening to be the protagonist of Seasons ), but you soon figure out there is something much more serious going on. That's when the real juice of the Rusty Lake universe starts being revealed. Recognizable locales, characters, and motifs appear, all within a bundle of well-designed puzzles and a delightfully eerie story. Case 23 embodies exactly what I love about the Cube Escape series, and it