Metroidvania
Animal Well (PC) Review
Recent years have seen quite the resurgence of Metroidvania games. Titles like 2021’s Metroid Dread, or this year’s Prince of Persa: The Lost Crown show how evolved the genre has become. Metroidvanias such as Cave Story and Ori and the Blind Forest aimed to diversify the genre in scale and budget. Lone developer Billy Basso sought to reinvent the wheel in his first release, Animal Well. Earl...[Read More]
Blade Chimera: New Metroidvania by Team Ladybug in 2024
PLAYISM and WSS Playground, in collaboration with Why So Serious, Inc., proudly unveiled Blade Chimera, a Metroidvania masterpiece by Team Ladybug, arriving on Nintendo Switch and Steam in Spring 2024.
Nintendo Download for April 20, 2023
2023 has been an incredibly condensed year for gaming and Nintendo is partially to thank. While some of Nintendo’s heavy hitters aren’t expected for another month, the eShop has plenty of titles to keep fans entertained. From beloved tactical Game Boy Advance remasters to sequels 10 years in the making, the Nintendo Download for April 20th is jam-packed! These are some of the games hea...[Read More]
New Gameplay Trailer released for Hunt the Night
DANGEN Entertainment and Moonlight Games have released new gameplay footage and screenshots of Hunt the Night
Shantae and the Seven Sirens (PS4) Review
I still kick myself for not noticing the Shantae series when it started. An Arabian Nights-style aesthetic AND a Metroidvania? How could I not enjoy it? Way Forward has done an amazing job building on each game’s success to make the next one bigger and better. With Shantae and the Seven Sirens, does the series finally hit the big time?
Recompile features Neon A.I. and Tight Combat, Hands-On Impressions
There is a world inside your computer. Programs, utilities, the internet, and so on. Over 100 years, humans have created a device that can think, calculate, send buckets of data instantaneously, and communicate across the entire planet. Computers have become far more than just a utility. They’re gateways to an entire digital universe that is expanded further and faster than ever. In this dig...[Read More]
3000th Duel (Nintendo Switch) Review
A genre that has always excited me is metroidvania, a type of game that has seen a massive flood of titles that fit the mold but can vary in quality greatly. For the most part, the metroidvania titles I come across are stellar, aside from maybe a few glaring problems or a personal taste issue. Upon startup, I thought 3000th Duel was going to fall into the bin of less than average metroidvanias and...[Read More]
Ori and the Blind Forest (Switch) Review
Ori and the Blind Forest has made waves since its launch in 2015 and there’s an argument to be made that it could have been even bigger had it launched multiplatform. In recent years there has been a steadily blurred line for console and PC players with even Sony finally allowing crossplay. That general shift in mentality seems to have led Microsoft into releasing several games on other platforms ...[Read More]
Underwater Metroidvania Outbuddies Available Now on Steam
Metroidvanias are a dime a dozen these days, but developer and designer Julian Laufer looks to do things differently and bring things underwater. With the help of publisher Headup Games, Julian’s newest game, Outbuddies, has officially launched on Steam today. Initially finding itself as a spare time passion-project in 2013, the game grew through interest and influence from popular games in ...[Read More]
Indivisible Combines Lots of Mechanics in a Brilliant Way – Preview and Interview
One of the visual styles that have a tendency to resonate for longer periods of time is hand-drawn, typically using more traditional animation techniques to really breathe life into a game. Most famously, Cuphead took this ideology to the extreme with the roots of animation and Hollow Knight created intense emotions with subtle movements and characters. These are games that became immediately time...[Read More]
Savior, Now on Kickstarter, Radiates Style and Grace
There’s a particular style being displayed in the Kickstarter trailer for Savior, a game being developed by Starsoft. Using a pixelated art direction, Savior echoes of Metroidvania classics and old-school Prince of Persia titles with a focus detailed animation and fluidity of movement. Starsoft claims on their Kickstarter page that the game is in pre-production, looking for a more direct funding s...[Read More]
Bloodstained Ritual of the Night (PS4) Review
When it comes to Blooodstained: Ritual of the Night, there is one word that comes to mind, expectation. Following a massively successful Kickstarter campaign and a back and forth with backers and fans that eventually led to a visual overhaul, Ritual of the Night seems like it has been a game that has shifted design quite a bit. Even after several years and honing in that experience, Ritual of the ...[Read More]