REVIEW: SEASON: A letter to the future on PC (Steam)

Review by Jon Donnis

SEASON: A letter to the future is a third-person, atmospheric adventure bicycle road trip game. Bet that is the first time you have ever heard of one of these types of games! 

You play as Estelle and will Immerse yourself in the environment as you take your first trip leaving home to gather memories before a terrible catastrophe wipes everything out, you know the catastrophe is coming, but there is nothing you can do to stop it. Your only wish is to record everything of the "old world" before the new one comes, whatever that may be.

 

Exploration, recording, meeting new people, and understanding the weird environment you're in are the main game objectives. Each recording technique catches a unique layer, including noises and music, artwork and architecture, and the narratives of people going through crucial events. Your instruments will remove these layers until you can see the underlying culture, history, and ecosystem. 

You are brought to the big questions by this adventure: What is this season? Why is it ending? What will the upcoming season bring?

This is not as much of a game as it is a story, a journey of discovery. Find a cemetery, follow side paths, stop off at a temple, there is so much to explore.

Your bicycle is your main mode of getting about, although you can also walk. As you explore you will reach points of interest, at this point you will get off your bike and explore that area. You can take photos, record audio of various sounds, and in general make a record of what you are experiencing. You can even make sketches. You have a journal which you will also use, and you can collect various items that you also think are of interest. The journal will allow you to make conclusions about what you experience. Along with that you will also meet various characters, and how you interact with them will also affect how things turn out for them.

This is a super relaxing game, which will give back to you depending on how much you put in. You can take your time to really explore, and fill up your journal, or you can rush through the game. Clearly it is better and more rewarding for you if you take your time. The more you investigate an area, take photos, audio clips etc, the more you will get back as you will unlock inner thoughts of the main character which may then be jotted down in your journal.

The graphics and general style of the game is pretty damn unique and just feels so warm. You feel like you are truly experiencing a game, as opposed to just playing it. Voice acting is all of the highest quality, and the sound effects are just about perfect. 

This is a really unconventional game, which is such a refreshing change from prety much anything else in the gaming world. It is a hard game to even describe. It is an experience, something that will make you think, but after you have finished it, you will want to replay it, and see what else you can find out and explore.

The Good

Beautiful graphics, great sound effects and voice acting, and a wonderful relaxing experience.

The Bad

You might find yourself obsessively trying to collect every keepsake, and get everything, which is not the point of the game, also mouths do not move on the characters when they speak.

Overall

An exceptionally well made game, original and unique in so many ways.

If you want something different, an experience more than a game, then check this out.

I score SEASON: A letter to the future a solid 9/10.

Out now on Steam and also PS4/PS5

https://store.steampowered.com/app/695330/SEASON_A_letter_to_the_future/

REVIEW: BROK the InvestiGator on PC (Steam) - Available on Consoles from March 1st 2023

UPDATE: Available on Consoles from March 1st, 2023

Review by Jon Donnis

I was asked to take a look at BROK the InvestiGator by my good friends at CowCat Games.

If you have been following my reviews on this site, then you will know I am a fan of the old fashioned point and click adventure games made famous in the 80's and 90's, well for the first time ever (I assume, I have not actually checked), we have a point and click adventure mixed with a Beat'em Up and RPG.

You play the part of an InvestiGator, (The G is capitalised due to the character being an Alligator), you live in a world where the humans are gone, and replaced by animals, you have the privileged class and the not so privileged class. You live with the son (Graf) of your deceased wife, and you are just trying to make your way in this new world. As with all point and click adventures, you will examine a scene, pick things up, try to solve the various puzzles that come your way, but here is the big twist, your character is an ex-boxer, and as such with a click of one button, you can use your fists to help you in your travels, that might entail you beating up some bad guys harassing a friend, or destroying a panel to open a door. Either way it is a nice addition to a genre that has seen pretty much everything before.

As you play and meet new people you will have various missions and side missions to complete, puzzles to complete, some you will need to use your brains, others you might just need to beat up, the story will change depending on your choices you make, giving your different endings depending on those choices.

The Prologue which is out now gives you full access to the first chapter of the game, there will be 6 in total.

The Good

This is a well-crafted game, fantastically drawn characters, full voice acting, the puzzles are just what you would expect in such a game, and the beat em up elements are fun and really do give a tired genre a kick up the ass.

The Bad

None really, this is a fun well-made game.

Overall

The Prologue is free, so download it, play it, and I am sure if you are a fan of point and click adventure games, then you will enjoy it.

I score BROK the InvestiGator a solid 8/10

Review by Jon Donnis

The "Prologue" is available NOW on Steam and GOG : https://store.steampowered.com/app/1318790

Available on Consoles from March 1st
PS4™

PS5™

Xbox One

Xbox Series X|S

Nintendo Switch

REVIEW: WHALIEN - Unexpected Guests on PC (Steam)

Review by Jon Donnis

We are back once again, and this time we are looking at a bright and colourful action adventure game.

"Players take on the role of Ernest Hemingwhale, the sole remaining inhabitant of Fin, the mechanical whale. Fin is not only Ernest's home but also his close friend. When mysterious and dangerous Squiddies begin taking over Fin's body, he doesn't hesitate to take down the slimy threats. The origin of the mischievous little beings is not the only secret to discover. The mechanical whale is filled with little details and even more unexpected guests, the Springpeople. Whatever they are up to remains to be seen.

Ernest must use both his wits and special gloves and pearls - appropriately named Mr. Push and Mrs. Pull - to manipulate objects in the environment, solve puzzles, and send the Squiddies packing. Through unique, vibrant, and colorful environments, players delve deep into the inner workings of Fin, meet loveable characters, and help protect not only Ernest's home but also his friend.

WHALIEN- Unexpected Guests is a short but sweet adventure game about friendship."

This is an interesting game, there is not as much direction as I would like, which means that on some levels you wont really know what you are supposed to do or where you need to go, but if you stick with it, you will figure it out. With that being said, I have to admit that I gave up on level pretty far into the game, which I kinda knew what I had to do, but didn't really understand how to do it, so I found myself just running about aimlessly, trying to do everthing and anything I could, and as mentioned, without direction it makes some parts of the game rather frustrating.

General gameplay involves you getting from one location to the next, there are collectables hidden around the level as well. You will gain a few powers, that of pushing and that of attracting, you use these powers to either move things out of your way, position them to help you reach a certain point, you also have your gloves which each has the push and pull ability but on a larger scale. These are the skills you really need to master, as you will need to fire the ability and set it off in order to activate certain things.

Some levels need precise jumping and placement, other levels require more of a puzzle element where you might need to activate something to move forward. In later levels you will need to collect ingredients, and feed what I believe is the mechanical Whale, this is where I got stuck and eventually gave up. I assume this was near the end of the game, so I wasn't too bothered.

The Good

Bright and colourful, controls are easy to learn, and in general gameplay is fun.

The Bad

A lack of direction really hurts the gameplay, and leaves you feel frustrated instead of challenged. Some motion sickness issues when I first started playing, I disabled some of the graphical effects and that lessened them.

Overall

Until I got stuck I very much enjoyed the game, if you don't get stuck as I did, you will probably complete the game in about 3 hours, so keep that in mind.

WHALIEN - Unexpected Guests has its problems, but I am sure they will get fixed in future updates. It is not perfect by any means, but it is also not bad. This is a decent adventure game, perhaps a little harder than it needs to be considering who it should appeal to. I score this game a fair 7/10.

Out Now on Steam

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1270680/WHALIEN__Unexpected_Guests/

REVIEW: NEO: The World Ends with You on PC Steam

Review by Jon Donnis

From Square Enix comes the PC port of console game NEO: The World Ends with You. It seems rare to have a console game ported to PC these days, usually PC gets the first release, anyway here we are.

Since this is a port, I wanted to quickly point out that there aren't that many graphics options on the PC release, standard stuff, the game runs well even on a mid-powered PC, so power is not something you will have to worry too much about. And if you have the PS4 version, then there is no real difference to the PC version, although the PC version is graphically superior as you would expect.

NEO: The World Ends with You is the follow up to the beloved action RPG The World Ends with You, you play as a high schooler named Rindo, one day you are on the streets of Tokyo, doing your thing with your friend Fret, when out of nowhere you are pulled into a weird game, (The Reapers Game.) whereby your very survival depends on how you play. I will let the official synopsis better explain it.

"It was just another seemingly ordinary day in Shibuya, but not for Rindo. He could tell something about the city felt different.

When a psychic battle breaks out on the Scramble Crossing, Rindo thought he'd managed to escape it. Until a girl calling herself a Reaper shows up in front of him. "Welcome to the Reapers' Game, kid."

Surely nothing too terrible could happen in a game...

With this thought in mind, Rindo casually joins the game with his friend, Fret. But as they start playing the game, the two start to feel like something isn't quite

right. There's something off about this "Shibuya" they're in!

As the pair grapple with their doubts, they're suddenly confronted with the rule of the Game: win, or be erased.

In this second Shibuya called Shibuya's Undergound (or "UG") they must compete with the other Players to take the top spot and survive.

Will Rindo and Fret be able to return to the original Shibuya...?"

As you progress you will meet up with and team up with a group of unique people, together you will explore the city and solve the mysteries of the game.

The plot of the game here is very important, and there is a lot of dialog to watch/read through, plenty of twists and turns to keep you interested. There are a lot of references to the previous game, but if you never played that, then don't worry as everything is explained well.

Most of the fun comes from combat, each of your group's members can use a psychic ability, by equipping a pin. For example, Rindo might have a pin equipped that allows him to slash using a spectral sword. Other pins allow different attacks, for example to fire blasts from far away. You control all of you group simultaneously, and by pressing the corresponding button on the controller, you will use those players abilities. But be careful your abilities have limits and when they reach that limit, they will need time to recharge, so button bashing will only get you so far.

While you fight you have something called a Groove, which you will see as a percentage at the top of the playing area. Reach 100% and above and you can start a Mashup, you can increase your groups attack power, and even get launched into the air and attack from above. To be brutally honest I found this all a little confusing at first, but slowly you do get the hang of it.

You also get to level up your pins, which makes them more powerful, get new ones with new abilities and so on. Although this sounds a bit confusing when written down, in practice it is much simpler.

Outside of the battles, you will also get to explore Shibuya, you can scan people by pressing a button, and read their minds. You can also find monsters this way, known as "Noise", beating these is a great way to unlock new pins.

Throw in side quests alongside the main story, and you get something called Friend Points (FP) you used these to unlock bonuses attached to each friend you add. So, if you "Friend" with the owner of a restaurant, you can unlock new items for him to sell in his shop. This is also a great way to boost your stats. Check out clothes shops and buy yourself clothes and accessories and for your group too.

The graphics have a totally unique look, and the soundtrack will keep you bobbing your head.

The Good

Very interesting gameplay, very different to any action RPG I have played before, the graphical style, the music, everything just feels different, and finding something different in the gaming world is a tough thing these days.

Although the general concept of the game is a bit complicated at first, you will get into it soon enough.

The Bad

The camera angles are fixed, so when running around the city, I kind of just wanted to move the camera and I couldn't. Also there is a lot of dialog and the story is important, so sometimes when you just want to get going and explore, you might get frustrated at having to wait.

Overall

An interesting and pretty unique game, unlike anything I have played before. It is "very Japanese" in its style.

For fans of the previous game, this is a no brainer. For people new to the franchise, it might seem a bit weird, but stick with it and there is a fun game to be had.

I score NEO: The World Ends with You on PC Steam a fair 8/10

Out Now on Steam

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1647550/NEO_The_World_Ends_with_You/

REVIEW: Breakers Collection on Nintendo Switch

Review by Jon Donnis

Back in the 1990s we were very lucky that we had an almost endless stream, of beat-em-up arcade games, from the Fatal Fury series, to Streetfighter and of course Breakers. And today we get a re-release of not only Breakers but also the sequel in Breakers Revenge on the mighty Nintendo Switch. Called the Breakers Collection, it is your classic 2D beat-em-up style game with a few important improvements.

Here is the plot of the game.

"Somewhere in Hong Kong, two martial artists face each other in a vast courtyard. The challenger is a stout man in brown skin. The ground has been tainted with blood. However, his crescent blade has not touched his opponent yet. It was a one-sided battle. He was already exhausted and it will not be long before he would fall. "Fool, you will become one of my family" resounded the opponent's voice, as the challenger crumbled to the floor and was turned into sand.

The Fighting Instinct Tournament, or FIST, is a tournament as fierce as its name suggests. There was no shortage of martial artists who entered the tournament seeking fame, and yet there were many who left the tournament as corpses. The last challenger who remains in this lawless tournament gets to challenge the organizer of the tournament, the Head of the Huang Financial Clique, for the chance to win the massive prize money. The martial artist who can manage to defeat him will obtain the honour of truly calling him or herself the strongest. However, none of the martial artists who were chosen to challenge the champion in a private final match have ever come back alive. The sponsor is actually an evil spirit who possessed the body of a modern man from Hong Kong who has established a selection system to amplify his dark powers. The FIST tournament has gathered numerous participants from around the globe and another sacrifice will be chosen this year."

So, it your classic tournament system, to win money, yes, I know it is not really very original, but does anyone really care about the plot line in beat-em-ups?

You have your usual collection of characters with different skill sets and from different countries. Sho Kamui being the lead character, a Japanese Karate expert. And yes, he will remind you of a certain other character from a famous beat-em-up and yes, he even has some of the same moves.

There are a few different gameplay modes, including online modes if you have a Nintendo Subscription. Otherwise, the single player mode is your typical tournament mode, with various storyline screens interjected between fights.

Visually there are also a few options. You can play with original graphics, a smoothed-out mode, where the graphics are a bit smoother, and everyone's favourite the CRT mode, designed to replicate the look of playing on an old-fashioned TV. You can even choose to have all of the moves listed on the screen as you play, to help you pull off that special move to finish off your opponent.

Both games play well, Breakers Revenge is clearly the superior game, it has more characters, and the in-game balance is better. The moves are all pretty familiar to players of the genre, and how to pull them off is all pretty standard.

This is an easy to pick up and play game, some of the sound effects are pretty dated, and the Italian character Pielle Montario is pretty hilarious, the noises he makes just sound wrong on so many levels.

"In this collection, the player will have the opportunity to play the classic Versus Mode local or with online lobbies, Arcade Mode, Ranked battles with Rollback Netcode (GGPO), Team Battle, Art gallery, Training mode and more!"

The Good

If you are a fan of retro 2D beat-em-ups, then you can't go wrong with the Breakers Collection, everything you want is there, colourful characters, animated backgrounds, lots of moves, great fights. It is pure 2D beat-em-up heaven.

The Bad

If you have a Nintendo Switch, then you will most likely already have the Capcom Arcade, and if so, you can get Streetfighter 2 on there very cheap, and it was even free for a while, so it might be hard to justify paying out a fair amount of money for Breakers Collection.

Overall

Games like this tend to appeal to the older game who want reminding of the glory days of their youth, putting 10p coins in the local arcade machines for hours on end.

Both the Breakers games included here could be consider some of the better games of the time, of this genre. Are they better than Streetfighter 2? No. Are they better than most other 2D beat-em-ups? Yes

I score Breakers Collection a fair 7.5/10

Out Now at

https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Switch-download-software/Breakers-Collection-2309606.html