HyperX Clutch Tachi Review
The fighting pad and arcade controller market has always been a fascination to me. As a player who is extremely mediocre at fighting games but still enjoys their penchant for speed, skill, and flair, there’s never been much of a reason to use a genre-specific device. Let’s be honest, these accessories are meant for fighting games and fighting games alone, much like a wheel set-up is on...[Read More]
Heavys H1H Headphones Review
Back in college there was an afternoon I was feeling particularly despondent for one reason or another. The only thing I could think to make me feel better was music. Because this particular memory is from almost 20 years ago, please forgive me if I can’t remember whether I used my laptop, a CD player, or a hand-me-down iPod. But what I do remember is plugging in a pair of dirt-cheap headpho...[Read More]
The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu Review
I love horror. I love being scared. I love the adrenaline rush. Few mediums capture the all-consuming feelings of terror as well as video games do, and The Mound: Omen of Cthulhu has it all: the anxiety, the dread, the constant sense that something is always building just out of sight. Developer ACE Team did an amazing job with the audio design, wrapping players in a kind of torture chamber of spo...[Read More]
Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced Review
Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag is the last numbered entry in Ubisoft’s long-running series–a fact I’ve always felt has carried a significant amount of weight since its release in 2013. To this day, Black Flag is probably considered the most beloved Assassin’s Creed game. While Odyssey holds the mantle for my personal favorite and Ezio’s adventures across his tr...[Read More]
Wall World 2 Review
Wall World 2 absorbed around 10 hours of an entire Saturday. A Saturday I was supposed to spend playing 007 Last Light. Honestly, I feel like it’s high praise when your small, unassuming roguelite can draw a person in long enough to distract them from one of the highest production releases of the year. And Wall World 2 really does deserve it. A few weeks ago the game’s existence came a...[Read More]
007 First Light Review
007 First Light is an inflection point for the storied, suave spy. Though most of us likely identify James Bond with a particular actor, he is more than just a handsome face. He embodies a mood, an attitude, a way of life. Bond is not a pencil-pushing government man. He’s the mythical ideation of a spy. He goes covertly behind enemy lines. He escapes near-death scenarios. He drives the faste...[Read More]
Tavern Talk Stories: Dreamwalker Review
Not unlike its predecessors, Tavern Talk Stories: Dreamwalker is chock full of charm, endlessly endearing, and just plain cozy. Players can enjoy settling in with loveable characters, witty banter, and adorable design elements. I spent several hours lost in Asteria’s Drowsy Dragon and all of the adventurous tales it had to offer. Fans of Coffee Talk, Dungeons & Dragons, or just cozy games in ...[Read More]
Swan Song Review
Swan Song‘s emotional and mechanical framework rests in the confines of a solitary music box. On approach, the game is appropriately simple. A lid pops open to reveal the contents inside: dozens of puzzles that grow in complexity and a narrative about loss. A gripping story that tugs at the heart isn’t mutually exclusive to one genre or another. When delivered appropriately, players ca...[Read More]
Starfield PS5 Review
Were I marooned on an island with convenient access to electricity and just enough internet to download a Day One patch, games like Starfield or Crimson Desert or Baldur’s Gate 3 would be enough to indefinitely sustain my need for entertainment. The allure of an all-encompassing video game is perhaps too hard to ignore. Why else has Bethesda cemented its legacy with the one-two punch of Fall...[Read More]
Bubsy 4D Review
Bubsy is one of those characters that was always in orbit around the galaxy of games that have been in my life since the late 1980s. He just never found a way to land on a console I was playing at the time. If I scrape at the bottom edges of my memory, there’s probably a time where I played a Bubsy on a SNES emulator. But I did that for hundreds of games. (Shh, please don’t tell the po...[Read More]
Luna Abyss Review
Luna Abyss bombards the player with a cacophony of stimuli. Colorful pulsing particles. Grotesque creatures. Bizarre liminal spaces. Cryptic text. Thrumming music. In a matter of hours the game morphs its definition, congealing mechanics it has pulled from other discernible places. At first it’s a work of horror. The player finds themselves in an impossible prison of infinitely high walls, s...[Read More]
Directive 8020 Review
“You should totally save scum,” my friend whispered as they watched me enter a potentially harrowing scene in Directive 8020. I felt the same way. Wake-up procedures hadn’t gone as planned for the first wave of the Cassiopeia’s crew. Two Sleep Technicians were supposed to wake them up as they closed in on the planet of Tau Ceti f’s orbit. This handful of scientists, p...[Read More]