The aesthetics were legitimately nice, but they were overshadowed by the red brought to my eyes by the gameplay. The music was nice, but a song’s repetition grows irksome after returning to a stage after each one of a multitude of deaths. The bad of the game is bad enough to darken the good of the game, which is a shame to those who truly did excellent work. Those who worked on the pixel art, on the aesthetics, or on the music, hats off to you. You did great work. I wish the game I played was of the same caliber.

I can give it a point or two for the educational value, but as something that is supposed to be fun the interactive sequences are only mildly entertaining and the episodes themselves will have your eyelids getting heavy in no time flat.

Tangle Tower is a very excellent presentation of a very short game. It feels like a mobile game, and has a very short play time of 5 hours, with no incentive to replay. If this was a $5 game it would be a lot easier to recommend, but as it stands, Tangle Tower can’t justify it’s $20 price point.

Rescues and level subgoals add a lot of additional meat and challenge, but this is a very simple shmup. There is no interesting key gameplay mechanic, no waves of bullet hell, no fast speeds, and no interesting setting. In a world where Bug Princess is 13 years old, Ikaruga is 16 years old, and 1942 is 33 years old, there is absolutely no reason to play a shmup so basic.

Double Kick Heroes is a friend to all manner of gamer, headbanger or not. It’s wonderful tracks, post-apocalyptic backdrop, and various features boost the fun factor well beyond your typical rhythm experience. While I don’t consider the IP to be anything groundbreaking, Headbang Club clearly has an audience in mind. I’d say they’ve managed to cater to that audience and then some. [Early Access Review]

If Ghost Blade had a classic, well-established pedigree I could understand picking this one up. If you’re in that extremely small niche that enjoys this sort of game, you’ll love it. Anyone less than absolutely hard-core should steer clear.

After the head changing, talking teeth, back and forth repetitive scenes, Clockwork Tales: Of Glass and Ink ends as a disappointing couple hours of play.

Some people will get a real kick out of this one and there is some fun to be had from the frenetic slaughter of massive amounts of enemies in co-op mode, but all the fun is leeched out of it in just a few missions.

The largest drawback to Monochroma was the repetition and simplicity of the game which makes it very boring to play. - See more at: http://cogconnected.com/review/monochroma-review/#sthash.ZHxCjDCL.dpuf

Contrary to its name, Original Journey is far from an original adventure, offering little to motivate players to see its campaign through. If not for the sake of this review, I would have thrown in the towel long ago. Unless you’re really keen on checking out some hand-drawn art, steer clear of Original Journey.

Combine technical faults, repetitive gameplay, and characters so idiotic and unlikable you’d wish the game’s enemies would rip their spines out, and you’ve got a title that is a chore to play through.

I was about to launch into another broken situation here, but I’m sure you get the point. The point is this: although there’s a very competent core loop and entertaining resource management sim somewhere within State of Decay 2, it’s really, really, broken. Unacceptably so. It frustrated me mightily to see a flash of a game I wanted to play, only to be immediately reminded that it’s not ready for release.

Lego The Incredibles simply does not meet up to the expectations its predecessors have set. With a roster that lets us down, overpowered heroes, a near lack of puzzle mechanics, a small world, and a ton of repetitive tasks, there is nothing super about this game.

The unbalanced multiplayer, uninspiring music and repetitive gameplay are just a few of the more significant issues that dragged the entire experience down. Sadly, Extreme Exorcism is going straight to the graveyard for me.

What comes together to create the full package is very underwhelming but wrestling fans will get a kick out of some of the references made from fight to fight as they beat their way across Beatdown City. Non-wrestling fans will find very little to enjoy in the characters and story but may find the experimental combat innovative.

Rise & Shine is a great looking game that elicits a few chuckles and grins, but doesn’t have the gameplay chops to stand up to the big names in the genre.

It’s a disappointment to see something squander such potential.

This is the best version of a very bad, fatally flawed product.

#DRIVE Rally delivers on its intentions to be a fun, arcade rally racer. You can quickly get into a race if you are short on time or are just looking for something less demanding than a more realistic rally racer. The game launches on September 25, 2024 on the Steam, Epic, and GOG game stores. [Early Access Provisional Score = 75]

Even beyond this bizarre hurdle, the whole game is designed to impede you. The money you earn can't be spent on anything useful. The experience you gain never leads to you getting stronger. The battle mechanics make every fight as slow as possible. Even clicking on chests and items comes with a short delay. YIIK frustrates me so badly I feel like I personally offended the creators at a party or something, and this game is their revenge.

It’s dull, repetitive, and just doesn’t offer the replayability of other rogue-likes.

The Sinking City on Nintendo Switch is extremely rough around the edges. I understand the lack of hand-holding when examining clues and evidence, but the fact of the matter is the game is so terrible in nearly every other aspect, that I wanted my hand to be held to get through it quicker! The Sinking City is the type of game that will appeal only to the most hardcore of H.P. Lovecraft, or noir fiction fans. Everyone else will be left wondering how so much could go so wrong in what really is an excellent idea for a game. Like the visions haunting Charles Reed, I’ll be seeing this one in my nightmares for quite some time.

For Cyberpunk 2077 to be an outstanding game, one of two things needed to happen. Descoping of large portions of the game, and a structure more akin to an action RPG. A tighter focus akin to Rise of the Tomb Raider or even Prey could have allowed for more depth to the narrative experience. OR, alternatively, they could have leaned way further into the RPG elements of the game. Spend more time balancing and incentivizing the various half baked systems like Netrunning, and offer far more flexibility in how V can be role played. Of course, such a move would come at the expense of the high production value narrative CD Projekt Red wanted to create. As it turns out, even 8 years of development couldn’t make both – or either – of those outcomes happen. So is this a good game? Yes, sometimes, but only if they manage to sufficiently patch it.

Unfortunately tedious, unimaginative missions and too much emphasis on the poorly presented combat system drags the rest of the game down. With serious technical issues afflicting the game, it would seem that Risen 2 performs better on its home turf, the PC.

While Symmetry has an appealing art style, and an intriguing story, it doesn’t have the gameplay to hold attention.

Anoxemia’s intended atmosphere is one of horror, yet I mostly felt annoyed. I wasn’t afraid or juiced up with adrenaline, I was just frustrated. If you’re looking for the wonder or the terror of the deep, you may want to look elsewhere.

Zombie Driver is bad. In almost every conceivable way. It never really hits the mark on anything it attempts, leaving the player with a frustrating mess of interchangeable missions, a map that’s a chore to navigate, sluggish controls, and a story that you’ll forget before you hit the X button to close the software. You’d probably have more fun in a real zombie apocalypse.

Cross of the Dutchman just doesn’t feel finished. If the combat gets tightened up and the stealth gets reworked or removed, my opinion of this game would dramatically improve.