Love & Country has been written by a women-led team, and that different perspective gives the sensuality and sexually charged scenes a very different tone and texture. To be clear, it’s very, very sexy, and frequently so. It’s not explicit, per se, but the way it tantalises the imagination it may as well be. I would suggest that this is probably the sexiest game that you’ll play that isn’t outright pornographic, but the different authorial perspective in how it’s written is appealing, and interesting. And so, so goddamn sexy. Given that this is an otome game, and whatever the rest of the context is, the ultimate purpose of it is to give players the opportunity to squish characters together like they’re playing make-believe makeout between dolls, the writing here is pitch-on perfect for the genre.

For a series that has struggled to recapture the lightning-in-a-bottle magic of that first title from a few decades ago, it’s great to see that with Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble the developers have landed on what might be a strong future direction for the series. Banana Rumble in itself is a little undercooked overall, but it’s still pristine Monkey Ball action, backed by manic good fun multiplayer, and hopefully will be backed up with a second game that more completely executes on the potential.

Thistlemire is a weird, strange, and beautiful little thing. It serves a niche within a niche within a niche, but if you are curious to see how an RPG combat system could be alchemised into an unforgiving yet rewarding puzzle game, then this is going to intrigue and fascinate, and you may even fall totally in love with it.

An enjoyable, if generally uninspired city builder and light-touch RTS. It’s pretty to look at, has a comfortable, laid-back vibe, and aside from wrestling with the controls, is an easy-playing experience that you can tune out to. It ticks all the boxes and leaves you wanting nothing, even if, after a few weeks of solid play, it will then be buried in the Steam list to gather virtual dust.

Overall, C.A.R.D.S RPG: The Misty Battlefield is a brilliant idea and, mechanically, it’s executed well. But it’s also hard to shake the impression that this is just the first iteration of the idea and that a sequel, while unlikely, would be all the developer needed to really elevate this concept to become something special. As it is, though, it’s a very fine time waster, and, personally, my favourite application of the Slay The Spire style of deckbuilding roguelike yet.

Monolith is made by people who love the genre, and has clearly been made for people who love the genre. I cannot fault the intent or the effort that has gone into it. It’s beautiful, most of it is genuinely intriguing, and it’s filled with classic puzzle design that the genre’s biggest fans must surely be missing for long stretches of time these days. If only the onboarding in the first hour wasn’t such a poor start, and if only that ending wasn’t such a rug-pull, this could have been something memorable.

Aside from the drop in technical fidelity, the Switch port of Xuan-Yuan 7 doesn’t miss a beat, and it’s actually one of the more impressive action RPGs on the console. I do hold out hope that eastasiasoft and Softstar can achieve a similar miracle with Sword & Fairy Together Forever, because that’s on another level entirely and is genuinely one of the finest releases this generation, but having Xuan Yuan VII on the Switch is a big box ticked.

Just as Persona 5 Royal added something meaningful enough to actually be worthwhile, without being a full sequel or changing anything that people liked about the first game, Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance really does deserve the moniker “ultimate version of the game.” You’re going to need a ridiculous amount of time to play it (again), but if you enjoyed it on any level the first time around, you’re going to love what the development team has done to it this time.

It’s fast, furious, and often frustrating. Slave Hero X is what it wants to be, and in principle, there’s nothing inherently wrong with that. It’s just that Slave Hero X also does little to stand out within its little niche. The original is a cult classic, and perhaps this will be too, especially among the collectors for the new physical edition. If I were a betting person, however, I’d be inclined to argue that it will be simply forgotten.

The appeal of Democracy 4 is pretty obvious – it’s for anyone who has an ideological interest in politics and is interested in seeing how their ideology would actually play out and how they would perform as a leader. It’s not perfect, of course, and certainly not training to become a real politician. It’s also not a game for someone who only has a pragmatic interest in politics. It’s really not fun trying to envision how you would actually lead a nation versus how you would aspire to if you could be completely uninhibited in power. But it does get you thinking about political policy and ideology and, if nothing else, if you play well you end up with a screenshot proving that you could achieve what Che Guevara could not. And that *is* fun. I’ve done that. You can all call me Dee Guevara now.

I appreciate Yeo for being willing to put himself out there, put the art ahead of the commercial best practices, and craft something that is eccentric, nuanced, and even profound. Fading Afternoon isn’t an “entertaining” game in the traditional sense, but it’s a powerful one that will leave you reflective and pensive by the time you put it down. The games industry needs more people like Yeo.

Five Memories Spent With You doesn’t hide why it exists – you’ll see your favourite girl (and all her sisters) in their bikinis within the first hour, but what you’re really building up to is the wedding dress scene. It’s quite sweet when it comes.

Memories of a Quintessential Summer is the more “game-like” one. The concept is simple – the protagonist and his harem decide to relax on a tropical island that the girl’s father owns (oh, yeah, he’s absolutely filthy rich, by the way – that’s a major plot hook). Unfortunately, once they get there a typhoon comes through and strands them. What was meant to be a short weekend becomes a two-week imprisonment until a rescue boat can get to them, and they just don’t have enough supplies to last that long.

I understand why the developers set Crown Wars: The Black Prince during the Hundred Years War. It’s a compelling era of European history and you inherently want to play it. It got me playing a game I otherwise would have glossed over because of the promise of its theme. The problem is that once you have someone’s attention this way, you need to deliver on what you’ve promised them. Crown Wars doesn’t quite get there and fails to fill the void with something memorable.

There’s not much else I can say, given that any commentary on the story would be a spoiler to the first game, and as much as I can breathlessly enthuse about the aesthetics and presentation, that’s something you’re going to have to see to get a feel for just how well it works despite being so eclectic. Cupid Parasite: Sweet and Spicy Darling is a sequel to a game you should play before it. But it’s also a game you really should play, because it is the most artfully unique and downright entertaining otome visual novel out there. Sweet and Spicy Darling is more of the same, and that’s all it needed to be.

Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is a delightful, wonderful little game. My life is better for the joy that it has injected into it and there’s not a thing about it that I think the developers could have done better.

This was a really nice treat for Koei Tecmo to drop onto Steam out of nowhere. It’s a well-optimised port, and it plays as well as it did a decade ago. With Koei Tecmo revisiting its backlog like this, I hold out hope of being able to play Samurai Warriors 3 again at some point.

It’s rare for a game to be quite this timeless, and thank goodness it hasn’t been lost to the GameCube platform and now people can discover or rediscover it on modern hardware.

The authentic Taiwanese ghost stories, an intriguing university campus to explore, and a fun – if B-grade cheesy – cast make The Bridge Curse 2 well worth your time. There are also some genuinely memorable monsters and eye-opening scenes. This is one of those super-niche horror games that you’ll be glad you discovered.

So many parts of Read Only Memories: Neurodiver make me happy: the sound the Neurodiver makes plus its cute little tentacles, a purple heroine, spunky personalities, and a good mystery make the game easy to pick up and enjoy. Players can add a layer of philosophy to the game by digging into the moral questions posed through the narrative, or stay at the surface level. Either way is good. The learning curve is more than reasonable. A lack of accessibility options (including text and control settings) is a bummer, and not something to be overlooked. Still, Read Only Memories: Neurodiver is a phenomenal psychic mystery game. It’s one I plan on returning to soon.

I went into QUALIA expecting it to be a fairly run-of-the-mill big boob fanservice game. And in some regards it is. It’s not really breaking new ground on how these stories are told. On the other hand, the subject of the game is inherently interesting and highly topical, and while the presentation is very familiar, it’s exactly what the target audience likes to see. It’s also an impressive example of how to build a visual novel on a minimal budget without needing to make concessions to the goals of the project. The android at the heart of QUALIA might not be my idea of the ideal love robot, but I certainly enjoyed the opportunity to learn more about her here.

Neptunia Game Maker R:Evolution is an admirable effort to find a way of introducing more characters and an all-new plot-line, while also in some ways going back to the fundamentals in terms of storytelling and structure. I do wish the Idea Factory people would give up on this action combat system when the turn-based approach was less obviously affected by the budget, but the usual gorgeous fanservice art and antics of the characters kept me smiling throughout.

The fact that El Shaddai has been remembered as a cult classic (albeit with a fleetingly small cult) that has never been replicated, while its immediate peer from a decade ago has been relegated to the deep collective memory of “content that was kind of fun, I guess, but I have new toys to play with” highlights which of the two we, as a collective, should be trying harder to encourage more of. We need to stop acting like “complexity” (i.e. some abstract ideas and the occasional metaphor) is an inherent flaw.

I typically give visual novels with poor localisations 1/5. After all, the exclusive point of the game is to share a story and if the localisation is bad it has failed in that task. The score I’m giving The Hungry Lamb: Traveling in the Late Ming Dynasty should highlight just how disappointed I am by the localisation, because this could have very easily been one of the most powerful stories in video game history.

I am the target audience for Demon Slayer: Sweep The Board in that I’m both a Demon Slayer fan and the three Mario Party titles on the N64 Virtual Console on Switch are (by a significant margin) my most played titles on it. I got everything that I expected out of this game and had a lot of fun with it right throughout. In fact, with Mario Party itself in a weird kind of limbo of diminishing returns of late, perhaps we do need a new property to pick up the baton.

I’d be doing everyone a disservice if I sat here and said that Emerald Beyond was for everyone. It isn’t. It isn’t even close to everyone. It’s a JRPG made for the most hardcore, veteran JRPG fans. Specifically, it has been designed for a very specific kind of JRPG fan who, firstly, loves things that are genuinely different. Secondly, its for JRPG fans that like complex, textured and nuanced combat systems that reward people who are willing to tinker and learn them, and punish those who don’t. For a niche within a niche within a niche, SaGa Emerald Beyond is the kind of game that the new, “improved” blockbuster Square Enix hates, but if this really is the end of this series, at least it’s gone out having delivered the full promise of what SaGa has always stood for.

This is a beautiful, serene and relaxing experience and I loved every second of it.

For a collection that will only ever appeal to a very limited niche, the Epyx Collection does a decent job of making those games playable on the Switch, but a terrible job of celebrating them. The only way this thing had a chance was to go the full virtual museum tour, and they completely missed that opportunity. As it stands, most people will buy this, play it for five minutes to remember the console they lost to the garage storage boxes decades ago, and then move on.