Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 basically accomplishes what it sets out to do, but doesn't move the series forward in any significant way, even feeling like a minor step back in certain aspects.

Dark Souls 3 was a wonderful coda for the series, revisiting the best parts of Soulsborne while skillfully buffing over the pieces that didn’t work. Still, the Souls tricks and tropes that have become hallmarks are no longer groundbreaking, and there isn’t much left for Souls proper to achieve. As such, the run-of-the-mill quality of the experience offered here just doesn’t cut it anymore. While I still hold some hope that the second (and final) piece of DLC will be more substantial, Ashes of Ariandel illustrates exactly why Souls needs to end for the foreseeable future.

The sequel rights many of the first game's wrongs and is a nice, iterative step forward on the formula Monolith's been perfecting since 2005. For those who were lukewarm on the first PXZ, these improvements may make the difference.

There are dozens of Dragon Ball Z games and Kakarot represents only the latest attempt to fully retell the manga’s story in videogame form. However, the quality of the experience makes a strong argument for this entry being the last one since the cartoon graphics perfectly recreate Toriyama’s visuals and the story hits every beat far better than the anime managed to. By presenting a great story with such perfect fealty, it’s safe to say that (for now, at least) Kakarot is the definitive Dragon Ball Z videogame.

Ultimately, though, the drudgery of actually playing this game outweighs whatever interest its narrative has to offer. I have to admire the ambition of the concept here, but Stories: The Path of Destinies falls short of having systems equal to that aspiration. Like its swashbuckling hero, this game’s reach exceeds its grasp.

I don't think I can stress it enough; I really don't like the overhaul of the battle system in Xenosaga II.

The game controls nice and tight—a necessary element for successful fast action. Every button on the Dual Shock 2 is used, but it’s an extremely comfortable and intuitive layout.

The setting, urban art theme, and gravity-shifting mechanics give Sideway: New York plenty of opportunities to stand out, but it squanders all of them. Instead, Nox navigates bland levels and takes out repetitive bosses with a set of generic powers. With so much potential, it's remarkable that Sideway ended up being so ordinary. Unfortunately, that's the only remarkable thing about it.

Although it may not sound like high praise to say that The Wolf Among Us: Smoke & Mirrors is holding steady with the status quo, it's so stylish and enjoyable that I'm quite content to get more of the same.

I really didn't expect much from this game, but it overdelivered in spades.

Yatagarasu: Attack on Cataclysm is aimed at the very niche audience who genuinely champion gameplay over graphical achievements, and who aren't afraid of putting in some hard work to get the most out of it. Given its Indiegogo campaign, this game had the potential to become one of the worst cases of buyer's remorse that I've ever had, but it turned out beautifully in the end. Weird PC port quibbles notwithstanding, of course.

Having beat Neko Navy: Daydream Edition, I’m still coming back for more, Yes, I’m still not exactly sure what is going on – who’s attacking and why are these cats called in for defense? But honestly, there’s no need for a coherent story when everything else is done so well.

With streamlined and engaging mechanics and gameplay, it does the games it was inspired by proud and is a worthy addition to any tactics game library.

WrestleQuest is a fantastic homage to the wrestling scene of the ’80s and early ’90s, and expertly crafts that persona for its world. However, the slow pacing in and out of combat and various bugs dampen things. Fans of classic wrestling will delight in all the references, but players who don’t have nostalgia for the subject material will still find much to enjoy here, even if it’s not as tight an experience as it should be.

Ultimately, Tyrant’s Realm executes a gameplay loop that’s rewarding enough to render its minor inconveniences just that — minor inconveniences. It’s another successful, joyful genre-mashup that anyone looking for a retro-inspired soulslike will have a good time with.

It’s unfortunate that I find myself having to put the boot in this hard to what’s obviously a passion project from an indie developer, but my emotional state playing Fretless oscillated between boredom, irritation and occasionally finding it all mildly pleasant. Perhaps it will hit differently for someone who’s into the music scene or deckbuilders, but as a JRPG fan who’s partial to a good rhythm action game, it hit a bit of a bum note for me.

Strange Brigade is the rare title that manages to construct completely satisfying single- and multiplayer experiences in the exact same space. It’s not a huge project — a motivated team could blast through in under five hours while digging up all of the secrets might take closer to twenty — but it’s immensely replayable thanks to character variety and the different dynamics of co-op and solo modes.

Tomb Raider I-III Remastered remains an excellent collection of Lara’s first adventures that allows fans, both new and old, to dive into Lara’s earliest days and see where she got her start. Here’s hoping that The Last Revelation, Chronicles, and Angel of Darkness will be part of a second collection!

While I found Salt and Sacrifice worth breaking at least one controller over, it’s not for every Souls fan as it commits bizarre mistakes in design and comes with a few baffling omissions — in some ways, the experience is the total opposite of Hidetaka Miyazaki’s teachings. I’m glad I finished it, but it’s not an easy one to recommend.

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake is the kind of thing I love to champion — a mid-budget licensed platformer with a few rough edges that could have easily existed in the ’00s. Sure, it’s not breaking any new ground and could use a little polish when it comes to level design and performance on the Switch, but the final product is a joyous ride from start to finish. For fans of the series like me or anyone else who can’t get enough of that yellow sponge, this undersea multiverse adventure is worth checking out.

The excellent color palette, cute yak animations, witty writing, and excellent soundtrack were simply not enough to encourage me to play further. All of the novel concepts and innovations presented to me were swiftly undone by the insufficient interface controls near the halfway point of the campaign. Fighting with this interface felt like I was a monk trying to coax my yak up a ramp, and that yak was unwilling to take another step.

When the game lets its main character race through the world, bounding across chasms and flinging himself here and there with the grapple, it is really wonderful. That happens all too rarely, however, and instead the game breeds repeated frustration brought on by the difficulty of figuring out where the protagonist should grapple, why he can't, or what to do about it.

As a singleplayer title, it seems to offer a wealth of content — the stories have a quirky kind of charm and each scenario has four possible outcomes, with a total of over twenty endings possible. Of course, playing with rivals adds a replay value of its own, but after a little time spent with it, I came away feeling that Monster Prom is only functional at best — despite the wealth of options, the scenarios become predictable and tired quickly. Even so, a group of friends turns it into a delightfully messy romp of the kind that my younger self would have loved, minus the cocaine.

Overall, it’s more than a little eyebrow-raising to see how closely Vermintide has followed the template set by Valve, and disappointing to see that it hasn’t improved or advanced the precedent that was set — it’s just a not-as-good version with rodents in place of the undead.

While it might seem like a sci-fi soulslike, The Surge proved itself to be more than just another wannabe thanks to the outstanding twists on combat, satisfying choices in playstyle, and allowing for fearless engagement in its systems thanks to the ability to respec at any time. While I often felt wrecked and ruined by my journey through the hostile, unforgiving mega-corp, by the end I came around and instantly started a new playthrough. Deck 13 has taken the criticisms leveled at them after Lords of the Fallen, and not only responded to them, but actually used that feedback to improve in major ways. Great job.

Dull, mediocre games… well these games are like a painter's palette filled with nine shades of gray. There isn't much to work with, so the end result is as lifeless and flat as a Midwest landscape study in wintertime.

While both the core campaign and this DLC would use a little tweaking, there’s no doubt that they remain exciting, engaging plays that come recommended. As Incommodus the Servo Skull says, PURGE THE HERETICS!

If I’m being honest, my frustrations with the marketing’s focus on the worst caricatures of Latinx people made me brace myself for a racist triple-A experience full of gross clichés and awkward attempts to be apolitical. Instead, I was surprised to find that more thought than I expected was put into its depiction of Latinx people. Although it isn’t perfect — those cringeworthy lines! The grind of finding gear! — it’s better than what I initially expected, and that counts for something.

Its reach exceeds its grasp, but at least Disney Epic Mickey is reaching. Occasionally it brushes its fingertips up against something amazing that might have been.

In a way, the shallow nature of play, the points system and the short run time make me think Monster Prom XXL would be better suited as a hyper-casual board game brought out on a Friday night, but in its current incarnation, this finned, furry student falls far short of a passing grade.

In short, I was satisfied with the game, but not overly impressed. The faint thrill of Jedi-dom was indeed there, but in the end it's just another action game in a vast, overflowing ocean of them.

While it’s certainly familiar, the amount of variety on display makes Superstars feel like a proper follow-up and evolution of the old school entries, rather than just a simple retread of those past ideas. And in a way, that’s what I love about Sonic Superstars — it knows what the fans want, but it’s not content with playing it safe. Rather, it introduces new ideas to the well-established, crafting one of the finest 2D platformers around. If Sonic Frontiers set a new standard for what 3D Sonic should be, then Superstars is arguably the new blueprint for his 2D adventures.

Starpoint Gemini Warlords is an impressive effort by Little Green Men, especially in light of its crowdfunded origins and community-driven design. That they’ve managed to expand the scope and scale of their game to encompass a whole other genre outweighs the concerns raised by poor balancing and a less-than-smooth final result. All the same, those concerns remain, so those who are willing to put up with the rough edges are the ones who’ll find themselves most satisfied.

The Eternal Castle Remastered isn’t for everyone and I can easily imagine many prospective players being turned off by the controls or the abstract visuals, but there’s no denying the fact that it’s a strong addition which adds depth to the Switch library, and it comes absolutely recommended to anyone with a taste for those bygone classics or eccentric art-house titles.

Despite its lack of complexity and failure to capitalize on its oversized world, I found it easy to like Misc. A Tiny Tale. The chunky, expressive little automatons immediately drew me in, and its earnest narrative of self-acceptance and mutual aid proved a pleasant counterpoint to the ever-growing hellscape of the real world. While these elements aren’t enough to propel Misc. A Tiny Tale into the annals of the genre giants it’s modeled after, I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a smile on my face as I watched the credits roll over a saccharine song espousing the power of friendship.

Mulaka is a treat for the eyes that’s just fine as it is, but I can’t help but feel there were many opportunities where it could have, and should have, done more.

Avalanche has built a gorgeous open world with as many framerate hitches as there are load times (i.e. basically none) and id has filled it with their usual incredible gunplay. It’s not quite a replacement for Doom Eternal, but it’s made the wait far easier.

Bartlow’s Dread Machine has a great set of bones. The concept and the core mechanics of being on rails are a great starting point, and the story (which I have not spoiled here) was surprisingly effective. However, the key phrase here is “starting point”. Despite its appeal, there’s a lot of polish that needs to happen before I would be able to recommend this one to shooter fans.

Finest Hour is a heavily-scripted experience, almost to the point of being completely on rails. Things happen because they're scripted to happen, not because they're an organic outgrowth of the gameplay.

While I still respect the concept and gameplay at the core, this superfluous follow-up stretches the definition of what a sequel is, and the majority of what it changes isn’t great. More than anything else, Nidhogg 2 is like someone drawing a mustache on the Mona Lisa with a sharpie – it was perfect the first time, and ‘touching it up’ has only marred that beauty. I’ll be sticking with the original.

Yes, the EyeToy has potential. Groove is an example that the potential has yet to be realized.

All-Star Battle R is an extremely daunting affair to jump into. Yes, the developers have done a good job of offering ways to ease players into its eccentricities, but at the end of the day, it’s still a game where a fashionisto who can zip and unzip any flat surface might find themselves facing off against a woman with prehensile hair. There are fifty playable characters here, and even though I completed most of the All-Star mode and collected a huge amount of unlockable content, I’ve just dipped my toes into what the game has to offer. Whether they’re fans of the manga and anime or not, this is worth a look for any serious fighting game aficionado.

I didn't love it as a survival experience—maybe I couldn't have—but I enjoyed The Flame in the Flood as a tour of a drowning America.

I recently revisited the original Banjo-Kazooie as part of the Rare Replay compilation and still found it to be the best of its genre, and I’m not one of those people who believes that a mascot platformer has no place in the modern gaming scene. I was ready to celebrate the return of this genre, but Yooka-Laylee is simply a chore to play. The folks at Playtonic have demonstrated that they can recreate the spirit of old-school 3D platformers. Now, critically, they need to recreate the quality.

With its online implementation and improved strategic combat, there are certainly appealing qualities to Temtem, but its entrenched ties to old-school Pokemon prevent it from blossoming into something greater. It isn’t redefining what we already know, so for those simply looking for another Pokemon-like experience who just wanna catch ‘em all, this one might be a good fit.

Despite the small bugs and a skewed economy that diminishes the experience, West of Dead is still something I can’t put down. The developers seem committed to fixes and I expect the experience to improve as time goes on, but it’s already an incredibly solid game that I enjoy and can easily recommend.

It's sad. It boggles the mind to think that this much time was spent on presentation and backstory when none of it resonates in the slightest.

Like the best crime films, Mafia: The Old Country succeeds thanks to a complex and dark tale of revenge and familial ties. It’s a short, yet satisfying ride, and Enzo’s tale is easily one of the best of the year. While some may lament the lack of an open world, the narrative and solid gameplay delivered by the developers makes this an offer no one should refuse.

If one can stomach the questionable story choices, Sniper Ghost Warrior Contracts 2 has some of the most engaging sniping action around. Whether a player wants to simply click a button and watch a slo-mo bullet explode a head, or whether they want to be forced to calculate exactly how far an enemy will walk in the one and a half seconds between the bullet leaving the barrel and closing the deadly distance, SGWC2 scales exactly to any level of interest and skill. It may be brutally violent, but it’s an intensely satisfying sniper experience.

Anarchy Reigns is an attractive, bombastic entry that retails for half the price of a normal title while delivering a fantastic level of quality. If you ask me, smaller-budget titles that try to do something different should be supported and celebrated-definitely give this one a shot, but keep an eye out for double chainsaws approaching from the rear.

For a game that’s almost ten years old, the ideas and gameplay in Red Faction: Guerilla has barely aged, and there’s still nothing like it on the market. It’s unfortunate that the engine and performance can’t do this fantastic game justice, but it remains an essential play for anyone who missed it the first time.

That’s a minor flaw, however, in a game that is a sparkling and unique addition to the Metroidvania stable. While Dandara’s world has ostensibly little to do with Dandara the historical warrior apart from inspiration, I hope that players finish the game and feel as interested to explore her story as I was to explore Long Hat House’s gorgeous and intricate world.

With just an hour of main game content and no online leaderboards to encourage replaying levels, Sneaky Bears is more of a minor diversion than anything else. It’s cute and funny, and just a little upsetting when stuffed bears start threatening each other with brutal murder. That throwing mechanic, though – I spent five minutes in the level select screen just enjoying the simple act of knocking things over with my tossed guns. The goal of VR is to make fantastic spaces feel more natural, and by solving this problem, the developers at WarDucks have taken the medium one step closer.

Despite the overpowered nature of the stealth, Heretek does include enough new content to whet the appetite of Mechanicus fans and gives them good reason to come back. The new battlegrounds are a nice reprieve from the planet scenarios of the core campaign, and the new items and units give players more choices. All in all, it brings glory to the Omnisaiah once again.

Small issues can’t detract from a solid puzzle game. Worm Jazz offers plenty of challenging head scratchers while providing a relaxing gaming experience at the same time.

Eastern Exorcist is brisk and engaging. Despite a few rough points, the combat is solid, the world is beautifully rendered, and the extremely depressing story is was interesting enough to carry me through to the end. After the credits (which are entirely in Chinese, just FYI) there’s footage promising DLC or a sequel that’s is already in production, and I’m absolutely interested to see how this franchise moves forward.

While Vaporum: Lockdown initially seems like an intriguing proposal, especially on the Switch where dungeon crawlers are fairly few and far between, it ultimately it ends up being just a perfectly fine experience overall, if perhaps a bit too derivative to be memorable. Only recommended for diehard dungeon crawl or steampunk fans.

Supermassive Games is responsible for the most compelling interactive movies around, and House of Ashes proves that the Dark Pictures Anthology is on solid footing after a divisive second entry. While it shares the same basic structure of the previous two games — a mismatched group explores an abandoned location, discovering the secrets of what happened there — it’s so wildly different in tone and theme that it feels nothing like the others. This was a big swing in a few different ways, and I’m glad to say that they knocked it out of the park.

Mothmen 1966 gets in, tells the story it wants to tell, offers a few surprises, and then gets out long before it wears out its welcome. I had a great time with it, and I would hold it up as an example of a well-done Visual Novel that understands its content and the electronic medium, and leverages both to wonderful effect.

Overall, HeistGeist is an engaging romp through cyberpunk Central Europe. I wish it did a bit more with its card mechanics and strategies, but it’s interesting enough to see through to the end. It doesn’t quite live up to the potential of its concepts, but it remains a recommendation nonetheless.

While girlfriend-friendly and action-ready, Crimson Alliance needs some beefing up to be a memorable experience. Booting up the similar Torchlight for just a few minutes is enough to show that while simple is good, elegant is better.

The opening chapter provides a strong foundation on which to build an engaging (and hopefully not too regressive) adventure game experience.

The variety of games is far better this time around that it was on their first PSP collection, Reloaded, and the overall quality of the selections is quite high.

Sparklite is probably best suited for younger players and those looking for a delightful (if somewhat insubstantial) romp through a gorgeous world. It probably won’t be something I look back fondly on in a few years, but it’s entertaining and whimsical enough to be worth a purchase.

Putting aside the fact that I find it incredibly weird that Dancing in Moonlight and Dancing in Starlight are being sold as two separate, full-priced games (they’re too similar in concept and execution for it to make sense) it’s neat fanservice for those who wish to spend more time with the Tartarus SEES and Phantom Thieves crew. Ultimately, though, I wish that the devs had tried just a little harder to carve out a new and exciting rhythm game, rather than something that fits squarely into established genre norms and coasts by on the charm of its characters.

Although Mirror of Fate doesn't live up to its full potential, it often comes close. I can see the beginnings of a fantastic new-school Castlevania experience trying hard to emerge here, and with just a little more polish and precision, MercurySteam would have turned out a solid winner. It's not yet fully evolved, but the work done here is still a valid step towards the future state of this ever-changing series.

Dead Rising 4 may not be the series’ high point, but it’s easily the second-best, and a great experience in its own right. Zombie slaughtering has never been this accessible or thrilling, and the developers at Capcom Vancouver have once again proven that they know exactly what to do with a winning formula.

The combination of brutal, mostly unwinnable combat and the level-scouring required to solve some of the puzzles might be frustrating to some.

The two biggest positives are its deep fighting gameplay and it surprisingly up-to-date roster.

While the gameplay mechanics are a blast, the level designs are so questionable as to make me wonder about Croteam's reasoning.

After wondering where it could go after the third entry, Zombie Army 4: Dead War is a fitting finale to the franchise. Everything about the presentation is top-notch, and there’s even a special surprise for anyone playing on the PS4. Between Left 4 Dead and World War Z, the co-op zombie shooter is a genre with some truly great titles, and now Rebellion has finally made a game that deserves to be named among the best of them.

It's hard to beat blasting aliens on a commute, but its long-term prospects demand a tolerance for repetition that the game's charming awkwardness might not overcome.

Those hoping to see the franchise return to its legendary roots, or those (like me) who are just sick of the Final Fantasy XIII universe are likely to come away less impressed. It's nice that we've finally gotten the opportunity to play this game, but I'm not convinced it was worth the wait.

At the end of the day, Unbeatable is a solid rhythm title with great audio-visual presentation and and a heartwarming narrative, though some lackluster pacing and inconsistent voice application make it a trickier recommendation than I would have expected.

Getaway isn't a shining beacon for all to follow, but its greatest contribution is that it is a ray of light that brings progressive ideas and expressions to the gaming conscious and deserves credit for it.

If not for the endgame spike in difficulty and the traitor mechanic which doesn't feel fleshed out, it would be an automatic recommend to anyone who enjoys this type of game. Don't get me wrong, though—there's still a lot to like, and it still earns a cautious thumbs up as long as prospective players don't mind a bit of endgame grind.

While it may not do anything new or anything spectacularly well, there's no denying that it's a hell of a lot of fun.

Some of the puzzle design is solid enough that I could easily have pictured Full Bore working as a more linear game. As it is, it's dull and frustratingly misguided, and there are too many low-budget indie puzzlers in the market for one like this to stand out.

For a two- or three-hour game with an asking price of $7, Leo's Fortune might seem a bit overpriced, but throughout the journey I found myself enjoying the controls, the well-placed puzzles, and yes, even the nostalgic gaming environments.

Nairi: Tower of Shirin is a beautiful-looking title, but finishes feeling rather rough and unfinished. There are plenty of puzzles to enjoy, but the script takes some strange turns and I can’t help but feel like there should have been more to the story.

This brief length shouldn’t discourage anyone with a PSVR from playing Wayward Sky, though – besides being a stellar proof-of-concept showing how one of the oldest genres of gaming will do just fine in this brand new format, it’s a great title all on its own, and a genuine standout of the launch lineup.

The menus have a clean and striking aesthetic, and I loved the way crones gathered around a shattered mirror to look down on Ivan during loading scenes. Breadcrumbs Interactive also nailed the voicework. Last but not least, the head-bobbing soundtrack from Romanian underground band Subcarpati, with its trippy hip-hop and folk influences, feels like the perfect choice. It’s the kind of music people will want to listen to even when not playing. Despite some of the issues I had with it, playing Yaga felt like reading my favorite folktale but better, because this time I got to star in it. Let’s just hope the next time I spin a yarn I get better luck and find Ivan a wife to make his babushka proud.

The two halves of Return to Popolocrois aren't equal. By the twenty-hour mark, I was enraptured with being a bigwig farmer, but the JRPG side had lost its appeal. I was essentially grinding out the dungeons not to advance the narrative, but to find items that could be utilised or exploited on the farm. I have to wonder what the experience would have been like had the developer done away with the JRPG side altogether.

Atomfall is ultimately what I call a “chimera” game — it incorporates elements from different genres, but keeps their influence on a surface level. It has resource management and crafting mechanics of classic survival titles, multiple endings and choice-related story and gameplay outcomes akin to classic RPGs, and an emphasis on exploration usually seen in action-adventure counterparts. These are all good things at first glance, but the lack of depth in most regards makes it hard to recommend to dedicated genre fans while also making it relevant to any discussion on traditional boundaries of defining genre.

Tales of Zestiria had a good chance to surpass Vesperia as my favorite Tales title, but the weak plot left me wanting more. On the other hand, the combat system is currently tops, so that's a plus. Overall I still enjoyed my time with it, and would recommend it to Tales newcomers. Just come to it for the combat (and not the story) and everything will be roses.

While I’ll probably never know what a zarvot is, this project offers a solid arcade shooter and a decent campaign — it just needs a little more polish.

Robocop: Rogue City exceeded my wildest expectations when it comes to what a Robocop game could be, and the team at Teyon should be immensely proud of delivering a true love letter to one of the defining films of the 1980s. Anyone who’s even a casual fan of Robocop should buy this game without hesitation as soon as feasibly possible — no Robocop fan will walk away disappointed, and this experience is worth way more than a dollar.

Cognition fails not from a lack of execution, but from a lack of imagination.

The best thing I can say about Team Sonic Racing is that kids will probably love it, although that’s damning praise considering its predecessor. Sonic All Stars Racing Transformed was a wonderful title offering both nostalgia and gameplay, easily giving Nintendo’s efforts a run for their money. Sadly, while Team Sonic Racing can boast improved driving physics and a solid team element, nearly every other aspect of the experience is a step backwards.

BioWare has often shown more willingness than most triple-A developers to respond to community criticisms and they’re already pushing patches to rectify Andromeda’s many issues, so I’m not pronouncing the Mass Effect series dead just yet. But speaking as someone who owns multiple pieces of N7 apparel and has read the Mass Effect books – the freaking books – I hate Andromeda. Maybe this is karmic balance for all of the recent big-name releases that have actually lived up to my expectations, but it’s been a long time since a game left me feeling as deflated as this one.

Backbone’s narrative and character work are thrilling, complex, and thought-provoking, and the writing deserves all the praise it can get. That said, there is some feeling of the pacing being slightly off, since the final acts feel like they follow too quickly after the introductory ones. Whether it’s due to a lack of time or inspiration, the story could’ve done with at least two more chapters of narrative substance during the middle stretch. Any other issues I might raise with Backbone are mostly trivial. With its inspired script that accentuates themes of dystopia and desperation, this detective story delivers one of the most inspiring narrative-driven titles I’ve played in some time.

While the last boss is unnecessarily cheap (come on, we all saw that coming) and the graphics are nothing to write home about, I was happy to find that there were plenty of nuances to the fighting, and there was clearly much thought given to its design. Senko no Ronde 2 is an oddball title that’s not for everyone and the story mode is a complete waste, but for those who find themselves in the Venn diagram intersection of fighting games, anime, giant robots, and shmups, there’s nothing else on the market like it.

I’m hesitant to call Burly Men At Sea an example of ‘style over substance’ because it’s all style, but one’s opinion will ultimately boil down to how one feels about the type of game it is. While not a blockbuster that everyone will enjoy, it’s a neat little project that works well enough on the Switch and kept a smile on my face throughout.

Eminently playable.

Without the distraction that lovable licensed characters provide, I was faced with the inescapable conclusion that Mercenaries 2 was a mediocre title, suitable only for those who fantasize about using attack helicopters to slay entire countries.

Ultimately, by neglecting to tell the stories about these games, Namco Museum on Switch leaves its selections in the unenviable position of selling their legacies to contemporary players on gameplay alone. Namco Museum would have prospective players believe that these selections are valuable, timeless experiences, but the reality is that no game is timeless — every one exists in its own moment, a photograph with its horizons safely tucked away in the background. For players that have the memories, maybe a faithful recreation is enough. But the rest? They’ll be left wondering what all the fuss was about.

Despite the uncomfortable number of missed opportunities and graphics that fall short of current-generation standards, tooling around underwater and leisurely unfolding the central events in Endless Ocean remained unexpectedly delightful and engaging until the end—and even a few hours after.

The high stakes created by The Wise Monkey's first scenes propel the player through the rest of the episode. Although the game stumbles mechanically in a few spots, it manages for the most part to maintain the tension that The Hangman lacked.