Disgaea Infinite is one of those rare games. It plays like a visual novel, but it will also appeal to fans of the Disgaea RPG series.

Mercenaries Wings: The False Phoenix is a serviceable SRPG that brings little new to the table but might satisfy an old-school itch.

The gameplay hasn't really changed, but it's more than serviceable and will keep you entertained as you make your way from punchline to punchline. If you're in the market for some cheap laughs, this game is an easy recommendation.

Chaos Wars is not a great game, but it is fun. I felt let down by O~3's low-budget localization, and the last few hours of gameplay really felt dragged out, but otherwise I enjoyed the experience.

Forspoken is a far better and more compelling game than I had feared, but it also doesn’t reach the heights I dreamt of. There is a lot of fun to be had exploring Athia and the main quest keeps things interesting even when you get bored with the open-world checklist. But at the same time I can’t help but be disappointed with how safe Forspoken plays the open world, and I am unlikely to go back to clear out all of those rote points of interest. And I also can’t deny there are some eyebrow-raising moments as to how the writers chose to portray a black woman like Frey, despite personally liking her quite a bit when viewed through the lens of having finished the game. There is a lot of diversity in the cast too, in a way we don’t usually get from big-budget RPGs. I am not sure how many steps forward versus how many steps back Forspoken takes, but there are steps taken forward. In the end, I recommend Forspoken to anyone who loves Final Fantasy XV or Ubisoft-style open worlds and especially anyone who has a thing for character mobility. Yet, the game has a certain charm that I believe makes it worth giving a try to anyone.

An uninspired sequel that feels like it was rushed out the door.

RPG Maker Fes got on my nerves at times, but I was still completely enamored by it. The touch screen controls work perfectly and the game even has a predictive keyboard to help as you're typing up dialogue. Between being able to make your RPG in chunks on the go and having such a wonderfully user-friendly UI, Fes makes the creation process easy—it's the process of executing these creations that it doesn't make simple. If you're prepared to dedicate yourself to your RPG and have the patience to learn Fes's intimidating mechanics, you'll find that it's a fun piece of software that will help you bring your creations to life.

Flawed? Sure. Is Arc Rise Fantasia the best RPG I've played? Far from it. However, Arc Rise Fantasia captures the heart and soul of the JRPG so wonderfully that it will be easy enough to overlook the flaws.

Overall, Atelier Lydie & Suelle is a great entry in the Atelier series, and it’s easily one of the stronger Mysterious entries. It competes with Atelier Sophie for my favorite in the trilogy, though the general bloat of Atelier Lydie & Suelle gives Atelier Sophie the slight edge. That said, it’s a great follow-up. Though it may take a while to reach its conclusion, it serves as a nice way to tie up as much of the Mysterious storyline as possible while also offering new worlds to explore, exciting new battle mechanics, and a refinement of an already excellent synthesis system. Of course, with the recent announcement of Atelier Sophie 2: The Alchemist of the Mysterious Dream, I’m eagerly looking forward to more Atelier.

Despite being an imperfect experience, there’s much to love about Summer in Mara. Each aspect of the game gives you something to do and a lot of control over how you want to approach it. While it can be easy to get sucked into the game’s progression through the quest system, you can still go at a slower pace should you desire. And this is definitely the recommended way to approach the game. Take it easy in Mara and enjoy this endless summer. Get excited with each new discovery and enjoy the trek! Even kids find the simple, consistently adorable adventure incredibly welcoming, so even if it’s not for you, Chibig has made something special for all ages! This indie team has lovingly crafted a big, heartwarming tale that can hopefully lead to more adventures in this world, or even the universe beyond.

To see a series falter so badly after years of doing everything right is distressing. One can only hope that Konami returns to the drawing board before undertaking a fifth installment in the series.

I think those looking for a great RPG will find one in Tales of Symphonia. However, for those looking to play it via Tales of Symphonia Remastered, I just cannot recommend it in its current state on Nintendo Switch. For fans of the original, or Tales fans in general, this “remaster” will likely be a stack of disappointment, from framerate inadequacies to performance issues to audiovisual hiccups. Newcomers may find value in this “remaster” on PS4 or Xbox because the original Tales of Symphonia has heart, and Tales of Symphonia Remastered is its most readily available version. However, it is the unfortunate truth that they will still be playing a compromised version. This “remaster” does not cut it by modern standards, especially when it looks worse, sounds worse, and plays worse than a game 20 years its senior.

In other words, for those still interested, Alpha Protocol should be low on the to-play list.

So Disney published an RPG with some innovative mini-games utilizing the DS to its full extent. Unfortunately, the rest of the game was garbage.

For undying JRPG fans, SoD might be another great experience, but overall, it is another meal for Mediocrity.

A fulfilling RPG experience that doesn’t require a 50+ hour time commitment is always welcome for those of us with busy schedules. The 13 or so hours I spent on a single playthrough Arcadian Atlas was time wonderfully spent. With its expressive sprites, fun gameplay, robust writing, and jazzy music, it is clear that Arcadian Atlas was crafted with lots of heart and is definitely worth a look.

Calamity Angels is most excited to direct you quickly to its unique combat, which the game supports by investing heavily in your fighters. When I say it’s experimental, I don’t mean it’s half-baked; in fact, it’s refined and confident in itself. There have been other games where your party members don’t do what you want them to, but I can’t recall any other case where that was this fun. Here, it’s so exciting that it feels like opening your eyes to something new and special. It’s frustrating to see how a little more here and there outside of combat could have built Calamity Angels up into a classic. You know the item was sold “as is,” but you get what you paid for. At least it delivers on its main draw.

Made in Abyss: Binary Star Falling into Darkness is a hot mess of a game. I respect that rules from Made in Abyss’s world and mythos translated into the game mechanics, but that made for a wholly unappealing play experience. While I wouldn’t recommend playing Made in Abyss: Binary Star Falling into Darkness, I would definitely recommend checking out the Made in Abyss anime or manga to see why it’s highly regarded.

Despite developer Bunnyhug getting so much right in terms of the presentation and some of the gameplay, the multitude of bugs and questionable design choices cast a heavy shadow that is impossible to ignore. Since its October release, there have been two patches to address some of the bugs, but the game still remains a messy experience overall. If you can look past the technical issues currently plaguing the game then Moonglow Bay could be a worthwhile time-sink, but it otherwise remains a difficult sell for all but the most diehard Harvest Moon fans.

For now, Chocobo GP is a fine time. It’s not doing much new with the formula, leaving the adorable, titular chocobo behind the pack of plumbers, hedgehogs, bandicoots, and their friends. Still, it does have the potential to get better and maybe toss a phoenix down on the long-dormant series for future entries.

If you enjoy a game that's easy to pick up but has challenging battles and allows you to customize your character with plenty of new duds, then Blue Dragon: Awakened Shadow will be worth your while.

If this game gets patched up enough to render it seamlessly playable, then I would give it another go. But as it currently stands, the game is a challenge for all the wrong reasons, stemming largely from it's crippling system failures.

Aura: Fate of the Ages promises many things, yet fails to deliver on almost all of them.

With SoM, Square Enix failed to leverage modern game design concepts and technology to improve on a treasured JRPG. Instead, they opted to do the bare minimum, and that's a damn shame.

Qora just isn't fun to play.

Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light shows how much and how little the series has changed over the past 30 years. It was fun experiencing Fire Emblem‘s origins for the first time in the original format. For a game released in 1990 on the Famicom, it indeed has a grand story with beats reminiscent of games from that era. However, I do know the third game of the series, Monshou no Nazou (Mystery of the Emblem), is a remake of this game and features a lot of improvements. It makes me wish we got that game instead; it would have been closer to how the series is today.

Perhaps in the course of the nearly 30 hour romp I had through Final Fantasy II, I missed some mystical item that magically makes the game fun and so I was never able to actually appreciate the full worth of the game.

I didn't love this chapter quite as much as I loved the first, but I'd still happily recommend it to anyone who likes point 'n' click adventure games.