When Maglam Lord is sticking to its visual novel elements, it’s rather enjoyable. You can choose your reactions and responses, building relationships and going on dates with the various other characters. The writing is decent, and the sense of humor is fun. Unfortunately, this is only half of the game. The other half is a somewhat dull action-RPG where you wander through uninteresting levels and engage in combat that turns out to be lacking in engagement. There’s an emphasis on grinding for materials to raise your strength, but nothing about the battles make this an enticing prospect. It’s not a very long game, but it feels absolutely interminable at times. Not without its charms, but hard to recommend on the whole.

The emulation of each game isn't completely spot-on, but they're all really playable and the assortment of control options is a nice touch.

Don't go in expecting much more than a non-threatening time waster, and you might have a good enough time with the pigs. Failing that, a bacon sandwich will probably set your sense of justice right once more.

Dungeon Defenders iOS is a deep, sometimes entertaining game… but the controls are a core, critical, nasty flaw that I don't think can be "fixed" or addressed in any meaningful way.

I just really wish that ideas like the random potentially timer resetting events and the energy 'gameplay' mechanic didn't make the choice harder than it already had to be.

Fading Fairytales is a very, very simple game that's great for newcomers who want to acclimate themselves to the strategy genre.

How much you'll enjoy Gun Commando will depend on how nostalgic you are for a shooter that recalls the bygone days of boot disks and Sound Blaster 16 cards.

Luxuria Superbia isn’t entirely reciprocal, but the rewards of giving yourself to its pleasures are great.

Forklift Extreme is fun enough, but it’s also very repetitive. It can also be very aggravating trying to get top marks due to how easy it is to bump some small object or another. I imagine if you’re a forklift fan, you won’t get burnt out on the whole affair as quickly as I did. Even with that in mind, I can’t say I didn’t have some fun with this one. It’s more intuitive to play than the countless Simulator games that have released on the Switch, but still nails down the feel of what it’s trying to get across in a sufficiently complex manner.

I really like how retro-ized the whole game is, and how the graphics and interface are designed to look just like a cocktail table arcade machine.

Though considerably shorter than I would have liked it to be, My Little Monster is a reasonable amount of bang for your buck.

Load it up, go mental with a machine gun during your coffee break, turn it off and forget. Sounds like pretty good escapism to me.

And while Puddle may have launched on nearly every platform this side of the generation first... it manages to finally land on iOS *still* leagues better than most of the competition. Don’t step-over this Puddle, jump in.

In the end, I think I'm just a bit disappointed that for how much Mortal Kombat X is a better-designed experience, very little of that improvement includes the actual gameplay.

Destroy All Humans! has an interesting premise that helped it stand out back when it first released in spite of not exactly being a top-shelf game. Oddly enough, that premise is still quite unique more than fifteen years later. But the things that were rough then feel even rougher now, and I’m just not sure it’s going to impress anyone coming to it for the first time. When the mayhem hits a high and you’re blasting away humans, their structures, and their defenses with your otherworldly weapons, it’s still a lot of fun. What happens between those bits isn’t as interesting, unfortunately. In fact, it can sometimes be outright dull. Add in some technical issues with this port and you have a rather lukewarm invasion all-around.

While you are partially at the mercy of random elements, there’s a great degree of agency in how your chosen heroes and their abilities work together. I think the core game here is just as good as titles like Slay the Spire or Monster Train, but the Switch conversion leaves a bit to be desired. Play it elsewhere if you can, but if you enjoy the genre and only have a Switch, you’ll probably be able to put up with this port’s issues.

Aside from the neo-retro presentation and moving some actions to separate buttons, River City Saga: Three Kingdoms delivers almost exactly what its concept suggests. It plays like one of the best beat-em-ups from thirty years ago, with all that implies. The farcical retelling of the Three Kingdoms provides a fun excuse for the action, and you’ll have a whole lot of goofy thrills if you opt to play it via the extensive co-op multiplayer options. I could do without the terrible platforming bits and I wish it had the courage to shake the formula up a little more, but those who love River City will find this scratches the itch well enough.

It’s hard to find much to object to in Gubbins, really. It doesn’t do anything dramatically different from other word games on a fundamental level, so if you don’t like that kind of thing I guess you won’t enjoy this? Otherwise, this is smooth sailing all the way. It has tons of charm thanks to its lively presentation, the extra twists give the gameplay a flavor of its own, and you can try it out for free, buy extra bits like more Gubbins a la carte, or pay one reasonable fee to get everything. I’ll happily take this game and all the gubbins and Gubbins that come with it.

Gorilla Gondola is a quality release, with responsive controls, good graphics and energetic music. The gameplay feels fresh and there's definitely skill involved with bouncing the gondola through the tight spots.

As a WarioWare-inspired affair, Atari Mania falls a little short of that series while still being good enough to be of interest to those enjoy quick-fire gaming. If we look at it as a celebration of Atari, it’s very well done. There are lots of little details in here for the true-blue fans, and the sense of humor hits the right spot as far as I’m concerned. The Switch version has some technical issues that mean you’re probably better off playing it elsewhere unless portable play is critical for you, but if the Switch is your only (or preferred) option, it’s playable enough to get into.

It's still a very fun game and one of the more accessible games in the 4X genre, and I'll never get tired of pretending everyone is their respective character from Clone High, but I can't confidently recommend this game to anyone who already has the first game, unless those graphics really mean a lot to you.

Mika and the Witch’s Mountain wears its inspiration on its sleeve, and it is so dedicated to its core gameplay mechanic that it can wear a little thin before the game is up. It also suffers from some performance issues on the Switch. With all that said, I can’t say I didn’t have some fun zipping around on my broom, delivering packages to a bunch of quirky characters. This is one of those games where if you think the concept sounds good, you’ll probably like what you get well enough.

Overall, if you're a fan of mini-game collections and you're looking for a new fix, Flick Champions does a solid job of satisfying that need.

These no-frills rereleases of the games are highly enjoyable in a vacuum, but when measured up against similar games in the genre available on the Switch, they feel lacking. If you’ve checked off the big-pants games in the action-RPG looter genre on the system and you don’t mind the price, then and only then should you consider grabbing Dark Alliance II.

I think it's safe to say Crow is a mixed bag, but is still worth picking up because it so much uniqueness to offer. Because it does look so stellar, you can't help but wish those little design flaws (like trading a d-pad for your finger being in the middle of the screen at all times) weren't there.

There are two groups of players that should quickly fall in love with Call of Duty: Heroes. Obviously, series fans will enjoy the fan service that Heroes has, but I think fans of Clash-style PvP combat will also be intrigued enough with the heroes aspect to want to check it out.

It's just all disappointing because Zodiac's such a gorgeous game. And the interface in combat is super-slick. And the Zodiac system is really cool to play with. But what Zodiac: Orcanon Odyssey fails to do is to make the player want to keep playing it. It fails to capitalize on the strengths it has, preferring to draw itself out into a boring trudge rewards you with too few bright spots over far too long of a playing time.

If I was more aware of the missing content this review may have been a bit easier to swallow. But expectations are everything, and if Breach & Clear expected what little it gave us to be OK for now… it expected wrongly. Sadly, though, some of us also expected the wrong thing.