Fallen Hero: Rebirth
Where to even begin? Well, the simplest way to go is with a list, but much of what I could say/commend is already covered in the product’s description. So I’ll be foregoing that in favor of a wordy paragraph[or two].
Still, what a story! Maybe it isn’t the “perfect book” for everyone, and there are probably a fair number of people who’ve never considered if they would enjoy playing a CYOA game that could make you feel like you’re fighting a losing battle even as you successfully accomplish what you set out to do without a hitch. This book gives that feeling. Oh boy does it ever!
– Real player with 317.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure Superhero Games.
So, I never, ever, did a review on any game I have ever played. But this one… This deserves it.
For those people who just wanna know if its good: Yes. It is the best cyoa game I have ever played. Go buy it.
And for those who want to know more…
Story
In a world where Superheroes are real, you were a member of the Justice League Avengers Titans Rangers, a team of heroes to protect the innocent. But after a failed mission that left you assumed dead, you return seven years later to become the greatest villain Los Diabolos has ever known.
– Real player with 70.3 hrs in game
Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Yakuza: Like A Dragon is a new spin on the series with a new protagonist and supporting cast that succeeds at breathing new life into one of my favorite video game franchises of all time. Returning players will find comfortable and familiar ground mixed with a new combat system that takes some getting used to but eventually feels solid. This is also a good starting point for newcomers to the series as it doesn’t require knowledge from the other Yakuza titles to be enjoyed to the fullest. Those with knowledge of prior games will have a more fulfilling experience as there are a lot of callbacks and memorable appearances from characters that were part of past installments.
– Real player with 106.8 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure Action Games.
For the seventh entry in the main series, we have a new protagonist and rather more controversially, an entirely new genre. Instead of the beat-em-up brawler gameplay of the previous six iterations it’s now a turn based SJRPG. For most companies pulling it off would be a tall order; for Ryu Ga Gotoku on the other hand the result is a masterpiece.
Remarkably the game doesn’t innovate much. The small(ish) open world maps stuffed with things to do is still the core of the game. Most of the old side activities like Karaoke, golf and mahjong are there along with some new ones, like a mario-kart style street race and a cinema minigame. The arcades still carry old Sega classics too. The combat, while new to the series, is still fairly standard SJRPG fare - on a characters turn they choose between attacking, using an item or skill; there’s a smattering of damage types and status effects like burning or poison plus some positioning rules. Aside from the set-piece battles random enemies roam the map and trigger combat if you get too close. Nothing outside the wheelhouse of a Fire Emblem/Disgaea fan in other words.
– Real player with 98.5 hrs in game
Heartbound
Okay, so let’s get right into listing the pros and cons.
The pros:
The graphics are lovely to look at and have a really nice style.
While this is incredibly subjective, the music is a very nice listen (and can be found on YouTube uploaded by the devs for free, so bonus points!) and usually fits areas well.
The one con that’s really long and might take a minute or two to read:
Arguably the most important thing in an RPG: the story. Golly gee it’s incredibly mediocre. The (current, it’s in Early Access, so who knows, maybe it’ll get better?) story offers twists you can see from a mile away, and honestly at times feels like a fan fiction written by a teenager who’s parents told him “no” once, so he went online to say his parents abuse him and that no one understands him.
– Real player with 11.4 hrs in game
Read More: Best Adventure Story Rich Games.
TL;DR - Recommended? Yes. A quite promising Early Access game with a future I want to see where it’s all headed.
Heartbound is one of those few games currently in early access that actually shows promise with a solid foundation to expand from.
As of this initial release the first two chapters are available and will take around 2 hours, give or take, to complete. However, there’s enough reason to start another run to try things differently to see how the game responds in kind. Many things you do as a player are obviously, and not so obviously, tracked by the game and can have changes both big and small. As the game further develops I suspect that these things, even the small stuff, may have consequences in future chapters down the line.
– Real player with 7.7 hrs in game
Tales of the Black Forest
Review with accompanying screenshots and videos at Sinical Network
https://www.sinicalanimenetwork.com/post/2019/12/24/tales-of-the-black-forest-review
I recently received a beta key of this game for free from MyLifeForAiur as a beta-tester and proofreader for this game. Tales of the Black Forest by 拾英工作室 (Shiying Studio) and SakuraGame is a top-down RPG Maker-based adventure game with anime, mystery, thriller and supernatural elements in a modern Japanese setting. The game features a high school girl Kashin Kihara, who has no recollection of her childhood and has the unusual ability to see yōkai which include monsters, demons and spirits. One day, Kashin dozed off while taking a train home, and woke up to find herself trapped in a dark rural village.
– Real player with 58.3 hrs in game
Review brought to you by:
Life Needs a Little Sin
Tales of the Black Forest is a fantastic adventure through the supernatural Japanese culture, with a twist of modern times and events. Published by SakuraGame, the game went through a deep proofreading, finally reaching the western market completely in English.
Kihara Kashin looks just like your typical high school girl, timid and always with her nose on her favorite books. Her presence can almost be camouflaged among all the other passengers waiting for the train, but Kihara is different. Ever since she was young, she can see Yōkai (ghosts, phantoms, strange apparitions) and interact with them, curiously, in a friendly way.
– Real player with 10.1 hrs in game
Aveyond 4: Shadow of the Mist
I am a full-on Aveyond Kingdom fan. Amaranth/Aveyond Kingdom and John Wizard are my 2 favorite game makers, and they frequently collaborate with each other. Their games are reminiscent of the old Square Soft games, for the Super Nintendo with strong stories and fun sidequests. They are as much fun as The Legend of Zelda or any early Final Fantasy game ever was.
Aveyond Kingdom’s Aveyond 4, Shadow of the Mist is in many ways, a more polished production than their earlier work. The graphics and backgrounds are the best they have produced by far. The storyline is both deep and hilarious, and the characters are, for the most part, engaging.
– Real player with 208.3 hrs in game
As a life-long fan of the Aveyond series, I can say with certainty that this is an incredible game. However, it’s not an Aveyond game. Yes there are references here and there in conversation, but the only thing that makes this game by definition an Aveyond game is the presence of the holy land of Aveyond itself. You could change the name of that place and erase the 5 or 6 references you get in passing and you wouldn’t even know it was part of the series. Like I said before I don’t think this is a bad game, but it just doesn’t have the feeling of being on a proper quest to save the world. In every Aveyond prior to this, there has been a real threat of an evildoer plotting some grand plan, and you are sent on a quest to stop this from happening, running into all sorts of plot twists, tricky puzzles and difficult enemies along the way. In this game,
! you start off on a quest to find your dog, and even when the game seems to pull out the dramatic plot of an evil demon, the main characters brush it off as a joke, leaving the whole plot lacking to feel of a real, important goal.
– Real player with 129.1 hrs in game
Dark Fear
Dark Fear surprised me when I played through it as mobile games don’t often translate well to a big bulky desktop. That feeling that the game is too tiny and bare bones can often overtake qualities that were more apparent on a handheld device. This one is somehow different. Perhaps it’s the amalgamation of styles and their successful combination that gives Dark Fear its legs.
The experience could have been much longer (ignore my playtime as I distinctly remember having to pause this one for a very long, long time…hey, sometimes you have to pee for 3 or 4 hours or whatever I was doing) and sometimes you’ll be wishing that the systems at work were even more complexly engaging (the battles have only a small but efficient set of commands) but for all of that this was an entertaining experience.
– Real player with 11.7 hrs in game
Drawing lots of inspiration from the old Sierra point-and-click adventure games, with a little dash of Oregon Trail and some basic old-school RPG mechanics, Dark Fear succeeds at crossing all three of these and adds a healthy dose of creepy atmosphere and some good scares. I’m only about a quarter of the way through the game, but already I can tell that it’s only going to get even better from here. Although the music doesn’t match the retro art style, it definitely helps up the creep factor. For example, the music in the old plantation house creates a great sense of forboding, and that’s on top of the unsettling pixel art.
– Real player with 10.5 hrs in game
Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin
The title says MH Stories well i should note there is not much story going on in this game, but that is to be expected from capcom and a monster hunter game!
the gameplay is amazing. its unique and really fun weather you’re fighting or exploring.
i really enjoyed the rock,paper,scissor style for the battles and how the animations worked to really show that style!
so many cool monsters and most of them can be obtained as monsties! hey you monster hunter fans out there who want to mount your favorite monster when they wont try to knock you off, get this game right now cause thats what you’re about to do here!
– Real player with 477.3 hrs in game
Really enjoyed the game, its a bit grindy and my only concern is the lobby for co op missions which rarely find people to play with, so i end up doing solo.
– Real player with 114.6 hrs in game
Sabres of Infinity
For a game with few images and no real “gameplay” it really makes you feel immersed as a soldier who works his way up the ranks however he chooses. Are you an honorable hero? A dastardly coward. Or maybe a coward with a good heart, who wants tries his best but it just isn’t good enough. All is possible and more. This game really lets you feel the weight of your decisions, to the point where while i was playing i would feel sadness everytime some of my men died, and i worked as hard as i could to keep them alive. This payed off as by the ending of the game against overwhelming odds i told my men that any who wished to retreat could with no repercussions, and not a single one ran. The game is the price of a coffee, and provides a far more enjoyable experience then a coffee. Buy it, you almost certainly wont regret it.
– Real player with 59.3 hrs in game
So, to start, I have just finished Sabred of Infinity for the first time, so if you want to know what its like to play through it 5 times, ill have to get back to you (because i do plan mulitple playthroughs)
I hardly ever write reviews for games on steam. For the most part, i think someone should be able to judge how they are going to feel about a game based on the general description of the game and its overall reception. Most people, i think (including myself), even if they look at reviews, go into the reviews with a certain disposition towards the game one way or another and tend to discount the reviews that dont already side with their own pre-formed opinions.
– Real player with 17.3 hrs in game
Rune Factory 4 Special
The Peak of Farming RPG Game
Having played the game for countless hours in 3DS and the Switch, RF 4S is easily the best in the series and is the best RPG Farming sim out there, rivaling even Stardew Valley and easily outclassing the series this game is based on: Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons.
Besides as a Farming sim, the game is a great JRPG with nice and fluid combat, there are several weapon type which has different gameplay each such as short sword which is decently fast and will have 100% of your shield effect but it’s range is limited or dual knife which is extremely fast and have lots of DPS but the range is very short and you cannot have the shield benefit at all, my fav is great sword since it has a lot of damage and great reach but it’s slow and only have 50% of the shield effect, but you can use other weapon skill while benefiting the greatsword’s range and damage, yes you can use different weapon skill even if you’re not equiping the corresponding weapon but you’ll get double the MP cost penalty which is annoying early on but once you have lots of food to restore your MP it is not a big deal.
– Real player with 35.1 hrs in game
Full video review: https://youtu.be/9EKIHS4j-tI
Written review below!
I was a bit iffy going into this one. Harvest Moon type games have always been a bit hit or miss for me, but with Rune Factory 5 coming out soon, I figured I’d give this one a shot.
Gameplay
Despite the simple graphics here - RF4S is a bit of a beast in terms of content. Not only is there the farming stuff, but you’ve got dungeon exploring, this extensive crafting system, a large map to explore, and a dating and marriage system on top of that. Up front, it seemed like I would get lost in all of this, but the game actually does a really good job easing you into it through its request system.
– Real player with 34.1 hrs in game
Cat Quest
Tl;dr, Cat Quest is scrumptiously pawsome. Unless you don’t particularly like cats.
In this sexy kitty dancing…no, wait, wrong game, scratch that. In this furry…aaargh…scratch three. In this bright, colorful, light action RPG you play as an unnamed cat Dragonborn, erm, I mean Dragonblood, the only cat species capable of slaying dragons and saving the world of Felingard from destruction.
Visuals, sounds, music, even the combat sounds are all cute, charming, fuzzy, warm and simply cattastic. All the animations are very fluid, character designs are smooth and imaginative and the overland map is adorable and a joy to traverse. Catnap animation melts the coldest of hearts.
– Real player with 20.3 hrs in game
Okay so I wanna take a minute and seriously talk about the mechanics of Cat Quest because the Gentlebros really put together a very sweet and silky setup.
The inventory system is clean and to the point, and I love it. There’s no trash to pick up, just gear. And you’ll never clutter your bag with six different Longswords – you have one longsword, and if you pick up a second, the first one just gets stronger. The same with armour.
You have three slots for gear: head, chest, and weapon. When you sort your inventory by these three slots, the sorting puts the best piece at the very front so you immediately know what gives you the most benefit. This isn’t perfect, though – say you’re more interested in hitting heavy with magic, or you want to build up your armour. You’ll need to peruse and compair for yourself, but the best well-rounded piece is always right at the top of the list.
– Real player with 17.8 hrs in game