DeVuego

The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood drinks deep from the well of creativity, shattering whatever narrative mould you may have expected to deliver a magical fortune telling experience you’ll find hard to forget.

With Neva, Nomada Studio continues to display an unmatched level of craft as they create yet another visually striking and evocative fantasy world. But in bending it to fit new systems and more direct storytelling, Neva struggles to define itself beyond raw beauty and uneven, all too familiar thematic ground.

Short and sweet, Is This Seat Taken? manages to make a joyful puzzle game out of classically uncomfortable social situations. It could have done with a bit more variety, even in its short runtime, but this is one that will speak to a lot of folks.

A simple, yet enjoyable puzzle platformer, Scarf is a beautiful title that plays around with the tried and true tale of the hero defeating evil.

Unreliable performance and some underdeveloped mechanics do hurt the impact and atmosphere of After Us, but its intriguing post-apocalyptic world and satisfying movement still make for a worthy adventure.

Godstrike fulfils that baseline need all boss rush games do – the thrill of overcoming seemingly insurmountable odds. Its primary mechanical hook of entwining health and battle time into powerful abilities creates fantastic, tense battles. However it’s the smaller things that hold the experience back. A distinct lack of characterising flair for the bosses through story or music hurt their memorability, and the unrelenting difficulty amongst the chaos, while exhilarating to overcome, is still (at times) overbearing. Regardless of its rough edges though, Godstrike is enjoyable as a quick hit of intense action.

Crossing Souls has charm in spades, from its perfectly emulated presentation of the Golden Age of Film to its engaging exploration. While its combat leaves a lot to be desired and its puzzles are shrug-inducing most of the time, Crossing Souls won’t walk away without some new fans

There are more polished, quality roguelites out there that will engage you for a longer period than Death or Treat, but that says less about its own achievements and more about the incredibly high bar set by its predecessors.

Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX is a fine enough remaster if you have fond memories of the original. It looks and sounds great, but stumbles in its translation and will likely do more to frustrate newcomers than convince them the Master System classic was any good.

Verne: The Shape of Fantasy is a decent enough adventure that doesn't quite capitalise on its promising premise to leave its mark on the genre.

The Occultist has a strong premise, interesting narrative, and engrossing atmosphere, but unfortunately it fails to capitalise on this with some pretty tedious gameplay, a lack of scares, a boring protagonist and out-of-place voice acting.

Curse of the Sea Rats’ charmingly nostalgic art direction can only partially hide a Metroidvania whose mechanical shortcomings are numerous, and whose substandard technical stability is irredeemable in its launch state.

Enchanted Portals copies almost everything about Cuphead, except for the precision of its mechanics, the tightness of its design and the enjoyment gleaned by mastering it. All the good bits really…