DeVuego

Aureole – Wings of Hope isn’t a particularly complicated game – but it doesn’t need to be. It’s built around a great idea for a simple-but-addictive platformer, and it pulls it off nearly perfectly.

Even if you’re a diehard fan of TMNT in its current incarnation, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed is a stuttering mess that doesn’t deserve your money.

It was clearly influenced by Studio Ghibli and Kiki’s Delivery Service, and it’s solid enough that you can see that influence come shining through, but at the end of the day, all the game really has to say is, “Hey, remember Kiki’s Delivery Service? Yeah, that was pretty cool.”

Creatures of Ava is one of the rare wholesome games that adds enjoyable gameplay to its cozy atmosphere. It brings together ideas you’ve seen elsewhere, but does so in a way that makes them more or less its own.

Koa And The Five Pirates of Mara is perfectly serviceable, as 3D platformers go. And it’s certainly more fun than Summer in Mara. But it’s lacking in any kind of spark of inspiration, and for that reason, it’s every bit as forgettable as its predecessor.

It all makes you wish that there was nothing notable about Death or Treat, so that you could just write it off completely. But it?s hard not to go back to that intro cutscene and see how much care went into creating it, and then wondering what went wrong. It makes you conclude that these developers might have a great game in them ? it?s just definitely not this one.

In that respect, Windfolk may be one of the most frustrating games I’ve played in recent memory. I had no expectations for it going in, but it shows immediately that it can do one thing exceptionally well. If they could have made a game that lived up to that — or even came close to living up to that — then it could’ve been worth playing. As it stands, though, it just feels like a lot of wasted potential.

In other words, Super Sports Blast is a pretty enjoyable package of sports games. I’d have no problem recommending any of its component parts individually (though Super Volley Blast would have some caveats), which means that all three together are — to borrow a sport that Unfinished Pixel haven’t yet tried their hands at — a slam dunk.

In other words, Concept Destruction feels more like a really great demo or a proof of concept than a full-fledged must-play game. What’s here is good, but with a few big tweaks and additions this could have been great. As it stands, this is a fun way to spend an hour or so, but if you want more than that, you’ll just have to wait for the developers to flesh this out a little (or rather, a lot) more.

But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t get your kids Gigantosaurus: The Game ever, only that there are other games you should get for them before this one. It’s hardly a must-play, but if you’re looking for ways to get your kids hooked on gaming at a young age, this one might be the way to start.

I get that this is kind of a lazy way to write about Zeroptian Invasion. But, in my defense, this is a lazy kind of game. The most innovative thing it does is give you the option of CRT mode, which toggles between making the game look crisp and clean, or making it kinda-sorta imitate how games looked a few decades ago. Apart from that…I don’t know, you could get into the debate of whether this is more Galaga than Space Invaders. Either way, though, both of those games are classics that will continue to be remembered for decades to come, whereas I’m going to forget Zeroptian Invasion even existed within a few minutes of finishing this review.

Then again, nothing else works out, either. Timothy vs the Aliens is all about missed opportunities and strange choices that transform a game with a promising premise into a giant mess. If you squint hard enough you can see how it could’ve worked, but as it stands, you’ll want to stay far, far away.

Considering how huge my backlog is and how many games I start only to never finish, though, I can't say I mind the brevity all that much. There's something to be said for showing up, doing your thing, and leaving, rather than trying to artificially inflate a game's length without adding anything new. Nihilumbra is proof positive that a game can be short and still be indispensable, and if you like platformers, you owe it to yourself to check it out.