A MOST AGREEABLE PASTIME
Video Games, Victorian Style
Author: Virtuanaut
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I have a confession to make. I’ve never played Night Trap before! It sure seems like something I’d have played, doesn’t it? I’ve always wanted to try it, but I never had a Sega CD and I just never got around to playing the later ports. On the plus side, this means I went into this…
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I’m not one to start bragging about my toys unsolicited, but Sir Lucius was kind enough to ask, perhaps not realizing that like some nerdy vampire, once invited, I will be all up in your business. Today’s tour begins with the living room. Here we have the PS4 Pro, PSVR, Xbone, and disgustingly excessive 4K HDR…
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Stay a while and listen while I break from my usual M.O. of reviewing hoards of games to recount an offbeat tale of railguns and romance. It was some time ago, so far back that I can’t quite recall the exact year, but I can narrow it down to near the end of the previous…
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If you’re anything like me and haven’t touched a Sonic game since the Sega Genesis days, then Sonic Mania and its return to the good old days of simple, but effective side-scrolling platforming probably sounded pretty good to you too. I’ve never really played any of the later 3D Sonic games, so I don’t really know…
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If you’re anything like me and haven’t touched a Sonic game since the Sega Genesis days, then Sonic Mania and its return to the good old days of simple, but effective side-scrolling platforming probably sounded pretty good to you too. I’ve never really played any of the later 3D Sonic games, so I don’t really know…
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The latest offering from Arkane Studios brings us yet another spiritual successor to System Shock and Bioshock, this time falling under the previously established brand of Prey, for what seems to be no other reason than for Bethesda to renew the rights to a series that was never all that popular to begin with. Despite the fact that…
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After I tried out Jotun on Sir Merriweather‘s recommendation, I knew I had to get this game too. Sundered, the latest entry from Thunder Lotus Games, promised to be a fast-paced, extra-challenging Metroidvania with some amazing looking hand drawn animation and environments, all set in a bizarre world that seems to be the product of dumping sci-fi,…
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The Last Door is actually technically two games, as it was released episodically over the course of two separate standalone seasons, but as they both make up a single complete story, let’s just call it all The Last Door for simplicity’s sake. Anyway, The Last Door is a point and click adventure game by The Game…
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Oh, I have been waiting seven years to finally play this game. The Dream Machine is a point-and-click adventure that was released on an episodic basis, with its first episode coming out in 2010 and the conclusion finally just arriving in 2017. It features a fascinating plot about the physical exploration of dreams, but the really…
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The previews and the demo for the long-awaited Final Fantasy XV made it one of the most anticipated Final Fantasy releases in quite some time (even if I didn’t actually get around to finally playing it until eight months after it came out), but could it possibly live up to all the hype that seemed to promise…
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Monster Bash was one of those early 90’s games by Apogee, former king of weird PC platformers and shoot-em-ups. I think this was about the last game like this that they did before they became 3D Realms and started doing nothing but first person shooters (not that there’s anything wrong with that!). Monster Bash tells the thrilling story of Johnny…
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Super Castlevania IV finally brought Castlevania to the 16-bit world and did quite a fine job of it. Konami really went all out with this one, taking advantage of every bit of the Super Nintendo’s new technology. The backgrounds are highly detailed, animated, and often multi-layered. The vaunted parallax scrolling is also applied to the level in some interesting ways, making…
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Another mobile game? Has the world gone topsy-turvy? Slayaway Camp suckered me in by promising me piles and piles of puzzles, all with the theme of being goofy eighties slasher movies, and I’m pleased to say that it did not lie. Underneath all the blood and guts lies a very classic slide-the-block-around puzzle, the likes of which…
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A new VR game about killing zombies that uses the PlayStation Aim controller? How could this possibly go wrong? Well, let me tell you about my first experience with Arizona Sunshine. I started my journey, rifle in hand, walking towards the first zombies I saw with great anticipation for the moment that I would be…
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Last Voyage is the previous game by Nightgate creators Semidome. Like Nightgate, it offers a selection of beautifully bizarre abstract and minimalist puzzles, along with some non-puzzle flying sequences. Last Voyage approaches things a bit differently though, with each chapter being made of entirely different sets of mini-games, and with a noticeably heavier emphasis on the abstract part. One set…
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Wow, has it been two whole years since Pillars of Eternity came out already? And Parts 1 and 2 of the expansion, The White March, have been out for about a year already too? Time sure flies when you’re having all this fun. Anyway, Pillars of Eternity brought us back to the wild world of CRPGs, in…
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Monument Valley was an amazingly well designed little puzzle game for mobile devices back in 2014. Its use of mind-twisting M.C. Escher-style environments, combined with a really beautiful minimalist art style and impressively effective touchscreen controls, made for one of the most memorable gaming experiences on a phone. For better or worse, Monument Valley 2 is very much…
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Today I’m going to talk to you about The Witness again. I spoke very briefly about it once before, but this time I’d like to take that analysis a few steps further, as well as discussing what it all means about why and how we play games, why this game has attained the dreaded label…
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What is Dogolrax? Well, Dogolrax is game about you, a nameless human guy, being stranded on an alien planet called Dogolrax, which is named after an alien god that is also called Dogolrax. How did you get there? I don’t know. What’s going on with all the crazy aliens there? You know, I still don’t know. What do I know? Well, I…
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We return to the wild world of Castlevania with The Castlevania Adventure and its sequel Belmont’s Revenge, both for the Game Boy. The Castlevania Adventure is a fun little game for what it is, but I don’t know how much anyone that didn’t already have a nostalgic itch for it would enjoy it. Being a Game Boy game naturally…
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Disclaimer: zero spoilers ahead. If you’ve played and enjoyed the previous two seasons of Telltale’s The Walking Dead, then you’ll be happy to hear that A New Frontier hasn’t altered the successful formula at all. If you haven’t, then you’re also in luck, as this makes a great new jumping on point, with the focus being on…
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I don’t play very many mobile games (nothing against them, I just have so many other platforms I’ve already got too many games for), but every once in a while an impressive one suddenly leaps out of the shadows and bites me. Nightgate is one such unexpected nibbler. I had never heard of the game,…
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I’ve been aware of Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite for some time now, but have never really given it much consideration. Marvel vs. Capcom 3 was pretty enough, but the almost complete absence of single player content resulted in me losing interest pretty quickly. Even seeing the latest E3 footage, I thought “that looks nice” and then just…
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There were surprisingly few new games revealed at Sony’s conference, with the majority of trailers being new footage of games that were already revealed at last year’s E3, and very little revealed about the few new VR games they displayed, but even so, there were some pretty nice things to see here. Part of me is…
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So, apparently the director of Beyond Good & Evil 2 was…not entirely truthful when he claimed that the game would not be present at E3 2017, as a cinematic trailer was revealed today: Wow. That…is certainly some amazing CGI, but is it just me or is this one of the cringiest videos ever? I suppose…
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Oh geez. I didn’t even realize Bethesda was doing their show ahead of the actual start of E3 too! Guess I’ll be staying up late just to show you fine readers another 5 exciting upcoming new titles! (Just kidding, I’m always up this late) #5: Dishonored 2: Death of the Outsider (Xbox, PlayStation, PC) I’m a…
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Wow. Well, E3 hasn’t even actually started yet and there have already been some pretty impressive reveals. There are already far too many for me to even keep track of alone, so for now I’ll just stick to some personal highlights of today’s Microsoft Briefing. #5: State of Decay 2 (Xbox and PC) 2013’s State of Decay put…
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Farpoint is finally here! After being teased as a possible Playstation VR release title last year, Farpoint and the much coveted Aim Controller were delayed for more fine tuning. Luckily, all that extra polish seems to have paid off, as this is one hell of an experience. Farpoint quickly strands you on a mysterious alien world and slowly reveals its…
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For some reason I never got around to Blood 2 back in the day, or any day since. Perhaps its bad reputation had been subconsciously swaying my opinion about it? Who can say? Whatever the cause, I figured it was time to finally give it a shot and see if what they say about the game…
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Speaking of nineties shooters, how about Blood? Published by 3D Realms and developed by gaming legends Monolith Productions, Blood answers the question that no one asked; ‘What if Duke Nukem 3D was a comically violent horror game’? Created with the Build Engine not long after Duke Nukem 3D, it’s impossible to not see the strong similarities between the two on the surface.…
A MOST AGREEABLE PASTIME 