Latest Reviews
Review Chronicles Of The Wolf (Switch) - A Spot-On Castlevania Tribute That May Test Your Patience
A Metroidvania with claws
Chronicles of the Wolf is a tough game to review. A decade or so ago, 2D Metroidvanias were rarer, but they now represent one of gaming’s most enduring and best-developed genres. But how do I assess a production like this that purposefully ignores many of the design changes that made the genre more accessible? This meaty...
Review Front Mission 3: Remake (Switch) - Didn't Get The Love & Time This Tactical RPG Deserved
Wanzer more unto the breach
Every time I pick up the Front Mission series, I am rooting for it. Mechs (wanzers, in this case) are always cool and I always love a good tactical RPG. However, Front Mission 3: Remake doesn’t just manage to put me off with its deeply frustrating combat mechanics; it feels like a haphazard and even insultingly bad...
Mini Review Until Then (Switch) - A Relatable Yet Ethereal Narrative Adventure
Glitch in the Matrix
Until Then is a visual novel that tells the story of Mark Borja, a high school student who grapples with the usual day-to-day of teenage life while trying to figure out why he’s experiencing weird cases of déjà vu. It’s a slow burn; one that relishes in the quieter, mundane aspects of life that many TV shows and movies...
Mini Review Locomoto (Switch) - On The Right Cosy Track, But Has A Few Train Faults
Tickets, please
I thought Locomoto would be the perfect game for me amidst the Switch 2 chaos. With all the excitement of opening new games and speeding around the track in Mario Kart World, I needed something much slower, calmer, and cosier. And, for the first five hours, Locomoto slotted into that role perfectly. You're the conductor of your own...
Review Tron: Catalyst (Switch) - A Repetitive & Forgettable Time On The Grid
Needs more time to compile
No matter how much I learn about the workings of computers, it will always be Tron in there. Little programs, running around on the Grid, trying to keep the whole system from falling apart. So, Tron: Catalyst felt right up my street. It does a great job of visually replicating that digital world and there is a great idea...
Review Ruffy And The Riverside (Switch) - An Inventive Platformer That's More Than Copy-Paste
The right Ruff
Sometimes I'll get asked to review a game that doesn't immediately feel as though it really falls within my wheelhouse. At all. And I have to admit, as much as I do love the look of Ruffy and the Riverside, with its 1980's kids-TV-show-styled characters, replete with visible marker strokes from having been coloured in, I definitely...
Review Deltarune (Switch 2) - A Superbly Subversive RPG That Defies All Rules
A worthy follow up to Undertale
It’s going on seven years since the first chapter of Deltarune became available and after the release of Chapter 2 in 2021, we’re now finally past the halfway mark of the story with the simultaneous release of Chapters 3 and 4. To mark the occasion, Toby Fox has decided to give the game an ‘official' paid...
The best life
I absolutely adored the original Fantasy Life on the 3DS, and thankfully, Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time has proven to be a worthy successor, sinking its claws into me all over again. Kate Gray reviewed the Switch 1 version and said, “It's beautiful, it's robust, it's got multiplayer, it's got three fully-fleshed-out areas...
Nothing soulless about this one
Never let it be said that Atlus is afraid of finding new ways to capitalise on its flagship Shin Megami Tensei franchise—for quite a while now, there have been significantly more spinoff ‘SMT-adjacent’ games than mainline entries. Still, that’s certainly not a bad thing, as the company has clearly come up with...
Review Bravely Default: Flying Fairy HD Remaster (Switch 2) - A Solid Refresh For A 3DS RPG Gem
Have we been here before?
In 2013 (!), Square Enix released a game in Japan for the 3DS called Bravely Default: Flying Fairy, which (after a modest update) eventually received a Western release as just Bravely Default. At the time, the company had been focusing development resources much more heavily on games it believed would appeal more strongly...
Review Gex Trilogy (Switch) - A Happy Throwback That Couldn't Be Any More '90s
Enter the '90s
Note. Gex Trilogy isn't playable on Switch 2 via backwards compatibility at the time of writing, although a patch has been submitted to Nintendo for review, according to Limited Run. We'll update this note when we hear more. Dimitris Giannakis’s Carbon Engine is back on behalf of Limited Run Games, and, despite some previously...
Review Split Fiction (Switch 2) - Peerless, Visually Stunning Co-op Adventure With Boundless Variety
Co-authored
In many ways, Split Fiction feels like the culmination of everything Hazelight Studios has accomplished in the co-op space. The journey began with Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, a charming fantasy that required solo players to coordinate both thumbs to control two characters simultaneously. The studio then progressed to A Way Out, a...
Plenty of bugs
Date Everything! is a dating simulator where the dateable people are actually objects, or inanimates, that exist around your home. You begin Date Everything at work, where you are a recent customer service hire at Valdivian, a major tech company. Almost as soon as your work day begins, you’re informed that your job is being made...
Review Fortnite (Switch 2) - A Visual Overhaul & Neat Mouse Mode Tricks For Ol' Reliable
A mouse-t play
Listen. I'm not gonna dive into this review of Fortnite on Switch 2 with any ideas of pretending to know everything, or even understand anything, about a game that's grown from hastily retooled battle royale to...well...it looks kind of like Roblox now, in all honesty. What on earth is going on here? Yes, since the last time I...
Review Mario Kart World (Switch 2) - The Perfect Introduction To A New Console Generation
Highway to Shell
Editor's note: With the whole team now having spent a week with the game, we've updated the text below with our verdict on Switch 2's premier launch game... True story: Not long before Switch 2 launched, I passed my driving test in America. A new Mario Kart game perhaps isn't the best game to start after getting a licence in a...
Review No Man's Sky - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition - Hello Games' Classic Without Cuts Or Concessions
Atlas(t)
When was the first time you played No Man's Sky? For me, it was right back at its initial launch in 2016, a launch that, for reasons that have been recounted ad nauseam by now, left me fairly miffed overall. Here was a game that was very obviously a huge task for its small (and, as it turned out, phenomenally determined) dev team, a game...
Come on and join the Kohga
It felt weird coming back to Tears of the Kingdom, one of my favourite gaming experiences evz, so soon after I had wrapped it up for the first time. Time has sped by unfathomably quickly, and I wasn't sure whether a performance boost and an additional mobile app would be enough to let the Nintendo Switch 2 Edition get its...
The ultimate life form?
When I originally reviewed Sonic X Shadow Generations on the Switch, I went bold and called it “the very best 3D Sonic game so far” – a statement I very much stand by. The combination of the nostalgia-fueled Sonic Generations and the thrillingly dark, Shadow-focused expansion made it an experience that comfortably...
Review Survival Kids (Switch 2) - Konami's NS2 Debut Is Cosy, Competent, Kid-Friendly Co-op
At first I was afraid, I was petrified
A treasure map: a voyage. The ocean sploshing happily at your makeshift raft. Then a ferocious storm! Shipwrecked, alone, starving, surely doomed. Well, not exactly. The happy sploshing part, yes — and technically a shipwreck — but then you’re in for a calypso-tinged, cosy hangout with friends. Survival...
Review The Legend Of Zelda: The Wind Waker (GameCube) - A Timeless Treasure
Cel-da? Is...is that you?
In honour of the game's arrival on Switch 2 as part of the Nintendo Classics GameCube lineup, here's our new retro review of one of Link's most memorable adventures... If I were to put together a list of my favourite pre-Switch-era Zelda games, those that came before the
Review Puyo Puyo Tetris 2S (Switch 2) - A Disappointing Update For A Modern Puzzle Classic
T-blocks keep fallin’ on my head
We’re making this a trend now, huh? It’s never long before Puyo Puyo Tetris makes its way onto the scene. Such was the case back in 2017 with the launch of the original Switch, when a worldwide release of 2014’s Puyo Puyo Tetris (which released on Wii U and 3DS in Japan) served as one of the very first games...
Review Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour - Surprising, Delightful, And You Know Where It Belongs
Museum peace
Altogether now! "This should have been a pack-in." Or, if that simply wasn't on the table, free for the first year. Or free with a Nintendo Switch Online subscription. It's painfully obvious to everybody but Nintendo that paywalling this specific software further behind the already-pricey console is a mistake. And it's a real shame...
Review Wobbly Life (Switch) - Kid-Friendly Open-World Sandbox Is Frustrating Fun
It's a wobbly life
Editor's note: What's this? A non-Switch 2 game?!? Variety, my friends, is the spice of Nintendo Life... A goofy life sim set in a physics-based sandbox, Wobbly Life by RubberBandGames is an entertaining amalgam of open-world adventure and indie party games. With its cartoonish tone and compulsive gameplay, it's clearly...
Cleanliness is next to godliness
If you want to put your Switch 2 through its paces, there’s no shortage of options in its generous launch lineup. Whether it’s the candy-colored charm of Mario Kart World or the neon-drenched cityscape of Cyberpunk 2077, you’re spoiled for choice when it comes to visual powerhouses. With such major titles on...
Tri-forced new content
Editor's Note: As this is our first 'Nintendo Switch 2 Edition' review (and with many more to come, potentially), we want to outline their focus from the off. Our existing reviews — in this case for Breath of the Wild, both the Wii U and Switch versions, and the DLC — are still live and relevant. If you're coming to this...
Review Yakuza 0: Director's Cut (Switch 2) - A Series Highlight That's Never Looked Or Played Better
I'll be damned, the punk kid's finally turned into a true yakuza
Yakuza 0 was the first Yakuza game — after many, many attempts on my part — that finally and fully opened my eyes to the magic of Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio's long-running (and entirely bats**t) franchise. This was the one that finally did me in. And from the moment its incredible...
Review Fast Fusion (Switch 2) - The Most Accomplished Entry Yet, And A Visual Showcase
Fuuuuusion, haah!
Some of my favourite memories from the Switch 1 came from those opening few weeks following the launch in March 2017. Like everyone else, I was utterly glued to Zelda: Breath of the Wild, but I also poured a huge amount of time into Shin’en Multimedia’s Fast RMX. It was the game to showcase what the console was capable of in...
Names are for friends, so I don't need one
Since this review was originally published, a patch has been released addressing various issues and adding a 'Frame Rate' option, which caps gameplay at 30fps. While we unfortunately cannot revisit games on an individual basis, it should still be noted that the updated game may offer an improved experience...
Review Arcade Archives 2: Ridge Racer (Switch 2) - Still A Thrill, More Than 30 Years Later
Are you all set?
I can appreciate that it's a thoroughly annoying thing to say to anyone under the age of 30, but you really had to be there with games like Namco's Ridge Racer. The original 1993 arcade release was nothing short of breathtaking—so much so that when EDGE magazine put a screenshot on its cover, I remember thinking it simply couldn't...
Review Cyberpunk 2077: Ultimate Edition (Switch 2) - A Superb Port Of An Incredible RPG
Here comes the choom-choom train
It’s more often than not these days that a game released in an underwhelming state is left abandoned in a pool of its own minor updates. On occasion, though, we have a redemption arc like that belonging to 2020's Cyberpunk 2077. Originally released in a state that was barely functional and riddled with more bugs...
