Cadence Of Hyrule – An overclocked remix of The Legend Of Zelda

We tend to think of Nintendo as one of the most fiercely protective owners of videogame IP. Yet it’s more common than you might think for the Japanese giant to allow third parties to play with their toys. Even western hands have been allowed to touch the crown jewels, ever since Retro and Rare took on Metroid and Star Fox during the GameCube era. Even Mario has been allowed to venture west, first with Ubisoft’s Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle and more recently with the Super Mario Bros. movie. But then there’s The Legend Of Zelda, which for years seemed totally out of bounds…

Xeno Crisis – Hand crafted arcade action

You can tell when a game is something I really love, because I’ll pick it to write about on this blog purely as an excuse to play again! Sometimes the blog offers me the impetus to try a game I’ve never played it before. Other times I might select a game because I’m certain it will be interesting to write about. But other times, like with Xeno Crisis, it’s just for the love of playing. An excuse to spend a week in the company of greatness.

The Textorcist: The Story Of Ray Bibbia – Typing of the possessed

The way I see it, if you’re going to make a typing game, why not port it to the Dreamcast? The Textorcist: The Story Of Ray Bibbia is an indie game that originally released for PC and Mac in 2019 and is a devilish mix of bullet hell shooter and typing game. If you’ve played Sega’s inspired Typing Of The Dead then you know what to expect, so it’s easy to imagine this game working well on Dreamcast. But for the developer, and a solo developer at that, to actually follow that thought through and fully remake their game for Dreamcast, then professionally release a packaged version for sale… Well that’s so cool, I just had to buy it!

Super Robot Wars T – A newcomer’s perspective

If there’s one long running series I really should love to bits, it’s Super Robot Wars. Strategy RPGs are my number one, all time favourite videogame genre, and I love robots of all sizes, especially giant ones, too! So why am I only just getting into this series in the year of its 30th anniversary?

Ys IX: Monstrum Nox – An RPG with a secret identity

After falling for Falcom with Ys VIII: Lacrimosa Of DANA, and subsequently working my way through a number of the best entries in the series, Ys IX: Monstrum Nox was my first time playing a brand new entry at launch. Exciting, right? This instantly made it a different experience to the others, with relatively little historical context to go on, and largely free of any critical consensus. Except of course, informed by my now EXPERT opinion on what makes a great Ys game.