Live your days as Yoshi speeding past the kingdom while Koopa is five miles ahead.

Super Mario Kart is a pretty humble beginning for the series, and I believe is still fun enough to be worth playing. Despite being the first, I found the controls to be rather intuitive and smooth once you get the hang of them. Probably the only big thing lacking in this compared to others is the variety of tracks, instead of each having their unique identity there are multiple for the same theme; this doesn't actually serve as a problem though it is just interesting to see how the series evolved from here.

Now on the other hand an actual potential problem is that the game is actually very difficult. The 50ccs should be doable by pretty much anyone, but the 100ccs might actually take a good bit of tries. Easily the hardest part is the Special Cup which you unlock by beating the available three on 100CC, and its here that I had to dip out due to how difficult it seems. If fellow players are to be believed, the 150ccs are actually pretty insane and will challenge even the best karters. I would say though that trying the three cups on 50cc is still worth doing for everyone and should be approachable.

Overall, definitely a great start to the series that has me amped to try out more. For my playing, I did it through the SNES Classics library available through the Switch Online Membership, which should be suitable if you're not able to use an emulator.

Wannafest22, much like its inspiration I Wanna be the Guy, is a game that heavily pays tribute to various retro games of a large variety. In this game, the Kid is placed in different stages from games that the makers wished to showcase to a modern audience who may have never heard of them. The stages are certainly creative and faithful to their original games, with the occasional twist applied that makes the IWBTG aspect stay strong throughout. Aside from the quality aspect, this is also a technical accomplishment for despite being made in Gamemaker 8 it has advanced features that most would not expect or believe possible, it certainly makes for a game that will amaze.

The game itself is very enjoyable, most of the time you'll be experiencing gameplay similar to the stages inspiration. This means that there is a load of variety of what's going on from one stage to the other. At the end of each stage is a boss as well, these are a recreation of one of the bosses from that game. The final stage of the game is the one that plays most like I Wanna be the Guy and binds the experience together with a climatic final boss that makes for a great showdown.

Overall, I would say that anyone who has tried IWBTG or thought about it should also give Wannafest a try. The difficulty should feel much more approachable than the original while still maintaining itself as a solid challenge that feels rewarding to complete and enjoyable all the way through. Also this game is completely free, you can find it at https://cherry-treehouse.itch.io/wannafest22 for Windows PC.

A wonderful remake brings a legendary character back to life: Sparx the Dragonfly.

As someone who never got to play the original, I was really excited when the trilogy remake came out and so far this was a strong start to it. Spyro is definitely one of my favorite video game characters, so being able to witness his journey's original beginning in the modern age was wonderful. I have played the game to completion twice now, and definitely think it has a level of charm that games today truly lack.

Probably the best thing about this game is how smooth Spyro's movement feels. His moveset involves quick ways to damage enemies and swap right back into movement, all while having great maneuverability. This enables you to play the game quickly if you wish, so I would say it's definitely looking good for speedrun potential. There's a tiny bit of less control over the flying segments, but nothing too aggressive to complain about.

As far as the levels go, they're pretty simple and often adhere to the world's theme a bit too closely to make them pop out from each other, but they certainly remain enjoyable all the same. The game operates as mainly a giant Collectathon, and oftentimes these levels have neat ways of hiding different collectibles. Some of them mentioned in the skill book (optional objectives) can be a bit harder to find than I think reasonable, but this amounts to three or so and that's all. Some levels contain boss battles as well, they're all pretty easy with some coming with interesting No Hit Challenges as well. The flying levels as mentioned earlier have a bit rougher controls, but outside of one I found them enjoyable.

Lastly, I'll mention that the remake does a stunning job on the graphics upgrade, while still having a taste of that old school charm to it in the revised music. Of course if you don't like the revisions made to the songs you can actually toggle the original versions as well, but I found the new versions to be rather faithful and enjoyable. Overall it was a great game and has me looking forward to the other two Spyros bundled in this collection.

When their country needed a hero, they asked a demon to fly.

Ace Combat 7 is the first game in the series that I have played, and was one of the strongest introductions to a franchise that I've experienced. The entirety of the game is an adrenaline fueled rush that had me on edge the full duration of my playtime, and the coupling of excellent controls and exciting campaign missions brought this full circle to be a near perfect experience to me. I will mention since I barely ever play games online U have only done the campaign mode so my rating does not reflect what the multiplayer experience may be like.

The campaign is genuinely one of the best story modes I've played in a while. I found the narrative to actually be pretty compelling, and also very sensical as compared to a lot of military plots. It does an excellent job of explaining prior world history so you can easily pick it up as your first game and not be confused by the story. I have to commend the hard work put into the various cutscenes of this mode, it really felt like a cinematic experience at times that also ties in extremely well to the actual gameplay. Another highlight of the campaign is the various radio talk that occurs in missions, I really enjoyed listening to the occasional banter that Trigger's fellow pilots would give, while of course gunning down legions at the same time.

The campaign offers some extremely strong moments in its highest points, such as incredible battles accompanied by some of the greatest songs ever composed. I can firmly say that Daredevil will never be leaving my playlist any time soon, it was actually the reason I wanted to play this in the first place. Probably the only thing I didn't like about the campaign is ironically where the game gets its "Unknown Skies" title, the gimmick slowed the gameplay down quite a lot so it was definitely the weakest point of the mode. Luckily that segment is over pretty quickly and the game returns to all guns blazing every which way until the credits roll.

With such an amazing game in existence, I think it is worth giving a shot atleast once even if you don't believe it will interest you. I have never really cared for military-style games but this easily puts them to shame and won me over. Looking forward to trying the rest of the series!

Disc Room is a pretty interesting game where the main mechanic involves surviving as long as possible in a room with moving killer objects. With such a simple idea, the game manages to have a lot of variations on it with more than 50 different rooms of such, each having a gimmick that makes it particularly special. Some of these areas involve different objectives as well, such as staying in a specific area of the room, or triggering floor panels, or even fighting a boss by collecting orbs on the ground. To assist the player there are a few powers they can use as well, such as the ability to dash through discs without taking damage. To bind these segments together the rooms are laid out in a grid format the player can traverse pretty quickly, with additional rooms being unlocked by completing side objectives in adjacent ones. I found the overall game's concept to be highly enjoyable, and would say this alone already makes the game excellent. The additional work put into the art and sound wrap up the main game as a solid experience.

Besides the avoidance aspect, there also a few extra details worth mentioning as well. Each disc that you see in the game can be "collected" by dying to them, thus one optional goal is to try and obtain each disc. There are also a few special rooms with puzzle elements as well, they're pretty tough to solve somewhat but have unique solutions that make them worth the attempt. The big feature worth addressing though is record times, each room has tracking for the times you get in it and also features a target time set by the developers to try and hit in order to mark the room as gold on the map. Additionally, the game also tracks the automatically records of your Steam friends as well, so you can compete for the highest times amongst the various rooms of the game.

Overall, definitely a game worth taking a look at if you are interested in survival or avoidance gameplay. The game has a lot going for it as a single player experience, and records add a load of replayability for those with friends who also play the game.

Before starting, I'll mention that this review is based on my most recent playthrough in April 2023, but comes from someone who has enjoyed the series since I was a little kid. My latest playthrough is the first time I ever committed to doing the optional content in the game, and does heavily affect the rating.

For starters, this is one of my favorite RPG games due to how much life it has put into it. A lot of people consider the storyline of the Kingdom Hearts series to be wacky and convoluted, but I have always found that to be what makes it unique and creative. Sora is a pretty plain protagonist all things considered, and yet I find it hard to actually dislike him at all due to how it actually fits the story well. The inclusion of your partners, while questionably useless at times as these things go, really makes the game feel like a true "journey with the bros" which is an integral part of the experience to me. And of course, there are all the various tie-ins from stuff like Final Fantasy or Disney, which in some instances are barebones but others are pretty neat. Probably the best part though is the world itself, the concept of Heartless and Kingdom Hearts is fairly neat and to me has always been interesting to see built upon. Music is another great factor too, I think Kingdom Hearts has one of the most memorable and best soundtracks of any series.

Gameplay-wise, this has some good days and bad days. A lot of the features from later games are missing from this one, making Sora have way fewer capabilities than he would have in the future. Some of the combat especially feels a bit sluggish, such as the dodge roll barely making much distance, or the guard being not very reactive. A lot of the magic also feels rather useless in comparison to Thunder or Aero, the Stop spell especially feels a bit tedious since enemies won't die until it ends. This being said a lot of the fights are actually pretty fun, mostly the bosses. A lot of the end-game content is pretty exciting to fight, the secret bosses themselves are all spectacular and the last secret one is quite a climatic final showdown that serves as a perfect teaser for KH2. I know some people have a lot of grievances with the Gummi Ship, but I actually found this part of the game to be mostly fun (I did not do every mission but I obtained all related trophies).

Now as for my grievance: Synthesis. This is a good system conceptually that allows you to use enemy item drops to form equipment and weapons you can use. If you've played 2 or 3, you know that for the most part, it's fairly simple to do too since you can get items from mobs that are easy to grind out and then can take them to the local Moogle to use. Kingdom Hearts 1 however has these two aspects reversed, you can only synthesize in Traverse Town and you cannot grind out some items from just normal mobs. Part of the Synthesis item list are these things called "Stones", and they only drop from rare enemies that are rather obnoxious to get to spawn. Sometimes you can leave and re-enter a room over and over again, sometimes you have to leave the world itself and re-enter via the Gummi, and for one set I even had to back out to the title screen and rejoin to get them to respawn again. The grind for the final reward here was over 15 hours and that's with using a very detailed guide (KHGuides.com), I believe it would truly be unreasonable to expect people to do such without one, and did not find it very fun with it either.

Overall, I think Kingdom Hearts is a very solid success in making an RPG series that's unique and memorable. Given the simplicity of the combat and the inclusion of all the Disney worlds, it would probably be one of the best starting points for kids to get into, and even as an adult it still feels incredibly fun to play and finally do all the harder content in the game.

Epistory is a beautiful game that mixes artistic visuals with text-based combat and does so extremely well. It is without a doubt one of the best-looking games I have played, and the unfolding nature of the world's map continuously offers a new experience worth looking at.

The gameplay is pretty simple, enemies walk towards you with words above their heads, type those words and they shall be defeated. This gets intermingled with a gimmick of having different magic you can use that applies different effects, such as temporarily freezing enemies or burning their next word automatically. The game's difficulty is really determined by your typing capabilities, it can be rather hard in the endgame if you aren't proficient at your keyboard but a relaxing experience if you are. The words you have to type vary in length depending on the enemy, with some of them being short while others incredibly long. This in turn makes the game pretty good for expanding your word knowledge.

Overall, Epistory is definitely a game worth playing if you enjoy typing and wonderful aesthetics. It was a real treat to play and highly enjoyable.

Zup! is a pretty simplistic game in which you have a stack of cubes and need to get the blue one to land on the green field to clear the level. This is accomplished by clicking red cubes that explode, thus making you rely on physics to win. It's an interesting concept, but the game really lacks on much of a puzzle element, since everything boils down to either clicking the right explosive or just timing correctly. The DLC puzzles (which are free) are a bit more interesting as they add a bit more gimmick reliance, but I don't really think this accomplishes much in the puzzle aspect overall.

Ty the Tasmanian Tiger, he's one of the characters I can remember from the earliest parts of my childhood and everyone's favorite Australian hero. In my eyes he's one of the keystone entities from the PS2 era, standing alongside others like Sly Cooper and Jax and Dexter.

This is the first game in the Ty series, and it already starts it pretty strong by having a lot of personal touches that make it stand out from other games, and yes the Australian theme is one of those big touches. From the characters to the voice acting to the locations within the game, there's an emphasis on nature and aesthetics that goes really nicely with eachother. At some points it can feel repetitive of course, the character roster isn't large enough to cover every world so many are reused multiple times, and the worlds themselves can often feel a bit bland sometimes, but for the first entry, it's certainly interesting enough.

Gameplay in Ty is pretty simple, you have numerous different boomerangs that can be thrown with different effects, and you also have a bite attack. This marks a game anyone can pick up and play, with the only real difficulty coming from the actual collectathon aspect since some items can be hidden well. On that note, I didn't really care for the translucent boxes with the picture frames in them, it became a measure that forced the use of one boomerang most of the time. My other complaints about the game involve the second boss, which felt like it could have used an explanation for how to deal damage, as well as the music which felt a bit too quiet at times and didn't really vary enough either.

Overall though, Ty 1 was a great reminder of my childhood and still holds up very well to this day. I never played the other games in the series, so this certainly has me excited to finally try them out next. This is a game I can definitely recommend playing.

.Flow is a fangame of Yume Nikki with a higher focus on the horror aspect than the original. This leads to a much more gruesome aesthetic throughout the game, which in turn makes for quite a different experience. (The game even causes a weird glitch for me upon loading it for a few seconds each time adding to the creepiness factor)

Like Yume Nikki, the goal is to collect various effects throughout the dreamworlds. This time I found them to be quite a bit more difficult to locate, even needing to resort to a guide eventually in order to find the hardest ones. This doesn't drag on the game much, though there was definitely one that seemed a bit overboard and had some maze shenanigans here and there.

Overall, it's quite an exciting game that felt like an excellent experience if you like Yume Nikki. It is a lot more unsettling though so be aware of that.

Yume Nikki is a lovely and atmospheric exploration game in which you have to explore various dream worlds that consist of varied themes. It's a rather simple game, but it manages to be incredibly unique and interesting nonetheless, as shown by its ability to spawn several fanmade works and be referenced through countless indie titles.

The actual exploration of the game is generally what I would consider easy, you simply walk around and take in the atmosphere usually without fear of danger (there are very slight occasions you may need to escape an enemy). Your goal is to collect various "effects" hidden through the dream worlds, and for most of them, it is rather simple to do since finding them is the only true challenge. There are about two effects that might prove challenging to find, but all the others are mostly found in reasonable places to discover naturally. Along the way are plenty of intriguing sights to see, while some of them might be quite unsettling it all comes together to make a lovely artistic style.

As far as complaints go, my only one really revolves around the fact that your movement speed is pretty low. This can lead to the exploration aspect being a bit of a drag if you start needing to revisit locations. The game does have a counter to this, however, which is the inclusion of a Bicycle effect that doubles your speed; I would highly recommend finding this with a guide if you start to dislike the slow walking since it makes that problem null.

Overall, Yume Nikki certainly lived up to its reputation in my eyes and made me once again find the enjoyment of exploration that games like Outer Wilds had to offer. I look forward to trying out some fanmade games of this, it's certainly a formula that works exceptionally well.

Highly recommended.

Could Garden is an incredibly relaxing game in which you place plants on various set pieces in order to grow them and beat the level. The game introduces various different plants to use, ranging from trees to mushrooms to vines, and since the puzzle aspect contains a load of leeway you are free to use whichever you like the most once you obtain them. The set pieces usually involve various city locations that have been run down, such as a junkyard or abandoned factories. It makes for a pretty poetic piece when you realize after mankind's creation is tired nature is there ready to take over again, and I think this is where the game's true beauty comes out. Overall, it's definitely something worth playing if you need something chill and aesthetic to play; the puzzle aspect isn't dominant enough to deter anyone from beating the game 100% so do not worry about that.