Starts off very fun, with it giving you the choice between doing the level legitimately or going for a more destrucive, chaotic approach. Only the completion time for a level really matters towards your end rank, and it's lots of fun fooling around and causing a lot of destruction or trying to avoid it (and failing). However, the further you get in the game, the more it gets rather frustrating instead of fun, with one or two floors having essentially 'escort missions' where the AI either doesn't accept a more creative answer, or it gets stuck on level geometry and it's a hassle getting it unstuck. To top it all off, it crashed on us a few times as we played, and though not a huge problem since most levels can be cleared pretty fast if you know what to do, it does take away from the fun of destruction a bit if you also need to watch out you don't overload the game and lose progress.

Still a great time, especially in co-op and probably best experienced that way, but later levels became a tad too frustrating to score the game higher.

Decidedly one of my favourite games in recent years. I’ve always had a love for when things line up to the beat in games and movies, and no game I’ve ever played has committed to it by this much, to where the entire game is built around it.

The story isn’t anything too special and doesn’t ever take itself super seriously, but I absolutely loved the characters, and I think this comes down to how much heart and passion was poured into this game. The animation, the music, especially the voice acting all sell it perfectly. It gets away with a lot by how genuine it portrays itself. For example, the writing can be very quippy and pun-riddled, but thanks to the voice actors all doing an excellent job and the fact the game plays it straight and sticks to its guns, it all comes off more charming than annoying. The writing in itself is very well done, with it hitting all the right notes to set the appropriate mood for every scene, be it goofy, climactic or more emotional.

The entire world is so vibrant and full of life, literally bopping to the beat alongside you. With an action game entirely based around hitting enemies on the beat, it’s so easy to get into a flow-state that never lets up, since everything in combat is dedicated by the music. Said music can get a little bit samey at some points, but it’s always good, with especially the tracks by the end of the game really getting dang good. Only downside I personally had is that because it requires such constant focus on hitting things on the rhythm, it can end up a tad tiring for longer play sessions, so no harm in taking a few breaks. Though it’s not a point against the game in my opinion, that constant focus also made it so that I didn’t really experiment with the different combo’s much. Since it takes quite a bit of focus to stay on beat and the basic combo’s do the trick just fine, I rarely had to change it up, but that didn’t make getting those S ranks any less satisfying.

Its greatest strengths really lie in the passion that the game practically exudes as you play. All the love, time and effort put into the animations, the cutscenes, how it all syncs up with the music flawlessly, the amazing voice acting, the character designs… there’s just a general optimism at play that put me in a good mood while playing it, and the humor, both visually and in writing, landed often enough to make me chuckle and even sometimes laugh out loud a bit.

I have nothing but praise for Hi-Fi Rush, and I think everyone owes it to themselves to at least try it. It might just be your jam, just as it was for me.

I am decidedly not Princess Peach: Showtime!’s target audience, but that didn’t stop me from playing it and having a decent bit of fun. However, I think even for children, this game isn’t exactly the cream of the crop.

Peach herself still feels about as blank of a canvas as ever, which is a bit sad since Luigi managed to really become his own character in his spin-offs. It feels like every outfits she dons just makes her ‘act out’ a personality, which is kind of the point, but also makes basic Peach still feel as bland as ever. Only Cowgirl Peach threw in a nice little bit of sass that I appreciated quite a bit. The voice acting was also a bit hit or miss, with some lines sounding great but a lot of them sounding either off or just devoid of any fitting emotion. I am fully aware these are personal nitpicks though, but for Peach’s first game in a long while, the devil is in the details sometimes, at least for me.

Sadly it’s not just the details that are ‘kind of off’. The variety on display with the different roles Peach plays admittedly works well on a first run, since you’re never doing the same for too long. The theatrical aspect of it is front and center, with every level actually being played out on a stage and more complex structures held up with barely visible wires to give that hand-crafted feel. It doesn’t break immersion as much as it keeps it grounded that this is all a play with an audience watching and clapping as we pose. On that note, things could’ve been a bit more… theatrical. More bombastic. It always felt like the climax of a given costume was kind of short and very ‘oh… that’s it?’. The gameplay styles themselves also kind of get old really quickly because of how simple they are, with a stand-out being the detective transformation with mysteries that sometimes felt so laughably easy even a monkey could do it. To give credit where it’s due, I found most of the ‘sword-punch-lasso’ levels inoffensive and brainless in a fun way on the first go, iceskater Peach was surprisingly tight on timing at some parts and phantom thief Peach was probably some of the most fun I had with the game. It’s always fun to some degree, but it’s never ‘a joy to play’, and I feel like that does significantly knock the game down when all it has going for is its looks and fun factor. Despite how writing can be very important on stage, I never expected Princess Peach to have inspiring or surprising scenarios. It’s all pretty run-of-the-mill, Peach coming to save the day as the hero. I was even a little surprised by the ending of the game, since I figured the villain would get some kind of redemption, but nope, not even that, which felt oddly cold for a supposedly kind-hearted character like Peach. (But again, big nitpick!)
Princess Peach looks decent, plays decent, but never goes above and beyond on either front, and that’s a bit disappointing.

Now, on a second run, the stages kind of fall apart a little. When the surprise and variety is gone, you start to notice how many sections kind of drag along, with no option to skip them. If you miss a single collectable, which can be easier than you’d think when you often get locked out of returning to a previous section, you’ll have to start the entire level over again, non-skippable slowness included. With a sizeable post-game that makes you go through all the stages again for some new collectibles, it’s essentially inevitable that if you want to get the most out of Princess Peach: Showtime, you’ll run into this repetition which makes once fun sections a bit of a chore.

To end on a positive note: I thought this game wouldn’t be for me, at all, but I gave it a go because I was impressed by how far they stuck to the theatre theming in the demo, and on that front I was not let down. The outfits for Peach are all quite a sight, the cutscenes looked quite nice and the music was a nice surprise too, quite a few catchy tunes! I had more fun than I thought I would have, but this is definitely one for kids, seniors or Peach fans only.

A perfectly serviceable entry in the New Soup lineup, which is enjoyable to play but the main gimmick ends up rather confusing. It’s all about collecting as many coins as possible, but in the end all that does is having you get showered in 1-ups. What’s a hundred coins worth anymore when there’s millions all over the stages? When does the little ‘bling’ of collecting coins turn boring when you realise that the game does nothing creative with them besides giving you a ton more than usual? A shop to use your crazy amount of coins could’ve been nice, or levels that unlock after a certain amount of coins has been collected, but as it is, it’s a boring gimmick that doesn’t bring much variety with it. The game underneath that gimmick is about as good as any other New Soup game, but that’s not much to write home about.

To condense dozens of paragraphs full of spoilers to a few sentences: Xenoblade Chronicles 3 is a game full of potential. A story with potential, characters with potential, gameplay systems that had the potential to be great, amazing even. In my humble opinion, it does ultimately not deliver on any of this potential in the long run, meaning that all the greatness it built up comes crashing down for me. Because of how massive a disappointment it was, story-wise, character-wise, gameplay-wise, mostly due to the high standard the series set for me with the three games that came before it, I really have no desire to return to it. It's a quality game marred by a bunch of narrative and gameplay decisions that either don't mesh with me or show more glaring faults. Thankfully future redeemed literally did redeem it and showed that this game could've been masterful if it was designed with different systems in mind.

I had high hopes for this one despite disliking rogue-likes/lites due to the high review scores, but in the end it falls into the same kind of dull repetition that kills any of my interest to keep playing. It’s a cool take on poker, but I felt like my losses and wins were so luck-based that I felt no sense of progress or higher understanding, and the cards you unlock after every run didn’t really feel exciting either so that sense of ‘slowly upgrading for better runs as you go’ was very lacking too.

It’s a very nice concept and for rogue-fans, you’ll probably love it, but for me it was just kind of dull and disappointing.

Honestly, just wow. This was my very first Prince of Persia game, and what a banger game it turned out to be. I didn’t expect much from it, but on all accounts it surprised me and surpassed my expectations. The story, for example, was a lot more engaging than I thought it would be. Metroidvania’s are often gameplay-first, after all, but the characters feel well-realised and the dialogue well-written, without ever overstaying their welcome. Its mastery doesn’t lie in the quality of this all alone, but how it all stays very snappy. Never did I feel like a story sequence was dragging on, it says what it needs to say, says it well with bombastic cutscenes left and right, then launches you right back into the action. The gameplay has a certain flow to it, both in the combat and the exploration. It’s all about speed and zooming left and right, up and down with every upgrade essentially allowing for quicker traversal or more opportunities for complex puzzles. Said puzzles never really got that difficult, but never braindead either. The combat feels like a constant dance of long range, close range, parrying and dodging, ground and air, where all of these options work in harmony to allow you to juggle enemies in the air but with plenty of ways for them to bring you back to the ground if you get overconfident and just start button mashing. The bosses especially can be punishing, with one encounter in particular forcing me to rethink my play style to overcome it. I played on Hard, but no challenge felt insurmountable even though battles move at breakneck speeds sometimes. I even sometimes felt like with all the upgrades I got I could brute-force certain bosses a little, but not to a degree that hampered the enjoyability.

The music and visuals are also quite impressive, with a painterly quality to the visuals and especially the ‘time effects’ having a very distinct look and sound that I found particularly satisfying. Music is quality across the board, with every theme feeling fitting for the area, and a few standout tracks for bosses that got my blood pumping, even if admittedly nothing really stuck with me in my head.

Highly recommended for anyone who likes metroidvanias, I don’t think one needs to be a fan of Prince of Persia to enjoy this one, it’s a great time!

After the lacklustre campaign of the base game, I had high hopes that this would be much better due to all the praise I heard for it, and I was certainly not disappointed! The story isn’t much, but the mysterious air around it all definitely elevated it. I’ve never really liked much of the splatoon cast of characters, and though I continue to be indifferent to them, Pearl and Marina are definitely a step above the squid sisters with more distinct personalities and just altogether more fun interactions. Where this campaign obviously excels is the gameplay, and it SOARS right past the base game’s quality to blow me away. The short duration of the levels, the challenge cranked up but never too high, all the cute lil mem cakes with frankly beautiful little poems attached to them, that final boss fight’s sheer scale… everything blends together so well that the campaign flies by and not a second of it was wasted. I had a blast from beginning to end, even as I had to retry over and over in some of the harder sections. (Especially the secret boss is a doozy, and though quite frustrating at first, beating it felt so good!) In any case, very glad I went back to Splatoon 2 after 3 to check this out, was absolutely worth it and I highly recommend.