I don't know how Fair Play Labs have done it. Everything else GameMill Entertainment has published has been the drizzling shits, whether through deadlines, funding, or using the cheapest developers they can find. You would expect All Star Brawl 2 to be garbage, more games for the mill. But Fair Play Labs are just so passionate, so devoted to making the best possible Smash clone, with licensed characters given due care and attention, with quality modes and decent online, that they've pulled a miracle out. They've made the best Smash clone I've ever played.

My playthrough consisted of trying a few modes out, including the online, but mostly of many, many hours of the campaign mode, a roguelike jaunt through three large zones of group battles, one on ones with possessed characters, power-up stops, minigames, and boss battles. I used most of every character I could in this mode, but mostly focused on Rocko, Spongebob, Raphael, and Patrick. This mode is THE mode. Endlessly fun, and hilariously broken by the time you've funnelled enough slime and splats into the permanent power-ups in this mode. It sounds funny, but I appreciate this as a workaround to unlocking characters. Serious online players don't want to have to unlock characters before they get to grind them out, but the experience of unlocking new guys to play as is crucial to the casual experience. It's the best part of smash, and having unlocks in this one mode brings that feeling out nicely.

Mechanically this is... kind of brilliant? You've got all your air dodges and wavedashing and such that a melee player would want, but with some good additive changes to the Smash formula. You have a slime meter that lets you beef up your specials, as well as granting you a cinematic ultimate move when full. Your chargeable, smash-esque moves are on a separate button to your light attacks, removing the need to 'smash' the analogue stick. More accessible to kids, innit. The only thing you really lose is that not all your buttons do something different between side and neutral, but like... who cares? Immensely playable. Great game feel. Only occasionally bugged out the arse, and even then it's had regular updates to smooth stuff out.

I just really like this. Mr. Krabs just got added in as dlc. I should try him out as a main. The fun never ends. But sincerely so.

Fuck GameMill.

Revisited the original Mega Man for the first time in a long time, and I think, possibly, that we're all idiots who decided this one was lesser than the rest, basically because it doesn't have 8 robot masters and a slide.

It's a gorgeous game, even with the graphical flickering that runs throughout it. The colour palette is carefully used to maximise how clear and engaging everything can look within the NES' limitations. A lot is made of how Mega Man is blue because that gave them the best colour design options, but even in all the robot master power colours, Mega Man looks good, which is... funny, because if you really look at his weird little body it's actually quite unpleasant. But who's closely examining NES sprites, anyway.

Controls are tight, as simple as they are. He jump, he shoot. Each enemy and their placement is clearly built with one solution in mind, and without incredibly tight controls it would fall apart (and often does on slipperier surfaces).

Bosses are memorable. For all that later Mega Man games expand upon this base, they never have a robot master that looks quite as good as Fire Man, Elec Man, Ice Man, Bomb Man, or Cut Man. There's something special to them. Okay, maybe Heat Man. And Guts Man is, of course, some sort of mad icon for the series, reappearing constantly because we all just love that big burly jaw.

If this specific game has any failings, they're two-fold. One is the magnet beam. Optional within its level, and only obtainable as intended with Guts Man or Elec Man (necessitating either foresight or a second play of the most irritating level in the game), and yet without it you cannot actually beat the first Wily stage. That's bad design. That is absolute dog shit.

The other failing is that Wily himself is easy as all get out to beat, even if you aren't using the hilariously overpowered Elec Man weapon combined with the pause button (doing damage each time you unpause, allowing you to win with as much as a single blast). I don't necessarily want Wily to be as painful to fight as he is in Mega Man 7, but I want to feel like I overcame something.

Mega Man is a better game than it will ever get credit for, and I recommend you go back and give it another go, and just have some fun with it. I've never been more glad for younger me to have been wrong about a game.

There are, arguably, two Contras for the NES. Which isn't to say that there's Contra and "everyone is a robot in europe" Probotector, though that is true.

There are, arguably, three Contras for the NE- well, do we count the famicom edition, with its moving backgrounds, easier difficulty, and ACTUAL PLOT IN BETWEEN LEVELS (this is the version I played)?

There are, arguably, four Contras for the NES. Well, three, but there are two ways to play them.

There are, arguably, six Contras for the NES. The ones where you play a pure, unfiltered, challenge, with a harsh limit on lives and continues as you dodge pixel sized bullets and use every strategy you can think of to stave off death, and the ones where you enter the Konami code and treat this stuff like it's a console port of a Metal Slug, where you can freely die over and over, knowing that it would take a LOT of mistakes to put you down for good.

It's a meaningful change to the game, one that I think can completely alter your perception of the challenges contained within, seeing stuff that should be challenging reflex checks as cheap deaths, because you aren't valuing your life enough. I played it both ways, and honestly they're both good, valid ways to enjoy Contra, because it is simply that good a game that it can accommodate both modes of play.

The power-ups are great in this. Yes, the laser is stupid, basically just a skill check for people who hammer the shoot button, the flame shot is... unremarkable? and the machine gun and spread shot are ridiculous in how good they are (and invincibility is what it is), but what's notable is how none of them feel like a nerf, and can be made to work with the right strategy.

Bosses are amazing. Often stationary target-shooting exercises, they still test your shooting skills and dodging abilities quite well, and as the game descends (literally) into more surreal and alien environments the bosses also become a visual treat. Why not rip off Aliens? Aliens is awesome. Good choice, Contra developers.

Normal enemies are varied and enjoyable, all looking like different flavours of American football players, or otherwise being out of sight throwing grenades from trees or the like. Their teensy tiny bullets really test your eyesight as you desperately try not to die and lose your god damn spread shot again.

The game feel is amazing. Every little noise is great, and your weaponry feels meaty as it blips away at enemies. The jumping is spectacular, even when you're leaping foolishly into enemy fire.

Easily a top 10 NES game of all time, an-oh shit, there's two player as well, isn't there!

There are, arguably, 12 versions of Contra for the NES. And they're all great.

Simple, elegant design pushed to the limits of timing, twitch reactions, memory and flow. There’s some sort of narration happening but I have transcended.

I am the circle.

I am the balls.

I will spin.

Forever.

I wi-ah shit I hit a block again. Four stars.

Something to appreciate here is I failed a lot, but never got mad. I just kind of laughed at myself, knowing exactly the timing I needed, shrugged it off and tried again. That’s a special and rare thing in games. I appreciate it for that as much as anything else.

The extra challenges are for psychotics, mind.

It's very odd going back to Mortal Kombat 9, after three other games in the series (and two Injustices) have refined the modern Netherealm fighter to a razor-sharp point. The core gameplay is there. The wonderful approach to a story mode is there, highlighting several characters across its many chapters. The look is... well, miles off, actually. It's juvenile with so much of our cast's designs, in a way not uncharacteristic for the franchise, but that stands out compared to the other games in this trilogy (quadrilogy? MK1 occupies a weird space that makes this a difficult call). Sonya in particular is a cartoonish pair of fake breasts beneath some sort of generic military sleeveless jacket deal, like if Ash Ketchum fucked.

It's just all not quite there yet. The studio has to grow into a true industry leader position, with a... I won't say maturity, but more maturity than this. The gameplay has to become more fluid and less prone to cheap fucking around (and gets there quick in MKX), and that absurd level of visual polish the series is now known for has to actually happen.

But it is good. The story is good. It's a hoot to play. If I'd ever finished up with it when it came out it would have a higher score. But knowing that it only gets better makes it that much harder to score above a 3. Worth it if you want the whole story, but maybe just breeze through on lower difficulties so you can move on to the sequels.

Imagine making the perfect Bomberman game some 13 years after your franchise began, and having to plug on in the years following knowing that it is simply impossible, unimaginable even, for any Bomberman game to match Saturn Bomberman.

The game feel is unparalleled, the use of dinosaurs the best and most straightforward buddy system in the franchise. The music some of the best in all of gaming. The power-ups are tight and all useful in some manner. Enemies aren't frustrating and fit the level themes pretty well. Level obstacles are reasonable, adding just enough spice. It's just the best. A real 5 star game.

It's received criticism for not being different enough, but that's maddening, as polishing the formula here has paid off more than any extreme change EVER does for the series.

An essential game, and one of the best Sega Saturn games ever made.

A brilliant, if not particularly interactive, artist presentation of the life and fate of Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, the CIA's facilitating of a coup against him, and his subsequent house arrest until his death. It's a beautiful, potent way to learn some history, and has encouraged me to learn more about the man and what else he did in life.

I, depressingly, do not need to learn any more about the CIA's sinister acts against other countries in pursuit of American interests.

But yes, great experience, not much of a game to it, but the weight of what it's doing is worth a lot.

A most excellent beat 'em up, with all the touches one needs to feel like the developers gave a shit about the subject matter.

If there was one significant failing, it's my own for never once managing to get a multiplayer game of this going, despite it clearly being designed to be played that specific way, but as I'm saying, that's on me.

Even without others this is a joy to play, and the story objectives and secrets add some time onto what would otherwise be quite a short game. Usagi's the way to go for me specifically, because I'm an Usagi Yojimbo fan before I'm a Turtles fan nowadays, but the whole cast of playable characters are a good time. Well worth anyone's time.

Do we not talk about the level design of Metroid enough? Of Metroidvanias/search action titles in general? Is it not one of, if not THE most important aspect to these titles, both a casual play perspective and those of sequence breakers and speed runners?

This is a game that removes that fundamental part of these titles, replacing it with a random arrangement of pre-designed rooms that essentially exist in isolation. No matter how good one specific bit of design can be, one well-designed landmark, it is an island unto itself, interacting not one bit with the world outside of it. To turn a search action title into a roguelike in this specific manner feels utterly, woefully pointless.

It’s not like parts of this aren’t proven ideas heading in. Randomisers match the same thrilling ‘what power-up will I get here’ feeling that Fight provides, but without the sort of genius level design of a Super Metroid, the ability to skillfully navigate without the intended power-ups are lost, and so a power-up that allows progress HAS to be in the rough area you’re playing within. The concepts are proven, it’s in the execution that they fail.

Some positives. It looks good, and the unpleasant fleshiness of enemies and environments carries the machines vs meat theming of the storyline really well. It feels good to play, power-ups depending, and by the end of a run you feel obscenely powerful, firing endless projectiles all over the screen constantly. That visual and feeling is at the centre of many a quality roguelike, and the creators should be proud of that.

The music is inoffensive, which is to say I barely noticed it. Almost criminal in a search action title, but not the worst thing in gaming overall. There’s just a high bar here.

And that’s… maybe all there is to say. I didn’t hate this, despite the fundamental failure that’s at its core. That’s worth something, but that something only amounts to two stars. If I believed in half stars it may be higher, but I don’t, so it isn’t. Get it cheap if you get the chance, don’t if you don’t.

you absolutely can still sequence break, and you unlock a key retro ability by doing so, but in this game all that really means is ‘I made it through a hot/dark room without dying’.

Really fun to play! Really shitty to look at.

What’s there is fun! There’s not much there.

They’re adding more stuff as they go! Behind paywalls that feel a bit too expensive.

Your favourite wrestlers are here! Except the ones that aren’t, and the ones that are are in looks or personas considerably out of date.

It has minigames! Shit ones.

I dunno, it’s a game of two halves, but the negatives outweigh the positives, and you kind of wish they’d call time on it and work on an iterative sequel rather than pouring resources into a game whose rep has driven people away.

Also why does everyone do the freakish bulging eyes celebration when they get a belt? You’ve got all these personalities but no personality, you dig? A shame,

What a lovely little pack-in. I don’t know if I need a single other ps5 game to take advantage of the controller’s features, but to have one like this -for free- makes me smile.

The whole game controls well, even with almost completely needless combat and all the challenge of a day at the beach. As a thing to just play through it’s magnificent. Just let the gamefeel wash over you and smile. Don’t think, just feel. But also look at this Sony product. Collect the Sony products. We’ve made it easy for you, come on. You can even rotate it a but when you succeed. Come on. Look at these electronics. Did you own them? Bet you did you little console mark. We made them into 3D objects so you can remember, and celebrate us. Come. Celebrate the Sony Playstation brand.

You are not immune to propaganda. But at least this is nice propaganda. Comfortable. Don’t think about what that means.

Don’t.

Every hour, every minute, every second spent in thus game took me from idle enjoyment to an increasingly nagging question: why does this compare so poorly to Powerwash Simulator?

They're both in that family of chill task-oriented client-mission simulator games where you plug away at a job, and I half-expected the variety of House Flipper to keep it around the same level, but it lacks the polish, the pleasantness, the humour, the aesthetics, the charm, the individuality that comes from my favoured job sim, and instead feels like point-accruing and wealth-hoarding to no end. Do I want to turn my shack into a proper house with my nigh-infinite funds from my boring ass jobs? Do I fuck. It doesn't feel like the idea is even sold to me, let alone any unique expression in the missions. Yes I can make everything look like shit while still filling bars or abandon jobs early, but to what end? What's the point? It doesn't feel good. There's no flow. This game simply has no rizz.

It doesn't even do a fun time lapse to show what cool shit I did. I just have to... what, enjoy the memories?

I won't. I refuse. Two stars. Just because bland isn't always enough to bottom out entirely. It has its moments. I think. I just can't think of any right now.