Game Reviews

Oh, Hey. Didn't See You There. Were You Here the Whole Time?

HIGH Blanka!

LOW Lars!

WTF Mega Man!

Gaijin Repellant

HIGH Nailing a combo with pitch-perfect timing against a similarly-skilled opponent to win a heated match.

LOW Most of the new music is... not good, and several design decisions are a step back.

WTF Coming across a customised Akira online decked out with a leather cap, a handlebar moustache and a pair of stylish red underpants. Then losing.

Welcome back to a semi-regular feature here at GameCritics.com: TouchTalk. While this series was inspired by one of my old features, the Bargain Basement, I've got an all-new focus for an all-new phase in gaming. Rather than highlighting discounted gems in the used section of a retail shop, I'll be reviewing downloadable mobile games and apps that you might want to check out… and maybe some that you'll want to avoid.

A Serious Trial of Suspending Disbelief

HIGH Occasional funny dialogue.

LOW Zero gameplay variety or innovation.

WTF Make me feel guilty after forcing me to murder 200 people? Yeah, right.

Theater of War Crimes

HIGH The quarter-mile shot.

LOW Are those tank guns manned by psychics?

WTF And then the bullet plowed through his head, popping his eyeball before blasting off the back of his skull! (Repeat 100 times.)

Where High School is Literally Hell

HIGH Performing an attack that deals over 9 million in damage.

LOW Level grinding can get tedious.

WTF The post-game abandons any pretense of sanity and slathers itself in crazy sauce.

Your Daughter is in Another Castle

HIGH Flinging an enemy high into the air and watching the varying gravity directions pull him back and forth.

LOW Pretty much every single line of dialogue. Or the boss fights. I can't pick between the two.

WTF Look man, I know you love your daughter, but do you really not lose sight of that while the world is getting taken over by aliens?

Not the Type that Shatters Glass

HIGH There are some rather tense and scary scenes to play through.

LOW Crashes to desktop whenever I skipped through dialogue too fast.

WTF How did the bad guy get out of a locked, sealed room? It's never explained.

Old Friends Return in a Most Unexpected Fashion

HIGH Labrys' elegant, touching story.

LOW The white story text can sometimes be hard to read.

WTF I forgot how much I missed these characters until Arena reminded me.

A Spreadsheet with Great Music

HIGH The soundtrack easily lulled me into the one-more-turn mentality.

LOW The tooltips and tutorials leave much to be desired.

WTF That's how I control my fleet of galactic destruction?