HIGH Tutorials that help me get better at Lumines.

LOW Visual overload can make it hard to focus.

WTF How is the soundtrack this good?

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi everyone, Eugene Sax here with another review from GameCritics.com.

I haven’t played a lot of Lumines, historically.

The remastered version from 2018 was my first intro to the series, and honestly… well, I didn’t really enjoy that first pass at it. It felt too loud, both audio and visually, and I couldn’t wrap my head around the horizontal puzzle style. Knowing that the people behind Tetris Effect were also behind Lumines, though, I wanted to give it another shot and see if this new entry was a better way to get into this franchise.

Mea culpa, Lumines — I was wrong about you. (At least in some ways.)

Lumines: Arise is a block dropping puzzle in conversation with Tetris, but rather than the classic tetrominos filling horizontal lines, it instead focuses on asking the player to create 2×2 blocks anywhere on a horizontal plane. Blocks drop from the top of the screen, and players need to move them around in order to create 2×2, 3×3, or larger, in order to score points. A “timeline” moves across the screen and erases any complete blocks it comes across, clearing more room for players to create more blocks, and so on. There is also a rare “chain block” that will allow all linked blocks of the same color to be erased from the timeline, even if they’re not in the shape of a square.

The big mechanical addition to this version is “burst”.

As players create blocks, a meter will fill at the top of the playfield. At any point, players will be able to activate the burst, which then stops blocks from falling for a few moments. If players can create a block during this burst period, it will cause blocks of the opposite color to fly above the screen. Players can continue and make more fly up. All of those blocks come rushing back down once the burst is over, then creating a large chunk of squares to combo with.

Gameplay is broken up into a couple of modes for Arise.

Journey takes players through sets of stages (four or five, normally) with increasing difficulty as things progress. Playlist mode allows players to combine their favorite stages together in a custom order to play, or just to watch if they want to take in the visuals and music. Lastly, there’s multiplayer, which consists of some solo leaderboard competition or battle modes.

I also will shout out the tutorials specifically as Arise tailors them to new players and gives small missions that make it easy to understand and learn not only how to play, but also how to grasp more advanced techniques. These tutorials made me better in a way other puzzle titles haven’t.

At this point in the review, it feels a little like burying the lead to only just now mention the visuals and the music.

Since each stage only has two colors players need to match, this mechanical simplicity allows for some creative and striking ways to keep the play field visually interesting, and the developers lean hard into delivering over-the-top sound and graphics, far above what you might expect for a puzzle title.

One in particular that I enjoyed was a food-themed level. Blocks started as red apples and green melons, but then changed to broccoli and tomatoes as I got further in, while classical string music played in the background. Another had orbs of fish and hermit crab shells that changed color to reflect the sun setting on the beach landscape behind the playfield while listening to slow, smooth pop vocals. The visuals and music combine masterfully to pull players into Arise on a level above just block-matching, and it eats up time in a way that hasn’t happened to me in a long while.

With that said, some of the levels do get overwhelming as previous versions of the game. However, there is a moment of pause and the music fades out between each song, giving a welcome break to catch your breath and reset before going into the next stage. There are also a wealth of accessibility options that allow players to adjust any of the visual stimuli including background effects, particle effects on the playfield, and so on. If it’s too much to take in visually, it can be turned down.

While my memories of playing it in the past weren’t great, the masterful music and visual presence combined in Lumines: Arise really turned me around on the series. It’s not one to miss!

For me, Lumines: Arise gets 8.5 blocks exploding into glitter out of 10.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Enhance and Monstars, Inc. and published by Enhance. It is currently available on PS5, PSVR2 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 6.5 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. Around 1 hour was spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E and contains Mild Fantasy Violence.  The blocks will explode into particles on screen, fantasy violence amounts to spiders and snakes that fight each other in the background (but these can be turned off in accessibility menus).

Colorblind Modes: There are multiple colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: Sound is not needed to complete the game. Captions for character dialogue can be resized. The game is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: The controls are completely remappable.

The post Lumines Arise VIDEO Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The animation is way better than it has a right to be.

LOW The story barely evolves and remains one-note from start to finish.

WTF Some of the fauna encountered expire horrifically during battle.

Fretless: The Wrath of Riffson is a 2D JRPG deckbuilder with rhythm action elements. Players take control of Rob, a talented but unknown musician from a remote area who harbors big dreams of trekking across the world and smashing his way to victory at the upcoming Battle of the Bands hosted by musical megacorp SMR.

However, whispers abound regarding this tournament. Could it be that SMR are instead up to nefarious schemes, rigging these battles so that only the most malleable and easily-bought contestants make it through to the end, winning a tournament that’s little more than a hollow scam to exploit musicians for corporate greed?

Well, yes. It pretty much says as much right from the start. Anyone expecting wild plot twists is going to leave disappointed, so expect musical assassins and goons to be deployed en masse to prevent Rob from winning the competition fairly.

See, music isn’t just a pleasant or occasionally irritating distraction in this world — it’s how people survive. Out in the forests and grasslands, acoustically empowered foes lie in wait to annihilate Rob via the medium of turn-based battles, and it’s here that the rhythm-based battle system comes into play.

Starting out with his trusty six string guitar, Rob can assemble a deck of commands that are randomly drawn from a pool. Three in a row can be set in motion to attack and debuff opponents, or heal and strengthen Rob’s defenses, with timing based QTE’s assigned to each action. Hitting these QTEs accurately can influence battle by enhancing damage dealt, or mitigating damage taken.

Rob will find three additional instruments to unleash havoc with, each of which has its own battle theme when in use. The Bass Guitar is a heavy hitter, the Synthesizer features a warlock style approach of slamming out buffs and debuffs, and the Eight String causes damage to Rob in order to power up its attacks. Each instrument also has passive qualities, with the Synthesizer triggering equipped mods if enough frequency is gained during the turn, for example.

Sound complicated? It can be if desired, though the extremely mild difficulty means that learning the nuances of the battle system isn’t necessary. QTE checks can also be disabled, which I did as I found they weren’t adding anything to the experience — with the Guitar Hero-style “Crescendo” super attacks being the one exception. After building enough meter and initiating the Crescendo (or having a boss encounter do the same to Rob) a musical highway of notes appears alongside a cool animation. It’s a neat touch.

The graphics are… interesting. I don’t think the style is anything to write home about, but the animation is almost unnecessarily lavish. Every attack has a different animation associated, including found or purchasable ones that can be cut into the deck. Cutscenes and Crescendo sequences have clearly had a lot of effort put into them, and it’s downright weird to see a fairly generic graphic style have an almost overwhelming amount of care put into the animation. It might even be a negative in some ways — with no way to skip many of these animations, they slow battles down more than necessary.

Exploration is pretty typical stuff. Each town has a few shops and NPCs, and Rob will occasionally encounter simple puzzles such as shoving boxes, copying environmental patterns or ensuring switches are hit in sequence. There’s a decent diversity of environments, but it’s notable that none of the characters Rob meets along the way are even remotely interesting or fleshed out. It harms the sense of discovery when all that’s waiting in the next outpost are more inconsequential background faces chucking out the odd music pun.

Fretless is remarkably frictionless, but not necessarily in a good way. Standard enemies pose little threat, but still take a while to whittle down with no way to skip attack animations or immediately stomp underpowered adversaries. I killed most bosses on my first attempt, with one of only two deaths in the entire game occurring because I killed myself attempting to learn the Eight String Guitar — which, as mentioned earlier, sacrifices Rob’s health to strengthen its attacks and can kill players who aren’t being judicious with its use.

Bizarrely, the final stretch of the adventure devolves into a monumentally non-thrilling stealth sequence where being spotted by roaming guards results in being evicted from the premises and starting over. On the one hand it’s simple to stay hidden, as their field of vision is projected around them in plain sight. On the other, it’s an absolutely terrible sequence that took far too long to get through, not helped by the fact that I spent ages looking for an exit, only to find that the camera perspective made said exit look like a solid wall.

It’s unfortunate that I find myself having to put the boot in this hard to what’s obviously a passion project from an indie developer, but my emotional state playing Fretless oscillated between boredom, irritation and occasionally finding it all mildly pleasant. Perhaps it will hit differently for someone who’s into the music scene or deckbuilders, but as a JRPG fan who’s partial to a good rhythm action game, it hit a bit of a bum note for me.

Rating: 4 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed by Ritual Studios and published by Playdigious Originals. It is currently available on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher. Approximately 8 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: This game has not been rated by the ESRB.  It’s fine for kids, I’d think, with its upbeat approach to nearly everything that’s going on and cartoonish villainy from the bad guys. However, watching the skin melt clean off (potentially artificial) wildlife to reveal a skeleton as they die seems massively at odds with its usual vibe, even if there’s no blood involved.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game’s story is told entirely in text, so subtitles aren’t needed. While music is a big part of the game, I don’t recall anything from the rhythm based gameplay that didn’t also have a visual cue that would suffice.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

The post Fretless: The Wrath Of Riffson Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

Video game soundtracks take on lives of their own — The opening beats of Morrowind’s main theme, the shifting chords of C418’s Minecraft, and the panic-inducing pizza delivery theme from Spider-Man 2 have stayed with gamers since they came out and will continue to for years to come.

Video game composing has become as respectable and mainstream a profession for musicians as any other genre: The band Sea Power made the soundtrack to the hit 2019 game Disco Elysium, the music collaborative Machine Girl composed the original soundtrack for the 2022 game Neon White, and even Paul McCartney helped work on Destiny soundtrack in 2014. Becoming a composer for a popular or hit video game can easily become a highway to stardom for musicians like Lena Raine, Koji Kondo, and Austin Wintory.

However, there is an entire subgenre of video game soundtracks deserving particular acclaim — Videogame mod soundtracks.

As videogame mods have become larger and more mainstream and accessible, so too have their makers become more ambitious, often incorporating fully-fledged soundtracks into their creations. These soundtracks are written by indie albeit highly skilled musicians, adding new life to mods, as well as occasionally opening up new opportunities for their composers. Mod soundtracks easily have the power to reshape the video game music world as it’s known, as seen in mods for Deus Ex, The Elder Scrolls and the Portal series.

Deus Ex Revision

One of the most impressive examples is Deus Ex Revision, a community-made overhaul mod of the groundbreaking 2000 immersive sim, Deus Ex. Available for free on the Steam store, it provides a total revamp of the base game, adding new areas, achievements, characters–and a totally revamped soundtrack. The composing duo EdenShard, consisting of John French and Logan Felber, did the soundtrack to Revision.

Composing a soundtrack is a difficult enough task, but even more so when working with a game that has a preexisting soundtrack. For Felber, who was writing a remixed soundtrack for Deus Ex Revision, this led to an interesting challenge, saying, “For the most part I refrained from ripping the original [Deus Ex soundtrack] samples as an exercise in the sound design…It’s a little tedious but plotting notes by hand gives me cleaner results as well as a more thorough handle on the composition.” This led to a soundtrack which, Felber says, had a “moodier, more ambient tilt at the cost of the characteristic ‘tracker sound’ edge…” Felber admits that “…While we took that as a matter of artistic license at the time, I think in retrospect it was more the limits of what we knew how to do musically. In some places it worked, but if I had to do it over again it would sound a lot different.” Felber’s soundtrack has been hailed since Revision was released, with many citing it as instrumental in retaining the atmosphere of the original game.

The Elder Scrolls

Immersive sims are not the only genres to have mod soundtracks. Two of the largest mods for the renowned RPG series The Elder Scrolls, namely Beyond Skyrim and Tamriel Rebuilt, have similar initiatives. Beyond Skyrim is a sprawling fourteen-year-old project by modders to add the rest of the continent of Tamriel to Skyrim, and has had numerous composers work on its myriad subprojects, such as Daniel Ran, who wrote the soundtrack to the mod’s Bruma release; Michiel de Groot, who wrote the soundtrack for the mod’s upcoming Elsweyr release; and Eric Gordon Berg, who wrote the soundtrack for the mod’s upcoming The New North release. Tamriel Rebuilt is Beyond Skyrim’s older (and even more ambitious) counterpart for The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind, and it too has had various soundtrack releases, some by Erik Rettig, known by his pseudonym ASKII.

For Beyond Skyrim, each composer had a differing thought process. Daniel Ran admits it was daunting work, saying, “When I’m working on something else, it will for the most part stand on its own, but the Bruma OST was implicitly put up against some of the best work by one of the most successful video game composers to date. That was a mental challenge I often struggled with.” Like Felber, however, he tried to stay true to the original music of Oblivion, where Bruma first appeared, while also developing something novel: “It’s not so much about the specific choices Jeremy Soule made, like chord progressions or instrumentation, but rather how each was used to create the desired effect as a whole. People have specific expectations for a TES score; memorable, song-like tracks with harmony and structure that are easy to follow. So I applied my own style to those principles.”

Ran worked on a section of the world of The Elder Scrolls seen in a previous title; whereas Michiel de Groot had no such restrictions working on an Elsweyr project. He found writing the soundtrack to be a challenge, but a fun one. Speaking of the differences between snowy Skyrim and balmy Elsweyr, he says, “We needed something more distant, something vastly different, in order to really make it fit this beautifully unique place…In the case of the music for Beyond Skyrim Elsweyr, it ended up as a wonderfully diverse collection of instruments from all over the world, due to the visual input and history of the region.” De Groot cited extensive research he did on both the fictional world of Elsweyr’s lore as well as the cultures that inspired it as being key in helping create his soundtrack. Having that to guide him prevented him from falling into what he called the “Infinite freedom” trap and doing whatever he wanted whenever he wanted. “Yes, having no time / budget restraints can be dangerous for efficiency when you’re not careful–but it also paves the way for more creative freedom than a professional environment might provide,” he finished.

Eric Gordon Berg agreed that the process is a daunting one. Like Ran, Berg has worked on a soundtrack for a part of Tamriel previously seen in another game, this time Morrowind. “I have spent countless hours listening, studying, researching and trying to emulate the sound of these games. Not just Skyrim, but the entire franchise. There is something so special and unique about these soundtracks. They aren’t just fantasy soundtracks. They have an identity of their own.” He is hopeful of the finished product: “ I want people to listen to The New North fifteen years from now and feel that same level of nostalgia they have for the original Morrowind.” He hopes that when people hear his music for Beyond Skyrim, they don’t think of him, but rather of The Elder Scrolls.

ASKII worked on the soundtrack for Tamriel Rebuilt.

ASKII says he does not that the task of writing for Tamriel Rebuilt lightly. “It’s not just about complementing an existing soundtrack, but also about honoring the nostalgia and emotional connection people have with the original music.” He similarly does research as de Groot does: “Before I begin writing, I spend time listening to the original soundtrack again to get into the right mindset. I also ask for screenshots and lore background from the new regions to understand the story and emotional tone I need to convey.” Still, ASKII lets his own style shine through, especially as he has access to new technology: “The original soundtrack from 2002 used sampled instruments that don’t quite compare to modern libraries. That’s the biggest shift in sound. Some purists aren’t too fond of that–which I totally understand.”

As for whether or not working on mod soundtracks provided future opportunities, the results are mixed. De Groot found his work with Beyond Skyrim to be quite enriching. Aside from working with instruments and sounds and cultures he was unfamiliar with, most of his active clients were once developers on Beyond Skyrim. De Groot has had the opportunity to work on many other soundtracks on a smaller scale, on top of meeting several talented artists who’ve since made album covers for him. Berg has similarly had success, calling the gravity his project credit has “Overwhelming.” Berg has been interviewed by the BBC on his work, met musicians like Chrissy Taylor and Vela Farguharson, and started a small YouTube channel. “While I can’t say that the project has specifically been attributed to one opportunity or another,” he says, it has certainly launched my music career.” ASKII’s music was introduced to a broader audience through his work on Tamriel Rebuilt. “It’s become a meaningful part of my portfolio, and I feel honored to contribute to something with such legacy,” he said.

Portal

Portal mods are taking a similar path. Popular mods such as Portal Stories: Mel and Portal Reloaded both have their own unique soundtracks. Jared Poolaw collaborated with Ella Ayar for the soundtrack to the mod Portal Revolution, which released in 2024 on Steam to overwhelmingly positive reviews and adds an entirely new storyline independent of the base game of Portal 2.

Composing for Portal mods is a similarly challenging task, according to Jared Poolaw. Poolaw says the initial process of composing for Portal Revolution was “Surreal.” The project was intimidating at times and he admits, “There were many times where I felt like I bit off more than I could chew,” yet he adds, “I’m sure I wasn’t the only one thinking that.” Like other composers, Poolaw “tried to make sure every test chamber’s music sounded meditative and reminiscent of the first Portal’s soundtrack while also trying to mix in bits from Portal 2 and Half-Life.” Poolaw says his work on Portal Revolution has yet to open up any other opportunities so far, but says he’s glad to have it in his portfolio.

The Future

Most of the composers are in consensus — even more mods will have soundtracks in the future. Ran said his soundtrack is not the first and won’t be the last: “The barrier to entry is low enough now that getting paid for the work isn’t necessary any more, and streaming platforms like Spotify have made it easier to earn money than ever before, despite its drawbacks.” De Groot and Poolaw both agree that mod soundtracks will become more prevalent going forward and that working on one is one of the best ways for aspiring composers to get experience and build up a portfolio. “I think these kinds of modding projects are quite special and I’m glad to see them highlighted, specifically from an audio and music perspective,” said de Groot.

— J. Barnes

The post Beyond Skyrim: Mod Soundtracks appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Creative, thought-provoking worldbuilding that I will not soon forget. 

LOW A music-based game that forces players to dodge off beat still feels counter-intuitive. 

WTF Videogamedunkey is in this?? 

When I first started writing for GameCritics, one of the first titles I had the pleasure of reviewing was a strange looking title called Everhood. 

In my time with it, I was flabbergasted by Everhood’s commitment to storytelling, larger than life philosophical themes, and moral ambiguity — all of which have stuck with me. Four years later, when I saw Everhood was receiving a sequel, I jumped at the chance to see what else developers Jordi Roca and Chris Nordgren had up their sleeves. I’m happy to say, Everhood II takes all the successful elements of its predecessor, dials them up to eleven, and creates a superb experience that oozes with personality, comedy, and mystery. 

Everhood II takes its protagonist into a realm past death, riddled with danger and mind-bending realities. The player will befriend an enigmatic raven who encourages them to defeat an entity known as the Mind Dragon in order to escape this perilous dimension. Along the way, the player will travel across space and time, meet zany characters, and make critical decisions that will impact not just their story, but the entire cosmos. 

Though all of this sounds far-fetched, one of Everhood II’s greatest strengths is its cryptic, yet thought-provoking worldbuilding. Each of the realities the protagonist will visit feel lived-in, and are filled with memorable characters. From a battlefield decimated by the war between fruits and vegetables, to a digital circuit board riddled with viruses, exploring each setting without knowing who was truly friend or foe always kept me engaged.  

The main hook at the start is fighting against the initially-overpowered Mind Dragon, and upon the player’s defeat, traveling back to previously-visited worlds that will allow the protagonist to get stronger and more prepared for an inevitable rematch. However, each time a world is revisited, it changes drastically. Whether it’s the passage of 1000 years, or a town that once celebrated you as a hero but has now come to see you as the enemy, the choices made in-game will greatly affect the setting of the next environment, and perhaps the overall arc of the story itself, highly encouraging multiple playthroughs!  

Music-based combat as a concept remains mostly unchanged from the first Everhood. The player is on a five-note grid, and will have to dodge, absorb, and reflect incoming notes from their enemy. Though I found the musical tracks in the first installment to be mildly underwhelming, Everhood 2’s soundtrack is filled with psychedelic tunes that get the blood pumping with synth-based choruses when they’re not perfectly reflecting the personality of the opposing foe. 

However, the main issue I had with the first Everhood‘s battle system remains unchanged here in the sequel. Though the opponent is hurling notes in time with the music, it’s the player’s responsibility to dodge these notes when they arrive, and they’re usually off beat. There were times where I felt it was difficult to fully resonate with the music because I intuitively wanted to press buttons in time with the tunes, but succumbing to this urge would lead to my untimely death.  

Also, for an experience so entangled in its philosophical themes, music isn’t central to the plot, so it begs the question of why this combat system was picked in the first place. 

Apart from my modest frustrations with the combat system and a few too many time-shattering events to keep track of by the time I made it to the endgame, Everhood II is a triumphant follow-up to an already strong title. I will not soon forget the chaotic worlds visited, the eccentric friends made along the way, and the thought-provoking questions raised by my travels through the spirals of time. 

Rating: 8.5 out of 10 

Disclosures: This game is developed by Jordi Roca and Chris Nordgren and published by Foreign Gnomes. It is currently available on Switch and PC. Copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 12 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes. 

Parents: This game was rated E+10 by the ESRB, and it contains Fantasy violence and mild blood. Themes of death, conflict, morality, and philosophy are intricately woven into the game’s core. I wouldn’t recommend the title to anyone younger than their early teens. 

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes, but there is an image sensitivity mode for those who might be sensitive to flashing lights or bright colors. 

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: The game is fully subtitled. Though the speed of the text can be changed, the size cannot. The game is music-based, and though one could get away with playing it without sound, that lack of audio input adds another level of difficulty to the combat.

Remappable Controls: No, the game’s controls are not remappable.  

The post Everhood 2 Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Lovely soundtrack and picturesque landscapes. 

LOW I would love more music interface in my music game.

WTF Crazy glitches make for awesome in-game screenshots.

Symphonia first materialized as a student project in 2020, and after just a few years, has transformed into something quite impressive for a title with such humble beginnings. Developed by Sunny Peak and published by Headup, Symphonia is a musical platformer that stars Philemon, an avian (I’m pretty sure?) violinist extraordinaire tasked with bringing the sprawling land of Symphonia back to life after music unexpectedly vanishes from the land.

in this 2D platformer, Philemon mostly gets around by using their violin bow to jump around. It acts as a skewer of sorts that allows them to stick themselves into pillows, platforms, and hanging fixtures. With each successful leap, Philemon is catapulted even further, motivating players to develop a rhythm that allows them to move seamlessly from place to place.

Although the gameplay mechanics are pretty straightforward, they are by no means easy. Many levels have sections requiring synchronized movements, including jumping, swinging from place to place, rappelling, and even freefalling when the time is right. These mechanics can be tough, but Symphonia‘s lack of combat makes it a bit less challenging overall than other platformers of its kind.

In certain spots Philemon must stop jumping and play their violin to get platforms moving, uncover hidden items and reunite missing orchestra musicians. I loved this mechanic because it encouraged me to slow down, breathe, and listen to Philemon’s lovely violin playing — their solos are intricate, with many variations to listen to.

There are also special items that players can collect if they so choose, some of which unlock interesting abilities.

For instance, teardrop-shaped memory fragments not only grant Philemon new abilities from the start menu such as a double-jump and slow-motion movement, but they also unlock images that help players interpret past events that occurred in the land of Symphonia. Interestingly enough, there’s not much lore to be discovered regarding these past events — most images depict the first chair musicians abandoning the land, but the circumstances that led to their departure are never disclosed. This is, perhaps, one of the weaker points of Symphonia‘s overarching narrative.

In terms of its campaign, Symphonia is comprised of four areas, along with a home base location called the Heart of Symphonia.

Each area contains a landscape that aligns with a musical instrument, and each level’s musical score mirrors the featured instrument — a satisfying artistic choice. I was particularly excited to see how strings were depicted, and String Meadows features glittery (and dangerous) shooting stars that litter its sprawling hills. When Philemon happens upon the cellist who inhabits the meadows, they play music together that shifts the setting of the level from night to day, to dawn, and to dusk. I adored String Meadows, and its attention to detail was a delight to experience. 

While there’s no denying that Symphonia’s landscapes are visually stunning, the musical score is where Symphonia truly shines.

Composed by Olivier Esman and performed by the Scoring Orchestra Paris, Symphonia’s music is inspired by the Romantic period. Each level clearly conveys the drama associated with the music of that age, and each musical piece is sonically interesting. However, although I generally enjoyed my playthrough, I would have loved to see at least one level where the game mechanics were rhythmically aligned with the musical score.

While Symphonia is predominantly a platformer, some mechanics are reminiscent of the metroidvania genre, where rhythm and intricacy are key to successful gameplay. Players often have to be very precise to adequately jump, fly, levitate (and so forth) from place to place, and it would have been awesome to see Symphonia’s precision-heavy gameplay merged with the tempo and percussion of its musical score, offering a more unified, embodied experience. That said, Symphonia’s soundtrack is impressive regardless, and Esman’s intentionality in crafting the score is abundantly clear. 

Symphonia is an audiovisual masterpiece. It’s short, sweet, and just challenging enough to keep even the most seasoned players on their toes. I look forward to returning to Symphonia’s magical soundscape when I need to feel inspired, and I am excited to see what Sunny Peak has in store for the future. 

Rating: 8 out of 10

–Taylor Pryor

Disclosures: This game was developed by Sunny Peak and published by Headup Games. It is currently available on PS4/5, Switch, PC, and XBO/S/X. This game copy was obtained via publisher, and reviewed on PS5. Approximately six hours were devoted to the game, and it was completed. There is no multiplayer mode. 

Parents: This game is rated E. There is Mild Fantasy Violence, which I assume occurs whenever Philemon dies, but there are no enemies to defeat and, therefore, no gratuitous or bloody battles. 

Colorblind Modes: This game does not have colorblind modes. 

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: The game offers subtitles, but they cannot be resized. Game speed can be changed, and players can change “screen shake effects” but there are no rumble cues, which could make gameplay difficult for Deaf and hard-of-hearing gamers. Therefore, this game is not fully accessible. 

Remappable Controls: Yes, the game’s controls are remappable. Players can change the controller configuration or can opt for preset controls. 

The post Symphonia Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Vibrant atmosphere with expert storytelling.

LOW Unbalanced, grindy combat.

WTF People flying by spinning in place.

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi everyone! Eugene Sax here with another review from GameCritics.com!

In some places, music is more than just the rhythm of sound. On Saturn, music is the source of electricity and life for its highly cyber world. In this sci-fi setting, Bobo is an imprisoned sinner not because she’s committed crimes, but because she has an ability that most do not — she can sing. After an escape from confinement and a decision to rebel against the system in earnest, she’ll uncover the truth about Saturn’s music and a secret artifact known as the Keylocker that will set their world free. 

Keylocker is a turn-based tactics RPG where players control Bobo as she leads a rebellion against the corrupt Emperor of Saturn who’s outlawed music in order to control electricity. Players will fight against members of the Saturn church while gathering equipment and resources to ultimately take on the Emperor himself.

Just a glance will show that Keylocker is gorgeous. The pixel art is both beautiful and decrepit, highlighting both the neon-soaked city and the slimy dregs that Bobo pulls themselves up from. The characters are also great, each with a unique portrait and style, from the hacker wearing a computer version of Greek drama masks, to the gas mask girl with a keyboard guitar. These faces are in stark contrast to most of the enemies who are shown in muted colors, all feeling very uniform.

For most of the campaign, players will follow cyborgs Bobo and Dealer. They seem a bit one-note to start with Bobo being rebellious and wild, while Dealer is aloof and self-centered. However, they quickly evolve from tropes into much more. Dealer soon shows a softer and caring side, while Bobo learns self sacrifice and the value of the greater good. This growth also applies to the enemies as well, as their initial notes of infighting during story scenes are revealed to be varying motives that reveal themselves as players progress.

Combat has players managing both EP (electric points – the equivalent of mana) and LP (life points). Once the LP of a character drops to zero, they are out of the fight. EP is used for everything during a skirmish, like charging up a shield for allies, providing armor, or powering up moves that attack enemies directly. The developers lean heavily into timing-based fights similar to something like the Mario and Luigi series. Selecting an action will trigger a prompt, and if the player hits the action command perfectly, they’ll receive a bonus to the action like more damage on a hit, or completely dodging enemy attacks.

It seems fine on the surface, but the problem with Keylocker‘s combat is how frequent and unbelievably brutal it is. As players finish each enemy, a danger meter will fill. When it’s maxed out, more enemies will spawn in. This can lead to some encounters having waves of enemies instead of just a single group. And as I mentioned just a moment ago, timing is key to every action. If a player attacks and misses the mark, the damage they deal is significantly reduced, or they might even take damage themselves in the process. And that’s just for attacking. If players miss a single button on defense, that could mean a character death, even if they’re at full health — And this is on the normal difficulty!

The other problem is how grind-focused the campaign is. Players need to fight to level up, but this timing-based fighting is just too dangerous, and players with imperfect rhythm might find the early parts basically impossible to crack. On the other hand, someone who can nail the timing consistently could probably walk through most of the content with nothing to worry about.

I want to like Keylocker more. The world is beautiful, the atmosphere of cyber-Saturn is great, and I have found parts of the story to be genuinely moving. However, those things just aren’t enough to make up for its grindy, repetitive and punishing combat, and ultimately, this is a hard one to recommend to anyone besides the most hardcore RPG players.

For me: Keylocker gets 6.5 sad guitar plucks out of 10.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Moonana and published by Serenity Forge. It is currently available on PC, PS5 and XBS/X. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Steam. Approximately 10 hours of play were spent playing the game, and the game was not completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E10+ and contains Fantasy Violence, Mild Blood, and Mild Language. Characters will be seen coughing up pink blood when they are close to death, and the portrait screens for the characters will become bloody and beat up. Players will be using everything from musical instruments to firearms to attack robots, cyborgs, and animals. There is some cursing (d***, b******, etc), but not the major curses (f*** or s*** for example).

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind Modes are not present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles, but subtitles can not be altered and/or resized. All of the audio cues required for gameplay also come with visual cues. The game is fully accessible.

Remappable controls: Controls are completely remappable.

The post Keylocker VIDEO Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH A chill, pleasant mood elevated by lovely music and art.

LOW It’s very short, and oddly strict about timing.

WTF It’s oddly bright and upbeat for a game about trying to get some sleep.

When it comes to rhythm games, one persistent (yet understandable) misunderstanding about the genre is that it’s about appreciating music. While the overwhelming majority of rhythm games are framed around music, rhythm play is ultimately about rhythm. Music is just the best mechanical device to build a timing-based set of mechanics around. It’s why so many rhythm titles are still playable in the deafening cacophony of an arcade, or why many rhythm players can still succeed with the music on mute. However, Half Asleep Games’ Melatonin might be one of the few where the music is truly essential.

The concept of Melatonin is heavily informed by genre classic Rhythm Heaven, and like Rhythm Heaven, Melatonin frames its challenges around scenarios set to music. But, where Rhythm Heaven was whimsical, silly, and focused on bizarre, energetic set pieces, Melatonin‘s framing is a more coherent and chill.

As one might expect of a title named after the brain hormone that helps regulate sleep, Melatonin is about a young person trying to get a good night’s rest. Unfortunately, their brain seems to have other ideas, with stages organized into five “Nights”. Each musical piece is centered around a dream subject, such as “Work,” or “Nature,” or “Space”. Melatonin‘s hand-drawn visuals are excellent, with character art and lines reminiscent of modern cartoons and a light, pink-and-pastel color scheme.

The music is a standout, with a number of relaxed pieces produced both by Half Asleep Games and other producers like Gravity Sound and Filippo Vicarelli. Fans of selections found in the “Chill Beats” and “Lo-Fi Girl” corners of YouTube and Spotify will find much to like in Melatonin‘s soundtrack. While consistently of a piece with the dreamy vibe, the songs do vary in tone, with some of the more stressful dream subjects having a darker mood.

Meanwhile, Melatonin varies the interactions with each dream, with the patterns themselves varying throughout the song. For example, a dream about shopping might show players a pattern first, then have them swipe their credit card to match the pattern to buy trinkets. Meanwhile, a dream about time challenges players to wait until the pause in the beat to bat away a flying clock. A dream about exercise has players hitting shoulder buttons to flex their right or left biceps. Melatonin then ups the challenge by speeding up the song, slowing it down and messing with the prompts.

Melatonin‘s strongest Rhythm Heaven influence is in the nature of the these prompts. While most modern titles often use a standardized set of visual cues to tell players the timing of the beat, Melatonin challenges players to listen to the beat for their cue. Most stages vary or even hide the prompts at certain points, forcing a player to pay attention to the audio as much as the visual. Helpfully, the game doesn’t throw a player into the deep end, as there’s a mandatory practice stage for every song and an explanation on the nature of each mechanic.

Melatonin also has assists that may help players with poor timing or those with disabilities. These can consist of adding a metronome beat, or permanently turning on the tutorial-style button prompts, which makes Melatonin a more “traditional” rhythm experience. Personally, I found the scoring assists which widens the “perfect” timing window to be the most helpful. Melatonin doesn’t penalize one for turning on assists either, which I appreciate as someone who was never a fan of the way some devs try to shame players who want to take it easy.

A while it’s a conceptually-perfect perfect love letter to Rhythm Heaven while still offering its own vibe, Melatonin isn’t free of the occasional sleep-disrupting issue. Without assists, play is surprisingly unforgiving on timing. Perhaps it’s just my own lack of skill (or my aging reflexes) but some stages were basically impossible for me to complete without turning on scoring assist. A few of the interactions also rely on an unintuitive understanding of the timing for their cues, as well.

Also, Melatonin is on the shorter side, clocking in at under three hours to get through all available stages. The included custom beatmap options and a personal quest to get a perfect score can add time to that number, but one could theoretically clear Melatonin in the time it takes to have a nice weekend nap.

With all that said, Melatonin never stopped putting a smile on my face. The pitch-perfect sound and visuals, along with the twist on Rhythm Heaven‘s under-imitated style make for a unique and memorable, if brief, experience. Consider it a compliment when I say that my time with Melatonin passed by like a pleasant dream.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Half Asleep Games. It is currently available for the PC, Switch and PS5. This review is based on a code provided by the publisher and reviewed on PS5. Approximately 2 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode. There is no multiplayer mode. The game was completed.

Parents: This game is rated E by the ESRB, with content descriptors for Mild Fantasy Violence. The rating does not have a description, but if it did, it would probably read something like: “This is a story-driven rhythm game in which players control a young person in their dreams over the course of five nights. Players will attempt to hit buttons in time to the music and according to specific patterns in each stage. During the game the protagonist dreams of playing a video game where they shoot cartoon aliens.”

Colorblind Modes: The game has no colorblind modes.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: Gameplay relies heavily on using audio cues, and in its default mode will gradually hide visual cues to further challenge the player. Assists are available in the accessibility menu to permanently enable visual timing cues, making the game playable for players that are deaf or hard of hearing. There is no voiced dialog in the game, and all text is rendered onscreen. This game is fully accessible (with the appropriate features turned on.)

Remappable Controls: This game’s button controls are not remappable.

The post Melatonin Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH An ingenious, unique core mechanic. 

LOW A slightly homogenous, limited soundtrack. 

WTF The announcer, who seems straight out of a 2003 DDR cabinet. 

For a rhythm title, Spin Rhythm XD’s appeal is hard to sum up in a few easy words. In a world without narrative and possessing stripped back and strict methods of interactivity, rhythm games bypass the usual videogame criteria to play on the dark corners of our lizard brain that simply crave new interactive sensations. 

The hook of Spin Rhythm is right in its name — rather than being a simple tapping or button-spamming title where the player presses the corresponding button as a note passes through some sort of ‘judgment zone,’ the judgment zone itself is able to be spun by the player in order to line up alternating red and blue blocks with red and blue notes coming down the screen. These basic notes are then either tapped individually, or automatically counted as successful hits when they pass through the correct color. 

Spin Rhythm expands on this basic idea, of course. Even on the early difficulties, there are sections where the player is asked to flick their analog stick (or their finger, if they’re using the touchscreen) to one side or another, seemingly imitating a DJ scratch. As the player advances through the difficulty levels, Spin Rhythm adds even more wrinkles, such as held notes that need to be released at the right time to continue the combo, or additional note types using the shoulder buttons. 

Throughout it all, the root of the Spin Rhythm identity lies in the fact that the horizontal movement of the judgment zone is often just as important as the vertical movement of the notes downscreen (or, perhaps, more important). This leads to different sensations than the average tapping-based rhythm game.

There are often sections, for example, where the player is simply allowed to hold the judgment zone in place as a stream of both red and blue notes flow down the screen. Staying still in the middle of this blizzard as the judgment zone automatically gobbles them up like Pac-Man tickles a part of my rhythm brain I didn’t know existed. These moments often exist in combination with other characteristic nuggets of Spin Rhythm’s feel, such as a series of back and forth horizontal spins, all of which reset the position of the judgment zone while making the player feel like a calm and collected DJ in the middle of a note inferno. 

It’s a bit hard to describe how these basic concepts and sensations make a player fee, but it’s important to evaluate whether or not a game got them right — and Spin Rhythm XD very much gets this right, no matter what peripheral is used to play. 

As for the Switch version, the player can either use a Pro controller or the Switch’s touchscreen in the style of a mobile rhythm game. Both methods are satisfactory and I’d imagine that the average player could get by using either one of them though I’m sure each mode has a bit of awkwardness on higher difficulties.  

More divisive, I expect, will be the soundtrack. With a decent amount of exceptions, Spin Rhythm mostly uses EDM tracks from modern record labels. To many, the structural similarity of the songs here (verse-chorus-breakdown-verse-etc) might be a turnoff, but I hope this doesn’t end up being the case.

Regardless of what one thinks of the individual tracks, the note structures exhibit a lovely level of homespun detail, feeling appropriately congruent with the song they’re representing while also containing a nice amount of artistic interpretation, appropriate for a rhythm title that doesn’t follow a single instrument for the full duration of a song. 

Details such as this tightness and flair of the notes, the expressive UI — even things like the fact that there’s a preview of the notes scrolling along underneath each track in the song select screen — speak to a level of passion the devs seem to have for the genre, and perhaps a desire to create an experience that is equivalent to their favorite rhythm games, not merely a pastiche of older titles. 

And so, the Switch adds yet another solid rhythm game title to its growing library and reinforces the idea that the console is becoming the go-to destination for both handheld and couch-centric rhythm gaming shenanigans. It certainly helps that Spin Rhythm is so welcoming to players of all skill levels — seasoned rhythm gods, beginners, and even perpetual mediocrities like myself. Spin Rhythm does its best to keep the groove going for everyone. 

Rating: 8 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed by Super Spin Digital and published by Super Spin Digital. It is currently available on the Switch, PC, and Mac. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 11 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was not completed. 0 hours were spent in the local multiplayer mode. 

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E, and contains Mild Fantasy Violence, Mild Language. My guess is that these descriptors are related to some of the lyrics in some of the songs, and perhaps some of the different album artwork or background areas. 

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available. However, the color of different note types etc. can be altered. 

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles cannot be altered or resized. Though it is understandably quite difficult to play a rhythm game without sound, Spin Rhythm XD offers tutorials that are easy to complete without sound, and all other information is presented visually. Theoretically, it would be possible to progress purely using pattern recognition. 

Remappable Controls: Certain functions are remappable. Spin Rhythm can be played in a few different styles — as a purely touchscreen experience, controlling movement through the Pro Controller’s gyroscope, or using buttons and the analog stick. For the default controller scheme, the player moves an analog stick back and forth to spin the judgement zone, presses A or B to tap the red or blue notes, and presses RB or LB to hit the green notes.

The post Spin Rhythm XD Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

This is a transcript excerpt covering the score awarded to Goodbye, Volcano High on the So Videogames podcast, episode 353: Wendy’s Chicken Sandwich 8.5/10

BRAD: The only thing I really have for housekeeping is I want to do a circle back. I’m trying to get into this habit of bringing something to the show, talking about it, but then I haven’t finished it. Right. But if I feel like it’s good enough to finish, I want to come back and do a score and I’m going to do that today. I did it. I think I’ve been doing it on the shows that you’re not here, but this is you’re finally here back so you can hear me doing it. Now I want to circle back to Goodbye Volcano High, which I played last episode and talked about that in depth. You can go back and hear the details there, but just for a brief recap, in case you didn’t hear that episode or for Carlos who wasn’t here, uh, goodbye. Volcano High is a visual novel slash animated film. It’s basically like this really high quality, super slick cartoon that you watch, but you also make choices, narrative choices. And you also do like some music, minigames and a few other minigames. [00:25:00] But large part, it’s, you know, I feel like it’s kind of fair to say it’s visual novel. But like it’s so slick. The graphics are fucking amazing. The animation is really amazing. The voice work is fantastic. Every voice in this game is just like tops. And I found out after the fact that it was Sarah Elmaleh who did the voice direction and she did a spectacular job. She understands voice directing 100%, and I couldn’t have been happier with the voices. Basically, the story is that you play a well, you play Fang, who I believe is an Archaeopteryx. I think every character in this game is a anthropomorphic dinosaur.

CARLOS: Oh, that’s what it is. Because I knew there was some sort of animal person.

BRAD: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everybody is an anthropomorphic dinosaur, and this takes place back in prehistoric times, although it’s kind of a weird mix because they got shoes and there’s like iPods and, you know, like, they’re like kind of like human society ish, but they’re still dinosaur people. Anyway, they fang is in high school and the rest of her friends are in high school. It’s a fantastic coming-of-age story about where you are now, what your next phase of life is going to be, and when you sometimes grow apart from friends. Maybe you’ve been really close all through junior high or high school or whatever, but as you get close to that cusp of going out in the real world, you see that maybe not everybody is on the same track. Maybe some things that you’ve shared in the past, maybe you still share them, still friends. But like, you know, one person’s path is not the path for everyone. I mean, I don’t know about you, Carlos, but I remember going through that exact same thing when I was in high school where my best friend at the time started getting into some stuff that I wasn’t really too into. But, you know, we were still friends and everything. But then when we started talking about what we were going to do after high school, I mean, his ideas were very different from my ideas. I mean, I think he was going to enlist in the Navy, and I was like, I’m super not doing that. And so that may have been the right choice for him. It wasn’t the right choice for me, but we were still friends, but we just ended up being on different paths, right? Did you ever have that experience yourself?

CARLOS: I’m trying to think about that. Um, and by the way, this kind of brings up a note and it’s interesting. It’s kind of my first question before you even go into your final review of it. But like we have talked about games like this before and how it’s hard for us to connect to them. Yeah, because those moments are so far removed from our lives. Totally. Totally. Yeah. And so I’m just wondering how you found the connection there, because for me, it’s really hard to get into a game where I’m thinking about those choices that I made so long ago.

BRAD: Well, you know, that’s a good point because we have said that many times, and I don’t generally like teenage protagonists because I feel like they keep hitting the same tropes over and over and they don’t really do like much of an examination. Like, for example, like, you know, whenever you get like a teen protag and a jRPG or something, I’m just like, Oh, like, okay, whatever. Like it’s like the same, the same notes over and over. And it’s funny because speaking of openings and starfield and how, you know, people say it’s starfield, like it’s got you got to put 12 hours in before it gets good. Like in this game. Goodbye Volcano High. I think I played like the first opening scene, which is maybe like three minutes, four minutes I was in, dude. I’m like, Oh yes, I’m in. Like, this is. This has got me. So you don’t need 12 fucking hours to get somebody into your fucking game. You just need a good start to your game.

CARLOS:And another game I’ll talk about today also has that same kind of thing. So yeah, you can just get, you can get hooked right away.

BRAD: Yeah, you can. And so and I will be perfectly honest, dude, when I started this, I was like, okay, teenagers. I don’t know. I’m like this old crusty ass senior citizen. I don’t know if I can reconnect, but man, they totally got me, dude. I think the voices are great and that helps. The performances are very strong. I think also we don’t normally spend a lot of time on this particular aspect, right? Like when you’re on the cusp of breaking away. And I think that’s kind of what got me.

CARLOS: That’s the difference. Okay.

BRAD: Yeah. Like the difference of like I we are still friends, but we are no longer so close or we are making different choices and our choices, the thing that is right for me that is not right for you is what’s kind of driving us apart. And do you bridge that or do you not bridge that? So I think that was something that really resonated with me because you don’t even have to be a high schooler to have that. I mean, I can think of many friends, Um, you know, after I got out of high school in my adult life where it’s like, you know, we were friends and then all of a sudden they make a choice that I feel like I can’t get on board with or vice versa. And then maybe we’re still friends, but like, we’re not the same because of something that happened or, you know, they chose a different path or a different job or they moved or whatever, something like that. So, so that I think was kind of a really key part. But I think the other part was that and I don’t think this is a spoiler, I think they they think they talk about this in the trailer. It’s even in the opening logo. So I don’t feel like this is a spoiler.

BRAD: But, you know, the current theory about what happened to the dinosaurs is giant meteor. Right? Like wiped them out because of like, I don’t know, big, big meteor hit the earth dust cloud killed all life, etcetera, etcetera. So that’s in this game. Like as after the first couple moments, you realize there’s a giant fucking meteor heading for Earth and all these dinosaur people, they know about it and they’re like, It’s coming. And then to see how they deal with that really [00:30:00] connected me really strongly. I mean, in large part because of. Right. I mean, it’s funny because my I let my son play this, my 14 year old son, I’m like, I think you’d really like this because you’re like in the age bracket. Plus you’re going through some of this stuff, play this, let me know what you think. And he, like, he plays the game. Right after this first session, he comes up to me. He’s like, Dad, what the fuck? I’m like, What? He’s like, There’s a giant fucking meteor coming to hit Earth and like, this is not even believable. People aren’t even doing anything. I’m like, Oh, really? You think that’s not believable? What are people doing about Covid? And he’s like, uh.

CARLOS: All right. Yeah.

BRAD: So not only Covid, but also the ecological thing that we’re going through now, where Earth is literally boiling us to death and we’re fucking around. We’re just fucking around. We’re still boiling, we’re digging for oil and we’re burning gas and we’re not changing. We’re doing the wrong things.

CARLOS: But I was just going to say just not to tangent, but like in Seattle today, it’s going to be 80 and it’s like, no, no, no, no, no. And then like, oh, tomorrow I bring this up because again, people aren’t talking about it like, What the hell? It’s right in front of our faces. Tomorrow it’s going to go down to 71 or something and be like, Oh, kind of like fall weather again then. Then literally two days later, 80 again, and then like three days later, 88. Are you fucking kidding me? What is wrong? That’s like, what?

BRAD: What evidence do we need? Dude, what were We are. We are. Yes, we are living. It’s. We’re. We are neck deep in all these signs, all these scientists that are like, screaming at us, being like, oh, my God, the polar ice caps are melting. The the the global temperatures are rising. We’re seeing green. I fucking I just watched the news report yesterday. So Greece, they got three years worth of rain in two days. And now the government agrees to saying, well, you know, I think that maybe we’re going to have permanent lakes where we used to have dry land. That’s fucked up, dude. Like. So anyway, not that we need. I mean, this is all very serious.

CARLOS: It is very serious. Let me just finish that that tangent by saying, everybody go check out the movie. Don’t look up.

BRAD: Please go check out that movie. Yes.

CARLOS: Because that is exactly what we’re talking.

BRAD: Exactly. So so that’s I think what kind of got me right is because not only is it the divergence of path, not only is it the outstanding performances, the script, super organic, it feels like everybody in this is just like a person. I mean, they’re dinosaurs. Yeah, whatever. But put that aside. It just feels like people talking in a very realistic way. And I was I was easily getting sucked into it because I was like, Oh, those are the jokes I would kind of make. Or like I had a friend who talked like that or yeah, you know, like you can it feels real, right? But also the sense of impending fucking global disaster. And what does that mean for you on a day to day basis? Because these characters often say, Hey man, there’s like a big meteor coming. What am I supposed to do? And they’re like, Well, what can we do? Yeah. You know, in our particular case, there is stuff we can do. So that’s a whole different question. But the idea of like one individual person stopping one individual person stopping global warming or stopping fascism, right? One individual person feels kind of helpless. But if you get together with people, you’ve got some power. You get together with your local government or something, you’ve got more power. So that concept of like, how do you live your life on a day to day basis, minute to minute, hour to hour when you know, this giant fucking mack truck is going to come and smack the shit out of you? Yeah. And there’s nothing you can do to stop it, right? So that was very fascinating to me and I just really loved how they handled that. So even though on the surface, this doesn’t seem like something that either you or I would connect with, I was in from from the get go and it held my attention like all the way through, dude. Like, I was just I was I was glued to it.

CARLOS: You said enough things that that differentiate it from the kind of things that we can’t connect to. You know what I mean? Yeah, there’s like a multiple things going on there. So. Yeah, so it’s.

BRAD: It’s really good. Really good.

CARLOS: What’s this? You’re going to score this one? Yeah, I got to.

BRAD: Score this one. I feel like I just. I had a wonderful time all the way through. I really appreciated, I mean, number one, like the production quality, I can’t even describe to you how good it is. This could be easily like a TV show that you would watch, like some high quality cartoon that you’d watch on TV. Like it looks great, it moves great, sound is great. Everything is great. The art direction is great and the musical numbers are wonderful. I’m not usually a guy that gets swept away in the moment, but I was really feeling this. and music and I felt like it went really well with the game and the moments and everything. And when it got to the end, I feel like they. I feel like they fucking pulled it off. I feel like they got to the end. And I was like, okay. I feel like that was a good ending, you know? And that’s, I mean, real talk, dude. I was like, How the fuck are they going to end this? Like, is the meteor going to crash? Are they going to have happy ever after? Like, what’s going to happen? And I’m not going to spoil it, but like whatever ending they got to, I was like, Yeah, man, I felt that.

CARLOS: So, all right, what are you what are we giving it?

BRAD: All in all, this is pretty spectacular shit. Oh, one more thing. Also, I got to just say, this is an example of what video games can do, because I’m sure some people are going to be like, Well, you couldn’t this there was no platforming, there was no attack combo. There was, Oh, it’s not a game. It’s just a thing. Yeah. Okay, fine. Whatever. It’s an experience that you could only have in the video game medium, right? Like you got experience. Be there, be alongside these characters. You make your choices, you’re in it in a way that you wouldn’t be in, in a TV show or [00:35:00] a book or an audiobook or whatever This is. This is something video games can do, and I think this is a wonderful example of it. So I just really want to highlight that it doesn’t matter that, you know, you didn’t have an inventory or that there were no guns or anything. Like it’s just it is what it is. It’s just a video game experience. And I give this this experience altogether. Goodbye Volcano High. I give it a solid nine.

CARLOS: Whoa! Nine.

BRAD: Very good. Nine, solid nine.

CARLOS: And we don’t do scores much, so. That’s a pretty big deal. I was going to say also when you mentioned that conversation stuff, which I love in games like this, when they get it organically, like you said, super organically, it’s Night in the Woods, one of my favorite games.

BRAD: If you like Night in the Woods, you would like this game.

CARLOS: Yeah, because I’m going to. I’m going to download it because yeah, I just love that kind of like quiet little simple throwaway conversations that feel real, you know?

BRAD: That’s exactly that’s what this game is. From front to back, dude.

CARLOS: Oh, there you go. Okay, I’ll download it.

BRAD: All right. I had a wonderful time with Goodbye, Volcano High. It’s an amazing experience that could only be had in the medium of videogames. Absolutely Solid nine. There you go.

So Videogames Official Score: 9 out of 10

Developer: KO-OP

Publisher: KO-OP

Code Source: Publisher

Platform Reviewed: PS5

ESRB Rating: T – Language, Suggestive Themes, Use of Alcohol and Tobacco

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes.

Subtitles: There are subtitles for most of the conversations in the game, although there are no lyrics onscreen when Fang is performing songs. There are options to change colors and other aspects of the subtitles in the menu, but I was not able to get the options to work during my playthrough. In its current state, this game is not fully accessible.

Controls: The controls cannot be remapped. There is no control diagram. The player selects choices with the analog stick and confirms/cancels with the face buttons. During music segments, the player will be holding the analog stick in a direction to ‘capture’ nodes, they will press face buttons in time to a beat, and they will flick both analog sticks in a particular direction to match some notes.

The post SVG REVIEW Goodbye, Volcano High appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH A wonderful playlist with interesting remixes.

LOW The art style does nothing for me.

WTF What’s with all of these RPG elements?

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi everyone! Eugene Sax here with another review from Gamecritics.com.

Ever wanted to have Cloud, Squall, Yuna, and Vivi team up to fight Sephiroth and Kefka? Well now you can in the latest Final Fantasy rhythm game. Theatrhythm Final Bar Line is the newest installment of this musical remix series where players can go through hundreds of songs from the franchise’s history.

In Bar Line, players will be using a combination of pressing or holding buttons to tap in time with the music, as well as flicking or moving the control sticks to hit notes, or some combination of these options. In some songs, it can also require players to hit a note and then move the control stick to follow the note up and down the screen. There’s also a simple control mode where players can hit one button to hit all notes in the song, or a pair mode which allows two players to play on one note chart. All three control styles can be used for all parts of the game, making it the first of the series that can be played completely co-op if desired.

Bar Line has three different modes of play — Series quest (their campaign mode), Music Stages (their free play mode), and Multi Battle (online multiplayer). Series quest takes players through each individual game, playing through the bigger songs while cutesy versions of game characters and monsters will battle underneath the notes. Once the level is completed, the song unlocks for free play. Each song can also have an additional modification where it can be more strict on timing when players hit the notes, or it can make notes move faster than normal. There are some light RPG elements as well — completing songs will level characters up and enable them to do special moves if players nail a long chain of notes or getting through a certain portion of a song. The other two modes, the Music Stages and Multi Battle mode, are more about getting the highest score and highest chain possible.

As you can tell from what I’ve said so far, there is a lot going on in Bar Line, and this is both for better and for worse.

For example, I love the expansive playlist of over 350 songs that collects all of the greatest hits from the Final Fantasy IP, but it also includes different types of remixes and tracks from other media, like the mobile games, animated films, and other Square franchises. On the flip side, the RPG elements are superficial, and I only needed to pay attention to them if I wanted to achieve a specific side goal during a song in order to get an unlockable. I also have to admit that the art style did absolutely nothing for me. So much so, in fact, that I eventually turned off the art because I wanted to focus solely on the note charts.

That said, the music nerd in me enjoyed Bar Line‘s rhythm aspect, especially as it seems more focused on playing different parts of a song, rather than specific instruments in a song. In a way, it felt more like being a conductor rather than someone seated in the orchestra, and for this music I think that’s the appropriate choice. Also, being able to play every minute of Bar Line in co-op is an interesting addition to the rhythm genre since there can be more than two players on different note charts, while having some paired notes go between players kept the music sounding and feeling fresh.

Overall, I enjoyed my time with Theatrhythm Final Bar Line. The note charts are interesting and build on themselves as sections of a song are repeated, the track selection is immense, and as a bonus, it plays great both in docked mode or on the go, which means that it’s easy to pick up and get a couple of songs in, anywhere or anytime. Rhythm fans and Final Fantasy fans alike shouldn’t miss out on this one.

For me, Theatrhythm Final Bar Line gets an 8 out of 10.

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Square Enix.  It is currently available on PS4 and Switch. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Switch. Approximately 8 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was not completed. About 1 hour was spent in multiplayer

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated T and contains Blood, Fantasy Violence, Mild Language, and Mild Suggestive Themes. From the ESRB Website: “This is a rhythm game featuring characters, settings, and sequences from the Final Fantasy franchise. Players engage in rhythm-based battles, commanding their fighters to use swords, pistols, and magic spells against enemies (e.g., dragons, ogres, half-human creatures). Video clips/cutscenes also depict instances of violence: large-scale battles with explosions; a character impaled by a lance; characters shot with guns/arrows, accompanied by brief blood spurts. Blood may also appear on the ground and on characters’ faces. Some female characters wear revealing outfits (e.g., low-cut tops, deep cleavage). The word “a*s” appears in the dialogue.”

Colorblind Modes: There is one color change option. This changes the notes from red, green, and yellow to blue, teal, and orange.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: Text and voiceover are in the game, but the text is not resizable. Playing with no sound doesn’t hinder gameplay, since each note has an indicator on when the note needs to be hit. This game is fully accessible. 

Remappable controls: This game features no remappable controls, and no control diagram. Players can use the face buttons (A, B, X, Y), the shoulder buttons (R, L, ZR, and ZL), or the directional buttons (up, down, left, right) to hit the notes. Players will also use the left or right joystick to flick in directions, or to follow a note on screen.

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