Wildfrost review
April 24, 2024 by RSS Feed
Wildfrost is an easy game to fall in love with. What I mean by that every little aspect of the game has its own little charming flourish to it. You might not be able to appreciate all of those nitty gritty details on a phone screen, but on larger displays Wildfrost is one of the most polished deckbuilders you can find on the App Store.
Cold cards
The core concept of Wildfrost is hardly new. In it, you customize a deck full of units, abilities, and more to battle through increasingly difficult stages in an effort to reach and defeat a final boss. As you try and fail a bunch (and occasionally succeed), you'll unlock new cards or factions to add more variety to each playthrough.
There are definitely some significant ways in which Wildfrost reworks this idea into something unique, though. Combat takes place across two lanes and involves unit cards that have their own timers that tick down every turn before attacking and using their abilities, for example.
Friendly frosts
The main thing that jumps out about Wildfrost is just how nice it looks, feels, and sounds. Everything is bright, colorful, and full of expression, and there's a ton of little animation or design touches that bring its flat cards to life. I also want to shoutout the game's superb soundtrack, which is something I don't think I've ever said about a deckbuilding roguelite before.
All of this attention to detail extends to more technical aspects of Wildfrost as well. The game runs at an extremely smooth frame rate all the way up to 120 frames per second and its cloud saving system is among the best I've experienced, with progress syncing between devices nearly instantly.
Icy edges
As charming as I do find the vast majority of playing Wildfrost, there are a few things that I found slightly troubling in my time with it. The first (and most significant) is that it is awfully difficult to see and read cards on certain devices like my iPhone SE. If you have a larger phone, I could see this being a non-issue, but I found myself only really feeling sort of comfortable playing on my phone after simply memorizing what most cards do, and only then only playing the first few opening stages before things get too complicated.
And this brings me to my second point: deep runs in Wildfrost can be very infuriating due to a certain degree of randomness, some ambiguous card text, and the high degree of complexity that doesn't always play well with an occasionally finicky control scheme. There are multiple times during my time with Wildfrost where I lost entire runs because a card didn't operate the way I thought it would, or an attempt to read a card resulted in playing it. If there were some way to confirm card plays or have an undo button, most of this would be a non-issue. It's also something that becomes less of a problem the more you play, though that's mostly because you end up learning how to avoid these things the hard way.
The bottom line
There is an extremely high bar set for roguelites on mobile--particularly deckbuilding ones--and Wildfrost manages to clear it despite some pain points in its design. This is thanks mostly due to the game's impeccable style that makes spending more time with it a complete delight.
Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/wildfrost-review/
credit : 148apps
Ghost Trick review
April 18, 2024 by RSS Feed
Ghost Trick is a cult classic game for a few very good reasons. It's a one-off release by the creator of the Ace Attorney series that only released on Nintendo DS back in 2010, which was pretty late into that device's life cycle. Beloved as it may be, it's not a huge surprise to reveal that it didn't perform well sales-wise back then, but at least Capcom knows that the game captured enough hearts that it was worth remastering. This new release of Ghost Trick looks and plays great, and--although it has some of the same pain points of the original release--is well worth playing for its unique sense of style and charm.
Ghost game
Ghost Trick is a bit of a critical darling, so I won't spend too much time in this review belaboring how it works or what it's about. What's important to know for this remaster is that it takes advantage of being on upgraded hardware by looking extremely sharp and running at a smooth and stable frame rate.
As for the gameplay, using a finger in place of the stylus works exactly like you'd expect, and there's nothing so demanding design-wise that having higher fidelity touch is necessary. The only mild annoyance I came across while playing this version is that taps to advance dialog occasionally would register as a swipe input and pull up the game's dialog history instead.
Sample specter
The iOS version of Ghost Trick is a free-to-start title, which gives you a surprisingly lengthy chunk of game to play to decide if it is for you or not. You play through multiple puzzle sequences in their entirety and get enough story to get a sense of what the overall plot will end up being. Very few things past this paid point end up being all that surprising, but it is nice that Capcom has decided to really let players get a feel for the game before deciding whether to fork over a whopping $29.99 for the full experience.
Aside from the main story, Ghost Trick has a few special features like illustrations, notes, and music from the game you can browse/listen to, as well as a "Ghost Puzzle" minigame that is simply an animated jigsaw puzzle of several scenes from the game. These aren't terribly exciting add-ons in my opinion, but the core game is more than worth the asking price alone.
Old soul
The last thing to talk about now is probably just how Ghost Trick feels to play in 2024. The short version is: pretty good! It's definitely easy to peg it as an older title, but its look and gameplay are still so incredibly distinct and charismatic. In almost 15 years since its release, I don't think anything has measured up or even made the attempt to do things that Ghost Trick does.
My only caveat with the experience is that some of the game's puzzles are not all that fun to figure out. Deep into Ghost Trick as the challenges get more complex, there are times when the way to avert someone's fate with your ghost powers is--let's say--less than clear. This can lead to quite a bit of trial and error, with errors kicking you back to the beginning of a sequence. Luckily, there's a menu option in-game that lets you fast-forward through dialog to make these sections feel less tedious, but it can still grow tiresome to just experiment until you happen upon some obtuse solution to move the story forward.
The bottom line
Ghost Trick is a charming and unique puzzle adventure experience, and I'm not sure there's anything else out there quite like it. It's certainly not the smoothest play (especially these days), but this remaster definitely adds enough shine to make it worth picking up on iOS.
Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/ghost-trick-review/
credit : 148apps
Slice & Dice review
March 28, 2024 by RSS Feed
There is no shortage of roguelikes on mobile, and great ones at that. I feel like I'm writing about some new hotness in this space every other month. It's a pace that feels unsustainable, and yet, the hits keep coming. Slice & Dice is yet another incredible run-based dungeon-crawler that is more than capable of standing out in front of its excellent competition.
Rolling deep
In Slice & Dice, you "control" a party of adventurers as they battle their way through a set of increasingly challenging combat encounters. You do this by rolling dice for your team and choosing to lock in specific abilities before using them to deal damage, buff your team, etc. Each of your party members has unique sides on their individual die that is determined by their particular class and the items you have equipped on them.
After each battle, your party gets stronger through gaining a choice of item or a somewhat random offer to evolve one of your heroes' classes. Through these layers of chance, you are supposed to try and create some degree of order that allows you continue to survive fights and forge on. But, if you don't, there's always next time, and chances are good your next run will have some new unlockable to play with.
Variable variety
It may seem like Slice & Dice is a total crapshoot given how chance-based every facet of its gameplay is, but if that was the case I probably would have stopped playing it well before writing this review. There's some design magic at work here that I can't quite put my finger on, but you never feel totally out of control or unable to right the ship on any given run of Slice & Dice. At the same time, you always feel like you're on a razor's edge, as one bad turn or roll can also spell disaster and stop even the most promising runs short.
If at any point you do feel like you're starting to master (and grow weary of) the game, Slice & Dice offers a ton of different ways to prevent that. Between different hero classes, new modes, harder difficulties, and several other modifiers you can mix and match together, there is a whole lot of game to explore that will feel fresh for a really long time. Oh, and if the prospect of playing Slice & Dice to unlock all of these things also sounds draining, there's a little check box in the settings menu that can just unlock everything for you.
Dice pocket
Slice & Dice is available on PC as well, but I can't imagine a better home for it than on mobile. The pacing of the combat and overall run structure fits incredibly well for on-the-go play, and layout of the action looks great in both portrait and landscape mode. The game doesn't have cloud saving for retaining progress between devices, but that doesn't feel all that important for a run-based game where unlocks can all be bypassed.
Something else nice about Slice & Dice is you don't have to take my word for all of this. You can try it out yourself for free and see what up to 12 fights of a run feel like, which should give you a really good sense of whether this game is for you and if you like it on mobile. If you decide you are all-in on it, a single $8.99 purchase unlocks the full game.
The bottom line
There's so much possibility space in Slice & Dice and the game is designed expertly to let you explore all of it on your own terms, all while delivering a super satisfying and strategic roguelike experience. There's not much else I could ask for from a game like this, except more ones like it, I guess.
Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/slice-and-dice-review/
credit : 148apps
Methods: Detective Competition review
March 19, 2024 by RSS Feed
Something I had an epiphany about last year was why so many visual novels go out of their way to lose focus or just get a bit goofy with their storytelling thanks to PARANORMASIGHT's deficiencies in that department. Methods: Detective Competition has no problem doing this while being strange from the jump, and it makes for a jarring entry into what ulimately becomes a charming adventure, at least for being the opening chapter in a larger series.
Mysterious mystery competition
As its name implies, Methods: Detective Competition, is a story about super sleuths who have been gathered together to try and decide who is the greatest detective of them all. This creates a structure where you are regularly investigating staged crime scenes and using deductive reasoning, but as you go you also start to peel back layers about the competition, the people in it, and why it's being organized to begin with, which ends up serving as a larger mystery and driving force for the game.
If you've played any visual novel games before, the gameplay should be entirely familiar. For the most part, you are simply tapping to advance dialog between characters, though for investigation segments you may need to tap on points of interest or make dialog choices to lock in your deductions. There is a fail state for arriving at the wrong conclusions, but this game makes it very easy to reverse course and change your choices to keep the story flowing.
Curious characters
The plot setup is not the only aspect of Methods: Detective Competition that feels odd. Every character in this game is full of quirks and mannerisms in a way that is borderline offputting at first, but--by the time I finished this first game's twenty chapters--they turn into endearing qualities that also lead to some legitimately funny moments.
To match these strange personality traits, all of the game art is similarly cartoonish, with many characters often seeming misshapen or even warped. I wouldn't say this style really suits my tastes, but it does a great job of meshing with the writing style and solidifying the overall tone of the game, while also making it visually distinct from any number of other visual novel mysteries with more conventional character art.
Playing the long game
Methods: Detective Competition is a port of a PC game that came out 2020, and it's more or less the same game with one important distinction: This release on iOS is just the first part of a much larger game. As noted in the App Store description, buying this app version for $2.99 grants access to the first 20 chapters of a game that spans 100 chapters total.
For the price, this is definitely worth it, but it is important to note that there isn't a satisfying close to playing this game as a standalone experience. By the end of Methods: Detective Competition, I have more questions than answers about the mystery competition. Luckily for Erabit Studios, I am interested in seeing where things go from there.
The bottom line
Methods: Detective Competition is an enjoyable and intriguing opening to a much larger narrative that will come to iOS in the future. If this game is any indication, though, I can expect more zany reveals, clever mini-mysteries, and some pretty funny jokes and bits that are all broken down into manageably-sized chapters.
Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/methods-detective-competition-review/
credit : 148apps
Ex Astris review
March 12, 2024 by RSS Feed
I've always been of the mind that the stories that video games tell tend to not matter all that much. There are various reasons (and a fair amount of nuance) for this that I can't get into here because I have a game to review, but it just so happens that this game is a perfect example of my point. For a large portion of Ex Astris, it is practically impossible to tell what is going on, but this rpg still manages to impress thanks to its inventive combat system, fascinating aesthetic, tight pacing, and surprising mobile-friendliness.
A true mystery
In Ex Astris, you play as an investigator from Earth visiting an alien planet. This planet has been previously discovered and had contact with humans before, but for some reason that relationship got cut off for awhile and now your character, Yan, is here anew to investigate... something.
If this sounds pretty vague, just wait until you dive further into this game. Very little gets explained, and--when it does--it is with proper nouns that also have very little explanation about what they are. If the vibe Ex Astris was going for was to make its world as mysterious and confusing as it might be to a young investigator that had never been there before, then mission accomplished! Even if you are able to piece things together, Ex Astris definitely avoids filling in blanks and often will skip moments of action or transition that might explain how your character arrived somewhere or what certain character motivations are.
Build a combo, dial a combo
The good news about all of this story stuff is that it largely doesn't matter. I blazed through Ex Astris because it looked cool, ran at a smooth 60 frames per second, had nice, tight dungeons, and--most importantly--an expertly-crafted combat system.
In many rpgs, there's a point at which I feel done with combat. It becomes a thing I have to do to continue progressing, though the actions associated with it lose quite a bit of luster. This did not happen with me for Ex Astris. I could not wait to hop into fights with new enemies and try to puzzle out new combos or hunt all over environments for materials I could use to build new gear or cook food that could change the interplay of my characters. It was very much a driving force throughout the game, thanks in no small part to the careful attention-to-detail given to each interlocking system--of which there are about a half dozen--including heavy emphasis on reaction-based defense and combo-inputs that make you feel like a constant, active participant in the action.
Mobile mastery
Outside of the specifics of its combat, Ex Astris is a very conventional rpg experience. You have party members, side quests, little items tucked away in corners, some light puzzle-solving within dungeons, and even an in-universe mini-game you might spend way too much time trying to get good at (as I did). It has so many of the things I’d expect from an rpg that if it weren't for the fact I was playing using touch controls, you might have been able to convince me that Ex Astris is an old and forgotten mid-tier Playstation 2 game.
Despite feeling very console-like, though, Ex Astris does a shockingly good job of being mobile-friendly. Even though the touch controls are just virtual buttons, they feel natural in the way they are placed and how they respond to inputs. Its environment design is also very open and detailed without being overwhelming. Lastly, Ex Astris is very generous with checkpointing, allows for quick restarts of fights, and handles cloud saves in a very clear way so you're never wondering where your save might be at any given time. All of this ties together into a package that feels immersive, but without being super unwieldy or overly long for mobile play.
The bottom line
By the end of Ex Astris, the story takes on a shape that explains enough stuff so that there's an ending that makes sense, but even if it didn't it wouldn't have made a difference to me. The systems at play in this game are so finely tuned, well executed, and portioned out that the entire thing could have been written in gibberish and I would have still enjoyed it immensely.
Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/ex-astris-review/
credit : 148apps
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