I’ve lusted after this game for years but this was another PlayStation exclusive. The original version was in fact never adapted for PC. We had to wait until after the Miles Morales sequel added a Remastered version of the first game before that in turn was released for PC. So it took a very long time for me to be able to play this, but at least it does have updated graphics and supposedly better performance. It was absolutely worth the wait as even after so many years, this is a top notch superhero action game.

I like to try weird and novel games. Sometimes this is rewarded when I come across unexpected gems. Often this is not. Kenshi is a game that unfortunately falls into the latter category for me. Yet if I’d encountered it at a much earlier age, I can see myself falling in love with it. The game is advertised as a kind of RPG in which you can do almost anything and that’s largely true. But it’s also rather ugly, has a terrible interface, and is fully of janky, inconsistent mechanics. You can get all kinds of amazing stories going with your characters, but you’d also have to put up with a lot of grinding and boring moments in which nothing happens and I’m just too old for that now.

I became a fan of the new style stealth-focus RTS games due to Shadow Tactics but unfortunately the developer Minimi Games is no more. I’ll probably get around to playing their last pirate-themed game at some point but in the meantime here’s a World War 2-themed game in the same vein by a different developer. This one is much more combat focused and features a base management component in between missions.

I always like a light game in between heavier ones and this plant collecting title is just the ticket. Thematically it’s somewhat similar to Potion Craft in that customers come to your shop with their problems and you offer them plants. Mechanically it’s completely different as it’s really a sort of deductive, puzzle-solving game. It has a decent story, mostly fair puzzles and is short enough that any missteps are easily forgiven. I’m not sure I’d want more of the same but it’s perfect as a light game.

Codemasters acquiring the official World Rally Championship license effectively killed off the Dirt franchise in favor of this game as its successor. As a huge fan of rally games, I was going to play this but before I could get around to it, fans and the market collectively decided that it’s a dud and so the attempt to kickstart a whole new series of games died before it could properly get off the ground. Indeed, I’ve found myself that while it is able to feature the latest rally cars due to the WRC license, it is markedly inferior to its predecessor in many respects including graphics, sound and perhaps even personality.

The RoboCop franchise dates to over thirty years ago and with the 2014 remake being a failure, should be considered dead. Yet here we have a new videogame based on the original films that has been well received by critics and achieved modest commercial success. The game works of course by mining old timers’ nostalgia for the original films but it also plays off of our fond memories of old-school shooter games. Its production values aren’t top of the line, it’s janky in parts and its story and lines of dialogue are a little too derivative of the films. On the other, it very much feels like RoboCop and as I’ve always said, it’s okay to be good enough so to me this is an absolute gem of a game.

I first played the original Fantasy General during my schooling days. It was a pirated copy back then of course and without a manual, I never had a firm grasp of the ruleset and was never able to beat it. I never forgot the game however and it seems that it has its share of fans. More than twenty years, another company made a sequel and now here I am playing it, because I noticed that it was being given away free on Steam.