Category Archives: One-Shots

One-off articles about games, cultural phenomena, anime and anything else that isn’t getting the Cover Game treatment.

One-Shots, Racers

Inertial Drift Sunset Prologue: A Bold New Take on Arcade Racing

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I love me a slippery-slidy, drift-centric arcade racer, as you’ll know very well if you followed the extensive Ridge Racer Cover Game feature from a while back, or indeed were kind enough to watch my playthrough of Split/Second Velocity on YouTube.

As such, I was immediately interested when PQube announced its upcoming racer Inertial Drift, developed by an outfit known as Level 91 Entertainment. This game promised a ’90s style aesthetic, exaggerated arcadey racing action… and what sounded like a rather unusual control scheme.

How exactly does a twin-stick racing game work anyway? I fired up the Inertial Drift Sunset Prologue interactive demo to find out.

Continue reading Inertial Drift Sunset Prologue: A Bold New Take on Arcade Racing →

One-Shots

TubeLive: Living the Streamer Dream

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There have been a few games released over the course of the last few years that purport to be based around the life of a streamer or YouTuber, and I’ve typically shied away from them.

When Hammerfist, developers of the Deep Space Waifu series, reached out to me and asked me to take a look at their new game based on online video culture, though, I was interested. Hammerfist has a distinctly “punk” attitude towards game development that I rather like — and I was intrigued to see how they would approach this subject matter.

What followed was a rather entertaining game that can be beaten in a couple of hours, but which provides an enjoyable experience along the way. Hit the jump and let’s take a closer look.

Continue reading TubeLive: Living the Streamer Dream →

One-Shots, Puzzlers

Helltaker: Hell is Sliding Block Puzzles

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At the time of writing, a new independently developed game called “Helltaker” is all over social media, with all sorts of people sharing screenshots and fanart.

With that in mind, I decided to give it a look for myself. Turns out it’s a free download for PC, available via Steam. As such, there’s absolutely no risk involved in trying it out at the very least — and if you like it, you have a cool thing to add to your library; if, on the other hand, it’s not for you, you haven’t lost anything.

What did I think? Hmm, mixed feelings if I’m perfectly honest; let’s explore all that a little further, then.

Continue reading Helltaker: Hell is Sliding Block Puzzles →

One-Shots, Switch

A Hat in Time: Hat the Nipper

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Despite what anyone who has ever worked in the teaching profession (including myself) might tell you, children are not inherently evil.

They’re not inherently good either, mind you, and that’s what potentially makes them interesting as characters. Particularly characters in some form of interactive media where you get to explore the consequences of “good” and “bad” behaviour in various contexts.

Among other things, A Hat in Time is a joyful exploration of what it means to be a child. A child who has their own spaceship and is clearly a lot more 1) intelligent and 2) affluent than they might let on, but a child nonetheless. Let’s explore this strange and wonderful world through the eyes of the one and only Hat Kid.

Continue reading A Hat in Time: Hat the Nipper →

One-Shots, Switch

Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon – Enhanced Nostalgia

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Part of my intention behind my Delving Into series focusing on Castlevania was to get a solid understanding of the classic franchise before jumping into Koji Igarashi’s Kickstarter-funded Bloodstained project.

While I’m not all the way through the classic games at the time of writing, I do feel like I’m at an adequate point where I can start looking at the two Bloodstained games and be able to analyse their similarities and differences from classic-formula Castlevania.

So let’s begin today with a look at Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon, a spinoff title developed by Inti Creates, designed more in the mould of Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse than the more recent, post-Symphony of the Night open-structure 2D platformer incarnations.

Continue reading Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon – Enhanced Nostalgia →

Community, One-Shots

Why I Don’t “Review” Games

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I have a few things lined up to write about, but I saw an interesting discussion online earlier today, so I thought it would be something worth talking about.

It’s a discussion that seems to have continued in perpetuity ever since the earliest days of gaming media, so regardless of whether you’re reading this at the time of writing or a few years down the line, I suspect it will remain relevant.

I’d like to talk about why I don’t consider myself to “review” games in the traditional manner — and why, from the very beginning here at MoeGamer, I have not made use of any sort of summative system such as percentage scores or star ratings. Let’s talk about that!

Continue reading Why I Don’t “Review” Games →

One-Shots, Switch

Lonely Mountains: Downhill – Bringing the Outside Inside

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For a lot of us, the more “extreme” sports are probably best left in the realm of fantasy, because we’d probably kill ourselves within about five seconds of starting.

I, for example, know that while I am perfectly capable of riding a bike, I would almost certainly be never heard from ever again were you to put me at the summit of a mountain atop a suitable bicycle and encourage me to enjoy a scenic but perilous trail down to the bottom. Which is a shame, because I rather enjoy the peacefulness of being out in nature — the breeze brushing past you, the clear air and the relaxing, soothing sounds of being far from “civilisation”.

Lucky, then, that we have games like Lonely Mountains: Downhill, which allow you to enjoy at least some of that experience from the comfort of your sofa — and without any risk of injuries ranging from grazed knees to catastrophic eruption of ribcage from torso. Let’s take a closer look.

Continue reading Lonely Mountains: Downhill – Bringing the Outside Inside →

One-Shots, Switch

Kawaii Deathu Desu: The Art of Finger Dexterity

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Back in the early days of gaming, it wasn’t at all unusual to find games built around a single, static mechanic that simply required players to show increasing levels of mastery over it.

There was a certain degree of “make your own fun” to these games; you might try to think up challenges to impose on yourself, or keep track of your high scores, or perhaps compete against a friend to see who truly was best.

These days, there tends to be an expectation that even “arcadey” games have a certain amount of depth to them. But titles like Kawaii Deathu Desu, developed by Brazilian outfit Pippin Games, demonstrate that sometimes all you need are two buttons and some twitchy fingers — plus some cute girls never hurt, either. Let’s take a closer look.

Continue reading Kawaii Deathu Desu: The Art of Finger Dexterity →

One-Shots, Shmups

Waifu Uncovered: Return of the Strip ‘Em Up

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So it seems that “strip ’em up” is a thing now. I am neither surprised nor particularly upset about this, given that Kaneko’s classic erotic Qix-alike Gals Panic also spawned its own subgenre; it’s just amusing to see this sort of thing happen in the modern day.

For the unfamiliar, the strip ’em up, previously seen here on MoeGamer in the form of Deep Space Waifu (and in a tangentially different form in Crawlco Block Knockers) is a take on the shoot ’em up — or, more broadly, arcade game — formula in which you not only blast enemies, you also, through engaging with the game’s specific mechanics, find some means of disrobing the (usually anime-style) young lady in the background. Success provides titties; failure provides frustration.

Which brings us to Waifu Uncovered, product of the delightfully named One Hand Free Studios, and a game that, rather pleasingly, isn’t just a clone of Deep Space Waifu. Let’s take a closer look!

Mild NSFW stuff ahead!

Continue reading Waifu Uncovered: Return of the Strip ‘Em Up →

One-Shots, Switch

Disaster Report 4: Summer Memories – Living a Crisis

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I reviewed this game for Nintendo Life! Stop by and check out my thoughts over there, then pop back here for a more in-depth look.

In video games, we’re accustomed to having some sort of concrete “villain” to fight — usually a personified antagonist of some description.

But what happens when you don’t really have an “enemy” as such — you’re just struggling against natural forces that have no feelings about you one way or the other? And how will your experiences interact with those of the people around you?

These are the questions that Disaster Report 4: Summer Memories attempts to answer. So let’s take a closer look at how it does that.

Continue reading Disaster Report 4: Summer Memories – Living a Crisis →