Tag Archives: PlayStation 4

Another look at Granblue Fantasy: Relink after finishing its main scenario

I rolled credits on Granblue Fantasy: Relink after about 20 hours of play. That might sound short for an RPG — and it is, by modern standards — but reaching the end of that main story is also potentially far from the end of your time with the game.

We’ll explore that side of things in more detail another day (mostly because I haven’t really delved into the “endgame” as yet) so today we’re taking a look at the gameplay experience while you’re playing through the main scenario.

Without wishing to spoil things too much, I had a great deal of fun playing through Granblue Fantasy: Relink. So let’s take a closer look at exactly why this game works so well.

Continue reading Another look at Granblue Fantasy: Relink after finishing its main scenario

A first look at Granblue Fantasy: Relink

I’ve been looking forward to Granblue Fantasy: Relink for a while, despite its seemingly troubled development cycle.

Ever since I spent some time playing the original mobile version of Granblue Fantasy, I’ve been hungry for the setting and characters to be adapted into a full-scale, not-free-to-play, not-mobile game. Because of all the mobile games I’ve spent some time with over the years, Granblue Fantasy is still one of the best in terms of the effort that has gone into its presentation and setting.

Ultimately, though, it was still a mobile game, and as such its appeal to me waned as the grind — or the temptation to spend money — ramped up. So does Granblue Fantasy: Relink provide what I wanted from a “proper game” adaptation of the franchise? Let’s take a closer look, based on a few hours of play.

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Date A Live and the comforting familiarity of tropes

“Tropes” has become a bit of a dirty word over the course of the last decade or so, for a variety of different reasons, but I’m here to present you with the not-terribly hot take that tropes exist for a reason, and that, when handled well, can enhance rather than detract from a creative work.

This particularly came to mind towards the end of last week, when I elected to finally pull down Date A Live: Rio Reincarnation from my shelf and make a start on it as one of my “things I’m playing that are not my current Big Game” titles to enjoy in the week.

As a visual novel, it’s something that can be enjoyed with minimal “effort”, and, as I’ve discussed in a few places before, it’s also ideally suited for things like reading in bed, accompanying mealtime or just generally zoning out in front of.

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Two Point Campus and the management sim as imaginative play

I am, as I have spoken about numerous times previously, not good at strategy games with a competitive component. But I have always enjoyed a distinct offshoot of the strategic genre: the management sim, in which you tend to mostly be competing against “yourself”.

Ever since I first played SimCity on Super NES — a game that I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy when I first got it for Christmas as a kid, but which I ended up loving — I’ve found great value from games where you get to “play God” to varying degrees, having the opportunity to express your creativity within the constraints of a set of game mechanics.

And the latest of these I’ve found myself having fun with is Sega’s Two Point Campus, the follow-up to their successful riff on Bullfrog’s Theme Hospital, Two Point Hospital.

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short;Play: Mighty Gunvolt Burst

Inti Creates, as you’ll know if you’ve read my feature on them, read my many words on Gal*Gun Double Peace and Gal*Gun 2, and listened to our Inti-centric podcast episode, make fantastic games.

One of my favourite games of theirs that doesn’t have Gal*Gun in the title is Mighty Gunvolt Burst, a game which is essentially nothing but Inti Creates fanservice. Dripping with the “enhanced retro” aesthetic the team are such masters of, this is a challenging platform adventure with satisfying progression mechanics.

Check it out in the video below, and don’t forget to subscribe on YouTube for more!

Warriors Orochi 3: First Steps in a Ruined World

I, if it has not already been made abundantly clear, love the Warriors series as a whole. And I’ve found myself particularly enjoying the Warriors Orochi branch.

Warriors Orochi’s core appeal is that it successfully divorces both the Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors casts from their original contexts, allowing them to break free from the stories they’ve been telling since the PlayStation 2 days. Instead, they get the chance to have a bit of fun.

Well, “fun” might not be quite the right word, given that Warriors Orochi 3 starts off with all of them (except for three, conveniently) dying horribly. But it’s certainly fun for us.

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Atelier Lulua: The Scion of Arland – A Trilogy of Four

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Up until this point in the Atelier MegaFeature as a whole, we’ve explored the games in release order.

They were released in clear “sets”, after all — we had the Atelier Iris trilogy, then the Mana Khemia duology and then the three Arland games. And while the stories don’t always follow on directly from one another — most notably in the Atelier Iris series — each game in each series, at the very least, feels like it has a number of stylistic and thematic elements in common with its contemporaries. But in 2018, something interesting happened; after three Dusk games and three Mysterious games, Gust issued the surprise announcement that the twentieth game in the mainline Atelier series would not kick off a new trilogy; instead, it would return to Arland for (probably) one last time.

So with that in mind, we’re skipping forward from 2011’s thirteenth Atelier game Atelier Meruru: The Apprentice of Arland to check out 2019’s twentieth installment Atelier Lulua: The Scion of Arland. Then we’ll go back and look at all the ones in between. Sound good? Good. Let’s get cracking — beginning with an overview of what this game is all about and how it fits in with its predecessors.

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Atelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland – Tradition, Modernity and Belief in Oneself

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As our exploration of Atelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland comes to a close, it’s time to contemplate the game’s narrative component.

As we talked about when we looked at the game’s overall structureAtelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland is somewhat more non-linear than previous installments in the series. There’s a core linear progression based around Rorona’s assignments, but the bulk of the narrative content comes from the wide variety of optional events you can enjoy with the ensemble cast.

Between all those events, you get a good sense of what sort of place Arland is — and who Rorona and her friends really are. So let’s take a closer look!

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Final Fantasy VII Remake: The Future is a Blank Page

To say that the Final Fantasy VII Remake project was hotly anticipated is something of an understatement.

Ever since the run-up to the PlayStation 2 launch, where one of the promotional videos showed a cutscene from Final Fantasy VIII apparently being rendered in real time by the new system, fans have been wondering what would happen if one of the world’s most beloved RPGs were ever to get remade.

Well, we’re starting to get some answers now… and a whole bunch of questions, too. Let’s explore!

Spoilers for both the original FFVII and FFVII Remake (yes, there are differences) ahead.

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Disaster Report 4: Summer Memories – Living a Crisis

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.

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