Slaughter: The Lost Outpost Nintendo Switch Review 6/10 "Take Back Control of A Prison Run By Inmates!" 💥 #IndieGame #GameDev #SlaughterTheLastOutpost

Inmates of a massive, labyrinthine prison  have broken free and anarchy reigns, cue the entrance of your lone hero – named Russell, natch – a man who is here to bring law and order to chaos…by shooting everyone dead in a blizzard of bullets and gore.

A third-person shooter with a focus on head-on action as opposed to strategic, cover-based gameplay,  Slaughter: The Lost Outpost makes a solid first impression, running at 60 fps on the ageing Switch hardware, and the initial sections consisting of tense, close-quarter combat with armed prisoners, either blasting you from afar and dashing behind doors, or rushing you with knives. The industrial surroundings, little shortcuts through vents, and smooth ambient work gave off some pretty positive vibes for my first thirty minutes or so with the game.

Rallyallyally Nintendo Switch Review 5.5/10 *A chaotic racer that’s fun…for a few minutes* 🛣️ @hairyheartgames #IndieGame #GameDev

A multiplayer racing title from wonderfully named Scottish developers Hairy heart Games, Rallyallyally can be played with up to eight vehicles (a mixture of players and bots), in a game wherein the main goal is to grab a hold of a roll of road, and unroll it to the finish line! 

Upon completion of each section, points are awarded accordingly, and the hectic action rolls on until all three rounds are complete. Scattered powerups help add to the frenzy, and the simple visuals suit the on-screen action.

There are very few options available to customise your approach to Rallyallyally - although you can choose from a large variety of vehicles – and the game quickly becomes repetitive, with some of the environments getting in the way, and the zooming single-screen action sometimes tipping over from chaos into seeming randomness, as you struggle to even find yourself onscreen, or which direction in which you are currently zooming!

SUMMARY
A game that is fun for a short while, but the lack of customisation options combined with the fact that variety in the gameplay means that this is a tough one to recommend beyond those gamers that enjoy true, pure chaotic action in their racers.

5.5/10

🧊💦MELTING 🧊💦

Tiny Pixels Vol. 2 – Stormy Knights Nintendo Switch Review 6.5/10 “Bite-sized, princess-rescuing action” 🏰👸⚔️ @eastasiasoft #IndieGame #GameDev

A snappy, heavily timing-based adventure game that casts you in the role of a knight on a quest to rescue several princess trapped in separate castles, you’ll find yourself adjusting to the simple control setup quickly, and timing your movements, shield blocks, dashes, swipes and magic accordingly as you cut your way through the enemies ahead of you, in single-stage battles.

Gore Doctor Xbox Series X Review 5/10 “Gore, Gore, Gore” 🩸🪓🤡 @Salient_Games #IndieGame #Horror #GameDev

I am someone who reviews a lot of horror games, and I am also a massive fan of the Saw franchise - it being my favourite horror series of all time. I also have House M.D as my favourite TV show, so a game entitled ‘Gore Doctor’ sounded right up my street and was something I thought would be hard for me to not enjoy - and yet this game struggled to fully grab me.

Agent Fall Nintendo Switch Review 6.5/10 "A brief ‘n breezy 2D shooter for the casual player" 🔫🕵🏻‍♀️ @PufferfishDig @eastasiasoft #IndieGame #GameDev

Whilst the blurb for the game may look to convince you that this 2D run ‘n gun title will provide a serious challenge, it is actually a very short, simple and quite charming little title that provides an hour or so of blasting action, with a paper thin story that acts as an excuse to move from place to place, all the while taking down enemies in droves in single player, or co-op.

From the Website:
'Agent Fall is an action game inspired by classic titles, where you face an intergalactic government conspiracy. With aliens siding with the government, you, as an agent, must take down this dark alliance. Prepare for frantic combat, with powerful weapons, relentless enemies, and epic bosses.'

Hot Rod Mayhem Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Smooth Racing and Vibrant Visuals" 🚘🚔@CasualBrothers #IndieGame #GameDev

Kart racing is a genre that has certainly had its ups and down over the years, it feels like there have been an incredible amount – of varying quality – that have been released in the last few years alone on the Switch and Xbox, where there will always be a niche due to the focus on local multiplayer, after all – bashing around with friends is always fun!

To this end, Hot Rod Mayhem makes a great first impression, with energetic music, and a colourful customisable cast of characters as well as several vehicles to choose from, each with their own stats. 

Beyond the Ice Palace 2 Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Worth a go if you go mental for this stuff" ⚔️ @PQubeGames #GameDev #IndieGame

Beyond the Ice Palace 2 has a heritage longer than many people reading this have been alive. The original BTIP was released in the Stone Age (1988) for the first mass-market home computers, including the Commodore siblings C64 and Amiga, the Atari ST and the ZX Spectrum. You take the role of the Cursed King, champion of the gods, raised from the dead in order to whip and grapple your way through your decaying kingdom.

Caligo Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Striking Visuals and Imagery, with Heavy Iconography" 🕯️🗼 @Krealit_team @Pinkerator #IndieGame #GameDev

"Jane's tent was a bitch to put up but it was a hit at Glastonbury"

One of the most visually interesting walking simulators that I’ve played, Caligo begins with your unknown player character being beckoned forth by a masked entity through a series of locations to meet a mysterious individual. 

The first thing you’ll notice is how crisp and interesting the game is visually – with each area you pass through being rich with things to take in, as well as the occasional, scattered collectible item to pilfer. 

Pacific Drive Xbox Series X Review 6/10 "Now my car has a slightly stronger left door. Thrilling!" 🚘🌲@ironwoodtweets #IndieGames #GameDev

Keith was a little disappointed that the picture on Auto Trader didn't quite match the car which was on the car salesman's forecourt...

What happens when a heaping pile of things I love crashes at full speed into a brick wall of stuff I despise? Pacific Drive, that’s what! On paper, this chill, spooky, and surreal adventure is very much my bag. Within the first few minutes, it becomes clear this is a big honking homage to Andrei Tarkovsky’s monumentally awesome 1979 film Stalker, with a killer indie-synth soundtrack and fun 70s aesthetics bolted on top.

The game opens with you driving through a beautifully realized recreation of Washington state’s rainy Olympic Peninsula, before being accidentally tossed into the “Zone”. This walled-off area is the testing ground for mysterious technology, resulting in chaotic, dangerous, and surreal phenomena. After finding a working station wagon, you must figure out a plan of escape, aided by eccentric scientists and technicians on radio comms.

That crack in John's windscreen was something that AutoGlass just outright refused to fix.

Mortisomem Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Bite-Sized Brazilian Folkloric Horror"

A new title on console from solo developer David Pateti, Mortisomem casts the player in the role of protagonist Donald Barnes, a merchant in Brazil during 1917 who walks home from his local one night to discover that the feared Mortisomem is after him. 

Long believed to just be a story designed to scare children into behaving, it becomes clear very quickly that Donald Barnes is up against a supernatural force determined to hunt him down, and this is NOT a harmless kid’s tale.

Police Shootout Xbox Series X Review 5/10 "A Quirky Blend of Genres Sandbagged by Technical Issues." 🚨🚔 @GamesIncubator #IndieGame #GameDev

A turn-based FPS game with investigative qualities was very much of appeal to me when I was offered to cover Police Shootout, and whilst it is an intriguing blend of genres that comes frustratingly close to being an idiosyncratic gem, there are just a few too many rough edges to ignore.

The game begins with your character moving from the big city to a small American town, transferred in a bid to find out what happened to his brother. Your commanding officer is a rather brusque gentleman who hints at knowing your ulterior motives for being in his neck of the woods, but initially seems to be warning you off your private quest of familial revenge.

Sniper Killer PC Review 6/10 “Flesh Wound” 🔫 @LeggoMyGiallo @henryhoare8 @torturestar @PuppetCombo #IndieGame #GameDev

I’ve been very vocal about my love for the Torture Star Video line of releases, enjoying every release that I have played thus far. After playing several of them, a thought did enter my mind – “would I ever finally play one and dislike it? Would one fail to live up to the rest and finally break the streak?” Luckily, whilst I would say the streak is intact - I do have my issues with Sniper Killer.

In Sniper Killer you play as… well, a ‘Sniper Killer’, a man who enjoys shooting people… usually in the face, although the first time I took control of him, I shot the wrong target and then, when I found the right one - I shot him in the shoulder, a mere flesh wound, but the game decided that was close enough to kill him. This did tickle me as you see the victim later on and he is missing most of his face. I wanted to tell the police that someone else must have shot him after I did, as I was nowhere near his face with my shot - but that's strangely not a dialogue option.

Dog Man: Mission Impawsible Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Full price? You’d be barking mad" 🐶 @MindscapeGames @F84Games #IndieGame #GameDev

I have to admit, I had never heard of the Dog Man franchise, I was very much unaware of Dav Pilkey’s books, graphic novels and the upcoming animated film. As such, I approached Dog Man: Mission Impawsible as a pure platform gaming experience, and as such – found it pretty middling in terms of gameplay, interesting in terms of presentation... but I did balk <bark? - Ed> at the asking price.

Dog Man Mission: Impawsible begins with the titular character getting called back into action, and re-banding his old companions in a bid to save their town, each has their own skill to surpass certain obstacles, as well as their own weaknesses. From that moment, the game reveals itself to be a pretty standard platformer, very accessible, and with a generous learning curve for younger / newer players, but overall very much not deserving the premium price tag that is attached to Dog Man Mission Impawsible.

Tap Wizard 2 Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Tap Wizard 2 Didn’t quite manage to cast its spell on me" 🧙‍♂️💥🧙 @Top_Cog #IndieGame #GameDev

The trailer for Tap Wizard 2 struck me as a game akin to Vampire Survivors, and as I’d wet my whistle on that particular genre during my end of year Switch mini-review round-up, I quite fancied another game with the same flavour. Digging deeper into Tap Wizard 2 reveals that it is actually an ‘idle’ game, a genre which is more suited to mobile devices – from which this is a port – and so I wondered how it would fare on consoles. It turns out that whilst the design and charm is there – it does feel that the mobile market is perhaps the best place for Tap Wizard 2.

The game begins with you choosing your wizard and their six powers from a choice of various elements, from then on, your wizard will engage in endless waves of combat with enemies in ever-increasing numbers and strengths as you incrementally increase your stats, powers, and abilities.

Visually the game features some tasty pixel art and runs very smoothly. The chiptune audio is catchy, but on a relatively short loop, although you can flick between a few different ditties in the menu. What you cannot do, though, is turn off the rumble on your controller, this is of note as the controller constantly rumbles throughout the game, and you can’t put your controller down or it’ll rumble off the table and onto the floor. This wouldn’t normally be an issue, but as it’s an idle game with a lot of downtime, it would have been a nice feature to include.

Whilst primarily an idle game, you can take direct control over your wizard as he wanders his way around the single-screen battlefield, and you’ll find that you’ll survive longer and get more pick-ups this way, as the AI-controlled wizard tends to just either move in a sweeping circle, or stay in the centre of the screen, ignoring the many chests that pop up full of goodies. 

Another minor niggle is that the left thumb stick – this controls the on-screen cursor, the right thumb stick handles manual wizard movement – seems to always start offscreen at the bottom left, which is a bit odd, the centre of the screen would be preferable for initial cursor placement.

The number of various panels, inventory areas, unlockables, upgrades and bonuses etc. is laudable and certainly adds a sense of progress to your quest, but the time-locked lore / narrative reveal is so overly verbose and lengthy that I got more irritated than intrigued upon reading. 

I found that the game was best played as I was cleaning my flat, having it on in the background and popping back every few minutes to maybe take over manually, and click through, selecting all of the things I’d unlocked whilst idle.

SUMMARY

It’s a game that’s too uninvolved to sit and fully engage with, and not engrossing enough to boot up and check in when playing on the Xbox, without the instancy and casualness of mobile play. 

I’d be interested to see what developer TopCog comes up with next, as I feel there’s a lot of talent and promise there, but on console, Tap Wizard 2 doesn’t quite click for me.

6.5/10

💧MELTING💧

Neon Blood Nintendo Switch Review 6.5/10 "The spark of something beautiful" 🧠⚡️ @ChaoBrainStudio #IndieGame #GameDev

Neon Blood was one of those games that struck me the moment I first watched the trailer, a beautiful blend of 3D environments with 2D characters, that supposedly melded that cyberpunk aesthetic with detective-based adventure, on paper – and on screen – it looked to be a winner. Sadly, as much as there was in Neon Blood that really drew me in, there was just as much working against my enjoyment.

Set in an alternate, distant future, the player is cast in the role of detective Axel McCoin, a burnt-out detective who regularly uses the fictional drug Spark to cope with extreme pain caused by his failing bio-implants. Mostly dismissed by his superiors, Axel (cool name ) gets embroiled in a series of murders that hint at a larger conspiracy…

Super Rolling Heroes Deluxe Xbox Series X Review 6.5/10 "Keep on rollin’ baby" 🧶 @solidneongames @JanduSoft #IndieGame #GameDev

A fun and polished casual title, Super Rolling Heroes Deluxe is a game about downward momentum. You must control your colourful, rotund buddy as they tumble down mountains avoiding spikes, traps, and pitfalls in a bid to make contact with the jewel at the end of each stage, thus completing the level.

Controls are simple, you can backpedal slightly, slow yourself down, or hop as you roll down the hills, smashing up the tiny houses, cars and structures that litter your way. The music is light and gentle, matching the pastel colours that are a breeze on the eyes. The animation and scrolling is also a very smooth 60 fps, which adds to the flow of the game.

Unfortunately, whilst there are various cosmetic unlockables that you can purchase – and side roads that lead to the extra gems etc. that act as in-game currency, the environment never really changes, and aside from the game getting trickier, you’ll find yourself passing the same structures and items over and over, meaning that there’s no real sense of progress beyond the numbers of the levels changing. 

You can adjust the difficulty to make it more of a challenge, but a little could have gone a long way here, with maybe differing weather conditions affecting your traversal, and some more dynamism and variety to the environments themselves, or the inclusion of hectic multiplayer races. 

SUMMARY

All that said, this is a fundamentally sound game that is fun for short blasts and is perfectly priced – but lacks that little something extra to make it a strike.

6.5/10

💧MELTING💧

Snowman Story Nintendo Switch Review 6/10 "A very specific festive adventure" ☃️ @OdencatGames #IndieGame #GameDev

As this was a child-friendly game, I thought I’d take the opportunity to play through with my three-year old son, a boy who is very much caught up in the magic of Christmas. As it pans out, whilst this is a very cute and noble game as a bittersweet Christmas fable, the simplicity and repetition end up stagnating any sense of flow, and ultimately mute the eventual emotional payoff.

IronFall: Invasion Nintendo Switch Review 6/10 💥 @VdDevGames #IndieGame #GameDev

Sometimes I’m taken in by a simple trailer for a game, or even the first few words of a press release, we -very kindly – get sent a lot of games here at GF, and as I mention in my year-end article - we unfortunately don’t get the time to cover them all, so when a certain genre pops out that you haven’t tucked into for a while, or you are just really in the mood for. It’s fun to take a punt and see what the game has to offer. In the case of IronFall: Invasion, I could see that it was a Switch FPS – and that was all it took for me to dive in.

From the rating of 6/10, you can probably tell that this won’t be featuring in our end-of-year lists, but I do have a bit of a caveat here, as IronFall: Invasion captures a very specific vibe, and I can imagine that it will find its niche among gamers as it feels like a bit of a time capsule, which I’ll explain as best I can.

IronFall: Invasion is a 2024 release of what was originally a 2015 3DS game, and though it appears that it wasn’t too warmly received at the time of release, as I didn’t know the background of the title at the time of playing, I had a very different experience, and to me, it felt very much like an early PS2 title that had been remastered for the PS Vita.. 

From the blunt and pacey intro through to the presentation and mechanics of the game – you’ll be getting Perfect Dark / Deus Ex vibes from how each cutscene is presented – there’s a solid functionality to the game that seems locked in to the early 2000’s in an almost delicious way that’s designed to invoke a very specific nostalgia, and – to me – it’s this that is the IronFall: Invasion calling card. If you don’t connect with this, it will be a very vanilla experience.

Set in the near future, you are a soldier that is a one-man force against an alien (although...robots) invasion, and through arena / corridor based FPS action, must take down this growing threat. The combat is suitably PS2, in that it is heavily cover-based and against a relatively small variety of enemy types in empty areas with no collectibles or reasons to explore, beyond clearing them out. 

There are sections wherein you have to hold a post against enemy attacks, but it’s all very PS2-retro. That said, the entire game is a silky smooth 60fps, and the gun play is quite satisfying, you pick up weapons that fare better against certain enemy types etc., and that N64/PS2 vibe is in full force as you make your way through the campaign. 

There’s almost a celebratory sense as to how the game feels to play, like it’s point blank refused to move beyond the era that it evokes, and does it bizarrely well. Each time I cleaned out spawning roomfuls of identikit enemies, and had marched down myriad boring corridors, I almost felt transported back in time, and it was oddly nostalgic of a very specific time for me. 

Of course, the question is - whether that feeling is worth £18 to you?

The controls feel like they could do with a slight tweaking in terms of sensitivity, but again – there’s no room for personalisation here, you get what you are given, and that adds to the ‘trapped in time’ sense that the game conjures up.

SUMMARY
I hope that this game finds its audience – perhaps not at the current full price, admittedly – but nonetheless, there’s a little bit of magic here that will be quite a trip down memory lane for a lot of folks. 

There’re no flourishes here, just a rock solid meat ‘n potatoes early PS2 duck ‘n cover shooter remastered for the PS Vita...except it’s a 2015 3DS game released in the Switch in 2024, natch.

6/10

💧MELTING💧

PURCHASE LINK:

IRONFALL Invasion | Nintendo Switch download software | Games | Nintendo UK

Flint: Treasure of Oblivion XBOX Series X Review 6.5/10 "A voyage with a touch of seasickness" 🏴‍☠️🦜 @PlayFlintGame @_SavageLevel_ #IndieGame #GameDev

A game that presents itself fantastically in some ways, but fumbles the bottle of rum over the side of the vessel in too many others to make it completely smooth sailing.

Flint: Treasure of Oblivion has an opening segment that certainly grabs your attention, as the game opens on a raft adrift in the ocean and we are introduced to Captain Flint and his hulking second in command, Billy Bones. They’ve clearly been at sea for a while with no food or water, and Flint finally loses his mind and decides he has no recourse other than to devour his best friend. 

It’s a fun and novel way to introduce the basic mechanics of the game as you chase your erstwhile companion all over the tiny raft. Luckily for all involved, in the midst of this debacle a ship sees the duo and takes them aboard…

Europa Nintendo Switch Review 6.5/10 "Its visuals, charm and story do enough to lift it above average" 🌏 @EuropaGame #IndieGame #GameDev

Having seen the trailer and played the game, I can tell you right now that it's not possible to review Europa without mentioning Breath of the Wild, so I won't try. This game, like the aforementioned (Linked, you might say) Nintendo smash, is an open-worldy, puzzley platformer. 

The game has you play Zee, an android, as you explore the breath-taking views of the eponymous moon of Jupiter. You're guided through the journey by the voice of your deceased creator/father, who speaks to you through his journal, pages of which you gather as you progress.