Recent reviews by V8_Ninja

MainFrames is, without a doubt, a delightfully varied platformer with an excellent mixed media art style. The level design weaves between precision platformer and puzzle platformer without any hiccups, and the optional rooms almost always introduce a new mechanical twist to overcome. The game is accessible to a fault, with a set of welcome game modifier options (game speed, infinite jumps, etc) being accompanied by an intrusive hint-giving NPC and several conspicuously-placed platforms that trivialize the more taxing challenges. The written story and worldbuilding are probably the weakest parts of the game, but ultimately they are serviceable and get lost between the fantastic animated vignettes of cute personified programs. My biggest critique of MainFrames is that its length and difficulty aren't going to entirely satisfy platformer aficionados, but being gracefully short is never a bad trait.

My time with Victory Heat Rally was undeniably fun. Nailing a tricky drift and rocketing past CPU opponents is satisfying, especially when the nice spritework of scenery objects pass by at a blistering clip while rock-infused electronic songs fills your ears. The excellent menu UI helps cater to the mammalian part of the brain that wants to get to the good stuff (the core gameplay) as soon as possible. At the same time, there are so many weird discrepancies and small issues that my time outside of driving left me disappointed. Basic info like what the vehicle stats do or even what my finish time was on a race are outright unexplained or hidden behind screen transitions. Pausing while drifting continues to play the drifting sound effect despite no other SFX playing. The news broadcast intermissions before playing on a new track are uneventful and mostly get used to show how one-note the unlockable drivers are. If you can mesh with the core racing gameplay of Victory Heat Rally, you will have a good time. Otherwise, I have to recommend that you spend six hours on other games you know you will enjoy.

Strictly looking at the core mechanics, Parking Garage Rally Circuit is a time attack arcade racer. However, what makes it stand out is that the game is completely kitted out. Drifts and boosts can be chained, forcing the player to delicately balance going fast and maintaining control in eight hand-designed courses. The online features are surprisingly fleshed out, from the customizable lobby multiplayer to the various preference options for downloading player ghosts. The ska soundtrack by The Holophonics is icing on the cake, somehow breathing character into each stage while still being energetic enough to keep the gameplay tense. If you have ever gotten into time trials for an arcade racer, be it Burnout or Mario Kart, you should buy this game immediately.

One BTN Bosses is a compact treat of a video game. There are hundreds of bullet patterns, dozens of arenas, and a handful of playstyle modifiers packed into a gameplay format that truly does only use one button. Each fight is a timing challenge that is affected by player choices, and those choices have obvious ripple effects as the player gets further and further into any one fight. The cute art, the bumping soundtrack, and the amusing character quips round out the package into something that almost anyone can pick up and enjoy. The roguelike mode can get a little repetitive, but variety of upgrades offer an unexpected depth.

Corn Kidz 64 nails the throwback collectathon essentials. There are a variety of interesting player movement actions that need to be combined to overcome dozens of platforming challenges placed in an irreverent, cartoon world that expands the more it is explored. The strongest individual element is the art direction, where rascally goat kids are faithfully recreated as low-poly models in a dream world of a cartoonishly exaggerated middle-of-nowhere town. What separates this game from similar recent titles is that it's level design is much more focused than others in the genre. There really is only one traditional collectathon level, and that level is designed very deliberately to guide players towards finding isolated challenges / rewards. That design also means that the player will reach dead ends they can't quite get past, forcing them to travel back and forth between different locations in order to make progress. It's awesome for mechanically reinforcing the importance of exploration, but if a player isn't familiar with the tropes of the collectathon genre it will be hard for them to parse those dead ends as anything other than a stop sign. If you can tolerate the slight annoyances of the genre, this is a collectathon well worth playing.

Patrick's Parabox is a very good entry in the minimalist indie puzzle game niche. Each mechanical twist gets its own set of introductory levels, explaining the core idea without divulging exact nuances. Then each of those intro puzzle packs are followed up by a smattering of optional and required challenges that ask you to discover those intricacies. That process of unfolding the mechanical origami packed into this game is satisfying, even after several hours. The polished presentation is also a nice treat, helping to highlight the reality-warping spaces that you are presented with. If you have any positive inclination towards sokoban gameplay, you should check this game out.

Castle on the Coast is clearly a budget game made for children. What that means in the most practical terms is that the platforming is easy, the presentation is limited, and the ambition is tempered. Despite all those constraints, the developers have made an entertaining 3D platforming toy box. It is inherently fun to abuse the floaty jumping mechanics to climb up buildings. Even aside from those core mechanics, the variety on display is plentiful. Surprisingly, the thing that ties it all together is the earnest writing. A conflict about kids being disillusioned with one another is accompanied by quirky jokes and intentionally flat voice acting. This game will not make a dent on anyone's "Best 3D Platformers" list, but it has the right amount of heart to be a delightful romp.

Witcheye feels like a faithful remake of a long-lost PC Engine game. The gameplay is as simple as it comes. You control the titular witch's eye as it floats through completely linear levels, doing your best to bonk enemies before they do the same to you. That simple gameplay is accompanied by simple pleasures; The spritework is very cartoony and the soundtrack has lots of upbeat synthesizer ditties. There are dozens of ways this game could be expanded upon to create a more substantial experience, but that's not what the developers did and I respect that decision. Witcheye operates on a level of pure simplicity, and that makes it a tad more authentically retro than many other throwback attempts.

Gato Roboto is exactly what it looks like: A Metroid-inspired indie game with enough little twists to avoid getting lost in the shuffle. The subversion of controlling a cute cat inside of a mech suit leads to amusing gameplay scenarios, but that's also the case for many of the major upgrades and mechanics. Difficulty will always be subjective, but I found that the level design provided enough resistance to make progress feel earned and rewarding. The only criticism I feel the need to vocalize is how this game is a bare-bones Metroidvania, with each new area being a linear level that just happens to loop back on itself. Otherwise, Gato Roboto is an amusing action platformer that can confidently be beaten in an afternoon.

As much as I don't want to admit it, Animal Well proved that I get caught up in the chatter surrounding gaming more than enjoying the medium itself. This game is an excellent puzzle platformer Metroidvania where every room has multiple purposes and all your upgrades are multimodal. What's more, secrets are placed throughout the world map with increasing levels of obscurity. Once you uncover the secondary use of a tool, it makes you curios enough to poke and prod at other locations to see what else the game has in store. Granted, the amount of secrets can be a little overwhelming, especially if you go into the game with no goal in mind. But even then this game has multiple stopping points that will leave players of different skill levels satisfied. While it's not wholly unique, Animal Well is the most consistently good puzzle platformer Metroidvania I've played in a long while (if ever).