If today's RPGs don't have enough airships for you, one developer hopes to rectify that in style. Sky Oceans: Wings for Hire wants to bring?? folks back to the "golden era of classic JRPGs," and we'll see how it fares the skies sta?rting on October 10, 2024.

Publisher PQube and developer Octeto Studios announced the date along with the new trailer below. You can spot some real Skies of Arcadia vibes at first glance. When this one launches, it'll be plundering the skies on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, and PC via Steam, Epic Games Store,?? and GOG. 

You might have already taken these wings for a spin yourself at this point. Sky Oceans had a demo during Steam Next Fest in June, offering up a brief taste of the life of a dogfighting sky pirate. The aerial b?attles themselves are turn-based, giving you the option to attack or evade enemy fire when necessary. If your crew's gear isn't cutting it, you can take some time outside of battle to reinforce equipment, boost your arsenal of weapons, and improve overall agility.

The story has you traversing the world above the clouds as Glenn Windwalker, who cert?ainly has a name suited for adventure. The actions ??you and your squad take throughout the narrative can shape the future of communities around the world, each providing their own unique characters, dilemmas, and related sub-quests.

Whether or not Sky Oceans lives up? to its inspirations is still, if you'll pardon the expression, up in the air. Personally, we don't have nearly enough sky-faring RPGs featuring rag-tag pirate?? crews, so the more the merrier. 

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While I wouldn't say I'm bad at games by any stretch, I know a game I'll be bad at when I see one. NanoApostle is one such game, and the frenetic boss rush actioner from developer 18Light Game (Pronty) is due out on PC in summer 2024. 

Who cares if I'll be bad at it, though. You might not be! It certainly seems exciting enough, and the intense boss battles at its core are on full ??display in the announcement trailer f??rom publisher PQube. 

NanoApostle puts you in the role of a nanomachine-augmented child na?med Anita. As she attempts to escape a top secret facility, she comes face to face with a bunch of cybernetic experiments that certainly seem to have "gone wrong." Or maybe they've gone exactly as th?eir creator intended? Either way, she has to beat 'em all up using a "Destruction Point" battle system. As the name implies, this involves using Anita's Apostle nanites to identify structural weaknesses in enemies and land decisive hits.

Destined to die

The stages themselves are something you'll have to contend with, too. Some of the environments will warp and advance as bosses become more aggressive. As one might expect from a game like NanoApostle, it results in the need for a lot of well-timed dodging and parrying. You'll also n??eed to be strateg?ic with the way you utilize skill points to decide upon your personal approach to combat. 

It all looks and sounds very cool, even if it smacks of a game that I'll pick up and get frustrated with almost immediately. For a lot of folks, that's a key selling point, and I can't say I'm not immediately drawn in by the promise of any game that falls in the Oops! All Bosses! category a la Furi. Hey, why not, bring on the punishment.

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A pair of dungeon-crawlers are about to make their way back to adventurers around the world with the announcement of Class of Heroes 1 & 2: Complete Edition for PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and PC.

The collection includes Class of Heroes: Anniversary Edition and Class of Heroes 2G: Remastered. Both will be available together on consoles and sold separately on Steam. There's no release date in place, but PQube has them penciled in for ?an early 2024 launch. You can see how the updated RPGs look today in the announcement trailer. 

Developer Zero Div's series first opened its doors to students when the original Class of Heroes hit PSP in Japan back in 2008. A North American release followed in 2009, which is also when the sequel launched in Japan. The Anniversary Edition version of the first game made its debut i??n Switch in Japan in 2018, adding in a room for ??changing outfits, difficulty options, and more.

Class of Heroes 2G introduced some new features when it made its way to PlayStation 3 in 2010. Additional party members, new dungeons, and full voiceovers joined the mix, giving players more reason to go back to the grind. With both games combined there are over 175 dungeons to traverse, so no?w's a good time to invest in some knee and elbow pads if you plan on crawling through 'em all.

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Bullet Babes

PQube has announced that it will be handling the western release of Inti Creates' Gothic Gals with Guns actioner Grim Guardians: Demon Purge �The publisher will launch the cool-looking title digit??al on cons?oles on February 24, with a range of physical releases also in the works.

Standard boxed editions of Demon Purge will be made available on PS4, PS5, and Nintendo Switch platforms this spring, while ??a?? special Collector's Edition is expected to launch in summer 2023. This latter edition will include a boxed physical edition of the game on PlayStation or Switch, alongside a 40-page artbook, a sticker set and key ring, art cards, and even a fun origami set, representing the magic of our monster-mashing Kazimono sisters, Shinobu and Maya.

//www.youtube.com?/watch?v=ZeN47PDxyiQ&ab_channel=PQube

Grim Guardians: Demon Purge is a pixelated 2D adventure that marries a Castlevania's Gothic aesthetic with the run 'n' gun chaos of a Gunvolt. One or two players will lead the Kazimono sisters deep into the dark dungeons of a demonic castle, determined to purge its evil from their village school. Younger sibling Maya will be looking to bring down a battalion of hellish opponents with her lethal *checks notes* origami skills, while her older sister Shinobu i?s, somewhat more traditionally, going with good old-fashioned lead �delivered accurately and with spe??ed.

Inti Creates' stylish-looking title shifted onto my radar at the end of the era, thanks to its cool pixelated visuals, cheesecake anime style, and interesting mix of magic and bombastic action. I'll be keeping an eye on this one, and I will ho??pefully find the time and opportunity to check it out for all of you folks right here at the good ship Destructoid. Lock 'n' load..?. and fold, I guess.

Grim Guardians: Demon Purge launches February 24 on PlayStation, PC, Xbox, and Nin??tendo Switch platforms.

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The developers say console publisher PQube left them feeling 'manipulated and exploited'

Narrative adventure game A Space For The Unbound is on indefinite hiatus. This news arrives alongside claims from M??ojiken Studio and Toge Productions that their console publishing partner PQube Games exploited them.

In a Twitter statement from the Space For The Unbound account, the companies say they discovered earlier this year that PQube? had done "certain things" that left them feeling "manipula??ted and exploited," and so their agreement has been terminated.

They allege that PQube used the developers' I??ndonesian heritage to obtain a diversity f?und from a "well-known" console platform in August 2020. These funds were intended to support underrepresented developers during the pandemic, yet Toge and Mojiken claim PQube withheld information about it.

Instead, PQube allegedly added the grant fund ?as a recoupable minimum guarantee. Then it allegedly used this to negotiate an increase of PQube's revenue share.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0_j39smn6k

A feud over funding

Toge and Mojiken say they uncovered the true amount of the funds and their intended purpose in March 2022. Due to it, the pair decided to t??erminate their contract?? with PQube Games.

"We are absolutely heartbroken that a party we worked with would do this and a project we have worked on for 7 years has been taken advantage of in such a way," the statement reads. "Since the uncovering of this issue, we clearly cannot trust PQube Games nor continue to work together for the release of A Space For The Unbound as PQube Games has fallen considerably short not only of reasonable decency, but also of their obli?gations to us due to these predatory practices."

//tw?itter.com/ASFTUgame/status/1562319004949028864

Toge and Mojiken say that as of the statement, PQube is still refusing to hand over publishing control on console platforms. Thus, the two have to delay the launch of A Space For The Unbound indefinitely, until it can make new arrangements. The companies also asked people to not engage in "negative or harmful" actions over this, inc?luding review bombing and boycotting. "All we ask is for people to read our statement and for your understandi?ng of our delay."

We've reached out to PQube for comment. In a statement to Fanbyte, the publisher says Toge Productions has "sought for some ??time to unilaterally enforce unreasonable revised terms" to their agreement. The company says it has supported development at every stage.

"Toge Productions have sought for some time to unilaterally enforce unreasonable revised terms to our agreement and it is disappointing that, as a result of not achieving that and despite PQube’s significant efforts to accommod??ate this, they have sought to deal with the matte??r in this way," the statement reads. "We will respond through the appropriate channels."

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All the singulaladies, all the singulaladies

If there is one thing my Apple Arcade subscription has taught me over the past few years, it’s that games designed around gacha mechanics don’t necessarily have to be the type of whale-hunting monstrosities that result in terrible YouTube “influencers�bragging about how they can’t play anybody online anymore because they spent $100,000 in it. Games like World of Demons and Star Trek: Legends are enjoyable gacha games in part because you don’t have menus popping up constantly goading you into dropping cash in them. With that monetary incentive removed from th?ese titles, players are free to enjoy the actual gameplay without worrying they’ll miss out on something huge if they don’t buy a loot box or start a game-specific subscription service.

That’s the idea behind Super Bullet Break, a new deck-building RPG with roguelike elements releasing tomorrow for PS4, Switch, and PC. It has all the makings of a game Belgian politicians would trot out on the ch??amber floor to publicly chastise. But because it’s not free to play and everything is included with the price of purchase, you’re left with a fun and fast gacha game that won’t ask you to break the bank.

Just try not to break your controller whi?le playing it.

Super Bullet Break (PC, PS4 [reviewed], Nintendo Switch)
Developer: BeXide Inc.
Publisher: PQube
Released: August 12, 2022
MSRP: $19.99

The world of video games is in danger and it’s up to three expert gamers—Akari, Hikaru, and Sumire—to save the day. Our trio of heroines is contacted by a mysterious AI known as Nayuta who needs their help fixing some of the most popular games on the market that have become corrupted. In each of these games hides a Singulalady that is unleashing buggos on these digital worlds, changing how the characters act within them. To save the day and save these games, the girls will have to investigate, which in Super Bullet Break means working your way across a randomly generat?ed map f??ighting monsters.

The combat here has its roots in the CCG genre. As you adventure through each corrupted game, you earn bullets to use in battle. These bullets are usually represented b?y a cute anime girl with a predetermined set of skills. Some only attack your opponents, some attack and heal in the same move, and some can have their skills altered by other bullets in your deck. Once a bullet is used in battle, it’s sent to the discard pile until your deck reshuffles. With more ??than 160 bullets to unlock, you can build a pretty eclectic and powerful deck.

//www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ODxiWAOluU

Don't blow in these cartridges

Collecting the right bullets for your deck is important, but you’ll also want to pay attention to the cartridges they’re attached to. Each bullet you obtain is paired with a randomly selected cartridge that has active or passive skills that can alter the bullet’s effectiveness or provide buffs for the player. Cartridges are not permanently tied to a bullet, and you’ll often encount??er ??two of the same bullets with different cartridges attached.

The key to making it through this game is building your deck with the best bullet and cartridge combinations. But doing so has its hurdles. First, outside of a few that can be purchased in shops and those you get for defeating bosses, all of the bullets you earn in Super Bullet Break are random. Second, you can only carry a limited number in your deck. Final?ly, because this game is a roguelike, you lose all of your earned ??bullets when you either fall in battle or free one of the games from a Singulalady’s control, reverting your deck back to its original build that's determined by which of the heroines you choose to play as.

That final point really bothered me for my first few run attempts. “Monochrom?e Tactics,�the first game you’re trying to save from a Singulalady’s control, is shockingly tough for what is essentially the t??utorial mission of the game. Looking at my log of attempts, I actually failed this map 11 times before beating it. Maybe it was my poor luck with bullet pulls, my unfamiliarity with how this all worked, or maybe my deck never shuffled in my favor, but that opening investigation nearly had me smashing my $70 controller in frustration.

Difficulty dropoff

Imagine my surprise when I beat the next three games within this game in a single go. The difficulty went straight out the window the second Super Bullet Break started introducing gimmicks to groupings of cards. These gimmicks, like the enemy-delaying ‘Heartsplosion,�can easily turn the tide of battle in your favor. In fact, some of these gimmicks are so powerful I didn’t even have to strategize with my deck. I just played whatever bullets were in my hand and watched my enemies meet their demise. “Monochrome Tactics�is without any gimmicks, and I can’t quite figure out why the developers decided on throwing players directly into the deep end rather than sticking it later in the campaign to craft something of a logical difficu?lty curve.

As headache-inducing as those first 11 failed attempts were, I will say they got me to look at Super Bullet Break in a more laid-back light. It took me a while to realize this, but this is a very noncommittal game. When you’re always starting from scratch, no matter if you beat the final boss or lose to the first grunt to cross your path, the game becomes something akin to solitaire: something you pla??y for fun or to pass the time. In fact, I wish I would have requested a Switch review code for this because, win or lose, this is the type of game I would have loved to have played in bed each night before going to sleep.

If you want to find true enjoyment in Super Bullet Break, don't go into it thinking it'?s going to be anything substantial. Like the free-to-play gacha games that inspired it, it's a very casual experience with a win-some/lose-some philosophy that I found to be refreshing. This wo??n't be a game I have deep memories of in a year's time, but for now, it's a pleasant palate cleanser to the heftier games that demand a lot more of my time, energy, and concentration.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Super Bullet Break appeared first on Destructoid.

Young girl, you're out of your mind

I never thought I'd be the type of person who'd enjoy a game where you pump high school girls full of pheromones to satisfy their needs, but here I am reviewing my third Gal*Gun title. Despite clearly not being in its target demographic, I've always enjoyed the absurdity of it all. It's nice to have something downright outlandish to revel in while the rest of the industry pushes towa??rd that homogenized c??enter.

Of course, that absurdity and outlandishness come at a price, and the Gal*Gun franchise has always been in the middle of one controversy or another. Gal*Gun Returns is no different as a few weeks ago, we learned the X??box One port of the ??title had been canceled after some "productive discussions" with Microsoft.

Having seen what this series can do, the move didn't surprise me.?? But now that I've played it, the cancellation seems even more ridiculous as this is easily the tamest entry in the franchise.

Gal*Gun Returns (Switch [reviewed], PC)
Developer: Inti Creates
Publisher: PQube Games
Released: February 12, 2021
MSRP: $49.99

Gal*Gun Returns takes players back to where it all started 10 years ago. Apprentice cupid angel Patako is nearing her graduation, and her last task to shoot a student with a Pheromone Shot. Unfortunately, her equipment goes haywire and unloads a bevy of arrows into the back of Tenzou Montesugi, an unpopular student who's about to be ??the hottest kid in school. Because of how many times he was shot, Tenzou has until the end of the day to profess his love to the girl of his dreams or risk being alone forever.

It's a premise later games in the Gal*Gun series have tweaked upon, but in Returns, the set-up is at its most basic. There are no branching paths here. You sim??ply pick the girl you want to pursue from the start and get going after her.

Standing between you and a happily ever after are throngs of students and few faculty members you need to satiate with those Pheromone Shots. As you move through the school, girls will ambush you unless you can pump them full of enough mojo to satisfy their needs. If there are too many girls to handle, activate Doki Doki mode, and you'll get a chance to giv??e one of the girls some personal euphoria. If you manage to hit all the right spots within the time limit, pleasing her will satisfy the rest of the girls on screen.

[brid video="713204" player="12899" title="Gal%20Gun%20Returns%20Review" duration="247" description="In today's Destructoid Review, CJ mast??ers the ultimate challenge of dodging women by shooting them with pheromones, and I'm already questioning my life choices writing this description! But is the game any good? Find out!" uploaddate="2021-02-03" thumbnailurl="//cdn.brid.tv/live/partners/10260/thumb/713204_t_1612314749.jpg" contentUrl="//cdn.brid.tv/??????????????????????????live/partners/10260/sd/713204.mp4"]

While Gal*Gun Returns is technically a rail shooter, it's a very primitive take on the genre, and in practice, it's closer to a simple shooting gallery than anything else. That's not a bad thing as it's quite a decent shooting gallery game. My favorite shooting bits happen when you and your chosen waifu have a one-on-one moment with its own unique set of rules. Shoot the sheep, pick the lyrics, defeat the tentacle monster; I only wish Returns featured more moments like this as the main narrative is a bit too?? limited and repetitive. You'll see some locations multiple times running through the story mode with each girl.

In fact, most of this game is pretty basic compared to what's come after it. It's not nearly as scandalous as Double Peace or Gal*Gun 2 as it lacks some of the features that made those games as naughty as they are. You can't vacuum the clothes off the girls, Doki Doki mode is very hands-off, and while the game boasts 423 different pairs of panties, they can be difficult to see without heading into some of the other modes or changing up the girls' costumes. This definitely feels like Inti Creates putting its toe in t??he water to see what it could get away with rather than diving straight in.

As is the case with all the Gal*Gun titles, the girls in Returns look fantastic. The character models here are very bright and distinct, and while they may be wearing the same uniforms, I got to know most of them through my repeated playthroughs and return trips to Doki Doki mod??e. The school itself looks noticeably better than it did back on the Xbox 360, even if the art direction is?? rather sterile. Most of the school is barren, empty, and lacking in vivid colors or lighting.

While it isn't the best looking Gal*Gun title on Switch, it runs well enough with no noticeable drops in the framerate, smooth reticule movement, and a control scheme that makes sense for the type of simple rail shooter it is. There are, however, far too many loading screens to sit through. It would have been nice if more of the Switch's features were worked into this remaster. There are no gyroscopic controls, no touch controls in handheld mode, and, most bizarrely, Gal*Gun Returns manages to screw up one of the main selling points ??of th?e Switch.

When playing on my television with my Pro Controller, I took my console out of its dock to play in handheld mode while I made dinner. Unfortunately, after I picked it up, none of the controls worked. Couldn't shoot, couldn't exit back to the title screen, couldn't? work the menu. The only thing I could do is hit the home button to exit out of the game and manually remove my Pro Controller so I could actually play in handheld mode. It's a strange oversight on the developer's part and something I hope they fix in an update.

If you find the experience to be to your liking, there is quite a bit of content to dive into. Gal*Gun Returns has a ridiculous number of portraits to unlo??ck, a fantasize mode where you can fight the controls to get the girls into the right position you want so you can "observe" them, and a post-story campaign called Doki Doki Carnival that's mildly amusing and only moderately entertaining. You get all that, plus most of the DLC that was released for the original game and new story elements that flesh out the narrative.

Gal*Gun Returns is a pretty decent remaster of a so-so game barring a few issues. I don't think anybody is going to walk away from it arguing it's the best in the series, but it's wo??rthwhile for fans who??'ve wanted to see where this franchise got its start. And if you're anything like me, it'll make you appreciate what's come after it all the more.

_{[This review is based on retail builds of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Gal Gun Returns appeared first on Destructoid.

Thanks to PQube

[Update: An English dub is confirmed for the western release.]

It's great to see Kill la Kill still in the spotlight all these years later, and thanks to PQube, the new fighter is now coming to Europe.

As announced on Twitter, the company is partnering with Arc System Works to bring the game to PS4 and Switch (it's also available on PC) later this year, in line with the US and Japanese releases. They remind us that the original writer is working on a new?? storyline for the game.

Just another reminder: This is not being developed by legendary fighting game developer Arc System Works, but rather, APLUS, who worked on games like Little Witch Academia: Chamber of Time and a few 3DS entries in the River City/Kunio-kun series. Arc is merely publishing it ??????????????????????????in North A?merica and Japan.

PQube Games [Twitter]

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Tears in the fabric of spacetime

Muv-Luv Alternative is the culmination of everything that’s come before it. Muv-Luv, the collection of the first two games, built up a fascinatingly rich sci-fi world which has clearly saved the best for last. This is the big payoff, and it delivers in almost every regard. For those who have no knowledge of the series yet, I am reviewing this devoid of any major spoilers. It’s impossible to separate these ga??mes from one another, and I’m hoping to represent that as best as I can for newcomers.

Everything in Muv-Luv Alternative is bigger, better, and perfectly connects the plot in a ton of unexpected ways. The artwork is more detailed, and there’s even a few fully-animated cutscenes. While there were some instances of fighting in Unlimited, this is where the conflict wit?h the alien invaders finally comes to a total head, and it gets downright brutal at ti?mes.

Muv-Luv Alternative (PC, PS Vita [reviewed])
Developer: ixtl Inc.
Publisher: PQUBE Limited
Released: June 12, 2018
MSRP: $39.99 

In fact, the biggest departure in Alternative is? just how fucking savage and ugly things get. This game made me genuinely uncomfortable, brought me to tears at times, and most importantly, it made me truly care abou?t the fates of these characters and the worlds they live in.

The first several hours serve as a recap of past events. Coming in hot off of Unlimited, this was a little less than ideal, but I understand why it exists. It’s not even just a straight retread either. Things play out slightly different, but it’s just close enough to what I’d already experienced to feel a bit monotonous. However, like pret??ty much everything that’d happened in the st??ory up to that point, the feelings it invoked and the details presented were all very intentional.

The creators want you to feel bored, and they want you to feel like you’ve been through this before. When they finally pull the rug out from under you, it hits that much goddamn harder as a result. After roughly fifty hours of painfully-crafted buildup, Alternative introduces us to the enemy up close and personal.

At this point in the game, every character feels like a close friend who you know inside and out. The stakes are the highest they’ve ever been, and you aren’t just trying to protect some random anime ladies anymore. It’s very dif??ficult to impress just how effective this obscure means of storytelling was.

This epic adventure may have started out as a harem anime centered around everyday high school life, but it effortlessly? transitions into one of the most insanely detailed visual novels ever created. It manages the ridiculous task of retroactively improving the previous two entries in the series. Almost every breadcrumb trail and tiny bit of foreshadowing is followed up on in a completely natural way.

Once you get past the initial recap of events, it’s all balls to the wall from there on out. We’re talking full-scale battles, against a horde of invading aliens, packed to the brim with excessively-detailed future technology that believably exists within the world. There are multiple types of mechs used to fight these bastards, and they’re all beautifully realized as well. This isn’t some copy/paste, gaudy Gundam knockoff. The mechrophiliacs (I’m coining that term) among us will have plent??y to droo??l over.

This is hardcore science fiction at its finest, but it doesn’t come without its drawbacks. Alternative suffers from the same complete lack of political correctness as its predecessors??. I can see how these aspects may turn many others off f?rom the series.

If you are particularly passionate about just how “woke�you are, and have difficulty separating the standards of fifteen years ago from those of modern society, don’t waste your time. Muv-Luv doesn’t give a shit. It’s not trying to be “edgy.�The story it’s telling is genuinely disturbing, and works, because of just ho??w poorly? it fits into today’s world. There were points where I cried because of just how brutal this stuff gets.

This is a dark tale that subverts your expectations and plays off your emotions in impossibly unforeseen ways. Muv-Luv doesn’t want to hurt you. It just does due to the causality of t??????????????????????????elling its story the only way it po?ssibly could.

It’s crazy to think about, but this started out as an eroge game. As it stands now, in i?ts western release, it’s anything but. Things get so totally fucked that my dick wanted to shrivel up inside itself and never come out again. It was not always easy to keep going.

However, if you’ve got the stomach, you don’t mind a little romance, and you can see past the limit?ations of the visual novel genre, you’re in for one of the most in?tense sci-fi stories ever told. The ending initially left me a tad unsatisfied, but repeated playthroughs revealed its true depth. Even now, after finishing everything multiple times, I’m unsure that I fully have a grasp of what actually went down. I still have questions, and I’m positive that the answers lie buried somewhere between a few forgotten words.

Muv-Luv, as a whole, is equal parts beautiful and ugly, and it’s extremely affecting as a result. This is an imperfect yet peerless classic in its? field. There is nothing else like it, and I doubt there ever will be. It’s a flawed masterpiece that’s destined to be misunderstood. It may not be for everybody, but there's something undeniably special here. It will rip your heart out and leave you begging for more.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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Now this is what it's like when worlds collide

Muv-Luv is a collection of the first two entries in a trilogy of visual novels. The first part, Muv-Luv Extra, is basically a slice of life harem anime on the surface. The sequel, Muv-Luv Unlimited, is an epic, mech-filled sci-fi story. Make no mistake, while the?se two narratives are seemingly-unrelated, they're very much two sides of the exact same coin.

Muv-Luv (PC, PS Vita [reviewed])
Developer: ixtl Inc.
Publisher: PQUBE Limited
Released: June 12, 2018
MSRP: $39.99 (PS Vita)/$29.99 (PC)

It’s worth noting this originally released about fifteen years ago and some of the story beats and humor haven’t aged extremely well. All of the female characters are, essentially, presented as conquests. They’re fully fleshed out (heh) characters, but the main goal of the game is to eventually sleep with them. Considering Muv-Luv initially debuted with a plethora of gratuitous sex scenes for each romanceable girl, that’?s hardly surprising.

While there’s still a bit of fan service here and there in the western release, all of the full-frontal nudity has been taken out. You know what’s crazy? When you strip this thing of all that sexy fluff, it holds up remarkably as a tried and true tale of romance. If I hadn’t already known about the naughty bits being removed, I’d have never even noticed. I’m typicall??y against most censorship of any kind, but these stories are so damn wonderful and heartfelt that it feels inconsequential in the grand scheme of things.

Muv-Luv Extra is, more or less, a straightforw?ard love story and it’s the most divisive entry in the series by a long shot. Takeru, the main character, is thrust into the path of a group of ladies and your only real goal here is to choose one as a romantic partner. He wakes up one day to find a blue-haired girl mysteriously lying in bed beside him and events quickly?? spiral out of control from there.

?Sumika, Takeru's closest friend since childhood, finds the two of you together, and she's pissed. She wants blood. Between her and the blue-haired lady, Meiya, you'll have to attempt to keep the peace. Both of them are vying for your attention, and more characters erupt later to furth?er complicate matters. Our respective Don Juan, Takeru, will have to fend off their advances while attempting to live a somewhat normal high school life.

In this newest version, you’re presented with the option to skip Extra altogether, but doing so would be a great disservice. Not only is it absolutely essential to the storyline of Unlimited, but it’s a delightfully naïve experience in its own right. At the very least, playing through the Sumika and Meiya routes are necessary to fully understand the depth of events to come. It might seem like lovey-dovey, skippable nonsense, but it successfully sets up a story arc that simply couldn’t be told in any? other way. 

Unlimited, the sequel, retains many of Extra's romantic themes, but it takes place in a dystopian future where humanity is on the brink of extinction. The small portion of the population that remains?? is left fighting for survival, with the help of badass mechs, against a mysterious alien species. It’s impossible to go into more details without spoiling anything, but I can assure you it’s fucking awesome.

The way that these two stories twist, blend, and mirror each other is pretty damn impressive. The plot and characters may not always be completely realized, but there’s something special here. By the time Unlimited’s credits were rolling, I had fallen head-over-heels for this world and the people who inhabi??t it. However, if you ??don’t enjoy reading, you’re going to have a bad time. 

This a visual novel in the purest sense of the term. If you’re not familiar with the genre, this is a largely pass?ive experience. You'll occasionally answer a few questions, and those will decide which ending you receive. It's always obvious which girl's route you're choosing, so you won't have to worry about accidentally getting the wrong ending.

These two games are mostly exposition, but they lead to a third act, Muv-Luv Alternative, which delivers an unexpected amount of nuance. Every seemingly-frivolous event shown here is full of intention. Muv-Luv may have dropped its perverted? past, but rest assured its unwillingness to compromise on the things that matter is more than evident in its delivery. It knows exactly what it is, and it’s completely unashamed.

This is not a game for the faint of heart. It’s offensive, perverted, and subtly violent at times during its openin?g moments. It’s also adorable, funny, and heartwarming in equal measure. It’s a complicated beast that rewards those who persevere. While far from perfect, it lays the foundation for one of the most epic sci-fi stories ever told. There is nothing else like it.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Muv-Luv appeared first on Destructoid.

Oh, I see how it is. Have the gay guy review a game about fruit.

I'm baffled right now. Absolutely baffled. Befuddled even. Nonplus. The karting genre is a gaming no-brainer. It's one of the linchpins of the industry, corralling casual and hardcore gamers alike. It's been that way since the early 1990s, and yet, with the PlayStation 4, kart racing fans are woefully underserved. Sony squandered its chance to carve its own franchise in the last generation when it decided to compete with itself, releasing both ModNation Racers and LittleBigPlanet Kart. Without those, karting fans have had to make due with Beach Buggy Racing, a bad console port of a bad mobile racer.

Maybe that's why I decided to give All-Star Fruit Racing a shot. So desperate for a quality karter on my Sony box, I'd ?give into the idea this colorful racer could  be what this console's been missing. And I can say now, withou?t a doubt, this is the best kart racer on the system. But given its competition, that's a mighty low bar to hurdle.

All-Star Fruit Racing (PlayStation 4 [reviewed], Switch, Xbox One, PC)
Developer: 3DClouds.it
Publisher: PQube Games
Released: July 13, 2018 (EU), August 21, 2018 (US)
MSRP: $39.99 on console/ $14.99 on Steam

All-Star Fruit Racing comes to the PlayStation 4 at a disadvantage. I would say the same about the Xbox One, but Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed is backward compatible on the system and it's a much better racer than this. Anyway, All-Star Fruit Racing is at something of a disadvantage. It ??has no hook.

Most games in the genre do. Either they bring together characters people know and love -- your Marios, Diddys, Bandicoots -- or they introduce some mechanic that can give it a leg up on the competition, like create-a-track or using actual cars instead of karts. The former is more common than the latter. Mascot racers were a dime a dozen for a while and will probably continue to be with Team Sonic Racing and Nickelodeon Kart Racers on the horizon.

But All-Star Fruit Racing doesn't have any of that going for it. All it has is fruit and lots of it. In all different shapes and sizes, scattered throughout the 21 included tracks and imbued in the racers themselves, fruit is the conceit around which this game was designed. It's fruit all the way and if it were a slightly better or slightly worse game, I'd probably be in a more affable mood, jotting down dozens of fruit puns I could interject into this review. Unfortunately, All-Star Fruit Racing is so middl?e of the road, so unexceptionally average, I j?ust don't have it in me.

It's quite difficult to make a rotten kart racer and I can say without question developer 3DClouds avoided doing just that as nothing in the game strikes me as horribly awful. The characters lack personality and are designed with an art style like looks like one of those cheap, Canadian CGI television series from the last decade, but they feature character specific weapons, a concept I adored in Mario Kart: Double Dash that has been absent ever since. The fruit motif wears out its welcome quite quickly, but I'd be lying if I said snow on fruit isn't my jam. Icy Grapes is a delightful jaunt through ??a snow-crested winery and Frozen Castle, a single lap track adorned with frozen pomegranates, wouldn't look out of place in a more legitimate karting game.

Those are just surface level complaints though and a quality racing game can succeed if the quality of the racing itself is up to snuff. With All-Star Fruit Racing, it's not, though it's not for a lack of ideas. The game mixes things up a bit with how items work, leading to one of the stronger concepts found in it. Many races will have mystery item boxes standard to the genre, but I'm far more interested in races that have me collecting fruit from the track. In these races, collecting a piece of fruit doesn't automatically give me an item to use. Rather, it fills a fruit meter, and when that meter is filled, I can mix and match fruits for different items. Filling up all of? the fruit meters grants me the ability to use my character-specific weapon, which, somehow, is the only fruit-based weapon in a game that's all about fruit.

There are also different approaches to the racing format. The game has standard three or five-lap rac??es, single lap races, and elimination races, where every dozen or so seconds the racer in last place is eliminated until there is only one left. Each cup in the career mode will mix and match these race formats with the different weapon collection methods, making for a bespoke experience with each trophy I collect. In addition to the cups of the career mode, I can engage in single track races, Fast Championship mode which selects three tracks at random, Custom Championship mode where I can choose up to six tracks to race, and a Time Attack mode. There is local and online multiplayer, the latter of which isn't available at the moment -- or it is and I just can't find other reviewers playing at the same time I am.

On paper, that all sounds plumb. In practice, it should be the same but there are issues throughout All-Star Fruit Racing. Let's start with how the karts handle. They actually steer pretty well. Drifting for a boost is encouraged, but elongated drifts will actually cause to wipe out. It's ma?nageable, but the speed boost I receive from pulling off a drift doesn't kick in right away. There's a lull from when I exit the drift to when the boost takes effect.

The longer I hold a drift, the longer my speed boost will be and in a tight race on the hardest difficulty, I appreciate whatever leg-up I can get. These boosts matter, unlike any of the boosts I receive from item boxes or my fruit concoctions. There are two, maybe three, speed boosting items in the game that don't actually gain any ground on my competitors. They're anemic, and the only real way to gain ground on the highest difficulty is to combine great drifts with the various boost pads that line the tracks. All of the other items are a mixed bag of either weapons I use to hit a single target in front of me or traps I drop behind me to dete??r those creeping up on my rear. Firing them off isn't exactly a visual spectacle and almost all weapons strike their target with little pomp.

The weapons and items aren't great, and I'll say the same about the track layouts. Some are quite bizarre in fact. Avocado Roller is a single lap track riding atop a multicolored snake where each color on it affects my tires in a different way. Neat concept, awful execution. It takes all of one minute to reach the finish line and due to the short length of it, a single attack from another racer will render any possibility of a first-place finish moot. Then there's Lychee Loto, a multi-lap track with a giant loop that ends jarringly?? because its impossible to see what's ahead of me.

Many track??s in the game have this surprise element about them, where what's ahead isn't always seen in advance, forcing me into blind turns. Track memorization will alleviate this issue somewhat, but there are still questionable design choices throughout. There is more than one track in the game where the road will fork and one route is blatantl?y shorter than the other even if the longer option has a boost pad on it. There are also invisible obstacles I've run into, boost pads that don't seem to work, and other racers that will be ahead of me one second and then far behind the next.

There are other bugs and design flaws. Sound effects are wonky as hell. In elimination races, when a competitor is eliminated, their name will appear in the middle of the screen blocking my view. When it gets down to just me and one other racer, the countdown, which usually goes from nine all the way to one, will cut off at three for no reason. Some cups will feature four racers through all of the tracks, other will have 10 and it's never explained why. Starting positions for racers don't seem to follow a pattern. There is no rubber-banding, but opponent AI is wildly inconsistent. One race they'll be a real ch?allenge, the next, and this actually happened to me on more than one occasion, all of my competitors will instantly veer left at the start of the race, giving me an easy win.

I have a lot of questions for this game, like why is Poseimon one of the last tracks I unlock when it's so dull and why does Dino Juice have a Jurassic Park design motif with a Danny Elfman inspired music track? Or why did I race the same track two different times in a single cup? But I don't want to think about what the answers to those would be because I really don't want to think about All-Star Fruit Racing anymore. If this were on mobile I'd have deleted it after my first trip to Avocado Roller. As it's a PS4 game, I was holding to hope there'd be something, anything, I could grasp on to he?re that would signify it as a quality kart racer for the platform. There isn't.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: All-Star Fruit Racing appeared first on Destructoid.

You are everyone's senpai. EVERYONE'S!

Today, publisher PQube and developer Agate showed off a trailer for their newest game, Valthirian Arc: Hero School Story. It's a?? twist on the JRPG school premise where inste?ad of going to classes and flirting with waifus him-or-herself, the player is the school's principal who manages the school to raise dozens of such heroes over several generations.

I say "is" rather than "will be" because I happened to play the Flash game the Valthirian Arc series launched as years ago, so personally, I'm impressed to see its name show up again under the same publisher who brought Stein's;Gate and BlazBlue to Europe!

I had a soft spot for the original flash game's premise. Its lite action RPG battles were fine for what they were, but the main goal is in the simulation side where you enroll new students, train them (often but not always through said battles), and g?raduate them out of your school to gain renown. It's an addictive and satisfying loop to constantly raise heroes instead of being one yourself, but I felt like said Flash game was lacking in substance and staying power.

Valthirian Arc 2 answered that concern with many new management and battle features like learning skills, building school facilities, and creating equipment. Hero School Story's trailer sugge??sts it's doing even more of that, graduating from 2D to 3D in the process. I can't hide the fact that I'm excited for this game mostly by nostalgia bias, but I truly ca??n't think of any other simulation game that plays with similar ideas.

Of note is that until recently, Hero School Story was in development under the name Valthirian Arc: Red Covenant. It was also Kickstarted successfully last year as just a PC game, and ??PQube's publishing is mainly to branch out into the PS4 and Switch.

Valthirian Arc: Hero School Story is scheduled for release this year.

The post PQube shows off RPG school sim Valthiria??n Arc: Hero School Story appeared first on Destructoid.

Shakes tiny fist

Earlier this year, we learned sexy-anime-girl-dungeon-crawler and horribly named Omega Labyrinth Z would not be seeing release in Australia due to its content. The game features high school girls with big boobs you can play around with using the PlayStation Vita touchscreen, so seeing it banned on Nanny Island was no big surprise. Neither was news it would be refused ratings in the UK, Germany, ??and New Zealand. This, how??ever, is a surprise.

PQube Games, publisher of all things distinctively Japanese, announced via Twitter the title's western release is no longer happening. While Omega Labyrinth Z passed through the ESRB and PEGI without issue, the l??ocalization is being called off due to "the wishes of the platform holder."

Please see below the statement on the situation of #OmegaLabyrinthZ in the West. It is with sadness that we announce that the game is cancelled on both platforms and all Western regions permanently. We will not comment further on this matter. Thank you for your support. pic.twitter.com/ePmmiWSTAY

— PQube (@PQubeGames) June 25, 2018

I appreciate how frank and apologetic PQube Games is in the statement. Getting Omega Labyrinth Z ready for western games has been quite the ordeal and it's a shame its path to release hit a deadend. Make no mistake, I'm not disappointed because it's one less booby game on the market. I'm disappointed because it's one less roguelike dungeon crawler I'm going to be able to play and one less reason to turn on my Vita in 2018. I guess I still have Muv-Luv to look forward to, if that's any consolation.

PlayStation blocks launch of adult anime game Omega Labyrinth Z [Eurogamer]

The post Booby dungeon crawler Ome??ga Labyrinth Z rejected by Sony appeared first on Destructoid.

Pantsu Printing Problem

This week saw the Western release of cult upskirt-shooter Gal*Gun 2, although a?? weird printing error may leav??e you wondering what barrel-blazing title you have actually picked up.

First posted by Twitter user @Luke_Balicki, the cover sleeve for the Nintendo Switch edition of Gal*Gun 2 has the artwork for Natsume's steampunk blaster Wild Guns Reloaded printed on the reverse. This is a baffling situation as the two titles ?aren't even fr??om the same publisher, having nothing in common outside of both games featuring the word "Gun" in their title.

This isn't the first time the Gal*Gun series has had a print issue. The PS Vita edition of Gal*Gun Double Peace ?was once given the erroneous ESRB rating of "E for Everyone" on its reverse, which I'm su??re surprised Pops when little Jimmy started sucking the clothes of wide-eyed anime schoolgirls.

Other players are since claiming to also have the same bizarre goof. Did you pick up Gal*Gun 2? If so, do you have a similar printing error? Let us know in the c??omments!

Very funny misprint on galgun 2 for switch. @PQubeGames @IntiCreatesEN
Just look at the inside art! Same as @Natsume_Inc Wild Guns Reloaded on Switch!! pic.twitter.com/HIqdqUIB94

— Luke B (@Luke_Balicki) April 24, 2018

The post Something’s weirdly amiss with this Gal Gun 2 cover sleeve appeared first on Destructoid.

Love glue-gunning

It happened several weeks ago on its Twitter feed
Did PQube Games pose a question for its followers to read. 
With Gal*Gun 2 a month away the publisher wanted to know 
If you’re a fan who’s brave enough to play the game on the go. 
Would you play it on a plane? 
Would you play it on a train? 
Would you play it with the volume up in a crowd like you got no shame? 
Happy to say I’m the type of guy who doesn’t give a shit. 
No matter what kind of game it is I’m playing it on my Switch. 
So I did play it on a plane, 
And I did play it on a train, 
And if I could then yes I would play it in Spain with David Wain. 
For all its pert, there’s something you should know about this game, 
Despite the naughty bits it shows, Gal*Gun 2 is rather tame.

Gal*Gun 2 (PlayStation 4, Switch [reviewed]) 
Developer: Inti Creates 
Publisher: PQube Games 
Released: April 13, 2018 (EU), April 24, 2018 (NA) 
MSRP: $59.99

Gal*Gun 2, which is actually the fourth game in the series and the third to make it out of Japan, is using its first appearance on a Nintendo console to mix up the concept behind its on-rails sexual student shooter. No longer am I the victim of a boneheaded Ekoro and her wayward arrows. Now, I’m a recruit of the Angel Ring Company, armed with the classic Pheromone Shot, the Demon Sweeper from Gal*Gun VR, and a pair of goggles that will help me see the demons festering inside this clean, somehow-all-girl-except-for-m?e school campus.

By my side is Risu, a bumbling failure of a paper-pusher for the Company who needs my help to make her demon squashing quota. We’re given less tha??n a month to make her goal, but I meet it in approximately seven in-game days. After t??hat, I’m mostly meandering through the story as I try and grow closer to the two humans in my life: Nanako, my childhood BFF, and Chiru, the shut-in who lives next door.

Interactions with both girls boil down to me giving them snacks until they like me enough to advance their story. Nanako and Chiru have very different paths in life, and I’m there to pretty m??uch perv it all up. My character is unapologetically seedy at times, but hey, the ladies seem to like it. As do the classmates I can call upon for some naughty-time “rendezvous” I gain access to by completing requests.

I can only complete two requests a day, so hitting Risu's quota before time's up means balancing story missions with side-quests featuring my potential boos and returning characters, or answering the call of a girl in need in exchange for her phone number. These requests/missions fall into one of a few categories. There are the standard shooting levels, which again have me pleasuring lovestruck girls with little bursts from my love gun and freeing students possessed by little demons. There are guard missions, which place me in a single area where I have to protect a girl or group of girls as they’re attacked by demons of different difficulties and sizes. Finally, search missions task me with locating a certain number of objects before time runs out. At first, I despise the latter of these tasks, but when I finally figure out to use all the c??ontrols at my disposal, I come to appreciate them for their abundant replay value.

There’s variety here, which is something I can’t say about its predecessor, Gal*Gun: Double Peace. There’s also a reliably steady framerate on the Switch, which the last game on the Vita lacked. It’s basically the exact same school as every other outing in the series, but cleaner and more polished, making better u??se of the Unreal 4 engine. There are also motion controls th?is time, but they're not as accurate as I'd like. The cursor can drift, and the game doesn’t register slight movements all that well, so I find it best to pump these girls full of my love juice using a mix of motion and analog controls.

When comparing Double Peace on the Vita to 2 on the Switch, this hands-down plays better than the last game. And going with a more open, mission-based progression system is a move I appreciate even if the payoff isn’t as astounding as it could be. It’s a step forward for the series, but the content that actually matters, the aspects of the game synonymous with the term "Gal*Gun," takes a step back.

Gal*Gun: Double Peace succeeded largely because it was unapologetic in what it was. It was sexy. It was silly. It was about as Japanese -- or at least what we in the West perceive Japanese to be -- as gaming gets. At a time when people across the internet were asking for better representation of women in media, it was a reminder that it’s okay to just think girls are sexy. That’s why I like that game. That’s why it’s still on my Vita despite my limited storage space. The way it presented itself with gusto is why it got a fan base large enough in the West to warrant a sequel, and yet so much what made that game wonderful feels sterilized in Gal*Gun 2.

I’ll say it: this game isn’t perverted enough. I didn’t put 40 hours into Double Peace because it was an on-rails roller-coaster ride of spellbinding set pieces. I did it because the game is a perfect combination of unbridled sexiness and an appropriate amount of sleaze. Yes, I can use Demon Sweeper to literally suck the clothes off of girls, and that’s neat, but it’s boorish compared to the subtle creepy voyeurism of zooming in on a girl and having her clothes become lightly translucent, giving you a peek at the underwear underneath. That’s out in Gal*Gun 2, as are touch controls.

Doki-Doki Mode in Double Peace on the Vita was a scandalous delight because I could literally use my fingers to pleasure up to three girls until they were absolutely soaked in euphoria. Not here. Gal*Gun 2 neuters Doki-Doki. It’s just one girl at a time and isn’t a weapon I can use when I’m overwhelmed by a horde of horny hotties. Instead, it’s its own mission or one of the activities I can perform with a girl I’m having a “rendezvous” with. Without touc?h controls on the Switch, it’s a sanitized, off-hands experience. I just use the Pheromone Shot to cast demons out of a girl, popping her clothes off if I’m successful enough. I get that doesn’t sound too bad and can actually be kind of fun, but it pales in comparison to how I used my digits to really give it to the girls in the last game.

The changes made to the fundamental facets of the Gal*Gun experience are regressive. Like if Midway Games put blood in the first Mortal Kombat, then decided for MKII that SNES sweat was the way to go. Is Mortal Kombat without blood still the same experience?? Technically yes, but in reality, no because wanton gore is sewn into the fabric of that franchise in the same way sexy shenanigans?? are sewn into this one.

Nothing in Gal*Gun 2 tries to go beyond what the series has done before. Many parts don’t even keep on par. Changing the structure of the campaign helps pad the play time, and it’s still a silly, relaxing, and quirky experience with bizarre elements that are beyond explanation -- hit the minus button to see what I’m talking about. But it’s all just so gentrified and clean cut. If Gal*Gun: Double Peace was Times Square before Giuliani with all the porn stores, go-go bars, and occasional double homicide, Gal*Gun 2 is Times Square after ?Giuliani where the most immoral thing you’ll see is the lingerie section at ?Forever 21.

_{[This review is based on a retail version of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Gal Gun 2 appeared first on Destructoid.

Also other stuff but mostly boobs

As a member of the Destructoid staff, I get an ass-load of emails every day about games I'll never bother to learn about let alone play. Mostly mobile stuff from sketchy Russian developers who I'm sure are just out to infect my phone with malware. There are some ways to get my attention though. Anything that's similar to The Legend of Zelda piques my i??nterest as well as crazy Japanese games. Also boobs. Boobs do the trick as well.

So when I get an email with the tagline "The quest for the breasts begins!" it goes straight from having my c?uriosity to having m??y attention. When that line is combined with this logo:

it becomes something I can't ignore.

Omega Labyrinth Z -- fuck that is an awful? name -- is a rogue-like dungeon crawling RPG that is coming west courtesy of PQube, the publisher of everything sensationally smutty. I mean, just check out this totally subtle trailer:

So much nuance.

Omega Labyrinth Z will feature standard dungeon crawling concepts and more booby friendly ones as well, such as the ability to touch the girls anytime, Z-Cups, and using the power of boobs to transform crystals. We'll also be able to, and I quote, "Utilize the ‘Faint☆Awakening' system to improve characters by touching them until they scream with excitement!" Ball's in your court, Senran Kagura.

Omega Labyrinth Z will launch for the PlayStation 4 and?? Vita in Spring of 2018.

The post This game is about boobs appeared first on Destructoid.

More games need badges

Publishers PQube have announced that anime-up-the-ass fighting game Under Night In-Birth Late[st] will be launching in Europe and North ?America in February 2018, coming to PS4, PS3 and PS Vita.

The niche but beloved fighting franchise will also see a snazzy Collector's Edition in Europe, courtesy of Rice Digital. The "End of Dawn" set features the PS4 ??version o?f the game, along with a 128-page artbook, the game's soundtrack and a cool selection of 20 badges. Badges! The set will retail for around £55.

Although Under Night will be available on three Sony formats, only the PS4 versions will be seeing a physical releas?e. A new trailer for the game was also unveil??ed, which can be seen below.

Under Night In-Birth Late[st] arrives in North America and Europe February 9 on PS4, PS3 a?nd ?PS Vita.

The post Under Night In-Birth Late[st] arrives in the West in February, gets collector’s edition appeared first on Destructoid.

Oh, right. The delusion. The delusion for Takaru, the delusion chosen especially for Takaru, Takaru's delusion.

Late last month, I reviewed Tokyo Dark, an independent supernatural investigation point-and-click. People sacrificed themselves for religious cults, I had a great time. In early October, I spent most of my free time playing and speculating about the fantastic Danganronpa V3, where talented teenagers kill each other to escape the prison they're stuck in. And now, as October is coming to an end, here I am reviewing Chaos;Child, a s?cience-fiction murder mystery visual novel. 

I swear I don't have an obsession with Japanese people killing each other in strange circumstances. These things just happened naturally, by pure chance! Please believe me. It's??? a huge conspiracy. I haven't done anything wrong! I'm innocent. It wasn't me. It wasn't me. It wasn't me. It wasn't me.

ChäoS;Child (PlayStation Vita, PS4 [Reviewed])
Developer: 5pb.
Publisher: PQube
Released: October 17, 2017
MSRP: $59.99

Sorry, spaced out a little there. Chaos;Child is kind-of, sort-of in the same world as the ever so popular Steins;Gate. The year is 2015, and a series of grotesque murders happens in Shibuya. You play as Miyashiro Takuru, an anti-social Jap?anese teenager. As a member of your high school newspaper club, it's obviously up to you to solve the case. You don't get a scoop like that any day, after all, and the wrong-siding masses would never find leads like you can. 

The main gimmick of Chaos;Child, and its predecessor Chaos;Head, is the main character's delusions. During conversations, you can decide ?to imagine a more pleasant outcome, or a more negative series of events. Of course, you can also stick to reality. While this was fun to mess around at first, I couldn't help but feel like this mattered very little in the whole scheme of things. After all, you wi??ll always get the neutral ending first no matter the delusions you choose. If you're looking for a quick wank, you might enjoy the events that happen in positive delusions (be careful around family!), but I couldn't see the appeal of negative delusions. Creeping me out works a lot better when it's not something I deliberately choose the timing of. I ended up sticking to reality a lot.

Chaos;Child references Chaos;Head a lot. That's natural for a sequel, but the problem here is that the latter was never officially localized. While a lot of the references land through explanations from the characters, not all of them do. As a whole, it felt like the reader was expected to know about the circumstances surrounding the New Generation Madness murders of Chaos;Head, and the visual novel was trying to play with the resulting expectations. I feel like there would have been a lot to gain by releasing an official translation of Chaos;Head first. I ended up filling in the blanks with bits and pieces of Chaos;Head's fan-translation and its animated adaptation, which is hardly idea??l.

Let's talk localization. That's everyone's favorite part, right? The best way I'd describe it is a strong foundation that lacks polish. Characters talk in a hip, young lingo that doesn't feel too stereotypical. It's in general quite pleasant to read... A very modern visual novel with references to internet culture aplenty. The TIPS system, which offers a dictionary for uncommon or fictional words used, can also greatly help if you're ever confused. The issues I have with the localization are mostly technical. Chaos;Child has a number of typos and odd spacing issues that hurt the experience. Words someti?mes went beyond th??e text box, and the text bubbles appearing in the virtual lobby were all around completely messed up. It's a rough overall package.

Visually, on the other hand, Chaos;Child is a very clean. Character portraits are nicely improved over Chaos;Head in detail and quality. CG is as a whole more consistent than Steins;Gate's art under Huke...  But in m?ost scenes, you're going to spend a lot of time looking at backgrounds that aren't anything special. It's a visual novel! Imagination is your greatest weapon.

Now, the elephant in the room. Chaos;Child is slow. It is very, very slow. It's so slow that despite my best efforts to format this review in a way that emulates how slow Chaos;Child felt, I couldn't even come clo??se to the original material. Most of your time is spent in school talking to other students. In-between murders, you'll fantasize about swapping bodies with a female character while preparing a school festival. Maybe you'll visualize yourself accidentally kill your best friend when making her drink eye drops, or you'll lift skirts with your psychokinesis.

Some of these scenes do help flesh out the characters, and they were never a complete chore to read. But it just felt like there was too much down-time between moments where the plot actually goes forward. It took me significantly more time to finish my first ending in Chaos;Child for this review than to get a platinum trophy in Steins;Gate 0. And yet, reaching the true ending requires you to get every heroine ending beforehand. Chaos;Child is almost comically lo?ng, and not all of this length felt deserved. That's a real shame because the main mystery was quite engaging.

Curious to see if the animated adaptation that condenses all that in a properly digestible 13-episodes-plus-OVA format was a good alternative, I watched that as well. It ended up going too far in the other direction?... While the visual novel stretched the filler sequences thin, the anime blazes through the key scenes like it has to catch a bus in five minutes on the other side of town. The most important moments happen too quickly and are too impersonal without the protagonist's thoughts. If you're picking between either of them, definitely stick to the visual novel.

I've complained a lot, right? And yet, I do feel like there's a strong core underneath all the issues I had with Chaos;Child. With fixes to the localization oddities and a more condensed game mode, I believe the fun character interactions and the thrill of the murder cases wrapping themselves around the main character would shine a lot more. It would only require fine-tuning to make this a visual novel I can highly recommend like Steins;Gate and Steins;Gate 0.

As it is currently, however, Chaos;Child did not make me feel?? under? either a positive nor a negative delusion.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

The post Review: Chaos;Child appeared first on Destructoid.

Marketing stunt for attention? Maybe but whatever

White Day is a Korean horror game with a serious tone where you try to escape a haunted school with a girl. There are unlockable (and now downloadable) costumes for all the characters in the game including the prota??gonist, the three girls, and the janitor. Costumes include beachwear which is shown off in this wacky trailer featuring club music and a dude in a pink apron chopping fish.

This sort of humor is not present in the game at all, but it's fun. This trailer kind of makes me want Sonnori/ROI Games to create new types of games like maybe a Persona style role-playing game.

The post White Day’s Beachwear trailer is completely ridiculous and not at all related to the game appeared first on Destructoid.

Ahead of its time

A game so scary players emailed the developers imploring they make it less frightening so they can beat it, or even horrifying enough to drive them to suicide? Such stories developed around this game similar to the mythical Polybius arcade game. The former I still see posted around the web, with people citing the emails as the reason multiple difficulty levels were create?d with different amounts of scares, ?the latter not so much.

I could not find definitive proof that either was true, but with those stories and a lack of a release outside South Korea, White Day: A Labyrinth Named School developed a cult following and gained a reputation as one of the scariest games (somewhat) available at the time despite being relatively unheard of. Now it's not only been given a full, official localization treatment including English voice-overs, but the game has been remade with n??ew semi-modern graphics and animations.

White Day: A Labyrinth Named School (PS4 [reviewed], PC)
Developer: ROI Games, Gachyon Soft
Publisher: PQube
Release Date: August 22, 2017 (Europe-PS4: August 25, 2017)
MSRP: $29.99

ROI Games has done a fantastic job on the remake, not only having the game run very smoothly and consistentl?y with shiny new graphics, but fixing all the bugs and glitches people had trouble with in the original game. The PlayStation 4 version is cleaner and has better textures than the mobile version?? of this remake which released back in April, but not by a lot (which is not a bad thing, in fact I'm surprised how they managed to make a game like this on a phone).

It's no Until Dawn in the graphics department, looking like it could work on a Play?Station 2, but?? the stylized design looks great and captures the feel of the original. Some of the ghosts still feel a bit dated in their model and animations, and a few seem a little too clean or cartoon-ish, but those are negligible nitpicks at worst.

In White Day you play as a Korean male student who has a crush on a beautiful girl named Han So-Young. To both return a diary she dropped and give her a White Day gift, he follows her into the school at night, which is haunted to say the least. Inside are two other girls and based on choices you make with the three girls, you earn one of eight different endings. New to the remake is a section of gameplay that unlocks if you get the best "White Chrysanthemum" ending with So-Young on hard difficulty and get "certain collectibles." It probably includes the pig-tailed girl seen in trailers, because I never encountered her in? the main game.

Weaponless, the core gamep??lay revolves around solving puzzles while avoiding an insane baseball bat-wielding janitor and of course, ghosts. The ghosts are mostly just for scares; the janitor is your only real threat as he hobbles around the school halls with a flashlight and whistle. If he sees you, you must run and duck away to hide in a room or perhaps a bathroom stall. Most of the ghost scares are entirely optional, many you'll never ever see without a guide telling you exactly how to see them which is a bit disappointing since it's the best part of the game.

Difficulty changes various things, including the janitor's AI, how dark the game is (null with brightness options), number of felt tip pens (needed to save a la Resident Evil ink ribbons), and help. On hard you don't get hints on your phone, and you don't get an eye on your HUD telling you when the janitor is nearby. Certain ghosts and puzzles are only?? available on higher difficulties, so you w?ill miss out if you play on easy. Even if you play on hard though, many of the puzzles are as missable as the ghosts.

Throughout the game you will find miscellaneous inventory items as well as interactable objects which serve as a puzzle, but in my playthrough many were left undone. It would warrant more playthroughs to see all the ghosts and solve all the puzzles, but the core gameplay of avoiding the janitor, which involves a lot of just sitting and waiting for him to pass or running in circles til you find?? a room he doesn't follow you into, isn't worth it.

Longtime fans of the game will vehemently disagree, but the janitor is really not that scary after the first encounter or two. He becomes nothing ??more than a nuisance, especially when he seems to love staying in the stairwells which is the hardest place to lure him out of while not getting caught. It feels like you're fighting the game at times. He is so difficult to avoid on hard difficulty that I became frustrated to the point of quitting and started over on easy, sacrificing the extra scares and new content.

I don't know what the puzzles I didn't solve amounted to (some I couldn't even access, likely due to the difficulty setting), but I achieved 35% of the ghosts and watched the rest on Y?ouTube from the mobile version. Turns out ??most of the ones I saw were on the critical path, only discovering one or two optional ones on my own. They are good scares, far spookier than the janitor ever is, which makes it a shame that they are locked behind certain difficulties and are hard to find without explicit instructions.

To be fair, a large reason those optional scares are spooky is because they are optional and you can just stumble upon them, which makes you feel more vulnerable than when something ??scripted happens in a story cutscene. Having a lot more isn't quite the answer, as too many would dilute the effect of building tension, which this game does excellently with great sound design. A ghostly threat would be better than a janitor though.

Your experience with this game will be greatly improved by A) playing with headphones, and B) not turning the brightness all the way up. I never played the original so I can't compare, but there is a nerve-wrenching ambiance throughout much of the game. Sudden banging on the window or sounds of objects moving or falling seemingly right by you never let you feel sa??fe. They sound great and terrifying, but they repeat regularly and never manifest as any real scare or threat, so in ways it feels a bit cheap.

When you have to adjust the brightness to make some logo barely visible when starting most games, it tends to make the game too dark. The same is true here, but I advise you not turn the brightness up so high that you can see eve?rything perfectly; you'll be robbing yourself of a creepy environment.

Puzzles are a mixed bag of both ?unique and clever, such as getting a combination from medals, as well as familiar like changing a clock according to one of your many, many notes and documents. There is one puzzle that really helps if you are familiar with Chinese characters (or Japanese kanji), which will require a bit more thinking if you don't and I'm curious to see how people deal with it.

The cool thing is that all the puzzles and combinations chang?e on each playthrough, so according to the game description you can't just look them up in a guide. Though at times when stuck a certain combination was exactly the same in a video as in my game, so either not all of them randomize or there are not many possible combinations.

Reading about the old game, I saw many claims of bugs and glitches, but I encountered almost none. Near the end when I had to trigger an event ?to get a pair of keys, I died from the janitor, reloaded, and then suddenly I couldn't get the event to trigger again no matter what I did. I couldn't progress until I loaded an earlier save and did it al??l again, but that was it.

The choices with the characters aren't particularly deep. They don't need to ??be overly elaborate, but with multiple endings, affinity score, and unlockable costumes I feel there could have been just a bit more. I can't speak for the extra section after clearing the best ending on hard, but the endings aren't particularly satisfying, like the story overall. It functions to put you in a scary environment, which is enough I suppose.

In any case, White Day has some good scares and decent puzzles that you have to play hide-and-seek to reach, but it doesn't quite live up to its legends. In 2001, it was probably one of the scariest games in existence, and you can't fault it for not matching modern horror heights, but in any era the b?acktracking and waiting for the janitor to pass over and over isn't the greatest gameplay experience. Still, this will do the job if you can't wait til Halloween for a six- to eight-hour ride.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publ??isher.]}

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Ghosts? In my school? It's more likely than you think

After nearly three months of silence, PQube has given the final release date for White Day: A Labyrinth Named School. The remake, which released in South Korea back in 2015, will arrive on PC and PlaySta??tion 4 August 1 for North America, and August 4 for Europ?e. The PC version will receive a worldwide release on August 4.

The publisher has an overview of the plot via the official website:

"Starting a new school is never easy, especially when it’s one plagued by rumors of violent murders and vengeful spirits. Unfortunatel??y for Hui-min Lee, it takes less than two days before Yeondoo High School’s newest student finds himself trapped inside the building overnight – and thrown face-to-face with the malevolent spirits roaming the corridors.

It started off innocently enough: Hui-min had intended to quickly sneak in and out to hide some chocolates in the locker of a cla?ssmate. But as soon as he stepped foot inside the shutters slammed closed for the night, locking him inside with possessed janitors hellbent on killing intruders, and vengeful ghosts eager to sap his lifeforce away. C?an Hui-min sneak though the school and discover a way out? Or is he fated to become yet another ghost haunting the classrooms of Yeondoo High School?"

While I've never actually played the original since I'm a big baby when it comes to horror, I did watch TheSw1tcher, a YouTube channel, play part of it several years ago, as well as one or two other videos. The game showed its age graphically, but the original did have some interesting concepts going for it. White Day has its own take on Nemesis from Resident Evil 3 in the form of the janitor, as well as a dialog tree, an uncommon feature in horror games, which affected the story progression? and the ending obtained. It will be interesting to see how much this remake changes and improves upon the original.

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PQube behind the localization

Turns out the earlier Amazon Germany listings were correct, as PQube announced today that Chaos;Child will be receiving a western release.

While no solid date has been given, PQube has stated that Chaos;Child will be coming to North America and Europe in Q3 2017. The visual novel will be arriving on PS4 and PS Vita, leaving the Xbox One (which was where the visual novel first launched) and PS3 versions behind in Japan. The western release will be nearly two and a half years after its initial release in Japan, so for those looking to f??ind out more, the internet ??will be a minefield of spoilers.

Since I'm unfam?iliar with the ?game itself, and terrified of stumbling upon and posting said spoilers by mistake, here's a snippet from the press release to help get an understanding of what the plot is:

"Taking place in Shibuya, Tokyo, several years after an earthquake has nearl??y destroyed the district, it follows Takuru Miyashiro, a high school student who lost his parents in the earthquake, and his group of friends.

When a series of bizarre murder cases ??take place in Shibuya, Takuru notices that th?e dates of the murders match up with a series of murders that happened six years before. Using this knowledge, Takuru and his friends begin to investigate and find themselves embroiled in a dangerous murder mystery…"

PQube ??has also released a teaser trailer, which you can find below.

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