There’s little invention or imagination in the open world of Team Ninja’s action-RPG, but its core mechanics set it apart from other games.

It’s the season for samurai when it comes to video games. Medieval Japan is no stranger to video games. From Okami and Onimusha to Tenchu and Total War, the setting has been explored in poetic and powerful ways before. But a few popular games have recently rekindled interest in the sword masters and ninjas. Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice established the spirit of modern action games set in Japan’s turbulent past, while Ghost of Tsushima refined the open-world action-adventure genre with a samurai tale.

Team Ninja’s latest action RPG, Rise of the Ronin, released on March 22nd, sits somewhere between these two titles. Set in the late Edo period, the game employs a deep role-playing system and challenging parry-based action combat reminiscent of Sekiro, presenting a vast open-world map littered with checklist activities and distractions. It’s a lot like Ghost of Tsushima, which itself follows the familiar open-world path established by the Assassin’s Creed games. But Rise of the Ronin, a best-of-both-world approach, loses the sanctity of the strong, unforgiving combat language established in Team Ninja’s previous games and fails to bring any new original ideas to the open-world formula.

That’s not to say that Rise of the Ronin doesn’t bring something completely new to the genre. The game’s combat is a good balance of approachability and difficulty, with a variety of melee and ranged weapons and stances to choose from. The companion system encourages you to indulge in side content and bond with your friends. And the accurate period setting gives it a more realistic portrayal of the era compared to other games set in medieval Japan. But despite striking a good, if somewhat shaky, balance between the hard-edged combat and serious systems of old-school games and the ambitious, vast scope of modern open-world titles, Rise of the Ronin can easily get boring.

The story is set in the mid-19th century, during the decline of the Tokugawa Shogunate, a time of great turmoil in Japan, where political and cultural revolutions steered the country in a new direction. Rise of the Ronin begins with the game’s protagonists, the Blade Twins, twin brothers who have grown up and trained together as part of the Veiled Edge resistance movement against the Shogunate. At the start of the game, you can customize the twins’ appearance to your liking and choose their gender, but you will only play as one of the twins, with the other appearing as an ally. An early assassination mission goes wrong, resulting in the loss of your partner.

You then embark on a bloody, decades-long path of revenge that will take you through Yokohama, Edo and Kyoto, navigating the changing political climate of the time. Along the way, you’ll encounter real historical figures who determined the fate of Japan. In Yokohama, the first city you explore in Rise of the Ronin, you’ll befriend Sakamoto Ryoma, a powerful samurai from the end of the Edo period. Join Sakamoto and his friends on a quest against the Shogunate, but you can also choose missions that favor the Shogunate.

The opening of Rise of the Ronin sets you on a path of revenge.

The element of choice remains a key part of Rise of the Ronin’s gameplay. How you approach quests will tilt and shift your loyalties and alter your interactions with people on both sides of the divide. Early in the game, I was faced with the choice of executing a minor antagonist or sparing his life at the end of the mission. I chose the latter, and he ended up becoming a powerful ally, aiding me in future main missions. Rise of the Ronin presents you with several such impactful choices throughout its story, and its narrative structure always feels like a piece of tailoring of its own making.

As you progress, the story branches and your objectives change. What starts as a tale of personal revenge soon becomes an epic tale of political intrigue and national interest across a Japan on the brink of revolution. Your initial adventure in Yokohama and the surrounding area will lead you to Edo (Tokyo’s former name) and Kyoto as you absorb allies and turn the pages of Japanese history. The setting is fascinating, but the meaty story, which spans years and involves dozens of major and minor players, suffers a bit under its weight. Like most RPGs, Rise of the Ronin approaches storytelling with a light touch, lacking the emotional thrust and narrative structure of character-driven action-adventure titles like Ghost of Tsushima.

Yokohama is the first city you’ll explore in Rise of the Ronin.

The main campaign is no cakewalk either. It can take 20+ hours to complete, with at least another 20 for side quests, activities, and exploration. Even if you focus solely on the main quest (and you probably won’t), it’s not that hard to lose track of what’s going on. There are multiple factions, side characters, allies, and enemies, all competing for your loyalty and attention. But over time, they all blend into one mass of exposition-guzzling NPCs, with only a few memorable standout characters. It also doesn’t help that the side quests remain poor throughout the game. The game map is littered with icons promising things to do soon, in true Ubisoft style, but these missions and activities don’t bring anything fresh to the formula.

While Rise of the Ronin is lacking in terms of story, it is packed with mechanics. From weapon variety, combat stances, and an extensive skill tree to a deep bond system, gear bonuses, and soul-like inspiration, the game is packed with so much that it often feels overwhelming. Much of how the game plays and feels is similar to Sekiro : Shadows Die Twice, but without the crushing difficulty and complexity of the combat. Team Ninja’s games are known for their uncompromisingly tough combat. The company’s Nioh games and more recently Wo Long: Fallen Dynasty were firmly rooted in the Soulsborne ethos with their tough combat and complex level design. Rise of the Ronin opens that door by making combat much more accessible by implementing one-button combos, a forgiving parry window, and a wide variety of weapons and skills for every situation. The open-world design also brings it closer to modern action-adventure titles, allowing you to always turn around and explore in another direction even when you come across a difficult obstacle.

Rise of the Ronin’s open world gives you the freedom to explore beyond the main story.

Let’s jump into the combat. The masochistic difficulty of previous Team Ninja games has been wiped away, but it’s still pretty challenging. There are three sets of multiple stances for each weapon type, all of which are effective against certain enemies. The combat moveset is simple, with a single attack button to launch into combos, but the sheer number of weapon types at your disposal creates confusion. Though the controls are the same, the versatility of the Uchigatana is quite different from the speciality of the spear. The careful, blunt swings of the Odachi are a far cry from the agile swings of the Dual Blades. And the stiff, direct movements of the polearm contrast with the flexible flair of the Oxtail Blade.

Each weapon type has its own animations and set of fighting skills, which work like Weapon Art in Elden Ring, unleashing special attacks by pressing the right bumper and corresponding face buttons on the PS5 DualSense controller. I kept switching between weapons to get a sense of the different styles and break the monotony of the shallow combat mechanics. There are also plenty of ranged weapon options. Revolvers are quick and can stun close-range enemies for a second if you pull the trigger at the right time. Rifles, on the other hand, are more accurate and better for targeting enemies from a distance. Bows are a stealthier option and also allow elemental attacks, adding fire and acid arrows to your quiver.

Rise of the Ronin’s combat is easy, but difficult.

Melee combat itself is predicated on parrying, blocking, or dodging attacks and counterattacking with quick combos to defeat opponents. As in previous Team Ninja titles, all offensive and defensive actions are controlled by Ki, or stamina. Your health bar is accompanied by a Ki meter, which depletes while dodging, blocking, and attacking. Ki regenerates if you’re not performing these actions, but being too zealous will quickly drain your Ki and make you susceptible to heavy damage from attacks. The same goes for enemies: normal attacks, martial arts moves, and well-timed parries (called counter sparks in the game) chip away at your opponent’s Ki, eventually enabling critical hits that may one-hit kill weaker foes.

Despite ticking most of the boxes for a modern action RPG, Rise of the Ronin’s combat never feels as tight or powerful as Sekiro’s. The counterspark deflection, triggered with the Triangle button, feels out of sync with other actions, making the timing difficult to get right. The parry window isn’t narrow, but the action itself is accompanied by an exaggerated animation that feels out of place for a maneuver that requires dexterity. Inventory management in the heat of battle is also tedious. Switching between two equipped melee weapons, a third ranged weapon, and quick items for healing and status effects is never smooth, and it often feels like you’re drowning in menus and UI every time you want to tinker with your loadout. The custom loadout slots are helpful, but a more intuitive weapon swapping system would have improved the experience.

Stealth is extremely useful for clearing out enemy lines.

Combat in Rise of the Ronin may not be as responsive as you’d like, but it’s always fun. Trying out different weapons keeps it fresh, and fighting multiple enemies at the same time is also challenging, especially if you keep switching stances to fight different types of enemies. Clearing out enemy camps (which you do often in the game) always requires a thoughtful approach. I thought of them as reminiscent of camps and bases in the Far Cry games, where you’re given the freedom to clear out however you want. You can charge in and attack enemies head-on, or carefully rush through them and silently take down unaware guards one by one. Combat isn’t always fluid, but it does look smooth. Each weapon’s fighting skills often come with elaborate animations that add a touch of glamour to the combat. A skill tree spanning strength, dexterity, intelligence, and charisma traits adds meaningful abilities to your bag of tricks, bringing a bit more depth to the relatively shallow combat experience.

In the main missions, you will also be accompanied by two companions. You can choose your companions from among the characters you have met and bonded with over time. The level of your bond with your companions will determine their effectiveness on the battlefield. Companions are especially useful in difficult boss battles; they attract enemy attacks and give you an opportunity to attack. At any time during the main mission, you can also control your companion characters. Most companions are handled with great care, with well-developed personalities and clearly defined traits. Showing a personal favor to a companion will deepen your bond and they will reveal more to you. All companions are deeply tied to the overall story, and your choices may determine their fate. As a result, over time, you will come to care about them and their objectives.

Companions Don’t Just Pose on the Battlefield

While you have companions in the form of friendly NPCs when completing main missions and actual players online in co-op mode, you’re alone when exploring the open world. To move around the world more quickly, you’re given a horse, a grappling hook, and a glider. The horse companion is perfect for the rolling countryside, while the hook and glider are useful when traversing dense cities. With two tools at your disposal, your character becomes more agile, and while you’d imagine you could easily parkour across rooftops a la the Assassin’s Creed series, the Blade Twin is surprisingly stiff. You can climb rooftops with the help of ladders, carefully placed boxes, and dangling ropes, and you can jump from rooftop to rooftop for some distances, traveling on foot never feels smooth.

The open-world elements of Rise of the Ronin are pretty much what you’d expect from the genre: a never-ending and ever-growing checklist of things to do and errands to run. When you defeat an enemy camp in an area, icons representing side activities appear on the map for that area. You can find and pet stray cats, ask your companions for favors, do NPC quests, take photos, find landmarks, shoot targets, or find “random” encounters. These get boring quickly, and the limited variety of quests means there’s little incentive to dive into the side content. Scaling up to an open-world design doesn’t really add much meaning to Rise of the Ronin, other than the freedom to waste time trying to finish the main story. Whereas Team Ninja’s previous games benefited from a linear level design that felt tense, this latest game loses tension by switching to an open-world approach. And unlike Elden Ring, it fails to justify the switch by digging up the carcasses of every open-world trick.

The bonds you forge in Rise of the Ronin shape the story.

Visually, Rise of the Ronin is also not a standout. If the game had stuck to a Nioh-style linear design, I wouldn’t have minded as much, but an open world needs great vistas and breathtaking scenery. It needs lush environments and a striking visual style. Rise of the Ronin looks boring, flat, and gray compared to modern open world games. The game’s environments are not diverse or vibrant, and the textures lack detail. Even the character models look poor compared to other games. The game looks good in certain moments, and the lack of graphical finesse can be ignored for the most part, but the bar has been set high by games like Ghost of Tsushima and Horizon Forbidden West. It’s unfair to expect a Team Ninja game to approach that standard, but Rise of the Ronin could have chosen a bolder visual style to make up for its shortcomings in visual fidelity.

Meanwhile, performance on the PS5 leaves little to be desired. The game offers a Performance mode at 60fps, a Graphics mode at 30fps, and a Ray Tracing mode at 30fps that enables ray tracing lighting. I stuck with Performance mode, as the graphical gains in the other modes weren’t enough to justify the drop in frame rate. The frame rate drops as expected in crowded sections and densely populated cities, but overall it’s stable. However, Rise of the Ronin, a PS5 exclusive, excels at taking full advantage of the DualSense controller’s capabilities, with responsive vibration and adaptive trigger feedback to in-game actions.

Rise of the Ronin looks good, but it lacks the polish of modern open-world games.

Rise of the Ronin is clearly Team Ninja’s most ambitious work to date. Known for its tense, linear, and challenging Souls-like experiences, the studio is aiming wider this time around, hoping to attract a wider audience more receptive to open-world games. It makes sense that a studio whose previous games were well-received by a niche audience would make their next project more accessible, and Team Ninja’s latest title largely succeeds in blending the specific essence of its games with the general familiarity of the open-world formula.

The problem, though, is that the formula has become stale over the past few years. And games that don’t add a unique twist to the genre tend to get lost in a pile of similar titles. FromSoftware also pushed the scale of its games with Elden Ring. But rather than adapting from an existing open-world blueprint, the studio chose to challenge established tropes at every step. That’s not the case with Rise of the Ronin. Its open world has little invention or imagination, but its core mechanics and compelling story are what set it apart from the rest.

The companion system adds meaningful decisions and choices, and seeks to add depth to each character in the game. The variety of weapons and tools at your disposal keeps combat fresh and engaging, while the game’s evocative settings and colorful cast of characters keep the story constantly evolving. Rise of the Ronin is clearly punching above its weight class, and you can feel your knees wobbly, but it’s worth praising it for never succumbing to the strain.

Pros:

• Challenging Combat
• Engaging story and setting
• Likeable characters
• Diverse weapons and tools
• Companion System

Cons:

• Uninspired open-world design
• Lack of visual sophistication
• Repetitive side activities
• Troublesome inventory management

Rating (out of 10): 7

• Rise of the Ronin was released exclusively for PS5 on March 22nd.
• The price of the PS5 standard edition on the PlayStation Store will start at Rs 4,999.

The post Rise of the Ronin Review: Team Ninja’s Samurai Tale Falls Flat Under Pressure appeared first on Review Products.

Nixxes Software’s finely tuned PC port of Ghost of Tsushima is better than ever.

Just when vast open-world games were starting to become noticeably tiring, Ghost of Tsushima arrived like a summer breeze. Sucker Punch’s Japan-set action-adventure game didn’t reinvent the wheel by any means, but it did deliver a memorable samurai tale that reshaped familiar open-world tropes into original ways of player interaction. Ghost of Tsushima and its massive success on PlayStation consoles demonstrated that the open-world playbook (largely written by Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed and Far Cry series) had become so stale that a small but clever new idea could be enough to create a meaningful experience.

Through its simplified quest design, narrative approach to map markers, and evocative visuals and music, Ghost of Tsushima set the standard for what a modern open-world action-adventure title should be. And now the game is coming to PC in a package that amplifies what it already did well on PS4 and PS5. First released on PlayStation consoles in 2021 and now available on PC from Steam and the Epic Games Store, Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut comes with a host of improvements, including the Iki Island expansion, improved graphics, and a faster framerate. But does a four-year-old game still hold up to the rapidly changing standards of modern video games?

The answer to that question may vary depending on how much open world you’ve played. If you’re tired of running around seemingly endless maps chasing the same objectives without any payoff, Ghost of Tsushima may feel boring, especially if you’ve tried the game on consoles. But if you’re new to the game, Sucker Punch’s stirring tale of revenge and samurai honor, expertly ported to PC by Nixxes Software, is definitely worth your attention. I got the Platinum for Ghost of Tsushima on PS4 and played the Director’s Cut and its included Iki Island expansion pack on PS5, but I still happily spent time with the Steam version of the game.

Ghost of Tsushima tells the story of a samurai, Jin Sakai, who embarks on a path of revenge when a brutal Mongol army led by Khotun Khan invades his homeland, the Japanese island of Tsushima. Khan and his merciless warriors eradicate samurai resistance, destroy villages, and capture Jin’s uncle, Lord Shimura, the land steward of Tsushima. Jin, a young samurai who grew up under Lord Shimura’s protection after his father was killed at an early age, barely survives the battle but sets out to find his uncle and save Tsushima.

Bound and broken by the samurai code of honor, Jin eventually enlists the help of his allies and adopts guerilla tactics to gain the upper hand against his brutal enemies. As it turns out, the samurai tradition of fighting the enemy head-on in a just battle doesn’t hold up so well against the Mongol army, who have no qualms about using any dirty means to seize control.

Jin reluctantly abandons the rules his uncle drilled into him and becomes Ghost, a warrior who uses deception, distraction and stealth to resist the Mongol invasion and free his uncle. His unconventional methods are aided by unconventional friends – commoners far removed from the shackles of straitjacket-wearing samurai morality. Having lived his whole life in black and white, Jin walks the grey path for a higher purpose. Ghost of Tsushima’s story, like its systems, treads familiar territory. We’ve all seen and read revenge stories in which the protagonist is confronted with the rigidity of his values and forced to think in unnatural ways. But the sophisticated presentation of the game’s ideas trumps its reliance on tried-and-true tropes.

Visual Presentation

Ghost of Tsushima’s biggest selling point on PC is its graphical fidelity. The action-adventure title is one of the best-looking games on PlayStation, and the new PC port allows the game’s visual presentation to shine in a way that consoles just can’t. If you’ve got the right system, Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut can go toe-to-toe with some of the most graphically impressive games on PC. While the character models and facial animations look a bit dated in 2024, its rich, diverse environments are still some of the best in the medium.

Ghost of Tsushima features some of the most impressive environments in video games.

However, animation quality remains high across the board. Jin controls smoothly whether he’s riding his trusty steed or using his grappling hook to scale tall cliffs and towers. Combat animations may be some of the best ever seen in a third-person action-adventure title; each sword stance comes with its own unique set of animations and moves, adding individuality to your play style. Animated with the help of actual Japanese sword experts, Jin’s sword movements flow like a river of deadly slashes and thrusts, all the while retaining the weight and impact of a high-stakes duel.

On PC, Tsushima comes to life at higher graphics settings. Whereas in other open-world games, persistent markers and HUD elements actively ruin the immersion, Ghost of Tsushima encourages you to interact with the natural environment to discover interesting items and treasures. Chasing foxes or chasing golden birds through tranquil pastures and rolling grasslands is a meditative experience because everything looks so beautiful . The game’s evocative visuals are anchored by a vibrant art style that finds a sweet spot somewhere between the natural realism of Red Dead Redemption 2 and the saturated fantasy of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Ghost of Tsushima doesn’t try to look realistic, instead opting for poetic romanticism as its visual identity.

Horses are the best way to get around Tsushima.

PC Features

Nixxes also prioritizes performance across a wide range of hardware capabilities, from high-end PCs to handhelds like Steam Deck. The game features unlocked framerates on PC and plenty of graphics options that can be tweaked to get the performance and image quality you want. There are also options to support upscaling and frame generation technologies such as Nvidia DLSS 3, AMD FSR 3, and Intel XeSS to improve the game’s performance. Unfortunately, Ghost of Tsushima does not have ray tracing support. While the inclusion of ray-traced reflections would pose technical challenges and may impact the game’s performance, the feature is a given for modern PC titles that boast impressive visuals.

The game supports ultrawide monitor setups on PC and the PS5 DualSense controller. Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is also the first Sony title to come with the new PlayStation Overlay on PC. At any point during the game, you can press Shift + F1 on your keyboard to bring up a window overlay that displays your PlayStation account, friends list, and trophies. Note, however, that you will need to connect to your PlayStation Network account in-game to access this feature.

Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut is the first Sony title for PC to feature the new PlayStation Overlay.

PC Performance

I played Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut on the HP Omen 16-xf0060AX provided by HP for this review. As such, the resolution was limited to 1080p, but I got stable performance even at very high settings. According to the game’s system requirements published before release, you need an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 or AMD Radeon RX 7900 XT GPU to achieve 60fps at 4K resolution. With DLSS frame generation turned on with an Nvidia RTX 4060 GPU, I was able to achieve stable frame rates of over 100fps at 1080p resolution. There was very little stuttering during gameplay at various graphics settings.

Reviewing Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut on the HP Omen 16

Processor: AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS

Graphics: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 laptop GPU (8GB GDDR6 dedicated).

Memory: 16GB DDR5-5600Mhz RAM

Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe TLC M.2 SSD

With DLSS upscaling set to Quality and the graphics option set to Very High, the average frame rate was an excellent 114.5 fps, with the 1% and 0.1% low averages well above 70 fps. Lowering the graphics settings to High caused a slight visual degradation and raised the average frame rate to 146.8 fps. Adjusting the DLSS upscaling option to Performance gave even better results, with average frame rates of 128.7 fps and 159.8 fps at Very High and High settings, respectively. Of course, you’ll need a more high-end system to run the game at a stable high frame rate at 4K resolution. But as Nixxes promised, Ghost of Tsushima is optimized to run smoothly on a wide range of hardware.

Ghost of Tsushima uses vibrant colors in a variety of ways.

Verdict

Sony has had a strategy of delaying the release of PC ports of its first-party PlayStation titles. The success of the PC versions is a testament to the strength of the company’s exclusive single-player games, such as God of War and Marvel’s Spider-Man Remaster, which continue to generate interest years after their initial release. Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut perhaps highlights that phenomenon better than most other releases. The game is the largest single-player release for PlayStation on Steam, surpassing God of War’s all-time player count on Valve’s platform. This is despite a PlayStation Network account linking controversy that led to pre-orders being cancelled and the game being removed from Steam in over 170 countries where PSN is not supported.

PC players have clearly been waiting for a port of Ghost of Tsushima, and Nixxes Software has released a finely tuned package that looks better than ever, plays smoother than ever, and has some nifty PC-exclusive features that enhance the experience. Of course, the game itself remains unchanged, so its flaws are present on PC; the open-world idea opts to recycle existing tropes rather than reinvent them, and the core gameplay loop isn’t all that different from Assassin’s Creed titles. But when it comes to presenting those familiar ideas in an exciting way, Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut goes a step further than most.

Pros:

• Strong Points
• Amazing visuals
• Consistent PC Performance
• Advanced Graphics Settings

Cons:

• A formulaic open world
• Lack of ray tracing support

Rating (out of 10): 8

• Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut was released for PC on May 16. The game was tested on an HP Omen 16-xf0060AX laptop provided by HP.
• The price for the PC version starts at Rs 3,999 on Steam and Epic Games Store.

The post Ghost of Tsushima Director’s Cut PC Review: A masterpiece that stands out from the rest appeared first on Review Products.

Often left me peachless.

Endlessly creative and adorably cute, Princess Peach: Showtime! is an uncompromising but approachable adventure that’s an absolute blast for kids and adults alike.

Pros

• +Adorable visuals
• +Fantastic boss fights
• +Approachable difficulty

Cons

• -A slow start
• -Occasionally choppy performance

Princess Peach: Showtime! is an action-adventure game that’s overflowing with the boundless creativity and charm characteristic of some of the best recent mainline Super Mario outings like Super Mario Odyssey and Super Mario Bros. Wonder. Despite its more linear design and basic control scheme compared to those games, it’s packed with memorable stages and mechanics that make the most of the charming theatrical theme in truly imaginative ways.

The simplicity means that it’s one of the most approachable first-party games on Nintendo Switch making it a super choice for younger or more casual players, though seasoned gamers will still find plenty to enjoy in its brilliant boss fights and tricky challenge modes. Wrap it all up in an attractive art direction and throw in a raft of collectibles hidden throughout each stage and you’ve got an impressively well-rounded package that ranks among some of the best Nintendo Switch games available to play right now.

Setting The Stage

Princess Peach: Showtime!

The action kicks off in the sprawling Sparkle Theater, nestled in the little bay far from the Mushroom Kingdom where Princess Peach has been trapped by the malevolent Madame Grape and her legion of purple minions. Grape has corrupted the theater’s plays with her malign influence and caused all of the lead actors to disappear, leaving it up to Peach and the theater’s magical guardian Stella to save the day. It’s a simple setup that is conveyed through an introductory cutscene that is lavishly animated but rather jarringly relies on text dialogue rather than any kind of audio narration.

Still, it’s only a minor omission that is quickly forgotten once you’re thrust into the hub world of the theater’s foyer. It’s divided into five floors, each containing doors leading to different levels, and sits above a mysterious basement. There are thirty main stages in total, arranged into groups of three with each trio representing the entirety of a specific play. They’re spread out evenly across the floors, though each ends with a final stage that is accessed through the basement.

The plays all follow unique themes, ranging from a lighthearted Wild West romp to more unconventional additions like a sci-fi action thriller. They’re all brought to life by the cartoon-like visuals that are filled to the brim with theatrical details and flourishes. The scenery has a distinctly hand-crafted look, with floating clouds that are suspended from visible wires. They cast prominent shadows on the backdrops behind them which, while a simple effect, helps lend everything a wonderful sense of depth.

Despite the side-on perspective, stages are also fully three dimensional and allow for back-and-forth movement in addition to side-scrolling traversal. Bright cones of stage lighting highlight important objectives and follow Peach as you explore – likely to be a huge help for players who are less experienced in traversing 3D environments. This, in addition to an optional item that grants three extra lives and can be obtained from a non-player character (NPC) in the foyer, intelligently incorporates more forgiving elements in a manner that feels both natural and unintrusive.

Dress Rehearsal

Aside from the rare brief platforming segment, the overall pace of Princess Peach: Showtime! is more pedestrian than more traditional Super Mario adventures. Peach has slow movement speed and all of her actions are controlled entirely with just three buttons. You tap the A button to jump, hit the B button to interact, and occasionally press ZL or ZR in order to travel to secret areas when you’re standing on special spots hidden throughout each level.

In her default getup, Peach is armed with a magical ribbon that can defeat Grape’s minions, trigger key items like lamps or doors to progress, or inspire any dejected supporting actors that you stumble across. Running around mindlessly tapping that button on almost everything that you see isn’t the most engaging or subtle formula and the very early sections of the first few stages suffer as a result.

You’re soon given a transformation, however, which is where Princess Peach: Showtime! is at its absolute best. Modeled after the costumes of the missing lead actors, each play has its own unique transformation that grants Peach a wide range of special abilities. Every new arrival feels remarkably distinct, spicing up the basic formula with elements drawn from entirely different genres. The Ninja Peach transformation, for example, incorporates elements of stealth games, allowing you to hide in tall grass and quietly take down unsuspecting foes with a quick kunai slash.

The Detective Peach transformation plays much more like a story-driven adventure, where you solve crimes by chatting to NPCs and using your magnifying glass to track down hidden clues. The Mermaid Peach transformation is something akin to a puzzle game, as you guide schools of fish through maze-like gauntlets under increasingly strict time limits. Although I enjoyed my time with each and every transformation, the button-mashing cookie baking and rapid cake decoration challenges of the Patissiere Peach transformation were a personal highlight that absolutely oozed that Mario Party minigame charm.

Unfortunately, some transformations do push the game’s uneven technical performance to the fore. Loading times are long and a few levels suffer from noticeable framerate dips in busy moments. By far the worst example was one particular Figure Skater Peach stage that involved careful timing to pull off ice skating tricks. The choppy framerate made it frustratingly difficult to get into a definite rhythm and caused me to miss a fair few jumps the first time around which is disappointing, especially in a first-party release.

BEST BIT

Not only are the appearances of each of Peach’s transformations very cutely designed, but they feature distinct animations that further help set them apart. I especially appreciate Patissiere Peach’s adorable little back-and-forth skip whenever you stand still.

This shortcoming aside, each floor concludes with a boss fight, all of which are definite highlights. The boss designs are memorable and each encounter involves some strong mechanics. One sees you defeating a genuinely quite creepy projector-themed cat as it tries to swat you away with attacks that are represented by 2D projected images, while another has a giant disco-ball bird that can flip the entire stage into its mirror image in order to crush you with falling blocks. There are also separate challenge levels, called rehearsals, that offer reimagined versions of past stages with difficult special conditions. These are some of the hardest challenges in the game and make for a delightful diversion.

The same is true of the unlockable outfits for both Peach and Stella, which can be purchased from a small stall in the foyer using hidden stars collected from each level, obtained by rescuing a top-hat-wearing character hidden in each level, or are awarded for finishing certain stages. There are loads to discover, giving you plenty of reasons to comb over past environments for anything that you might have missed.

It’s a fantastic way to round out an overall package that’s already got plenty to offer. Whether you’re a long-time Super Mario fan or a complete newcomer to the series, Princess Peach: Showtime! is an excellent adventure that’s easy to recommend.

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I need a key.

Alone in the Dark squanders the promise of its compelling source material with ropey design, awful combat, and choppy presentation.

Pros

• +Strong voice acting
• +Compelling Lovecraftian themes
• +Deep worldbuilding

Cons

• -Awful action setpieces
• -Shoddy graphics

Despite a spirited commitment to themes of cosmic horror, Alone in the Dark stumbles, hamstrung by dodgy presentation, poorly executed combat setpieces, and obtuse design.

A reincarnation of the seminal 1992 horror classic of the same name, Alone in the Dark follows the stories of Emily Hartwood and private investigator Edward Carnby as the pair investigate the mysterious disappearance of Emily’s uncle, Jeremy Hartwood. Following in the footsteps of modern horror titans, Alone in the Dark opts for a third-person over-the-shoulder perspective as you explore its bleak and foreboding environments.

Set in the 1920s, Alone in the Dark pays constant homage to the works of the influential yet problematic H.P. Lovecraft. The game’s characters are locked in a fight for survival with forces beyond their comprehension, whose supernatural powers warp and undermine the protagonists’ understanding of reality. It’s when developer Pieces Interactive leans into this storytelling tradition that Alone in the Dark is at its strongest.

Traditionally, Lovecraftian fiction is all about unraveling mysteries – the answers to which offer sanity-straining revelations that pull the protagonists deeper into a horror-fuelled cosmic morass. It’s fitting, then, that puzzle-solving is the core around which the game is based. On arriving at Derceto, a hundred-year-old manor in the swamps of Louisiana, Emily and Edward immediately set to work getting to the bottom of Jeremy Hardwood’s disappearance.

Thinking your way through Alone in the Dark’s puzzles often feels rewarding

Now a sanatorium, Derceto is populated by an intriguing ensemble of outcasts, plenty of puzzles, and locked doors galore. The puzzles themselves are pleasing affairs, often requiring you to read documents, look around for environmental clues, and intuit solutions. One particularly impressive challenge early on involved opening a lockbox by cross-referencing the backs of important paintings with a poster and a mysterious journal. Some are more practical, however, like recovering an important clue from the bottom of a well by filling it with water. Thinking your way through Alone in the Dark’s puzzles often feels rewarding but, unfortunately, these setpieces struggle to shine in the shadow of numerous issues with presentation as well as dire action segments.

Muddy Waters

Fighting a monster in Alone in the Dark

Despite generally strong voice acting, Alone in the Dark’s characters are dogged with stilted animations and visuals. Emily and Edward look less like intrepid investigators and more like mannequins brought to life by exactly the sort of supernatural powers that the pair are trying to unearth in their investigation. Not even excellent performances by David Harbour and Jodie Comer (who play Edward and Emily, respectively) are sufficient to breathe life into their dead eyes.

Alone in the Dark often feels lopsided. The in-game documents and clues are lavish affairs, often with their own voice acting. It makes for immersive and compelling moments of investigation. However, this can’t be said for Alone in the Dark’s vocal direction overall. Protagonists will often repeat canned phrases and conversations with non-player characters are limited and stilted. During my first two hours with Alone in the Dark, Emily informed me that she needed a key over a dozen times, always in the same tone of voice and with the same, frustrated inflection. Effort noises are shamelessly repeated and begin to grate after a while, too. Even if the quality of the acting is impressive, this sort of repetition waters down proceedings, undermining the gravitas that Harbour and Comer might otherwise bring to the game.

BEST BIT

David Carnby speaks to a member of staff in the kitchen.

Combing through the fascinating, well-voiced diaries and documents found throughout Derceto Manor made me feel like a proper detective as I connected dots and made deductions.

The weakest aspect of Alone in the Dark by far is its combat sections. Clunky and unresponsive controls punctuate poorly designed combat setpieces. Figures covered in black slime will run towards you, and it’ll be your job to aim and shoot before they get too close. Molotov cocktails can be thrown at potential assailants, too, and these can be found in a surprisingly large number of locations. Ranged combat options feel imprecise and unfulfilling. The same can be said for melee, which feels like trying to mash a potato with a flimsy plastic fork and is about as satisfying too. You pick up a melee implement, hammer the attack buttons, and hope for the best, much as you do at range.

It seems as though Alone in the Dark’s combat system aims to ape the dramatic, over-the-shoulder action found in the likes of the Resident Evil 4 remake or Control. However, even if Alone in the Dark were to offer reliable and satisfying combat, it would still feel hugely out of place in what is, in essence, a game about solving mysteries and unraveling a conspiracy. This incompatibility serves only to make Alone in the Dark’s failed attempts at action combat seem all the more dire.

Puzzling Through

An ominous conversation in Alone in the Dark.

Despite all this, there is a gripping core of supernatural intrigue that runs through Alone in the Dark. As you begin to unearth more of the details surrounding Jeremy’s disappearance, you’ll be granted little motes of insight into Decerto Manor and its history. As you delve deeper, you’ll find that disparate threads begin to weave together. A name drop here or a little clue there can become invaluable later on.

ACCESSIBILITY FEATURES

Alone in the Dark options menu.

Alone in the Dark is unremarkable in its accessibility offerings but offers a few helpful settings. Camera shake options, text and map highlighting, and adjustable subtitles are all available. The game also provides two difficulty settings, one of which provides players with extra hints and clues. There are no dedicated settings for colorblind users.

Though Alone in the Dark’s more intriguing elements are buried deep, they are certainly present. The game encourages you to speculate and hypothesize, filling in blanks deliberately left by the developers. In many ways, this is the essence of effective horror games. At its best, Alone in the Dark lets your own imagination do the legwork, a process that’s far more gripping than any canned combat setpiece with a shadowy silhouette.

Unfortunately, Alone in the Dark is so burdened by flaws that this strength is rarely given a chance to shine. Hampering an already shaky presentation, Pieces Interactive’s offering suffers from bugs, too. For instance, it will sometimes be impossible to select certain entries in the game’s menu, and selecting an interactable object while not having the right item will bring up a glitchy silhouette of a radial selection menu.

Buried deep inside Alone in the Dark is a compelling Lovecraftian mystery. However, any prospective detective will have to wade through layers of presentational and mechanical obstacles. While Alone in the Dark will likely have something to offer long-time fans of the franchise, those looking for a fresh horror experience will almost certainly find something better elsewhere.

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