Recent reviews by American Squidiot

Undertale is an interesting little gem of a game that in a matter of six hours, became my game of the year for 2015 and earned itself a spot in my all time favorites.

From the opening moments of the game I instantly loved every single character, they all had fun and distinct personalities and they have established links with eachother that you learn about over time. The way the characters interact is where they shine, I loved some characters dearly, and felt an undescribable hate for another, but at the end of the game, I felt for them, I understood them. Some of the characers end up in hilariously awkward situations, and I could not stop laughing throughout each one of them, whether you are dating a skeleton with a ridiculously over-inflated ego, or cooking with a fierce warrior. The story is a work of art, it is maserfully crafted with utmost care, and it revolves around your humanity and your ability to show compassion to others. It is because of these moments, happy or sad, that I think Undertale is the most well written game I have ever played.

All sentimental value aside, I love this game.
While the writing and story are easily my favorite parts of the game, the gameplay is quite solid. Normally, it plays like a typical classic RPG, you walk through interesting areas and pick up items. But battles are where the gameplay is best. When in a battle, you can interact with the enemy in a specific way until they lose their will to fight, and you can then spare them. This offers no expericence points, only money, but this mechanic is your new best friend. It makes some fights much easier, and some much harder, and balances out the game perfectly. Each enemy has their own unique "acts" and a unique way to spare. But that's not all the battles have to offer, when your turn ends, the enemy attacks in a short, usually only a few seconds long bullet-hell minigame. When there are multiple enemies, the attacks in these segments stack. This offers a great amount of variation between battles, and I almost never felt bored or annoyed with battles.

All in all, Undertale is a work of art that focuses mostly on it's story, but the gameplay holds up equally. Creating the best game I have played in 2015, and one of my favorites of all time.

• Excellent story
  
• Entertaining characters
  
• Some of the best writing in years
  
• You can date a skeleton
  
• You can pet all the dogs
  
• Wonderful Soundtrack

• The graphics are inconsitent, some things look sort of ugly, other things look absolutely stunning.
  
• Lots of tears (This is can be a good thing)
  
• I think it crashed once or twice, but that may have just been the stupid wiki not doing anything right.

Evoland is game about the history of action-adventure games, with a few RPG elements mixed in.
The game starts as a simple, black and white, 8-bit adventure, but as you progress, you gain more elements such as music, color, 32-bit graphics, and overworld, turn-based-battles, and other elements of action-adventure games. This is by far my favorite part of the game, it's fun, humorous, and is reminiscent of early NES-SNES games. More things elements pile on, such as a partner, NPCs, shops, and currency.
Eventually you gain the third dimension. However, that is when I feel the game takes the most risks, and also the experience starts to dampen. The first official dungeon in the third dimension is frustrating, the combat is slow and ineffective at some points, requiring you to run away, or face having to start over the dungeon. This is probably the most frustrating part of the game, but alas, you get to the boss. The boss is unexpectedly difficult for first-time players. Afterwards, you re-emerge in a new area of the overworld, with new enemies, and HD graphics.
After this, the experience is still slowly dampening.. There is a small required side quest. If you bought an item called the "Fast CD player", this side-quest is much less time-wasting. Without it, the game creates fake loading screens that are nothing but unnecessary. After this, you access two of my favorite areas of the game, an area where you use crystals to change from 2-D to 3-D, which works as a time puzzle. In this area you gain the bow, which is very useful here, but not anywhere else.
Afterwards, we visit an area which both parodies Diablo and useless items in video games, such as an item that grants +300% damage to walls. Around here I should mention the humor. Evoland, is a very witty game. Making lots of jokes and some of its areas are parodies of other games. I should also mention that whenever you gain an element, a small text box appears and says a short joke, or a relating commentary of some video games.
The final boss is interesting; it uses mechanics of other games, and puts them into one boss. However, one flaw with this fight is your character's speed. At every other areas in the game, your speed is perfectly fine, but here, you sometimes make the fight too easy or too hard.
There is one minigame, Double Twin, which I find to be great fun, it is a card game, requiring you to use the cards you have found all through the game. Double Twin has around 4 levels, which are all different in their own way, with the opponent using a different deck of cards every time.
I feel lke $10 is a little much for a 4 hour game, but the creators did go for quality and humor for the entirety of Evoland. It is a fun game, I actually recently finished my second playthrough, which I felt was more of an achievement run. The game does have its flaws, but it also has its great moments. Evoland earns a 7/10.

Foul play is a wonderful game following the adventures of Daemon hunter Baron Dashforth, and his assistant, Scampwick.

It plays a lot lot like Castle Crashers, but mixes it up, and instead of health, you have a mechanic called the mood meter, the more you score hits and combos, the higher it rises, the more of a chance of survival you have. The graphics are more smooth than Castle Crashers, but still retains the same charm, with all the characters and enemies big enough so that you can see them, but that also sometimes makes it hard to know if you are in the same layer as the enemy. The bosses are both challenging and rewarding, each with their own special attacks. The story is very well thought out, with Scarmpwick acting as a great source of comic relief. The presentation of the game is wonderful, I couldn't find one glitch or error with the game. The music fits well, and perfectly suits the seriousness of some situations.

Overall, Foul play is a wonderful game, and I would reccomend this game to anyone who has played Castle Crashers, and liked it, or someone who likes side scrolling beat-'em-ups. 9/10