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Vanillaware is a well-known name among longtime RPG fans, and for good reason. The developer’s games have always been works of art, oozing with style and high-fidelity 2D art. Despite this, the games have always felt a tad lacking. Never bad, but never as good as they looked. With Unicorn Overlord, that disparity came to a sudden shocking end. Make no mistake, Unicorn Overlord is still a gorgeous game, perhaps even the best-looking game in Vanillaware’s long history. Without a doubt however, it is easily their best game in terms of pure gameplay.
A clear continuation of the gameplay style of Ogre Battle, Unicorn Overlord presents a fun story and variety of colorful characters to add to the player’s army. Battles play out in vivid detail with a wide variety of deep strategic options to play with. With a huge world to explore, character bonding, story choices, and tons of secrets to uncover, Unicorn Overlord is an absolute delight that can keep players entertained for many hours. Many expected Unicorn Overlord to be a perfectly enjoyable game, but what we got instead was one of the best strategy RPGs in a long time.
We weren’t surprised by an incredibly cute yarn about a hermit crab adventuring through the ocean to reclaim his stolen shell. It wasn’t even the tongue-in-cheek humor, the puns and wordplay, or the clever undersea environmental designs using many everyday objects to construct a fantastic undersea world that blindsided us. No, the real reason Another Crab’s Treasure is one of the biggest surprises of 2024 is the fact that the game’s cutesy exterior belies its solid and punishing combat, inspired by the parry-heavy gameplay of FromSoftware’s Sekiro, making this an adorable Disney-flavored Soulslike that’s definitely not for the faint of heart.
Peglin is a roguelike RPG with a unique premise. Players take on the role of the titular peglin, a little guy who has big beef with dragons, amassing a pile of orbs that they throw onto the pachinko-board playing field to do battle. The more pegs an orb hits on the way down, the higher the damage it deals. Though there is a plethora of ways to add complexity and up the peglin’s destructive potential, the overall package is simple yet surprisingly compelling. Couple that with its developer’s penchant for writing sphere-based puns and witty scenarios, and it’s easy to see that this game has what it takes to keep the good times rolling.
by Michael Apps, Pascal Tekaia, and Casey Pritt
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