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More fun than a barrel of monkeys.

It all began on this day 40 years ago, in 1981. Nintendo- a then-obscure arcade machine manufacturer- had a problem with their latest game, Radar Scope. The machines weren’t selling as well as hoped, so the company decided to refit the unsold units with a brand new game. Young staff artist Shigeru Miyamoto was tasked with creating an arcade game that would capture the attention of the American audience. The finished product starred a stressed-out gorilla with an infinite supply of barrels who wasn't afraid to use them. It's the stubborn monkey himself, Donkey Kong.

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Family Matters

August of this year will mark the 20th anniversary since Dragon Quest was introduced in the US. With 10 core sequels and many spin-offs since then, you’d think an RPG fan such as myself would be well-versed in the series by now. But in reality, my Dragon Quest knowledge over the years has only been cursory at best. I got started about eight years ago when I completed Dragon Warrior (the series’ name in the US until 2005), and I’m currently nearly halfway through the massive adventure that is Dragon Quest XI. My depth of familiarity with the series pretty much ends there. Or at least it did until I recently finished Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride- a Nintendo DS remake of the beloved Super Famicom original.

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Fifteen years old but still fresh for newcomers.

As much as I love games, I dread the hours it takes to get over the hump of one that’s new and unfamiliar. When I finally get over it, I hope that I didn’t waste those hours on a game I won’t keep playing. So when I fired up Disgaea 1 Complete for the Nintendo Switch I wasn’t sure what to expect. Even though it’s been fifteen years since the game’s initial release, it was still a new and unfamiliar title for me. Thankfully, I’m glad to say that the hours spent getting over that initial hump were worth it.

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Dust is still as great now as it was six years ago on XBLA.

Somehow it’s been six whole years since Dust originally released as a Summer of Arcade title on the Xbox 360. It’s incredible to me that it’s been that long, but though six years have passed, Dust still holds up as a great title today. Since its original XBLA release, the action-adventure spectacle has made its way to PC, PlayStation 4, iOS, and now most recently the Switch, where it feels right at home.

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We can rebuild it. We have the technology.

As video game enthusiasts, we tend to want sequels to be these huge shifts from the previous iteration of a series, sporting tons of new features and locations while retaining the core concepts that made the game fun in the first place. It’s a tall order, and obviously some sequels nail this formula while others miss the mark entirely. Then there are games like Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, which is “just” more of the same mechanics and progression as seen in 2011’s Human Revolution. While there is little to set Mankind Divided apart from its predecessor that isn’t a bad thing, is it?

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