Game reviews – Page 15 – Savior Gaming

Quartet Steam Review

Every so often, I come across a game and I think, damn, I need to play that game. Not because it looks amazing graphically. Just because it looks like one of those games I used to play when I was a kid. You remember the type, you would rush home after school, pop it into your Super Nintendo, and just lose yourself until your parents inevitably said, “Hey, time for dinner,” or “Get to bed.”

Quartet on Steam (consoles coming Q4) is that game, and the great people over at Something Classic Games were kind enough to send me a copy to check out.

The first thing to get out of the way is the combat; it is very fluid and easy to get into. Nothing fancy is going on here either. If you love old-school turn-based RPGs where your strategy matters, the combat for Quartet is something you are going to enjoy. It clicks all the boxes. Exploiting enemy weaknesses, defending to lower damage, restoring AP (ability points), buffing your characters, and debuffing enemies. Most battles, you can just power through but bosses and higher difficulties, these buffs and debuffs will make or break your battles.

Speaking of battles, this game won’t waste your time with random battles. You can see the enemies on screen, and if you feel like you need to level up, you can usually find more to fight, but mostly, you will always be at an appropriate level to get where you need to go. I rarely say this about a game in 2025, but Quartet really tries and succeeds at respecting your time. Maps aren’t small, but they also aren’t huge for no reason.

This brings me to one last point. The story, you guys know, I am not going to go into a ton of detail about the story because I don’t do spoilers. Just know the story deals with magic, a government conspiracy, and a poor cook named Ben who just wanted to go to work. The game starts by letting you choose between one of four characters to play as for their introductory story. While you play through all of them, I recommend starting as Ben. He doesn’t have the best story exactly, but what he does have is the best mixture of story and humor, and that is where this game shines.

There are a few things I would have liked to have seen, maybe some more interactions between certain characters, but truly, for a game that you can beat in about 20-25 hours, I understand what they were going for. Something they may have left out in favor of a shorter experience, and I can’t be mad about that. This was a 9/10 experience for me, and I will be playing through this again. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Triangle Stategy PS5 Review

Triangle Strategy was recently more or less shadow-dropped onto Xbox and PS5 by Square Enix, much to the surprise of fans. Triangle Strategy tells the story of 3 great powers on the continent of Norzelia, starting at a time of an uneasy peace that quite frankly won’t last long.

You, the player, will control the decisions of one section of the great power of Glenbrook, House Wolfortt. Now I will say this: if you have this game on the Switch or PC, there is no reason to buy it on PS5 or Xbox unless you want some minor quality of life improvements over the Switch version. I didn’t even notice them; I only discovered them when I looked them up to write about them.

The combat in this game is beautiful, most battles feel unique, and the ones that don’t aren’t meant to. On the higher difficulties, the smallest mistake can be devastating, and even on the lower level,s battles are still a rewarding experience.

The story itself is a Miles May vary situation. If you love a classic war story full of intrigue, betrayal, well-done ( though admittedly somewhat easy to see coming) swerves, you will love the story.

The biggest issue comes in pacing, and you will see this time and time again, and in many reviews. The pacing for this game is atrocious at times. You will, in one instance, spend 45 minutes just reading, then get hit with a battle, just to go back to reading. Then you may get 2 solid battles in a row and some nice dialogue, and another battle, and you are feeling great, the pace is perfect. Then you hit with what feels like hours of dialogue. I found myself leveling up characters in the mock battles just to break up the story that I loved, just for the break.

Now, long-time readers know that I only assign numerical scores to games that companies send me, and I doubt you will ever see me assign a number to a SE game. This is more of a recommendation vs a no recommendation situation. Of course, you should buy this game. If you are reading this, you likely waited years for it to arrive on consoles. Well, it is here, and it is fantastic. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Hogwarts Legacy

The dream of many has come true: you’ve been accepted into the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Set nearly a century before the Boy who Lived would enter its walls, we play as a newly discovered prodigy first setting foot into the school while a goblin revolution looms in the background.

As a kid into my young adult years, I loved the world of Harry Potter. I found the lore and worldbuilding fascinating while not really being too invested in Harry himself. While the personal politics of J.K. Rowling have soured my taste for Potter, I was curious if all the hype around the project was warranted.

First, I will say the game excels at bringing Hogwarts to life. The castle is a breathtaking marvel to explore; fans of the books and movie are in for one hell of a treat. It was really cool to make friends, each with their own interesting sidequests, and actually attend classes. There is a vast landscape outside of the castle into Hogsmeade village, the Forbidden Forest, and more. For a while, I had a blast exploring all I could. The game offers a lot of character customization options and there are plenty of spells to learn- including the Unforgivable Curses (you can bet your ass I learned those puppies). The game has plenty of Wizarding World fan service…

However, this game gets incredibly stale and becomes a slog once the wonder wears off. Combat essentially boils down to Arkham-lite; the Unforgivable Curses break the game if you want to cruise through the last third of it. The main story is meh. The friend questlines are more interesting than the main game’s. One huge issue I had is that the game is overly stuffed with fetch quests and scavenger hunts for pointless collectables. Given the vast bestiary and enemy pool they could have drawn from, enemy types are pretty limited. There isn’t much Hogwarts life at Hogwarts Legacy- classes, dueling club, races all end quickly enough. You can pick your house, but it has no weight to the story or how the characters react to you. After the first ten hours, I felt like I was merely grinding to finish the story.

In the end, Hogwarts Legacy isn’t terrible but far from what it could’ve been. Potter-heads will love it, but the casual gamer will pick up on the bloat and repetitive nature of the game. I bought it for $25, which I’d say is a fair price for the fun I got out of it. May the gaming gods bring you glory.

Ale Abbey – Monastery Brewery Tycoon

Ale Abbey is from a company called Hammer and Ravens. Long-time readers may remember that they tossed me a game called Razerewire:Nanowars that I was once the world score leader on. I no longer am.

Anyway, I picked up a copy of Ale Abby because for years they posted screenshots and sent me little pictures, and I knew I didn’t want to miss it. It took a little longer than I would have liked, but it was well worth the wait.

The concept is very simple. You get put in charge of an abbey, this abbey worships beer, so get to brewing. You quickly learn the basics of how to put together a recipe, make booze, and build rooms. This is all very easy at first. Later on, when towns want special brews with certain levels of strength or flavors made with certain ingredients, it does get a bit more challenging, but only slightly. As the game tells you when you can’t pay your bills, this isn’t the Dark Souls of tycoon games. Pick up a couple orders that give you half up front and half when it’s filled, and you are on your way back to brewing.

At no point did I ever feel like I hit a point where I felt like I was so far in the hole I couldn’t keep playing, and my first attempt, I screwed up pretty bad by not paying the bandits cash or ale to leave my carts alone. This cost me a lot of money, more than it would have cost me to keep them happy.

I also made some bad choices on when to build new rooms, which hurt my ability to brew. My second run went much smoother when I paid attention to profit margins, bandits, and when to build. Keeping some booze in the basement, only building when you have extra money lying around, and remembering this is a marathon, not a race, are the keys here.

Ale Abbey has been a pleasure to play, and will be in my rotation of games to play for a long time. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War – Definitive Edition

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War – Definitive Edition is an old-fashioned RTS from Relic Entertainment that they were kind enough to send me. The game was originally released back in 2004, and if you have fond memories of playing this as a child and think this will bring that back, I honestly can not tell you if that’s true. I never played the original release. What I can tell you is that it has been a long time since I sat down and played an RTS where I just zoned out and enjoyed building a base, teeing up some troops, and just watching the mayhem unfold. And for that, thank you, Relic.

Now graphically, the game looks better than ever, but the game still isn’t as good as most modern games. So if you are looking for this game to be a modern masterpiece, you will be very disappointed. It is, however, a very nice upgrade from 21 years ago.

The controls are simple and easy, and are pretty much on par with any other RTS, with 90% of the controls working from the mouse as you would hope, and being able to do some quick commands from the keyboard. On easy or normal, this isn’t at all necessary, but on hard, it makes a very big difference.

This brings me to the very few complaints I have. None of them are major, but while the game will run on just about anything these days, when battles get massive, there can be some frame rate drop on slower machines. On the bright side, I did this on my laptop and was purposely seeing if I could make it happen, and it never happened during normal gameplay. Just be aware that if you are riding that line on the recommended specs, don’t try to hit that cap on troops and vehicles for the hell of it.

Next, there is no keybinding. This doesn’t bother me personally, but the few negative review on Steam seems to mention it. I get it in a way since most games have it now, but to me it isn’t worth being upset that they didn’t add it to a game that never had it to begin with, and it was never important to do anyway.

At the end of the day, the game is called the definitive edition, and for $30 you get everything the game has ever offered, in the best-looking version that has ever been offered. Does it have its issues? Yes, is it perfect? No. Is it worth the price? Absolutely. This 8/10 experience truly is the definitive experience. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers (sn1)

During an exploration on the moon, a strange object was found. A space dumpster. Inside the long sealed empress of evil, Rita Repulsa, is unleashed to conquer Earth. Zordon, an ancient alien wizard, and his trusty robot servant Alpha 5 spring into action. Zordon has Alpha find five teenagers with attitude from the nearby city of Angel Grove. Jason, Zack, Trini, Billy, and Kimberly were chosen to become the Power Rangers, the only heroes mighty enough to stop the forces of evil…

If you grew up as a 90’s kid as Savior and I did, this show is peak nostaglia as you can get. Fighting, monsters, a colorful giant robot fighting said giant monsters- what else can any kid ask for? Hell, I was a Power Ranger for Halloween the years I wasn’t Batman. The first season with the classic 6 rangers is lightning in a bottle. The core 6 had good chemistry and for the first 60-episode season, it is it cool seeing the characters grow. For example, Billy starts as a weak, stereotypical nerd who gradually becomes the team’s tech wizard as well as a competent, confident fighter. The show’s structure is aligned with self-contained episodes but the multi-part arcs are some of the show’s highlights. The evil Green Ranger arc that introduces the legendary Tommy into the group is still awesome all these years later. The original Zords are iconic: the Mastodon, Triceratops, Pterodactyl, Sabre-Tooth Tiger, Tyrannosaurus, and the Dragon Zord. The theme is one of my all-time favorites and I still smile each time I hear it; the music all around kicks ass.

Like many show’s there’s some dull episodes here and there. Because of the use of Japanese footage, there is quite a bit of repetition to the Ranger and Zord scenes. This show looks goofy and over the top, but to a charming degree. A couple of times in the first season, plotlines do repeat, just slightly altered. As a kid I remember thinking Bulk and Skull, the comic relief bullies, were annoying, and they are, but they grew on me. Rita is a goofball villain with a shrill voice and neither her or her lackeys are competent, but damn if it isn’t funny.

In the end, Power Rangers is a fun, goofy, kids show but it’s still plenty of fun. Whether you’re riffing it with friends, or getting hyped whenever you hear “It’s Morphin Time!”, the first season of Power Rangers is a good, light-hearted time in our dreary world I recommend. May the power protect you.

Bus Flipper: Renovator Simulator Steam Review

Bus Flipper: Renovator Simulator from Polden Publishing is an odd game for me. I love that they sent it for me to check out, and I normally love games like this. The premise alone seems like it would be great: buy old buses and campers, fix them up, furnish them nicely, and sell them for a profit. How can this possibly miss?

Truth be told, the game doesn’t really miss. The game is exactly as advertised. It also doesn’t even do a single thing badly. It looks pretty decent, and it controls pretty well. The sound is nice, and even the story that goes along with it is ok.

That, however, is kind of the issue; everything about it is just painfully average. Now the game costs less than $15, so expecting anything on par with House Flipper would be unfair, but there is very little room for you to be original. The game gives you some idea of how to furnish each bus after you clean it up. The ideas they give you are honestly what you should do, not because it gets you the best price, but because it doesn’t seem to matter. I tried the first mission twice and got the same offer on my bus when I tossed a bunch of coffee cups and a plant into the yard, as I did when they were on the bus.

This brings me to my next point, the mini game for negotiations. It is essentially a bar that zips back and forth, and it is basically a game of luck. The game isn’t by any means bad; for less than $15, there is some fun to be had. There are just much better games out there. Unless your heart is truly into fixing up buses, this one is better off staying on the auction block. 5/10, best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Giant Machines 2017 PS5 Review

Giant Machines 2017 on PS5 is another game I am grateful to Ultimate Games for sending me to Review. The game itself is a simple concept; they take some of the biggest machines known to man and let people use them to help launch a spaceship. The type they used to rip a mountain to pieces, for example. Some of these things are quite literally bigger than houses.

The issue is that the game is terrible. Driving a huge dump truck and hitting even a small guardrail will send your truck bouncing around like a character from a fighting game. If this wasn’t bad enough, sometimes you don’t have to hit anything to make this happen. You can mitigate this by staying on the road, but not everywhere you need to be is even near the road.

You would think that maybe using a huge saw and tearing apart a mountain would at least be fun, but you would be wrong there as well. I never expected getting this thing into position to be fast, since you are essentially moving a small building around. I did, however, expect it to be entertaining in some form when I got there. It was really just frustrating.

Steer very clear of this game. Between the bugs, lack of polish, and the fact that the game was originally released back in September 2016 on Steam, there is no reason to buy this 3/10 experience. I’ve never driven these machines in real life, but I have driven some large machinery, and it fails in every way as a simulator and as entertainment. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Mecha Godzilla, not in the game. But I wanted something positive

You will notice above I have a picture of Mecha Godzilla. He isn’t in the game, but he is a giant machine. I wanted something positive in this post, and this is what you are getting.

Whimside Steam Review

Whimside is a cute creature collector sent my way by Toadzillart, which I am always grateful for. The concept is quite simple and straightforward. It sits at the bottom of your screen while you go about your day; in fact, I am playing it right now as I type this. Every so often, creatures will wander past, and you click on them to capture them. You can then breed them to make new creatures with various physical attributes to unlock new areas to visit, which allows you to continue on your quest to unlock more areas.

This doesn’t mean the game is easy; it takes time and a bit of luck to breed the right creature to unlock the next area. You also get a small area you can decorate and keep creatures that will spawn gems to spend in the store to buy new things and upgrades to make your quest easier. This can be things like more room for eggs, auto collectors for gems, or just new decorations.

This is honestly a very niche title; it won’t appeal to everyone. The collector in me that loves to have something to do while I write or just watch random videos, however, loves having this thing on the bottom of my screen. There is also a setting that lets you minimize it completely and gives you a notification when something you need to be aware of happens. The game is sitting at very positive reviews on Steam, and with very good reason. At less than $6, the game is a steal. 8/10 experience at this price point. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.

Gold Gold Adventure Gold Steam Review

Gold Gold Adventure Gold is an early access title with an extremely catchy song sent to me by a company whose name I think someone was stoned when they came up with, not judging, I have made some amazing decisions that way. But huge shout out to Can can can a man for hooking me up with this one.

Seriously, I love the song. I could give you the early access trailer, but I won’t; you are getting this one. Enjoy.

Anyway, now that I have attempted to make you listen to a song and said I thought the guy who named a company was a stoner, let’s move on to why you are here. The game is all about building a city, inviting heroes to live there, and then using those heroes to go out on missions to kill monsters and go on adventures to make you money. Think Majesty for those old school gamers.

This game has a ton of potential; it even has a built-in way to make sure you, even if you run out of money, have a hero available in the form of a pet. You can choose between 2 as of now, and it evolves as it levels up into a much larger creature. Make sure you pet him and give him love, by the wa,y so he does what you want. That isn’t a joke; there is an in-game mechanic that allows you to pet and brush him when he does things you like.

We all know what this looks like, but it’s a forge

The main way to progress through the game is to build different buildings, places to recruit heroes, a forge so your heroes can improve their weapons, or a place for them to train.

The premise is quite simple, and the game works fine about half the time. I lost my first game, however, because of a weird glitch. Most of my heroes either got stuck on a wall and couldn’t attack the enemies, or were shot through the walls and were killed by the enemies. Both scenarios made the walls completely useless.

The game did pay me back with my first win. Which also came when on day 2 of 6, a level 40 spider came and killed all my heroes while I was attempting to upgrade my main building. This caused them to not be able to attack my main building at all because of the fence that gets put up around it. They were forced to just stand next to it, then attack the farms that pop up automatically. 6 days later, I won my first game.

The game is a lot of fun, but most of my games have come with some weird issue. Only those 2 were of the sort I would consider game-breaking, but both soured the experience quite a bit. The game is at best a 6/10 experience. It has a lot of potential, but it needs a bit more time. Best wishes, and may the gaming gods bring you glory.