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Dadish (Switch): COMPLETED!

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I’d seen this game get gradually cheap and cheaper on the eShop but never bit, until two sequels came out and were bundled together and then reduced. Look, cheap things come to those who wait.

Dadish – a radish who is a dad, obviously – has to navigate a load of platforming challenges to save his many, many kids. You can jump, and double jump, and that’s it, but there are a good variety of levels and gimmicks with usual platform game features like spikes, springs and moving platforms.

There’s nothing outstanding here, but it is a solid, well made game with some really funny conversations between Dadish and both his kids and the characters you meet. Levels are tricky but never frustrating, and unlike the thousand other games on the eShop that are superficially similar, it nails the physics and collision detection which are essential to the genre but broken so often.

Now onto the sequel!

Invincible Presents: Atom Eve (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

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Presumably to tie in with, or advertise, the Invincible series on Amazon Prime, this part turn based strategy, part visual novel was released for free by Amazon. And it’s pretty good!

It tells a similar story to the show, but mainly from the point of view of Atom Eve, with her run-ins with useless foe Killcannon as well as family drama and love life trauma.

The visual novel bits allow you to choose various responses in conversations, some of which are only possible if you’ve levelled up the skill tree in required ways. The fights are turn based and fun, with some forward planning required for many of them.

Definitely worth playing if you’re a fan of the source material.

The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Finally a Zelda game where you play as Zelda! Aside from HYRULE WARRIORS of course, but that isn’t exclusively you playing as Zelda. Yes, a game using what appears to be the same engine as the remake of Link’s Awakening did a few years ago, only this time you’re Zelda and you don’t really fight anything because you have a magic wand and can use it to summon items and creatures you have previously scanned with it. Yes – it’s The Legend of Zelda (Actually Zelda This Time): The Magic 3D Printer!

Except it isn’t all Zelda, is it. Because not only do you start the game playing as Link, but at any point you like you can turn into a sort of clone of Link for a limited time. Cop-out, innit. Luckily, the first bit as Link is only very short (he’s soon captured and you have to save him), and the Link Clone is used at your behest for the most part so can be (and was) ignored almost entirely. At least, until you find some of the bosses are only able to be damaged when you’re in Link form. Boo.

But, it doesn’t really matter too much. As with other non-Zelda-based Zelda games, it’s mainly about the puzzles and the cloning wand makes some of the traditional ones (such as “hit the switch from a distance” or “press these two buttons at the same time” take on a different dimension when you can throw bats about or drop a bed on stuff.

As it’s all in the graphical style of Link’s (Re)Awakening it all looks lovely too which that tilt shift-like thing going on and everything looking like a little toy in a giant diorama. It isn’t very difficult, especially once you discover that you the beds you generate can be used to nap in to regain hearts, but it is very lovely and enjoyable. The fact the overworld is pretty much all unlocked from the get-go is nice too, as you get the option of which order you complete the “dungeons” and can – with judicious use of various cloneables – climb onto and over pretty much everything so exploring is fun. And essential if you want all the extra hearts.

Perhaps not the best Zelda game, but certainly the best Zelda Zelda game and it’s fun to play and has lots of silly characters and quests to keep you entertained.

Auf Wiedersehen, Monty (Switch)

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Nah mate. Look, I tried. And, it looks so much better and plays so much better than the previous two Monty games, but I just couldn’t make head nor tail of the map, where I’m supposed to go, or what I’m supposed to do. Collect plane tickets, go to other countries? Then what? Why? There’s money pick up, I think? And other items?

Just utterly flummoxed by it and wandering the map with a dwindling number of tickets which are needed to get around wasn’t fun. I looked up the original game cassette inlay and that didn’t help either. Abandoned!

Monty on the Run (Switch): COMPLETED!

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Another Monty game. It’s very similar to the first one, really, but with the added feature that you have to collect five specific items en-route to the exit or you can’t escape.

I think I was lucky in that I found them automatically or accidentally, because I certainly remember when I’ve played this previously a very long time ago I must have missed some. It wouldn’t surprise me if backtracking to find them again was impossible too.

The jumping physics and general collision detection seems a bit improved over the first game, and graphically it’s a bit nicer too. There is a teddy that looks like you should pick it up but it kills you, which seems a bit unfair as there’s no warning. Bloody teddy bears.