Recent reviews by ChaosFox

An unforgivably poor "port" of the PSX original. As with the bulk of Pixel Games UK's back catalogue, N2O runs as a PSX-emulated version on the back of a modified version of RetroArch. This in an of itself wouldn't be a bad thing, but it doesn't even support the most elementary features of an PSX emulator, let alone the bespoke features you would expect to find in a standalone release (achievements, etc.) for which money is demanded. Memory card functionality is broken, such that if you attempt to save a game on the virtual memory card, that data will be lost upon restart; your only recourse is to use the internal save state functionality. The emulator also offers up no DualShock support, which is a deal-breaker for this game; the original PSX version made superb use of the analogue controls. Accordingly, both the analogue stick and d-pad respond as digital control.

A curious addition to the Monty Mole series, Moley Christmas was (originally) released as a free promotional demo to be bundled with Your Sinclair magazine in (I believe) 1987. It was never meant to be sold as a standalone product and anyone hoping to get a full experience out of it will be sorely disappointed - it can be played through in literally 2 minutes and almost certainly not worth the €3 asking price on its own. The net experience will probably last about 10-15 minutes as you try to fathom your way through each screen by way of trial and error.

Gamers who play this without understanding the context may struggle to understand what the heck is going on. Screen 3 in particular requires a crucial tid-bit of information from the original magazine (designed to be cut out as a cassette inlay): specifically, you need EIGHT tapes to proceed.

Plus points? Well, it's an interesting insight into (or throwback to, depending on your age) the UK gaming journalism industry of the 1980s (and may make you slightly nostalgic for the unique brand of humour exhibited by Your Sinclair). It features the magnificent Auf Wiedersehen Monty theme by the late and legendary Ben Daglish, although that vastly superior game also available here on Steam for a couple of euros more (and the Spectrum AY version pales in comparison to the C64 version anyway).

Mystical was considered adequate when it appeared for the Amiga and ST in 1990, and even less so when it was ported to DOS PCs and the 8-bit micros (ZX Spectrum, C64, Amstrad CPC) in 1991. The principle is fine - scroll upwards, collecting scrolls and potions for magic spells - and it's quite nicely animated, with bespoke death animations for each spell and in some cases for certain spell/enemy combinations, quite nicely done for 1990.

However, Mystical is typical of the "arcade game" mentality of the era, which is to say that it is short - it can be played through in around 45 minutes. Unlike the arcade games of the era, it's also painfully easy, and doesn't really scale its difficulty in any meaningful way - level 4 is roughly of similar difficulty to level 2. I managed to play through with minimal effort on my first go as soon as I figured out what the heck was going on with the needlessly convoluted spell system.

To add insult to injury, what you're getting here is the atrociously bad DOS port, which features a number of game-breaking bugs: for example, if you accidentally fire off an instant death spell such as a sword at a level boss, it'll kill the boss as if it were a normal enemy, but because the boss energy level isn't reduced, it doesn't register it as level completion, so you'll be stuck there until you quit the game.

And the final insult? Ziggurat hasn't even seen fit to provide a cracked or modified version of the game, and has even neglected to include a PDF copy of the manual, such that you won't be able to pass the copy protection mechanism at the end of the first level without scouring the web for a copy of the Amiga/ST/DOS manual.

A little context for the non-Brits out there: Horace Goes Skiing is a game that was originally released in 1982 after Hungry Horace (also available on Steam). It was primarily developed for the ZX Spectrum but did receive a C64 port a couple of years later. It's a simple affair - cross the road to buy a pair of skis while avoiding the traffic, cross again to get to the ski slope, and ... ski. Repeat ad infinitum. It doesn't get harder over time.

This is essentially a semi-faithful remake of that game built in Unity. It does what it says on the tin - it offers a playable version of Horace Goes Skiing, now in widescreen and with smooth movement. It's visually almost entirely based on the ZX Spectrum version, but offers up a rendition of the C64 title tune as the Spectrum version's audio was tantamount to ear rape. It lacks some of the flourishes of the later C64 rendition such as how Horace knocks over flags when he hits them. The hit detection is ludicrously bad.

There's a distinct sense of a missed opportunity here. Horace Goes Skiing cannot really be considered to be a "good game" by modern standards, but it could have been tweaked into one. An option to switch between Spectrum and C64 visuals (and possibly modernised visuals) would have been welcome, as would the ability to actually save the high score, as a high score is the only noteworthy goal in this game. A sense of progression could have been introduced by having progressively harder ski slopes and offering some variation in the roads to be crossed. All this wouldn't have been possible on the Spectrum 16K of the era but could now easily be achieved while leveraging the nostalgia that a lot of 40-somethings feel for this game.

For the meagre price, it is at least a funny little gag game to show off to Generation X friends who might be feeling a little nostalgic. But as a game, it needs some substantial reworking.

The Steam Link is a remarkably difficult device to review, not least because it's really only a gateway - technically speaking, you can use any device capable of running Steam for exactly the same purpose. As a device in its own right, the Steam Link is a fairly nifty albeit simple piece of kit - it's well-built, sleek-looking, robust and fits unobtrusively behind your TV. It comes equipped with the requisite accessories (AC adapter, HDMI cable). It's easy to set up and get going. It works just fine with the Steam Controller, and recent updates to Steam have enabled the use of Xbox 360 pads or even DualShock 4s if you have a PS4 handy or happen to prefer the DS4.

Essentially, because the Steam Link is suitable for one purpose only - accessing your home PC running Steam via Steam In-Home Streaming - it's an unfortunate necessity that this product should be judged on the merits of SIHS, and this is where it sadly falls down. Upon purchase, I found that the Steam client on the host PC was prone to regular crashing, thus throwing me out of my game on a semi-regular basis. This problem seems to have been fixed in the meantime, but because your access to the Steam service is contingent on having installed the latest version of the client, and because Valve is fairly notorious for shipping client releases with fresh bugs that really should have been picked up in testing, there's no guarantee that this stability will persist.

Streaming to the Link via a wired connection is a wonder to behold when it works - even on my average network, aging GPU and mid-level CPU, I can get a full 1920x1080 at 60fps with very little perceptible lag. However, actually getting games to work with ISHS is a bit of a crapshoot. I personally play a lot of older stuff, much of which ISHS bluntly refuses to stream to the Link. DOSBox-based games in particular are a struggle, but this problem can be remedied by using the direct3d output of the Daum Café DOSBox build.

Steam also struggles with streaming non-Steam games - it essentially forces you to run Steam as Admin to get many non-Steam titles to stream (for instance the GOG version of Baldur's Gate: Enhanced Edition), which isn't great for someone like me who buys most of their stuff from GOG.

I don't necessarily regret buying the Link/Controller combo, but I have found that it is a bad idea to buy a game on Steam specifically with the expectation of playing it via streaming. There simply isn't the guarantee of support for this purpose. If you already have a decent display setup in your computer room and simply want a way to occasionally stream stuff to your living room or bedroom TV, the Steam Link is a workable solution, but it's not a dependable one, which is why it gets a thumbs-down from me, at least until Valve figures out a way to indicate which games work with ISHS and which do not.

I did come very close to giving this game a thumbs down, if only on the basis that the storefront (in fact, all the storefronts, also on Android, Xbox, PS4) is deliberately misleading about what Funk of Titans actually is. The short and narrow of the issue: if you're looking for a traditional 2.5D platformer that lets you explore levels, this isn't it. Funk of Titans is an autorunner, of the same ilk as games like Bit.Trip Runner and Rayman Jungle Run.

That means that your character follows a pre-determined path and you are given the opportunity to perform actions at the right moments. The simplistic nature of the controls for such games makes them ideal fodder for mobile stores, and indeed, FoT started out as a mobile game whose premise - taking the myth of Perseus and turning it into a Blaxpoitation parody, complete with a version of Zeus that has a little more than a passing resemblance to Samuel L. Jackson. It doesn't take itself particularly seriously - the game is littered with nerd gags in the form of collectables and unlockables.

So, with that being out of the way now, what are we looking at. Three worlds, 42 levels in total, you're looking at around 2-3 hours of playtime if you breeze through without trying to get all three medals, around 6 hours of playtime if you're a completionist and call for all three medals on each level, try to level up to the maximum and get all 21 achievements. It isn't a challenging game, even for the most casual gamer, and relies a lot more on blunt memory recall than skill. The secrets (in each case a Pegasus statue that gives you one of the requisite medals and grants you access to an end-of-level minigame) are pretty much signposted - you might miss them on the first run, but you'll know where it is by the time you come to your second run-through. Said minigame, which involves Perseus riding the game's version of Pegasus (a jet engine with a horse's head mounted on it) is funny the first time, fun the next few times, and teeth-gnashingly tedious and monotonous once you've had to go through it the 50th time.

Controls are responsive enough, although combat doesn't require a great deal of skill, with some very generous collision detection.

Graphically, it's a straight mobile port of a Unity Engine game, so you're looking that's par for the course with this type of game - PS2-level geometry, texture and shadow effects combined with some very in-your-face lighting effects. The music, which appears to have been licensed from an external composer, is top-notch, and it's a pity that there's no separate soundtrack available.

Knowing what you're getting, Funk of Titans is a fun, functional little casual time-waster that'll give you a few hours of entertainment. But it's also painful to witness the potential of such an imaginative principle being wasted on such a banal principle, and I hope Crowd of Monsters revives Funky Perseus at some point to give us a fully-fledged platformer one day, because goodness knows, the imaginative story and style deserves better than this.

This is essentially a SNES ROM image packaged in a cut-down version of the SNES9x emulator - no more, no less. You can ALT+Enter out of the game and use the menu to tweak a few image filtering settings and modify the controls (they map fine to an Xbox 360 pad, settings are saved when you quit the game). Controls are mapped, as expected, to the equivalent buttons on a SNES controller.

If you didn't grow up with SNES gaming, chances are you won't enjoy this. If you did grow up with such games, you know what to expect: the kind of sluggish, poorly animated, side-scrolling beat-em-up with copious Mode 7 effects that the SNES was numerously blessed with. For its era it's competently done, but it hasn't aged well. Should you get this in a bundle, you can have a few hours' fun with it, but it's not worth the normal €5 asking price.

If you're looking for a decent side-scrolling beater, you're better served on Steam by Streets of Rage, Double Dragon Trilogy or Double Dragon Neon.

One-dollar games are notoriously difficult to review. Generally, they deliberately offer such a short experience so that you really cannot judge how good the game is by its length. You really can't expect much for a buck.

So what it ultimately boils down to is whether that short experience is worth not only your one euro, one dollar, slightly less than one pound or whatever, but also whether it's worth your time. What you're essentially getting here is one hour's worth of gameplay for your money - maybe a little more if you struggle with logic puzzles.

The problem with Hook is that the game never really takes off into greatness. You spend the first 25-30 levels asking yourself if this is all that the game has to offer, after which the game starts to up the difficulty slightly, giving you hope that you may eventually be challenged.

Many puzzle fans, sadly, will be disappointed. Hook blows its contingent of new features by the mid-way point and never introduces anything new thereafter except slightly increased complexity in the layouts. And ironically, it's a hook that Hook is missing - you don't get much of an "a-ha" feeling when you solve a puzzle - each one is solved by simple patience and superficial logic, the kind that electronic engineers will doubtless be familiar with from reading circuit diagrams.

Hook certainly won't give you the feeling of having wasted your dosh - especially so if you buy it in a sale or bundle. Its contemporary miminalist visual and audio style is serviceable and functional but by no means revolutionary. But it will have you wondering if it was an hour well-spent. And as it spends an hour teasing greater things, it will likely frustrate you that it ultimately doesn't deliver on those "a-ha" moments.

9.03m cannot be reviewed as a game as it isn't really one, so I'll try to put it into the kind of context that it's supposed to be - as an "artistic experience".

Part of the sales pitch of 9.03m is as a tribute to the victims of the 2011 Japanese tsunami, which leads me to my main objection about this "experience", namely that the connection is tenuous at best. Rather than actually humanise the victims of the tsunami, 9.03m effectively consists of a sequence of clichéd emotional imagery with very little bearing on the subject at hand - a football, a cradle, a relationship ring and so on. None of this is ever contextualised. If I were particularly cynical, I might suggest that the developers created this as a tech demo and then picked a famous disaster at random as a context to promote it.

Mind you, there are three good reasons to pony up the €2 for 9.03m.

Firstly, all of the proceeds for this are going to charity, so you can be sure you'll be supporting a good cause. Secondly is the astoundingly beautiful music, which alone makes the experience worthwhile.

And finally, you have the gorgeous and very touching ending which, while falling into the trap of not relating to the tsunami in particular, is a wonderful sight to behold and does a good job at tugging at the heartstrings.

So, if you're looking for a tribute to the victims of the 2011 tsunami, you may find better elsewhere. But 9.03m is worth the money for the soundtrack and gorgeous imagery. A very, very close thumbs-up from me.

It pains me to give this a game a thumbs-down, it really does, but after 10 hours in, there is just so much fundamentally broken about this game that I can only recommend that people give it a wide berth until the developer finally sorts out the myriad problems with it.

It's a shame, really, because the game's handdrawn graphics are astoundingly beautiful, the soundtrack is wonderful, and its setting is startlingly original. Seriously, how many games do you see set in Aztec-era Mexico?

For the first 10 levels, you tend to be tolerant with the game, because the bugs don't manifest themselves, progression is fairly linear, you expect the somewhat sloppy combat system to improve as you gain skills, and it's just so damn beautiful. The problem is that after that, things start going downhill very quickly.

The game has a hair-tearingly annoying autosave system that saves after each level, and also records quest errors and bugs that cause you to fall into an infinitely deep hole. The combat is atrocious, and eventually devolves into using somersaults to scrape past powerful opponents in a desperate attempt to maintain some kind of combat strategy. Quest texts are misleading and often lead into dead ends, which you often cannot find your way out of without much backtracking, trial and error and - in some cases - a walkthrough.

Compounding these problems is an appallingly bad energy system, which requires you to go hunting for various types of 'energy' to pass certain obstacles. Some - the green 'vital' energy and the white 'divine' energy - are fairly regular occurrences - the others, like the gold 'elemental' energy, force you on an arduous wild goose chase with only a vague idea of how to find said energy.

And that's not to mention some of the possibly worst design decisions ever to be committed to a game - I will simply say "monkey cave" and "gap", which will probably evoke similar traumatic memories in fellow players.