Greg Hicks

1 month ago | fingerguns.net | Greg Hicks

If you’ve kept up with Finger Guns over the years: firstly thank you, and secondly, you’ll know of my love for Street Fighter and Tekken. But whilst those two are the mainstays in my game, I do like to dabble with other fighters too. Yet through all the Bloody Roar’s and Rival Schools over the years (yes that’s irony as they’re dead franchises), Fatal Fury has never been on my radar. But now, twenty six years after the last main entry, one of SNK’s beloved series’ is back.

2 months ago | fingerguns.net | Greg Hicks

Most people, when they think of anime in the late 80’s/early 90’s, will often recall Akira. If not, it’ll be that really cool trailer that the Manga label used to put out: the one with all the wild, adult-content ones we weren’t allowed to watch: Wicked City, Project A-Ko, and the cat girls from Dominion Tank Police. What does Mullet MadJack have to do with this, you might be thinking? Well, everything, and we’ll get to that.

2 months ago | fingerguns.net | Miles Thompson |Joshua Thompson |Toby Andersen |Greg Hicks

The First Berserker: Khazan plays like an amalgamation of all the spin offs of the Souls genre. The level structure and loot of Nioh, the dark fantasy roots of Berserk and Bloodborne, anime visuals akin to Code Vein. If you can name a motif that’s been inspired from Miyazaki’s seminal series, chances are you’ll find it here too. However, to call The First Berserker: Khazan a mere imitation of other titles would be to do it a massive disservice, a mistake I’d implore people not to make.

2 months ago | fingerguns.net | Joshua Thompson |Toby Andersen |Greg Hicks |Ross Keniston

Much of what gets labelled the trendy moniker of cosy game are titles that do a decent job of checking the familiar boxes, more so than feeling like a refreshing cup of tea. The buzzword has felt a little diluted in recent years. And whilst there isn’t anything inherently wrong with X game having X setting but “make it cosy” as a premise, I now have a bit of trepidation before going into anything labelled as such.

2 months ago | fingerguns.net | Toby Andersen |Miles Thompson |Joshua Thompson |Greg Hicks

Already seen by many as a Code Vein successor/imitator, mainly because it combines soulslike gameplay and anime aesthetic, AI Limit steps into a crowded genre with the weight of comparison on its shoulders from its first echoing footfall. Its post-apocalyptic, it’s dark chasm-like expanses are full of challenging combat encounters fought by schoolgirls in ripped clothing – in many ways we think we’ve seen it all before. But maybe Code Vein isn’t the game to compare AI Limit to?