The two latest HyperMegaTech! Super Pocket releases take about as different an aesthetic sensibility as possible! One’s all black with subtle gold accents and seeks to imitate the premium feel of its inspiration in a budget package. The other is exceedingly bright and feels like it’s ready for a day at the beach. That said, the game libraries of the two appeal to the same audience of ‘90s arcade die-hards.

Super Pocket: NeoGeo Edition

You’d likely expect to find a lot of fighting games on the SNK version, and you’d be… half right? Three of the 14 games fit that description, which may feel a bit low for the company, but they’re fairly well-chosen: Fatal Fury Special, Samurai Shodown II and The Last Blade. These seem chosen to be as representative and enjoyable as possible while keeping licensing costs down? There’s no King of Fighters, but there’s some stuff to enjoy. (Especially on the Super Pocket, which has no way to support multiplayer.)

As an MVS fan without a heck of a lot of fighting skills, it’s nice to see the rest of the platform’s library get representation. The platform’s next-best genres are scrolling shooters and beat-’em-ups, so they’re here too. Alpha Mission II, Last Resort and Blazing Star are here for shmupsters. Punchy players can enjoy Mutation Nation, Sengoku 3, and a game with one of the best subtitles in history, King of the Monsters 2: The Next Thing. Living in the middle are the run-and-gun games: Metal Slug X, Shock Troopers: 2nd Squad and Top Hunter: Roddy & Cathy.

Rounding out the collection are isometric racer Over Top and future sport title Soccer Brawl. The latter isn’t exactly one of the MVS’ strongest sports entries, but we suppose it’s included because it drew inspiration from Europe’s extremely janky but inexplicably popular cyber-athletics trend.

It’s a decent selection of games, and the slick black look works well both on its own and as a neutral-looking model if you’re just looking as an Evercade player. (It remains unfortunate where some of this money goes given SNK’s current ownership. I guess that’s just us, though! We like human rights and living journalists, we’re quirky like that.)

Super Pocket: Data East Edition

This Super Pocket model’s marketing shots and box art don’t quite match. Instead of the muted pumpkin orange and periwinkle those images depict, the unit itself features more of a sunshine yellow and bright sky blue. Frankly, the actual color makes a lot more sense! It’s fun and a good fit for summer.

The Data East Edition’s included library does include a few ‘80s highlights from the company, but smartly focuses mostly on its ‘90s era. After all, BurgerTime, Karate Champ, Lock ‘n’ Chase, Breakthru, Burnin’ Rubber, B-Wings and Peter Pepper’s Ice Cream Factory are fine enough? But the later releases are designed with longer play sessions in mind, which fits the Super Pocket best.

Data East was also a practitioner of the beat-’em-up arts, with Bad Dudes vs. Dragon Ninja, Spinmaster and Crude Buster making this collection. It also did a lot of work in the arcade platforming space! The two Joe & Mac games may be known by a larger audience, and they’re joined by Super BurgerTime, Edward Randy and Tumblepop.

The two Dark Seal games are a fun addition. They’re essentially isometric Gauntlet, with a bit more about the fighting and depth to make it feel like the connective tissue between that game and the later Dungeons & Dragons arcade titles. It also feels like the developers enjoyed the bit of world-building they got to do in the margins? Regardless, they’re still a lot of fun to play.

Our favorite game of the bunch is Chain Reaction, perhaps more popularly known as Magical Drop. It’s an all-time puzzle classic, and exactly the sort of thing you’d want in your pocket. We’d love an Evercade cartridge that focuses on the genre, making any Super Pocket into something that could fill that need! For now, this isn’t too bad.

The two latest additions to the HyperMegaTech! Super Pocket line are out now. They join the previous models, featuring Capcom, Taito, Technos and Atari. For more on the handhelds’ cartridge ecosystem, check out our Evercade archive.

The post Super Pocket Data East and SNK Editions Are Quality Additions appeared first on Siliconera.

Evercade, the physical cartridge-based retro platform that began in 2020, is continuing its regular pace of releases to support the platform five years later. Longevity like this comes with benefits and drawbacks! After all, being this established likely opens a few new doors for licensing, but it also means a lot of its easiest acquisitions have seen release. So where is the platform headed? The four latest 2025 Evercade collections offer significant insight.

The exceedingly clunky name of the Windjammers, Karnov & Friends cartridge likely stems from a rights split: while most of the Data East library (and the name) are now owned by G-Mode, this collection focuses on a handful of games owned by Paon DP. Seemingly Blaze worked out enough to keep the logo in the games themselves, but stopped short of whatever arrangements would be required to call it what it is: Data East Arcade 3.

Still, we’ll credit the name with one thing, and that’s accurately cataloging the contents. You’ve got Windjammers, an all-time versus mode classic that has seen enough commercial support in recent years to pull it out of the “cult” category. You also have Karnov, a game with some name recognition in the retro community if nothing else. And then three games most people don’t know about! But we suppose they’re Karnov’s friends, and we’re glad he found some friends.

Gremlin Collection 2 is an interesting handful of titles. Action-racer Buggy and party strategy game Hogs of War offer some gameplay types that could use more representation in the Evercade library. Hogs is a 3D take on the Worms formula, with a focus on positioning and a different weapon set that keeps it distinct from that franchise’s own polygonal efforts. Buggy is probably as close as the Evercade will get to Crash Team Racing, an action-racer with a single-player story mode.

The cart also includes Loaded and Re-Loaded, gore-heavy top-down shooters in the vein of Smash T.V. and Gauntlet. They’re… fine.

Tomb Raider Collection 2 includes Lara Croft’s fourth and fifth PS1 outings, The Last Revelation and Chronicles. They’re not exactly the best-regarded entries, and they don’t have the benefit of nostalgia of the early entries, but it’s nice from a completionist standpoint to have these join the first three on Evercade.

The Gremlin and Tomb Raider carts are examples of the Evercade testing its limits, with late PS1-era games really benefiting from analog sticks that the handhelds and stock controllers don’t have. That said, a system update last year added support for analog control on third-party controllers, so you may find that worth exploring if you really want to get the most out of 3D games.

Rounding out the system’s recent releases is Atari Arcade 2, a pack of ten early games. The headliners are Berzerk and its sequel Frenzy, but even outside of that there are games that feed into that era’s “one more quarter” arcade appeal.

It’s an interesting collection of games, because a lot of them relied upon innovative hardware that can’t be replicated. Dark Planet used a two-layer screen setup to offer a 3D effect and let you play either near the ground or high above and fight different sets of enemies. Fire Truck was a co-op steering wheel game. Still, there are a few games in this collection that show off a hardware innovation of Evercade’s own: the EXP’s dedicated Tate Mode button.

These latest mid-2025 Evercade cartridges are out now. For more on the system’s cartridge library, as well as breakdowns of compatible hardware, check out our Evercade archive.

The post Windjammers Headlines Mid-2025 Evercade Releases appeared first on Siliconera.

The Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion Destined Rivals launches later in May 2025. Here’s our overview of the set, so you know what to expect, and our picks for the best cards based on a varying criteria.

The coolest Pokemon Trading Card Game Destined Rivals cards

Is it weird to just say aesthetics? The Illustration Rare cards featuring trainers with their star partners are inherently compelling. Even other special partner cards look good. Heck, we’re big fans of the Elite Trainer Box with its flat black-and-red design and would have loved card treatments to match.

But even outside of looks, there are fundamentally cool cards in here. Lots are built around the Team Rocket faction, with underhanded tactics and their signature creatures. Thankfully, this time it isn’t relying upon indicating creatures are “mistreated” by giving them low HP and making them nearly useless? You still see some bad sportsmanship, though. Spidops likes to gang up on you. Houndoom burns and confuses simultaneously. Ampharos punishes opponents’ evolution with damage counters. Hypno mind-controls the opposing bench to swipe at its active pal. That’s not mentioning the dark faction’s, uh, Darkness Pokemon? Nidoking poisons for eight times the usual amount. Arbok has an ability to stop other abilities from entering play and swings its tail for a bunch of splash damage. There’s Muk, Crobat, Weezing, Sneasel… truly a lot to choose from here.

There’s also a dedicated Team Rocket Energy card, providing two Darkness or Psychic energy. With it, the super-strong Mewtwo ex can hit hard! The downside: you have to get at least three Rocket cards on the bench before it can hit at all. Even some out-of-type options use it well, like Moltres ex, which is happy to use it to fuel its normal attack, but can also Thanos-snap its foe to the discard pile with one.

There are 11 Team Rocket Trainer cards in the set, most with effects that you’re used to, but slightly better with the faction restriction. The Stadium lets you draw two cards a turn, offering the foe nothing unless it’s a mirror match. Its Great Ball always catches something, but evolution or basic is a coin flip. Its dedicated Transceiver lets you choose which one of these you want from your deck. Our favorite combo, though? That’s Team Rocket’s Wobbuffet and Orbeetle. Orbeetle lets you move around damage counters at will, while Wobbuffet’s attack transfers counters from one bench creature to the opponent.

The most interesting Pokemon TCG Destined Rivals cards

The set’s focus on trainer’s Pokemon means that each essentially gets its own theme deck, cards designed to work together for a particular strategy. The Team Rocket collection is larger, and we hope that it might get more support in the future. But the rest? This is probably what we’re getting.

Gold and Silver protagonist Ethan and recent companion Arven might be the headliners. Arven has a Mabosstiff, a Toedscruel and a Greedent, with no particular energy required and a dedicated sandwich item for efficient healing. It’s flexible, but may need an external centerpiece. Ethan’s party would only look nostalgic if you accidentally caught and used a ton of Fire types, with only a Pinsir and Sudowoodo with colorless attack options. He gets a dedicated Trainer to search for Pokemon and energy, and his Typhlosion’s attack needs you to have adventured as much as possible (into the discard pile) to really hit. His Ho-Oh is the star, speeding up your energy ramp and managing a decent attack in a pinch.

Gym leaders Misty and Marnie join as well. Misty stays within her Water type and is the only one to not get a dedicated Trainer card to assist, so there’s not a lot her Lapras and Gyarados can do to get your attention. The art’s fun, at least? Marnie similarly sticks to the darkness, running the Grimmsnarl, Scrafty, Liepard and Morpeko lines. They’re not fancy, but they’re built to quickly attack and get a lot of energy cards attached, so we could see someone making good use of them.

Hoenn champion Steven and Sinnoh champion Cynthia round out the selection. Cynthia’s all about getting her Garchomp out and dealing a ton of damage while refilling your hand in the process. Her other Pokemon are essentially unplayable and don’t have a lot of synergy, but that Garchomp might be good enough to play anyway. Steven’s works a bit better, with a dedicated defense boost from Carbink, stadium card Granite Cave and an energy acceleration sweeper in his Metagross ex.

The most meta-relevant Pokemon TCG Destined Rivals cards

Because of the trainer’s connection, a lot of cards in this set don’t work universally. But hey, some do? Team Rocket’s Petrel is a functional reprint of Skyla, a popular Supporter card that lets you search for any Trainer card you want. That’ll be welcome for a lot of decks, no matter the strategy. The new Shaymin shields much of your bench from your opponent’s attack damage, but that would need to be a counter to a particular strategy to become competitive. There’s a new Rapidash with card draw, but a Stage 1 is a hard sell as a utility. Finally, Yanmega ex loads itself up with energy to attack when it swaps in, but then has to ship that energy to a benched creature. It could deal the final blow, or it could set up another fighter really quickly.

The cutest Destined Rivals cards

It’s tougher to find these in this set! After all, so much of the cards are Pokemon at work, either as elite fighters for champions or prisoners of an evil gang. But they’re here if you look! Growlithe is sticking out its tongue in the woods. It’s hard to tell what Cetoddle and Breloom are up to, but they’re certainly having a good time. Even Misty’s Psyduck is having a rare no-migraine day and loving a lounge by the pool.

The Pokemon Trading Card Game Scarlet & Violet: Destined Rivals expansion launches May 30, 2025.

The post Pokemon TCG: The Best Destined Rivals Cards appeared first on Siliconera.

Scarlet & Violet: Journey Together, the new Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion set, focuses on the return of specific trainers’ Pokemon and their particular game strategies. Looking to find the best cards of the set? We’re here as always to help break it down.

The coolest Journey Together cards

We see a couple of entries in our favorite category, “legendaries you can get as uncommons,” in Virizion, Articuno and Regice. Pulling a cool creature more times in a pack is just good, and though these three lack the sort of powerful attacks you’d want for a constructed deck, they each have some really handy moves for a limited format. Seeing as we’d love to see more attention to that format in the Pokemon TCG, it’s great that they’re at a rarity that means they’ll get pulled in that context more often!

From a visuals perspective, we love to see different art styles and approaches on even the normal cards, and there’s a ton of that to appreciate in Journey Together. We especially like the Metapod, Karrablast, Cubone, Kecleon, Ludicolo and Iono’s Voltorb. The Illustrator Rares are always great, but we like that there’s something interesting to look at without cracking a ton of packs just to get one.

The most interesting Journey Together cards

The new Meowscarada line is intriguing, as it uses all-colorless attacks. The final evolution in particular, though, is what makes it worth a look. Its power lets it swap into the active spot whenever it wants, and then slap an opponent’s ex Pokemon for 180 damage with just two energy.

There’s also an effort to make burn more of a viable strategy. Magmortar increases your burn damage by 30, while Volcanion ex makes for a strong attacker but also can use its power to burn the opponent every turn it’s out in front. Finally, though its Stage 2 status makes it unlikely to see play, Ludicolo uses its Vibrant Dance ability to give all your creatures 40 more HP, and that’s a fun idea.

The most meta-relevant Journey Together cards

The set’s Tapu Koko ex makes for an effective sweeper. Its Linked Lightning attack deals a base 60 plus 20 for each of your benched creatures, and it does it at just two energy, meaning you can get that 160 up and running fairly quickly. The flexible Brock’s Scouting supporter lets you pull either two Basics or one evolution from your deck. A new special energy card shows up, too, and it’s a versatile one. Spiky Energy provides just one colorless, but it also deals 20 recoil damage to the opponent if it attacks you. Handy!

Alcremie ex might be a good bench utility despite its evolved status, as its ability can heal anything for 30 once a turn. Toedscruel is similarly intriguing, as it lowers all your retreat costs by two and can effectively let you swap around your Pokemon at will. A beneficiary of that strategy could be Magearna? If you move it into the active spot, place an energy on another creature and then move it back out to attack, you can use its ability to get 90 HP healing along the way.

The cutest Journey Together cards

There’s a decent pool of options for cutest cards in this set, a welcome change from the last few expansions. It’s not hard to make Sprigatito cute, but the one here lounging in its bed certainly qualifies. Togedemaru is also an easy mark. The sleeping Komala is a friend, and so is Skwovet chowing down. In terms of Illustrator Rares, Lillie’s Ribombee captures a moment well, and Furret is just a good little bud.

The latest Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion, Scarlet & Violet: Journey Together, launches March 28, 2025. Check out our Pokemon TCG archive for more about the game, including an overview of this latest set.

The post Pokemon TCG: The Best Journey Together Cards appeared first on Siliconera.

In 2021, we took a deep look at Dark Deity, a tactical RPG from indie developer Chip Moore and his studio, Sword & Axe. Four years later, the team delivered the sequel Dark Deity 2 that looks to build on the first’s world and ideas to make something a bit larger and more polished.

Narratively, Dark Deity 2 takes the path of many before it: it’s a story sequel and it’d love if you cared about the old characters, but it’s not crucial. The game takes place 25 years after the first, so you’ll see some of the old party members, but a lot of the core crew is a new generation. The writing’s a lot stronger, too — it helps to bring on a dedicated writer, so well done — though we did find ourselves losing a bit of patience in a few of the more verbose scenes. The best consequence of a stronger focus on story is the opportunity it gives players to make meaningful choices. A few times during the game, you'll choose a side in a fight, making different allies and sometimes seeing entire factions wiped from the map.

Though the first game wasn’t shy about its influences, Dark Deity 2 feels like it moves just a shade closer to its main inspiration in a lot of areas: classic Fire Emblem. Rather than the four different weapon trees of the original, this sequel sees a move to equippable weapons. The upgrade items for skills and stats are similar in frequency and use. Even characters feel a bit more Fire Emblem-y.

One area in which it doesn’t feel like Fire Emblem is its pace and focus on objective-based maps. Dark Deity 2 essentially treats every chapter like a special event, with the pressure on and multiple priorities to juggle. You’ll need to protect and rescue civilians, seize particular points on the map and fend off waves of reinforcements, all within a tight turn limit. (There is a difficulty that removes the time restriction, if that’s a dealbreaker for you.)

Whether that pace feels overwhelming will likely hinge on how often you use training maps. The game offers a rotating selection of ten training maps, and these are much more generic “defeat all the baddies in your own time” fare. Challenging one costs 1,000 gold, allowing you to grind up units’ levels if you want but making it come at the expense of upgrades and weapons.

There’s also a change that makes it a bit more tolerable to bring underleveled units into battle. The first Dark Deity felt built around its “grave wounds” system: permanent stat decreases instead of permanent death. This sequel makes that less severe, with penalties that last for the next chapter or so. You’ll still try to avoid it, but most of the time it happened for us, we found ourselves shrugging and just taking the penalty for a map.

Dark Deity 2 comes much closer than its predecessor to nailing its target aesthetic. The first one had excellently animated attacks, but the maps were less professional (even after a much-needed revamp) and the interface didn’t follow the pixel art look. This time around, the map sprites are charming, the environments feel like they’re done with more care and there’s even a pixel font in the menus that largely fits in with the resolution of the other art. The character art is still jarringly high-resolution, unfortunately, but it largely gets away with it.

That said, there are still elements of the game that show that it’s a small-team Game Maker project. Maps have an extra row and column that you can’t reach but your cursor can move into, losing itself off the screen. We don’t have an exact answer why, but we’d guess it’s a workaround for some limitation of the game engine. The enemy ranges, which many players keep on permanently as a nice help, don’t update with reinforcements or when terrain changes, so you have to toggle it off and on again like you’re running IT support. And the “ally” movements are often less than ideal, either idling out of the way instead of helping or running full-speed into enemy territory to their inevitable deaths.

Dark Deity 2 is far from perfect, and it could use a few rounds of post-launch polish. But it’s a strong step forward from the first game’s base, adding and refining smartly to make something within their means that’s still engaging to play. We hope they’re able to keep delivering games like this in the future!

Dark Deity 2, developed by Fire & Axe and published by Indie.io, launches March 24, 2025 on Steam.

The post Review: Dark Deity 2 Refines Both Its Pixels and Its Tactics appeared first on Siliconera.

Trainer’s Pokemon have long been a feature of the Pokemon Trading Card Game, tracing back to the first generation’s Gym Heroes expansion. Still, it’s been a while since we’ve seen them in quite this number! Journey Together is built around four trainers from recent generations: N, Iono, Lillie and Hop.

Iono, the Paldea gym leader, has previously been the reason for a jump in demand for Pokemon TCG releases, so her inclusion here makes sense. Her iconic partner, Bellibolt, gets a starring role as her ex with a big 230-damage attack. That said, it’s maybe better as a supporting creature. Its ability lets you play as many energy to Iono’s Pokemon as you want, which is amazing, and its attack can only be used every second turn. But maybe it’s a finisher.

Weirdly, we think Iono’s Voltorb might be better unevolved? The Electrode has some normal moves and an explosion that takes it out and is a coin flip whether it takes the opponent with it. Voltorb, conversely, has an attack that increases in damage by 20 for every electric energy on your Iono’s Pokemon. Also, the art is just way cooler. It’s joined by a Kilowattrel that can discard an energy to draw up to six cards every turn, and a Stadium card, Levincia, that lets you retrieve those energy to your hand.

Hop, the companion character from Sword & Shield, may seem like a sort of boring choice given his cadre of creatures. But in practice, that’s sort of fun? The whole group is helped by support effects and Trainer cards to make some otherwise-middling attacks a bit better. Hop’s Snorlax is key to the whole group, with an Extra Helpings ability that increases attack damage by 30. The Postwick stadium does the same thing, and though you can’t use multiple Extra Helpings effects at the same time, it can stack with Postwick. And his own Tool card, Hop’s Choice Band, once again increases damage by 30 while also decreasing energy cost by one.

Hop’s Zacian ex is his sweeper, with a one-energy attack that can do 30 to the active opponent and a bench target at the same time and a four-energy attack that again only works every two turns. His Corviknight can also deal damage to the active and bench simultaneously. And his Dubwool can move something to the active spot when it’s played.

Lillie’s Journey Together Pokemon largely seem built to bring back the idea of Fairy Pokemon to the TCG without, you know, actually bringing them back. Lillie’s Clefairy gives all Dragons a Psychic weakness, restoring the role of Fairy type as the foil to that dominant opposition. Well, it was dominant in the video games? With its double energy type requirements, dragons haven’t exactly been in charge of the card game recently, especially without Double Dragon Energy. She also gets the benefit of Lillie’s Pearl, a Tool card that makes her Pokemon pay out one fewer Prize card.

Lillie’s Ribombee lets you lure out basics from the opponent’s hand, which combos well with Clefairy’s attack: Full Moon Rondo, which does 20 extra damage for each creature on both benches. But truly, that attack is basically the only usable one in the bunch! So it’d be hard to build a deck around just it.

The star of the Journey Together collection clearly is N, though. The Black & White character ties Hop for the most representation in the set with 13 distinct cards, and they’re all across the energy and power spectrum. His iconic partner, Zoroark, is here, though it really could use some help. Its Ability lets you discard a card to draw two every turn, and its two-energy Night Joker attack lets you use a benched N’s Pokemon’s attack. That attack could be Virtuous Flame, a 170-damage move from Reshiram that otherwise requires four energy of two additional types. Or Powerful Rage, its other move, that attacks for double its current damage.

It could also be an attack from N’s Darmanitan, which can use Back Draft and deal 30 damage for each energy in the opponent’s discard pile. That could be effective later in the game? And since that attack in particular is colorless, it solves a bit of N’s energy problem: you need to build around Zoroark and feed it darkness energy, but that likely means not running the types for Reshiram to attack on its own, so there are going to need to be times when someone else can attack in a pinch.

In terms of Trainers, N has two helpful ones. N’s Castle is a Stadium that negates his retreat costs, and Item card N’s PP Up lets you play an extra energy from the discard pile. He also has a smattering of other Pokemon that don’t synergize particularly well, like Joltik and Purrloin and Klinklang.

While more Trainer’s Pokemon are on the horizon in upcoming sets, these are likely the only ones for these specific trainers anytime soon, so it’s highly doable to judge whether they’ll be strong enough to play as a group. In our estimation, that’s… basically everyone but Lillie. Sorry, Lillie? There’s not a lot of room for deck-building creativity, as the other three sort of have one viable configuration and strategy, but still.

The latest Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion, Scarlet & Violet: Journey Together, launches March 28, 2025. Stay tuned to Siliconera for a breakdown of the set’s best cards, or check out our Pokemon TCG archive for more about the game.

The post Pokemon TCG Journey Together Expansion Brings Partners to Battle appeared first on Siliconera.

Though it’s always been some part of the franchise’s DNA, more and more of the Like a Dragon games increasingly operate on an ethos of “why not.” Instead of flipping a switch between gritty crime drama and hijinks, the latest releases spend almost all their time on the silly side. So given that, why not make Majima a pirate captain? Someone at Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio inevitably made a joke about his eyepatch and here we are with Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii, an entire adventure bent around the goal of making that joke work.

So yep, the Mad Dog of Shimano washes up on a beach with amnesia and becomes a real-fake pirate in a world where a gambling scheme has made old ships and cannons all the rage. Like previous side-story releases, Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is made to recycle the environments from the main games and offer something a little different. So in addition to Infinite Wealth’s Honolulu, the new release tacks on sailing and a few islands and makes traversing between locations a big part of the draw.

The narrative is framed as Majima recounting his story months later, making any inaccuracies and embellishments for the sake of fun gameplay totally intended. The first big opponent is a pirate with the less-than-fierce name Keith, and the number of times the game manages to put a full-screen, serious-looking “Keith” interstitial up on screen tells you everything you need to know about the game’s tone. Augmenting this feel is the mix of Yakuza rock with pirate instrumentation and shanties. You can tell the audio team had fun with this one.

Sailing is fairly simple, and much like random ruffians on the games’ streets, you’ll have small ship fights along your way too. These battles, as well as more momentous ones in boss fights and coliseum matches, serve as the primary game progression. You collect crew to operate cannons and machine guns, as well as some to be part of boarding party combat. Money and materials can craft and upgrade better weapons. Pirate renown gates progression. All the side activities feed into at least one of these systems. It ultimately works to tie the game together, in our experience, as everything feels like it’s at least a bit productive.

On land, Majima has access to two combat styles. Mad Dog feels like an offering to old fans, recreating his punching and slicing sort of approach from older games. But most of the work feels like it went into Sea Dog, his pirate-y style. You have swords you can throw, a powerful gunshot and, our favorite, a grappling hook. You can use this to essentially teleport across the fight to a distant foe, and since so many enemies back away and shoot guns, this speeds things up considerably.

The hook is also used outside of battle to retrieve items or swing up to roofs and other platforms for hidden treasures. The generous lock-on function really makes fishing or bug collection easy, and we appreciate that the dev team didn’t insist on making it a test of skill. It’s also not the only unlikely battle accessory you’ll find along the way, but we won’t spoil anything.

While there’s no Animal Crossing island or Pokemon spoof this time, there’s a decent collection of side activities. Of note are the return of Dragon Kart and a nice selection of Master System games! But it’s a bit thinner, for sure. It puts its new ideas largely into the main quest sequences, like ill-advised attempts at 2D sword-fighting and laser-dodging platforming. Hey, they don’t work well, but they’re short! And that makes them tolerable.

Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is fairly long by side game standards, though length will vary wildly depending on how much you get into the side stuff. You can probably power through the five story chapters in 15-20 hours if you only pause to gather what you need, and if you prefer more challenging combat to grinding for power and health upgrades. If you invest fully in completing every single thing? We wouldn't be surprised if you get 45 to 50 out of it. We landed right around 35, working through most main activities while only dabbling in the staple minigames like karaoke and gambling and such.

Without the, ahem, near-infinite wealth of content of its predecessor, Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is unlikely to be anyone’s favorite Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio game. But as a side story? It’s a great time.

Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii launches February 21, 2025 for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series, Xbox One and PC.

The post Review: Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is a Seafaring Side Quest appeared first on Siliconera.

Whether you’ve managed to get your hands on packs of the new elusive set or not, there are a lot of Pokemon TCG Prismatic Evolutions cards you might want! As always, though, it depends on why you want them. It’s probably the card game with the highest percentage of collectors that never play, but hey, some of us do! Anyway, let’s get into it, shall we?

The coolest Pokemon TCG Prismatic Evolutions cards

The first card we need to mention is the full-art Palafin ex. It's drawn by Tetsuo Hara, the co-creator of Fist of the North Star, and it shows a wild spirit that's not common in Pokemon TCG art. And there's no big manga connection, but we've really enjoyed the works of recent TCG debut Yukihiro Tada. The latest is a cycle of Ogerpon ex cards, and we're big fans of the head-on approach and sharp color work.

We also appreciate the continued trend of legendary creatures at lower rarities to make pack openings a bit more fun. Shaymin, Regigigas, Heatran, Suicune and Groudon all fit the bill this time around.

The most interesting Prismatic Evolutions cards

A first in the TCG, Eevee ex can evolve into another ex card as if it were a normal Eevee. While we sort of wish that were true with all basic ex cards, as it opens up depth and possibilities, it definitely fits into the appeal of Eevee. The ex versions of Flareon, Vaporeon and Jolteon in the set complement this, with each sporting an attack that uses their three types of energy to do massive damage. The other evolutions have three-energy-type attacks too, but they don't overlap in the same way, making them a bit tougher to play together.

The most meta-relevant Prismatic Evolutions cards

A new Festival Lead user, Seaking, could see some use? Its attack, Rapid Draw, is a one colorless energy move that deals 60 damage and lets you draw two cards. And the ability letting you use it twice a turn? Tempting.

On the subject of card draw, Amarys is a new supporter that lets you draw four cards instead of the usual three. The cost? You'll have to discard your hand if you have five or more cards at the end of the turn. But since this game is usually about expending resources more than stockpiling them, that's probably worth the risk. Similarly, Larry's Skill makes you discard your hand, but if you're already empty? You get the Pokemon, Supporter and Basic Energy of your choice.

Let’s also cover the new ACE SPEC offerings! Joining a suite of reprints is Max Rod, which grabs five Pokemon or energy from your discard, and Treasure Tracker, which fills your hand with Tool cards. Given how strong ACE SPEC cards are, these might not be popular options, but we're sure they have a niche.

The cutest Prismatic Evolutions cards

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Eeveelutions take center stage in terms of being adorable, but there are a few little pals joining them. The Buneary and Slowpoke are endearing? But yeah, you're probably here for all the Eevee prints. Our favorite is the Elite Trainer Box promo, which shows it asleep on a rug surrounded by toys.

The latest Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion, Scarlet & Violet — Prismatic Evolutions, is available in stores starting January 17, 2025. If you’re looking for it on shelves, you might need to be patient; The Pokemon Company International has acknowledged that high demand for the set may lead to shortages, but it says it’s working to print more as quickly as possible. For more on the Pokemon TCG, including an overview of this expansion, check out our archive.

The post Pokemon TCG: The Best Prismatic Evolutions Cards appeared first on Siliconera.

If you’ve heard anything about the new Pokemon Trading Card Game set, it’s likely these two points: that it’s centered around Eevee, and that demand has wildly outstripped initial supply. The first thing’s definitely true, and anecdotal evidence suggests the second is too! So given that it may be a bit before you get your hands on some Pokemon TCG Prismatic Evolutions expansion packs, why not read up on what it’s all about?

So yes, the set’s primarily about Eevee and its evolutions, specifically in the latest game generation’s Tera variants. They’re all here in both regular and gem-like forms, so there’s a lot to collect! Even the base Eeveelutions are rare, though, so don’t expect each pack to be chock full of them. If you're looking for Eevee stuff in particular, your best bet is through the promotional cards headlining the set’s special boxes. There are collections, blister packs and surprise boxes, and each comes with at least one Eeveelution. They're separate from the ones in the set, though.

Prismatic Evolutions also serves to collect some of Japan’s other miscellaneous cards and promotional releases, leading to a few lines of things that don’t really align with Eevee or the newest games. There’s a batch of old Professors and Black Belts with different art for different regions. There are also cameos here from sets past! The Festival Lead users like Dipplin see reprints. Ancient and Future are here. Whether to pad out the non-rare list or perhaps as a consideration of limited play, the set has its fair share of encores.

The demand for the set suggests that maybe they didn't need help enticing collectors, but they did it anyway with some new ball-themed foil variants. It's uncommon enough to find the Poke Ball version of a card, but the Master Ball foil will be even tougher to find. We did manage to pull a Dreepy one, and it looks nice enough. The best part of both variants is the etching on the art. This is the sort of treatment we'd get for a secret rare, but that look within the conventional layout of a standard card looks nice without venturing into overkill like some of those unreadable rarities.

With the reprints, miscellaneous promo inclusions and absurd numbers of Eevee varieties. Prismatic Evolutions is a strange set to get your mind around. It’s much more of a set about chasing cool rares than it is one for opening one pack and enjoying all the inclusions, and we can’t imagine it being particularly useful for limited play given how all-over-the-place its ideas are. But there are without a doubt some cool cards to pull and show off!

The latest Pokemon Trading Card Game expansion, Scarlet & Violet — Prismatic Evolutions, became available in stores starting January 17, 2025. If you’re looking for it on shelves, you might need to be patient; The Pokemon Company International has acknowledged that high demand for the set may lead to shortages, but it says it’s working to print more as quickly as possible. Stay tuned to Siliconera for a breakdown of the expansion’s best cards.

The post Pokemon TCG Prismatic Evolutions Set Is Full of Rare Finds appeared first on Siliconera.

Okay! We’ve named our system-specific winners for PlayStation, Switch, Xbox and PC, but it’s all been leading to this: our overall winner. What is the Siliconera Game of the Year 2024? Read on!

These awards represent the consensus of the Siliconera staff. For more of the year’s award selections, check out our Game of the Year 2024 archive.

Balatro

Balatro is one of those games that hooks you in an instant. The moment you encounter your first Jokers, the appeal of the game and its potential is abundantly clear, and continued play shows that solo developer LocalThunk knew exactly how to see those ideas through. Writers love to bandy about the idea of “setting a new standard for the genre,” but never has that been truer than with Balatro and roguelike deckbuilders: from now on, every new game has to be worth playing instead of another round of Balatro, and that’s a high bar to clear.

Mouthwashing

Mouthwashing is a relatively short experience, clocking in at just a couple of hours. Still, it packs so much psychological horror and body horror into that time to rival its passive-media equivalents. We won’t talk about the game’s twists to avoid spoilers, but you’ll certainly want to! And that’s the hallmark of a successful narrative. (For more on the game, check out Stephanie's review.)

Winner: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

Well, we called it. Rebirth revitalized our faith in Final Fantasy with a game that’s fantastic on its own and only enhanced by knowledge of the older releases. And though some titles took a serious run at it, nothing managed to topple Square Enix’s gem off the top of the Siliconera podium. Congratulations to our 2024 Game of the Year!

What is your overall Game of the Year 2024? Let us know in the comments!

The post Siliconera’s Overall Game of the Year 2024 appeared first on Siliconera.

The reports of the Nintendo Switch’s death are greatly exaggerated. 2024 brought even more great games to the platform, be them excellent remasters or truly fresh ideas. But which won Siliconera’s Switch Game of the Year 2024?

These awards represent the consensus of the Siliconera staff. Multiplatform games are considered on the platform for which they received the most staff support. For more of the year’s award selections, check out our Game of the Year 2024 archive.

Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door

This remake of the GameCube classic showed a new generation of players just how good the Paper Mario series was — and could be again — when allowed to sport fun characterization and mechanical depth. It’s one of the best role-playing games of all time, lovingly restored to play just as we remember it. It certainly earned our 10/10 score.

Unicorn Overlord

A spiritual successor to Ogre Battle, Vanillaware’s Unicorn Overlord has a nuanced world, engaging combat and that signature Vanillaware art we know and (usually) love. The developer generally hasn’t done sequels, but we’d really love to see what it could do if it built atop this work! Still, even if that doesn’t happen, it’s nice to see a game like this again.

Winner: The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom

A Zelda game starring Zelda herself — that is, one acknowledged by Nintendo — has been a long time coming for fans who have been clamoring for it for ages. It surely is its own thing, as Grezzo’s follow-up to the Link’s Awakening remake and not a sprawling 3D adventure, but it’s a great little toy box with tons of puzzles to solve and lots of pieces to try to solve them. Congratulations, Echoes of Wisdom!

What is your Switch Game of the Year 2024? Let us know in the comments!

The post Siliconera’s Switch Game of the Year 2024 appeared first on Siliconera.

In a world in which most big titles make it to lots of platforms, the PC has become a haven for indie projects to shine before they get the resources to spread further. That shows in this year’s PC Game of the Year finalists!

These awards represent the consensus of the Siliconera staff. Multiplatform games are considered on the platform for which they received the most staff support. For more of the year’s award selections, check out our Game of the Year 2024 archive.

1000xResist

If your game is so exclusively narrative-focused that there’s not much else, that puts a heck of a lot of pressure on that narrative. But hey, pressure makes diamonds! It’s hard to put 1000xResist down, as it captures your attention and won’t let go until its story is fully told. (See Jenni's full review of the game for more on what makes the game so special.)

Crow Country

Snipperclips developer SFB Games’ love letter to PS1-era survival horror, Crow Country shows both a profound knowledge and appreciation of those games and a desire to tell its own sort of story within those confines. It nails the look and feel, but it doesn’t feel like a cheap imitation. Many recent indie homages have shown just how difficult it can be to thread that needle. (Check out Daniel's review.)

Winner: Balatro

There are some who scoff at the accolades Balatro has been earning. We’re guessing most of those people just haven’t played it! The game has joined the rarefied air once occupied by Tetris alone, games that you encounter and immediately realize you’ll be playing for the rest of your life. Congratulations, Balatro! You’re the 2024 Siliconera PC Game of the Year!

What is your PC Game of the Year 2024? Let us know in the comments!

The post Siliconera’s PC Game of the Year 2024 appeared first on Siliconera.

Microsoft has made significant strides in recent years, bringing more of the games that we cover here at Siliconera to its platform. That shows in our Xbox Game of the Year 2024 nominees! Check out this year’s honored titles.

These awards represent the consensus of the Siliconera staff. Multiplatform games are considered on the platform for which they received the most staff support. For more of the year’s award selections, check out our Game of the Year 2024 archive.

Persona 3 Reload

While it’s famously missing some stuff, Persona 3 Reload still manages to be the best version of the much-beloved game. The signature Persona style shines with the added visual fidelity, and new features help you to see more story choices and keep more party members caught up. (Read our review for more!)

Dragon Quest III HD-2D Remake

Dragon Quest III is a beloved entry in the franchise and the centerpiece of the Erdrick saga, but its original presentation left it inaccessible to a lot of today’s players. The slick HD-2D aesthetic, combined with a host of quality-of-life improvements and updates? They make this iteration of the game the perfect way to play it. (Shaun's review delves deeper into these things!)

Winner: Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth

Kiryu and Kasuga’s Hawaiian adventure has all the fun, drama and just plain game inside this game to make it a can’t-miss regardless of whether you’re a long-time Yakuza fan or just showing up now. You can get emotionally invested in its narrative if you’d like, but hey, if not, there’s basically whole Pokemon and Animal Crossing games in here to play too. In many ways, it’s a culmination of the franchise to date! We’re curious to see where Like a Dragon goes from here.

What is your Xbox Game of the Year 2024? Let us know in the comments!

The post Siliconera’s Xbox Game of the Year 2024 appeared first on Siliconera.

It’s that time again! Over the next few days, Siliconera is celebrating the best of 2024, with platform awards each day until the overall winner next week. Read on for our PlayStation Game of the Year selections!

These awards represent the consensus of the Siliconera staff. Multiplatform games are considered on the platform for which they received the most staff support. For more of the year’s award selections, check out our Game of the Year 2024 archive.

Astro Bot

While Sony’s dismantling of its Japanese studios has been heartbreaking, its last group standing put in the work and showed just how good games could be. But hey, we’re not kidding ourselves; we’re probably just getting this game and not a full rebuild of what was. Still, what a game it is! The best platformer without Mario in the title (and better than a lot of them with it), Astro Bot takes the warm fuzzies of nostalgia and surrounds them with well-crafted levels and super-polished mechanics. The little bot’s previous adventures have been wonderful, too! But this is the first one without any need for asterisks: a great, full game for everyone.

Metaphor: ReFantazio

The combat and characters of Metaphor paper over the game’s many rough narrative elements, building a high fantasy take on Persona that holds up well to lofty expectations. (And the soundtrack is of course stellar.) It’s familiar enough to make long-time Atlus-heads happy, while sporting a fresh enough setting to add variety to the studio’s catalog. (Check out Stephanie's review for a deeper dive into Metaphor.)

Winner: Final Fantasy VII Rebirth

While we briefly considered giving the award directly to in-world card game Queen’s Blood, the whole of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth is worthy of our PlayStation Game of the Year 2024 honor. This excellent return to the world of Square Enix’s most famous game is filled with love and care, meeting (and subverting) the expectations of longtime fans. (But yeah, also, you should definitely check out Queen’s Blood.)

What is your PlayStation Game of the Year 2024? Let us know in the comments!

The post Siliconera’s PlayStation Game of the Year 2024 appeared first on Siliconera.

RIKI 8Bit Game Collection is one of those releases that puts a lot of the information right there in the title: it’s a Famicom compilation — a Famicompilation, if you will — and it’s spearheaded by manga artist RIKI. These are recent releases rather than original licensed titles, and some of them are more music than game. We’ve enjoyed a lot of these in their original forms, and we’ve been spending time with this new collection to let you know what to expect!

Included are five games — “games” — Kira Kira Star Night, Astro Ninja Man DX, 8Bit Music Power, 8Bit Music Power Final, and 8Bit Music Power Encore. We use the quotes there because the last three are essentially albums with visualizers rather than something with gameplay, but they’re very cool versions of the things they are for sure.

The 8Bit Music Power releases, which have launched sporadically since 2017, contain too many composers to list. The general idea is that it’s a compilation album from all the chiptune artists RIKI could get to join in. Accompanying these is a suite of cute animations, as well as an interface for manipulating the NES’ sound channels in real time. The first one has a few more interactive elements, but the last two smartly focus on the tunes themselves.

At a certain point, bringing these releases back into modernity would defeat the purpose. After all, much of the impressive appeal of the cartridges is what they get decades-old hardware to do! That said, the crucial thing here is accurate audio emulation, and in our time with the collection, it seems faithful enough to our ears. It’s admittedly not quite as cool a way to experience it as booting up an old Famicom, but that’s not really an option most have.

Since the games have a native 4-by-3 aspect ratio, the game shows bits of RIKI's art from each title by default in the vertical letterboxing. You can change or remove these, and even stretch the display if you're a monster, but we don't mind the initial configuration. One option we wish were there is a zoom crop, since a lot of time the bottom of the 8Bit Music Power screens are just the game title and the top could have some room for truncation. The result could look nice, we think?

Kira Kira Star Night and Astro Ninja Man DX are indeed games, but as games go, they're pretty close to visualizers too. In Kira Kira Star Night, you collect star icons as they fall from the sky in various formations. The appeal of the game is letting the soundtrack wash over you and watching the elaborate backgrounds and animations.

Astro Ninja Man DX, the latest release of the bunch, is a single-screen shooter in the vein of early-’80s arcade classics. You gain more and more… ninja astronaut silhouettes?... and shoot more projectiles at once to take down enemies. This again feels more like a way to enjoy the music, though the formula is closer to a familiar score-chasing arcade game than Kira Kira Star Night.

While the games themselves won’t hold your attention for too long, RIKI 8Bit Game Collection is a handy little app to keep on your Switch for its unbeatable soundtrack. And hey, it’s also a lot cheaper than buying cartridge versions, so it’s an accessible way for those who’ve been interested for a while.

RIKI 8Bit Game Collection launches December 12, 2024 on the Nintendo Switch for $19.99. It was developed by RIKI and City Connection and published in the West by Embracer subsidiary Clear River Games.

The post RIKI 8Bit Game Collection Is a Rockin’ Compilation Album Compilation appeared first on Siliconera.