STAYING IN
been washed to the shore for today’s consoles. The end result? A mixed bag. While one should expect gameplay to remain virtually the same, some elements feel dated and could have been refreshed this time round. For example, the dialogue is super repetitive, as though the original catchphrases were ported across 17 years later. Loading simply to enter a small room also feels like something we shouldn’t expect in 2020. There is also a new horde mode to play with friends, where you confront a series of robotic enemies but it’s bit forgettable. For what it’s worth, this is very much a graphical upgrade, which does hit the spot and the main game play is still good fun.
SKIP TO THE ENd: Graphic upgrade is the only real big change.
RUINER
Platform: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PC
Genre: Action
Price: £17.99
★★★★
After two years, Ruiner gets a Nintendo Switch release and has retained much of the dark cyberpunk look that gave it good reviews the first time round. For those unfamiliar, it’s set in the year 2091 in the cyber metropolis Rengkok controlled by the Heaven conglomerate, as you attempt to rescue your brother from their clutches. It is as bloody as before and as challenging - filled with fastpaced violent combat, and a really wide choice of weapons and skills, which enable you to spice things up. Then there’s the strong soundtrack which adds some real oomph. Overall, the game works well in this handheld format. SKIP TO THE END: The bloodiness continues on the Switch, working well in handheld mode, with all the style and gritty music that worked the first time round.
POKEMON CAFE MIX Platform: Nintendo Switch, Android, iOS
Genre: Puzzle
Price: Free (with in-game purchases) ★★★★
As the name suggests, Pokemon Cafe Mix is about you managing your very own eatery for the Pokemon population. Every order is depicted in the form of a puzzle in which you have to link up matching Pokemon icons to clear the puzzle. This is entirely a touch screen only game. The tutorial gently eases you into the system, before letting you loose with more pressing matters like Cafe Skills and Golden Acorns. Be careful with your lives though lose any of the five you’re given and you have to wait half an hour for each to replenish, if you want to stick to free play of course. In-app purchases are not forced on you they are there if you want to buy things like extra lives and power-ups, but it is possible to play most of the game without needing to part with cash.
SKIP TO THE END: This game isn’t difficult and is skewed to younger players, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t fun for any Pokemon fan especially considering it’s free.
GAME CHART
1. The Last Of Us Part II
2. Bravely Second: End Layer
3. SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle For Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated
4. Ring Fit Adventure
5. Animal Crossing: New Horizons
6. Fifa 20
7. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
8. Grand Theft Auto V
9. The Last Of Us: Remastered
10. Minecraft
● Ukie Games Charts (c), compiled by GfK
Any More Than You Want recalls Beatles-influenced 90s Britpop.
What’s The Matter features bursts of flute, as Cadien Lake James sings “All I wanna see is that sparkle in your eye” and Whistle In The Wind (End Of Everything) is slower, with a yacht rock sound including sax break, and laid-back vocals.
Their natural habitat is on stage and their tour with Car Seat Headrest was cancelled, but they’re heading to Australia in the autumn, and with luck can perhaps play these songs live in the UK next year.
Matthew George
WILLIE NELSON - FIRST ROSE OF SPRING
★★★
The grizzled drawl of a singing voice, the yearning of a pedal steel, the boxy sound of an acoustic guitar: it must be Willie Nelson!
First Rose Of Spring sees Shotgun Willie almost entirely in reflective mode, culminating in a lush version of the standard Yesterday When I Was
Young. In fact, a number of songs reference first love; but for a saccharine streak, the record would be a fine companion to later Dylan albums such as Time Out Of Mind.
But Nelson’s not completely lost his edge.
On We Are The Cowboys, he takes aim at one of his favourite all-American targets: cowboys (see 2009’s Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond Of Each Other), with lyrics such as “Cowboys are average American people/Texicans, Mexicans, black men and Jews”, that probably still cause a frisson in the Midwest.
The sole exception to this balladheavy album is the puckish The Only Hell My Mama Ever Raised, whose protagonist’s backstory is decidedly similar to our present singer’s.
He most successfully pulls at the heartstrings on the beautifully elegiac Stealing Home, but elsewhere his sentimentality becomes a little cloying.
Rachel Farrow