Nelson Schneider - wrote on 01/18/20 at 04:30 PM CT

At MeltedJoystick, we’ve been aware of the death of console gaming since 2017. Sure, we may occasionally partake in some brief necromantic dalliances – Chris with his PlayStation 4 and me with my dusty, offline Switch – but for the most part, we’ve been quite happy with modern era PC gaming.

However, recently the...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 01/12/20 at 02:33 PM CT

When the newest entries in the ‘Pokemon’ franchise of beginner/casual RPGs were released in November 2019, there was a major fan uproar. In a decision that could only be described as “questionable,” perpetual ‘Pokemon’ developer, GameFreak, released “Pokemon Sword Version” and “Pokemon Shield Version” with a gutted National Pokedex, leaving hundreds of pocket monsters on the c...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 01/04/20 at 03:35 PM CT

The monthly ‘Backlog: The Embiggening’ articles I assemble for MeltedJoystick are usually depressing enough. But I received a special request from a reader to ring in the new year with a list of ‘kinda-sorta-confirmed-we’ll-get-back-to-you-on-that’ game releases coming over the entirety of 2020. The big games journalism sites would just dump everything in a big pile and point excitedly,...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/29/19 at 03:40 PM CT

The Boring ‘20s are right around the corner, and as a new year and a new decade prepare to land upon us like so much parasite-riddled excrement from an unwell ruminant, it’s somewhat peaceful to soak-in the tiny, insignificant January Games Industry release schedule. Indeed, the Two-Faced God, Janus, whose name is attached to the first month of the year, symbolically looks forward and backwar...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/22/19 at 04:26 PM CT

Last year’s New Year’s Backlog Ablutions experiment turned out to be quite the success. While both Nick and Matt ultimately failed the challenge, this goal-setting activity succeeded in getting both of them to play more regularly.

However, Chris and I both found the challenge to be “2EZ,” so this year the MeltedJ...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/15/19 at 04:15 PM CT

Another year has come and gone, and through it all, the MeltedJoystick crew has been watching. Always watching… Once again, it’s time to take a look back at the year and praise the 5 biggest Wins for the gaming community while simultaneously *facepalming* over the 5 biggest Fails.

Top 5 Fails

5. Japan Bans Console Modding

Just when our friends in the Land ...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/07/19 at 03:50 PM CT

2019 was a challenging year. So many of the “hot, new releases” turned out to be “old things being ported to new platforms,” to the point where, if you pruned all the ports, remasters, and compilations out of the annual release summary, you really wouldn’t have much.

It was also a rough year for exclusives, with little in the way of Game of the Year material hitting any lone console...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/01/19 at 03:02 PM CT

Welcome back to another installment of the MeltedJoystick Review Round-Up. Here’s what our staff has reviewed since last time:

Nelson’s Reviews:
I admit, I cheated a little, as two of these reviews are for coop games that I finished on my own. But I was completely fed-up with people canceling, postponing, and...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 11/24/19 at 02:49 PM CT

December is upon us, as the Twenty-Teens prepare to give way to the Boring ‘20s. Shockingly, Publishers seem to have caught on – finally – that releasing games late in December is an exercise in futility. The result is a month with few releases, but all of them crammed in the first 10 days or so. It doesn’t really matter, though, as the continued dominance of ports means there’s not muc...

Nelson Schneider - wrote on 11/17/19 at 04:29 PM CT

Recently, I read a videogame review on another site and dared to delve into the dark underbelly that is the typical Internet comment section. Actually, I read comment sections with regularity, as they are a great way to keep in touch with the zeitgeist of the Mob at any given point in time. However, in this particular instance, I actua...