Year in Review: 2024
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/28/24 at 10:57 PM CT
Well, the world didn’t end last year, in spite of world politicians’ overwhelming levels of hubris and stupidity. Unfortunately, that means the MJ Crew had to come up with a year-end list including 5 things that didn’t completely suck about gaming and nerd culture in 2024… Hey, we tried. At least coming up with complete gaming disasters was still easy, so that’s a plus, right? (No, it’s not.)
Top 5 Fails
5. Square-Enix Makes No Money from Traditional Games
Oh, me, oh, my! While everyone in the MJ Crew loved Square-Enix at some point in the past, we’ve all come to feel a great sense of disdain and betrayal from the former titan of Japanese RPG publishing. We thought the company might get back on track after getting rid of its Western, non-RPG-related studios, but, alas, it was not to be. In 2024, Square-Enix revealed that they make next to nothing from “traditional” games – the type that used to be their bread and butter – with most of their revenue …
MeltedJoystick Games of the Year 2024
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/22/24 at 02:04 PM CT
This year seemed to fly by, even as quality videogame releases were few and far-between.
The good news, though, is that every single game that got the MJ Crew’s attention this year (in a good way) was the type of thing that would normally fly under the radar. These were mostly surprise releases with no (or next-to-no) hype buoying them up, while the most-hyped titles of the year fell-flat alongside “AAA” sales and profit margins.
Without further ado, MeltedJoystick proudly presents our selection of the 5 most intriguing releases of 2024:
1. Unicorn Overlord (Multi)
Vanillaware is back in grand style with a Fantastical blend of Turn-Based Roleplaying and Strategy games that managed to invoke the spirits of some of our favorite RPGs and Strategy games of all-time, while also being unafraid to do its own thing. Even better, It’s one of Vanillaware’s first attempts at branching out into multi-platform releases, allowing anyone with a 9th Gen console to experience the …
Are You Prepared for Dungeons X Dragons?
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/14/24 at 07:24 PM CT
The social downfall of Hasbro Wizards of the Coasts continues. Not merely satisfied with filling its last 4 years of book releases with enough DEI pandering to choke a hippogriff and purposefully alienating its core audience, the corporation recently released a 50th anniversary coffee table book with a foreword that included disparaging comments about the game’s co-creator and community folk hero, Gary Gygax. These comments weren’t anything surprising, of course: Simply more 2020’s accusations of misogyny, and the like… The types of basic insults the Woke crowd has leveled at pretty much EVERYONE in the last decade (including each other). However, something about these Social Justice platitudes appearing in an official product that was supposed to be a celebration of half-a-century of tabletop roleplaying really shook the hornets’ nest.
And when you shake a hornets’ nest hard enough, eventually the Queen will show up. In this case the “queen” in question is a …
Review Round-Up: Fall 2024
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/07/24 at 09:56 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:
Ugh. None of us really did much gaming this Fall. After my distasteful Summer filled with mediocrity and disappointment, I found myself avoiding starting a new game for well over a month. I fiddled around with some mobile games, which were all crap… except one, which has an identical PC version, so I went ahead and reviewed it. With the logjam broken, I played one of my most recent acquisitions and actually enjoyed it. Plus Chris and I finally finished a 12-hour coop game after more than half a year.
“Yu-Gi-Oh! Master Duel” – 4/5
“It Takes Two” – 4.5/5
“Unicorn Overlord” – 4.5/5
Chris’ Reviews:
Chris has, once again, had plenty of free time to play games, and finally tore himself away from zombie-schlock to play… some ‘Star Wars’ schlock… before going straight back to zombie-schlock with what …
Backlog: The Embiggening – December, 2024
Nelson Schneider - wrote on 12/01/24 at 09:20 PM CT
Welcome back to another look into the near future! It’s time to toll the ancient Yuletide carol once again, as the end of the year stares us in the face. Let’s take a look at what the constipated factories of Industrial Gaming are trying to squeeze out in a desperate attempts at generating a last-minute profit.
There are only half-a-dozen shovelware titles coming in December, and all of them are part of the Licensed Swill category. We’ve got games coming based on the ‘Indiana Jones’ movies, the ‘Fairy Tail’ anime, the ‘Rugrats’ cartoon, Funko-pop toys, and ‘Predator’ movie(s), and the scheduled holiday movie release of ‘Dog Man,’ based on the children’s comic books.
Some of that shovelware was old, but in the grand sorting scheme, being some form of Swill outranks being some form of port… and yes, there are ports. Thankfully, there are significantly fewer ports than usual, and, as a year-end twist, the Nintendo Switch is NOT the primary dumping …
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