Wailing Heights (Xbox One, 2018)

Wailing Heights

Developed/Published by Outsider Games

Released for Xbox One (8/15/2018)

Also on Linux/Mac/PC/PS4

 

 

Wailing Heights is the first and only release for the Xbox One from Northern Ireland-based developer Outsider Games. It's a point & click game with an interesting premise that has you playing as a ghost who can "body-hop" to take control of other characters in the world. Featuring some detailed high-definition illustrations that looked like they popped right off a comic book, Wailing Heights certainly possesses some promise. Let's get right into it and find out if it's as cool as it sounds...

In Wailing Heights, you take control of the soul of Francis Finklestein, who was once the manager of a famous rock band from Great Britain called the Deadbeats. You've recently perished and the afterworld is a strange place by the name of Wailing Heights. There are no regular people in Wailing Heights, which is inhabited by a bunch of monsters. These aren't your regular scary monsters though, instead you'll meet hipster vampires, vegan werewolves and soulful zombies. Finklestein is a ghost himself, which explains his ability to hop into the bodies of other citizens.  The main objective as you go about exploring Wailing Heights is to find each member of the Deadbeats band and bring them together for a reunion show.

King's Heir: Rise to the Throne (Xbox One, 2018)

King's Heir: Rise to the Throne

Developed by Cordelia Games

Published by Artifex Mundi

Released for Xbox One (12/14/2018)

Also on Linux/Mac/PC/PS4/Switch

 

King's Heir: Rise to the Throne was developed by Cordelia Games, the same ones who brought us Path of Sin: Greed, which I found enjoyable enough to check out their earlier effort. This game was previously released as Kingmaker: Rise to the Throne and for some reason the later ports of the game had the title changed to King's Heir: Rise to the Throne. Both names are equally forgettable and I couldn't figure out why the title had to be changed, but they're both the same game so it really doesn't matter in the long run. Enough about the title, let's look at King's Heir and see how it plays...

King's Heir is exactly what you'd expect from Artifex Mundi if you've played any of their other releases: a mixture of the point & click and hidden object genres. The story involves a prince who fell in love with and married a poor girl, which the king did not approve of at all. The king sends the prince off to battle and plans to drive the poor girl away while he's out, which backfires when the prince is killed in battle. The prince's wife later died after delivering their baby, which has now gone missing. You take control of a royal knight who must try to find the missing heir, help them regain the crown and take over the throne. It's a cool setup, but unfortunately the characters and dialogue just aren't all that interesting and I found myself really struggling to care about the plot. While the story is a bit of a letdown, it was at least sufficient enough to provide reason to continue forward to the next puzzle. 

 

Woodle Tree Adventures (Xbox One, 2019)

Woodle Tree Adventures

Developed by Fabio Ferrara

Published by Chubby Pixel

Released for Xbox One (5/8/2019)

Also on Linux/Mac/PC/PS4/Switch

Woodle Tree Adventures was originally created by a single developer, Fabio Ferrara, and was released for PC back in  2014. The Xbox One version was ported and published by Chubby Pixel in May 2019. Woodle Tree Adventures bills itself as an old-school platformer that will take you back to good old days of Banjo Kazooie and Mario 64 with lots of jumping and collecting to be done. Without further ado, let's delve into Woodle Tree Adventures and see if it can deliver on its lofty promises of taking me back with a blast of nostalgia...

The story in Woodle Tree Adventures involves the great tree tasking you with finding 3 fairy tears on each stage in order to restore peace to the forest (or something like that). There are 6 worlds to explore, with 2 bonus levels that open up once you've collected enough berries, which act as the games collectibles. There's a decent amount of variety to the stages that no 2 feel alike, though they all feature the same task of finding the 3 tears and then taking them to the exit. In addition to the platforming and collecting, there's also some very basic combat that involves your tree character smacking enemies with his leaf. Initially, the combat feels clunky and you have to be practically on top of enemies before they drop. As you collect enough berries, you'll eventually unlock acceess to new leaves of a different color. These upgraded leaves will fire projectiles, which help make the combat more tolerable than trying to swing the default leaf right next to the enemies.

Concept Destruction (Xbox One, 2020)

Concept Destruction

Developed by Thinice Games

Published by Ratalaika Games

Released for Xbox One (5/20/2020)

Also on PC/PS4/PS5

 

Concept Destruction comes to us from Thinice Games, a one-man development studio out of Barcelona, Spain. Published by Ratalaika Games, the game features cardboard cars squaring off in arenas, destruction derby-style. It's an interesting concept and retails for a reasonable $4.99, so without wasting any more of our precious, limited time, let's get right into the review...

Concept Destruction features some rather simple graphics, but the textures are sharp and everything is easy to distinguish. The concept of racing around in cardboard cars is unique and the cars look the part, right down to the corrugated edges. There's an impressive damage system where the cardboard will react to where they are smashed. 

 

For this review, the game was played on an Xbox One X and the frame-rate dipped frequently when you played with maximum amount of opponents. While the game is still totally playable, this was worth pointing out and you might want to hesitate if you're playing this on anything less than an Xbox One X, since performance may become an issue on the lower end systems. This game is optimized for the new Series consoles, so I'm quite certain the game runs silky smooth on those systems (if I had one I'd be happy to test, but like most of you I've still been unable to find one as of May 2021!). The sound design is what you'd expect, with the sound of motors and cars bashing into each other being the main things you'll hear while playing. The music consists of some generic heavy metal that does a good job of fitting the destruction theme. The menus in the game are easy to navigate, rounding out an overall solid presentation here.