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On an isolated stretch of road near a lonely lighthouse, two doctors march toward a cliffside mansion. They have been hired to rewrite the memories of an old man named Johnny Wyles in order to fulfill his dying wish of going to the moon. This isn’t a simple process, and as the doctors dive into Johnny’s mind and revisit several of his most important memories, they effectively relive his life in reverse. To the Moon may be light on gameplay, but it is a storytelling powerhouse that explores the themes of love and regret, and by the end, I felt encouraged to reflect on some of the most important relationships in my own life.

In 2011, designer Kan Gao released To the Moon onto PC. For Gao, its development was a way to work through several existential questions he'd encountered when he learned about a life-threatening condition facing his grandfather. That original 2011 release used the RPG Maker XP toolkit, which gave To the Moon an old-school charm, but Gao’s heartbreaking story was the real reason To the Moon stood out in a pack of pixelated indie darlings. Almost a decade later, To the Moon is on Switch, and the entire game has been rebuilt in Unity. The visual overhaul is slight, but it retains the old school charm of the original release.

Fortunately, the narrative has been completely untouched, because it remains incredibly powerful even a decade after release. As players explore Johnny’s sometimes mundane and often heartbreaking life, they encounter several strange mysteries. For example, why is his house full of origami rabbits? Why does his wife seem obsessed with lighthouses? And why does Johnny’s mother call him Joey? The revelations to these miniature mysteries are often as surprising as they are heartbreaking. You spend most of the game reading and clicking through text boxes, but the dialogue feels natural, and I was genuinely interested to see how Johnny’s big life events would play out. Overall, To the Moon’s narrative is well-paced and kept me glued to my Switch’s screen until I rolled credits.

While this experience is largely a narrative-based, it has a few gameplay moments. As you jump from one memory to the next, you collect a series of mementos of Johnny’s life. You do this by inspecting significant objects within the environment of each memory. These mementos aren’t hard to find, but collecting them sometimes feels like a chore since the process is so simple. Once you collect all five mementos in a given space, you complete a simple puzzle before jumping to the next memory. During these picture puzzles, you flip columns or rows of tiles until all the tiles are flipped over and you complete a picture. I got hung up on one of these puzzles, but for the most part, they are shallow experiences that don’t add much to the overall package.

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Fortunately, To the Moon’s narrative is so heartfelt and touching that its superficial puzzles didn’t diminish the adventure. To the Moon forced me to think about my own life and my own regrets and asked me what I would change if I could. I may not have a machine that can rewrite my memories, but if I did, I wouldn’t want to forget this game.

Score: 8.25

Summary: To the Moon may be light on gameplay, but it is a storytelling powerhouse that explores the themes of love and regret.

Concept: Two doctors attempt to fulfill a dying man’s last wish by reconfiguring his memories

Graphics: Inspired by 16-bit RPGs, To the Moon looks like an old SNES game

Sound: The soundtrack is a bit repetitive, but the main piano-driven theme is moving

Playability: You spend most of the game reading dialogue boxes, but a few simple puzzles interrupt the narrative

Entertainment: To the Moon is incredibly story-focused. Fortunately, that tale is powerful and heartfelt

Replay: Moderately low

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Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order's pre-order bonuses were pretty fun. Case in point: the Bee-D-1 skin. Not only is it a silly pun, but you get to dress BD-1 up like an adorable insect. Okay, he's just a yellow droid, but are you going to tell us that he isn't adorable?

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order's other pre-order bonuses are also available for everyone now, and these include:

• Orange Lightsaber Blade Color
• Mygeeto Campaign Lightsaber Hilt
• Umbaran Campaign Lightsaber Hilt
• Bee-D-1 Skin
• Gold Squadron Stinger Mantis Skin

If you still haven't finished one of last year's best games, now is the perfect time to jump back in.

[Source: Gamesradar]

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Last time on Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot...

Andrew Reiner and Alex Stadnik began their perilous journey, fighting the evil Saiyan Radditz and his quest to annihilate Earth. With the livestream chat on their side, the two gamers vanquished their formidable foes and continued their quest through CyberConnect2's newest RPG. Due to overwhelming support, the gamers decided to come back for another stream, answering every question they could while showing off more of the game. Did Reiner master his combos? Will Alex be more active in the chat? Find out these answers and more on this episode of New Gameplay Today Live!

We'll be going live tomorrow at 10 a.m. CT, so be sure to join us in the chat to have even more of your questions answered! 

Wanting more Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot goodness? Be sure to check out our original livestream where we played the first three hours of the game.

If you like today's show, you can subscribe over on YouTube, Twitch, Mixer, Twitter, or Facebook to get notified when we go live in the future! Thanks for watching!

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• Completing this assault rewards you with 500 reputation, 750 Artifact Power, and a Cache of the Amathet.
• Cache of the Amathet contains: 5500 Coalescing Visions, an item level 440 piece of gear, Corrupted Mementos, and 2000 gold.

• Down From the Sky - Kill 8 Amathet Bowmen in Uldum.
• The Sun King's Chosen - Defeat 4 rare Amathet enemies in Uldum.
• Champions of the Amathet - Kill 6 elite Amathet enemies in Uldum.

• Dune Buggy - Defeat Aqir Sandcrawler in a pet battle.
• Strategy: Unborn Val'kyr [1 2 1] and Ikky [1 1 1]
  
  • Turn 1: Curse of Doom
  • Turn 2: Haunt
  • Swap to Ikky
  • Turn 3: Black Claw
  • Turn 4: Flock

• Completing this assault rewards you with 1500 reputation, 750 Artifact Power, and a Cache of the Black Empire.
• Cache of the Black Empire contains: Vessel of Horrific Visions, an item level 440 piece of gear, Corrupted Mementos, and 2000 gold.

• Minions of N'Zoth - Defeat 20 minions of N'Zoth within the vision.

• A Foul Annoyance - Kill 7 Squidtail hozen in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms.
• Pillars of Oblivion - Destroy 6 Black Empire Obelisks in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms.
• Marshals of Madness - Kill 6 faceless minions of N'Zoth in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms.
• Tomes of Ancient Madness - Collect 8 Tomes of Ancient Madness from k'thir enemies in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms.

• Brain Tickling - Defeat Tormentius in a pet battle.
• Strategy: Ikky [1 1 1] and Fel Flame [2 2 1]
  
  • Turn 1: Black Claw
  • Turn 2: Flock
  • Turn 3: Scorched Earth (Fel Flame is forced into battle)
  • Turn 4: Flame Breath

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Cryptic Studios is making a free-to-play action/RPG in the vein of Diablo based on Wizards of the Coast’s massive hit card game Magic: The Gathering. For our recent cover story, we were fortunate enough to get the first details and extensive hands-on time with Magic: Legends. From the strategy behind building decks to engaging in non-stop action via spells and summons, we saw a lot of promise. Here are the biggest highlights of our experience.

Cool And Satisfying Spells

This is a game about magic, after all. What would it be if you didn’t have interesting spells? Magic: The Gathering has a glut of impressive spells, but bringing them to life in an action/RPG is a whole different ball game. A card has some gorgeous art and straightforward text to convey function, but that needs to be reimagined for a flashier, action-packed adventure, so a lot of care went into bringing Magic to this new format. You should feel powerful when doling out your spells (and they should look cool, too). Thankfully, Magic: Legends fulfills that fantasy. Cast Fire Vortex and watch enemies get sucked into a merry-go-round of fire. Need to push them back? Use the spell Tidal Wave to envelop enemies in a flood of water, washing them away from your character and leaving a pool of water in its wake that applies a snare to foes for over five seconds. Want to be crafty and confuse foes? Summon an illusory ally to take some of the heat off yourself, or select Telecast to teleport to a new location – disorienting the baddies you leave behind, while also dealing big damage to the ones surrounding your new location. 

While each class has three permanent abilities, the spells you cast are up to you, depending on which you pick for your 12-card deck. At any time you have a random hand of four spells to cast. These come in three different types: sorcery (instantaneous or short duration effects), creature (summoned pets), and enchantment (long duration, sets a “rule” to build around). As we played, we all quickly chose our preferences, focusing on getting the most out of these spells and using them at opportune moments. Having one spell take out a swarm of enemies never gets old, and being able to upgrade your favorites to see more devastating outcomes makes you feel powerful.     

Big Summons For Big Damage

A significant part of this game is summoning when you’re not casting direct-damage spells, and they are your best chance at surviving against the large waves of enemies. Your summons depend on what you put in your deck, but watching them multiply really drives home you’re building your own awesome army of majestic creatures from the MTG universe. Putting buffs on your summons will also cause them to grow to epic proportions, which is a sight to behold on screen. During our hands-on time, we summoned a variety of creatures, such as baloths, griffins, angels, flametongue kavus, and earth elementals. You definitely want these powerful beings on your side, and it was a treat when we had tons of them following us around on-screen, ready to brawl at a moment’s notice. 

The Joy Of Mixing And Matching Decks

One area where you have a lot of freedom to customize is in building your deck. Just like in the card game, this requires thought and care, but you can decide how much you want to get into the weeds of it - Cryptic said it’s considering some sort of sample versions for players who don’t like to tinker. For those that do, you want something that suits your playstyle, but also, if you’re playing with others, complements their decks. 

For instance, we had someone focus on buffs to ensure our summons would stand the test of time and dole out ridiculous damage, and all of us focused on healing, which meant we weren’t going down easily. The cards you can choose from all represent the five colors of magic, and you don’t have to stay tied to just one, regardless of class. The Geomancer class may be all about playing aggressive and in-your-face like most red cards, but that doesn’t mean you couldn’t pair it with some white to give you access to angel summons and healing spells. However, unlike the card game, you can only use two different colors for your decks.

The developers said they plan to have leaderboards of the top decks so people can see different creative ways to approach the game’s challenges and follow their lead if they wish, just like how people look for decks in the card game. This gives you something to aspire to, as maybe you need to rank up a certain spell to get the most out of that type or deck. Cryptic said it doesn’t want one deck to reign supreme. It won’t be banning cards like MTG does, but the team is working to ensure the game is balanced and there’s no runaway option for success. Building our decks became far and away the aspect we had the most fun with, and it’s cool to have something that’s slower, more thought-intensive to complement the non-stop action once you’re on the battlefield. 

Intense Action Rising With Our Mastery

Magic: Legends is about loot and epic battles. To ensure everyone is getting a challenge that excites them, Cryptic spent a great deal of time developing “The Director.” The Director A.I. measures the intensity of battles and adapts the situation to how you’re performing. This is separate from game difficulty, but in case you’re wondering, the game does have the standard modes. The Director is more about the moment-to-moment action and providing some variety and unpredictability. If you’re really mowing down the competition, it might spawn a miniboss you didn’t experience when you previously played the quest. Or if it ups the amount of enemies attacking you and you start to get overwhelmed, it will tone down the action so you can regroup. Taking on these tougher challenges rewards you with better loot drops. In our ventures, there were points where we were tearing our opponents to shreds, and The Director stepped in, spawning a horde of enemies that filled the screen. But we got the last laugh with more shards to upgrade our cards after the level.

The Harmony Of Working With Others

You can certainly play Magic: Legends solo, and we all did our first few missions alone. It’s still fun playing that way and helps in getting acclimated to things, but playing with two other players is really the best way to go. The fights are more thrilling as you see all your different spells and summons come together. It gives you more freedom in how to approach things, as well. Some missions have time limits to get specific things done, so you can get a jump ahead by splitting up. And there’s something to be said about seeing your different decks come together. 

When we played, we all made our decks by what we each liked best and just went in. What ended up happening is we had a great deal of summons, buffs, and healing. When we got to our main boss of that area, Josu Vess, we were able to really see the power of these combinations, especially because he was weak to summons. Playing with others also just makes the battlefield more chaotic and interesting. Imagine a bunch of spells going off at once, or seeing the combination of all three players’ summons roaming around the battlefield together. It’s as great as it sounds.

If you want to see some of what we experienced in action, check out the New Gameplay Todays we did on the Geomancer class and Mind Mage class. And keep watching the site for coverage all month long on Magic: Legends.

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