Alex Kidman is an award-winning Australian journalist with more than 20 years games and tech writing experience under his belt. Critics have accused him of being a heartless and relentless word-writing machine, but this is clearly false. Alex will deal with those critics once he's finished his latest software upgrade.
Idea Factory International is bringing otome visual novel Battlefield Waltz to the West over a decade after its original Japanese launch. First announced during IFI’s Summer Festival 2024, the game will be available in physical and digital editions.) It follows a young woman named Lan on her journey as the Maiden of the Cursed Sword. Following tragic circumstances, she ends…
It’s that time of year again! We’re counting down the days to Christmas with our own little “advent calendar” – one new game to play over the holiday season each and every day. As the year winds down, things get really busy. We’ve got Christmas parties to attend, the end…
Set in an alternate 19th-century Japan near the end of the Boshin…
Xuan-Yuan Sword: The Gate of Firmament is actually an older title, being…
Most tourists visiting Tokyo probably don’t go anywhere near Yumenoshima Park, located in Koto City, though they probably inadvertently glance in its direction once or twice because it’s basically just around the bay from Tokyo Disneyland, albeit in a significantly more industrial area. Well, actually, I wouldn’t know, I’ve no…
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On a recent trip to Japan, I spent a very pleasant week in Hiroshima. When I say “Hiroshima”, for most Western readers it’ll bring to mind one single reason to visit. Specifically, most tourists heading to Hiroshima do so for the sake of atomic bomb tourism, taking in the Atomic…
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DDNet contributor, Alex Kidman, recently took a trip to Japan and, out of incredible jealousy, we asked him to drop us a couple of stories of highlights from his trip. Here’s his first! Wander the streets of Akihabara, and you’re beset on all sides by anime, video games and, increasingly,…
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For some decades now, wrestling game fans have been seriously limited in game choice, with only titles produced around the dominant brand, WWE – such as WWE 2K23 easily available to Western audiences. However, the publisher of WWE made a huge misstep with WWE 2K20, dropping Japanese developer, Yukes, in…
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Ever since I first laid eyes on Bullfrog’s classic Theme Park, I’ve been equally smitten by theme park simulators and also terrified of what they make me do. Don’t get me wrong; the classic blend of management simulation – like it or not, you’re more or less balancing an Excel…
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There’s absolutely no shortage of affordably-priced gaming headsets on the market. For not that much money, you can pick up a wired set with some kind of flexible microphone, a braided cord and an aggressive-looking logo on the earcups. Which is all well and great, but I have a very…
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Puzzle Bobble is an amazing puzzle game. I use that tense specifically because it’s one of those concepts where the developers got it absolutely plumb right from the get-go, all the way back in 1996. Yes, that was a long time ago. But I’m right. Fire up a copy of…
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There’s no way I can start this article without acknowledging that professional wrestling, the one “sport” that I properly follow, is a staged performance. “Fake” is often thrown around, but that’s not entirely accurate when you’re talking about a performance that can involve being thrown off a ladder through a…
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Annual sports game refreshes all tend to get a little stale over time, but few have had such a fall from grace as we saw out of 2K Games’ WWE line of games back with WWE2K20. The shift from Japanese developer, Yukes, to US Studio, Visual Concepts, led to one…
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I am, in many ways, the worst possible person to review a Raiden game. It’s not because I hate the series, or can’t appreciate the beauty of a vertical shmup. Quite the reverse. I’ve loved Raiden ever since the first time I lined up a 20c piece against a grubby…
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