PixlBit

If Seltzer and Friedberg made a game.

For all the retro-inspired indie titles out there, the genre seems mostly earnest, even deferent. There may be a small jab, such as Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon regulating the whip to a sub weapon, yet these are smaller details as opposed to poking fun at the original retro titles. Granted, the goofy nature of many retro games renders parody harder to accomplish, as even Shovel Knight feels like it could have once been an earnestly made game from the '80s or '90s. Enter Old School Musical, a rhythm game which pokes fun at an entire smorgasbord of games.

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Half of this episode is missing, too!

Gah! What the hell happened? Well, Julian will explain, but basically, this edition of Nerds Without Pants is problematic. Wait, that’s not the right phrase. It’s plagued with problems. Lots of problems! To quote The Doctor: “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.” Hopefully you power through the audio issues, because we have former PixlBit Features Editor Jesse Miller to talk about missing in action games. Please be gentle in the comments; Julian agonized over this one.

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You'll have a Marble Blast... once the rest of the content is available.

Back when the GameCube released, I developed a real love for rolling monkeys in balls along complex tracks while hoping to reach the finish line without falling off. Yes, Super Monkey Ball was truly something special. Later, during the Wii’s lifespan, a couple titles based around rolling marbles appeared under a new series, Kororinpa, scratching that same itch. These were incredible games that used the Wii’s motion control to great effect and since then I’ve been pining for more ball rolling goodness in whatever form I can get it. Enter Marble It Up, a spiritual successor to the Marble Blast series that had its final release on the PC and Xbox 360. While I missed these titles, if Marble It Up indicates their quality, I’m sure I’d have loved them.

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All warped out.

Velocity 2X, by all measures, is a well made game. It has a pretty extensive amount of content including 50 core levels with a healthy number of objectives to achieve in each, a set of unlockable puzzle-based bonus levels, and the Switch version even includes the DLC out-of-the-box. But even after completing the whole game, I never really felt satisfied with it. While there’s a lot of content, each level feels similar to the last and this lack of diversity eventually wore me down. By the time the credits rolled, I was relieved to be done with it.

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