Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba is a wildly popular anime and manga series that stars a captivating cast of characters all seeking to protect innocents from insidious threats. My wife and I are huge fans of the show to the point that we’ve obtained dozens of Banpresto, Figurizm, and Masterlise figures for our humble collection. It’s also why I was intrigued by Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board!, a virtual board game adaptation of the series from CyberConnect 2 and Sega.

Following its release on Nintendo Switch this past April, Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board has been released on additional platforms. Unfortunately, however, it seems my wait for Sweep the Board to come to PC was not worth it. After nearly 10 hours of playing, I still have a hard time discerning just who exactly this game was made for. From clunky controls to boring minigames, Sweep the Board feels like a party game that lacks any sense of "party."

Demon Slayer: Sweep the Board adapts several arcs of the manga and anime into Mario Party-esque layouts. From Asakusa and Mount Fujikasane in Board 1 to the Swordsmith Village in Board 5, each map is chock-full of references and nods to moments from the show, which was a treat for me as a fan. For instance, there are multiple paths in Mt. Natagumo that take you to Tsuzumi Mansion, which has a mysterious drum that causes characters inside the building to move to random locations. The Swordsmith Village, meanwhile, has hot springs, mechanical training dolls, and Haganezuka chasing you around. Those familiar with the source material will no doubt get a kick out of the references, albeit a brief one.

Coming off the heels of the decade-long Hydaelyn and Zodiark saga, Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail takes you to completely new territory, quite literally. For once, you--the Warrior of Light--are offered the chance for some peace and quiet alongside your friends, with no calamitous threat looming over your shoulder. There are no dragons to slay, gods to fell, or villains to vanquish on the agenda. Hell, we traveled to the literal edge of the universe, I think it's fair to say we deserve this break.

This latest adventure is the beginning of something new for the MMO and aims to try something a little different with a number of unpredictable outcomes. You'd be setting yourself up for disappointment if you're expecting this expansion to offer the non-stop excitement and narrative revelations or Shadowbringers or Endwalker, but Dawntrail is still a great setup for a lower-stakes adventure, and one that ultimately makes Dawntrail's twist that much more compelling.

Major spoilers ahead for Dawntrail's story

More than almost any other genre, the metroidvania is reaching a saturation point. We have beloved modernizations like Hollow Knight and Axiom Verge and big-budget takes like Batman: Arkham Asylum or this year's Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown, alongside a steady, constant drumbeat of indie releases. It's hard to throw a rock at Steam without hitting at least a couple of metroidvanias, and with that much choice, it's hard for any one to stand out. Gestalt: Steam and Cinder is the latest indie take on the genre, but it manages to do what many others don't: pay homage to the two most prominent originators of the genre with smart, deliberate design choices that help it stand out in a crowded field.

In some sense, all metroidvanias combine aspects of Super Metroid and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. Gestalt does so as well, but it also wisely leans on some of their best attributes, which feels like a conscious choice. For Super Metroid, that means a vast, interconnected world that is broken into a handful of distinct zones that play like their own stages. And like Symphony of the Night, it sports gorgeous pixel art with an emphasis on slick combat with light RPG hooks.

In Gestalt, you play as Aletheia, a no-nonsense bounty hunter who is on semi-friendly terms with the governing body of Canaan, a post-apocalyptic steampunk city. The world has recovered from the devastation of a war involving clockwork soldiers and cursed armor, but the stability is tense and everyone senses it's coming to an end. You get the impression throughout that Canaan's peacekeepers have tried to recruit Aletheia at various points, but she's always preferred to go her own way because she is, above all else, a cool, independent protagonist. Taking bounties ultimately leads to trouble as she investigates the areas around Canaan for clues about what's really going on.

Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn has been marketed as a souls-lite rather than the more common souls-like, which I assumed meant it would be more approachable while still retaining many of the genre's core tenets. This is partly true in that it's nowhere near as punishing as From Software's games, and features familiar elements like bonfire-esque checkpoints and an Estus Flask-style healing system. Yet the game's style is more akin to something like Star Wars: Jedi Survivor than any Dark Souls game. Flintlock feels like a mashup of sensibilities between a souls-like and a more traditional action game, bridging the gap between the two with its own delightful approach to fast-paced combat and high-flying traversal.

One area in which Flintlock immediately stands out amongst its contemporaries is its unique setting. Mixing magical high fantasy with elements from the 17th to 19th century and the advent of gunpowder, Flintlock's world is immediately intriguing. For your part, you're strapped into the boots of protagonist Nor Vanek, a sapper in the Coalition army who unwittingly breaks a seal to the Great Below, unleashing malevolent Gods and their armies of the dead upon the lands of Kian. This act sets in motion a fairly straightforward story as Nor--wracked with guilt over condemning her home to near-annihilation--sets out on a path of vengeance to kill the Gods and retake the world. She's joined by a mysterious fox-like companion called Enki, who's keen to share his knowledge of the Gods while aiding Nor's efforts with a host of magical abilities.

The narrative's simple, laser-focused approach works in the game's favor, giving you a clear end goal to pursue that aligns with the snappy pacing of its action and movement. There are moments of interpersonal conflict, but the story never deviates from its deicidal path, lending the narrative a purposeful sense of forward momentum that carries it through to the end. The trade-off, however, is that you're unlikely to feel any attachment to its small cast of one-dimensional characters, despite enjoyable performances from Olive Gray (Halo), Alistar Petrie (Sex Education), and Elias Toufexis (Deus Ex: Mankind Divided).

Nintendo deserves and often rightly gets a lot of credit for the proliferation of esports and speedrunning, two competitive video game subcultures that have exploded in recent years. The Nintendo World Championships events were among the first high-profile, publisher-led efforts at esports, and many of the best-known speedrunning records are based on classic NES games. It makes sense, then, that Nintendo would capitalize on its place in history with Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition, a hybrid speedrunning tutorial and ongoing online competition for Nintendo Switch. While the tools are a bit barebones for true speedrun enthusiasts, the presentation nicely preserves and illuminates the joy of racing to shave milliseconds off your best time.

Nintendo World Championships kicks off on a self-congratulatory tone, having you peruse icons, favorite NES games, and "Hype Tags"--slogans from throughout Nintendo history--to build your profile. The icons are all from Nintendo-published NES games, but the "favorite games" include lots of third-party games and even Famicom listings. Similarly, the slogans run the gamut from nostalgic ("Plays With Power") to more contemporary ("Retro Game Collector"). It's a nice little touch of personalization to welcome you into Nintendo's long history.

Once you've created your profile, you can choose One Player or Party Mode. The One Player menu greets you with three gameplay options: Speedrun Mode, World Championships, and Survival Mode. Speedrun Mode makes for the bulk of single-player, and is composed of a large collection of challenges from across 13 classic Nintendo games. Those challenges are then reused for the solo online play and Party Mode challenges. The challenges include each NES Super Mario Bros. game (including the so-called Lost Levels), Metroid, The Legend of Zelda, Donkey Kong, Kirby, Excitebike, and Balloon Fight, among others.