How do you describe a piece of interactive entertainment? Chances are the first thing you mention is the way it plays, or the supposed “genre” it is part of.

Final Fantasy is a JRPG; Gears of War is a third-person shooter; Mario games are platformers. And this isn’t only true for mainstream games, either — even the most esoteric indie games tend to be described in terms of their mechanics. Fez is a puzzle-platformer; The Binding of Isaac is a roguelike shooter; Minecraft is an open-world building and survival sim.

While you may then elaborate on that by describing the setting — sci-fi, fantasy, cartoonish crazytown — it’s highly likely that this is not the first thing you mention. Interactive entertainment is pretty much the only artistic medium in which we do this.

This article was originally published on Games Are Evil in 2012 as part of the site’s regular READ.ME column on visual novels. It has been republished on MoeGamer due to Games Are Evil no longer existing in its original form.

Read the full article on MoeGamer.

Originally intended as a pack-in game for the Wii U as a demonstration of the GamePad’s capabilities, Game & Wario has been considerably overshadowed by its eventual replacement Nintendo Land.

But it’s a great game in its own right, both as a showcase for the Wii U GamePad and as a title that provides enormously varied quick blasts of entertainment whenever you feel like it.

It’s very much an old-school Nintendo game, in other words, and while it’s rather different from previous WarioWare titles, it’s an excellent addition to any Wii U owner’s library.

Read the full article on MoeGamer.

Nights of Azure is one of Gust’s most mechanically interesting games — particularly in how much it differs from the company’s usual output — but it also has a fascinating, ambitious narrative.

Combining a deeply personal tale with a more conventional JRPG-style “save the world” narrative, the overall atmosphere of the game is very distinctive and quite unlike your average JRPG, if such a thing exists. It blends drama, romance, action, horror and mystery together to create something altogether unique that is very much worth experiencing.

And it pulls the whole thing off with such wonderful style, such a beautifully clear sense of its own identity, that you can’t help but be compelled by the tale it tells.

Read the full article on MoeGamer.

Been tweaking the back-end of MoeGamer to hopefully make things a little easier to organise and find in the long run. The changes are subtle, but they'll hopefully make a difference — to me, if no-one else.

You'll notice the top menu bar has expanded a bit, now with several areas. "Cover Games" lists all the games that have had the Cover Game treatment since April 2016; Essentials currently simply contains the Wii U Essentials articles I've started recently — I intend to expand this to cover other underappreciated systems in the future; One-Shots provides quick access to the one-off articles about games that were noteworthy but didn't, for one reason or another, get the Cover Game treatment.

Perhaps the most noteworthy addition is From the Archives. Here there are presently two categories: MoeGamer 1.0 features all the articles from before April 2016 (i.e. from before I started the Cover Games approach and took a rather less organised approach to posting) while READ.ME will eventually become an archive of visual novel-centric articles from the site I used to run, Games Are Evil. Over time, I'd also like to incorporate the Swords and Zippers JRPG-centric article I had on Games Are Evil, too, though I need some alone time with the Wayback Machine before I can do that, since GrE no longer exists in its original form.

I'm happy with how MoeGamer is coming along — that it's becoming a comprehensive resource for those interested in Japanese and Japanese-inspired games and visual novels. I still need your help, though: the contract for my most recent "day job" recently came to an end, so I'm presently without a regular source of income. It'd be great if Patreon income from the MoeGamer project was able to help fill these "gaps" when they arose, so please, dear Patrons, I encourage you to share articles that you particularly enjoy on MoeGamer — and share this Patreon page to encourage people to sign up and help support my work.

On that note, I'm interested in hearing ideas for potential rewards I can offer for becoming a Patron, since I'm conscious I don't have any at present (aside from a credit on MoeGamer itself) and feel this may be what's stopping some people from signing up to assist. If you have any bright ideas for what a struggling, unemployed writer might be able to provide for his potential audience, please send me a message or leave me a comment.

I'll leave you by saying yet another hearfelt "thank you" to those who have supported me and my work up until now. I hope you'll continue to support my continued efforts on MoeGamer, and help to spread the word far and wide to those who might be interested.

Thank you, once again. Your support means more than you probably know!

(Image source: My Girlfriend is the President, Alcot/JAST USA)

 Any time someone claims that Nintendo’s flagship action-adventure-kinda-sorta-but-not-really RPG series The Legend of Zelda is stagnant and doesn’t try anything new, the perfect rebuttal is The Wind Waker.

Originally released in 2002 to a somewhat surprised Gamecube audience that wasn’t sure what to make of its cel-shaded visuals and seafaring-heavy gameplay, The Wind Waker has subsequently proven itself to be a timeless classic in the series as well as one of the most interesting Zelda titles there has ever been.

And with the HD remaster for Wii U, the definitive version of the game now exists thanks to some much needed tweaks and updates as well as full widescreen support and glorious high-resolution visuals.

Read the full article on MoeGamer .

Gust, as we’ve established, is a company that doesn’t like to do things entirely conventionally. As such, it’s entirely fitting that a Gust action RPG isn’t quite what you’d normally expect from the genre.

Nights of Azure is a fascinating game from a mechanical perspective in a variety of different ways. Drawing influences from a variety of sources including From Software’s popular Souls series, Falcom’s Ys franchise, monster-raising games such as Pokémon and even elements of tabletop role-playing, the whole experience is one you can easily lose yourself in.

The result is a game that is initially surprising and baffling in roughly equal measure, but taking the time to get to know what makes the game tick really pays off in the end: it’s one of the most interesting takes on the action RPG for a long time.

Read the full article on MoeGamer .

Hello patrons and prospective patrons!

Once again, I'd like to start with, once again, a hearty thank you to those who have generously contributed to the MoeGamer project over the course of the last year. I've been delighted to see people supporting my work both financially and with social shares, and I hope that will continue in 2017.

Speaking of 2017, the plan is to continue largely as I have done last year, with a single Cover Game each month — starting with Gust's Nights of Azure this month — punctuated by additional articles as and when I can fit them in.

These additional articles will often be one-shot looks at games that I want to fit in between the Cover Game features, but starting this month I'm also beginning a new "Essentials" series. This focuses on a single underappreciated system (initially the Wii U) and highlights the unique experiences you can have on that system and not anywhere else — or, in the case of games that have subsequently become multiplatform, why the underappreciated system's version is the most interesting way to explore it.

I'm going to make one big change, which is to incorporate more frequent updates on this Patreon page. Specifically, I'll be sharing the introduction to each article on MoeGamer here on Patreon, with a link to read the full article on MoeGamer itself. This provides another means for people to discover my articles, plus some more regular posts here on Patreon itself.

You can help, too! Follow @MoeGamer on Twitter and like or retweet posts you find particularly enjoyable. Share MoeGamer's articles on social media such as your own Facebook, Twitter and Reddit accounts. Tell your game-loving family and friends about MoeGamer. And feel good about supporting long-form, in-depth explorations of underappreciated video games in an age of increasing attention deficit disorder!

Thank you so much for the support this month!

Hello Patrons!

I hope you've been enjoying my work on MoeGamer over the last few months; with the Ys: Sights and Sounds article published today, that's now four full months of following my new "cover games" format, with a few tweaks along the way.

You may have noticed that with Ys I shifted slightly from the fixed article formats I followed for Senran Kagura, Megadimension Neptunia and Dungeon Travelers 2. This was partly to make the things I write seem less formulaic, and also, in my opinion, represents a better means of splitting up the things I want to talk about across the several articles.

Probably the biggest change from before is making the first piece each month cover the historical context of the game rather than putting this in the same piece as a discussion of the game mechanics, as to a certain extent introducing a game or series requires talking about its historical context anyway. By extension, discussion of game mechanics are now in their own dedicated post, and in the case of series like Ys, this affords the opportunity to talk about how the way the games actually play has evolved over time.

You may have also noticed an article about the wonderful cyberpunk visual novel VA-11 HALL-A sneak in; I'm going to start adding a few one-shot posts like this alongside the month-long coverage of the Cover Game as a means of talking about certain topics with a little more immediacy rather than waiting for the following month to post something. Me posting a one-off article about a game doesn't preclude it from getting the full Cover Game treatment at some point down the road, but to minimise the possibility of me repeating myself too much, I'll try and leave at least a few months in between this happening.

So what's coming up? Well, next month you can expect an in-depth look at something that isn't a game at all, but rather a piece of software that will help you to make your own games: Degica and Kadokawa's RPG Maker MV. Over the course of the month, we'll look at the history of the RPG Maker series and its numerous incarnations over the years as well as the new and exciting features MV has brought to the table. For those of you interested in getting your hands dirty with amateur game development, this coverage will include some tutorials and handy links, too!

In the near future, you can also expect at least one article on the subject of the recently released rail shooter from Inti Creates and PQube Games, Gal*Gun Double Peace, too. It really is a very unusual game indeed, and, of course, due to its subject matter, it's something that the mainstream gaming press completely ignores at best and refuses to take even a little bit seriously at worst. It is, however, well worth your time; despite the hilarious premise, it is both a solid rail shooter and an interesting take on dating sims, with some fun characters and an absolute ton of unlockable and collectible content to keep you busy for a long time.

I'll also do my best to try and remember to post updates to you lovely backers a bit more often, too; your support is very much appreciated, particularly as the missus and I have been struggling a bit with financial matters recently due to her long-term sickness keeping her out of work for a good few months and my reliance on erratic freelance income. Your pledges have helped take a bit of the edge off these trying times, so a thousand thank yous for that.

Do please point family and friends in the direction of MoeGamer and this Patreon page if you think they might be interested in my work and the things I cover, and know that I am extremely grateful to those of you kind enough to think my work is worth a bit of change each month. You make the time and effort that goes into putting these posts together all the more worthwhile.

Here's to many more months of moe moe kyun kyun~ or something. <3 you all!

Thank you so much for the support this month!