Of the many mascot characters that Sony attempted to craft for their PlayStation brand, none wore that particular role with less grace than Sir Daniel Fortesque of the MediEvil series. That's not to say that his games were bad, but tha...

The onset of 3D graphics in the 5th generation led industry leaders in animation, such as DreamWorks, to gravitate towards making videogames. Some of those games, like Skullmonkeys, were visual and graphical masterpieces that still hol...

It looks like the quality of games in Retro Sanctuary's Top 100 PS1 games list is starting to be more consistent right at the halfway mark (games 60 to 51). Sure, there is still the questionable inclusion of games that are better on th...

The PS1 era saw the birth of many new franchises in gaming and a common trend between many of them is how the first game introduced core concepts and ideas that the sequel then improved upon and elevated to new rights. In many ways, Te...

If 2020 was a wet fart of a year, then 2021 was the lingering smell left behind that refuses to dissipate. The novelty of staying at home for most of the time due to COVID-19 has already worn thin, and it affected my enjoyment of thing...

The advent of the PS1 and 3D gaming lead to new ambitious and creative developers entering the field, and as they crowded each other in an established market, it was clear that successful games from non-established franchises needed so...

The first Tomba! was a genre-bending game that had a lot of great ideas in combining Action Platforming mechanics with Adventure game concepts to make an entirely unique game. It succeeded at that, but it also had its share of flaws, i...

Designed and directed by a previous Capcom visionary, Tomba! was meant to be a unique game that defies description. While ostensibly being an Action-Platformer, it also included several RPG and Adventure game elements that it is closer...

It came, it saw, and it sure as hell bloody conquered. With its entry into the console race, the electronic giant, Sony, was a pro athlete competing against high school kids. Not only did Sony convincingly "win" the 5th generation cons...

The PlayStation 1 had such a massive library of games that it is impossible to do it justice with a simple top 100 games list. As such, I decided to supplement my usual review of a top 100 games list (this time, I used the top 100 PS1 ...

The original Mega Man Legends game introduced fans to a charming world that strongly evoked Saturday Morning cartoons and anime, and that unique charm earned it a deserved fandom despite its gameplay shortcomings. One of the biggest ch...

The first Mega Man Legends game had a unique charm that made it a cult favorite despite what I consider to be some significant flaws and limitations. It looks like it was just a dress rehearsal for Capcom though, as the second Legends ...

I think it's weird how much people like Mega Man Legends. Objectively, I don't think it excels in any one thing that it does. It has charming graphics that are terribly constrained by technical limitations. A well-realized world that i...

Brigandine is one of the few late 90's games that attempted to combine the Grand Strategy genre with Tactical RPGs. Oddly, all of those games, like Dragon Force on the Sega Saturn, feature a similar anime-inspired character design and ...

Incredible Crisis may be one of the weirdest games released on the PS1. In fact, it may be one of the first games to showcase a typical brand of Japanese humor and wackiness that would later be replicated by games such as Captain Rainb...

Not having RPG games of its own, Activision in the 1990s attempted to latch into any obscure RPG properties from Japan and support localizing it. Surprisingly, these localization efforts were highly competent but were honestly mostly w...

The most striking thing about Kartia: The Word of Fate is immediately apparent, and it is the distinctive artwork and character design of Yoshitaka Amano of Final Fantasy and Front Mission fame. Attempting to support Amano's art is an ...

Despite the stellar reputation and good commercial performance of the first three Mana games, all of which followed a similar formula and gameplay template, Square never returned to that style with the remaining games in the franchise....

For me, the top 70-61 games according to Retro Sanctuary's Top 100 PS1 Games list are proof of the strength of the PS1's library. It includes genuinely very good games like Klonoa and Fear Effect as well as games with the respectable l...

Just a year after the release of the first game and envisioned as a spin-off sequel, Abe's Exoddus isn't actually a much different game. Yet, it is improved in many small areas that is a much more enjoyable game to play.If you loved th...

There is no doubt that the Oddworld was a unique breath of fresh air (despite Abe's foul farts) when it was first released on the PS1. It was an interesting Puzzle-Platformer with a unique look and a subversive story. Also, it had huge...

Fear Effect 2 is a prequel that is very much in the image of the first game but with some additions for better or worse. It has more action, story complexity, puzzles, well-directed cut-scenes, and more cleavage. Originally, I thought ...

While the name and tank-style controls may suggest a Resident Evil-like Survival Horror game, Fear Effect in fact has more in common with the cinematic action games Naughty Dog likes to produce today.This is a relatively short game tha...

Klonoa is different from the other mascots introduced in the late 90s in that Namco balanced the edgy style of the era with a classical Japanese focus on cuteness and personality. That saved the character from being as dated and cringy...

The PlayStation 1 had such a massive library of games that it is impossible to do it justice with a simple top 100 games list. As such, I decided to supplement my usual review of a top 100 games list (this time, I used the top 100 PS1 ...

Seeing the recent remaster of SaGa Frontier anyone might think that it's obviously both a better game and a more regarded title. That can also seem the case if you consider the vast amount of love for the first game compared to a relat...

Despite routinely selling and scoring less than average for a Squaresoft JRPG, the SaGa series continued to be developed by the company since its inception as the second Final Fantasy game. That must mean that the series has some reall...

Saiyuki: Journey West is one of the rare titles that deserve the "hidden gem" classification since it fulfills both parts of that qualification. It is hidden in the sense that few people have heard of it, with fewer actually playing it...

One common mistake used when discussing the Clock Tower series is to claim that it is a derivative of the Resident Evil games, which is false both from a chronological and gameplay perspective. This series actually started on the SNES,...

Many PS1 RPGs with heavy Anime aesthetics had dating sim elements in the game. Yet, very few of them were ever localized west. Thousand Arms, which was published by Atlus, is one of few such games that was ported West.Honestly, if this...