The opening moments are unforgettable. Idiosyncratic and crunchy.

Faithful remake of the Don Quixote of video games: all modern games are contained within System Shock. There are games before System Shock, and there are games after. We haven't left cyberspace since.

An intricate knot of Scottish myth and the irreducibility of meaning. If cottonball can = cloud, nothing is meaningless. A playful celebration of life; posits an optimism based in conflict-as-meaning.

Although its charms are limited, the pixels and sound bits, imbued with melancholy, rearrange the user's computational surfaces. An adventure for the senses more than the intellect.

Simulates the free joy of picaresque adventuring like few other games.

Textured and mysterious, it recalls the early 2000s era of PC gaming. Unpolished, yet tense and unpredictable. Mix of worn and novel gameplay features. The dream of a Christian haunted by pagan echos.

Fun incarnate. The avatar of play. Relentless enjoyment. Almost unbearable.

Much of the game is gratuitous, useless: herein lies the secret of life, of play, of good games. Explores the absurdity of choice. A simulation of a simulation: as good as friendship, if not better.

Northern Journey is a spell. Once you wake up, you'll never encounter an adventure this good again - it's an echo, now going, now lost. Essential vital gaming.

Like the speculative aliens that fill the lurid corridors of Zortch, the game suckles the brain, emptying it of all bit-potential greater than 64. Side effect: washes the brain of AAA ennui.