Dennis Scimeca's Reviews
Where The Elder Scrolls Online fails is when it doesn't break enough from the traditional MMO formula, which is the same mistake other massively multiplayer games keep making, but the only places I've felt that weakness so far are in the monster behavior and quest systems. If the endgame and player-versus-player content I haven't gotten to yet also stick too close to typical MMO formulas, then it's going to be difficult for Bethesda to justify the cost of a subscription for The Elder Scrolls Online unless additional, fresh, and substantial story material is regularly added to the game for high-level players, maybe even on a monthly basis.
You may find the title music serene if not melancholic when you first load up Valiant Hearts. When you return weeks later to replay favorite sequences and find collectibles you missed, you may find the same music moving for the way it tugs at the heart strings. You will know, as you're returning to the game, the music is a reminder of the tragedy and the beauty that lies underneath the cartoonish art and puzzles of Valiant Hearts.
Telltale has proven again how well their episodic storytelling format lends itself to adaptation of successful franchises. And the binge-playthrough taught me that anyone who hasn't been following The Wolf Among Us episode-by-episode, and who therefore might feel like they missed the boat, couldn't be more wrong.
The endings for Season Two collectively did the worst thing an ending can do for a video game franchise: They made me unsure that I cared about season three. [WARNING: Spoilers in this review]
The studio has a 10-year release plan for new Destiny content, including the first two expansions some players have already paid for. What Bungie has released so far is merely a scaffolding, which isn't immediately honest with the player about its core identity. It's a beautiful scaffolding, though, and in the triple-A video game industry, merely beautiful is almost always enough to satisfy the baseline consumer.
Hyrule Warriors is not easy. I had to turn the difficulty all the way down on more than one occasion to get through the game in a timely fashion. That's a relationship I am used to with so-called "core games," or games aimed not at casual players, but traditional gamers who want some good, old-fashioned punishment through game difficulty.
It's always a pleasure when a game is a no-brainer to recommend. Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor fits into that category. It is dense with content, will envelop you within its world, and is worth every second of your attention it demands.
The more we played The Pre-Sequel, the more dubious we became as to whether it warranted a standalone release. Oxygen consumption and verticality were the only fresh elements in the level designs. The new weapons classes—cryo and laser weapons—felt like additions to our arsenal that we could take or leave. The writing was full of references to the previous two games.
Get ready to lose hours of your life to Civilization: Beyond Earth
Sunset Overdrive tries too hard to make you love it
Prepare to happily pour months of your life into Dragon Age: Inquisition
This War of Mine tries to give us the barest taste of what it might be like to be trapped behind the lines of a war, with our entire world crumbling all around us. If that feels uncomfortable, if it is no fun whatsoever, the developers have accomplished precisely what they intended to.
For existing fans, Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker checks all the boxes as to why they love Nintendo. For the kids this game might be gifted to for Christmas, Treasure Tracker provides an adorable demonstration of what Nintendo is all about. And for that, I think this is one of the strongest titles Nintendo has released in 2014. It's a must-have for Wii U owners.
All the elements to recommend Iron From Ice to Game of Thrones fans are there.
The challenge in recommending The Dark Below at this price point to anyone other than a hardcore Destiny fan (who was likely never on the fence about the purchase, anyway) is that this DLC tries to please too many masters. If you don't care about the Crucible, that new content doesn't matter. If you don't have a Raid group, Crota's End is irrelevant. And what Destiny really needs—a satisfying narrative—is still entirely absent.
The variety and quality of stories written by the community playing Elegy for a Dead World demonstrates the game's success at enabling its players to write effectively. Writing is so much more difficult than waggling a joystick or pressing buttons, and yet Elegy for a Dead World makes writing accessible to just about anyone who has the heart, and the courage, to try.
Endless jogs through and hiding in forests and combat that wasn't satisfying for all its vagaries made Evolve palatable for me only in small doses. It was nothing I wanted to play for extended sessions.
Cranking up the difficulty in Starships and thereby eliminating the margin for error can address shortcomings of the tactical mode, but the strategic mode will always remain simple. Hence the feeling that Starships is more like a mini-game than a fully-fledged title, an observation held up by the game's low asking price of $15.
I have no doubt Hardline represents the best efforts of two talented studios, Visceral and DICE, to cough up a satisfying cops-and-robbers Battlefield. Despite best efforts, the pairing doesn't work.
Splatoon proves Nintendo has the chops for online shooters