Micro Machines: World Series has the presentation nailed and feels like playing with toy cars again. However, once the glitter of that presentation wears off you'll find a game that controls way too loosely to give any kind of satisfaction and more frequently provides frustration, and furthermore nothing to really incentivize you to push beyond that without anything to unlock. To paraphrase the Micro Machines Slogan, “If it doesn't control good, it's barely worth playing.”
Get Even is the core of a fantastic, provocative game that has the potential to be the kind of experience that only games could do, but that core gets rather frustratingly lost within decisions that would better fit within a box standard shooter that impudently goes after Call of Duty's crown. This is a game and a team with potential, but with Get Even, you're only getting a glimmer of that.
Housemarque has another hit on their hands, and Nex Machina is probably their best, smoothest and more varied shooter yet. The mechanics masterfully layer on top of each other world on world to keep the crazy action fresh session after session and the entire game has a colourful 90's joy to it that sucks you in. Online co-op being the one nitpick that could come patched in later, I can only wholehearted recommend Nex Machina as the shooter you pick up this summer.
There are a couple of nitpicks too many against Wipeout Omega Collection from being a flawless package, but the sheer hours of racing that you'll get from the game, how gorgeous it looks and how well the mechanics hold up earn it an easy and complete recommendation anyways.
Telltale's The Walking Dead: A New Frontier is going to be no more or less than what you expect, for both good and bad. It's great to see a new engine bring Telltale up to more modern graphical standards in ways that only improve the storytelling. You probably know by now if you're interested in what Telltale is selling, but A New Frontier is a great place to jump in.
Rising Storm 2: Vietnam may not be a game for everyone but I can see how deep an enthusiast could dig into the foxhole if they can survive the brutal bombardment that is the learning curve. Tie up your boots and give the game 20, 30, even 40 hours, and perhaps you'll graduate and have a very rewarding time.
Portal Knights is not completely unpalatable or unsavable, it just also isn't super elegant in the same way the heaviest hitters of the crafting genre marry together all of their systems. Revisions or sequels that totally rebalance this could create something special, but for now, Portal Knights is just kind of there.
Guilty Gear Xrd Rev 2 remains just about the final word in the genre for balance, fighting systems and training modes. Literally the one major stumbling block for this entry in particular is how little it actually offers returning players. Anyone yet to try the Guilty Gear series who enjoys fighting games owes it to themselves to check out Xrd Rev 2.
NBA Playgrounds is let down by several little things, but most chiefly by the singular mode on offer. If they launched with some more fun modes to embrace the irreverent tone the game clearly wants to go for, or add them later for some added value, then the game might have some staying power.
The Surge is great, and I say that with only a single qualifier - It's standing in a genre built by games that did more than great. Which isn't exactly fair to hold against this game, but if you've ended the age of fire, woke from the nightmare and torn through Japan, The Surge is going to scratch, if not satisfy that itch.
STRAFE gets a lot of presentational things right, and even though it undermines and contradicts its own mechanics in some places, the singular sense of style the game exudes is fantastic. Running through the swarmed halls of the dilapidated space station has a lot of appeal for classic shooter fans.
From Software brings the Souls train into the station on a fittingly somber, yet high note with this excellently realized content. The one stumbling block comes from trying new things at a stage where they probably shouldn’t have with introducing the stealth element. nevertheless, as a concentrated showcase of 8 years of Souls and the journey along the way, it’s an excellent send off to the age of fire.
Toukiden 2 takes a core from Kiwami and makes some subtle changes that develop the whole thing from Monster Hunter clone to something unique in the genre. The new, faster combat is a ton of fun and while cramped controls and limited presentation are there and a bother, they aren’t the end of the world and don’t frequently get in the way of the fun.
As a showcase for the Nintendo Switch Hardware, Fast RMX is a gorgeous visual showcase and adapts as easily as the Switch itself to however you and some friends might want to play it, at least as what you want involves straight racing. Never the less, the solid physics behind the racing and the great polarity mechanic make Fast RMX a pulse pounding time.
Atelier Feris: The Alchemist and the Mysterious Journey is sometimes charming, but frequently feels a bit vapid in execution. The core of Alchemy is done well, but the things around it don’t hold up. I can praise it for telling a more personal journey, but not much else.
Digimon World: Next Order is a different breed of RPG in a pretty stagnant genre, and for what it tries and does to bring this old favourite to modern times, I have to commend it somewhat. But what it does is in places archaic, or not explained well enough to be managed properly without a guide.
Berserk and the Band of the Hawk is the definition of phoned in, as even compared to other Warriors titles the combat is bare and they do little to nothing to mechanically bring you into the world of the game. Limited maps take away the extra juggling the series needs to keep interest and the result is just a pretty boring time.
Even though firmly rooted in last generation sensibilities for the genre, Tales of Berseria takes something as old and trite as the revenge plot and refreshes it with a gorgeously realized world, filled with three dimensional characters and conflicts and fun combat. Does it break new ground? No, but it knows how to make something engaging from the treaded paths.
Ultimate Marvel VS Capcom 3 doesn’t really welcome newcomers into the amazing crossover battles that the game can offer, and doesn’t have any new content to really tempt a double dip from an old fan, but the visual update and just being made available again is fantastic. It’s great to welcome another fighting franchise to the current generation if you’re looking for something to play with friends, but perhaps the PS3 version can be busted out for the same experience until Infinite comes out.
Though I do have to knock it quite a bit for failing on the presentation, as that is a rather large part of a game like this, the story that Batman: The Telltale Series has to tell is strong enough to carry it through the technical hiccups. Telltale clearly understood Batman as a beloved character and then used that to turn it on its head and fan or not, this is worth a look.