Aaron Riccio's Reviews
Mirage ought to have been more than the dim illusion of where the series has already traveled.
Even the game’s most effectively bleak ending, in which Jüngle’s founder, Josef Jüngle, is revealed to have been dead and automated for quite some time, is undercut by him still being very much alive in the other two endings. The Last Worker’s conclusions should feel earned—that is, a consequence of the protagonist’s decisions. Instead, they’re as easy and largely frivolous as just adding something to an online shopping cart.
The game doesn’t feel particularly focused on or interested in the mystery at hand so much as in better establishing the world of TRON for a future sequel, which may or may not come to fruition. Identity is beautiful and brilliant in spots, but more times than not, there’s no weight to the derezzing or freeing of the various suspects, no emotional connection between these digital creatures and their world. That and more leaves the game feeling too much like reading a rulebook—and one that stops just short of letting you actually take it for a hell of a ride.
Curse of the Sea Rats is ultimately a perfectly average game marred by some poor design choices, like instant-death chasms and repetitive forest and cave areas. The trap-filled final dungeon finds the game at its best and most inventive, and is a joy to fight through and navigate, but it also emphasizes what’s missing everywhere else. Rats!
It shouldn’t feel like a chore to be Batman, or his successor, and yet that’s precisely what winds up happening in Gotham Knights. Instead of cracking cases, players are stuck mopping up random crimes, and doing so with a combat system that feels more brutish and banal than that of the Arkham games. Considering how well the game understands Batman’s sometimes complicated lore, that’s a disappointing legacy for the World’s Greatest Detective.
“I’ll hack the machine and you’ll destroy some stuff,” says B-12 at one point in the final act. With that line, the game unintentionally reveals what it thinks of its cat protagonist. Despite being flesh and blood, the cat never needs food, water, or sleep; never hisses in anger at having to undertake a task; never bristles at the sight of a Zurk horde, at least not outside of one cutscene; and, aside from a few seconds of slower-than-usual animation, never seems injured by any major falls. Which is to say that if Stray had made even more room for moments that were alive to what it’s like to be a cat but also feel as one, then it might not have left us with the nagging feeling that the critter at its center is a calculated means to an end.
You’d think that the bigger an enemy is, the harder it would fall, but because the only determining factor of difficulty is the gap between your level and theirs, there’s no sense of scale to combat. The only tactic you need is that of attrition: The longer a battle drags on, the more meters you’ll fill, and the flashier the attacks that you’ll be able to unleash, like interlinking with allies to briefly enter a more powerful form, or executing a chain attack that laboriously unleashes a series of uninterruptible commands. Your sword-sponge enemies have millions of hit points not because it makes for interesting combat, but because it stretches things out long enough to make players feel as if they’re more than cogs in the system. These flashy combos are a good way to illustrate the importance of teamwork to the plot, but in terms of gameplay, they only continue to demonstrate how overly engineered every inch of the conflict is.
As for the game’s bosses, they’re most efficiently fought one on one, keeping the other characters out of harm’s way. It’s telling, then, that the game’s final area, the labyrinthine Aldalar Tomb, pointedly separates the three heroes. All that build-up to unite the family, and in the end, Greak: Memories of Azur finds it best to keep them apart.
The game's attempts to distinguish itself from other first-person shooters ultimately feel superficial.
It has just enough bells and whistles to suck you into its world, but not enough to compel your immersion.
The game is limited by the static nature of its mission-based structure and the protagonist's severe lack of motivation.
Our ancestors didn't have it easy, and that's the for-better-and-worse message reverberating through every interaction in the game.
The more often you get stuck with the same items and abilities, the more redundant and shallow the game feels.
The game is boorish, infantile, and violent, and, in refusing to take any sort of consistent stand, is wildly off the mark.
This VR title boasts an endearingly goofy premise, but it's one that's executed in bumpy fashion.
WarioWare Gold slightly redeems itself only after you've suffered through the feeble punchlines of the Story mode and have unlocked Challenge mode, which puts bizarre roadblocks in front of the player that affect your interactions with the microgames.
Despite the variety of tasks to manage throughout, there are remarkably few ways in which to handle them.
Kirby's powers are diluted when spread out across four players, yielding a more carefree experience.
Fe is filled with rote tasks, and its hyper-stylized imagery impedes attempts at emotional connection.
Because the game puts no emphasis on leveling up your kingdom, the majority of the side missions feel aimless.