Aaron Riccio's Reviews
Gravity Rush 2 should be a sleek and swift experience, but it feels like a local train stuck in traffic.
Figuring out The Last Guardian's puzzles—like the one in which a broken wheelbarrow must be used as a makeshift catapult—isn't nearly as difficult as getting Trico to cooperate.
Watch Dogs 2 not only represents a massive upgrade over its predecessor, but over similar open-world titles.
The game’s best moments use the story’s futuristic and space-bound setting to find new dramatic opportunities.
There's an odd dissonance found in the five social games that make up Jackbox Party Pack 3. With each new Jackbox Party Pack release, the included games increase in production value, but diminish when it comes to actual substance. Scripting is at an all-time low for the franchise, replaced by the unevenness of a book of Mad Libs.
The player has full control of each character, but not their fate, and so the senselessness of war always sticks out.
Exist Archive is bound to end up as a footnote, perpetually overshadowed by the titles that it so earnestly emulates.
In a world of all-too similar platformers, Hue is a literal palette cleanser.... We may never be sure that we're seeing the same blue, but it's hard to imagine anyone not being entertained by Hue.
Checkpoints are frequent and the Game Over message keeps comically cycling between nostalgic pleas to “Insert Coin” or puns based on your method of death (“Kentucky Fried Pilot” if blown up, “What the Hell?” upon burning alive). These grim jokes serve to reassure players that Rive knows exactly what it's emulating (“Cool, a rising lava level” and “That AI activated my auto-scroller somehow!”), and that each scenario, no matter how ludicrous, is beatable.
Players are offered no real choices within this tersely edited walking simulator, and yet the contemplative nature of the game keeps things feeling unusually satisfying. That’s because you’re given the imaginative freedom to engage with what they’re seeing, more so than in Dear Esther, such that the game feels like an interactive studio tour through a detective’s dreams.
Fans know exactly what they're getting from Phoenix Wright, and Spirit of Justice doesn't disappoint.
Mankind Divided feels torn, and not just between the story-centric campaign and gameplay-focused Breach.
Movement here isn't just treated as a necessity of the gameplay, but as an expression of joy and healing.
Ghost Town Games avoids the flavorless death known as repetition, and doesn't overcook the game's premise.
The Solus Project benefits from the fact that you can't just shoot your way out of a bad situation.
It refuses to treat your protagonist's quest seriously, which in turn undermines the serious gameplay.
Even when the narrative fails to drive the plot, the game’s well-designed room-escape puzzles pick up the slack.
The latest from Insomniac Games is particularly polished when it comes to the variety of its puzzles.
The developer's ambition to make a triple-A title without the resources of a larger studio gets the better of them.
By the fifth of the six main zones, the game becomes a dull gauntlet of repetitive mini-bosses.