Lacks the girth of FM4 but wrestling iconic cars around legendary tracks has never looked or felt this good on console.
Beneath Broforce's hyperbolic chest-thumping action movie-inspired silliness lies an extremely polished run 'n gun platformer. Simple and reliable but nuanced and ever-changing (thanks to the constantly rotating characters) Broforce is testosterrific. If you could watch Commando on a SNES, this is what it would look like.
F1 2016 is definitively the best Formula One game Codemasters has ever crafted. Deep and nuanced, stuffed with fan service, and as demanding as you’d like it to be, this is worthy fare for the motorsport obsessed while remaining accessible for the merely curious, and absolutely worth the upgrade from previous years. If F1 2016 and last year’s Dirt Rally are indicative of the level of quality we’re going to get from Codemasters going forward I can’t wait to see what’s next.
Ape Out is an intoxicating fusion of percussion and destruction that oozes style from every angle.
Forza Horizon 4: Fortune Island is a great expansion with some of the best stretches of road in the series to date.
Forza Horizon 4: Fortune Island is a great expansion with some of the best stretches of road in the series to date.
Hitman Episode 2: Sapienza is a fantastic follow-up to the promising first episode; huge, bursting with deadly promise, and begging for many, many playthroughs. The lack of much meaningful local voice acting is a disappointing miss, however, and that might really start undermining Hitman’s jetsetting international atmosphere in later levels if it’s not addressed.
The improvements to F1 2018 since the already-impressive F1 2017 are largely incremental and often very subtle – and there are still a few areas where it's openly coasting on previous efforts – but F1 2018 features the finest handling and force feedback for a dedicated F1 game to date, some welcome visual improvements, and a career mode that does a better job than ever at capturing the nuances of the world's most-popular motorsport.
Dirt Rally 2.0 is as tricky to tame as its predecessor but doing so is as satisfying as ever.
F1 2019 is a very, very good game – the best F1 game to date – but it definitely doesn't always seem like a new game.
A brilliant and beautiful stunt driving masterclass, Trackmania Turbo is fast, frenetic, fun, and only occasionally frustrating. If this generously proportioned and highly engaging arcade racer gets its talons into you the way it did me, it'll have you compulsively chasing ghosts for ages.
Grid Autosport promised proper motor racing and that's exactly what it delivers. The spirit of TOCA is finally back.
Hitman Episode 6: Hokkaido is one of the best levels this season and a great mission to end the year on. The map itself is very good, the atmosphere is excellent, and the hits are challenging. Tricky and more than a little James Bond-esque (the snowed-in private clinic has a real SPECTRE / On Her Majesty’s Secret Service vibe to it), Hokkaido is vintage Hitman at its most creative.
These redressings of Sapienza and Marrakesh are familiar levels, sure, but they’re done differently enough to feel new (if slightly easier). The first mission far outshines the second with its dark humor and appropriate execution options, but both warrant many, many more playthroughs.
Grid is way too lean on tracks but delivers its hyperbolic brand of Hollywood-style racing with style and confidence.
Need for Speed Heat is a mosaic of existing ideas but it is easily the most impressive Need for Speed game in years.
SnowRunner's peculiar brand of off-road ordeals is addictive, deep, and rewarding when played in the right spirit.
WRC 9's incredible stages make it easy to recommend to series first-timers, although it's not a huge leap from WRC 8.
Oozing with 1930s atmosphere, Mafia: Definitive Edition is a successful rejuvenation of the best story in the series.
Dirt 5 isn't particularly deep, but it's fast, frantic, extremely handsome, and buoyed by a superb stunt track editor.