Ben Salter's Reviews
Mario Party Superstars succeeds with a fresh coat of paint and just the right amount of quality-of-life improvements to keep it familiar yet far more accessible than dusting off your Nintendo 64. You just can’t beat Mario partying like it’s 1999 (and 2000 and 2001).
Playing as Samus has never felt better, with the bounty hunter’s quick and nimble movement perfectly paired with a blend of action, speedy traversal and stealth.
Flight Simulator on Xbox Series X and S is marvel to behold. It might not be that easy to read a cockpit flight plan while lounging on the couch, but it’s a stunning way to watch the world go by with Microsoft Flight Simulator on Xbox.
Skyward Sword HD is more about updating a game designed for the Wii’s waggle to work well on a handheld and with a conventional controller. With that focus, it delivers a version of The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword that is much easier and more natural to play from start to finish.
Mario Golf Super Rush remains easy to pick up and play, but it’s lacking the final coat of polish we expect from Nintendo games, and is light on content for a full priced Switch game. It’s a Mario sport game that can be picked up and played by a wide audience, but has positioned itself to only really appeal to dedicated fans of Mario Golf.
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury is a delightful double act. Super Mario 3D World holds up well, and offers a unique multiplayer experience that works particularly well on Switch. Its opening worlds are designed to cater for that varied audience, while the second half injects some much needed difficulty and is best played solo. Bowser’s Fury is experimental in nature, and offers something completely different with a fully open world housing plenty of Shines to collect at a rapid pace. While neither quite reaches the dizzying heights of Super Mario Galaxy or Odyssey, it is a double dose of Mario doing things differently, and a fitting finale to Super Mario’s 35th anniversary.
If it didn’t carry the COD name, it could very well have been labeled as an entirely different game marketed as “from the creators of Black Ops”. Raven and Treyarch have tried something new here, and delivered a refreshing Call of Duty single-player experience — just be aware it’s a smaller scale spy thriller, not an epic open warfare game.
Like Origins, Valhalla benefits from a year off with a fresh audience. It doesn’t reboot this time, but instead improves upon the duo it’s following, introducing proven elements from some of the best in the business.
While the gameplay remains strong, and is improved in this Deluxe repackaging, Pikmin 3 is visually a dated game, and it’s a shame Nintendo refuses to remaster last-gen games, whilst still charging full price. Nevertheless, the cracks are covered up to a degree in handheld mode, as Pikmin 3 almost rounds out the full Wii U collection on Switch.
Any new ideas have clearly been held back for when the new consoles are actually obtainable by the masses, but FIFA leaves the Xbox One and PS4 in a pretty good place — and with some extra pace — in 2020/21, still with plenty of scope to go from good to great next-generation.
It presents as a modern game but retains the essence of an old one, and it’s that combination that well and truly entrenches the original Mafia, now reborn, as the best in the series.
Paper Mario The Origami King is a delightfully charming game, with a vibrant open world to explore and endearing characters that are genuinely funny, so long as you can handle a healthy dose of dad jokes.
There’s more fun to be had here than the past couple of games, and it feels like it’s been made with more passion, by AFL fans, for AFL fans who desperately want an AFL game to play.
Moon Studios has built upon its own great work to delver a fantastic sequel.
I had high hopes for Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot, and it delivers across the board.
On their own, none of these elements are going to win awards and are all done better elsewhere, but as a package they form something exciting — much like the Star Wars films.
Despite being over a quarter of a century old, the gameplay holds up remarkably well, especially the short and sweet dungeons and delectable puzzles. It’s one of the shorter Zelda games, clocking in at 8-10 hours, but it’s quality over quantity with a relaxing and familiar The Legend of Zelda jaunt.
While the story didn’t live up to expectations, the actors’ performances are fantastic as Man of Medan delivers its quota of horror tropes in chapter one of The Dark Pictures Anthology.
Like Ashes Cricket before it, Cricket 19 takes a good thing and touches it up. Its strength is definitely when bat meets ball, which is largely the same as Ashes Cricket, but its focus has been on enhancing everything around that.
Viewed in context, there’s plenty of fun to be had here for fans of the show.