This was already one of the PS5’s prettiest, most satisfying open-world adventures. The Complete Edition doesn’t reinvent it. Instead, it gives its strongest ingredients more room to breathe, adds a genuinely worthwhile new chapter to Atsu’s story and provides a surprisingly addictive combat playground on the side.
Minecraft Dungeons II adds depth without losing the approachable chaos that made its predecessor work. The Sift and expanded gear game broaden the formula, while a reduction in start-and-stop co-op menu faffing is greatly appreciated. I just wish its teasing glimpses of an open world went further.
Fuse Games has taken the foundational joy of Star Wars racing and wrapped it around a surprisingly deep arcade system, branching rogue-lite campaign, meaningful vehicle differentiation and enough customisation to keep the garage interesting.
Gears of War: E-Day feels like a confident reminder of what made this series Xbox royalty in the first place. It’s nasty, ridiculous, surprisingly funny and occasionally horrifying, all while giving Marcus and Dom another jaunt to share that feels worthwhile rather than merely nostalgic.
Ultimately, Minecraft Dungeons II feels like the sequel this particular family wanted. It keeps the immediately understandable combat and absurdly addictive loot chase of the original while adding the systems that make spending an entire evening playing together much easier. The character-building is deeper, movement is more interesting, exploration has more purpose and the co-op experience has been thoughtfully improved.
It is stranger, faster, more physical and considerably more willing to throw its toys out of the pram. Most importantly, it feels like Remedy actually had something to say with the sequel beyond “here’s more Control.” It’s a sequel is that’s willing to take a big, weird swing, and it mostly connects.
Ultimately, when it came time for me to eject from AC8, I was left with the impression of something fun but not flawless. Target-selection nonsense, overcooked dialogue and some not-so-novel decisions that decelerate the pacing keep it from being a perfect sortie. But when Wings of Theve is firing on all afterburners, it delivers exactly the kind of high-speed, high-altitude blockbuster nonsense I wanted from it.
The previous Hot Wheels Unleashed games understood that the best thing about Hot Wheels is putting tiny cars somewhere they absolutely shouldn’t be. Infinite Rush gives those cars a massive playground, but because everything is built around the same toy scale, it doesn’t produce quite the same sense of wonder.
Mortal Shell 2 is ambitious, occasionally awkward and sometimes downright mean, but I also found it to be hugely satisfying when its systems click together. The first outing felt like an intriguing experiment in condensing the Soulslike formula into something more intimate and unusual. This sequel takes that foundation, blows the walls out and builds a much bigger playground around it.
All in all, Marvel’s Wolverine isn’t the next great evolutionary step for the action genre. It doesn’t need to be. It can just be a highly polished, brutally entertaining character-action game that makes smart decisions about how a man-beast should move, fight and behave.
Capcom has modernised the formula without sanding off its personality, combining deliberate swordplay, grotesque demons, and a rather rollicking adventure marked with dark twists and turns. The end result is a bloody, stylish and surprisingly amusing-in-spots slasher that understands the appeal of cutting through Genma demons with increasing degrees of supernatural bullshit. It’s not trying to be Warlords again. It’s forging its own blade. And after nearly two decades of waiting, I’m more than happy to be storing it up on my katanakake with the older ones.
It’s not The Witcher 3. It doesn’t need to be. Dawnwalker has its own blood type and a unique RPG-ing taste that’s anything but vein-illa. Despite the occasional technical anaemia, there’s enough life in it to suggest Rebel Wolves could eventually sire a truly monstrous series from this.
Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy doesn’t reinvent the action-adventure genre, and it doesn’t completely preserve the things that made the previous Plague Tale games distinctive. Instead, it takes the series somewhere genuinely new and, for the most part, sticks the landing.
Elden Ring Tarnished Edition sure ain’t the definitive technical version of FromSoftware’s masterpiece. The 30fps target, occasional open-world performance dips and reduced visual fidelity are real compromises, and players with access to stronger hardware will get a cleaner experience elsewhere. But holy Golden Dung, this port works way better than I dared to hope for.
Star Wars Zero Company is an excellent tactical RPG that understands why this genre is addictive. It takes familiar XCOM foundations, removes some of the barriers to entry, adds some clever new mechanics and then gives the whole thing an absurdly attractive Star Wars coat of paint.
The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered on Switch 2 is a technically ambitious, occasionally messy resurrection of one of Bethesda’s finest RPGs. The 30fps performance and frame-pacing issues stop it from being the definitive version, but the visual overhaul, modernised systems, complete content package and sheer convenience of handheld Cyrodiil make this an excellent way to revisit an old friend.
At this stage, I’m quite impressed. The spectacle is there, the movement is excellent, the team mechanics have genuine potential and the accessibility is considerably better than the intimidating 4v4 structure initially suggests. If Arc System Works can iron out the mechanical quirks and prove that the deeper systems have enough variety to sustain a serious competitive scene, Marvel Tōkon could become something considerably more interesting than another licensed fighter with pretty particle effects.
For newcomers, this is unquestionably the version to play. For returning fans, it’s the replay the original always deserved, complete with meaningful new content rather than the bare minimum expected from a modern re-release
It’s bigger, smarter and more flexible than the original without losing the beautifully stupid charm that made Heave Ho such a co-op classic. If you’ve got pals, offspring or anyone willing to risk your relationship in the name of physics-based nonsense, Heave Ho 2 is an easy rec. Just don’t expect anybody to admit it was their fault when everything inevitably goes spectacularly wrong.
The aged skeleton of Halo hasn’t lost many minerals or calcium after 25 years and I’m going to give Halo Campaign Evolved a big thumbs up.