There’s a ton to love about Moving Out and it comes recommended as a new title to place in your party playlists next to Jackbox and Overcooked. It’s just a shame you don’t have the option to also move out that enormous online shaped elephant in the room.
There’s certainly fun to be had with a mate/partner/postman in Biped, but there’s very little here to have you playing for any more than a weekend. Once the levels are complete there’s the odd unlock that doesn’t justify prioritising Biped over the likes of Jackbox or Overcooked. If you’re on your own you’ll find little joy in ploughing your way through the adjusted solo campaign, which is more infuriating than infatuating.
This bus journey offers little thrills and a whole lot of frustration. Much like a normal bus journey then, I suppose.
The narrative is by far the most engaging and wonderful I’ve had the pleasure to experience this year so far.
Saints Row IV still offers exactly what it ever has, because there’s nothing new to see. If you desperately need it wherever you go, then go nuts. You aren’t going to be disappointed. If you’ve never played a Saints Row IV, you’ll find vastly superior versions on other systems.
There’s nothing particularly excellent about Wunderling, everything it does it does well and that’s about all there is to it. It’s a fun if not remarkable time, and if you’re looking for a platformer/puzzler that revels in mixing up the formula and making you laugh along the way, you won’t need to look much further.
Two Point Hospital is a glorious port that should keep any fan of the management genre happy as Larry, and Theme Hospital fans should jump on this immediately. Damn near everything you loved about the game is here on display, along with modern objective-based missions and star ratings that keep you wanting to improve your hospitals over and over.
Not Tonight begins as it means to go on. You’re quickly introduced to your protagonist, a British national with European lineage. They’re stuck in the Britain that no longer sees them as worthy inhabitants of their proud nation, keeping them around only to work the menial jobs and live in the crappiest of accomodation built specifically for those ‘Euros’. Your job as a character who is most assuredly British but just ‘doesn’t look like it’ is that of a bouncer, going from pub to pub working for landlords who are either going to be decent to their ‘Euro’ or not.
Still, away from the painting what Eastshade presents is a story of unexpected depth, allowing you to get lost in its gorgeous world and cast of delightful characters. Its calming nature lures you in, the world makes you want to stay lost in its peaceful serenity.
Mario and Sonic at the Olympic Games: Tokyo 2020 isn’t a groundbreaking revolution one may have hoped for or one may have expected for the Switch edition but there’s more than enough here that it does well rather than retreading the same formula. The series has moved into a new direction with the addition of a delightful Story Mode and the ‘Tokyo 1964’ mode is an inspired addition, which will warm the heart of any stone cold adult just looking to relive his youth once again.
These console versions – at least the PS4 Pro Enhanced version I’ve been reviewing – have been heavily struggling under its mighty weight, and perhaps needed a little more optimisation before it launched out in the world of the sofa dwelling controller types.
Chalk down Hexagroove: Tactical DJ as one of the year's biggest surprises. A wholly unique take on the rhythm genre, it's challenging and enormously rewarding. The feeling of creating your own music for a virtual crowd to respond to is addicting, and while the multiplayer ultimately offers very little to the package, the single-player and the seemingly endless Freestyle mode will have you coming back to best those scores again and again. This is definitely one for headphones or a very loudspeaker system, and a must for rhythm action fans.
Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair is one of the biggest surprises of the year and an absolute must-play. Rare are back. Wait. Playtonic have arrived. There we are.
It’s quintessentially pinball, and whether or not that appeals to you effectively means you’re either in or out before you’ve even seen a trailer. But what’s on offer here is beyond anything I was expecting, and Zen Studios’ previous iterations of their pinball mastery to shame. The sheer detail and love that’s gone into Star Wars Pinball is unparalleled, and as a Star Wars fan those little moments that they’ve added just to make people like me smile has really elevated this entire game. This entire pinball game.
You’re never going to find it easy, and there’s far more exciting Switch puzzlers out there and on the horizon, but if you’re looking for something that’s going to either infuriate or grab your attention through originality and utterly bizarre mechanics that you rarely see elsewhere. Well, you could do worse.
Bulletstorm lives and dies on its campaign and the Switch version has absolutely smashed it out of the park. It’s a crying shame the planned sequel was cancelled due to the poor sales of the original release possibly in relation to launching so close to Gears of War which was considerably more successful. The madness of this game warrants a second outing, the tremendous Skillshot system still unrivalled to this day.
Erica is a genuinely terrific achievement. As far as the ‘PlayLink’ aspect goes – even if the game is not officially part of Sony’s range – there’s nothing better out here. Technically it feels solid as a rock, with gloriously smooth transitions from gameplay back to FMV cut-scenes. You immediately feel part of the world and it never really gets old. You want to do right by Erica the moment you meet her and there’s very few games that offer this level of interaction, even if as a whole, the game is about the journey rather than the destination.
It’s easy to pick up, it’s difficult to master and offers badass bosses at the end of each world whilst sword-fighting robot viruses intent on taking over an old lady’s computer to a synthwave soundtrack blasting over beautifully designed neon-infused levels.
The human experience of being drawn into a cult full of deep, dark secrets and the emotional toll it weighs upon you is front and centre in Sagebrush and that’s what made this two-hour experience stand out to me. The slow pace is entirely purposeful, allowing you to soak up each moment and learn more about those who believed in Father James room to be understood, to be heard and ultimately, to be mourned.
Aside from the vastly eclectic endings, the gameplay just isn’t enough to sustain it through several attempts to find them all. The gameplay never deviates from avoiding vision cones and knocking some people out if necessary. And as the game is encouraging you to experience it over and over again, it really needed a compelling reason to work your way to another ending. The premise and the endings are the clear standouts. It’s the bit in-between that makes it feel like The Church in The Darkness is a squandered opportunity.