Chris Brown's Reviews
A gleefully tongue-in-cheek throwback to shooters of yore, Shadow Warrior offers fantastic melee combat and a truly beautiful world to discover and then slaughter in.
By adding more content, more depth, and more choice, Enemy Within enhances rather than alters the core XCOM experience, and in doing so makes a great game even greater. A must-have.
One of the best RPGs of all time returns. This new edition succeeds not because of any enhancements added by Beamdog, but because the game BioWare created is still as strong as it ever was with only dated design and mechanics holding it back.
The focus on action for the first half of the episode takes away from what makes this series great, but the exceptional tone, and excellent storytelling still deliver. Clementine promises to be a unique and compelling protagonist, and Telltale has the potential here to make the most important game in the zombie sub-genre. [THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS]
The Banner Saga is an absolutely gorgeous, engrossing RPG that features well-balanced and pleasingly tactical turn-based combat. It's a linear journey, but one that's definitely worth taking.
Might and Magic X is an unabashedly old school RPG experience that, despite one or two high notes, often only serves to remind us why so many of these mechanics were relegated to history.
Episode 2 contains all the elements we've come to expect and deeply admire from a Telltale series, but it's too thinly spread to achieve top marks.
To the player willing to take the game at a slower pace, with a focus on pure stealth and without the artifice of in game assistance Thief will deliver the goods. For everyone else the reward may not be worth the effort.
1954 Alcatraz fails to deliver. There is a lot to like, the narrative and setting are exceptional, but the constant shortcomings of almost every other aspect of the game quickly saps enjoyment and replaces it with frustration and disappointment.
An inventive and outlandish puzzler that executes with bloodthirstily aplomb.
Daylight incompetently piles on the clichés and delivers an experience that is far more likely to induce boredom than anything resembling fear.
This time around, From Software has nailed the PC version of its beloved franchise, leaving absolutely no doubt as to which platform gives players the best experience.
Admire Spiders for their ambition, but as with its prior efforts this is again a case of reaching too far and spreading too thin. The result is a game that feels incomplete despite its comparatively short length for the genre.
Like Bastion before it, Transistor is a pleasure to play and an involving experience from start to finish. Its mature story and evolving combat will keep you engaged to the very end, and have you longing for more.
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter is a compelling interactive novella that draws players in with its beautifully atmospheric setting. The slow burn narrative doesn't quite land the final emotional punch it's aiming for, but it more than satisfies on every other level.
Shadow of Mordor is the single best Lord of the Rings adaptation to date, and one of the very best third-person action games in many years. By taking some well-known mechanics and adding their own special twist with the Nemesis system, what Monolith has created is much more than the sum of its few borrowed parts.
Borderlands the Pre-Sequel is everything you should expect from a Borderlands game. While the gameplay additions mix it up slightly, it often feels like a huge expansion rather than a stand-alone release. The quality is fantastic, the comedy is hilarious. There's more loot than you can wave a Dahl shotgun at, plus all the pulse-pounding bullet-spewing carnage you could hope for, but 2K Australia pulls back at the precipice of brilliance.
Beautifully presented and expertly executed, The Legend of Grimrock 2 is everything that made the first game great, only now there is even more of it. Wonderful puzzles and plenty of variety will keep eager adventurers entertained until the very end.
Dragon Age: Inquisition is still a brilliant if flawed gem from one of the best storytellers in the genre. The journey is long. The path is fraught with dangers and more than a few missteps, but it's an epic adventure well worth the undertaking.
The Witcher Adventure Game is a truly stunning digital version of the board game, that sadly only highlights how much more fun you and your friends could be having playing the physical version.