Rhythm Doctor doesn’t try to reinvent the wheel, but the gameplay that it provides is engaging, fun and very addictive. You will find yourself trying to play one more time, hoping you’ll achieve a great rating for the next level. Plus, the spin they added where you are healing patients with these beats feels very fulfilling. It seems like you’re doing something more than just enjoying your time, you’re also helping people feel better, too.
Wax Heads is an impressive achievement. It delivers a great mix of varied music, great record graphical design, exquisite fictional critical texts, and narrative. The universe built around Repeater Records is a lovely one, filled with cool customers and interesting co-workers. Make sure to unlock and play all the songs that were specifically recorded for the game.
Hank: Drowning on Dry Land is a short game, but a well-made one. It knows what it wants to be and it definitely doesn’t overstay its welcome. The focus is on sharing a great, relatable story and one that only gets better as you play. Granted, you can finish it in 30 minutes, but it ends up being a very fulfilling, albeit sometimes frustrating game that you will remember for quite some time.
MotoGP 26 continues to refine the series, and it has some notable additions. It’s more of an incremental upgrade rather than a massive new entry, but that’s fine. You get the latest tracks and riders from the real MotoGP, along with a great career mode, the exciting arcade control system and even Ride Off, which I found to be quite fun to mess around with.
Reclaim! Azhe-giiwewining does not have the deepest story or the most complex mechanics in the adventure game genre. But it does have the power to bring a whole new culture and mythology to a player’s attention, giving them an entry point to then further explore the Ojibwe cultural universe. I started reading about their history and language after my first hour with the video game.
Lunchbreak Tactics is a smart and fast auto-battler that plays to the genre’s strengths. A complete winning 12-battle run can take under 20 minutes once gamers understand the mechanics and know the type of team they want to create. The fast speed, with its cool rock soundtrack, condenses a battle to under one minute. The game looks good, and developing a team during the shop phase involves a balance of long-term thinking and luck.
Ayasa: Shadows of Silence is the first game for Aya Games, and you can see that from various issues like bugs or a lack of polish in some areas. However, for a debut game, this is quite good, because it manages to create its own style, stick to the idea and it embraces the weirdness more often than not. I wish the controls were better and there were fewer bugs, but if you get past those things, you have a pretty solid game.
HELL OF FEAR: Mind Breach successfully manages to bring us the intensity of survival games, along with the horror expected from titles like Dead Space. While it’s clearly an indie game, it delivers a nicely polished experience where you always try to stay alive and fulfill the different missions that appear along the way.
City Tales - Medieval Era does a great job at offering a chill, yet still very well-made city building experience. It’s not as intense and challenge-filled like other similar games. Instead, it offers a dreamy and fun world that you can explore at your pace. Yes, you won’t have the realistic graphics of a game like Anno 117, nor does the game want that. But the visual style is very beautiful in its own right, and creating your own medieval town is a lot of fun.
Crimson Desert is one of those games that manages to seamlessly combine elements from our favorite RPGs and open world games. While you can see some of its original MMO roots in the quest design and side activities, it’s clearly meant to be a wonderful, immersive and engaging action RPG focused on exploration and with a good, emotional story to boot.
The Ratline challenges players to find Nazi criminals using nothing more than their own brainpower, limited starting information, and the ability to chat up people and search an archive. Its mysteries are inspired by history, with plenty of details that will probably lead some to learn more about World War II and the real ratline but also have plenty of solid fictional twists and turns.
The title’s voice acting is impressive, and I appreciate the effort to offer more biome variety, even if Lana’s animations aren’t always great. Anyone who loves the protagonists and the immersive use of an alien language should play the sequel. Planet of Lana II: Children of the Leaf is a good sequel that still impresses with its atmosphere, even as some of its new gameplay ideas don’t fully deliver.
Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties manages to revitalize one of the weaker entries in the franchise. It brings transformative improvements to combat, which leads to more fluid battles. There are also excellent visual upgrades, along with restructured segments that help deepen the emotional investment you have in these characters. Granted, some of the pacing issues and story habits are retained, but the main campaign feels stronger than the original, thanks to these updates.
It's also nice to see that the game’s performance is outstanding, and the co-op aspect is one of the highlights. Yes, it’s not a very long game, but it tells a very refreshing story that we can easily connect with challenging moments in our lives. Plus, mechanics like scuba diving or driving break the mold, while offering yet another way to experience this troublesome, yet beautiful world they created.
There’s no doubt that Nioh 3 is the best game in the series. Even though everything has been streamlined and made easier and more fun, it’s hard to make a Nioh game easy for a newcomer to the series. There are two things that will help new players from having an easier time in Nioh 3. One of them is reading each of the dedicated tutorials in the game. The second one is simply practicing everything that the game teaches you.
The mechanics are easy to pick up, while the puzzles aren’t egregiously illogical. This is an experience best enjoyed in sessions of around two hours, or shorter if the puzzles become annoying. Earth Must Die is proof that decent writing paired with classic gameplay is still a good combination for modern adventure games.
Pathologic 3 is the most approachable title in the series, offering a good mix of narrative, carefully crafted atmosphere, management elements, and tense infected district sections. Players need to diagnose patients correctly to stand a chance of keeping the population alive, which in turn earns the time needed to discover all the town’s secrets.
UNBEATABLE is a labor of love, a game that celebrates music and wants players to love its tunes and vibe with them. The story is not always entirely coherent, but all the characters are lovely to interact with. The visual style is clearly anime-inspired but has unique touches, even if the world can seem a little empty. The game’s music is so good that even the menu tracks are bangers.
At first, I had no idea what to expect from Dreams of Another, as screenshots and trailers don’t make it justice. It seems like a generic, pixelated shooter, although the game is much more than that. It’s a game that focuses on creating a great, different experience, and it mostly sticks the landing in my opinion. Yes, it’s not flawless, nor does it try to be.
Football Manager 26 is a good step forward when it comes to engine and tactics, but it can frustrate many long-term fans. I like the dual approach to tactical choices, and I feel that the title reflects real-world trends. The match day experience is good, and the integration of women’s football adds a new dimension to the sim.