Cassette Beasts does fall into some familiar pitfalls, making for a hit-and-miss adventure. Some might find its complexity appealing, but that comes at the expense of casual appeal and legibility. Still, I’m encouraged by how many of its original ideas land. Monster fusion is a truly impressive trick, exploration feels classic and modern in the same breath, and its cassette motif is a clever bit of theming that gives it a distinct style. Perhaps Game Freak should be the one taking notes this time.
Empire of Sin delivers a clever, genre-melding experience that perfectly marries the world of 1920s organized crime with strategy gameplay. Bugs and a lack of combat speed or automation options can grind its pace to a halt, but it does a stellar job of putting the player in the mindset of a mob mastermind (or a gun-toting buffoon) with streamlined speakeasy management.
Perhaps it’s thematically fitting that the game itself is such an oddball outlier that’s been met with cruelty and misunderstanding since its announcement. There’s poetry to that, but it didn’t make my 11-hour playthrough any more enjoyable.
MindsEye is a baffling, busted shooter that squanders a campy sci-fi premise.
South Park: Snow Day! brings the cartoon’s up-and-down foray into gaming full circle. The co-op adventure underwhelms with sloppy action, repetitive combat, and a poorly implemented roguelite structure. Fans of the show’s first few seasons may get some laughs from its throwback humor, but the fun setup gets flushed down the drain like Mr. Hankey.
Balan Wonderworld is a hodge-podge of half-formed platforming ideas that squander a whole lot of charm.
Anger Foot's one-note action gimmick can't find a second leg to stand on.
AEW: Fight Forever will win over N64 nostalgists, but anyone looking for a modern wrestling experience may be let down by an unpolished, bare-bones package.
Destruction AllStars has a sturdy engine, but it’s overworked in almost every respect. The needless on-foot component and character abilities clutter an otherwise light but fun pick-up-and-play game with satisfying wrecks. Toss in some overeager DualSense support, and the result is a multiplayer game that’s chaotic for all the wrong reasons.
Though the idea of FBC: Firebreak has some potential that may reveal itself with later updates, shallow teamwork and repetitive missions fail to impress in its probationary period. It’s a gig built on incentives, promising players that things will get better the harder they work. Maybe they will for the most dedicated company men, but I imagine many workers will hand in their two weeks before getting to that point.
Rusty Rabbit needed a tune-up, but there's still some treasure to find in its scraps.
In its latest action-adventure game, Sniper Elite developer Rebellion lays out a solid plan to thrive in a wasteland of nuclear apocalypse games. Rather than aping Fallout or Stalker’s action RPG formula, the more streamlined Atomfall scavenges together some original ideas in its deconstructed quests and an emphasis on bartering. That could have made for a compelling survival story built around open-ended exploration, but it’s those pesky details that will get you killed during a nuclear disaster.
Warriors: Abyss is a shallow Hades riff that doesn't put its creative squad building hook to good use.
Mario & Luigi: Brothership puts some creative new spins on an old formula to make for the duo’s biggest RPG to date. Though for all its inventive combat tweaks, Brothership finds the series getting even further away from the strengths that set the Mario & Luigi series apart from everything else in the Mushroom Kingdom. Even with some bright spots, it can’t escape a continued downslide for a series that can’t help but trade in clever writing for dull gimmicks.
Endless Ocean: Luminous’ calming ocean exploration and lovely multiplayer components wear thin due to slow progression hooks that turn every aspect of it into a long chore. With tons of features from previous installments missing, anyone who wants to see its miniscule story to its end will need to tread a lot of water to find the pearls.
The Teal Mask contains your average monster catching fun, but it doesn't do enough to address Pokémon Scarlet and Violet's biggest problems.
Everybody 1-2-Switch! is a perfectly enjoyable minigame collection dragged down by what feel like obvious oversights.
Hogwarts Legacy will likely please die-hard Harry Potter fans, but its tired open-world design lacks imagination.
Scorn impresses as a visual tribute to H. R. Giger, but half-formed gameplay hurt its horror more than it helps.
Triangle Strategy delivers smart tactics, but battles play second fiddle to its dull political lore.