With Sonic Mania, Christian Whitehead and his team have done exactly what fans have wanted for years: start with the old and incorporate the new, keeping great level design, heart-pounding music and charming art direction. Sonic's back.
Guitar Hero Live doesn't want to be your disposable videogame anymore, and it's fine with being in the background. Because like any good song, it knows how to get your attention– even if you thought you weren't listening.
With 100 single-player levels, Badland: Game of the Year Edition is a worthy single-player romp on the Wii U, if you don't mind a little frustration every now and then. But with 100 co-op levels—not to mention 27 multiplayer deathmatch stages—it's a perfect addition to your multiplayer arsenal. So long as you're okay with senseless clone death.
Buying the Skylanders Trap Team Starter Set probably won't be enough for you. Again and again, you'll run into times when you wish you had just a little more cash to buy that colored trap, or that Skylander. But more than any Skylanders game before it, Trap Team makes you feel good about your purchases– even if it's your kid that gets to enjoy them.
It's just too bad that this dungeon crawler just doesn't live up to what it looks like. Maybe next time, Finn. Maybe next time.
Skylanders SWAP Force may seem like a cash grab in some ways, but the game their figures belong to is just so charming and, well, fun, that this doesn't really seem like an issue. The gameplay's addictive, the figures are well-built– screw the haters. I'm a Skylanders fan.