Teardown is an exciting and experimental destruction engine with some stunning moments. Whilst the heist missions do add a little extra variety to the sandbox, its full potential isn’t reached with them. Regardless ,if you just want to blow stuff up, then Teardown is a good time if your PC is up to the task.
Godlike Burger could and should have been so much better. It is an amalgamation of really bizarre ideas that come together to create a really unique (and mental) gaming experience. However, it suffers from a myriad of technical and design issues, such as a clunky user interface, awkward progression system, and annoying controls that do bring the experience down several notches. Not all is lost, though. There is potential in here, so I really hope this idea isn’t abandoned, but instead built upon via patches or a sequel.
Green Hell VR makes a successful transformation into a VR title. Making full use of the extra level of interactivity and immersion that VR can provide whilst delivering a (almost) complete gameplay experience. There are some rough spots, but it’s well worth picking up, especially for long time fans.
Despite being a regular Destiny player, I am also a cynic. The last couple of years haven’t been kind to the game (and the franchise as a whole) and I didn’t go into this expansion with the greatest of expectations. However, Witch Queen has quickly become my favourite Destiny experience to date and a huge step in the right direction. We ended up getting an amazing and rather beefy campaign that shows Bungie at their very best, but there’s still a long way to go with everything else in the game.
Winter Ember is a game I am heavily conflicted on. On one hand it’s an immersive Thief inspired game with tense stealth aspects. On the other hand it’s frustrating to play, thanks to its zoomed in camera and lack of consistency. There’s a lot of potential that was unfortunately wasted in here. If you really want to satiate your Thief hunger, it pains me to say this isn’t the solution. Just play the original and its sequel for the upteenth time…
Ikai was a horror title I was actually really looking forward to. A game steeped in Japanese folklore in a self contained location could (and to be fair, should) have made for an absolutely terrifying and unique experience. However, it just didn’t manage to make the cut: its short runtime, generic gameplay loop and complete lack of scares resulted in a really underwhelming and, more often than not, frustrating, horror title you should avoid.
Let me be clear: if you didn’t like Death Stranding when it first came out, then this Director’s Cut will do basically nothing to fix any of the game’s issues for you. It is still obtuse at times, a bit too long, a bit too confusing for some. However, if you were a fan of the original launch, then there’s just enough new content here to justify the upgrade. It sure gave me the perfect excuse to start a fresh save and enjoy these brand new additions.
If Pavlov is the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive of the VR market, and Onward is its Insurgency, then ALVO can easily be described as the Modern Combat of the VR market.
Ghostwire: Tokyo is a delightfully intriguing and unique gaming experience that blends a wonderfully weird world with a great story and fast-paced combat. Despite some repetition in its open world activities, the pros more than outweight the cons. Tango Gameworks’ spooky adventure was worth the wait, and it is a game I can highly recommend.
Ghostrunner Project_Hel is a fun, if a little bit short-lived expansions. Hel is an interesting character and it was great seeing a little bit more of the world that the base game introduced but rarely explored. Whilst it’s great to be back in the fantastic world of Ghostrunner, with some new abilities to spice up gameplay a little bit more, there’s just not enough content in here to keep you entertaining for more than an hour or two.
Republique is a fascinating game with a unique gameplay hook that works incredibly well all these years later. Whilst the story doesn’t hit the landing, with a somewhat weak final act, it is shrouded in plenty of mystery and a world intriguing enough to push you through. Here’s hoping that, with this Anniversary Edition, there’s plans to return to this franchise, or, at the very least, a resurgence in this particular type of stealth-based gameplay loop.
Martha is Dead’s compelling narrative is let down by some dull gameplay that just can’t support it in any meaningful way. It does deal with themes of loss in a uniquely told story that had me guessing what was happening every step of the way, but the sheer amount of monotony annoyed me more than I could stand. If what you are looking for is a proper horror experience, this will not be for you. With that being said, if you want a compelling narrative, then, as long as you can get past some tedious lack of proper gameplay, I can recommend picking this game up.
If you have somehow enjoyed the base Serious Sam 4, you will most certainly enjoy Siberian Mayhem. It’s pretty much the same damn game, just with some slightly less terrible performance and some better level design. However, most of these changes don’t make up for a very superior overall package. If you didn’t like that game, this won’t be the one that will make you change your mind. For every fun action-packed encounter, there will be something else that is equally dull to bring the experience down a notch.
Dying Light 2 isn’t a massive reinvention of the original game, but honestly, it didn’t even need to be. It successfully manages to improve on the core aspects that made its predecessor so appealing, adding more content, set pieces, and improving on its presentation, whilst delivering that same thrilling feeling that captivated us all those years ago. The story may fall flat at times, but the fun of free running around the open world of Villedor will still keep me busy for many hours to come.
Rainbow Six Extraction is so much better than it had every right to be. There’s some solid cooperative action to be had in here, but while I did have a blast with its modes, I don’t think the game has knocked it out the park… yet. There just needs to be a lot more of it, be it in terms of maps and readily available modes. With that being said, if you just get some friends together for a few scary rounds, you all will most likely have a good time.
Endwalker does exactly what it sets out to do. It ends a long-running story with style, and give us even more of the game that we love. Such a fantastic end to the storyline, and I am looking forward to what the future holds for Final Fantasy XIV.
Shadow Tactics: Blades of the Shogun – Aiko’s Choice was a surprising release five years after the original’s debut, but I’m glad it exists. Whilst it doesn’t tread any new ground, it doesn’t need to, thanks to its excellent level design and gameplay that still fresh and rewarding.
Does Halo Infinite reignite that Halo passion? For the most part, yes! I will admit that there is a lot of frustration regarding the decisions in multiplayer and a rather static open world. However, the core gameplay experiences keep Halo Infinite fresh and one of the best first person shooters in years. Halo is back!
Chorus is a great game that just doesn’t quite meet its full potential. The amazing story setup doesn’t manage to hit the mark, with lacklustre characters and underwhelming emotional moments. One the other hand, the combat is definitely worth getting into, with some fantastically smooth controls once you get used to them. Fishlabs’ first attempt at a bigger-budgeted game ended up being a good one, and this is worth checking out if you’re in need of a substitute for the Rogue Squadron series of games.
Battlefield 2042 provides a surprisingly complete multiplayer experience with a game mode for everybody. Although, with it’s countless number of bugs, mediocre map design and balance issues it also makes it a very difficult game to recommend especially at the current price. There is a fair amount of fun to be had with the game that might be improved in the next year or so.