Jesse Norris's Reviews
PowerWash Simulator 2 takes the idiom “If it ain't broke, don’t fix it” and dials it up to 11. This is a bigger, prettier, and easier-to-play sequel that’s coming Day One to Xbox Game Pass.
NINJA GAIDEN 4 revives the decade+ dormant franchise with a new developer leading it into an insanely fast, new direction. It’s a fun, occasionally beautiful title with an actually not terrible story, perhaps a first for the series
BALL x PIT is a brilliant mish-mash of two genres, with excellent strategic choices in its main gameplay sections. The town building may not be for all, but I enjoyed it well enough. The only minor issue was the sameness of the progression between the base game and new game plus. Still, it took me nearly 60 hours to get to that point; it's in Game Pass on Day One, and I had a blast while doing it.
Campaign Only: Battlefield 6’s campaign is an explosive, epic, and stupid 5 hours. Fantastic gameplay meets an annoyingly trope-filled story. Everything is so damned pretty, sounds too good, and plays too well for that to keep it from being a whole lot of fun.
Alien: Rogue Incursion Part One – Evolved Edition’s name is nearly as long as its runtime on console. I was able to clear the entire game in roughly 3 hours, though I knew where to go and what to do after having played it once in VR. Without that immersive interactivity, what was already a mediocre title is made that much worse.
Moon Mystery shoots for the stars and nearly achieves its goals. For $20, you get 5 or 6 hours of occasional fun, and a few moments of utter bewilderment
SILENT HILL f is a terrifying and terrific title. This harrowing tale of choice and consequence should thrill and properly disgust any fellow survival horror sicko.
Top-tier movement and combat elevate a decent story into something worth your time.
Borderlands 4 is a masterpiece
Cronos: The New Dawn is excellent. Gorgeous graphics, smartly deliberate gameplay, an intriguing story, and incredible music create a new IP that is easily Bloober Team’s best.
Gears of War: Reloaded is a solid graphical update to one of Xbox's most important games. It is nearly 20 years old now, though, and some of that age is starting to show.
Shinobi: Art of Vengeance is a 10 when it comes to combat and visuals. Incredible replayability, a decent story, and a good soundtrack are let down by frustratingly imprecise platforming. Still, the other parts are so strong that I can easily recommend this game to damned near anyone.
Herdling is a special experience, full of emotion and beauty.
Dead Take is a solid four or five hours of classic horror puzzle fun, mixed with some excellent (and some mediocre) live-action scenes. It isn’t looking to break any ground, instead targeting a good, scary time, and nailing it.
NINJA GAIDEN: Ragebound looks great, and is a lot of fun. A few balance issues and a short run-time vs. its $40 price hold it back from greatness.
WUCHANG: Fallen Feathers is an amazing title, one of the best the genre has to offer.
RoboCop: Rogue City - Unfinished Business is a solid step-up from the original, though performance on Xbox is a bit rough.
Eriksholm is a tough game to fully review, as giving away the gameplay mechanics and plot elements that made me enjoy it should be experienced without spoilers. If you have the time, in this never-ending deluge of excellent games, consider adding this one to the backlog. It’s fun and not frustrating stealth and shockingly high production values make this one of my favorite surprises of the year.
Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 + 4 is a brilliant package only marred by a loss of 4's story mode charm.
Yearly sports titles tend to be small upgrades. College Football 26 is different, as CF25 set the groundwork after over a decade away. ’26 takes a more-is-better approach and smashes it. This is one of the best-playing and most realistic-feeling college sports titles I have ever played.