Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden is an enjoyable adventure, with a strong narrative focused on emotions and personal grief, and combat that is both fun to play and customizable to your liking. Sadly, an unstable frame rate and issues in both pacing and choice impact, do take away a bit from that shine.
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RoboCop is a passionate and faithful addition to the franchise, but it's not without its flaws. While the gunplay gives you plenty of customization and is a whole lot of fun, the rest of the game lacks a bit on the content side. It is lacking some depth in its conversations, story telling and the game world also feels a bit empty from time to time. That, and the technical imperfections that are present during gameplay, prevent the game from being that true nostalgic banger.
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Assassin's Creed Mirage is a nice mixture of old and new. The look and feel of this more focussed adventure match that of earlier entries, whilst going back to it's roots with the focus on stealth. Deep skill trees and a gigantic map have been swapped for a slimmed down Bagdad and a few skills to choose from. Fans of the Ezio and Altaïr era are going to feel at home right away, and even the mediocre story and the nagging bug now and then, are not going stop you from having a fun trip down memory lane.
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Immortals of Aveum adds some fresh twists to the formula, but mostly sticks to the basics of the fps genre. The worldbuilding and overall presentation look great, and shooting the different kinds of magic powers feels responsive and fun. But there are some flaws that do retract from the overall experience. The story goes all over the place in terms of tone, and performance wise there is still a lot of progress to be made. In between all the 2023 heavy hitters, Immortals sadly just falls a bit flat.
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Remnant II takes the shooting souls-like core of the original game, and builds upon it on almost all fronts. From building your perfect build by mixing archetypes, to exploring the diverse selection of beautifully crafted worlds, Remnant II gives you plenty of secrets to discover. The gunplay also feels really solid, although the overall experience does get hurt by a fluctuating difficulty and a scarcity of weapons for a FPS souls like, especially in the early game.
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Aliens Dark Descent is a fresh RTS-adventure that stays true to the Aliens roots, whilst building upon its foundations. The squad based tactical action feels fresh, and gets intense pretty quickly when out in the field. Traversing the multi-run stages is engaging, but multiple technical flaws do hinder the game from reaching its full potential.
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Building further upon the foundations of Horizon: Forbidden West, Burning Shores is a rather fun expansion. With a new beautiful area to explore, new machines to beat and some epic setpieces, Guerilla delivers a true ending to the second installment in the Horizon series. One that makes the wait for the unevitable third game even harder than it already was. A must play for every Horizon fan out there.
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The Callisto Protocol clearly gets its inspiration from the older Dead Space games, thanks to co-creator Glenn Schofield being the director on the game. The survival-horror action is being presented very convincing here, with nice visuals and thrilling audio design. Sadly the gameplay is more of mixed bag, with a lot of ups and downs. Whilst not being perfect, Callisto Protocol nonetheless is a fun ride that every survival-horror fan should at least put on their radar.
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Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2, although not completely perfect, is one of the better installments in the franchies in recent years. A solid singleplayer delivers a thrilling rollercoaster with diverse gameplay and settings. The spec-ops is a nice co-op warm up, but the real deal here is the multiplayer. With tightly designed gameplay, maps that suit the different modes well, a lot of content to choose from, Infinity Ward really hit a sweet spot with this newest installment.
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Although Mario Strikers Battle League Football does come with some flaws, in the end it's a surprisingly fun multiplayer sports title. Gameplay is easy to learn, but hard to master with some nice deeper mechanics. Content wise the game falls short with only a few single player options to play through. The multiplayer aspect, on the other hand, works like a charm and delivers some classic chaotic Nintendo multiplayer fun. Mario Strikers succeeds in bringing that nostalgic fun to the Nintendo Switch.
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Puzzles are sometimes so tricky without any indication of progression that it sometimes gets frustrating, and even during dialogue, the gameplay systems work against you more often than they help you. Moreover, the game also feels very outdated in terms of animation, something that you can hardly look past while playing. If you like a deep mystery and can bite through all those pain points, give Swansong a chance. But for most people, this bloodthirsty adventure won't deliver the euphoria they had hoped for beforehand.
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After the Fall is a fine VR-shooter if you're up for blasting some zombies with your friends. The gunplay is good and the Snowbreeds that are coming to kill you will haunt your nightmares. It's a shame the game lacks variety and is pretty short to boot.
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Ghostwire: Tokyo is a thrilling paranormal rollercoaster with ups and downs. Exploring the city of Tokyo is fun and defeating your first few enemies is a blast, its flaws also become apparent very quickly. The game lacks enemy variety and the same goes for Akito's weapon arsenal. Ghostwire gets a little repetitive and sadly doesn't find a way to fix that problem before the credits roll.
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Rainbow Six Extraction more or less feels like a big expansion, rather than a full game. There simply isn't enough variety in the gameplay, while the scale feels way too small as well. The inclusion of cooperative play softens the blow a little, and the shooting is a lot of fun. With that being said, there is just barely enough here to justify the price tag.
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After years of absence, Halo is back. And how. With a thrilling campaign, 343 Industries captures that feeling of old-school Halo, whilst adding to the formula. The new open-world structure is a lighter version of what we know from the genre, but the addicting gameplay makes the whole experience feel truly remarkable. And that feeling extends to the multiplayer. There are some technical points that do need some refinement, but overall Halo Infinite is a solid new entry in the iconic franchise.
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Whilst Call of Duty Vanguard does not innovate much to push the boundaries of the franchise further, The WWII shooter does deliver a compelling experience. The short, but action-packed singleplayer offers a nice introduction, although it could be a bit more coherent. The zombies' mode offers some new elements, while still feeling trusted. But by far the biggest reason to like Vanguard is multiplayer. With a nice selection of maps, plenty of modes, and some tweaks to the known formula, it truly delivers.
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Whilst nog being the most revolutionary entry in the series, Hitman 3 truly does deliver the best the new trilogy has to offer. With six stunning and diverse locations, plenty of opportunities to kill and all the finetuning, Hitman feels better than ever before. There are some minor technical flaws and bugs, but overall Hitman 3 is a worthy ending of this modern Hitman-era.
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Disintegration a great game that tries new things and that should certainly be praised in a world full of sequels. The combination of a first-person shooter and real-time strategy game works well in general and is super cool to play with. Its difficulty is all over the place however, which can be a pain sometimes since the weapons don't have the weight you should be expecting.
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While Warlords of New York brings new content for players to enjoy, this is not the most original piece of content that Massive delivered. The main quest of freeing Manhattan is the well-known Ubisoft formula repeated. The four warlords in contrast are fun mini bosses to fight against, each introducing a small but fun gimmick. The main antagonist, Aaron Keener, on the other end falls completely flat. This first paid expansion for The Division 2 is a safe rollercoaster ride for players, but that's all.
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Hunt Showdown is a thrilling and original take on the battle royale genre. Hunt and be hunted for the best rewards whilst walking through the lands of 19th century Louisiana. Despite some minor technical flaws, the first-person shooter succeeds in delivering a both exciting and terrifying co-op experience.
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