John-Paul Jones's Reviews
Calvino Noir starts off strong with a great setting and cast of characters but finds itself almost totally crippled on account of its heavily flawed stealth mechanics; a tragically missed opportunity.
An entertainingly substantial, if simplistic take on tower defence warfare, Toy Soldiers War Chest's thrills are prominent, yet a little dulled by some technical issues and a needlessly greedy pricing model.
A brilliantly constructed if slight first-person puzzler, the new narrative in Q.U.B.E Director's Cut serves to elevate an already entertaining yarn into a near-essential prospect.
In the end, Traverser is a game that shows great a deal of promise in the early going, with its interesting setting and accomplished visual style making the game tremendously easy to get into. Once in for the long haul however, Traverser begins to reveal an affair less compelling than its first impressions would suggest. With shoddy controls, uninspired puzzles and frustrating boss encounters all detracting from an otherwise entertaining experience, the result is a title that is merely enjoyably average rather than truly great.
A bold take on the long-forgotten FMV adventure genre, Her Story might be old-fashioned and light on what some might describe as traditional gameplay, but its sophisticated narrative and entertainingly novel take on detective work both allow it to soar far beyond the zenith of its seemingly outmoded remit.
A content stuffed version of 2013's Payday 2, what Payday Crimewave Edition lacks in single-player allure and aesthetic sheen, it more than makes up for with its irresistibly compelling multiplayer heists.
More than anything else, from a technical standpoint Bladestorm: Nightmare is a disappointingly subpar port of what is effectively a last-gen console game. With the tremendous amount of grunt available to them, the developer should have produced the definitive version of the game, instead of the poorest which really, is a position that no PC gamer should ever find themselves in.
With its vibrant visuals and easily accessible gameplay, Colour Guardians is the best kind of gaming palate cleanser. While certainly not a prospect for the long-term, Colour Guardians regardless entertains with deft aplomb when taken in short bursts.
Leaps and bounds ahead of their previous effort, Brawl might not be the most polished title available and the dark setting certainly feels overdone but as a multiplayer party title, the game arguably brings the thrills where it counts.
A simple, yet eminently playable dodge em' up vertical scroller, Lost Orbit will suck players in with its tight controls and wonderfully constructed story.
Unlike the game's release on consoles, the presence of mod support means that WWE 2K15 will actively evolve over time on PC. Until the mod community flourishes however and assuming the game's rough edges prove tolerable, WWE 2K15 remains an enjoyable wrestling yarn the likes of which PC players haven't been graced with in, well, forever.
Much like the conflict that the game shares its namesake with, Verdun is a ferocious and tense multiplayer shooter the likes of which we haven’t seen in a long time. Generously stuffed with player-made emergent moments on the battlefield and an incredible sense of place, Verdun is not just a great take on one of history’s more marginalised wars, it also happens to be a resoundingly solid shooter in its own right too.
A shamelessly hardcore FPS, Tower of Guns places a premium on player skill over the linear, big-budget Hollywood narratives that we're used to.
Without online multiplayer, all the stages and possessing visuals that are inferior to the console versions, Dead or Alive 5 Last Round manages that rare and horrible thing of making PC players feel like second-class citizens to their console brethren and in doing so, succeeds in heavily tarnishing what is actually a pretty incredible fighting game in the process.
In plundering Assassin's Creed: Black Flag practically wholesale, Rogue proves to be a double-edged sword. As much as Rogue succeeds in servicing those who were disappointed that Unity eschewed Black Flag's naval shenanigans, the game also serves as a timely reminder just how little the franchise has evolved in recent years, in spite of its relatively novel take on the series' narrative.
White Night's biggest achievement though is clearly the terrifying atmosphere that pervades throughout its duration. Though certainly not absolving the game of its other flaws, the sense of dread and fear is palpable and in a genre which has largely neglected the finer aspects of its craft, White Night stands out as an exceptional, yet mechanically imperfect proposition.
Although Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number is more narratively ambitious than its prequel, something has been lost in the transition. The levels, while good for the most part, simply do not match up those seen in the original game. Nevertheless, Wrong Number still stands as an excellent closing act for the series all the same.
At the end of the day, Empires mode is arguably where the crux of the experience lies and as such it really does add a lot of crucial depth to a series that is regarded in many circles as a largely one-trick pony. It's just a shame that similar evolutions aren't forthcoming in other areas of the game which, some nearly fifteen years on, are now starting to look really quite old in the tooth.
Bolder than ever before, Olli Olli returns with new stages, tricks and a superb tutorial and practice system for folks who may have been dissuaded by the steep learning curve of the original. While no ground-breaking alterations have been made to last year's game, Olli Olli 2 still effortlessly proves itself as the finest skater in years.
An effective if not particularly ambitious or polished reboot of an arcade classic, Q*Bert Rebooted is as accessible as the franchise has ever been but offers little in the way of significant new additions to keep players hooked in the long term and remains hobbled by a lack of leaderboards.