Samuel Incze's Reviews
LEGO Horizon Adventures disappoints despite its humorous narrative. Repetitive levels, limited combat, and a lack of character variety make it a far cry from what a LEGO game should be. While the visuals are nice, the gameplay is stale and unimaginative. It's a missed opportunity for both the Horizon and LEGO franchises.
Metaphor: ReFantazio is a thrilling JRPG with a unique story and the typical engaging gameplay elements that Atlus is known for. The combat is challenging, featuring the press turn battle with a new risk-reward system adding depth to the classic turn-based formula. While the game shares some similarities with the Shin Megami Tensei and Persona series, such as social stats and character bonds, it carves its own path with a captivating narrative and stunning world. The excellent voice acting, music, and visuals further enhance the experience, making it a must-play for JRPG fans.
Astro Bot is a delightful platformer that excels in delivering a fun, nostalgia-filled experience for PlayStation fans. The intuitive controls, immersive DualSense features, and visually stunning levels make it a joy to play. While the challenge might be lighter than some platformers, it more than makes up for it with its charm, creativity, and heart-warming nods to PlayStation’s history. If you’re a PS5 owner looking for a feel-good adventure, Astro Bot is an absolute must-play.
Stellar Blade is a fun hack-and-slash that leaves a little to be desired. The story is decent, the combat is challenging, but traversal and some mechanics bring the experience down. There is a lot to enjoy here, and despite its flaws, it should keep you entertained for a while.
Ereban: Shadow Legacy is a fun stealth adventure with innovative shadow mechanics and a captivating world. Despite some bugs, the core gameplay and cleverly designed levels create a rewarding stealth experience.
Rise of the Ronin is a fantastic adventure with a branching story, challenging combat that rewards mastery, and a beautiful open world. The stunning visuals, entertaining characters and world filled to the brim with engaging quests will keep you hooked, but beware the uneven voice acting and overflowing loot!
Winter Survival is honestly a complete waste of time. The story might give you some initial intrigue. However, the stiff gameplay mixed with unreasonable survival mechanics leads to a frustrating experience that will deter you from being able to make significant progress. Do yourself a favour and pass on this one!
WWE 2K24 continues to improve on the 2K series wrestling formula whilst offering a host of new features for players to enjoy. This year’s MyRise storylines are the best ones yet, and the showcase mode is great fun! Unfortunately, Universe mode and GM Mode still seem to be underserved with 2K focusing on MyFaction instead.
Persona 3 Reload is the definitive way to experience this spin-off series’ third entry! With an absolutely fantastic story, refined gameplay and stunning visuals, this remake will definitely keep you addicted for hours on end!
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League is actually a really entertaining experience. The interesting narrative features countless jokes and one liners will have you chuckling over and over again. Admittedly the gameplay does take a little bit to adjust to, but it is really fun and chaining combos feels satisfying!
Whilst I believe that The Last of Us Part II Remastered might have been unnecessary, it does offer a variety of new features for you to enjoy. The cosmetic additions are welcomed and having the option to strum a guitar endlessly may be a bit of fun. However, I believe it will come down to whether or not you want to experience the extra dual sense features or if you are interested in a Last of Us Part II themed roguelike mode, that’ll determine if you play it or not.
Arizona Sunshine II is a great VR experience with a simple but heartfelt narrative and fluid gunplay that feels very natural with the VR controllers. The game does feature a variety of bugs, but this doesn’t stop it from being an enjoyable thrill ride!
Gunhead is a FPS roguelike that promises a level of challenge with its procedurally generated levels and unique gunplay system. However, it can't escape the monotonous rinse and repeat formula of the gameplay, and the samey level design. The inclusion of a sporadic half-baked narrative in this style of game just leaves a lot to be desired.
The Talos Principle II is a fun, but challenging, puzzle adventure. The narrative is intriguing, even if it is a little slow to get going. However, it is the puzzle solving gameplay that is the highlight of this title. The puzzles feel unique and very creative and will cause you to flex your problem solving muscles.
Assassin’s Creed Mirage is absolutely phenomenal! The story does start out a little slow, but once it picks up, it becomes one of the more interesting narratives in the franchise. Ditching the cumbersome RPG stylings of Valhalla, Odyssey & Origins, Mirage will finally make you feel like an Assassin again! The map may not be as large as some of the earlier entries in the series, however, this only serves as a benefit as you won’t be traversing through a mass of unused space just to get to your next objective. Overall, Assassin’s Creed Mirage is the title that many AC fans have been waiting for, and serves, to some degree, as a bit of a nostalgia trip as well.
EA Sports FC 24 is exactly what you would expect from EA's yearly footballing simulator. There are a few new mechanics to enjoy, with some of them being more useful than others. Player career has seen a slight upgrade with the new contract objectives. However, outside of this there aren't any substantial changes and Ultimate Team is still great fun, for those that enjoy that side of FC. This is yet another solid entry in EA's yearly football sim, and proves that EA don't need FIFA's license to draw players in.
Starfield is a fun adventure that may just lack a bit of direction. The narrative is not exactly intriguing. However, Starfield throws a metric tonne of interesting side quests which will easily distract you from the meagre main plot. Combat is very reminiscent of the fallout series, with the gunplay in particular feeling pretty satisfying. The ship battles are also quite simple and avoid unnecessary systems which is ideal for this style of game. Whilst there are a few bugs, because after all this is a Bethesda game, thankfully they are minor and non intrusive, and often quite hilarious. Overall, Starfield is an entertaining sandbox that will give you hours upon hours of fun. I just hope you don’t mind sitting through (or skipping) the generic dialogue throughout the main quests.
AEW Fight Forever struggles to find its place with its first entry into the world of video games! Whilst it tries to set itself apart from WWE’s flagship series, with a lack of creativity and variety, it just ends up becoming a bit monotonous. There may be something here for die hard fans, but unfortunately beyond a few matches in exhibition and a lacklustre career mode, AEW Fight Forever does not do enough to be an enticing wrestling game! Unfortunately, unlike the actual AEW brand, the game just can’t compete with its WWE counterpart!
Minecraft Legends is a bland strategy title that fails to impress. The core tactical systems are shallow and have been implemented quite poorly and the third person combat and traversal is underwhelming at best. As you are locked to controlling your hero, constructing defenses and ordering troops can also feel quite awkward meaning this experience quickly becomes very tedious. This is really unfortunate, because the story is decent, and has some clever humour. However, this is not enough of a reason to be worth investing time into Minecraft Legends.
Tchia does initially give players a decent narrative to latch on to. Unfortunately, after a couple hours of play, it becomes quite dry. Tchia’s setting, which is heavily based on New Caledonia, does look stunning, especially with its simple art style. However, the world does feel quite empty, and with traversal often feeling quite slow, there is little reason left for players to take on the chore of seeing the sights.