Sammy Barker's Reviews
Moss is sublime throughout, but it's so good that you'll wish there was more of it.
Knockout League's colourful cast of characters look chunky in PlayStation VR, and stepping into the ring with them is an immersive treat.
When two outrageously detailed character models are slugging it out, EA Sports UFC 3 feels sublime. Incredible animations paired with a weighty physics system mean that you feel the thrills and spills of every bout. Unfortunately, the clunky ground game combat fails to hit the same highs, and the campaign – which is a novelty to begin with – loses its lustre after a few rounds. There's still a lot to like here and more than enough content to sink your fists into, but it still feels like there's a bit more refinement required before this series achieves G.O.A.T. status.
Like it or not, Madden NFL 18 is still by far the best American Football game on the PlayStation 4, but if you fancy something a little sillier then Mutant Football League is not a bad shout at all. It plays similarly to the iconic EA series, but its aggressive playbook and irreverent sense of humour make it a fun alternative for a few downs – just don't expect the appeal to last long into overtime.
One of the greatest games ever made resurrected in one of the greatest remakes of all time. Shadow of the Colossus remains faithful to the 2006 original, but its presentation is on par with the very best that the PS4 has to offer. A masterpiece.
The Inpatient's strong opening is undone by a rushed finale, and while the various plot permutations add replayability, they come at the cost of a fulfilling narrative. As a PlayStation VR experience, this is a fine-looking spook-'em-up with some neat innovations that help create a tactile world, but the story is far too fragmented and, frankly, flat to do justice to the universe it's inspired by.
Life Is Strange: Before the Storm is more down to Earth than the main campaign, and it's actually better for it. Deck Nine's done an incredible job of working within the boundaries that DONTNOD's story set, and its biggest achievement is characterising the enigmatic Rachel Amber, who's both intoxicating and fragile all at the same time. Episode 3: Hell Is Empty feels like it could use a little more breathing room, but it crescendos with a gorgeous conclusion that's as heart-warming as it is heart-breaking. After all, we already know where this story ends.
Resident Evil 7: Biohazard's End of Zoe expansion offers the kind of tongue-in-cheek silliness only Capcom's survival horror franchise can provide. Played straight with some pretty serious stakes, the DLC still manages to be downright stupid all at the same time. It's a wonderful send-off for one of 2017's greats.
It's hard to complain about an additional two hours of Resident Evil 7: Biohazard – especially when it's free. There's some fun lore for fans to soak up here, and some pretty tense scenarios, too. While it never really has anything to rival the main game's best bits, it's worth the bandwidth for Redfield's masterfully manicured mane alone.
Mike Posner was a few years early: all he needed was to set a high score in Invector to show Avicii that he's cool. This is a hyperactive rhythm game, which is perhaps defined more by its presentation and soundtrack than its simplistic underlying gameplay. It's good fun, though, and playing it will make you feel cool – even if it's only for a fleeting second. There's something to be said for empowerment like that.
Bethesda's really tried to make DOOM work in virtual reality, but despite supporting all three of PlayStation VR's control options, it doesn't really feel like the title was designed with any of them in mind. That said, if you can ignore the flaws with whichever peripheral you choose, then the over-the-top action of id Software's series transfers well, and this is arguably one of the better looking virtual reality titles to date. It's a little on the short side, but the price point reflects that, and the gunplay is still as intense as it's ever been.
The wonky motion tracking and cumbersome menus may leave you reeling, but Monster of the Deep: Final Fantasy XV is not the gimmicky gag that many expected it to be. This is a hearty package with a surprising amount of meat on its bones, and it's a feast for the eyes in PlayStation VR. Cut corners like 2D cut-scenes do break the immersion somewhat, but relative to expectations, this is way better than it has any right to be.
Episode 3: Fractured Mask doesn't quite hit the same highs as its immediate predecessor, but the tangled web that Telltale's cast in Batman: The Enemy Within is getting increasingly intriguing with each episode. This particular instalment may pump the brakes slightly in order to include necessary setup for the impending finale, but it feels meaningful, and the scenes with Selina and Bruce are particularly engaging.
Virtual reality breathes new life into an already excellent campaign. While you'll have probably seen everything that The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim VR has to offer before, you'll never have seen it quite like this: vast, varied, and like an actual living, breathing place. Bethesda's proven that blockbusters can make the transition to PlayStation VR – and on this evidence, it's something we'd like to see happen more often.
Need for Speed Payback is a real-world example of microtransactions gone wrong. As an open world racer, the game's inoffensively average – but when paired with its bafflingly bad progression system, it's frankly an embarrassment. It's scary to think that publishers are quite literally sabotaging their own games in pursuit of a bonus buck or two these days.
No Heroes Allowed! VR is a deeply satisfying and surprisingly humorous PlayStation VR strategy game. It doesn't do much with virtual reality, but it looks great inside the headset and has some unique gameplay ideas to boot. Sure, its high price means that it's never going to get to the top of the food chain, but this likeable title is still worth feasting on – assuming, of course, you can afford it.
Megaton Rainfall is an incredible accomplishment, but not one that we particularly liked to play. The sense of scale is outstanding – and it's even more impressive with PlayStation VR – but the cumbersome combat grates almost as badly as its cringe-inducing storyline. It would appear that even being a literal god isn't all it's cracked up to be.
Gran Turismo Sport represents a sharp change in direction for a beloved brand – and only time will tell whether that move proves shrewd. The game sets a new standard for online simulation racing on consoles, and for that it must be praised, but in its efforts to educate it's shed the series' revered single player structure – and almost certainly a fair few fans along the way.
Brave New World doesn't give Chloe and Rachel quite enough screen time to shine as brightly as Before the Storm's first episode, but there are plenty of top-notch moments in this instalment, and the cliffhanger has us eagerly awaiting our next fix of Life Is Strange.
It's the unique way in which individual stories overlap that makes The Invisible Hours such a great game. You'll need to replay this story multiple times over in order to uncover all of its secrets, and with each run you'll come to appreciate its choreography more and more. Existing inside a living, breathing world with famous historical figures like Thomas Edison is what virtual reality was made for, and the fact that the fiction is able to deliver shocks with such frequency is testament to the quality of the story-telling on display.