Wyrmhall is a rare bird: a cozy game that doesn’t try to hide how repetitive it is at its core, but finds a way to make that gameplay loop surprisingly addictive. If you’re looking for something to knock out in a sitting, it’s worth checking out.
It’s quite possible that Sony don’t think they need MLB The Show 25 to be a huge departure – after two years of adding in some cool new features, this may be the year they decided to coast a little. And, I mean, why not? Even a forgettable version of MLB The Show still delivers a best-in-class baseball experience. It makes it hard to recommend if you picked up the last few years’ editions, but if you’ve taken a year or two off, it might be time to jump back in.
If you want a traditional, linear experience with clear goals and objectives, Atomfall probably isn’t what you’re after. It’s very much a player-directed experience – for better and for worse, depending on your perspective. However, if you’re the type who wants a game to give you the freedom to play however you want, then you owe it to yourself to check out Atomfall.
No matter how fun the gameplay is, that doesn’t matter if the game doesn’t consistently work, and I don’t think anyone could realistically say that Rise of the Ronin works as it should on PC.
With a story that keeps you engaged and guessing to the end (whichever end you uncover), Expelled! is a worthy successor to inkle’s previous glories, and it’s the kind of game that every mystery fan needs to play.
Petit Island borrows a lot of well-established ideas without doing enough to make any of them feel like its own, and as a result, you’ll come away from the game wishing you could play some of those other games instead.
Regardless of whether you want to play with someone else in-person or online, Split Fiction is well worth your time. It’s an excellent co-op adventure, and it’s easy to imagine the game garnering the same kind of following – and accolades – as It Takes Two.
Rolando was a triumph of mobile gaming on its first release, and Rolando Deluxe shows that it’s every bit as great now.
If you’re a fan of old-school shooters – or even if you just like games where you don’t have to think much and you can fire away at everything that moves – you should definitely check out Forgive Me Father 2. It doesn’t break new ground, but with weapons and action this fun, it doesn’t need to.
I’m not sure that Avowed needs to feel weighty and meaningful to be fun. In fact, I’d say that it’s better because it’s not trying to make itself into a grand statement. Avowed is, as I noted above, exactly what you’d imagine a fantasy epic to be – and it’s all the better for it.
Ys X: Nordics is a fine return to form for the series. Time will tell whether the already-announced sequel (expanded version?) is a worthwhile upgrade, but why wait until then? We know this version is good as it stands, and that’s more than enough to make it worth your time.
It’s undeniably a great game when it works, and everything that made it our GOTY a few years ago still stands. I’m sure the PC version will get there eventually, and when that happens it’ll be a must-play for anyone who loves big, open-world superhero games…but for now, you’re better off holding off, and giving the game a little more time to iron out the kinks.
Crown Wars: The Black Prince is a competent tactical RPG that fits squarely within the confines of its chosen genre, so if you want more X-COM-likes in your life, and don’t mind feeling like you’d get the same experience playing any number of other, similar games, you could do worse than checking it out.
It’s basically a generic action game with Star Wars slapped on top, featuring some fairly easy platforming and plenty of hacking and slashing your way through forgettable enemies.
Legacy of Kain Soul Reaver 1 & 2 Remastered is probably a must-play if you were obsessed with it 25 years ago, but probably missable if you didn’t play it the first time around. It’s got some interesting ideas and it delivers on some of them, but overall, you’ll probably need nostalgia goggles to get the most out of it.
There’s plenty to like about Botworld Odyssey. It’s made the jump from mobile gaming to PC without feeling like it had to sacrifice much, and it offers players a nice twist on the creature-collecting genre in the process.
Even if you’re a diehard fan of TMNT in its current incarnation, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutants Unleashed is a stuttering mess that doesn’t deserve your money.
While I wouldn’t say that It’s Only Money fills the void left by Saints Row’s departure entirely, it definitely does a very good job of trying. Its production values may be a lot lower (and more on that in a bit), but the game captures the same sense of customizable anarchy that made Saints Row great at its best.
It works as it should, which is always a plus (even if it’s a little baffling at times), and I have no doubt that if you sank a half-dozen hours or so into the game back in 2002, you should find that the game is probably the same now as it was then. I think that if you don’t have that sense of nostalgia you’ll probably find the game a little lacking, but as PS2 remasters go, you could probably do a lot worse.
It’s not quite enough to make up for the lack of a Party Pack this year, especially given how lousy the Jackbox Naughty Pack was, but if it had been included on a Party Pack it would undoubtedly be a standout game, no matter what else had been included. The Jackbox Survey Scramble is a very enjoyable addition to Jackbox’s impressive stable of party games.