Rock, Paper, Shotgun's Reviews
In the end Iconoclasts wasn't quite what I expected, but I greatly enjoyed my time with it, and would recommend it to any platformer fan.
If you've any interest in transhumanist philosophy or even ethics in general, then you owe it to yourself to pick this one up. If you don't, then The Red Strings Club should still hit the spot – and you might find you have more to say the next time someone asks you about the nature of happiness.
The Tomb Kings are ultimately a great addition to Warhammer's perpetually pissed-off factions, but their poor integration into the Vortex campaign suggests that Creative Assembly haven't quite figured out how to add factions who don't share the core participants' objectives.
Even though being a whaler boils down into fairly basic and repetitive actions, there's a texture to Nantucket that I appreciate. It's a fine place to spend time, even if a lot of that time is spent against the grindstone. And the more I play, the more there is to do and see, I just wish it cut to the chase much more quickly.
Paradise is a very satisfying and deeply peculiar game.
If you already love these puzzles, this is a must buy, and if you want to get into a smart, engrossing, and perfectly delivered pure puzzle game, this is an amazing place to start.
[PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds] is best when one round you're a Ghillie-suited assassin and the next you're a struggling nobody with a gun you've never seen before. When you aren't at either extreme, the highs and lows of play can begin to even out and round after round can begin to blend together.
This could have been the Hidden Folks of murdering. And it's all there, underneath the mess, waiting for someone to rescue. Sadly that has, so far, not been realised.
On the whole, though, Okami is a delight from start to finish. It gives you the freedom to savour and indulge in every last drop of its ink-washed world, and its combat and story are both superb – particularly if you have even the slightest bit of interest in Japanese mythology.
Shadowhand is built entirely on a foundation of muddy luck. Sometimes the cards come up in such a way that you can combo twenty or more in a row. Sometimes you have to pass your turn over and over again, waiting for a useful 7 or 5 to show itself. That's why I find it unsatisfying.
You absolutely should play it if you've played To The Moon. If you haven't, you should blooming well go and play that, and then this.
SpellForce 3 is a game that, when pulled apart, doesn't always come out looking great, but that I've still really enjoyed.
It's a lot at once, and so sumptuously animated throughout, that its brevity is a bonus, not a loss.
It might not fully satisfy match-3 fans, then, but this is still a delectable puzzler wrapped in an engaging fantasy story, served with a side of so-so platforming. It's with great skill that Trinket Studios has managed to make that unusual combination work at all, even if I'm left longing for a more developed follow-up that makes the most of every one of its inspired ingredients.
Simple, satisfying, vertical and easy to binge on, like a tube of Pringles. Hyakki Castle feels like a generic alternative. It'll fill the gap for a while, but once you pop, stopping might be easier than you'd hope.
You'll have an example off the top of your head, but I'm struggling to think of the last twin-stick shooter that put a big emphasis on downtime between blasting, with NPCs, a decent chunk of story, and an RPG-style upgradeable roster of characters. That's what Tower 57 rather modestly offers, all through very pleasing chunky 16-bit art.
With how difficult it is to both a) learn all the mechanics and b) execute actions with Slade's lumbering movement, it's tempting just to move on, and to leave Outcast in the past.
If you're in desperate need of a historical strategy romp, you could do a lot worse than Empire Divided, and it's the best piece of Rome DLC by quite a large margin, but barely a turn went by without me wishing I was bullying Elves or fighting the hordes of Chaos instead.
If you want a new Lego game to sit down and play with your kids, or indeed by yourself, then this is the one you've been waiting for since 2013.
For those first few hours, Battlefront 2 struck me with gorgeous moment after gorgeous moment that's made me reevaluate what's possible with 2017's technology. It's a shame that the fighting frequently gets bogged down by chokepoints, and any long-term appeal is undermined by a progression system that can't shake the pay to win shadow which continues to loom over the game.