Kotaku's Reviews
Sledgehammer Games has delivered a polished experience across all areas of Call of Duty: WWII, showing us exactly what a classic Call of Duty game should look and feel like in 2017. This entry shouldn't disappoint fans, whether their preference is campaign, multiplayer, or zombies
It's a playable Saturday morning cartoon: silly, janky but for a brief period of time, a fun distraction.
The Frozen Wilds doesn't revolutionize or even significantly expand on the best ideas introduced in Zero Dawn. It succeeds in a more straightforward way: by giving us more of an already fantastic game.
The New Colossus crafts a world that can deliver exciting action and human drama. The messy gunfights give way to something much larger. The New Colossus examines violence, resistance, and the necessity of revolution. It's bloody and occasionally silly but never stupid or crass.
Assassin's Creed Origins is ungainly and uneven, beautiful and frustrating, expansive and unexpectedly conservative.
Every element gelled so well that I was simply enraptured by the beauty of the whole experience.
Fire Emblem Warriors lacks charm but compensates with spectacle.
When I finished the story, I had to stop myself from immediately starting a new game. That's partially because this is one of the best survival horror games I've played, but also because you unlock several snazzy new shirts for Sebastian, alongside other goodies to take with you into NG+.
It is a well-crafted game, and like its predecessor, it feels like an authentic recreation of South Park the show. It is full of shocking, outrageous moments. But it can also feel sanitized, like a Disney-fied rendition of a cartoon that won many early fans over with how crappy and explicitly un-Disney it was.
Brawlhalla is a dynamic take on platform brawler that feels good to play. It's never going to replace the game that inspired it, but means that there's another (non-Nintendo) game to play when I invite my friends over to hang on the couch.
The fundamental issue here is that being good at Shadow of War means the process becomes routine. Find intel. Target underlings. Go after Warchiefs. Attack the castle. Defeat the Overlord. Appoint your favorite orc as new Overlord. With so many maps this time around, I grew fatigued of this procedure halfway through. And because Talion is so overpowered, I barely died—so there were fewer chances for orcs to remember our previous encounters.
It's delightful and fun and worth the effort it'll take to clear.
This is clearly a high point, the highest since The Taken King launched nearly two years ago. It's a red-carpet welcome for new players and a slightly bittersweet payoff for those of us who've been there from the start.
There's so little to love [in 2K18 MyCareer modes] that all we're left with is the basketball (which you can enjoy in other modes), Brands™ and a mountain of problems.
When class trials get heated up and I'm staring at a screen, trying to piece together in my head how or why something could have happened, what could possibly disprove an airtight alibi, what deus ex machina allowed for this series of events to unfold, it feels like the Danganronpa I know and love. Danganronpa V3 still gives me those moments, if only a little less frequently than I would have liked.
Warhammer 2 might have a lot in common with the first game, but everything it has done to set itself apart is big and fresh and daring, making this a game that's worthy of its own place in the spotlight.
Ultimately, Death of the Outsider is just more Dishonored. Dishonored excels at being a blank slate for players' creativity, and while Death of the Outsider doesn't do anything to change that, it doesn't ruin a good thing.
An unexpected treat of a game, one that bodes well for the future of the Lego video game series. A rapid-release movie tie-in is a really strange place for innovation, yet here it is.
Were Hob a tightly-scripted action adventure that guided the player from point to point and told them exactly what was expected of them, it wouldn't be nearly as magical an experience, and certainly not as personal. Making my own decisions (and my own mistakes) makes the impressive, world-changing moments feel like something I did.
It is, on so many levels, an incredible achievement, packed with enough heart, intelligence, and confidence to sustain ten lesser games. It’s a testament to its form, even as it’s held back by it in places. It still feels premature to declare Original Sin 2 an all-time classic, as some have, but I imagine plenty of future games will borrow ideas from it. It’ll be a crying shame if they don’t.