AusGamers's Reviews
Ultimately, the Forza Horizon series has always been about positivity, and an unabashed love for the singular thing that is driving. Infectiously so, which makes Forza Horizon 5 the most polished entry, in terms of overall structure and presentation, to date.
Oh, and your 13-year-old 80s mullet is the thing dreams are made of.
For a genre steeped in keyboard shortcuts, understanding tech trees, the importance of a build queue, and multi-tasking so you can turn that gold into gold-plated armour, Age of Empire IV's easy-to-learn interface and systems go the opposite route to what you'd expect when throwing the word ‘streamlined' into the mix.
If the game’s pacing, its toolsets and some of the missed opportunities mentioned throughout this review were in place, the score here would be much higher. Even with rose-tinted glasses on as someone who grew up in the 80s and 90s, I can’t bring myself to overlook Echo Generation’s glaring pitfalls, which is a shame because it nails nostalgia and reference and feels. It’s just a slog to pull those things out of it, and then some. Still, I see a bright future for this studio and the potential for this as a series moving forward, because there’s a lot to build on here. It also begins life on the right voxel foot as a Game Pass offering, so those pitfalls immediately just become the grind they are with very little money handed over on your part.
With Back 4 Blood available on Xbox Game Pass on PC and Console there’s reason to jump in if you’re looking for something new to play with friends. The look and feel is familiar and the action is engaging and chaotic when played with a group. For a while that is. Thanks to the sameness that permeates across most levels and backdrops and the predictability of the pace, it doesn’t take long for this Left 4 Dead spiritual successor to wear a little thin.
Hell, even the genre's fonts are similar (or the same), and that's across rival publishers and developers over major titles designed to clash against one another at retail. But this familiarity has kept the genre on top in its home base of Japan, and evergreen as far as pop-culture relevance goes in the West.
Then, once repaired and ready to dare, she moves onto the next fashionista boss withholding this summer's must-have accessory -- a Charge Beam here, a Phantom Cloak there -- and takes no guff when procuring whichever suit upgrade it is she needs to get to her final destination.
It definitely eases you in, especially if you're a newcomer, but it's also surprisingly quick to lean into the stuff found in the compendium of stages from the first two GameCube outings.
Far Cry 6 is still a lot of fun. AI warts and all.
Other things like being able to stack gems or potions in your stash.
Does this break the overall experience? Its fun? Not really, but it definitely convolutes proceedings.
Combined with the new animation work, linking a few passes together to score a beautiful goal feels (and looks) fantastic.
It might be a strange way to phrase things, but Kena suffers from feeling too much like a game for a game’s sake. The latter third is essentially a string of linear levels with puzzles and boss fights, so much so that by the time the climactic confrontation rolls around it affects the dramatic tension the story has spent several hours slowly building towards. It’s by no means bad, or anything close to that. Instead, you get the feeling that much like commanding the Rot to prop up a fallen statue the experience itself is given the very same vibrant animated lift based on how it looks.
It might take a flow-chart or two to understand its premise, but it takes experiencing a loop or two or three to discover its genius.
It's the sort of framework that's easy to grasp, and one that plays into a lengthy and rewarding tale. An adventure that sees Even travel from the lowliest slum-like villages of Onecroft all the way to the shining beacon in the sky that is Sixtopia.
And it honestly doesn't take the game long to deliver on that hinted at promise.
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Going even more retro is fine too, whenever No More Heroes III dips into EGA and CGA monochrome computing for little story vignettes it's always captivating.
It's comforting and familiar and simply does what it does without a great deal of fuss. In many ways it feels like the ideal pandemic lockdown game. I'll happily load King's Bounty 2, pull up the covers and settle in for the weeks and months to come.
Playing in a squad is the experience in terms of actual playability, and on that front it’s fun to be in the midst of a distinct 1986 cinematic Aliens vibe for a time. Sharing in the look and feel, pointing out the similarities, the inconsistencies, and questioning some of the questionable logic. In the end the impressive, but static, visuals and sound design do a lot to put you into the universe. But, at best Aliens: Fireteam Elite is what you play in the arcade before jumping into the cinema proper.