VG247's Reviews
It's not far from being a bit special, the kind of indie gem that everyone has to play, but it's unfortunately just not quite there.
I am hopeful that 2042 will be a more interesting Battlefield game at some point next year, but having been through varying degrees of rough launches with this series - from BF 2142 through BF 5 - I can’t say I have the stamina to perform the dance of chastising DICE for technical problems and missing features, only to turn around and celebrate when the game is inevitably ‘good now, actually’ a year into it.
Let’s be clear for a moment: Forza Horizon has always been good. From the moment it burst onto the scene in 2012 as a spin-off to the core, more po-faced Forza Motorsport series, it established itself as a fun, thrilling, and subversively moreish alternative thread for racing on Xbox. It was in many ways the spiritual, open-world successor to Project Gotham Racing, and in turn traced its roots back to arcade racing royalty like OutRun. This is a tough lineage to stand up to, but Horizon 5 takes all that history and experience and runs with it, incrementally upgrading this series into must-play brilliance. It’s an achievement of a game.
Judged on its own terms, Call of Duty: Vanguard offers a solid, albeit predictable campaign, an engaging multiplayer with deep progression systems and satisfying gunplay, and a Zombies mode that will only serve as a minor distraction in its current state.
It's certain to make you smile and burst out with laughter with how silly it can get at times, make you feel a sense of achievement and satisfaction when completing objectives, and also make you want to throw your controller out the window when you just can't seem to win a race no matter how hard you try. Just don't expect too much from the Mass races.
Shin Megami Tensei 5’s combat is great, punishing and rewarding in equal measure without ever tipping the scales too far in one direction. Mixing and matching your deck of demons makes for great fun as well, and spurs you to look to all corners of the ruined world for allies of all shapes and sizes. It’s everything outside of the battling and grungy soundtrack where Shin Megami Tensei 5 badly misses the mark, with one-note characters that you’re never given the chance to better know, and a paper-thin plot that feels dragged out over dozens of hours. Shin Megami Tensei 5 is a good RPG battler, but it’s not good at much else.
There’s no need to change what works already, though a few additional gameplay flourishes could have helped AoE 4 feel more fresh and exciting. The campaigns are robust, but the missing content stands out in its absence. That’s especially true considering Age of Empires 4 is a full-priced release, though being on Game Pass makes it a more appealing prospect. What’s here is still more than enough to be getting on with, but lIke any good strategist, World’s Edge is planning ahead for the long game.
You'll enjoy Guardians of the Galaxy if you go into it with the right expectations.
There's a lot to like in House of Ashes. It can look great (but also a bit ropey at points), the acting is largely excellent, and your actions (or lack of) can really impact the story. Yet, the game element is lacking, which in turn makes the gameplay sequences where you're in proper control end up lacking in scares. This is a fun time, especially if played in a group or online with a friend, but I was more afraid of button prompts than the monsters.
Back 4 Blood takes an old-school approach where it makes sense, and modernises where it doesn’t. It’s heartening to be engaged by a game purely for its gameplay and variety, and not to pad out a progress bar somewhere.
I might be easily pleased these days, but I think Crysis Remastered Trilogy is an easy recommendation for anyone who loves a bit of first-person gunplay. All three campaigns are good to great, visually they look the part, and it can already be bought at a smashing price. Not the definitive package, at least on consoles, but it's very good all the same.
Far Cry 6 prefers playing guerrilla over more serious reflection because “blowing up s*** is fun,” and Ubisoft just isn’t quite ready to give that up yet.
Metroid Dread is likely to give those that have been counting down the days to its release exactly what they want: a thrilling experience in line with what they loved about past games.
Alan Wake was and still is an occasionally bizarre action horror game, with some lovely set-pieces, fun combat, and what I hope is a slightly tongue-in-cheek sense of self-importance. I think it stands up remarkably well 11 years after its original release and this Remaster is the best way to experience what I consider to be a modern classic.
I enjoyed playing Hot Wheels Unleashed a lot. The racing is straight up fun thanks to a top notch handling model that really makes the most of some impressive powersliding mechanics. But I can't help but wonder what could have been had we not got a game brimming with DLC and tied, to its detriment, to uninspired track environments.
With so many other incredible JRPGs released in 2021, it’s hard to recommend Astria Ascending. It does have a very pretty artstyle, which is what will draw most players initially. The battle system and customization options can be enjoyable to tinker around with, but the lackluster story and unpleasant cast of characters really bog down the whole experience.
There's a melancholia to Sable, wrapped up in the ruined cities and gigantic skeletons dotting its landscapes, but this is balanced with an infectious core of positivity running through the game. What it lacks in drama, it more than makes up for with sheer creativity and grandeur, leaving you with a sense of serenity much-needed and appreciated in these bizarre times. However, it all circles back to the joy of discovery: you might not know exactly what you’ll find as you peel back the layers of Midden, but it’s bound to be interesting.
It’s one of my favourite games of the year - and one we’ll surely be talking about for months to come.
If you liked previous entries in the Life is Strange series, you'll probably enjoy this one. It's a tighter, cleaner take on the formula, but at its heart, it's still the balance of magic and mundane that’s become signature to these games.
WarioWare: Get It Together is unabashedly Nintendo, fulfilling its mission statement to the letter with alarming precision, but also not rocking the boat very much at all. The game’s one big change - controlling a cast of characters - didn’t turn out to be that big of a deal after all. The result is a wonderfully infectious game to play alone - while it lasts - but the true value of the package will be in playing it with others.