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Thumbsticks

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175 games reviewed
72.8 average score
80 median score
72.0% of games recommended

Thumbsticks's Reviews

Life is Strange: True Colours features what really matters in a Life is Strange game: a likeable protagonist and a brilliant setting. It’s also received a massive visual upgrade this time around, which really makes the town of Haven Springs feel cosy, somewhere you want to spend your time.

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Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl straddle the line between old and new by giving two beloved heirlooms a polish that avoids tarnishing treasured memories. These are buoyant, accessible RPGs for fans and newcomers alike.

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In so many ways, Gotta Protectors: Cart of Darkness is a frenetic, baffling, exhausting, draining experience. But, somehow, that’s not a criticism? You’ll come away feeling like you got hit by a train, but in a really positive, memorable way.

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Familiar but refreshed, Nintendo Switch Sports is an excellent party pastime with the promise of more fun to come. An unfussy online implementation also improves the experience for solo players.

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Aug 31, 2022

Sam Barlow's Immortality switches digital footage for celluloid film, and it's a better fit. His fixation with scrambled narratives has found its natural home, not in the realm of computers, those ghost-free machines, but here, on coils of vulnerable tape.

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In a medium preoccupied with guns and bombs and violent, power-fantasy notions of heroism, Gerda: A Flame in Winter treads a quieter path through its World War II setting, and is perhaps all the more powerful for it.

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Sep 22, 2022

In a world where 2014's Mario Kart 8 is still going strong, on the face of it, it seems hard to justify a third full fat Splatoon game in the same time frame. While it might not be groundbreaking, Splatoon 3 is nonetheless a high watermark for the series, and is a welcome premium product in the era of battle passes and microtransactions.

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Oct 12, 2022

There's very little that's new in Easy Come, Easy Golf that wasn't in Everybody's Golf before it – save for its team mechanic and those frightening golf-baby clones – but that doesn't matter. None of that matters. The fact we've got a Clap Hanz golf game on a Nintendo console, at long last? That's a hole in one, for sure.

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Nov 15, 2022

Bayonetta 3 is an awful lot more, but it's also an awful lot more of the same. It's a game that revels in its spirited too-muchness.

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Nov 24, 2022

If Ragnarök spells the end of God of War, as both its themes and talk from Santa Monica Studio suggest, then it will serve as a fitting end for Kratos. Not just because it would make an impressive swansong for the God of War, but because that level of weariness and relief that Kratos feels from completing his lengthy endeavours is, by its end, projected onto the player, completing theirs.

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This XCOM meets X-Men effort from Firaxis isn't flawless, but its a fantasy dinner party of superheroes elevates the experience above its formulaic story and forgettable hero.

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Oct 24, 2023

Shifting perspectives, changing abilities, and an expanded open world playground make this sequel into a bona fide blockbuster.

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Nintendo rather threw the kitchen sink (full of thousands of Post-it notes) at Super Mario Bros. Wonder, so it's unsurprising that not every element is as successful as the game's – and the genre's – best. But when you think about it, it's remarkable that, after nearly four decades, there are still new ideas left to try. The real wonder is how good Mario's latest 2-D romp turned out.

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Nov 30, 2023

If you're already invested in the Remedy Connected Universe – that's Alan Wake, this sequel, and 2019's Control, thus far; officially, everything else is just an Easter Egg – then you will devour and adore Alan Wake 2. For everyone else it might feel like a slog, at times, through Alan's hackneyed writings and Remedy's penchant for mixed-media presentation, but this is still an excellent survival horror with many bright spots reflected in that signature flashlight.

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Dec 6, 2023

If there is any criticism to be made of Jusant, it's that developer Don't Nod – no stranger to over-egging the narrative pudding at times – couldn't hold its tongue, filling the beautifully spartan climb with diaries, logs, and otherwise unnecessary lore. But the game's focus on its core climbing mechanics, and some of the finest art direction we've yet seen, still make this an essential journey.

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Oct 24, 2016

Players who like hardboiled detective stories will likely find something of interest here as well, but most of all, for those familiar with the work of Suda51 – especially Killer7 and Flower, Sun, and Rain – The Silver Case will be an essential 'new' Suda51 trip.

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Jan 9, 2019

The Long Dark is by no means perfect, but what it lacks in finesse it makes up for in attention to detail. The survival is tough but addictive, coming with a vast array of supplies to find and stats to manage, while the challenge mode and story accommodate players with different levels of experience and ability. It’s got a lot of ground to cover in patches and updates, but there’s still a mighty fine game underneath its shortcomings.

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The core racing model is a fluid rush, and a thrill to control through an intriguing, if undercooked world. It’s to 34BigThings’ credit that they make known where their crosshairs are trained, but the bite is that much harsher when they miss their mark.

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Oct 10, 2017

If you remain a committed 3DS gamer – and there's every reason to be – I would suggest looking at some of Jupiter's cheaper Picross titles available via the Nintendo eShop. If not, Picross S continues the studio's good run of engaging puzzlers with a wealth of content and visual finesse that is underpinned by timeless gameplay. Keep 'em coming.

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Jul 29, 2018

It's hard to ignore the unsavoury taste that comes along with The Crew 2's social media-based progression system. That being said, most people will accept that it's just a somewhat topical stand-in for an experience point system – and skip through all of the awful vlogger posturing and horrid presentation – to find at its heart a knockabout arcade racer with the capacity to make you smile.

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