IGN's Reviews
The Champions' Ballad isn't the extra dose of story for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild that many fans were expecting, but it would be churlish to turn down another chunk of hours with one of gaming's greatest achievements. Even better, those hours are filled with new surprises, endgame-level challenges, and the weirdest post-game reward of recent years.
Curse of Osiris landed in Destiny 2 with a thud. Its campaign and story are a bust, its new content is mixed and buggy at best, and it does nothing to address the community's loud cries for fixes to the endgame. The few redeeming features are its more challenging and varied Adventures, and the Raid Lair's puzzles and tough boss battle.
WWE 2K18 for the Switch wasn't ready to be released, plain and simple. The degree of slowdown in any match type with more than two people in the ring at the same time is simply unacceptable. Add onto that the weird audio glitches and an overall lack of polish, and the underwhelming single-player modes that impact all versions of WWE 2K18, and you have a Switch port that even the biggest of wrestling fans should stay far away from.
Doom VFR is a brave shooter that proves that VR games don't have to be conservative with movement to work. Fast-paced action with a great stable of recognizable weapons and enemies makes it a challenging rush, once you find your VR legs. It's a shame VFR story didn't get the same self-aware treatment as Doom did, but even if it's all about warping and gunning, that's more than enough.
Rocket League's colorfully absurd cars-playing-sports concept works so well because the energy of its arcadey gameplay meshes with its deep team-based strategy and variety of modes. It's exceedingly rare to find a multiplayer game that's welcoming and approachable for new players and so intricate that the best players can earn a living by mastering its depths. Rocket League is a golden example of turning a good idea into something truly amazing.
Despite not adding anything new to the gameplay of The Surge or providing many rewards to returning players, A Walk in the Park provides more of the wickedly fun combat and detailed environments that we saw in the main campaign. The juxtaposition of the family-friendly funtime setting and technological horror is at times goofy and genuinely chilling, and even with a fairly basic set of objectives, exploring the ruined park was a fun way to spend a few hours back in this world.
Seven: The Days Long Gone feels like it's trying to break new ground at every turn, but in the process it makes some really bad choices and is executed poorly. Its action is acrobatic but almost immediately gets stale, climbing is only fun when the levels allow it, most crafting systems are needlessly obtuse, and its fast-travel system actively tries to kill you on a regular basis. Add to that the regular bugs, and Seven's days are numbered.
Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a standout RPG that manages to keep its story, combat, and exploration interesting over the course of at least 70 hours of adventure through an impressively varied and rich world. Getting from place to place can be confusing, but outside of that and a multi-hour progression roadblock near the end this is an excellent game full of tough, memorable battles and a positive message.
Because of its diminished graphics and clumsy combat controls, Skyrim VR definitely isn't the best way to actually play Skyrim. However, if you leave the difficulty on the default lowest setting and roam the world as a god who can slay enemies with the flick of the wrist, it's a good way to experience Bethesda's legendary RPG from a whole new perspective.
The most important parts of LA Noire have aged beautifully, with incredibly detailed faces, diverse characters, and unique, challenging crimes to solve as a detective. The top-notch writing and voice acting bring 1940s Los Angeles to life, but are let down by a dull open world with frequent frame rate drops. Aside from difficulty aiming in gun fights, it's a smart port with accurate motion controls and the ability to play almost entirely touchscreen, too.
Battle Chef Brigade successfully mixes genres to create something wholly engaging. The charming art direction and characters, creative combat, and clever puzzle mechanics help put Battle Chef Brigade squarely in its own genre. Despite a few storytelling stumbles and some minimal repetition, the sunny disposition of Trinket Studios' puzzle/platformer/beat ‘em up ultimately shines through.
The Sims 4 on console includes all the free feature updates from the PC version, and while they are good new additions that should have been included with The Sims 4 to begin with, they don't make up for the performance issues. Most of the problems are minor annoyances, but because save and menu bugs have been so frequent, this version of The Sims 4 is a generally unreliable experience, which is unfortunate since it is a genuinely fun game. And while it is disappointing that the console version is missing some community features from the PC version, I'm glad that at least cheats work.
Rebounding from a weak second episode, Batman: The Enemy Within's third episode restores my hopes that this season will turn out well. Major developments around Batman's big secret and strong interactions with Harley Quinn, Selina Kyle, and John make Fractured Mask work, right up until the extremely abrupt ending.
Unless you played through both Sun and Moon extensively and have already collected every Legendary Pokemon, it's easy to recommend to any Pokemon fan.
Ashes Cricket isn't pitch perfect, but it's the best videogame representation of the sport to date.
LEGO Marvel Super Heroes 2 doesn't deviate much from the established LEGO template, but its wide variety of settings, heroes, and abilities make it constantly fun to play, especially in co-op. The combat is still quite simple and it's sometimes difficult to tell what you should do next, but the story is lighthearted and fun enough that mild annoyances like these fade into the background.
On top of the joy of creating and playing as your own character, there's a lot of goofy charm that makes Sonic Forces hard to be too disappointed with. The graphics are colorful and engaging, and the music is a pumping backdrop for extreme team-ups, super-speed cinematics, and lots of ruminations on the power of friendship. There are some really fun levels in the mix, too, and surprisingly strong boss fights make for some unexpected highlights. But Sonic Forces doesn't build on its handful of good ideas as much as it should, and it screeches to a halt just as it seems to hit its stride.
The core of Episode 5: Don't Stop Believin' provides a thrilling and fulfilling resolution to the season arc with a couple interesting surprises in store. I just wish it hadn't been immersed in this flimsy, fake crisis of the Guardians breaking up and getting back together that was never fully realized, and ended up dragging the whole season down. Flaws and all, however, Guardians of the Galaxy is, overall, one of the stronger stories Telltale has put out. This has become the version of the Guardians team I see in my head first when I think about them. I'd be thrilled to hear we might get to join them on the Milano for a second season.
Call of Duty: WW2's offers a fast-paced and fun World War II experience with its new multiplayer mode and return to Nazi Zombies.
WRC 7 doesn't unseat Codemasters' Dirt 4 as this year's premier rally game, but it definitely continues Kylotonn's upward trajectory in the genre.