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There's no soul to Falling Skies. It's a generic, cheap turn based tactics game. It lacks any identity of its own, fails to represent its license, and fails to understand what made the game it copied its base mechanics from so great. And as such I can't really recommend it to anyone.
Lords of the Fallen has some pretty clear inspirations, but it's a very different game despite those influences - enough so that Souls fans can't be guaranteed to enjoy this one. What it is is a challenging fantasy game with a good sense of progression that is entertaining to play, even if it's got no chance of being remembered as a classic like Demon's Souls and Dark Souls are.
It would be nice to see Just Dance further innovate as a series, or it runs the risk of becoming incredibly repetitive going forward. Some new features provide interesting wrinkles in the existing formula, but it feels like the series has plateaued and is in need of a few new moves before the next inevitable release.
If you enjoyed the original Legend of Grimrock, odds are you will feel right at home here. It is bigger, more polished and provides greater variety than its predecessor. Newcomers to the dungeon crawling genre might find the learning curve somewhat steep, as is usually the case for these types of games. It's also disappointing that the game doesn't do much to push the genre when there are ambitious projects like Malevolence out there, but Legend of Grimrock 2 is a nice, safe, purchase for the dungeon crawler tragics.
This is a budget production, and it's worth noting that aside from a lack of multiplayer there's a lot of content in Shadow Warrior, so it more than justifies its cheaper asking price. It's worth having on the shelf as a curiosity, but I do hope that the development team at the heart of this game decide to do something more genuine and mature next time around. The talent is there, and it's wasted on a game like this which, fun as it is, doesn't live up to the promise of its screenshots.
A good kid's game, film, or book is one that children can spend hours of time on. A great one is a game that children and adults can enjoy equally. Skylanders Trap Team is closer to Saturday Disney than Harry Potter, but that's not really a criticism of it. It's a highly focused game designed explicitly to fill up the Christmas list of the child in the household. But it is a well produced game, well above the standards of most children's games, and those miniatures are highly collectible stuff. The kids will love having this under that pine tree.
Sunset Overdrive is just what the Xbox One needed - a distinctive exclusive to set the thing apart from the PlayStation 4. Titanfall was adequate and the Forza games are great for racing fans, but Sunset Overdrive is a glorious breath of fresh air.
When Michael Foucault wrote about his philosophical concept of the "limit", he was talking about how we need art that push boundares - of good taste, of sexuality, of art itself - in order to define what the limit is and why we need to have it. Bayonetta 2 will challenge some people. It will make them uncomfortable. It's transgressive in numerous ways, and with that comes the potential to offend. But in causing offence, Bayonetta 2 encourages conversation, and that's the very definition of a good work of art.
There isn't much more to say about Race The Sun. It does what it promises in offering a fast runner-style game, and it's nice that the developers went as far as to offer completely new level layouts each day, but ultimately this is as shallow as the likes of Doodle Jump or Temple Run, and costs an order of magnitude more money.
With a rocking soundtrack, loads of content, plenty of fan service and some clever gelling of two disparate video game universes, Hyrule Warriors is easily my favourite game of 2014 so far. Let's just hope for a sequel that explores some of the other Zelda titles!
I love that games like Fluster Cluck are leading the charge of local, social, multiplayer, and I hope it continues indefinitely. Being able to experience actual living room mayhem again as you did back in the day when friends would come over for epic SNES and N64 sessions is still a blast 15 years later.
For all the games' narrative themes of consciousness-probing, identity-subsuming science, the reordering of the psychic self for a greater application of the flesh, I needed to look no further than my own pathological gameplay in its honour. The rage quits, the restarts, the late nights, the infinitesimal adjustments to my thirteenth, fourteenth, fifteenth attempts, all part of my drive to survive to the end, no matter how many hours of hell it took. That is the essence of survival horror. Those are the roots around which The Evil Within is so expertly entwined.
Forza's combination of speed, presentation values, excellent handling and flexibility in letting players approach the game in a variety of ways makes it really hard to put the controller down. At the end of the day, it is just a whole lot of fun.
'Tis the season for horror games, and it is nice to see some games still understand that the true roots of horror are sown in the mind. Too many franchises (I am looking at you Resident Evil and Dead Space) gave up chilling atmospheres to placate the high action crowd. While there is some action to be had here, do not play Lone Survivor: The Director's Cut looking to score perfect headshots or cheap scares. The pace is slower and as a result the sense of horror is more palpable, memorable experience.
I have issues with these kinds of games, in that they do tend to romanticise organised crime and vigilantism, and Sleeping Dogs, despite having a policeman as the protagonist, doesn't actually do enough to reflect the actual horrors that the Triads inflict on any population they involve themselves within. However, as a gangster-style narrative, I can't think of one I enjoyed more than this. I loved the game when I played it as a freebie on PlayStation Plus ages ago. I love it even more on my shiny, powerful, PlayStation 4.
Looking back on this review, I'm actually a bit depressed that the highlight of the game (for me, at least) was simply how good Ryse looked. It's obvious that Crytek is capable of so much more, but Ryse simply borrows the best that a few franchises has to offer, and instead chooses to cobble them together quite lazily with a few superfluous mechanics thrown in for good measure, rather than refining and building upon the core game. Granted, Ryse could have been doomed from the start, having started out as a Kinect-only title with a fairly limited control scheme, but I can't help but feel that a brand new IP deserved a little bit more than what we ultimately got. But hey, at least it looks good, right?
But I'm really stretching to find a complaint there. The reality is that Samurai Warriors 4 is nothing short of brilliant, and a huge leap forward into the new generation of game design by Koei. It's cinematic, its beautiful, it's fast and entertaining, and if you allow it to be, it's even a little educational. And that makes it an inspiration.
Look, I'm not going to put on a purple astronaut helmet or run half-speed into a wall of cake mix or perform any other act of subterfuge that may trick you into forgetting that Natural Doctrine is one of the most unforgiving virtual experiences currently available in this or any possible dimension. It's like that university professor who wouldn't accept your term paper three minutes late despite the fact that your dog body slammed your cat from the roof that morning, placing them both in sad but cute comas. It just doesn't give a damn. Yet, if you have patience, get a kick out of learning through experimentation, and receive a rush when accomplishing what seems satirically impossible, you may appreciate Natural Doctrine's unyielding difficulty, and certainly gain a feeling of unrivalled empowerment that's associated with overcoming it.
The easy comparison is games like Portal or Q.U.B.E. due to the perspective and puzzling nature of the gameplay. Though TRI lacks the polish and presentation of the more popular Portal titles, its sheer accessibility and serenity mark it out as something genuinely different, and as such deserves to be noticed.
The penalties for my aggressive style of racing seem like they would take all of the fun out of Driveclub for me, given that's usually the only way I can win in this genre, but that is not the case. I enjoy Driveclub a great deal and am looking forward to future updates and getting back online to race against other players. I enjoy the different tracks, beautiful locations and slick-looking cars, and unlocking new rides is always a rush and the thrill of victory is addictive and rewarding.