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The Edge of Time has all the flavor of a Doctor Who production but more time spent cooking in the TARDIS would have gone a long way to make it more stable.
By blending social deduction with survival mechanics Other Ocean has successfully avoided any Among Us clone accusations. Regardless of my tempered enthusiasm from Day One DLC and some polish concerns, Project Winter is a well-devised game that can lead to moments of intense distrust and cooperation few online games can equal.
Ride 4 is as niche as a game can get and I respect its commitment to providing enthusiasts with the most hardcore of simulated racing experiences. I expect to see fans of the franchise welcome this new entry with open arms, especially if they’re on the PlayStation 5, and dig deep into its features and collection of real-world vehicles.
Skul: The Hero Slayer has a lot going for it, but it is also muddled with design issues. For all of its creative skull designs, interesting build options, and cool and flashy attacks, I found the experience as a whole to be draining. It’s a case where the core gameplay loop is hindered by its overbearing rogue elements. A genre reliant on repetition has to accommodate for it by offsetting the recursive elements of the game, no matter how good the combat is. Skul: The Hero Slayer is certainly enjoyable on occasion, but its roguelite ingredients ultimately harm the title as a whole.
Taiko no Tetsujin Rhymic Adventure Pack, while not outstanding, is a solid entry to the series. Fans of the franchise will enjoy the free play mode as usual. The newcomers can go for the RPG Adventure mode if hardcore drumming to get the perfect S rank for every song is just too daunting for them.
Patient gamers waiting for a new installment of MechWarrior will be pleased to find a graphically modern version of a classic franchise, but also a game that struggles to compete with the story, pacing and characters of recent action games that have learned to balance complexity and momentum with a little more panache.
Final Fantasy VIII Remastered is a prime example of how to do a remaster well. Improved graphics modernize the experience, and modifiers help alleviate the grind issues.
You won’t find many games on the market that take on the subject of religious cults and presents them in an all too real light. In that regard, The Church in the Darkness does well by its subject matter, allowing you to investigate Freedom Town in a way that might actually change the way you look at the people who make up the Collective Justice Mission.
WRC 8 screams mediocrity in every turn, something akin to a budget title, but still it’s sold for a full price. It’s not a bad game by any means but not that great either.
When the most critical bugs are eventually squashed (developers have promised a steady stream of patches) and the penalty for dying hopefully toned down a bit (or conversely, more resting points added to the world), Decay of Logos will rise up to its full promise.
Before long, you will notice that the sweat you once poured trying to get through brawlers like Streets of Rage and Final Fight is absent here.
However, for all that talk about the game’s subject matter, its satire is no stranger than what you used to see in South Park’s heyday. Agatha Knife is all barks and no bite as it makes fun without being mean or mocking. I expected to sit through some profound lesson but much to my surprise – and without spoiling too much – the outcome was positive for all the parties involved. In the end, the unique presentation and a curious premise hide a somewhat familiar parody and the so-called criticism the game likes to think it represents isn’t as sharp as Agatha’s knifes.
From its title screens to its combat mechanics, The Surge 2 copy/pastes a great deal from the two-year-old original and while it moves the franchise into a more open and populated world, I was hoping for a more dramatic evolutionary leap. Like its Soulsborne models and its predecessor, The Surge 2 is a challenging game, made more so by an inconsistent frame rate and sometimes imprecise combat controls.
Headliner: NoviNews isn’t meant to dazzle people with super tight, unique, and revolutionary gameplay. It is, however, immensely replayable as it gives room for you to play through the story again and make all sorts of different choices the second or third time around.
While there is no lack of stuff to do — story missions, side quests, and faction missions, not to mention the multiplayer PvP Ghost Wars suite which is the marquee feature for many players — not all of it is engaging and most all of it has been done before and better, not only by other shooters but by other games in the Ghost Recon franchise.
If you shun DiRT Rally’s authenticity or F1 series’ almost tiresomely detailed race weekends and don’t mind the deficiency of online features, GRID is just about the best game you can get if you only fancy racing fast.
The Sojourn is a beautiful game with numerous extremely clever puzzles but it has a hard time balancing its story and difficulty curve.
Deliver Us the Moon is a good-looking game with a solid story premise that doesn’t quite stick the final landing.
Although it has an intriguing story that feels like a Greek mythology greatest hits collection, Argonus and the Gods of Stone impresses with a fresh setting and the transposition of the puzzle-adventure genre into the world of ancient gods and heroic characters.
Aside from some minor visual glitches and pop-in and some finnicky platforming, A Knight’s Quest is not at a bad time but it’s not an experience that will stick with you, either. Its focus on humor instead of drama or pathos will be a selling point for players weary of self-important heroes and dark themes but on the flip side, humor is very subjective. From its title to its overall mechanics, A Knight’s Tale seems like a safely familiar variation on a popular but over-played theme, appealing for its recognizable form but less satisfying for its lack of creative ambition.