DayOne's Reviews
State of Decay 2 is a legitimately great game. The zombie apocalypse genre is oversaturated at this point, but State of Decay is able to find its own lane and provide genuinely unique and interesting mechanics that very few other games can pull off. The game as it stands today has seen a massive improvement over what launched in 2018, and Undead Labs should be proud of how the game has evolved.
DOOM Eternal The Ancient Gods Part 2 is tight, focused, and a gripping end to the rebirth of the franchise that is an easy recommendation to any fan of the genre. Breathtaking graphics, great music, and an over-the-top story combine with the best gunplay in the business to give us a rousing send-off for the series for the time being.
Wreckfest is an excellent racing game. It has one of the best physics and by far the best damage models in any racing game I have ever played. Combine these with a variety of classic and destruction derby-style races and you have yourself one hell of a title. This one is a no-brainer for anyone with Game Pass and it’s on sale quite often as well. Do yourself a favor and check Wreckfest out, there’s a good chance you’ll absolutely love it.
In short, Monster Energy Supercross 4 is Milestone’s 4th attempt to bring the world of licensed Supercross onto our consoles, and this iterative upgrade does not fix what isn’t broken, mostly just switching out content and applying minor improvements here and there – a rather frequent sight in days where all development is heavily impacted by the COVID-19 restrictions. It does feature a bit more eye-candy if you’re on Series X or S, but nothing too fancy. It may not be the most spectacular or polished racer ever, but there really aren’t many games like this on the market, with the Italian studio once again delivering a solid enough title for bike fans to keep them busy until the next instalment.
Despite some of these flaws, I still found myself coming back to the game again and again, trying to win the next event or beat my best times. The game is fun, beautiful, and unique enough to stand out. Fans of anti-gravity racers have been left starving lately and Pacer is definitely one title that can satisfy that hunger.
At full price I would say make sure you know exactly what this game is before buying it. It’s excellent, but this genre isn’t going to be for everyone. On Game Pass though this one is a no-brainer to give a try. The install size isn’t huge, but the amount of high-quality content contained within is.
The Division 2’s mix of gorgeous graphics, fantastic gameplay, excellent music, one of gaming’s coolest UI’s, and a progression system I truly adore makes it one of my favorite games in quite a while. Every day I find myself opening it up instead of something new and I simply had to review it to get my thoughts out there.
Killer Queen Black is a brilliant fusion of platforming, combat and strategy, and if you’ve yet to give it a download, you won’t be disappointed if you do. When you find yourself shouting SNAIL! at the top of your lungs, I suspect the game will already have you hooked.
In conclusion if you are a fan of the Yakuza series (as I am) this game is for you although it would also be a great introduction for anyone new to the IP. As is standard for the series, the game does not hold your hand and some parts have a steep learning curve but that is all part of the challenge in a Yakuza game. The major design changes to the gameplay have not spoilt the experience and many hours can be happily spent running around Yokohama.
Little Nightmares II then – a grimy, grotesque and greasy journey through a city of nightmares, it’s inhabitants a collection of melted skin and incorrect proportions, a twisted take on the world around us, with everything good and pure buried under an all powerful darkness. A journey worth not just experiencing, but one you deserve to survive through too. Will you be able to recall all the details once you’ve woken up? Probably – but you may not want to do so. Not yet. Let the nightmare fade first. Let the light come back in.
Ryse is exactly what a launch title in 2013 should have been. It is gorgeous, it does not overstay its welcome, and as it is now on Game Pass it is easy to recommend to anyone who has Game Pass on console. It is also available on PC, but you need to buy it outright there. On the whole? If you have not played this game and you liked the HBO series Rome and seeing the same execution play out 1500 times? This is the game for you!
We Happy Few was originally released in August of 2018 to highly mixed reviews. The game was a mix of its original survival genre roots interspersed with a well-received story. Bugs were frequent and it truly felt like a game stuck between two fandoms. One wanted the original survival game, and the others wanted a Bioshock like narrative-driven title. Two and a half years later has developer Compulsion Games been able to right the ship and deliver on their goals?
Project Winter looks and plays really well. The in-game comms system has a quite different sound design than we are used to these days, and hearing your companions voices fade out as the distance between you grows can induce some mild panic. The game has plenty of depth and detail to make it far more than a one-dimensional experience and is all about team work and communication. This is certainly a great game to play with friends and even people that you do not know as it will not matter so much when you fall out once their treachery and dishonesty becomes apparent. This is not the “Among Us” clone you suspected after all, and I’ve come away impressed with whats on offer here. Unique and surprisingly deep, Project Winter is definitely something you should add to your download queue.
Halo: The Master Chief Collection is one of my favorite videogames of all time. It cannot be stated just how incredible the work that 343 Industries and multiple other studios have put into it over the past 5+ years to get it here. Any future compilation of titles should look to this as the benchmark for what a collection of beloved titles should be.
The Medium has a lot of good ideas that come together in a mixed bag of a game. I found the story to be involving and well written; the atmosphere and ambience unnerving. The environments are often hauntingly beautiful to look at, and the soundtrack is a genuine highlight. The good in this game is forced to carry you through the bad, which in some ways, is the gameplay itself, where a lack of challenging puzzles, a shallow yet innovative dual reality mechanic, and an over reliance on exposition pull you out of the detailed and interesting story Bloober are trying to tell. The Medium is then, perhaps, a victim of its own gimmick – a game of two halves, one full of detail and intrigue, the other somewhat lost in the gloom of the veil.
It’s a game I would whole-heartedly recommend to anyone; the remedy to the degenerative AAA condition of exponentially longer and larger games. Clearly ‘Practice makes Perfect’ – Focusing and refining Hitman over the last 9 years has paid off, and IO has earned a Silent Assassin rating.
t’s cute. It’s endearing and somewhat simple. If you are looking for a short, relaxing and visually pleasing game then Donut County is one to try. The humour is on point and the short intermezzo’s of story between levels means both story and gameplay never overstay their welcome. The game isn’t exactly a long affair though, around an hour and 45 minutes long. So, want something short and refreshing to play between the longer games or service titles you’ve been playing lately? Give Donut County a try.
As part of Game Pass for both console and PC, Wilmot’s is an easy recommendation for anyone out there that loves to sort things. The relaxing feeling that starts to take you over as you play isn’t something matched by many other titles. It really is the best of what smaller mobile-style games have to offer.
In conclusion, the game started strongly and is just the type of puzzle game that I really enjoy, the lack of story or purpose did let it down, but I could let that go as it was fun to play up until it hit horror mode and the final level ruined it for me. It really felt like two different games had been welded together at the last moment and totally spoilt my enjoyment of what had gone before. The game had a lot of promise at the start. Hopefully the next release from the developers will stick to the good ideas on display and lose the bad as they clearly have a lot of potential.
Neoverse is an anime-inspired take on the deck-building Rogue-like genre. Featuring bland 3D graphics with stiff animations, forgettable music, and a convoluted UI the gameplay is both too simple and somehow too convoluted for this game to keep up with the big boys of the genre.