XboxEra's Reviews
Arcadegeddon might just secretly become my go-to co-op shooter for some time, and I sincerely hope that the muted Early Access launch last year won't end up hurting the game's long-term plans. Because even with its lack of originality and limited variety, Arcadegeddon offers a surprisingly satisfying and addictive gameplay loop, one that deserves to be built upon for months or years.
Hollow Knight: Voidheart Edition is an eventually great game. It requires a ton of patience to see through, so even though it’s on Game Pass you need to make sure you’re willing to commit that much time because boy does it both start slow and make some head-scratching decisions when it comes to the map and exploration. If you can hold on for a solid 10 or 15 hours though you’ll end up finishing up one of the best 2nd halves of a game in the past generation.
House Flipper is really fun and it’s a great addition to Game Pass. It’s an Xbox Play anywhere title and available on both console and PC. The UI works best on the latter but the game is still a hell of a relaxing time on the former. Grab your bucket and mop, start vacuuming up every roach you can see, and you’ll be building the home of your dreams in no time.
Ms. Chalice and the new weaponry and charms are an excellent addition to what was already a stellar package and you can even complete all of it on the simple mode for once! Everyone should at least see if not play this expansion, it is truly wonderful
Outriders: Worldslayer is a solid 8 or so hour expansion that adds a seemingly long and quite enjoyable endgame grind to what was already a solid title. With the base game on Game Pass, it is worth giving that a shot and if you like it just know that this expansion is available, and it’s damned good. It takes everything the main campaign has and dials it up to eleven in a brilliantly dumb-fun kinda way.
All in all, F1 22 sets out to achieve various noble objectives, but not everything performs quite as well as intended. The revolutionized cars feel like they should, the new broadcast options and extra accessibility settings allow for a more approachable presentation, and the sheer amount of game modes and content that we'd expect from a Codemasters Formula 1 racer makes this an easy-to-recommend buy for Formula 1 fans.
In short, Broken Mind can sometimes be a fascinating experience with some interesting story beats and curious playable segments, but it's sadly hampered by formulaic puzzles, clunky combat and uneven technical polish. The game is still worth a shot for those looking for peculiar horror games.
Whether you’re looking for a fascinating trip through history or one hell of an action RPG there are few games out there better than this one.
Besides being a darn good collection, it all comes down to whether or not you’re interested in the games. For fans of Darkstalkers and Capcom’s fighters in general, the improvements and first-time ports are worth it, plus the museum has some nice goodies like concept art and design documents.
AI: THE SOMNIUM FILES nirvanA Initiative is one of my favorite games to release this year. With a mixture of wit, humor, and above all else heart it is something no one should miss. Whether a fan of the Visual Novel genre or not this game is a damn near perfect follow-up to the original.
Shredder’s Revenge is an exquisitely executed example of modernising a classic genre and making you feel like this is how you remember the older games looking and feeling, despite being so much better.
It may not be the cheapest but it sure is an experience to enjoy. Having Jason’s ‘kill, kill, kill’ motif echoing around your head as you play it is not a prerequisite but it sure is fun
Rather nice graphics and great music are massively let down by unbalanced and poor gameplay, along with a paint-by-number, creepy as hell story. Technically I might have been interested in what this dev can do in the future, but God damn man. This game is gross.
The now par foThe good news is that you can enjoy the hell out of this game without spending a penny, but if you’re either prone to MTX-it is or really care about PVP it wildly throws off the endgame balance. For me, though this is a title I will be playing for a very long time while I wait for the next mainline entry in the series to hit. It is a great game, and with some love, care, and lack of greed it could become the best mobile title ever made.
While the campaign story is good and understandable it is easy to become overwhelmed by the forced dialogue and the RTS gameplay is intuitive but it can take a while to take it all in and program your hands to use the radial wheels efficiently. Overall I recommend Spellforce III : Reforced as a fan of RTS and ARPGs
It can get a bit samey towards the end, once you’ve seen all the tricks it has up its sleeve. Those tricks though are fantastic, and the control scheme behind it feels great. Few games have ever had as satisfying a gameplay loop for me, and if you have any type of decent gaming PC then this one is well worth a download
With boring, glacially paced gameplay, janky controls and far too many technical issues wiping out any sense of pleasure gained from playing through to the games anti-climax, I was left wanting.
Silt is a rather short, basic to control game. The story was intriguing from the start, and if you can look past how bland and unfun it is to play at times it might be worth checking out. For me though a nice art style and possibly interesting story simply isn’t enough to overcome how poor feeling and frustrating I found everything else.
Jurassic World Evolution 2 is an accessible, well-polished simulation/building hybrid from the developers over at Frontier. The campaign isn’t a real campaign, just a tutorial. The additional Jurassic Park: Chaos Theory missions are where the fun can be found. The weak points are the lack of depth and freedom in terms of building a unique park. Maybe it’ll happen in the third installment? A new film is coming after all, perhaps it’ll be a case of third time’s a charm? It’s not the best building game in town, but it does get the job done. And dinosaurs are cool.
AI: The Somnium Files is a fantastic game. Visual novels normally aren’t my thing, but I quickly found myself engrossed in the mystery. It has one of the best scripts I can remember in a game, and truly stellar voice acting. While this one is on Game Pass if it sounds at all interesting to you then I implore that you check it out. “Shadows!” “Threat, silhouette, A-set!”