Skurttish

I REALLY wanted to love this game, but every zombie is a damage sponge. I’m looting for an hour and spending it all in just a few encounters to do quests, and then I have to go out and loot again. It feels tiresome. The amount of damage that the zombies can absorb without dying makes me cringe every time I arrive at a new quest zone and see there’s another fatty in an orange jumpsuit—oh man, how many crafting materials will I have to spend to take this guy down?? And if I take the easy way out and just use a gun, a million virals come and try to climb down my throat at once. The game shows a lot of promise, but I’m done.

A good, simple, fun Zelda clone. It doesn’t do terribly much in comparison with other games, but what it does, it does well—and I liked the simplicity that it offered. It gave me a few happy evenings. It gets a 9 instead of a 10 because it is really simple—even the map is pretty small. But, again, what it set out to do, it accomplished.

I only played the campaign, no multiplayer. The gameplay was good—classic Halo. Same for the sound and etc. The level design and world design was standard for a Halo game—nothing really impressed me, and nothing stood out as particularly ‘bad’, but the world definitely could have been more varied. I think the biggest issue for me was that the game’s writers had an unfortunate tendency to introduce these really dramatic, emotional crescendos before the player had a chance to really like the protagonists. It seemed too early to have Master Chief playing the role of sympathetic father, or to have another main character crying about his identity—those scenes could have been shorter and kept closer to the end of the game, when the writers had more emotional capital to cash in with the audience. It was a normal AAA FPS game, and I had fun, but it wasn’t spectacular.

An okay, short game. It was basically a movie, both in how long it was and in how little gameplay there is. I played it curled up on the couch and it was good for a quiet evening.

A great idea that was too frustrating to finish. But it really is a game with great central ideas—excellent investigational elements, an interesting plot, brilliantly creative worlds. What I didn’t like was the stress of knowing you’re on a time limit every run, and that some of the puzzles were so hard, they’d take almost all my time—and then I wouldn’t be able to explore any of the area past the puzzle. Plus, the fact that certain events only happen a certain amount of time after each run begins means that you’ll be sitting around waiting sometimes, and Lord help you if you mess something up and have to sit through that again. Ultimately this frustration was why I watched the ending on YouTube after getting about 85% of the way through—those last few steps were too finicky. But if you have a lot of patience and want a Myst-style space investigation game, this is absolutely for you.

A good survive-forage-crafty game. Loved the experience of diving deeper and deeper into the creepy depths, seeing something weird move out of the corner of your eye. There’s a big difficulty spike towards the end of the game, and that’s my biggest negative, but as long as you use a guide when you need to go really deep (past 900m), you won’t be bothered by that. The ending was very satisfying.

I think I’m in the minority of not really enjoying this one. There were a couple reasons why—first, the main weapon of the character is just a slog to use. It loads incredibly slowly, and has a nasty tendency to miss, earning the player an instant death. Second, the crafting system used so many random components scattered throughout the world that I went without an upgrade for about five straight levels, because I was always one or two mats short in some category or other. If there had been only three or four mats rather than six, it would have given the upgrade tree more flexibility, so that derps like me could have a slightly less frustrating experience. Third, the story had a bit of fluff that didn’t add much to the game, specifically in the middle. Without going into spoilers, three of the episodes could have not been included and nothing would have been lost, but the game would have maintained a tighter focus and moved a little faster. All in all, it was fine, but not one I would specifically recommend.

Fe was okay. Gameplay-wise, it didn’t have quite enough separating it from other 3D platformers to be memorable, so it needed a strong story to pull it through—but the story was so obscure and vague as to be totally opaque to me. After I beat it I was left with a vague impression of different color foxes, aliens (probably), and crystals. Well, cool, but………huh?

A fun RPG with a good premise, plot, and execution. It’s especially impressive given that it was developed by such a small team. The levels are extremely varied, and that helps keep things interesting, although it was a bit too long (it took me 16 hours, and it could have been more like 10-12 given that the basic golf gameplay doesn’t change much). I took two points off. The first was because it’s difficult to judge the slope of the land you’re on when putting; just having an arrow labeled ‘slope’ isn’t detailed enough to give you a sense of how great the slope is. The second was because the game was too easy, in my opinion. I felt like I was able to beat almost everything on my first attempt, until I made it to the last level—and even then, it was only two tries. Still, a good game, and an easy recommendation.

Fundamentally, this is a really enjoyable turn-based strategy game, with interesting characters, well-designed levels, and great variations in gameplay from world to world. However, my score dropped to a 7 due to technical issues and a lack of story—objects started chaotically popping in at World 3 and got worse and worse until the end of the game, and the story added basically nothing to the experience. Still, for fans of the genre, this is an easy recommendation.

Not much more can possibly be said about this game than what has already been said, so I’ll be brief: Wonderful story, wonderful world, great soundtrack, beautiful visuals, clunky and floaty and awkward controls. If the controls were sharper, this would have been a perfect 10, but even after 60 hours in the game I still couldn’t make Geralt do what I wanted him to do whenever I wanted him to do it. Still, fabulous game, and an easy recommendation.

A game with a good concept that is unfortunately simple. What I was looking for from this game was something similar to a Mario game or Untitled Goose Game, in that it would give me a challenge with an interesting series of steps I had to go through to complete it. But the challenges aren’t hard enough to be engaging.

An enjoyable, cute puzzle game. Some of the puzzles are really hard, but the game always gives you the solution if you beat a little mini-game (loved that feature). Probably the best part about it is that every room you enter, you have NO clue what’s about to happen—you may use a tube to **** black sludge out of a kitchen sink, or it could be even more absurd than that, but it’s always good fun. Sometimes items on the screen are too small (I played on a Switch Lite), but that’s to be expected for a game developed on PC. In addition, some of the puzzles are really challenging, although they are possible. Still, a very fun game, and an easy recommendation.

A puzzle game with an interesting concept brilliantly executed. Especially the later levels added a lot of interesting twists and turns that gave the game a feel of “I have no clue what the mess could be coming up next”. I played this game with my stepson, and there are definitely a few stumpers, but we only had to look up a walkthrough once. Other than that, it was hard enough to spark some fun discussion, but not hard enough to get really frustrated. Although the story was interesting and relatable, it was also really predictable, but we didn’t pick it up for the story, so we didn’t mind too badly. An easy recommendation to a puzzle game fan.

A strong middle segment carries a slow beginning—all in all, I liked the story as a whole, although the beginning wasn’t my favorite. My biggest issue was how clunky and floaty the controls were. Each move is a bit longer than you’d hope it to be, meaning you can’t dodge when you want to; each step is a bit more cinematic than is practical, so your character feels like a boat that you have to maneuver. That gets important when you die three or four times on a platforming section. I also thought the game was a little bit overcomplicated, with a few too many skill tree categories and gear types/bonuses and mission types and etc—but then again, I like single player campaigns, so that’s what I was looking for: A simple story game. Someone who likes online multiplayer looters will enjoy this more, maybe. But with all that out of the way, I liked the cinematic value of the game, and I liked that they stayed true to making the Avengers look as awesome as possible, which is a big part of the Avengers schtick. This game gave me and my 11-year-old kid, an Avengers fan, a happy memory together. 7.5/10, but for Metacritic purposes I’ll round it up to an 8.

[SPOILER ALERT: This review contains spoilers.]

A fun shooter with an original concept that is well implemented. It’s a short, simple game, but it packs some great twists along the way that makes it outpunch its weight class. However, I don’t think it’s worth $25. It took me and my stepkid three hours to get through. It may be worth it for some folks to get PS Now to play this game, if there are other games on the service you’re interested in as well. I also thought the game could have benefited from some music during the levels. Having nothing but silence was an odd design choice. Still, a fun game, and one I recommend.

An enjoyable puzzle game that does enough to keep you interested, and gives you a really immersive feeling of being on the moon when you step outside the space station. That naked feeling of vulnerability will be a sensation I remember for a long time after the credits. Unfortunately, the story wasn’t quite as good as it needed to be—without giving anything away, a few of the data points collected along the way revealed a bit too much about where everything was about to go, and that made the big reveal more like an update about where the characters wound up rather than major revelations. Difficulty spikes were also an issue, with some puzzles being as simple as ‘find this in a room and put it here’, and others being like navigating a maze to find the bit of cheese somewhere inside. Finally, for a game this length, a $25 MSRP is too high. I finished the game in 7 hours, so I feel it should have been cheaper (although I played it on Game Pass, it’s now been removed).

Simple, fun, silly, thoroughly enjoyable. It’s really ‘just’ a pixel-art Game Boy game simulator, but it packs all the fun of that medium into an affordable, relaxing experience (although it does have enough difficulty to give you a little hint of spice). I especially like that this is an $8 game, and not a $20 game, like so many short indie games are these days. That’s not a bad price point, and I appreciate that they’re not trying to pull the classic over-priced MSRP followed by ‘sales’ that mark it down to where it should’ve been all along. But I think I should have known that the pricing would be appropriate, given that this is published by Devolver—they are quickly becoming one of my favorite publishers. My only negative point is because I felt the game was short. Imagine if this was a $20 or $25 game, and there were three or four worlds that you could wander around on—suddenly this goes right up there with Mega Man in my book (yes, debatable, I know). As it is, I finished it in 3 hours, and although I left with a good taste in my mouth, I can’t give it much higher than an 8 when it’s this short and simple. Regardless, a game I enjoyed very much.

First off, I played this game as a palate cleanser after taking on Hollow Knight, so I played it on easy. Hollow Knight is hard enough that it made me look for something simple and popcorn-y to help wash it down after I’d spent 11 or 12 hours on it. Halo 5 was great for that. It’s a simple game with an old plot, a plot that’s already been done a hundred times and will be done a hundred more times before it’s replaced, but I didn’t mind it for that—there’s a place in the world for old stories coming around again. (I’m not sure that place is in the middle of a Halo series, with a technological giant footing the bill—it seems like those games should be a touch more revolutionary—but this is where we are, tech giants don’t want to take that risk.) I’ll just say this: If you dread seeing the same old archetypes repeated through a similar story arc as the action movie you watched next week, your worst fears will be realized here. The levels were fine in the beginning, got really interesting, and then went back to fine. Everything worked and I didn’t encounter any bugs. Now, I thought the music was above average (a special shout out to the French horns used throughout, especially when they were matched with trumpets over the top—really interesting scoring techniques used there) but the assets used and the general design scheme were nothing out of the ordinary. I feel like I can’t really comment on the gameplay, because I played the whole game through on Easy. Normally to do a review I would play it on Normal, but, again, this was a palate cleanser.

First off, I think all of my critiques could be fixed by future updates, because they really are fixable. This is a game with some really good ideas. So let’s start with the good. First, it’s fun to fly your falcon (even if the little circles that your bird does when you leave it alone always put you off ****, right, good paragraph, whoops). The game is set on a good premise. The art direction looks great, I loved the whales, and there’s a great general ambience. Now, the rest: You are a glass cannon. On Normal difficulty, I found I had to grind boring side quests just to make progression—but even then, I cleared the quest I was on and got stuck AGAIN on the very next one. I turned the difficulty down to Easy (and I still died a few times, which is probably not how it should be). The quest system was strange, and the UI never clicked with me. Having to cycle through NPCs at perches to receive quests was odd, and it was inconvenient not being able to see which NPC was at which perch without being having to actually go there. And even after I did figure out the system, the side quests were very dull, but also the only way to grind money or XP. If you’re playing even on Normal difficulty, you’ll have to grind, because your falcons don’t have much HP and the enemies’ aim is fabulous. You’ll die even as you are frantically trying your best to survive, running away, dodging constantly. The story was entertaining until I got pinched by the gameplay, and after that point, the story wasn’t good enough to revive the game for me. I finished it, but just to say I didn’t quit. I’ll say it again: All of these things could be fixed by a few redesigns. If there are other positive reviews after the date of this negative one, the game might be worth a shot.

A game that has a lot of really good elements, held back by a few faults that could be overlooked, depending on the player. First, the good: I really liked the story, and after playing the game with my 11-year-old step kid, so did he. It was a great memory for us together, and immediately after the game was over, he made a little Cal Lego guy, and that little dude already has some serious miles on him. The game was hard, but we just right away turned the difficulty to ‘Story’ and we loved it. We are wusses, and we wear that badge very proudly. I would imagine we would have enjoyed the game a lot less had it even been on Normal, because the Souls influence is strong with this one. Now, the not-so-good: The backtracking after your work is done on a planet. A fast travel system here would have put this game at a 9 for me, but my kid and I spent two entire sessions just trying to figure out the map of two planets in order to get back to the ship. The map doesn’t tell you which directions are passable or not if you’ve already explored them, meaning that you have to go and see if you can go that way or not, and my mental map is terrible—I’m always lost in real life. For some players who have a stronger sense of internal direction this wouldn’t be an issue, but it was for me. Anyway, a really fun game, especially for a Star Wars fan—doubly especially for a well-oriented Star Wars fan.

A really fun game that should have just stayed a game. I enjoyed the skills, level design, and story of the game a lot—when it was just a game! When the show started up, you realized that the story wasn’t quite good enough to be on TV, although it was more than enough to make an enjoyable game. I’d recommend this one, because although the show holds it back a bit, the game has a lot of good ideas and makes for a great cinematic action experience.

Huge whiff by Naughty Dog, one of my favorite developers. I’m giving it 4 points because the gameplay is still the great gameplay that you enjoyed in TLOU 1, but folks, the story is really, really bad. It’s dark, depressing, joyless, and constantly violent without any redeeming qualities whatsoever. The game forces you to make downright evil decisions, and then shames you for it. In addition, the ending (without giving anything away) doesn’t resolve any of the burning questions I had when playing the game. That’s a critical element for a linear game with no multiplayer, and not even side quests. Woof. Naughty Dog, you’ve seen better days........I’m gonna go play Spider Man.

My only complaint with the game—and I mean my ONLY complaint with the game—is that it was a little too easy. There were too many times when I ended the level totally stocked up on supplies, sure that whatever came at me I’d be totally able to handle. It took away a bit from the suspense and fear of what might be around the corner—if the supplies had been more limited and the challenges a little more difficult, this would have been a real nail-biter. I played on Normal difficulty. With that being said, I loved the story (it was like playing a good Stephen King novel), the graphics were fabulous especially for 2010, the music was creepy and nailed the right tone, and the gameplay was based on good ideas and executed well (with the aforementioned caveat). A hearty recommendation from me. This was a really, really good time.

An interesting game with mostly good writing and most good vocal performances, delivered by a funny cast thrown into weird situations. I was bouncing back and forth between a 7 and an 8 throughout the game. On the one hand, the gameplay is really unique—I have never seen the main combat technique used before, and it works well. On the other hand, there are lots of inconsistent difficulty spikes that are jarring sometimes. On one hand, the story is interesting and written in a very funny way, and it goes well beyond being the same old ‘good vs evil’ shallowness that you normally see. But on the other hand, not all of the voice acting is well delivered, and parts of the ending got fairly cheesy. The platforming for the first two thirds of the game is too simple, but they do eventually make it more interesting, so, again, there’s a mixed bag here. At the end of the day, I’m going with an 8 instead of a 7, and it’s because the characters were funny and memorable. This is a game that’s not for everyone, so make sure you watch a little bit of it before you buy to see if you’d really like it, but for those who enjoy this type of game, there is a lot of good to enjoy here. Thank you, developer!

A really great game, which gets even more fun in local coop. I had an awesome time with my stepkid with this one. The challenges are fun and interesting, the music is excellent and fits the quirky theme perfectly, loved the art design, the gameplay is awkward in a cute way, and it doesn’t last too long (there’s only so much time a game like this could hold one’s attention, after all). My only complaint is the price. For $20, there is not enough game—but you really don’t want a game like this to be much longer, so what should come down is the MSRP. If it were a mite cheaper, this would be a perfect 10 in my book.

My score for the masochistic gamer who loves crazy hard challenges: 10. My score for the average gamer: 6. First off, the level design is really creative, the skills are incredible and a delight to use, the story is good enough, the visuals are superb, and the soundtrack is absolutely one of the best I’ve ever heard, if not The Best. But gameplay is the most important element, and the game is just too hard. I can’t tell you how many times this one brought out the ‘oof’ of “I have to do all that AGAIN?” Especially the escape sequences and one particular boss at the end of Mouldwood Depths just brought groan after groan of frustration from me. Mouldwood Depths as a whole was not well designed, in my opinion. Because it is a darkness-based level, there needed to be a better way to get around without so many trial-and-error blind jumps. As it is now, it is an exercise in frustration, and if you have a decent backlog (like everyone who has Game Pass probably does), there comes a point where you just start to rue the time you spent. But, again, a gorgeous game. I just wish it were more forgiving.

A great platformer with beautiful visuals, a touching story, and amazing level design that pairs with some really fun movement-based skills. Probably the best thing about the game is that all of the skills are movement-based. By the game’s end, you feel like a certified ninja, flying around the screen and twirling through every level like a ballet dancer of death, able to pick between four different fun ways to kill every enemy. The visuals are also excellent, something straight out of a Disney fairy tale. And the story has a powerful and surprising ending, another thing that I really enjoyed that sets this apart from other games I’ve played this generation. It is absolutely a memorable and engrossing ride. But there were a few details I didn’t like as much, and that’s why it’s an 8 and not a 10: —Most items in the game have a similar glowy/fuzzy aesthetic, which makes it hard to tell which items are projectiles and which are not when lots of things are blowing up. —There is no way to move the screen, making some jumps blind. That’s stressful in a game with a limited save function. —Speaking of that save function, I thought I would dislike a save mechanic that was limited and consumable, and you know what, I did. I have kids—sometimes I just need to drop the game instantly. Not with Ori. Don’t let the negatives scare you away—it’s a really great game, and one I heartily recommend.

An arcade game that will give you a great experience if you go into it knowing exactly what to expect. The gameplay here is great. All the mechanics work well and are fun to use, especially slowing down time—that makes the game. There are also lots of fun little details that give the game a really distinct personality and flavor, like the emoji-ed banana poking his head out on the side of the screen when you kill an enemy in a flippy way. Loved that. Plus, the platforming elements turned the game into a playground. I never knew I needed a shooter to be a ninja platformer, but I know now, and I loved it. The music added a lot to this feel—I really enjoyed the electronic, bumpin feel. But if you’re looking for story, don’t look here. That isn’t what this game is for. This game is best enjoyed after a few beers with buddies, shouting as loud as you can when somebody makes a great kill. In that context, it’s unparalleled. And in that sense, I’m actually taking off both of the points I am because of what’s missing, rather than what’s here. I feel like the devs would have been well served to ditch the story mode as the main focus and instead introduce local multiplayer. What I have in mind are things like a plain exhibition mode (similar to the boss fight at the end of the campaign), a capture the flag mode, a king of the hill mode, etc. These things would have bumped this banana game up to a 10 out of 10 and probably gotten it its own dedicated following in the Reddit community, but as it is now, it’s a fun little four-hour diversion. Still, a really fun game to shout at, and one I recommend.

A well-assembled puzzle game that mimics an open-world RPG in the size of both of its primary maps, where you are presented a massive tangle of problems and obstacles and slowly unravel them one by one. It’s a very satisfying feeling to get the item you’ve been looking for for SO long, and to put it in its home, opening the way forward. Good: —Interesting cast of characters and monsters to meet. You never really know what is around the next corner. —The puzzles were fun and generally fair, although on the Switch Lite there were a few items that were so small my wife and I weren’t able to see them. We had to use a guide to find out where the item we were missing was. —My wife liked the music. —The art direction works for the style of story. Meh: —The story doesn’t have any twists or turns, really. Even the ending is not ‘surprising’ so much as just a resolution. Bad: —The final level overstayed its welcome a little bit. Actually, honestly, when we finished the first level, we were surprised that the game was continuing—it had already been so long that the game could have ended there and we would have been content. The second level was good, though, and we enjoyed it, but with how simple the game’s mechanics are, it was a bit lengthy. All in all, a game we enjoyed and do recommend.

It’s a game that could have been better than it was, with few surprises. Ultimately, this game felt like just ‘wrapping up the series’ than really delivering a surprising, exciting experience. First off, you can’t understand all of the plot without reading a book, which is not how games should be made. If you can’t understand everything that’s in a game during the game’s run time, that part should be cut or included in another way. There were too many questions I had about the story of this game for this to go unmentioned. Second, there were big spikes in difficulty that were surprising. You’d wander through an area full of big, tough enemies and get to the next and it’s, like, three grunts. Odd. Not game-breaking, and still an interesting game (and series) to experience, but odd. Finally, even after multiple Halos, I’m still getting lost in the levels. A consistent objective marker is such a key quality of life feature, but this game only turns on the marker for the more difficult locations. That’s great, but I’m such a moron that I needed it more often, ha. The ending was something you could have seen coming a while ago (or, at least, I did), although I think maybe I’ve played too many action games lately, if I’m starting to get a sense for the plots. Time to switch genres.

It’s a mixed bag here, but I think there’s enough good to give it a 7 that should be a 6. First off, the gameplay is fun, but ammo is really scarce. I feel like my guns ran out after only a few shots, and that made it feel like I was always in danger of being pinned down in a bad checkpoint with no ammo. Didn’t like this. But, the new enemies were great, especially the buffing class, those stupid little butterflies. They were a pain, in the best possible sense. I liked having to select a priority target at the beginning of a firefight. BUT some difficulty spikes were nuts. One example is a level with about 80 jackal snipers chilling on a plateau above you. It was maybe 78 too many, I think. Story-wise, here’s a big negative: The story has big gaps that you apparently have to read a book to understand. I won’t give anything away, but this fact alone drops my score significantly. If you can’t explain it in the game, cut it and no one will miss it. Otherwise, the beginning is a great breath of fresh air to a franchise that was starting to feel a little stale at the end of Halo 3. The first few missions are great, and the new enemy has new guns that are really fun to use (even if they aren’t super different from the guns previously). Then the game gets real slow in the middle, and nothing of interest happens for several more missions. Except, for some reason, a mission is stolen from Titanfall 2. It was weird, but whatever. In the fifth mission aboard the Mammoth I hit numerous bugs. Not sure what happened, but my Mammoth kept on floating through non-rendered terrain until everything would just stop. I restarted over and over and it finally fixed itself. Then the final mission and the ending of the game was awesome, in my opinion. Really enjoyed the final mission from start to finish. And that’s how you get a 7 that should be a 6: Make an okay game with a few great things.

This is only a review of the single player campaign, which is all I played. Let’s start with the good: There’s finally a little icon that tells the player where they’re supposed to be going. That’s a fantastic addition, and it really helped me make my way through the levels. Full marks there. But the rest of the game was pretty unremarkable. The story had a great premise and had parts that were really engaging, but was poorly written, with awkward or overly-emotional deliveries that didn’t give it the feel **** story. The voice acting and lines were definitely missing a layer of polish that you’d find playing something like Titanfall 2 (or even Halo 2). Then there’s the level design, which varied very little from block to block of the city, no matter which time period you’re playing in. The layouts are different, sure, but it’s basically the same deal from area to area. More creativity would have improved this aspect. As far as difficulty goes, the game was definitely on the easy side. As you grow in gaming, you start to realize that difficulty is the spice that keeps gaming engaging; without an acceptable level of difficulty, the game is dishwater. I wash my dishwater down the drain each night and it’s forgotten by the time my head hits the pillow that evening. Unfortunately, that’s the case here with Halo 3: ODST. If it didn’t have Halo in the name, nobody would remember this game at all (much less play it)—it is gaming dishwater. Music, sound, and visuals were fine.

An improvement over Halo: CE in nearly every way. The biggest improvement was in the story—it was very interesting. It did a great job of fleshing out and expanding the Halo universe, something I loved. The gameplay was the same great, classic Halo FPS. Don’t fix what ain’t broken. The graphics were good, certainly good enough to do the job, and the cutscenes looked really great. Finally, the music and sound never got in the way (although I didn’t like the bits that sounded like they could have been from a Phil Collins outtake—stay away from acoustic percussion, Halo, and stick to synthesized sounds! It fits the genre better). I did take off one point, and it was because the game was too difficult. There were some sections that were overly challenging. But other than that, it’s a game I absolutely recommend.

This is only a review for the single player campaign, which is all I’ve played. I’ve played several of these campaigns, and so far this is my favorite. The gameplay is varied and exciting, with lots of missions feeling totally different from one another, which keeps everything really fresh—and the story! The story was really entertaining. I didn’t expect it to be as good as it was, but it was a very pleasant surprise. Really good action game. There were some bits that were really challenging, and for that I dropped a point. Honestly, some parts could have used a few fewer enemy shooters. But that’s my only complaint. I made it through eventually, and I’m glad I did. I recommend it.

A cute, happy little game with an interesting mechanic that works and is very entertaining. The atmosphere of this game is like Animal Crossing in that there are no enemies and nothing stressful at all, no time limits, etc. Everyone in the story is most worried about being together and being friends. Some folks will find this really boring, but I didn’t mind it because I liked the puzzles. The base mechanic of the game works perfectly, and every level mixes things up a little bit. But this game could use a built-in hint system or a marker on the HUD that describes what your current goal is. There were points where I didn’t know what to do and didn’t know how to know what to do. The art was fine, I liked it but it didn’t blow me away. The music was good—I enjoyed it. The price, on Game Pass, was well worth it. Recommended.

A game that might have been great in its day, but hasn’t aged well at all. First off, the graphics stand up just fine. More than serviceable—quite good, considering when it was made. Also, the basic gameplay is generally very fun, as you would expect from Halo. The music and sound are fine. But the level design is atrocious, and I mean that in all its negative severity. There are very few quest markers, and when they are present, they don’t show you where to go, only where you need to end up. I spent just as much time enjoying the shooting as I did lost and frustrated, staring at the same hallways over and over, wondering where I was going wrong. And when I did find where I was supposed to be going, Halo CE took a dead halibut and slapped me in the face with it. This game is HARD, y’all. Between the Flood level that finds you frantically running from enemies spawning endlessly all around you, to chain grenade explosions that kill you without having done anything wrong, you will die a lot, so I hope you have an excellent podcast on, because you won’t want all your attention to be on this. It’s too frustrating. All of this, for a story that probably wasn’t particularly good even in its prime. You can see the twists and turns coming from last Tuesday (and I say that as a gamer who was somehow not previously spoiled). TL;DR : I do not recommend this game. The levels are confusing mazes, the gauntlets that the game makes you run are too daunting even on Normal difficulty, and the story was your average action movie you can stream on Netflix.

A game with a very pretty veneer that just fell short for us in a few areas. I played this game with my wife in the evenings after the kids had gone to bed. First off, we really liked the writing. You come to care about the main characters. This was the biggest plus for us. In addition, there is a chapter select screen you can use to go back and see alternate paths of storyline that you didn’t take before, which is a feature I love. Good thinking on this one, devs! The graphics were really pretty at times, another plus. However, the sound didn’t have as much variety as a game this long would need. Sound effects and songs got very repetitive, especially the chime that indicates when something good happens or you’ve discovered something. And that brings us to the biggest negative of the game for us: It was way too easy. It was more of a visual novel than a game, which was not what we were looking for when we bought a game. I wanted to actually have to solve something, not just click A until the main character solved it—and I wanted to actually use the little magnifying glass to find cool stuff scattered around, but instead, you only use that when a prompt appears on screen. It holds your hand too much. All in all, a good experience, but not one that left us raving like Tangle Tower did.

This is a review for only the single player campaign, which was all I played. It’s a great popcorn shooter, like the video game equivalent of junk food. The best thing about the game is that when you die, you respawn within about three seconds. That makes death a minor penalty and keeps the pressure off the player. Plus, the checkpoint system is very well balanced, making the player repeat just the right amount of sections and allowing them to skip the hardest ones once they’ve beaten it once. Two big pluses there. The auto-aim is very aggressive, and it makes me feel like I’m a pro-level player, which I know I’m not, ha! But for a game like this, I actually liked it. It was fun to feel like I could routinely nail head shots across a battlefield. The story was where I deducted points, and I took two whole points off, because there was a missed opportunity here. This could have been a really powerful story, if it were fleshed out and executed well. Instead, what we got was a popcorn game. Well, c’est la vie. The music was meh—I love the opening theme of Halo, but at points they started to do a rock-based thing during some of the campaign levels that I didn’t like. I think a drumset shouldn’t have a place in a modern shooter—the sound is too old fashioned. But I didn’t take points off for that because it never got in the way. Graphics and sound were good enough for government work. TL;DR: Fun action game with level story. Shooty shooty boom boom, kaplowie, yay.

A really fun arcade game that takes a little bit of time to figure out how to play best. First off, the music was bangin. If all games had music of this relative quality, there would be no albums. Really enjoyed this part of Gunhouse. The art didn’t get in the way, neither was it amazing. Same with the sound effects. They were fine. There was no story, basically, but I wasn’t expecting one. This is an arcade game (and a good one). Now, a note on strategy: I started this game and stopped frustrated at Day 4 because the 18-second limit felt too short and my shots weren’t very powerful because I couldn’t line up that many tiles. I came back and tried again, though, and found a better way to live. Instead of trying to line up little shots, I focused on whatever color was receiving the bonus, and tried to fill the WHOLE GRID with that color and dump it in the special-shot tanks. It worked, and I was OP, and I had a blast. (But if you play the game trying to make little boxes, I think you’ll find it frustrating.) With that caveat, this is an easy recommendation for a lazy Saturday. I did take off a point because I think the tutorial should have pointed the player more towards making huge boxes rather than little ones, and that was an obstacle for me. Other than that, though, this was a great experience (especially for only one dollar).

This is only a review for the single player campaign, because that’s all I played. The game has an average story with a few twists and turns to keep you awake through its beginning, but I actually enjoyed the ending. It’s a pretty good war movie about a squad of marines coming together. However, the gameplay was an issue for me throughout. First, you’d better nail your headshots, because otherwise enemies take four, five, or six shots to bring down. That takes a long time, especially when they’re all hiding behind cover. Your best move is to run around them just to speed up the process, but then you might find yourself outgunned without cover, and you’ll die quickly. And when you die, the checkpoints are miles apart. There are multiple points where you’ll clear a monstrous path of enemies featuring tanks and folks with mortars right and left, then die in the next section (with its OWN tank and guys with mortars), and you’ll have to clear the first area again. It’s too much. On another note, the levels were too long. It took me an hour and a half to do each one, on average. Forty-five minutes is about what is good—double that, and I got tired. (The levels would have been a lot shorter if the checkpoint system had more points of respawn.) It was very strange that the main character wasn’t voiced, yet he gets asked so many direct questions. Ha. If you knew you weren’t going to voice the main character, isn’t it better not to ask him things directly, so there aren’t so many awkward pauses? It could have been written differently. There wasn’t much mission variety other than the context of each mission. What I mean to say is that each mission gave you a new story you’re involved in, but the gameplay was basically the same other than boats and tanks. Mission variety keeps things moving. And, lastly, it was cool that so many buildings could fall apart, but this led to some really clumsy hitboxes and shots that looked totally clear but were actually obstructed (by nothing). All in all, not a game I would recommend for the campaign (or, more accurately, a game I would recommend somebody watch a playthrough of rather than play themselves due to all the bugs). I gave it four points because at least it worked (generally), and I did enjoy the ending of the story.

It’s a game that pairs an excellent story with fun, arcade-y gameplay. That’s a good mix! Probably the best thing about the game is how very Japanese it is. It’s a legitimate cultural experience, one that preserves its identity even despite linguistic translation. In addition, although I don’t like fighters, this game’s fighting system was fun all the way through—but I will say that I lost interest in it by the end because it just isn’t my genre. At that point, I put the game on easy just to enjoy the story, and what a story it was! Very well done. Now, I took off two points, and one was for the graphics. I suppose they were going for an old style? But honestly, it didn’t appeal to me—it was just janky enough to get in the way. They would have pulled off a more modern style better, I think. This problem is doubled when paired with the music, which was the most negative part of the game for me. They tried to make the music older, in a way, to imitate a game from early 2000’s, and it just sorta came off sounding low budget. This is most apparent during the most climactic fight scenes, where the heavy distortion of the guitars should be making my speakers fall out of their casings, but instead, they are very quiet and sound far away. In addition, side quests are introduced by the same simple guitar riff (and if I never hear that riff again, it’ll be too soon). Now, having said all this, I didn’t take a point off for the music because if I want great music I’ll go listen to Spotify, not play a game. The other point I took off is because the side quests often dealt with topics that were a bit oversexualized. I actually stopped doing the side quests after the fifth or sixth one that dealt with a dominatrix, or catfighting, or what have you. I felt that fewer, longer side quests that had more depth would have done more for the game than the many side quests they had that were shorter and often went in racy directions without really needing to. But, again, the story is fantastic, and it’s a lot of fun to step inside a totally Japanese world after a long day at work. Thank you developers! Really well done game, and one I recommend.

A fun brainteaser that can get really, really challenging if you’re looking to 100% it. The graphics, audio, and story were all good—the story was at times comical and at times somber, and it offered the same semi-nihilistic paradigm that Little Inferno did. It’s nice to play games that strive to be literature—it’s good for the soul. It’s all about the gameplay, though, and this game offers that in spades. I loved the challenge of programming my answers, and it was fun to watch my little human zip around completing tasks. Definitely satisfying to watch him whizz through a correct response. I did not 100% the game, as the challenges got too hard for me, but I’m sure there are people that enjoy that sort of thing. It was nice that the really hard challenges were optional bonus events and not part of the main story line—I appreciated that. Overall, my only complaint is the price, because $15 MSRP is a mite high. I’ll give it a 9.

It’s a fun, relaxing little game with an interesting and surprising ending. I liked the graphics and the humor throughout, and the music fit with the theme and was enjoyable. Also the base gameplay reminded me of a Mario game, where you’re given a little hint of what star/moon you’re looking for in the form of a riddle, and you have to look where you think the answer to the riddle might be—it’s a similar idea here, where the game gives you a phrase and you have to guess the answer in the form of what combination of items you should burn together. That worked, and it was fun. The ending did something that few games do: It presented a clear and poignant paradigm for the player to consider. In this way, the game isn’t just a game but also literature, something I appreciated very much (although I did not agree with the worldview that the game offered, still, at least it offered one). All in all, I’ll give it an 8. I took a point off because of the price ($15 MSRP, definitely wait for a sale) and because the game was maybe a little too long for the style of gameplay. Repetition definitely set in around the final catalogue. But still, a good game that I enjoyed.

First off, the game is great, and I do recommend it. The gameplay is really fun, with some awesome quality of life improvements after Dishonored 1 and Death of the Outsider, like the quick save and quick load buttons. They did the level design well in general—although most of my complaints concern the game’s design, the levels are still really fun to wander around, and tracking down enemies and slowly taking them down one by one is a blast as you slowly unlock more areas you can safely explore. The art is the same great art from before, and the music was a treat. The sound design in general in all the Dishonored games is top shelf. There is a LOT of lore, so if you’re a completionist and you know you can’t find a scrap of paper in a game without reading it or you feel like you’re not getting ‘the full experience’, this game will feel like a grind. Personally, I read the stuff in level one, and after that only read the things that directly concerned the mission. There is an indicator on the game’s HUD that lets you know if something is really important. It’s a nice feature, and that meant the lore never overwhelmed me. Props to the devs for including that indicator, very nice idea. Now, there were a few issues: One, you will need a guide to do all the things you will probably want to do. Nonviolently eliminating certain key figures (no spoilers) can be very complicated, making it all but necessary to be shown the answer rather than figuring it out yourself. In my opinion, that is poor game design. It should be a little bit easier to accomplish main mission objectives in the way I want to. Collectibles can be really challenging, sure, but not main mission objectives. Two, certain levels were really hard unless you knew in advance what upgrades to buy. I did the whole game without a guide, and without giving anything away, two levels were a slogfest without having the right upgrades installed. There should have been a warning or some more sneaky ways for me to avoid combat that would have kept these levels from being as hard. Lastly, the nonviolent takedown trigger was finicky. Sometimes, probably once or twice a level, I would not be able to take down an enemy even though I was in the correct position, and it would often trigger a detection and call all the other enemies to my position. It’s not the end of the world, but a stealth game really benefits from having tight nonviolent controls. No more negatives. It’s a great game, with interesting levels and fun little challenges, with awesome music, distinctive art, and a satisfying flavor. Be warned, all ye who enter here: You will have fun.

A well-designed mystery game with a great story and interesting characters, a distinctive art style, and excellent music. What more do you want? One of the few mystery games that really made my wife and I exclaim audibly when the big reveal came around, and yet, when it happened, we found there had been subtle clues all along that we could have picked up on if we had been just a little bit sharper. We have spent the last half a day still talking about the motive behind the crime, the other characters involved, the possibility of the ending not being the true ending (meaning some loose ends were not actually resolved, although they were presented as resolved), and etc. That seems like the mark **** mystery to me. All in all, a really fun game. I am only giving this game a 9 and not a 10 because of the price—this game took me and my wife about 6 hours to complete, and $20 MSRP is too expensive for that length ****, in my opinion.

The main campaign was fun and relaxing, maybe a bit challenging to comprehend in the beginning because of the unusual control scheme, but all in all positive. I liked the graphics and visual style, and I loved the music—the swing jazz was a real delight. Some of the puzzles had just enough difficulty to keep some spice in the game while allowing for progress at the same time. However, the main campaign was pretty brief, and after that the DLCs started. Let me tell you, folks, those were a SLOG. After the first few puzzles of the Director’s Cut, the game got so difficult that my stepson and I were rage quitting every sesh, and then we dropped the game. Main campaign: 8/10, fun puzzle game. DLC, what little we did of it: 2/10, too hard and finicky to be fun. All in all, let’s go with the 8, because I think the main campaign deserved it and the DLCs are meant to be extra additional content. Plus, I think the game’s price is reasonable.

This game captures the thrill of flying in an excellent way, and it doesn’t overstay its welcome, which is something I can’t often say these days about video games. It was really nice to play a game that I knew wouldn’t drag on 50 hours. Plus, the open world design and the simple gameplay itself gave me the freedom to just go wherever I wanted, which felt great since the act of world traversal itself is one of the game’s strong points. However, on to the negatives: The game throws a lot of lore at you which isn’t entirely necessary. Towards the end of the game, when I came upon scrolls and found my 998th weird sci-fi-ish name with some little backstory with it, I just had no clue what was happening anymore, and I couldn’t keep all the characters straight. If the game’s story had been told in a simpler way that was easier to grasp, it would have been more powerful. I took off one point for this. Ironically, although the middle of the story had me drowning, the end was very poignant. I liked the simplicity of the story’s close—a very pretty moment, gentle and memorable. I wish the rest of the story had been structured with such elegance. Graphically, it was excellent, with an art style I enjoyed immensely, and the music sounded like the outtakes from a U2 album from the mid-2000’s (you can decide if that’s a good thing). However, I’m going to subtract another two points due to the design of the temples, which were very confusing and without enough internal direction to clearly show me where to go if I lost the thread of the temple’s inner workings. To put it more briefly, if I got lost, I had to wander through the whole dang thing trying to figure out what it was I was supposed to be doing. A hint system or more clear indicators on the walls would have helped this issue, which often left me relieved that a temple was finally over at the end of them. Finally, the MSRP for this game is crazy high. $15 for a game that takes about 3, 4 hours (assuming you don’t get lost in a temple for an entire sesh)? No, no no no. If the game cost so much to make that you have to charge this amount, you should make cheaper games. Another point off for this, so our total score is a 6.

There’s really a lot to review here, so I’ll use a bullet-point format to cut out the fluff: GOOD: —Story. Very well-written, I cared about the characters, it started and ended well, and there wasn’t a big drop off in the middle. It maintained an excellent air of tension in the face of decline. Epilogue Part 2 was really, really, really excellent. —Graphics. Beautiful game. —Music. Well done. However, even with these good points, my score was going to be a 7 (until I hit Epilogue Part II, which I just loved and brought the game back up to an 8). I was going to give it a 7 for these reasons: BAD: —Really clunky, awkward controls. In the balance between ‘cinematic’ and ‘precise’ movement, the game is too far towards ‘cinematic’. They try to correct this during a gunfight by using the world’s most aggressive auto-aim adjustment, meaning you only have to aim within ten or fifteen degrees of a target and your cursor will snap right on him. This makes the game a smidge too easy when you’re winning, and frustrating when you’re losing. The most common reason I died was because I was mashing R1 trying to get behind something as cover and instead of doing that, my character was gracefully and cinematically adjusting his weight, a movement that lasts the length of a solar body’s rotation around the center of the universe. —The characters chatting as they rode their horses to the next objective. Look, this is just a personal preference, but I listen to sermons as I play games, and having the characters constantly chat at me meant I couldn’t focus on the sermons. I would have preferred it if they had cut out making me ride my horse to the objective entirely, and instead had made all the dialogue part of a single cutscene and showed a scene of us riding to the location. —As you’re following your party to the next quest, even if you cut to Cinematic View to engage the auto-drive (which is not explained well in the game btw), you have to hold X so your horse will keep going. My thumb is stronger, and for that I owe you one, Rockstar. Now, if only I needed a strong thumb ever. So, it was a 7, but then Epilogue Part 2 happened, and now it’s an 8. Play the whole game just to play that epilogue. You won’t regret it.