Though it has to be said, the somewhat janky real-time cinematics, not to mention seeing so many others running around as you're trying to trigger an important event, hinder the dramatic impact of the story being told.
A summer camp teen horror inspired by movies from the 1980s, the setting and set-pieces are at times cliché or familiar, but with a cast of engaging characters and great story you're left with something wholly memorable.
It remains to be seen how exactly the online create-a-club stuff pans out in terms of competition, but as a same-room couch jam Mario Strikers: Battle League Football gets better and better the more you play. A surprisingly deep, chaotic bit of Mario Sports action.
The flip-side to this is a positive, in that Rogue Legacy’s intricate progression and many, many secrets to discover is enough to warrant on and off play for weeks and months. If you’re after a pure rogue-lite experience and something that has the combat depth and platforming challenge to keep you hooked on its loop for an extended period, then Rogue Legacy 2 is a resounding success. Visually, it's a huge leap forward over the original too - with some fantastic animation and responsive 2D action.
Nintendo Switch Sports lives up to its namesake in that the sports are both the star of the show, and the entirety of the experience.
In the end it’s hard to look at this as anything but a missed opportunity, where the mix of old and new doesn’t quite come together. The horror aspirations amount to little more than set dressing. Fast-paced shooting is where Forgive Me Father settles, a place where enemies move in predefined patterns and strafing is just about all you need to do to survive. As fun as that can be in doses, there’s little incentive to keep going once you realise that’s all there is.
Narratively there's a lot of nuance to be found in the conversations between Vincent and his robo-pal MAC, his family, and other humanoids, which in turn leads to several branching paths and even different overall conclusions.
Plus, you can equip a book that fires Palpatine-style lightning bolts.
In the end, Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands is a confident and very welcome step forward for the Borderlands series.
A gem of a first-person shooter, an interactive rollercoaster, and one hell of a good time. So much so it’ll have you lining up to go again.
Cyberpunk 2077's long-awaited next-gen console update is here, and the extended wait looks to have been worth it. The Performance Mode corrects all of the poor frame-rate issues in one fell swoop, not to mention the several thousand bug fixes that 14-months and change can bring. There's even some new stuff to discover, from the ability to purchase/rent apartments to an overhaul of enemy AI. As a reboot of sorts it's by no means perfect, but it's now a great foundation on which to deliver more Night City stories.
Ultimately, the Forza Horizon series has always been about positivity, and an unabashed love for the singular thing that is driving. Infectiously so, which makes Forza Horizon 5 the most polished entry, in terms of overall structure and presentation, to date.
For a genre steeped in keyboard shortcuts, understanding tech trees, the importance of a build queue, and multi-tasking so you can turn that gold into gold-plated armour, Age of Empire IV's easy-to-learn interface and systems go the opposite route to what you'd expect when throwing the word ‘streamlined' into the mix.
It might take a flow-chart or two to understand its premise, but it takes experiencing a loop or two or three to discover its genius.
And with dimensional portals opening and closing throughout Rift Apart's many locales, the general idea is you can instantly travel between highly-detailed worlds.
The co-op action here is memorable, ambitious, and quite unlike anything we’ve played in a while.
Being placed in a world akin to a setting kids might be whisked away to if they were transported to a nightmarish version of their own imagination -- by that interdimensional beast that lives underneath their floorbirds -- it's, yeah, terrifying.
It's also as strange as Mario's team-up with a sentient hat that for some reason lets him Being John Malkovich a dinosaur.
In the end though, by not committing to either the sim-style of TIE Fighter or the arcade-action of Rogue Squadron – the middle-ground falls a short of brilliance. Most campaign missions follow a similar flow, rarely delving into sheer cinematic spectacle or pure sim-like protracted and intense battles. But there’s no denying that when played in VR Squadrons often feels like a dream come true - and when it stays on target, it’s a force to be reckoned with.
Underneath the beauty, there’s a morality tale that slowly unfolds amid the sometimes overblown spectacle. An element that was present in the original but feels more prevalent and potent here. The ending backs an even bigger gut punch this time around.