Floaty imprecise controls, a lack of depth, random spikes in difficulty due to bad design, random frustration, a mini-game for the sake of a mini-game, and a protagonist with the all the charisma of a shiny blue block.
Take your pick of the four aforementioned proteges listed above, team up with another player, and take-down syndicates and streetcorner thugs using combat inspired by the popular Batman Arkham series of games.
Morbid curiosity perhaps, just to see an example of a rushed, broken, and featureless game passing itself off as a premium sports experience.
And so this once sleepy locale has been turned into a gothic hellscape, where citizens are hiding, and cultists are working with their vampire overlords to appease the more powerful vampire gods.
In a game where you use toilets to save, fight with a lightsaber-like weapon, assassinate strange and odd characters in a world chock-full of pop culture references and absurdism – that's strike three and four.
In the end Earthfall is unfortunately the exception to that age-old rule, originally spoken and then sung by Mary Poppins – ‘a spoonful of co-op makes even the most mediocre of shooters go down'.
Stick with the 1991 original.
A visually impressive remake full of detail and polish for what is for the most part a painfully average platformer. From a time when the genre was moving forward and delivering better traditional efforts than this.
As loud, brash, and in your face Trials of the Blood Dragon is, it’s all over after a few hours. So it doesn’t outstay its welcome. Which is about the highest praise you can assign to this oddity. Part ‘80s love letter, part Trials game, part mash-up of new and mostly terrible play styles.
The core shooting mechanics are quite possibly best in class. It's a shame then that everything around them fails to reach those same heights. Destiny Expansion II: House of Wolves is no exception, and seems to be an expansion in name only. If anything, it makes the already overplayed sections of the core game feel smaller. And for a grand sci-fi universe, that's a bad thing.
Ultimately the new Saints Row is a disappointment, especially if you’re a fan of the series.
Another average, but ambitious, outing for the blue hedgehog.
Much like the origins of Space Hulk it feels true to the tabletop roots of the series - but also lacking in its limited scope.
And really, when the crashes look like simple physics experiments from the late-90s that can trigger from the slightest of scrapes – it was destined to fall short of hitting its lofty Burnout spiritual successor goal.
Which, in case you were wondering, isn't a good thing for a, you know, racing game.
Things go horribly wrong and fall apart.
Instead what we've got here is a HD misfire of a motion-control misfire from over a decade ago.
It doesn’t become great, but there are flashes of brilliance and promise.
As it stands it's still a few meaningful patches from becoming something that we'd recommend.
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.