Ghostbusters has a vaguely half-decent core, but stretches it too far over interminable levels wrecked by mindless repetition and a lack of strong ideas. It’s dull played solo, tedious in multi-player and generally no fun whatever you do. The new movie has its lovers and its haters, but the game will create no such divisions. Whoever you are, whatever you like, it’s just no good.
You can see the potential in Rodea's high-flying, swooping, soaring gameplay, but it's all squandered by the woeful visuals, poor design and terrible controls. The Wii U might be short of quality games this winter but you'd have to be pretty desperate to buy this.
With ropy graphics, repetitive gameplay and wretched controls, Godzilla is so bad that it's almost lovable. You get a lot of classic kaiju to play with, and smashing them through the sights of Tokyo can be strangely entertaining. Sadly, it's not entertaining enough to warrant paying out for a full-price game.
After a long and troubled development history it's hard to describe Devil's Third as disappointing, but whatever genius Itagaki possessed when he made Dead or Alive 2 or Ninja Gaiden seems to have deserted him with this one.
There's precious little sign of excitement, imagination or progression, the weapons are weedy and the storytelling poor. Given that there are plenty of other twin-stick shooters with better gameplay and graphics out there, you'd be mad to buy it were it a fiver. At [its launch price], however? That's the biggest joke of all.
From New Super Mario Bros. to Rayman Legends to Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds to the recent Doom reboot, we've seen games that mix twenty-year-old styles with modern visuals and new ideas and the results have been great. Mighty No. 9 isn't in the same league. Instead, it looks and feels like an amateurish homage to Mega Man with bargain-basement production values and a ridiculous difficulty level. While fans will find something to love in its hardcore gameplay and old-school character design, non-fans should steer well clear.
Some will relish the gruesome spectacle and challenge, but Execution manages to transform giant-slaying into something of a chore.
Like Sonic? Play Sonic Mania. Played Sonic Mania? Play it some more. While Sonic Forces looks fantastic, it's one of the least engaging games in the entire series.
Talk about a squandered opportunity. There's nothing much wrong with the graphics or the rough-and-tumble arcade racing, but the new Micro Machines hasn't got the single-player mode to pull players in or the multiplayer content required to keep them there. There's a sorry sense of ‘will this do?' about World Series. While the nostalgia factor is high, the rest is a letdown.
There are good ideas at work in Reservoir Dogs: Bloody Days, but it's a shame that one of the most intense and shocking indie movies ever made has spawned a game that's neither. At its best, it's a tight, engaging twin-stick shooter with an element of strategy and a cool rewind mechanic, but it never manages to be anything more than that.
I love PaRappa and his ‘I gotta believe’ attitude, but this early rhythm action game no longer holds up. That’s no slur on its charming visuals, great music and superb animation, all of which look great in this HD update, but the gameplay just doesn’t really work. Enjoy PaRappa in your memories or on YouTube if you must, but this remaster will leave you thinking bad of the rapping pup and, really, who wants that?
Has-Been Heroes is an interesting attempt at a new kind of puzzle/strategy/brawler hybrid, but it’s never as much fun to play as it looks like it should be. It’s a game that has good ideas and strong visual design in its favour, but it never manages to balance the high difficulty level with rewards that make the hardship worth your while.
It looks great and plays very nicely, but Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash lacks the depth, the career modes and the content that make a great Mario sports game, and Nintendo's usual attention to detail isn't quite there. With a bargain basement £10 to £15 price tag it might be worth considering, but at £40? It's not even close.
Eternal Crusade is trying to do a lot and be a lot of things to Warhammer 40,000 fans. There's an obvious love of the universe and some real thinking behind the more melee-focused combat style of the game but, right now, it isn't really working. The gameplay needs more polish, better balancing and more finesse and the same goes for the presentation. If or when it gets that it could be a contender, particularly if you love the franchise, but until that happens you might want to stick to something else.
Bound by Flame looks like a budget RPG contender, and there are some nice ideas in the combat system and the Bioware-like treatment of the side-characters. Sadly, there's just too much about it that's generic, unpolished, badly animated, poorly implemented or uninspired. If you must have a fantasy RPG to play on PS4 then this might do, but there will be better around the corner, and this really isn't an easy game to love.
Homefront: The Revolution has plenty of ambition and a handful of good ideas, but it's spoilt by the clumsy execution. Much as we love the mix of gameplay styles and those classy customisable guns, we can't get over the lifeless gunplay, clumsy movement and woeful AI.
Sonic Forces is a spectacular but empty sugar rush that's over in a blur. Once again, Sonic's return to form falls flat.
Space Hulk: Deathwing – Enhanced Edition is an improvement on the original version, but still nothing more than a semi-decent co-op shooter chained to a ditchwater dull campaign.
Got a household of bored kids on a rainy weekend? World of Warriors has just enough charm and interest to keep them busy for a day or two. Yet while it has depth and a few good ideas, it's not compelling enough or varied enough to hold their interest for any longer.
Got PSVR but no Aim? You might not want to bother. Bravo Team isn't an exceptional game in terms of visuals, scenery, action, AI or enthralling set pieces, and it's really only the make-believe, plastic gunplay that makes it worth a punt. It isn't good enough to make it worth purchasing the Aim for.