Reviews

I can’t imagine that Retro Studios took on the job of making a new Donkey Kong Country game lightly. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if it kept a lot of them up at night. Donkey Kong Country is quite rightly regarded as a masterpiece, a feat of technical wizardry and genius game design even…

I imagine almost everyone who’s ever ridden a motorcycle has heard the same worried refrain from their mum about how motorcycles claim thousands of lives on the road every year. For those who decide to put mum’s mind at rest and stick to a car, TT: Isle of Man is a great consolation prize, an…

After over five years in development, Sony’s Santa Monica Studio’s God of War is back and I think you know by now, it’s a triumphant return for one of PlayStations greatest anti-hero’s and god defying badasses, Kratos.

Extinction offers up an interesting premise that I was personally drawn to. Being a fan of The Shadow of the Colossus, which this game seems to borrow elements from, it seemed like a no-brainer. What we get however, is an underdeveloped pot of mediocrity that pulls off a few neat tricks, while ultimately crumbling under…

“Fuck the Oscars! This is the real shit, right here.” At least that is what creator and director Josef Fares said loud and clear regarding his new title A Way Out at the 2017 Game Awards. Given his enthusiasm, it wasn’t a stretch to believe that this experience would not be an extremely good one,…

I used to wonder what would happen to the video game systems of my youth. Whether they would be left to rot once they were no longer being produced and their hardware stopped working. The C64 Mini is the latest in a run of miniaturised retro video game hardware that answers that question and, like…

Far Cry 5 has been something of a curiosity since it was announced. While an unquestionably brave move to set this new installment of the 14 year old franchise in the United States, many were curious about the game’s motives — given the political and social turmoil in which the US currently finds itself, would…

As I write this, three days after a rather bumpy launch, its clear that Sea of Thieves is a bit of a mixed bag. There are things that I love about it, there are things that I don’t love about it and there are things that I feel are not particularly well understood by those who…

Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom is a phenomenally gorgeous game, playing host to some of the liveliest and most beautiful environments I’ve ever had the pleasure of traveling through. From a town controlled by the power of luck to dream lands filled with terrifying monsters, Ni No Kuni II takes you on an eye-opening…

It’s been around six months sine Assassin’s Creed Origins arrived and in that time, the game has proven itself to be one with legs. With Curse of the Pharaohs, the game’s latest and largest DLC expansion to date, Ubisoft looks to keep Bayek’s adventure rolling with a trip to Thebes.

I have a genuine love of job simulator games that is both unnerving and inexplicable. I also find them deeply hilarious. The seriousness with which they take themselves and my absolute refusal to take anything seriously makes for a very entertaining combination, at least as far as I’m concerned. Thus, when a code for Pure…

If Burnout Paradise Remastered does anything, it makes the EA of 2008 look like a benevolent creativity incubator when compared to the strife-prone publisher of today. For one thing, the game is great fun. For another, its clear that developer Criterion was given the room they needed to properly execute on their vision. It’s a…

Kirby Star Allies was so disgustingly cute that it made me want to vomit. From its charming and delightful characters to its friendship-based co-operative gameplay, everything about Star Allies is just plain adorable. When Kirby’s friends are low on health, he heals them by ‘kissing’ them, generating tiny love hearts across the screen. When presented…

In the last twelve months, I’ve gone from having never played a Yakuza game to having played three of them and what I didn’t expect was for them to grow on me so quickly. This series has always felt very By Japanese People, For Japanese People, there’s so many cultural nods and gestures that don’t…

Supermassive Games are throwing out the releases in the last few months, we have had the moderately delightful Hidden Agenda via the Play link games on the PS4 and before that was their Until Dawn Spin-off Until Dawn: Rush of Blood as a PSVR launch title. It was a blast to play and really showed…

Scribblenauts Showdown would best be described as a party game, taking inspiration and gameplay from a range of titles like Mario Party, Dance Dance Revolution, Angry Birds and Diner Dash. The action takes place in a variety of fun modes, including Sandbox, Showdown and Versus modes, each of which features a variety of fun activities.

If Moss is any indication, 2018 is going to be a huge year for the PSVR. Moss is this year’s first major VR release in terms of hype factor and I’m happy to say it’s one I was not disappointed in.

Payday 2  bursts onto the Nintendo Switch as one of the most complete packages of the title that you can find score in one initial purchase. Through it’s performance issues and strange omissions of certain DLC packs, Payday 2 is mostly what you expect, but this time, allowing you to take your heists on the…

To put it simply, Metal Gear Survive should not exist. Before evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of the title, one must first address the point of its existence in the first place. The Metal Gear series is famous for its stealth mechanics and intriguing story about the changing landscapes of technology in our world, topped…

Atomik: RunGunJumpGun is absolutely maddening. I’ve been trying to come up with a way to describe it for a week now and the best I’ve got is “the bastard offspring of a bullet hell shmup and Flappy Bird.” That really covers all the bases I think. You will know, based on this description, whether Atomik…

It only took me a little over two hours to knock The Station over but I’m stilling idly thinking about it whenever I’ve nothing else to occupy my brain. For a game this short, there’s a surprising amount to unpack once the credits have rolled. It’s not perfect — the edges are rough like shark’s…

Those who grew up in the 80’s and early 90’s will remember the heady days of the video game arcade. Magical places full of light and noise and games you couldn’t play anywhere else. Going to the movies meant visiting the arcade next door, and I would beeline for the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cabinet. Streets…

Broadly speaking, whenever a game receives an expansion pack, they tend to take that word”expansion” rather literally. Typically what they bring to the table is more of everything you could already do in the base game. More units, more characters, more places to visit, things to do. Civilization expansions take a very different approach. They…

Radiant Historia: Perfect Chronology is a game about cause and effect – the consequences of fate, and how the smallest decisions can change an entire history. In Radiant Historia, the kingdom of Vainqueur is under siege on all sides. Tensions are rising in the cities of Alistel and Granorg, and a mysterious force known as…

Kingdom Come: Deliverance attempts to give players a realistic medieval action-RPG, complete with a dense and diverse open world. Being heavily based on historical fact, the experience is mostly aimed at history buffs, but can also be enjoyed by casual fans thanks to its capable combat mechanics.

Boy, Bayonetta 2 is … a lot, isn’t it? There’s so much going on with this game that I barely know where to start talking about it. Maybe let’s start with the fact that its been re-released on the Nintendo Switch and go from there.

It’s hard to imagine that Bayonetta was released nearly 10 years-ago now and the apparently superior sequel Bayonetta 2 was 4 years ago! With the newly released Switch port arriving this month, for the most part, it honestly feels like it was made for it today, it just ages well and for a guy that…

The Inpatient for PlayStation VR is a psychological horror game designed by Supermassive Games, who were the minds behind the awesome PS4 exclusive Until Dawn and is set 60 years before that aforementioned title. Those merits alone will sell the game to VR enthusiasts and horror buffs such as myself. After the VR games Resident Evil…

Trying to market Account + VR would be like trying to drag a pizza delivery man away from dancing on the side of the road and showing him the power of social media advertising. It’s pointless, the only thing that can help advertise this wonderful, engaging, hilarious adult experience is to just yell at people…

You ever sit down with a game, settle in with it, familiarise yourself with the controls and prepare for the inevitable hook that will lead you on your quest? My experience with Fe was fine right up until the part where the hook was supposed to arrive. It never did. Forty minutes after booting the…