7th Generation

–

Alpha Protocol is a stealth game with a heavy emphasis on RPG mechanics. You pick between classes, level up, assign points to different skills, and gain an assortment of perks which vary certain statistics. It very much feels and plays like a modern-day-setting Mass Effect—including an awesome conversation system. However, most of the gameplay is riddled with bugs and a general lack of polish, resulting in a lot of unneeded frustration. Your bullets, for example, don’t necessarily hit where you’re aiming, and most of the shooting is governed by dice-rolls. This is why the game puts such high value on sneaking around enemies, though the stealth elements are rather lacklustre as well. And I’m not even mentioning how awful the boss encounters are—yuck.

–

There’s a lot of stuff to be impressed by in Assassin’s Creed—being able to lose pursuers in large crowds, the fast and fluid climbing, and the rooftop to rooftop parkour are all absolutely exhilarating. It had a lot of things going for it at the time, even if most of the story missions were largely bland and tedious. I doubt anyone found the “sit on this bench and listen to these two people talk about stuff” that engaging. To be fair, the assassination missions were incredibly intense and were often satisfying to complete without a hitch. However, despite the super-engaging parkour, the guards were alerted way too easily and resulted in excessive amounts of fleeing.

–

Assassin’s Creed II is a perfect example of how to improve upon an original blueprint laid down by its predecessor. Most, if not all, of the problems that plagued the original Assassin’s Creed are completely nonexistent, and it’s super-impressive that Ubisoft Montréal still kept all of the awesome parkour gameplay and neat story intact. It also helps that Ezio, Assassin’s Creed II’s main protagonist, is a much more interesting character than both Desmond and Altair from the original game. The trials and tribulations Ezio faces throughout the campaign result in fun and engaging mission structure. Set during the Italian Renaissance the game takes place in both Florence and Venice and couldn’t have been any more believable with an amazing attention to detail. The light-RPG mechanics and an incredible soundtrack from Jesper Kyd round out a truly fantastic sequel that I happily played more than once.

–

The leap from Assassin’s Creed II to Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood may not necessarily be as big as I to II, but the additions they made to the formula make Brotherhood quite an excellent game regardless. The best addition to Brotherhood is the assassins guild that allows Ezio to find and recruit assassins throughout Rome. These assassins can help Ezio in battle but they can also be sent off to other locations around Europe to do tasks, gaining you extra bonuses like currency to buy weapons and armour. Rome is a massive city with lots of recognizable areas to explore, however I did find that segmenting certain parts of the city to use for later parts of the game felt a little contrived. Luckily there’s tons of side content and the small Price of Persia-like platforming sections are back in full force. Brotherhood also introduces multiplayer to the series for the first time, something that is way better than it has any right to be. Blending seamlessly into a crowd and nonchalantly poking out and stabbing your target was incredibly satisfying.

–

Revelations is a very small step from Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood but it’s still a decent game. I was actually pretty surprised how much I enjoyed it overall considering how little it expands on the Assassin’s Creed formula. The biggest addition to the formula is the bomb building which is a small RPG-like crafting system that lets you make things like smoke bombs to distract guards around Istanbul. Revelations also features a really barebones tower-defence mini game that only comes into play around 2-3 times during the campaign and basically sucks every time. Revelations’ narrative is quite boring compared its predecessors—especially the out-of-Animus Desmond stuff—but it does close out Ezio’s story suitably. If you liked both Assassin’s Creed II and Brotherhood then, like me, you might end up enjoying Revelations for what it is. However, playing the same parkour focused Assassin’s Creed gameplay for another 20-30 hours might be a little much for some.

–

Assassin’s Creed III finally takes the Assassin’s Creed series into a new time period with a collection of new characters and gameplay tweaks, but the overall experience isn’t as strong as previous games in the series. It’s definitely the most ambitious game in the franchise and the American Civil War setting is incredibly intriguing. The lack of polish and the scattershot gameplay systems make III feel very messy though. Some new gameplay elements like the naval combat were done incredibly well, but other additions like the item trading and economy were very poorly explained and hardly made any sense. It also didn’t help that the old Assassin’s Creed formula of climbing towers and synching viewpoints has started to show its age. My biggest problem were the main missions though, having a frustrating lack of checkpoints.

–

Arkham Asylum is probably one of the most surprising games I have ever played. Licensed video games are generally pretty lacklustre, and, to be completely honest, I wasn’t expecting much from the game. Arkham Asylum is quite good though, and being able to play as Batman with all of his badassery and amazing gadgets was just exhilarating. Arkham Asylum is incredibly well designed, possessing incredibly tight controls that lets you kick the ever living crap out of thugs while never stressing the player out with convoluted button combos. It’s an adventure with more than just combat as exploration and discovery is one of the best parts. Batman can utilize gadgets like explosive gel, batarangs, and detective vision to find secrets hidden throughout the Asylum.

–

Arkham City plays similar to Arkham Asylum only it’s far more open with more exploration. The game features many of the same mechanics like the brutal combat and fluid stealth, but the world is much larger. Whereas Arkham Asylum was one massive building with a collection of smaller wards, Arkham City is one massive city with a bunch of different districts and factions. Batman can utilize some new tricks like being able to grapple and glide around the city, and some villains like the Riddler take on a more prominent role. Because Arkham City is open world-like, expect to find a few side quests—and a few familiar faces—along your adventure. It’s definitely a game I have little reason to not immediately recommend.

–

Fans of the previous two Rocksteady-developed Batman games may find Arkham Origins—a Warner Bros. Montréal joint—pretty disappointing. It’s a paint-by-numbers affair, so if you’ve played both Arkham Asylum and Arkham City then you’re probably not going to find anything fresh or new in Arkham Origins. It ultimately feels like Arkham City in terms of scope but much smaller in terms of worthwhile content. It starts out strong but becomes less entertaining the further you get—stark contrast to the engaging origin storyline of Batman and Joker told through the overarching narrative. Even much of Arkham City’s layout is reused with only small variations here and there.

–

It’s sometimes easy to excuse a mediocre game’s shortcomings because of its so-stupid-it’s-fun nature, but often times these games get a free pass without deserving it. I feel this way with Binary Domain. It’s a 3rd person shooter, not dissimilar to the Gears of War series. You’re going to run into an area, find over, then hold the left trigger while feathering the right trigger quite often. While the enemy robots are generally pretty satisfying to kill, the encounter design is pretty lame. The storyline and characters (who are extremely goofy) are just plain awful. There were multiple times throughout the campaign where I literally almost fell asleep. It has some neat ideas like the voice commands, and picking your crew during certain mission can raise their overall friendship resulting in some goofy moments during battles, but I found the overall game to be incredibly dull.

–

I loved exploring every nook and cranny in BioShock because Rapture—a massive city at the bottom of the ocean—is one of the most fascinating settings in all of video games. Everything from the audio diaries you find, the people you meet, and the enemies you fight are all amazingly realized, and the detail is just incredible. Even the combat, despite being the weakest part of the game, is varied with lots of options, including magic-power-like Plazmids that allow you to set enemies on fire or shoot electricity into a puddle of water. This combat variety comes into play more often when fighting Big Daddies, the game’s boss-like enemies, which are some of the most intense fights you’ll have in the entire game. You’ll even have to make some pretty tough moral choices and your actions might come into play later on in the game’s 15-hour story.

–

BioShock 2 is a good sequel—it’s BioShock we’re talking about here—but the overall narrative felt a little forced and the gameplay tweaks were few and far between. You play as a Big Daddy, and though the game does a decent job at explaining who you are and why you’re there, it always felt like a really weird decision. Being a Big Daddy also means that you have many opportunities to recruit Little Sisters and protect them while they gather Atom. This element of laying down traps and protecting your Little Sister from baddies was surprisingly really fun. The combat remains largely the same with a few small quality of life improvements. Hacking things like cameras, for example, is much faster, and you can now use both Plazmids and Weapons at the same time. BioShock 2 also features some pretty robust multiplayer, but it feels very tacked on. The campaign is a good length though, so you’ll have lots to do if you don’t want to take on other players online.

–

The world of Columbia portrayed in BioShock Infinite is so incredibly realized and beautifully designed that it’s easy to forget that the game is just a lot of fun to play. The mix of action-heavy set pieces and subtle touches that intertwine with the overarching narrative is done amazingly well. It doesn’t look like BioShock but it features the same exploration-based gameplay with lots of secrets to uncover, and audio logs to collect that slowly decipher the game’s narrative. When it comes down to it, BioShock Infinite is everything I enjoy about video games: thought provoking story, engaging combat with plenty of variation, stunning visual motif, and phenomenal audio design—including an extraordinary voice cast. It’s a game I had a hard time putting down.

–

Borderlands is such a fantastic mix of solid shooting and tightly balanced role-playing mechanics that it makes long sessions feel like short ones. You can spend hours exploring the depths of Pandora alone or with a group of friends, and since there’s so much to do in the game you’ll likely end up playing for longer than expected. The shooting feels great and isn’t garnered by dice rolls, rather, you always hit wherever you’re aiming. Borderlands features a nice balance of classes—all with unique traits and abilities—who allow you to experience most of the same content with a different play-styles. Even classes themselves have varying specs depending on how you want to play. The sheer amount of guns that you can potentially find is staggering as well, resulting in many unique possibilities; you’ll never want to stop finding bigger and better loot. I would’ve liked to see a little more variety in the starting locations for the classes since you’ll likely want to try them all, but Borderlands is definitely a game that you can play for hours at a time.

–

The thing with Borderlands 2 is that it’s fundamentally superior than its predecessor in every way; everything from the world, visuals, story, combat, loot—there’s no reason to go back to the original game. But Borderlands 2 is only a small step forward rather than a leap. There’s a brand-new story, classes, environments, and enemies, but you’re going to be doing the same stuff over and over again. It can potentially be a fairly repetitive experience. It’s a really fun time, no doubt, but it’s a game that will feel very familiar. It sucks too that each of the 4 new classes have the same starting location again, meaning that you’ll end up playing the same content again and again if you want to try all of them. Borderlands 2 is just a lot more Borderlands, for better or worse.

–

In Brothers you play as a pair of siblings trying to find a cure for their ailing father. The neat part of Brothers is that you play as both characters at the same time, each controlled with a different stick on the controller. At first this concept is difficult to get the hang of, but once it clicks you’ll start moving the brothers around the environment in tandem with little-to-no problems. Essentially Brothers is a puzzle game where you use each brother to do different things, such as activating switches to lift a platform, or distracting hostile creatures. It’s really fun and can be extremely addicting. Unfortunately Brothers only last for 2-3 hours and can easily be completed in one sitting, but it’s a fantastic 2-3 hours nonetheless.

–

Brutal Legend was original pretty divisive how it melded a collection of different genres together into one strange adventure. Despite this I found the weird mixture to be quite a lot of fun. You may eventually get tired of Jack Black’s voice by the end, but the metal-themed open world, character/action combat, and real-time strategy elements come together quite nicely even if these elements don’t sound like they would necessarily mix. The Metal theme is done brilliantly as much of the game’s environments and character design are all based on 80’s Metal album art. The soundtrack is also phenomenal, featuring some of the greatest metal artists of all time such as Iron Maiden, Metallica, Judas Priest, and of course, Motorhead.

–

First-person shooters have more or less worn out their welcome over this console generation. Some developers try to tweak small thing here or there but we’ve all come to expect the same gameplay most of the time. Bulletstorm is one game that tries to spruce things up a bit. Killing enemies in unique ways—like kicking them into spikes or throwing them off cliffs—rewards you with skill points which you can then spend on upgrading your weapons. It changes up your tactics, since most of the time you’d probably just want to shoot every enemy you see. It’s a neat concept but it doesn’t add too much value in its execution. It’s still a linear, set-piece-heavy first-person shooter when all is said and done, not to mention the mindless story and annoying characters.

–

Gunslinger represents Techland getting the Call of Juarez series back on track after The Cartel, which many people believe to be very poor. It still features the same American Wild West aesthetic only the game is designed with a new cel-shaded look, something that actually makes it stand out above other games of the same ilk. The story is pretty engaging as it’s told through narration rather than cutscenes, which allows the player to continue playing while the story is being told. The story even rewinds some sections to narrate the tale with different perspectives, something that I felt was quite novel. Most of the shooting feels pretty good and you can rack up points by killing enemies fast, in combos, and with accuracy—something that really comes to play in the score attack mode. It even has a pretty awesome stand-off mechanic, something that has rarely been done well. It’s a fun shooter, but there were spots in the story that I felt dragged on too long, with some of the level design leading to parts where you get shot fun multiple directions and not realizing why you died. The boss fights were also pretty frustrating and lacked any real strategy other than, you know, shooting them in the face.

–

If a God of War-like brawler is where you wanted the Castlevania franchise to go, then you’ll probably really like Lords of Shadow. Don’t get me wrong—it’s nowhere near as good as a God of War, but it’s a solid action game that has surprising depth and fun combat scenarios. It tells of the story of Gabriel Belmont, a man that is on the hunt for a mystical mask that can revive his fallen wife. The game takes you through a multitude of interesting areas, all of which are split into mini-chapters. It’s a surprisingly long game that can take upwards of 20 hours to completely finish, and features some great Shadow of the Colossus-esque boss fights along the way. It’s not necessarily an essential game, but it’s a very solid one.

–

When Mirror of Fate was originally showed to the public I was very excited, mostly because I loved the GBA/DS-era, Metroid-style Castlevania games. Unfortunately Mirror of Fate feels like a poor man’s Symphony of the Night. It features weirdly loose controls, slow traversal that makes backtracking a huge pain in the ass, and an overall lack of polish. The combat is really strange because it uses the same type of combos as the original Lords of Shadow does, only purely played in 2D. It doesn’t feel right at all. Everything from the character movement to the platforming feels off, and the game looks very ugly and runs at a piss-poor frame rate. Mirror of Fate is essentially one massive head scratcher.

–

Conan is an awful game that I would have a really hard time recommending, even to die-hard action game fans. It’s very similar to the God of War series—you’ll be doing a lot of button mashing in order to kill your foes, and there are some ridiculously simple puzzles to break up the action. Most of the combat isn’t fun at all—especially around the last couple hours of the game—and the game’s visuals are quite ugly. It’s very hard to root for Conan as a protagonist and you will never care what happens to him next. You’d be lucky to find anything worthwhile in Conan’s adventure.

–

Costume Quest is a cute, little game great for introducing RPG newcomers with its light mechanics and easy difficulty. The idea of equipping different costumes to change which caricatures your player uses in battle is extremely clever and unique. The game’s narrative is very basic but relatively funny, including many references of other media (like Arrested Development, for example). Although it’s a great concept the execution is rather lacklustre and the battles become repetitive only after a short while. It’s a great way to introduce RPG mechanics to newcomers even despite most of its faults.

–

Crysis 2 gets away from the open environments from the original but its tight moment-to-moment gameplay definitely makes up for its lack of breadth. Like the original you can play the game in different styles—you can choose the defensive approach and surround yourself in a protective barrier, or you can turn invisible and stealth kill your way through encounters. It was super-fun using these powers in tandem while smoking enemies, and the layered New York City-themed environments added to the depth. This was my first Crysis game so getting used to switching gameplay styles on the fly took some time to get used to, and I never enjoyed how fast your stealth metre drained. But the game is absolutely stunning, and it’s surprisingly lengthy too.

–

Crysis 3 almost feels like a large expansion for Crysis 2. Most of the gameplay feels unchanged, and the more linear approach that Crysis 2 took over Crysis 1 is still intact. There’s a couple of new hooks like the Bow & Arrow that adds some fun nuance to the stealth, but there’s nothing here that really stands out. Visually it’s a stunning game that feels like it’s pressed up against the Xbox 360’s and PS3’s power wall, and it’s disappointing that Crytek didn’t decide to wait 6 months to release it on the new, more powerful 8th generation consoles (though, it’s probably beautiful on powerful PCs). Crysis 3 is ultimately pretty fun even if it doesn’t reinvent the wheel. If you liked any of the three previous Crysis games, and if you’re one of the 14 people on earth that care about its story, then you’ll probably still enjoy what Crysis 3 has to offer.

–

Vigil Games did a phenomenal job at getting the feel of Nintendo’s Legend of Zelda series just right in Darksiders. It features themed dungeons, small keys, skulls that give you more life (sort of like heart pieces), and even features one of those tedious fetch quests near the end of the game. Darksiders knows it’s extremely similar to the Legend of Zelda and commits to it quite well. However, Darksiders is a fantastic game on its own merit. The combat in particular feels extremely tight, and world is just a lot of fun to explore. The game had some small issues with the frame rate and screen tearing, but issues like these were easy to look past when everything else was so much fun.

–

Darksiders II is a much different game than its predecessor as Vigil Games chose to steer away from the comparisons to the Legend of Zelda series. Since you play as the smaller and more agile Death, Darksiders II is a more combat focussed game that relies much more on fast-paced fighting and less on dungeon crawling. There are still dungeons but are much less pronounced; rarely themed in the traditional sense and are much shorter in length. This isn’t to a fault however as the game is just as engaging as it was before. There’s colour-coded loot, a quasi-open-world environment, and fair collection of side quests. Although its overall design has changed, Darksiders II unfortunately features a lot of the same technical issues like screen tearing and frame rate drops. Luckily these flaws never truly got in the way of enjoying its 20-or-so hour adventure.

–

Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls are a breath of fresh air into a generation that’s otherwise chock-full of giant set-piece, explosion-heavy shooters and action/adventures. Dark Souls is an extremely punishing game that will test your limits while allowing you to explore a fantastic, Metroidvania-like world all the while. From Software purposely conserves most of the game’s information allowing the community to figure things out on their own—something that games have been getting away from for years. Lordran is a beautiful, brutal, seamless world, full of distinct areas that bleed together in some really awesome ways (which is much more engaging than Demon’s Souls HUB structure, for example). The game features bonfires which replace the old levelling structure from Demon’s Souls, allowing the player to level up and attune their magic at these various points through the world. The boss fights are incredible, the world is varied, the game is just plain addicting.

–

Dark Souls II was a hotly anticipated game, and deservedly so, being the sequel to one of the most well-regarded role playing games of the generation. It’s a terrific sequel with a clever assortment of UI improvements, finely-tuned classes and skills, and a wide variety of terrifying locations for the player to explore. If you thought some parts of the original Dark Souls were hard, just wait for Dark Souls II to rip you to shreds. Dark Souls II is much more streamlined experience that allows newcomers to get the hang of its nuance. The beautiful environments are littered with things that want nothing but to see you die a miserable death, not to mention the plethora of incredible boss fights that you will most likely see a few times (or 20) before figuring out their weaknesses. Dark Souls II offers so many improvements that it’s hard to expect much more from a this truly great sequel.

–

Dead Island features many of the same gameplay hooks from other open world games but it’s not on the same level as something like Fallout 3. Dead Island takes place in a zombie apocalypse on a remote island where people have come on a tropical getaway. It features quests, loot, and all sorts of other RPG elements. Its combat is hard and brutal but it’s best controls are hidden behind the options in the main menu. Turning on the analog combat will allow you to swing your weapons in specific ways by pressing the right stick in certain directions. It makes killing zombies throughout the world fun and exciting, while also letting you decapitate them in gruesome—and awesome—ways. I had fun running around and completing objectives, but Dead Island’s final half gets away from what makes the game fun in the first place and completely falls off the rails by the time you reach the end.

–

Deadlight starts out very strong but eventually teeters off. It’s a side-scrolling action/platformer and for the most part it controls well and feels pretty good to play. It takes place in Seattle during a zombie apocalypse where you play as ex-ranger named Randall, who has been separated from his wife and daughter. It’s an extremely linear platformer with bits of action thrown in here and there. The first 5 or 6 chapters have you avoiding zombies, jumping through buildings, and solving puzzles, all of which were engaging. It starts to fall apart the further you get, as the game quickly throws in frustrating segments like running from a hostile helicopter, or trying to sneak past gun-wielding humans. It’s too bad because I think if the game kept its focus on its strongest elements Deadlight could have been a really awesome game. Instead, its final areas are too frustrating to recommend slogging through.

–

Dead Space is the game I always hoped it would be. It features the same hooks as the early Resident Evil games like scarce ammunition and backtracking, and the isolated space station results in extremely suspenseful horror that never lets up. One of the best parts of Dead Space—to get away from the Resident Evil comparisons—was the tactical dismemberment. The best way to kill enemies was to sever their limbs to make them less effective. Most kills are a combination of two maneuvers. For example, shooting a fast moving enemy in the legs and then finishing them off with a stomp is much more effective than trying to shoot them in the head. It’s an awesome concept that works surprisingly well in execution, and learning the best way to take care of each enemy was a blast.

–

Dead Space 2 is a fantastic sequel, one that manages to refine most of what made the original Dead Space so good in the first place. It’s structured much better narratively, boasts some amazing horror/action sequences, all while looking beautiful at the same time. The first hour or so is up there as one of the best opening sequences of all time as the game throws you in the deep end right away. Some of the changes Visceral has made, like giving Isaac Clarke a voice or ramping up the action a little too much, can be a little off-putting. But I found the campaign to be better paced overall, and it introduced some cool new characters and terrifying enemy designs.

–

Much of what made the first two Dead Space games so fantastic is lost in Dead Space 3—including the horror, which, up until this point, was the hallmark of the series. Dead Space 3 feels much more like an action game than it does a survival horror game, complete with human enemies that aren’t fun to fight, and a general lack of creepy atmosphere. It’s too bad because I really enjoyed both of the previous games in the series, and the additions like the weapon crafting and side missions were cleverly implemented. Most of the fights come down to predicability. You run into an area with a bunch of vents on the walls, turn on a switch, then wait for the enemies to pop out and swarm you—and don’t forget about the enemies that spawn behind you every… single… time. It also has quite possibly the worst auto save system in video game history which can cause hours of lost time if you’re not careful.

–

The super-engaging stealth gameplay in Deus Ex: Human Revolution gives the player tons of customization options to play around with. You could play Human Revolution like a typical shooter, but the most enjoyable experiences come from the plethora of stealth options. Its RPG mechanics allow you to dump skill points—earned from completing missions—into parts of Adam Jensen’s body. The way you build Adam’s powers can dictate what options are available to you at any given time. For example, some sections are blocked by heavy objects. If you’ve put skills into Adam’s strength augmentation you can pick up and the throw objects with ease, allowing you to explore areas otherwise inaccessible. This breadth of abilities is the Human Revolution’s biggest strength, along with a terrific presentation, that separates the game from the rest of the pack.

–

Zipping around the environment as a masked assassin throughout Dishonored was a lot of fun, but sneaking all the way through giant castles or just prancing through masquerade parties unnoticed was the main draw. You’re given lots of powers to experiment with which ultimately varies how you play the game. You could simply crawl through small nooks and crannies toward your objective or you could possess animals, like fish, to swim through sewer grates. It feels fresh. The game is short and goes by too quickly, plus it’s very hard to tell whether you’re hidden or not, which became frustrating on occasion. Otherwise it’s great fun.

–

DmC has fairly solid combat mechanics and some of its level design is completely bonkers. But like many character action games it can get pretty repetitive, even if most of the levels were pretty cleverly designed. There are a ton of different difficulty modes that range from a cakewalk to downright sadistic, so there’s definitely some variation here. DmC just feels like I was going through the motions. I don’t know if I was just expecting a lot more from Ninja Theory—especially after Enslaved—but what’s here is a decent rental.

–

The original Dragon Age is a hardcore RPG, one that many people will have a tough time jumping into. It’s a very demanding game that takes a considerable amount of time, patience, and education to really get into. But once you lose yourself in the game world you can lose sleep quickly. It’s a massive game with lots to do, and the tactical combat has the right amount of challenge and reward that you’ll want to keep playing long after you should have stopped. It’s a game with many variables so you may end up playing the game more than once after you finish it for the first time.

–

Dragon Age II is an extremely disappointing game for many reasons. If you’re thinking this is the Mass Effect 2 of the Dragon Age series, you’re in for a bad time. Its biggest problem is that it just feels tiny. Hawke—Dragon Age II’s new human-only protagonist—will only explore the city of Kirkwall and some of its surrounding areas outside its walls. You will likely see the same recycled areas a multitude of times, making the game feel extremely small. The quests, levelling, characters, and action are all relatively okay—the tactical yet snappy combat was actually pretty good—but feels insignificant with the lack of grandiose that the original game excelled at.

–

Duke Nukem Forever had a very long and troubled development cycle. It started way back in 1997 just after the release of Duke Nukem 3D and went through multiple engines and iterations before the assets were finally picked up by Gearbox in 2010. I’m actually surprised that Gearbox decided to finish it because it’s a pretty dismal game. It feels like a relic from 10 years ago with generic shooting mechanics, awful platforming sections, lengthy load times, and humour to roll your eyes at. There’s absolutely nothing worthwhile to experience in Duke Nukem forever, not even out of curiosity.

–

The most impressive thing about Dust: An Elysian Tail is that not only is it a great game that offers beautiful, fluid 2D art, snappy combat, Metroid-inspired exploration, and a story that was surprisingly emotionally resonating, but it was primarily developed but one dude over a three year span. This includes all of the programming, gameplay mechanics, audio engineering, and art design. This made me appreciate Dust more than I would have otherwise, and is probably one of the most impressive games I’ve ever played considering how polished it is overall.

–

When I started Oblivion for the first time, I was overwhelmed by just the sheer amount of options you have at your disposal. You can enter any house, talk with any citizen, kill any animal, or drink at any bar. You can pick up every fork, spoon, plate, apple, book, flower—if you see it, you can usually interact with it. Once you finish the opening quest, you can literally go anywhere you want. Want to see the north sections of the map? You can run there immediately. And that’s what I love about Oblivion—there’s a main narrative, tons of varied side quests, and a massive amount of customization, but my favourite part was just to set out in a direction and explore. You’re bound to find something interesting. It’s not a perfect game—levelling up some skills like your agility was pretty annoying, getting Vampirism is a giant hassle, and closing Oblivion gates got old very quickly—but the game has so much content that these small annoyances never outweigh all of its positives.

–

Skyim is a game that you can play for hundreds of hours and never see the entire game. Bethesda Game Studios are known for making massive open-world RPGs, and Skyrim is easily their biggest and best yet. The northern region of Tamriel, Skyrim, is a more frigid landscape with mountains and snow; the game takes place in this entire country and it feels absolutely gigantic. You can’t go anywhere without picking up quest after quest, all of which feel unique and worthwhile. The best time to be had is to just set off in a direction and explore—there’s so much to do and so much to see that you’ll likely find yourself lost for hours at a time. Let’s not forget about the brand new levelling system which rewards you with skill points depending on how you play. Skyrim is one of the best reasons to be a gamer.

–

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West isn’t the best playing game and it has its fair share of shortcomings, but it’s an extremely enjoyable game warts and all. My favourite aspect of Enslaved is the constant back-and-forth between Monkey and Trip—the two protagonists of the game—as they try and survive through the post-apocalypse. Their story is well told and above all else, they seem believable. Playing Enslaved is fine but it’s not the game’s strength. The combat can be frustrating at times and the Uncharted-like climbing can get tiresome. But all of the gameplay elements taken as a whole are surprisingly good even if some things are a little off. You’ll want to see the game to the end as well, as the game’s narrative might surprise you by the time you reach its conclusion.

–

I wouldn’t go into Fallout 3 thinking it’s anything like Fallout or Fallout 2—think: an open world environment in the same ilk as Bethesda’s previous games like The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, only in a post-apocalyptic setting with guns instead of swords. You start out in a Vault underneath the earth and you’re forced out to find your father. The point where your character first exists the giant doorway leading to the outside is one of the most memorable moments in video games. Just the sheer amount of crap to do in the post-apocalyptic Washington D.C. allows you to play the game for hours without even hitting any major quests. The progression system is very good where you can choose a different perk after each level, allowing for each player to have their own unique character. I spent at least 80 hours exploring the Capital Wasteland, scouring the landscape for better guns, armour, and just about anything. This is a game that you need play once in your lifetime.

–

The Mojave Wasteland in Fallout: New Vegas is a giant, fascinating open world which rivals the expansiveness of past Bethesda Softworks games like Fallout 3 and Oblivion. Obsidian Entertainment is behind the game and although it’s structured much like Fallout 3, the story—specifically the way the narrative can twist and turn—is its strongest element. The game features four main factions, and you’ll have to choose where you alliance lies at some point during its lengthy story. This can dictate what areas are hostile, and some factions may randomly hunt you down if you’re not careful. That aside, exploring the massive wasteland is its biggest draw, and there’s a lot to do here. Side quests will constantly pop up, and you’ll likely want to visit every new spot on the map to uncover new weapons and supplies. It’s a very intricate game however, and this results in a multitude of bugs. New Vegas is by far the buggiest open world game from Bethesda, and it can get in the way of progress quite frequently. I don’t even want to into how long the long times can get. But if you can somehow avoid most of its bugs, you will most likely find yourself really enjoying its engrossing world.

–

Far Cry 3 features a multitude of fun things to do like hunting animals to upgrade equipment, exploring the wilderness for collectibles, taking over enemy-occupied outposts, and climbing radio towers to unlock sections of the map. But those peripheral elements are its strongest facet because most of the main story missions—not to mention the story itself—just aren’t that great. The last half of the campaign is especially mediocre. It’s a beautiful game despite the console versions running sub-optimally, the shooting feels tight, and most of the upgrades allow you to experiment with the combat. It’s a game I really enjoyed despite its fair share of shortcomings.

–

Blood Dragon is a surprisingly fun, smaller, cheaper, tighter, smoother, and funnier follow-up to Far Cry 3. It maintains a lot of the same controls and mission types but it’s set in an 80’s action film-inspired setting with laser guns, mechanical dinosaurs, and a radical soundtrack. There were times when I actually laughed out loud because of a random event here or a funny joke there. And like Far Cry 3 proper, Blood Dragon is absolutely addicting so you’ll likely continue playing for hours at a time. I really enjoyed this bit-sized follow-up and hope to see more of this from Ubisoft in the future.

–

Fez is a platformer with focus on solving puzzles in unique ways. Its main hook is how you can rotate the world 90 degrees at a time. This allows you to get an entirely new perspective on what is otherwise a flat, 2D world. Solving puzzles net you cubes which are basically Fez’s version of Super Mario 64’s stars. Finding these cubes will unlock other parts of the game world that are otherwise locked. The physical platforming feels great, and manipulating the perspective while jumping through tough sections is really satisfying. It’s not until you find out Fez’s deep secrets that the game really opens up. You may even want to grab a pen and paper just to keep track of all the crazy stuff you find around the game world—you’ll probably need it.

–

Grand Theft Auto IV is a successful mix of Rockstar’s tried and true formula set in an ultra realistic representation of New York City. Liberty City is massive and the stories told throughout its busy streets are some of Rockstar’s best. You play Niko Belic, an Eastern European gangster who tries to start a new life in America. His tale takes some pretty significant turns that you probably won’t expect, all with believable consequences—something that Rockstar was getting away from with Vice City and San Andreas.  However, GTA IV still plays like a GTA game; expect to steal cars, shoot guns, kill enemy gangs, evade the cops—you know, normal GTA stuff. Its mission design has its rough patches and the shooting still doesn’t feel very responsive. I would’ve liked to see Rockstar tighten up the slow character movement as well. Grand Theft Auto IV is an awesome game that is held back by some nagging issues.

–

I was pleasantly surprised with how well Chinatown Wars turned out. The isometric view works well on a small handheld like the DS and PSP, and Chinatown Wars’ rendition of Liberty City was surprising big. The main hook is the drug dealing. You can buy and sell drugs depending on prices around the city—so, for example, you can buy cheap Heroin in the East side then sell it for profit on the West side. This micromanagement of your finances really puts an emphasis on side tasks rather than always jumping right to the next main mission—which, to be fair, are all pretty good. It’s definitely one of the best games I’ve ever played on a handheld and is better than most console GTA games to boot.

–

Rockstar North has nearly perfected the open world crime genre with Grand Theft Auto V. Los Santos and its surrounding region is one of the most diverse, beautiful, and well-crafted game worlds you can explore in this day and age. It feels alive and it feels like a place that you could conceivably live within. It’s hard to argue against some of the game’s stuck-in-the-past controls and gameplay nuance—the shooting feels straight out of GTA IV—but GTA V’s multi-character campaign puts a small twist on what we have come to expect from open-world crime games. Each character feels distinct from the other, resulting in some really fantastic mission design that revolves around all three of them at once. And considering it’s easy to switch between all three at any given time, it’s difficult seeing Rockstar going back to its one-dimensional stories.

–

Guacamelee implements its super-unique Lucha Libre aesthetic incredibly well, separating it from the overused pixel art that indy developers consistently fall back on. Rather than relying combat mechanics like shooting, Guacamelee has you punching and suplexing your enemies into oblivion, resulting in some pretty fun combat scenarios. The game features multiple maps and has you unlocking core abilities that unlock other parts of the game, so expect some familiarity with the Metroidvania genre tropes. Also be prepared to get a little frustrated with the last few sections as the game’s difficulty curve can feel unfair at times.

–

My biggest problem with Hitman: Absolution is that the assassination missions that made the Hitman series so successful are spread too far apart. You’re forced to sneak your way through giant environments way too often—almost a third of the game is just sneaking. It’s not very much fun. The game also features manual checkpoints that you can find throughout its various stages. These can be activated whenever you want, giving you the ability to pick and choose the best opportunity to utilize them. The problem with these checkpoints is that they reset everything in the level except any targets you’ve assassinated, so it hardly made any sense.

–

Hotline Miami is all about running into buildings and brutally murdering every person you see, hostile or not, to move to the next area. Sometimes enemies will have melee weapons like pool cues or knives while others may have guns. You need to be super-fast in order to survive since enemies will rush you quickly if you’re not careful. It’s engaging and requires a perfect mix of quick thinking and problem solving. The phenomenal soundtrack pumps up the action suitably making every scenario dynamic. It also hits a sweet spot of being difficult but fair, without any particularly frustrating stages.

–

In I Am Alive you play as a man named Carlo who was separated from his family when a catastrophic event ripped the world apart. The game begins as Carlo finally arrives back at his hometown to search for his lost loved ones. Because the event tore down most of the town’s infrastructure, survivors have been without proper resources for a long time. The lower regions of the city are completely covered in dust so exploring these areas is unwise. It’s a neat approach to a game and often requires you to reserve resources like ammo and food. Much of the game takes place above ground level so climbing is a big part, but it can be really finicky and cause some annoyances. It’s also a half-open-world game where things likes side quests can be completed to save other citizens around town, but you’ll likely transverse a lot of the same ground since the world isn’t very big.

–

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning features many of the same hooks that other open world RPGs have. There’s a big world, quests, experience points, and dungeons. The combat in Amalur is a mix between basic action-RPGs and character-action games, and it ends up being pretty engaging. The only problem is that I felt the world was too narrow and not expansive enough to feel alive or believable. I found myself going around the same areas tackling the same types of dungeons over and over again despite most areas feeling distinct. I loved the grind for loot and some of the story stuff was well done, but there was always too much to do at any given time. I think if you were to plough through the main plot and not derive from the primary quest line you may find Reckoning to be pretty good.

–

I didn’t enjoy LA Noire very much. It has an amazing sense of place, the acting is just tremendous, and its tone is perfect—everything else just kind of sucks. Most of the game revolves around you walking around crime scenes to find clues, interviewing people to find out what happened, and taking everything you’ve learned in order to decide who is innocent and who is guilty. The problem is that none of these things were fun in practice. Trying to parse which characters were lying by studying their faces or tone of voice was the only thing done well. LA Noire features a massive open world based on Los Angeles with a few things to complete and some collectibles to find, but probably didn’t need to exist. You could find something to like in LA Noire but I definitely wouldn’t recommend paying full price for it.

–

LEGO Batman 2 has a collection of neat additions to the tired LEGO formula but it continues to have some pretty significant problems. It now features one massive Gotham City-sized HUB that acts like an open-world but it’s very finicky. Frame rate problems and awful flying controls are quite annoying, and the city only really exists to hide collectibles. The regular stages are standard LEGO game levels, so expect much of the same type of light puzzle solving seen in previous games. I was expecting a little more out of the new open structure and I hope to see it expanded on in future iterations.

–

Limbo is a dark, foreboding, minimalistic platformer designed as one continuous adventure sprinkled with some light puzzle solving. Its old film-reel visual design combined with its atmospheric audio give the game an effectively subtle mood. Most of the puzzles come down to making a mistake and having to go back and try it again. The urgency in which Limbo jumps right back into action after deaths allows the game to keep a steady gameplay flow. It’s one of those games you’ll likely finish in one sitting but will stick with you for a long time.

–

Lone Survivor feels like a 2D, old-school Resident Evil game with a 16-bit pixel art aesthetic. There are zombies, pistols, healing items, keys to unlock previously locked doors, and an abandoned city. The thing is, Lone Survivor is a complete chore to play. It ranges from tolerable to absolutely dreadful in many cases, as sneaking your way by enemies is too slow and shooting your way through enemies only works when you have ammunition—which is basically never. The map is useless as the game is played in 2D but the map is displayed in a top-down perspective. You need to experiment with things like cooking food, trading items for ammo, and finding hidden characters that help you along the way, but the game never really explains any of this outright. Lone Survivor’s strong, atmospheric presentation is unfortunately brought down by nonsensical gameplay mechanics that are poorly conveyed.

–

Majin and the Forsaken Kingdom feels like one massive Legend of Zelda dungeon. You explore themed environments while collecting keys, battling enemies, and discovering secrets. It was a game developed on a tight budget but its clever mechanics are implemented well. You play as a young boy who frees a mystical creature called the Majin, a big brooding troll who slowly builds a bond with you over the course of the adventure. The game revolves around you commanding the Majin to complete puzzles and to attack enemies in tandem. While the game is a little ugly and has some pretty substantial presentational issues, the core mechanics are designed amazingly well. It definitely caught me by surprise.

–

Mass Effect is a space-opera RPG where you level up, collect loot, and place skill points into different abilities. The combat can be exhilarating but often feels too ambitious. Having two squad members at all times is a fun gameplay element but commanding them was a hassle. Where Mass Effect really shines is with its dialog and story. You can choose what Shepard says during conversations, allowing you to carve his or her story the way you want. The universe is expansive with other intelligent races—like the Asari, Turian, Salarian, and Krogan, among others—having deep, rich histories. Mass Effect can be a little finicky in spots, but it’s an incredible game where I always looked forward to what happens next.

–

Mass Effect 2 is the greatest video game sequel of all time. In many ways, it’s the quintessential game of the seventh generation—one that stands up at the top with some of the all-time classics. BioWare took every single criticism of the original Mass Effect and fixed them. The shooting feels like the shooter, the dialog is improved with awesome Paragon and Renegade interruptions mid-conversation, and the story expands on the universe in some really clever ways. But it’s the characters of Mass Effect 2 that are the real show. It’s Shepard’s mission to search the galaxy for the meanest, most bad-ass crew to take on a suicide mission, but you have to earn their trust by helping them out. This leads to some of the greatest side mission I have ever seen—it’s Shepard’s duty to earn their respect, and by helping each character deal with their most difficult situations, they will respect you back. Mass Effect 2 is one of the very best games ever created.

–

For being the successor to one of the greatest role playing games ever made, Mass Effect 3 had some lofty expectations to live up to. Despite a few issues stemming from the story and mission design, BioWare managed to release a worthy conclusion to a fantastic trilogy—a trilogy that’s up there as one of the gaming’s best. Shepard’s final chapter has him or her helping races like the Salarians, Krogan, Asari, and Quarian in order to gain their armies to help fight the war against the Reapers. It’s pretty similar to Shepard gaining trust of individual characters in Mass Effect 2, only on a much larger scale. The missions take you through a multitude of locales and alien home worlds, which were usually pretty fun. The side quests—like flying the Normandy around the galaxy map—were kind of lame, and collecting assets for people around the Citadel got pretty tedious. Luckily the main mission variety and in-depth story help out the uneven pace, and multiplayer is some of the best cooperative wave-based shooting I’ve ever played.

–

Max Payne 3 is not that great. It’s definitely one of the most cinematic games I’ve ever played, easily, but the game controls very sluggishly and made the game feel pretty unresponsive. Since it’s a shooter, not being able to quickly get into cover and shoot enemies became very frustrating. It’s very GTA-like with its swim-y, auto-aim focussed shooting, and it’s combined with linear levels and seemingly endless waves of foes. It’s also pretty unforgiving by the time you reach its final stages, so the already middling gameplay gets even more frustrating by the end. I would’ve liked to see them get away from Grand Theft Auto’s type of weak shooting mechanics. Max Payne 3 has its moments of cinematic excellence, but has too many control issues to wholly recommend.

–

All of the peripheral elements around the core gameplay of Metro 2033 are incredible. The game has an amazing, creepy atmosphere, the story of Russians living inside the metro system because of a nuclear winter is outstanding, the bullet economy puts a weird twist on video game currency, and the Russian-accented voice acting makes the game feel oddly foreign. However, ultimately the game just isn’t much fun to play. The shooting feels loose and inaccurate, and the enemy behaviour can get quite irritating. The game is super-linear—having to follow NPCs similar to a Call of Duty game—straying from the very thin path only occasionally. It’s funny too because even despite being incredibly linear, I was often lost and couldn’t figure out the correct path to take. It’s a very messy game with awesome ideas that I wish were implemented into a better playing game.

–

Most of the problems I had with Metro 2033 weren’t amended in Metro Last Light. The shooting mechanics are vastly improved but it was the only aspect of the game that I felt 4A Games reworked. You still have to grind through lame stealth sections, shoot your way through seemingly never-ending monster pits, put up with occasionally-awful checkpointing, and stumble your way through paths that are extremely linear but still somehow maze-like. I think it’s a well-made game—some of the atmospheric sections are quite impressive—but I just didn’t have much fun playing through it. I would only suggest Last Light to someone who has a weekend to plough through a generally short game.

–

Mirror’s Edge has a really awesome concept—not to mention a superb visual aesthetic—but the game’s first-person-platforming gameplay ends up falling flat. My biggest caveat is the platforming itself which is difficult to get a hold of. This is mainly because of the lack of peripheral vision, something that 3rd person parkour games never really run in to. Around the half-way point Mirror’s Edge also introduces gun-wielding enemies who become frustrating to run from, especially when you have to time your jumps perfectly while dodging bullets at the same time. It needed some tweaks, but even then the game’s core mechanics might be too unremarkable to actually remedy.

–

Portal is such a simple yet clever game. Early on you gain the ability to shoot two portals at any wall or ceiling and jump between them to solve puzzles. Puzzles can be extremely simple like taking a cube and figuring out a way to place it on a switch across the room. But they can get quite devious like shooting portals while moving in order to gain momentum, resulting in higher or longer jumps. Portal isn’t your typical puzzle game either—there’s a phenomenal narrative thread told throughout the game, not just a checklist of puzzles wrapped up in boring menus.

–

Portal was one of those games that I didn’t think needed a sequel, but Portal 2 is everything I could’ve wanted out of one. The game is bigger and most of its concepts are expanded upon—including fluids, which completely change the way you think about completing puzzles. The best addition to Portal 2 is Wheatley, a new companion robot eye… thing. This little guy, voiced by Stephen Merchant, is like GLADoS from the original game and is absolutely hilarious. The game’s narrative is completely unpredictable, something that I was worried about coming in. It’s lengthy with tons of variety, and even you put the humour aside, its concepts are executed so well that it’s a difficult game to put down.

–

RAGE is a first person shooter, first and foremost, with a small, open-ish HUB environment to drive around in. It’s not a giant, open-world, exploration-heavy RPG in the same vein as Fallout, so the marketing really dropped the ball on this one. You can take “quests” from citizens in nearby towns, but they always end up being linear shooter levels, not massive dungeons to explore. It’s a somewhat fun game—it has great shooting mechanics, looks amazing, and runs silky smooth—it’s just… so middling. I don’t know if my expectations were too high, or if id Software didn’t do a good enough job explaining what exactly the game was, but it’s pretty disappointing. I wanted something a little more.

–

Red Dead Redemption is essentially Grand Theft Auto set in the late American Wild West. Instead of cities there’s vast landscapes and small towns. Instead of cars there are horses. Instead of machine guns there are six shooters. I feel this setting fits Rockstar’s famous formula much better, though—the world feels absolutely massive. Your character, John Marston, is tasked with finding and capturing gang leaders. This leads him to many locales, including Mexico, in order to locate them all. It’s an incredibly engaging experience because John is a great character with a multitude of fantastic supporting characters to interact with throughout the adventure. There’s tons of activities like duels and robbing banks, plus it has one of the best pieces of downloadable content ever. It’s the best Wild West video game money can buy.

–

Remember Me centres around people’s consciousness and how memories can be change and/or erased without any major consequences. You play as Nilin, an “Errorist” who hunts down bad people to steal their memory. Remember Me takes place in Neo Paris, a futuristic, almost sci-fi version of real-life Paris without the pristine beauty. The 3rd-person combat is not dissimilar to the Batman series but focusses more on precise timing and building your combos in a separate menu. So instead of just doing any combo you like, you earn actions throughout the game that can be assigned to any of your 4-5 different combos slots. Some heal you while some do more damage. It’s a neat system that works really well in execution. The time spent not fighting is Uncharted-like; running through dense, linear areas, climbing up buildings and jumping across ledges. It caught me completely by surprise.

–

Resident Evil 5 is a pretty good game that doesn’t feel much like a typical Resident Evil game anymore. It builds upon Resident Evil 4’s blueprint with 3rd person shooting, performing wrestling moves, and blasting zombies in the face, but Resident Evil 5 can be played cooperatively with a buddy making the campaign a lot more shooter heavy and less horror-like. You will still need to upgrade weapons, fight giant boss monsters, and complete some light puzzles here and there but most of your time will be spent shooting enemies. There are even a few set-piece moments that ramp up the action but they weren’t great and Capcom could’ve cut them entirely. Resident Evil 4 had a perfect mix of tight shooting and classic Resident Evil horror, but Resident Evil 5, while still fun to play, gets away from this combination too often.

–

Resident Evil 6 is a complete disaster. Over the years Capcom has been getting away from the classic Resident Evil formula and RE6 takes every lasting piece of what’s left and throws into a pile of flaming trash. Poor storyline is the least of the game’s problems with gameplay fundamentals that are practically broken, and checkpoints that make you want to throw your controller at the wall. I can’t even begin to explain how awful the boss fights are. Resident Evil 6 is the most shooter-esque of any RE game, but the aiming never feels right and the enemy’s behaviours are laughably bad—not to mention frustrating to deal with. The game is easily 20-hours in length between the four campaigns, and you’ll end up playing the same awful parts multiple times as some character’s paths intersect on occasion. It’s hard to believe that Capcom has let this franchise down this sick, dark path.

–

While Guitar Hero established the bass-line (pun intended) for plastic instruments across North America, Rock Band introduced the entire rock and roll experience to households with the additions of drums and vocals that let four players rock out at the same time. It features a phenomenal track-list, finely-tuned progression, and super sharp presentation. I can’t even begin to tell you how many hours I spent playing the drums on expert, trying to beat songs like Run to the Hills by Iron Maiden, or Won’t Get Fooled Again by the Who. Playing with family and friends together is the main draw here, and it felt fresh every single time.

–

Everything that made the original Rock Band so fantastic was kept intact in Rock Band 2. It’s also a much more streamlined and accessible game than its predecessor making it easily more recommendable. The 80+ song setlist features some amazing tracks like Carry On My Wayward Son by Kansas, Everlong by Foo Fighters, Spoonman by Soundgarden, Alive by Pearl Jam, Ace of Spades by Motorhead, Chop Suey by System of a Down, and even some much-requested bands like AC/DC. But the best part of Rock Band 2 is the nearly-endless amount of downloadable songs allowing you to keep playing long after release. I would view the online store multiple times a day looking for the next song to play with my family, and would often buy songs just to see how fun they were on drums.

–

While I’ll give Suda 51 some slack for making “unique” or “different” games, not abiding to standard video game practices and generic design, I’ve never actually enjoyed playing any of them. Shadows of the Damned is the most video game-ass video game from Suda 51—in terms of feeling like a typical video game—but it’s just not quite there. The strong emphasis on crude humour gets old very quickly and although the 3rd-person shooting is mechanically sound, it doesn’t quite add up to a great game. The main character’s gun is named Johnson, and to give you an example of how eye-roll-inducing the game can be: it’s once referred to as a “Big Boner”… so yeah, it’s quite goofy.

–

Sleeping Dogs is an entertaining open world crime game in the same mold as Grand Theft Auto and Saints Row. You steal cars, complete errands for kooky characters, and earn respect from different factions. Since it takes place in Hong Kong, United Front has put more emphasis on combo-based hand-to-hand combat—similar to Batman: Arkham Asylum—meaning you’ll hardly ever use guns, which is refreshing. There’s a great parkour element where you can freely climb over fences and other obstructions making the traversal quite fluid. The mission design isn’t particularly fantastic and there’s a few side activities I purposely avoided, but the game manages to stay engaging throughout the entire adventure.

–

The enjoyment you get out of South Park: The Stick of Truth ultimately depends on how much you enjoy South Park’s weird humour. As an role playing game none its mechanics really stand out—there’s no real depth and the battles eventually become very repetitious by the end. You can pick classes, assign skills, and choose your party member, but none of these elements are very intricate. The Stick of Truth’s humour is the game’s driving force and while I did chuckle a few times throughout it’s 10 hour story, I couldn’t get into the humour that a hardcore fan would probably really enjoy. The game features a plethora of call-backs to the show like Mr. Hanky, Manbearpig, Canada, and other famous (or infamous) jokes, but again, a lot of enjoyment will come down to how much you like revisiting it all. This definitely isn’t a game I could recommend to any RPG fan.

–

Thomas Was Alone is a platformer where you play as a collection of shapes with each having their own unique abilities. The tall yellow rectangle, for example, can jump really high while the fat blue square can float on water. You have to use all of the varying shapes in unison to get to the end of each stage. The problem I found was that the platforming just wasn’t fun. It felt more like a chore, more than anything, like having to constantly change from one shape to the next using the shoulder buttons. It’s a shame that the cleverly implemented story narrated throughout the game is bogged down by having to slog through boring gameplay mechanics in order to reach its conclusion.

–

Tomb Raider is a beautiful game filled with amazing set-piece moments, fun exploration—especially after you finish the game—and intense firefights. It’s not perfect as the storyline is hit-and-miss, and the times Lara is beat up to near-death just gets ridiculous—the brutal death scenes were particularly needlessly vulgar. It’s formula is very Uncharted-like with lots of climbing and puzzle solving to go along with the firefights, and it all comes together in a really great package. Its linear structure that allows for exploration is very welcome and I can’t wait to see how it’s expanded on in the future.

–

It’s hard to describe Telltale’s The Walking Dead as a typical adventure game because it really isn’t one. It’s more of a character-driven story, set in the world of the graphic novels with very minimal gameplay. Over the 5 episodes Clementine and Lee’s story has them battle through death and destruction while trying to keep themselves alive—and more importantly, sane. Each episode is themed, like the second episode that introduces the core group of survivors to a secure farm only to find out it’s not quite as secure as they originally thought. The story definitely has some rough patches but you’ll likely care about the characters as they develop from one episode to the next, especially since your consequences may lead to drastically different scenarios down the line. It’s definitely a game that makes your choices difficult, yet meaningful. I might’ve shed one or two tears by the end.

–

The Walking Dead: Season Two is an incredibly disappointing follow-up to my favourite game of 2012. The uninteresting narrative is too all over the place, I couldn’t bring myself to like any of the new characters, and most of the episodes drag on for far too long. It’s only 5 episodes long, like most Telltale games, but it feels like 6 or 7 from all of lacklustre content. It features the Telltale checklist of bugs and glitches, none of the story threads kept me engaged like the first season, and there are some episodes that feel like complete write-offs. I never expected Season Two to come close to Season One, but I definitely wasn’t expecting it to be this disappointing. Clementine deserved a better follow up than this.

–

XCOM is a great turn-based strategy game with finely tuned mechanics. The main missions where you command a group of allies around to try and flank enemies were always really fun, and the base building stuff in between missions was designed well. Recruiting allies and training them feels incredibly satisfying, and having permanent death rewards players that keep their allies alive at all cost—especially when they get stronger after every successful mission. For example, I was able to keep to one of my original British snipers alive throughout the entire campaign. Enemy Unknown can get incredibly tense the further you progress as countries will start to panic and stop funding your projects, resulting in less money to spend on upgrades. It’s very addicting, and unfortunate presentational issues aside, fans of strategy games will find much of what XCOM offers extremely gratifying.