In terms of design this is pixelart at its finest. But when you look behind the pretty facade the mechanics are not as refined and remain mainly superficial.

As long as you find capable team players this is a fun romp, while with the wrong “mates” it becomes a tedious mess. That aside it lacks a little refinement here and there and mission variety – nothing critical though.

Even though Dennaton adds a few interesting elements and delivers a strangely weird and fascinating story, Hotline Miami 2 has problems to step out of the shadow of its predecessor. In the end it is more of the same with a raised difficulty level – which isn’t exactly the worst thing in the world.

The positive trend continues. I am especially happy about the environment puzzles, the boss fights as well as the quiet moments where fear and terror set in. With every episode it looks more like a real Resident Evil.

This is what modern city building should look like. There are small annoying flaws in terms of traffic infrastructure (roundabouts, pathfinding) and also the difficulty level is very forgiving. But none of it is critical and will keep you from playing. Where SimCity and Cities XXL failed, Cities Skylines passes with flying colours.

It’s a pity that the Definitive Edition falls short to the PC in terms of certain texture details. But other than that even two years after its premiere the rejuvenated Dante and his brother show that they still got it.

I don’t get it. They improve on almost every level. They add new elements, the flow feeling is stronger than in the first iteration. And then they decide that from the half way point they ramp up the difficulty level so immensely that flow turns to frustration faster than you can fall off the board. I don’t get it.

The surreal world with its design in the spirit of heavy metal album covers sparks your interest, but with the shallow characters and hardly-challenging puzzles you get little more than solid entertainment.

The step into pure turn-based tactics works well for the Neptunia crew. It lacks the depth and raw charme of games like Disgaea though.

Despite some heavy trial-and-error and jagged edges, White Night combines mansion horror like Resident Evil with an intriguing black and white art design.

Challenging, ridiculously old-school platforming with puzzles that challenge your brain as well as your hands – I like it.

Unfortunately this is not the spiritual successor to ThrillVille. What it gives you is a tremendous editor with convincing physics that tries to camouflage that the attached mini-games are average at best.

There Came an Echo with its surprisingly effective speech recognition is pure immersion. But it definitely could be more challenging, offering more tactical depth and more content in general.

While the visuals are nice and seem to push the hardware a lot of times, you can hardly say that about the mechanics or AI, which are just a tad over the common mobile game on your phone.

A stronger showing than the first episode. The pacing is better and more varied, the story seems to gain momentum as well. Some problems like the random item distribution stay the same, though.

It tries to be like The Talos Principle, but it plainly doesn’t reach it on any level, neither philosophically nor in terms of puzzles or immersion.

It is the storytelling that keeps Republique interesting. The stealth mechanics are not up to common standards, but the dystopian setting manages to salvage a lot.

They’re back. Again. And as usual, Koei didn’t change much. Well, close to nothing, if you take the extensive editor out of the equation. And on top of that the Warriors suffer from technical issues.

While the mechanics definitely work better that in Lucius’ first killing adventure, the Devil’s son stumbles over bugs, clumsy UI and a total lack of atmosphere.

After the gruesome Resident Evil 6 this is a first step to redemption. Atmosphere and exploration move back into the center, but are too often overshadowed by action. It it still a long way back to the old Resident Evil virtues, but you have to start somewhere. So why not here?

The camera is finicky, loading times are long, visuals are scraggy. But underneath all that is a decent game that grows on you once you start to level up your character.

It doesn’t reach the elegant brilliance of its spiritual successor. Options in attack and defense are limited, presentation sometimes is confusing. But the poker for the right tactics keeps the momentum going and delivers intense matches.

Yes, the fights could be more challenging and mechanically more diverse. But in the end the mixture of tabletop, trading cards and real-time action works surprisingly well.

If you like old-school adventures with a modern twist and a lot of humor, stop right here. This book will keep you busy.

This can be as funny as it can be frustrating. One moment you smile at the successful pun towards The Matrix, Lord of the Rings or Super Mario and the next moment you’re dead. But after cursing the developer, the random generator, god, the world and yourself you’ll find yourself crawling back. Again and again.

Challenging jump&shoot with interesting level design in parallel worlds with an additional difficulty level and coop mode on PC.

Is this really the Last Round? I doubt it. But that aside you’ll get a well filled beat-em-up package with subtle visual improvements. But it can’t hide that the base engine is from 2012.

Well done, Creative Assembly. Attila is the game that Rome 2 should have been. It still has its flaws but this fifth century survival strategy is quite entertaining.