All VR headset owners should own at least one Owlchemy Labs game, and this is the company's best yet.

The game's 16 thoughtfully designed fighters are all unlocked and ready to trade blows the moment you boot it up. Their combat takes place within a smooth fighting engine worth recommending, too. The trouble is nearly every single thing currently surrounding that engine should be covered in those tacky, animated "under construction" GIFs.

I got tired of the game after 20 hours for the reasons stated above. There's beautiful, inventive fun within DL2, but Techland doesn't do paying customers favors with the game's dialogue, pacing, and execution. Wait for a sale.

Onrush, at its best, absolutely sings as a tight, responsive, bright, and beautiful love letter to the likes of Road Rash 2 and Burnout 3: Takedown. I'd settle for Steam Workshop's wildest dreamers finishing what Codemasters Evo started.

Quantum Break’s story and visual prowess are reason enough to recommend this game to anyone looking for a rote shooter with a more-than-usual focus on compelling narrative. The best I can say about the action sequences is that they’re tolerable en route to uncovering the game’s core of science-fueled existential crises. So while I feel comfortable recommending this ultimately uneven adventure, in a gaming world where we’ve already played so many super-charged, inFamous-styled action games, I feel pretty disappointed by “just good enough" for QB's action portions.

It's easy to deride games that lack originality and favour existing ideas. But refining proven designs is just as important as creating them in the first place. This is where World of Final Fantasy shines, and if you're looking for a simple, accessible roleplaying game that stirs up memories past, then you could do much worse.

As it stands, Donut County makes for a light, airy snack of a game—it's a tight circle of satisfying, empty calories. But like a real donut, finishing one often just means you want another.

Don't let the saccharine looks fool you: Arms is deep, challenging, and an essential purchase for the Nintendo Switch.

Infinite Warfare takes the series to its logical conclusion, delivering one of the best single-player campaigns in ages. But the trademark multiplayer modes need a serious overhaul.

It'd be easy to glance at Avowed and see just another all-too-familiar take on a well-trodden fantasy RPG space. But that would be a mistake. The game's zippy controls, tough but not overwhelming combat, and morally ambiguous perspective make for a memorable journey that sets itself apart from the crowd.

The basic gameplay pattern of hunt, trap, and fight is wonderfully unique among games of this sort. The shell surrounding that single thread, however—the matchmaking options, the balance across different modes, the personality of the environment and characters—feels under-thought...None of this helps assuage the fear that Evolve is a great gimmick and little else: something we'll play for a month or two, and not much longer. With more time and attention from the developers, maybe it could be something more long-lasting. Either way, there are worse things for a game to be than fun for a short time.

Grey Goo is definitely a throwback, albeit one with some compelling innovations. Those who remember the heyday of the RTS genre should get a kick out of it, while the unprepared may be scared away.

Compared to other always-online games meant to draw users back time and again, Hitman is something quite novel: a game meant to be replayed and eventually exhausted. Sooner or later you'll run out of challenges, optional targets, and nooks and crannies to explore. More are on the way, sure, but eventually those too will dry up. It's a nice, alternate school of thought to games that build a continued connection on semi-random drops and repeated actions, rather than execution. How novel.

For all its individually familiar mechanics, the holistic experience of Dawn of War 3 is as different from its predecessors as the second game was from the first. It doesn't feel like either older game as a whole. Instead, approach this as its own self-contained vessel: an RTS with a better-than-average campaign and an approach to multiplayer that has a lot of potential if it can find a community of players that hasn't already dedicated itself to one of the two styles of play it emulates. If, however, you're a longtime fan simply looking for a second lap around for either of the first two games, you'll be sadly disappointed.

It's a structure that can feel punishing, unforgiving, tedious, and enraging in turns. But it's also a structure that leads to moments of the most genuinely satisfying sense of achievement I can remember having in modern gaming...It's about a miles-long journey starting with a single, halting step. It's about putting one foot in front of the other until you can't anymore. It's about climbing the mountain because it's there. It's about falling down 1,000 times and getting up 1,001 times.

Life is Strange: Before the Storm doesn’t have that arc. Its strengths remain strong; its weaknesses stay weak. So, if the first episode doesn’t grab you, it’s safe enough to bail and jump into the more complete and energetic original.

The disparate gaggle of stories apparently set in the same universe might feel like required reading to some obsessive fans. As someone who just wants to know what’s up with King Mickey (and still kind of likes that theme song), this is an unnecessary, dissatisfying distraction.

It's not a perfect collection. Still, I'll take a re-release that's doggedly old-school over the microtransaction alternative. DrillLand is exactly the kind of unique, satisfying, and cutesy puzzle-action game I want right now.

While The Old Blood does manage to achieve greatness, it doesn’t quite have the scope to do so consistently enough.

In very good news, all of that time in the oven did nothing to stymie or complicate the basic, satisfying thrust of the original game. Instead, Back in the Groove is boosted by even more roguelike weirdness and multiplayer support.

Potential meta-joking aside, The Beginner's Guide plays out like a diary, wholly and shamelessly. While there's an argument to be had over whether or not a straight-up diary counts as art worth celebrating, a video game trying to do the same thing, without meaningful interactive options or epiphanies, and without giving us as players the space to come to our own conclusions, doesn't respect the viewer or create interesting opportunities for either empathy or outrage.

Syndicate is a step in the right direction for the series. It’s not as innovative as it could be, but it’s an entertaining adventure worthy of the name Assassin’s Creed. Buy it.

There's little to complain about on a technical level, but Mario and Luigi: Paper Jam Bros quickly becomes a repetitive slog.

Far Cry Primal is video game aspirin — numbing, and nondescript, but basically pleasant.

Super Mario Run never amounts to much more than a conveyor belt coin hunt, without the kind of exploration-based depth that characterizes the best of the Mario series.

A certain party-playing crowd will overcome the awkward bits and have a blast. Most won't. Rent, don't buy.

After a half-dozen hours with Atomic Heart, I’m eager to see where it takes me. I’m currently exploring the college town around a mag-lev train station, looking for a dead comrade with a ticket on them. The game’s promotional screenshots suggest far more varied environments than the underground tunnels I’ve been through and a wider mix of malfunctioning worker bots...Atomic Heart is loaded with little loving details, and its combat is notably more fluid and involved than the somewhat plain shooting typically associated with its sub-genre. I suspect the answer to what went wrong with the grand robo-workers’ utopia is going to involve some well-worn sci-fi tropes, but I’m fine with it. It’s a fun, ambitious shooter with a distinct style and worth the occasional kick in the head. [Impressions]

For a game that takes place in such a wide-open wilderness, the actual story is almost claustrophobic in its quick pace and clipped storylines—a short story rather than a great American novel of rugged adventure in the remote mountain west. It's a shame, too, because by the time the game ended I was finally starting to be able to feel my way around Firewatch's unique landmarks and winding paths without relying on that map overly much.