This reboot takes itself too seriously -- every texture is spit-shined and gleaming, every animation wrought with care -- without the self-awareness to sacrifice technical sophistication for ease of use. FIFA Street is enjoyable only under the best circumstances, before the engine and the sheer density of barely distinguishable, locked-out moves take over.

Sonic Colors feels like a step right back into the same crap this series has drowned in for the past decade. If I had to pick a color for this game, it would be brown, for very obvious reasons.

Despite the cliche of the angry video game reviewer who “doesn’t even like video games,” it’s not that fun tearing down the work of people who haven’t done anything catastrophically wrong. Because there is nothing about Valkyrie Elysium that is outright bad or broken. It’s just the experience as a whole is so dreadfully dull.

But, it's not only those racing enthusiasts who will see F1 2015 as lacking. Everyone who tries it will. Its development was short-sighted, and its appeal is thusly short-lived.

Strong Bad Ep.5 is also the least linear of all the games in the series.

If the presentation wasn't so horrible, One Piece: Romance Dawn would be a decent way for a JRPG fan to spend an afternoon after they've exhausted their library of other more innovative titles. If you've always wondered what the fuss was with One Piece, you'd be better off watching the show or playing the fun, but flawed Pirate Warriors series.

Strong Bad Ep.5 is also the least linear of all the games in the series.

It's got a lot of interesting ideas in theory, but the longer I played, the more I felt my feet drag. Making matters worse, it tends to have a bit of a loading problem.

The Bureau: XCOM Declassified desperately wants to be liked, but by failing to satisfy in any direction, all it succeeds in being is a disappointment. It wants to be a strategy game without being a strategy game, it wants to be a shooter without being a shooter, and it wants to be XCOM without being XCOM. As such, it is nothing. It's an inconsequential waste of time that does nothing for anybody, and saying that makes me feel guilty because its cloying pleas to not be hated are worthy of pity.

The ironic thing is that the most pedestrian of stories can be convincing when coupled with intelligently applied interaction -- something Dear Esther stubbornly stands against. It's as if it wants to be a part of this wonderful medium of ours without asking itself why, which is exactly why you should seek it out and learn from its failures as a game enthusiast, critic, or developer.

The whole production is imbued with stunning environments replete with this trenchant sense of beauty. It's just really a pity the gameplay is rarely as cogent as these ornate landscapes or the gauzy, resonant soundtrack. There's obviously something special at work here bubbling beneath the surface, but it's too subtle and poorly realized to merit delving into.

The game's variety and length come across as nothing more than smoke and mirrors, the endless, grinding busywork that contributes nothing to the overall gameplay is inexcusably plentiful and mind-numbingly repetitive, and to top it all off, the game can't even compete in the visuals department and somehow looks worse than the original.

Ultimately, while Accel World VS Sword Art Online: Millennium Twilight means well to try and merge what's cool about both Sword Art Online and Accel World, its high points are too few and far between to consider it a success.

As much as Warp's presentation gives you the illusion that you are playing a charming game full of personality, a lot of the initial goodwill and attachment to the cute critter protagonist is slowly eroded by your actions and the problematic controls. In the end, all that is left at your disposal is a virtual representation of your imminent failure and repetitive demise.

A lot of the issues are tech-related: crashes, geometry bugs, load times, and framerate can all be fixed with patches. As of now? The interesting puzzles and fantastic music are not worth suffering through the bugs, lackluster models, and mediocre combat and skills. If your interest is piqued here, wishlist it and come back at a later time; I have no doubt that this game will reach its potential, but it's just not even close right now.

It's unfortunate then that the game is buried under a myriad of problems, from dated, ugly presentation to shooting that feels clumsy.

It feels like a game created mainly to remind people that the franchise still exists, rather than actually satisfy those who'd deign to play it. Utawarerumono fans are better off waiting for Utawarerumono: Prelude ot the Fallen (a remake of the first game in the trilogy due out next year), while newcomers are advised to pick up Mask of Deception and Mask of Truth, or even just watch the anime instead.

It is a mediocre title at best and one which revels in that fact. A sticky, filthy little pleasure that I have had quite a bit of enjoyment playing.

In a world where THPS 2X is still readily available for less than $10 on eBay, it's hard to give this HD downgrade any sort of recommendation. The original games earned our nostalgia, while this release abuses it. It's short on content, quality, and personality. This is not the Tony Hawk I remember spending middle-school summers with.

Although its premise was simple and delightful at first, playing through FEIST was a trying experience and one that I would not want to repeat.

Even though Noby Noby Boy's shallow antics aren't fun or interesting enough to justify the lack of actual goals or structure, there's just too much new and quirky stuff here to not be deserving of its incredibly meager $5 asking price.

If nothing else, Magical Drop V succeeds in featuring one of the most busted English translations I've seen in years. It's the closest the game comes to offering some genuinely entertaining '90s nostalgia.

Mundane boss confrontations don’t allow you to exhibit your fighting prowess. Awkward platforming segments slow the flow of the game to a crawl. Weird clipping issues and dangerous framerate drops deter the action of the rather short (five to eight hours) span of play. I wish there was more to Afro Samurai, but there isn’t much to sink your teeth into. The game feels 75% complete.

It did propose some thought-provoking questions about mortality, but I was too busy being frustrated at the controls to give any of it a second thought while playing.

Sadame is as repetitive as a song about thongs sung by man named Sisqo. The vast majority of encounters in the game follow the same pattern: enter an area, watch enemies appear, defeat enemies, watch more enemies appear, defeat more enemies, go to next area. That's it. That's the whole game.

While the characters are fun, much of their characterization comes from Go! Go! Nippon!, as does the idea of visiting various places to earn date points. Not talking about the locations much defeats the purpose of the traveling format, and the plot wavers between comedy, romance, and real drama too much to fully capture you on any point. The lack of accuracy on the country lessens the impact of the serious moments as well.

It's very much the type of game you play for the story, which has flashes of brilliance that can only be effectively realized in an interactive medium such as this. Unfortunately, it's tied to lackluster mechanics, technical problems, and a disappointing lack of polish.

The multiplayer works about 45% of the time. The "challenge" mode is more like a training simulation for Skynet. 2/3rds of this game are not up to par. I cannot get three other people together to play Lethal League on my couch. My experience with Lethal League is valid even though I didn't contort my life to satisfy a hypothetical. Some other people might be in the same position, and I hope this review is useful to them.

Spy Chameleon is a short game that feels too long. It's one good idea not fully realized and a reptilian mascot who deserves another shot.

Enjoying Sir Hammerlock's Big Game Hunt is about managing expectations, about knowing what you want out of Borderlands 2's constantly expanding menu -- its strong suits are the subtle twists on combat and enemy behavior, exploration, farming, and a hidden raid boss that costs almost 100 Eridium to spawn.

It's just a shame there isn't way more game here. If this truly is the start of a franchise, I'd potentially be up for more titles, but I can't deny how much this sparse pilot entry leaves me wanting.

Clumsy, visually sub-par, and disrespectful of the player's time. While it revels in its own stupidity and hopes you'll do the same, it's one of those sad games that believes a ridiculous concept is enough to make for a worthwhile game, and in Tank! Tank! Tank!'s case, that's just not true. Indeed, there's nothing more upsetting than a game that believes, if it's wacky enough, it can get away with being crap.

Escape Plan never aims to be anything more than a showcase of the PlayStation Vita's touch controls, but said controls are so insensitive and poorly implemented that the best it can hope for is to be used as an example of what not to do when designing a Vita game.

Hawken has never been a terrible game, but it has never made a case for itself as anything more either. This console version puts up even less of a fight.

Dragon Ball Xenoverse has some of the worst design decisions ever embedded into a videogame. There are no menus, the story mode's difficulty is all over the place, and the game's best aspect, creating characters, is locked behind hours and hours of frustrating play. It certainly has its moments and the core fighting mechanics are great, but the game falls flat in too many other areas to be standout title.

It's almost like developer Hapa Games had two really cool ideas and tried to integrate them both into Ascendant, with mixed results. At times it has flashes of brilliance with its focus on raw skill and combat, and others, it feels like you're just aimlessly wandering another barren landscape, in search of a rush.

F1 fans will be drawn in by the licensed racers and circuits from the 2011 Formula 1 season, the idea of using the DRS rear-wing control, and KERS boosting abilities. They may even be entranced by the depth of the career mode or the number of race options both online and off. But when it comes down to the presentation -- endless menus, muted graphics, and the races themselves -- many will lose interest in F1 2011 very quickly.

If you're a die-hard fan of the Transformers film series, I would recommend picking up Rise of the Dark Spark when it's heavily discounted (like, under $10) with a group of friends just to play Escalation.

There's room for a good videogame based on A Song of Ice and Fire, but while A Game of Thrones: Genesis is the first of its name, it never becomes more than an incestuous child born from both media parents.

Even the high-fidelity visuals are marred by an inconsistent framerate and terrible animations and transitions.

Even at its best, the game feels like an idea gestating in real-time, like a sponge dinosaur filling up with water. So much of Headlander teases you with the idea of what could have been; a shame, because the game we actually got is kind of a bummer.

It's a very short game that still manages to be far too long.

There just isn't enough here to justify warranting a purchase of Definitive Edition. It's slightly worse than its prior counterparts (even forgoing the Wii U's gameplay twist with Murfy and not letting another Switch user connect and play in that particular way), and the only truly new feature is the ability to play a tournament mode in the Kung Foot soccer minigame.

There are better games out there for far cheaper. Get the original Modern Combat or N.O.V.A, which cost less and provide far more entertainment with far less aggravation.

I truly wanted to like this game. It combines several of my favorite tropes and ideas into one cohesive whole, and I respect what it was trying to attain. But combining a half-baked hide-and-seek operation with a ghost story that seems ripped straight from a casual game isn't the way to hold my attention.

They took a simple, beloved concept and tried doing too much with it. As a result, the course design is rarely rewarding and the elaborate story is poorly presented. No matter how far above the clouds this game is, it landed in the rough.

Into the Hive isn’t the bigger and better follow-up that Paint it Red deserved. It’s only half of one, and what happened to that other half is a mystery of its own. All that was found was an empty shell and some bloodied remains. Not the way it deserved to go out.

Army of Two has many good ideas but ultimately falls flat on its promise. It's got some fun moments of cooperativity, some clever mechanics, and an unusually badass multiplayer mode, but its horrible controls and vanilla campaign mode prevent Army of Two from being even an above-average game.

I'd have had no hesitation in recommending 1-2-Switch if it were included with the Switch or maybe $20 max, but as it stands it is far too expensive for the dash of entertainment it provides. 1-2-Switch is a good distraction for parties with people who don't game much, or those looking for something a little different than Cards Against Humanity for the millionth time. Otherwise, wait for a deep price drop.

It's a very flashy, interesting shooter that doesn't bare direct comparison to anything else out in the market. Unfortunately, that's all it really has going for it since it's such a frustrating and poorly designed shooter. It doesn't help that the game is difficult, limiting health and continues until you unlock more through failed attempts. People love to say Sine Mora is style over substance, but the substance is still clearly there. In Ether Vapor's case, it just isn't and style can only go so far in this genre.

If Dungeons 2 [were] just a competent dungeon builder held back by a few technical bugs and some bad interface design, it might be something worth checking out. As a dungeon builder horrifically Frankensteined to one of the lamest RTS experiences I've played in years, its an unfortunate monstrosity that should be safely avoided.

The Legend of Legacy comes so close to be a compelling role-playing game, but it just doesn't do enough to earn the amount of patience it requires of players, let alone reward it.

Dead Block takes a popular genre that thrives on increasingly manic gameplay meant to evoke higher and higher tension levels, and turns it into something dull. It may have had the beginnings of a genuiningly fun game at some concept stage, but the end result is a repetitive game that you'll likely get tired of before it ends.

Samurai Jack: Battle Through Time is a weak adaptation of the series, but the action mechanics just aren't all there either; which drags down even further.

Too much of Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles Remastered Edition is tied to an experience that is no longer available. The moment in time that made the GameCube original possible has long passed, and trying to capture that nostalgia with so many missing pieces, is a fool's errand.

Mario Kart Tour is a blemish on the franchise it shares its name with. The genre-defining creativity found in past entries is completely absent here, replaced by a hollow experience that's simply coasting on the name and goodwill of the games that came before it. I can only hope this is Nintendo's mobile initiative hitting rock bottom, and that it's all uphill from here. Because I can't stand the thought of another one of my favorite series having its reputation dragged the mud in search of a quick buck.

Flaming Fowl Studios has the opportunity to transform Fable Fortune into something more in the future. For now, it's derivative, flawed, and unfinished.

RemiLore: Lost Girl in the Land of Lore is a huge disappointment for me. When you can grab something excellent like Enter the Gungeon for a fraction of the price, it almost comes off as embarrassing. It's not utterly vile like a pickle sandwich, just incomprehensibly dull considering its vibrant, cute, colorful presentation.

That said BlazeRush is easily recommendable as one of the experiences to show off your fancy new toy if you get a Rift. It certainly has that initial "wow factor" even though it isn't the kind of game that comes to mind when most people think virtual reality.

Minabo boils life down a bit too far. Life is so unbearably exhausting and complicated, and Minabo is boring and simple. It’s not that I think that it needs to be crushingly depressing or maddeningly frustrating, but there needs to be some sort of conflict or tension. Don’t ask me to walk through life 25 times with only minor differences each time. Once is more than enough.

Simply put, we’re still looking for that definitive JoJo's game, because JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven isn’t it.

DBZ for Kinect is just what you'd expect: a half-realized game for a half-realized piece of hardware.

There is nothing here that should attract new players or even bring back lapsed hunters who have already moved on to other titles.

As it stands, and as a review of a product, Back in 1995 is a gimmicky curiosity, not unlike its graphical approach; flat and askew, with some semblance of structure if you squint between the lines.

You'd be better served experiencing Five Nights at Freddy's 4 the way it was obviously intended to be enjoyed. By going on YouTube and watching some twenty-five-year-old, dressed like a fourteen-year-old, scream and cry his way through the game like a seven-year-old.

I wrack my brain trying to figure out Dark Alliance’s strengths, and I’m not coming up with much. The level design works surprisingly well for multiplayer. I was afraid looting would fall by the wayside, but every time a fight would wrap up, everyone would run off in different directions and grab chests before finally moving on. I didn’t feel like things were getting missed. Well, except for the shoes that would pop out of chests some other player would open. Those just rot, forgotten on the ground.

Hopefully the game grows over time. I know Evolution Studios turned Driveclub into an enjoyable experience after a failed launch. Maybe Kunos Simulazioni can do the same for Assetto Corsa.

The graphics make you think the gameplay cake is real, but the cake is a lie. All you'll find are Flappy Birds, a dead Princess Peach, and Marcus Fenix. But hey, at least you can kill the Duck Hunt dog, so that has to count for something. Oh, and this is the Dark Souls of video game humor. Take that for what you will.

It’s sad to say, but I can only recommend Hatoful Boyfriend: Holiday Star if you’re either a) extremely bird to death over the holidays, B) extremely drunk over the holidays, or ideally, c) extremely both.

There really just needed to be more of everything: more story, more to do, and more reasons to do it. With such a beautiful art style and such a unique character Beyond Eyes had a chance to be something really special but instead it just feels like walking past a beautiful painting, as it is over in the blink of an eye.

If the control scheme was a better, we'd call Mahjong Tales: Ancient Wisdom a great time-waster for the PS3. But the lack of polish on this boring $10 PlayStation Network game makes us want to call it a waste of time instead.

To say that Voltron: Defender of the Universe is a disappointment is an understatement. What should be blistering action is yawn-inducing and seems more like a chore used to get to the mech sequences, which only serve to disappoint MORE by the sheer mediocrity of them. I'd rather watch the series on Netflix.

It's downright frustrating, actually, as with even the slightest tweaks, Lost Planet 2 could have been another winner for Capcom, and the epic sequel fans had hoped for. As it stands, Lost Planet 2 is a shell of a potentially great game, brought down by bizarre, dated, and counterintuitive design decisions. And that's a shame.

Still, it's not the worst thing on shelves right now, but its $49.99 price tag isn't doing the game any favors, either. Maybe as a deep discount title or even a digital download with some of the game's more frustrating modes stripped out (let me run over zombies for ten bucks!) Blood Drive might have been a more attractive proposition.

The Flock is a promising idea dressed in the blandest of clothes.

Adventure Time fans would do better to wait for WayForward's upcoming DS game, because that stands a chance of actually being good. This is little more than a shameless little attempt to make a quick buck at the expense of a fun little show. I know it's a show primarily for kids, but even kids can reasonably expect better than this.

The best thing about Nekoburo: Cats Block is the art style; everything is bright, colorful and super adorable, but take that away and you're left with a generic, poorly translated puzzle game with a tilted playing field that doesn't compliment gameplay.

As a product for humans though, I can't see Wasteland Workshop as anything but a bad buy. A cynical ploy to pad out the “value” of the Season Pass and maybe milk a few weirdos like me who just can't resist neon lights.

What Initiation should have been is a miniature legit campaign with Challenge Maps as a bonus. With a more unique set of moves for Bruce, and an actual meaningful storyline, it could have been a cool diversion. In it's current state however, it's a pretty poor piece of DLC no matter how you slice it.

Still, it's not the worst thing on shelves right now, but its $49.99 price tag isn't doing the game any favors, either. Maybe as a deep discount title or even a digital download with some of the game's more frustrating modes stripped out (let me run over zombies for ten bucks!) Blood Drive might have been a more attractive proposition.

It also doesn't help that this mission inexplicably has more blocked off areas than any other piece of content, forcing players to drive around the long way to locate quest objectives.

If you haven't played King Arthur, then you won't really enjoy this a whole lot, and if you have played it you'll just think of how much better it is than this weird expansion. I recommend that you check out the original game if you haven't played it, and if you have played it you should just wait for King Arthur 2 to come out.

Even though Compile Heart had a couple interesting ideas with this game, its execution failed to bring out its true potential. And despite having two Tales of series members on board, their involvement couldn't stop Dark Rose Valkyrie from wasting people's valuable time. At least Fujishima's character designs continue to look gorgeous.

The total lack of strategy needed to beat the game, the fact that all levels play pretty much identically, the lack of any notable level design, the lack of bosses, and the total lack of difficulty, make Eduardo feel like an hour and a half long tutorial mode of a good run-and-gun platformer that is yet to be made.

The lack of online play and the overall single-player experience is a pretty big bummer. Unless you’re desperate and need a quick Mario Party fix on the go, stick with a console version if you can.

For a title set far into the future, Terminator: Resistance remains disappointingly locked into the past. With lackluster design, story, dialogue, AI, and combat, Terminator: Resistance is a genre example generations out of time.

Where it fails, however, is in trying to be superficially difficult through cheap enemies with aggravating attacks and the ability to instantly block all your moves until you level up enough to find the one attack that breaks their defenses.

There is no reason to waste your time on a game as unambitious as Shooting Stars! You can say it's a small game, a joke game, a mobile game, and that's all true. I'm not holding it to ridiculous big-budget standards. But even within its genre and scope, there are better playing games out there that don't insult your intelligence on a regular basis. Play those instead.

Play this if you like a challenge and have patience to get to the good stuff, but don't even bother finishing it.

Aegis of Earth: Protonovus Assault is proof positive that one good idea can’t carry a title. The central gimmick is a good one, but there is just no reason to subject yourself to a game so unambitious and condescending.

Surprising introductory puzzle aside, it does nothing to innovate and barely feels like its moving the plot along. Much as I enjoy this particular series, They Stole Max's Brain! -- nothing personal, Sam -- is for the dogs.

This is the Police presents situations that aren’t deep enough to invoke social commentary, yet it still takes the opportunity to arbitrarily throw them out in the open. It’s missing key storytelling elements that allow for that kind of messaging, and in the mundane yet slur-sprinkled missions those ideas fall apart.

For whatever it's worth, I like Night Trap. It is a bad game, but I like it. Screaming Villains' love-letter to one of the most notorious video games of all time has to be the most oddly-conceived re-release in gaming history. But I can't think of another game, that's so bad, that somehow deserves the recognition so much.

The best thing I can say about PO’ed is that it can be completed in around three hours. Aside from that, I really didn’t enjoy it. It’s not the worst FPS I’ve played. For all its problems, it at least isn’t bland. It has its high points, demonstrates a capable development team with a willingness to experiment, it just didn’t result in a fun final product.

Without the element of surprise, Frog Fractions 2 is just a collection of mostly bad minigames. There was magic with the original game, but that trick only works once.

Dillon's Rolling Western demonstrated a lot of promise out the gate, adding a literal "spin" to the tower defense genre, but the journey is just too long and tedious. It's the videogame equivalent of a triathlon, only with the added bonus of having to redo any one leg of the event or the entire event itself should your performance ever fall slightly below satisfactory.

Why settle for this shallow, repetitive interactive adaptation?

There's no sugarcoating it: Fallout 76 comes up short at nearly everything it aims to be. It's not a good role-playing game and it's not a good multiplayer experience. It never really feeds into the gradual RPG power fantasy but it's also inadequate as a survival simulator. In wanting to be so much, Fallout 76 doesn't amount to much at all.