While I enjoyed my time with Wasteland 3 and recommend it to those looking for some quality post-apocalyptic adventure, my hope is that inXile will knuckle down and iron out the bugs sooner rather than later — there’s a lot of great adventuring to be found within already, but it’ll be even better once the game is working properly.

There's no denying that this year's game is a triumphant return to form for the franchise. It's nice to see skating back as the focus after the two Underground titles.

Using the wolf's sense to see the Twilight Realm is a ghastly, beautiful effect to be sure, but contributes little to the player's sense of discovery, save for a few holes to dig or making a few jumps that would otherwise be impossible.

The new areas are a little more open than one might expect from the claustrophobic RE7, but they’re packed with enemies to blast with Chris’ new semi-auto shotgun, and the faster, more combat-heavy gameplay works just as well in first person as the main game’s slow and tense exploration does. There’s a about an hour of content in Not A Hero, including a boss fight and a truly jarring close-quarters battle that proved traumatic in VR. This is a stellar piece of bonus content, which has only one thing keeping it from being the definitive piece of Resident Evil 7 DLC – it’s not End of Zoe.

While it’s very short, Godstrike concentrates a ton of great moments into its limited running time. The bosses are gorgeously designed, the powers are interesting to mix and match, and there’s even a daily challenge for people to test their skills with randomized powers and perks. It’s visually impressive, it plays well, and just about anyone can jump in and get the hang of things. While I could see some of the truly hardcore scoffing at just how much work Godstrike‘s developers have put in to sand down the bullet hell genre’s rougher edges, the result speaks for itself.

I don’t think that The Pedestrian has a grand point to make, and that’s okay. Even without a message or an emotional hook, this is a beautiful, fiendishly clever little puzzler that surprised me at every turn, and that’s more than enough.

I'd say that the kind of story that The Last of Us wants to tell can't be done in a mainstream video game, but I Am Alive and the Metro series manage just fine. Perhaps it's more accurate to say that it can't be done in the kind of game that's expected to sell three million copies.

While digging in a hole might not seem like the most entertaining thing to do in a game that's doesn't have "craft" in the title, SteamWorld Dig successfully delivers its own unique style of subterranean gameplay thanks to a great balance between managing the mine, chasing upgrades and having just enough story to keep me curious without getting bogged down in too much lore.

My Brother Rabbit wants to tug the heartstrings as it messes with the mind, and it does an exceptional job of both. There’s something heartbreakingly absurd about watching a stuffed rabbit doing its best to take care of an anthropomorphized plant, but it’s the abstraction that cuts right to the heart of the situation — this is a story about children trying to process huge issues so far out of their realm that the fantasy interpretations actually make more sense. It’s challenging and touching, sweet and scary, and one of the best things that Artifex Mundi has produced. R

As I end this review, I'm reminded of a phrase attributed to Oscar Wilde: "The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy." That sentence perfectly describes Prison Architect—as it is with many sims like it, it's growth for the sake of growth, and when I was done with the game and had my prison and had every little detail perfectly in place, I let it burn to the ground again.

A great popcorn thrill-ride from start to finish. It may not be the deepest or most thought-provoking thing out there, but there's no question it delivers on its promise of slam-bang action and enough plot to hold it together.

There's no denying the game creates one of the most intense and interesting war game experiences out there on a console. I'm personally more a "run and gun" guy than a "sneak around in the shadows" player, and I still found SOCOM II: U.S. Navy SEALs to be an engaging and engrossing gaming experience that immersed me in a world I'd not experience otherwise.

I miss my sprite-based 16-bit hockey games, deficient opponent AI and all. Somehow I recall enjoying those more than I did ESPN NHL Hockey, even despite all that it brings to the genre: nuanced controls, deep physics and mechanics, a licensed presentation and polished visuals.

The story had enough twists to keep me enthralled to the end, which didn't require an epic forty-hour time commitment. There were elements of strategy in the shooting, but it wasn't a first-person frag-fest. I would say that the emperor wears its bloodstained new clothes quite well.

It may sound strange, but the developers of Brave Story: New Traveler have created an above-average experience by taking a perfectly average formula and making absolutely no errors in its execution.

Yakuza 2 isn't perfect by a longshot, but it's one of the exceedingly few games that makes an effort to deliver legitimately mature content aimed at, and intended for adults like me who can appreciate something a little more substantial than killing terrorists, aliens, or zombies once in awhile.

Unravel Two is a fairly compact jaunt with only seven levels and some optional challenges for those who want them, but I found it to be the perfect length for what it is. The runtime offers a satisfying array of puzzles that function equally as well with one player as they do for two, it’s stunning to look at, a pleasure to listen to, and although they might not be ranked alongside other videogame luminaries, I adore yarnies. I’m not sure if a third game is in the cards considering how quickly Unravel Two was forgotten, but if so, I’d be more than happy to go on an adventure with them again.

The fights are long and challenging, and the gameplay has an appeal all its own. With plenty of features, great graphics and sound and a surprisingly well-developed backdrop, Tao Feng's unique gameplay is a welcome step in the right direction.

For anyone who has ever fallen in love or suffered heartbreak, Maquette will resonate. Yes, some puzzles were weaker than others, but those issues felt secondary to the masterful tapestry being painted before my eyes. Maquette is a poignant and rewarding experience that reminded me of some of my happiest moments, it forced me to stare straight at sorrow, and simultaneously reassured me that it’s okay to feel that pain.

Lego Indiana Jones is so successful because it reimagines the films it’s based on without reproducing them.

Conarium is a short experience — I finished it in around three hours — but I’ll happily take quality over quantity. Despite finding fault in a few certain places, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Conarium and was happy to finally find a title that faithfully scratches that Lovecraft itch.

So LawBreakers is easy to recommend to those with nostalgia for the arena shooters of the late ‘90s. Its less-than-alluring presentation hasn’t exactly earned the game a massive following, so when I say as someone raised on Unreal Tournament that this is the real deal, I hope someone heeds my advice. LawBreakers deserves a chance.

Antonball is a great little package of classic-looking, feeling and sounding videogame goodness. Combining two simple concepts in unique ways to create new flavors of engaging gameplay is always great to see from studios showing an appreciation for the medium and a mind for ingenuity. Given this, Antonball is a safe pick-up for anyone with an itch for something old-school, yet still fresh.

Perhaps it's still too experimental and difficult than the sixth entry in a series ought to be, but despite everything, RE6 offers top-tier cinematic action and series-high storytelling. For fans who've yet to try it, the PC version is the right choice.

It’s absolutely worth playing for anyone who missed it the first time, and the new features and content make a strong argument for existing fans to take a second look.

While it might be going a bit far to say that this is the biggest action game ever made, some math might make the point more clearly. There are around 150 missions on offer, each coming with a remixed super-hard version. Each of the four soldier classes play so differently that they’re effectively a completely different experience. Consequently, it’s not a huge exaggeration to say that Earth Defense Force 6 has 1200 missions to enjoy – and that’s all before the DLC comes out. This might be the most gameplay ever, and such a huge amount of it is so flat-out great that it can be called one of the best games I’ve ever played.

So much of Spirits of Spring is on-point that the failure to ultimately cross the finish line is a sharp disappointment. I should keep things in perspective, though. Spirits of Spring's design, art, and narrative work so well together in conveying its theme that the strongest complaint I can muster is that it doesn't work perfectly.

Stick It To The Man is a short, uncomplicated project that lives and dies by the quality of its writing, and to its credit, that writing is strong enough to support the entire experience.