Cuphead feels a bit like a good magic trick. The experience is brief and so artistically impressive that it’s hard to believe it’s happening before your eyes. The game has one of the most memorable art styles in years and turns every moment into a picture-perfect display of cartoon merriment. But this is more than just an eye-catching game. Cuphead is all about the big fights and the feeling you get from winning them. It’s delightful and fun and worth the effort it’ll take to clear.

I’ve also been won over on the idea of these half-sequels. Warhammer 2 might have a lot in common with the first game, but everything it has done to set itself apart is big and fresh and daring, making this a game that’s worthy of its own place in the spotlight.

It is, on so many levels, an incredible achievement, packed with enough heart, intelligence, and confidence to sustain ten lesser games. It’s a testament to its form, even as it’s held back by it in places. It still feels premature to declare Original Sin 2 an all-time classic, as some have, but I imagine plenty of future games will borrow ideas from it. It’ll be a crying shame if they don’t.

2K’s MyCareer modes have always been far from perfect. My old reviews are testament to that: they’ve been things I’ve loved in spite of their glaring problems, as much for their effort as their execution. In 2K18, though, there’s so little to love that all we’re left with is the basketball (which you can enjoy in other modes), Brands™ and a mountain of problems. [MyCareer Mode Only]

It’s an unexpected treat of a game, one that bodes well for the future of the Lego video game series. A rapid-release movie tie-in is a really strange place for innovation, yet here it is.

Where Danganronpa V3 shines is in those moments where, countless murders later, I’m still excited to solve the whodunnit. When class trials get heated up and I’m staring at a screen, trying to piece together in my head how or why something could have happened, what could possibly disprove an airtight alibi, what deus ex machina allowed for this series of events to unfold, it feels like the Danganronpa I know and love. Danganronpa V3 still gives me those moments, if only a little less frequently than I would have liked.

Ultimately, Death of the Outsider is just more Dishonored. Dishonored excels at being a blank slate for players’ creativity, and while Death of the Outsider doesn’t do anything to change that, it doesn’t ruin a good thing.

This is clearly a high point, the highest since The Taken King launched nearly two years ago. It’s a red-carpet welcome for new players and a slightly bittersweet payoff for those of us who’ve been there from the start. Soon enough, everything will change yet again.

The Metroid story is one of feast or famine. That avalanche of new games in the early 2000s itself followed nearly a decade of dormancy. I hope that Samus Returns’ title has some greater meaning beyond being a simple inversion of the Game Boy game’s, and indeed heralds the return of this sadly neglected series. Samus’s return to the past was fun; now here’s looking to the future.

Four years later, what a transformation this new game is. It’s full of combat, but Knack’s arsenal of moves is greatly expanded with a punch flurry move, an extendable-arm power shot and more. This time there’s a 34-node upgrade tree that weaponizes Knack’s dodge, speeds up most of his moves and adds some new ones. [Early Impressions - 1/2 through the game]

Right now, much of Absolver might feel small, but it has plenty of room to grow. Its foundation is solid: a well-designed combat system in a distraction-free world. Whether you spend a handful of hours seeing the sights or days delving into meta-discussions on the best builds, Absolver’s fresh approach to hand-to-hand combat is a welcome addition to the pantheon of one-on-one fighters.

By adding an enthralling tale packed with rich, engaging characters and an ever-looming man-versus-nature conflict, Nihon Falcom has crafted a game that’s incredibly hard to put down. There are no real “Everything’s okay now, we can rest” moments in Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana. The struggle isn’t over until everyone escapes the island...I’m somewhere between 35 and 40 hours in, and it doesn’t look like I’m getting off anytime soon. That’s fine. I’ve got everything I look for in an action RPG right here.

Plunkett: There are four constants in life. Death, taxes, a new Yakuza game every year and Bob Utsunomiya being a creepy piece of shit.

Mario + Rabbids is way better than it has any right to be.

For all that I hope Naughty Dog refines their next game, I can’t say I regret taking another scenic spin down Uncharted lane. Lost Legacy tells a winning tale of friendship set against a backdrop of gorgeous mayhem, and it might even teach you a thing or two about Indian history along the way.

While the core game is focused on the battle between cartoonish forces of good and evil, in the quiet moments, as the ringing of explosions fades, Agents of Mayhem demonstrates real heart.

Sonic’s early days stressed his supposedly edgy attitude and speed, traits meant to differentiate him from the slower, more deliberate Mario. But it was never really about attitude or speed. Sonic Mania clearly articulates Sonic’s true appeal: Sonic is pure joy, a spinning ball of fun blazing a trail towards the next adventure.

Tacoma ultimately succeeds as a piece of emotional storytelling. Every moment spent with the crew is spellbinding, as their strengths and struggles play out in painful detail. The experience is sometimes frustrating, but Tacoma leaves a lasting impression.

For players who enjoyed the first game, Splatoon 2 is not a reinvention, but it doesn’t have to be. It adds here and there, retaining what was best about the cheerful original while giving it a graphical upgrade and portability. Splatoon 2, at its best, is still Nintendo with confidence and flair.

Pyre is interesting enough to play multiple times, but it can also be played just as a one-on-one sport. In the game’s versus mode, which pits you against either an AI opponent or against a friend on your couch. In the story, there’s a lot of narrative pressure to do well in the rites. Against another person, I was a bit freer to just enjoy banishing my enemies, or passing the ball down the court, or flying over an aura blast.

Although things fizzle a bit in the final act, as the story moves into the realm of crystals and gods and other JRPG nonsense, the game never stops feeling consistent. Even the random NPCs never stop getting old.

Stormblood’s epic narrative, gorgeous new locales, spectacular battles and some fresh gameplay mechanics make a great game even better.

Ever Oasis is an intriguing blend of genres that serves as an interesting proof of concept, but is far too bland and repetitive to be a classic of the ARPG genre. And that’s too bad, because after a spate of similarly disappointing entries in the Mana series, I was hoping this spiritual successor would be better. I plodded through it, searching and searching for some kind of respite, something that broke out of the game’s loop of busywork. I never found it. As with most oases, this one turned out to be a mirage.

Arms is a one-trick pony. That one trick is polished and addictive, with deep minutia worth mastering. What makes it so eminently replayable is each battle’s constant and fluid power struggle; the ah-ha of dodging an opponent’s grab, jumping up and grabbing them; moving that opponent into a vulnerable corner with a boomerang arm; or the exhilaration of landing a slow, large “Megaton” punch. While Arms doesn’t play like a Mario Party mini game, it definitely could be one.

Hypothetical conquests aside, Order of Battle is still a fantastic prospect for anyone down with the idea of turn-based warfare but without the inclination/time for the more serious side of the genre. This is a fast, smart strategy series, and even if some of the campaigns are a bit of a let-down, the beauty of it is that you can just ignore them and focus on the battles you want to fight.

If you’re timid about bringing your fighting skills to the online arena, that’s fine. There are other fighting games out right now that will give you that single-player fix. But if you’re ready to hit and kick other players until they stop moving, whether you’re a seasoned veteran or a newbie just getting your feet wet, Tekken 7 is the real deal.

I do not regret my time with A New Frontier, but the emotional core at the center of the series seems rotten. There are seeds of greatness here, but A New Frontier never gave them the necessary time to grow. The Walking Dead started as a story about people. It was about a convict looking to redeem himself and a child growing up in an unfair world. A New Frontier chases after these figures but no matter how hard it runs, it always remains firmly in their shadows.

I do not regret my time with A New Frontier, but the emotional core at the center of the series seems rotten. There are seeds of greatness here, but A New Frontier never gave them the necessary time to grow. The Walking Dead started as a story about people. It was about a convict looking to redeem himself and a child growing up in an unfair world. A New Frontier chases after these figures but no matter how hard it runs, it always remains firmly in their shadows.

Outside of Civ’s relentless near-perfection, Endless Space 2 is now one of the real standard-bearers in the 4X space. While some of its more direct elements come up short, its implementation of politics is a masterstroke, adding depth and complexity to part of a game that often feels like an arbitrary chore.

From start to finish, Echoes presents a grueling experience. Its war is a brutal grind of bodies and mud. If you can endure the challenge, you’ll find a satisfying mixture of tactics and story. Just don’t be surprised if you’re left with a few nasty scars in the process.

Netherrealm Studios stumbling while adding an innovative new feature to Injustice 2 would have been much more tragic if the bits they normally excel at, fighting and storytelling, weren’t so spectacular this time around. Where follow-ups to traditional comic book events often fail, Injustice 2 is a worthy successor to the original in almost every way.

The worst version of Prey is the game its ending thinks it is, an action-y game with stealth elements about humanity and moral choices. The best version of Prey is the game that happens in between, one where you ignore its plot completely, take your time to explore every cranny, and hide in a tree to look at the stars. It fails itself when it tells you what to do, but you have plenty of opportunities not to listen to it and have a great time in the process.

Part of the original Mario Kart 8 was broken, and Nintendo fixed it in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, giving an already spectacular game substantial new legs...As for those of you new to Mario Kart 8, you’re showing up to the party at exactly the right time.

Narco Road makes no sense in a broader context. It seems antithetical to the franchise’s realistic aspirations. If the goal was to make sure no one takes the game seriously, it definitely succeeded.

The end result is one of the weaker remasters in Double Fine’s catalog. It doesn’t reach the operatic heights of Grim Fandango, and it lacks the memorable puzzles of Monkey Island. Full Throttle is a rough and tumble game full of affection for the open road. It’s a fun time full of fire, stunts, and fury. The remaster is a solid preservation of a classic title with some unnecessary additions.

Mr. Shifty stands victorious. The carnage was anything but cute, but it sure was satisfying.

Tearing away all of the bloat, Yooka-Laylee is a challenging and satisfying platformer. When it focuses on the basics, it succeeds with considerable flair. Yet, these moments arrive in short bursts that are padded out by confusing and hostile design. They point towards a far more enjoyable game than the complete package. The parts are significantly greater than the whole. There’s fun to be had but it doesn’t come easily. And if I never have to collect another shiny again, it’ll be far too soon.

Tearing away all of the bloat, Yooka-Laylee is a challenging and satisfying platformer. When it focuses on the basics, it succeeds with considerable flair. Yet, these moments arrive in short bursts that are padded out by confusing and hostile design. They point towards a far more enjoyable game than the complete package. The parts are significantly greater than the whole. There’s fun to be had but it doesn’t come easily. And if I never have to collect another shiny again, it’ll be far too soon.

This is simultaneously a joke about pixel hunting, a joke about adventure games, and a joke about the dumb things that players will do in video games. Did you ever think you’d want to hunt for pixels again? And did you ever think that the act of hunting pixels might be fun? Thimbleweed Park somehow both subverts pixel-hunting and makes you want to hunt pixels, which is just about all you can ask for in an adventure game.

This game will take many, many hours of your time. In exchange, you’ll get a terrific, pulpy story told with style to spare. Persona 5 took nearly 100 hours of my time, and I gave it gladly.

There’s another lesson in Everything, too. Even in the face of unimaginable grimness—of the hell that is difference, actual or perceived—there’s still room for wonderment at the miraculous gazillion-piece jigsaw puzzle that is the universe. It’s OK to believe that we’re all part of something, that no matter how fragmented things can become, there are still innumerable connections.

The plot and structure of Mass Effect: Andromeda can be viewed as a metaphor for the game itself, where a population eager for a fresh start makes a leap into a new frontier. The destination isn’t the paradise we hoped for. For our characters, Andromeda required a leap of faith, the belief that the universe must hold more for humanity. Nobody anticipated how much work building a new home would really take, and in a way, the entire game is about mitigating everyone’s disappointment. The truth is that Andromeda itself isn’t the promised land players hoped for either, but there is a lot that’s good in this flawed new frontier for Mass Effect. The question is: will you play long enough to find it?

The result is rubbish. Wildlands’ gameplay is too chaotic to call back to Tom Clancy classics like Rainbow Six or the series’ earlier titles. Its politics are too vapid to compete with the Splinter Cell series’ pulpy yet prescient narratives. Wildlands wants to be everything. It succeeds at being nothing.

That’s my favorite thing about Nier: Automata. Knowing that it’s accessible to all sorts of players means there’ll be plenty of people to revel with me in this equal parts charming and macabre world that Yoko Taro and PlatinumGames have built.

This is a game that will dominate dinner conversations. It’s a game that will lead to countless anecdotes, discoveries, and swapped stories. Already, colleagues and I have spent a great deal of time comparing notes and talking about how we solved major puzzles.

Despite clear flaws, Numenera is easily my favorite game of The Great PC RPG Revival (sorry, Pillars of Eternity, Tyranny, and Wasteland 2) so far. For nearly two decades, Planescape Torment was one of a kind, and after that kind of time passes, you figure that’s just the way it’ll stay. Against all odds, however, this 2017 video game has taken Planescape’s mottled old flesh and stitched together something strange and new. I wonder what sort of legacy it will leave.

The main plot of Night in the Woods didn’t move me much, and in fact it disappointed me a little in its shift from relatable ‘people stuff’ into grander, supernatural machinations. But for me the plot was secondary to the experience of kicking around town, bumping Mae up against everybody’s lives, seeing myself, who I could have been, who I’ll never be.

If you want to play a Halo game with the simpler story, backs-to-the-wall tone and cinematic flair of Bungie’s good ol’ days go right ahead and play Halo Wars 2. Just don’t expect the quality of the game to match that of the cutscenes.

If you want to play a Halo game with the simpler story, backs-to-the-wall tone and cinematic flair of Bungie’s good ol’ days go right ahead and play Halo Wars 2. Just don’t expect the quality of the game to match that of the cutscenes.

With Horizon, the studio is finally let loose to show us how much more they’re capable of, and what they’re capable of is jaw-dropping.

Even the most clumsy and gnarled duel will achieve moments of greatness. And when two experienced players operating on the same wave-length begin stringing together slashes, parries and counter-attacks in an unbroken chain, the resulting exchange feels as much like a choreographed ballet as a fight to the death…if ballets ended with severed heads flying into the orchestra.

Nioh is one of the most memorable and competent action games in a long time. There’s a genuine speed to combat, and the mixture of stances, magic, and other options turns any battle into a violent crescendo of action. It rockets players from challenge to challenge, remaining consistently exciting throughout. Nioh is a focused powerhouse of samurai action and folk whimsy that surpasses games like Dark Souls and brings a truly fast and dynamic pace to action-RPGs.

Resident Evil 7 can occasionally frustrate with excessive boss fights and patronizing puzzles, but it’s still a scary and violent blast of survival horror that paints a bright future for the franchise. Bloody, tense, and exciting throughout, Resident Evil 7 is exactly what the series needed. Full of dread and brimming with anxiety, the series that started it all has finally found itself after decades of wandering.

This isn’t a GTA clone, or an RPG, nor is it a brawler. It’s something more than that but also different, a human drama that combines rudimentary game elements and weaves them into something that can make you laugh, cry and feel within the space of minutes.

Like most recent entries in the Tales series, Tales of Berseria is an epic adventure packed with stuff to do. There are mini-games to play, cosmetic items to collect, food to cook and treasures to uncover. Those goofy fun trappings are draped across a much more serious whole this time around, offering welcome respite from a tale that’s not afraid to take its memorable characters to some very dark places.

Read Only Memories provides a clumsy but resonant experience. What it lacks in thematic substance or technical challenge, it makes up for in emotional content, a lush setting, and memorable characters. It’s a story worth experiencing in spite of its occasional frustrations. Come for the robots. Stay for the soul.

I can’t summon the necessary bile to truly dislike Gravity Rush 2, nor can I summon the necessary warmth to love it. In the aftermath of its grand finale I was exhausted in every way, happy to have gone on such an epic journey and just as happy that it was finally over.

Hatsune Miku: Project Diva Future Tone doesn’t miss many beats. Though a couple of my more recent favorite Miku tunes didn’t make the cut (notably “Love Song,” featured in last year’s Project Diva X), I am overwhelmed by what Sega’s latest vocaloid rhythm game has to offer.

Hatsune Miku: Project Diva Future Tone doesn’t miss many beats. Though a couple of my more recent favorite Miku tunes didn’t make the cut (notably “Love Song,” featured in last year’s Project Diva X), I am overwhelmed by what Sega’s latest vocaloid rhythm game has to offer.

With Miitomo being a social app and Pokémon GO a licensed Niantic creation, Super Mario Run is Nintendo’s first real foray into mobile gaming. They’ve fumbled the execution somewhat, but these first stumbling steps bring with them a game that’s worth playing.

Eschewing the spare storytelling of previous Team Ico games, The Last Guardian’s plot unfolds in a series of easily digestible cutscenes. It’s a dark fairy tale that probably isn’t quite what anyone expected, but ultimately serves to make the friendship at the core of the game even more remarkable. The Last Guardian is about two lost souls becoming one, and the strength and joy found in that conjunction.

I don’t know how Final Fantasy XV will be remembered when held up to the rest of the Final Fantasy pantheon. But I do know that it’s got everything I want from a Final Fantasy game. I know that it’ll be yet another snapshot in a life filled with Final Fantasy. Another grand adventure, another gang of worthy heroes; another tale of crystals and magic and betrayal and love, all beautiful melodies and lush scenery and the finely honed complexity of carefully choreographed combat. Onward to secrets beyond the horizon, and don’t forget the Phoenix Down. If that’s not Final Fantasy, I don’t know what is.

Planet Coaster is best when treated as a giant LEGO set. A sunny, cheery tabula rasa, lying there waiting for you to go nuts in a never-ending quest to make yourself as happy as the grinning faces of the people lining up to take your rides for a spin.

For 20 years now, Pokémon games have presented fantasies where people live, battle, and grow alongside powerful monsters. In Pokémon Sun and Moon, that wistful reverie invites you take a holiday, leave your worries behind, and grab yourself a lei. As it happens with all good vacations, Pokémon found itself again.

For 20 years now, Pokémon games have presented fantasies where people live, battle, and grow alongside powerful monsters. In Pokémon Sun and Moon, that wistful reverie invites you take a holiday, leave your worries behind, and grab yourself a lei. As it happens with all good vacations, Pokémon found itself again.

I liked Watch Dogs 2, though perhaps not quite as much as it wanted me to like it. It is a significant improvement over its predecessor, filled with challenges that tested my problem-solving skills. It compensates for its technical shortcomings with a raft of interesting new ideas and a near-endless supply of things to do. Its motley crew of hackers won me over with their unflappable enthusiasm, and its loving recreation of San Francisco made me nostalgic for a city that I’m generally happy to have left behind. All that, and little flying robots, too.

The edges are rough but the core is solid. Dishonored 2 may not redefine the formula set by the its predecessor, but it is still one hell of a game. The game stumbles but always manages to recover. Like a bumbling assassin that somehow get the kill, Dishonored 2 manages to succeed in the face of almost unassailable odds.

Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare is three very different games. It’s a character-driven military sci-fi action adventure with spaceship battles and a villain carved from the finest cedar. It’s a lighthearted co-op survival game with a bitchin’ period theme and some classic tunes. And it’s Black Ops III’s competitive multiplayer with a fresh coat of paint. I suppose it’s easier to push boundaries if you take them one at a time.

Hitman: Season One has it where it counts. Its ten missions consist of far more hits than misses, and its open-ended levels are able to sustain hours of obsessive repetition and mastery. The overarching narrative may be unimpressive, but each location is well-conceived and believable, full of fascinating details and hilarious overheard conversations.

House of the Dying Sun’s numerous achievements are all the more remarkable because it is largely the work of one man, an ex-AAA developer named Mike Tipul. In some ways, Dying Sun reminds me of Gunpoint, the terrific single-developer stealth game from 2013. While the games share little in common in terms of style or mechanics, both take a couple of good ideas and expand on them in smart ways without adding flabby padding. Both feel guided by a single vision, and both left me wanting more when the credits rolled.

Titanfall 2 is impressive. Its influence will ripple through video games in the same way that titles like Half Life or Halo managed in their time. Beautiful and bold, Titanfall 2 is the pinnacle of first person shooters.

Civ VI, which is already building upon what made Civ V so great anyway, forces you to adapt and play differently each time depending on your map and policies, so...yeah, we could be in for a long, fun ride with this one.

The fall’s most exciting Final Fantasy game.

A remarkable overachiever. Battlefield 1's creators could have taken the easy road. They could have omitted a campaign. They could have hastily assembled its multiplayer like the atrociously conceived Star Wars Battlefront. They didn’t. In this day and age, that makes all the difference in the world and it made all the difference here. Battlefield 1 could have been a disrespectful mess. Instead, it rises above to deliver an outstanding historical shooter.

The first episode of Hitman is a very strong start, and it’s a return to form for a series that some were worried had begun to wander.

Pokken Tournament might not quite be the Pokemon fighting game I’ve been dreaming of for years, but to be fair my dreams are ridiculously lofty. Despite its limited-by-reality scope, it’s the closest we’ve come to capturing the excitement of animated Pokemon battles in video game form.

As with all adventure games, solving puzzles in Day of the Tentacle sometimes feels like trying to get inside the designers’ heads and understand exactly what they want you to do. It’s there that the 23-year-old wrinkles sometimes show.

Given how effortlessly our imaginations float beyond the stern ramparts of Mr. Clancy’s literary world, it’s hard not to wish this finely honed contraption could be granted the lightness of spirit it needs to truly thrive. Given how expertly much of The Division has been assembled, it’s hard not to hope that such a wonder might still come to pass.

In the end, we’re left with a game that’s much like its setting: beautiful, but short on oxygen.

Despite how pedestrian some aspects of the game may be, I concluded Quantum Break feeling like something new had happened. Something special had happened that more than compensated for some of the flatness of the story and the mostly rote gunplay. A game simply never worked like this before, nor has a TV show. Because of that, what might have otherwise been ordinary feels extraordinary.

This is a game that can broaden an individual person’s horizons and that of the entire medium, as well. It’s definitely worth your time.

The sense of triumph after defeating a Dark Souls boss is unlike anything else I’ve felt in video games.

Stories feels like it’s trying something rewardingly different, to do more than just ape the linear style of a summer blockbuster movie. It’s embracing tried-and-true hallmarks of action game design and weaving them around interactive fiction elements. The result is both familiar and fresh.

About the only thing that bummed me out was that, despite the end of TBS1 falling flat, the last battle of TBS2 is somehow even worse, a weird little puzzle of a thing that’s too dependent on luck and scripting.

Realistically, after playing Danganronpa 2, it feels less like two games and more like two parts of the same game. Like when Kill Bill Vol 1 came out, then Vol 2 came out a little while later. But we’ll get to that a bit more later. For now... well, want to describe just what Danganronpa is?

It’s one of Nintendo’s most distinct games in years, one that makes great use of the Wii U for a fun, distinct solo or co-op experience.

Even if you can get used to the awkward controls, Star Fox Zero is merely mediocre. It’s as disappointing a major Nintendo console release as there’s been in some time.

OTC throws a lot of what you expect of a strategy game out the window. Instead of having time to make plans, you need to move fast. Instead of worrying about units you need to worry about market forces. Indeed, there’s little room for strategy at all; the circumstances of a game can change so often and so rapidly depending on the market that this is more a game about testing your reactions than any grand central plan.

Uncharted 4 may have problems at its edges, but its middle is phenomenal. It is a sufficiently wonderful finale for a studio that has made its own case that its next great step should be somewhere new.

For now, Stellaris is a game that reaches for the stars, only to fall just short.

Still having a good time, but it’s more about the company than the activities...At least now I know which one Battleborn is. It’s the one that needs to do better by Shayne & Aurox.

There is no other game I can turn to that will let me leap about a roomful of demons, firing a satisfyingly chunky assault rifle into the throng as beasts disintegrate into a bloody pulp. It sets my heart racing in a way that not even the original Doom managed.

I didn’t enjoy most of my time with it, but I wasn’t miserable either. There’s nothing wrong with being Ethan Brady, but you could have been Benjamin Walker.

Make a Lord of the Rings version next if you have to. Then Conan. Then Game of Thrones. Then, I don’t know, Krull. Whatever it takes to keep injecting that old strategy vs tactics formula with cool story quirks and fantastic magical powers, I hope Creative Assembly keep doing it, because Total War: Warhammer has been a blast.

Blood and Wine is equal parts triumphant and somber.

Yes, it is good and satisfying and even spectacular to play a traditional third-person action adventure in virtual reality. [Tested with Oculus Rift.]

If you’ve got experience with Hearts of Iron III, I guess all I can say is that as much as I bitched about the interface up top, you’ll find this a lot easier to get around, especially when it comes to production.

I’m surprised to find myself thinking of Mirror’s Edge Catalyst as a disappointingly safe game, given that I would never have used that word to describe its 2008 predecessor.