PC Gamer's Scores

  • Games
For 3,862 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 50% higher than the average critic
  • 5% same as the average critic
  • 45% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.7 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Game review score: 72
Highest review score: 98 Crysis
Lowest review score: 7 NRA Varmint Hunter
Score distribution:
3877 game reviews
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The flock of dizzying strategic possibilities and the brilliant plumage it's dressed in make this digital board game a must-play.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A compelling WWII grand-scale sim. When I say "grand," I'm talking about a King Kong Burrito Supreme with extra sauce and tripple toppings. [Feb 2003, p.74]
    • PC Gamer
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    As any fan of this outstanding multiplayer game will explain, six new maps for Battlefield 1942 is almost like adding six new sequels to the game. [Apr 2003, p.100]
    • PC Gamer
    • 89 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The best fully 3D real-time strategy yet. [Feb 2001, p.58]
    • PC Gamer
    • 86 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Comfortably the best, funniest and most heartwarming game about a desperate battle over real estate, now available on PC as a good port at a generous price.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Old Gods does just about everything you could ask for in a sandbox strategy game expansion, and with far fewer initial bugs and technical issues that any previous release of the series. [Aug 2013, p.75]
    • PC Gamer
    • 88 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Halls of Torment's specific aesthetic couldn't be more attuned to my sensibilities as a child of the ARPGs of the late '90s and early 2000s. Give me two honking great orbs representing my health and mana and a protagonist who has no articulating joints in his legs and I'm a happy man, and HoT makes me very happy indeed with its lo-fi heroics and diffuse, stygian levels. If I could play this thing on a beige CRT while Rob Zombie screamed in my ears I wouldn't know it wasn't 1999. Actually, wait, I can do that. If anyone needs me, tell them I'm busy for the next… foreseeable future.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    An atmospheric, captivating crime thriller with an interactive story that unravels differently for every player.
    • 90 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A deep and rewarding competitive game that becomes something special when taken on in the company of others.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The deckbuilder and the soulslike accommodate each other well, even if Death Howl is initially too busy killing you to show its best hand.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Not since lemmings has a game so seamlessly mixed humor, cutscenes, and cruelty. [Holiday 2011, p.77]
    • 88 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    It's a changed game, but it's never been such spectacular fun to play, or so creative to tinker with.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A gleefully anarchic treasure trove of jokes and skits, TGYH is the funniest game I've played.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    This wonderfully clever strategy roguelike demands your best, and it deserves to get it.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Vessel of Hatred gives Diablo 4 a beating heart: Compelling characters to root for, creative loot to chase, and fiercely expressive action.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Still, Gears of War is a fantastic action game worthy of your time if you've never played the Xbox 360 version. [Jan 2008, p.72]
    • PC Gamer
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Jamestown harkens back to an era when we played games just to get a high score--when beating a game this challenging actually earned you bragging rights. [Oct 2011, p.77]
    • PC Gamer
    • 85 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Merciless, frustrating, and harder than dry cereal, but exquisitely balanced. Few games are so rewarding. [July 2013, p.62]
    • PC Gamer
    • 92 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A completely original, utterly captivating riff on the first-person action game. [Apr 1999, p.114]
    • PC Gamer
    • 89 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    If you’re looking for a great thrill ride, an interesting story, and bleeding-edge technology, Max Payne delivers all of them.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Defense Grid's excellent personality and gameplay make it both a great game for experienced tower defense fans and an excellent starting point for new players. [Apr 2009, p.86]
    • PC Gamer
    • 90 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Silksong can be ruthless, but it's hard to pry yourself away from its haunted little world that never seems to end.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Polishing off the brilliance that is NOLF 2 are the game's stunning graphics, powered by the LithTech Jupiter engine. [Holiday 2002, p.78]
    • PC Gamer
    • 85 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Though not quite as genre-pushing as "Chariots" is, Beelzebub masterfully ties up every single loose end left dangling in the first and second seasons. [July 2008, p.69]
    • PC Gamer
    • 80 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    An endlessly delightful destruction sandbox.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Funny, touching and full of action and smart in-jokes, Citadel is Mass Effect’s heartwarming last hurrah to its fans.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Spectacular player collisions and tackles, and a far more realistic pace make FIFA 12 the best football sim yet.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    This game has evolved from admirable statistical sim to full-on addiction. [July 2005, p.57]
    • PC Gamer
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    A first-rate RTS game that just may revitalize the genre. [Sept 2000, p.110]
    • PC Gamer
    • 80 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Knockout City punches above its weight as a complex and uniquely fun competitive brawler.
This publication does not provide a score for their reviews.
This publication has not posted a final review score yet.
These unscored reviews do not factor into the Metascore calculation.

In Progress & Unscored

?
    • 87 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Clever innovations and a generous economy make Legends of Runeterra easy to love. [Open Beta review score = 85]
    • 75 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    The result is a competent remaster and the best way to play this classic Total War, but it still can't compete with its modern heirs.
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Mycopunk shows a ton of promise, but that doesn't mean it's infallible. The progression can become a bit of a slog, and it can take a while to level up or collect enough resources to upgrade your kit. There's also definitely a cap as to how many missions you can do in a row before it all just blends into a violent blur. The variety in mission types only keeps things fresh for so long. There are also some glitches, many of which the devs are aware of, but that doesn't make them any less annoying. I've been lasered by an Abomination through a wall more than once now—you're never safe, even when you think you are. But none of this ruins the fun, it's just something to bear in mind: The fungal growths of Early Access. [Early Access Provisional Score = 79]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Honestly, I would have preferred Krafton give this game even more time to cook. It almost feels like I'm playing pretend at playing pretend right now—engaging with a variety of set pieces I can do a cute peace sign in front of before moving onto the next thing. In an attempt to offer something different to The Sims, Inzoi has failed to establish any sort of identity of its own. I'm not even sure Krafton knows what direction it wants to take right now, but it needs to figure that out quickly, otherwise I fear it'll be another casualty of the genre. [Impressions]
    • 40 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    It's a spectacular disaster, which feels like a rarity these days: there are lots of bad games, but for a game that was announced at E3 and made by a major publisher and studio to be this catastrophic is something.
    • 86 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Playing Mass Effect Legendary Edition is a constant see-saw of noticing an improvement, then wishing it went further. You can sprint outside combat, but only for like three seconds. There's a dedicated melee button, yet no way to separate the sprint and take cover actions to separate keys. You can skip the elevator rides, which are the only way to hear banter that could be filling the stretches where you jog from place to place. The graphics are better, but there's no FOV slider. [Mass Effect 1 score = 77]
    • 39 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    The action would be passable if it were buoyed by a compelling story, but I ain't gripped so far. [2-Hour Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Repo is a fantastic co-op horror game that can hold its own against big shots like Lethal Company. It's also only in early access right now, and with plans to introduce more player customisation, story elements, equipment, levels, and enemies, all I can say is that I'm really looking forward to seeing where the devs take this co-op horror game. [Early Access Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    Subnautica 2 is a decidedly well-balanced survival game. In a handful of hours of pre-release play, I've never found the scavenging and crafting grueling, but neither have I found it so easy that the expansion of my underwater base feels unearned. [Early Access Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    It's so mundane that I expected Schedule 1 to get boring by the fifteenth time I'd lugged a bulk order of plastic baggies to my crappy apartment, but like my latest strand of weed called "Wedding Ass," the drug-dealing sim dominating Steam right now is undeniably habit-forming...Chalk up that success to a lot of smart design choices from developer TVGS—its constant sense of progression, clockwork open world, expressive characters, gratifying supply/demand loop, day one co-op support—but I reckon Schedule 1's secret sauce is a crafting system that doesn't suck. [Early Access Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    I haven't been too blown away by what I've seen of it so far, but if Masters of Albion could help revive the god game genre, at least a little? That'd be fine by me. [Early Access Impressions]
    • 55 Metascore
    • Critic Score
    I'm enjoying Battlefield 1. It's not a huge departure for the series, despite the period, but it is meaningfully distinct from Battlefield 4. That may disappoint those who simply want progression that mirrors the jump from Battlefield 3 to 4 – more guns, more features and new maps.
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    But as I should've guessed from developer Traveller's Tales' modern Lego run, Legacy of the Dark Knight is just too darn delightful to sustain a stormy mood. It took all of five minutes for the brick-based brawler to put a smile on my face, and it didn't go away for two hours of play. [2-Hour Hands-On Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    On the surface, Bond might seem a natural fit for IO: all glitz and gadgets that make it feel like barely a skip away from the world of Hitman. But what I saw had me feeling that the studio has not leaned into its strengths, trading the absurd clockwork worlds of Agent 47 for a more tightly choreographed, linear, and "cinematic" game that IO has never been all that good at. The last time it tried was Hitman: Absolution. We know how that worked out. [3-Hour Hands-On Impressions]
    • tbd Metascore
    • Critic Score
    There's two chapters left to turn things around but Tell Me Why is going to have to pull out all the stops to make up for a bungled first act.

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