The cute shell holds challenging combat and a mature story. The turn based fights are fair, due to their transparency and calculability. Nevertheless, the lack of proper replayability and endgame as well as the small amount of dialogue dull the experience a little.

Fallen God is a good and lenghty standalone expansion to Spellforce 3, but it does not have the same impact as Soul Harvest did. The new troll faction is somewhat of a mixed bag, the dialogues drag out too much and the rts elements can feel a little undercooked. But Spellforce has always been more than the sum of its parts and if you loved the two previous games in the series, there is a good chance you will love Fallen God as well.

On the technical site, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered works like clockwork. However, 4K and 60 fps cannot save the game from an empty world, a severe lack of challenge, no dynamic weather and no global high scores. A game that drives mainly on nostalgia and lost its contemporary value.

Ghostrunner is fast, hard and unforgiving. But in a good way! It’s also beautiful, has an interesting world, a great soundtrack and the gameplay is just on point. The combat-system is with all the enemy-types rich in variety and pure fun, especially for speedrunners. Sometimes the world-design is a bit repetitive and not every enemy-type gets the screentime they deserve, but everything else is just great.

An utterly charming yarn about friendship and kindness that breathes gritty modern life into the quaint JRPG format of classic Dragon Quest.

The newest Ubisoft open world title surprisingly enough sets innovation as its priority; and succeeds. A feature that lets you play any character is impressive and works quite well in the world of a dystopian London. The only real issues are a lack of challenge and rewards combined with a mixed enemy AI.

The second part of the Dark Pictures Anthology improves upon almost everything from its predecessor. Little Hope presents a captivating story, but the shallow gameplay and underwritten characters are definitely a matter of taste.

While the three new levels are excellently designed and the combat is as satisfying as ever, the lack of new weapons or abilities feels like a missed opportunity. The main downside however is the uneven balancing: Some battles are littered with high level enemies (some of which require precise aiming in the midst of combat) and take easily more than 10 minutes to complete, all while you are grasping for ammo and health. Doom Eternal made you feel like a badass, while Ancient Gods almost makes you drag from one fight to next, always hoping you make it out alive somehow. This might be a real dealbreaker for some players, even for those who finished Doom Eternal without a problem on normal difficulty. Ancient Gods is still good fun, mind you, but I don't feel this is the right direction for the franchise. There is a difference between challenging and hardcore.

Except for hard core-fans of the series, barely anyone will find their time worth invested. Wet Dreams Dry Twice heavily bases itself on stereotypes and jokes that were not even funny when the first game launched. Bugs further diminish the enjoyment, but at least the game has an interesting story and a couple of new features.

The Revenant Prince had so much potential, which makes it even more depressing that in the end, it turned out to be a bore. It does look nice, for sure, but that fact alone can only take it so far. The story is completely uninteresting and confusing, you don’t know what you have to do half of the time, there are a lot of bugs and the fights are moderately entertaining at best. Skip this one.

Partisans 1941 is, for all its problems, a wonderful game for fans of the genre. The atmosphere is fascinating and the gameplay is as fun as it is hard to learn. If it wasn’t for the lame story and some problems with the enemy’s A.I., we’d recommend it even more. Let’s hope for some patches.

Well, that’s a disappointment: After The Escapists 1+2, we were looking forward to the next game set in the same universe. The Survivalists, however, can’t hold a candle to its predecessors. The gameplay is broken in more ways than we can count, there are plenty of design flaws which makes you wonder how anybody couldn’t have seen how irritating they are and nevertheless, the game is way too short and way too easy. Such a pity.

For a game about rallyes, there isn’t a lot of this in Art of Rally. Driving around is fun for an hour or so, but after that, you have more or less seen everything of interest that there is. Stilistically, the game is a success, but it is too easy, the story is weird (but not in a good way) and repetition takes away a lot of the fun one could have.

What the Fork succeeds in what it tries to do, which is to be an entertaining game in the vein of Overcooked. Especially the leveldesign is quite good! After a while, however, doing the same thing over and over again can become repetitive. However, if your’e looking to have a good time with some friends, you can’t go wrong with this one.

As Far As The Eye doesn’t only look nice, it also plays quite well. And it is hard! It demands a lot from the player und to get better, on really has to learn the ins and outs of the game. Too often, however, success comes down to luck, whch is a shame and makes some moments frustrating.

Dedicated remaster with successful new modes, races and detail improvements. Technically and in terms of AI behavior, however, the game is unfortunately not yet running as smoothly as it should.

The ocean setting is still amazing, controls are fine and the action is satisfying enough. However there is a ton of stuff that feels undercooked or downright boring, such as story, mission variety, loot or the superficial upgrade mechanics. 4 player co-op is easily the most interesting feature of Aquanox Deep Descent and could be worth a look, at least once the devs iron out some of its shortcomings.

The Signifier could have been some much more than it turned out to be. It does a lot of stuff right, though, especially regarding the design of the stages. It creates a believable, atmospheric world and the story, alltough not too creative, is intense. If it wasn’t for the ending and the boring gameplay, The Signifier could have been a classic.

Serious Sam 4 delivers dumb, fun action, but not much more. The humour doesn’t really work, the story is as stupid as it gets and there isn’t really any variety. However, to relax after a hard day at work, this might just be what some people need.

Ride 4 is tough, really tough, but not always in a good way. The penalty system is confusing, the driver’s A.I. is quite stupid and some parts of the game aren’t explained enough. However, if a challenge is what you seek, this might be the game for you.

Star Wars: Squadrons is a probably unwanted but successful mixture of the classic X-Wing and Rogue Squadron series. It combines a fantastic Star Wars atmosphere with an entertaining campaign, and convinces with an arcade gameplay feel, despite surprisingly complex controls. A higher rating is only prevented by an underwhelming multiplayer mode.

While FIFA 21 plays a lot smoother than its predecessor and offers even more content for the fans of career and VOLTA mode, it once again feels like an evolution not a revolution. EA Sports really need to breathe new life into their football simulation. But maybe that will only happen, as soon as the franchise arrives on next gen consoles.

The Dungeons of Naheulbeuk is, before all else, just a lot of fun, both regarding the gameplay and its humour. It is made for people who love pen & paper, and it does this job quite well. There are some hiccups, however, especially concerning the controls. But this doesn’t keep the game from being a success.

It's charming, but absolutely nothing happens and you watch ships go around for hours.

Wingspan did have so much potential to be great, but in the end, it is just okay. There is just too little variety to the gameplay and, being based on a boardgame, it doesn’t manage to justify its existence with any meaningful upgrades to the source material.

The gameplay shows its age and the updated visuals are not nearly worth the performance cost. If you already own the original, you can give this one a pass.

Of course, it cannot keep up with modern open-world genre representatives of the caliber of a GTA or Watch Dogs in terms of scope and gaming activities. But it doesn't even want that. Mafia wants to tell a story, a story about family, friendship, morals and tragedy, and the game does this very well.

A thoroughly engrossing action game that will keep you coming back for dozens upon dozens of hours. Each run is brimming with satisfying combat, new and interesting story bits and powerful upgrades, which more than makes up for the hefty amounts of repetion. Clearly a contender for game of the year.