Telegraph's Scores

  • Games
For 820 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 43% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 53% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.9 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Game review score: 78
Highest review score: 100 Pokemon Legends: Arceus
Lowest review score: 10 Kung Fu Rider
Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 39 out of 820
826 game reviews
    • 88 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The example of difficult second album syndrome that most readily came to mind while I wandered these wastelands is the Stone Roses, who spent almost five years trying to outdo their era-defining, genre-defying debut only to emerge with a bloated classic rock retread that effectively ended the band’s career. That’s not to say Horizon Forbidden West is gaming’s ‘Second Coming’ – but it’s not the second coming of gaming either.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Remaking a touchstone of the medium in this fashion is like creating a big-budget, 10-part Netflix drama series out of the title sequence from Grange Hill. Franchise fans will tune in to see an outsized sausage on a fork only to be confounded by the three episodes dedicated to the netball teacher’s character arc. Curious newcomers tempted by the production values and peerless reputation could find the soporific pacing and weirdly dated references to outsized sausages leaves them wondering what all the fuss was about. And everyone else might just shrug and watch The Witcher instead.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Despite the volume of content and the sharp precision and attention to detail levelled at everything from visuals to audio, Forza 6 can oftentimes feel like the standard bearer of a bygone age. On the one hand it's a mechanical wonder, but on the other it's firmly rooted in ideologies and design tropes of the past.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Black Flag is a good game not because of its meandering plot or lumbering main missions, but because of its invigorating interpretation of swashbuckling on the high seas. A thrilling pirate’s life for us.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The game's chief appeal really is wrapped up in Alec Mason's capacity for devastation and whether or not the endless opportunities to cause widespread mayhem (albeit in a good cause) are worth slogging through some of the game's drawbacks is down to the appetite for destruction of each individual player. Those who demand in-depth plots, revolutionary gameplay and a twist around every corner won't have much use for Red Faction: Guerrilla. But if you enjoy blowing things up, this well may be one of the best video games ever made.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Perhaps inevitably, on PS5 the game itself almost feels like a secondary concern to the tech demo but developers Insomniac deserve credit for delivering an experience at once both familiar enough to appeal to fans of the first game but also with a strong identity of its own.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    In trying to be all things to all people, Dragon Age: Inquisition lacks the impact that it might otherwise have had if BioWare had imbued it with the same sense of purpose that its predecessors carried....Inquisition, on the other hand, offers an embarrassment of things to do but sometimes forgets to provide the motivation to do them.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Whether you love this iteration or not relies entirely on your tolerance of Mario Kart being Mario Kart. Unbalanced, flukey, stagnant even, but still managing to offer plenty of fun.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The game's chief appeal really is wrapped up in Alec Mason's capacity for devastation and whether or not the endless opportunities to cause widespread mayhem (albeit in a good cause) are worth slogging through some of the game's drawbacks is down to the appetite for destruction of each individual player. Those who demand in-depth plots, revolutionary gameplay and a twist around every corner won't have much use for Red Faction: Guerrilla. But if you enjoy blowing things up, this well may be one of the best video games ever made.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Look, if the Telegraph’s scoring policy would allow me to give extra points for cuteness, this game would be our highest rated game ever. I really mean that. Nothing else I’ve played comes close. Kirby makes the characters of Animal Crossing look about as appealing as the beasts from the most recent Resident Evil title. But The Forgotten Land feels like candyfloss, all sweetness but not enough substance. Kirby is one of Nintendo’s quirkiest and most charming characters, but he deserves better than a reheated take on one of his big brother Mario’s most forgettable outings.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The AI is one of Crysis 2's biggest problems. It's utterly atrocious, to the point of parody at times.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    It's definitely worth a try thanks to the great exploration and fluid combat systems, just make sure you have plenty of patience on hand.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Wargroove is a very enjoyable game but one which still feels rough around the edges.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It still has more charm and character than most and –despite the hiccups- provides a challenging, fun and satisfying puzzle experience for players young, old -and everything in between.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    While Hogwarts Legacy makes what seems a genuine effort of inclusion, much of it is muddled.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Sucker Punch's PS4 tribute to Akira Kurosawa is gorgeous to behold but its sparse open-world and bloated mechanics has it falling short.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Shift doesn’t pull off that tricky balancing act with the finesse of Bizarre’s urban racer, but there’s still a lot of fun to be had here for petrolheads after a lighter introduction to the world of sim-racing. If nothing else, it’s certainly a shift in the right direction for the series, with a solid base for improvement.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It’s a very well crafted video game that entertains far more than it frustrates, and while it borrows heavily from several prestige titles, it weaves their characteristics into a cogent whole that serves Darksiders style, drive and narrative well.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    A good game that, on a few occasions, desperately feels like it's trying to be better than it is, but lacks the juice to succeed.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Layton charm is undoubtedly still present, but it's not enough to carry the series by itself. Upon solving certain puzzles, Layton exclaims 'I love the thrill of a good solution'. So do we, Hershel, so do we. And in this Layton game, sadly, that thrill is all too rare.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    What is here is a thumping, bubbly, precisely-engineered and consistently entertaining platformer, but one that lacks for ambition.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    You can only review what is in front of you. And currently, PES 2020 seems out of form.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Disappointing too is the roster of worlds you visit, and the lack of exploration in each.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It’s a superior game to Conviction, but it won’t be held in the regard as the original Splinter Cell or Chaos Theory. It’s spread too thin and too focussed on trying to cater to everybody than exploiting what it’s best at.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    In Local and Private lobbies, Tekken 7 is almost perfect, but comes short of greatness when it comes to looking at the full package, which is a frustrating disappointment.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    FIFA 15’s biggest changes are cosmetic, and that will is absent. FIFA 15 plays, more than any other recent FIFA sequel, largely the same.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    It is probably best summed up by a battle with a beast in the game’s denouement: a suffocating struggle in the dark, punctuated by fierce assaults on the senses that goes on for ten minutes too long, losing its lustre in the process. By turns thrilling, terrifying, thoughtful, thoughtless and tedious. A strange game indeed.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It doesn’t lack for content, then, but those looking for something filling and nutritious may feel short-changed by the game’s adolescence and humdrum tasks. But sometimes you simply need a sugary, cathartic snack. Taken under these circumstances, at least, Sunset Overdrive’s giddy blasting often hits the spot.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Just Cause 2 is not without its flaws, but it offers a highly satisfying, if hardly unique, open-world adventure in which players are encouraged to indulge in as much mayhem as possible.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Rage is a game that would have benefitted from being streamlined, with additional FPS levels replacing the awkward driving. It should have been an id game. Instead it occupies this weird halfway-house between Borderlands, Motorstorm and Doom, not quite an RPG, not quite a racer and not quite an FPS.

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