City of Brass is a great game that's mostly elevated by its setting and visuals. Once you get into the rhythm and understand how each enemy reacts, it becomes rather enjoyable, even addictive. It's a shame that the controls aren't optimized and there aren't other visual options. It's easy to overlook these drawbacks though.

Astria Ascending's 2D puzzle platforming blended with turn-based combat and stunning art style does all the heavy lifting to keep players interested as the game's writing feels a bit generic.

Resident Evil Village: Shadows of Rose provides yet another compelling excuse to return to the gorgeous locations from the base game. With a tangible sense of heart and meaningful character development, this campaign expansion establishes Rose as a standout figure in the world of Resident Evil. This delicate story of growth and self-identification is viciously contrasted by psychological horror visuals that will unquestionably haunt players for quite some time.

If you buy this game, you'll have an insane amount of fun, whether you buy loot crates or not, but after spending dozens of hours playing my Heavy, it's apparent to me that EA has designed progression to become a struggle for those who don't want to buy crates. If there's a line to cross, EA didn't just step over it, they blew it up with the Death Star.

For the first time, EA has brought a full Sims experience to console, with all of its features intact – even cheats. The Sims 4 doesn't always feel at home on Xbox, though, with clunky menus, confusing controls, tiny text, and a mess of tutorials. But if you prefer to game on console rather than PC, The Sims 4 is still worth the time and effort. The character creation, building, and social interactions are engaging enough to keep simulation-minded players busy for years.

Shredders is a fun, straightforward dive into the world of snowboarding, with mostly great controls and movements, and plenty of real-world influences. Some rough edges and often poor performance are all that hold this title back.

Those who welcome demanding, reactive and deep gameplay will find a lot to love about the Cobalt. It harshly punishes the impatient, but it'll reward those who take the time to master it.

Compared to its predecessor Neon Chrome, Time Recoil falls a bit short. The campaign structure is too linear and doesn't give you any larger goals to work towards other than advancing the story. The powers system is a bit unintuitive and would work better if it didn't require kill combos.

With some updates to the game's loot system and improvements to performance, Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin has the potential to be a worthwhile action RPG for diehard Final Fantasy fans. However, there are just way too many things this game doesn't get right. It certainly isn't one of the best RPGs on Xbox, but if you have a few dedicated friends willing to endure this adventure via online co-op, you can undoubtedly share in a few great laughs. Still, I can't recommend Stranger of Paradise: Final Fantasy Origin for anyone interested in a serious Final Fantasy story.

American Fugitive stands as a decent homage to classic GTA titles, but its rough mechanics, annoying gameplay quirks, mediocre story, and lack of side content left me disappointed.

What should have been a staple of VR shooters to come turned out to be little more than what feels like a rehash of a 2000's shooter. While the gameplay might have you yawning at times and racked with frustration in others, The Gallery at least provides an incredible wealth of stories from real WWII veterans that brings a level of intimacy to what could otherwise feel like a soulless experience.

State of Decay 2 is by no means a perfect game. It retains the quirks of its predecessor, complete with mixed production values and a litany of smaller problems. That said, the game has never crashed on me, and is wonderfully atmospheric, with great music, sound, and masterful use of lighting to create fear and tension.

FlatOut 4 is a little rough around the edges. The frame rate could be better, the single-player difficulty can be unfair at times, and online multiplayer lacks some popular event types. Still, it's an impressive package on the whole. 20 different tracks and several race types ensure that single-player and online multiplayer won't get stale too quickly. And you won't find another racing game with such a delightful emphasis on destruction.

Rise & Shine reminds me of the original Battletoads from Rare, a game that would've been excellent had it not been so punishing. All of the work that went into creating such beautiful art, packing in so many gaming references, and creating the interesting bullet abilities, is undermined by the excessive challenge. Players who like tough games will love Rise & Shine, but it will never truly shine unless the developers rebalance the difficulty.

The Hitman HD Enhanced Collection leaves a lot to be desired, despite supporting 4K resolution on Xbox One X and running at 60FPS. I'm not discounting each game's greatness for the time that they first launched — they were regarded as solid entries and still are — but as an HD collection they fall flat.

Saber Interactive has a decent framework here. With more polish (and perhaps a less hideous character art style), an NBA Playgrounds sequel could potentially live up to the NBA Jam legacy. But I can only recommend this particular game to basketball fans with local friends to play against and a tolerance for clunkiness.

Bleeding Edge misses its mark, but there's a spark inside this game worth keeping your eye on.

Sherlock Holmes: The Devil's Daughter delivers a gratifying story-driven experience, interwoven into an authentic representation of 19th century London. With great voice talent behind its cast, the game manages to form engaging inter-character relationships. While the game is held back by its level design and some unintuitive mechanics, it provides a consistent depiction of a mystery-filled London.

Saints Row (2022) succeeds at returning to the roots of its predecessors by paring back the outlandish absurdity without losing an ounce of chaos, but sometimes feels as if it's holding on too tightly to a past best left forgotten. Plus, it has a distinct lack of polish.

This episode feels significantly shorter than episodes from other franchises, but it isn't. Three hours just flew by and you won't miss any achievements because they're all chapter based.

Torchlight 3 is a lighthearted, simple co-op ARPG that might provide some fun to casual ARPG players or serious fans of the series, but doesn't do much else to justify its existence.

Where Brawlout excels is its accessible—if shallow—combat, its tight controls, and its vibrant characters with appealing visuals to boot. But balanced gameplay is everything in a game like this, and Brawlout falls short in that regard.

One must put up with a lot of rough edges to enjoy Farming Simulator 17. But if you can do that, it certainly offers a deep farming experience and plenty of realistic licensed machinery.

Twin Mirror has some great ideas, including a visually and narratively appealing Mind Palace system, but the weakness of its main character and its "tell don't show" method of storytelling drag the whole endeavor down.

Windbound was most definitely inspired by Zelda: Breath of the Wild, but with a much heavier focus on survival and crafting. If you enjoy survival games and want something to scratch that Zelda itch, you should check this game out.

If you're in the mood for a challenging and dark adventure, you could do worse than 2Dark. The pulpy subject matter and tone are different from the average horror game. The unique perspective and art style actually serve the material quite well, too. Despite the rough edges, horror fans should give 2Dark a chance.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 is nothing short of ambitious, expanding on the classic Call of Duty formula with more cooperative gameplay opportunities and just enough nostalgia to keep things interesting. Not all of the game's "seven pillars" hold up due to light content at launch, but there's potential for post-launch seasonal content to make up for shortcomings.

Eiyuden Chronicle: Rising is a promising taste of what players can expect from the visual presentation of this captivating franchise. What it's lacking in enemy variety and mission diversity, it makes up for in style and flashy combat.