SLEEP AWAKE is a game I saw in my email, having never heard of it. I redeemed the key on a whim, and dear lord, am I happy that I did. The four hours I spent in The Crawl as Katja were full of intrigue, some genuine scares, and a hell of a lot of enjoyment.

Alone in the Dark has come a long way from its initial showings. Clever writing, great performances by its two leads, and solid gameplay come together to give the franchise a new life.

I love a good challenge every now and then, but I don’t mind being able to coast as I please and feeling powerful to destroy foes to boot. For that, Yohane’s little adventure offers a fun journey through a weird labyrinth with funky, eldritch-looking monsters. An easy recommendation for the 2D action beginner.

Though my thoughts on Silver Star Story aren’t necessarily the best, LUNAR 2: Eternal Blue does a lot of heavy lifting as the remaster work does for me. Both games’ Remastered modes have had a lot of care put into them to make them look good on modern display, as best as you can get when working with native code really. LUNAR Remastered Collection is a set of games I think can be enjoyed by anybody, particularly those who have a love for old-school, adventure-focused anime and JRPGs alike.

It’s a short and sweet DLC that gets a short and sweet recommendation. If you love PowerWash Simulator then this is $8 you should go and spend right now.

I’m not too big a fan of how much was stripped away in Ninja Storm’s Connections History mode, but it still does a good job of picking the right moments to sum up for Naruto-noobies while still offering fun fights alongside Boruto’s extra story. Ninja Storm fans will know what they’re coming back to, this time with a larger roster than Storm 4. Connections is ultimately a great little collection of all things Naruto.

Bulwark: Falconeer Chronicles is not made for everyone. It’s an odd duck in the way it controls, the way it tells its story and the way it simulates the world, but it truly is a great way to spend a rainy Sunday afternoon. Want a conventional strategy game or city-builder? Look elsewhere. Are you in for something executed by a single developer, taking risks and doing something new? Well then – The Ursee awaits.

Besides being a darn good collection, it all comes down to whether or not you’re interested in the games. For fans of Darkstalkers and Capcom’s fighters in general, the improvements and first-time ports are worth it, plus the museum has some nice goodies like concept art and design documents. These games are still visual treats with lovely spritework and animations, too. And while I don’t think this will net a tonne of newcomers into fighting games and Darlkstalkers, ports for today’s hardware (with good improvements!) are always welcome.

Threefold Recital is a great 2D narrative adventure title, no thanks to its unique setting and enjoyable characters. The team has done an excellent job between balancing story delivery and breaking up the eventual monotony with distinctive minigames that are both repeated and one-off. Behind all this lies themes of living and identity that resonate not only for the three leads but for the player as well.

Tunnels of Terror is a great first expansion with a lot of high-quality content and it’s well worth your time and money if the base game ever held your interest.

Though bittersweet, Dordogne offers a thoughtful, well-paced narrative that is accompanied by beautiful visuals and sounds. It’s a pleasant adventure title through-and-through. One that I recommend to just about anyone.

All in all, the official videogame for Kingdomino is just that: Kingdomino, digitally. It features two artstyles, a strong online module and various settings, but it also doesn’t do anything special or different compared to the board game. No particularly fancy animations, no extra game modes, no campaign to play through. If you want Kingdomino on your device, this is perfect – it’s even a light-weight game that runs on weaker machines, so it’s got very little in terms of downsides.

Swarm 2 is a ton of fun. You’ll swing around shooting robots in decent-sized arenas until you can barely stand because it feels so damned good. A solid progression system and good looks don’t hurt either.

Halls of Torment efficiently combines the highs of some of the best bullet heaven shooters out there, with immaculate Diablo-coded looks and sounds. Despite not being revolutionary, nor packing the outrageous depth of some of its rivals, Chasing Carrots‘ title is easily one of the most interesting and addictive titles in the genre. And, as a Game Pass release, you have very little reasons not to give this one a fair shot.

Railway Empire 2 is a great game for fans of simulators and builders. It tries to find the middle ground between being accessible and challenging, with the chance of losing the more advanced players in the process. The developers can cherish what they’ve created. But could expand upon the ideas some more for the next iteration. As I’m sure plenty of players would love to go deeper into the world of building a railway empire.

BAD END THEATER is an enjoyable stint of being able to choose the dilemmas your cast of characters face and then watching them die a bloody death. It’s an amusing choose-your-adventure sort of game with a bit more than that once you explore what this theatre has to offer, even if it isn’t quite subtle about certain aspects of its venue. Perfect for the sadist in you and even the hopeful.

I’ve quite happily played through and enjoyed Simon the Sorcerer: Origins, and for fans of the series, this is genuinely a pretty great return for this 90’s adventure game anti-hero. In many ways, it feels made by a group of fans that loved these classic games, and as such, is made with a fair amount of care and passion. I hope they get to make another one.

Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands does not try to reinvent the Borderlands wheel. Instead, it molds it into something fresh enough to satisfy fans of the series that are looking for more.

In a vacuum, Pinball FX is for the most part a sensational pinball game, and to be fair the closest competition is Zen Studios own fantastic pinball games themselves – who, for yet another installment, remain the kings of pinball in videogame form.

Cursed to Golf is charming, smart, sounds and plays great, and is full of heart. It mashes up a side-scrolling arcade golf game with roguelike mechanics in a fresh and exciting way. At only $20 US at launch, I think it’s well worth a purchase if anything you’ve seen here has you intrigued. This is one curse that’s well worth the cost.

Overall the Ace Attorney Investigations Collection is a great kit of two very fun adventure titles. Alongside new quality-of-life features and development documents on characters and environments, this collection finally completes the series’ transition to modern platforms and brings an untranslated game westward for the first time. Highly recommended for Ace Attorney fans who’ve never played these games before.

World of Solitaire is one of the best videogame versions on modern consoles of 5 famous solitaire games, and at an inviting price around 10 bucks, it’s definitely worth playing for fans of the genre. A lot of cool features extend its longevity, but perhaps allowing more customization of the rules, more actual gameplay variety and some extra quality-of-life changes would have made it a truly unmissable experience for card fans.

PowerWash Simulator is already a great time, and this DLC is perfect for matching the tone of the game. It’s silly, fun, and a solid value.

A licensed Transformers racing game with actual robot combat elements being one of the most unique and fun racers of 2024 was certainly not on my bingo card, but I ain’t complainin’. A very solid racing module, a lot of smashing and bashing in car form, and then a fast-paced, if quite simplistic third-person robot-shooting intermissions make for a legit fun time, with even a surprising depth in the loadouts and available characters. Sure, a bit more polish and variety wouldn’t have hurt, and the progression is rather bizarre – and the lack of proper multiplayer is a bummer. Still, Transformers: Galactic Trials is both a great Transformers game for fans young and old, and an exhilarating racer with a lot of fresh ideas and a quite solid execution all around. Keep an eye out for this one.

Outside the aforementioned oversights, there’s a near perfect collection on offer here that’s an absolute must for fighting game fans.

There’s a pleasant puzzler in Projected Dreams, thanks to its visuals, music, and simple game design. Who knew making shadow puppets could make for an enjoyable afternoon? An easy recommendation for everyone.

EA Sports FC 24 continues the legacy of a great football game series. It’s easy to pick up for anyone thanks to a good tutorial system and features addicting modes that you can take online and offline. The game’s gorgeous and runs really well on the Xbox Series X. EA has made sure to entrench its football series even without the FIFA license, so I think you can continue to expect only the best from this series going forward.

Inertial Drift: Twilight Rivals Edition is a new version of this interesting drift-based arcade racer from 2020, adding brand new graphical enhancements on current-gen consoles to bring features such as 4K and 120fps and a fun DLC that adds new tracks, cars, and a fantastic set of Eurobeat tracks. It’s more of a quantitative update than a transformative one, and the extra cars and tracks don’t help solve the game’s relatively repetitive gameplay, yet this is undoubtedly a superior way to enjoy this quirky and adrenaline-filled arcade racer that I can certainly recommend to fans of the genre.

So LEGO: Brick Tales then – a bright, colourful and certainly more creative take on LEGO in its digital form. While there’s some fiddly controls at times, it’s all quite charming and relaxing – and as the rest of the package is so wonderfully put together, it’s hard to gripe too much about a fussy control scheme. Besides, back in my day, I never used a manual to build my spaceship, and had to spend quite some time searching for just the right brick to make the whole thing work. Either way, it was a great dose of nostalgia.

DOG WITCH is plenty cute as it is fun. Thanks to the short runs, it’s easy to hop into whenever you need to spend a bit of time without having to overthink on builds and setups. Thanks to a good amount of enemy and equipment variety, you can’t go wrong with this adorable deckbuilder.

I feel like there’s not a lot to say about TRON: Catalyst. It perfectly captures the essence of the TRON audiovisual experience, without overstaying its welcome, taking me just about 10 hours to finish. It has a satisfying, if rather formulaic, ARPG combat loop – with even the iconic disc-throwing and vehicle usage. The story is sound, and there’s a quality dub underneath it all. It may not reinvent the wheel, nor hit the heights of the legendary TRON 2.0, but it sure reignites my TRON hype, with hopefully the upcoming movie, TRON: Ares, delivering after the many years of delays as well. If not, well, you can always play this really cool game!

PlateUp! is barrels of fun if you’re playing with friends or family. You’ll be barking orders to one-another before you know it. And even if you fail, you’ll find yourself starting another run in this fairly addicting cooking slash restaurant management roguelike.

Machick 2 doesn’t quite reinvent the bullet heaven wheel, but it greatly expands on the already great ideas of the first game. Gorgeous 2D graphics and various unique concepts, such as creating your own wands and hatching chicks to fight for you, turn it into a unique enough experience to bother checking it out among the hundreds of similar titles out there – one that runs very well even on lower end PCs, in fact. Some readability issues and slightly less depth than the genre’s bests perhaps don’t allow it to become an unmissable classic, but fans of the genre should absolutely check it out. And with console releases confirmed to be coming in the future, bullet heaven fans on Xbox should absolutely keep an eye out for this one!

The Alters combines a bunch of genres I hate, and somehow makes a game I loved (when it worked).

NeoSprint is a fun and well-made homage to racing games of old, with a fun and precise arcade driving model from a top-down view. There’s a vast selection of tracks, a solid editor to create and download new ones, various cars and plenty of customization, including several callbacks to other Atari classics, making this game worth the time for racing fans who aren’t afraid of playing something that winks to an era before 3D racers got popular. Lack of proper online multiplayer is a bummer, although leaderboards and downloadable ghosts are in the game. Ultimately, NeoSprint is a retro arcade bonanza that I can see myself coming back to for a while, especially if the community and developers keep the content and challenges coming.

Playing on a Series X, the game ran at 120fps and felt smooth as butter.

Hot Wheels Unleashed 2 – Turbocharged is an extremely safe, but ultimately very fun sequel. The new story mode doesn’t change the formula, but the new game modes, the tons of content and customization on top of an improved core gameplay make this an exhilarating racer for young and old.

Botany Manor is an enjoyable puzzle-focused adventure with an obsession in weird plants and an interesting estate. What might be lacking in overall narrative is made up for pleasant pacing and a relaxing homework assignment at a country side world of plants.

You Suck at Parking is a refreshing addition to the racing genre unlike any I have seen before. The controls are simple and the gameplay is accessible but things soon develop into a far more complex challenge. For those who prefer gaming in short bursts, this could be a popular title far into the future especially as the developers have promised much more content is still to come.

Momodora: Moonlit Farewell is a great 2D platformer title that boasts a beautiful presentation and good level design that can challenge but never strangle you. Good narrative pacing and ability acquisitions keep Momo’s game from becoming stale—and don’t get me started on the fun boss fights. A perfect title for the Metroidvania faithful and newcomer.

Hollow Knight: Voidheart Edition is an eventually great game. It requires a ton of patience to see through, so even though it’s on Game Pass you need to make sure you’re willing to commit that much time because boy does it both start slow and make some head-scratching decisions when it comes to the map and exploration.

Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 can be slow and lethargic, sometimes to a fault. It's a game that's more concerned with the plight of a villager than the saving of a kingdom. And yet it's in those very moments, the conversations in the back of a cart, the early morning horse-rides in the brisk, cold air; that the magic, charm, and humanity of it all shines brightest.

The game’s cutesy style that reminisces perhaps too many forgettable indie games is only a ruse – the game has charming characters, the humor is on point, the amount and variety of content is quite impressive and, most importantly, the gameplay works very well. It isn’t the most complex or riveting gameplay loop, but then again the popularity of titles like Muse Dash show how simplicity and polish walk hand in hand, and now Rhythm Sprout is furtger proof of this. Recommended to all rhythm game fans looking for a more humorous take on the genre.

By the end of the game I walked away a happy camper. I got a fairly good understanding of what people love about VTubers, a bit of terminology in, and all-the-while engrossing myself in an entertaining story with good visuals and music that sadly does have its own set of pitfalls.

Ready or Not ushers in the triumphant return of tactical FPS games to console, and I’m all the happier for it. With a decent single player option, plenty of replayability and a multiplayer co-operative mode that absolutely shines, Ready or Not will offer plenty of tactically driven gameplay for those that look for it. If you prefer to run’n’gun, you’d best look elsewhere.

Teardown is really damned fun. The devs took a solid premise and built a great sandbox around it. Performance on console is better than I could have hoped for, and with proper mod and DLC support it should have tons of content for years to come.

As of this writing, of the 3 new modes in Fortnite’s new metaverse, LEGO Fortnite is by far the most popular, and it’s certainly not only thanks to the behemoth brand that is LEGO. This is a not excessively daring but surprisingly fun, polished and good-looking survival game – a genre often notable for quite ugly, poorly running and janky experiences. All the basics of a good survival experience are there and players have solid freedom in constructing their own LEGO creations or, alternatively, to follow the guidelines and build standard things as suggested by the game. With lots of customization and servers allowing up to 8 players to work together towards a common goal (or to troll each other, if they want to), LEGO Fortnite has the potential to become a mainstay for prior Fortnite fans, offering a new enough experience to perhaps convince newcomers to hop into this title as well. If future updates keep making the game more varied, deep and fresh, we could truly have a near unmissable gem on our hands.

The game is just a blast to look and listen to, which pardons some of the less impressive combat encounters and the play-it-safe game design. It’s not a game that reinvents anything, but it sets out to do specific things, all of which it does pretty well. Fans of third person action adventure games should definitely consider playing Kena: Bridge of Spirits, with accessibility options and a story mode difficulty allowing even newcomers to videogames to enjoy this colourful, cartoon-esque journey.

Shin Megami Tensei V: Vengeance is a great refresh of a game that I had gripes with back then. Besides the far more interesting Vengeance route, the additional quality-of-life changes, added mechanics, and greatly improved performance make Vengeance easily the best version of a great turn-based RPG. Great for returning players and an even better deal for new ones.

It's not all that unique, with games like BPM: Bullets Per Minute already "inventing" some of these concepts, but the quality is undeniable, and FPS fans should not skip this one for sure. Especially since it's launching day one into Xbox Game Pass.

While Viewfinder’s story didn’t pull me in or leave me desperate to unravel the narrative threads, the concept, level design and puzzles on offer here are fantastic, filled with clever ideas and creativity. This is pure video game magic, manipulating imagination itself. Is there any better game than one that makes you exclaim aloud – “Look how cool this is!“?

House Flipper 2 is a massive improvement over the first game. While it can have some issues with a controller it’s not enough to keep me from recommending the title. Painting, Planting, Selling, and Flipping has never been a more enjoyably chill vibe than it is here.

In conclusion, I truly enjoyed playing through the Bloom section of the game. I have played the Life Is Strange games and I might prefer this, but perhaps that’s my 90’s nostalgia speaking! I will replay the game before the second half to get better relationship statuses as it turns out I wasn’t doing as well as I thought with my friendships (and possible relationships). If you are interested in story-driven games, some 90’s nostalgia, and paranormal magic vibes, then I do recommend you check out Lost Records.

Cross Tails is a solid strategy title with strong mechanics and plenty of user choice when it comes to unit customisation along with pleasant visuals and music. Despite the small map sizes, the enemy units provide a good challenge that even some lifelong SRPG developers struggle to accomplish. It’s a ‘thumbs up’ from me.

Keylocker is a fun, beautiful turn-based RPG that does a great job of meshing not only a fun combat system but a sleuth of other minigames to keep its journey fresh. If you like rhythm games and an extensive timing-based combat system, look no further than this one.

It’s a low-maintenance game with a creative cacophony of ideas mixed with a dab of fourth wall-skirting plays that appeals to a wide-reaching audience of all ages. Where many games opt to host depressing narratives to appeal to their young adult audience, Blue Archive instead plays itself straight—keeping an upbeat vibe with a touch of comic mischief while not being afraid to touch on the “what-ifs” if things all went wrong. It’s easy to pick up and play and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Indika is an odd, wonderful title. Mixing 3D photo-realistic art with 2D-pixel graphics makes some bold choices. Excellent writing and voice acting help carry mediocre gameplay and created an experience I will never forget.

It’s a bit light on content outside of the games, but every option you could want is here, things run great, and the full package is a decent value.

Monster Energy Supercross 25 makes quite the noticeable upgrade to this franchise, as the switch to Unreal Engine 5 gives us better looks, better physics, with even various AI and customization improvements that turn this year’s game the best one in the series yet. With the 2025 roster already in place and various promised new content updates throughout the year, AMA Supercross fans should have their hands full – albeit newcomers might still find this peculiar racing style and some of the jank a bit tough to swallow.

In the end, Tomb Raider I-III Remastered brings us back to arguably the most exciting era of the franchise, allowing us to revisit with updated controls and graphics these iconic action adventure classics, while also mantaining the smart level designs, puzzles, etc. as they should be – though, for better or worse, without any real attempt to fix any of the games’ shortcomings either. While the game does indeed look and control better, there seems to be a rather heavy-handed use of AI for upscaling textures, with also various locations where the completely different lightning models used drastically alter the atmosphere – often for the worse. There’s also no real new content or updates, making it feel like we’re playing a slightly modded version of the originals. Which, for a Tomb Raider aficionado like me, is absolutely fine – these games still hold up for the most part, even though some of the action-packed sequences and convoluted puzzles of 2 and 3 are a bit over the top.

For a full launch, I think there’s plenty of content that’ll keep you entertained. It has a strong driving model with interesting mechanics and plenty of modes to tackle alone, with a pair, or a group of mates. I find KartRider: Drift to be very addicting, seeing as I’ve put well over 50 hours into the game already, I can easily see myself putting more than double over the coming months.

Let Them Come: Onslaught is a quality bullet heaven experience. It offers a lovely art style, an exciting soundtrack and an intense difficulty with well-designed level progression. It is, however, a bit on the short side, with only 4 levels, 2 characters and not a huge build variety. It’s a game that is quite close to greatness, but it will need a bit more content to truly become an unmissable classic survivors-like experience. I still feel like recommending it to fans of the genre, as its gameplay loop is one of the best ones on Xbox right now.

I enjoyed the first videogame of the Unknown 9 universe, and I sure hope it won’t be the last, as I wanna keep going back to this vast fictional world. And while I absolutely want to applaud Reflector Entertainment and Bandai Namco for trying something different, perhaps they stuck a little too close to the action adventure videogame genre’s tropes, in an attempt to better appeal to the masses. Still, it’s a game that has some good ideas and a terrific lore, one expanded upon by all the transmedia products out there. Fans of action adventure games should take this leap of faith into The Fold and give Unknown 9: Awakening an honest shot, with its budget price that should help with pulling the trigger over such an… Unknown quantity.

Colour me impressed. When I think indie, I rarely think “open-world”, but BINGOBELL showed me that’s it’s possible to craft a great and ambitious adventure game without a large body count. KAKU: Ancient Seals is one of the best open-world indie games I’ve ever played and I highly recommend it to anyone looking for their fill of lush environments and challenging dungeoneering.

For my slights with the overall narrative, however, The Gap offers real problems, giving a more sci-fi glimpse to the world of genetic and neurological disorders and how it impacts dreams, ambitions, and our families. For those that love to delve into the mind and its inner workings (with a bit of stretching done to the science behind it), look no further than here.

In the end, DreamWorks Gabby’s Dollhouse: Ready to Party is a fun little adventure that captures the cuteness and charm of the series. It features accessible yet enjoyable platforming, many fun side activities, but also a huge chunk of the show’s big roster of support characters – all dubbed, in fact. The show’s iconic visuals are perfectly recreated, and so are its tunes, turning Gabby’s first proper console release into a great gift to any young fan of the series. It’s a little bit short, and surely it won’t win any awards for originality, but for a licensed videogame of a preschool show, it’s actually quite nice and wholesome. Meow!

SONIC X SHADOW GENERATIONS is a good collection of two fun games. Sonic Generations is still a solid romp even if this port adds more issues to the game while Shadow’s offering is action-packed and builds on the former’s strengths. This is the most you’ll ever get of Shadow the Hedgehog for quite a while, so dig in while it’s hot.

Despite a handful of bizarre small changes from the original games, Crash Bandicoot: N. Sane Trilogy is still quite a riot. Naughty Dog’s iconic “on-rails” 3D platformers, remade from the ground up by Vicarious Visions, is still a lot of fun, with the main character’s iconic spins making for what is still a quite fresh experience that differentiates itself from other titles in the genre. With tons of content and a massive amount of extremely hard challenges to aim for in the search of that elusive 100% completion (and beyond), this is one of those platformers that could keep you coming back for a while – making this a great addition to Game Pass (also on PC and cloud – the first Activision-published game to be playable via cloud on Game Pass).

You might think that a music game where the actual rhythm-based segment is not all that memorable is doomed from the start, but this isn’t the case: not in Soundfall’s case, anyway.

OCTOPATH TRAVELER 0 is a damn good JRPG. The world, despite my grievances with the main story, is interesting and fun to explore when the game lets you. Wishvale’s rebirth’s best parts aren’t the uninteresting city building but, again, the stories of the characters within. With great music and visuals accompanying all this, you can’t go wrong with SQUARE ENIX’s latest turn-based title.

Two Point Campus is a robust, accessible and unique simulation game that SEGA and Two Point Studios can be proud of. Two Point Museum is definitely recommended for fans of accessible simulation/management games.

While the level design is serviceable and the budget of the game clearly shows in things like the UI, the combat flows very well once you get a hang of it and the game is always giving you more monstrosities to slash into ribbons. Morbid: The Lords of Ire might not be the best soulslike I’ve played, but it’s absolutely one of the better games in the genre. And considering it’s not launching as a full-priced game, it’s hard not to recommend the game for fans of the genre looking for something similar but still fun enough to have a good time.

A distinct lack of it’s own identity, a bit of jank, some uneven performance and a lack of online multiplayer perhaps doesn’t make it into an essential buy, but if you’re nostalgic for FlatOut games, or just the arcade racer attitude of the 00’s and are able to put up with some of the jank, you will surely have a lovely time in Trail Out.

Playing Tales of Graces f again gives me a chance to reflect on the game’s story, which I enjoyed more so in my last playthrough some eight years ago. But I enjoyed running through the game’s campaign way more than Vesperia’s (which is nothing but a blur to me) thanks to fun cast members with a great English dub and an incredibly fun combat system. Don’t go into Tales of Graces f Remastered expecting deep worldbuilding and level design and I think you’ll have a lot of fun that way.

Vessel of Hatred has a great start, mediocre middle, and frustrating ending. The Spiritborn class is a fantastic addition, along with the new Mercenary system. At $40 if you’re in it for the story you may come out as frustrated as I am, but if gameplay is all you care about then there’s a lot to love.

My verdict? This isn’t just a retro release—it’s a tribute. To the creativity of the 90s, to the risks developers took, and to a mascot who still puts a smile on people’s faces. It may not be flawless—but it is, without question, the purrfect way to experience Bubsy.

In short, Monopoly (2024) is hardly an essential buy for those who already own other Monopoly videogames. In a vacuum, however, it does most everything right to be a solid digital recreation of this iconic, friendship-breaking board game.

Ultimately, Let’s Sing 2024 revamps multiple features of the game, offering a more complete and varied experience. The Career mode functions as a great singing school of sorts, and the new online modes create a sense of community and competition not found in prior episodes. Shame then that the starting list of 20 songs is, for my tastes, not on par with last year’s title, and that the new VIP membership is a step backwards for the game’s monetization. But for fans of karaoke, it’s hard to recommend a better new game on market.

Tribes of Midgard is a large number of simple systems that work well with their co-op focus. The new survival mode makes solo play a Hel of a lot more appealing, as well. Retailing for a very reasonable $20 US this one is worth checking out if you have a group of friends interested in it.

Flintlock: The Siege of Dawn is a lot of fun if you engage with all of it. At first, I was flying through the main quest before I slowed down and explored every inch of each map. Once I made that change I went from enjoying my time to loving it. It’s not the tightest game out there, but it has a lot of great ideas that come together for a package well worth experience.

There’s a lot to like about Ara: History Untold, even with the rough edges that appear every so often. Barring some performance issues, I’d say anyone even a little curious about the genre should give the game a shot and try it for themselves (especially if you have Xbox Game Pass). As for those of you with hundreds of hours in 4X games? Well, Civilization VII is still months away and Ara is a worthwhile competitor in the space and so I highly recommend playing at least a few games during this wait. Who knows, maybe you’ll find yourself with a new favourite in the genre…

Trepang2 is a title that tries to recapture the magic of the classic F.E.A.R. franchise, managing to mimic certain aspects well, even improving upon them, while also failing to do so in others. The action-packed gameplay is mighty spectacular and incredibly satisfying when fighting against other soldiers, much less so when it’s against generic zombie-like enemies, flying mobs, or bullet sponge bosses, whose mechanics very much negate the perks of the shooting mechanics themselves. Likewise, the game’s execution of a horror mystery is a bit weak, especially compared to the great original F.E.A.R. game, with a very basic execution of horror tropes and no interesting characters to speak of. Yet, with some of the most satisfying shooting on the market and a surprising amount of customization and cheat codes, Trepang2 is still worth a shot, whether you’re a fan of the franchise it’s inspired by or just a fan of exciting first-person shooters.

After a slow start Loot River really grew on me.

Its relatively limited budget is felt in many ways, with various invisible walls, flawed collisions and more to slightly hamper the experience. Yet, I thoroughly enjoyed my time with Twirlbound’s open world adventure, as its cute visuals, on point humor, infectious sympathy and solid gameplay loop kept me more than intrigued enough to keep pushing on, with the end credits rolling before the game’s relatively limited scope would start hurting. Keep an eye out for this one, as it’s a pretty fun ride.

Star Trucker can be as relaxing or sweaty as you like. While the main story’s writing wasn’t the best it was more than made up for by how solid the rest of the title is. It looks great, feels damned good to play, and I could see it easily becoming a new go-to podcast game for millions of Game Pass players.

Shoulders of Giants is a wonderful surprise. It’s a third-person action roguelike with a ton of heart. Great gameplay, stylish graphics, satisfying progression, and a killer soundtrack combine to create a game I loved spending time with. I know it’s great solo so as long as the co-op runs well this is a title you and your friends won’t want to miss.

I had a good time with Afterimage. Its levels got more and more interesting as you progressed, the characters you’d run into were well-acted and I liked the interactions Renee had with them. There’s a lot of game to go through with Afterimage, multiple endings in fact. And though I spent most of my time cheesing encounters because I could, and I take issues with the game’s presentation, there’s a strong gameplay loop that I think many players, especially those new to Metroidvania-style games, will enjoy in Aurogon Shanghai’s first venture into 2D action games.

Atomfall is best when it’s difficult. While I had a few issues with the story, my main concern is the crashing I experienced on Xbox. If that is smoothed out this one is an easy recommendation for those with patience. It can be brutal, but it’s oddly endearing and full of intrigue that’s well worth checking out.

Kotama and Academy Citadel is a good Metroidvania title that does its own thing when it comes to progression. Which is part of why I like the genre so much—the fact that there’s still so many ways to get players engaged with differing approaches to character upgrades, challenges, storytelling, and the like. Kotama’s game doesn’t always nail every aspect that same of the greats of the genre do, but I’d be lying if I said it didn’t have a solid combat system, boss fights, and excellent visuals and information relaying. This is a solid Metroidvania title to add to your ever-increasing backlog.

It is amazing how much passion was put into this project by its sole developer Matthias Linda and the artists involved. And you can see it permeate through the games gorgeous 16-bit visuals, accompanied by Eddie Marianukroh’s phenomenal score consisting of tempered orchestra and pleasing synthetic melodies. Despite my frustrations with the combat system, there’s a lot of good you’ll find in Chained Echoes. I can easily recommend this game for any Super Nintendo era role-playing game. A beautiful rose with a very sharp thorn.

DRAGON BALL Sparking! ZERO is a great 3D arena fighter. It’s got a sizeable roster, huge maps, and a fun combat system that I quite a bit of mileage out of over the weekend. A clumsy user interface and only one splitscreen map does suck the life out of the party a bit, but there’s still a great game here for Dragon Ball fans and arena fighter enthusiasts.

The DioField Chronicle is a great real-time strategy game for consoles. It controls well, the stages aren’t too long, and there’s enough mechanical depth to make stage replays interesting. Although I couldn’t be bothered with the game’s story, the scenes themselves don’t last long and all of it can be skipped at any point. I would have liked some more quality-of-life features such as always-on enemy range marking, but what’s missing hardly impacts the gameplay. This is a game I can recommend to tactics and JRPG fans alike.

While there’s not really a meaningful structure, plot or anything to work towards, especially for solo players, the mere skill ceiling to climb towards is a satisfying enough loop to guarantee plenty of hours of parkour, with the game’s physics and mechanics properly keeping up with the expectations of such a precise formula. Hardly a revolutionary or particularly memorable game, but it aims to do satisfying parkour first and foremost and it succeeds there. And that’s perfectly fine.

Despite the lack of quality of life features, however, GRANDIA HD Collection serves as a great way for players to play a set of excellent RPGs on modern platforms. Either games can be played to your liking at anytime and are great fun thanks to a solid combat system and presentation.

Kao the Kangaroo is a well-meaning game, and despite some missteps, it is in my opinion one of the better 3D platformers of modern gaming.

Lost in Random: The Eternal Die is a short, fun experience. It takes all the classic elements of the roguelite genre and meshes them into this world seamlessly. It’s well worth checking out whether at full price or via Game Pass.

Arcadegeddon might just secretly become my go-to co-op shooter for some time.

Turnip Boy Robs A Bank is a damned good time, that is just as long as it needs to be. Whether you’ve played the first game or not it is well worth checking out on Game Pass. Good looks, fun gameplay, and excellent music make it another solid addition to the platform.