Frankly, this game just isn’t very good.

This feels like it’s a cheap Gamerscore game, but it’s neither cheap enough or easy enough to get the full 1000 achievement points. If you can get this for a couple of bucks on sale it might be worth frilling away your time, but even then I’d say give this game a pass.

This is a decent time waster, that’ll get you a bunch of Gamerscore. It’s not a good game, but it’s cheap, and you’ll see your numbers go up. Sometimes that’s all you need out of a couple of bucks and thirty minutes of your time.

Although TRANSIRUBY isn’t particularly evocative, it’s a solid Metroidvania through and through. Completion is a couple of hours, and its slow pacing makes it a game that I can recommend to beginners of the genre.

Hogwarts Legacy borrows a lot of design choices and ideas from other open world titles, and yet, it creates a truly unique product unlike any title in the genre, with a true focus on world-building rather than non-stop combat encounters; and it’s a title that should be experienced, even by those who aren’t Potter fans at all.

The idea of cleaning, repairing, and building ancient European houses and castles was an appealing one. Unfortunately, Castle Renovator fails to be enjoyable by any metric.

Fashion Police Squad is smart, plays pretty well, and doesn’t overstay its welcome. It’s priced at $20 on Steam, and if that holds true for the Xbox launch then this one is an easy recommendation for any lover of first-person shooters and fashion.

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.

The Pathless has a nice visual design and cleverly designed puzzles to solve. The movement mechanic is different but may not be to everyone’s taste and could even be off-putting for some. My main issue is that once gameplay has been established in the first and second sections it is pretty much repeated for the remainder of the game. I am sure that there are people out there (completionists especially) who will love this game as it is, but I cannot help but feel that a bit more inventiveness and a less cliché story would have made it much better.

Inkulinati is now available in Game Preview and on Game Pass, and it’s already a very unique turn-based strategy game. The game’s visuals fall into the surprisingly popular recent trend of medieval art, such as the one found in Pentiment, yet offering a compelling combo where players are tasked with assembling a deadly army of anthropomorphic animal soldiers – all this with a highly replayable campaign, much to unlock and even a PvP mode, though that one’s unfortunately limited to local play only. This is a review in progress because the game itself is in development still, but fans of turn-based strategy should absolutely keep an eye on this one.

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.

The Dead Space Remake has no flaws for me. It took one of my favorite franchises and reinvented it perfectly. It is stunning to look at, and every single change or addition they made works. This remake is a masterpiece and I hope that this is the rebirth that the Dead Space franchise deserves.

At its core, OddBallers is a fun game with an engaging gameplay loop and good enough variety to last for a while, but with little marketing, a seemingly nigh non-existent playerbase and some technical woes it’s hard to recommend this one just yet, unless you’re guaranteed have a group of friends to play with.

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake is the best SpongeBob game ever. There’s a lot of love that went into this project and you really feel it as you jump, swing, and kick about. A solid pick up for platforming and SpongeBob fans alike, this game is an example of what game software for children (and licensed property) should strive to be.

Hi-Fi RUSH came out of nowhere and floored me. It is one of my favorite-looking games, maybe ever. The combat is sublime, the story is great, and the music just works. Tango Gameworks has shifted from making ok to good horror games and created one of my favorite action platformers of all time.

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.

It is a faithful 1:1 port of the mobile game, for better or worse. The controls work well in the end but did require some time to get used to. At only $10 at launch, it’s an easy purchase if you’re already a fan or someone new to the series. Here’s to hoping that this is just the start of the franchise porting over to consoles.

I think I would have preferred to have more conversations to read as opposed to playing the minigames, but I also think Salamander County covers an odd gaping hole once filled by Xbox Live Indies or Newgrounds games. You’ll likely not open this game again after you’ve stopped playing, but it could keep your nieces and nephews entertained for a moment. And of course, an easy thousand Gamerscore—likely my third time pulling off such a feat!

Its initial teasers promised a gorgeous magical world full of incredible sites. Instead, we’ve been given something boring, that runs terribly and has a story full of overused tropes.

If you love the idea of taking a floppy tube, pointing it at something hot, and spraying all over it until everything is cold and you’re filled with regret then FireFighting Simulator – The Squad can be done alone, but it’s far better with some friends.

Need For Speed Unbound, even at its launch, is certainly rather packed with content. The story sees the player throughout 4 weeks of days and nights throughout many events, some mandatory and most optional, with players always being able to decide how many seen-before events they wanna rush through again for some extra cash. With tons of unlockable and upgradable cars, a robust if uninspired multiplayer and an open world with plenty of things to do, Unbound’s unlikely to last you less than a couple dozen hours, unless you get bored before the end credits of course. But boredom isn’t what I’d associate with the latest installment in this everlasting franchise: Need For Speed has found its identity, and while a few concepts require some finetuning, it’s the best episode in a long while and one of the most stylish and generally finest racers of the generation thus far.

For twenty whole dollars this game is simply a fantastic deal, and one I can easily recommend to any Xbox player, JRPG fan or not. It’s launching on Game Pass too, so there’s no excuse. After all these years, this game still holds up. Hold the lattes for a few days and pick up Persona 4 Golden—you won’t regret it.

For Xbox players, Persona 3 Portable is an amazing game. And despite this version’s flaws, I implore you to give it a go.

Monster Hunter Rise benefits from a tighter focus and massive quality-of-life improvements over its predecessors. The performance is excellent, and your hunts are more enjoyable than ever. With it releasing day one on Game Pass it’s a world worth visiting by yourself or with some buddies.

GRIME is a series of good to great-pieces that are slightly held back by performance issues. Depending on when you’re reading this review I hope those are fixed because this game is fantastic. It’s beautiful, ugly, terrifying, and something any Metroidvania Soulslike fan should love.

Prison Simulator is $20, and I can’t recommend it. While it may be halfway decent on PC control wise it is a mess on console. There is not a single part of the game that is enjoyable to play, and even if it was the overall structure grew stale after a couple of hours of gameplay. This is one Simulation to stay far away from.

It runs terribly on consoles and feels awful to play. The overall setup and amount of content is its best point, but in execution, it simply isn’t fun.

Aery Path of Corruption is only $10, and even at that price, it’s too much. It is an ugly, boring, poorly paced, and thought-out fever dream of a game that even the most freakish feather head would do their best to avoid.