Joe Apsey's Reviews
Cloudpunk is a fantastic sci-fi dystopia, with some great writing and voice-acting which helps bring the stories of the people of Nivalis to life. Whilst the experience can get a bit repetitive the excellence elsewhere ensures it is worth experiencing.
Fortnite on PS5 is an improvement with a lovely 4K resolution and useful and accurate haptic feedback. Activity Cards help players get to the Battle Royale mode they want easily, jumping in quickly without wasting a moment. Adaptive Triggers disadvantage you in Battle Royale but are a nice addition in Save The World. Fortnite is still the same game, albeit with some nice quality of life changes on Sony's new console.
Curse of the Dead Gods' mechanics work together and mesh excellently, with the dark oppressive narrative and atmosphere really creating a unique gameplay experience, with the features on offer. A lot of variation and the ability to tune your character helps it stand out during the less enjoyable difficulty spikes the game suffers with towards the end.
We Were Here Too is a great sequel and really elevates the unique mechanics the franchise offers. Despite a difficulty spike on one puzzle and some wonky looking cutscenes, We Were Here Too is worth a play and really shows the potential for this series and more co-op games in the future.
Offering a spine-chilling and creepy setting and atmosphere, Mundaun is a great experience that doesn't feel like anything I have played before. Its gameplay systems all blend together surprisingly well and it is just the right length. The strengths help alleviate some of the issues I had, but even with those present, it is well worth a play for fans of the genre.
Narita Boy feels like a completely unique experience and the first step for a new collection of games based around this digital aesthetic. The soundtrack here is flawless and the way everything plays into its setting and narrative is just as good. The gameplay might slog at times and not quite hit the mark, but Narita Boy is something you shouldn't miss.
Despite a few issues with a lack of upgrades in some areas, Saint’s Row The Third Remastered is a great way to dip your shoes back into the franchise and remember why Saint’s Row 3 helped the series find an identity, allowing it to go on to do bigger and better things in Saint’s Row IV.
Hot Wheels Unleashed is one of the best arcade racers to release on modern consoles in years.
Guardians of the Galaxy shines when it focuses on the characters and the world around them. It might not be the most innovative game this year, but it excellently executes the tried-and-true linear action-adventure formula to deliver a great single-player experience.
Just Cause 4 is an enjoyable ride with a memorable and exciting campaign, full of thrilling gameplay moments. However, the rest of the game is a compilation of outdated mission design and poor technical performance. My advice: stick to the campaign for a fun fifteen hours and forget about everything else.
Sniper Elite V2 Remastered is a solid remaster that allows you to experience the campaign, DLC levels, and visceral, satisfying shooting the game is known for again in 2019. Some aspects of the game have not seen much of an upgrade if any upgrade at all, with the game's AI and the audio system showing its age. Despite that, the game is an enjoyable way to hop back into Rebellion's classic franchise.
A short and satisfying dungeon crawler with a litany of skins and crazy weapon designs to unlock and slash at a variety of enemies with. Co-op makes it a great family game when you combine it with how easy the game is. It may be a little long for how simple it is, but there is still a great five-to-eight hour experience here.
Gunfire Games have created a deep looter shooter, with meaningful rewards and tough bosses, combined with a fascinating world packed with lore and story reveals that are worth experiencing. Remnant is a replayable, bitesize adventure that I will be hopping back into again and again. However, the PS4 version at launch is marred by frame rate drops, crashes, and a few fights that feel broken and unbalanced.
Etherborn is a great and unique puzzle-platformer with some smart level design and gorgeous views, thanks to its colourful, yet simple art style. It is a tad short and I would have liked to see a little bit more experimentation; however, Etherborn is clearly one of the better, more rewarding puzzle games in recent memory and well worth a playthrough.
Whilst the environments of Reisum and the bosses in the Subject 2923 DLC are some of the best in the game, the opening of the DLC and the overall package doesn't feel like a satisfying end to Remannt's story, making it a fine add-on for hardcore players, but not offering much reason for lapsed players to come back.
Just Dance 2021 contains one of the best tracklists the franchise has ever had and makes meaningful improvements to the World Dance Floor and communicating players' performance to them while they dance. However, some childish maps and poor choreographies bring this tracklist down slightly. The core gameplay here is still good and I hope next year Ubisoft is able to fix some of the key issues this game clearly had being developed under COVID-19 restrictions.
We Were Here feels like a first outing but its unique co-op puzzle-solving gameplay immediately gets its hooks into you and offers an experience unlike anything else on the market. A few blemishes from a restricted budget show themselves every now and again, but the gameplay is most important and We Were Here is a solid launching bed for the two sequels.
Judgement is a fine and serviceable port of the PS4 game, but apart from enhanced visuals and 60 FPS gameplay, the overall experience doesn't feel that much more enhanced than what you saw on PS4. This is definitely the way to play for newcomers but those who have already seen Yagami's journey through shouldn't worry about missing much here.
Days Gone on PC is an impressive technical upgrade from the PS4 version, running flawlessly and looking gorgeous, thanks to the increased detail. The game still has major flaws and is largely uninteresting and bland, but the tick-box formula and amount to do will grab some people. That said, don't expect PlayStation and Sony's typical great narrative and gameplay the brand is known for.
Technically Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart is a PS5 showstopper, offering stunning graphics and set pieces that make use of the PS5's SSD, while also looking like the best animated movie we have ever seen. But, although combat is fun, the narrative of Rift Apart really drags down the experience, not treating its characters with respect and not meaningfully progressing the story for long time fans and leaving newcomers confused. Rift Apart is a fun ride, but ultimately not one you will be talking about for years to come.