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It’s indicative of the game’s clear messaging that despite multiple car crashes, a delirious dream sequence, a high-stakes infiltration, and more, the moment that most stands out is a relatively quiet one: Trevor sitting at a piano, playing an original piece that he’s composed. For all the time spent controlling him up to that point, this is the first time where Angela, and by extension the player, can see him as an independent person, one capable of making his own decisions (in this case, his art). That glimpse of his humanity is a moving little flourish that attests to American Arcadia’s belief that we all deserve freedom from coercion and an unreal life.
That’s how so much of Thirsty Suitors feels to play: stylish to look at and perhaps pleasurable in the moment yet ultimately quite shallow. As a whole, it’s a bundle of middling mechanics carried by strong writing. The story may be about Jala coming to terms with her past while she figures herself out, but the game itself never settles on a cohesive vision of what it should be.
The aha-moment click of solving a puzzle is consistently satisfying, and on that level alone, The Talos Principle 2 delivers in spades. But where it soars is in the way that the discrete parts introduced throughout the game slowly begin to come together, revealing something akin to one massive, interlocking bit of machinery. If you buy into the game’s conceit, that humans are themselves machines, then these aha moments are more than just the thrill of accomplishment and more like a celebration of our inquisitive humanity and capacity for growth.
Move It! can only be played in an environment where players are able to move around freely, as there’s no portable option available. Since the Switch’s biggest technical innovation is its ability to inhabit both the handheld and home console sphere, one can’t help but feel like, by avoiding the alternative, Intelligent Systems is trying to take the easy way out here and simply build on what it’s done before. But the developer has only provided a slight variation of a better, more thought-out experience. Ultimately, Move It! ends up sharing far too many similarities with its overweight, zigzag-shaped mustachioed protagonist, as both are crude, frequently annoying, at times entertaining, and, above all, carbon copies of something else that’s far more polished.
Once we stop sharing in Yasna’s discoveries, the storytelling never quite clicks. Apart from a few stiff flashbacks, players simply don’t get to know enough about Yasna’s fellow researchers to get invested in how their fate drives her search for answers. Yasna’s quest feels detached rather than desperate, with all the game’s themes coldly laid out in dialogue choices. The Invincible does remain reasonably engrossing through to the end, but it never recaptures the interactive vigor of its first half, eventually becoming a bout of scientific calculus on autopilot.
Still, at the center of it all remains Kazuma Kiryu, a genuinely good man caught in the throes of a vicious career. Even with the series ready to move on without him as protagonist—no disrespect to everybody’s new favorite himbo, Ichiban Kasuga, who’s positioned to be our hero going forward—Gaiden makes a stronger than expected case for why and how he’s endured so much, and deserves a better ending than the old life has been willing to give him.
In practice, Remedy has seemingly harnessed every game design trick in the book to present Alan and Saga’s fractal realities in all their abstract and frightening glory.
Though Jusant gets a bit fanciful in its last level, abandoning its natural elements for an astronomical excursion, the rapturous feeling of climbing the seemingly unclimbable continues to drive the game forward. This is where Jusant’s deliberate, precise mechanics are so vital, as the more responsive the controls, the more responsible players are for each outcome. Nothing is impossible, the game suggests. You just have to take it one step at a time.
But all that feels incongruent with the game’s source material. Perhaps it’s a bit naïve to hope that any social commentary can survive decades of franchising, but Rogue City’s handling of RoboCop leaves hardly a trace of his origins as a commentary on police violence and militarization. All the time you spend clomping around the faithfully rendered interior of the police station is in service of selling the cops as a force for good, with RoboCop’s actions emphatically meant to make the world a better place. There’s even a dialogue option to call the police a “family,” now totally decoupled from standard sci-fi corporate malfeasance. Rogue City has clearly put a lot of thought and effort into replicating the world of this character, but it does so within a mechanical and narrative framework that never quite fits.
The score, composed by Chris Detyna, Jakub Gawlina and Leszek Górniak, impresses with fresh instrumentation and variations on Brad Fiedel’s powerful theme. Of particular note is a gorgeous acoustic rendition scoring the credits and one of multiple sex scenes, calling back to the original film. But Resistance is more than just hollow fan service or wish-fulfilment for a worn-down fanbase, as it stands out as an engaging first-person action-adventure. And, with this remaster, it gets a second wind as a truly “complete” experience.
Thankfully, every inch of Wonder is bursting with personality, from Mario squeezing through a pipe after eating an Elephant Fruit to your being able to place cardboard cutouts to mark a path for others online and in co-op. That this short and relatively easy game never forces you to master (or even use) abilities like a grappling hook or gliding cap speaks to just how much it’s trying to do, but such minor flaws don’t come at the expense of joy. Wonder is a platforming playground for all ages that, at its best, redefines Mario’s world as one of unlimited potential.
In Spider-Man 2, we have the most elevated idea of what a AAA open-world game could be. Insomniac’s New York City isn’t an empty place for the player to destroy at will, Peter and Miles aren’t audience ciphers, and the story isn’t there for padding. Great power has been employed to bring this world to life on a scale unprecedented, even for AAA games. Insomniac’s great responsibility was in filling that world with life, love, and something even Peter’s Uncle Ben forgot to imbue his nephew with, and most games of this type must aspire to emulate: Insomniac’s Spider-Man sequel is a game driven by great purpose.
At its most mundane, Jack’s travels let players float through beautifully rendered sci-fi hellscapes with steps light enough to walk on water. And at its most astonishing and electric, this is a game of balletic death-dealing that may demand perfection but rewards persistence like very few other games in recent memory.
Umbral is a beautiful dark twisted fantasy, and then there’s all of Axiom to explore as well. The developers have made the most of these realms, layering distinct challenges atop one another. And the result is the best of both worlds: Axiom’s dense, gothic world (and its interconnected twin in Umbral) and a second life with which to better appreciate the masocore combat.
Compared to just how expansive MK11 felt even at launch, MK1 feels a bit like Street Fighter V at launch. At least this game has a full-fledged campaign and Arcade style modes with fully voiced endings, but there’s a similar feeling of emptiness about it. That’s a bad vibe to get, especially for the first major fighting game to launch in Street Fighter 6’s shadow. There’s plenty of room for MK1 to expand, but as it stands, Mortal Kombat just tested its might on another reboot and may have broken something unnecessarily in the process.
That El Paso, Elsewhere works at all as a drama is a huge achievement. It tackles weighty topics with a maturity that’s rare in gaming, and which is all the more impressive given that it does so within the framework of a shooter that suggests a Halloween attraction as curated by John Woo. It’s emblematic of the game as a whole—a bizarre amalgamation of parts that shouldn’t work yet manages to form something cohesive, soulful, weird, and deeply personal.
Mirage ought to have been more than the dim illusion of where the series has already traveled.
Every step of the way is littered with details big and small that absolutely sing, from the way that you can see the solution for a problem reflected in a puddle at your feet, to the ways the aphids and fireflies floating through these strange new worlds coalesce into funny little helpers along the way. Even with a phobia of everything this world was made to embody, it’s hard to not become transfixed by the beauty and enormity of it all.
Trepang2’s default control scheme even neglects to map the crucial slide maneuver to any button, only triggering when you crouch while sprinting. This can be changed in the options menu, but the oversight speaks to how the game, which launched on PC back in June, hasn’t been rebalanced particularly well for its console release. As frustrations mount with the final level’s poor autosave and maddening boss fight, it becomes clearer than ever that a console is far from the ideal venue to experience this flawed yet inspired shooter.
On the other hand, Lies of P’s refusal to dish out any significant discomfort lowers the stakes considerably, so that you’re never pushed to engage with the game’s mechanical limits. As a result, everything from its level layouts to its boss fights to its jump scares don’t get seared into your brain out of repetition or necessity. It’s why, unlike Dark Souls, Lies of P is so easy to stick with. But it’s also why, unlike Dark Souls, you might forget it in a year.