Reviews
110
While I would love to see what the developers at Insomniac Games can do once they’ve really figured out the power of the PS5 and perhaps the direction they want to take this franchise in, Rift Apart is, at the very least, a very good time that occasionally flirts with greatness.
There’s really no other game quite like New Pokémon Snap. It’s a nature-photography arcade game whose gameplay feels pure and simple and yet is wholly unique at the same time. There’s maybe no better way to immerse yourself in the wild world of Pokémon—the lovable creatures have never looked so good.
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury is a no-brainer purchase for anyone who has yet to experience one of Mario’s most imaginative adventures. The Nintendo Switch version might not introduce a lot that wasn’t already here before, but both the base game and Bowser’s Fury are primed to delight players of all ages seeking two distinct flavors of pawsome platformer.
I know that many would complain about there not being enough in the way of traditional gameplay if the puzzle sections were reduced, but I think The Medium as an even more narrative-focused experience would be more effective overall.
Hitman 3 doesn’t do too much to improve on its predecessors or the Hitman formula in general, choosing to instead emphasize the features and elements that always made the series great, while showing them off through some of the best and most intricately constructed maps the series has seen so far.
This is a game with a strong sense of identity, and that’s something that you can’t say about a lot of AAA open-world games these days.
Such as it is, though, Shadowlands’ endgame content offers such a massive improvement over BfA that you’re actually hearing longtime WoW players sound excited about playing the game again. That’s an accomplishment in and of itself, even if it sometimes feels like Blizzard is still working on what the ideal modern WoW experience really looks like.
Unfortunately, for every one thing Immortals does right, it does five things wrong. The various armors that you collect are all pretty cool looking and come with unique stat buffs, but unlocking them often requires you to solve tedious puzzles, which again, are no fun for a litany of reasons. I really wanted to like this game—it reminded me of ’90s games like ActRaiser with its art style and arcade-y action.
The core gameplay loop remains largely the same throughout and might not change much outside of upgrading characters, yet by placing a greater emphasis on story and cleverly integrating elements from the established canon in smart mechanical ways, this hack-and-slash adventure easily surpassed my expectations. Knowing how this story ends doesn’t make the events leading up to it any less thrilling.