HIGH Adorable slimes and fantastical environments.

LOW The frustrating progression system.

WTF The ethics of my “ranch”.

All the way back in 2016 I picked up a Humble Bundle containing the original Slime Rancher and tried it on a whim. Stardew Valley had only just been released and the indie farming mania had yet to fully take effect. So, while it had some problems, Slime Rancher felt fresh and I was quite taken by it thanks to the whimsical charm of the Far Far Range, filled with all its gelatinous inhabitants. Many hours were spent enjoying the feeling of discovery as I explored new areas, built up my ranch and let it devolve into Dickensian work standards as overcrowded cells of slimes generated income for my capitalist vices.

Over eight years later, Slime Rancher 2 finally got its full release and I was eager to get back and start rounding up some colorful creatures. After finally making my way through the main content, let’s just say I have some thoughts…

To set the scene, the player reprises the role of Beatrix LeBeau, an intrepid slime rancher who has made her way to a new land with a conservatory most could only dream of, ripe for turning into a brand new Slime Ranch. Alongside is her trusty ‘Vacpack’ — a gun capable of sucking in and firing out nearby food, slimes and the occasional decorative pot.

The system is quite simple — catch a slime, feed it food and out plops a ‘plort’ which can be sold for sweet, sweet cash. Different slimes have different food preferences and conditions needed to keep them, so if the player wants to “catch ‘em all” they’ll need to expand their ranch with a number of different environments. Amateur geneticists can also crossbreed slimes by feeding them each other’s plorts (I would advise not dwelling too deep on this) creating a larger and feistier, but also more profitable Largo Slime.

For the first act of the campaign I was enjoying myself as the trappings feel immediately similar to the original Slime Rancher. I was a little disappointed to find the majority of slimes were reused from the first game, but SR2 manages to maintain the same whimsy and comical interactions as slimes bounce around looking for food and bumping into each other. The initial areas are relatively colorful and diverse, and the player will have some immediate goals to fill out the ranch and get a few key upgrades.

On that note, Slime Science is back from the original and has a much larger role to play. Alongside stockpiling plorts, the player will need special science materials that randomly spawn around the map. Initially this added an element of excitement as I stumbled across rare resources and hurriedly carried them back to base. (Slime Rancher 2 assumes the player loves running, by the way — it forces them to do it a lot!)

One of the main areas Slime Rancher 2 has evolved is in the use of this Science to unlock both utilities and decorations. Warp devices move people and resources, utilities to help recover health or stamina, and aesthetic pieces liven up the ranch and bring it to life.

Overall, there’s a lot to like here. Slime Rancher 2 is split into two distinct acts, and the first is certainly a continuation of the original formula. Act 2, or “The Grey Labyrinth”, is where the story truly starts — and frankly, I consider this section to be actively harmful to the overall experience. Judging by player reviews I might be in the minority, so allow me to defend myself.

As I made my way further out from my main base, the sheen started to wear off as trekking through the same landscapes time after time became frustrating. There are a couple of portals and shortcuts that help skip some of the journey, but the ability to create teleporters is locked until almost the very end of the game. An issue, since Slime Rancher 2‘s primary focus becomes less about ranching and more about exploring as the adventure progresses.

Worse, there are not one, not two, but three RNG resource grinds in order to get to endgame, which just means running around in circles to find the needed items — and maybe I’m just going crazy, but I’d swear the RNG odds decrease for areas that have already been explored until time passes to reset them. This often resulted in me having to go back to base and do a long runback to grind more resources because I hadn’t found all the rare spawns I needed.

With limited stamina that takes slightly too long to recover, these grindy late game utility unlocks, and lack of focus on the actual ranching, Slime Rancher 2‘s second half was not a great time. Achieving these goals were often met with relief that I didn’t have to grind further or deal with frustrating mechanics any longer, rather than being excited about finally getting a cool, new toy. It’s just not enjoyable, and feels like such a weird design choice in an otherwise cozy title.

It’s not all bad in the back half, though. The later stages do feature the most impressive environments the series has to offer, and numerous times I stopped in awe to admire the scene before me. The dynamic soundtrack is also consistently good throughout. Some of the new slimes have interesting designs and quirks that immediately made me want to add them to the collection. The story… well, the story doesn’t actively detract from things and does justify some interesting world events and settings.

Ultimately, Slime Rancher 2 is a strange beast. On paper it has everything the original does, and more. More slimes, more unlocks and more imaginative environments. Sadly, the frustrations overshadowed many of those positives for me, as many of the new additions actively work against the tone of the experience. Quicker access to fast travel or unlimited stamina would go a long way to easing these complaints, and make me feel less like my time was being wasted.

I’ve been rather negative on its latter sections, but for those who enjoyed the original Slime Rancher, it manages to hit many of the same pleasant notes — but maybe have a guide handy to minimize the travel and grinding. 

— Adam Sharman

Rating: 6 out of 10

Buy Slime Rancher 2 – PC – PS – XB

Disclosures: This game is developed by Monomi Park and is self published. It is currently available on PC, PS and XB. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC. Approximately 15 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There is currently no multiplayer option.

Parents: The game has an ESRB rating of E10+ due to Fantasy Violence. Evil slimes known as Tarr that will consume friendly slimes are able to be toggled off on game start, however the player can still be damaged and bitten. All “fighting” is done by launching enemies away or shooting them with water. 

Colorblind Modes: There is no colorblind mode.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game does not offer subtitles, but there is no audible dialogue — all story is conveyed via text. (See example above.) Slimes do make noises but they do not affect gameplay with the exception of the lucky slime which does have a jingle to indicate its presence. Without a matching visual cue, it is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls on both keyboard and controller.

The post Slime Rancher 2 Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Speed. High body count.

LOW No real story. It’s a one trick pony… but it’s a good trick.

WTF My adrenaline and focus levels.

One of the first games I ever sat down to write a full review on was Severed Steel. It’s a first-person shooter from solo developer Greylock Studios, where the player controls the titular Steele — a one-armed woman with a penchant for parkour and over-elaborate gunplay. Sure, there was a SUPERHOT-esque story presentation, but frankly I was too busy having a blast slow-mo diving through window frames and throwing empty guns at foes to be concerned with it. Three years later we see the release of Greylock Studios’ next project, Echo Point Nova, which asks one simple but tantalizing question:

“That great stuff again, but what if we added a hoverboard?”

Ok, that’s not the only change, but Echo Point Nova is very much doubling down on the DNA of its predecessor. While the more cramped cyberpunk superstructure of Severed Steel has been changed to a vast open-world, the overall goal remains the same — go fast and kill everything.

Upon starting, I wake up in some sort of crash pod and am swiftly informed that my mission is to “investigate the planet” and “kill bad guys. Thousands of bad guys”. Any narrative foundation is almost instantly forgotten as I step forward and grab my revolver. Echo Point Nova is not something to be played for the story, as what little story and lore is present mainly serves as a vehicle for the developer to bring the player up to speed and point them in the right direction. From there the map is revealed to be a sprawling setting of floating islands that almost all contain some sort of battle and reward.

Now when the player is presented with a big map, minimal story and a whole lot of combat, the combat and movement need to be great to compensate for the lack of other traditional features, and I’m happy to report Echo Point Nova succeeds on both fronts. The hoverboard’s overly slick movement can take a bit of getting used to, but as the player unlocks more jumps and grapples they will find that riding along the ground begins to feel more like an optional extra rather than a given as they maintain momentum by slingshotting around loose bits of rock and riding along walls. 

Movement doesn’t just serve as a way to carry the player between fights and hunt down collectibles, though — it’s also their main means of defense. Anytime I found myself stuck in a corner without a plan, a flurry of bullets would quickly deplete my health bar. It’s an effective system to keep the player moving and maintain adrenaline levels, as slowing down is frequently punished. 

Onto the combat. Does firing an RPG, grappling the rocket into the sky, flipping upside down in slow motion, pulling out a sniper rifle and popping goons sound like a good time? If not then we clearly have very different ideas of entertainment. The combat is the meat of the experience, feeling heavily inspired by the frantic speed-based style of shooting inspired by works like Quake or Tribes: Ascend, and I adore it. 

As someone who usually enjoys a slow-paced tactical shooter, I was concerned I might have trouble adjusting to the constant movement required for success, but found myself adapting quickly. For anyone in the same camp, Echo Point Nova comes with a boatload of accessibility options, so the difficulty can be adjusted to suit the player. The masochists can crank it up to maximum with minimal health, while players who want to feel like a god can drop the difficulty down and play with unlimited slow motion.

Game environments are fully destructible, so when in doubt the player can make their own entrance or exit through terrain to find cover. However, I found this element to be a bit underutilized compared to Severed Steel, as any wall that takes more than one swing to break through would bring my momentum to a screeching halt.

The enemy and weapon variety are also both strong, with bosses being a particular standout. One of my favorite moments in Echo Point Nova was fighting one of the initial bosses,  gliding over sand dunes to launch a high speed assault against a mechanical worm, swinging through its interior to target weak points before shooting out the other side. I didn’t know that I wanted a crossover between Dune and Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater, but I’m not complaining in the slightest. Every fight ending with a gun or perk unlock to continually mix things up is just the cherry on top. 

Combat arenas opt for a minimalist look, with different islands on the map being sparsely populated by ruins or trees. This seems an intentional design choice, though, as it can already be a challenge to keep track of enemies on relatively open levels. The dynamic soundtrack has a fantastic mixture of chill, almost ethereal electronic tunes to accompany the player as they grapple through the clouds before shifting to slightly more animated and heavier tones for combat and boss encounters. It’s certainly more subtle than one might expect, but it always feels appropriate and punctuates the player’s actions nicely.

Echo Point Nova is a representation of what I love to see from an indie game. Take one key mechanic, polish it to a mirror sheen, and leave the player with a fantastic gameplay experience. It’s a worthy follow-up to an already adrenaline-filled experience, and it’s been getting continuous post-launch support including a whole new map with developer commentary.

If the idea of gunning down bad guys while kickflipping through the sky doesn’t appeal, then there’s nothing in Echo Point Nova that’s going to convert someone. For me, though, Echo Point Nova does exactly what it says on the tin and excels at it — and honestly, that’s enough to keep me coming back with each update to maintain my 100% completion.

Rating: 9 out of 10 

— Adam Sharman

Disclosures: This game is developed by Greylock Studio and is self-published. It is currently available only on PC. This copy of the game was obtained via paid download and reviewed on the PC.  Approximately 19 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was finished with 100% completion including post-launch content. 0 hours of play were spent in multiplayer mode. Up to 4 player co-op is available as a scaled version of the single player mode.

Parents: The game is not currently not rated by the ESRB. According to the developer it contains “stylized first person gun and melee combat, with blood splashes and blood wound decals on enemy character bodies.” There is a reduced blood option for those who are concerned but given the speed of the combat the blood is certainly not a focal point Echo Point Nova is still very focused around gun violence so parents should be advised.

Colorblind Modes: There is no dedicated colorblind mode although some colors can be manually changed.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game does not offer subtitles but there is no audible dialogue beyond enemy noises which do not impact combat. Minor story and lore dialogue are communicated via text. While these boxes can’t be traditionally scaled, they are static in the world so the player can get closer to them for a larger view.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls on both keyboard and controller. There is no diagram. Controls follow familiar first-person shooter norms. WASD controls movement with the mouse being used to aim and shoot. The number keys and mouse wheel can both be used to swap between weapons while familiar ancillary keys like F, Q and G are used for melee, grapples and ‘grenades’ respectively

The post Echo Point Nova Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Great use of Remedy’s Control aesthetic for a team shooter.

LOW Little interaction between the different weapon classes.

WTF Don’t ask about Sticky Ricky…

I don’t play many first-person shooters. However, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t excited at the prospect of a multiplayer shooter taking place in the Remedy connected universe (notable residents: Alan Wake and Control). It’s a universe that I love playing single-player titles in, so my interest was high. 

Unfortunately, the reality is that FBC: Firebreak fell far short of my expectations. It’s a weird experience like almost every Remedy title is, but its mechanics and gameplay quirks fall flat instead of standing out. 

Firebreak’s ask of players is to team up in a squad of three people and clock in for their shift at the Federal Bureau of Control, a fictional government agency that deals with all things ghostly and “paranatural.” In a new initiative called the Firebreak Protocol, FBC management sends teams out into the depths of FBC HQ to tackle the zombified masses of people known as the Hiss, as well as ghosts and strange happenings that have spiraled out of control. 

These missions vary in scope, but nearly all of them replicate the Control aesthetic to a T. The soulless, corporate interiors of various office floors were our playground, but more often they felt like killing floors. Each level is oppressive, contrasting most other titles in the genre that take a fantastical or slightly horrifying approach.

In this way, Firebreak takes a different path towards putting players on edge in a zombie shooter, and it’s the game’s biggest success. Rather than being the super-powered heroine of Control, Firebreak puts the player in the shoes of a regular guy with a gun and a home repair kit. The anxiety of going up against a threat that’s normally taken care of by an extraordinary individual is what kept me going. At its best, Firebreak offers the fast-paced excitement of a great Call of Duty: Zombies level, but it can’t maintain that tone. When it wanes, the material feels like the corporate exercises the title is trying to mock.

Each of the five selectable missions are different threats that teams need to clear in the Oldest House, an enigmatic building first shown in Control. Between destroying endlessly multiplying sticky notes to collecting larva from an alien in an office basement, the mission variety is theoretically there. However, these tasks start to get stale after replays of each mission, which are required to progress in the rewards system. These replays are also a great time to practice teamwork with other players, but so many of the roles and tasks that each player on a given team “should complete” often feel disconnected and superfluous.

Starting on the mission design, the way a mission begins is with all three players needing to complete a few tasks toward the overall goal. Sometimes that’s destroying haunted sticky notes, fixing panels on a giant furnace, or exorcising ghosts from the FBC. All the while, a crowd of Hiss zombies is attempting to kill every player while they’re trying to do their jobs.

The problem here is that these tasks often felt like filler to me. Sure, I had to go fix a few panels or load some alien specimens into a cart, but the best parts of the missions are killing the Hiss en masse. It makes the goals feel like hoops to jump through to unlock better gear, instead of being the “meat” of Firebreak. There are standout portions of each mission, sure, like the giant sticky note Sticky Ricky acting as a final boss, or the frantic sprint to load barrels and stop a giant furnace from going supernova. Sadly, there are few of these tremendous moments, and more tasks that boil down to clicking a sequence of buttons in a row to get to the next room.

The “roles” of Firebreak also don’t have implications for gameplay outside of doing the random tasks in each level. Each player is assigned one of three “Crisis Kits” before they play — a Fix Kit, complete with a wrench that can fix electrical panels, a Jump Kit, fitted with an electrical shocker that can charge up powered devices and electrify water, and the Splash Kit, a super soaker on a player’s back that can cleanse players of ailments like poison or burn. Theoretically, all three also have in-game combat uses, but they aren’t as strong as a player’s secondary gun. 

If you didn’t guess, the Splash Kit is about the only one that consistently pays off. I would consistently play using the Fix Kit and stick to it, but I wish I had used the Splash Kit more since it could heal damaged players. The problem is none of these kits seemed to matter when it came to deciding the ends of matches, and all of them should be reworked to have greater effects in combat.

Ultimately, Firebreak’s gameplay problem is that the gunplay in this supernatural team-based jaunt is the best portion of the experience — it isn’t a terrible problem to have, but it’s a sign that the missions and classes need design boosts to make them more relevant and compelling. 

Firebreak is a new direction in expanding Remedy’s connected universe, but the art direction and aesthetics can only do so much of the heavy lifting when the other aspects aren’t bringing as much to the table. The end result doesn’t stack up to the source material that inspired it, and to this Remedy fan, it could and should be so much better. 

Rating: 5.5 out of 10

Buy FBC: Firebreak – PC – XB- PS

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Remedy Entertainment. It is currently available on PC, Xbox Series X/S, and PS5. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and was reviewed on PC. Approximately 6 hours of play were devoted to the multiplayer mode, and each mission was completed at least once. There are no single-player modes.

Parents: This game is rated on the ESRB as T for violence, blood, and language. It contains gun violence killing non-human creatures.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Dear & Hard of Hearing Gamers: There are subtitles in the game that can be resized. The game is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: The game’s controls are fully remappable.

The post FBC: Firebreak Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Excellent worldbuilding. Engaging combat. Fantastic art direction.

LOW Frequent crashes and freezes, slow loading screens. Sparse, unpopulated areas.

WTF The way Vrann says “faces” sounds an awful lot like “feces.”

From the moment I stepped foot into my first dungeon, I was fully immersed in Questline’s Tainted Grail — a dark fantasy take on what can best be described as a “Scrollslike” due to its Elder Scrolls-adjacent gameplay with lore that borrows concepts, places and characters from the Arthurian mythos.

The adventure begins on the Island Asylum. It’s a vast, cavernous compound run by Red Priests who treat their inmates much as inquisitors would heretics, subjecting them to the rack and other means of torture as well as experimenting on them with an otherworldly force known as the Wyrdness.

Once the player finishes creating their character from a disappointingly short list of customizable features, a guard will approach the cell and ask them a series of questions to determine how they landed themselves in the dungeon. The player’s class is based on how they choose to respond. For instance, responding with “I was hunting” granted me the Ranger class, deadly with a bow and arrow.

After the player has been freed from their cell by a mysterious NPC, they’re free to explore the linear but dynamic dungeon where they’re presented with many opportunities to lockpick or crawl through tunnels. Along the way, they’ll encounter cells containing inmates afflicted by the Red Death (a plague with mysterious origins) who share some juicy lore bits with the player. There are also back rooms where they can beat down Red Priests and acquire loot before finally escaping and boarding a ship bound for the shores of Avalon.

This process of effectively rolling a character followed by the trope of escaping from a dungeon and setting out on the main quest will be familiar to longtime CRPG players. The similarities between Tainted Grail and The Elder Scrolls series in particular are countless, but more significant are the similarities in gameplay, worldbuilding and level design — and arguably, it improves on all three.

The gameplay is largely the same (first-person ARPG with the option to toggle third-person on and off) but the movement in Tainted Grail is surprisingly fluid and responsive, even on mouse and keyboard. The inclusion of mechanics like parrying and dodging, as well as a wide variety of interesting spells and powerful weapons — all equipped with light, heavy and charged attacks — make combat equally challenging and rewarding.

Things like upgrading weapons, using skill and ability points to buff the player’s build and gaining passive XP (the player can boost their agility level just by running) all manifest in a similar way to Scrolls but there are enough differences to function as quality-of-life updates to the formula established by Bethesda.

Being able to chop wood, dig for treasure, fish, mine for ore, forage for mushrooms, cook various dishes and brew potions (as one can also do in Scrolls) makes the resource-gathering aspect of Tainted Grail a bit more lifelike, although the places where one can handcraft weapons and armor or chop wood on chopping blocks were a little too rare.

The open world aspect of Grail was also a significant strength, as I felt like I could look at practically any distant point on the horizon and eventually be able to make my way to it. There always seemed to be a new path to explore, whether tucked away in a forest, in a cavern, or hiding in plain sight. If I got frustrated with an area, I could easily fast-travel somewhere else.

The level of creativity that’s gone into the art direction is remarkable, from the Giger-esque Archspires to vast highlands that rival the verdant beauty of Scotland. Speaking of which, it’s apparent that much of Grail is influenced by ancient Celtic culture — hence the presence of druids.

The druids were easily my favorite NPCs because of their many idiosyncrasies, such as one named Therrov who dabbled in alchemy but consistently botched his potions with one particularly humorous result: I had my PC imbibe one of his potions which caused his speaking voice to sound like a chicken until the effect finally wore off.

I felt rewarded by their change in demeanor as they went from being hostile to warm and appreciative once I helped their comrade in a quest, and I also admired their fierce loyalty to each other (mostly) in the face of total annihilation, as they were hounded by both the Red Priests and a certain Knight of the Round Table. Some of their lines of dialogue doubled as compelling lore dumps and heart-wrenching soliloquies about genocide, thanks to Grail‘s excellent writing and exceptional voice acting.

Though it was satisfying to continue to meet NPCs, explore the world and fill the map in, there was a point at which I felt Grail start to lose its magic — and partly, it was due to technical issues.

The concept art featured in the loading screens is gorgeous and horrific in equal measure, but one can only look at it for so long before the length of the load time erodes any enjoyment of the piece — and Grail‘s loading times are long. I would watch the clock as seconds turned to minutes, the pause in gameplay long enough to make me want to check my phone, and even after looking at emails and such, the game would still be loading.

Worse, nearly every time I tried to boot Tainted Grail up, it would either crash or take a lifetime to verify the integrity of its files. On a recent attempt, I had to download the latest patch (which took only a minute or two to install) but then had to wait for almost a half an hour for the integrity of the files to be verified before it finally started… and then immediately crashed.

The developers are clearly trying to address many of these issues by fixing bugs and adding slight changes and modifications, but the patches never seemed to do quite enough. Even after downloading the latest patch, I would run into weird glitches such as the afterimage of my short sword cutting in and out after sheathing it to enter dialogue. There’s also often stuttering in higher-density areas and sometimes combat will cause the game to freeze, which is especially frustrating during a boss fight.

All this leads me to say that I think that Tainted Grail could have benefited from more time in development even though it had already been a couple of years since the demo dropped. Though it often stumbles over the technical weight of its own creative ambition, Tainted Grail has the makings of a phenomenal RPG — but readers just might want to hold off until that weight has been lifted.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Buy Tainted Grail: The Fall of Avalon — PC

Disclosures: This game was developed by Questline and published by Awaken Realms. This game is currently available on PC, PS5 and XBS/X. It was obtained via the publisher and reviewed for PC. Approximately 10 hours were devoted to the campaign mode. The game was not finished. There is no multiplayer mode.

Parents: This game is not yet rated but it’s a dark fantasy RPG so one can expect a high level of graphic violence and gore, foul language and disturbing imagery.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game has subtitles for dialogue but no visual cues to warn the player of incoming attacks from the side or from behind, which makes it not fully accessible.

Remappable controls: The controls can be remapped.

The post Tainted Grail Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH The Tower of No Interval.

LOW The final encounter.

WTF Not sure a broken sword is the weapon of choice entering a Demon King’s maze.

Presented in a 4:3 aspect ratio with grainy polygonal art, Labyrinth of the Demon King is a near-perfect evocation of dark corners last seen since the mid-90’s.  Played from the first-person perspective, players will hack, slash and puzzle their way through dungeons and towers as a samurai on a quest to avenge their fallen lord by slaying the titular monarch.

Caked in muddy earth tones, monsters shiver through hazy, pixelated halls.  The occasional flash of red viscera gives depth to their dismembered, barely human figures as they limp and stumble after the player.  Their howls cut through fuzzy rain-patter, creating a world that is threatening and immediate despite its ostensible lack of visual fidelity.

A dungeon crawler with a dash of survival horror, the Labyrinth of the Demon King is not a happy place, and respite is all but non-existent.  As I slowly progressed through the foreboding castle, I found my senses more important than a steady sword hand.  A foot peeking out from a corner, or a shuffling in the darkness can tip off observant players to an imminent bushwhack.  While combat is generally fair and balanced, being caught unawares by a group of enemies will quickly exhaust even the most robust health bar.

When it comes to crossing blades with the labyrinth’s demonic denizens, combat is a rhythmic affair.  A slow-motion dance of thrusts and ripostes, even the quickest weapons feel heavy and sluggish.  Frantic, panicked swings, while instinctive given the macabre trappings, will result in rapid defeat as the samurai’s stamina is easily depleted.  Victory, then, becomes a matter of patience rather than reflex. 

Most attacks can be parried, and with long wind ups, enemy blows are effectively telegraphed.  A surprisingly accommodating parry window kept most of my frustration at bay — even when I hit the block button too quickly, I often had time to reset and try again before the monster’s claws made contact.  That’s not to say navigating the Labyrinth of the Demon King is easy, but so long as I didn’t panic, I generally felt well equipped to handle whatever the sinister overlord could dish out. 

For those moments where I overreached my ability, I was pleased to find the Demon King’s rebukes to be lenient.  Falling in battle means resurrecting at the last shrine players rested at.  Enemies respawn, and any resources expended in the fight are forfeit, but beyond that all progress is retained.  That being said, the final battle didn’t feel quite as well tuned as the rest of the fights.  With a more diverse moveset and stronger emphasis on reaction time, the climactic encounter is suitably dramatic. However, with a dozen or so retries, my eventual triumph wasn’t without some exasperation.

Light RPG elements further balance the scales with character progression tied to two primary attributes — strength and stamina.  Weapons can also be improved to stand up to the hardier members of the Demon King’s army, and while the selection of armaments is probably too wide given Labyrinth of the Demon King’s brevity, I’m not one to complain about too many choices.

Martial prowess alone is not sufficient for navigating the Labyrinth of the Demon King, though, and careful exploration plays a large part in the player’s survival. 

As the title implies, each of the main areas is a complex interweaving of rooms, halls and courtyards — losing one’s way is an inevitability.  While maps can be found for each floor, these handy aids are imperfect — passages that appear clear on the map are, in fact, obstructed while hidden paths and outdoor areas go unmarked altogether.  This setup results in a keen straddling of discovery and handholding.  Players are forced to learn levels by landmark, making mental notes of unlocked shortcuts with the map acting as a flawed safety net.

Forgoing punitive mechanics, Labyrinth of the Demon King builds tension through atmosphere and narrative.  While the overarching tale of revenge is standard fare, I found the flavor text throughout the world to be quite affecting.  One highlight is a note describing, in detail, the grisly consequences of defiling a Buddhist altar.  Shortly after finding this note, I encountered a character in possession of a key I needed to progress.  They agreed to help, but only after I desecrated the very altar I had been warned about.  I won’t spoil the outcome, but the author of that note could not be accused of understatement.  This kind of foreshadowing is found throughout Labyrinth of the Demon King and adds dreadful depth to its nasty, grimy styling.

Ultimately, Labyrinth of the Demon King is a canny mixture of aggressive posturing and subtly accessible mechanics.  I was surprised at how tense my experience was, despite the relative ease with which I traversed its halls.  Labyrinth of the Demon King manages to capture the abrasive essence of titles like Shadow Tower and Silent Hill but in a compact, easily digestible package.  The developer’s ability to achieve this balance is commendable and, as the samurai sits drinking matcha tea in the labyrinth’s one refuge, I am filled with a familiar warmth.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Buy Labyrinth of the Demon King – PC – PS – XB – SW

Disclosures: This game is developed by J.R. Hudepohl and published by Top Hat Studios. It is currently available on PC, PS4/5, XBO/X/S, and Switch. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS5. Approximately 8 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Suggestive Themes, and Violence. This is a horror game and most enemies are monsters or disfigured humans.  The player attacks enemies with weapons such as swords, clubs and guns. Enemies bleed when struck, staining walls and floors and can be dismembered.  Certain enemies require the player to stomp on their head repeatedly to kill them. Disturbing and creepy imagery is found throughout this game. Beyond the violence, there are references to sexual abuse in text notes found in the game.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: There is no vocalized dialogue in this game, and all character interactions are shown in text boxes. This text cannot be resized. This game makes use of audio to signal enemy presence, often when that enemy is not visible on screen.  One particularly dangerous enemy often spawns behind the player or outside of their field of view and is signaled through a specific auditory jingle.  None of these audio signals have accompanying visual cues, and I found myself taking damage more often when playing without sound. This game is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

The post Labyrinth Of The Demon King Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

The title delivers on its promise — I was gripping my mouse so hard by the end of it that my knuckles were literally white.

White Knuckle belongs to the “Getting Over It”  genre of difficult platformers where tons of progress can be lost in a moment. However, White Knuckle takes it a step further through the use of roguelite and horror twists, and tops it all off with PS2-era graphics.

White Knuckle takes place in an abandoned underground research facility called Sub-Structure 17, which is divided into three regions (more regions to come later, as it’s currently in early access) and play revolves around climbing, which the player does with their own two hands, quite literally.

The first-person climbing is achieved by alternating between each hand to grasp any sort of handhold within reach, and this must be done quickly, as each hand will tire and let go after holding onto a handhold for too long. There are also items to be used, some create handholds, some buff the player, and some are used for defense.

Sub-Structure 17 is host to a variety of life. There are oversized flies called Bloodbugs that
knock into the player, which does low damage but forces the player to let go of a handhold.
They’re incredibly annoying, and were the bane of my existence. Bloodbugs can be defended
against by hitting them with a hammer or throwing things at them — which I preferred, as it was
way funnier. Not every creature is dangerous though. Roaches can be found everywhere, and occasionally
silver and golden variants will appear which can be collected to use as currency to buy perks
and items.

White Knuckle being a roguelite is such a natural progression of roguelike concepts that I’m surprised more games haven’t tried it. Failure is inevitable, so randomizing things like items and level generation keep each run fresh and alleviates some of the annoyance that comes from restarting.

However, as with any roguelite, things aren’t over after completing one run. There’s also Hardcore and an Endless mode where the player can climb through a region of their choosing to unlock more perks. Unfortunately, most of the perks are simple stat increases like more stamina, longer reaching range, and so forth. Perks that are more impactful, like a double jump, are incredibly rare. So for the most part, getting new perks through additional play didn’t shake things up.

Beyond the mechanics of vertical platforming, the horror elements of White Knuckle are phenomenal because there are so many things to be afraid of — falling, creatures, running out of tools… everything.

During my first run, I hammered some pitons into a wall to create handholds, swung across a few gaps, and felt things were going great until I realized that the souls of the damned were below me, and slowly filling up each room that I had previously climbed up through. I immediately started panicking and started ascending as quickly as I could. Then, I misjudged a jump and fell to my doom.

Every subsequent death played out similarly. I’d reach a new height, White Knuckle would introduce a new room or creature that made me uneasy, I would panic because I didn’t know what to do, and then I would die.

Overcoming panic is what led to my first successful ascent of Sub-Structure 17. Knowing what to expect and being confident in my skill took the fear out of White Knuckle, but this is the unfortunate reality of pretty much any horror game. Fortunately, this loss of fear gave way to something new — I began to experiment with different mechanics and creatures, and realized how much I had been held back by my fear.

One of the first creatures encountered is a fleshy growth that appears on the walls, and shoots tendrils out across the room it’s in. Getting hit by one of these tendrils drags the player towards the growth, and it begins to attack. However, these tendrils can be grabbed and used for climbing, as if they were rope. This discovery (and others like it) only happened when I stopped seeing every creature as an obstacle or enemy, and started trying to imagine them as opportunities to climb even faster.

Finally, I would be doing White Knuckle a disservice by not mentioning the aesthetics.

Sub-Structure 17 and the three regions currently available look great — not graphically, but stylistically. Everything is incredibly dystopian thanks to hardly any metal surfaces that aren’t rusted, paint peeling off the walls, and a darkly oppressive atmosphere. Everything is either in a state of disrepair or incredibly unwelcoming, but what I appreciated most is that every handhold looks like it belongs. I climbed broken ladders, swung onto crumbling walkways and shimmied across metal beams. The fearsome horror aesthetic isn’t compromised for gameplay with bright yellow paint, and that commitment kept me immersed.

There’s nothing quite like White Knuckle. Adding roguelite features to a difficult platformer feels like a natural progression of both genres, and the horror elements are the cherry on top. The ‘dated’ PS2 style graphics are an amazing stylistic choice that enhance the overall experience, and despite the content still being in early access, there’s plenty of replayability to be had here.

White Knuckle is expected to stay in early access until the end of 2025, and due to popular demand, the ability to save a run and come back to it later is coming soon.

— Zackary Edwards

The post PREVIEW: White Knuckle appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Correctly identifying my first spirit!

LOW Trying singleplayer mode.

WTF Why is there a full ribcage in this garage?

The best I could hope for was to get out alive.

It had all started innocently enough, with a group of friends exploring a purportedly haunted house. We brought the standard tools — EMF detectors, infrared cameras, and thermometers in case we found cold spots.

Minutes were spent slowly walking from room to room, waiting for books to start flying off the shelves or for a ghostly hand to pick up a pencil and start writing in the notebook I’d left lying on a table. Then a voice on my radio started yelling that ghost activity was spiking. My partner ran for the front door, but dropped dead after just two steps.

I turned and ran until I found a pile of boxes to hide behind, and remained crouched there until that same phone voice let me know that things had quieted down. Ten seconds later I had sprinted all the way to the front door, just in time to see it slam closed in my face. A moment later, ghostly fingers pushed in from the edge of my vision, grabbed me, and yanked me into the ghost dimension, where a demon butcher was waiting to torture my soul.

…Which is a roundabout way of saying that in VR, Phasmophobia can be a harrowing experience.

Of course, that’s exactly what one would expect (and even hope!) from a first-person co-op ghost investigating simulator. No one is playing something like this to wander around a house and find zero evidence of paranormal activity. After all, they can do that for themselves without even turning on a videogame system. What Phasmophobia offers a group of players is the certainty that in every house they enter, something strange will be going on and it will be up to them to properly record and classify it.

Like most online co-op experiences, the player is expected to go back to the same locations over and over, so the key element keeping things interesting is the sheer volume of ghost types that the player can run into.

A look into the in-game manual reveals dozens of different entities, each with their own idiosyncracies. Some ghosts throw things around rooms, some wander the halls, blinking in and out of visibility. The main gameplay loop is to keep track of every piece of behavior a discovered ghost demonstrates, and then use that to identify what type of ghost it may be. No ghost shows every ability, so once the player has seen objects fly around a room or found ghost scribbles in a notebook, they’ll be able to narrow things down from over thirty options to just a handful. Every new piece of evidence gained lowers the number of ghosts it could possibly be, and this in turn lets players know which technology they should focus on using next.

Gameplay is slow and fiddly, but that’s actually a part of its charm. Phasmophobia is the rare experience that demands players engage with it in a very specific way to appreciate it. More than once I found myself standing rock-still, staring at a thermometer and willing it to dip below zero so that I could get the last point of confirmation I was looking for, all the while wondering if the footsteps I was hearing were my partners or a ghost creeping up behind me. It’s rare for a horror title to give me real chills, but Phasmophobia managed it over and over again.

That said, Phasmophobia only really works if the player is willing to fully commit to the experience. If the player doesn’t tick off two important boxes before starting, it’s almost impossible to enjoy it.

The first is the environment they play in. This isn’t something to boot up casually — it needs to be played in a dark room, at night, with no one around, while wearing headphones. It’s been suggested that the reason real-life ghost hunters only investigate creepy locations at night is that the oppressive shadows and eerie silence give the human imagination fodder to build the supernatural experiences they’re hoping to find — and whether that’s true or not, it’s absolutely what the Phasmophobia experience is built around. A player has to be willing to completely set aside their suspension of disbelief and allow themselves to be scared if they’re going to enjoy it — if they’re not going to commit, not only will they not enjoy it, it’s essentially not even a game any more.

The second, and even more important requirement is that they play with a group of people equally committed to the game. While Phasmophobia can technically be played offline, it’s barely functional in singleplayer mode. Players’ inventories are limited to just a few tools but there are plenty available, so unless a group of investigators search the location together, there’s no real chance of getting any decent evidence as it’s unlikely the player will happen to be holding the correct detection equipment when they stumble upon a spooky situation, and by the time they make it to the supply truck and back, the activity will no doubt have ended or moved to another part of the house.

Not only is co-op the only effective way to play the game, partners who are as frightened as the player add much to the experience. Every time I got on my radio to ask everyone to stay still so I could confirm that I was hearing a ghost walking around, I felt like something special was happening — this is a unique co-op experience, and one that rewards cooperation and mutual engagement like few I’ve encountered.

The biggest obstacle facing would-be Phasmophobia players is finding enough people willing to join in the shared roleplay that it requires. But, anyone able to put together a quartet of ghost investigators who are free for couple of hours on a particularly dark night will find themselves in one of the most effective co-op horror games ever made.

Rating: 8 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Kinetic Games. It is currently available on PC, XBS/X and PS5. Copies of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS5. Approximately 2 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode. The game was not completed. 15 hours were spent in Multiplayer modes.

Parents: This game was rated T by the ESRB, and it contains Blood, Use of Drugs, Violence. Yes, the deaths can be scary — especially in VR — but beyond that there’s nothing here that would keep even younger teens from being able to have a great time with it. Literally the most questionable thing in the game is that players can restore their sanity a little by taking a swig from what’s obviously a flask of liquor.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: Sound design is integral to the Phasmophobia experience, and the key audio cues are not subtitled. This game is not accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, the game’s controls are not remappable.

The post Phasmophobia Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH “I know kara-te!”

LOW The first act.

WTF Just how many animations for knocking out a Nazi did they program?

After cutting their teeth on famed Nazi killer BJ Blaskowicz in Wolfenstein, Machine Games have now set their sights on one of the all-time great fascist foilers — Dr. Henry Walton Jones, Jr.  While Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is far from perfect, its understanding of the physicality and improvisational spirit of its titular protagonist, coupled with the unfortunate timeliness of its subject matter results in a special (if flawed) experience.

Hot on the heels of a mysterious giant who stole an artifact from Marshall College (Indy’s employer), Dr. Jones finds himself smack in the middle of the winding streets and vertical architecture of fascist-occupied Vatican City, which comprises the first big chunk of this first-person, immersive simulation-style adventure.

Unfortunately, this opening third is easily the weakest part of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.  My instinct to explore (egged on by an open-world nonlinear structure and a map full of objectives and collectibles) was summarily punished as I ran headlong into locked door after locked door.  I was taunted by map markers that were seemingly just out of reach, only to discover hours later that I’d been stymied by narrative stage-gates I had not yet reached.

Thankfully, these misgivings were all but assuaged in the subsequent acts, beginning with the introduction of Emmerich Voss — a sneering Nazi archaeologist, and foil for Indy. 

While Voss’ aims of strengthening the Nazi war machine with ancient relics aren’t exactly fresh territory, his staccato speech, racist diatribes and apparent aptitude for martial arts make him seem simultaneously dangerous and pathetic.  Riding a fine line between pulp and plausibility, Voss injects much needed vitality into the rest of the proceedings.

The second act brings the open desert of Gizeh, pockmarked with possibility as I dove into tomb after tomb to uncover the mysteries of the past. After that, I trolled the winding jungle rivers of Sukhothai by boat in search of underwater treasures and forgotten temples — an invigorating contrast to the claustrophobic cobbled paths of the Vatican.

With the literal broadening of my horizons, the flexibility of play came into focus.  For example, if I spot a dig site in the distance, I’m welcome to investigate, no longer burdened by barred gates and locked doors. As I delve into any of the Great Circle‘s many nooks and crannies, I’m likely to find further mysteries to investigate and artifacts to add to my collection.

While played from the first-person perspective, to call Indiana Jones and the Great Circle a first-person shooter would be a misnomer.  There are guns (loud, chunky ones at that) but they’re far from the centerpiece.  In fact, players are explicitly encouraged to avoid firearms, as they are likely to draw attention, and Dr. Jones, a humble professor from Connecticut, can quickly become overwhelmed.  Instead, much of my time was spent in the shadows, slowly picking off my fascist foes in increasingly brutal fashion with many improvised, disposable weapons.

Every enemy outpost has multiple approaches — from a simple hole in the fence, to underwater passages and ziplines.  There are also disguises that Indy can use to infiltrate enemy ranks, gaining free access to restricted areas.  The stealth mechanics aren’t particularly fancy, but they are effective.  Sneaking through a desert camp, I’d often spot an enemy ahead with his back turned.  The prospect of slowly dismantling
enemy camps never got old, due primarily to the physicality of the stealth takedowns.

The world is littered with armaments, from clubs and shovels to the more unlikely dustpans and guitars.  Each takedown features a contextual animation and, for a relatively bloodless affair, I found it hard not to cringe as I heaved a sledgehammer into the back of a Nazi’s skull.

When stealth ultimately fails, the combat proves no less satisfying. Hearing an alarm raised, I would often turn to see half a dozen angry Wermacht soldiers running towards me. Frequently outnumbered, Indy has never been shy about employing less than honorable tactics. That sledgehammer can be thrown to knock enemies off balance, a crack from Jones’ whip can disarm another, even guns — depleted of ammunition — can be flipped around and used as bludgeons. With weapons breaking after a handful of strikes, Jones is often left with nothing more than his clenched fists — not to imply this is any less effective.

With deceptively simple mechanics, I was immediately hooked on the sweet science — carefully timed blocks allow for quick counter-jabs, and stronger punches can be charged for breaking through someone’s guard. Each blow is rewarded by an increasingly-bruised Nazi mug, and machine games have cut no corners on the animations, to the point where I was still knocking out Nazis in new ways through my final hours of play.

While Dr. Jones’ combat prowess is noteworthy, that PhD isn’t just for show.  When beating down fascists loses its luster (it doesn’t) there are tombs, crypts and caves aplenty to explore full of puzzles and traps.  These range from dead-simple (finding a note that reveals the code to a safe) to the more elaborate, such as using a cryptography machine and code chart to uncover a hidden combination.  Disappointingly, most of the puzzles are single-solution and don’t offer the open-ended, creative delights of the combat. As such, they feel lesser by contrast — in many ways, it was more of a puzzle to make my way through a populous military base than matching symbols on an ancient pillar was.

Ultimately, it feels as though Indy is having something of an identity crisis.  On the one hand, the freedom and agency offered in the latter two-thirds of the world design and free-flowing combat embraces the character in a way that previous digital incarnations haven’t.  On the other, stilted puzzle design and a stubborn resistance to its own structure, particularly in the early stages, holds Indiana Jones and the Great Circle back from true greatness. 

Be that as it may, with the state of the world in 2024, few things have brought me such catharsis as beating a Nazi senseless with my bare hands. That, if nothing else, justifies the existence of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.

Rating: 7 out of 10

— Ryan Nalley

Disclosures: This game is developed by Machine Games and published by Bethesda Softworks. It is currently available on XBX/S and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via paid download and reviewed on the XBX. Approximately 30 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated T and contains Blood and Gore, Drug Reference, Mild Language, and Violence. The official description reads as follows: This is an action-adventure game in which players assume the role of Indiana Jones on an adventure to uncover a mystery while defeating villains. From a first-person perspective, players explore various locations (e.g., catacombs, tombs, ruins) while solving puzzles and engaging in hand-to hand combat against enemy soldiers. Players can perform stealth attacks and whip attacks to take out enemies discreetly. Players can occasionally use rifles, machine guns, and objects (e.g., shovels, brooms) kill enemies. Combat is accompanied by impact sounds, realistic gunfire, and small blood-splatter effects. One sequence depicts a severed arm on the ground; another sequence depicts a corpse impaled on a spike trap, with small blood stains. The text in the game briefly references drugs (e.g., “I tried morphine; but the drug has given only transient surcease”; “Do not think from my slavery to morphine that I am a weakling…”). The words “a*s,” “bastard,” and “p*ss” are heard in the game.

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind modes are present.  Three filters are offered — Protanopia, Deuteranopia, and Trinaopia with options to adjust the brightness, contrast, intensity and strength of each.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles.  The subtitles can be altered and resized.  In addition to the baseline subtitles, closed captions for important sound effects are also offered. All sound cues have an accompanying visual component, this game is fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.

The post Indiana Jones And The Great Circle Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Surviving the final wave of a horde mode swarm when all seems lost.

LOW Crashing to the desktop, three times in a row.

WTF The available cosmetics are… uninspired… to say the least.

It’s an ugly planet – a bug planet! – and that just won’t do, so it’s time for humanity to rise up and destroy the alien threat before they destroy us!

It’s been a good year for fans of taking on relentless insect threats in videogames. Helldivers 2, the new Earth Defense Force, Space Marine 2 and its Tyranid onslaught… it seems like everywhere players look, there’s a bug with terrifying mandibles trying to chew their faces off. However, there’s now one more to consider, and it’s based on the most iconic movie featuring insect-stomping shenanigans ever made!

Enter Starship Troopers: Extermination, a follow up to Paul Verhoeven’s classic sci-fi war satire. Most people who saw it seemed to take away the message that blind faith in gung-ho jingoistic propaganda spewed out by a faceless government generally leads to a lot of naive recruits getting horrifically splattered across far off battlefields. I, as a member of the intelligentsia, took away a different and far more profound message – space bugs are coming, and they’re coming to kill us all.

Not to worry, though. As a first-person shooter supporting up to sixteen players at a time, Starship Troopers allows humanity to fight back and unleash hell upon any marauding spacebugs trying to turn humankind into plasma-melted soufflé.

After getting through a brief tutorial focusing on how to create and repair various structures in the field using a physics-defying building tool, players are given free rein to choose from various missions they want to be sent out on. There’s a largely forgettable singleplayer tutorial campaign voiced by Casper Van Dien (who played protagonist Johnny Rico in the film) but uninspired mission designs like “kill ten bugs” or “transport a single canister of ore” coupled with braindead AI companions will likely kill most people’s interest in this mode quickly.

The singleplayer’s clearly just been thrown together for the sake of it though. Multiplayer’s where the magic happens, and the magic typically involves smooshing innumerable bugs into paste alongside up to fifteen other players.

A number of modes are available to select across a variety of maps on a rotating timer. Horde mode features waves of combat against the bugs with short breaks in between to repair and upgrade the base. Advance and Secure dish out various objectives such as transporting ore from refineries dotted around the map before hunkering down into a final base defense mission, or there’s a smaller scale Hive Mode where a group of four players infiltrate an enemy hive to drop small-scale nukes into their nest.

There are six classes for players to choose from before heading into battle, each of which has certain inherent advantages. Guardians, for example, are adept at holding the line with beefier armor and the ability to chuck down a fortified enclosure which helps stabilize their aim. Medics can send drones out into dangerous hotspots to revive downed troopers and supply the team with healing items, Engineers are able to create and repair strong structures even during phases where other classes have their build option disabled, and more.

These classes can be leveled up for players to earn swanky new guns and equipment, some of which can eventually be made available to other classes once mastered. It’s pretty standard fare involving shotguns, assault rifles, LMGs and a few exotic energy weapons, though the Engineer’s disappointingly weak flamethrower was a bit of a letdown. If I’m close enough to smell the bugs cooking, I want them charbroiled within moments.

The bug menace features a few classes of their own. There are melee attackers of various shapes and sizes, with the bigger bugs naturally tanking more damage and biting troopers in half more easily than their smaller brethren,  alongside ranged adversaries that either attack with linear projectiles or bombard the area with massive plasma explosions that can wreck a base in moments. It’s not a huge amount of enemy variety, but it does encourage team diversity when it comes to dealing with the threats players will encounter.

As a sixteen player game, the overall experience can vary wildly between matches. A poor or mismatched team will often struggle when things get hectic, clinging on for dear life as their base is blasted to bits from long range and the squad is downed one by one while nobody plays the objective. On the flip side, a well formed battalion can make newer recruits feel like a spare wheel, running around the map looking for ways to help out despite enemy threats being annihilated as soon as they appear.

One gripe is how building materials are shared between the whole team. I’d rarely ever find that I had enough time to build my own little corner of the base before others had used up all the resources, so I eventually just gave up on this aspect of the game entirely. With everybody ripping through resources as soon as they spawn in, it’s often a coin flip as to whether the team ends up with a sleekly efficient murder fortress to safely combat the bug menace, or an insanely constructed ass-backwards death pit for everyone to swiftly get overrun in.

Players who enjoy unlocking new skins and cosmetics so that their avatar stands out on the battlefield are going to be sorely disappointed. Don’t expect to be romping around the battlefield in a Michael Ironside or Casper Van Dien skin – a few almost-imperceptible color changes to the base uniform, helmet and gun are currently the extent of what’s on offer here.

In most aspects, Starship Troopers feels like it’s reaching for the heady heights of ‘good enough’. The shooting is good enough, the interface is good enough, the class and weapon selection is good enough… however, the final product falls short in one key area that clearly isn’t good enough, and that’s on a technical level.

Frankly, at the time of review, it was a mess. In the fifteen-plus hours I spent with the game, I’d wind up clipping through geometry, spawning with my gun obscuring my view at a weird angle whilst unable to fire it, witness companion AI in the singleplayer taking the scenic route straight into a lava pit, have annoyingly frequent hard crashes to the dashboard erasing all my hard earned XP during any given match, and more. It may have left early access, but Starship Troopers is definitely not ready for general release yet, at least on the Series X where I tested it.

Adding insult to all of this injury, it just lacks any flair that could set it apart from the competition. The combat is fine if somewhat uninspired, the writing and presentation frequently fall flat, and when it comes to chewing through hordes of enemies, there are plenty of competing titles on the market that offer a more compelling experience – the obvious comparisons are Earth Defense Force and Helldivers 2, and even something bug-adjacent like Exoprimal stands out more,

Sadly, as things stand I can’t recommend this to anyone except the most hardcore fans of the IP.

Rating: 4.5 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed by Offworld Industries Ltd. and published by Knight’s Peak. It is currently available on XBX/S, PS5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the XBX. Approximately 17 hours of play were spent in multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood and Gore, Intense Violence and Language. There’s no description, but It’s about what you’d expect from a game based on the Starship Troopers franchise. Players die relatively bloodlessly and hordes of enemies spew small amounts of ichor when shot.

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind modes are present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. (See text examples above.) The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized, so good luck reading them — on a 77-inch screen they appeared to be about two pixels high and I couldn’t see a way to enlarge them. Also, not all dialogue is subtitled, but most of it doesn’t really matter too much. This game is not fully accessible.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable.

The post Starship Troopers: Extermination Review appeared first on Gamecritics.com.

HIGH Escaping from jail for the first time.

LOW The final heist mission.

WTF Why does everyone in this town sleep with their eyes open?

Thief Simulator 2 is a wireframe — and by that I mean it’s an amalgam of mechanics that form the shape of something interesting, if not the substance.  Generally, Thief Simulator 2 makes good on its titular promise, offering a technical exploration of the trade complete with home invasions, safecracking and bank heists.  Upon closer examination, it fails to stretch beyond these constituent parts to truly embrace a life of larceny.

The narrative here is mostly a setup for thievery. Our unnamed protagonist has found himself in over his head with the mob, and is now staring down the wrong end of a sizable debt. Thankfully, it’s nothing some lockpicks and a solid work ethic can’t fix.  Set in modern-day suburbia, Thief Simulator 2 takes place across two semi open-world neighborhoods as our thief-on-the-run attempts to burgle his way back into the Lombardi family’s good graces.

While there are several mission types in this first-person crime spree, each is structured similarly — case the joint, sneak in, grab the loot and exfiltrate with none the wiser.  There’s an emphasis on preparation, with reconnaissance forming the cornerstone of a successful infiltration.  Early on, players are required to manually ‘mark’ residents through line of sight, revealing a chunk of their 24 hour schedule.  This is quickly obviated by the micro-camera — a handy little device which, when planted outside a residence for 24 hours, reveals every inhabitant’s full schedule, including pets. 

To streamline the pilfering are a host of tools and skills that can be unlocked and upgraded as the player progresses.  Gaining these abilities requires experience points which are awarded not only for completing missions, but also for all items stolen along the way.  I developed a form of digital kleptomania as I stuffed my backpack with every cell phone, wallet and bottle of wine I could lay hands on, chuckling as I imagined the inhabitants waking up the next morning to bare walls and empty safes.

These abilities and tools act as a kind of stage-gating to the progression.  House 112 on Madison Street just installed those fancy new ‘Level 2’ locks?  Time to steal as much stuff as I can to level up my lockpicking skills.  Someone just install out-or-reach security cameras? A fancy remote control drone can disable it, allowing me to bypass security and move on.

I appreciate Thief Simulator 2’s emphasis on planning, and the ever-expanding toolset offers an appealing carrot to keep one moving forward. However, I quickly developed a sequence that worked for virtually every main mission — plant the micro-camera, cross-reference the schedules to discern when everyone is either asleep or out, and then sneak in and sneak out.  Rarely did I feel pushed outside of this comfort zone, and I rarely had to think on my feet.  The residents seldom deviate from their daily agenda, and as long as I picked an opportune time and didn’t dilly-dally, I rarely ran into issues.

I found this ease slightly disappointing. Given the open nature of the missions and the wide array of abilities and tools, I was hoping that creative problem solving would be encouraged.  Not only is this not required, there generally isn’t opportunity for it.  Player agency, for the most part, begins and ends at whether I want to sneak in through a window, vent or front door — beyond this, most levels play out in identical fashion.

To be fair, later missions do offer stiffer challenges.  More complex homes have full security teams and increased levels of electronic surveillance and countermeasures.  These were more engaging and emphasize my favorite feature in Thief Simulator 2 — the door closing mechanic. 

For a thief, silence is golden. As such, doors must be slowly closed by holding down the button for an extended period to avoid unwanted attention.  Equally important was re-locking each door behind me, as residents and guards will become suspicious if doors are left open or unlocked.  Of all the mechanics in Thief Simulator 2, this made me feel most like a real burglar, and added a much-needed layer of tension when trying to quickly execute a robbery.

Beyond the standard residence thefts there are two other mission types. The first occurs if the player is arrested, and is by far the more successful of the pair. 

Finding themselves in a jail cell, the player must pay a fine or plan their escape.  Picking the lock of my jail cell, sneaking through the station (and course filching whatever my sticky fingers could nab) and finding a key to make my escape was the highlight of my time with Thief Simulator 2.

Unfortunately, the heist missions don’t fare as well. These complex stages completely abandon planning, which then removes much of the player’s agency in the process.  These could have served as a ‘final exam’ of sorts after cutting one’s teeth on the small scale robberies prior, but instead they’re largely trial-and-error stealth missions, requiring little more than avoiding the paths of guards.

There’s a compulsive, checklist quality to the action in Thief Simulator 2.  Once I developed a successful sequence, I found pleasure in its repetition — I dotted every “I” as I deftly picked locks on my way in, and then crossed every “T” as I shut and relocked those same doors on the way out.  However, these moments were just base mechanics and never developed beyond that — planning is as simple as planting a camera, and a successful robbery is just a matter choosing the right the time of day. I have to imagine that being a real thief is more complicated than this, and I wished Thief Simulator 2 asked more from me.

Rating: 6 out of 10

— Ryan Nalley

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Ultimate Games. It is currently available on XBX/S, PS5, and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the XBX. Approximately 20 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated T and contains Drug Reference, Language, Use of Alcohol, and Violence.  Given the title, it’s safe to assume that Thief Simulator 2 doesn’t encourage lawful behavior, and every mission revolves around stealing or other illegal activities such as vandalism. Conflict avoidance is generally best practice in Thief Simulator 2 and as such, there’s not a significant amount of violence.  Characters can be struck with a baton or crowbar, but there is no blood or gore present. Most four-letter profanities are present throughout the game, but not excessively.

Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles, however this only pertains to the dialogue for the story.  Ambient dialogue in the world is not subtitled. The subtitles cannot be altered and/or resized. Outside of the glaring omission of subtitles in the game world, Thief Simulator 2 does a good job of providing visual representation of essential sounds.  I played a number of missions without sound and did not find that there were any limitations.

Remappable Controls: No, this game’s controls are not remappable. This game does not offer a full controller map diagram.  In addition to the screenshots, movement is mapped to the left stick, with camera control on the right.  The A button is used to interact with the world, while the B button is used to jump, and the X button to lock doors.  The Left Trigger is used to sprint, while the Right Trigger is used to attack. While in a vehicle, the Right Trigger controls the gas, while the Left Trigger controls braking and reversing.

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