Crime Boss: Rockay City is proof that star power isn’t everything. In fact, it’s a reminder that a celebrity cast does nothing for a game when it’s void of anything interesting or fun to support it. When run-ending bugs appear, Crime Boss is miserable, but even when I’m running a mission bug-free, I lay witness to a painfully dull take on organized crime. At its best, Crime Boss functions – I can shoot weapons at enemies, empty bank vaults and warehouses for loot, watch cutscenes with recognizable faces and voices, and grow my empire – but it never captures my attention in a meaningful or memorable way. Instead, it pushes me further and further away, leaving me with no desire to ever return to Rockay City.
If Bubsy 4D is an attempt to bring new players to this 33-year-old franchise, though, its poor level design, characterization, and platforming will ensure it won’t.
It’s a disappointing konbini experience for someone who genuinely cherishes them in Japan. It is neither narratively nor mechanically engaging, and though Makoto seemed to enjoy each shift, I rarely did.
Wheel World is an amalgamation of boring races and exploration, poor storytelling, and often clumsy gameplay that never felt great.
Though the developer has some horror highs in its catalog, The Casting of Frank Stone rests six feet at the bottom of it.
The Old Country isn’t bad; it’s also not great. Perhaps most depressing, it’s simply fine, inoffensively so. There’s nothing in here you haven’t seen elsewhere, cast included. And worse yet, probably done better. For all the great prequels out there, The Old Country is proof that going backwards isn’t always an interesting way forward.
Despite a solid gameplay foundation, stunning world, and unique two-realm mechanic, by the time I reached credits after 48 hours, I was overjoyed to be done.
If you wanted anything more out of this second crack at making a new sci-fi IP in survival horror, or something markedly different that acknowledges just how far gaming has come since 2008, The Callisto Protocol is not your answer.
While Industria’s atmosphere certainly nailed what it was going for, the monotonous gameplay and rushed story left me dissatisfied. Still, I loved the ambiance and backdrop, and I wouldn’t mind if Bleakmill took another crack at it – the rest of this world just needs a few more cogs added to its machine.
LKA made the best recreation of an Italian setting I’ve ever seen in a game and I wanted nothing more than to enjoy it. However, LKA’s love of Italy is the only warmth I felt in Martha is Dead. The rest left me feeling as cold as Giulia’s dead sister.
Though the combat, which falls between serviceable and irritating, threatened my enjoyment, I still found delight in the currents of Another Crab's Treasure. Kril's reluctance to become a hero and his subsequent journey, messaging surrounding the dangers corporations pose to our oceans, and clever twists on the Soulslike formula deliver a satisfying, albeit uneven and flawed, wade through uncharted waters.
When The Cosmic Shake is at its best, it sounds, looks, and plays like the kind of game I would have begged my parents to buy me growing up. But when it falters, it’s boring. It’s a game I recommend to fans of SpongeBob SquarePants with ease; for those looking for a great platformer, though, better options lie elsewhere in the sea.
Ultimately, New Tales From The Borderlands feels like more of the same and fans of the first are likely to enjoy this, but given it’s been nearly eight years since that first one, I wanted more of an evolution.
Little Nightmares III delivers on the original conceit of the series with a horror-filled adventure that feels like trying to escape a nightmare you desperately want to wake up from. Outside of a few noticeable, if underbaked, additions Supermassive has introduced, I’d welcome more variation to the game’s formula. However, even if Little Nightmares III offers more of the same, it’s hard not to smile whenever Low and Alone’s adventure sends chills down my spine.
With Dead Island 2, Dambuster Studios asks little of the player – only that you enjoy a good excuse to kill zombies in increasingly gory ways for a weekend or two – and in doing so, it delivers on the promise of what this series is all about.
Throughout my time in Metal Eden, I couldn’t help but imagine just how good a sequel I hope Reikon makes could be. This is a great start in the FPS genre for the team; its ideas are strong, and with refinement, Aska’s next mission could be as excellent as the Ghostrunner and Doom Eternal adventures it’s clearly inspired by. Though the star of the show – its first-person shooting and movement – is sometimes weighed down by an overreaching narrative and boring morph ball sections, when Metal Eden shines, it’s as bright as the sun that sheds light on Moebius’ dark underbelly.
While Iron Galaxy has excellently modernized the gameplay and graphics of these classics to feel right in 2025, I wish it had done a better job of highlighting the influence these games once had in their heyday.
It’s an admirable shooter in a genre often tied down by live-service elements, and unlike its contemporaries, it asks one simple question: Can you please mow down hordes of enemies with big guns?
Ultimately, Veilguard delivers on the promise of every Dragon Age with its strong characters, engaging combat, and a classic BioWare role-playing experience.
Little Kitty, Big City could have easily over-relied on its cute cat, forgetting that controlling it and interacting with the world around it needs to be just as pleasant. Instead, a perfectly paced runtime, feline-forward mechanics, and engaging exploration coalesce into a reminder of why we love these animals so much in the first place.