Indie Metroidvanias were still somewhat of a novelty back in 2013. Even then, Guacamelee stood out among its peers because of its smooth platforming, wonderful music, hilarious writing, and gorgeous art style. I was a huge fan of that special game. And, judging by the glaring similarities and multitude of copied elements, so is Guacamelee 2. Guacamelee 2 successfully imitates the style of the first game but lacks the surprise and ingenuity necessary to top that original outing.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/420251-guacamelee-2-review-bueno-but-too-muchador-like-the-first-luchador

Players probably fill up with sorrow and anger when they hear “playable teaser” but that’s exactly what The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit is. Instead of being a meaty demo for a doomed horror game, it’s an extended free sampling of the upcoming Life is Strange 2, of which some of Captain Spirit‘s choices will carry over to. While details are slim about that second season, Captain Spirit faithfully captures most of the essence of the first game in its two-hour runtime for better and for worse.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/400035-the-awesome-adventures-of-captain-spirit-review-more-like-relatively-decent-adventures

Sonic Mania was one of the biggest ploys on nostalgia in recent years. Mixing the Blue Blur’s greatest hits with some new levels and putting it into one cohesive package adequately satiated the hedgehog’s starved fanbase. Sonic Mania Plus, as its name implies, is the updated version of that Genesis era love letter complete with two deep cut characters among other visual tweaks and new modes. Plus packs only a couple solid additions but still remains beholden to 90s core design that birthed it, for better or worse.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/404759-sonic-mania-plus-review-blue-tinted-glasses

Like role-playing systems before it, roguelike elements have started creeping into more and more genres over the years. Whereas RPG-ification brought in a more tangible sense of progression, injecting games with roguelike qualities gives them a layer of unpredictability that forces players to learn its systems over memorizing level layouts. Mothergunship takes those concepts and grafts them onto the first-person shooter genre while letting players craft their own weapons. While there are better first-person shooters and better roguelikes, Mothergunship excels when it fuses the two genres and brings out the best in each.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/407121-mothergunship-review-making-the-mothership-proud

The ocean is terrifying. Not only is it filled with nightmarish hellspawns that look like they flopped out of H.P. Lovecraft’s notebook, but it’s also a mysterious place we have yet to fully conquer because of how deadly it is for our fleshy bodies to navigate. That sense of danger, mystique, and separation makes the ocean depths a prime setting for a horror game that few seem to take advantage of. Narcosis, a walking simulator-horror hybrid that takes place on the seafloor, attempts to realize this potential, but ends up drowning because of its flimsy scares, poor controls, and abhorrent visuals.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/409697-narcosis-review-blunder-the-sea

Video games rarely teach us much real-world history. Yes, God of War and Assassin’s Creed have showed us rough amalgamations of previous civilizations through the tip of bloodied blades, but those are half-exceptions to the near-industry wide rule. Few games plant themselves as deeply into history as 1979 Revolution: Black Friday. 1979 Revolution is an adventure game with its own fictional narrative but it’s set against the backdrop of the 1979 Iranian Revolution that uprooted the country and forever changed it. While some of its rough edges detract from the overall experience, the way that it fuses its educational material into its nuanced story makes it a fresh and informative take on the genre.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/412105-1979-revolution-black-friday-review-join-the-revolution

Although many seem to use gaming as an escape from depression, games don’t usually try to tackle that subject. It seems odd for a whole medium to abstain from talking about something core to the human experience that most experience chronically or through loss. Anamorphine does not shy away from such topics. It’s a walking simulator that examines grief through the surreal, abstracting sorrow through metaphors and visual abnormalities. The silent story shows respect while exploring those topics but the game suffers from a long list of technical issues that severely hamstring the experience.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/412567-anamorphine-review-a-trippy-traumatic-tale-told-through-a-technical-tragedy

Before writing about video games, I spent over three years working in the food service industry. And more often than not, I hated it. The stress of preparing other people’s grub on a deadline is the type of looming anxiety I still have nightmares about and, despite the lessons I learned, am glad to finally leave behind. Overcooked 2, like its popular predecessor, is a gamified version of that panic that’s all about cooking, mixing, and serving an endless stream of dishes for increasingly impatient customers. Instead of triggering flashbacks of my days in an apron, Overcooked 2 served me an incredible cooperative experience full of triumph while also cultivating a safe amount of culinary anarchy.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/414995-overcooked-2-review-cooking-with-gas

THE WALKING DEAD game series has always been an apt representation of Telltale Games. The inaugural season represented the best of what the studio had to offer, while the inconsistency of later ones also demonstrated their wavering quality and ignorance towards to annoying technical shortcomings. The Walking Dead: The Final Season Episode 1 is the intro of their last game on this fittingly shambling engine and, thus, feels like the sendoff to a certain chapter of Telltale’s existence. Even with new technology on the horizon, the first episode of this (alleged) final season feels like a testbed for a better style of game that adds new gameplay mechanics and a more cinematic presentation while maintaining Telltale’s signature solid character work.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/417571-the-walking-dead-the-final-season-episode-one-review-a-promising-start

Video game remasters have been quite the rage for the past decade or so. Cynically, they let the publisher cash in on nostalgia but optimistically, they act as relics of another gaming era. Strange Brigade is fittingly one of those relics and while it is releasing for the first time in 2018, its structure, look, and gameplay make it feel like a remastered game from the last generation that I missed the first time around. Even if it doesn’t look or play like the newest title around, its solid action, well-paced puzzles, and pulpy style make it worth playing through with a few friends.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/423133-strange-brigade-review-a-relic-in-both-senses-of-the-term

Sly Cooper has given video games a sugarcoated portrayal of raccoons, one of nature’s most mischievous creations. These cute critters are born to do the dirtiest work with their opposable thumbs and identity-concealing masks, not steal from jerks to avenge their ancestors. Donut County is almost an exposé on the bastard nature of raccoons as they send holes to unsuspecting citizens and ruin their lives. It may be an evil concept by an equally evil species of mammal, but it’s one of the most thoroughly charming and hilarious games I’ve ever played.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/422699-donut-county-review-a-hole-lot-of-fun

This new Tomb Raider series has taken quite some time to build Lara up to her mythical pre-reboot status. Shadow of the Tomb Raider, the trilogy-ender in this new series, aims to be that title that completes her arc from Bookshelf Raider to a legitimate Tomb Raider. While the game slowly reverts back to a standard, swashbuckling adventure by the midway point, it starts out as a promising, nuanced look at Lara and the treasure-hunting genre.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/429243-shadow-of-the-tomb-raider-review-raider-in-her-last-arc

Games don’t release in a vacuum and, thus, makes it hard to write around this particular elephant in the room. Telltale Games basically announced its imminent shutdown as I sat down to materialize my thoughts on The Walking Dead: The Final Season Episode 2. Reports have indicated that this closure will also prematurely end this season, putting the next two episodes on the vaporware shelf next to Silent Hills and all those damn Star Wars games EA keeps canning. It’s a shame too since The Walking Dead: The Final Season Episode 2 is mostly all setup that we will likely never see the payoff to, which drains this episode of most of its purpose.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/434287-the-walking-dead-the-final-season-episode-2-review-the-sophomore-setup

The original Life Is Strange was a successful yet divisive narrative-driven adventure game. Most of that division was rooted in its cringeworthy, hammy dialogue that made its teenage cast grating to listen to. You either looked past it or couldn’t. It resonated with enough people to warrant a sequel in the same vein but with different characters in the same universe. Life is Strange 2 Episode 1 is the debut of a new season and it still has plenty of awkward dialogue and interactions, but it’s also got more heart.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/436369-life-is-strange-2-episode-1-review-hitting-the-road-walking

Assassin's Creed Odyssey is a big risk. Not financially — they always seem to be sure money makers — but creatively. While Ubisoft claims the gap between Syndicate and Origins had been planned, that hiatus coincidentally helped stave off the burnout inherent to an annual series. And then Assassin’s Creed Odyssey was announced to come out just less than a year after Origins, risking the fatigue that the Egyptian entry and the sabbatical worked in tandem to avoid. Odyssey hardly improves on the previous game’s foundation and is a step back in a few ways, but it still tells an incredible, character-driven story in a gorgeous, expansive world.

Read the full review here: https://www.gamerevolution.com/review/437939-assassins-creed-odyssey-review-greek-repeat