Starting with Super Stardust HD and running through games like Resogun and Dead Nation , it's experimented with different spins on the genre. Nex Machina feels like the culmination of those efforts, offering intense, high-octane action that constantly has you analyzing your surroundings and your options for disposing of enemies. It's an incredibly fun and satisfying experience to pick up and play, but it also features a variety of wrinkles and secrets for high-score chasers. Add in the gorgeous, neon-infused visuals, and you've got the finest output of Housemarque to date--which makes it all the more upsetting that the studio has decided to shift gears and go in a different direction.
Still, you won't find a better example of its work than Nex Machina. Created by members of the Sonic fan-hack community under Sega's watch, Sonic Mania exudes passion and reverence in its recreation of nostalgic visuals, sounds, and level designs.
But the game isn't content with senselessly regurgitating the past; rather, it expands upon the familiar with new ideas of its own and delivers plenty of inventive concepts that diversify and build upon the series' fast-paced level design. Sonic Mania is smart and interpretive in its approach, leveraging the strengths of its design and visuals to craft not only the best Sonic game ever made, but an amazing platforming experience overall.
If you've enjoyed Sonic at any point in your life, you owe it to yourself to play Sonic Mania. And even if you're not a longtime fan, the fast-paced platforming on display is a fantastic introduction to Sega's beloved blue blur. Matt Espineli. There's no shortage of Metroidvania titles out there, but Iconoclasts stands tall as much more than a simple game about exploring the world while solving puzzles and fighting bosses.
Sure, you swing a wrench that can interact with objects and whack enemies over the head, but the magic of this game goes far deeper than the tools at your disposal. Iconoclasts is a story about conflict: science vs. And that serves as an incredible backdrop for dynamic characters that extend far beyond their bit look. It's worth playing just to see where they--and you, as the mechanic Robin--end up. Tony Wilson. The last chunk of the game involves replaying earlier missions with small tweaks, and certain late-game story content was consigned to a special edition bonus feature.
Despite all of that, The Phantom Pain stands as a seminal example of what an open-world action game can be. While still retaining much of what makes a Metal Gear game so distinct, it presents players with a vast open world and the ability to tackle its challenges in many, many ways.
The mechanics of Ground Zeroes have been fine-tuned, and you can leverage them in a multitude of ways as you take part in the game's consistently excellent, thrilling missions. Just as enjoyable are the emergent hijinks you'll encounter along the way, and all of this is made better by the consistent progression of building up your own personal army.
Although it's undoubtedly an experience best played after playing making your way through the prior games, The Phantom Pain is a game that everyone should ultimately try. It holds up now, even after a few years; all that's changed is the price tag. Shovel Knight : Specter of Torment puts you in the shoes of one of the main game's antagonists, Specter Knight, as he takes his own unique journey through the same levels featured in the original game.
As with Plague Knight's campaign, the unique mechanics at play here like the dash attack make for a much different experience. You would be best-served by starting with the base Shovel Knight campaign, but whichever version you play, you'll be treated to a modern take on retro platformers that bests many of the classics it draws inspiration from.
Transistor , the follow-up to Bastion, would take many of the striking features of that game like the hand-painted art style, for one but twist them for a sci-fi, cyberpunk tale. Red was a singer who had her voice physically stolen in an attack on the city of Cloudbank, and she's the one you control in this unique isometric action RPG. The Transistor, a sword-like weapon that killed a man in the attack, becomes Red's tool for fighting back against an army of robots known as The Process, controlled by an evil collective known as The Camerata.
Yes, it has a lot going on, but that's how it is with Supergiant's games. The Transistor glows and speaks; it trapped the consciousness and voice of the man it was used to kill, which means this dead man becomes Red's companion throughout the game, similar to the narrator in Bastion also voiced by Logan Cunningham. What sets Transistor apart is that it incorporates a layer of strategy on top of the action RPG gameplay.
There are countless permutations to Red's movesets since each individual move, or functions, can be mixed with another to create an attack which can be used to make short work of enemies that took over your neon-lit city. You also get to pause the action for a limited timeframe to craft a plan of attack and come up with clever ways to string together functions. Not only does Transistor's soundtrack stand out for its folk-tinged electronica, but it's the focal point for characterization and acts as a driving force from start to finish.
Music is at the forefront and Darren Korb's vision for complementing the futuristic world is fully realized, which makes Transistor an absolute joy to play. Pyre , the latest from Supergiant Games, diverges from the action RPG gameplay the studio is known for. The fantastical, hand-painted art by Jen Zee returns.
A western, electronic, trip-hop fusion soundtrack from Darren Korb also makes a comeback. But instead of controlling a single protagonist who destroys the enemies in their path in search of answers, Pyre revolves around a mystical sport that's played in an underworld populated by those who've been exiled from the normal world.
You are The Reader, found in Purgatory where reading is forbidden by a band of exiles who befriend you. The Rites are rituals of sport that determine your worth, and this is where the meat of the gameplay happens. In a Rite, you assemble a team of three from a pool of allies you meet along the way.
You face another team of three and fight for the single orb placed in the contained arena with the objective of dunking or shooting the orb into the other team's goal or Pyre.
Only one player from each team can move at any given moment. Each type of player has a varied skillset that can make the sport easier, depending on your playstyle.
It sounds like a bit much at first, but once you get a hang of the flow, there's just nothing quite like it.
Many have described it as Rocket League meets Dota meets Transistor. Outside of sick orb dunks is the intriguing visual novel-style story about sacrifice and the ties that bind. Vertical arcade shoot-em-ups typically deal with far-flung futures where an ace pilot is defending Earth from a swarm of technologically advanced aliens. By taking place in an alternate timeline where Mars was colonized by England in the 17th Century, Jamestown immediately sets itself apart from its peers.
Your private spy agency has been compromised by the very megacorporations you get paid to infiltrate, and now you have just 72 hours to regroup and begin a final last-ditch mission to preserve the life of your AI companion, Incognita, who is your only defence against total defeat. Armed with various tools, you control a pair of agents on assignments to gather resources and allies, with each location and its goals being randomly generated.
This is a game where your mistakes stick, no matter how terrible the outcome, and even if you play perfectly, your successes, whether it's knocking out a guard or an entire security system, are temporary. This is a high stakes puzzle that always has a fresh experience for you every time you play.
Combining both fantasy and horror in an action-adventure role-playing game, Bloodborne takes you on an unforgettable expedition throughout the ancient city of Yharnam. You select your own origin story and shape characters through stats and in-game decisions, but you'll always find yourself armed with a transforming "trick weapon" and faced with abominations that either used to be human or is something so alien you can barely comprehend it.
As the game progresses, you'll uncover dark secrets and fight to survive while you explore Yharnam's cursed streets. Cinematic visuals ensure you enjoy every visceral detail in this gothic environment, while Bloodborne's challenging gameplay puts your wits, strategy and reflexes to the test.
You can't take many hits, and death means you drop all your currency, so dodging and parrying is the order of the day. Alongside the story, there's the optional online mode that allows you to invade or be invaded by enemy players. Or you can try out the randomly-generated Chalice Dungeons, which blend enemies old and new into twisted labyrinths full of unique rewards. Critically acclaimed for its stunning visuals and musical score, Journey lets players explore an ancient and mysterious world.
The game puts you into the place of a robed traveller, looking for a way up to the peak of a mountain. You don't know why you're going there, but you're left with no doubt that it's what you must do. Whether it's with a CPU companion or a real life player, you'll travel towards the summit without a word, communicating only in charming musical tones. The actual mechanics are like a platforming game, requiring you to jump and slide through environments, helped by your companion and enchanted pieces of fabric that respond to your songs, helping you reach new areas.
The story and world is shown to you with little direct explanation and no spoken dialogue, forcing you to interpret the game's storyline on your own. It sounds quirky, but Journey provides innovative and immersive gameplay that will get you hooked, and leave you with a strong impression that will last for a long time afterwards. If adventure is something you seek, Night in the Woods is a unique exploration game that may pique your interests with its dark humor and contemporary story.
You play as Mae Borowski, a snarky college dropout who also happens to be a cat. Mae's just returned to her hometown, Possum Springs, which has fallen upon hard time since the local mines were shut down. Reuniting with your friends, you gradually begin to adapt back to your old life as Fall rolls in.
And then stuff starts to get weird. Gameplay-wise, you'll be running, jumping and use a few different supernatural powers to voyage into Mae's past and present life in the town. You have some control over the game's outcomes with your choices too, the friends you spend more time with revealing more of their secrets to you, which means you have a good reason to replay the game when you're done.
It has a cute visual style, but this will lull you into thinking that the content of this story is anything but the unflinching look at modern life for young people. All of these games are well regarded by critics, but not every title here will be right for you. When considering a purchase, go by genre, not just reviews. Check what kind of game mechanics, play modes and other features these games have, and you will have a better idea of what you're in for, whether you're searching for a new game in a familiar genre or want to try out something entirely different.
If you're still not sure, look for demos. Some of these games have limited free versions if you search the PlayStation Store. Download these and you can then try out the game hands-on to see if it's worth your time and money. Now while these games are indeed cheap, they can get cheaper. The prices of these games drop several times a year for various events, so if you're willing to be patient, waiting for one of these sales will let you get even more for your money.
Richard is a Tom's Guide staff writer based in London, covering news, reviews and how-tos for phones, gaming, audio and whatever else people need advice on. When not at work, he's likely thinking about how to brew the perfect cup of specialty coffee.
Whenever you're downed, your character has a chance to survive as a white flag waving fowl before coming back into the fold after a ten second timer. Not only that, but Realm Royale features class-based gameplay, personal mounts, a unique arsenal of armour and weapons, and an eye-pleasing art style that makes that familiar base jump at the start of each map all the more exciting. The open beta will eventually form into a full release, and you can help Hi-Rez iron out the technical bumps in the meantime by putting Realm Royale through its paces.
A hectic, borderline-sadistic hack-and-slash, you should only play Let it Die if you have a penchant for getting your ass handed to you. The most memorable by far is the skateboarding Uncle Death. Who wears spiral sunglasses and biker boots. So we promise all those deaths mean something. Imagine having the whole pantheon of DC comics at your fingertips, where superheroes saunter through city streets without fear of prejudice and adventure lies around every corner.
That's DC Universe Online in a nutshell; a battle-tested MMO in which players create their own superhero and battle it out in a sprawling multiplayer landscape inspired by the comic books that brought us Bats, Supes, and all the rest.
The game's over seven years old, so its visual oomph isn't as impressive at it once was, but developer Daybreak Game Company has been so committed to enriching the game with new updates and content since launch that it's hard not to be impressed by the sheer breadth of gameplay available for free.
A must play for DC fans, and definitely something to try out for those on a budget, DC Universe Online is a super sized corker of a free product. To mitigate the notable lack of crowd-pleasers, Sony pulled out all the stops for the remaining 10 months of By the end of the year, the Vita gained support for the well-regarded PlayStation Plus subscription service. A system bundle, which included a whole year of the service along with a 4GB memory card, came out at a time when its heaviest hitters could be downloaded for free using the PlayStation Plus Instant Game Collection incentive.
But by then smart phone games were evolving, Vita's reputation had been - fairly or unfairly - tarnished as something with no viable games to play, and Sony was slow to unlock its heritage of PlayStation games to help stem the bleeding. PS5 take note - while new games are pricey to produce, Sony already has a raft of older titles to lean on when that lull inevitably comes along in between PS5's launch and its second wave.
In a last-ditch effort to save the Vita from becoming the next Dreamcast, Sony was giving away a year's worth of access to Uncharted: Golden Abyss, WipEout , Gravity Rush, and Unit 13 as part of this bundle. Critically, the latter was a disaster for the Vita's reputation.
If the masses were already dissuaded from buying a Vita due to a lack of triple-A blockbusters, Black Ops Declassified would cement that decision. For those who want a good hero shooter to tuck into, but can't afford the ever pricey Overwatch , Paladins is the perfect substitute.
Sure, it's almost criminal just how similar it is to Blizzard's multiplayer masterpiece, right down to each character's design and their respective special abilities, but Hi-Rez Studios has managed to cobble something seriously fun out of this unashamed imitation. As a free-to-play shooter, Paladin's microtransaction store, which the progression system awkwardly pushes you towards, is hard to ignore or enjoy, but there's no pay-to-win rubbish to worry about here.
Enter another strange new reality in this sequel to the original Axiom Verge, one of the best "metroidvania" games released in the last ten years. Like the first game, the main goal is exploration of a large interconnected world. As you travel you'll find roadblocks, but you'll find the tools to overcome them at the ends of other paths, so if you're struggling, just look elsewhere.
There are of course many enemies and even a few boss monsters to tackle on the way, but with a varied array of weapons, you might just be able to find your way through and discover why you've been brought here. Yu and Kay are a couple in a tight spot, and so have escaped to a desolate planet. In the body of their old spaceship, they plan to build their home, with the help of the friendly denizens of their new world, and by defeating those who seek to tear them apart.
In keeping with a game about an intimate relationship, Haven makes you control both characters simultaneously, both when roaming the world and in a fight. You can do this with a local co-op partner or by yourself as you prefer, but either way the mechanics of moving and battling in unison matches perfectly with the tone of the game, told through interactive conversations.
Plus the electronica soundtrack is a treat to listen to throughout. Cloudpunk is the name of the company you work for, a shady courier operation. As Rania, a driver responsible for making these deliveries, you'll travel the city on your assignments, learning more about the activities of its diverse inhabitants over the course of one dramatic night.
The city of Nivalis has a thick, oppressive atmosphere, and you'll explore its skyscrapers from top to bottom as you drive and walk between destinations. In suitably cyberpunk style, there are few happy moments to be found across the different stories, but many different secrets for you to uncover.
A self-described "pop album video game", this is a high-speed puzzle that takes through a neon world on the back of a motorcycle, skateboard and other vehicles, and with an emotive soundtrack to boot. You're playing a young woman with a broken heart, who has found herself on an unending road in the sky; part of a world that takes after the cards of a tarot deck.
Each level, which is individually scored, sees you collecting items, dodging obstacles and battling foes as you ride towards the end of the level.
There are boss battles too that mix in other mechanics to break up the action with new challenges. Once the story is through, you may want to go back through and improve your scores so you can get a perfect set of gold medals. Even if you never played the original, you'll still find this roguelike platforming game easy to get into. Playing as one of several explorers, you'll be tasked with delving into the depths of the Moon. Each playthrough is made up of randomly-generated levels, which means you'll never see the same content in the same way twice.
And even if you win which is quite unlikely on any particular run , there are still more secrets for you to find on subsequent playthroughs. If you don't want to adventure alone, you can invite up to three other players in local co-op or one other player online, either fighting through the caverns together, or against each other in Arena mode.
The second game in the open-world hacking series takes you to San Francisco, where, as new protagonist Marcus Holloway, you join Deadsec to take on the ctOS system that monitors the city. As well as conventional weaponry, you also have the ability to hack nearby devices, such as your enemies' smartphones, drones or even parts of city infrastructure, to help you fight back.
And if fighting against the city isn't enough, you can also join up in co-op to get or give a helping hand, or invade another user's game and engage in a tense game of cat and mouse, trying to figure out their disguise and take them out first. Taking inspiration from viral animal memes, this game puts pets and wild beasts together in an arena for a Street Fighter-style showdown that manages to be both complex but very dumb. To cut through to the heart of the game, it's a 2D fighter.
That means you'll be moving and jumping backwards and forwards in a straight line, deciding when best to block and attack in order to win the best of three rounds. You'll need to be seriously online to understand where the ideas for the characters came from, but anyone can appreciate the absurd spectacle of a jacked Shiba Inu punching a magical squirrel.
There's also a pretty robust combo system beneath the silly visuals, meaning that if you spend some time getting to grips with the game, then you can become the apex predator when you challenge your friends, try the game's arcade mode or fight against others online. The newest game to take social media by storm, this battle royale-style title doesn't involve fighting directly, but rather platforming by way of running, jumping, diving and grabbing. Each round takes you through your way to the end of one of several tricky obstacle courses.
Make it to the end fast enough, or complete one of the other unique goals tied to different maps, and you'll get to progress to the next round, until a victor is decided in a final free-for-all.
With up to 60 players a match each playing as a cute bean-shaped character, there's a lot of visual appeal, particularly when you begin to unlock cosmetics to customize your avatar's look and emotes. Sometimes you'll be playing against all of the other players, but other times you will be split into teams for a more cooperative experience.
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