Posts tagged “preview”

The original Little Nightmares is one of my favourite horror games ever. I admire a horror game that doesn't rely on the first-person perspective. Little Nightmares is scary in the same way it was scary to hide in your parents' wardrobe because you were planning to jump out at them, but then you sort of fell over your dad's shoes and you weren't sure what…

Tagged with Bandai Namco Entertainment, feature, preview, Tarsier Studios, Little Nightmares II.

“Less is more”. A classic advertising slogan isn’t it? I imagine a minimalist house with shelves that fold away discreetly and a glass coffee table that sits in an expanse of glossy white. They’re often marketed as an economic use of space that cuts out any unnecessary noise. I don’t disagree! If anything, I can see the appeal. But I prefer homes with a bit…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montreal, Assassin's Creed Valhalla.

It was when I drank baby milk with a bunch of half-naked yakuza in diapers that I really knew I was back in a Yakuza game. I noted an edge of disbelief in my voice as my laughter echoed across the room. But mixed in with my cackle was genuine warmth, too. It was good to be back.As a long time fan of Sega's action…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, Sega, Yakuza: Like a Dragon.

I don’t watch much horror myself, so forgive me. But you know those trailers? The ones where there’s a cabin in the woods and a group of smiling high schoolers descend upon it? They flip up the trunk of their car, eagerly fling their suitcases on the wooden decking, and chortle about how they are going to have a rad time. Tropicana in the morning,…

Tagged with feature, interview, preview, Young Horses, Bugsnax.

Watch Dogs Legion, aka Watch Dogs London, is nearly upon us. See its release, there, squatting at the end of October 2020 like a big cockernee pumpkin smoking a cigar. I am broadly looking forward to Ubisoft's hacktion adventure where you can play as anyone by recruiting any NPC you see into your gang of hacktivists with undercuts, because from the hands on previews I've…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ubisoft, Watch Dogs Legion.

I'm going to get this out of the way, because every outlet with a hands on preview of Ubisoft's action-adventure Immortals Fenyx Rising (which used to be called Gods & Monsters) is going to say it somewhere. Immortals Fenyx Rising is a proper Breath-Of-The-Wildalike. It's one themed around Ancient Greek myths, yes, but you've got yer horses you can tame, yer open world to explore…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Quebec, Immortals Fenyx Rising.

Three-way mega-battle FPS MMO PlanetSide 2 is about to unveil another big update. The Shattered Warpgate will introduce hazardous storms to one of its maps and some new equipment, but most importantly, a campaign.Its big update back in March, Escalation, bought thousands of players back, but where that was focused largely on organised groups of experienced players, Rogue Games' Andy Sites declared that "our goal…

Tagged with Daybreak Game Company, feature, free to play, interview, preview, rogue planet games, PlanetSide 2.

"If you're a ghost, and you walk through a wall..." asks Richard Hogg, in the tone of a man confronted with a real head-scratcher, "...do you get to see the inside of the wall?"It's a good question. The kind which, for most people, might fuel a good half hour in a pub, or a 2am chat with a partner who can't sleep. But for Hogg…

Tagged with Annapurna Interactive, feature, Hollow Ponds, interview, preview, Richard Hogg, Ricky Haggett, I Am Dead, Wilmot's Warehouse.

Spiritfarer, the "cosy management game about dying", is full of many little acts of kindness. "You can hug anyone, by the way," Nicolas Guérin tells me, during my recent hands-on preview. Guérin is creative director at Thunder Lotus Games, and Spiritfarer is a slight shift from their action games Sundered and Jotun. Death is a common theme, perhaps, but Spiritfarer is a much more gentle…

Tagged with feature, preview, Thunder Lotus Games, Spiritfarer.

So, as of this evening's Xbox Games Showcase, we've finally seen footage of Halo Infinite, and it looks good! There was indeed a grappling hook, more mobility in general from the Chief (he can climb on boxes now!), and a couple of new guns. There was also some classic Warthog action, some dependably stirring music, and a couple of genuinely sublime moments of looking-out-across-a-halo-at-sunset beauty.…

Tagged with 343 Industries, E3 2020, escharum, feature, preview, Xbox Game Showcase, Xbox Game Studios, Halo Infinite.

If you'd told me before today that it's possible to make an upbeat and friendly 3D platformer based on the works of Franz Kafka without undermining the nature of either, I would have found it hard to believe. And yet here we are.I'll confess that it's been a long while since I've read The Metamorphosis, and I never had particularly strong feelings about it (save…

Tagged with All In! Games, feature, ovid works, preview, Metamorphosis.

If you see the name "Menelaus" and find yourself scratching your head over how to pronounce it, then have no fear: play any more than eight seconds of A Total War Saga: Troy, and you will never forget. That's because the extremely bellowy king of Sparta can't seem to take a breath without hollering his own name on the exhalation. He's like an incredibly angry…

Tagged with A Total War Saga: Troy., Creative Assembly Sofia, feature, preview, Sega, A Total War Saga: Troy.

Playing a big ol' chunk of Assassin's Creed Valhalla made me realise how much the series has changed since the first game in 2007. If you played Altaïr's first adventure and then skipped straight to Valhalla, where big buff blonde viking Eivor is running around 9th century England, you probably wouldn't realise they were in the same series. Assassin's Creed Valhalla doesn't feel like an…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Montreal, Assassin's Creed Valhalla.

I don't go round singing "Maybe It's Because I'm A Londoner!" or anything, but out of all the places I've lived so far, London is the one I think of as home. And this so happens to be the setting for hacktion-adventure game Watch Dogs Legion, which is definitely not called Watch Dogs London despite how often I accidentally say that. It's a dystopian near-future…

Tagged with feature, preview, Ubisoft, Ubisoft Toronto, Watch Dogs Legion.

I don't like rocket jumping. It is silly. And yet, I had a good time with Rocket Arena, the upcoming online shooter, when I played in a closed preview event a bit over a week ago. It's coming on July 14 from Final Strike Games, via little known indie publisher Electronic Arts.The original version of Rocket Arena was a mod for Quake, which your dad…

Tagged with EA Originals, Electronic Arts, feature, Final Strike Games, preview, Rocket Arena.

After a year of speculation, I've finally had a chance to play Humankind, Amplitude Studios' much-anticipated competitor to the Civilization series, and while I only got to play through the very first era of the game on a single map, I can say for sure we've definitely got a contender here. I'm hesitant to say how strong a contender until I've seen more of the…

Tagged with 4X, Amplitude Studios, feature, hands on, preview, Humankind.

I've just invented a new dance move. It's called the Squatting Witch. You grasp an imaginary ladle, and stir it slowly around an invisible cauldron while doing squats in time to the music. It's my second best move after the Driving Crab, where you curl your fingers over a pretend steering wheel and steer left and right while scuttling from side to side. My hosts,…

Tagged with Bossa Studios, E3 2020, feature, preview, Surgeon Simulator 2.

We're all friends here, readers. As such, you know that I like me a creepsome horror game or two, which is why I was keen to have at the demo for In Sound Mind, a new game of just this sort shown today at the PC Gaming Show. I say creepsome horror, of course, with the caveat that what I played was very much a…

Tagged with E3 2020, feature, Modus Games, preview, We Create Stuff, In Sound Mind.

I played a lot of Startopia growing up. If you are unfamiliar, it was a weird management game where you were in charge of running a port on a big, donut-shaped space station. Last year Spacebase Startopia was announced, a sort of remake-slash-sequel to Startopia made by a different studio, and this weekend it went into a closed beta. So what else could I do,…

Tagged with beta, feature, Kalypso Media, preview, Spacebase Startopia, Startopia.

Total War Saga: Troy is out on August 13th and will be free at launch, and having played a demo battle which pitted Achilles’ Acheans against Hector’s Trojans, I’m intrigued to play more. I've chosen the word "intrigued" deliberately, here. Because while the tactical depth of what I played was impressive, and rooted itself emphatically in its semi-mythical setting, its multi-skilled infantry and attention-demanding heroes…

Tagged with Creative Assembly Sofia, feature, preview, Sega, A Total War Saga: Troy.