Reviews Archives - Page 46 of 128

Vengeance: The Kotaku Review

Vengeance is what happens when someone takes the murderous revenge tale of movies like Kill Bill and turns them into a board game. Or at least tries to. A game for 1-4 players, Vengeance puts you in control of a person who has been wronged at the hands of criminal gangs, and who is now…

By Luke Plunkett Published March 25, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Ni no Kuni II: The Kotaku Review

It can be difficult, as a jaded adult, to appreciate a great fairy tale—one where the hero always wins and naivety is a character strength rather than something to grow out of. So it is with Ni no Kuni II. But if you can look past this game’s more childish tendencies, you’ll find a fairy…

By Jason Schreier Published March 23, 2018

ReviewsSwitch

Kirby Star Allies: The Kotaku Review

Great games are interesting, as are terrible ones. Mediocrity’s a bore. Too bad Nintendo’s newest Kirby game is just that. Kirby Star Allies is the Nintendo Switch debut for a franchise that was on a hot streak in recent years on 3DS. It boasts the same top designers as 2014’s Kirby: Triple Deluxe and 2016’s…

By Stephen Totilo Published March 16, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Kingdom Come: Deliverance: The Kotaku Review

Kingdom Come: Deliverance was a grand idea. In a genre awash with fantasy epics, it sought to ground a role-playing adventure not in some distant and imaginary land, but in history. There would be no wizards, no dragons, no giant rats—just you, a horse, some mud, and a cast of flawed human beings. Drawing on…

By Luke Plunkett Published March 14, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Secret Of Mana: The Kotaku Review

Secret of Mana is a broken game that I will always love. Playing through the recent remake forced me to reckon with why that is. Originally released by Square in 1993 on the Super Nintendo, Secret of Mana is the textbook example of the “action role-playing game.” Like any RPG, the damage you do to…

By Chris Kohler Published March 9, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Metal Gear Survive: The Kotaku Review

Metal Gear Survive is wreckage of the long battle between the series’ lead creator, Hideo Kojima, and Konami, his long-time employer who ditched him three years ago. Kojima split with Konami after a lifetime of making Metal Gear games, going back to the first in 1987. Survive is Konami’s attempt to make a new one…

By Heather Alexandra Published March 7, 2018

ReviewsHardwareComputers

Zotac Magnus EK71080 Mini PC Review: A Powerful Little Black Box

Zotac is renowned for making powerful mini PCs. Zotac also makes the world’s smallest Nvidia Geforce GTX 1080 graphics card. Combine those two things and you’ve got one heck of a powerful small black box. There are several ways to make a very small gaming PC. One way is to make a gaming laptop without…

By Mike Fahey Published March 5, 2018

ReviewsPC

Into The Breach: The Kotaku Review

Into the Breach is a game about the accumulation of small decisions, good or bad. It’s a game that never lets you forget your past runs, especially your failures. Into the Breach is made by Subset Games, the studio behind 2012’s FTL, the hit strategy game that charged players with keeping a spaceship in flight…

By Riley MacLeod Published February 27, 2018

ReviewsETC

Adolescence: The Kotaku Review

The best thing about Adolescence is that it eventually ends. The real life journey that runs from age 13 to 19 starts with a bang. Seemingly overnight, your body is no longer fully under your control. Extra hair, pockets of fat, and pimples have appeared as if by magic. Everything is different. Everything is harder.…

By Gita Jackson Published February 26, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Dynasty Warriors 9: The Kotaku Review

If you’ve played an hour in one Dynasty Warriors game you’ve played an hour in all of them. That’s been the conventional wisdom for a while now and although Dynasty Warriors 9 doesn’t disprove it, it does point toward some interesting new possibilities for the series in its new open world setting. Dynasty Warriors 9…

By Ethan Gach Published February 14, 2018

ReviewsBoard Games

Black Fleet: The Kotaku Review

There are too many board games about pirates. But Black Fleet is one you should fight through the fatigue for. It’s similar in scope to other buccaneering board games, since it involves merchants carrying goods across the Caribbean and pirates raiding (or trying to raid) them. But where Black Fleet is cool is that it…

By Luke Plunkett Published February 13, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

The Longest Five Minutes: The Kotaku Review

The Longest Five Minutes presents its basic fantasy tale as a series of flashbacks experienced by its amnesiac main character during the game’s final battle. It takes an otherwise generic retro turn-based RPG and turns it into something special. Wait, I’m already at the end of the review? How did I get here? Oh wait.…

By Mike Fahey Published February 13, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Dragon Quest Builders: The Kotaku Review

Here is how I play Minecraft: Step one: find a tree. Step two: build a house. Step three: walk in one direction for five minutes. Step four: get bored, turn off the game. If only there was something like Minecraft, but with tangible goals. And if only it was also… a JRPG? Dragon Quest Builders,…

By Jason Schreier Published February 9, 2018

ReviewsPC

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall: The Kotaku Review

It took Civilization V two full expansions to become the classic it’s regarded as today. Civilization VI is halfway there. While my 2016 review of Civ VI was glowing, it did come with the historical reservation that Civilization games are so big, and their design process so ever-evolving, that they’re rarely a masterpiece from the…

By Luke Plunkett Published February 7, 2018

ReviewsPS4

Shadow Of The Colossus: The Kotaku Review

It’s strange to think about it now, 12 years later, but there was a time when I wondered if Shadow of the Colossus was going to be any good. I was a big fan of its predecessor, Ico, and when the doors opened at E3 2005 I beelined for the Sony booth to get a…

By Chris Kohler Published February 6, 2018

Reviews

Football: The Kotaku Review

If Football—that is, the American National Football League football—used the same naming scheme as “Dungeons & Dragons,” we’d call it “Beer Commercials & Cheerleaders.” Like dungeons and dragons, beer commercials and cheerleaders are two things that not everyone likes. They are also, however, not The Point of their respective games: they are simply nouns which…

Tim Rogers Published February 4, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

EA UFC 3: The Kotaku Review

In MMA, there are fighters who’ve got all the potential in the world, but continually fail to put the pieces together. My heart breaks each time they steal a round from a canny vet, only to be force-fed a diet of dirt and canvas dust in the second. A slip or two on the way…

By Nathan Grayson Published February 2, 2018

ReviewsMultiplatform

Celeste: The Kotaku Review

Celeste is pure. Each room offers new challenges, but the solution is always the same: jump. Jumping is remixed in dozens of different, exciting ways. Celeste is the very soul of simplicity, and that’s what makes it such a beautiful game. Celeste tells the story of Madeline, a young woman on a journey to climb…

By Heather Alexandra Published January 25, 2018

ReviewsBoard Games

Raiders Of The North Sea: The Kotaku Review

Raiders of the North Sea is the brightest, breeziest way to pillage the shores of Europe I’ve ever had the pleasure of playing. It’s a worker placement game for 2-4 players, where everyone is in competition to build up a crew of bloodthirsty marauders, secure provisions then head out raiding monasteries and villages in an…

By Luke Plunkett Published January 17, 2018

ReviewsBoard Games

Android: Netrunner: The Kotaku Review

The card game Android: Netrunner does not feel like a game. Jacked into its system, Android: Netrunner’s thorny mechanics melt away until all that’s left are electric impulses in my brain interfacing with my opponents’. It becomes a stylish dance of psychology. Android: Netrunner is not a new card game, but it’s the most captivating…

By Cecilia D'Anastasio Published January 17, 2018