Well Played

• PS4
• 8.5 / 10
• Australie

• PC
• 9 / 10
• Australie

Once things begin to click, every level of Neon White is an entertaining fever dream that you can’t help but play over again to best your results. The entire package is excellent, but it’s that rush of adrenaline when every move and every quick flick transitions at times seamlessly that drives the experience beyond even initial expectations. When the game slows down to reveal important character moments, it’s a chance to catch your breath, before diving back into the next lot of cleverly paced levels that are wonderfully designed to make the most of the concept without overburdening you with mechanics or brash visuals. Neon White is excellence defined as a speedrunner’s dream.

• SWITCH
• 7 / 10
• Australie

• PC
• 8 / 10
• Australie

Across my journey with Card Shark, I amassed ill-gotten wealth and discovered amusing (and alarming) characters that uncovered a tale with exciting twists, full of pompous aristocracy and political intrigue. While the game does request your full and proper attention to achieve the very zenith of your trickery, you’ll feel incredibly accomplished at what skullduggery you can achieve.

• PC
• 9 / 10
• Australie

What Corpse Factory lacks in subtlety it makes up for with an unnerving commitment to its absurdly morbid theming and story. The production value of Australian team Crow River Studio’s latest visual novel is remarkable in both its art and fully voiced dialogue. The lack of meaningful decisions and its three endings offering the coldest of closure does little to shake this title from being an easy recommendation for fans of edgy psychological horror.

• PS5
• 7 / 10
• Australie

Silt is an enjoyable puzzle adventure game, but it doesn’t really do much that the genre hasn’t seen before. The ability to possess creatures and use their unique abilities to solve puzzles is decent fun and does force you to think in some instances, but the lack of a coherent narrative paired with a slight lack of originality in its gameplay sees it fail to be as memorable as the games that appear to have inspired it. If you’re keen on a Limbo-esque experience that you can see through in a handful of hours, Silt is still worth a try, but the stark reality it faces is that there are so many games like it that do things better.

• PC
• 6 / 10
• Australie

• PS5
• 8 / 10
• Australie

Fans are in safe hands with Sniper Elite’s latest stealth sandbox. Rough edges and last-gen visuals and design leave this entry feeling slightly laggard in 2022, with the series needing to really shake up the formula. The mostly standout French levels and exceptionally tactical stealth action keep things just fresh enough for this fifth outing. You’ll be hard-pressed to find a more gruesomely rewarding assassination sim this side of Hitman but be prepared for a sprinkling of jank on your sniping escargot.

• PC
• 8.5 / 10
• Australie

Eternal Threads comes together as a solid, engaging narrative that keeps things simple, with a cleverly implemented time manipulation mechanic that easily allows you to jump back and forth through every possible outcome. And you’ll want to explore those outcomes, because there’s plenty of interesting threads that could otherwise go unnoticed. It might not do anything altogether ground-breaking, but as an overall package it’s hard not to recommend this thoroughly enjoyable tale.

• PC
• 6.5 / 10
• Australie

I’m a little disappointed in Salt and Sacrifice. It’s certainly not a bad game, but it makes a lot of changes that remove the charm and heart of the original, favouring more standardised mechanics instead. One of the more egregious design choices is definitely the new hunt system for named and nameless mages, which creates an arbitrary progression block and breaks the flow of the game. I’m not sure what happened between this game and its predecessor, but the graceful understanding of Metroidavanias as a whole is lost in this game, and what remains is not as compelling as the original.

• PS5
• 7 / 10
• Australie

Trek to Yomi may not be the complete samurai package, but it’s still one that’s worth experiencing. The combat may not be as precise and varied as one would hope and there are definite frustrations felt during boss fights and certain encounters, but that shouldn’t overshadow the game’s stronger qualities. An exceptional visual style, some solid voice acting and immersive audio will draw you into this violent, mystical and surprisingly affecting tale of revenge.

• PC
• SWITCH
• PS4
• XONE
• 4 / 10
• Australie

A choice-based narrative against the backdrop of an extremely charged period in America’s history has limitless potential, but everywhere you look, Best Month Ever!’s ambitions outstrip its ability to execute. Characters and situations compete with one another to see how bizarre and unrelatable they can be, and there’s a general lack of emotional impact or cohesion. Awkward voice work and janky animations seal the deal, with some of the game’s art direction being the only light in the darkness for this tawdry mother and son tale.

• PC
• 6 / 10
• Australie

• PS4
• 9 / 10
• Australie

• PS5
• 7 / 10
• Australie

There’s no denying how good ANNO: Mutationem looks. The neon lights pop, the character animations are fun, and the combat (when it gets moving) is crisp and exciting. But pulling the focus away from those side-scrolling action sequences comes to the detriment of the overall package. The story never really pulled me in as much as I wanted it to, taking its time to build in the hope of creating intrigue, but all it did was remind me of how good the beat ‘em up sections would have been if the entire game had been built around them instead of filtered in-between.

• PS5
• 8 / 10
• Australie

• XONE
• 7 / 10
• Australie

Even if Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla is your first game in the series and first DLC, you’ll enjoy this mythical outing. The Assassin’s Creed series has been around a long time and it’s likely going to continue for a while still, so I have to respect that the games are breaking their mould. The addition of new powers is a bonus I wasn’t expecting, but if you’re playing as a god it’s only fair the game lets you act like one. It’s a return to form after Odyssey’s own mythical DLC that values the player experience and allows players to dip back into the game two years after launch. However, past face value, it really doesn’t add much to the overarching storyline for the franchise. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a fun and enjoyable adventure, but it feels like it could’ve worked harder to build itself into the series as a whole. The creed remains, but it’s left me wondering where we’ll see the game series go next.

• PS4
• 9.5 / 10
• Australie