Digital Trends

• X360
• États-Unis

The weird and often metaphorical story is pretentious and hampered by low-brow sensibilities. It’s hard to sell a game on being deep when one of the level bosses looks like a penis. But even if you enjoy the story and presentation, the gameplay is flawed and the level layouts are deceptively dull. A flashy opening area is typically replaced by a generic, square area. The colors may change, but the design philosophy is consistent. Killer Is Dead tries to deliver something original and unique, and for that it should get some credit. Sure, that uniqueness is inundated with misogyny, it’s offensive at times, and it is created on bland gameplay, but kudos for trying, I guess. There are some fun moments, but they are hidden under a pile of issues from the offensive to the technically flawed.

• X360
• États-Unis

In spite of a handful of shortcomings, some of which could easily be fixed with a balance-focused patch, series fans get a big improvement here over Madden NFL 13. Yes, it’s the only pro football sim around, but you’ll play it because you want to, not because you have to. Madden NFL 25 may not be the monumental change that its auspicious anniversary-bearing title might suggest – this is not the 2025 season, believe it or not – but it’s yet another solid effort from the EA Tiburon team.

• X360
• États-Unis

he Bureau‘s bright spots are all too rare. The deeper you get into the game, the more frustrating it becomes. It may not be fair to criticize a game for being something it isn’t, but it’s not unreasonable to expect a certain level of quality from your story-driven gameplay. Why didn’t 2K Marin focus more on character development? Why wasn’t there more emphasize on 1960s technology and culture? Why not try to make more distinctive aliens and alien weapons rather than just making stuff that looks so familiar from a plethora of other games? In the case of The Bureau, these questions have to be asked since the bones of a better game can be glimpsed underneath the piled bodies of your dim-witted squadmates. It could have been Mass Effect by way of Mad Men. Instead it’s just another shooter with aliens and a scratchy-voiced main character.

• PC
• PS3
• X360
• États-Unis

• PC
• États-Unis

• X360
• États-Unis

• PS3
• États-Unis

• X360
• États-Unis

Like Journey, Brothers is about the loneliness and the celebration of sharing a profound experience. Even when you have a partner, a family, you are also always going to just be yourself. And unlike Journey, Brothers is played entirely solo, a personal experience that illustrates how two people can overcome the inherent isolation of being alive through friendship and family. Brothers is grounded and human, its play built on touching the physical world and experiencing the ecstasy and loss that comes with being a part of everything. Where Journey was spiritual and ephemeral, delivering an impressionistic revelation as you climbed the mountain, Brothers is the opposite. Catharsis comes from the descent, not the climb. That is what Josef Fares and Starbreeze have done here. Their work boils video games down to their most essential tools — manipulating an object on a screen and pressing a button to effect change — and uses those tools to tell an astoundingly affecting tale about complex people. If you touch it, it’s impossible to not be touched back.

• PS3
• États-Unis

Dragon’s Crown benefits from its smart structure and pacing, something Kamitani’s struggled with in the past. He’s always been a chef of note, cooking unusual and distinctive dishes like Odin Sphere, but his previous games have been flawed in one way or another. Sphere was beautiful but bloated. Princess Crown was elegant, but it was often difficult to figure out what to do (and that’s on top of it only being available in Japanese.) Vanillaware’s art is awash in life. Every character portrait literally heaves, with detail lines expanding and contracting, making something hand drawn seem alive. Even simple things like the level select map are more detailed and surreally beautiful than many whole games. The writing overflows with humor and strange asides, like one Monty Python-inspired boss that shouldn’t be spoiled and a stat-boosting cooking mini-game between stages. From this point on Dragon’s Crown is Kamitani’s signature dish. And it is delicious.

• PC
• États-Unis

• PS3
• États-Unis

The changes to the decade-old series that has spawned so, so many sequels and spin-offs are small but significant. For veterans, they provide a convincing reason to dip back into the Romance of the Three Kingdoms one more time, to check out the alternate histories and plow through the Ambition Mode. But the game also demonstrates deftly why there are so many entries in the series after so many years. It’s still a blast to play at the most basic level. Do not dismiss it as just another Dynasty Warriors.

• IOS
• États-Unis

• X360
• États-Unis

NCAA Football has come to the end of its career in the first high definition console generation, and it’s graduating into a very different landscape. It’s turned into an effective, but not legendary, player at the end of this career phase. The question now is whether or not EA will recognize the opportunity for NCAA Football to evolve and change in the aftermath of 14. This is a good, solid game. If it’s going to be great, it needs to transform into something else, just like the best college players come graduation time.

• PC
• États-Unis

With studios like Telltale Games working to push forward a new era in adventure game storytelling, Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded feels as dated as his titular outerwear. There’s something to be said for the simple joy of strolling through the newly refreshed environments of Sierra’s classic and to hearing all of these beloved characters actually speak for the first time, but it isn’t enough. The immature humor and outdated, borderline offensive treatment of women all works within the context of the fiction, but never has it been more clear that it’s time for Larry to grow up.

• VITA
• États-Unis

• VITA
• États-Unis

The new PlayStation 3/PlayStation Vita port of Hotline Miami is a near-carbon copy of 2012’s PC release. Twin thumbstick/button controls replace the mouse/keyboard of course, though this mostly boils down to player preference. The Vita version employs touch-based targeting, though doing so can be difficult when you’re being rushed. The Sony platform releases also bring in the expected crop of Trophies and leaderboards, as well as a bonus mask collectible, but the two versions are otherwise exactly the same. Hotline Miami was one of the strongest games of 2012 and it is a welcome arrival this week on Sony’s console and handheld platforms. The two-man team at Dennaton achieved something truly special with this relatively low-fi game, couching the straightforward-yet-challenging play in a grim and instantly absorbing fictional world that is further brought to life by the swirling psychedelic soundscapes. It’s never to late to jump on with an exceptional game, and whether you go PC or PS3/Vita, this one is definitely worth your time.

• X360
• États-Unis

With the driving, the sense of accomplishment, and a moving fantasy that does truly feel like the best of both worlds, Grid 2 mostly does what Codemasters set out to do. It’s a quiet game, one that slowly reveals its best aspects to a diligent player. There’s a lot of racing similar courses again and again, a lot of failure and repetition. It all adds to the game’s quiet dignity. Grid 2 could do what every other big racing game on the market does now, offer all glitz and noise, and ape the shining fury and licensed soundtracks of Need For Speed or the music festival hoopla of Forza Horizon. Codemasters’ game just goes for a slow, steady immersion. In your garage, it’s nothing but the cars and some slick ambient music that wouldn’t sound out of place on an ‘80s Brian Eno album. At the end of tournament, an all too real Sports Center broadcast talking about the rising sport you’re engaged in plays. The future of driving games may be in even bigger and brighter graphics and more ridiculously tangled social networking features, but in the present there’s Grid 2, an elegant example of what video game racing are.

• PS3
• États-Unis

Maybe the saddest aspect here is the rickety treatment of science fiction, forcing you to take in its world without the necessary grounding. Even minor details, like how a totalitarian law enforcement operates without firearms, are ludicrously explained away in hidden text files. On the gameplay side, the over-reliance on a fundamentally fractured battle system certainly doesn’t help. Remember Me could hardly be considered anything close to art, but sci-fi at its core should at least serve as a functionally cautionary tale. As it stands, this vapid brawler can probably be summed up best in one word: forgettable.