IGN

• PC
• SWITCH
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 9 / 10
• États-Unis

Cocoon is a breathtaking puzzle-platformer that borders on psychedelic. Building on what made Inside designer Jeppe Carlsen's previous work stand out, Cocoon not only presents a mind-bending journey through the cosmos via fascinating worlds-within-worlds puzzle mechanics that beg you to delve another layer deeper, but an interesting take on the repetition of work, life, and being part of a "bigger picture." With a relatively short playtime and some well-hidden collectibles that make it worth replaying, Cocoon is a must-play for fans of Limbo or Inside, or anyone looking for a new puzzle adventure to play and then sit down and think about for a while.

• PC
• SWITCH
• PS4
• PS5
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 7 / 10
• États-Unis

If you were hoping for a dramatic reinvention of EA’s soccer sim to go along with ditching the FIFA name, EA Sports FC 24 is not that. If you’ve played FIFA, you know exactly what kind of incremental improvements and longstanding problems with AI to expect this year. New mechanics like Evolutions show that EA has a general grasp of how to improve its RPG elements, even if it’s only currently for Ultimate Team where you have to put up with all of the dreaded microtransactions. Elsewhere, Volta mode is still a lot of fun with a full team of friends thanks in part to its unique arenas, while the Career Modes once again suffer from the same lack of care they’ve been missing for years, with the added annoyance of some ill-conceived RNG-based objectives this time. All told, it might have a new name, but EA Sports FC 24 is just about the same, frustrating but beautiful game.

• PC
• PS5
• XSX/S
• 9 / 10
• États-Unis

Last year, I said in my review of Cyberpunk Edgerunners that CDPR now has a blueprint for where to go with Cyberpunk 2077, and Phantom Liberty shows the studio already had exactly that in mind. Between a more sophisticated level of storytelling with excellent performances, smarter insights on the cyberpunk genre and its dystopian themes, and landing on top of a much-improved gameplay experience thanks to its fresh 2.0 update, Phantom Liberty marks a new chapter for Cyberpunk 2077 and is finally close to what I’d hoped it would be when I first sat down to play three years ago.

• PC
• 5 / 10
• États-Unis

Mineko’s Night Market is an adorable little sim that could’ve been cozy, but is mostly just boring chores that don’t reward you in the kinds of satisfying ways we see in other popular games in this relaxed genre. After putting you to work, it doesn’t let up, trapping you in a grind of gathering resources and making crafts for lifeless NPCs. Beyond some purring cats, gorgeous artwork, and a handful of legitimately funny bits, it doesn’t provide anything to make all your work worth it.

• PC
• 4 / 10
• États-Unis

We haven’t quite been waiting 100 years for an Avatar game that lives up to the potential of the show, but it’s certainly beginning to feel that way after playing Avatar: The Last Airbender - Quest for Balance. This half-baked and wildly inconsistent retelling of the excellent TV series shows the promise of what an Avatar game could maybe be, but a baffling choice of which scenes to highlight, a clunky camera and combat, hilarious balance problems, and an overreliance on middling block puzzles and boring fetch quests leaves our search for the real Avatar still desperately out of luck. With more Avatar shows and movies on the way, it’s just downright odd how Quest for Balance has managed to arrive at this point in time as both an unsatisfying entry point for newcomers and a poor way to revisit it for dedicated fans.

• PC
• PS5
• XSX/S
• 7 / 10
• États-Unis

Payday 3 is a solid step forward for my favorite heist simulator franchise, even though that step is a lot smaller than I’d hoped due to a lack of content and the unsurprising but still majorly annoying bugs and performance issues. The awesome combat, greatly improved AI, and especially the stealth options are so massive they alone justify this as a full sequel, and the new and improved heists with clear phases to navigate them are absolutely fantastic. I just wish there was more loot in the proverbial vault at the outset, and that Starbreeze would have used its years of experience in order to ensure this was a more robust and far more stable launch. I’m confident Payday 3 could become the sequel we all deserve with a year or two of updates – for now, it’s a nice start.

• PC
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 7 / 10
• États-Unis

With smooth online multiplayer, a handful of mostly distinct maps, and downright adorable characters, Party Animals delivers a fun party game that brings cuddly, chaotic fun where it counts the most. The intentionally wobbly controls take a moment to get used to, but once you do it’s wonderfully satisfying to land a punch and send another player flying into an environmental hazard for a KO. It does commit an all-too-common cardinal sin for contemporary multiplayer games in making local play less enjoyable than going online, but all three main modes are a good time, especially in a full lobby of eight players.

• PC
• PS4
• PS5
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Lies of P might not branch out particularly far from its soulslike inspiration, but like a marionette controlled by a skilled puppet master, it plays the part extremely well in a wonderfully dark fantasy world. It must be said that its uneven difficulty didn’t always make me feel like an underdog, especially when playing as a brawny, overpowered version of Pinocchio with a massive weapon, and combat pigeonholed me into a specific playstyle while the levels are less open and twisting than most. But with an awesome weapon crafting system, some really memorable boss fights, and one of the better stories we’ve seen in this genre, I can enthusiastically recommend you spend your time hanging out with Gepetto and friends. If you’ve been waiting for a Bloodborne remaster or sequel that may never come, Lies of P is the next best thing.

• PC
• PS5
• XSX/S
• SWITCH
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Mortal Kombat 1 is another great entry in this legendary series, but it’s not one without issues. The new Kameo system is excellent, there are smart changes to the fighting mechanics that address many of the fundamental issues that cropped up over Mortal Kombat 11’s life, and predictably, the fantastic single-player story mode that continues to be the gold standard of the genre. But certain elements of online play are starting to feel dated, and Invasions mode is not nearly engaging enough to hold my attention for as long as is needed to unlock a majority of the goodies hidden behind its many treasure chests and gimmicky battles. Still, Mortal Kombat 1 marks a new beginning for the franchise, and it’s a very exciting launching point for the next era.

• PC
• PS4
• PS5
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 7 / 10
• États-Unis

It’s said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. LEGO has Mega Bloks. E.T. has Mac and Me. Now Forza Horizon has The Crew Motorfest. To be fair, Motorfest is a robust racer with a confident sense of style, a quality arcade handling model, and a long list of generally well-planned events right out of the box. However, the shift to a smaller map has seen it lose a part of its old identity, boats and aircraft feel like they’ve been sidelined, and some of its event Playlists work a lot better than others. Ultimately, The Crew Motorfest is a little more Ice Ice Baby and a little less Under Pressure. It’s a catchy enough copy, but it ain’t exactly back with a brand new invention.

• PS5
• 6 / 10
• États-Unis

Firewall Ultra simultaneously feels like two steps forward and two steps backward. It somehow does just as much right – and wrong – as Firewall: Zero Hour, a VR game that is now over five years old. While its shooting and tactical teamwork feel, look, and sound better than ever, its content is limited and it’s filled with questionable uses of new tech like eye tracking. What it all adds up to is a decent competitive multiplayer shooter that just happens to be in VR, but its awkward controls are a shot in the foot rather than the shot in the arm that the PlayStation VR2 desperately needed.

• PC
• XSX/S
• 7 / 10
• États-Unis

It’s never a great sign when someone recommends a game on the grounds that it gets good after more than a dozen hours, but that’s very much the kind of game Starfield is, and I do recommend it. There are a lot of forces working against it, and the combination of disjointed space travel, nonexistent maps, aggravating inventory management, and a slow rollout of essential abilities very nearly did it in. It was the joys piloting a custom spaceship into and out of all sorts of morally ambiguous situations in a rich sci-fi universe that eventually pulled it out of a nosedive. I’m glad that I powered through the early hours, because its interstellar mystery story pays off and, once the ball got rolling, combat on foot and in space gradually became good enough that its momentum carried me into New Game+ after I’d finished the main story after around 60 hours. Like Skryim and Fallout 4 before it, there’s still an immense amount of quality roleplaying quests and interesting NPCs out there, waiting to be stumbled across, and the pull to seek it out is strong.

• PS5
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Trine 5: A Clockwork Conspiracy is an awesome sequel that keeps the good times rolling for one of the best co-op puzzle-platformer series out there. This set of puzzles are some of the strongest they’ve ever been, and boss fights are creative and original – even if those highlights are occasionally cut short with snooze-inducing combat sections and a predictable story. It may not do much to innovate beyond what we’ve done four times before, but Trine 5 plays to its strengths extremely well and makes some important tweaks here and there that definitely make it worthy of a playthrough or two.

• PC
• SWITCH
• PS4
• XONE
• XSX/S
• PS5
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Sea of Stars is an excellent tribute RPG that channels the best parts of its ‘90s-era forebears like Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy 6, and even Star Ocean: The Second Story. Because of that, it’s fair to say that its world, graphical style, and mechanics aren’t wholly original, but there are enough interesting twists in its 30-hour story to make for a rich and enjoyable experience of its own merit. This isn’t just nostalgia fodder. That said, its twitchy combat can be difficult to get a handle on, and once you do, it only stays interesting for so long before its limited customization options make it start to feel just a little repetitive. That’s made up for by a strong soundtrack, an approachable and endearing story, and a wide number of fun zones and boss fights that make this a trip worth taking.

• PC
• SWITCH
• XONE
• PS4
• PS5
• XSX/S
• 9 / 10
• États-Unis

Before playing The Making of Karateka, I had no interest in Karateka beyond it being a historical stepping stone to Prince of Persia. But I get it now. I I see its many parts: The animation that was hand drawn from Jordan Mechner’’s snapshots of his family’s karate instructor; the music that began as a fatherly lesson in Wagner’s leitmotifs; and the cinematic framing of a story that cuts between scenes in a far more complicated way than, say, the “They Meet” cutscene in Ms. Pac-Man. Karateka is significant, but the story behind it is remarkable, and The Making of Karateka tells that story in the coolest way possible.

• PC
• SWITCH
• PS5
• XSX/S
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Blasphemous 2 is an excellent Metroidvania and a marked improvement over the original, even if it did occasionally make me cancel my lunch plans with its grotesqueries. What it lacks in originality with its design it more than makes up for with its bizarre world, appalling story, and inspired look and sound. The new weapons and focus on platforming definitely helped sustain my enjoyment for the campaign’s sizable duration, even when underwhelming enemy variety and unchallenging bosses leave something to be desired. Its stomach-churning religious torture porn might be as far as you can get from the adorable world of Hollow Knight, but you’d be hard-pressed to find something better to play while you continue your interminable wait for Silksong.

• PC
• PS4
• PS5
• XONE
• XSX/S
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Armored Core 6 doesn’t look to reinvent the bipedal legs of the mech action genre, but it does update, refine, and polish them to an aggressive shine. Every sortie is a satisfying combat puzzle to solve thanks to fantastic mission design, intense boss encounters, an extremely wide assortment of weapons and parts that can dramatically affect how your mech plays, and excellent, explosive combat that manages to take very complex systems and mechanics and make them easy to understand and execute. Its interesting premise is stifled by bland storytelling told through mission briefings and radio chatter, but this is still nonetheless a welcome return of a classic mecha series.

• PC
• PS5
• XSX/S
• 8 / 10
• États-Unis

Immortals of Aveum is an impressively confident first-person shooter that successfully trades muzzles and magazines for mages and magic. Its fast-paced, spellcasting combat is both satisfying to master and spectacular to look at, and it features a lengthy and hearty campaign packed with secrets to keep us going well after the story has wrapped. As someone who desperately hopes that unapologetically single-player shooters will live forever, these Immortals have done a great job of making sure they’re definitely not dead yet.