Going in without any nostalgia was going to be interesting as I felt the Battlefront remasters were held up entirely by nostalgia, and so having had no previous experience with it, would Bounty Hunter hold up in 2024 or should it have been left in 2002?
Shadows of Doubt is game that I’ve been following for a while, the premise of being a private detective in a dystopian future comprised of glorious voxels, spending your days solving cases and scouting for clues very much appealed to me. When it was announced for consoles, my trousers were neatly folded in a drawer, hopefully to never be needed again.
Fast forward a year and the game gets a massive overhaul for its Steam release. DLC is now included for free - and the developers have fixed a lot of the more glaring issues that plagued the game upon its initial release.
How does it fare in 2024? it’s a lot of fun, but the repetition at the heart of the game is hard to ignore.
One of the oldest questions never asked, perhaps because everyone’s talking about that damn chicken. And I’m not about to answer that question as this is not Amphibian Psychology 101. I’m here to talk about HOW the frog crossed the road and how this (loosely) relates to Horizon Chase 2, new to Xbox.
Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden won me over with its understated characters, music, atmospherics and earthiness, whilst Outcast: A New Beginning featured incredible traversal mechanics and lore, and now Dragon’s Dogma 2 – and out of the three, this is the title that I, by far, have the strongest history with – comes blazing out of the gate with its main strengths being in how much it embraces and excels at being a video game, completely nailing combat mechanics and explosive, immediate gameplay.
It’s a game that is a pleasure to write about, and I feel like I could just list all of my in-game experiences to get my point across because there are so many personal stories to tell, all through a design sentiment that eschews seriousness to put fun and gameplay at the absolute fore.
Thus, when I caught wind of this new entry in the franchise- pseudo-reboot, pseudo-revising, pseudo-revisiting pseudo-sequel – call it what you want – I was glad to discover that I feel that this I finally the most complete, accessible, and wonderful way to know the story of the impossibly named ‘Cutter Slade’, and appreciate the full scale of the dev’s vision. A vision set into motion almost thirty years ago.
Set during the settling of America in the 1600’s, the game begins with Banishers (effectively mercenaries that deal with hauntings) Red and Antea arriving on boat to New Eden - a small settlement near Boston - having received word from their friend Charles that their ghost handling skills are required in this fledging town.
I have dug. I have heisted. And I have loved both. Three of my favourite games on the PC in the last ten years were made by the Swedish studio, Image & Form. Steamworld Dig 1 & 2, and Steamworld Heist are both beautifully formed and have really well thought through game mechanics. It’s simplistic to say perhaps, but both Dig and Heist just work. There’s little extraneous in there, and these elements are combined with gorgeous visuals and engaging characters to make very appealing games that I’ve returned to many times.
There is so much choice now when deciding what to play next and there is also the question around should I buy my next game or should I join Game Pass?
Well, with Game Pass games changing on a regular basis it can be tough to try and work out exactly where you should get your next game from.
Upon playing Earthsiege 2, I vividly remember thinking that it was the absolute zenith of ‘lifelike’ tactical combat and, even though it was a genre that was not on my radar at all, I was completely hooked and played through the entire campaign multiple times, something I rarely do (even now!).
I also remember playing the original MechWarrior on the SNES and finding it a pale imitation of the shining diamond that was Earthsiege 2, it seemed more arcadey, slick and, to be honest…I was never a fan of Mode 7.
Admittedly, in the quarter of a century since, I’ve rarely returned to the genre and when I have, nothing has captured my imagination in the way that Earthsiege 2 did *wipes away a single tear*.
Over the last decade, I have transitioned from PC gaming to pretty much pure console gaming, and so almost a decade of the work of Amanita Design has completely passed me by due to their PC exclusive nature. It was only whilst half-drunk one night - and trying to buy the Machinarium soundtrack on vinyl - that I discovered that they had released a game called Creaks that was available on Xbox…and so our love affair resumed.
