Charles Onyett
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Writing For
IGNLatest Reviews
Hotline Miami’s momentum of mystery builds right up to its finale, where snarling cynicism is offered as a justification for why all this machinery of neon fuzz and thumping bass, bright blood and fractured identity was started up in the first place. Yet the justification is also disarmingly simple, the same reason why quarters were dropped into arcade machines built during the late ‘80s era Dennaton Games so clearly reveres. Why bother with Hotline Miami? Because it exists. Because it’s fun. Because it deserves to be played.
ArenaNet has built one of the most exhaustively detailed and rewarding MMOs in existence, one that never unfairly penalizes and fosters an incredible urge to explore through a generous reward system and achingly pretty environment design. It’s a virtual world that more than anything wants you to work together with others, and provides a huge number of possibilities for cooperation while minimizing restrictions. For those disappointed in the lack of open world PvP, the World versus World alternative is a fascinating, complex system that demands teamwork, and the arena PvP modes should provide an instant-fix for those who thrive on fast, adrenaline-fueled combat. Whether you’re looking for competitive play, want to be told a story or simply want to go for a walk through fantastic countryside, Guild Wars 2 lets you do it all with a minimal amount of arbitrary, irritating limitations, and all without a subscription fee.
It's difficult to ever feel completely satisfied with a play session of Skyrim. There's always one more pressing quest, one more unexplored tract of land, one more skill to increase, one more butterfly to catch. It's a mesmerizing game that draws you into an finely crafted fictional space packed with content that consistently surprises. The changes made since Oblivion are many, and result in a more focused and sensible style of play, where the effects of every decision are easily seen. Featuring the same kind of thrilling freedom of choice The Elder Scrolls series is known for along with beautiful visuals and a stirring soundtrack, playing Skyrim is a rare kind of intensely personal, deeply rewarding experience, and one of the best role-playing games yet produced.
The Witcher 2 is a dense, deep role-playing experience where your decisions have a significant impact on not only the structure of individual quests but also the direction of the main plot. Its world is stunningly realized with beautiful effects and an obsessive attention to detail. The plot stubbornly refuses to slow down and often unexpectedly spirals into crescendos of betrayals and wild revelations involving a huge cast of scheming characters who don't feel like tired video game stereotypes; they feel human. Combined with the remarkable environment design and to a lesser degree the decent writing and voice acting, the atmosphere of The Witcher 2 is one of unrivaled authenticity. The fast-paced swords and sorcery combat system, though not without quirks, provides plenty of entertainment, and the crafting and alchemy systems mean there's incentive to explore and collect. The Witcher 2 is alternately offensive and endearing, grimy and gorgeous, and never ceases to surprise. It's one of the great titles of 2011, and one of the best role-playing games in years.
The original Portal benefitted from its brevity. It had a concise story paired with inventive first-person puzzle mechanics that challenged you to be creative while pulling the trigger. Portal 2 makes the original look like the prototype it was. It's filled with a larger cast of characters vividly brought to life through brilliant writing and some of the best voice acting in video games. Its puzzles are challenging without being unreasonable, and, once you're finished with the single-player mode, one of the best co-operative experiences on the market awaits. Valve cuts no corners and finds ways to make you care about everything from the major characters to the cubes used to solve puzzles. From the beginning of the single-player story to the end of the co-op mode, Portal 2 is a novel, unforgettable experience.
Longtime fans will surely find a lot that's familiar in Shogun 2, but will also find Creative Assembly's most polished, well-presented and playable version of its Total War franchise. Shogun 2 is an expertly tuned turn-based strategy game filled with exhilarating real-time tactical battles against a capable artificial intelligence or others online. With a gigantic multiplayer suite and fantastic visuals and sound, Shogun 2 is a high point for the Total War series, featuring a staggering attention to detail and immensely satisfying gameplay.
Playing Magicka isn't about going through the motions with a control scheme you've used a thousand times before. It requires some reflex training that can reward you with wildly entertaining success on the field of battle. Unfortunately, Arrowhead's game is in need of patching at the time of this review, and bugs, crashes and connectivity issues occur with regularity. Even so, with a level-headed team of four, Magicka's cooperative action is entrancing chaos. It's rare for a game to feel this mechanically satisfying.
With its newest MMO in its flagship franchise, Square Enix delivers a gigantic, beautiful fantasy world to explore. The flexible class system means you'll be able to mix and match abilities from many different roles so you can change your specialization at will. Much of the promise of the combat system and depth of the crafting mechanics are drowned, unfortunately, under a sea of interface and performance issues that hinder the experience at nearly every step. While there's a lot to consider when building your ideal class, there's far too little interesting structured content to chew on, resulting in an experience that quickly grows tedious and tiresome. All MMOs are designed to keep players logging in for long into the future, but at launch Final Fantasy XIV's questing mechanics feel more like a subway commute than a fun gameplay experience. Patches over the course of the next few months may address many of the technical issues, but for now this is not a world worth visiting.
Have you ever wanted to man the item counter in a role-playing game like Torneko from Dragon Quest IV? That's exactly what you'll do in Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale. It's a game packed with content and personality that challenges you to comb through dungeons and a spend-crazy customer base on a quest for profits. Though the entertainment value of the haggling and combat mechanics gradually wear too thin, that won't happen until a number of hours in. It's a refreshing take on the traditional role-playing game, and if you wind up loving the gameplay, a number of modes unlock after the main game is complete. At the very least, it's probably the most fun you'll ever have repaying a loan.
This is one of the scariest games in recent memory. The loading screen recommends you turn the lights off and play with headphones, something I'll strongly echo. Amnesia: The Dark Descent's puzzles aren't especially impressive and the voice acting can range from convincing to goofy, but the atmosphere Frictional has infused into the experience is as powerful as they come. It's a tale of terror that's menacing and disturbing from the very first moments, and only amplifies the further you progress. Any fan of horror, every Lovecraft fan, and any with even a hint of curiosity should give Amnesia a shot. Few games are able to conjure up an atmosphere this genuinely frightening.