Kyle Hilliard
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Latest Reviews
Drag x Drive
Getting your hands on Drag x Drive for the first time, the instinct is to make fun of its absurd control scheme. Essentially gliding two mice around to move and pantomiming the act of shooting a basketball to score is admittedly not the primary way any logical person would imagine...
Developer Giant Squid was born from members of the team that created 2012’s Journey. Giant Squid founder and Sword of the Sea’s director, Matt Nava, is credited as Journey’s art director, but frankly, you could have guessed that just from looking at the screenshots at the top of this page....
Super Mario Party Jamboree released for Switch late last year to a generally positive reception, and for good reason. The unavoidable frustrations of the typical Mario Party game still exist in Jamboree (it can feel slow and unfair and isn’t particularly fun to play alone), but lots of smart decisions...
Mario may be the most important platformer in Nintendo’s gameography, but depending on your generation (mine, specifically), Donkey Kong represents a very, very close second. Maybe even a first, depending on my mood that day. Rare’s Donkey Kong Country games are formative video game experiences for me, and Retro’s Returns...
Kojima Productions has proven it is good at sequels. Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty was an incredibly impactful game that remains my favorite from director Hideo Kojima and his team. As a result, I went into Death Stranding 2: On the Beach with high expectations. Continuing the story...
At reveal, Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour seemed like a charming way to learn about the tech of the Switch 2. A lovely journey through the hardware that would feature some fun tech demos and minigames to show you what your new system could do. And then, like many others,...
Blades of Fire
Blades of Fire developer MercurySteam has a fascinating trajectory. Amidst excellent releases in the Castlevania and Metroid franchises, MercurySteam interrupted its strong run with a few disappointing releases. All of that is to say, its output has been inconsistent. Blades of Fire, sadly, falls on the lower end of the...
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 drops you into its melancholy world with a refreshing lack of context. While the game is undeniably a fantasy RPG (with a smattering of science fiction), it blessedly does not begin with scrolling text explaining its universe. It may be confusing at first, but the trade-off...
Silent Hill 2
The original Silent Hill 2 released in 2001, which was an impressive time for the medium. The year was not without other forward-thinking games tackling complicated emotional subjects (Metal Gear Solid 2 and Ico, for example), but James Sunderland’s journey into the titular town continues to stand out as arguably...
Donkey Kong Country Returns for the Wii is one of the best 2D platformers of the past 20 years. It’s a hyperbolic statement I would typically avoid in a review, but revisiting the game on Switch and years of reflection have given me the confidence to commit. The Switch transition...
Digging into the memory banks of my game-playing career, I don’t know that I have ever felt so directly called out by a video game. I am not a successful fighter like protagonist Alta, nor do I have her personally destructive focus on success at all costs. But I know...
The Arkham series has earned the prestige of being a fantastic and consistent video game franchise without any licensed game asterisks. Nearly all the Arkham games are great in different ways and perhaps the most surprising compliment to pay Arkham Shadow is that it stands up in that lineage, despite...
CriticDB tracks 121 Kyle Hilliard reviews, averaging 78/100. See the score distribution and their highest & lowest rated games below, or browse every Kyle Hilliard score in the Reviews tab.
Kyle Hilliard score distribution
- 90–10015
- 80–8946
- 70–7940
- 60–6917
- 50–593
- Below 500
















