With Forza Horizon 5 and Gran Turismo 7 representing the best that racing games have to offer these days, you’d think every other racing game would pale in comparison. Or at least not put out a new installment just a few weeks later. But GRID Legends (Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, PC) manages to hold its own, more or less, by having equally solid controls, good places to test them, and a nice variety of ways to do so.
Here’s a little tip for you: If you ever see a review of a mobile game on this site, it’s safe to assume one of two things: it’s either a lot of fun or so terrible that I feel a moral obligation to warn everyone not to get it, even if it’s free. Thankfully, the free-to-play, fantasy-themed match-3 puzzle game Puzzle Quest 3 (iOS, Android, PC) is decidedly in the former category.
It goes without saying that if you’ve already played a relatively new game on a previous generation system, or still own it, there’s no reason to buy the new version on a newer system unless there’s something new or improved about it (I’m looking at you, Metro Redux, and your thankfully revamped controls). Especially given how the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S are both backwards compatible. Which is why, if you’ve played or still have Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy you don’t need the Uncharted: Legacy Of Thieves Collection (PlayStation 5, PC), which brings those third-person action / adventure games to Sony’s new system and PCs.
If you haven’t played them, though, Uncharted: Legacy Of Thieves Collection is both a good time and a good value.
Well, assuming you’ve already played 2007’s Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, 2009’s Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, and 2011’s Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception (all of which are available in the Uncharted: The Nathan Drake Collection). Given how Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End brought this series to a satisfying conclusion, and Uncharted: The Lost Legacy was an engaging side story / post-script, neither should be your first time with this series.
By any measure, 2021 was a terrible year. And while some games made it better — hence their inclusion on my Best Video Games Of 2021 list — there were also some that made it so much worse.
Here, in the order I suffered them, are my least favorite games of 2021.
While 2021 has been a terrible year, it was actually a pretty good one for games. Way better than the last couple, anyway.
Here, in the order I played them, are my favorite games of 2021.
Thanks to its multiplayer mode being free, and super good, it’s easy to forget that Halo Infinite (Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC) also has a single-player campaign. That is, unless you’re one of the people who prefer to play these games solo, and with its epic sci-fi space opera story driving the action. It’s for them — by which I mean us — that I present this assessment of Halo Infinite‘s story driven campaign.
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: I love shooting Nazis in the face from the first-person perspective. And with all the shit going on in the world — people shouting “Jews will not replace us”; people wearing sweatshirts with Nazi symbols to keep warm while committing treason — my trigger finger is especially itchy these days. Thankfully, shooting Nazis is exactly what you get, and more, from the World War II first-person shooter Call Of Duty: Vanguard (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC). But what makes this installment really satisfying is how, across the board, the good people at Sledgehammer Games have added interesting new mechanics while keeping, and bringing back, what made this shooter series so great in the first place.
We like our video games sequels like we like new albums by our favorite bands: we want some evolution, but not to the point where it seems unfamiliar. Which is going to be a problem for some fans of the Forza Horizon series of open world racing games, since Forza Horizon 5 (Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC) doesn’t add much in the way of gameplay to distinguish it from previous installments. But for people just looking for an engaging racing game — i.e., me — Forza Horizon 5 provides the same level of racing excitement as, well, previous installments.
It doesn’t matter what you put on a pizza; if the cheese, sauce, and crust aren’t good, the pizza won’t be good, no matter what you pile on top. The same is true for combative action games. If the combat is bad, the game is bad, no matter what other mechanics there might be. Which is the problem with Marvel’s Guardians Of The Galaxy (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC), a story-driven, sci-fi, third-person shooter whose problematic combat and other rather basic problems somewhat undermine an otherwise entertaining space adventure.