Like seconds of a good meal, add-ons for video games can sometimes be more of a good thing, sometimes just more of the same, and sometimes just too much. Thankfully, it’s the former category that we find Resident Evil 4: Separate Ways, an add-on for the recent and excellent remake of Resident Evil 4.
For some, fighting games are all about beating the crap out of their friends. Or complete strangers they meet online. For others, though, they’re about the challenge of taking on a computer intelligence, one that may even be more skilled than they could ever hope to be. It is for the latter group — of which I am a proud, paid up member — that I present the following critique of the new Mortal Kombat 1 (PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, Switch, PC) from the perspective of someone who only played it — and only wanted to play it — as a single-player game.
There’s an old saying: The devil’s in the details. But when you’re making a massive game like the sci-fi space opera action role-playing game Starfield — which is out now for Xbox Series X/S and PC, and is easily one of the best games of the year — sometimes it’s the little details that get lost in the shuffle, especially when you have so many big details to worry about. But in playing Starfield, I noticed a couple little things that I wanted to applaud the good people at Bethesda Game Studios for including, things that won’t make a big difference to a lot of people, but things I noticed and appreciated.
Many of us aspire to greatness…and many of us fail. But sometimes, in failing, we still manage to do something good. It’s something I thought about while playing the ambitious but underwhelming and yet still engaging fantasy first-person shooter Immortals Of Aveum (PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, PC). While it falls short of what would seem to be its lofty goals, what Aveum does offer is exciting combat in interesting places against competent enemies, and that’s enough to make it kind of fun.
Having read nearly all of the novels based on the Halo games, and having interviewed many of the people who’ve written them, I’ve always thought of these books (and the games, and the comics…) as sci-fi space opera stories. But in the following email interview with Troy Denning, the author of seven Halo novels — including the newest, Halo: Outcasts (paperback, Kindle, audiobook) — he explains why these books (and games, and comics…) are more hard science fiction and space marine stories than anything operatic.
One of the things that always kills my enthusiasm for multiplayer games is how some people take them so seriously. Maybe I’m weird, but I don’t like being yelled at because I didn’t do something exactly right or don’t have the skills of a professional gamer. It’s one of the reasons why I enjoyed Crash Team Rumble (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One), which is such a weird, goofy, cartoony game that you’d have to be a huge dick to take it seriously.
At this year’s Summer Game Fest, which was held at City Market Social House in downtown Los Angeles on June 9th and 10th, the good people from NetherRealm Studios and Warner Bros. Games gave journalists — present company included — some hands-on time with the upcoming fighting game Mortal Kombat 1, which will be out September 19th for Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, PC, and Switch.
What follows are my limited impressions of the game.
Two weeks after unveiling an impressive new trailer for their upcoming third-person survival horror shooter Alan Wake II, the fine folk from Remedy Games gave journalists a deeper look at this scary shooter behind closed doors at this year’s Summer Game Fest, which was held June 9th and 10th at Los Angeles’ City Market Social House. And while we didn’t get to take the game for a test drive, the live demo did make this attendee even more excited for this scary game, which will be released October 17th for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.
Expectations can be tough, especially when a lot of time has passed. Just ask George Lucas about The Phantom Menace. Or Axl Rose about Chinese Democracy. Or George R.R. Martin — no, don’t bother him. Or, you could just ask the good people at Blizzard who made Diablo IV (PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, PC), which comes eleven long years after 2012’s Diablo III (and, well, a year after the wrongly convicted Diablo Immortal). Especially since Diablo IV is not a huge jump forward the way Diablo III was over 2000’s Diablo II. But while Diablo IV may be more of a refinement than a reinvention when it comes to this series’ third-person hack & slash / bow & arrow / magic spell action, it still ends up being as effortlessly addictive as the most recent installment. And Diablo III.