So a Viking, a samurai, and a knight walk onto a battlefield…. While this sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, it’s actually the loose premise of For Honor (Xbox One, PlayStation 4, PC), a third-person hack & slash action game that isn’t funny…but isn’t all that fun, either.
In real estate, the three most important things are location, location, location. But in the open world street racing game Forza Horizon 3 (Xbox One, PC), location is just one of many important things that make it the best racing game of the year, and one of the best overall games of the year as well.
When I first saw that the Anat Fort Trio’s new album Birdwatching (CD, digital) featured alto clarinetist Gianluigi Trovesi alongside double bassist Gary Wang, drummer Roland Schneider, and Fort on piano, my first thought was that it would probably sound like the wonderfully evocative albums Currents and Post Scriptum by the similarly configured Wolfert Brederode Quartet. And while it does at times, the overall tone of Birdwatching actually sets this album apart.