Xbox Series X|S Game Reviews
Review Insurgency: Sandstorm - An Incredible, Immersive FPS Coming To Xbox Game Pass
Check your corners
New World Interactive finally brought Insurgency: Sandstorm over to consoles last September, following an almost three-year period as a PC exclusive. Sandstorm marked the follow-up to 2014's Insurgency, with both shooters delivering a masterclass in immersive and tactical close quarters gunplay. We can gladly say that the team was...
Review Battlefield 2042 - DICE's Latest Shooter Joins Xbox Game Pass
Modern Warfare
The latest game to join the November 2022 Xbox Game Pass lineup is Battlefield 2042 (courtesy of EA Play), so we've gone back and dug out the Pure Xbox review of the game from November 2021, which you check out below. However, Battlefield 2042 has obviously changed over the past year thanks to various updates, so you'll also find...
Review Gungrave G.O.R.E - Addictive Arcade Action That's Definitely An Acquired Taste
Kick their ass (on Xbox Game Pass)
The absolutely ludicrous Gungrave has finally returned! This brand-new entry sticks resolutely to the script laid down by earlier efforts in the franchise, presenting exactly the same flimsy but satisfyingly flamboyant arcade action as its predecessors, just with much prettier graphics this time around. This is a...
Review Evil West - Action-Packed Wild West Horror Let Down By Dull Design And Weak Narrative
From Dusk Til Yawn
Flying Hog Games, we think it's probably fair to say, has a bit of a marmite aspect to its back catalogue. Between Trek to Yomi, which we actually quite liked, and the multiple instalments of the ridiculously shallow Shadow Warrior series, this is a studio whose work you kinda either gel with or don't. It's brash, it's brutal,...
Review Somerville - An Engaging Sci-Fi Story Let Down By Dull Gameplay
Close Encounters of the Bland Kind
Somerville is an aesthetically pleasing slice of sci-fi that draws influence from the likes of 'War of the Worlds' and 'Close Encounters of the Third Kind' to present the short tale of a bewildered man on the run from otherworldly machines as he attempts to reunite with his wife and infant son in desperate...
Review Sonic Frontiers - A Great 3D Entry And A Bright Future For The Blue Blur
A Sonic the Hedgehog game like no other
Sonic Frontiers takes 3D Sonic games to new heights with its “open zone” format. Instead of the same old style of progression you may have come to expect from this series, this new entry’s focus is all about exploring expansive natural environments and ancient ruins – speeding around doing what you...
Review Pentiment - Obsidian's Medieval Murder Mystery Is A Game Pass Delight
A narrative adventure most unexpected
We've been really looking forward to getting our hands on Obsidian's Pentiment ever since it was first announced back at the Xbox & Bethesda Summer Showcase in June of this year. A uniquely stylised narrative-driven murder mystery, it ticked all the boxes for us in terms of presenting a game world so...
Review Football Manager 2023 Console - Another Solid Season On Xbox
Help, we're addicted to FM again
For the second year running, Football Manager has arrived on Xbox Game Pass at launch in the form of both Football Manager 2023 (the PC version) and the newly renamed Football Manager 2023 Console, with the latter serving as a toned-down version of the PC experience for Xbox One, Xbox Series X and Xbox Series S. The...
Review Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 - Infinity Ward's Best COD Since 2009's MW2
Modern W
2022 has been a slow year for AAA gaming, with much of the industry's anticipated lineup delayed until next year. However, like clockwork, a new Call of Duty game has managed to make it, with long-time developer Infinity Ward back behind the iron sights for another venture into the murky world of Modern Warfare. 2019's
Review Persona 5 Royal - One Of The Greatest JRPGs Of All Time Hits Xbox Game Pass
Love that Joker
Persona 5 has, quite rightly, been heralded as one of the greatest JRPGs of all time ever since it first released back in 2016. The first all-new numbered entry in the long-running Persona franchise since 2008's superb Persona 4, this really is Atlus firing on all cylinders, serving up a supremely stylish, action-packed and...
Review Amnesia: Rebirth - A Halloween Horror Adventure Worth Taking On Xbox Game Pass
What lies below?
Amnesia: Rebirth is now available on Xbox platforms, including Xbox Game Pass as one of the service's latest day one drops! We played through Frictional Games' recent horror adventure when it first launched on PS4, and we've now dipped back into the title on Xbox Series X to see how things hold up. Thankfully, this remains a great...
Review A Plague Tale: Requiem - An Incredible AAA Adventure On Xbox Game Pass
Ratified
A Plague Tale: Requiem is pretty much everything we'd hoped for from a sequel to one of 2019's biggest surprises in A Plague Tale: Innocence. Asobo's much-anticipated follow-up doesn't reinvent the wheel by any stretch, but it successfully builds on the team's debut effort, mixing in fresh combat options, new varied locales and an...
Review NHL 23 - A Fine Hockey Game, But A Disappointing Lack Of Ambition
A "not bad" follow-up to last year's effort
When we reviewed NHL 22 last year, we noted how the transition to EA's Frostbite engine had been a success, so we were happy to forgive the lack of major changes to its game modes. That said, we also mentioned that we were hoping for "some ambitious new modes and features in NHL 23", and unfortunately that...
Review No More Heroes 3 – Travis Touchdown Returns To Xbox
From the creative mind of Suda51
Where do you start with a series like No More Heroes? If you have played it before, you’ll already know it’s absolutely bats**t crazy. And well, if you haven’t played it before, just so you know – it’s absolutely bats**t crazy. Legendary Japanese game developer Suda51 and his studio Grasshopper Manufacture...
Review FIFA 23 - EA's FIFA Franchise Hits The Showers On A High
The final whistle
Yes, after 30 years of EA's all-conquering FIFA franchise, it's finally time to bid farewell to a series that's been a constant companion to footie-loving gamers since all the way back in 1993 (as of next year, EA has confirmed its football games will be known as "EA Sports FC"). It hasn't always been top-flight stuff, there's been...
Review Deathloop - Arkane's Best Game Finally Arrives On Xbox
Groundhog Slay
It has, quite unbelievably, been a year already since Arkane Studios' superlative Deathloop launched on PS5 and PC. It was a rather frustrating exclusivity deal that came as something of a surprise given that the game's publisher, Bethesda Softworks, had just been snapped up by Microsoft in the months before release but, finally, Xbox...
Review Isonzo - A Brutally Brilliant Depiction Of WW1 Italy
Rifles at the ready
The 'WW1 Game Series' is back with another entry following the cult 2016 hit Verdun and its 2019 follow-up, Tannenberg. Isonzo takes the battle to the Italian Alps, which puts a veritably vertical spin on the realistic tug-of-war battles the series is now known for. This third entry doesn't reinvent the wheel by any stretch, but...
Review NBA 2K23 - A Surprisingly Strong Season For Basketball Fans
A nostalgic trip through b-ball history
It's once again reached that time of year when another entry in the NBA 2K franchise slam-dunks onto our consoles and, yes, it's sometimes difficult to muster much excitement for these annual instalments, easy to dismiss them as just another incremental update that looks and plays almost identically to the...
Review Metal: Hellsinger - A Delightfully Devilish Rhythm Shooter Blasts Onto Xbox Game Pass
Danse Macabre
Back in 2016, Bethesda rebooted the DOOM franchise to spectacular effect with a game that took the series' frantic FPS action and carefully reworked and rebalanced it, adding a delicious layer of strategy and a striking new sense of rhythm to the bloody violence at hand. More than ever before, players were required to think on their...
Review Steelrising - Spiders Serves Up A Super Solid Soulslike
To be this good takes Aegis
Hot on the heels of the rather disappointing Thymesia, we've got yet more soulslike action inching its way methodically onto Xbox consoles in the clockwork form of Steelrising. Spiders, the developer behind the excellent Greedfall, has come up with another cracker of a game to add to its resume here too, as this is a...
Review F1 Manager 2022 - A Podium Finish For Frontier's First Effort?
It's definitely in the points at least
For whatever reason, we've never seen the excellent Motorsport Manager on Xbox before, so the arrival of Frontier Developments' brand-new F1 Manager series is a huge breath of fresh air for the genre, and we've been eagerly awaiting its arrival ever since it was announced earlier this year. The good news is...
Review Immortals Fenyx Rising - A Fantastical Adventure That Draws Heavily From Breath Of The Wild
Now available on Xbox Game Pass!
Update (Aug, 2022): Two years later, Immortals Fenyx Rising is now available with Xbox Game Pass! Below, you'll find our original review from 2020, which was just after the Xbox Series X and Series S first released. Enjoy! Read More: Four Games Are Available Today With Xbox Game Pass (August 30, 2022) Original...
Review Immortality - Sam Barlow Serves Up A Cinematic Masterpiece On Xbox Game Pass
Who Wants To Live Forever?
What happened to Marissa Marcel? It's the question posed at the very beginning of Sam Barlow's latest intricately woven interactive experience and, in order to discover the answer, you're gonna need to embark on a journey that takes you to some seriously unexpected places. Marissa Marcel starred in three movies during the...
Review Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: The Cowabunga Collection - A Radical Bundle Of Beat 'Em Ups
Totally not bogus
It's been quite a year for fans of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. We've already had Tribute Games' outstanding Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge, a game we called a "lovingly crafted and supremely entertaining return to the glory days of early 1990s Turtles action" in our 9/10 review, and now the heroes in a...
Review Destroy All Humans! 2 - Reprobed - A Shiny Remake That's Unashamedly Stuck In The Past
Watch your behind
A couple years back, THQ Nordic began pumping us all full of nostalgia with a number of PS2-era remakes; namely Spongebob Squarepants: Battle for Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated and of course, Destroy All Humans! Well, you better get ready to be pumped full of errr, alien juice, as Destroy All Humans 2 is returning this month to...
Review Pac-Man World Re-Pac - Classic 3D Pac Is Back After 23 Years
How does it hold up?
You don’t often see Pac-Man outside of a maze, so whenever it does happen, it’s often a weird and sometimes wonderful sight. Over the years, we’ve seen the dot eater cameo in fighting games like Super Smash Bros. and even race around in karts in certain other games, but did you know he’s also featured in his very own 3D...
Review Saints Row - A Truly Disappointing Return For The Saints
Saints Low
Volition's decision to reboot their long-running Saints Row franchise has had us intrigued, excited even, ever since this brand new entry was officially announced back in 2021. A ground-up reworking seemed like a great opportunity for the developer, a chance to make a clean break, to refresh and reset a series that was struggling somewhat...
Review Thymesia - Sadly, This Soulslike RPG Isn't As Great As It Looks
Does Hermes deliver?
The Kingdom of Hermes has fallen into an age of calamity. In a world where the use of powerful alchemy was once widespread and welcomed, things have gone terribly wrong. The now blood-soaked streets are filled with plague-ridden monstrosities and it's up to you, Corvus, to take out the mutated trash. OverBorder Studios'...
Review Arcade Paradise - A Great Simulation Game That Deserves Your Attention
A combination of laundromat and arcade management
It feels like Arcade Paradise kind of came out of nowhere. We'll admit that we reviewed it on a whim, not really sure of what to expect, but we're pleased to say we've been having an absolute blast with it so far, and we've still not yet seen everything it has to offer. So, what is Arcade Paradise?...
Review Two Point Campus - Near-Perfect Marks For This Superb Sequel
Game Pass is in session
The excellent Two Point Hospital has offered up countless hours of simulation fun on Xbox Game Pass ever since it joined back in early 2020, and now the developers behind that game are back with Two Point Campus, taking us out of the medical wards and into the halls of various school academies — complete with the signature...
