Popular games reviewed

Tomb Raider Trilogy

Tomb Raider was rebooted with Crystal Dynamics’ 2013 release of the Tomb Raider. The game shows the origin stories of Lara Croft in an intense environment with difficult puzzles that will test anyone. The free roam adds hours of gameplay for players wanting to explore the beautiful world that is incredibly well-made. Lara does turn from a slightly scared young woman, into a cold killer rather quickly, but for good reason with how the world around her is acting. It brought life back to the Tomb Raider franchise that was starting to be overtaken by Nathan Drake and the Uncharted franchise, but with this first release being so well made, Lara jumped right back to the top of the list of best action-adventure heroes. The game has it all, emotional moments, scary, tense, action and puzzling. If you haven’t had a chance to play this game then we would definitely recommend it.

The 2015 release of Rise of the Tomb Raider had a lot to live up to and it absolutely smashed it. Again, the game has it all, just this time even more of it. Lara once again cemented herself as the top action-adventure hero and overall, one of, if not the best gaming character of all time. The second game in the trilogy takes everything that made the first game so good and just improves on it in every way possible.

2018 brought a close to the Lara Croft origin story trilogy. The story, like the games before it brought you close to the side characters throughout and made you emotional when something happens to them. The setting is once again one of the best in gaming and the game keeps improving and adding even more for players to challenge themselves with. The game brought the end to this trilogy in a fantastic fashion, and we are so happy that a new game has been announced so we get to explore the world of the Tomb Raider again.

One thing that brings these games down is the poor multiplayer mode. Obviously, the story mode is the main part of the game, but with how today is for gamers, it seems as though everyone wants a multiplayer mode. For us personally, completely binning the multiplayer and adding more attention to the story mode would be the best way forward. The story does feel as though you are just trying to live up to your father’s name and he was famous and an important character in Lara’s origin story, however, it did feel as though on times he was the main character in a way and so we hope this changes with future releases.

Gran Turismo 7 celebrates the 25th birthday of the series and it does it in a stunning way. The graphics of the game are some of the best that you can possibly see currently. The gameplay makes you feel as though you are actually driving the car, with all cars feeling different in their own ways. There is plenty to do in the game with the online races where you can challenge your friends or others to races on tons of different tracks with set rules or custom if you want to play around more. The single player element has plenty to do with the missions, the addition of the café giving challenges to players to complete, mainly in the races. The customisation and stores available within the game add even more for a player to jump into by being able to basically complete change the specifications of your car to fit the styles needed for races.

The game is amazing, but there have been some problems. The servers, people, us included are not happy with the fact that when the servers are down for maintenance that the single player is also unavailable. The rewards are decent, but could be better for the longer races, but with the microtransactions being around, it seems like the rewards may not change enough. Overall, the game is great for those that love the world of cars and racing. If you are more of a casual player then the game may be slightly overwhelming and to put it bluntly, just boring.

Horizon truly shows the power of the PlayStation 5. The graphics of the world and the character designs and movements look as real as a game can get. The game brought back some of the fan favourite characters from the first game, obviously with Aloy being the main hero of the story again. The setting is stunning, just like the first game and in our opinion even better. The combat was once again amazing and the overall gameplay makes this one of the games of the year and at this moment, it is leading the race. The game has a lot of free roam opportunity with the side quests, errands and all the other missions and collectibles that can be found while exploring.

The main story was longer than the first game, but the addition of characters that are extremely futuristic does take away some of the tribal nature of the game and we feel as though it was not the greatest addition to an amazing story. The story made sense, but a bit more backstory into characters, especially the main villains this time around would have added a lot to the game, this was another thing the first was lacking in for the most part.

The gameplay is what makes Horizon one of the best games available and if you haven’t played the first game then we would highly recommend playing that before the first game as it helps a lot with the story. We gave the first game in the series; Horizon Zero Dawn a strong 9 and this game follows suit. The ending clearly sets us up for a third game in the series and we are excited for it, we just hope that the game includes more backstory to characters.

Pokémon Legends: Arceus

A different style to a massive franchise. The game had a different playstyle than every other before it and it feels amazing. The open world element makes this quite possibly the best Pokémon game released yet. If you are a fan of Pokémon, then this is a must buy game. If you are not a fan of Pokémon, then play the game anyways and you will become a fan. This is one of the must have games for the Switch. The story doesn’t live up to the free roam standards, but the Pokédex makes this game re-playable for hours on end.

The first game was and possibly still is the greatest story game of all time and it actually has a half decent multiplayer mode to it as well. The game starts instantly with heartbreak that somehow even when you don’t know the characters at all, still makes you feel sad and sorry for them. Joel and Ellie are two of the best characters in a game and we cannot wait for the show, even though we aren’t sure about the casting choices. The game is dark and gruelling throughout, but again, also tugs at your heart strings with the different side characters involved that come and go and the relationship formed between the two main characters.

It will take a lot for a game to ever reach this level of mastery again.

The Last of Us Part 2

In many people’s opinion, the game didn’t need a sequel, but the game was still welcomed with open arms by fans. It did not disappoint, well it did, but it shouldn’t. It disappointed people as it didn’t go as expected.

The first game showed that there was potential for a lot of heartbreak, but not many players expecting such a major moment to occur so early into the second game. It caught everyone off guard, and it introduced a new character Abby that, even though definitely had her reasons for doing what she did, was still hated by near enough everyone. I guess you could say that is great writing because most villains you should hate. Playing as the villain for a lot of the game was both good to learn backstory, but also annoying for some after what had happened. Nobody wants to play as a character they hate. We feel as though some of the missions that you have to play as Abby are some of the best in the game.

The game did not disappoint. It lived up to the hype.

In our opinion this rivals Last of Us as the best story of all time and we could argue that it tops it. Arthur is the best character and his journey was one of the greatest things we have witnessed.

Obviously the first game was amazing as well and in the second game, which is a prequel, we meet some characters that players will recognise already and so the game gives great backstory into what happened to the group.

The game was ahead of its time and with technology advancing the way it has, it is obvious that the overall graphics of the prequel would be so much better. The setting, the character models and just everything about this game is perfection. The graphics are superb. The characters are some of the best in gaming history and the story is probably one of the saddest you'll ever play through on times.

If we could give games higher than a 10, then this may be one of the few that would break the scales.