Author: Press Play Media

Lowbirth Games’ new noir mystery game This Bed We Made weaves an intricate narrative set in 1950s Montreal. Playing as Sophie, a hotel maid entangled in a web of secrets, players navigate through a tale of love, murder, and mystery that unfolds over the course of a very engaging 3 to 6 hours. We played the PlayStation 5 version. Continue reading “This Bed We Made review (PS5)”

Frogwares takes a surprisingly drastic approach with The Sinking City 2. Rather than continuing the open-world detective adventure formula of its predecessor, the studio has turned its Lovecraftian series into a much more conventional third-person survival horror. That change could easily have gone wrong, especially considering how much of the original game’s identity was tied to investigation and the city of Oakmont, but Arkham proves to be a suitably grim replacement. Calvin Rafferty’s attempt to rescue Faye after an occult ritual goes horribly wrong provides a straightforward emotional hook, while the flooded city and the supernatural forces lurking beneath it gradually expand the story into something considerably more cosmic. The personal motivation works well enough to keep the journey moving, although Calvin himself is not always the most compelling protagonist, and the wider mysteries surrounding Arkham are ultimately more interesting than his relationship with Faye. Continue reading “The Sinking City 2 review (PS5)”

Cold Symmetry clearly had something to prove with Mortal Shell II. The original Mortal Shell was an intriguing but also somewhat limited take on the Soulslike formula, built around a handful of genuinely clever ideas that never quite escaped the constraints of its modest scope. Its sequel feels like the point where those ideas have finally been given room to breathe. Mortal Shell II is bigger, more ambitious and considerably more confident, but what makes it particularly interesting is that it does not simply try to imitate FromSoftware more convincingly. Instead, it takes familiar Soulslike conventions and starts pulling them apart, most successfully through its Shell system and the decision to remove stamina from the equation. The result is a dark fantasy action RPG that can be exceptionally satisfying when its systems click, even if some rough edges keep it from reaching the very highest tier of the genre. Continue reading “Mortal Shell II review (PS5)”

There is something inherently amusing about the idea of humanity’s last great hope being a city that simply refuses to stop rolling. In Monsters are Coming!, developed by Ludogram and published by Raw Fury, survival means escorting a mobile settlement towards the Ark while an increasingly unpleasant assortment of monsters tries to turn your grand escape into scrap metal. The story is deliberately lightweight, giving us little more than the motivation to keep moving and the knowledge that the city matters considerably more than the individual hero. That simplicity actually works rather well for a roguelite built around repetition, although anyone hoping for a substantial narrative or memorable cast will find very little here beyond the charming premise. We are essentially disposable workers protecting a much more important pile of buildings, which is a surprisingly fitting attitude for a game that is more interested in systems than storytelling. Continue reading “Monsters are Coming! review (Xbox)”

Panzer Knights: Commander’s Edition is one of those games that sounds considerably stranger on paper than it actually feels once we get behind the controls of a tank. Joy Brick combines World War II tank combat with an anime-inspired cast, placing us in command of a German Panzer unit as the conflict progresses through several of its early campaigns. It is certainly an unusual perspective, particularly because the game deliberately sanitises much of the political and historical context surrounding the German war effort. That makes the premise a somewhat uncomfortable one for some players, while also leaving the narrative feeling oddly incomplete. The game is more interested in battles, objectives and the personalities of its fictional crew than in examining the circumstances surrounding them, and the result is a campaign that provides historical framing without ever developing into a particularly compelling war story. Continue reading “Panzer Knights: Commander’s Edition review (PS5)”