Rift Apart plays great, it got tight accurate platforming (that for some reason has always been underutilized), satisfying shooting with great effects as the enemies break apart, and some solid traversal mechanics. And technically it's a marvel, it's truly a sight to behold.

But it has struggled to retain the old charm and wit of the first games for over a decade now, and Rift Apart might be the most generic and safe writing this series has ever seen. Virtually every gag is a dud.

It's also clinging on to the same formula, and while the rifts add a unique touch, if you played the first game back on the PS2, you can already imagine how this game plays. I don't know why Insomniac is this insistent on being traditional considering how many Ratchet games there are.

But, the game looks so damn good and there are some incredible sequences in Rift Apart (that big fixer-robot battle was amazing), that I can forgive the problems I have. However, if the next Ratchet and Clank don't try something new, I'll be disappointed, the spectacular visuals won't carry a second game the way it carries Rift Apart.

It's very charming, as you make your way up the mountain and talk to all the funny critters living there. As you can guess, the game is about a little bird going on a hike. She can fly and glide, and by doing tasks, you gain "golden feathers" so you can fly higher.

The game does a good job of giving you goals while also giving you the freedom to choose if you care about doing them.

It's also fun to fly and glide around, and the vertical level works well in giving you reasons to fly around.

It's a great way to spend an hour.

Future Perfect successfully captured some of the qualities in Goldeneye 007's campaign levels, levels that are relatively small but feature a lot of replayability with meaningful rewards.

It got a lot of charm to it, and both the single-player and multiplayer are rich and full of content. The story in the campaign takes you everywhere, across time and space, and the story is well-made and fun to follow.

Back in those days, a lot of people didn't have the ability to play online, and this game might just be the best offline "multiplayer" game, with tons of things to do and try and the option to use bots to play against.

It got eclipsed by Halo 2 and the growth of PC multiplayer, but it's a real classic and worth playing, it's a great game.

Retro shooters are flooding the market and Ion Fury is usually named as one of the better ones. And I agree with that assessment, while I still think Dusk is the best of the bunch, Ion Fury is up there. The shooting in Ion Fury is tight and accurate, and it got a lot of cool callbacks to '90s shooters, and it's super fast and hit that old-school run-and-gun gameplay well.

But, there are some notable problems with Ion Fury. You can die VERY fast, which means you gotta autosave constantly. The game is also too sparse on the ammo, I barely used my favorite weapons because they rarely had ammo. I used the first few guns 80% of the time. The game also reuses the same enemies all the time, and it's possible to get a bit stuck in some places (although some might say this is a part of being a retro shooter.)

But all in all the game is a success, but it's probably a game aimed more towards fans of retro shooters. It's quite long, around 8-11 hours, and its difficulty is likely gonna bounce some people off it before the end credits.

If it was around 5-6 hours, had more ammo, and scaled the difficulty to reduce the constant need for autosaves, it would fare a lot better in my opinion.

You walk forward in an acid-trip-like world, talking to aliens and listening to music while a story focused on discovering yourself through music unfolds. Once in a while, there is some small music mini-game, but for the most part, this is about looking and listening as you move ahead. And that's fine because it does look and sound great, it's a presentation showcase. It's slick and polished, but I wish the music mini-games were fleshed out and more frequent, adding a bit more gameplay to the game.

If you have seen a lot of trailers and gameplay, like I had, you will have seen a good deal of the first 1-2 hours of the game. As a result, I wasn't that into the game early on, it didn't surprise me, but as the game went on, it completely changed my mind.

The controls might be the best of any 2D platformer, it is responsive and weighty, accurate, and satisfying, and as the levels get harder, you will notice more and more how well it controls.

I wasn't sure how cool the Wonderflowers were gonna be, but there are great ideas throughout the game that keep them fun, from start to finish, every level feels like it's made by the best 2D level designers in the business.

There is a high level of polish, it feels like it was completed 2 years ago, and they spent the last 2 years perfecting it, and the visuals are some of the best on the platform. The audio is also on point, even the talking flowers work well in the context of the game.

The multiplayer is pretty solid too. I used the "Dark Souls shadow" mode for half the game, and it makes the game feel slightly different and more social when you see others play alongside you.

I was skeptical going into it, but this is the real deal, it's one of the best 2D platformers you can get and one of the best games of the year.

You can also finish it in 12 to 15 hours, which in my book is a good thing in an age where every game is 30-40 hours long.

You know, this is a contentious game, and personally I never quite understood why. Granted, the first hour is really weak with excessive tutorials at every point, but as it progresses it turns into a masterpiece of player progression. What I mean by that, is the game tells you tidbits leading you on in an elegant manner that easily could have turned into a mess, yet the intelligent design knows where to push the player and where to not.

It leads you to the information you need instead of letting you loose. It's like a game designed with an open-natured approach but knows that letting the player run free would become a mess, as there would be too much back and forth, aimlessly trying to find some clue you constantly overlook. Instead, the game is aware of where you can go wrong and nudges you in the right direction. This leads to a satisfying path through the game, where you end up feeling in control of an increasingly complication picture.

The A.I. holds the game back, as they barely know how to navigate the environment and you can easily outsmart them. But even so, it's still satisfying to mow them down.

The ending is terrible and ends the game on a dud, but for the most part, this is an engaging smart game.

I played and loved the game when it came out in 2002 on the Gamecube, but I wasn't sure if the game would hold up today. But man, this blew away my expectations more than I ever could have anticipated. The dual-stick implementation makes the game come alive anew, and the visuals are perhaps the best on the Switch.

There are a few areas (the mines!) that are a bit rough, and the backtracking can be bothersome later on, but this game is still as unique and breathtaking as it was 21 years ago, it's an absolute marvel of videogame design and you can't compare it to anything.

The first two Call of Duty were PC first, this one is only on consoles, and as such, it lacks the accuracy and responsiveness of its PC forebears, it also lacks some of the top-tier level design of COD 2.

The game is stuck in time, it's not bad, but it's been outdated by countless other Call of Duty games. Its aiming and movement lack the speed you are used to in COD games (especially since there is no sprint). It also features some corny cutscenes which you can't skip and have to watch every time you load up the game.

If I had to recommend a Call of Duty game, this would be down toward the bottom of the list, but it's not a bad game, it just can't quite compare to the games before and after it, COD2 and COD4.

The way it tells its story is its biggest strength and biggest weakness. It's very easy to miss the point entirely. The game also has a tendency to devolve into constant rewinding which sucks the life outta the game.

I don't mind interactive live-action stories like this and played a few of them, but when the ending came around, I only halfway understood what was going on and had to check Youtube to figure it out.

On one hand, you can credit the game for taking a chance and being willing to be cryptic, and it's well-acted, but whether or not this game is gonna click for you is a coin flip. If your curiosity won't latch unto the mystery, you won't find much to get engaged with.