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In the late '90s and early aughts, a little fellow named Mr. Driller burrowed his way into the hearts of puzzle game fans worldwide. The years that followed saw several Mr. Driller releases across multiple platforms, but after a while, Namco seemed content to entomb the series and focus on other things. Now, a little over a decade later, Bandai-Namco has decided to unearth one of the most beloved Mr. Driller games, the formerly Japan-and-Europe-exclusive Mr. Driller Drill Land , to release on Switch and PC for a new generation of fans to enjoy. Mr. Driller Drill Land focuses on the titular Mr. Driller, aka Susumu Hori, and his extended gang of excavator friends and family (including his dad Taizo, who you might remember from Dig Dug). They're off to visit a new underground amusement park called Drill Land, filled with attractions that very coincidentally are based around the colored-block-drilling gameplay that defines the Mr. Driller series--with some notable twists. Challeng...

There are a lot of reasons to take a look at West of Dead . Cowboys and Wild West aesthetics are hot in games right now, in the wake of Red Dead Redemption 2. Run-based games are, likewise, very much a structure du jour. It's dusted with voiceover narration from Ron Perlman, who you might know from Guillermo Del Toro's Hellboy films or the FX TV Show Sons of Anarchy. And it certainly doesn't hurt that its core mechanical conceit, as a cover-based twin-stick shooter, helps Frankenstein it to original and, dare I say, innovative gameplay. Unfortunately, West of Dead is a textbook case of a half-baked concept: Though its big sweeping ideas work well, the minutiae, from scaling the difficulty of encounters to unrefined enemies and plain old technical issues, threaten to undo the experience at any time. West of Dead's conceit builds up a simple but interesting little tale. In Purgatory--which is apparently in Wyoming--the dead have stopped filtering "east" to heav...

One of the best parts of Pokemon Sword and Shield was exploring the Wild Area, an expanse of rolling hills, sand dunes, and lakes that made collecting the games' 400 Pokemon especially enticing. The first DLC for the games, The Isle of Armor, improves upon the original Wild Area--in fact, the island is all Wild Area, with far more variety and much more interesting locales to explore. While it doesn't alter the game much, The Isle of Armor recaptures the joy of exploration and catching new Pokemon, and it makes me especially eager to see where the next DLC takes us. In my original Pokemon Sword and Shield review , I said that "the Wild Area is the show-stopping feature of this generation. Pokemon roam the fields and lakes, changing with the day's weather. They pop up as you walk by, and you can even identify Pokemon out of your direct line of vision by their cries. It's all too easy to set out for one destination only to be distracted by a Pokemon you haven't...

Nearing the end of SpongeBob’s journey under the sea, you’re tasked with guiding a ball through a giant Rube Goldberg machine in Mermaid Man’s Lair. Once you activate the machine you have to match the ball’s painstakingly slow speed while using SpongeBob’s arsenal of bubble abilities to make sure it doesn’t fall over. It’s a simple task in concept, but trying to execute it is some of the most unfun and Sisyphean gameplay in recent memory. In one section of the puzzle, all you need to do is stand on a button, and that button opens a gate for you to bowl a bubble into so you can progress. The only problem is that during SpongeBob’s wind-up animation for bowling, he walks forward. That means you fall off of the button, which closes the gate and prevents you from bowling the bubble where you intended, when you intended. These kinds of gameplay barricades are common, and force you to restart and face your demons again, and again, and again. SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom -...

Editor's note: You may have seen our spoiler-free The Last of Us Part II review , originally published on June 12, 2020. Due to a strict embargo, we were limited in what aspects of the game we could touch on in that review. While I critiqued the game in full for that embargo, there may be some parts of the review that could use more explanation. Now that the embargo has lifted, I've expanded on my thoughts here; this review has the same arguments and score as the first one and is simply more detailed in my analysis. Note that this review contains spoilers, including one major character death. The Last of Us Part II begins with serious tonal whiplash. One moment, Ellie and her close friend Dina are becoming more than friends in a basement filled with weed plants and Naughty Dog porn puns; the next, Joel is being savagely beaten to death with a golf club. It's the first of many, many gruesome deaths. Some happen whether you want them to or not, in intimate cutscenes that a...

Lacking meat on its bones, Skelattack has disjointed pieces and parts that add up to create an awkward, though heartwarming, side-scrolling platformer. You can see snippets of a precise platformer in Skelattack, but they are too sporadic and underutilized to really make you sweat. In a game centered on a human invasion of the afterlife, there sure aren't very many enemies, and most of them remain in place or move like molasses, emulating the dead far more than the warm-blooded humans they're supposed to be. Skelattack's identity crisis is further fueled by its far too brief length, which prevents any of its solid ideas from coming into their own. Starring a chipper skeleton named Skully and his lovable bat-pal Imber, Skelattack tells the story of a peculiarly joyous world of the dead, dubbed Aftervale, that's suddenly invaded by the wretched humans who seek immortality. Developed by Ukuza, Skelattack is the debut title in Konami's new push to publish games made b...

Editor's note: Due to embargo restrictions around spoilers, parts of this review are intentionally vague. We've done our best to explain certain parts of the game and our critique without discussing any story spoilers; however, if you want to understand the full context of some of our analysis here, we'll have another review up when The Last of Us Part II is officially out that discusses the story in greater detail and further explains our thoughts. This review will have the same score and will just serve as a deeper, more detailed analysis for those who want to read more. At the beginning of The Last of Us Part II , you get a glimpse of Ellie's life in idyllic Jackson, Wyoming. If it weren't for the walls surrounding the town, you could almost forget that the world is crawling with infectious monsters that would kill everyone in sight; its main road, blanketed in snow, is a charming row of old buildings with decks for sidewalks, more Old West town than post-apoca...