You can probably close your eyes and imagine it: what if you mapped the gameplay of Bomberman onto the dungeons of Legend of Zelda, while also handing the main character a pickaxe for close combat shenanigans? What you’re picturing there, if you’ve done it right, will be astonishingly similar to what you get in Cave Bad, the latest from indie publishing giants eastasiasoft. Cave Bad is out now on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, PS5 and Nintendo Switch.
Late to the shores of Xbox, after having a stint on the Switch, PC and mobile, we won’t hold it against it: we are, after all, big fans of any games that let us swash our buckles and buccan our ears. Under the Jolly Roger is out now.
Mail Mole on Xbox does the job of offering a ‘00s-era platformer - nothing more, nothing less. There’s no innovation here, not even capitalising on the fact that you’re a mole, and you may well groan at the landslide of cliches. But as we came to the end of Mail Mole, we kind of dug it. Aside from the odd control molehill, Mail Mole is a smooth ride and it may well scratch an itch that you forgot you had.
If you were brought to Under the Jolly Roger on Xbox with the promise of swashbuckling, action, and a hope that it would be ‘Black Flag: The Ship Bits’, then turn sail: this isn’t the game you’re looking for. This is a pirate sim with the emphasis on ‘sim’, and all the resource management, tedious downtime and charmlessness that can come with the genre.
It does virtually nothing new, and revels in all the eye-rolling cliches that you may be used to. But in the exploration, hidden object puzzling and minigames, it has all the hits: there’s not a duffer on here, and - for a lot of hidden object fans who are crying out for precisely that - Demon Hunter is something of a revelation.
Like a giant bear, the games industry has been hibernating for the past three months, waking up only to toss out a Hitman 3 or a Little Nightmares 2. But spring is coming, and that big, unwashed bear is waking up. It means we have actual games, all with a passing chance of them being decent! Hooray and hurrah.
Retrace: Memories of Death on Xbox takes the basic structure of Happy Death Day and makes it into a video game, giving you the chance to save everyone from horrific deaths. But what could have been a web of strategic choices instead turns out to be a few single threads, and the promise fades a little.
You only have to watch Akuto: Showdown for a few minutes to know that it’s going to be insanely fun. From Hut 90, this is an arena brawler set in a zoomed-out isometric space, where you pick up ridiculously over-powered weapons and wail on your enemies. It’s a multiplayer, frantic, ridiculous experience and it looks darn tootin’. Akuto: Showdown is out now on Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S.
Katana Kata, what a wonderful phrase. It means “a way or form of memorising and improving combat moves”, in this case with the Katana blade. It helps to display where Katana Kata’s interests are: this is a game that wants you to fail, and fail again, until its swordplay becomes so fluid and natural that it forms muscle memory. Yep, this is a Souls-like game, and it takes no prisoners. Katana Kata is out now on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, PS5, and Switch, where it joins a previous drop on PC.
The Artifex Mundi wheels are turning faster, as we receive the second hidden object game from them in the space of a month. Hot on the heels of Persian Nights 2: The Moonlight Veil, we get the third in the Demon Hunter series, with Demon Hunter: Revelation.
If you’re looking for a challenge of any form, then Under Leaves is not for you. It’s also not particularly long or deep, so don’t expect anything that will last you for more than an evening. But if you want the gaming equivalent of a foot spa, or a hidden object game that a family could play together (or independently) without much issue, then Under Leaves will charm the socks off you. It’s a children’s book come alive, and we don’t get many of those on Xbox shelves.
As if we needed another reason to play Moving Out again. This wonderful party game was one of 2020’s best co-op games, and it has received a chunk of DLC today, all themed around the very thing that none of us can have: a tropical getaway. Moving Out - Movers in Paradise DLC is out now on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, PS5, Switch and PC.
Werewolf: The Apocalypse - Heart of the Forest on Xbox is laid-back and wordy, instead trying to capture the spirit of the original table-top roleplaying game. Some might bemoan the lack of action, but we got lost in it: Heart of the Forest revels in storytelling and character-building, presenting you with choices to make, adding consequences to those choices, and then growing your character based on those consequences. It could have done with a bit more bite and certainly more Garou-bloodletting, but the tale it tells will leave you over the (full) moon.
There’s no doubting that there is a short and ramshackle Breath of the Wild at the centre of Effie on the Xbox. Its rough, indie edges can be incredibly charming, and surfing the open world on the back of a magical shield is a gift that keeps on giving. But the rough edges are too sharp, too frequently.
As I've played almost every fishing experience that you can find on the big black box, I thought I'd attempt to rank them, nailing a list consisting of 5 of the best fishing games on Xbox One, if you will.
The Apex All-Stars Series come to an end this week in Forza Horizon 5, and as sure as night follows day, I’m here to provide you with the info you need to get your hands on shiny new cars.
There's aren't many (in fact, there are hardly any) boxing games on the market, especially those that utilise the power of current-gen consoles. But come this October all that will change as we get the opportunity to rule the ring in UNDISPUTED.
