Action

The combat in Dark sucks. By extension, this means almost all of Dark sucks, as it's built, by and large, around this idea of combat. You see, it's a little known fact that vampires can only clumsily walk up to enemies, bash them over the head or suck their blood, making loud slurping noises like granny at Christmas and alert everybody within a five mile radius.

While not without its hangups, Mortal Kombat: Komplete Edition is a solid fighter that takes the franchise back to its roots while pushing it forward at the same time. The fantastic campaign, combos that require more skill than luck and clever new additions not only make this one of the best Mortal Kombats in years, but it's also one of the best fighters on PC.

Contra Evolution Introduction Remakes are a finicky endeavor; nostalgic gamers might enjoy updated graphics and sound with their favorite old titles, but messing with classic gameplay elements is a big no-no. For others, remakes are an opportunity to make an old game better, taking the framework and name of the original and dressing it up with modern game mechanics. Contra: Evolution – which finally released in the App Store this week after debuting in China a few months earlier –…

Never a fan of torturous hardcore platformers, Ravenous Games' League of Evil stole my heart in 2011 with its magnificent controls and pixelated graphic style. Not only did it kick off the well-loved (and hated) "retro" trend that captured the App Store for the next year or so, but it also showed that iOS was a serious gaming platform, one capable of precise controls and infectious, original ideas. After ditching the pixel art style and dialing down the difficulty with last year's League of Evil 2, Ravenous returns to the well once again with League of Evil ...

It seems like every game they release these days calls itself a 'survival' game. How many of them actually are? To me, if you are calling a game a survival game, that implies consequence. If you are playing a game and the only consequence of failing to survive is that you have to go back to the last checkpoint, then what you are playing is not a true survival game, in my opinion. I can say one thing with absolute certainty: Don't Starve is a survival game.

High Moon Studios, most notable for their Transformers titles, have taken it upon themselves to finally give Deadpool, Marvel's infamous antihero, a starring role in his very own video game. It's a game that certainly captures the redeeming (and some not so redeeming) qualities of the crazed mercenary, but suffers from design decisions that, while heavy on “brakkabrakka!”, are dated and lack style. Somebody Get This Guy a Straitjacket!

While I've thoroughly enjoyed playing Borderlands 2 like a fiend the last ten months, I never found myself to be fully satisfied with the game. Sure, it feels great to get all the uber-rare weapons and mods and take on all the raid bosses and whatnot - I'm talking about emotionally: if there's one way Borderlands 2 disappointed me, it was how it mostly wasted its opportunity at creating a resonant narrative: even the death of a beloved character didn't provide anything but the most particular story beats.

Taking cues from Portal, 3AM Games' debut title is one of the many physics-based puzzlers that have been emerging as of late. Initially conceived on Kickstarter, Magrunner: Dark Pulse uses magnetism as its core game mechanic and has a heavy focus on narrative. Regrettably, this ambitious project is held back by some pesky flaws.

Have you ever dreamed of piloting an attack helicopter, loaded up with huge machine guns and enough missiles to level a major metropolitan area? I...have not. And if I had, Thunder Wolves may have turned me off to the whole exercise. Thunder Wolves is a 90s style arcade helicopter game. If you are looking for some sort of helicopter simulation, you'll want to look elsewhere. This is a game about easily piloting one of the most complicated vehicles on the planet and turning everything you see into a smoking crater. Sounds great, right?

As a manly man, I like my games to be very manly. But every now and then I'll set aside my lumberjack simulators to play something on the girly side. Among the girliest of games was American McGee's Alice which came out as a PC exclusive over ten years ago. After a decade of fans demanding more, Electronic Arts finally relented and released the much-anticipated sequel. That was two years ago, when fan expectations were incredibly high, and the game released to mixed reviews. I decided to strap on my pinafore, grab my teacup and take a trip down this rabbit ...