Role-playing

The ocean waves beat a gentle rhythm on the beach behind me as I enter the disused bungalow. An idyllic tropical setting, but I'm here as a scavenger rather than a tourist, picking over the wasted scraps of a life once lived. The now deceased occupant lies on the floor with a gunshot wound in his temple.

Rise of the Hutt Cartel, the new digital expansion for Star Wars: The Old Republic, injects new life into the game a few months after its first anniversary. Players have had a love/hate relationship with SWTOR since launch, yet the game retains a loyal fan base while the overall user count steadily increases over time. There are so many things about this latest Star Wars MMO that players love, and yet SWTOR lags behind its competitors in a number of important areas. Rise of the Hutt Cartel delivers more of what makes the game exceptional, and makes attempts ...

Evoland is a love letter to a genre long past its golden age. By combining your favorite elements from The Legend of Zelda, Final Fantasy and Diablo, it manages to act not only as a nostalgic trip through some of the best gameplay features of the last twenty years, but also as a decent game in its own right. You'll laugh at the jokes, you'll get the references, but you'll also question why so many classic franchises are finding it so hard to re-find their identities, when a small studio like Shiro Games can sum it all up so succinctly. If, as a child, you ...

We have seen various changes to the Paper Mario franchise over the past decade. Having started with turn based battles for the first few installments, then switching over to more dynamic combat in Super Paper Mario Wii, I’m happy to say that with Paper Mario: Sticker Star for the 3DS, the series has gone back to its roots and makes for an immensely adorable and memorable adventure.

Kingdom Hearts is a franchise well-loved by RPG and Disney fans alike, not surprising considering its impressive blend of animation-based nostalgia and slick gameplay. The first two games were met with critical acclaim, but it was spin-off after spin-off that has caused some to abandon the series, waiting for the holy grail that is Kingdom Hearts 3. Dream Drop Distance, for the 3DS, is about the closest we’ve ever come to a full Sora-and-Co sequel, but is that enough to look over the fact that this is, effectively, just another spin-off?

Mists of Pandaria is the fourth expasion to the ever popular MMO, World of Warcraft This time around, players will be leaving the sundered lands of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdom to head to (you guessed it) Pandaria, where a mysterious race known as the Pandaren wage war against the Mogu, an ancient race that wants to reclaim Pandaria for their own. After more than 7 years, is World of Warcraft still the top dog in the MMO space? Or is the genre finally in need of some new ideas to keep players engaged?

Mass effect 3 was released a year ago today, and Bioware is finally ready to be done with it in the form of one last piece of DLC, Citadel. Citadel is not only Mass effect 3’s last expansion but also a sort of send off for the entire trilogy, filled with a story campaign, old faces, funny banter, and tons of mini games to be played. The first half of the DLC gives you a mission in which you deal with a new enemy, while the second half has you catching up with all your squad mates, new and old.

Baldur's Gate is often regarded as one of the finest role-playing games in existence. Initially released in 1998, it was BioWare's second title and proved to be influential not only for BioWare's later works but for other Western RPG developers. With a strong emphasis on storytelling and customization, Baldur's Gate paved the way for other RPGs to follow in its footsteps and ultimately change the landscape of the RPG genre.

To say that Final Fantasy XIII was a huge success would be a pretty major understatement. For the first time, fans of the record breaking series were given something that offered everything a Final Fantasy game could give, with the added bonus of some stunning next-gen graphics and the all important movie-like cut scenes that turn this incredible instalment into more of a video game epic.

Capcom has several successful series that it tends to stick to the majority of the time; Resident Evil, Street Fighter, Devil May Cry, just to name a few. So when the publisher/developer released their brand new IP Dragon’s Dogma, they were definitely stepping way outside of the box. Combine that with what they claimed would be a unique and complex combat system, and different way to adventure with friends, and a large open world to explore and Capcom had the makings for quite a gaming experience. Doubts ran rampant about whether Dragon’s Dogma could live up ...