Subscriber Exclusive
GAME ON | OPINION: Backpack Battles requires skill, organization
Veterans of games like Skyrim, Resident Evil, Diablo and countless more know the struggle of inventory management as our hoarder drive takes over while adventu…
Stories by Jason Bennett
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Subscriber ExclusiveGAME ON | OPINION: ‘Stranded’ achieves landing on planet
Clearly taking some cues from survival OGs such as Rimworld and Oxygen Not Included, Stranded: Alien Dawn charts its own course through the stars to offer a co…
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Subscriber ExclusiveGAME ON | OPINION: Poker-theme roguelike Balatro has an ace up its sleeve
Highly addictive and infinitely replayable, Balatro (Latin for jester) is a magnificent, unique take on the roguelike deckbuilder genre. In a world of inferior…
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Subscriber ExclusiveGAME ON | OPINION: Your mileage may vary with anomaly-filled survival game
Pacific Drive is a first-person, single-player driving survival game set in the Pacific Northwest with a customizable, upgradeable car serving as the player's …
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GAME ON | OPINION: ‘Palworld’ a diamond in the rough
In a matchup that seemed like a lopsided Rocky vs. Apollo Creed fight, a true contender to Nintendo's globally dominant Pokemon franchise has appeared -- and i…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: ‘Aliens: Dark Descent’ game is terrifyingly faithful to the James Cameron movies
Based on the hit James Cameron franchise, "Aliens: Dark Descent" is a return to the terrifying world of xenomorphs in this real-time tactical, squad-based shoo…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: Whimsical ‘Disney Illusion Island’ family-friendly video game full of hugs and little hearts
Oh, boy! Disney fans of all ages will find something to love about "Disney Illusion Island," a local co-op 2D platformer that brings together the Power Four of…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: Tense, top-down survival game ‘ZERO Sievert’ challenging even in rookie mode
In "ZERO Sievert," set in a fictitious post-apocalyptic part of Russia, players take on the role of a hunter charged with investigating dangerous areas in a ba…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: ‘Return to Moria’ delights ‘Lord of the Ring’ nerd despite a few ho-hum elements
'The Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria'
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Subscriber Exclusive‘Symphony of War’ pretty good, considering the limits of the RPGMaker game engine
'Symphony of War: The Nephilim Saga'
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Subscriber ExclusiveGAME ON: ‘Dead by Daylight,’ ‘The Quarry,’ ‘Outlast’: 3 spooky video games perfect for Halloween
Fall is my favorite season, and part of that reason (the part that isn't Thanksgiving dinner, anyway) is the spookiness of October (we even got a Friday the 13…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: Out-of-this-world interstellar RPG ‘Starfield’ can leave you feeling lost in space
Bethesda is back! Eight years since the release of "Fallout 4," and 25 years since the developer's last original intellectual property, "Starfield" is a toweri…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: Nice-looking medieval animals highlight ‘OK’ deck-builder ‘Banners of Ruin’
"Banners of Ruin," a deck-building card-battler featuring anthropomorphic mice, bears, weasels, rabbits, beavers and wolves, gets some of it right and some of …
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Subscriber ExclusiveGAME ON: ‘Baldur’s Gate 3’ is a genre-defining, adults-only D&D masterpiece that lets you play your way
Every once in a while, a game comes out that defines a whole genre overwhelmingly. "Dark Souls," "Street Fighter 2," "Super Mario 64," "Skyrim." Benchmark-sett…
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Subscriber ExclusiveOPINION | GAME ON: ‘BattleBit Remastered’ looks clunky but delivers polished, responsive video combat
Who needs awesome graphics anyway? At first glance, publisher SgtOkiDoki's hit first-person shooter "BattleBit Remastered" seems to lean more silly than simula…
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Subscriber ExclusiveEscape an endless dungeon in this difficult tower-defense, roguelike video game
'Dungeon of the Endless'
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Darkest Dungeon 2’ returns players to the inviting embrace of madness and despair
Darkest Dungeon 2 is a Gothic, turn-based roguelike RPG which builds on the many successes of its predecessor, while also making significant changes to gamepla…
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No scary stuff in whimsical ‘Book of Demons: Hellcard’ video game
"Book of Demons: Hellcard" is a game that's a lot less gruesome than its title might suggest. There is a dungeon to dive into, battling downward level by level…
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Record ’em all, fight ’em all in monster-packed open-world RPG ‘Cassette Beasts’
Don't think of "Cassette Beasts," a turn-based, open-world monster-catching game, as just a "Pokémon" clone. It's its own beast, so to speak.
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GAME ON: Melt hordes of enemies while playing ‘Halls of Torment’ and ‘Soulstone Survivors’
This week I tried out two "bullet heaven" or rogue-like shoot-'em-up games made to join the same niche as the genre-defining "Vampire Survivors," where the goa…
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GAME ON: ‘Oregon Trail’ takes players on a nostalgic trip to Willamette Valley
No game makes me as nostalgic as 1971's "The Oregon Trail," the game of my childhood. I spent many hours in a school computer lab in the late 1980s traveling w…
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GAME ON: ‘Pentiment’ players illuminate a macabre 16th-century murder mystery
"Pentiment," a historical-mystery role-playing game, ably transports the player back to the early Renaissance period. Set in 1518 Bavaria (today, southern Germ…
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GAME ON: Glory to Acaristan, my ‘Contraband Police’ comrades!
"Good morning, Comrade! Welcome to your first day as the border inspector for the Acarist People's Republic. Glory to Acaristan!"
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GAME ON: Heal the earth in the eco-friendly strategy game ‘Terra Nil’
I like games that operate from a unique niche, that give us something we haven't seen before, and "Terra Nil" seems to fit that description.
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GAME ON: “Chaos Gate’ Grey Knights stomp Nurgle’s minions in new ‘Warhammer’ game
"In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war." This line, part of the intro to every written work of the "Warhammer 40,000" universe, perfectly e…
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‘Hogwarts Legacy’ video game gives solidly fun wizarding experience
Since the first Harry Potter book was released in the late 1990s, the magic of the Wizarding World has enchanted children and adults alike in a way not seen by…
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Mafia: Definitive Edition’ a huge visual upgrade from the original
Is it just me or is the 1920s-30s aesthetic timelessly appealing? The cars, the suits, the suspenders, the hats, the music. I could do without the poverty of t…
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Settlement Survival’ city-builder more interesting than its name suggests
Would a rose smell as sweet by any other name? "Settlement Survival" surely wins the award for the most uncreative (yet perfectly accurate) game title, but the…
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Forspoken’ price and annoyance factor high, replayability low
Who hasn't dreamed, at some point, of being whisked away to a fantasy world to discover magical powers? There's certainly no shortage of such tales in movies, …
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OPINION | GAME ON: Text-based RPG ‘Roadwarden’ immerses players in grim story
In a throwback to an early era of gaming, the newly released "Roadwarden" is an homage and advancement of the text-based role-playing game, showing once again …
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OPINION | GAME ON: Unpolished and humdrum ‘Police Simulator’ still kinda entertaining
Have you ever been driving down the road when you see someone toss a fast-food bag out a window or blow through a red light and think to yourself, "Man, I wish…
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘The Long Dark’ survival adventure deepens the chill with expansion pass
Cold, hungry, low on supplies, you sit huddled in an old shack with a fierce blizzard raging so hard outside it shakes the window panes. Eventually, the storm …
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Tactics Ogre: Reborn’ shows right way to remaster a classic
'Tactics Ogre: Reborn'
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OPINION | GAME ON: Complex, polished ‘Against the Storm’ piles on enjoyable challenges
I love the methodical nature of city-builder games, and I love the randomized, permadeath aspect of rogue-lites, but until "Against the Storm," I'd never seen …
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OPINION | GAME ON: Rise from orphan to noble to king in ‘Mount & Blade 2: Bannerlord’
It has been a long campaign of attrition in the kingdom of Calradia, with countless sieges and sacrifices, but finally, the goal has been met: "Mount & Blade 2…
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OPINION | GAME ON: In the wastelands of ‘Kenshi’ nobody cares if you live or die
In the unrelenting world of "Kenshi," filled with harsh landscapes, dangerous beasts, brutal slavers, hungry bandits and hungrier cannibals, you are not specia…
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OPINION | GAME ON: In grimdark ‘Knight’s Tale,’ Mordred must save Avalon from evil King Arthur
In "King Arthur: Knight's Tale," don't expect the classic telling of the story, with clear lines between good and evil. In this turn-based, "grimdark" fantasy …
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OPINION | GAME ON: Your grizzled ‘Wartales’ mercenaries seek fortune in post-plague open world
I'm totally a sucker for open world role-playing games where you control a medieval mercenary group, and a recent entry into this genre, "Wartales," does a pre…
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OPINION | GAME ON: ‘Way of the Hunter’ shoots for realism while teaching ethics
For many people, their first experience with a hunting game was "Duck Hunt" for the Nintendo, or perhaps one of those "Big Buck Hunter" arcade games with the p…
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OPINION | GAME ON: Digital mind of ‘Citizen Sleeper’ must keep decaying body alive in this dystopian video game
It's helpful to consider "Citizen Sleeper" as one of those games where the journey is more important than the destination. It's not whether we win or lose, it'…
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OPINION | GAME ON: Video game tests how long you and your pals can survive the Amazon’s ‘Green Hell’
In 1971, the 17-year-old daughter of German biologists was the sole survivor of a plane crash in the Amazonian jungle. Injured and alone, she spent the next 11…
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OPINION | GAME ON: Meow, nap or leap for your life as lost tabby cat in brief, engaging ‘Stray’
"Stray," a cyberpunk puzzle-platform, isn't the first game to have a nonhuman protagonist, but making your character a nameless cat might be a first.
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OPINION | GAME ON: Zenlike calm of ‘Cloud Gardens’ lets players build a better post-apocalypse
Picture a crumbling highway overpass, cars rusted and broken down, directional signs faded and overgrown by vines.
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OPINION | GAME ON: Be any kind of captain you long to be in ‘Star Traders’
I'm not sure how I slept on "Star Traders: Frontiers" for so long, but I'm grateful for the Steam summer sale for bringing it to my attention. If you've always…
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OPINION | Money-grubbing in video game ‘Diablo Immortal’ disappoints players
There's no question that "Diablo Immortal" is a technical masterpiece for mobile gaming, ably delivering the top-down action of sending countless demons back t…
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OPINION | GAME ON: Vampires valiantly take back the night in vast open-world ‘V Rising’
In "V Rising," you awaken as a vampire after centuries of sleep and must start from almost nothing, acquiring power and resources to become the next Dracula.
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OPINION | GAME ON: City-builder ‘Patron’ adds complexity to basic ‘Banished’ model
Veteran players of city-builder games have probably played "Banished," and players of that game will immediately find "Patron," created by Croatian developer O…
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OPINION | GAME ON: FromSoftware’s demanding ‘Elden Ring’ respects player’s intelligence
I don't think it would be a stretch to say that FromSoftware's "Elden Ring" is its magnum opus, and a pinnacle of game development.
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OPINION | GAME ON: Interest drops off once you beat mountaineering adventure ‘Insurmountable’
There's something primal about climbing to new heights, whether it's a tree in the backyard, the corporate ladder or, for some people, the tallest peaks in the…
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OPINION | GAME ON: Feed (or eat) your enemies in ‘Noble Fates,’ kingdom simulator
Given the chance, would you rule by fear or favor? Kingdom simulator "Noble Fates" puts the power in your hands to do with as you see fit.
