Honest Xbox Reviews

One thing I remember when doing reviews and news for my old writing place was getting to see how loved Abe and Oddworld actually was, so the fact I've not seen the Internet go crazy for this news just yet (or I might have missed that day) has been a massive surprise. I played the last game in both old and new form (well tried to I think you would call it) with my love for the Abe fart button being a memory in gaming that will stick with me until I'm in the afterlife somewhere. So the chance to press that fart button once again is surely a reason to keep an eye out for this.

Oddworld Inhabitants Inc revealed that the follow-up to Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty will be released in 2017 and it shall be called.........Oddworld: Soulstorm (name of the post kind of gave it away already). No platforms have been confirmed just yet, but Sony seeming to be more the company most interested in it by being the only ones I've seen retweeting the above image out when it was revealed late last …

It's almost like I planned that overdue review perfectly, but yes, an hour freeplay of Dead Rising 4 is coming to the console next week for those who are yet to sample the game. This timed demo as such will offer new players the chance to earn achievements and carry their saved game progress into the full game should they decide to buy it after ending the trial period.  Players can experience both the single player Story Mode as well as Multiplayer during the trial period, with the hour clock the only thing holding you back. This will be available on Jan 31st, so be sure to download it when it becomes available

This news comes after a few more things coming to the game were revealed moments ago on a Capcom blog. Two new modes of difficulty and some Street fighter costumes to wear while killing those zombie folk will be up for grabs. With both of these available via a free update which will be hitting the game on Jan 30th.

If there's one genre on consoles today that has been done to death, it's this one. With slaying zombies in some shape or form being something many of us enjoy doing every now and then, even if it has been done over and over again. I wasn't a huge fan of the Dead Rising series up until getting to play Dead Rising 3 with my launch day Xbox One console, with DR3 certainly showing off the power that the console had very early on. With the co-op feature that DR3 had too, I found myself losing hour upon hour on it with a family member online, ignoring the story half the time, and just building the weird weapon and vehicle combos that make the game stand out against other zombie games out there.

In Dead Rising 4 the story carries on a year after the events in DR3 and a full sixteen years after the events of original, with you once again returning to Willamette as Frank West. The game starts with a student of yours taking you back to Willamette on the hunt of a big story, but bef…

Bethesda have just revealed that Prey will be releasing worldwide on May 5th for the Xbox One, PS4, and PC. To go with this announcement they also have a new gameplay trailer which you can watch below. Pre-order the game now and you will get your hands on the exclusive Cosmonaut Shotgun Pack for the game when it releases. This pre-order bonus not only includes the Morgan Yu’s family heirloom Margrave shotgun, but it also has tools to fight threats aboard Talos I. The items you will also receive are things such as three Neuromods which players can spend to acquire new abilities, two Medkits, a Fabrication plan to create the Shotgun and Ammo, a starter kit for building tools and weapons, and a unique upgrade to help players preserve their limited resources.

Seeing this game at the low price of just £6.60 in a sale recently I decided to pick it up for myself, even without knowing if it was any good or not. Now while I would love to play through all five episodes that come with this game and then type up a review, if I've learnt anything in the past it's that I will end up finishing this series by the end of the year if I'm lucky. I have numerous Telltale episodes on my Xbox One that I have picked up in sales (Game of Thrones, Batman, Borderlands) which after playing a few episodes of a review code for something for the site comes in and I forget all about them for ages. This weekend I finished the first episode of this. So while it's still fresh in my mind (and lets be honest here, will future episodes really throw up anything different other than story? If they do I will obviously come back and edit this review), I thought I should type some words on it while I have this spare time just incase it drops in price again.

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The four games that will make up Games with Gold for February have been announced by Microsoft, with a decent mix of games on offer next month for those gold members out there.

Xbox One owners get Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime (Feb 1st until Feb 28th) and Monkey Island 2: Special Edition on the Xbox 360 (Feb 1st until Feb 15th), with Monkey Island also being available on the Xbox One thanks to it being backwards compatible.

Project Cars Digital Edition joins the Xbox One offerings from February 16th until March 15th, With Star Wars: The Force Unleashed coming to both the Xbox One (BC) and 360 from February 16th until Feb 28th.

I've not played Lovers in a Dangerous Spacetime before so am looking forward to giving that a look, with Monkey Island being a game I already own. I've never played Project Cars so that will be nice one to finally try, but Star Wars for me is the one I'm most looking forward to playing.

What do you think of the games on offer in February? What ga…

EA have put out a small post on the EA Access website on what to expect from their poor value service (I'm joking Sony) in the next few months. While it doesn't feature any big hitters when it comes to the vault offerings, details have also been confirmed on when you can expect that 10-hour trial for Mass Effect: Andromeda to drop onto the Xbox One.

The four games mentioned to be coming to the vault later this year are Dead Space Ignition, Madden NFL 17, Skate 3, and Zuma's Revenge. Like I said nothing really that great, but with these games added it will bring the current game count to 40 titles being available in the vault, which for just £3.99 a month/£19.99 a year offers great value for those who want to boost their current game collection.

Now why you clicked on this link, when can you expect that Mass Effect: Andromeda trial? The date the 10-hour trial will hit the service has been confirmed as March 16th, with no other details currently other than it will offer 10 …

To sit here and type to you that Halo Wars 2 was even on my radar would be a huge lie, with me sucking at the first game, and not paying any attention to the build up of the release for this sequel at all. None the less, I'm a man who likes to give every game a shot, so like me you should at least go and give this beta a go if like myself you wasn't a big fan of the first game.

The beta for this will run from today until Jan 30th, with the full game set to release on February 21st. You can add the beta to your download queue on your Xbox One by clicking here. Be sure to let me know what you think either in the comment below or via social media. Here are some big Internet people you may or may not know trying out the game at a recent Xbox event.

Overdue reviews is a section on the blog where I finally get to play and review a game a while after the game has launched. Chances are you already own it by the time I post these up, so these reviews are done to get some fresh new content on site for games I've not reviewed anywhere else.

I've told this story many times on Twitter and places I've wrote previously, with The Flame In The Flood being a game I've wanted to play since seeing it on a stream of a UK event called Rezzed a while ago. Truthfully, very rare do I go out and buy a game these days, and that's mostly down to writing on websites and me always having something going on when it comes to reviews. Buying a game when busy just slows things down when it comes to content going up, so adding new bought games into the mix only takes me away from something that I should be playing to something that I just want to be playing. Sure enough big/little games slip through the net from time to time and slow me …

Gamers of a certain age want nothing more than games they loved as kids to come back onto their current day consoles. That nostalgia feel of seeing games you once loved coming out once again fills our hearts with not only sheer excitement of a game we once loved coming out again for a whole new audience, but at the same time we worry will it capture what the original game did so well.

Micro Machines has always been the best when it comes to top down silly racers on our consoles, with any game even attempting to beat it even since always getting a "close, but not good enough" when it comes to getting its scores in reviews on many sites. Codemasters saw the call of a new Micro Machines from us all and have finally given in, with Micro Machines World Series set for a release this April on the Xbox One & PS4.

This new game promises to bring what the original offered, while also adding in new things to bring it up to date. Micro Machines World Series will offer players a 12 …

The guys who have seemingly been world leaders in bringing market-defining mobile titles to the world (or so said the press release in my email inbox) have revealed they are to enter into the console market on February 14, with the release of its arcade-style motocross game, MX Nitro. The game promises to offer the below features, with no online play and rather PVP ghosts being the one many will focus on.
Single Player ModeAsync Multiplayer ModePvP with other players’ ghosts13 Hardcore BossesMore than 40 tracks from around the globe5 Unique Bikes55 Crazy StuntsSolo Campaign and multiplayerBike and rider customization Challenges and achievements Hard Rockin’ Soundtrack

Before Christmas a code come through for Headlander, a retro-futuristic, side-scrolling, action-adventure game if the website for the game is to be believed. It was one of these games that I had heard nothing about, but a quick viewing of the trailer made me want to give it a look for the blog.

The game begins with you choosing from three heads (lady head, and two male heads) and waking up like you've taken a drug you shouldn't have. That's not all mind you, as you soon find out you also have no body and must spend the game attaching yourself to any bodies that you come across if you want to be a complete person. These bodies also come in handy for the colour coded doors that only open when you either shoot them with that colour gun, or being that colour body when standing in front of them.

The story goes that you're the last known human in the universe, with just your head and the voices you can hear the only things going for you early on. Going through the game your…

Over the weekend it was revealed that I Am Bread is finally coming to the Xbox One. Much like games like Goat Simulator I am Bread is not your standard game, with you taking the role of the final flips of an uncooked piece of bread on its way to the toaster and it's toasty end.

I for one am eager to give this one a look, with it being on Steam and PlayStation consoles for what feels like an eternity already now. No official release date just yet, with the only thing we have is the below teaser from the official Xbox YouTube page. You can sign up on their website to keep up to date with when the game will release, or you can just follow me and I will do all that for you.

All change with the Games with Gold games today, as the 16th of the month means two new games become free downloads for the next month.

Xbox One owners can get their hands on Killer Instinct: Season 2 Ultra Edition, with them also able to get their hands on Rayman Origins like their 360 brothers and sisters thanks to the 360 game being backwards compatible on the Xbox One too.

Links for both Killer Instinct & Rayman Origins can be found by clicking on the name of the game you want to add to your download queue.

Rise & Shine has already been the toughest review of 2017 for me, but that's not that hard seeing as we are only two weeks into it. I came across the game one day via Twitter, as of late my life is making me miss the smaller releases on the console, and I find myself coming across these games thanks to the lovely people I follow on Twitter.

The thing that attracted me most to wanting to review Rise & Shine was how it looked, with me only finding out it wasn't your average side scrolling shooter once I loaded it up. This review has seen many deaths for me let me tell you, with the Twitter account of the guys behind it sharing the cries of many journalists who dare to ask about an easier setting for the game. While it would have been nice to breeze through each level that I've played so far on an easier setting to just enjoy the story, taking away the difficulty this game has would make it much less of a game, as without that joy of beating a tough area/boss the gam…

This might just be the shortest review I will ever write on this blog and it's not that I couldn't write a ton of words on this game, oh no. It's more the fact that I feel if I go into to full on rant about my time with mekazoo I will only come across negative on a game that I assume many people have put their heart and soul into, and I've never liked being a dick in a reviews to guys who do such a thing. So lets get this over with.

Oh how I wanted to enjoy Mekazoo and its nods to many games that I enjoyed in the past. With its Donkey Kong like music, Sonic like levels, and the looks of a classic game I would have enjoyed back the day, it's a shame that then this review will be about as short as the time the game held my attention for. The downside comes almost instantly when playing Mekazoo, with the game pretty much feeling like a rinse and repeat experience right from the off, making it a game not able to hold my attention for any longer than 30 minutes. The ga…

In the next few hours Gears of War 4 shall be getting it's latest update, which will also have some new cards and a couple of brand new maps to play with too. The schedule for this update is sometime around 6pm UK time (10am PDT) this evening, so loading up the game anytime after then should see the update there waiting for you.

This update looks to focus on a bunch of things when it comes to actual tweaks under the hood, with quitters being the people who are set to feel it the most. You can read the full post over here on the Gears forum, with a few highlights from this post found below. The two maps being added are yet to be revealed, with the forum posts being littered with guesses of classic maps returning to the series once again. I will get some gameplay up on the YouTube channel later tonight of these new maps, so be sure to be subbed to the YouTube channel if you want to give them a look.

Combatting Quitters – Phase 1
Combatting quitting has been a top priority for us at …

Other than a few tweets and a couple of news posts in recent weeks, the urge to get on the blog and type something up at length has been a tough one. A horrid few weeks (read that as trying to sort Xmas out for two kids on a tight budget, and those same two kids then coming down with a sickness bug on January 1st) has really wiped me out in all honesty, and that fire I had to type seemingly flying off somewhere in the process with it too. I've spent most of the last week power napping after spending my nights tending to the kids taking it in turns to stick their head in the bucket, with my Xbox One being nothing more that a machine that played videos either in film//TV/YouTube form. But today is a new week, a new week where the kids are all better and I once again have a few hours in the day (once adult duties are out the way) to sit down with my laptop and Xbox and hopefully get that urge to talk to anyone who reads these posts of mine. So I thought for the first proper posts of…

I'm yet to get my hands on a LucidSound Xbox One headset to review for the site sadly, but with gaming TV legend Alex Verrey (Big Boy Barry from many a Gaming show if you're old enough to remember) behind the PR, it's no surprise to learn that the company were recently given an official Microsoft License to begin producing headsets for both the Xbox One & Xbox One S.

LucidSound already have three gaming headsets available, those being the LS30 Wireless Universal Gaming Headset, the LS20 Amplified Universal Gaming Headset and the more recent LS40 Wireless Surround Universal Gaming Headset. The new range of licensed products promise to offer features tailored to the Xbox gamer, with further details on this and future headsets expected later this year.

Now like I said at the start of this post, I'm still yet to actually get my hands on one of these headsets and see the quality that they have seemed to offer to other reviewers out there on the Internet, so I can't…

I loved me some old school hockey games back in the day, you know, back when even the none hockey fan could name one Amercian hockey player (mine being Wayne Gretzky as I used New York Rangers a lot back then). If you're anything like me and loved these old school hockey games of the Megadrive/Genesis era, then Old Time Hockey may be one to keep an eye out for. Planned for an early 2017 release, the game looks to offer the same arcade fun that those did, with the current era of sports games being more true to life than offering the fun times that games did back then. Check out the latest trailer for the game below. You can also follow the game on Twitter here, and check out the website here.

It's a new month (just incase you're too drunk to notice), and that means two new games thanks to Games With Gold. Both games are now available on the Xbox One (one being backwards compatible of course).

The Xbox One sees World Of Van Helsing: Deathtrap now being available to download for free if you have Xbox Live gold, but you can also get the 360 game that is available on your Xbox One too, that being The Cave. You can find store link to both games here and here. Let me know what you think of both games either in the comments below or on social media.

Currently playing this one for review, so thought I would share with those who haven't yet heard of it about its pre-order status. The trailer pretty much shows off what the game is all about, with it certainly being a "think and gun" game like the description says on the pre-order page. I can't say much else due to embargo I have on me, but look out for a review on this to drop around January 12th, with the game releasing on the console on January 13th. The game costs £11.99 here in the UK, with those across the pond seeing a price of  $14.99, and can be pre-ordered by clicking here if the below trailer tickles your fancy.