8.5 out of 10 Review

EA UFC 2 is one of the most realistic UFC games since THQ reinvigorated the MMA genre with UFC Undisputed back in 2009, and I'm still not sure if that's good or bad. On one hand I have to plan out each fight as if I were mapping out strategies for a real MMA fight — which will never happen in a million years — and that requires thought and quick decisions on when to strike and when to try a takedown. On the other hand I'm really bad at planning for MMA, preferring to just punch and kick the crap out of an opponent as opposed to clinching or going to the ground, and that approach gets me beaten up a lot.

Firewatch is a gorgeous game. There are breathtaking vistas around every corner, bubbling rivers flowing to crystalline lakes and sprawling meadows more verdant than any you've ever known. It's all realized with an eye that captures the majesty of the natural world, but exaggerated for effect by painting a landscape in the way a poet would sonnetize a moment in time. Being out in these Wyoming expanses is incredible, as everywhere you turn provides a different, stunning perspective of Campo Santo's vision of the world.

From that love comes a touching story packed into a beautiful setting with a delightful main character in Yarny. The care and devotion of the team at Coldwood to the craft of game development is more than evident at every turn. This game is not without its frustrations, particularly in puzzles toward the end of the game, but the brief fleeting moments of anxiety are easily countered by the overall warmth that Unravel exudes. This is a game I'll play when I'm having a bad day and want to turn it around.

While Marvel's had a tremendous amount of success at the box office over the last decade, the comic publisher has been relatively quiet on the video game front comparatively. There have been a few exceptions to the rule, but Marvel has been almost singularly focused on the mobile game arena. Over the last three years however, TT Games has managed to release two Marvel games under the Lego banner to sate fans hungry for Marvel action on a console. Though TT Games has been delivering licensed Lego video game adventures for over a decade, Lego Marvel's Avengers feels as fun and fresh as it has in years. It also gives Marvel fans a new spin on stories and characters they've spent a great deal of time with since The Avengers hit theaters in 2012.

The finale to Telltale's Game of Thrones first season has been a long time coming. For months, we've been lying in wait for the moment when the Forresters would be able to exact their revenge, and stake the true claim to Ironrath. It's been an tumultuous journey to get to this point, to be sure, but no one person's story in Game of Thrones ever goes quite the way it was envisioned. In the past year, we've done everything we could to try and make sure the Forresters didn't meet a horrible fate, and to ensure things worked out for the family struck with incredible tragedies. But we forgot one crucial thing--there are no happy endings in Westeros.

Activision's three-year cycle of development for the Call of Duty series continues with Treyarch's latest entry, Black Ops III. The former Tony Hawk Pro Skater studio known for Call of Duty: World at War are taking things to the future with their third Black Ops title. Continuing in the footsteps of Sledgehammer Games' release of Advanced Warfare last year, Black Ops III fully moves things even later into the future. Some of the more acrobatic moves and skills we saw in both Titanfall and Advanced Warfare are making a return here, which might underwhelm some fans hoping for a different experience.

After the underwhelming reception the masses had to Assassin's Creed Unity and its Titanic-sized glitches, Ubisoft has decided to take the franchise to the Industrial Revolution and turn the Templar war into Gangs of New York. All DiCaprio references aside, Assassin's Creed Syndicate is a proper return to form which makes amends for Unity's shortcomings while establishing itself as one of the finer entries of the franchise. The series last two solid entries, Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag and Assassin's Creed Rogue, took us across the Atlantic to the open seas of the new world, but Syndicate takes us to London as it's growing from the boom of the 19th century technology.

It’s not often that I stare at a game’s menu screen for a few moments just because it looks so good. That’s exactly what I caught myself doing the first time I loaded up Civilization: Beyond Earth with the Rising Tide expansion installed. The way light reflected off the rippling waves of the vast ocean was beautiful and soothing; what I didn’t know from those first few moments was how that body of water would change Beyond Earth for the better.

It's been an odd decade for Transformers fans. On the one hand, there's been more Transformers-related things coming out than ever, but on the other, most of those products are the god-awful Michael Bay Transformers (or their mind-blowingly bad tie-ins). Transformers: Devastation promises to it up to all the oldest of old-school 'bot fans, with a sound and style that harkens back to the Generation One television show. Oh, and it was made by Platinum Games. Get ready to have your energon blown, baby-bots, because there's so much more to this than meets the eye.

The first year of Destiny has been a bumpy ride for Bungie. From an underwhelming final product to a very flimsy first DLC pack, Destiny has seen a lot of ups and downs in only its first year of a proposed ten year plan. The House of Wolves was a step in the right direction for the game, and even though the Taken King undoes some of what that DLC introduced, it is exactly what Destiny needed after it in order to progress.