Latest Reviews
Review SteamWorld Build - Thunderful Drops A Stellar Steampunk Adventure Onto Xbox Game Pass
Dig It
Thunderful (an amalgamation of Swedish indie devs Image & Form and Zoink) has been delighting us with its clunkety, clankety retro-futuristic SteamWorld series since SteamWorld Tower Defence on the Nintendo DSi all the way back in 2010. While that particular game may not have been the most explosive of starts - it's definitely the weakest...
Review Teardown - A Slick And Addictive Slice Of Voxel Destruction
Appetite For Destruction
Blasting into Tuxedo Labs' Teardown for the first time, we felt as though we had a pretty good idea on how the experience was gonna go. This is a game that's all about destroying stuff, it's about destroying stuff that's made in a stunning voxel art style so that destroying that stuff looks incredible, and we were fairly...
Review Persona 5 Tactica - A Successful Switch To Slick Tactical Action For Joker & Company
Love that Joker
Atlus games' phenomenal Persona 5 has already provided us with a couple of successful spin-offs in the form of Dynasty Warriors crossover Persona 5 Strikers and the rhythm action effort Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight. Now, the Phantom Thieves return for yet another side gig in the form of Persona 5 Tactica, a tactical turn-based...
Review Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 - A Mostly Fun Time That Relies Too Much On Past Triumphs
Rundown on new ideas
Call of Duty 2023 is here, with Modern Warfare 3 taking the mantle this time around as the franchise's first 'back-to-back sequel' in its 20-year history. This year's game contains three main components: campaign, multiplayer and for the first time in the MW series, Zombies. But, how do they all stack up? And how does Zombies...
War never changes (but it could at least have tried)
A brand new re-release of a bunch of Metal Gear Solid games that take in the series' history from 1987 right up to 2004 should, you would think, be cause for much celebration. Hideo Kojima's jaw-dropping stealth spectaculars remain as vitally important as ever, absolute must-plays for any student...
Review Wild Hearts - Koei Tecmo & EA's Monster Hunter-Like Arrives On Xbox Game Pass
How does it hold up?
Update (Thu 9th Nov, 2023): With Wild Hearts arriving on Xbox Game Pass as part of EA Play today, we thought we'd re-share this review from earlier in the year so you can get an idea of what it's like, and whether it's worth a download. Keep in mind the game has also received multiple patches since release, as documented on the...
What's the story, Morning Glory?
If there's one group of gamers who've been eating better than most lately, it's definitely Like A Dragon/Yakuza fans. Over the past few years we've seen Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio fully invest in revisiting, remaking and remastering important parts of its long-running RPG series, continuing to add stunning new entries to...
Review Robocop: Rogue City - A Slice Of 1980s Nostalgia That Feels Purposefully Old School
This tin man's got heart
There's just something about RoboCop. Maybe it's an age thing, maybe you just had to be there, but the ultra-violent tin cop sits alongside the likes of Knight Rider, Terminator and lots of other 1980s goodies as a property that immediately gets our excitement levels right up to the max as soon as it's mentioned. We'll sit...
Review Jusant: Not Quite The 'Peak' Of Xbox Game Pass, But Still A Fun Adventure
Ready for a climb?
Jusant describes itself as an action-puzzle climbing game with "meditative vibes", and when you combine that with the talented Life is Strange and Tell Me Why studio DON'T NOD, the concept has long sounded like a winning formula to us. But what about the execution? In a year that's been overflowing with new Xbox releases and "day...
Review Alan Wake 2 - Remedy's Best Game Yet And A Big Improvement On The Original
He's still a writer...
Editor's Note: The majority of our Alan Wake 2 review time was spent playing the PC version of the game. We have also tested the Xbox Series X version out for a short time, and have noted our Xbox performance impressions towards the end of the review. Remedy Entertainment's Alan Wake is an adventure that this particular...
Review Sonic Superstars - A Modern Take On Sonic's Classic 2D Games
Fun with friends
SEGA is back with a new Sonic the Hedgehog side-scroller and this time it’s having another crack at the “classic” experience reimagined with 3D graphics. The blue blur has been here before with games like Sonic the Hedgehog 4 and even hybrid releases such as Sonic Generations, so how does this new experience hold up? Well,...
Review Like A Dragon: Ishin! - This Slick Remaster Serves Up Another Excellent Yakuza Adventure
Bakumatsu Beatdown
Update: To celebrate the arrival of Like a Dragon: Ishin on Xbox Game Pass, we thought we'd highlight our Pure Xbox review once again - giving you a chance to see whether it's worth a download this week! <related ids="157021"> Original review (Fri 17th Feb, 2023): It’s been something of a golden era for fans of all...
Review NHL 24 - Hopefully The Start Of A New Era For EA's Hockey Games
A meaningful stride forward?
When it comes to EA Sports' NHL series, last year's NHL 23 was one of the biggest disappointments we've experienced thus far. It wasn't a bad game (which is why we gave it a 6/10 here at Pure Xbox), but it still felt like it barely made any strides forward whatsoever, and we ultimately grew tired of it very quickly. NHL...
Review Assassin's Creed Mirage - A Super Slick Return To The Series' Stealth Roots
The Thief of Baghdad
The Assassin's Creed franchise has come a long way since we first got our hands on the fairly disappointing tech demo that was the original experience all the way back in 2007. Yes, pals, that really was 16 years ago already. The core concept behind AC has always a strong one, and the first outing was undoubtedly a real...
Review Forza Motorsport - The Next Generation Of Racing Is Here
All revved up with lots of places to go
It's been a long time coming, but developer Turn 10 has finally rounded the bend to deliver its vision for next-gen racing on Xbox Series X and S - yep, Forza Motorsport is here. We've been waiting for this one since 2017's Forza Motorsport 7 brought gorgeous 4K / 60FPS racing to Xbox One X, but the question...
Review Gotham Knights - A Dark, Dense And Surprisingly Gripping Adventure
The Bat Fam Rises... on Xbox Game Pass this Tuesday!
Update (Mon 2nd Oct, 2023): With Gotham Knights arriving as part of the Xbox Game Pass October 2023 lineup, we thought we'd share our own PX review of the game once again - this is based on the version that launched last year. Gotham Knights has since received a few updates that have improved
Indiana Groans
Seattle-based developer Harebrained Schemes certainly knows its way around a turn-based RPG. The twelve-year-old studio has given us the fantastic Shadowrun series of games, a series which recently made the leap to Xbox consoles, as well as the excellent Battletech which, for now, remains a PC-only deal. With this proven track record...
Review EA Sports FC 24 - A New Era Begins With An Impressive Result
The next chapter has kicked off
This year marks a major milestone for EA Sports and what used to be known as the FIFA series, now adopting the new name of "EA Sports FC" and embarking on a new era in the process. In the case of EA Sports FC 24 though, we're not looking at a massive overhaul compared to last year - instead, it's a subtle but...
Review Resident Evil 4: Separate Ways - Ada Wong Returns In A Dynamite Slice Of DLC
All killer, no filler
2023 has been quite the year for Resi fans, with Resident Evil 4 Remake surpassing all expectations in serving up a revamped version of a stone cold classic that may actually go down as the definitive version in the long run. We certainly thought so here at Pure Xbox, dishing out a perfect 10/10 score in our review, where we...
Review Cyberpunk 2077: Phantom Liberty - CDPR's RPG Finally Lives Up To All Of The Hype
Back to the Future
What a rollercoaster ride we've been on with Cyberpunk 2077. After a hugely disappointing experience with the borked original console release, which resulted in a much lower scored review than we ever expected to dish out, we were then pleased to report on patch Hotfix 1.4's litany of incremental improvements that made a notable...
Review Party Animals - Cuddly Carnage Brings Fun And Laughter To Xbox Game Pass
All-out pawfare
What do you get when you mix Gang Beasts (the popular physics-based brawler) with some unbelievably adorable characters, a bunch of unique features, and a day one release on Xbox Game Pass? The answer is Party Animals, which is not only a great and hilarious new addition to the genre, but it's also one of the very best party titles...
Review Mortal Kombat 1 - 30 Years In The Making, But Does It Live Up To The Legacy?
Welcome to Liu Kang's reborn universe
Where do you start with a series as big as Mortal Kombat? The brutal and bloody game has not only popularised and evolved the fighting genre over the past 30 years but also helped transform the video game industry. It had jaws dropping (in more ways than one) during the era of arcade gaming with its unique...
Review The Crew Motorfest - A True Forza Horizon Competitor Enters The Playground
The new motorfest
Forza Horizon has ruled the open world racing roost for years now, subsequently becoming one of the jewels in Xbox's first-party crown as Playground Games has taken the genre to new heights. However, we did feel like 2021's Forza Horizon 5 was a little bit of a drop off for the series, as it — perhaps naturally — started to run...
Review Lies Of P - Dystopian Pinocchio Slashes And Stabs His Way Onto The Best Soulslikes
We're telling the truth
FromSoftware games - especially Bloodborne and the Dark Souls series - are typically hard-as-nails, punishing experiences set amidst Gothic architecture with light horror elements and H.P. Lovecraft-inspired monstrosities for enemies. Non-FromSoft games in the genre often forego everything bar the difficulty, such as the Star...
VATS entertainment
Depending on how much you bought into the hype during the long run-up to the release of Bethesda's Starfield, it's hard to know quite what you might have been expecting when you finally sat down to press the start button and get stuck in. Was this going to be some monumental step forward for video games, a piece of interactive art...
Review Sea of Stars - An Instant Indie Classic Magics Its Way Onto Xbox Game Pass
Total eclipse of our hearts
If you've played Sabotage Studio's rather excellent 2018 effort, The Messenger, you'll know this is a dev team that's a dab hand at revisiting retro classics - in this case the likes of Ninja Gaiden - and updating them into slick and entirely modern-feeling experiences that keep the old-school vibes alive whilst providing...
Mobile Suit Gundaaayum!
There has, understandably, been a whole heap of interest leading into the release of Armored Core VI: Fires Of Rubicon, and certainly a great deal more hype from a much wider range of gamers than is usually the case with this long-running, and rather niche, mech shooter series. Of course that's all down to how FromSoftware's...
Review Immortals Of Aveum - EA's Spellbinding Shooter Packs A Punch
Story ain't this one's strong suit
The scale of EA's 'Originals' program has certainly grown this year with the arrival of Wild Hearts and Immortals of Aveum - two full-priced titles aimed squarely at the AAA gaming market. We've spent this week playing through the latter — EA's brand new magic-based shooter — and have come away largely...
Strog Rock
Almost exactly two years on from Nightdive Studios' phenomenal remaster of the original Quake, old-school FPS fans are being treated to a second helping of revamped retro-fragging action with this all-new enhanced version of iD Software's seminal sequel and, joy of joys, it's only gone and dropped onto Xbox Game Pass. Let’s not beat...
Review Atlas Fallen - AA Adventuring Rises Above Its Flaws With Addictive Action & Exploration
The Essence of Combat
Deck13 has been on a pretty solid run over the past nine or so years, with the likes of The Surge, The Surge 2 and, to a slightly lesser extent, Lords Of The Fallen, seeing the German studio serve up some satisfyingly crunchy AA action of the Soulslike variety. While 2014's Lords of the Fallen was a valiant effort, it had a...
