First Parsec

Not only were my fears of the roguelite loop unfounded, but the Burnout roots baked into developer Fuse Games’s DNA was joyously evident in every moment I spent on the track with Star Wars: Galactic Racer. And the times I wasn’t going hundreds of miles per hour when I was on foot did a great job of further Star Wars-ifying my experience. I’m incredibly optimistic about what I’ve seen from this long overdue spiritual successor to Episode 1: Pod Racer, and I can’t wait to play more of it.

The true dark fantasy of The Relic: First Guardian is all of the potential it squanders; an energetic action game marred by its own shambolic state and broken in too many inexcusable ways.

In an age where single-player first-person shooters are slowly going extinct because they only make money for their publisher once while multiplayer live-service shooters vie for our time and attention on a daily basis (and often contain lots of bullsh*t, like microtransactions and/or drawn-out gameplay loops), Metro 2039’s single-player-only craftsmanship and attention to detail after my first few hours with it have me already prepared to call it my favorite first-person shooter in a long time.

While I can definitely see it working well solo, playing with two other players in real time is where 1001 Threads of Mizan really shines. There were no multiplayer quick time events or big flashy mid-fight cutscenes that triggered when everyone did a specific thing, but there were definitely moments where all three of us needed to attack a single weak point, or work together to defeat various obstacles at once in different areas during the boss fight. I'm very interested to see how this fusion of single-player and co-op works throughout the game.