Do you remember the last game to make you cry? The last one to make you laugh? Can you recall a game that has done both? It’s a remarkable endeavor to strive for, and one that few in the industry have ever accomplished. Gaming by nature is mindless entertainment, but every once in a spectacularly rare occasion, along comes a title that manages to tug on just the right heartstrings to remind us that games can be a powerful tool for storytelling. When you combine the talents of two legendary creative forces of their respective mediums, the result is one of those occurrences.

Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch should not be good. In an age ripe with bleeding-edge technical presentation and blockbuster-equivalent action set pieces, there was a definite stigma attached to this project. Originally released only as a Nintendo DS title in Japan, Ni no Kuni met tremendous sales and critical success. But as a potential PS3 exclusive released worldwide, there was a greater anxiety: could such an inherently traditional Japanese role-playing game with a blatantly niche presentation meet equal success in places like North America and Europe? The answer was an obvious yes, and it is because of both Studio Ghibli’s sensitive art direction and Level-5’s understanding of the formula that made it so.

Ni no Kuni’s deceptive charm belies its mature story.

It’s the same question everyone asked before Nintendo was convinced to localize their Wii exclusive RPGs Xenoblade Chronicles and The Last Story, and it’s the same answer. In the hands of masterful creators, anything can be a success. But Ni no Kuni is more than just the sum of its parts. To call it “that game made by Studio Ghibli” would be a disservice to the title and complete disrespect to both teams. This is a love letter to the gaming industry; a plea for others to realize that games don’t need to pride themselves on their violence or their absurdity to tell a mature story. There’s no forced romantic subplot to drive home the marketing technique of “sex sells,” there isn’t vicarious warfare. There is simply a boy and his story, and it is one of the most mature tales seen in a video game in years.

Ni no Kuni begins in the sleepy town known as Mortorville, a fictional hamlet located in the Pacific Northwest sometime during the 1950s. After a tragic and unfortunate accident involving Oliver, our hero, and his best friend Phillip, Oliver’s mother suffers a heart attack and dies. Overwhelmed with grief and guilt, Oliver locks himself in his room and cries himself barren. Until his tears fall upon the patchwork doll that Oliver’s mother had given to him many years ago, and suddenly breathe life into the stuffed toy.

The doll, who is henceforth and shall forevermore be known as Mr. Drippy Lord High Lord of the Fairies, gives Oliver hope. He tells him that he is from another world much like Oliver’s, but this place is cursed by the Dark Djinn Shadar, and all who live there have become heartless shells of their former self. Everyone who lives in this world shares a soul mate with someone in Oliver’s world, and in particular there was once a great and powerful sage named Alicia who has been imprisoned by Shadar. As luck would have it, she is the soul mate of Oliver’s mother, and if Oliver can free her, he may be able to bring his mother back to life. Ultimately, Oliver’s significance to this other world and his role in the game’s grand scheme is something worth discovering on your own, but in traditional dramatic fashion, expect many surprises.

One of the most touching scenes in the game.

As a character, Oliver is an affable young boy with a kind heart and an almost frighteningly naïve perception about the world. His catch phrases (“Jeepers!” and “Neato!”) remind me of a time when innocence wasn’t lost so young. It turns out he’s a pretty killer wizard as well, as he quickly discovers his inherently natural gift for magic through the use of the Wizard’s Companion, a fabulous piece of in-game literature that serves as more than just a table of contents or a manual, but as an authentic presentation of sorcery and the art of spells. Mr. Drippy serves as a sidekick of sorts, and other times a mentor, but always a friend. He is brought to life through a superb vocal performance by Steffan Rhodri, whose thick welsh accent gives the lantern-accessorized fairy immense charm and personality.

Combat in Ni no Kuni is interesting, but it’s not the most effective example of genre-blending. Many of the traditional Japanese role-playing elements are present, such as the introductory splash screen and the formulaic turn-based combat, but much of this has its own unique spin. Though the combat is turn-based, it’s also real-time, in a way that’s probably most similar to a Tales of or a Star Ocean game. You select your actions, and then your character has an allotted time to perform those actions. When the time expires, you select again, and it’s during this selection process that many times combat will pause. Some actions will need to be done in real time, such as the broad strokes (selecting basic “Attack” or “Defend” options, or scrolling over to the “Provisions” menu). But it’s once you make that decision are you given the freedom to choose without pressure.

Here’s where things get interesting. Take all of that and throw Pokémon into the mix. Not only do you have the ability to control the primary characters, but you can also choose to select creatures (known as familiars) to fight for you, and for a majority of the game, that’s the better option. The familiars come in all shapes and sizes and as you’d expect from a Level-5 game, their names are hilariously pun-filled. Essentially, you’ll accrue a team of three heroes (a fourth joins your quest, but not until the very tail-end of the game), and each person can hold a total of three familiars. You can then choose three extra familiars to keep on your active reserves, and everything else you have excess of will get sent to the familiar retreat once you gain access to it, a pen house of sorts that you can access at almost every save location in the game.

The familiars and the characters level independently of each other, but certain stats of the heroes will affect their familiars, such as HP and MP. This is because the familiars share a direct bond with their owners. All damage they take is shared by their user. Nearly everything else is dependent on each character and familiar, so you will have to become aware very quickly of enemy weaknesses and strengths and know what to use to counter it: familiars with high defense, high attack or magic, or perhaps some good old fashion human magic?

Sometimes Oliver needs to get his own hands dirty.

Every enemy you fight that doesn’t include a boss is a familiar that you can capture, and once captured, you’ll then have to attend to their needs. A simple feeding mechanic sees that you give treats to your familiars to level their stats, and doing so fills up a couple of meters: one that measures their fullness, and another that tracks their familiarity (or otherwise, their affinity toward you). The latter increases more efficiently if you feed your familiar their favorite kind of treat. Familiarity has no real consequence if you don’t level it up. For instance, a familiar won’t ignore you if its familiarity is level one; however, there is benefit to leveling it up, as it allows you to continue feeding them more and increasing their stats further, as well as unlocking more ability slots for combat.

Once familiars reach a certain level, you can choose to metamorphose them. Doing so requires feeding them a particular item that matches their celestial sign (Sun, Moon, Star, or Planet. These signs also have a minor role in combat in a very primitive rocks-paper-scissor type fashion). Once they evolve, they will be able to learn new abilities, but their levels reset to 1 as do their stats; however, their growth rate is drastically increased, so when they reach the same level at which they evolved, they will be more powerful. There is a third tier of evolution as well, resulting in usually one of two possible outcomes for each familiar, typically with very minimal difference in stats but with opposite growth traits (such as one form being more proficient with fire abilities, and the other ice or storm).

All the glitz and glamor can’t cover up all of the blemishes, though. If there’s one area where Ni no Kuni suffers the most, it’s in the combat AI. Because you can only personally control either one character or one familiar at a time, the others are left up to rudimentary tactical settings. Things like “Provide backup” or “Keep us healthy” should prove useful, theoretically. The problem is that because they’re so general, the characters will perform those actions at the slightest trace of disaster. Esther, informally the game’s “healer,” is the most notorious offender of abusing the tactics settings. Within a few minutes and perhaps no more than four of five battles after first getting her, she had expended all of her MP. Adjusting her tactics to keep her on healing duty was even more fruitless as she’d waste an expensive heal on someone who would only suffer a minor scratch. Having to set your companion characters to “Do not use abilities” for nearly the entirety of the game except for boss fights seems like a complete misuse of the system, but I couldn’t, for the life of me, figure out a better way.

Taking more direct control of each character could have also provided better management, but with the way the combat was designed, switching back and forth between characters puts a serious halt to the pacing of combat, and more often than not I found it just easier and more satisfying to do as stated above with the other characters while I simply controlled three well-balanced and versatile familiars for Oliver.

Whether for good or ill, combat can get a little frantic if you lose focus.

But it’s an RPG, and combat is just one facet of these games. The other side, of course, are the hundreds of side quests meant to broaden the world and characters within it. Ni no Kuni suffers no shortage of those, though they come in a bit of a mixed bag. On one hand there are many of the traditional side quests you’d expect, those as well split into two categories: Errands (a variety of gathering, capturing, or fetch quests), and Bounty Hunts, your usual “kill this powerful creature.” The other side of the coin are the missing heart quests, which ties loosely into the game’s story about the inhabitants of this world having their hearts stolen.

Essentially, random NPCs you encounter will be lacking any one emotion out of a dozen or so: things like courage, kindness, and enthusiasm. Your job is to go around and find someone who possesses an excess of this quality, use a special magical locket given to you to take a bit of that emotion, and then give it to the anemic person. It’s the Robin Hood syndrome – Communism at its finest. And while there’s nothing technically wrong with this whole subplot (especially since many of the rewards are excellent), the game never really allows you to do it. By that I mean, instead of letting you figure out what emotion a person might be lacking, every single time you’ll get the same scripted scene where Mr. Drippy will have to remind you that you can take pieces of someone else’s heart to give to this person, and without fail, he will tell you exactly which piece is missing. Every. Time.

These aren’t the only instances where the game feels like it’s underestimating its player, either. Among the various spells you’ll acquire that fill up the Wizard’s Companion, many of them serve no purpose in combat. Some have no purpose at all except for reading material, but several will be used in side quests or while exploring, and somehow the game feels the need to once again take control away from the player to tell you exactly what you need to do. The Bridge spells is perhaps the most commonly used utility spell out in the world. A spell that can create paths over stretches of land, Bridge finds a lot of use throughout the game. But on every occasion, instead of simply walking up to an area that you know you’ll need to use the spell for, you must interact with it first and have Mr. Drippy remind you that you have a spell that can create bridges.

But then there are instances when the game truly tests your mettle, and perhaps nowhere more so than the series of side quests given to you by a strange little ghost named Horace. Solve his riddle in the first town and you’ll encounter him in each subsequent location with a new and more difficult conundrum. These require you to actually invest time and effort into solving them, including reading through various excerpts of the Wizard’s Companion or deciphering an ancient alphabet. It’s a strange dichotomy to have a game that proposes all of these wonderful concepts, but then takes half of them away from you and your ability to simply play.

The Wizard’s Companion is a fantastic companion piece in-game, and even better if you snagged yourself a copy of the limited print hardcover edition.

But playing is half the fun with No no Kuni. Given the game’s creators, you can expect nothing less of a spectacular visual design and a charming soundtrack that encapsulate both the feelings that Oliver must contend with, but also the adventure that he has embarked on. I highlighted Mr. Drippy’s voice actor earlier, but the whole ensemble is exceptional, and though Oliver’s buoyant enthusiasm can sometimes grate on my nerves, it’s by no means bad. Studio Ghibli’s talents have not gone to waste, either, giving us some of the most memorable (and occasionally awkward) scenes from their seasoned filmography yet.

The entire package is a thoughtfully and lovingly wrapped present to fans of both studios and long-time naysayers who cry that the genre is dead. Ni no Kuni’s faults are few and far between, and though some are more peculiar than others, there is little that can stand in the way of one’s enjoyment of this game. While it’s not the most forward-thinking RPG to come from Japan this generation (those honors go mutually to Xenoblade Chronicles and Demon’s Souls), it is certainly the one with the biggest heart.

Crystal Dynamic’s Tomb Raider reboot accomplishes many things, but among them it establishes one principle, an absolute truth: Legends aren’t born, they’re made. Through trials that will test Lara Croft’s survival instinct, her willpower, her strength, and her courage, this isn’t the iconic heroine you know. She’s human. She’s real. She is pure and innocent and finds out very quickly that the only choice that matters in life is the choice to live. You will see her endure grueling inflictions and torment, and through it all, you will see a survivor emerge.

Tomb Raider tells the reimagined tale of Lara Croft’s origins: the truth behind how she became one of gaming’s most iconic leading ladies. Her first kill is handled with grace and humility by the game’s creators and shows a truly realized twenty-one year old woman in the situation that will define her life. Perhaps a little too presumptuous is how quickly Lara accommodates herself, as one minute she’s weeping over the dead body of her assailant and the next the game proposes you take out a handful of island inhabitants nearby. But this is something quickly forgiven considering the circumstances surrounding Lara’s adventure. It’s kill or be killed, and by the end of the game you’ll have seen the full extent of her character’s growth that breathes refreshing new life into this icon.

The same can’t entirely be said for the supporting cast, which largely fit the bill of stereotypes and genre clichés: the geeky tech support, the spiritual protector, the ambitious and naïve best friend, etc. The only character who steps up to the plate is Conrad Roth, whose own arc largely juxtaposes Lara’s. He serves as both a mentor and father figure to our heroine, offering advice, guidance, and most of all, trust. He is the catalyst that drives Lara to believe in herself and in the things that she must to do rescue her friends from the savage island inhabitants and the strange weather phenomena that has resulted in hundreds of shipwrecks and plane crashes for thousands of years. (If I didn’t know better, I’d think this was a LOST video game – and a better one than the actual LOST game).

Conrad and Lara, the only two characters that show significant growth.

Lara’s journey begins shortly after her ship, the Endurance, unwillingly joins other wrecked vessels on a mysterious island rumored to be home of the lost Yamatai civilization, a Japanese kingdom that worshipped the Sun Queen Himiko. The first hour of the game is a stretch of quick-time events and various unfortunate situations that Lara must find her way out of, but only serve to strengthen her resolve when she finally gets to roam around. Make it past this and the island becomes your playground. Not quite to the extent of games like Far Cry 3 or Assassin’s Creed 3, but Tomb Raider gives you enough freedom within each given area to explore and discover all of the hidden novelties in the world, including journal entries from some of the island’s previous inhabitants and Lara’s shipmates, the latter of which give some insight into the characters despite their lack of growth in the story.

Each area offers a dozen or more collectible items to find and various campsites to discover, many of them serving as fast travel locations to allow quick access to and from another map. Campsites will also function as your primary base of operations for leveling and upgrading your weapons. Accomplishing certain tasks in the story, discovering treasure chests, or collecting full sets of items will usually reward you with both XP and salvage. Salvage is used to purchase attachments to your weapons, either improving firing rate, reload speed, accuracy, damage, ammunition, and more. The game rarely feels sparse for salvage, as well, considering there are multitudes of ways to get it, including a very basic albeit sufficient hunting system.

Combat feels extremely tight and precise and offers players a pleasantly varied sense of gameplay. You can progress through most of the game in stealth, using silenced firearms, your bow, or close-range kills with your axe to dispatch enemies quietly, and the stealth doesn’t feel like a gimmick as it did in Uncharted, either. Lara’s animations as she moves close to walls and cover look and feel natural. And speaking of cover: I’m a fairly vocal detractor for cover-based gameplay but Tomb Raider does it better than any other game I’ve seen; in fact, if all cover shooters were to adopt this method, I’d be okay with it. In essence, there is no designated button to stick to cover or pull away from it: instead, Lara will intelligently duck or hide if you’re near appropriate terrain when an enemy is nearby. Because she’s not actually stuck to the wall, you can freely switch between cover without it feeling too rigid. Many environments are also destructible, forcing you to be quick and resourceful about how you approach any combat situation.

Fire plays a key role in various puzzles and exploration throughout the game.

The platforming elements in the game are equally responsive and incorporate a number of different tools to provide a fresh experience even near the final stretch of the game. The acquisition of a rope will allow you to shimmy across otherwise unreachable gaps, while your initial axe upgraded will eventually let you scale particularly craggy walls. Even in the final hours you’ll acquire a device that lets you zipline across the ropes you string up, among other, more practical uses. The variety of ways the game seeks to keep things fresh throughout, and the excellent pacing of this so that you never feel frontloaded with all of the goodies but don’t feel particularly bored by the end as well serve to strengthen an already solid action game.

The locations you’ll trek through have Lara climbing massive rickety radio towers (again, are we sure this isn’t LOST?), snowy mountain peaks, a ruined village, ancient Japanese temples, and more. Among these locations are the game’s namesakes: optional tombs that offer adequate rewards for those willing to raid them, usually in the form of a heaping helping of XP, salvage, a weapon part used for upgrade, and a location map. While the tombs themselves aren’t particularly large in scale, and the puzzles within aren’t all that difficult, they are a decent enough diversion and provide just enough fan service to those who expected more of the old. This is, after all, an origin story: she can’t have always been a “tomb raider.”

Using the rope and an axe to great affect. That’s ingenuity.

Perhaps the game’s greatest flaw is in its multiplayer, an unnecessary addition that seems to have been added simply because an apparently vocal group of people wanted it. I’m of the mindset that a game does not need multiplayer – even in this day and age – to be a worthy purchase, and Tomb Raider could have proven that theory if the developers had stuck to their original ideals. Alas, instead we’re given a few rather bland and uninspired modes that honestly do more to insult the game than compliment it.

Visually, the game is stunning. The environments are equal parts breathtaking and harrowing. The camera is always on the right side of cinematic, providing you gorgeous backdrops as Lara scales a wall, or focusing in on the action in an intense shootout. Lara’s animations in particular, as I’ve mentioned earlier, are excellent, and Camilla Ludington turns out a wonderful performance as both the voice and motion capture of Lara herself. She’s appropriately naïve and awestruck when she needs to be, and gives the character enough emotional depth to allow players even a fraction of the understanding of what Lara might be going through. There are many gruesome scenes in the game, to be sure, some of them as a result of an accidental death, but others that are essential to the plot and serve only to show that this legend has gone to hell and back, but she made it.

Lara endures some violent and emotionally draining torment during her journey.

A few notable glitches occurred, namely in one particular chain link fence that looked wide open from a distance, but it wasn’t until I moved right up next to it that the fence appeared. You may also occasionally find animals spinning around in place. Do not be alarmed. Quick-time events are also increasingly becoming a crutch in gaming, and sometimes Tomb Raider uses them freely. Never more so in one specific location than the initial hour of the game, but some scenes or combat scenarios could have played out much more dramatically if they didn’t boil down to “push [this button]…..NOW.”

Tomb Raider’s greatest strength is indeed in its heritage. It is a powerful ally that maintains a devoted fanbase to this day. Luckily for them and everyone else, the game lives up to that legacy. Lara is treated like a person, perhaps for the first time in her storied career, and is allowed to grow in extraordinary ways. That growth is at the core of this story, which at times may feel predictable but rarely pedantic. Complimented by strong gameplay mechanics despite a large misstep in the online department, and an evocative, fascinating island to explore, Tomb Raider is an emotional and exhilarating look into the birth of a gaming legend.

“Bring us the girl, wipe away the debt.” These few words are the catalyst that set the grand scheme of BioShock Infinite in motion, forcing protagonist Booker DeWitt to travel to the industrious floating city known as Columbia in search of a young woman named Elizabeth. Buried deep in dept within his own gambling addiction and alcoholic stupors, this appears to be Booker’s only chance at saving himself from further destruction. But Columbia’s stark fanaticism and political zeal aren’t the only issues he’ll have to deal with, as the mysterious “A.D.” brand on his right hand marks him as the so-called False Shepherd, sending the whole city into a violent uproar.

Infinite’s unflinching portrayal of early 20^th century racism and religious extremism may a bit too uncomfortable for some people to take, as the game spares no expense to tell its story. At the top of the mountain is Zachary Hale Comstock, the founder of Columbia. His indignation is an iron fist, as the people of Columbia worship him as both savior and Prophet. He proclaims to have seen all possible futures, and has predicted that the False Shepherd would come to steal away the Lamb of Columbia – Elizabeth. Booker’s struggle through the many layers of this floating kingdom will have him fending off countless Columbian nationalists, mechanical monstrosities, and more as he seeks to rescue Elizabeth and return her to those who desire her. But the deeper Booker finds himself involved in Columbia’s political battle between Comstock’s men and the rejected society known as the Vox Populi, the less likely it seems he’ll ever make it out alive.

Enjoying a bit of ice cream amidst all the turmoil.

Fans of Irrational Games’ previous BioShock will find entrance into Infinite very accessible. Plasmids are replaced by Vigors, which are fundamentally the same thing: abilities that enhance the player’s control and provide alternative means to combat. You’ll find an assortment of standard firepower throughout the game, some more useful than others. There are a few new additions to the franchise, particularly the skyhook and the collection of outfits. The former is a tool used to navigate many of Columbia’s disconnected aerial locations, but has value in combat as well. You can perform a devastating landing attack on enemies by dropping from the skyline, in addition to using it for some more tactical advantages like getting the high ground or finding ammo caches. The outfits are collectible pieces of gear that affect your abilities in combat by increasing the damage of certain Vigors or weapons, by raising the drop rate of ammo upon an enemy’s death, or other benefits. Their effect is random to a degree: each one is coded into the game, but when you pick one up it may not always be the same thing.

Perhaps the most ambitious feature of BioShock Infinite is Elizabeth herself, and not since Half-Life 2’s Alyx Vance has there been a companion character that has behaved so naturally in the world and fulfilled the role of cooperative partner so well. She’ll scavenge for ammo, health, and money for you, and even though it’s left up to chance, she’ll definitely save your life on more than a few occasions. But more than that, she is the star of the show: while it’s through Booker’s eyes you witness the adventure, ultimately, it is Elizabeth’s tale that is at the core of BioShock Infinite. The mysteries surrounding her imprisonment, existence, and why Booker’s employers desire her so much serve as some of the game’s final surprises. And make no mistake, the ending will leave much room for discussion and will most certainly require a secondary playthrough.

Elizabeth’s personality, behavior, and movement are unlike anything else.

The city of Columbia is a star in its own right, and like Rapture, evokes a number of different ideological and social extremisms. Rapture’s submerged dwelling belied its capitalistic leader, Andrew Ryan: it was oppressive and claustrophobic, dark and haunted. It was a city that looked down upon censorship of art and media, where morality was in absence, and where every individual was encouraged to take their own piece of paradise. And yet there was just something not quite appropriate about it sitting at the bottom of the ocean. On the contrary, Columbia’s “fortress in the sky” ambition is its own form of dramatic irony: free of constraints and boundaries, Columbia is more sectionalist and segregated. Comstock’s word is law and racial and religious discrimination runs rampant. The two settings – Rapture and Columbia – are at once equal and opposite, two sides of the same coin. And this is by no means accidental. But that discussion is for another place, at another time.

Infinite’s portrayal of many of its themes hits a few high notes, particularly much of its more existential questions at the back end. Its racial and religious contrivances falter a bit but they serve their place in the overall picture. Much of that will fall in line upon the second playthrough more than they might in the first, once players fully grasp the context of the game. Perhaps the largest issue is the game’s reliance on the old and familiar. Make no mistake, the story, cast, and soundtrack set BioShock Infinite ahead of the pack and a forerunner for Game of the Year, but the gunplay still feels very typical. This is by no means a fault, as the action is certainly more fluid. But it almost feels like the game tries to fall back into shooter-mode too often, which sharply contrasts some of the more passive sections.

You’ll encounter these two throughout the game, often comedic but always important.

Of course the skyhook livens things up a bit, and the enemy AI behaves exceptionally well, but at the end of the day the mechanical experience of the game won’t differ too much to what you played in the original BioShock. In fact, much of the non-combat procedures have been removed entirely (for better or worse): hacking is gone and provided you have enough lock picks, Elizabeth will perform that action for you. The game never feels more redundant than a certain portion near the tail end, roughly an hour or two before the game’s final battle. There’s a stretch where you’ll fight the same boss enemy three times in a row, all while performing what ultimately amounts to a needless fetch quest. It felt entirely like fluff or padding to lengthen the game, and as a whole, there could have been a number of sections throughout that were removed to create a more succinct package.

Aside from these few encounters and perhaps the game’s climax, which is more or less an accumulation of combat strategies you’ve learned up to that point, the game rarely feels cheap. In fact, with Elizabeth’s aid, I strongly recommend playing on the hard difficulty, as you’ll get the fullest experience out of the game’s strong enemy AI and Elizabeth’s practical scavenging. Should you fall in combat, checkpoints are scattered generously throughout a level, so at most you’ll be set back a door or two and with a few coins lost. For ultimate thrill-seekers, 1999 Mode unlocks upon completion, which serves as an extreme or very hard mode, upping the scarcity of ammo and money found in the world and increasing all aspects of the enemy as well as the monetary cost of death.

The motorized patriot, one of the more frequent heavy hitters of the game.

While Booker and Elizabeth function as the game’s heroes, the supporting cast are equally delightful (or intentionally not so much), with one or two exceptions. Comstock is a great antagonist and his messianic preaching paints him as a very confident, proud man; however, characters like Daisy Fitzroy, leader of the rebellious Vox Populi, and Songbird, Elizabeth’s mysterious protector, could have gone in much better directions. Daisy starts out as this strong leader devoted to her people, and through some of the early Voxophones – recorded messages found throughout the game – you build up this idea of her in your head. But ultimately, the fate of her character takes a disappointingly extreme turn. Songbird, on the other hand, takes no turns whatsoever; it simply exists as the enigmatic protector of Elizabeth. Perhaps there’s room there for discussion, or potential DLC, but as it stands it feels almost like a missed opportunity.

But nothing in the game could have been achieved so effectively if not for two things: the look and sound of Columbia. In stark contrast to Rapture’s dark hues and dim lighting, Columbia flies in the face of the sun. Brightly lit, colorful, and with a glossy sheen over it, its picture-perfect look hides its dark and seedy undertones. The city feels alive, as well, as the different interconnected portions of Columbia sway like independent structures. You’ll occasionally stumble upon conversation between characters that has absolutely nothing to do with your situation, and other times, you may hear something that you don’t know is foreshadowing future events.  The game, without question, looks infinitely better on PC than it does on consoles, and if you have any choice whatsoever, you know the way to go. Ultimately both console versions have reduced draw distance and just a general glazed, filmy look to the world. The PS3 copy suffers a bit from excessive screen tearing and the Xbox 360 version has a number of texture pop-ins. There’s not a whole lot that will break the experience, but why rob yourself of a greater presentation if it’s possible? Otherwise there are a few inconsistencies here and there across all versions, like an NPC not moving out of your way, or audio overlap.

One of the first sights you’ll see upon entrance into Columbia proper.

The team at Irrational has crafted a story and universe that simply demands to be explored further, whether through discussion or by replaying the game. It’s not so much that you’ll get a different experience, because despite whatever choices there are in the game, none of them affect the outcome; it’s that those seemingly insignificant, binary choices are actually part of the discussion. That conversation you heard that made no sense originally now has context. Those pictures you saw, the music you heard – all of it has meaning the second time through. The music, especially, is incredibly powerful, and stands on its own as the most inspiring part of BioShock Infinite. Whether it’s one of the game’s original scores or a licensed piece of music, there isn’t a single part of the game’s soundtrack that doesn’t just fit and sound wonderful. It’s more than just good background noise, as well, as music plays a key role in the story and overall structure of the world. Nothing is without purpose.

There’s much to be discussed about BioShock Infinite. In itself, it’s not a fairly difficult game to review: while the gameplay manages to provide some new enjoyment, it’s everything else that keeps it floating high above its competition. But it is a near impossible game to discuss to anyone who has not yet finished it. Simply writing this review has tested my patience and ability to not spoil anything, and yet I can’t help but talk about or slyly reference what I know. That is a credit to Irrational Games. They have managed to capture an audience with thought-provoking questions about existence, about life, and about guilt. So few games come along that truly demand discussion or analysis. BioShock Infinite’s ending may not be the greatest of all time like many claim, but it is absolutely one of the most well-constructed. Because it’s not the ending alone that makes it so special, it’s what you know and what you’ve seen that creates the magic.

The famous proverb states that “revenge is a dish best served cold.” Take a child soldier trained to be a killing machine, give him a sword and cybernetic implants, then set him loose on a corporation that’s abducting children and turning them into mindless killers. If you ask me, revenge is par for the course. Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance, the aptly but grammatically incorrectly named endeavor from Platinum Games and Konami, teaches us that not only can you combine two similar words to create a video game title, but if you put heavy metal to any action sequence, it’s going to be awesome. But enough jokes, because Rising is actually pretty spectacular.

Set four years after the events of Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, the Sons of the Patriots (SOP) system has been dismantled and the need for Private Military Corporations (PMCs) has dwindled. In order to survive the changing of the times, these PMCs needed to find a new way to validate their existence on the world’s stage. The rise of cybernetic technology allowed these corporations to manufacture and mass produce partially-artificial soldiers. Raiden, the game’s protagonist and controversial hero of Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, has joined up with Maverick, a PMC specialized in personal security. On a routine escort, his ward is killed by a rival corporation known as Desperado, and in the process, Raiden is severely injured, forcing him to undergo yet another cybernetic enhancement. Raiden’s quest for revenge sends him across various landmark cities in the world as he hunts down the members of Desperado one by one.

It’s not a tale that’s going to set any standards for storytelling, but it doesn’t need to. Raiden’s character growth alone is enough to warrant his quest for vengeance, regardless of the situation. The elite members of Desperado known as the Winds of Destruction are also worthy adversaries and typically outlandish Metal Gear villains. The battles against this bunch are some of the best in the game and rank up high in terms of the storied franchise’s pantheon of fantastic boss fights, each one requiring precise use of the game’s various features.

Anticipating your enemy’s attack is the most important thing.

Combat in Rising shares many similarities to one of Platinum’s previous titles, Bayonetta, and as such also has a lot in common with some of the classics of the genre like Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden. You can perform a number of combos, stringing together light and heavy attacks in fluid continuity. The game runs at a remarkably constant 60 frames per second. There’s virtually little to no downtime in the midst of a fight, as Raiden can ping pong his way between multiple foes without missing a beat. Unique to Rising is the ability to enter Blade Mode, which allows him a few moments of pause to slice carefully and precisely.

You can control your katana a few different ways while in Blade Mode: the buttons designated for heavy and light attacks will swing the sword either vertically or horizontally, while the left analogue stick controls trajectory; on the other hand, you can use the right analogue stick to get a more precise angle of cut, most often necessary if you want to hit that sweet spot on an enemy’s body in order to perform the finishing move known as the Zandatsu, which allows you to restore your health and energy bar, the latter required to use Blade Mode. Picking up stray repair units and electrolyte packs from defeated enemies comes in handy, but the best way to stay in top form is to string together as many Zandatsu as possible, which not only keeps you fully healed and ready to perform another, but will increase your combat score, granting you more BP (the points rewarded based on performance) for customization.

Limbs can be dismembered with ease, changing the way an enemy attacks and moves altogether. Raiden’s defensive is part of his move set, replacing the standard dodge and block functions found in many similar games with Defensive Offensive and a parry system. The first is a particular skill you’ll have to unlock yourself, which will allow Raiden to evasively back-or-sidestep most enemy attacks while getting in a free swing of his own. A parry, on the other hand, is far more difficult to properly pull off, but can be one of the most rewarding feelings in the game. Successful parries will fully block most enemy attacks, but performing a perfect parry – that is, guarding right at the moment of an enemy’s attack – will leave them open for a counter, often giving you a chance to use Blade Mode and finish them off quickly.

Steal the enemy’s primary repair unit using Zandatsu to fully restore your health and energy

Combining both into your repertoire will make even the harder difficulty settings that much easier, as the game’s larger enemies and bosses certainly don’t hold back. Checkpoints are placed evenly throughout most levels though, so restarting a mission or a particular area rarely has too many drawbacks. Even some boss fights have checkpoints mid-battle, softening the blow of some of those deadly multi-stage encounters. Ultimately, though, the culmination of those fights feels a little underwhelming, as you’re forced into a quick-time event to finish them off. The fights themselves are so rewarding that it doesn’t disrupt the pace too much, but it still would have been nice to claim victory of your own merit. What tends to get in the way most of all, however, is the camera, which minds its own business a good 70 to 80% of the time. But in some of the more close-quarter areas of the game, it likes to focus in on the action which leaves you open and very susceptible to attack from enemies outside your field of view. And in a game that uses blocking and evading in such a specific way, being able to see the entire battlefield would have been a huge plus.

Metal Gear Solid fans may find it rewarding to see that even some of the series’ stealth roots have made their way into Rising’s gleefully outrageous adventure. You can sneak up on enemies and perform a stylized one-hit kill, or use some of the more well-known disguises from the stealth series to avoid being spotted: a cardboard box and a barrel, for instance. Alerting enemies usually calls in the reinforcements, and in Metal Gear games of the past, this typically meant bad news. You had few means to properly defend yourself against a wave of armed soldiers. But in Rising, stealth and action work so well together that you’ll likely find yourself mixing a bit of both into your arsenal and won’t feel so overwhelmed if you’re spotted.

Rising’s politically-charged campaign shouldn’t last more than six to eight hours for most people, but like so many others of the genre, one play through is simply not enough. Unlocking the game’s Very Hard and Revengeance difficulty settings will test the mettle of the most seasoned combo masters, and acquiring enough BP to learn and fully-level up all of the game’s skills, weapons, and armor modifications will likely double that time. Not to mention more than half a dozen VR missions aimed to hone in and train specific functions, such as use of Blade Mode or sneaking abilities.

It’s not still called Metal Gear for any old reason.

The soundtrack is backed by a collaboration of well-known hard rock and heavy metal performers, and the sound they lend to Rising’s intense action could not have fit more perfectly. The boss themes are particularly exciting and help elevate already fantastic encounters. Mr. Quinton Flynn’s reprisal as Raiden is filled with typical angst and justified anger. His growth and evolution occurs in a believable arc that lends further credence to his existence in the franchise. Raiden is a natural opposite to Snake’s stoicism, and he’s allowed to vent his frustration in the best way he knows how – through his sword. Raiden’s history as a child soldier also plays a key role in his development here, and, well, let’s just say that Jack the Ripper is back.

Your destinations, while often steeped in historical significance and political intrigue, are all fairly standard city streets and industrial buildings. There’s not a ton of creativity in the environments, and although they look nice – for the most part – you’ll certainly remember the characters more than the locales. A few of the game’s on-rails segments are more annoying than fun given the high speed at which you’re moving and whatever else is flying directly toward you, but luckily there aren’t too many and they’re spaced fairly far apart.

Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance is a bold step forward for the series. It shows that you don’t have to be a member of the Snake family to star in your own game, and even the controversial Raiden proved to be an interesting and likeable character given the circumstance. Tactical Espionage Action has been the tagline of the Solid series for more than 15 years, and has a home within the confines of a pure stealth-oriented affair. But Rising’s intense action and relentless speed set a precedent for the franchise as a whole, and offer a glimmer of a potential longtime partnership between Konami and Platinum Games.