Razer launched the Barracuda V2 Pro on October 15, noting on its official blog that the newest addition to the lineup is designed with "versatility in mind" and, as it turns out, the marketing spiel has plenty of truth to it.

From its foldable form factor, dual-mic design, great sound, and understated look that doesn't scream "gaming headset", the Barracuda V2 Pro has managed to take priority in my backpack no matter if gaming or music-listening is on the agenda.

There was nothing stopping me from digging out any other Razer headset to use for both gaming and in lieu of a pair of headphones, but not all the brand's past pairs are suited for the outdoors. As much as I adore the Kraken Kitty lineup, I don't feel comfortable donning the RGB-powered cat ears to listen to the latest Troye Sivan album while running to the Big Tescos for the food shop, no matter how cute I find it. However, I've done just that with the Barraduda V2 Pro, and its versatility is entirely to thank.

Key specs

Design

Much like the black Barracuda X (2022), the V2 Pro is a closed black over-ear headset with oval-shaped cups. RGB haters (couldn't be me) will be happy to learn that the Chroma-powered logos of the Barracuda X Chroma haven't stuck around, and instead the three-headed snake branding is nothing but subtle, glossy, 3-dimensional-to-the-touch images on the exterior of each cup and nothing more.

The design differences of this new pair are so minor that you'd barely be able to spot the difference unless you're someone who spends far too much time in the land of headsets - which is undoubtedly me. What's new is that the foam padding on the underside of the headband now travels from the left yoke to the right yoke. The padding of the 2022 X release just sat in a small section in the center, but it's been extended to provide more optimal comfort. Comfort must have been on Razer's mind, as the fabric-coated ear cups are now made of a leather-like material too.

Features

The Barracuda V2 Pro is an over-ear, closed-back 285 g headset with 40mm Triforce Bio-cellulose audio drivers and THX Spatial Audio+ support. Unlike the existing pairs in the Barracuda lineup, the V2 Pro is holding a very neat (and handy) secret - its left earcup can be opened to reveal its HyperSpeed 2.4GHz wireless dongle.

This may not seem like a big deal, but for someone who constantly misplaces wireless dongles, it's been a bit of a lifesaver. Unfortunately, this lucrative hidden storage doesn't provide enough space to also store the adapter that's packaged with the pair, but I'll take any storage ingenuity over none at all.

Besides the storage, this headset is rocking some serious premium upgrades over its predecessors. The V2 Pro is equipped with simultaneous Bluetooth and 2.4GHz wireless, so you can answer phone calls between gaming sessions, and it sports ANC - both of which can be selected through the pair's manual onboard controls. The ANC includes an ambient mode, so you can be more aware of your surroundings, and makes the V2 Pro handy for more than just gaming.

Using gaming headsets for day-to-day music listening can be awkward, particularly if there's a large microphone in the way. The V2 Pro has a solution as the HyperClear Full Band Mic is not only detachable, but the "dual-mode mic system" allows you to switch to using a dual hidden beamforming mics for chatting when you're out and about.

Performance

Testing Razer's Barracuda upgrade happened to coincide with my favorite time of year, Halloween. The smell of freshly carved pumpkins and dusty old spider decorations had fully enveloped my house by the time the headset arrived at my door, and so it felt entirely fitting to first test out Disney Dreamlight Valley with the pair on PC while its spooky-themed events were in full swing.

While I usually prefer to run around my Disney-themed valley on the OLED Steam Deck so I can multitask with a Netflix binge, being able to focus on the game's audio for once was a treat with THX Spatial Audio+. I occasionally find myself overwhelmed with the life sim, as there's always a myriad of Disney characters roaming around, and finding who you want can be a challenge even when you have fast travel to rely on. Thanks to the combination of the crystal-clear audio from the can's bio-cellulose audio drivers and spatial audio, I could easily pinpoint any approaching pal - whether it was Scar with a new sarcastic quip, or the Fairy Godmother about to check in. It was neat, as this game is already my happy place for when life gets a bit too much, so the extra level of immersion was a welcome experience, and one that's got me playing more on the PC than my Valve pixel-pusher ever since.

Of course, you don't need to be able to hear Goofy's cheeky laugh in a 3D soundscape in order to be a good Dreamlight Valley player, so I stuck on Counter-Strike 2 to put the "ultimate immersion" properly to the test. With the ANC and THX Spatial Audio+ working together, I was more than able to get absorbed into the game, so much so that I missed deliveries at my door on multiple occasions despite people both knocking and ringing my door. That may not sound like a good thing, but being able to entirely drown out the real world for a moment definitely proved Razer's "ultimate" marketing spiel.

While I'm not a fan of beamforming tech, I do love the V2 Pro's dual-mic setup. In this day and age where a cost of living crisis still affects so many of us and determines how we enjoy our hobbies today, I'd hope that a piece of tech that costs $200 would be able to be helpful for not just gaming, but everyday use too, and this is.

You didn't have to stroll uptown feeling a bit silly with a microphone dangling next to my face or wearing a gadget that looks and feels designed purely for gaming in mind. Instead, I was able to easily detach the HyperClear full-band mic and leave it at home, while being able to depend on the beamforming mics for incoming calls. I'd not recommend using the latter for streaming or podcasts, but they are decent enough where a quick call with your mum is entirely doable, and she won't be exclaiming "what" or "huh" every two seconds.

The main microphone was also great for playing Repo with friends and was enough to record my screams without sounding like a muffled, peaking mess. But what pleased me the most about the V2 Pro was that versatility, as it was just as formidable for music as it was for gaming. Its 285g weight was light enough to make long journeys across the city of Glasgow less of a strain on my ears, and its foldable design took up less space than my go-to JLab JBuds Lux ANC cans.

While switching from one pair to another left me feeling a bit glum (I really adore my JLab cans), it was nice to only have to worry about charging one device at a time. Although its 70 hours were enough to cope with a weekend of blasting out Wolf Alice and Florence Road, while keeping the pair on my head for weekdays, divulging in fun Repo madness with friends without having to pick up a USB-C charging cable once.

Should you buy the Razer Barracuda V2 Pro headset?

This is the most premium Barracuda headset the line has seen so far, but nabbing all of those juicy high-end upgrades and its versatile ways comes at a $199.99 / £199.99 cost that not everyone is going to afford. Especially at a time when the hobby has already become an expensive minefield.

The thing is, that price point is pretty much what you can expect when it comes to gaming headsets of all shapes and sizes that incorporate both simultaneous wireless audio and ANC into the mix. The Turtle Beach Stealth 700 Gen 3 also launched for $199.99 / £179.99 and had a similar simultaneous wireless and ANC combo. Whenever those features are key, you can expect to be paying upwards of $150 / £150, but you don't have to stick with it if you don't want to.

If you're just a fan of the V2 Pro's design and feel, the Barracuda X still remains a great multi-platform headset, and it's regularly found under $99.99 / £99.99. You'll have to forgo the dual wireless and noise-canceling, but it sports the same look and still sounds fantastic for its age. There's also the Barracuda X Chroma available for $129.99 / £129.99 if you love your RGB lighting.

If it's more of the premium trifecta of the dual wireless, ANC, and an impressive battery you're after, that's when the Barracuda V2 Pro feels hard to beat. Sure, alternatives like the aforementioned Stealth 700 exist with even an additional 10-hour battery life, but it's missing ANC. Meanwhile, my other go-to option, the Sony Inzone H9 II (which has dropped to a similar $200 price in recent sales) has the wireless and ANC covered but not the battery chops.

How I tested the Razer Barracuda V2 Pro headset

The Razer Barracuda V2 Pro became my one and only headset for two weeks, in order to see how it matched up against all other pairs I've tested to date. In that time, I used the wireless pair to play Counter-Strike 2, Marvel Rivals, and Disney Dreamlight Valley on the PC, while switching over to play Marvel Rivals, Doom Eternal, and Silent Hill Townfall on the PS5.

When I was in a gaming-on-the-go mode, I stuck the USB-C dongle into the Switch 2 and played everything from Marvel Kart World, Pokemon Pokopia, Donkey Kong Bananza, and Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave while taking breaks to watch Party Down on Netflix and catch up with some Halloween movie offerings, including Hocus Pocus on Disney+. The headset was also perched on my head as I listened to Wolf Alice, Florence Road and Troye Sivan via Spotify.

For more information on how we test gaming headsets, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

Not a fan of the Barracuda V2 Pro? Check out our guides to the best PC headset for gaming, the best PS5 headset, and the best Xbox Series X headset for more options from Razer and our personally picked brands.

Phantom Blade Zero is not a Soulslike. This needs to be the first thing that I tell you, because you need to wipe away any such preconceptions in order to fully appreciate what it is (and is not) doing. The intricate combat and hostile land come instead from wuxia storytelling traditions, and a supernatural martial arts world that can be traced back to the director's first game Rainblood: Town of Death. While "very, very good" is not a genre, it's certainly an accurate description of this game.

Following the events of a prologue I'm not allowed to tell you about, our hero Soul is left with just 66 days to live. This doesn't mean a Dead Rising style time limit – in-game time only passes after specific story beats – but it does mean that anybody feeling particularly brave can opt for a hardcore difficulty that wipes your progress after 66 deaths. That could potentially mean losing dozens of hours of play, so if you opt for that, consider yourself warned.

Developer S-Game is keen to celebrate what it calls a "kungfupunk" aesthetic. It's an appropriate turn of phrase. As I explore the Phantom Realm, meeting new people and chopping them up, I find characters and locations that subtly fuse nature, supernatural horror, Chinese history and mythology, and a hint of the modern world. I fight faceless warriors wielding blades, phantoms playing pipas, deformed monstrosities that could never be mistaken for human, and much more. All this across locations including cliffs, a lake, fields, villages, caverns, and a lavish estate.

Phantom Hiddelston

Combat is at the heart of it all. And what combat! Every time I start a fight – which happens a lot – it's with a smile on my face. Every clash is a deadly dance between my opponent and I, and we both look like masters of the craft. Together, we weave graceful tapestries of blocks, swing, parries, lunges, dodges, and violently flamboyant strikes. Avoid button-bashing (which will usually see you punished anyway), and Phantom Blade Zero offers that rarest of things; combat that looks as good as it feels.

Visually, the combat owes much to S-Game's commitment to motion capture, including a number of martial artists. Hong Kong movie legend Donnie Yen (who you may know from the Ip Man series, or as Caine in John Wick: Chapter 4) is credited as Creative Consultant, and he even took part in some motion capture himself. It's not all relentless flailing, either, as enemies (particularly some of the tougher bosses) will sometimes size you up or wait for you to approach before striking.

Scraping away the impressive visual flourishes, I still manage to find one of the best combat systems I've come across in a long time. From the first few fights right up until the final boss, I sometimes catch myself thinking this just works so damn well. Yes there are parries, yes there are unblockable red-flash attacks, and yes weapons are upgradeable; but it doesn't quite feel like anything else in the best possible way. I block a series of attacks from a boss, yet can still get in a few hits of my own before they're finished. Failing a parry or a dodge, I'm punished ruthlessly. Next time, I just… stay out of range, then dive in with fists full of vengeance. Too often in other games, that's not even an option.

Then there are the weapons themselves, another stroke of genius. There are a total of 30 regular ones, most of which are entirely missable in the expansive world. Each and every one has some kind of unique trait, and gains even more as they level up (you equip two weapons at a time, switching between them instantly refilling the Sha-Chi depleted by blocking and strong attacks). An early one I stick with for over a dozen hours builds up bleed status in human enemies, while another comes with a jug of booze to induce Tipsy and Drunk states (don't drink and dice, kids). Some excel at breaking through shields, others can counter enemy attacks, and not a single one is a match for any other.

Then there are the many Phantom Edges to find and use, limited-use weapons that might do anything from strike enemies from a distance to temporarily summon minions to your side. A small number feed into the light brush of Metroidvania to the experience, in that they can (without cost) be used to traverse or open up new routes in the world. On rare occasions this will be compulsory to advance the story, but usually, it simply allows me to sate my curiosity for a previously inaccessible area.

Finding where to use my new blocker-cracking goodies is nice and simple, as relevant areas are marked on the map automatically; and turn a pleasant shade of green when you have the corresponding Phantom Edge. In fact, despite the often challenging combat, Phantom Blade Zero does a lot to smooth your progress. Save/respawn points are (usually) placed very generously, medicines are refilled each time you come back to life, and – this is a biggie, and may prove a point of contention for some – enemies almost never respawn. Like I said, it's important to remember that this isn't a Soulslike.

Although Phantom Blade Zero has a huge map with multiple regions, it doesn't quite feel right to call it open world. For one thing, it's tightly designed and tightly paced, with almost no wasted space. Whenever I uncover a new area or decide to wander off the obvious path, there's always something to find (usually including something, or several somethings, that want me dead).

The main story drives me forward, with no doing laps of the same area or regular backtracking to well-worn paths. Nonetheless, I find exploring irresistible, and make a habit of wandering down routes that lead away from my next objective. I'm regularly rewarded for doing so. There's some traditional "collect four X to increase your Y", and in addition to this, the more I explore the more weapon upgrade materials I find. I stumble on many hidden bosses this way, too, laying my hands on powerful weapons I would have otherwise missed. Curiosity is, quite literally, good for my Soul.

I find the combat fantastic, exploration compelling, and the storytelling… inconsistent. There's quite a lot of it. There's in-game dialogue, traditional cutscenes, and a few more experimental approaches that I heartily applaud. There are also seemingly hundreds of notes scattered about all over the place, which I'm less a fan of. I'm usually happy to read in-game text, but there are far too many bits and pieces here, especially for an action game. I quickly adopt a habit of picking them up and then instantly exiting the text screen.

Bloke Zero

The worst offenders, for me, are the Memory Flowers. These contain some of the most crucial story details and are, in addition, tied into HP increases and unlocking some of the more powerful character skills. Whenever I Interact with one, Soul stands perfectly still, staring down at a blue flower while voices play in his head for a few minutes. I have the option of skipping through lines at least, but I stubbornly refuse. Doesn't that kind of defeat the point?

The storytelling ranges from the great to the weak, and while it's mostly pretty straightforward, some of it goes over my head a bit. It's more of a minor annoyance than anything else though, and so it says something that this is my greatest criticism of the game. I do run into a few bugs – two boss fights see me getting stuck on the scenery, resulting in me taking unavoidable damage which makes me say very naughty words – but these are relatively small ones that can and, hopefully, will be patched out on or shortly after launch.

After 30-35 hours, I reach the final boss and – eventually – emerge victorious. Of course I do. Look at how much I've buffed up Soul and his weapons! After all that time, and a great deal of chasing down sidequests and digging out secrets, I am rewarded with what is very definitively the Bad Ending. It's abrupt, and unsatisfying on a few different levels. Nonetheless, I'm surprised to find that I'm not too bothered. There's so much of the map I have yet to explore – including an entire region – I immediately dive back in, eager to see what I'll find next.

One of the things I find is that some secret bosses crucial to the True Ending represent a stratospheric difficulty increase. I'm not quite sure how I feel about this. I was doing so well up until then! But in the end, I decide I'm OK with it. After all, there's so much still to see and do, and I can't wait to see and do it.

Phantom Blade Zero was reviewed on PC, with a code provided by the publisher.

Lego Rayquaza is an odd pull from the many Pokemon Legendaries, but not one I object to. The stratosphere-skirting mythical dragon of the air, Rayquaza served as the mascot of Gen 3's Pokemon Emerald, and has always occupied a solid spot in the Legendary B-Tier, at least when it comes to public acclaim. Somewhere below Mewtwo and Arceus, but certainly above the likes of Mesprit and Ting-Lu. But hey: I've always liked its ambiguous nature and meteor-blasting powers as shown off in the first Mystery Dungeon, and it seems Lego like him too, as now Rayquaza has got his own dedicated set. After the Lego Pikachu and Poke Ball build failed to impress or surpass the best Lego sets, can the mascot of Emerald do any better?

Rayquaza features

• An impressive stand that turns a Pokemon into a full scene
• Some articulation, though not a significant element
• A single obscure minifig

A recreation of the cloud-wrapped Sky Pillar location from the games serves as a stand and mount for Rayquaza, the dragon itself perched atop a translucent pillar artfully and cleverly obscured with a few drifting cumulus. Meanwhile, a minifig of "Draconic Loremaster Zinnia" (no, I don't remember either) can be placed anywhere on or off the stand, as well as being given a pair of Keystones to hold for an implied mega-evolution to come. I think that last addition is a bit strange, as there's no option to customize or modify Rayquaza into its mega-evolved form, so I guess those stones are... What, sequel bait? Regardless, the minifig serving as a tiny point of comparison for scale really does sell the dragon as this massive presence within the scene, a trick I'd like to see more Lego Pokemon sets make use of in the future.

Rayquaza itself has a certain degree of articulation and customization built in. You can take it off the stand with a bit of disassembly (more on that later), and there's the ability to tweak the position of its arms, ear protrusions, mouth and dorsal fins/flaps. It occupies a strange place between presentation piece and full-on action figure toy, but I think there'll be less confusion or frustration if we all consider it to be the former, as it doesn't quite have the easy articulation or sturdiness to survive a child's play session.

Rayquaza build

• Most of the time spent is creating the base
• A build that remains diverse enough to stay entertaining
• A clear and legible building process with no hiccups

Building the Lego Rayquaza set might throw some people for a loop, as the majority of the experience is spent not building the titular serpent, who probably accounted for maybe a quarter of the process, if that. Instead, most of my time was spent assembling the Sky Pillar base, a rising mountaintop vista frosted with crumbling ruins and wispy clouds. It's certainly more compelling than some stands I've seen, even if the fiddly details on the ruins weren't always hugely thrilling, and I rather liked piecing together the clouds and seeing how hard, geometric shapes nonetheless came together to form something convincingly ethereal.

Rayquaza, by comparison, is done in a flash, to the extent where I was almost disappointed by the brevity. Being so long and thin, it's effectively little more than a series of tube-shaped partitions clipped into each other, before a few final bricks come together to form the head and dorsal fins. I enjoyed it! I just wish it had gone on for longer.

But overall, this is one of the better Lego Pokemon builds. There's enough variety involved as to shake up the experience when needed, the manual didn't falter on legibility, and it's fun to watch the whole thing manifest from the ground up before quite literally finishing at the tips of Rayquaza's ears.

Rayquaza design

• A lot of articulation, but not much flexibility
• Can be taken off its perch (with some work)
• A good recreation of the legendary dragon

So once it's built, now what? Well, you can take Rayquaza off its stand... Sort of. Actually, the way it's structured means that the two are interlocked, so you have to cut the big dragon in half and reattach it without the support pillar in the middle if you want to carry it around separately, at which point he does tend to flop around flaccidly from the midpoint down. Well, I guess he is canonically an old dragon. It happens to all of us.

I'd say the body itself has a lot of articulation, rather than good articulation. You can reposition the arms... A bit. You can open and close the mouth... A bit. You can imperceptibly fiddle with his ears and dorsal fins in ways that won't look hugely different. All these elements are customisable, but ultimately it will always be just good ol' #0384 sitting upright and bearing his fangs at people, no matter what you do to it. Still, there's a lot of room to position the accompanying minifig, and ultimately this all just means this is a presentation piece more than all else. I've certainly seen less flexible builds.

Still, the overall appearance is good. Rayquaza is a creature of angles and ridges, far better suited to Lego blocks then anything defined by curves, and whereas Pikachu was spelunking the uncanny valley, Rayquaza looks pretty impressive, albeit with a certain goofiness about the face if you open its mouth too far. No stickers either, thank god.

Should you buy Rayquaza?

I'm willing to give a thumbs up to Rayquaza, but then again, I didn't have to pay for the damn thing, and Lego's tough pricing might be harder to swallow for those who don't have PR connections. There's nothing wrong with Lego Rayquaza, but I'm not sure that it quite justifies the hefty price tag. Still, that's less of a problem with this model specifically and more of a recurring issue with Lego generally.

If you can stomach the build's bill, then Rayquaza is a good time, and maybe one of the best Lego Pokemon sets out there at time of writing. I like that the minifig gives it a sense of scale, I like that the dragon's naturally angular appearance means it's a good fit for Lego and escapes the uncanny valley, and creating clouds is so oddly cathartic that Lego could well be advised to fold this idea into future skyscraper designs.

Ratings

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

How we tested Lego Rayquaza #72168

This review was made using a set supplied by Lego.

I built the Lego Rayquaza (72168) set across a couple of sessions of roughly an hour and a half each, though these weren't rushed experiences by any means. I also made some attempts afterwards to push the articulation to its limits (i.e., seeing how much play it takes to break it).

For more, check out our guide to how we test products.

For more recommendations on cool collectibles, why not check out our guide to the best toys?

Over the years, Clayface has come in many shapes and sizes: thespian comedy sidekick in the Harley Quinn series, meme minifigure in the LEGO Batman games, and even as the focal point of Emmy-nominated two-parter 'Feat of Clay' in the seminal 1990s show Batman: The Animated Series.

2026's Clayface – the first outright horror in the DCU – taps into the rich narrative vein of the latter, molding the comic book villain into a tragic, deeply troubled figure that manages to escape the long shadow of the Bat for his own flawed, grisly rampage through Gotham.

Fresh off an Oscar nomination, the world of sandy-blonde actor Matt Hagen (a starmaking performance from Tom Rhys Harries) soon crashes down around him after bedding the girlfriend of crime boss Markos Szabo (David Dencik). The repercussions are severe and instant in a breezy first act: Hagen's face is slashed to pieces. His one saving grace is experimental nanocell surgery by outcast scientist Dr. Caitlyn Corr (Naomi Ackie).

From there, Hagen's internal strife is quickly swept to one side, despite Rhys Harries' best efforts (the first casualty of Mike Flanagan and Hossein Amini's underbaked script), for a full-throated revenge quest as a shapeshifting Matt lashes out at those who have left his career in tatters.

What follows is a pulpy, predictable trail for Hagen to follow, though sprinklings of a will-they/won't they dynamic between the former actor and Corr, suffering through a rocky relationship with a GCPD detective (Max Minghella), adds early intrigue to the villain's origin story.

While your mileage may vary on the Frankenstein-flavored romance, it never quite amounts to anything more than set dressing for scenes filled with buckets of the red stuff. For audiences, though, that red-hot passion being substituted for dripping claret should be enough – a real shock to the system from a DCU that is quickly learning that its biggest strength, like Clayface himself, is in its malleability.

Face off

Much like the utensils Matt uses to disfigure his face, director James Watkins wields the camera in tricky, suffocating fashion – and deploys gory special effects with a razor-sharp mastery.

One particular hide-behind-your-hands moment involves plane turbulence and travel scissors as Matt's treatment fails, creating a vivid sense of dread that isn't always present throughout its cornucopia of splattered brains and sliced-off fingers. It just might make you reconsider how you pack your carry-on luggage in future.

Another gripping sequence comes later on at Gotham's Vesuvius nightclub. There, a more mutated Hagen passes through undetected as his Clayface powers morph the action into something more tangibly closer to a Hitman level or Trap-esque navigation of social spaces.

Not only does it confidently stand out as Clayface's highest point with its frenetic fighting, it also acts as an ingenious blueprint for the Batman villain to be torn away from the murderous excesses of his R-rated backdrop. Should it materialize, a future showdown with the Caped Crusader won't feel like his edges have been sanded off. If nothing else, it's proof Clayface can survive just fine beyond his own movie.

If only that same care and attention to detail were present elsewhere. Fittingly for a film that revolves around disfigurement and plastic surgery, Clayface's themes are only surface-level in their explorations.

Instead of interrogating the fascinating to-and-fro between Hollywood's impossible beauty standards and body dysmorphia, Clayface continually runs the risk of being too simple and too safe. But if you're only here for gnarly kills and squeamish, uncomfortable horror as Matt's dashing good looks and chiselled features melt away, you'll no doubt walk away with your bloodlust satiated.

Watkins and the production team working its magic with special effects, though, doesn't necessarily mean the (admittedly sensible) budget stretches beyond its means.

Clayface's CGI can be shonky in places, while Gotham is a big letdown. The best portrayals of Batman's home turf paint it as a diseased and decaying city, rotten down to its very brickwork. Clayface's take doesn't inspire, coming across as tawdry and more Joker-lite than a confident first taste of the streets where Batman will soon make his name in the DCU.

Clayface, then, struggles to balance its dual personalities. As a superhero movie, it's a freakishly good time, setting itself apart from anything put out by DC and Marvel in terms of tone and terror. But as a horror movie, its skin-deep thrills and spills mask an uneven tragedy that even the emerging star power of Tom Rhys Harries can't overcome completely.

Clayface releases in cinemas on October 23. For more, we have a guide on DCU Chapter One and other upcoming DC movies.

The SteelSeries Aeon Pro is the most expensive controller I've come across in my four years of reviewing them professionally. At a cost of $249.99/£229.99, it's about $50/£30 more expensive than a DualSense Edge, Nacon Revolution X Unlimited, and Razer Wolverine V3 and V4 Pro. That means it's about $70 more than the Victrix Pro BFG pads, and a staggering $170 more expensive than the popular GameSir G7 Pro. Even against the most expensive and most recent PS5 controllers like the Scuf Omega and Razer Raiju V3 Pro, SteelSeries is still coming in about $40 higher up the price scale.

I'll be honest, I like the SteelSeries Aeon Pro, but when an Xbox Series X controller is this expensive, it better not miss and hit the wall. SteelSeries has definitely shot its shot with the Aeon Pro. This thing feels distinct; it has a unique identity because it's not afraid to take big swings or just do some things a bit differently. Its charging stand cancels out the need for a carry case because it holds all its parts together. Its removable battery ensures you never run out of charge. Its screen has a bold interface that flies in the face of most on-board gamepad menu systems. All of these things are impressive, but are they $250 impressive? I'm not so sure.

For context, I think even a $200 controller is still way more expensive than it needs to be. That much is clear when brands like GameSir, Gulikit, FlyDigi, and PowerA are charging far, far less than the licensed brands for much the same features on PC. $250 is a lot of money for you to spend on a controller, so let me tell you why you should probably wait for a price drop on this one.

Design

I'd love to say the design of the Aeon Pro feels original since we haven't seen an officially licensed Xbox controller from SteelSeries before, but it's very reminiscent of the GameSir G7 Pro. That is hardly a bad thing, and SteelSeries, whether intentionally or not, has managed to recreate some of the best parts of that popular controller. Particularly in the white colorway, its grey, textured grips are grabby, contrasting beautifully with its eggshell body that feels really sturdy.

The G7 Pro and the OG Xbox Series X pad from Microsoft itself feel like inspirations here, but SteelSeries has absolutely souped up some of its parts in ways that feel unique to this product.

For starters, there are four large, metallic back buttons on the rear of the Aeon Pro. These aren't your average GameSir back buttons that hide away in the grips of the controller, camouflaging themselves into the shape of the handles. These are loud, brushed silver paddles that don't try to blend in neatly in any way, shape, or form. They understand that largesse is easier for your fingers to find when they're wrapping around a controller, and they click in with absolute delight. They draw a lovely line between back buttons and back paddles. They're not quite the magnetic ones found on the Elite Series 2 or the Gulikit KK3 Max; they're non-removable and a signature part of the Aeon Pro's identity, but they're longer levers that actuate with more flexibility, feeling more premium than your average pro controller's back buttons.

That element of metallic design flourish is present elsewhere on the Aeon Pro too. The D-pad, triggers, and bumpers are all a brushed steel vibe, even if they're actually just a different type of plastic and not the real thing. It all offers a temperature contrast to the Aeon Pro's plastic and rubberized textures you find for the most part. If this were a cheaper controller, I'd be applauding the trickery this plays on your brain to make you think more expensive materials have been used, but when this thing costs $250, I end up raising an eyebrow in the same way I would when an unfamiliar charge appears on a bill I need to pay.

Thankfully, the microswitch buttons, which click with a deep, almost "thocc" sound like premium keyboard switches do, feel luxurious. Again, I don't know if I'd argue they feel and sound more premium than the ones on the Nacon Revolution X Unlimited priced at $200, and that's really the crux of the issue with the Aeon's design. It's got top-shelf features, but they're not worth $50 more than its competition.

Unfortunately, there's a design flaw staring you in the face here, and it's the options and in-game menu buttons being at the bottom of the controller's body, not on either side of the integrated screen. I don't care who you are, how expensive your controller is, or how many fancy features you give it. Those buttons should be at the top of the controller, not the bottom.

Yes, I can adjust to this, and have had to for a few controllers that I've reviewed, but it is always, always, objectively wrong to place them here. Twisting the knife is the fact that there is so much space at the top of the body for these buttons to fit.

The Aeon Pro has a deep and long face, which I enjoy the look of. I suspect this was to give the screen a bit more room to glow, but when it isn't actually that large, it feels like there's a lot of dead space bordering it where functionality could have been squeezed in.

Some pause buttons would happily border the OLED display without ruining the Aeon Pro's look.

Features

For years, some of the higher-end wireless Xbox controllers have been shipping with charging stands, but SteelSeries has well and truly broken the mold. The charging stand here is the most robust offering I've seen, acting not only as a place to holster your peripheral between sessions, but a connection hub for your gaming platforms, and as a hold-all for the swappable parts the Aeon Pro has at its disposal.

The Aeon Pro features extremely convenient magnetic thumbstick tops, which are fantastic. I hate swapping out controller thumbsticks because it's such an anxiety-inducing process. You feel like you're going to break something when you pull it off, and putting a new one on takes such a faffy angling process that you're never confident it's on correctly. SteelSeries clearly understands this, and using magnets is absolutely genius to snap on and snap off to your liking. According to Razer and its new Wolverine V4 Pro, however, using magnets so close to the Hall effect thumbstick sensors could cause issues with calibration. I haven't encountered any.

These swappable thumbsticks slot right into the top of the charging stand - a convenient and simple way to keep them safe without warranting the need for a carrying case.

Like a lot of the SteelSeries gaming hardware you might come across on PC, the brand has provided a "limitless" battery life system, which essentially means that you're supplied with all of the capability and means of never running out of battery life, and if you do, it's your fault and not SteelSeries'.

That includes a swappable battery, and a spare that slots into the charging stand too. If you somehow run out of charge in a session and don't use the stand itself to refill, you can remove your battery, replace it with the one in the stand, and hot-swap as you need to. It's a genius system that's hard to fault, but it's another small innovation that I'm not sure warrants the extra $50 SteelSeries is demanding since one or the other (a charging cradle or a spare battery) would have sufficed for a lower cost.

Offer me a "limitless battery life" claim if you want, but when it's on me to make that happen, don't also charge me $50 extra for it.

The charging stand does double as a USB dongle as well, since there's no separate receiver supplied in the Aeon Pro's box. Around the back you'll find an Xbox and PC USB-C port so you can connect to two platforms at once and switch out on the controller's menu depending on which you want to game on. That's a really nice touch for folks who do play across Xbox and PC at the same setup, and could be a reason to buy this particular controller if you find yourself in that section of the gaming Venn diagram. Personally, I haven't found this all too useful and would have much preferred the ability to connect to two different PCs at once. Bluetooth does work great, however.

The thumbsticks here are Hall effect. I'm fine with that, since Hall effect still feels great to play with. Again though, if you're going to charge this much for a controller, I expect to see the gold standard of TMR sticks included, thank you very much.

Like many other gamepads these days, there's an integrated screen and menu system. I do like this; it uses bold lettering and clever haptic feedback to help you navigate, which goes against the norm of tiny text and janky but navigable menu systems on most of these controllers. It feels like it has a purpose by easily helping you connect via Bluetooth, Xbox, or PC, but it's nothing revolutionary, which again, for a product of this price, maybe should be. The Manba One's menu still did it better, even if the haptics and navigability on the Aeon Pro are among the clearer and more satisfying controller settings menus I've tested. When the Genki Manta eventually launches, I fear both might become irrelevant anyway.

Rounding up the rest of the features, there's wireless charging, a 3.5mm headphone jack, USB charging, and two trigger stop switches.

Performance

The Aeon Pro is a very comfortable and usable controller across the board. I played about 4 hours of Big Walk with two friends using this controller in my hands, and time melted away without me realizing. That's the sort of experience you can have with it; it'll provide plenty of functionality and decent comfort for general gaming needs, and you won't complain about a thing. I think sometimes, the best controllers are the ones you don't notice or even have to think about; they work and let you immerse yourself in the game you're playing, and the Aeon Pro does that.

As a controller that's trying to be an all-rounder for console and PC play, the Aeon Pro succeeds. Its swappable thumbstick tops are super easy to use and feel like a breath of fresh air. Its microswitch buttons are well cushioned and feel responsive. Its grips wick moisture well and help you hold it securely. It looks nice on a desk, adding a touch of class to your setup. Platformers, exploration games, driving games- they all work really well with this controller, and for anything you're looking to casually kick back and enjoy alone or with friends, the haptics are precise and add a good layer of feel to the mix.

As for anything more? I think the Aeon Pro falls flat, and with its aforementioned price tag, it should be offering you more. As a controller for FPS games like Hunt: Showdown or Titanfall 2, I don't think the back buttons/paddles help as much as they should. I even found this in challenging singleplayer games like TowerFall Ascension and Control Resonant. Despite their clicky actuation and bold design, the lower back buttons especially take a bit too much force for my ring fingers to press in an instant. That leaves me feeling like I'm lacking the twitchy speed a controller like this should give me, and it feels like my gameplay suffers as a result.

The Aeon Pro doesn't feel as responsive in Control Resonant as the FlyDigi Apex 5 or the Nacon Revolution X Unlimited do, and both are more affordable. Perhaps more telling is that both of those alternatives have two additional bumper buttons as well as four back buttons, so they outclass the Aeon Pro for less money. For a bit of context on how I come to that judgment, let me explain.

In Control Resonant, you use the dodge button a lot. I map my "B" button to the right-hand additional bumper on these sorts of pro controllers, with the back buttons filling in UI and other combat or movement abilities. I can do that on cheaper alternatives to the Aeon Pro, but I can't do that here because there aren't additional bumpers, and yet it costs more. Combat gets significantly more difficult and feels clunkier, then, because my right thumb is going to have to come off its stick all the time to press dodge.

Then, I need to pause the game, and my thumb hits absolutely nothing on the top right of the gamepad. Remembering the awkward button placement, I clumsily bump my thumb on the right stick on its way down to the bottom of the controller, and I remember that price tag again. If I had paid for this controller and not been supplied with it by SteelSeries, I'd feel a bit like a clown putting on his makeup for throwing so much money at it.

There are lots of more affordable options that are an objectively better bargain than the Aeon Pro if you're after absolute speed and responsiveness. It seems to have misplaced priorities that are invested in comfort and connection convenience, not functionality.

That just about sums up my experience with the Aeon Pro; for anything relaxed, like driving in GTA, Cyberpunk, or Forza, you'll have a great time. For light platforming, exploring a big open world, playing a sports game like Tennis Elbow 4, or narrative-driven first-person games, it offers a premium feel and good comfort. The issue is that a $40 gaming peripheral can offer you great experiences across those sorts of genres too, so why should I recommend this to you for $210 more?

For players who want to top leaderboards, improve KD ratios, and best their time trial records, there are so many more affordable controllers I'd recommend over this one, and that's the problem with SteelSeries pricing this thing so high. There's a great controller to be had here, and if it were even $200, this review would be very different. But it doesn't give you enough to warrant its expense. Yes, the charging stand is excellent; it's cool having a swappable battery, and magnetic thumbstick tops honestly rule. But they don't feel like they warrant the extra expense when the gamepad itself isn't as good as the cheaper competition.

Should you buy the SteelSeries Aeon Pro?

If you're going to charge significantly more than the competition, it better be for a good reason.

That's the golden rule with any product, but in a competitive market like that of Xbox and PC controllers, it's especially true. Having tested the Aeon Pro for a few weeks now, I find it hard to pinpoint why it costs so substantially more than its rivals, and that's an issue.

While the SteelSeries Aeon Pro has a lot going for it, I feel as though SteelSeries has slightly misjudged where its priorities should be. It might demand a higher cost because of its innovative charging stand/accessories hub and spare battery, but I would have been more open to paying a premium if there were more additional buttons and TMR thumbsticks on top of the clever innovations the brand has made. If it were like the Steam Controller and offered some funky PC navigation, or extra ways to use it and make life easier, sure, charge more, but the Aeon Pro doesn't do any of that.

As it stands, the Aeon Pro is an great, truly comfortable controller, but it's not the best controller. Being the priciest, that makes it difficult to recommend. Once the price inevitably drops because no one can afford it, or when it hits the discount shelf, it'll be a better investment, but until then, shop for something else.

How I tested the SteelSeries Aeon Pro

I used the Aeon Pro for all of my gaming for about two weeks before writing this review. I tested it across PC and VR platforms, using it in all sorts of gaming genres to see how it fared. While I compared it closely to other premium Xbox controllers in how it performed, I also used my knowledge of the controller market to evaluate it and drew from my four years of experience as a gamepad reviewer.

For more on how we test controllers, take a look at the GamesRadar+ hardware policy.

You can see some more alternatives by looking at the best TMR controllers, or the best PS5 controllers.

Mini PCs haven't been shielded from this year's price increases, but the GMKTec K8 Plus still manages to pose a serious threat to Valve's $1,000+ Steam Machine. The AMD Ryzen 7 8845HS box launched a good few years ago, but has nevertheless risen to fame among those looking for a lightweight gaming experience. Its sturdy 1080p performance across some of the most demanding games on the market keeps it fiercely competitive with both cheaper alternatives and more expensive mainstream devices, even if the days of a $500 price tag are long behind us.

The K8 Plus used to be a steady $400 - $500 device, but the 32GB RAM version I've been testing is now more likely to be found between $750 and $900. If you spot it on a good day, though, it could be one of the few last bastions of entry-level PC gaming - assuming you're happy rolling the dice on its WiFi card.

With the best gaming PCs running you thousands of dollars and the best gaming laptops seeing their own inflations, many are looking to integrated GPUs to see them through these troubling years. The GMKTec K8 Plus does much more than its Radeon 780M would suggest, though. With easy upgradeability, a rare Oculink port for additional eGPU access, and a cooling system equipped to deal with gaming's larger challenges, the K8 Plus could give the Steam Machine something serious to think about.

Configurations

This far into the GMKTec K8 Plus's lifespan, there are only two configurations that sit with consistency on the shelves. Both use the AMD Ryzen 7 8845HS, an octa-core processor with 16 threads and a 54W TDP, partnered with the brand's Radeon 780M integrated graphics. However, the 16GB DDR5 5600MHz RAM model is often available for a couple hundred bucks less than the 32GB version I've been testing.

As it stands, the model sat on my test bench will run you somewhere between $750 and $950 depending on sales (note Amazon's listings generally drop you down to 512GB of storage), whereas the cheaper alternative can drop things down to around $600.

Design

The GMKTec K8 Plus keeps the same compact form factor you'd expect from a mini PC, with a 58mm height and a pretty square 127 x 132 mm depth and width. It's small enough to sit neatly under a monitor or to one side, though its port placements might get in the way of such a neat setup.

I was initially nervous about the transparent plastic top floating just over the top edge of the main chassis. The twist-off cap provides easy access to four top screws for entry into the main compartment, housing the system's main fan right up top. You'll either love it or hate it.

I can see how those going for a cleaner, more professional look might balk at the plastic hat, but the convenience it brings to the table is undeniable. Plus, anyone bored of the homogeneous box aesthetic will be glad of the more unique design choice here.

Twisting the lid counter-clockwise provides a satisfying snap as it lifts away from the main body of the device, and replacing it is as simple as lining everything up and twisting in the opposite direction.

Everything around that lid also feels solid. A metal casing keeps things looking premium on the desk and in the hands, while that bold green power button provides a little relief from the all-black design. My only concern is the printed 'GMKTec' logo positioned diagonally across the top right edge, which cheapens the aesthetic a little.

Features

The GMKTec K8 Plus has three main weapons in its arsenal: its ability to host a whole bunch of external displays, its Oculink port, and its upgradeability.

Ports aren't plentiful here though; you'll find similarly-sized options with more USB-As on offer around the back. You're still getting two USB-A 2.0 connections for more permanent accessories as well as two USB 3.2s at the front for easier access as well. On paper, those dual USB 4 slots are holding their own as well, and we haven't even mentioned the twin RJ45 Ethernet slots.

Tallying those connections with the HDMI 2.1 and DisplayPort, you've got space for up to four external displays to run here - perfect for those building a more substantial workstation from a smaller device.

That's not all, though. The front of the device also plays host to an Oculink connection, a rarity even across mini PCs designed more specifically around gaming. It allows you to (probably later down the line, looking at current GPU prices) attach an external GPU for a boost in performance should you require it. It's also a boon for those building a home NAS server, allowing for additional SATA connections.

Port placement could present some concerns here. The USB 4 required for that final fourth external display is positioned around the front, next to the Oculink. It's a small gripe, but that's going to make for a slightly messier setup when everything's firing on all cylinders. I would have loved to see at least the Oculink's more permanent connection situated out of sight towards the back.

Finally, that aforementioned twist-off lid provides easy access to RAM and storage upgrades. Once you've got those four screws holding the fan down away you're in to swap out for up to 96GB of SODIMM memory and up to 4TB of M.2 2280 storage.

Performance

The GMKTec K8 Plus can hold its own in lighter games, speeding through Restory, Stardew Valley, and Islanders with only a little stutter here and there. It's a perfectly playable experience for these less demanding games, often at a lower price than you'd find elsewhere on the market.

Putting the K8 Plus to the test against something a little meatier shows its limits, though. It still holds its own in full Triple-A releases, as long as they're a little older, slimmer, or offer additional optimization tools.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, and Cyberpunk 2077 hold their own in the 40-fps range when under Medium settings here. That's not the super smooth 60fps many aim for, but it's running - and with prices the way they are, I'll certainly take it.

Yes, things fall off a cliff slightly when we get to High graphical settings - though Tomb Raider manages to hold its own here much better than the heavier titles in my benchmarking roster.

Suffice to say, the GMKTec K8 Plus will run a sturdy Steam library, but you'll need to be taking advantage of additional FSR tools baked into that Radeon 780M GPU to reach the kinds of speeds you'll find in more expensive machines. If you just play lighter indie titles, though, you're pretty set.

The GMKTec K8 Plus doesn't just want to play your games, though. This is a compact mini PC designed to power through day-to-day productivity as well. AMD's components scored 2,218 in their single core Geekbench 7 benchmark here, with 13,410 in multi-core performance. Considering the size and price point, that's certainly a result in GMKTec's favor.

Unfortunately, there's one glaring issue I ran into almost every day when running the GMKTec K8 Plus. This thing's WiFi card is fried. While it can hold its own in day-to-day web browsing, downloads represent a particular challenge for the out-the-box connectivity, often requiring me to leave it running overnight for a job that would take most other machines an hour or so. The K8 Plus allows for WiFi card upgrades, and it's not an expensive part to replace, but I'd factor the cost into this rig's price tag before checkout.

Should you buy the GMKTec K8 Plus?

If you're willing to roll the dice on those internet speeds, or swap out your WiFi card straight from the off, the GMKTec K8 Plus actually represents solid value in today's market. It's going to hold its own against the Steam Machine in day-to-day 1080p performance, while coming in remarkably cheaper (especially on its best days). You'll also enjoy the benefits of a full Windows productivity suite for your cash, as well as that easy-access upgradeability - not to mention the flexibility of that Oculink port later down the line.

How I tested the GMKTec K8 Plus

I've had the GMKTec K8 Plus on my desk for two weeks, running the mini PC for all my work and most of my play during that time. Aside from a few Doom: The Dark Ages and Planet Coaster 2 skirmishes, this hub has been my destination for lighter gaming across Stardew Valley, Islanders, and Restory, with in-game benchmarks tested at both high and medium graphical settings in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered, and Cyberpunk 2077. The CPU was also tested using Geekbench 7. Each of these benchmarks was performed three times, with the final result representing an average of all runs.

For more information on how we make our recommendations, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

We're also running through the best gaming handhelds for something even more portable, as well as the best mobile controllers and best gaming tablets.

Final Fantasy Resonance is at once a nostalgia-laced antidote for the longtime fans who have felt alienated by the recent 3D iterations turning their backs on the series' turn-based traditions as well as Square Enix giving its trademarked HD-2D style a much needed shot in the arm. While I've been enamored by this retro-modern style since its introduction in 2018's Octopath Traveler, over time it's been losing its charm, as the same presentation had been wheeled out in successive nostalgic outings, though at least Dragon Quest 7 Reimagined had the good grace to try something different.

Nonetheless, its legacy of pixel-based classics like Final Fantasy 6 meant it was only a matter of time before a Final Fantasy title would receive the HD-2D treatment while also finding ways for the aesthetic to feel fresh again. Ironically, it's done that not through a brand new game but with an adaptation of mobile spin-off Final Fantasy Brave Exvius.

Crystal clear

Square Enix reworking its mobile catalog to console may not be new, as it has done successfully with Octopath Traveler 0, and less so with Various Daylife, but Final Fantasy Resonance is more significant as it excavates a since discontinued mobile game. The work from Square Enix Creative Studio 5 and Lancarse is even more extensive than just an act of preservation or removing the gacha elements that had been why Brave Exvius passed me by when it was available. While its story and characters remain intact, the whole presentation and experience has been overhauled to feel like a very classic yet fresh Final Fantasy adventure that stands on its own two feet.

Just about everything in Final Fantasy Resonance harks back to the series' classic hallmarks, from turn-based battles with a party size of four characters to the explorable overworld of Lapis peppered with towns, dungeons, random encounters, and – of course – a story that revolves around crystals. As a knight of the kingdom of Grandshelt, your protagonist Rain finds himself setting out on a journey to find the legendary crystals before each can be destroyed by a mysterious group of elite armored warriors calling themselves the Sworn Six.

There's plenty that follows a largely conventional structure – visit a new region, discover a problem the locals are having where one of the characters end up joining your party, and a dungeon that culminates in a fight with one of the Sworn Six – but it's not really a criticism when the execution of this formula is done so well. Sure, there are some familiar characterizations, from a leading man obliviously caught in a love triangle, to a feisty mechanic who's often butting heads with the sleazeball of the group, but these are fun characters to spend time with. Even the game's villains are written with pathos, while the series' recurring Espers have their own personality as you fight for the right to summon them in battle.

It's all bolstered by the presentation that's a substantial level-up from past HD-2D games. While Final Fantasy Resonance does make use of voice-acting as well as having dialogue text accompanied by expressive character illustrations – the latter introduced in this year's The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales – its biggest improvement comes from the spritework, which are bigger and feature more animations than what would have been feasible for a 16-bit Final Fantasy.

Another subtle yet meaningful shift seen early on is how it's not presented with the same top-down medium-wide camera but actually leverages the fact that the game is made up of 3D environments. It's not that Final Fantasy Resonance strives to be cinematic, but a simple change of the camera to a close-up, more dynamic angles during a boss encounter, or one of your party member's show-stopping Limit Bursts, does a lot to make HD-2D feel fresh again.

It's only undermined by the occasional use of CG sequences when you're summoning Espers or Visions, the latter including manifestations of characters from the numbered Final Fantasy titles. Given how their CG sequences are taken straight from Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, I imagine they looked far more spectacular blowing up on your smartphone back in the day. I personally found these transitions at odds with the HD-2D style, and it's perhaps weirder if playing the game with English audio since the CG Visions are only voiced in Japanese.

Vision quest

Visions are nonetheless a core component in Final Fantasy Resonance and are significantly overhauled from Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, where they were unlocked through a gacha system. This remake has just 26 from the hundreds of the mobile title but nixes any monetization or rarity randomization. Each is unlocked either by visiting their respective shrine or completing a side quest, while awakening more of their abilities is done by using magicite found as you go through the campaign.

Obviously, it's wish fulfillment having the likes of Final Fantasy 7's Cloud fighting alongside Final Fantasy 13's Lightning or Final Fantasy 14's Y'shtola, though they are more comparable to the skill-wielding summons from the likes of Persona 5 than true party members. They also have the added function of being like jobs, giving more abilities and attack options for the party member who's equipped them, while keeping them paired up for longer also levels up mastery, unlocking more benefits. There's also incentive to master multiple visions, since some of these perks become equippable, and you can mix and match different abilities, like a more flexible form of Octopath Traveler's secondary jobs.

Indeed, while there are many familiar Final Fantasy elements – such as Phoenix Downs for reviving fallen party members, or using tents as save points for fully recovering – I can't help but think how much of Octopath Traveler's design sensibilities permeate throughout. Mostly, it makes for a smoother experience, like the ability to run making dungeon traversal snappier, and the mini-map acting as a red-flashing radar helping you anticipate random battles.

It's also evident in the presentation of the battles themselves, with a timeline on the top displaying the order of turns while icons next to enemies also indicate which elemental properties they are weak, resistant, or immune to after a respective attack or spell is used on them. That said, the battles flow differently to the break and boost systems of Octopath Traveler.

While staggering has become a core mechanic since Final Fantasy 13, in Final Fantasy Resonance, your abilities also show their effectiveness in dealing damage to an enemy's HP and stagger gauge, handily color-coded in the same respective red and yellow. Instead of raw damage, it's often more important to focus on attacks that bring down the stagger gauge faster, especially when those abilities tend to cost less MP, before saving the strongest attacks for when their guard is down.

The more satisfying strategy comes from coordinating an attack where you stagger all the enemies during the same turn. Not only do you have the next turn free for everyone to pile on, but it's also how you get to finish the turn with a powerful Resonance attack from one of your equipped visions, in other words, the CG special ability mentioned previously.

Admittedly, the power of these bonus attacks in earlier field battles almost feels too much, prompting that The Simpsons 'Stop, he's already dead' meme to spring to mind after my party has wiped all but one enemy out whose HP is also already at zero, before unleashing a Resonance attack. But then it's also encouraged since you can gain an Overkill bonus at the end of a battle. Bosses are spongier and don't go down as easily, but there's a great sense of relief when you manage to stagger them just before the timeline indicates they're about to dish out a devastating attack on the whole party.

Finite Fantasy

The cozy familiarity of Final Fantasy Resonance does mean that at times it has almost too predictable a rhythm. It's not that the boss battles, or optional monster dungeon challenges, won't occasionally put you in a tight spot, but there is less friction in mind. For example, if the boss' weakness isn't already obvious from appearance, once you spend the first couple turns figuring this out, it's easy to hit pause, load your last save, quickly reassemble your party and visions, and skip any cutscenes to get back to that same fight at an advantage with minimal fuss.

With access to an airship by the game's midpoint, you might say it opens the world up a bit too soon, such as being able to reach one region several chapters before its relevance to the story even kicks in, or access monster dungeons that indicate you're far below its recommended level but you might as well go in so that you can fast-travel to it once you are ready. In that sense, there's almost little in the way of surprise.

Yet, while it might feel a little too breezy at times, it also feels a comforting counterpoint to the unfathomable bloat of the modern JRPG – looking at you, Final Fantasy 7 Remake trilogy.

There's a generous amount of side quests on offer that unlock at a manageable cadence where the rewards are usually upfront, while dungeons never outstay their welcome, although side quests do have a knack for backtracking to earlier locations that's at least mitigated by fast travel. Even the endgame convention of ascending a huge towering dungeon is smartly broken up so that you can always go and explore the rest of Lapis and mop up other side quests without worrying about how far the next save point is.

Final Fantasy Resonance may only cover the first story arc of Final Fantasy Brave Exvius, which might make it seem less complete than the multi-arc epic of Octopath Traveler 0, yet that may also be the point. If this beautifully enhanced remake does as well as it deserves to, then I'm hopeful its subsequent arcs will also get the same restoration treatment, with even bolder design choices.

Final Fantasy Resonance was reviewed on Nintendo Switch 2, with a code provided by the publisher.

Don't make this adventure final. Check out our best Final Fantasy games, best RPGs, and best JRPGs rankings for loads more to keep you busy. Our new releases calendar has plenty on the horizon too!

You know what they say, bundle it with Banjo, and they will come. That’s pretty much the headline draw of the Evercade Nexus: Blaze’s grand foray into the fully fledged world of early 3D retro handheld gaming, and, if I’m being real, the N64 collectathon is all some players need to pick one up. However, as a proud portable console parental figure who has watched the cartridge-based system grow up over the past few years, I’d say the platform has more to offer as it becomes an awkward teenager.

Daft analogies aside, the Evercade Nexus has the potential to become one of the best retro handhelds around, but it has some growing up to do. I mean that with love and support, as the portable console builds on what the OG handheld, Super Pocket, and EXP have already achieved. Turns out adding a pair of thumbsticks, a pretty cromulent 5.89-inch IPS 840 × 512 display with elevated brightness, and tricks like Bluetooth and multiplayer Wi-Fi can take a system to the next level, but that means transferring the same school as many other $200 brutes.

I don’t think $199.99 / £169.99 is an egregious price for the Nexus given its access to over 750 classic games and its overall contribution to physical gaming. The latter means I’m certainly willing to overlook some smaller caveats in the name of keeping true ownership in the hands of players via pretty fun collectable cartridges. The latest handheld also proves that Blaze is more than capable of venturing beyond the fifth generation of consoles and beyond, suggesting that the ecosystem is here to stay, but I’d avoid directly comparing this latest portable to its ROM-wielding rivals.

Here’s what’s Nex(us)

I’ve got fond memories of freeing the OG Evercade from its cardboard prison back in 2020 to review it for a national UK newspaper segment. At the time, I recall wondering what Blaze could do next with the 2D-focussed portable, and while I was rooting for the cartridge-based platform actually taking hold, I figured the hardware would need to evolve.

And evolve it did, but not quite in the pattern I was expecting. While we’ve now been graced with a much larger handheld that’s comparable to the Nintendo Switch in size and form factor, Blaze clearly decided to bide its time and focus on grabbing very specific groups of retro sickso, like the coin-ops crowd with the Evercade Alpha, couch dwellers with the Evercade VS, and budget button bashers with the Super Pocket.

That’s not to say it sidelined its core handheld ambitions, as it has been slowly simmering the broth with the improved Evercade EXP-R. The Nexus is the first device from Blaze that screams “next-gen”, though, and while the company continues to squeeze juice out of the same innards it's been using for all its gadgets, this newbie really is a different beast.

I could compare the Nexus to a zillion handhelds out there, and if I’m being particularly mean-spirited, I could say it looks like a Wii U mini. Rather than using the latter as a gag, though, I reckon it’s best used to describe how the large 5.89-inch display dominates the centre of the handheld, while the chonker-than-average sides exist to provide you with something solid to grip from the front. It should be all eyes on that screen, and given the platform's new quest to expand into 3D games, blowing up those visuals makes a ton of sense.

The screen isn’t massive, but it’s certainly big enough. Depending on the size of your mits, the handheld’s side lugs will vanish as you grip the front. Trust me when I say you will need to use your thenar muscle to hold on to the portable since the back passes on ergonomic grips, meaning you’re holding something more like a solid slab. That sounds like it’ll upset your hands, but so far, I’ve yet to feel any specific strain compared to using a Switch or any other handheld that doesn’t include ergonomic humps around back.

I am sort of surprised Blaze didn’t try to tap into classic portable designs with the Nexus, instead going for something that ultimately looks contemporary. This isn’t a departure since the OG Evercade also went with its own arcade-inspired aesthetic rather than paying homage to anything specifically. That said, it does somehow feel like it’s trying to tap into what our hands all collectively love about gaming handheld mammoths like the Steam Deck OLED while trying to maintain the portability of both larger emulation portables and conventional contenders like the Switch.

Whether it actually achieves that goal is somewhat subjective. The figures certainly suggest so since it weighs in at 410g, sitting nicely between a Switch Lite and larger handheld gaming PCs. It even takes a middle ground on feel, straddling between the more plastic-heavy cheaper devices and the full-body feel of something more substantial. You could argue it should be going for the latter for $200, but so long as it’s not committing hollow-feeling cardinal sins, I’m on board for some deliberate plastic-based bulk.

Gaining control

The key here is that the Nexus’ controls are designed to facilitate “early” 3D, rather than covering console generations that bring us closer to the present day. Yes, it includes thumbsticks, but it sticks with smaller Switch-style sticks rather than making room for full-sized gaming handheld controls. That, and the fact that it chose not to go with at least hall-effect sensors, something I’d absolutely say is now a standard, is a bummer, but at the same time, the decision makes sense in the context of its current library.

I could harp on about how I’m not super into the bottom placement of the thumbsticks for balance reasons or the distance that then introduces between the bumpers and triggers. But, after spending a lot of time playing Banjo-Kazooie and its sequel while comparing them to the N64 original and other ports, it’s clear that the layout is a nice fit for the specific platformers now landing within the library.

In Banjo’s case, I found using the right stick for camera controls to be slightly cumbersome due to the above face button placement and the aforementioned downward balance quirks, but quickly realized the L and R buttons make for a more authentic feel anyway. I personally appreciate the way that if you choose not to leverage the secondary thumbstick, the handheld feels more like a single-stick setup geared specifically towards ‘90s capers, and just like with controllers like the 8Bitdo N64 controller, the setup manages to feel that bit more authentic.

I can’t guarantee Blaze even meant this, nor am I convinced everyone will see the bright side in what is otherwise not an ideal layout. Had the Nexus launched alongside a bunch of later re-releases, particularly those that rely on that stick for contemporary camera controls, it’d be in a spot of bother. The layout hits the spot for the era now being covered by the Evercade, though, all while not omitting any specific buttons in the name of needless nostalgia.

As for my overarching feelings on everything accompanying the sticks, the Nexus pretty much sticks to the Evercade handheld script. The membrane-based buttons feel nice and tactile, offering up taller domes sitting within a bowl recess to keep things from protruding too much. Blaze has actually changed up the D-pad since its EXP-R and OG portable, as it’s also taller, slightly larger, and has a wider floating pivot than before. It’s not the nicest set of directionals I’ve ever had the pleasure of using, and it can be fully pressed in the middle rather than being completely on a pivot, resulting in some stiffness if your thumb is at the centre, but it’s still pretty serviceable in fighting games and arcade romps.

The digital clicky triggers feel fine, but as previously mentioned, the distance from the sticks makes them a little hard to wield. There aren’t too many games that make the bumpers and triggers mandatory, but the new DOOM collection does default to a modern FPS control scheme, and I could feel my aging hands having to extend vertically to swing around hell while aiming my boom stick.

First-time frills

3D-orientated controls aren’t the only thing making their debut with this handheld, as the Evercade Nexus acts as an introduction to quite a few portable perks. Some of these boons are more valuable than others, as while the customizable RGB logo at the front is a nice touch and doubles up as a battery life indicator, I can’t say I’d miss it. The real meat and potatoes ties to wireless connectivity, with the main course being the new Eversync local co-op feature.

Eversync is a prime example of Blaze extracting something innovative modern-day consoles are doing in the space, namely the Nintendo Switch’s local multiplayer functionality, and retrofitting it for the Evercade platform. While you might pick up a VS-R specifically for its same-room couch co-op, this handheld bridges the compatibility gap for when you want to play multiplayer carts with friends.

There’s a slight catch-22 in that EverSync will only really feel beneficial if plenty of players actually pick up a Nexus. I guess there’s an element of self-marketing in that if you do spend $200 on the portable, you’ll potentially nudge your pals to do the same so you can reap the full wireless benefits. If that doesn’t happen, though, the feature will likely fade into the background and become less of a reason to have invested in the portable in the first place.

The Nexus’ other big new trick is wireless audio connectivity via Bluetooth, and I have really mixed feelings on its inclusion. You could say it’s a no-brainer in 2026, as fewer players have wired headphones that’ll slot right into the 3.5mm jack. At the same time, it’s a feature that likely impacted the end MSRP, and if you’re already into old-school setups, chances are you’d be a-ok with using a corded set of buds or phones. Plus, as I’m about to get to with the way the OS works, you can’t simply jump into the global settings if your headset disconnects while playing something like Banjo-Kazooie.

One smaller element that has survived between the EXP-R and Nexus is the TATE mode for vertical arcade games. The dedicated button still sits proud on the front row, meaning you can still technically play shmups like Truxton while filling more of the 5.89-inch display. The downside is that the Nexus ditches the option grip and lacks the extra left-hand A and B buttons, meaning you’ll have to use the default buttons and a thumbstick. This is fine for casual play, but I’d rather play those tough shooters with a D-pad.

HDMI hang-ups

I’ll keep my complaints about the Nexus’ lack of HDMI output brief, as Blaze has already given up on handheld video output. I’ve come to accept the fact that it’s simpler to just remove the port from the EXP range since it has been historically plagued with issues, but I feel like the Nexus should double up as a home console. Part of that comes down to its price point, but it also feels like not making the device dockable, in turn allowing players to hook up the shiny new Evercade Dual Thumbstick Wireless Controller, is a missed opportunity.

Would all of that likely drive up pricing? Absolutely. It’s important to be realistic amid the current climate, and unfortunately, the impact of AI on everything means we can’t have nice things. The Nexus is an unwilling participant in RAMageddon, and I’m confident if Blaze could pull off expanded features while keeping the MSRP sensible, it would do so.

Sleep mode slip-ups

Blaze has been using the same Linux-based operating system for its Evercade range since 2021. The VS HDMI console brought with it the side-menu interface that went on to power the Alpha arcade machine and, now, the Nexus, but I really figured the OS would have evolved somewhat for this handheld.

I’ll admit that I foolishly took common Linux/Android features before realizing they’re not a guarantee, and one of those perks is sleep mode. The idea of not being able to hit the power button, suspend everything in motion, then return to what you were doing later is unfathomable if you’re using a smartphone or another portable console, but the Evercade Nexus completely lacks this ability.

I know some of you will be immediately shouting about how sleep mode on Evercade consoles isn’t possible thanks to the cartridge system. I’d be willing to buy that argument if plenty of handhelds hadn’t already included suspend and resume before now that use physical games (PSP, DS, and even the much newer Analogue Pocket), not to mention the games are completely dumped into memory upon boot. I suspect the real reason stems from using the same hardware and Kernel pairing since 2020. Whether that means updates that usher in a proper sleep mode are still on the table remains to be seen, but having to completely power up and down the Nexus between sessions feels pretty archaic.

An otherwise slick OS

Credit where credit is due, the Nexus’ operating system feels like proper console software. It avoids feeling like a Linux or Android reskin, something that might fuel the idea of buying something by Anbernic or Retroid, and while there are cons tied to that, it still feels like you’re playing on a proper independent platform.

It’s the small digital library touches that link to physical games rather than downloads that help the Nexus’ OS shine. From the basics like tracking what you own to hidden and downloadable “Game of the Month” releases to tide you over between cart pickups, the handheld’s software feels pretty alive compared to cartridge-based systems of yore.

The portable’s OS really is pleasant to use, and far snappier than you’d expect from something with 512MB RAM and a standard quad-core chipset. I’ve certainly used front-ends on more powerful hardware that feel a little sluggish, but then again, this isn’t an ordinary handheld, and that becomes more apparent when you hop from home to cart. As much as it pains me to say it, the only slow part of the whole experience is loading cartridge games themselves, since the handheld dumps the contents into memory rather than running straight from the source.

It’s a hard one to explain to those of you unacquainted with Evercade handhelds, but booting games is almost like an operating system swap. When you load up a cart, you’re diving into either a bespoke wrapper for running a ROM or a native port, and that means you won’t always be able to hop back into the main menus for access to things like brightness, aspect ratio, or even scanlines. In fact, the latter highlights that unless a game specifically supports the visual overlay, it won’t kick in after boot, and that’s the case for the Banjo-Kazooie double pack.

What the Nexus perhaps needed, or could use, to achieve a perfect portable score is an overarching HUD, one that can remain after you’ve swapped the handheld’s consciousness for a cart. The current setup makes Evercade consoles feel like something from the sixth generation, and I’ve been far too spoiled by dashboards since the early 2000s.

In an ideal world, the menu button would present players with a pop-up side menu for accessing base settings, or at the very least the brightness toggle, while in-game. I could be jumping the gun here, as we could end up with these features creeping in with future Nexus updates. That’s the beauty of having Wi-Fi for OS updates, but alas, I can only judge what’s currently on the plate.

The power of optimization

The Evercade Nexus aims to prove the same portable point as its predecessors in that optimization can triumph over brute specs. The retro handheld scene has gotten real comfortable with increasing horsepower until emulators can run classics at full speed without any quirks, whereas Blaze continues to impress with its bespoke cartridge system and bespoke ports.

Of course, waiting for Blaze to strike licensing deals and dial in those emulators for specific releases will slow you down. That’s not a caveat; it’s more just a reality tied to traditional game releases and ports that makes sense outside of DIY emulation perks. At the same time, it’s that same process that will save you from historically rough-looking N64 results on most devices and the onus of using the right settings and specs.

Not to keep banging the Banjo drum, but the Nintendo 64 compilation is the perfect launch title for the Evercade Nexus. In 2026, it’s easier to play N64 games in general, but in previous years, emulating Ninty’s old console was a nightmare. It technically still is if you aren’t using a relatively high-end handheld, but by teaming up with Rare, Blaze has managed to prove you can get platformers like this running at 60fps with zero quirks.

While a chunk of the Evercade library uses ROMs and emulation wrappers, that isn’t the case for Banjo-Kazooie and its sequel. Rare has instead created a native port for Blaze’s hardware using the OG source code, and that’s absolutely bananas when you think about it. We’re not talking about a massive monolith in the industry here; we’re talking about a handheld maker from the UK that has built a platform that now has enhanced versions of retro games, and that is absolutely worth celebrating.

That’s not to say you can’t get good results with emulation, but running a Banjo-Kazooie ROM will certainly pale in comparison to Rare’s custom widescreen, 60fps enhanced Evercade port. Even on something high-end like the Retroid Pocket 5, the N64 collectathon is stuck at half the frame rate without intervention, and even then, there are plenty of visual texture glitches tied to frame buffering to deal with.

All of this boils down to a specific truth: tailored ports normally reign supreme, and while the Evercade library still largely leverages emulation, the Nexus sets the stage for more bespoke releases. Banjo-Tooie isn’t even the latest cart that uses original source code, as the new DOOM collection is also built from the ground up, and the boomer shooter feels slick thanks to the portable’s beefier controls, thumbstick support, and the back digital triggers.

The overarching message with the Nexus is that Blaze is striving to continually pair enhanced hardware with solid releases without disrupting backwards compatibility. I’m pretty impressed it has managed to stretch its core hardware this far, even though that comes with some functionality caveats, to say the least. But there’s something honorable about a handheld that puts its existing library and core player base first over trying to accelerate, and that really helps put some of the big console dogs in this industry to shame.

I want to wrap up the whole performance side of the Nexus by touching on the battery. In my tests, I was able to squeeze around 4 hours out of the 5,000 mAh cells before reaching for a USB-C charger. That's the average runtime while putting the portable through its paces with Banjo-Kazooie/Banjo-Tooie sessions,

Should you pick up the Evercade Nexus?

I’ve no qualms with calling the Evercade Nexus Blaze’s best handheld yet, helping both the existing library and shiny new ports shine through enhanced hardware. At the same time, I stand by my initial comments that the portable platform is about to go through an awkward teenage phase as it tries to grow out of its old habits and adopt the same functionality as its competitors.

There’s absolutely still room for the Evercade Nexus to improve and become its absolute best self. For instance, if Blaze can patch in some sort of sleep feature and find a way to make global settings accessible regardless of the cart you’re using, then we’ll be looking at a standout alternative to emulation-based devices. However, if those perks don’t make their way to the portable via a future software update, I feel like Evercade fans and newbies alike will be wondering what’s “next” after the Nexus.

As things currently stand, the Nexus is absolutely worth investing in if you’re serious about the Evercade ecosystem or want to support one of the last bastions of physical gaming. Caveats like the fact that you’re getting a traditional (but serviceable) LCD display, standard potentiometer thumbsticks, and no HDMI output will matter most if you’re also considering an existing Android or Linux contender, but otherwise, you’re still getting the best Evercade experience yet from this new handheld.

How I tested the Evercade Nexus

Throughout my time with the Evercade Nexus, I used the handheld with multiple cartridges, including the new Banjo-Kazooie double pack and DOOM collection, to assess its ergonomics, features, performance, and overall user experience. To test the screen, I used the portable to play games in all lighting conditions, including outdoors and indoors with different illumination, while also keeping track of elements like battery life, perceivable frame rates, and general operating system stability.

For more information on how we test retro handhelds and other gadgets, swing by our full GamesRadar+ hardware policy.

Malls, in pop culture at least, are inhabited by three main groups. Zombies, the monster-battling kids from Stranger Things, and teenagers in Avril Lavigne music videos. Stupid Never Dies’ Davy is somehow all three at once: a hoodie-wearing defector from the zombie horde, facing off against other monsters in the hope of saving the life of – and winning the heart of – the cheerleader he’s crushing on. Even though they've never spoken, because she's in a kind of accidental cryostasis, in an ice-cream shop's storage freezer.

So, in short: he was a boy (before he died and rose again), she was a girl (before she gave herself the Walt Disney treatment). Can I make it any more obvious?

This ‘00s pop-punk vibe really does bleed into every part of Stupid Never Dies, from Davy’s baseball-cap-hoodie-&-kicks dress sense through to the game’s theme song (actually kind of a bop), which has a music video you can watch from the start menu. And, most striking of all, its zine collage aesthetic. Every cutscene, collectible, and bit of UI is composed of marker-pen scribbles, stickers, and images apparently torn out of a magazine, like a mixed-media shotgun blast to the eyeballs.

As for the mall? In Stupid Never Dies it’s a House Of Hades-style hub, with a host of friendly-ish faces – who include a were-chihuahua, a gargoyle in a shopping trolley, and the aforementioned icy crush – all waiting for Davy to return from adventures so they can sell him upgrades. Much like in Hades, once you’ve done all your admin it’s off to the underworld to see how deep you can go this time. Unlike Hades, the way you enter it is by flushing Davy down a toilet.

Get stupid

GPTRACK50 was founded by veteran Capcom producer Hiroyuki Kobayashi and Stupid Never Dies, the studio's debut, is basically a greatest-hits mashup of his back catalog. The maximalist punk style and fondness for toilet humor are a reminder that Kobayashi worked with Suda51 on Killer7. And once you’re in the dungeon, the combat mixes the aerial hack-and-slash and combo grading of Devil May Cry with the ridiculous crowds of enemies found in Sengoku Basara.

Not content to be purely a tribute act, though, Stupid Never Dies does throw a few new fresh ideas into the mix. And, in classic Capcom fashion, a whole new vocabulary of terminology to go along with them. There’s Davy Burst, Stupid Parries, Heat Attacks, Instant Skills, Style Eat, Metaphitic Miasma Layers… at this point, I admit, I’m pulling names from the in-game tips guide just to make a point. But let’s translate the important ones.

Stupid Parry, for example. This is an action game made in the 2020s, and so the inclusion of a parry is basically mandatory, but this is an unusual take on the idea. It’s called ‘Stupid’ for a reason: Davy dashes into the attack, and is guaranteed to take damage, even if there’s nothing to be parried. If it does connect, though, you’ll reduce the hurt Davy would have received, and convert it into chip damage that can be recovered later on.

And, if you parry into a gold-flashing Heat Attack, it’ll trigger a ‘Stupid Impact’. This stuns your assailant and exposes their glowing core so that Davy can do what zombies do best: take a big old bite of their innards.

This is how you offset all that damage you’re voluntarily taking, but it’s also how you tap into the game’s defining feature, the Style Eat. Not content with just being a pop-punk teen zombie monster hunter, Davy is also a kind of undead Kirby.

Eaten mess

For every core you chomp down, you’ll steal an ability from your victim. If it’s a rank-and-file monster, like one of the hordes of skeletons and lizardmen, this will be a single-use Instant Skill that shoots out a blast of bones or lizard-claw scratches. Useful enough, if not especially exciting.

But if you’ve just taken a bite of one of the elites – a werewolf, a vampire or, why not, a fairy – then you’ll perform a Style Eat transformation. Davy is able to shapeshift into their form, or at least a version of it topped off with a baseball cap. (The character designs for these transformations are an absolute delight, and maybe the best reason to Style Eat your way through the game.)

So, with a tap of the D-Pad, you can now turn into a werewolf, able to bound through the dungeon on all fours, attack with speedy flurries of claw strikes, and – classic lycanthropy stuff, this – backflip off walls to reach high ledges. Plus you get one random ‘Style Skill’, pulled from a pool of possible powers.

Including your default zombie state, there are 11 Styles on offer, each with its own move set and playstyle, and a choice of five possible special abilities to augment that. The necromantic lich, for example, can summon skeletons to do the fighting on your behalf; its Style Skills include a giant scythe swing, sapping the health of your skellies to boost its damage, and one that turns you and your bony minions into spinning tops that hurt anything they touch.

This is a remarkable amount of variety, but it’s also a lot for any developer to take on, let alone one as small as GPTRACK50. Not every Style here is created equal, and it’s hard not to conclude that the studio might have – ahem – bitten off more than it can chew.

Creature features

While becoming a werewolf makes Davy more agile, this is very much the exception to the rule. Most are really slow and ungainly, something that makes sense for a hulking tank form such as the golem or cyclops, but less so for the floating will-o’-the-wisp or fairy. Meanwhile, the merfolk Style allows you to swim underfoot like one of Splatoon’s Inklings, but just for a couple of seconds at a time. Then you have to waddle around on land like your Speedos are chafing, waiting for the swim bar’s cooldown to complete its agonizingly slow refill.

Traversal isn't a huge part of Stupid Never Dies, however: it's just how you get from one arena fight to the next. So the much bigger problem is how many of these Styles feel ineffective in combat.

Sticking with the merfolk for a moment, you’re intended to stay underground and close in on prey before popping out for a powerful uppercut. Cool in theory, but just not especially practical when you need to chew through enemies by the dozen. It’s a similar story with the snow fairy, which grows more powerful for every enemy you freeze, and the will-o’-the-wisp, which can immolate itself to hurt anyone who touches it. There is no shortage of ambition in the design of these transformations, but that's frequently undermined by their execution.

This problem plagues almost every part of Stupid Never Dies’ combat. It’s not just that hits lack the sense of connection that makes Devil May Cry’s melee sing – that would be an unreasonable standard to hold this game to, even given their shared heritage – but that, often, they don’t connect at all. There’s no lock-on targeting, which makes sense given the quantities of enemies the game throws at you, but that means you can never quite rely on your hit landing where you want.

Your foes seem to be suffering from the very same issues. They’ll often stand around idle for seconds at a time, before charging forward with some powerful attack that misses you by miles. And if this initially sounds like a blessing, remember Stupid Parry’s vital role in the combat loop. There’s an awful lot of chasing after Heat Attacks, trying to throw myself in front of them so I can line up a Style Eat – and hoping that it doesn't simply sail past the intended victim and chomp down on thin air instead.

Meanwhile, there’s always a ticking clock at your back. There's a time limit on how long you can spend in the dungeon before the game… well, it doesn't immediately kill you, but it nerfs Davy so hard that, honestly, you might wish it did.

So, with all that in mind, why bother wrestling with the intricacies of any Style that leaves you waiting on a cooldown for an attack that might just miss, when it’s so much quicker to slash your way through the hordes at werewolf speed?

And so, that’s the way I end up playing Stupid Never Dies. Relying on the same two or three Styles (the werewolf, the lich, the vampire at a push), hammering Stupid Parry for all it’s worth and just kind of hoping for the best. Occasionally, I’ll even turn on the Go Nuts Mode, which makes you – quoting the menu directly – "strong as shit", just to chew through repetitious segments quicker.

I do feel bad for throwing out most of the game’s more interesting ideas but, honestly, they’re necessary for a functional experience. And the more I play, the more I realize that combat finesse isn’t really the deciding factor in success or failure. This is first and foremost a game about leveling up: every run at the dungeon boosts the amount of XP collected, so that by your hundredth attempt you might be able to do 20 level-ups within the first minute.

It’s an RPG on fast-forward, the numbers going up over and over again. And as long as that number is higher than the next layer you enter, it’ll be a cakewalk. Try to reach beyond your assigned level, though, and you’ll find yourself throwing punches at a brick wall.

Leveling up at this ridiculous speed, with visual fireworks that go off every single time, does have a certain dopamine-loop satisfaction to it. That makes it easy enough to pour time into these dungeon runs. But for all the color, and the cool visual flourishes, and the poppy soundtrack, I find myself playing Stupid Never Dies with my brain only ever halfway engaged, not really feeling much of anything. For hours at a time, I’m just as much of a zombie as Davy.

Stupid Never Dies was reviewed on PC, with a code provided by the publisher.

Never die, and never stop playing, with our best ARPGs ranking that bring you even more action. Keep an eye on our new releases list for what's coming next!

After a couple of years riding the optical analog train, Razer has hopped to the Hall effect platform, providing magnet fans with the Razer Huntsman V3 HE. The more widely popular adjustable-switch option is still less reliable, the brand is quick to point out, but keen to get their name among the Hall effect champions, Sneki has yielded its classic approach for this release.

Available in 65% and TKL form factors, the Razer Huntsman V3 HE starts life at a modest (for the best Hall effect keyboards) $119.99, jumping up to $139.99 for those navigation buttons. That puts it in a particularly competitive situation when looking across the rest of the mainstream gaming market. It's undercutting the SteelSeries Apex Pro Gen 3 range by a whole $100 in its smallest form factor, also dropping below the Logitech G512X ($179.99) and at a fraction of Asus's flagship costs.

The wider market has a few contenders under $100 that will save you a few bucks, but at the moment the Corsair Clipper Pro Mini 60 ($99) is the only mainstream Hall effect gaming keyboard I've tested that's cheaper than the Huntsman V3 HE. Whether it can hold its own against the best gaming keyboards on the market is another question.

Design

You wouldn't know this is Razer's first foray into a particular switch tech from looking at the Huntsman V3 HE. From the outside, this is the same all-black slab of brushed metal as any other Razer keyboard available. It's as solidly built as you'd expect from this brand as well, with an unyielding top plate, dense casing, and textured doubleshot PBT keycaps up top.

Underneath that top plate, we've got a pretty standard tray-mounted internal setup. That's a little cheaper than the gasket-mounted design you'll find in more premium decks, though I was relieved to find absolutely no ping, echo, or rattle across the chassis. That was my only gripe with the previous generation Razer Huntsman V3 Pro Mini; it felt great and had a few of its own tricks up its sleeve, but sounded pretty awful. The V3 HE model uses an additional sound-dampening layer to keep those unwanted echoes down.

While the Huntsman V3 HE suffers in uniformity and loses a little textured depth to its keypresses, it's still operating with a satisfying clack.

Two flip feet extend from the rear to provide a more comfortable elevation during longer typing sessions, and while they can pop out when moving or storing while unfolded, they hold everything in place well on the desk.

Features

Approaching the Huntsman V3 HE from the perspective of one searching specifically for a Hall effect keyboard, there are two main features we need to examine; the switches and the software.

Under each roughly textured keycap you'll find a creatively-named Razer Hall Effect Magnetic Switch. These clackers offer adjustment from 0.1mm to 4mm, the typical standard across the market, with a 40G operating force. That keeps them similar to standard linear red mechanical options in general operation, though with a little extra resistance as is usual for a magnetic switch.

Razer's got the full Hall effect menu here as well. Rapid Trigger mode resets each keypress dynamically, automatically preparing for the next input as soon as any upward motion is sensed rather than waiting for a full return on the key. Essentially, it makes for faster repeat presses in particularly competitive scenarios.

We've also got Snap Flex on this roster, an additional functional layer that can program certain moves and actions to the release of each key. That's accompanied by Dynamic Keystroke, a four-command action roster that can be triggered simply by pressing a single key. That doubles your inputs per-key compared to the Corsair Vanguard Pro 96, which only allows for two commands, but it's worth noting this is a particularly niche use-case. After years of testing the latest Hall effect decks, I typically only assign one or two keys to multi-input macros during more competitive endeavors.

Razer's magnetic switches aren't doing anything you won't find elsewhere by themselves, then, though they are doing it at a slightly lower price compared to most of the mainstream competition. Its Synapse software, however, has a nifty trick.

Razer's still not too happy with Hall effect technology, that much is clear from the brand's insistence on its own optical analog switches. Those concerns have made their way into its customization software as well.

Alongside all the usual keybinding, actuation settings, and RGB configurations, Synapse also houses a recalibration tool for the Huntsman V3 HE. Magnetic fields from other devices on your desk can (though I've personally never witnessed it happening) interfere with the actuation of a Hall effect keyboard. Should that happen to you, Synapse will allow you to reset the accuracy of the magnets in your deck.

Say you're not approaching the Huntsman V3 HE from a Hall effect standpoint, though. To make way for those magnetic clackers, the simple design does drop some key features you'll find elsewhere on the market. There's no dedicated media controls here, less common on the TKL model compared to the 60%-er. This is also a fully wired deck, opting not to pump the additional weight (and cost) of the size of battery required to keep those magnetic clackers running. Still, the whole thing polls at 8,000Hz which ticks a box for the ultra-competitive among us, though most of us have little need for this fancy extra.

Performance

The Razer Huntsman V3 HE's biggest success comes in the improvement of its typing feel and, crucially, sound. With no more pings and rattles across the casing, these smooth, light, and bouncy keys hit the ear with a crisp, robust clack. While there's a little inconsistency in this tonality across the deck, Enter and Space keys producing a notably deeper sound, actual keypresses remain steady in actuation and overall feel.

There is, however, a temperamental side to the new line. The first Huntsman V3 HE I had on my desk, a 60% model, exhibited a notable amount of chatter, particularly around certain keys such as Shift. A fresh board removed the problem entirely, so I'm confident it was a manufacturing error - but it's worth highlighting some batches may perform better than others. With everything up and running, the Huntsman V3 HE keeps its cool in both a casual setting and faster arenas.

Typing remains equally comfortable on the Huntsman V3 HE, with the smoothness of those switches coming into their own compared to cheaper Hall effect decks. Many fall down here, with a resistance level set too high to feel truly nippy under the fingertips. Both that robust sound profile and the light feel of these clackers come together to produce an effortless experience through longer typing sessions.

Should you buy the Razer Huntsman V3 HE?

The Razer Huntsman V3 HE is priced competitively when looking across the market at Corsair, SteelSeries, Logitech, and Asus. While it's not quite as cheap as smaller brands in this space, it does well to offer such a wide range of switch adjustment options in a sturdy chassis.

Both the 65% and TKL layouts will sit larger on your desk than the slightly cheaper Corsair Clipper Pro Mini 60, but this is an easy recommendation if you're looking to maintain those separate arrow buttons, while Razer easily wins over SteelSeries thanks to its dramatically reduced cost.

Ultimately, the Huntsman V3 HE comes with the same caveat shared by most magnetic keyboards. By default, they're more expensive than their mechanical counterparts, often with fewer quality of life features. On top of that, it's generally going to be particularly competitive players getting the best bang for their buck here.

If you know you want a compact magnetic keyboard with arrow buttons intact, I'd recommend Razer's over alternatives. If you're just after a new gaming keyboard and aren't scaling ranked leaderboards, you'll either save cash or find more wireless options with mechanical models.

How I tested the Razer Huntsman V3 HE

I spent one month swapping between the Razer Huntsman V3 HE 65% and Razer Huntsman V3 HE TKL models, with an additional week spent on the larger form factor due to a faulty 65% unit. During that time, this keyboard became my daily driver for all work and play, taking center stage in Doom: The Dark Ages, CS2, High on Life 2, and Planet Coaster 2. For more information on how we test gaming keyboards, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

We're also hunting down the best gaming headsets and the best gaming monitors to fully kit out your setup.

The interminable wait for a Cyberpunk 2077 sequel continues, but at least we have Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 to fill the void. A collaboration between digital worldbuilders CD Projekt Red and acclaimed Japanese animation house Studio Trigger, this follow-up to 2022's inaugural season of anime features an entirely new cast of characters navigating the same unforgiving Corpo-ruled world. And though nothing here can quite top the impact of David's tragic arc in season 1, Edgerunners 2 is another nova Night City story.

Four years in the making, Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 can't be dinged for a lack of ambition. Orbiting a quartet of interconnected protagonists, at times it can feel like multiple seasons of TV in one. The closest to a lead is D. (Nazeeh Tarsha) – a spiky-haired netrunner who's out for revenge on those responsible for the massacre of his nomad tribe. Early on, he meets Roman (Valeria Rodriguez), a young wannabe filmmaker who champions analogue photography over BDs, and knows a great subject when he sees one.

Then there's Talia (Kimoy Lee), a gravely ill young woman who has progressively replaced each failing body part with chrome, and is now more machine than human. Her story dovetails with that of Weak Kingsley (Clancy Brown), a former Edgerunner who went cyberpsycho and had all his upgrades stripped. King, as he's otherwise known, was once close with Talia's mother, Avida (Cesili Williams), and makes saving the self-destructive Talia his redemptive mission.

Perhaps most intriguing of all, there's Capri (Brittany Lauda) – a mysterious, impossibly powerful digital construct that anyone and everyone wants control over, including Kang Tao corpo Kiril Yang (Daniel Wu), who also happens to be Talia's father. Unlike season 1's speed-enhancing Sandevistan, Capri is more than mere MacGuffin; she is unpredictable, revels in chaos, and has a history waiting to be unearthed that will be of particular interest to 2077 players.

Doom and chooms

For the most part, this more ambitious structure works. While it sometimes lacks the propulsion and greater intimacy that comes with following a single central character's journey across 10 episodes, there is a more diverse variety of story threads being woven here. D.'s revenge mission closely mirrors the escalating stakes of season one, delivering on the requisite spectacle and sense of impending doom, but Roman, King and Talia all offer very different flavors. Talia's thread, in particular, is deeply somber and sad, as she reckons with her failing body after maxing out her cyberware capacity. Likewise, King, once a legend, but with nothing else to live for anymore, ties his fate to Talia's in a way that is tender and caring – a rare glimmer of hope and decency in a cruel world.

Roman is the least successful of the four and more of a storytelling device there to connect the other protagonists, rather than a memorable character in his own right. Though ostensibly a coming-of-age story for the young documentarian, who finds himself in way over his head as D.'s public rampage escalates, more often than not he's simply a witness to proceedings, rather than an active participant.

If there's a downside to this structure, it's that D. and Roman's story is siloed off from Talia and King's for much of the season, with fairly minimal overlap. But as their paths fully converge in the final episodes, the long wait is paid off. It would have been easy for all involved to re-run David's story, perhaps with a different outcome, but Edgerunners 2 deserves credit for not simply rehashing its predecessor's winning formula.

Chrome is where the heart is

Where Edgerunners excels, once again, is its sublime animation. Studio Trigger has outdone itself here; it's an even more impressive and creative rendering of CDPR's world than the first go-round. The ultra-stylized character designs are distinct and full of personality, action is eye-poppingly fluid and dynamic, while fans of the game will revel in its recreation of familiar locales from across Night City. You'll almost certainly want to pick up a controller and (re)visit them yourself after rolling credits (which is exactly what the team at Studio Trigger did).

Netflix and co. have shown impressive restraint keeping Capri out of trailers, as she's an aesthetically stunning creation. Visualized as a piece of neon pink and green abstract art born of The Net, Capri has no limitations, and Trigger doesn't hold back on the chaos that follows in her wake. Indeed, as the season progresses, the scale and spectacle are more reminiscent of Akira than even David's Cyberskeleton-aided rampage. Quite what a figure as powerful as Capri means for the future of this world is a fascinating question.

What you might still be wondering is whether Edgerunners 2 continues the story of Lucy or dearly departed David Martinez from the first season. That is best discovered by watching, but there are connections – some overt (and rather clumsy), others more ambiguous or thematic. But it's important to note that Edgerunners 2 embraces the anthology format, rather than positioning itself as a direct continuation of the first season, and as such you could comfortably watch Edgerunners 2 after skipping the first season or the game. Though why you'd want to is another matter.

Whether you're coming to it completely fresh, or as someone who was in on 2077 from day one (bugs and all), Edgerunners 2 is yet another victory lap following Cyberpunk's extraordinary redemption story. It can't quite top its predecessor and is unlikely to be quite as beloved as a result, but Edgerunners 2 proves there are still plenty of stories worth telling in Night City.

Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 releases on Netflix on October 20. Make sure you're there the moment the new episodes drop with our Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 release schedule. Or for more from Night City, check out our exclusive interview with showrunner Bartosz Sztybor.

They don't make many games like Call of Duty anymore. Activision's yearly blockbuster has an obscene budget and you can feel the dollars that made Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 at work in every shootout, in every shuffle up and down a pipe, in every cutscene.

Firing guns feels incredible, movement is phenomenal. Traversal has had a big upgrade: it's not Omnimovement – getting around instead feels closer to that seen in 2022's Modern Warfare 2 but there's a level of responsiveness at all times, even when other shooters typically restrict. Often your character will do what you want, as soon as you tell them to do it, with plenty of control even when mantling or sliding.

Gunfights feel responsive, with weapons often being easy to handle, and the impact of every bullet that meets the mark feeling meaningful. Shoot an AI opponent in the leg and they'll fall over and crawl for cover, or roll onto their back and wait for death. Shoot a player and the now-familiar hit sound effects will pile on as you pile on the lead – the feedback helps to stay on target, and popping opponents is almost disturbingly satisfying.

You may not like the way every gun handles in Modern Warfare 4, but you will find a gun that works for you. These fluid and engaging gunfights are the basis of the entire game, a foundation that everything else layers on top. But this year, those layers are also sublime.

Taking to Task Force

The campaign starts with Wu-Tang Clan's C.R.E.A.M. is playing as you wander through the streets of Seoul. People are going about their day, the convenience stores are stocked, and the city feels alive. Then North Korean forces attack, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 gets down to business. There's a real sense of place even if in classic Call of Duty fashion it's still incongruous, letting you stroll around the convenience store swinging haymakers at the crisps as everyone chatters around you.

It's the start to a campaign that feels authentic in the way that few franchises really manage to pull off. Call of Duty is one of them, when it's on form, and I'm happy to report that Modern Warfare 4 is one of The Good Ones: it looks superb, moves at a relentless pace, and manages to bring years worth of Modern Warfare storytelling to a satisfying conclusion. When special forces soldiers are free to draw the line, who's to decide what's right or wrong?

It manages to do this while simultaneously cleaning the decks of most of the lingering threads from the disappointing Modern Warfare 3 (which we called "underwhelming" in our Modern Warfare 3 review). A lot of this is achieved by killing off a whole bunch of beloved characters, often brutally and without warning. Several times after a shocking death the camera lingers on dead characters to show you they're really dead and won't be returning in some of the post-launch content or a much maligned sequel Infinity Ward isn't responsible for.

Filling the void left by these deaths are a heap of new characters that I quickly gel with. Big bad Mads Mikkelsen is a lot of fun, but the standout is Lanny Joon as Ko who gives a stellar performance. Elsewhere, I squeak with delight when I recognize the voice of Luke Tennie from Apple TV's Shrinking. Most of these characters are lightly sketched out, but you're moving at such a quick pace you won't notice. Exposition is delivered breathlessly as you push from firefight to firefight, whispered in the quiet moments as you scurry around hoovering up ammo and armor plates from vanquished foes.

It's one of the most morally challenging Call of Duty campaigns in recent years, as the game pushes you gleefully to do things that don't fit with the usually narrow worldview of the series. One level has you playing as a North Korean soldier terrorizing a small village as you look for a dissident. How brutal you want to be is up to you but it's an unflinching level, let down slightly by the fact you're scuffling around the place looking for collectibles.

Price to see you

John Price, now on the run after assassinating General Shepherd in Modern Warfare 3, has grown a full beard instead of his ridiculous mustache and has to reckon with his own morality. There a few tough moments here: beating someone to death in an alleyway, facing off against "good guys" during fights through the Parisian streets, and even shooting-to-kill at former squad mates. After years of Price being the most recognizable good guy in the Call of Duty series, he's kind of a dick here, but trying to square that is part of the point.

Modern Warfare 4 has made me struggle with my own morality too, because I really wish it would relax its stance against civilian casualties. It's not a late heel turn for me, but the fact that innocents are in the middle of most of the gunfights and just clipping one results in an instant game over while enemies are unbothered has my ghillies in a twist. Have you ever tried to fire an assault rifle in fully automatic while hanging from the passenger seat of a speeding car without hitting civilians? I have, and it's pretty difficult.

These moments are rare frustrations in Modern Warfare 4's campaign, which is otherwise packed full of some of the series' most bombastic sequences to date. Several of the game's most impressive moments come early, with one highlight seeing you stalk a target through a club before you end up having to blast your way out.

Stranded, meanwhile, will be in 'best campaign mission' debates for years. The mission is an expansive playground that has you dropping in with nothing but a pistol and slowly gathering gear as you roll around the North Korean countryside exploring points of interest on foot and slowly gather yourself an arsenal, before attacking the objectives as you wish.

This is followed up by an amphibious assault on Seoul that feels like a full circle moment for Call of Duty, looking back to its D-Day origins. Call of Duty's campaigns have always been at their best when you're pushing against something impossibly well-defended, whether that's the beaches of Normandy or the cityscape of Seoul.

Unfortunately, the execution here is a little shaky and emblematic of some of Modern Warfare 4's biggest problems: if you stray too far from your commander, you're instantly killed with a tooltip popping up to tell you to follow your squad leader to exit the beach safely. It happens again and again, and after the freedom of Stranded, there's a disconnect when you're strapped back into the rollercoaster's straight line.

It's a shame, as, when Modern Warfare 4's missions hit, I'm reminded why the series' campaigns remain so important in a genre increasingly measured by online success and hours streamed.

It might still be junk food – even if this is a higher quality than limp-burger-like Black Ops 7 or Modern Warfare 3's attempts – but there are glimpses here of how Infinity Ward's modern approach to a military thriller can still push further. If only they'd let me off the leash a little.

Run DMZ

DMZ, Modern Warfare 4's headline addition, puts freedom front and center. Evolving on the mode first introduced in Call of Duty Warzone 2.0, this is a full-blooded extraction shooter taking place in Hajin City, a huge map that stretches between North and South Korea. Hajin City doesn't feel like a real place in the same way as Escape From Tarkov's miserable arenas, but it is expansive and well designed, with impressive verticality.

There are a few standout spots which seem to be tied into story missions that you can approach too. In one, me and my group pull off a daring heist at a casino, while a more frustrating mission sees us attempting to raid a robotics lab full of robocanines. Both missions have raid-like mechanics, and these more scripted experiences feel like they add something a bit different to the traditional extraction shooter experience.

Playing in this pseudo PVE-environment, DMZ could be one of my favorite multiplayer games released this year. You gear up, you drop into the map and prowl around shooting enemies and hoovering up loot until you either achieve the mission you came here to do, get scared and head for an extract, or get brutally murdered by another group of players or the AI.

Progress is rewarding. While your operators will level and be reset as you prestige, everything that gives you XP will also unlock new stations at your FOB – a safe area where you can recuperate between matches, spending currency and crafting recipes to make yourself more powerful.

The rewards are generous, and the end result is that DMZ feels less like an extraction shooter and more like a roguelike, which does take the sting out of getting ganked. Warzone's meteoric rise saw a point when casual players got pushed out in favor of more experienced players, so it remains to be seen how DMZ will evolve in future.

The nature of extraction shooters is such that not everyone will be pushed towards the same climatic conflicts, but the Call of Duty audience tends to favor an aggressive playstyle, and I'd expect this to filter down into DMZ.

Class warfare

Less revolutionary, but no less impressive, is the game's multiplayer. At this point, Call of Duty's multiplayer mode is iterative, more akin to FIFA (erm, I mean, EA Sports FC). This suits everyone fine. There's a new collection of weapons to unlock and upgrade, camouflage to earn and an unending supply daydreaming, clueless players to blast your way through in the name of hitting that prestige button as many times as possible.

Modern Warfare 4 is the best arena shooter on the market right now in terms of how smooth it feels and how engaging it is to play. The arsenal of (fictional, unlicensed) weapons offers up a horde of good choices for a variety of playstyles. I even like the maps this year. Transit 213 feels like one of the franchise's best already, taking the Shipment ideals but updating it for the modern day.

Sadly, the big negatives are largely the same. Killstreaks remain an anti-fun device that rewards players for kill streaks at the expense of the rest of the lobby. I will rally against killstreaks to my dying breath, and I'm not convinced it's even particularly fun for the person that's awarded them. The other thing is that the player base is… not particularly engaged. It's not hard to walk up on players that aren't listening at all, or to play on a team that has no concept of how to pick up objectives at their very feet. People should feel free to play however they want – and it's bound to get sweatier as players drop off – but I can't shake the sense some teammates and enemies alike are second screening Family Guy Funny Moments compilations.

The bigger additions to Modern Warfare 4's multiplayer are hit and miss: I like Inflation, a 6v6 mode where killed players drop cash and you have to scoop it up similar to the game's existing Kill Confirmed mode. The twist is that the amount of cash you drop is a percentage of what you're currently carrying, and the winners are the team holding the most cash when the round times out. This has the fascinating impact that the better players are holding more cash and thus are worth more when you kill them, and suddenly there's a frantic back and forth, a game that isn't over until it's very much over.

Other new modes are a mixed bag. Collateral seems determined to take over the Valorant / Counter-Strike 2 niche, doing away with standard weapon names and perks and offering purchases like "Power Pistol" or "Semi Auto Rifle" for a round-based attack and defend mode. It's confusing primarily because Call of Duty already has a round-based attack and defend mode, Search and Destroy.

Except, here, regenerating health is turned off and in its place there's the overarching economy. This is one of the headline additions to Modern Warfare 4 and I can't help but feel like it's a naked attempt to bring the gameplay of Counter-Strike to console players.

Frontline, meanwhile, is like Team Deathmatch with fixed respawns, which is a miserable exercise in repeating the same kill corridors over and over. Ground War Outpost is equally annoying, with a flood of people shooting you from every treeline, sandbag, or tower. You can't escape combat, but the furious sound of being in a Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 firefight is so intense that you can't really relax into it in the same way as you can in something like Battlefield 6 or Wardogs.

But it doesn't matter. The multiplayer is phenomenal, and if the campaign is junk food, this is closer to an all-you-can-eat buffet inviting you to snack on what works for you and steer clear of the bits that don't. I have a sneaking feeling that I am getting too old for Call of Duty, a feeling Modern Warfare 4 has reinforced. But even if I'm not as fast at the game's multiplayer as I used to be. Even if some of the additions seem meaningless, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is, surprisingly, one of the best games this year, and it's phenomenal fun. Isn't that supposed to be the whole point?

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 was reviewed on PC, with a code provided by the publisher.

Answer the call by checking out our best Call of Duty games and best FPS games rankings for more to play next!

The CRKD Nitro Deck 2 has been a long time coming.

Quite literally, in fact. CRKD originally announced the accessory in December 2025, almost a year ago. Since then, the follow-up to the original Nitro Deck has experienced delay after delay, but the wait has been worth it. Just like the OG, the Switch 2 controller transforms the handheld into a more comfortable and adaptable device, equipping it with ergonomic grips, adjustable capacitor thumbsticks, and more, and the upgrades are so palpable that it makes me wish they were there by default.

That would mean putting up with the loud and intrusive rumble and having to source a new case, though, as the Deck 2's bulky size makes it incompatible with everything I've thrown its way. Yet it's a small price to pay to make Nintendo's current-gen console feel truly premium.

Design

It's difficult to look at the Nitro Deck 2 and not think "Steam Deck" but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I'm pretty privy to the look and feel of Valve's pixel-pusher, and anything that emulates its appeal is a win in my book.

They aren't twins, and I believe the familiarities are accidental as the extra length of the Nitro Deck 2 is likely to accommodate the new handheld's larger 7.9-inch screen more than anything else. Yet, I'm definitely more of a fan of the Deck 2's elongated shape, and the fact that its "Black Edition" has a retro-inspired translucent chassis by default.

There's no plain Jane where this new and improved model is concerned. The controller's transparent 'Smoke Black Edition' exists instead of a simple black alternative, and there's also a PAL Grey and White model available too. That retro-fueled GameCube-inspired look of the original doesn't exist, but I suspect that'll change in the future. The Switch 2 actually allows you to play GameCube games via the Nintendo Switch Online library, unlike the original handheld, so it would be a missed opportunity to not see a purple-blue Nitro Deck this time around.

Features

Speaking of which, the Nitro Deck 2 possesses a lot of similarities to its previous generation. It's a controller that's designed to transform your handheld into something more adept and ergonomic, but there's a bit more freedom this time around. Instead of having to deal with the finicky process of carefully sliding your Switch into the device, you simply need to pull each grip to the side. This allows the Deck 2 to extend, allowing you to place the Switch 2 inside. A locking mechanism on the back can then be turned and tightened to keep it in place and prevent it from slipping out.

The new mechanism sits on top of a kickstand, which remains a single column as it did on the original version. The two sets of mappable back peddles also remain unchanged, as does the CRKD logo that's equipped with RFID technology for easy connectivity to the accompanying app - a neat feature which I appreciated as someone who hates dealing with long-winded serial numbers.

The Nitro Deck 2 is naturally also flush with new buttons to match the Switch 2. On the left side of the pad, you have the thumbstick and the circular D-pad underneath. Rather than keeping the capture button as is, CRKD has combined it with the minus button at the top right-hand side. Pressing the upper half will activate the minus options, while the bottom will allow you to take screenshots and game clips as normal.

A Syncing button now takes the place of where you'd traditionally find the capture button on a left Switch 2 Joy-Con. Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the device, the layout is vastly similar. The plus button has also been split into two - with the upper half triggering the plus functionality as normal and the bottom being a program button. The latter is assigned to GameChat by default, but that's likely to make up for the lack of a dedicated 'C' GameChat button. Something I'm entirely okay with, as I never use it.

Below this you'll find the right thumbstick and a CRKD light-up Home button. The CRKD CaptiStick-branded Capacitor Sticks are powered by capacitor sensors, which the brand insists can provide "drift-free precision," but that's not all they bring to the Deck 2. Both are surrounded by dials, which can be turned at any moment to adjust resistance. Being able to tighten or loosen stick tension at a whim is extremely handy if you're wanting pinpoint accuracy for platformers or kart racers, and it's a nice inclusion for the upgraded gamepad.

Additionally, you've also got a set of three trigger buttons on either side of the controller. The D-pad is interchangeable with additional pads sold separately by CRKD, but most interestingly enough, the accessory can be used as a Pro-style controller. CRKD ships a plastic rectangular slab, which can be placed in the center instead of a Switch 2 display. While that means having to adjust your comfort to using a handheld-sized pad for docked gaming, it does give the new Deck 2 more appeal, though I'm still not 100% confirmed that it provides enough to warrant its $99.99 / £89.99 price point. But more on that later.

Performance

When I first attached the Nitro Deck 2 to my handheld and sent my Joy-Cons to the side table storage of my living room, where gaming accessories go to collect dust and rot, I immediately knew I had to lower the rumble. By default, it is set to max, and is so loud that it made for some very awkward gaming-in-bed moments. Having to constantly explain that you are, in fact, playing Fire Emblem and not doing anything notorious to your partner does not make for a good time. It's so loud, in fact, that it even managed to continually wake up my cat on a night-to-night basis.

You see, with Fortune's Weave, the game sets off the handheld's HD rumble whenever you are within the radius of enemies during battles. This happens a lot as you are constantly dealing with swarms of soldiers or evil possessed skeletons on any given map, but the motors of the controller don't quite have the nuance of the console's rumbling ways. They get loud and a bit grating on the ears, but you can at least adjust them through a combination of buttons (holding L + the plus button for three seconds), and toggle both the left and right rumbles separately. Thanks for that, CRKD.

Toggling the motors down to their lowest setting made my time with the Deck 2 far less awkward, and fortunately, it is one of the very few grievances I have with the accessory overall. My entire journey with the device is only really inhibited by some minor nitpicks, like the fact that it's too big to fit into my favorite Switch 2 cases, which means I'll likely have to pick up the brand's $39.99 / £34.99 (via CRKD) hardshell carrying case, or the tightening mechanism sometimes sounds like it's breaking each time you turn it. Otherwise, this made using the Switch 2 feel truly next-gen.

Using the Nitro Deck 2 feels very similar to using my OLED Steam Deck, but that's a positive for me. I absolutely despise the awkward flat backs of the Joy-Con controllers, so having two ergonomic grips to wrap my hands around feels more comfortable and natural. However, one of my personal favorite features was not the comfort but the inclusion of a U-shaped adapter.

I'm not a fan of Bluetooth, especially when it comes to controllers. While using the GameSir G8+ I feel like I'm constantly having to spend more hours dealing with connection issues than actual gaming. The wired link between the Nitro Deck 2 and the Switch 2 meant that tedium was a non-issue.

It's also handy for knowing how to align the 7.9-inch display into the device. As the Deck 2 wraps around the console, it was confusing at first to know whether or not I had it hooked up properly. There's no satisfying click or feeling involved whatsoever. The adapter requires the Type-C ports of both the handheld and the device to be stacked on top of one another, and connecting the two made the entire device feel more secure.

What I didn't like the feeling of all that much was using it in docked mode. Don't get me wrong, I love the fact that CRKD chose to give the option of using the Nitro Deck 2 as a typical controller, especially as it makes the price feel more justifiable. Yet, it feels like you're basically using a Steam Deck-sized device as a gamepad, and that is not comfortable on your wrists for Mario Kart World, Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave, or any game out there. In a pinch, I can absolutely see it coming in handy, but it should not make someone's decision to purchase the Nitro Deck 2.

Should you buy the CRKD Nitro Deck 2 controller?

The CRKD Nitro Deck 2 is cool, but I'm not so sure it's $99.99 / £89.99 cool.

That feels like a lot to pay for a controller of its type when you factor in the $49.99 / £39.99 MSRP of the original, and the fact that many of you looking for new Switch 2 accessories may have just had to cope with the console's newly increased price.

If you have the funds where $100 doesn't feel like a lot, and you play your Switch 2 day in and day out, then it'll absolutely improve your handheld mode experience. Going back to the default Joy-Con controller layout after using the Nitro Deck 2 for weeks feels like a huge step down, and the comfy curvature of the pad's form factor makes diving into just about any game feel magnificent. When I dreamed up the Switch 2 in my head way before its first unveiling, this is more what I had in mind.

But no matter how next-gen it feels, its price and some minor grievances (that rumble really had an effect on me) prevent me from giving it a full five-star rating. Should it ever trickle down to an MSRP more in line with the original, then it should absolutely be part of your setup, and I hope that happens once the holiday sales kick off later this year. Though in the meantime, I'd only fully recommend this to those with the budget to spare. Or at least to those who truly hate the cramp-inducing flat backs of the Switch 2 Joy-Cons.

How I tested the CRKD Nitro Deck 2 controller

To put the new Nitro Deck 2 through it paces I swapped out my dusty old Joy-Cons and attached to my console for a little over two weeks. Whether I was connected over Bluetooth or via the accompanying adapter, I played everything on the new CRKD accessory, from Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave, Mario Kart World, Pokemon Pokopia, and even Nintendo Switch Online titles like Star Fox Adventures and Super Mario Sunshine via the GameCube library. I also used the Nitro Deck 2 as a Pro Controller in docked mode to see how it matched up to my wireless controllers of choice.

For more on how we test controllers, check out the GamesRadar+ hardware policy.

Creating the ultimate Switch 2 setup? Check out our guides to the best Nintendo Switch headsets, the best Nintendo Switch 2 cases, and the best Nintendo Switch 2 microSD Express Cards while you're here.

Capcom's had a helluva year. Resident Evil: Requiem, Pragmata, and Onimusha: The Way of the Sword are some of the best games released these past few months, and that's not to mention the latest, apparently greatest, Monster Hunter Stories instalment. Then, of course, there's Zack Cregger's brilliant Resident Evil, which set a new standard for video game adaptations at the theater.

But not everyone's perfect, not even Capcom. The latest attempt at bringing Street Fighter to the multiplex is an overstuffed miss – a hyper-edited, dick-joke-filled, tonally inconsistent movie that ends halfway through its own story. But rather than leaving you wanting more, you're left with a headache, caused by too many booming needle-drops and too few satisfying uppercuts. The character roster – full of hilarious wigs – is simply overstuffed, with four primary protagonists all given too little screen time.

First, there's Ken Masters, a once-respected fighter now doing adverts for Duracell and taking on novelty fights with polar bears. Ken's rich, jacked, and looks like Noah Centineo, but nobody wants to party with him, so he sings karaoke alone, belting out "What's Up?" by the 4 Non Blondes, a favourite of his missing brother, Ryu.

Speaking of which, Andrew Koji's solemn champion has gone into hiding after failing to save his and Ken's master, Gouken, from the evil Akuma. Like that beastly spirit, Ryu is possessed by a dark force, which comes out when he's fighting, so Ryu's swapped throwing hadoukens for selling noodles to tourists.

Fight club

That doesn't last long: M. Bison – an unleashed, high-camp David Dastmalchian – is hosting a second World Warrior tournament to lure out Ryu and capture his "hado" powers. Bison sends his best minion, Chun-Li, to seek out fighters from all over the world, but, to absolutely no one's surprise, she's not actually Bison's lapdog – she's an undercover Interpol agent whose personality boils down to wanting revenge and being hot, something that's mentioned a dozen times by multiple different characters.

Then there's Ken's agent, best friend, and former sparring partner Dan Hibiki, a metaphorical punching bag who, despite not having a grand entrance, is at the center of multiple major story beats and has an arc of his own. The marketing might not be drawing attention to Dan, but he has at least as much screentime as Chun-Li, if not Ryu.

That's not to mention the plethora of other characters, like Eric André's Don Sauvage, given ample air time to shout funny things, and Jason Momoa's green-skinned, hulking Blanka, who was brought up, we're told, by "eels… electric eels". Cody Rhodes' Guile has the most ridiculous haircut ever put to screen, while 50 Cent's Balrog, Vidyut Jammwal's Dhalsim, Orville Peck's Vega, Rayna Vallandingham's Juli, and Mel Jarnson's Cammy are all also… here. There's little more to each of these fighters than what you get from the character select screen; they are mere set dressing.

In order to juggle so many spinning plates, director Kitao Sakurai, a frequent collaborator of André, keeps things rolling at a bombastic pace, editing every scene like it's a TikTok, allowing nothing to breathe, and no emotional connections to be formed. Characters say their motivation out loud multiple times, just in case you were scrolling through reels while watching, like Ken, who we know is a loser, so everyone calls him one, until, suddenly, midway through a later-stage fight, he's cool again, just like that.

Another round

The actual fights suffer because of the pace. We've been living in a post-Raid and John Wick world for well over a decade, trained on visceral, sleek action that clearly shows every punch. Street Fighter goes in a different direction, using wires and CGI to recreate moves from the games, but they too often look janky. When something really cool happens, it's heavily signposted with slow motion. The recent Mortal Kombat movies got away with heightened, silly fighting moves because everything's a gory mess, but Street Fighter is squarely aimed at 12-year-old boys, so there's no blood, and therefore no distraction from some clunky-looking moves.

Street Fighter instead works best as a comedy. Sakurai's a great director of slapstick, which half of these fights are anyway, but your tolerance for the humour depends on how much you enjoy lowbrow jokes. Example: Ken gets punched in the cajones; someone shouts: "Yo, his dick is toast!" It's one of the movie's biggest laughs. The movie also shines during animated sequences, which are much more serious in tone and look stunning, like classic '90s anime. There's a clear vision behind these that's sorely lacking from the messy live-action movie they're stuck inside.

Were this entirely animated, it may have been another Capcom win, but sadly, that's not the case. Street Fighter's biggest flaw is simply trying to do too much, cramming three movies' worth of characters and plot into two hours, and then ending inexplicably halfway through a scene without resolving the main conflict. It's sequel bait when they really should have focused more on round one being perfect.

Street Fighter releases in theaters on October 16. For more, check out our ranking of the best video game movies and our guide to the many upcoming video game movies in the works.

The trailer for Over the Hill makes it look like you’ll be taking an off-road vehicle out into the wilderness and having a wonderful, relaxing time in warm sunshine, listening to acoustic guitar music as you trundle around paradise looking at the wildlife. Balderdash. It’s the single most stressful game I’ve played in years and I think it hates me.

It’s a bold move for a game to focus on the actual worst bits of open world driving games like Forza Horizon or even GTA. You know, the ones where you try to drive up a hill and it’s just a little too steep for your car to manage. Sliding around, skidding back down, and getting stuck against trees is the core experience at first, as there's just not enough grip to enjoy yourself. You can soon upgrade your tires, at which point things improve. But even with this added grip, Over the Hill is best described as a constant, laborious battle against hostile terrain – and that's far from enjoyable.

Said terrain at least looks reasonably nice. The art style is noticeably similar to developer Funselektor’s sublime Art of Rally. Not entirely flat-shaded, but certainly channeling that look. This can make more sparse areas like the Algerian desert look basic at times. The game uses lighting, fogging, and weather effects alongside a diegetic soundtrack to create its moods, but any sense of wonder quickly wears thin. There's so little to discover, it's frankly boring, a feeling compounded by the fact you're limited to moving at an absolute crawl. Even at full speed, you could probably run faster, if only you could exit the car.

Trails and tribulations

The game's best feature is the winch, which can latch onto trees with a quick press of the Y button on an Xbox pad. You then reel it back in, pulling yourself out of mud/water/rocks/trouble/the-clutches-of-despair in the process. It works really well and one item even lets you make an anchor point almost anywhere you like. That can feel like cheating, but sometimes there's no alternative. You soon acquire other limited use items too, like planks of wood to bridge small gaps and, later, a jack to reset you if you roll over. It doesn’t physically leverage your car’s chassis, instead respawning you, which really does feel like cheating when everything else is so hands-off.

While you can technically go anywhere, most steep hills are impassable, causing you to seek out the flattest routes, at which point you discover the world is actually quite linear. That at least means routes have been curated to offer a decent challenge, with jutting stones and slippery, bare rock faces clearly placed to test you.

Some such routes are turned into 'trails', which are the most videogamey and enjoyable part of the proceedings as you try to make it to GTA-esque checkpoint circles that appear at shortish intervals along a challenging track. Some of them are brilliantly designed – the Bridal Veil in the second Canadian area is a standout, passing a beautiful waterfall, which I was lucky enough to discover while the virtual sun was out. Gorgeous.

Sunshine is pretty rare, though. Storms are frequent and sway every tree on the screen in spectacular fashion. Inching forward through the surprisingly hostile elements in turn disperses the map's fog of war, revealing question mark 'points of interest'. These might be crates with personalization mods for your car, vehicles to tow back to your camp, or gates which denote the start point of those standout trails. Clearing every point in one area removes that map's fog of war completely, though you won't need the map by then. There's no rush or even instruction to complete anything; you can take your time.

The physics are OK, but not quite as convincing as other, more realistic-looking off-roaders. Your truck's movement is questionable at extreme angles and deformable terrain like mud or snow always deforms to the same level. It doesn’t build up again under reversing, nor squish outwards like it does in Snowrunner, either. It’s just there until it's flattened. Nonetheless, it does look pretty nice when you’re slewing around in a swamp or window-deep in snow and your wheels are leaving great troughs in your wake.

Off Road Pokedex

There’s an instant camera so you can snap the local fauna, which is a lovely feature but rarely used. You won’t see as much wildlife as you might expect, but that just makes the occasional sighting of an eagle that much more special.

There are a few mechanics (actual mechanics, the kind that use spanners) here and there with a few dialogue boxes to their names who will sell you upgrade items, but for the most part it’s a decidedly isolated solo experience. You can change songs on the tape player in your car, either track by track or different albums, but the best match is the laid-back acoustic guitar fare, which sounds a lot like pixel art fishing game Cast ’n’ Chill.

If aching isolation sounds like your idea of hell, you can play with other people, winching each other out of trouble and pulling up larger meteorites together. However, Funselektor has made it clear that the game was first designed as a solo experience and online performance is still being worked on. The game runs well even on Steam Deck despite some pretty vast draw distances, and visible LOD redraw is kept impressively scarce.

There is something to be said for setting off into the night as rain hammers down on the metal roof of your vehicle, your headlights swaying and dipping as you carefully navigate the undulating terrain. The same goes for those old-school 'Top Gear' moments of clinging to a mountainside with a 200ft drop to your right. But when you realise you're in your umpteenth hour of watching a small, low-detail car crawl slowly over barren sand dunes or trundle through another desolate valley, you'll likely long for something to happen.

Over The Hill was reviewed on PC, with a code provided by the publisher.

Your journey isn't over yet. Check out our best open world games ranking for more worlds to get lost in!

The thing about the Friday the 13th movies are they're not very good. Nightmare on Elm Street has innovative effects, Halloween pivots off the expert tension of director John Carpenter. But the first entry in the Friday the 13th franchise is mostly inert. It isn’t until later entries that it amps up the thrills and chills, realizing that the hockey-masked Jason is a ridiculous immortal slasher/wrestler in a funny way, rather than a scary way.

So, if you’re a high-end studio like A24, how do you build an entire eight-episode season of television as a prequel? You focus on the one element of the original movie that totally works: Betsy Palmer’s bonkers turn as Mrs. Pamela Voorhees. And thankfully, they found the perfect modern actress to play the iconic killer lunch-lady in Linda Cardellini.

Unfortunately, like the movie that came before it, that’s pretty much all that works about the meandering, mostly scare-free Friday the 13th prequel, which debuts after an extremely long and messy development and production process. Fans tuning in to see the lurid sex and violence of the best of Friday the 13th (it’s a sleepover/drive-in classic for a reason) will mostly be frustrated at the lack of the former (there’s almost no nudity, and relatively chaste soap opera-level sex), and put off by the latter, which relies heavily on digital trickery and the same sort of faces getting torn off in gruesome ways, episode after episode.

Even worse, some big swings that completely change the mythology and continuity of the film series seem entirely misguided. Adding a Stranger Things-style conspiracy element to the show isn’t going to bring in new fans, and it’s just going to annoy the older ones.

Mask off

We pick up with Pamela living with her son, Jason (Callum Vinson), who knows he's different from the other kids, but is very sweet and beloved by his mother. One day at Camp Crystal Lake, where she works as the lunch lady, Jason drowns thanks in part to the negligence of the counselors, though that doesn’t become a factor until much later in the season. A year later, the camp is about to reopen, and Pamela is still bereft, believing Jason is out there somewhere since they never found a body. And aside from going a little nuts at a town potluck, she’s pretty reasonable in her grief, calmed by the town’s kindly sheriff/romantic interest Levon Brooks (William Catlett). That is until she’s attacked at home by two armed thugs who have been tracking her – and Jason – for mysterious purposes.

There’s a burst of violence from Pamela, and more to come, as well as potentially other killers lurking in the wings. But other than walking us through Pamela’s increasingly brazen acts of brutality that she all but commits in the town square with no real interest from either the police, or Levon’s news reporter sister, Briana (Devin Kessler), who is investigating the overall conspiracy, there’s no "why" here. Is this about diving into the depths of madness to see where it comes from? Maybe – that certainly seems to be where the show lands in the final scenes – though a classic late-season flashback episode posits another, much dumber theory we won’t spoil here.

It’s also, unfortunately, not particularly funny. Or fun. Or scary. Everyone is playing this material dead seriously, from a weird little girl Pamela becomes obsessed with who seems to be a refugee from showrunner Brad Caleb Kane’s other horror prequel, IT: Welcome To Derry, to a group of hippies who seem like they wandered straight out of a high school production of Hair.

Horror – particularly slasher horror – needs the giddy laugh release of gruesome kills once the tension has been revved to unbearable levels. The rambling plot has none of that; the release isn’t necessary because mostly everyone seems confused about what they’re doing next, and why. Most of the deaths are perfunctory, and only one featuring a skinned body gets close to the proper level of gore for something like this, so it’s unfortunate it happens to a character who has been barely built up.

Mommie dearest

At least Cardellini commits 100% to the material, pulling from the other dark turns in her filmography that on paper make this role make sense. But coming on the heels of her Emmy-winning role in HBO’s oddball DTF St. Louis, Crystal Lake is a significant step down that isn’t worthy of her talents; she’s much, much better than this show. And while she elevates the proceedings, it’s also hard not to think what Cardellini would have done, and what could have been done with Cardellini, if original showrunner Bryan Fuller had been allowed to continue with his likely singular vision.

Alternately, what could someone like Ti West, or any of the A24 slate of directors who know how to channel grindhouse and shlock have done with this material, instead of the Lifetime with slightly more blood version we get here? There are attempts to ape the gritty, indie nature of the original movie (one shot mirrors an iconic kill in the original beat for beat in a later episode), but mostly it looks visually bland, rather than ripped out of ‘70s or ‘80s cinema.

But that’s what could have been, not what is. Instead, we’ve got an eight-hour-long prequel in place of the 90-minute kill-fest that Friday the 13th made its name on, full of perfectly fine performances and okay murders. Cardellini, like Palmer before her, is great in the role of Pamela Voorhees, making a solid argument that the series should have continued with her, not Jason. But even Cardellini can’t save Crystal Lake from drowning.

Crystal Lake releases on October 15 in the US, and on October 19 in the UK. Look ahead with our guides to most exciting upcoming horror movies and new TV shows heading your way.

Castlevania: Belmont's Curse forced me to do something I have not done since playing my very first video game ever on the Sega Master System 2 in the early '90s. And that is: grabbing a pen and paper and writing down notes. Usually a method I reserved exclusively for Jankin matches in Alex Kidd in Miracle World, Belmont's Curse gave me so many cryptic clues, so many patterns to remember, so many intriguing characters or key items hidden away in places, that placing markers upon the map was simply not enough.

No, a game this complex warrants detailed manual transcription. Its recall challenges are a workout for the brain as much as its tricky traversals are a workout for the fingers and thumbs.

The Seine of the Crime

Like all great Metroidvanias, I spend half my time soaring through the air and the other half staring at the map – a sprawling puzzle of tunnels and halls that spans iconic Parisian locations such as Notre Dame and the Catacombs. And, of course, Dracula's Castle. An imposing, intricate structure full of brutal traps, ambush rooms, and the occasional roast chicken tucked away behind a wall.

Dracula's Castle reveals itself unexpectedly, following a series of clues and exploration that misleadingly appears to be guiding you to the next big boss fight. Under any other circumstances, the pursuit and anticipation of a boss being met with simply a cutscene could severely hamper motivation to continue playing.

However, the cutscene in which Dracula's Castle emerges is gripping and rewarding to watch, with striking animation that matches the dark, exquisite cinematography of the Netflix series. My disappointment at the lack of a boss quickly shifts into a deeper appreciation for Castlevania's ability to subvert expectations midgame.

Visually, Castlevania: Belmont's Curse is a feast for the eyes. Lightning flashes through Gothic window arches, illuminating painterly backgrounds of a city in flames. Detailed depictions of buildings such as Notre Dame are so beautiful that it's easy to forget they're filled with hostile enemies.

None of which are too much trouble though. Belmont's Curse is generous in its weapon offering – with 7 weapon families, each with 4 weapons, plus a flexible Arcana System that lets you seamlessly swap between a variety of abilities and spells depending on enemy type. My personal favorite is a sword and shield combo that lets you charge dash through enemies, obliterating everything in your path. Needless to say, this weapon is excellent for runbacks.

This Metroidvania's rooms are packed full of a variety of monsters, but there are always plenty of effective ways to deal with the crowds via magic, weapons, and relics. Unlike previous Castlevania games, these items are obtained through exploration – you don't get them from enemy drops. Weapons are hidden in chests that await as a reward at the end of tricky traversal sections.

Whipped into shape

Of course, airborne traversal requires teeth-gritting precision and patience as you close-in on secrets; but the challenge is always followed by the relief of unlocking a shortcut and exclaiming, "I'll never have to do that again!" It's challenging but never torturous, made fluid and fun as you use the legendary Holy Whip to swing between hooks, grapple enemies, and yank yourself away from spikes.

Controlling Rose Belmont feels a tad heavy but intentional. Clearing out ambush rooms by grappling aerial enemies with the whip then falling to smash those below in, literally, one fell swoop is immensely satisfying. The pace of movement, slide dodges, and traversal tools borrow the best parts of Dead Cells, but the unique Castlevania essence shines through in the form of the whip.

Progression relies on deciphering cryptic clues to hunt down Tarot card bosses. The guidance buried within these clues is often not particularly obvious. After pacing back and forth library halls for hours, hitting every wall in sight, sometimes it's admittedly far more difficult to find the bosses than it is to actually fight them.

Talos is a particular highlight boss, featuring mid-stage traversal sections timed against a countdown clock. Avoiding his powerful attacks then racing through the traps of the next room to relocate him provides that quintessential enjoyable stress only a Metroidvania can give.

Heart pounding? Yes. Palms sweating? Yes. Shouts of joy when Talos is defeated? Absolutely.

Although the wayfinding can be baffling and the fast-travel is surprisingly limited for a map so large, Belmont's Curse is a super accessible entry point for the Castlevania series. Accessibility options include toggles to increase health potion capacity, retry bosses without runbacks, and boost attack damage. The game also offers plenty of Mirror of Life save points, reducing the pressure of getting trap rooms and traversal sequences right the first time. Plus, enemies only respawn after you die, so you can thankfully re-enter a cleared room and it will still be cleared.

It was always going to be a tall order to follow up on the iconic Castlevania series music crafted by Michiru Yamane, and this is sadly where Belmont's Curse falls a bit short. The main motif is gothic and brooding, but the majority of the in-game music doesn't quite match the atmosphere of the visuals and the story.

Fortunately, the narrative more than makes up for the weaker soundtrack. The game delivers an intense dose of Belmont family drama that continues on from Castlevania 3: Dracula's Curse. The stakes are higher than ever as Leon Belmont reappears, and the mystery of Rose's curse brings an impending sense of doom.

Longtime Castlevania fans will delight in the array of nods and references throughout the game. Haunting paintings of Alucard literally lead the way via directional sword points through the labyrinthine corridors of Dracula's Castle; and we also get to face off against legendary Castlevania foes Death, Medusa, and Carmilla once more.

Often colourful and flashy, Belmont's Curse doesn't necessarily look like a Castlevania game. But it sure does feel like one. With enigmatic puzzles, gothic atmosphere, a dramatic anime-esque storyline, and well-paced action, this is a hugely compelling Metroidvania and a triumphant return for the iconic franchise.

Castlevania: Belmont's Curse was reviewed on PS5, with code provided by the publisher.

It's not a terrible night for every curse, as if you've been saddled with an overwhelming desire to play more like this we have a handy best Metroidvania games ranking just for you!

Marvel’s most offbeat trilogy comes to a conclusion in VisionQuest. The follow-up to 2021 MCU TV pioneer WandaVision and 2024’s occult follow-up Agatha All Along, VisionQuest puts Paul Bettany’s sentient synthezoid in the spotlight for a story of fathers, sons, unlikely love, and the very origins of artificial general intelligence in the MCU.

Like its predecessors, VisionQuest is a mystery box series with a decidedly off-kilter sensibility. Several years after overriding his programming and flying away from Westview, White Vision is now working in a Scottish pub by day and living in a utopia of his own creation by night. The virtual architectural marvel that Vision calls home is a haven for orphaned Stark AIs J.A.R.V.I.S. (Hugh D'Arcy), F.R.I.D.A.Y. (Orla Brady), E.D.I.T.H. (Emily Hampshire), and even former Avengers villain, Ultron (James Spader). Per Vision’s house rules (and the limits of CGI budgets), all roam the oblique-angled halls as human avatars.

Vision’s relatively peaceful existence is upended when the bounty hunter Paladin (Todd Stashwick) puts Vision in his crosshairs for a mysterious Client, and unearths the existence of Vision's son, Tommy Shepherd (Ruaridh Mollica) – one of the twin boys born of Wanda’s Westview Hex who winds up in the body of a London pickpocket. Vision’s quest: save Tommy, evade Paladin, and reveal the identity of The Client. Oh, and did we mention there’s an avian serial killer known as Butcherbird bumping off prominent AI specialists across the globe?

Paranoid androids

VisionQuest, then, is a dense show. It packs an awful lot into 8 episodes, with most clocking in at close to, or over, an hour each. While WandaVision concerned itself with an exploration of the Scarlet Witch's grief (via the medium of TV sitcoms), VisionQuest has more existential questions front of mind as White Vision reckons with his relationship to his former self, sort of dad Ultron, magical son Tommy, and the legacy of how he came to be; let's say it isn't just Tony Stark and Bruce Banner who have fingerprints in Vision's source code.

It can be surprisingly heady at points – like WandaVision's Ship of Theseus exchange extrapolated over 8 hours – but it also has a lot of heart, particularly when it comes to the show's more human-than-human AIs. J.A.R.V.I.S., F.R.I.D.A.Y., E.D.I.T.H., and security/maintenance men D.U.M.-E. and U. are a delightful bunch of oddballs for Vision to bounce off and find kinship with. And it even finds time to humanise mercenary assassin, Paladin.

As greater threats emerge, Bettany dials up the danger in his performance – one of many shades here that the long-serving Marvel star has never had the chance to play previously in the MCU. It's a far more complete, well, vision of the character than we've seen before. But the show's best work is reserved for genocidal AI Ultron, who's transformed into a lovable, megalomaniac grandpa who hangs out in Vision's attic. Spader's capricious murder bot steals every scene he's in.

Showrunner Terry Matalas previously created the well-received 12 Monkeys TV show and Picard season 3, so is no stranger to brain-bending, high-concept sci-fi shows. Sometimes, VisionQuest is too complicated for its own good; it can be hard to keep track of whether something is happening in the virtual world or tangible reality at points, and there's intentional obfuscation going on when it comes to the show's underpinning mysteries that only adds to the sense of confusion. This should lend itself to WandaVision-level theorizing week-to-week – a shame then that Marvel is releasing the show in two-episode batches, rather than letting each episode breathe.

Pleasingly, the answers we do get are satisfying and come at a regular enough clip that you're never left in the dark for too long, before the show swiftly moves onto the next mystery. T'Nia Miller's Jocasta has featured little in pre-release promotional materials, but becomes one of the show's more compelling central figures as the series progresses. And in the same way that Agatha All Along was a vehicle to introduce Joe Locke's Wiccan into the MCU proper, VisionQuest does the same for Raurdih's Mollica's Speed, taking him on a full emotional journey here. If anything, Tommy is better served by VisionQuest not concealing his identity or powers.

Like father, like son

WandaVision's ingenious sitcoms-through-the-ages structure is a tough act to follow, and there's a sense that VisionQuest is constantly striving to match its predecessor's audacious creativity. It's a show that has an awful lot of fourth-wall-breaking fun with the MCU, though, with winking references to Wanda's ignominious fate in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Thanos' scrotum-like chin and more. The fact that James D'Arcy reprises his Agent Carter role as Edwin Jarvis isn't even addressed, and for long-serving MCU fans, it ties up the existence of Jim Hammond – glimpsed briefly in sculpture form in Captain America: The First Avenger – in a way that brings MCU synthezoids full circle.

VisionQuest does have a less contentious relationship with traditional superhero action than WandaVision – a show which infamously dropped the ball in its finale by prioritizing empty spectacle over a carefully mounting mystery. When Vision goes full phasing, laser-shooting synthezoid, easily dispatching a room full of armed heavies in the blink of an eye, it's thrilling. But, maddeningly, as he was in Infinity War, Vision is again critically compromised early in the series thanks to the sudden development of vibranium bullets (you'd think MCU bad guys would have thought to use them before now). As a way to put Vision on the back foot, it's a frustrating decision.

Like Vision himself, then, VisionQuest is a flawed creation: often brilliant, but riddled with imperfections and contradictions. As the final MCU project to hit screens before Marvel mega-event Avengers: Doomsday, it's also a little surprising how disconnected from the wider MCU story VisionQuest feels, with no sense that any of this will one day feed into the bigger picture. Instead, it serves as the end for a certain era of MCU TV, and it that sense it's a worthy final chapter.

VisionQuest streams on Disney Plus from October 13. Never miss an episode with our VisionQuest release schedule, or look ahead to the future of the MCU with our guide to all the upcoming Marvel shows.

Valor Mortis is an easy game to like, and an even easier game to fantasize about kicking down a flight of stairs. It's a perfectly functional Soulslike based around swordplay and parrying, which is about as novel in 2026 as having a pause screen. It's also got terrible scripted parkour sequences that will make you wish you could snap off the lead character's legs. It even has a frikkin' sewer level.

Yet, it keeps nearly winning me back. Its combat can be exhilarating, the pulpy writing charming, and its puppydoggish "look ma! I'm making my first Soulslike! I am, I am!" enthusiasm is contagious. How can you hate a game that has a boss fight against a sentient windmill? Well, that boss fight being a finicky slog certainly helps…

You died

You're William, a loyal soldier of Napoleon Bonaparte with such low life expectancy that William dies on the battlefield before the game even starts. William somehow recovers from that setback, rising from the grave with a classic case of videogame protagonist amnesia. He's now in a nightmarish version of Europe where everyone has succumbed to a horrible plague that makes them want to draw swords and turn William into a shish kebab.

William may not remember what's happened to him but you'll be able to get by on muscle memory if you've played anything even vaguely Souls-y before. Brutal combat that's all about parrying blows and striking at the perfect moment. No map screen. Shortcuts steadily unlocked. If you die you get one chance to get your level-up currency back, yada yada yada.

If you don't like learning to parry then go play something else (also, my deepest sympathies, gaming in 2026 must be miserable for you). Valor Mortis demands precise sword-tennis right from the start, with even rank-and-file enemies taking multiple parries to finally break their guard. If you bounced off Sekiro and Ominusha: Way of the Sword, I'd recommend running away screaming from this.

You also have a gun and the power to shoot flames from your fingers, and it's nice to see these treated not as mere bonuses but as valid strategies. I finally got through the game's first boss when I realized that I wanted him on fire as much as possible. And once you get the blunderbuss, it's great fun cutting swordsmen off by just blasting them in the face, Indiana Jones-style.

Still, being able to shoot fire from your hands is a videogame idea so ancient it might actually predate man discovering fire. The other powers you gain aren't that imaginative either. The ability to stop time is used for seen-it-all-before-puzzles, like freezing a cog in place so you can get through a gate before it drops.

Another power creates platforms and walls you can run on, but only in predetermined areas. The final power is a shield which deflects attacks, which rewards you spending the last twenty hours of mastering the parry with the power to, er, no longer have to worry about it as much. Eh?

Witch is Familiar

Valor Mortis is made by the developers of Ghostrunner, the fun but also incredibly infuriating parkour game. That makes this the first time in human history a studio has pivoted to making a Soulslike and actually made a game that's less frustrating. But, as it goes on, Valor Mortis increasingly plays like it wants to be Ghostrunner 3.

Wall-running and swinging off poles works fine for a while. It's even somewhat liberating to play as someone so acrobatic in a genre that usually roots you stubbornly to the ground. But Valor Mortis occasionally demands perfect parkour from you in scripted set-pieces. This was around the point I debated throwing my gaming laptop into a roaring fire.

These feel like irritating memory tests rather than fun platforming challenges, and seem to forget I have access to a sprint button. Occasionally I'd leap on a platform only to be insta-killed because tsk tsk the game had plans to dramatically destroy that platform before I reached it, and my naughty sprinting ahead had spoiled the fun. Instant death for you.

A pity, because Valor Mortis does have a few nasty surprises (complimentary). I love how the 'dog' enemies are actually human soldiers who've horrifically twisted themselves into a canine shape. They then chase you, barking like bloodthirsty hounds. That's a stroke of evil genius. Please get it the hell away from me.

And there's a reason parrying is gaming's verb of choice at the moment. It feels great and jammy as hell to pull off, and that's still true here. The first person camera gives it a brutal you-are-there immediacy that a traditional third-person camera could only dream of.

The game's best boss fights, brutal parry-offs where you're only a few minor mistakes away from the grave, are immensely satisfying, even if a slightly wobbly power curve meant that the first boss was by far the most trouble I had.

Fair warning that jank currently runs through it like a French blade through a whiny British videogame critic (er, hopefully not?). Crashes to desktop, a framerate that's all over the place, and one boss suddenly not attacking me presumably because they're aware I'm on a tight review deadline – thanks again, The Orphan! I played this on a PC that ran Gears of War: E-Day without a hitch, so I'd recommend seeing how the launch day patch holds up across PC and console, which we're told addresses many of these issues.

As William explores, he occasionally hears the voice of Napoleon Bonaparte in his head, offering some unsolicited combat philosophy. Alas, Napoleon's hilariously banal insights wouldn't make the cut for an office motivational poster, let alone the battlefield. This is meant to be one of the greatest military strategists of all time? I'd be amazed if this chump could win a game of tiddlywinks.

Fortunately, other characters are a lot more fun. Like the mad scientist who keeps sending you out on deadly research expeditions, and whose understanding of ethics is up there with the Umbrella corporation. One village is praying to a mysterious deity, and learning whether she's a God, a myth, or a real person is one of the game's best reveals. Shockingly, several unseen children might just steal the entire show. They narrate and guide you through a destroyed city, covering the walls in adorably crap drawings of the monsters you've faced. Awww.

Valor Mortis is not without its charms. For the most part it's a perfectly playable Soulslike with combat that's satisfying to master. But I've seen all its tricks before, executed better, and a shift to first-person isn't enough to make this truly stand apart. Soulslike imitators really need to learn that FromSoftware didn't get where they are today by copying someone else's homework.

Valor Mortis was reviewed on PC, with code provided by the publisher.

In the mood for more-tis? Check out our best Soulslike games ranking, and games like Dark Souls recommendations!

Membrane gaming keyboards are some of the cheapest available, but they often have a hard time defending themselves against the budget end of the mechanical market. The Corsair Skiff 100 Plus sits at the usual $59.99 / £59.99, but its typing experience, extra macro keys and vibrant RGB lighting combined with a healthy propensity for discounts falling at around $49.99 / £39.99 mean this deck really can give some of those cheaper mechanical clackers something to think about.

It's only going to make sense if you're looking for a super silent gaming keyboard, and the best gaming keyboards at the top of the market have nothing to worry about, but even if you're on the fence about losing that thwack sound the smoothness of these rubber domes is enough to keep those with tired hands coming back.

I always find membrane keyboards troublesome on the old fingers. Their caps often need far more pressure than mechanical options to actuate, often with a mushy, almost-stuck, feeling to them. While I haven't exactly been dancing across the keys during my time with the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus, it's certainly the best membrane gaming keyboard I've tested so far from a typing feel standpoint.

Corsair Skiff 100 Plus design

Corsair isn't doing anything revolutionary with the design of the Skiff. This is an all-black plastic chassis illuminated by a bold set of bright LEDs. Yes, there's a little flex when pushing particularly hard on that top plate, but the plastic underneath feels sturdy and durable and hammering down on the keys themselves never presented a single bounce in my testing.

ABS keycaps can feel a little sticky under the fingertips, but are par for the course at this price. It should be noted, though, in the race against Amazon's collection of budget mechanical decks, that these clackers can't be replaced. Once they shine up, you're stuck with them.

That's one of the main drawbacks of membrane keyboards, though one the Glorious GMBK 75% manages to overcome particularly well. If only the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus combined its far preferable typing feel with Glorious's swappable caps.

Otherwise, we've got a full-sized layout here, with comfortable spacing between the main deck keys and plenty of space in the top right corner for that volume dial. Corsair hasn't skimped on this aspect either, while it's seemingly plastic on the top it still has that brushed aesthetic regularly threaded through this brand's keyboards.

My only real gripe with the design here is in the cable. It's permanently plugged into the deck and it's that old cheap rubber material that keeps its kinks no matter how flat you try and straighten it out.

The permanent connection will make travel a little squeakier and that cable construction makes for a pretty messy desktop experience before it's properly managed or tucked away.

Corsair Skiff 100 Plus features

Corsair uses standard rubber dome switches under each of its ABS keycaps, which means you're not getting the speed or smoothness of a mechanical clacker or the additional actuation controls of a Hall effect keyboard. Still, you're paying less than you usually would for a mainstream brand's gaming keyboard using either of those clackers, and getting more additional features in the process.

Membrane keyboards may sacrifice typing feel but they're still loved by players on a budget for their sturdy feature sets compared to comparably priced mechanical options. You're getting six additional macro keys lined up along the left side of the chassis here, for example. While they can only be configured with recorded macros, rather than system features, it's certainly more than you'll find from most budget mechanical options.

The volume dial on the top right also has other membrane keyboards like the Roccat Magma beat, though dedicated playback controls can only be accessed when holding the function button at the same time. That's neater than having to squeeze extra buttons onto the deck, but some may prefer track skips to have their own controls.

Surface-level customizations like basic RGB lighting effects and macro settings can be configured in Corsair Web Hub, but you'll need to download iCue to go deeper into each of those ten lighting zones and configure Win-Lock conditions. PS5 and PS4 compatibility mode can also be toggled with Fn+Windows, held for five seconds.

The Corsair Skiff 100 Plus also comes with a wrist rest in the box, which is always appreciated. In this case, the pad isn't quite as plush as you'll find on other, more expensive, models, but it's perfectly raised to provide a more comfortable angle for the keyboard itself and keeps the brand's soft-touch covering as well. It handles temperature particularly well, staying cool to the touch after longer sessions unlike some of the more pillowy options out there.

There's one 'but' here, and it's a little hidden in the spec sheet. The Corsair Skiff 100 Plus doesn't feature full N-key rollover, instead we're back to 12-key selective rollover here. That's not going to hurt most of us too much, though.

Corsair Skiff 100 Plus performance

Onto how the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus actually feels to use, and I will say I was surprised here. I'm normally warming up the hands when I prepare for a membrane keyboard review. Those heavier switches can take their toll on the joints.

While there's still more actuation force required here compared to a mechanical deck, though, the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus feels relatively breezy. Only the hybrid mecha-mechanical SteelSeries Apex 5 beats this one for typing feel among its peers. Every keystroke is smooth, and even manages to maintain a nice sense of tactility at the bottom of each press. Some keys feel a little lighter than others; main alphas are a little heavier, while larger keys like the backspace, space, and enter have a little more give to them.

In-game, repeat keypresses feel a little sluggish compared to a mechanical deck, but side by side with heavier switches that don't have this level of smoothness they're nearly sprightly. I was still able to zip across arenas in Doom: The Dark Ages, even if my CS:2 performance was a little more cumbersome than usual.

Crucially, keypresses are recorded as quickly as casual players will need them, and feel comparatively comfortable when they are.

Should you buy the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus?

Casual gamers looking for a keyboard to run their everyday Steam library will be happy here, while I'd still recommend typists opt for something more mechanical under the hood. That $59.99 / £59.99 full price is set a little awkwardly against cheaper mechanical decks, but if you value additional macro controls and a wrist rest more than a lighter typing feel the Skiff 100 Pro is well worth keeping an eye on. With discounts settling early in this keyboard's life, I'm hopeful this one will find itself at $40-$50 soon enough - and that price it's an easy recommendation for membrane keyboard fans.

How I tested the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus

I used the Corsair Skiff 100 Plus for all my daily work and play for a period of one week, while testing alongside some alternatives for a second week. That was a busy few weeks of typing, but I also took the Skiff out for a spin in my usual roster of Doom: The Dark Ages and CS:2 as well as some Planet Coaster 2 and High on Life 2. For more information on how we test gaming keyboards, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

We're also rounding up the best hot-swappable keyboards and the best wireless gaming keyboards for more options.

It's not so bad, I thought. What could it cost? $150? $170? Nope.

The Corsair Vanguard 99 Air is a wireless optical mechanical keyboard with a nicely quiet low profile typing experience, but a key piece of software that I couldn't get working. And it costs $259.99.

That's the price of some of the best gaming keyboards on the market, decks tuned with high-end typing experiences, feature-full magnetic switches, or luxury build materials. It can't be the price of the low-profile clackers I've had on (and off) my desk for the last few months.

Corsair has been flying high with recent releases like the Vanguard Pro 96 and Galleon 100 SD shooting to the top of my recommendation lists. The Corsair Vanguard 99 Air may serve you well if you're after a low profile option with silent keystrokes, but it's going to be difficult to fully get behind in 2026.

What I like about the Corsair Vanguard 99 Air Wireless

Compact 99% layout

Squished gaming keyboard layouts are becoming far more popular as folk push toward more compect designs while still keeping their number pads intact. That's certainly a trend I can get behind, especially with the Vanguard Air 99's additional strip of macro keys running down the right hand side as well.

It's a little longer than a 96% offering, and still suffers slightly from the squished arrow keys in the Corsair Vanguard Pro 96, but ultimately you're getting everything you need here without having to load a behemoth onto your desk.

Slick design

From the semi-transparent accent keys to its subtle RGB lighting, the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 gets a lot right with it aesthetic. Even the slightly rounded keycaps offer a nicely comfortable landing spot with just the right amount of visual interest to keep the board looking slick on a desk.

That extends through to the typing experience as well. These are notably quiet clackers, but it's impossible not to be impressed with the sound dampening underneath as well. Every keystroke feels cushioned but sounds it as well. Rather than the echoes, pings, and thocks of a chunkier mechanical deck, all I can hear is the tippity taps of particularly light optical clackers.

Good key travel

Once thing that generally puts me off about low profile keyboards is their lack of, to put it obviously, depth. I know I know, a low profile deck is all about light touches, speed, and soft pressure, but I prefer a tactility that few slimline decks can accomplish.

Corsair has nailed it here, with a suitably satisfying feel to each keystroke that manages to keep everyday typing and gaming rich and interesting while still keeping that silent low profile DNA.

Meaningful screen updates

Since the launch of the Corsair Vanguard Pro 96 and its pretty boring display / glorified digital photo frame, Corsair has added more screen options to its iCue-supported devices. Now that the Vanguard Air 99 is among them, you've got a good supply of options to keep tucked away in that top right corner. Media information, FPS, weather, and calendar displays are all available... as well as your photos.

What to consider

Some typing... quirks

Unfortunately, the first major problem I encountered with the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 was its chatter, and it was a problem that presented itself almost immediately. Multiple inputs are regularly detect off a single keystroke and it's pretty frequent.

This was ultimately solved with a later firmware update on a new unit, but it should be known that the original device I received suffered pretty heavily.

Concerning Stream Deck functionality

Finally, we get to one of the most frustrating parts of the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 experience. Those seven macro keys lined up along the right side of the deck are designed to work with the brand's Stream Deck software for a greater degree of flexibility in your extra controls. The key word there being 'designed' to.

In reality, I couldn't get the Stream Deck software to recognize the keyboard once, no matter how it was connected, how up to date both the keyboard and software were, and even with a completely fresh second unit at my disposal. Corsair supplied me with a brand new retail device after I got in touch around this issue, but unfortunately it was never resolved in my testing.

Should you buy the Corsair Vanguard Air 99?

I wouldn't recommend the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 to anyone initially drawn in by the promise of that Stream Deck integration and, considering the price point, I'd be wary recommending it to those just looking for a low profile keyboard. It feels solid in the hands, but with early chattering and this level of software volatility, it's difficult to call the Air 99 a reliable piece of kit.

If you're after a silent-as-possible low profile keyboard and don't mind potentially missing out on one of the advertised features, there's still a nicely designed deck to be found here. Smooth typists and light-handed players will be delighted with the overall build and feel and that boosted screen works a lot harder than previous iterations as well. Ultimately, though, this isn't an easy recommendation to make - especially at this price point.

The competition

How I tested the Corsair Vanguard Air 99

I've had the Corsair Vanguard Air 99 on my desk for a total of four weeks (and in my possession for a few months). That's because I spent two weeks putting the deck through all my usual speed, durability, and typing tests before trading my device out for a new one following chatter and connectivity issues. With a fresh unit in hand, I tested for a further two weeks afterwards.

I primarily tested across Apex Legends and CS2, with additional gameplay in Planet Coaster 2, Doom: The Dark Ages, and Farming Simulator 25, while using the keyboard for everyday productivity at the same time. For more information on how we test gaming keyboards, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

I'm rounding up plenty more of the best wireless gaming keyboards as well as the best hot-swappable keyboards on the market as well.

On paper, Avatar: Seven Havens is absolute catnip for me. Picking up at some point long after Legend of Korra, the world has been reduced to seven havens (get it?) following a mysterious cataclysm that the remaining people blame the previous Avatar for causing. Heady stuff! In practice, however, this juicy plot and narrative threads are let down by inconsistent animation and hard-to-follow action.

Note: spoilers for the end of episode 1 follow.

The new show follows Pavi and Nisha, long-lost twins who also happen to both(?) be the Avatar(s) somehow. From every in-universe source as well as everything we as viewers know, if true double Avatars would be a first. The mystery of how that's possible, what happened to them and the world at large, and the struggles of the city of Ellora to survive is the driving force behind the new animated show's first season.

New faces, new places

Helpfully, this is all completely fascinating to me, a huge Avatar nerd that's seen the movie and other shows, read the comics, and owns every art book. Post-apocalyptic Avatar setting? Yes, please. What do you mean Korra ruined the world? How is it possible there are two Avatars? This kind of hype is intentionally cultivated, of course, but I would be lying if I said it didn't work on me.

One major hurdle any new Avatar show is going to encounter, just like Legend of Korra before it, is that introducing a new Avatar as protagonist essentially means an entirely new cast and setting. They're generational, so it's not like, for example, Asami can reasonably feature heavily in Avatar: Seven Havens even if Legend of Korra had a bit of a "have your cake and eat it too" attitude by slipping in very old characters from the original show as well as descendants.

But Nisha and Pavi are immediately charming, and their supporting cast of Jae and Karthik, among others, stand out even if they're not quite the Team Avatar of old. The fact that Nisha and Pavi are voiced by Aishu Devan and Saheli Khan, respectively, also helps bridge the gap a bit given they're roughly as young as Zach Tyler Eisen was when voicing Aang in the original Last Airbender series. There's a throughline there, whereas Korra always felt more like an adult.

All the ways in which this really works for me and pushes the right buttons are frustrated by the simple fact that Avatar: Seven Havens often just doesn't look that good when it matters. I won't speculate as to how it happened or why, but the work produced by Avatar Studios and Nickelodeon Animation Studios, with animation services provided by French studio La Chouette Compagnie, regularly pales in comparison to previous Avatar offerings.

It is perhaps unfair that Avatar Aang: The Last Airbender, the sequel movie to the original series, released earlier this year and looks incredible – animated movie budgets and animated series budgets are not the same. Plus, Studio Mir (known for its previous work on the Avatar franchise) crafts a high bar to clear, even if I've quite enjoyed other La Chouette productions like the Disney animated series Dragon Striker.

Braving the elements

While the Avatar: Seven Havens environments and backgrounds are colorful and bright with some incredible attention paid to lighting at times, most of the major character design elements feel flat. Compared to the design of the city of Ellora, which is awesome in the literal sense of the word and regularly gets featured in broad, zooming shots, major characters feel a bit bland even if the crowds of nameless characters are themselves nice to look at.

But the real problem is Avatar: Seven Havens' action. The martial arts and bending of the elements while mixing the two are hallmarks of the franchise, and Seven Havens has a readability problem. It doesn't matter how fast or slick your animation is if it can't be followed logically, and Seven Havens frequently gets lost. Even in isolation, it's rarely impressive, though there are still several moments that stand out, like Jae taking on multiple bandits at once, for example, despite my overall disappointment.

I take no pleasure in now agreeing with much of the early sentiment towards Avatar: Seven Havens. When the trailers first came out, the collective response to the animation was fairly tepid, but I firmly planted my feet on the "wait and see" side of the line. Trailers are rarely representative of an entire product! But I waited, and I've seen, and I've unfortunately been left wanting. The classic Avatar theme rising up behind Nisha and Pavi embracing their destiny is wildly effective when it happens, but it can't make sequences that follow look any better.

Avatar: Seven Havens is out now on Paramount Plus, with new episodes releasing weekly. For more, here's our guide to the best new TV shows heading your way.

When it comes to retro gaming, the Lego PlayStation represents one of the most iconic and instantly recognizable consoles ever produced, marking Sony's arrival on the scene that would change the gaming industry forever. Unlike the previously released scaled-down Lego Sega Genesis Console (40926), the PlayStation is recreated on an almost perfect 1:1 scale with the original, making it an eye-catching display piece and easily one of the best Lego sets for retro gamers.

Lego PlayStation features

• Iconic console
• Full size replica
• Incredible detail

The first thing that strikes you when you see the Lego PlayStation is just how much it looks like the actual console, which is no mean feat when you consider its unique shape and all of the curved surfaces involved! Likewise, the DualShock – Sony's first controller – is perfectly recreated despite the unusual angle of its hand grips, as well as sporting those iconic PlayStation face buttons.

Price will no doubt be a deciding factor for many people, as the Lego PlayStation is going to set you back $179.99 / £139.99 which places it firmly in the premium collectable category. However, I believe that it earns this increased price tag, due to the sheer number of impressive features packed into that classic gray case.

PlayStation build

• Hidden details included right from the start
• Two internal dioramas that can be viewed externally
• Easy to follow instructions despite complex elements

Naturally, you're going to be working your way through a lot of gray bricks that make up the exterior of the Lego PlayStation, however the internal build is far from boring. One of the first things you construct as you start forming the base is a large PS symbol, with color scheme matching the original logo. Around this a green layer is formed with gold and silver pieces laid on top, which actually has the appearance of components on a circuit board and really gives the impression that you're looking at the internal workings of an electronic device.

Then we get to the two internal dioramas, representing huge PlayStation hits Gran Turismo and Ape Escape. These pack a great deal of detail into a small area, and while constructing them can be a little fiddly due to the many tiny pieces involved, the overall effect is worth the effort. I particularly enjoyed that the Gran Turismo cars are actually minifig roller skates with different colored tiles on top, and that the main Ape Escape character has an interchangeable red or blue helmet – with a nearby box built into the scenery to hold the other piece!

I'm even prepared to forgive the 15 small stickers used in these areas, as the rest of the pieces with designs on them (such as the external buttons and logos) are all printed and look great. While the dioramas slot snugly into place within the PlayStation, they can easily be slid out by pulling the sides of the console outwards, for clearer viewing or display.

PlayStation design

• Incredibly accurate recreation
• Technically impressive design
• Working Power and Open buttons

It's hard to overstate the amount of attention to detail and effort that has gone into making this set an almost perfect recreation of the PlayStation console and controller, which really stands out when you see it side by side with the original machine! Everything matches up perfectly, from the AC In, AV Multi Out, and Serial I/O ports on the back, to the ridges along the sides and controller ports at the front that you can actually plug the DualShock into. Flip it over and it even has the four 'rubber' feet in the correct places, a detail most may not even see!

Of course, the stand out feature on the Lego PlayStation is the working buttons on the top, which function through a clever series of pivots and rubber cushions. Press the Power button and a luminous rod pops up through a slot in front of it to represent the LED lighting up, while a prod of the Open button causes the disc tray lid to smoothly swing upwards exactly as you remember it. Push the lid back down and it locks into place with a satisfyingly click, again just as the original did.

This functioning mechanism really gives Lego PlayStation the "wow" factor, and every single person I've shown it to has been blown away by how impressive it is. You do have to be a little careful when operating it, as if you push either of the buttons down too hard they can become jammed within their housing, but this is relatively easy to fix and shouldn't happen if they're used with the care this set deserves.

Should you buy PlayStation?

There have now been a few officially licensed Lego games console sets released, but in my mind the PlayStation stands above them as an impressive and incredibly detailed tribute to an iconic retro console. I constantly had a smile on my face while building it due to all of the wonderful little touches and the genuinely remarkable mechanics that make it function, so if it's within your budget then you shouldn't hesitate to make it part of your collection.

Ratings

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if...

How we tested Lego PlayStation #72306

This review was made using a set provided by a third-party PR company on behalf of Lego.

I built the Lego PlayStation (72306) set over a few sessions, with the main console taking me around 8 hours to build followed by another hour or so to complete the controller. With the pieces divided between a total of 14 bags, there are plenty of neat break points so you can make your individual sessions as long or short as you like.

For more, check out our guide to how we test products.

For more recommendations on cool collectibles, why not check out our guide to the best toys?

Early on in Clive Barker's Hellraiser: Revival, as I try to escape a torture dungeon full of mangled victims with only a plank of wood for protection, a huge man in tough leather stomps towards me, calling me "vanilla" as he shrugs off my hits. In a way, he's not wrong. While the violent adventure protagonist Aiden Lynch is thrust into is filled with extreme gore and upsetting imagery, its core combat is fairly basic. Enemies take hits until eventually keeling over on the spot, and guns I pick up later feel like peashooters.

Then I get my hands back on the Genesis Configuration, the mysterious puzzle box that led to me being kidnapped in the first place (after my girlfriend Sunny is summoned through an impossible gateway in our bedroom mid-coitus), and the whirring mechanism that is Hellraiser: Revival begins to reshape, shift, and slot into place.

Such sights

With Cenobite Hell Priest 'Pinhead' (voiced by original actor Doug Bradley) and his crew's pain-dimension antics serving as an enigmatic third-party, and themes that revolve around the arrogance of humans and boundary pushing without demonizing fetishes, Revival feels true to the spirit of Clive Barker's The Hellbound Heart novella, and the original Hellraiser movies. Ditching the direct-to-video sequels that turned the Cenobites into simplistic slasher villains, it's great to see the nuance and complexity of their torturous machinations return. This isn't just a great Hellraiser game, but a great continuation of Hellraiser across any medium.

Even so, there's no escaping it – Hellraiser: Revival is still a horror-themed action game that has to take Aiden through a sequence of bloodsoaked combat rooms. Yet, an increasing number of toys, from propelling flames towards enemies or flinging metal saws across the room to decapitate foes Gravity Gun-style, keep action interesting. There's a Condemned: Criminal Origins-like grottiness and emphasis on melee combat. If an Xbox 360 crackled with the blue electrical energy that marks a Cenobite visitation, this would be the result.

While fights could use more impact, and finisher animations are somewhat limited, there are still moments that impress, whether that's cutting off the limb of a human enemy and having them begin to bleed out before instantly collapsing, or switching to a baseball bat to batter armor away, exposing flesh to damage. Eventual supernatural threats, the shambling Unworthy, even offer Doom-like health restoration if you get close enough to finish them off with your Genesis cube once they're staggered.

Gore in combat is one thing – who hasn't lopped off limbs in a game before? – even if the occasional opportunity to command the Hellraiser series' iconic hook-chains is a novelty. But, Hellraiser: Revival ratchets up to another level in set-dressing and cutscenes. This is undoubtedly one of the most explicit games I've ever played, with scenes ranging from flaying to body-ripping and stomach-churning flesh statues. One primary antagonist has shades of Bioshock's Sander Cohen about him, but here his flesh artistry is truly sickening to observe.

Many moments are direct callbacks to the original Hellraiser movies as well, though arguably have more impact as, here, completely digital, there's no blurred line between real and practical effect. Hellraiser: Revival has plenty of new sights to show you as well. It's almost the game's mission to ensure you find something stomach churning. (I'm avoiding showing too much in the screenshots here).

After fighting my way through this cult's basement, solving the odd puzzle to progress, I emerge into a thriving sex nightclub that serves as the organization's front. The standard club goers here are innocents, just looking for a place to have a good time, while the Cenobite-worshipping cult are essentially posers who use the guise of BDSM to prey on the vulnerable, who mask their sex club in positive, consent-forward posters until one step into the VIP section they're replaced with banners hailing their prophet.

As always with Hellraiser, villainous depravity is dialed up to 11, but there's truth in how Hellraiser: Revival tackles the subculture its themes are rooted in, and how bad actors can hide their own selfish abuse behind rhetoric. Count yourself lucky if you've never crossed paths with someone like that.

Thankfully, Pinhead has just as little time for the cult as Aiden does – though more out of a bored apathy that its leaders think they can match the Cenobites' freak – sending you on a collision course to take out them out in exchange for favors from Leviathan's labyrinthine realm.

While, as a game rooted in combat sequences, the focus is often on meting out ironic punishment against enactors of abuse, there are some surprising moments of sweetness. One early, short scene has Aiden talking frankly about consent boundaries with a patron at the club as he searches for a keycard. Likewise, on his quest to revive Sunny from the Hell-like Labyrinth, Pinhead emphasizes to Aiden that she entered the pain dimension of her own consensual volition and that, if resurrected, she has just as much free will to leave Aiden again if she wishes.

Demons to some

Plumbing the cult's base of operations for clues, and exploring the Labyrinth and its nightmarish reflections on reality, Hellraiser: Revival effectively explores objectification, control, and consent in relationships more responsibly than a lot of other games would dream of. For all its shocking violent imagery, Hellraiser: Revival can also be thematically mature. It's clear Saber Interactive really understands what sets Hellraiser's original entries apart from the horror competition. The story itself has been worked on collaboratively with Hellraiser's creator Clive Barker, and it shows. In that respect, this a much better resurrection of the Cenobites than the flashy but shallow Brucker-directed 2022 Hellraiser reboot.

This sense of purpose helps make the gore that litters the cult's compound feel more than pure shock value – though in Hellraiser the shock is part of the point too. Exploring denser, lively environments is where Hellraiser: Revival shines, such as poking around a deranged artist's workshop (and occasionally bopping enemies that emerge from Iron Maidens), or tracking down a ticket to gain entry to a peep show. Detours through sewers and woods are less interesting, though, thankfully, don't overstay their welcome.

Between gunning through these locations, Aiden finds himself intermittently visiting the Labyrinth realm from which the Cenobites hail. Filled with tight, claustrophobic tunnels, and clever use of quick-loads to create impossible geometry and decoy dead ends, these excursions feel true to the movies – Hellraiser 2 especially – while also making creative use of the digital medium.

No combat ever occurs in the Labyrinth, but there is danger. Sequences where Chatterer – the teeth-chattering, mouth-flayed creature – pursues you by walking menacingly towards you and teleporting around are nice and tense without being too demanding, the slight increase in pressure amplifying the disorientation of the maze to great effect. Sliding under hallway block death-chains to get away feels humorously like Call of Duty's omnimovement, and it's not long before I'm taking my traversal skills outside the Labyrinth to stunt on shotgun-wielding enemies back in the real world.

Light puzzling also exists here, but is thankfully not obtrusive. When it's revealed that the Genesis Configuration can move platforms at a distance and transfer fire between sconces, I worried that these would get in the way – the last thing I want is Pinhead tutorializing me on environmental puzzles – but they don't appear too often.

Snappy as good horror should be, Hellraiser: Revival took me just under 9 hours to beat, and never kept me in one place for too long. Despite some maps and number pad puzzles that give the impression of Resident Evil-like spaces, this is much more linear and keeps moving rapidly, always changing up the types of spaces and action you're doing even if combat does loom larger than I'd like, and I spend a touch too long juggling my limited inventory space between bullets and bandages.

Only during some so-so boss battles and fiddly insta-fail stealth sections do I start to get restless, but even these are infrequent. I even find myself invested in the narrative right up until the credits drop (which feature an unmissable, diabolical, and utterly iconic music remix I won't spoil here but had me cheering out loud). My horror gaming besties know that's a rare treat indeed, and it's a game I'm still turning in my (pin)head even now.

Rarely subtle, Hellraiser: Revival's rawness is truly shocking, but what's stuck with me more than the sights of sculpted, twisted muscles are the stories behind them. For a game based on Clive Barker's work (seriously, read the Books of Blood if you haven't), that's the right place to land. This is a pain that lingers.

Cliver Barker's Hellraiser: Revival was reviewed on PC, with code provided by the publisher.

Want to raise more hell? Check out our best horror games ranking, and keep an eye on our upcoming horror games list for more.

You've likely seen the HyperX Cloud III before.

It's a common sight to behold if you've ever spent time hunting through the best gaming headsets on Amazon, which is what led me to finally test it out for myself. I wanted to ensure anyone who didn't take the time to scroll through the second page of Amazon's search results was still getting their money's worth. Just because a headset turns up on page one doesn't necessarily mean it's worth your time and attention, but that does happen to be the case here.

Its fantastic sound, comfortable fit, and multi-platform prowess make it a worthwhile pickup, and its White-Pink colorway (which I tested below) is perfectly suited for cute and cozy setups. Though if you are debating adding this to your online shopping basket, just make sure it's sporting one of its many, many discounts before you buy.

Key specs

Design

HyperX lives by the "if it's not broke, don't fix it" philosophy when it comes to the look of its headsets, and the Cloud III is no different. If it weren't for the fact that I opted for the White-Pink version for review, this headset would look identical to its wireless counterpart, the HyperX Cloud 3 Wireless. Which is great, as just because you're choosing the less feature-full version of the two doesn't mean that you deserve the least best-looking of the pair.

As this is pretty much the same headset, it shares the same over-ear form factor, lightly memory foam-padded leather headband, and metal yokes. With this 'White-Pink' version, the yokes are a cool-toned metallic pink rather than red, and the cups, fabric-coated cord, and headband are all draped in the same bright white paint job.

While this design has been used before, that doesn't stop me from being a fan. The brand's decision to ensure the yokes, 'HyperX' logos, the interior of the earcups, and the tiny speckles of the accompanying cord are all pink with this model in particular has won me over. Especially as it blends in well with my cute and cozy work-in-progress PC gaming setup.

Features

Wired headsets like the HyperX Cloud II aren't bursting at the seams with features, but there's still a bit more to this pair than meets the eye. It's equipped with angled 53mm drivers, with a 10Hz-21kHz sound frequency, and is compatible with a wide range of gaming platforms thanks to the brand's unique cabling.

Instead of a basic USB-C wired connection. HyperX has included a 3.5mm cable with an extension that provides the option of USB-C. The headset also includes a USB-A adapter (which is attached by default) to open it up to more platforms, including that of the PS5. While this may not seem exciting to some, I've tested alternatives in a similar price range, like that of the Asus TUF Gaming H1 GEN II Hatsune Miku Edition wired headset, which was limited to USB-A only, so this is a refreshing sight to behold. Sure, you could always just buy an adapter, but I'm always going to prefer it when brands provide everything you need from the get-go.

Additionally, the wired Cloud III features a detachable Electret condenser microphone and onboard controls, including a mic mute button and volume dial.

Performance

With the high price of the Cloud III, I was expecting a lot, and I was not disappointed. While not as densely packed as I prefer, the memory foam padding on the underside of the headband made the pair incredibly comfortable to wear for long periods of time, which was handy now that Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave is taking up all my free time.

As the latest game in the series has got me glued to my Switch 2, I chose to test the pair's audio with the handheld first and foremost, and it was an easy feat. Thanks to the cabling choice, I was able to pop off the USB-A adapter and stick the headset directly into the console's top USB-C port. Both the game's audio and dialogue absolutely shone through the white-added cups, which was exactly what a game that relies on amping you up through triumphant battles needed.

Talking of the sound, I was a big fan of what the pair was able to muster, no matter if I was glued to Fire Emblem or playing on my PC, PS5, and even my Steam Deck. The extended frequency meant that there was more room for low-end sounds to pull through, which lent itself to games and music alike. I've recently been on a bit of a Smashing Pumpkins kick, and Billy's guitar has never sounded clearer or crunchier - which is exactly what you want when it comes to a Siamese Dream album playthrough.

Throughout my testing, the cord did become a bit of an annoyance, particularly as it's pretty long. However, its adaptability meant I could pop off one end and use the 3.5mm connection instead. This came in handy when it came to not just the Switch 2, but the PC too.

My rig only has one USB-C port, and as I test a lot of tech, it's often already in use. However, I could easily adapt the Cloud III to my setup, as I had 3.5mm, USB-A, and USB-C connection types to play around with. The long cabling was a bit of a nuisance while I was playing through Counter-Strike 2 or Marvel Rivals on Steam, and sat most of the time curled up on my lap as I helped keep my team healed and alive as Invisible Women. However, I'd much rather it be too long than too short.

The microphone of the HyperX Cloud III is also just as fantastic as the audio quality. If you want a clear and concise recording without any unwanted background noise, this is it. It's also detachable, so if you prefer to stick with microphones like that of the Shure MV7i and not have a headset one dangling in your peripheral vision, you can remove it entirely.

Much like the rest of the headset's design, I also love the look of it. Looks aren't as important as sound quality, but again, I'm still thankful HyperX chose to add a drop of color, utilizing the same dusty pink on its grill as found across the pair. Often, microphone headsets can add a cheapness to an accessory's appearance, but the white and pink microphone adds to the can's cute, cozy, and sleek aesthetics.

Should you buy the HyperX Cloud III gaming headset?

The HyperX Cloud III is undoubtedly pricey for a wired headset. At $99.99 / £101.99 there's a huge range of wireless alternatives you could buy in its stead, and I'd recommend that you do - particularly as models like SteelSeries Arctis Nova 3 Wireless can be picked up for less when there's sales inbound, and it provides wired and wireless connectivity options.

However, because the Cloud III isn't exactly new, you're far more likely to find it sitting at $56 / £69, and that's a perfectly reasonable price to pay. Just like most headsets, as it's been around the block, it's prone to discounts and is a regular feature of big sales events, from Prime Day to Black Friday.

Anything under $60 / £70 feels more appropriate for this headset. If you happen to stumble upon it at Amazon or anywhere else for that price (or for even less), you should snap it up if great audio quality, a great microphone, and a comfortable fit are high up on your list of priorities.

How I tested the HyperX Cloud III gaming headset

During a two-week testing period, I hooked up the HyperX Cloud III wired headset to my PC, PS5, and the Nintendo Switch 2 to put its 53mm audio drivers to work. On the PC, I picked up Counter-Strike 2, Marvel Rivals, and Dispatch; meanwhile, Marvel Rivals, Doom Eternal, Fortnite, and Silent Hill Townfall were my testing games of choice when it came to Sony's pixel-pusher.

When it came to the Switch 2, I played Mario Kart World and Fire Emblem Fortune's Weave using the pair, while keeping it on my head when it came to some Netflix downtime to watch Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story, and catching up with The Shards via Disney+. Additionally, I used the wired cans to listen to a range of genres on Spotify, most notably Troye Sivan and the Smashing Pumpkins.

For more information on how we test gaming headsets, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

Not sure if the HyperX Cloud III wired headset is for you? Check out our guides to the best PC headset for gaming, the best PS5 headset, and the best Xbox Series X headset for more options for your setup.

I haven't had this much fun waking up in a strange diner and fighting for my life since Fahrenheit. Silver Pines wears its influences on its traditional detective coat sleeve, and that's by no means a bad thing. It fuses together the elements it's taking from each masterfully, resulting in a survival horror Metroidvania that is powerfully gripping from start to finish as Detective Walker investigates a strange, forgotten, and abandoned town on the trail of a missing musician.

Beautiful painterly visuals contrast the grimness of the setting very nicely. As does the relaxing ambient music from jukeboxes or radios that breaks up some of the quietness of exploration. The dreamlike quality combined with nightmarish content invoke a very strong and moody atmosphere that perfectly accompanies its investigative storyline where reality itself comes into question.

Silver lining

Not only does Silver Pines look and sound good, it also feels good thanks to excellent pacing across both its narrative and with how you progress through its haunting, dense world.

Unlocking new items allows Walker to traverse new areas of the detailed map, making it exciting to revisit past areas to push further into the secret corners of Silver Pines. While inventory juggling and unlocking is vital in the likes of Resident Evil as well with its many, many keys, Silver Pines bridges that gap to feel more Metroidvania shaped in how the map unfurls and you keep feeling like you're pushing at the space's boundaries.

This system interplays spectacularly with the inventory management in how tools have multiple uses. The crowbar, which can pull down wooden panels, is a lot more versatile than the box cutter, but naturally takes up more space. It does at least double as a melee weapon though, so it doesn't feel like wasted item slots to be taking it everywhere with you. The manhole cover key, on the other hand, is a little more of a nuisance. Where key items in Resi frequently get used up, they stick around far more often in Silver Pines.

You can combine items, find upgrades for your guns so they take up less space, and often leave key components in the puzzle you know they're for so you're not left carting them around while you look for the rest. There are also plenty of storage boxes so you can swap out what you need or think you might need (i.e. more guns) so you're always prepared. But you really do have to move, transfer, combine and rotate things in your inventory on a regular basis to optimize what you're carrying. "I'll never run out of empty bottles," I said, and then did and wondered if I could pour my Molotov cocktail all over the floor so I could stuff some herbs into it instead.

Silver Pines' camera system is a wonderful way of making it easier to keep track of mysteries and areas, which builds on the now-beloved mechanic from Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown. Found a point of interest? Take a quick pic. Silver Pines encourages you to do so while examining objects or coming across key areas on the map, but you can and should use it a lot more of your own volition, as any good detective would.

I take snaps of signs with numbers I want to call. Signs that may hold some secret information on a second glance. The price of cigarettes? Yeah, that could be important. Snap it. You also don't want to find yourself thinking it will be easy to come back to an item when you have the space to pick it up and then wandering the town in a daze searching for it later. Don't be like me. Use your camera plenty.

Little touches like the item vending machine and using the pay phones for both saving and story purposes add an extra layer of shine to an already polished game. Yes, you do have to pay to use the phone, so it's always worth giving the coin slot a good rummage.

Checking in with your client, Mr Jackman, by saving also helps remind you what you're up to when you pick up a save and lets you know when you're on the right track. Even when I'm sure of my path ahead, I'm always curious to hear what Walker's updated report will be. The game is kind enough to sometimes have Jackman call you after particularly big story moments (usually capped off with a boss fight) so there are a few free save opportunities if you're totally short on coins too.

Come Pine with me

Silver Pines is a game that sticks with you. I rolled from one ending right into the next and into the next, trying to scrape together whatever clues I could while finishing off what I needed for them and turning everything over in my mind even while I wasn't playing.

I scoured the map for vents I hadn't opened, ledges I hadn't yet thrown myself off to see what was down there and I usually found something to make it worth my while. I ended up going back and wiping out any last straggler enemies just so the whole town was safe for me to bring up my inventory and pore over my notes at any given time. And because no one wants a Silent Hill-esque monstrosity lurching after them while they're desperately looking for a vending machine.

Really the only problem I have is that Silver Pines can get in its own way with its storytelling. Even with a strong idea of where the story was heading, I was gripped to learn and discover everything I could. It does such a strong job of worldbuilding and creating intrigue into the town as a whole, not just Walker's own objective, that three endings later I still have questions and wild theories that I want more information on.

I'm left here going full Jonathan Frakes in Beyond Belief: What's the importance of the TV shows? Why let me call the Conmag number? What does it all mean?! Everything is so well-choreographed that it feels off for there to be loose ends.

While it's true that great horror keeps mysteries spinning long after you've finished with them, it feels like all the Silver Pines endings I've uncovered (which is all of them) stop just short of arriving in the sweet spot, feeling like I've missed something rather than being truly haunted by forbidden discovery.

As things are, it's a disservice to such an excellent game to be left unsatisfied. Maybe it's about the journey rather than the destination, but I don't feel like the journey is over and honestly I don't want it to be. I'll be messing with my pushpins and red string a while longer, hoping there is more to come, as it's a world I'm not ready to be done with. Perhaps this whole thing is an elaborate ploy to teach me that perfection is unattainable.

Silver Pines was reviewed with PC code via Steam Deck, with a code provided by the publisher.

Check out our best survival horror games ranking for more!

There's a massive laundry list of changes in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt Remastered, but you know what the singular best one is? They fixed those accursed trees Roach gets stuck on when you're on horseback.

The Witcher 3 has long been recognized as both a pivotal RPG and open-world game, but it's undeniable there's a host of little frustrations that have always been present in the fantasy epic. Chief among those, for me, was the way Roach would always get stuck or snagged by trees as you rode by them – and while that may seem like an innocuous change on paper, that no longer happening is a genuine major frustration taken off the board.

More largely, it's indicative of what The Witcher 3 Remastered is on a larger scale. No one really asked for this update, or even expected it, but it's hard to deny that it improves The Witcher 3 pretty much across the board. It's made me think about how quickly we move on from video games in general, and how I wish we'd have more chances to return to games of the past, not just with visual remasters or remakes – but an integral look at how the core systems and experience can be refined or improved.

An old friend

When The Witcher 3 released, I was still in college, living in a tiny house that was, somehow, even smaller than a two-bedroom apartment. I remember being locked in my closet of a bedroom for 300 hours, entranced by The Witcher 3 and the world it effortlessly weaves. As someone, at that time, without friends, overworked, and destitutely poor, there was something about Geralt's experience that deeply resonated with me. A character locked into a path he never chose, but trying to make the best of it.

While I don't want to focus too much on the original experience of The Witcher 3, I can say that returning to the game again years later has only grown my appreciation of it. The Witcher 3's writing felt like a step above in 2015, but even over a decade later, there are very few games that can match it. The complexity of its morality and choices, the way those side quests effortlessly weave into the overarching narrative, and Geralt's fascinating growth as a father all still have real emotional heft. Of course, none of that is lost with this remaster, and it also includes The Witcher 3's two expansions. Two exceptional tales that reflect Geralt in new ways, digging into regret and redemption in Hearts of Stone, and longing for a peaceful life in Blood and Wine.

The remaster doesn't make The Witcher 3 feel like a new game; it's ostensibly the same experience, shining highs, warts, and all. That's by and large a good thing, as the messy nature of The Witcher 3 is ultimately what makes it so intoxicating – a grand journey and riveting world that feels living, breathing. But so many of those warts have now been papered over and made less egregious, if not nonexistent now. It's a bit like your friend dying their hair and getting a new haircut – you never imagined them with that hairdo, but now that you see it, it's really working.

This remaster feels very much in line with the Cyberpunk 2077 2.0 update CD Projekt Red released for its sci-fi RPG, and I'm honestly a bit blown away by the sheer amount of changes across the board here, and how thoughtful many of them feel.

The most obvious alteration in this remaster is a complete graphical overhaul, with lighting in particular being given the most attention. For the most part, the visual upgrade makes The Witcher 3 even more stunning, with environments especially given an extra pop. The Italian Riviera-inspired fields of Tuissant shimmer in the sunlight, and you can almost feel the thick humidity of Velen's swamps. Hair physics have also been touched up, and character animations look even smoother.

While I largely think the visuals lean into The Witcher 3's distinct blend of realism and stylization even more, there is the occasional character that looks just a bit wonky in the upgraded visuals. Equally, this visual upgrade seemingly comes with a few new performance issues. Playing on PC I've occasionally run into slowdowns in some of the busier scenes or combat encounters. But it should be noted that CD Projekt Red has already committed to performance improvements.

While you likely wouldn't notice unless you were deliberately looking for it, there's a whole wealth of new animations spread across combat as well. Geralt has new visual effects for casting Signs, new combat finishers, and idle animations. These changes are subtle, obviously, but add a greater sense of variety, especially when you combine them with the sweeping changes made to gameplay systems.

The Witcher 3 Remastered's visual upgrade is nice, but where the majority of changes lie for this version of the game is in gameplay changes. Again, I must state here how utterly thankful I am to be rid of that godforsaken tree problem.

But the change I legitimately enjoy the most is the overhauled skill system, which feels much smarter, streamlined, and encourages experimentation. The original game's skill system was, in short, a mess. Even just the layout of the skill system has been entirely changed, resembling more of a proper skill tree now rather than just a slapdash grid of things to choose from. This visually makes a whole lot more sense, providing a nice new sense of progression. But under the hood, there have also been changes to refine bonus values for skills, synergies between certain skills, and more.

It's a bit hard to drill down into exactly how this changes things, but after a few dozen hours, I can say I absolutely found The Witcher 3's progression more satisfying with this system. It feels drastically easier to make "builds" now, and really fine-tune what kind of Witcher you want to play as, whether that's a sword-slinging expert or a crafty master of bombs and potions.

To complement these changes, combat has a new "Modern" camera that tracks closer to Geralt to make the action pop, while enemy behavior has also been very slightly tweaked. These changes aren't enough to make The Witcher 3's combat one of the all-time greats, but it does go a decent way to making battles feel more dynamic and challenging. I particularly like the new camera design, as it feels like even that slight shift in perspective makes battles feel more like crunchy knock-down brawls, rather than tactical RPG affairs – a shift that fits the game's tone better.

My other favorite change is an overhauled menu, which is much simpler and easier to navigate. In particular, the codex doesn't feel nearly as cumbersome, to the point that I actually enjoy reading some of those character bios and books without having to dig through a metaphorical pile.

The way you move through The Witcher 3's world and engage with it has also been nicely touched up and made less aggravating: climbing doesn't feel as cumbersome, some quest tracking is easier, Witcher senses feel clearer to use, it's easier to run away from combat, and the list goes on.

Again, a lot of these are changes that you simply wouldn't notice if you weren't looking, but as someone who's put a good 600 hours into The Witcher 3 over the last decade, the difference is palpable. This remaster simply looks and feels better to play in so many ways, not changing the overall experience, but enhancing it – a game that already got a "next-gen update" last year.

While remasters or remakes certainly aren't anything new, it's extremely rare to see a studio take a brush to a past game to truly touch it up, really dig down to the roots and say, "What can we do to make this even better – take out some of those frustrations that couldn't be erased initially?" These video games that take thousands of man-hours, years of people's lives poured into them, deserve that chance in so many ways. It's just a shame more don't get it.

But in The Witcher 3's case, the sprawling RPG has simply never been better.

The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt – Remastered was reviewed on PC with a code provided by the publisher.

Tracking down your own gaming prey while you wait for The Witcher 3: Songs of the Past expansion and The Witcher 4? Our games like The Witcher 3 recommendations can point you on the right path, while our best open world games and best RPGs rankings have even more in store.

Ogres are like onions, if onions were built out of bricks and (not to give away too many spoilers) it's those root vegetables that had me rushing across the room in glee and exclaiming 'onions!' on a rainy Wednesday night this week. The Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots set is filled with more than a glancing nod to the celebrated first film, from the exclusive printed signpost pieces to a simple blue flower with red thorns.

The 1,403-piece set took me a couple of evenings to devour, but I'll confess I wasn't coming into this set 100% objectively. Character sets rarely get my heart pumping. There's something about the cold, plastic eyes of my favorites when locked into Lego's harder edges that gives me the creeps. I'm happy to report, though, Lego Shrek neatly sidesteps this curse and I'm impressed by just how well the green giant comes across here.

Is it going to replace any of the best Lego sets for scale, mastery, or creativity? It's unlikely. But if you're a Shrek fan this is an excellent shelf piece.

Features

Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots stands at 8.5-inches wide and 6-inches deep when fully built, comprised of 1,403 pieces. That's a pretty dense equation, but a lot of these bricks are smaller nubbins that go a long way to creating a sense of texture in these details.

That means the $129.99 / £109.99 price tag has an easier time justifying itself - judging by recent releases this is the going rate for a 1,400 piece set.

The value of those pieces holds quite firm, though. There are seven printed blocks here, developed specifically for Shrek and Donkey's faces and that 'Beware Ogre' signpost at the front, as well as a Puss in Boots minifigure, complete with hat, sword, cape, and wee little printed boots.

Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots build

This is a pretty straightforward build process that doesn't jump around the diorama too much, we go from the base to Donkey, sprinkle in a few environmental extras, and then move onto the big man himself. Bags 5-10 are dedicated to Shrek's figure, while 1-4 will have you working on that swamp and ass.

As is to be expected from our rotund pal and his furry donkey friend, a lot of this work deals with covering corners and joins. That means heavy use of slopes and larger curved round corners, rounding out those boxy bases.

For the most part, instructions are clear and easy to follow. I'd recommend a brighter building environment, particularly when working through bag 6 as the darker brown of Shrek's garb can be incredibly difficult to parse from the instructions without the big light on. Where left and right sides need to be considered, Lego splits internal pieces into red and green camps for a better visual understanding of direction and to avoid mistakes.

Creating Shrek's legs was the only hurdle I encountered. There are a lot of similar shapes at play here, all converging on one base with a lot of rotations within the directions. Working on top and underneath the base with very similar brick concoctions is a little trickier than the rest of the build. I'm grown enough to admit I had to break down my first leg entirely after noticing a mistake.

It's a satisfying build process overall, though, with that classic 'oh this is what I've been building for the last hour' recognition moment as each bag comes to an end. Using black mechanical claws with horizontal bar plates for the strings around Shrek's tunic is particularly ingenious move.

Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots design

I was surprised by how well Shrek came to life at the end of this process. Characters, especially particularly round ones, don't always fare well against those straight-edge bricks and I was worried about his face in particular coming across a little uncanny.

However, with the extra scope in the price tag to include far more curves and smaller pieces, everyone's favorite Ogre looks fantastic on the base.

Donkey looks a little less rounded, coming across slightly slimmer than I'd have expected - next to Shrek he looks a bit one dimensional. There's still a nice level of detail here, with jagged pieces creating an impressive sense of texture underneath his front white stripe and down his mane. It's the 1x2 Rock Claw pieces doing the heavy lifting here, both across Donkey and in Shrek's tunic, allowing for a finer level of ruffle than typically afforded by your standard studs.

Shrek's a big guy, though, so keeping him sturdy on that swamp base is a lot of work. Held in place by two ball joints under his feet, and secured to Donkey's side by studs, this larger chap stands pretty securely in place. Those rotations under his boots give him a little wobble, which can be unnerving when moving the diorama, but he's sturdy when stuck in place. Donkey himself is built straight into the (nice) boulder he's perched on.

All that anchoring does mean there's very little articulation in these joins. The only posing power we have here is Donkey's mouth and ears and Shrek's left arm.

Lego thrives on its smaller details in sets like this, though, and there's no shortage of surprises in this display. From smaller hints like a blue flower with red thorns and a small onion tucked away at the back of the base to larger icons like that signpost, there's plenty of storytelling in Shrek and Donkey's environment.

Unfortunately, Puss feels like an afterthought. He's only here in minifigure form and, while his theming stands out well, he's just a little too luminous for my liking.

Shrek's green plates are vibrant, yes, but against the browns of his tunic, Puss's almost luminous toning feels a little off. Being a minifigure, this kitty's scaling is also out of whack - his head and much of his torso being about the same size as Shrek's eye and brow.

Should you buy Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots?

The Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots set can feel a little overpriced considering the lack of posability and the disappointing Puss minifigure, but there are some nice exclusive printed pieces here, not a sticker in sight, and the extra detail afforded by the additional brick count helps both Shrek and Donkey avoid the Lego figure curse.

Movie fans are going to find joy in both the smaller and larger aspects of this build and the finished product will look fantastic in any swamp. Clever piece usage, surprisingly convincing texture effects, and just the right level of reliance on curves makes this well worth investigating.

Buy it if...

Don't buy it if:

How we tested Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots

This review was made using a kit supplied by the manufacturer.

I spent two evenings putting the Lego Shrek, Donkey & Puss in Boots set together, totaling between four and five hours of build time split across two sessions. Stumbling blocks, fixes, and frustrations were logged as they appeared during the build process, and the final sculpture was fully examined for durability and stability. For more information on how we make our recommendations, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

We're also rounding up all the best toys on the market this year.

Star Wars is full of vile scum and hideous villains worthy of punishment, but perhaps none have a face more punchable than the arch-rival of Star Wars: Galactic Racer, Kestar Bool. He's the current champion of the recently established Galactic League and is a truly detestable one at that. A whinging, arrogant rich kid with an undeniable talent for tearing up the track who really needs to be taken down a peg or two.

The moment the game's faceless protagonist, Shade, meets him was all the motivation I needed, but I didn't realise the road to challenging him would be more demanding and thrilling than I imagined. This is what I've felt has been missing from big-budget racing games of the last few years – high-octane action and real challenges to get invested in – and Star Wars: Galactic Racer delivers on both in bucketloads.

Feel, don’t think

Star Wars: Galactic Racer feels sublime to play, and that becomes apparent after just a few races in my campaign journey. Given that developer Fuse Games was founded by five former Criterion Games developers – the studio behind the likes of Burnout and several Need For Speed games – it's hardly a surprise either.

Unburdened by tyres and petrol engines, the driving model allows the three repulsorcraft types – all-rounder landspeeders, nippy speeder bikes, and fluid skim speeders – to feel extremely slick, gliding around corners in wide arcs or sharply banking in at speed with no substantial effort on the controls. Once you master advanced drifting manoeuvres, the brakes often feel optional, so Galactic Racer is more Mario Kart than Gran Turismo in that regard.

There's superb tactility to the game, particularly in its pre-race check sequence. You've got to rapidly input cheat code-like button sequences (one of the Auto-Pilot ability inputs is actually the famous Konami code) within five seconds to prime your afterburners, activate any abilities you've picked up on your current Tour, and start your engine. Each button press is accompanied by satisfying bleep-bloops and, on the PS5's DualSense controller, there's even a nice bit of resistance on the trigger, like turning a key in a car, to start your engine – and I say that as someone who usually turns off adaptive triggers at the first opportunity.

Admittedly, it's a lot to take in at first. The high-speed racing feels both awesome and terrifying as a novice racer as you go through plenty of butt-clenching moments that result in narrowly making it through a series of tight corners, unscathed if you're lucky, or going out in a dramatic fireball. Galactic Racer at least makes each crash look spectacular while you consider your errors, with engine parts and crumpled bodywork blasting across the track in slow-motion and from multiple angles.

But, the more you learn the tracks, improve your racecraft, and push the limits of your speeder, the closer you get to entering a racing flow state, feeling the Force as you fly right on the edge and use everything in your arsenal, no matter how underhanded, to beat your opponents to the finish line. Success in Galactic Racer means giving it your full focus at all times. That's not going to be to everyone's tastes for an arcade racer, but when you come out on top, or even just barely survive a race, it makes for the most satisfying and immersive racing game I've played.

Star Tours

The smooth and speedy driving model is what makes the racing exciting in moment-to-moment gameplay, but it's the roguelike-inspired risk and reward mechanics and run-based format that kept me coming back. These permeate most modes in the game, including short but intense multiplayer tours, but are most prominent in the three-act campaign.

Rather than following the usual career mode blueprint of racing through various series/cups/wristbands until you become the ultimate champion of all racing, Galactic Racer's campaign plays out across run-based tours, where you pick from branching paths to decide which race events to tackle. Every four events moves the Galactic League to another planet with its own array of circuits and hazards, and there's time for you to explore the paddock and buy upgrades.

All the while you need to avoid losing your League Token or getting Wrecked (by crashing three times) to eventually reach the tour's final race and hopefully emerge victorious, ready for the next Act checkpoint and a new tour. Otherwise, you've got to attempt the whole tour all over again. It sounds unforgiving, but it's a genre mashup that works incredibly well to the point that I'm surprised it hasn't been done in a more mainstream fashion before.

Events are all very quick, making for a brief and moreish adrenaline rush. Each type offers its own rewards with the best being locked behind the most dangerous that can easily end your tour in flames. Eliminator races offer the best rewards – high Credit payouts, two Upgrade points, and a high-quality Part that can substantially buff your speeder – but if you can't battle your way into the top three before time runs out, your League Token is lost and your tour is over instantly.

Mystery Encounters, meanwhile, avoid races altogether as Shade is approached by one or more of the many colorful characters in the Galactic League paddock. You won't know what will happen until it's too late, from being offered faulty but powerful parts by monkey-like mechanic Hibi or getting a cut of gambling profits, to getting extorted for Credits under threat of having my ride sabotaged.

My favorite of these is when top-tier 'Glup Shitto' Biddy Blas – a noisy, irritating, and childish rival racer – offers me a powerful speeder part, claiming it's part of his culture to offer such gifts. Two races later, my speeder violently explodes the moment the race starts as Blas gleefully laughs over the radio. "Biddy Blas strikes again!" Thanks, Biddy.

Potential detonations aside, these events, and the parts and upgrades they provide, mean every tour is full of interesting choices to make regarding your build and how you progress. Depending on the speeder type and Racer Style you choose at the start of your tour, you may want to spec into boosting your afterburners or ramjet or maximize your ability usage to keep your rivals in check. Galactic Racer forces you to be adaptable, but also seek out synergies as you make the most of its partially randomized rewards.

As a big fan of the ramjet, I love getting upgrades that boost its overall power and efficiency but especially love the ones that trigger effects when you push it to its redlining limit. And the blaring alarms don’t bother me when I've got the Vent and Surge abilities equipped, allowing me to instantly purge heat to keep it going almost endlessly and fly even faster. That is of course until I inevitably go too fast and end up misjudging a turn, colliding with a barrier at over 600 or 700kph.

The archives are incomplete

Star Wars: Galactic Racer's tracks are highly technical, filled with winding turns, obvious and obscure shortcuts, and dangerous hazards that must be effectively used or avoided to stay competitive. Ando Prime's freezing temperatures may keep your engines cool, but spend too long in the cold and your steering will freeze up. Risky manoeuvres are essential to success and immensely gratifying to pull off.

Much like real racetracks, each planets' various circuits are made up of sections of a wider course. While that gives the environment a singular identity, it can mean individual circuits blur together a bit. Because they share common elements, I'd struggle to tell you what makes Jakku's War Fields, Giants' Graveyard, or Debris Dunes distinct, even after playing for over 30 hours and racing on them many times. Only a handful of individual courses truly sing, such as Sentinel I's Acid Ring, a small ring-shaped track – half-banked, half-flat – around an acid lake. The simplicity essentially makes it Galactic Racer's answer to Mario Kart's Baby Park, the site of some of the most chaotic and dangerous races I've played.

Still, I know which planets I like – Jakku and Lantaana's winding circuits with plenty of elevation changes are thrilling, while Sentinel I's acid puddles and Crait's terrifyingly tight crystal tunnels can be tough to deal with. But, with only six to race on, the tours you go on don't quite live up to the Galactic League name. I'd love to have seen something closer to a Formula 1 calendar, with fewer tracks per planet but greater variety – a Monaco on Mustafar or a Silverstone on Scarif, for example.

This becomes especially noticeable in Act 3, a gauntlet that runs through all six planets in the same order every time. Not only does that mean it can get repetitive, but it also starts to go against the run-based format by elongating the otherwise snappy tours I'd been enjoying up to this point. Additionally, podracing challenges appear between each planet – which are exhilarating, but saddle the tour with a comparatively brutal level of challenge since they act as another point of failure. "This is not where the fun begins", I think as Ben Quadinaros steals my League Token.

I'm more here for the action and sense of character than the story, but, thanks to an abrupt campaign ending, I'm left wanting more from Galactic Racer's narrative. Still, even with those annoyances, I'm impressed by how the tours add genuine stakes to these blistering races.

Star Wars: Galactic Racer feels like a proud rebel when compared to the current racing game landscape. It forgoes deep simulation mechanics, vast car selections, even larger open worlds, and live-service guff in favor of frenetic racing that feels fantastic, an honest to goodness story that fits perfectly into the Star Wars canon, and some proper friction.

That all means it oozes character, expertly modernizing the arcade racing of the 2000s for 2026 and putting risk and reward at the forefront, which is what racing is all about. And as Fuse Games' debut, it's bordering on a perfect start.

Star Wars: Galactic Racer was reviewed on PS5 with a code provided by the publisher.

There's a galaxy of gaming out there. Check out our best Star Wars games or best racing games rankings if you feel force pulled towards more!

As Gears of War: E-Day launched, developer The Coalition was thinned by more Xbox layoffs. It's a heartbreaking circumstance by any metric, but the timing feels crueler since rolling credits on E-Day's campaign and seeing the extent of their triumph – an ode to big-screen action that restores Gears to the cutting edge of third-person shooters.

Too often, AAA shooter campaigns can feel like bolt-on afterthoughts in a multiplayer-oriented genre. But E-Day builds an entire city in excruciating detail, only to tear it down brick-by-brick around you.

Good kid, bad city

Kalona is an industrial city, with Gothic streets criss-crossing between dockyards and military forts. Headlines splashed across billboards celebrate the end of a war fought against the Union of Independent Republics (UIR). Kalona's gothic grandeur has been untouched by the war – I'm reminded of New York City's celebrations post-World War 2, which in pictures seems far removed from mainland Europe's devastation.

The conflict casts a long shadow over returning Gears protagonists Marcus Fenix and Dominic Santiago. Brought closer by the death of Dom's brother and Fenix's squaddie Carlos Santiago, who died fighting the UIR, the pair are ditching a military ceremony to get drunk when the titular Emergence Day begins. The earth cracks open and hordes of subterranean humanoids – some scuttling on all-fours, others geared with guns and armor – spill onto the surface and kill indiscriminately. The horror is awfully believable: civilians are slaughtered as they run while fire and sinkholes lay waste to Kalona itself; leaving Fenix and Santiago to link up with a back-footed defense alongside fellow Gears Carter and Reyes.

With E-Day's campaign set entirely within Kalona, The Coalition shows its destruction in unflinching detail. Hammering home that this is happening as we play, E-Day rarely cuts away from Fenix – who leads Bravo Squad from one fire to the next – and instead uses returning locales to ground Kalona's downfall. One setpiece, Legacy Bridge, is used several times – but with the campaign's full-throttle pacing makes it feel like lifetimes have passed between each visit, to say nothing of the city falling apart around it. I'm reminded of Halo 3: ODST's excellent single-setting, which made you ache for New Mombasa through reminders of the world that was.

The bleak tone is surprisingly complementary for Gears' larger-than-life action, personalities, and load-bearing use of the word "fucker". But even the latter is additive to E-Day's story. In the moments we spend with Fenix, Bravo Squad, and other survivors; the bravado is stripped back to explore grief, trauma, and humanity. And going so long without discussing shootouts (in a Gears of War game!) speaks to the strength of E-Day's setting. But this is an action game first and foremost – not that any reminder is needed.

Reloaded

Gears of War: E-Day is the best cover shooter I've played since the series' Xbox 360-era heyday. Where 2024's excellent Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 thrived by pushing its scale and melee combat, E-Day reaches new heights for cover shooters in a more literal sense – turning encounters into scrappy, fluid gunfights. An adaptive cover system means nearly anything can be used, not just ol' reliables like car bonnets and concrete corners, and on plenty of occasions I'm saved by Fenix's willingness to dive behind shin-high rubble and shoot whilst lying on his back. Cover being more naturalized does wonders for Kalona – the absence of traditionally signposted cover makes it feel like a city, not a level.

Surviving is tricky, even on normal difficulty. The Locust are smart foes and know how to press an advantage. Twitchy crawlers rush at your position even as well-armed Drones dig in and fire from cover, the latter preferring to shoot and flank rather than charge forwards. Unique enemies reveal themselves across the campaign, and are deployed rarely enough that they are always an 'oh shit' moment – be it acid-spitting toad-creatures or, to coin an in-game description, "floating ballsacks" that rain fire from above.

In your corner, precision and brute force are equally viable. For most of the game I opt to play at mid-range where possible, using bolt-action rifles to carefully pick off targets. But limited ammo means you'll often fight with whatever gun you can scavenge, and after one such fight in an overrun train station, I grew attached to the Gnasher shotgun – its buckshot initially feels lackluster, but when you're close enough to fire without first aiming, it's devastating.

There were several times when E-Day sold me on a gun I had initially written off. Weapon and armor mods, found in hardcases across the city, are deliciously impactful. My favorite switches the Gnasher to slug rounds, allowing it to capably pop Drone heads from several meters, and my Longshot sniper rifle was unrecognizable by the end of the game, having swapped its long-range scope for an over-the-shoulder reticle in tandem with a mod that reloads its chamber with every headshot.

The result is so much variety that I struggle to draw the line under examples – it would be sacrilege, surely, to not praise the acid-spitting Incinerator shotgun, or the return of the Lancer assault rifle. The Lancer is Gears' most famous weapon, thanks to the iconic chainsaw blade fixed beneath the barrel like a bayonet. But, I find melee disappointing in E-Day – a little too soft and weightless in comparison to trading desperate gunfire from cover.

It took me 16 hours to finish E-Day's five-act campaign. That includes most of its side objectives – not to chase down collectibles, but because I wanted the extra shootouts they promised. I rolled credits days ago, and feel the same melancholy that finishing a good book can leave me with – in this case, a testament to those engrossing few days in Kalona.

I'm a little less enthused by E-Day's multiplayer, which is a mixed bag. Versus – PvP modes ranging from team deathmatch to objective-based scraps – is too uneven to feel truly competitive. Expect to be matched with level 50+ players while you're still level one, resulting in too many one-sided stomps in quickplay. I can live with that in isolation, but more damning is how poorly E-Day's cover-based pacing survives contact against other players.

The emphasis on positioning that fuels the campaign's scrappy shootouts is gone, as players (including myself) careen around the map with one-shot-kill Gnasher shotguns – which is fun in its own way, but better-suited as a Quake-style LAN party game than something to be taken too seriously. Especially as guns and loadouts are locked behind a leveling system, so you can't just mash together your preferred kit and lean into the chaos.

Much better is Gears' Horde Siege mode, which drops three teams of four players into Kalona to fight the Locust on several fronts. Each squad has their own primary objective, but with optional side objectives encouraging detours, you'll often wander into someone else's war. It's an excellent dynamic: I've been on the cusp of being overrun during an objective defense, only for friendlies to crest the horizon, Lancers blazing, to save the day. It's even better when the shoe is on the other foot, and I've barreled through Locusts and over rubble to revive someone outside of my squad. A hero? Me? You're too kind (and correct).

The world feels harder nowadays, and layoffs at The Coalition are just one facet of that. I often look to games to meet me in the moment, but equally important are those with the power to take us away. Gears of War: E-Day does this sublimely, its campaign contrasting quiet vulnerability and cataclysmic setpieces so dramatically that it would be comical if not so well done. Versus mode isn't for me, but I continue to dip into Horde Siege on evenings and I'm already planning to run through the campaign on a harder difficulty with friends. E-Day is a very good time, and it's easy to underestimate how powerful that can be.

We reviewed Gears of War: E-Day on PC, with a Steam code provided by the publisher.

Gear up for your next adventure! We've rounded up the best shooters to play in 2026.

I firmly believe you need to be a specific type of player for the 8Bitdo FlipPad to win you over. The idea of quickly turning your doomscroller cell phone into a Game Boy with physical buttons is alluring, yes, but when you weigh up the quirks compared to just, well, grabbing one of the best retro handhelds out there designed to run classic capers, the appeal slightly falls apart.

None of that stops the 8Bitdo FlipPad from excelling as one of the best retro controllers for Game Boy games, though, as it's one of the nicest pads I've tested yet. For $29.99, you're getting an accessory that offers satisfyingly clicky buttons, a hinge that'll make even your iPhone feel like a '90s flip phone, and an extremely low-profile design.

That sadly all comes at a pretty high cost for the FlipPad, as its direct USB-C design means that, unlike the GameSir Pocket Taco, it's fully dependent on your phone. For your 30 bucks, you're basically getting an, admittedly nice-feeling, set-up buttons hooked up to a direct USB connection, and when you consider that alongside some really unfortunate design limitations things get a little tricky.

Flippin slick

I'll admit that I've spent more time with this gamepad than I'd usually give to a Game Boy controller. I even specifically placed the 8Bitdo FlipPad in the hands of a casual retro gamer to conduct some further A/B testing.

The reason is simple: I wanted to absolutely confirm whether stripping back a Game Boy-style controller like this to a sleek "pad" is worth it. The FlipPad is undeniably the sleekest of its kind out there, and its 19.7mm profile makes the GameSir Pocket Taco look like a bulky plastic monster by comparison, not to mention it weighs in at only 31.5 grams.

But, that sleekness comes at the cost of useful innards. Again, you're only getting USB-C with the FlipPad and, in reality, that means it's confined to either the bottom of your phone or slightly larger compatible devices (I've already experimented using the Razer Edge).

Cramming everything into a small rectangle designed to rest on the bottom of a phone screen also eliminates good junk in the trunk. The Pocket Taco uses this asset to stow away a battery and give its shoulder buttons somewhere to hang, whereas 8Bitdo has opted to stick four left and right "back" buttons on its face.

I'll admit there aren't too many games suited to a Game Boy layout that make use of proper shoulder buttons anyway. However, if you did fancy strafing in the likes of DOOM for the GBA, you'll probably get your fingers in a bit of a twist trying to press the top toggles while shooting via the face buttons and using the D-pad.

And yet, part of me does buy into the idea of trimming everything back to make the slickest Game Boy mobile controller possible. The idea here is that by containing everything to the bottom centre of your screen, it'll merely feel like your phone has physical clicky buttons, rather than feeling like it's wedged between a gamepad. It's exactly how you'd want an accessory you'll be sneaking in Pokemon sessions with on the go, and that plays into its strengths as a casual controller.

Case by case basis

If there's one thing 8Bitdo has really dropped the ball on with the FlipPad, it's accommodations for specific phone cases and non-standard handsets. As a gadget that connects straight into your doomscroller, it relies on you using a "standard" protective shell that's around 2mm thick. That will specifically ensure the controller fits flush to the base of your device, but through my own testing, I've rarely found that to be the case.

Had I only tested the FlipPad with the latest iPhone and the apparent 2mm case the FlipPad is designed around, I'd be saying the controller fits perfectly. You'll no doubt see plenty of videos and articles claiming there are no issues in that department, but I unfortunately wasn't treated to that Goldilocks "just right" scenario. Yes, my proverbial porridge was either too cold or too hot, representing the woe of the pad wiggling side to side or not fitting at all.

I specifically tested the FlipPad with a Google Pixel 7 and a protective shell, and while I could plug it into the USB-C port, it still suffered from an air-gap pivot. I suspect that's because the phone's cheaper silicone shell was out by a fraction of a millimeter, but it's more or less the sort of generic accessory you'll get at Amazon.

In contrast, I wasn't able to plug the FlipPad into an Asus ROG Phone 8 Pro with a Devil Case attached at all. I should note that I wouldn't have been able to use the controller with the handset anyway since it has a very silly offset USB-C port, but even if it were centered, thicker protective cases are going to be too deep and prevent the pad from reaching your port.

I don't want to tell 8Bitdo how to suck design eggs here, but I do reckon the FlipPad could have avoided fit issues with some tweaks. While I get that the controller maker was trying to keep connectivity faff free, some plastic adapters to suit different phones and case thicknesses could have made a meaningful difference. Since the gamepad relies on USB-C, I reckon going the extra mile with a system that helps adjust things specifically for your phone would have made a lot of sense, and ultimately would have helped it achieve a near-perfect score.

It all hinges on the pivot

It's in the name, but one of the FlipPad's biggest draws lies in the fact it "flips." The mechanical hinge absolutely plays into forgotten hardware mechanics that were once harnessed by phones and handhelds like the Game Boy Advance SP. In both those cases, the folding elements were designed to stand in the way of unwanted interaction, say, a bunch of keys in your pocket, but with 8Bitdo's Game Boy controller, the role is reversed.

The FlipPad's hinge exists to throw the controller out of the way when you need screen access. Like it or not, Android emulation suites and apps, like RetroArch, will require tweaking by touch, and interacting with settings menus, or even just taking a call in between games, is a pain when you have to revert things back to a vanilla cell phone. By way of flipping, 8Bitdo's design lets you flick the buttons out of the way with a solid snap that keeps it in place.

The hinge mechanism itself is extremely satisfying, providing a more solid, mechanical feel than something like a GBA SP. The swivel mechanism will apparently withstand over 6,000 flicks, and I genuinely reckon I'm halfway there since I've been using mine as a fidget toy. I should note that I'm doing that without it plugged into anything, as I'd be slightly paranoid about putting stress on a device's USB port through the force of the pivot.

If you use the perfect-size case without an air gap, your port should be safe. In normal circumstances, even slight movement shouldn't pose a threat, but I know better than to put needless stress on USB-C ports. I don't really think the FlipPad is committing any real sins here, but I do want to illustrate how 8Bitdo's design feels to use in practice.

Cromulent clicks

The 8Bitdo FlipPad's buttons don't really feel like an actual Game Boy, but in this instance, that's a good thing. Instead of opting for traditional membranes, this mobile controller uses click dome contacts that provide pleasingly tactile inputs that are closer to microswitches in feel. That means less travel and a more definitive input confirmation that's confirmed through ASMR-tier sounds, and that helps reinforce the overall design.

Had the FlipPad gone with the same arguably more authentic-feeling membranes of the GameSir Pocket Taco, its whole feel would have potentially been compromised. The fact that the controller will pivot if you don't use the right case ties into this, as the shorter travel of the dome buttons means less surface pressure that could potentially cause the unit to shift around even with the rubber pad gripping the screen.

You will absolutely still feel a bit of movement with the wrong case, particularly if you're playing something more frantic like a shoot-em-up or hectic NES platformer. But, in many calmer situations, the travel means the gamepad will largely stay put, in turn helping mask some of the connector's shortcomings.

The physical feel of the buttons lives up to 8Bitdo's usual quality levels, with a soft-touch matte finish on the face buttons accompanied by embossed A,B,X,Y symbols. The D-pad is the one element that feels like it's trying to emulate a Game Boy, as it's virtually a 3/4 replica of Nintendo's original, complete with those iconic ridges (for performance, naturally).

I still stand by the idea that the FlipPad is better suited to quick plug-and-play casual experiences. You can expect nice precision and minimal latency since we're talking about direct USB-C, which does lend itself to trickier platformers. That said, You're not getting as full a layout here since the shoulders are on the front, and it will limit your scope for playing games from across the console generations that use more buttons.

Less isn't always more

8Bitdo's FlipPad scores major points for sleekness and feel, but it really sacrifices additional features to make it happen. Even if it increased the price to the same as the Pocket Taco, a way to connect the controller to other devices and consoles via Bluetooth would have helped it excel, and that could have been achieved with some sort of plugin puck.

Using an additional back unit with some guts inside could have also provided a place for optional shoulder buttons, again, providing opportunity for an additional hardware feature. These are admittedly all plans 8Bitdo could have in the works for a Pro version (if not, then feel free to steal), but the current version feels a bit bare bones otherwise.

The streamlined nature of the FlipPad will work for some players, largely those of you who want something extremely discrete on the front of your phone. Adding in the above extras would have captured an additional slice of the market pie by providing external Game Boy buttons for everything from your Switch to something more niche like a docked Analogue Pocket. Perhaps there's room for that still, and while it keeps the gamepad from perfection, it's not a complete dealbreaker.

Should you pick up the 8Bitdo FlipPad?

As a mobile controller geared towards 8 and 16-bit era games, the 8Bitdo FlipPad is one of the best around. It's sleek, unobtrusive, and provides excellent clicky buttons that will bring you a lot of tactile joy. The hinge mechanism also makes for a phenomenal solution to retaining cell phone functionality while having buttons smacked on the front that feel like a natural part of the device, but its commitment to the compact bit is what keeps it from being the ultimate Game Boy controller.

Quirks with the connector requiring a specific 2mm-thick case act as part of the roadblock to a perfect score. But, I ultimately think ditching elements like Bluetooth connectivity for wider compatibility is the FlipPad's real Achilles' heel. It might reach the same heights as the Pocket Taco by way of a sleeker approach, but by not matching it on its wireless capabilities and physical shoulder buttons, it can't soar past its competitor.

Deciding between the FlipPad and Pocket Taco really comes down to your gameplay preferences. If you can pluck out games you know will use physical shoulder buttons, you're largely better off with the latter, whereas if you're really just looking for a nicer way to play OG Game Boy romps like Pokemon, 8Bitdo's buttons will provide a much nicer feel and less bulk. Both are solid options, but I can't help but feel I'm still waiting for an elevated accessory that really pays tribute to Ninty's iconic brick.

How I tested the 8Bitdo FlipPad

Over the course of a month, I put the 8Bitdo FlipPad to the test using various USB-C phones and devices, including the Google Pixel 7, Asus ROG Phone, and Razer Edge gaming handheld. To assess its functionality, build quality, and overall feel, I used RetroArch to emulate suitable arcade and Game Boy games, evaluating whether the design aspects make the gamepad a better fit for 8 and 16-bit games compared to rivals like the GameSir Pocket Taco.

For more information on how we test retro console and accessories, swing by our full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy for extra deets.

The Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 has always been a tricky one to pin down. This line consistently sees some of the more impressive benchmark numbers when I test at the top of the GPU food chain, but last year's model was more of an aesthetic refresh while 2026's iteration is a solid refinement further.

What's new? In a nutshell, a 4K resolution on that fantastic Mini LED display and brand new thermals under the hood. Combine that screen with rising component costs, however, and you've got a rig that pushes well past $4,000 in its RTX 5090 form. The best gaming laptops are all far more expensive this year, but is it worth investing quite so much cash when prices are up? I spent three weeks with the 2026 Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 to find out.

Configurations

This is Asus's speedster, so it's keeping its configurations fairly close to the top of the price range. Like last year's, the 2026 Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 is strictly an RTX 5080 or RTX 5090 affair, but this time it's paired with a slightly upgraded Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus processor. That's not going to give you too much in the way of real world gaming performance, but is geared towards heavier AI workloads better. All that's paired up with a predictably high amount of RAM, either 32GB or 64GB.

The configuration I've been testing doesn't have a specific street price. It's a pretty standard RTX 5090 / Intel Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus pairing but that 4TB RAID storage isn't listed in too many locations. Still, the extra space isn't going to inform too much from a performance standpoint - expect to pay around $5,000 for an RTX 5090 model with a more modest SSD setup.

Design

Last year's Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 made leaps in the machine's aesthetics. Previous iterations were lumped with a translucent chassis design. Hey, I'm a big fan of transparent tech throwing it all the way back to the '90s, but not when I'm spending a small fortune on a high-end gaming laptop.

Thankfully, 2026's iteration continues the newer matte black finish, with a far more premium look overall. Inside, we've got an understated soft touch plastic with a little more flex than I'd expect for this price but an ultimately solid feel to it. Display hinges also operate with a little wobble but feel secure and smooth. One-handed operation is still very much on the cards here.

The back lid still carries one of my personal gripes. I've never been a fan of Asus's dot matrix display panel on the back. It's pretty redundant, adds to the final price, and creates this scratch of dots across the back of an otherwise sleek looking machine. It doesn't look like Asus is binning this showpiece any time soon, but it can be turned off in Armoury Crate.

We're also looking a little heavier than last year. The RTX 5090 model I've been testing weighs in at 3.7kg compared to 2025's 3.3kg. It's not a massive deal - these aren't gaming laptops designed to be carted around with you, but it's worth noting if you're concerned about the odd road trip.

At the end of the day this is a larger, chunkier gaming laptop than many will typically be hunting for. That's because it's designed as a desktop replacement rather than a truly portable play machine. That extra heft is going a long way in terms of cooling and performance, but there are alternatives if you want to ease transport a little more.

The Razer Blade 18 manages to squeeze top-shelf performance into a 3.1kg package, trimming the thickness down from Asus's 1.38-inches to 1.1-inches. It doesn't sound a lot in the grand scheme of things, but considering that's 3.1kg of CNC milled aluminum on Razer's side, the Blade looks and feels more like a premium purchase overall. In fact, the 2026 Strix Scar is also chunkier than the MSI Raider A18 HX A9W - its second closest competitor. That ones measures in at 1.26-inches thickness and only 3.6kg.

Display

This year's Scar 18 is the first to feature a full UHD+ 4K display, something the previous generation seemed to miss out on. This screen is where Asus makes up some serious ground lost to Razer in its design.

That Mini LED panel packs a serious punch, it's every bit as vibrant as the previous generation with a massive range of colors supplying well-toned, uniform images at enough brightness to combat sunny environments. 2,000 dimming zones also make for an almost-OLED like black response, while still holding that peak brightness.

You'll need to configure the display to get this response, though, with three settings to choose from; one-zone, multi-zone balanced, and multi-zone strong. The former goes straight for high contrast, while the 'balanced' option seems to hit the mid-point between darker details and full-screen brightness. The 'strong' preset goes full force on both brightness and impact.

There's a lot to fiddle with here, but here's my cheat sheet. I got the best results with True Color HDR switched on. That means you won't have access to the additional visual settings in Armoury Crate, but there are so many it's difficult to quickly and easily fine-tune your screen before diving into actually playing on the thing. Flip the switch to enable the Ultimate performance mode and you've unlocked the full 240Hz refresh rate as well. Of course, you'll likely want to switch to different SDR zoning options for different titles, but there's plenty of room to tweak here if you don't like the out-of-the-box visual experience.

The fact that the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 manages to pair that 4K resolution with a full 240Hz refresh rate (under the system's Ultimate mode) is a rare feat. When pushed into UHD settings, the Blade 18 will cap you at 120Hz on its IPS panel no matter how much you fiddle with the controls. For comparison, the MSI Raider A18 HX A9W keeps that sharp Mini LED but also drops you down to 120Hz. In Razer's defence, its FHD+ resolution setting can take you all the way to 440Hz, but there's no QHD middle ground on Sneki's option - here there is.

Ports

The Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 falls inline with its competition on its ports, with one design caveat. You're still getting three USB 3.2 Gen 2 connections with two Thunderbolt 5s in there, as well as Ethernet, 3.5mm audio and an HDMI 2.1, but these outlets are all positioned on the sides of the device.

Larger 18-inch desk-hoggers typically keep more permanent connections to the rear of the chassis. It's tidier, keeps your right hand free for movement, and ensures vital cables aren't knocked or pulled about too much. With everything relegated to the sides, an accessory-heavy setup is going to get messy real fast. Thankfully your Thunderbolt 5s and HDMI are still kept on the left.

Keyboard and trackpad

The Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 doesn't do anything particularly fancy with its keyboard, but it's still comfortable and satisfying for both work and play. Its actuation is nice and light for gaming, with a tactile bump and return on the debounce. Everyday typing can feel a little soft, though. There's a nice snap to each keypress, but a surprising amount of flex remains under the main deck area.

You'll still find a full suite of controls here, though. A half-sized number pad sits neatly on the right, with full-sized arrow buttons providing relief after months of testing squished clackers. Additional volume, mic, fan and Armoury Crate controls also line the top right corner of the deck.

The trackpad runs beautifully, with a smooth glide and no unnecessary travel on a harder press. Tap and swipe gestures are picked up perfectly and the entire pad sits solidly in place.

Performance

In FHD, the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 manages to out-perform the MSI Raider A18 HX A9W in two in-game benchmark runs, Total War: Three Kingdoms and Horizon Zero Dawn: Remastered, while falling just shy of MSI's numbers in Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Cyberpunk 2077. It also, however, stays in front of the Razer Blade 18 that only just lost out to the 'most powerful' moniker to the aforementioned Raider.

QHD benchmarks let the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 take a much stronger lead. Here this machine is performing better than the Blade 18 and Raider A18 HX A9W in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, and Cyberpunk 2077, only taking a slight dip down in Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered.

4K is where things get a little more heated. The Razer Blade 18 still leads in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, though the Scar is hot on its heels with pretty much identical results. The MSI Raider takes a larger backseat in this run.

Both the Scar 18 and Raider get identical benchmark results in Total War: Three Kingdoms at 4K - something I don't think I've seen before, anecdotally. Still these are incredibly impressive scores to be matching.

The story remains similar in Horizon Zero Dawn: Remastered, the Raider is ever-so-slightly ahead here, but the Blade 18 and Scar are performing pretty much identically.

Asus reclaims its lead in Cyberpunk, technically. All three machines are just tip-toeing over that 60fps threshold here, and the Blade 18 drops at RT: Ultra, but the Scar has just nipped to pole position.

We perform synthetic benchmark tests using 3D Mark's Steel Nomad run, as well as Time Spy and Fire Strike. The former is our main indicator of real-world performance, though, with its score offering a greater insight into how each machine will handle more demanding modern releases.

Here, the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 is pretty evenly matched with its main competitors, but sits towards the middle of my 18-inch pack. We're still comfortably ahead of last year's release, though.

Fire Strike is an easier run, allowing for a finer level of comparison. That MSI Raider score is yet unchallenged, but the Scar 18 is the machine coming closest with 41,777 points putting it comfortably above the Razer Blade 18.

The rig also claims the crown in Time Spy tests, with its 24,194 score putting it well ahead of both MSI and Razer.

It would be inconceivable that a $5,000 gaming laptop with the latest Intel processor, 64GB RAM and an RTX 5090 GPU wouldn't give us full 4K performance no matter what challenged it. The Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 carries its components well, with the cooling to support a push into the upper echelons of gaming laptop performance. Whether it can beat MSI for sheer power can be determined in a few ways.

Taking things as simply as possible, the Scar beats the Raider in more runs but still trails slightly where sheer power is required. In my tests, the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 came out on top against the MSI Raider A18 HX A9W and Razer Blade 18 in 7 tests across 1080p, 1600p, 2400p, and 3D Mark benchmark runs. MSI claimed the throne in 6 instances. That's still pretty squeaky.

The Raider managed to hold its own a lot better in the more demanding categories, scoring higher across two 4K benchmarks compared to the Scar's one, and holding onto the crown in 3D Mark Steel Nomad.

Single-core Geekbench 7 performance goes to MSI as well, with the AMD Ryzen 9 9955HX3D pulling an average of 3,186 across user tests and the Intel inside the Scar 18 only mustering 2,874.

Should you buy the 2026 Asus ROG Strix Scar 18?

At $5,000, the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 is primarily competing against the Razer Blade 18 and MSI Raider A18 HX. Put simply, each one has their use.

The Razer Blade 18 isn't going to perform as well as these beastly rigs, but it looks, feels, and carries itself a lot better overall. That's your alternative if you still want some semblance of portability in your roster.

The MSI Raider performs better than the Scar when the heat is on, but ultimately these two are pretty evenly matched from a sheer power perspective. Pair the Asus up with that incredibly powerful display and it still makes for the better 18-inch buy overall.

You'll need to be ready to invest, but if you're going for high-end 4K performance with an endlessly tweakable screen the Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 is still the best 18-inch gaming laptop I've tested so far.

How I tested the 2026 Asus ROG Strix Scar 18

I used the 2026 Asus ROG Strix Scar 18 as my daily driver for a period of two weeks, with an additional week spent testing alongside other PC alternatives. During that time I was primarily playing Farming Simulator 25, High on Life 2, and Doom: The Dark Ages for myself, while performing specific benchmark tests in Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Total War: Three Kingdoms, Horizon Zero Dawn Remastered, and Cyberpunk 2077. Each test was run at 1080p, 1600p, and 2400p three times in both High and Highest settings with the final result here representative of an average.

I also tested the Scar 18 in 3D Mark Time Spy, Steel Nomad, and Fire Strike - again, performing each benchmark three times and taking a final average result. The machine was tested in the system's 'Turbo' performance preset.

For more information on how we test gaming laptops, check out the full GamesRadar+ Hardware Policy.

I'm also rounding up the best Asus gaming laptops as well as the best Razer laptops and best Alienware laptops for more alternatives.

Look, I wanted to like End of Abyss; and I did! Sometimes. When everything's going smoothly, it's an atmospheric and excellently-paced survival horror that's harsh but fair. The problem is that when everything isn't going smoothly – which is more often than should be the case, especially in the latter half of the game – it's a pretty good example of what not to do in the genre.

The distant camera and smoky darkness may well put you in mind of Little Nightmares (studio Section 9 is made up of former Tarsier devs), but a better comparison would be classic Resident Evil. Partly this is down to the (great) monster design – many of End of Abyss' creepy horrors wouldn't be out of place for Leon Kennedy and friends to face, with dashes of the sort of abominations that haunt The Last of Us and indeed Little NIghtmares. But, End of Abyss feels built in the Resident Evil mold right down to the gameplay.

Abyss of a problem

Though you can sprint, avoiding the lumbering pace of old-school Resident Evil (the controls are, thankfully, significantly tighter too), one survival horror element End of Abyss channels excellently is teaching you to be wary of, and respect, uncharted territory. There could be an enemy just off screen at any time, and you don't want to run in for a hug. Especially not when most of the beasties can delete a huge dollop of your health with one hit.

Your scanner also serves to reward more careful exploration, but with mixed results. Although it can provide useful info, such as what notes say or which keycard is required for which door, it's nothing that a simple button tap wouldn't achieve faster with equal efficiency. The only unique use it really has is for a bit of classic 'follow power lines through the walls' in order to find door-opening nodes to shoot.

The Resident Evil comparison comes in not just through keycard use, but intentionally imperfect combat against resilient enemies. There are also safe rooms, though saving works differently to the Capcom classics. When you die, you retain any items you picked up, and any opened doors or extended bridges stay as you left them. However, all enemies – apart from bosses and ambush setpieces – respawn. Any expended ammo, however, does not.

Combat while exploring is usually tough, just the right level of awkward, and manageable (make sure you upgrade your weapons, though). Unfortunately, End of Abyss has a nasty habit of cheaply synthesizing challenge by forcing you into a tiny arena. This is especially true of the boss fights, most of which are awful. When facing multiple enemies, this results in silly situations where you're leading monstrosities in circles like a Benny Hill chase, occasionally stopping to take potshots at them until it's over.

Bugs aside – I have a few instances of enemies hitting me through walls, an elevator that doesn't load properly, and a soft lock that loses me progress in the final area – my journey to the end of End of Abyss is frequently marred by small but cumulatively annoying gripes, a different kind of horror to where the game shines. Gloomy environs, for example, contribute to the great atmosphere, but it does mean that levers and other objects can sometimes be hard to see. At one point, I completely miss a progress-crucial destructible section of floor because the subtle pale coloring melts out of view.

My greatest nemesis is a radiated area where, without the correct (and missable) suit mod, you take minor but constant damage while exploring. Once I eventually get hold of the mod, I find that it requires four energy points to activate… and my suit only has three! Cue hours of aimless wandering until I finally stumble across what I need – wait for it – deep into the area I need it for. Doubtless I missed at least one of these energy pickups somewhere earlier, but it shouldn't have been possible for me to find myself in that situation. While there's a touch of Metroidvania – I regularly encounter doors and devices before I'm able to make use of them – the fact that there's only one piece of traversal gear to find (a grappling hook) brings me back to Resident Evil as a reference point.

A combination of darkened corners and missable items means that I spend a lot of hours wandering around in this way, and I often yearn for fast travel between safe rooms. It doesn't help that information from the scanner isn't very useful for many doors, cheerily informing me that they're locked without any indication of how I might remedy the situation.

That said, End of Abyss does hold some juicy rewards for those willing (or, in my case, forced) to stray off the main path. Not only crafting materials and snippets of lore, but meaty weapons and entire boss fights that you can otherwise roll credits without seeing. There's even a way (it seems) to soften the difficulty of the final boss by finding certain items scattered across the game, but by then I've had more than enough of running around overfamiliar areas to even consider the idea.

I spend way, way longer than I'd like doing laps of the shuttle system trying to find something to help me progress, and I'm not a huge fan of the fact that, if you run out of crafting materials for ammo by repeatedly failing a boss fight, the only way to get more is to revisit areas you've already rinsed to kill enemies you've already killed. It was bad back when Bloodborne did it, and it hasn't suddenly become good now.

However, there are enough sprints of enjoyment between the swamps of frustration to just about hold End of Abyss together. There's lots to enjoy if you live for immersing yourself in a complex environment to explore backwards and forwards with little consideration of plot; but if you're after something where you can follow the story path with relative ease, expect to make plentiful use of guides.

End of Abyss was reviewed on PS5, with a code provided by the publisher.

This isn't where your gaming journey ends. If you want more like this, check out our best survival horror games ranking, or keep an eye on our upcoming horror games list!

Toem 2 is a game for nosy people, which is great news for someone like me who spends at least half their time while out and about carefully eavesdropping on other people's conversations. (Don't hate me, we've all done it.) But rather than it being a game about listening to people, Toem 2 is – like its predecessor – all about grabbing your camera and talking to every single person you meet.

Rather than making you feel like a voyeur, though, Toem 2 immediately makes you feel calm and at ease. The black-and-white hand-drawn art style is charming and will constantly surprise you as you move through each area. But, starting out Pokemon-style in your home bedroom with your nana waiting downstairs, about to put the TV on full blast, is the most wholesome start to this equally wholesome game.

Like the original Toem, you have a single end goal, which is to attend a festival for a once-in-a-lifetime event that's actually known as a toem in the game, but the bus that's going to take you there won't go direct. Instead, you find yourself taking detours through different areas, speaking to anyone you meet to see how you can be of help. As it turns out, in order to earn enough bus tokens to get to the next stop along your journey to the magical event, you're going to need to lend a hand – or a camera.

Snap, crackle, pop culture reference

Each area has a core character that you'll need to help with a larger multi-part quest through the district. This is a bit of a change from the original game, but it's a welcome one, as there's a joy in seeing these familiar faces pop up as you explore a new drama that needs your assistance. It's just another way that Toem 2 shows off its excellent writing, with the game regularly making me chuckle out loud at its unexpected silliness.

Because outside of these core companions, there are so many funny little guys and gals just waiting to be spoken to, all with some kind of problem that needs solving. Whether it's a skeleton trapped in a hanging cage that just can't remember whether they left the stove on, or a biologist that needs some fish-themed analysis doing that's so clearly another nod to Pokemon.

There's plenty of whimsy to be discovered, and you'll find yourself learning each area practically by heart as you meander back and forth across it, finding items, taking photos, and chatting with the locals. It's probably the gentlest Metroidvania-alike you're ever going to find.

It's such a great feeling when the random item or person you took a photo of earlier turns out to be plot-critical, often in hilarious ways. It's something Toem 2's very good at – the art of surprise.

A costume you found in a crate may come back later as a much-needed prop; a character you snapped because you thought they were cute might just be the key to the next quest you pick up. It's just part of its charm and clever puzzle creation.

Happy snappy

I won't lie, across its roughly four-hour playtime, Toem 2 will make you fall for it over and over again. There's such a gentle playfulness to its narrative, and even though the mechanics of taking photographs and interacting with people and the world is fairly simple, it still finds ways to surprise you.

It helps that, as with the first game, each area has a distinct visual theme and feel, from the countryside farmland vibes of Cropten to the fantasy themes of Taletorp – which I've aptly misread as Tabletop multiple times. There's not enough game time to really be bored, but developer Something We Made doesn't ever give you the option. It's delighting you at every turn.

The new core characters also give you special new camera add-ons that are unique to each area. The first area, for example, gives you a pair of scissors for snipping and cutting at things, and it's really interesting to gain another way to interact with the world than just taking pictures.

Not that taking pictures isn't really satisfying, though. You've got a cute floating drone for taking shots and a good old tripod, and just whipping out the camera is enough to entertain. The gyro lets you aim (or the right stick), and you can zoom, focus in on a point of interest (which sometimes comes in handy for the more unusual quests), and pan around the world to see what might be lurking in a corner upon closer inspection.

If you're the kind of completionist gamer that I am, you can eke extra joy out of each locale by snapping pics of the local wildlife. You'll get an extra stamp for it in your journal too, but I just love the silly little names given to the critters you'll find like the sootsprite-esque Blobnuts and sad mushroom Mopeyrelles.

The only thing that I don't enjoy about Toem 2 is having to finish it. It's one of those games that you really settle into the groove for, just to find out you're about to finish it. I would love some more of its whimsical little world and its lovable mute protagonist (side note… what is it), and hopefully the fact that this is already a sequel means we might get a part three one day.

Toem 2 was reviewed on PS5, with code provided by the publisher.

Ready to-em tackle more like this? Check out our best Switch indie games recommendations, and the hottest upcoming indie games you need to be adding to your calendar!