Halo 3: ODST

The Halo games have continued to be system sellers for Microsoft for generations at this point, but Halo 3: ODST always ends up being one of the more under-appreciated games in the franchise. And that’s a shame really, because ODST had some really interesting ideas that were executed reasonably well – including but not limited to large open environments and a setting that didn’t rely on Master Chief or Cortana. It’s a unique game that has a lot to say, and fans should definitely give it a try.

Quantum Break

Quantum Break was an ambitious project from Remedy Entertainment, and it sought to combine elements of a TV show with a game. Sure, some of its concepts didn’t really stick the landing – but Quantum Break is an extremely fast and frenetic shooter that features some interesting time-based abilities and a story that’s about as weird as one would expect from the developer. It’s easily one of the more underrated Microsoft exclusives, but one worth trying out nevertheless.

Sunset Overdrive

Sunset Overdrive comes from the now Sony-owned Insomniac Games. It’s a post-apocalyptic adventure game where you grind on rails, jump on bouncy surfaces, and use a vast array of weapons to gun down waves upon waves of enemies. It features a colorful open world with likable characters and quality writing, but the game wasn’t really able to make an impact in the end. Sunset Overdrive is emblematic of the developer’s biggest strengths, which makes it a really underrated game that deserves a lot more love and credit than it gets.

Mafia 1

The original Mafia was a game that was well ahead of its time. In a market where every developer was trying to copy Rockstar’s formula of an open world, Mafia provided its own take with a more realistic world that operated on brutal rules and a story that was a complex tale with plenty of loyalties and conspiracies. It was a special game that unfortunately never got the audience it deserved, most likely due to its demanding gameplay – which is honestly a shame.

The Saboteur

Developed by Pandemic Studios, The Saboteur thrusts players into a beautifully realized rendition of 1940s Paris. You play as a racer-turned-rebel who embarks on a quest to prevent evil schemes from happening, and that story remains engaging from start to finish. But what’s more impressive is the set of mechanics that beautifully combines social stealth elements with action gameplay in an open-world setting, and it’s honestly a surprise as to why such a special game went unnoticed by the masses.

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West

Enslaved: Odyssey to the West is developer Ninja Theory’s take on the classic Chinese novel Journey to the West, and it tells the story of two people who must work together to ensure each other’s survival. The game uses a simple but fun combat loop for its gameplay, but what makes it special is the interesting scenarios it keeps on creating at every turn – which makes it such an engaging experience.

Vampyr

Vampyr is all about a doctor juggling his personal life at a hospital and his struggles with turning into a bloodthirsty vampire. The combat is all about balancing stamina and dishing out damage to your opponents, and the game does a great job of creating a well-knit set of systems that beautifully interact with one another to create a fully realized world. There are a few rough edges here and there, but it is a game that’s worth trying out.

As Dusk Falls

As Dusk Falls is a narrative adventure that starts out simply with a family embarking on a road trip, but that soon evolves into something greater. The art style here is fantastic, and the story is pretty engaging from start to finish. It’s a simple game that does just enough to keep you entertained for its runtime, and sometimes that’s all you need.

Gears of War Judgment

The Gears of War series has continued to be one of the most valuable first-party games for the Xbox platform, and almost every mainline entry has been showered with great critical and commercial reception. Gears of War Judgment stands out as an exception, not because it suffered from bad reviews – but that not many people actually played it. And this is a shame because this prequel provides a ton of context to the events of later entries – and that information will be highly appreciated by fans of the franchise.

Killer Instinct

Killer Instinct attempted a shot at revival in 2014, which ended up receiving a rather tepid reception from fans. While it wasn’t on par with contemporaries like Mortal Kombat or Street Fighter, Killer Instinct was certainly a quality first-party game from Microsoft that never really got the love and attention it deserves.

Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments

Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments is widely considered to be one of the best games in the long-running series, and a lot of that praise can be attributed to the game’s excellently crafted story. Crimes and Punishments never fails to keep you guessing, and the writing is also quality stuff. The gameplay revolves around carefully assessing clues and deducting solutions to these cases, and that provides a very distinct fantasy of being a great detective.

Gears Tactics

Gears Tactics does a great job of translating the series’ signature third-person shooting to a top-down tactical game without losing the game’s identity in that transition. The resulting product is a game that shouldn’t work but somehow feels like a natural evolution of the franchise. It constantly ramps things up with new kinds of obstacles and more complex levels, and that keeps you engaged for a long time.

Wanted: Dead

Wanted: Dead takes inspiration from multiple action adventure classics like Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive, and crafts an experience that feels equal parts a glorious homage and a fresh experience. Wanted: Dead features a solid combat loop where you can effortlessly switch between slashing your foes with a sword and gunning them down with weapons – and that foundation of ideas rarely gets stale.

State of Decay 2: Juggernaut Edition

State of Decay 2 didn’t launch in the best of states, but over the course of multiple major updates – the developers were able to not only fix the game’s technical issues but also realize its potential with new content changes and mechanic overhaul. But for many fans, the boat had already sailed by then – and State of Decay 2 became an underrated game only appreciated by a small group of people. If you are one of those who gave up on the game, give it another try – and you might be surprised.

Metro 2033

The Metro series came into the limelight with Metro: Last Light and recent entries such as Exodus are widely praised for their brand of survival gameplay. As a result, Metro 2033 ends up being a rather underrated game in the series – which is a shame because many of the ideas that we have come to associate so dearly with the series were actually founded in Metro 2033. It’s a really well-made game, and more people should give it a shot.

PREDATOR: HUNTING GROUNDS

Illfonic’s asymmetrical multiplayer title Predator: Hunting Grounds was a flawed game in more ways than one, but for fans of the property, there was some fun to be had in getting to play as a Predator. With multiple different Predator types to play as and unique abilities to make use of with each of them, the game certainly had some interesting mechanics up its sleeve- even though not all of them were as well executed as they should have been.

DEATH STRANDING

This was probably the most obvious choice for a list such as this one. Death Stranding is built all around the idea of players’ actions and their cooperation having a significant impact on the game’s world. What was once a barren wasteland might look entirely different based on what players were doing. A once-deserted landscape might have a long highway stretched over it now. Mountains that were once desolate and almost impassable might have networks of ziplines scattered across peaks and valleys. It’s very effectively done, and adds so much to the gameplay experience.

The last game Dontnod Entertainment released was Twin Mirror, which launched in December 2020 to lukewarm critical reception at best. That reception has been reflected in poor sales as well, with the company revealing that it has so far only managed to recoup 75% of its production investments. Due to a couple of factors, in fact, Dontnod doesn’t expect the situation on that front to improve too much. Specifically, the developer attribites that to “a market that is globally saturated by the end of 2021” and “the sudden closure of the Chinese market”- which, it says, it “not expected to be lifted in the medium term.”

On the opposite end of the spectrum, Vampyr, the Focus Entertainment-published action RPG that launched in 2018, seems to be doing rather well for itself. It’s hit another sales milestone, with over 2 million units sold worldwide, and was also downloaded 8 million times in 2021 thanks to a free Epic Games Story giveaway. At last count, in April 2019, Vampyr had sold over a million units.

Twin Mirror is available on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, while Vampyr is available on those three platforms in addition to the Nintendo Switch.

Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain

Kojima’s swansong Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain is a game that actually uses its open-world setting to great effect. Its setting of Afghanistan houses a complex web of interconnecting systems that create a highly dynamic gameplay loop – requiring players to alter strategies on the fly. It’s also filled with a ton of neat little details to signify the outcome of your killings. If you get sloppy and do a lot of killing in your mission, your Demon Points increase which causes the Horn on Venom Snake to grow along with blood smears on his face. After a certain point, the horn will grow out completely and you turn into Demon Snake.

Now, you can play the game on consoles once again (or for the first time, if you haven’t yet jumped it) with improved resolution and performance. Dontnod Entertainment recently took to Twitter via the game’s official page and announced that a new patch for it has now gone live, following which it runs at 1440p and 60 FPS on PS5 and Xbox Series X. Meanwhile, Xbox Series S and PS4 Pro players can enjoy the game at 1440p and 30 FPS, while Xbox One X will run the game at 1296p and 30 FPS.

Vampyr is available on PS4, Xbox One, PC, and Nintendo Switch. You can read our review of the game through here.

Back in April 2019, publisher Focus Entertainment (known then as Focus Home Interactive) announced that the game had sold over 1 million units, and that the publisher and developer Dontnod Entertainment were going to collaborate on another new project. There have been no updates on that project since then.

PS5: 1440p / 60 FPS
PS4 Pro: 1440p / 30FPS
XSX: 1440p / 60 FPS
XSS: 1440p / 30FPS
Xbox One X: 1296p 30 FPS

— Vampyr Game (@VampyrGame) October 20, 2021

September came and went, and now it’s time once again for the offerings of Sony’s PS Plus to refresh. While the month of October is often reserved for more spooky affairs, it seems Sony decided to do a little bit of a half and half there with a good game for the horror-themed month and one that is a bit more quick.

As announced by the official Twitter, this month’s offering consists of Vampyr and Need for Speed: Payback. Vampyr is an action RPG from the folks at Dontnod and follows a doctor who finds himself as part of the undead and must choose between his oath to help people or to give in to his newfound bloodlust. Need for Speed: Payback is on a very opposite end of the spectrum. A racing title from earlier this gen from Ghost Games it sees you trying to pull off wild stunts in a Hollywood style.

Vampyr and Need for Speed: Payback will be free to all PS Plus subscribers starting October 6th. You can still redeem the current games, Street Fighter 5 and PUBG, until that time.

Need for Speed: Payback and Vampyr are your PS Plus games for October: https://t.co/kKNMxUDkCL pic.twitter.com/K1Kutlws67

— PlayStation (@PlayStation) September 30, 2020

Nex Machina

Housemarque, better known for the arcade shooter Resogun, released an arguably superior follow-up in Nex Machina. The latter is more of a top-down shooter akin to Robotron and Smash TV, and had Eugene Jarvis – who designed both – as a consultant. The result was an intense, action-packed arcade title with heaps of particle effects, great bosses and excellent areas. Unfortunately, Nex Machina and Housemarque’s other arcade title Matterfall reaped so little success that the developer proclaimed the arcade genre dead and focused on more mainstream genres.

Last year came the surprise action RPG of Vampyr. The game followed a doctor who was recently turned into the undead and must unravel both the mystery of his new illness as well as struggle between his newfound lust for blood and his oath as a healer. The game was both a financial success and received critical acclaim. Now, it’s going handheld with a Switch version almost a year later and we got to finally see the port in action.

Thanks to YouTuber Handheld Players we’ve got our first in-game footage of the game in action on the Switch. We see them playing through most of the opening half hour of the game. For the most part, though the visual downgrade is fairly obvious, it’s not too terrible looking and seems to play mostly smoothly. It’s definitely not a bad version of the game by the looks of it if it’s your only choice, or if you want to revisit the game.

Vampyr is available now on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. The Switch version will release on October 29th. You can check out the footage below.

Mass Effect 2

BioWare made it pretty clear that the final mission of Mass Effect 2 was “The Suicide Mission” so it’s a given that bringing everyone back alive would be tough. However, actually accomplishing this meant recruiting all possible companions, completing their Loyalty missions and getting all of the ship upgrades. Oh and when you’re actually at the Collector Base? You need to choose the right person for each task, lest death take them. Do all of that and you’ll get the happiest ending…which is everyone finding out that the Reapers are coming to kill them all. Speaking of which…