S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl

Jade Empire: Special Edition (PC GAMER)

Grim Fandango

Clive Barker's Jericho

Crysis

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare

Gears of War

Hellgate: London

S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Shadow of Chernobyl

Great atmosphere, somewhat open-ended gameplay, and a little more intelligence than the usual FPS. Some problems though.

This game is definitely an FPS, first and foremost, and the RPG elements are rather minor. You have inventory management and carry limits, you can talk to and trade with other characters, and you can take up various ques... Read Full Review

Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars

Tankspam.

There is very little "strategy" involved in this RTs. Trying to do anything else but mass-spam attacking with your elite units almost always ends in failure. Sending small raiding forces into the enemy base ... Read Full Review

SiN Episodes: Emergence

Nothing exceptional, but not terrible either. Oh yeah, and boobs!

Let's be honest: Where would this game be without big-boobed bad guys and cute, foul-mouthed sidekicks? It'd be even more of a run-of-the-mill FPS than it already is. The graphics are decent, though still not on par w... Read Full Review

Gothic

A little rough around the edges, but a great start to the Gothic series

Gothic 1 and 2 are more or less on equal ground when it comes to gameplay and graphics. Gothic 2 is much bigger than Gothic 1, in fact pretty much the entire gameworld of Gothic 1 is contained within Gothic 2. In my m... Read Full Review

Gothic II

A great down-to-earth kind of RPG that emphasizes character interaction and story over looting and leveling.

I describe Gothic as down-to-Earth because its world and characters tend to resemble real world circumstances much more so than your typical fantasy RPG. The characters are all very human in their design, whether they're... Read Full Review

X3: Reunion

Patching has helped bring X3 closer to completion, unearthing a gem from a pile of bugs and unfinished bits.

When this game was released it was unquestionably still in its beta stage. Patches have definitely brought it up to a much more complete state, especially in the performance department. There's even an 'official' cockpit... Read Full Review

SpellForce 2: Shadow Wars

The best attempt yet to combine the RPG and RTS genres, superior in every way to its competition.

If you've played Spellforce 1: The Order of Dawn, you won't be hugely surprised by Spellforce 2: Shadow Wars, which is a good thing, because the original did a lot of things right. Mostly what it needed was some rounding... Read Full Review

Condemned: Criminal Origins

I give Monolith credit for trying to do something different, but the gameplay is a little too one-dimensional.

As some other reviewers have already stated, the combat tends to get tedious towards the latter half of the game. On the highest difficulty setting, melee combat can be very trying, as blocking requires exact timing of t... Read Full Review

Planescape: Torment

Fascinating story and characters. The best story-driven RPG ever made.

All I can say is that no game has made more of an impact on me than this one. The characters are extremely well written and are equally unusual and unique. A floating skull that talks smack, a long-dead Mercykiller wh... Read Full Review

Guild Wars (Special Edition)

Send in the clones!

I'll give credit where credit is due. This is indeed a nice-looking game that has very modest hardware requirements for the visuals it produces. The scale of the landscape is impressive, albeit very lonely due to instanc... Read Full Review

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

A mile wide and an inch deep

I've played every game in the Elder Scrolls series, starting with Arena back in 1995, and for the most part, Oblivion follows the same formula as its predecessors: An expansive world populated with rather generic cardboa... Read Full Review

Crysis

Good game. Gameplay hasn't advanced much from Far Cry, but the graphics and physics are a healthy step up, as are the sy

Graphically, this game can be stunning, provided you can run everything at high. When you start moving the settings down to medium or low, it looks noticeably less good. When you set shadows to low and shaders to medium/... Read Full Review

Neverwinter Nights 2 (CD-ROM)

A game with its share of flaws, balanced out by a respectable story, characters, and long campaign.

Let me start off by saying that the stock AI in this game is absolute garbage. You must download this fan-made AI script found on the NWN2 Vault, right here: http://nwvault.ign.com/View.php?view=NWN2HakpaksOriginal.De... Read Full Review

The Witcher

An excellent game held back somewhat by an outdated engine and a few technical issues. Better than the sum of its parts.

This game caught me by surprise. I was initially expecting a rather straightforward hack and slash diabloesque clone. Instead, I ended up getting a fairly deep story-driven cRPG with plenty of dialogue and decisions to m... Read Full Review

Medieval II: Total War

Core gameplay remains pretty much the same as Rome, with better graphics and slight improvements to AI.

For Total War veterans, there are no surprises in this game. A few new features have been added: the ability to call crusades, papal influence and excommunication, inquisitors, princesses, priests, 'exploration' of the N... Read Full Review

Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of The Betrayer

Better storyline, more mature content and characters, improved level design, but same clunky/broken mechanics as the OC.

This game does better with the story and characters than the OC. It was a relief to have a more mature set of party members who actually seem to fit the D&D universe. The story, while nothing to get your heart racing... Read Full Review

BioShock

The greatest ever? Revolutionary? No, but a solid, stylish game with more meat and depth than the vast majority of FPSs.

This review deals only with the game itself. I know that there are many problems ongoing with online activation, limiting the number of installs, server problems, etc., and the use of hidden and invasive DRM or DRM-like ... Read Full Review

Gothic 3

Fun and flawed liked its predecessors, but not as good this time.

Gothic 3 has the familiar sprawling world of the previous Gothics 1 & 2, more sprawling and heavily populated than ever before in fact. It resembles the first two in look, with greatly improved graphics, but not function... Read Full Review

Mass Effect

Pretty, verbose, and blah.

Another shooter/action-RPG, which ends up unsatisfying in both departments. ME's two strongest points are its graphics and story. The plot and characters, while well-written, are oh-so predictable if you've ever pla... Read Full Review

Titan Quest

Looks nice, but the repetitive/simplistic and painfully easy gameplay bring it all down. It's buggy too.

Even as far as Diablo wannabees go, this game fails to draw much if any interest from me. I've played Sacred/Underworld and Dungeon Siege 1/2, and while not a big fan of either of those two series, I still found them mar... Read Full Review