Box Art
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Title
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Genre
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A-On
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Description
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Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag
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Action-Adventure / Stealth / Pirate Simulator
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Yes
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Prequel to ACIII (also technically a sequel if you consider the modern day story), you play as the pirate captain Edward Kenway on his quest for glory and riches, during which he will meddle with both Templar's and Assassin's affairs. The story is set on XVIII century Caribbean sea. Given the premise of the game, you are going to spend lots of time behind the wheel of your ship. Surprisingly though, despite what you might think after playing ACIII, the naval missions are actually very fun and engaging. In fact, being a pirate is so fun you'll be sad when you're forced to go onto dry land. The world map is huge and contains lots of additional (though mostly filler) stuff to do. Overall it's a very fun open world game with beautiful, vacationy visuals and one of the best entries in the AC franchise. (Note: If you play offline, you will be unable to access certain naval convoys, white whales, and social treasure chests you can only find when your friends find them online.)
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Batman: Arkham Knight
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Action/Adventure
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No
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Fourth entry in the Batman: Arkham series. After Joker's death, Gotham City goes mad as Scarecrow teams up with the mysterious Arkham Knight to wreak havoc. You know the deal by now - punch bad guys, do detective work, punch more bad guys. But this time, you can use the Batmobile, a feature that is great at first until they ask you to keep using it over and over again. Also, Scarecrow-induced hallucinations give you even more Joker screentime, which may or may not tickle your fancy depending on how much you like Mark Hamill. While it has its rough edges, it's still a worthy conclusion to the Batman Arkham series.
Note - As WB Games is publishing this title, there is already a metric fuckload of DLC cut up and sold in tiny bite-sized packages (unless you bought the season pass). Most opinions on the DLC are somewhat mixed, especially concerning how long they are, so I would suggest holding out for the inevitable GOTY edition if you want it THAT much.
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BlazBlue: Chrono Phantasma Extend
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Fighting
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No
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The spiritual successor sister series to Guilty Gear. Features HD sprites, 3D backgrounds, and loads of animu. CE adds even more characters and balance tweaks, as well as a "visual novel" minigame about the events of its manga spinoff, Remix Heart. inb4 MaiOlev.
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Dead or Alive 5: Last Round
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Fighting
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No
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You know the deal by now. A solid fighting game surrounded by titties. There's a LOT of DLC for this game, so if you just want some core fighting, you can get the Core Fighters pack for free. Story mode and all characters except six (four constant, two rotating) aren't included here, but if you just like fighting it'll be all right.
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Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition
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Action/CURAYZEE Simulator
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No
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A remake of the 2008 release, DMC4SE once again gives you as much sword and gun gameplay as you could want. With dozens of weapons and fighting styles at your disposal, kill a bunch of demons and save the world I guess. Along with the not-emo Dante and original character donut steel Nero, you can now play as Dante's katana-wielding brother Virgil, his mysterious demon love interest Trish, and the gun-mad mercenary Lady. It's no Bayonetta, but it's definitely crazy enough.
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Dragon Ball XenoVerse
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Action RPG/Fighting
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No
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Dragon Ball is back. Made by Dimps (the Budokai guys) in the Tenkaichi/Sparking! style. Now you can finally make your shitty Dragon Ball Z original character from when you were ten, you weeaboo. I bet he's a super saiyan and everything, loser.
Character customization is pretty great, the game is pretty fun, has MMO-esque aspects (some have compared online side-quests to Monster Hunter). Controls take some time getting used to, and grinding can be a chore if you didn't spec your character right for your playstyle. It's more of an Action RPG than a pure fighting game.
Pretty much pointless if you're not a Dragon Ball fan, but if you are, this a huge treat.
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Fallout 4
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Action RPG
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No
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It's Fallout. You know what you're going to get. You are placed into a vault at the dawn of nuclear war, and emerge in a post-apocalyptic 50s Americana. Make friends, steal shit, kill a guy, strip him of his clothes, die a lot. Even the side quests are so addictive that you'll forget about completing the main storyline. That said, it's developed by Bethesda, so expect a few glitches and corrupted saves along the way.
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Final Fantasy Type-0 HD
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Action-RPG
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No
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Imagine Crisis Core but better with 14 different playable characters, playable summons, A WORLD MAP, chocobo breeding and a fantastic story. The gameplay is difficult and will kill you if you get careless but is fun and faster than Crisis Core because less "slot machine" bullshit. Much, MUCH, bloodier, gorier and violent than the previous Final Fantasy games.
Has updated graphics compared to the PSP version, as well as the option to change the voices to English or Japanese, no multiplayer (as if anyone cared about it), an exclusive alternate ending, an updated soundtrack and an exclusive demo for Final Fantasy XV for the Day One edition. Keep away from the English dub, it is the worst English dub Square has ever worked on (even worse than Final Fantasy X, but not as bad as FF4 SNES). Has a somewhat spotty translation so get the PSP version if you are willing to pirate and you have PPSSPP or a PSP with CFW.
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Forza Horizon 2
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Racing
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No
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Great graphics, superb physics, fun soundtrack, big and pretty open world, lots of cool cars. Very deep upgrading and tuning, shallow visual customization. Top notch career structure with a lot of freedom and incentives to do your own thing. Being Forza, this is loaded with DLC and a little over 1/3 of the cars are inaccessible until you shell out some cash.
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Grand Theft Auto V
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Open-world Action Adventure
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No
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Do I really need to explain to you what GTA is all about? This time, you can play as three different characters, switching them on the fly to play unique missions. Go to strip clubs! Rob banks! Make Jack Thompson pissed!
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Halo 5: Guardians
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FPS
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No
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Sequel to the (debatable) abomination that was Halo 4. Takes on an approach similar to Halo 2 where you switch between 2 protagonists; Master Chief and Spartan Locke. Chief leads his Blue Team squad and Locke leads a squad of literally whos and Buck from ODST, who is a Spartan now for some reason.
The plot is a complete mess and features Cortana becoming a literal AI goddess who slaughters millions of people. Beneath the ridiculous plot you will find some really great gameplay. Playing on harder difficulty
is a must. Besides some particularly repetitive and annoying boss fights, single player is worth playing, but is far from the best in the series.
Multiplayer is the best it's ever been, despite some autists on /v/ who will disagree. The new Forge is one of the best map editors to ever be created for a console game. 343 has been consistently releasing
free updates on a monthly basis and has, so far, patched in almost every feature the community has been asking for (Infection mode, a new Firefight mode, new Forge pieces, etc).
Play the game yourself before you cast judgement. While 343 completely botched Master Chief Collection, they seem to be doing right by their fans with this game.
Be aware that there is a free PC port of the multiplayer (though currently lacking a server browser) and Forge for Windows 10, and as the those are the only truly great parts of the game, it may be worth just playing that instead.
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Halo: The Master Chief Collection
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FPS
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No
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Compiles Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, Halo 2, Halo 3, and Halo 4 (plus Halo: ODST as DLC) into one big ol' package, as well as featureing new graphics and audio for Halo 2's campaign a la Combat Evolved Anniversary, and unlike CE:A, Halo 2's multiplayer remade in a modern enegine as well.
Obviously, the story modes are still top notch and have loadsacontent. The only downside so far is the multiplayer: sadly, 343 Industries has a knack for making half-baked matchmaking experiences. Maybe they'll patch it, maybe they won't. At this point, most of the major bugs in multiplayer have been patched, but you should still expect up to 10 minute wait times for some matchmaking playlists. The patches have stopped coming and 343 seems to have given up on fixing this mess.
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Just Cause 3
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Open-world Blow-Em-Up
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No
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If you've played Just Cause 2, you know what you're in for. Nearly everything can be shot or blown up or grappled to. Tie a guy to a plane and take off, with him dragging behind you. Jump out of a helicopter into another helicopter. Unfortunately, the game is still fairly unoptimized, so prepare for a lot of loading screens and overall jankiness.
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Metal Gear Solid V: Ground Zeroes
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Tactical Espionage Action
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No
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The semi-demo "prologue" to Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain. Invade a U.S./Cuban base to save your friends. Additional missions use the same map, but change it so you have to assassinate soldiers/obtain enemy intelligence/save Hideo Kojima, allowing you to play in different ways. Many people complained about the incredibly short playtime of the game (around an hour for the main mission), so rent it first if you're not sure if you want it yet.
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Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain
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Tactical Espionage Action
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Sorta
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The continuation of Ground Zeroes. More of an open world Metal Gear this time - you can try to get in without alerting anyone to your presence, and then go in guns blazing after that fails. Catch animals and send them to your Mother Base! Fight alongside a mute sniper in a bikini! Teach a wolf how to CQC! The choices are limitless.
Note: The "sorta" in terms of always-online refers to FOB missions, where you can invade other players' Mother Bases and vice versa. There's also reportedly microtransactions related to base building, so tread with caution.
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Raiden V
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Shoot 'em Up
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No
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The newest entry in the Raiden series, which despite bad initial impressions by shmupfags proves it is a worthy successor to the classic titles.
It is available as retail only in Japan, as the worldwide release is digital-only. However, if you have the Japanese release the game will be automatically updated to your region.
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Rare Replay
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Compilation
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Yes
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Oh hey, Microsoft remembered Rare developed other things besides Kinect sports titles. For $30, you get thirty of Rare's greatest titles all wrapped up in one package, along with developer interviews, minigames, and all sorts of other bonuses. Keep in mind that some emulation is a bit spotty for some titles (mostly N64 ones), but you also get Grabbed by the Ghoulies in 1080p and 60 FPS so there's that.
Note: An internet connection is required right after download to verify the Xbox 360 titles. This collection can be played offline after said verification, but will not work due to "needing an update" until then.
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Rayman Legends
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Platformer
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No
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Another game featuring our favorite limbless hero and friends. Collect Teensies, punch enemies to make them inflate and explode, rescue axe-wielding princesses. If you played Rayman Origins, you can guess what the gameplay's like. It's an Ubisoft title, though, so expect some features like daily challenges to be locked behind online play. All the regular single-player levels are still available, though.
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Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
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Action/Sandbox
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No
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You play as Wei Shen, an undercover cop whose job is to infiltrate a Hong Kong triad. Gameplay is much like Grand Theft Auto, expect with less emphasis on gunplay and more on martial arts. It's basically an HD remake of the last-gen version with all DLC included, and thus falls into the First Rule of HD Remakes: if you already played and beat the original, this version won't put much onto the table.
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The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt
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Action RPG
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No
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You are Geralt of Rivia, a witcher - that is, a monster hunter and mercenary. Travel around the world, helping or hindering others, while fighting the mysterious army known only as "Wild Hunt". While combat may vary in enjoyability from person to person, the real hook is the story: you have 50 hours worth of gameplay, and that's from the side missions alone. Worth a try just to see how much love CD Projekt RED puts in its games.
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Titanfall
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FPS
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Yes
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It's like cawadoody, but with giant robots and parkour. No single player campaign, so you better hope that the game servers stay up longer.
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Tomb Raider: Definitive Edition
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Action-Adventure
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No
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Another (after Legend) complete reboot of the Tomb Raider franchise, and far more radical this time. Follows young Lara on her first ever adventure during which she will find herself struggling to survive on a mysterious, mythical island after her ship, on which she travelled along with her crew, gets wrecked. Has a good story and gameplay, pretty graphics and semi-open world with some additional stuff to do. Unfortunately there is little to none actual Tomb Raiding, but you will have plenty of fun nonetheless. Also protip: for maximum fun, try playing with the bow only. Includes all prior downloadable content.
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Transformers: Devastation
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Action-Adventure
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No
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The phrase "Platinum Games does Transformers" is all you need to know about whether you should try this game. Play as the Autobots and get into some signature Platinum CUR-AY-ZEE combat with the Decepticons. Only problem is that, as with many of Platinum's deals with Activision, the game's a little short. So if you're going to buy it at full price, make sure you have the strength to 100% everything and SS-rank every mission, you scrub.
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Trials Fusion
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Motorcycle Racing???
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Yes
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Get a motorcycle. Ride a course. Crash. Try again. Make it to the next checkpoint. Crash. Try again. Think about a cool trick you could make in the level creator. Crash. Repeat. Again, it's a Ubisoft title, so expect some features to be unaccessable if you're not signed into uPlay.
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