Hey you. Yes, you, at the back. I see you there, hopping from foot-to-foot, so full of your own humour you’re about to burst. Go on, get it out of your system.

“Walking Simulator 3000! Hurr hurr hurr!”

OK, good, now we’ve got that out of the way, perhaps the adults can continue. […]

There is a certain type of person who is going to see Murdered Soul Suspect as an enjoyable and above-average cat simulator with an unnecessary murder-mystery attached to it. There are a number of parts of the game which require taking control of fearless and athletic felines, and these play rather well. I also suspect that one or more of the developers have kitties at home due to the attention which has gone into these sections, including the addition of a “meow” button. I can honestly say I was enormously entertained by this, meowing like a maniac as I zoomed through church air conditioning vents, annoyed repair men, and jumped all over old ladies trying to give their daughters marital advice.[…]

I recall reading a newspaper retrospective on the film version of The Exorcist where the journalist authoring the article wondered if the movie’s reputation did it a disservice: for a first time viewer, how could a mere piece of story-telling on celluloid ever live up to that reputation? This is not to say that DreadOut is a hyped or famously scary game; on the contrary, it’s a localised-to-English version of an Indonesian game that had the potential to be an unexpected gem. It is more that once expectations have been set high, disappointment bites all the harder, and after a fantastic start, this game unfortunately lets itself down […]

One of the first things I noticed on starting Daylight was that the protagonist is female. I nodded in approval, before a millisecond later reflecting it is sad that is still noteworthy. Protagonist gender is a peculiar topic. […]

Haunted Memories is, without a doubt, an exceptionally mysterious game. As the nameless (but beardy) protagonist, you awaken in a rainy, gloom laden countryside scene. As you make your way down the path, there’s a car by the side of the road – empty, lights on. What is this place? There’s a note on the car – will this shed any light? Yes! It seems that mumble mumble mumble mumble. The plot thickens.

This is not going to be a full review (not least as I am not sure where to begin), about which I am glad as I try not to do spoilers in my reviews, and it would be hard to talk about what makes Goat Simulator so much fun without giving away some of the […]

There comes a point in the career of many a schoolchild where they stumble with delight upon the saying “those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.” The quotation is from George Bernard Shaw’s Man and Superman and is undoubtedly the bane of many in the teaching profession. I have always thought this rather unfair. Unfortunately, with Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs, the maxim is appropriate.

There’s no danger of the faint-of-heart accidentally picking up Outlast thinking it’s a staring contest simulator. It is very obvious what this is. It’s a visceral horror game set in an asylum. You can’t get anywhere near this game without that being as plain as the nose on your face (though whether that nose will continue to be attached to your face is not quite so clear).

Are you bravely fighting off paranormal forces in the search for the truth? Or are you picking the scabs off your own disquieted mind, gradually descending into insanity? Those are the two possible perceptions of the unfolding events in Anna – Extended Edition, and the game’s exploration is finely balanced between them, until the impeccably placed threads draw together in a conclusion which transcends both.

Dick van Dyke has a lot to answer for. As a child, growing up in my native England, seeing Mary Poppins on television and van Dyke’s character “Bert” enunciating preposterous syllables in a ridiculous manner, I simply assumed that, as this was a fantasy movie, that’s how people from Planet Chimneysweep speak. Because it most definitely is not how any person from the British Isles has ever spoken. Ever. EVER. I was given cause to reflect on van Dyke’s crimes against voice-acting on more than one occasion while playing Huntsman – the Orphanage.