Dan Stapleton
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Writing For
IGNLatest Reviews
Contrast
Contrast is a game full of heart, beauty, and at least a few excellent puzzles. It’s at its best when it marries its poignant story to its platforming, and at its weakest when it’s about moving boxes, but it rarely goes very long without showing us something worth playing.
Enemy Within is an amazing expansion to a brilliant tactical game. It’s front-loaded with enticing new options that dramatically increase the replay value of the first half of the campaign, though the latter half is a bit neglected. More than ever, XCOM is a spectacular tactical game full of stories...
Batman games are like pizza: even when they’re not very good, they’re still pretty good. Next to Arkham City, Arkham Origins is a bit of a disappointment in its lack of new ideas and use of win buttons, making it the least interesting of the trilogy. But as excuses to...
Shadow Warrior
“Come for the shooting, stay for the swordfighting,” quips Lo Wang in one of his huge vocabulary of one-liner taunts. It’s good start for a description of the appeal of Shadow Warrior, but it leaves out the surprisingly good story and impressive length (get your minds out of the gutter!)...
Lost Planet 3
Lost Planet 3 at least has a respectable story and some combat variety to it, even if the pieces don’t always come together quite right. Jumping in and out of the mech keeps it from being just another cover-based shooter. If not for level design that’s full of frustrating inconsistencies,...
Don't call this XCOM. While its tactical combat works well enough to prevent The Bureau: XCOM Declassified from being straight-up bad, everything else is fumbled so often and so bizarrely that I can’t recommend it. Hell, this prequel can’t even manage to explain where the name XCOM comes from even...
Saints Row IV
With its recycled map and wildly overpowered abilities, playing Saints Row IV feels like a lot like enabling god-like cheat codes in Saints Row The Third and going nuts. Its ridiculous story, goofy characters, self-aware humor, and amazing character editor make it all work, especially for those of us who’ve...
I'm very pleased to see a good new RPG in this classic isometric style, and its The Dead Man's Switch story has some well-told twists while it lasts, and the light tactical combat has enough depth to make it a worthwhile adventure. But the bite-sized scope and limited choices available...
Viewed side by side, it might be tough to distinguish Company of Heroes 2 from its predecessor. When examined up close, the changes introduced to distinguish warfare on the Eastern Front of World War II from the Western are as problematic as they are interesting. However, that comparison is to...
Blizzard can still put out an excellent real-time strategy campaign that isn't just more of the same. Kerrigan's vengeful rampage may come with a generous helping of cheese and some tedious boss fights, but the chance to play with increasingly powerful units and abilities makes up for a lot –...
In some ways I'd equate SimCity to an early version of Minecraft: a wonderfully creative toy attached to a barely functional game. The most important parts of something really cool are here already, and that's enough for me to recommend it to people with a tolerance for buggy but beautiful...
Blasting through the bright and cheery 1950s world of Destroy All Humans! is a simple but satisfying kind of fun, and there’s a lot to be said for that. Just like the original, this remaster’s comedy is a little hit or miss but its attitude is in full force all...
