Polygon

When looked at as a list, those bugs and glitches seem damning, but spread across the 20 to 30 hours that Darksiders 2 lasts, they had minimal impact on my enjoyment. If you viewed the first Darksiders' borrowed gameplay beats as a potential sign of laziness from Vigil Studios, Darksiders 2 provides hearty evidence of a team with genuine skill and ambition. It doesn't always nail the pacing or polish, but Darksiders 2 adds so many valuable ideas to the series that a path to its future seems clear for the first time.

It has all the open world elements tons of collectibles and outfits to buy, a vibrant city that looks fantastic but a convoluted layout makes navigating it irritating. It's got the basics of a free-running mechanic, but doesn't provide enough opportunities where climbing and sliding is useful

Even without the content creation mode, Sound Shapes would be something unlike anything else on the Vita, or even on consoles. While some might complain about Sound Shapes' willingness to be finished and enjoyed, I dare anyone to go through it remaining non-transfixed by exactly what Queasy and their musical and artistic partners have assembled. Sound Shapes is video game pop music, and those don't need to be dirty words.

While Deadlight makes a gamble hiding some of its biggest narrative successes behind collectible items, that risk pays off well enough to overlook some of its mechanical flaws. Tequila Works pushes the presentation and production values of the genre past where anyone could reasonably expect, and has a game that stands out because of it.

The weakening of its two founding pillars causes Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance to falter. There's a failure to build investment in the story, the Dream Eater system trashes reliable and beloved AI companions for a convoluted Pokémon substitute, and some passable combat can't pick up the slack left by choppy pacing and the maddening Drop system.

In small, small bites, Wreckateer's chaos is infrequent enough to be relatively inoffensive. It's actually well-suited for a party game, as its score-chasing design and habit of overstaying its welcome are built for frequent turn-passing. But trying to storm through a few dozen castles in one, single-player session is an invitation for dismay, because in Wreckateer, repetition isn't education - it's punishment.

The Secret World does best when it focuses on experimentation overlaying its MMO groundwork. Its mainstream, postmodern pastiche of gaming and nerd culture that ranges from John Landis and Edgar Allen Poe to alternate reality gaming is a welcome respite against the backdrop of Blizzard and BioWare. But The Secret World's successes have little to do with the MMO essentials, and though its trappings are unique and sometimes powerful, its core is undeveloped.

The best thing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD has going for it is the fact that deep down inside are the original games. There's a pleasure to be had seeing familiar characters and levels. Nailing a 500,000-point run purely off of muscle memory over a decade old is like having a conversation with 1999 you. For that moment, you will be glad you played Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD. Then you'll bounce fifty feet off a crotch grind through a cement wall and into infinity.

Dyad isn't perfect there are courses that cross the line from confusing to inscrutable, and the more pure race courses aren't as fun as the other game types. But these are minor quibbles amidst a sea of light, sound, and fun. While Dyad's music and visuals more than live up to all the hype laid upon it, playing it is where the real surprise lies.

This is incredibly ambitious game design, and it's fulfilling a promise of games as interactive storytelling in a way that so many others seem content to phone in or ignore all together. To have a game that not only focuses on story but tells one compelling enough to keep thinking about once the console is off? That's something no one should miss.