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20 BEST SPACE GAME ON PC

Leave boring old Earth behind and travel to the farthest reaches of the universe—and beyond in these, the PC’s greatest space games.

The Dig
Year 1995 |Developer LucasArts
The LucasArts point-and-click adventure that everyone forgets about. A mission to divert an asteroid heading for Earth goes awry, sending a group of astronauts to a distant, seemingly abandoned, world. Some of the puzzles are maddeningly obtuse, even for a LucasArts game, but its colorful, strange planet feels genuinely alien. Great voice acting too, with X-Files and Terminator star Robert Patrick playing the lead.

Homeworld Remastered Collection
Year 2015 |Developer Relic/Gearbox Software
One of the best singleplayer RTS campaigns ever, beautifully remastered by Gearbox. The sight of thousands of your ships streaking across the game’s vividly colorful space-scapes is majestic. Its battles are tense and tactical, featuring many types of ship to command, including some colossal battleships. The Remastered Collection looks great on modern PCs and comes with the original Homeworld and its sequel.

Lunar Flight
Year 2012 |Developer Shovsoft
This modern take on classic arcade game Lunar Lander is a unique, challenging low-gravity flight simulator. It’s not as deep as some sims, but wrestling with its physics to deliver cargo and make landings on alien worlds is an enjoyable process. It’s also one of the best games to play with a VR headset, if you’re lucky enough to have one.

Space Engineers
Year 2013 |Developer Keen Software House
Minecraft in space, basically. Harvest asteroids for building materials then craft them into floating bases and flyable spaceships. You can hover around with a jetpack or build a gravity generator to walk on the surface of bigger asteroids. One of the best co-op build-’em-ups on PC, and new features are being added regularly.

EVE Online
Year 2003 |Developer CCP Games
Live another life—in space! There’s nothing else like EVE Online, the massively multiplayer RPG where everything is controlled by players. It’s a living, breathing galaxy in which thousands of capsuleers fight, trade, mine, and explore together. Break away from the relative safety of your policepatrolled starting system and you’ll find a ruthless, cosmic Wild West, where piracy, espionage and scamming are rife. Whether you’re fighting in a massive space war, where thousands of real-world dollars hang in the balance, or just exploring New Eden on your own, EVE is unforgettable.

Elite: Dangerous
Year 2014 |Developer Frontier Developments
An entire galaxy is your playground in this massive, beautiful space sim. Starting with a basic ship and a handful of credits, it’s up to you to shape your own destiny. Do you become a fearsome pirate? A master trader? An explorer? The beauty of Elite: Dangerous is being able to play in a way that suits you. From thrilling dogfights to gentle exploration, there’s something for everyone. Its ships are a dream to fly, from nimble fighters to heavy cargo haulers, especially with a flight stick.

Star Wars: TIE Fighter
Year 1994 |Developer Totally Games
A rare opportunity to be the bad guy in George Lucas’s space opera. With a variety of Empire-themed missions—dogfights, escorts, attacking capital ships—and a story to follow, it’s one of LucasArts’s best Star Wars games. Replace this entry with Star Wars: X-Wing if you’d prefer to play as the boring old Rebel Alliance. The best thing about this entire crop of Star Wars space sims is that they’ve all resurfaced to buy on GOG.com, compatible with modern systems.

FTL: Faster Than Light
Year 2012 |Developer Subset Games
FTL mixes turn-based and real-time strategy together to capture the experience of captaining a Star Trek-style spacecraft. It’s a strong roguelike, too, with the backdrop of a familiar yet fun sci-fi universe that comes with its own semi-humorous lore and a neat set of narrative beats that make the journey to its finale exciting every time. Being able to name your ship and crew makes it all the more heartbreaking when they die together in enemy space.

Wing Commander:Privateer
Year 1993 |Developer Origin Systems
Fans of the series will argue endlessly about which Wing Commander is the best, but we love Privateer’s darker feel. It’s a rich sandbox in which you can be a mercenary, a pirate, a merchant, or a mix of all three. You jump between systems looking for bounties to hunt and ships to rob, and the first-person dogfights are a thrill. There’s a linear story, but the real joy lies in doing your own thing.

Kerbal Space Program
Year 2015 |Developer Squad
W restle with gravity and the laws of physics as you build your own spacecraft and attempt to explore the cosmos. A robust, compelling sandbox of possibilities that’s as funny as it is clever. Escaping Kerbin’s atmosphere and landing on the Mun for the first time with a ship you’ve built is about as satisfying as PC gaming gets.

Take On Mars
Year 2013 |Developer Bohemia Interactive
If you like your space games a little more grounded, try Arma developer Bohemia’s Take On Mars. It’s a space exploration simulator based on real astro-science. You can build a Curiositystyle rover and explore the surface of the red planet or construct your own moonbase. A game for people who want the sci without the fi.

Sins of a Solar Empire
Year 2008 |Developer Ironclad Games
Mixing real-time strategy with 4X elements, Sins is a game of galactic conquest. Choose a faction, gather resources and become a mighty space-lord. Commanding its real-time wars is a thrill, but combat isn’t always the answer: you can use diplomacy to conquer systems too. A refreshingly slow-paced RTS with some truly massive space battles.

Universe Sandbox
Year 2011 |Developer Giant Army
This space simulator lets you play god and manipulate replicas of real galaxies and solar systems, and witness the (often catastrophic) results of your cosmic meddling. Increase the mass of Jupiter and you’ll see the rest of our solar system being sucked into it, or delete the Sun and watch Earth and the other planets drift away confused. A sequel, Universe Sandbox 2, recently arrived on Steam Early Access.

Galactic Civilizations II
Year 2006 |Developer Stardock
Conquer space with an army of customizable ships. Thanks to its smart, creative AI, a full-size game can take many exciting weeks to complete. You have to balance economic, technological, diplomatic, cultural and military power to forge alliances, engage in battles, and dominate the galaxy. Similar to the Civilization series, certainly, but on a much grander scale.

Artemis: Spaceship Bridge Simulator
Year 2013 |Developer Thom Robertson
You’ll need a group of three to six friends to get the most out of this one. Each player controls a different station of a starship—engineering, weapons, helm and so on—and must work together to destroy enemies, with a captain giving orders. It’s basically like staging a Kobayashi Maru test in your living room, and it’s amazing.

Flotilla
Year 2010 |Developer Blendo Games
This turn-based strategy game by prolific indie studio Blendo (Thirty Flights of Loving, Gravity Bone) plays out in 30-second bursts. Queue up your orders, then watch the action unfold until one side is completely obliterated. With a relaxing classical score, including Chopin’s Raindrop Prelude, and a stylish, curiously colorful art style, it’s one of the more offbeat games on our list. Flotilla also features psychic advisor dogs—there’s a strong sense of humor at work here.

Starbound
Year 2013 |Developer Chucklefish Games
Basically Terraria in space. Hop between randomly generated planets on a starship, hunt alien creatures for food, build colonies and underground bases, and try not to die. A brilliant sci-fi sandbox with a charming art style. Playable races include robots, beings made of solar energy, ape-like creatures, and wingless birds.

SpaceEngine
Year 2010 |Developer Vladimir Romanyuk
Do you like feeling small and insignificant? Do you enjoy having existential crises? Then play SpaceEngine, which features the entire universe. Or at least the bit we know about. Focus on Earth, then pull back at top speed, and you realize you’re on a tiny speck of dust hurtling through an endless void. The tech is remarkable, enabling you to travel effortlessly between galaxies and land on planets, even if there’s not a lot else to do.

FreeSpace 2
Year 1999 |Developer Volition, Inc.
While most space simulators use aircraft-like physics, FreeSpace attempts something more realistic, resulting in responsive, weightless controls. Battles play out like zero-gravity World War II dogfights, and it’s one of the best space combat games on PC. You’ll never forget your first combat encounter inside a colorful nebula.

Mass Effect 2
Year 2010 |Developer BioWare
If you’ve ever fantasized about being Captain Kirk, in command of your own starship, exploring the galaxy, meeting weird aliens, being confronted with cosmic dilemmas, Mass Effect 2 is that in game form. It’s part Star Wars space opera, part brilliant Star Trek episode, and one of the best sci-fi games on PC. It doesn’t have the freedom of Elite and is largely a linear experience, but it takes you on an unforgettable journey around the galaxy, visiting bizarre planets and getting involved in the lives of the people who live on them. We love the whole series, but Mass Effect 2 is our favorite.

10 CREEPY VIDEO GAME URBAN LEGENDS

10 Lovender Town syndrome
In February 1996 Pokemon Red and Green for the Nintendo Gameboy was released in japan to wide acclaim, however not everything about its release was so positive. Allegedly around the same time as the game’ s release, there was a noticeable rise in children committing suicide or falling ill. The legend states that this was caused by the music played in the game when the protagonist reaches Lavender Town. The Lavender Town theme is believed to have featured extremely high frequencies which were only detectable by younger gamers. These frequencies caused headaches, self harm and mental illness in those who played the game, ultimately leading to an estimated 200 children killing themselves. The story concludes by saying that due to the scandal the Lavender Town theme was later changed by developers Nintendo to a lower tone, and in the Western version, the music was changed completely.

9. Squall is dead
Final Fantasy 8 is considered a classic in the long running Japanese franchise, however the plotline is not without rumor. At the end of the first disc, protagonist Squall squared up to the evil Sorceress Edea on a parade float. So far, so Final Fantasy. However during this battle Edea sends a shard of ice flying through the air and into Sqall’s chest, causing him to stumble and fall off the float, ending the duel. Yet when disc two starts up, Squall appears alive and unharmed. The legend goes that everything that happens in the game after this is Squall’s dying brain attempting to process information before it runs cut of oxygen. To add to this theory, the finale features a series of scenes that flash before the player’s eyes. These include blurred out details, the battle with Edea itself and, for a brief moment, an image of Squall with his face missing. The legend states that his brain is close to death and therefore forgetting his own image.

8. Polybius
In 1998 a post on the website coinop.org stated that in 1981 a new, addictive video game was installed in a Portland, Oregon arcade called Polybius. Polybius proved popular, however players soon began complaining of nausea, headaches, and nightmares after spending time playing the game. Soon after the Polybius cabinet was visited by strange men in black who allegedly unknown and unauthorized data gathered from the players. In 2013 the website Skeptoid conducted an investigation into whether Polybius actually existed. They found that while there was no record of any game called Polybius in or around Portland in 1981… …there were two cases of gamers collapsing with headaches and stomach pains on the same day. Ten days later federal agents raided video arcades throughout the Portland area in an attempt to break up a gambling racket operated by arcade owners. To prepare for this operation, undercover agents had indeed investigated arcade machines to try and collect evidence. While Polybius may not be true, the seeds of the legend were based in reality.

7. Morrowind’s mod
Morrowind is the highly popular and critically acclaimed third instalment in the Elder Scrolls franchise, yet that hasn’t stopped people making their own mods for the game. One mod, called Juk1166z.esp, at first appeared to do nothing except corrupt the game. However when run through an MS-DOS emulator the game takes a sinister tone, Major NPCs immediately died, their corpses littering the game. The remaining characters would appear briefly and only say “Watch the sky”. The player’s health would be draining constantly and dungeons would start displaying images from your computer. The mod didn’t just affect the game, it took control of your computer. Finally a long-limbed character called the Assassin would appear, who would hunt the player and shriek in piercing tone. The game screen would slowly become darker and darker until nothing could be seen at all. According to one player who allegedly played the mod he began to dream, and then hallucinate, about the Assassin.

6. Killswitch
A company called Karvina Corp is believed to have released a game called Killswitch in 1989. The game followed the story of Porto, a human woman, and Ghast, an invisible demon, as they attempt to unravel the mystery of the mine they find themselves trapped in. There was a twist however. Once played, the game wiped itself completely, preventing the game from being played ever again. As only 5,000 copies were produced, so the legend goes, this has led to brand new cartridges being extremely valuable. In 2005 Yamamoto Ryuichi bought a copy of the game for $733,000, with the intention of broadcasting the playthrough on YouTube. Yet to date Ryuichi has only posted one two minute long video of himself crying before the character selection screen. The legend suggests that the game sends people mad. However it is most likely false, as the earliest mention of any game from that period called Killswitch… …comes from a now abandoned website called Invisible Games which deals in creepypasta about fictional games.

5. Pokemon block
Pokemon Black was released as a companion to Pokemon White in 2010. However before that there was another Pokemon Black – a far more sinister and twisted version. The legend states that an unnamed man was digging around a flea market in 2005 when he came across a version of Pokemon Red which was pure black. The game played as normal to begin with, with Professor Oak giving you the usual choice of three starter pokemon and a fourth one called Ghost. Ghost was level one and capable of only one attack: Curse. Every battle played the same. The opponent was too scared to move, allowing Ghost to cast “curse”. Once cast the screen would go black and the distorted scream of the defeated pokemon would play. This could even be cast on the trainer themselves, ultimately killing them. If you survived, Ghost would appear at the end and battle you. The screen faded to black and rebooting the Gameboy, the save file would be wiped clean.

4. Sonic.exe
Everyone knows Sonic the Hedgehog as the bright and colorful Sega mascot but Creepypasta author JC the Hyena had other ideas. The legend went that a man known only as Tom received in the mail a CD from his missing friend Kyle, accompanied by a note telling him to destroy it. Tom played the CD to find a heavily modded version of Sonic the Hedgehog. The blue sea was now an ocean of red blood, the sky was overcast and Sonic himself had glowing red and bleeding eyes. As he played the game further it appeared that Sonic was violently torturing and murdering the inhabitants of the game. Eventually the game began communicating with Tom, asking whether he wanted to play a game of hide and seek and addressing him by name. The more Tome played, the more it became clear that Kyle had been sucked into the game by Sonic… …another victim to be toyed with, tortured and murdered by hedgehog with the demon eyes.

3. Herobrine
First released in 2011, Minecraft has become a global sensation. It has sold over 106 million copies and cost Microsoft $2.5 billion when it was bought in 2014. Yet if a post on 4cham is to be believed, the simple block building game hides a dark and sinister secret. In 2011 a post on the popular online bulletin board mentioned a blank eyed character walking around his single player world and deforesting the map. After his post was deleted from the messageboard a few times, he received a message from a fellow user called Herobrine with one word, “Stop”. It turns out ‘Herobrine’ was the gamertag of the brother of Minecraft’s lead developer Markus Person aka ‘Notch’. When pressed on the issue, he allegedly said he did have a brother, but he had died. Since then people have built and expanded on the legend, insisting there is a character called Herobrine haunting the game.

2. Ben drowned
In 2010 anther 4chan user called Jadusable claimed to own a haunted copy of the classic N64 game Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. Jadusable bought what he thought was a brand new game from an elderly gentleman, but when installed into his console he found only a saved game called ‘Ben’. When Jadusable attempted to start a new game, the NPCs continued to call his character Ben. When the saved game was deleted, the NPCs just ignored him altogether. A later post by his alleged former roommate stated that Jadusable was slowly sent mad by this game.

1. Pole luno
Pale Luma is a text based adventure game which required gamers to input commands in order to progress through the story. Yet unlike other text based games, Pale Luma appeared to crash if anything other than the correct command is entered leading many people to dismiss the game as a broken and buggy product. One player however, Michael Nevins, wasn’t going to be put off. After six hours of trial and error, Nevins reportedly go through to a congratulations screen and a set of coordinates. Being nearby Nevins allegedly set off to the park where the coordinates were to investigate. When he dug at the point indicated, he uncovered the decomposing head of Koren Pauisen an eleven year old gril who had gone missing a year and a half before. The developer of Pale Luna was never traced, and the rest of Karen’s body was never found.

Best new Android games of 2016

Lewis Painter showcases the best upcoming games of 2016

Rush Rally 2
Rush Rally 2 is an upcoming racing game for not only Android, but iOS and Apple TV too – and it boasts some impressive features. First of all, the developers claim that the game will run at 60 frames per second and will feature over 72 tracks across a number of game modes including Rally cross and Rally Championship. There are eight cars available at launch with a plan to add more over time, all featuring realistic physics gathered from “real car telemetry data”. The iOS/Apple TV variants even feature MFi controller support, allowing you to use a gaming controller to play.

The good news is that the developers claim the game is completed, and it’s just a matter of deciding on a launch date. The developers hope that’ll be some time in May, but nothing is confirmed just yet.

Hackers
Hackers, as you’ve probably guessed already, is a game about hacking – don’t worry, you won’t get into trouble with the NSA for this kind of hacking, though. The idea is that you build up your hacking network and then hack your friends and other online players. Though details about gameplay are scarce, the idea is that you have a network, and you have to build up your defences and resources in such a way that you make the core of your network impenetrable to hackers. The game is currently in beta testing, which you can sign up for at tinyurl.com/h85vaac, with a plan to release for Android in the coming months.

The Elder Scrolls: Legends
The Elder Scrolls: Legends was first announced at E3 2015, and while there still isn’t a solid release date in sight, it looks promising. It’s a collectable card game, with gamers collecting cards with stats including agility and strength to be used in battles, although there isn’t much else to go on as Bethesda is being tight?lipped about the whole situation.

Bethesda has recently announced a beta test which should be starting soon, and those interested can sign up at tinyurl.com/hcynze8. The game is set to be available for both PC and Mobile and while we assume this means both iOS and Android, there is no platform confirmation so far. The release date is still unknown, but with E3 2016 fast approaching, we imagine it’ll get some kind of mention then.

Leap of Fate
Leap of Fate is an interesting game already available for PC, but is due to be released on mobile ‘soon’. The game is best known for being hardcore. It may have something to do with the fact that you have one life to survive a journey across a futuristic, slightly cyberpunk looking New York. There’s no health regeneration either, so you’ll probably die quickly and have to start all over again. You can play as one of four characters, all technomages (using science to create the illusion of magic), and there are over one hundred upgrades available over four categories: Mobility, Passive, Attack Skills and Equippable Glyphs. You can find out more about Leap of Fate on its official website at tinyurl.com/j8ghja4. There’s no word on the release date for the mobile companion just yet, but we’ll update this when we know more.

Samurai Rising
Square Enix recently posted a teaser for something called Project: Rising with promises that we’d hear more soon. Well, it turns out that the “more” it was referring to was yet another trailer, although this one included a few more details – the only issue is that it’s in Japanese. A Japanese?speaking writer over at Touch Arcade translated the trailer, and gave us the following insight: “…it’s another free to play social action RPG from the same artist responsible for Bravely Default. The game centralizes around four player co?op, with players taking the role of various Final Fantasy?ish classes.” The video specifically mentions the Dragoon, White Mage and Black Mage classes, so it’s safe to assume that other Final Fantasy?esque jobs will make an appearance in the full game. Samurai Rising looks to be a Japan exclusive game at launch, but we’re holding our breath that it’ll come to UK shores sooner rather than later.

Fallout 4 The Commonwealth needs you

It has been one of the biggest hype-trains in recent history; when Fallout 4 was announced just before E3 2015, people went nuts. And publishers Bethesda played on that, allowing their own promotion engine to be fuelled by the enthusiasm of fans the world over. So when Fallout 4 finally arrived, it is little wonder that a number of people were disappointed by what they got.

Even after all this time, when people should be well aware of how hype often gets out of hand, and when they should know that no game is perfect, they still managed to make themselves believe that Fallout 4 would, somehow, be a game that offered no problems. But by its very nature, Fallout 4 was almost guaranteed to be imperfect; any game as ambitious as this one is bound to have issues to some degree, and Fallout 4 is no different.

People the world over started identifying things that they didn’t like: graphics that were a bit poorer than ere expected, bugs that occasionally lead to hooking up on geometry or seeing odd things like models in strange places, that kind of thing. But it would serve one well, when approaching a game like Fallout 4, that (in the first instance) some truly great games have also had bugs and, most importantly, highlighting individual elements that may leave something to be desired in only truly relevant if these elements ruin the entire experience.

And, quite honestly, in the case of Fallout 4, they do not. You can bitch all you like about the little things that annoy you, but when the game is considered macroscopically (as it should be) there are very few things that might hamper the overall experience, and certainly none that will ruin it. The game begins with the player’s chosen character (created with a robust set of character editing tools) being rushed to Vault 111 in the face of total atomic annihilation. We’re not going into detail here, because spoilers suck… suffice to say that when the character awakens, you find yourself in a very different world, a long time after the bombs fell. After a few short “mandatory” missions that get you into the swing of things, Fallout 4 sort of stands back and says “It’s a great, big world out there… have fun with it”. And so the player begins a massive journey of discovery, in which the central plot plays only a small part. Fallout 4 isn’t about getting from A to B in a narrative; it is about living in a post-apocalyptic world.

To this end, Fallout 4 gives the player every tool it can muster in making the experience as engrossing and complete as possible. From the basic stuff, like character modification through skills and visual elements, and gear modification and improvement, right through to the establishment of settlements, Fallout 4 offers the player an absolute ton of things to do. I found myself spending long sessions tweaking my guns and armour, or fasttravelling between my settlements to make sure that they were properly defended and offered the growing number of residents what they required. I would spend hours constructing buildings in the game’s settlement editor, or hunting through random piles of scrap to find the elusive materials I needed for a particular weapon part. And then I would spend other long sessions exploring the Commonwealth (once called the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, the vast setting for this game) and completing missions. Between crafting, tweaking and combat, Fallout 4 has consumed many hours for me, and I still have a ton that I want to get to.

It’s the kind of game that you can spend a good long time playing, with short sessions great for tweaking and crafting, and longer sessions ideal for finding new places, trading and, of course, shooting stuff. And, thanks to the fully open nature of the world, you’ll be spending some of that time running away from enemies you cannot handle just yet, licking your wounds and levelling up before going back to exact a bit of revenge.

While Fallout 4 does give you every tool you need to survive in this world, it doesn’t hold your hand. It doesn’t guide you in any particular direction (the quests feel more like suggestions that compulsions) and it simply lets you get on with doing your thing within the game world.

And that world is massive. While fast-travelling is an option, this place has been created to be explored on foot, either solo or with a trusty companion (although the dog, for example, becomes more of an annoyance before long, so companions are only suggested for the most patient of players). It is a world that is full of surprises and oddity that you’ll never find if you bounce between fast-travel points, and this convenient method of traversing the map is only suggested for completing tedious tasks, like hauling junk back to your base of operations. There are amazing uncharted places and experiences here, and missing out on them would be a crime. Besides, walking is good for you.

None of it ever really seems overwhelming, either. Junk is automatically stripped down to needed parts by settlement workshops, for example. Traders are relatively plentiful (although you won’t find them fast travelling) and can even be set up in your settlements. The skill tree is simple yet expansive, but the lack of level cap means that you’ll more than likely never have to worry about getting to any particular ability at the expense of others. Combat can be daunting at times, but the game gets you feeling like a bad-ass pretty quickly, complete with customisable power armour and a massive arsenal of weapons that you can trim to suit your play style. It feels like the developers made a world for you to live in, on your own terms, rather than giving you a controlled experience. In truth, the only thing that is really overwhelming in Fallout 4 is the sheer scope of what you can do with it… and that’s a good kind of intimidation.

So, yes, the graphics may not be the best we’ve ever seen. The world may have bugs that aren’t mutated mosquitoes, flies and roaches. The companion AI does leave a lot to be desired. But the truth is that these things can be avoided or, at worst, ignored. And when everything is put together, all of these issues, whether in isolation or combined, do very little to hamper an excellent gaming experience. You may find yourself getting annoyed, even to a high degree, at times, but you will keep coming back. Like with Skyrim, Bethesda have managed to create an experience that is so wonderfully immersive with Fallout 4 that you’ll constantly keep coming back to it, bugs and all. It’s single-player only, which may make some people wonder about the longevity of the game, but with the amount that it offers to do, you’ll probably still be playing it long after you’ve set aside the latest cut-and-paste multiplayer FPS title. It’s not a massive step forward for the franchise, but it doesn’t need to be.

45 best Android games

The best Android games for your phone or tablet

1. Star Wars: Uprising

Free
With Star Wars all the rage the Galaxy needs a new hero in the fight against the Empire. Take part in Sector Battles, create your own character, and play real-time co-op.

2. Despicable Me

Free
If you love those little yellow things you’ll love Minion Rush. Jump, roll, dodge and scramble to collect bananas in this cute runner game.

3. Crossy Road

Free
Why did the chicken cross the road? Never mind that, why didn’t you? We love this hopper game, and so will you.

4. Fallout Shelter

Free
Fallout fans will love Shelter, a mobile game that gives you complete control over your very own Vault, and the citizens that reside in it. Can you keep your Dwellers happy, fed and protected from the dangers of the outside world in this post-apocalyptic adventure?

5. WordBrain

Free
“Even the smartest word game enthusiasts will have a real challenge to complete this game. In fact: only very few have!” That’s all the encouragement we need: the challenge is on to become a word master in this headscratchingly difficult hiddenword
game.

6. Minecraft

Pocket Edition
?4.99
Construction sim with endless possibilities. This infinite box of Legos has the very real potential to eat your life before your eyes.

7. Alphabear

Free
Oh now this is supercute. You spell out words and bears appear. Longer words equal bigger bears and even more cuteness.

8. Spider-Man

Unlimited
Free
Recruit an army of heroes in the Spider-Verse and take on the Sinister Six. This action-packed arcade game will keep you entertained for hours.

9. Clash of Clans

Free
Form the ultimate Clan with your own army of Barbarians, Archers, Hog Riders, Wizards and more, then defend your village and take down the Goblin King.

10. Lego Ninjago

Tournament
Free
Ninjas, it’s time to enter Master Chen’s Tournament of Elements. You must use your training to take on Elemental Masters, and the more you win the stronger you become.

11. Monopoly

?1.49
Who doesn’t love Monopoly? If you answered “me”, go directly to jail. YOU WILL NOT COLLECT ?200.

12. Table Tennis Touch

45 best Android games Table Tennis Touch

79p
It’s not a freebie, but stunning graphics make Table Tennis Touch worth the download. Even more so if you like Ping Pong.

13. Sim City Build It

Free
A realistic city-builder that lets you create an environment in which your citizens will thrive, and trade resources with friends online. Just when you think life is going good, real-life challenges will keep you on your toes.

14. Plants vs Zombies 2

45 best Android games Plants vs Zombies 2

Free
Plants vs Zombies is the tower defence game loved by all, and the sequel is much more of the same zombie- and super-plant goodness.

15. First Touch Soccer 2015

45 best Android games First Touch Soccer 2015

Free
There are loads of football games for Android, but if you don’t want to pay a penny First Touch Soccer is a great choice.

16. Walking Dead: Road to Survival
Free
TellTale’s Walking Dead series is not to be missed, but this alternative is a turnbased RPG that focuses on the original comic books over the TV series, and in which your decisions will determine who lives and who dies. Kicking off at Woodbury, can you take on The Governor?

17. The Room Two
?1.99
Physical puzzles in a beautifully-realised 3D world make this somewhat unsettling sequel a joy to play.

18. Lara Croft Go
?3.99
Explore the ruins of an ancient civilisation and face deadly challenges in this turn-based adventure game. More than 75 puzzles are split into five chapters.

19. Bad Piggies
Free
From the makers of Angry Birds, Bad Piggies is an addictive and challenging puzzle game, with some action thrown in to add to the fun.

20. Temple Run 2
Free
A hugely popular runner game for Android, Temple Run 2 sees you navigate perilous terrain as you attempt to escape with the cursed idol. However far you can get, it won’t be far enough.

21. Monument Valley
?2.99
Supremely calming puzzler with innovative perspective-based gameplay. More soothing than an opiate-spiked Horlicks.

22. Jetpack Joyride
Free
Mission-driven progression and a range of crazy gadgets, jetpacks, vehicles, achievements and character customisation add replay value to the simple controls and repetitive nature of Barry Steakfries’ endless journey in Jetpack Joyride.

23. Angry Birds
Free
Just because it’s old doesn’t make it bad: this list would never be complete without this mobile gaming classic.

24. Ridiculous Fishing
?1.99
“A handcrafted game about fishing with guns, chainsaws & toasters.” SOLD.

25. Super Hexagon
?1.99
Frantic shape-based avoidance game. Punishing difficulty set to a rather wonderful electronic score.

26. Threes!
Free
Potently addictive, simple yet full of strategic depth, Threes is based on a set of numbered tiles that you manipulate around a four-by-four board. There are blue ones, and pinky twos, and you jam these into each other to make white threes. Everything else is a multiple of three created by joining two matching white tiles. Two plus one equals three. Three plus three equals six. Six plus six equals 12. You get the picture.

27. Flow Free
Free
Addictive colour matching fun that is equal parts frustration and satisfaction. Attempt to reach the goal in as few moves as possible.

28. Sonic Dash
Free
The lovable blue spikey-haired hedgehog returns in this endless runner game for Android. Dash, jump and spin through levels collecting rings, dodging spikes and ultimately climbing the leader boards.

29. Dumb Ways
To Die 2
Free
Warioware-style mini games abound in this free gigglefest. Fun, quickfire action, with entertaining deaths aplenty.

30. Words With
Friends
Free
Words With Friends is in essence Scrabble, played with friends at your own pace. And you get to show them how much more intelligent you are than them. A no-brainer.

31. Call Of Duty: Heroes
Free
This 3D combat strategy game has you customise your base and train elite forces to wipe out enemies in fierce battle. Plus: create deadly alliances with your friends, competing for in-game rewards.

32. Riptide GP2
?1.59
Rocket-powered hydro jets and futuristic race tracks make Riptide GP2 a fast, fun, and visually stunning racing experience.

33. Cut The Rope: Time Travel
Free
Cut the Rope: Time Travel is a new adventure filled with time-travelling, candycrunching, physicsbased action. Help Om Nom feed his ancestors as you play through the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, a Pirate Ship, Ancient Egypt, Ancient Greece, the Stone Age, Disco Era, Wild West, Asian Dynasty, Industrial Revolution and the Future. Great for kids, too.

34. Beach Buggy Blitz
Free
A fun driving game in which you collect power-ups and performance-boosting upgrades, unlock new vehicles and collect new characters. Awesome fun and great graphics make Beach Buggy Blitz an easy download.

35. Machinarium
?3.99
Josef the robot is on a mission to save girlfriend Berta from the Blackcap Brotherhood in this award-winning adventure game.

36. Hitman GO
?3.99
Agent 47’s latest outing is a quasi-board game that plays like the leadup to a game of Cluedo. Initially odd, but ultimately rewarding.

37. Marvel Contest of Champions
Free
If you love your superheroes and fighting games then you’ll love Contest of Champions. Level up characters and build your own team of champions in this graphically stunning fighter game.

38. Thomas Was Alone
?3.99
Satisfying special gameplay takes second place to the compelling writing and characterization. You’ll never care more about a bunch of squares.

39. Badland
Free
Gorgeous sidescrolling, jump-based platformer, and winner of three awards. Worth downloading for the stunning visuals alone.

40. Grand Theft Auto San Andreas
?3.99
Rockstar has retooled its genre-defining franchise for Android, and you can pick up GTA III, Vice City and San Andreas for criminally good gaming wherever you go.

41. Criminal Case
Free
Are you ready to test your detective skills? This is a hidden object game with an actual storyline: investigate crime scenes for clues and help the Police of Grimsborough crack murder cases.

42. Modern Combat 5 Blackout
Free
Gameloft’s answer to Call of Duty on the PC or consoles, Modern Combat 5: Blackout is a meaty game which includes both singleand multiplayer modes.

43. Goat Simulator
?3.99
What started out as an Internet joke has now landed on Android. Play as a goat and wreck as much stuff as possible in this fantastic mess of a game.

44. Crazy Taxi City Rush
Free
Crazy Taxi City Rush rewards you for insane driving as you race around doing whatever it takes to get your passengers to their destination on time.

45. You Must Build A Boat
?1.99
Sequel to 10000000, this builds on the original tile-matching puzzle meets running game with a boat. You have to build it, assemble a crew, and explore whatever dungeons you pass as you float down river.

GALLERY OF PUZZLE GAMES

Kami

Kami is a familiar concept, requiring you to tap at squares of a patterned grid to make them one uniform colour. The paper texture of the squares and origami like folding animation as they change hue, make it a fun brainteaser.
? Price: Free

The Room 2
At the other end of the spectrum to Kami, The Room 2 is both devilishly difficult and rendered in photo realistic graphics. Dark and mysterious, this point-and-click adventure is full of puzzles that will require hours to master.
? Price: ?1.99/$2.99

Cut the Rope 2
Don’t be fooled by the bubblegum bright colour scheme and cartoon graphics, this sequel is very smart. Ramping up the physics based puzzles, there’s a lot to consider in helping Om Nom reach his candy.

? Price: Free

Strata
Your goal in Strata is to layer ribbons over a grid and ensure the top layer matches the colours of the grid below. A smooth learning curve helps, but there is no denying this minimalist game is a mind-bending monster to conquer.

? Price: ?1.86/$2.99

Hitman GO
The console game franchise has been reinvented as a villainous version of Cluedo. This approach was great for simplifying the controls for mobile, without sacrifi cing the complexity of the puzzles or the elegant in-game visuals.
? Price: ?2.99/$4.99

Monument Valley
Full of impossible architecture that doesn’t go anywhere, Monument Valley is like an interactive version of M.C. Escher’s surreal paintings. Your job is to figure out which objects to move around so the heroine can move on.
? Price: ?2.49/$3.99

Land of the Pharaohs

The start of the Assassins

2013 saw the release of Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag, and it brought a lot of freshness to the franchise. See, up until that point, Assassin’s Creed had started treading familiar territory a little too much. The original game was something of a breath of fresh air when it first arrived, despite complaints about repetitive game play.

The second game – arguably the best in the franchise – took the series to fantastic new heights, spawning two great expansions as well. But by the time the third title came out, things were feeling a little stale. It didn’t help that, until the release of Assassin’s Creed: Unity (with its many, many bugs and issues) Assassin’s Creed 3, despite a strong story and a whole new setting, was considered by a great many to be the series’ lowest point. It lacked the depth of the second game, and the uniqueness of the first.

So when Black Flag hit shelves and afforded players to take on the pirate life, it made something of a splash. The hero wasn’t the noble Assassin that we had seen three times before, and the focus of the game was somewhat different. It was something of a triumph for a franchise that was becoming long in the tooth far too quickly.

This was perhaps also due to the fact that Assassin’s Creed had become a regular feature in the video game calendar. Other than a gap between the first two games, released in 2007 and 2009 respectively, the series has seen a major release in every year. 2010 brought Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood, 2011 Assassin’s Creed: Revelations, 2012 Assassin’s Creed III and 2013 Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag. In fact, the trend continued after Black Flag, too; 2014 brought Assassin’s Creed: Rogue and the lamentable Assassin’s Creed: Unity, and 2015 Assassin’s Creed: Syndicate. And then, in a surprising move, Ubisoft announced that there would be no game in the franchise in 2016, opting rather to release a remastered version of Assassin’s Creed II.

That two year gap may be important, if trends are to be believed (and considering there was a two year gap before the release of the excellent Assassin’s Creed II). Because this year – two years after the release of Syndicate – Ubisoft have announced Assassin’s Creed: Origins.

Just before E3 2017, rumours started spreading about the game, and that it would be set in Ancient Egypt (a setting many fans have believed would be explored by the franchise sooner or later). And those rumours proved founded in truth - Assassin’s Creed: Origins will take place in Ptolemaic Egypt (a period that lasted from 323BC until 30BC). And it will also explore the origins of the shadowy Assassins, which there has been quite a bit of speculation about.

In Assassin’s Creed: Origins players will take on the role of Bayek, who is a Medjay (basically an Ancient Egyptian paramilitary force who had sweeping policing and protection duties). The players will use Bayek to protect his people from threats, although whether the Templars will be the main bad guys this time around (the order was established in 1129AD) remains to be seen. What we do know, however, is that taking out bad guys in Assassin’s Creed: Origins will be a little different.

Missions will build towards something that has been missing from the franchise – boss fights. And each boss fight will be different, forcing players to consider loadouts and tactics with each and every one, rather than just taking to the mission with their favourite kit. Additionally, mission completion will be freer than before… this time around, targets won’t just stroll around areas where players will expect to find them. Rather, they will have lives, meaning that they will travel between different locations at different times of day.

This means that the player will need to strategies and choose the best time to strike, adding a new level of freedom to mission completion. That, all on its own, is reason to get excited; this freedom will enable players to take advantage of differing conditions, and make each hit their own, rather than being shoe-horned into tighter situations.

Players will also be able to undertake missions at their own pace, which is a good thing when one considers that Assassin’s Creed: Origins offers an entire country to explore. There will be varied environments, ranging from lush, overgrown oases right through to desert landscapes. In addition, players will be able to discover and explore tombs and more, meaning that there is going to be a lot to do in Assassin’s Creed: Origins… just like there was in Black Flag.

And at the core of the action – in addition to great graphics and a number of expected new mechanics – will be an overhauled reactive combat system, as well as a host of new weapons that all have their own characteristics.

It is all rather exciting, particularly for fans of the franchise who have seen chinks appearing in its armour. But possibly one of the most exciting factors is one that is happening behind the scenes… and is the reason why Black Flag has been mentioned so often here. The team behind Assassin’s Creed: Origins is the same team that created Black Flag, an undeniable high point in the franchise’s history. That team brings with it not only the know-how that went into creating Black Flag, complete with its enormous playing area, but also the time that they have put in; Assassin’s Creed: Origins’ development started in 2014, not long after Black Flag was released.

Many Assassin’s Creed fans are suffering from “once bitten, twice shy”. The franchise’s misstep with Unity left a sour taste in many mouths, which many feel Syndicate did not do enough to change. But initial reports for Assassin’s Creed: Origins seem hopeful that the franchise will be aking a long overdue return to the heights achieved by Assassin’s Creed II and Black Flag… all we can do is hope that our upcoming adventures in Ancient Egypt will be what the franchise needs to return to its former glories.

LEGO Marvel Super Heroes: Universe in Peril

Loosely based on the 2013 PC/console game, the Android version drops the open world aspect and splits the levels into shorter stages to suit the mobile form. It’s still a huge download though, mainly due to the large number of cut-scenes featuring trademark LEGO humour. While the character roster isn’t as colossal as the original, you still get to play as over 91 characters.

Ranging from fan-favourite superheroes to minor characters, these are unlocked during play or earlier via IAP bundles. Naturally, they all bring their unique powers to the table and while the main character for each stage is preset, you get to choose a tag partner. During play you can switch characters at any point, or hit the tag button to use both Starting off with Iron Man and The Hulk, we soon got used to the touch controls, although there’s an option for on screen buttons as well. You simply drag your finger around to move, tap on enemies to attack, swipe to dodge and flick up with two fingers to fly. You can also throw heavy objects and once the super meter is charged, unleash a mega attack on your opposition.

Each of the 45 missions features ten special challenges, such as beating a time limit, collecting enough studs and defeating all enemies. There’s plenty of replay value here, particularly as some feats can only be achieved using certain characters, so you’ll need to return to stages later once they have been unlocked. Red bricks can also be found, or bought, to increase your powers and enable cheat modes during your gameplay.

LEGO Marvel Super Heroes is well presented, fun to play, features nice boss battles and offers plenty of content to keep you returning.

?Price ?3.30/$4.99 + IAPs
?Designed for Phone and tablet
?Requires Android 4.0.3

3 games review Wonderbook: Book Of Spells Zone Of The Enders F1 Race Stars
Wonderbook: Book Of Spells
Wand Direction

Before we go any further, it has to be said that Wonderbook: Book Of Spells is not software designed for 30–year-old videogame reviewers with scruffy facial hair and fading hairlines. It’s a rather lovingly put together EyeToy and PlayStation Move combo that promises to bring the magic of Hogwarts to your PS3 just in time for Christmas, featuring words by JK Rowling herself, and tech by the splendid Sony London. So, being said 30 year old, it made sense to let the child of the house have a go. Unfortunately, he’s only 16 months old, so he trampled across the blue Wonderbook accessory, tried to eat the glowing part of the Move controller, laughed at his own face on the TV for about five minutes, then ran into the kitchen, grabbed a bag of dried pasta and emptied it all over the hall while hooting maniacally. Not a great help.

Thankfully, his mum is a diehard Potter aficionado, and we managed to combine our powers of technical knowledge and Hogwarts wizardry to spellbinding effect. The tech is actually really nice; your Move is transformed into a gnarled, wooden wand which can be used to levitate objects or shoot
jets of water across the place in a pretty magical fashion. There are four chapters in Book Of Spells, each comprising multiple incantations, and every one is lavished with detail, artful storytelling and almost faultless tech. Levitating eyeballs and toads, warding off nasty roots, chanting weird spell names… it’s all in here.

The production is fantastic, frankly. This is software designed for young Potter fanatics, probably around eight years old, and it brings a sense of spirit and warmth that’s entirely in keeping with the Rowling universe. It’s easy to sneer at stuff like this, so-called ‘non-games’, but it’s better to think of Wonderbook as a Christmas toy rather than a videogame franchise in and of itself.

Quite where the tech goes after Book Of Spells has been exhausted is anyone’s guess, really. It does feel like a one-off of sorts, a great seasonal product that doesn’t really need any further add-ons despite the promise of next year’s Diggs Nightcrawler, but should Sony choose to, there’s potential for Wonderbook to turn into a nifty little platform of its own. If nothing else, too, it confirms that Move is by far the best motion control device on the market, capable of some real wizardry of its
own. Lovely.
Jon Denton

Zone Of The Enders HD Collection
Jehuty calls for Konami’s remastering department

There’s something deliciously poetic about Konami bundling a new Metal Gear demo with an HD transfer of a videogame that was originally used as a vessel through which to sell a Metal Gear demo. Back in the day, Kojima’s name wasn’t widely enough known for a new IP to be sold off the back of that alone, but the chance to shove Snake around a tanker made the unknown quantity that was Zone Of The Enders that much more appealing.

But with this package bringing together both the glorified tech demo that is the original videogame and its glorious yet underappreciated sequel – both with a fancy new lick of polygonal paint, no less – we can only hope it’s not the demo doing the selling this time around. The slick new anime intro tells you everything you need to know about the videogame, and as much as you’re ever likely to understand about the story too, for that matter. Mech combat is the order of the day, though it’s a fluid and graceful strain that doesn’t really exist outside of anime even to this day.

Whether jetting around the sky spewing laser death at other extremely expensive robotic things or engaging in choreographed melee showdowns with rival Frames, Jehuty’s antics are stylish in extreme. That said, it’s all fairly subdued in the original, with only a couple of mechs on screen at once – it was an early PS2 game, let’s not forget – but the sequel ramps up the intensity within minutes, even if it’s at the expense of frame-rate issues that apparently still haven’t quite been ironed out.

While the original holds up better as a way of establishing the universe than it does on a gameplay level, the second game flips that on its head – it’s a peerless action videogame in its field, though we’d wager there isn’t a single person on the planet who actually know what is going on on a narrative level. But you simply won’t care. The original has done its job of creating a world in which giant robots can fight scores of other giant robots and that’s more than enough for the sequel to survive on its gameplay merits alone.

ZOE may feel like a proof of concept, spliced with Eighties mech anime pulled off an old VHS. But the second videogame both feels and now looks like it could have come out in the last few years. Whether you still harbour fond memories of the franchise or never played it back in the day, Zone Of The Enders is definitely worth another look, and the HD remaster team have done a sterling job. Oh,
and did we mention the Revengeance demo? You’ll want that too.
Luke Albig?s

F1 Race Stars
Mario (Andretti) Kart

You know the old adage: you wait ages for a karting game and then three come along at once. Or something like that, anyway. This year LittleBigPlanet Karting had pole position, Sonic & Sega Racing Transformed is the underdog bringing up the rear and then there’s F1 Race Stars sitting slap-bang in mediocre mid-table.

It’s about as mild a game as they come – even for a karting game – which is a shame when the initial promise of it really does make it quite interesting. Take the new ‘innovative’ features in slipstreaming and KERS boosting, for example. The former – though not unheard of in racing games – is pretty new for karting games and boosts your speed when behind another driver. It’s a form of rubberbanding, sure, but one that you can benefit from too.

KERS, as race fans will likely know, is a fancy doohickey that goes inside a Formula One car for improving acceleration after sharp braking. With that in mind, its inclusion in F1 Race Stars does make a little more sense, as highlighted areas around certain bends enable you to charge up an additional boost of up to three tiers when carefully controlling acceleration.

Then there’s the power-ups themselves, some of which are your usual red shell/green shell guff and others that are a little more… respectful of the subject matter. Like the Safety Car pickup, a blue shell-style power-up that forces the player in first place to a crawl behind the pace car. Or the rain cloud that, as you might expect, covers the tarmac in slick pools of water.

It’s unfortunate that such a reverence of Formula One should be F1 Race Stars downfall, then. The biggest problem is the handling, an element that should be of primary importance in any karting game. Where most let you hop and drift around sharper bends, F1 Race Stars has none of it: if you want to tackle some of the game’s wackier tracks then you’ll either have to ricochet off walls and hope you aren’t slowed too much, or brake yourself and recuperate afterwards. It’s a huge detriment
to the game as a whole, turning what could be an entertaining spin on F1 racing into a frustrating slog.

We like a lot of what F1 Race Stars does – honestly, we do – but if Codemasters wants to keep this interesting idea going it really needs to find out exactly what it wants the game to be. In the end, though, a karting game that is a pain to control is no karting game at all.
Adam Barnes

Battlefield Hardline

Top 10 Survival Ios Games of All Time

The Ultimate Guide to Punch-out!

Top 15 Most Successful Indie Games Ever Made

50 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games of 2018

65 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games of 2017

Top 10 Scary Fortnite Creepypastas

8 Video Game Records That Will Never Be Broken

Top 10 Battle Royale Games

Top 25 Best Free Ios Games

Top 25 Free Ios Games of All Time

The Scariest 10 Video Games That Traumatized Players

10 Video Game Easter Eggs That Took Years to Find

10 Creepy Video Game Urban Legends

Top 10 Scariest Horror Games of All Time

10 Video Games That Caused Real Life Deaths

Top 15 Scariest Gaming Theories

The Scariest 10 Video Games That Traumatized Players

Top 10 Best Xbox 360 Action Games of All Time

Top 10 Fighting Games to Play in 2019

Top 10 Best Open World Games Like Skyrim (2019)

Top 10 Best Games for Nintendo Switch

Top 10 Best Pc Rpgs for the Last 10 Years

50 Most Wanted Ps4 Games

Top 25 Ps4 Indie Games

Battlefield Hardline

Top 10 Survival Ios Games of All Time

The Ultimate Guide to Punch-out!

Top 15 Most Successful Indie Games Ever Made

50 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games of 2018

65 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games of 2017

Top 10 Scary Fortnite Creepypastas

8 Video Game Records That Will Never Be Broken

Top 10 Battle Royale Games

Top 25 Best Free Ios Games

Top 25 Free Ios Games of All Time

The Scariest 10 Video Games That Traumatized Players

10 Video Game Easter Eggs That Took Years to Find

10 Creepy Video Game Urban Legends

Top 10 Scariest Horror Games of All Time

10 Video Games That Caused Real Life Deaths

Top 15 Scariest Gaming Theories

The Scariest 10 Video Games That Traumatized Players

Top 10 Best Xbox 360 Action Games of All Time

Top 10 Fighting Games to Play in 2019

Top 10 Best Open World Games Like Skyrim (2019)

Top 10 Best Games for Nintendo Switch

Top 10 Best Pc Rpgs for the Last 10 Years

50 Most Wanted Ps4 Games

Top 25 Ps4 Indie Games

How To play games in Facebook Messenger

Facebook Messenger now has a proper gaming feature called Instant Games. Chris Martin shows how to use it

Following on from the success of its hidden games inside Facebook Messenger such as football keep ups and basketball, the firm has launched a fully-fl edged gaming feature called Instant Games to its chat service. The firm describes it as a new ‘gaming tab’ inside the app that allows you to challenge your friends and family at a number of games. It’s simple enough to play if you follow the steps below, making sure you’ve updated to the latest version in your app store first.

Play games on
• Open or start a conversation (groups included)
• Tap on the game controller icon
• Choose the game you want to play

Games list
With over 1.2bn games of the basketball game played, launching Instant Games is the next logical step. The feature is rolling out in 30 countries on Android 5 or later. Features include score leader boards in-context chat, and group thread conversations. Read: How to send a Facebook message without Facebook Messenger.

If you’re looking for a Facebook Messenger games list, then check out the image below which shows the 17 launch titles from partners such as King, Konami and Bandai Namco. Highlights on the games list include the likes Space Invaders, Puzzle Bobble, Words with Friends: Frenzy and Pac-Man.

Mirror’s Edge Catalyst

It’s shaping up to be the sequel I always wanted

I ’m at a presentation of a Catalyst mission and I’ve lost count of how many times the word ‘fluid’ has been used. The movement? Fluid. The combat? Fluid. The mission structure? Fluid. The way the engine can seamlessly transition from the outside world into a building’s interior? Also fluid. It’s subtle hints like this that convey DICE’s intent for its game.

I sympathize with the repetition, because Mirror’s Edge Catalyst isn’t dramatically different from its predecessor. Yes, there’s an open world now, but the basic tenets of what made Mirror’s Edge so good are all present in the demo. It looks gorgeous, just as Mirror’s Edge did. Its freerunning seems responsive and satisfying, just as Mirror’s Edge’s was. When Catalyst was announced, DICE claimed it wasn’t a sequel. Here it looks like the most typical of sequels, improving the first game’s best features and tweaking its worst. In short, it’s Mirror’s Edge but more fluid. It’s pretty much exactly as I was hoping for. Opening the map screen, Faith places a marker to the mission’s starting point.

This activates Runner Vision, which in Mirror’s Edge showed players the optimum route. In Catalyst, it does the same thing, but is applied on-the-fly based on where your waypoint is set. As in the first game, it’s also optional.

Approaching the looming building of Elysium, Faith passes a ‘Gridleak’—just one of a number of collectibles that will be hidden around the city. Generally, I’m not a fan of hunting down trinkets through a large open world. But Mirror’s Edge is a series about the joy of movement. Done well and the collectibles could be fun mini-challenges that break up the more involved missions and sidequests. Faith reaches the marker, triggering a cutscene. Yes, there are still cutscenes— but now they’re in-engine. It introduces a new character: a swaggering jerk whose impotent, macho smack-talk accompanies Faith throughout the mission. Catalyst is a reboot of Faith’s origin. Once again, it’s about the figures on the edge of a dystopian society—the ‘runners’ who deliver secretive documents and the sense of competition between them. You’ll see much more of life as a runner in Catalyst, where Faith will operate as a cat burglar, data courier or spy.

Moving on up
Infiltrating the building, Faith shows off her new and improved moveset. With enough momentum, she can again chain between wallrunning, sliding and clambering around with ease. Additional skills are part of an upgrade system that lives in Faith’s glove. In the demo, she has a Mag Rope. It’s basically a grappling hook-style device that lets her swing between large gaps. For Catalyst, the combat has also been incorporated into the flow of movement so that it’s less stop-and-start. A UI element shows the location of any surrounding enemies that might block your way. It’s a matter of finding the gaps in their positioning and taking out anybody who gets too close.

In the demo, this is all performed flawlessly. It will no doubt be more clumsy in the hands of someone less skilled but DICE has tweaked the difficulty to remove some of the frustrations of a poor performance. “I wouldn’t say it’s easier, because it’s not easy,” says senior producer Sara Jansson after the demo. “It’s still a skill-based game. But we’ve worked on different systems that help you if you’re slightly off timing. If you jump a little bit too early into a wall run or jump you’ll get help to still make it, depending on how much momentum you have.” Get it right, and you’ll keep more of your momentum. “If you’re a skilled player, you’ll just be a lot more fluid.”

Phil Savage