PC Reviews

SEGA's House of the Dead is a gaming institution, not because it's especially good (although it does what it does very well), but because its purposefully shaky action and dialogue makes it stick in the mind. Being chased by a sumo-sized monster? You can't possibly enter the door marked "No Entry." It's silly and harmless, and Typing of the Dead takes that idea and makes it even more outlandish.

Old-timey PC gamers might recall a game from the 80's called Shufflepuck Cafe, a science-fiction air-hockey sim with overt influences from Star Wars. The new PC game Shufflepuck Cantina Deluxe takes the same concept and allows modern gamers to experience the exotic thrills of Air Hockey... IN SPAAAAAACE!

In Race The Sun players control a fast-moving hovercaft that speeds through an endless landscape of abstract geometric objects. Enormous cubes, cones, and walls fill the world as the player hurtles ever forwards towards a setting sun. The ship is unable to stop, only steer from side to side until the player makes an inevitable mistake and crashes in a shower of flaming pixels.

The Wolf Among Us Episode 2-Smoke and Mirrors continues Telltale’s Fable-based series in excellent fashion. This second episode lacks the excitement of the first, but it provides a much more complex outlook into this unique, noir-themed world.

Assassin's Creed Liberation HD might have been a good idea six months ago. Take a popular, critically successful Vita game and port it to consoles and PC. Why not? There are a lot of people that wanted to see this chunk of the story but weren't willing to by a handheld for it. Sure, six months ago it would have gone down a treat, and would have nicely bridged the gap between Assassin's Creed III and IV. With Black Flag on the market though, Liberation HD feels like a leap of faith gone wrong.

The developers behind Deadly 30 absolutely have to be zombie game fans. It's a cunning combination of Call of Duty's Zombies, Left 4 Dead and a dozen other supernatural franchises that have defined the last few years of undead-erific fun. It's not a complicated idea: survive. But that's not quite as easy as it sounds, and it'll take every second of your 30 day "holiday" to really make it out alive.

Metal Gear Rising Revengeance sent up some red flags when it was announced; it didn't have Snake as a playable character, it wasn't part of the main Metal Gear storyline, and it was an action game with very little of Metal Gear's genre-defining stealth gameplay. However it was developed by Platinum Games, the studio behind Bayonetta, so it wasn't such a surprise that Revengeance turned out to among the best action games of 2013. Alas, it was only available for consoles, leaving PC Gamers out of the loop until now.

After the shocking conclusion to the first season of Telltale's The Walking Dead, Clementine is back. The timing is perfect: the TV show has hit mid-season after a shocking finale and multiple sales, including the Telltale Humble Bundle, means there are few of us that haven't at least started the first set of episodes.

The keyboard that came with a Dell might be good enough for a civilian, but Space Marines, Dovakiin, and Zombie Hunters need a little more out of their primary input device. Mad Catz makes some very elaborate gaming keyboards that sport integrated touch screens, modular design and dozens of programable keys, but their S.T.R.I.K.E 3 is a less expensive gaming keyboard that keeps many of the features that gamers want, but with a smaller price tag.

Final Fantasy VIII was completely mind-blowing to those of us who had been obsessed with Final Fantasy VII. The locations were dark, the characters followed you around and they even managed to have hands. It helped that it was a decent title in its own right, and now it's been re-released on Steam, with a few modern features squeezed in. Is it worth another investment, or should you stick to your Vita download?