This weekend sees the release of not one, but two sci-fi epics in the form of Dune: Part Two and Rebel Moon Part Two: The Scargiver on VOD and streaming. If neither of those strikes your fancy, don’t worry; we’ve once again descended into the backlog of Netflix’s streaming library to bring you a trio of the best sci-fi movies to watch in April.
This month’s picks include John Carpenter’s 1984 sci-fi body-horror romance starring Jeff Bridges, an underrated post-apocalyptic blockbuster about mobile city fortresses duking it out for resources, and an anime adaptation of a cult-classic cyberpunk manga.
Let’s take a look at what this month has to offer!
Editor’s pick: Starman
Image: Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
Director: John Carpenter Cast: Jeff Bridges, Karen Allen, Charles Martin Smith
The pitch “John Carpenter’s version of Close Encounters” conjures a far different image for fans of the Halloween director than what his 1984 film Starman turned out to be. The film kicks off with a sleek spaceship descending upon Earth in a frame not too far off from the opening of The Thing. There’s even a bit of body horror: When the alien creeps into the home of the recently widowed Jenny (Karen Allen), the entity uses bits of DNA of her deceased husband to recast his corporeal self — growing from baby to toddler to teen to adult Jeff Bridges in mere seconds. It’s sick! Then Carpenter gets all mushy in his most romantic film to date.
Starman is a sci-fi film through and through — the alien visits our planet after intercepting Voyager 2’s golden disc, and its arrival sparks a classic Spielbergian cat-and-mouse game between bumbling feds and the on-the-lam ET — but in having the alien assume the form of Jenny’s dead husband, Carpenter burrows deeper into human mortality than these screen stories tend to go. Allen, spiraling in an impossible situation, and Bridges, mixing his alien’s hyperintelligence with childlike wonder, have the chemistry to make a silly story sing. Jenny knows the man in her passenger seat isn’t her husband, but he is a second chance. Carpenter mines the dreamlike premise for all the sap, leaning on Jack Nitzsche’s unforgettable score to swell at just the right moments. Starman is pure Hollywood romance, and proof that boxing a director into one genre is the quickest way to limit greatness. —Matt Patches
Mortal Engines
Image: Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
Director: Christian Rivers Cast: Hera Hilmar, Robert Sheehan, Hugo Weaving
An underrated post-apocalyptic blockbuster from many of the people who made the Lord of the Rings movies, Mortal Engines was a box-office bomb but deserved much better. Set in a future where cities are mobile and big cities hunt smaller ones, the story follows a young assassin (Hera Hilmar) who seeks to take out a power-hungry leader (Hugo Weaving). Along the way, she finds allies (Jihae) and maybe even a bit of love (Robert Sheehan).
But the characters or narrative aren’t Mortal Engines’main selling point (although Weaving does fully and delightfully commit to an over-the-top villainous performance). Instead, it’s the fantastic production design and creative world-building that make Mortal Engines feel like a breath of fresh air in the sequel/prequel/remake-heavy sci-fi blockbuster landscape. Now that it’s newly on Netflix, check out one of the 2010s’ most undeserved flops. —Pete Volk
Blame!
Image: Polygon Pictures/Netflix
Director: Hiroyuki Seshita Cast: Takahiro Sakurai, Kana Hanazawa, Sora Amamiya
Alongside the likes of H.R. Giger and Shinya Tsukamoto, Tsutomu Nihei is one of the most prolific artists associated with the subgenre of posthuman science fiction, emphasizing horrific man-machine hybrids and massive, desolate worlds set in the far future.
Nihei’s 1997 manga Blame! is inarguably his magnum opus — a post-apocalyptic cyberpunk saga about a mysterious warrior known as “Killy” wandering the metallic wastelands of an Earth overrun by a techno-organic virus. Adapted into a feature-length anime by director Hiroyuki Seshita (Knights of Sidonia), Blame! streamlines the manga’s story into a single adventure in Killy’s quest to find a means of undoing the virus that has reshaped the world and endangered humanity’s last remaining descendents.
While the film loses some of the evocative, wordless melancholy of the manga in its translation from page to screen, it lacks none of the scale and depth of its world-building and vistas. The action is punishing and electrifying, as Killy contends with monstrous killer androids and a ruthless antagonist hellbent on killing as many impure humans (i.e., everyone) as possible. Blame! is a worthy adaptation of the source material, as well as a worthwhile watch for anyone who considers themself a fan of dark sci-fi animation. —Toussaint Egan
April is nearly here and spring has sprung, which means it’s time to comb through the best movies leaving streaming services at the end of this month and plan accordingly.
This month’s lineup is an eclectic assortment of classics, crowd-pleasers, and cerebral gems. Jonathan Glazer’s 2000 debut, Sexy Beast starring Ray Winstone and Ben Kingsley, is a top priority; you must watch that if you haven’t already. Other picks include the sci-fi horror film Underwater, starring Love Lies Bleeding’s Kristen Stewart, Kathryn Bigelow’s elusive cyberpunk thriller Strange Days, a classic martial arts action film starring the inimitable Sonny Chiba, and more.
Whatever you’re looking for, there are options for you, with the added urgency of “you won’t be able to watch this here next month.”
Here are the best movies you should watch before they leave streaming this March.
Editor’s pick
Sexy Beast
Image: FilmFour/Fox Searchlight Pictures
Director: Jonathan Glazer Cast: Ben Kingsley, Ray Winstone, Ian McShane Leaving Criterion Channel: March 31
Earlier this month, Jonathan Glazer took home the Academy Award for Best International Feature Film for The Zone of Interest, his first Oscar win in his 30-plus-year career. Glazer has only directed four features in that time, each one more cerebral and astounding than the last. His first film, Sexy Beast, is arguably his most “commercial” effort to date — and even that qualifier feels like a stretch: It’s a black comedy crime drama that plays out with the nail-biting tension of a horror thriller.
The film centers on Gary “Gal” Dove (Ray Winstone), a career criminal happily whiling away his retirement in Costa del Sol with his wife and friends. Gal is suddenly plagued by a visit from Don Logan (Ben Kingsley), a former associate who has come to recruit him for a upcoming heist. Don is a foul-mouthed, emotionally manipulative sociopath who delights in incessantly berating those around him and bending people to his whim, so when Gal refuses his offer, Don makes it his mission to make Gal’s life a living hell until the job is done.
Glazer’s stellar direction and Ivan Bird’s dreamlike cinematography are what set Sexy Beast apart from other crime movies of its era. So does Kingsley’s scene-stealing performance as a malevolent agent of chaos, who blows in like a bad omen to wreak emotional and physical havoc on anyone and anything unfortunate enough to be close to him. That’s not even mentioning the score, which includes contributions from U.K. trip-hop outfit Unkle, who Glazer previously collaborated with on the music video for their 1998 single “Rabbit in Your Headlights.” Sexy Beast is an exhilarating, thorny, and terrifying case study in emotional manipulation that also happens to be a superb heist movie, and you should absolutely make it your priority to see it if you haven’t already. —Toussaint Egan
One of the most influential action movies ever made, The Street Fighter is a gloriously violent display of Sonny Chiba’s unique star power, as he rips and tears his way through a bunch of gangsters and lowlifes. Decades later, Chiba’s son Mackenyu (One Piece) is carrying that legacy forward… albeit in a slightly less violent fashion.
The first movie to receive an X rating in the U.S. because of violence, The Street Fighter not only inspired the title of the fighting game series, it also introduced the idea of X-ray fatalities, directly influencing Mortal Kombat. If you’re a fighting game fan and you’ve never seen The Street Fighter, this is your chance to fix that. —Pete Volk
Movies to watch on Hulu
Underwater
Photo: Alan Markfield/20th Century Fox
Director: William Eubank Cast: Kristen Stewart, Vincent Cassel, Mamoudou Athie Leaving Hulu: March 31
Underwater is a lean genre project with B-movie flair and solid execution. Sometimes, that’s all you need.
Kristen Stewart stars as the mechanical engineer of a research and drilling facility at the bottom of the Marianas Trench. When disaster strikes and part of the facility is destroyed, she joins the remaining survivors in their attempt to make it out alive. With a strong cast (with the exception of T.J. Miller, who is graciously killed very early in the movie), solid direction by William Eubank (who just directed the solid action thriller Land of Bad), and a tight script from Brian Duffield (No One Will Save You), Underwater is a fun popcorn sci-fi thriller. And with Love Lies Bleeding now out in theaters, why not check out an underrated Kristen Stewart project? —PV
Movies to watch on Max
Strange Days
Image: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
Director: Kathryn Bigelow Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Angela Bassett, Juliette Lewis Leaving Max: March 31
Strange Days is a cult classic whose reputation is defined in no small part by how difficult it has been to watch on streaming. Max added the movie to its platform in January 2023, but not all good things last.
Set in a futuristic Los Angeles just two days before the end of the 20th century, Strange Days follows Lenny Nero (Ralph Fiennes), a black-market broker dealing in an illicit technology that allows the user to record their own memories and physical sensations and experience them after the fact. When Lenny comes across a recording that threatens to implicate the LAPD in a high-profile murder, he’s forced to turn to his old friend Lornette “Mace” Mason (Angela Bassett) in order to uncover the origins behind the recording while staying one step ahead of a mysterious killer that wants him dead.
Conceived by producer James Cameron and inspired by the 1992 LA riots that erupted in the wake of the infamous Rodney King trial, Strange Days is a pitch-black sci-fi thriller that touches on institutional racism, voyeurism, societal collapse, and sexual violence, the latter of which is focused primarily on women and Black people. It’s a hard watch — but nevertheless a worthwhile one that rewards its audience with a trio of terrific performances and a strikingly original vision of a bygone alternate future. —TE
Movies to watch on Prime Video
The Swordsman
Image: Well Go USA Entertainment
Director: Jae-Hoon Choi Cast: Jang Hyuk, Kim Hyeon-so Leaving Prime: March 31
There’s no shortage of terrific Korean action movies. If you’re specifically looking for one that’s a stylish, emotional historical drama with fast and frenzied swordplay, I would highly recommend The Swordsman. Set in the aftermath of the Joseon dynasty, the movie follows the story of Tae-yul, the former bodyguard of King Gwanghaegun, who lives in seclusion with his daughter, Tae-ok.
Taey-yul has been afflicted with a condition that threatens to rob him of his sight, and in order to cure it, he’ll need special herbs afforded only to the most well-connected of families. Desperate to help her father, Tae-ok accepts an offer to serve a wealthy family in exchange for the medicine, but when she is inadvertently kidnapped as part of a larger conflict, Tae-yul is forced to come out of hiding to come to her rescue.
Joe Taslim of The Raid and Warrior fame shines as Gurutai, a sneering slave trader and Qing emissary who serves as the film’s primary antagonist. The action itself is terrific, but what really elevates The Swordsman as a whole is Tae-yul grappling with his rapidly diminishing eyesight and the unfolding tragedy of his backstory conveyed through flashbacks. At an hour and a half, it’s a perfect action film to pop on and watch over the weekend. —TE
There’s plenty of great thriller films to watch on Netflix. But if you prefer your stories to be more procedural, there’s just as many fantastic TV series to choose from on the service.
We’ve put together our conspiracy corkboards, crunched the numbers, and followed the money to bring you our list of the top suspects for the best thriller TV series to watch on Netflix. From modern classics like David Fincher’s Mindhunter and You to pulse-pounding murder mysteries like Erased and more, Netflix has a selection of thriller TV just waiting to become your next obsession.
Here are the best thriller series you can watch right now on Netflix. Our latest update added The Diplomat as our editor’s pick.
A throwback to the kind of plot-heavy political thriller that used to run television (and the screwball comedies of days gone by), The Diplomat is a delightful star vehicle for Keri Russell. She is Kate Wyler, a whip-smart career diplomat whose plans are thrown into disarray when her upcoming assignment in Afghanistan is changed to what seems to be a cushy post as the new U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom. For Kate, who loves her work and is very good at it, this is a clear downgrade, but the more power-focused people in her life (including her conniving husband Hal, played by Rufus Sewell) are delighted by the new role. What follows is a whirlwind of intrigue and mystery, with snappy dialogue, strong chemistry between the leads, and plenty of twists and turns.
After courting many viewers for its first season, The Diplomat will return for a second. We can’t wait, especially after the first season’s cliffhanger ending. —Pete Volk
Babylon Berlin
Image: X Filme Creative Pool
Bad things are coming to 1929 Berlin. We know this, of course — with the vantage point of history, the Weimar Republic era was marked by economic insecurity and the beginning of the Nazi Party. But the ’20s in the world of Babylon Berlin exist just before that horror, when the degeneracy from all that economic downturn could give way to roaring ’20s clubs just as easily as unending darkness.
That tension is captured in Babylon Berlin by two protagonists: Gereon Rath (a soft and strong Volker Bruch), a vice inspector on a secret mission to take down an extortion ring, and Charlotte Ritter (Liv Lisa Fries, all vinegar and chutzpah), the new police clerk who moonlights as a sex worker. Together they provide two very distinct vantage points on the Weimar Republic’s waning days, exposing the rot of what’s to come at the same time they find hope in what could’ve been.
Babylon Berlin’s trick is by not getting ahead of itself. The show is perhaps one of the slower boils on this list; the thrills of the mystery, such as they are, come from meticulous pacing. Answers don’t come easy, and a whole country’s politics don’t change overnight. Babylon Berlin is a web of history and conspiracy, and by taking those elements equally seriously and methodically, you get a twisty, hardboiled detective story for the ages. —Zosha Millman
Bodies
Image: Netflix
Solving a murder is hard enough, but how do you go about apprehending a culprit whose crime literally transcends space and time?
Bodies is a terrific cerebral whodunit with an excellent ensemble cast whose stories weave into one another effortlessly as the series builds and the mystery deepens. Created by Paul Tomalin (Torchwood) and based on Si Spencer’s 2014 comic, this sci-fi crime thriller follows four detectives living in different time periods of London who find themselves investigating a strange murder. What’s so strange about it? Well, the victim’s body appears — and reappears — in each time period in the exact same location. What’s even stranger is that the victim was last seen alive in 2053, despite being seen dead both in that year and as early as 1890.
A engrossing drama that feels like a mashup between Class of ’09, Dark, and Alex Garland’s Devs, Bodies is one of Netflix’s most compelling releases this year and wholly deserves to be added to your watchlist. —Toussaint Egan
Erased
Image: A-1 Pictures/Aniplex of America
This sci-fi mystery thriller miniseries from 2016 centers on Satoru Fujinuma, a 29-year-old delivery man who is inexplicably sent back in time and reawakens in his 11-year-old body. Determined to save the lives of his mother and his elementary school classmate, who died and disappeared, respectively, under mysterious circumstances, Satoru must combine his knowledge of the future with his ability to change the past in order to apprehend the culprit and bring them to justice.
Erased is a compulsively watchable thriller anime, filled with enough twists and turns to keep audiences guessing right up to the series’ exhilarating conclusion. —TE
Ganglands
Image: Netflix
French action cinema is having a bit of a renaissance, and one of the leading figures is director Julien Leclercq. He made the very good Olga Kurylenko thriller Sentinelle, the Jean-Claude Van Damme-led The Bouncer, and my favorite movie of his, the tense crime thriller Braqueurs (also known as The Crew).
Six years later, Leclercq took his talents to television with the Netflix series Ganglands (also known as Braqueurs). It shares the same name, lead (the excellent Sami Bouajila), and general vibe, but is not technically a sequel or a remake. In Ganglands, a crew of expert armed robbers are drawn into a gang war: They’re so dang good at crimes, everyone wants to hire them, even the people they rob.
Leclercq and writer Hamid Hlioua have created a muscular little thriller anchored by strong leading performances and the director’s tension-filled style of building action and conflict. The second season was recently released on Netflix, and both seasons are very much worth your time. —Pete Volk
Lupin
Image: Netflix
The thrill of the heist — there’s just nothing like it. Ask Assane Diop (Omar Sy). He’s been working as a con artist and thief for years, drawing his inspiration (and moniker) from an obsession with the literary gentleman thief Arsène Lupin. His thrills are hard-won, but they’re also smoothly meticulous. For Assane, the art of the heist — even with a priceless diamond necklace worn by Marie Antoinette — is a given.
What comes less naturally is revenge. Lupin’s first season follows his quest to seek vengeance on the rich family that wronged his father, and the show is full of twists and turns as his mission starts to bleed from his gentleman thief persona back into his real life.
The French series was a breakout hit when it premiered on Netflix, thanks in large part to Sy’s performance. He is magnetic as he makes con artistry look easy, with the sort of natural charm that makes you believe he can fake his way into any vault or safe in France (and that’s all before we get into his thieving skills and connections). With a heist, the end is, typically, self-assured. Sy’s performance ensures Lupin has the same confidence, and makes every step of the ride along the way its own thrill. —ZM
Mindhunter
Image: Netflix
David Fincher’s exacting vision is applied to the television format in one of the best shows Netflix has ever produced. Over two seasons, odd-couple FBI agents Holden Ford (Jonathan Groff) and Bill Tench (the terrific Holt McCallany) interview serial killers in the burgeoning field of criminal psychology.
In a nice twist on conventional character tropes, it is the young agent who is often cold and emotionally removed, and the older one who worries about the consequences of their actions. Their chemistry, as well as Mindhunter’s deep study of our culture around serial killers and the approach to stopping them, makes the show excellent, and it never veers into the exploitation of its peers in the genre.
How exacting is Fincher’s vision? Take a look at this mind-blowing VFX reel from the show, which literally changed how I watch modern cinema. —PV
Monster
Image: Madhouse/Viz Media
If you’re a fan of the 1960s crime drama series The Fugitive, you’ll likely love the 2004 anime adaptation of Naoki Urasawa’s psychological thriller manga. After all, the series was inspired by it! Set in Germany before and after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Monster centers on the story of Kenzo Tenma, a Japanese brain surgeon living in Düsseldorf. After being implicated in the murders of his superiors, Kenzo must go on the run to clear his name by tracking down the real culprit: a young man he once treated.
Spanning 74 episodes, Monster is a labyrinthine drama filled with a rich cast of characters and enough harrowing twists and revelations to fill a Matryoshka doll. —TE
The Night Agent
Photo: Dan Power/Netflix
Sometimes, you want a “light brain” thriller — something not too deep that might be perfect for a bucket of popcorn or for background viewing while you fold some laundry. The Night Agent is Netflix’s quintessential plot-heavy popcorn thriller, elevated to solid fare thanks to the surprising chemistry between its two leads.
Adapted by The Shield creator Shawn Ryan from the novel, The Night Agent stars Gabriel Basso as an FBI agent who has been relegated to watching a phone that never rings in the basement in the White House. When that phone does ring one night, he and the person on the other end (Luciane Buchanan) are brought into a vast conspiracy that threatens to unravel everything he knows. —PV
You
Image: Netflix
No one is doing it like Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley). The man is in a league of his own when it comes to stalking women and obsessing over them. This is the double-edged sword of watching You and following Joe in his unethical exploits: He is outright the villain of his own story.
Luckily, You is very aware of this, taking the initial premise of the first season — boy meets girl, boy stalks girl, boy manipulates her whole life to a dangerous degree — and continues flipping it over, putting Joe through his paces, letting him scramble to cover his ass as he gets in deeper and deeper. Each You season is a flavor unto itself, switching locales and ladies and letting Joe make the worst kind of case for himself.
You is not a show for the faint of heart, but it’s also not a thriller that rests easily on its underlying darkness. Joe may be an absolute piece of shit (even Badgley thinks so, and would really like it if you did too), but the show knows how to keep him engaging as it turns the screws on him. Each of the four seasons challenges him in new ways, and it makes for a snaky and startlingly good time. With You there’s only one thing you can always expect: for Joe to go to extreme and violent lengths to prove he’s not the bad guy. Also a plexiglass vault. —ZM
Hazbin Hotel’s frenetic first season finished up on Friday, with a dozen reveals and dangling plot threads, all primed for a second season. The devilish comedy comes from creator Vivienne Medrano, who first posted the pilot episode on her YouTube channel, and follows Charlie, the princess of Hell, who opens a hotel in hopes that demons will rehabilitate and get to heaven. Oh, and it’s also a musical!
The first season finished with a bang, but it might be some time before we see the second season of Hazbin Hotel. So if you need something to sate your devilish desires for now, Medrano handpicked some of the show’s biggest influences.
Invader Zim
Image: Netflix
Where to watch: Paramount Plus
Merdano calls this one a “huge one” and it’s not hard to see why: Both shows share a similar kind of feverish sensibility, along with a strong, vibrant color palette. The spindly style of Invader Zim feels clearly at play in Hazbin, with characters like Alastor and Angel Dust feeling like they could fairly comfortably roll between shows.
The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
Image: Cartoon Network Studios
Where to watch: Max
The other childhood show Merdano cites is about two kids (one a clueless happy-go-lucky oaf, the other a cynical and smart-ass tomboy) who summon the Grim Reaper and beat him at a game of limbo, thus making him their eternal servant best friend. They get wrapped up in the paranormal world of demons, gods, and other supernatural creatures, but it’s all done with a goofy spin. The infernal through-line from Grim Adventures to Hazbin Hotel is pretty obvious.
BoJack Horseman
Image: Netflix
Where to watch: Netflix
While there were other shows she watched when she was younger, Medrano says Netflix’s BoJack Horseman — about an anthropomorphic, depressed washed-up sitcom actor (who is also a horse) — is the one that came at the “perfect time” to show her that she could tell a complicated emotional story in adult animation.
“[It’s] actually one of my favorites of all time; phenomenal show,” Medrano says. “It kind of showed me that adult animation can not only just be raunchy comedy, but it can be a story that has intense development of its characters. It can have incredibly flawed characters. It can make you cry. It can really get deep and dark.
“It had just started around the time that I was like, really making the pilot and they kind of made me go, Oh, wow, adult animation is starting to change. And it’s starting to evolve.”
South Park
Where to watch: Paramount Plus
Medrano calls South Park a “huge turning point” for her with adult animation — an experience a lot of people had around Comedy Central’s classic. The show tackled topical ideas and events, all with a gleeful, jaded humor that has kept it running since 1997. “From that point on,” Medrano says, “I kind of just kept watching [adult animation].”
Rick and Morty
Image: Adult Swim
Where to watch: Max
Similar to BoJack, Medrano cites this ever-popular Adult Swim comedy as a proponent of the depth and humor she tries to balance with her work. As anyone who has watched Rick and Morty can attest, there’s more to the show and more to Pickle Rick than the reputation it gives. “Something like Rick and Morty that is still very raunchy, and vulgar, and shocking in a lot of ways — it went this direction of like, Yeah, but let’s go a little deeper, let’s get a little darker. I think that also helped shift the space kind of more towards Oh, that works! That has an audience that did really well.”
Baldur’s Gate 3 is an incredible role-playing game experience, a gift for RPG fans and a wonderful introduction to the genre for newcomers. It’s got everything a good RPG needs: memorable characters, exciting, strategic battles, and a textured world to get lost in as your party goes questing across the map. It’s a showcase for just how good RPGs are when they really connect, and fortunately for us, there’s plenty more where that came from.
So, in the event that Baldur’s Gate 3 has inspired you to explore the genre further, here’s a list of games that similarly nail the RPG experience in ways that will leave you itching to get back to the character you’ve created — provided, of course, you didn’t immediately roll a new one to take into Baldur’s Gate 3 all over again.
If your favorite parts of Baldur’s Gate 3 were the turn-based combat, the character interactions, and the branching narratives, then Fire Emblem: Three Houses might scratch that itch. The actual gameplay itself doesn’t have a lot of story-defining choices, since you pick a set path in the first moments of the game. But that choice does grant three completely different ways the game can play out (and a fourth secret one), as well as variations in which characters come along with you and survive till the end. There’s also a lot of options for character interaction built into the game mechanics. Not only do you, the player, build a rapport with the characters, it’s literally part of the game to pair characters off in different interactions so they can build their bonds outside the battlefield and support each other while in combat. And yes, that means romances. So. Many. Romances. —Petrana Radulovic
Divinity: Original Sin 2
Image: Larian Studios
Where to play: Windows PC, Mac, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch
Larian Studios’ previous game is a natural next step for Baldur’s Gate 3 fans, as it’s about as close as you can possibly get to “more of the same” without waiting for a sequel. There’ll be some adjustment — as it’s not a D&D adaptation, the rules are different and combat here has a different set of quirks you’ll have to learn to navigate — but the transition is surprisingly seamless. Most importantly, Original Sin 2 has what Baldur’s Gate 3 nails in spades: a rock-solid focus on character and permissive design that encourages you to come up with oddball solutions and surrounds you with a cast of characters you’ll think of fondly. Shoutout to the homie, The Red Prince. —Joshua Rivera
Pillars of Eternity
Image: Obsidian Entertainment/Paradox Interactive
Where to play: Windows, Mac, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch
One of the first big attempts at a throwback to the Baldur’s Gate franchise is still one of the best. Pillars of Eternity tells a sprawling tale with a great hook — children are suddenly being born without souls — as a mystery meant to draw you into its strange fantasy world and characters. A little more old-school in its design, but with the option to crank down the difficulty if story is why you’re here, Pillars of Eternity’s biggest strength is in its elegant narrative, in which the answer posed by every quest intersects with at least two other equally interesting quests. It’s easy to lose an evening navigating the game’s tangled web of short stories, but what a tremendously satisfying way to get lost. —JR
If there’s one thing I enjoy more than Pillars of Eternity, it’s Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire. Whereas the first game took place in an atmospheric if derivative take on a classic fantasy continent, Deadfire puts you in control of a customizable ship on the high seas. Along with The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Spiritfarer, and the recent Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew, Deadfire is proof that archipelagos make for perfect video game worlds: As you build your party of travelers, you’ll encounter vastly different factions, cultures, and ways of life, both linked and separated by the waves between them. Exploring the world of Deadfire feels at once like a singular journey and a collection of potent short stories, all connected by vivid writing and myriad chances to role-play. —Mike Mahardy
Wasteland 3
Image: inXile Entertainment
Where to play: Windows, Mac, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
If you can stomach the hyper-goofiness of its post-apocalyptic storytelling, Wasteland 3 stands among the best that the CRPG genre has to offer. Its script and character writing leave a lot to be desired, but in terms of structure, Wasteland 3 is as open as they come: You pursue three major quest lines across a ruined Colorado, all the while building up your headquarters and recruiting a massive party of survivors. If inventory management and improving your team composition are your favorite aspects of CRPGs, Wasteland 3 is a dream. And while there are compelling story beats strewn throughout, it’s the mechanics and systems that make inXile’s 2020 release sing. —Mike Mahardy
After a dozen or so hours investing in your party in Baldur’s Gate 3, they start to feel like superheroes. Battles hinge on incredible (and very fun) stunts that can excite the storyteller in you narrating the whole fight. Marvel’s Midnight Suns is entirely built around that feeling, a strategy game where winning a battle largely depends on you figuring out the most dramatic move possible every turn. It’s also got a character creator for your original protagonist and lots of fun RPG-style conversations between said fights too, so the social butterflies among us won’t feel left out. Just don’t come looking for romance, which unfortunately is not part of the experience. —JR
Planescape: Torment
Image: Black Isle Studios/Interplay Productions
Where to play: Windows, Mac, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, iOS, Android
Going back to the original Baldur’s Gate games is a very different experience from Baldur’s Gate 3, as they come from an entirely different era in game design that may or may not speak to you in the same way. In spite of its similarity to those older games, Planescape: Torment, a sister title to the OG Baldur’s Gate games, is worth giving a shot. In it you play The Nameless One, a man with no memories in search of his identity and the reason he can’t seem to die. Taking place in Dungeons & Dragons’ Planescape setting — a sort of interdimensional halfway point in the multiverse, where anything could be a door to Someplace Else — Planescape: Torment is among the most bizarre, existential, and contemplative RPGs ever made. It’s a game where combat barely matters (seriously, just play on easy and put all your stats in Wisdom and Charisma), but deciding who The Nameless One becomes as he learns more about himself is everything. —JR
Torment: Tides of Numenera
Image: InXile Entertainment
Where to play: Windows, Mac, PlayStation 4, Xbox One
Maybe you tried Planescape: Torment and found it too clunky. Or maybe you loved it and want more. In the way that Pillars of Eternity was a spiritual successor to the original Baldur’s Gate games, Torment: Tides of Numenera is a new attempt to recapture the magic of Planescape: Torment with more modern sensibilities. In this game, you play as the Last Castoff, a sort of rejected avatar for a being known as the Changing God, who has achieved immortality by hopscotching across bodies like yours. What’s up with that? What else has this Changing God done, and who else have they left in their wake? Tides of Numenera retains the focus of its inspiration, emphasizing role-play over combat, using the mystery of an immortal being and an indelible science fantasy setting to probe at troubled characters and ask big, sweeping questions about fate and existence. —JR
Dragon Age (all of ’em)
Image: BioWare/Electronic Arts
Where to play: Windows, Mac (for earlier entries), PlayStation 4 (Dragon Age: Inquisition), PlayStation 3, Xbox One(Dragon Age: Inquisition), Xbox 360
For over a decade, the RPG void left between Baldur’s Gate 2 and Baldur’s Gate 3 was filled by Dragon Age. Beginning with 2009’s Dragon Age: Origins, the Dragon Age games mixed dark fantasy with bright, snappy characters to create one of the most beloved fantasy RPGs in recent memory. Each game has a slightly different flavor — Origins is the closest to the “classic” RPG feel, where combat strategy is just as important as role-playing through an epic plot, while Dragon Age 2 focuses more on straightforward action and smaller character drama, and Dragon Age: Inquisition splits the difference with the most modern design of the three. Play all or one, in any order you choose. Each has its strengths, and all of them have at least one character destined to become your favorite. —JR
If you appreciate how a game will throw your best-laid plans out the window with one failed dice roll, then Disco Elysium is the obvious follow-up to Baldur’s Gate 3. Not only do your choices have the same level of impact, but both games embrace creative problem solving in the way only a good role-playing game can. Disco Elysium lets you talk your way out of (but usually into) trouble in some mind-bending ways. Although it’s a more modern setting than Baldur’s Gate 3, both games relish their moments of bleakness. Paladin-type role-players may struggle with the inner demons of Disco Elysium’s amnesiac main character, but he’s the hero for those who revel in messy choices. —Chelsea Stark
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
Image: Harebrained Schemes
Where to play: Windows, Mac, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, iOS, Android
Yeah, fantasy is cool and all, but what if you want a Baldur’s Gate 3-style adventure in a sick Blade Runner-ass setting? Shadowrun: Dragonfall is your answer. A relatively short and self-contained RPG set in Shadowrun’s totally rad, magic-but-also-cyberpunk universe, you play as a shadowrunner (a mercenary, but cooler) hired to join a crew for one big score. It goes sideways of course, and once you escape the chaos, there’s only one question on your mind: Who set you up and why? Perfect for anyone who wants to trade swords and spells for guns and cyberdecks (and also spells). What’s more, if you love it, there are two more games widely available (and optimized for consoles): Shadowrun Returns and Shadowrun: Hong Kong. —JR
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic
Image: BioWare/LucasArts
Where to play: Windows, Mac, Xbox One, Xbox 360, Nintendo Switch, iOS, Android
Another big appeal of RPGs is getting the chance to traipse around a very familiar setting and seeing what trouble you can get into. In Baldur’s Gate 3, that’s the Forgotten Realms of Dungeons & Dragons. But let’s say you wanted to do that in Star Wars — lucky for you, there’s Knights of the Old Republic. Made by BioWare, the folks behind Dragon Age, KOTOR (that’s what the cool kids call it) is set thousands of years before the prequel trilogy, at a time when both the Jedi and Sith were numerous and at war. This setting gives KOTOR a flavor that’s impossible to find in modern Star Wars, as one of the premier RPG developers was given free reign to define its own corner of the universe and infuse it with all the charm of its acclaimed role-playing games — and a killer mystery to boot. —JR
But ever since HBO rebranded to Max, guess what? You can call it TV again, and nobody can stop you.
We’re here to round up some of the best TV shows available to watch on Max. More than enough people have likely already extolled to you the virtues of The Sopranos, The Wire, Deadwood, and Game of Thrones. (If not, where have you been?) Consider this a supplementary list. A Max 2.0, if you will.
For more great TV, check out our lists of the bests shows of 2022 and 2023, which include many selections on Max.
Editor’s pick: Rome
Image: HBO
Before the fantasy renaissance Game of Thrones kicked off, Rome was the setting for HBO’s best sword-swinging prestige play. And while this amped up historical drama didn’t quite hit the heights of HBO’s A Song of Ice and Fire adaptation, it’s still plenty entertaining, and one of the most interesting shows on Max.
Rome’s first season chronicles the rise and fall of Julius Caesar. The story is told through the lives and intrigue of the most powerful players, including Game of Thrones vets Ciarán Hinds as Caesar and Tobias Menzies as Brutus, but also through two lowly soldiers (Ray Stevenson and Kevin McKidd), who just happen to be around to witness some of the biggest moments in this period of Rome’s history.
As fun as Rome is as a series in its own right, it’s equally as fascinating as a historical document for HBO. While it feels slightly out of step with the slower dramas the network was known for at the time, like The Wire, Deadwood, or The Sopranos, Rome’s quick-paced brutality and prestige sheen make it feel right at home in the current line up for Max. — Austen Goslin
Fringe
Image: Fox
Back in 2008, J. J. Abrams, Alex Kurtzman, and Roberto Orci launched a series that was intended to be spiritual successor to The X-Files by way of Lost. Over the course of five seasons, Fringe became that and so much more: a cerebral procedural drama about urban legends, parallel universes, anomalous oddities, and a beleaguered mad scientist’s long quest for redemption.
The series centers on Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv), an FBI agent assigned to investigate unexplained phenomena related to a mysterious series of occurrences known simply as “The Pattern.” With the help of a Department of Homeland Security consultant (Joshua Jackson) and his eccentric father (John Noble), a brilliant yet troubled researcher known for his speciality in the field of “fringe science,” Dunham is tasked with unmasking the culprits responsible for these strange phenomena and bringing them to justice.
The series overcame multiple threats of cancellation and precipitously declining ratings to amass a passionate cult following, all while delivering one of the most complex and emotionally moving storylines seen in a mainstream sci-fi TV drama. Featuring guest appearances from such lauded sci-fi icons as Leonard Nimoy and Peter Weller and an absolute standout supporting performance by the late Lance Reddick as Fringe Division director Phillip Broyles, Abrams and company’s show is an enduring series worthy of reappraisal and admiration. —Toussaint Egan
Unicorn: Warriors Eternal
Image: Cartoon Network Studios/Williams Street
What do you get when you combine Arthurian legend, the “rubber hose” art style of Osamu Tezuka and Max Fleischer, and the determination of one of the most successful American animators of the past 20 years? You get Unicorn: Warriors Eternal, of course — the passion project of director Genndy Tartakovsky and writer Darrick Bachman set in a Victorian steampunk world.
The series follows a trio of immortal warriors: Melinda, a powerful sorceress; Seng, a cosmic monk; and Edred, a warrior elf, who are reincarnated across several generations by the wizard Merlin to fight an unending battle against an ancient evil. Upon realizing her destiny as the latest reincarnation of Melinda, a young bride-to-be named Emma Fairfax sets off in search of how to get her old life back while fending off the droves of malicious henchmen her reawakening has brought about.
Brilliantly animated and exquisitely original, Unicorn: Warriors Eternal is without a doubt one of the best animated series Max has to offer. Both Tartakovsky and Bachman have expressed interest in exploring the world of Unicorn more in future installments. Only time will tell if that comes to fruition, but one of the best ways to help ensure that it does is by watching the entire series in full. You won’t regret it. —TE
Banshee
Image: Cinemax
Like Antony Starr in The Boysand Warrior on Max? Have I got some good news for you!
Warrior creator Jonathan Tropper’s first show, Banshee,follows an expert thief recently freed from prison who accidentally becomes the sheriff of a small fictional Pennsylvanian town.
It’s a perfect fish-out-of-water setup for a great lead performance, and Starr is fantastic, carrying this show much like he does The Boys. It’s also one of those shows that falls in between the era of serial television and the era of “10-hour movies,” and the mix often gives Banshee the best of both worlds, as Starr’s Lucas Hood uses his unconventional background and skills to be a very different kind of sheriff. Not everything works in the show — some of the plotlines are more thought through than others — but it’s a consistently good time anchored by a great premise and a fantastic leading performance. —Pete Volk
Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski’s seminal 1992 reinvention of the Dark Knight changed American animated television forever. Set in an anachronistic 1950s vision of Gotham City, the show follows billionaire playboy Bruce Wayne/Batman, of course, but also a rogues’ gallery almost as large as his arsenal of gadgets and vehicles.
The dark color palette and art deco aesthetic is as much a revelation to behold now as they were over 30 years ago. The series’ writing delivered some of the more memorable and defining stories related to Batman’s various nemeses, while also inventing its own enduring original character in the form of Harley Quinn, the paramour and sidekick to Batman’s adversary the Joker. There’s too much to say about Batman: The Animated Series to fit into only one article, let alone one blurb. To say that it is one of the best series to watch on Max is an understatement; it’s practically a prerequisite. —TE
Veep
Image: HBO
For every profession, there’s a TV show that makes people who work that job go, Yeah, that’s the one that got it really right. When watching Veep, the insult-filled comedy about a dysfunctional vice president and her dysfunctional staff, it won’t bring you comfort to know that it’s the show most D.C. insiders nod along to as the best reflection of their life. But the genius of Veep is you can put that out of your mind for a spell; you’re laughing too hard to care.
In Veep, you can see the roots of big shows to come: Succession and its insult comedy, the comedy of errors of Barry. But Veep is singular because it is just always fucking on. Where most shows are finding themselves in the first season, Veep confidently charges out with guns blazing and F-bombs flying. And it only gets stronger from there. As you watch, and you inevitably remember that this is how our elected officials (at the very least) feel they should be reflected, it might seem terrifying. Then again, in a way it makes sense; Occam’s razor tells us the simplest explanation is often the right one. And that’s the same ethos that makes Veep’s comedy so cutting — these are the simplest people, doing the simplest mismanagement you can imagine. At least here, it’s funny. —Zosha Millman
Watchmen
Photo: Mark Hill/HBO
People have a lot of opinions about Watchmen. One of the more popular ones is that no one should bother adapting or expanding on it, and they are, generally speaking, right. Damon Lindelof’s sequel/reinvention of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ acclaimed comic appeared about as ill-conceived as every prior attempt to revisit Watchmen, and Lindelof even seemed apologetic about attempting the same. How lucky we all are that he did: HBO’s Watchmen was dazzling, a nine-episode limited series that took the superhero metaphor to uncharted territory, turning a deconstruction of superheroes into a stylish contemplation of American power and racism. Violent, funny, and surprisingly moving, HBO’s Watchmen lures you in the same way the comic did: A man is found dead, and that death exposes a conspiracy that threatens to unravel the entire world. —Joshua Rivera
I May Destroy You
Photo: Natalie Seery/BBC/Val Productions
Michaela Coel’s searing black comedy follows Arabella, an author with a viral success under her belt and a terrible case of writer’s block keeping her from her next one. When Arabella blacks out following a night with friends at the pub, she learns that she was raped, and attempts to reconstruct the night as best she can. What begins with abject horror grows — thanks to Coel’s incredible performance and razor-sharp writing alongside co-writer Sam Miller — to become a morbidly hilarious, compassionate portrait of modern womanhood, where violence is an occupational hazard of being alive and surviving trauma becomes a marketable asset. I May Destroy You is remarkable for the tonal tightrope it walks but also its unsparing eye, which lets no one — not the audience, nor its characters — off the hook when it comes to its most biting satire or devastating blows. —JR
Starstruck
Photo: Mark Johnson/Max
A rom-com about Jessie (Rose Matafeo) — an unassuming Kiwi woman living in London, where she works at a movie theater — and Tom Kapoor (Nikesh Patel), the actor and movie star that she keeps running into and falling in love with, Starstruck makes charm look easy. Like most romantic comedies, a lot of this is due to Matafeo and Patel’s easy chemistry, as both play characters with a naturalism that makes the unlikeliness of their relationship less of a big deal and more of a big complication. It is just hard to get involved with someone whose whereabouts are news, which forces the 20-something Jessie to be way more decisive than any 20-something is about anything. Starstruck is, at least in part, a rom-com about how many good romances are ones that nearly don’t work out, and its old-school screwball approach to modern love makes it feel both specific and timeless. —JR
Station Eleven
Photo: Ian Watson/HBO Max
Look: If you’re going to watch one pandemic show, you should make it Station Eleven. The story itself is simple: In a world where a flu-like pandemic wiped out the bulk of civilization, Kirsten (Mackenzie Davis) leads a traveling theater troupe in the Great Lakes area. A run-in with a dangerous wanderer makes her revisit her past, and stare down a dangerous future.
Like a lot of HBO shows, Station Eleven tells its story by braiding individuals and their stories together. Through the various perspectives and players of the story, Station Eleven builds something new: a treatise on the value of art, the things that stick with us, and the people we choose to keep in our hearts, whether for reasons happy or sad. Without being too preachy, the show breaks free of mere COVID-19 relevance. What makes Station Eleven a relevant watch isn’t what makes it a powerful one. What we carry through the pandemic isn’t all we’ll take away. —ZM
The Leftovers
Photo: Van Redin/HBO
The show kicks off a few years after 2% of the population has vanished. Not a fiery rapture, nor a giant robot plucking a few people off the face of the planet before life goes on. No — this is more like a quiet missing, the sort of act that’s confounding just for how sudden it is, and all the more so when the world keeps spinning. Such trauma is total disorientation for everyone in The Leftovers, whether they like it or not. The world has been rocked, and as some try to hold on to their old way of life, others want to get as far away from it as they can.
And so The Leftovers (and everyone in it) spins out from there. Like so much of modern media, The Leftovers is “about” “grief.” But as it kaleidoscopes out and picks out one character or another to focus an episode around, it tells a story much more heady and richer than so many other tales of grief and coping. And as it goes on, The Leftovers grows more bold, more mysterious, until reaching its final chapter, an all-timer of a finale. Each of these chapters and characters is its own fault line, but in The Leftovers, you never know when things will come tumbling down. —ZM
Adventure Time
Image: Cartoon Network
I’ve recently rewatched Adventure Timefor the second time, and I’m happy to report it still holds up even as you continue to age out of its target demographic.
The tales of Jake the Dog, Finn the Human, and the rest of their colorful friends and foes deftly move between silly humor and intense drama in ways few other shows have. While ostensibly a children’s show, Adventure Time isn’t precious with its audience: It isn’t afraid to delve into serious topics (the finale remains a remarkable feat, using the end of a long-running show as an allegory for grief), tell complex stories and jokes, or throw in a few real scares.
That’s all packed into a story with a massive scope, told in bite-size episodes as hilarious as they are moving. And the show looks good while it’s doing it, consistently pushing itself and the medium to find new ways to express itself. That’s how Adventure Time can be an excellent show for children that also gained a dedicated fandom of adults: It’s just That Good.
When you’re done with Adventure Time, the post-finale specials Distant Lands and the new spinoff Fionna and Cake are also on Max and worth your time. —PV
That’s what we’re here for today: To help you figure out what shows with new seasons in 2024 you should catch up on, and which ones might not be worth the effort. First things first, we’re counting out the easy ones: Big returning shows like The Boys, You, and Bridgertonare cultural phenomena that have been massive for years, so you probably know whether or not they’re for you. If one of them seems like your bag, start watching, but trust your gut instinct either way. As for everything else, here’s what you should know:
Image: Peacock
Watch it if you like: 30 Rock, or any sitcom with a constant barrage of hilarious and offbeat jokes Previous seasons: Two Where to watch: Peacock (Netflix after March 14)
This is an easy one. This sitcom about four women who used to be pop stars in a girl group is heading into its third season, and its first after moving from Peacock to Netflix. There are only 16 episodes in the first two seasons, and at just 30 hilarious minutes each, it’s easy to breeze through. —Austen Goslin
Image: CBS
Watch it if you like: Elementary, or any other offbeat procedural, or exorcism movies Previous seasons: Three Where to watch: Paramount Plus
From the minds behind all-time great legal procedural The Good Wife, Evil takes the elements of procedural shows we know and love and expertly applies them to the demonic and supernatural. Gleefully playful, surprisingly scary, and mischievously funny, Evil is unlike anything else on television. —Pete Volk
Image: Syfy
Watch it if you like: The Chucky movies, horror comedy, Jennifer Tilly Previous seasons: Two-and-a-half Where to watch: Peacock
Chucky is one of the boldest shows on television, never afraid to reinvent itself or dive into the deepest recesses of its canon. After seasons set in a quiet small town and a Catholic boarding school, the current season (in a mid-season break) is set in the freakin’ White House!! It’s one of the funniest shows on TV, and almost inarguably the goriest. Four more years! —PV
Image: Apple TV Plus
Watch it if you like: Dry British humor, spies, fun television Previous seasons: Three Where to watch: Apple TV Plus
Slow Horses really started to catch on with the 2023 debut of its third season, but if you’re not on board yet, 2024 is the perfect time to catch up. The series centers around Slough House, essentially the island of misfit toys for disgraced British spies who are disdainfully called Slow Horses. The horses are led by Jackson Lamb, a fantastic spy with awful hygiene and a penchant for rudeness — played terrifically by Gary Oldman. Slow Horses’ third season was its best so far, which is saying something for one of the most fun and watchable shows on TV. —AG
Photo: Ser Baffo/ABC
Watch it if you like: Sitcoms like Parks & Recreation, or generally sweet and funny shows Previous seasons: Two Where to watch: Hulu
Genuinely funny broadcast sitcoms feel like a rarity nowadays, but Abbott Elementary is doing a great job holding down the fort. Set in a Philadelphia elementary school, the growing roster of phenomenal guest stars helps keep each episode fresh, while the show lets its core cast of teachers grow as characters, friends, and more. Abbott isn’t the funniest sitcom ever, but it’s got a few great jokes every episode and as much heart and personality as any show on TV right now. —AG
Image: PBS Masterpiece
Watch it if you like: Animals, British shows, procedurals Previous seasons: Two Where to watch: PBS All-Access
The latest adaptation of James Herriot’s books about being a veterinarian in the British countryside as World War II looms is equally tender, charming, and beautiful. Another example of applying the procedural format in an unlikely direction, All Creatures is about how we care for our community — human and animal alike — and it’s one of the best shows hidden away on PBS. —PV
It’s been a great year in movies. So great, in fact, that it was hard to limit our year-end list to just the 50 best new movies. Similarly, TV had a stellar year, and the 50 best new shows only scratches the surface of the year in episodic storytelling.
But not all of those movies are available to watch at home, and many of those shows are spread across a litany of streaming services. Netflix remains the king of streaming services for now. Statistically, you, dear reader, probably have a subscription. But the platform released well over 100 new movies in 2023, and even more shows. Not all of them can be winners. How do you make the most of your subscription? By sticking to these great picks.
A note: This list doesn’t include movies or TV shows produced by other companies but licensed for distribution by Netflix, like May December and Jawan.
Here are the best new Netflix original movies and TV series that came out this year.
Netflix’s best new movies of 2023
The Killer
Image: Netflix
David Fincher’s technical precision is a perfect fit for a story about a methodical hitman. The Killer is an immense technical feat — watch the behind-the-scenes about the sound design and VFX after.
They Cloned Tyrone
Photo: Parrish Lewis/Netflix
One of the year’s most impressive directorial debuts, Juel Taylor’s sci-fi farce They Cloned Tyrone also features one of the year’s funniest performances by way of Jamie Foxx.
Kill Boksoon
Photo: No Ju-han/Netflix
One of many stellar 2023 offerings from Netflix’s investment in Korean entertainment, Kill Boksoon follows an assassin who is also a single mom. It’s a great mix of action thrills and domestic drama, aided by a layered lead performance from Jeon Do-yeon.
Extraction 2
Photo: Jasin Boland/Netflix
Arguably Netflix’s best pure action movie of the year, Extraction 2 improved on the first thanks to a change in setting and one of the year’s most ambitious one-take sequences.
The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar
Image: Netflix
One of four experimental shorts by Wes Anderson adapting Roald Dahl stories, Henry Sugaris the first and best of the bunch. Benedict Cumberbatch is trying to learn how to cheat at cards, but the real joy is Anderson continuing to toy with the inherent artifice of storytelling, having actors read directly to the camera and using stage-like props and sets.
Netflix’s best new TV shows of 2023
Pluto
Image: Netflix
The long-awaited adaptation of Naoki Urasawa’s legendary manga lived up to expectations, and then some. It’s a gorgeously told story about the hunt for a serial killer targeting the world’s most powerful robots. Unflinching in its depictions of personhood for humans and robots alike, Pluto is a masterpiece.
Blue Eye Samurai
Image: Netflix
Husband and wife duo Michael Green and Amber Noizumi delivered one of the year’s biggest surprises in this bloody, sexy, and satisfying revenge thriller about a mixed-race warrior who hides her gender and ethnicity while seeking to kill the four white men in Japan, seeking vengeance against her father.
Steven Yeun and Ali Wong excel in this intense thriller about two regular people who get in a feud that spirals out of control after a road rage incident. It’s a smart show about how the pressures of capitalism pit people against each other, anchored by two terrific lead performances.
The Diplomat
Photo: Alex Bailey/Netflix
A throwback to the kind of plot-heavy political thriller that used to run television, The Diplomat is a delightful star vehicle for Keri Russell. It’s an absolute treat to see her lead a TV show again, and the supporting cast, led by Rufus Sewell and Rory Kinnear, are more than up for the task of letting Russell shine.
Others worth watching:
Movies
Jung_E, a post-apocalyptic sci-fi from the director of Train to Busan and Hellbound
You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah, an Adam Sandler family joint that is a fun and funny teen comedy
Reptile, a dark crime thriller starring (and co-written by) Benicio del Toro
Wingwomen, a French heist/found sisterhood movie directed by and starring Mélanie Laurent
Ballerina, a dark Korean revenge thriller
TV
I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson, the third season of Tim Robinson’s zany sketch comedy show
The Night Agent, one of Netflix’s biggest hits of the year and a fun popcorn thriller
Ganglands, the second season of the excellent French crime thriller series
Bloodhounds, a Korean drama about two boys in a bromance who just love to box
Physical: 100, a Korean competition show about finding the fittest person in the country
It’s been one of those strange, busy years where any of Polygon’s top 10 games of the year could have made the No. 1 slot. Heck, you could expand that outward to include the top 20. There was a wealth of great games throughout the year, making it impossible to keep up with everything — even here at Polygon, where many of our jobs are to keep up with video games. That’s why we’ve created this list of 10 games you might have missed, all from indie studios. They cover a bunch of different genres, from a goofy multiplayer game to an inventory management roguelike.
Like with Polygon’s list of the top 50 games of the year, there are plenty of fantastic games that slipped through the cracks. Think we’ve missed any extra-special indies from the past year? Drop your favorites in the comments.
Bread & Fred
Image: SandCastles Studio/Apogee Entertainment
Developer: SandCastles Studio Where to play: Windows PC
Bread & Fred is a game you’re going to want to play with a friend. (Only one of you needs a copy of the game, thanks to Steam’s Remote Play Together.) You’ll play as two penguins tied together on a short rope, tasked with climbing a snowy mountain. It’s hard! The rope is very short, meaning there’s little wiggle room. Communication is key to timing each jump precisely — or you might fall down the mountain once again with a splat. So yes, Bread & Fred is hard, but it’s not impossible. Better yet, its challenge is pretty hilarious when playing with a friend you’re comfortable shouting at — or with. The animations have a slapstick element, making the already silly premise even funnier. —Nicole Carpenter
American Arcadia
Image: Out of the Blue Games/Raw Fury
Developer: Out of the Blue Games Where to play: Windows PC
Trevor, an office drone, wakes up one morning and learns his bosses are conspiring to kill him — and also that his entire life is built on a lie. American Arcadia is set in a ’70s-inspired metropolis called Arcadia, but something’s up with Arcadia: It’s a Truman Show-type widespread deception designed to trick thousands of people into living guilelessly for the entertainment of others. But that’s not American Arcadia’s only trick. One minute you’re bouncing across platforms like any other side-scrolling platformer. The next, you’re solving puzzles from a first-person perspective. Video games don’t often deploy multiple perspectives. Here, the shift is jarring but effective; it puts you on edge — kind of, one imagines, like learning the truth about Arcadia. —Ari Notis
El Paso, Elsewhere
Image: Strange Scaffold
Developer: Strange Scaffold Where to play: Windows PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X
If you can’t get enough of Max Payne, you won’t want to miss El Paso, Elsewhere. When vampires and werewolves arrive in a mysterious, supernatural motel, vampire hunter James Savage takes them head-on. What you get is a third-person shooter that revels in PlayStation-era graphics and explosive gameplay, with a narrative that sets the stakes especially high. You see, Savage’s ex is a vampire that’s about to perform a ritual — in that El Paso motel — to end the world. Within the mayhem of El Paso, Elsewhere, there’s a beautiful story about addiction and heartbreak that grounds the game’s physical demons within its metaphorical ones.
Yes, I made a Max Payne comparison — and you’ll see that a lot when reading about El Paso, Elsewhere — but the game is something wholly itself. It’s not to be missed. —NC
A Highland Song
Image: inkle
Developer: inkle Where to play: Nintendo Switch, Windows PC
A Highland Song is one of those 2023 latecomers, sneaking into this year’s release calendar on Dec. 5. From the creators of 80 Days and Heaven’s Vault, it’s not a game to be missed. The stylized art style perfectly renders the Scottish Highlands, where Moira is exploring in order to get to the sea. It’s one of those games, like A Short Hike, where the journey is much more important than the destination. Set to music from Scottish folk artists TALISK and Fourth Moon, A Highland Song has so many lovely, warming moments, even when you’re sheltered up in a cave to escape the cold. —NC
MyHouse
Image: Veddge
Developer: Veddge Where to play: Windows PC
MyHouse.wad is a pretty boring Doom mod. I’m no game designer, and I’m hesitant to repeat a tired line about modern art, but come on: I could have made this! The map is just a typical suburban split-level home. There’s nothing to do but scurry around polygonal furniture, look at tacky domestic art, and shoot some generic Doom enemies. I suspect — if I’m being honest — its elevated reputation stems from its tragic backstory.
A Doomworld user named Veddge released MyHouse.wad on the site’s forum back in March. Veddge was clear from the beginning that MyHouse wasn’t his mod; he’d just polished it up. The original version belonged to Veddge’s childhood friend Tom, who had recently passed away. To honor his pal, he decided to touch up the map into operable shape and share the file with some hardcore Doom nerds — the sort of folks who might appreciate this amateur but lovingly made map.
I appreciate the good intentions. I just can’t understand why anybody would find this normal house all that interesting. I mean sure, the rooms keep moving. And sometimes there’s no way out. And other times I wake up in an empty hospital. But this is just a normal, boring Doom mod. There’s nothing to see here.
Unless none of this is true. —Chris Plante
Videoverse
Image: Kinmoku
Developer: Kinmoku Where to play: Mac, Linux, Windows PC
Videoverse is a game for those of us nostalgic for the early internet and its intimate communities. When I was a kid, I spent my free time digging into niches on Neopets and talking to strangers about shared interests in AOL chat rooms. I made friends in forums, creating an online world sometimes more enticing than my own real life. Videoverse is all of those things on a fictional forum dedicated to a dying MMO, and it perfectly captures the drama and sadness of letting go. All at once, Videoverse has recreated the frivolous, beautiful, dramatic, and profound ways technology has influenced my life, and maybe yours, too. —NC
A Space for the Unbound
Image: Mojiken/Toge Productions
Developer: Mojiken Where to play: Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Windows PC, Xbox One, Xbox Series X
Set in rural Indonesia, A Space for the Unbound is a slice-of-life story of high school sweethearts Atma and Raya, who have a bucket list to fulfill. While A Space for the Unbound is an intimate look into a teenage relationship in ’90s Indonesia, it’s also the backdrop for a larger supernatural power that’s threatening reality — the end of the world. That framing makes for an interesting dichotomy between the scope of the stories: everyday moments paired with otherworldly drama. It’s one of those games that’s so earnest that’s it’s easy to overlook any flaws or bugs while captured by the stakes of the world and its characters. A bonus for pixel art fans: The game is gorgeous! —NC
Tape to Tape
Image: Excellent Rectangle/Null Games
Developer: Excellent Rectangle Where to play: Windows PC
A hockey game, but make it roguelite! Tape to Tape is in early access, so it hasn’t had its full release just yet. But what it is now is very fun: a game about building a hockey team by hiring players and managing the team. Play in games, of course, with different — not actual hockey-legal — abilities, upgrades, and bribes. Tape to Tape screams ’90s Wayne Gretzky’s 3D Hockey, but a lot more wacky. As in other roguelites, losing is fine: It’s an opportunity to upgrade your tools of the trade and get further next time.
Grab some hockey fans in your life for online multiplayer (with Remote Play Together) or on split screen. —NC
Moonring
Image: Fluttermind
Developer: Fluttermind Where to play: Windows PC
Don’t let the old-school visuals fool you: Moonring is one of 2023’s richest video game experiences. Created by Dene Carter, a co-creator of the iconic RPG Fable, the colorful adventure gives players the expansive freedom popularized by games of the 1980s — when graphics played second fiddle to creativity and scope. Trade with unsavory types. Partner with questionable cults. Converse with practically everyone.
Perhaps most importantly for our readers, this Ultima-inspired roguelike is free. Like, free free. At that price, Carter may get his wish of introducing the old ways of game design to new audiences. “I hope Moonring recaptures some of the spirit of those days for you,” Carter writes on the Moonring Steam page. “For those who did not, I hope that the more modern conveniences you find in this game allow you to catch a glimpse of what we did 40 years ago.” —CP
Backpack Hero
Image: Jaspel/Different Tales, IndieArk
Developer: Jaspel Where to play: Nintendo Switch, Mac, Windows PC
When I can’t sleep, I consider the mysteries of the universe. Like, who came up with the whiskey sour? “Whiskey is amazing, but what if we added raw egg whites?” Backpack Hero’s creators took a similarly audacious approach with the classic dungeon crawler, splicing the genre with the Tetris-like inventory management popularized by Resident Evil 4. Much like the foamy cocktail, the results are delicious.
Generally, I’m hesitant to list back-of-the-box bullet points, but I’m tickled by how big the creators have made a game about backpack organization: There are over 800 items and 100 enemies, you can play as five different heroes, and the dungeons are procedurally generated within a overworld map the player constructs. Like its hero mouse, Backpack Hero punches way above its weight class. And it will keep you up at night, because there’s always time for one more run. —CP
Happy December, Polygon readers! The winter holidays are only a few short weeks away, but don’t fret: There’s plenty of presents in the form of movies new to streaming to enjoy in the meantime. With November now behind us, we’ve combed through the latest movies to stream on Netflix, Hulu, Max, and more to bring you the best of what December has to offer.
This month, we’ve got a bunch of DC Comics films arriving this weekend on Netflix, including Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel starring Henry Cavill and Matt Reeves’ explosive take on Batman starring Robert Pattinson and Zoë Kravitz. Hustlers, the comedy crime drama starring Jennifer Lopez and Constance Wu, comes to Hulu this week, while the modern slasher movie The Strangers: Prey at Night comes stalking its way onto Max.
Let’s dive in and see what this month has in store!
Editor’s pick
The Batman
Photo: Jonathan Olley/Warner Bros.
Genre: Superhero action Director: Matt Reeves Cast: Robert Pattinson, Zoë Kravitz, Paul Dano
It’s a daunting task, creating a new incarnation of Batman. Since the character’s first appearance in 1939, the Dark Knight has become one of the most iconic characters in the entirety of popular culture, with several feature adaptations having taken their own unique crack at what makes Bruce Wayne, the man beneath the cowl, tick.
Matt Reeves’ 2022 reboot starring Robert Pattinson shows audiences a Batman younger and angrier than any they’ve seen before — a costumed vigilante who’s only two years deep into his campaign as a caped crusader for justice. This shift affords Reeves the opportunity to devote more time to Batman as a crime fighter and detective, piecing together clues and surveilling suspects as he attempts to uncover the truth behind a conspiracy at the heart of Gotham City and apprehend a vengeful serial killer, the Riddler (Paul Dano). From the film’s gothic modernist version of Gotham City to the ferocity of the film’s close-quarters fight sequences, The Batman feels like a brilliant distillation of all the qualities that have made the character such an enduring pop culture icon while carving its own niche in the broader universe of Bat-media. We’re still two years out from the highly anticipated sequel, but if it’s been a while since you last saw it in theaters, The Batman’s arrival on Netflix is the perfect opportunity to revisit it. —Toussaint Egan
New on Netflix
Man of Steel
Image: Warner Bros.
Genre: Superhero action Director: Zack Snyder Cast: Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon
Stay with me as I share my journey with this movie. Like many others, when I first saw it, I hated it. I thought the violence and destruction were excessive and without thought, and it left a bad taste in my mouth. With the passing of time and the completion of the trilogy of movies, I have done a complete 180, and Man of Steel is now a movie I unexpectedly and unabashedly adore.
This is a deeply personal movie about feeling alienated from the world around you and wanting to be accepted, and about the failures of our parents while they try to look out for us. (Man of Steel could also be referred to as “Inside You There Are Two Dads: The Movie.”) All the elements that left me cold the first time around have since been contextualized thoughtfully in the movies that follow, especially in the opening scene of Batman v Superman.
Henry Cavill seems born to play Superman, bringing his natural charisma and good looks to the role in addition to an undercurrent of melancholy as he tries to navigate a world that seems to have no clear place for him. Michael Shannon is menacing as Zod, as is Antje Traue as his lieutenant Faora-Ul. With incredible fight scenes, a roaring score from Hans Zimmer, and thoughtful meditations on where our parents’ vision of our path in life differs from our own, Man of Steel deserves your reconsideration (or a rewatch, if you’re already in the “this rules, actually” camp). Now that it’s on Netflix (and with a new Superman on the way), that’s doubly true. —PV
New on Hulu
Hustlers
Image: Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
Genre: Crime comedy-drama Director: Lorene Scafaria Cast: Constance Wu, Jennifer Lopez, Julia Stiles
Based on an article from fellow Vox Media publication New York Magazine (hello, my colleagues), Hustlers is a colorful, exciting crime thriller about a group of strippers in New York City who scam wealthy clients. The movie features one of Jennifer Lopez’s best performances as the group’s ringleader and mother figure, and Constance Wu, Riverdale’sLili Reinhart, Keke Palmer, Lizzo, and Cardi B fill out the lovable group of women just trying to make it on their own terms. From our review when the movie was first released:
If anything, the film, based on a true story, feels more like the female reboot of a franchise than any of the actual remakes and reboots in that vein that we’ve gotten (Ocean’s 8, Ghostbusters, Men in Black: International, etc.) in that it tells the kind of story usually reserved for men with a cast full of women. Unlike those attempts, Hustlers never once feels like it’s just “a heist movie but with women;” it’s a full-fledged epic, made by and about women, and proof positive that female-centered films can flourish without being based on a pre-existing male-based IP.
Lopez recently announced a new album and short film due this February, which makes it a great time to revisit one of her best roles. —PV
New on Max
The Strangers: Prey at Night
Image: Aviron Pictures
Genre: Slasher horror Director: Johannes Roberts Cast: Christina Hendricks, Martin Henderson, Bailee Madison
Director Renny Harlin is taking a page out of the Fear Street playbook by spearheading a new trilogy of stand-alone sequels to 2008’s The Strangers, all scheduled to be released throughout 2024. What better occasion could there be to revisit the last time the series’ sinister trio of masked murderers last stalked their way across screens?
Bryan Bertino’s original 2008 movie was a hit: a lean, mean psychological horror film that felt like a much-needed back-to-basics serial killer thriller for audiences fatigued with special effects-reliant spectacles and the “torture porn” traps of the Saw franchise. The Strangers became a sleeper hit among fans and saw significant success at the box office, so it’s a wonder why it took over a decade for the sequel, The Strangers: Prey at Night, to finally come out.
Set 10 years after the original, the movie follows a family vacationing at a trailer park in Ohio who unexpectedly cross paths with three masked killers intent on adding them to their body count. With no other recourse and desperate to survive, the family must band together to fight back and escape with their lives. The sequel leans more into the tropes of slasher horror, and the sedate barebones aesthetic of the original gives way to a more neon-infused contemporary grunge, but overall, The Strangers: Prey at Night is still a wickedly fun and terrifying horror movie. Here’s hoping that Harlin’s trilogy is able to push the carnage even further. —TE
New on Prime Video
Mr. & Mrs. Smith
Image: 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
Genre: Action comedy Director: Doug Liman Cast: Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, Adam Brody
Every once in a while, you’ll see people complaining about how there’s too much sex in movies and TV. The truth is very much the opposite — our mainstream entertainment has never been less sexy (even filmmakers during the Hays Code era worked around those restrictive standards to imbue sexiness into their work). Mr. & Mrs. Smith is a wonderful antidote to these times, a sexy movie about sexy people doing sexy things.
Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie play a husband-and-wife assassin duo who are in the midst of marital problems — turns out, it’s hard to keep your home life spicy when your work life is as dangerous as it comes. When they’re both assigned to kill the same person, things go very wrong.
It’s a very fun time at the movies, but there’s another reason to watch Mr. & Mrs. Smith right now — Prime Video is working on a TV adaptation starring Donald Glover and Maya Erskine (Blue Eye Samurai), which will premiere next February. —PV
Scott Pilgrim Takes Off, the anime adaptation of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s hit comic series by studio Science Saru, premiered on Netflix last friday. Produced and written by O’Malley and co-creator BenDavid Grabinski, Scott Pilgrim Takes Offdiverges significantly from the source material, morphing into an adaptation that at once functions as both a sequel and a remake of O’Malley’s original comic.
If you’re new to anime, Scott Pilgrim Takes Off might be your very first introduction to the work of Science Saru, the Japanese animation studio co-founded by Masaaki Yuasa and Eunyoung Choi. In recent years, Science Saru has garnered a reputation as one of the most memorable anime production houses of the past decade, thanks to a wildly idiosyncratic body of films and TV series and Yuasa’s flair for expressive, comically-inclined animation.
If you’ve already watched through the entirety of Scott Pilgrim Takes Off and are looking for something else to watch as you puzzle over what exactly that ending might mean for Scott and his friends, not to worry: We’ve got just the list in mind.
We’ve pulled together our favorite Science Saru anime for you watch, from freewheeling romantic comedies, to macabre supernatural action dramas, and more.
Adventure Time, “Food Chain”
Image: Science Saru/Cartoon Network
Run time: 11m Where to watch: Max
What better place to start on a journey through the weird and wild animation of Science Saru than the studio’s first production? Directed by studio co-founder Yuasa, this 11-minute episode of the beloved show Adventure Time follows Finn the Human and Jake the Dog supervising a field trip to the Candy Kingdom’s Natural History Museum. After being transformed into birds by the mischievous Magic Man, the pair experience the circle of life firsthand as they transform into bacteria, plants, and eventually caterpillars which eat and are subsequently eaten by bigger birds.
It’s a beautiful and trippy short that hones in on Adventure Time’s distinctive brand of surreal humor while coming across as a great sampler for Yuasa’s particular approach to animated comedy and storytelling.
The Night Is Short, Walk On Girl
Image: Science Saru/GKIDS
Run time: 1h 32m Where to watch: Max
The 2010 anime The Tatami Galaxy is commonly regarded as Masaaki Yuasa’s magnum opus and one of the best anime to come out of Science Saru. Adapted from Tomihiko Morimi’s 2004 novel, the 11-episode anime follows the story of an unnamed college student who, paralyzed with indecision, is bounced between multiple parallel universes as he re-experiences his freshman year over and over again. Unfortunately, at this time of writing, The Tatami Galaxy is not available to stream. But The Night is Short, Walk on Girl, the standalone spiritual sequel to the series, is just as good a place to start if you’ve never watched a Science Saru anime before.
The Night Is Short, Walk On Girl follows a hapless senior student at Kyoto University who plans to confess his feelings to his classmate at the school’s yearly night festival. Unfortunately, the two are separated while taking in the local nightlife, creating two parallel storylines of a comedic bar crawl and an over-the-top series of mishaps and shenanigans. If there’s one anime on this list that feels the closest to Scott Pilgrim Takes Off in terms of comedy and premise, it’s this one.
Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken!
Image: Science Saru/Crunchyroll
Number of episodes: 12 Where to watch: Crunchyroll
Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! won its way into our hearts, and onto our list of the best anime of the year, back when it first aired in 2020. Based on Sumito Ōwara’s manga, the 12-episode anime follows a trio of high school girls who form a bond over their mutual love of animation. The series follows the girls’ journey through the wild world of amateur animation, first establishing a “film club” to circumvent the resistance of their teachers and parents, before creating a short film to sell their first commercial anime project.
Aside from being a delightful anime in its own right, Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! is a passionate tribute to the craft and dedication of traditional cel animation that puts an unsparing focus on the struggle that goes into taking a creative vision from an idea to reality. Filled with brilliant fourth wall-breaking sequences and charismatic characters, Keep Your Hands Off Eizouken! is as entertaining as it is educational.
Devilman Crybaby
Image: Science Saru/Netflix
Number of episodes: 10 Where to watch: Netflix
Long before Scott Pilgrim Takes Off was even announced, Yuasa’s adaptation of Go Nagai’s apocalyptic superhero manga Devilman was a breakthrough success for both Science Saru and Netflix when it debuted back in 2018. An alternate modern retelling of the original story, Devilman Crybaby centers on Akira Fudo, a lonely high school student who is transformed into a powerful human-demon hybrid shortly after reuniting with his childhood friend Ryo Asuka. A hyper violent dark fantasy with intense action sequences and an ambiguous ending that borders the line between implicitly hopeful and explicitly nihilistic, Devilman Crybaby is a modern classic that’s strongly recommended for fans of anime like Neon Genesis Evangelion, Chainsaw Man, and the supernatural thriller anime X.
Inu-Oh
Image: Science Saru/GKIDS
Run time: 1h 38m Where to watch: Max
Masaaki Yuasa’s latest film is also, as of this writing, his final production with Science Saru, having announced his retirement from the company shortly before the movie’s premiere in 2021. That doesn’t necessarily mean Yuasa won’t ever direct another project at the studio again, but if it is, Inu-Oh is one hell of a way to cap off his time there. As critic Kambole Campbell noted in his review for Polygon, the film is, “a psychedelic, bombastic rock opera [that] ponders what stories have been lost as society’s more controlling elements attempt to control how art is made and distributed.” Music has always been a large part of Yuasa’s animation, and here, that love for the tightly wound relationship between the visual and the musical erupts into a howling display of breathtaking scenes and foot-stomping musical numbers. If you’re looking for an anime that matches Scott Pilgrim Takes Off’s energetic beat, Inu-Oh is an easy recommendation.
The Heike Story
Image: Science Saru
Number of episodes: 11 Where to watch: Crunchyroll
The Heike Story is an undersung entry in Science Saru’s body of work. That’s a shame, because it’s an achingly beautiful series that more than deserves appreciation.
Directed by Naoko Yamada (K-On!, A Silent Voice), this adaptation of the classic Japanese epic follows Biwa, a traveling orphan who is brought into the home of lord Shigemori, a powerful lord whose servants killed Biwa’s father. Framed as a classic tragedy, the series follows the members of Shigemori’s family as his empire crumbles from the inside out, with Biwa documenting the various twists and turns of their destruction while playing her lute. The Heike Story was one of the best anime of 2021, and for good reason: It’s a beautiful, complex story of power undone by hubris with a delicate and beautiful art style and an evocative musical score.
Ping Pong the Animation
Image: Science Saru/Funimation
Number of episodes: 11 Where to watch: Crunchyroll
Ping Pong the Animation is one of the best anime of the past decade. Based on Taiyō Matsumoto’s (Tekkonkinkreet) original manga, it follows the story of two young men: Yutaka “Peco” Hoshino, a cocky self-assured high school student who’s a local Ping Pong whiz, and Makoto “Smile” Tsukimoto, his reserved childhood friend.
The series follows the diverging lives of Peco and Smile, as the former is humbled and eventually forced to grapple with the limitations of coasting on sheer talent alone, and the latter is coaxed out of his shell to live up to his own potential as a ping pong player. Animated entirely in Flash, the series is one of the most unique productions of its era: A coming-of-age psychological drama, brought to life with idiosnycratic blend of misshapen lines and odd proportions that coalesce into an inspired display of visual and emotional storytelling.
Microsoft’s Xbox Game Pass subscription service is having another banner year in 2023, with over 450 games now available for console players and over 400 for PC players.
The service has recently been bolstered with the addition of two huge Xbox Game Studios exclusives, Starfieldand Forza Motorsport, while Cities: Skylines 2 is a big-deal day one addition for the PC crowd. Atlus’ JRPG classics Persona 4 Goldenand Persona 3 Portable made their debut on Xbox consoles earlier in the year, and Tango Gameworks’ surprise release Hi-Fi Rushtold a cathartic rock ’n’ roll story with clever mechanics. Blockbuster titles are well represented with the likes of Assassin’s Creed and Hitman, cult favorites like Lies of P popped up, and Game Pass has continued its strong tradition of curating the best of the indie world with the likes of Cocoon. Even Grand Theft Auto 5 — and its extremely popular online mode — has returned to the service once more. That’s a lot of “free” video gaming to be done!
With the sheer size and the bounty of choice it offers, Game Pass can be a bit overwhelming to digest. But we’re here to help. Here are the 25 PC and Xbox Game Pass games that you should be checking out if you subscribe to Microsoft’s flagship service.
[Ed. note: This list was last updated on Oct. 24, 2023, adding Cocoon, Lies of P, and Party Animals. It will be updated as new games come to the service.]
Assassin’s Creed Origins
Image: Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft
Assassin’s Creed Originshas always been good — but it was only in hindsight, three years after its release, that I began to consider it great.
It’s a phenomenal concoction of historical tourism, sci-fi storytelling, and open-ended combat. It also displays a confidence that the more recent Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla can only partially match. Whereas the two most recent entries embrace the insecure ethos of “content” that has so defined the last decade of open-world games, Origins is content to leave vast swaths of its world empty and to let things burn slowly, in ways both narrative and explorative. Its map unfurls over deserts, mountains, oases, and sun-swept cities slowly being buried in sand, all while its two central figures (Bayek and Aya) navigate one of video games’ most compelling romances.
It’s not completely averse to daily challenges and cosmetic DLC packs. But it’s the rare open-world game that trusts my attention span. It understands that pastoral beauty and tragic storytelling, successfully interwoven, are worth more than any number of distractions its successors can throw at me. —Mike Mahardy
Assassin’s Creed Origins is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Chicory: A Colorful Tale
Image: Greg Lobanov/Finji
Chicory: A Colorful Tale tells the story of a small dog who accidentally inherits a magical paintbrush. As you travel around the black-and-white open world, you use your new paint powers to bring color back to the environments. Everything is your canvas, and you can color it all to both solve puzzles and customize the setting to your liking.
The gameplay of Chicory is cute and relatively simple, even as you unlock new powers. But the reason it made it to the No. 2 slot on Polygon’s 2021 Game of the Year list is the story it tells about the destructive powers of self-doubt — the way it cruelly infects even the greatest artists out there.
Chicory is a game that’s not about coloring in the lines or even making something beautiful. It’s about making something — painting something, in this case — that you are proud of, that makes you happy. And if that creation also brings joy to those around you? Hey, that’s great too. —Ryan Gilliam
Chicory: A Colorful Tale is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Cities: Skylines
Image: Colossal Order/Paradox Interactive
There’s a reason Cities: Skylines is often held up by literal city planners as the pinnacle of the genre: It doesn’t fall into the trap most city-builders do of treating all its resources and systems as mere data points on a list, gaming by way of a spreadsheet. Cities: Skylines is the real deal, letting you get into the weeds of urban micromanagement and understanding how and why metropolises morph in response to the needs of their citizens. (It’s also proof that planned cities are a crime against humanity.)
Cities: Skylines forces you to grapple with the beautiful, messy truth of what your citizens are: people. In other words, Eric Adams, please play Cities: Skylines! —Ari Notis
Cities Skylines is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Citizen Sleeper
Image: Jump Over the Age/Fellow Traveller
Citizen Sleeper is a hyper-stylized tabletop-like RPG set in space. In a capitalist society, you find yourself stuck on a space station. You’ll need to manage your time, energy, and relationships to survive the collapse of the corporatocracy and the anarchy that follows. You’ll roll dice and make decisions to get paid and help those around you.
Aside from its interesting setting, Citizen Sleeper features a vibrant cast of impactful characters, making each interaction memorable. It follows an excellent trend of table-top inspired games to encourage you to find your own objectives, and to revel in the story when things fall apart. It’s packed with tense decisions, great writing, and striking visuals. —Ryan Gilliam
Citizen Sleeper is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Cocoon
Image: Geometric Interactive/Annapurna Interactive via Polygon
A mysteriously beautiful, exquisitely paced puzzle adventure from some of the minds behind Limbo and Inside, Cocoonshares those games’ wordless delivery and stark aesthetic. But it’s more abstract and contemplative, and perhaps even more involving. It’s a game of pocket universes, one inside another, inhabited by buglike techno-organic life-forms — including the player character, a scurrying little beetle-thing. The conceit is that you can step up out of one reality and move it around another on your back, in a gently glowing sphere that also interacts with the world around it, before diving back in — or swapping it for another entirely.
Like so many puzzle adventures, it’s essentially a game of locks and keys, plus the occasional ingenious boss fight. But like the very best of them — Fez, for example, or Portal — Cocoon plays games with perception and reality that rewire your brain in pleasantly tortuous ways. —Oli Welsh
Cocoon is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Crusader Kings 3
Image: Paradox Interactive via Polygon
Imagine if Succession unfolded between the years 867 and 1453, in the throne rooms, banquet halls, and torchlit back corridors of European castles. Monarchs rise and fall, small-time fiefdoms become bona fide kingdoms, and nonmarital children exact revenge after decades of being shunned. Crusader Kings 3is the story of the Roy family if we could pick any character, see them through to their death, and assume control of their orphaned heir — at which point, we can completely alter the course of the dynasty through petty gossip and underhanded murder attempts.
In Paradox Interactive’s vast suite of grand strategy games with complex systems that give way to thrilling emergent storytelling, none have made me cackle with glee quite as much as Crusader Kings 3. In one playthrough, I wed my firstborn son to the daughter of a powerful neighboring king, only for said daughter to declare a holy war on me one decade later. In another, I strong-armed one of my vassals into remaining loyal, shortly before knighting his cousin and sworn rival; I didn’t want to be a jerk, but my characters were jerks. I was just following the script down the path of least resistance.
Much like Succession, Crusader Kings 3 is at its best when tensions finally boil over between the emotionally stunted members of a dysfunctional family. Unlike Succession, though, Crusader Kings 3 never has to end. —Mike Mahardy
Crusader Kings 3 is available via Game Pass on Windows PC and Xbox Series X.
Death’s Door
Image: Acid Nerve/Devolver Digital
Death’s Door is a cute little Soulslike game. You play as a raven who works as a kind of grim reaper for the bureaucratic arm of the afterlife. It’s your job to adventure in the world and claim the lives of a handful of bosses. The world of Death’s Door is charming, as are its characters, with excellent dungeons to explore and puzzles to solve. There are also giant enemies who will test both your skills and patience.
Still, Death’s Door has a friendly air around it. It wants you to succeed, and does a nice job easing you along with easy-to-read enemy and boss patterns. It’s a great, challenging Game Pass game to cut your teeth on before venturing into even more difficult titles. —Ryan Gilliam
Death’s Door is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Doom (2016)
Image: id Software/Bethesda Softworks
2016’s Doom builds off of one of the oldest franchises in gaming history with speed, acrobatics, and an absolutely killer soundtrack. Doomguy moves extremely quickly, swapping between a variety of guns, grenades, melee attacks, and a giant chainsaw to blow up demons off of Mars.
The game is bloody, metal as hell, and surprisingly funny. Doom makes you feel like a god, capable of clearing any hurdle the game could throw at you, and it doesn’t offer a single dull level in its lengthy campaign. —Ryan Gilliam
Doom (2016) is available via Game Pass on Xbox One and Xbox Series X.
Forza Horizon 5
Image: Playground Games/Xbox Game Studios via Polygon
Forza Horizon 5 is the latest racing game to land on Xbox and Game Pass. It’s a visual feast filled with some of the most realistic-looking cars you’ve ever seen. But anyone who loves any of these Forza games will tell you that the Horizon series is so much more than its graphics.
Horizon 5 takes place in a fictionalized Mexico, and gives you the freedom to drive around a massive map in whatever car you want. You can drive a nice sports car while off-roading, or drive a hummer off a massive ramp.
Forza Horizon 5 gives you the freedom and choice to drive how and where you want inside a legion of incredible cars. —Ryan Gilliam
Forza Horizon 5 is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Grand Theft Auto 5
Image: Rockstar North/Rockstar Games
Grand Theft Auto 5 is one of the most celebrated games of the last decade. In that time, it has appeared on three different generations of consoles, seen numerous graphical improvements, and gotten new modes, like its sweeping first-person alteration.
The main story focuses on three criminals from three very different backgrounds bumbling their way through numerous heists in the city of Los Santos — a fictional version of Southern California. And in order to tell the stories of Michael, Franklin, and Trevor, the game implements a feature that allows you to swap between the protagonists at will, offering a new perspective on the city and letting you play multiple roles per heist.
Grand Theft Auto games usually live long past their time, but GTA 5 has remained especially relevant due to GTA Online, the sprawling MMO-like experience that Rockstar Games created inside the world of San Andreas. It’s the massive GTA 5 sandbox — plus a little extra — without any of the constraints found in the story mode.
The parts of GTA 5 that annoy — such as the more misguided aspects of its American commentary, or the occasional tailing mission — are distant memories compared to the chaos you can cause every five minutes. If futzing around a semi-realistic metropolitan area is something you really enjoy, it’s hard to imagine anything on this list entertaining you for as long as Grand Theft Auto 5 will. —Ryan Gilliam
Grand Theft Auto 5 is available via Game Pass on Xbox One and Xbox Series X.
Halo: The Master Chief Collection
Image: 343 Industries/Xbox Game Studios
The Xbox brand might never have taken off without the Halo series, the first-person shooters that helped to popularize local competitive multiplayer on consoles before taking the party online after the launch of Xbox Live. The Master Chief Collection package includes multiple Halo games, all of which have been updated to keep them enjoyable for modern audiences.
But what’s so striking about the collection is how many ways there are to play. You can go through the campaigns by yourself. If you want to play with a friend but don’t want to compete, there is co-op, allowing you to share the games’ stories with a partner, either online or through split-screen play. If you do want to compete, you can do it locally against up to three other players on the same TV, or take things online to challenge the wider community.
These are some of the best first-person shooters ever released, and they’re worth revisiting and enjoying, no matter how you decide to play them. Sharing these games with my children through local co-op has been an amazing journey, and this package includes so many games, each of which is filled with different modes and options. It’s hard to imagine ever getting bored or uninstalling the collection once it’s on your hard drive.
This is a part of gaming history that continues to feel relevant, and very much alive. —Ben Kuchera
Halo: The Master Chief Collection is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Hardspace: Shipbreaker
Image: Blackbird Interactive/Focus Entertainment
Hardspace: Shipbreaker is another game poking fun at corporate greed and its general indifference toward the working class — seen in other excellent building games like Satisfactory. But Hardspace takes it further than just tongue-in-cheek poking by asking: What happens when the workers have had enough? Hardspace: Shipbreaker’s pro-union message is a delightful backdrop for an incredibly deep and stress-filled puzzle game.
As a Shipbreaker, your job is to break apart and recycle small spaceships. With your handy welding tools and futuristic gravity tethers, you’re able to carefully carve up these once-great hulks and repurpose them for the future. Sometimes that means throwing all the metal plates into the furnace to be melted down, and other times you’ll need to comb through the skeletons, grab salvageable items, and extract them still intact.
As you improve your skills, the game will test you with harder and larger ships. Suddenly, you’ll have to start worrying about the active nuclear reactors that are still in these vehicles, or pressurized cabins that explode if you open them in the wrong order.
And all of this danger circles Hardspace: Shipbreaker back to the conversation it starts at the very beginning. Hardspace is a game about focus, and how taking your eye off the ball for even a second can end in explosive death, or worse: a career spent toiling under forces that couldn’t care less about you. —Ryan Gilliam
Hardspace: Shipbreaker is available via Game Pass on Windows PC and Xbox Series X.
Hi-Fi Rush
Image: Tango Gameworks/Bethesda Softworks via Polygon
Rhythm games, for players who prefer to shoot, dodge, punch, and jump on their own time, can be a tough sell. But such is not the case with Hi-Fi Rush, the action game from Ghostwire: Tokyo developer Tango Gameworks. It provides an array of visual cues to help rhythmically challenged players, but crucially, it doesn’t require that protagonist Chai attacks according to the game’s metronome. Instead, its rhythm elements are an optional layer to interact with, offering score chasers something to aspire to. For everyone else, the game’s vibrant world, rock n’ roll storytelling, and entrancing traversal stand well enough on their own. It’s a cathartic triumph of a game.—Mike Mahardy
Hi-Fi Rush is available via Game Pass on Windows PC and Xbox Series X.
Hitman World of Assassination
Image: IO Interactive
Hitman, Hitman 2, and Hitman 3 are some of the best sandbox puzzle games ever made. As Agent 47, you’ll climb buildings, sneak around parties, and murder spies and debutantes with all manner of tools. Hitman World of Assassination includes the campaigns from all three of the games in IO Interactive’s recent World of Assassination trilogy, giving you more than a dozen maps to play on. Just last week, it also added Freelancer mode, which functions like a roguelike as Agent 47 kills his way through four major crime syndicates, fleshing out his safehouse as he goes.
The Hitman series may be about violence and murder, but it manages to stay lighthearted and fun with its wild physics and silly scenarios. It’s the perfect series to goof around in if you feel like being stealthy, or just want to see what happens when you drop a giant chandelier on a crowd of snobby jerks. —Ryan Gilliam
Hitman Trilogy is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Lies of P
Image: Neowiz
One of 2023’s most delightful surprises, Lies of P is a Soulslike starring a noticeably hot Pinocchio, of all things, from relatively unheralded Korean developer Neowiz. It turns out to be one of the most original and interesting takes on the genre from outside FromSoftware — although more so in its strong storytelling and themes than its gameplay, which is heavily influenced by Sekiro and Bloodborne in its aggressive, rhythmic focus on parry-and-thrust.
As Pinocchio lies and battles his way around a crumbling Belle Epoque town that’s been overrun by its servant class of automatons, Lies of P’s grim tale bends to the player’s choices in ways that convince and intrigue. This works particularly well with Pinocchio’s dual nature as a half-human half-puppet who can be modified with gameplay-altering tools; Lies of P presents an illusory society that you can tinker with and change, just as it tries to manipulate you. —Oli Welsh
Lies of P is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Mass Effect Legendary Edition
Image: BioWare/Electronic Arts
The Mass Effect franchise was gigantic for the Xbox 360 era, but it didn’t transfer to future platforms well — purchasing and downloading the entire story became confusing and expensive when moving to the Xbox One and Xbox Series X. But 2021’s Legendary Editionfinally made the entire Mass Effect trilogy accessible in one package.
The story follows Commander Shepard, a futuristic military hero, who’s tasked with gathering a collection of alien misfits for a variety of missions. Each game is wonderfully crafted, with stand-alone stories and breakout characters that don’t rely on the series’ wider narrative. As a trilogy, the games build on each other with meaningful choices that carry over to the next entry, giving weight to your choices.
The Legendary Edition is the way to experience Mass Effect, and it’s a must-play whether you’re on your first run to save the galaxy or your fifth. —Ryan Gilliam
Mass Effect Legendary Edition is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X, but only for those that have Game Pass Ultimate.
Party Animals
Image: Recreate Games/Source Technology
Look, it’s not rocket science. Sometimes you just want some truly dumb, violent nonsense to play with your friends, and fulfilling that need is just as important for a well-rounded subscription service like Game Pass as serving up expansive RPGs and intriguing indies. Party Animals is a multiplayer party brawler about cute critters knocking the stuffing out of each other. That’s it. It’s not Smash Bros., and nor does it pretend to be; it’s more like an aggressively cute Gang Beasts, or a Fall Guys that’s just about fighting. It’s a little slow, but that just makes it easier to revel in its soft-bellied slapstick. Turn your brain off and enjoy. —Oli Welsh
Party Animals is available via Game Pass on Xbox One and Xbox Series X.
Pentiment
Image: Obsidian Entertainment/Xbox Game Studios
Pentiment is the most immediately striking and recognizable game on this list. Inspired by the art of classic manuscripts, Pentiment sucks you into its beautifully designed version of 16th-century Europe, when books were still being written by hand in monasteries.
You play as Andreas, a young artist looking to make his fortune in an ever-changing world. And as you explore a small village and the grounds surrounding it, and go to work drawing magnificent pictures in custom manuscripts, you’ll meet new people and further flesh out Andreas’ personality and background.
The story will take you through murder, scandal, and a variety of other dramatic events in Andreas’ life. But the plot is secondary to the game’s incredible style and dialogue. —Ryan Gilliam
Pentiment is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Persona 4 Golden
Image: Atlus via Polygon
Persona 4 Golden follows a boy who goes to stay with his uncle and cousin in a small Japanese town. But almost immediately after his arrival, a serial killer starts murdering civilians, all of which have an unknown thread connecting them.
As with all Persona games, Persona 4 Golden allows you to play out your time in school, improving your character’s social stats and friendships before diving into dungeons to help further the plot. But the cast of characters in Persona 4 Golden is unlike any other in the series, offering some of the most memorable party members in any RPG.
Now on Xbox, Persona 4 Golden looks wonderful and plays beautifully. It’s a smart turn-based RPG that’s loaded with conversations to be had and mysteries to solve. —Ryan Gilliam
Persona 4 Golden is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
PowerWash Simulator
Image: FuturLab/Square Enix
PowerWash Simulator is the perfect game to sit on your couch and space off to. As the name suggests, you’re a professional power washer, and your job is to use your washing tools to obliterate grease, grime, and goop off of vehicles, buildings, and even entire playgrounds.
There are some minor upgrade and currency systems, but PowerWash Simulator mostly takes a minimalistic approach — you power wash stuff, no more, no less. Sure, you can take special jobs where you wash something wild like a Mars rover, but it’s really just about making things clean. And while it might sound like boring yard work, it’s actually quite meditative.
Blasting the black film off of a colorful slide provided me with one of the biggest serotonin bursts I’ve gotten from any piece of media in years. It’s a delightful, peaceful game that never fails to relax me after a long week. —Ryan Gilliam
PowerWash Simulator is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Slay the Spire
In Slay the Spire, I play as one of three unique characters, in order to fight my way through a randomly generated map filled with battles, treasure chests, and RPG-like encounters. Combat is similar to that of a turn-based RPG, but instead of selecting attacks and spells from a menu, I draw cards from each character’s specific pool of cards. These cards allow me to attack, defend, cast spells, or use special abilities. Each character has their own set of cards, making their play styles radically different.
I also learned to buck my expectations for the kinds of decks I should build. The key to deck-building games is constructing a thematic deck where each card complements the others. In card games like Magic: The Gathering, this is easy enough to do, since you do all your planning before a match — not in the moment, like in Slay the Spire. Since I’m given a random set of cards to build a deck from at the end of each encounter, I can’t go into any run with a certain deck-building goal in mind. I have to quickly decide on long-term deck designs based on what cards are available to me after a battle. The trick with Slay the Spire is to think more creatively and proactively than the typical card game requires. —Jeff Ramos
Slay the Spire is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
You start the game by inheriting a farm from your grandfather, and you then move to a sleepy town to take over the diminishing acres. For the next 10, 20, 50, 100-plus hours, you work to turn that farm into a modern utopia.
This is easily the most relaxing game on Game Pass. All you do is plant seeds, care for animals, mine some rocks, and befriend the villagers. There’s plenty of drama to be had — with the Wal-Mart-like JojaMart and an army of slimes trying to stop you from mining — but at the end of the day, you’re still going to pass out in your farmhouse and get ready to plant more strawberries the next morning. —Ryan Gilliam
Stardew Valley is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge
Image: Tribute Games/Dotemu
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revengeis already a classic Turtles brawler. If you could’ve overheard a bunch of kids talking about their dream TMNT game while playing the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade cabinet at a local pizza bar in 1989, or Turtles in Time in 1991, this is the Turtles game they’d be imagining.
But over 30 years later, Shredder’s Revenge implements some features that distinguish it from the days of the coin operated arcade. There’s a world map, side-quests, new heroes, experience points, and online matchmaking that help modernize the throwback trappings. Shredder’s Revenge manages to balance itself nicely between the world of retro and revamp.
With only 16 “episodes,” it’s the perfect Game Pass game to jump into with some pals at a sleepover — as long as there’s pizza, of course. —Ryan Gilliam
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder’s Revenge is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim Special Edition
Image: Bethesda Game Studios/Bethesda Softworks
The Elder Scrolls 5, better known as just Skyrim, is a classic. And while you can play it on almost any console or device known to humankind at this point, it’s still worth playing on Game Pass if you’ve never given it a chance, or are just craving another journey in its sprawling world.
Like most Bethesda RPGs, Skyrim is a first-person game with a giant, living world. There are dungeons to crawl, stories to uncover, and a variety of guilds to join. But you can also go off the beaten path and discover your own fun in Skyrim — it rewards you for being curious. It’s the kind of Game Pass game that you can play for hundreds of hours and never get bored. —Ryan Gilliam
The Elder Scrolls 5: Skyrim Special Edition is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
The only control you have over the game is what character you select, what items you choose during your run, and where your character moves. Depending on your weapons of choice, knives, whips, flames, magic bolts, bibles, or holy water fly out of your character in every direction, decimating hordes or pixelated movie monsters, earning you cash for your next adventure.
Though extremely simple on its face, Vampire Survivors is one of the best games of 2022. It perfectly walks the line between peaceful and stressful, requiring the perfect amount of attention for success. It also facilitates growth through skill and through roguelite progression, ensuring that each run is a bit different from your last. —Ryan Gilliam
Vampire Survivors is available via Game Pass on Windows PC, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X.
Halloween is nearly upon us, and what better way to prepare for the spookiest holiday of the year than to dive deep into the best stories the horror genre has to offer?
We’ve pulled together a list of some of the best short horror games to play with only a few days left before Halloween. Whether you’re looking for a chilling psychological horror experience or frantic splatter-core nightmare, these are some of the best games to play this season.
If you like folk horror movies like The Wicker Man and Enys Men, you’ll love Helltown. Developed by Nicolas Lamarche and Gabriel Bolduc Dufour, Helltown follows the story of a postman assigned to deliver packages to a secluded rural neighborhood called Little Vale. After their first day on the job, things quicky take a sinister turn as disturbing visions manifest into an insidious plot rife with demonic cultists and unspeakable horrors. An open-world horror exploration game, Helltown offers multiple endings and collectibles and is the perfect game for those who enjoy sinking into the unknown.
Fans of slow-burn psychological horror with oppressive atmospheres and an emphasis on strong sound design should definitely check out No one lives under the lighthouse. Much like Robert Eggers’ The Lighthouse, starring Willem Dafoe and Robert Pattinson, this game puts players in the role of a lighthouse keeper who assumes stewardship of a small island off the coast of the United States after the former keeper deserts their post. Unlike that aforementioned movie, you’re all alone; with no one else to keep you company as you tend the light of the tower and conduct chores around the island. Or are you?
In this experimental first-person horror game, players assume the role of a sled dog musher hired by a mysterious scientist to safely escort him across the frozen plains of the arctic to a remote research facility. Along the way, the pair encounter increasingly strange and disturbing phenomenon that calls into question the scientist’s motivations, if not the entire expedition as a whole. Can the scientist be trusted, and what’s up with all these strange visions?
In this role-playing horror game (see the title?), you are Liana, a young girl recovering from a life-saving operation. Upon returning home, she awakes one morning expecting to meet her mother, only to instead be greeted by what appears to be a mannequin-like figure resembling her mother. What’s going on here? As the week wears on, Liana will have to unravel the mystery behind her peculiar situation before time runs out.
The second game from Jamie Gavin, a Galway-based game developer who works under the pseudonym “Enigma Studio ‘’ alongside composer Karl Barnes, Mothered is the middle entry in a loose trilogy of games set to conclude this year with November’s Echostasis. If you enjoyed this one, you should definitely check out Mothered: Home — the “DLC sequel” is even available to play for free via the Haunted PS1 “Spectral Mall” Demo Disc.
Benedetto “Ben” Cocuzza is a game developer known for unique low-poly survival horror games inspired by ’80s VHS aesthetics and classic slasher horror movies. Taking cues from The Texas ChainSaw Massacre and The Hills Have Eyes, Stay Out of the House is a stealth game where players assume the role of a young woman kidnapped while on a road trip with her boyfriend across the border of Oklahoma. In order to escape, players will have to sneak their way through the maze-like interior of a masked madman’s dilapidated house without alerting either him or his deranged family members.
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