Voidling Bound was provided by Hatchery Games for review. Thank you!
I’m not sure how it shook out this way, but I ended up getting two different creature collectors to review at the same time. I love the genre, especially as a Pokémon fan, so I was really looking forward to seeing how these two titles differ from the tried-and-true mechanics defined by the most popular games in the genre. However, Voidling Bound takes a very different route, focusing more on third-person action that revolves around getting more powerful with creature collecting. While it can start to feel extremely repetitive when it comes to grinding, the mechanics keep it interesting enough to continue experimenting and getting more powerful.
While Voiding Bound’s DNA is rooted in creature collecting, it takes a different approach that sets it apart and keeps it interesting, and it becomes more like a third-person adventure. Instead of the conventional system where there are over 100 creatures to collect that we use in turn-based battles, there are instead only 9 creatures that we take control over in third-person combat.
This ultimately makes the game focus on making these 9 creatures stand out and feel remarkably different, which works extremely well.
To further stand out, each creature has multiple evolution lines based on two elements that feel remarkably different. For example, the Kwipeck can choose either Fire or Organic, and each has a unique playstyle. Fire can modify the primary attack into a quick machine gun or give them exploding bullets, while Organic can become either a long-range sniper or slower bullets that inflict debuffs. The evolutionary tree spans out with 30 different pathways, all affecting the creature’s abilities and aesthetic, which can completely change its playstyle. And with each type of enemy having different elemental weaknesses, it encourages trying out different evolutionary lines for different situations.
These can directly affect how they play, but then we have a few ways to make them stronger. Every species has a skill tree, which we can use currency to unlock nodes that make every creature in that species stronger. And, as we use the monsters in missions, they will level up, giving us the choice of increasing their stats. There are 5 stats to increase, which can give us more strength, health, elemental damage, and attack speed.
Finally, this brings us to the main way we will grow our creature’s strength: breeding. Monsters can only grow to level 20, which means we can only increase their stats by so much. To mitigate this, we can breed these creatures, bringing in some of their strength to their offspring so they start with higher base stats.
This defines the gameplay loop. Go into missions, grind, level up, and breed to acquire more powerful companions. We can also find eggs in the world, with some being golden that hatch unique monsters, but the best way to get more powerful is going to be by breeding. We also have the chance to splice in new perks to make our creatures way more powerful, but if we do that, we can’t use them to breed anymore. Since each monster gets a level cap of 20, we could use them to breed for better base monsters and then splice new perks to them, so they can still be usable.
As for the actual combat, it was more enjoyable than I expected. Each of the creatures has their own primary tech, secondary attack, melee, dodge, and ultimate attack. They all feel wildly different from each other, and can be further defined by the evolutionary lines. Still, I was quite impressed by how much I enjoyed how fast and flashy the combat was. Cycling through the abilities to keep myself protected and healed up, while saving up for my ultimate ability that deals massive damage, was very enjoyable. And with each creature having its own playstyle, I had a blast trying all of them out to find my favorites.
As much as the combat is exciting and energizing, I did find myself mostly focusing on one or two creatures instead of constantly swapping between all 9. I loved the Kwipeck, and I focused a lot on breeding it specifically instead of going to each creature. It’s nice to have options and see what each creature is like, but I regularly found myself focusing on one or two primarily.
I love Voidling Bound's unique take on monster collecting, but it can feel quite repetitive towards the later end of the game. There are only a few mission types, and while a lot of them take place in different areas, it still feels like we’re doing a lot of the same. Since they all follow a similar structure, and we have to play those missions multiple times to grind in the beginning, it feels a little stale. And with all the creatures we have, which will need to be used to increase our power and rank, the grinding feels more like a chore to start.
This does get better later on once the Abyss is unlocked, which is an endgame roguelike-esque mode. It can also feel a little repetitive after consistently taking part in it, but it’s definitely a step up from the usual missions.
And it improves further as we unlock more facilities in our hub, with one of them being a training facility to actually increase the level of our creatures without sending them on missions. Being able to train and level up multiple creatures while completing missions makes progress go significantly faster, but it takes some time to get there to the point where it feels like it makes a difference.
The facilities in the hub help a lot and can include upgrades and ways to get materials that we need a little faster. The currency can be used to get elemental nodes for evolutions, upgrade our health charges with how many we can use or how much it heals, decrease the cost of training and increase the cap of how far they can train, and more. It all feeds into helping us during combat or improving our creatures, and it does make a difference.
As for Voidling Bound on the Steam Deck, it is a decent experience. It got rated Playable ahead of its release, and I would agree with the rating. However, after testing, there’s only one way I would recommend playing to enjoy the game on the go.
I recommend sticking to the high-quality setting, but turning down the 3D resolution to 70% with a 30 FPS cap. The game runs quite well in a lot of spots, but as soon as combat gets heavy with tons of effects on the screen, the CPU will get bottlenecked and framerate will dip. Even at the lowest settings, there will be drops below 40 FPS, so it ends up not being viable to play above. And since the game is CPU-bottlenecked, increasing quality that will push the GPU won’t make the game suffer as much in those moments.
I decided to bring down the 3D resolution a bit to help with stability, since the default High preset will drop below 30 FPS in some of these heavy combat areas, especially in later missions. In the end, the game looks great and plays wonderfully with the controller, but we can’t push the framerate too much.
Voiding Bound is an interesting and unique take on the creature collector style, and its stylized focus helps it stand out from the pack. The decision to only have 9 creatures that can branch out makes each one feel significantly different from each other. The evolutionary lines and progression systems feel rewarding and distinct, and some of the areas in the hub help streamline and speed up the process to make the grind feel less obnoxious. The missions can feel a little bit repetitive, and it’s easy to focus on one or two creatures instead of all of them, but that doesn’t take away from how rewarding it feels to make them progressively stronger.
I was hoping it would perform better on the Steam Deck, but it’s decently playable as it is. It will require 30 FPS, but because the game is mostly CPU-bound, we can push the visual quality higher. It’s definitely playable and enjoyable, but requires some compromise.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
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Mixtape doesn’t adhere to what defines a video game in a traditional sense. In fact, it almost ignores the question entirely, and that’s what gives it its own unique identity.
This is a relatively interactive, relatively indie experience published by Annapurna Interactive, a publisher known for its unconventional take on video games from within the industry, such as Stray and People of Note. As someone who enjoys artistry in games and walking sim-esque experiences, I was immediately intrigued the moment the game was announced. After a surprisingly short three-hour binge session, the credits rolled, and I was left with mixed feelings that deserve a thorough unpacking.
Mixtape is a coming-of-age story centered around three teenagers standing at the edge of adulthood, trying to figure out who they are while slowly drifting apart from the world they grew up in. Set against a backdrop of the 90's rebel culture, the game captures that raw, restless energy of youth where everything feels loud, chaotic, and ironically temporary.
The story structure is uniquely categorized by song tracks, aka a mixtape, as the name suggests. While experiencing the characters' past adventures, they all have corresponding songs that represent the reflective ambiance of the scene or environment. That makes music not just a background element; it is the backbone of its storytelling. Each track defines each scene meticulously, shaping how each memory captures the character's emotion.
When it comes to these types of narrative-focused, visual novel-like games, story is everything. And honestly, I really liked it. The characters and their issues feel extremely real, and it connects to the player both on a heartbreaking and nostalgic level.
The main character, Stacy Rockford, is grappling with their deeply flawed traits while also capturing common human pitfalls like jealousy, ego, greed, and selfishness. Those reflections allowed me to empathize with her and care for both her and other distinctive characters' narratives.
What I disliked about this was the inconsistent flow of the story. After an emotional scene, a radio-like character introducing the next song, “our next track is this, it was a hit in bla bla,” feels slightly jarring, creating a slight pacing issue that hurts the overall immersion felt by the scene just before it.
After making my way through Mixtape, the story felt extremely short, and all the powerful cutscenes felt rushed and lacking an emotional “punch” that was to be expected. In many ways, it needed a bit more time to build up and properly connect with the characters. That being said, this isn’t a case of bad writing or poor execution. It feels more like a game that simply didn’t give itself enough space and time to fully land its emotional weight and poise. The foundation is strong, but the impact never quite reaches its expected heights.
Nonetheless, I really loved what was accomplished with its narrative direction. Fresh, artistic, and overall like a unique, bittersweet little experience that lingers more than it explodes.
Let's dive into the most controversial and weakest part of the game, the “gameplay” of it all. Honestly, I would say there is barely any gameplay in this game whatsoever. It feels more like a physics showcase demo, or a visual novel with an artistic edge, rather than an actual game.
Every gameplay section consists of either walking or quick time events. You press buttons at a moment's notice, carry objects, take photos, flip the bird, bang your head in-sync with music, perform stylish skating moves, and go through a close-up, slightly disturbing French kiss sequence. Exciting stuff.
Beethoven & Dinosaur have done an excellent job with what they are trying to achieve. The physics interactions and overall quality are some of the best I’ve ever seen, but it feels lacking as a video game, something I'm meant to interact with.
In most games, I can find a “game” aspect because your choices matter, you can actually fail certain moments, and the player remains engaged. Here, there are no choices whatsoever. You can’t really fail, change, or influence anything. You are essentially watching a movie while occasionally pressing buttons or walking.
These may present themselves as flaws, but in reality, they are design choices meant to force the player to focus on the narrative, music, and a relaxed emotional flow without stress. However, some of these “gameplay” sections feel so long and stretched out that they start to contradict that intention and become extremely boring.
When it comes to graphics and artistic direction, Mixtape is simply breathtaking. It masterfully blends a stylish surreal art style with modern, beautiful lighting and image quality. Incredible lighting and image quality, combined with awesome physics interactions, creates something that looks breathtaking.
Character movement in particular is inspired by stop motion animation such as Corpse Bride or Wallace and Gromit. And when it’s a game based purely on 90s nostalgia, it's hard to imagine any other way. Though I must admit, at first it made the game feel a bit laggy, but you get used to its style pretty quickly.
The greatest part of the visuals, though, is the colors. The game is so beautifully vibrant and colorful during positive narrative moments, and it shifts to darker, grittier tones with more artistic lighting when dramatic events unfold. That way, the game hooks the audience through its artistic direction directly, with little built around it.
If a game called Mixtape had issues with its sound and music department, it would be catastrophic. Luckily, it truly does it justice.
Both the 25 licensed tracks and the original OST sound amazing in-game. It introduced me, as someone not familiar with the bulk of the music, to tons of bangers that I added to my personal playlist. The sheer quality of the soundtrack is not the only strong point; it’s how perfectly it is matched with the narrative that makes it so special and memorable.
Voice acting and sound effects also work flawlessly. The overall game is really an ear feast, and I highly recommend playing it with headphones to enjoy the full depth of what the game is aiming to deliver.
When it comes to indie games, they usually feel right at home on the Steam Deck. Unfortunately, Mixtape uses the Unreal Engine 5, so running the game at 60 FPS with higher settings was never really realistic on a Steam Deck.
Fortunately, the game is a cinematic visual novel-style experience that doesn’t really need 60 FPS to be fully enjoyed. When testing the game on my desktop, the fluid 60 FPS camera movement actually felt a bit out of place because of the game’s stop-motion-inspired character animations. Locking the game to 30 FPS gives it a much more cinematic feel overall.
The game comes with a default Steam Deck Verified preset, and thankfully the settings aren’t locked, so you still have freedom to tweak things if you want. But honestly, I wouldn’t recommend it. Even at the lowest settings, increasing the frame rate results in unstable 40 to 50 FPS gameplay with noticeably worse image quality.
Thankfully, Beethoven & Dinosaur did a really solid job optimizing the default Steam Deck settings. Throughout the entire game, I didn’t experience a single drop below 30 FPS, and visually, Mixtape looks surprisingly gorgeous for an Unreal Engine 5 title running on the Deck.
Of course, compared to desktop or console, some of the more advanced lighting effects lose a bit of their impact. Reflections and sunlight bouncing off characters and environments look significantly better on higher-end hardware, but the Steam Deck version still looks more than acceptable.
Overall, Mixtape was a fantastic out-of-the-box Steam Deck experience.
Honestly, I don’t really see Mixtape as a traditional video game. It feels more like a beautiful little art project that accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do. If you appreciate strong artistic direction and want to experience something that feels like a gorgeous 3-hour interactive movie, you’ll have a fantastic time with Mixtape. But at the same time, it's definitely not going to be everyone’s cup of tea.
It’s slow, heavily cinematic, and far more focused on atmosphere and emotions than gameplay depth. But for the audience it’s trying to reach, Mixtape absolutely succeeds.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Following on from the great LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga, I had high hopes for LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, and it didn't disappoint. I had a checklist in my mind of things I wanted to see in the new LEGO Batman game, and it checked nearly all of them.
It's always interesting to see how the LEGO games handle the story of the franchise they're taking on. Legacy of the Dark Knight takes some artistic liberties with the retelling of the Dark Knight trilogy. Although the basic plot is largely followed, there are definitely some extras thrown in to pad out the playing time, some lines are kept from the movies, but said by different characters, etc., along with trademark goofs, gags, and references that we've come to expect from LEGO games, and for the most part, they hit the mark to provide a humorous time while still telling the original story.
The limited number of characters available in the Dark Knight trilogy helps to make every character feel unique in the game. Unlike LEGO Star Wars, where there are hundreds of characters separated into "classes" that all do similar things, each character in LEGO Batman has its own set of abilities and combat styles, which make them feel different to play. Batman focuses on stealth gameplay, which works surprisingly well; Catwoman can summon cats to explore vents, and Jim Gordon can use his foam gun to interfere with machinery.
The game's combat is rather basic, as you would expect from a LEGO game, but it's still quite engaging. Beyond mashing the X button to punch the heads off of enemies, you'll also need to keep an eye out for button prompts to counterattack enemies as well as dodge incoming unblockable attacks. It feels like they've taken a couple of cues from Soulslikes, just watered them down to make the game much more accessible.
You also have the addition of a stealth system, which allows you to perform quick takedowns of enemies. If done properly, it can make missions much easier, since being detected can trigger additional enemy spawns. I was worried this wouldn't work well in a LEGO game, but they've done a good job of it here, and it does feel satisfying when you take out a group of criminals without being spotted, very in-keeping with the Batman style.
These changes help to make the combat something more than just button-mashing, and the flow of the combat feels great, with the game auto-locking onto enemies and your character smoothly moving across the screen to land the next punch to the nearest enemy. This avoids the disappointment when a punch doesn't land, and eliminates the need for most of your own movement during fights, allowing us to focus on the action.
Visually, Legacy of the Dark Knight is quite pleasing. The reflections and rainy streets of Gotham are pulled off surprisingly well for a LEGO title, and the voice acting, while slightly off-kilter compared to the movie's voice actors, captures the general feel of the originals and is decent in its own right.
Being able to explore and drive around Gotham City was a pleasant surprise. I wasn't sure how large the world map would be, given that The Skywalker Saga had many planets with smaller sections, but Gotham City is one sizable map. You'll mostly be gliding or driving around the city to get to your destinations. The driving physics are a little odd, especially certain collision physics that felt very unnatural, but for the most part, it's quite fun to carve a path of destruction on your way to the next mission, or glide along the rooftops to find those sneaky collectibles.
I did try the game briefly in co-op play, which, disappointingly, is still couch co-op only; no online multiplayer here. While it does work well, there are some limitations. The game is permanently split-screen, unlike older shared-screen LEGO titles, which has benefits and drawbacks: it allows for more separation than a shared screen but sacrifices a lot of screen real estate when searching for objects and puzzle solutions.
Vehicles are also oddly limited to only being drivable by the character that owns them, so if you have the Batmobile, for example, only the player playing as Batman can use the vehicle; it seemed like an unnecessary limitation for the game.
I also noticed some issues in this mode. Namely, certain visual elements, such as fog, seemed to display incorrectly on the 2nd player's screen, being too thick or entirely non-existent, and I also encountered an issue where I completely lost control of my character as player 1, requiring a game restart to continue. These issues were not present when playing solo.
LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight has great controller support, as you would expect from a LEGO title, and it also supports 16:10 aspect ratios, so we have no black borders around the Steam Deck's display.
Legacy of the Dark Knight defaults to Low settings on the Steam Deck, and we should keep them there, with FSR set to Balanced. I used the SteamOS frame limiter to limit the game to 30 FPS.
The game largely holds 30 FPS throughout with these settings, even in combat, but do expect the open-world driving portions of the game to dip into the mid-20s. It's still playable, but it may be unpleasant at times.
Power draw varies hugely. In indoor areas on foot, expect around 11-15W of drain on the battery; this can leap as high as 18-22W when traversing the city in a vehicle. Expect around 3 hours of battery life from a Steam Deck OLED and around 2 hours from a Steam Deck LCD.
LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight allows you to remap controls, adjust the size of text and subtitle text, add closed captions, and lock-on assist.
It also offers options to help with difficulty, such as slowing the game to 50%, not losing studs (currency) on death, and skipping some puzzles and combat.
LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight is pretty much what I had hoped for from when I heard the game announced. A humorous retelling of the Dark Knight Trilogy, complete with a sizable recreation of Gotham City filled with collectibles, built-for-fun gameplay, and you can bring a friend along for the ride.
The Steam Deck handles the game quite well for the most part, with an excellent control scheme. Do expect some dips when traversing the city in a vehicle, but by and large, the game remains playable and enjoyable on the handheld.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
007 First Light was provided by IO Interactive for review. Thank you!
When I was a kid, I remember playing the original Max Payne and completely falling in love with it. Years later, in high school, I spent countless hours playing the Uncharted series without ever getting bored, having the time of my life from beginning to end. Unfortunately, linear story-driven action games have become extremely rare these days. Most players now expect massive open worlds, hundreds of hours of side content, and bloated gameplay systems. And while I absolutely love some of those games and often find them more immersive overall, sometimes all you really need is a nonstop cinematic action experience that grabs you instantly and refuses to let go.
It seems IO Interactive felt the same way. Taking a huge risk, the studio behind Hitman secured the legendary James Bond license and attempted to create something truly special. I’ll admit that after watching the trailers and gameplay previews for months, I expected nothing more than a gimmicky mix of Hitman and Uncharted. I thought it would end up being a decent but forgettable action game.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
007 First Light is an absolute blast from start to finish, hooking the player immediately and never loosening its grip for a single moment.
When it comes to James Bond movies, we almost always see the legendary spy at the peak of his career. Experienced, confident, charming, and always in control. The smart one-liners, absurd yet iconic gadgets, and cocky, flirtatious attitude are all there by default. 007 First Light completely changes that formula. Instead of presenting us with the perfected version of Bond, the game focuses on a young and inexperienced version of the character, making the story far more personal and character-driven. We don’t just watch Bond save the world; we grow alongside him.
We open in a military setting where Bond is not yet a spy, but simply an Air Force soldier caught in a disastrous ambush behind enemy lines. As we desperately try to survive and escape, an MI6 agent suddenly reaches our comms and begins guiding us through the chaos. From there, events unfold in a surprisingly compelling way, leading MI6 to consider Bond as a potential candidate for the newly forming 00 program.
What follows is one of the most refreshing parts of the story. Instead of instantly turning Bond into a superhuman agent, the game takes its time. We undergo rigorous training, meet new allies, slowly adapt to this dangerous new world, and begin to appreciate the opportunity and purpose MI6 gives us. It makes Bond feel human, vulnerable, and far easier to empathize with than the untouchable version we are used to seeing on screen.
The overall story structure is packed with superb action, mystery, betrayals, humor, and genuine emotional weight. Honestly, I never expected to feel this strongly attached to the narrative of a Bond game. Some players may find the opening hours surprisingly slow, but for me, that slower pacing was where the game excelled. It gives you time to fully immerse yourself in Bond’s world, understand the people around him, and slowly connect with the character on a deeper level. That is easily one of its greatest strengths.
That said, I do think the story starts feeling slightly rushed toward the finale. It almost feels too short by the time everything begins escalating, and I definitely would have loved a few more hours to flesh out certain moments and relationships further.
Another small disappointment was the lack of a truly iconic Bond villain. While the antagonists work well enough for the type of origin story the script is trying to tell, don’t expect a larger-than-life mastermind on the level of classic Bond movies. It feels intentional and understandable, but it still leaves a slight disappointment by the end.
007 First Light has a very unique gameplay identity of its own. In the Hitman games, stealth and methodical exploration are the absolute core of the experience. First Light borrows many of those elements, but never fully commits to becoming a stealth sandbox itself. Instead, it feels like IO Interactive carefully sprinkled the DNA of Hitman in without allowing it to become an actual Hitman game.
During missions, we can take multiple approaches to the same objective. For example, you might infiltrate a VIP area disguised as a waiter, sneak through ventilation systems, use one of your limited gadgets to poison a guard and create an opening, brute force your way inside through combat, or simply bluff and manipulate your way forward with clever dialogue choices.
The rewarding feeling of exploring each mission area and discovering alternative solutions creates a genuine sense of freedom that very few cinematic action games manage to achieve. Even though the experience remains largely story-driven and linear, the missions themselves consistently make the player feel creative and in control.
In both combat and optional stealth scenarios, Bond relies on two core resources. Gadget parts and the instinct bar. Gadget parts are used for a wide variety of actions such as stunning enemies, hacking environmental systems, lowering bridges, unlocking shortcuts, disarming opponents, and much more. These tools are incredibly powerful, but also extremely limited, forcing players to think carefully before using them recklessly.
That limitation creates a surprisingly satisfying layer of decision-making throughout the game. Instead of mindlessly relying on gadgets in every encounter, players constantly have to decide whether a situation is truly worth spending resources on. This keeps both combat and stealth scenarios fresh, tense, and far less repetitive than they otherwise would have been.
The instinct bar serves as another brilliant mechanic, essentially acting as a limited get-out-of-jail-free card during stealth sections. It allows Bond to bluff and manipulate suspicious enemies into believing he is not trespassing, while also helping isolate targets from crowded groups by cleverly luring them away. In gunfights, instinct can also slow down time, allowing Bond to land precise shots in classic cinematic fashion.
Together, these mechanics perfectly capture what makes James Bond feel different from a typical action hero. You are not simply overpowering enemies through brute force, but surviving through intelligence, improvisation, and resourcefulness. It genuinely makes you feel like a smart and adaptable spy rather than just another shooter protagonist, and honestly, I found it absolutely incredible.
The melee combat in 007 First Light will immediately feel familiar to anyone who has played the Batman Arkham games. Most encounters revolve around parrying, dodging, and counterattacking enemies in rhythmic hand-to-hand fights. To the game’s credit, it introduces a few unique touches, such as throwing objects at enemies, slamming them into breakable machinery or environmental hazards to deal heavy damage, and chaining together flashy cinematic takedowns.
That said, while the melee combat is definitely fun, I also found it to be one of the weaker parts of the overall experience. A lot of these encounters feel more like “last resort” situations after a stealth attempt goes wrong, rather than a fully fledged combat system meant to stand on its own. Because melee is not the primary focus for 007, that becomes somewhat understandable, but even then, many fights ended up feeling a little clunky, overly familiar, and lacking a strong identity of their own.
Gunfights, however, are a completely different story.
The shooting mechanics are incredible. As I mentioned earlier, carefully managing your gadgets already adds a huge amount of tension and strategy to every firefight, but the game goes even further by constantly forcing players out of their comfort zone. You cannot simply sit behind cover forever and slowly clear rooms, because nearly every piece of cover in the environment is destructible, and enemies throw grenades at you as if there is no tomorrow. On top of that, ammunition is fairly limited, so you always need to stay mobile, aware of your surroundings, and ready to improvise.
One small example can perfectly summarize why the gunplay feels so satisfying. When you run out of ammo, you can throw your empty weapon directly at an enemy to stun them, rush forward during the chaos, perform a melee finisher, grab their weapon, and quickly reposition into another piece of cover before continuing the fight. Moments like these make the combat feel dynamic, cinematic, and constantly engaging.
These little details add an enormous amount of immersion to the gunfights and prevent them from ever becoming repetitive. Honestly, this is some of the most enjoyable and creative third-person shooter gameplay I’ve experienced in a very long time.
Visually, from a purely technical standpoint, I found 007 First Light to be solid and perfectly acceptable for 2026 standards, but not necessarily groundbreaking. The image quality and lighting effects are undeniably impressive, yet they are the kind of visuals we have already seen executed even better in some other modern AAA titles. Where the game truly stands out is not raw graphical technology, but its artistic direction and overall presentation.
The mission environments are incredibly detailed and atmospheric, constantly feeling alive and believable. Large locations are filled with hundreds of NPCs who all look surprisingly distinct, move naturally, and interact with the world in ways that rarely feel robotic or repetitive. Combined with the clever use of cinematic camera work, seamless transitions, and subtle visual effects, the overall presentation creates an impressive level of immersion throughout the experience.
I did notice a few weaker areas visually. Facial animations can occasionally feel stiff in certain conversations, and the quality of hair rendering is not always on par with the rest of the presentation. Still, outside of those minor shortcomings, it remains consistently gorgeous and visually immersive from start to finish.
Since the 1960s, music has always been one of the defining aspects of James Bond. From the iconic main themes to the unforgettable movie opening sequences, the franchise’s soundtracks have consistently played a huge role in shaping its identity and atmosphere. Thankfully, 007 First Light understands that formula perfectly and delivers one of the strongest audio presentations I have experienced in a Bond media project.
The opening sequence alone is an absolute work of art. Featuring a stunning performance by Lana Del Rey, the intro instantly captures that classic Bond feeling while still sounding fresh and modern. Honestly, I would go so far as to say it is one of the most memorable and impressive musical pieces ever created for Bond media.
The rest of the soundtrack also does an excellent job balancing traditional Bond-style themes with fantastic new arrangements. Throughout the entire game, the music constantly reinforces the feeling that you are playing a true James Bond experience. Even during quieter moments, the soundtrack subtly elevates the atmosphere and adds a massive amount of immersion to every scene.
The audio design shines outside of the music as well. Strong performances from the cast bring a wealth of personality and emotion to the story, while the sound effects deliver an impactful punch to both gunfights and melee combat. Weapons sound loud and realistic, punches feel heavy, and environmental destruction carries satisfying weight.
Combined together, the soundtrack, voice acting, and sound design create an absolutely phenomenal audio experience. In many ways, the game feels like a love letter to everything that has made James Bond sound iconic for decades.
When a new AAA title launches in 2026, we Steam Deck users usually start praying for a semi-decent experience. But every now and then, developers optimize their games so well that we end up asking ourselves, “How does this run so great?” Thankfully, IO Interactive has done a surprisingly solid job optimizing 007 First Light for the handheld, even if the experience is not without some frustrating technical flaws.
When we first booted 007 up, every single setting was pushed to the absolute lowest possible values, with FSR also set to Performance mode by default. Naturally, that made us very nervous at first. But once gameplay actually started, the game immediately surprised me with frame rates hovering between 50-70 FPS in lighter areas, and most of our concerns quickly faded away.
However, after spending much more time with the full game, it became clear that the overall stability is far less consistent than those first impressions suggested. Performance varies wildly depending on the area. Some missions and indoor sections can run incredibly smoothly at near-60 FPS, while heavier environments can suddenly drop into the mid 30s. The Africa region, in particular, is a performance nightmare on Steam Deck, with heavy NPC density and large open environments causing major frame-rate instability, dropping to 22-24 FPS.
Outside those demanding sections, though, the game generally hovers around 40-50 FPS, which is still fairly impressive given the visual complexity and scale.
Unfortunately, one of the biggest technical problems comes from the in-game framerate cap system, which doesn't function properly. Even when selecting the 30 FPS option through the v-sync settings, the game often ignores the cap entirely and fluctuates into the low-to-mid 40s on its own. Because of this, achieving a truly stable locked frame rate through the in-game options becomes nearly impossible.
I also experimented with raising several settings, including switching the upscaler to Quality mode and increasing most options to Medium while keeping textures on High. Performance then dropped into the 32-40 FPS range. Still, despite the performance hit, the experience remained visually impressive for a handheld experience and never turned into a completely blurry mess outside of a few demanding effects.
Shadow quality and hair rendering are especially performance-heavy settings and can drastically impact frame rate, but aside from those, the visual presentation is surprisingly good on the Steam Deck.
Interestingly enough, I ended up finding a strange workaround that provided the smoothest overall experience. Instead of using the Steam Deck’s built-in FPS limiter, disabling frame limiting entirely while only setting the display refresh rate to 45Hz somehow resulted in noticeably more stable frame pacing and smoother gameplay. I honestly cannot fully explain why it works better this way, but compared to using either the in-game cap or the Steam Deck limiter, the experience felt significantly cleaner and more responsive.
At the end of the day, while 007 First Light is definitely not a perfectly stable Steam Deck experience, it is still surprisingly playable and visually impressive for such a demanding modern AAA title. With some tweaking and realistic expectations, it can absolutely provide an enjoyable handheld Bond experience. For right now, focusing on mostly medium settings with Volumetric Fog on Low and FSR on Balanced is going to be the best way to enjoy the game.
At the end of the day, 007 First Light is easily one of the best Bond experiences I’ve had in years. IO Interactive perfectly understood what makes James Bond special and combined cinematic storytelling, clever mission design, fantastic gunfights, strong music, and immersive spy mechanics into something that truly feels worthy of the legendary IP.
Despite taking clear inspiration from games like Max Payne, Hitman, and Uncharted, the game still manages to build its own identity instead of feeling like a cheap imitation. Sure, it has some flaws. The melee combat can feel a little clunky, and the ending feels somewhat rushed, but none of those issues stopped me from having an absolute blast from start to finish.
As for Steam Deck, while performance stability can sometimes be rough and certain areas push the hardware very hard, 007 is still surprisingly playable and visually impressive for such a demanding AAA title. With some tweaking and realistic expectations, it delivers a genuinely enjoyable handheld Bond experience that feels great to play on the go.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Mina the Hollower was provided by Yacht Club Games for review. Thank you!
“If Shovel Knight is our Mario, Mina would become our Zelda.”
It is the kind of statement that should collapse under the weight of its own ambition. A comparison so brazenly self-assured that, from almost any other studio, it would sound absurd. But Yacht Club Games is not just any studio. Shovel Knight was not simply a successful retro revival; it was one of the defining indie games of its generation, a masterclass in understanding the language of classic game design without becoming shackled to it. It understood precision, pacing, challenge, and above all else, joy.
Mina the Hollower proves that it wasn’t lightning in a bottle.
It is bigger, darker, stranger, more ambitious, and in many ways, even more impressive than Shovel Knight ever was. Where that game perfected the side-scrolling action platformer, Mina the Hollower turns its attention toward top-down adventure games with almost terrifying confidence, carving together elements of Zelda, Castlevania, gothic horror, Soulslike tension, and arcade-era immediacy into something that feels both reverently nostalgic and startlingly fresh. And it absolutely rules.
From the moment Mina bursts underground in a shower of dirt and teeth, the game establishes an identity all its own. The burrowing mechanic is more than a gimmick; it is the foundation of the entire experience. Used for traversal, combat, evasive movement, puzzle-solving, and exploration, it gives Mina a fluidity unlike almost anything else in the well-trodden genre. There is a wonderful rhythm to movement here, a constant dance between aggression and escape, where every encounter feels joyfully kinetic and deliberately tactile.
Combat is fast, vicious, and remarkably expressive. Mina’s arsenal grows steadily throughout the adventure, introducing new weapons, secondary tools, trinkets, and modifiers that radically alter how encounters play out. One moment you are darting beneath enemy attacks to strike from behind with surgical precision; the next you are unleashing screen-filling chaos while desperately managing positioning against overwhelming odds. The game demands attention without ever feeling punishing for punishment’s sake.
What makes Mina the Hollower so compelling, however, is its astonishing sense of scale. This is not a compact homage to old handheld adventures. It is sprawling. Regions unfold into labyrinthine tangles of hidden routes, cryptic shortcuts, forgotten ruins, and secret encounters that constantly reward curiosity. Every new area feels dense with possibility, packed with optional discoveries and environmental storytelling that gives the world a genuine sense of place. There is an old-school opacity to the adventure that feels deeply refreshing in an era terrified of letting players miss things.
And you will miss things, like entire optional bosses, strange NPC questlines, hidden items, bizarre secrets tucked behind suspicious walls or buried beneath the dirt. The experience feels gloriously unconcerned with guiding players neatly through its world. Instead, it trusts you to explore, experiment, and occasionally become hopelessly lost. That trust is rewarded constantly.
The world itself is stunning. Yacht Club’s pixel art has evolved from impressive to genuinely breathtaking, with some of the finest animation work in modern pixel-based games. Mina moves with astonishing personality, enemies twitch and lurch with grotesque charm, and environments drip with atmosphere. There is a theatrical quality to everything, as though the game exists somewhere between a forgotten gothic horror serial and an unearthed masterpiece from an alternate gaming timeline.
Yet for all its visual brilliance, it is the soundtrack that truly elevates Mina the Hollower into something special. Jake Kaufman’s work here is extraordinary.
Shovel Knight’s score earned its legendary reputation through sheer melodic brilliance, delivering one unforgettable theme after another. Mina somehow surpasses it. The soundtrack is richer, moodier, and more textured, equally capable of explosive triumph and oppressive dread. Every area possesses a distinct musical identity, with tracks that burrow into your brain long after the console is switched off.
There are moments where the score swells into eerie grandeur that feels almost overwhelming, transforming simple exploration into something hypnotic. Elsewhere, minimalist melodies and unnerving basslines create a constant undercurrent of tension, reinforcing the game’s darker tone without ever sacrificing its sense of adventure. It is an astonishing achievement, and one of the finest soundtracks Yacht Club Games have ever produced. Dare I say it: it is better than Shovel Knight’s. Without a shadow of a doubt. Not because it abandons the infectious hooks that made that soundtrack iconic, but because it expands upon them with greater emotional range and atmosphere. Mina the Hollower’s music does not merely accompany the game; it defines it.
On Steam Deck, Mina the Hollower feels nothing short of exemplary. In an era where “playable” on handheld often translates to compromise, Yacht Club Games instead deliver an experience that feels purpose-built for Valve’s portable powerhouse. The game’s gorgeous pixel art and razor-sharp responsiveness translate beautifully to the smaller screen, creating the kind of dangerously moreish “just one more area” experience that handheld gaming thrives upon.
More impressively still, the performance is virtually flawless. Across exploration, combat, and some of the game’s more chaotic encounters, the framerate never meaningfully falters, holding a perfectly stable and immensely satisfying 90fps throughout. Combined with an astonishingly low 7W battery draw, Mina the Hollower becomes an absolute dream on Steam Deck, comfortably offering upwards of six hours of blissful, uninterrupted gameplay on a single charge. It is the sort of optimisation work that feels increasingly rare; thoughtful, efficient, and clearly designed by developers who understand exactly how people want to play their games.
Quite frankly, it may already stand among the very best Steam Deck experiences available.
What is perhaps most impressive about Mina the Hollower is how effortlessly confident it feels. Many retro-inspired games are content to imitate the aesthetics of the past while sanding away the rougher edges. Yacht Club Games understand that the magic of those older games came not just from how they looked, but from how boldly designed they were. Mina embraces mystery, difficulty, experimentation, and discovery with absolute conviction.
It never feels cynical. Never calculated. Never designed by committee. It feels meticulously handcrafted, proudly seeping with character and deliberate thought throughout.
That craftsmanship extends everywhere: the responsiveness of movement, the density of secrets, the immaculate pacing of exploration and combat, the unforgettable boss encounters, the perfectly judged difficulty curve, and the sheer generosity of content. This is a game overflowing with ideas, yet somehow never loses focus. Shovel Knight cemented Yacht Club Games as one of the great modern indie developers. Mina the Hollower feels like the moment they transcend even that reputation.
If Shovel Knight was their Mario, then yes, Mina the Hollower may very well be their Zelda to an entire new generation.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Yerba Buena was provided by Focus Entertainment for review. Thank you!
As a California native, Yerba Buena immediately spoke to me. It was the name for San Francisco, and it still has a little spot in the city. I lived near San Francisco for some time and went there frequently, so I was quite intrigued to see the name also be used as a name for a game. And that game turned out to be nothing like what I expected, diving deep into sentient NPCs and an evil plot to take over that world.
In the game, we control Barbara (Barb), a jobless woman who has just missed a job interview. As she is driven around by her best friend, Russell, they get hijacked by a biker, and Russell is taken hostage. Barbara finds a suitcase, and inside it, there is a weird-looking gun called The Oscillator. With it, we can move glitching objects around, which we will need to do if we’re going to foil an evil plan to enslave 1970s San Francisco.
The opening act of Yerba Buena was slow, and I’ll say it’s quite boring up until the 30% mark. Once we start getting into what is truly going on and confirming suspicions from the story's first acts, it gets much more interesting. I don’t want to spoil any plot points, but I like the meta angle that developer Mad About Panda went with. It was an interesting way to convey the overall plot and what is really going on. Most people who play video games will probably have their biggest suspicions in Chapter 2, and it was quite obvious up until the confirmation, but it was still interesting.
I also love how they used collectibles to give background information about the world and companies behind what’s going on. It’s all very meta, but it’s presented in a way that moves away from cringe. It’s all done well, and it helps make sense of the 1970s San Francisco world.
However, I just couldn’t connect with Barb. In almost every scene with her, I just saw her as dull. She didn’t have much personality to her, mostly just going with the flow and being confused. I’m sure that’s part of what makes her special, because she is jobless, but it made it very hard for me to get invested in her. The voice acting was okay, and I liked some of the other characters, but Barb was difficult. It just felt like she was a blank slate with little personality and predictable reactions, just refusing to be interesting or unique.
I appreciate the levels themselves. There's a good variety in locations, going from the town to a crazy carnival to an office space and a bunker just in the first half of the game. I like the change in setting without giving up the core 1970s vibe spread throughout.
Just like the story, the gameplay took a little bit of time to get fun. At its core, Yerba Buena is a puzzle game where you will complete objectives by moving objects around using the velocity of others. It starts off with only being able to use velocity to move objects around, copying the direction of an object, and applying it to a glitched one. It gets a little old pretty fast, with some solutions being so obvious that it took no thought to finish.
Then, our Oscillator gets upgrades, and that’s when the gameplay truly shines. Figuring out the right combination of moving objects along with the other new powers requires more thought and ingenuity, and it becomes significantly more enjoyable. There were some puzzles, like the Basketball one, that I had to really think outside the box to complete, and once I figured them out, it was so satisfying. Even just figuring out one step of the process to complete the puzzle felt rewarding. There are also hidden collectibles to get by modifying the world in certain ways, which is like an extra puzzle in itself.
There are some puzzles that feel a bit too difficult, and it can be a bit frustrating. Some of this was due to not fully scanning the environment, which I highly recommend, but there were some puzzles that had too many parts that needed a specific type of movement to copy/paste, and it wasn't easy to find. Being able to scan and highlight which parts can be modified and which can be copied does help, but some were a little too hidden to make out easily.
Yerba Buena is quite playable on the Steam Deck, but there are one or two concessions that we will have to make. The game defaults to the high-quality settings, and while it runs decently well, there are moments where the frame rate will drop. Luckily, it sticks above 30 FPS most of the time, but there are enough drops here and there to feel noticeable.
Because of that, I actually recommend playing at 30 FPS lock on medium settings. This is going to keep the game at a stable framerate while looking decent. There’s only one graphical setting to change, which is the low/medium/high preset, so there isn’t a lot to customize in detail. Low doesn’t look great, so medium with 30 FPS is going to be the middle ground that stays stable and looks good.
It would have been nice for it to run at a stable 40 or 60 with good visuals, but this is one of those games that doesn’t feel like there’s much being sacrificed at a lower framerate, so I didn’t mind much. The gamepad controls look great, and it does support the 16:10 aspect ratio, so it is comfortable to play on the Deck.
Yerba Buena is an intriguing experience that gets better after its opening. The story and gameplay get significantly better after the opening act, expanding in gameplay depth and with plot points that keep me interested. I couldn't really connect with our playable character, and that did make it hard to enjoy her perspective in the story. Some of the puzzles can be a bit too difficult, but apart from that, it's a great puzzle game that will keep you hooked.
It's also very enjoyable on the Steam Deck. It will need medium settings for a solid 30 FPS experience, but for this type of game, it fits very well.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Bubsy 4D was provided by Atari for review. Thank you!
Bubsy has had quite a contentious time in the spotlight. It had a great run with its first few games, then started a downhill spiral with Bubsy 3D. Since then, the games have not had a chance to let the wisecracking bobcat shine, with The Woolies Strike Back and Paws on Fire being critically panned. Now, Bubsy 4D is a chance at redemption for the franchise, answering the age-old question: Can Bubsy be fun again?
As developer Fabraz has proven, yes, he can.
Fabraz showed their skill for 3D platforming with their recently released Demon Tides, and I’m happy to say it carried over to Bubsy 4D. Bubsy’s moveset caters perfectly to the environment, with double jumps, lunges, glides, and turning into a giant furball to roll around at fast speeds. And they can all work together seamlessly to overcome obstacles. Want to get up an extremely tall building? Jump onto it, jump off, do your double jump, lunge onto the building to crawl up it slightly, jump off again, and then glide back to the roof. And that’s only if you want to use the building alone to get up, as there are most likely other buildings or structures that you can use if preferred.
What makes it so great is how easy it is to swap between them. All of the moves really only use a few buttons, and it all feels so snappy and immediate when using a different move. It’s very important in a platform like this to have that, but with the variety of moves that can influence each other, Fabraz balances it well. Even if there are some unstable moments, like when you’re in your ball form and you veer off course, quick thinking can pull you back with lunges and glides.
The levels are designed wonderfully, encouraging quick thinking and multiple solutions, while also not feeling overwhelming. Each level has a timer as well, so speed running in finding shortcuts, or combinations of moves, to shave off a few seconds to get to the end of the level is encouraged. However, taking time to explore the level will be beneficial, since it will usually have other collectibles or blueprints to unlock new moves. These collectibles can also unlock new outfits, including the infamous Bubsy 3D look. The levels may be short, but they are sweet and fun to experiment with.
However, it’s an extremely short game. While there is some replayability to each level to unlock all of the moves, beat the target time, and get all of the costumes, there isn’t much reason to keep playing after the credits roll. I beat the game with a 70% completion rate in 3.5 hours, and I had taken extra time to search through the 15 levels and get as much as I could find. It was fun, but with the limited scope of each level, I felt like I had seen it all.
The only things I was missing were the costumes and extra moves, but I almost never found myself using the moves that I unlocked. They were nice extras, and it was cool to expand the moveset, but I realized that at the end of the final boss, I never really used any of those moves. The OG Coyote Time move to walk off of ledges was useful to a degree, but the core moveset satisfied everything I needed to get through the levels, and I never felt like the unlockable moves changed much. The Item Sniffer will be nice to find collectibles around the levels when trying to 100% the game, and the extra life is a nice touch, but apart from those two, I didn’t feel like the other upgrades were worth it. The costumes, on the other hand, are great. Most are different jackets, but we have some of the humor in there with the Hedgehog outfit and bringing back the Bubsy 3D look.
With the scope of the game being smaller, the story ends up feeling like a means to an end, but that’s not where the team focused its efforts. The overall narrative follows Bubsy and friends as they travel to alien planets to get back their Golden Fleece that was stolen by the Baabots. It provides just enough motivation for the team to keep going, but it’s definitely not anything to write home about.
However, Bubsy’s humor is in full swing and firing on all cylinders. From Oblivia constantly getting Bubsy’s name wrong to his aversion to doing any extra work or fighting against the bosses, the comedic timing and script kept things interesting and had me laughing. The comedy is sprinkled throughout, from the one-liners to the easter eggs (try dying in the Bubsy 3D costume). These moments, including discussions with the team within levels, were the highlight of the narrative experience. I understand it technically has nothing to do with the narrative, but because this kind of humor is so intertwined with Bubsy, it still feels significant.
Bubsy 4D got the Steam Deck Verified badge ahead of its release, and based on Fabraz’s previous game, Demon Tides, I expected performance to be around the same. And I was right. With the default settings, we get around 60 FPS with lower battery drain, around 10W - 14W.
Honestly, I would probably keep the settings here. The most noticeable issues with the quality come from grass and terrain details popping in. However, we have to bring the entire quality of the grass and terrain up to fix this, and it’s still not completely fixed. Even at the High quality preset, the grass and terrain will still change or pop in when running around. On top of that, there are still some spots where the framerate will throttle and drop to 40 FPS. This doesn’t usually last long, so it isn’t a big issue, but it happened enough times to be noticeable.
Ultimately, the default settings keep the battery drain low and the world looking great. I would prefer to fix the pop-ins, but the cost is too great and not worth the sacrifices with battery life and more constant drops. For what it is, I would consider it very playable and enjoyable like this.
When all is said and done, Bubsy 4D is a great return to form for the series. The tight 3D platforming in great level design is mixed with the humor to create something extremely fun in the moment. However, the length of the game is much shorter than I would have liked, and I didn’t find much motivation to replay, even after I finished. Still, it is without a doubt the best Bubsy game since Bubsy 3D.
And despite some minor grievances with pop-ins and drops, it’s an incredible experience on the Steam Deck.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Luna Abyss was provided by Kwalee for review. Thank you!
Narrative-focused single-player shooters are some of my favorites. I love the combination of action-packed shooting mixed with an engaging, interesting story. It's even better when the game takes place in a futuristic or sci-fi setting. That's what got me interested in Luna Abyss. The world looked beautiful and haunting, and the combat was filled with action. For the most part, the game holds up to what it was showcasing, especially when it comes to eye candy.
If there’s anything Luna Abyss excels in right off the bat, it’s the visuals. The game is beautiful, with incredible, varied settings doused in colorful lighting that almost perfectly illuminates the world around it. The atmosphere creates a haunting scene, highlighting the gloomy, abandoned mines, reactors, and towns. The use of red, blue, purple, and yellow lights feels like they hit the world just right, making each level look like it's framed in a photo. And while the outside areas don’t benefit as much from the lighting, the use of color in the actual landscape makes up for it.
It all adds to the intriguing world that Luna Abyss takes place in. It’s expertly crafted to highlight the abandoned, apocalyptic nature of the blood moon and its infinite abyss. The atmosphere captures the creepy vibes perfectly with the visuals, and is accompanied by some decent sound effects. It all comes together to create a gorgeously striking visual splendor that is just a treat to see.
Luna Abyss’s story ended up roping me in throughout my time with it. We start out as a prisoner named Fawkes, who is stuck on this moon doing work for the “All-Father” to reduce their sentence. We are managed by Aylin, a floating robot head that gives us orders based on what the All-Father wants. This means we will be descending into the infinite abyss, and in our first run down there, we ultimately awaken the eye and our chosen to fulfill a prophecy. This is what begins our descent into the crazy unknown, where we will have to fight corrupted monsters and complete the missions given to us.
Without spoiling too much, I will say the narrative grew on me, and even surprised me later on. I wasn’t surprised by too many revelations, but it was interesting learning about the All-Father and what truly happened here. What got me the most was the extent of the actions taken in the past that set the events of this game in motion. The voice acting is decent as well, which helps bring it together as we talk with the inhabitants and learn about their stories, while also getting caught up in a gigantic mess that we never made. I was genuinely hooked on the story to the end, and it will be worth sticking through.
As for the general gameplay, there are two parts to it: combat and platforming. I have a love-hate relationship with both of them, making me feel conflicted with the design of each mechanic and the scope of Luna Abyss itself.
The gunplay can be fast-paced and exciting. Just like a lot of bullet hell or boomer shooters, there’s going to be a lot of moving around, and it feels great to do that here. Jumping, dashing, and shooting enemies feels tight and energizing, and it can feel so satisfying to use finisher moves that replenish our health or deal damage to enemies all around them. And I’m really glad that the developers allowed us to autolock onto enemies with the left trigger. This puts a little less stress on actually shooting them and gives us time to focus on dodging the orbs coming at us.
There are some genuinely exhilarating moments, and when it all works, it’s great. With the soundtrack pumping, some of the combat encounters just hit all the right notes. And when that would happen, I genuinely loved it. Providing autolock and making all of the weapons not use any ammo, we need to pick up, keeps us focused on the action, which was a great decision on their part. The autolock is a little clunky, and I noticed the lock could go onto other enemies randomly sometimes, but it is great to have.
However, I was almost always brought back down to reality, which became more and more obvious further in the game. The weapons themselves feel great to use, but they are basic. There are only four weapons that we can use, and there aren’t any other ways to use them. No alternate firing modes or customization, what you see is what you get. This started to feel boring, since the combat encounters weren’t exciting enough to overlook it. And with each weapon only having one upgrade, which didn’t really feel impactful, apart from maybe shortening cooldown times, I just couldn’t enjoy myself fully.
On top of that, some enemies will require specific guns to actually kill them. They will either have blue or purple shields, which require the Shieldbreaker or Monarch’s Lance to dissipate. That brings up the other issue in combat: it’s not great to switch between weapons. There are two ways that we can do it, whether it’s using the Dpad or holding down LB. Using the Dpad is an instant switch, while holding down the LB button will bring up a weapon wheel and slow down time. Using the Dpad in the middle of a fight was uncomfortable when constant movement is needed, and I didn’t like time slowing down since it usually cut off my flow. If you are playing on a Steam Deck or using the Steam Controller, we can essentially fix this by mapping the Dpad to our four back buttons using Steam Input. This was my favorite way to switch between weapons, so I recommended if you’re playing on the Deck or with the Steam Controller. The game really emphasizes switching weapons constantly, and it just doesn’t feel great to do so with the default controls.
I would also say that the enemies were a little bit on the bullet-spongy side for my taste, but this could also be the fault of the Scout Rifle being a little underpowered. I just didn’t look forward to using it in the slightest, yet it was the main weapon I would switch to after I had gotten rid of the shields on enemies, since the other guns could only shoot 3 to 4 times before going on cooldown. It became a pain to use, especially in boss battles, since it would deal almost no damage.
There is some good to be found in the combat, but it definitely has some major flaws. Thankfully, the platforming is better. Movement in general feels great outside of combat. Jumping to platforms and dashing, while managing to create platforms and tethering ourselves to possess specific robots, was extremely enjoyable. The dashing can feel a little bit loose, but I rarely had any issues when platforming, jumping, and getting from A to B.
A lot of the high points here translated to combat, and moving around, jumping, and strategically putting up a shield to block projectiles felt great. The one big issue that I felt here was dashing. This could be because I have recently just played through another bullet hell game, Saros, but I missed being able to dash through projectiles. While the dash can cover some ground in Luna Abyss, it does not make us immune, so I would regularly still be hit with projectiles. I understand that this is a bullet hell game, but there were a few times where it became a little bit difficult to manage where all of the projectiles were coming from, so having a little bit of immunity during dashing would’ve been nice.
There isn’t much in the way of progression, but there are collectibles to find that pad out the story, crystals we can destroy, and health upgrades. These can all be found within levels, and there’s a nifty level selector that will tell us how many of each of these are in each stage. It will be up to us to actually go out and find them, and they are well hidden throughout the levels, so that is exciting.
Luna Abyss has its graphical settings, locked when you normally play, with only the ability to change resolution. At its default, the game looks great and runs quite well, though it will regularly dip down below 40 FPS in some big fights and open areas. Still, for an out-of-the-box experience, it’s quite impressive that they were able to optimize the game well enough to look this good and still run at a solid framerate.
However, I wanted to find a way to improve the experience, so I did. By using the launch option SteamDeck=0 %command%, we can check the game into thinking that this is not a Steam Deck, which will unlock all the graphical options we can change. The first thing I did was try to find the settings that are being used for the default Steam Deck preset, and it seems like they use medium settings for everything without any upscaling. For what it’s worth, I think the game looks fantastic this way, but there are a few modifications that I would make to enhance the experience a little further.
On the default preset, I noticed that the grass is shimmery, which we can fix by turning the Anti Aliasing quality to High. It isn’t too much of a performance hog, but it does help the world look less pixelated. I would consider this toggle to be a huge help, so I recommend doing this no matter what.
The bigger problem I faced was whether or not to use FSR upscaling. After testing all of the settings individually, I realized two things. First, going from medium to low had almost no change in performance with a worse-looking image, while medium to high had a better-looking image with significant performance drops. The middle ground was leaning towards the medium settings altogether, but FSR changes that. By turning it on High Quality mode, we can play at the high settings without dropping below 30 FPS nearly as much. It sounds like a great trade-off, but FSR upscaling makes the game look blurry. Even on the high-quality setting, the area is very clearly blurry.
So, I recommend playing the game with a few settings on High, but no FSR upscaling and a 30 FPS cap. Even at the lowest possible settings, there are still going to be fights and some areas that drop into the 30 FPS range. The only way out of it is using FSR upscaling, but I could not bring myself to use it because of how blurry it could make this beautiful game. It just wasn’t worth it.
Luna Abyss is a gorgeous and haunting shooter where the story hooked me in. I loved going through the levels and seeing the beautiful lighting and atmosphere, while the narrative hooked me in with some surprising revelations that I had not expected. The combat is a little on the basic side, which becomes more obvious later on, but the platforming is solid and quite enjoyable.
And it’s surprisingly great to play on the Steam Deck. I would consider it surprising since the visuals still look fantastic while holding a stable framerate, and I would say the team did a great job with optimization. I just wish they didn’t lock the quality settings on the Steam Deck by default.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Thick As Thieves was provided by Megabit Publishing for review. Thank you!
When Thick As Thieves was first announced, it was due to be a PvPvE extraction heist game, where multiple thieves were after an artifact, and you had to steal it for yourself while foiling the plans of others.
Shortly before release, however (as soon as April 2026), the plans changed, and Thick As Thieves became a 1-2 player co-op heist game, with the removal of all PvP, many previously promised features, such as a "living world", as well as areas and characters that are present on the Steam store page no longer being available.
Because of these last-minute changes, Thick As Thieves comes across as a very bare-bones game, more of a proof of concept, really. There are just 2 maps available, each with various contracts, which are essentially different sets of objectives that change certain things about the map, such as guard patrol patterns. Each time you play, the locations of certain key items will also be different, so there is a little variety going on, but not enough to really hold your attention for more than a couple of hours.
While the maps are quite nicely detailed and presented, and the variety is appreciated, you will become familiar with them fairly quickly, and that causes them to lose their ability to surprise you. Having the key item be located in the Library as opposed to the Bullpen is hardly a way to increase replayability; it just merely means you might turn left down the corridor instead of right, somewhere you probably had to go at some point anyway.
Progression, likewise, is limited. You'll earn points/pounds through completing contracts and objectives, which can then be spent on unlockables, which are mostly cosmetics, aside from the 2nd map, higher difficulties, and the game's 2nd character. There are a couple of pieces of equipment to unlock, as well as 2 available from the start. These are pretty nifty and helpful tools to have, such as a smoke bomb to distract and blind guards, which is almost essential.
A key part of Thick as Thieves is navigation. This was simultaneously the coolest and most frustrating part of the game for me. Cool because you have to get out and analyze an actual map while the game still plays out, as well as use clues you find around the map to find the location of your target. Frustrating because when you're on a time limit and trying to find a specific room while figuring out where you are and planning a route, it can be a little stressful, but maybe that's the point.
Once you've got your route planned, you then have to bypass the security. Guards, Magic Eyes, Turrets, and Pressure Plates. Guards are the trickiest, moving on set patrol patterns. You either have the option to avoid them entirely, distract them, or take them out from behind, which was my preferred tactic. I did encounter a couple of issues with guards. After being knocked out, they would sometimes remain constantly "alerted" and run around the map like headless chickens, which should not have happened, as it made the rest of the mission very difficult.
Magic Eyes are best avoided, or you can use a smoke bomb to temporarily blind them. Not much to say here, get caught, and you'll likely be trapped in the area you're in for a little while and take damage-over-time unless you can hide again, but they don't seem to alert the guards, and ultimately they feel a little useless.
Turrets and Pressure Plates I largely found to also be non-issues; one is just a timed avoidance as it rotates, and the other is so easily perceptible that you should never end up touching one. Again, I did encounter a bug here, sadly, where a turret was able to perceive me through a wall, as well as fire and kill me through said wall, quite the issue in a game based around stealth.
The stealth mechanics work reasonably well (aside from the above-mentioned issues). The game has a "light/dark" system that detects whether you are in shadow and makes you more or less visible from a distance accordingly. While the idea is neat, the game can never truly take advantage of it due to its limited scope. There aren't too many light/dark areas in the game, and you're probably just going to stay completely out of the line of sight of the guards anyway. It's most noticeable in outdoor areas, where, for example, if you're under a street lamp, you can be spotted from very far away.
Given the troubled development of the game, Thick As Thieves feels like you might imagine, a game with plenty of neat ideas, but poorly executed. I have no doubt that in the months before release, game mechanics were reworked to align with the new direction the game was taking. Some things feel like they don't belong in the game or were quickly thrown in, while there are big swathes of content seemingly absent. You also cannot pause the game, even in solo missions, no doubt a leftover from when the game was meant to be an online-only extraction title. You can play without an internet connection, however.
The saving grace here is that Thick As Thieves is launching at just $5, likely a far cry from the originally intended price, with the idea that the developers will expand the game in the future, most likely through paid DLC for additional maps. I do worry whether the game will garner enough of a player base for this to come to fruition, though.
I did need to install the VCRun 2022 Redistributable to get the game to run, as the developers don't seem to have included it with the installer. If your game doesn't run, go into Desktop Mode, boot/install ProtonTricks, select Thick As Thieves, then Default Wine Prefix, then Install a Windows DLL or Component, then scroll down and find VCRun2022 and install it. The game should now work.
Thick As Thieves works great on a controller, and thus controls well on the Steam Deck; it also supports the 1280x800 native resolution of the Deck.
The game defaults to Low settings, and I would keep them there. While you can hit 60 FPS in certain areas, the game tends to hold around high 40s and low 50s, so I'd recommend that you use SteamOS to cap the framerate to 40 FPS for a more stable experience. The game still looks decent on Low settings, and 40 FPS works well given that it isn't very fast-paced.
Your power draw will be around 18-20W, depending on the area, but it's relatively stable throughout. Expect a battery life of around 2.5 Hours on a Steam Deck OLED and around 1.5 Hours on a Steam Deck LCD.
Some UI is rather small and difficult to read on the Steam Deck's screen.
Thick As Thieves contains no accessibility options, but all dialogue is subtitled.
Thick As Thieves' troubled development has unfortunately resulted in a game full of half-baked ideas and limited replayability. While there are a couple of hours of enjoyment to be had, as well as a modest price tag, bugs and a lifeless world are a far cry from what was promised.
Once you've got the Visual C Redist installed, the game runs well on the Steam Deck and is perfectly playable at 40 FPS.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
Every once in a while, you come across a piece of media that resonates with you for years on end. The emotional impact, countless hours spent absorbing the music, characters, atmosphere; it all comes together to create something uniquely mesmerizing. The kind of experience that makes you silently realize you're deep into one of your favorite games of all time.
Clair Obscur is the very first game from indie studio Sandfall Interactive, and before release, almost nobody expected it to become such a massive hit and dominate award shows the way it has. This small team of 33 passionate French developers delivered something gigantic, and its impact will likely leave a mark on the overall gaming industry for years to come.
Set in a breathtaking dark fantasy world inspired by the Belle Époque golden age in France, Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 tells the story of a civilization slowly approaching extinction. Every year, a mysterious being known as the Paintress awakens and paints a number upon a massive monolith. Anyone matching that age instantly vanishes without a trace. With the number decreasing year after year, humanity sends an expedition into the unknown each time, hoping to find the Paintress and finally end the cycle. Expedition 33 follows the 67th expedition, a group of people marching toward an almost impossible mission, knowing that their own remaining time is running out. What follows is an emotional and deeply personal journey filled with loss, mystery, and the constant fear of inevitable death.
The story and writing are etched with a level of screenplay and dialogue quality that competes with film classics. Without diving into spoilers, the narrative constantly evolves through multiple emotional and philosophical layers. Much of the experience revolves around mystery, slowly connecting fragmented conversations, hidden meanings, and puzzling dialogue pieces together. That constant feeling of trying to understand the truth behind everything is what made the story so addictive.
Clair Obscur distinguishes itself from its peers through its characters. From major cast members to side characters you may only speak to once, nearly everyone feels carefully written and memorable. One of the smartest decisions in the script is that no character feels completely devious or maligned. The game masterfully captures the grey areas of humanity, constantly pushing the player to empathize with actions that may be wrong, desperate, or forced by circumstances.
Story and writing are personally the most important aspects of a video game for me. With most games, I usually find myself nitpicking certain flaws or decisions I didn’t fully like. But in Expedition 33’s case, I genuinely struggle to think of anything I would change. The writing quality throughout the experience is nothing short of masterful. It made me cry, laugh, reflect, and constantly kept me emotionally invested from beginning to end. It was a complete rollercoaster of emotions.
When it comes to gameplay, my favorite way of describing Expedition 33 is “the best of both worlds.” The combat system feels like a near-perfect blend of classic turn-based Final Fantasy combat and the reaction-based defensive mechanics of Souls-like games such as Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. While adding active reaction mechanics into turn-based games is not an entirely new concept, Expedition 33 is in a class of its own.
At first glance, combat starts like a traditional turn-based RPG. You build a party with different characters, unique strengths, playstyles, and skill combinations, carefully strategizing your way through encounters. However, once enemies begin attacking, the game transforms into something far more interactive. You can dodge, parry, or jump over attacks entirely through player reaction and timing.
Parrying, in particular, becomes one of the most satisfying mechanics in the game. It is extremely difficult to master, but also incredibly rewarding. Every successful parry grants AP, allowing you to build resources even while defending. Perfectly parrying entire enemy combos triggers devastating counterattacks that feel impactful every time. After hundreds of hours of gameplay, landing a full counter never stops being satisfying.
There are a total of six playable characters in the game, and each of them feels both unique and surprisingly deep mechanically. Each character introduces their own gameplay system and combat identity. For example, Lune functions as a mage who utilizes elemental “Stains” to create different effects and empower specific abilities, while Sciel fights using a card-based system that grants buffs, applies debuffs, and shifts her between different combat stances and modes.
The game also includes a character inspired by the classic “Blue Mage” archetype from Final Fantasy, allowing you to collect enemy abilities and use their own attacks against them. The amount of combat variety and combo potential across the cast is nuanced and contributes to the game's overall atmosphere.
On top of the turn-based combat, the game features a Free Aim system that feels like a small third-person shooter mechanic. You can manually target enemy weak points, interrupt attacks, or trigger special interactions during battle. What makes it even more impressive is how deeply this mechanic can be integrated into character builds. You can fully specialize certain characters around Free Aim and essentially turn them into machine gun-style damage weapons that seem to draw inspiration from first-person shooters. The sheer amount of build variety gives the combat system an unforeseen level of replayability and experimentation.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 uses a unique world structure that blends open exploration with more focused level design. While there is a large overworld where you can freely travel, fight optional bosses, discover loot, and unlock side activities, the main gameplay loop revolves around the game’s individual locations.
These locations function almost like large dungeon-style areas with semi-open layouts. They are filled with enemies, platforming sections, hidden paths, optional encounters, shortcuts, puzzles, and combat challenges, all of which constantly reward exploration. Each area is mechanically distinct, introducing new enemy combinations, traversal ideas, and gameplay scenarios rather than repeating the same structure over and over.
By avoiding the typical “open world checklist” design, the game becomes more enjoyable. Exploration feels focused and gameplay-driven rather than bloated, keeping a strong pace throughout the entire experience.
At first glance, character progression looks deceptively simple. You level up your characters, improve stats, unlock new skills, and equip stronger gear, much like you would in a traditional RPG. However, the game's real depth comes from its Picto and Lumina systems.
Pictos are special equipment pieces that not only provide stats but also unique passive abilities that can drastically change your playstyle. The clever part is that after winning four battles with a Picto equipped, its passive ability is permanently unlocked as a “Lumina.” Once unlocked, you can equip that passive separately without needing to keep the original Picto on your character, essentially letting you stack and combine countless different effects together.
Throughout the game, you constantly collect Lumina points that expand your Lumina capacity, allowing for increasingly powerful and creative builds. The feeling of gradually becoming stronger is satisfying, especially because the system constantly rewards experimentation.
There are well over a hundred different Pictos for Luminas in the game, creating an enormous amount of specialized build variety. Even after reaching the level cap for your characters, weapons, and equipment, you can continue farming Lumina points to further improve your builds. This progression system adds a huge amount of replayability, especially for New Game Plus runs where you can experiment with entirely different playstyles and absurdly powerful combinations.
At first glance, the graphical quality in Expedition 33 may seem like a fairly standard Unreal Engine 5 presentation with solid but familiar texture work. What elevates the visuals is the incredible attention to atmosphere, particle effects, lighting, and artistic direction. Nearly every area in the game feels as if it were pulled from a painting, constantly presenting the player with unique visual themes and memorable scenery.
The game makes extremely smart use of cinematic techniques such as depth of field, lighting contrast, fog, and environmental effects to enhance the overall presentation. Rather than forcing realism through an enormous budget, Expedition 33 uses its artistic strengths intelligently, often masking technical limitations in ways that feel almost magical. The result is a game that looks breathtaking despite being developed by a relatively small team.
The cinematic presentation quality is so good that some scenes feel closer to watching a professionally edited, scripted movie than to playing a video game developed by a small team in France. And thanks to the talented motion capture performers and the game’s strong directorial vision, the cinematics become far more emotionally immersive than most RPGs. The facial animations, body language, camera work, and performances all come together brilliantly, making the visual presentation during story moments pull you deeper into the experience and make even simple conversations feel impactful.
The only noticeable technical issue I found was with the character models. Both important story characters and random NPCs can sometimes look a little too similar facially, making it fairly obvious that many of them share very similar base models underneath their designs.
While this is ultimately a minor complaint, it can occasionally diminish immersion and create unintended confusion during certain scenes. At times, I found myself wondering whether a character was intentionally connected to another, related somehow, or part of a future reveal, simply because some faces looked so similar. It’s one of the few areas where the game’s smaller budget becomes slightly more noticeable.
Also, the aggressive use of depth of field causes some blurriness issues. On hair, it causes an effect that looks a little bit underwhelming. But other than that, the game looks absolutely gorgeous.
Music... music... music... I seriously don’t even know what to say here. I feel unqualified trying to review Lorien Testard’s work because the soundtrack is simply awe-inducing. With 154 different tracks, this is easily one of the most robust soundtracks I’ve ever heard in a video game.
The differentiation is insane. Some tracks are emotional and melancholic, some are peaceful and atmospheric, while others suddenly turn into intense boss themes that make fights feel ten times more impactful.
What makes it even more special is how memorable everything is. Hours after playing, I still had multiple tracks randomly stuck in my head. The music carries so many emotional scenes and elevates the entire experience constantly. There were moments where I just stopped moving for a minute and listened to the sounds coming through my speakers.
Sound design and voice acting, as presented, are top-tier. The impact and feedback during combat feel incredible, especially when it comes to parries and powerful skills. Every hit, counter, explosion, and attack has this heavy, satisfying feeling to it that makes combat even more addictive.
Voice acting is fantastic across the entire cast as well, with emotional scenes feeling natural and believable instead of overly dramatic or forced. Honestly, the entire sound package, from music to effects to performances, is a work of art.
I want to start with a small disclaimer here. If you simply download the game and play it using the default “Verified” settings, you are honestly going to have a pretty terrible experience. Out of the box, the game uses heavily restricted settings that look extremely blurry, suffer from unstable performance, and introduce noticeable input delay due to the uncapped fluctuating frame rate.
By default, the game does not properly allow you to lock the frame rate, meaning performance constantly jumps around between 30 and 50 FPS, depending on the area. In most games, this would already be annoying, but in a reaction and parry-heavy game like Expedition 33, inconsistent frame pacing actively hurts gameplay.
Thankfully, there is an easy workaround. By adding:
SteamDeck=0 %command%
into the Steam launch options, you can bypass the game’s restricted Steam Deck preset and gain full access to the graphics settings menu, including proper frame rate limiting options. This alone massively improves the experience and immediately makes combat feel far more responsive.
The second thing I highly recommend doing is injecting an FSR 4 file. Thankfully, this process is extremely simple and dramatically improves image quality without heavily impacting performance. There are multiple ways of doing it, but the easiest method is downloading the amd_fidelityfx_upscaler_dx12.dll file directly from AMD’s official files and replace the existing one through Desktop Mode.
Once both of these tweaks are applied, the visual difference is shocking. The game transforms from a blurry, unstable mess into one of the sharpest and most visually impressive games available on Steam Deck. Here’s a comparison between the default FSR 3.1 implementation and FSR 4 running on the Performance preset.
Once properly configured, the game manages to hold a surprisingly stable and responsive 30 FPS lock on Steam Deck for the vast majority of the experience. Around 99% of gameplay feels smooth and consistent, which is extremely important for a reaction-heavy combat system like this one.
There are a few exceptions. Some larger open-world sections and certain chaotic 3v3 encounters can occasionally dip into the 24-27 FPS range, but these drops are relatively minor and rarely occur during actual gameplay. Overall, the experience still feels very comfortable and responsive on the Deck.
There is little visual sacrifice made while using lower settings. Even on desktop hardware, the difference between the lowest and highest presets is surprisingly subtle in many areas. Thanks to the game’s creative use of art direction and lighting, Expedition 33 still looks absolutely gorgeous on Steam Deck despite running on the lowest available settings.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is one of the rare games that reminds me why I fell in love with video games in the first place. Between its masterfully written story, unforgettable characters, addictive combat system, incredible soundtrack, and beautiful artistic vision, this is an experience that will stay with you long after the credits roll.
On Steam Deck, the experience is also far better than the default settings initially suggest. While the out-of-the-box “Verified” profile is disappointing, a few simple tweaks transform the game into a surprisingly stable and visually stunning handheld experience.
It feels surreal that this is the very first game from Sandfall Interactive. If this is what the studio is capable of on their debut title, I cannot wait to see what they create next. Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is not just one of the best RPGs I’ve played in years. It is probably the best game I've ever played, period.
Our review is based on the PC version of this game.
If you enjoyed this review, be sure to check out the rest of the content on SteamDeckHQ! We have a wide variety of game reviews and news that are sure to help your gaming experience. Whether you're looking for news, tips and tutorials, game settings and reviews, or just want to stay up-to-date on the latest trends, we've got your back.
