February 2025 in Games

February was a month of returns. How apt to return to it now, more than a month late, to cover the biggest videogame releases of the month.

The scene-stealer of February 2025 was Kingdom Come: Deliverance II. Warhorse Studios' 2018 original was a bit of a cult classic. Eschewing the trend of 'player-success positive' games intent to propel you forwards, Kingdom Come: Deliverance was a detailed and merciless medieval simulation. Combat was notoriously difficult and conversation with non-playable characters could be just as ruthless, making every inch of progress hard-won. It was stubbornly niche but it did sell pretty well (around 8 million units), enough that excitement has been steadily brewing around this sequel.

KC:DII picks up the story almost exactly where the first game ended. Once again, you play as Henry, who has worked his way up to become a man-at-arms under Sir Hans Capon. Whilst Hans is an entitled, antagonistic oaf, Henry walks an often hilarious line between charming and gormless, a perfect balance for a variety of colourful outcomes in conversations. After a brief prologue, Henry finds himself abandoned and penniless in a village in the Bohemian countryside.

To call these games realistic is somewhat misrepresentative. They are highly detailed recreations of fifteenth century, Eastern European countryside, which means a lot of fields and forests. These environments lack variety and excitement, but they still inspire wonder - perhaps because of how rare this landscape feels in video games. The gorgeous presentation undeniably helps, but the design is working a more subtle magic. Spend hours jogging around similar dirt tracks and the acquisition of a horse feels truly game-changing. Spend even more hours galloping around similar countryside and the eventual arrival at a big city can feel like entering a whole new game. Your interactions with this world are, like the environments, highly detailed and specific. Combat is once again difficult and must be taken seriously. In fact, KC:DII demands you take all its systems seriously. Steal something and you risk getting caught, which can happen if someone recognises a stolen object in your possession. Fall foul of the law enough times and you can be quite literally branded a criminal, which will affect how other characters treat you for the rest of the game. Henry needs sleep, which is one of the only ways to regain health or save - apart from potions, made in a tedious brewing process. Not that you'll be able to afford any recipes for a while!

The initial hours of KC:DII can feel arduous, even punishing. It's hard to scrape together enough money, it's hard to win fights, it's hard to convince characters of anything… and it's very easy to get confused. There are plenty of very reasonable criticisms of the systems here, from menus that make it difficult to view information to status symbols that are only explained in a buried menu. Sleeping in someone else's bed is sometimes a punishable offence, but it can be tricky to realise you're about to make that mistake. The list of minor - but no less irritating - irritations goes on. However, the major challenge of those opening hours is actually a deliberate choice. This is a game that takes it's time, stands by its vision, and builds up to moments of satisfaction that are genuinely rare in video games. Just like when you finally get a horse or arrive at the city, reaching new levels of mastery within these systems can be awesomely gratifying. Meanwhile, KC:DII is feeding you heaps of character and story, all of which also pays off handsomely if you stick with it.

It is hard to say with absolutely certainty what has made this so much more successful than its predecessor, but a grander scale and a proud lean into comedy surely make a big difference. Most of all, however, this is an unusual game - a special creation - and one that deserves all its accolades for that reason alone.

Monster Hunter also returned this February, after a long wait. While we have seen Rise and Stories 2 in the intervening years,, Monster Hunter Wilds is the first mainline entry since World in 2018. Previously a niche concern outside of Japan, Capcom's series has grown in popularity in the West over the years. In step with this, the games have become more accessible. It is therefore no surprise that Wilds is the easiest yet for a new player to jump in - in fact, it's been criticised for being too easy! This is something of an inevitable struggle for a series with both a strong contingent of long-term fans who enjoy a challenge, as well as a bunch of new players who aren't as sold on the crunchier heritage.

For those who fall into neither camp, Monster Hunter is a pretty self-explanatory title. In a fantasy setting, your customisable character sets out on expeditions to take down huge beasts in a vibrant open world across a variety of biomes. Successful hunts net you monster materials, which enable the crafting of armour and weapons that, in turn, improve your ability to hunt nastier monsters. It's always been a relatively stripped-back loop and often a grind. Wilds balances out this gameplay with the most involved story yet, and softens the grind. This new evolution doesn't hinder the strength of that core gameplay, but nor does it innovate. The EDGE review summarised Wilds as impressive, but not surprising. It is a beautiful game, especially in motion, and this really speaks to not only the design of the monsters but also their animation, how they crash about the environments, and how they react dynamically to being attacked.

All this could be said, admittedly to a lesser degree, about its predecessor. I took this opportunity to finally fire up Monster Hunter World, a game I had owned for years but never made the time for. Indeed, I would describe it pretty much how I've described Wilds. The monsters are clearly the most attractive element, the way they occupy the world, moving and behaving like real wildlife. The combat system is clearly deep and varied (although I was surprised how hack & slash it feels starting off) . I would love to dive into Wilds, mostly to be wowed by all of this turned up to 11, but without lots of time on my hands - and friends to play online with - I will let this tremendous beast pass me by, admiring it as does.

February saw an unexpected return for RGG Studio's Like a Dragon series - not because it's only been a year since Infinite Wealth (this studio is always incredibly prolific) but because in this one, you're a pirate. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawai'i stars Goro Majima, previously a playable character in Yakuza 0 but most commonly featured as a scene-stealing, non-playable, wacky psychopath. He is thus the perfect fit for the series' wackiest outing yet. The Like A Dragon games are open-world adventures that are consistently beloved and have two broadly consistent ingredients: earnest crime-thriller plots and strange, often hilarious side quests. Pirate Yakuza is no exception. One side quest results in an hour-long live-action comedy TV show, whilst the main story hides a late-game tear-jerker. The big new addition here is naval battles. These play similarly to 2013's Assassins Creed IV: Black Flag, but simplified. Here, your ship can boost and drift. Like the older game, there is a boarding mechanic but it has little in the way of dynamic variation.

The combat here is not the turn-based style of the most recent Like a Dragon games - we're back in the previous brawler style, plus a new 'Pirate' fighting stance involving cutlasses. By all accounts the action is as brilliant as ever. The setting is Honolulu, as it was for the previous mainline entry, Infinite Wealth, which might feel too soon for some or a welcome return for others. However players feel, Sega are surely chuffed that RGG are once again able to cleverly asset-flip to save development time. Much of the same minigames return, but there's less content here. That might make it feel like a good jumping-on point for Like A Dragon virgins, but this being more of a side-story might make you feel more inclined to roll up your sleeves and get stuck into the enormous Infinite Wealth.

More than any of these games, the one I keep returning to even now is Avowed. This marks the return of Obsidian to the fantasy RPG. The studio haven't exactly been quiet over the last few years, but they've strayed into slightly different territory with The Outer Worlds, Grounded and, most recently, Pentiment. Avowed takes the First-Person trappings of Sci-fi RPG The Outer Worlds but brings them home to the fantasy setting of Obsidian's own Pillars of Eternity series. The world of Eora is steeped in lore, with a whole pantheon of gods who are worshipped, revered and reviled. The universe here is vibrant, complex, richly storied and full of proper nouns. It will be a real matter of taste whether you take the time to read the many, many text logs scattered around the open world. They range from literary excerpts that add colour, to more straightforward lore-explainers like 'The History of the Living Lands: Chapter 1'.

Whilst Avowed might seem similar to KC:DII, both being First Person RPGs with plenty of dialogue and story, these comparisons are quite superficial - they play very differently, and the differences really define each game. Where Kingdom Come is slow, deliberate and crunchy, Avowed is a fast-paced and combat-focused thrill ride, in which the story might feel comparatively throwaway. Obsidian serves up plentiful quests from the very beginning and allows you to parkour across rooftops, fire off magic spells and go to town with a variety of weapons to complete them. Kingdom Come knows what it wants to be, and doesn't compromise. Avowed is happy to provide almost anything you might ask for, cheerfully, a little cheaply, and bound onwards into high-fantasy nonsense, leaving behind a trail of glowing mushrooms. And while I do hope that description favours the artistry of Warhorse's game, it is actually Obsidian's to which I have been compelled to return. Kingdom Come is a special meal with a rich flavour that demands attention. But Avowed is a pizza that is just too damn easy to scoff.