God of War Ragnarok is a lavish production with pristine visuals, jaw-dropping scale, crunchy combat that is as satisfying as it is brutal, and a world that begs to have its every corner and crevice explored. It's a spectacular blockbuster, but these are the least of its achievements.

In a game where a hulking god rips all manner of creatures limb from limb, the most shocking moments aren't bathed in blood, but carried by poignant words and heartfelt emotions. They are a former God of War--known for mercilessly killing his kin--finding the words to empathize with loss; a despondent child emploring a father to break a self-destructive cycle; a moment of tenderness in the life of a boy that has the weight of the world on his shoulders.

God of War Ragnarok's most impressive achievements are its exploration of loss and love; grief and growth; determinism and defiance. It's an astoundingly well-written game that deconstructs the mythology of Norse gods and rebuilds it as an odyssey about families. Its story isn't about the end of the world, but those that have a hand in it. They're revered as mythical gods but are characterized by deep flaws, twisted by skewed perspectives, and corrupted by questionable motivations in the same way the people they preside over are. And yet, some also have redemptive qualities. In that respect, Ragnarok's story is told from a grey area where nuances blur the line between heroes and villains; good and evil. By constantly challenging you to reconsider who they are and the factors that drive their actions, these characters remain compelling throughout.

Infinity Ward's rebooted Modern Warfare 2 brings back a more classic Call of Duty multiplayer experience than we've seen in recent years, with maps better tailored to traditional 6v6 play and dialed-back movement mechanics. Modern Warfare 2's gameplay really feels like a refreshing return to old times again for Call of Duty, but unfortunately, the package as a whole feels lacking and gun customization is overly complex.

As a whole, Modern Warfare 2's multiplayer is the fast-paced shooter you expect it to be. The standard maps are scaled down for 6v6 matches this year, so there are less quiet and campy moments, and you're almost always finding yourself in the thick of the action. Modern Warfare 2 does dial back the overly fast-paced movement of recent years too, but that doesn't mean you can't choose a run-and-gun playstyle. The gameplay is just a bit less twitchy too, as the movement feels more on par with the original Modern Warfare series than the 2019 version.

Sliding doesn't quite feel as fast and fluid as Modern Warfare 2019 and the bunny-hopping movement has been nerfed a little since the beta. You can still hop around a corner, but there's not a build-up of an overly-aggressive speed that lets you start hopping all over the map. This makes the multiplayer movement feel more grounded and slower-paced than the last few entries of the franchise, which is a great change. The last few years of Call of Duty has left the majority of the casual player base at a disadvantage in trying to counter the hopping and sliding frenzy.

The advent of digital collectible card games has led to an explosion of different approaches to the genre. Mostly, though, new games have adapted the fundamentals of physical CCGs. With Marvel Snap, Hearthstone veteran studio Second Dinner has reduced the collectible card game to its most essential pieces and reimagined them, creating a combination of systems that are elegantly simple without ever feeling simplistic.

Like many other modern card games, Marvel Snap automates its equivalent of mana or energy, adding one unit per turn. But then it streamlines the genre even further: Each game lasts only six turns, and there is no direct combat between characters or choosing whether to deal damage to enemy scrubs or "go face" for direct player damage. Instead, your goal is to accumulate the most power across three locations. At the end of six turns, whoever controls two of the three locations wins the match, and ties are determined by total power across all three.

Those three locations are randomly selected from a massive pool, each introducing their own intricacies and elements, and the areas range from the straightforward to the silly. The symbiote planet Klyntar will depower every card played on it, while NYC's Central Park adds a 1-power squirrel to each other location. The locations are revealed from left to right over the first three turns. The random nature means you can be halfway through a match when a surprise third location completely shakes up your strategy, and sometimes you'll need to gamble by blindly playing a hero into an unrevealed location.