We’re back again with our monthly check-in where us Gaming Respawners share what games we are currently playing. As of now, not much of anything current has our attention, with most of us going back to older titles or remakes of older titles. Seems to be a trend here lately, with many of us looking back as opposed to looking forward. Part of it is certainly due to a lack of big releases during the summer, but perhaps there are other reasons why we are mostly looking back at older titles, and perhaps one of us will share in great (and I do mean GREAT) detail why we are focusing on the old rather than the new. Join us in Gaming Respawn Plays (July 2025) and enjoy the read!
Kyle Moffat
Resident Evil 4 Remake 
Over the past month, I have had the absolute pleasure to play the 2023 remake of Resident Evil 4. Now, some years ago, I watched a playthrough of the original game; some further years back, I watched my brother play it (I was way too young to see RE4 unfold before my eyes). To experience one of gaming’s most beloved titles of all time comes with exceptionally high expectations. It did not disappoint.
This is a masterpiece in survival horror! The RE4 remake has countless moments that put me on edge as I frantically switched between weapons in fight mode or sprinted away in flight mode. It’s constantly tense for a first playthrough, which undoubtedly kept me engaged throughout the adventure. I was constantly having to contemplate my decisions about ammo and health usage, alongside the purchasing of specific weapons, attachments or other items. Everything is somewhat scarce in the RE4 remake, making this a superb survival horror experience I wish I could wipe from my memory to start once again.
I’ve yet to even talk about the visuals: This game is breathtaking! For a village and castle truly encompassing Resident Evil, I couldn’t get enough as I took my time to simply explore the surroundings and notice the small details. This is how to remake a classic game!
Will Worrall
Call of Duty: Black Ops III– Zombies Chronicles Edition and Ruffy and the Riverside 
This month, I’ve been playing a variety of different titles, but two in-particular stand out. Firstly, I’ve been playing the hell out of Ruffy and the Riverside, a game that manages to be both a decent homage to classic platformers while still feeling like a decent game of the era in its own right. That said, I’ll hold off talking about it too much as I’ll soon be releasing a review for you folks to read.
Instead, let’s talk about the other game(s) I’ve been playing: older CoD titles. Lately, I had a hankering for some CoD zombies, but I found myself a bit bored by Kino Der Toten since I feel like I mastered that particular map back in 2011/2012. Luckily, a friend of mine bought Call of Duty: Black Ops III – Zombies Chronicles Edition recently, so I’ve had a chance to play one of the BLOPS titles that I never got around to, including zombies and the main campaign.
I’ve enjoyed the hell out of the zombie mode. With the main map of the mode being a lot more complex and interesting than most of the base maps from previous versions, there’s a ton to do and a huge learning curve for people who are playing solo, like myself. The main campaign, though, has been…interesting.
If you don’t know, BLOPS 3 features one of the more brutal campaigns in the series’ history. Coming fresh off a replay of BLOPS and BLOPS 2, I was shocked to find that the opening mission of BLOPS 3 features a scene where your character (err, spoilers, I guess?) has their arms and legs all ripped off by a combat robot in first-person, in excruciating detail. Not only that, but a little later on, we watch two innocent people having their heads blown off by an enemy faction with some sort of futuristic Mad Max device.
It’s all a bit much, frankly. It smacks very much of a game series that felt like it had to keep ramping things up but didn’t know what to do after Modern Warfare literally nuked that one guy. Each game since has tried to ramp things further and further into the stratosphere, and BLOPS 3 decided to do that with gore and viscera. There are actually some really interesting questions in this storyline about the horrors of what has happened to these characters and whether they really asked for or deserved it, but honestly, it’s mostly blown away in an overpowering current of American jingoism.
Of course, all the complaints sort of fall to the dust when you recognise that, despite having an intensely brutal storyline, the gameplay is still top-notch. It’s still fun to run around with your robot powers blasting enemies, but I also feel like the niggling thought at the back of my head about how insane this all seems won’t go away.
Peter Keen
Driver: San Francisco and Bayonetta 3 
Modern gaming SUCKS! There, I said it. Not what you really want to hear from a gaming journalist, but, well, it does. This month, I wanted to give my PS5 a bit of a break as I hammer it most every day. Instead, I have been playing Driver: San Francisco on my Xbox 360 and Bayonetta 3 on my Nintendo Switch 2.
I’ll start with Bayonetta 3. The reason I’m playing that is because hack and slash games are my favourite genre, and Bayonetta 3 has been on my to-do list for ages! Also, there are many games that are running so much better on the Switch 2 over the Switch 1 versions, of which Bayonetta 3 is reported to be one of them.
Does it run better? My goodness, yes! Is it good? Mmm, it’s okay. It’s not winning me over like the previous two games did. The controls for the gazillion moves, weapons, and special features are frankly ruining the experience as there are far too many to remember. To add to this, the first few levels are, artistically speaking, quite dull. Destroyed tower blocks aren’t that interesting to look at, really, are they? I am enjoying the game enough to keep playing every other day, but I’m hoping the settings get a little more interesting as the game goes on. I play Bayonetta 3 every other day as the other game I’m playing on the off days is Driver: San Francisco.
Oh boy. Grab a coffee and buckle up. This is going to sting!
I’ve played Driver: San Francisco before and nearly completed every challenge the game could throw at me. I had fond memories of it, especially the movie-inspired scenes you can drive through. I recently bought Forza Horizon 5 and was enjoying it but kinda’ not. It’s just, well, too much. You look at the map, which is completely chock-full of icons of things to do. It’s overwhelming, overly complicated, and don’t even get me started on the awful UI menu system of trying to find things. It wasn’t like this before. Back in the day, things were much simpler. So, I began to wonder: Were games like Driver: San Francisco REALLY that good, or is my romantic memory making it seem better than it actually was?
So, I decided to put my money where my head was and dug the game out to find out. Before EVEN PUTTING THE GAME IN THE CONSOLE, I got a huge surprise when I opened the box. There was an instruction manual AND a huge Driver SF poster, which had a map of everything on the back. It’s beautiful. I also found the receipt I had when I bought the game. £15 from Asda! You don’t get any of that anymore in the box, do you?
Firing up the game, the awesome theme music soundtrack kicked in, and a HUGE smile spread across my face. This felt GOOD! Now, I’m playing on two generations of consoles ago, but this game still ran at a smooth 60fps on an Xbox 360. Admittedly, the sharpness of the lines and the game’s detail are not there, but most importantly, it’s not that bad either.
After my first session, I sat there in shock. This was a pretty average game at the time, but it has so much fun in it that is missing from today’s gaming world. The way the game is focused, knows what it is, and doesn’t try to bamboozle the player with too much means it’s confident in delivering a wonderful gaming experience. It’s not trying to please everyone with over-stuffed content. Yes, there are lots of things to do, but it’s not in your face. It’s easy to navigate, and there is a minimal skill tree. It’s barebones, unadulterated driving fun. Smash cars. Race cars. Police chase. Evade the police. Crime story. It’s all here and at your own pace.
Then there is the soundtrack. I voted this game as having the best in-game soundtrack of all time. Admittedly, music is a personal thing, but for me, the tunes here not only ring my bell, they just “FIT” the game’s moments and content. It’s like they really thought about which tracks to play and at what time to play them.
No word of a lie, I am enjoying playing this game and this world so much, I literally just jump in one of the old American muscle cars (Ford Gran Torino is my favourite) and cruise the digital streets of San Francisco and just….be! I even sometimes play a game of driving as if it’s the real world. Stop at red lights, stick to the limit, etc. It’s just so nice to be in the game cruising around.
This game is just so damn cool and makes modern games look utterly pathetic.
I could end this rant here, but then there is even more.
So, while I’m enjoying Driver SF, I dipped into YouTube to check out a few driver-related things I wanted to see. It wasn’t long before I noticed that there is new Driver SF content uploaded even in 2025! In fact, a random YouTuber who now plays the game on PC, and pretty much solely posts just Driver SF content, posted a video 2 months ago that has already got 61,000 views! This game was from 2011! I then spotted that while other games are having their multiplayer servers shut down, Driver SF multiplayer servers were opened back up!
I haven’t got an Xbox Live subscription, but there are videos of people playing Driver SF multiplayer right now in 2025. I think a lot of these are on PC versions of the game, but I did find one of an Xbox 360 gamer playing it too!
What does all this tell you?
One, I’m not going mad. Modern gaming sucks as there is a revolution starting to happen of people “downgrading” back to this era of gaming. I’ve now seen many videos of people saying they have done just that: They’ve sold their modern consoles to go back to when gaming was, in my opinion and theirs, simple, great, and fun!
And second?
Driver: San Francisco was, and STILL is, a bloody awesome game! Just play it!
(This video is from one of the Movie Challenges in the game. I grew up watching the cop show Starsky & Hutch on TV. The music, the car sounds, the police siren, plus the action, is just how it was in the TV show. They absolutely nailed this level, as they did many others in the game.)
*(video courtesy of Gaming0verdose)
Tasha Quinn
Peak 
This month I’ve been playing a whole lot of Peak. If you’re not familiar with it, Peak is a climbing game where, after crash-landing on a strange island, players are tasked with reaching the peak of its mountain to be rescued. I bought the game because it was pretty cheap on Steam, and a couple of my friends had it, and I’ll admit I didn’t expect it to hook me as much as it did. What I love about Peak is how simple but satisfying the gameplay and overall concept are. You climb through five distinct biomes: the Shore, the Alpine, the Tropics, the Caldera, and the Kiln, each of which have their own challenges. Mostly you’ll be climbing with your bare hands, but you can find different tools to help you along the way. You can play the game solo, and I have several times, but it’s much more enjoyable with friends as they can give you a boost, pull you up, revive you, and shoulder the weight of more gear.
You feel the pressure when they’re down though. During my last run, two of my friends fell to their untimely demise, so it was up to me to make it to the next campfire to revive them. Luckily, with their ghosts to guide me – because that’s how they hang around – I was able to make it, but it was a lot of pressure. You get a new map every day too, so it’s inherently re-playable, which is another big reason why I’ve been enjoying it so much. Honestly, for the price, I wasn’t expecting much from Peak, but I’ve been playing it most nights for the past few weeks, and I don’t see myself stopping any time soon.
