SpongeBob SquarePants: Giant Tides is a powerful 3D platformer with sponge-tastic gameplay flow and perfect childish humor – only some annoying race tracks slowed down my fun.

With an emotional story, a strong message and sublime gameplay, Constance is one of the best Metroidvanias out there. Only small details diminish the overall experience.

Kirby Air Riders is clearly the product of a development team driven by passion. This is especially evident in the effort they put into elevating it to so much more than just a simple fun racer. Nevertheless, not every spark ignites.

Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 satisfies multiplayer and zombie fans, but the co-op campaign is a complete disappointment.

Mouse-drawn! Winter Burrow is a well-balanced mix of survival and cozy game and will be your perfect companion for the winter season. The game has only minor flaws and will captivate genre fans, at least for the duration of the story.

Leaves a bit to be desired when it comes to mechanics, but scores in terms of atmosphere, art style and characters. And a good time loop never fails.

New ideas, mechanics and a fresh setting combined with the known and loved formula of Anno provide an accomplished tightrope walk.

A fun return to Hyrule that doesn’t come without small obstacles, but nevertheless serves a diversified and detailed adventure for Zelda-fans.

Hardcore survival horror with an interesting story and great art style, but also a high frustration factor.

Jurassic World Evolution 3 exudes dinosaur love like no other game – making its predecessors completely obsolete.

The Outer Worlds 2 impresses with well-written dialogue, countless role-playing options, and surprisingly strong shooter gameplay. However, the title runs a bit flat in terms of quest design toward the end.

Ninja Gaiden 4 offers superbly choreographed action and is more beginner-friendly than any other game before it. The brilliant game design more than makes up for the weak story.

A creative, wacky solo adventure in which the highlight is the incredibly bizarre game world. However, Keeper remains rather thin in terms of gameplay right up to the end.

Those who are unfamiliar with the first Bloodlines will have a distinct advantage with Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines 2. A compelling storyline, an atmosphere as thick as blood, and brutal action make for an impressive package – although the role-playing aspect has been noticeably reduced.

A great experience that invites you to pause and presents a concept so strong that it leaves you with an insatiable hunger for more.

With a well-rounded gameplay flow, seamless catching and fighting as well as a smooth performance, Pokémon-Legends: Z-A is the best game delivered by Game Freak in the last ten years.

Battlefield 6 is a top-tier destruction sandbox and multiplayer shooter that brings the brand back to the Champions League.

Little Nightmares 3 does what you'd expect from a game in this series. It's dark, scary, delightfully repulsive, and bizarre. The fact that the co-op mode is only available online is a bit of a bummer. The playtime could also be longer.

Not quite as well rounded as its predecessor, Ghost of Yōtei offers more variation, but falls short in terms of story and depth of side characters. Nevertheless a great open world-adventure with a fantastic presentation.

Even better than its already brilliant predecessor, Hades 2 offers more content, a crisp combat system, lovable and exciting characters, and so many details that even after dozens of hours, you won't feel a bit bored. A masterful sequel that could hardly be any better.

Cute visuals, lame puzzles, and fiddly building elements: The nice concept of LEGO Voyagers suffers from lack of ambition and moments of frustration.

The focus on action takes away from the spookiness, but Silent Hill f is nonetheless a really brave survival horror game that fans of the genre shouldn’t miss.

Focus instead of expanding: Unlike many other studios, developer Techland takes a different approach and presents Dying Light: The Beast, a game that knows what it's good at. There's no time for boredom or slow spells in this compact game...But apparently, there's no time for any special innovations either. A sequel, not a dimensional leap. On the other hand, it's just way too much fun to explore the world like a monkey climbing a tree and mauling zombies. It should get boring, but there are too many buttons being pressed for that.

Hollow Knight: Silksong is close to perfection, with only a few nuances that could dampen motivation. A worthy successor to what is (to date) probably the best Metroidvania game ever made.

Borderlands 4 motivates with tons of loot and tight gunplay – it is and remains one of the best loot shooters ever. Now that the story and endgame has returned to most of its old strengths, you can easily spend dozens of hours here before boredom sets in. Only the open world wasn't really necessary.

Feeling truly powerless and helpless again? The latest Bloober Team game can help. In this space-age survival horror, people seem to die every second. You have to like it – but it's a lot of fun.

Not without its minor flaws, but certainly one of the biggest surprises of the year: If you like to explore freely and don't want everything spoon-fed to you, you shouldn't miss Hell Is Us.

The Nintendo Switch 2 upgrade for Kirby and the Forgotten Land offers more of the same and will definitely appeal to fans of the original.