The only aspect of The Darkness 2 which doesn't carry a balancing good/bad caveat are the graphics, which are irrefutably extraordinary.

Functional, but unexciting, Shadows' will fill the rainy Sunday mornings of ardent Suda 51 fans, but doesn't have any specific grounds upon which to recommend it. This game really is just painfully average in every way, and you shouldn't let Garcia's accent and tattoos deceive you into thinking otherwise.

To release this game in such a poor state is almost offensive. What's there is great when it works, but the bugs should have been fixed by now. To follow the rules of a review, we can only score the game on its current state, which means it falls way down the all-time rankings. The caveat, though, is that if you give Red Orchestra 2 a little more time and you're willing to overlook the faults, it's likely capable of breaking into the top five games of the year so far.

Payday: The Heist has a brilliant concept at its heart, and that's further rounded out by some great art direction and some solid level design that makes a few of the missions real fun to play. Unfortunately, though, budget production values are evident in the graphics and limited selection of levels, and these factors inevitably come into conflict with a higher-than-expected price point.

Dear Esther definitely isn't a product which everyone will appreciate - the walking-talking pace tends to polarise audiences quickly - but those who are tempted to try it out would be much advised to do so. You won't be disappointed.

Here is a game that uses metaphor and wit to weave a story in which a demented young girl does battle with robotic march hares. It may still gyre and gimble along the wabe, which stops it from being truly frabjous, but it's still brillig in its own right.

All the staples of the series are back, including the drop-in drop-out co-operative play, and it's these which define the title more than the new features.

If it weren't for the endlessly brown, generically sci-fi and personality-deprived caves of Mars, Armageddon could be hugely enjoyable.

When you consider the accomplished start of the game, it feels like a shame that Relic hasn't been able to carry this quality throughout.

Gunplay that is this fluid – Run! Slide under obstacles! Jump! Slow-mo! Shoot those grenades! Kick that guy! – takes a long time to get old. Those hoping for a sophisticated and thrilling horror will be severely disappointed, but those who'll be happy with just a quite good shooter will be pleasantly surprised indeed.

It's the supreme joke, in a way: Syndicate is a game about huge corporations and has been published by one of the biggest in the business...and it fails because nearly every element of it feels designed by committee. The shooting is competent, the co-op fierce, but in a saturated market where consumers are spoiled for choice those two plus points aren't enough to recommend the entire game on.

Rock of Ages has faults - it's samey and repetitive in long-play sessions, for example, and if the trailers don't tickle you then there's little chance the full game will impress. However, considering the low price and artistic spark that lies at the heart of the game, Rock of Ages becomes a difficult game to turn down, even if the mechanical side of the experience doesn't quite rival the creative side, and there are occasional glitches with the physics of enemy AI.

Hard Reset's main strengths lay in its graphics and its consistent delivery of combat which, while moreish and dully enjoyable, lacks the precision or scale of its competition. Thus, while it's a solid game that delivers on a pure blow-stuff-up basis, it doesn't have quite the level of inspiration or finesse needed to make it stand out from the crowd.

The lack of humour is the real wound; Serious Sam 3's violence often made us smile, but it never made us laugh. So, while there's still gleeful carnage on an impressive scale, the game is still a little dimmer than it might have been if not for the sadly slightly straightened face that Sam wears.

It's not horrible, broken, offensive, unfair or anything like that - it's just completely bland. It doesn't do anything new, and it doesn't excel in anything either. Plus, while the combat is fine, it doesn't offer the fun, blast-through action experience of games such as Torchlight, Diablo or even Titan Quest.

There are plenty of flaws, such as the iffy aiming, average graphics and poor story, but Dead Island still claws back ground with the variety of weapons, the scope and the pleasant progression path. Zombie aficionados won't be wowed, but they could also do a lot worse.

Xotic still retains a moreish, arcade charm despite the excesses of the design team and patience is all that's really needed to unlock an extra level of fun. The fact that Xotic's primary appeal gets so lost is enough to take the score and accessibility down a peg or to though.

It's unfortunate to see Nuclear Dawn suffer from such simple errors, as underneath these tiny flaws is an above-average game with some new, interesting ideas at its core. If you're playing with friends or get lucky with a random server, it can be a lot of fun - but often that's not the case and as a result Nuclear Dawn doesn't quite earn the recommendation it's otherwise capable of receiving.

Sanctum isn't a truly great game – it needs more content and a few more customisation options to earn that recognition in our eyes. Still, even as it is at the moment, it comes pretty close and provides a brilliant, if short-term, gaming fix.

The game really represents a missed opportunity for Bethesda. With a little more polishing and thought the game could have been great, rather than merely good.

Play Sequence well and you'll fall into Zen bliss, forgetting all your problems and applauding yourself after every victory. Fumble and you'll swear in grunts, hating yourself until you get it right. Perseverance is hard, but worthwhile.

It's dreadfully average and far too quickly finished, providing nothing more than the most basic type of fun on the first run-through and little incentive to revisit. Not because it's broken; just because it's boring.

While points have to be docked for the annoying QTEs, the rest of The Run is amazingly exhilarating. The set pieces left us panting for breath, unable to process what had just happened, and the excitement level only dropped to 'really exciting' in between.

Lume isn't going to be a game for everyone and will seem downright slow in the eyes of the YouTube generation. Those who can remember how adventure games are supposed to be played will find it to be a rare treat, however.

Everything it does has been done before, either in the earlier games or in the free mods on which this latest title is based. It's by no means a bad game, but its lack of ambition combines with the failure to improve old faults to create a merely average title.

Red River's biggest technical faults concern the disappointing graphics, however. It's one thing to balance out poor texture quality with an impressive scale, but when the world is so stunningly flat and empty it's hard to see why the textures are muddier than a rugby match in a thunderstorm.

Dead Rising 2: Off the Record has problems - and that's compounded by the fact that some of those issues are inherited, rather than new. It's a game with strengths too though, and while Off the Record doesn't prove to be any better than Dead Rising 2 on the whole, it certainly isn't any worse.

While Double D's one-tone puerility won't appeal to everyone, the game does offer a refreshingly in-your-face scale of violence that will endear it to long-term Serious Sam fans. If you fancy a 2D action fix to help you wile away the hours until Serious Sam 3 arrives, then look no further.