If Carmen Sandiego had more educational value I may have raised the overall a point, but with the lack of educational value, we are given a platformer that doesn't have a lot to offer. There are better educational games out there and there are better platformers out there.

Monopoly for Nintendo Switch isn’t a bad option if you’re looking for a digital version of the board game. As a plain adaptation, it does its job well, with the added bonus of portability without risk of losing parts. Unfortunately, the Living Boards and Action Cards don’t add anything truly significant. Plus, when playing with AI or even online without chat, it feels like a shallow experience compared to the inherent joy of gathering around the table and laughing as your friends go bankrupt. And it’s hard to talk about a game so rooted in capitalism without mentioning that this game isn’t cheap. At its fairly high price point, the game’s few additions hardly justify the cost. You may as well buy a game that isn’t a mere digital replication of a tabletop experience, or just pick up a nice physical collector’s edition of Monopoly.

Samurai Warriors Katana is not a bad title by any means. However there are still a handful of issues,and the problem of repetitiveness that really holds the game back.

Sony throws together some mini games and slaps the "spy" moniker in this lazy attempt to cash in on the holiday buying craze.

The challenge and personality of old-school shooter or adventure classics is totally absent. It’s one of the most creatively bankrupt games I’ve played this year. And you should not play it.

I don't want anyone to feel like they are trudging through the monotony and minutia of this game just to witness the pretty lights. It's not worth it. Sure, the environments are pretty, but that doesn't hide the ugly that is this game. For people looking for a quick shooter, you can find it in Bodycount, but other than that, look elsewhere.

In the end, Daymare: 1998 is clearly a passion project and it definitely shows (and I absolutely love it for that). Granted, there are some bumps along the way in the gameplay and design departments, and the game itself looks like it is a generation behind current gen. However, if you can live with those things, you have a solid survival horror experience here. Just make sure you've played all the classics first!

The celebrated comic series makes a jump to the Xbox, but the sub par gameplay and weak visuals in this budget game doesn't do it any justice.

Conceptually, Repressed is exactly the type of game that appeals to me. Delving into the repressed depths of the mind provides plenty of opportunities to tell an immensely profound and intriguing story. In practice, however, Repressed is actually quite bland and uninteresting. Mechanically uninventive and stylistically dull, there was little that kept me engaged besides the passable but rudimentary story. Repressed is hard to recommend for anyone besides those that are completely sold on the minimalist aesthetic or a limited creative concept.

Koei tries to breathe new life into its declining hack and slasher, but find no such love on the 360. Prepare for more repetitive combat, poor Live support and washed out visuals.

Doctor Who: The Edge of Time has some fun ideas and offers fans a great opportunity to go on a time-hopping adventure with the greatest alien hero television has ever seen. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite feel ready for prime time nor is it optimized well enough on the PlayStation 4.

Hidden Dragon Legend’s cover art should appear in any search engine’s results for mixed bag. The combat it offers is challenging and genuinely fun, but the traversal that comes between it is far too often broken and unfair. As you run through Imperial China, you’ll be enchanted by the mood, only to be brought right back out by stiff cutscenes and terribly compressed weapon sounds. Upon reflection, I truly believe that MegaFun Games put real passion into this project, though; even the elements that don't work are laid out in a way where they'd be very enjoyable if they did. It's just a shame that the finished project is so deeply flawed.

Krater offers an interesting take on post-apocalyptic games and utilizes strategic maneuvers while engaged in combat, but it felt a bit dragged out and of course, I went a little click happy. Although the story was okay, I felt that the gameplay was repetitive and the point-and-click tactic was getting tired.

It's a crying shame that Uncanny Valley spends so much of its time crippling your play time with contrivances and strict time limits. Once you learn how to make progress, you'll enjoy a second half akin to what the entire game should have been, but then its endings get less memorable. Uncanny Valley wants to be an engaging survival horror romp, and sometimes it gets to be, but it's ultimately an experience that can be best described as mediocre.

Cashing in on the Jaws franchise may have been a brilliant idea on paper, but this game struggles to entertain with a poor storyline and frustrating controls.

Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City is an unfortunate addition to an otherwise great franchise. With this being the second of three Resident Evil games coming out this year it would probably be best to just skip this one entirely unless you are a diehard fan who wants to see every game in the series. This title had a lot of great potential but falls flat on almost every part of its delivery and while it may not do everything wrong what it does right is hardly enough to save this alternate take on a great franchise.

SCEE London brings the whole Getaway British gangster feel to the handheld, with unfortunately the same dull plot and uneventful gameplay.

Better stick to the book as this game proves to be too simplistic and dull to be of any fun.

Spectra is an average, straightforward racer that’s easy enough to grasp. And yet, it comes off as half finished.

Flight sims should be great on the DS, but the touch screen feature was sadly underused here, and feels much too clunky and lackluster for today's gamers.

Mighty No. 9 has semblances of good ideas thrown into levels that are muddled with instant kill spikes and overly difficult platforming sequences, which when combined are just bad level design.

There will be a small audience for this game I’m sure but most should just let this game pass them by.

There just isn’t enough within R.B.I Baseball 16 to recommend buying it unless you’re an absolute diehard fan that needs to own every game in the series.

Tied Together is a fairly entertaining co-op multiplayer game at core but marred by the lack of variation. Although not a long-lasting experience, it does promise moments of family-friendly fun.

If you have three friends who don't mind rustling through some awkward mechanics and just want to kill massive quantities of demons with no consequences then pick it up. Otherwise, if you're into deeper multiplayer experiences, there are countless other games that will be more suitable to your cravings.

And that sums it up. Fuel Overdose is a game full of wrong turns. From art direction to gameplay, lacking story to lacking track design, it’s a game that never really finds its way to anything that even resembles mediocrity.

It's about time the iconic Pac-Man gets his own cart racing game, but we're hard done by the game's generic racing action and bland tracks.

Oh... Sir! is mostly a delight, a fun little game about just insulting your opponents until you've humiliated them enough that they concede. Though some of the writing isn't to my tastes (and of course, more words would be appreciated), the actual back-and-forth insult trades are really enjoyable. It's fun to string together just the right words to take the opponents down. It's going to be one of my go-to games for when I just need to kill a little bit time, and I hope to see the developers improve on this concept.

While poor performance often makes the repetition more of a chore than it needs to be, a truly interesting world, game design that understands its gameplay is repetitive and regularly finds new contexts for its loop, and fantastic atmosphere still kept me having a great time with Disaster Report 4. There were times when the game made me groan, but there was no point in its campaign where I didn't want to see what was coming next. Its a game I know I'll remember.

Joining the list of sequels that should not be, this racer prooves to be too simplistic and shallow to be any fun to anyone.

With gangsta-themed games growing in popularity, this ride and gun actioner provides some decent arcade-style action, albeit with limited replay value.

At the end of the day, G. I. Joe Operation Breakout is hurt by a campaign that is neither fun nor a fitting tribute to a classic pop culture license. There’s multiplayer - local only - but I strongly doubt people are going to stick around to try it out. What it all comes down to in the end is that $40 is far too great a price to ask for this limping tribute to G. I. Joe.

Unearthing Mars begins as a serious expedition to Mars only to transform into a laughably bad science fiction space opera about angry aliens and partying pig dog beasts. It won’t leave you with anything to remember it by, except for how laughably bad it is. The experience of Unearthing Mars is a lot like being EPCOT Center’s Spaceship Earth while riding high on bad weed.

Table Manners simply is ridiculous and fun, and it knows it. All it asks of you is that you be as lighthearted about the gameplay as it is. And if you can do that, and you don’t mind failing some levels in the process, I think you’ll love every second of it.

The game has the mechanics down in the flying and running, but the combat and the game's progression just isn't up to par with where it needs to be.

Sadly, Koi is so easily forgettable and dull that I struggled with finding things to even say about it.

While the original might have a following, this sequel fails miserably with drab story and pointless combat.

Monkeys can be quite a handful when they're at school, as this party game features a simplistic and frankly not fun assortment of mini games.

Bullet Witch is a like B-grade movie; it's far from perfect due to its modest production values but that's why you love it anyway. Who can I recommend the game as out of place and time than this to? At least not to tech-heads who find even 4K resolution insufficient. But anyone like me who enjoys curious games of the past, appreciates the Japanese penchant for drama, just loves pretty and moody female protagonists and is fed up with most of modern gaming fads can find plenty to like about Bullet Witch.

The concept is outrageous, but it works. However, at the end of the day, it is a game about a piece of bread.

The jury is still out on whether or not Dream Diary exists as a faithful remake/adaptation of the original Yume Nikki, although research has led me to believe that it wasn’t well received by the community. So if you’re a fan of the original game, you might want to temper your expectations. For the rest of us, Kadokawa’s remake is a spooky adventure game that doesn’t break new ground but will take you to some strange and exotic places.

Overall, I enjoyed getting scared by horrible, scary-looking spirits.

Midway seeks to revitalize the classic arcade game, but the transition is plagued by terribly dated visuals, frustrating controls and an overall unpolished product.

Edge of Time is all around an extremely mediocre brawler.

You fight bugs until the credits roll, and if that doesn’t hook you at the beginning, then you’re especially not going to love it by the time you’ve played the game for its 4 hour run time.

The RPG genre has just started to bloom on the DS, but not helped by Konami's outdated title and hampered by its frustrating touch controls.

AO International Tennis is sadly not a great game of tennis. It can still be buggy (I’ve had it hard crash a couple of times), has really long load times, and just isn’t all that compelling. I put a ton of time into AO International Tennis and I can say that I never once found myself fully invested.

Afterfall: Insanity is a bit of a mess. Everything about this product comes off as unfinished and if given more time to cook and iron out the bugs, the game could be enjoyable but in its current state it is barely passable.

Carnivores: Dinosaur Hunter HD is a real mess. I didn’t pay for this, so I don’t feel like I have lost anything other then time, but I feel actual sorrow for the people that have. Avoid this like an extinction-level meteor.

I played through the game’s first chapter before quitting in disgust and frustration. Syberia for the PlayStation 3 is a half-assed product.

I do love the direction that the developers were going for, but without an entertaining storyline and exciting gameplay, there isn’t much of a reason to pick up the game at all.

Snow Moto Racing Freedom is not a bad game but it's hopelessly mediocre in every aspect. The major problem with the game is it's all too grounded. The developers should have made it sexier by adding a flight of fantasy to it. Have fireworks and flair, an option to race around in unrealistic settings and reward players with gratuitous things such as different racer skins and soundtracks. As it is, the game is like a grumpy hermit in the Northern Scandinavian wilds, living in his little hunting cottage and settled with his bleak surroundings, baltic herring meal and the radio with one channel for weather forecasts. It's snowing everyday.

In many ways, The Midnight Sanctuary is an epitome of a Japanese storytelling; its pacing, nuances and paradigms – and of course, presentation. You can take a look at these screenshots and think the game looks kind of silly but I’m confident that it would be nowhere as absorbing if it were presented in a typical anime-style or photographic quality. If anything, the naïve graphics accent the chilling factor of the intriguing story that whispers through this midnight sanctuary.

Tryst is a decent game for a decent price but know going in that it has a fair number of issues that (hopefully) will be patched.

Milanoir is an enjoyable, bite-sized action game. Its combat stays fresh despite its simplicity, and well-designed boss fights allow the game to put its best foot forward for most of the campaign. However, the final act walks back much of what made the main game fun, while the story fails to coalesce into anything particularly moving. Milanoir may provide some fun thrills for action-movie junkies with an appreciation for Milan and its culture, but those looking for anything deeper would best look elsewhere.

Anyone expecting a Zelda-esque level of role-playing or story, or Mario-level platforming will be disappointed by The Forbidden Arts, as will gamers looking forward to a lush, 3D world to explore. In fact, The Forbidden Arts is a platformer with light RPG elements, a skeletal story and an imperfect balance between its controls and its demands. Ultimately, The Forbidden Arts lacks ambition and enough imagination to help it stand out from a crowded, accomplished field.

Rugby Would Cup 2011 is a poor game. Poorly made, poorly executed, and lackluster title, that causes an insatiable need to cleanse oneself after being played. It's not a top tier game, and shouldn't be regarded as one, so just leave it be and no one will get hurt.

Full of bugs, glitches and a laundry list of elements that feel unfinished or outdated, it’s pretty hard to recommend Rune II: Decapitation Edition to anyone whose enjoyment depends on a quality experience. Players with a love of all things Viking and high tolerance for mediocrity might be able to find a few hours of fun in Rune II’s messy world, but most gamers would do better to spend their time and money elsewhere.

Those Who Remain looks and plays like it come through a time portal from the mid-90s. The graphics are washed-out, plain, and badly angular. The frame rate is choppy despite the simplicity of visuals and jerks horribly when turning the viewpoint. There is no cohesion to the production design; nonspecific props are just scattered all over the place and random images from the web are plastered into frames that decorate walls. The main character’s sedated delivery kills off the rest of the atmosphere. And no, being indie isn’t a plausible excuse because there are plenty of similar but better-done indie horror games out there. All in all, Those Who Remain is an unfortunate attempt at psychological horror that goes on to show it’s a hard genre to get it right.

While the idea of turning real world items into in-game ones is pretty neat, the game throws in everything it can to make the experience as uninteresting as it possibly can.

To put it bluntly Dungeon Hunter: Alliance just reeks of mediocrity.

The sandbox mode is the only thing that keeps Adventure Park from being total hot garbage. Unfortunately, cheating the economy doesn’t make the broken mechanics, lack of content or dismal performance any less rotten. If you’re in the market for a game like this, you’re best off sticking with the classics.

The battles you encounter in both the single player and online modes are fun and can keep you entertained for a while. However, the gameplay became pretty repetitive after the first few fights.

I’d talk about the game’s graphics and expand on the discussion of using VR to expand on the Planet of the Apes mythos but right now? I just don’t care anymore. I'm so frustrated thinking about all the problems that made this game so miserable to play that I’m done. Don’t play this game or, if you have to, wait for a sale. Damn you, Crisis on the Planet of the Apes VR. Damn you all to hell.

Nitrobike is a good idea, it does a lot of things right, but it isn't the final product I think Left Field Productions wanted it to be.

While it’s alright in quick bursts, it gets tiring very quickly, and it won’t be too long before you find yourself wanting to go back to main series games and play something more fulfilling.

At best, this is just a pain pill for hardcore racing enthusiasts. As one of four racing games in the Vita's launch, it's the only one holding the fort down for the urban street racing sub-genre, but it's completely lifeless and devoid of originality. Players unable to quell their curiosity will definitely find something playable here, but they'd do just as well to save their money for the eventual Need For Speed release.

If you need a good excuse to kill a weekend and you are in the mood for some mindless entertainment with a friend (or solo, if you want), then Blue Estate is worth checking out.

Fallout 76 is a confusing experience, a discord of half-baked ideas and false premises but also some genuinely smart gameplay mechanics that allow solo players and groups alike adventure in equal terms. I want to desperately love it more but as it stands now, the game makes it pretty tough. Still, I will have my Frankie keep on going, no matter how stubborn that might be in the long run.

On the surface LA Cops appears to be a solid top-down shooter. Unfortunately, it relies too heavily on a broken teamwork system. The shoddy AI works against the game and results in the game being more of a frustrating title than an fun one.

Like all games that stress art and atmosphere above all else, appraising Vane is difficult. Some will fall in love with it from the first scene, simply because they appreciate its visual style and engaging music. For me, it’s the game equivalent of tuning in to the fireplace channel on Christmas day. It’s oddly pleasant in its own way, but there’s little substance to it. Vane simply has too many faults and not enough strengths to carry a recommendation. Even in the absence of technical mishaps, it’s simply not engaging or interesting.

It’s unfortunate that Corpse of Discovery can’t capitalize on it’s strong premise. Instead, it flounders, attempting to be profound and metaphysical but never managing to be anything more than “meh.”

Unsatisfying, under-developed gameplay mechanics and a ridiculously short length, Light is anything but the name suggests.

Overall, Bad Bots was a great game to play.

Although EA has had some great success with NFL Street, the new NFL Tour just didn't stand up as well. You would hope the time to work on a next gen version of the game would have helped more, but overall this is a pretty mediocre arcade football game.

Microsoft seeks to spice things up with this sequel to the surprise hit Party game. Although the game can be fun with friends, it is let down by the bland single player mode.

I feel for the developers, who clearly had their hearts in the right place when making this game, but the misjudgements in its structure and release make it impossible to love.

Gensou Skydrift has little going for it. There’s little to appreciate for fans of Touhou or racing games. The story doesn’t have much charm in it to justify getting it for the campaign and the character dialogue is forgettable gibberish. The racing is unappealing due to the often abysmal track design as well as the driving that feels clunky and simplistic. Gensou Skydrift is a title that’s only worth playing for the sheer novelty of playing a Touhou racing game where characters ride on top of each other.

UFO were just so close. The controls and in-game gadgets are actually OK. Those hacking sections were fine, too! It’s really sad, then, to see them come up so short. With more polish and more work, this game could have been fun. Instead, it’s a grossly frustrating game, too focused on dated mechanics and a misguided stealth element for it to be entertaining.

Many gamers will enjoy Depths of Fear: Knossos because it’s different, it’s weird, and it’s trying something new.

There’s a lot of promise to Morphies Law, but there’s also a lot of frustration for the ways it fails to meet this promise. As you play it, you find yourself noticing more and more things that feel like they should be there to help you enjoy what the developer came up with, but it’s not there, so it winds up feeling empty, lifeless, and unclear as to what you’re doing. A cool idea will get you partway there, but without the right follow-through, it just winds up being a game you’re not interested in playing much longer.

While the movie wasn't quite original, the game didn't fare all that well either, bogged down by lame characters, uninspired gameplay and dull visuals.

It’s worth noting that the way to play Old Time Hockey is with friends. The game offers up to 4 player co-op but even then I wouldn’t recommend it. While it can be fun to get a group of friends together for some couch co-op, the game just isn’t that fun to play. The novelty of it all wears off fairly quickly and before you know it you’ll be looking to play better games like Blades of Steel or Gretzky. To be honest, you’re probably better off playing one of those anyway. Old Time Hockey tries to capture the attitude of hockey’s past with the arcade fun of historic hockey games, but it does neither particularly well.

Koei tries to revive the Winback franchise, but with limited success, thanks to a bare-boned story, simplistic gameplay and the lack of a challenging AI.

Boost Beast is an underwhelming take on the established match three formula. The few attempts Arzest make to set it apart backfire, making much of the game dependent on luck. You either lack the correct colors to defeat the zombies or you score ridiculously big boosts with very little effort, making even victory unsatisfying. Unless you absolutely must have your match three fix on the Switch, there are better puzzle games out there.

Unsurprisingly, The Dark Eye: Book of Shadows has some technical issues with crashes and mission-killing bugs, but those pale in comparison with the game’s biggest flaw: its lack of imagination or originality. I don’t think it’s a cynical cash-grab. I think that the source material might be part of the problem, coupled with the developers being satisfied with minimal presentation and coloring obsessively inside the lines. There are so many outstanding action-RPGs — both based on D&D and not — that this game is hard to recommend unless you are already steeped in the lore and culture of The Dark Eye series.

If you want a real survival horror then find something else because this one is not worth your time.

Out of Ammo offers a nice blend of RTS and FPS mechanics that's pretty fun. The ability to take possession of friendly units and fight alongside AI soldiers is a cool trick that puts you in the middle of action. It's unfortunate that known technical issues with the PlayStation VR don't allow for the level of precision I came to rely on during the heat of combat. It's also a little dry, content wise, as Survival maps differ only in terrain and setting--you'll always fight the same units no matter which map you choose. I look forward to what version 2.0 and 3.0 might look like down the line.

Even after multiple playthroughs and making all possible decisions, it’s difficult to say with certainty what Epanalepsis is all about. Like all good science fiction, it invites multiple interpretations, but in this case may not add up to anything of substance. Despite that, the journey itself and the thoughts it inspires are worth recommending.

SFTX is just another in a laundry list of games trying to capitalize on the success of cover-based shooters but promptly fail to do so.

Selma and the Wisp has an interesting premise, having you control a character who, in turn, leads another character. Unfortunately, the indirect playstyle leads to frustration in hazardous areas as you are forced to escort a girl and hope she doesn’t die by accident. At least it’s a short adventure, with ten levels that only run about two or three hours, for those curious to try it out. The idea of this “guiding light simulator” remains intriguing, but the experience is hard to fully recommend.

Dog Duty’s marketing makes it seem like a blast, but actually playing it is a sobering experience. It has its moments, and will surely be to someone’s taste, but the whole thing feels like wasted potential. It blends the tactics and action together in a way that dilute both halves, and what’s left is an experience that is too hollow to be a tactical, and too automated to have satisfying gameplay.

It is great to see more games of this quality appearing on download services such as Xbox Live Arcade, as it shows that those platforms are viable for bigger and better games. Deep Black Episode 1 may miss step in a couple of places and have an extremely abrupt ending, but it is a competent shooter that is defiantly worth a look, if you enjoy the genre. Just don't expect anything ground breaking in terms of story.

In addition to a spectacularly unlikable antihero protagonist, Devil’s Hunt has combat that sometimes feels like an afterthought and endless cutscenes that desperately need the help of better writers and designers. I liked its story, and a better executed Devil’s Hunt could give Devil May Cry or that other Polish novel-based game a run for its money.

When the most critical bugs are eventually squashed (developers have promised a steady stream of patches) and the penalty for dying hopefully toned down a bit (or conversely, more resting points added to the world), Decay of Logos will rise up to its full promise. As it stands now, you have to answer the following questions. Do you want your game challenging? Do you want a game that doesn’t guide you by hand but trusts your own initiative? Do you want a brave elf heroine with floppy ears? If you answered “yes!” three times, Decay of Logos is absolutely for you, a high fantasy adventure that is as high on its stakes as on the reward you get from conquering its unlikely circumstances.

I thought I would've been more engaged in both campaigns, but I felt that both modes were pretty bland. Yes, it had its fun moments but they were few and far between.

What started out as a promising sojourn into another world, where I could single-handedly take on a horde of Giants, ends up feeling much like the citizenry of Extinction, tired of fighting, tired of Giants, and tired of being there. There’s enough good here that the failures just hurt more. There’s fun movement when it works, fun puzzle-like combat, but despite its best efforts, there’s no portal big enough to save it from the weight of its own systems.

One of the earlier platformer for the PSP now jumps to the DS, but looses much of its appeal, and reduced to a single-button gameplay and dull storyline.