It's not a must-have title, but may provide a refreshing alternative to bald space marines and army recruitment programs.

In the end, Assassin’s Creed Rogue feels like a multi-colored blanket stitched together by years of older materials.

The best praise you can give Romeo is a Dead Man is this is probably exactly what game you would expect from Grasshopper Manufacture and Suda51. It has that Suda51 personality embedded within it, even if it is a bit rough. Its stylish presentation, absurd storytelling, and amusing ideas like the Bastards system, along with entertaining combat help make it a fun time, but it eventually becomes repetitive as enemy variety thins out in the later stages with that frustrating level design. Still, for fans of Suda51’s work, there is stuff here to appreciate. It is a little messy, somewhat inconsistent, and a bit rough, but unmistakably a Grasshopper Manufacture game, and that alone will be enough for some people. What I am trying to say is that Romeo is a Dead Man is good, but in a quaint, unconventional manner.

The gameplay is hindered by basic mechanics and somewhat awkward melee combat, which detracts from the overall enjoyment. However, the game excels in creating a compelling atmosphere, and the gameplay maintains a smooth flow. In the end, Hollowbody provides a nostalgic experience for fans of British survival horror at the price of a large takeaway pizza (£14.20), encapsulating both the triumphs and shortcomings of the genre, making it a worthwhile choice for an engaging evening for fans of horror games that like them with a sprinkle of nostalgia.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Soul Hackers is a solid taster into sampling a blast from the past. It’s obviously aged a bit, which is clearly seen in this port, but the story is good and the rewarding, deep combat mechanics survive the test of time to make this a solid, satisfying RPG to play in 2013.

Costing the now seemingly normal 1200 Microsoft Points, Comic Jumper is worth the price alone just for the humorous experience that the game is built around.

A smart adaptation that replicates the action of the series without resorting to a typical hack n’ slash knockoff. The cluttered camera and controls take some adjusting, but otherwise this is the first real attempt at successfully adapting the colossal anime hit in videogame form and is another proud notch on Omega Forces’ belt (it also increases the anticipation for Berserk, their next anime offering later this year).

It’s a real shame that the two halves of gameplay, the action and the puzzling/exploration, differ so greatly in quality or this would be an easy recommendation to any 90s nostalgia-hunters. Instead there’s a clear divide and the fun often comes crashing to a halt, constraining the player to slowly back up and work a row of dawdling dummies with a pipe for five minutes to conserve resources. To make it worse there are actually two extra modes, a classic wave-based survival challenge with a shop between each round and a procedurally generated labyrinth, that both rely on this exact approach to play: aggro the mass of dopes and painstakingly beat them to death with a melee weapon in order to save any important armaments for the real problems. I still say it’s worth giving a shot if you’re into this style of retro horror, more so because of how exceptionally cheap it is, as long as you’re aware of the few clumsy design choices that all too often get in the way of the experience.

Let it be known that de Blob 2 is by no means a bad game, just one with enough detrimental flaws to hold it back from greatness.

Simply put, Dead Rising 4 is going to upset the serious hardcore fans of the series who have enjoyed its quirky mechanics over the years. Signs began with Dead Rising 3 that Capcom was moving in an direction to simplify the game to allow more accessibility to the mainstream. Dead Rising 4 will not do anything for those people, but for anyone who did enjoy the previous title or would like a game that’s about dressing up in dumb clothes and killing zombies in stupid ways with bizarre weapons, while celebrating the wonderful festivities of massacre over a Christmas theme, then this title is for you. It makes an improvement over the third entry, offering a few hours of silly fun for a series that still manages to bring a unique experience like no other when it comes to dishing out the zombie violence.

WRC 10 is the best the WRC series has ever been. It might not be the biggest leap in improvements, but the refinement of the vehicle control, the improved physics, new tweaks to the career – just as time-consuming as last year’s – and the increased legendary car/track count help make the return to the series a good one. There is just a bit too much deja vu here that might put off casual fans from buying the game if they already have WRC 9. Sadly, that is one of the downsides that come with these yearly sports releases. Still, I can recommend WRC 10 to the people who want a new racing game, and those who are into motorsports will find WRC 10 a great title to play with, just make sure you try to go for the full wheel set up to truly experience throwing a car around these amazingly designed courses.

Cat Quest turned out to be a low impact game with a high emphasis on fun. It’s a great armchair zen experience that fits Switch to a tee. It’s easy to play for five minutes, an hour, or more, and always make worthwhile progress – even on busy days when time is not on your side. It’s a pun filled game that’s a purrfect fit for gaming on the move. Sure, not everyone will approve of it’s unapawlogetic feline-centric wordplay, and upbeat pawsitive nature, but others may just find the humour to be cat-hartic – especially whilst compared to the self serious attitude seen in other modern RPGs. If dog is your pet of choice there is however no hope for you. Sorry.

Fibble: Flick 'n' Roll is a nice first attempt by Crytek at breaking into mobile games, but they don't really seem to have given it their all.

For better or worse, The Alliance Alive is the very definition of a mid-tier RPG. The visuals and story fall under the line of “good enough” that they don’t necessarily have to aim for greater heights, while the content is practically bursting with customizable features and mechanics that will drive stat-lovers into a joyous frenzy, even though the time it takes to reach to the juicy center is a bit on the long side. It’s an overall solid experience and yet another badge to pin on the Nintendo Switch for its outstanding service of the RPG genre.

It’s a good time and a fantastic brain-burner, but perhaps by trimming some of the weaker areas and focusing on what makes it special, Relicta could have stood a little taller next to some of the giants in its category.

Overall, Shantae: Risky’s Revenge is a nice throwback, even if it’s not really that old, with a single glaring problem – being ‘Metroidvania’ style comes with some responsibilities that this title just couldn’t hold up its end of the bargain for.

The episode, and the game in general, is not bad. In fact, it is good. There are moments of tension and a narrative that goes some way to engage the player. And since, I’ve been a bit of a downer about the whole thing, I would like to add, the voice acting is superb, as expected. Plus, Jesus turns up again in all his man-bun glory which made for a great ending to his character. But by the standards of Telltale, the episode is simply, and frustratingly, just ‘fine’ or ‘OK’. For any other franchise, this would be par for the course. But for The Walking Dead, a series revered and loved by many, it seems crushingly disappointing.

Overall, Samurai Warriors 5 is another solid entry in the long-running series, but does not do much to bring in new players, as it still has that repetitive nature and simplistic mission design that the series has been known for. This is more for existing fans to have another game to confidently enjoy, but the cross over function with the game modes does make the initial hours a slow burn before it opens up all the good stuff.

By the end of Episode 5, the single most impactful decision reveals itself, leading to all sorts of speculation on how the final episode will play out. It’s just too bad that with that anticipation comes dread, as Game of Thrones now runs the biggest risk of showing just how meaningless the players’ choices will matter, depending on how they handle the key decision made by the end of this episode.

As it stands, PlayStation All-Stars: Battle Royale is a cool, if limited, way to celebrate the history of Sony's time in the videogame business. It is just a shame that some of the ideas that give the game its own identity spoil it.

First-person shooters are never going away, but, if you fancy a great and bloody time pretending to be a katana wielding, nerd assassin after getting drained on role-playing military soldiers, then you can’t go wrong with jumping into the role of Mr Wang and slicing up some demons.

Dungeon Defenders: Awakening has had a buggy start, but the foundations here show signs of greatness, and right now it still makes for a bloody good time with a lot of difficulty to get through, which should only get better as the bugs are ironed out and the content increases.

I may be able to suggest this game as a decent mobile title to play for someone who wants another rhythm game but the way that the game handles a character diagnosed with cancer makes me feel worse about its entirety.

In the end, episode 2 is a more dialogue-heavy entry compared to the first, but it’s also a much stronger episode for it.

Severed Steel was fun to play, but I couldn’t recommend it at its current price in its present state. Greylock Studio needs to throw some intense boss battles in there, a few tough enemies, and, in my opinion, rework the bullet time metre. I really hope the developers don’t move onto their next project straight away, and instead turn this game into a series that will make people look forward to the sequel. If you love these types of games, then there is no doubt in my mind that you will also enjoy Severed Steel.

The game is seriously addicting thanks to the gratifying mechanics and simple, fun premise that it’s built on. I can see myself jumping online almost daily to claw my way through the ranks but I do worry that the long wait times for matches will only get worse if High Horse Entertainment don’t manage to pull in some more players. I wish them all the best and hope to see Disc Jam continue to be supported by them for the foreseeable future.

Testament can't quite make up its mind what type of game it wants to be with the change of camera location and controls, and it has its issues with repetitive sound effects, but the storytelling is top-notch. If you're a fan of mystery games, point-and-click adventures, complicated puzzlers, or you're just a sucker for a good story, then The Testament of Sherlock Holmes is a no-brainer.

To play The 40th Day in single player exposes a multitude of flaws the core game has, with AI mistakes particularly running rampant throughout. Co-op does a lot to mask these annoyances, but it is still not enough to push the game into the realm of a ‘must buy.’

Killzone: Shadow Fall isn’t the great launch title that Sony was hoping for with its shiny new box. The campaign is too varied in quality to bring a worthy single player experience. For every high point you experience, there’s a low around the corner, and the last bits of the campaign were so monotonous and unexciting, thanks to typical cliché gameplay for the genre that is mixed with tedious level design.

Hardline both succeeds with flying colors, and fails miserably in various aspects of its game design but the good outweighs the bad with its sandbox style mission design, handful of addicting multiplayer modes, and rock solid Battlefield gunplay players know and love.

Killsquad is a good attempt at merging a few ideas from other genres and coming up with an arcade-style isometric shooter with a loot grind. The action loop is solid, and the high enemy count makes for some frantic action that merges quick ability activation with the player’s own skill. It falls short in some elements, such as no end game content and a loot grind that is too focused on the shop rather than rewards through contracts, and could do with a better diverse set of abilities and weapons for each character. Still, this is a game that is easy to jump into, and even if the end game does not exist, taking the game as an experience from the first to the last contract is good enough to recommend, think of it as an isometric shooter rather than an action RPG. One thing though is that make sure you have yourself a friendly bounty hunter or three to come along with you to get the best experience from this entertaining, blaster action game.

Fans of LittleBigPlanet will surely enjoy LittleBigPlanet Karting, as it manages to take the essence of Media Molecule's platforming joy and translate that into a solid and enjoyable kart racer, with all the charm you would expect. It's a shame the developers felt that they needed to take every aspect of LittleBigPlanet and use that as a base to create this game, as it has hurt it in some regards and has made the online multiplayer an awkward mode to participate in.

Sublevel Zero Redux has helped remind us that 6DOF gameplay is something that should return in bigger bulk, and fans that enjoy games like Descent will see things here to relish – tight controls, fluid movement and the challenge. The small issues with Sublevel Zero Redux come with its procedurally-generated and roguelite elements, mainly the former, where levels are not as engaging as they could be, and so its down to the punchy, fun combat and the constant supply of improved weapons to keep the game engaging until the end of its multi-campaign, rather than staying after it is over to improve runs.

Overall Popup Dungeon is a very average game; first launching on Kickstarter April 3rd 2014, it has taken more than 6 years to release but the game and the humour already feels outdated. However Triple.B.Titles have done a great job at creating a papercraft style game and by adding more depth to the combat I could see this game sticking around for a while with the aid of a creative community to take the game to its limits.

Whilst the game is densely packed with a ton of stuff to do, I still believe most of it is much too easy or repetitive – resulting in it feeling mostly like constant fetch quests. The parts I did love came significantly late into the experience and left me wanting more due to their brevity. It’s fair to say there’s something for everyone but that also makes it feel uneven. Up until the late game all the player does is run back and forth, switching between different times, battling with no interaction, and riding those damn trains that actually make stops like a 10-minute loading screen. I wasn’t really hooked by the bad attempts at humour or the weird little jingles that yo-kai types have, either, but I would still play a future Yo-kai game in hopes that the combat gets the lime-light it deserves. Until then, though, I can only recommend the title to a much younger demographic who could get the full experience, but probably still need their older sibling to help with those tougher fights.

Operation Arrowhead certainly features a large assortment of content, both offline and online, that rewards its fans, but for those who prefer their shooters to require little thinking and itchy trigger fingers, you may want to pass this one up.

A year after its PS5 debut, Rise of the Ronin arrives on PC with Team Ninja’s combat prowess at its core—fast, fluid, and deeply satisfying. The story is engaging enough, though its pacing can feel slow at times, while the open world is filled with familiar tropes—plenty of icons, bandits, and the occasional stray cat, but also plenty of that great combat to experience. PC performance is underwhelming, and optimisation could certainly use some work, though there’s hope for future improvements. It’s not a masterpiece, but Rise of the Ronin stands out as a game where the real excitement lies in its combat, not the world it inhabits.

This is easily the best Lego game to date, and although lacking any huge leaps forward in the gameplay department, still offers a lot of fun for anyone who picks it up.

Overall my suggestion would be, stick the game’s suggestions (hints) on high, enjoy it as a constant stream of brain-dead semi funny entertainment, in a universe you are probably familiar with, and get as much stress-free enjoyment from what admittedly, feels like a pretty polished episodic game.

If people can stick with the game to get past the initial effortless difficulty, I fell they will find something to enjoy either by themselves or with friends when the tough beasts are introduced.

NES Remix 2 is a better attempt at doing bite size challenges of NES games by expanding the quality of the games included.

Ys: The Oath in Felghana is a game that derives from the old fashion days of action RPGs.

Overall, Chariot is a game that is deliberately slow-paced and also demands patience.

It’s cute, charming, and lots of fun, with enough challenge to stand up on its own right among other platformers.

Space Run is a solid entry in a genre that is full of unimaginative titles, and from the get go Space Run supplies an easy to understand, but challenging to beat campaign that will keep people’s minds and fingers active from beginning to end.

Even though the game has lost its thrilling moments and the story feels like filler in the grand scheme – making me not care much about Alan this time – Alan Wake's American Nightmare is still a good and entertaining shooter. The story will last around four hours and the Arcade Mode will keep you coming back if you enjoy that type of gameplay.

The game is worth a prod though because the feeling can’t be matched. It’s a classic game, with most of the best elements, tossed into a nifty hitch of a game ported over from the DS.

The budget price and quaint visual style makes Cogs as addictive and satisfying as the old-school toys it references. It'll certainly last longer than a ball-in-a-cup.

For a game that was created by just two students, it’s an accomplishment to be incredibly proud of and I know that I’ll be gifting a few of my friends this game throughout the year, even if it is only to drive them crazy with confusion too.

The Mad Ones is, at times, a compelling first step on this journey. However, whilst the episode excels in offering customization it is also quite regressive. Any attempt at a compelling narrative was lost under the weight of the other systems at play. I do hope this balance is righted in future episodes. If so a special game may evolve from this rocky starting point.

Despite this game more than likely being in a niche category to most people, it ends up being one of the best selections on the 3DS, and with all the great stuff you can do in it, it deserves all its praise.

Mulaka is not a perfect game, but it makes sure to show the uniqueness of the Tarahumara culture and demonstrate that Mexican culture can be interesting. Mulaka follows an entertaining story, with a good formula for its controls and mechanics, and while it may have some flaws, it isn’t anything that should spoil the overall experience. The sound and visuals match each other, letting the player become hypnotized in Mulaka‘s world until the game ends, which takes around 6-8 hours (depending if you want all the collectibles or not). Mulaka is a fun little game that I say is worth your time for anyone into action/adventure games.

It has its flaws, and is by no means the perfect game, but it is the perfect Wolverine-simulator, at least for the time being.

Confounding puzzles aside, “Fright of the Bumblebees” functions nicely as an adventure game for just about any audience or age group. The humor is varied, the gameplay is accessible, and the challenge is substantial without being frustrating.

Eufloria brings a much-needed minimalist take on the 'RTS' genre and does so quite well.

With its sandbox style approach to escaping, sometimes you might find yourself flapping in the wind and unsure what to do next. The pacing of the game has been improved since the first one, with less time spent waiting around. The 16-bit style visuals have also been given a nice step up, with the game overall looking and playing great.

In the end, it comes down to how well you can slug through the shallow and unchallenging tactics and the annoyingly drawn out battles to experience such fan-service love, its huge list of references, and its desire to bring a title for video game fans of things Japanese.

The best part of this adventure is the characters, with Ceville, Ambrosius, the undead pirate and the lisping demon all possessing the potential for further development. I would welcome them back in a slightly more humourus and random comedic sequel.

Still, if I had to name the thing I personally love the most about Cubello, it’d be the fact that it actually got me using my Wii again on a regular basis, after I’d previously lost all interest in it.

Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris is a solid follow up to Guardian of Light, but the sequel does not surprise as much the second time around, sticking closely to the same design with some slight tweaks around gear and the inclusion of a basic loot mechanic.

This game really only applies to the anime crowd, as it’s not for everyone, but if you are one of those few who don’t mind some questionable young ladies popping tits and ass in the air after each boss fight, then you will find a good, humorous dungeon crawler in Dungeon Travelers 2: The Royal Library & the Monster Seal.

Lords of the Fallen isn’t ashamed of cloning the mechanics of the Souls series to bring a different perspective on the genre.

Lego Batman 3: Beyond Gotham is another solid and humorous jump into the world of Lego and the DC universe. It has issues, such as sloppy AI and a sluggish start, but that aside, the game is packed with references pouring out of its ears.

It might only be worthwhile for a couple of months, but 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil is a solid, fun and good football game to fill in the downtime between World Cup matches.

It may be a fixed narrative with little alterations, but it’s still an interesting narrative, but should that fail at any point than this entire castle built by Telltale may collapse.

WWE2K16 is a game with so many various bugs that sometime soon sentient societies will rise up to worship them. If this does not bother you, and you can laugh away regular trips to the monster factory of technical horror, then maybe you will be able to find moments of joy in the substandard gameplay on show.

So should you buy this game? Well, that depends on your answer to two questions. First – do you have time on your hands? Second – are you willing to play one of the best RPGs ever? If so, take it from me – three weeks, two days, and 95 hours later, I'm still loving this game. You'll love the new upgrades to the original content, and don't be surprised if the game makes you rethink what you thought you enjoyed about RPGs.

In the end, Samurai Warriors 4-II is yet another Musou entry out of a dozen or so that hit every year. However, these button-mashing brawlers can still provide hours of entertainment for players who want to turn their brains off and enjoy some over-the-top action.

In the end, if you’re looking to pass the time by banging metal with metal and blowing stuff up, you can do far worse than what Gas Guzzlers Extreme is offering.

This is not just a wonderful experience but it is the perfect homage to the rich Disney heritage.

An essential play for any fan of George Lucas’ creation. Unfortunately, the gameplay feels a tad repetitive, un-ambitious and never quite lives up to the superb storytelling.

It is a promising start for this huge expansion, with a varied selection of tracks, some straightforward, some complex. It does seem weird the order they are in when it comes to the cup progression, and I do question why we need tracks that are designed as openers in the old games. If Booster Course Pass Wave 1 is the opener, I’d imagine as we get further into the release schedule, those selected will begin to showcase the bigger, larger and more complex tracks, and that makes me stoked. The expansion itself is easily worth it for Mario Kart fans. We are talking about doubling the number of tracks that were in the original Mario Kart 8 Deluxe release, meaning that we get to experience the fantastic Mario Kart 8 gameplay across a whole game worth of new tracks. With the price being as cheap as it is, it is a no brainer that Mario Kart fans should pick this up. A good first wave, so let’s see what Booster Course Pass Wave 2 brings.

I feel that Cladun Returns: This is Sengoku!’s repetitive issues will cause some people not to find any appeal in the game – you cannot get around the point that this game is driven by some grind and trial and error elements. If that gameplay loop doesn’t fit for certain people, then those will not have fun. For others, Cladun Returns: This is Sengoku! can offer a amusing challenge that scratches an addictive itch, but those will need to stomach some of its frustrations to find what makes it a good game and reap the rewarding gameplay after taking a few missteps inside its challenging dungeons.

With one episode behind me, I feel like the series may be too rough in far too many areas to heartily recommend to all, but regardless there is something compelling about it.

I found it a ton of fun and terribly addicting to the point where I just consumed it in about 2 days.

You can see glimpses of what could have been, but it is spoilt by some bad choices and a sloppy ending.

I’m not a fan of the system at all. But, if you can round-up a few amigos, order in some food and drinks, and pop this sucker in, I can guarantee you’ll be jumping up out of your seats in excitement and screaming with laughter more than any other game you can think of. This doesn’t mean I forgive it for being so shallow mode-wise, but what is there is damn good.

The sheer amount of things to do is a key factor that prevents it falling into the trap of the same old routines other space games have fallen into. X3 is deep, complex, insanely huge, annoyingly but yet rewarding.

If you really like puzzles and parkour mechanics, check this one out, otherwise you might not find what you’re looking for.

As unfortunate as all that sounds, Sayonara’s gameplay is still unchanged from its handheld release, and every bit as fun and polished.

In spite of it not being quite original, it’s an enjoyable effort all the same.

No More Heroes is still a great game, if a little inconsistent; dozens of inspired moments with the dullest sandbox world yet produced as the hub, sacrificing fun for drudgery, yet somehow getting away with it, a fast-paced action game, coupled with a frame rate volatile when you do anything too fast. This is a deeply flawed game but it is brilliant; overcoming a multitude of shortcomings and refusing to be crippled by its own flab.

Mahokenshi is a visually eye-catching and mechanically solid entry into the big world of deckbuilder games and brings in a mixture of elements that will appeal to not just card/deckbuilder fans, but people who also enjoy board games.

It’s challenging, interesting, funny and most importantly true to the brand.

Steam is looking to have a promising future for fans of Japanese role-playing games, and while Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth1 might not be the best of the bunch that people were hoping to see arrive on the platform, the game is still a good, light-hearted and comical RPG that does a good job of honouring and having fun in regards to the topic of video games, while also being given a wonderful performance boost from PC hardware.

Deck 13 took what they learnt from working on Lords of the Fallen and added their own ideas to allow The Surge to be more than a pure Dark Souls clone. The combat is fantastic, engaging, and features a neat limb target system, and the skill progression is refreshingly open to experimentation, but the overall experience is sadly hampered by the lack of enemy variety and a monotonous sci-fi location, which has so much potential wasted with the current industrial environment. Even with those faults, The Surge is a better game than Lords of the Fallen, and one that I can recommend to fans of the popularised action RPG subgenre, because there is a good, fun experience to be had with The Surge, and some of its unique ideas bring solid additions to From Software’s concrete formula.

The frantic and exhaustive action is still there and looks better than ever, but you are now required to take extended breaks for the sake of sanity.

Design choices made by the limited hardware this title originates from hinder the overall game, stopping it short of greatness, but this is still one Final Fantasy that RPG fans should find time for, as joining in education with Class Zero is a jolly experience.

Featuring a cute artsy style, cartoon-like in its appearance and with sharp, colourful and detailed vista's, chick, chick, BOOM! Is a party-game worth picking up for the Wii. Purely because it does what it sets out to do, and does this wonderfully. It doesn't aim to reinvent the wheel, but what it does give you is refined and simply 'pure-unadulterated fun' and that is what you want when you want to have a quick game when you have friends round. But if you are a 'solo-player', it also has quite a bit for you to do too!

It strikes me as ironic that the game is named Overlord when really the minions are the stars of the show.

It sounds like I am being hard on Return to PopoloCrois, but that is because I am a little disappointed with Return to PopoloCrois and how it doesn’t blend the two things I enjoy (RPGs and Harvest Moon) in a way that sets a good example for both properties involved.

While you might not come out this game’s 40+ hour adventure with memories of the plot, you will remember the heroes, their fights and the lovely music that wraps it up to signal this as the best Tales of game since Tales of Vesperia hit the Xbox 360 back in 2009.

It's not up to Mario Kart standards, but for a family get together it's an entertaining alternative that sits well with all ages.

It's a good game and the zero gravity gameplay is innovative; Shattered Horizon just lacks that extra oomph of content – be it more weapons, character classes, RPG style upgrades or even vehicle sections - to improve longevity.

It might not be to everyone’s tastes, but it makes a whole bunch of interesting and bold design decisions, and I guarantee you’ve not played anything quite like it. For those reasons alone, it gets a glowing recommendation.

Mothergunship is hectic, fast and feels very 90s, and if that is something that tickles your fancy, then there is no wrong in picking up Mothergunship and having a blast with its bullet-hell, roguelike, insane gun crafting blend of action until you become sick of it, at that point, hours will have passed and many robots will have gave their life for your frantic enjoyment.

The Glaive works well and is rather satisfying to use but this is offset by the old school use of ammo crates and parts of levels being sealing off, making it as linear as they come.

It is a unique mismatch of ideas, and that is what makes it so uniquely appealing, and very much worth giving a go.