South of Midnight is a tremendous display of artistry, even if its gameplay doesn't hit the same heights.

Hot Wheels Unleashed 2: Turbocharged enhances the original's formula in every possible way.

Zenless Zone Zero is at its best when it's delivering stylish action over puzzles.

Graceful movement and jaw-dropping fights against colossal monsters make Solar Ash a worthy follow-up to Hyper Light Drifter. [Recommended]

Immortals Fenyx Rising merges the best and worst of Ubisoft games with The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

With As Dusk Falls, Interior Night and Xbox Game Studios are testing the limits of what an interactive narrative adventure game can be. It's certainly odd for this to be one of the biggest Xbox exclusives of 2022, but it keenly demonstrates that there's still a lot that developers can do to innovate within a genre that seems limited at first glance.

Sniper Elite 5 is an increasingly rare WWII game that actually does something new with the conflict. While its story has nothing new to say and its commitment to history can be a burden on its creative potential, its open-ended missions make for a devilishly enjoyable stealth action game. Its excessive violence can be a little hard to stomach, even for the most hardened gamers, but you can’t have a guilty pleasure without a heaping helping of self-indulgence.

American Arcadia turns The Truman Show into an interactive indie thriller you don't want to miss.

Tales of Kenzera: Zau is more effective as a moving reflection on grief than as a Metroidvania.

The Brave and Default combat system strikes a near-perfect balance between two rival battle mechanics that have struggled to coexist over the decades, but that’s about the extent of the game’s individuality. Beyond that, it features a comically overused premise, music that’s simply remixed to suit your current locale, countless dungeons that offer no new experiences and only serve to pad the game’s supposed worth, and an overall gameplay loop that’s worn out before the end of the first chapter. Besides looking a bit nicer on newer hardware, the reason for this sequel’s existence isn’t clear.

If you are looking for a fresh new multiplayer arena shooter experience, LawBreakers is great at blazing its own zero-g path, and does so at a $30 “budget” price. That’s if you’re looking. With more open-ended multiplayer shooters available than ever, you may be fine with the shooter you’ve got.

Tchia pays tribute to New Caledonia with a gorgeous open-world game that takes the right notes from Breath of the Wild.

Super Monkey Ball: Banana Mania should include everything fans love about the series: Skill-based difficulty, great music, fun minigames, and excellent replayability with a good group of buddies by your side. Unfortunately, this collection feels like a rushed remake that throws out the precise controls and stellar music of the original titles. The charm and fun gameplay of the original games are still there, but this remake doesn’t feel like much of an improvement over the classics.

For those who harbor warm nostalgia for the Game Boy Advance era, Mario vs. Donkey Kong is a fun and faithful remake with some solid new puzzles and an unexpectedly terrific soundtrack. It’s an odd choice for a revisit, though, as the first-draft puzzles and rigid movement of the original release poke through the Switch version’s modern façade. It’s less of an exciting new Switch game and more like something light to hold Nintendo fans over while they wait for a shiny new console.

World of Goo 2 is the meta sequel that the eccentric puzzle classic deserves.

While it has its quirks, Weird West is a bit of storytelling spectacle that seems to have been hand-crafted for diehard RPG fans.

A solid shooter standing atop fan service and nostalgia.

Revenge of the Savage Planet plays its open-world formula safe, but it shows its teeth where it matters.

With a slow plot and uninteresting characters, Dying Light 2: Stay Human's few redeeming qualities are what sets the franchise apart from other zombie games out there.

The 7th Guest VR is haunted by clumsy motion controls, but satisfying puzzle design keeps this 90s PC remake alive.

The Evil Within 2 overhauls every aspect of the original to create a surprisingly adept sequel that makes us a hungry for more. Both gunplay and stealth have been refined and lend themselves well to the restrained open world format. Its surprisingly heartfelt narrative and many twist and turns round out the experience.

12 Minutes is something unique and experimental, and like any experiment, there are going to be some hiccups. As it turns out, this game’s main fault was that it, by its nature, rips time from its players. But between those moments, it tells a brilliant story, one in which you can go back to any chapter and decide to do a rewrite. 12 Minutes certainly won’t be for everyone, but if you’re looking for a change of pace, the game comes recommended highly.

Rise of the Ronin has an excellent parrying system that makes its Soulslike gameplay feel challenging, yet fair compared to its contemporaries.

WarioWare: Get It Together's character-swapping gimmick adds unnecessary confusion to a perfectly enjoyable microgame collection.

By locking away the other two monster classes at the beginning, Evolve needlessly gates off completely different styles of play that new players will want to experiment with immediately, if only to get a feel for competition. Even in the case of the hunters, the slow leveling and unlocking of new skills, perks, and characters feels needlessly complex in what could have been a simpler and more approachable game.

Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: The Game — Complete Edition is a much-needed re-release that faithfully preserves the long lost original. The outdated beat-’em-up combat and light features may not live up to fans’ almost mythological memory, but just being able to find that out is a victory in its own right.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II doesn't quite live up to the heights set by the game it reboots, but it's still great for those just looking for some fun online shootouts.

There isn’t a AAA game out there that doesn’t exist to make money, but Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel stumps for dollars in a brazenly insipid way. It’s a paint-by-numbers effort, almost from top to bottom.