It deserves to be noticed too; it’s not the greatest ‘Monster Hunter’ game out there, but it is gorgeous and has a lot of interesting, unique ideas going for it.

Thanks to a deep narrative, exquisite morality mechanics that make every decision equally weighty and meaningful, and sublime characters, inXile has given the game a genuine shot of living up to the legacy of one of the greatest games of all time.

I could perhaps recommend this game to those looking for a crushingly difficult dual stick shooting game. It’s humorous at times and it does have some personality to it. It is the kind of game that could be brilliant with a few tweaks here and there, but presented as it, I do find it difficult to recommend to most people.

Whether it released in 2017 or 1989, Warlock’s Tower would be a timeless classic. It explores rudimentary puzzle elements everyone should be familiar with and, armed with a deep understanding of why they work, introduces a meaningful wrinkle. In a game industry that often relies on deceptively shallow open worlds and filler for the sake of content to market, sometimes we need to take a step back and recognise that one grainy little monochrome screen can hold volumes.

With great music, satisfying gameplay and a lot of replay value, Chime Sharp is definitely a puzzler worth your time. It’s a colourful journey through a world of vibrant melodies, with a degree of challenge sure to test even the most seasoned of genre fans. Whether you’re looking for short bursts of play or an afternoon of high-score hunting, Chime Sharp is not to be missed.

hat is important to any great visual novel is that it has great writing, and the Danganronpa games are by turns hilarious, reflective, intense and jovial, the characters are all unique and interesting, and the twists and turns are often startling. Visual novels just don’t get better than these.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has taken over A Link to the Past as my favourite game in the entire Zelda series. Therefore, Breath of the Wild has become what I consider to be the greatest game I have ever played. It does not have the narrative depth of other games reviewed on this site, but it is the first open-world game since the original Legend of Zelda that successfully tells the player to take it at their own pace (without feeling like you should be doing something else).

What could have been something lasting, something real, is instead a two dimensional narrative which brandishes plot twists and visual trickery to camouflage a lack of rich storytelling. Nonetheless, I would still highly recommend Stories Untold to writers and game developers: there are ideas in the first few episodes which are fascinating, and I’m dying to see where No Code’s metafictive experimentation might take the text adventure genre.

These are really minor complaints, though, when stacked against the fact that Atelier Firis took me back to the innocence and joy in those Arland games that got me interested in the series in the first place. Most importantly, given that this is the first time that he’s helmed the creative side of an Atelier title, Shinichi Yoshiike has proven himself to be a confident and safe pair of hands to shape the series into the future. As such, I expect that this series will continue to remain my favourite among the more traditional JRPG franchises out there.

The gameplay loops that New Frontier Days offers are addictive and it's easy to get dragged into watching the town build over a period of hours, but the $13 or so that the game asks upfront is about $11 more than I've ever been suckered into paying for one of these games when they're free-to-play on mobile (I got a little too hooked and enthusiastic on Sim City BuildIt once, so sue me).

Sadly, I found later levels lost a lot of the game's early steam, as too much of the old "pixel perfect" platforming starts to creep in.

This really is as no-frills as games come, and is priced to match.

That gorgeous big screen makes for an incredible display of the game's endless winter, and if you're in the mood for the big television experience, you need only dock the console once you're back at home. The added benefit is that the game doesn't tax the Switch's battery anywhere near as badly as games like Zelda does, and I've been able to use the game to make train trips absolutely bearable with a good pair of headphones, for both the trip and the return.

Put simply, NieR: Automata is the greatest game ever made. It’s not just that it is the deepest and most narratively potent game ever developed - and it is a truly deep narrative experience - but more than that, Yoko Taro has finally found perhaps the developer on the planet capable of doing his visionary work justice. This game is a true, genuine work of art, and anyone who wants to prove that gaming does possess an equivalent to the greatest novels, operas, theatre plays, or paintings, now has that very game to point to. Yoko Taro is gaming’s Shakespeare, Da Vinci, and Welles, all rolled into one.

The misfortune here for Nintendo EAD is that party games need to be accessible and appealing to a mass audience, but 1-2-Switch settles for a very specific demographic and all but alienates the rest. For that reason, it’s not a purchase I would recommend; it would have been better as a "free" pack in so that people would get the chance to try it for themselves before deciding on whether it had any long-term longevity for them.

This is an exceptional port of a hugely underrated game. The character art is one of the most critical features in the game, and on the much larger PC screen the art is vibrant, detailed, and attractive. This alone really makes Monster Monpiece’s PC port the definitive version. Hopefully this is not the last we see of Compile Heart producing CCGs.

It’s still the same cosy time and resource management simulation we fell in love with decades ago, but Story of Seasons: Trio of Towns stands out from the pack in understated ways. Its gentle but omnipresent plot functions in tandem with a broader perspective of agriculture to serve up one of the more distinct entries in this long-running franchise.

Unlike Nintendo's Mini NES retro console that was released last year, this is a more difficult package to recommend to people that didn’t grow up playing the games. I don’t think there’s been a better effort to archive the games on the Atari 2600 and bring them to modern players, but I just don’t think the people used to complex worlds, storytelling and gameplay that we have today will understand the value of these older games. But older players may well get a kick out of playing Basic Math again, to remind them of just how hard it was to act out excitement on that Christmas day when their parents thought they had found the perfect gift.

Unlike Nintendo's Mini NES retro console that was released last year, this is a more difficult package to recommend to people that didn’t grow up playing the games. I don’t think there’s been a better effort to archive the games on the Atari 2600 and bring them to modern players, but I just don’t think the people used to complex worlds, storytelling and gameplay that we have today will understand the value of these older games. But older players may well get a kick out of playing Basic Math again, to remind them of just how hard it was to act out excitement on that Christmas day when their parents thought they had found the perfect gift.

For Honor takes some risks and creates a new property that I'd love to see more of in the future. Unfortunately, there is this impression that perhaps Ubisoft was not entirely confident in this first outing. The online modes are fun enough, but they can get grindy and their lack of depth begins to show after a time. This when coupled with the lack of dedicated servers leaves For Honor feeling somewhat incomplete, despite some beautiful environments and engaging combat.

It’s about enjoying the moment, even if it might not lead to a happily ever after, and at least giving love a chance to blossom.

Sniper Elite 4 focuses on a handful of things that it does very well, and the overall experience is one that I enjoyed. This is a more thoughtful, slower burning pace than the typical shooter, though it is punctuated by moments of intense action that stand out more because they are highlights and not a constant drone of gunfire and running. That being said, the series on the whole has room to grow and is probably overdue to put some more effort into its story and perhaps add a few more wrinkles to the overall gameplay as well.

The Warlock of Firetop Mountain is clearly just the start, and it’s a clever, rich one. It’s a game that is steeped in layer after layer of nostalgia, and it would be silly to suggest that it’s not important that you are old enough to have that nostalgia for these kinds of experiences before the game will really click with you; but all the age demographic statistics out there suggest that there are more than enough people of around my age playing games on their iPad and would find real nostalgic joy in adding this to their library.

It takes a familiar, played-out sci-fi story and uses mechanics and interactivity to give it a fresh, insightful spin. It’s not as nuanced a take as this sort of story needs, but you can’t argue with how well Divide’s approach works at its best.

In part I’m disappointed, because a hardcore simulation about exploring uncharted oceans in search of new land would be a fascinating game, but at the same time the simple, clean charm of Neo Atlas is really difficult to resist, especially when I’m in the mood to play something low-pressure while catching up on my movie or television backlog.

What’s really hard to shake about Berserk is the feeling that Koei applied the wrong template to it. With the Nioh engine now having proven itself, I would rather Koei had held onto the IP a little longer and married Berserk’s dark narrative to Nioh’s gameplay structure.

On a whole, Digimon World: Next Order isn’t a bad experience. It does take some time in order to get used to the flow of the game, and to deal with its irritations, but once you're there, you're in for what might potentially be a very addictive grind indeed.

The creative team needs to find writers willing to back up the narrative context with a story that has meat, and the gameplay designers need to dare do things differently to what has come before. Horizon is a remarkably refined and technically brilliant game, but Guerrilla has yet to prove that it can take that next step and produce a genuine classic.

The campaign tells a safe narrative that is made more impressive by the intimacy of the gameplay. The multiplayer Blitz mode may not be for everyone, but between it, and the rest of the multiplayer, there's enough there to keep people going for quite some time.

It does seem as though Arc System Works were relying entirely on the nostalgia to sell Double Dragon IV. And while it captures the essence of those original games it falls short of being a good game today simply because the original hasn’t aged well. It would have been pretty rockin' back in the 80s though.

If the developers had been content to just play to the game’s strengths as an adventure game, Uncanny Valley could have been something really good. Sadly, the shoehorning in of dull “survival horror” pulls the rug out from under that potential.

Management games are, of course, incredibly niche, but as SEGA's Football Manager series has proven, there's a lot of potential in there for these games to also be utterly life-consuming. Is Franchise Hockey Manager 3 up to that standard? No quite, but it's on the right path.

Firefighters: The Simulation is a long way from being a great game, and in the state that its in now, I wouldn’t even call it a good game. But if you can look past its flaws, you’ll find a framework for something quite fascinating. I just hope that updates, or maybe a sequel, eventually do that framework justice. I’d love to see what a truly finished version of Firefighters: The Simulation would look like.

I cannot emphasise enough how captivating A Normal Lost Phone is.

Dragon Quest VIII isn’t the perfect port in coming to the 3DS. It is, however, very close to the perfect classical JRPG.

Nioh is a better game than what From Software has achieved.

While I appreciate the idea behind making a Power Rangers game that taps into nostalgia, I can't help but feel that the Power Rangers property can - and should - do far better with the brawler genre.

Knee Deep isn’t a terrible game, nor is it as ground-breaking as it wants to be. It definitely gives a unique spin on the interactive drama genre, and it does tell a somewhat dark, noir inspired tale. Folks who approach this as anything other than a slightly more interactive Visual Novel are going to be disappointed, though, and given that it was more pitched towards adventure game fans, I think there might be a few people that are disappointed with their purchase here.

This might mean that VR games never fit in with the current expectations of non-VR games, but when they’re stuff like Dexed, I don’t mind in the slightest. This is a game that focuses on immersion, and immersive it is. Simple gameplay loops give players a reason to keep coming back and playing more, but what will stay with you for far longer is just how beautiful it all is.

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is a game that really struggles to find the new voice that Resident Evil so needs as a franchise. It’s incredibly well designed and executed, and you’re not going to find a game that does VR better than this one. But it’s a confused game, sending out all kinds of mixed messages that suggest the development team - and especially the writers - have a better idea of what makes for horrific imagery than they do of horror as a storytelling genre. As a real fan of horror, and someone who has studied it for years, this is what doesn’t sit so well with me.

I alternated between enjoyment and stretches of indifference. I am genuinely glad, though, that we have this addition to our growing Western library of visual novel hybrids (!).

Even as a dedicated single player game, Dynasty Warriors: Godseekers is one of the best games available on the platform. It’s just so perfectly balanced, invigorating, intelligent, and rich.

Joe’s Diner could have been a good game. It has a lot of the pieces for a heart-attack inducing horror game, with its eerie setting and mechanics that force you to make your sense vulnerable. If it did something – anything – with its burial ground plot, it could have told a noteworthy story, or at least an interesting one. Instead, all it does is exploit stereotypes to deliver the weakest Twitch scares I’ve ever seen.

Ultimately, what makes Earthlock so essential is just how earnest it is in its love for classic JRPGs. It’s worth sitting through its more cumbersome features in order to appreciate the hard work that a team of people who clearly love the genre have sweated over to refine the game to the point where it’s not only a homage to the greats of old, but it adds just a little to what makes the genre so wonderful.

Why a small team thought it could make a grand open-world RPG is beyond me, but Skylight Freerange 2 demonstrates the horrible consequences of vastly overreaching what your resources and skill level allow. Full props to the developers for trying - the game is oddly fascinating in just how badly it has failed -, but make no bones about this, if the screenshots and video haven’t proven it to you: this game is an utter travesty.

Top that all off with vehicles that control like flies trapped in syrup, a gross lack of interesting weapons, and only a couple of different vehicle types. Once you’ve had your fill of laughing at Planet 2000’s low-budget oddities, you’re left with a mess of a game that’s just tedious to play.

This is the most disappointed that I’ve been with Square Enix for quite some time.

What stands out most about The Flame in the Flood is that its form of survival isn’t candied up, but sits severe and plain about what chance most of us would have. It’s second even to the slice of America it presents, a piece of a soul set upon a shelf, hoping to be called upon once more. If nothing else, The Flame in The Flood allows that piece to have its moment with sincerity.

Stars in Shadow is a really solid strategy title, and that it comes from a new indie team makes the title's accomplishments all the more impressive. However, this is a game built by a small team and there are some technical hurdles, a lack of multiplayer and a simple presentation that hold the game back slightly. The different parts of the game are well balanced against one another, with different types of victory and multiple ways to get there.

It’s been a while since I’ve played through a proper horror game and became so invested in the “villains” of the tale.

If Velvet’s party of anti-heroes were written by lesser writers, the thirst for revenge would have tired us out far too early; revenge is a state of mind of heightened emotion and impact, and over the course of a full-length JRPG the passion and anger would have boiled over far too soon. But, thanks to brilliant characterisation and the ability to throw some genuine humour and moments of softness into the mix, the team at Bandai Namco has been able to deliver one of the most refreshingly nuanced quests that we’ve seen in this series, and for the first time in a very long time, I haven’t been able to put a Tales game down.

Moekuri is a hardcore tactical RPG wrapped in ultra-cute packaging. It's a bit rough around the edges, and the difficulty curve will probably alienate a lot of folks, but if you can look past those things you’ll find a lot of depth and enjoyment.

For all its humour, its intelligent noirish thriller narrative, and the sheer amount of stuff to do, Yakuza’s real strength forever remains in the little details that it gets right about its representation of Japanese cities... Every Yakuza game to date has been a genuine classic, and Yakuza 0 continues the fine form for a series of JRPGs that is right up there with the best of the genre. It’s completely essential.

It’s more a concession to the fans who bought the first two on the Vita than anything else, I suspect, and I’d be surprised if Koei expected this to make any kind of money, but it is a good gesture by the company to allow us to finish our collection for Atelier games on the go.

It’s made me into a fan of Fate. If that’s not a sign of a quality game, then nothing is.

In the tradition of Worms Forts it’s an intriguing base-building strategy game, and the real-time nature of it solves one of the bigger issues of Worms Forts: that it could be bogged down to almost stalemate, making games drag on for ages. That being said, the game does need a lot more than what it’s offering, and as with all indie games, I wonder about the wisdom of making the game so heavily reliant on multiplayer. When players have to wait around for however long just to get a game going, they’re just as likely to go and play something else instead.

Many people may simply look at King’s Quest and think it’s cashing in on an old series and taking advantage of the revival of point and clickers. It is so much more. The Odd Gentlemen is such a small team, but Creative Director Matt Corba should be given some sort of award for his work with this game. He, and his team, handled the canon of the previous games beautifully, while managing to weave an entirely new and just as endearing storyline into it. The team might not have had an IP like The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones to work with, but King’s Quest does everything right.

Gravity Rush 2 deserves to be one of Sony’s biggest games of the year. Even if you weren’t able to get into the first, give this one a go. The story’s self-contained enough that you’ll still be able to follow along, and in the effort to make the game more accessible to a wider audience, the overall experience is also more refined and there’s clearly a meatier budget backing it.

Barring performance, predictable design and somewhat low production values, Bridge Constructor is still by all means a proficient puzzle game. Successfully latticing wood and metal and cabling to ferry lorries across a steep ravine feels great, and especially if you managed to cut costs and earn a high score. Furthermore, mechanics and optimisation which encourage player experimentation and reward creative thinking makes Bridge Constructor a satisfying journey for puzzle fans on the PS4.

Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA Future Tone is the holy grail of an already illustrious franchise. For existing fans of the virtual idol, this isn’t just some greatest hits album. Plenty of formerly arcade-exclusive tracks are available on console for the first time. Newcomers, meanwhile, are positively spoiled for choice and couldn't ask for a better time to start the franchise.

Hatsune Miku: Project DIVA Future Tone is the holy grail of an already illustrious franchise. For existing fans of the virtual idol, this isn’t just some greatest hits album. Plenty of formerly arcade-exclusive tracks are available on console for the first time. Newcomers, meanwhile, are positively spoiled for choice and couldn't ask for a better time to start the franchise.

I don’t think a couple more branching points would have gone amiss, but even as a strictly linear visual novel, LoveKami -Divinity Stage- is a great game. It touches on some serious themes around idol culture and sexuality, but mostly, it’s just a cute, sexy romantic comedy to get the heart pumping.

The best, most well-resourced developers in the world would struggle to make a quality simulation game with online sharing, VR support, and the ability to fully explore and interact with your creations. This is the work of a small indie developer that should have focused on getting a few things right, than throwing in everything and failing at it all.

Nubla is a work of art based on many other works of art. It is able to capture the feel of the very museum it is based on, it allows anyone to come along and pick it up. The ability to explore the game at their own pace without dragging out too long is appreciated. It is a beautiful, calming game that many should try out. Many will probably buy it for the quick Platinum trophy, but hopefully once they're in they discover something that makes them sit back and reflect too.

It’s difficult to shake the feeling that Atari’s management felt guilty for foisting the hellishly bad free-to-play Rollercoaster Tycoon 4 on fans, and RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic is its apology for doing so. This is an excessive game with almost too much content and replay value, and is devilishly difficult to put down once you start playing.

On the whole, Nitroplus Blasterz Heroines Infinite Duel is a quality 2D fighter, even if it lacks the narrative in needed and the characterisation that would have made it more effective as fanservice. All I can recommend is that you give the game a chance until you've managed to topple the boss, because from that point on you'll probably find yourself with a game that has a combat system you'll quite enjoy.

Industry Giant II is a game that I would recommend in a heartbeat, as it’s a fascinating simulation of the fascinating production and logistics processes in economics. It’s also highly educational, both in its approach to gameplay and its actual presentation, and I’m a big fan of games that do that. But all of it is for nought if you’ve just spent a weekend slowly building up a commercial empire, only to have a bug corrupt your save file and make you lose all that progress.

Xmas Shooting is a delightful little game, and a great way to get into the spirit of the holidays. For the hardcore shoot ‘em up fans, it won’t bring anything new to the table, but it has plenty of challenge and fun to offer in a bite-sized package. Despite the difficulty, I'd even recommend it to people who don’t normally like the genre. The sense of silly fun and surprisingly poignant story are reason enough to give Xmas Shooting a go and try to overcome the challenges that it throws at you.

There’s a lot to admire about We Sing. It’s a perfectly accessible karaoke game that comes with plenty of content and, in allowing ten people to play at once, it’s a perfect party title. Obviously your own mileage will depend on how much you enjoy singing, but hey, we all belt out some great performances in the shower, and this is just an extension of that. This is well worthwhile picking up if you've got a New Year's party to host, or attend.

Planet Coaster is everything I could want in a simulation game of this type. Good management tools, good building tools, and most of all, it is extremely fun to play. It's the best amusement park simulation we've seen yet, and any complaints that you might have with the variety of rides that it offers are mitigated brilliantly by the use of Steam Workshop to allow the community to broaden the experience. In this way Planet Coaster feels both nostalgic and yet eminently modern.

The unfortunate thing about Battalion Commander is that if it was one of those free-to-play mobile games, I’d probably have fun with it I could see some others even enjoying it enough to toss it a couple of coins in support. Sitting on trains or in doctor's waiting rooms, or standing in queues, I often go to my phone to keep me occupied and this kind of game would have fit the bill perfectly. But if I am to sit in front of my PlayStation 4, I’m not going to want to play something that requires minimal effort, no narrative and five minutes of my time. Simple as that.

The most disappointing thing for me, though, is what’s probably the least of Space Overlords' worries: it just doesn't feel right, on that primal level that action games generally tap into. Despite the title, playing the game made me feel small and weak – not just because of the mechanical hindrances, but because of the lack of any sort of feedback.

Most tellingly, though, the frustration of trying to find a green cursor highlight amongst dozens of balls of the same colour is quite possibly the most insane thing to overlook that I've ever seen done in a puzzle game.

Zen Studios is by far the most proficient developer of digital pinball out there. I don’t think there can be any debate about that. But the studio has utterly outdone itself with Pinball FX 2 VR, to the point where I can’t actually see myself playing pinball outside of VR going forward.

This game’s obvious new feature is its HD art, and, more than just being beautiful, the ability of this art to enhance the characters and world makes Shantae: Half-Genie Hero the most impressive take on the whole fantasy Middle East setting since the utterly brilliant Prince of Persia: Sands of Time.

Despite its short runtime, Feist feels like the video game equivalent of being pushed over and kicked repeatedly without respite.

Rome: Total War on iPad is an absolutely cracking game that further establishes the tablet platform as the go-to place for strategy gaming on the go. Now we just need to get a proper Civilization (perhaps a port of the second), and a Europa Universalis onto my iPad and I'll be one truly happy camper.

Crystal Rift possesses all the potential in the world, and I certainly hope the game performs well enough that the development team is able to go back to the drawing board and come up with a more comprehensive and nuanced structure for another crack at the VR dungeon crawler.

Laser Disco Defenders is missing a lot of components from being a phenomenal game or even a fantastic top down shooter. Some of the groundwork laid by the developers leaves room for excitement, but there just isn’t enough carefully crafted content to back up the solid mechanics. It’s a dance which ends too soon, and it comes as a hard recommendation.

Dead Rising 4 takes a few steps forward in terms of the gameplay mechanics, but also takes a giant zombie-infected shamble backwards in regards to the narrative elements. Taking away the ticking clock, making the maniacs nothing more than a mere annoyance instead of the stuff of nightmares, and having civilians easily rescued really pulled away from what I liked in the previous games. Dead Rising 4 is fun, but it’s also a little hollow and it’s lost a significant chunk of the series’ soul.

Like any sort of anti-art, it shatters the foundations of the medium so that we can look at those pieces, in isolation, and understand their value as a whole. It throws a spanner into the whole argument around games as art, paradoxically affirming the artistic merits of the medium in a way that few other games ever have.

SMT IV: Apocalypse is a really smart and thoughtful game on the wrong platform entirely, for what it wants to offer. It’s easy to spot the compromises to the vision that the development team needed to make to have it all fit the platform, and while it’s still an essential title, it’s difficult to sit back and not wonder just how much more it could have been.

There’s a premise with a lot of potential in enigma, but it’s squandered on cliche characters, uneven pacing, and rough localisation.

Clockwork Tales’ inconsistent tone, lack of self-awareness, and generally poor presentation let down an otherwise standard example of the genre, which means you’ll need to be a really big genre fan to derive much value from this.

There are dozens and dozens of different elemental monsters to discover, and that’s half the joy of the game. The other half is the bright charm and personality of Alchemic Jousts. It’s not the deepest strategy game you’ll ever play, but it’s one of the most charming that you’ll see for some time to come.

It’s also a horribly, horribly plain looking game. Because each level plays out on a single screen panel, there’s a lack of a sense of scale, which is generally appreciated in a strategy game. Environments look like they were done in ten minutes in Microsoft Paint, too. This kind of game flies by okay as a little mobile time waster, but a PlayStation 4 experience needs to offer much more than this.

All of this would be almost okay if 4 Elements also wasn’t one of the most unrelentingly plain-looking games, with terrible sprites representing enemies, and bland level design to back it up.

What Mario Maker on the 3DS has forgotten is that one of the key reasons to make games is to have other people play them.

Let It Die is of exceedingly high quality for a free-to-play title; it’s dozens of GB in download size and looks and feels every bit an example of a higher-end game from Japan. It’s also far too reasonable on the microtransactions and asking players for money. It’s possible to speed up progress through the game by paying real money, or preserve a favoured character that's just perished but the incentives for doing that are low, particularly when anyone who is inclined to enjoy a roguelike is not going to have any issues with a grind, or re-starting games from scratch after a character dies.

Calling All Units doesn’t set out to do anything new, it’s pretty much an online only version of Need for Speed: Pursuit. The new mechanics of chasing down others online with a group of others is indeed fun, and for the most part the online does work. The story does nothing exciting whatsoever, but it does teach the new mechanics and how they work.

The overriding focus of any point-and-click adventure game has to be on the excellence of the story, well fleshed-out characters, as well as puzzles that are germane to the story and enhance it. On all these counts, I believe Demetrios delivers, notwithstanding a few minor stumbles. It is particularly welcome on the Vita platform, which lacks a wider range of games in this genre. The game runs smoothly with minimal loading times, and the bubble icon looks very cool indeed, to boot.

Because I was so emotionally invested in the game, I started to lose time while I was playing it. I don’t think it’s an overly long game, but I do think that its length will be wholly dependent on how good you are at understanding its logic and puzzles. It wouldn’t matter if it was over in an hour, though. The game is deep, meaningful, and powerful. It’s reflective, different, and beautiful. It may well end up being more divisive than Ueda’s previous masterpieces, but that doesn’t mean it’s not a masterpiece, from one of the industry’s true auteurs. Play this game. Even if you hate it, it’s going to broaden your horizons around what games are truly capable of.

Fun, as the rhythm portions and the soundtracks that they use mesh well together. But let's not pull punches about this; this is a game that is going to be exclusively of interest to existing fans of Senran Kagura, and who are also fans of rhythm games. It's not going to convert anyone to the franchise, and unlike the likes of Persona 4 Dancing All Night, it's also not meaty enough as a rhythm game to appeal to people who aren't already deeply involved in the genre. It's pure fanservice.

This simply isn't true. The thematic depth and cultural context of the game make for a wonderful, complex, and meaningful narrative, and FFXV is every bit as worthy as a narrative work as Stand By Me, from which it draws so much inspiration. Couple this with the fact that it's a surprisingly traditional Final Fantasy game in the ways that count, and I've got to say I haven’t loved a Final Fantasy game with such raw passion in many years.

Experience the game with the mindset of wanting to get lost in a virtual world, though, and you’ll be pleasantly surprised by Hollow Realization’s hidden charms.

Dragon Ball: Fusions takes a familiar tale and style of play and decides to mix the whole formula up. Some aspects of the formula work better than others, but the end result is still an enjoyable experience that takes an overly well-known property and manages to make it fresh in several ways.

Playing Exile’s End involves a lot more aimless running around than it should. It’s frustrating because these are all problems that have been solved as the Metroidvania genre’s developed over the years. When it’s allowed to shine, it’s a wonderful game that almost rivals the original Metroid, I just wish it didn't spend so much time getting in its own way out of a commitment to dated ideas about difficulty.

For strategy gaming veterans, Motorsport Manager will just feel right. There are a myriad of meaningful choices embedded into each part of the game, meaning that lovers of micromanagement will find themselves at home in Playsport Games’ take on the manager genre.