Visually vibrant, and with a superb, deep range of music, Akihabara - Feel the Rhythm Remixed is one of the better ports from mobile to console. It's just unfortunate for the game that 2018 threw up both a brilliant entry in the Lumines series, as well as the majestic Tetris Effect. A year ago Akihabara would have come across as something vibrant and fresh. As it stands now, it instead looks and plays like a lesser homage to its peers.

The environment and the art style work well together to create a tense experience, yet this tension however is lost with a somewhat simple approach to game design, a shame to what is a quality horror game.

As confusing as it is that this game happened at all, I loved having the chance to play it. Akiba's Trip: Hellbound & Debriefed might look like a game that should have stayed on the PSP, but the satire and humour is there, the grainy rendition of Akihabara is still enough to make this homesick otaku miss Japan, and the action remains on the right side of simple and entertaining that you can enjoy it while it lasts. Akiba's Trip isn't going to win GOTY awards, but I sure enjoyed collecting a big pile of skirts.

Though there’s less direct threat when compared to more mainstream horror titles, there’s an intensity to that environment that helps to create a wonderfully sinister atmosphere. It’s not an essential horror game, but it’s a genuinely ripping yarn.

The Sly Trilogy is still a very good collection and if you can ignore the slight issues with the compressed videos and sound, you will have a wonderful time.

Martyr succeeds in giving players an action RPG experience that manages to combine the action of a 'Diablo clone' with the Warhammer 40K license. It has a great skills system that's tied to the equipment you use, rather than just the experience level, and that makes playing around with the copious amounts of loot that you'll be earning very enjoyable. If only the execution of the game were as consistent and reliable as the design, and if only the developers had have put more effort into the optimisation for console.

Slap Them All is by no means perfect. It's shallow, even by genre standards, lacks the all-but mandatory four-player option, has been balanced for two players to the point that it doesn't really work as a single-player game, and fails to give players any reason to give it a second go once powered through. And yet at the same time, it is the best use of the beloved Asterix & Obelix property that we have seen in years and for us long-suffering Asterix & Obelix fans, for that reason alone Slap Them All is a gift.

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

That ending notwithstanding, Kona is a trip worth taking. It’s a beautiful, moody showcase of the snowy wilds of northern Canada, and a slow-burning mystery steeped in atmosphere. Play it for the journey, not the destination.

Monster Train does indeed deserve to be noticed; it's the epitome of something that is better than it looks. Underneath that blandly homogenised aesthetic and equally bland promise of yet more roguelike lies a game that offers players some deep, invigorating, challenging and rewarding turn-based strategy. You may well find this one very difficult to put down.

It delivers a palatable story with reliable combat and predictable but comedic character development, so in a way, it really ticks the boxes of what a decent (but dated) JRPG should be. However, a host of quality of life improvements would have been a good way to ensure that players don’t get too bogged down in the execution of the mundane.

It’s unfortunate that Sand Land isn’t quite up to the standard that one of Japan’s all-time great artists deserves. It’s not that it’s a bad game. It’s very entertaining, especially when you start messing around with the tank battles. It’s just nothing more than a well-made licensed tie-in, something that you’ll forget soon after you play it, and never feel the need to return to. It really does look great, though. Akira Toriyama is going to be missed.

A handful of technical hiccups mixed with an aggressive monetisation strategy could very well leave a questionable taste in peoples' mouths.

Fearless Fantasy tried something different and it more than worked well. It's a great satire of the whole JRPG genre, while also managing to be a big creative and throw some of its own ideas into the ring.

Not a perfect game, but it is a very, very good one that does something the series has needed to do for quite some time: innovate.

For now, though, this is a fine multiplayer experience to have sitting on the PlayStation 4.

It combines the nostalgia of Record Keeper with a typical storyline and free-to-play features that makes it irresistible despite a lack je-ne-sais-quoi/oomph.

I’m going to hazard a guess and say that the potential audience for Sacred 2 Remaster is very small. It’s a very simple, grindy, button-masher action RPG with a totally irrelevant plot. If you’re going to play and enjoy this, it’s because you get hooked on that simple, basic gameplay loop. And if you do… well, welcome to dozens upon dozens of hours of it. If you’ve never played Sacred 2 before, but enjoy Diablo-likes or Eurojank like Risen, Gothic or ELEX, then there’s every chance you’ll find this one amusing (and in the right way).

If there’s one takeaway to be had from the Capcom Beat ‘Em Up Bundle, it’s that genre-themed compilations aren’t the best way to repackage these classic titles.

So there are some neat little features to the newest Mega Man. However, while it's the kind of game that series fans should enjoy, there just isn’t enough to bring it to a new audience.

I consider the value of these sports management simulators to be an opportunity to teach the nuances of the sport to laypeople. By understanding the underlying tactics and management structure that goes into those on-field or on-track performances, you do come to a much deeper understanding of the sport itself. Football Manager understands this, but F1 Manager doesn’t quite. Not yet. The presentation of the information is accessible and even elegant, but this is an enormously complex sport, and the developers haven’t found a way to translate this so it’s palatable to people who aren’t already deeply invested in the sport. As enjoyable, comprehensive, and well-designed as F1 Manager is, there’s still work to go to get it to the standards of Football Manager in supporting people to develop a passion for the sport.

While Astebreed may be short in length, it more than makes up for it with its anime styled storytelling and quality, fast, furious action. It's another classy little indie game on the PlayStation 4 that further enhances the console's value.

You need to have a high tolerance for crass to enjoy Hakoniwa. This game is less "fan service" than it is an actual perversion, but if that kind of eyes-wide humour appeals to you then Hakoniwa is very, very funny. You'll probably only play it once because jokes are never as funny when repeated, but for that first run though, there's a sense of glory around the game; this thing offers a kind of joyous, unbounded creativity that it's impossible not to sit back and wonder at just what kind of process went into the making of it.

I do think that if developers want to tackle World War 2 as a subject, they need to go one of two paths. They could take a clinical approach and create a wargames simulator that focuses purely on the strategy. Or they could create a serious commentary that deconstructs and analyses the war. What they should not be doing, however, is presenting the war as a purely entertaining experience. As a work of pure entertainment, Company of Heroes 3 would have been better served tracking a fictional war. However, its quality as a piece of entertainment is undeniable, and for most, that’s going to be all that matters. It also works far better on a console than I would have expected something from the RTS genre to ever do. For those that do find World War 2 to be entertaining, this one’s going to be hard to resist.

Gameloft has made the game pleasant to look at, with a pixel art aesthetic that bubbles along with colour and verve. Unfortunately, it's impossible to hide that this is based on an incredibly old game, and we've certainly seen similar efforts that offer more of everything, including the all-important random events to experience on the journey. The thrill of exploring the unknown does wear away when, after just a couple of outings, you're now experiencing the thrill of the far-too-familiar events and occurrences. Still, the educational heart of the game is still there (the lives of these intrepid folks and the little pockets of civilisation along the road are a fascinating bit of history), and Gameloft has done a good job in bringing appropriate sensitivities into the game to make it something to give to the kids to play today.

Flame Over is refreshing. It has a clever twist on the roguelike by introducing the fire as the primary enemy, that is by far the most engaging aspect of the game. It feels real, it spreads, it’s alive. The first few stages do get repetitive, and it isn’t long before you start seeing the same rooms, as is standard for the genre, but it’s well worth the adventure.

NBA Live 19 has provided a fun, slightly hybrid arcade/simulation style of basketball that works well on the court. There is still room to add features and improve some aspects of the gameplay, but the series has taken some long strides in the right direction since rebooting. That is good news for hoops fans such as myself, who feel that some healthy competition is a good thing.

After many hours spent with FIFA 19, I can confidently say it is a really good game - probably the best in the series. The biggest concern for those trying to decide whether to buy or not is how much the minor incremental increases of the FIFA 18 release really matter.