It remains true that Cat Quest is a hugely reductive game that strips the RPG formula to its very roots, and that lack of depth becomes tiresome towards the end. I'm glad that this is not a game that outstays its welcome, but at the same time it's not a game I'll remember, beyond that adorable skipping run of my adorable little furrball.

Tesla vs Lovecraft is enjoyable enough for what it is: a simple, energetic twin-stick shooter fat doesn't push any boundaries but gets most of the fundamentals right. At the same time, there's so much untapped potential in the idea of Lovecraft/Tesla crossover, and that leaves me wanting so much more from this game than it actually delivers.

Maquette - and the development team - deserve better. There's some real talent evident in the unique, interesting, contemplative and rewarding puzzle design here, and that kind of quality occurs less and less frequently in this vapid and action-obsessed industry. The development team also know how to write interesting and emotionally engaging narratives - we don't see stories about love told with this kind of sincerity anywhere near often enough. Unfortunately, the one and only problem that the game has is also the thing that almost breaks it; the two elements that the entire experience relies on are at near-complete odds with one another.

This Is The Police aims to be something of a higher production values take on Papers, Please. For the most part it succeeds, and certainly Lindsay loved in, as you can see from her perfectly fair take on the game. But truth be told the simulation/ strategy gameplay isn't that involved, so what I was left with was the narrative storytelling, and while every moral conundrum gave me real pause to think, too often I thought my emotions were being exploited and toyed with by a game that was going to play out the same way regardless. That in itself is worth talking about in the context of a conversation around determinism, but I was still left feeling a little cheated, truth be told.

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.

While it doesn’t offer a whole lot to do and risks getting overshadowed by bigger party racers like Nintendo’s own Mario Kart, Chiki Chiki Boxy Racers is good for an afternoon of fun with up to eight players. It doesn’t overstay its welcome and it’s simple enough that players of all ages can immediately understand the controls and goals.

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.

You have to be a rally game fan to enjoy WRC 6 much, but if you are, then I suspect you’ll appreciate the authenticity the game offers that other, more general interest rally gamers, like Dirt, do not offer.

As a horror experience Outlast 2 works as a bit of grindhouse exploitation. It’s intense, it’s sharp, and it’s a grisly, beautiful game. But it’s also so linear and tries to be so cinematic that it opens itself to comparisons to similar stories told in other media, and as weird as it is to say, Outlast 2 is also far too safe.

I'm actually disappointed that I didn't like Golf With Your Friends more. I enjoy party games, I enjoy minigolf, and I do think that the fundamentals of good minigolf are in there. However, it's worth remembering that right back at the start with the Nintendo Switch Zen Studios released Infinite Minigolf - a minigolf game with character avatars, personality AND the ability to create and share courses, giving it much greater value as a single-player experience. It doesn't have the ability to provide the kind of wildly entertaining large party experience of Golf With Your Friends, though, so I guess the question then becomes which of the two scenarios will more likely describe how you're playing games most of the time?

For fans who've desired to take Trials on the go, there's a lot to enjoy here, but there's no denying that the F2P mechanics and digital controls sink the ruts a bit too deep at times.

NBA Live 16 has a lot of really solid pieces that are starting to come together. These disparate parts still need smoothing out and the game itself still has room to improve, but those looking for a more arcade-like NBA experience with a variety of modes should enjoy what the game has to offer.

The Last Ninja is not likely to find new fans. The archaic nature of them makes them awkward to play, whereas there are plenty of other retro options that are much more instantly familiar and comfortable to play. They are enormously important, influential games, however, so if you’re here for the history and heritage of video games, then by all means, struggle through this collection, because it is right up there with the most famous retro series that we just don’t talk about that much.

Sadly Shadowgate remake falls into a trap of not adding anything to Shadowgate, making it rather redundant to play. With that being said, Shadowgate is still Shadowgate, and there's an inherent classic quality to this adventure that, coupled with the dark fantasy atmosphere and general difficulty, also makes it inherently rewarding.

Smash Cat Heroes is a decent little game that packs multiple challenges. It might not be a classic game that will be remembered in the years to come, but it's good fun.

It’s still a lot of fun, don’t get me wrong. I’ll be playing this with my brother for our weekend gaming catch-ups for quite some time, there are already lengthy periods where there is not a single online game of Machi Koro With Everyone available, and you can be sitting in a lobby that you’ve created for 10 minutes just to get a group to join randomly (in a game that is less than a week old). Given that, it’s unfortunate that the party game flavour makes it less viable as a long-term single-player experience. I love it, but at the same time, Machi Koro With Everyone is an almost excellent adaptation of a brilliant board game that made one very big, unforgivable mistake.

Fatal Fury: First Contact is still a joy to play and - I really can't say this enough - it remains impressive that the developers were able to create such pristine fighting games on such modest hardware. With that being said, the five games Neo Geo Pocket Color games that have now been released really should have been compiled together into one collection, and I would really like to see some of the other, non-fighting games that appeared on the console given the same emulation and restoration process now. I don't begrudge SNK going to the effort with the five fighting game classics that it has, but enough's enough with this genre. It's time for something different, please.

Spirit of the North almost nails it. From the art to the characterisation, and even the wordless narrative structure, the developers have clearly put a lot of thought and creative energy into this, and it shows. You might want to play on another platform to get the full scope of the vision, because on Switch it is a little limited by the hardware, but even then, Spirit of the North has moments where it soars. It's just unfortunate that it keeps crashing into walls along the way, as the developers tried to justify the existence of the game by what can only be termed "gameplay bits", and every time that happens the motor takes a while to get going again. If you can handle the clumsy pacing and arbitrary puzzles and collectibles, though, Spirit of the North really is beautifully earnest in what it is looking to achieve.

For a couple of dollars, though, A Winter's Daydream is the kind of indie visual novel that deserves support. It tells a good, interesting, and original story, with presentation that is inoffensive on every level, and some truly pleasant moments throughout. It's not a visual novel I'll ever replay, but I did enjoy every second I had with it.

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.

Despite moments of brilliance and an overall lovely aesthetic, there are mechanics which seem to be at odds with each other and thus the game seems conflicted. One moment you’re slowly following an enormous, glowing beast through an oceanic tunnel, and the next you’re chaining drifts together to zip through tight caverns while breaking through cracked glass panes.

If you did have nostalgic love for Snow Bros 2, it would clearly hit you a little harder, though I do have to note that if it’s just the arcade game you want in a legal fashion it is part of the Amusement Arcade Toaplan app too – and there it’s a fair bit cheaper than Snow Bros 2 Special’s asking price too.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven isn’t going to send a ripple through the video game community, but it was never intended to. As a simple little love letter to fans, it succeeds despite taking its faults and the lofty requisites to truly treasure it.

Unfortunately the transition to the current consoles leaves room for improvement. WWE 2K15 is fine for the fans, but hardly in the leagues of the best wrestling games ever made.

The genre has been able to tap into this to make it the core feature, and while we’ve seen better and more creative applications of that feature in the past, Adventure Bar Labyrinth is a solid, vanilla, example of that appeal.

Taken from within a vacuum, NHL 15 is a perfectly solid hockey title, however longtime fans of the series are bound to be disappointed by the things that they have grown used to over the years that are missing.

Unity plays well, but it's not really good enough for a AAA-game to play well, and this especially applies to Assassin's Creed, which has always been a franchise with stronger narrative and thematic value than its counterparts.

That the developers apparently haven’t considered this suggests that they’re been far too modest with their own game. Which is fine, but the audience for “more of the same Tactical Mind, just with a few new levels” may just be small enough that the modesty has killed the future of Tactical Mind, because I can’t imagine too many people who played the original will find this essential… and those that overlooked the original aren’t going to be converted on the minor changes made this time around.