DrawRace 2 isn't just everything a sequel should be – it's more. DrawRace was a solid foundation, but what RedLynx has created here goes far beyond what is usual – or even exceptional – in the industry. It's an essential purchase, a game shot through with brilliance, and one that will live with its players for a very long time indeed.

Super Mario Maker's greatest achievement isn't in the pleasing snappiness of its creation, but how it fosters a deeper understanding, and appreciation, of good level design. There can be few finer ways of marking the series' 30th birthday than that. [Nov 2015, p.104]

Arranger's cheeriness and playfulness thus works its way into every facet of its design, from the craft of its puzzles to the personality of its world and its inclusive embrace. This year has already supplied a pair of best-in-class puzzle games in the shape of Animal Well and Lorelei And The Laser Eyes; now they need to shift over and make room for one more. [Issue#400, p.112]

As vivid and memorable an evocation of a place as any hyper-detailed triple-A fantasy universe. [Issue#377, p.106]

Crucially, it's everything a racing videogame should be: a relentless, unwavering and phenomenal assault on the senses.

Once again, Criterion still manages to stand out and offer something fresh, setting a new standard in open-world driving games with - that word again - a seamless feast of quality. [Dec 2012, p.98]

In feeding constant surprise, engaging wit and sharply pitched challenge during its course, Plants Vs Zombies proves again PopCap's incredible knack of taking an established game form and making it all its own. [May 2009, p.94]

Stealth games are only as good as the flexibility of their encounters, and in that regard Black Flag is the most generous Assassin’s Creed game to date.

For the first time, Bungie has successfully remedied two of the most frequent criticisms of Destiny: that there isn't enough to do, and that its endgame is overly focused on raiding. [December 2018, p.102]

Where Frostpunk was painfully intimate, the sequel takes a bird's-eye view, but this distance serves it just as well. [Issue#403, p.100]

Battlefield 1 is better than its predecessors in almost every way. [Christmas 2016, p.102]

Its sheer assuredness in mechanics, spectacle and often situation are unlikely to be surpassed for some time.

There are whole essays that could be written about the depth of the tuning mechanics. [December 2018, p.110]

This is a game about stories that has a knack of producing really good ones - when you're doing well, and especially when you're doing badly. [March 2019, p.120]

A fairytale comeback. Extravagance was one of the signatures of the graphic adventure: extravagance to bring them in, and a cracking story well told to keep them. Both tenets of the Broken Sword series remain intact here, and that's all the devoted fans could have wanted. [Christmas 2003, p.94]

Arise has embedded itself deep in our skull. [Issue#418, p.110]

Added depth and nuance are the guiding principles for this spectacular follow up. [Nov 2009, p.100]

It's this beautiful mess of strategic genius and personality defects that elevates Wild Bastards to the pantheon of truly great hybrid roguelikes, managing to do for the FPS what Spelunky did for platforming, and Slay The Spire for deckbuilders. [Issue#403, p.116]

Rez Infinite is 15 years old, and the best VR game of 2016. [Christmas 2016, p.116]

Its finest tactical espionage action yet. [Oct 2015, p.104]

Unforgettable. [Oct 2015, p.108]

Minor gripes aside, Rock Band with four players in the same room is quite something to be a part of, a game not only an evolution of the genre but of the social side of gaming itself. [Jan 2008, p.80]

Huge in scope and strong on detail, IX has ironed out the kinks that have made the series less palatable outside Japan, and with Nintendo's support, IX is sure to have the wider impact that the series has craved. [Aug 2010, p.92]

Games have mastered action – the amplified and instant reward – but Papers, Please finds satisfaction in the tedium of bureaucracy, and twins it with genuinely human stories and an underlying, dread-filled tension. It’s rare to play a game about something, about a time, a place and a theme, and for a game to embody those ideas from meaning right down to mechanics.

Its thesis - that a multiplicity of cultures leaves a society profoundly enriched - has never seemed more urgent and vital. [Issue#390, p.130]

No other GTA has felt so trim and robust while making good the promise of a living, breathing action world. [May 2009, p.86]

The present console cycle is expected to last nearly a decade, and there will inevitably be developers advocating the need for more sophisticated tools. But just like Machu Picchu, the Pyramids and every other engineering marvel of antiquity, Uncharted 3 will stand as a reminder to future generations of gamers that enough problem-solving imagination can turn any old trowel into a magic wand.

To play New Horizons is to retreat to a fairer, kinder place, where even the supposed bad guy is a philanthropist who gives you interest-free loans you can pay off at your leisure. Animal Crossing has always been a pleasure; never has it felt quote so essential. [Issue#344, p.110]

By polishing away blemishes, Rock Band 2 carefully improves on its predecessor. Those expecting the likes of music-making functionality perhaps aren’t quite on Rock Band’s wavelength, which is about performance, not creativity. [Dec 2008, p.85]

Games are so rarely funny by design, but Jazzpunk is much more than a funny videogame. It’s a comedy, and one that wouldn’t be possible – or anywhere near as powerful – in any other medium.

Ultimately, no one will disagree that Uncharted 2 is one hell of a ride, and the best PS3 action game to date.

An emphatic, feature-packed and sometimes stunning final act.

This is twitch gaming at its finest, with beautifully tuned thumbstick controls and a pulsing rave soundtrack that only seems to focus the mind more sharply.

One of the most distinctive, exciting and fully realised puzzle games we've played in years. [Issue#332, p.122]

PGR3 hasn’t moved from its niche, not at all – at its core, it’s still pure PGR, a savvy and standalone mixture of real form and hyper-real function – but it’s been transformed into a wondrous and rewarding beauty spot. [Christmas 2005, p.88]

We may have no experience of 1980s Taiwan, but Devotion carries the tang of authenticity in both the sharply observed detail of its setting and its more imaginative flourishes, including a gorgeous interactive storybook episode. [Issue#331, p.122]

It may be pulled together from no more than shards of light, but few games manage to be both a science and an art. [Oct 2008, p.99]

It's unusual to find a game of this sort deal with losing, which is obviously the majority experience, with such care – the packaging of Barry's mad dash turns it into an endlessly rewarding marathon, rather than a series of disconnected sprints.

Gauge, then, is throwaway, minimalist, score-chasing brilliance, a game that's pulled together from the smallest selection of pieces, but that also feels bold and new and intensely imaginative.

Disco Elysium's skill system is a marvelous reworking of calcified genre conventions. [Issue#339, p.100]

But that's what Arco does, playing on your sense of riding into the unknown, taking risks that might kill for the sake of curiosity. [Issue#401, p.120]

Best of all is how the storytelling bleeds into the battles. [Issue#362, p.114]

It remains to be seen whether Bandai Namco's game can achieve what Street Fighter 6 hasn't quite managed, and bring in a new generation of players, but this is the first time in decades that these longtime rivals have felt so well matched. [Issue#395, p.114]

Despite its hectic invention, then, Velocity retains a rare kind of focus. Vita owners finally have something tart to see them through the drought, and the Minis just got a new standard bearer.

This is a brave and truly original work, and if this is what happens when Simogo explores its dark side, it should do so more often.

It might not always say what you want it to hear, but the words stay with you. [Issue#139, p.110]

It may not re-invent the wheel, but MotoGP2 is a shiny new alloy among racing games, and builds upon the series' excellent reputation. And that should be enough to stir up Xbox live all over again. [June 2003, p.100]

Combat is thrilling – each weapon packing a solid, vicious blast; movement suggesting heft and momentum. [Dec 2008, p.80]

As an open-world game, it might be too light for some, but World earns the suffix in other entertaining ways. [Issue#413, p.106]

This is a game that requires serious commitment. [Issue#395, p.116]

The Alters is unique in how it explores trust, regret, choice, self-sacrifice, labour and autonomy through its characters every bit as much as its pylon puzzles. [Issue#413, p.110]

Brutal and rather short, VVVVVV's also devious and darkly funny. It's a pedantic classic, and a game for watch-makers as much as speed-runners.

It's a masterfully constructed piece of tabletop theatre, whose spell is only broken once, as we were delayed for over an hour by some key loot that took over a dozen attempts to drop. Many won't make it past this preposterous roadblock, but those who persevere to the bitter end will be heartily glad they did.

Developer Dang smartly refuses to complicate things, instead relying on its diverse menagerie and devious level designs to keep you on your toes. [Issue#362, p.121]

Combat is thrilling – each weapon packing a solid, vicious blast; movement suggesting heft and momentum. [Dec 2008, p.80]

If Rocket League often feels like a sports game for people who don't really like sports games, that's no criticism. [Oct 2015, p.123]

Dead Rising 3 is a sandbox in the purest sense, one that urges you to experiment with its innumerable toys at your leisure. The result is an open world that, in spite of its reanimated inhabitants, feels more alive than most.

It’s a strange situation for the series to truly hit its stride in a game that’s both beginning and conclusion, and you can’t help but wish Dante would never grow up, that there could have been more stories of his teenage roundhouse kicks. [Apr 2005, p.90]

Despite its unreserved nature, and being about as tightly tethered to reality as the Burnout series, Ridge Racer 6 hasn’t floated away from its roots. It’s content to sink into its well-established furrow of soaring slides and skids, and it still feels crisply satisfying with it. [Jan 2005, p.82]

The presentation is as characterful as you would expect from London Studio, it's welcoming to newcomers to the EyeToy, or even to gaming in general, and the navigation system has been much improved, responding snappily to your commands.

Bright, colourful and mostly dismissive of current trends, it’s clear The Behemoth wants to delight players with every moment of its latest performance. That it succeeds in only most of those moments is still a remarkable achievement.

As Sid Meier once said, games are a series of interesting decisions. Well, Balatro has those in spades - and hearts, clubs and diamonds besides. [Issue#395, p.120]

For those already playing Final Fantasy XIV, Stormblood is a beautiful, essential expansion...It's not only a great expansion to a much-improved MMO. It's also, in story terms at least, a game that stands tall among the best Final Fantasy has to offer. [Sept 2017, p.112]

Showdown is not just a party game, nor is it the limp refurb you might expect this late in a console life cycle. It feels like something as crucial to Codemasters Racing as any of its predecessors – less a spin-off than a deliberate change of tack.

Whatever the oddities and missed opportunities of its singleplayer mode, Bad Company 2 delivers a fulsome online game that continues to hone a winning formula. [Apr 2010, p.90]

So while the campaign's filled with visual pleasures and colourful tricks, it's in the stark white spaces of the editor that Sound Shapes really dazzles, stepping away from the museum of hallucinations that all rhythm action games offer and threatening, at times, to become a genuine musical instrument in its own right.

The game's parts are by turns novel and enjoyable, but when played in longer bursts feel repetitive. Brotherhood is Assassin's Creed II 2, its new mechanics feeling more like extensions of an existing form than innovations. It's a greatest hits disc, then, a weighty, good-value deal that plays the series' best bits – but there's the constant danger that you've heard them before.

This is a delightfully risky experiment, and the end result is pure alchemy: the blending of two fiercely traditional genres into something both unique and entirely natural. [Apr 2009, p.125]

It would be easy to take The Minish Cap for granted, left as it is with little to do but shuffle and tinker with its immaculate heritage. That, however, would be a grave mistake... Maybe you can't go wrong with the Zelda template, but they haven't always gone this right. [Christmas 2004, p.91]

With a defined beginning, four distinct seasonal environments and an affecting, surprising conclusion, there's no question that Proteus is a game. But if there's one concern, it's whether this is an island that's worth revisiting once you've seen all it has to offer. In a way, its lack of progression – the absence of skill trees, difficulty levels and save points – works in its favour; you won't dive back in to mop up the last few achievements, or to climb leaderboards, but simply because you want to play Proteus.

It's a third and final chapter, then, with all that implies. It's off-putting to new players, too busy tying up loose ends to dangle any threads of its own, and fails to stand up as its own game in the same manner as its predecessors. But it's also a spectacular, powerfully imagined and dramatically involving final act to one of gaming's richest sci-fi sagas.

As a whole, it's remarkably cohesive, a compound puzzler that should be added to your collection with express speed. [Issue#395, p.123]

It homes in, with a clockmaker's precision and a playful gleam in its eye, on what Mario does best.

Some may argue over what the series should have become, but what’s important is that it has made that tough decision for itself, and established a rock solid foundation for inevitable, now justified successors. [May 2006, p.86]

Offbeat, occasionally twisted, frequently funny and never boring, Horace is the best kind of attention-seeker: it demands you sit up and take notice and never stops rewarding you for doing so. [Issue#354, p.120]

Whatever you conclude about the bigger picture, this is special stuff. The claustrophobic buzz of flies, the distant muezzin drone, the desperation as you crouch uncertain in the dust whilst your men call frantically for orders will lodge in your mind long after you've walked away from the game. [July 2004, p.98]

Schlocky and silly in places, but potent and reflective in others, Nilin’s tale has bags of heart to play off against its flamboyant bosses and existential quandaries, all grounded by a charismatic female star. While the world building isn’t on a par with the best – hampered by a civilian population as robotic as its metal cohorts – a rich backstory and architectural detail make Neo-Paris a place worth visiting.

Sonic And Sega All-Stars Racing is the most fun karting game on iOS, and an update taking care of those online hiccups can only make it more essential.

There's a beauty and a strangeness to Tenderfoot Tactics fans of gardens or grid combat owe it to themselves to discover. [Issue#354, p.122]

What a rare delight this is: while other games concern themselves with the big moments this funny, sincere tale reminds us that it's the gaps in between where life really happens. [Issue#354, p.123]

Far Cry 3's main missions are nothing special in and of themselves, and include one or two exhausting slogs and limp stealth sections, but the campaign does a better job than Far Cry 2's storyline when it comes to providing an alternative to the open emergence of the player-authored escapades.

It’s resplendent with detail and vibrancy: each of WHD’s eight tracks is a shimmering, 1080p rhapsody, played at an unwavering 60fps. [Dec 2008, p.93]

Whether this is the best Spider-Man GAME will likely be debated at length, but in so vividly capturing the intensity of the superhero experience, it is unquestionably the best Spider-Man simulator. [Issue#391, p.106]

Deliriously funny. [May 2018, p.114]

One of the year's finest grid-based strategy games, a steely and engrossing work of calculation. [Issue#349, p.102]

Its nonsensical charm – cartoon aliens, sweeties that make planets, and a robot T-Rex – as well as a winning extra mode (which basically makes planets into timebombs) after completion rounds off an original and deep hybrid.

As a game of corners, conditions and the times in which you master them, DIRT is an outstanding engine of online competition, powered by an outstanding engine of sight, sound and physics. [July 2007, p.88]

Chaos Theory is the game that the original Splinter Cell was meant to deliver: a tight play experience within a trusty framework, one more of enjoyment than irritation, and a game that’s no longer exclusively for fans of repeated reloading. [Apr 2005, p.97]

This lightness of touch, combined with instant restarts and a Trials-style checkpoint system, makes for an extremely moreish racer. [June 2016, p.123]

Zero mission is … old, but it's also tantalisingly new, coupled with a tightening of the mythos and franchise in anticipation of follow-ups to "Prime" and "Fusion." It works. [Apr 2004, p.107]

For those of us with purer nail-hitting, dog-poking and badger-stomping in mind, the pleasure will have to remain in the doing.

DaWindci's a sedate, slow burning thrill.

Is it better than Flick Kick Football? It lacks the purity of Pik Pok's original, and isn't nearly so charming. But where Flick Kick lapses into formula after you reach a high enough score, Flick Soccer gets even more challenging – and in full flow, it can provide a magical experience.

Throw in a typically generous range of levels and a surprisingly engrossing hidden object game, and Snapshot becomes a recipe for a candy-coloured afternoon of elegant brainteasers.

When Tunic gestures towards Zelda games of old, something it does with all the subtlety of an air traffic controller, it's indicating an attempt to chip away the intervening decades and get back to the feeling of playing those games for the first time, when they still held what seemed like bottomless mystery. [Issue#370, p.104]

Bar a handful of bosses, Dark Dawn is a pushover, never requiring you to brave the combat's depths. Yes, it grants breathing room for testing unlikely combinations, but we'd have liked to put our mastery to the test. [Jan 2011, p.101]

It’s refreshingly exacting about timing, though too forgiving when it comes to grading – you can miss several prompts, take plenty of damage and still earn gold.

Warp tends to the lightweight - almost a confection - but as with anything that offers this sort of energetic sugary high, sometimes it's good to be left wanting more.