For all the nonlinearity of its telling, the strangeness of its details, at its heart this is a relatively conventional save-the-world narrative. Which is no bad thing, necessarily, in a game that elsewhere tends towards obscurity and excess. But it's those latter qualities we're here for, ultimately - and Alan Wake 2 delivers over and over. [Issue#392, p.100]

It’s uncompromising and involved and may not be for everyone, but you sense it’s the game Bizarre have been meaning to make for the last seven years, and for that alone, it’s precious. [Nov 2007, p.86]

It's a game you'll come back to the next day, having faced constant defeat in levels that are surely impossible, and find yourself beating them. [July 2016, p.120]

With Capcom's technicians helping Nintendo's console punch well above its weight, Rise has made it a thrilling contest between two majestic beasts. [Issue#357, p.104]

There's a remarkable consistency to the design even as the levels gets steadily bolder until, after hovering vacuums, teleporters, and levers that freeze time, Simogo throws in a climactic boss battle that is as nerve-wracking as it is joyous. It's a compliment to say that Beat Sneak Bandit feels like a Rhythm Tengoku minigame taken to its logical extreme; it's constructed with a precision and a sense of mischief – and, in its final surprise, a generosity of spirit - that echoes the best work of the WarioWare team.

It's fitting that we're able to steal a line from the script to sum everything up. No spoilers here, just an epitaph, from the moment Cortana turns to Master Chief and says this: "It's not a new plan. But we know it'll work." [Christmas 2004, p.74]

If "Far Cry" was a game of ambition, then here is one of power. Power which Crytek has channelled, with both passion and care, into superb freewheeling gunplay. [Christmas 2007, p.84]

If L4D2 is sometimes over-complicated by its glut of small innovations, then it also substantially rewards the player with its few large ideas: confusion gives way to depth and dynamism, grander thrills and starker dramas. We’re still interested in the fate of the original game’s heroes, but this sequel affirms that the way ahead is due south.

Rome: Total War is more compelling, more beautiful and more expansive than anything that has gone before. [Dec 2004, p.104]

A dazzling package. A singleplayer campaign crammed with set-pieces that pull the player through at breakneck speed sits alongside Spec Ops, 23 co-op missions and a MW greatest hits package, before that superlative multiplayer, which really needs no introduction. With such attractions on offer, this is a shooter that demands playing, and playing again. It is still Call Of Duty, but its execution is skilful, mostly thoughtful, and it boasts the highest of production values.

It all adds up to a remarkable mixture of emotions, seldom encountered in a commercial videogame: kinetic thrill and the satisfaction of optimising your time, but also mounting claustrophobia, empathy for co-workers, and a sense that somewhere out among the stars there's a kinder society waiting to be riveted together. [Issue#373, p.104]

The game's excellent controls and stream of grisly scares make it the current standard for survival horror, and it now boasts eruptions of blockbusting action that rival this generation's biggest games. [Feb 2011, p.94]

Inside may require thought, care and occasionally a sharp sense of timing to progress, but its obstacles never feel unfair. [Issue#296, p.120]

It may well have been a great game at its initial deadline, but the staggering level of detail in its amplified incarnation helps it run rings around its already estimable predecessor.

Dark Souls beckons the masochistic with its chilly indifference. If you steel your nerves and persevere, the loot you'll uncover is an adventure so exquisitely morose and far-ranging that it will tug at your mind insistently during the hours you spend apart.

It may produce an experience which is as gruelling as it is compelling, but that’s a badge of honour the game wears with pride. [Nov 2006, p.86]

The ambitious, exacting craftsmanship of Evolution goes a long way to ensuring that every person who gives the game a proper chance will be seduced into becoming precisely such a fan. [May 2012, p.106]

The Stanley Parable is brave. It’s brave because it offers the freedom to define the parameters of your experience. It’s brave because it’s willing to explore the ways in which games manipulate players, and to extrapolate that point into a discussion of the way we are all manipulated by the structures of real life. It’s brave because it’s willing to make fun of itself.

Codemasters had a hard act to follow in Grid, but with this sequel it’s delivered a dazzling package that can proudly take its place among the best racing games of this generation. It not only smooths off nearly all of the awkward edges that have plagued the studio’s ongoing attempts to cohere its racing games with driver-focused storylines, but it does so with enough pomp and spectacle to send current-generation hardware off with a memorable bang.

Perhaps, though, the reason A Highland Song stays in the memory is because of those bumps and scraps rather than in spite of them. [Issue#392, p.110]

If you want to know what unites all players, though, it's the sheer glory of the wide-open world that is brought into being here. [Issue#408, p.114]

You’ll never be able to play enough Dota 2 to totally master it, and although it’s an F2P game it can be too cruel and unusual for some. But persist through the tough start and accept the idiosyncrasies, and you’ll start to understand why so many have stuck with it for more than a decade. Why would they need something new when they’ve got this incredibly deep, rewarding multiplayer experience?

The freedom of movement requires a new level of spatial imagination. Before Prince of Persia, platform games were like playing Tetris with only the blocks and bars. [Christmas 2003, p.100]

Demon's Souls is the antithesis of the fashionable approach to gaming. It encourages mastery over mere perseverance and every reward is so hard won as to make it almost unattainable. But if gaming's ultimate appeal lies in the learning and mastering of new skills, then surely the medium's keenest thrills are to be found in its hardest lessons. For those who flourish under Demon's Souls' strict examination, there's no greater sense of virtual achievement.

A classic reborn in wonderful style. Capcom's hot streak continues apace. [Issue#331, p.106]

This still stands as one of videogaming’s greatest achievements, one finally properly served by an excellent English translation to reveal a game that feels far fresher than its age, setting and rivals might otherwise suggest. [Nov 2007, p.97]

This confident refinement of Human Revolution's potent, though flawed, proof of concept, has resulted in one of the most elaborate videogame sandboxes in which we've ever had the pleasure of getting lost. [Oct 2016, p.104]

There are some VR games that still make our stomachs flip, but this captivating adventure is one to make the heart soar. [Christmas 2018, p.118]