This isn't a game that redefines the genre: this is one that rolls it up and locks it away.

Yes, there's still the freedom to cause havoc, and inevitably you do; the difference is that you’re no longer impelled to toy with GTA IV's world in quite the same sadistic way - you live in it. [June 2008, p.82]

Since the end of the N64 era, as Nintendo has explored new pastures and methodically tended old ones, it’s been easy to forget the times when every major release from the company felt like this. It’s a bravura piece of design that pulls off stunts no one else has even thought of. [Christmast 2007, p.76]

No one makes worlds like Rockstar, but at last it has produced one without compromise. Everything works. It has mechanics good enough to anchor games of their own, and a story that is not only what GTA has always wanted to tell but also fits the way people have always played it. It’s a remarkable achievement, a peerless marriage of world design, storytelling and mechanics that pushes these ageing consoles to the limit and makes it all look easy.

The result, for all the longevity of its series and the familiarity of the open-world genre, is a game that evokes feelings we haven’t known for 20 years. Not since Ocarina Of Time have we set foot in a world that seems so mind-bogglingly vast, that feels so unerringly magical, that proves so relentlessly intriguing. Plenty of games promise to let us go anywhere and do anything; few, if any, ever deliver on it so irresistibly. Nineteen years on, Ocarina is still held up as the high-water mark of one of gaming’s best-loved – and greatest – series. Now it may have to settle for second place. [April 2017, p.104]

It's a game of restraint, but with some brutal sucker punches; the tale of a one-man cowboy army who is nothing without the people around him. It's a game about the fear of the future that reaches astounding new technical heights, and makes Rockstar's previous games look and feel like ancient history. It's a resounding triumph to which there is only one reasonable response - and an appropriate one, too. Hats off. [Christmas 2018, p.104]

Like Breath of the Wild, Odyssey is a new entry in a long-running series that belies its age with sprightly invention, taking big risks with an established formula, and having all of them pay off handsomely. Mario might be getting on a bit, then, but a dinosaur? This astonishing adventure proves he's anything but. [Dec 2017, p.98]

Half-Life 2 is a first-person shooter. But in action, storytelling, technical achievement, atmosphere and intensity it has far outdone its peers. Valve just hit the top note no other PC game developer could reach...The excuse that 'it's just a game' won't cut it anymore. [Dec 2004, p.102]

If only the mechanics matched the atmosphere. If only Rapture was a less linear world to move through. If only BioShock was the wholly brilliant experience you know, from your moments within it, it could have been.[Oct 2007, p.88]

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

So, is this what we were expecting from Capcom – a revolution in survival horror? No... It's an interactive B-movie, but one filled with sights, sounds and thrills that will linger in the memory long after the content of more sophisticated titles has been forgotten. [March 2005, p.76]

Baldur's Gate 3 leaves you with as many ideas it it does memories. That, surely, is the soul of roleplaying. [Issue#389, p.98]

As a whole it is almost overwhelming in its depth, irresistible in value and certainly, unreservedly, brilliant. [Dec 2007, p.82]

As a whole it is almost overwhelming in its depth, irresistible in value and certainly, unreservedly, brilliant. [Dec 2007, p.82]

With the first instalment, BioWare built a universe of words – a deeply convincing multicultural sprawl you could read about without ever quite getting to touch. Here, you’re inside it from the start – and the view is often dazzling

Not for the first time, a Miyazaki game has arrived and the landscape appears transformed. As you play, there is a sense of plates shifting beneath you, of the T&Cs of game development being hastily rewritten. We haven’t felt this way since “Breath of the Wild.” Here, as there, an open world means freedom and fresh air. [Issue#370, p.96]

These moments are why you play Skyrim, because in the instance of breathless excitement, triumph or discovery, you invest completely in its world.

But these rare lows are a fair trade for some of the most stratospheric highs we've experienced in a videogame since, well, its predecessor. In reimagining Hyrule and reshuffling the tools you'll use to explore and to save it, Nintendo may not have quite reinvented the wheel. But this kingdom provides a wondrous space in which to consider how you just might. [Issue#385, p.98]

Zelda virgins might well play The Wind Waker and deem it the best game they've ever encountered. To those of us who already have an idea of what to expect, though, it's 'merely' brilliant. [May 2003, p.88]

As with previous GTA games there's lots to criticise, but San Andreas survives, scathed but still walking tall, buoyed by the kind of ambition that sees most games crumble under the weight of it all. It's a multi-faceted, multi-achieving experience, a rough-edged but massively substantial landmark. [Christmas 2004, p.78]

It’s a multiplayer riot, a visual landmark, a feat of engineering, and one of the most charming games ever made. But even those accolades are dwarfed by its scope, its potential, and the apparent endlessness of them both. [Dec 2008, p.76]

GTAIV’s modern weapons spit bullets like angry hornets until a health circle depletes; here, lives end in uncompromising fashion. For the western aficionado, it is viciously accurate; for the fan of wanton sandbox carnage, it is comically frank.

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]

Naughty Dog has delivered the most riveting, emotionally resonant story-driven epic of this console generation. At times it’s easy to feel like big-budget development has too much on the line to allow stubbornly artful ideas to flourish, but then a game like The Last Of Us emerges through the crumbled blacktop like a climbing vine, green as a burnished emerald.

With the focus on elaboration rather than evolution, Twilight Princess triggers more memories than it creates, yet it's still an effortless classic that towers over the gaming landscape. Ignore it at your own cost. [Christmas 2006, p.68]

Portal 2 delivers, and it does it in style, creating one of the most meticulously designed, thrilling and delightful playgrounds we've ever seen. It's a game with a magical take on momentum, where single bounds over tall buildings are business as usual, where every surface is a potential launchpad, and the entire experience is a belly laugh.

GTAIV's modern weapons spit bullets like angry hornets until a health circle depletes; here, lives end in uncompromising fashion. For the western aficionado, it is viciously accurate; for the fan of wanton sandbox carnage, it is comically frank.

Take away the branding and there remains a core of irrepressible imagination, the fuel of so many great games, that is anything but robotic. [Issue#403, p.92]