Guillermo del Toro once said in an interview, he made the film for himself and his children, and it shows. The game, on the other hand, might just be the perfect instrument to penalize adolescent troublemakers.

A sterling example for an effective and utterly successful overhaul of a proven and compelling concept, rather than a fundamental shake-up. This might not be a system-seller some people might have hoped for. But those who already own a Wii U can and should look forward to many, many hours perfectly tuned Nintendo entertainment.

If you're willing to put in the effort, you'll get a game with unparalleled depth and competitive fun. This one has one hell of a learning curve, but climbing it, you'll find, is a huge pleasure in and of itself.

The focused narrative and fighting mechanics work hand in hand to make for a real alternative to more expensive (and expansive) monster-rpgs, without being any less deep or engrossing for it.

It's easy to pick up and play, the cash shop is non-intrusive and the combat is quite dynamic. It's a solid piece of MMO, easily warranting that client download, maybe you even try out your dungeon master chops in the foundry editor?

This still is a seasoned and distinct piece of rpg. But between the slow start, the often slumberous and drawn out palaver and some redundant carrot-dangling in the main quest, this clearly is the weakest entry in the acclaimed series.

It's a brilliant add-on, going in with a master surgeon's precision to subtly tweak and change the mechanics for maximum impact. More than ever, this is a Civ, where you want to preserve peace, all the while showing the rest of the world that your way of life is the best one.

The Inner World is a game of opposites. While the puzzle design and characters of this debut manage to pleasantly surprise, the voice acting is in parts atrocious. Also, the stark contrast between the quality of the background art and the rather crudely drawn characters is a bit jarring. Still, this unevenness only really hits home because the rest of this point-and-click adventure is really well done.

It's nothing new that a decent look can't rescue an otherwise failing game. Dark isn't exactly bad, but at the same time it is never interesting. There is a couple of good moments in this, but in the end, I was kind of glad it was over.

Curiously, this offers about the same value as the recently published Stadium, but costs about twice as much.It's not exactly worse than that one, but, crucially, by far not as good a deal.

With Stadium, TrackMania 2 still holds true to the core tenets of the series, catering first and foremost to those, who'd do everything to shave that elusive hundredth off their time to beat the competition.At only 10 Euros, it's also a great place to start, if this games sounds like your kind of deal and you haven't gotten around to trying the series out.

Gameplay-wise this is mediocre, it's got some rough edges and only a few truly great moments. It really is action from the assembly line, nothing more, nothing less. The meta-humor on the other hand is fantastic and well delivered, if an acquired taste. Deadpool aficionados might just enjoy their five to six hours with this.

Saucy dialogue with a dash of sarcasm – even 20 years on this mix manages to entertain to a degree you'll forgive the game's relatively short story and the pretty pedestrian puzzle design.

A hack & slash game without a skinner-box loot reflex is bad enough. T o make matters worse, the quality of the fighting mechanics never holds up with the wide roster of heroes. If your favorite Marvel character is in the starting line up of this free-to-play MMO, one go can't hurt. Still, it's a shame what this turned out to be, considering the promising license.

So, is it trashy enough to gather a cult following, however tiny? Partly. The funnily deformed characters, gallons of bad pixel blood, choppy dialogue and the surreal scenes of arbitrary love-making do exude a certain broken brand of charm. But even these traces of unintentional hilariousness don't change the fact that actually playing Ride to Hell never is anything even remotely resembling fun.

Portal's influence is on evidence at every turn, but Magrunner still retains quite a bit of individuality, enough at least, to not come off as another clone. Still, the certain something is missing from this, which I found mainly to be down to the game not playing the horror card more decisively.

This is a game that puts the racing experience front and center. The physics model of the pros at Milestone is a piece of art that has only matured over the years. The sensation of speed might not be there yet and the console versions' 30 FPS are an issue, but the handling of the bikes is almost perfect.

Even though its level design capabilities are kind of rudimentary, the game still manages to give its short intense bursts of action some variety, ensuring that you return to it for another round. This, and the lovingly – and knowingly – dilettantish Amiga-style graphics makes this a really solid sleeper of a game. Had Dungeons and Dragons: Chronicles of Mystara not come out shortly before, this would most probably haven gotten more buzz.

Many, many years we had to wait for the next chapter to one of the best strategy games ever. Naturally, not everything still feels as fresh as it did almost seven years ago, with Relic clearly going for a natural evolution, rather than a revolution. However, this doesn't change the fact, that, a few issues with close camera angles and the AI pathfinding notwithstanding, Company of Heroes 2 makes for an experience as tactically engrossing and challenging as its predecessor.

This double feature is one of the best games of this type and era...It's a revelation for everybody who was there when it first came out in the arcades and for those who just dream of simpler times. Better yet, Capcom didn't content themselves with forking it out for the sake of quickly getting another product on the market. They spent ideas, love and not least considerable resources to get this version right. You know what you're getting yourself into with a brawler like this. If that's what you're looking for, you can hardly do any better than with Chronicles of Mystara.

The first two thirds are a contemplative puzzler with dreamy art direction, beguiling music and sound effects you can turn off, should you so desire. It's a small idea, but one worth playing. Had the developers withstood the urge to go a bit overboard with the action in the last bits, this would have been a really great brain-teaser. In any case, you should give it a chance to enchant you before it'll almost inevitably spite you a bit. Sometimes there's something to be said for that, this is not one of those times. But what can you do? Weather and seasons tend to come and go as they please.

In this new iteration, Animal Crossing: New Leaf still may not be the most complex sim there is. But it has a special brand of charm that transforms even the most basic of activities, like sitting on a virtual bench, into a wonderfully soothing experience. This is why I love it.

Cutting your teeth on astonishingly good-looking and immaculately presented fluff pieces and then going ahead to produce arguably the darkest game of this generation – that's the sort of trick only the real heavyweights can pull off. Naughty Dog's game ain't begging for sympathy, it doesn't care if you like it or not. As such, it's a wake-up call for the medium, determined that the line isn't drawn between good and evil or right and wrong, but between you and the others.

Undeniable technical difficulties aside, with a price tag of only 20 bucks nobody should miss out on State of Decay. It's easily one of the most complex and elaborately designed XBLA title to ever grace that service, so clever and mature I'm struggling to name another open world game that has felt this fresh in the last three years since Red Dead Redemption rode along.

In spite of all the criticism, Legacy of Romulus is a step in the right direction for Star Trek Online. It's just a very short one.

It shines in each and every discipline, only taking the very occasional and tiny misstep, you'll be hard pressed to notice or get in arms about. It's one of these games that gets you thinking long after you finished it, which makes me want to recommend it even more.

Rising Storm is a very special brand of shooter, not that you'd expect any less from Tripwire Interactive. The pacific setting gives the trusty Red Orchestra gameplay a fresh coat of paint and the game does a good job in keeping a good balance between American and Japanese forces, which could have easily been skewed against the latter. Instead, Rising Storm shows very well that it's not always down to who's got the bigger guns at their disposal.

In a desperate attempt not to scare anyone away with their choice of style, Insomniac made a game that will have a hard time getting anyone to love it. Don't get me wrong, the basics are there. And when a team of four unleashes an eardrum-busting cacophony of powerful weapons effects, you do feel solidly entertained. But it's never more than that. Nothing will ever stick out and it's only the passably rounded basic mechanics that pull you through the campaign, never to return once you finished it. The old art direction would probably not have saved it, but at least it would have had an identity.