The second game from Disco Elysium studio ZA/UM, this text-heavy, dice-driven RPG is an exquisitely constructed take on consumerism, empire, nostalgia and beyond.

Playground Games does it again: equal parts adept teacher and artisanal tour guide, Forza Horizon 6 takes the lessons from 14 years of series history and applies them with panache.

Mixtape, from The Artful Escape studio Beethoven & Dinosaur, is a delight. It's a celebration of teenage life that makes its point, aptly, just as a teenager would.

This genre blend revels in its own sense of imagination and excess.

Saros' narrative often feels at odds with the kind of experience it wants to be, but there's no denying this is another top-tier action game from Housemarque.

Part-chaotic retro shooter, part-stylish cartoon noir, Mouse P.I. for Hire goes beyond its stellar artistry to land an invigorating, imaginative hard-boiled romp.

Emboldened by years of success, Capcom's risky 360-era shooter dares to tackle sci-fi shooter convention in a proudly experimental gamble.

Weaving Terry Pratchett, Terry Gilliam and more, Esoteric Ebb is a comedic D&D adventure where a waylaid Cleric is tasked with solving a crime, days before the world's first election.

With spellbinding combat and high-concept maps, Marathon is far more than a cool aesthetic draped over the bones of an extraction shooter.

Pokopia succeeds in capturing the spirit of Pokémon's past without sacrificing its uniqueness, as one of the best spin-offs the franchise has ever seen.

Capcom marks Resident Evil's 30th anniversary with a stellar return that's both a masterful bit of suffocating horror and a nostalgic, fan-thrilling victory lap for the legendary series.

Styx: Blades of Greed isn't quite as well cut out as a fine piece of quartz, but it's easily the best stealth game in years - and so utterly compelling you'll be desperate to get back to it when you have to do boring un-murdery things like, I dunno, going to the shops, or feeding the cat.

Tarsier returns to horror with a rich, meaningful evolution of its familiar Little Nightmares formula. And while it could perhaps be a little more radical, Reanimal remains utterly compelling; bleak, nasty, and full of menace.

Innovation is the ki to success for Team Ninja and Koei Tecmo, as Nioh 3 iterates on the formula once more to take an already great 'masocore' series to new heights.

The fact that RedLynx then has the gall to put mountains of tracks, skill levels and modes into a technically impressive package is likely to mean you'll gorge on DrawRace 2 for so long you'll want to send the developer more money out of sheer embarrassment. 69 pence, for goodness' sake!

It's not every day you get to roll a decapitated dominatrix robot head around in the name of quality mobile entertainment.

2XKO is a tag fighter like no other, with a bold aesthetic and superbly crafted core gameplay experience. Beloved League of Legends characters are revitalised in a new light in a truly stunning free-to-play experience.

Inkle mixes archive-surfing and audio drama to create a surprisingly powerful story of obsession and a machine.

All round, it's a compendium of disappointment, and something to which only super-hardcore Ridge Racer fans need subject themselves.

Identifying clues is now a more intuitive process. While before you might mistakenly think an adjoining picture was part of the same hint, the game now highlights the clue in question so that there's no ambiguity.

The rest you probably know about already: the fantastic visuals, the cracked humour, the five contrasting chapters that keep you transfixed right to the end. If a better game ever comes to the iPad, you might well spontaneously combust.

Broken down into its base mechanics, Spirits probably doesn't sound especially exciting, but in practice, its charming hand-drawn aesthetic and calming pace make it a perfect game to unwind to on a lazy Sunday.

You can smash through Terminator 2D: No Fate's story mode in less that the runtime of the movie, but that doesn't stop this side-scrolling action platformer from being a perfectly presented tribute to 90s nostalgia.

Can't sleep? Moon too bright? Want to eat it? It's a simple goal for a demon in the underworld, as you'll find in this gorgeous, extraordinary narrative adventure that just so happens to require skateboarding.

Santa Ragione delivers a subversive, sometimes shocking, often funny first-person narrative horror that, while perhaps a little insubstantial, remains an engagingly unconventional exploration of some timely themes.

While racing is at its core, Kirby Air Riders channels the chaotic energy of Smash Bros. to deliver a deceptively deep one-button gameplay experience - and tops it with absolutely oodles of things to do, see, and unlock.

These games have always come with oddities, but the central mode is so staggeringly joyous and compelling that it draws my eye and my attention and leaves me powerless to do anything else. Unlike Tetris, Lumines didn't need a borrowing from Lumines to become even better. All it needs - and this may just be me, and I know we have the Steam Deck - is a release on Switch 2, where that glorious panoramic screen that you hold in your hands is waiting to take this absolute dazzler back home to its portable origins.

The Outer Worlds 2 is for better and worse still fluffy gaming comfort food, but it is significantly improved and better than its predecessor in almost every way.