A brilliant musical puzzler that sends you out into the world enriched and filled with curiosity. [Eurogamer Essential]

A brilliant musical puzzler that sends you out into the world enriched and filled with curiosity. [Eurogamer Essential]

Trails to Azure is an important second entry to the Crossbell saga, adding some neat touches and forming two parts of a whole with Trails From Zero. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A half-interesting game is buried by a mess of its own making - and represents an industry conundrum that will only continue to grow.

Mixing Into the Breach with Frozen Synapse makes for an inevitably strong core of mech combat, but the rest of Phantom Brigade is underwhelming.

Team Ninja evolves Nioh's formula in a Three Kingdoms-era action RPG where allies, flags, and stealth make its brutal challenges more manageable than ever. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Give yourself to this elegant and empathetic study of solitude. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Chaos is actually choreography, as an unreleased Atari arcade game gets the full Minter treatment. [Eurogamer Essential]

Navigating a tonal minefield with just enough confidence, Company of Heroes 3 is a big, refined, and beautifully textured addition to an already brilliant series. [Eurogamer Recommended]

The long overdue samurai spin-off is classic Yakuza under its period dressing but also underwhelming as a current-gen remake.

Far more than just a Monster Hunter clone, Wild Hearts exceeds expectations and then some, mixing streamlined action with inventive new toys. [Eurogamer Recommended]

As a technical showcase for what's possible with PSVR2 Call of the Mountain excels, even if its world and mechanics sometimes fall short. [Recommended]

All the confusing yet irresistible energy of early-noughties double-A gaming, marred by awful writing and a core gimmick that doesn't ignite.

Hi-Fi Rush is unashamed to be loud and brash and playful, and it's confident in its execution. On the surface it might seem frivolous but there's a deep battle system here that rewards combo memory and, of course, rhythm. It's upbeat, wide-eyed and unpretentious, but that's all part of its inescapable charm, a game that appeased my inner teen and rewarded musicality in equal measure. I had a blast. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Disparate parts pull together to form a beautiful game that's only more potent for its awkward adolescence. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A rare balance of playfulness and genuine strategic depth, plucked from the margins of history. [Eurogamer Recommended]

While a fine piece of craft and a sumptuous reworking of the setting, EA Motive's Dead Space remake sheds a little of the 2008 game's enchantment.

An intimite, mindful story of journalling what matters hits a few small bumps in the road.

Forspoken takes it time to get over a wobbly start, but there's something worthwhile here amongst the noise.

Nintendo's long-running fantasy series looks to its rich history for this smart, satisfying turn-based strategy game. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Much like its endless enemies, Darktide's many small issues add up to a real nuisance - but stupendous atmosphere and vicious action just about prevails.

A miserable cocktail of ideas from other action-platformers and the worst parts of Rick and Morty. [Eurogamer AVOID]

Criterion takes the reins once more for an arcade racer that’s capable of going toe-to-toe with the all-conquering Forza Horizon. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Despite something of an overdeveloped plot, Crisis Core Reunion goes beyond just a quick upgrade, making some fundamental improvements to visuals, sound and controls, and implements them with care. There are flaws, but it remains a joy to spend time with favourites Cloud, Aerith, and Sephiroth once more. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Brisk, stylish and compulsive, this is everything an arcade game should be. [Eurogamer Essential]

Dead Space comparisons are impossible to avoid - but while The Callisto Protocol's missing some of the depth and tension, it makes up for it with production value and bloody-minded fun. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A bullet hell barrage that wants you to be a better player, Gunvein brings a confident blend of thoughtful elegance and unyielding intensity. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Great tactical fun nestled in a sweet-natured superhero dollhouse.

Sluggish pacing and stripped-back character interactions dull the charm, but there are still scares to be found.

It is, in other words, a really beautifully made video game. It knows what it is - the kind of game with launchers, the kind of game where the protagonist has lines like, "Never thought I'd be blowing up my own house!" And it delivers on its simple pleasures with beauty and variety. There's online co-op for two players, which I haven't been able to test, and I gather the consoles may stutter a bit, although I've had no problems on PC. But otherwise Evil West is wonderfully brutal and charming and luminously old fashioned. It's Bulletstorm. It's Painkiller. It's werewolves up the wazoo. And I had a brilliant time. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An interesting reworking of the traditional Pokémon gameplay for an open-world setting brought low by its lifeless environments and graphics

An interesting reworking of the traditional Pokémon gameplay for an open-world setting brought low by its lifeless environments and graphics.

An escape from alien invasion, with beautiful art direction.

Slick puzzle design finds itself at odds with the creativity of organising that A Little to the Left wants to evoke.

A brilliant narrative adventure that is filled with intelligence and heart. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An exhaustive reworking of a foundational dark fantasy epic, with some quietly radical new ideas. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Despite the joys offered, Sonic Frontiers is a hot mess of a reinvention that can't commit to its new direction.

Football Manager is still the best sim of its kind, but FM23's serious lack of major improvements shows an annual release schedule taking its toll.

Much like its heroes, God of War: Ragnarök learns to love itself for what it truly is: gargantuan, excessive, and wonderfully absurd. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An imaginative co-op experience that demands communication and teamwork, and conjures something memorable and unique as a result. [Eurogamer Recommended]

This year's Modern Warfare 2 has some good moments, some beautiful cinematics and some typically moreish multiplayer - but it's a cowardly retconning of the original's story.

Saturnalia successfully establishes a relationship between its physical and spiritual horrors, which together pull the player into its unpleasant reality. Saturnalia is a horrible little video game, but horrible in precisely all the ways its makers intended. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Witty, observational writing and a hands-off approach to deduction elevate this excellent period murder-mystery to a singular work. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A sapphic, sci-fi fever dream that finds horror and beauty among the stars, Signalis is dense and alluring to the last. [Eurogamer Essential]

Bayonetta 3 might not be as consistently brilliant as its predecessors, but when it's good it's next to godly; playing as Bayonetta with her entire suite of toys unlocked is as electrifying as it's ever been, a spectacle of sinewy combat and S&M excess that's uniquely, defiantly video games. It's so over-the-top that trying to make sense of it would be a mistake, and while the rough edges are a disappointment if you embrace the chaos there's a lot to love here. Bayonetta 3 is overstated, in parts underbaked - but it's rarely less than a thrill. [Eurogamer Recommended]

I think about all this as I play. I think about what I'm going to unlock next, which evolution I'm aiming for, where the next treasure chest and coin boost is coming from. I think about garlic, my favourite attack, which creates a little circle of damage around you so you can just nudge yourself against enemies the way a cat nudges you with its head when it wants fuss. I think about popcorn, which is what Vampire Survivors sounds like, each monster death sounding like another bit of corn popping in the microwave until the whole thing reaches a buttery crescendo. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An extraordinarily detailed economy and range of interlinking systems make Victoria 3 a grand strategy to rival some of Paradox's best. [Eurogamer Recommended]

This is a slight muddle of a game, but it has its pleasures.

An unforgettable story of desperation and hope in beautiful, gruesome, plague-ridden 14th Century France. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Well, this turns out to be brilliant fun, tactical and knockabout, exactly as you'd expect if you combined Mario and XCOM. The roster of characters is colourful and quirky, encouraging experimentation, and alongside equipping items and sparks, each character has a handful of skill trees to plug points into as they level. (Characters also auto-level off the battlefield.) Throw in bosses, inventive victory conditions, deep cuts from Mario universe and clever battlefield design and you've got something pretty special. [Eurogamer Recommended]

In Scorn, a game of wonderfully horrible atmosphere and smart, hands-off puzzling is undermined by some dodgy checkpoints and wonky combat.

Explore an endless wetlands in this glorious study in nature and solitude. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Part adventure game, part construction simulator, Lego Bricktales lays strong foundations for a truer type of Lego experience.

Bounding Box delivers an anachronistic high-wire act, and the perhaps the best shooter outright since Doom Eternal. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An aimless-feeling revamp of 2016's best multiplayer game, slightly coarsened by free-to-play grinding.

Dome Keeper merges digging and base defence but struggles to make either a success in their own right.

Imperfect, unkind, and rough round the edges, Session captures more of real skateboarding than almost any game that has come before.

FIFA 23, like so many FIFAs before it, sums up the best and worst of football culture - a joyous game in the vice-like grip of profiteers.

In a way, it makes me look on those cinematic action-adventure games a little more kindly. I see the craft that the developers tried to hide, and I can enjoy the gaps between what they were hoping would happen and what often happened instead. But that's a fleeting thought, really. Mainly when I play Automatoys I think about Automatoys. I think about getting that ball from the start to the exit, and when one machine is done, I cannot wait to see the next. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Hob's Barrow is a game that refuses to leave your brain until the whole thing is untangled. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Grounded's charming, Honey I Shrunk the Kids premise is elevated by its uniquely welcoming approach to wonder. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Compact and terrifying, this score-attack shooter feels like it's come from the future. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Compact and terrifying, this score-attack shooter feels like it's come from the future. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Trails From Zero might be late to the scene but even now, Nihon Falcom's JRPG remains one of the best Trails games yet. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A deft and heartfelt journey through nostalgia. [Eurogamer Recommended]

There's a wonderful depth of tactics in this cyberpunk charmer. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A beautifully structured, rich and thoughtful adventure with gentle but decisive RPG elements. [Eurogamer Essential]

A lean and tightly-restrained mashup of more than just Rock Band and Doom, Metal: Hellsinger captures the earnest spirit of an underloved genre. [Eurogamer Recommended]

This narrative-driven dice game from Cosmo D is packed full of his signature visual and musical motifs, and loosely picks up your pizzaiolo/secret agent journey from 2020's Tales From Off-Peak City Vol. 1. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Characterful fighters, a good skill ceiling, and a co-op emphasis with real depth makes Warner Bros. MultiVersus a very pleasant surprise. [Eurogamer Recommended]

There are few surprises to be found in Splatoon 3's multiplayer or campaign, but it is the best Nintendo's spectacular series has been to date. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An exhilarating, fluid, incredibly broken mage-‘em-up set in tortured procedural worlds.

Sam Barlow's epic mystery of self-reference and cinema is an elaborate, ingenious enigma - one that would be even better if it didn't want to be solved.

It's fun, I think: a budget Kirby about rolling around and annoying your friends, an amuse bouche, which may or may not be how that phrase is spelled. I worry it won't be too long before this sinks down the rankings in our house and disappears from the main Switch screen, but it will leave some lovely sugary memories behind. And the subconscious desire, perhaps, to eat an awful lot of strawberries.

I can't help but admit I'm having a smashing time - quite literally - with Saints Row. Yes, the story is trite at times and yes, much of where that story takes you can feel a touch ridiculous, but it's to the team's credit that this deftly side-steps the issues of its predecessors and rarely feels gratuitous or malicious. The Saints Row reboot is self-aware and self-deprecating and if you're able to move past its prior reputation, there's a fast and furious shooter here that's worthy of your time.

A game that gives you the rare chance to kick back and do diddly squat. [Eurogamer Recommended]

The biggest success of the game, though, is its sense of authenticity. The LGBT+ representation is excellent, with diverse characters normalising queer relationships. The developer's devotion to authentic twentysomething reference points is commendable. And where so many music stories push songwriting and acoustic instruments as more "authentic" than manufactured pop, here the secret to success is simple: just be yourself.

Roll7 blends genres with total mastery in Rollerdrome, one of the most breathlessly stylish and casually, outrageously cool games you'll ever play. [Eurogamer Essential]

Arcade Paradise made me think of Outrun and GTA and Mr Driller, and also my own working life in my teens as a dishwasher and a double-glazing salesperson, sure. But it also made me think of those mazes tiled on the walls of Warren Street tube. Warren Street! Get it? Little puzzles made to be solved between trains, but tricky enough to encourage you to miss your train in the first place. Then you solve the maze and you're off into a wider maze of the underground network. And maybe, who knows, there's a maze beyond that too. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Being a cult leader in this funny old game, then, is a little bit like being a game designer, I imagine. It's complex on certain levels, and to use the lovely vivid cliche, you're herding cats quite a lot. But really you're trying to arrange happiness for people. The only difference is that as a cult leader, if they don't become happy on cue, you can cook them and eat them. [Eurogamer Recommended]

[Eurogamer Recommended]

Clever tweaks to a brilliant formula make this a tactics game just built for experimentation. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Just as it did with Two Point Hospital, Two Point Studios has combined neatly overlapping managmenet systems with an irrepressably oddball charm. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Monolith Soft closes out its loosely connected trilogy of epic RPGs with its most adaptable, malleable and high-spirited adventure yet. [Eurogamer Essential]

While component tales and battles can be hit-and-miss, this elderly Squaresoft anthology is a wonderful testament to its genre's flexibility and range. [Eurogamer Recommended]

It's by doing this - looking at the world through feline eyes - that Stray creates a journey filled with such a sense of exploration, on top of the chance to indulge in as much cat-truction as you like. While doing so, though, it also crafts a touching story about the human desires of those who, at a glance, lack humanity - be it to reunite with a loved one, protect a community or reach the outside world. The result is a wonderful mix: a game about the longing for freedom, clever climbing mechanics, and every cat’s eternal desire to knock items off shelves. [Eurogamer Recommended]

As Dusk Falls represents a bold new future for interactive movie games - a future where games can do away with the supernatural spectacle and thrillery whodunnits to rely on human drama to entertain us instead. And OK, this does occasionally veer into soap opera, but at other times it's gentle and deep and dark, even profound. It shows how well games can handle stories and themes like these when done with care and understanding, and how well it can pull us into the lives of others and invest us in the decisions they have to make. And that's what really stays with me about the game: stories - human stories. They are the troubled, awkward and beautiful stories I can see in the world around me, that I can relate to myself. This is a game that reflects, in many ways, our own lives. Silly as it sometimes can be, As Dusk Falls feels real, and I can't think of a higher compliment to give it. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An eerie journey back to the days when all games were a bit eerie anyway. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An excellent, deceptively unshowy blend of platformer and roguelike. [Eurogamer Recommended]

The master of the 80s arcade spectacular returns to familiar stomping ground for a game that's fascinating if not exactly finessed.

Marrying some frightfully clever time-scrolling with a captivating look into its characters' lives, Eternal Threads is a nosy player's dream. [Eurogamer Recommended]

The new generation of F1 gets a video game run-out that's at times overly familiar, but one that's nevertheless fully-featured. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Exploring an essential subject with claustrophobic, surrealist verve, Milky Way Prince feels like the first steps of a future master. [Eurogamer Recommended]

An inventive twist on both the musou formula and the acclaimed Three Houses RPG, Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes is a high point for the genre. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Laser Dog Games turns a deadly game show into a fizzing delight. [Eurogamer Recommended]

This minimalist, warm-hearted, puzzle game is a surprisingly tricky yet satisfying experience. [Eurogamer Recommended]

With airtight controls, smooth speedrunning and a big helping of anime-inspired flair, few games can keep up with Neon White's pace. [Eurogamer Recommended]

So yes, Turtles single-player has been an absolute delight. I can't wait for my first six-player match.