Fresh, but slightly sanitised, Rock Legend isn't a game you're going to play intensively for months. However, note the price (GBP 12.50), and purchase anticipating two or three weeks of quirky, leather-trousered amusement, and you shouldn't be disappointed.

I gave up after trying three of the six short races and the simple shooting and collecting mini-games. Life's too short. I'm never going back, and God forbid gathering people together for the multi-player mode. If the controls don't kill me, the irritating farting ditty in the background just might. That's the last time I play this dreadful excuse for a racing game.

Half an hour and one hundred percent done.

This is a ludicrous amount of excellent fun to get for free, and in that price bracket, it automatically gains an extra point on the Out-Of-Ten-o-Meter.

As a relatively cheap mechanism for bringing you back to what is still fundamentally an excellent game, Operation: Omega Dawn is as good an excuse as any to get back into Warhawk's superb online multiplayer.

The lack of grouping levels does it a real disservice, and once again that it's a remix of an old PC game with a new title isn't enamouring. But the same hypnotic power is present here, and even now, having played the stupid thing to death, I've a horrible suspicion that if I loaded it again I'd end up playing all over again.

The scoring system is extremely forgiving. As long as you make some kind of noise the song bars will fill up, though they'll vary in colour from red to green depending on how well you're doing. At the end of your performance you'll get comments from the judges. Some of these are a bit snidey, but not enough to make anyone cry.

It's a good fit for the DS, the top screen showing your list and time, the bottom the interactive scene. But it's a shame it's rehashed PC backgrounds, and low-res images. I'd love to see more originality applied, but there's no denying this is idiotically absorbing.

Its skill system is like a twisted version of EVE Online's, without the intricacy or CCP's talent. Its mise-en-scène is somewhere between the grittiness of Conan and WAR's orcs and humans. Underneath the lack of originality, there's a hole where the game should be: a loose, incongruous mess of bad controls, horrible user interface, and broken combat system.

Suffice to say, there's a lot going on in Warrior Epic. But at this early stage - effectively, still a public open beta - it still feels rough, and a long way from fulfilling its potential.

Despite all that, you may find that you can't quite forget Fatale, that you come back to its problems, its frustrations, and its ambiguities even when the memories of more fully-realised games have faded. Trapped somewhere between survival horrors and full-blown gallery installations, Tale of Tales remains a fascinating studio.

If you've never played any of Nintendo's many Picross titles, this is as good a place to start as any.

But when you find yourself constantly messing up routine jump manoeuvres because of vindictive collision detection, the whole thing becomes aggravating - a war of attrition against poorly designed controls.

Those in search of a tough brawl might find nourishment in Golems of Amgarrak's slim pickings, but it's ultimately another quest-by-numbers effort that makes it very clear that the Dragon Age team's attention has now fully shifted to the sequel.

Only dedicated deadheads need apply.

As well-intentioned as this remake probably was, the harsh truth is that the gameplay hasn't aged well. If you can stomach even a quarter of the game's 16 levels, you'll deserve a Medal of Honour for special feats of tolerance.

For only 200 points, you get a good few hours of beautiful entertainment, and an Endless mode to pick through once you're done. More of this kind of thing, and Nintendo's best kept secrets won't stay that way for long.

Despite the pretence of gaming structure, let's call The Polynomial what it is: an invitation to sit around in self-medicated bliss.

What was a wonderfully intuitive and thoroughly relaxing process on iOS (especially the iPad version) is a bit more of a challenge when you reduce it to mouse control, though.

Meanwhile, it serves as a sharp reminder that, regardless of how pointless the skills are that some videogames imprint upon our minds and hands, some of life's biggest thrills are to be found in their mastery.

Once you slip into the mindset and embrace Puzzle Bots' lo-fi charms, the initial clunkiness dissipates into a cloud of goodwill, and chipping your way through 17 stages of point-and-click puzzling seems like a fine way to occupy an evening.

After its unnecessarily basic opening run of levels, the excitably named Go! Go! Island Rescue! begins to justify all the exclamation marks with some furiously taxing levels.

Even if GTi Club Supermini Festa was a tenth of the price you'd be hard pressed to justify buying it. Its existence in 2010 is entirely redundant.

There are two sides to SBK X, really. The Arcade mode is probably too laid back - if you just want to dabble with bikes without putting much thought in, MotoGP 09/10 is a more gratifying game - but the Simulation is extremely flexible.

Because it's scientifically impossible to have too many match-three videogames in your life, here's another one to salivate inappropriately over.

We should reserve judgement until Namco releases a proper version, but from what we've seen, it's worth it.

Given that the original came features eight levels of a similar quality (and can be tried out free first), you might be better off checking out the original first. If you just can't get enough, come back for second helpings.

Viewed without the surly baggage of a retro purist, you'll take it for what it is: a jolly old-school throwback with dozens of dastardly levels to mine and a hideous art style. Can you dig it?

The game hooks you by virtue of a well-judged difficulty curve allied to a drip-feed of upgrades.

If you wish Breakout games looked and sounded like they were made by Amiga obsessives in the early nineties, Ricochet HD might have an unlikely allure. The rest of you should probably look up far superior Shatter.

Damn you Fair Play Labs and your time-thieving ways.

Puzzle fans bored of sliding tiles as quickly as possible will enjoy the change of pace.

With its rather rudimentary style, Arctic Escape will doubtlessly pass most people by, but those of you who take pride in rooting out DSiWare's hidden puzzle gems will be happy they did.

How long you keep going is probably more down to your OCD tendencies than anything, but with dozens of frog species and even more achievements to shoot for, it will most likely be longer than you should.

It's a simple enough formula, but for those of you looking for an uncomplicated reminder of a forgotten era, Captain Sub is a fine waste of time and money.

Some games are so excruciatingly terrible that you feel compelled to review them, if only as a benevolent act of public service to ward off the curious and daft.

If you loved Words With Friends, then it's almost certain that you'll waste just as much time here. Just don't blame me for corrupting your innocent mind.

A mildly engaging way to spend an otherwise empty hour of your life.

The lack of multiplayer is a bit of an oversight, but if you can live with that, Castle Conqueror represents another persuasive reason to consider thumbing through Nintendo's virtual racks.

For your massive 59 pence outlay, you get 27 tricky-as-you-like courses, rendered with the requisite loving care, and the chance to obsess over your times with your equally OCD friends. Honestly, what's not to love?

More to the point, why would you consider spending £4.50 on the gaming equivalent of pairing socks? I'm not sure even the developer, Intense, has the answer to that one.

Simultaneously brain-frying and fiendishly satisfying, Ancient Frog is another puzzle revelation. And with 100 beautifully presented levels to unpick, it's a keeper.

The puzzles aren't bad either, and flitting between nicely-rendered static environments is pleasantly old school, and works well on the iPad.

So even if golf brings out your inner chainsaw-wielding Alf Garnett, face your demons with this playful physics-based catharsis. All yours for 59p.

Little angry robots need love too. But it's a special kind of love that one formally expresses via the ancient art of turn-based combat and fruit machines.

For as much as I wanted to experience more of its restless, morphing environments, there's only so much personal failure you can take before it's time to wave the white flag of surrender.

Imagine how stupid you'd feel if you actually ended up paying for more of it?

And with online leaderboards, Game Center integration and universal iOS support, it works even better on iPad, as you'd expect.

But despite its hugely endearing premise, the dizzying, chaotic novelty soon turns into a muddled scrimmage where success tends to be measured as much in luck as in skill.

As it is, Lucid flows along happily over its 55 levels, but playing for high scores alone may not be enough to tempt you into the zone.

If the point is make your mundane life seem exciting by comparison, then I guess it's job done, but hardcore adventurers may find these sections taxing for all the wrong reasons.

If Alien Hallway bothered to adopt the 'lanes' system of PvZ, it might have worked, but instead this headlong battle quickly descends into a repetitive brawl of little consequence.

Even on the most basic level it fails to drag itself out of the mire, with haphazard handling and regrettable collision detection conspiring to ensure that any enjoyment you eke out of it will be entirely coincidental.

It's a beautiful piece of design and one that puts PomPom right up there with Canabalt creator Adam Saltsman at the very forefront of the genre... whatever genre this actually is, of course.

If you have the free code then there's no reason not to give Bloodbath Arena a try, even if all it really adds is a place to quickly grind your way up a few levels. As a paid download, however, it's uninspired stuff.

As with so many gaming oddities, Cell is haunted by the ghost of the game it could have been. Though, unlike so many of them, Cell barely ever lets you get bored. The screen's always bursting with poison voxels, the world s always a little bit of a mystery.

Spectacularly miserable licensed fare - a tie-in game that recalls the bad old days when a movie title was leased out to some mom-and-pop developer in the middle of Siberia and put together with the help of a broken woollen loom and old chopsticks.

Out There Somewhere isn't a normal game, though: it's a platformer with a devious twist and a truly shocking difficulty curve. It's a platformer with a very late level, for example, that contains absolutely no platforms at all - just empty space and a doorway right near the ceiling. With this weird, atmospheric brainteasing oddity, the Brazilian micro-team Studio MiniBoss has put itself firmly on the indie game map. This is challenging stuff, but it's wonderfully creative with it, and I'm not sure I can recommend it enough.

you get less than two hours of gameplay consisting of a few repetitive fights, and all you get to show for it is a new hat. Hardly worth getting out of bed for, let alone rising from the grave.

Reliable and workmanlike, the Crimson Map Pack gets the job done, but it'll take something more dramatic to keep players on the hook into 2013 and beyond.

The basic mechanics are tedious, and they don't even work properly. To get much value out of this you'd have to be a serious Austen buff, or a really hardcore fan of finding stuff hidden behind other stuff.

If you still pine for rigidly contained maps like Battle Creek, Turf or even the relatively recent Guardian, then the Majestic Map Pack lives up to its name.

Olo is small but perfectly-formed, a game of depth with simple rules and the classiest presentation.

A chilled-out and peaceful challenge, quite unlike anything else around, Finger Hoola is just lovely.

Two and a bit out of three isn't a batting average to be ashamed of, though, and since Castle comes packaged with the usual array of playlist polishes to keep the game fresh, there's absolutely no reason for anyone still loving Halo 4's multiplayer not to embrace it. After all, it's a long wait for Halo 5.

Vector is a joy to behold on the iPhone, but an absolute dream on a Retina-screened iPad.

The Football Playbook is unlikely to live long in the memory: it may be a reasonable proof of concept, but it's a long way from the beautiful game.

rRootage Online is why Kenta Cho releases his games in the way he does; it's now got a chance to hit a new audience, and be enjoyed by many more people, in what feels like the definitive version. If you've got any interest in shooters, don't let him down.

This is pared-back game creation at its most sharp-edged: a sewing needle through the tear duct, a razor blade lodged in your brain.

All of which puts GoatUp 2 right up there with Gridrunner as Llamasoft's best work on iOS. It may have one foot in the past, but even with all that methane this is a daisy-fresh delight, as sprightly and joyous as anything on the App Store. In other words, a taste very much worth acquiring.

As usual, Love's eye for a scandalous and knowing wink at gender relations forms an enjoyable, coherent journey through well-rounded characters' lives. If Hate Plus has a downside, it's that you will have to put aside time to read things for three days. But the upside is that you get to read Christine Love's stories for three days, have your cake, and eat it as well.

Coolson's Artisanal Chocolate Alphabet is a beautifully crafted, fun to play game. It's perfect for anyone who enjoys wordplay, has fastidious organisational tendencies or was disappointed to discover that high-paying jobs in publishing do not magically apparate after three years spent reading one Thomas Hardy novel and watching Loose Women.

As it stands now, it's a fun time-waster for retro game and horror fans. With a little more balance and polish, however, it could be something quite special.

It's hard to shake the feeling that China Rising is Battlefield 4 by numbers - maps for the sake of maps. That's enough for most. That is, if they can get the bloody game to work.

Second Assault marks another successful map pack for DICE, although one not nearly as sharp as Battlefield 3's marvellous End Game sign-off. Two excellent maps, one decent effort in Metro, and the perfunctory but underwhelming Operation Firestorm are enough to freshen up the rotation, while the new weapons might sate those who've already (somehow) exhausted the 'vanilla' game's already sizeable arsenal.

From the cartoon sketchiness of the art to the breezy gallicisms that litter the text, there's a wonderful sense that, for all its elegance, the core of Poof vs. the Cursed Kitty came together in a mad rush. And although it's a pretty simple affair at heart, it will drink in your free time with surprising ease.

It's unadorned, then, but the game's so wonderfully unselfconscious in its aims that it creates the perfect atmosphere in which to enjoy its simple charms.

This is DLC that sticks to what has worked in the past while taking tentative steps towards a different formula in which Call of Duty is many games under one banner. Action movie, slasher horror, sci-fi conspiracy - they're all in here, and often competing with each other.

Exploring the ruins of ancient civilizations under the watchful eyes of a race of paleo-people isn't just surreal; it's also unnerving to see how little power you really have here. Without air, without any technology to speak of, without your friends or family, you're truly lost.

What a treat, finally, to be able to say nice things about Battlefield 4. Onwards, upwards, and never look back at the destruction you left behind.

Above all though, I like the fact that it's kind of an art game take on stupid coconut-shy mobile sports rubbish while also being an extremely good example of the latter. It's the sort of game you could write a paper about but you will also see randoms playing and enjoying on the train.

At its best, this is still the shooter that can do things no other can - the emergent drama, the unscripted madness - but Battlefield Hardline will need to offer much more (and work perfectly on day one) for DICE's biggest hitter to not get left behind.

There is a soul to the game, an integrity that tries hard to smooth over many of the game's rough edges.

Undeniably Islands sits to the far left of the sliding scale that runs between digital art installation and Call of Duty. That only adds to its transgressive appeal. It expands the definition of what games can and might be. [Recommended]

An odd combination of Dead Space and Dear Esther, ICARUS.1 isn't particularly challenging to play through or exciting to conclude, but it does offer a premise and a pace to enjoy it that never feels that it has to rely on the obvious survival/horror tropes, preferring instead to evoke the spirit of classic science fiction, from a time before all astronauts were armed and the mysteries of the universe could be solved with a blaster.

Clickers meet twin-sticks in a game that will eat your time like no other. [Recommended]

On Sony's Vita (it's worth noting that it's also available on PlayStation 4, with cross-buy part of the package), it nestles alongside contemporary classics such as Spelunky, TxK, Hotline Miami and Proteus and cements the cult status of this much-loved, ill-starred handheld. Heck, it may well be the best of the lot. [Recommended]

Please Knock on My Door effectively encompasses the isolation and strain those who experience depression go through on a day-to-day basis. [Recommended]

A smart and charming puzzle game that has respect for your time and money. [Recommended]

A classic tower defence game gets a makeover, and a welcome touch of physics.

Beneath the bland mascot lurks a decent arcade game.

Sterling hack-and-slash combat meets raw, fractured prose in one of gaming's most essential nightmares. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A one-of-a-kind splicing of PS1 with 16-bit aesthetics and formal conventions, streaked with self-aware humour, sorrow and yearning. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Told with nerdish detail - and limited production values - Train Sim World 2020 might surprise you. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A narrative postal adventure delivered with zip and style. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A gently interactive experience that will put a smile on your face. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A brilliant woman's life is centre-stage in a game filled with insight and generosity. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Llamasoft's latest arcade treat is as thrilling as ever. [Eurogamer Recommended]