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.

In some ways, Directive 8020 feels like a game of missed opportunities, and a bunch of almost-theres. But sometimes Supermassive's ambition pays off. It's a touch too long, it's a little too one-note, and I wish it could have pushed a little harder to find its own identity as it charted so much well-trodden ground. But its existential chills are effective, it's got an earnest spirit, and a phenomenal cast that genuinely made me care. If Supermassive keeps pushing its horror series, I suspect great things are in store.

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

From the developer of The Banished Vault, Amberspire is an equal-parts frustrating and intriguing eco city-builder set on a moon that was built as a mausoleum.

Little personal quibbles like this aside, though, I had a lot of fun with Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, and am eager to get back into the seat of the Batmobile to cruise through the streets of Gotham once more, but with my children by my side as co-pilot. The game has a winning marriage of deep Batman lore for fans and Lego's iconic humour, so there really does seem to be something for everyone tucked within the folds of the Dark Knight's various capes and masks. [Hands-On Impressions]

Great emphasis and great care - in many ways to already great success - has been placed on understanding and recreating the ineffable Bond-ness of the licence. That goes from the casting decisions to the story to the way Bond moves and talks; the way the game's mechanics are constructed; the tiny, missable moments of craft across animation, sound, music, lighting. The options available at any time. Even the type of game 007: First Light actually is. [3-Hour Hands-On Impressions]

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.

Peter Molyneux does his greatest hits, mixing god sim, business sim, and third-person adventure into a charming, appealingly tactile - if slightly awkward - whole.

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.

Years of careful study underpin a deceptively familiar sequel. The new additions make a difference but it's the confidence in what this eccentric card game is that shines through. Cruelty has never been so enjoyable. [Early Access Review]

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

John Carpenter's Toxic Commando blends Left 4 Dead-style zombie blasting with systems borrowed from Saber's back catalogue. The results work well enough, but are undermined by flabby mission design and unnecessary meta-progression.

A vast world and even vaster array of MMO-like activities mix with glittering fidelity in Crimson Desert, but what good is it without much character, texture or charm?

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.

It's a fun distraction on your mobile, giving you a few hours of entertainment to rack up a high score, finish all the stages, and gawp at the tremendous graphics. Like I said, worth a bob or two.

Despite some truly awful sections to put up with, enough of the old magic remains to make it worth sticking with if you loved the original. The real puzzle is how Telltale let it out of the door in this state.

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.

The sequel to Squanch Games' detestable FPS demonstrates significant improvement, though its biggest features remain its weakest - and technical issues hinder the progress made.

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.

With nothing to aim for other than a slightly higher score, Food Processing feels like one of those apps which burns brightly and briefly before you move on to something more involved. That's a guaranteed few million sales, then.

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.

Like so many plying their trade in 2D action adventures, Rogue Sky wins the day through eye-catching art and simple, effective mechanics that always manage to avoid straying onto the wrong side of the challenge/frustration divide.

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.

With tactile controls, Shadow Runner would be an excellent, original platform puzzler, but it doesn't quite come off on touch-screen devices. Nice try, though.

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.

Metroid Prime 4: Beyond is enjoyable enough, and has glimpses of vintage Metroid shining through, but this game could and should have been so much more.

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.

A shift away from single-player leaves Call of Duty with its most lopsided and homogenous entry in decades, though what it does offer is consistently good fun when accepted on its own terms.

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.

Rich PvE combat and an unusually friendly community make Arc Raiders a more approachable extraction shooter than most, but Embark Studios' continued use of AI voice generation is a black mark against its reputation.

Oh, and here's a bonus: this is one of these games that runs well. I don't associate Warriors with that, even on higher-end consoles. But this is great. I don't know if it began life as a Switch 1 game and was then shifted to the successor machine or what, but whatever the reasoning I'm thrilled to note that this looks nice enough but also maintains a solid and high frame rate, even when hundreds of troops are bouncing around on screen. [Impressions]

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.

PowerWash Simulator 2 opts for welcome refinements over big advancements, but it's as weirdly compelling and winningly daft as ever.

Psychonauts studio Double Fine returns with a surprising, shapeshifting adventure of captivating wonder and beauty.

The Chinese Room has managed to make something from a box of inherited parts, but this action RPG feels hollow and functional, and is only redeemed by some stellar performances from the characters and cast.

Kenny Sun's new game is a voguish spin on an Atari classic - and it rules.

Lumiose City could do with work, but Pokémon Legends: Z-A is a much more tightly focused - and delightfully goofy - return to better form. At least by modern Pokémon's standards.

Battlefield 6 delivers a thrilling multiplayer reset and a decent, if derivative single-player. But it still displays nagging doubts about what makes Battlefield special.

Supermassive's decision to play it safe means too many familiar frustrations, but impressive artistry – and a mid-game uptick – makes for a grimly compelling adventure all the same.

Jenny Jiao Hsia's dazzling, semi-autobiographical tale of teenage life finds wit and warmth in its WarioWare weirdness, even as it deals with difficult themes.

I love crime fiction. On principle, I will, to paraphrase one of Death on the Nile's main characters, go absolutely bald-headed for an Agatha Christie game, with the full understanding that reimagination and reinterpretation are crucial parts in keeping stories alive well beyond the existence of their creators. But while there is eccentricity and tension and vitality (however subdued and English) within the pages of Christie's decades-old books, my first lesson in playing Death on the Nile is to accept comical lifelessness in the modern world's most interactive media form. And it is a different creature entirely.

Kyle Crane is back, and looking for revenge on the evil scientist who's spent 13 years experimenting on him in this enjoyable if sometimes uneven romp through Techland's greatest hits.

A fun arcade karting experience is often too chaotic for its own good, but a tight handling model with a high skill ceiling offers surprising depth.

Sucker Punch's sequel offers more great swordplay and heartfelt storytelling, but would be better served as a linear action game, freed of its poor sidequests and dated open world.

Maybe it's witchcraft. Maybe it's magic. Either way, Supergiant manages to draw down the moon with its Herculean action and epic narrative in Hades 2.

The politically-charged 1997 PlayStation original is one of the finest tactics games of all time. This remaster offers a brilliant new reading of what was already a classic text.

After an absolute age, EA's wheelie classic is back with great handling and a whole world of slightly jarring niceness. [Early Access Review]

Borderlands 4 brings a more sensible script and a true open world to its pseudo-cel-shaded gun-show. But these moderate improvements are undermined by frustrating exploration and combat that takes too long to properly shine.

Baby Steps walks a fine line between frustration and accomplishment to provide a walking simulator and climbing experience quite unlike anything else.

Silent Hill f's frustrating first-half is outweighed by a brilliant, delirious second that's well worth the initial slog.

As a short but sweet puzzle-adventure game, Lego Voyagers handles itself with an air of grace but no snootiness - a game so lovely it's hard not to feel sad when it's all over. Look deeper though, or simply from the privilege of age, and it'll leave a more lasting impression on those of us who know what proper friendship feels like. Sometimes a little "hello" is all you need.

Pretty and charmingly mean-spirited, this is a game filled with revelations and genuine personality.

Cronos: The New Dawn is Bloober Team's best original game yet. An immersive romp through a suffocating portrayal of 80s Poland, where your journey is far from what it first seems.

Hell is Us is an absorbing, nightmarish meditation on the horror of war, but divisive design choices prove tedious.

A powerful, memorable story told not with dialogue but with interaction, movement, and art.

A legend is brought back to life with Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, in a surprisingly sensitive remake from Konami featuring developers from the original.

Movement, meaning and mindfulness combine in Giant Squid's latest, a game of free-form expression and flow.

Mafia continues to feel a tad dated in its design trappings, but there's a fascinating mix of beauty, efficiency and nuanced performances here that are well worth your time.

The ant-sized thrills of Grounded return in a sequel which lays exciting foundations for the future. There's work to do but, already, an exciting adventure to have. [Early Access Review]

A great idea lost under the weight of tiresome game mechanics.

At its best this colourful racer has the power to improve your day.

Familiarity stalks you at every turn in Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, a competent, cool and pretty soulslike with a nice twist on death but few true surprises.

A brilliant core mechanic and clever design twists make Bananza a delightfully sticky 3D platform adventure topped off with a sweet central character relationship.

Eriksholm: The Stolen Dream offers luxurious cutscenes and a focused twist on stealth by remaining intentionally inflexible, but doesn't quite pull it all together.

There are cuts and alterations, but this remains a properly glorious collection of two classic games.

Still a classic, but a little of that vital weirdness is gone.

A busier, louder, and more emotionally resplendent take on this singular hiking sim.

What a bizarre, improbable thing this is. If Control was all about a fairly standard action game with world-beating set dressing, it feels like Firebreak has worked backwards from that set dressing to build all its actual ideas from. It really is a game about fixing furnaces and picking up Post-its, but it wants you to do it with strangers, and, heck, why not have a little interference from the Hiss as you go? It’s pretty much Control fan fiction - and I mean that even if you don't get the mission in which you're fixing giant fans.

Dune: Awakening is a harsh survival game, an intriguing RPG, and a fierce open world PvP game all in one. Somehow, it pulls it off.

A smart and inventive RPG-lite, and a worthy entry in the TRON canon.

Although it shows some early promise, MindsEye is sunk by a ridiculous story, inconsistent writing, poorly designed mission scenarios, and utterly atrocious combat.

The Alters achieves something tense and new by merging strategy base-building with third-person exploration and a sci-fi story about cloning yourself. But repetition and complicated busywork mar the overall effect.

Mario Kart World offers neat twists on the classic Mario Kart formula, but its open-world ambitions are somewhat let down by some classic Nintendo quirkiness.

Part of me has always thought that Nintendo doesn't really care about technology. The company's made games that look like they're made of paper and felt, and when it dabbled in VR it did it with cardboard. So it feels a bit weird to see Nintendo banging on about HDR and, in the later moments of the stamp rally, diving inside the Switch 2 console itself and letting you walk over its battery and its heat channels and all that jazz. It feels like Nintendo spends a lot of time pretending that this isn't technology at all. It's just imagination and playfulness.

FromSoftware's multiplayer spin-off is an exhilarating rush and a celebration of the studio's prior achievements Souls veterans will devour.

Blades of Fire manages to feel original, lovable, and born of genuine passion, despite the near overwhelming number of problems that could have extinguished it.

By turns minimalist and luxurious, this is a thrilling exploration of the art of photography.

Here's a more grounded Doom, but one that's as brisk and playful as ever.

A wondrous dreamlike world to explore in or out of VR, but a story that doesn't always hit as hard as you might want.

A zany, knockabout co-op action adventure that's kaleidoscopically colourful but wears you out before you get to the good stuff.

Despelote's creators tell a remarkable, pseudo-autobiographical tale about football, Ecuador, and community - but also one about the act of remembering, and the creative act itself.

Ingenious and characterful, this immersive sim is an absolute delight - particularly when things go wrong.

Part management sim, part open-world adventure, this is both weird and familiar, and deeply comforting stuff.

Forza Horizon 5 is an excellent title that is still one of the best-looking racing games ever made. Nothing really comes close to the level of raw environmental fidelity that Forza Horizon 5 so effortlessly accomplishes across its vast open world. Plus, the car models look great, lighting quality is excellent, and performance is typically impeccable across its target platforms. Panic Button's porting effort certainly does the job too, though the base PS5 essentially comes in exactly as expected. Relative to Series X, it's a near-perfect match. That's not a bad thing at all, as the port is consistently high quality and arrives without significant issues.

Outstanding artwork and glorious combat bring Clair Obscur: Expedition 33's bold, painterly world to life.

Acclaimed point-and-click studio Wadjet Eye's gently paced, time-travelling genre-hopper blends elegant puzzling and intricate, affecting storytelling to beautiful effect.