Almost everything you do in Liberty City would be good enough to drive its own game, and the best parts would be good enough to outrun the competition, but the reason it works so well is that Rockstar has made a game that requires no patience to play. This, as much as its usual coherency and the best script in the series, is what makes GTA IV the best openworld game yet, and why it will take something miraculous to rob it of game of the year status.

Where Galaxy matches "Mario 64" is not quite in its quality of execution - alongside the brilliance of some stars are others which fall a bit flat, and there isn't the overall sense of implacable perfection that that game had - but in its confidence and originality.

GTA5 may not be the Hollywood-beating crime story it wants to be, then, but it's the best video game it's ever been, and I'll take that.

It's hard to overstate the courage and conviction with which producer Eiji Aonuma, director Hidemaro Fujibayashi and their team have rewritten their own work, and the size of the risk Nintendo has taken with a beloved property. Breath of the Wild isn't just the most radical departure from the Zelda tradition in its 30-year history, it's the first Nintendo game that feels like it was made in a world where Half-Life 2, Halo, Grand Theft Auto 3 and Skyrim happened. It's inspired by those greats and others, but it doesn't ape them any more than it rests on its own laurels. [Essential]

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.

An astounding open world unlikely to be rivalled until well into the next gen, saddled by a throughline from the last. [Eurogamer Recommended]

There are a million and one awe-inspiring moments saturated with detail waiting to be uncovered in Metroid Prime. Each new area is like an art exhibit.

A luscious, sprawling epic of a game and one of the most complete experiences I have ever encountered. If this is what I've waited a year to see on my PS2, then I would have waited ten. Magnificent.

One of the most daring and influential game designs of all time makes a long overdue comeback in Mario's most madcap adventure yet. [Essential]

The first half is fast, exciting, beautifully designed and constantly full of surprises. The second half is festooned with gobsmacking plot twists and great cinematics but let down by repetitive paint by numbers level design.

Half-Life 2 has astonished us from start to finish. Valve has done to the FPS genre what restaurants in Chinatown do to ducks; shredded it, smothered it in a delicious sauce of their own devising, and served it up in a way which you simply couldn't have imagined when looking at them in the pond.

BioShock is the ultimate rarity: not only does it live up to its lofty promise, but exceeds it through simple, old fashioned talent and imagination - not to mention verve, style,class, wit, and sheer bloody-minded ambition. It takes the tired, worn-out FPS genre by the scruff of the neck, reinvents and bend it out of shape in such a breathtaking fashion that it's going to take something very special to top this in the months and years ahead.

Whether or not the multiplayer sticks, however, is arguably a footnote, because at the core of Uncharted 2 is an action-adventure masterpiece whose minor flaws are washed away on a tide of rhythm and spectacle - one that would still be an essential experience even without the option to pull your friends off cliffs and play capture-the-heirloom.

A relentlessly compelling title that feels so rich with atmosphere, breathless excitement and palpable tension that virtually all our minor quibbles go out of the window.

With excellent stagecraft and meticulous detail, Baldur's Gate 3 conjures the illusion of perfect freedom - and then it disappears.

The Orange Box offers everything any fan of first-person shooters could possibly want: some of the best single-player gaming ever in the shape of Half-Life 2 and Episodes One and Two; wonderful innovation from Portal, and the most refined, downright fun team-based online FPS currently available in Team Fortress 2. If that doesn't warrant a 10 out of 10, nothing does.

The Orange Box offers everything any fan of first-person shooters could possibly want: some of the best single-player gaming ever in the shape of Half-Life 2 and Episodes One and Two; wonderful innovation from Portal, and the most refined, downright fun team-based online FPS currently available in Team Fortress 2. If that doesn't warrant a 10 out of 10, nothing does.

Perhaps BioWare's greatest success in Mass Effect 2 has been taking a complex RPG and making it effortless to understand, play and enjoy on a constant basis, because it has done this in a manner that should prove utterly essential to veterans and newcomers alike, and more than enough to suggest Mass Effect 3 will be the most important game in BioWare's history.

Elden Ring remains a glorious game, one that established fans are going to savour for some time to come, and one that may just welcome new fans into the FromSoft fold. Sumptuous visual design, dark and detailed lore and a vast-but-intricate open world are reason enough to venture out into the Lands Between. Add to that FromSoftware's unforgiving and unforgettable gameplay loop and this is something truly special. [Eurogamer Essential]

In weaving together the extraordinary craftsmanship evident in the music, storytelling, adventure and world design of Skyrim, Bethesda has created a very special game indeed - one that's likely to remain in the affections of gamers for many years to come.

If the idea of 20 hours of palpitating living nightmares sounds like your idea of fun, then you have no choice but to part with your cash immediately. If only all videogames were this brilliant.

A terrific Breath of the Wild follow-up with some brilliant new systems, amazing views and more dungeon-type spaces, plus a slightly deadening emphasis on gathering resources.

Simply a stunning, magical game.

The hours spent playing this masterpiece were the perfect encapsulation of why videogaming is such a favourite waste of time for so many of us. Thrilling, terrifying, moving, confusing, amusing, compelling, and very very dark. BioShock isn't simply the sign of gaming realising its true cinematic potential, but one where a game straddles so many entertainment art forms so expertly that it's the best demonstration yet how flexible this medium can be. It's no longer just another shooter wrapped up in a pretty game engine, but a story that exists and unfolds inside the most convincing and elaborate and artistic game world ever conceived.

As stunning and enjoyable as ever. You may feel foolish gripping the controller throughout a 40-minute cut scene, but MGS2 is something which must be experienced.

It's everything a videogame should be; innovative, compelling, challenging, long-lasting. And spiked with controversy and a wonderful wit, it's also something that so few videogames can ever be - cool.

What we have here is a role-playing game in which little could be improved - the story and quests are captivating, the gameplay tried and tested, and the overall feel is professional and entertaining.

It's no exaggeration to say that you could be still be playing this when the next GTA game comes out, even if it takes Rockstar another two years to finish. It's not perfect then, but so much of it is so good that you won't care.

Every bit as good as we thought it would be – if not better... But don’t expect to be constantly surprised, for much of Vice City is a retread of old ground, and if you didn’t like the last one, then Vice City probably won’t change your mind.

We're just happy to see a flagship game for a modern system that's about running from left to right and jumping over things. New ideas are great, great old ideas are better, and LittleBigPlanet has both: it's the future and the past of videogames, rolled into one.

Rockstar's skill in creating a believable, functioning world with a distinct, coherent and consistent atmosphere is peerless. The broad-brush vision is masterful.

The truth is, for every hour our blood was pumping like a turbo charged locomotive through our adrenaline scored veins, there were an equal number of hours where we were bored with the unimaginative repetition of formulaic corridor based FPS trawls. [Single-Player review; Multiplayer also rated 90]

The feeling of jubilation once you have Gold awards for every area of every test is immeasurable.

An indispensable game, combining arguably the finest RPG/adventure the 16-bit era ever produced (even compared to the likes of Secret of Mana and Final Fantasy VI) with an expertly realised multiplayer rendition of Zelda.

The Last of Us is a deeply impressive demonstration of how it can and should be done. It starts out safe but ends brave; it has heart and grit, and it hangs together beautifully. And it's a real video game, too. An elegy for a dying world, The Last of Us is also a beacon of hope for its genre.

Sure, there are times in the game when you want to shake Miyamoto and co by the lapels for including elements of the game which remain dogged by old-school convention, but they represent a flea bite on what is just a stunning and relentlessly enjoyable game.

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.

Great new gameplay features can't help the fact that Persona 5 Royal drags on even more than its predecessor.

Portal is perfect. Portal 2 is not. It's something better than that. It's human: hot-blooded, silly, poignant, irreverent, base, ingenious and loving. It's never less than a pure video game, but it's often more, and it will no doubt stand as one of the best entertainments in any medium at the end of this year. It's a masterpiece.

Rockstar's skill in creating a believable, functioning world with a distinct, coherent and consistent atmosphere is peerless. The broad-brush vision is masterful.

World of Goo is breathtakingly fresh while built on the foundations of genre classics. It offers a gentle challenge as you make your way through its seasonal chapters the first time, and then a fiendish one as you try to fathom quite how it's possible to attain the OCD targets.

When it's all done I'm left with that strange feeling of being very well cared for. I've seen a bunch of wild sights. I've messed around with cool gadgets, used the controller in unusual ways, tilting it, yes, but also blowing into it, trying to read the buried hieroglyphs of its rumble, I've ticked boxes, collected things, unlocked things, nodded at references that make me feel old, or sharp-eyed, or generally in the know. But when I close my eyes I see the tumbling fruit, the hundreds and thousands, the gems stacked so high I can kick through them as if I'm wading through autumn leaves. I think, more than anything, of all the glorious bits and pieces.

Modern Warfare 2 balances the spectacle and silliness of its single-player campaign with a deep, enduring multiplayer core, carefully covering its bases for players of all persuasions. But there is no denying it seeks merely to build upon the successes of its forebear while doing very little to expand its scope or redefine them.

Despite eye-catching changes, the heart of this series remains gloriously unaltered. [Recommended]

Perhaps not the deepest of games, revolving as it does around slaughtering demons and finding the appropriate key-substitute to open the next door, but it's certainly one of the most stylish and downright entertaining I've played in recent months.

It's a role-playing game in the most literal sense of the phrase, a game in which you're encouraged to give in to the fantasy, and to see what life is like when it's composed of rooftop brawls and zip-line getaways. Animations, traversal mechanics, takedowns: they're all building towards the same thing. In Arkham City, you become Batman.

Tight, inventive gameplay, cascading card synergies, and gentle, witty character-writing ensure that, while Cobalt Core might not slay Slay the Spire, it does indeed slay.

This game is one of the greatest things that video games have ever achieved.

Is BioShock the greatest game of all time? I honestly don't know, but it's one of the most interesting and immersive experiences to grace our beloved medium.

It transcends the very genre it once created.

If you want to gorge on a next generation audio-visual feast then Gears of Wars is a king's banquet. But what of the gameplay pudding that Peter Moore so often reminds us that he likes? The proof, he says, is in the eating, and in this case Gears of War sticks to a well-worn recipe.

A staggeringly ambitious game that successfully unites some of the best elements of RPG, adventure and action games and fuses them into a relentlessly immersive and intoxicating whole.

Persona veteran Atlus flexes its expertise with a fresh take on high fantasy. What it lacks in subtlety, it makes up for in grandeur and heart.

It succeeds not only for being consistently spectacular, but for the way it has been crafted into something that keeps you engaged right to the very end.

BioShock Infinite doesn't blur the lines between your reality and the game's to quite the same extent as its predecessor, but it's a more complete and polished story, and that's the thing you'll remember.

The best game yet in one of the best FPS franchises of the era. Better than either of its predecessors, Halo 3 still can't quite escape the category of flawed masterpiece - but this time around, the flaws are so minor that even the most churlish of reviewers would be hard pressed to mark the game down.

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

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As it stands, it's the offline arcade racing game to end them all, with an online implementation that falls frustratingly short of expectations.

If you've never played MGS3 before it's a must-buy. That's what we've made our final judgement based on; while this may not be great value for someone who paid full price for the game previously, for collectors, online gaming fans or people who haven't played MGS3, this is absolutely the definitive version of one of the finest games on the PlayStation 2.

Modern Warfare 2 balances the spectacle and silliness of its single-player campaign with a deep, enduring multiplayer core, carefully covering its bases for players of all persuasions. But there is no denying it seeks merely to build upon the successes of its forebear while doing very little to expand its scope or redefine them.

Guns of the Patriots is a frustrating, fractured game that turns Metal Gear Solid's world upside down several times over, but never changes it.

Stands out as an absolute colossus that towers over the competition - on any format.

The best Star Wars game since "X-Wing" and/or "Tie Fighter," if not ever. Unless something entirely unbelievable descends from the heavens, it's the RPG of the year. If the remaining major players fumble even slightly, it's game of the year.

It’s good. Damn good. In fact, I’ll certainly go as far as saying it’s the best pure strategy game I’ve played this year, and that’s good enough for me.

It's consistently satisfying over long periods, fulfilling its usual role of dominating a willing crowd's evening into the early hours, and now allowing you to sustain that after everyone's gone home using the Internet.

It's beautiful, though that's entirely the wrong word. This is a war game, so the word should be "visceral" or something. Models are hugely detailed for an RTS, physics implemented impressively and so on. But relevantly, it's a functional sort of beauty (or - er - viscerality).

Can a slick, mainstream action game really reckon with the violence that drives it? The answer is yes - messily, but powerfully. [Eurogamer Essential]

What's immediately apparent is that it's been balanced incredibly carefully.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars is a triumph, not just in terms of bringing a difficult game to a new platform intact, but because it actually improves it in the process, and demonstrates a mastery of DS form and function.

To say that this is a must-buy is doing it a disservice; it's a game you'll want to instantly evangelise to anyone with even the vaguest sense of what makes a game good.

City 17 provides the setting for a VR adventure filled with brilliant detailing. [Eurogamer Recommended]

A CRPG of unparalleled breadth and dynamism, Original Sin 2 is Larian's masterpiece. [Essential]

Epic has created the mother of all first-person shooters with this game - over a hundred maps, a selection of diverse and extremely well balanced game modes, built in voice communications, intelligent bots, a great offline play mode, good network code, a superb server browser and a solid graphics engine. Onslaught alone is worth the price of entry, but the game as a whole is a stunning package.

Braid is beautiful, entertaining and inspiring. It stretches both intellect and emotion, and these elements dovetail beautifully rather than chaffing against each other. Still wondering if games can be art? Here's your answer.

Maybe the one notable down-side of this incredible sequel is that it is 'just' the second part of a game we all loved two years ago, and even die-hards like myself have to acknowledge that. As such, as refined and honed as the gameplay is as a whole, you can never quite replicate the wow factor of the original - even if it ends up being a better game.

Compact by the standards of the Galaxy adventures but still loaded with bountiful secrets, beneath the warm familiarity of 3D World lies one of the strangest Mario games in years - or at least one of the most random in its influences and its moment-to-moment indulgences. And that's a very, very good thing.

And, more to the point, because millions will thoroughly enjoy StarCraft II regardless, thanks to a dense, thrilling, relentlessly clever and class-leading campaign adventure that takes this RTS to the masses in spite of itself. It might be less than half this sumptuous package, but it's a lot more game than almost anything else.

One of the best games ever thanks to its gameplay, it also happens to be visually stunning, with beautifully designed 3D polygonal characters, all animated exquisitely with very few (if any) perceptible glitches in the modelling.

This is, in almost every way that matters, the perfect Street Fighter.

Minecraft is a towering achievement in the very possibilities of gaming, and it does this without losing itself to either esoterica or cynicism. It is a game anyone can play and anyone can get something out of, no matter how skilled or imaginative they are. They will make something and they will have an experience that feels like theirs and theirs alone.

Thematically, too, Persona 4 has real impact. Ostensibly, this is a game about being a teenager living in extraordinary circumstances - but beneath the murder-mystery premise, it's easier to relate to than that. It's a game about negotiating the murky waters of adolescence, rolling with the hurtful buffeting of pubescent relationships, grappling with self-image, peer pressure and modern life's demand that we all grow up quicker than our parents did.

Persona 5 is unconscionably sublime. Every beat, every subtlety, every movement of the camera - it all translates into a kinetic masterpiece, strung together with the best visuals this side of Atlus. Persona 5 won't change your mind on JRPGs if you lack a taste for the genre, but if you're in any way a fan, well -Why the hell are you still reading this? Go forth and damn well purchase. [Essential]

Pitched perfectly for casual on-the-move play, it's the kind of game you can happily fill a couple of bored minutes with, or power through for a couple of hours, trying to snag every star. With 100 stages included for starters, and more on the way via updates, welcome to your new favourite waste of time.

Just buy the sodding game - it's one of the best of the year.

The visuals are beautiful, the soundtrack atmospheric, the single player campaign (mostly) engaging, and the multiplayer is excellent. It's only really let down by suspect AI and a few tedious missions.

But you’ll also love Splinter Cell for being a challenge in an age when videogames have all the interaction of a fairground ride.

Right from the start it conjures an atmosphere of being something special, but to keep that level of quality up consistently over 60 hours ensures that this will be a game that will be talked about for years to come...A work of art, you might say.

Fallout 3 almost effortlessly succeeds in its central aim of reviving a much-loved brand to appeal to the vast majority of players. It's a thrilling, all-consuming experience that will absorb you for weeks, whether you're attracted by the action, the adventure, or the role-playing, as you fall in love with the relentless excitement, incredible atmosphere, sense of place and sheer choice...Bethesda has once again delivered a game of life-affirming brilliance that will be heralded as a classic, and talked about for years to come.

The real star, however, is Horde, a ballistic assault on your worst score-rush tendencies that transforms maps into Gears-flavoured Mutant Storm: weapons spawn, then a wave of enemies hits, then more weapons and then another, tougher, wave.

For the vast majority of the gaming world, this is quite easily the best 3D beat 'em up ever made.

As with any game that dares to be ambitious, deconstruct Mass Effect 3 into its constituent parts and of course there are flaws, but taken as a whole this is arguably the first truly modern blockbuster, a game that transcends the genre boundaries of old and takes what it needs from across the gaming spectrum in order to finish its story in the most compelling, thrilling, heartbreaking way possible. Few gaming sagas come to a definitive close, but this one signs off in breathtaking style.

It is the most formally inventive Zelda in a long time (admittedly, that's not saying a great deal). But it's the game's carefree attitude, quick tempo and warm heart that do the most to make it feel new...Skyward Sword will surely be the greatest adventure money can buy.

Breathtaking in ambition and crafted with the skill of a studio that's been making music games for 15 years, Rock Band 3 is Harmonix's masterpiece – a towering achievement not just for the genre, but for the medium itself.

It's a timeless piece of quality gaming that, with the exception of its visual element, would probably work on any format, past or present.

Hades is a proper lark. I love it. But there is something else here, something that I have always felt about games but never been able to put into words. There is something about polished, smartly conceived Hades, about so many of Supergiant's games which, the joyous brilliance of Pyre aside perhaps, are always too rigorous, too responsibly conceived not to know exactly what spot they're going to fit into on the shelf, which pillars they're going to present to the press - there is something about these games that are so assuredly products that reminds me that games are never ever just products. Games are always a way of being. To play Hades, Roguelite aside, economy aside, loop aside, is to be furious and vengeful, to be driven by bitterness, self-hate, ennui, to be pulverisingly powerful and yet horribly efficient. This is the truth of it down to the controls, which encourage you to grip the pad by the facebuttons and squeeze and squeeze and squeeze like you're one stress ball away from telling your boss to shove it. This game comes from Hell, and it takes you back there, and it's brilliant. Get in. [Eurogamer Essential]

Keeping what works while reimagining what doesn't, this is about as good as remakes get. [Eurogamer Recommended]

For the hardcore fighter, it's without doubt an essential purchase, in that it's a test of true skill and grit, has oceanic depth and subtlety, and rewards patience and persistence.