By refining the elements which made it fun, granting you all the toys and stripping away almost all of the laborious tasks, Volition has served up something more in line with what we expected in the first place. If your appetite for destruction remains unsated, it's well worth diving in - just don't expect anything too revolutionary.

You know that moment in a good roguelite where you've overextended yourself, but you've also won riches that you don't want to lose before you can bank them? This is what Loot River is built for, ultimately: I race around the world, dashing from one tile to another, breaking off from a little continent, an archipelago of burning wood and then searching, searching for the level's exit as I eye my tiny health gauge with fear. A procedural dungeon-crawler where you can rescramble the once-scrambled levels? Gary Chang would be proud. [Eurogamer Recommended]

Those who own previous incarnations of the game won't find it a worthwhile upgrade, as it merely adds some new scenarios (which aren't much different to the old), a fresh dollop of buildings and an editor that allows for importing satellite maps. Nothing to get too excited about, really.

Sometimes, though, familiarity and simplicity are exactly what's called for, and for those of you that just can't get enough of these dumb-arsed shooters, Crisis Zone has a certain cultish appeal that's just on the right side of admirable.

Judged purely on its own merits on this platform it looks like it might be vaguely interesting, but all too soon you're dragged into the real world and forced to acknowledge that despite its warm touches of humour, the hackandslash action is nowhere near the standard we expect from a full-priced game these days.

This gorgeous microcosmic mech game just about survives its more frustrating moments. [Eurogamer Recommended]

For all the things Gat Out Of Hell could or ideally would do though, it's important to remember what it is - a standalone expansion. Go in remembering that, and knowing about the lack of missions, and it's a pleasant surprise how much it at least tries to offer within its limits. Just don't expect it to be a sequel, or even a full slice of Saints Row 4 at its best.

A well-designed, well-conceived game.

Even hardened FF fans can't escape the fact that this is little more than a solid, functional port of a four year old game. As potentially enjoyable as it is (if you put the hours in), and as much content as there is in this all-encompassing release (if you really put the hours in), things have moved on considerably in the MMO scene in the intervening years.

It's sociable rather than solitary, and there's not a single nasty or brutish thing about it. The good selections of courses and events mean it's not too short, and it's an ideal alternative to real winter sports if you're poor. But most importantly, it's not rubbish.

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.

Duck Amuck is a title that does its utmost to show (a lot like Rub Rabbits) what the DS can do with all its gimmicks, but it fails to live up to its qualities on the game side.

Whether you're playing on your own, online or with a friend it's liable to offer even more hours of fun than that poster of that lady tennis player scratching her arse - though possibly not the Kylie remake.

A Quiet Place: The Road Ahead takes some very usable source material and fails to do much with it.

It makes some small progress in freeing point-and-click from the needless bonds of tradition but is it really a compelling, imaginative experience that proves mouse-based adventuring isn't dead? Nope. Not even close.

Visuals aside, the game ultimately gets too repetitive too soon. It claws back some respect by providing additional challenges for each map and offering different characters with slightly different abilities for replay value, but the mechanics never really change enough to capture your interest for long.

Putting both expansion packs in the same package, though, is a sensible idea, though given that neither are actually as good as their parent offering, perhaps it should have been a mid, rather than full-priced offering.

For now, those prepared to invest the necessary commitment, ignore the blandness and live with the game's failings will find that – once on the dirt, gravel, snow or asphalt – WRC FIA World Rally Championship delivers moments that are indisputably thrilling.

The art style is very appealing, with lots of crisp cartoon sprites, but the core gameplay feels truncated and shallow.

So drink some Tequila at the bar and have a think about whether a slow-paced tactical squad RTS set in the Wild West is really for you.

Even if you can forgive the technical cock-ups and lack of multiplayer action, all you're left with is a fairly uninspired single player campaign that'll take you all of 12 hours to finish.

People shouldn't make RTS games for consoles for the same reasons that people shouldn't put square pegs in round holes: they don't fit. And people definitely shouldn't make substandard RTS games for consoles.

With Commando 3, Capcom manages to both wash away the bad taste of Rocketmen and prove that old-fashioned blasters can be made to work today without losing the naïve verve of the 1980s.

For all the weirdness and fun it promises, Biomutant ends up a deeply conventional open-world action game.

The longer we've spent with The Last Remnant, the more we find ourselves wishing that it were a pure strategy RPG, because the more time you invest, the more interesting the battle system becomes - and, as a consequence, the more you begin to resent everything that prevents you enjoying it. [JPN Import]

A once-reasonable game for the 360 is now a distinctly mediocre game for the PC.

A bog-standard historical city-builder and we can like it, lump it, or - my recommended reaction - just ignore it.

There's nuance and depth here that goes beyond most people's preconceptions of what motion gaming is about, and yet the game never loses sight of the fact that anybody should be able to get up, have a try and have fun doing so. The sad part is that more studios aren't using the technology to this standard.