There are some surprising omissions. The main one being the complete lack of any ability to speed up time - especially since that once a park has stabilised there can be a lot of waiting around while you amass enough cash to buy a Gorilla or whatever.

Its old-fashioned mentality won me over: while other sims can seem to favour a rather coldly analytical approach to management, here you feel as much a fan as a manager, cheering your team on from the sidelines. It might take away much of what makes a truly authentic sim, but in doing so it gives back plenty besides.

Watch Dogs doesn't have that promising kernel. It certainly entertains, but mostly through borrowed concepts, and the central notion that could have made it stand out - the hacking - is the most undercooked of all. It doesn't get anything horribly wrong, but nor does it excel at any of the genre beats it so faithfully bangs out. It's good, and yet that always feels like a criticism when a game comes weighed down by this much hype.

The pack does inject some honestly good, fun and creative features into what is still one of our favourite multiplayer games to date. It alters it to the point that it feels like a slightly different game, and it's a commendable effort by DICE to refresh and revive the BF1942 experience.

But as tools for improving your language skills, whether you're starting from scratch or have some basic knowledge, they're great.

Ghost Recon is undoubtedly a chunky, enjoyable addition to the 3DS line-up, and a slick if unspectacular strategy blast.

Overall, it's a very entertaining low-tech drive and demolish racer, but with one caveat for veterans of the series - they'll have seen much of the game already in FlatOut 2.

Lacks the polish of Mikami's Capcom work, showing a rough edge that its creators no doubt hope communicates their punk attitude to game development, but really just comes across as a bit shoddy. But at a time when few publishers of EA's stature are willing to take genuine risks, its uniqueness is welcome and interesting. And as a celebration of the puerile, it leaves Duke Nukem Forever standing, staring longingly at its tit bridge.

The meagre character list is among the few real drawbacks in what is a surprisingly accomplished fighting game, sporting just fourteen selectable fighters (two of which are stronger, slightly broken versions of existing ones).

This is an enjoyable but rarely essential entry to the Mario & Luigi suite, then. AlphaDream is to be commended for its willingness to build each new game around a different kernel of an idea, but, perhaps inevitably, some of those ideas will be smaller than others.

"Solid" is one of those terrible damning-with-faint-praise words which will have anyone cringing but it's the one that applies. It's a well-built, well-made, well-designed well-solid RTS, and of its type, one of the finest of the year.

It can't reach the heights of SSX or the first and second Amped, but what it lacks in precision, it makes up for in slightly mindless fun.

A streamlined, structured, gorgeous grind, an addictive and even rewarding grind if you're that way inclined, but a grind nonetheless. An ultimately grim and unvarying pursuit.

It's turned my head, even if it's not quite the 'trip' that it might have been.

But like a train journey with a friend, a few hours can be lots of fun, but then you've arrived at your destination, the conversations are put back in your bag, and the rest of your life is ready for the living.

Puzzle games often sound complicated when you try to explain them to people in text, but Spin Six quickly becomes one of the ones that gets under your skin.

If you're prepared to expend the requisite effort, there's a decent game of golf to be had here, but there's substantial room for improvement.

If you can track down Singstar Rocks on the cheap, though, you're pretty much guaranteed a few memorable drunken nights in. It's still as compelling and fatally flawed as it has ever been, where the ratio of good to bad songs is as frustrating as we've come to expect.

The sheer unabashed evil that Eko Software has managed to cram into a seemingly cute puzzler is something to behold.

It's certainly not a bad game, at least in terms of core mechanics and functionality, but in terms of praise it only ever feels "good enough" rather than just "good".

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.

A dilution, not a distillation of Puzzle Quest's relentlessly compelling formula. It's a game that drives the franchise too deep into niche territory, where it loses sight of the elegance and simplicity which turned the match-three genre into an everyman phenomenon.

Sounds Shapes is not a brilliant game, but it is a bold, often beautiful experiment that stands and sounds apart. And in one of the driest, dreariest periods for console gaming in memory, that's music to my ears.

The award for best/only recent IndyCar sim that manages to be strangely absorbing while faithfully reproducing the sport, albeit in an aesthetically displeasing way, goes to... IndyCar Series!

It's a package that knows exactly why people want to buy it and lives up to their expectations; that it uses a little imagination along the way is a bonus. You'll either want it or have no use for it, so the number down there doesn't matter a great deal.

In short, it takes having fun extremely seriously. As long as you've got the patience to handle it, you'll find that's no bad thing.

Guacamelee has real heart and a blazing desire to put on a good show.

Both the unwieldy control scheme and the bafflingly forgiving nature of the game count against it, which is a shame because for the most part it's a thoroughly satisfying and meaty shooter, blessed with some stunning backdrops and a blistering frame-rate.