More future primitive than highly evolved, there is some fun to be had here, but ultimately it’s a game that adds nothing of substance to either genre or franchise.

On paper, it seemed great. A new Soulcalibur game with 20 characters launching on the current generation of consoles! But what we got looks like a copy and paste from something we’ve played before.

Switch owners may be more comfortable with playing older games than Nintendo’s less portable cousins, but even this feels a bit too short-lived and dated to satisfy our Capcom cravings, especially when there are more exciting oldies to come to Switch, from Resident Evil 4 to the recently announced Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen.

While we thoroughly enjoyed our 4-6 hours with Kirby Star Allies, it definitely was lacking in some areas on top of its short length. Levels are decisively easy and lack extra exploration, boss fights are simplistic, and the minigames are fun but shallow. It’s difficult not to feel like Nintendo was playing it safe when designing it.

As a celebration of Shonen Jump’s illustrious history, we expected more from Jump Force than just pure spectacle. But with its off-putting photorealistic aesthetic, underneath the hi-res razzle-dazzle is ultimately a hollow package and a shallow gaming experience.

The series quite clearly left me in the dust as I matured and doesn’t seem to be making any effort to change in the future. Nostalgia alone can’t keep this game afloat and it’s loot crate-like, monotonous system makes Need for Speed Payback feel stale.

Sadly, Sonic Forces struggles with the same issues that have plagued 3D Sonic games since Sonic Adventure – portraying an accurate sense of speed to the character while giving players a choice on how to clear obstacles. While the game includes three stage types – all of them are plagued by their own gameplay issues.

Strip away the need for it to be a Metal Gear game, and Survive is a surprisingly solid survival adventure game. There are moments of pure excitement in the game when you are defending a single point from oncoming enemies using cobbled together equipment and limited resources.

Can you separate a game’s design from its business model? In the case of Artifact, that’s a resounding no. Both are broken. In a market of pay-to-play, Artifact is pay-to-pay. Skill matters, but the strongest card is your credit card.

What disappoints so much about Anthem is that there are sparks of potential in there. Flying around in your Javelin and queuing up combo attacks with other players can be a blast. But then you discover that you’ll have to back out to Fort Tarsis during Freeplay every so often in order to continue earning experience points. Or you’ll be killed and stuck staring at a red screen waiting until a player feels like reviving you. Or you’ll want to customise your Javelin and find there are no interesting cosmetic options that aren’t behind a paywall.