Despite the successes of The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales, I can't help but feel it doesn't make full use of its time-travel potential, both in its overworld and in its story. Still, while it's not particularly exceptional or exciting, it is both adequate and effective.

NBA The Run does its best to make up for what it lacks with a high attention to detail that makes it easy to see the love for streetball culture. The gameplay, art style, and overall presentation hosted by the legendary DJ, Bobbito Garcia, feel like it all belongs, and that’s what matters. The love of the game is what’ll keep me playing, and it’s easy to feel the team’s love of the sport. Play by Play made clear its plans for ongoing iteration without annualized releases, so hopefully many of these shortcomings can be rectified post-launch to make it the definitive streetball game it wants to be. As it is, it’s too barebones to wholeheartedly recommend, but there’s a great game of basketball waiting for you if you don’t mind only playing online matches.

Despite all the games it influenced over the years, Gothic still stands alone. This remake is both faithful and fresh, providing much-needed improvements and wider accessibility in spite of its unforgiving nature and undeniable eurojank (a term the original Gothic helped establish). Newcomers may feel the game is a relic in some ways, but anyone interested in an underplayed yet seminal classic owes it to themselves to give Gothic 1 Remake a shot.

I have always enjoyed Rhythm Heaven, and I’m beyond happy that the Switch’s popularity has enabled Nintendo to take more chances on dormant franchises. I’m excited to see how the single-player offerings play out as you get deeper into them, and I look forward to busting this game out at future friend gatherings. [Hands-On Impressions]

Mina the Hollower looks like a nostalgic throwback, and it undeniably is, but its thoughtful design and larger sensibilities make it play and feel like a contemporary video game – one that has taken the right lessons from the medium’s history.

The overall gameplay experience, with its reworked action, vibrant, updated visuals, and re-recorded voice lines, is a treat and an excellent proof of concept for Ubisoft’s first-ever remake. I’m cautiously optimistic about the complete package, as tweaks to the modern-day story and the new endgame missions that add to Edward’s already-complete narrative remain to be seen. Still, I’m already confident Black Flag Resynced will replace the original game’s icon on my desktop this July. [Hands-On Impressions]

If Bubsy 4D is an attempt to bring new players to this 33-year-old franchise, though, its poor level design, characterization, and platforming will ensure it won’t.

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book plays like a unique puzzle game with Yoshi aesthetics, and the result is a largely rewarding experience that rarely challenged me, but didn’t have a problem delivering the charm.

I am utterly delighted by Legacy of the Dark Knight. Its story is charming and effective, its combat is engaging, and its open world is top-notch. It's a no-holds-barred approach to the revered character, and though there are spots where the execution could have been better, TT Games included everything I could have asked for in one wholly entertaining package. The Dark Knight has a storied legacy, and this adventure does it justice.

Although it may not reach the heights of other narrative-puzzle contemporaries released since Call of the Sea, Call of the Elder Gods is still an entertaining test for your noggin, wrapped in an adequately engaging Lovecraft-inspired story. Harry and Evangeline would say otherwise, but it’s okay to embrace this game’s insanity-inducing madness with open arms.

Even for a series built on delivering approachable racing action that appeals to both newcomers and hardcore players, Forza Horizon 6 impresses at each turn, delivering one of the greatest racing games of this generation.

I was too busy questioning character decisions (theirs, not mine), rolling my eyes, and grappling with an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu to ever enjoyably engage in Directive 8020.

I love coming-of-age stories, but Mixtape stands out even among my favorites for how well it nails its earnest, whimsical tone, treating life milestones with grave sincerity. Its stellar writing, concise runtime, and inspired use of its licensed soundtrack make it an instant classic and a heartfelt trip down memory lane.

Inkonbini spent its five-hour runtime talking to me – not with me – and I never felt a part of this town’s culture or its inhabitants' lives in the way the writing says I was. Customers would enter my store, hit their marks, share their golden lesson of the day, and the shift would end. I’d do the same thing the following day, and the following day, until Makoto’s final shift arrived and the game ended with a cheery but unearned celebration of my week at Honki Ponki. It’s a disappointing konbini experience for someone who genuinely cherishes them in Japan. It is neither narratively nor mechanically engaging, and though Makoto seemed to enjoy each shift, I rarely did.

Vampire Crawlers elevates an otherwise simple but highly entertaining card game with sensations more reminiscent of a casino (or Vampire Survivors) or the blinding blue light of doomscrolling late at night to create a retro-inspired diversion that’s hard to put down. Its pull is less powerful with its dozen or so stages complete and behind me, but it’s clear that desire to return will never quite let up, lingering, waiting in the gothic wings for one more run.

With plans for post-launch content already announced, Invincible VS is likely to only improve as its lifespan progresses, which could certainly address some of the current shortcomings. However, with an already solid foundation built upon approachability and personality, Invincible VS is easy to recommend to both seasoned fighting games fans and Invincible enthusiasts.

Moving, shooting, improving (both in stats and skill), winning, and even losing is an unequivocal joy in Saros, and I only wish I could write this sentence faster so I can hurry up and get back to planet Carcosa and attempt another run.

The unique way the story is conveyed is more impressive than the story itself, but it's still a great time for fans of choice-driven games.

Everyone will approach Tomodachi Life differently, and that is what makes it such a unique experiment. However, if you don’t have the time or creativity to imagine and engineer unique dynamics between tens of Miis, Living the Dream’s removal of the social features cannot serve as a safety net as it did with the 3DS release. And sadly, outside of the daily dose of comedy, there isn’t much more to buoy this release.

It's never been easier to get into the competitive Pokémon scene, and playing Pokémon Champions has been a highlight of my last week. Champions seems to be designed for people like me, who are familiar with competitive battles and want an easier way to participate. However, it also makes moves to cater to completely new players and extremely seasoned players, and by trying to satisfy all three audiences, it fails to properly serve either. With minimal content and a pressure to collect Pokémon in mainline games, it works best as an additional mode for the main series. As a standalone product, it's a game confused about its own goals. And much like the in-game status condition, that confusion only hurts it in the long run.

Despite these hardships, both intentional and otherwise, I eagerly fired up the next stage, excited to test my skills and get angry all over again. When stages click, it’s a deliciously fun challenge. When the perspective makes it tough to even tell how to proceed, it can be frustrating. Still, Super Meat Boy 3D makes a strong argument that Team Meat’s formula can work in three dimensions, but it needs to iron out some kinks before it reaches the same heights as its 2010 classic.

These moments, combined with the fascinating vintage visuals and music, make it easy to overlook the areas where Mouse wastes some potential. Sure, I'd have liked more meaningful investigative mechanics and fewer reskinned baddies, but I was often too busy tapping my toes to jazz tunes and laughing at the riotous cartoon antics to be too bummed about it.

Gamers often complain that big publishers refuse to roll the dice on new properties with unique systems; I give Pragmata big props for doing precisely that and experimenting with something unconventional. The story and structure as a whole feel a bit by-the-numbers, but the beautiful futuristic visuals and inventive battle system are solid wins.

Through its stellar use of the roguelite formula and ability to build your loadout in such rapid fashion, Deadzone: Rogue provides a compelling shooting experience that I look forward to firing up for a few runs every day. But it's not just the structure that has its hooks in me; the shooting mechanics, varied enemy types, and the compelling narrative mystery all coalesce into one of my favorite shooters in recent years.

The primary draw of Reunion is seeing Max and Chloe reconnect and make up for lost time. The game delivers on that front; their heartfelt interactions sometimes made me forget the game’s other shortcomings. The manner in which Deck Nine sends these two off into the sunset – again, the version I unlocked – is truly wonderful. The rest of the package is overwhelmingly familiar to Double Exposure and takes a step backward in some cases. As much as I love Max and Chloe, everything around them seems to fall apart when they come together; Reunion is, sadly, no different.

The Maximum Collection gets just about everything right, but there’s really only one game in the mix that I’d hold up as a true classic of its genre. Beyond X-Men, the experience here is likely for those hunting nostalgia or players with a particularly keen eye for understanding the early days of superhero video games. If that’s the sort of thing that makes your interior Colossus roar, you can expect a solidly good time.

I am a big fan of cinematic platformers. I appreciate this attempt at taking the mechanics and presentational focus of the genre and applying them to a fun cartoon. That part of the game, alongside the platforming and puzzles, works well and is attractive. Unfortunately, the frequent sneaking slows the game down and is a barrier instead of a fun series of challenges to overcome.

I love that Milestone is experimenting with new ideas within the arcade racing formula, and while the story didn’t land for me, I applaud the effort at narrative in a genre that frequently doesn’t even try to add meaningful context to its races. Even so, difficulty spikes and arbitrary objectives combine with overly convoluted mechanics to rob Screamer of some of its fun. It’s worth experiencing to see a developer try something new, but this race track might just have too many turns to be a winner.