Alien: Isolation is a solid survival horror game with high production value that has an extremely compelling setting that captures Ridley Scott's original film vision incredibly well.

Knowing what I know about the series thus far tells me that Trap Team will remain a solid product and gift for any child with video games in the living room.

It seems fitting that FromSoftware ends its DLC trilogy in the snow rather than some hellish landscape or poison-infested shrine. Sure, I died plenty of times while playing Crown of the Ivory King, but I also remember the sense of accomplishment that contrasts those deaths.

Gauntlet is not a roaring return for the arcade classic, nor is it a critical failure.

There's plenty to admire here, though, if you take Driveclub at face value and don't take things too seriously.

The story, the full narrative, is relevant to a lot of children like Ethan Carter and is steeped in sobering realism. For that, I would encourage you to discover it and find him.

While I do believe some players may dismiss the game as a “walking simulator” (as they are wont to do nowadays), Neverending Nightmares falls into the must-play section of the horror genre. Whether or not you find it scary, you’ll definitely be disturbed and intrigued as you seek resolution to the madness.

Simply because the World Cup is mentioned in this year’s installment, I’d say add this to your collection, but if you’re neck deep in collected items from last year’s title, sticking with the old might not be a bad idea.

D4 is a game that knows what it is. It’s quirky and odd with an outrageous story and over-the-top characters, and that may not sit well with some people, but that’s the kind of game Swery is known to make.

Persona 4 Arena Ultimax could have easily been a cash-in, a weak standalone expansion that merely included a few extra characters and call it a day. But both the extensive episodes in story mode and the lengthy Golden Arena mode bolster the already strong multiplayer modes, all of which should satisfy casual fans of the Persona series and hardcore players who wish to perfect their battle skills.

Even if you're likely to move onto the console version or you don't play your 3DS much, this edition of the venerable brawling series offers everything you could want and will likely become a standard bearer for the platform.

Middle-earth just wants the player to explore it like a playground. You can climb up structures, leap from them to tackle a wild creature of the land, and even enlist your own group to drive the dramas that ensue. Shadow of Mordor paints the pictures that rest somewhere between bookends.

Forza Horizon 2 may be vanilla when compared to other open-world racers, but if so, it's one of the most well-produced vanillas ever made. While it could be bolstered by having more skill-based challenges and any kind of avatar customization, it impresses with technical brilliance, robust online integration, and graphical splendor.

Endless Legend won’t be for everyone, of course. This is very much a hexagonal conquest game that comes complete with methodic, turn-based play. While I found multiplayer way too slow and dependent on others, the single player was my jam. The best way I enjoyed this game was to fire it up in the morning, grab a cup of coffee, and prepare for a few hours to vanish.

Firefly Studios hasn't quite made a new classic RTS game here, but they were extremely close.

Spacecom is still fun if you’re not a social gamer, but if you plan to play by yourself exclusively I’d wait and see if it goes on sale.

On a whole, its biggest fault is that it's just adequate. It doesn't matter how well-realized the characters are, if they don't have anything interesting to do.

It may not convert those who avoid the tower defense genre at all costs, but it does prove that a few small but important tweaks can change one's perception in a big way.

There are more challenges to unlock in Fenix Rage than I should bother mentioning, including one that butts heads with my infinite-jumping utopia, so it’s worth noting that on top of an already enjoyable and cookie-filled game, you’ll find yourself revisiting earlier levels again just to maximize your investment.

There just isn’t anything of note really in Fairy Fencer F. It looks outdated, feels “meh” at best and “Seriously, really?” at worst.

Sure, it’s a mess. It glitched on me a few times, the design is woefully old, and the gameplay teeters towards boring. But in spite of all those issues, Boo Bunny Plague won me over. It’s a good little distraction at $5.99. If it hits $0.99 during a sale? Yeah, get it.

There is a time and a place for decisive tactics aimed solely at victory, though Minimum hopes to draw a line in the sand. Then, it hopes to add a few 90 degree angles and complete a box. Then, it asks you to put a bullet through that box guy’s head. It’s up to you whether you decide to follow through with that or try the flaming swords.

I’d hope that more major franchises, especially those that have leaned on gaming tropes, like saving a princess from a tall castle, take notice. Hyrule Warriors benefits from allowing the Zelda series to take some big risks.

Disney Infinity: Marvel Super Heroes is still an excellent upgrade to both the single player and content aspects of the game.

Still, Murasaki Baby does a great job of introducing a steady climb towards multitasking where inputs on both rear and front touch panels require delicate planning.

Maybe it's because I'm not Japanese or familiar with Japanese culture, but these otome games, I'm sure they have a place in Western society, but I don't quite know where to put them.

Give Destiny a try if you like the idea of cooperation blended evenly with competition. The truth remains in its satisfyingly responsive mechanics, relatively forgiving checkpoint systems, competitive multiplayer, and the opportunity to blast away a million and one guys if that's what your story really needs to framed around.

With a more engaging story that didn’t solely rely on zaniness and/or idiocy to sell itself, Dead Rising 3 could have been more worthy of recommendation. Instead, accept my lukewarm approval of it as a purchase decision.

Curtain Call is a nice and “fixed” update to the original Theatrhythm, which while good already, is made better and with a few additional little tracks tossed in.

I wish NHL 15 offered a more straightforward season mode, though the options to run your own team or play as a specific pro will give every fan what they’re looking for. Whether or not the horn sounds on home ice, every goal will give the fan in you the same satisfaction as if the game were live right in front of you.

The Metro Redux edition is a compilation of two solid FPS games.

Old Iron King's focus on fire is a welcome change, and despite some uninspired moments, it has the atmosphere and challenge we've come to expect from the series. Souls fans will likely find something to enjoy here.

The Sims 4 could easily have been an nominee for one of our editor's choice awards, but it's woefully incomplete, despite being unexpectedly solid and entertaining in its current state.

Firefall is middling. If you have free time to spare, the fact that it won’t cost you anything to try is a huge win. If it manages to sink its teeth into you over the first few hours, you might just be hooked. Personally, I’ll pass.

Ambivalence aside, this is definitely an engaging and challenging story worth imbibing.

Five Nights at Freddy's is horror done right. No slasher techniques, no gore necessary.

That inFamous: First Light echoes the main game’s themes of siblings and what it means to lose family struck me deeply, especially as brotherhood has taken on different meanings for me over the years.

Though the ending wraps the story up a bit too neatly and the lasting value sharply drops off once you complete the game, Professor Layton vs. Phoenix Wright points its fingers with the best of them.

Tales of Xillia 2 both succeeds and fails by playing it safe.

Madden NFL 15 is a solid title that's actually one of the better editions to date.

With all the playtime, all the free updates, all the unique class-changing items, and the online community that will surely stick with the game post-launch you’d have trouble finding a game with much more to offer.

As a value buy, Diablo III: Ultimate Evil Edition is unquestionably solid and, given its enhancements over the last two years, is difficult to fault.

If CounterSpy doesn’t look like the kind of game you’d want to play, don’t. Even for indie fanatics it’s missable, though I doubt you’d want to give up the visuals or the procedurally generated levels.

Honestly, if you can get past the idea that Akihabara nerds are coming off just a little too rape-y for the average player (and Japanese tentacle monster), the game itself isn’t bad at all.

As it stands, Back to Bed occupies an odd middle-ground, in that it manages to be both endearingly quirky yet fundamentally dull.

In the end, though, its lack of depth makes it hard to recommend to anyone who’s not a fan of WWE in the first place. Lucky for the game’s makers, that’s one group of people there’s definitely no shortage of.

Hohokum gives you everything you need to enter a colorful and freeform world with little restraint toward the kind of art exploration that turns anyone into a finger-paint prodigy. That doesn’t make for the greatest video game, even if its charm lasts far longer than you’d think.

Frankly, I’m not sure what the developers were thinking with Sacred 3.

While I’d rather not see a sequel, you should know that this Remastered version basically puts a T-ball stand in Sony’s living room where they’ve now started selling bats. Depending on the level of broken the company's biggest Bravia display could become given that scenario, I'd say the brand is worth a lot of money at the moment.

God of War’s first two entries should absolutely not be missed now that they’ve been remade—just choose your edition wisely if you crave the grandeur of an actual HD remake.

Crown of the Sunken King marks the first piece of DLC in a planned trilogy, and it's a wonderful opening chapter. It doesn't reach the heights of Dark Souls' Artorias of the Abyss and features design flaws that hold it back, but the simple bliss of more Souls content is something fans can get behind (as long as they mentally prepare themselves for death and despair).

No matter the platform, The Swapper is a game that people should play. It may be a year later, but the game still stands out as one of the most creative and forward-thinking indie releases in recent memory.

The game was meant to put players into a spooky kind of mindset, but everything about it is just frightfully boring.

For what it is, One Piece: Unlimited World Red is a solid game.

Wizards of the Coast needs to learn about loss aversion and the concept of not fixing something that ain't broken.

While not a hefty time investment, any player will experience a narrative that reasonably mixes fantasy with common storytelling tropes. I just felt that there could’ve been much more to absorb and more game to play.

It comes down to this: Fans of old-school PC RPGs that don't hold the player's hand and focus on depth and freedom will adore this game. Audiences without that experience will also find something to love in Divinity: Original Sin, because depth and player freedom never become dated.

In the end there’s no denying that there’s fun to be had in Civilization Revolution 2. If you’ve played the original, you can safely avoid this one.

Add new ships, new weapons, new maps, new enemies and a few more colors, and this thing goes from less than ho-hum to slightly above average. As it stands now, Pulstar is not a game I can easily recommend.

It’s tough to wholeheartedly recommend Light given its imperfect brevity, but if you couldn't care less about the $12.99 price tag, then by all means give it a try.

Fans of Gundam will surely love the inclusion of six different series, and the number of mobile suits and upgrades gives some incentive to keep playing. It doesn't escape the repetition that plagues Dynasty Warriors titles, but fans of Dynasty Warriors and/or Gundam will find something to enjoy.

It just doesn’t have any real character to speak of, just passable. Forgettable.

It deserves wholeheartedly to be on a list of nominees later this year. Play Shovel Knight. It is a damn delight.

Sniper Elite III is like working from home for me. Although I enjoy the tasks and executing them, I feel like there are ways to make doing them more rewarding and engaging.

While I’m not increasing Guacamelee’s score with this review, it is easily one of the best next-gen games you can own right now, especially considering the price. I know some reviewers don’t take that into consideration, but with persistent cooperative play and plenty of exploration, genuinely fun combat, and gorgeous 1080p graphics, it’s hard to find a better value for your digital currency of choice.

With a steady stream of content planned, a solid framework for housing, and a commitment to hardcore seriousness and silly humor, WildStar is more than the sum of its parts, and every MMO player should at least give a fair shake.

If you’ve never played Company of Heroes 2 and are interested in the RTS genre, buy this. If you already own CoH2, then at $19.99 this expansion may be a little pricey, though those who loved the base game will lap up the versatility of the new armies and the exhilarating wars that can be waged in the added maps.

Valiant Hearts could very well be the most poignant World War I game ever made, especially as it tells a tale from both sides of the conflict without getting bogged down in the unnecessarily stupid allegiances and battles that wasted thousands of precious lives.

All told, A Wizard’s Lizard can prove enjoyable.

It's not a perfect game: the visuals are dated, the combat spikes wildly at the end of the game, and the character interactions can be total anime cheese. However, it's a game in which I cared more about the characters and story than most boilerplate save-the-world JRPG melodramas.

Knowing your role makes Intercept one of the better cooperative experiences available on PlayStation 4 right now.

If you’re down with tough puzzlers and the retro vibe, give it a shot. Be warned, you’ll be using your keyboard here the whole time.

In that way, Entwined feels like Journey and that’s high praise for upstart developer Pixelopus.

I love the colorful environments, the little messages from explorers, and the sense of satisfaction you get from clearing a level quickly. Pixeljunk Shooter Ultimate plods along at a slower pace than you'd expect from the shooter genre, but its style and adventuresome attitude make it endearing and perfect for PlayStation Vita.

As polished as the graphics and presentation may be, the lack of options is apparent especially when compared to its MMA predecessor, UFC Undisputed 3. Perhaps that's not a fair comparison, but that's reality.

Tomodachi Life does its best to cut through a lot of society's hateful garbage to produce an incredible island paradise of distraction and more often than not succeeds, but not without stumbling all over itself, revealing too many embarrassing inner thoughts.

Amidst all the other plateaued features the game has to offer, it’s not enough to maintain sufficient buzz or convince jaded gamers not to wait for a seasonal sale.

Murdered: Soul Suspect, though it was diverting like a bit of light reading, never really hooked me. And that's its biggest problem.

Pushmo World is an eShop gem that might wind up with the same fate as other missed jewels like The Cave or Kung-Fu Rabbit, but for those that spend the coin on it, it's a title that revels in its challenge without shame, and will not hesitate to push others away.

Regardless of the differing packages, Ultra Street Fighter IV is unequivocally the best of the lot, though the series is showing its wear after six years. Whether that means yet another SFIV installment will be arriving in the pipeline remains to be seen.

The Delta release features some gorgeous animations and character designs, although the biggest addition is the Grim faction.

If you're inclined to play a mature game with mature decision-making, I do highly recommend Always Sometimes Monsters. The game smartly tests how effectively you choices play out in the final act, something I don't wish to spoil but Vagabond Dogs deserves praise for.

Though gang warfare slightly overtakes the more pertinent theme of personal security and government surveillance, Watch Dogs is a superlative technical achievement. Its interpretation of Chicago is painstakingly detailed and sets a new bar for open worlds, with only a spare few hiccups in frame-rate.

Taking its name from one of the most seminal technological inventions of the 20th century, Transistor is unequivocally one of the greatest games this year and rivals Journey as one of the best indie titles this decade.

Mugen Souls Z relies heavily on underboob, sideboob, and boob windows to get the job done, but this is not the full extent of the overt sexism, fetishism, or hypersexualization.

Some of its lazy touches recall a PS2 relic that was better off being pretty on older hardware. If it does interest you for some reason, I’d advise you to wait for a sale price at least, because I can’t see this flying off of store shelves.

As a mid-range title it would have been fine with the amount of content, but released at near full retail, it's bitten off more than it can chew; something that tastes especially poor when the meal hasn't been fully cooked.

A shining example of how to revitalize an old-school franchise. Its alternate history of World War II with the Nazis coming out on top is both far-fetched and over-the-top, but it keeps it grounded by being an extremely fun shooter, having a compelling story with well-developed characters, and a main protagonist who you’ll truly care about to the end.

Players in it for the long haul have the ability to create a vibrant mini-ecosystem provided they’re not discouraged by the monstrous UI and lack of online capabilities.

I found myself surprised by the charm The Last Tinker oozes at every step, be it the breathtakingly colorful visuals or the varied and exciting soundtrack.

While Borderlands 2 for Vita is a neutered version of the original console title, with the toughest costs coming to the multiplayer and technical execution, it's still one of the best games for the handheld system.

The best version of the venerable kart-racer since the Nintendo 64 era.

The troublesome touch controls result in a lesser experience, but at its core Broken Sword 5 is still a solid adventure game.

Tex Murphy fans will lap it up, but everyone else will likely consider this a case not worth solving.

Nice to see Bandai-Namco is bringing back some classics; maybe we can see more intense action and story next time.

While elements are bland and the story feels heavily padded, to say that Demon Gaze feels half-assed would assume that it's trying to be more than it is, a grindfest that rewards players with 2D titillation and innuendo. It does what it does fairly well, but it's also profoundly average. Nothing is ventured and nothing gained in any part of its design.

It just goes to show that games with bold design and content-rich features can find a home on any platform.

The lack of content and limited attempts at personality hinder those moments, but at the end of the day Cel Damage HD is a solid update of a mostly forgotten 13-year-old game.