Shantae: Half-Genie Hero is pleasant but shallow. The initial “wow” factor of the wonderful aesthetics wears off once the backtracking starts, and the game never recovers. It looks wonderful, but no amount of prettiness can cover up gameplay that can’t come close to the quality of the visuals.

Fate/Extella is a solidly-built Warriors-style brawler with a unique sense of speed and a sweet, engaging story. It would’ve been more impressive if it took about half as long to finish, though. Its distinctiveness is spread far too thin, battered into oblivion by endless repetition. Fans of Fate seeking a worthy coda to the story of Fate/Extra will find it here, but it’d be best to engage with the game in short bursts, rather than have it wear out its welcome over long sessions.

There are times when it looks like there’s a much better game trying to claw its way free from the technical and design issues that plague it, but they’re only fleeting glances at what could have been before it gets overwhelmed by the muck dragging it down. Fans of the books it’s based on might get some worth out of The Dwarves, but when compared to pretty much any other half-decent RPG on the market, it comes up short in almost every possible way.

While it’s far from the most attractive FPS I’ve played this year, Verdun gets its setting and tone incredibly right. There’s a moment in every match where I found myself peering out from behind cover, looking down my rifle, desperate to catch sign of any movement in a field of debris — a moment where the game completely justifies its setting and mechanics. Verdun is rough at times and only half of its modes are any good, but those special moments it offers are rare enough to deserve attention.

A New Frontier doesn’t fail completely as a narrative experience — Javier and his makeshift family aren’t unlikeable as far as characters go — but the story that’s being told in these first two episodes just doesn’t command the player’s investment like it used to. The gameplay aspects are superfluous, the story beats are overly familiar, and and not even seeing Clementine again can save the moaning, ambling corpse this series has unfortunately become.

A New Frontier doesn’t fail completely as a narrative experience — Javier and his makeshift family aren’t unlikeable as far as characters go — but the story that’s being told in these first two episodes just doesn’t command the player’s investment like it used to. The gameplay aspects are superfluous, the story beats are overly familiar, and and not even seeing Clementine again can save the moaning, ambling corpse this series has unfortunately become.

Situs Inversus also ties the season together excellently by not only being a satisfying mission on its own, but by featuring several callbacks for longtime series fans. Some of the assassination options mirror those from older games, and thorough players might notice some special cameos. IO taking the time to provide these little nods to fans was great.

As a trio, the Bethesda Pinball pack is a solid collection. DOOM alone is worth the price of admission, and Fallout 4 is a great-looking table with a few unnecessary mechanics. Skyrim isn’t bad, just a little overcomplicated and a bit too slow for my taste, although I daresay fans of the source material will get a kick out of it. Overall, Zen Studios continues to give pinball fans a great way to continue to experience the game they in a new, yet pleasantly retro ways. Real-life pinball machines might be hard to find, but the game remains alive and well… in digital form at least.

Dead Rising 4 may not be the series’ high point, but it’s easily the second-best, and a great experience in its own right. Zombie slaughtering has never been this accessible or thrilling, and the developers at Capcom Vancouver have once again proven that they know exactly what to do with a winning formula.

Road To Ballhalla is a delight. It rises above its inspirations to bring a new musical sensibility to the action puzzle genre. While some levels can be frustrating or even punishing, it never feels unfair — clearly a huge amount of thought has gone into balancing the difficulty, and anyone who brings a steady hand and a good amount of patience will find one of the most wonderfully kinetic puzzlers around.

I’ve no doubt that there’s a hardcore segment of gamers who will appreciate what Cursed Castilla is going for, and for these players, it will certainly do a great job of bringing back a late-’80s sort of arcade experience in a way that few retro-inspired projects accomplish. For most players, though, I feel that it’ll be viewed as a cute little oddity and little more.

Sure, it’s still awesome in scope and there’s a ton of content in the package, but it only offers minimal visual improvements, dated gameplay, and inexplicable legacy bugs. Unless someone defines their RPG experience by sun rays and water effects, this reissue just doesn’t represent a notable improvement over the original. Still, for those who aren’t yet Dragonborn, this is the best way to become so.

Just a bad use of Ubisoft’s talent pool, and a worse use of gamers’ hard-earned money.

Players in the target audience for these titles (like me!) who’ve been waiting for this storied series to come to console will find the package worth exploring even if there’s only one real reason to buy in.

Steep is a gorgeous game that was never able to keep my attention. On paper it seems to have everything it needs to succeed — multiplayer, a big world to explore, lots of things to do, different ways to play — but wandering the mountain and taking part in generic events lacks excitement and personality. I doubt I’ll remember it exists in a year, which is a shame because that moonlit landscape is just breathtaking.

This isn’t slick, soulless and focus-tested into insensibility. Let It Die is rough and engaging on a primal level, and intensely refreshing as a result. It’s also a shining example of a free-to-play title that doesn’t make lecherous moves on anyone’s wallet every five minutes. This game is less about paying to win, and more about playing to win.

Every one of the four levels is delightful and inventive, offering multiple ways to solve each problem and reacting logically to out-of-the-box ideas. It may be on the short side, but Expect‘s wit and ability to engage players more than earns it a place on the must-play PSVR list.

Dying due to confusing design rarely makes for good times, and this soured me on Stereo Aereo pretty damned hard. It’s unfortunate because I genuinely dig the overall aesthetic, and I definitely enjoyed the soundtrack. Even the relatively meager storyline has its high points. However, when the difficulty kicks into high gear, it all bubbles down into an overly busy, confusing and imprecise mess that I can’t wrap my head around.

World of Final Fantasy is a great-looking game with charm to spare and quite a few cool ideas under its belt, but it never quite nails the pacing and the excellent localization can’t save it from a pedestrian storyline jaunt through linear dungeons. It’s a reasonable option for anyone hankering for some Final Fantasy nostalgia or anyone who wants to overdose on cute and the colorful, but for everyone else it’s merely a decent JRPG with a few too many irritating lows.

Robinson: The Journey‘s developers have built a world worth exploring, and armed players with all the tools necessary to do so. While I wish the adventure was a little larger or that its price was a little more reasonable, it absolutely delivers on its premise. Thanks to PSVR, I was able to solve puzzles on an alien planet (that looks suspiciously like prehistoric earth) while hanging out with a heartbreakingly adorable baby T-Rex. This is the kind of experience that virtual reality headsets were designed for, and one of the best available showcases for the technology.

Any player with a taste for a medieval warlord’s life and a tolerance for dated graphics shouldn’t pass up the chance to sink their teeth into Mount and Blade: Warband. Though the PC version may be a bit easier to recommend thanks to the prevalence of mods and a more established community, folks without that option will do just fine on consoles.

For anyone happy with being dumped into horde-style arenas and expected to slam zombie brains across the room with a sledgehammer with a team of like-minded savages, it’s definitely one of the better options on the market right now. Players who crave more than just shooting might find that it doesn’t quite manage to deliver a captivating experience past this core competence, though.

Despite its roughness, The Last Guardian is absolutely worth experiencing for the beautiful relationship at its heart, and for the flawless manner in which the adventure closes. Ueda’s ability to develop smoothly-running games may remain in question, but his expertise in crafting ravaging narratives and developing deep bonds with minimal dialogue remains nearly unmatched. He’s one of gaming’s premier storytellers, and of the three experiences he’s created, this may be my favorite yet.

In the end, Shadow Warrior 2 isn’t a bad game, it’s just not a really good one, either. It delivers a laugh or two, but in a few years, I’ll struggle to remember that I even played it. Pick it up during a sale or during a dry spell in the new release schedule, but there are plenty of other titles more deserving of attention at the moment.

A laughably awkward ten-year jump forward and a climactic showdown against a foe whose motives utterly escape me. The project’s original director was Kingdom Hearts creator Tetsuya Nomura, and it seems some of his influence remains embedded in the final product — FFXV’s latter half feels like a different game entirely, and it’s a mess. FFXV’s inability to live up to its early promise might rank as 2016’s biggest gaming disappointment.

After one day of playing GoW4, I knew it was an awesome title. After one month of diving deep into all campaign and multiplayer modes, that feeling hasn’t wavered. The developers showed hints of brilliance with their remake of the original Gears, but no one could have predicted just how firm a grasp they had on the intricacies of what makes this series so special. Its few flaws knocked my score down a few notches, but the gameplay is well-paced, gorgeous to watch, and tremendously satisfying. GoW4 a system-seller and a must-have title for any self-respecting fan of shooters.

While Dead Rising 2: Off The Record outdoes its predecessor in terms of raw playability and the amount of content it offers, it’s just not as satisfying. Both Dead Rising 2 and 3 understand that these are games are fundamentally about helping people in a terrible situation, and they’re richer because of it. Frank West’s jokey manner fits the sandbox mode well, but his detached, ironic worldview doesn’t land the way the rest of the series does. In the end, this effort feels like a minor sidenote before the series put the best pieces together for Dead Rising 3.