I enjoyed Grand Kingdom quite a bit. On paper this game is everything I want in an SRPG, but it did leave me feeling a little underwhelmed. With a stronger narrative stitching everything together, I think it really would be the total package.

I did not like anything about Wasted. Neither its humor nor its gameplay are adequate to support the irritation of mastering the first dungeon or the tedium of blasting through the subsequent four. I spent many hours beating this game out of sheer spite and didn’t enjoy a single minute of it. Reader, do not repeat my error.

Lost Sea has some good ideas. Exploring randomized islands alongside talented crewmates sounds exciting and it looks like an enjoyable swashbuckling adventure, but the annoying music, repeated areas, boring combat and terrible AI sank this game long before the ship reached its destination.

Though prospective pilots may have a tough time giving the green light to Assault Suit Leynos due to the hefty price tag, it’s an impeccable remake of a classic, underappreciated Genesis game that delivers all that could be asked of it and more.

This undersea tour is quite short. I got through it in about two hours or so and was surprised by the brevity, but it’s probably better that way. No matter how beautiful it is to swim with whales or to descend into an undersea crevasse, there is precious little to do in Abzu, and it’s never particularly touching or thought-provoking. If it told a better tale or if there were more to it than swimming and occasionally pushing a button, it might have been a knockout. As it stands, the appeal of looking at pretty fish wears off in a hurry, and there’s not much else to recommend it.

Monochroma can proudly hold its metaphorical head high among other classy 2D puzzle-platformers. This is a game whose developers extensively studied the greats of the genre, and obviously understand what they did right. While it may not bring anything particularly new to the table, Monochroma is a beautifully executed adventure that kept me enthralled all the way from the promising opening to the slightly annoying finale.

It’s absolutely worth playing for anyone who missed it the first time, and the new features and content make a strong argument for existing fans to take a second look.

It’s difficult to recommend a title that serves only the most experienced racing fans, while alienating the rest of us. When coupled with a bland visual presentation and more than a few technical issues, players should to go back to older motocross titles to get their fix.

While I can imagine how Portal may have inspired the team to expand on its concept, in the end, all I wanted to do was play more Portal.

Although I absolutely love the aesthetics and concept of Headlander, the non-combat gameplay is only fair, and it’s brought down further with too much combat detracting from the things it does well. I was interested enough to stick around and see how things turned out at the end, but there were definitely a few times when I walked away and took a break out of annoyance. Like so many other examples before it, Headlander is another could-have-been that just doesn’t play to its strengths.

For me, personally, too much of Generations is repeat content and it breaks my heart to see another installment on hardware that doesn’t do it justice. I still love the series and I’m looking forward to an all-new Monster Hunter on a better system in the future. In the meantime? I’m cutting this hunt short.

Fans of the series will find lots to love, but fighting fans who don’t know anything about One Piece shouldn’t shy away from checking out the wonderfully balanced action. By the time players reach upper tiers the opposition is formidable, but smart play is rewarded and it always feels fair no matter how weird the pirate plotline gets.

Umbrella Corps has a few interesting ideas up its sleeve, but that’s all it has. Whenever it attempts to put those ideas into practice, they’re shoddily executed and laughably inept for a tactical shooter that rewards almost no tactics whatsoever.

FRU absolutely delighted me with its ingenuity and elegance. It has gone on to become not only a surprisingly enjoyable indie gem, but one of my absolute favorite exclusives for the Xbox One, and one of my favorites of all time.

A fan of the hidden object genre who doesn’t mind a little extra padding will certainly find this to be a worthwhile entry.

Despite its lack of long-term staying power, Pac-Man 256 is a fantastic reinterpretation of an arcade classic that looks and plays great, and this port is easily the best version. That said, it’s not meant for extended sessions, so I recommend playing in small chunks to avoid burnout.

Being interesting doesn’t change the fact that Mighty No. 9 is still a dismal failure.

While it may not have reached perfection yet, the Atelier series is getting close. Each new title offers a substantive change to the core mechanics, so vets will encounter something new and new players can easily jump in. I seem to say this in every review but it remains true—this is good as JRPG design gets, and I can’t wait to see what the developers have in store next.

Just small flaws in an otherwise sublime shooter. Brigador might not necessarily satisfy players looking for a new sim or a successor to a beloved series like MechCommander, but it scratches the itch for a challenging rampage game steeped in top-notch cyberpunk atmosphere.

Being a bit soft on the narrative is a sin that many games commit, and while I’m generally a big story guy, 7th Dragon III: Code VFD performs so fantastically in all other aspects that I can’t scold it for not making me examine the human condition. For players who want an excellent RPG-lite or a nonstandard dungeon crawler, this game is the total package—it’s got some of the most entertaining mechanics I’ve seen in years, it’s as smooth as butter to play, and everything about it oozes polish. It’s not only going to be one of the best 3DS games released this year, but one of the best 3DS titles overall.

When a title shows off obvious influences one hopes that it will rise above them, but Anima: Gate of Memories isn’t fit to shine its influences’ shoes. Its fundamentals are shoddy, and its characters and narrative are a bore. Anima never executes anywhere near the level its considerable ambitions demand.

The difficulty of Downwell will turn away just as many players as it attracts. While persistent effort will ultimately unlock alternative starting stats that benefit less-skilled players, the game starts players from zero after each death—it’s a formula that will either exhaust or inspire the player depending on how they feel about this kind of experience. As for me, Downwell joins the ranks of Spelunky as a go-to, action-oriented roguelike, but I expect many who try it will quickly shelve it for less difficult adventures.

This leaves TurnOn in a tough spot. More than 90% of the game is a high-quality, quirky, relaxing exploratory platformer. Unfortunately, that game is broken up and gated off by runner levels that add a disconnected (and possibly fatal) element of challenge, so I can’t recommend it for that strength.

Its vividly depressing, yet wondrous world proves that Playdead is still the master of atmospheric side-scrolling platformers, and it quickly became one of the best games I’ve played this year.

After the smaller and less satisfying DLCs that came before, it’s nice to have something larger and deeper to add to my Fallout 4 experience. Although this is really just more Fallout, Bethesda hit a high note here.

The online is worthy of special mention, as it’s arguably the most important factor when it comes to a fighting game’s longevity. Fortunately, Guilty Gear Xrd: Revelator nails this aspect admirably. The netcode is solid, with even games held between Japan and the UK offering decent matches.

All of these positives were true in the PS2 original, though, so the triumph of Leifthrasir is in making things easier to enjoy on current platforms.

Hyperdevotion Noire: Goddess Black Heart is both too similar to and too different from its parent series to hold my interest. Trying to “fix” the lackluster battle system with more minutiae has only made it less tolerable, and worse, I just don’t care about these characters anymore. I’ve played worse games—far worse—but Hyperdevotion Noire has lost the soul of a franchise I once loved.