Considered as a whole, Ultra Smash does just enough to get by. At moments it shines and at others it frustrates, but mostly it just coasts.

If nothing else, Star Wars Battlefront is an exercise in pure spectacle, laid out in all of its neon glory.

In the end, Telltale's Game of Thrones succeeds in telling a violent, sad story that feels very much at home in the world of Westeros. By the finale, the danger feels real and your choices feel like they have mattered.

Battlefront doesn't go much deeper than its ambitious surface appeal. It front loads its best content, only to fade in quality as the hours roll by. Star Wars Battlefront's skin is beautiful, but its legs are shaking, and threaten to buckle with time.

It's a bold, declarative statement backed with aesthetic skill on nearly every front. ROM is a resounding success and one of the most affecting adventures I've ever had.

Interestingly, Sports Interactive has said it plans to sell a standalone version of Football Manager Touch, with a release date of "sometime before Christmas." If you’re the same kind of Football Manager player as me, you may be better off waiting for that. For now, you can find Football Manager Touch here in Football Manager 16. Many of the new features--the Set Piece Creator, Create a Club and a lightly tweaked tactics UI--are available in Touch while almost everything I dislike has been cut. This, coupled with the fact that the match engine feels just a little bit more Joachim Löw than Tony Pulis this year, was enough to draw me back in.

The bread and butter co-op experience shines just bright enough to compensate for this relative lack of content.

Worse than the technical shortcomings, off-the-mark combat, and terrible omissions from the roster, Yuke's failure to capture the heart of WWE makes WWE 2K16 such a disappointment. The modern WWE is overflowing with talent. The series’ inability to deliver on the magic of WWE's characters and athletes, beyond number crunching and subpar combat, indicates that this series is still far from being able to relive the magic of the squared circle inside your living room.

The fact that your decisions stick with you after walking away from the game is a testament to the great storytelling on hand. Fallout 4 is an argument for substance over style, and an excellent addition to the revered open-world series.

Fallout 4 is an engrossing game that lures you in with mystery and the promise of adventure. Its wretched wasteland can be captivating, and you never know what odd person or settlement lies around the next bend.

The fact that your decisions stick with you after walking away from the game is a testament to the great storytelling on hand. Fallout 4 is an argument for substance over style, and an excellent addition to the revered open-world series.

As a third-person adventure game, Rise of the Tomb Raider excels. Rather than collide, gameplay and story share the space, supplementing each other and emerging as a cohesive whole.

Learning the skills and vocabulary of the game gives you the confidence to risk chaining large combos, and it’s at this level where you can experience Downwell's most exhilarating moments again and again.

Black Ops III's narrative doesn't support the campaign in any meaningful way, either. It tells an incomprehensible story about AI ascendancy and the moral grays of a hyper-connected future, raising intriguing questions but never bothering to answer them. At the end of it all, after hours of soulless shooting and unremarkable storytelling, Black Ops III delivered its nebulous twist, and I didn't dwell on it.

In its undead modes, and the first 10 hours of multiplayer, it excels. But in its campaign, it merely crawls forward. Black Ops III doesn't offer anything remarkable to the series, but does just enough to maintain the Call of Duty status quo. The franchise, however slowly, continues its inexorable march.

Considering how much processing oomph it seems to need, Sword Coast Legends looks muddy and unremarkable. The world is easily forgotten. Sewers, woods, tumbledown buildings, castles and keeps--perhaps the game’s beauty is limited by the necessity to stick to reusable tilesets, or perhaps the lack of clarity is down to that 3D style.

It's a neat twist on the creature-collecting game with a lot of heart.

Despite its lacking final moments, The Park makes the experience of searching a haunting, abandoned amusement park feel genuinely tense. This, rather than a specific plot point, is what sticks with you after you turn off the game and return to your normal, less disturbing reality.

Yes, Minecraft Story Mode Episode Two is another brief adventure, but it's an entirely compelling one throughout.

The game is far from perfect, but it is, at points, truly exceptional. Its jaw-dropping visuals, adrenaline-pumping audio, and highly-customizable handling make screaming around the darkened streets of Ventura Bay an intense thrill. The sense of ownership that comes with tuning a single ride to perfection rather than simply grabbing the flashiest vehicle available proved tremendously rewarding.

Though it starts with a glimmer of excellence, Armikrog's luster fades over time. It inevitably feels empty, falling flat in its effort to develop its characters, fill out its world with compelling atmosphere, and provide consistent puzzles with sound logic.

In some ways, Halo 5 is the boldest Halo yet. The franchise's multiplayer is at its peak, with a mode I'm sure I'll return to several times over. But then there's the campaign, which introduces fluid new movement and open level design, yet can't tell a coherent story to match. There are signs of a phenomenal shooter here, but certain narrative aspects feel underdeveloped, holding the franchise's newest sequel back from true excellence.

As far as the Tales series is concerned, there’s no overestimating the value of familiarity, which is why "comfort food" is a term often used to describe it.

The developers at Untame should be proud and confident that they can build thorough and robust gameplay structures around their ideas. But the concept at the centre of Mushroom 11, I would implore, is not something they should return to.

A triumphant return to form for a franchise, and presents a beautifully structured tale with heart and soul to spare.

But like its story of fashion and surface appeal, there’s not much depth here, and the facade fades with time. Tri Force Heroes offers us the means to work together, but not enough reason to do so.

They say beauty is only skin deep, and in this case, there's definitely a lot of roughness under the surface.

Life is Strange paints an excellent, vivid picture of a young woman's struggle for acceptance and justice, but trips itself up by trying to make things gamey.

Guitar Hero Live's reinvented mechanics makes music-driven gameplay fresh and fun again, and while that's a truly massive and meaningful change for the genre as a whole, the campaign's off-putting presentation and GHTV's unpleasant microtransactions all sour the experience built up around that gameplay.

In addition to its satisfying emotional arcs, dark humor and semi-insulting banter are the other major hallmarks of Tales from the Borderlands. This final , written in collaboration with longtime Borderlands writer Anthony Burch, is the funniest episode in the series. One minute you're on the verge of tears as the characters spiral into despair, and the next a character speaks a line or an event occurs that brings you right back up to a side-splitting high. In my time with the episode, I alternated between wildly upset and laughing hard enough to choke.

With too much out of sync--from wildly variable handling to the way you use items to the unconvincing character relationships--Fatal Frame: Maiden of the Black Water isn't anything more than a mediocre experience.

While the initial thrill of decorating the game's big spaces is fun, I wish there was something more cohesive that tied Happy Home Designer together--a way to play with friends or an actual village that takes shape as you add more and more denizens.

Any good bedtime story that makes you want to hear it again right after it’s over is one for the ages.

Even with improved on-court control and an online Pro-Am mode that can lead to pockets of outlandish fun, NBA Live 16 still fails to justify its existence. Its Rising Star and Dynasty modes are too underdeveloped and unvaried to remain interesting beyond the first few hours of play, and the basic dribbling, passing, and shooting tend to trip over themselves during offensive rebounds or fast breaks.

The loss of humanity Prison Architect breeds in its players could be its greatest strength, but without even an acknowledgement of that loss, the game stumbles instead of teaches.

It's a pleasant start, packed with individual events but featuring little in the way of narrative propulsion. When I reached the end of this episode, I wanted more. I'm hoping that, like most outstanding Minecraft creations, Minecraft: Story Mode just needs a little more time to build.

The frequent and diverse boss encounters distract from the otherwise rote, unimaginative, and oft-repeated mission objectives.

For every promising moment--which are few and far between--there's a commercial for candy, or a series of mini-tasks and menus that drag you back down. Chibi-Robo is a sleepy trip through a forgettable world. Plead with it to go faster, beg it to surprise you with new experiences, but don't be surprised when it answers back with the merits of biting into the center of a Tootsie Pop.

It may lack a certain spark and its missions tend to slip into drudgery, but I keep finding myself coming back to blast off toward any star in the night sky and eventually reach it. Such possibilities satisfy the thwarted little astronaut within me, and perhaps more importantly, they kindle excitement for the possibilities of the future.

For a game that needs to present information clearly and effectively, it fails to do so, and this failure has an unfortunate ripple effect on the rest of the game.

There's a point when a character whistles the boss fight music. And just when you're sure one such encounter is coming, he walks away to that haunting tune, without so much as a fistfight. This is what Hearts of Stone does best. It takes our expectations and runs with them.

That old Civilization mantra still echoes, just like it used to: One more turn.

These tens of thousands of encounters plus the appearances by the series’ many other heroes makes for an essential experience for any Dragon Quest fan, even if you haven’t played a hack-and-slasher in ages. These characters are so fully realized that, assuming you’re not a stickler for official canon, it wouldn’t be unreasonable to consider Dragon Quest Heroes as a companion piece alongside the main series.

The soundtrack in THPS5 is good enough, but the game is riddled with technical glitches and design missteps, making it a huge step back for the series.

Within THPS5 lies a basic skating game that's difficult to enjoy, because you have to jump over numerous hoops and ignore a plethora of obvious issues to find the smallest amount of fun. Previous THPS games were able to capture your imagination, and motivate you through character progression, gear, interesting levels, and even a great soundtrack.

Whether you're bumbling your way to the top or playing all your cards right, Armello makes regicide ridiculously entertaining.

Rock Band 4 recaptures the unadulterated gratification that made the series such a hit half a decade ago, but mainly because it’s a relatively unchanged, repackaged Rock Band 2. A lack of content and general stagnation hold this particular iteration of Rock Band back, but new ideas like Freestyle Solos genuinely enhance the core experience, which remains a sincere and joyful celebration of music.

After Dark may not be a revolutionary addition to Cities: Skylines, but the number of impressive new features and enhancements offered here is more than good enough to get my vote again.

The Beginner’s Guide is an absorbing journey into the thoughts and processes involved during the creation of a video game. It succeeds in helping you understand and sympathize with game developers as artists and people. It equips you with important tools to perceive and think about both video games and other mediums in intelligent ways. It’s a game that lives up to its namesake--it’s the beginner’s guide to the meaning of video games.

Few sports games come close to providing a more authentic and fun virtual representation of the real thing, and even if this is the least user-friendly entry in years, I can’t stop playing it.

NBA 2K16 draws you in with its welcoming personality and expanded game modes. But it still manages to push you away with unexplained intricacies.

The Nathan Drake Collection is a firsthand account of Naughty Dog's growth as a storyteller, and this collection is the best way to relive that history, and witness its transformation up close.

In the words of Revenge of Kuma: Confront the reality that everything you loved about the first Afro Samurai game is dead, and your memories are all you have.

In any game within the toys-to-life genre, there's sometimes an unspoken question: is this also a great toy or just a great game? In LEGO Dimensions' case, the answer is easy: it's both.

The game and its numerous systems are a complete time sink that allows you to spend dozens of hours building your perfect character, and then tempt you to do it again a few more dozen times. Disgaea 5 is the biggest and most satisfying installment in the series to date, and It could easily be the last one you ever need to buy.

Dancing All Night might have sounded like a fun idea on paper, but it simply doesn’t hold a candle to better portable rhythm games.

It’s chock-full of Orcs, Vampires, Skeletons, Ogres, Trolls, Elves and Dwarfs, violence, and cheating.

Blood Bowl 2 is a step forward. It's a much friendlier, easier game than its predecessors, with improved looks, a tutorial campaign, controller support, and the UI improvements. New players won't feel blocked off from enjoying it.

For a French recreation of a British board game pastiching an American hobby, Blood Bowl 2 is remarkably coherent.

FIFA 16 can be stubborn and stifling, but it feels gloriously new, and having to learn fresh strategies and nuances in a game series like this is an almost-forgotten pleasure.

FIFA 16 is full of scrappy back and forth, the ability to play patient possession football, and a greater range of passing than ever.

FIFA 16 can be stubborn and stifling, but it feels gloriously new, and having to learn fresh strategies and nuances in a game series like this is an almost-forgotten pleasure.

The Taken King is more than just an expansion; it's also a heart transplant. And with its wounds sewn shut, the anesthetic wearing off, and the scalpels put away to dry, Destiny has pulled through the operation with renewed vigor and a much stronger pulse. Now, only a few scars remain.

It may not stir the hordes of wailing YouTubers looking for the next best haunted house, but SOMA succeeds at crafting something much more meaningful in a genre that’s deserving of more than just simple jump scares.

Skylanders SuperChargers is a fast-paced affair, never lingering in one spot for too long, always offering something new and fun to do. It's a great game to play with kids, and one grown ups shouldn't be ashamed to try.

Players who have already taken this trip with Shadowrun Returns and its expansion may find themselves wanting a bit with the gameplay, and newbies will have quite the learning curve to surmount, but if you see the gameplay as an adequate means to experience the more satisfying narrative end, Shadowrun: Hong Kong more than earns your attention.

Soaked to the core in that quintessentially nineties cocktail of cynicism and an exultant love of violence, playing Act of Aggression feels like going back in time and returning to a home that only exists in your oldest memories. And that's special, even if it means dealing with some obtuse design issues.

Ultimately, the excitement that comes from commanding powerful ships during explosive battles on the high seas overshadows these faults. The thrills that await, along with the promise of unlocking advanced ships down the road, make World of Warships an enticing expedition into the sometimes turbulent waters of free-to-play games.

When Satellite Reign is on and all the parts decide they want to work together, it is a blast. Infiltrating a base without setting off any alarms and stealing new guns and money from under the enemy's nose is tense and satisfying, and you have to be willing to take risks to succeed. I just wish you didn't have to slog through the uninviting early hours and the game's regularly busted AI to find those thrills.

NHL 16 is a huge improvement over NHL 15 in every way, and it makes me optimistic for the future of the franchise.

The On-Ice Trainer is an awesome alternative to tutorials, and it makes me hope that other companies, not just those making sports games, will find a way to implement similar tools. NHL 16 is a huge improvement over NHL 15 in every way, and it makes me optimistic for the future of the franchise.

There's little worth in assessing soccer sims by the weight of their game modes, or indeed, the breadth of their official licenses. All that truly matters is what unfolds in those virtual ninety minutes, either against a friend, an online stranger, or the computer. On that test alone, PES 2016 represents the best game in the series since the PlayStation 2 era.

All that truly matters is what unfolds in those virtual ninety minutes, either against a friend, an online stranger, or the computer. On that test alone, PES 2016 represents the best game in the series since the PlayStation 2 era.

Above all else, the most meaningful stride forward is the new collision system, which so much now hinges on.

Even though it gives you a chance to revisit one of the best RPGs in years, The White March Part 1 ultimately feels like a missed opportunity to expand that greatness into new territory.

The Mod system and the weather effects are reasons enough for Forza 5 enthusiasts to seriously consider this sequel and the abundance of difficulty and assist options makes Forza 6 an immensely accessible driving simulation for newcomers.

Even if it takes a camera or a mobile device to fully come together, Tearaway Unfolded is a smart, slick reimagining of Media Molecule’s underappreciated gem. The innovative methods by which you can twist, turn, and bend the colorful paper world provide interesting new challenges to wrap your head around, and the already beautiful world has an even bigger allure on the PlayStation 4. It’s just plain fun.

The best console version of Dishonored that money can buy--and make no mistakes, that still makes this the best version of a fantastic game—but as a re-release on systems far more capable than their predecessors, this is a perfunctory release that doesn’t justify the price tag except out of sheer convenience.

The game won't necessarily turn you into the next Shigeru Miyamoto, but you can almost feel a little bit of that magic rubbing off every time you upload a new creation.

Not bad. But a laundry list of unfortunate drawbacks keeps it from becoming the exciting box of good times and nostalgia that it could have been.

A great twist on the classic 4X formula.

Mad Max's combat system is too dumbed down to enjoy, and repetitive activities such as searching for scrap and invading small enemy camps gets old fast. Mad Max offers some great experiences, but for a game that tries to impose the realities of survival on you, it does a poor job of following up on this pressure.

With solid presentation, combat, and customization, LBX: Little Battler’s eXperience is a satisfying game that is more involved than it seems. It’s not without its faults, including unwieldy, sometimes tedious design, but to write it off as just another kid’s RPG would do it a massive disservice. Level-5 has created an action-RPG that--even with its faults--is still an entertaining offering.

It's a peek into the early days of complex level design, interlocking combat mechanics, basic physics, and the best of what could be accomplished visually and sonically on the NES. Just don't ask me to beat Snake Man again. Please, never ask me to do that.

Zombi manages to set itself apart, with its deliberate pacing, desolate atmosphere, and focus on survival. It might not be a Crown Jewel, but this undead romp through London is an interesting change of pace.

If Ultra Despair Girls didn’t have so much else going for it, it would be a mostly-mediocre quasi-survival-horror-shooter with a few high points. But even with some very obvious gameplay issues, the sheer strength of the game’s setting, story, characters, and style manages to overshadow everything else, turning this into an absolute must-play for anyone already invested in the Danganronpa universe.

Despite the occasional laughs and wonderfully weird multiplayer modes, Devil's Third is near-impossible to recommend. The numerous issues with the controls as well as crucial elements of the game's combat systems soon mount up to provide an experience that frustrates far more often than it entertains, resulting in a missed opportunity for what could've been a cult hit.

Devoid of any throwaway modes or game types that rely on nostalgia, Madden NFL 16 is both sensible and forward thinking. Its developers could have made a bigger deal about Super Bowl 50 or relied more heavily on the appeal of Hall of Fame players (who are available in Ultimate Team). Instead, EA Tiburon has focused more on fans’ diverse play tastes as well as making this one of the most welcoming Madden games in recent memory.

Saying that The Descent meets expectations may be damning this DLC with faint praise, but that’s also a fair summation of what it offers during its seven-to-10 hours of action. This is a pure sideline quest to the events of Dragon Age: Inquisition that plays out in a completely linear fashion and has no impact on the greater world.

I didn't expect to have so much fun with Until Dawn, and the depth with which my choices mattered and affected the final outcome encouraged repeat playthroughs. The visuals can be wonky at times, but in the end Until Dawn succeeds in being a thoughtful use of familiar mechanics, a great achievement in player-driven narrative, and a horror game you shouldn't miss.

The return trip might have revealed a few more cracks than we remembered, but it also serves as a shield for our nostalgia. And as remakes go, that's worth the journey home.

There has never been a game in the series with such depth to its gameplay, or so much volume in content. The best elements from the past games are here, and the new open-world gameplay adds more to love on top. When it comes to storytelling, there has never been a Metal Gear game that's so consistent in tone, daring in subject matter, and so captivating in presentation. The Phantom Pain may be a contender for one of the best action games ever made, but is undoubtedly the best Metal Gear game there is.

Even a couple years after its release, though, The Bridge is one of the better examples of 2D puzzle games available right now. It's a shame that frustration can sometimes break the trance induced by the wonderful art and design, but that shouldn't keep you from exploring this unique black-and-white world.

There are no big action sequences, which takes away some of the energy, but the emphasis on character relationships is what makes this episode a good one.

It stumbles when trying to tell a story, but excels at communicating phenomenal mechanics.

What doesn't work is the fact that the disparate parts of puzzles and message board threads don't really have anything to do with each other.

Nostalgia, intelligent combat, and a range of tactical depth is hard to find in different games, let alone rolled up into one very catchy, very reasonably priced package.

Everybody's Gone to the Rapture uses subtle cues to guide you through its world and then gives you the space to digest what you find. It's a wonderful example of what games can achieve narratively while presenting minimal physical engagement and tasking player imagination with the rest.