The sterile presentation and lack of options certainly don't help matters, either. While it has its highlights, the party is over before it can really get started.

What makes Human Revolution on the Wii U special aren't the additional features, but that which was already constructed. The game draws remarkable contrast between the sterility of the corporate world and the grit of the city.

Inspired by a number of popular sc-fi properties, Dark Matter held the promise of offering an appealing mash-up of Metroid-style gameplay and Dead Space-like scares. While it mostly gets the mood right, due in no small part to its slick lighting and audio work, its other elements barely range from subpar to serviceable.

Glare offers an inventive mechanic that could have given rise to a memorable adventure, but then fails to build meaningfully on that early promise. This is an entertaining pit stop that can tide you over on your journey to a bigger, brighter galaxy.

For just $15, you get a couple of dozen hours of mostly enjoyable Diablo-styled hacking and slashing that is just well crafted enough to make you overlook the lunacy of the story and the aggravation of the bugs.

Rocksmith isn't going to be replacing the likes of a keen ear, a copy of Guitar Pro, and a good set of tabs for me, but when I think back to when I bashed out my first clumsy Green Day chords on guitar, I'd have killed for as good a teacher as this.

Though there are some clever moments to be found in the platforming challenges, the majority of the levels are either disappointingly tepid or downright frustrating. Irritum's flawed attempts to challenge your dexterity and engage your mind aren't enough to inspire you to linger in this limbo.

Be prepared to grind for several hours before the game's rhythm picks up and its diversity compels you towards the exciting closing battles that reveal Salvation Prophecy's best attributes.

That some inoffensive visuals and a few fun 2D sections are the highlights of a largely 3D game is telling. Sonic Lost World desperately wants to be Mario Galaxy, but in overtly coveting the great Italian plumber, it smothers the talents of its blazing blue hedgehog.

The new character combinations enhance the gameplay, expanding on what can be created and adding an interesting mechanic to the game. You may wind up shopping for new figures to unlock new content, which isn't a cheap habit to build, but Swap Force taps into the sheer joy of experimenting with new character combinations and building them from there.

The Stanley Parable is both a richly stimulating commentary on the nature of choice in games (and in other systems, too, like our workplaces and our families) and a game that offers some of the most enjoyable, surprising, and rewarding choices I've ever been confronted with in a game. Going the wrong way has never felt so right.

A haphazard collection of obtuse puzzles strewn about an ill-lighted world that does nothing to call attention to them. While it might be easy to assume these frustrations echo the protagonist's apparent mental illness, PolyPusher Studios utterly fails to teach you about the limits and goals of its own work, and does little to illuminate how its puzzles relate to the real-world experience Montague's Mount tries to evoke.

Full Bore's bluesy music is catchy, the animations are equally charming and unsettling, the puzzles are often fun to solve, and there are hints of a good, dark mystery behind the greater plot.

This one-hour prelude thinks as little of you as it does its characters.

When it becomes clear that success isn't a matter of overcoming psychological terrors but of discerning rigid, obfuscated logic, Knock-knock reveals itself to be not something horrifying that defies all understanding, but simply a mundane, frustrating little puzzle box.

The unpredictable human element is both an asset and a liability, and the technical problems that have plagued it are far too significant to be ignored. But when it clicks, as it often does, there's nothing quite like GTA Online.

With all the additional features that expand Prime World beyond traditional genre definitions, the game lacks the heart and focus needed to keep you invested in each match.

This is a game that demands a lot up front but pays off down the road as long as you stay patient when it comes to online homework and in-game experimentation.

Cityscapes are cloaked in deep purple haze and long shadows, and droning minor-scale chords heave and sigh, suffocating you with their smoky nuances. No matter how this story unfolds, it's hard to imagine a happy ending clearing away the pervading darkness.

This debut episode from The Wolf Among Us crafts an excellent illusion that usually veils the systematic gears that click and whir whenever you veer down a particular path. More impressively, it nails its atmosphere.

Disgaea D2: A Brighter Darkness is one of the funniest and freshest role-playing games of the year.

A fascinating experience that expertly links story and mechanics to further your connection to the world.

Pokemon X/Y isn't quite a mega evolution of its numerous predecessors, but like a dark move played against a ghost- or psychic-type pokemon, it doesn't disappoint.

Pokemon X and Y benefit greatly from their leap to a fully 3D world, and have plenty to offer both veterans and novices alike.

It's a capable homage to a beloved 16-bit franchise, complete with attractive visuals and great audio, but the overall package is best suited to those who are eager for new challenges to keep them busy after they've worked through the readily available and more affordable library of older fare that already covered the same ground.

Brutal robot-destroying fun is buried deep, but this giant mech battling series could still use an oil change.

A generic shooter notable only for its intense difficulty.

Card Hunter's fusion of tabletop role-playing games and trading cards is easy to get into and hard to pull away from.

An extensive cast of DC characters can't help Scribblenauts Unmasked overcome the dangers posed by its own flawed internal logic.

If you're going to remake a game known for its tacky humor, this is the way to do it. The crassness is here, but it's merely seasoning in a colorful old-school first-person shooter that allows excitement to build organically from the way its systems interact.

Rain pulls you in from the early moments. The abandoned city that you roam through is beautiful in its gloominess, and the quiet piano score adds subtle background texture without overwhelming the other aspects. The pieces of Rain meld wonderfully together, and as the story comes to a tense conclusion, it becomes absolutely riveting. But there are hours between the evocative opening and cathartic ending that go through the motions.

The original Etrian Odyssey is remade with refined customization, enchanting visuals, and an intriguing story.

F1 2013 takes you on a nostalgia trip into the history of Formula One, while compelling new modes and subtle improvements layer atop a familiar, but winning formula.

If the game had made better use of its assets and given us a reason to care about more than the fleeting pleasures of customization and combat, it might be worth enduring the currency grind. As it is, like its strongest mechs, it runs out of power far too fast.

An unfinished, broken mess of a tactical shooter that offers not even one redemptive bright spot.

Despite the occasional technical missteps, NBA 2K14 is a great experience that deftly captures the essence of what makes the NBA so appealing. Nothing could perfectly replicate reality, but 2K14 has almost as much personality, and gives you the freedom to perform how you wish.

Its concepts may be familiar, and its mechanics are not best-in-class, but Marlow Briggs switches gears often, always moving forward at a breakneck tempo.

Shoots for scares, but elicits yawns.

Dragon Fantasy Book II is a pale shadow of the Super Nintendo role-playing games that it is inspired by.

Despite the lack of a defining new feature to attach itself to, FIFA 14 is far more than the sum of its parts. It's a fundamentally different experience to last year's game, and an entertaining one at that, moving the series ever closer to the realism it so proudly strives for. The only competition FIFA has this year is itself.

Combining beat-'em-up action with randomized levels and loot, Legend of Dungeon offers just enough variety to stem the tide of repetitive gameplay.

A Realm Reborn isn't so novel that it feels like a vacation to an undiscovered realm. Instead, fantasy-world travelers will understand the language and quickly take to local customs. Yet these previously charted lands are wondrous to look at and overflowing with like-minded adventurers seeking to make a name for themselves in a world in need of heroes.

A standard but enjoyable shooter and one of the best-looking games on the Vita.

This is a game that tries to straddle the line between arcade action and sublime simulation and never succeeds at either. PES is at its best when it's selective with its realism: here's hoping next year it can go back to doing what it does best.

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker HD is a loving restoration of a bold and beautiful adventure, with Nintendo shifting some elements of the original game's aesthetic, and streamlining the pace where it had occasionally sagged.

It's hardly foul, but good ideas and charming animations aren't enough to save Foul Play from repetition.

ARMA III is a beast. It occasionally flails and moans, but once you learn how to balance yourself upon it, it gives you a marvelous, turbulent, and memorable ride.

GTA V is an imperfect yet astounding game that has great characters and an innovative and exciting narrative structure, even if the story it uses that structure to tell is hobbled at times by inconsistent character behavior, muddled political messages and rampant misogyny. It also raises the bar for open-world mission design in a big way and has one of the most beautiful, lively, diverse and stimulating worlds ever seen in a game.

SteamWorld Dig is a charming, atmospheric exploration adventure, but it grinds to a halt just when it starts going full steam.

NHL 14 adds little of note to NHL 13 aside from better hitting, more fighting, and a disappointing NHL 94 retro mode.

The new features brought to the table don't add enough over what was available in NHL 13, making this a dubious buy for anyone who still has last year's game and can live without the crushing new hits and more widespread fisticuffs.

The Ultimate Edition of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow breathes new life into the three-year-old game through improved graphics and extra content.

The three experiences complement one another with unique elements and welcome context that is a treat for longtime fans and newcomers alike; plus, there's enough variety to keep everyone engaged for the 50 or 60 hours it can easily take to absorb everything.

The powerful abilities of the diverse character classes are fun to use, the world is varied and enticing, and the constant promise of more riches and better gear makes conquering that next group of foes an alluring prospect indeed.

On console as on PC, Diablo III is a very safe game. It never diverges from the path carved by its predecessors and the numerous loot-driven hack-and-slash dungeon crawlers they inspired. But Diablo III also proves that when done well, the classic formula can still be absorbing.

This is a captivating adventure, but it's also a very dark and disturbing one that touches on depressing real-world themes and doles out psychological horror along with monsters and gore. Still, this gives the game added depth and a literary weight that elevates it well above much of the horror genre in general, especially in a game that arrives without much pretension and with a plot device about murderous pig-men.

KickBeat is a plucky new contender in the rhythm gaming arena, with punishing difficulty and pumping industrial beats.

Puppeteer is a little quirky, perhaps even a little insane in places, but unashamedly so. And you know what? It works brilliantly.

Technical issues aside, the upgrades to Rome II have helped blur the lines between tactics and strategy, creating a powerful, engaging drama that works well on every scale.

Rhythm fans will find a lot of music, challenge, and customization to love as they get to know Hatsune Miku: Project Diva F.

Game-breaking glitches and a poor camera make TMNT: Out of the Shadows a bruised and battered shell of what it could have been.

Most of the time, particularly early on when its quirks are fresh and unknown, it delivers. Even its weakest moments owe their existence not to ineffective ambiance and tension, but rather to excessive confidence spurred by eventual predictable encounters that clash with the promise of the setting.

This is a lovely game, let down not by its mechanical simplicity, but by its resistance to doing more with those mechanics. Yet when it taps into basic animal instinct, Shelter reminds us just how precious life is, and how apathetic the laws of nature are to our pleas for mercy.

It's less about what you do, and more about where you are. Though they've substituted platform hops for page flips, the developers have crafted a Disney-quality world worth revisiting.

Race the Sun is an elegant endeavor, pairing slick action and stiff challenge with systems that make you want to come back day after day.

A great-looking remake of a classic game, but playing it is an exercise in confusion and frustration.

This is a satisfying game--especially to the longtime Warhammer 40K devotees who have been waiting for a new Space Hulk video game for nearly two decades--but it could have been so much more.

Major improvements to the cooperative mode coupled with the Vita's portability make this the best version of the already excellent Spelunky.

Tales of Xillia is a gorgeous and fast-paced Japanese role-playing game that suffers from a few questionable design choices.

Lost Planet 3 is a difficult game to hate and an equally difficult game to adore. It might feature monstrous aliens, but it never thinks big.

Lost Planet 3 is both less exasperating and less diverse than its predecessors.

Lost Planet 3 takes narrative steps forward while standardizing its sci-fi action, for better and for worse. It's a decent game, neither a mess nor a triumph.

Killer Is Dead is filled with Suda 51 eccentricity, but it struggles to stay relevant with inconsistent combat, a poorly told story, and some awkwardly sleazy moments.

Madden NFL 25 marks a quarter-century of football gaming with a disappointing addition to this venerable franchise.

It's a shame that EA Sports decided to make such a big deal out of the Madden anniversary this year. Putting that big "25" on the box cover ramps up expectations and may well make a standard baby-steps Madden sequel seem more disappointing.

It uses absurd scenes to imbue this feisty adventure with enough variety to keep you continually amazed, and presents every disparate scenario with expert care. Rayman Legends' off-kilter identity serves as the foundation for this wild and crazy journey.

Fueled by smooth platforming, striking visuals, wacky situations, and infectious beats, Rayman Legends is a nifty platformer that exudes unabashed delight.

Despite the potential pitfalls and the actual flaws of Payday 2, things have a way of coming together.

As long as you can find some felons to fight alongside, Payday 2 is an addictive and challenging criminal pursuit.

Payday 2 brings crime to life with an alluring intensity that entertains in spite of some rough edges.

The greatness of Disney Infinity's Toybox is undermined by the carelessness of its structured content.

Divekick's single-player game is lacking, but this two-button brawler turns into feet-flying fun with friends.

It delivers some enjoyable stretches of shooting action, but The Bureau: XCOM Declassified too often transforms the series' signature tension into tedium.

The game gets in its own way, stumbling when it seeks to siphon strategy mechanics into a formula that doesn't support them. The Bureau wants to rocket you into outer space, but it can't escape the gravity of the games that spawned it.

The Bureau: XCOM Declassified mirrors but never masters. When it gets down to the shallow shooting, it fares well, equipping you with some fun futuristic weapons and letting you go to town on nasty intergalactic intruders. But the game gets in its own way, stumbling when it seeks to siphon strategy mechanics into a formula that doesn't support them.

Europa Universalis IV easily provides hundreds of hours of gameplay for those who develop a taste for it. There are very few games remotely like this out there, making it a must-get game for people who want to "fix" history.

The Brigmore Witches is a haunting end to the Dishonored story arc.

Awkward controls and other flaws make it hard to appreciate the innovative and devious puzzles in Open Me.

Beer and blood spray punctuate the fun punk rock brawler Charlie Murder.

The Wonderful 101 is a bright, bold adventure that occasionally struggles to control its big ambitions.

With excellent writing and remarkable attention to period detail, Gone Home turns the process of exploring a house into a captivating and deeply poignant journey of discovery.

As Spelunky makes it way to the PC, the rewards and dangers are just as alluring as they were one year ago.

An adept fusion of music and gameplay.

Saints Row IV's crazy missions, fun superpowers, and funny writing make it an enjoyable way to live out your destructive fantasies.

The simulated city of Steelport doesn't offer deep gameplay or the most satisfying challenge, but it is a great place to mess around.

Saints Row IV owes a lot to games like Crackdown and Prototype, but the absurd humor that infuses every aspect of this game gives it an identity all its own.

It's with--and against--others that the game hacks into your pleasure centers, so while Sam Fisher may not be the man you remember, Splinter Cell: Blacklist has too many sweet adventures in store for you to miss them.

Blacklist makes it fun to fly solo, but it's when you join others that the stealth action really heats up.