Much like last year's game, this mixed martial arts fighter impresses inside the octagon but doesn't do nearly as well outside of it.

The moments where Outriders is taking daring swings at mixing disparate elements are when it's at its best. The game is surprisingly deft at combining things that shouldn't work together: Its story is often funny but similarly severe; its combat requires you to take cover and to charge; its abilities make you phenomenally powerful but prone to overestimating yourself. If you can find the balance in Outriders, People Can Fly's RPG-shooter finds ways to combine well-worn video game ideas into something new and fun. Especially when you're accompanied by friends and put the time in to really understand the game's systems, Outriders rewards you with epic battle moments and a sprawling scope. It left me wanting to continue venturing out into the wilds of Enoch to see what I might find there--and to smash whatever it was with seismic earthquake magic.

Ni No Kuni 2 is a robust game that offers ample ways to spend your time, and even if they aren't all up to the same level of quality, it's easy to appreciate how they collectively contribute to the bigger picture. It's chock full of excellent battles and surprising moments that make for a far more memorable experience than you initially expect and leaves you impressed by your own accomplishments. If you didn't play the first game, don't let this one pass you by too.

As the saying goes: It's easy to learn, hard to master. Although a few shortcomings in the map design eventually surface and fatigue in looting can set in, Fortnite rarely fails at challenging you in unexpected ways, resulting in something more than just another typical last-person-standing shooter.

The variety of challenges makes Tembo fun and exciting, though the high-pressure, instant-death sections can become irritating because they tend to eat through your limited stock of lives much faster than any other parts of the game, throwing the otherwise solid pacing off.

Blizzard's fast-moving racing game is at its most fun when you're playing it with someone else.

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

It's a wonderful game with charm and inventive ideas that work and pave the way for new experiences in an otherwise stale category of games.

Some of the new ideas in Arceus have rough edges, and it's slow to start before you get access to many environments and mounts. This is an awkward first step, and it was a big adjustment for me, a longtime fan of the series, to make. Once Pokemon Legends: Arceus finds its stride, though, it's the most daring and inventive the series has been in years, breaking apart the staid core and creating something new and exciting from its pieces.

Most of the time, though, Devil Daggers finds elegance in its simplicity. By stripping the pomp of many modern shooters, it reveals the complexity beneath, molding the fundamentals into something exhilarating, something always worth one more try.

What's most remarkable about Tomb Raider is how its many elements so perfectly complement each other, so that no matter which activity you're currently engaged in, you're fully invested.

Wonder Boy: The Dragon's Trap shines as one of the best retro remakes yet. It knows not to tamper too much with the enjoyable, exploration-driven gameplay that made the original so good, instead focusing on updating the presentation to reintroduce the game to a new generation of players. While it's a bit on the short side--you can probably beat it over the course of a lazy Saturday--its small world is packed with personality. Whether you've played the original or are completely new to the weird, wacky world of Wonder Boy, The Dragon's Trap is an adventure well worth embarking on.

Despite taking more time than it should to really hit its stride, El Paso, Elsewhere is unrelenting once it does. Its straightforward action is enhanced by its consistently evolving enemies and delicate balancing of power, while its captivating love story presents a novel take on established mythologies with some impressive performances to back them up. It wears its inspirations on its sleeve but has its own ideas to add to the mix, making El Paso, Elsewhere much more than the sum of its apparent parts. It's a game with its own interesting approach to narrative that's backed by exciting gunplay, and one you shouldn't judge entirely by what it reminds you of.

Hearing a sweeping synth-rock melody punctuate a flurry of sword strikes, mace combos, and stalagmites exploding into a shower of loot is a delightful event that you'll experience countless times.

The exquisite visual design is so breathtaking that I continually found myself staring at the scenery instead of pushing onward. Tomb Raider is a great reinvention of this enduring franchise that made me eager to see where Lara goes in her future.

There are bigger, more complex, more beautiful open-world games on the market. But none of them are this good at making you feel so young at heart.

Interloper distills the core elements of every good RTS and adds a little extra to put it over the top. No matter if you love or loathe traditional real-time strategy, the deep tactics and puzzle solving crammed into a nicely condensed package here come highly recommended.

Watch Dogs Legion is an anti-fascist game, and it's admirable that it sticks to that message and sees it through to a satisfying and affirming conclusion. It also bolsters the franchise's clever hacking gameplay to offer more creativity than ever. One of Legion's more profound messages is about what it means to be a true Londoner, and by the game's end, you'll have a DedSec crew made of wildly diverse and disparate citizens from unique cultural, ethnic, and economic backgrounds--all united in their goal to restore their home. If anything, that's as powerful a message for the game as you can get…Watch Dogs: Legion struggles with tone at times, but its empowering message about unity and justice still shines in a game that is as absurd as it is impactful.

Even now, Broken Sword 5 still looks gorgeous, and although its murder-turned-conspiracy story feels somewhat rote these days, its characters and dialogue are still great fun to watch as the drama unfolds.

Picking off enemies one-by-one with a railgun, demolishing them point-blank with a shotgun, and ripping through them with a chainsaw are just a few of the exciting moments that make it hard to put down. However, if you want to experience its action-packed highs, then disregard its groan-inducing lows and skip the cutscenes.

It's still a relatively simple and short action game at heart, but a solid combat system, some extremely intense and cinematic levels, cool extras that fans of the movies will enjoy, and the option to play cooperatively with a friend all add up to make The Return of the King deserving of its name.

Super Mario 3D Land eases you in with creative level design and tight controls while leaving plenty of challenging content to be discovered.

Warlords of Draenor has revitalized World of Warcraft with a huge amount of new content and refinement of the basic gameplay.

Smart, occasionally funny, and immediately charming, Broken Sword 5: The Serpent's Curse is easy to recommend based on its strong narrative, memorable characters, and artistic merit. The game is a vibrant return to form for the series, and should easily please the series' and point-and-click adventure game fans alike.

Overflowing with colorful personality, Puyo Puyo Tetris revels in its weirdness. It provides solid versions of both puzzle games and merges the two in bizarre, frantic ways that adds a fresh dash of style to these long-running series. With an array of game variations spanning single-player, along with on- and offline multiplayer, it's an incredibly meaty package that should satisfy gamers for a long time to come.

The third time is the charm for Traveller's Tales--logical puzzles and great offline co-op play make this the best Lego game yet.

Disgaea DS is a delightfully evil strategy RPG with enough depth (and prinnies) to entertain you for ages.

The first installment of Hector: Badge of Carnage is a crass and creative detective adventure.