Our gripes about the game’s seemingly random cuts aside, we can’t deny this is the best party game available on the new consoles.

Impressive visuals aside, Maiden Of Black Water is unashamedly last-gen in design. It’s creepy enough to give you sleepless nights and the story’s better than that of previous games, but you’ll have to put up with occasionally clunky controls if you want to enjoy this tale. It’s just about worth it.

There's just an overall lack of subtlety, from the controls to the music, to the story-telling. [Issue#166, p.100]

The music and black-and-white sketch style offer a refreshing change of pace to much of what's out there. [Issue#166, p.100]

It delivers a touching story and wraps it around a compelling puzzle platformer. [Issue#166, p.99]

It will certainly give your grey matter a workout, but it's clear that this would be better suited to mobile. [Issue#166, p.99]

Dream is ambitious, but players will need to be persistent and forgiving to enjoy what it has to offer them. [Issue#166, p.98]

Promises more than it can deliver. [Issue#166, p.98]

An unhappy marriage of horror and narrative exploration, but - by the end of the satisfying story - you'll be glad you stuck it out. [Issue#166, p.97]

So compelling are the first seven or so hours that the filthy tricks of the finale can't even sour them. [Issue#166, p.96]

A perfectly executed heist offers an incredible sense of achievement. [Issue#166, p.95]

It’s a nice mix of team building, draft tactics and instant gratification that shows off some of the best side of this area of the game.

If there ever was a perfect MOBA ambassador for consoles then it was always going to be Smite. [Issue#166, p.88]

It’s still great, but next year we do hope EA concentrates on what’s in the game less, and more about what’s fun to play.

Gears Of War: Ultimate Edition definitely belongs in that upper tier; its campaign no longer carries the industry-shaping impact it once had but it remains tremendous fun, while its multiplayer is still dramatic, unique and engaging, perhaps even more so now given the final touches The Coalition has added. As was the case back in 2006, come for the campaign and stay for the multiplayer – you’ll be glad you did.

Until Dawn plays with you. It’s an extended metaphor for horror games, one that prides itself on how much it predicts – and counteracts – what you’re doing. If you care about the advancement of meta-narratives and the player/game relationship, this is for you.

Forza Motorsport 6 is not the conclusive leap that some fans were expecting. It feels like more astute groundwork; more prep for the definitive seventh instalment. It doesn’t feel hollow or lacking in content; it’s a cautious and discreet update that still feels, to its credit, genuinely cutting edge. You probably shouldn’t miss it. Just don’t expect the ground to break.

It feels like a game-by-numbers: the straight-to-video spiritual successor to what Shadow Of Mordor did last year.

While boredom can set in as you perform the same handful of actions time and time again, there is just enough variety to keep you entertained. [Issue#165, p.98]

Smart, sketchy but pacy, Q.U.B.E: Director’s Cut is more than worth the price of admission, regardless of format.

Unoriginal. [Issue#165, p.96]

It does little to endear you to Tembo's later stages. [Issue#165, p.95]

At times, it can be too clunky and a little finicky, but while The Swindle is undoubtedly a great idea, games of this ilk can’t suffer missteps like infuriating controls – and sadly that does hold this game back.

Combat is surprisingly basic given that this is from the man behind the Ninja Gaiden games. [Issue#165, p.86]

Metanet once described N++ as being a game they hoped would be so refined and so complete that “there’s no need to make another one.” We’re inclined to agree.

It’s as much a part of the PlayStation legacy as Ico is, as Shadow Of The Colossus is. Its place in PlayStation legend goes beyond its similar presentation and taps into something more sublime, something more exhilarating.

Beyond Eyes isn’t going to take longer than a few hours for anyone to complete and the price doesn’t quite reflect the brevity of the experience.

Even with many of Rare’s most loved classics missing on account of licensing issues – GoldenEye 007, Donkey Kong Country to name a couple – Rare Replay is still an extraordinary exercise in value, and a fantastic celebration of one of gaming’s most accomplished and innovative developers.

Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture is a brave experiment, and one that’s paid off for The Chinese Room. If you’re a console-only gamer, it’ll be unlike anything you’ve ever played before – we say that with admiration.

Super Mario Maker takes one of the most beloved franchises in gaming history and gives it one of the most intuitive level editors ever seen, one flexible enough to allow for countless possibilities. It’s bursting with charm, contains some real laugh-out loud moments and is essential for any Mario fan.

It would be ludicrous to assume Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain will appeal to everyone, but it is absolutely the best game in the series – and one of the best games we’ve ever had the privilege of playing.

Winter isn't quite here yet. [Issue#164, p.100]

Different for everyone, yet still fantastic. [Issue#164, p.100]

Poor graphics and tedious gameplay. [Issue#164, p.93]

This game is a victory for the FMV, for mobile/PC games, and for the concept of interactive narrative as a whole.

Visually stunning, but a slog to play through. [Issue#164, p.90]

Impressive at times, but well-beaten by the competition. [Issue#164, p.89]

Enjoyable, but suffers from a lack of upgrades. [Issue#164, p.87]

The combat is well-structured. [Issue#164, p.86]

It’s a game with a huge amount of ambition, not to mention imagination, but a few unrefined core mechanics and tedious world can overshadow all of its fun.

Unfortunately, this ‘puzzle’ system doesn’t have as much depth as you’d want – especially during later levels, with things finishing before they’ve really gotten started. There’s a good idea here, presented in a way that is silly enough to be charming, but not dim-witted.

If you are willing to put a lot of time and effort in with The Nightmare Princess in order to unlock the more elaborate traps and levels, then you’ll find a game which will perfectly scratch that sadistic itch. Otherwise, the game’s shortcomings continue to botch a series we would otherwise love.

It should have been a cause for celebration that an EA Sports game review has forced us to abandon the well-worn ‘It’s like last year but slightly better!’ template, yet Rory McIlroy PGA Tour is like two years ago but significantly worse. Not nearly good enough, especially for a game whose slogan is ‘golf without limits’.

Very young and very undemanding fans of shōnen manga may get a fleeting kick out of J-Stars Victory VS+, but there’s too much cheaper (and superior) competition currently available across all platforms to warrant a half-hearted recommendation.

This sense of discovery is enhanced dramatically via a graph system, too, a means by which you are scored on the total number of blocks you’ve used, the footprint or size of the factory itself and the number of cycles you have to run through to create ten of your required object.

So another tremendously well-made blockbuster from the LEGO factory, once again proving that there is no room for second-rate movie tie-ins any more and that no-one understands how to get the most out of classic movie franchises like Traveller’s Tales. But like the dinosaurs, it’s only so much time before they’ll have to evolve.

If you’re looking for a new experience then there are few multiplayer games as well balanced and enthralling as Rocket League. This could well be a contender for one of the best games of the year.

Each takes some getting used to, but we recommend that you finish the Dante/Nero campaign before tackling the others in order to properly understand how the core combat was originally designed to operate. All are worth playing, giving this package more replay value than most of its peers.

If you’ve never played a God Of War game before, this is arguably the perfect place to start.

It’s a genuinely interesting story to try and wrap your head around, and a perfect game for the Vita, to boot.

A couple of lines of dialogue can often be all you’re given before being plunged into whatever mundane task is expected of you; rare are the significant characters and even rarer are the ones you care about. It just doesn’t maintain the same depth of exploration or profundity that the series is known for, leading to a much quicker-paced Elder Scrolls experience.

What we’re getting at is there’s not much space for classic simulation sadism here. It’s all happiness and accumulation, which is fine and pleasant, but not gripping.

Nobody is shooting for the moon here, just aiming to give the fans more of what they enjoyed. [Issue#163, p.110]

It becomes an overbearing checklist of simplistic social commentary. [Issue#163, p.109]

Cheesy titillation aside, this is very possibly Tamsoft's best game. [Issue#163, p.108]

Great game when it works like it should – but is that a disclaimer we should really tolerate?

It is without a point. It fires its Uzi rounds aimlessly and manages to hit nothing. It’s not bad, it’s not horrific, it’s not reprehensible and it’s not memorable either.

Sometimes, such fondly remembered franchises can be revived to stand alongside contemporary greats, simultaneously satisfying our younger selves and our more demanding modern expectations. Sadly, despite Stainless Games’ best efforts to recapture the wacky allure of the 1997 original, Carmageddon: Reincarnation is not one of those games.

It’s an acquired taste, and if its appeal lies solely with those of you yearning for a title that allows you to get behind the wheel of wondrously modelled tractors and farming machinery, then this is absolutely the game for you. For the rest of us, it will continue to remain a mystery.

It’s jarring mechanics are a little too unnecessarily complex, but those who often find themselves drawn to the subtle puzzles of similar strategy and simulation games will have plenty to chew on here.

The only thing we could criticise? Put in the hours, and you’ll quickly begin to understand how the level tiles work – think Carcassonne: you know what’s drawn from the bag, and how to counter each piece. That’s the only thing that dilutes it, if it bothers you, bump up the difficulty and it’ll feel like a new game.

What Woolly World instead offers is one of the most visually charming and inventive games you’ll see this generation: one that will put a smile on your face, if not sweat on your brow.

It offers all the right elements that the genre needs, but fails to utilise them in any particularly original, entertaining or - indeed - working state. [Issue#162, p.112]

For the money it's a very interesting take on the genre with a captivating style. [Issue#162, p.111]

A complete transformation of a genre. [Issue#162, p.110]

IT does offer a great time, as well as a chuckle now and again. [Issue#162, p.109]

The underlying controls are fun and fluid, but the lack of variety leaves the game - and therefore its player - wanting. [Issue#162, p.106]

Despite its clever purpose it's lacking in execution and duration. [Issue#162, p.105]

While it's still an essential part of any JRPG fan's collection, we recommend grabbing it on PS3/Vita instead. [Issue#162, p.104]

It provides a bit of fan fare and not much else. [Issue#162, p.103]

The action is fast and furious. [Issue#162, p.102]

Boasts little to enthral any but the most diehard of fans. [Issue#162, p.100]

As a standalone DLC add-on, though, it's a great use of the engine. [Issue#162, p.98]

That’s the real achievement here: that you can play it however you like. By removing any elements of linear progression, Slightly Mad has proven that players are smart enough to come up with their own direction through a game like this. Long may this approach to design reign.

Episode 3 ups the stakes and takes narrative risks that we rarely get to see: it expands the game’s universe not only forward, but outward… and the very last scene makes you question every single decision you’ve made so far, even down to the random photos you’ve taken around the Bay. We say that without a hint of hyperbole, without a hint of drama. Chaos theory in action, indeed.

The five maps are great now, but they’ll grate if you’re playing them over and over again for weeks on end while waiting for new content. What’s here is undoubtedly clever and thoroughly entertaining, but it’s also limited and given Nintendo’s history with new IPs, be prepared for the possibility that its online community may have dwindled by the time the promised DLC makes up the fuller package envisioned.

The game is a shambles aesthetically. The visuals are perpetually murky and washed-out, and there’s barely any sense of attentive design; dim corridors lead to dim rooms that lead to more dim corridors.

Wild Hunt is a masterpiece of open-world design in which it feels like every last detail has had the same level of care, thought and attention paid to by the team that created the game. It is fascinating to explore, consistently rewarding, always engaging and cements CD Projekt Red’s reputation as a studio to watch.

This is the best superhero fantasy we’ve ever enacted, and we’re so sad it’s over.

You'll have a few hours of fun but by the time its YouTuber-friendly novelty factor wears off you'll have decided it's far from the best thing since sliced bread. [Issue#161, p.104]

Best consumed with an uninterrupted hour of your time and a pair of headphones. [Issue#161, p.102]

By the time the main course is served most will have already left the track. [Issue#161, p.100]

Neverwinter might be competent, but it's rarely fun or interesting. [Issue#161, p.96]

What's truly disappointing is that there are seeds of greatness here. [Issue#161, p.94]

This was the episode that made us fall back in love with Telltale. [Issue#161, p.88]

Lack[s] that killer hook of the season's intro. [Issue#161, p.88]

It’s anticlimactic, but perhaps intentionally so. After all, it’s the journey that counts, and both Vella and Shay have come a long way from where they started. Double Fine has proven its honed and tested skills in this genre again, but we can’t help but feel that there was more it could do.

Its numerous annoyances prevent it from enjoying ‘must-have’ status but if Nintendo’s promised patch eliminates its most irritating one, it could be great rather than merely good like it is now.

Unwritten Tales 2 comes up unfavourably when compared to the classic games it tries to emulate, contemporary titles that have tried to do a similar thing, à la Broken Sword 5, and games that have tried to modernise the genre such as The Walking Dead. In that context, it would perhaps have been better if those ‘unwritten tales’ remained as such.

An enjoyable if obvious knock-off, then, and a refreshing new direction for a stagnant franchise, but hardly the kind of revolution that would worry the Templars.

The fun in Titan Souls is in finally overcoming what initially feel like an impossible battles. In that regard, it’s a celebration of gaming as it used to be in ‘the good old days’.

Ultimately Cities: Skylines has provided exactly what players wanted from SimCity 2013, and that ought to be all it takes to convince would-be city planners.

It admirably builds on that already impressive accomplishment, and makes for a solid entry in the series.

If you have a PS4, want to kill monsters and have fun while doing it, look no further. [Issue#160, p.109]

The problems of the original Shelter remain albeit in a bigger and more complex world. [Issue#160, p.108]

There's just nothing that's especially worth singing the praises of either. [Issue#160, p.106]

Controls feel a little unwieldy. [Issue#160, p.105]

Diversity in the playable cast doesn't equal diversity in gameplay, though. [Issue#160, p.104]