The frantic and occasional flawed action on the pitch harks back to older PES games. Fifa 12 is the more complete football experience but PES 2012 can still deliver in short hectic doses.

Strangely, for all the noise Savage Planet makes, its strongest moments are its quietest. There’s an element of silent theatre to the way your character communicates his goofy personality through his hands, while the world design is spotted with pleasing flourishes, such as trees bearing foliage that transforms into butterflies. In the end, it’s little touches like this, rather than the more in-your-face moments, that lend Savage Planet the dash of flavour it spends so much energy searching for.

Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games may not do either universe justice when it comes to their distinctive gameplay or graphic styles. However, the use of London landmarks and actual event venues makes for a colourful diversion with more than enough variety to keep the kids happy.

If only the game gave you more encouragement to improve.

Those previously unaware of Time Crisis will find the whole affair bafflingly cheesy, but devotees of the franchise will love Razing Storm as a package, although most will surely agree that it should have been billed as Deadstorm Pirates, with a free copy of Time Crisis: Razing Storm thrown in.

Keeper speaks clearest through its tremendous images, while billing itself as a “story told without words”. But the latter isn’t quite right. At various points, button prompts flash up on screen: for example, press X to “peck”. In spelling out exactly what the player should be doing, the world’s ambiguity is diminished.

This comfortable but clunky reboot of the part farming simulator, part dungeon crawler, part life sim is very much a product of its time.

Apartment Story is a film-length mediation on loneliness, repetition and adult life that is unlike anything else I’ve played. With a little more time and scope, a little more access to Arthur’s wider life, this could have been a cult classic rather than a cult curio. Yet when an indie debut manages to so effortlessly capture such a miserable mood – and for less than the price of a London pint – Apartment Story still feels like an easy recommendation.

But for gamers wanting a nicely sedate, yet increasingly fiddly and demanding challenge, Pilotwings Resort delivers in the same way as that introverted bass player – with modest, affable confidence.

A solid enough title – but it's certainly not a game for the casual console golfer.

Yes, it is indeed a proper, grown-up third-person shooter. But not, alas, a particularly good one.

I wanted to love this game. On paper it is outrageous. Strange Scaffold, the developer, is known for the weird – notably Clickholding, which is sinister, experimental and truly queries what a game is in its execution (there is a lot of clicking, and being watched in the action of clicking). Creepy Redneck Dinosaur Mansion 3 certainly is creepy, and set in a mansion, and does have dinosaurs and some really satisfying puzzles. It also has some great ideas and isn’t quite a failed experiment. While it doesn’t bend reality in the way that it seems to want to, it aims high, and if the player can manage the places where the aesthetic falls short, they’ll have a great time. They might even meet a nice, blond dinosaur they can take home with them.

It's a little cramped – occasionally you'll swipe past the option you wanted and need to make a series of jerking thumb moves to get back on track – but offers a breezy kind of customisation both for those with inspiration and plans they want to execute and those without, who just want to browse and tinker.

What Air Riders lacks in modes, it makes up for in charm. There are a heap of customisation options, allowing you to pimp your ride with unlockable stickers and alternative colour schemes – you can even hang a plushie from your machine like a Kirby-branded Labubu...This is a tightly focused game that reminds me of Nintendo’s fun-first NES-era game design – for better and for worse. It has a sprinkling of Sakurai magic and oodles of visual panache, but at full price it is – like Kirby – a little puffed-up.

Arcade Paradise comes across as a little confused, sometimes: if the premise of the game is that you’re running an arcade in your father’s laundromat in secret, for instance, then why is your dad the one paying you bonuses for those daily gaming challenges? It has the feel of a game that changed shape a few times over the course of its development. Nonetheless, it is more than a collection of average arcade game tributes. Intentionally or not, it captures something of the ennui of young adulthood and 90s Gen X disillusionment with menial work – and how video games have always been a colourful escape from the boredom of everyday life.

This horror game creates great atmosphere with its acting and visual design, but is regularly brought to its knees by uninspiring gameplay.

As it stands there's just too little on offer here to justify the cost for a full-priced, boxed retail release.

While the music and gameplay have evolved with the times, in terms of narrative, Scott Pilgrim EX plays it way too safe. Though written by series creator Bryan Lee O’Malley, there’s none of the edge that secured Scott Pilgrim its original cult following. Our cast have, for the most part, worked out their differences. There’s no David v Goliath here, no antagonist that forces Scott and his pals to grow amid the messiness of bad relationships. Scott’s other friends appear in fun cameos and cat-meos, but the story is a silly, shallow adventure that feels like a side quest, the kind of game Scott would stay up all night playing before missing his shift at work.

As it stands, while highly enjoyable, it’s strictly for fans. Hopefully they waited for both parts to be available: the decision to split it remains pig-headed and it undoubtedly works best as a coherent whole. Still, if you played and enjoyed part one, this is an admirable conclusion to a loveable series.

It's clear that, like Sam, Ubisoft has a plan. They want a Splinter Cell that builds on Conviction but is truer to the series' heritage – and with Blacklist they've achieved that, albeit imperfectly. If the next game can refine the formula and give it a proper plot, then just maybe Ubisoft can deliver a classic the next time Sam is the man with the plan.

And, yes, the handful of marquee moments spent running from or tussling with gargantuan creatures are spectacular. I will never turn my back on a pelican again as long as I live. Throughout, Reanimal drip-feeds clues to compelling mysteries surrounding the nature of its world and the children’s place within it. A shame, then, that it whiffs its apparent swing at recapturing the gut-punch of Little Nightmares II’s ending.

Much as our heroes are caught between two worlds, Fantasian has one foot in design dogma while the other paddles around cautiously in new ideas. The result is a lengthy and sumptuous genre piece, the equivalent of a good Netflix movie that you probably wouldn’t watch at the cinema. These days, that’s more of a compliment than it used to be.

Reigns Beyond works as a madcap space caper that you can dip into for 10 minutes at a time, and the wit and pace of the dialogue are impressive. But I did wonder why I was part of a band. Sometimes when you land on a planet you’ll play a gig, but these musical interludes are repetitive, unchallenging and inconsequential. It’s funny and surprisingly wide-ranging as a space-team comedy, but as a band buddy comedy it’s comparatively shallow. I also wonder whether the name isn’t holding it back at this point: Reigns made sense when it was a game about being a variably competent monarch, but it doesn’t scream comedy sci-fi, and I think it will end up passing a lot of people by as a result – a minor tragedy, as you won’t find anything else like these few hours of spacefaring silliness for under a fiver.

The intrigues that play out between its often bizarre but always interesting characters and factions, and underwater sequences that see Reed in a 1920s diving suit, are highly absorbing. Its narrative puts the boot into religious cults, and Lovecraft would surely not have approved of its ruminations on racism. It also tackles Depression-era deprivation, which is pretty apposite in today’s world. The Sinking City is original, commendably thought-provoking and deliciously gothic, but aspects of it feel either half-finished or ill thought-out. Had it pruned just a little of its ambition, it could have had more than cult appeal.

With rewards for completing each stage within a set number of moves, there are incentives for perfecting your approach too. But the game’s tutorials linger well into the game’s 40-hour runtime, and combined with a bland storyline, basic environments and a persistently low challenge, it’s a game that will only appeal to the series’ most committed followers.

The innovation of players running around after their shots is fun but you may find yourself longing for a leisurely stroll over the course.

Really, it’s the kind of game that’s best enjoyed when you don’t think about it very hard. It’ll make 12-15 hours disappear in an ever-escalating sequence of rooftop-spanning leaps of faith, easily conquered shootouts and cartoonish face-offs against supervillains and giant robots. It’s as moreish as popcorn, and exactly as substantial.

Whether your guests’ stay is pleasant or not rarely makes a difference, so the management elements feel like stepping stones to the story Bear and Breakfast actually wants to tell. Hank is a sweet Bear and his friends are memorable enough, but in its storytelling the game seems to introduce and abandon characters for long periods of time. It is a simulation that requires patience in a genre that usually gives players loads to do – it’s a management game that’s obsessed with managing its players, rather than letting them exercise control.