The Adventures of Elliot: The Millennium Tales is an interesting experiment for Team Asano, proving that the developers can also explore new ideas and genre formats beyond turn-based experiences. The unique systems give players depth to explore in an adventure that opts to be simple on the narrative side. In the end, Elliot’s journey is worth digging deep into, spending time to truly engage with the elements the developers set for it.

Increasing the technical efficacy for UFC 6 was the next progression for the franchise as it utilizes the tools that EA has been implementing in recent times. Fight Week will keep players engaged along with The Gym, but this feels more geared towards the hardcore UFC fan. There's a lot here for newcomers to start with, but the accessibility features can at least get them engaged initially. The Legacy narrative prologue to Career Mode is narrow, and most of the time in the mode, ends up involving sparring to try to increase traits and fitness prior to a fight. There's much more here that can be added. The game looks and sounds great and the combat remains core. Flow State is a welcome addition, however, if going towards being a fighting game. The menu performance is abysmal and hopefully can be improved as it detracts from doing certain things. The Hall of Legends is a wonderful experience that needs to be implemented into other sports games. Everyone loves a good documentary. UFC 6 improves on the UFC experience over its predecessor and boasts everything that the fanbase could ask for.

NBA THE RUN accomplishes Play by Play Studios' goal of providing NBA Street to modern gamers. This is accomplished by setting the game up as a battle royale while keeping the gameplay completely similar to its predecessors. Taking this style of game online with real NBA players may actually bring players over from 2K who are looking for something different. What really helps is that it's only $30, and while most battle royales are free, every cosmetic is paywalled. Nothing is paywalled here, but it does require time investment. That time will go by quickly, though. The game plays and looks great, but just has a few quirks that could use some adjustment, such as game speed and dunk distance. While more content will come, much like a battle royale starting out, there's really only one thing to do. If 2K is too much for you and you just want to play some basketball, this is it.

Crushed in Time is a clever adventure game that manages to provide a compelling meta narrative and use it well. The vibrant world of Holmes and Watson is constantly changing around in a way that pays homage to game development itself as well as the genre’s different possibilities without breaking from its physics-inspired “point-and-pinch” format. While the narrative loses itself in a poorly handled drama in the end and the hint system feels lacking at specific moments, the full result is an impressive experience worth exploring.

If you're a fan of F1 and stick with it through and through, then the 2026 Edition DLC is a must for only $30. There's a solid amount of extras that come with this, and it's not just simply getting the cars to use in time trials or custom race. You can actually engage with My Team and Career with this DLC. As long as you manually engage these changes on the car, you'll be satisfied with your purchase unless you only care about a roster update and the MADRING. Setting the deployments to automatic would be selling yourself short of the experience and actually understanding the way the drivers race in 2026. Mimicking the driving experience each season for these drivers is what Codemasters and EA have always done best. This may change your mind on the actual regulation changes.

While more enemy variety and better playspaces for stealth would have been nice, what's given works well enough, especially when paired with all the characters. Finally, the game is wrapped in a beautiful presentation that serves as a love letter to Batman. LEGO Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight does Batman proud and is a rare case where the Dark Knight deserves to step out of the shadows.

007 First Light is a fantastic action game that’s not without its share of faults. It has epic, high-octane action sequences, the gunplay is some of the best in the genre, and the hand-to-hand combat and stealth mechanics are fluid. With that said, the puzzle-solving sections of the story do feel either basic or overly linear and having characters tag along sometimes ruins the fun. That’s on top of Bond’s younger character being less likable. Despite our complaints, 007 First Light remains a massive accomplishment and one of the best 007 games to be released, featuring a solid cast of characters and highly engaging scenarios.

Mina the Hollower is an incredible action adventure game that manages to offer a lot to explore and significant depth in its combat and exploration mechanics. Every single time you try to see just a little more, and you can open up many new possibilities with new items and game-changing features. The end result is a fantastically crafted experience that should be on the top of the lists of new indie titles to give a try in 2026.

Yoshi and the Mysterious Book is a charming adventure that’s unfortunately weighed down by its disjointed mechanics. Each level feels unique thanks to the drastically different play styles of each creature encountered, but they're mostly limited to their singular, short stage. Not only that, but some of the better creatures get far less time in the sun to truly appreciate them while others linger for far too long. With that said, there's some fun to be had as there are levels that do a good job of creating unique situations for Yoshi to solve. Even though most of the experience is straightforward, it’s the thoughtful encounters that require puzzle solving. At the end of the day, there’s a certain whimsy to Yoshi and the Mysterious Book, but it fails to truly be anything remarkable.

Schrödinger’s Call is an impressive adventure game that offers an emotional dive into various tragedies, using empathy as a guiding force. Just as Mary works her way through people’s stories trying to find hope along with the truth, this is an experience that can resonate with people beyond the screen. It’s one of those games that is so fascinating to see in motion because it has something to say and a strong vision of how to present it in terms of atmosphere and style.

Despite this, from a gameplay perspective, Luna Abyss is a gorgeous, excellently paced FPS that mixes up the platforming and shooting in a way that makes it easy to keep on playing without feeling like either is getting repetitious. The story does come together eventually but by the time that happens, it's easy to have written it off, despite a few fun side-characters hanging around the abyss. The setting picks up the slack for the plot, though, and the levels are designed to make full use of every single one of Fawkes' abilities. Luna Abyss is a gorgeously atmospheric FPS that expertly mixes in its platforming elements, creating a dark and moody adventure where the response to each challenge is to look forward to what the next area has to offer as soon as its beaten.

While a bit short and unpolished, I did enjoy my time with Bubsy 4D, going back to pick up every collectible in the game and even doing half the time trials, which aren't normally my thing. Once you know Bubsy's move-set, it's easy to want to put them through their paces, and after cleaning out the levels it feels nice to tear through them at top speed. It also helps that if you've only got a few yarn balls left, once you pick them up you can just quit the level rather than have to commit to completing the whole thing, making the scavenger hunt feel much more approachable. A few months more polish and a little extra content would have helped Bubsy 4D properly reintroduce the bobcat as a prime platforming mascot, but even so it's a solid adventure for a character that nobody's really quite sure why they're happy to see return.

Birushana: Winds of Fate is an interesting follow-up to the original story, adding a healthy dose of romance, comedy and drama to bring more endearing moments with the characters. As the game only does a quick recap of events, it’s hard to recommend for those who haven’t actually played through the original. Players coming back for more, however, will find it offers legitimate reasons to dive again into this world of samurai conflict.

Zero Parades: For Dead Spies is a great RPG experience that manages to explore the espionage angle in an interesting way in its narrative and gameplay systems. The world manages to provide a fascinating context of decay, political intrigue and despair. While it may be a little complicated as a starting point in the genre, it’s a must-play for those looking to dig deeper into what the genre can offer.

Whirlight: No Time to Trip is point-and-click that oozes passion and charm in its world, characters, narrative and gameplay. Its main issue is that it falls for the biggest and most common trapping of its genre: the ingenuity of its interactions come at the cost of some solutions being less intuitive than would be ideal. The result is a game that can be just as frustrating as it is whimsical.

Starbites is a good turn-based RPG that offers a straightforward journey through a futuristic world. Its battle systems are not groundbreaking, but offer malleable build options that make it fun to play with and master. Built upon solid fundamentals, the game thrives in what it sets out to accomplish and offers a good time for fans of the genre.

Forza Horizon 6 is magnificent. It’s everything we could have hoped for, finally bringing the open world racing experience of Forza Horizon to the Asian setting.

Nitro Gen Omega is a game that still feels a little rough in its 1.0 release, not being as approachable in its multitude of systems as it could have been. It’s not a bad game per se, but one that demands effort to understand and pull through. Nonetheless, its battle systems and animations shine through to the point it can be worth giving it a try for fans of unique RPGs and simulators.

Call of the Elder Gods is a fantastic Lovecraftian adventure with a unique setting, compelling story and mostly intuitive puzzles, except for one that feels like it makes no sense. Thanks to the Request Hint menu, even players who aren’t very familiar or have a hard time with the genre will be able to advance through the game, but finding solutions by yourself is a fascinating experience. While anyone may enjoy the game, it’s especially recommended for those who have already played Call of the Sea for a further dive into the universe’s lore.

Mixtape is an impressive take on what it feels to be a music-obsessed young person trying to come to terms with growing up and moving away from something they took for granted for years. The bittersweet feeling of having regrets and “big hits” stays as a lingering to a life that will never come back. It’s an emotionally powerful adventure in a way that's definitely worth giving a try.

MotoGP 26 is the technical racing king in the current market space. The amount of details that have gone into the physics model cannot be overlooked, but it has gone back to having a steep learning curve to get good. The AI is inconsistent, which actually makes it feel brutal because you will feel like you're making ground. You can turn off Dynamic AI as this may be the culprit as it pushes the difficulty to the extreme every other lap. The Arcade Mode is back for those looking for something not as challenging. The updates to Career Mode are more than just subtle changes. These are solid enough to modify the experience, including the new Rider Ratings. The introduction of Production Bikes is a nice addition to go along with the already established other Rideoff bikes to try. There remains a lot to be played in MotoGP 26, it is just going to take some dedication to get good.

After a period of expansions that were often average at best, World of Warcraft: Midnight delivers what now feels like a consistent quality following The War Within. It's not perfect, but it's a solid expansion that continues to show that World of Warcraft is heading in the right direction and understands what its current playerbase wants to see. World of Warcraft is in a good spot, and that's only being improved with the addition of features like Prey that keep players wanting to log on regularly, even if they don't have the time available. It's now accessible for players who want a more intense experience, as well as those who play casually, and that shift is what WoW needed.

Moomintroll: Winter's Warmth is an interesting way to dive into the world of Moomin, offering a simple but fairly competent adventure that doubles down as something akin to a coming of age story. Unfortunately, what could have been a fantastic adventure is dragged down slightly by the way quests are presented as repetitive chores. Nonetheless, it’s still a curious adventure, especially for fans of the original universe or those curious about its rendition of a world reminiscent of a fairy tail.

Shapez 2 is an automation game with just about all the rough edges sanded off, built to make creating what look like incredibly complicated layouts as simple as possible. It may take a little effort to sort out the best way to, for example, create a platform that maximizes stacking two items, completely handling two sets of four belts with no backing up, but then you save it as a blueprint and the tangle of conveyors and stackers is now another tool in the menu that can be laid down with a mouse click. White paint needs three different paints mixed together, two at a time, but create a single paint-mixing platform handling two fluids running at top speed, copy it to let the output of the first combine with the third color, then copy both platforms together and stack them three high, save as blueprint, and done! Handy as that is, though, the randomness of the shape deposits means you'll probably need to poke around hand-crafting solutions every bit as often as relying on your blueprints, and there's always a new challenge that requires retooling what you know. And then building bigger, as the little factory clustered around the entrance to the void grows to meet its ever-escalating needs.

Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream is an enjoyable simulator of managing society from the advantage of an overlord who can play with the characters as if they were dolls, but never fully control the unhinged nature of human interaction. The dialogue and events are full of silly whims and this funny mood gives form to its comfortable experience. It’s important to keep in mind, however, that much of what it offers depends on how much the player dedicates to it and the repetition may boggle it down.

Opus: Prism Peak is an impressive adventure game that manages to provide an emotional experience that feels deeply relatable and well-executed. Its beautiful art style is accompanied by an involved gameplay with photography mechanics and a world that grows if the player decides to explore it as much as possible. It’s an inspired testament to the powerful experiences the genre has to offer and one of 2026’s must-play games.

After over a decade, Ys Memoire: Revelations in Celceta proves itself just as good as it once was under the moniker of Memories of Celceta. Its only major caveat is that it really doesn’t bring much to the table as a new edition. On the other hand, for anyone who hasn’t given it a try, it’s pretty much a must-play.

Life is Strange: Reunion manages to succeed despite being given the near-impossible task of closing up a branching story told across several development teams. The plot can be a bit convoluted with the different timelines and mergers, but at its core, Reunion delivers a compelling story across the board, and it's hard to ask for much more of a narrative-centric game. Longtime fans will find an enjoyable experience, while lapsed fans or newcomers can be caught up to speed quickly.