Minecraft: Story Mode strays from the more mature content that Telltale normally associates themselves with and manages to create a fun, family-friendly world for one with no real story.

It doesn’t reach the level of greatness of say Chrono Trigger or Persona 4, but there is enough going for it where it is worthwhile experience for fans of the genre.

NHL 24 does do some things that make changes to gameplay in a positive way. The checking is improved and going with the Total Control scheme allows for some more simplistic gameplay while netting advanced results. The Exhaust Engine is a nice addition that’s really only achievable to its maximum during power plays as it’s difficult to keep the puck in the offensive zone for two minutes straight, especially with this A.I. being so aggressive and overkill, once again. HUT Moments are the shining mode addition this year, but these classic moments to relive are locked behind HUT thus requiring an internet connection. Otherwise, outside of cross-play for that and CHEL, the rest of the game is mostly untouched and once again feels familiar.

While not the most robust of the PlayLink games, Knowledge is Power is still a fun, playable game show that family and friends will easily be able to pick up and play. Games are short, which means that it’s not something you have to dedicate a night to, but also sets you up for rematches galore. The questions are interesting and niche, which makes them harder while at the same time making you feel like you know the answer. The way they’ve implemented the Power Plays is a nice touch, allowing you to slow your opponents down in a game that’s all about speed. So if you’ve been liking the games that Sony has been offering with their new PlayLink initiative, Knowledge is Power is another one to pick up.

Miitopia on Switch is a fantastic conversion from the 3DS and does an admirable job at enhancing the experience. The jump up in graphics is welcome, but the biggest improvement to the experience as a whole lies in its Mii integration. Having so much customization for the cast thanks to a robust online selection of fan creations allows the story to be goofier and funnier than it could be on its own, and the various absurd situations the cast is placed in help provide a lot of comedy. It’s basic as an RPG, but the execution of the basic combat system is good and it features modern quality-of-life improvements like auto-battle and fast-forward to keep the pacing high. If you’ve been craving a silly, fun RPG that isn’t too difficult and offers a lot of variety, Miitopia is a must-buy.

Dragon Quest III: The Seeds of Salvation shows its age even with the modernization but it also holds up very well. The game mechanics and story progression are echoes of a forgotten past which will invoke nostalgia in older gamers but may just seem archaic to the younger crowd. This one holds up the best out of the three Switch titles. The first two games are mainly worth playing for historical interest or nostalgia but this one should be played by any JRPG fan for its own merits. While this title does a nice job of concluding the Erdrick trilogy, it’s a great title in its own right and still enjoyable over thirty years after its release. It would be great if the subsequent Zenithian trilogy found its way onto Switch.

Viola is a fantastic coming-of-age tale that manages to successfully mix satisfying platforming with rewarding turn-based RPG mechanics. The cast of playable characters is a blast to play as and more importantly, to learn about. They play off of one another nicely and despite the game not having voice work, there’s a sense of chemistry and a bond forming between them as their time together grows. The game does have rough edges when it comes to polish, but it does play like a dream with a controller once you get the hang of its somewhat-quirky jumping mechanics. It’s a great-looking and sounding game and one that should please anyone looking for more action in a turn-based RPG framework.

In a nutshell, it does a great job of improving and respecting many elements of the source material, but adds too much filler content. Actraiser Renaissance is far from perfect, but it’s a must play for fans of the SNES original.

Taking a year off truly helped the core experience of Monster Energy Supercross 25, but at the sacrifice of cut content. The change to the Unreal Engine 5 provides a different experience than in the past. The updated riding physics makes the game both more accessible and more difficult. Tight cornering and fighting for grip is the biggest hurdle. The Neural AI in the fantastic Career Mode is great, something that other racing series could use. The removal of the Compound hurts, but the Rhythm Section mode helps to make up for that loss. Mainly, fans of the series looking for a current Supercross experience finally get it in 2025, as the game is finally set in the year it releases.

Deadly Premonition: Director’s Cut won’t win any awards for its visuals or mechanics, but the player will be completely immersed within a world just brimming with life thanks to the intriguing storyline and highly likeable cast of characters.

The Enigma offers plenty of teases for the season ahead while also improving upon the combat and presentation for Telltale’s take on the powerless superhero. Those mere hints are all that separate this episode from feeling like a standalone story, though, albeit an intriguing one at that. Once the full season comes into play, this debut episode may feel a little less out of place, but for now, The Enigma represents a strong start for Bruce Wayne’s latest struggle to keep his city, and his relationships, intact.

The gameplay itself is complex and enjoyable, but the lack of consistency in the controls will drive more hardcore players nuts. Still, it’s almost worth buying for the gorgeous art and animation alone, and I can’t deny that it put a smile on my face.

In the end, Crackdown 2 is a fun game, especially when played with friends but, unfortunately, it just doesn't deliver quite a deep experience.

Maybe there's a great game beyond level 8. Maybe it turns into peaches and honey. Maybe a magical unicorn bursts from the screen. Who knows? After playing a single level beyond any possibility of ever getting any enjoyment from it again, I turned the game off and walked away. Gameplay masochism only stays enjoyable so long before a feeling best described as "screw this!" sets in, and Fractured Soul blew past that point and never looked back.

Clockwork Aquario is a fantastic action-platformer that blends quick-moving playable characters and enemies alongside an inventive attack strategy. There’s nothing else like it on the market today — despite so many games trying to replicate arcade-style fun. The big key here is that this is a legit arcade game that has been repurposed for modern hardware and that allows it to retain what made arcade gaming so fun, while having more modern quality-of-life improvements thrown in. It plays wonderfully, looks gorgeous and is a blast in multiplayer. The soundtrack is a lot of fun, but doesn’t reach the heights of classics in the genre. Still, for anyone seeking a fast-paced side-scrolling game, there’s a ton of variety offered up here and a lot of fun to be had with Clockwork Aquario.

Fans of the original Layers of Fear or any psychological horror game will truly enjoy Layers of Fear 2. The core and elements of the original remain intact and the cruise ship setting is an improvement over the original. The visuals and art direction will blow your mind as the cruise ship truly comes together when adding in the audio and horror element. The story takes a while to develop and it may not even be understood in the end depending on what ending the player gets based on the choices made in the game. Sure, the game is only ten hours, but it’s designed for multiple playthroughs. Besides that and some technical issues, Layers of Fear 2 is another horror masterpiece and improves on what the original accomplished.

While it may leave you wanting more in certain areas, Crossing Souls is still an excellent action game with a terrific, gripping story you’ll want to see to the very end. This little chunk of the 1980s is filled with terrific, nicely-detailed visuals, fun character-switching gameplay, and a unique vision of the afterlife with several impressive touches.

Last Stop may succeed when it comes to delivering a (mostly) engrossing set of stories, but it suffers from a notable lack of substance when it comes to gameplay, with several moments of interactivity feeling like they were included solely only to draw things out. It can still be a fun ride with a lot of enjoyable twists and turns, and could be recommended for fans of narrative-focused games, but it could have benefited from more depth. Last Stop is a good, straight shot of a subway ride that gets you to your destination, but don’t expect much beyond that.

It’s decent survival horror, but Silent Hill fans will be disappointed.

LEGO Horizon Adventures is a fun, albeit brief, romp through the world of Horizon. Its story, humor, world and gameplay may not fully match up to its source material, or reach the same heights as the best Traveller’s Tales LEGO games, but Guerrilla Games and Studio Gobo have built a strong foundation for a new style of LEGO game.

Randall’s story is easy to relate to being as he is just regular person trying to find his loved ones in a world gone to hell and the gameplay is just as easy to get sucked into.

With some fine-tuning and a more effective blending of old mechanics and newfangled, newcomer-friendly ones, Gust may have a top-notch JRPG hit on their hands next time — but only next time, because this time they’ve missed the mark ever so slightly, despite their intentions being in the right place.

Even with the annoyance of the narrator being so utterly clueless, there’s no question that Maquette is effective at illustrating the pain of a good relationship gone bad. The integration of puzzles and story never gel as it should, with only the setting feeling like it was at all related to the narrated events, but even so the pace of each was strong enough that it never feels like things lag — solve puzzle, get story. Usually just a few lines at a time, hovering over a wall or other piece of environment, but it still felt like a nice way to mark progress as one solution flowed into another. Without the story Maquette would still be a nicely-intriguing puzzler, and the scaling of the environments made for truly enjoyable moments when what seemed like a small irrelevant detail on a prop turned into the solution to a whole area. At this point it should be clear that I’ve got mixed feelings on Maquette, but there’s no question that I’m glad to have played it and won’t be forgetting the game any time soon.

Cruis’n Blast is the most thrilling racing experience on Switch and the best arcade racer in years. It plays like a dream and offers up more control options than most arcade racers on the console. Its diverse lineup of vehicles, tracks and various track-related setpieces are tremendous and keep the player engaged from beginning to end. Other than the lack of online multiplayer, it’s hard to find something missing from the overall presentation given what the game is trying to be. The sound design is fantastic as well — with a fun soundtrack that’s breezy and easy on the ears.

With an original story, sprawling environments, excellent use of the Vita's touch capabilities and tons of bonuses to find, it's sure to be a premiere game of the console for long to come. If the graphics were more refined and the story less disjointed, it would certainly rival the best the series has to offer.

With better controls, it would be an incredibly solid WiiWare title, but as it stands it’s simply a good puzzle game that will keep you entertained for a little while.

Resident Evil Revelations was a step in the right direction five years ago, but has since worn out its welcome. The game is enjoyable and features a undeniably spooky atmosphere, but at the end of the day, it's a five year old 3DS game on its third life.

The biggest hurdle to enjoying the game is simply your tastes for (or tolerance of) copious displays of fanservice. As long as you can handle that then you’re in for a very mechanically sound dungeon crawler with Demon Gaze.