Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China is a wonderful setting for a competent, but fairly unimaginative, 2.5D stealth title. Hopefully this won’t be Shao Jun’s final appearance.

Not a komplete katastrophe, but you should employ kaution when deciding if Mortal Kombat X is right for you on PC. It's a great game, but one that's krippled by bugs.

An episode where plenty goes on, but neither story nor characters are actually advanced a great deal. The Ironrath Forresters are still miserable hostages, Asher still needs an army, and Gared is still doing Nights Watch duties. A few revelations, plus Mira’s dynamism, keep things from going stale.

Book One is a tiny taste of what's coming. It's delectably delicious and I'd love to rate it higher, but at this point, it's hard to say whether Dreamfall Chapters will be filling and satisfying - or if it'll leave us feeling a little empty.

The main plot starts moving into gear, and with it come puzzles, decisions, and a bit too much time-wasting... but not enough to detract much from the wonderful core experience.

Assassin's Creed: Rogue is Black Flag with worse writing and (broadly) improved missions. Does very little to alter the formula, but is about as mechanically sound as Assassin's Creed gets and runs well on PC.

Less an endless voyage through the stars, and more a space-bus journey to the shops. If you're intimidated by Civilization this is an reasonable starting place for the 4X genre, but it's not for those seeking a deep or lengthy experience.

Hotline Miami 2 is certainly worth a purchase from anybody who played the original over and over, but don't expect it to hit the same heights.

The shimmer of Central and South American gold may catch the eye for a spell, but the real substance of this DLC lies in the custom nation designer. A capable tool for all your bizarre alt-history fantasies.

In sporadic bursts, Evolve can be outstanding. But its design depends upon uniting players of idealistically equivalent skill levels, and it struggles to consistently do so. The game’s gated progression system is superfluous and, at times, actively harmful to positive team-play.

Episode two of Telltale’s Game of Thrones concerns itself with maneuvering pieces into position and foreshadowing greater conflict. It’s a robust foundational episode, shoring up Forrester character development for future pay-offs (and inevitable tragedy.)

A solid opening to what could be a genuinely interesting episodic adventure. The mystery seems compelling, the characters are largely likeable, and the presentation is impeccable - but the emphasis is on "could" and "seems". It's still just episode one.

The unofficial NYPD Blue adventure game that Telltale never made. Aside from some pretty clear budgetary constraints, The Detail’s hard edged cop narrative has a compelling opening.

A "launch" build with some features still in infancy, Elite: Dangerous nonetheless offers terrific space flight ambiance and trading progression befitting of the once-revolutionary series. In a few months time, this title could be outstanding.

Rubbish controls, dull combat, and a general sense that it's not quite sure what it wants to be, let down an otherwise entertaining and regularly amusing world-saving romp.

Putting a solid score on a game whose overriding ideology is a rejection of certainty is an act of high absurdity. But it’s also somewhat appropriate for The Old City: Leviathan’s other persistent theme of reconciling incompatible truths.

Gentle RPG systems collide with robust pinball design, triggering a modest gaming jackpot.

Relic’s attempt to create a more dynamic single player campaign is partially successful, but the systems of company permanence don’t entirely gel with the inflexibility of an Iron Man save system, and the map is light on grand strategy.

An entertaining comedy adventure, but too many of the puzzles in Randal's Monday are too far from even its own internal comic logic to really make sense. It's a fun ride, but it's also liable to frustrate if you refuse to use any outside help to solve this time-travelling puzzler.

Advanced Warfare might not be advanced enough for my liking, but it's a return to the typical fast-paced, explosive gameplay of CoD titles that aren't called Ghosts – and it works alright on PC, too.

Lords of the Fallen isn’t going to triumph in a direct match-up with Dark Souls, but seeing the Souls combat system and level design transplanted with this degree of success into a shorter, more accessible game is really no bad thing.

Ryse is a little better than its reputation as a tech demo in search of a game. But not much beyond a mediocre combat system in want of something more than its predictable, opulent story.

Styx is an honest attempt at a traditional stealth title that, like its protagonist, all too often grasps for the ledge and falls short.

A highly polished and generally entertaining romp, but it's missing a vital spark to bring everything together.

FIFA 15 still plays decent football, but with the same (increasingly inexcusable) bugs and instabilities of the past few seasons.

Fun enough in its own right, but lacking in a number of ways when compared to its predecessor. There isn't much in the way of new stuff for Naruto fans to squee over, and as this is a game based around making Naruto fans go "squee", that's a bit of an issue.

Golden Realms provides plenty of hours of entertainment, but feature-wise there’s still some room to be filled in this Halfling’s stomach.

A sound concept that will attract some space strategy fans but currently lacks long term appeal.

Superb faction design and twists on 4x genre conventions, combined with rather passive AI (even at higher difficulties,) mean Endless Legend is a strategy title that falls frustratingly short of being sublime.

The Sims 4 is just like a dollhouse: it's pretty and polished and there are all sorts of possibilities, but in the end, it's really quite empty.

Dead Rising 3's world is grey and bland, yes, but those aren't words that can be used to describe the frenetic zombie-culling action which forms the game's core.

Hatoful Boyfriend’s goofy pigeon dating antics belie a smart, on-tone parody with a moment or two of sincerity.

A decent pool model that tends towards natural-style simulation, let down by several minor annoyances and one crippling problem. It’s a multiplayer-leaning title, and Pure Pool’s PC server troubles mean any online play is currently a non-starter.

Season Two's early promise has consolidated into sporadic flashes of greatness, but the consistent excellence of Clementine's character alone isn't enough to carry the series. It needs the lift of an outstanding final episode.

Gods Will Be Watching is an interesting and novel little game, but one that's quite horribly flawed in a number of ways.

Unrest is a short narrative full of ethical dilemmas, presented through the eyes of an unusually diverse cast of RPG characters. Those choices have an isolated impact, but don’t expect them to alter the story to a radical degree.

Unlikely to live in infamy. Quest for Infamy is a reasonable attempt at making a Quest for Glory game, but it's let down by dull combat and puzzle design.

Friendlier F1 handling in a Grid 2 wrapper, Grid Autosport is a tour through the Codemasters back catalogue. Single player is hampered by predictable AI, but tuning options and improved cornering elevates the multiplayer above Grid 2's.

A change of focus from civilian to military engagement places a greater emphasis on firearms and offers neat thematic alternatives to scavenging resources. But Lifeline’s familiar urgency is restricted to Danforth’s rather mundane outskirts.

This particular episode is more a shaggy dog story rather than something that goes for the throat, but it's building up promisingly towards the season climax.

Watch Dogs is decent, but as the first entry into the series it’s still trying to find its niche and its style, and as a result it’s a little bland and all too repetitive. It successfully apes a lot of other games without ever really finding a way to stand out on its own, and the hacking isn’t really enough to push it past “me too” status.

A solid and surprising well-written shooter that should easily please fans of the genre. It doesn't do too much more than that, but that's not really a complaint.

Van Helsing 2 is a near-complete title that NeoCore are clearly racing to finish in time for release day. It’ll end up a better game than the first, but will almost certainly retain some deadline-crunch bugs until a couple of patches are out of the way.

Tex Murphy is back, and that's exactly as good – and as bad – as it sounds.

Digital happiness push all the right buttons with a game that will make you think and possibly even be a little scared.

An episode of grim, despicable moments and further fascinating tests of Clementine’s morality, but one which persists with some of the weaker aspects of this second season.

A solid RPG experience offering everything you'd expect - but not enough surprises. Many enjoyable features but feels like playing part one of a two parter.

Child of Light perhaps doesn't shine as bright as it might, but it's nonetheless quite a dazzling sight.

All is not perfect in the future, but Trials Fusion is another worthy entry in the series’ bizarre bike-bouncing world.

Latency and optimisation issues hamper what is otherwise a weighty multiplayer melee title. War of the Vikings could do with more modes of play, but the ones already here reward the skillful combatant.

Not without its flaws, but very few of those flaws matter too much: Moebius is, on the whole, a well-written and interesting investigation.

A precise, highly challenging parkour platformer with a heavy emphasis on replaying stages and somewhat unfortunate fascination with projectiles.

Often frustrating and sometimes unfair, but the glorious flight mechanics, general compelling gameplay, and attention to detail mean Luftrausers is easily worth considering.

For a game packed with cold, mechanised artillery, this FPS-Roguelike mash-up has a surprising amount of warmth and humanity. Scale the Tower of Guns and you’ll find some pick-up-and-replay charm.

Clementine’s characterisation and her interactions with adults are strong as ever in this fraught episode. Two-fifths of the way through the story is still too early to judge how other themes, characters and plot strands will pay off, but the build-up suggests it’ll be worthwhile.

Enjoyable, authentic, and oh-so-cool... when it doesn't break.

A solid city builder that will appeal to most fans of the genre even if it's currently lacking in features and scope.

A solid fast fun shooter that could blossom over time and it's free so it's definitely worth taking it for a spin and experimenting with the weapons.

Conquest of Paradise adds colonial and indigenous mechanics which undoubtedly improve the main game, but does it in a way that introduces a new problem or two.

A bit buggy and a bit uninventive, but a loving, enjoyable tribute to RPGs of olde.

KickBeat isn't going to revolutionise the rhythm-action genre, but it nonetheless provides another perfectly solid, perfectly enjoyable opportunity to get into the flow of your music and have some rhythmic fun.

By stretching the years to 24 turns, adding seasonal weather and (all but) removing sea battles and internal politics, Caesar in Gaul proves to be an effective, though not exactly revolutionary, expansion to Rome 2.

A self-contained tale about the human catastrophe of slavery is an abrupt turn from the original’s happy-go-lucky plundering style, but the game’s mechanics adapt relatively well.

World of Warplanes needs fleshing out. In time it could be what arcade flight buffs are after but at the moment it's lacking.

It’s far too early to crown this season as a successful follow-up to Telltale’s first foray with The Walking Dead, but there are enough threads of character intrigue to suggest that Clementine and her new crew have a promising (that is to say, heartbreaking and terrible) future.

It’s not a must-have purchase, but if you’ve dreamt of a Crusader Kings II scenario in which a devil-possessed ruler might have a chance to pick their own Pope, then this is the DLC for you.

I hope that, when episode two launches, I'll be bemoaning my own idiocy and falling over myself to award the complete game a much higher score. For now, though, I'm playing it safe: until I know how the whole thing plays out, my recommendation is guarded.

What the people want doesn’t always have to be a revolution. State of Decay: Breakdown is a full sandbox mode for the main game, carefully designed to incorporate the original's strengths in scavenging and player-created character arcs.

More stuff crammed into cities that are too small still makes the game frustrating despite Maxis' best effort. Only pick this up if you're a fanatic.

State of Decay holds together like a rusty, duct-taped piece of DIY weaponry, but offers an unusual, open-world survival exercise that few other zombie titles can match.

Like its name implies, Contrast is a game with a sharp difference between its highs and lows. There's a lot to like here, but it doesn't make it all that easy to do so.

A criminally short opening chapter that nonetheless offers a glimpse of Rapture at its opulent heights. The noir intentions are dispensed too soon, so the Booker/Elizabeth relationship and familiar combat have to see Burial at Sea through to its disturbing, perplexing climax.

The locations and themes in Deadfall Adventures are its stars, but neither the combat nor the puzzles really stand out and the pulp tone goes missing whenever most of the cast speak. A forgettable, Boy’s Own jaunt through well-thumbed pages of adventure fiction.

An acceptable game for the fans, though not a particularly good port in any way, shape, or form. If you have a 360 controller and love the series then you'll have a fairly good time, but you might want to consider waiting for a price drop.

The Football Manager formula is as complex and addictive as ever, but a compulsion to keep playing shouldn’t be mistaken for revelatory advances. 2014 is a marginal improvement for the series, but retains several of its shortcomings.

Another day, another PC launch riddled with bugs and issues. Battlefield 4 is a perfectly decent game with a crashing client, crashing servers, and a whole host of issues that cause lag, disconnections, graphic and sound glitches, and plenty more. When they get fixed it's easily worth a purchase; right now, it's a frustrating experience.

Uninventive, but still enjoyable thanks to the quality of the basic mechanics on offer. Unfortunately, the PC version's bugs make it a much harder sell than it should be.

A turn-based, space trading and combat title which benefits from its open-ended nature and undemanding PC requirements. Aspects of the dynamic universe are too detached, and the combat doesn’t hold up forever, but these shortcomings do not undermine Smugglers V’s laudable player freedom.

A solid and enjoyable opening entry into a series that, thus far, is impossible to judge. The Wolf Among Us perhaps hews a little too closely to the first arc of the comic it's based on, but it does an admirable job of translating that world to a new medium.

FIFA 14 is the reassuring central-defensive midfielder of the series. Dependable, rather than revelatory. Physical, tenacious and tight on space. It does the job without fuss, but also lacks flair.

F1 2013 can make even the most naive neophyte feel like a legend. But if you’re already a legend of previous games, there may not be as much here to impress you.

Urban Trial Freestyle’s big problem is not its similarity to the Trials series, but the inability to offer anything that casts it as a credible alternative.

A gory old-school shooter that largely makes up for a lack of variety by being making combat very, very enjoyable.

Like the redacted CIA documents featured so heavily in the game’s marketing, The Bureau comes across as disjointed, baffling and inconsistent. But moments of clarity may well keep you interested in what lies beneath that faltering surface.

A solid Metroidvania brawler with a whole lot of heart and a whole lot of humour.

The weakest part of BioShock Infinite in four unremarkable wave-combat arenas.

Fraught firefights and desperate scavenging in an uncaring world.

A faithful and enjoyable update of an overlooked FPS classic. It won't set the world alight, but Rise of the Triad deserves the attention of anyone who fondly remembers the FPS games of yesteryear or resents the slow hand-holding and cover-taking of recent corridor shooters.

Cloudberry Kingdom is a very varied, very clever, and very, very hard platformer. It never quite hits the heights its competition does, but then, it's really trying to be a very different game.

A perfectly capable tactical RPG that's unfortunately light on both the tactics and the RPG. Not really bad in any way, but I suspect this won't really shine until the community get to grips with the editor.

A very mixed bag, but one that's certainly worth a look if the Polis Ranger scenario intrigues you.

Convincing characters, a well-realised, unusual setting and sensible puzzles. All evidence points to a strong opening for this episodic adventure series.

If tropical islands and resort management sound like fun then you'll likely enjoy this; if they don't, then you're really not missing any major updates to the base game. Either way, though, you'll likely want to wait for a price drop.

There’s no shame in derivation, and Magrunner applies its Portal-like mag-glove idea with confidence. A worthwhile, if unoriginal, addition to the first-person puzzle genre.

Not exactly Incredible, but a charming and capable action-RPG at an enticing price.

It looks like Sanctum and it sounds like Sanctum, but it plays totally differently. While the more devoted fans of the first game might take issue with a lot of the changes, and while it doesn't match up to that game's heights, there's still a lot to enjoy in Sanctum 2.

What Metro lacks in pitch-perfect game mechanics, it makes up for with an atmosphere that you can taste.

The broad stylistic flourishes do a fair job of masking the underwhelming reality of much of the gameplay, but once Greaves’ tall tale is told you’re left with a pretty linear, whack-a-cowboy shooter in a no-horse town.