The mobile port works beautifully, its timed button presses easy enough to pull off on a touchscreen and its cute, deliberately blocky graphics looking alluringly colourful on a small screen.

Although compelling, it was originally priced at a rather sporty £24.99 on iOS, which many found off-putting. Its release on Apple Arcade also includes its DLC, making this an irresistible bargain and easily the best way to experience the game on the go.

A heartwarming adventure about growing up, packed full of imagination and 90s snark, but its main strength is the way in which it manages to expertly capture what it feels like to be a young, bored teen on the verge of adulthood.

A near future third person sci-fi adventure whose believable characters, expressive animation, and glorious icy backdrops are undermined by a linear story with too little variety in its interactions.

We’ve learnt never to assume a game’s final quality from even the most positive preview, but we were thoroughly impressed by First Light, which proved to be considerably better than we were expecting. The thought of future Bond films being owned by Amazon is very disquieting, no matter the talent involved, but no matter how all that turns out it’s very clear that Bond’s video game career couldn’t be in better hands. [Hands-On Impressions]

A fun and energetic fighting game that does its best to cater for both casual fans and fighting game veterans, although its roster has some strange priorities and the single-player content is very limited.

A genuinely different kind of team multiplayer game, with exactly the sort of thoughtful weirdness you’d expect from Double Fine.

A surprisingly conservative follow-up to Returnal but the transcendent third person action is so well orchestrated that qualms about the storytelling and lack of innovation seem like only minor concerns in comparison.

A colourful and creative first person adventure, whose From-style asynchronous multiplayer, branching plot, and faltering stealth sequences are hamstrung by a very low budget.

An impressively successful follow-up to Vampire Survivors, that features entirely different gameplay but a similarly deceptive sense of depth and nuance to its charmingly low-tech action.

A noir boomer shooter rich in style and atmosphere but limited by its unremarkable gunplay and flat writing, which fails to capitalise on its fun premise.

The joy of playing something that isn’t a sequel or licensed tie-in is considerable in its own right but this tightly designed third person actioner is a pleasure from beginning to end.

It’s not hard to take issue with Champions but for better or worse it’s clearly not finished yet and… it’s free. If you’re a veteran Pokémon fan then the only real benefit you’re getting here is easy access to a constant stream of online matches, since the matchmaking is actually pretty good. Otherwise, this seems to be aimed at a slightly awkward mix of hardcore esports fans and people brand new to the franchise, who want to know how the battles work (and to be fair, the tutorials are pretty good and the interface fairly straightforward)...Champions fulfils that remit reasonably well but it’s a hard game to get excited about and probably something you’re better off just making a mental note of, so you can come back later when it’s working properly and is more content complete. [Review in Progress]

A loving homage to the original X-COM, that’s far more interested in turning up the difficulty than coming up with any new ideas.

A more family friendly attempt to mimic the likes of Limbo and Inside but while the graphics are impressive the gameplay feels stolid and poorly paced.

An impressive, near-essential expansion for Borderlands 4, with an excellent new vault hunter and some of the best level and mission design in the franchise.

Super Meat Boy in 3D seems to be an inherently flawed concept and while this does its best to make navigating the third dimension feasible, the end result feels frustratingly imprecise.

Whilst ultimately an underdeveloped entry, it does make for a loving send off for Max Caulfield. Unfortunately, being another weak entry, it may also play that role for the franchise itself.

With base building, monstrous sea beasts, and a slow progress from hapless crash survivor to king of the ocean depths, it has more or less the same cadence as the original Subnautica, which was also very good. It does feel slightly like a missed opportunity that this isn’t quite the sea change (pun, I’m afraid, intended) it could have been. Especially given how long the actual sequel is taking.

It’s a well-made game, but lacking in magic. The anodyne character design, lacklustre script, and battles that have challenge but little excitement, conspire to make it feel oddly pedestrian. Still, if you’re craving a decent sized role-player on your phone this certainly manages to tick all the right boxes, even if that’s all it does.

Although the game moves fast, you don’t have to, gradually moving your avatar and adjusting their angle of fire as you smash your way through its stages. It lends itself well to mobile conversion and remains just as addictive as it was on PC and console.

While point ‘n’ click adventures experienced their apogee in the 1990s, it’s still a genre that manages to generate new outings. Mystery Of Silence is one, telling the story of a journalist investigating a mysterious island monastery.

A tough, flashy, and surprisingly versatile extraction shooter which houses a magnetic loop of death and loot beneath its occasionally obtuse idiosyncrasies.

An inessential but enjoyable expansion for the best 2D Mario game of the modern era, with some fun multiplayer distractions and a soupçon of new single-player content.

An anime-infused arcade racer with a full-blown story, cracking multiplayer, and an OTT driving model that gamifies every part of its tricky, knife edge races.

A bizarre mishmash of disparate gameplay elements, with absolutely no sense of coherent design or narrative… and yet its stunning game world is still a fascinating mess to explore.

One of the best puzzle games of recent years is also one of the most empowering and cleverly designed, as its stretches seemingly simple mechanics to impressive lengths.

A mostly successful remake that reimagines Fatal Frame 2 for the modern day, and while it can veer a little too much into action territory it’s still an impressively horrifying video game.

An impressively full-bodied Japanese role-player that’s good enough to attract non-Monster Hunter fans, with the Pokémon style collection process making up for the flaws in the storytelling and combat.

A missed opportunity for an exciting take on medieval history, that’s inferior to Kingdom Come: Deliverance in every respect.

A competent Left 4 Dead clone that seems to have gained little from the association with John Carpenter, but it is a sensibly priced diversion for those that want a new co-op shooter to play with friends.

An atmospheric and evocative action role-player whose rough edges and lacklustre combat are balanced by compelling world-building, beautiful environments, and a far reaching sense of consequence.

Like its predecessors, it’s incredibly lightweight, your choices set out so briefly you’re regularly left guessing about potential outcomes; a sense the game attempts to paper over by throwing so many of them at you. It’s occasionally amusing, but too insubstantial to be satisfying.

This release includes all seven DLC packs, comprising challenge tombs, new weapons, and outfits, making it a real value for money proposition. It’s great rediscovering Lara’s swift journey from ingénue to casual mass murderer, via a whole lot of looted historical relics.

Rhythm action combat proves a fun way to get sweaty, assuming you like the style of music, but the extreme brevity is only slightly extended by online leaderboards.

Slay The Spire is not a game that sounds very exciting to describe and that’s certainly true of its sequel as well. But once you get a feel for how it works it’s enjoyably addictive in the way only the very best video games are. The early access version isn’t cheap, but the original game can currently be downloaded for just £4.99 on Steam, so if you’re not convinced you can get a good idea for whether you’ll like the sequel from that. [Early Access Review]

Following up last year’s well-received game is an unenviable task, but WWE 2K26 manages to build on what’s come before with some game-changing mechanics and welcome refinements.

A welcome reminder of the origins of Pokémon and while the game’s age is obvious in more than just its graphics the unbounded sense of exploration and experimentation remains as compelling as always.

A welcome reminder of the origins of Pokémon and while the game’s age is obvious in more than just its graphics the unbounded sense of exploration and experimentation remains as compelling as always.

A beautiful looking 2D side-scrolling puzzle game whose lack of challenge and regularly recycled mechanics prove disappointingly bland, with no significant improvements over the original.

Absorbing VR tower defence that improves on the original game in almost every department, but is let down by a pointless, tacked on narrative.

A wonderfully engrossing cosy game that combines the best of Minecraft and Fallout 4 to create a Pokémon spin-off that, for the first time in a long while, is constantly surprising you with its ambition and variety.

An excellent 3D platformer that rather than just trying to copy Nintendo has plenty of ideas of its own, with some thrilling freeform action.

The most entertaining new Resident Evil game in over two decades, with fantastic combat, amazing graphics, effective scares, and the most enjoyably bad one-liners in the business.

It’s spooky rather than scary but with a great script and characters, and some smart puzzles, this is a must-play for anyone who enjoys the kind of stories only video games can tell.

A deep, demanding turn-based strategy game-cum-deck builder whose Soulslike sensibilities leave you to uncover the complexities of its combat, story, and world on your own.

A very run of the mill Metroidvania that does little of interest with the God Of War setting and stumbles in terms of the dull combat and unengaging plot.

An accomplished and darkly witty first person puzzle game that’s predictably not as good as Portal, but does come surprisingly close at times.

The newly vertiginous sandbox levels prove an excellent canvas for sneaking and stealing, in a welcome new entry in what feels increasingly like the spiritual successor to Thief: The Dark Project.

An inventive sequel whose small improvements in gameplay can’t make up for tedious firefights and minigames, and a less witty script.

An excellent compilation of seven games from the heyday of Bomberman, but it’s a shame it doesn’t have more online options, to make joining in the multiplayer fun easier.

A darkly atmospheric horror puzzle game from the original developers of Little Nightmares, that’s undermined by dull puzzles and too much trial and error.

Suda51’s punk attitude results in another uniquely bizarre third person action game, but this one has more life and originality to it than most of his other more recent titles.

One of the most complex and rewarding strategy games of recent years, hidden behind a mask of weird humour, ugly visuals, and a lot of random number generation.

The best Mario Tennis game since the N64 era and a hugely enjoyable multiplayer game with a ton of single-player content, although there’ll still be too many gimmicks for some people.

The incremental pace of progress and presence of numerous currencies are the remnants of its microtransaction-based original version, which is still available on Android, where its clean graphical style and slowly complicating interactions remain moderately entertaining.

Even without the controversies surrounding it, Yakuza Kiwami 3 is a huge disappointment, with no useful changes and a worthless new expansion.

The best Soulslike not made by FromSoftware, which expands and improves on the series’ exceptional combat with two separate play styles and a fantastically wide range of enemies and locations.

An historically authentic military flight sim that rewards the hard work put into mastering its combat, although there was no need for it to be quite this inaccessible to non-propellerheads.

Almost as conflicted as Hamlet himself, this is both an amusingly whimsical graphic adventure and a frustrating, needlessly obscure chore.

A sorely underdeveloped, crafting-orientated survival horror game, whose neat comic book art style isn’t enough to compensate for sub-par combat and storytelling.

A loving remake of a JRPG classic, with pitch perfect graphics and charming, if simplistic, storytelling and combat.

An outdated and uninteresting Soulslike that takes an already flawed original and makes it even less compelling, with unengaging storytelling, bland visuals, and repetitive action.

A flawed but brilliant mountaineering game that splices survival gameplay and a fascinating four-limb climbing system with exploration, risk-taking, and the emotional fallout from a climber’s loved ones.

A lo-fi 8-bit style twin-stick bullet hell shooter whose exhilaratingly weird music and catalogue of surreal weaponry is undermined by technical problems and a reliance on luck.

A genuinely funny Paper Mario style role-player, with entertaining puzzles and a welcome mockery of LinkedIn culture, let down by rhythm action battle mechanics that don’t quite work.

A fabulously imaginative and unique take on the budding detective genre, that mixes clever investigation work with an unpredictable but gripping story.

An extremely solid tag team fighting game that’s bound to become even more impressive over time, assuming it can sort out its launch performance problems.

A strikingly beautiful, sci-fi alternative to Hollow Knight: Silksong, but one which is consistently off the mark when it comes to the balance between difficulty and frustration.

A welcome but very minor improvement for the best Animal Crossing game and while the free Update 3.0 adds plenty of new features the time seems ripe for a full-blown sequel.

An engaging mix of The Legend Of Zelda and Fez, which rearranges a number of familiar ideas into a clever action puzzler, even if its visuals are a bit too old school for its own good.

An amateurish mess masquerading as a homage to Dino Crisis, which might be defensible as a well-meaning fan project, if it wasn’t for the outrageously unreasonable price tag.

A quietly powerful, deceptively smart narrative adventure about childhood and football which succeeds as a thoughtful reflection of not only a moment in time but memory itself.

A relaxing and nuanced survival city builder, that has plenty of depth and variety but also an unusually laidback and optimistic tone.

An energetic, platforming brawler with a mischievous glint in its eye, featuring a unique blend of feral cyberpunk and old school arcade action.

One of the few slices of DLC that can claim to be better than the parent game, as the gameplay of Frontiers Of Pandora is tightened up and the graphics pushed even further.

A fantastic detective adventure, that stands with the very best examples in gaming, thanks to a complex and intriguing mystery filled with interesting characters and puzzles.

One of the best survival horror games of the year and an impressively disturbing mix of EarthBound and The Thing, that also happens to be one of the best bargains of 2025.

Video games rarely get to be autobiographical, but this indie gem is a funny, touching, and endearingly honest portrayal of one person’s difficult student years.

If you must play a video game version of Monopoly then this is definitely the best way to do it and far from the lazy cash-in that it could have been.

The mega evolutions and real-time battles continue to impress, but this expensive DLC is far too repetitive to be considered an essential purchase.

An excellent start for FIFA on the iPad, even if it does show every sign of first match nerves - with considerable room for improvement.

A distinguished iOS release that manages to replicate almost all the features of the home consoles originals, both good and bad.

A mediocre homage to Contra and a terrible adaption of Terminator 2, which has nothing interesting to say about the concept of adapting movies into 2D video games.

A compact and polished VR puzzle game with a sturdy, tactile feel and wonderfully evocative characters and environments.

It’s effectively a State Of Survival clone that uses Resident Evil themes and settings. So it’s a base builder at heart, except your base is Raccoon City – not that it makes much difference since you’ll be raiding rival Raccoon Cities in dull multi-hour engagements and paying real cash to unlock legendary heroes like Leon S. Kennedy. There are zombie-orientated exploration segments, and lane-based tactical battles, but the meat of the game is gacha and pay-to-win base building of the type that’s by now wearyingly familiar to mobile gamers.

Taking the dwarves and mining from deep rock galactic, and the auto-aim swarm control of Vampire Survivors, this is a glorious mobile mash-up that proves at least as addictive as its twin inspirations.

Another Microsoft exclusive arrives on PlayStation 5 and this one is marginally superior to the Xbox version, with excellent DualSense support and ironed out performance.

A skateboarding sim which transcends the genre through its dazzling psychedelic presentation, smart design, and comedic lightness of touch.

An impressively daring horror experience that pushes the boundaries of what most people would expect from a video game, in terms of subject matter and imagery.

It’s certainly a better alternative to the mobile game that inspired it, but what few new ideas Octopath Traveler 0 has do little to give it its own identity and paint a worrying picture for the series’ future.

A scary, atmospheric, and cleverly designed survival horror, whose photorealistic visuals and superb sound design help overcome some occasional frustrations.

Almost exactly what fans didn’t want from a new Metroid Prime but while it is widely inconsistent the majority of the game is undeniably entertaining.

One of the best scrolling beat ‘em-ups ever made, with fantastic retro graphics, four-player co-op, and as much variety and combat depth as the genre will allow.

Some of the best 2D artwork ever seen in a video game, married to a spitefully difficult game whose main gameplay gimmick only manages to make it more frustrating to play.

It may not have started off life as a VR game but this roguelite first person shooter works perfectly as one, with excellent enemy variety and a mountain of zany weaponry.

An interesting and personal feeling set of first person histories that barely constitute a video game and yet wouldn’t really work in any other medium.

A time loop adventure with an interesting premise and characters, but a frustratingly rigid structure that fails to resolve most of the stories it sets up.