A very competent Soulslike, with excellent combat and an attractive art style – it’s just a shame it barely even tries to do anything new.

The updates have brought definite improvement, but even after two years the huge scope and ambition only serves to hide how simplistic and repetitive the gameplay is.

A fascinating reimaging of an 80s classic that never quite existed, but as interestingly unique as it is, it lacks the elegant simplicity of its more famous stablemates.

Featuring Buzz Lightyear, Elsa from Frozen, Wreck-it Ralph, Mickey Mouse, Moana, Maleficent, and others, more characters are due this year. It’s a solid start, and provided matchmaking remains this easy, a promising one.

A complicated game to score. It’s a mechanically-superior sequel in every way, with more robust combat mechanics, mini-games, and puzzles populating the reference-stuffed open world. But there’s a nagging feeling the extended length and focus on combat has come at the expense of a memorable story. It’s still an essential play for fans of the show, and role-playing nuts will greatly appreciate the surprising amount of depth, but a South Park game propped up by its game mechanics is perhaps the most unlikely twist you’ll find here.

One of the best action role-players on any portable - if it wasn't for the appallingly banal plot and characters.

An impossibly ugly attempt at a faux retro 2D shooter that thankfully plays better than it looks, but still feels like a mostly wasted opportunity.

The excellent multiplayer deserves to be the focus here, rather than the repetitive, humourless, and largely artless first person shooting of the single-player campaign.

A clever, if not wholly original, action strategy that's only lacking in single player appeal.

Don't let its low price or simple visuals fool you, this is the most demonically addictive game of the year and it takes no prisoners.

Playing as the bad guy has never been so disturbing, but despite all the nuanced decision-making the underlying gameplay is never as interesting as the premise.

Breathless horror that efficiently recreates the look and feel of Aliens, but is let down by clunky motion sensing controls and reloading mechanics.

With a warm but whacky sense of humour, this is a Tycoon-style game that has you managing a blacksmithing business staffed by spuds. Set them to work forging weapons with stats that appeal to the selection of heroes that inhabit each of the game’s towns; the better the correlation, the more they’ll pay and the better their XP, adding to your shop’s fame and letting you expand your operation. It’s a polished product, even if it does eventually feel a bit repetitive, and the fact that it’s a PC port makes some of the text so tiny that those playing on phones will be reaching for a magnifying glass.

An unnecessary but well-made expansion for what remains Kirby’s best platform adventure, with plenty of neat new extras and a peculiarly difficult final boss.

Pretentious and restrictive, but also one of the most spectacular visual and aural experiences on the PS3.

A successful reboot for a franchise that still has a lot to give in terms of uniting gamers, and non-gamers, around its uncomplicated but endearing charms.

The brothers’ interactions and cute claymation styling make for delightful, heart string-plucking interludes between levels. There’s not much of it but it concertedly leaves the door open for future chapters.

Call Of Duty’s most concerted effort to break the usual formula is unfortunately the most unsatisfying sequel in years, especially the badly flawed story campaign.

A notable improvement on the original, although most of the changes are still just doodling in the margins – as the series waits for a more substantial overhaul.

Although not a game in any conventional sense, more a work of interactive fiction, Florence is about falling in love, its protagonist drifting through the tedium of adult existence before meeting the love of her life. From the mild awkwardness of their first date, to moving in, daily routine, arguments and beyond, your part in each scene sometimes amounting to no more than scrolling through its practically wordless pages, but making you feel a part of its story in a way that graphic novels and films can’t. At only 30 minutes long and with little replay value, this is not for everyone, but its unique emotional journey is an experience that stays with you.

As pre-order bonuses go this is definitely a cut above, but it's also an addictive and rewarding mini-game in its own right.

Despite the change in tone many things remain consistent, from Amanita’s trademark simple but infinitely expressive character design, to trial and error gameplay that has you tugging, pushing, and prodding things to solve puzzles, making this a perfect candidate for the move to mobile. It’s a brief experience, once you’ve figured out what you’re doing in each scene, but also an eerily atmospheric one.

A fiercely original take on traditional computer role-playing games that often seems unrefined and self-indulgent but is still a welcome shake-up of genre norms.

One of the most successfully depressing survival games ever made, and a fascinating portrayal of an ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances.

It's got its share of flaws but this is another absorbingly original puzzler for WiiWare.

This punch-pulling retro update is charming and beautiful but doesn't quite have the mind to match.

The longest-running game you've never heard of gets a typically competent but characterless makeover.

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.