Glory of Generals has a few things to show for its tour of duty: plenty of unit types, a huge roster of real-life generals for the historically inclined, and a veritable ton of content — with 60+ missions, some of which took us the better part of an hour, there’s plenty to see here. Unfortunately, not even the most devoted of war-gamers is likely to enjoy the experience for that long; opaque systems, a sense of randomness, and an annoyingly uncomfortable control scheme conspire to sink this ship long before the war’s won.

When it comes to a game like Solitaire, a developer needs to go out of its way to justify why a gamer wouldn't just boot up their PC's free software or download a free phone app. And while Solitaire Dungeon Escape attempts to add some flavour with the "save the princess" setting and features simple and functional gameplay, its technical shortcomings are baffling and do enough to sour the whole experience.

Regular Show: Mordecai & Rigby in 8-Bit Land is almost a decent enough game, but serious gameplay flaws keep it from reaching its potential.

The After Kick system is satisfying and the Download Play-enabled multiplayer is a great addition, but they aren't enough to save the experience. We regretfully recommend a pass.

Mortal Kombat 1 on Nintendo Switch manages to deliver this superb game's Story and Towers modes in a state that's playable, but only if you've got plenty of patience. There are frame rate issues, big resolution dips, input and timing problems related to performance drops, missing content, game-breaking bugs in Invasion mode, long loading times, and unresponsive menus. If you are a huge Mortal Kombat fan whose only option is Switch, you may be able to press through all of this. However, if you have any other option, we suggest you stay away from this one for now.

Again, it’s essentially an enhanced port of a free-to-play mobile title. We also know QubicGames can do better than this – with the likes of Robonauts. This one, though, is more in line with the limitations of Astro Bears Party. Given its simplicity and bright presentation, it’s best recommended for a younger audience.

The main issue with Word Wizard 3D is ultimately that none of the game modes are particularly special; these can all be found in one form or another elsewhere.

Wicked Monsters Blast! HD PLUS is a title that attempts to create a funny, charming, competitive party atmosphere with a collection of varying mini-games. In reality it doesn't quite manage to be funny, charming or that competitive, and will leave most players craving something else that does it better.

FIFA 20 is a cynical attempt from a publisher to completely cease support for the Switch while still having the gall to suggest it deserves to be rewarded with a near-premium fee for its lack of effort. If you want to pay good money to get insulted, go heckle a big-name comedian instead: at least you'll get a smile out of it. If you don't already own a FIFA game on Switch and aren't bothered about having the latest kits and team rosters, just get last year's version on the cheap.

Van Helsing Sniper Zx100 evokes the creepy aesthetic of Killer7, but while Killer7's unique concepts and quirky style helped it overcome its significant faults, Van Helsing doesn't have the same originality; its charming 3D presentation is delicious icing let down by a fairly flavourless light gun cake.

With nothing to offer besides some pleasant storytelling, we cannot recommend Sword of the Necromancer on any meaningful level. It’s not horrible, but it’s bereft of both meaningful content and any manner of unique execution. A sequel or heavily-modified relaunch could salvage the game into something much stronger, as the core idea of resurrecting fallen monsters is a decent one, but its treatment here renders it irrelevant. What a shame. This could have been something special. It's not a complete and total disaster – occasionally, when the screen is a little busier, you might feel a flicker of engagement as you dash between combatants – but overall, we'll be leaving this one for dead.

Ben 10 Omniverse 2 is a disappointing experience that is not worth playing unless you're a hardcore fan of the Cartoon Network franchise.

Obviously the average individual wouldn't get much mileage out of this, but parents might want to look elsewhere to get educational games for their kids. Granted, there are not many other options on the eShop, but this really isn't a good enough product to be worth a recommendation, it's just a bit too simple for its own good.

Habroxia is a pretty bland and curiously straightforward little shmup with nothing about it that stands out as being worth recommending. The handful of little flourishes it introduces – such as switching between horizontal and vertical traversal or its three different fire modes – just don’t add any kind of fun to proceedings because the game hasn’t been designed in a way that makes them neither interesting or necessary. The Switch is absolutely drowned with fantastic old-school shmups with lots of unique little quirks and clever design decisions that make them deliciously moreish to play and really, and at the end of the day, you’d be much better off choosing almost any of them than spending time with a game that seems perfectly content to let you glide through it without providing any incentive, narrative or challenge whatsoever.

Warhammer 40,000: Rogue Trader is a cracking bit of turn-based Warhammer action that delivers big on strategic and atmospheric combat whilst also serving you a top-notch, choice-driven narrative and campaign. Hooray. However! This Switch 2 port, at release, is a borderline disaster, and not something I recommend anyone pick up until it's had some patching done. A constantly stuttering frame rate, long loading times, unresponsive and laggy menus and controls, a huge graphical downgrade, and hard crashes aplenty make for a mess of a port. Let's hope they fix it up, because for now, it's a hard pass for a great game.

If you’re a fan of the series, this entry won’t be of any great surprise - after all, we’ve had a water gun third-person shooter and a rhythmic cookery game under the Senran Kagura banner - but if you’re new to the series this title might look like the kind of thing you'd not normally find on Switch. As innocent and silly as it all pertains to be, it’s just a tame excuse to get a bit of cheap sleaze onto a Western games console.

Aztech Forgotten Gods had a lot of potential that is unfortunately wasted. On the plus side, the game is artistically pleasing, with well-designed enemies and a city that at least provides a nice bit of visual variety. In terms of gameplay, however, the whole thing is a bit of a mess, with poor combat mechanics and a daft camera causing way too much hassle than it’s worth. Minor distractions in the form of cosmetic customisation proves a nice little touch, but sadly Aztech: Forgotten Gods’ core gameplay is simply far below par, making this an action game you'll probably want to sit out.

There are better sudoku games in the DSi Shop at the moment, so unless you're an advanced player who doesn't like to fill in their own candidates and already knows what a "Swordfish" and an "X-wing" are, there's no need to kill yourself trying to wrap your head around this title.

After thirty years of fame, the Fist of the North Star series deserves a much better celebration of its history than this sorry piece of software. Hardcore fans of the series may find that their love of the source material helps paper over the gaping cracks — the same goes for dedicated followers of the Dynasty Warriors lineage — but if you don’t fall into either of those two camps then you should leave this well alone, and simply track down a copy of the 1986 anime movie instead. It will provide more enjoyment during its 110 minute running time than Ken’s Rage 2 can muster during several days of gameplay.

The absence of features such as an acceptable draw distance, NPCs, a useful crafting system - and much more besides - makes Stone Shire feel like a rushed and unfinished demo of a better game.

Its stripped-down simplicity and lack of goals make it appear suited toward a young audience looking for virtual dolls’ heads to mess around with, and there may be some fun for them in that for a while.

Gothic Masquerade is just about as shallow as any other hidden object game, but this one has the courtesy of being over with in just around an hour.

If you're looking for the next Stardew Valley, this doesn't even come close. Harvest Moon: One World is a poor imitation of what the series once was, and it feels more like a rushed mobile game than a full-fledged Switch game. These games have always been about chores, but this one feels like a chore to play. In our opinion, your money is better spent on something that respects you as a fan of the genre.

Tamagotchi Plaza is a dull, vapid, and utterly unsatisfying minigame collection that rapidly overstays its welcome. Though charming and visually competent, the underlying gameplay is undercooked, unrewarding, and shallow with its ‘free mobile game’-like design. There may be a valid case here for playing with very young children for some very light and simple entertainment, but even then, the price tag is comically high for the shallowness and quantity of content you’re getting. I’d suggest you steer clear; it’s worth neither your time nor your money.

When one takes a step back to look at all that Puzzle & Dragons Gold has to offer, it’s rather difficult to say exactly who it’s for. Longtime fans of the series will no doubt decry the laundry list of cutbacks that the core gameplay suffers from, while newcomers will be paying cash to get a massive misrepresentation of what the series is actually all about. Sure, multiplayer proves to be mildly amusing for a time, but it lacks the kind of depth or longevity that previous releases in the series have had in spades, and the less said about the single-player content, the better. Puzzle & Dragons Gold feels in many ways like a free demo of a much better game that you could potentially buy, except no such game exists because this is it. Don’t waste your time or money on this poor approximation; go download Puzzle & Dragons for free on your phone for a much more enjoyable experience and save your money for much more worthwhile releases for the Switch.

With very little to actually do and way too much repetition we'd advise you to look elsewhere. To end on a positive note, the loading screen is quite nice.

The odds are quite good that you will never get the chance to play Cooking Mama: Cookstar, and that’s probably for the best. Beyond its status as a curiosity item in the wake of the mess surrounding its release, there is absolutely nothing about Cooking Mama: Cookstar that justifies the price of admission. Extremely shallow gameplay, terrible motion controls, and some of the worst voice acting we’ve heard in a modern video game make for an experience that’s woefully average at best and outright unenjoyable at the worst. If you happen to be fortunate enough to come across a copy, you could always pick it up purely for its resale value and as a conversation piece, but do yourself a favour and don’t waste your time actually playing it.

Devil Band - Rock the Underworld is a poor man's Plants vs. Zombies. It's cheaper to buy but equally cheap on the ideas front, with nothing new to contribute to the formula and a worse way of doing what makes PvZ worth playing. Tactically bankrupt and equally light on entertainment, it's definitely one to avoid.

We’re not going to mince words here, Balan Wonderworld is a waste of your time. Monotonous level design, awful performance, and shallow gameplay combine to make for an experience that is simply not fun to play. It may look pretty (when it’s framerate isn’t chugging), but there simply isn’t enough good content here to justify your time or money, and this is doubly true when you take into account that this is a full-priced retail release. If you’re looking for a good 3D platformer for your Switch, this most definitely isn’t it.

Rise of the Guardians: The Video Game is simply not very good. The action becomes repetitive almost immediately and it only gets worse from there, with collectibles almost impossible to see against the environment, glitches preventing important things from spawning, and a complete and total lack of challenge. Done right, a mindless button-masher can be a lot of fun; this game seems to exist only to remind us how easy it is to do them wrong.

Thymesia has all the ingredients necessary to make for a solid indie Soulslike, but falls short of greatness due to messy implementation of mechanics, bland level design, weak lore, and issues with difficulty balancing. Add to this the fact that we experienced serious performance issues with this Cloud Version — problems which fundamentally hampered our timing and control input during combat, ruining the most promising part of the game — and you've got a Switch experience that's best avoided at all costs.

Having Swords & Soldiers on the go should have been an easy war to win. Instead, we advise you to beat a hasty retreat.

With seven months until the release of Part 2, we can only hope that EA learn from their mistakes here and step things up for Harry's grand finale.

Everything works, but with lifeless aesthetics and barely any reward for playing, kids will find this dull and slow-paced while adults would only view it as lacking and simplistic.

Arcade Hoops Basketball is not a terrible time-waster, but it never tries to be anything more than a very simple diversion. Only the most diehard basketball fans will care enough to keep firing it up after the first few times around.

There is very little to recommend in Secret Agent Files: Miami. The poor story, unintuitive interface and atrocious presentation make for a thoroughly disappointing game that gamers will likely regret purchasing. There are plenty of quality adventure titles on the 3DS and DS; Secret Agent Files: Miami doesn't even come close.

With sluggish gameplay, off-putting presentation and bafflingly poor design decisions at every turn, Langrisser Re:Incarnation Tensei is an entirely underwhelming revival of a once-beloved series, and a subpar SRPG besides.

Whether you're looking for exploration or monster-rearing, there are far better options on the 3DS - for an eShop alternative, try The Denpa Men 3 - so we regretfully recommend leaving this one lost in space.

With incredibly linear and sometimes confusing levels, painfully tedious combat and bland, dated-looking visual design, Beast Quest is a crushing disappointment when you consider the rich source of inspiration that the famous book series supplies. Speaking of the books, this game was only ever going to appeal to those who have love for the kingdom of Avantia, and it's a real shame that after such a long wait for a video game adaptation of the series, those same dedicated fans have to endure this unflattering and lifeless adaptation. Put aside your affection for Adam Blade's novels and just play one of the many other amazing RPGs on Switch instead.

Moorhuhn Kart 2 takes a game that's nearly two decades old, tweaks the visuals a bit, then actually removes elements from it (such as its character animations and speed settings). With only eight tracks on offer it would be underwhelming at a budget price, but given it's selling for $30 at launch there's nowhere near enough content or quality to justify that price.

At its core, Puzzled is essentially a Tetris knock-off that tries to do something clever with it but in doing so removes what makes Tetris so enjoyable. Its poor stage design leads to some frustrating moments and the more you play it the more each level feels like a chore rather than an exciting step forward. The only thing we’re Puzzled about is why this was chosen for the Switch treatment ahead of far more deserving Neo Geo games.

Despite EnjoyUp's efforts to improve and refine the experience, Rock 'N Racing Off Road DX just doesn't do enough differently or better to warrant a purchase.

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole is a tedious, uninspired effort marred by repetitious combat.

Even if you've been searching desperately for an air hockey simulator on 3DS, we can't possibly recommend this bare-bones, repetitious attempt, at least not at its current price.

Joe's Diner is a bad game with a good premise.

Unfortunately Neopica has not revolutionised the pet simulation genre with its latest offering. The whole experience is both repetitive and mundane, even for the most ardent of pet simulation enthusiasts.

Dream Trigger features some really unique and original gameplay ideas - maybe a few too many for its own good - and ultimately tries to do too many things at once, overwhelming the player with its rather steep learning curve. Toss in the barrage of game crashes and you're left with a game that had a lot of potential that was never in the vicinity of being reached.

For the most part, Haunted Castle is a pretty miserable experience, and in a strong contest with Castlevania: The Adventure (the first Game Boy game) for being one of the worst in the Castlevania series. The options in this collection help allay some of the issues – or at least allow you to cheat through them – and it’s still (begrudgingly) worth struggling through for its unusual place in the Castlevania series. However, in the cold light of day, there's no denying that this is a pretty poor video game and one that most people will want to ignore.

At 200 points, Sea Battle is a good deal for those desperate for something new to play on their aging DSi, but once you get past the nostalgia factor of its source material Battleship is a shallow, luck-based board game remembered best by children for its fun plastic game pieces and tactile feel, that Sea Battle's low-budget presentation doesn't come anywhere close to replacing.

As a visual novel, Wheels of Aurelia is a lacklustre experience. As a driving game, it’s even worse. However you wish to identify it, this title lacks genuine substance; it's a solid idea executed poorly.

You'll be hard-pressed to find a game more difficult to complete than Stonekeep. Not because its design is devilishly clever or because it has fantastic AI, but simply because it is a pain to play. The game suffers from frequent slowdown, a nonexistent plot and motion controls that are completely sanctimonious.

Put this notebook back in your desk.

There's not much to say about Ice Station Z, other than that it feels like a prototype or a proof of concept more than a final game. If there's hidden depth to be found, we certainly didn't come across it, and if things pick up later in the game very few are going to stick around for the experience. Ice Station Z, unfortunately, is not worth your time or money.

M2 has done a typically peerless job of porting Altered Beast from the Mega Drive, and proves once again that it is the master of retro emulation. However, one has to question the wisdom of wasting so much time and effort on converting such a dismal game; Altered Beast fails to entertain during its criminally short length and really should have been relegated to the mists of time by now.

Decay of Logos is a mess. It looks bad, has some crippling performance issues and is stuffed full of nonsensical and overly-punitive gameplay systems that make every minute you spend with it feel like a slog. The world that Amplify Creations has created here does occasionally feel like it could be an interesting and worthwhile place to explore, but there are just far too many bugs and problems that get in the way of you settling down to enjoy this game in any way whatsoever. Avoid.

The controls are flat-out bad, but at least the stages are animated nicely. Maybe taking your own real life dog outside and tossing the ball around with it is a better option if you're up for a good round of fetch.

It's not the best looking or most original game, but this would be somewhat forgivable if it was at least fun to play. It isn't. There's very little variety in the way the gang members attack and in a scrolling beat 'em up that greatly reduces the enjoyment provided. Playthroughs can be tedious as a result and the biggest challenge becomes trying not to quit the game early. There's very little replay value in the game but you could always get a friend to join you for some two-player co-operative fighting so you can at least share the suffering. Burning Fight is one to avoid.

Real Heroes Firefighter 3D suffers from below-par visuals and a game engine that feels nothing short of cheap. It isn't a patch on the Wii version - which wasn't outstanding to begin with - and any fun that the game provides disappears quickly in a puff of smoke thanks to annoyance after annoyance. With so many other titles out there, it really can't be recommended.

Plättchen: Twist 'n Paint is the videogame equivalent of trying to pat your head and rub your stomach at the same time; there are too many elements to consider in tandem for this to be considered to be much fun.

Don't be fooled — while Hideaways is functional, it's simply not fun to play.

Through and through, this is a fastball on Sega’s part and one that many gamers are going to want to avoid.

There's so much potential packed into the idea of a fishing game for the Wii, But Reel Fishing Ocean Challenge doesn't take advantage of any of this. Faulty motion controls, uninspired gameplay, and unattractive visuals do nothing but hinder this game, and the fact that you have to pay more for "extra" content just to unlock levels that are already visible in the full game is offensive. If you're looking for a satisfying fishing experience on the Wii, you'd be better off sticking with the original Reel Fishing Challenge instead.

101 DinoPets 3D isn't egregiously bad - one game-breaking glitch aside - but the experience it provides ranges from dull to muddled.

Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit on Wii is a very poor excuse for a racer that feels like a slap in the face compared to its PS3/Xbox 360 cousin.

Easter Eggztravaganza is a weak attempt at cashing in on the Easter holiday. The gameplay is uninspired, the aesthetic quality is low, and the entire game can be played through in just around an hour. While some of the younger players out there might be entertained by this on for a short while, the truth is that it’s less exciting than checking out your grandmother’s Fabergé egg collection.

All in all, G.G Series THROW OUT is a disappointing game that struggles to maintain player interest for more than a few minutes.

Looking for a Mario Kart style game for your Nintendo 3DS? Just buy Mario Kart.

Adventure in Vegas: Slot Machine isn't broken, unplayable or convoluted beyond reason - it just simply isn't even remotely fun to play.

Shifting World certainly contains the germ of a great idea but it execution leaves a lot to be desired. Uninspired level design, a useless map, poor responsiveness and inexplicable slowdown all come together to make Shifting World feel like an unfinished beta version released at retail. Shifting World had potential, but in its current state, you're not missing much by passing on it.

No amount of boost Firebrand Games tries to use, NASCAR Unleashed still reeks of the pits and you should stay far away from the stench.

If you already have a soft spot for Stubbs the Zombie, you’re going to have a perfectly fine experience here. But we wonder why on earth anyone would hold a candle for a game this obviously flawed. There’s some ambition here for sure, but something is always working against it. You can’t lose yourself in its mindlessness because your character is too weak. You can’t really formulate a decent strategy using your powers because you can only gain access to them through the rote melee combat. The jokes didn’t make us laugh. The premise is fun but the gameplay simply doesn’t do it justice. We’ll say it again – in order to make Stubbs the Zombie fun at all, you have to possess one of the firearm-wielding humans, thus transforming it from a load of baffling nothing to a pretty dull shooter. Please, no more resurrections for Stubbs. Let the man rest.

Can it be patched into some sort of better state? Honestly, it's hard to see how they can fix Batman: Arkham Knight to a satisfactory degree, and it feels like a step too far to have even included this final chapter in the collection for Switch. A great ending to an amazing trilogy, but just completely broken for now.

It's not as though Family Pirate Party was a spectacular failure, but rather that Aksys Games seems content with the package it has delivered.

Like its predecessor, Touch Battle Tank 3D 2 is a misfire.

While the very young may be entertained by this for awhile, they'll soon grow tired of going through the same motions repeatedly.

Hollow is an incredibly ugly game with the kind of plentiful technical issues that make it actively difficult to play. Those with a masochistic streak might derive some pleasure from its abrasiveness and its downbeat tone, but most Switch-owning horror fans would be much better served playing through Resident Evil Revelations and its sequel for the umpteenth time.

My Sims Camera’s saving grace is its relatively low price, and when you consider that Nintendo have charged the same for clock applications and calculators, My Sims Camera isn’t a terrible purchase. Saying that, unless you’re a fan of the series it’s perhaps best to steer well clear of this title.

While there may still be one episode of House, M.D. left, it's safe to say that it's not going to get much better at this stage. If you've enjoyed the previous episodes thus far, then the completely unchanged nature of this one won't let you down. Everyone else should stay clear from this game and spend your 800 Points on something that will actually entertain you for more than two hours.

Every puzzle can be finished by anybody relatively clever in about an hour, after which there's practically nothing else to do. Add to this the very cheap feel of the game and it's probably not something you'd want to spend points on.

Sit. Heel. Stay away.

If you’re a rabid Mega Man fan, have already played all the main games to death, and are desperate for something to fill that void, Metagal is maybe worth your five bucks. Otherwise, we’d encourage you to save your money and put it towards something that’s more worth your time.

Perhaps the PlayStation and Xbox versions of Rise of the Dark Spark are just as high-quality as their predecessors, but on Wii U, Rise of the Dark Spark is everything Nintendo fans have come to loathe about movie tie-ins and multiplatform gaming: a lazy port with missing features that treats Nintendo players like second-class citizens.

Very young children and penguin lovers who've never played the My Farm series before may find some enjoyment in this one, but unless you fall into one of those two categories, My Arctic Farm will be a chilly experience.

Super Robo Mouse doesn't deliver the goods. There are other challenging, twitchy action titles on the Wii U eShop that provide a stronger presentation and are more fun to play. Save yourself a broken window and lost controller and spend your money on something else.

The sheer repetitiveness of the experience kills any promise that the initial concept may hold.

Hollow 2 could - and should - have been a vast improvement on the first game. With poor visuals and gameplay that frankly feels like a chore to play, there’s little here to convince anyone looking for a new FPS on the Switch. There are small hints of a good game bubbling under the surface, and perhaps with more time and diligence this could have seen the light of day. As it stands, Hollow 2 fails to address the glaring issues from its predecessor and should be left well alone.

There will inevitably be some racing game fans that will find enough good in this title to warrant a purchase, but the broken gameplay, cheap AI, and dismal visuals will likely be more than enough to scare everyone else off.

Whilst the N64-era aesthetic will appeal to some, Macbat 64 just isn’t worth your time. Diploducus Games seem to be relying on little more than nostalgia as it’s selling point, but when it utterly fails to deliver on gameplay, we can’t recommend this to even the most die-hard platforming fans.

Players are better off using that two bucks to buy some actual gum. Watching candy spin down the machine dispenser chute is about as fun as Bubble Gum Popper.

Stunt Cars feels like it's trying to do too many things at once and gives the game a very erratic feeling at times, making you wonder exactly what the developers were ultimately going for when they put the game together.

The challenge is almost non-existent, most of your deaths will be control or camera related rather than from genuinely messing up, and a loop of an annoying 40-second song plays endlessly.

With no real sense of achievement in clearing randomly generated puzzles rather than a limited list, it's hard to recommend Crazy Sudoku over more rewarding experiences like Sudoku Sensei.

Takes a fun but simple mechanic and does very little to build an entertaining experience around it, providing far too little variation or progression to keep things interesting.

Heavy Fire: Black Arms 3D is some of the most unimaginative shooting gallery action that $5 can buy. Sure, there are quantifiable improvements over its WiiWare blueprint, but minor improvements to the skeleton do nothing for the heart. When challenged by a squad of inane mechanics, rote encounters, choppy framerates and soulless stages, the only way to win is to not play at all.

Diatomic is a game suffering from an ill-placed desire to stand apart from established popular shooters on the Wii. Whilst being a bit different is certainly admirable, choosing a rubbish control system is not the best way to do it.

Dream Alone tries so hard to capitalise on the inspiration from its formative peers that it forgets to carve out an identity of its own. The poor platforming engine, floaty controls, and frustrating level design leave far too much to be desired for this to be the game of anyone’s dreams.

Leave this train in the station.

You're probably getting a feeling we weren't especially impressed with Baila Latino, and you'd be correct. The horribly thought out UI, hard to follow dance instructions and uninspired gameplay modes unfortunately ruin the cheery atmosphere delivered by the upbeat soundtrack and surprisingly nice graphical presentation.