Ashen's slant on the Soulslike subgenre isn't revolutionary, but is a wonderful example of the familiar formula executed well. It's thoughtful, gorgeous, challenging and a dream to explore.

Capy’s tough-love approach and well-worn survival systems makes it harder to appreciate Below’s singular look and feel.

Parkitect, for all its quality, is content to be a fairground attraction: fun and mechanically sound, but not something you’re going to queue up hours for.

A obsessively tuned, finely crafted shooter that more than recreates the speed and pure joy of '90s classics.

Building the best decks will cost you, but Artifact is an intricate and rewarding card game.

Wonderfully weird and inventive. Katamari Damacy isn’t perfect, but it holds its own impressively well 14 years on.

While it lasts, Mutant Year Zero is a tense, absorbing and atmospheric new member of the XCOM family. I suppose wanting more of it is a good problem to have.

Imaginative, beautiful, and utterly strange, but you’ll need to really love the story to endure its idiosyncratic combat.

Still delivers the series' sandbox mayhem, but is underserved by some pretty dated systems.

A diet XCOM in a fascinating techno-cultist skin.

With less loot to grab, simplified platforming and easy puzzles, Darksiders 3 leans harder on its combat than previous games. And while Fury packs a punch, the wonky camera makes fights more frustrating that they should be. It doesn’t condemn Darksiders to oblivion, but it’s the lowlight of the series so far.

Riddled with bugs and bizarre mechanics, Underworld Ascendant is a bafflingly poor debut from OtherSide Entertainment.

Despite the considerable issues with the PC version, I've still had long stretches of fun with Fallout 76. I really wish PvP had more at stake then lost junk (or at least more willing participants) but the world retains a lot of what I love about Bethesda's previous RPGs with finely crafted environments, enjoyable weapons and crafting, and surprising little scraps of story to uncover and investigate.

The Walking Dead gets the zombies and the theme just right, but everything else is a mess.

As chaotic and exhilarating as Battlefield has always been. Just don’t expect a dramatic reinvention of the series.

Essentially more of its predecessor but with a more consistent quality of levels. Which is fine: its predecessor was great.

A mediocre detective game with predictable stealth and a surreal story that runs out of steam near the end.

It's a spectacular disaster, which feels like a rarity these days: there are lots of bad games, but for a game that was announced at E3 and made by a major publisher and studio to be this catastrophic is something.

Football Manager returns with a kitbag full of new and overhauled features. It's the best at what it does, and FM 19 is the best it's ever been.

Mostly delightful and sometimes punishing, Bad North is a fun alternative to more complex strategy games.

I listened to Wandersong's soundtrack while writing this review, and I've been happily jiggling my leg throughout.

An often spectacular space shooter that lacks the variety and depth to justify serious investment.

Exapunks is a hacking game that will make you feel like a genius or an idiot—sometimes both in quick succession.

A fighter with a great roster and exciting brawls, let down by an undercooked singleplayer component.

A beautifully constructed and powerfully atmospheric mystery that you really have to work to solve.

A captivating story and varied card battles ensure this light-touch RPG remains entertaining throughout its lengthy campaign.

A quality-made but unsurprising multiplayer FPS that offers refined versions of the current most popular modes and top-tier shooting.

Maintaining an almost impossible level of polish across its many modes, FIFA 19 might not eclipse PES 19 on the pitch, but it demonstrates its worth via The Journey.