Partisans 1941 is, for all its problems, a wonderful game for fans of the genre. The atmosphere is fascinating and the gameplay is as fun as it is hard to learn. If it wasn’t for the lame story and some problems with the enemy’s A.I., we’d recommend it even more. Let’s hope for some patches.

Star Wars: Squadrons is a probably unwanted but successful mixture of the classic X-Wing and Rogue Squadron series. It combines a fantastic Star Wars atmosphere with an entertaining campaign, and convinces with an arcade gameplay feel, despite surprisingly complex controls. A higher rating is only prevented by an underwhelming multiplayer mode.

As a longtime fan, I like the optimization options that Fire Emblem Engage allows for.

Telltales new series kicks off with style, offering Batman fans two hours of interesting choices, action and a promising story. Don't expect decent puzzles or exploration though: Aside from dialogue and rapid quick time events, there is not much to do.

MIO: Memories in Orbit is a challenging Metroidvania with a strong atmosphere, which is likely to appeal especially to fans of the genre.

The coming-of-age adventure in the style of Life is Strange, with great characters, dialog and a mystical storyline, lets up a little at the end, but offers a great experience overall. I had a lot of fun with Swan, Nora, Kat and Autumn. I also enjoyed taking a nostalgia trip back to the 90s through the girls and reminiscing about my own youth.

Quotation forthcoming.

Sifu is an incredibly frustrating, yet amazingly rewarding experience. Those who seek an unforgiving but mostly fair challenge will find something truly special with this Kung-Fu-game. It’s visuals and style are fantastic, as well as it’s stunning soundtrack! Yet, those who are easily annoyed by difficult games should be aware, that Sifu does not offer any easy-modes or level-checkpoints. It is uncompromising to the bone.

The First Berserker: Khazan is a fantastic game for all Soulslike fans who appreciate challenging boss battles. Sekiro fans, in particular, should definitely check it out.

Eerily beautiful, but after some time the horror feeling of the predecessor goes missing. […] The setting in the pampa of Arizona is fitting and the atmosphere works very well, but overall I prefer the previous game.

Hell is Us impresses with its symbolism, its dark world, and its free exploration, but it still has a lot of room for improvement in terms of optimization and enemy design.

Despite its refreshing setting and sharp dialogue, this is an almost retro-infused sci-fi adventure that relies heavily on mechanics established by Bethesdas Fallout games, while never reaching their depth nor scope. It's accessible, witty and great fun if you keep your expectations in check, even though the main story and some long-term decisions don't quite live up to their full potential.

Neocore hasn't changed the formula much since the surprise hit that was the first The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing and why should they? Part 2 offers loads of low-priced fun for the hack 'n' slash fan who has (played) everything else. It doesn't offer the addicting loot runs of Torchlight 2 or Diablo 3, but Van Helsing 2 is a well crafted monster slaying experience in its own right with some fun ideas like the tower defense bits and the chimera pet.

A well crafted game with a good sense of humor, excellent (German) voice acting and nifty puzzle design. Despite its weak presentation and insignificant story Ceville stands out as one of the better traditional adventure games in years.

The cult role-playing game returns with sleek graphics and meaningful improvements – a treat for fans! The technology could be better, though.

Rebel Galaxy Outlaw is like the little, cool brother of Elite Dangerous. It’s not as huge and doesn’t offer the variety in terms of ships or planets compared to it’s older sibling, but at the end of the day, Outlaw is just plain fun.

The Dungeons of Naheulbeuk is, before all else, just a lot of fun, both regarding the gameplay and its humour. It is made for people who love pen & paper, and it does this job quite well. There are some hiccups, however, especially concerning the controls. But this doesn’t keep the game from being a success.

Power Wash Simulator is already the most satisfying game of the year. To clean cars, motorcycles, playgrounds or even the Mars Rover has never been so great. And the best thing is, we can do this together with five friends in a coop session.

Trine 4: The Nightmare Prince, despite being one of the easier puzzle games and not featuring any story depth, provides a vast amount of different riddles, a beautiful fairytale-like world and lots of fun, especially when playing the multiplayer mode.

Planet Zoo was one of the games I was most looking forward to this year. With several preview events, I just had a good feeling that Frontier Developments was playing to the strengths of Planet Coaster and Jurassic World: Evolution, giving us the best build up simulation in recent times. I wasn't disappointed either, although in my opinion there is still room for improvement. The first campaign missions explain a lot of details, but how I now sensibly design a zoo from start to finish was not explained to me. Also the user interface and the handling could be a little more clear and handy - draping certain items in the enclosures really cost me my nerves! It's also a pity that the franchise mode is currently struggling with server problems and so the heart of the game doesn't work yet.

Classic Mario Party with interesting twists and fun new modes. Jamboree TV on the Switch 2 brings even more entertaining new features, though the base game doesn't benefit from the higher resolution.

A finely crafted game that knows what it wants to be and succeeds on almost every level. The fluid action, beautiful art style and engaging story will keep you hooked for at least 15 hours, but once the final boss is done, there aren’t many reasons to return. Enjoy it while it lasts.

A well-made nostalgia-trip with all the strengths and weaknesses of the original games.

The Great Circle is not your average action-adventure game, but a true Indy experience through and through. It does have its shortcomings and the story sometimes goes a little off the rails, but none of that should stop true fans of enjoying the hell out ouf it.

Machine Games treats the iconic character with love and care, making it by far the best Indiana Jones game since Fate of Atlantis.

High replay value, enormous depth and massive demands: Total War: Pharaoh is strategy food for advanced players. The game requires a certain amount of training, but it also rewards it with an overall motivating gaming experience.

The first episode of Daedalics The Pillars of the Earth is beautifully designed, has a great presentation but slightly too little gameplay. However it gives you a thrilling and interesting story to enjoy.

Even though the original game released back in 2017, Resident Evil 7 Biohazard looks and runs very well on Nintendo Switch 2.

A perfect cast, strong performances and a thoughtful script offer an intimate, almost voyeuristic insight into the personal lifes of these characters, who really grew on me the longer I played. In terms of gameplay, there are ups and downs, some of which could have been avoided. I understand the directors intention behind some decisions, but I wished the game had more options in terms of video control or perhaps even a post-credit-mode that lets me combine two videos into one cohesive dialogue. But as long as you know what you are getting into, this movie-in-a-game-hybrid can be a fascinating experience, even when the overarching storyline turns out to be a surprisingly simple affair.

Rebel Galaxy scratches the Freelancer itch that went untreated for over a decade.

Resident Evil Village for Nintendo Switch 2 is a well-made port, although it's lacking the exclusive mouse feature which we wish they included.

The 99-player highspeed-races are a fun experience but you can't call it a traditional battle-royale game. With a great ranking system and its nostalgic tracks and fun modes for added variety F-Zero 99 shows what the series always was about while still being unique on its own.

The new Farming Simulator gives fans exactly what the want.

The survival game Stranded: Alien Dawn from Haemimont Games is a great mix between The Sims and Rimworld. We enjoyed the long term satisfying campaigns and had a lot of fun while building a new civilization on a foreign planet.

Nintendo Switch Sports has a few flaws, but overall it’s just as fun as the version we probably all played when we were younger. Especially soccer was a nice addition while badminton is rather disappointing.

Quotation forthcoming.

Despite its highly repetitive nature, I had a great time with Dragon Commander. It may lack a good story, but interesting characters, carefully written dialogue and a smart way to handle some pretty sensitive issues more than make up for that. As a strategy game, Dragon Commander is not as good as it could be. The overall experience however feels fresh and memorable.

Both accessible and merciless at the same time, this is by far one the best roguelike deckbuilders since Slay the Spire.

LEGO Bricktales feels like a short vacation to your childhood if you grew up with games like LEGO Island. The cubicle worlds look stunning, and the gameplay offers a nice and balanced mix between exploration and building. However, the game is a bit too short and too easy and would benefit from a full sandbox mode.

Echoes of Wisdom introduces refreshing ideas but it can't keep up the initial excitement.

This remaster collection turns out to be a lovingly restored new edition, with which strategy fans of the old school in particular should be happy. One can argue about the dusty gameplay and some lack of comfort, but these are concessions to the community that wished for "their" old C&C.

With a charming cast of undead pirates, lots of style and all the bells and whistles from Desperados 3, this is another excellent addition to Mimimis considerable catalogue. The unusual freedom of choice however proves to be a double-edged sword: It's fun to pick a crew and play the missions as we see fit, but it also takes away some of the challenge we loved in the previous games.

Quotation forthcoming.

The game does not shine with its idea or the technical implementation, but creates an atmosphere that lets us forget everyday life for a few hours.

Battle Worlds: Kronos offers a strategically tough and challenging experience. The turn-based tactical battles are demanding but also motivate to test out new strategies. Although the user-interface could be a bit more polished and some battles can be quite frustrating if you realize that your strategy doesn't work out, next to no other game will offer such deep tactical possibilities.

Metro Exodus definitely has its flaws and the new gameplay formula still requires a bit of rework. Nonetheless, the game offers a unique shooter experience as well as a satisfying conclusion to Artyom’s journey.

Like its predecessor, Deliver us Mars lives from its great atmosphere, but this time it also complements it with a well-staged narrative. The clearly more personal story, in which a family's discord is also symbolic for humanity's fight for survival and their different views on the future, fascinates from the first minute on. It doesn't even bother that it doesn't rumble and bang at every corner.

Although The Surge has many similarities with its spiritual predecessor Lords of the Fallen, I strongly prefer this Sci-Fi-Horror-Trip. This is not only due to the strong combat system and its bloody finishers, but also due to the crafting, which is smartly interlocked with the fighting and the simplistic character development.

Lost Ark finally made its way to the west and – despite the unfulfilling PvE content – it proved a successful third attempt for developer Smilegate and Amazon. It is not a perfect game. Some content is still missing, the story is mediocre and classes are bafflingly gender locked. However, from the 15 distinct and intriguing playable classes to the beautiful world design, there is much fun to be had with the game. Lost Ark is already brimming with content and with even more to look forward to the world of Arkesia has a bright future ahead of itself.

As an avid fan of the Overcooked series I am more than happy to see some additional representatives of the Couch coop genre – especially if they are as well-made as Moving Out.

Mimimi Games might be gone, but their legacy lives on: Sumerian Six is a finely crafted stealth tactics game that every fan of Commandos or Shadow Tactics will enjoy.

Emotional, varied and sometimes wonderfully crazy: Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth is a real action role-playing monster that offers exactly the virtues that series fans expect.

Agatha Christie – Death on the Nile is a successful adaptation of the classic novel from the 1930s. It respects the source material without being an exact copy while also adding some fun twists, such as a time leap into the 70s. Definitely worth a try for fans of detective adventures, at least if one doesn't mind the minor technical issues.

Company of Heroes 3 is a well-done real-time strategy game, with great mission design, intense battles, diverse strategic options and a large scope, but it could have dared a bit more modernization in some places.

In the port for Nintendo Switch, Gothic 2 shows its best side and offers one of the best opportunities to catch up on the role-playing classic.

Sand Land is a nice anime adaptation and an action JRPG for those who have difficulty with the genre or want to get started. Each character we meet has their own story to explore, and there's always something to do thanks to numerous side quests. At the same time, the tasks are not very demanding and the stories are quite flat. Stress only occurs in the boss fights.

The F1 Manager 2023 is better than the last years prequel, but some more management options are still missing. The game has lots of potential, although for example we still can’t create our own team. Overall the game from Frontier Developments makes a step forward in the right direction.

A great remaster of an ingenious classic that captures the charm of the original very well and, thanks to variable difficulty settings, shouldn't overwhelm or bore anyone too much.

Larian Studios have managed to create good quests that make fun because of all the odd characters and the great self-depreciating humor. But at the same time the game lacks comfort, so that the player has to have a lot of patience in order to see the end.

With Beyond a Steel Sky, Revolution Software, the team around Charles Cecil and comic book legend Dave Gibbons, has successfully transported the fascination of classic adventure games into modern days. Clever ideas, charming characters and witty dialogues make the sequel to „Beneath a Steel Sky“, which was released 26 years earlier, a must-play for every adventure fan. Hopefully we don’t need to wait that long for our next visit to Union City. It would be a shame.

Adventures can be so cool: The Drifter is an exciting pulp thriller with a great atmosphere.

Look closely, Konami, for this is how a Contra game should look and play like! Blazing Chrome doesn’t win a price für originality, nor does it reinvent the action genre. It’s just a damn well-made game.

One of the better rhythm games, which also offers good long-term motivation. And that for little money.

Endling doesn’t leave us with a positive feeling, but weakness. The story is depressing and at the same time full of hope. If you like short indie games with a serious ark and beautiful animations, Endling is for you.

Don't get us wrong, Test Drive Unlimited 2 is a very decent game. With a massive island to explore, beautiful cars and scenery that can take your breath away, it's an absolute eye candy. Still, almost every aspect of the game can use some polish. [Mar 2011, p.99]

The LEGO Harry Potter Collection offers a nice graphical touch up to the well-beloved Lego classics. Although the changes aren’t substantial enough to warrant a different rating, the games themselves remain classics for good reason.

Birdigo is a well-designed, entertaining mix of Wordle and roguelike games such as Balatro and Slay the Spire. While not mechanically extensive, it's engaging to play and comes with a charming birds' migration theme.

Sudden Strike 4 has become a solid RTS, which seems to shine with tactical depth for quite a while.

Doki Doki Literature Club Plus! is a really smart horror game in disguise. The visual novel plays with your expectations, your knowledge of video games and the standards of the genre. Every player who loves well written stories should give the game a chance, although it starts really slow and you have to click through a lot of very boring dialogue before it really begins. But don’t have any expectations for the additional content in the Plus! version. The prequel chapters are pretty dull and add nothing interesting to the main story.

A sweet adventure in a lovingly designed world. Apart from the inaccurate controls, it's a real fun game.

Six Inches Under is just as good as the original Supraland, even though it's a little smaller in scope and there are only a few new mechanics. Combat is toned down significantly this time, which leaves even more room for fun exploration and cleverly designed puzzles that will keep you hooked for up to 20 hours.

I'm a huge fan of Hexfeld strategy games. Whether it's the Panzer General series, Panzer Tactics HD, or much more complex titles like Strategic Command and Gary Grigsby's War in the West, I've spent several hours of my life playing turn-based strategy games with WWII setting. I liked the Panzer General series and also Panzer Corps the best, because they were quite complex, but with a simple user interface and catchy rules. A similar case is Unity of Command 2, where the logistics gives the usual hex battle an interesting spin.

Nikoderiko: The Magical World offers an excellent Jump&Run experience. You can clearly see the influences of other platforming legends, but the game manages to offer enough personality to become a strong platformer in its own right. We can recommend it to anyone who craves a fun and lighthearted gaming adventure.

The design of the game may seem strange at first glance, but it's ultimately a refreshing idea and makes the game original and worthwhile.

A good game will always be a good game and even better with a huge graphic update. Broken Sword: Shadow of the Templars – Reforged is a great remake. Only the revised audio sounds a bit tinny and some content from the Director’s Cut is missing.

Resident Evil: Village is a really weird game. The setting is awesome and it starts off with great atmosphere, but after the first area the game becomes less and less scary. The premise of the game is really interesting, but the story gets dumber and dumber and turns out to be unintentionally funny. At first Village really is the survival horror, fans of the older RE games love, but it becomes almost Call of Duty in the end. Village is not a bad game. In fact I had a lot of fun playing it. It is a bit disappointing since the setting had so much potential for a really scary old school survival horror Resident Evil though. But if you’re looking for a shooter with horror elements, Village is a dumb but super entertaining blockbuster.

Quotation forthcoming.

You enjoy slower RPGs like the Gothic series, love exploration and have a taste for gorgeous pixel art? Boy, are you in for a treat.

Drova delivers a 40-hour adventure with tons of secrets to uncover, monsters to fight and places to explore. It's another indie triumph and worth every cent of its low asking price.

Fire Emblem Warriors: Three Hopes feels like a classic warriors game but still requires strategic thinking. It provides little to no innovation regarding the core gameplay, instead it offers quite a few aspects we‘ve already seen and loved in Three Houses. If you miss the characters and want to enjoy some fast-paced combat, it’s worth checking out.

Sometimes Death’s Door is pretty crisp, especially a passage in the Ceramic Palace really made me curse. But I couldn't stop, I wanted to move on. The game did a really good job of keeping me going despite all the setbacks. One flaw: even before the test, I played a preview version of Death's Door, which ran very smoothly. That's why I'm pretty amazed that performance drops occur in the full version. For me the adventure is still an indie highlight and I wait patiently for patches so that Death's Door runs as smoothly as before.

Sonic Racing: CrossWorlds impresses above all with its diverse cross-world mechanics. However, some of the races are somewhat overly complex and require some getting used to. Still, it's a fun racer.

Despite the small problems, Luigi's Mansion 2 HD gives you a good opportunity to catch up on the 3DS classic on the Switch. If you've already played the original, you shouldn't expect any changes from the remaster other than a graphic polish and adjusted controls.

Little Nightmares 2 is a really well done game, and once we're done typing this test, we'll keep our fingers crossed for a third part.

The setting is a good fit for turn-based tactics and the bite-sized approach really works in its favor. Just don't expect a game that will last you for weeks, and once it's finished, you have seen pretty much everything it has to offer. However, if you are looking for an accessible tactics game that is fun to play and doesn't overstay its welcome, Showgunners is an easy recommendation.

The small innovations, the visual upgrade and the new Magolor epilogue make it more than just a nice remaster that really comes into its own in co-op mode.

There is always something fascinating about space. If it's done as well as in Chorus, I would love to just fly around and explore the star systems. But in a shooter, of course, the fights are in the foreground and luckily they work flawlessly.

Grid, the soft reboot of the brand, is like the original game a fun arcade racer with a few easy-to-use simulation approaches. The circumference is minimal, but on track Grid is very convincing and challenging.

A game for F1 fans and beginners: With a good handling model and a lot of content, Codemasters brings the success back to the Formula 1 franchise.

Star Wars Jedi: Survivor presents itself as a successful and sensible further development of its predecessor. The technical shortcomings are a pity, but should not distract from the otherwise good overall impression.

Roots of Pacha is a cozy farming and life simulation at the dawn of humanity. There are cute animals, great NPCs and a lot to explore, discover or develop. The successful Stone Age simulation, with only a few stumbling blocks, makes a Stardew Valley heart beat faster.

Codemasters delivers with F1 25 a good racing game for fans and beginners. With Braking Point 3, the revised MyTeam mode and a lot more, there is plenty of content for multiple hours of fun.

Untitled Goose Game is both for people who like creative and weird ideas and people who are into stealth. Sadly, the whole spectacle is over way too quickly. But in the two hours it takes to play through Untitled Goose Game, you’ll have a blast. Awaken your inner goose.

The Minecraft saga continues: Minecraft Legends is a beautiful strategy game, made for beginners of the genre. The campaign and the versus-mode are fun to play. If there wouldn’t be some bigger pathfinding issues with our A.I. compagnons and with more options of commands, the game would be even better.

A worthy successor to The Settlers in spirit, which also brings its own ideas to the table.

Quotation forthcoming.

Can't Drive This is an enjoyable and kind of innovative couch-coop racing game, that's played best with friends or family side by side, but it lacks singleplayer content and a four player online mode. But both are likely to be added with updates in the future.

Bear With Me is a fantastic adventure with a fascinating Noir-setting and a huge portion of charm and creativity. Especially its narrative power impresses easily.