If you’re in the mood for something that will really test your strategy-building chops, Invisible, Inc. Console Edition should be somewhere near the top of your wish list. It’s a tantalizing combination of turn-based tactics and stealth, wrapped up in the shell of an unforgiving roguelike where every single decision matters.

KOI is a game that almost went somewhere. While it has a pleasing aesthetic, and peaceful ambiance, what’s on offer is woefully short. So the score earned here, for the first game developed in China and released for Western audiences on the PlayStation 4, should serve as a sign for any other developers in China to strive for something more.

Overall, this is one action-RPG fans won’t want to miss.

Grab your sword, prepare to enjoy that character creation menu, and get ready to spend as much time in the hospital as in a 3D dungeon labyrinth.

The game is polished and runs very smoothly. In my two complete playthroughs, I only noticed a couple of slowdowns that happen in massive battle scenarios, and an odd issue where crates can visually clip and disappear when you get close to them with the camera, but neither come close to being gamebreaking issues.

Nevertheless, this is title crafted with care and a gaming heritage that ought to tickle any player — the Ammoconda, for instance, shoots out bullets in the vein of Snake. Toss in co-op gameplay, excellent writing and a genuinely entertaining sense of humor that is often self-referential and never trite and you’re left facing a competent shmup that is familiar, yes, but damn entertaining.

This is a huge, gorgeous adventure by any reasonable standards, and while retro gamers will probably get a kick out of it more than anyone, it’s not content to rest on its laurels and exploit nostalgia. For every way it recalls classic titles like Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, Teddy doles out a few original ideas of its own. Excellent level design, a number of fun-to-use items and the creative “Musicom” system, which lets you communicate with NPCs using music, prove that LookAtMyGame’s wonderful little indie goes beyond its inspiration.

Dark Souls III is another punishingly hard game in an era of hand-holding that masochists will appreciate. While enemy AI is laughably dumb, those same enemies can take you down in no time flat. This is a game that forces you to learn its intricacies and quirks, and use them all to your advantage. Sporting a wonderful environment full of color, suffering, death, and a small amount of hope, fans can expect to sink several dozen, if not hundreds, of hours into the game, if they haven’t already.

The appeal might not last forever due to a lack of content and depth, especially in the game’s story mode, which doesn’t fully explore all the great wacky ideas it seems to have. Even so, this is a standout indie that will bring a lot of people back to the couch — both the literal one and the figurative one of their past.

Nights of Azure is a bit shorter than your average JRPG, but it jam-packs a ton of variety into its 20-25 hours of story — and if you stick around to collect everything afterward, you’ll have even more time to sink your teeth into the game’s various systems.

This is the game rally fans have been waiting for. DiRT Rally boasts a simple title that reflects its deceptively simple goal: to be the best rally game, or even the best racing game, released to date.

As usual, MLB The Show remains the series to beat in the baseball simulation category (not that there’s much competition). Unlike last year, which served mostly as a spit-shine to a venerable series, MLB The Show 16 features meaningful upgrades, including a few new modes to change up the way baseball is played.

Trillion: God of Destruction is a bold experiment by Compile Heart, but unfortunately, it’s one that doesn’t work all that well.

Candlelight is a lot of great and fun ideas that feel more disjointed than cohesive. Rather than teach the player or provide a challenge, it throws things at you as if to say “hey, check this cool thing out,” without utilizing that mechanic as a lesson to overcome future challenges, instead getting redundant by often falling back on very basic platforming in the later levels.

“Adorable” is about the biggest compliment I can give to Catlateral Damage as a whole. As a cat lover, I relished the chance to vicariously experience the destruction they cause, only to find that knocking things over ad nauseum wasn’t all I thought it would be. In any case, there are plenty of laughs and smiles to be had if you’re of a mind to enjoy this silly “Simulator” stuff, and creator Chris Chung has seen fit to stuff the game with a plethora of cutesy collectibles (including a surprise “Pawlatinum!”). Go in with modest expectations and a lighthearted attitude and you’ll be sure to have a good time.

Outside of some blocky textures, there’s nothing terribly wrong with Aegis of Earth — but there’s also nothing groundbreaking here, either.

Overflowing with buckets of self-aware humor and charm, and bringing the beloved point-and-click cartoon adventure into gorgeous HD, this should be a priority for both fans of the original game as well as anyone looking to play an important and influential part of gaming history.

A lot of thought and care went into this game, more so than expected at first glance. While République can be a little rough around the edges at times, its flaws are never so pronounced that it ruins the experience.

Salt and Sanctuary is fairly shameless in the way it replicates elements from games like Dark Souls and Bloodborne, but that’s not really a bad thing when you see how it all comes together as a polished and thoroughly enjoyable final product.

Senran Kagura Estival Versus sure has a lot of fanservice…and, unfortunately, not a whole lot else.

EA Canada went to great lengths to listen to their critics from the previous release and have made a bunch of much needed improvements to EA Sports UFC 2.

The Division is something special that’s never really been done before in games, and while I don’t expect perfection from such a bold experiment, I’m impressed with what they have been able to pull off so far.

Samurai Warriors 4 Empires is definitely an entry for hardcore Empires fans — with the same repetitive combat, and even reused graphics and audio assets, this release will not do much to convert anyone who isn’t already heavily invested in the series.

[There are] so many ways to take on this single mission, part of the fun will be seeing other players’ creative ways that they assassinate the targets. If you’ve ever wanted to play the part of a super agent in a large sandbox, this is as good as it gets. With a fairly robust content creation engine, and future missions promised throughout the coming year, it looks like Hitman will be the weapon of choice of stealth gamers for the foreseeable future.

There’s replayability in the different modes like Daily Drive, Infinity Drive, and Boss Rush for those that like to buckle down and test their skills to get top scores on leaderboards. There’s the campaign, which has an interesting story with different dialogue per character. There’s extra stuff to buy with credits (earned by your scores per level) like game altering fun features, or concept art and codex entries to further learn about the characters and enemies.

If you’re a huge fan of Nippon Ichi’s games, then this is the game for you. However, the same reasons that fans enjoy their games are the same reasons to avoid them if you’ve not liked their work up to this point. The story is absurd, bordering on nonsensical at times. The graphics are disappointing at best, laggy at worst. Combat has a unique multi-weapon approach, but still mostly boils down to mashing the Square button until you can occasionally use a special ability.

For those that miss the ’90s and its truly classic FPS titles, then Gunscape is going to be a real treat.

Ironcast has a fascinatingly complex base game, filled with myriad details to keep track of and a brilliant sense of strategy. Unfortunately, while serious tacticians will find themselves enjoying the nightmarish difficulty, anyone looking for a lighter challenge will be left in the dust, as permadeath and a merciless RNG slow progress to an unsatisfying crawl.