It’s a blissfully lighthearted and colourful game filled with charm, humour — I giggled aloud the first time I caught a black bass, described in-game as “the most metal of all fish” — and a much needed sense of normalcy that comes at a time when we could all use a little pick-me-up.

I won’t judge anyone who gives this one a whirl and simply decides its not their cup of tea. I suspect it’s a little akin to bungee-jumping, high-stakes investing, or alcohol — some folks just don’t have a taste for it. But for a handful of players looking to test themselves and the limits of their perseverance, Nioh 2 is probably going to be a nice slice of video game heaven.

I can’t deny that I had plenty of fun taking in this authentic new Star Wars story, but I get the sense that an extra six or twelve months of development could have given us a more polished and less derivative experience.

In the end, it might not be what we do in Death Stranding so much as the ideas that underlie the experience that make it so engaging, and make us so willing to overlook the elements that don’t quite work. Its grand — and timely — vision of how to unify a broken country; its take on killing only as a last resort; even its commentary on our culture’s growing reliance on having the world delivered to our doors. Kojima has given us lots to chew on.

In a medium overloaded with huge and hyper-violent experiences, it’s an absolute delight to encounter a game like Luigi’s Mansion 3, a small but painstakingly architected adventure that engages us with its creativity, innovation and individuality.

My recommendation: Play the campaign, then wait a few days before diving into multiplayer. This might be the best way to avoid cross-contamination and get the most out of these two deeply incongruent gaming experiences.

It might be the perfect remake.

The resounding theme of Gears 5 seems to be marrying old with new. There’s never any mistaking it for something other than a Gears game, thanks to its polished cover-based combat mechanics, gleefully gory action, and 4K, HDR-enhanced graphics that raise the bar of what we can expect from an Xbox One game. But it’s also trying to grow the Gears experience by focusing on new characters, altering the flow of the campaign, and adding daring new multiplayer modes.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses does a laudable job of bringing Intelligent Systems’ strategy series to Nintendo’s hybrid console, and I’m likely going to be playing for months to come. The ability to take command of three different houses, each with their own roster of students, adds plenty of replay value. Still, I’m going to keep my Game Boy Advance Micro loaded with a copy of Fire Emblem handy for those days when I want to feel what it’s like to really risk the deaths of beloved heroes in battle.

These levels are clearly designed to make us think about how to make our own levels rather than deliver the sort of flowing, satisfying play found in Mario’s best games. Some deliver lessons so short that they can literally be completed in just a few seconds.

A special kind of frustration swells up from playing a game that delivers pristine action mechanics set within a creatively vapid world.

Running across a horde of freaks in Days Gone is a helluva thing.

Tom Clancy’s The Division 2 has stuck its landing. Like other games of its ilk, it could do with learning a lesson or two from its competitors, but it has arrived playable, polished, and with so much stuff to do that most players probably won’t even reach its sizeable endgame — which, at this point, I’ve only read about — for weeks, if not longer. I’m not ready to give it a numbered score, but I do feel comfortable saying this is one loot shooter you can dive into with confidence on day one. [Review in Progress]

BioWare has created a sufficient foundation of story and play mechanics. Now it just needs to figure out a way to properly meld and symbiotically grow both elements.

Problem is, even the spectacular action grows tedious in short order thanks to lazy mission design. It seems nearly everything we do is based on simple math. Kill X number of bad guys to make them retreat. Blow up Y number of power sources to unlock a door. Destroy Z number of this type of facility in order to draw out the next boss. It’s about as basic as it gets.

This is Far Cry reduced to its core elements, both good and bad.

2019’s Resident Evil 2 captures the vibe of the original perfectly, thanks largely to outstanding production values...Its visual design stands toe-to-toe with any contemporary work, with fantastic character models, dramatic motion capture performances and extraordinarily detailed and refined environment design. Just about everything is worth looking at a second or third time, either to catch a potential game clue or simply to appreciate its beauty.

I can’t recommend Fallout 76 to more than a handful of people. A niche few will still be drawn to it, perhaps out of curiosity, a completionist’s need to devour all things Fallout, or, like me, a morbid desire to simulate life after the end of the world. For everyone else, hold onto the hope that Bethesda learns a lesson from this failed experiment.

In creating a scoundrel of our choosing, we might actually end up learning a little bit about ourselves.

It might lack the spit and polish seen in some other shooters, but Battlefield V delivers a visceral thrill unique to the series. Its adrenaline-filled, large-scale battles give rise to memorable moments simply not seen in other games, and these moments are augmented by the faithful Second World War setting. Those looking for an alternative to the twitch-driven combat of other popular shooters will find it here.

The game is a fascinating study of a conflicted man who knows right from wrong, but doesn't always allow this knowledge to inform his decisions...He's a classic antihero: A bad man seemingly headed for tragedy who we nonetheless like, root for, and want to see make better choices.

It looks great, plays beautifully, can be surprisingly challenging, and puts a fresh and fun spin on toys that come to life inside games.

It’s smaller, but it’s also undeniably bolder and more focused than any of its recent predecessors. And for a series known for its more is more philosophy, that’s no small feat.

The modes and minigames are quite good, but I think the need to use Joy-Cons rather than traditional controllers could prove a little frustrating for people who only have two Joy-Cons and prefer using a bigger gamepad.

Intimidatingly epic.

It incorporates elements of arcade driving, simulation racing, storytelling, exploration, discovery, collection and even role-playing in ways that few other racing franchises have even tried and none can match. If there's space for just one racing game on your shelf, Forza Horizon 4 is probably the one it ought to be.

On the subject of breathtaking scenery, Shadow of the Tomb Raider is a showcase for what an Xbox One can do.

Effortlessly yet cinematically swinging from the Battery through the Village and Central Park and up to Harlem is itself worth the price of admission. And now that Insomniac has all the mechanical fundamentals firmly in place, one can hope that the inevitable sequel will give this talented studio the confidence to take a few more risks and create a truly inimitable superhero game.