Park Beyond will probably be pretty good one day, but it is not this day. Currently, it's a theme park building sim that doesn't include features that we'd consider to be a basic requirement of the genre, it's poorly balanced with systems that feel wildly misjudged, and it's also riddled with bugs and glitches that range from comical to pad-tossingly infuriating. Avoid it like Alton Towers during the school holidays.

Oddworld: Soulstorm presents itself well and shows a grand vision for the series, but as a modern game in 2021, it's just not where it needs to be. It can be extremely awkward to pull off even basic manoeuvres, some new features miss the mark, and certain levels made us want to quit altogether. Bugs exacerbate some of the gameplay frustrations with wonky AI, and ultimately the play experience can be frustratingly rigid. Fans will love this reimagining of a classic, and the franchise's unique charm shines through, but it's a tough sell for anyone coming to the series fresh.

Outside of its great use of the DualSense, RIDE 4 is a frustrating and disappointing experience. The lack of a meaningful tutorial, an aggravatingly difficult and boring campaign mode, the absence of local multiplayer, and the greedy credit system all equate to a game that feels like it was rushed for people hungry to get a next-gen motorcycle experience. RIDE 4 feels like a tech demo of the DualSense and nothing more. For an immersive racing experience on PS5, it is better to switch gears and look forward to Gran Turismo 7.

The game is different, odd, colourful, and often funny, but it feels like step backwards from its predecessors in more ways than one. And sadly playing as Battle Cat just doesn't seem to fix it.

While this won’t put off those who managed to overlook the shortcomings of the previous two games, those looking to sign up for the first time on this voyage may want to seriously consider if the pirate life is for them.

If trudging around a nice-looking hell is what you’re after then there may be a little merit in investing in Infernium, but for anyone after a decent gaming experience – be it horror, puzzle, or walking simulator – then this just doesn’t cut it.

The combat feels awkward; the game is buggy, and filled with abrupt cutscene transitions. At the end of the day, we’re left asking, ‘Who is this for?’ Children don’t care about Battlestar Galactica and The Thing, and adults won’t love the boring, simplistic gameplay loop.

Megalith is a run-of-the-mill MOBA that, despite its VR novelty, does nothing to distinguish itself. It’s cool to be placed in the shoes of larger-than-life titans, but the game’s single mode is middling at best. There’s still enjoyment to be had with its varied albeit limited cast of characters, but better MOBA’s have had difficulties maintaining a consistent player base mere months after release. If you add the VR requirement to that unfortunate fact, you’ll be hard-pressed to have the opportunity to play Megalith with someone in a month or two, but that’s assuming you’d even want to.

Dan & Gary Games has given the Metroidvania-RPG genre a fair crack of the whip with Super Daryl Deluxe, but its needless amount of monotonous side quests and its floaty, button-mashing combat negates the occasional humorous highlights. There is a good game in here somewhere, but plenty of fat trimming is in order before you can get to it.

With a shockingly brief single-player campaign, and an enjoyable but inconsistent multiplayer mode, your enjoyment of Call of Duty: Black Ops Declassified will depend almost entirely on your desire for a portable entry in Activision's blockbuster series. The title delivers a satisfactory first-person experience, but falls seriously short in substance. Sony Cambridge will, in all probability, better this effort in virtually every area with its forthcoming Killzone: Mercenary, which ultimately makes the shooter hard to recommend.

Tales of the Shire has a great premise, but will unfortunately leave most players wanting more. Its charms will potentially appeal to Hobbit fanatics, but with there being much better cosy games on the market, it's relying heavily on its Tolkienian license to distinguish itself.

As part of a larger, more cost-effective compilation, this would have been a decent addition – but instead you have a mind bogglingly expensive minigame, which only the most dedicated of wordsmiths should consider.

Get Even had a good base of neat ideas, but the execution of the overall product is so poor that many areas feel unfinished. Combat is quite simply a disaster, the graphics look like they’ve been taken from a 2008 PS3 game, and the soundtrack crushes your enjoyment far too often. The plot may well grab your attention, but the act of actually playing Get Even is nothing but a chore.

Vane is exhausting, ponderous, bewildering, endlessly frustrating, needlessly obtuse, narratively unsatisfying, mechanically clumsy, and technically shoddy, all shot through a camera so ill-equipped to deal with the rudimentary task of showing you what's happening on screen that you might as well pop a blindfold on and try using The Force.

MotionSports Adrenaline tries to bring a unique control interface to Move that can compare with what's found on Kinect, but while there's some potential to be had here, the overall experience is nowhere near as exciting as any of these sports are in real life.

A small range of unlockable augments do make things a touch more bearable, but Evan can barely activate a single skill before his implants start overheating and you're forced to stop what you're doing. We think Foreclosed is meant to be played like a run-and-gun, ability-popping shooter — but the execution misses the mark almost completely.

Initially it's quite a novel experience, despite controls feeling fairly clunky. You solve problems, earning bricks with which to create new buildings and slowly unlock new business types, which expand your options. However, after a while, it becomes more difficult to manage; if a building is really lacking appeal, a circular meter will begin to fill. If you let it fill up, the building's business will close, and will be essentially useless. The trouble comes when you have buildings that won't move, and more than one suffering this red circle. This is just an example really, but the point is that the gameplay becomes too complicated. After a while, it loses the fun factor, and becomes a frustrating balancing act with too many plates to spin.

While fervent aficionados of hidden object titles may well squeeze a drop of enjoyment out of its item collecting, most will be better off spending time hunting for a more worthwhile title to play.

With an intriguing core concept and solid presentation, SkyScrappers isn't an especially bad game – just a ludicrously overpriced one. If, by chance, you can afford to snag a copy, then you're in for a fun little tussle – just don't expect it to be one that'll keep on giving.

While the title does streamline some tasks, its controls are still counter-intuitive on the DualShock 4, adopting a rub-your-head-pat-your-belly approach that’s almost impossible to adapt to. There are lots of jobs to complete and different cities to unlock, but the visuals are tired – like an upscaled PlayStation 2 release – and the overall loop isn’t as addictive as its immediate peers.

At the end of the day, we're not entirely sure why R.B.I. Baseball has been revived. A full-on, retro styled game would perhaps be a reasonable alternative to MLB The Show, but this game ventures way too closely to Sony's series without having the budget to compete – and it makes a poor connection as a consequence. Bench this one, and get your baseball fix elsewhere.

Far Harbor should have be an easy sell to those who have picked the Commonwealth clean, but something terrible lurks within the fog. Serious framerate issues on PS4 make the expansion stink like the rot of a mutated fishman, killing any sense of adventure in what is otherwise an intruiging add-on.

The visual style is putrid, but there are some nice touches, like the inclusion of Mr. T as an avatar. Unfortunately, the gameplay generally feels unresponsive, and there’s really no room for skill beyond your ability to avoid blisters. This isn’t offensive by any means, but SEGA’s upcoming Olympics game is so much better that a visit to YO! Sushi is the closest it'll be getting to Japan.

Caveman Warriors is a half-decent platformer with a relatively unique setting, but is sadly underwhelming in most regards. It plays fairly well and offers some quick and easy fun in multiplayer, but some questionable presentation and frustrating enemy encounters let it down. With a vast pool of quality 2D platformers to choose from on PS4, this game doesn’t do enough to truly compete, and we fear it will subsequently be consigned to history.

Skydive: Proximity Flight is fun at first, but it plummets prompter than bungee jumper with the wrong length cord. With little other than a flimsy campaign mode to keep you occupied, the thrill of swooping through a never-ending sequence of coloured rings will soon outstay its welcome, and you’ll quickly be looking elsewhere to get your fix of extreme exhilaration.

Ultimately, Skydance’s Behemoth feels like it’s still in its beta phase. The enormity of its Behemoths works excellently in VR, but at almost every turn, the game bogs you down with bugs, repetitive gameplay loops, and underdeveloped level design. Sadly, it also lacks the same sense of place that the developer's previous work has, with its Forsaken Lands feeling painfully dull for the most part. There are moments when the magic shines through, but Behemoth is a massive missed opportunity overall.

Dark Rose Valkyrie offers opportunity for excitement, but ultimately fails to deliver. Weak concepts and a suite of poorly crafted gameplay systems sink an otherwise semi-interesting premise. This is a frustrating and slow slog all the way to the end.

There's fun to be had in either mode, but the game's ideas are squashed by some poor design. Combat is accessible but stiff; animations are likely to lead you into danger. Some random abilities are clearly better than others -- a shovel can dig up stat gems, meaning you can buff yourself as much as you want. Then there's the small matter of online matchmaking, which at the time of writing, doesn't work at all. Local play works, but this is a game where split-screen makes it much harder to play effectively. If ReadySet Heroes can be updated to overcome some of these problems, it has potential. There's imagination on show here, but right now, it's not something we can recommend.