Despite having my skin crawl at almost everything Mr. Voice said, his breaking the fourth wall to rope the player into his scheme creates an awful sense of complicity. Thankfully, this is directly balanced by the joy whenever you can lead Misfortune into any small act of rebellion against him. It’s a giddy combination of adult smugness at getting one over on a rival combined with childish conspiratorial whispering under a blanket fort.

£14 is a lot for two hours, and as I think I’ve perhaps covered above, it’s an abysmal game. The Welshest game I’ve ever played, but still abysmal. Great TV show for the most part, but one that keeps annoying your viewing pleasure by asking you to click on a dot. Graphics are amazing, though!

It’s a fun and original concept, stretched so thinly that it’s snapped back and pinged us in the eye. We deserve to be underwhelmed by it, and its creator should be lauded as a prodigy of the horror genre all the same.

A short-lived yet slowburn sci-fi drama about two engineers exploring a spooky, beautifully designed Martian base that's let down by a general lack of inspiration and especially, a dissatisfying plot.

Praetorians HD Remaster looks better than its predecessor, but honestly, still looks like a mobile game I’d find in a promoted tweet, alongside a vague imperative like “defend your empire!”.

On paper, Crucible was built for me. It’s a MOBA-infused hero shooter with an emphasis on mobility, with a diverse line-up and some interesting new ideas. In reality, I’d rather play any of the many games that grapple with just one of Crucible’s heads, and pulls it off far better. This hydra might be sprawling, but none of it looks healthy.

Not creepy or scary enough to quite work as a horror game, and without the sense of investigation that would make it work as a mystery, Perception falls between two posts. It’s premise is strong and the echolocation works well, but there simply isn’t enough to do in that old house, other than knock on the walls and listen to tales of times gone by. It’s a game that I wanted to like so much more than I do, partly because it’s so visually appealing and partly because Cassie is such a likeable character. She deserves a better story for herself rather than to be an observer of other peoples’ lives.

I am an Elite apologist, and have been since the earliest of accesses. When I praise the exploration and simminess I do so from the mindset of a guy who can put on a playlist of songs and indulge in the kind of spaceman play-pretend reserved for toddlers in cardboard boxes. And I would be an ingrate if I did not acknowledge the delivery of those spacelegs I have so often requested. But even I can only stomach so much bugginess and general wonk. Hopefully in the future Frontier will finish working on Odyssey's borked features. When that happens, I'm sure this will be the place to jump in for new players. But I can't make that recommendation now. Perhaps if you're desperate to step foot on a strange world (lord knows I have been) this fancy-yet-malfunctioning ferry might satisfy you. For everyone else, stick with the spaceship you've got.

I’m aware how dreadful the AI is throughout. I’m aware that despite its attempts to move things on it’s extremely derivative of a genre that’s wearing itself thin. But I want to recommend it anyway. It’s got this weird bubbling heart underneath it, a clear desire to be a great game despite not being able to reach it. It’s packed, varied, and so bloody enormous. It’s a real muddle, and a muddle for which I’ve developed a real soft spot.

Were it built with more skill, with a greater flow of movement and one hell of a graphical upgrade, and then given a dose of writing that wasn’t horribly reminiscent of its sister show, this could have been quite the thing. And yet, I enjoyed myself at moments, before wearying of its weaknesses toward the end. Fascinating that it came this close.

New Allies isn't for me, I'm afraid, and I couldn't speculate who it might be for either. But I don't want to end this review on a downer. Every creative biffs it once in a while. It's an unfortunate part of the process. So if you haven't already, I'd urge you to ignore this little stumble into the mud, and check out Blue Byte at their best by grabbing hold of the excellent Anno 1800.

Metal Gear Survive is the game I want it to be about…10% of the time. When there’s a rare section where stealth is the best approach. When I just manage to defeat the final wave on a protection mission, thanks to strategic placement of defences. When I’m thinking my way out of a tense situation, moments away from being overwhelmed – by zombies, rather than starvation or suffocation...Most of the time though, it’s a game that goes out of its way to be repetitive, frustrating and dull.

It made me so paranoid that I second guessed everything I thought about the game. It’s a shame that the ending, when it happens, is a bit abrupt, but even after it ended I couldn’t decide what had happened. It’s only a couple of hours long, but Old Gods Rising stewed me in my own juices so thoroughly that I woke up, confused, at about 2am, looked at my aforementioned boyfriend as he slept, and thought “he was definitely in on it with Maz… he looks too smug”. That’s got to be a well crafted story, hasn’t it? As long as you don’t mind not having all the answers at the end.

It reeks of development hell, as demoralising to play as I imagine it was to make. Yes, clearing a map of its icons can be readily distracting, and it fulfils this role at least. But that’s no longer nearly enough. Although I’ll say one thing for it, that shouldn’t be underappreciated. It’s fast travel is fast – it loads anywhere on the map incredibly quickly. Which would be a nice thought to end on, if I didn’t add: it’s just it’s not much fun when you get there.

Breached is just too small in every aspect to feel satisfying. I’d love to see this fleshed out into something with more ambition and more purpose.

This is a disaster, and the biggest surprise about it is that Ubisoft thought it worth releasing.

Perhaps its lack of ambition that’s the most frustrating aspect of Bedlam.

The satisfaction of The Last Worker, then, comes from roleplaying the sabotage of an exploitative major corporation, and if you crave the sense of catharsis that comes from sticking a finger up to the man, it may well fill a hole. But that’s not quite the same as marshalling the human capacity to serve up real food for thought, or prompt us to imagine a better future.

I should add that Foreclosed, from a performance perspective, is technically flawless. No stutters or hiccups. This is clearly a team that knows how to put a game together, even if the one they have didn’t hook me on any level. Then it ended after around five hours, just as it was threatening to get interesting. For those after a more engaging cyber-shooty game, I recommend reading Ed’s review of The Ascent. For cyber-story-puzzly fans, meanwhile, I recommend Mind Scanners. Foreclosed, for all its graphic novel aspirations, is paper-thin.

I know the above's been pretty bleak and it genuinely saddens me that Redfall is a disappointment. I simply can't believe it's by Arkane Austin, the same folks behind Prey, and by the same minds who helped bring Dishonored's Dunwall to life (Dishonored 2 remains one of my favourite games of all time). It's not that Redfall's absolutely diabolical, by any means. There are moments of wonder buried away in Redfall, where Arkane's penmanship and architectural mastery surface. I just know that Arkane are far, far better than what they've put out here, and there's a sense that what's arrived is a game that was pulled in so many directions it couldn't cope.

There’s still a certain compulsion to whacking out cards in an optimal order, figuring out the most impressive combos during performances and the most efficient routes through the meta-game camp upgrades. There are endearingly playful touches, too, like the way my strongman quivers when he’s nervous, or how Henry Ford rocked up to that show in a motorised carriage with a plush leather seat. Those joys fade fast, though, and you’re left with a slog to a finale you’ll just have to hope is no longer broken. I hate to say it, but there are better shows in town.

I'm not going to begrudge the Dannys, both Glover and Trejo, a pension. I just cannot fathom the decisions that went into making Crime Boss: Rockay City.

Mighty No. 9 is the best Mega Man game I’ve played in years, but all of the problems it has come from that too. Whether the gaming scene of 2016 needs a modern Mega Man is a more ambiguous question, perhaps answered by the old adage: be careful what you wish for. Or in this case, what you back.

The whole play experience seems set up to make you feel as if you’ve arrived just after the fun is over. Indeed, the game’s opening, where you wake up having missed the start of Reclamation Day, and must trudge to the vault’s exit alone through drifts of spent confetti, couldn’t set the tone more succinctly. The party’s over before it’s even started.

The Waylanders is an RPG that's endearing as it is janky. It has fun characters and looks stunning, so here's hoping that more patches can get rid of the (potentially game-breaking) bugs.

Horrible to control, horrible to listen to, really surprisingly ugly to look at, and and all-round mess, I’ve no desire to put myself through this.

I feel rotten, panning a game that’s delightful in some ways but frustrating where it matters.

Yume Nikki thrives on its own obtuseness and obscurity, even now it has been dragged into the light somewhat. Dream Diary really does feel like a second-hand retelling of half-remembered and ill-understood nightmares, and I found my mind wandering on imaginings of its own to get as far as possible from these dreary dreams.