Yooka-Laylee and the Impossible Lair is a work of great courage and respect for the platform genre. It is not revolutionary but manages to be a simple, but refined pastime made with all the trappings of the genre.

Warsaw cannot be defined as a mere clone of Darkest Dungeon, because it has its personality and a gameplay with a lot of combinations. Pixelated Milk has created a game that deserves a chance if you like the genre and/or if you want to learn more about what happened during the Uprising.

Neo Cab leaves the illusion of having met someone, human beings in virtual disguise. Chance Agency has hit the spot, simulating that humanity that wanted to praise.

The Bard’s Tale IV: Director’s Cut defines a further step forward for InXile Entertainment. The flaws are there, but it's worth playing as long as you like this genre.

Football Drama is an intriguing hybrid of genres, which prefers narration with the main character that holds hope and passion for all of us.

Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age – Definitive Edition succeeds in the difficult task of improving one of the most successful JRPGs of recent times with very little sacrifice on the purely graphical side.

Code Vein is a good dark anime-style action RPG. There are some flaws like the AI or various technical/graphic imperfections, but the articulated combat system, the versatile gameplay, the co-op and a plot that holds up to the end despite stereotypes and clichés manage to give to novices and experts 40+ hours of brutal souls like fun.

FIFA 20 does not change the formula that has led the EA series to excel in the football category for years. The content offer is wide, with a series of (interesting) variants that unfortunately risk falling into oblivion very soon, swallowed up by that bottomless well that meets the name of Ultimate Team. The changes to the game structure do not distort a tried and tested system that is quite spectacular and favors the attack on the defense. The impression is that a bit more courage would be needed to review some mechanics and get rid of some historical problems (for example the speed, both of the maneuvers and some players), even if on the whole gameplay is quite enjoyable.

The Surge 2 is frantic, punishing and moderately performing, to the point of entering in the ranking of the best soulslike. The flaws are there, but this new adventure will know how to get you right.

Contra Rogue Corps is the disappointing final chapter of a saga that has seen better days due to monotonous and trivial gameplay, along with a mediocre artistic direction.

Die Young is an escape simulator. Exploration is its strength along with the constant fear of being hunted down and not knowing where to hide. There are several technical problems (to be solved quickly) and some aspects of the gameplay are not perfectly calibrated, but if you can look past there is a good indie game.

Despite some uncertainty regarding the framerate The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening is an excellent remake, which enhances the original experience in every way and makes it modern thanks to a very valuable series of improvements.

Star Wars Pinball continues to bring credit to the developers of Zen Studios. If you want to experience the thrill of a pinball machine on the move, this title is really for you.

Green Hell is a wild and spectacular indie survival because there is so much to do and a lot to risk at every step. It has intriguing mechanics, solid gameplay and extreme realism that blend well with the deadly Amazonian context, forcing the player to engage himself to not dying every 15 minutes. Some minor bugs and technical issues cannot ruin one of the most exciting experiences on the survival scene.

Ambitions exceed the real resources of the young development studio, creating a title that never finds its balance.

It makes no sense to focus on minor flaws: Borderlands 3 is a great game, with charisma and great replayability, with four characters to look into, lots of sub-quests to deal with and a future DLC that could shine to the full.

Daymare: 1998 is Invader Studios' labor of love. It's not perfect by any means, but it can be a nice experience for every true fan of the genre that can stand its little missteps.

Rebel Cops offers several interesting ideas, in particular in how to approach the various situations, but the implementation of these is rarely on point. There are too many ups and downs in a game with a rather limited scope, without any degree of replayability and plagued by many problems. The inspired setting, although full of clichés, the excellent art direction and an engaging soundtrack can't counterbalance the many issues of this spin-off of This is the Police.

This remastered version preserves all the magic of Ni no Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch and delivers it to all PC and PS4 owners. A highly recommended experience.

Blasphemous is a Metroidvania with gorgeous pixelated graphics and simple, yet satisfying combat. Tedious sidequests and some minor design flaws hold back this 2D from shining even more.

NBA 2K20 remains a beautiful and satisfying title, but this time the loot box case heavily influences the final vote.

Konami scored an amazing goal with eFootball PES 2020, improving an already effective gameplay to make it almost perfect. Evolution has only partially involved the game modes, but the result is the best chapter in the series and a divine football simulation.

Daemon X Machina is the perfect meeting point between Armored Core and Zone of the Enders, offering a quick and exciting gaming system, without sacrificing a good dose of depth and customization.

GreedFall is a charming RPG with a beautiful setting and an engaging plot. It’s a bit rough on the edges, but it represents the pinnacle of Spiders’ productions so far, even if there’s still room for improvement.

WRC 8 has to deal with too many compromises, and it comes out smaller than its potential. It is neither insufficient nor broken but seems to evolve too slowly, without clear objectives.

Behind Children of Morta's pixel art, lies an excellent hack’n’slash which has little to envy to the pillars of the genre. The RPG aspect is well defined, and the growth of the characters is never trivial.

Creature in the Well is a hypnotic flipper ‘n’ slash with astonishing art design. A brilliant mix that explodes in pure arcade pleasure, despite its dungeon crawling being quite repetitive and little inspired.

Iceborne is more than just an expansion, improving in every way the already excellent gaming experience offered by a blockbuster like Monster Hunter World. Recommended for veterans and new players.

Gears 5 is the natural evolution of the historic TPS series and, with its solid gameplay and contents, is a step towards the future that so many fans wanted. Perhaps some of them wished for a more decisive revolution, but the developers' hard work can be seen and felt, and it can satisfy any kind of player.

Nothing new in this remaster of Final Fantasy VIII, but even after twenty years, the title remains a great game, to discover and play again.

With its horror setting, slow-paced gameplay and unforgiving permadeath Hunt: Showdown is one of the most interesting FPS of this generation. An easy game to recommend if you like the idea of hunting big bad monsters and don't mind the random server problems.

Blair Witch tries to do its job but can’t keep the player's attention highly enough throughout the entire experience. Despite that, Bloober Team put some interesting new mechanics on the plate, but the inspiration seems to get lost at the same rhythm with which Ellis's past tries to emerge.

Catherine: Full Body is a journey towards maturity that doesn’t take itself too seriously, but at the same time offers a good excuse for a bit of introspection. Neither a remaster nor a remake, this version manages to offer an even richer and more substantial experience than the original.

Man of Medan is an enjoyable adventure. The story, albeit a little bit predictable, is quite interesting with a good amount of branches and different endings. Some dialogues do not seem to take into account what happened before and there are a few technical problems, but overall it’s a good experience, and an interesting start for The Dark Pictures Anthology.

The story is splendid and so is the music, photography is always on point... but on the technical side we’re far from the sufficience. Despite all the flaws, I have become attached to Sean and Daniel and I want to "help" them reach the Mexican border.

Milestone hold the reins of driving pleasure, shaping the raw material as they wish, finally exploiting all the Unreal Engine has to offer.

Astral Chain is a detective story of the near future, a game with a crazy rhythm and direction. However it is around the gravitational field of its combat system that sensational qualities and unexpected flaws rotate. We’re still talking about a memorable, amusing, tachycardic experience, doped by a techno-aesthetic power that flexes Switch's muscles like only Nintendo managed to do. Despite certain flaws endemic to their work (unmanageable camera on all), PlatinumGames confirms itself as the king of stylish action games.

Remedy outdid itself by creating an impeccable narrative experience so intimately interconnected with a bewitching setting, raising the bar for anyone who wants to break into the action adventure genre.

SUPERHOT is the most innovative shooter of recent years, even on the Switch.

Remnant: From the Ashes is, in all honesty, a breath of fresh air. A solid and alluring co-op action RPG with a good lot of innovations. Don’t call it a “souls-like with guns”, it’s much more than that.

Oninaki is strange. At first you think you love him, then the feeling changes and in the end you almost can't stand it anymore. The truth is in the middle: it is a good game with some interesting mechanics and others much less well chosen.

A nice roguelike by Double Fine Productions, even if it’s a bit shallow.

Ion Fury is a love letter to 90s shooters, especially addressed to Duke Nukem 3D. A well written love letter, although it could have been more varied in some parts.

Are you ready to play the role of a badass secret agent? Despite some undeniable flaws, Twisted Pixel's game let you do it with style. Poor interactivity with the environment and mini-games can awaken abruptly the player from the feeling of "presence", but the variety of action and a fair degree of replayability make Defector a remarkable example of a virtual reality mix, balanced between adventure and action.

It’s easy to understand and justify the state of worship that Metal Wolf Chaos XD has managed to unintentionally create during the last fifteen years: an insane setting, a pungent satire aimed at the American society and a good technical realization, all at the service of an enjoyable third-person shooter. However, the latter ingredient didn’t age very well: Metal Wolf Chaos XD is quite easy, somewhat spartan, and the weapons fail to convey the right feedback.

Kill la Kill: IF has a lot of potential, unfortunately the contents are lacking, despite a visually stunning combat system.

Age of Wonders: Planetfall is a great 4X, but it lacks in accessibility.

Wolfenstein: Cyberpilot has a lot of potential and a lot of very good ideas, but it’s a very short experience and doesn’t have any replay value.

Wolfenstein: Youngblood could be wrongly categorized as a "more of the same", but the many new features make it an indispensable title for fans of the series, even if these new mechanics aren’t without flaws.

Fire Emblem: Three Houses succeeds in bringing a breath of fresh air into a saga that is perhaps too anchored to its own style, it does so by renewing the experience without losing sight of the deep strategic soul that has always been the trademark of Intelligent Systems’ works. The pace of the game may seem a bit diluted to the most fundamentalist fans, but the overall result is, in our opinion, absolutely convincing and worthy.

Night Call is thriller on the importance of verbal confrontation, adapting to one's interlocutor, creating fluid dialogues without necessarily complying with all their thoughts. A visual novel that is so classic, even predictable in its police nuance, but brilliant in the micro-situations we will experience in every journey.

The general idea behind Redeemer is solid, however its realization could have been better. Too bad for some the sparse technical issues.

There is a lot of fan service in Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3: The Dark Order and that’s a smart move from Koei Tecmo and Team Ninja. The game is tailored around the expectations of Marvel’s fans, with tons of characters and references to both movies and comics. Sure, cameras are bad and graphic is not so good, but superheroes lovers, the only target of the game, will not care about that too much.

Attack on Titan 2: Final Battle is basically a GOTY Edition of the game published a year ago, now with a couple a new modes and weapons.

Earth Defense Force 5 is yet another iteration of a series that embraces the repetitiveness of the action to make it its own main strength, thanks to an enviable amount of unlockable content and an immediate gameplay formula capable of entertaining for tens, if not hundreds of hours.

Blazing Chrome is the coin op you didn't play in the arcade, the cartridge that never came out for Neo Geo, the game you didn’t know you missed so much. A game with spasmodic, sadistic and punitive action, just as we liked in the 90s.

Stranger Things 3: The Game proved to be a much more mature and complex title than what could have been expected.

Dragon Quest Builders 2 is gigantic, enhancing the original game in every noteworthy aspect.

The new features included in Shadowbringer further refresh gameplay and storytelling of this remarkable MMORPG. Even with the typical weaknesses of the genre, which however requires several hours of repetitive activities such as FATE events and secondary quests to level up, Final Fantasy XIV still proves to be among the best massive multiplayer online experiences, especially together with a close-knit group of friends.

Finally someone who doesn't use pixel art for their nostalgia project! Unfortunately though, SolSeraph is too easy for hardcore players and its tower defense sections are sub-par in their genre. Good boss fights might have saved it, but no luck there.

Sea of Solitude is a game of suffering and altruism, of lights and shadows, of terrible errors and courageous teachings. The work of Cornelia Geppert and Jo-Mai Games is without any doubt a game worth playing.

Sometimes less is more, but other times it's just plain less. The streamlined city-builder mechanics keep the player focused on the zombie menace, but the few military units and lack of strategic combat make They Are Billions repetitive. Ah, the game is also tough as nails.

My Friend Pedro is a sequence of short, intense levels which morally oblige the exasperated spectacle, exciting like few other run ‘n’ guns. Then There is a whole outline of apathetic environmental puzzles, bizarre situations and an aesthetic between the chilling and the anonymous.

A game like Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night deserves a second opinion, and here it is on PS4: Iga gave Castlevania classics fans exactly what they wanted; we can find weaknesses, but the substance is a love letter to Symphony of the Night.

Despite its wonderful art direction, Super Neptunia RPG is obsolete, anachronistic and poor in content.

White Rabbit has done an excellent job with Death's Gambit, managing to create a good balance between soulslike and pixel art. Even if we are not in front of a perfect product, Death's Gambit is strongly recommended to all lovers of this kind of game.

Mini-Mech Mayhem takes an interesting basic idea and develops it into nothing, resulting in a shallow experience with very limited content. The mini-robots are the cutest, though.

Super Mario Maker 2 is a masterpiece. An exuberant and hilarious editor that makes the Wii U game look like a beta version. An irresistible tool used by Nintendo itself to create a brilliant story mode and an even more social chapter, perfect for sharing the experience, online or on the sofa.

Trials of Mana is amazing and, by itself, makes this compilation essential for all of those who have poured tears and hopes on the photos of the game during that torrid summer of 1995.

Even with its (few) flaws, The Sinking City manages to shine right where other games of the same genre have failed to impress. It doesn’t abuse jumpscare and useless boss fights, but instead Frogwares focused on a well thought out and engaging investigative system and on pleasant action parts, which naturally lead the player to discover the monstrosities of the abyss and to bitterly repent of their own curiosity.

Samurai Shodown is true to the series’ soul, like a modern version of Amakusa Kourin which lacks something to achieve perfection.

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is not a bad game but it is disappointing, a metroidvania all too anchored in the past that doesn't really add anything new to the genre that Koji Igarashi himself contributed. Beyond the bland execution and the continuous plagiarism of Symphony of the Night and Aria of Sorrow, Bloodstained is plagued by too many problems, especially in terms of combat and the hitbox system, preventing an enjoyable gaming experience. It hurts to say this, but there are too many better alternatives to Bloodstained on the market. We expected a lot more than this from Igarashi-san.

F1 2019 is exactly what it’s supposed to be: the best of its kind, at least until next year.

The game developed by Beenox is a highly optimized title for today's standards while maintaining all the charm of the original. Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled is colorful, virtuous and fun, offering an interesting level of difficulty that makes the whole operation not just a vehicle to recall memories, but also a challenging arcade game with all the trappings of the genre.

Judgment is another hit for a team that can’t seem to miss the target.

Five Nights at Freddy's VR: Help Wanted offers delicious bite size horror VR experiences, and the variety of the offer will make you overlook the series' known defects.

Contra Anniversary Collection offers a series of run and guns of undisputed historical value in a package that honestly could have offered so much more. Contra III: The Alien War and Hard Corps remain as beautiful as the sun, and the two arcade games still offer a steep but extremely rewarding challenge, however the superfluous presence of the Probotectors can only appear as a waste of space in the eyes of the true fans.

It’s a pleasure to play Octopath Traveler on PC as it is on the Nintendo Switch.

Tales of the Neon Sea makes the cyberpunk arguments of Blade Runner its own, embedding them in a valuable work in pixel art, and managing to give us back some of that sound old 1980s science fiction that, for one reason or another, continues to fascinate us. The gameplay, however, is plagued by repetitive mechanics and some puzzles suffer from a bad translation from Chinese into English.

To appreciate Conan Unconquered it is necessary to close both eyes on its limits and bear the bizarre design choices, but if it is true that perseverance pays, it is also true that one can get tired much earlier.

Sword Art Online: Hollow Realization Deluxe Edition is based on an engaging premise. However, this clumsy port of a title not exactly excellent fails to realize the potential that has fascinated the public.

Compared to the previous iteration of the franchise, MotoGP 19 improves everything, sometimes in a subtle way, others in a sensational way, becoming the new yardstick of the genre.

Vectronom should be in a museum, taking the place of one of those interactive, experimental installations, in front of which perceptions become fluid.

Void Bastards is based on a neat concept inspired by many things, especially System Shock 2. Too bad it's a bit too monotonous.

The Elder Scrolls Online’s newest expansion give us new information about the lore of the franchise, while introducing an intriguing new class (the Necromancer) and a lot of endgame content.

Little Friends: Dogs & Cats is a bit of a wasted opportunity. Too few content, too little gameplay, for a game that could have become the new Nintendogs.

As a cinematic experience, Observation can easily be considered one of the highest points of the genre. Cool photography and a great reproduction of the space environment supports a solid and unnerving narrative. On the gameplay side, however, something did not work to the end and at least part of the screams I left to wander in space were not one of terror, but of frustration.

It doesn’t really introduce anything new to the genre, yet Warhammer: Chaosbane is a nice hack & slash ARPG with a deep and engaging endgame.

Assetto Corsa Competizione sets a new standard in the racing simulators genre. The driving feeling is unparalleled, amusing and passionate in its complexity, while the spasmodic search for detail exudes passion.

With a longevity of about five hours, Home Sweet Home is to be described as nothing more than a luna park attraction, but keep in mind that it fails to introduce noteworthy novelties to the genre, appearing at times like a blatantly incomplete game.

Gato Roboto is an adorable metroidvania that never lowers its rhythm: the controls are perfect and the feeling is the right one, ideal for alternating shootings, platforming and exploration.

The gameplay of Pathologic 2 is very barebones in favor of a story pretty difficult to understand. It’s a very complex game, barely passable on the technical front, but with a great atmosphere.

Gunlord X is an absolutely excellent Turrican clone, recreated with love on a new platform without laziness and with the desire to offer the best possible experience.

Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons for Nintendo Switch is a decent conversion of a game that may not have aged very well, surpassed on several fronts by many other exponents of the same genre.

Super Cane Magic ZERO is the perfect example of how to best nurture the creativity, style and humor of a cartoonist without making a product destined exclusively to the fans. This new game by Studio Evil manages to be modern and fresh gameplay-wise without sparing tributes and citations to the gaming and pop universe.

Blood & Truth is the macho simulator par excellence. The tracking is reliable and accurate, while the abundance of crazy scenes guarantees an explosive and varied adventure, at least while it lasts. It has a serious need for extra content, but its heart is in the right place, in the midst of a thousand explosions and a shower of bullets and broken glass.

Everybody’s Golf VR mixes the arcade soul of the series with a pseudo-simulative approach of the gameplay.

More than a “more of the same”, Shakedown Hawaii improves almost everything it takes from Retro City Rampage and introduces new mechanics. Not everything works as it should, but it never lacks ambition. Moreover, his 16bit style is super cool.