It can get a bit samey (the gameplay loop is basically the same, season to season), but Super Farming Boy has such charm that you won’t mind the grind too much.

Ultimately, the only real reason to buy Fit and Fry: Organized Chef is the same as the first game: a massive Gamerscore boost for very little effort; there is almost no discernible difference between the two games, just slightly tweaked and repackaged.

CASSETTE BOY has warts, but press LB and RB enough and they might just look like chiselled cheekbones. We forgave its issues because it’s just so gung-ho in its inventiveness.

There’s heart, there's humour, and the overall aesthetic and vibe bring back a sense of nostalgia that is impossible to beat. I just wish UNBEATABLE was smoother.

Legends BMX delivers exactly what it promises: fast, flowing BMX freestyle action in a compact, arcade-friendly package.

Dreamscapes - Nightmare’s Heir is not your average hidden object game. Some of its qualities are intended, like a joyful dreamworld, and some of them are unintended, like acting so corny that it gives off a pungent whiff. Sure, it could have done with some spit, polish and sophistication, but where’s the fun in that? Dreamscapes - Nightmare’s Heir is at its best when it’s ramshackle.

EBOLA VILLAGE is a good little homage to those 90s survival horrors of the past; intriguing and gory enough to fit right in.

We often say that games aren’t for everyone, but Egging On, most emphatically, is not for everyone. It demands that you enjoy wrestling a borderline-uncontrollable main character through simplistic hoops. It needs you to feel the glow of reaching heights you have never reached before, only to tumble to your doom afterwards.

Hextreme Void comes across as a self-inflicted dare: to make a game with the least amount of player involvement possible. Hextreme Void is the result, and while it manages to complete the dare, we were a bit nonplussed about why it bothered. So, we scooped up our balls and headed off to play BALL x PIT.

Rage Swarm feels like it got half-way through a successful port from mobile to console. While there are no microtransactions, the grindy free-to-play identity is still there. With some more surgery, extracting the tedium, this sporadically fun auto-battler would have been less, um, enraging.

Garten of Banban 8 misses the target by some way. A puzzle horror game this is not, with activities stretching the definition of puzzle, and an adventure devoid of scares entirely. It’s a big step backwards for a series; one that was improving incrementally with each release.

When S.P.E.A.R. gets even remotely difficult, it can feel like you’re not just fighting giant, flying eye bosses: you’re fighting the engine, too.

If you’re in the market for a Telltale-like episode of narrative goodness, then take a bow, SOPA - Tale of the Stolen Potato. This is not long, difficult or ambitious, but it never fails to be charming.

Delivery of Us is one of the better sliding puzzle games we’ve played, but it’s also one of the shortest. It’s very much a small parcel rather than a large letter. You might need to ration yourself a few levels a day to spread the experience out a wee bit.

We’re a little enamored with Just a Little Purr Suit. It’s not got a big budget sheen, or even a mid-budget sheen. What it does have is a brilliant concept and some clever, tightly wound puzzles that will require deep thought to complete.

Cookie’s Trails may be a fluffy, feel-good hour, but it verges on mindless and leaves no permanent mark on the memory.

A lack of challenge means that Sokobear Winter doesn’t quite stand out as much as it could have done. Sokobear Winter is middle-of-the-pack, when it had so much more promise.

Any game that lets you pull on your Velociraptor suit should, at the very least, be thrilling. Somehow, Raptor Revenge can’t even manage that. It takes one of the coolest animals to have ever lived, files off their claws and makes them a bin collector. That’s where Evolution takes you, I suppose.

If Cats Around Us: Giant Cat can find a solution for its biggest failing - that it’s kitten-sized, even for the price - then it might move closer to the top of its cat-egory.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 is one of the best entries in the Yakuza franchise, so any chance to play it again is a welcome one. This Xbox Series X|S version may not feature as many upgrades as the other two recently re-released Yakuza games, but it doesn’t need to. It’s visually a step-up from those and the pacing is a lot better too.

Apartment No 129 is a tricky game to review because, essentially, there are a lot of broken elements, and the control system is mayhem at times. But if you can somehow get around that, there is a reasonably decent, creepy game underneath.

Brews & Bastards is both good and bad. The actual shooting action is hugely enjoyable, but the platforming aspects and - frankly, stupid - multiplayer system weigh the scale down more towards the bad side.

Hero Seekers does just enough to lift itself above the rest of KEMCO’s output. The Hero system is interesting, and the story is compelling. As for the rest of it? Well, it’s very much a retro styled JRPG.

It’s thrilling to play, a Metroidvania where you can feel confident giving yourself over to the development team as they present surprise after surprise. It’s bruising, but that’s an expectation of the genre, and the rewards are bountiful. It’s a game where you may feel contradictions – sometimes despair, often delight – but everything is suffused with the glow of immersion.

Mel the Space Cat isn’t a particularly special platformer. It’s easy, short, and the enemies are all recycled from a bazillion other games. But Mel’s blink-dash power, which lets her zip about the level at speed, just about saves the day. A bland 2D platformer gets the smallest sprinkle of interest.

Outlaws + Handful of Missions: Remaster is a win for Nightdive. The developers' ever growing reputation for preserving and accentuating classic games is put on full display here. The remaster is faithful, one that keeps the spirit of the original game alive whilst smoothing some of the edges that time has inflicted upon it.

Direction Quad feels a little like Frogger, but with the frog’s shoelaces tied together (we know, frogs aren’t big shoe-wearers). To some, that might sound like an intriguing extra layer of difficulty. To us, it was rage-inducing. If you’re fond of a little masochism, give Direction Quad a go.

Total Chaos is a disorientating tale of mystery, horror and survival which despite some frustrating niggles, details a desperate struggle against insanity itself.

At times, it will be blindingly obvious that Yakuza Kiwami is now a ten-year-old remake of a 20-year-old game. It isn’t the best-looking game in the series by a long way, and suffers badly from some early pacing issues. Get through those moments though and once Kamurocho opens up fully, there is a very good Yakuza game within.

Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin is certainly a better-looking game than the first one, but it feels like it plays it a bit safe in improving anything else really.

There’s only one group of people who would get anything from RoboHero, and that’s achievement hounds. For everyone else, RoboHero is the most challenge-less puzzle game that we can recall. It’s a sudoku with only one number still to be filled out; a wordsearch with all the irrelevant letters redacted. It’s a puzzle in search of a point.

I’m not going to try to oversell Buffet Boss. It’s basic to look at and play, and never feels like you’re preparing food - everything is reduced to standing on squares. It’s even a poor example of a tycoon game, with less interaction than the average.

The Cursed Frog isn’t going to win any awards, but it’s about the best you can hope for from a cheap platformer. You’re getting a forty-five minute experience that can’t sit still, juggling ideas and mechanics without ever settling on one. By the end, we looked back on The Cursed Frog with fondness. It was an enjoyable burst of chaos.

Goat Simulator 3 - Baadlands: Furry Road has a lot to offer, but even for a Goat Simulator game, it is somewhat janky. Too janky.

Owlen and the Spirits of the Past is in the odd position of being the best Aery game in ages, yet it doesn’t have ‘Aery’ in the title. It’s also an appropriate gateway for new players, particularly if they’re younger. Just apply blinkers and avoid looking at the pop-in, musty story and over-eager visual effects.

If you want a good mystery and don’t mind a few hiccups along the way, then come and solve The Last Case of John Morley.

Retro fans, or those who loved the original, are going to have a blast with Blood: Refreshed Supply. It plays exactly like a game from those times: fast and furious.

If you want to know why programmers always have a pained expression, then play Sushi for Robots. It takes sequencing problems and repackages them exquisitely. But it’s not going to be for everyone: those with a taste for logic flows will have full bellies, while I found myself cursing its intricacy and difficulty levels.

Hidden object fans, run away. There is no story to speak of, the art is a washout, and it never seems to end. Enchantment 2 Sun’s Tear is what happens when hidden object games go wrong.

One Button Games 5-in-1 vol 3 proves me wrong. More specifically, Revolve A, Twin P and Two Lane have proved me wrong. They show that, with some wild invention and riffs on arcade classics, you can make one-button games that are fun for more than five seconds.

I can see the appeal in making One Button Games 5-in-1 vol 2. There’s a challenge in creating these games. You can see how the designers have done back-flips to make them function, incorporating hold-presses of the A button just as much as taps. But as fun as they must have been to make, we are the ones who have to play them. And I rarely found that process to be fun.

GIGASWORD is an ambitious blending of genres. RPG elements aligning with puzzles and platforming is always going to be a curious concoction, and in this case, sometimes for worse, sometimes for better. The poor platforming and bugs may put a downer on your experience, yet the overall brilliance of narrative, combat, and level design will most likely override this, leaving GIGASWORD an indie title worth playing.

This IS Simon the Sorcerer, claw-machined from the ‘90s and dropped into a polished, modern graphic adventure.

It all leaves Pad Quad as an opportunity that wasn’t seized. It’s a platformer where you can swing a racket, knocking back projectiles, and that’s inspired design. But Pad Quad does so little with the concept, building levels that could have been in any other budget platformer.

If you like survival and base-building games, there should be enough on show in Kentum to whet your appetite.

I’m happy that Toad Slide exists. While the mix of sokoban and sliding games doesn’t gel (too easy, no strategy), the experiment was enjoyable to take part in. Plus we were rewarded 2000G for our curiosity. Not a bad deal all round.

Anima: Gate of Memories I&II Remaster seems to very much be two games of their time. It has fun built in, but the world of third person action adventures has moved on since the original releases of the two games included in this remaster.

We stand - just about - on the right side of sokoban fatigue with The Cute Whale. That’s largely down to some cracking, well thought-out puzzle layouts that kept the cynicism at bay.

I don’t think there is quite enough content here to really warrant a purchase, even for the cheap price. But then, if you have always wanted to shoot a giant emoji, Emoji Battlefield – Origins could (just about) be for you.

Quick Whiskers doesn’t do a lot wrong. It has a fine eye for tense platforming sequences where there isn’t much room for mistakes. But it’s also nothing special, as it fails to generate any charm or ideas beyond a cool cat character and a dash mechanic.

There’s no way this is going to challenge the hardcore gamers out there, but for everyone else, Samurai Academy: Paws of Fury is a good way to spend a couple of hours.

Gridz Keeper is 25-minutes of random lever pulling and the odd jolt of satisfaction when a puzzle is solved. If we’re honest, we’d rather spend that time head-shotting undead hordes in a more conventional zombie game.

Some might find the non-linear approach to storytelling a bit confusing and the slow gameplay a bit hard to take. However, there is something engaging and creative about Injection π23 'Tabula Rasa', with enough about it to keep anyone intrigued until the end.

It feels like there is potential for a good game in there somewhere, but there is not enough content in El Coco to fulfill it. The game plays like a prototype or a tech demo rather than a fully fledged product in its own right.

We’re confident that Earthion takes the crown for best SHMUP of 2025, which isn’t bad for a 16-bit title.

It would be fair to say that a sokoban puzzle game is only as good as the quality of its puzzles, and on that count Poko achieves his Arctic Quest.

If you’re hoping to grapple with more of a puzzle tiger than a puzzle kitten, then you will be disappointed with Catnigma. There’s more difficulty to be found in opening your mail. We found that degree of challenge to be calming and even endearing, but we don’t expect it to work for everyone else.

If we had to glide Aery: Titans of the Future into a hierarchy of Aery games, it would land somewhere in the middle. It has no new levels of note, and the story is a lecture. But robots are quite cool, I suppose, and there are no bugs to disrupt things. As possibly the most prolific series on the Xbox, we should be expecting some improvements, but I guess we’ll have to make do with ‘more of the same’.

If you’re a Talisman enthusiast, then Talisman: Digital 5th Edition is the superior port of the board game. It looks gorgeous, the fiddlier elements of the game are automated, and online matches mean that you don’t need friends huddled around a board. It’s got some legibility issues and could have tightened up some elements, but generally it’s everything you’d want from a board game conversion.

Hidden Legends, perhaps appropriately for a hidden object game, is a mixed bag. There’s a ridiculous amount of stuff for your money, but enjoying that stuff requires a shift in expectations. This is less a hidden object game, and more a glaringly-obvious object game.

Despite a few misses, Wildkeepers Rising tries enough new things to satisfy veterans, while remaining accessible enough for newcomers to enjoy for the long haul.

I can forgive Master Lemon: The Quest for Iceland for the odd issue, and that is because this is a game that is full of heart. It is a touching tribute to a friend, and while it isn’t perfect as a game, as a work of art it has a great deal of value.

I do love a good point-and-click adventure, and Scott Whiskers: The Search for the Golden Cat is a great yarn. It feels like a lovely family friendly game, mostly because of its themes and the wholesome main hero. However, younger gamers may well struggle with some of the puzzles as they can be a bit tricky at times.

I was pleasantly surprised by Chickenhare and the Treasure of Spiking-beard. It’s far from throwaway, as it offers a meaty number of levels that all attempt to delight the player in different ways. They’re so good, in fact, that they overcome a salvo of issues. A lack of co-op, poor character-switching, a wandering camera and some nightmare bosses all would have sunk a weaker vessel, but Chickenhare and the Treasure of Spiking-beard floats on.

REDEX asks a lot of a player, outside of the cheap entry point. It tutorialises itself poorly and asks you to die, over and over, before you become even barely functional. Later on, it asks you to grind through levels that don’t repay the favour of being enjoyable to replay. There’s an enjoyable hour or two in the middle, but they’re bookended by pain.

DRAGON QUEST I & II HD-2D REMAKE on Xbox may be a remake of games nearly 40 years old, but the work gone into their re-creation makes them instantly playable.

KILL IT WITH FIRE! 2 deserves credit for building on what made the first game so much fun to play. Despite some rough edges, there’s clearly been an effort made to flesh out the spider exterminating fun, and for the most part it pays off.

Lucha Align makes that critical mistake. It’s a shape-sorting game that adds the shapes, throws in some sorting, but then neglects to include stakes, rules or anything else of value.

I can’t help feeling that Habitat Shapes is a puzzle-designer short of a really good game. With more finesse in its layouts and the shapes that it offers, it would have been more memorable and stimulating to play.

Whether Slide Stories: Neko and Friends is the game for you depends entirely on whether you like puzzles or not. Specifically, you need a love for slide puzzles, because if you hate them, you aren’t going to get much else out of this game. For me, this was a nice experience, and I liked the different levels of difficulty available.

Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut is still the same Yakuza 0 - one of the best games in the entire franchise. And whilst a few new cutscenes don’t completely ruin the story, the question is more why they have been included in the first place.

Whether to pick up Bunninjutsu, then, is a matter of expectations. Expect a platformer made by a bedroom-developer and you will be pleasantly surprised with its invention and parkour-like platforming. Expect something that is anywhere near a Crash, Spyro or Mario, and you may well regret that £4.19 outlay.

Any memory of Lonely Guardian will puff away immediately, even while you’re playing. It’s so easy, short and uncomplicated that it will barely touch the sides.

Neon Inferno is a challenging game with a cracking amount of enjoyment to it. Couch co-op helps, as does the stiff challenge, but that does mean you’ll need to put in the work in order to get through everything it has to offer.

Bugs, poor pacing and free-to-play grind. It’s not a great future for anyone who begins to play Cup Heroes. Which is something of a shame, as the opening of the game can be a whirlwind romance for fans of auto-battlers and pachinko.

Give Sektori a chance and it may well grab you. But no matter whether it does or not, there is no doubt this is good for a short blast. Of course, some may crave more than noise and spectacle in their games, but while Sektori provides both, the deeper gameplay loop is just not there.

Saborus is a unique, thought-provoking horror adventure that deserves credit for its premise, but struggles to fully deliver on its potential. It is worth experiencing for its bold design and unsettling atmosphere, but be prepared for rough patches along the way.

King of Ping Pong: MEGAMIX reminds of those days of going to the arcade, where something brash and loud would entice us into dropping coins. But like those times, this is an incredibly hard game and anything resembling fun becomes a struggle. Nail it though, and you’ll gain a proper sense of achievement.

S. Prysm Destroyer only has a sheepish answer to the question of ‘why should run-and-gunner fans play this game?’. It’s got some quirky PS1 graphics and wasp-woman butts. That wasn’t enough for us, and it’s probably not for you, either. We like a little more substance to our shooters, even at a budget price.

If you’re looking for an ambient, indie, alien adventure to embark on, Dome Keeper excels in risk-reward driven space solitude, and it is bound to keep you gripped despite the replay value perhaps not being as long as more complex genres.

Terminator 2D: NO FATE is a good game, with lots of nods to the lore, all of which will go down well with fans of the franchise. Equally, it’s welcoming enough for those who aren’t invested in the universe.

Ah, Love! Season 3 somehow holds the crown for the best of the series so far. No, it isn’t for interesting gameplay, stellar puzzles with thoughtful level design, or any other innate value associated with gameplay. It’s simply because it made the correct choice of halving the number of stages included.

I was in pain in the latter levels of Hexa Chippy, but that pain was self-inflicted. Hexa Chippy gave me all the tools to solve its path-finding puzzles, I just chose not to use them. I also needed to squirrel-up and get good at solving this kind of hex puzzle. But as much as the fault is my own, there’s still the matter of an over-eager hint system and mostly useless reset and shuffle features.

We had a whale of a time with Vambrace: Dungeon Monarch. The combo of deckbuilder and hex-based strategy game was delicious, and the lack of any real balancing meant we became a god on the battlefield. Which felt quite nice, if we were being honest.

It has a mad but intriguing story, good gameplay, and excellent visuals, and it’ll be interesting to see what the team behind Chorus of Carcosa come up with next.

There aren’t many political simulation games out there on the console market, but Suzerain is one that is full of depth, colour, and deep intrigue.

DETECTIVE - Rainy Night is a low-budget horror detective game that gives you an hour or so of entertainment, playing out like an episode of some mysterious TV show.

Dark Quest 4 is a pretty accomplished turn-based strategy game. It doesn’t wow with new features, but instead provides a solid challenge and the chance to play with friends.

Sacred 2 is very much a game of its era, and I’d say that era has passed. Unless you are a rabid fan, you’ll not miss much if you skip this remaster.

It’ll take just a few minutes for you to start enjoying ROUTINE, especially if you like games set in space, the chance to go solving strange mysteries, or the odd, non-conformist narrative.

Overpowered 1 - Mars Infestation is capable of providing some retro gaming enjoyment, as well as an addictive gameplay loop, at least for a time.

It is held back slightly by a lack of difficulty, a shorter runtime and a handful of technical hiccups, yet it remains a charming, joyful platformer that understands its audience perfectly.

If you want a polished single-player adventure then Pigeon Simulator is not the right perch. But if you are looking for a light-hearted co-op romp filled with physics-fuelled disasters and ridiculous pigeon-antics, this is well worth a dive.

3D Don’t Die Mr. Robot is a little too true to its arcade origins. Like the games it homages, there’s an immediate kick of adrenaline, but not much in terms of staying power.

Those coming to Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 primarily for multiplayer will find a polished, thrilling package that will last all year. Those seeking a memorable solo campaign will leave disappointed.

Let’s hand Lost Twins 2 its laurels. Making a cooperative game that delights the experienced gamer just as much as the inexperienced is witchcraft. Only Hazelight can do it consistently. But in comes Lost Twins 2 who nails that AND arrives with an innovative mechanic.

Ah, Love! Season 2 takes everything it has from its previous entry, and that leaves it scrambling for any reason to exist.

I cannot stress enough about how important it is for games like Torii to exist, as they push boundaries and try new things in the gaming space, working all-new narratives. I like how this game uses symbolic visuals, rarely spelling out the narrative to the gamer, leaving them to instead figure out the message being told.