Robo Revenge Squad is an interesting game with some clever ideas. Playing with friends is good fun, but going solo is very hard. Just be aware that the online scene is seemingly dead too.

Despot’s Game: Dystopian Army Builder is a pleasant surprise. It has a real one more go appeal, a hook that will drag you back in over and over again. The sheer amount of team building options is remarkable. Every run is different as well, so the replayability is nailed on.

Heirs of the Kings is pretty indistinguishable from any of KEMCO’s recent output. It could be any one of a number of games, and it is this cookie cutter approach that sees the shine wearing off.

There are times when Deliver Us Mars feels a bit rough around the edges, and the platforming and climbing mechanics don’t work as well as they should. But ultimately this is about the story it tells, dazzling with splendid characters and a wonderful sense of place and space. The exploration and puzzle elements of the game bring much to love too.

In flashes Go! Go! PogoGirl feels like a classic platformer that has found a way to make constantly bouncing around a level fun. But they are just flashes, and it’s equally common for the pogoing to be slow and cumbersome.

I very much like the work of Tonguç Bodur, especially the strange puzzle walking sim experiences. There are bits of that found in The Redress of Mira but other gameplay mechanics let it down somewhat. The story and visuals just about make up for these mechanics and the price feels good for a four-hour adventure game, but ultimately it's the weird stuff we want next time please, Tonguç.

Kattish is good for achievements and paw for gameplay. It’s just not poor in the way we expected. The opening levels make it seem painfully generic, but when the gravity gameplay kicks in, it becomes painfully fiddly. Kattish trades one itchy furball for another.

Don’t be put off by the graphics. JANITOR BLEEDS is a survival horror that is very much capable of sweeping you off your feet.

Albacete Warrior is a comedic achievement. But not because it manages to join the elite club of games that are genuinely funny. Albacete Warrior is, without any doubt, the least funny comedy game we have ever played.

Rhythm Sprout is a playlist of eclectic bangers, tied to a simple rhythm action system that slaps you round the face with challenge. But master it - or take advantage of the Beginner Mode - and you will experience what will undoubtedly be one of the most charming games of 2023.

Like a cat with a ball of wool, you will toy with Cat Slide Tiles for a few minutes and then toss it away for something better.

With little to show for your efforts, Godlike Burger misses the chance to delight the palate. It’s unlikely you’ll want to go back for seconds.

Under the deck, Tortuga - A Pirate’s Tale looks to be a challenging simulation title, but the real challenge is figuring out what to do; it currently feels very inaccessible for console players.

Stick with Robotry and you will get a lot out of it. But there is no shame in admitting defeat either; it can be an obscenely hard game in places.

Hunt Ducks 4 is a racket, a grift. The developers have carefully peeled the label off of Hunt Ducks II’s bottle and then sold it again as Hunt Ducks 4 instead. We gave Hunt Ducks II a miserly 1 out of 5 the first time round, and we’re duty bound to do the same again. That Duck Hunt dog is turning in its grave.

A game for all the ages, there’s a ton of content included so take out your wand, put on your most magical of hats, and go and enjoy the thrills of Hogwarts Legacy.

Yes, there could have been a big revamp of GoldenEye 007’s mechanics. Yes, the graphics could have been remade and, yes online could have been included. But does any of this take away from the fact we now have one of the most iconic shooters of all time playable on Xbox Series X|S? Not one jot. GoldenEye 007 is perfect.

Fashion Police Squad is a fun and humorous take on the FPS genre. It comes with fast fluid gameplay that feeds off some DOOM roots, but manages to still do its own original thing, working loads of great ideas and concepts.

Trash Sailors is a fundamentally flawed experience which isn’t totally sunk but will have you questioning when you can get back on dry land.

Monster Hunter Rise isn’t quite Monster Hunter: World. And that’s partly because Rise doesn’t offer too much in the way of new things, and what is here suffers graphically in comparison.

Strip some of the excess fat off of Shapeshooter, cutting it down from an awkward polyhedron to something more elegant and powerful, and there would be a good game here. But it’s overburdened, and we found ourselves dreading playing at its slow, ambling speed for too long.

One half of LoBlocks is more enjoyable than we anticipated. The other half is far, far worse. Where does that leave us? If you can hold a hand over one eye as you pick from the game menu, then there’s a devious little puzzler to be had in its Classic Mode. Just don’t look at the other half, the Arcade Mode, which is a half-formed little growth that could probably do with being sliced off.

When RE:CALL is confident in its central conceit, it’s a bloody brilliant narrative adventure, and the writing here is among the very best. Let’s choose to keep the first levels as core memories. We’ll conveniently forget the rest.

All in all, Persona 4 Golden is an absolute triumph; very much golden. It isn’t quite as good as Persona 5 Royal, but the difference is like a hair's breadth. There’s a great story, tons of content to get involved in and some superb combat and exploration opportunities.

Deep Space Anomaly feels unfinished; like the developers cobbled some ideas together and shovelled it out of the door as fast as possible.

We Were Here Forever is the biggest game of the series so far, and it’s pretty good without reaching the upper echelons of its genre. Sure, the story isn’t going to put you on tenterhooks, but the ingenuity of the puzzling more than makes up for its shortcomings in that department.

CyberHive is pretty calming on the whole, and following the narrative or keeping your crew lean, mean and hungry is fairly interesting. CyberHive will be able to deliver much more fun than you may expect.

With different levels every time you play, and procedural generation in place, your runs in Warpips should never feel the same; and that means the longevity is there.

There should be no hesitation in recommending Persona 3 Portable to any fans of the RPG genre.

Chasing Static certainly looks the part with its survival horror throwbacks mixed with more modern fixtures, but as well as the game is designed, it cannot shy away from the fact there could have been just a little bit more.

Shoulders of Giants is something of a grind, both in terms of gameplay and structure. Still, at its core there is fun to be had and hopefully potential to evolve in the near future.

Backfirewall_ is a wonderful game; one that is highly original and full of creativity. It's a delight to play through, capable of making you laugh and gasp in equal measure.

While we found Sissa’s Path soothing in its own laid-back manner, we also found that the path it offered didn’t really go anywhere. Sissa could have done with showing more claws.

Playing GRIS for the first time, in its Xbox Series X|S format, has been an early 2023 highlight. Its reputation preceded it, so it was never going to surprise us. But we didn’t expect to connect with it as much as we did. What a meticulously crafted platformer it is, and what a fantastic example of Xbox Series X|S prowess it is too. Clear the room of distractions and play it in one go if you can.

If you have a deep love for Psikyo shooters, or carry some nostalgia for the Starfox era of 3D gaming, then there is some rough, unrefined enjoyment to be had in Zero Gunner 2. Just with plenty of asterisks.

GUNBARICH is a success. It’s a blemish-free port of a game that spliced brick-breakers with shoot ’em-ups, and got away with it.

How does a game like Retro Tank Arcade manage to find itself on a Microsoft Store, rubbing shoulders with Dead Space? Perhaps the developers have blackmail material on Phil Spencer. It’s the only solution we can come up with for why this utterly broken, dismal tank game is available for sale.

We have to implore you not to buy Joy Ball Adventure. It’s unfinishable, bugged to the point of impassibility on Level 14. What little we played was good, particularly for that low price, but you can experience an actual, working version of it by buying Kid Ball Adventure instead. It has the novelty of actually being playable.

Memory Link sticks in the memory for the wrong reasons. Stiff controls and non-existent guidance means that you’ll spend most of the time lost in a playground which isn’t all that fun to play within in the first place. Sure, it’s free with its achievements, but it needs to do far more than that to impress.

The shooting is okay, the non-precision platforming is similar, and the extra abilities come in handy. Basically, if you think you’ll like Unichrome: A 1-bit Unicorn Adventure, you probably will. But there is nothing new or ground-breaking on offer.

Dragon Blaze is not pushing at the boundaries of what shoot ’em-ups can do. Even for Psikyo, who are well known for sticking to a formula, this is one of their most formulaic games. But like ordering the same tikka masala over and over again, simply because you know it’s going to be good, Dragon Blaze delivers a return on the trust you put into it.

It combines showstopping unique gameplay with some of the best cel-shaded visuals, a superb soundtrack, a fun tone and great characters into one of the most memorable games in the past little while. It’s the type of game that reminds you why you fell in love with the genre in the first place.

For those who like the franchise, SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake is an absolute gem, delivering for gamers of any skill even if it does feel a tad easy to play. It’s highly recommended for those looking for an well-worked platforming adventure, or younger gamers. I for one would welcome a sequel with even more of the same, ideally with an absolutely huge Bikini Bottom to explore and even more characters to play as.

Think of Wonderland Nights: White Rabbit’s Diary less as a visual novel, although it is one, and more of a deduction game. Playing this way leads to joy after joy, as you pair up individuals using an astute timetable mechanic with the aim of unlocking one of a multitude of endings. Like an episode of Columbo, you know how things turn out, but it’s how you get there that’s the mystery.

I have loved the idea of Dance of Death: Du Lac & Fey; the storytelling and writing are surprising, engaging, and well-executed. However, I think the gameplay mechanics could do with some more work and it never feels as fluid or streamlined as other games in the genre.

Be prepared for Puzzle By Nikoli W Slitherlink: you will need to be firing on all mental cylinders to get the most out of its Boxes-based puzzling.

If you’re a fan of a sim experience then you will get a whole load of enjoyment from Startup Company Console Edition.

It may be an old game, but Kingdom Rush is still hugely enjoyable. It is simple but compelling, and when you are down to your last HP and a horde of enemies are bearing down on you, it gets extremely tense.

That title was always going to be a challenge to shake. With so many good Metroidvanias out there, spilling out of Game Pass on a weekly basis, Clunky Hero can’t help but feel slow and cumbersome in comparison. It’s large, dense, and at its best when you’re exploring but, in every other way, Clunky Hero succumbs to its name.

One Piece Odyssey is a darn good RPG, but it’s hampered by being very slow out of the blocks.

She Wants me Dead is a hard platformer, but it's a very engaging and quite addictive one; something that is always a good hallmark for a side-scroller. The level design is decent, and the challenge builds well, so much so that as you complete a level, you'll feel extremely well rewarded. However, there isn't enough content for the asking price, even when you factor in the replay value; going back to perfect your time and score for achievements.

With totally wacky minigames, a stock photo overdose and a suitably surreal story, Salamander County Public Television may not be for everyone. But if irreverence and things way outside the box are your thing, this is a fantastic indie game you will be playing long after you have solved the mystery of the missing residents.

UnderDungeon is a game that will restore your faith in the retro scene. It is quirky and charming, yet while the action isn’t fast and furious, it is much more considered. There are issues, but the levels are varied enough to keep you coming back.

Breakers Collection is one of the better QUByte Interactive remasters and so if you have a hankering for the past, and games with an almost psychic AI, this is for you.

Fueled Up may not be the most comprehensive experience, but on the whole it’s a great little co-op game that’s accessible to all.

If you have found the Puzzle by Nikoli W series already, then Heyawake is a satisfying more-of-the-same. Its air of familiarity is easy to ignore when you’re pulling the pencil from behind your ear and filling in more brain-teasers. But if you’re new to the series and want to dip a toe in, it’s possibly the least engaging by a degree or two.

If you want to understand the B-movie charms of this strange little subgenre, then Demon Hunter: New Chapter is a surprisingly good place to start.

Mrs.Cat Between Worlds is a case of good cat, bad cat, and for a blizzard of Xbox achievements, that might well be enough to cough up £4.99 like a furball.

Chenso Club is, despite the retro stylings, very enjoyable. The heroines are all very different, the challenge is real, and you can play couch co-op to see just who is the greatest alien squasher in your house. If you are looking for a retro styled platformer, then Chenso Club is the one that you should give a chance to.

It’s easy to dismiss Kamikaze Vegetables, as it isn’t abundantly understandable what it’s trying to do, nor is it the prettiest peach. So lettuce be clear: this is Metal Gear Solid but with the ability to strap yourself to a firework and fire yourself at an enemy, exploding in a fountain of vegetable chunks. Which, we think you’ll agree, puts it in contention for game of the year already.

It is by no means a bad game, but OmegaBot needs a little polish in the platforming sections to make it a great one. As it is, it is firmly middle of the pack.

Wings of Bluestar is pretty much what we expected - a short shooting game with easy achievements thrown in for good measure. For achievement hunters, this is an easy sell, but for anyone looking for a game to invest time in, Wings of Bluestar is going to disappoint.

A superb story that occasionally dips into the sublime, but doesn’t manage to clasp its fingers around your heart like To The Moon, Gone Home and other similar narrative adventures. A Space For the Unbound deeply wants to be in the same category, but its earliest moments are too wayward, too slow to generate momentum. Regardless, this is a rich yarn with a fantastic ending, so find some space for it if you can.

Trenches is a short but good little horror experience. It plays with an interesting premise and setting, mixing horror, fantasy and reality. The jump scares are excellent and the tension is good, but the world is very limited and there’s a chance you may well get tired of the trench maze trek after a while.

What this amounts to is a superb story that occasionally dips into the sublime, but doesn’t manage to clasp its fingers around your heart like To The Moon, Gone Home and other similar narrative adventures. A Space For the Unbound deeply wants to be in the same category, but its earliest moments are too wayward, too slow to generate momentum. Regardless, this is a rich yarn with a fantastic ending, so find some space for it if you can.

Shieldmaiden: Remix Edition isn’t going to set the world on fire, but there are worse ways to spend your gaming time.

Remember Gauntlet? Maze Blaze is a distant cousin, twice-removed. If you’ve been hankering for some cooperative maze-clearing, albeit without any barbarians or accidentally shooting the food, then Maze Blaze is going to deliver.

Neon Souls is a run of the mill platformer that fails to stand out from the crowd. Poor controls and unimpressive visuals make it a less appealing option to those after some old school fun.

The bookworms have been at The Darkest Tales, and there’s a risk, and not necessarily a small one, that you will come a cropper on the bugs they’ve introduced. Read with care.

You have to give Sail Forth credit for its chill art design, and the calming sounds which ensure sailing around is a nice enough experience.

What we have in Aniquilation is almost a case of style over substance - a game that looks flashy and full of pizazz, but is a bit lacking where it counts.

There’s a very good chance you’ll enjoy your time with Space Raiders in Space. The sense of humour is on point, helped along by the Easter Eggs that have been sneaked in, but it can also play a very mean game of Tower Defence; that obviously helps. With a supercritical head on, it could be said that the story isn’t awfully long, but there are a number of different endings to try for, and so this helps a bit.

Wave Break unapologetically rips the core gameplay from Tony Hawk’s games, changes the skateboard to a speedboat, adds in some almost superficial gunplay and reckons that is enough. Multiplayer modes offer some fun, but Wave Break offers nothing new for existing fans of arcade skaters.

Gundam Evolution is an FPS worthy of attention from anyone interested in mech battles, let alone fans of the franchise.

We Are the Caretakers deserves heaps of praise. You can point to the world design, story, depth of gameplay and themes of conservation and find something to fall in love with. But it needed longer in Early Access. The bugs and crashes keep stampeding through the game, trampling on what was painstakingly constructed.

Ship Graveyard Simulator tries to bring the excitement of breaking ocean-bound vessels to your sofa. However, it ends up feeling like something best left buried at sea.

Dakar Desert Rally can feel great, until you start trying to drive anywhere, and then it is quite a let down. There is the opportunity to learn to drive around these issues (and just accept that AI drivers will hit you, avoiding them as best you can), but Dakar Desert Rally fails to ever really flow.

If you have a spare twenty minutes to kill, Backpack Twins will allow you to make a bit of progress towards full completion, wasting a bit of time in the process. And it's that which makes it feel a little more suitable for something like the Nintendo Switch than the Xbox.

With a small but strong line-up of new dinosaurs, the chance to take in a decent campaign addition and the opportunity to again throw hours of life at Jurassic World Evolution 2, it’s safe to say that the Dominion Malta Expansion is another valuable addition to the roster. If you’ve gone all-in on what Frontier have created so far, then you’d be mad to not fill your boots here.

On PC, Strategic Mind: Fight for Freedom could well be a fine game, but it just doesn’t work on the Xbox, and that is a big problem.

While its sharp-edges are enough to make it a wary recommendation, hardcore puzzle fans (or players who come for nostalgia) might find that NEScape! is at least worth a Blockbuster rental.

If you’re the kind of person who enjoys RPGs based on the sheer number of dials and levers that you can pull, min-maxing the systems until they break, then Ultimate ADOM - Caverns of Chaos is lovingly constructed for you. Of course, if you’re here because of a love for the original ADOM, there’s plenty here for you too. But if you want to be transported by an RPG, or demand a dungeon-crawler with some colour, sass or story, then Ultimate ADOM - Caverns of Chaos won’t do anything for you.

Final Fantasy VII is regularly seen as the greatest game in the fabled JRPG franchise, yet it is hard to argue against CRISIS CORE -FINAL FANTASY VII- REUNION being the best spinoff. The improvements to the graphics and combat elevate this remaster above, whilst retaining the best features of, the original.

In Beholgar we have a game with some good ideas that is marred by poor execution. The combat feels samey and yet frustrating, the jumping will have you chewing your joypad, and while Beholgar looks fine, things like platform piercing axes are the nail in the coffin.

The main issue is the lack of any kind of tactical play in Divine Knockout (DKO). The best of these games have characters that can counter the moves of others, and that is entirely missing here. Just hammer X to win!

For a game that’s all about box-pushing, Sokocat - Combo does a rather good job of box-ticking too: it’s got plenty of levels, all well designed, with toy-like presentation and a streak of accessibility running through it.

When you consider what is included here, Starsand feels decent value for money. However, the menus, a severe lack of direction, and a slow first few hours might put many off from giving it a go. Should you stick with it though, you’ll discover that Starsand is a reasonably clever game that is full of secrets.

When Tetraminos - Xbox Series X|S sticks to delivering Tetris on a budget, it’s an acceptable alternative. Four-player Tetris, alongside three single-player game modes, is a healthy bundle of stuff. Where it comes undone is when it remixes the formula.

With seventy puzzle layouts and no frills, Mahjong - Xbox Series X|S might seem like the ideal purchase for someone who wants a no-nonsense version of the classic game. But when the simplest interactions come with baggage, there’s no reason to pick this over the many other options on the Xbox Store.

As a one-hour stroll goes, One Step After Fall is a painful one. It’s more like walking over LEGO than a relaxing amble.

Ships Simulator is a voyage into the tedious, but the inexcusable visuals drag this one down to the depths.

Hello Neighbor 2 has a great idea at its core, and it works well overall. Its potential, however, seems limited and has possibly already been reached.

Accident falls short, stumbling at the opportunity to deliver a fulfilling experience. Following a helpful tutorial, it struggles to find a balance between being stupidly easy and oddly difficult, with the latter mainly due to iffy game mechanics. The investigation portion does pose decent logical problems to solve, but the morbid aftermath is a massive downer.

Terror of Hemasaurus is a brilliant effort from a one-man studio. It takes that familiar Rampage formula, gives it a fresh coat of pain and whacks a strong story on top. The result is something that is a joy to play.

Even though you’ll have a good time with Beholder 3, you may well find that it becomes a little bit too samey after a while. But perhaps the humdrum life of trying to balance chores with spying needs means it is meant to be that way.

RWBY: Arrowfell is a lot of fun, with a real urge to not only follow the story through but to explore every inch of the game world. The difficulty is set a tad on the easy side, without a doubt, but it is still fun to fight the foes and figure out new strategies to utilise the various powers of the girls.

Oxyjet does bring a new idea to the party table, and being a big fan of a co-op game experience it would be churlish of me to mark it down too much for being a fairly slight experience. But playing solo is very dull, and while knuckling down with a partner against the AI is better, it still misses the ultimate competition that comes from a real live adversary.

Bloody Samurai is far from a spectacular action-platformer. It could do with some clarity, a better UI and a dollop of variety. But for the price, Bloody Samurai has style to spare, and there’s at least an afternoon’s worth of entertainment in there.