If you or your kid loves to play open-ended games like Minecraft or create inspired Lego creations without instructions, the Variety Kit is a great way to go.

Mark of the Ninja is easily one of the best Xbox Live Arcade games of the year. In a time when no one thought they wanted another stealth game, Klei Entertainment surprised everyone with a truly wonderful one.

It's better than almost anything else on the platform. But it's also a game produced by a Nintendo with its back against the wall, which seemed to want to get a side-scrolling Mario on shelves to sell 3DS hardware before the time was quite right.

I wish I could recommend Sleeping Dogs with no reservations. The story is excellent, the gameplay has flashes of brilliance and the mission structuring makes it rather addictive. It's hard to ignore all the little problems that keep presenting themselves, but not one of them is troublesome enough to make you stop playing.

It's done some brilliant things with its genre to create a brand new experience, but no game mode aside from team deathmatch is well-balanced or interesting, and there are precious few maps.

Spelunky is designed to be played repeatedly, a randomly generated battle of human versus machine. Its goal is to challenge the player in a way that is seemingly impossible, but ultimately surmountable given the proper amount of training and skill. I can't recall another game that achieves that delicate balance as well as Spelunky. Its randomly generated nature and ecosystem of interactive elements challenges your decision-making abilities in a way that's nothing short of awe-inspiring.

A novel and original concept, executed cleanly and with style - in short, the ideal to which videogames should aspire.

That's all Max Payne 3 is – a beautiful, playable action movie.

It was one of the best cooperative experiences I've ever had in a video game, and I don't even know who those people were. I've made my concerns about the storytelling in this game clear, but maybe that's not as big of an issue. I came away from Diablo III with a great story to tell, one of my own making.

The multiplayer may be a miss, but Trials Evolution does nearly everything else right. Few superior motorcycle games have been produced this generation, and the game will only continue to get better as players contribute to the level-sharing service.

Well-balanced, fun turn-based strategy gameplay perfectly suited to mobile devices.

Even though I often struggled to find meaning within the game's mysterious world, Journey doesn't need to be explained. It's still a fulfilling experience.

Electronic Symphony's best new feature is the ability to sort your favorite tunes into a specified order and play them straight through. Or you can have your favorite song run on an endless loop and relive that moment of pure ecstasy, where it's just you and the music.

Rhythm Heaven Fever boasts a staggeringly extensive soundtrack of catchy tunes covering an array of different genres, from head-pounding rock to way-too-sweet pop, everything with a distinct Japanese style. Kicking back and listening to the music is the single biggest stress reliever when you're getting frustrated by the high difficulty.

So I forget what happened. The important thing is, Resident Evil Revelations is a kickass action game. It follows in the footsteps of Resident Evil 5, ditching the plodding "survive against insurmountable odds" gameplay of the early games in the series and going straight to "make zombies explode into a pile of goo with a machine gun." This is the first game I've played on 3DS that really pushes the hardware - if you want a 3-D graphical showpiece for your new console, this will be the game you brag to your friends about.

Yes, it feels pretty much exactly like 2005′s Mario Kart DS with better graphics. But it's still too good to put down.

The most important change is that most everything feels new. The fights against giant boss creatures at the end of each dungeon don't rely on old ideas. The classic characters are replaced, for the most part, with novel ones. If you already know what's going to happen, is that really capturing the spirit of the original Legend of Zelda, in which we all went in blind? Skyward Sword shows that "a real Zelda game" is about more than certain items or certain gameplay rituals, which in the end is more meaningful than adding better sword controls.

The game's greatest accomplishment is that it is a paradise of escapism, a lavish love letter to immersion. Diving into Skyrim's world feels both thrilling and comforting, like riding a rollercoaster or swimming in the ocean. There is very little padding. There are very few scripted quests that aren't worth experiencing.

3D Land is a grabby borrower of a game - enemies from Mario 3, music from 2006's New Super Mario Bros., gameplay from Galaxy. Eventually it starts borrowing from itself. It's an excellent game because all of these things work so well together; the only thing keeping it from perfection is that it cries out for more innovations to call its own.

Those thrills, ripped straight from summer blockbusters, tend to be both Uncharted 3's biggest strength and biggest flaw...Drake's Deception never lets up on the action, and it has an obsession with constantly one-upping itself. Before the end of the game, you will have escaped from a burning building, outran a massive wave of water aboard a sinking cruise ship and traversed a seemingly endless desert...These segments are thrilling, heart-racing stuff, but predictable.

Weighed down by bloat though it may be, Batman: Arkham City is still one of the year's finest games, filled with the capacity to surprise even players who've skulked through every inch of its predecessor.

Tiny Heroes draws its charm from all the chaos. There's always something to do; you'll constantly be throwing down new traps and replacing old ones at a frenetic pace. It's challenging and fun.

Bastion's fantasy world doesn't feel derivative. Its world and characters are all its own, and the narrator's verbal descriptions of abandoned quarries, forsaken gods and terrifying fortresses breathe life into them.

WIRED One of the best games ever, remastered; looks fantastic in 3D; improved controls. / TIRED It's the same game you played 12 years ago and remember exactly how to beat.

Witcher 2's technical and design glitches didn't stop me from thoroughly enjoying the game, however. It's one of the most realistic role-playing games I've ever tried - just like in real life, the decisions you make have wide-ranging effects, and you won't learn what those are until much later.

Much like Sony's Heavy Rain, L.A. Noire is a game you simply must play if you are interested in the development of storytelling in videogames. Also like Heavy Rain, the gameplay occasionally struggles to walk the tightrope between being robust enough to hold up the story but easy enough that the player doesn't give up halfway through.

A tumultuous blend of Prince of Persia-style jumping action and the "bullet hell" of insane shooters like Ikaruga. It's complex, difficult and a lot of fun.

Portal 2 is in the business of defying players' expectations. Valve never wants you to predict what's going to happen at any moment, and delights in subtly setting those pins up and knocking them down. Even more than the clever gameplay mechanics and sharply written story, the smiles and laughter that such a carefully crafted game can extract from you mean this one will stay with you for years to come.