VALA offers up heaps of action-packed twin-stick shooting madness, with a great deal of content to work toward and unlock. However, the lack of interesting locations, repetitive enemy variations, and the tedious random weaponry system, ultimately holds it back. Better gameplay structure and less grinding would have done VALA some justice.

Immortal Redneck is a good, lengthy game. With its outdated graphics to the side, the game holds its own and deserves a place up there with Serious Sam. Its fast-paced gameplay offers fun, hilarity, and comes with some truly crazy gimmicks. The biggest downside is that it becomes overly repetitive before long.

TopSpin is challenging in many intentional and unintentional ways – the control system is tough to master but there is a great sense of reward to even getting the ball to land where you want it. The online requirements, and some of the more befuddling systems make it much harder to get to the core of the experience.

Not a belting success nor a show stopping flop, Evil Dead: The Game is buried in a misty purgatory that it can’t shake itself out of. The atmosphere is potent, the combat is visceral and strong despite its heaviness, and there’s certainly a good potential for multiplayer pleasures here. But much like the characters’ clothing, sweat-dabbled skin and blood-soaked exteriors, The Evil Dead can start to stink of the same old formulaic multiplayer games we’ve played before. However, if you want a good time with mates The Evil Dead will do in a pinch, just don’t expect this nightmare to last long.

Cobra Kai 2: Dojos Rising Could have been a massive step up from the first game which was in all fairness a cash grab. But rather than producing a quality product they just released a buggy mess and I can only assume this was because it couldn’t wait any longer. The Series is now on season 5 and this game was to tie in a much earlier season. Fans of the series might consider picking this up but I don’t think I could recommend it.

Phasmophobia has hit the Xbox and brings all its scrappy charm along with it. I think there are people who are going to love this multiplayer horror game, but once the scares wear off, there isn’t a lot to keep coming back.

Crimson Capes is an interesting experiment, where every fight could be a chance for meaty combat, instead it feels like too close to Prince of Persia combat – flailing and anachronistic.

Gem Wizards Tactics for me feels like a half-decent PC game that has struggled to be remade for a console. It’s quite clear that a mouse would make all the menu navigation a lot easier. It would also help explain what all the skills are if you hovered over them. But the clunky controls, impossible menu navigation and weirdly short story mode made me lose interest in this game pretty quickly.

Super Volley Blast hardly goes above and beyond, but it does indeed offer a fun, colorful, and accessible arcade experience nevertheless. I take issue with its lack of depth and its somewhat incompetent AI when playing solo. However, with that in mind, the game just about manages to meet expectations through both its local multiplayer component and its quirky, play-it-safe concept.

Tcheco in the Castle of Lucio manages to faithfully capture the feel of the NES titles of old – both good and bad. It’s easy to pick up and play and can be rewarding at times, but the retro visuals and design mean it can be equally frustrating to play. Good for short bursts here and there, just be sure to bring all the patience you can muster with you.

SYNTHETIK: Ultimate is a decent rogue-lite game but it has made a lot of choices that could compromise the experience based on the player. They have tried to combat this with difficulty modifiers and game customisations, but it’s not normal to have to tweak the game this much before you can play a game without being frustrated. Once you have got past that, the game is a decent challenge and there is some variety on offer. The weak storyline, the unclear level progression and inventory organisation might, unfortunately, might put many off.

Chess Knights: Shinobi is a short simple puzzle game that has put some effort into its graphical display. The chess pieces and the level design captures the Japanese Edo era well enough. The puzzles range from simple and ramp-up to fiendishly difficult quite quickly so don’t expect to whizz through the game with ease.

It’ll be over in an evening, but despite a poor first impression I enjoyed the challenge Kid Tripp brings to the table. The responsive controls, smooth gameplay and muscle memory flow meant it was easy to get hooked; even after my hundredth death the one-more-go feeling was still there. Well worth a look if you’re after something short and snappy to get in to.

Hello Neighbor is a confused game that doesn’t do much to entice those that are new to the experience. There’s a lack of structure in both the story and the gameplay. This alone makes much of the pace rely heavily on trial and error, and although there’s a wide variety of different puzzles to work out, the delivery of each of them can be mind boggling if you miss out on a single detail.

Wind Peaks is a short and easy adventure that can be enjoyed within an evening, it misses out on providing anything besides basic item hunting, but it doesn’t drag on too long to stop you from pushing through to the end. Whilst additional tasks in some levels such as stacking totems or photographing an animal with a camera you found are a slight break in the gameplay, you’ll mostly be doing the same thing over and over. It’s not bad if you want something simplistic, but it could certainly do more to be enticing and exciting and a little more engaging. It’s not a bad start from Actoon Studio, but it’s not quite up there with an Artifex Mundi title either.

Hood: Outlaws & Legends is a great idea in desperate need of more revisions – it is stealth game in which devolving into frenzied fracas is too easy to slip into.

Narcos is an OK game with few new ideas brought to the turn-based action strategy genre. But unfortunately, without difficulty tweaks or in-game saves this game starts off tough and just gets harder from there. When you can’t be too cautious or throw caution to the wind it really limits the strategy element and instead means the game relies on luck and repetition to progress.

Mable and the Wood is a pleasant adventure with a cleverly thought out combat system. Execution is not always perfect, and the game isn’t without its flaws however overall is still an enjoyable adventure. This is a nice little platformer where you are free to make your own decisions and choose the kind of hero you want to be.

As overGame put in their email to me, Gaijin Charenji 1 : Kiss or Kill is more of an experience than a traditional video game. If you are up for an hour spent questioning what you see before you, before having your mind melted by the mad antics on display, then absolutely pick it up. I fear many people won’t be willing to give it a chance however, and that’s a shame, as it is a unique experience that will stay with you for some time.

Little Big Workshop is a decent workshop simulation game and fans of this genre would enjoy it. However, I feel it could have done with a lot more hand-holding through the game for beginners. There are a lot of tools and tweaks that could be implemented to increase the efficiency of your workshop but with such a brief tutorial a lot of these will be missed and it will cause you to struggle.

Projection: First Light is a tough one to recommend then. On the one hand it has a lovely visual and audio style that draws us in, and the idea of the core mechanic is great. In practice though it’s too fiddly and unreliable to sustain a several hour+ title, and it likely won’t hold the attention though to its conclusion.

Again, I appreciated the retro visual style, and for all the weirdness of the experience I found myself wanting to see what the next ending would bring. That it is so short to run through is a blessing, but once more I’m not sure I could recommend this to anyone who isn’t really into esoteric, indie experiences.

Whilst its mechanical depth leaves a lot to be desired, and whilst it’s far from the most innovative of its kind, The Tower of Beatrice goes on to provide a neat escape room-like puzzler that doesn’t at all outstay its welcome. Those looking for an interesting take on the hidden object concept will pull the most from this, but even so, I would caution against setting expectations too high. It’s fun and unique, but somewhat let down in the long run.

Strong multiplayer props up an otherwise poor showing from Call of Duty this year. The combat and movement is a good as ever, but a woefully dire co-op campaign drags the experience to one of the lowest points in years, and is only mildly mitigated by the End Game extraction mode that has some good to it, albeit marred by not being the main focus of the release of Black Ops 7.

At first glance One Escape appears to be yet another simple platformer. The use of three distinct characters and some fun level design however mean that anyone looking for a short, fun experience should definitely check One Escape out.

Transformers: EarthSpark – Expedition has come and gone and it’s largely an unforgettable experience for me. Transformers are cool and I always enjoying taking control of one and this iteration started out no different. But as the game went along it was too much of the same button mashing patterns with a navigation system that was making me mad having to constantly check. All of the experiences the first time were fine but it didn’t leave me craving more.

Protocol is an alright puzzle game, it’s an alright shooter game, it’s just simply alright. It’s very busy jumping from genre to genre and focusing on atmospheric building and keeping the player entertained using some crude and brash humor at times that becomes stale on replays.

Cosmic Top Secret is a 3D platformer with a unique pulled-from-a-scrapbook look. It is clearly a personal story that I am glad exists, even if I didn’t find it captivating.