Simon Parkin
The greatest fighting game series of them all is back, but its return is half-cooked, with much of its advertised features yet to materialise
It's testament to Taro's talent for storytelling that the game inspires replay as much through its narrative hooks as its baser promise of trophies and a 100% competition record.
Abzû is a beautiful audio-visual treat that's light on challenge but big on wonder.
Final Fantasy XV takes the series in a new direction, but despite some memorable moments, it remains remains a confused, uneven package.
Glitch-ridden and seemingly unfinished, this is a tragic swansong for Tony Hawk's video game career.
Glimpses of Yuji Naka's outmoded genius can be seen in Rodea's barren skies, but a paucity and dissonance of ideas make this a failure.
Lost Sphear is a more ambitious JRPG than its predecessor, yet it risks abandoning its purpose to return to the genre's simpler days.
The FMV thriller is fully exhumed in this splicing of game and cinema, where high production values fail to obscure the creative fissures.
Relentless and brutal, this post-apocalyptic pixel art survival quest is a gruelling, if often beguiling, challenge.
A characteristically imaginative minigame suite that lays out the possibilities of Nintendo's new console, without feeling like a guidebook.
Samurais vs. Chocobos.
This period study of the arcade's formative beat 'em up has its charms, but the sense that this is a game out of time is not easily shaken.
The designer behind Harvest Moon returns with a game that frustrates as much as it fascinates.
Billed as a grand, lavish piece of fan service, this is as much a tribute to Pok'mon's charms as those of the series whose name it bears.
A painfully undercooked Japanese RPG that shows how far the genre has fallen behind its western rivals.
Pokémon X & Y is the finest expression of Satoshi Tajiri's obsessive vision yet.
Elementary.
Post fantasy.
Pocket fighter.
Heavy Spectrum's affectionate, idiosyncratic reboot summons the spirit of the original Shadow of the Beast, as well as some of its faults.