Nocturne is a short RPG that shines most when you let the story and music lead the way. The combat is flexible enough for players of any skill level, and every big fight has its own personality. Exploration and the RPG systems could use more polish, but at around ten hours, the game ends before those problems wear you down.
Nivalis Nights is a solid cyberpunk business sim with strong atmosphere, detailed restaurant management, and plenty of side content. Its thin life-sim systems and rough performance keep it from being the complete city-life RPG.
The Walking Dead: Streets of Survival delivers nostalgic pixel-art action, recognizable characters, and satisfying progression, but uneven combat and limited content keep this enjoyable adaptation from becoming an essential beat ’em up.
Welcome to Elderfield, which blends cozy farming with dice-driven RPG combat and Lovecraftian dread into an addictive, uneven mix; thin on romance, but endlessly worth exploring.
BLACKWOOD has a compelling experience buried inside. The double-life structure works as a concept, and the dual economy gives that concept real mechanical potential. But until the technical problems and weaker systems are addressed, the potential remains more impressive than the finished experience.
RuneScape: Dragonwilds is especially appealing because it offers a familiar universe with a completely different gameplay structure. For survival-game fans, it provides a progression system that feels more purposeful than simply collecting materials for increasingly expensive crafting recipes.
HOT WHEELS Infinite Rush successfully turns Milestone's toy-racing formula into a charming open world, delivering addictive collecting and fun driving despite uneven activities, navigation issues, and technical frustrations.
WARDOGS is at its best when you stop treating it like another conventional FPS and start treating it like a battlefield. You are one part of a much larger operation, and your job does not have to involve pulling a trigger.
Tiny Eden is a cozy, hands-on apartment garden sim with genuine depth in its soil and plant systems, but technical hiccups and a slow reputation grind hold it back. Worth a patient try.
The Blood of Dawnwalker will suit gamers looking for a serious, immersive dark fantasy role-playing game with choice-making elements and a vampire-themed environment, rather than one that simply includes vampires. There will be no denying that the game has some flaws, in particular, in terms of combat diversity and traversal. However, the game's best mechanics work together rather than separately.
1666: Amsterdam feels more like a promising foundation than a finished experience. If Panache improves the combat, makes Aaron's movement feel more natural, gives the world more convincing reactions, fixes the technical problems, and builds on the game's strongest investigative systems, the final version could be considerably better than what is available today.
Resonance: A Plague Tale Legacy ultimately feels less like a dramatic makeover and more like Asobo finding a second identity for its brand. It may not have the emotional devastation of Amicia and Hugo's story, but Sophia's trip has enough personal drama to warrant its place.
STAR WARS Zero Company blends XCOM's tactical bite with genuine Star Wars heart and soul. It delivers a deep, richly characterful campaign that's absolutely well worth its price.
Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2 rebuilds its classes and adds a genuinely clever Specialist system, but stuttering, crashes, and a campaign that runs out of content too fast keep it from being the leap forward it should've been.
METAL GEAR SOLID: MASTER COLLECTION Vol.2 finally frees MGS4 from PlayStation 3 jail, delivering excellent performance alongside two preserved classics, making it essential for longtime Metal Gear fans.
MARVEL Tōkon: Fighting Souls is not perfect, but its strengths are much more important than its shortcomings. It feels fresh without losing the bits of fighting games you know. And it has enough depth that you can keep discovering new possibilities long after you learn the basics. For a new fighter, it makes a strong argument for itself on the PS5 as one of the more enjoyable entries in the genre.
Duskfade succeeds because it knows what kind of game it wants to be. It doesn’t try to reinvent 3D platformers or compete with big AAA productions. It takes the most enjoyable parts of the genre and builds a modern adventure around them. It’s not a perfect outcome, but it’s accessible, fun, and packed with the kind of personality that made classic platformers special.
No More Room in Hell 2 is at its strongest when it reminds you that survival is supposed to be difficult. You are not meant to feel completely safe, and zombies are not simply targets waiting to be cleared from a room.
Finding Polka may not be the biggest or most technically ambitious game of the year, but it does something arguably more difficult: it leaves an impression. It makes players laugh, encourages them to look closely at every corner of its beautifully drawn world, and eventually hits some genuinely emotional notes.
Big Walk works because, at its heart, it understands that multiplayer games don’t need to be competitive, combative, or constantly active to be enjoyable. The best moments come from communication, exploration, mistakes, and unforeseen circumstances that arise when a group of people works together to solve problems.