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Despite its vast scope, The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt tells a personal, intimate and touching story, filled with characters you'll love and hate, and stuffed with monsters to slay. I completed the main storyline in around 50 hours and - yes I know this is a cliche - I've barely scratched the surface. The Witcher 3 is an astounding achievement.
Another Nazi-blasting triumph, Wolfenstein: The Old Blood is the perfect companion piece to The New Order, and proof positive that MachineGames knows exactly what it's doing with the series. The Old Blood is more of the same, which is certainly no bad thing.
Cramming many of Assassin's Creed's calling cards into ACC: China's diminutive 2.5D frame, while amping up the importance of stealth, is impressive. But too much of the game is flat and uninspired. There's the barest bones of a great game here. Let's hope one of the sequels expands on that promise.
State of Decay: Year-One Survival Edition is a generously proportioned package (that's not a euphemism), containing a stack of content, a huge open-world packed with ravenous zombies and precious few supplies to see you through. The apocalypse has never looked so damn bleak, although the 1080p upgrade helps bolster the gloomy visuals. State of Decay heralds the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine.
As endless runners go, Infinity Runner is a fine example, but greatly lacks polish and finesse. Repeated use of assets also leads to deja vu, and some parts of the game are just plain broken. The story too is deeply unsatisfying with its eye-rolling conclusion. But then for the price, you can't really go too far wrong. If nothing else, Infinity Runner offers a few hours of silly sci-fi entertainment. With space werewolves.
A gloriously unhinged and unashamedly stupid game, Goat Simulator is still one of the most enjoyable things I've played in some time. It's a horribly glitchy mess, but it's also somewhat majestic in its commitment to providing surreal lunacy that will have you in fits of laughter. If this is what it's like to be a goat, I don't want to be human anymore.
NetherRealm has outdone itself with Mortal Kombat X, delivering an uncompromising fighting game that revels in blood-drenched ultra-violence. Not just essential for Mortal Kombat fans, MK X is something that deserves to be enjoyed by all fight fans over the age of 18. Brutality!
For newcomers Dark Souls II: Scholar of the First Sin is a superb package, with the wonderful DLC thrown in and the visuals at the best they have ever been. However, it's also tough going thanks to the remixed enemy placements and new random encounters. For veterans this is a welcome return to Drangleic but not one that is mandatory, as the changes feel all too insubstantial at times. So while Scholar of the First Sin is the definitive package, it isn't one that is required for repeat visitors.
With two mahoosive games and a ton of additional content stuffed into the box, Borderlands: The Handsome Collection is well worth the asking price, what with its sharp, pimped-out visuals and what not. If you've already taken this ride before on Xbox 360, you might want to think twice before parting with more cash for the Xbox One version.
It might not reach the dizzy heights of seminal Resident Evil, but Resident Evil: Revelations 2 is nonetheless a solid fleshy slab of survival horror that represents great value for money and a fun few hours of infected freak shooting.
A mighty fine bite-size Battlefield experience that takes a franchise synonymous with being a military shooter and establishes it in new territory. Battlefield Hardline is not as grand or epic as you'd perhaps expect a core Battlefield title to be, but it's certainly a damn fine alternative.
Final Fantasy: Type-0 HD might not be to everyone's tastes, but the game's combat is mostly enjoyable and there's plenty to explore and discover. The story might be convoluted, but it's engaging and the characters are (mostly) likeable. Final Fantasy: Type-0 HD is good fun, and well worth delving into for a few dozen hours.
Ori and the Blind Forest excels in so many areas. The fantastic level design, the inventive abilities, the touching story, the wonderful score and of course those scintillating visuals all stack up for one hell of an experience. Demanding a place in your collection, Ori and the Blind Forest is the best game I've played this year.
LA Cops is a neat game of cops and criminals that's just too short-lived and lacking. The 70s style is a nice touch and the partner dynamic adds a strategic bent (even if we did mostly just use the second cop as an extra life) to what is otherwise a fairly sterile twin-stick shooter. It's not quite our bag of donuts.
DmC Devil May Cry: Definitive Edition proves that DmC is still brilliant. A slight resolution upgrade, frame rate boost and additional content make for a good value package, but if you've already played DmC on last-gen platforms, you may want to carefully consider re-purchasing this, despite it remaining deliciously devilish.
Zombie Army Trilogy isn't an especially well made game. It's a bit buggy and cheap and it's decidedly dumb. But it's also capable of being really fun. Get online with a few friends, get the beers in, and laugh together as you massacre Hitler's undead army, one squishy head at a time.
Free from Kinect, Frontier has been able to deliver a game that revels in split-second timing and precise controls. The result is the studio's best Xbox game in years that's a brilliantly fun coaster-racing, track-building, building destroying experience in its own right. ScreamRide feels like a reaction to the studio's Kinect work. Where Microsoft's motion-detecting device demanded games without precise input, ScreamRide revels in it. The result is a joy.
Pneuma: Breath of Life should have been the kind of game you turn to between Call of Duty sessions, but instead it's a slightly insipid, short-lived and ultimately disposable puzzler. Console gamers like us are crying out for games like these, but Pneuma really isn't it.
A love letter to fans, Dragon Ball Xenoverse features almost every character, masses of content and the trademark vibrant and frenetic art style. Unfortunately, it's not really much fun to play, succeeding in being something of a repetitious slog. A game for the Dragon Ball purists, Xenoverse is unlikely to appeal to anyone else.
Evolve is brilliant in the right circumstances and with the right people, but it's hard to unreservedly recommend to everyone. Those with dedicated teams will get the most out of the game while those in matchmaking will find mixed results. Still, Turtle Rock deserves recognition for attempting - and almost nailing - such an ambitious project.