Whether you’re driving a supercar through Mexico or simply unpacking a cardboard box in an utterly engrossing way, the year offered plenty of gaming joy. Our critics pick the top titles
A genuinely inventive tactical role-playing adventure that uses procedural generation to allow for player-created stories, all taking place in a fantasy world constructed from luscious papercraft set-pieces – like a digital board game.
: “It is like a never-ending fountain of fun, combining the linear, discrete, themed levels of 2D Mario games with the joyous freedom of movement of 3D Mario.”As the nephew of a famous folk artist, you have to find your own true musical direction in this pretty, unusual game – and of course that direction is prog rock.
: Infinite’s star isn’t a character but Master Chief’s new grappling gun … This touch of Spider-Man points to Halo’s status as an undeclared slapstick comedy, its violence as wacky and infectious as its story is po-faced.Taking elements of Toy Story and the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids franchise, this enchanting co-op game has a warring couple battling to reach their daughter when they are magically shrunk to the size of dolls.
: Like any great holiday, there is nothing to think about here except which thing to do next … there is no more fun way to drive virtual cars than this.Barcode-tattooed assassin Agent 47 returns with another set of enticingly open and multifaceted kill missions, travelling from English country estates to Argentinian wineries, donning costumes, experimenting with unlikely weapons and causing mirth, murder and mayhem wherever he goes.