One gamer has gone through the ringer and back, experiencing all of the highs and lows of various video games in pursuit of the deadliest of world records. GiantWaffle, or Andrew Bodine to his mum and dad, took on the challenge to set a world record, and after 572 hours over the course of a month, he has reached the finish line.

You could argue that every video game is an action, and you’d be right! For this award though, we’re looking at those games whose inherent activity that you have agency over is just so gosh dang good that you can ignore everything else about it. The games whose ability to rock you like a hurricane more than makes up for a silly story, occasional glitches or even a lack of ambition.

Super Mario Maker 2 is one of the best games released this year. As far as sequels go, it’s pretty close to perfect. It took the ideas from the original, added a compelling single player campaign, a tonne more creative options for people like making their own levels, and even patched in proper online co-op with friends and not just randoms after players noticed the feature was missing. It’s really, really good.

With an industry that’s obsessed with getting the most bang for buck with any new game, few live service games truly manage to rise above the obvious cash-grab trap and find themselves settling into a groove of establishing a community and then toiling away to create new content on a consistent schedule. That’s not to say that one such game doesn’t exist.

So says the game’s director, Patrice Désilets, at a recent conference where he lamented the fact that Ancestors was not met with the praise he’s accustomed to. You might recognise the name Patrice Désilets. He’s the guy responsible for developing some of those Assassin’s Creed games. You know, the ones with the dude in the hood who did all those …

As we wind back the clock and have a look at what 2019 had to offer gamers, it feels only fitting to start the first of our annual time travel trips to shine a light on the best new experiences that popped up throughout the year. In an industry where sequels dominate and current games are positioned to stretch as much longevity out of a property as is humanly possible, it’s new ideas that are seen as risky business.

Next year’s going to be an especially big year for the Xbox brand as it tries to undo the damage that the Xbox One’s miserable reveal did. With its focus on TV (TV! TV TV!) and Kinect, along with a dearth of great first party games, the Xbox One had a rough start.

Satellites rain death as factions fight for control of a Broken Earth. Protect your team's harvesters, build factories and vehicles, and assault the enemy base. Earthbreakers is team FPS action in an RTS world!