10 Early Contenders For Game Of The Year 2016

9. Monster Hunter: Generations

Thankfully for us Westerners who were waiting on a bonafide brilliant instalment of Monster Hunter before dipping our toes in, Generations is exactly that. You can check out the full review over here, but sufficed to say, what Capcom have crafted this time is a perfect RPG; one with endless customisation and a ludicrously addictive loot grind.

Embodying the idea of a titular Monster Hunter, you'll train yourself with all manner of blades, melee weapons or firearms, before journeying out into a variety of landscapes to hunt and skin beasts of all sizes. The bigger the creature, the fancier the reward, and everything can be sliced up and repurposed into a new weapon or armour set.

There's no progression quite so rewarding as starting with a basic short sword and leather armour, before clinching a victory on some screen-filling beast and emerging wearing its skull and shoulder bones as a helmet/shoulder pad combo. Once Monster Hunter sinks its talons in, they go deep, and I've not been so thoroughly enamoured by a game's many interworking systems all year.

Handheld gaming - and the 3DS in particular - was built to house drop-in/drop-out masterpieces like this.