The best games know how to turn small beginnings into something much bigger. A tiny kingdom becomes an empire. A simple card deck transforms into an unstoppable combo machine. One runway expands into a web of incoming air traffic. These games are all about momentum – starting with very little then slowly building towards mastery, complexity and sometimes complete chaos.

What starts as a regular, albeit very stylish, game of poker quickly turns into something devious. You had a standard card deck in your first round, but 15 minutes in, you suddenly find a joker that gives you an extra multiplier every time you play a heart card, and another that powers up kings – and now nothing interests you more than having an entire deck of kings of hearts. Some cards bring you in-game currency. Some boost your score. Some break, because they’re made of glass. And that sound of your score multiplying hundreds of times is worth every fail along the way (there will be a lot).

Zapping aliens and mining for precious resources. Two tasks that seem pretty straightforward when you think about it. But once you put them together, things start to get slightly more complicated. The true challenge in Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor is completing these tasks while experimenting with a deep class and skill system. Plus, every run evolves differently from the last one, keeping you constantly on your toes in your heavy mining boots.

What does an air traffic controller need to land a plane? Easy – a plane and a runway. Point one towards the other. Job done. That’s how Mini Airways starts, but things quickly become way more hectic. You will be dealing with peak hours at an airport, no-fly zones, difficult terrain, accidents and a whole lot of other metaphorical spanners being thrown in the works of your perfectly running airport machine.

At first glance, The Battle of Polytopia looks simple: a tiny tribe, a few units and a fog-covered map waiting to be explored. But every turn expands the possibilities. New technologies unlock stronger armies, cities grow into powerful hubs and small tactical choices slowly shape the fate of your civilisation. Before long, what began as a humble settlement turns into a battle for domination.

Boiling the strategy genre down to its core is what makes Thronefall such an amazing and accessible experience. You build up your kingdom and defend it, just by racing around the map and doing everything yourself. But that is also where the game’s unique challenge comes in: at some point, it will ask you to be everywhere at once all the time. You are not a king issuing orders to your underlings and waiting for results – you are putting out the fires, and every night there are more and more of them.

You are a piece of bacon travelling through the human body. That alone should tell you enough about the kind of experience Bacon in Zane is aiming for. Here, simple taps and straightforward movements quickly spiral into a bizarre obstacle course of lungs, neurons, bacteria and increasingly absurd physics-based challenges. Every new area introduces another strange mechanic or surprise, constantly escalating the chaos while somehow still making perfect sense in the game’s wonderfully weird world.