Some games just get your hooks in you like no other, whether that’s the ‘one more match’ pull by some of the games on this list or the addictive mission structure of some others. These games have had us hooked for a big part of 2019, or all of it.

The following Top 5 list was compiled by Dylan Blight, Ashley Hobley and Ciaran Marchant.

What makes Grindstone so enjoyable is the thrill of pulling off a huge combo. The game uses typical match-four mechanics but opens it up so that clearing and the entire board of enemies around you is possible. The amount of times I’d spent five or more minutes pondering over my move before locking it in so I could see this amazing combo of attacks pulled off on screen is what’s kept me coming back again-and-again to Grindstone.

The game has a ridiculous amount of levels and an RPG system that lets you unlock and change up your armour, skills and weapons to best suit a certain level or playstyle.

A colourful art style, great music and sound effects paired with a slowly growing variation of enemy types and difficulty make Grindstone easy to lose many hours to, and easy to come back to level, after level.

– Dylan Blight

I sunk more time into this auto battler than I thought I would and often longer than I intended to. The randomness of the character drops is the element that got me coming back again for round after round. I would learn each match about the combination of champions I had used and why I done well or, more often than not, done poorly. Sure I would have champions and combinations I preferred, but the randomness forces you to try different strategies which in turn makes you better equipped for any combination of champions you are offered in future games.

The drafting rounds are an element that separates it from auto battlers and helps to make you feel a bit more of a sense of control and hope if you are not doing so well. The hook of setting up your move and watching the ensuing fight play out just hit a certain party of my brain and had me playing match after match.

– Ashley Hobley

Bright lights, big numbers and crazy characters, these are some things that places like Las Vegas use to lure people into their giant casinos; Las Vegas could learn a thing or two from Borderlands 3.

With not only the wastes of Pandora to explore but the vast expanses of its galaxy, Borderlands 3 draws players into its gameplay loop. Enticing you to explore more, to complete a boss one more time and maybe even take a spin on one of Moxie’s very own casino machines.

How does it do this? Guns. Guns with bright colours and guns with big numbers on their stats. There is something purely joyful about checking out a gun that has just dropped for you, but even better, seeing the destruction you can reap with it. But for much of the game, there is always something better on the horizon, something to push and strive for. Something that makes you keep turning on that console and picking up that controller. 

– Ciaran Marchant

One more drop! These are the words that millions of players found themselves saying when Apex Legends burst onto the scene in early 2019. Battle Royale players new and old flocked to Apex Legends to explore its varied map and to master its roster of characters. There was always something more to get, new character skin or weapon skin to unlock. Players strove to get their character cards up on the big screen in games, to prove that they were the apex of the Battle Royale community.

With its range of characters, every game was different and abilities changed the way you played the game. And when the game starts to wind down and you start to rethink your choice for one more drop, Respawn changes it up by making map changes as many BRs do or do something that the other Battle Royales couldn’t: release a new character.

– Ciaran Marchant

It feels like cheating to put one of the easiest games to lose time to at the top spot on this list, but hey, Tetris is just that good and Tetris 99 makes things just more competitive.

Released at the start of the year as a free-to-play game for Nintendo Online subscribers, Tetris 99 quickly became a time-sink for me as I chased a victory. The game has you playing against 98 other players and although there know-how when it comes to defending and attacking certain players, it ultimately comes down to just being good at Tetris.

No other game in 2019 had me jumping straight back into the queue for another match as Tetris 99.

– Dylan Blight