Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater HD is a welcome return to form for a classic franchise, arriving as a digital title from Activision and Robomodo in summer 2012. To get the word out, Tony himself tweeted some teasers to his 2.8m followers then showed up at the Spike Video Game Awards to surprise everyone with the game’s announcement and a teaser trailer. Long time THPS fans responded with love, as “Tony Hawk” trended on Twitter and Kotaku stated it was “my favorite VGA surprise” and Yahoo headlined that long time skate fans are stoked.

Remedy’s Death Rally is definitely a contender for iOS game of the year. We revealed the game to the likes of Pocket Gamer, GameSpot, IGN, and Modojo, all of whom raved about it. Post-release it generated outstanding reviews from the likes of Slide to Play, GamePro, and dozens of other sites. After the game’s numerous, beefy updates, Touch Arcade named it one of the “Best iOS Games April 2011” and bumped its score to a perfect 5 stars. Remedy recouped the cost of the game in three days. There is more to come, an update with multiplayer action is coming soon.

One of Sandbox’s recent projects was Wappy Dog from Activision for Nintendo DS. Wappy Dog breaks the videogame mold by combining a toy with an extensive pet simulation gameplay experience. Wappy impressed audiences from Toy Fair to E3, including Consumer Reports, IGN.com, and CNET. Wappy hit the shelves this fall and continues to get rave reviews from Common Sense Media, Gamer Pops, Popzara and KidzWorld and was included in USA Today’s Top Tech Gifts for Kids, MSNBC’s Hot Holiday Video Games and ZDNet’s Holiday Gift Guide 2011.

Working with developer Ecko|Code, Sandbox unveiled Dexter Slice of Life, a fresh social gaming experience based on the hit Showtime TV series. Kicking things off at Comic Con, Mashable took questions about Dexter from readers and had Michael C. Hall himself answer them on camera (well, an iPhone camera!), then followed up with a preview. Upon release, the free to play game was well received by the likes of Kotaku, GamesRadar, Inside Social Games, Games.com and Social Gaming Hub.