Fight Night Round 4 not only matches its predecessor, but improves upon it and has reclaimed it's title as the best boxing game in the world.

Overall, the general feel of Shadow Wars is a solid turn-based strategy game -- even if its story backdrop, limited multiplayer, and character archetypes are short on originality.

I'm shocked that 10 episodes in, Telltale's still finding gimmicks to keep this stuff fresh.

That's Batman's general theme: so many of the mechanics turn Batman: Arkham Asylum into a bona fide "Batman Simulator," that the feeling of being Batman compensates for its flaws.

The first improvement is that everything is smoother.

The first improvement is that everything is smoother.

The real attraction here is the game's "Sticky Fingers"-like bulge of music. With 84 tunes on the disc (all are original recordings) and 20 free downloads form the online store, Rock Band 2 is simply the cheapest way to beef up your library.

Wii Fit Plus is a better product, but keep in mind that it's not a sequel. Like the second edition of a book, it looks and feels exactly the same as before, but the additions effectively make the previous version obsolete.

The selection of jams, from Pitbull's "Calle Ocho" to M.I.A.'s "Galang '05", are all bootie-bouncing material. The range of dance routines vary considerably and feel legit -- I'd feel comfortable doing "the jerk" at a club.

Most of the game's enjoyment comes from building up characters over time through battling and buying, a practice that should be right up the average RPG player's alley. "Is it a fighter? Is it an RPG?" Well, it can be both, and still be fun.

The game shines particularly bright in the Total Team Control mode, which allows you to hook up online with nine other players for 5-on-5 basketball. This mode simulates the experience of playing an actual game of basketball more closely than any videogame I've played.

At times like this, it's a wonder that adventure games ever went off the rails.

But be patient, put in the dedicated time, research, and strategic planning, and Sunshine Islands will reward you satisfactorily.

Devotees will immediately recognize Retro Evolved 2's myriad improvements.

I commend the game's focus on simplicity -- Trials HD doesn't have gratuitous power-up integration and smartly avoids an unnecessary Jump button. And the game is rife with content: the heavily replayable 42-stage campaign complements the Skill Games mode and the easy-to-use level editor.

You could easily fill an entire review with the grocery list of games from which Outland cribs its gameplay elements -- Ubisoft's own marketing specifically calls out Ikaruga and Prince of Persia as "inspirations," for heaven's sake. But doing so seems unnecessarily reductive to me, because Outland manages to take those "inspirations" and create something that feels like genuine innovation.

But is Sports Champions a "killer app?" Not exactly, but, as you might guess, the multiplayer is a lot more fun than single-player.

You could easily fill an entire review with the grocery list of games from which Outland cribs its gameplay elements -- Ubisoft's own marketing specifically calls out Ikaruga and Prince of Persia as "inspirations," for heaven's sake. But doing so seems unnecessarily reductive to me, because Outland manages to take those "inspirations" and create something that feels like genuine innovation.

Origins' brilliance is it keeps that simplicity on the surface, but ends up feeling incredibly varied thanks to its level design.

New control schemes that work this well have been long overdue in baseball games, especially when you consider that we've been hanging onto the standard pitch meter for the past eight years. It's time to move on and analog controls are the first step in the right direction.

Origins' brilliance is it keeps that simplicity on the surface, but ends up feeling incredibly varied thanks to its level design.

The fact that it does something genuinely different than the rest of the genre earns it a lot of goodwill from me; if DOW2 really was just the expected "COH in space" or "DOW with spiffy graphics," then those flaws would be intolerable. So yes, I love it, flaws and all. Besides, watching Assault Marines or Stormboyz fly in the air and slam down onto some fools doesn't get old.

As a game steeped in immediacy, Mirror's Edge is an absolute must-play despite its idiosyncrasies. And as a pied piper for progressive design in first-person gaming, it's all the more important.

Evolution evolves the series, and it does so wonderfully. I suspect a future follow-up will involve a complete overhaul, but until then, GTR Evolution -- and Nordschleife in particular -- is where every good driver should be.

Sacred 2 turns out to be a great couch game, largely because you can play co-op with a friend at your side. But the real surprise is that the folks at Ascaron managed to create a mostly-great interface for the XB360 and PS3 controller, giving you faster and easier access to more combat abilities than you could use in the PC version.

Mass Effect 2 is a fantastic game regardless of platform, and anyone who doesn't own an Xbox 360 should definitely experience it on PS3. Nevertheless, the 360 version is still the way to go. The continuity of customization offered by the dozens of decision links between the first two games were easily the most satisfying thing about ME2, and that's largely lost on PS3.

Even without multiplayer, Torchlight makes for a remarkably entertaining 10 to 15 hours, with plenty more custom content to come thanks to the powerful game editor TorchED, which you can download free of charge.

Though it occasionally stumbles, there's one thing that Bad Company 2 clearly demonstrates: DICE has graduated from the, "can only do a multiplayer FPS" class, and is perfectly capable of making a great all-around game.