Well, we hate to say it, but DMC3 is still no "Devil May Cry." The world has moved on, folks, and a lot of that game's sheen is now standard issue in gaming. [PSW]

There are a few good moments here and there, but sadly, there's an unfinished aura to this game that permeates throughout. [PC Zone]

Gearbox's refusal to arm us with anything other than historically accurate kit is also incentive to take it slow and think. Medi-pacs are non-existent and no, you don't miraculously heal over time or stumble across a BFG. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Dredd fans will enjoy looking around the levels and laughing at the in-jokes - the rest of you will see this for what it is, a bog-standard FPS. [Nintendo Offical Magazine]

On pure graphics alone though, it's a massive step forward and is easily one of the best-looking sports games currently available. Add all the other improvements, plus the wealth of new boxers, gear and venues and Fight Night Round 2 is a super heavyweight of a sequel. [PSW]

It's the polar opposite of all that dialogue-based soul-searching and Jedi hocus-pocus, but boy oh boy, is it good. And there's not a single lightsaber in sight. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Things really rumble in two-player mode, where bouts evolve into ridiculously tense face-offs more like chess than a messy scrap outside the pub. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

For every second of satisfaction, there is a minute of monotony; where cardboard enemies fall under a cloud of red paint, physics offer no value whatsoever, AI is largely non-existent and gameplay follows the worn-ragged formula of coloured keycards and enemies that appear from thin air. [PC Zone]

Settlers is far from awful, it's just mind-numbingly dull. Which is far, far worse.

Overall however, we're rather taken with Nexus. Its mixture of tactics, mouse-control and combat-orientated gameplay is suitably different from both "Homeworld" and traditional space-combat games like Freespace, delivering something unique and yet familiar enough to appeal to fans of either game. [PC Zone]

The greatest driving game ever. On any console, computer, or arcade cabinet, ever. Even with all the problems, nothing even comes close to matching the sheer adrenaline GT4 offers when you're chucking a 700bhp beast around one of the game's beautifully crafted courses. As a game, GT4 is staggeringly huge, looks and sounds amazing, and features so many cars you're unlikely to ever see them all. [JPN Import]

This is a game that knows its small target audience (basically anyone who's played an Ys game before) and sticks to it without even trying to appeal to anyone else. Good luck to you if you fall into that category. [PSW]

It left us shaking our heads in utter bewilderment. Fans of EA's other Street games will be rightly embarrassed by the sheer awfulness of this faux street culture. [PSW]

It's one long action set-piece right the way through, with no time to get bored, lost or confused. Thrilling from beginning to end, Project: Snowblind is a top-quality shooter that deserves to be a smash. [Xbox Gamer]

Catching up with Chun Li and chums is fine and the replay value is bolstered by the chance to play all the character variations but it's one strictly for nostaligia buffs. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Nano Breaker degenerates into a slew of mindless button-bashing encounters. It's fun in a retro kind of way, but it isn't quite intelligent enough to keep you coming back for more.

It's a fun and a very stylish third-person action game - a lot better than the movie deserves, by all accounts. Just don't buy it expecting to see anything you haven't already seen before. [PSW]

This was a feature of the first game, but here you can turn even the most peaceable follower of the Light into a bitter and twisted receptacle of evil. Kind of. [PC Zone]

While it's still a great game, the basic flaws of last year's V2 version haven't really been addressed and the new menu system is laborious and unfriendly. [PSW]

The perfect example of how updates of existing titles should be done. Every single area has been improved way beyond what we would have been content with. Sports games don't get much more polished. [Xbox Gamer]

While the game boasts an impressive array of hardware, you're sadly only allowed to play as the forces of the 'right and just' in a linear two-pronged campaign that starts with the US-led invasion of Afghanistan and finishes in Iraq.

It's infuriatingly slow-paced at times, but that's not to say it's dull. Imagine you're lying in a field on a summer's day - that's action-free too, but hardly dull. Suikoden 4 is much the same, it's more interested in curling you up on the sofa on a rainy Sunday afternoon than in BLOWING YOU AWAY with MASSIVE COMBOS and HUGE EXPLOSIONS. [PSW]

Resident Evil 4 displays such extreme mastery of the videogame medium that it deserves far more than any review could give it, which essentially makes the thousands of sycophantic words we've just battered out redundant.

The game oozes atmosphere, from the Russian propaganda blaring out of the loudspeakers to the eerily empty war-torn streets. [PSW]

Minish Cap is a miracle. It constantly thrills and surprises you and the difficulty is perfectly judged. There's an absolute mountain of bonuses to discover thanks to the Kinstone system and you can get lost for hours just doing that. There certainly hasn't been a better GBA game released all year.

It's sturdy, it's explosive, and in short bursts it's a stupidly enjoyable, C4-charged rolling death machine of a GTA-beater. Beyond that though it never stretches itself to the obvious cult classic it could have so easily become. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

The beauty of NFL Street 2 is its immediacy. Although numerous offence (running, passing and trick) and defence plays can be employed, its anarchic nature ensures it is extremely fast-paced and easy to pick up. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

The premise is certainly unique and brimming over with potential, but the execution is so lazy and ham-fisted if it were a killer it would have shot itself in the foot. Shame really. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Sure, you can fly a zeppelin on Mars if you want, but aside from slightly more responsive flap settings, blowier wind (to use the technical term) and a guest appearance from Stephen Hawking as the voice of air traffic control (joke), X-Plane offers very little that Microsoft's doesn't already do both prettier and more intuitively.

If you want a game with good fight mechanics that stands up well on the PC, you should get "Prince Of Persia: Warrior Within." If you want a standard shoddy port of a console game, you should get this. It's fun, but it doesn't belong.

For the brief stretch you spend with Riddick in the galaxy's most notorious correction facility, Escape From Butcher Bay will keep you imprisoned in your house and chained to your PC from start to finish. [PC Zone]

Despite its smattering of positive elements though, D-Day reeks of being rushed to the table like a pot of undercooked sauerkraut.

But when you find yourself contesting an LDV Vans tie at six in the morning, you have to concede that they've got it right. Quite simply the most addictive thing I've ever tried. And I've tried the lot. [PC Zone]

Those who've already tasted the Prince's heady delights might be a little disappointed - this feels like a collection of new levels and bosses rather than an honest to God sequel. Like we said, call it a remix. [PSW]

Military obsessives will love it and, providing those who play it are prepared to put in the time required to learn its quirks and foibles, they should be rewarded with a fairly satisfying experience.

You could say the new dark and gritty atmosphere isn't as enchanting as the sumptuous visual quality of "Sands of Time," but what it lacks in the beauty stakes it more than makes up for in pure visceral excitement. [Offical UK Xbox Magazine]

Sadly, the developers have completely missed the point of the TV show, knocking out a second-rate two-wheeled racer that will disappoint fans of the programme and appear pointless to anyone else. Even the ever-excitable Teutul boys sound bored of it all. We can't blame them really. [PSW]

Ironically Worms Forts would probably be a faster and more intense game if worms didn't feature at all. Read into that what you will.

Blizzard has done what every MMORPG should be trying to do - it's ticked all the right boxes and really tried to forge the link between the heart and the head in a hugely immersive virtual space. This is what creates the stories in your imagination. These aren't just battles, they're adventures. Now that's what role-playing should be all about. [PC Zone]

A mess, a hurriedly produced and lazily-designed RTS produced to cash in on gamers hoping to relive the film's stunning battles. Just make sure you're not one of them. [PC Zone]

Like its predecessor, Sid Meier's game effortlessly takes the best of every style of gaming and mixes it into a consistent and enduringly charming whole. Certainly there are games with more strategy, and others with more action, but few, if any, can claim to be as breathlessly easy to enjoy. [PC Zone]

Perhaps Snake Eater's greatest achievement for games in general is this: it makes it very clear that making an organic environment like a jungle is not merely a case of changing colours, textures and maps. It's a lush, chaotic place out there in the real, natural world, and computers are just at the very edge of starting to replicate what that's like. Snake Eater does it so much better than anyone else. [PSW]

The action is bewildering and frenetic, the challenge is minimal and the usual camera problems persist, but this is still an exuberantly entertaining game.

This game is so close to flawless it's painful to the eye. It's so beautifully constructed, so immaculate, I can barely bring myself to divulge its details...Simply the most essential gaming experience of the year, the game the entire FPS genre has been building towards for the past decade, and one of the defining moments of the videogame medium as a whole. [PC Zone]

Had the melee combat been more refined, the engine used to its full capabilities and the niggles ironed out, then you'd be looking at perhaps the finest RPG of all time. As it is, it'll have to make do with the accolade of being one of the deepest, most engrossing and entertaining PC games of 2004. [PC Zone]

The whole thing's about as free-roaming as a man in a straightjacket locked in a padded cell, and about as fast moving as a glacier.

If it had flashier graphics or a simpler, more intuitive fighting system, it might appeal to everyone. As it stands, it's a curio and only of interest to completists and Street Fighter obsessives after a bargain exhibit to stroke in private. [PSW]

A game with a severe identity crisis, clearly trying to appeal to the action-loving masses while attempting not to alienate fans of the slow-paced gameplay of yore. Problem is, it's unlikely to truly grip either group, and may well estrange many core fans. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

With only two way multiplayer returning, this really was a missed opportunity to improve upon a disappointing franchise. As it stands, BW2 gets the smack put down on it by virtually every other fighter out there. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Blinx 2 is on par with the original, but the fact is that there are better alternatives out there that don't muddy the platform fun with complicated game mechanics and dull level design. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Races feel more like a monotonous chore than a speed thrill, purely because the tracks fail to inspire exciting burn-ups. [PSW]

Squeezed down to small screen size, it loses a lot of what made the Super NES game a classic.

It's just a shame EA insist on using a blurring effect when you boost. The graphics are already blurry enough to make it tough to see where the track ahead is taking you. The last thing you need when rocketing along at some silly speed over 100mph, is an effect that looks like someone's smeared Vaseline on your windscreen.

It looks more surreal than ever, provides a decently sized chunk of gameplay (although the multiplayer modes feel a tad half-hearted compared to the attention that has been lavished on the single-player game) and, despite being a first-person shooter, is cleverly suitable for all ages (although Nintendo's younger punters will find it prohibitively hard and confusing).

In truth, the puzzles are rather refreshing, not least because you have a gurgling baby to help you who eats literally anything.

It's a reasonably fun title, but tired graphics and monotonously easy challenges mean this is strictly one for undemanding kiddies. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

For an arcade game, it's even surprisingly playable with a steering wheel, with near misses causing no small amount of amateurish flinching. If you can't afford to attach largely pointless gadgets to your otherwise moribund vehicle, this is the next best thing. [PC Zone]

The sensation is difficult to explain, but it's akin to abandoning the sensation of control itself, as if you're truly within the gameworld and every neuron twitch in your brain results in precisely the correct physical translation.

Certainly a big departure from the traditional Sims gameplay and it's all the better for it. It's extremely accessible - although the longish loading times are a bit of a pain - and a hoot to play, with a constant stream of details that'll keep you smiling. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

A Hero's Tail is actually fairly hefty, with enormous levels to explore. Obviously a younger gamer's title, plenty of colourful visuals and the addition of so many replayable mini-games should keep the kiddies enthralled (and quiet) for hours at a time. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

The Urbs may have style and attitude, but it's still essentially the same Sims flavour. It requires patience, it's high maintenance and has little action (it's a girls game).

Basically one big collect-'a-thon.

There are off-line games equally or even more spectacular in immediate scenery or character models, but what game can offer such outrageous landscapes on such a grandiose scale? It's not just the sheer footslogging size of it, but the way the environment is realised to enhance this impression of immense vista and truly epic proportions.

Expertly produced with enough sheen in all the right places to make it worth your while, but still flawed enough to be a bit disappointing.

If you're in the mood for some easy-to-learn but hard-to-master city-building gameplay, Children Of The Nile is as good a game as you're likely to find. Hardly as unique as is claimed, but good all the same.

Despite a few points of ingenuity that shine through the murk, there's just not enough reasons for it to be a must-have game. It's also not nearly as good as "Call Of Duty." [PC Zone]

If only there was more to do, more variety and more choice, we may well have had a bona fide classic on our hands. As it stands, Scrapland is like a supermodel with a venereal disease - drop-dead gorgeous, and you can still have some fun with it, but you'll ultimately be deprived of the money shot. [PC Zone]

Overall, the multiplayer game modes are far more engaging than the story mode, whose biggest failing is a lack of variety. One for Xbox Live maniacs only.

A game that feels vaguely like chewing an endless pile of cream crackers. The cream crackers of vaguely interesting turn-based combat, interspersed with the odd sultana of story and the out-of-date marshmallow of film footage. [PSW]

The restrictive point-and-click system will always be an issue for most of us ("See that sand over there? Can't go there"), but the price and intriguing scenario mean that this isn't a total waste of time for those who fancy some arcane adventuring.

There's no standout reason to upgrade from previous editions. But if you're new to backside-blistering fun on four wheels, Fury 3 is worth a blast. [PSW]

Part of the problem is that instead of playing to the original game's strengths, what the developer has devised is a lily-livered RTS that's a pale shade of the Kohan engine on which it's based. [PC Zone]

There's no doubt that there's a huge amount of gameplay here, but at 30, perhaps it's a bit too expensive to warrant buying. Depends on how much you love your retro games. [PSW]

Stays faithful to the movie licence and dishes up hour upon hour of orc-slaying fun. It's not really doing anything new as far as RPGs go but, what it does do, it does well. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

There's tons of bonus material on offer including comic covers and illustrations, and the option to save your game at any point is a godsend.

It's also AMAZINGLY loud. Random battles erupt with an explosive screech sure to stain your sofa and almost every flick of the D-Pad on menus results in a baffling, ear-smashing clang.

If you enjoyed films like The Grudge, The Ring (the Japanese versions, that is) and The Eye, then this will give you goosebumps the size of tennis balls. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Gameplay is soon stretched as thin as Mrs Incredible's arms after you've tired of the new character moves and primary school-level puzzles, that include untaxing challenges such as overcoming laser traps by destroying conveniently placed power supplies. [PC Zone]

The difference would appear to be in the detail, and it's not merely cosmetic, with a new hard steer function lessening the reliance on the handbrake.

We've all got a soft spot for SpongeBob here at OXM towers (Ben T in particular), but our osmotic obsession can't mask the fact that this is a by-the-numbers platformer, albeit a charming one. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

A manifesto for every future video game. Now we've seen what can be done when truly brilliant people get to make a world brimming with variety, music, humour and sheer scale, very few other games are going to be able to live up to it. [PSW]

It's the most polished version of the game so far, and those who've never made a small child puke before will be in store for hours of fun. But the new interface with its streamlined minimalism hides a baffling array of build options, and is not the best for the newbie. [PC Zone]

It's as solid, competent and thrill-packed as the previous entries in Maddox Games' single-handed assault on the flight genre, it just doesn't really do anything that we haven't seen before. Nothing major at least. [PC Zone]

Bottom line is that Jump To Lightspeed is not an essential addition to SWG, and by no means repairs the many faults of the existing game. [PC Zone]

The whole game feels a bit slow at times. There are moments when the action chugs along slower than a milk float, particularly when you're being chased by the police.

A beautiful, balanced fighter, and a wealth of multiplayer options earns DOA the ultimate respect.

Sadly, when it comes down to it, this is all just a very dull experience. You fly about a bit, shoot at some tiny dots, shoot at some more tiny dots, become irritated by shooting at tiny dots, stop concentrating and crash into the sea. Then you start the entire process all over again.

Sabre Squadron's main claim to fame is its new multiplayer options, which allow you and some friends to play any of the nine new levels co-operatively. With the team AI problems eradicated, these levels become far more calculated and precise affairs (so long as your team-mates work together of course).

Such a humble gem of a game deserves recognition on the scale of more publicised actioners on release, and any self respecting beat 'em up fan definitely needs this in their life. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]

Obviously not the most groundbreaking title out there, but a solid title that, with a bit more concentration on the presentation front, could have scaled the heady highs of platformers.

The interface as well as several features have been lifted from ["Championship Manager"], and as such it's a slick affair. And perhaps it's the familiar feel or the hypnotic flashing text, but it somehow drags you in, whatever your knowledge of the sport. That said, the bulk of the tactical stuff can be delegated to a head coach, although that kind of defeats the object of the game.

It's a shame that the bosses require little more thought than simply chucking back what they throw at you, and it hardly qualifies as a platformer at times when you can just fly everywhere.

Tribes: Vengeance just feels right. Its fun lies in simple movement - something overlooked in all other high-octane blasters, and it gives you such a feeling of fluidity, control and desire for self-improvement, that on a basic level it's extremely hard to dislike.

This is a lazy, by-the-numbers sequel to a game that didn't exactly grab us by the throat first time around. Ladling on the gore and heaping on the sex can't disguise how average BloodRayne 2 really is.

It's still boring though. [PSW]

The camera has a tendency to misbehave, leaving your troops obscured by mountains during battles and your workers hidden behind city walls. What's more, the linearity of the missions negates much of the game's strategic subtlety, while selecting troops is clumsy.

So with the main new feature [First Touch] largely redundant, you're simply left with yet another sluggish, indistinguishable FIFA game. It's also tactically perverse, with defenders lurking on the edge of the box, and forwards showing little inclination to push up.

If you want to look at pert bottoms and women sucking each others' necks while wearing stockings, you'd be better off doing it on the internet for free. [Official UK Xbox Magazine]