Basically, there are just enough tactical elements in Lockdown to ruin it as an action-oriented shooter, and just enough action elements to ruin it as a tactical shooter. [May 2006, p.50]

Sadly, as egg-cellent as that premise sounds, thanks to some monotonous gameplay and a lazy job of porting it from the PlayStation, Chicken Run ends up being merely medi-yolk-re.

It's like scoring with a random co-ed after a night spent projectile vomiting with your frat buddies. [Dec 2004, p.89]

This is essentially a professional quality modification to “Blitzkrieg”, handled by another Russian developer with ties to original producers Nival Interactive. [Mar 2006, p.61]

If you have been wondering why so many South Koreans are so excited about this game...well, you'll still be wondering after you play it.

It shamelessly copies two Blizzard classics, "WarCraft II" and "Diablo." The problem is that it doesn't copy from either classic particularly well, and the result is a flat, lifeless experience that quickly becomes more of a chore than a pleasure.

In the end, it does a decent job of bringing the massive battle formula to the King Arthur license. [Feb 2005, p.9]

A reminder that sometimes a solid jaunt through a colorful little world is better than plodding through yet another post-apocalyptic wasteland. [Feb 2003, p.73]

It makes the mistake of being repetitive and, worse of all, boring. [Aug 2003, p.86]

Let's be kind and say that it looks lovely in its plumed cap of mediocrity. [Feb 2004, p.84]

Unfortunately, at $30, the shot is foul. Guys, it's called a roster patch. Look it up.

The game isn't at all involving, with its poor sound and graphics and nonsensical story. There just isn't anything to drive the player along. [Oct 2003, p.95]

It's too bad Midway is so caught up in the me-too game when it's just children like the Rush series who get hurt. [Dec p.93]

Editing terrain can be an absolute beast, particularly since configuring certain animal enclosures requires painstaking detail. [Feb 2006, p.66]

They've left out the overbearing story elements and achieved a deliriously unselfconscious zaniness. [July 2005, p.91]

There's probably an entertaining game to be made from the disaster that is dating; this isn't it. [Oct 2004, p.87]

While you need to babysit your smoke-jumpers a wee-bit too much, the topic is interesting enough to make this more than just a curiosity. [Jan 2005, p.79]

In the GBA version you have a set of skills that level up, each useful in different types of interaction. [Mar 2006, p.88]

A good game hidden behind a baffling interface. All the "one more hour" elements are there; you just have to find them. [Apr 2004, p.72]

Takeda's strength lies in its handling of the nuances of combat. Leadership, morale, training, tactics, and other factors all come into play.

Only hardcore, completist fans of the franchise and those who play new games to relive old ones should appy here. [July 2005, p.59]

There isn't anything painfully awful about Highland Warriors, but there's very little to get overly excited about. [May 2003, p.82]

A fair game that is almost completely undone by an interface as archaic as the warfare it presents. [Nov 2005, p.79]

Controls are so poor that Sam might as well be fighting the forces of evil blindfolded. [July 2006, p.92]

With artificial intelligence as unintelligent as it is, the pure thrill of Diplomacy is untranslatable to the computer. [Jan 2006, p.46]

Other than the sheer speed, there's nothing particularly revolutionary or memorable here, but it does everything just well enough to be fun. [Sept 2002, p.81]

Never falls on its face—it's occasionally spooky, sometimes mildly thought-provoking, and always visually stunning—but neither does it come close to setting a new standard for adventure gaming (a shame, since the subject matter is ambitious, if pretentious, and could have been the starting point for a more unique venture).

Most certainly a pleasant console role-playing game of a faded breed. [Jan 2006, p.89]

The additions are more serviceable than inspiring. [June 2003, p.87]

Said crimes are only marginally more heinous than this bug-ridden, empty, lifeless, un-engaging, shoddily designed excuse for an adventure game. [July 2004, p.69]

It's less punishing than "1503 A.D." and not as insufferably cute as "The Settlers." It has none of the depth of "Children of the Nile" or its Impressions predecessors. And it's as mildly entertaining and ultimately forgettable as it sounds. [Feb 2005, p.71]

If you feel like a little frenetic shooting and don't really care if it makes any sort of cohesive sense, then you won't feel bad about picking up this title. [July 2004, p.67]

Playing with toy cars should be a lot more entertaining than this. [Oct. 2006, p.77]

Curiously absent from your dollhouse accoutrements are law books. [Jan 2003, p.85]

it's downright provincial. It's a game about buying buses, setting them up to drive in a circle, and then watching them.

The economic model guilding the action is ridiculously off-kilter. [Feb 2006, p.66]

There's nothing at all wrong with arcade-style gameplay, but there's something wrong if the action is alternately dull and frustrating, as it is this game. If you're a Ducati devotee or fan of motorcycle racing, prepare for disappointment with this game.

Fans might—or should—expect something more than a six year old DOS to Windows port with a few extras.

Quite simply, this is a game that just doesn't work.

It all feels very tired; same dated graphics, some laughable environments, level editor is beyond complex.

When the core gameplay is lacking, any variation on "blah" comes out as "bleh." [Jan. 2007 p.52]

The rules are poorly applied, the interface is clumsy, and the pacing is very, very slow.

There's a few clever puzzles scattered throughout the levels; unfortunately, there's also a few incredibly painful flying and driving sequences as well. [Jan 2003, p.77]

Moscow to Berlin is almost slavish in the way it sticks to the formula and gives no sign of wanting to be anything more. [Oct. 2006, p.76]

Given the charm, elegance, and imigination of designer Benoit Sokal's best-known work, "Syberia", it is a crushing disappointment that these qualities are almost entirely absent from Paradise. [Sept. 2006, p.58]

Simply isn't interesting enough to merit sticking it out that long.

The combat is too simple, the resource system is too complex, and the small flashes of brilliance get lost in the mediocrity of the rest of the design. [July 2005, p.67]

Quite possibly the most unpalatable role-playing game concocted in recent memory...A gooey mess of reflex-driven combat, muddled interface, cliched dungeon designs, and useless player decisions. [Nov 2003, p.95]

The developers have hand-placed absolutely everything, robbing the whole game of any sense of exploration or freedom. [June 2003, p.85]

Not even Hitler's plan to fight the war on two fronts was this painfully ill-advised. [July 2006, p.63]

This isn't a quick play, and games can drag out for ages, making the battles either a labor of love or just plain laborious. [May 2004, p.68]

In its present state, however, playing it is about as enjoyable as walking the plank in shark-infested waters. [Nov. 2006, p.72]

With good physics, respectable graphics, an interesting city to explore, and lots of good stuff to shoot, Starsky & Hutch is way better than it should be. [Jan 2004, p.84]

Spartan's 3D battles look great, and the freer camera control give you a new perspective on hoplite warfare. [Sept 2004, p.74]

Although the game lacks some of the amenities of the long-established "FIFA" series, it also lacks a lot of the baggage that the EA Sports monolith has accumulated over the years. [March 2005, p.86]

A very linear game. Like a puppet on a string, you are pulled along a straight path between cut scenes and have almost no control over the sequence of events. Couple this with a rather short story, and you have a release that provides an excellent entry point for those who are new to video gaming.

The graphics engine just isn't up to the task. Clipping errors abound, the animation quality is generally poor, and you'll see weird things like floating dogs or soldiers firing their machine gun from two feet away.

What makes the name so highly appropriate...is the constant assault that the game wages on your patience and sanity. [Sept 2004, p.68]

It's simple and initially somewhat fun, but after a while it grows pretty monotonous.

The X-Files repeatedly bellies up to near-greatness but always slips back to mere above-adequacy.

But this isn't so much a racing game as a slapdash splash of smeared color that never quite captures the feeling of hurtling down a track. [Jun 2006, p.92]

At least you can thank Bet on Soldier for making it easier to go back to boycotting Starforce. [Dec p.62]

You buy the potions and upgrade your skills and weapons in order to keep winning the chip wars, the Sisyphean point of which is to afford superior preparations for the next war, and so on. [Jun 2006, p.83]

The legacy at hand offers only frustration and disappointment. They made it so. [Apr 2007, p.62]

Thanks to dreary daily training and eating sequences, this might be the dullest game ever made about vicious duels to the death. Morituri te salutant, indeed. [Oct 2005, p.90]

Lacks the slightest spark of life or inspiration. It has no character, both literally and figuratively, and its action is stilted and crude. [Jan 2004, p.65]

But stripped of its hype, what's most shocking about the game is its mediocrity.

When getting yourself wet, your vehicle seems intent on steering itself, making what you are really trying to do more difficult than it should be. [Mar 2004, p.82]

The incomplete A.I. and numerous bugs indicate that somebody was more concerned with getting the game on shelves before Christmas than providing a finished product. [Apr 2004, p.68]

Nearly everything about this game screams half-singed: the "Diablo"-riffic graphics, the text that doesn't match the voice acting during the clunky cut-scenes, and the goofily written manual that gives away most of the game's surprises. [March 2005, p.81]

Primal Hunt is a collection of annoying "Quickload" moments resulting in a thoroughly annoying game. [Nov 2002, p.84]

While it has personality, it's often homely, and despite the welcome addition of a bit of sleaze, it focuses on the more mundane parts of running a casino. [Sept 2003, p.87]

But this isn't so much a racing game as a slapdash splash of smeared color that never quite captures the feeling of hurtling down a track. [Jun 2006, p.92]

Overall, you'd be better off just going to see the movie again. [March 2005, p.85]

If nothing else, you get your twenty bucks worth.

Provides a very satisfying wrap-up to this series and, in some ways, is the best gaming experience of the group.

Suffers from crippling lack of polish, content, and forethought. [Nov 2003, p.93]

Attention to detail doesn't go far when core gameplay is this scattered. You could make a good rugby game for the PC, but Rugby 2004 isn't it. [Mar 2004, p.83]

Manages to recreate the chaos of Vietnam almost too well. It's an exhausting game, with very little let up. [Jan 2005, p.68]

Aside from the TV tie-in, there is nothing in Alias to recommend it over other games of its type. [Sept 2004, p.69]

The game's dialogue system almost resembles a tree, except you basically just click on any of the questions until they're all gone. Interrogation at its, um, finest. [June 2005, p.58]

At least the soundtrack is cool. [July 2006, p.66]

The armored Task Force engine is one of the most complete, and completely baffling, systems in modern computer wargaming[sic]. [Dec p.63]

Requires too much of an investment in time to get to the interesting parts, and by then it's too late - the thrill is gone. [Sept 2003, p.80]

This is the most disappointment I've ever felt playing a game. [July 2004, p.7]

It's a bullet-ballet rail ride with decent graphics, passable physics, horrible character animation, and an uninteresting world. [Feb. 2007, p.69]

The whole thing plays out like some budgetware "Turn-Based Combat RPG for Dummies". [Oct. 2006, p.80]

Rival Interactive had their chance to fix its onerous product, and for all the tweaks, it's still just not enough. [Feb 2003, p.81]

What bodes particularly well for gamers, however, is the fact that gameplay borrows heavily from "NiGHTS" - a cult hit that has yet to find its own sequel. [Sept 2004, p.7]

What isn't quite so entertaining is the reliance on essentially one weapon. [Sept 2002, p.86]

Unfortunately, like a TV show, when the game's over, it's over. [Nov 2003, p.101]

Only moderately entertaining, and lacks much of the original's personality due to the graphics that are too small and indistinct, but mostly due to it being so derivative. [Feb 2003, p.87]

To get an accurate sense of what playing Star Wars: Battle for Naboo is like, find a heavy object and bash yourself over the head with it.

On the easier levels, it's a silly exercise in mashing buttons to spew ammo throughout a world of bad physics, cheap animation, and tinny sound. [June 2005, p.90]

The only thing it really adds to the Carnivores series is snow and hair, but if you enjoyed the previous hunting games and wanted more, then, well, here's more.

Offers a large selection of wrestlers to choose from, but other than their appearance, there is very [little] to differentiate one from the other, and noe have any character to speak of. [Mar 2003, p.88]

An amazing bargain, particularly if you like the idea of exploring a dynamic universe and don't mind filling in a few gaps with imagination while you live the Captain Kirk fantasy. [July 2004, p.67]

Even worse is the enemy AI, which either miraculously sees you or remains unaware of your presence even if you're standing right in front of an enemy soldier. [Nov 2003, p.100]