With dated graphics, no unlockable characters, and a "revolutionary" fighting engine that was new in the 20th century, there's no doubt that this game simply, is the Court Jester of Fighters.

In a repetitive mind numbing kill-a-thon manner, it's a good time. Is it a $30 (120 quarters) good time? No.

The biggest problem with the game, aside from the voice acting, is the difficulty. Both the characters and the monsters are capable of getting critical hits, but the monsters seem to have an advantage over Zak and his companions.

In the end, though, the lackluster graphics, frustrating gameplay and repetitive actions make it a slightly entertaining romp through a scary theme park, but not fun enough for us to recommend as one of the DC's best.

The controls are incredibly stiff, the locales are boring and rectangular, and the enemies will stand stock still until you shoot them.

Now imagine the whole game, from start to finish, lasting about 15 minutes -- even with limited continues. Oh dear.

While the pack does allow you to throw an amazing party, it doesn't do anything else -- and parties lose their novelty pretty fast.

Control issues push this title much closer to Sony's clunker than (EA's) NHL 2001.

A pretty vast improvement over the PSOne version, but numerous technical and gameplay problems that were apparent then return to mar the experience, making a mighty big mess of what's still a promising idea.

As a pinball game, the tables are too barren and as an action/platform-like game, the pinball control is out of place.

When you consider the Army Men franchise's extraordinary commitment to ordinariness, then it shouldn't be a surprise that the game is so utterly banal.

The batting and pitching interfaces are as good as we remember them from the stellar N64 games, but the fielding transitions are terrible and there are graphical bugs that are unforgivable. The game looks okay, with nice character models but lifeless environments and stadiums -- but it's just not what you'd expect from a PS2 sports game.

It is an utterly routine shooter with a handful of different ships to fly, awkward controls, and robotic enemies that on their worst day aren't so much dangerous as they are sort of "pesky."

The Bouncer is here and it's not any good. We know how much that hurts, but it's time to move on. The game is less than three hours long -- less than 30 minutes if you skip the movies -- and what's there isn't fun.

While it graphically looks fairly good, its simulation of the sport places the emphasis squarely on offense, and that's just not how baseball is played.

It could have been an interesting game with a little more imagination, but it's flatter than month-old soda.

Neither excellent nor miserable, it's a fairly good racer, but it's not changed much since our last look at the game, and since then a lot of handsome titles have hit the shelves.

A tired genre makes its first zombie steps onto the PS2. It's time for a rethink.

Overall, Stupid Invaders is an adventure title that just isn't as much fun as it should be. But it's plenty stupid.

There are too many nagging problems, from the stuttering animation to the strange, stooped-over look of most of the players, as if they couldn't stand up straight.

Plain, cold and uninspired, ESPN NBA 2Night has all the grit and soul of an Egg McMuffin.

Serious motorcycle enthusiasts might want to give this one a whirl -- to crash really expensive bikes on bland racecourses, if for nothing else -- but the vast majority of Dreamcast owners will want to avoid this game.

Sure, it's got Mario Lemieux in it, but while Super Mario may be able to save the Pens, he can't save this one.

There were a few fun moments while playing this, particularly in the Capture the Flag mode. Unfortunately, the cosmic physics combined with the hit-and-miss controls ripped the huge potential out of its heart.

Once the game starts up, another problem becomes apparent; the game was rushed out the door before it was finished. From random lockups when loading to a litany of missing features too numerous to list completely, it's obvious that Age of Sail II was released in a beta state.

With medical miracles and the highest average lifespan known in our short existence on this planet, we have to think that we've evolved beyond hitting each other over the head with frying pans and retractable boxing gloves.

The graphics are fine, the options plentiful and the details lovingly polished, but the core gameplay -- the part where you're in a car racing against other cars -- doesn't do much to advance the genre at all.

All we can tell you is that the game has mediocre graphics, poor sound, stability problems, an awkward premise and a whole lot of standing around. It may be utterly realistic, although the lack of any falling damage and the fact that wooly rhinos can magically sprint up sheer cliff walls make us doubt it.

A thin game that is sometimes fun, but mostly routine, and with less depth and imagination than the great games it is copying.

The stories, on the other hand, are so boring and unconnected that they must have been based on historical facts that have long since been forgotten, except in some German children's textbook.

All of the vehicles control terribly, the levels are uninspired and the game itself is just a port. Why bother?

A decent game that could have been great if it had been released three years ago.

Delivers the darkly comic humor and creepy mood of Sam Raimi's wonderful film trilogy, but simply fails to follow through on its promise with basic gameplay.

The tanks are cool and feature gritty design and nice detailing -- but their animation sets are pretty limited and the sensation of piloting an actual, steely titan is somewhat lacking.

The graphics reside on the bottom side of ordinary, Quinn Buckner's commentary soon grows repetitive and there just aren't enough bells and whistles to impress us. Add that to the occasionally frustrating gameplay and spotty AI, and you have a team built for boring, sub-.500 play.

While it's an improvement over the original, Team Arena is essentially a decent mod but it's nothing that can't be found for free.

If there is such a thing as a low end to a Miss score, this game would be there, precipitously hanging with its arms spinning in comical circles directly over the ledge that drops into Dudville.

The sort of videogame that needs to have the epilepsy warning printed in 72-point Helvetica bold. This game is so colorful, fast and disorienting that we came close to passing out a couple of times and poking ourselves on the "Seaman" microphone.

What should or could have been a cool, sneaky shooter devolves into a series of tedious levels, severely aliased graphics and some of the stupidest, ugliest enemies we've seen this side of "Delta Force: Land Warrior."

After a few hours around the track we quickly grew tired of the same shallow driving, no matter how great those courses looked.

With bland graphics, poor gameplay balancing and -- worst of all -- terrible controls, so much of the game is so much of a drag that it falls short of the anemically rising levels that set the 3D action/adventure standard.

A waste of an excellent license and a great opportunity.

In a move that perfectly mirrors our own high-school careers, it seems as if Ubi Soft went to every length imaginable to make sure that every aspect of this game is dead average, and no more.

A lot better than we would have expected, but that's not saying that much.

As the Whatsit says, " @!#?@!"

Misses the mark by just a tad, but that shouldn't halt the admiring throngs.

Controlling everything with the DC controller, especially over the often lengthy missions, will lead to cramped, achy hands, and the necessity for quick command issuing just doesn't fit well onto a gamepad.

A poor ending to a bad journey.

Though occasionally enjoyable, endless game crashing bugs, bouts of tedium and a few badly designed elements make it a miss.

Longtime fans of Lara's exploits will find more of the same ride, but we can't recommend paying the full admission price.

The graphics, while not terrible, certainly border on the slightly embarassing.

Finally and least forgivable, important terrain features and items pop into existence only when the Grinch comes close, and disappear again if he moves away. This is endlessly irritating.

Tomb Raider junkies will like the new levels, but anyone that got sick of this back in 1997 isn't going to have a sudden change of heart.

Problematic gameplay and terrible control mar an essentially goofy and slightly fun offering.

We come not to bury Spider-Man, but to lament that more could not be done to make the Nintendo 64 version of the game as sharp as its counterpart.

Is Gunman Chronicles a good total conversion? For the most part, yes. Is Sierra trying to milk the Gordon Freeman cow one too many times? Absolutely.

Contains fleeting moments of fun, but the weak control of the game makes playing it more of a chore than anything.

In short, this interactive bit of testosterone-laden tomfoolery is just like the movie.

Failing to pull through with what could have been a very interesting premise, however, EA has given us the keys to Bond's wheels but included with them jagged visuals, uninteresting level designs and some of the least polish we've seen in a while, making this game something of a clunker.

It's simplistic and mechanical, and just doesn't deliver the feel of a smoky pool hall where skill rules out over luck.

A real waste of the attractive Gabrielle Reece license.

Everything that's done right here is on a prom date with wrong, and the wrongs manage to dance all over the rights' feet a little too often.

Unfortunately the grappling in the PSOne version of UFC is quite a bit less complex than the Dreamcast version's, with only one button combination used for most throws and one for counters. This makes successfully grappling an opponent much harder.

It certainly does not have the basketball depth of "NBA Live 2001," and we'd only recommend it to die-hard college hoops fans who simply have to play as a Division I team.

As it stands on Sega's magic box, there's only the junk of civilization's decay to be found -- and it smells like someone's stinky afterthought that's been left to stew in the sun.

A mostly retrograde move -- less impressive in almost every aspect than the gems that inspired it. It's by no means the worst game we've played, but only the most rabid of Star Wars fans (of which there are plenty) should take this one for a spin... hover... whatever.

With its myriad bugs and lack of real multiplayer component, Jet Fighter IV is the sort of game that should have spent a few more months in the hangar.

Well, it sucks. There's really no getting around it. It has great ideas and some innovative design, but a horrible grappling engine and the worst collision detection ever seen in a wrestling title overshadow all of the good.

Poor AI, routine melee combat and unimaginative gameplay consign Rune to the hellish abode of the bored.

Prolonged exposure to this latest Bond adventure reveals that TWINE is, despite the gorgeous visuals and top-notch presentation, at heart a relatively shallow experience -- decent, but not quite good enough.

It's not a horrible game, but the one other pool game available at launch, "Q-Ball: Billiards Master," is just a tad bit better.

The golf ball "rolls" like a ping-pong ball on an air-hockey table...TW2001 slices into the rough when it comes to actually playing the game, and that's a shame, as nearly everything else is top-notch.

Whether standing on its own or against the legion of fine racing alternatives out there (from "Gran Turismo" to "Wipeout"), this is one racer we'll probably leave in the games garage.

Melodramatic dialogues precede and follow each fight, and they're handled with the same mildly illiterate aplomb as most anime translations -- meaning that they're longwinded, heavyhanded and occasionally unintelligible to all but the most diehard of fans, which is just how we like 'em.

Ugly visuals and a much uglier framerate fail to bolster a lackluster stunt system that's neither visceral nor deep.

A passable shooter that will please Nintendo-owning fans of the genre, but it won't win any awards for originality, ingenuity or design.

It contains an interesting and cleverly told story and takes great pains to build an atmosphere, then smashes the whole house of cards to the ground, violently, with a cheap cop-out ending.

It's fine for players looking for basic off-road action, but those looking for hardcore realism or arcade action should look elsewhere.

Unfortunately, this isn't the sort of game we want to play online or off.

Alas, KISS Psycho Circus just plain sucks.

This hastily assembled, disposable piece of plastic tries to surf, as it were, entirely on the cool little surfboard add-on that's used to control the rider, but it wipes out early and often.

It the best of the Olympic crop, but it still doesn't quite get even a bronze medal.

Uninspired graphics, technical flaws and a clunky interface leave it floundering in the channel.

Lacking in gameplay and visual splendor, Evergrace doesn't do enough to provide a quality next-generation RPG experience.

The gameplay is as expected -- slow, with a lot of exploration and some tough and sometimes frustrating enemies and puzzles.

An ugly, hollow mess that disgraces its storied predecessors in every way.

A pretty weak entry from Ripcord, Spec Ops II won't overly offend or overly excite anyone.

It's a gun game without a gun, and there's really no way to get past that one glaring omission.

Those who enjoy lackluster game values, cliched dialog and a motley collection of sophomoric characters will find this a competently produced title that won't be hard to get through.

X Squad was to be the first squad-based game on PS2, but its AI is so bad that it really becomes a basic third-person action title with only some nice effects and a huge weapons cache to show for it.

Decided it didn't want an in-game save function and forgot to add multiplayer, a skirmish mode or the ability to change the level of difficulty.

After a year of impressive Dreamcast titles, gamers have come to expect something more from their next-gen consoles, and the same shallow, flashy arcade games just aren't going to cut it.

From the moment this underwhelming title stumbles into action, gamers will be hard-pressed not to notice its painful mediocrity --CB2001 makes the annual SCEA father-son hackeysack tournament look like a paragon of x-tremity.

This level is fairly fun and is one aspect of the game that keeps Andy MacDonald from being a huge, steaming pile of crap, instead making it passable into the realms of midsized steaming pile of crap.

A must for shooting enthusiasts and fans of the disappearing light-gun genre, but is almost the perfect definition of a rental title to the rest of the gaming community.

Plenty of flash, spectacle and new features... but so little meat to carve a proper meal from.

Is EX3 the worst fighter we've ever played? Absolutely not -- however, its mediocre fighting engine and uninspired visuals are yet another example of a once noble series gone sour.

It's such a banal misuse of a popular franchise that its mediocrity really shines through.