If it weren’t for all the bugs, Sacred 2 would get a better score, but as it stands now it needs some significant patching to reach its full entertainment potential.

The experience is not flawless by any means, with a story mode that stumbles over too many frustrating sequences and not enough narrative pay-off to make it worthwhile on its own. But taken as a whole -- with its frequent bits of brilliance and its delightful, heart-pounding moments -- Mirror’s Edge is a leap of faith worth taking.

Regardless of how you feel about the game, give Nuts & Bolts a rent, and who knows -- you may end up purchasing the game with the desire to see it to the end, and then some.

I don't think Eternal Poison is trying to be a ground-breaking strategy role-playing game. I think the developers were aiming for stylistic and different, and they've definitely succeeded at that.

Ultimately, the single player campaign is atrocious and I had a rotten time playing it. It seems to take everything that was frustrating about Modern Warfare, magnify those elements, and then leave out the interesting objectives, characters that matter, and anything that leaves a lasting impression beyond anger and disappointment.

While it’s not yet perfect, Smackdown vs. Raw 2009 is easily the best wrestling game we’ve seen this generation, hands down.

While it’s not yet perfect, Smackdown vs. Raw 2009 is easily the best wrestling game we’ve seen this generation, hands down.

A game that actually accomplishes what most sequels strive to do, which is to be better than its predecessor in every way possible. Gears 2 is a thrilling experience that does all the right things. It has an engaging shooting mechanic, excellent presentation, and a hard-hitting demeanor that both excites and delivers. The multiplayer mode will easily keep you engaged for many months to come. The only thing that really halts this game’s momentum are the AI bugs and lackluster story.

If you can get a group of people together you know to play with, I really do think this game is worth the $25 they're selling it for. It's not perfect, but the first commercial game from an indie developer rarely is. Isotx has shown a ton of promise, and is definitely a company to be looking out for in the future.

Valkyria Chronicles is a visual feast. It maintains a high level of difficulty in a new and rather innovative renewal of the tactical genre that provides enough of a challenge to entice fans of the genre, but is not so stuck in its ways as to keep normally averse gamers away.

Resistance 2 is a great shooter with outstanding multiplayer components that transcend its lackluster single player campaign. The campaign’s scale and ingenuity displayed in the boss fights will giver players an experience they have never had before, but it ultimately collapses on itself with poor design and execution in both level and story progression.

Eufloria is tough, but not impossible, to love. You may have to fight through (or altogether ignore) the campaign mode to get to the good stuff, and even then you may spend more time waiting and micromanaging than you'd like, but I can't possibly deny the strength of Eufloria's most basic design choices.

While On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness Episode Two makes for a better game in the technical sense, the somewhat ho-hum story drags it down.

The overall experience of Fallout 3 is unmatched, and the amount of game Bethesda has packed into this $60 title can’t be ignored. Flaws aside, taken as a whole, Fallout 3 is an astounding effort and easily one this year’s best gaming experiences.

The overall experience of Fallout 3 is unmatched, and the amount of game Bethesda has packed into this $60 title can't be ignored. Flaws aside, taken as a whole, Fallout 3 is an astounding effort and easily one this year's best gaming experiences.

A great game, providing solid, fun gameplay that left me feeling challenged enough (and addicted enough) to keep playing. With each battle lasting about ten minutes, this is a perfect title to play in short bursts and makes for an ideal portable title.

As a product, LBP is amazingly solid with firm foundations outside of minor movement issues. As an experience, LBP is immeasurable and defined by the community. Let’s hope designers keep designing and further the bar as the game grows older.

This is a solid experience that 90% of people won't appreciate, but 10% of people will love. It lacks the charm and staying power of other titles in the genre, but it will definitely keep Japanese strat-fans satiated for a good deal of time.

You'll have to slog through a very frustrating few hours in order to get to the good stuff, but once you've gotten over the game's incredibly obvious flaws, you'll find one of the most emotionally evocative games ever made.

Everything that makes Castlevania what it is; huge bosses, monster-slaughtering, as well as weapon-gathering and castle-raiding, is all here, and it's done spectacularly.

A great game that does everything a first-person shooter should. It has a great presentation, good shooting mechanics, decent AI, a long single player experience, impactful choices, an enormous multiplayer component, and some of the more memorable injury scenes ever witnessed in a videogame. The pitfalls come with the redundancy of some missions, the sparsely populated world, and awkward saving system that can often throw players miles away from objectives with nothing but a long, pointless drive to look forward to.

At the end of the day, Sam & Max Season One is an excellent game with enough punch to overcome its deficiencies.

Not even the inclusion of co-op would have made this one any the better, no matter how angry you might be that it was excluded.

The latency, disconnects, freezing, and generally poor structure cripples the game’s ability to deliver its characteristic style of play.

A nice surprise. It's a party game with an role-playing twist, but it's still surprisingly easy to pick up and play. In fact, the only thing difficult about this title is putting it down. It's funny that this waggle-free Wii title makes for one of the best party games available for the system.

It may not have the most gripping story but it positively shines from a gameplay perspective.

Dead Space is a beautiful videogame, showing incredible polish and detail in both the visuals and the control. The amount of love and attention packed into this title is apparent, as scares and action are perfectly blended. What an incredibly impressive way for a new survival horror franchise to debut!

The responsive controls, improved animations and mechanics, the new collision system, and the amazing Be A Pro mode all come together beautifully to create one of the best football games I've ever played and certainly the best in the series. In short, FIFA 09 lives up to its own hype.

It may not be as instantly satisfying as your standard action title, but after just a few minutes of play, World of Goo makes you feel like a genius, a general, and a god all rolled into one.

Fracture feels like a concept forged many years ago, but it just doesn’t stack up with any conventional standards. If you enjoy shooters, feel free to rent. Otherwise, it’s safe to pass this one up.

The combat system is too watered down to be compelling and the strategic aspect too simplistic. The only real challenge derived from the game lies in balancing these two aspects, which is satisfying for brief moments.

Given that there are several different planets to explore, myriad sidequests and optional bosses, and a ton of Spectrobes to collect, the micro-managing collectioneer will find plenty of game in Spectrobes: Beyond the Portals. It's just too bad that not one, but two clumsy combat systems and a cluttered UI detract from an excavation mechanic which provides some of the most fun that can be had with a touch screen and stylus.

We expected the worst, but in the end, we were pleasantly surprised by the authenticity of the game's world and the depth of its story. We're glad to say that the little lakeside resort town of Silent Hill continues to be just as messed up as it always was.

It has a lot of good ideas, but none of them are fully fleshed out and turned into truly great gameplay additions. The story is forgettable, the equipment and level ups may as well not even be there, and everything just feels half-finished.

The camera can often become an obstacle, the moves can be difficult to pull off or memorize, the flair outside of dancing is lackluster, the time spent on loading screens is ridiculous, and the dancing itself can be at times, pretty damn derivative.

All around, Samba de Amigo is probably the best "arm dancing" game I've played yet (don't laugh, the Wii has tons of 'em), but unfortunately isn't billed as such.

I simply don't understand how this got the green light in its current condition and I am gravely concerned that something like this is going to be sold to people. Maybe it's fine on the PS2, but the Xbox 360 version is poison for your disc tray.

But if you’re a fan of Jet Grind Radio, Katamari Damacy, or any stylish, pseudo-sandbox style game, then get de Blob today. You won't be disappointed.

I can wholeheartedly recommend the full-price purchase of Wario Land: Shake It to only three groups of people: kids between 5-10 years old, die-hard fans of hand-drawn animation, and people who love "easy but smart" 2D platformers.

It doesn't do a whole lot more than what was done in the original, but what has always been there has withstood the test of time so well, and most of the new content is just as fun as the old.

Mega Man 9 is a fantastic game. The music is incredible, seven out of eight of its stages are amongst the best the series has ever seen, it has butt kicking extra features, a great story, and it's only ten bucks. It's damn tempting to just give the game a 10 and be done with it.

Without a doubt, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is a masterpiece of storytelling and fits magnificently into the Star Wars universe. Unfortunately, as a video game, the gameplay issues in The Force Unleashed are extremely noticeable and hinder a lot of the enjoyment that is derived from the narrative.

While challenging and strategy intensive, Yggdra Union is polished and easy to like. The combination of an involved strategy game play design and steadily increasing difficulty keeps you hooked, and the thrill of winning against massive armies keeps you coming back.

My biggest takeaway from Chapters of the Chosen is that despite it's sexy new makeover, it still feels like an old school adventure.

In summary, Armored Core: For Answer is a bland game that only exhibits brief periods of satisfaction, namely blowing things up, amidst its numerous flaws. For Answer has some particularly testy controls, poor mission structure, aggravating battles, and a complete lack of flair in its levels.

If you’ve played the previous Peggle incarnations by PopCap and enjoyed them, Peggle Nights is a safe purchase. It’s a new coat of paint on a classic casual title. If you’re unfamiliar with the former stuff, do yourself a favor and (at least) download the demo. It won’t disappoint you. Just ask the PC guys, they've had it forever.

Strong Badia the Free is mostly made up of all new environments, so it in no way felt like a simple recycling of Homestar Ruiner, and while the game's structure of "convert a country, to move to the next country" makes it inherently more predictable than Homestar Ruiner was, it's still full of surprises.

Strong Badia the Free is mostly made up of all new environments, so it in no way felt like a simple recycling of Homestar Ruiner, and while the game's structure of "convert a country, to move to the next country" makes it inherently more predictable than Homestar Ruiner was, it's still full of surprises.

Harmonix doesn’t necessarily break any molds with Rock Band 2, but it does a damn good job of perfecting the one it created. There’s little doubt that this sequel will be the life of just about every party for at least another year.

A big mess of a strategy role-playing game, as it seems to fall short on just about every level. Fans of strategy games can easily overlook a lackluster presentation, but Zoids Assault also suffers a severe lack of appealing game play, making it hard to recommend to anyone.

The game is a vast improvement on what was already a fantastic product in NHL 08, which is due in great part to this year’s pioneering (and addictive) modes.

The world of Viva Piñata seems right at home on the DS. Despite carrying over some faults from the original and dealing with minor limitations, Pocket Paradise is a terrific addition to the DS library and in many ways improves upon the Xbox 360 version.

Lock's Quest is everything a portable strategy game should be. Its battles are exciting little bursts of bite-sized panic attacks, lasting only minutes at a time, but feeling much longer. Despite a few niggles, the stylus controls work pretty damn well, helped by the clean and simple methods of control used. It's just a really, really, really good portable game.

It's not what we expected, and it's not what the game could have been: it's not perfect, or even particularly great. Yet what it offers is wholly unique, and there's a lot of satisfaction to be had in small amounts throughout its running time. I'm in no hurry to play through it again anytime this week, but heck...maybe in a month or so I'll create a whole new species and send them out to the stars.

It's very simplistic, despite the appearance of having a complex system of creature building. Apart from my issues with the combat, at no point is the game really bad, but it's never a whole lot of fun either. It is charming for about an hour's worth of play but not much else.

It’s annoying, frustrating, and those hand cramps are all for naught. I was actually surprised to see that a game as brutally simple and dreadfully mundane as Facebreaker dared to have an online component.

Ultimately, Pirates Vs. Ninja Dodgeball is a waste of time.

Managing the flaws might not have been a chore had the story been compelling, but this is where the game commits one of the worst sins an RPG can in my eyes: it’s just average, and often it feels forced.

Online integration, what I think is the most fascinating new feature of the game.

Castle Crashers remains one of the best beat-'em-ups ever created and certainly one of the top games on XBLA to date.

It never truly captures the imagination nor has the ability to draw a person into its fantasy world.

N+ on the Nintendo DS is a fun, polished game for what it is ... a collection of obstacle courses. But it’s a polished and tight experience, to be sure, although I do feel that the game could benefit from having a tighter overall goal structure versus an open series of mini-challenges.

An incredibly deep videogame that will have gamers enthralled well into 2009. It looks solid, plays superbly, and is a truly refined simulation of golf that obscures its few flaws very well. EA Tiburon has set the bar so high for itself that I can’t envision many ways in which Tiger Woods PGA Tour 2010 can be a better game.

I do appreciate the writing in this title a lot more, because like Super Paper Mario, it really hit home with a lot of otaku and geek tropes, giving me my own personal glee during the dialogues.

You're not getting a sports sim here; this is about simple Wiimote-swinging fun. Those looking for a high level of challenge need to look elsewhere.

The game's stunningly beautiful visuals, coupled with a decently funny script made for an enjoyable adventure.

Galaga Legions is a fun, imaginative XBLA game that I'd recommend in a heartbeat during almost any other time of the year -- but given its lack of content and the other, much more impressive games from the Summer of Arcade, Galaga Legions might not be for everyone.

Maybe the idea was kind of clever, or you may have fun accidentally, but everything else is horrendous.

The game just isn’t fun. The spotty controls, rigid character movement, and frail character creation drag Smash Court into the ground.

While the single-player experience is truly the high point of the $10 purchase, the multiplayer and challenge rooms act like the "sprinkles on the cupcake," giving the player more game than they should ever expect for $10.

I wanted this game to be exceedingly different, and I don’t believe I got that. It’s still much the same, even if the grass looks greener this time around.

A mixed bag. It’s vastly better than its predecessors in many ways, but there are a few areas -- big ones -- where it falls flat. Still, I can say without hesitation that it’s easily the best Madden game since the franchise entered the high-definition era.

SB:Ep1 is a mixed bag; it's funny, but can get old during a sustained playthrough, and it's got some neat puzzles, but they're presented in a disjointed, directionless way that'll have players doing things not because the story or characters dictate them, but simply due to odd item placement and situation setups that seem like they should be done just because.

As the first full-length art game ever made, and one of the most ingenious puzzle-based games ever devised, you owe it to yourself to buy Braid. It's worth fifteen dollars. It's worth fifty dollars. It's got too much new and intelligent and thoughtful stuff to be ignored simply because of a few hundred extra MS Points.

For the price, it totally delivers.

The game play is entertaining enough, and battles and missions provide callenges that keep you coming back. It's just that the lackluster presentation and boring story really hurt the overall package.

The story is still compelling and slowly spirals downwards into the more twisted and perverse, with several moments that leave you in shock. The game has a lot of room to grow, though, and can tighten up some of the aspects of combat and get rid of the damned grain filter.

If roguelikes are your brand of fun, you'll probably like Izuna 2. For the rest, I'd still recommend trying it out, but be warned that this level of challenge isn't for everyone.

The perfect game for bringing old and new FF fans together.

It's a fun game. Just don’t be surprised when a Quarterback Quiz pops up, or some assh.le keeps hitting pause every five minutes while you’re playing online.

Engaging gameplay and an excellent story make this a must have title for fans of simulation titles such as the Phoenix Wright series.

Hail to the Chimp is a collection of decent ideas, all poorly executed to some degree. The satire, while welcome to the genre, has been managed in a much better capacity by other games. The mini-games are all weak, mundane, and especially repetitive.

Which leads to the burning issue: outside of marketing it as its own product at retail (and making a ton of cash in the process), there's no reason why what truly defines Guitar Hero: Aerosmith (the music) couldn't have been offered as downloadable content.

Guitar Hero wrapped in a really good gimmick. Aerosmith is a fun and exciting band to the right people, but the core gameplay is too stale to really warrant anything more than an average score.

When everything is accounted for, Overlord: Raising Hell is an occasionally fun game that is rarely engaging, but always funny.

The game is boring for long stretches, has an uneven level of difficulty and no worthwhile story.

The things that the title does right, it does well. Explosions are crisp, the autosaving is merciful, and the multiplayer is stable. Yet, there is a lot wrong with Bad Company. That list includes the driving, schizophrenic but miraculously expert marksman AI, plot holes you can drive a truck through, and signing your soul away for additional weapons.

The control scheme’s simple hold-and-release button press mechanic belies its depth, and while there’s a steep learning curve that makes the game somewhat inaccessible to newcomers, it’s worth sticking to. The game is beautiful to look at, and it provides a fantastic simulation of tennis.

To take a page from the book of elitist musicians everywhere: "Put down that toy and go play a real plastic guitar."

A sluggish camera, some bad gadgetry, inadequate fighting mechanics, poorly utilized stealth system and really sh.tty rhythm segments really injure what could have been a complete package.

The most satisfying entry in the entire series. Its scope and emotion are heretofore unmatched in the medium of videogaming (my sister and I were literally screaming at the screen during the climax in a high-temperature corridor), it wraps up two decades of series mythology, and what gameplay there is, is damned satisfying in how it complements the story.

On it's own, Blast Works' campaign mode would probably only deserve a 7.5. It's a solid shooter with an amazing gameplay mechanic, but overall the main game is too bland to deserve a higher score, even at the budget retail price of forty bones.

The game just reeks of a lack of interest. The animation work is fine, and there aren't any bugs, but it feels like there's no care for the audience involved here.

Even as a non-fan, I've been finding my time as the jolly green git rather enjoyable and have found plenty to like about it. It's definitely worth a weekend's smashing and bashing, at the very least.

Its gameplay mechanics are abysmal in almost every conceivable way. Its story is nonsensical at best, sacreligious at worst. Its entire running time is completely disrespectful to the player's intelligence, assuming that if the character models and locations change, the player won't realize he's getting into the exact same gun battles and fistfights he engaged in at the very start of the game. Looking at The Bourne Conspiracy as a list of bullet points, it is an undoubtedly awful game...But why, then, did I have fun with it?

Fans of high-speed action titles can't go wrong; in fact, they'd be foolish to look anywhere else for anything better this generation. It's just disappointing that Ninja Gaiden II -- which is said to be the last in the series -- isn't quite the flawless masterpiece I’d hoped for

There's enough new content to make it worth the asking price over the original, and the new online multiplayer modes take this one well above par.

Unless you don't find Penny Arcade remotely funny, or if you demand that your action-RPGs be really deep and really challenging, then I'd highly recommend Episode One.