Yes, Justice’s new shriek adds a new trick to his repertoire, but besides this and a few new touchscreen forensic gizmos, this there is little change from the GBA ports. [Apr 2008, p.95]

It can't entirely compensate for the lack of depth, but wading together into a throng of the undead, guns blazing and fists flying, leaving a trail of dissolving bodies in your wake, is without question a grisly pleasure.

As much as Firmament highlights the skills and importance of industrial labourers, then, it also brings with it some of the tedium of the real work - which surely wasn't part of the blueprint. [Issue#386, p.118]

If action games are at their best when experienced in a flow state, then Atlas Fallen's attempts to harness and bottle this magic are a creditable experiment. It's just a pity it sacrifices so much in pursuit of this ambition. [Issue#388, p.112]

Area 51 is entirely without inspiration, an exercise in slick, crowd-pleasing cookie-cutter cliché from the Jerry Bruckheimer school of entertainment manufacture. It is absolutely not bad, almost never broken, and usually a good deal of fun. [July 2005, p.92]

It’s sweet stuff, but repetition quickly sets in.

With combat that feels lightweight and inexact by comparison, in service of a broader structure which doesn't quite suit the core mechanics, the game's strengths - in particular, that winning, distinctive aesthetic - don't provide enough of a spark to let Ashen find its own way in the dark. [Issue#328, p.108]

It sounds as if the cast are having more fun than we are. [Issue#388, p.122]

Atomfall isn't always a brilliant game, then, but it's often a surprisingly comforting one. [Issue#410, p.102]

The bare-bones Training mode does little to help the inexperienced either. [Apr 2012, p.124]

Those who can overlook the rudimentary visuals, convoluted interface and overly forced dialogue may lose themselves in the vast mathematical playpen. [Aug 2010, p.95]

It's a tremendous shame, because the bosses themselves are a finely conceived, smartly designed and varied bunch. [Issue#296, p.121]

Mere hours after playing it, Hue is already vanishing into the background of our minds, leaving only a vague sensation of something more tangible. [Nov 2016, p.123]

Once fluent in Hulk's explosive vocabulary of lamppost-javelins, boulder-bowling balls and tank football, it becomes apparent how much there is to praise in this game. It's hard to think of a superhero title that has come so close in delivering the spirit of the hero's super-ness. [Sept 2005, p.95]

At times it taps into our lizard brain so successfully that hours pass by, our eyes glazing over as we mindlessly follow instructions. [Issue#376, p.116]

Smarter, faster pacing could have made all the difference. When it isn't intentionally hobbled, the combat is spectacular and unique. [Feb 2010, p.88]

Silt remains grimly unsettling, and there's a sprinkling of ingenuity in many of its puzzles, but it's not as powerful as it promises to be. [Issue#373, p.118]

The end-of-stage bosses remain something of a saving grace. [Issue#410, p.112]

Not for everyone, Dancing All Night will suit players who love rhythm action enough to overlook a lack of content, or who love Persona 4 enough to forgive the length and leaden pace of its script. [Jan 2016, p.123]

In confronting Peter's regrets, it leaves us with one of our own - that we didn't stop 15 minutes sooner. [Issue#376, p.121]

The claustrophobic setting is the game's most glaring weakness: you can't have an epic adventure in a single city any more than a child will be content to endlessly explore his own back garden. [Apr 2011, p.82]

The cold heart beneath the cuddly surface fits the dark tone of the game, which beneath all the whimsy tells a melancholy story. Even so, players drawn in by Pid's dreamy visuals might end up feeling betrayed.

Admittedly, there's little here to quicken the pulse, and some of later objectives are troublingly fiddly, with sensitive motion controls and increasingly intricate level design proving uncomfortable bedfellows. But otherwise this is an unusually clever, polished and robust eShop release that offers several hours' worth of dizzy delights.

Crucially, we never lose our will to continue. [Issue#410, p.114]

With its best ideas exhausted long before the developer tires of them, some moments of real ingenuity are swamped by busywork. At times, you’ll admire the craftsmanship, but Sky Tourist is often too busy trying to be clever to remember to be fun.

As an example of unabashed, often exuberant Britsoft that pulls out the SRPG's staples and rebinds it in approachable ease, Future Tactics is remarkable, deserving of cult status. [Aug 2004, p.99]

Arlo may have the grimace and mane of Geralt, but his game needs to be more than a series of narrow squeaks. [Issue#408, p.118]

It’s a game that’s full of faults, but also one in which they can be immaterial to the experience of playing. [Sept 2007, p.95]

It remains compelling, but much of that compulsion is in expecting the game to truly deliver - a moment you'll likely still be awaiting at the anticlimactic conclusion. [Jan 2005, p.89]

Like the movies that doubtless inspired it, Shank ultimately has more style than substance. It looks fantastic but it's hardly a lengthy game, and it does little to trouble your brain. As throwaway entertainment goes, though, it's solid popcorn stuff.

For a game that trades a competitive level of complexity for more instant action-based appeal, it needs to be slicker in its presentation and explanations. [Jan 2007, p.80]

A little too much is left to chance. [Issue #389, p.123]

In spite of these shortcomings, Starfield exerts a curious gravitational pull: there is a pleasant mindlessness to it that means it can easily become a black hole for your free time. But if it's not a BAD game, it's an achingly unambitious one, failing in what should be one of the foundational aspects of any space exploration game (see Post Script). True, we've come a long way in six decades. But zoom in on the recent history of games - and that of its maker - and you're forced to concede that we've not covered much distance after all. For Bethesda, this isn't so much a giant leap as barely a small step. [Issue#390, p.112]

It's a shame that, for all those nifty custom USB sockets, there's no real connection to be found here. [Christmas 2018, p.112]

Like the movies that doubtless inspired it, Shank ultimately has more style than substance. It looks fantastic but it's hardly a lengthy game, and it does little to trouble your brain. As throwaway entertainment goes, though, it's solid popcorn stuff.

It isn’t perfectly realised, but the subtleties of tactical planning and the bloodiness of frontline slashing combine to suggest a new way forward for realtime strategy. [Aug 2006, p.90]

Tourist Trophy is never anything more than you, a motorcycle, and the quest for the racing line. It’s more than accomplished enough to fulfil fanatics of bikes and simulations, but too dry for anyone else. [Apr 2006, p.86]

Mechs are the only interesting offline opponents, but in a way that causes the action to feel stuttered: these encounters are engaging due to the sensation of one-on-one combat, but those of Lone Wolf are so ponderous that most fights become wars of attrition... As a result, the game can't throw enough of them at you to make the skirmishes feel genuinely intense of chaotic. [Feb 2005, p.76]

There are scores of tiny, surprising, memorable reasons to like Blood Will Tell, and one big reason not to: the game can’t do them all justice. It’s as likely to aggravate as to amaze, and even if you appreciate its peculiar magic there are sections where that magic is spread so thin that it’s impossible not to fall out of its spell. [Dec 2005, p.109]

The game carries you through its disappointments and annoyances on the back of its brilliantly realised microworld. [Feb 2009, p.88]

Haunted Hollow’s charismatically ghoulish visuals can, at times, make for a cluttered board, and its decision to hide certain units and items behind micro-transactions grants those who pay more tactical breadth. Accept this last point in particular and there’s fun to be had with Haunted Hollow, but Firaxis’ creepy monsters can’t quite compete with its extra-terrestrial threats.

It's simple, enjoyable, and in wisely steering clear of trying anything grand or complex, is an enjoyable if self-contained success. [May 2010, p.97]

Annoyances aside, there's a sense of pluck to Titanic Scion which may well power you through its most threadbare moments and its nagging UI quirks. [Issue#416, p.118]

This is a pizza-and-a-six-pack kind of game: sit back, crack open a cold one and get ready to grin your way through the most gleefully stupid 20-odd-hours you'll spend in front of a screen all year. [Christmas 2018, p.116]

Fussy collision detection and what can only be deliberate slowdown are perhaps nods too far to the 48k era, yet the developer's ageing tools have sculpted something that feels surprisingly new. Not bad for what looks like the oldest game on Vita.

It's a loud, mindless end to a game that features many stunningly crafted elements but rarely puts them to memorable use - a letdown after RE7 rescued the series from the convolutions of Resident Evil 6. [Issue#359, p.102]

Crysis 3 has neither direction nor freedom, though it does have human weapons, alien weapons, a cloaking device, an Armour mode, and a bow. And with this many options at your disposal, Crysis 3 insists, surely you must be having fun.

There’s certainly something to be said for such a calming, stress-free adventure – a game that goes out of its way to provide a holiday as much as it does entertainment. [Mar 2006, p.95]

Ignorance of Pyro's past glories is actually an advantage with Commandos 3 since it means the tension and atmosphere that the series still has in abundance can be enjoyed without the nagging feeling that things aren't what they used to be. Inspiration and aspirations appear to be in short supply in the Commandos camp.

Watching your carefully directed army walk into each other and painfully slowly correct themselves by walking one square left, two squares up, one square right, while an army approaches is frustrating to say the least. [Oct 2007, p.97]

Siege can feel cool and inhospitable, but when the conditions are right and you're playing with friends, the game's tense gameplay and measured pacing makes for a refreshing, cerebral contrast to the run-and-gun hyperactivity of most online shooters. [Feb 2016, p.104]

It’s accomplished and inventive, but there’s not enough to quicken the pulse, and you feel relief, rather than satisfaction, when the trickier challenges are conquered. The constant metallic clanks are the sound of a game whose nuts and bolts are fully functional, but this tin man of a game is missing its heart.

Feisty and unapologetic, it’s a game that's happy to break the resolve of those who fail to accept its rules: play casual and compete at leisure. [June 2006, p.91]

The portability that saw the game through its tour of every major format during the '90s has finally failed the test of time, and it's the trawl of the cursor between one lemming and the next that does this interpretation the most damage. [Mar 2006, p.92]

Attempts to bring the fun back into Henry's life make for a more engaging third act, even as they inadvertently underline that they (and we) are largely going through the motions. By the treacly finale, we're more saddened by the unfulfilled promise of the start. Lululu's insistence on Saying Something over exploring the potential of its central mechanic proves, well, unbecoming; Henry Halfhead is at its best when possession is nine-tenths of the lore. [Issue#416, p.121]

Overall the greatest disappointments is the lack of any sense of exploration or accoplishment. And although the mansion is packed with wonders, there's no feeling of discovery since the game manoeuvres you neatly from one room to the next. It adds up to a world in which you never feel truly connected. [Christmas 2003, p.111]

Judged purely on its battle system, Grandia III is the best RPG on PS2...But battles are only part of the RPG experience, and elsewhere the game struggles. [May 2006, p.93]

Anarchy Reigns sits awkwardly, then: its balanced multiplayer mode means a fixed moveset and an unremarkable singleplayer campaign, while the high online player count means matches too often descend into scrappy pileups. Neither its on- or offline offerings are essential, but Platinum has shown that an online brawler can work. It's rough around the edges, sure, but it's a proof of concept to build on.

It's when the game is at its most GTA-like that it comes alive, conjuring up scenarios that take in whole city boroughs and throwing at you groups of adversaries and challenges you have to juggle on the fly… and then you get to a tediously engineered boss encounter and it all begins to get tiresome again. [Christmas 2005, p.109]

It's good shooting, of course, pulled off with the studio's signature style, but it's come at the cost of Syndicate's imagination and ambition.

As a short, sharp blaze of fun, it's every bit as brash and ballsy as "Mercs" ever was. [July 2008, p.99]

There's wild west fun to be had within these simplistic charms, but it's unlikely to replace your favoured multiplayer shooter. [June 2010, p.103]

Where FlatOut felt like racing in a field, FlatOut 2 feels like racing on a film set. It has been reshaped into the archetype, competent arcade racer. [Aug 2006, p.89]

People of Note is a gratifying, if ultimately ephemeral, hodgepodge of ideas - a pleasant distraction but hardly an instant classic. [Issue#423, p.116]

To enjoy EDF, you've always needed to be willing to compromise. Those days are gone. It's never felt so fluid. [Feb 2016, p.116]

Where the game partially redeems itself is in its hammy tone, and variety of inventive guns and missions. [June 2015, p.120]

The charismatic animation and evocative, sunset-hazed setting make up for a lot of the game's shortcomings, and although limited in lasting appeal, Miami Vice is solidly and imaginatively made. [Sept 2006, p.86]

We've seen so many of these puzzles before. [Dec 2015, p.121]

It's a smart concept, skilfully realised in the main, and yet it's compromised by a truly boneheaded piece of design: the default perspective offers such a limited view of the field of play that you're forced to squeeze the zoom button throughout to make it playable, with no option to toggle it.

At launch, it feels neutered, and far too inconsistent to establish a lasting dominance on the multiplayer scene. [Apr 2015, p.110]

The Wonderful 101 draws on ideas from Kamiya’s previous games – Viewtiful Joe’s cartoonish charm, Okami’s brushstroke mechanic, Bayonetta’s setpieces – but in concert they’re messy, hamstrung by cluttered visual design and a clumsy central mechanic. Stretched over a large frame, they wear thin quickly. There’s a good game in here, but it’s smothered by the need to conform to its host platform’s feature set, and a distorted concept of value for money.

Even at maximum velocity it fails to stir the blood like the games to which it's most indebted. [Feb 2016, p.120]

Scribblenaut's levels have gone from being unfocused sentences in which a few choice nouns can dominate to rigid, over-punctuated impositions on player creativity. [Dec 2010, p.93]

But if you can ignore the plain looking game world and suspect AI and buy into the mercenary fantasy, there's enough fortune and glory here to give a warlord reason to make it a home.

There are plenty of smart ideas here, but a fair bit of dreck, too. [Oct 2016, p.120]

There is a tremendous amount going on, to the point that it's all too easy to miss a mission-critical SOS. [Nov 2014, p.108]

Antichamber is many things – a remarkable technical achievement, a smart subversion of its genre, a game that plays you as much as you play it – but you're more likely to respect it than enjoy it.

The meetings themselves are well realised, with the developer putting considerable effort into evoking the right kind of atmosphere. [Christmas 2007, p.99]

As the adrenaline fades, disappointment always creeps in, that meeting this creature more up-close than ever before might have actually, finally defanged it. [Issue#407, p.98]

A more joined-up package than many games of its type. Unfortunately, it's just a rather limited one. [Christmas 2010]

An impressively comprehensive, reasonably captivating though ultimately flawed experience. [June 2005, p.95]

As the clear standout elements in a shooter that otherwise feels like it's been drafted out of pre-existing parts, we'd like more change to actually play with our cards after tearing the packet open. [Issue#410, p.118]

A scary, vicious, visually progressive if rather hollow next-gen showcase that doesn’t outstay its welcome. If you want to spend a night or two in the company of the future of horror videogaming, you could do a lot worse. [Christmas 2005, p.94]

The game's fusion of rhythm-action and RPG never quite fits as neatly as you'd hope. [Nov 2014, p.115]

While Cargo Commander might be an occasionally limited platform game, it's nonetheless an entertaining ode to the simple pleasures of an honest day's work.

The moments that make Biomutant worth playing, intermittent as they can be, exist not in spite of the game's muddled identity but because of it, sitting right at the junction between its janky mechanics and outright bonkers fiction. [Issue#360, p.108]

It's much like Twitter itself - raucous and ridiculous, funny but infuriating. [Apr 2015, p.122]

The voice acting, dialogue and narrative itself are all weak, thereby demanding that the underlying systems do all the heavy lifting in terms of player engagement - something they sustain, but only to a certain point. [Aug 2010, p.97]

Unlike a good spy, however, it flubs its final execution. [Nov 2014, p.116]

Sometimes a lazy afternoon's worth of slow-release serotonin is all you need, and this soothing backrub of a game delivers on that promise. [Issue#359, p.117]

Fans of Westeros will likely be delighted by Telltale's exploration of a formerly undocumented northern clan, but there's nothing here yet to match up to the greatness of The Walking Dead. [Feb 2015, p.112]

It may lack the emotional heft of darker epics, but it remains a tightly plotted confection with charm to spare. [Jan 2009]

While the game delivers its smooth-edged package efficiently enough, it never manages to raise the pulse like its predecessor, and like an ancient tomb, close inspection reveals some worrying cracks. [Feb 2015, p.114]

Lego finally has creative expression in videogame form. [June 2017, p.104]

There's a solid adventure title here, but it's spread thin over a densely written airport thriller. [Feb 2011, p.102]

An overall shoddy feeling to the production spoils a great deal more. Where there should be panache, there are rough edges. As a comedy, it achieves much. It is funny. But as a sports game a great deal more polish is required. [Sept 2004, p.106]

This once-forgotten game deserves its redemption arc. [Issue#359, p.121]

The memories of that abysmal story mode soon fade, and those prepared to put the hours in by themselves will find a game as fluid and flexible as any on the market. [Dec 2017, p.110]