Die-hard Marvel fans can adjust the score on Ultimate Alliance about ten points higher. The character dialogue alone will cause numerous geek-outs, chock full of obscure references as it can be. All other comers will find a capable, high quality action RPG that offers a huge amount of customization and a lot of unique characters that are far more than sprite swaps of each other.

Despite the flaws, this game is impressively large and open ended, and offer a wealth of fun and addictive content - two of the most important qualities of any game.

Have you ever played a game that's so good that the simple knowledge of its existence is enough to put a smile on your face? This is one of those games. Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon is a shining example of what this genre is capable of, and it comes as close to perfection as any recent adventure game has.

100% completion can be had in a few days play, and after that I am afraid the game will be yet another dust magnet on the shelf. In that time, however, players can experience a truly well made, and magical game.

This is the best online action on the PS2, period. Nothing else is even close. Whether you want to gun down terrorists, hop in a tank and blow stuff up, smuggle goods across the border, or extract hostages from hostile territories, SOCOM 3 is where it’s at.

The difficulty may be a prohibitive factor for some, but make no mistake, this is the new king of the DDR mountain.

It’s easily one of the deepest games I’ve played in a long time, and will last you a while too.

In the end, how you receive this game will depend largely on how much weight you put on the X-Men franchise, because without it, Legends would be a very average brawler at best, and an overwrought, slightly clumsy bore at worst.

Agent 47 continues the tradition of greatness in Blood Money, taking the sandbox formula that’s worked for years and bringing it into 2006.

While the gameplay is serviceable, fun and current, the art design and visual production are head and shoulders above similar games in many respects.

There are some AI issues, and the multiplayer component seems like it was tacked on as an afterthought, but, as a total package, Legends delivers. It is as true to the source material as any game could hope to be, and as a long-time fan of the X-Men, I am more than pleased.

But strip away the culture it’s trying so very hard to win over and there’s a game that’s been hastily, and sparsely, updated, and was beaten to death in the womb by "Burnout 3" months ago. Just like 20” rims and a spoiler on a 1984 Volvo, this game may turn heads, but where it counts most it’s a phoney.

While both versions are comparable in most respects, the slow down and horrendous load times between areas that are apparent in the Xbox version are what sets the PC incarnation a notch above its console brother.

Dominions 3 pretty much stands alone at what it does, and its central gameplay is well balanced and extremely fun. However, it undoubtedly is burdened by a huge learning curve and archaic graphics.

The game controls are extremely tight.

Visually, Call of Duty 3 absolutely trumps the previous game. While profound launch titles like "Call of Duty 2" always strike a special cord, it is exhilarating to see the console mature and develop so far after only a year.

Despite the small gripes, overall this is a great collection of classic Genesis titles. While the Wii's Virtual Console promises to have at least some of these titles available for download in the near to immediate future, Sega Genesis Collection offers a nice, compact alternative.

The story, graphics, speech, and every other aspect make this game an addictively fun title that no true RPG fan should pass up.

It is a great quest game that is definitely aimed to appeal to the generation of gamers that grew up in a time when the adventure game genre took center stage.

What it does do is take the simple, tactile pleasure of solidly built FPS action and inject it into such a staggeringly wide variety of situations, contexts and scenarios that putting down the pad after a heavy blasting session is genuinely difficult.

The game features some of most stunning scenery yet seen in a video game, and Jack Wall’s ethereal musical accompaniment captures the feeling of the game’s artistic landscape.

What I love about Nocturne is that the game forces you to play intelligently all throughout. At no point do you feel as if you are taking a backseat to the story or the occurrences on-screen. Absent-mindedly progressing through every battle will bring you straight to the Game Over screen. You have to strategize to be able to get through the game.

But strip away the culture it’s trying so very hard to win over and there’s a game that’s been hastily, and sparsely, updated, and was beaten to death in the womb by "Burnout 3" months ago. Just like 20” rims and a spoiler on a 1984 Volvo, this game may turn heads, but where it counts most it’s a phoney.

If you like deliberately subjecting yourself to frustration for little or no reward, surrounded by a group of idiots mocking you, super glue a coin to the ground and attempt to pry it away while screaming obscenities at the top of your voice. It'll be cheaper than wasting your money on this.

For twenty bucks this is a pretty great game, especially if you’re big into rally racing.

Typical EA first in the sense of unrelenting polish and presentation, of production values meant to wow you with glitz and glamour at every turn. Typical EA secondly in the sense of a don’t-rock-the-boat, stick-with-the-formula game that offers nothing new aside from a few odd bugs I’ve never seen in an RTS before.

A fairly simplistic game, an hour or even less spent with DDRMax2 will make even the most jaded gamer realize its charm. Even if it is not your cup of tea, I suggest you give it a try at least once.

Quake 4 brings an engaging single-player challenge with a refresh of some of the genre’s most popular online play. Still, this is an incremental step, not a leap in design.