There's an inherent appeal in shooting targets that never seems to dim, but Wild West Guns is far too content to let that natural amusement carry the load for its own tepid design.

Fairly dull - a sensation that the "zany" presentation usually accentuates. The Vs. mode makes up for it slightly, as you try and outpace your friend, but even then it's hardly essential, despite a single-cart download-play option.

There's much to be said for games which simply polish an existing formula to a shine - but Loki, sadly, doesn't even quite accomplish that. It's solid, and it's competent, but unless you're absolutely crazy for point and click action RPGs, we find it hard to recommend a game on the basis of competence alone.

If you're the lucky parent of patient children or you're happy enough to relive faded old glories, then you might just find enough here to justify the price. Everyone else should probably steer clear of what could have been a solid platformer, but quickly becomes an all-too-familiar grind.

After thirty-odd rounds of Duæl Invading, it becomes increasingly apparent that a Game Over screen isn't going to appear any time soon. With extra lives spewing out at a rate of knots, it seems like the difficulty level wasn't quite as finely tuned as it could have been.

A very poor introduction to the genre for Xbox owners. It's by no means terrible; but without borrowing Sakaguchi's rose-tinted glasses, it's not much fun either.

You certainly can't fault Firefighter F.D 18 for fiery originality, but its ambitions are cruelly extinguished by overly simplistic game design and a clunky control system makes it the kind of cult curiosity that only the true hardcore would ever dare parting cash for.

Sadly, torn between a character license it can't fully use and an experimental format of vague structure and uncertain purpose, Wonderbook's magic spell grows weaker over time, rather than building to a fantastical crescendo.

I really, really hope the developer gets a second crack at Move Fitness, as the core concept clearly works and there are some screamingly obvious things that, if added, would make the game a much better, potentially excellent, fitness game. But as it stands, what should be Mr. Motivator is very much Mr. Average.

By bringing nothing particularly new to either genre that it borrows from, Gatling Gears fails to justify its inflated price of 1200 Microsoft Points, and is far from an essential purchase.

A fairly limited package that quickly runs out of ideas.

There's a lot of game in Crash Tag Team Racing, but there isn't a lot of good game. And since there isn't really a lot of kart-racing game either, on a system that seems to have more pure racing games than any other in recent memory, it's hard to think of a good reason to tag it any other way.

A once-reasonable game for the 360 is now a distinctly mediocre game for the PC.

Eight years in purgatory hasn't really been long enough to justify the move into down into the rosy red-tinted fires of Hell & Damnation. Sorry, Lucifer.

You can just about forgive a game you enjoy for being short. When it's a game you just endure... well, the urge to staple it to the back of a group of hobbits heading southeastward is increasingly attractive.

As a whole the game feels undercooked, unpolished and ultimately unsatisfying.

The first Lords of Shadow was a sweet surprise. The follow-up is a hostage to a story it tells badly, and a prisoner within a dull urban maze that refuses to become a characterful exploratory playground. To live on but to be diminished - that's the fate of the vampire in Castlevania's lore. Sadly, it's a bit of an epitaph for this well-meaning but bloated game as a whole.

The real problem, however, is that Lips: Number One Hits doesn't just fail to move this series forward - it fails to resolve the serious issues with the first game.

This is the kind of game you'll only get out when you've got people round who want to play the Wii cos they've seen it on the telly, and you'd rather eat soap than play one more round of Wii Sports baseball.

While it is fun, although not magnificently so, in its own right, it fails to offer a convincing reason to buy it over the many other fine EyeToy outings that have gone before.

If you're a fan of Conflict and/or shooters in general, you're likely to find Denied Ops shallow and dull. The two-man control system doesn't work properly. The visuals are ugly. The script is sub-Armageddon. Yes, it's easy to pick up and play. But if you're after an experience with real challenge and depth, you won't want to.

With its shaggy construction and wild ambition, E.Y.E. Divine Cybermancy is as difficult to dislike as it is to recommend.

Combat is the brightest highlight, though it's still dulled by clumsy controls. Beyond that, the environments are so monotonous as to kill any passion for the thing.

Empire mode becomes repetitive too quickly, and doesn't provide either the strategic depth in the "board" sections or the real thrill, bluster and mania of "Dynasty Warriors 3" (elephants!) in the combat sections to keep you truly interested.

The gameplay is repetitive - not a problem for puzzle games if they also have an addictive quality, but Shrek-N-Roll just doesn't.

Those who own previous incarnations of the game won't find it a worthwhile upgrade, as it merely adds some new scenarios (which aren't much different to the old), a fresh dollop of buildings and an editor that allows for importing satellite maps. Nothing to get too excited about, really.

A mildly engaging way to spend an otherwise empty hour of your life.

The fact that we actually did play it through to completion - despite the sort of flaws that have sent us flying off the handle in countless other reviews - is a testament to its continued accessibility and the continuing attraction of the Buffy franchise.