Microsoft's biggest mistake with Amped 2 was not in shunning its chief competitor's vivacious aerial antics, but in failing to mimic its ease of control and combo structure - areas where the "less is more" idiom could most do with application.

This is quite long and has stacks of replay value with the multiplayer. That multiplayer mode will be hugely satisfying to anyone who happens to know someone else with a PSP (gasp!) and it represents further evidence that 2006 is the year of co-op gaming.

Without a doubt, EA isn't treating the expansion of The Sims 3 lightly - World Adventures might be a bit of a thematic stumble, but it makes for a significantly bigger and more varied game, far more so than any prior Sims 1 or 2 expansion has achieved. It's impossible not to recommend it to avid Sims players, but anti-Sims snobs will inevitably find it to be an annoying side-order of collectormania and repetitive puzzles.

A pretty respectable FPS, but like "Unreal 2" it's the game's inability to innovate consistently that compels us to give up.

But for those willing to sit back and savour the unhurriedness, the experience can be both enlightening and rewarding, revealing as it does truths about this world even as it paints a vivid picture of another. Axel should be proud: that surely is the highest calling of any artist.

Its best ideas may be borrowed, and it tends to repeat itself fairly regularly, but Beenox's latest is still a generous and witty button-basher.

You'll enjoy the gunplay, you'll probably be numbed by the slo-mo gunplay repetition, and then see it through anyway because it's all quite undemanding fun with a decent story. On horseback. Just don't expect Gun to change the world. It really is just "True Crime in the Wild West."

It's one of the strongest launch titles, offering taut fun and challenge in a rapid-fire, quick-load manner that's perfectly suited to the handheld. It may not offer a vision of the portable future that Sony's creative dreamers were hoping for, but as a video game, it works small wonders.

But with a core battle system that keeps you involved every step of the way and a suitably compelling narrative, there can be little doubt that Shadow Hearts: From The New World is a unique and compelling RPG.

It's complicated, often unhelpful, and engrossing. It's the shy boy your mum told you to make friends with. It's a troubled and stubborn creature, with a funny run.

One for those who value story and character over technical innovation then, but definitely a game worth trying if the concept has tickled your fancy.

Apart from the (sadly) expected Bethesda hiccups - erratic quest markers, odd spawn glitches - there's nothing really wrong with Dawnguard. At the same time, there's nothing here that demands 1600 Microsoft Points' worth of attention. If all you want is a solid side quest and some good loot, this will scratch that itch. If you were hoping for something more epic and ambitious, keep waiting.

Wii Fit Plus is indeed an enhanced version of the original, as Miyamoto said. It's just a shame those enhancements aren't expansive or extensive enough to guarantee long-term value, or to justify the higher SRP.

If you're willing to put in the effort, it can steadily win you over. Obsidian can't really compete with the bigger boys in the RPG field, then, but it's carved out a little space to call its own. With ambition instead of budget, and integrity instead of polish, in the end the choice of whether to persevere or not is pretty easy to make.

Other than the disappointing lack of a spruce up for the sound and cut-scenes, only the lazy racial stereotyping of much of the cast and the occasional interloping of slightly crass sexual humour into an otherwise very family-friendly script (despite the murders, obviously) mar an otherwise-excellent adaptation of a genre classic.

It's better than Ice Station Santa, yet not quite as good as Moai Better Blues. It remains small in both size and scope, while those who have stuck with the series since Season 1 will find that much of the actual gameplay is basic meat-and-potatoes fetch-questing. And yet...it's indecently cheap and, for all its minor flaws, the ongoing saga of Sam & Max is still the funniest game around.

If you can live with the lo-fi elements, there's an awful lot to enjoy.

If you're interested in a serious relationship with gaming rather than purely out for a good time, please do take a look at Penumbra. It does some truly clever stuff, has an effectively creepy atmosphere and there's a few signposts in it that action and adventure games alike would do well to follow.

As pointless distractions go, this is one of the best in a while.

At its best, it's arguably the most accomplished Phantasy Star yet, and undoubtedly the new king of loot-hoarding on the PSP. We just hope next year's Sega-developed Phantasy Star Online 2 does more to reinstate this classic series to its former glory.

An effortlessly engaging, if rather slender, dose of wanton destruction that should satisfy the appetites of both retro fans and mainstream gamers without alienating either group.

It's hardly an arcade classic, in other words, but if you're after nothing more than a friendly and frantic fifteen minutes of action every now and then, Choplifter HD just came to the rescue.

That's not to say it's not without its own unique pleasures, but while I'm curious to see what happens next, it so far lacks the edge-of-the-seat impatience that The Walking Dead conjured up at the end of each episode.

It doesn't always succeed in finding a balance between its chilled-out exploration and OCD completist tendencies, but when the formula clicks, the result is both charming and visually stunning.

To put it bluntly, Dementium II represents one of the better survival horror experiences on a system not known for its support of the genre.

As fan service it crowd surfs into the living room with ample generosity and verve. But, irrespective of one's tastes, next to the breathtaking attention to detail of The Beatles project, as a celebration of a group's creative output the package feels a little insubstantial.

For drinking fun with people who are in their twenties and know who Parker Posey is, pick Scene It. For family fun with people who are either too young or too old to drive and think Truffaut is a special kind of Ferrero Rocher, pick Buzz! Hollywood.

Syndicate is a game struggling to be all things to all people and underselling its strongest points in the process. The story is a perfunctory thing, worth playing once for the robust gunplay, but it fails to make Syndicate stand out from the cyberpunk herd.