The key thing that kept me playing and happy was the story. I really enjoyed the dialog and plot more than anything else. If there is one game you want to play for comedy Giants is it. The story doesn't have much depth and it does taper off towards the end, but while you have it, it is obscenely funny.

The base gameplay and fun factor are through the roof. This has to be the first MMO that immediately grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. Wearing tights is extremely addictive, if you can fight off the eventual tedium set-in.

It's very admirable for Futuremark to make an exclusively PC game that is DX10 only, to boot, but I'm not quite sold on the longevity of the zero-G concept. It's a new and exciting spin on the competitive FPS genre, but I don't think it will keep me away from games like Borderlands or Dragon Age for long.

The most important thing we can say is that we had a whole lot of fun playing it - and that's what matters, isn't it?

The only thing really missing from Ghost Master is the wow factor. There's no feeling of ever being overwhelmed with how cool the game is, nor do you 'wake up' from a Ghost Master marathon at 6am and realize you have to shower for work, because there's no chance of having a Ghost Master marathon.

A better game than Deus Ex, but it’s a lesser experience. It is far less ambitious, not as complicated and about a third as long.

There are areas it could be improved - the fights could be bigger and more involved, and the game could be longer, and the powers have a little more oomph - but it's really just a series of minor nitpicks that tug away at the whole experience.

The combat, first and foremost, is just plain awesome. With all the tools of the 2nd edition AD&D system available, Black Isle have created some awesome encounters for you to tackle.

It's got almost enough gameplay to rival "Battlefield 1942" as the definitive team-based action game, but with a much smoother, more ambitious, and ultimately more effective engine.

Vehicles, weapons, bases, and factions are all inter-woven into a system of balanced and sophisticated combat, even if it does feel like fighting for fighting’s sake.

It will scare you silly and make you dizzy and when you finish the game you will likely not forget some of the things you encountered for some time. Again, we wish it was a longer experience and we feel not enough was done with multiplayer but on the whole it’s definitely worth picking up.

Provides the ultimate combat flying experience, and no perfect place to play it. The dynamic campaign may be good, but it’s not compelling. The multiplayer venue is hampered by a factious community, and terrible matchmaking interface.

This game has so many good things going for it that it hurts to rant about the shortcomings. To start, the controls are severely jacked.

There’s more senseless violence in GTA3 than there are bleeps in an episode of "The Osbournes."

This game is still very enjoyable. If you’ve played the first one (and you should, if you haven’t), there will be some severe déjà vu happening, but that doesn’t mean it’s not still better than a lot of games these days.

You’re not likely to find another game that lets you skip the pansy levels and move onto the dragon-smiting immediately.

Battles are fast and furious, but you never feel overwhelmed or pulled in too many directions at once.

Quake 4 just isn't notably better than "Quake III" in multiplayer, while having the single worst server browser known to man.

The levels are even bigger and more interesting. The game will take a good while to finish - 50 hours isn't out of the question, so you'll definitely get a good bang for your buck.

It looks great and it’s thoroughly immersive, as long as you stay in your ship.

A surprisingly charming title. It’s simple enough to be liked by casual gamers and deep enough to have some appeal for the hardcore player.

Quake Wars just has too much going on to fall into a rut, not counting a couple of choke points on certain maps. It has all the characteristics of an excellent hardcore game except the performance, and that’s a shame. Hopefully upcoming patches will address this and the voice comms issue.

A worthwhile game, but its stability, length, and a number of the gameplay dynamics hold the game back.

It loses some points for being an outdated modification packaged up and sold as a standalone expansion, but Mount & Blade: With Fire & Sword is definitely worth the $15.

In the area of goofy fun, this game lives for eternity.

Some interesting levels -- even three or four -- and I'd go into the 90s, but the levels are amazingly dull for a game built on an engine this powerful. It's like hiring Michaelangelo to paint your garage.

Although it has an uninspired campaign, it’s very true to the universe. The same can not be said for the combat system, which deviates from the board game a great deal but results in some remarkably bloody battles. RTS games all too often suffer from micromanagement mania, but Warhammer does away with this.

With only minor flaws like somewhat poor AI and brevity, and only one major missing feature in multiplayer, it’s hard not to like this game.

The horror aspect is pulled of very well, and you'll find yourself jumping out of your seat often.

It's quite gritty, has some surprisingly creative missions and even offers historical lessons about the Vietnam conflict. Now if only it was prettier and fixed the "realistic" walking motion.

I found Dragon Age II to last about 27 hours for my first playthrough, split almost evenly between its three acts (though the last was a bit shorter). This was disappointing compared to Origins, which took more than 50 hours, considering both were fully explored at a fairly leisurely pace...With that said, DA2 is still a pretty darn good game.

While it does refine the genre, Dungeon Siege II doesn’t really offer anything truly new. Sure, we can take issues with the graphics or the somewhat uneven difficulty level, but the real trouble comes in the lack of meaningful addition.

Artificial limits to and strict uniformity of online play, precious development time spent on extraneous and arcadey side-missions, removal of a crucial gameplay mechanic because “the game isn’t balanced for that?” I just expect more from a developer who wouldn’t be around if it weren’t for the PC.

The killer problems were the story, the tedious nature of the game, and the short length... [but w]e highly recommend Blair Witch 3: The Elly Kedward Tale to anyone looking for a good scare.

The stake gun and painkiller are simply useless in multiplayer, and they’re your starting weapons. This is as poorly thought out as id giving the blaster as the weapon in "Quake II."

I've played Thief the third time now. It's time to elaborate and expand. The small touches implemented by the developers, like the City, factions and stores are mostly cosmetic, never taken advantage of fully.

A good game and graphically far superior to Silent Hunter III, but a couple of weeks more in beta, and some outside testing to tell the designers to stuff their interface where the sun doesn't shine would have done wonders for the game.

I really did enjoy the game, but I can't help but wonder what it would have been like if Volition didn't have to make sacrifices for the sake of the console versions.

Though hampered by terrible graphics, a lack of multiplayer and a few gameplay problems could not keep us from being impressed by Jagged Alliance 2: Unfinished Business.

Without better DM map design, more polished graphics and artwork and maybe more panache in the weapons design department, we don't feel that Unreal Tournament is quite ready to earn our seal of approval as the uber-shooter to carry gaming into the next millennium.

It’s a great recreation of the old Marvel comic book to which geeks like myself will quickly warm, and the best use of a movie license in at least a couple of years.

People have different styles of play to go along with different tastes and preferences. You now have some choice as to which RPG is for you. I could never really say which is better than the others are since they are so unique, yet so common.

L.A. Noire is an ambitious and brilliant game, carrying a new vision for the adventure genre. Sadly, it tries too hard to appeal to the mainstream by taking away control of your actions too often.

Going up against another player in Myth 2 makes me feel more like a tactical leader than any other RTS has before. You feel more in control of the flow of battle; after playing Myth 2, battles in other RTS games feel like you're just throwing guys at the enemy.

Random hilarious run-ins occur frequently, many times when they aren't even scripted. And for a show that has virtually nothing to do with driving, it's impressive to see a Springfield with seamlessly integrated wacky vehicles, destructive driving (Canyonero! - it's in the game, baby), and unexpected donut theft.

BFV's lack of originality can't be excused - not only isn't it all that much different from the original, it isn't even clearly better than the Desert Combat mod.

The brightest point about all this, is that if Microsoft wants to spend the money, all of these problems can be patched away. A better chat interface is easy – even color-coding messages would help tremendously. Co-op is a long-term project but not impossible.

Monolith could’ve done so much more with the nuked city in regard to level design, instead you find yourself still exploring generic offices and buildings like you did in F.E.A.R. And come on now, no mouse side button binds? Seriously? How hard could that have been to implement.

There are just a couple of minor things holding it back : the slightly jumpy mouselook feature, and the slight frustration in finding specific items or areas on particular levels. In the great scheme of things these are a small problems in an otherwise fantastic action shooter.

Despite our nitpicky issues with "graphical cleanliness" and clunky multiplayer, Baldur's Gate simply shines.

Though Kingdoms addresses all of the original criticisms of Total Annihilation, it continues to suffer from extremely high system requirements.

What Nuclear Dawn does best is perhaps how it requires each team of players work together.

The levels started off to a great start, but tapered off way too quickly in a way that was just disappointing. They had a great story going for them, but some more length and detail would have gone a long way for them.

Hopefully Ubi shakes things up for a third instalment however, because the current trend is going to result in something downright style and mediocre for Vegas 3.

I really like E.Y.E: Divine Cybermancy. The shooting is tight, the character progression is deep, the visuals aren't bad, and it's a hell of a lot of fun once you're able to jump 30 feet high, not to mention do everything else a cybernetic/psionic assassin is capable of.

Black Cactus has crafted a game that is just different enough for mainstream RTSers to appreciate, while adding things like a unique and involving storyline and intelligent adversaries for those who don't want to play the same old thing.

As long as you realize you're buying a John Woo shootout sim and not a story-driven narrative with lots of cool weapons, locations, characters, and multiplayer longevity, Max Payne 2 won't be a disappointment.

I utterly hated the singleplayer aspect but enjoyed the multiplayer.

Where the game falls short is in not providing enough for the player to do, so its lack of depth becomes apparent. In the GTA titles the player was kept too busy to worry about the limitations of the world; in Fable there aren’t nearly as many options or missions. The storyline is also poorly crafted though engaging with its chilling touches of darkness.

This is definitely a faster-paced and more action-oriented SupCom, and while some people will like that, I would count myself with those that were hoping for more substance in the sequel to one of the deepest strategy games out there. As such, color me unimpressed.

We loved the graphics, sound, game play, to put it simply -- everything. Crimson Skies is bound to bring some ray of light to your tortured existence. If not with its campy humor, then possibly with its incredibly fun game play.

While the original Icewind Dale was a very tight, focused product, the sequel is very rough around the edges, and though the aesthetics are superior to the original, the game itself is undeniably inferior.

Everything was handed to the development team on a platter – a working engine, complete with all basic content (textures, models, terrain) and this is the best they can come up with?

Instead of being a restriction on what they can do, the license is nothing but a positive effect on the game.

It has a great concept, great innovations, but they should have spent more time refining the gameplay to be more rewarding. City building, fighting, and creature training are all too shallow.

On the one hand, I love the flight models, the graphics and the challenge of multiplayer. On the other hand, there's no escaping the conclusion that this is really just a spruced up "Forgotten Battles" with carriers and more American-Japanese planes.

There is an abundance of strategic options, so there is depth in that way, but not all of them work as well as they should.

Despite the disappointing AI and intense, at times unfair difficulty levels, it is a fun game. However, it's barely playing the same sport, never mind in the same league as "FreeSpace 2."

The campaign lasts about 6-8 hours, but it's really not particularly fun or interesting. Things that made Crysis so awesome, like destructible buildings/foliage and vast sandbox environments, are nonexistent in the sequel, and the "new and improved" nanosuit is little more than a shell of its former self.

As for regular gamers, if you’ve ever felt any desire to play a more complex and realistic version of Civilization, to wonder if you could unite Germany as Prussia, or beat the Yankees as the Confederates, Victoria is definitely worth trying now. It’s cheaper and the patches plus this expansion have made it a great value. Just be warned, there is a lot to learn in a short time.

If Ritual can improve the plotting of future chapters, add more variety to the enemies and weapons and maybe make the game a tad longer per episode (we would have preferred six to eight hours for the price) we could see this becoming a successful new way to present PC games.

I really enjoy the action and gameplay that Combat Arms has to offer. And with a free admission price, it’s kind of difficult to not at least try it out for a few matches. At the very least, you will respect the ability of the game to be fun, fast paced, and highly addictive.

If you value a good story, engaging combat, and convincing vocal performances in an RPG, you will most certainly find Two Worlds II to be lacking. However, if you appreciate the journey itself and don't mind a game that's rough around the edges, you might want to give it a try.

A solid entry in the series but doesn’t really advance it meaningfully in any way. Indeed, in some ways – the brevity of the campaign, the so-so missions – it’s a step back from previous games.

Mirror’s Edge is a lot of good ideas mucked up by poor implementation and an apparent lack of play testing.

The only way for a campaign that short to be worth a damn is if it was the best three hours you've ever spent with a game in your life, and this is most definitely not that. It generally plays like your standard COD clone, only not as exciting or polished.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is probably one of the best examples of how Wolverine was meant to be portrayed beyond the comics: brutal, bloody, and violent as hell. But that doesn’t mean it’s perfect. The game plays it safe too much in terms of gameplay, afraid to stray from the tried and true action formula that has sustained other series’ like God of War and Devil May Cry.

As captivating as Mass Effect is in terms of story, setting, and core game mechanics, it sort of falls apart when it comes to basic gameplay.

Too short to justify its current MSRP.

Red Orchestra starts bright but fades rather quickly. The exact cause was difficult to pin down, since the game is truly excellent on most technical levels, yet the whole doesn’t seem equal to the sum of its parts, never mind better.

Where the developers chose to, they pulled off a great first-person RPG complete with sneaking, combat, dialogue, an interesting story and of course role-playing elements... On the other hand, its combat is not that strong and yet for some reason someone at Troika or Activision saw fit to include multiple prolonged sequences of it. Furthermore, the balance of the game is really thrown off by those fights.

If you can get past the brick-handed interface and get into the game itself, odds are you'll enjoy it.

They replicated a lot of the surface that made the original so good but F.E.A.R. Extraction Point ultimate feels hollow when you finish it, thanks in large part to a storyline that’s less of an expansion and more of an extended ending to the original.

The interface problems, with the help of poor unit AI and netcode, are the key reasons for our frustration with Generals otherwise outstanding gameplay.

Bottom line, if you're looking to get sucked into a game and feel like you are a part of its world, this one is not going to cut it.

Just keep in mind that this isn’t "Baldur’s Gate," that the focus of play is far removed from the tactical combat mechanics of yore, and that you’re mostly adventuring solo.

The game artificially creates work for the player - ie, having to switch a sniper to shooting mode is patently ridiculous.

There's no way it's worth the $59.99 they're asking. Based on the length of time you'll spend playing, it's comparable to being charged double- or triple-price for a movie ticket, when you may already be hesitant to pay the regular amount as it is! If you want to play it, rent it for 360 or PS3.

A really solid first effort for Playland. This game has the strong possibility of evolving into a very good series. Level design is mostly solid. Production values are suitably high, if not up to the work that Valve and id are doing these days. Weapon choice is varied. And best of all, the game has some character.

If you have an Xbox or PlayStation 2, those are by far the better platforms for Madden 2003.

Yes, yes, no doubt Valve will release more maps soon and the community is already churning new content out, but are we expected to pay for an updated mod that was free which offers less content than the original but that’s supposed to be ok because the community will fix it? Huh? That’s logic I can't wrap my head around.

The multiplayer just isn't interesting enough to bother with while the single player game offers no replayability to speak of.

There are a lot of little reasons to get Black & White 2, but none of them comes together with quite the synergy that would make them more than the sum of their parts.

Just one of those strange games that has it all on paper, executes the design properly and yet doesn’t capture the imagination.

To be truthful, Titan mode is really the only significant addition to the game. This could just as easily have been an expansion pack for Battlefield 2, featuring Titan.

Doesn’t live up to its illustrious predecessors. So many changes has cost the game its identity.

If gamers will take the time to move beyond the initial frustrations (and politics) as well as any conditioning suffered from years of frenetic shooters, they will find a game that is both challenging and refreshing.

Bottom line: Duke Nukem Forever was not worth the 15-year wait, nor is it worth paying the full $50. However, I cannot deny that I thought it was both fun and funny, which at the end of the day is what this franchise is all about.