After last year's revolutionary success, this game - like "Madden" - is slowing down with age. [Oct 2004, p.125]

For the second year running, "NHL" best encapsulates the play and and authenticity of the sport. [Sept 2004, p.103]

This is the most mindless button masher I've come across in a long time...Like its silently morbid hero, the new Gungrave shows up dead on arrival. [Nov 2004, p.158]

The game looks okay, but combat is dull and it doesn't compare to its PC counterpart. [Dec 2004, p.168]

The game looks okay, but combat is dull and it doesn't compare to its PC counterpart. [Dec 2004, p.168]

The graphics engine...is stunning, i.e., totally awesome and/or completely beautiful. [Nov 2004, p.166]

There are few games I would sooner recommend to parents for their kids, and if those parents happen to be gamers, they might very well be sneaking down after bedtime to get their own fix. [Sept 2004, p.107]

Though the difficulty level is steep, it isn't the type that sends you home with a gauzy head and a fractured spine. It's more of a glove slap to the face - a challenge from a worthy foe that keeps you coming back for more. [Oct 2004, p.136]

The enemy AI is weak, and fog blankets backgrounds like a tarp of ugly. [Oct 2004, p.129]

The real triumph of Sly Cooper's developer Sucker Punch is the way it has managed to make 3D platforming as fluid and effortless as the 8-bit 2D classics we cut our teeth on. [Oct 2004, p.130]

To understand how Demon Stone beats the odds, all you have to do is play through the first level, with its epic battle and brilliant camera work. [Nov 2004, p.131]

It's not cripplingly difficult, but a definite challenge even for FPS veterans. [Nov 2004, p.165]

I can't let my desire to root for an underdog discount the fact that this game is really nothing special. [Sept 2004, p.111]

Although there's really nothing outrageously bad about Dino Thunder, I ofter found myself a little bored with being a giaint robotic dinosaur, which just shouldn't happen. [Dec 2004, p.16]

The scope of this title covers the final third of the Legacy of Goku storyline, but it does so in splotchy, episodic segments relying on the most generic "walk around, talk to people, and fight things" formula. [Oct 2004, p.147]

I love the constant action and surprisingly deep gameplay that Heroes has to offer. [Dec 2004, p.191]

With its moving story and deft execution, Fable is quite literally the adventure of a lifetime. [Oct 2004, p.138]

Quirky doesn't even begin to describe this game. Maybe if you add "deeply disturbing" and "inexplicably compelling," then you'd have a start. [Sept 2004, p.115]

The enemy AI is weak, and fog blankets backgrounds like a tarp of ugly. [Oct 2004, p.129]

The levels are linear and dull, and for some reason you can only take cover in specified circles in the environment, which takes away any sense of reality or spontaneity. [Dec 2004, p.168]

The levels are linear and dull, and for some reason you can only take cover in specified circles in the environment, which takes away any sense of reality or spontaneity. [Dec 2004, p.168]

Although there's really nothing outrageously bad about Dino Thunder, I ofter found myself a little bored with being a giaint robotic dinosaur, which just shouldn't happen. [Dec 2004, p.16]

The action does get intense, and if anything else, having to keep your eye on your comrades in a way highlights the grim fight for survival and tight-knit nature that all soldiers need in battle. [Oct 2004, p.129]

The action does get intense, and if anything else, having to keep your eye on your comrades in a way highlights the grim fight for survival and tight-knit nature that all soldiers need in battle. [Oct 2004, p.129]

Those who can look past Locomotion's hideous shell and see its inner beauty will be treated to an economic simulation that is very well-designed, both detailed and accessible, and a lot of fun once you get into it. [Nov 2004, p.167]

The game's disarming voyeurism, bizarre camera angles, and exceptionally well-placed tension is what the series has been trying to do all along, but The Room is the first entry to do it right. [Sept 2004, p.104]

With incredibly realistic damage modelling transforming every crash into a work of art fit to be framed and hung on the walls of Paris' Louvre museum, Burnout 3 is a visual dynamo that will floor players with its speed and gorgeous vistas. [Oct 2004, p.122]

The racing genre has been loking for a new hook for a while now, and I htink that Monster has started its own fun method of mayhem. [Oct 2004, p.123]