A shocker of a shooter, providing PSP players with access to an experience unlike any they’ve ever held in their hands – tactical online fragging.

While it surely won't appeal to the Tekken heads, it's a great fit for those who swear by Samus and die by Donkey Kong.

NBA 2K11 has gone out of its way not to be just another NBA 2K game, but a better NBA 2K game. That is something considering the size of its trophy case.

Though The Baconing is more or less just another DeathSpank title, with an okay story and final boss, it shows the franchise is consistently at the top of its game. Its silly brand of humor and graphics are iconic and show off the action RPG genre, which is privy to generic hack-and-slashery.

NBA 2K11 has gone out of its way not to be just another NBA 2K game, but a better NBA 2K game. That is something considering the size of its trophy case.

Neversoft has refined the gameplay to the point of it being almost a meditation exercise, letting you grind, manual, revert and flip with a Zen-like calmness.

Same great dialogue and voice acting.

Though The Baconing is more or less just another DeathSpank title, with an okay story and final boss, it shows the franchise is consistently at the top of its game. Its silly brand of humor and graphics are iconic and show off the action RPG genre, which is privy to generic hack-and-slashery.

Getting people to work as one towards a common goal is rare, but Rock Band makes it common. There really is no room anymore for the cliché that a gamer is just some unkempt teenage sweating in some lonely basement filled with loose cables and empty water bottles.

This game has got it all - sophisticated strategy, awesome gameplay and well-placed humor.

It's bigger, longer and smarter than "The Two Towers."

As a demonstration of how control mechanics can be designed for the Wii, Sin & Punishment 2 is pure brilliance. And in those moments where everything comes together, there's really nothing quite like it. In brief bursts, you'll swear it's the best shooter ever made, but taken as a whole, it's simply too much of a hybrid for its own good.

Although it offers a plethora of ways to interact, it is ultimately limited by the friend codes feature. Luckily, you can have fun all by yourself with this one.

Unless you already happen to live in a beautiful tropical paradise with your mansion and fancy cars, take my advice: put on a bathing suit, crank up the heat, pour yourself a frosty rum drink with a little umbrella, queue up some Dick Dale and meet me on the road.

One of the coolest features in Master of Orion 2 is the ability to do research. There are over 200 different technologies that you can acquire by the use of scientists in your empire. You get to choose many different technologies to research at any point and time.

Backbreaker Vengeance is so far from a sim, it's hard to say any given gamer couldn't enjoy it, no matter their tastes.

If you enjoyed the original, don't hestitate to pick up the new game and import your songs over. But don't buy a Kinect just for Dance Central 2. Don't run out and pay full price for the game if you're only going to enjoy it during a party. There's sure to be a sale sooner than later.

Madden 11 is beautiful to look at. The realistic physics add much to the gameplay, and destroying some 12-year old in Iowa by 50 points never get sold. But the trend of making Madden "simpler" is troubling.

If you like sheer pointless destruction and your dad won't give you his car keys, then DR: NE is the next best thing.

An excellent fighting game, especially for a handheld, and just about the best 3DS launch title. But if you already own Super on a console, gimmicky 3D and a small smattering of new features doesn't come close to warranting yet another purchase of the game.

Same great fun with some good tweaks.

Madden 11 is beautiful to look at. The realistic physics add much to the gameplay, and destroying some 12-year old in Iowa by 50 points never get sold. But the trend of making Madden "simpler" is troubling.

Lots of running around and beating guys senseless with my trusty lightsaber and smacking people around with the power of the Force.

While the control limitations and simple combos will have you weary of the single-player modes in a couple days, the never-ending blood and neat three stance system will make kicking your friends' asses all the more enjoyable.

The foundation for the UFC Undisputed series has been remodeled so thoroughly that faulting UFC Undisputed 2010 for its optional Career mode and its questionable online business practices would almost be missing the point.

With a unique plot, great characters, and gameplay that’s fun for both kids and adults, Lego Batman continues the sheer fun of the series and is a great game on all available platforms.

It's high-quality work all the way, from the production design to the responsive (if crushing) controls and utterly smooth online play.

Although WDC is lacking a few important elements of a true racing sim, it still holds its own in the genre quite well. However, for hardcore sim fans, playing this game is kinda like watching a stripper; it's fun as hell while it lasts, but you're left yearning for much more, and chances are you'll look elsewhere to get it.

Combining high speed racing with well designed tracks and tons of competitors, F-Zero X surely does its predecessor proud.All in all, this game is plain fun. Nothing really new, but nothing bad either.

The addictive gameplay along with clean textures and smooth animations produce a rock solid game. The lack of a level editor is something of a letdown, but I guess we'll have to just wait for "Dave Mirra 2."

Battlefield 1943 is an impressive feat - it's a fun and gorgeous-looking downloadable game. If its rigid online structure can somehow be made more user-friendly in future patches, it'll be even more of a sure-bet that many of us will be playing for a long, long time, especially if this type of co-operative unlocking of features becomes a standard in future content.

Great action and great weapons carry this game far.

It does a nice job offering a much cheaper alternative without sacrificing too much quality. It’s just a shame that the online play is broken, though I suppose you get what you pay for after all.

Unreal Championship is like a well-worn pair of sneakers that you threw in the wash - underneath the fresh polish is a comfortable fit, but it's just the same old pair of shoes. Lucky for us, these shoes still fit.

We love the immersive gameplay and cool visuals, although we’re starting to get tired of constantly saving and reloading because some guard spotted us picking a lock.

An excellent start to the planned four-part series. It manages to capture everything that makes the Wallace and Gromit animated shorts so endearing, expanding it to the adventure game genre. Seeing it's just a two- to four-hour long slice of a bigger, fully priced pie, we cannot wait to see what craziness is in store for the folks at West Wallaby Street in the future episodes.

Offers enough graphical flair and gameplay depth to be considered the cream of the current crop of PS2 basketball games.

The pacing is one of The Writer's biggest strengths but also the means to what some might consider its greatest weakness.

But if you're sick of the Street and want a good point/counter-point battle, this is the only one on the 3DS right now… and it's a good thing it's damn fun.

If you're more familiar with the second game than the first, you’ll doubtless find the heavier occultic, religious tone a little distracting. It’s okay, though; you will deal, or you will die.

There’s no question that Rock Band is better with instruments, but on the handheld, given that the primary comparison is Guitar Hero: On Tour which comes with the multi-colored, pro-arthritis death vice, I’m glad there aren’t any here.

It’s unfortunate that Street Fighter IV steals much of the would-be impact and innovation from Super Street Fighter IV, but when all is said and done, SSFIV is the best modern fighter in video games today.

The movement feels fluid and natural, and there's really nothing bad about the controls.

I was expecting a reiteration and that’s what I got, but deep down, I was hoping for more of a rejuvination.

Now, somebody please make a version with all of the bad words intact! I wanna say stuff that would make Bob Saget cringe!

Lunar: Silver Star Harmony is one of the best RPGs available on the PSP. The added content and reworked presentation are more than enough to warrant a playthrough or two for even the most dedicated fans.

Resistance 2 tries to be both an intimate date and an enormous, chaotic festival. That it succeeds at the wild party and fails at the more sober date is no great loss. Those of you who are only interested in multiplayer will find much love to be had in this grand orgy of a game.

It's a likable retelling of a classic series with enough content to keep most gamers entertained for weeks, and the ability to play as all these old-school bosses is sure to strike your geek nerve.

A solid game with great multiplayer, but nothing wholly unique in and of itself.

Sure, the missions get repetitive and the vehicle handling stinks, but for all that, Just Cause 2 is just plain fun.

The standout is Pitch Black mode where only one player is our pal Riddick (who can see in the dark thanks to either surgery or magic depending on which movie you watch) and everyone else hunting him has a flashlight and a gun.

With a rehashed battle system and a story very loosely tied together by tight underwear, Thongs of Virtue is not as cohesive nor as innovative as its predecessor. But it feels overbearing to criticize an unflinchingly goofy 15-hour adventure that couldn't take itself any less seriously if it tried.

The real problem is that right to the end, it's just more of the same. There isn't the sharp contrast that DKCountry brought to the SNES as most hoped and expected. While no major ground is broken from Banjo Kazooie, Donkey Kong is still all there as a 3D platform game.

LBP2 is just about the toughest game I've ever had to score. You'll only get as much out of it as you're willing to put in.

What is remarkable is that, even despite these drawbacks, the steep learning curve, accurate controls, and heated tactical challenge make Vegas’ online game the most complete for the 360 so far.

Overall, Elite Force screams quality gaming, though perhaps a little short of quantity.

An extremely solid game. It retains the amazing graphics and fun gameplay of the original and throws in a few new features for good measure.

With a rehashed battle system and a story very loosely tied together by tight underwear, Thongs of Virtue is not as cohesive nor as innovative as its predecessor. But it feels overbearing to criticize an unflinchingly goofy 15-hour adventure that couldn't take itself any less seriously if it tried.

Perhaps the crowning achievement of "Marvel vs. Capcom 2"'s is the game's ability to get around the Dreamcast controller's lack of six buttons.

Pretty much everything is just like earlier Zelda games, and that’s good from a nostalgia point of view, and bad for originality.

While Shadowgrounds: Survivor arguably does nothing we have not seen before, its clean, solid presentation and hectic, engrossing gameplay make it worthy of praise. You get a lot of game for pocket change, and that it’s a great shooter makes it worth every penny.

It's great to play a shooter that contains more than just planes, tanks, and machine guns. The fireworks theme gives the game an excuse to take you around the world, celebrating local cultures with glittery explosions, while still granting you the rare opportunity to blast a hole in a flying squid.

Improves many of the niggling flaws of the original while updating the maps and graphics along the way, leading to a genuinely fun and at times, addictive game. Unfortunately, the disconnect ranking issue still need some ironing.

If ESPN wants to compete with an EA Franchise that has made some serious leaps and bounds this year, they’re going to have to buckle down in the off-season, tighten up their offense and maybe learn some new plays on defense.

Though it sticks very closely to the franchise's formula and has a few flaws, the excellent story, great presentation and varied gameplay make this 'final' episode a good one.

An exceptional blend of gaming styles filled with enough irreverent humor to please old and young alike. It could stand to be harder and less linear, but in the end this marks another winner for the mustachioed mascot.

The sheer amount of content alone in Dawn of War: Dark Crusade is worthy of respect. This is the kind of rampant generosity that we love, and it’s worth going to war with robot zombies over.

Maybe it's because I'm a girl and this kind of thing could get messy and cold, but I don't remember ever having had so much fun just by taking a Wii in the snow.

At about one-fifth of the price and length of a full-scale platformer, it's pretty, polished and fun. LostWinds is one of the most recommendable downloadable games from WiiWare.

The classic action/adventure combat, now augmented with time travel and more ways to dish out punishment, will please fans hoping for a good ending. There are still some lingering issues, but this old warhorse remains in top form.

The only “problems” with this game are that it's quite short (it's more like Portal-short in that it doesn't need to be any longer than it is) and that, like every remake and re-imagining, it doesn't bringing anything extraordinarily new to the table.

While I disagree that the future of RPGs entails such a separation between movie and game elements, the two still propel one another in the best interests of the story.

It's got great lightsaber battles and enough Star Wars action to satisfy even the biggest George Lucas junkie.

Voluptuous in every sense of the word. With the best graphics money can buy and a robust online ring, it's a great choice for your new 360. That said, it still doesn't really bring any new tricks to the fight.

A very solid game. What it isn't is a very innovative game. It does everything it has to and does it well, but it doesn't do anything new.

Lords of Shadow is one of the best games I've played all year, but its technical faults hamper the experience.

And while the gameplay and puzzles are streamlined, the unlockable content massive, and the flying modes excellent, the best part about the game is its snarky humor and feel-good satire.

The disconnect between the mystery story and the puzzle gameplay is not a damning curse for the Professor Layton series, this game included.

Lords of Shadow is one of the best games I've played all year, but its technical faults hamper the experience.

Like a racer from Stepford, Forza Motorsport 3 is clean, well-manicured, friendly, does everything you want it to, and yet it all seems a bit… eerily familiar. Beneath the handful of smart accessibility improvements and slick menus, it’s still the same game as Forza 2. That’s not a bad thing since the series is among the best; it’s just not anything new.

It suffers from several obvious shortcomings, but accomplishes what only a week ago seemed impossible by providing console gamers with the full Battlefield experience.

Case Zero is an effective tie-in that enticed me to pay attention to a game I had little to no anticipation for, and introduced elements I want to explore further once Dead Rising 2 lands.

You could play this game for years before you really started to feel like you might have seen everything it had to offer. If you can just get past the rough beginning, the difficulty, and the steep learning curve, Eve Online is the biggest game you could possibly hope to play.

The addictive gameplay, well-rendered graphics (even on an aged system), easy control scheme, innovative cooperative features and tons of replay value make for a winner.

Its unwavering adherence to tactical gameplay will exclude a number of quick twitch gamers, but for those with a little patience, this is a solid, engrossing port.

This stylish adventure is just what we hoped it would be - a deranged, oddball jaunt through a fun, bizarre world - proving that a creative mind is indeed a terrible thing to waste.

As a singleplayer experience, Bad Company 2 is mostly forgettable, which is a disappointment considering how entertaining the first game’s campaign was. Thankfully the multiplayer features are so polished and well designed that BC2’s shortcomings won’t matter in the slightest.

The humor is excellently well-written, and the setup to Chapter Three is more than enough to make up for the stale beginning of the Tales of Monkey Island series. If you haven't taken the plunge into the new Monkey Island, now is a good time to do it.

The strategic possibilities are limited only by the skill of the player. It’s likely too complex for some and isn’t without a few hiccups, but those with patience to burn will find this a bright candle indeed.

Chinatown Wars is a big package, and Liberty City’s pants are bursting at the seams.

While the multiplayer has its cons, it definitely has potential to be built into something more and I wouldn't be surprised if downloadable content releases soon. The single-player campaign is enough to hold anyone through a gripping story with non-stop and fast-paced action and a trio of compelling characters.

An action game fan’s wet dream. Despite a derivative structure and a few technical stumbles—like occasional slowdown and frequent screen tearing—Bayonetta takes everything that’s good about every other combo-heavy action game, cranks up the intensity, fine tunes the combat, and bundles it in a single, sexy, “au naturel” package.

While Starfighter is without a doubt a solid game, I can't help but wish for a more dynamic storyline or level structure. The ability to progress in the game without complete success would definitely boost the depth by leaps and bounds.

This is the most complete NBA game out there, dominating the court with its new control options, good A.I. and strong delivery.

While the multiplayer has its cons, it definitely has potential to be built into something more and I wouldn't be surprised if downloadable content releases soon. The single-player campaign is enough to hold anyone through a gripping story with non-stop and fast-paced action and a trio of compelling characters.

It looks simply unbelievable and the gameplay and control is easy and intuitive. The bullet time alone makes it one of the premier action games on the Xbox.

While the multiplayer has its cons, it definitely has potential to be built into something more and I wouldn't be surprised if downloadable content releases soon. The single-player campaign is enough to hold anyone through a gripping story with non-stop and fast-paced action and a trio of compelling characters.

The whole thing is simply great fun, a sort of malleable tour through the Dawn of the Dead films that clearly inspired the game. There’s a party in my Xbox 360, and all you zombies out there are invited.