Michael Jackson: The Experience 3D is an unfortunate game that punishes the player at the beginning and far too slowly develops into a functional game. I found myself playing the game just to listen to the songs, which speaks to the enduring power of Michael Jackson's pop legacy that I was willing to weather this game in order to listen to the music. Bottom line: Buy some CDs or MP3s instead.

I wish NHL 15 offered a more straightforward season mode, though the options to run your own team or play as a specific pro will give every fan what they’re looking for. Whether or not the horn sounds on home ice, every goal will give the fan in you the same satisfaction as if the game were live right in front of you.

Perhaps Necropolis’s worst sin is that it doesn’t motivate you to keep going. Sloppy mechanics can often be forgiven if the game has something compelling going for it; just ask Deadly Premonition. Here, however, players have no incentive to continue. The unfunny humor exists solely to mock the player. Every twist and turn, you’re greeted with another joke that undermines your quest and the importance of it. Your quest never feels purposeful or epic. Instead, it just feels like an insignificant afterthought.

If you dream of a single-player Star Citizen, or loved games like Freelancer, then this space sandbox will be a breath of fresh air in a much too sparsely populated genre. However, even though X4 is more accessible than X1–X3, it’s not a casual game. You have to work to figure out the mechanics behind Foundations, and if you put in the time, you’ll be rewarded with an experience that can last 100 hours or more.

L.A. Rush tries to keep up with the street racing scene, but it's all show and no go. Repeating races over and over isn't exactly a draw and the lack of customization is unforgivable.

It offers interesting gameplay mechanics and a ton of modes, but the pieces don't fit together well, making this mascot racer better suited for a weekend drag race than a 500 lap cruise.

Schrodinger's Cat and the Raiders of the Last Quark uses clever game mechanics and thought-provoking humor to create a fun platformer with an unusual twist.

Bad physics, bad level design and a paltry choice of vehicles overshadow the cool weapons and interactive maps. Where's "Twisted Metal Black" when you need it?

Sega obviously tried to emulate aspects of Super Mario Galaxy or other 3D Mario games to make this leap in the Sonic series, but Sonic: Lost World suffers with each “feature” they have added to the Sonic’s successful formula: running and jumping.

One of the worst games we’ve ever seen. As much as we’d like to see more sexual content in games, we’re afraid Magna Cum Laude will do for Mature games what "Showgirls" did for NC-17 rated movies.

You have to commend Way of the Samurai 2 for trying something different, but its myriad design flaws, weak delivery and repetitive nature serve as a reminder that different doesn't necessarily mean fun.

Cocked to the side of intellectual myopia, Flash Focus is a blurry and beady exercise that wants you to keep it one foot away from you – but you’ll probably do that and more.

Fist of the North Star: Ken's Rage reminds us what a great beat-'em-up at its core is all about, as long as you're playing by yourself and hopefully in spurts.

Except for a still-finicky camera (and Oswald being an adorable pain in the ass), I really enjoyed Epic Mickey 2: The Power of Two. The Rainbow Caverns stage is one of the prettiest I've ever seen, the animation style for the cut-scenes is simply beautiful FMV, and the puzzles-while not terribly difficult-are fun to solve.

Woefully limited in its fun factor and appeal.

For a while, it is rather enjoyable to cruise by and experience the closest thing you’ll ever have to being anything like Hef, but you'll quickly long for deeper gameplay or a more real sense of progression. Use that $50 on 3 years’ worth of Playboy subscriptions instead.

This is some of the most fast-paced, frenetic Mario Kart action ever, but only to those who subscribe to its gold pass. For everyone else, this is still a surprisingly inventive spin-off, but one that also feels undermined by greed.

Slender: The Arrival has solid qualities, as well as some hit or miss tendencies, leaning towards the miss side. Undoubtedly, this one is under the horror classification and does its job throwing out its scary surprises, and for better or worse, there are still some accidental funny moments that you can’t help but laugh at.

It's a good thing that the marketing genius in the Skylanders franchise is so effective. An uninteresting game may actually serve the purpose of of the franchise, since it allows people to level up their figures relatively quickly, prompting them to buy a new figure and start over again at square one. Also, since Skylanders figures can be taken from console to 3DS back to console and continue to gain experience, the 3DS version may be just the accessory that fans of franchise will want, even if the game itself is boring and bland.

Murdered: Soul Suspect, though it was diverting like a bit of light reading, never really hooked me. And that's its biggest problem.

Unfortunately, the poorly designed mini-games and boring gameplay takes most of the joy out of creation, effectively dropping this fantasy land into the shallow end of the kiddie pool.

Were Alpha Prime really fantastic in some specific aspect, at just $20, I would be happy to recommend it to one and all. It isn’t bad – you can have fun playing it and it’s not going to crash inexplicably – but it is an offering exactly matched by its budget price.

If you are trying to ween a GF (or BF, never let it be said GR isn't progressive) on to modern consoles, this could be a great stepping stone, as the gameplay and graphics are just as simple as they were back in the day. But if you're a hardcore, experienced gamer, you may want to skip Blade Kitten in favor of playing with other pussycats.

"NBA 2K7" is fast and beautiful, while NBA Live 07 is outdated, sloppy, and only worth playing for a quarter.

The biggest offender here is that Episode Gladiolus has stripped Final Fantasy XV of most of its best qualities, relying on a dull character to carry the weight instead of the game's expansive world. Having tossed out many of the reasons I enjoyed Final Fantasy XV in the first place, it's a far less interesting addition to the game than the free content that has been introduced during the past few months, including this week's 1.07 update.

It’s fun and humorous at first, but the lack of substance and challenge is a Spider-killer.

If the taste of orcs and humans battling on a 2D plain while gathering gold and other resources hasn't become stale to your senses, then by all means dive into this feast of rehashed mediocrity. I'm looking for something with a little more kick.

In that way, Entwined feels like Journey and that’s high praise for upstart developer Pixelopus.

For twenty bucks, it provides plenty of wacky pitches and some minor league couch fun, but the lack of modes and new gameplay really hurts. Instead of swinging for the fences, Midway has settled for a walk.

As far as reflex games, this isn't too terrible to play. Each "beat 20 games" setup has its own personality and artistic style - along with some fitting and pretty cool music to match - so it's not a total loss.

Unfortunately, I feel like fixing this game goes beyond patching glitches, fixing bugs, and then cramming in expansions. To bring this game up to the must-play level, many aspects of the game need a full overhaul.

Everblue 2 does a nice job of being strange. Unfortunately, it does a poor job of being fun.

While Dark of the Moon hits all the bases for a blockbuster game, it won't live up to the blockbuster experience. At least the game wasn't as bad as the movie.

Don't spend your money on How To Train Your Dragon, no matter how much you enjoyed the movie. You can easily do better than this terrible, movie-tie-in, mad grab for cash.

If you decide to by Time Crisis: Razing Storm, you will do so for the sole benefit of owning Time Crisis 4 and Deadstorm Pirates, two excellent arcade titles structured around the concept of "fun for the sake of fun".

I enjoy the basic gameplay, and the Saturday-morning cartoon-style visuals and light humor add to the fun. However, the lack of variety and poor design decisions make it seem like I'm the one that's cursed whenever I play.

It's just so not remarkable, so bland, so... not interesting... you get what I'm saying. Slow and lame, that's what I'm saying.

Maybe instead of trying to make it work with the Wii-mote, they should’ve gone with the guitar and drums. Maybe they could’ve touched up the corners on their animations, so they didn’t look so blocky.

The one area in which Shootout actually trumps the others is online play. 989 has built a robust, efficient online matching and stat-tracking system, making it easy to find other ballers and get a match up and running. The stat-tracking and ease of setting up tournaments are impressive.

But among the worst of it all is the lack of presentation. Nearly every football player looks the same. Their uniforms look like they're made from plastic. Referees have been transformed into Jumbotron cut-scenes. There are no coaches or players on the sidelines. And the crowds are comprised of the same four people copied a million times over.

C'mon, we all deserve better than this, no matter how slim the pickings are for the 3DS right now.

D&D Tactics flings lines of text at you, and none of it is well written. There's no effort made to provide well-developed characterization, yet there's a lot of time wasted on excess words. Worse, the default speed passes them by so quickly that I was usually three or four words from the end of a line when it faded.

If you've got a Vita, this is well worth a look, even if you're not compelled by the brand or even the gameplay.

In the end, Mario Tennis: Ultra Smash is a solid tennis game that feels thin when it comes to content. But the gameplay is fun and the visuals are great eye candy. Playing with friends in a living room is a fun way to kill a few hours.

Helix accomplishes a lot in appealing to Western gamers while still sticking to the themes Front Mission has established through its 15-year history.

Even the most fanatic of Toy Story fans will see straight through this game... the unoriginality and outdated-ness coupled with the poor graphics and weak framerate send this straight to the bargain bins. If you want to follow the exploits of Buzz Lightyear, go watch the movie and leave this one at the toy store.

With high-quality puzzle games like The Talos Principle available, I don't understand why anybody would pay to play Attractio. Its numerous flaws and bad design decisions aren't something that can be patched at a later date.

Shelter 2 isn't all bad, though, as the unusual watercolor-style visuals help to create a uniquely attractive view of nature.

Helix accomplishes a lot in appealing to Western gamers while still sticking to the themes Front Mission has established through its 15-year history.

L.A. Rush tries to keep up with the street racing scene, but it’s all show and no go. Repeating races over and over isn’t exactly a draw and the lack of customization is unforgivable.

Clearly the weakest baseball offering of the year. However, it's the only one that's online, and playing online can be fun.

A weak game with some good features; namely, the combo system and the fact that it sells for only 20 bucks. Yep, 20 bucks. However, waves of meaningless enemies, stupid objectives and a very limited shelf life make it quite evil indeed.

It’s like an ironic mustache or mullet. Like having a Steven Segal DVD in your collection. You’ll never get any real use out of it. You just have it in with your other games to show you friends you have a sense of humor.

This formulaic title just has very little to offer. It’s certainly a pale copy of whatever the movie has going for it, minus the star power, plot, humor and soul.

It’s a great concept and could have been a ton of fun if only it were set in a more open-ended, no-load time world, like "GTA" with zombies.

The game looks hot and puts out, so if you just want a fling, it’s not a bad choice. But for a long term relationship, I need much more depth. She ain’t getting a ring, that’s for sure.

I really like the extreme concept behind CART Fury and its mini games are neat. But in a fast paced game like this on a next-generation system, the oh so slow going menus and loading time brings this race to a screeching halt.

Not enough control is a major penalty and a lack of fun is grounds for ejection. Its simplicity might be able to hold your interest for a minute or two, but a true soccer fan will be left with deflated ball.

A fun hour or two and worth renting if you've got the flow and a lot of food, but otherwise it's just another rehashed old game.

If you are trying to ween a GF (or BF, never let it be said GR isn't progressive) on to modern consoles, this could be a great stepping stone, as the gameplay and graphics are just as simple as they were back in the day. But if you're a hardcore, experienced gamer, you may want to skip Blade Kitten in favor of playing with other pussycats.

The game's biggest flaw is its story, which is ironic due to the fact that the Lord of the Rings trilogy is all about its story.

The Battle of Forli shouldn't be considered an expansion pack. because it simply isn't. Its content belonged in the main game in the first place, as it contains a relatively important part of Assassin's Creed 2's story.

There's no way I could recommend buying this wallet draining mutant. While the heart of the character is here, the brain is not.

Unfortunately, there really isn't much more meat on the bones here. No create-a-skater, no skater statistics to flesh out or tweak, not even a bunch of new outfits or anything.

Urban Trial Freestyle steals the core gameplay of the Trials series but fails to do anything interesting with it. It’s a brief and utterly forgettable experience, one which only those who are willing to overlook its tedious gameplay in order to see their name in lights on its leaderboards will enjoy.

With twenty-six unique charaters and as many stories to play through, this is the hands-down, be-all, end-all, motherload of button pushing. The rest of us, however, understand why George Jetson hates his job. Ok, you can stop doing it now.

Any kid will be happier with a weighty MIT textbook that they won't immediately understand than this deadweight of a fighting design game that no one will EVER understand.

Street Hoops tries to capture the sensationalized style of hardcore playground ball, but only manages to come off as a weak, thinly veiled copycat.

But the evil control, level design and graphics from the Dark Side can turn a good jedi like Obi Wan bad.

Rampaging through the French countryside is entertaining enough for a quick rental. Otherwise, it doesn't have much else going for it and squanders its fantastical setup with a lackluster plot, limited online options, restricted strategic choices, and neutered dragons.

Rumors about a U.S. release of "Samurai Shodown V Special," a more complete version of this game with more fully-realized fighters, have been making rounds at some forums. That might be worth waiting for, because this version certainly isn't. If you own "Samurai Shodown IV," this deserves no more than a rental.

A lackadaisical, recycled romp that tries to emulate the Splinter Cell experience. But without the good graphics, A.I. or multiplay, all it does is put the “Why?!” in spy.

There’s no unifying factor to the game, no universal joy to be had, no... I need a beer.

There's a lot to appreciate hidden behind Maelstrom's ugly exterior. With any luck, KDV Games will be greenlit for a sequel and will have the opportunity to polish up the aesthetics to match the good gameplay.

Desert Child is built upon the promise of solid ideas that don’t quite come together. And sadly, they’re so deeply intertwined that a mistake in one aspect of the game critically injures the other part of the game. Hoverbike racing is a neat central mechanic but it wears thin and is stifled by its lack of difficulty and useless upgrades.

While not a spectacular failure, Delta Force: Black Hawk Down is just another ho-hum first-person shooter, offering a big multiplayer canvas but little else. I wouldn’t call it as unattractive as a live grenade, but I wouldn’t go jumping on it, either.

In fact, Marvel Heroes throws open the Avengers Tower doors to an expansive amount of gameplay, whether you pay or not. I applaud the generosity, and fully admit that Gazillion scores a few bonus points for it. It's not the prettiest or deepest dungeon-crawler you'll ever play, but it's free and it'll run on nearly any system. For Marvel fans like me, it doesn't get much better than that.

Sort of like a dumbed-down "Powerstone," but with fewer weapons. Honestly, this game does nothing new at all. And what it does do, we've seen done better in games.

Continues on the path of cool ninja stealth action, but is thwarted by a plethora of traps like poor control and retarded AI.

The lack of content and limited attempts at personality hinder those moments, but at the end of the day Cel Damage HD is a solid update of a mostly forgotten 13-year-old game.

For all Ninja Gaiden 3 tries to pull sympathy from its players onto its protagonist, it seems to have lost its way. It's an example of a game that is less than the sum of its parts-each on their own are fine, perhaps even good-because the entire thing is just stretched too thin. A two-hour campaign for a fraction of the cost would have, ironically, been much easier to recommend. But with things as they are, Ninja Gaiden 3 will only satisfy people wanting the video game equivalent to the weekend popcorn action flick.

As a movie port using the oldest recipe in the book, Constantine is about as average a game as you can get, which is actually better than most licensed translations. Neither Heaven nor Hell, Constantine is merely a short stay in Purgatory.

It captures neither the balance needed to make squad-based strategy work, nor the thrill of decimating troops single-handedly. If you’re a fledgling warrior, firmly take your sword and four-hundred kill count somewhere else.

This is the real problem: Of Light and Darkness just isn't fun. Unless you're new to the idea of a using a mouse, the game's basic gameplay, boring puzzles and average graphics won't keep anyone in front of the computer for very long.

If you're losing sleep at night and are in need of some real-time combat, get Vagrant Story. If it's too late and you already own this atrocity, just break it up and try to feed it to ducks or something.

The Caligula Effect is full of promising ideas that are bogged down by poor execution and lackluster presentation. The game tries too hard to do too many things all at once, resulting in obvious compromise.

For die-hard fans of the series, I'd suggest renting Futurama if you feel the urge to see your favorite characters in new situations. For the rest of the gaming audience, a suicide booth might be a bit more fun than putting up with this tedious game.

Unless you're an aquatic dinosaur fanatic who has a thing for submarines and listening to facts about dinosaurs, you're probably not going to enjoy this. Your time would be better spent at a local museum; at least they have the cool dinosaurs there and not just the underwater ones. [Tested both Vive and Rift]

Elex could well be this generation's cult favorite RPG, much like Two Worlds was mine, and the developer of Gothic and Risen has easily made its most beautiful and interesting setting yet. The world of Magalan is intriguing with its blend of technology and magic, but it's unfortunate that the game tucked inside of it is only fun to play half of the time.

The Zero series on the GBA trumps X7 with its tightened classic feel. The "Mega Man Legend" series (including Tron Bonne) worked the 3D controls much better. I'm all for change, but it has to come with improvement. The Blue Bomber has bombed out.

Inarguably, it's a sucky game. Once you've taken Marvel Nemesis through its paces, you'll pierce its glinty armor with your newfound eye beams of license abuse and try to toss it into the local penitentiary for the rest of its unnatural born life.

This could have easily been a great tribute to its SNES predecessor, had it paid any heed to what makes the tedium of an RPG tolerable... and that lies squarely in the saga that this game fails to describe.

Once again, Gundam gamers are left with the wrong end of the beam saber. More bad control, less game and more advertisements.

With both this expansion and its predecessor, Heroes IV expansions only give you more of the same... and charge you $30 for the pleasure. Does that make this a bad game? No, it doesn't, but it is a bad expansion.

There's no way I could recommend buying this wallet draining mutant. While the heart of the character is here, the brain is not.

Don't get me wrong, the game does handle fairly well, and with friends this could be a fun one to share, but single-player is worse than most. Combine a three-player team with the smallest roster KoF has ever had, and you'll have your faves chosen like a routine in no time.

Board game enthusiasts will find themselves bored quickly, the average player will only break it out when there are friends around—which is the point, and I guess with friends the skill-based games aren’t too bad—and Party aficionados will be able to scratch that virtual itch.

Still, Datura should be celebrated for exploring the immersive, psychological boundaries of video games. Even though it doesn't have a high production value and it's short even for a $9.99 game, its core message is that this is an artform that has the power to have players experience something that other artforms can only dream of.