While I certainly find myself wishing the developers would fix the problems with the game and incorporate more of the pen-and-paper game's RPG elements, it's still a game that I look back on with more fond memories than bad ones.

Dull, mediocre games… well these games are like a painter's palette filled with nine shades of gray. There isn't much to work with, so the end result is as lifeless and flat as a Midwest landscape study in wintertime.

While the game suffers from minor technical flaws and repetitive gameplay, it does something legitimately new with its TV show concept.

I miss my sprite-based 16-bit hockey games, deficient opponent AI and all. Somehow I recall enjoying those more than I did ESPN NHL Hockey, even despite all that it brings to the genre: nuanced controls, deep physics and mechanics, a licensed presentation and polished visuals.

The worst offender by far, though, is the menu system. For a game with such a simple storyline (which would seem to be designed to appeal to kids), the interface is completely out of whack.

Creeps into your life under the simple guise of a game and soon dominates your every waking (and occasionally sleeping) moment. It's like being possessed in The Exorcist or like a pod person in Invasion of the Body Snatchers—you still look like you, but you're sort of a shell of your former self because all of your faculties are focused on the game.

Digging deep into these levels proves to be a pretty profound experience. Each level is adorned with washed out colors and textures, as lush and lively as the cherry blossom trees the game so prominently displays.

If someone were looking for a platforming action game, there are better ones out there. If someone were looking for a Scooby-Doo game, there aren't.

There's a certain point in gaming where you just stop thinking about semantics of criticism and let a moment take you. It's probably after Nightmare scrapes his hulking sword across a castle wall with sparks nipping at Talim's feet as she runs up the wall ready to slice back at her aggressor. No two-digit number can validate the pure exhilaration of that moment.

A textbook example of a game that wasn't ready to be pushed out of the nest. What could have been an exceptional game founders in mediocrity because of an artificial timeline.

What should have been a fast, flashy, light-hearted affair is somehow grim and joyless. There's wonderful content here, but unfortunately most gamers won't ever see most of it because it's locked away behind a series of near-impossible challenges.

A light and breezy Sci-Fi romp, it has enough juice to occupy anyone in need of a good weekend diversion. It won't start trends (and I doubt it will set sales records) but there's something to be said for a project that's as solid and sincere as this one.

A player shouldn't have to slog through command list after command list before fighting a particularly challenging AI or human opponent. Patience may be a virtue, but it can also mean really stubborn.

Stark mastery of skills has its place, but it's a true shame that the developers couldn't shape Chaos Legion into a more compelling experience.

Right from the beginning, Silent Hill 3 tells its story with the subtlety of a sledgehammer. The all-important sense of pacing that the first two games had is completely lost.

Both the humor and the flight mechanics are poorly implemented, and that provides too much of an obstacle to the success of the game.

It's a bad game that needs to be reviewed so other gamers out there can avoid being sucked into the whirlpool of uninspired gameplay, bland graphics, and generalized mediocrity that colors the entirety of the title.

The crucial fear-factor is missing, the sense of fight, flee or die that makes survival horror so effective.

I was disappointed that The Great Escape opted for a more conventional action-game route rather than challenging the player through a sim-like game of socially-based puzzle solving. But it's still a game that is varied and sophisticated enough to be fleetingly fun and worthwhile for any fan of the film.

The game's difficulty curve is totally thrown off balance. I can only assume the intent was to provide a greater challenge than player-friendly Armored Core 3, and not outright sadism.

Several unfortunate technical issues hold[] it back. The item inventory screen is pure hell to navigate.

A horrible game manufactured with the creaky spare parts of a rusty genre along with fallen gears from the movie hype machine. This is the kind of game that's given away when you order a large pizza and get the second one for half price.

Seen through a kid’s eye this game is very cool with its full compliment of squishing sounds and gun blasts. For adults, I suggest you look elsewhere for your entertainment.

The game's real mistakes were made at the design level, and that's a pity, because it contained the potential to be a much better experience than it ended up being.

I swear, I felt my IQ drop as I was playing the game, the sounds of brain cells popping melding nicely with the oh-so-bland cock-rock soundtrack that seems to be a requisite feature of sophomoric extreme sports tie-ins.

Its incredibly addictive drawing and animation succeed by providing a unique opportunity for your imagination to run wild, yet I can't help but be disappointed that the rest of the game doesn't meet the same impressive standard.

Perhaps the biggest disappointment is just how easy the game is - winning battles doesn't take much strategy, at least not until the final boss.

I'm giving Advance Wars 2 an 8.5 because of the game's lack of any significant innovation (the missile silos and volcanos are nice, but one new tank doesn't cut it for me). The developers decided not to take any risks, which I can't really fault them for, since the first game was so damn close to perfection to begin with.