As an RTS it’s as entertainingly humdrum as any of the sixteen billion others, but the Hero Command innovation is so wretchedly underdeveloped it mostly serves to annoy and all but ruins the game’s single player campaigns. It’s fun in multiplayer and skirmish modes for a while, but Rise & Fall is far from the classic game that it could have been.

Sonic CD is a title worth purchasing on pure merit, and whatever their standard, the sheer number of games on the disc make Gems an economical acquisition.

Tacking on the motion controls has really weakened Enchanted Arms’ improved outing on the PS3, shoe-horning completely out of place and unfocused pad-shaking into an RPG and forcing players to accept it as necessary.

Kane & Lynch is very much a case of what could have been. With a little more time for polish and tweaking Eidos could have had a game worthy of the hype and its British Academy Video Games Award nomination (which was somehow secured before the game’s release).

Perhaps the most damning evidence in the case against bothering with this game (as if AI that sees your allies forever flying into your plane and bafflingly unresponsive speed controls aren’t quite enough) is that the whole experience feels reminiscent of a dumbed-down version of Crimson Skies.

It’s really the co-op mode that saves the game from utter mediocrity. Nevertheless, the abject blandness of pretty much every other facet of the game holds it back from being decent enough to purchase.

For the two or three evenings that this will last you, there’s enough going on to keep you pushing forward to the end.

If you want an inept and hurriedly put together version of an old classic, this is where it’s at. We suspect that’s one quote they won’t be sticking on the box.

It’s hard to really dislike Need for Speed Undercover simply because the core game is similar in many ways to the excellent Most Wanted. But it under-aims, underperforms, underachieves and does so while practically throwing a begging bowl at you in the form of purchasable unlocks.

The single-player is a fun new addition but is plagued by frustrating design choices and idiotic AI, while the multiplayer is very hard to justify paying £6.99 a month for, especially as the game doesn't even come with a free trial period.

An anthology of washed up ideas and concepts seen in almost every non-Nintendo platformer post 2D.

A competent if unspectacular stealth game.

All the ingredients for a nice simple and playable game are here, it’s just that carelessness and an unpolished roughness drags the game down to mediocre levels.

Worms Forts has some of the best features straight from the old games, but you can’t help but notice that a few good things are still missing from the transition to 3D.

FIFA Street 3 is about taking all the superficial and superfluous things about modern day football – from the overhead kicks to the pop-culture that surrounds the beautiful game in the 21 st century – and placing them centre stage.

Spectrobes is a suicidal endeavour by Disney, a fool-hardy exercise in boardroom cynicism resulting in little more than a way below par, under-funded attempt to cash in on Pokémon’s “Gotta catch ‘em all” legacy. Of what little enjoyment there is still left inside the DS cartridge, it’s left for the obsessive gamers who can stand the constant fruitless searching, endless digging, piss-poor combat, the rarity of finding something new, the barely existent storyline and even the feeble character designs.

A deeply confused game. It tries to pander to both of its rivals’ fans, but falls well short of satisfying either court. It doesn’t have enough gameplay options, the ball play is slick but unbalanced, and no matter how regularly updated or different it feels, it’s a disappointing exclusive title for Sony.

A few minorly successful party games aside – namely Golf and, to a lesser extent, Bowling – Super Monkey Ball just doesn’t work, and is almost true to its title: It’s not super, but it does have monkeys in, and it’s mostly balls.

FIFA Street 3 is about taking all the superficial and superfluous things about modern day football – from the overhead kicks to the pop-culture that surrounds the beautiful game in the 21 st century – and placing them centre stage.

What is important is the difficulty to distinguish between things you’re supposed to collect and things you’re supposed to avoid, especially when the screen fills with lasers and power ups. Even after several hours of play, dying because of this was fairly common.

The gameplay is very basic and badly dated and, with all the top-end city building sims out there now, that makes it doomed to failure. With very little in the way of redeeming features, it is only going to have any kind of appeal to the most hardened of Roman history vets – ones who don’t know games very well so won’t know better.

Jericho is definitely a case of inventive design married all-too-unhappily to old school thinking, and the result is a game that is almost fatally broken.

The vast world offers so much freedom that you could easily think you are lost. But you are not, because you can do whatever the hell you want, so even if you’re not able to complete a quest there will be plenty to keep you occupied until you can.

Many will lap up the opportunity to get to business tweaking and customising every shot, while players who might more often reach for the likes of Mario Golf or the Monkey Golf mini-games will be repelled.

Jericho is definitely a case of inventive design married all-too-unhappily to old school thinking, and the result is a game that is almost fatally broken.

It’s just too simplistic to hold the attention of any serious management fan.

It’s too short, it can be too easy and there isn’t a great deal of variety in the gameplay.

All in all Hasbro Family Game Night is not without niggles and annoyances, but it still represents decent value given the cost of the physical games and there are a number of nice touches to keep your interest, such as the unlockable items and customisable game room.