If you absolutely must have another zombie game, Zombie Apocalypse is far from awful. The most frustrating and disappointing thing about it is that the premise has so much promise - none of which is delivered on here. It's decidedly average.

Feels like it would benefit from a longer plot, but still fun if you overlook the repetitive nature.

This game is not going to break new ground in innovation but what it does do is deliver a good solid game that has well thought out online play, a good three player co-op mode and a solid single player experience.

Overall, Oozi: Earth Adventure is a nice little throwback to 16 bit gaming. The predictability of enemies may make this a walk in the park, however ramping up the difficulty to max provide a decent - often frustrating - challenge.

Unresponsive and unintuitive controls hold back what is otherwise an excellent, atmospheric platformer.

With a combat system that requires simple combos to achieve signature techniques, as well as activate Logia powers and Haki, each moment feels geared toward a faithful recreation of the source material. While it may only be a game for those who already love the series, Burning Blood delivers fans a boat load of fun.

Despite some frustrating nuisances, this is still one of the best showcases for the impressive Kinect technology.

Unfortunately, while on paper it might have sounded like a Fast and Furious calibre idea, in reality Wheelman is barely a Pacifier.

An overcast day in gaming history.

The Wii version doesn’t look as pretty as the other next gen consoles, but delivers back in spades with the realism that is offered by the Wii remote and nunchuck.

Children of Arkham is a less theatric, but more disruptive story to Batman’s lore.

There is definitely room for improvements in the graphics department and any straight-from-PC gamers will still need plenty of time to adjust to the gamepad clunkiness.

Ultimately, though, the game’s flaws more than outweigh its strengths, making it hard to recommend to all but the most diehard Final Fantasy XIII fans.

It's been months since I last sat down with this absolute classic of a game; if it takes a bit of DLC to rekindle my enthusiasm for this wild and wondrous title, then regardless of the frustrations, it's still a winner in my books.

It probably isn't the game you'll play hours on end, but you'll find yourself coming back to it over and over again.

Snappy fighter in a lacklustre package.

Interesting control scheme, but not much else.

It’ll leave you in hysterics, for better or worse.

One of the most enjoyable experiences I have had on Microsoft’s Live service. Games are usually full of accidental hilarity punctuated with the odd showcase of raw skill.

The change to an actual 3D engine has afforded the designers some flexibility in the layout and construction of the levels.

Ultimately, if you're looking for some Worms mayhem, we'd recommend sticking to the 2D variants - the recently released Worms Reloaded, for example.

The online requirement seems pointless, but it’s an enjoyable racing game overall.

It features some classic nostalgia from the 80’s, a fair amount of strategy mixed with skill and is pretty addictive – especially in online multiplayer where you can have four player dogfight mayhem.

A mediocre first entry in what I hope will branch into a kind of informative gaming genre.

The difficulty ramp is well designed, with occasional spikes to tease you with what the designers have planned for you later, and to a level, the game is fun to play. It's occasionally infuriating, but never frustrating; if you fail, you know it's because you need to perfect your technique, not because there's something fundamentally wrong with the game.

This has been an exercise in balance that has proved to be worth our while. While this game might not be up to much if you’re the owner of one of the hulking beasts that are Microsoft and Sony’s consoles, if you’re a Wii owner, don’t be put off by what you’ve read.

Definitely not mentally stimulating but the games will require a good level of reflexes and hand-eye co-ordination.

This is a solid effort at porting Ninja Gaiden 2 – one of the best hack and slash titles of this generation – to a handheld. Unfortunately, it still has the poor camera and occasionally sloppy level design of the original, problems that are further compounded by the Vita’s small screen.

A fairly simple arcade title that offers a so-so experience. Some of its gameplay is fun and it is challenging. But it doesn't offer you anything particularly engrossing.

Admittedly, this probably isn't the Burnout game fans were expecting when it was announced earlier this year. But for $18.90 NZ or 800 Microsoft Points, Crash! does offer up a manic, entertaining couple of hours for anyone with severe destructive tendencies.

At no point in the adventure do you ever suspect you're playing a cellphone game, nor do you feel like the experience is ever less than it can or should be. It's fun to play with a cool (if formulaic and linear) tale to tie the various levels together. If you're at all interested in Kingdom Hearts and have a DS, there's no reason to leave this one on the shelf - just make sure you've played through Birth by Sleep before you do!

It's a competent tie-in with plenty of goodies for fans of the series.

After the ball drops it seems strange that the game’s biggest flaw is a control issue that could have been avoided so easily if they just left the original controls in as an option. Unfortunately this will be remembered as an oddball in an otherwise great Tennis series. Camelot dropped the ball on this one.

The game is an anachronism, proving that transposing ideas from the past (without thinking critically about how they should be represented in the present) doesn’t always work.

If you're a first person shooter fan, and you have an iPad, and you care much more about blasting mindless aliens with a shotgun than being immersed in a riveting story, then Nova could well be for you.

The combat is fast, frantic and fun, requiring you to think and move quickly, and each of the classes are very different to play. Sure there's not much variety in the type of bad guys you come up against but the enemies which are present are generally very nice to look at and very satisfying to obliterate with your weapon of choice. It's easily the best action RPG on the 360 and arguably the best on any of the modern consoles.

If you're at all interested in playing a strategy game on a console, there's not many better options - that realtime guff belongs on the PC, turn-based works so much better on a 360 controller.

Dynasty Warriors fits perfectly on the console and I personally feel that’s where it should stay.

There is still no denying that Afro Samurai is an entertaining visual treat. The aesthetics of the game are a joy to behold and when you get into the zone you are bound to witness gory scenes of pure awesomeness.

In summary, there are many, many hours of playing time to be had in Atelier Rorona: The Alchemist of Arland; however repetitious game play and time constraints make it an acquired taste, best suited to fans of the series.

In the end, what you can count on is two to three hours of the same Dragon Age II. It looks the same, plays the same, and depending who you pick in your party, the chatter, while entertaining enough, is the same.

Refreshing and original. Unfortunately, the lack of victims running from the buildings makes it feel empty, and the repetitious gameplay loses its novelty value after a few hours.

This is a game with a number of mediocre elements, being released in a season already crowded with other shooters. However, the main thing it does well – capture the spirit and fun of the Bond movies – is enough to draw in a number of people.

If you've been hankering to cheat in poker, there maybe something here but that has got to be a pretty small market segment; smaller still when the market is restricted to people within that group that can handle the awful graphics. Not recommended.

For fans of the series, it's a no-brainer. There's so much Gundam here I'm surprised it doesn't leave little Manga stains when you put it down.

In the end, The Godfather II has the recipe for an excellent game filled with action, mindless violence, great characters and strategic thought. But you just can’t help but shake the feeling that it doesn’t quite feel 100% finished.

If you like a little Bejeweled, or something like it for your PS3, then 4 Elements is for you. You can blow up blocks, check your scores on the online leader boards and stomp your controller into expensive little pieces of plastic as you time runs out and the sheer mind-melting complexity of the whole thing finally gets the better of you. But, isn't that the whole point of a good puzzler?

A perfectly good movie tie-in game. It has familiar, but well executed gameplay with the occasional road-runner or bat-riding diversion. This, together with good graphics and sound, makes for a tidy enough game for fans of the film. While there have been movie games to hate, this isn't one of them.

It may not be fun, but it’s realistic.

Multiplayer aside, the single-player story is short-lived, clocking in at around 7 hours from start to finish. Despite this though, you’ll be left with some great memories and a soft spot for the two characters before you’re finished.

An average game with a few good ideas, some decent gameplay systems and some fun heroes to play. This would be fine, except that Darkspore depends on being a completely online experience - with bad servers.

Yoshi’s New Island places almost all of its eggs in the nostalgia basket. It's a bold decision, but one that ultimately holds back the game by bringing with it some retro-inspired design best left to the 90s.

Overall this is a game only a niche market will enjoy, anyone else looking for a great SRPG without the massive amount of dialogue should check out Disgaea 3, or any other of the SRPGs on the PS3. While, it has its moments, the battles just take far too long to get to, and the game suffers from the omission of an English dub and poor translation.

This could be the basis for a fully fledged, cross-franchise Nintendo rhythm game - now there's something I'd pay good money for.

I can see kids having a real blast with this game, so if you’re looking for something simple, innocent and lip-smackingly sweet for a younger friend, get a hold of it over other the other movie franchise-driven muck out there.

A pretty average affair. Fun can be had if you’re really into your hockey, but there are better games to choose from.

If you LOVE golf games, feel free to bump that number up as high as you like, but for me it sits in the middle of our score band, nothing bad about it, but nothing great either.

So what are you getting for your $70, then? To be honest, not a lot. The remake's cool and all but you'd be hard pressed to justify paying more than $20 for it alone - even if you're a hardcore Tekken fan.

But, in the end it is too easy and far too short.

While this is not an exciting or dramatic title, it is squarely aimed at a specific audience, and fits the brief well. Whilst it will definitely not appeal to anyone who enjoys action in their games, this will definitely have its fans somewhere out there, in our wide community.

Its a title with hints of nuance, and fairly entertaining gameplay, but absolutely no reason for me to get excited. And that makes reviewing it hard.

This is a game with a number of mediocre elements, being released in a season already crowded with other shooters. However, the main thing it does well – capture the spirit and fun of the Bond movies – is enough to draw in a number of people.

SingStar Dance is very party-game orientated with the full track listing accessible from the get-go.

If you know what you're letting yourself in for, go for it. It's a pocketable version of a minigame, with online play, and 3D that doesn't need glasses. It's honestly little more than that.

Beating levels will unlock different helicopters. So you can replay missions with birds that are faster and can carry more troops. All so you can get better completion times to move up the online leaderboards.

It tells a gripping tale of budding friendship during wartime married perfectly to its fantasy world that had me hooked from the opening moments.

The game lacks that sense of polish and depth that the franchise sorely needs. Gameplay is entertaining at first, but fails to remain so after extended play.

Other M is no longer the worst Metroid game.

Overall Shadow of the Beast a pretty good platformer with nothing much to hate about it. It’s a good time killer.

Regardless of game mechanics and how many genres you could lump on top of it, Ghost Hunters is trying to deliver on story. But how well does it do that? With relative competence you could say. I would judge it solely on narrative if the situation allowed, but the developers have chosen to include something else - something that certainly makes sense in its context, but the strategy component is easily the weaker link. Sadly that’s not something I can ignore.

It’s definitely worth a rent, but it has limited re-playability and its multiplayer value is only going to last as long as its community.

If you can get past the way the characters move and look, and you buy into the slow and thoughtful pace, The Testament of Sherlock Holmes is an enjoyable yarn. If you have the attention span to sit through cut scenes that contain important information. If you enjoy poking around in the contents of a dead man's stomach. If you like opium dens, dirt encrusted cockney urchins, and murderous conspiracies that lead you to hell and back.

Perhaps I could look past all of this incredibly juvenile sexism if the game was any good, but it’s really not. The game is played at a slow pace, the story is just confusing, and there’s nothing that makes me actually want to play it.

It's not Forza but it doesn't set out to be; instead, it aims at being the very best arcade racing game available and it succeeds most assuredly at that goal. A balls-to-the-wall thrill-ride, beginning to end, and definitely worth a thrash - if you can handle it.

This game is a bit of a conundrum: the fighting engine has been successfully translated, but then the developers did practically nothing with it. That's a big disappointment, and seriously hampers the value proposition of this roughly $80 [NZ] cartridge - not an insignificant amount of money, that's for sure.

Overall, a good game, but not one you'll play for hours and hours (unless you want it as part of your exercise routine), and just tough enough that you'll feel guilty for occupying the couch while our real athletes compete in London.

Kind of fun in short bursts.

Although it's easy to lose track of what's happening aurally in any game with an action element, the music in White Knight is consistently brilliant.

Some minor annoyances and bugs aside, Symphony of the Machine takes a simple puzzle mechanic of light redirection, and makes it a little challenging – while also surrounding you with a beautiful world waiting for your to manipulate the weather.

EDF4.1 won’t win any awards but, if you can look past its failures, it’s a pretty fun game.

Yonder is as calming as it is addictive. I had thought I was happy with the amount I had played, only to come back the next day and complete even more quests. At just shy of $40 it's a little more than I'd want to pay for a game based around exploration, despite how wonderful the world being explored was. That hasn't stopped me from showing the island of Gemea off to all my friends though. Like a kid with the latest set of Pokémon cards, they're not really interested, but I'm going to make sure they know all about Yonder: The Charming and Calming.

It's packed full of collectibles and secrets to keep players entertained and while it's aimed at the younger ones, parents who pick up the Vita after dark can while away an hour with it too.

Competent sums it all up really. If you like the idea of an action RPG with a big emphasis on the action, lots of repetition, and game design that never quite achieves the entertainment level you think that it could, you'd be fairly well served by this.

The game would have been better suited as an Easter egg in the next NHL franchise title, as its enjoyable enough gameplay would have provided great relief for a long season or playoff campaign.

It's a good title for fans of the franchise looking to play their favourite chapters from the on-going saga. Unfortunately, its poor localization, repetitious 'room clearing' level design, and shallow multiplayer mode make it hard to recommend to a wider audience.

There are some lovely aspects to the game, that have been developed from the earlier experiences that so many people knew and loved. There’s a great soundtrack, and the game has a polished look about it that makes you want to love it. But underneath, there is so much that’s broken, that I currently wouldn’t recommend the game - as I experienced it - to anyone not willing to go through the pain for a glimpse of the game they once loved.

Unfortunately, while on paper it might have sounded like a Fast and Furious calibre idea, in reality Wheelman is barely a Pacifier.

This game feels like a shadow of its predecessors and is only saved by the phenomenal impetus this series already has.

If you ever wished to play this classic game or would like to immerse yourself in a solid RPG and can handle a very simple graphical style, there's no reason not to grab this. It might be a little clunky compared to modern examples of the genre (and we're not talking just about the graphics here) but it's actually aged rather well.

If you want more DeathSpank, or if you haven't tried him before, then The Baconing is old fashioned gaming with a comedic twist. But, if you've played the other games, don't expect too much different.

Unfortunately, despite being fun, there's just not much to it. It's a quarter of a story and just one online mode. And while the whole tower defense thing works, and the game looks, sounds, and plays perfectly well, you can't shake the feeling that you've seen it all before.

Although Yakuza: Dead Souls gives a negative first impression with chunky controls and lack of an English dub, as you progress you adapt your play style compensate for the awkward controls. In addition, there's a lot to do in Kamurocho - in and outside of the quarantine zone - if you've got the time for it.

While its simple presentation lends itself more towards phones than 50 inch flat-screens, it's a clever little game that puzzlers will love and gamers everywhere might find something to like. And it might even get passed uncut in Australia.

But ultimately The Force Unleashed II is let down most by the short campaign mode which most people will be able to plough through in around 5 hours with time added for a couple of unlockable Challenges thrown in.

Despite being a side-show from the annual attractions, it’s still business as usual. Standard stealth with a null story amidst an interesting and unventured historical period. Like me, that last part may be enough to entice. Just don’t expect the former to feel as novel.

NBA 08 ultimately is too hit and miss to warrant becoming anything greater than an average basketball title.

Empires is only a minor advancement in the franchise, but a must-buy for any series fan.

In the end, The Godfather II has the recipe for an excellent game filled with action, mindless violence, great characters and strategic thought. But you just can’t help but shake the feeling that it doesn’t quite feel 100% finished.