Fans of the films will like the quotes and the general "Jigsaw-ness" of the aural experience but it's so perfunctory even they will have a tough time getting too excited about it.

I personally couldn't shake the weird exploitation feel of the game that was sexist in the worst kind of way: trying to be funny but failing. Juliet could have been an amazing character (even as a hot, 18 year old cheerleader) but is too air-headed and makes too many cheap jokes fall flat and just come across as flippant. She is not a hero on a quest, she's just a girl with some amazing skills who keeps stumbling along until she wins.

Given it completely fails to use any of the 3DS functionality in any meaningful way, chances are good you'd get a better experience with a DS game, too.

Ultimately Hustle Kings VR lacks a lot of polish. The fact that there’s a banner advert for LittleBigPlanet 3 in the background of one of the levels is a perfect example of how this title looks like a rushed effort to be in the VR line-up. Once the novelty of being able to look around wears off, you’re stuck with essentially the exact same experience that the franchise delivered back on the PS3.

Should you buy it? Almost certainly not. It's dull and has been done a thousand times before - and most of those attempts are superior.

Once you've had your fun with a few nifty control mechanisms, various weapons and other pieces of movieland technology, and seen enough explosions, I'm gonna hazard a guess at you looking around for something else to play.

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted is definitely more engaging as a team effort, and we're not ashamed to admit that a couple of the mini games had us giggling with childish glee.

An alright platformer with charming looks and characters, but nothing revolutionary.

Atelier Sophie isn’t at its best when doing particularly anything. It may only appeal to an alcove of anime fans, being so jovial you can practically hear it wishing you a merry Christmas. The broad stroke of the content can be experienced with any other JRPG, and better so. But if the home-bound, alchemic twist appeals, you may have a game worth persisting for.

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.

Kind of fun in short bursts.

Fuel feels like one giant exercise in proving a point, a huge technical achievement that manages to eschew the fundamental rules of a good racer and drive itself, tragically, into mediocrity.

Perhaps one of the game’s biggest failings is its price - at US$29.99, you can twice buy Mount & Blade, which does everything Aethereus does but in a much more polished way.

You could say that Shadow Puppeteer is the quintessential indie game - with a compelling gameplay hook and captivating story. It has potential coming out its ears, but the lack of budget means a lack of polish, especially in the control department.

It promised a lot, however the more we played it the more disappointed we became.

Uninspiring, unpolished, and unnecessary.

If shooting your balls into the mouths of clowns is your thing then go for it. Otherwise you'd be better off waiting until it's half price, if only to play the addictive Frog Leap.

Buku Sudoku isn’t bad; it’s just that the Xbox 360 doesn’t really seem the platform for such an experience.

An interesting premise squandered on poor storytelling and unremarkable play.

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.

This game will be a great rental title to experience a light-gun game on the PS3 and for true hardcore Time Crisis fans who will probably enjoy the challenge.

The result is a game that unfortunately showcases why controllers exist in the first place. If you've got a brand new Kinect, stick to the dance and fitness games and avoid this one.

As long as you go in not expecting a life changing experience, there’s an afternoon or two of enjoyment to be had here.

Multiplayer is definitely the drawcard of the game and could offer some fun knockout type sessions with a group of friends.

Normally we recommend this level of product only to the serious fans of the series but frankly we cannot even bring ourselves to do this. Avoid it.

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.

I couldn’t recommend a purchase of Lords of the Fallen. However, if you are a fan of the masochistic hack-and-slash action RPG genre and wouldn’t mind a change of scenery, or always wanted to try a Souls title but found their barrier to entry a bit daunting, this might be worth a hire to blitz through the campaign one or two times with a few different builds.

If it was released for free, as a platform to hook people on paid-for DLC, Ridge Racer would be pretty cool. As it stands, at full retail price, it's one of the most preposterously ridiculous and - frankly - offensive attempts at separating a gamer from their money that we've ever seen.

There's a decent amount of content on hand here, but it soon felt like a bit of a chore to get through it all.

An embarrassment for a great franchise.

My main issue with Seduce Me is that, despite the invitation that is right there in the title of the game, none of the characters want to cooperate. No matter how high your score with a character - and hence your implied closeness to that character - they still play as though they want you to fail.

The problem is, once you've worked out how each mini-game works, you realise there's little to no skill involved. In fact, some of them are completely random.

Skylanders: Imaginators is doing nothing the series wasn’t already doing, it’s just doing it in a more overt way. It’s bored with hiding its monetisation behind things like fun and subtlety. Instead of a focus on story and mechanics, Imaginators simply wants you to build a custom creation. When you’re done with that, they want you to make another.

Roller Coaster Tycoon 3D is disappointing in every key respect, and not recommended - unless you have a morbid curiosity and are interested to see how they managed to mess it up.

Poor pacing, clumsy scriptwriting, and an overall lack of polish (even by indie standards) make it all to easy to bow out before this monster can sink its claws into you.

Pain is one of the more original titles to hit the download services. But while it’s not just a bland tech demo for rag doll physics or the ‘Havok’ physics engine, it does come close.

Everything they've thrown in says "look what we can do" - and that' a sentiment New Zealanders can probably appreciate more than most.

The visuals are decent in Battleship, albeit extremely monotonous, and the controls are solid - but there are just too many negatives in the game to ever appreciate them.

In the end, if you're looking for a cheap augmented reality shooter you can rope your friends into playing at least once, instead of Magic The Gathering, this isn't too bad for the incredibly low price. Just be prepared to hunt for good locations to play it in. If nothing else, this is nice cheap distraction between Resistance Burning Skies and the next big FPS.

But if I got this for Christmas, I’d be writing Santa a somewhat angry letter, and asking where in the hell my puppy was.

Overall Shadow Assault: Tenchu feels as though the developers just wanted to put out an Xbox Live Arcade title for a quick buck, so they threw something together and slapped the Tenchu license on it.

It’s a shame I can’t recommend this download, as it is entertaining to dabble with while you wait for other people to come online, have a chat with a mate or kill some time between downloads.

It's repetitive and full of admirable yet ultimately failed experiments, and there are many better titles worthy of your attention.

Super Bomberman R isn’t a bad game when it’s working, and if you can get a few people connected to a single Switch you’ll have a great time. But due to a small online presence and some serious lag issues when connecting devices locally, the game just doesn’t work as it should. Super Bomberman R hasn’t launched with a downloadable title price – it’s a full retail game, with the price to match. If you need your fix, I’d suggest either waiting until you find this in a bargain bin, or dust off your Wii U and grab Bomberman 64 on Virtual Console.

An overcast day in gaming history.

While there's nothing technically wrong with the game, it just feels like there's so much missed opportunity with Sports Champions 2.

In the end, Triggerheart fell down as a game that didn’t grip me or leave me with the desire to appreciate more fully, so there was very little personal enjoyment.

All in all, I found EA’s Monopoly unfulfilling and sterile Although the graphics are clean and crisp there is no ‘heart’ to it. But what I find most remarkable is that there is no online multi-player ability. Seeing it’s a multi-player game I would have thought that online play would be a logical extension.

Dragonball Raging Blast 2 packs the characters, environments and plenty of extras making it a good for fan service. Unfortunately, that's all it's good for; it seems the developer, Spike, forgot about creating a solid fighting title.

In Epic Mickey 2, when you finally figure out what it was you were supposed to be doing, you just want to slap your forehead, because it just feels like another pointless hurdle.

Dragonball Raging Blast 2 packs the characters, environments and plenty of extras making it a good for fan service. Unfortunately, that's all it's good for; it seems the developer, Spike, forgot about creating a solid fighting title.

Hundred Years’ War is an appropriate subtitle as after a few hours of fighting, you feel like you’ve been playing for a hundred years.

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.

Not up for medal contention. Buy London 2012 for the PS2 instead.

The single worst feature of Fury has to be its utter unforgiving nature when it comes to creating your character.

The platforming feels off, the puzzle solving is either too easy or too restrictive, and the humour regularly falls flat.

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.

If only this innovative ending summary could have been attached to a better game. The Walking Dead: Season One was a bonafide masterpiece, and we’ve somehow gone from that, to something I wish would just stay dead.

Save your money for next year’s Street Fighter V.

If only this innovative ending summary could have been attached to a better game. The Walking Dead: Season One was a bonafide masterpiece, and we’ve somehow gone from that, to something I wish would just stay dead.

A rental at best, but better we just sweep The Cartel under a sombrero and forget about it.

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

Patchy. It suffers from bugs that see you teleporting from one place to another, graphical glitches, unfortunate design decisions, and poor level design. On the upside the arcade game is so good it should have been its own game.

Interesting control scheme, but not much else.

I am disappointed with the latest trend, where what looks to be a great game on another platform is an ultimate disappointment on the DS.

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

Despite the messy execution, there are moments of true beauty hidden inside Evoland (unlocking HD pre-rendered backgrounds being one) and there will be moments when you’re legitimately impressed with the next evolution, but there’s nothing in this game that makes it worth the $US10 asking price.

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.

It just doesn't do it well, either. To fail at the core of motion controlled gameplay at this stage in the Wii's lifespan is hard to accept.

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.

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.

The raw ingredients for a fun, fast-paced, high-adrenaline racer that the Kinect sorely needs are all in place. But sadly CrossBoard 7 is ultimately let down by a lack of fine-tuning in the motion-control and gameplay department.

Minesweeper Flags is a great ‘pick up and play’ live arcade game. The extra mode, content, multiplayer are a welcome addition to the series. Best of all you know what to expect: hours of addictive gameplay and it’s only 400 points.

Puzzle design, backgrounds, and atmosphere hold up, but not much else.

With repetitive combat, an item system that doesn’t accommodate the player’s intelligence, A.I. that can be as dumb as a bag of hammers, and small design decisions that feel like they exist to make bullet-points on the back of a box, Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Z is a mechanically tame game that expects little from the player, and respects them just as much.

The music is annoyingly repetitive, but the sound effects are pretty well put together.

Mixed bag: On one hand, the vehicular combat is solid. On the other, it's let down by poor mechanics and a slew of unwelcome gameplay additions.

Naruto Shippuden 3D: The New Era feels like an original DS game with texture filtering, poorly executed 3D, and game breaking motion sensor controls tacked on.

Sticks to the farm formula and delivers a pretty ordinary game.

Mario and Sonic need to stop meeting up like this.

A game that’s atmospheric as hell, but that does nothing with it.

This sort of gameplay, while not being too terrible with a controller, is still much more suited to a DS stylus or a mouse. When you throw in a lot of repetition amongst objects and a general lack of varied gameplay, Interpol is hardly a game I’d recommend.

Ghost Warrior 2 falls into the trap of trying to be accessible to a wide audience - however the end result is casual and veteran gamers will feel ultimately let down by a complete lack of freedom and unoriginal gameplay.

A mixed bag.

So, Cry Wolf has its moments. But for the most part, it’s a slog, an underwhelming and forgettable end to a series that showed so, so, so much promise.

For the most part Micro Machines: World Series is very close to being a great game; all it requires is a proper single player championship mode. Unfortunately, the broken online ruins much of the experience. Anyone looking for local co-op action should pick the game up if it’s on sale, but if you’re playing on your own, it’s tough to recommend.

Purchase for your grandmother rather than yourself.

Not a Megan Fox in sight... and it’s still terrible.

The only thing you will find confrontational will be the game itself.

At the very beginning of the game the United States President tells Duke Nukem he is a relic from the past. As sad as it seems, perhaps he was right.

Visually Terminator: Salvation matches the gameplay and is an equally dull affair.

If anything, Ace Armstrong vs. the Alien Scumbags! serves best as an example of how not to make a shooter.

One of the most pointless games made for the DS. The idea may sound good on paper, but performing magic tricks is really something which needs to stay in the real world. Stay away from this one, far away.

A sloppy piece of work that doesn't do justice to the series or to its fans. I'm not even sure fans of the series will enjoy this one. I certainly didn't.

Some very good writing bumps up the score for this one, but the lazy gameplay decisions make finishing the game a chore.

Simple gameplay hamstrung by freemium features.

One can only hope that Tony Hawk: Ride marks the end of these pointless bits of plastic, and not the end of the series itself, which surely calls for a more sophisticated makeover.

A strange mash up of party game and action RPG title that doesn't do either well. However, thanks to it simply being a Lionhead title, it will be useful to Fable: The Journey owners due to its compatibility with that title. Unfortunately, on its own, Fable Heroes fails to provide a solid singleplayer or multiplayer title.