Too much micro-management with virtually zero autonomy and common sense. [Oct 2007, p.85]

The action is quite a laugh and oddly refreshing. But it repeats and repeats and repeats. [Dec 2007, p.78]

There's an illusion of depth at play. [Jan 2008, p.74]

This game is clever, deep, multifacted and a strategy nerd's wet dream. It's just a shame that it all comes at the expense of being very, very boring as well. [Dec 2007, p.84]

There's little point bothering with Mata Hari, unless you're looking to sedate a relative and lack Rohypnol. [Dec 2009, p.75]

The level design appears to be somewhat lacklustre (there's too much 'take this point! And now this one!'), but it's still an enjoyable romp. [Mar 2008, p.85]

Delivers the goods in spades, with an improved engine and a new emphasis to real-time rather than turn-based action. [Oct 2007, p.82]

Still feels like watching Oh Dae-su slog his way through that goon-filled corridor. [Nov 2006, p.62]

Easy to pick up and strangely compelling. [Feb 2008, p.91]

It's slicker, more varied and better-looking than its predecessor. [Oct 2007, p.84]

Transparently not finished. [June 2010, p.80]

While Silverfall's artictic style and nature vs technology theme do set it aside from its rivals, the game still feels a bit rough around the edges. [May 2007, p.70]

The combat is, despite flowing well, incredibly and utterly console. [June 2009, p.74]

Looks and plays like a game from 1999. [Christmas 2006, p.93]

When you consider that the game is far too ugly to be shown on an unforgiving monitor - cel-shaded Ultimate Spider-Man looked infinitely better - and that it asks for an unjustifiable 6GB of HD space, and that we couldn't get more than 30 frames-a-second out of a fairly hot PC... Well, it doesn't seem like the best way to spend £30. Our advice would be to avoid the PC version of Spider-Man 3 like a spunk-filled bowler hat.

An interesting, glitchy reprise. Our most solemn, sincere advice would be to wait for February's boxed version, when everything could - hopefully - be more stable and friendly. [Feb 2008, p.76]

If you enjoy below average games or like adventures where the voices cut out halfway through every single sentence, then this one is for you. [Oct 2009, p.72]

Repetitive. [Feb 2008, p.83]

If you've exhausted X3 to an inhuman degree, you could do a lot worse than check this out, especially given the bargain price tag. [Sept 2007, p.86]

This game is badly made and overwhelmingly bleak, and while the original F.E.A.R. still exists, there's absolutely no way I could ever recommend anybody buy this, even if you're on fire and this game is a bucket of water. [Jan 2008, p.80]

An insecure game unsure of who wants to play it, but that's not to say it isn't fun. [Mar 2008, p.78]

More of a solid warrior and less of a gaming god. [Oct 2007, p.80]

If you're into the surreal, love your puzzles or you're simply sick of formulaic puzzle/adventure games, this could just be the perfect tonic for you. [Nov 2007, p.89]

Refuse to accept a game with such little creative effort put into it and vote with your wallets. [Feb 2010, p.79]

It looks fairly dated, and is only really for the devotee of life-sim games, feeling as it does like a semi-precious curiosity. [Dec 2006, p.68]

Utterly, shabbily redundant. [Nov 2007, p.87]

The shallowness of the gameplay quickly starts to show through the cracks. [May 2007, p.69]

It's still one of the best basketball sims available, just don't expect much beyond recycled goods. [Dec 2006, p.85]

With more ambition in the table design, Dream Pinball 3D has the potential to be great. As it stands, it's just good. [June 2008, p.82]

Somehow it manages to be far more entertaining than you'd expect. [May 2007, p.72]

For 20 quid, it's a half-decent ride while it lasts. [Sept 2007, p.73]

Barely explicable scantily clad slo-mo sequences aside, Velvet Assassin is a really solid game. [Aug 2009, p.66]

The game is very, very repetitive and very, very dumb, falling light years short of the novel's depth. [July 2009, p.77]

Massively ambitious, massively unplayable. [Sept 2007, p.74]

The dialogue is disappointing, being a case of exhausting the options rather than picking the right thing to say. [Apr 2007, p.68]

Awkward, clumsy, and unpolished. [Sept 2007, p.85]

Although the first half of the game falls into a lull of mundane and repetitive baddies, it definitely becomes more interesting, difficult and intense toward the closing acts. But dont' expect brilliant innovation. [Oct 2008, p.58]

It's a shame this isn't a hopelessly bad game, otherwise I could've called it "BlackShite" and been done with it, but instead it teeters on the edge of being a worthwhile purchase before deciding it's comfortable being ordinary and forgettable. [Feb 2008, p.72]

Those not expecting too much, who may be pining for an uncomplicated spin through familiar territory will certainly enjoy Tarr Chronicles, but it's no substitute for replaying the utterly fantastic and cheap, "FreeSpace 2." [Christmas 2007, p.92]

Handling is fiddly too, on both control pad and keys, and it doesn't feel as fun to play as Tony's series. [Apr 2009, p.70]

Running over zombie dogs is always fun. [Apr 2010, p.91]

Phantasy Star Universe is nothing more than the laggy, repetitive tranvestite cousin of "Zelda." Avoid this like a Paris-Hilton-borne strain of bird flu. [Feb 2007, p.78]

It's just a shame that the blocky menu system and overly generous built-in aim-assist smack of console pandering, because otherwise, this is a very competent piece of programming.

Wannabe "Age of Empires". [July 2007, p.82]

A hollow experience. [Feb 2010, p.80]

If horror films where the screams are sufficiently high-pitched to get the neighbourhood dogs howling are your kind of thing, then ObsCure II is easy to get into, not too taxing on the brain and just about competent enough to keep you playing for its 15-hour duration.

The problem is that déjà vu quickly sets in as there are only a handful of map templates. What's more, without a proper Skirmish or multiplayer option, if you're adverse to such hardships it won't be long before you're pining for something more upbeat.

Persevere a little and you'll soon be having a lot of fun. [Apr 2009, p.72]

It's sad that there are no great Gauntlet-style hack-and-slash multiplayer games anymore. Despite its flaws, this is the best that an old workhorse of a genre has to offer so, if you must play it, play it with friends. Don't expect too much though.

A proper ship simulator. And within that bracket, it faithfully reproduces long, combatless floating sessions. [Sept 2006, p.75]

Alpha Prime, with a passable storyline and passable gameplay, is a little passable anomaly. [July 2007, p.77]

For anyone who hasn't already got a helicopter license though, playing Enemy Engaged 2 is about as much fun as eating a pair of sheep's testicles. Yum. [Sept 2007, p.84]

Style over substance. [Oct 2010, p.74]

At best, this DLC is thoughtless, unoriginal and for those who simply must have two extra skill points. At worst, it's a waste of time and money, and poor form by Gearbox. [Apr 2010, p.88]

Awful on-foot controls. [July 2009, p.72]

So tough it's nearly impossible, and so it's almost unplayable. [Sept 2009, p.72]

A good, cheap laugh, and if you can get some friends to play, it's worth giving it a whirl. [July 2007, p.78]

This game fails to bring anything of any lasting substance to the standing-room only tactical shooter party. [Apr 2006, p.82]

While the story is light and terribly translated at times, the quests are rewarding enough (resource-wise) to keep you doing them. [June 2008, p.78]

Maelstrom is certainly interesting, but it just lacks that magic spark needed to transform a collection of ingenious ideas into a thrilling RTS experience. Innovative? Certainly. Thrilling and essential? Not quite.

It's decent, short-lived fun, but is this really what you bought your games PC for? [Mar 2007, p.79]

Vancouver 2010 isn't a bad game, just very limited by its subject matter. [May 2010, p.90]

You'll be left scouring the floor for items no bigger than a gnat's nutsack. [Jan 2008, p.78]

A tired old rehash of Blitkrieg - the last RTS game from developers Nival. [June 2007, p.76]

If it's multiplayer automotive giggles you're after, "FlatOut 2's" party mode is far superior. [Sept 2006, p.78]

A criminal waste of time and energy, as standard and generic a game as you could hope to find. [Feb 2010, p.74]

Part Age Of Empires and a dollop of Civ, what's missing is a memorable game experience. And as for the visuals - line it up against Total War or Rise Of Nations and it's almost laughable.

LOTR deserves a better action game than this, and with the rich source material available to them, Pandemic and EA should be ashamed of themselves for unleashing this on the general public - even if we know it'll go straight to the top of the charts regardless. [Apr 2009, p.52]

I haven't enjoyed an RTS this much in a long time, not because it's spectacularly unique on a gameplay level, but because it has an aesthetic that's just so different from the pervasive goblin-WWII axis of RTS games. [June 2007, p.84]

The very definition of average. [Nov 2008, p.64]

Despite my own selfish reservations, the switch to an attack focus is a very good thing. [Christmas 2006, p.78]

The multiplayer is what you'd expect: solid, if generic, shooting action around the levels that bored you in single-player. [Nov 2006, p.84]

A crippling absense in the multiplayer is online play. [June 2008, p.81]

Sadly, once the script stops, the game quickly becomes a joyless chore. [May 2006, p.90]

From the unfriendly, baffling set-up screen, everything is unwieldy and cobbled together. [Oct 2006, p.79]

Essentially, things fail to get moving in Disciples III. [Sept 2010, p.91]

The AI doesn't match up to the ambition. [Aug 2006, p.68]

Unfortunately, an hour's excitement out of eight is poor going, so RF Online is best played only if you enjoy continual grind with minimal reward. Most of us get enough of that at work.

Sad to say, the lumbering combat, laborious controls, frankly bizarre collision detection and remarkably glitchy graphics really put a bit of a kibosh on things. Disengage. [Mar 2007, p.70]

Food poisoning. [Dec 2007, p.81]

If you have a knowledge and love of golf, this might give you a more substantial - if less fun - game than "Tiger Woods."

Sadly, it seems Wing Commander fans will have to wait a bit longer for their salvation. [Dec 2008, p.69]

It's for kids and that's fine. But children deserve better. Get them a version they can actually control. Better still, get your beloved sprogs a game that won't decay their minds through dumb repetition. [June 2007, p.82]

Only worth buying if you see it in a bargain bin. [Oct 2010, p.89]

A series that increasingly looks stuck in the past. [Jan 2007, p.77]

This is a tale best told on paper, if only because the book doesn't have such awful music and voice acting, and it isn't shoe-horned into a generic RPG template. [May 2008, p.88]

Hateful game. [Sept 2008, p.60]

With some ropey PC controls, SAW's something of a gory stinkpot. [Apr 2010, p.90]

Not that much more than meets the eye. [Oct 2007, p.78]

Sadly, much of the novelty wore off soon after and the rest of the game left me, just like many in the film, dead in the water.

Lacks any sane rationale behind its price and hides within it a game that could have been so much more, but just isn't. [Jan 2008, p.78]

Typography aside, Battle of Europe is an enjoyable game that simply fails to distinguish itself as a particularly great one. [Oct 2006, p.65]

If you absolutely must play this game, and the wretched commercial system that chugged out this idiot child hasn't put you off the whole sorry shebang, then get a console version. Please don't buy this. [Oct 2006, p.74]

Everything about it feels floaty and disconnected, slowing down time makes you feel really sluggish and inaccurate, and you can forget about hitting anything while driving as your crosshair is jerked about rudely like a pogo-stick at a sexy bikini photoshoot. [Dec 2006, p.80]

It's a bit shit...Dialogue is laughably bad. [Christmas 2006, p.94]

The menus are too awkward - selecting a betting amount is fiddly beyond reason - and there's too much competition out there for Stacked to distinguish itself as anything other than one of the ugly cliches from its own character selection menu. [June 2007, p.74]

Patently unrecommendable. [July 2008, p.87]

It's by far their most accessible game yet. [June 2010, p.89]