Phantom Breaker: Battle Grounds is a serviceable beat-'em-up, which is always welcome. However, it bears the cruel irony of being far more fun in single-player than multiplayer — a backward design for its chosen genre.

An appealing idea for a game is present in Rengoku, and Hudson could create something powerfully addictive and fun if they just revised some basic aspects of the game design and moved it to a system powerful enough to do Suemi’s designs justice.

I so want to love Advent Rising, I honestly do. It's good, stable science-fiction with a heavy supernatural sub-plot and enough action to make Han Solo's trigger finger hurt for days. Unfortunately, all of that wonderful stuff is damaged by a hare-brained control scheme that simply doesn't work well enough when it has to.

It looks and feels somewhat like a game in the series, but in the end is miles away from touching the real Serious Sam games.

The Last Agent is right up there with Fallen Angel as the best of the DLC packs available for Dead Rising 3.

No matter how starved you are for some serious RPG action on a system ruled by mini-game compilations, you can do better than this.

It’s actually not a bad introduction to strategy games, and it may keep those starving for some tactics busy for a few hours. But the enemy AI, clunky controls and camera, and lack of real variety in the game make it worth not one penny more than the price tag.

Metal Max Xeno Reborn feels like a wasted effort. There is a lot of potential that Reborn brings to the surface, but ultimately, it's not the game that it needs to be. If you're a Metal Max fan hoping for an improvement over Xeno classic, then you'll technically get what you're looking for, but it's still not as good as earlier games in the franchise. If the idea really appeals to you, then you'll get some fun out of it, but otherwise, it's just tough to justify a purchase.

In a few months, Necronator: Dead Wrong could be a solid addition to the Slay the Spire-inspired card builder roguelike genre. As it stands now, it doesn't have the polish or content to stand out. The visuals are nice, the humor is amusing, and there's a lot of potential here, but the game is still obviously in production. Considering the glut of similar games on the market, Necronator isn't worth picking up until it has all of its playable characters. I'd like to be more positive about it, but I can only judge the game as it is, not as it will be. In a few months, I hope that most of my complaints will be addressed, but until then, I'd recommend finding a more complete game to play.

Warhammer 40K: Space Marine's story line is repetitive and unappealing - to the point that the game somehow manages to be both extremely short and entirely too long at the same time.

In the end, Deadbeat Heroes is undone by its own mechanics. The faster fighting is hindered by a lack of targets to aim for, while the lack of attack variety means that the excitement of combat can quickly be diminished. It is the grading system, however, that hinders any enjoyment that can be eked out of the game, as forced replayability just isn't fun. It's good to see a developer do something different in the genre, but gamers have better options before giving this title a spin.

Blue Estate is surprising in both good and bad ways. On the one hand, it delivers some good action with a surprising amount of cinematic flair. It also shows that the lack of an actual light gun can work quite well. On the other hand, the rather short game can feel too long, and the humor fails at being funny. If you can live with those shortcomings, the game is worth checking out for light gun fans who are jonesing for a new experience.

Suikoden Tierkreis manages to feel like a Suikoden game on a handheld, and it deserves respect for that. Unfortunately, it doesn't feel like a good Suikoden game.

In the end, Table Top Racing is a fine port.

Real Boxing is decent if you don't mind predictable boxing, a shallow creation system, inconsistent controls and an abandoned online community.

Ultimately, Voltron: Defender of the Universe is nothing but wasted potential.

Ultimately, Voltron: Defender of the Universe is nothing but wasted potential.

Too Human has been in production in various forms for 10 years, but somehow, it still feels like an unfinished game. The plot is half-baked, the gameplay is simplistic, the replay value is hurt by the lack of variety, and glitches are commonplace. While the very basic framework of a fun game is there, it's weakened by all the flaws.

If you can deal with the constant grind that comes from the raids and randomness of each playthrough, Toy Odyssey: The Lost and Found can be good. Despite a number of flaws, the overall gameplay is entertaining, and the story is interesting once you get enough pieces together. It isn't flawless in its many technical areas, but the job it ultimately does is more than adequate. That grind still hurts, and those looking for more structure and a better sense of progression in their titles would be better served elsewhere.

All in all, SpongeBob Atlantis Squarepantis is a decent enough kids' title on the DS, with platforming elements that work well, but it hardly does anything to push the genre forward.

Both the campaign and the multiplayer lack the flourishes that make some of the older entries memorable, but the core gameplay still holds up enough to remain enjoyable for newcomers and more casual players of the series. You have to treat the game as a local multiplayer title instead of an online one and hope you don't get hit with controller issues. Considering both the price point and the fact that other indie titles have already run with this concept to a much better execution, however, your best bet is to check out the game once it goes on sale or has a good price drop.

Were Spyborgs an actual cartoon, I would probably have been a little more merciful; it produces a licensed game feel, complete with the assumption that players could look up the story basics if they didn't know them. Unfortunately, without actual source material to benefit from, it has an uncomfortably messy plot without enough explanation.

It's hard to know if de Blob 2 was designed with a younger audience in mind, but that's really the only reasonable explanation for a game so simple, easy, short and boring.

In spite of a beautiful HD update, Tekken 6 on the PS3 just doesn't hold up as well.

I'd urge you to pick it up for a different platform if you have the means to do so. It's a very competent pinball title on every other system, but something has fallen apart in its transition to the 3DS. If you can get past these flaws, you'll probably have a good time with it, but I can't, knowing that this content exists in a better form elsewhere.

The game has its fair share of flaws, a lot of which I've pointed out in this review, but it's still fun to sit down and waste a few hours with it, and that's exactly what I got out of it.

I can only recommend Damnation to anyone who has a very particular special interest in alternative history, especially concerned with the American Old West. Even then, rent it first.

Aside from minor changes, everything else is pretty much in the same state that it was last year, except you can now pay the next-gen premium price for it. NHL 22 is still the best hockey game you can buy (mostly due to the lack of other options), but I'd strongly advise against it if you have played any other NHL title in the past few years. The series has been stagnating, and NHL 22 doesn't indicate any will to make meaningful changes, which is a shame because this would've been the perfect cut-off point to do something new and interesting.