In summary, Dragon Ball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 3 is fundamentally flawed in its basic execution; in a fighting game, the inability to fight properly is a severe drawback.

When I first started playing Sun Age, I felt a pang of nostalgia for the way games used to be, but it was quickly replaced by the feeling that this would have been a broken title even back then.

Geometry Wars: Galaxies is like nicotine in game form. It is bright, fast and fun; it does everything a handheld game is supposed to do and doesn't pretend to be something it's not.

There are plenty of other games out right now that, while perhaps not being gloriously violent future-sports games, have simply pegged the feeling of constant fun a lot better than you do.

Undertow is a good fit for the Xbox Live Arcade. The action is fast and uncomplicated, it has plenty of options for the single-player and multiplayer experiences, and the tight controls do a good job of making the player want to partake in the action.

It's one of the best hybrid RPGs I've played, as well as a serious game of the year candidate. It's the video game equivalent of "Battlestar Galactica" or "Babylon 5": a space epic that reaches for the stars and manages to hit most of them.

With incredibly boring and repetitive gameplay, it's pretty much impossible to recommend Godzilla Unleashed: Double Smash to anybody.

Essentially, the game punishes you for not giving up. You're better off starting from scratch with a new band. It's a relatively minor quibble, but as a potential passion and motivator of budding real-world musicians, Rock Band should be more tolerant of those players who refuse to give in to the tough songs even on the higher difficulty settings.

I've spent hours and hours playing Rock Band and feel as if it's not possible to have as much fun when I go back and play Guitar Hero III. It's not even a question of whether you're a fan of that genre or not — if you own an Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 or PlayStation 2, you need to pick up Rock Band.

Most first-person shooters are over after 10-15 hours. It'll be at least twice that before you see all that Ghost Squad has to offer. Its brevity on paper is not a curse, but a blessing.

It's got little to offer for SoulCalibur fans, little to offer for hack-and-slash fans, and little to offer in the realm of gameplay substance.

This is well worth a DS owner’s time, and easily one of the best things Square-Enix has published for the system.

Geometry Wars: Galaxies is truly the next step for this humble arcade throwback.

If you are a light-gunslinger, if you're in it for the fun of realistic point-and-shoot, perhaps inviting a few friends over for taking turns at high-score challenges — the game also supports a second Guncon 3 controller, not included in the bundle, for two-player arcade-mode games — you'll almost certainly enjoy Time Crisis 4. And you'll save wads of dollar bills you'd otherwise feed into arcade token exchangers.

Trauma Center: New Blood does not outshine the original, but it really does not need to do so to be a solid, exceptional work.

It was an incredible concept that intrigued me to no end, but the finished product leaves so much to be desired. Between the lackluster story, the poor presentation and the boring gameplay, Swashbucklers leaves you feeling cheated.

Much like any Uwe Boll movie, an impressive cast can't change the fact that the settings are unremarkable, the monsters control and fight lamely; without a decent fighting engine or satisfying destruction element, it fails on all fronts. This has all been done better elsewhere years ago.

For the most part, John Deere: Harvest in the Heartland is not a bad game. It is, unfortunately, a boring game with little incentive to play for longer than it takes to afford the tractor and ride it around for a while (maybe five hours, which is very little for a simulation).

It may not be as revolutionary as some may have hoped, but UT3 continues to deliver that little extra something with which FPS aficionados can test their reflexes.

Despite Call of Duty 3's quite a bit more robust online multiplayer features, trudging through that title's single-player campaign felt more like doing the weekly marketing by one's scrawled, near-illegible shopping list than playing a game.

Six months from now, during the midst of the annual games drought in new titles, shooter games no better than TimeShift will be favored by some, if not many, critics and will also sell well to a thirsty FPS audience. To significantly mark off this title right now would be, if you'll pardon the pun, merely a matter of timing.

A technically competent basketball simulation outfitted with years' worth of features and created by a development team with an obvious passion for NCAA ball. If you're looking for an NBA simulation, that's absolutely what you should play.

A technically competent basketball simulation outfitted with years' worth of features and created by a development team with an obvious passion for NCAA ball. If you're looking for an NBA simulation, that's absolutely what you should play.

For a licensed game, Avatar: The Last Airbender — The Burning Earth turned out to be a pleasant surprise. While it is ultimately bound by some of its limitations, THQ's development team deserves some praise for at least doing a solid job on the product — other than the ludicrous decision that led to the game's achievements listing.

It's easily one of the best single-player games on PlayStation 3, or any platform, this year.

Fans of the show will likely relish the opportunity to relive one of their favorite series through the eyes of the protagonists, while everyone else will simply wonder what's going on and why one of the main characters is dressed like a cat.

It's certainly a great half of a game; the somewhat limited gameplay aspects, pretty lights and revving engine sounds are good enough to make the title entertaining and fun, but they're not enough to comprise a convincing whole game.

The only thing that's even remotely fun about the title is the multiplayer, and that can be had on nearly any other 360 shooter worth its weight.