It's all so well written, acted, and directed that such seemingly unfunny lines as "Are those my Funyuns?" will make you laugh as hard as any comedy you've seen this year could. [Dec 2004, p.96]

A general sense of hack-and-slash ennui making Arthur just as nonstirring as the film was to a post-"Rings" audience. [Dec 2004, p.93]

This wonky A.I., coupled with an online component that falls flat on its face, makes Mercury hard to recommend for shooter fans. Just like Hollywood, rote imitation works for a short time only.

Crappy cutscenes and first generation PS2 visuals are not so cool. [Jan 2002, p.94]

There's very little rhyme or reason to any of the proceedings, but Roar is still king of fun. [Aug 2003, p.81]

Lacks any sort of range whatsoever. It also lacks fun. [Jan 2002, p.96]

This is as stock and uninteresting as it gets, nothing more than the staple prescripted key/switch hunt you've already seen 100 times. [Aug 2003, p.77]

You realize that Bilbo Baggins' dash maneuver (a sort of pole-vault jump) is faster than running, so you go through the whole game pole-vaulting like a ninny. [Mar 2004, p.98]

Does little, if anything, to elevate itself past mediocrity. [Spring 2002, p.93]

The thrill of driving classic Lotus cars is obliterated by its unresponsive handling. [April/May 2003, p.93]

Hell, you can't even choose which side to be on in team games. On the PS2, this is disappointing, but on the Xbox - where most games figured this stuff out over a year ago - it's inexcusable. [Jan 2005, p.100]

While fans will appreciate the faithful renditions of classic Euro circuits such as Silverstone, Hockenheim, and Monza, having more to choose from, as always, would have been better. [Winter 2002, p.109]

Once again, it's the series' fun two-to-four-player splitscreen mode that sets it apart from other fog-of-war games. [Nov 2004, p.92]

The bare-bones graphics and simplistic gameplay render this disc a painful walk down memory lane. [Apr 2004, p.83]

Very little about the game stands out. The graphics are relatively bland, and there's no real sense of speed while driving. [Fall 2002, p.120]

A passable motorcycle racer with decent track design, a solid framerate and a healthy sense of speed. But it's hard to recommend when it coexists with the superior-in-every-way "MotoGP 2." [Aug 2003, p.85]

Sadly, simplistic landscapes, tacky colors, dorky characters, and an utter lack of polish justify the bargain-bin pricing. The poor graphics even leech the thrill of deformable terrain. [June 2004, p.93]

Isis strives to be "Resident Evil," but instead ends up as its less-palatable ward, "Resident Unpleasant." [Mar 2004, p.101]

There's not a lot to Big Mutha Truckers, and what exists is forgettable.[Aug 2003, p.81]

We’ve simply seen this game too many times on too many systems to really be psyched anymore. [Jan 2002, p.96]

Yep, this is basically a rehash of last year's Chamber of Secrets game for Playstation, with similar visuals, controls, and combat. [Mar 2004, p.82]

It's virtually the same as last year's "2004 Season," and that wasn't very good either. [Oct 2004, p.95]

Trying out different lures - more than 700 are available by the end of the game - and searching for the best fishing spots is incredibly addictive. [Nov 2004, p.101]

If there was any truth in advertising, Universal would hawk this game as "Lord of the Pointless Fetch Quest" and recommend that potential buyers seek the Fellowship of Many Beers to dull the pain. [Winter 2002, p.103]

This is the 21st century. No game should ever make a player fetch a valve handle again. [Nov 2004, p.94]

A mangle of ugly graphics, repetitive combat, blah bosses, and just plain awkward moments, Robotech: Invasion fails to fire up protoculture-guffing fans of the late-'80s cult cartoon on which the game is based. [Nov 2004, p.100]

Take it please, and understand there are absolutely, positively, no returns. [Winter 2002, p.109]

IP 2003 is not the worst Xbox game ever developed, but it is certainly the worst Xbox baseball game. [June-July 2003, p.93]

This is a fistful of something, all right. And it's not to be stepped in, taken internally, or flung at humans. [Aug 2003, p.81]

A harmless diversion that any "Tetris" addict will be able to pick up and beat in an hour or two. [Winter 2002, p.102]

Lacks polish, underwhelms, pales in comparison to the board game that inspired it. [June 2004, p.88]

Hitting shots is a random affair rather than a sweet science, and the impressive array of street-ball moves (the highlight of the game) are rendered superfluous due to faulty A.I. and crude, if easily accessible, controls. [Winter 2002, p. 99]

The only thing missing are the severed limbs. Oh, and an overwhelming sense of quality and/or fun. [Spring 2002, p.93]

The in-game graphics are acceptable at best, with the cut-scenes barely making the grade. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.92]

Attempts at creativity here fall flat... It's standard prime-time fluff. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.93]

Here's some of the stuff you will not laugh at: dogs fornicating, bird poop, aliens anally impaled. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.81]

A decent story and some excellent stealth-based play prevent Revenge from sinking head-long into a hole of suck. [June-July 2003, p.95]

Simply uninspired - and repetitious to boot. [Oct 2004, p.97]

It borrows so heavily from significantly better racing games (especially "SSX: Tricky"), and will probably just remind you you should be playing them instead. [Apr/May 2003, p.92]

The list of omissions is epic: decent A.I., car damage, real-life car parts, an in-dash view, analog gas and break buttons - and, well, you get the point. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.84]

More glaring than the minigames' poor quality is their length, as each one takes several minutes to complete, and repeats ad nauseum. [Mar 2004, p.98]

Consider this a horrible trip down memory lane and use whatever means necessary to repress it. [Sept 2004, p.89]

A video coprolite. [Mar 2004, p.86]

Gets the gunplay and gruff attitude right, but beneath the badge, it's simply, well, not unlike most first-person shooters. [May 2004, p.81]

Despite a few obligatory new features such as a dull off-road car mode (ooh -- the tires inflate!), Hunter 2 feels less like a sequel and more like an add-on disc. [Mar 2004, p.86]

Besides its fine-tuned sense of the absurd, this is an undisciplined mess. [Dec 2004, p.86]

Camera angles are absolutely dizzying, and controls are clumsy and unresponsive. [Spring 2002, p.91]

The A.I. of your teammates is simply horrendous. [Dec 2004, p.95]

It's like the arcade game, except it's on your TV set and doesn't ask you for quarters. Or poultry. [Jan 2002, p.90]

At a very basic level, this is a competent racer in desperate need of a better interface and better A.I. [June-July 2003, p.94]

Full of uninspired backgrounds, bland water effects, and collision detection that will make your skin crawl. [Spring 2002, p.92]

Where most licensed brawlers feel sloppy and half-finished, Turtles is smooth and cohesive. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.81]

Episode-sized chunks linked by a central plot break up the game nicely, and although Mayhem clearly comes built for kids, its breezy gameplay and goofy sensibilities—ghosts can be fooled by sheets draped over the protagonists—win both adult hearts and minds.

It's not a good sign when a game's replay mode outdoes its interactive sequences. [Mar 2004, p.90]

This giant cat that wants to pinch mommy's ass is one ripe for the highway and an oncoming truck.[Mar 2004, p.79]

Here was a game with real potential to be what everybody had basically hoped for: "Grand Theft Auto" with really good graphics. Instead, what's here needs an air bag.

The game's mutants are ugly and lifeless. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88]

The multiplayer games are banal, and while Zapper offers cartoony kid-graphics, it's nothing that can't be done on inferior systems. Yawn. [Winter 2002, p.102]

An exercise in sheer frustration. [Fall 2002, p.121]

Forget the wonky camera and intermittent sputters when a new room loads - hell awaits, and it's genuinely desirable. [Apr 2003, p.93]

The same-old, same-old: the same static screens, decrepit point-and-click interface, crushingly slow pace, and confusing layout. [Winter 2002, p.105]

If Strike gets its mechanics brashly right, it fudges the details. [Feb 2005, p.93]

Blowout's dialogue and overall production value are sufficiently self-aware so that they're oddly amusing. [Mar 2004, p.98]

This game quickly strays into "Hogan's Heroes" territory, with comically stupid enemy A.I. and an endless string of overfamiliar formulas and cliches. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.85]

The game isn't even remotely balanced. [Winter 2002, p.102]

With no map to guide you, these missions are as much fun as trying to solve a Rubik's Cube in the dark. [Aug 2003, p.86]

Joins the ranks of rushed movie-to-game conversions, with drab visuals, repetitive gameplay, and a lack of style. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.85]

Although Hero's high concept borders on the brilliant, the game itself is poorly executed and seems as out of place on Xbox as a rump roast at a vegan restaurant. [Aug 2003, p.89]

Flawed but solidly fun, deep as a dime, and airy as a zeppelin. [Summer 2002, p.93]

Multiple game types add some much-needed variety: skins play, challenge, and golf modes exhaust all possibilities for ball-pin interaction. [Aug 2004, p.83]

Your $40 buys you nothing but a video version of the standard, real-life trading card game.

Something that's competent, but nonetheless the racing-game equivalent of shaved, unflavored ice served in a wooden bowl. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.87]

There's no solidity to the knight's movement, and the camera is usually twitching around like a plague rat on crank. [Aug 2004, p.87]

Playing the game simply feels too much like work. [Winter 2002, p.104]

Inexcusably awful. [Fall 2002, p.115]

It's not that Carmen is a failure - it just aims low in the first place. [Mar 2004, p.95]

The biggest disappointment is the game's multiplayer mode; there's now way to send blocks or any manner of taunts to your opponent. For shame. [Fall 2002, p.121]

Riding feels "real"... In short, Barbie's first foray onto Xbox is not a stinker. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.100]

It's quirky...it's garish...it's horribly annoying...The control is so utterly broken that one has to wonder what the developers were thinking. [Apr 2004, p.87]

Anything resembling compelling level design or effective camera control was left on the cutting-room floor. [Mar 2004, p.101]

Sports one of the most mind-numbingly frustrating camera systems in recent memory. [Spring 2002, p.92]

Tragically, the game's camera system is a joke. Players won't actually get to see what they're shooting more than half the time because the camera has a tendency to point in all the wrong directions at the right time. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.92]

The game lacks the sense of speed that made "Mario Kart" such a thrill. [Winter 2002, p.109]

This one comes straight from the backyard. It should return there, preferably buried deep by the family dog. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.95]

The game offers 27 different types of games, including slot machines and all types of poker, but does it so poorly you'll cringe at the thought of playing more than one or two. [Feb 2005, p.94]

We're pretty sure that in the very near future, we'll be using Toxic Grind to torture terrorists into revealing their most closely guarded secrets. Such is the game's badness. [Winter 2002, p.106]

It may be realistic to have a fishing game where the fish are all in hiding or killed off by man-made pollutants, but it's certainly not much fun. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.91]

You rarely get a sense of speed or weight while driving, and the controls are so awkward, the slightest steering overcorrection results in a spinout. [Dec 2004, p.83]

The sheer number and monotony of the challenges, however, gets boring at times. [Jan 2002, p.88]

The solid control and pretty grapihcs don't make up for the relatively bland stages and extremely short length. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.100]

The game suffers from a handful of setbacks, the least of which is its surprising brevity. [Aug 2004, p.82]

Although the game's controls remain its biggest hurdle, Murakumo does have its moments, mostly due to its graphics. [Apr 2003, p.91]

Wins the award for having the ugliest faces. [Winter 2002, p.99]

Any person who has not played it is, in some subtle way, morally superior to anyone who has. Now, a solemn pact: Let us never speak of SeaBlade again. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.87]

To the point: It's bowling, it's fun, it's $20. 'Nuff said. [Apr 2004, p.91]

Game design - in any sense of the phrase - is essentially nonexistent here. Each of the turtles has different attributes - but they're hardly compelling. [Nov 2004, p.91]

There's absolutely nothing appealing about any of it. Nor does the game possess any redeeming qualities, save for the fact that it won't immediately afflict you with cancer. [Oct 2004, p.97]

It's "Power Stone" sans fun. [Winter 2002, p.103]