Perhaps the most exciting alteration in gameplay is a ball that's no longer glued to your boot. [Winter 2002, p.108]

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]

KC's four-player mode...is essentially the equivalent of a Yugo with a top-of-the-line 100-disc CD changer and 5.1 surround sound speaker setup. That is, it's useless. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.80]

Although it's by no means a cakewalk, Ghost's single-player campaign works as sort of a live fire exercise for the real deal on Xbox Live. [Winter 2002, p.101]

It won't blow your mind, but it's a solid showcase for online console gaming. [Winter 2002, p.93]

Visually, Sam looks only decent, and slowdown creeps into play from time to time. You've seen better. [Winter 2002, p.106]

Levels look dazzling, but the actual tasks you must accomplish in them are often so contrived that all the realism fades away. [Winter 2002, p.101]

Ruthlessly hunting down other mechs in Stealth mode becomes the favored approach in the heat of battle, and makes for amazingly fun, intense gameplay. [Winter 2002, p.96]

Quite simply, action-adventure games don't get much better than this... The VR missions alone are well worth the price of admission. [Winter 2002, p.78]

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]

The animation transitions are sloppy, and the A.I. is lacking on both sides of the ball. The controls are simply too slow to respond to your input, as well. [Winter 2002, p.99]

We can only imagine the title Nickelodeon Party Blast refers to the fact this game can easily blast any party to smithereens. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89]

Transworld Snowboarding is the girl who always shows up in the teen movies. She's the ugly one who's revealed to be a hottie once the pretty boy du jour spends some time with her. [Winter 2002, p.97]

Rarely has so much sheer brilliance been nestled side-by-side with such absolute tedium and badly conceived gameplay, along with wild shifts in tone guaranteed to make your head spin. [Winter 2002, p.88]

One of the finest golf games around. [Winter 2002, p.107]

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

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]

Everything here blows up real well, and it's oddly beautiful to witness the rich pageant of the undead splattered in a magnificent hail of hot video lead. [Winter 2002, p.91]

Easily beaten, Mission to Earth provides no real sense of accomplishment or finality. [Winter 2002, p.94]

While there is no questioning the game's ability to sap huge portions of your life, we'd dare say there may be better ways to spend said portions of said life until next year's edition hits Xbox Live. [Winter 2002, p.92]

The game's infinitely looped, saccharine-sweet piano music and French-style accordion tunes may in fact turn children into the hockey-mask wearing, ax-wielding maniancs we always see in the movies. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88]

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

What really shines through here is the work of extremely talented artists, and the world of Dark Alliance is full of stately detail. [Winter 2002, p.107]

What ultimately lands Defender in the "utterly forgettable" pile are its bland graphics, twitchy controls, and various technical problems. [Winter 2002, p.104]

Rayne has been designed by sexiness experts and dropped into a game that features all the erotic appeal of Rosie O'Donnell scarfing down Canadian ham at an all-you-can-eat buffet. [Winter 2002, p.108]

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

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

Charming and accessible. [Winter 2002, p.105]