The crime fighting duo are back and doing what they do best. To those who are thinking “fighting crime?” nice try but I’m afraid that answer is incorrect. Sam, the 6ft laid-back Dog, and Max, his short psychopathic Rabbit companion, excel at biting sarcasm above all else. Don’t get me wrong, they do their best and ultimately solve crimes, I’m just saying they’re no threat to the Miss Marples, Poirots, or even Quincys of the world.

Read the rest of this entry »

“I am CL4P-TP but you may call me by my locally designated name, annoying little shit”. This line, minus the bit about him being an annoying little shit, is uttered by a small robot as the game begins. It is quite obvious that players are supposed to like this robot. I hate him with a passion. His appearance annoys me. His voice annoys me. Everything about him annoys me. I don’t think I’d be as annoyed at this pretty insignificant robot had he not been created as light-entertainment. Another character was created for this very purpose and his name was Jar Jar Binks. The major difference is that Jar Jar was created to amuse children and this robot is featured in an adult game with an 18 rating. Strange decision.

This serious/silly juxtaposition is indicative of the entire game. I can’t understand why this game deserves an 18 rating. I can only assume the creators purposely did just enough to warrant the 18 rating in order to gain a certain type of lucrative publicity. I’ll concede that there is a lot of blood. Heads explode and limbs fly off bodies but all the while it’s wrapped up in cartoon visuals.

Read the rest of this entry »

“Welcome to the world of fashion.” This is the message which greets you at the end of the intro. Nice visuals and upbeat music, the beginning of which is identical to a popular Football (Soccer) tune, come together to make the stylish introduction.

The game begins and you find yourself working in a fashion store named Primavera. You’re not the only shop assistant. There is a girl named Renee who seems to me to have a bit of an attitude problem. I suppose cheeky comments may be the norm in the hoity toity world of fashion but I wouldn’t be putting up with her nonsense.

Read the rest of this entry »

While writing my review of Hasbro Family Game Night on the DS I was certain of two things regarding this sequel on the Wii. Firstly, given the superior capabilities of the Wii the graphics would be much better. Secondly, the games would work better on the Wii and thus provide more in the way of entertainment than the version on the DS.

The first assumption was true. The graphics on the Wii are clearly going to be much better than on the DS. We’re not talking anything special here but they are solid enough and it can’t be easy to make what amounts to a few boardgames look pretty. My assumption that this shinier version on the Wii would be more entertaining proved to be a little off the mark.

Read the rest of this entry »

Hasbro (not to be confused with Haribo who make Starmix) are the world’s leading board-game manufacturer. The company has brought us hugely popular board-games such as Monopoly, Scrabble, Trivial Pursuit, Risk, and Cluedo. Family Game Night does not include any of those titles and this can either be seen as testament to Hasbro having a large volume of quality games or that this is a “best of the rest” collection. In this review I hope to arm you with enough information so that you can come to your own conclusion.

Mr. Potato Head takes on the role of host and hovers around while you decide which game to play next. There are four playable games – Connect 4, Bop It!, Battleship, and Operation. In an attempt to add some variety each game comes with a number of modes and additional options.

Read the rest of this entry »

I am not a huge fan of racing games but I enjoyed the previous title in this series.  The thing I remember most about Forza 2 is spending hours thinking up and creating designs, adding them to various cars, and selling them for a ridiculous profit in the auction. I didn’t spend anywhere near as much time with the paint tool on this occasion but I did notice the biggest flaw in Forza 2, having to create your initial design on an actual car, has been fixed with a nice black canvas to work on before applying the masterpiece to a vehicle. I did spend just enough time to create the Team Teabag mascot, the angry teabag man, and applied it to every vehicle in the hope it would bring me good luck.

This game looks incredible. I hesitate to use “photo-realism” when describing the graphics because for so many years the term has been quickly thrown around only for a title to come along with superior visuals and awarded the same label. Perhaps terms such as “even more realistic than photo-realism” or “photo-realism +1” should be introduced to save us from looking foolish in retrospect. I will go ahead and stick my neck out on this one. The graphics in Forza 3 look photo-realistic. I reserve the right to excuse such a bold statement in future by claiming what I actually meant is that Forza 3 looks photo-realistic after someone has downed six pints or had tear-gas sprayed in their eyes. Water, trees, and mountains simply have no right to look this good in a racing game.

Read the rest of this entry »

Another year and time for another round of Fifa vs Pro Evo. If it is possible for elitism to thrive within the sport genre of videogames this certainly has my vote as a perfect example. For a long time Pro Evo was regarded as the choice of those who truly loved the beautiful game while Fifa was viewed all style and no substance. If my name was Harry Hill and I had the luxury of my own TV show I would call out both parties to settle the dispute in a rumble. I apologise as I’m unable to do this and must resort to reviewing PES 2010 the old fashioned way. Read the rest of this entry »

The love-child from an affair between a quintessential English gentleman and a sex-crazed Worzel Gummidge. The result of Sid Vicious colliding at high-speed with an eccentric French mime on pep pills. Captain Jack Sparrow minus the rum and life on the high seas. Russell Brand.

“I’d like to apologise for the terrible attacks, Andrew Sachs, I would like to show contrition to the max, Andrew Sachs. I would like to create world peace, between the yellow, white and blacks, Andrew Sachs, Andrew Sachs. I said something I didn’t have oughta, like I had sex with your granddaughter. But it was consensual and she wasn’t menstrual, it was consensual lovely sex. It was full of respect I sent her a text, I’ve asked her to marry me, Andrew Sachs”. Russell, if you happen to read this, I enjoyed your song.

Read the rest of this entry »

If there’s one downside to reviewing a large number volume of games it’s that you come across very similar titles and this makes it difficult to find fresh ways of describing the same features. This problem is magnified when dealing with any title in a long-running series. What really matters are the new and updated features and this review will focus on those.

The loading times have plagued this series and last year’s outing was no exception. Fans will be happy to know the number of loading screens and the length of each has been greatly reduced. Graphically I see no difference from last year’s title but this was to be expected and 2009 had decent visuals anyway so it’s not a problem. The sound largely remains the same although there seems to be better use of your wrestler’s nickname such as the commentator mentioning “hand to hand” skills when you use the nickname “the soldier”. The music has also changed although you may not notice at first as very similar songs are chosen for the soundtrack each year.

Read the rest of this entry »

Same Game. Different platform. Huge improvement. Having played and reviewed the DS game I really wasn’t sure what to expect from this version on the Wii. I was of course confident that the graphics and sound would be far superior and I looked forward to using the Wii-mote instead of the DS controls which I found clunky. The first thing I noticed about this version is that the focus on an adventure mode has been ditched for a more Olympic themed experience in Festival mode.

There are training sessions for each of the events which help you get to grips with the different control methods. The Festival takes place over seventeen days and on each day you must complete a training session and take part in at least one Olympic or Dream event. Some of the days end with a character challenging you to a particular event. These challenges do not affect your Festival standing but do provide an opportunity to test your ability at certain events and you can also unlock what amount to merit badges for things such as completing a number of tricks during snowboarding. I played through the Festival mode as Knuckles and came first in Olympic, a close second in Dream, and top overall by quite a large margin. My crowning moment came as I faced Rouge in a Figure Skating challenge. This was undoubtedly my weakest event up to that point but I pulled myself together and spanked her…figuratively speaking.

Read the rest of this entry »