Metal Slug Anthology

Platform: PS2, £14.99.
Verdict: Tanks for the memories.
Rating: 4½/ 5
In this age of 3D, bump mapped, shadered and bloomed graphics, it’s always refreshing to settle down with an old-school 2D pixel pushing game. There’s something about the art direction - the fact that the designers have to squeeze so much character out of what basically amounts to a collection of different coloured squares is testament to why the pixel art scene is flourishing. The Metal Slug series is one of the last champions of 2D although even it has recently and unsuccessfully succumbed to the glamour of 3D. Starting out on the legendary NeoGeo it has blazed a trail as an over-the-top, run and gun two player shooter with a distinct cartoon style, wildly imaginative design and of course its trademark humour and the titular Metal Slugs - Super Deformed tanks, gun laden vehicles and armed animals. This anthology brings together all the arcade classics into one home console delight, notably including the reworked Metal Slug X and the previously unreleased Metal Slug 6. It’s not a comprehensive list as versions such as the NeoGeo pocket or Gameboy Advance games are missing but with seven games of raw, explosive fun included it’s an absolute bargain for nostalgia heads and shoot-em-up fans new to the genre. The series could easily be accused of being repetitive, with each iteration recycling old sprites and adding little new to the core gameplay but playing with a friend is an essential and entertaining part of its draw and Metal Slug 6’s score multiplyer system and weapon switching mechanic seeks to rectify the repetition and is enough to justify the purchase alone. Thankfully the PS2 version of this anthology doesn’t suffer the awful loading problems that mired the PSP, which means it’s nigh on perfect for the price, If you like shooting zombies from atop a thawed out wooly mammoth with mounted cannons that is.

Mario Strikers: Charged Football

Platform: Wii
Verdict: Football but not as you know it.
Rating: 3½/5
After years of rescuing Princess Peach from the clutches of Bowser and various other nefarious villains, it feels slightly wrong to start shoulder barging her into electrical fences but in the case of Mario Strikers: Charged Football, attack is definitely the best means of defence (and you're more than likely to be on the receiving end of her studded pink pumps anyway).
Taking football as its starting point and adding a dash of Americanised shoulder pad aggression then chucking most of the rules out of the window, Charged Football is a surreal and explosive take on the (allegedly) beautiful game that plays more like a cute version of the classic Speedball than Beckham's favourite past time.
With an emphasis on aggressive gameplay and oodles of special moves, football as you know it has been transformed into a scrappy but entertaining romp in the Mushroom Kingdom, filled with familiar faces from Mario's history and packed with multiplayer fun.
Alongside the traditional football staples of pass, shoot, tackle etc, Mario Strikers adds new strategic elements such as power-ups and pass charging. Power-ups allow you to drop bananas, become a giant or fire out shells (with obvious benefits) and pass charging makes the ball more accurate and powerful with every successive pass between your players.
If you find yourself on the losing end (or just want to increase your lead) Megastrikes are available which, if the shoot button is held long enough, allow you to fire a volley of successive balls at the opponents goal. Success is determined by a golf style power meter and can land you with five goals at once but for those worried about balance, it is easy enough to prevent but entertaining to do.
As a single player game, Mario Strikers feels slightly lacking but remains fun nonetheless. At its heart it's a multiplayer game and that's where it excels - as the first online game for the Wii it showcases a robust and intuitive service and provides hours of slapstick entertainment between friends round the TV or online.
Now that's what I call beautiful.

Smash Court Tennis 3

Platform: PSP
Verdict: Needs strawberries n' cream.
Rating: 3/5
With the football season over it's soon to be tennis' time to take over the TV screens of those too lethargic to make it out into the summer sun and what perfect timing for Smash Court Tennis 3 to arrive and provide the tennis enthusiast the canny ability to leave the house and still indulge in some racket based entertainment (apart from playing it for real that is).
Snapping at the heels of the PSP's recent re-introduction to Sega's revered Virtua Tennis series, Smash Court has a lot of work cut out for it to be able to justify its existence in delivering its own top spin on the same game.
Where it immediately differs most is how it controls – each face button is relegated to varying return types – slice and spin etc. So far so similar yet the timing of button presses differs from Virtua Tennis' real time reaction - in a similar way to Rockstar's Table Tennis, as soon as the opponent hits the ball you can tap a button and your player will return it when it becomes near enough. Precise timing is no longer required to just return the ball, instead it's used for accuracy and power - with the timing of each button press and release defining decent returns.
While this is an interesting attempt at a different approach, it backfires by making it feel less immediate, tactile and fun.
Elsewhere, Smash Court 3 seeks to out do Virtua Tennis by offering an overwhelming wealth of features. Alongside Arcade and Exhibition modes, Pro Tour allows you to create, customise and build your own player into a tennis super star. With masses of stats, a tour calendar to plan your season, Smash Court offers a comprehensive and polished career mode yet still treads familiar ground.
For those with shorter attention spans there's Ad Hoc multiplayer between PSPs and some quirky mini games such as Pac Man Tennis but they don't make up for the fact that although Smash Court tries really hard to impress, it just lacks that special ingredient where it matters most – on the court.

Full Auto 2: Battle Lines

Platform: PSP
Verdict: Mardy Max.
Rating: 2½/5
Everyone knows that the future is a barren wasteland where oil is more precious than life and catwalks are filled with leather, spikes and loin cloths. Tina Turner may not need another hero but Full Auto 2: Battle Lines demands you to be one, for better or for worse.
As heroic deeds go however it'll certainly take a concerted effort from the Homer as the road to victory is a particularly disheartening odyssey – the ridiculous quest to overthrow a weather computer by driving like a drunk is a painful and glitchy road to hell.
The expensive licensed soundtrack may delight some but unfortunately belies the quality of the game as Battle Lines comes across as an unfinished symphony of destruction that at least heavy metal fans will glean some joy from.
With a variety of play modes to choose from and only ad hoc multiplayer (yet another PSP game to sadly shun WiFi), Full Auto 2 is a generic and predictable package that ticks the usual boxes but adds little new and as the pint sized brother to the PS3 game, it's lacking the one thing that made it interesting – the ability to rewind time and correct your mistakes.
Anyone who's crashed their car for real will know what the benefit of hindsight brings and with the ability to crash, rewind and avoid that nasty collision, Full Auto 2 on the PS3 allowed the player to be courageous and experimental, safe in the knowledge that an unsuccessful manoeuvre could easily be corrected. The explosions looked nice too.
Without the hook of rewinding time, Full Auto 2 is reduced to an average game of driving erratically and shooting wildly. With the PSP's limitations and some sloppy programming, the choppy frame rate and twitchy controls mean it's functional at best and barely a joy to play.
Those with a penchant for road based destruction would be best advised to plump for Burnout because even though Full Auto 2 is packed with weapons and destructible set piece environments, it still can't match the visceral quality of its nitrous peer. There's also the next Wipeout on the way where the future is decidedly cooler.

Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta

For Xbox 360.
Verdict: King of the hill.
After an initial glitch that kept eager gamers round the world waiting an extra day, Thursday 17th May allowed access to beta code of one of 2007’s most anticipated titles - Halo 3.
With the full game due for release in September, the Halo 3 Multiplayer Beta is a three week long peak into the future, in the final part of Bungie’s acclaimed trilogy (downloadable from the menu of supercop game Crackdown).
Allowing access to three varied multiplayer maps and a mixture of social and ranked game types, the beta is a slice of the unfinished game going through testing and gameplay tweaks that the public are now contributing towards completing.
While not giving anything away about the story of clashing cultures and ancient alien technology, the beta has allowed us to see how Halo’s gameplay has evolved and what modern technology has done for the series.
With sharp new textures, physics reactive water and some incredible sound design the most immediate enhancements, the controller layout has changed to assign the X button to new ‘Equipment’ items.
Equipment are rare items scattered across the maps that add new depth and strategy to Halo. The Bubble Shield, Power Drain, Trip Mine and Grav Lift all seek to encourage even more improvisational gameplay without disrupting the careful balancing of Halo’s legendary weapon sets.
As well as Equipment, new weapons have been added - Spike Grenades are strategical genius, the Brute Spikers are ferocious, the Spartan Laser is devastating and the welcome return of the Assault Rifle as a start weapon sees Halo 2’s emphasis on dual wielding thankfully reduced.
Along with significant and welcome changes to weapon balancing, changes have been made to Halo 2’s still unbeaten party system which allows for friends to group in large teams and take on the world while ad hoc teams of strangers can form after games and disliked maps can be vetoed by vote.
Halo 3 also allows you to save your battles as editable movies, giving Machinima directors unprecedented flexibility and friends the ability to send bragging clips of their victories to each other.
For those 360 owners without Crackdown - you’ve got two weeks left to taste the future.

Pokémon Ranger

Platform: Nintendo DS.
Verdict: Gotta circle ‘em all.
Rating: 3/5
The Pokémon franchise has been with us since 1995 and over those years, in accordance with the ‘milk it’ directive, has spawned sequels, spin-offs and merchandise on a scale that almost matches George Lucas’ own ego funding empire of Yoda duvet covers.
Pokémon Ranger is the latest spin-off for the Nintendo DS that takes the world of cute monsters and gives it a new gameplay hook.
Removing the strategic turn-based combat that lies at the heart of the series, Ranger replaces it with a new touch screen centric method of capturing Pokémon that involves drawing multiple circles round them.
The key here is that you’re not playing as a trainer any more, you’re a Ranger which is the equivalent to the Pokémon RSPCA (or RSPCP).
Obviously, making pocket monsters fight each other isn’t going to sit well ethically so your new adventure sees you helping them rather than harming them.
Upon confronting a distressed Pokémon, the screen switches into capture mode allowing you to draw circles around it with your ‘Styler’ a gizmo that if used correctly can create an emotional connection with the creature and calm it down.
With a number of linked circles required, Pokémon attempt to disrupt your hard work by attacking the circle and resetting it. Each type of Pokémon behaves in a different way so the skill lies in watching and waiting before you frantically scribble round it with the stylus.
Friendly Pokémon can help out too with abilities such as trapping the aggressive Pokémon in a handy bubble of water but unfortunately this is as deep as things get - frenzied scribling and one off special traps.
The actual adventure sees you graduate quickly from helping the public to foiling the plans of the nefarious Go-Rock Squad who are intent on using a new Super Styler for their own dastardly deeds but like the Styler action, it never quite engages enough for you to want to see the end.
Hopefully we’ll see the end of light weight spin-offs for a while as the true sequels ‘Diamond’ and ‘Pearl’ are on their way - are you ready Pokéfans?

Spectrobes

Platform: Nintendo DS
Verdict: Gotta bore em all.
Rating: 3/5
Spectrobes is every parent’s worst nightmare. It’s not one of those mythical murder simulators that’ll turn your kids into slavish brainwashed killers but a new game with the obligatory addition to the ever expanding roster of wallet sapping, Manga styled Saturday morning cartoons. You know the ones - they make little sense and usually send the most resilient into an epileptic fit.
Despite the cynical cash cow Spectrobes is obviously meant to be, the game that will spawn a thousand merchandising opportunities has a lot going for it. Taking its cues from the Pokemon stable, it’s all about collecting monsters, rearing them and making them fight (kinda like bear baiting for ethically minded kids).
Spectrobes’ twist on this successful formula is that the creatures begin life as fossils that once located and excavated can be awakened by the dulcet tones of your voice.
Reared in incubators on a nutritious diet of similarly excavated minerals, the baby Spectrobes can become battle ready adults and even evolve (sorry creationists) into new wondrous forms of walking A-bombs.
Split between adventuring across sprawling dual screen landscapes to save the universe and the more sedentary aspects of archeology and creature breeding, Spectrobes attempts to use the DS’ unique features in a number of ways.
Excavating fossils requires the careful use of the touch screen as you scrape away the rock face with your stylus and in a lovely (but pointless) touch, blow away dust with your own breath (using the DS’ microphone).
Unfortunately, once you’ve awakened and reared an exciting collection of creatures, the actual combat makes it all rather pointless.
Trading Pokemon’s deep and strategic turn-based combat for a butchered real-time approximation, Spectrobes delivers a weak alternative with cumbersome controls and a bizarre impression of line dancing on ice.
Along with the stop/start trudge of random fossil searching and a forgettable story, no amount of unique touches can save it from the death knell of boredom - not what you need on a Saturday morning.

The God of War 2

Platform: PS2.
Verdict: It rocks.
Rating: 4/5
When our ancestors were granted with opposable thumbs, not only did it allow them to emerge as a dominant species and a master of tools, it allowed for the future creation of the iconic joypad and the subsequent need for blister covering thumb plasters.
The God of War series seems solely based around the punishment of your unsuspecting thumbs, requiring them to tap buttons like an uzi with infinite ammo and the latest instalment is a trip to Hades for them in more way than one.
Continuing the story of Kratos, God of War 2 sees him stripped of his powers and embark on a quest from the dead to slay the god Zeus with the aid of the mighty titans.
With his trademark chain weapons, Kratos rips and sunders his mythological enemies with claret spilling ferocity and a brutish disregard for life amongst exotic and fantastical locations.
Easily earning its age rating, God of War revels in its on screen carnage but aptly so - war is sick and brutal so its god must surely lead by example.
Kratos easily lives up to his title, slaying his way through Greek mythologies finest and GoW2 provides updated combos, new attacks and new weapons to create deeper combat and bring more variety to the admittedly repetitive action of its predecessor.
As well as the wanton carnage and thumb burning button combos, GoW2 is laced with puzzles. Giving you time to rest and a chance to flex some cranial muscles instead, GoW2’s puzzles are often satisfying and simple to work out.
Unfortunately some can be so subtle that the answer can be staring you right in the eye when your progress has halted in frustration.
Boss fights can slow progression too with some unfair difficulty spikes but each generally just requires learning attack patterns and keeping calm amidst a flurry of button presses and curses at the screen.
Like an Epic Metal record cover come to life, God of War 2 is loud, brash and a graphical swan song for the aging PS2.
It’s also what thumbs were made for.

Dragon Ball Z Budokai Tenkaichi 2

Platform: Nintendo Wii, also PS2.
Verdict: My hands are on fire!
Rating: 3½/5
With a grand and slightly incomprehensible title, the latest game in the Dragon Ball Z franchise aptly suggests much complexity yet beyond initial Wii based control changes and a comprehensive charting of the Dragon Ball sagas, there lies a very simple fighting game.
Seemingly attempting to be the definitive Dragon Ball Z experience, Budokai Tenkaichi 2 thankfully eschews any attempts at padding the game out with ill advised RPG adventures and remains true to the series’ hook - huge explosive battles between super charged martial artists, aliens and androids.
Alongside straight up tournament modes and Vs matches, DBZBT2 (to abbreviate) charts the entire saga of the Dragon Ball Z manga and anime series in a stunning 3D cartoon style, allowing you to participate in every key fight along the way with your fighter showing wear and tear as he battles on.
Of course, being on Nintendo’s quirky Wii console, things aren’t quite that straight forward. Those familiar with previous PS2 outings will be in for a shock as the Wii’s motion sensing controls become centre stage to really mix things up.
With the Nunchuk attachment in place, controls are at first glance familiar - movement is on the analogue stick and attack, charge and blast functions all have reasonable button placements. Motion however controls flight around the massive arenas, dodge moves and special attacks.
Shaking the Nunchuk to fly or dodge takes quite a while to get the hang of but patience bears many Zen points and the special attacks fit right into the new scheme as you mimic fireball blasts by throwing your hands out towards the TV.
It can be confusing and fiddly at first, requiring a lengthy tutorial but ultimately becomes satisfying, fun to master and the relatively simple combat never asks too much of you.
As engaging as the motion controls are, they’ll never be a match for the speed of button presses and to those completely alienated by the rampant hand flailing, respite lies in the appreciated (but dull) support for the Classic or Game Cube controllers.
Thankfully, on a list of things to do before i’m 35, ‘Throwing fireballs with my own hands’ has now been ticked off.

Lost in Blue 2

Platform: Nintendo DS
Verdict: Welcome to Tartarus
Rating: 2 ½/5
As tragic as being a castaway sounds, you’d think there may be some joy to be gleaned as an athletic 18 year old stranded with a similarly aged, attractive member of the opposite sex. Immediately referencing the film ‘The Blue Lagoon’ is a no brainer yet Lost in Blue 2 has more in common with Milton’s ‘Paradise Lost’ as the quest for survival can be particularly hellish.
With plenty of similarities to the short but sweet Another Code, everything in Lost in Blue 2 is done with the stylus. Allowing you to move around the environment by touching the screen where you want to go, on-screen tabs also allow for quick access to context sensitive actions and menus while allowing you to interact with the environment with a pleasing tangibility.
After the initial introduction to the game’s controls and simple story of marooned strangers, life very quickly descends into a struggle against the tyrannical demands of your body.
With three meters that need constant monitoring you have to carefully maintain your energy, food and water levels and each has a knock on effect on the other.
While all this seems perfectly fair and uncannily logical, the rate at which the meters drop is torturous, particularly early on in the game where, like some underworld torture from Greek mythology, food is limited to tiny morsels that seem to replenish less than it cost to gather them.
Thankfully the monotony of survival is broken up by a multitude of mini-games. As a game of survival, food is everything and a lot of time is spent cooking and hunting it in mini-game form, utilising the DS’ touch screen and microphone to satisfying results.
Unfortunately the uncompromising demands of your body and that of your inept companion mean that these mini-games are repeated ad infinitum, ironically making the very things that break up the monotony, monotonous.
Progression in the game eventually opens up new tools and skills making survival easier and exploration more enjoyable but the dull pain of repetition inflicted on you to reach these fields of gaming Elysium is too much for all but the most masochistic gamer.