Title: Final Fantasy XIII

From: Square Enix

For: PS3

It’s amazing that a solitary game franchise can make it to its 13^th release and still gave gamers climbing over each other to buy it. There have been some downright awful games amongst those 13, but they’ve got it right Square Enix have produced some of the most memorable games of all time.

I don’t blame you for thinking that there’s not much point in climbing on the Final Fantasy bandwagon at number 13, surely it’d be like starting to watch Lost in the final season, but this couldn’t be further from the truth.

Final Fantasy XIII is an excellent entry point for the series and in fact the RPG genre in general. It’s accessible, the combat system is somewhat simplified compared to previous games, the story is thrilling and the graphics are truly next generation.

The gameplay is very linear, which is fairly typical of Final Fantasy, but it is intense and the streamlining and innovations in the turn-based combat make it interesting rather than a chore.

I’ve only dabbled in the series since FFX as I became a bit disillusioned with the genre in general, but FF XIII has renewed my interest for a while at least.

Score 90%

Title: Guitar Hero: Van Halen

From: Activision

For: Xbox 360

I don’t claim to be any expert on Van Halen, but I thought I knew their music and was expecting to take a rocking trip down memory lane. But I couldn’t have been more wrong.

It’s a reflection of my now apparent limited knowledge of their music, but it’s also an indication that only true fans of Van Halen will get a kick out of playing it. Herein lies the problem – just how many huge Van Halen fans are still playing video games?

I recognised probably 4 tracks in the 25 track Van Halen playlist. I just don’t think they deserved to have their own game.

The saving grace for the game is the inclusion of 19 tracks from guest artists such as Billy Idol, The Clash, Foo Fighters, Judas Priest, Tenacious D and The Offspring.

The Foo Fighters – now there’s a band who could fill up a 25 track Guitar Hero game with hits that everyone knows! But Van Halen?

“Jump” is the biggest track and many will recognise “Hot for Teacher” and “So is This Love”, but the rest of the Van Halen songs just tend to merge into one.

Score 65%

Title: Heavy Rain

From: Quantic Dream

For: PS3

Heavy Rain.

Remember those two words, because they mark a particular time in history where gaming took a definite turn towards interactive movies and even real life.

The ‘Origami Killer’ has left a city terrorised and the police are running out of leads. In Heavy Rain you take the role of four different characters (at different times in the game) whose previously unconnected lives will be confronted by the same question: How far are you prepared to go for love?

This stunning and groundbreaking game is essentially an interactive movie where you are constantly making choices. Choices that may be as major as whether to shoot or not shoot, or choices that may be as minor as whether to clean your teeth now or do it later. But rest assured that every choice you make will have an impact on how the rest of the game, and ultimately the ending, plays out.

While choice-making games are nothing new, having it presented in this movie-like fashion and around such a heart-pounding psychological thriller is an edge of the seat experience.

Congratulations must go out to Quantic Dream and Sony for changing the way we view games from this point on.

Score 95%

Title: Aliens vs Predator

From: Sega

For: PS3

Expectations were high for the latest Aliens vs Predator game with some amazing teaser trailers. Unfortunately it could have done with another 6 months to a year in development to polish it off.

You get to play as either the Aliens, Predators or Marines in what amounts to a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors. Each race has their strengths and weaknesses – Aliens are fast, agile and can hide in the shadows; Predators can jump from tree to tree, have firepower from a distance and can go invisible; Marines have an arsenal of weapons, armour and a radar. Then each race has a strength to cancel out one of the others.

So there are three different parallel campaigns to play through – the most fun of which is as the Aliens, however if you’re up for a scare then the Marines campaign is genuinely freaky.

The online multiplayer is where it’s at, with all the standard modes available. I preferred the three-way battles as you needed to approach each enemy differently. However the online player base can be a little sparse at times.

It’s a shame that the game’s potential wasn’t fully realised, perhaps next time, although I feel we’ll all be a bit more cynical in out anticipation.

Score 65%

Title: Mass Effect 2

From: BioWare

For: Xbox 360

How do you follow up one of the best RPG games ever seen on a gaming console? By making the sequel quite possibly the best RPG ever seen – full stop.

I’m ashamed to admit that I got bored in the original Mass Effect after only a couple of hours of play and have since sold the game. But I have since learned that not far past where I stopped, the game opened up into an amazing universe of action and exploration.

Therefore I was determined to play through the 30-40 odd hours that it takes to play Mass Effect 2 in a somewhat linear fashion.

I’m not even going to touch on the storyline here – there’s not enough room on this page, let alone this column. Suffice to say that the beauty of Mass Effect 2 lies in the depth of its characters, races and their interactions. Sure, there is a base story, but everything surrounding the plot seems to evolve and grow as a living, breathing entity.

Mass Effect 2 simply has to be experienced from start to finish – twice even. It’s a sublime piece of scriptwriting and a masterful piece of game design. It might only be March but watch for this title on the Game of the Year lists.

Score 98%

Title: Army of Two: The 40^th Day

From: Electronic Arts

For: Xbox 360

The original Army of Two game had its problems but was great fun, especially if you joined up with a human counterpart. It’s sequel, The 40^th Day takes the original and improves on almost everything while keeping the core gameplay much the same.

Perhaps the most noticeable difference is the customisation options available. Firstly, you can visit the game’s official website and design your own mask for your character to wear during the game – which is great if you want a team mask for online play. The weapons too can be customised with interchangeable bits and pieces found or bought within the game. You can even gold-plate your weapons if you are so inclined

The AI of your partner and the enemies has been given a major lift too. Enemies will use similar tactics to you and even heal each other. While your partner is smarter and more independent-thinking, nothing really compares to playing split-screen or online co-op with a friend – it’s essentially what the game was designed for. There are several online multiplayer modes that put the focus on co-operative tactics.

It’s a great sequel which has some brilliant dialogue to compliment the explosive action.

Score 92%

Title: MAG

From: Zipper Interactive

For: PS3 (exlusive)

Don’t have decent broadband and a PlayStation Network account? Then move along – nothing to see here. MAG is an online multiplayer first-person shooter only. There are no offline single player modes whatsoever, so if you want to have a decent crack at MAG then you’d better bump up that data cap asap.

MAG is billed as a MMOFPS game (that’s Massively Multiplayer Online First-Person Shooter) in which 2 to 256 players can battle it out simultaneously in team-based combat on huge levels.

It can be quite daunting to begin with, seeing so many players on the battlefield at once, but you soon come to realise that teamwork amongst those members who have headsets for communication usually wins the day.

It can be frustrating to be working tactically within a likeminded group, flanking an enemy stronghold only to have some trigger-happy players charge in and ruin the whole game plan. It’s a constant theme though unless you sort out your own clans.

I found there was a heap of intermittent lag in the majority of the games I played, which was annoying even with a decent broadband speed.

MAG is fun however and with a few updates should realise it’s full potential.

Score 75%

Title: Bayonetta

From: Sega

For: Xbox 360 (R18)

Games which have strong female lead characters are few and far between. I’d be struggling to think of a notable one since Lara Croft. Sure, there are plenty of female playable characters but games where they’re the star of the show are a rarity indeed.

Enter Bayonetta – she’s strong, powerful, stylish, deadly, beautiful, intelligent and oozes sexuality mixed with a killer attitude. It’s a theme that flows throughout the game which makes Bayonetta a breath of fresh air for an already bloated hack ‘n’ slash adventure genre.

Bayonetta is the last survivor of an ancient witch clan keeping the balance between light, dark and chaos. The action is fast and constant as you travel from area to area dispatching all manner and all sizes and shapes of horrific demon creatures.

The combat system is almost perfectly fluid as Bayonetta strings together multiple combo moves including spectacular specials and finishing moves. There’s plenty of puzzle elements thrown in to break up the combat a-la God of War.

Graphically the game is stunning and considering the amount of action on screen, it just doesn’t skip a beat. Amazing game.

Score 90%

Title: Dante’s Inferno

From: Visceral Games/EA

For: PS3

The literary classic Dante’s The Divine Comedy has largely shaped the Western view of Hell for many years. Visceral Games has picked up this epic tale and had some fun with it in producing Dante’s Inferno.

Dante is a young Crusader who becomes disenchanted with war and decides to return to his fiancée in Florence. He finds his house obliterated and fiancée dead outside. As he approaches, Satan appears and drags her soul screaming into the depths of Hell. Your quest is then to carve your way through the horrors of the underworld in an attempt to save your loved one.

If you’ve played any of the God of War series then Dante’s Inferno is a piece of cake. Most enemies can be defeated with a basic attack and the harder ones only require simple combos. There is a decent amount of solid platforming to break up the regular combat too.

Graphically it’s stunning and the violence and gore is shocking at times – as you would expect in Hell. But I’m left wondering how the game escaped an R18 rating.

Dante’s Inferno could have been better, but there will be more games in the franchise to build upon a good start.

Score 75%

Title: Avatar: The Game

From: Ubisoft

For: PS3

It was always inevitable that the groundbreaking movie Avatar would be accompanied by Avatar “The Game”. Had the same amount of effort been put into the game as was put into making the movie such a joy to behold then we may have been looking at a work of art. But alas Avatar: The Game is yet another movie/game cash-in that looks enticing from afar but soon leaves you with a bitter taste in your mouth.

The game serves as somewhat of a prequel to the movie, yet provides little to no backstory – so it’s important to have seen the movie first to fully understand what’s going on. About 45 minutes into the game you are presented with a choice to play as a human with the RDA Corporation – a which point the game becomes a very generic 3^rd person shooter, or play as one of the Na’vi – at which point the game becomes a very generic 3^rd person action/hack-n-slash.

Unlike the movie, there’s no gripping storyline running alongside the action, which means you just don’t become emotionally attached to anything in the game – hence you’re left feeling empty inside as you go through the motions.

Avatar: The Game is definitely a rainy day hire.

3 out of 5