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Unlike our beloved Duke, not all games wither and die when they get stuck in development limbo. While the majority of titles that undergo drastic changes or lengthy delays end up performing oral acts on donkey’s groins, some survive the pre-release purgatory smelling of roses. Well, more ‘gameplay that’s not shit’ than roses, really. So without furthing rambling, here’s a bunch of games that survived development hell and lived to be damn decent titles.

Chances are, at some point in your romantic life, you'll have had a stinker of a date. Your potential love interest might have snuck off to the toilet when it was time to pay the bill and never came back. Maybe they had breath so bad, it would sink a luxury cruise liner. Or worse, perhaps they just had an annoying laugh. Still, we doubt any of these disastrous encounters can match the potential pitfalls of dating certain game characters, which include finding out your date is just a cover for an elobarte hit, getting set on fire during a romantic walk, or having your partner morph into a boulder monster mid sexy time.

Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days and Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light get reviewed, we reminisce about pioneering launch games, and more than you'll ever need to know about the music of Chess Games!

Thanks a bunch, Christopher Nolan. Ever since Batman Begins took the universally-reviled cinematic bastardization of a cool character and redrew it in the drab colors and long shadows of The Dark Knight Returns, the “gritty reboot” has been back in fashion. In Hollywood-speak, the term's a nice way of saying “we've screwed this up, can we have a do-over?” Of course, games being a forward-looking sort of medium, players have been wise to this trick for years now – and we're still suckers for it.

Whether it's a deeper-'n-darker sequel or restarting from scratch, rejigging your series with a darker palette and more distorted guitars is a great way to draw attention to what might otherwise be just more sequel-abuse. But how well does it work? From a player's perspective, a gray coat of paint is hardly going to turn gameplay upside down... but from a “cataloguing the tricks they'll pull to sell a new installment” standpoint, dark reboots are just gravy...

Our Kane & Lynch 2 multiplayer demo was unusual in that it took place in a Chinese restaurant that had been painstakingly disarrayed by professional set designers. Since the tables and chairs were knocked over for us in advance by the thoughtful decorators, there was little for Chris Antista to do but talk to the guy who designed the multiplayer for Kane & Lynch 2. What follows is a document of his conversation. Video after the jump!

Ah, multiplayer, a beautiful synergy of technology and human interaction. A healthy, jovial, life-affirming way of enjoying the company of your fellow man. Sometimes, anyway. At other times, not so much. Not so much at all. We were recently reminded of this by the Kane & Lynch 2 demo, whose Undercover Cop and Fragile Alliance modes proved with no margin for error what solid gold, conniving swine multiplayer games can so easily turn us into.

You see some games just seem to want you to be a bastard to your friends. Whether competetive or co-op, whether by mean-spirited mechanics or by simply offering just enough tools and temptation to ruin someone's day, certain multiplayer modes positively live to cause griefing and fights. And frankly, they're hilarious and we love them for it. So here are some of the most bastardly.

Ever since I was but a lad, the prospect of my first virtual hit a mere glimmer in my eye, I’ve had a dream. Oh, alright then, ever since I finished Blood Money. Anyhoo, that dream is of a world where Scotland always qualify for the World Cup. An existence where Back to the Future II's hoverboards are both affordable and in plentiful supply. And, most importantly, a world where the next Hitman is announced at this week’s E3 as an open world game.

Read inside to find out why Agent 47 doing a Niko Bellic would be a murderously good idea. 

We'll admit, when we first heard that IO Interactive was taking a realistic documentary approach to Kane & Lynch 2's visuals, we didn't expect too much. A bit of grain here, a bit of shakeycam there, and we figured that would be the lot. But if you've been playing the current exclusive demo of the game, as we have, you'll know that the reality is a whole lot more than that.

Having ogled it at length, we're blown away by how striking the effect is. It's the attention to detail that does it. Bright lights bleed out into the environment as if the camera white balance is all out of whack. The focus struggles to keep up as the camera shifts rapidly between near and far objects. Grain and blur vary depending on how well lit an area is. And those bits of pixelly artefacting and digital interference that kick up near heavy explosions are just brilliant. But don't take our word for it. Watch this video we've made and check out just how punishingly real it all looks.

Criminals aren’t the most respected members of society in real life, but they can make for some fantastic videogame characters. Perhaps it's because the game industry is clearly trying to turn our nation's children into a breed of hyperviolent superthugs, just like all the know-it-alls who don’t actually know much of anything keep saying. At any rate, we've chosen our favorite prisoners from gaming history, so read on for our glorification of digital lawbreakers and give them the credit they deserve. If you don’t, they’ll just steal it anyway...