Blast Factor - hands-on

Among the games on display during Sony's PS3 preview event in San Francisco was Blast Factor, one of the first titles to be available exclusively through the PS3's online service. Pitting the player against malignant microbes at the cellular level, the game plays exactly how it looks: like a cell-themed version of Geometry Wars or Mutant Storm. As a little robot-looking thing, you'll bounce around in a two-dimensional, six-sided Petri dish, blasting in any direction you point the Sixaxis pad's right thumbstick at. Occasionally you'll get power-ups for your cannon, but the goal remains the same: fight off waves of what look like blood cells and cancerous polyps, clear the dish and move on to the next one.

Mikel Reparaz
After graduating from college in 2000 with a BA in journalism, I worked for five years as a copy editor, page designer and videogame-review columnist at a couple of mid-sized newspapers you've never heard of. My column eventually got me a freelancing gig with GMR magazine, which folded a few months later. I was hired on full-time by GamesRadar in late 2005, and have since been paid actual money to write silly articles about lovable blobs.