Yakuza 2 is a game with an identity crisis. It features a complex plot that bears favourable comparison with some hard-boiled Japanese cinema. But it gets so carried away that it nearly forgets it’s a game at all. Pantomime villain aside, the characters are largely likable with distinctive personalities, and the plot’s various twists and revelations keep things barreling along nicely. ...

The serpent king Orochi and the Dynasty Warriors series have one thing in common, they keep on coming back for more. It’s Japan’s equivalent of the FIFA moneymaking saga. Here you can expect at least one game a year, if not more. Twelve months isn’t much time to create an entirely new game, so it’s little wonder that Warriors Orochi 2 is more like a ‘greatest hits’. ...

Who is Batman to you? The violent lawman of the modern comics? The wink-wink star of the 60’s TV show? Tim Burton’s gothic icon, perhaps? The point is this: Travellers’ Tales have never had a subject so open to LEGO interpretation, and with it, playful experimentation. And boy, do they love it. Did you feel that Indy was a tad shackled to his tombs and dusty continents? ...

Several years back, the 2K Sports team built one of the finest hockey games ever – the sublime NHL 2K5. Sporting a silky smooth on-ice experience complemented by solid franchise and online modes, it stands out as the high watermark of the PS2/Xbox puck era. ...

We sports gamers like to complain. A lot. It’s what we do. Sometimes, they’re legitimate gripes, while most of the time we just like to argue amongst ourselves about impossibly inane details of our favorite titles. A typical bullet point these days is that most new PS2 sports titles are simply (at best) roster updates from the previous year as the offending developer concentrates on the newer consoles. ...

Picture the whiteboard in the Madden PS2 Development Team War Room circa 2003. It probably read something like this: “2004, lots of defense… 2005, make online complete… 2006, move most of dev team to next gen… 2007, move rest of team to next gen…2008, no one will be buying the PS2 anymore.”  Lo and behold, lots of us are still purchasing and using Sony’s unstoppable warhorse. ...

Major league ballplayers are filthy, disgusting creatures. Constantly spitting and grabbing their crotches, they’re the furthest thing possible from lovable cartoon characters. It’s remarkable, then, how MLB Power Pros manages to turn everything about these gruff, vulgar “athletes” into cheek-pinchingly cute caricatures of themselves on and off the field. ...

‘Experience extreme monster truck action!’ proclaims the press blurb – and when a promotional sentence is one of the game’s highlights, you know you’re in for a bumpy ride. Whether in the stadium or out on one of this outing’s barren new exterior stages, Monster Jam’s vehicles defy your commands like snot-nosed out-takes from a brazen episode of Supernanny. ...

For something that looks like a Nintendogs rip-off, there’s a lot more on offer here than you’d think. Choose your four-legged bobble headed puppy from a whopping 48 breeds and you’ll begin a surprisingly entertaining adventure. It’s not GTA or anything, obviously, but it’s still quite diverting. ...

Somewhere between Rock Band and the distant promise of Guitar Hero World Tour, ‘classic’ Guitar Hero became very ordinary, very quickly. This, now the fifth game, bears all the hallmarks of a series paddling to stay afloat. World Tour’s change of direction is looking even more necessary now. It all started so well too. Aerosmith has been involved with track selections, story elements and even mockumentary videos, and are ...