Into every life a little rain must fall. It's a patronising cliche, usually used as half-arsed reasurrance by the kind of vacant do-gooders who think that talking in cliches is actually an acceptable thing to do. But it is true. And as good as this year has been for gaming, we have had a whole lot of rain as well. In fact at times it's felt like the mighty Zeus himself has been hosing a big drunken piss right down upon our heads, before doing a bit of sick as he shakes off and zips up.

Want a run-down of the absolute worst crap to happen in gaming this year? The next page. That is where it begins.

Sometimes, it's just easier to take the half-assed approach in life. Why tidy all of that crap clogging up your room when you can just stuff it under the bed? Why bother putting yourself through six years of baffling questions and migraines on Lost when you can just read a synopsis of the ending on the nets? And why go to the effort of designing an original, inventive game character when you can just borrow ideas from other developers or stick a shiny pair of shades on your protagonist?

Inside, you'll find some of the worst offenders of this noble, half-assed philosophy

It may seem pointless to award honors to a bunch of unreleased games, but the tradition at least offers an easy-to-digest E3 hype gauge. Nintendo's 3DS won Best Hardware and Best of Show, and based on our time with it, the awards are deserved. But since we love to play devil's advocate, we'll point out that the Wii won Best of Show in 2006, and you know how much we love it now...

Recent history has taught me not to get too excited about new Sonic games. But, whatever the quality of the gameplay in Sonic Colors, there's no denying the game's visuals are exceptionally good.

That sentence feels like it should end with 'for a Wii game', but for once, I'm just going to let that stand. And then I'm going to highlight some examples of why this game's visuals are 360-quality. Geek caps on? Good. Here we go...

During a closed-door session at E3 a couple weeks ago, we had the chance to see - and then play - a demo for InFamous 2, the 2011-bound sequel to Sony's promising, lightning-charged superhero/disaster/sandbox adventure from 2009. And while we weren't all that hot on the first game, we came away from this one impressed; while we only played for a few minutes, everything we experienced was better, faster and more visually interesting. And now, instead of just reading reactions like that from people like us, you can see footage of the InFamous 2 E3 demo for yourself.

 

THQ's Warhammer 40K MMO, Dark Millennium Online "is going to be a masterpiece," reckons Core Games VP, Danny Bilson. Full of pep and excitement for the project, he has already stated that he wanted to "shake up Blizzard" when the game’s first trailer was revealed during E3…

 

Today, Valve released two new videos from the Portal 2 demonstration at E3. Check out the Aperture Science training videos for the Pneumatic Diversity Vents and the Thermal Discouragement Beams for a sneak peak at some of the first-person puzzler’s new brain teasers.

Our very own GamesRadar E3 awards have already delivered the definitive final word on this year's show. But stay alert gamers - there's more E3 awards to come!

On Sunday June 13, Microsoft gathered hundreds of journalists, retailer VIPs and even a handful of celebrities for its lavish reveal of Project Natal, which would soon be renamed Kinect during the show. We knew going in that performance group Cirque du Soleil was crafting some kind of elaborate interpretation of the Xbox's motion-controlled device, but we had no idea it would involve an hour in line, an hour standing around and then an hour of baffling acrobatics that likened Kinect to the greatest artistic achievements of humanity.

All that opulence to show off Kinect Adventures? Time to put on our snark britches and take this thing down a notch.

 

Valkyria Chronicles was one of the most gorgeous games ever released on the PlayStation 3. So how could the PSP sequel to such a beautiful title be anything but a disappointment for fans of the original? Find out why Valkyria Chronicles 2 is shaping up to be a stellar sequel and check out our interview with the game’s producer to see it in motion…