Remakes of classic games are often a dangerous proposition, risking alienating fans of the original games in order to attract new players. For this week's Frankenreview we've gathered opinions from RPG-centric sites along with the more mainstream gaming press to see how Final Fantasy IV measures up.

RPGamer
It is disappointing, then, that while the characters are tweaked to update and strengthen their personalities and motives, the main story and its transitional events are left entirely untouched. The happenings which progress the narrative often conflict with common sense or with the game world itself. The characters are the most believable they have ever been, but their actions are not. Added lines of dialogue, mostly with NPCs, explain or foreshadow the most spastic story moments and definitely create a rounder, more interesting world. Logic-defying occasions still stand out, though, and reveal a thick, solid line Square Enix refused to cross when remaking a famous game with a large fan following.

RPGFan
The opening FMV is marvelous, but that's basically the first and last time you'll actually be impressed. More FMVs would have given the game the cinematic feeling it deserves, like the FMV's in Final Fantasy VIII. FFIV uses a polished in-game engine for cutscenes, which is not bad but underwhelming. The resolution and detail are average for DS. Stylistically I found myself even less impressed. The characters looked cleaner and more mature back on the SNES. The blocky, disproportioned, childlike models do not suit the game's mature story.

G4 X-Play
The best changes to Final Fantasy IV are the minor ones. The game is less stingy when it comes to precious items. A new feature rewards players for uncovering every corner of dungeon maps. This tiny innovation does double the work. It provides much needed access to resources and it encourages players to get into more fights. The game encourages and, more importantly reduces, the tedium of grinding by rewarding exploration – an act that, for most of us, is a reward in and of itself.

GameSpot
Although it has been rereleased several times throughout the years, this full remake of one of the most celebrated stories in video game history is in many ways more poignant and impressive than it was all those years ago, despite minor irks with the voice acting. With a cast of memorable characters and villains, a more accurate and authentic translation, a new skill-customization system, and a few important new story elements that help to better explain key plot points, this is the definitive version of Final Fantasy IV that everyone should experience.

Interesting. RPG sites are generally more forgiving with roleplaying games, but not so much when you futz about with a classic.

Will this new direction bring all-night Civ sessions to the console crowd, or should it be put to bed early? Get the verdict from the reviewing public, after the jump.

Eurogamer
You can't play Civ Rev like Civ. The underlying systems are the same, if hugely (and at times brutally) simplified, but where its PC siblings could, to a certain extent, be played at your own pace, this sticks army ants in your bed. If you try to sleep, you'll be eaten alive. It keeps moving at all times, and if you don't move with it you won't get anywhere. That said, the lowest couple of difficulty settings are almost hilariously forgiving, but you'll very quickly want to graduate to a more challenging one. Even if you're specifically aiming for an economic, cultural or technological victory, be prepared to shed some blood along the way.

VideoGamer
There are drawbacks to the new approach. As we said the world map is small, but at times it feels way too small. It seems like an oversight that the game doesn't allow players to generate custom maps that are bigger. And despite the world being tiny, it's sometimes hard to get an overview of what's going on because the camera's distance to the action is fixed in place. It's kind of like only being able to play PES on the short camera view. Sometimes you need to switch it to wide in order to see more of the playing field.

1UP
If you're new to Civ's turn-based world, the abundance of information at the beginning of a game can be daunting — and even more so for your chosen civilization's different opening gambits. Revolution does a great job of appropriate hand-holding, with its array of cartoon advisers and "Civilopedia," which contains a wealth of strategic and operational knowledge, accessible at any time. So, when your first Settler unit establishes the capital city in the opening turns, you'll be in good shape for the Manifest Destiny that's to follow.

IGN
Civilization Revolution is a standout strategy console game that successfully straddles the line between hardcore and casual. But after spending many hours with the game, I found myself wanting just a bit more depth, which I suppose is the inherent pitfall of bringing one of PC gaming's deepest experiences to a console with both input and hardware limitations. True, I could get in and out of a game with relative ease, but I also didn't have the option to micromanage my workers (there are production settings, but they are quite basic) or embark on an epic campaign.

Kotaku
...the game can be too short, and too small, and in some cases a little rough, but what Firaxis needed to do if this game was to ultimately succeed was take that core Civilization experience – the discovery, the advancement, the combat, the diplomacy – and ensure that even a streamlined version of the game still had you up at 3 in the morning, telling yourself you'll just have "one more turn". Which it does.

Looks like many more sleepless nights are in order.

Has EA DICE managed to provide a combination of solo and multiplayer experiences worthy of your gaming dollar, or has the mixed focus resulted in mix review scores? The critics arm themselves after the jump.

Eurogamer
...that famed Battlefield freedom has finally been translated into a coherent single player campaign, where your choice of route can have a distinct bearing on your chances of success. Governed by a linear succession of objectives, the route you take to get there can often be genuinely up to you. Be it stealthily on foot, sniping everything from afar or storming the gates in a tank, you simply use whatever hardware's at your disposal and set about taking down everyone in your way, in whichever way you can. With gunships and motorboats occasionally upping the ante further still, the moments when Bad Company is firing on all cylinders are thrillingly epic.

GameTrailers
Bad Company has a slightly different feel than other shooters, and not just because of the much higher things-blown-up to things-not-blown-up ratio. Weapons feel powerful—especially considering how destructible most of the world is—but accuracy isn’t as unnaturally precise as it is in some other shooters and this can make weapons feel less lethal. On the other hand, fans of shotguns will be very happy at the effectiveness of their weapon.

GameSpot
Be sure to crank the volume up to 11—Bad Company has some of the finest sound design out there. A sniper shot echoes perfectly through the mountains, while indoor firefights are so loud you may want earplugs. Visually the game does not fare as well. While it's by no means ugly, there is a strange graininess on each texture. Even looking into the clear blue sky in the first scene of the game, you'll be amazed at how fuzzy it looks. Of course, the destructible environments and exciting explosions make up for any graphical shortcomings.

TeamXbox
Battlefield: Bad Company knows what it wants to do and does it. The gameplay is simple and easy to wrap your mind around, but opens up to a lot of different strategies. The explosions are visceral and fun, and the game looks great too. Yeah, I bitched about the color palette, but there are moments when you realize they’re going for that smoky, hazy look that a battle-ravaged landscape would have and it’s O.K. It may not be a magnum opus like GTA IV, but Battlefield: Bad Company is a great piece of mindless fun to waste away some hours with this summer.

Not nearly as bad a company as I was expecting.

Sixteen years and three lackluster sequels later, Infogrames subsidiary Atari and developer Eden Games attempt to breath new life (and new death) into the series with an all-new Alone in the Dark, featuring a strangely displaced Edward Carnby in a modern-day setting. New setting, new gameplay, and terrifying new enemies, none of which are more terrifying than your average game critic.

IGN
I love a good yarn, and I was hoping to find one in Alone in the Dark. Instead I was introduced to yet another amnesiac fighting demons and carrying around a spooky stone. It doesn't help that our hero is challenged in the dialogue department, having been endowed by the game's writers with a nasty blue streak. You can count on hearing the words f*** or s*** nearly every time our scarred-up hero opens his mouth, an attempt at gritty realism that comes off as adolescent and trite.

Team Xbox
The problem is, who – if anyone – at the publisher or developer actually played this game and decided it was a good thing to unleash on gamers? Did they not realize how horrible the game is to control or how screamingly annoying the camera is switching from third person to a fixed shot is? Did no one say, guys we really need to make this game less of a frustrating mess, even for people who play lots of games? The answer to these questions seems to be “no”.
VideoGamer.com
For a game set in an eerie looking Central Park, with monsters around every corner, Alone in the Dark isn't really very scary. You'd assume this would be a given. You even have the trademark torch that runs out of batteries, yet there are few scares. When a monster lands on the roof of your car for the first time you might jump, but then when you've seen another magically fly 100 metres in order to do so it ruins the mood somewhat. There's a constant fear of death, but this isn't down to the setting but the inevitable fumbling in your inventory. One of the scariest moments occurred early on when Carnby appeared to be having some kind of seizure, his body uncontrollably gyrating on the spot. Alas, this was a bug, just one of many that occurred during my play through of the game.

1UP
As a lesson in ambition and creativity, AITD is an awkward (but welcome) role model. Though no one element is particularly polished, the game's plenty varied, and it happily defies genre characterization wherever it can — racing segments, rappelling, and a handful of great ideas keep things fresh. Though with such methodical, purposeful design every step of the way, it's tough to sit back and enjoy what's otherwise an engaging, surprisingly cinematic caper. You likely won't be thrilled by the time you sit through both of the equally lame lose-lose endings, but I can't imagine you'd regret your time in the Dark.

The game sounds like almost as much of a mixed bag as its review scores.

Now, as millions of gamers all over the world immerse themselves in Snake's final adventures, we take a look at how the game fared in the hands of the reviewing public.

IGN
Is it possible to give a game an 11? If so, this would be the game that would merit that score. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is a title that exceeds all of the hype that was attached to the title. Regardless of whether you've seen every trailer and screenshot, read every preview and heard every interview, you won't get a full sense of how phenomenal this title is unless you sit down and experience it for yourself.

GameTrailers
On the more exciting end of the spectrum are tense standoffs, gloriously insane fight scenes, genuine emotional moments, and some comic relief. These moments and the overall cinematic direction that frequently provides beautiful transitions in and out of gameplay are worthy consolations for players who unlike devoted fans won’t watch every scene gripping their controller and waiting for a button prompt to trigger a still image flashback or briefly switch a camera angle.

Eurogamer
You're sorry to see Snake go. But should you be? Guns of the Patriots is a frustrating, fractured game that turns Metal Gear Solid's world upside down several times over, but never changes it. It just burrows deeper into what fans love and detractors hate than ever before, and it will make few converts. It's a crying shame, given how many genuinely classic gaming moments there are here, given the countless exquisite creative touches, but Metal Gear Solid 4 is its own worst enemy. You could not ask for a funnier, cleverer, more ambitious or inspired or over-the-top conclusion to the Metal Gear Solid series, but it's definitely time to move on.

GameDaily
With four difficulty levels, enjoyable stealth based play and plenty of over the top action, Metal Gear Solid 4 is one of the best PlayStation 3 games. That said, its features, acceptable 10 years ago, seem foolish given the better playing games on the market. Snake's epic, final act just isn't the triple A extravaganza we expected, and it's clear that if Konami intends to continue this franchise or spin off into something new, it needs to study its competition and evolve, delivering shorter cut scenes and superior shooting. But for now, this is one of the most important games in history and you'll dig its cool boss battles, at times witty dialogue and unrivaled sneaking mechanics. Just be sure to keep a magazine handy when those cut scenes get ridiculous.

When it comes right down to it, none of these reviews will effect game sales whatsoever.

Now the two companies have teamed up again to give the classic Indiana Jones trilogy the tiny toy treatment in the hopes of recapturing the magic and wonder of the first two outings. Have they unearthed yet another treasure, or are they up to their waist in a pit full of snakes? Throw me the whip, and I'll throw you the review roundup.

G4 X-Play
The LEGO games have never been lookers, per se, but they’ve always had solid graphics and, most importantly, a great style accenting the notion of an evilly possessed LEGO play set. Original Adventures definitely continues the trend, delivering the same sort of clean and goofy looking graphics seen in the Star Wars games. Each character’s simple animations deliver a ton of personality, and while the environments are a bit flat, they set the scene well.

GameSpot
Though the puzzle aspects alone are enough to make Lego Indy worthwhile, the humor makes it enjoyable even for people just watching the action. The silent cutscenes take you through the journey in a much sillier manner than Steven Spielberg originally envisioned. No, you won't see the Lost Ark melt some unfortunate Lego person's face, but you will see Indy's father fall asleep (because he's old!) and even the Harrison Ford look-alike donning a blonde wig to deceive a foolish guard.

Eurogamer
Where the game unfortunately suffers is in what's been taken out. It's not entirely fair to compare Indy to the feast of content that was LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga since that was a compilation of sorts, but even compared to the single Star Wars editions this feels disappointingly light on the features that matter once the story mode has been exhausted.

TeamXbox
Lego Indy doesn’t vary much in scope and content from the previous titles that the pair (LucasArts and Traveller's Tales) have worked on, but it’s still a fun game to play and a smart take on the game-from-a-movie process, which more times than not turns out to be lacking in the “game” portion. Most of all, it makes me wonder what they’ll team up on next.

Perhaps they didn't capture all of the magic of the Lego Star Wars series, but a great deal of it made it into Lego Indy.

So how did destiny fare? The game is out, the scores are out, and the word is out on the ambitious first-person shooter. Does Haze deliver a nice, warm buzz, or does it leave you shaking and sweating in the corner, craving your next fix? Here's several small doses of Haze, now in convenient capsule form.

G4 X-Play
Here’s the problem — despite all of the creativity used to build the two sides in this game, Haze still plays like an incredibly average first-person shooter with some very sloppy design issues. Play as a member of the Hand and you feel incredibly naked, not to mention having to deal with very confusing level design that leaves you wandering around lost more than driving any sort of action. Play as a member of Mantel and, unless you’re juiced up, you’re pretty much just as useless.

GameTap
Sure, it has a consistent framerate and no loadtimes (thanks to its four gigabyte install), but its looks vary from "pretty good for an HD-gen shooter" to "wow, look at those textures change from low- to high-res back to low-, and check out those cracks!" The weapon pool is really scant, with just a pistol, assault rifle, sniper rifle, flamethrower, and rocket launcher. Sure, there are Mantel and Promise Hand versions of each weapon, but it realistically translates into the Mantel type looking futuristic while the Promise Hand version looks budget and uses a Spanish name.

CNET
A seven-hour campaign and uneventful multiplayer modes just don't cut it in light of the far better modern shooters available on the market. The patchy quality of the entire package is surprising, considering the developer's fine pedigree. Yet Haze is a roller-coaster ride made up of tall peaks and unfathomable valleys, and it won't leave you so much breathless as disappointed with its squandered potential.

IGN
There is a litany of problems with the game, from the odd warping of allied soldiers that blink into view suddenly at arbitrary checkpoints to poor texture work. Many of the environmental textures are generic and weak, and you'll frequently see seams or tearing constantly pop up within the game, which distracts from the action onscreen. The worst example of this has to be the visuals for the flamethrower, the Dragon de la Gente, which vomits a horrid cone of supposed flame that looks visually on par with what you'd find from the 386 PC days 15 years ago.

Kotaku
There's really no reason to recommend Haze over similar titles in the PS3 library. The game feels less polished than it should, seemingly "good enough" for release after suffering multiple delays. The story is forgettable, the weapons nearly indistinguishable and the seemingly strong concepts so poorly implemented that you'll have a hard time convincing three of your friends to drop whatever else they're playing for a co-op slog through the thing.

I thought I was going crazy over the past year concerning Haze, not seeing what the big deal was all about. I'm still a bit crazy, just not regarding this particular title.

So the question isn't should you play Ikaruga if you haven't. The question is, should you play Ikaruga on XBLA, or should you hunt down a Gamecube or Dreamcast version. Hit the jump for our Frankenreview to find out: it's Ikarugalicious.

Team Xbox
Time and again, the game has gotten high marks with critics as being one of the best looking 2D shooters on the market. ... now, making the jump to the 360, the game looks even better. In 720p HD, everything looks sharp, refined, and runs smooth as silk.

IGN
To truly excel at Ikaruga requires a mastery of the polarity system and a lot of practice...Casual gamers may find themselves overwhelmed and unable to scratch the surface of this classic. That would be a shame, though, as this is easily one of the best titles on the Live Arcade.

CVG
If you have an LCD TV you can flip that bad boy on its side and, in the options screen, flip the gameplay sideways so you get full-screen up-scrolling action (known in the shooter scene as TATE mode). That's how the purists play (and us).

Eurogamer
...whereas once dedicated players would need to import Japanese DVDs of the top players' score runs for tips and techniques, now you simply select their name on the scoreboard and sit back to watch their replay, awestruck. The option to save and upload all replays, combined with co-op play over Xbox Live, makes the definitive version of the game.

At $10, it's the price of two value meals. And cheeseburgers don't taste this good.

But after double-checking with the critics, it appears that I'm definitely in the minority. So hit the jump for our Frankenreview on Super Smash Bros. Brawl—what is pretty much a 5-chapter review of a fanboy wet dream.

GameSpy
From a visual standpoint, Brawl doesn't look much better than Super Smash Bros. Melee did on the GameCube. There is some slight improvement, as you can run the game in 16:9 widescreen format at 480p, and the difference is more noticeable on newer television displays. The real benefit is that everything runs at a silky-smooth 60 frames per second. But outside of the new characters and stages, you'd be hard-pressed to tell this game apart from its GameCube predecessor when viewed side-by-side.

NintendoWorldReport
Hands down, my favorite new thing about Brawl is its stages, which have been upgraded significantly for Brawl and are much more fun than those from Melee. Similar stages have enough differences so as to still feel unique. The levels pulled straight from Nintendo DS games—such as the frantic Pictochat stage—are some of my favorites. There is so much variety in the fighting locations that Melee's stages, some of which are included in Brawl, seem rather boring in comparison.

GamesRadar
Brawl's biggest addition...is Wi-Fi Connection support, and it functions... fairly well. If you're brawling with pals off your Friend Code list, the experience should be generally clean and lag-free. However, our attempts to play random opponents led to more than one unplayable choppy scrap that ended in disconnection. There's also no practical way to communicate with other players, and it's a total pain in the ass to share saved pictures. Apparently swapping 16-digit Friend Codes isn't enough, as you also have to share 12-digit Brawl codes. We'd say this'll get ironed out as the weeks wear on, but Wii's online "presence" has never seemed a priority.

1UP
I encountered some difficulty in putting a score on this game. Do I give it a B+ and say, "But if you're a huge Nintendo fan, add a point?" Or do I give it an A and say, "If you're a less committed fan, drop a point?" The answer was simple: This game was made for Nintendo fans. If you'd like to debate that fact, question whether Joe Schmo in Best Buy, who buys Madden once a year and maybe Halo cares whether or not Saki from Sin and Punishment is an unlockable trophy. As a Nintendo fan, I found great pleasure in unlocking all of the minutiae, in playing with characters that, to me, were unexpected surprises, and in reveling in what is clearly the greatest celebration of Nintendo culture around.

Kotaku
Super Smash Bros. Brawl improves upon its predecessors in every way imaginable - a truly worthy successor to the Nintendo fighting throne...[it] isn't just a game that will sit in your Wii for months, it's a game you'll actually play for months, if not longer. Alright, alright. I'll give in to the masses and pick up a copy.

So what did the critics think of Army of Two? Hit the jump for our Frankenreview on the game—what is inarguably the leading meta review system on Kotaku today.

GameTap
The aggro mechanic, where one player draws attention and hostility and glows red as a result while the other player effectively becomes invisible, sounds really goofy but actually works...It sounds nonsensical and looks pretty goofy, but the visceral feel of one guy tearing through baddies with an unlimited-ammo gun while the other slinks around and ends fools like a ninja is pretty great.
Eurogamer
There's a whole plethora of other co-op mechanics built into the game, and the majority of them are mildly pointless and prosaic in their implementation. Boosting up to high ledges, simultaneous co-op sniping, pre-animated feats of twin strength, and the scripted moments of back-to-back, slow-motion massacre all feel rather forced and flow-breaking.
IGN
[AI] will do what you need it to do for the most part and help you through most missions without major incidents. However, the AI will perform some stupid mistakes here and there, such as dragging you large distances to what it determines to be "safe cover" before healing you...and will sometimes charge blindly into the middle of battle, swinging the momentum its way and leaving it open to be quickly injured or even killed.
Daily Game
Borrowing a page from Gears of War, Army of Two [online multiplayer] goes the route of more-intimate online matches, with four players hopping into games that see two armies of two going up against one another. Like a tactical team-based game, Army of Two includes several objectives within each of its three game types (Warzone, Bounties and Extraction), and although the map choices are limited (four total, based on the campaign), they offer enough diversity that players can switch up their tactics each time out.
Kotaku (360 version)
I've never been a fan of small team shooter match-ups, but Army of Two doesn't just make it work, it makes it sing. Buy it for the chance to head butt your enemies to death in a custom mask, keep it because you're not going to want to give up on the ability to drag and heal, distract enemies with gunfire and use car doors to block bullets on the move. Whether or not the game is going to rattle the industry, it looks like a pretty fun co-op shooter.

Oh, and apparently it's amazingly good.

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview on Patapon—every review you need to read before deciding that it's time to dust off that PSP after all.

Game Almighty
Your band of Patapon are controlled by issuing commands, which are nothing more than rhythm-based drumming performed with the four main PSP buttons. Want to move your Patapon forward? Press square-square-square-circle. Want to attack? Press circle-square-square-circle. Your ability to maintain perfect rhythm while issuing a variety of commands is the essence of Patapon. Now add to this mix that you have three types of Patapon, including close-combat axe-wielders, mid-range spear-throwers, and long-range archers and you now have strategic elements to consider...
GameDaily
It might sound a bit burdensome, especially if you don't usually get your kicks from strategy games, but this is not a game that gets bogged down in the details. You will have to do some management between levels, but the interface is clean and fun to use. Furthermore, the battles themselves are a delight, and using music to perform all of the commands is such a unique and enjoyable experience that just about anyone can get into it.
Variety
While music is the blood of "Patapon," the game's art direction, which combines cartoon silhouettes with a shadow-puppet look at times, helps make it captivating. The screen fills with these little one-eyed creatures as a gamer progresses through 30 levels, culminating in sweeping battles that are nearly as fun to watch as they are to orchestrate.
GameSpy
Patapon is like a cleverly designed trojan horse, built to sucker you in with cute graphics and then beat you down with its primal, rhythmic challenge. It's great fun, but you may find it tough to actually play the game on the go considering the amount of attention it requires.

GameSpot
Patapon is unlike any game that has come before it, and with a retail price that's half of what many PSP games sell for, our recommendation of this ingenious recipe that has been masterfully realized is a no-brainer.
It's good to see software titles that do the PSP's excellent hardware some justice. At $20, it seems like a must-buy.

But it's been 7 years since the first game's incarnation, and Dante has been subverted by a remarkably similar looking chap sporting a glowy blue arm. So how does the series hold up? Hit the jump for our Frankenreview of Devil May Cry 4—because the suspense is killing you.

GameDaily
As for presentation, it's simply jaw-dropping. The visuals are absolutely spectacular throughout Devil May Cry 4, bursting with exquisite details. Whether you're storming the rooftop of an ice castle, fighting your way through underground caverns or slashing your way through a tropical jungle, they really come alive better than any current-gen Capcom effort we've seen. Occasionally, there is some slight flicker and slowdown, but this never dwindles the quality of the graphics.

1UP
Nero offers a remarkably different style of play thanks to the Devil Bringer, his demonically enhanced right arm. Its various uses include tossing foes around, pulling off unique finishing moves, and grappling across ...Devil May Cry has always rewarded pinpoint timing, and the Red Queen reconfirms that commitment with its brilliant "Instant Rev" mechanic that dishes out maximum damage by perfectly timing a button press during a combo. It's a seemingly insubstantial, purely optional gameplay addition that deepens combat immeasurably.

VideoGamer
Getting to a boss or a mini-boss demon and seeing what happens when you grapple them is what keeps Nero's combat interesting through the first play through. We won't spoil anything for you, but Nero brutally pummels one of the bosses during a mission about half way through the game in an attack that ends with a super-slow motion punch to the face that'll have you wincing every time you see it. This is what the DMC games are all about - over-the-top, brutal, Japanese-style violence. And we love it.

Xbox World
While the mechanics of the game aren't problematic in the least, a lot of gamers may have an issue with camera placement. Capcom has kept the same detached camera system in use for many of its staple franchises - for dramatic effect. Inexplicably, however, it also sought to break the 180º rule at every turn, literally, which means that with every cut to a new camera angle, you will find your running direction reversed, causing unnecessary frustration.

Eurogamer
There are other areas where the gameplay feels old - like the way you're penned into a predetermined area to fight demons, which respawn upon your return but with no requirement to fight them other than as a means to harvest more of the game's currency. Elsewhere, the accessibility doesn't extend to keeping you informed as to what to do or where to go next, so you're left to wander around until you find an arbitrary object...When it does things like this, it just feels like a high-def re-skin of a 2001 game design.I really wasn't a fan when I tried it out at TGS. The whole thing just felt like more of the same, but evidently that's what people want.

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview, victory lap 2007 edition. We pulled reviewers' top rated games* from Game Rankings to relive some of our best moments from the year.

Note, on repeat games, we picked the higher ranking platform.

Super Mario Galaxy (Wii) - Gamespy
Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a winner. Super Mario Galaxy represents the Nintendo Wii's best release to date, and takes the tried-and-tested formula from Super Mario 64 and Sunshine to a new level of perfection. It's the single best reason for naysayers to finally take the hardware plunge

The Orange Box (Xbox 360) - Gaming Age
If one thing is certain, there is not one game out there that offers such a complete package at the regular retail price of a single game. You get 5 outstanding games that give you a little bit of everything, action, story, puzzles, multiplayer, and just flat out addictive content...you would be doing yourself, gamers, and the wonderful developers a great injustice by not buying The Orange Box. Not only is it possibly the best bargain in gaming history, but arguably the best FPS experience of all time...

Bioshock (Xbox 360) - Jolt
Even when vastly outnumbered and outgunned, BioShock puts mania before mere survival...yet, that fear of an impending death never fades. The feeling of being watched, of being used, of being nothing but a pawn, balances perfectly with the game's no-holds-barred approach to combat. It's this mixture of ambience, emotion and plain old fun that sets BioShock apart from the scores of FPSes hitting the shelves this year...it is one of the most progressive, gripping and downright fun games to hit the market in the last decade.

COD4 (Xbox 360) - Eurogamer
...all you really need to know is this a huge return to form for the Call of Duty series, and for war-based FPS titles in general. Even without the vastly impressive multiplayer elements, Modern Warfare would be worth buying for its outstanding single-player campaign. It succeeds not only for being consistently spectacular, but for the way it has been crafted into something that keeps you engaged right to the very end.

Halo 3 (Xbox 360) - 1UP
Halo 3's campaign is better in every way imaginable. Subtly beautiful, rich and lush graphics, a heart-pounding orchestrated score, new weapons, vehicles, and enemies...and even better enemy and teammate A.I... Sure, no one aspect of the game is life-changing on its own, but perhaps the package as a whole is. After all, Halo 3 has enough content to keep you stuck to your controller for weeks, if not months or even years. Looks like we won't be finishing the fight anytime soon after all.

Good times. Did we really play that many FPSs this year...on the Xbox 360 no less? [image]

Now NiGHTS has come back to the masses on the Wii in NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams. So does its predecessor live up to expectations? Hit the jump for our Frankenreview: every thing you need to know about everything that is this one particular game.

GameTap
You can play Journey with several configurations. Each of them has a steep learning curve, but the remote-only setup will wear down your patience and send little kids crying to their mommas. It's just too tough to keep the remote cursor steady enough that it doesn't skitter around the atmosphere as you try to guide Nights past obstacles. Better to attach a nunchuk or plug-in a classic controller or even a GameCube controller, where the analog joystick eventually rewards your persistent thumb work with fairly smooth flying.
GameSpot
Visually speaking, Journey of Dreams is deliciously vibrant. Each dream world is unique and colorful without veering from the overall art design. From beautiful underwater vistas to a busy carnival complete with exploding fireworks, environments are created with painstaking care. Nights is smoothly animated, though in the ground levels, the children don't move as fluidly. Cutscenes are also well done and often poignant, thanks to expressive facial animations. You will encounter frequent moments where the frame rate dips a tad, but it doesn't usually get in the way of smooth flight.
1UP
This time, you assume the roles of William and Helen, two new tykes sucked into the dreamworld of Nightopia in order to better cope with the very modern pressure of living with unloving, often-absent parents. Unfortunately, you'll actually get to know these kids a little too intimately, thanks to an overabundance of heavy-handed, talky cut-scenes that assault the eyes (and ears) with amateurish production values. We definitely liked Nights when he/she was an enigmatic, laconic benefactor 10 years ago...now that it's more of a corny purple Mary Poppins that won't shut up, we're considerably less enamored.GameZone
More than half of Journey of Dreams' stages are worth playing through multiple times. Unfortunately, there are a few stages that you won't care to revisit. It's not that they're significantly bad, but they're not much fun either. They lack the excitement and awe-inspiring feeling that the rest of the game offers.
IGN
You'll also find odd sections of loading that don't bring up screens or icons at all, instead keeping the screen fully white or black for upwards of 15 seconds with no explanation. If it wasn't for the music playing in that background we would have assumed the game was frozen. This lack of overall polish can be found in virtually any area...
It looks fairly passable unless you are a big NiGHTS fan, though Wii owners who've beaten Super Mario Galaxy may be looking for something new.

PSExtreme
The most important thing about Unreal Tournament III is its speed. Where as UT2004 felt heavy and a little on the clunky side, Unreal Tournament III feels lean, and mean, and frenetic. Even though the speed of the game was slightly slowed down for the PlayStation 3 version (meaning, the players run a little slower), the intensity is still chaotic

1UP
Playing with the Sixaxis controller quickly erased any concerns about whether the game would struggle without the traditional PC mouse-and-keyboard setup. The default stick response errs on the little-too-slow side to keep from being spastic for the average user, but it can be dialed up to as twitchy as you like.

GameDaily
If it is multiplayer action you crave, then Unreal Tournament has it in spades. Team Deathmatch, Deathmatch and Capture the Flag are obvious favorites, but the new Duel and Warpath modes are real attention getters. With Duel, you face off against an opponent on a smaller map, resulting in a more intimate battle. Warpath involves some strategy, as you must capture and shut down enemy nodes in order to make their energy core vulnerable. Although the multiplayer support is only half of what the PC version handles (ten to sixteen in comparison to thirty-two), the PS3 edition is still lots of fun.

GameZone
The biggest change, and the one that affected me the most [from UT2004], was the removal of the adrenaline counter. I didn't know prior to playing UT3 that Epic had removed it, so it came as a big surprise not to have it included in UT3. In the past, the adrenaline counter permitted players to build up the meter through the means of kills or picking up items on the map to gain access to abilities such as invisibility, but with it removed, it felt like a little part of my soul died. [Ed note: having hated that adrenaline meter, we're thrilled.]

The Orange Box
IGN
Even in Portal, a short title that often requires a little trial and error, this problem is massive. The 360 version takes about three seconds to load your last checkpoint if you die. The PS3 version takes seventeen. It hurts.

GameSpy
Voice chat, especially over Bluetooth, has problems...Although EA has implemented some fine options for testing out your headset in-game (negating the archaic practice of exiting to the XMB to make adjustments), it's a bit of a moot point. We tested out three different Bluetooth headsets (including the Jabra packaged with Warhawk and a USB headset) and nothing seemed to work.

Kotaku
There are some other unusual hitches [in TF2], such as a brief pause as your character goes underwater and a visible delay in the launching of the Demoman's grenades. Game-killing bugs these are not, but serious players will most likely find themselves cursing their PS3s when one of these idiosyncrasies leads to their death...

GameDaily
Valve blends its older games with newer content, delivering an essential bundle only a fool would ignore, unless said fool demands the best version.

I'll be picking up UT3 this week. What about you?

So how was it? Hit the jump for our Frankenreview and find out: 5 muffin tops ready for ingestion.

IGN
You'll notice some slowdown issues when things get hectic, and the techno audio and sound effects often fight, having audio levels not always equalized as we'd like them...[but] the colors are still bright, however, and these remain to be some of the best particle effects we've seen on Nintendo's handheld, so while DS is the smallest piece of technology Geometry Wars has ever existed on, it still hold on to the spirit of the game very well.

GameDaily
You move your ship with the D-pad while touching parts of the screen to direct your line of fire. You can also use the face buttons for directional fire, if you prefer a more "old-school" method of play, ala Robotron 2084. The shoulder buttons activate whatever bombs you may need — and you'll definitely need them. Messing around with both the D-pad and the touch-screen takes getting used to, but it's a surprisingly functional control scheme.

Gamespy
Called "geoms," Galaxies' widgets are the game's most interesting gameplay shift...Anytime you kill an enemy with your gun, or your drone kills an enemy, the enemy drops a small yellow geom. Geom gathering forces rethinks of classical circle-strafe Geometry Wars tactics. Various stages filled with walls, mazes and other strangeness will also force you to rethink your routes, but the geoms demand that you actually go, and go quickly, right where you've cleared some enemies

GamesRadar
Fans will notice a significant drop in the amount of cursing and angry restarts that follow deaths. After you die, extra Geoms to unlock new levels or Drones are waiting for you in the menu, and leveling up your collection of Drones or testing your skills in some of the more challenging levels breaks through the monotony of its predecessors one-level grind.

Gamer 2.0
Geometry Wars: Galaxies is the definition of portable fun. Are the graphics great? No. Is the sound revolutionary? Probably not. Does the game make use of online play? No to that as well. But the bottom line here is that it gets the job done and it does what handheld games are essentially supposed to do.

Anyone pick it up yet? What do you think?

But Uncharted ended up being pretty good after all. Hit the jump for our Frankenreview: the full story on Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. Well, not the full story. We're not spoiling the game or anything. Or will we...

IGN
Uncharted does what few titles manage — it completely immerses you in its experience. From the moment the game begins with a sweeping camera move through the waters off Panama, a rich score and the words of Sir Francis Drake etched on screen, Uncharted will have you hooked. It'll maintain that hold with its story, style and gameplay.
GamerNode
...the characters in Uncharted are awesome. I thought Heavenly Sword was an anomaly, being a game rivaling most films in terms of voice acting and dialog, but Ratchet & Clank and now Uncharted have proven to me that it wasn't. Whether you hate the PS3 or not, you can't deny that a lot of the big titles do a great job in the voice acting and dialog department
TotalPlaystation
For a game that is really quite front-loaded with combat, you would think it could have felt a little more satisfying. Maybe it's a byproduct of this fancy-schmancy animation system that calculates and layers multiple pre-set animations on the fly, but the bullets never seemed to smack home with enough force (excepting the way a shotgun or a desert eagle could send someone flying 10 feet, mind you)...
1UP
Almost all of the handful or so of puzzles require you to crack open old-man Drake's diary for a hit-you-over-the-head solution. Think turning statues to the four compass points or rotating some rotting engravings...
Variety
At first blush it would be easy to compare Nathan Drake, the treasure-hunting star of Sony's new adventure videogame "Uncharted," with "Tomb Raider's" Lara Croft. But Drake leaves Lara in the dust, delivering the Indiana Jones experience better than gamers have ever seen it before...Anybody pick it up yet?

GameSpy
Super Mario Galaxy's graphics are out of this world. We've not seen such a beautifully vibrant game on the Wii. The strong use of bold colors married with the better-than-expected texturing makes for a great-looking game. It runs, as expected, very well at 480p in a 16:9 apsect ratio, and while a small part of us aches for a 720/1080p version of the game, we'll take what we can get. There's nothing else on the system that looks this good...
NintendoWorldReport
...the pseudo-linearity, aided by the automatic camera, makes it possible for the game to go back to its 2-D platforming roots rather than the wide-open, but less interesting seek-and-find nature of prior games. Occasionally, a handful of Star Shards must be collected to progress, but there is nothing approaching the tediousness of the blue coin collecting in Super Mario Sunshine. Players will absolutely want to collect all of the Power Stars.
GameSpot
It helps that practically every stage in the game has a great deal of replayability purely on its own merits. These levels are just inherently fun to go back to again and again...comets will enter orbit in some of these galaxies, and thus change the way you play in some bizarre way. Whether it's speeding up all the enemies in an area, putting you on a timed run, or having you race against a doppelganger Mario, there's a nice variety of change-ups to experience.
CVG
Galaxy also plays around with gravity and physics like no Mario game before it. You'll flip gravity to navigate giant block mazes, use a planet's gravity to propel yourself to a new platform and shoot into the stars...no matter where you run or jump gravity will twist and pull you towards the planet, allowing you to run all the way around it and even jump to other planets by hopping into their gravitational pull... It's not as revolutionary as Mario 64, but it certainly re-defines what we expect from a 3D platformer.
Eurogamer
It's simply an explosion of inventiveness - a total rejection of the cookie-cutter. There's almost no way of knowing when you go into a level what it's going to look like, what you'll need to do, or how long it will take. One star will be a cheeky diversion, the next a five-stage epic of delight and adventure.Hmm...what can you say to all these near perfect reviews? Something cheesy. Like, Houston, your Mario Galaxy has landed on the Wii. No, actually that's horrible. But we'll leave it up as an example of what never to say when talking about the game.

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview of COD4—the only review you'll ever need of the game before deciding, yes, it's a must-play and, no, you're never joining the Armed Forces.

Atomic Gamer
ew games have captured the detail level of a modern-day Middle Eastern city, at least when compared to photos from over there, but Call of Duty 4 does that well. And its depictions of snowy Russian rural areas - including a trip to Pripyat, the city which housed many of the people working at Chernobyl - are very convincing and do a great job to immerse you.
Gamespy
CoD4's mechanics are superb. The sense of aiming down your gun's barrel and unloading a full clip into an enemy feels perfect. The sense of impact behind a well-placed shot or three and the sense of danger as you try to bail out of the blast radius of a frag grenade is amazing.

TotalVideoGames
The inclusion of a time limit to several of the missions introduces a sense of pace and urgency to the proceedings, whilst occasionally a challenge that has no bearing on the success or failure of the mission becomes apparent, such as a split-second chance to save a citizen from execution.
UGO
The online multiplayer mode in Call of Duty 4 is unparalleled thanks to one enormously simple concept: Infinity Ward dangles so many unlockable carrots that you simply have to keep playing to see them all. Leveling up is nothing new for online gaming, but things are taken a step further in Modern Warfare as higher levels unlock access to additional weapons, Perks...and rulesets. In all, there are six basic game modes spread across 13 types of matches and 16 differently-sized maps inspired by the single player campaign's missions.
1UP
Call of Duty is one of those roller coaster-type games, where you sit back and let the game guide you down one hopefully thrilling path. But the trick to pulling off a successful linear shooter is breaking the player away from the rails every so often...Moonlight rescue missions, frontal assaults and panicked extractions, sniper infiltrations and assassinations, ambushes and support roles, small teams and big squads...
The recurring theme throughout the reviews was a constantly varied style of gameplay that kept COD4 from falling into the ho hum FPS trap.

While Rock Band won't be on store shelves for a few weeks, we do have at least 50% of the equation to ignite the flame wars. So hit the jump for our Frankenreview of the Harmonixless Guitar Hero III—all the answers to all of life's problems in five short paragraphs.

PlanetXbox360
Some veterans of the series may think that the buttons on their new guitar are sticking but that is actually a gameplay feature that Neversoft included to help new gamers feel comfortable in the series. The time limit to hit the correct key has been increased by what feels like a good bit of time, now hitting those impossible guitar solos is much easier. At first I felt like the game was too easy but the developers helped offset this issue by amping up the actual song difficulty.

Yahoo
The new guitar (we tried the wireless Les Paul that comes with the 360) feels a lot sturdier, with crisp precise controls and a suitably tense whammy bar. The detachable face plate will allow for some slick customization for people who aren't content with stickers. And being able to detach the neck will make it much easier to bring your controller to a friend's house...Give us this solidly built wireless guitar, Activision, and we won't begrudge you the extra profit.

OpposableThumbs
This is the first Guitar Hero game to venture online, and it's about time. While the face-offs and battles I've been able to participate in have been fun and largely lag-free, you're forced to search for your own games: the quick match option that is supposed to allow you to jump into a game quickly is completely broken....Also keep in mind that the co-op career mode, complete with exclusive unlockable songs, is offline only. That means that if you want to play these songs (and you will), you'll need a friend with a second guitar and time to unlock them with you.
GamesSpot
It's...disappointing that Activision has finally decided to corporate up the Guitar Hero experience with a fair amount of lame product placement and dynamic in-game advertising. It's one thing to get branded guitars and get Guitar Center to sponsor your in-game shop— it's quite another to have several of the game's environments feature billboards that display ads dynamically, and logos for Pontiac and Axe Body Spray that pop up all over the place. It even goes so far as to have Axe-sponsored guitars you can buy in-game, and Axe-sponsored go-go dancers prancing about the stage while you play. Gross.

GamesRadar
By going real with the songs, next-gen with the graphics and online with the gameplay, it leaves the wishlist relatively barren. At the same time, it's not delivering us much new on the gameplay front, and in fact lags a bit in terms of smart strumming mechanics.
The most noticeable difference to me in Guitar Hero III (and Rock Band, for that matter) has to be the hefty amounts of original studio dubs. I never had issues with playing covers before I'd experienced something better. And now it's really hard to go back.

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview; this week we did something special and only included reviewers that had "game" or some amalgamation of such in the title. That's for you, Insomniac. Live it up.

GameZone
The new Ratchet & Clank title, Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, is every bit as compelling visually as the high-end Hollywood animated features. Take anything from Dreamworks or Pixar, and compare them and you will find that ToD is a visual feast that rivals them. The major difference is, of course, that when you watch one of those films, that is all you are doing ...you are an integral part of the event.
GameDaily
The voice work is up to Insomniac's usual standards, filled with personality and hardly any dead spots...The dialogue is still hilarious, even with the random chatter that plays in the background. On top of this, the music works on a rhythm all its own. The tempo changes constantly depending on what's happening on-screen. What sounds easygoing at first soon bursts with romping energy. It's a terrific soundtrack, one with great unpredictability.
GamingAge
Whether it is a (optionally) motion control-enabled tornado launcher, a kick ass electric whip, or viscous little plasma beast capsules, nearly all the weapons are fun to use and required to be utilized throughout the game.... This is by far Insomniac's best selection of weapons and gadgets yet, although I have to say they are probably a little too good. By spending a few extra minutes exploring the stages and collecting raritanium and bolts, weapons can be upgraded to ridiculously powerful levels, even early on in the game.

GamerNode
Just about every minigame utilizes the Sixaxis controls (unless you count Clank's couple of solo runs). I know what you're thinking: "Sixaxis controls! Oh no!" but in all honesty, they're done well in this game. Nothing really takes you out of the flow; you do things such as control Ratchet as you halo jump from a ship or glide through the air, slide a ball around a circuit to hack electronics a la Bioshock, and cut holes in walls, and all in the midst of gameplay.

GameAlmighty
Whereas earlier installments of the Ratchet and Clank series offered a range of single player and online multiplayer modes, Tools of Destruction hones in on its solo experience with just a story-driven campaign. Dropping multiplayer negatively impacts the game's long-term value; however, focusing purely on the campaign has resulted in a level of quality that easily surpasses any previous iteration.
Yes everyone, it looks like Ratchet & Clank Future is every bit as good as we'd hoped.

And when we finally laid our eyes on the 93 ton, 700+ year-old statue Flynn said, "Never in my life did I think I'd see this. I remember rolling it up in Katamari..." It was a special moment.

Hit the jump for our Frankenreview on Beautiful Katamari for the Xbox 360: every review you ever need on a game from a franchise famous for rolling up the Great Buddha.

Gamespot
Beautiful Katamari doesn't look much like an Xbox 360 game. If anything, it looks like the PS2 game engine upscaled to the brink of exploding...we hoped for visuals that represented some kind of significant advance over those in previous games. The world and things that dwell within it just look kind of fuzzy up close, and while there are plenty of colorful backdrops and square-shaped people, again, all of it seems ripped right out of the PS2 games.

Gamepro
Beautiful Katamari suffers from some of the same goofs that plagued the other titles. You'll still get stuck in tight spots because the camera swiveled behind a wall or table, co-op control still amounts to pretending you share a single uncomfortable body with a twin, and a few of the levels are filled with frustrating opportunities to abruptly end your hard-won progress because you ran over the wrong item.

Gametap
...for Mars, you've got to roll up a katamari that hits 10,000 degrees. The katamari is continually getting cooler, and if you roll up cold things, the temperature goes down even more quickly. And then there are the environment hazards to watch out for, like those panicked fireman who might throw water on you and put out the katamari completely. It's a fun new twist on the katamari levels.

Gameinformer
This installment is also void of the wacky human-based story, and the King of All Cosmos seems to be bored and doesn't have the witty one-liners you know him for.
1up
The big addition to this Xbox 360-exclusive title is online versus play (as well as some future downloadable content and online leaderboards). Here you jump in a match with three others and compete to nab the most of a certain item in the given time. The big change-up from single-player action is the addition of a lock-on button that allows you to target opponents before dashing into them, knocking items off for the taking. This mode offers nothing more than forgettable fun, though, at best...
Hmm, I really hoped for this to be an HD feast for your eyes, even if the mechanic was getting a bit stale. Sounds like a pass if you've played the games before and aren't craving more Katamari.

So hit the jump for our Frankenreview on the newest Zelda title—offering almost enough time savings for you to finish school, get a job, become rich, buy the game and retire early to play it—because you don't need to click around and fight all the ads.

Eurogamer
Phantom Hourglass follows the events of the GameCube's Wind Waker, and does an unbelievably successful job of aping its visual style too, wisely focusing on creating expressive and beautifully-animated characters rather than effects, or environmental detail. As happy as most fans were to see Twilight Princess revive Ocarina's epic mood, the immense charm and polish of Wind Waker's art deserved better than the scrap heap, and so it's a delight to see it continued here.

CVG
Controlling Link with the stylus is like riding a bike without holding the handlebars: you know it can be done, but at first you might worry that it's just a stupid thing to do. It's not. Stylus control of Link is a very cool thing. Say sayonara to the d-pad, then, and embrace the technology that makes Phantom Hourglass the most enjoyable Zelda game since Ocarina of Time.

GameLife
Hold the stylus anywhere on the screen, and Link will run in that direction. Tap an enemy and Link will rush forward and attack it. Slash back and forth and he'll swing his sword in a wide arc...You can also draw on the game's map, perfect for plotting your ship's course at sea or making notes about places of interest you might want to return to later. And simple actions like throwing a boomerang become novel again when you're drawing the path that it will take, directly on the screen.

Variety
In some cases, gamers are asked to unearth buried treasures by plotting intersections on a map. In others, the game relies on more devious brain twisters, one of which even involves hidden numbers and the use of cryptology. There's occasional repetition in the dungeons and at least two cases in which the puzzles are so complex that finding their answers seems more about luck than honest intellect. But overall, this "Zelda" game succeeds by keeping players' mind fully engaged.

Gamespy
One of the most satisfying reasons to explore hidden parts of the world is to find some of the many ship parts you can customize your vessel with. From your bridge to your cannon, you can take the ship to the shipyard and see just what kind of super-vessel you can come up with...Salvaging treasure from the bottom of the sea is represented by a simple mini-game that can be frustrating, since failure requires sailing back to the dock to get your salvage arm fixed, but is a nice diversion to have.

- Looks like it's a keeper. Now to finish Bioshock, Metroid, and Halo 3...this list is getting heavy and it's barely October.

Hit the jump for our Frankenreview on Halo 3: you know, finish the reading.

TeamXbox
Perhaps more than anything, we were particularly blown away by the scope and scale of the environments. The Halo series has always been known for its grand scale, and Halo 3 only makes things that much bigger and better. You won't be spending hours exploring underground complexes or anything here, as the development team decided to focus their attention on creating rich, immersive worlds...we're happy to report that Halo 3 is not only the best game of the series, it's the best Xbox 360 game to date.
Eurogamer
It's not that the game is ugly - well, aside from the human faces perhaps, which look flat and unnatural and are the most obvious relics of the last generation here...It's just that, compared to games like last year's Gears of War, Halo 3 is an underachiever in graphical terms - but to our minds, any negative here is easily cancelled out by the joy of high framerates, no loading delays and an almost complete lack of any graphical glitches. It may not be gold, but it's the most perfectly polished silver we've seen.

Gamer2.0
...is it any big surprise that Halo 3 isn't able to live up to the insane expectations? Not really...[but] one thing that's still fresh in this third installment is the gameplay itself. It's much smoother and more streamlined than in the previous titles. There is more of a super soldier feeling with your controls (you can also tell now that you are clearly taller than everybody else). Weapons are balanced well and nothing seems to be too far off from their beta counterparts.
IGN
Let's get the Arbiter clear. He's the bad ass "Chief" of the Elites. He should be able to handle his own. In the campaign, the Arbiter and Master Chief are BFF. If you play alone, the AI takes control of the Arbiter and allows him to tag along. Enjoy watching your supposed equal getting shot in the face repeatedly and generally making himself utterly useless. What is the point of sticking you with an AI compatriot if all he's good at is respawning...it would have been nice to see such a prominent storyline from Halo 2 have more weight in the cinematic telling of Halo 3.

1UP
Where Halo 3 does surprise, however, is...stuff that may not seem like that big a deal on a bulleted list on the back of a box...Forge is a map editor, not a map creator — you don't craft any levels or alter their geometry; you only modify the contents within them. The Halo 3 difference, however, is you can actually play scored multiplayer games while doing so. This leads to all sorts of impromptu madness, like matches that simulate sports (try playing baseball with Gravity Hammers and Rocket Launchers), free-for-alls where new weapons and powers are constantly materializing out of thin air, or...well, you should just experiment with this mode to see al