Wii Fit Plus isn’t really a sequel — it’s sold separately without the Balance Board for those that already own it — it’s actually an expansion pack which includes the original games and workouts, and even transfers your data from the old game. This is pretty slick, meaning that you won’t have to swap the new and old Wii Fit disc. Wii Fit Plus features 15 new work out mini games and six strength training and Yoga workouts, and this time, you can mix and match your workouts as you see fit.

If you’re familiar with Wii Fit, you’ll feel right at home, the same slick, colorful user interface is present in Plus, and the “gameplay” is virtually the same, meaning it also includes some of the few drawbacks that the original had, most noticeably, sluggish response from the Balance Board. But this doesn’t happen too often, it it won’t affect your game too much. Multiplayer wise, there’s the same offline, turn based multiplayer where you compete on who can do the exercise the fastest way or get the best score. However, there is no online multiplayer, which again, is disappointing from Nintendo. Someone needs to go to Kyoto and check if those guys know about this thing called “The Internet”. Wii Fit with online multiplayer and leaderboards would make the game so much better, but again, as noted, Nintendo disappoints on that level.

The 15 new balance games and six new exercises are very well put together and will make sure you end up using your entire body after going through them. From Kung-Fu, where you have to sync your movements to a group of fighters on the screen, to Skateboarding, where you turn the Balance Board sideways and steer a skateboarder through an arena. But the best mini game by far is Golf, which not only uses the Balance Board, but also the Wiimote, and gives some of the most accurate golfing experiences ever — you’ll definitely improve your swing here.

Wii Fit Plus will satisfy fans of Wii Fit, with the new mini games and exercises will bring enough to do for a while, and the expanded abilities to manage and plan your workouts are quite detailed and pretty deep for a “casual” game. However, there is still no online multiplayer, which is a shame.

The Good:
Plenty of new games
Cheap
More depth than before
Includes the original Wii Fit games

The Bad:
Balance Board can get sluggish
No online multiplayer or leaderboards

Overall score: 8/10

You’ll notice right away that NBA Live 2010 does improve on a few things quite drastically, like the presentation. The visuals have received an overhaul, everything from the animations to the crowd and the stadiums look great, the player models however, while improved over last year’s edition, still lack behind in detail and realism compared to NBA 2K10, but overall, it’s still a pretty game. Gameplay wise, the action is definitely more fluid, and while some animations can seem out of place, it’s still better than last year. However, it’s not about being better than last year, where NBA Live 09 was virtually the low point of the series the past few years. Instead, it’s about how the gameplay compares to the rival NBA 2K10. The Live counterpart does have a more fluid play, but the 2K version seems far more immersive, mainly due to the realistic look and feel of it. However, NBA Live 2010 does feature a lot simpler gameplay, a lot easier to get a hold of, and you’re only using one button to shoot, regardless whether it’s a dunk or layout, jump shot or hook shot. However, this too has its flaws, as your player will often do something else than you intended. If you’re looking for a short jumper, the player on screen might take a hook shot if the defender is too close to him, and thereby take a much tougher shot when a simple one would have done the job.

NBA Live 2010 once again features Dynamic DNA, which updates players stats and rating every day, based on their real life performance. This is also added to the dynamic season mode, where you can play any of the real world games on that particular day, while the rest of the games will receive the stats according to the real game results. However, as cool as that is, you can’t manage a team, you can’t control any aspects of it, nor can you use your own created player. You’re basically thrown into the game, as if it was a random exhibition. We would have loved for EA to fuse his with the regular franchise mode, which would make for a compelling experience.

Multiplayer wise, the game has the same features as last year, with the addition of “Live Run”, actually, it’s called “Adidas Live Run” (dammed be product placement), where you’re put together with 9 other players online for a match in a training gym, where each player wears slightly different clothes, just as it would be if you got together with 9 buddies at the local basketball court. While this feature is great, however, most of the time it’s utter chaos, as everyone is looking to shoot the ball and no one is passing, and everyone is rushing after the ball and rebounds. It’s like a group of unorganized 7 year-olds playing for the first time, but it’s still a lot of fun, especially if you can find a few teammates that pass the ball once in a while.

Overall, NBA Live 2010 is a noticeable improvement over last year, however, it’s still comes short in certain aspects. The gameplay, presentation and features are a little notch lower than on NBA 2K10, so if you’re in for basketball this holiday season (and the upcoming NBA season), we recommend 2K10.

The Good:
Noticeable improvement over last year
Dynamic DNA is great
Live Run mode is a lot of fun
Good multiplayer

The Bad:
Too much product placement
Occasional AI issues
Not much depth
Lacking commentary

Overall score: 7/10

When booting up a game of 2K10, you’ll immediately notice that the gameplay has received a notch upwards, and that there are now a slew of new animations, all contributing to life-like, realistic players on the court. The player models themselves are the best the series has ever seen, as everything from clothes to skin, to facial animations have been rendered almost perfectly, besides one thing; the jerseys the players are wearing. Usually, they seem to “pop up”, as if resting on an invisible cushion on the player, giving them a very odd look. But overall, those are minor details.

The gameplay is smooth for the most part, but once a lot of players clog together, like in the paint, for instance; going for a rebound, the game features some serious slowdowns at times, chugging along in a single-digit frame rate. 2K Sports has promised a patch regarding this issue, so we’ll see how that turns out later on. A few other issues plague the game as well, from player animations that bring the ball back over half-court (resulting in a back-court violation) for no reason, to doing the wrong kind of pass or shoot. The low post play can be frustrating in particular, especially when playing with your back to the basket. However, one thing that has been greatly improved over last year’s edition, is the commentary, which now seems a lot more fluid and conversational, and the commentators will factor in the latest real life games in order to give a more natural commentary. It’s definitely a welcomed feature, and works great.

The new career mode, called “my player mode”, let’s you create a player, but this time, you go from a complete unknown, fighting your way through training camps, to development leagues, to the draft and finally, to the NBA. Fans of this kind of feature won’t get disappointed, as it’s very comprehensive and offers plenty of gameplay value. However, it’s not without its fault, as your player will often get penalized on his ratings and progress for no reason at all.

Technically, the game looks great, everything from player animations to the crowd and the bench all seem to fit perfectly, with the exception of the occasional frame rate issues. The soundtrack and commentary are great as well, the commentary in particular is the best the series has seen so far. The multiplayer is just as solid as the last few years, with online matchmaking and lobbies that will fit everyone from the newbies to the pros. Fans of the series won’t be disappointed, especially if 2K Sports fulfills its promise of fixing the issues.

The Good:
Great gameplay
Best commentary yet
Solid multiplayer

The Bad:
Occasional frame-rate issues
Some AI issues
Annoying product placement

Overall score: 8/10

Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising takes place in a fictional Russian island that has been invaded by the Chinese, and the single-player campaign follows you and your squad as you fight your way through the island, re-taking it. The 11 missions are well made and thought out, but they’re fairly tough, so don’t expect to beat every level on the first try, even on the lowest difficulty setting. The missions are also rather lengthy, and will take you anywhere between 30 mins to a whole hour to complete, depending on your skills.

The missions take place out doors, spanning over a large area, and objectives will be thrown at you as you advance. There are vehicles in the game, but some are close to impossible to control, like helicopters. It seems completely illogical to take “realism” to that level, and flat out make certain aspects of the game impossible, like controlling a helicopter. This frustration pop up in different aspects of the game as well, all related to it being too “realistic”, as in too “unplayable”. The enemy AI is good, and will give you enough of a challenge, the friendly AI however, is rather dumb, as your teammates will often ruin your stealthy approach. And even worse, they’ll often get in the line of fire.

The multiplayer portion of the game consists of co-op, where you can play the campaign with three friends, and a dedicated versus multiplayer feature, with classic modes such as Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch and so on. It’s also possible to have a squad of 3 AI teammates in multiplayer, however, the AI issues from the single player campaign carry over, so you’re not any better of. On the whole though, the multiplayer part seems polished and is quite entertaining.

Technically, the game looks great, and is very similar to Battlefield Bad Company, sans the destruction. The outdoor environment is rendered well, and everything seems to be realistic, again, sans destruction. The audio is great as well, and the mission briefings are short and to the point. However, we did experience a few bugs and hiccups with the game, including frame rate issues. In all, the game can be recommended to hard core shooter fans who crave for realism, but for everyone else, it’s a notch too realistic, often resulting in sheer frustration. The single player campaign is well made and the quality of the story and structure is welcomed, the multiplayer likewise is decent, but again, if you’re not into realistic combat sims like Arma, you’re in for a lot of frustration.

The Good:
Good campaign
Realistic

The Bad:
Some realistic aspects ruin the gameplay
Occasional bugs and glitches
Some vehicles are downright unplayable
AI has issues at times

Overall score: 6/10

Forza 3 offers 400 cars and 100 tracks, all built from scratch with a brand new game engine. Remember Forza 2, how the cars all had “jagged edges” because of no anti aliasing? Well that’s gone, as the cars are beautifully rendered (Turn 10 claims 10 times more polygons than Forza 2 per car, with full damage modeling as well) and the game runs at a constant 60 frames per second. technically, things are certainly looking good. The gameplay however, is where Forza 3 really shines.

The gameplay was already top notch in the previous game, and Turn 10 did a good job at recognizing what was good and what needed more help. Forza 3 can be approached by racing newcomers to veterans of the genre, and each will find the game satisfying, thanks to its detailed customization features. It’s very easy to drive, and the sense of speed is really good. The AI isn’t as challenging on the first two settings, especially in the beginning of your career, but it’ll give you a good fight most of the time. The career mode is lengthy and takes place over several seasons. As with Forza 2, after each tournament (and there are plenty of those) you get awarded a car — in addition to credits — that you can use for the next tournament and so on. And just like in recent racing games, there’s a rewind feature that lets you rewind a few moments in case you crash at the last turn, which, with this being a racing game, will inevitably happen. However, Forza 3 offers and unlimited amount of rewinds, which means some of the tension that always accompanies high-speed, high-stake races is gone. All things considered, if you played and are familiar with Forza 2’s gameplay, you’ll feel right at home in Forza 3.

In Forza 2, you could paint your car not just whatever color you wanted, but you could create custom designs and even trade and sell your car in the online marketplace. Forza 3 features all of that and some more, including now, for the first time, you can sell and buy custom designs instead of the whole car. So if you want that cool custom logo, you can just spend a few in-game credits (not real money, mind you, this isn’t EA) and get it on your favorite car. The multiplayer portion is as solid as it always was in Forza, and coupled with the new cars, tracks and new customization features, it’s even better to race against real-life opponents online.

Overall, Forza Motorsport 3 is a must have for any racing fan, whether you’re into arcade or simulation, you’ll find plenty to do in Forza 3. And until Gran Turismo 5 comes out, Forza 3 will solidly sit on the throne of racing games.

The Good:
Great selection of cars and tracks
Solid gameplay
Great customization features

The Bad:
Rewind feature prone to abuse
Career mode can get repetitive

Overall score: 9/10

While some indulge themselves in MMORPGs, at the other side of the spectrum of multiplayer games, first person shooters have had players battling in fast paced action for a far longer time — no quest reading or storytelling here, it’s guns blazing and the laws of headshots. Here’s our top 10 pick of the greatest multiplayer first person shooters of all time.

10: Team Fortress 2 (2007)

Valve’s successor to Team Fortress not only received a complete visual overhaul, it also became one of the most stylized multiplayer shooters of today, complete with its own sense of humor. The continuous (free) updates from Valve have kept players involved for a long time, with new weapons and maps added frequently.

9: Battlefield 1942 (2002)

Swedish developer DICE broke on to the gaming scene with Battlefield 1942, which would go on to become one of the most popular online shooters for the next few years. For the first time, gamers could participate in large scale, 64 player matches with big assortment of classes, tanks, planes, jeeps, battling over huge maps — it was warfare like never seen before, and it took the FPS scene by storm.

8: Halo 3 (2007)

Microsoft’s first Halo game on the Xbox 360 was received with one of the biggest launches in gaming history, and the polished multiplayer, which offered a ton of modes, detailed rankings, achievements and maps, have secured the game a top spot in the most played Xbox 360 games ever since. On top of that, the new The Forge mode made it possible to edit the maps as well, adding a new layer of gameplay.

7: Quake 2 (1997)

Quake 2 is widely considered the game that popularized the multiplayer shooter on the PC, and was one of the first to offer custom created content, such as maps, to be shared among fans and modders. It was also one of the first games to be officially selected in the Cyberathlete Professional League, a testament to its legacy.

6: GoldenEye 007 (1997)

While Quake opened the eyes of the general gaming crowd to the PC multiplayer first person shooters, GoldenEye 007 did it for the console crowd. It wasn’t the first console FPS game to offer multiplayer, but it was by far the first hit and a major breakthrough. Released in 1997 on the N64, the multiplayer part wasn’t originally a part of the game, and developer Rare assigned the job to a single programmer, Steve Ellis, who created the multiplayer version virtually by himself from the single player mode.

5: Unreal Tournament 2004 (2004)

Following the release of UT 2003, which received a mixed reception from the fans, Epic Games almost started from scratch and created what would become the most popular UT game ever, especially among modders, who were given the tools not only to create new maps, but completely different games, like Red Orchestra and Frag-Ops.

4: Tribes (1998)

In terms of multiplayer shooters, Tribes was a huge success, and was a game that pioneered some multiplayer FPS aspects that exist to this day. The game had a ton of exciting modes, revolutionary gameplay, not to mention 40 maps, some of which were huge, even by today’s standards.

3: Quake 3 Arena (1999)

Quake 3 Arena is perhaps one of the most fast paced multiplayer shooters ever made, and is generally considered the “founding father” of all the frag fests. It was the first Quake game that was exclusively multiplayer-oriented, and was minimalist in eye candy and aesthetics, only focusing on what really matters: gameplay.

2: Battlefield 2 (2005)

DICE brought the chaos and large scale warfare of WW2 into a modern day scenario, and Battlefield 2 became and instant classic, perfectly balancing the line between realism and accessibility — far better than any other military multiplayer shooter had done before. Or since. And despite being considerably buggier than competing games, the sheer quality of the gameplay — not to mention the detailed statistics and awards system — has meant that the game is still one of the most popular online shooters, despite being 4 1/2 years old.

1: Counter-Strike (1999)

Originally released as a mod to Half-Life, Counter-Strike immediately took the world by storm and has since consistently been the most played multiplayer shooter in the world. And with the update coming with Half-Life 2, CS: Source, the new visuals have kept it at the top spot. A proper sequel, Counter-Strike 2, is expected to be released with HL2: Episode 3 next year, and will most definitely continue the reign on the online multiplayer FPS scene.

FIFA 10 brings a slew of additions to the series, including a brand new “360 degree” player control feature, which means you can move your player in any direction, not just 8 as before, which astonishingly stuck with the franchise from before the analog sticks were introduced, which is now more than ten years ago. Finally, you can use the analog stick to move the player in any 360-degree direction. This means that the actions and movements of players are a lot more fluid and realistic, a huge leap over FIFA 09 (imagine how players used to zig-zag across the scree before?). Coupled with updated and increased amount of animations, it looks even better, almost as if you were watching a real match, if it wasn’t for the commentators and a few other nitpicks.

To take advantage of the much improved gameplay, a few game modes have been added, which still include the main one, career mode, which used to be “Be a Pro” (not the most clever name), where you guide a player (you, obviously) through his career. FIFA 10 adds to that by allowing you to import your own face as well, and thereby renamed it “Virtual Pro”. It still has plenty of RPG features and will definitely satisfy fans of the mode.

This time though, EA is offering paid DLC, where you can spend $2 at the “FIFA Store” and buy an upgrade to your Virtual Player that ups his attributes for a few matches and so on. There’s a sense of nickel-and-dime about this sort of DLC, and even charging for something that should be free, like Live Season updates (almost $10!), clearly, it’s nothing less than a rip off. For manager junkies, the Manager mode has received a good overhaul and now sports a lot more variety and features, and it’ll keep you busy for quite some time.

The sheer amount of content the game packs already though, will ease on the feeling of being nickle and dimed by EA, with the new modes, expanded multiplayer and added features, it’s still by far the most comprehensive FIFA game to date. Technically, it’s the best looking one too, especially considering the new animations and the improved AI. The commentary, like always, is a hit and miss, but for the most part, it’s decent. But the overall presentation is still wonderful, there’s a sense of a real soccer match going on when you’re playing. All things considered, FIFA 10 is the best soccer game out there, and for once, owners of last years edition have a definite reason to upgrade to this year’s edition — it’s by far better and the gameplay itself is reason enough for soccer fans to pick it up. However, the paid for DLC content drags it down a notch, as certain things should be free, as they always were.

The Good:
Immersive gameplay
Stunning animations
Plenty of modes

The Bad:
DLC is nickle-and-dime
Commentary can get tedious

Overall score: 8/10

Need For Speed Shift is the 13th Need For Speed game, and it appears that this time, the developers were looking to just get it right, not re-invent the wheel (pardon the pun). The career mode begins by throwing you on a track alone in a BMW, in order to test your skills (the game adapts the difficulty when you complete the track). While that’s a great idea, it’s frightful when you’re driving the first time, the controls are all over the place and you feel like quitting before even completing the first lap. Suffice to say, the first impression is rather bad. After fiddling with the setting and learning to proper handle the cars, it gets better, but we would have expected a better learning curve from such experienced racing developers.

The career mode includes 150 racing events, but you’re not forced to complete all of them before advancing to the grand tour, which kinda feels like a short cut. During each race, you get stars (points), not only for finishing, but for stuff like achieving the highest speed, or going through corners the right way or causing your opponents to spin or crash. It means that even if you don’t finish first, you can still accumulate enough to advance. The opponent AI is very aggressive, even on the easiest difficulty, and will often ram you and spin you off track, even if it doesn’t always seem like the most realistic thing to do. One thing the game excels at, is the sense of speed when you’re driving. The faster you go, everything seems more and more frantic, especially if you’re inside the driver cockpit.

The game is trying to be both a simulator and arcade racer at the same time — the controls are tight and every little mistake is punished, yet you’re encouraged to force your opponents to crash and to do slides and drifts, which, at least with the default setting, will almost always go wrong. It’s in the middle between simulation and arcade, it’s got the worse of both worlds. The game support 8 player online multiplayer, and here it’s even more confusing, as it always seems as the main objective for everyone is to just ram into each other get get points that way. I had a difficult time completing one single online race where everyone acted somewhat “decent”.

Technically, the game isn’t the best looking; the cars aren’t that detailed and the selection of cars isn’t that big to begin with. The tracks on the other hand, look great and are aplenty of. The online mode ran smooth, even though the experience wasn’t that great. If you long for a great driving game this holiday season, we’d recommend Dirt 2 over NFS Shift any day, but if you’re an NFS junkie, it’s still worth it.

The Good:
Great sense of speed
Lots of detailed tracks

The Bad:
Steep learning curve
Not that many cars
Unrealistic opponent AI

Overall score: 6/10

10: Avatar (November 15)

James Cameron’s upcoming sci-fi epic Avatar has been in production for years and sci-fi fans around the world are looking forward to its December premiere. The game adaptation, developed by Ubisoft, uses the same technology as the film, and will be in 3D as well.Very little is known about the game, mostly because it follows the movie closely, which itself has been a tightly kept secret.

9: NBA 2K10/NBA Live 10 (October 6)

The rivalry between NBA basketball series NBA 2K and NBA Live has been ongoing for several years, and for the 2010 versions of the respective games — which will be released on the same day — the stakes are even higher. 2K Games and EA have added a ton of new features to their games, which will make this years line up even more compelling to basketball fans around the world.

8: Aion: The Tower of Eternity (September 22)

Korean developer/publisher NCsoft is known for creating lots of MMOs, from Lineage, to Guild Wars, to the failed Auto Assault. Aion is their latest creation, and unlike many other MMOs, the main attraction here is that combat will, for the most part be airborne. Unfortunately however, unlike Guild Wars, Aion will be subscription based, and will cost $15 a month to be a part of.

7: Halo 3: ODST (September 22)

Halo 3 ODST (”Orbital Drop Shock Troopers”), doesn’t follow the main protagonist Master Chief, instead, it centers around an unknown soldier, “The Rookie”, who crash lands on a hostile planet and must find his teammates. While it’s not a true sequel, rather something in between Halo 3 and the upcoming Halo Reach, it’ll most certainly satisfy hard core Halo fans this holiday season.

6: Assassin’s Creed 2 (November 17)

Assassin’s Creed 2 features an all new setting: Venice during the Renaissance in the 15th century, where the player will not only have the opportunity to roam free around the city by jumping from rooftop to rooftop, it’ll also have the option of swimming in the countless canals. Even cooler, your weapons and gadgets will be made by none other than Leonardo da Vinci, who has been recreated in the game.

5: New Super Mario Bros. Wii (November 15)

New Super Mario Bros. for the DS was a mega hit for Nintendo, and true to company nature, it’s releasing a NSMB game on the Wii, which will be a sequel to the DS game. It’ll feature four-player multiplayer gameplay throughout the single-player campaign, and will include Wiimote motion capabilities (although players can still play the “classic” way by holding the Wiimote horizontally).

4: Forza Motorsport 3 (October 27)

Forza Motorsport 2 was the ultimate racing sim on the Xbox 360, and Forza 3 will take that to a whole new level, with over 400 cars which are ten times as detailed as in Forza 2, and 100 tracks as well, all built with a brand new graphics engine. The single player mode will include over 200 events, ranging from racing, to time trails and even drifting competitions.

3: Left 4 Dead 2 (November 17)

Despite the outrage among hardcore Left 4 Dead fans that Valve was doing a sequel only a year after the original game, lots of Left 4 Dead fans are eagerly awaiting the sequel, which brings four new survivors, a new setting and a lot of new weapons, including chainsaws and other melee weapons.

2: Borderlands (October 20)

Gearbox’ Borderlands was originally announced back in 2007, and was pretty much left alone until earlier this year, when an all new art style of the game was revealed. It’s a first person shooter with RPG elements and a “drop-in/drop-out” co-op mode in single player, set in a “Mad Max” type environment. Players will have a choice between four different characters, each with different abilities and skill trees.

1: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (November 10)

The sequel to the best selling FPS game in history has a lot to live up to, from compelling single player campaign to fully fledged multiplayer, and it looks like Modern Warfare 2 will accomplish all of that, and then some. It’ll build on the classic MW multiplayer formula by offering even more unlocks and bonuses, including perks that are now upgradeable.Even the visuals have greatly improved, with an updated version of the engine that will provide even more detailed worlds than before.

IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey continues building on the successful formula, with plenty of new additions and updates, most noticeably the visuals. The worlds beneath you are now a lot more detailed, the dogfights are more intense, and following the trend of modern games, there are tons of unlocks to be had as well. The controls — arguably the toughest part to port from PC to consoles when you talk about flying games — have been done quite well, and the different control options and layouts are going to satisfy a wide variety of players, from the newbies to the pros. The difficulty level follows as well, from an arcade style to pure simulation, there’s something for everyone.

The campaign missions are fairly well thought out, however, it becomes rather tiresome after you’ve flown a few raids, since there is very little variety among them. The 20 missions span from Italy, to Britain, to Germany and to Russia, however, all of them have two objectives: bombing runs and dogfights. And while the dog fights are exciting and thrilling, it too gets tiresome after a few missions. It helps with the different theaters of war, but we would have wished for more variety in the mission structures.  There’s also a large verity of authentic planes — as expected — and they’re all very nicely detailed and feature a ton of encyclopedia information, in case that interest you.

Multiplayer wise, the game offers decent 16 player multiplayer, where you have the basic modes, Death Match and Team Deathmatch, in addition to “Capture Airfields” — a domination type mode where you have to land your planes on an airfield in order to capture them — and Strike Mode, where each side has ground units it must protect, while attacking the other side’s ground units. While the multiplayer is fun and satisfactory, it would have been even better with a co-op mode.

Technically, the game looks great, however, stability and frame rate issue plague the game a lot, especially during dog fights, the frame rate drop drastically and, at times, destroys much of the fun that dog fights are. It’s a shame, since a last round of polish probably could have evened out these bugs and made a very compelling game, instead of leaving players wishing for a patch. If you’re into WW2 air simulators, IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey is still recommended, despite the issues, it’s still the best WW2 air simulator out there, even if you’re not exactly looking for a sim, you can tone the difficulty down to arcade mode and still have a lot of fun.

The Good:
Detailed planes and environment
Thrilling dog fights
Fun multiplayer

The Bad:
Linear and repetitive missions
Frame rate issues
No co-op

Overall score: 7/10

In Tropico 3, players will take control of El Presidente as they shape a tropical community into whatever they desire. Of course, tons of gameplay mechanics are in place that will keep the player guessing what will happen next.

Again, Tropico 3 will hit store shelves for the Xbox 360 after the PC version is released sometime this fall.

You play as Violet Summer, a british spy/assassin sent behind enemy lines for Queen and country. But not so fast. You start by waking up at a hospital after a mission went wrong. You’re woozy from the morphine and have nightmares of the past missions, which serve to tell some of the backstory.

The gameplay is your usual stealth action; you sneak around, way behind enemy lines and complete missions, which vary from blowing up important buildings (like fuel depots) to straight out assassinating Nazi leaders. The gameplay is very intuitive and the sneaking works great. To some extent. What Velvet Assassin does great — the sneaking — is countered by what it does bad; the enemy AI. You can sneak behind enemies, but those enemies are rather dumb, actually, they’re plain stupid. They walk through pre-determined waypoints, and will often ignore when they see you or when you do obvious stuff, like cut the lights. This takes away a lot of the rush from sneaking, because you know that you’re sneaking behind morons. Also, the stealth action is somewhat linear; there’s usually only one way of getting to your objective. This means that there is very little replay value in the game, as there is no multiplayer either.

The combat is mostly comprised of you sneaking up and surprising the bad guys by slitting their throats etc. However, there are other ways of killing your foes, like setting electricity through a water pit once a guard steps on it, or pull a valve that releases toxic gas, thereby killing your foes. In addition to this, there is the usual way: shooting them. However, the shooting mechanics are poorly implemented, and it’s best avoided. But at a few places in the game, you are required to shoot several enemies, which can become quite frustrating. Also, the amount of ammunition is quite limited, so you’re best off fighting your enemies in another fashion.

Another thing that the game does well, is the atmosphere it creates. It’s by no means a “light” game. It’s very dark, both technically and artistically, as you frequently come across atrocities of war committed by the Nazis, like mass graves of executed prisoners and resistance fighters. There’s a great sense of realism to the game, from the grim visuals, to the soundtrack, which create great sense of realism and danger.

Technically, the game looks great, especially the dark parts and shadows. The lighting is done very well and serves as a way of immersing the player into the game (and helps greatly with the sneaking). The sounds and voice acting are on par with what’s expected — not perfect, but not bad either. The soundtrack is especially moody and creates a feel of suspense. However, the game does stutter occasionally with low FPS, and there are a few bugs which should’ve been ironed out.

In all, Velvet Assassin can be recommended for the fans of WW2 games and especially stealth action games. However, there isn’t much of a challenge because of the horrible AI and lack of polish,. Furthermore, there is little replay value and no multiplayer feature.

The Good:
Great atmosphere
Harsh realism
Decent stealth action

The Bad:
Lacks polish
Very linear
No multiplayer
Occasional bugs

Overall score: 6/10

Don’t forget that you need the EA Download Manager to make the patch possible, though. Here’s the full changelog:

Spore Improvements:

• Asymmetry is now available for creatures! Details on new Asymmetry features for Creatures and Vehicles can be found here.
• This patch fixes several crashes in Space Game.
• Many tuning improvements to Space Game, including reduced disaster rates at all levels of difficulty, adjustments to Hard Mode, increased limits on concurrent trade routes, as well as changes to tool unlocks for the Knights.
• Creator Lineage appears correctly for all creation types shared after this patch is installed.
• Cheat is included that permits Creators to export creatures in Collada format for use in Maya. Creators must acknowledge and accept a Tools EULA to perform this operation. An additional cheat has been provided to enable highest quality textures to appear on vehicles, where it is supported by user hardware.
• Fixed a problem where creations would go missing if a user quits the game in any way while downloads are in progress.
• Fixed a bug where achievements were disappearing.
• Fixed a bug where some Sporepedia cards had corrupted backgrounds.
• Fixed a problem in Space where some Grox planets were unreachable.
• YouTube movies now publish as public

Galatic Adventure Improvements:

• This patch must be installed again after installing Galactic Adventures, even if you have installed this patch previously.
• You can now place the avatar, NPCs, and handheld objects on top of air, land, and sea vehicles in the Adventure Creator. Get more info here.
• Improvements are made to the Adventure Creator, including right-click camera behavior, and User Interface enhancements.
• In EP1 open gates were not working correctly when they were disguised
• Some customer-reported crashes in Galactic Adventures have been fixed.

Read (Spore)

According to recent reports, in the US The Sims 3 sold a full 820,000 copies in June alone. Added to that, Gamasutra strongly believes the game has sold over 2.5million copies globally.

Just to put that into perspective, the entire Sims franchise had sold over 100 million copies worldwide as of April 16th, 2008.

I think it’s safe to say that The Sims is definitely here to stay.