Fallout 3 takes place in the not so distant future (the year 2277), 200 years previously a mass nuclear apocalypse devastated the entire world and throughout your travels of “the wasteland” you’ll find that practically everything is radioactive. How are you alive you ask? Well you start the game in an underground vault and as you may have guessed you leave the vault and start exploring the United States of America.

Much like Oblivion you start by making your character and choosing your statistics such as Strength, Perception and Charisma. You then go onto to choosing skills for your character. Now unlike Oblivion where your skills went up as you used them (your athletics skill went up as you ran around) your skills in Fallout 3 only increase when you add points to that category (and by collecting little bobbleheads – but we’ll get to that later). You then have another sub category in the skills section called perks. Think of these as similar to spells in Oblivion except instead of paying for them in Gold you pay for them in points you receive when you level up. You can only choose one perk per level. These perks can be specially designed to your type of play: Do you like using rifles to kill your enemies? Perhaps you want the Commando Perk; do you go sneaking around and melee your enemy from behind? Maybe the Ninja perk is for you. There are over 50 perks available through your gameplay (and many perks can be used again for increased benefits).

One thing that has a very significant effect on NPC’s interactions with you is Karma. With RPG’s there are 3 main ways to go: Be a “good” character – kill slaves, performing “good” actions etc; Be a neutral character – if you can’t really decide if you want to be good or bad the best advice is to be both! Or you have the alternative of being “Evil” – if you just love to kill everything in sight whether it’s innocent NPC’s or if stealing’s your thing then you’re probably going to end up with bad Karma and as such people are going to behave negatively towards you, you might even get some of the “Very good” NPC’s attacking you for being “Evil”. All 3 ways have their benefits and drawbacks of course and at the end of the day just play how you want to.

If you haven’t guessed by now I should mention that the majority of weapons in the game are guns. You get the occasion melee weapon and it’s true that you may never have to use a gun in the game … although it’s pretty pointless if that’s how you’re going to be playing. The number of weapons available is huge but ammo for most guns (especially the big ones) is very limited so you must always conserve ammo and use it only when necessary. As for the types of guns you can get there are: Big Guns – in here you get flame throwers, missile launchers etc; Energy Weapons – as expected you can get laser pistols and plasma rifles; Melee Weapons – such as Baseball Bats, Combat Knifes and Shock Batons; and finally Small Weapons – which basically consist of everything else such as Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles etc.

A new addition to the series is the V.A.T.S Mode (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System). This brilliant device lets you pause gameplay in the middle of a battle and target specific parts of your enemy. As you can see in the image above the targeting system shows you the probability of hitting a target in the head, leg, arm etc. This handy device can really save you alot of trouble in the more difficult battles and is crucial if you like playing around with a sniper from far away. As expected there are certain perks you can get which increase your V.A.T.S accuracy. You can’t of course use it all the time. You can only use it if you have the required amount of Action Points. These points which refill overtime allow you to use the Advanced Targeting Mode so make sure that when you use it you use it correctly!

The game consists of the main quest and many other miscellaneous side quests. The gameplay is very non-linear, what I mean by that is that it has a very open style. You can go anywhere at any time and do any side quests at any time (within reason of course). You can still of course play the game in a more linear way by doing side quests one at a time and choosing not to explore the place. One of the major disadvantages of this game in my opinion is the huge amount of exploring to do.

Unlike in Oblivion you see where you could fast travel to the major towns straight away in Fallout 3 you can only fast travel to places you’ve visited which means at the beginning you can fast travel to nowhere. Some places require you to walk for hours of game time just to get to them and that isn’t even the worst of it. When you start exploring Washington DC as you’d expect there is a lot of rubble everywhere. This means that if you don’t know how to use the map properly to look for entrance points you going to have a very difficult time finding your destination. There is nothing more annoying in this game to follow your compass towards your destination and find out there is a huge rubble pile blocking your way just metres from where you need to get too. Sometimes you literally have to backtrack your whole way back or circle all of the way round the area until you find an entrance point. It’s a shame that they don’t highlight these “no-entry” points on your map more thoroughly as they can really ruin your gameplay if you find yourself continuously lost.

When asked to compare this game to Oblivion there are many differences and similarities that I can spot. They both follow the same “Sandbox style” rules and both have a main quest followed by many side quests. Fallout 3 tends to have the idea that every item you pick up in the game has a use (where as in Oblivion things like Quills and bones). The main difference though has to be the gear and setting. Oblivion has a medieval like theme with swords while Fallout 3 has a post-apocalyptic theme with guns. Which do you prefer? I much rather like swords than guns which is why I think Oblivion is that little bit better than Fallout 3.

A very important thing I should say without giving too much away is that if you buy the game without the “Broken Steel” add on make sure you’ve done everything before you get to the last stage in the main quest. I won’t say too much but if you finish the main quest without the Broken Steel add on you do not get a chance to do any side quests etc after the main quest has finished. A huge let down for most people and another reason why I think Oblivion is that slightly bit better than Fallout 3. I would game this game a ranking of 9.1/10.

So what makes this game so great compared to the others? Well I think the main thing has to be that it’s so unique. When LEGO Star Wars first came out it was brilliant because the concept of going around a venue blowing things up and collecting studs was new. However as the years progressed the concept gradually became duller until many people found it simply aggravating. Not much had been done to improve this feature in previous games which is why many people including me found games such as LEGO Indiana Jones boring, up to the point where when LEGO Batman came out I couldn’t even face purchasing it. Of course a huge factor is whether you like what the game is based on. I could play LEGO Star Wars for a long time as I like it whereas some people who don’t like Star Wars wouldn’t be able to play it.

The Harry Potter series however is one of the most successful and highly rated series of the decade. But if the game is just about blowing lego up again then surely it couldn’t be very interesting could it? Well actually it could! You see what Traveller’s Tales have done is continue the series from a new angle. Yes you have to blow up lego pieces to be a “True Wizard” but the number of different ways you can choose to blow them up is large.

Lego Studs are unsurprisingly a massive part of the game and return in the usual silver, gold, blue and purple colours. You can collect studs by blowing objects up with your wand by using different spells. This is where things get interesting. There are a huge amount of spells in the game such as Wingardium Leviosa, Expelliarmus, Stupefy and even Avada Kedavra. You see much like how not all objects could be destroyed using the force in LEGO Star Wars (Shiny objects) not all can be in LEGO Harry Potter by using the standard spell. Some must be targeting them and using Wingardium Leviosa while some such as plants can be removed by simply shining Lumos as them! The game may be a lot more technical than previous ones in the series but for this it is a lot more fun.

Making a new addition to the series out Hogwarts Crests: just as Hogwarts School is split into four houses (Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, Hufflepuff and Slytherin) there are four crest pieces to be collected in each level. But unlike Minikits in previous games which you could just find laying around these crests are much harder to find, most crests can only be found in free play mode. Another new feature to the series are the “Students in Peril”. You’ll find a student in “peril” in every level and if you manage to save them you are rewarded with a gold brick.

As with previous games gold bricks are used to unlock rewards and bonus content with a total of 120 possible gold brick to be found throughout the game. Red bricks can also be found throughout the game but are much tougher to get. Not only do you have to find a red brick you then have to post it using the nearest owl post. This can be of a certain benefit however because if you see an owl post on your travels you can take a well educated guess that there is a red brick somewhere to be found.

Unlike the other games in the series this game is not just made up of chapters for you to play in. In fact a large proportion of the game is spent in the Hogwarts grounds themselves. Between chapters you participate in lessons. Although these may seem pointless at first they are infect very significant as in these lessons you learn new spells and magical abilities which without you wouldn’t be able to progress throughout the game. For example remember the scene in the second film with all of the pixies? Perfect time to learn the new spell Immobulus wouldn’t you agree?

Diagon Alley also plays an important role in the game. Think of it as the Cantina in LEGO Star Wars or as the University in LEGO Indiana Jones. It basically contains all of the shops you need to purchase new spells, costumes, characters and even the opportunity to build your own level. You may remember the lego builder from LEGO Indiana Jones 2, its great fun for a while but it’s puzzling why the developers are still including this feature without any option to upload them to a server and to download other players’ creations.

One final thing that should be mentioned is the lego building capacity of the game. No longer do you need to use your hands to build lego bricks where you can instead use magic. That’s not all though. There are a few puzzles where you have to actually move lego bricks around and stack them to be able to reach higher levels. These puzzles are both challenging and fun which makes the game that much more different.

Overall although the amount of spells can be a bit alarming once you get used to it you’ve got a heck of a game in your hands! I would give it a rating of 85%.

So what’s new with this game then? Well starting off one of the most annoying things in Assassin’s Creed was that whenever you jumped into some water you drowned. This seemed a bit pathetic for an unstoppable assassin who can kill loads of people and then to die by falling in some water. Well in this game you can swim! The graphics of the game has also been completely revamped so it looks absolutely brilliant.

If you remember in the first game there were two parts to it. You as the assassin and you as Desmond in real life. Unfortunately as Desmond you were practically useless. You couldn’t kick, punch or anything. You just went to bed and woke up, probably the most boring part of the game. However straight from the start you killing people and escaping the evil Templars headquarters.

In my opinion one of the basic necessities for an assassin’s game is the weapons. Now in the previous game you didn’t have a lot of choice. You just got a large sword, a small sword and some other weapons. In this game however there are loads of different types of weapons. For example if we start with the hidden blade you can now have a double hidden blade, a poison blade and even a pistol! If we move onto medium weapons you can start from a measly common sword all the way up to a Condottiero War Hammer. These weapons of course are unlocked once you pay for them so there is a point in looting people for money. You can also change your armour and dye your clothes different colours by going to tailors.

This game really involves loads of different objects. There are not only loads of weapons but also different types of enemies now as well. In the previous game it was there were about 4 different enemies. In this game there are agiles, brutes, seekers and archers amongst others. One thing I found too easy with the previous game is that as soon as you got in a hiding spot you could relax. However the seeker’s job is, as you might have guessed, to seek for you. They often carry an extremely long pike which they will use to prod haystacks and wells which will force you out of the hiding spot. Also if you happen to be on a bench between two citizens the seeker will ask them to stand up fooling your cover again.

Another thing that has been improved is the morale of the enemy. You might remember in the last game where you might occasionally get a straggler who runs away from you. However this seemed to be a random event rather than something you did to scare him (not including of course killing everyone else). In this game certain things you do can increase or decrease enemies morale. For example, if you kill a brute every enemy around you will have a decrease of their morale by -30 points. If you assassinate an enemy with a pistol they will have a decrease of -20 points. However if you get injured they will have an increase of +10 morale, and if you enter critical state it will be +25. If an enemy is going to flee you will first see them freeze
briefly to the spot. They will then drop their weapon and run away from you as fast as they can.

The best of the game though has to be the brilliant storyline laid out before you. There are over 14 sequences for you to explore which have you assassinating important historical figures, to hiring thieves for you, to trying to find hidden glyphs. There really is a lot to keep you entertained for a long time, so if you decide to buy the game you won’t be disappointed.

I would give this game a rating of 93/100.

The game was released in November last year on the PC, PS3 and Xbox 360. If any of you have played “The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion” it is quite easy to relate this game with it. Both games are in the role-playing category and they both are brilliant. Dragon Age: Origins main plot is you becoming a Grey Warden, who are the “protectors” of Ferelden. You then engage the main enemies of the game “The Darkspawn” which is the name suggests are hideous creatures.

The game begins with you choosing your character. You can pick which class you want, which race you want, which gender you want, which origin story you want and of course you can customise nearly every detail of you from your hair to your eyes. Starting with classes you have three choices, Warrior; Mage or Rogue. The three races which you can pick are: Human; Elf or a Dwarf. Each of these choices has an effect on the origin story you can pick. There are 6 origin stories in total. If you are an elf you have a choice of two stories. if you are a dwarf you have a choice of 2 stories whereas if you are a human you get a choice of 1 story. However there is one story solely for a mage regardless which race you picked.

Basically the origin story acts as a mini tutorial for you, so you can learn the ropes of the game. After this all stories are linked to the main game where you start battling the Darkspawn. Much like “Oblivion” this game focuses a lot on attributes and skills. You choose how strong you are, how easy it is for you to block incoming hits etc. There are a few skills which you can learn such as Survival, Combat Training, Herbalism, Trap-Making and Poison- Making.

However unlike “Oblivion” the game also focuses on talents which your character can learn. These depend on the class you picked. So for example if you picked the Warrior class you can learn a talent called “Taunt” which increases the hostility of enemies around you. If you’re a Mage you can learn a talent called “Lightning” which speaks for itself, whereas if you’re a Rogue you could learn a talent “Stealth” etc. Each class also has 4 specialisations. These specialisations can be very beneficial if you decide to use them. You can learn 1 specialisation when you are level 8 and another when you are level 12. For a Warrior the specialisations are: Champion, Templar, Berserker and Reaver. If you are a Mage there is a choice of Arcane Warrior, Blood Mage, Shapeshifter and Spirit Healer. If you picked a Dwarf as your class you have a choice of Assassin, Bard, Duelist and Ranger.

Another important feature in this game is the buddy system. As you progress in the game you meet new people who join you in your quest. Each companion has their own personal quest if you get to know them an you can equip party members with weapons and armour which suits them. You can also select tactics for each party member. Do you hate it when archers and killing you? Well simply set a tactic for one of your companions to automatically target an enemy who is in attacking you with a ranged attack.

When comparing this game to Oblivion it would seem that whereas both games are very good Dragon Age: Origins is a bit more complicated. For example Oblivion has far less talents and attributes settings and when you attack in Oblivion you can only do one or two type of attacks. In Dragon Age: Origins however there are loads of talents and skills and you can do loads of attacks from flurries, to death blows etc.

The game can be complicated but by the time you’ve finished the origin story you should have a greater understanding of the game/. I would give this game 95%.

If I start by talking about the campaign mode I have to say that it has to be the best so far. There are 18 missions (well actually 19 but I’ll leave you to find out the last one!) split into 3 different acts. Each mission is fun, challenging and is a great option to play first if you are new to the Call of Duty franchise. The first mission’s even a tutorial which helps you learn the basics; it also features a time-trail exercise which at the end suggests to you which difficulty section you should have on the game regarding how well you did in the trail. I won’t give too much away but the ending is absolutely brilliant, in-fact saying that all of the missions are brilliant. In previous games there is usually one mission that stands out for me as being annoying, but in this game there are none. Although I must mention that mission 4 is very controversial and you may have heard a lot of bad press about it. As far as I’m concerned Infinity Ward has done everything they can to warn you off this. There is even an option to skip the mission if you want to.

New to the series is “Spec-Ops” Missions. There are a total of 23 co-op missions (although you can play them alone) which are quite a nice add-on to the game. The missions have three levels of difficulty and you really need good teamwork to complete the missions on veteran difficulty. The death cards in the previous game which seemed to serve no real purpose except in online co-op mode have been replaced by enemy Intel. Although this again serves no purpose (except for receiving a trophy/achievement) it actually makes sense that there is enemy Intel to collect.

Now we move onto the best part of the game … multiplayer mode. Currently there are 16 maps to choose from (although there will probably be more soon) which are all unique to each other. Some maps are in Brazil, some in Afghan and some somewhere else. Each map has its advantages and disadvantages. Some maybe better than others but I feel that each map is great in its own right.

The weapon list has been completely redone as well with over 40 different guns. One major advantage this game has is that the shotgun category has been moved down to secondary weapons. So now you can have an SMG, LMG or assault rifle as well as a shotgun. The attachments for the weapons are plentiful as well. In World at War there were only a couple of attachments but in this game you get the whole package. Heartbeat sensors, akimbo (the ability to wield dual weapons), thermal scopes, rapid fire and silencers just to name a few. This makes the games much more interesting. And of course where would any good shooting game be without perks. There are new perks introduced in this game such as: Bling (which lets you have two weapon attachments), Hardline (where killstreaks require 1 less kill), Last Stand and One Man Army just to name a couple. Also new to the game are deathstreaks. If you happen to be doing really bad in a game then once you have been say killed 4 times in a row you get a little bonus to help you get a comeback. There are only 4 deathstreaks in the game and one of them is the ever favourite Martyrdom.

One of the biggest expanses in the game has to be the killstreaks. In World at War there were simply 3 killstreaks. Radar, Artillery and Dogs. In this game there are 15 different kinds! Starting from a simple UAV when you get 3 kills, to user controlled predator missiles when you get 5 kills to an end of game tactical nuke if you manage to achieve 25 kills. Nothing is more satisfying than achieving a triple kill after sending a missile from an AC130 into a group of enemies.

One more thing that should be mentioned is the wide range of equipment available. Instead of just frag and sticky grenades you now also get throwing knives! These knives are absolutely awesome and can save your life if you master them. Just imagine your reloading when an enemy appears a distance off in front of you. A grenade wouldn’t kill him because by the time you’ve thrown it he would have killed you. So simply throw a knife at him and it saves your life!

Well I think that goes over the basics of the game and why you should buy it! I would rate it 97%!

Before I go on to that part of the game however lets focus on the other more familiar points of the game. Starting with controls it’s nice to see the game has gone back to using the four strong grapple routine which hasn’t been seen since Smackdown Vs Raw 2007. No more annoying ultimate control moves that don’t work … although there are a couple still there – but it’s nice to have a few included. I find that the controls are altogether more fluent and there are some new ones as well such as a strong strike for superstars with that ability.

Another thing that has dramatically changed for the first time in the series (including the Smackdown! series before that) is the HUD. Instead of the familiar display in the top left hand corner (if your player 1) you instead get a ring around your superstars feet. There is I feel advantages and disadvantages to this. The disadvantage is you lose the image of your opponent’s body saying if his head if red, orange, yellow etc however I suppose this makes the game more life like. The great advantage comes with the Royal Rumble. Before you could only have six superstars at a time because only six could fit on the screen. However now because the HUD is on the floor you can have more than six making the Royal Rumble seem more real. You can also unfortunately no longer store finishers (except in the Royal Rumble) but this is only a minor fault.

Onto the game modes the popular ‘Road to Wrestlemania’ mode is back with 6 new superstars. You can play as Shawn Michaels, Edge, Randy Orton, Mickie James or even your created superstar! There’s also a special co-op one (which can be done singularly) with John Cena and Triple H. Each of the 6 options offer the final 13 weeks before Wrestlemania. In the co-op mode you even get to play more than 13 matches, sometimes having to do a match at Raw and one at Smackdown in the same week.

Another thing that has grown since Smackdown Vs Raw 2009 is the abilities. There are now more than ever and nearly all of them have been revamped. There are a total of 21 abilities including some familiar ones such as: Kip-Up, Referee Shield and Possum Pin. There are also some new ones such as: Ring Escape, Fired Up and Exploder TB Attack.

The most impressive thing in the game which will give it a lifetime of playing has to be the WWE Story Designer. Well there is a slight lie. The main part of the infinite lifetime is being able to upload it online and then download other peoples and play them. Unfortunately this is only available on the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions. Anyway as you can imagine you design stories. Think of it as creating a show for Raw, Smackdown or ECW. There are set moments in which you can change the superstars involved, add music, change the camera and even input the text. Unfortunately the superstars don’t read aloud the text but that would be impossible anyway. Maybe in a couple of year’s time it will be possible, but not yet. Regardless of that the story designer is still brilliant. You could re-enact the ‘Monday Night Wars’ between WCW and WWF, you could re-enact DX ruining Mr.McMahon’s life. You could even create something completely different such as … DX taking over WWE – well that wouldn’t be new but it would be funny.

With the set moments you can also add matches. When you play the story you play the matches as well. As designer of the story though you get to choose who the player will play as. Who will win, how one superstar will lose etc. Basically you control everything. There is a slight downside to the owners of the PS3 and Xbox 360 as there always is on brilliant ideas. If you were thinking of making a story with your created wrestler I would advise strongly against because it’s just not possible. There is a limit to how many scenes your CAW can be in and the answer is a pathetic 10. You can’t even make a decent rivalry with that many scenes. If you thinking why not make 10 identical CAWS don’t think you can have them in 100 scenes. It’s not 10 scenes per CAW it’s 10 scenes overall which means you could only have a maximum of 10 different CAWS in 1 scene each.

Another new create mode is that you can create up to 3 different attires for your wrestlers. Even for the normal wrestlers. On top of this there are more moves in the create a finisher mode and of course the popular highlight reel is back. You can even use it create a entrance movie for your superstar (you even get a trophy/achievement for doing it).

One last thing that should be said is the new matches available. The Royal Rumble although not a new match has been upgraded. Instead of only having the annoying button mashing mini game there are now two extra ones. It all depends on where you have the superstar you want to chuck out. If they are lying on the apron you have to press any button to try and stop the moving gauge in the ever shrinking blue area twice before the blue area vanishes. If they are groggy against the ropes you must rapidly press buttons but there is a skill involved. You press certain buttons at certain times. Lastly if there in the corner then you mist press three buttons that appear on the screen quicker than your opponent in a row to eliminate them. The other new match in the game is the Championship Scramble match which has the same concept as the elimination chamber (except without the chamber and the elimination), basically whoever pinned a superstar last at the end of the time limit wins the championship.

Overall this game rates well above its predecessor. I would give it 94%.

Now the fourth Harry Potter game was completely rubbish. It was a totally different gameplay to the other games and the age rating (7+) probably should have been more like 7, because it seemed like the game was made for seven year olds. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix on the other hand is a lot better. It’s a 7+ again but in this game it doesn’t matter what age you are, you will still enjoy … unless of course you utterly despise Harry Potter but why would you be reading this if you did?

The style of the game is what people call a “sandbox”. Just like games such as GTA it basically means you can go pretty much anyone and do things in your own order, within a certain boundary. An example of this in the game is when you have to collect all of the members of Dumbledore’s Army. The game doesn’t tell you what order you must collect them, so you can go in any order you wish. Another brilliant thing in this game which we have just seen recently in the Sims 3 is that there are no loading screens. The whole of the Hogwarts School and grounds are loaded all the time. You don’t even get a slight pause as you go from one area to the next, it runs very smoothly.

One of the main features of this game is the spells. Owners of a Wii will have more fun casting spells in the game as they simply swish the wii remote in a certain direction to cast that spell. However don’t think if you own a Playstation 3 you are missing out on much, because you also do it on the PS3. You have two options … you can either cast spells by using the right analog stick or you can enable the motion sensitivity function and move the whole Playstation 3 controller to cast the spell. So really with the Playstation 3 version you are getting better graphics than the Wii and also the same motion control. If you’re lucky enough to own both the Wii and Playstation 3 you’ll probably better buying on the PS3.

As you walk around the grounds you will notice that there are quite a few things not quite right: such as paintings on the floor and statues covered up by curtains. You can use your spells on these objects and earn discovery points which in turn make your spells stronger. Another thing in the game is the portraits. As with the film and book versions all portraits need passwords and you need to find out what they are. It’s no use searching for them on the internet because you can’t type them in. The portraits give you clues as to what they are … some even just tell you the password straight away.

One of the unfortunate disadvantages of this game is that is quite short. Although saying that if you don’t rush through it you will find it will take quite a while to get 100% on the game. Many people say they complete this game within an hour. I can tell you that it is completely impossible to do that even if you’re on the easiest difficulty. If you’re on normal difficulty and play it at a steady pace this game should last you at least for over 10 hours … and that for a game is actually quite reasonable.

I think overall this game is very good … although non Harry Potter fans wouldn’t think it was as good as I’m saying. In conclusion buy this game only if you’re either a Harry Potter fan or you like a good RPG game because it is very good. I would rate it 88%

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This year this has been dropped which makes the matches a bit fairer and certainly more challenging which is a good thing, unless your rubbish at it! Instead of the diving this has been replaced by the staggering option which to be honest isn’t that good either. Basically your person just hits the ball with the racquet and then staggers for what seems like eternity. During that time all the other person has to do is hit the ball the other side and there will be a small chance you will hit it – if you do you will simply stagger again and then the match will probably be over. Although it may be a bit better than the diving option it is still horrible. Maybe if there was a little stagger that would be fine but it lasts for so long that as soon as you’ve done it you already know you’ve lost.

Anyway now for some positive points about the game! This game involves the new world tour and online ranking system. Which is good, quite an improvement over the last game. What happens is that you start ranked 100 in the amateur league and you have to work your way up by winning tournaments. Quite simple enough and also as you play people with a lower rank their skill is increased so you’ll eventually face tougher opponents. You can also go online and vs other people which can be fun, especially if you win!

The game features over 20 of the worlds top players including three legends. As well as that there are some new minigames as well as some of the previous ones from Virtua Tennis 3. There are many new courts and you have more control over how your player looks.

I think this game is mainly for tennis fans and quite obviously people who don’t like tennis are not going to be very interested. Also if you get the Wii version you can play it with the new Wii MotionPlus which gives you more control over your swings.

A good game overall although one that will only appeal to tennis fans. I would give it a ranking of 8.4

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Now, I personally prefer some good old shooting games such as COD or Resistance 2 but it is always good to have a break from that and play a RPG game. The game is split into many different sub sections which all fall under the main game. If you haven’t bought this game yet I would recommend getting the “Game of the Year” edition because as well as the normal game it also comes with two expansion packs (that are all in one disc): the knights of the nine, and the shivering isles.

Anyway the first sub section is the main quest. Which basically has you going around fighting monsters called Daedra. To be honest I have to say that I haven’t completed the main quest because I haven’t wanted to. Out of all of the sections I find that at a certain point the main quest becomes a bit dull. This isn’t because it is dull but because of what is available. This is an open-ended game so you can go anyway. If you’re an adventurer at heart then you’re going to want to explore everywhere rather than going to specific places. The developers realise this which is way you can postpone the main quest at any point in the game which is brilliant!

The next sub section focuses on guilds, which are like groups. There are 4 guilds in the game: The fighter’s guild, the mages guild, the thieves’ guild and the dark brotherhood. To join the fighter’s or mages guild you can simply go to a guild house in one of the towns and ask to join. The thieves’ guild requires a different approach in which you must go around asking about “Grey Fox”. The Dark Brotherhood requires you to kill someone and then go to sleep. It is possible to become head of all 4 guilds and obviously as you rise in status you receive bonuses from the respective guild.
There are also freeform and miscellaneous quests. These are in each town and sometimes in the countryside. They require you to do certain things and you get rewards for completing them … usually.

Another important aspect of the game is levelling up. As you progress through the game you level up and choose to improve 3 attributes. As you level up some of your enemies level up also. So for example if you were to do a quest in the mages guild in which you had to kill someone important that person may be three levels above you. It wouldn’t matter whether you are a low level 2 or a high level 26 that person would always be three levels above you. This is a good idea because it saves the game from being boring. If you got to a high level and then could go around killing people with one hit it would be a bit boring, so this way it keeps challenging you.

One thing I would definitely recommend if you were to buy this game is to get the walkthrough also. Although it may cost £10 or something it is definitely worth it. This is one of the few games in which you nearly 100% need the walkthrough to complete everything, unless you want to go on the internet and search for stuff you get stuck on (however the internet isn’t always right!). If you get the walkthrough you get a detailed list of all the weapons, armour, spells and details on every single quest in the game as well as maps for everywhere. On top of that the walkthrough also covers the Knights of the Nine and the Shivering Isles expansion packs! At the beginning of the game you need to select a class and race to do with what you want to be. For example if you want to mainly fight, use magic, sneak around or a combination of them such as a battlemage. It can be quite frustrating thinking about the one to choose because it will have an impact on the rest of the game – and it can be extremely annoying if you pick a person and then after hours of playing you realise that actually you wanted to be a mage instead of a fighter. The strategy guide can come in really handy here as it give a detailed list of all the races and classes available and tells you which one you should use depending on your opinion.

Overall this is one of the best RPG games out there despite its age, if you haven’t played before get it now with the strategy guide! I would give a rating of 96%!

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Legends of Wrestlemania couldn’t be more different, yet it is actually quite similar. The controls for a start and much … easier to use. Although it might take a while to get use to once you know them you know them well. You have “Square” for punch and the grapple is “X” instead of using the right analog stick. The game itself is built around the idea of chains. So to get a finisher instead of building up your momentum you can also now use chains to get there, and so for this game you must be at the highest chain (Chain Level 3) to do a finisher. You can initiate chain grapples by being in specific places, for example when your opponent is groggy, when they are on the ropes, when they are in the corner or when your irish whipping them. What will come after this is that a random button: either “X”, “Triangle”, “Circle” or “Square” will pop up and you have to press that button before your opponent does, simple! If you do you will cause damage to them, while if you don’t they will reverse the move.

This game features over 40 WWE Legends and managers which is a nice amount to start off with. These legends consist of people that were about in the 1980s and 1990s. Such as Shawn Michaels, Hunter Hurst Helmsley, Stone Cold Steve Austin and The Rock. However the brilliant thing about this game is that if you have a saved file of Smackdown Vs Raw 2009 you can import all of those superstars into the game. Which means you could have over 80 superstars and legends combined. You can also import created superstars … however if they had a created finisher this will be replaced and there are some moves in the Smackdown Vs Raw 2009 move set which aren’t in the Legends of Wrestlemania one.

The matches in this game are what you would expect. Steel Cages, Hell in a Cell, Ladder matches etc. Noticeably there aren’t any matches like the Elimination Chamber or the Inferno match but that is quite understandable considering they weren’t around in the 1990s. Complete with the normal exhibition mode you get the Relive, Redefine and Rewrite modes. Each mode is quite self-explanatory. The relive mode puts you in matches that happened in the first 15 Wrestlemania’s. From Hulk Hogan defeating Andre the Giant to Stone Cold defeating Shawn Michaels. In each match you get a certain number of objectives to complete. In the redefine match you play a match that happened but you change it, so for example you might have a match that was usually a ladder match but change into a hell in a cell match. Lastly the rewrite match changes the course of history. What if Bret Hart defeated Shawn Michaels in the legendary iron man match? This is what you can do. What’s nice about these stages is that before each match you get a video clip of what happened so you can also see the outcome before you play it yourself.

As well as those modes you also get the “Legend Killer” mode. For this you need to create-a-legend and put him/her against other legends trying to beat them. So in the first tier (there are about 7) you have to defeat about 10 legends without losing yourself. It’s no easy task because you don’t end up starting with full health at the beginning of each new match! There is also a place where you can view all of your medals, trophies and see which superstars/legends you play as the most in the game.

Overall Legends of Wrestlemania is a pretty good game, which although is different from the other wrestling games, looks to be brilliant. I would give it a rating of 88%!

To discuss this game and more visit the XtraGamer forum

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