For a lot of these Madden and other sports title reviews, I really don't have much to say. It's a yearly franchise of American football games, they are all fairly similar etc etc. It's nice then, or perhaps not so nice in this case, when there is some interesting history behind the game. Madden 06 came out the year after the consensus best NFL game of all time NFL 2K5. EA had managed to bully 2K games out of the market and as such Madden 06 was the only NFL game available that year. Add this to the fact that it was the first NFL game on next gen consoles, there was a lot of pressure on EA to make a good game. With all this pressure, Madden 06 ended up being a stinker and the worst Madden game on the console. It was obvious that the development of the game had gone poorly, with the 360 version being so much worse than the PS2 version. The game just feels off. Collisions look weird and often send your player in the wrong direction. Catching animations are bad. There's a huge lack of features. The game just doesn't run well at all. I found numerous glitches and really long loading times during my time with the game. It almost feels like the console is struggling to run the game. There is no reason to pick up this game on the 360 unless you like easy achievements.

Console sequel to the absolute classic PC online multiplayer shooter, UT3 had big boots to fill and of course it couldn't really manage to fill them, at least in it's present state. As with the nature of these reviews, playing it in 2024 with the multiplayer totally dead can be really detrimental to some of the more online focused games. Know I don't know if the chaos of capture the flag on Facing Worlds was recreated with this release, but even as a single player game it's not a complete disaster. For a start, they have kept consistent with the original games, which is probably for the best. Playing the campaign, albeit against bots, is a similar feel to the multiplayer of the original games. It's a super fast paced FPS with the same fun weapons, great controls and fun maps. The guns are all useful in different situations, with second functions adding to the tactical diversity. The bots are fine, obviously not as good as real players, but they do the job. I was quite surprised that the campaign is just a selection of multiplayer styles fights against bots. This decision for the campaign to be basically the multiplayer is a good and a bad one. While it highlights the best aspects of the game, it doesn't really feel like a campaign. The same effect could have been achieved with an offline mode for multiplayer games with bots, and then a separate real campaign with a story would have been appreciated. With that in mind, UT3 is fun to play, but it's not really something I would recommend picking up nowadays and in it's current form is a very average game at best.

It's really nice to revisit these games in 2024, especially after experiencing them on the Master Chief collection. It's much easier to get a feel for the campaign, not hampered down by the multiplayer or nostalgia. For many people, Halo is all about multiplayer. I get that, it is up there with Goldeneye as one of the most fun multiplayer shooters. Yet, with the servers shut down, does the campaign still hold up and is it still worth owning. The answer is yes, Halo 4 is still good. Halo 4 continues the epic series, but this time 343 have taken over the reigns from creators Bungie. Now, unless you have been hiding under a rock, you know what Halo is. A futuristic space FPS, with excellent controls and a cool story and world. There's vehicles, sticky grenades and weird alien enemies, it's great. Halo 4 is all of those things and more, it's really fun. I always think it's strange that this is not a Bungie game as it feels more like a Halo game than the previous Reach and ODST. They have kept everything you loved about the original 3 games and added in interesting enemies and weapons to boot. In some ways I actually enjoyed this more than Halo 3. It's graphics hold up much better which makes sense as it was more recent. I also think it is a bit smoother to control, if that is possible. The story explores the relationship between Master Chief and Cortana, which is a nice change and quite mature. In terms of criticisms, there are a few. The missions feature a lot more indoor environments, with corridor shooting style sections and less space to move around. I'm not sure if this is a bad thing, but it definitely feels different. The music is also unfortunately a step down, it's fairly hard to match up to Halo 3 though in this regard. I think my biggest gripe with the game is the final boss. I won't spoil anything, but it sucks. Overall I really enjoyed Halo 4 and looking back at it with a campaign focus, I think people may enjoy it more than they expect. Press R to climb was pretty dumb though. Of course you should pick up this one.

So I should start by saying that this is not a good game but it is a game I really enjoyed. Released in 2007, Vampire Rain got absolutely hammered by reviewers at the time, people hated this game. The difficulty is often brought up, the wooden characters, horrible weapons, the list goes on. I'd argue this is one of those games that's actually been misrepresented and I will try to explain why. Vampire Rain is a stealth/action horror game released by Japanese developers Actoon. Gameplay wise it is quite similar to MGS. You sneak your way around a fairly open and large map, trying to avoid enemies. You play as "American of Welsh decent" John Llyod, a member of the AIB, a special forces group, dealing with a infestation of nightwalkers in the city. The story and dialogue are campy B-movie style, but pretty fun. I actually found the story fairly engaging, and really enjoyed the setting in the rainy streets of LA. The excellent music also adds to the atmosphere and helps the game feel less low budget than it actually is, it's probably one of my favourite music scores on the console. The nightwalkers or vampires themselves are the main enemy you are facing. From a distance they look like normal people, but if they spot you they transform into monsters and charge directly at you. In this respect the game is definitely a stealth game. If an enemy spots you, you are basically dead. This is also probably down to the weakness of the weapons. The pistol does absolutely nothing and the SMG can kill 1 enemy if they are far away enough when they spot you. The real problem is that the game doesn't do a very good job of explaining this, and in my opinion this is what has lead people to label the game as too hard. The second level of the game, where you first encounter an enemy, is a great example of this. When you meet the nightwalker you need to hide around a corner, shoot the birds away, wait for the vampire to come and look around, then when it starts walking away make a dash down the road. This took me around 10 attempts to get right. If you make any kind of mistake you are dead. It's stuff like this early on in the game that really pose a problem for people just getting into the game and I have a feeling that a lot of people that complain about the game, didn't actually get very far. If you can get past these random hard sections Vampire Rain is a lot of fun. It's nice exploring the city, hiding from vampires and finding alternative routes to get past vamps. There are even some better weapons later on that make the game much easier, in some ways too easy in fact. There are some things about the game I dislike. It is very linear. Each level has one real route that you are meant to take and if you try deviating from it, well you will die. But I can't help feel like most reviews are a bit too harsh due to the frustrating nature of a small number of sections. I beat the game, enjoyed it and would play it again. It's not polished. It's not very well made or explained. Yet it is fun to play, and I found myself enjoying it more than a lot of "good" games. I'd grab this one for your collection and see if you can enjoy it with a bit of effort.

I've played a couple of Transformers games before this one and haven't been very impressed. It came as a bit of a surprise then that this game is pretty good. Part of the Cybertron series, along with War for Cybertron released a few years earlier, Fall of Cybertron tell the story of.... Well actually I'm not really sure. I'm not a Transformers fan and basically had no idea what was going on in the story. It seemed cool though. The game is a 3rd person shooter, a bit Gears of War esque, with some fun driving sections. It's a fairly short campaign, but its done really well. It has that Micheal Bay action movie style feel, with each section feeling like a really nicely set up action sequence. There are some great set pieces, explosions and effects. It's just the type of silly action fun that you would want from a transformers game. What I enjoyed most was the enemy and weapon variety. Even thought the levels were fairly linear, this variety kept me interested with each weapon feeling unique and useful. It also has a decent level of polish that I didn't expect. Of course it's no Halo or Gears, but it's really well made and feels like a AAA title. The music and sound effects, the great visuals, solid controls and nicely set up tutorial and campaign. Apparently the multiplayer was also excellent back in the day too. A nice little surprise package and a short campaign which I enjoyed quite a bit, a great one to have in the collection.

Did you know that Warriors Orochi 2 was actually intended to be an expansion of the first game? The answer to that is probably yes because it's basically the same game. If Koei Temco are one of the worst companies for the copy and paste theory of making games, this might be their worst offence, and it is really difficult to see the differences between the two games bar the story (which isn't that much different). So what do we have here? Well, some more hack and slash action in ancient China and Japan, with a huge cast of characters. These games pit you against huge armies of enemies who seem to stand there and do nothing. It is kinda fun smashing through literally thousands of enemies in one battle, but the lack of effort from these enemy "warriors" is a bit concerning. It's very much one of those games that you either love or hate. For Orochi 2, they have kept the mechanic that made Orochi 1 more interesting than other warriors games, in that you play as 3 characters. Swapping between the characters does still feel good, yet it's less novel this time around, and a lack of any further innovation or polish is disappointing. However, Orochi does solve one issue that plagued the first game, the need to grind out levels. For that reason alone, 2 is a little better, because no one likes to grind. For the majority of us that don't really have the patience to get that far, even this doesn't really matter.

The guys at Koei seem intent on realising the same game in as many ways possible. Not satisfied with having Dynasty Warriors and Samurai Warriors they decided to combine them into this package, the first in the Warriors Orochi series. It is basically the same hack and slash gameplay as the others Warriors games and if you are familiar with those games, it's more of the same. Of course this is extremely lazy, but it makes for an easy review. What has changed? Well there is one positive. In this game you get to fight as a team of 3 instead just 1. I do welcome this change. Rotating characters when they are low on health and using characters with different move sets for different battles adds a bit of tactics to the otherwise mash X game. The story is also a little bit more interesting but nothing special. I also found this game pretty hard compared to other warriors games, but maybe I just suck. Better than the standard warriors games but still nothing particularly special. Unless you love these, I wouldn't bother picking this up.

I've been pretty harsh on most of the warriors games but I think most of that criticism is warranted. The thing is, if you don't like this style of gameplay, you are not really going to enjoy these games. That being said, Orochi changing it up by having 3 characters was a big improvement. Orochi 3 makes further improvements and is probably the best in the series. For a start the story is actually quite fun. You start off in a losing battle against the multi-headed hydra. However, as you are about to lose they are sent back into the past to build up a stronger team and the game actually begins. Not having to follow true historical battles just makes everything more fun. The gameplay is also improved and the characters feel a bit more balanced. In Orochi 1 I found myself using all the same characters and having to grind to level others up. 3 is a lot more generous in giving out experience which is great. This means you can play around with different characters without having to grind. The characters are at least slightly varied and are fun to play around with. The levels are also a bit more varied and more fun to play. I found myself getting lost and frustrated less then before. Now I still don't love the gameplay, but warriors orochi 3 is a really decent attempt and is very successful at what it's trying to do. I would say this is a good place to start to see if you enjoy the Warriors games and not a bad title all around.

Many many moons ago, before Assassin's Creed was the yearly franchise that it is today, before it had become one of worst offenders of the typical Ubisoft game, it was one of the coolest ideas in gaming. From all of the cool and interesting IPs that we got with the 360/PS3 generation, I think AC was the one with the most promise. A historical game featuring assassins and templars, secret societies, beautiful realistic ancient world cities like Jerusalem, bustling with life and NPCs that you could actually interact with, bump into etc. I wasn't a huge fan of the whole animus sub plot, let's just set it in the past, but aside from that it's such a great concept. And at the time, it was a big hit and its easy to see why. For 2007 the environments are incredible, bursting with detail and life. Damascus and Jerusalem are beautiful to look at and are still fairly vast and detailed to todays standards. Nowadays, and perhaps because of the better sequels, AC1 has been somewhat cast aside, perhaps unfairly for that matter. Now, personally I am in two minds about this, because I am not an AC fan. The issue is really what I think of as the gameplay loop. Now the basic gameplay is fine. It offers a parkour style of gameplay similar to mirrors edge where you can run up and jump across building automatically just by holding a button. You traverse the environment, climbing up building and hiding from ensuing enemies as you explore the city. There is a bit too much fighting in this game, and a lack of stealth, but it's not horrible. The way the game works, once you get into it, is you are sent on a mission to assassinate someone. Once you get to that location you need to climb towers around the city to uncover the map, and then complete some smaller tasks like assassinating someone or chasing someone to get more information about the target. Once you have done enough you can actually go and assassinate the target. The problem is, all of this pre-assassination set-up is not good. It's boring, virtually identical for every mission and really just feels like filler. The main event assassinations are better as they offer some story and a bit of variety, and give a nice break from all the time spent doing what seem like procedurally generated sub missions. It upsets me how un-fun this series is, because I really want to love it and that makes it difficult to review. As much as I don't really enjoy playing it, AC is still an impressive world. The story and environments are excellent, it looks beautiful and has most of the basics that made the AC creed franchise so popular. A flawed but impressive IP that I can recommend only as an impressive point of reference and not as a fun game.

With the stupid naming system of all these DB games, I am always a bit confused which is which. I'm not a DB fan, so that probably explain it, but this Battle of Z game always stood out to me. It could be because of the late release date, but I think it's probably the awesome box art. What I try to forget though, is the very slow and boring 3D brawler combat, and that's what makes BoZ really stand out from the other DB games. Now, that's not to say that it doesn't have all the hallmarks of a DB game, as it does. It has lots of story and cutscenes from the TV series. It has a very short and basic campaign. It has loads of characters. Yet, it manages to change things up and be even worse by changing from a mostly 2D fighter to a 3D brawler. The game also has become team based, with you joined by 3 other friends for most fights. This introduces some team combo moves, which do feel cool when you pull them off, but this move was clearly designed for multiplayer play, which in 2024 is now dead, leaving an awkward empty single player campaign. It's happened before with Anarchy Reigns, and it's unfortunate that the multiplayer focus of the combat system doesn't hold up to the test of time. This empty gameplay is not helped by the stages. You fight in huge open and empty areas meaning that you will spend a lot of time just chasing your enemy around. This really slows down the fights to a snails pace, and removes any of the fun of the previous 2d DB game. Combine this weaker, less skill and combo based fighting, with the general lack of feature to the game aside from cutscenes and story, it feels very light for a 2014 release, and definitely not something worth picking up in 2024.

What a dumb name for a game. So here we are with another Dragon Ball game with another confusing title. How do we remember this one? Well it was the first Dragon Ball games on the console, released in 2008 and it looked great at time. Partly because it was the first released on the console, Burst Limit really sets the standard for the Dragon Ball games to come. This is not because it's an amazing game, but because like most DB games on the console, it is very average. In fact, it feels way more stripped back of features than the 3rd Budokai game found on the HD collection which came out a few years before. BL and most DB games have a simple formula. One on one fighting games with a short campaign covering a large story based on the famous anime. They all have loads of characters, lots of combos to remember, and a Ki system to charge up special attacks. Burst Limit doesn't do a lot to stand out from the crowd and offers little in terms of innovation or distance from this tired old formula. Fights all basically take place a similar area, each level offering little more than some dialogue and the fight itself. Of course, the fighting is what you have come here for, yet the fight system in Burst Limit doesn't really offer enough depth to compete with the traditional fighting games like Tekken and Street Fighter. I was expecting a bit more in terms of world building, tasks, challenges or even something like the 3D open world environments found in the Naruto games. Spam punches and kicks, build up Ki, unleash your special. So is there anything to like about the game. Well, the tutorial is nice and does a good job at explaining the game mechanics. They have also added some in-fight events which add a bit of story and variety to the fights. I found these interesting at first, but quickly it felt like they were only added to make the fights last longer. The campaign itself is also very short and quite stale. It's a real shame that most of the DB games on the console are fairly average, but in that way BL is a nice place to start. If you dig this, you will probably enjoy these others and vice versa. Disappointing, but a taste of what was to come.

Dragon Ball, the popular anime series featuring a cast of wacky characters beating the shit out of each other seems like the perfect candidate to make a game out of. In fact there has already been a large number of these games on various consoles, so much so that it is difficult to know where to start. The Budokai series are some of the most popular games in the franchise, particularly 3 and so it's great to see them again on the console for more people to play. But wait, we have an issue, where is 2. This HD collection goes down a similar route to others by completely skipping a game. It's really hard to understand why, especially when they have skipped the middle one. Alas, we are left with two 1 on 1 fighting games. The combat is quite simple and button mashing works, but there are a lot of different ways to fight and combos to pull off. You can charge up attacks with your Ki and use special moves. The games also feature a lot of story and cutscenes which, as a non DB fan, went right over my head. 1 is a fairly standard fighter, and there is nothing special about it. It's short and doesn't offer much except the fights themselves. 3 is much better. It is less linear and offers way more features. You can level up your character with new skills. There's a 3D world for you to explore with even some secrets to find. The combat itself is similar to 1, but the more fleshed out game makes it feel way better. These are both short games and aren't really groundbreaking. Yet, its a nice little package and a nice place to start playing DB games. A must for dragon ball fans and a nice way to see if you would enjoy the other games if you are not a fan.

Platinum games always strive to make interesting and stylish games. Bayonetta is their best known game on the system which managed to combine style and substance with its excellent combat. Vanquish came next with is substance but not much style, which makes it still a fun game to play. Anarchy Reigns is the third offering on the console and while it ticks the stylish box, it doesn't hold up in terms of substance. Gameplay wise AR is a 3D brawler set in a post apocalyptic future. A spiritual successor to the better Madworld, the game features 2 different but very short campaigns with different characters Jack and Leo. The story for each character is intertwined and works quite well, with some suitably cheesy dialogue between fights. It's a shame then that it's enjoyable on a very superficial level. The combat, while fun at first, quickly becomes repetitive and the lack of enemy variety later on in the game becomes a big issue. I found myself repeating similar combos all the way throughout the game and you are really given one set option to handle each enemy type which leaves you little space for creativity. Each level is set in a different area which seems interesting at first, there are different sections to each area and some special areas too, yet it all feels very superficial as when you spend a bit of time in a level you realise how small and dull they are. A lot of these problems are probably due to the fact the game wants to be a multiplayer brawler and maybe it did succeed in that, but i doubt you will be able to find any matches nowadays. A game which, while fun for a short while, looks more interesting than it actually is. Bonus points for the excellent music though.

Samurai Shodown Sen is the 360 generation's release of the beloved fighting game series. While I haven't spent much time with the previous games, Sen is seen as a departure from most of the previous games in terms of how it plays and this change has been attributed to making it more accessible to the general consumer. Sen attempts the transition to a modern 3D fighting game, but fails spectacularly. You have a fairly large roster of interesting characters with different fighting styles. The menus also have some nice music and decent artwork too giving a very feudal Japan feeling. In terms of positives that's about it. With it's lack of features, clunky controls, ugly graphics and total lack of a tutorial, Sen fails in some of the most basic aspects of game design. The most aggravating way however is the gameplay itself. Fights are slow and sluggish and the characters move extremely awkwardly. At no point in my time with the game was I able to feel any type of flow with the combat, I would either win with some cheap attacks or get totally dominated. The move list doesn't really help and the tutorial is even more useless. I'm not sure if this was a cash grab or they just absolutely botched the game but it's difficult to understand how such a poor entry in an otherwise highly regarded series could be released.

The year is 1995, it's Saturday morning and you are playing Sega Rally on your Saturn. You have the whole weekend ahead of you. No homework to do. Pure bliss. These were the heydays of the arcade racer, but at some point we lost our way. By the time the Xbox 360 had been released, driving games focused more on realism, car customisation, story and real life locations. Sure there are a lot of great and revolutionary racing games on the console. Grid brought the excellent rewind feature, Test Drive unlimited brought a beautiful open world Hawaiian island, Forza 2 created an almost perfect racing package, all of these changed the way we view racing games. In this regard, Sega Rally Revo stood out like a sore thumb. A pure arcade rally game, with no damage, no customisation, no real life tracks. It didn't go down well with reviewers and in my opinion has been severely misjudged. SRR is an excellent classic arcade racer and a must play for all retro arcade racing fans. For a start the racing is smooth and competitive. You take part in a selection of championships, 3 races for each event, against 5 AI opponents. The difficulty of these opponents cannot be changed and it does get really tough. The AI will attack you aggressively at corners and jump at you if you make even the smallest mistake. It's a hard but fair style of racing. There are times when you have managed to pick up speed and are ready to overtake the pack but the car in front of you swerves right into your path causing you to lose all momentum. At the same time, sometimes when you make a mistake the AI will come crashing into the back of you sending you flying forward and able to hold onto your position. It's both frustrating and incredibly satisfying at the same time. You have 6 sets of tracks, based of different locations and track types. Arctic has snow and volcano ash on the track, and the icy roads will have you skidding. Safari tracks are dusty which affects your vision. The Canyon tracks get very muddy with huge water puddles that slow you right down. Every track feels different in terms of the feedback from the road and it's a real nice feature which I much prefer to having a huge number of tracks that feel the same. Similarly, while there are not a huge number of cars in the game, each one handles differently and you will have favourites based on how they handle the terrain. As mentioned earlier, you are not bogged down by car customisation or autobraking. You have 2 options, auto or manual gears and a road or off-road set up. It keeps things simple and focuses the game on the fun part, racing. What makes the game really standout is the graphics and the deformable terrain. This game looks incredible. It's not something that I really pay attention to in games but even for a 2007 release, it's one of the best looking games on the console. The car models are nice and the lighting works well, but it's the tracks and the environment which really standout. This is probably due to the aforementioned deformable terrain. As you race around the circuits, the tracks themselves are affected by your racing lines. This could be simple like cutting lines in the snow to make it more compact and creating a harder more grippy surface for racers behind you, or more impressively changing the formation and area of puddles of water in the road as you carve through the mud. It really changes the tracks every single race and keeps things fresh and exciting. It looks beautiful too. I love getting my car all caked up in mud before driving through a puddle and washing it all off. Every time I play this game I enjoy it a bit more and I can't sing it's praises enough. So is it perfect? Well no. I can understand people being frustrated by its difficulty. A big crash can really mess you up for a whole race and the AI is brutal. The small number of tracks may be a turn off for some, but each race plays out differently each time so I have never found it an issue. One minor issue I have with the game is that you always start off at the back of the pack, no matter where you finished in the previous race, but this is mere nitpicking. I'm an official SRR fan boy now. There is nothing like it on the console and it is a must have for any 360 collector.