Publisher: Activision
Developer: Red Octane
Genre: Music
Release date: December 22, 2009

As I type this, my area is being hammered by the worst winter storm in 13 years. What better way to warm things up around the old homestead than to rock out with Van Halen, one of the best live-performance bands of all time? In Guitar Hero: Van Halen, Activision and developer Red Octane feature one of the true guitar gods and one of the most distinctive voices in the history of rock in another band-centric edition of the series that revitalized the gaming industry.

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Publisher: Namco Bandai
Developer: Spike
Genre: Fighting
Release date: Available now

Spike’s latest Dragonball Z-based fighter, Dragonball: Raging Blast, takes place in a world where tall hair and exaggerated yelling reign supreme. Fast battles and tight clothes are commonplace in this world, and you’ll be experiencing plenty of both as you play through the game.

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Publisher: Electronic Arts
Developer: Valve Software
Genre: Shooter
Release date: Available now

Valve has already set a high bar when making video games. With such hits as the Half-Life series, Team Fortress, Portal and the first Left 4 Dead, people keep wondering when they will run out of creative steam. Well, I can assure you, they certainly haven’t yet. You might remember a growing voice in the gaming community calling for a boycott of Left 4 Dead 2 because of its being released so soon after the original and concerns that issues from the first game had not been resolved. That boycott call ceased this past October before L4D2‘s release, and if you play this game, you’ll see why – it’s fantastic.

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Publisher: 2K Games
Developer: Gearbox Software
Genre: RPS
Release date: Available now

One of the more obvious trends in gaming lately has been the gravitational pull towards the undead. See, with a zombie there’s no moral conundrum to deal with; you just aim for the head and try not to get any blood in your eyes. Games like Left 4 Dead and its recently released sequel have capitalized on this, as well as Call of Duty: World at War, which added yet another layer of shoot first certainty by making the resident shamblers part of the third Reich. Capping soulless abominations requires no thinking and no need to check your fire, either, making the concept a perfect fit for a game like Borderlands. With that, let’s take a trip to Jakob’s Cove and the Zombie Island of Dr. Ned.

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Publisher: I-Imagine Interactive
Developer: RTL Sports
Genre: Sports
Release date: Available now

I should preface this review by pointing out that, more than most games I review, I am not part of the target market for this game. Even compared to the games made for girls aged 9-12, of which I’ve reviewed many. I know so little about soccer, it is literally impossible for me to participate meaningfully in this game. Watching soccer, to me, is a very small step up from watching long distance running on TV.

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Publisher: 1C Publishing
Developer: Gaijin Entertainment
Genre: Flying Simulation
Release date: Available now

Do you like racing around at great speed, causing mayhem with guns and blowing up things? Look no further: IL-2 Sturmovik: Birds of Prey is the game for you, especially if you’ve been doggedly fighting World War II on the ground (World at War; Call of Duty) and are in search of a new outlet. At least you can then decide if you want to swap your infantry boots for a comically overlarge moustache with accompanying leather hat. Think first-person shooter with a bucket load of caffeine. It’s manic; even in single-player mode there’s enough action and activity to keep the most demanding flight simmer happy. Switch to versus mode for a while and you’ll need to lie down in a dark, quiet room for a few hours (days in my case – I am not as young as I once was). It’s by no means a perfect game, but it’s fun and exciting.

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Publisher: 2K Games
Developer: Gearbox Software
Genre: RPS
Release date: Available now

With my affections towards Mad Max, first person shooters and RPGs, it was only natural that I would have been following the development of Borderlands from the very first snippet of info released over two years ago. I was anxiously looking forward to reliving Road Warrior-esque scenes on barren salt flats and experimenting on the wildlife using thousands upon thousands of randomly generated guns. And although what I hold in my hands is a solid, well playing romp on a strange and wonderful world, I’m still left conflicted as to whether I’m absolutely in love or just okay with it.

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Publisher: Hidden Path Entertainment
Developer: Hidden Path Entertainment
Genre: Tower Defense
Release date: Available now

Let’s talk tower defense. No don’t leave, at least hear me out. I don’t usually play this type of game, so when I was asked to review Hidden Path’s Defense Grid: The Awakening, I wasn’t that excited. The prospect of not being able to send a tooled up character into a bloody firefight with accompanying large explosions and general pulse-racing chaos sends a cold chill down my spine. Still, seeing as I like a challenge, I reluctantly switched on my trusty Xbox and waited as the game downloaded. Within 10 minutes of playing I was addicted. I even ignored offers of tea (which, being English, isn’t normal), as I was furiously engaged in planning my next strategy and vanquishing the wily enemy.

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Publisher: 2K Play
Developer: Silver Wish Games
Genre: Adventure
Release date: Available now

It’s hard to pin the tail on the donkey that is Axel & Pixel. At its heart, it’s a point and click, scene-by-scene adventure game, but it carries elements of timed button press sequencers, puzzlers and action games as well. Perhaps that’s what indie developer Silver Wish had in mind while they were conceptualizing it – a whimsical journey into another world that could offer up all of these styles and still manage to fall into a cohesive package that can hold onto the ball ’til the end.

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Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
Developer: Bungie
Genre: FPS
Release date: Available now

In classical music there’s a form known as “variations on a theme.” The composer starts out with a simple melody, and through clever manipulations of tempo and rhythm, he transforms that melody into something new and interesting, often several times in a single composition. Developer Bungie has done pretty much the same with their series of Halo games. The first three are the theme. The first variation was Halo Wars, in which they changed the focus from a “Rambo”-style shooter to real-time strategy. Variation 2 is Halo 3: ODST, which returns the series to the FPS genre, but drastically alters the way its story is told.

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Publisher: Black Inc.
Developer: Coreplay
Genre: Shooter
Release date: Available now

From past experience, we know that if a game has a gimmick it usually means that it’s the central focus of the gameplay, right? Unfortunately, that also means that just about everything else having to do with making a quality game is put aside in favor of ensuring that the gimmick stands out and sells copies. Grappling hooks, insane physics or how many enemies you can fit on screen all come to mind when I think of examples, but I also think that most of the time the reason for failure is because the game itself is too big for the gimmick’s britches. Thinking smaller, while relying on a hook is exactly what developer Coreplay had in mind with their particle-happy space shooter, Ion Assault.

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Publisher: Activision
Developer: Vicarious Visions
Genre: Action/RPG
Release Date: Available now

There’s a certain rinse and repeat sensation that every Diablo-clone inspires. When you strip away their trappings, be it an orc-strewn fantasy land or superhero-laden stronghold, these action RPGs amount to little more than bashing the hell out of everything not bolted down, scoring mad piles of loot and moving on to the next trigger point to engage a new stream of foes. While this game play can be addictive and certainly scratches that innate itch to cause untold amounts of mayhem, modern dungeon crawlers need to apply their own secret identity to make it all worth a gamer’s while. A few years back, Vicarious Visions updated the template they crafted with last generation’s X-Men Legends titles and drafted the entire Marvel roster with Marvel Ultimate Alliance. The ability to join forces with all of the great heroes that have inhabited that potent universe was a big draw and the game was a genuine success. Three years later, Vicarious Visions is back with the sequel, aptly titled Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2.

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Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Ensemble Studios
Genre: RTS
Release date: Available now

If you gotta go out, it ought to be with a bang. And that’s just what Ensemble Studios did. In early 2009, after 14 years as a game developer (eight of them as a subsidiary of Microsoft), Ensemble closed its doors. But their last project was Halo Wars, a real-time strategy chapter in the tremendously lucrative Halo shooter series. The fact that it prospered despite starting out with two solid strikes against it speaks volumes for the game and its creators.

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Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
Developer: Artificial Mind & Movement
Genre: Action
Release date: Available now

It’s said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Nowhere is this cliché more evident than in the video-game domain, where each year new action games build upon the foundations laid previously by other developers. Think of Bullet Time. First “The Matrix” film series did it. Then Max Payne copped to it. And suddenly, everyone from the Prince of Persia to Blinx the Time Cat was slowing time to get out of a jam. Of course, the movies are no different. You only need look in Quentin Tarentino’s direction. Every film that cool cat has ever seen has stewed in his brain pan and been churned out into the pop-culture fever dreams that he’s concocted; their obscure grindhouse origins are ripe for the enterprising cineaste looking to connect each dot. It’s fitting, then, that Artificial Mind & Movement’s new third-person action game, Wet, should emerge as the love child of QT and the action game genre.

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Publisher: Activision
Developer: Neversoft
Genre: Music
Release date: Available now

Who hasn’t dreamed of being on stage singing for thousands of adoring fans? It’s a fantasy that knows no age limit, no racial or gender barriers. But most of us are missing the one major element that would make that fantasy a reality: talent. And that’s where developer Neversoft’s Guitar Hero series comes in. Playing interactive music games, be they Guitar Hero, Rock Band, even vocal-only products such as Lips, gives even the tone-deaf player the opportunity to step up and be a superstar. Guitar Hero 5 takes the now-commonplace music-game mechanic and spruces it up a bit, giving us another good reason to drag out the plastic instruments and rock out until our hands cramp and our vocal cords turn to mush.

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