Ivy the Kiwi?
Reviewed for: Wii
Also available for: Nintendo DS
From: Prope/XSEED
ESRB Rating: Everyone (comic mischief)

If you squint hard enough to see through the Wii’s forest of ill-devised motion control tech demos, half-baked mini-game collections and one-trick peripherals, you might be lucky enough to spot a game like “Ivy the Kiwi?,” a completely sublime example of a game that hones in on one thing the Wii does best and takes perfect advantage of it without any unnecessary fuss whatsoever.

“Ivy’s” premise is simple: Ivy, a freshly-hatched chick, is lost and looking for her mother, and players are tasked with making that reunion happen.

“Ivy” presents itself as a sidescrolling platformer, but players have no direct control over Ivy: Instead, they point the Wii remote at the screen and use it to create vines that Ivy can walk on, spring from and use as protection from traps and enemies en route to reaching a level’s goal. Like a lemming, Ivy never stops walking, so a quick, steady hand is needed to create vines quickly and put them to good use.

If you’ve played “Kirby Canvas Curse” on the Nintendo DS, you have a good idea how this works, and it’s no surprise “Ivy” is appearing on that platform as well.

But while creating vines is easier with a stylus, it’s considerably more fun with the remote. “Ivy” lets players “swing” the vines while creating them by swinging the remote in a circular motion, which in turn launches Ivy forward or upward. Players also can treat a created vine like a slingshot and launch Ivy toward enemies and destructible blocks. All of this is elementarily possible with a stylus, but the Wii controls are so natural and intuitive that the sensation of unfurling, swinging and slinging vines feels surprisingly like the real thing.

The bigger screen also allows “Ivy’s” magnificent visual presentation — picture an animated watercolor drawing presented as a living storybook — to dazzle that much more. “Ivy” is a minimalist work in terms of art, sound and storytelling, but it’s a marvelous example of how to do a lot with a little. If little Ivy doesn’t charm you, little else can.

Like many of history’s best 2D platformers, “Ivy’s” adorability belies how challenging its 100-plus levels eventually become. The game is generous with extra lives and endless continues, but in return, it asks players to complete levels without making a single fatal mistake. Simply doing that is a hearty (but very fair) challenge by itself, and the truly bold can test themselves further by trying to collect the 10 feathers scattered around each level and still reach the goal before the clock hits zero. “Ivy” grades players’ performance on each level, and perfectionists can revisit completed levels at their leisure to improve their marks.

Beyond how well it accommodates both novice and skilled players, “Ivy’s” biggest surprise might be its multiplayer (2-4 players, local only).

A co-op mode allows two players to draw vines for a single Ivy, which turns “Ivy” into a terrific game parent and child can play together. Competitive multiplayer, meanwhile, pits four Ivys in a splitscreen race to reach the goal first, which sounds completely ordinary until players realize they can draw vines in other players’ quadrants and sabotage their progress. Instantly, a sweet story about a chick looking for her mama becomes one of the most cutthroat and hilariously fun multiplayer modes to grace the Wii this year.

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Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Also available for: Windows PC, OnLive
From: IO Interactive/Eidos/Square Enix
ESRB Rating: Mature (blood, drug reference, intense violence, partial nudity, strong language)

It’s almost reflex to criticize the storyline portion of “Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days” for being too short at around four hours long. But given how dishearteningly the story’s backward steps outnumber its forward steps, four hours might be plenty — especially if you find the more inspired multiplayer offerings more to your liking anyway.

On the positive front, “Days” is a more polished third-person shooter than its 2007 predecessor. Finding cover actually generally works this time, and while the automatic weapons remain frustratingly inaccurate, the pistols and absurdly powerful shotguns are sufficiently precise. In addition to smoothing out the framerate, a clever new visual style presents the action as though it’s being filmed on a handicam — video grain, compression artifacts, color separation, light streaking — and it effectively enhances the ugliness of the game’s violence. (The nauseating shaky cam effect can, mercifully, be disabled.)

But those filters color a storyline that drops players into much duller scenarios and offers exponentially less character insight than the first game did. Kane and Lynch weren’t exactly lovable in their debut, but “Days” renders them downright loathsome, and helping them reach the game’s laughably abrupt ending feels nearly as empty as getting them killed.

And while “Days” is a better shooter than its predecessor, it still sins too often for its own good. Enemies require far too many bullets to defeat — a problem compounded by the aforementioned inaccuracy — and it’s a slog to take them down when their psychic A.I. allows them to pelt away the second players pop out of cover. Occasionally, the cover doesn’t even work, forcing aggravated players to decide between being slowly decimated by endless gunfire or seeking new cover at the risk of being knocked down and cheaply ripped to shreds.

The failure to truly polish the shooting mechanics makes it harder to understand the complete removal of the squad mechanics that allowed players some control over their A.I. partner in the original. “Days” is best played with a friend controlling the second character via splitscreen/online co-op, but that’s little solace to players who have to fly solo and deal with an A.I. partner who isn’t terribly helpful. Between this, the uninspired level designs and the shoddy mechanics, “Days” doesn’t even need the entirety of its short lifespan to wear out its welcome.

Fortunately, while those mechanics carry over to “Days’” online multiplayer (8-12 players), the level playing field and terrific general premise make them significantly more tolerable.

The common thread connecting the multiplayer modes is trust, or lack thereof. Fragile Alliance pits players in a co-op heist against A.I. cops but lets players turn against the group in the name of greed. (The downside is, of course, getting killed by the group and respawning, penniless, as a cop.) Undercover Cop, meanwhile, designates one mystery player as a mole, tasking him with taking the alliance down from within before the other players can out him.

The pinch of paranoia transforms just another shooter into a mind game with guns, and the ability to parlay heist earnings into better weaponry provides “Days” some badly-needed replay value. Other multiplayer shooters do the shooting part better, but until they rip these ideas off, “Days” is just unique enough to merit a look.

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Monster Dash
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: Halfbrick Studios
iTunes Store Rating: 9+ (infrequent/mild profanity or crude humor, infrequent/mild horror/fear themes, infrequent/mild cartoon or fantasy violence)
Price: $1

No one born before yesterday will give “Monster Dash” credit for being original: It’s another derivative of “Canabalt,” and outside of giving players a weapon and some monsters to shoot, it doesn’t mess with the formula. For those unfamiliar with “Canabalt,” the gist is simple: The game’s main character is constantly and furiously running from left to right, and players must hit the jump button at the right times so the character leaps from platform to platform without falling to his demise. The longer he runs, the better your score. “Dash” adds its own small twist to the niche by populating the platforms with monsters and giving players a default pistol (and some clever collectible weapons) with which to dispatch them, but that little touch becomes a big touch when it effectively doubles the number of tasks that “Canabalt” asked players to perform. That doesn’t magically transform “Dash” into a supremely deep experience, but between those mechanics, the multiple environments, the random generation of each environment for each play and the innately addictive nature of pursuing personal and online high scores, there’s plenty of enjoyment to justify the bargain-basement asking price. The appealing presentation — colorful cartoony graphics, a catchy soundtrack and a sense of humor in the menu screens — doesn’t hurt, either.

Snoopy Flying Ace
For: Xbox 360 via Xbox Live Arcade
From: Smart Bomb Interactive
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+ (violence)
Price: $10

With respect to the procession of big-ticket downloadable games currently releasing during Xbox Live’s Summer of Arcade event, the game that released just in front of that wave might be better than just about all of them.

Fans of the “Peanuts” comic strip should find nothing surprising about “Snoopy Flying Ace’s” single-player campaign, which finds Snoopy living out his dream as a World War I flying ace in pursuit of the devious Red Baron.

What might be surprising is just how deep that campaign goes. “Ace’s” compromise between arcade- and simulation-flavored controls feels perfectly right — not so loose as to make flying the planes a mindless cakewalk, but neither stiff nor needlessly complicated enough to keep casual dogfighting game fans from enjoying themselves just as much. The selection of weapons, both authentic and nowhere near, grows considerably as the campaign progresses, and the variety of mission types is remarkable. “Ace” rarely repeats itself in the mission objectives department, and some of the missions are spacious and ambitious enough that players can land their plane, commandeer a turret and take back to the sky as they please to finish things off. The game even supports local and online co-op (two players).

“Ace” flashes similarly remarkable skill with its capacity to blend “Peanuts” characters and imagery into a world that otherwise resembles ours. Nobody dies here — pilots always parachute to safety before their planes crash — and the allowance of cartoonish special weaponry means this won’t ever be confused with a “Battlefield” game. But the basic weaponry operates and sounds like the real thing, and when a plane crashes, it most certainly looks like the real thing. “Ace’s” presentation wants it both ways, and thanks to some careful compromise on both sides, it actually gets its wish.

The variety and ease of play translate nicely to the online multiplayer arena (16 players), which finds “Ace” boasting the most frantically fun competitive arcade dogfighting since “Crimson Skies” succeeded way back in 2002 by observing the same principles. “Ace’s” six modes cover the usual gamut — from individual/team deathmatch to more objective-based battles — and the aircraft and playable character options complement the weapon variety from the single-player campaign to provide players a generous array of options. “Ace” even includes the ability to play as your Xbox Live avatar.

All that gameplay adds up to perhaps the best console gaming value $10 can buy this summer, and as result, “Ace’s” online community remains deservedly lively a few weeks after it first released. Given how infrequently a game comes along to fill this niche, and given how well this one goes about doing it, “Ace’s” longevity might dwarf that of a typical game in this price range.

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Clash of the Titans
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
From: Game Republic/Namco Bandai
ESRB Rating: Teen (blood and gore, mild suggestive themes, violence)

“Clash of the Titans’” dual multimedia failure began with Warner Bros.’s astounding ability to airball a dunk by failing, despite possessing all the technology money could buy, to remake a movie that actually made complete sense to remake.

With the video game, which fails to hold any candle whatsoever to the “God of War” games that took that original movie’s premise and lifted it wholesale, the failure is now complete.

In fairness to game, it doesn’t appear to have nearly the same budgetary freedom as the film. Most of “Titans’” storytelling takes place through the kind of static dialogue exchanges we expected from games 10 years ago, and most of those exchanges are bland even by those dated standards — more akin to receiving mission instructions in a “World of Warcraft” knockoff than playing out what’s supposed to be mimicking a sweeping epic that “God of War” started retelling five years ago to exponentially more dazzling effect.

But the cheap feel hurts far more during the act of actually playing the game. Dated graphics and absolutely pulseless environmental design team up with a patchy level structure that requires players to constantly backtrack into static hub towns to accept new missions that rarely show any more imagination than the dull lands that host them.

As should be expected from any game built around hack-and-slash swordplay, most of “Titans’” missions boil down to some form of killing lots of enemies.

Unfortunately, on top of everything else, the combat feels entirely insufficient for being the centerpiece of the experience.
“Titans” flashes some nice enemy design variety over the course of the game, but individual missions regularly toss out the same enemies en masse, and most of them sport absurdly simple attack patterns and intelligence. The controls are responsive enough, but there’s no tangible impact at all with even the strongest attacks, which makes hacking away at the same enemies ad nauseam completely unsatisfying. Enemies regularly require far too many hits to defeat, which might be fine if they put up an exciting fight. But they don’t, so it’s just a matter of mashing buttons for entirely too long just to get through battles that endear no gratification whatsoever.

One thing “Titans” attempts with some success is to give players the ability to steal and, unlike most games, actually permanently keep enemy weapons. The number of takable weapons is pretty high at more than 80, and “Titans” lets players upgrade any of them as they progress.

But all these weapons and upgrades have to play nice with all that unsatisfying combat, and all that variety isn’t nearly interesting enough to counter how dull the action overwhelmingly is. “Titans” is, at roughly 12-15 hours in length, at least twice as long as it should be even if it had better mechanics. Even the supremely polished “God of War” gets a bit old after eight hours or so, and “Titans” wears out its welcome roughly 10 times over by operating at such a low level by comparison.

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Fragger
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: Miniclip SA
iTunes Store Rating: 9+ (infrequent/mild cartoon or fantasy violence)
Price: $1 (free lite version also available)

While “Fragger” doesn’t match up with the immensely popular “Angry Birds” in terms of depth and destructibility, it comes surprisingly close in terms of personality — no small feat, considering this is a game about throwing grenades at soldiers instead of launching deranged cartoon birds at mischievous pigs. “Fragger’s” gameplay operates on similar principles: Players have a limited amount of projectiles, and they must circumvent angles, obstacles, and the laws of physics to take out all enemy targets before ammo runs dry. The less ammo it takes, the higher the score, and the more medals players receive for their trouble. “Fragger’s” puzzles are a bit more clinical, often challenging players to trigger cause-and-effect puzzles instead of simply letting pure physics and destruction take over like they do in “Birds.” But the general premise is the same, and “Fragger” delivers both quality and quantity with 70 (and rising) levels that grow satisfyingly intricate as players advance. “Fragger” nullifies the obvious brutality of grenade warfare with an amusingly cartoony presentation that, in addition to looking really slick, makes the task considerably more charming than it otherwise would have been. The look and sound, combined with the brainy nature of the challenges, makes this a war game even people who hate war might have a great time playing.

Transformers: War for Cybertron
Reviewed for: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Also available for: Windows PC
From: High Moon Studios/Activision
ESRB Rating: Teen (violence)

Yes, “Transformers: War for Cybertron” is a tangibly better game than the two rushed-to-retail games that accompanied the two godawful “Transformers” movies released in the last three years. And yes, by having nothing to do with the movies, “Cybertron” is free to base its storyline, visual presentation and gameplay on the cartoon, which is all “Transformers” fans have wanted all along.

But “Cybertron” improves on those games like a football team improves to 8-8 a year after it finished 1-15. It’s a leap in the right direction, but one still flawed in ways fan service alone can’t obscure.

First, the good stuff. The storyline not only takes place within the cartoon’s timeline, but is a bona fide prequel instead of some trivial side story. The playable characters — among numerous others, Optimus, Megatron, Bumblebee, Starscream and Jetfire — are colorful instead of drably indistinguishable like they were in the movies, and humans have no presence whatsoever.

As with previous “Transformers” games, players can play from the perspectives of both the Autobots and the Decepticons, but in a welcome evolution, “Cybertron” merges both campaigns into a single storyline. Previous games had players repeating the same events from both perspectives and effectively canceling out the two different endings that resulted, but “Cybertron” reaches a single, satisfying conclusion that nicely sets the table for the cartoon.

In terms of fundamentals, the news remains good. “Cybertron” looks great — colorful, but also just a little grimy — and it finds the sweet spot between making the Transformers both agile and impressively weighty. The controls are more conducive to transforming than they were in the movie games, and both the third-person shooting and vehicular controls are pleasantly responsive. “Cybertron’s” environments are tighter than the movie games’ wide-open levels, but they offer enough room for players to switch between forms as they please.

The problem comes when “Cybertron” tries to do anything ambitious with those mechanics… because outside of a couple of missions that incorporate air combat, it never really does. Regardless of storyline condition, practically every mission consists of killing X number of grunt enemies, moving to point Y and repeating ad nauseam until the boss fight, which usually consists of more mindless shooting with the occasional extra condition based on each boss character’s attack pattern.

The moment-to-moment action is good enough to make “Cybertron” mindless fun anyway, but fighting the same grunt enemies and completing the same objectives so many times gets old long before the credits get to rolling. “Cybertron’s” support for three-player online co-op livens things up somewhat, but repetition with friends is only so much better than repetition alone. (A bonus horde mode, which removes the storyline pretense and just floods the screen with enemies until you can’t take it anymore, is a better, no-nonsense use the co-op function.)

For some, “Cybertron’s” competitive online multiplayer (10 players) will be the star of the show, if only because it dangles a carrot in the form of attainable experience points and unlockable abilities for players who level their four classes (leader, scout, scientist, soldier) up the 100-level scale. But the actual gameplay relies on the same old game variants and feels simplistic and dated compared to more tactical shooters with similar leveling systems, and it might be too simple for persistent leveling alone to keep the community bustling.

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Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker
For: Playstation Portable
From: Kojima Productions/Konami
ESRB Rating: Teen (blood, drug reference, language, suggestive themes, use of tobacco, violence)

From the optional-but-recommended pre-game data installation to the offering of three imposing control schemes to the tutorial and eventually the game itself, “Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker” stakes its claim as perhaps the most demanding game in the PSP’s five-year-old library.

But if you’re part the intended crowd, and if you have company, the good news is that Kojima’s latest wholeheartedly justifies that demand with an experience that’s as filling as any of the big-screen “Metal Gear Solid” games.

Out of necessity, “Walker” — which sets itself 10 years after the events of “MGS3″ — also plays like a cross between that game and “MGS4.” The lack of a second analog stick and extra set of triggers, and the control freedom those afforded, makes it hard to run and gun to the extent “MGS4″ allowed on the PS3. “Walker” makes generous concessions to counter the button gymnastics needed to accommodate the PSP’s limitations, but it also encourages players to just stay out of trouble by avoiding enemies and using close-quarters combat the way older “MGS” games practically mandated. There’s an unquantifiable but noticeable easing up of enemy A.I. and the damage their weapons cause, but Kojima tunes it just right, accounting for the system’s deficiencies without dumbing the game down, stripping players of weapon/gadget depth or making the journey a cakewalk.

“Walker” plays like it should, tells another winding story that covers yet more ground in the bizarre “MGS” timeline, and it manages once again to stretch itself over 25-plus hours of playtime without being dog tired by the time the credits roll.

As usual with this series, though, that’s not all — and this is where it might get confusing.

“Walker” complements its primary gameplay with a surprisingly deep tool for managing Snake’s base of operations. Snake can make allies out of enemies he non-lethally neutralizes in the field, and the tool lets players put them to work researching intelligence, developing technology and even assisting in battle. “Walker” packages the tool inside a byzantine interface it doesn’t explain terribly well, but players who figure it out will find a strangely engrossing management game that regularly improves the action in the field.

Even with the presence of that tool taken into consideration, though, “Walker’s” biggest surprise has to be its co-op support for up to six players via local wireless play. The availability of co-op and the number of players allowed varies by mission, a nice consideration that shows Kojima values the story’s integrity over shoving six soldiers into every mission.

Unfortunately, some of the missions that do support co-op — in particular, fights against boss characters that take an army’s worth of bullets to defeat — practically require it for all but the most skilled “MGS” players. Given the series’ traditionally single-player leanings, this little surprise is bound to frustrate some, especially because players have to seek out other players who also have PSPs and copies of the game instead of just look online for willing partners. (Players with a Playstation 3 can use the free “Ad Hoc Party” app to jerry-rig an online session, but the number of players doing so is bound to be smaller than if the game supported online play on its own.)

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Guess the News
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: Finger Arts
iTunes Store Rating: 12+ (infrequent/mild mature/suggestive themes, infrequent/mild profanity or crude humor, infrequent/mild sexual content or nudity, infrequent/mild alcohol, tobacco, or drug use or references)
Price: $3

There’s nothing wrong with a game being just a game, but sometimes it’s nice to accomplish something with that entertainment. Enter “Guess the News,” which combines “Wheel of Fortune”-style phrase guessing and whatever’s in the news to create a word game that’s as enlightening as it is fun. “News” grabs fresh headlines from various news sources and presents them as incomplete phrases, scattering the missing letters among a sea of letter tiles below. Tap and/or drag the titles to their proper spots — and do it quickly to maximize score combos and avoid timing out — and the game hits back with increasingly obscure headlines that have more letters to fill in. “News” complements its concept with an exquisite interface that allows players to customize their experience according to difficulty and genre of news (top stories, sports, entertainment and so on). The game also makes it easy to dig deeper into those headlines, even mid-game: An in-app Web browser takes players to the stories behind the headlines they help complete, and if your continued research takes you out of the app entirely, “News” saves your progress for easy resumption later. OpenFeint integration — leaderboards, achievements and so on — rounds out the package.

Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11
Reviewed for: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Also available for: Wii
From: EA Sports
ESRB Rating: Everyone (comic mischief)

It takes a special kind of thread to maneuver a needle as well-established (and, because it’s a professional golfing simulation, creatively handcuffed) as “Tiger Woods PGA Tour,” and it’s doubly difficult to please everybody in doing so. But in making changes that separately benefit those who want a more accessible golf experience and those who want a game that makes that first group cry, that’s precisely what “Tiger Woods PGA Tour 11″ does.

On the accessibility front, “TW11″ introduces a slightly fantastical currency, called focus, that players can accrue by playing well and spend as they choose to add power to a shot, increase accuracy or (among other things) use a putt preview mechanic to help fine-tune a shot on the green. The focus interface’s subtle design respects the integrity of the simulation, and because it’s rewarded to players through skillful play and hands out benefits with entirely believable results, it’s satisfyingly authentic despite being an inarguably contrived video game mechanic.

The focus currency headlines a number of more subtle changes that let unseasoned players cater “TW11″ to best address their shortcomings. The career mode once again distributes skill improvements as players advance their created golfers through the PGA Tour calendar, but now players can allot experience points to the areas — putting, driving, fading and so on — that most need the help. The optional tutorial lessons do a much better job of preaching the value of draws, lofts and shot types, and the analog stick controls (and meters for reading their accuracy) are responsive without, as they sometimes have in previous games, resorting to excess sensitivity.

On the complete other side of things is the new True Aim mode, which takes away all of “TW11′s” gamey assists and presents the entirety of the action, even post-shot, from the golfer’s point of view. Outside of a GPS device that helps players read the terrain and know the distance to the hole, the True Aim filter is akin to playing golf the way real golfers play it. It’s little more than a new camera angle and a disabling of certain viewing functions, but it arguably is “TW11′s” best addition for players who crave authenticity and want a new kind of challenge from the series.

Though the aforementioned tweaks might be the best thing about “TW11,” the addition of team play is the most prominent. The Ryder Cup, complete with captain duties and team management, joins the roster of playable championships, and “TW11′s” online team play supports up to six teams of four players each.

Traditional solo play (up to four players locally or online) returns, but now all players can shoot at their own pace online without watching everyone else take their turn. That welcome change heads the usual list of tiny enhancements, including some tweaks to the graphics and ball physics, more realistic green layouts, dynamic wind patterns that are prone to gusts, and a livelier GamerNet Challenges system, which allows players to challenge community shot records and accrue bonus experience points without ever leaving whatever mode they’re already playing.

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Toy Story 3
Reviewed for: Playstation 3, Xbox 360, Wii
Also available for: Windows PC, PSP and Nintendo DS
From: Avalanche Software/Disney Interactive
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+ (comic mischief)

“Toy story 3″ is what happens when inspired ideas fight a battle to the end with uninspired ideas while good and subpar execution duel similarly in the background.

Fortunately, if not easily, the good guys win more battles than they lose, and the game is significantly better than its five-car collision of ingredients would imply.

The struggle is apparent immediately, with “TS3″ pushing players into the story’s first level — an on-horse Wild West chase level starring Woody as the playable character — before the main menu even pops up. The level is simple, straightforward fun, but it’s also hampered by an unpolished control responsiveness (in this case, some imprecise horse jumping controls) that infects other control schemes throughout the game. A very generous checkpoint system makes it easy to forgive the setbacks the controls cause, but not so much that they aren’t still annoying when they pop up in bunches.

Immediately following that first level, “TS3″ drops players into an entirely different mode — the Toy Box — and it does so without adequately clarifying that players who wish to continue the story can do so without doing a single thing in this mode. But the confusion might be for the best, because it’s probably the most foolproof way to demonstrate to players that it’s this mode — and not the storyline, which feels more like a collection of self-contained vignettes than a coherent storyline — that really makes “TS3″ better than just another kids’ movie game.

Toy Box is “TS3′s” answer to sandbox gameplay — a fully open world, teeming with citizens, “Toy Story” characters and a horde of missions to complete and virtual toys (characters, vehicles and full-blown playsets) to unlock.

The missions aren’t exactly ingenious, with most of them being either fetch quests or simple facsimiles of side quests found in other open-world games. But “TS3″ designs them to be either quick or open-ended, making it easy for players to take on multiple objectives at a time while collecting more as they check some off the list. The variety of quests does plenty to compensate the lack of original mission design, and it only increases as players compile rewards and use them to purchase new toys — a horse here, a stunt car track there — that come with new mission types.

Those occasionally dodgy controls rear their head here as well — particularly with regard to the toy car controls, which are among the worst driving controls to be found anywhere in 2010. But “TS3′s” mission structure is so dense that when one quest is giving fits, there’s probably another one right behind it for players to work on before they go back and give the first one a shot. It’s a busybody’s paradise, it uses the “Toy Story” license very well, and it offers ambitious players a ton to do if they wish to turn the game inside out.

The story missions, by comparison, are less impressive, in part because there aren’t too many of them and they don’t tell much of a story. What they can do, though, is experiment with level designs the Toy Box’s open-world structure couldn’t properly accommodate. Not every experiment is a success, but enough of the missions do enough things right to make this a welcome addition to the game’s surprise main attraction.

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Wake up the Box!
For: iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad (universal app)
From: Wandake
iTunes Store Rating: 4+

“Wake up the Box!” is an imperfect game in some pretty significant ways, but developer Wandake appears to have partially acknowledged that by rewarding those who get in on the ground floor. Like a handful of other physics-based puzzle games, “Box” gives players a set amount of pieces in each level and tasks them with arranging them to influence the laws physics and successfully complete the level. But unlike most of these games, the object in “Box” is to create a chain reaction that leads to havoc — specifically, waking the napping Mr. Box — instead of prevent it. Though “Box” gets the physics and piece controls perfectly right, it does a poor job of explaining this objective, and a lack of instruction means you’ll have to decipher the game’s methods, interface and scoring system yourself. “Box’s” level count — 15 total, 10 of which are pretty easy to solve — is similarly lacking. But Wandake has promised lots of updates to come as “Box” evolves, and because the game is free for the time being, questions of value cease to exist for those who download it before the price increases. So get it now, get comfortable with it and get ready: Once “Box” reaches the 11th level, it assumes players have the basics down and are ready for some seriously tricky challenges, and future level additions are likely to tax the brain similarly once Wandake pushes them out the door.

Super Mario Galaxy 2
For: Wii
From: Nintendo
ESRB Rating: Everyone (mild cartoon violence)

Nintendo has made zero bones about “Super Mario Galaxy 2″ being more of the same stuff that made “Super Mario Galaxy” what it was, and because “Galaxy” was one of 2007′s best games, no one really seemed bothered by the idea of “SMG2″ being, at worst, the same fundamental game with new levels.

And at worst, that’s exactly what this is. But that’s also what the first “Galaxy” was — a prototypical 3D Mario game that had the same old story and was more notable for the unbelievable variety of new level designs it unleashed than any revolutionary change to the way players controlled Mario.

This time, just like last time, Nintendo relegates motion controls to special self-contained challenges that serve as diversions more than the main course, which plays out using the same traditional control scheme Nintendo has been using since Mario first entered the third dimension in 1996. A second player can once again use a Wii remote to help (or hinder) Mario in a few minor ways, but this doesn’t change the core game so much as give it a light social element. Like its predecessor, and unlike last year’s “New Super Mario Bros. Wii,” “SMG2″ isn’t designed with multiplayer in mind beyond sharing turns and passing the controller around.

With none of “Galaxy’s” basic ingredients needing any repair, Nintendo did as it should and focused primarily on unleashing two-plus years’ worth of whatever crazy new level ideas it could conjure.

The result, without getting too specific and spoiling anything, is nothing short of exquisite. “SMG2″ reuses bits and pieces of certain “Galaxy” levels, but it largely reinvents the wheel, constructing worlds that play liberally with the laws of gravity, collapse upon themselves, make Mario feet 2 feet tall, dream up impossibly crazy boss fights and even pay tribute to Mario’s past adventures. New characters join in, old favorites return, and the whole thing is an unapologetically colorful ball of joyful, brilliant design that perfectly toes the line between welcoming players of all stripes and challenging the best of them to bring their A-game. Picking every level clean will take a good 15 skillful hours to do, and there isn’t a moment in those hours where Nintendo’s level designers just coasted by.

“SMG2″ expands Mario’s suit repertoire by combining his classic (Fire Mario) and “Galaxy” (Bee Mario, Spring Mario, Boo Mario, Rainbow Mario) power-ups with a couple new entrants. Rock Mario can wreak havoc as a living boulder, while players who could use a hand will appreciate Cloud Mario’s ability to create his own platforms.

But perhaps the most welcome addition — along with being able to occasionally play as Luigi without beating the whole game — is the return of Yoshi, whose unique abilities come into play much more effectively than they did in his last appearance eight years ago. “SMG2″ generally reserves Yoshi’s appearances for specific levels, but the upshot is that those levels better cater to Yoshi’s ability to eat this and grab onto that than would be the case if Mario could enlist him at any time. Yoshi gains a few new powers of his own, including the ability to illuminate like a light bulb and turn into a makeshift blimp, but the same abilities he’s had for 20 years remain the most fun to use here.

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Split/Second
Reviewed for: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Also available for: Windows PC
From: Black Rock Studio/Disney Interactive
ESRB Rating: Everyone 10+ (violence)

It’s pretty clear how “Split/Second” wants to set itself apart as more than just another arcade racing game. The game’s premise exists inside a reality television show, which exists inside a fake city that players can thoroughly blow to pieces while simultaneously working their way around otherwise traditional racetracks.

Less obvious, but perhaps more important, is how well “Split/Second” does the little things — difficulty balancing, single-player rewards, a pattern of destruction that relies on timing and physics instead of simple scripted explosions — to make the big thing work so splendidly.

“Split/Second’s” core racing component should ring mostly familiar to anyone with a cursory knowledge of how arcade racers work. The game is generous with the crash physics, allowing and encouraging dangerous driving over pristine technique, and players who draft, drift, catch air and otherwise live dangerously are rewarded with further abilities toward gaining an edge.

In this case, though, those abilities translate into limited-use but freely deployable triggers that level portions of the environment and brutalize all cars that happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Those triggers translate into everything from helicopters dropping bombs to collapsing bridges to a yacht taking out a piece of highway, and “Split/Second’s” outstanding graphics engine brings every calamity to eye-popping life.

But it’s the physics more than the graphics that keep those explosions fresh beyond the novelty period. “Split/Second’s” impressively spartan heads-up display offers clues as to when it would be best to trigger a disaster, but simply hitting the button doesn’t promise anything. A.I. drivers can sidestep a poorly-timed trigger, and players very easily can trigger an attack on their own car if they don’t think it through. Nothing about the mechanic is scripted, and A.I. drivers are as prone to making the same mistakes.

For the same reasons, dodging other drivers’ attacks is arguably even more exciting than setting them off. The arsenal of trigger possibilities shrinks considerably for players who lead the race, but driving with seven targets on your back changes the game enough to more than compensate. “Split/Second’s” superb driving controls make skirting disaster by inches a tangible thrill, and the game’s diversionary events — which find players dodging bombing helicopters and outrunning semis bent on sabotage — play to this thrill as perfectly as the more traditional races do.

A point could certainly be made that “Split/Second’s” single-player career mode is hampered by some ruthless A.I. that can send players from first place to last in the blink of a single mistake. But the game rarely trips players into making unfair mistakes, and the career mode counteracts by rewarding players who finish in fifth as well as first with some kind of progress compensation. Players can repeat races at any time (and with better vehicles acquired by accumulating progress elsewhere), and while the system occasionally feels cheap, there’s something refreshing about an arcade racer that challenges you to conquer it from the very first race.

Naturally, any grievances with the A.I. fall away in “Split/Second’s” multiplayer mode (two players splitscreen, eight online), and all that’s great about the on-track action in single-player play applies here as well. Just don’t expect much beyond that: It works, and it supports most of the single-player modes in multiplayer form, but that’s about as fancy as it gets.

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Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands
Reviewed for: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Also available for: Windows PC, Wii, PSP and Nintendo DS
From: Ubisoft
ESRB Rating: Teen (violence)

Five “Prince of Persia” games in seven years after three in the preceding 14 has taken the franchise from nowhereville to sequel city in a hurry, and “The Forgotten Sands” does itself no favor by abandoning the dramatic visual and narrative makeover that made the 2008 reboot such a pleasantly fresh surprise.

“Sands” instead is a direct sequel to 2003′s “The Sands of Time,” which provides the basis of the “Persia” film currently in theaters (and, consequently, should answer whatever questions you had about Ubisoft ditching that reboot and rushing “Sands” out 17 months later).

Early on, “Sands” feels less like a sequel to “Time” than a capable but uninspired imitation of it. It plays like a typical “Perisa” game, mixing some ambitious environmental platforming with sword combat that’s more fun than special. Per series tradition, the massive traversable environments — ledges, trapeze swings, poles, cliff sides — feel like gigantic environmental riddles more than simple action game playgrounds, and the game uses an assisted character movement scheme that doesn’t hold players’ hands but also doesn’t require angle-perfect precision jumping. As with “Time,” and per story dictation, players eventually receive a limited-use ability to rewind time and correct mistimed jumps without reverting back to a checkpoint.

That rewind trick becomes indispensable once “Sands” comes into its own and gives the Prince powers that dwarf anything “Time” did. Players gradually receive the ability to alter the environment — freeze and unfreeze water, make entire structures appear and disappear — while simultaneously jumping through and climbing around it in traditional and (thanks to yet more abilities) exhilarating new ways. “Sands’” early levels aren’t exactly dull, but the designs in the second two-thirds of the game, which mix and match abilities with abandon and place a premium on meticulous timing and some serious thumb gymnastics, put them to shame.

“Sands’” combat, which pits the Prince against several dozen grunts and the occasional heavy at once, is considerably less impressive, but also an improvement on the 2008 game’s drab one-on-one combat. The Prince has a modest array of upgradable sword attacks and spells, but the combat typically amounts to little more than mashing buttons to kill a few dozen enemies while dodging the glacial attacks of the handful who get a chance to fight back. It’s nothing other action games haven’t done considerably better, but it is good for a mindless break between the more cerebral platforming parts, and it never carries on long enough to become a detriment to the fun.

What can be a detriment is “Sands’” occasional ability to just act up and not play nice. During the course of this review, for instance, a segment near the end of the game proved impossible to pass until the game was rebooted, after which point everything clicked and the same attempted maneuvers worked perfectly. The game’s checkpoint system is generous enough to make this an inconvenience more than a deal-breaker, and there’s no telling how likely it is you’ll even encounter this problem. But if you suddenly find certain techniques failing you no matter what you do, your best recourse may be the reset button.

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10 Pin Shuffle
For: iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad (Universal App)
From: Digital Smoke
iTunes Store Rating: 4+
Price: $4 (free demo version available)

The complexity of mobile games has skyrocketed since the iPhone development floodgates opened a couple years ago, but sometimes the best games remain the simple ones that just use the touchscreen perfectly right. “10 Pin Shuffle” aims to replicate the shufflepuck bowling game found in arcades and bars everywhere, and while the default control setting is excessively sensitive, the Easy Controls setting perfectly nails the sensation of sliding the puck at those pins. That alone makes this one of those games that even technophobic non-gamers don’t need instructions to play. “Shuffle’s” feature set nicely complements its intuitiveness: The 3D graphics look great, the little touches in the sound and presentation departments are a treat, and the game’s stat-tracking is impressive in its details. Best of all, there’s a bounty of modes, including traditional bowling, a really clever poker mode that combines bowling with video poker, and a version of straight-up, pins-free shufflepuck with customizable win conditions. In-progress games are autosaved if interrupted, and almost all modes support solo play, single-player with an A.I. opponent and pass-the-device or Bluetooth multiplayer. (The poker mode can’t support pass-the-device multiplayer due to its design, but it does support Bluetooth play.)

Alan Wake
For: Xbox 360
From: Remedy Entertainment/Microsoft
ESRB Rating: Teen (blood, language, use of alcohol and tobacco, violence)

Until now, “Alan Wake” was best known in gaming circles as a title in development since before the Xbox 360′s mere existence was public knowledge.

The effects of the lengthy development are apparent in the final product, which occasionally looks older than it is and forces players to contend with some unwieldy (and slightly incomplete) third-person shooter controls. But all those years also have been very kind to the titular character and his story, which are so carefully and cleverly constructed as to render any shortcomings almost completely moot.

It’s no great surprise that “Wake’s” storyline — which finds Alan, a famous mystery writer, racing through a secluded resort town to discover why the pages of his unfinished manuscript have come true and made his wife disappear — is a cut above. Remedy Entertainment produced some of the best storytelling of the early 2000s with its “Max Payne” games, and while the particulars have changed, the ingredients — narration from the playable character, generally stellar voice acting, a word-perfect script that touches darkly comedic, self-depreciating and noirish nerves in the right ways at the right times — have all returned.

Where Remedy outdoes itself is with its thorough understanding of the art of the cliffhanger.

“Wake” presents its story as a six-episode miniseries, complete with “Previously on…” recaps at the top of each episode. The approach greatly enhances the game’s personality, but it also provides a means to drop a terrific reveal at the bottom of each episode that makes it awfully hard not to immediately dive right into the next one. (Sidebar to alleviate potential confusion: “Wake’s” generous checkpoint system does not require players to play entire episodes in single sittings.)

What initially begins as a collection of winks at nods toward classic horror tropes gradually becomes its own creation, and by the time the third episode kicks into gear, “Wake” has enough great characters and distinctive twists to keep its ultimate destination a genuine mystery. (Whether the culmination of that mystery satisfies or aggravates will, of course, come down to individual taste.)

All that wonderful storytelling is enough to offset issues with “Wake’s” gameplay, which is fun but would be unremarkable and kind of repetitive without the story and setting taking it down new avenues.

Though “Wake” utilizes an over-the-shoulder perspective, Alan’s aim — be it with his flashlight or his firearm — isn’t exactly refined. That in itself is an arguable service to the game’s immersion, given that he’s an author and not a soldier. But it also allows the game’s possessed but combat-savvy enemies to flank rather easily, and the shaky aiming translates into some poor field awareness that can prove fatal. A slick dodge mechanic comes in handy when things get hairy, but “Wake” is begging for a melee button that would have made fighting out of a jam more flexible and fun.

Again, though, when all else fails, the checkpoint system is pretty benevolent. “Wake’s” higher difficulty settings pose a nice challenge to those hungry for one, but Remedy ultimately wants to show the ending to anyone who wants to see it. Balancing those two priorties and pleasing everybody is an unenviable task, but Remedy does a very enviable job of pulling it off.

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Lost Planet 2
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
From: Capcom
ESRB Rating: Teen (animated blood, language, suggestive themes, violence)

“Lost Planet 2″ is the most aggravating kind of game there is, because when it isn’t busy being unreasonably toxic, it’s kind of awesome.

At its core, “LP2″ is, like its predecessor, just a ton of dumb third-person shooter fun. The weaponry packs an exaggerated punch (both in recoil felt and damage dealt), the operable mechs allow for joyously destructive rampages, and the explosions and screen-sized bug enemies are as impressive here as they are anywhere. “LP2″ primarily squares players off against human opposition this time around, but it still takes frequent occasion to bust out some show-stopping encounters against absolutely gigantic bugs.

The net visual and tactile effect of all this action remains incredible and distinctive fours years after we first experienced it, and while the run-and-gun controls feel slightly archaic in this era of cover-based shooters, they’re a perfect complement under these conditions.

Sounds great, right? It should be, and it would be if “LP2′s” overlying particulars didn’t have more left feet than an groggy millipede. But they do, and most of the fault lies with an startlingly unfriendly implementation of co-op play into what used to be a single-player-friendly game.

Like its predecessor, “LP2″ tells a story — and, at some 15 hours long, a lengthy one at that. But instead of present it like any other single-player game with co-op functionality, Capcom dresses each chapter in a multiplayer lobby interface. Players load out as a foursome, and those who wish to play alone are gifted three A.I.-controlled players with immersion-shattering fake screennames floating above their heads. The interface is similarly kludgy, offering no way for players to drop into games already in progress and never bothering to explain the confusing setup to players who played the first game alone and expected a similar road through the sequel.

But the real trouble awaits in the gameplay, which operates by multiplayer rules even for those who play alone. That means no checkpoints or save spots during the span of levels that often take an hour to finish. “LP2′s” complicated health math means players can respawn upon dying a limited number of times, but should that math run out, any progress in the level is lost. Players can’t even pause the game — something other co-op games allow even with friends aboard.

These inconveniences turn into deal-breakers once it becomes clear “LP2″ has no issue with dishing out some staggeringly cheap action even on its easiest difficulty. One-hit kills, psychic enemy A.I. and unavoidable boss attacks abound, and because Capcom put zero effort into making solo players’ A.I. teammates anything beyond borderline catatonic, what feels cheap with friends assisting is a nightmare alone. Challenge is a wonderful thing, but “LP2″ goes about creating it in entirely unfriendly and joyless ways.

The news is better for the subset of players who enjoyed “LP1″ for its competitive online multiplayer (16 players). “LP2″ borrows some of the single-player game’s health math but otherwise resists the temptation to fix time-tested modes that aren’t broken, and the dreadful A.I. is nowhere to be found. For players who want to experience all the game does right without dealing with all it does wrong, this is the way to do it.

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Smiles
For: iPhone/iPod Touch and iPad (separate version for iPad)
From: Sykhronics Entertainment
iTunes Store rating: 4+
Price: $2 (sale pricing; subject to change soon)

Given the number of perfectly good “Bejeweled” clones lurking in the iTunes Store, it’s impressive to find one, like “Smiles,” that goes its own way by changing just one rule. As with its ilk, the object of “Smiles” is to match rows of three or more identical blocks. The difference is that instead of switching two blocks around within the grid, players must swap in a block from outside the grid to match three and then use the block they just swapped out as the next block to swap in. There’s a loss of strategy in always having to use a particular block, but “Smiles” counters that by encouraging players to think quickly and keep the board constantly in motion while the score multiplier rockets upward. The fast pace of the main game mode is a surprisingly fun departure from “Bejeweled” proper, and a nice level of polish — both in the presentation and the responsiveness of the controls — makes it work. For a change of pace, “Smiles” includes additional variants, including an outstanding Zen mode that changes the game in the complete opposite way by once again hitting just one switch. The lack of online leaderboards is disappointing, particularly in light of how slick the score- and stat-tracking systems are, but an absolutely gargantuan mountain of unlockable achievements gives dedicated players plenty to shoot for regardless.

Dead to Rights: Retribution
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
From: Volatile Games/Namco Bandai
ESRB Rating: Mature (blood, intense violence, strong language, suggestive themes, use of drugs)

Six years ago, games like “Dead to Rights: Retribution” — third-person action games determined to do everything under the action game sun — were everywhere. Since then, most developers learned to specialize and substitute polish for versatility.

Volatile Games didn’t get that memo, and “Retribution” mostly carries on as if time never passed, competently doing a number of things (third-person brawling, shooting and stealth action) without knocking any one of them out of the park the way games today typically attempt to do. And here’s the funny thing: Because games like this don’t come along very often anymore, and because “Retribution” is nowhere near as bad as the few games that do typically are, it emerges as a much more enjoyable experience now than it might have been when this style was still in vogue.

Part of that is due to “Retribution” not completely ignoring the present. The shooter component, for instance, incorporates the over-the-shoulder perspective and environmental cover as well as the old-fashioned ability to run around and fire from the hip. The system isn’t perfect — certain objects that should provide cover simply don’t, and the welcome ability to freely switch between brawling and weapons combat also gives way to some awkward controller gymnastics and occasional camera disorientation — but it does work.

That goes as well for the brawling itself, which isn’t always pretty but is pretty enough. “Retribution” doesn’t pull any fancy tricks to make this anything but an old-school 2D brawler in three dimensions, but the control scheme is perfectly responsive and the block/counter/grapple system gives it the extra ounce of depth it needs to avoid being a completely mindless button masher.

Namco has positioned “Retribution” as a narrative reboot for embattled supercop Jack Slate, but regardless of whether such a thing was necessary — the story is fun in a dumb way but hardly special — the important point is that Jack’s canine sidekick remains at his side.

Shadow the attack dog, in fact, provides “Retribution” with its shining moments during some ridiculously improbable but wholly enjoyable stealth challenges in which Shadow must pick apart a room and clear a way for Jack.

A suspension of disbelief clearly is in order for a game that presents a dog with the intelligence and skillset of a special forces soldier, and “Retribution” flashes some additional technological obsolesce with regard to enemy awareness and overall artificial intelligence. But just as the cracks in the brawling and shooting segments’ polish aren’t deep enough to ruin a good time, the stealth segments are versatile enough to shake off their issues and stake a claim as the arguable highlight. Hunting thugs in the dark as a sweet-faced dog is great fun, and “Retribution’s” level designs, though never extraordinary, set the table nicely for some terrific stealth takedowns.

At the very least, when the camera and control schemes fail and Jack’s best-laid plans go to waste, “Retribution” displays a contemporary understanding of how never to let frustration linger for long. It’s forgiving in the field without being a cakewalk — when all else fails, dashing for cover and hiding out should heal wounds quickly — and the generous checkpoint allotment means that even when things go completely south, players don’t have to travel far to recover any lost ground.

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Monster Hunter Tri
For: Wii
From: Capcom
ESRB Rating: Teen (Blood, Use of Alcohol, Violence)

Capcom has tried and failed to persuade America to love “Monster Hunter” the way Japan does, but “Monster Hunter Tri” — imperfect and saturated with old trappings though it still is — might be where that persistence finally pays off.

Should “Tri’s” breakthrough happen, credit likely will go to the surprising support for four-player online co-op and downright shocking support for voice chat via Nintendo’s neglected Wii Speak peripheral.

Glorious absence of friend codes aside, rounding up a party still isn’t as elegant on the Wii as it likely would be on the other consoles. Additionally, the Wii Speak integration — assuming everyone even has the device — doesn’t always produce clear communication. If it’s logistically possible, a nearby PC and Skype account will better suffice.

Beyond these antiquities, though, the actual act of playing “Tri” online is very rewarding — due as much to the kind of game “Tri” is as its capacity for sharing the experience.

Though framed within a storyline, “Tri” structures itself like an MMO more than an adventure game. Players (solo or otherwise) accept quests centered around hunting different monsters for food and sport, and the overwhelming focus of the game centers around the act of conquering different monsters different ways than whatever rewards the story has in store for successfully doing so.

“Tri’s” environments give life to an impressive array of land and sea creatures whose mannerisms and capacities to fight back vary considerably, and after some early handholding, the game provides numerous weapons, items and tactics toward dispatching monsters any number of ways. The gist doesn’t deviate much from beginning to end, but it doesn’t need to: “Tri” zeroes in on the art of the hunt to a degree no other game does, and taming the game’s most impressive beasts is a rewarding endeavor alone and exponentially so when a plan of attack among friends succeeds.

If the concept sounds appealing, “Tri’s” unique bent should overcome some unwelcome callbacks (can’t save anywhere, overlong attack animations, large areas regularly interrupted by load screens) to outdated design. The camera controls are awkward, even when using the dual-sticked Classic Controller or Classic Controller Pro, and the control scheme takes additional adjustment when using the button-deficient Wii Remote and Nunchuck. The storyline also comes almost entirely free of voice acting, but that’s less of an issue when it becomes apparent how little a role the narration plays in the game’s enjoyment.

The good news is that all these issues are annoying more than damaging, and most of them are likely to cease mattering long before those who get into “Tri” are done picking it clean. More than 100 hours of gameplay is an easy feasibility for those who embrace all that lies within and challenge themselves to conquer every last creature, and the ability to lose oneself in a world this enormous more than makes up for the shortcomings with which it coexists.

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Blokzilla
For: iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad (universal app)
From: Tomato Interactive
iTunes Store Rating: 4+
Price: $1 (introductory price)

The concept of a Memory tribute providing thrilling, frantic action might sound ridiculous, but “Blokzilla” makes it happen by infusing the timeless card game with a bunch of timeless arcade game tricks. The concept is no more complex than matching two identical squares and clearing them from the screen, and “Blokzilla” would presume to be a cakewalk by leaving each square face up instead of face down. But rather than fight the failings of one’s own memory to succeed, players must sort through some deviously slight differences between squares that at first glance appear identical. Pick a bad pair, and the score multiplier resets. But carefully poring over each shape’s intricacies is equally damaging: “Blokzilla’s” score attack modes give players one, two or five minutes to clear as many squares and score as many points as they can, and the score multiplier melts away through inactivity as well as bad activity. The ticking clock, impatient multiplier and a delightfully loud visual and aural presentation combine to make the whole experience a startlingly intense good time. The only bad news about “Blokzilla” is the lack of online leaderboards, which are essential in a game so classically driven by high scores. But Tomato Interactive has indicated a willingness to add the feature in short order to a future update, so that may not be bad news for long.

Super Street Fighter IV
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
From: Capcom
ESRB Rating: Teen (alcohol reference, mild language, suggestive themes, violence)

To decide whether you should pick up “Super Street Fighter IV,” just take this simple test:

A) If you scoffed at the notion of Capcom rereleasing the year-old “Street Fighter IV” in enhanced form as a $40 standalone product (instead of, say, a $15 downloadable update) but played enough “SF4″ over the last year to justify its asking price several times over, then yes, you should.

B) If you squealed with delight upon hearing the news of “SSF4′s” arrival, then yes, you should.

The old-fashioned sensibilities of Capcom’s business model aside, “SSF4″ earns its worth by leaving the underpinnings alone but adding, improving and occasionally swapping out parts in just about every department.

Most apparent straight away is the boost to the roster. Eight fighters from the series’ past (DeeJay, T. Hawk, Guy, Cody, Adon, Ibuki, Makoto and Dudley) and two new fighters (Tae Kwon Do expert Juri and wonderfully bizarre Turkish oil wrestler Hakan) join “SF4′s” existing cast to bring the total to 35. All characters are unlocked straight away, and the original 25 fighters all receive a new ultra attack.

Arguably more impressive is “SSF4′s” mode expansion, which potentially caters to terrified newcomers as well as “SF4″ pros. The Quarter Match mode from 2008′s “Super Street Fighter II” reboot finally arrives here as the Endless Mode, and it supports up to eight players and spectators in the closest online approximation of the arcade fighting game scene. Newcomers, meanwhile, can enter the Replay Channel to download replays of better players’ matches and put their newfound knowledge to safe use in the freeform Training Room. The new Team Battles configuration, meanwhile, falls under the “something to bridge the gap” banner, allowing players of different abilities to team up in team elimination battles supporting up to four fighters per team.

Ultimately, though, it’s the devoted students of “SF4″ who stand to benefit the most from the additional year of fine-tuning Capcom has invested in its baby. The immediate availability of all characters allows the truly confident to skip the single-player warmup and jump online immediately, and Capcom’s up-and-down tweaking of the entire roster gives players both a conceivably more balanced game and volumes of new discoverable matchup minutiae on which to feast.

Presumably, once the cream rises to the top of the online universe, the Replay Channel, team-oriented modes and year’s worth of improvements upon “SF4′s” online matchmaking system should also allow an easier uphill climb for new players who want to cut their teeth online without getting completely obliterated. But if you tried “SF4″ last year and found the game too imposing for your tastes, it’s worth noting that this year’s edition doesn’t change the basic underpinnings in any way that would make it any less of a climb toward mastery. Nor has Capcom produced a more guided means of understanding the game beyond the hands-off Training Room and admittedly outstanding instruction manual. If you want to get good at “Street Fighter” and are hoping “SSF4″ contains shortcuts its predecessor did not, consider that hope officially — and, as “Street Fighter” devotees would tell you, deservedly — dashed.

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Tom Clancy’s Splinter Cell: Conviction
Reviewed for: Xbox 360
Also available for: Windows PC
From: Ubisoft
ESRB Rating: Mature (blood, drug reference, intense violence, sexual themes, strong language)

“Splinter Cell: Conviction” is a magnificently pretty example of how to present a mature game using vibrant environments and bright colors, so it’s a little bittersweet that its most beautiful moments take place when the lights are off and all that color is chucked by the wayside.

But only a little bittersweet.

“Conviction,” in a nutshell, is the reformed “Splinter Cell” game we’ve long been promised. Sam Fisher remains in the lead role — forced out of retirement to address a personal vendetta that cost the lives of his best friend and daughter — and he still does his best work by stealthily dispatching enemies instead of barreling forward with guns blazing.

But where previous games imposed all-or-nothing restrictions that left Sam as good as dead the instant players accidentally blew his cover, “Conviction” finally lets him give as good as he gets.

With bullets flying, “Conviction” plays like a contemporary third-person shooter: Players have powerful weaponry and environmental cover to aid their fight, and Sam is agile and tough enough to win a shootout when clandestinity fails. (During some of “Conviction’s” later missions, which take place in the bright light of day, barreling forward practically is encouraged.)

But what makes “Conviction” special is how deftly it mixes run-and-gun gameplay with the methods that have always defined the series.

Ubisoft introduces a number of new interface tweaks to make the pursuit of a perfect sneak attack accessible to anyone, and all of them pay off. The game’s graphics go gray whenever the player is safely concealed in the shadows, and alerting enemies of Sam’s location briefly marks the spot with an outline of his body. Disabling some light sources, tipping enemies off, executing an end-around and dispatching them from behind as they descend on your former position is as fun here as Jack Bauer makes it look on television, and “Conviction’s” engine is flexible enough to allow players who get caught in the act to fight their way out or at least attempt a dash for cover.

Experienced “Splinter Cell” pros might not appreciate all this emphasis on accessibility, but the Realistic difficulty setting should satiate their thirst for challenge. A brilliant mission inside a parking garage, where detection isn’t an option, also temporarily resurrects the original games’ sensibilities with exemplary results.

“Conviction’s” single-player storyline suffers a bit on the voice acting side — grunt enemies have roughly three sayings, and they spray the air repeatedly with them — but the actual plot is refreshingly personal compared to Sam’s previous assignments. Considering how concentrated that storyline is, the environmental diversity, and Ubisoft’s repurposing of different set pieces as stealth playgrounds, is absolutely terrific.

But “Conviction’s” arguable shining moment happens during a collection of two-player (online or splitscreen) co-op missions that doubles as a prequel to “Conviction’s” single-player story. (Quick aside: No competitive multiplayer. Sorry.) Neither player stars as Sam, but the full complement of his abilities lay at both players’ disposal, and coordinating stealth attacks with a teammate opens the door to numerous strategic possibilities that aren’t possible when fighting alone. Solo players can engage in most of this content by themselves if they prefer, but modes centered around cooperation — storyline portion included — are off-limits without a second player.

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Crush the Castle
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: Armor Games
iTunes Store Rating: 9+ (infrequent/mild cartoon or fantasy violence, infrequent/mild realistic violence)
Price: $2 (free lite version also available)

Anyone who ever took delight in setting up action figures with the sole intention of knocking them down can take similar delight in “Crush the Castle,” which skips step one and lets players use a catapult, some projectiles and gravity-intensive physics to reduce shoddily-built castles and their inhabitants to rubble. “Castle” isn’t a terribly demanding game: A couple taps determine the angle and force of the catapault launch, and beyond the arsenal of projectiles (rocks, bombs, mystical potions) players accumulate by advancing through the game, that’s all the strategy there is. But “Castle” provides as much enjoyment in watching the aftermath as it does in creating it: The physics are wonderfully condusive to chain reaction collapses, and whether it’s intentional or the byproduct of a shoestring budget, the sound and non-animated animation of the inhabitants is genuinely funny in a “Monty Python”-esque way. It’s unclear whether Armor Games plans to support “Castle” with new levels: The 90 levels available now are fun but quickly mastered, and while the level creator is outstanding, an inability to share creations with others hurts its value. But even if “Castle” never updates again, the fun and amusement it provides makes an easy return on the $2 investment it commands if you possess the mischievous state of mind that likely made its existence possible in the first place.

MotoGP 09/10
For: Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
From: Monumental Studios/Capcom
ESRB Rating: Everyone (mild suggestive themes)

Criticizing a racing simulation for being imposingly difficult is like docking points from lemonade for making your lips pucker, because that’s arguably the whole point of a good simulation in the first place.

So what follows isn’t a criticism of “MotoGP 09/10,” and for fans of serious sims and the venerable and resilient “MotoGP” line, it might as well be high praise. But casual racing fans who look at Monumental Studios’ motorcycle racing game and envision a chance to relive their glory days playing “Super Hang-On” in the arcade, take note: This most certainly counts as a warning, because “MotoGP” most certainly is not the game you have in mind.

The gravity of the situation makes its presence felt regardless of difficulty level or whether players venture down “MotoGP’s” season/career modes or settle for the arcade mode, which at least emulates “Super Hang-On” in structure if not in any other way. Even on the easiest setting, “MotoGP’s” A.I. riders rarely lay down for anybody.

More immediately pressing, though, are the riding controls. As with most driving sims, they treat gunning the gas pedal and careering around turns about as kindly as a mother bear treats a human being walking into her den. Disrespect a track’s racing line and take too long to brake, and it’s entirely too easy to enter a turn so wide that it takes you right off the track.

In a car racing game like “Forza Motorsport” or “Gran Turismo,” your problems likely would end there, with the car skidding out and maybe dusting a wall before coming to a stop and ceding control back to the player. But in “MotoGP,” trying to fight a skid also entails leaning hard on the bike, and players who lean too far in either direction will see their bike careen out of control from a distance while they fly off of it in another direction. Slightly missed turns very quickly can mushroom into problems that send a player from the head of the pack to 10 places back in the span of a single mistake. See how much fun you’re having if this happens near the end of a race you’ve led the entire way to that point.

But again, that’s the point of a racing sim — either ride smart or lose big. And while “MotoGP’s” learning curve is considerably more imposing than that of just about every other racing game out there, Monumental Studios never stacks the deck so high as to be unfair. The A.I. is good, but it isn’t cheap, and the controls are responsive and perfectly tenable if players take the time to master their subtleties.

For those who overcome the curve, most of “MotoGP’s” other frills reward in kind. The career mode incorporates team management, reputation management and the ability to research new bike technology on top of a lengthy trip through the 2009 MotoGP season, and Monumental promises to offer whatever free downloadable content is necessary to emulate the 2010 season as it happens. (Hence the game’s title.) The multiplayer component (20 players online, two splitscreen) is very basic, but the 20-player support certainly is nice if the game develops a hardened following of skilled players.

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Bird Strike
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: PikPok
iTunes Store Rating: 9+ (infrequent/mild profanity or crude humor, infrequent/mild cartoon or fantasy violence)
Price: $1

“Bird Strike” understandably draws comparisons to the mega-popular iPhone game “Doodle Jump,” because the base object of both games — continually ascend higher and higher without exhausting all means of doing so — is identical. But while “Jump” finds players helping a scribbled, spring-loaded alien bounce between platforms with no room for error, “Strike” is both a little more lenient and a little more open in its design. Beyond the initial leap off a sling, your obscenely charming cartoon bird friend doesn’t even jump: Rather, he soars upward using stray rockets and jetpacks, and upon reaching the top, purposely careens back downward to wreak obscenely cute havoc on all the obstacles he avoided on the way up. Reaching the top in “Strike’s” puzzle levels is a challenge, and the ceiling-free endless mode makes it impossible. But where “Jump” penalizes almost any downward descent with a “Game Over” screen, “Strike” lets players attempt a recovery by catching any unused rockets they spot on the way down. The overriding goal, regardless of mode or technique, is to score as many points as possible during a single flight. Players who fly solo can aim for the gold medal-worthy scores in each level, but those who take advantage of “Strike’s” OpenFeint support — and one of the better examples of how to integrate leaderboards into an iPhone game — can chase and surpass their friends’ marks as well.

God of War III
For: Playstation 3
From: Sony Computer Entertainment Santa Monica Studio
ESRB Rating: Mature (blood and gore, intense violence, nudity, strong language, strong sexual content)

An uncommonly high number of games that owe an uncommon amount of debt to “God of War” rolled out quickly and furiously in the early going of 2010, and upon completion of “God of War III,” it’s pretty clear why they did.

They wanted to get out of this thing’s way, and with good reason.

To keep the conversation grounded: No, “GOW3″ doesn’t shake up the formula — brutal third-person melee combat combined with ambitious environmental puzzle-solving — that made its predecessors among the best games in the Playstation 2′s and Playstation Portable’s libraries. Not accounting for the obvious advances in visual fidelity, ardent fans could still point to “God of War II” as the best in the mainline trilogy in terms of storytelling and level composition.

But that fight is too close to call with any authority, and for that same reason, “GOW3″ plays on a plane that all those imitators, good though most of them really were, simply cannot match.

A good portion of that comes in the construction of the game’s contemptible anti-hero. Kratos might be the scariest controllable protagonist in all of video gamedom, and Santa Monica Studio complements that persona with a vicious arsenal of weapons and attack patterns to match.

“GOW3′s” imitators typically understand the importance placed on a fluid control scheme and the ability to chain attacks without interruption and change tactics on a dime. But “GOW3″ compounds that attention to detail with a level of two-way savagery that simultaneously makes the player feel like an unstoppable monster and turns ordinary fights against nobody enemies into trap battles that can turn fatal quickly. Kratos’ tribulations have never been one for squeamish eyes and nervous hands, and some of the imagery “GOW3″ doles out is harsh enough to make anyone wince.

The unchained appetite for murderous grandeur spreads to the scope of the overall game, which occasionally zooms out to reveal environments, puzzles and even traversable enemy titans who reduce Kratos to the size of a nickel on the screen. Santa Monica has a knack and a half for presenting its idea of scope in a way that’s intimidating without being disorienting, and the way “GOW3″ shifts between such ridiculously divergent scales and perspectives is simply awesome. The series may best be recognized for its outlandishly epic boss fights, pitting Kratos against mythical gods and beasts many times his size, and that doesn’t change here.

With the core ingredients down to an art form, the game’s nitpicks are debatable and likely come down to individual perception. Certain puzzles might take too long for some players’ liking, and the bloodthirsty among us won’t love it when the game occasionally strings together two consecutive puzzles with maybe a short bout in between. The penultimate portion of the game drags a bit due to enemy repetition, and there’s one challenge in particular that briefly abandons all that’s good about the combat.

Fortunately, the payoff after this lull is enormous. “GOW3″ presents itself as the culmination of Kratos’ journey, and if that’s really the case, then the dazzling batch of sequences that comprise the game’s ending could scarcely be a better sendoff.

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Pokémon: HeartGold Version
Pokémon: SoulSilver Version
For: Nintendo DS
From: Game Freak/Nintendo
ESRB Rating: Everyone (Mild Cartoon Violence)

The first 10 weeks of 2010 have been more generous to gamers than the first half of most years typically are, and the release calendar is so full that a remake of a game that already feels like it’s been remade ad infinitum shouldn’t be worthy of a mention, much less 500 words’ worth of ink.

That is, of course, unless it does something as bizarrely revolutionary — and potentially beneficial beyond the realm of entertainment — as this twosome does.

Skeletally speaking, “Pokémon: HeartGold Version” and “Pokémon: SoulSilver Version” are, respectively, remakes of “Pokémon: Gold” and “Pokémon: Silver,” which released simultaneously on the Game Boy Color in 2000. Per “Pokémon” custom, those games were mostly identical outside of a few special Pokémon exclusive to each, and the same holds true of the remake.

In fact, a lot of what holds true in the remake has held true throughout the series’ lifetime — so much so that casual onlookers likely couldn’t tell the difference between a remake of a 2000 game and a brand-new chapter in the series. That’s something of a testament to the system in place, which combines classic role-playing gameplay with classic obsessive-compulsive completionism to create gameplay that’s addictive, accessible and rewarding over the long haul. But for players who hit their limit at some point in the last decade and are waiting for Game Freak to rock its own formulaic boat, watching the series reach into the past isn’t exactly encouraging.

With all that said, though, “SoulSilver” and “HeartGold” at least feel like more than simple retreads. Players with fond “Gold” and “Silver” memories can enjoy them anew with all the perks — sharper graphics and interface, stylus-friendly controls and the same wireless/online battling and trading modes that debuted in “Pokémon: Diamond” and “Pokémon: Pearl” — that have been added since the series migrated to the Nintendo DS.

But it’s the accessory bundled in the box — a fully functional, Pokéball-shaped pedometer that players can drop in their pockets and use to level up their Pokémon simply by getting out and walking around — that transforms the news of “HeartGold’s” and “SoulSilver’s” arrivals from pleasantly pedestrian to pretty exciting.

Nintendo previously produced a pedometer accessory for its “Personal Trainer: Walking” self-improvement game, and the pedometer here functions similarly. It counts steps and converts them into in-game experience independently of the game or DS, and transferring the data happens via a wireless infrared signal swap that requires no accessory hookup. Press a button, transmit data, reap some in-game rewards, and go rack up a few thousand or so more steps while developing your Pokémon in the healthiest manner possible.

The idea is pretty seriously out of left field, but it’s an ingenious way to add real-life value to a role-playing game’s most monotonous moments, and “HeartGold” and “SoulSilver” prove it also works. Here’s hoping, for the sake of those of us who have tired of “Pokémon” but not necessarily its principles, that other developers take the idea and do something similar.

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Tiki Totems
For: iPhone/iPod Touch
From: spokko
iTunes Store Rating: 4+
Price at time of review (subject to change): Free for basic version, $1 for premium version

Great fun though physics-based puzzle games usually are, they’re also kind of high-maintenance on the iPhone. Games that require precise degrees of tilting and touching also demand that players sit upright and use both hands, which isn’t ideal for a lazy pre-bedtime game session. So “Tiki Totems” gets points for adopting a “less is more” approach. The object of each level is to remove bricks and planks in order to safely drop a Tiki statue from the top of a structure to safe ground below, and removing certain pieces of the structure can ignite a chain reaction that’s entirely physics-powered. But the game’s low-maintenance control scheme — tap pieces of the structure to remove them, with no tilting or other precise motions running interference — makes it easy to pick up and play without sacrificing all that’s good about a physics-driven puzzle game in the first place. Now also is a good time to pick “Totems” up: The basic version, which comes bundled with 80 levels and the option to purchase 64 more, is currently free, while the premium version, which includes all 144 currently available levels and a promise to include all future level packs for free, only costs a buck. The games’ iTunes descriptions indicate these are temporary prices, so don’t waste time if you’re feeling thrifty.