Games

Ironically for a game entitled Brave, this licensed tie-in to the latest Pixar film plays it incredibly safe. Sure, some people might argue that it doesn’t need to be particularly imaginative as it’s aimed at family audience. But the same thing could also be said for Disney’s enjoyable Toy Story 3 or Cars 2 games. And what about Traveller’s Tales’ Lego games, which are still phenomenally popular with players of all ages?

You may not be able to watch Sony Pictures’ new Spider-Man reboot on your home cinema until later this year, but in the meantime you can always try your hand at swinging through the streets of Manhattan yourself that to this videogame.

The latest entry in this bullets-‘n’-brains franchise sees you once again join a team of Ghosts (hard-as-nails special operatives) in a globe-trotting tale of dodgy Russians, nuclear weapons and hi-tech weaponry.

There has been no shortage of games that try to make you feel like a superhero, with Batman: Arkham City still reigning supreme as the benchmark for the genre. If Prototype 2 doesn’t quite measure up to that title, it’s not for want of trying, and in the process it comes closer than any other game.

The Ridge Racer franchise has always been about one thing and one thing only – drift racing through city streets. No matter what instalment in the series you played, the basic set-up was the same: jam your finger down on the accelerator and never let go, carrying as much speed as possible into every corner as you modulate your braking to powerslide around every bend in the road.

I must have spent half my adult life playing various Tony Hawk skateboarding simulators, so I had high hopes for Electronic Arts’ SSX, a game which threatens to ‘pit riders against both mountain and man’. Yet somewhere in the transition from baggy skater shorts to wraparound snow goggles and luminous ski wear I’ve lost in all interest in hurtling around on a plank of wood. You see, in the Tony Hawk universe it seemed perfectly natural to grind your way along a pavement or whizz around the railings of a cruise ship, but I found pulling stunts off an oil-pipe halfway down a mountain faintly ridiculous.

It’s now 15 years since the PlayStation release of Final Fantasy VII brought the Japanese RPG franchise to the attention of mainstream gamers across the globe. But the intervening years have seen a change of fortune for developer Square Enix, with the Final Fantasy brand becoming a victim of its own success and struggling to live up to former glories.