Conquer the universe

An adventure that will take you to the wildest stretches of your imagination.

The best way to describe Genesis Rising is "what could have been."

The space-based, real-time strategy game features fairly novel concepts and an interesting storyline. But several flaws make it frustrating at best and unplayable at worst.

The idea is that humanity is so advanced it almost spans the entire universe, with only one small galaxy left unconquered.

In Genesis Rising, humans have developed living spaceships that are born with blank slates. Each ship is created with empty slots but has no weapons or other gadgets.

When players put genes into the slots, the ships mutate. If you add a plasma cannon gene, for example, you can watch one grow from the front of your ship. The ships are also filled with blood; when you kill an enemy, you can suck the blood from its capsule carcass to replenish your own supply. Blood is basically the fuel that runs the empire.

What could have been the coolest part of the game is the ability to change the genes of your ships on the fly. So if you're suddenly confronted with an enemy immune to beam weapons, you can change the ship's frigates into missile boats.

But it takes time to unload and reload genes, and the game simply doesn't give you enough of it. You cannot pause the action, which adds to the problem.

Combine that with the lack of any difficulty settings and the inability to save in the middle of sometimes lengthy missions and this game has frustration written all over it. Finally, although the game looks very good, its 3-D aspect of space is just an illusion. In fact, all ships exist and travel on a 2-D plane. You can even steer on a grid pattern. Ever since the game Homeworld showed that space games in 3-D work just fine.

It's rather inexcusable to revert to 2-D. Given the completely flat nature and lack of terrain features, each mission feels like the one before.

If genes could be swapped more quickly, if space were 3-D, if you could save in the middle of a mission and if there were a pause key so you could catch a breath, this might have been a fun game – but that's one too many ifs for Genesis Rising.

Rated: Teen
Platform: Windows 98/Me/2000/XP

REVIEWS

Transformers
Rating: Teen
Platform: Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PS2, PSP, DS, Wii
Transformers the movie has been a hit with hard-core fans, but can Transformers the video game do the same for gamers? The answer is yes.

The game, like the movie, is fun from the start. In fact, the game's best feature is the option to play as either an Autobot or a Decepticon. Playing as an Autobot means being mindful of your very interactive environment, which usually is a heavily inhabited metropolitan city.

If you choose to be down with Megatron's cause and run with the Decepticons, things are just the opposite. You're rewarded for destruction and encouraged to create as much havoc as possible as you take over Earth.

Graphically, all the Transformers look good in robot form and in disguise. Transforming is probably the most fun aspect of the game. You'll enjoy tearing up the roads as much or even more than you will staying in robot form and engaging hand-to-hand against combat foes.

- David Betancourt/Los Angeles Times-Washington Post

Big Brain Academy: WII Degree
Rating: Everyone
Platform: Wii
Leave it to the house that Mario built to expand its best-selling Brain Age games to its popular motion-sensor gaming console, the Wii. Nintendo offers a variation on the sequel to its hit Nintendo DS franchise with Big Brain Academy: Wii Degree.

Brain Age games, designed by a Japanese neuroscientist, are intended to improve thinking skills through an assortment of puzzles and quizzes.

The touch-screen game has been revamped to incorporate the Wii Remote as a pointer for 15 new mini-game challenges. Games range from popping balloons of varying sizes based on numerical order, to guessing a picture that's out of focus, to playing a variation of whack-a-mole.
In addition to the single-player mode, there are multiplayer party games for as many as eight people using two Wii Remotes.

Wii's party games are a big reason for its success, but the only downside is the price. Charging more than double that for a game that doesn't feel as deep may turn off potential buyers.

- John Gaudiosi /Los Angeles Times-Washington Post

Hour of Victory
Rating: Mature
Platform: Xbox 360
Everyone's favourite bad guys, the Nazis, return to the slaughter of yet another World War II shooter.

While the fad has surely faded, Hour of Victory at least tries a new twist. The draw here is that each mission can be played by one of three characters – Ross, a man who can push heavy objects and who totes big guns; Bull, a sniper who can scale buildings; and Taggert, a master of lock picking, stealth and silent kills. As each mission begins, players are treated to competent cinematics that tell the historically inaccurate tale – the three-man crew has been thrown together to prevent Germany from developing nukes.

Controls are nearly identical to other first-person shooters, and that's a good thing. The directional pad is used to lean left or right from behind cover. Visually, the game is unspectacular, even though it uses the latest Unreal Engine. And the enemy AI presents little challenge. The problem with Hour of Victory is not that it is a bad game, but that others (Call of Duty) have blazed such a spectacular trail before it.

- George Mathis/Los Angeles Times-Washington Post