Put the kids to bed, it's time to play some golf!!!

Outlaw Golf 2 brings a whole new element to the game of golf. Here are some features for this newest version:

8extreme courses in total, each with their own dynamic weatherconditions. These include 3 newly designed courses returning from theoriginal Outlaw Golf™ in addition to 5 brand new environments. From thearctic chill of Glacier Ridge to the steamy jungles of Aztec Acres,Outlaw Golf 2™ has it all, even a full sized miniature golf course anddriving range.

Features a fighting system that lets you beat up your caddie toincrease the Composure Response meter. No other Golf game packs thiskind of punch!

State-of-the-art Golf engine- Pioneering analogue swing technology now copied by many, originated and perfected by Outlaw.

Ok, with that out of the way, let me say first that I'm not a golffan at all. I've never played the sport and have no interest in hittinga little white ball around with a metal stick and then chasing afterit. Until now...

Outlaw Golf 2 is totally my style of golf. Nothing prim and properhere. Just good old fashioned 'let's have some fun anyway we can'.

Some sports games have a really high learning curve. This is one ofthose games, where I went straight to playing. I didn't do to bad atall. The little black 'help' button helped me make it through somecourses, although way over par.

Ifinally went to the movie/tutorial area and watched the instructionalvideos. I was laughing my a** off watching them. Here's one of a coupleof quotes. "When I see dem der three X's, Ima thinkin' I'm gonna watchme sum good porn" or "See the 'A' button? That's the a** kickingbutton" Hilarious!!!

Lots of different modes and characters to play with as well. Alright, on to some details.

Controls/Game Play:
As I said, I went in head first and started playing the gametossing aside the manual as well as ignoring the instructional videos.After hitting the black 'help' button several times I was easily ableto make my way through the game.

You're able to set the distance in which you hope to hit the ball,the angle at which your club strikes the ball and more importantly, thepower at which you hit the ball. All three of these are controlled byyour left and right thumb stick. When you have your shot set up, youpress 'A' and you set. Now pull back on one of the thumb sticks andwhen your power reaches the best range, you quickly push up on thethumb stick. The only catch is you have to make sure you push upstraight or your shot will be off.

There are also beatings you can dish out to your caddy to improveyou composure during the game. It's best to watch the tutorial on howto do this, but it's pretty easy. It was just fun watching thecharacters beat each other in the movies.

Overall, controls were excellent. Not too complicated but just enough options to keep things accurate and interesting.

Sound:
Great job with the sound! I enjoyed all the menu song tracks aswell as in the in game sound tracks. Fits the game perfectly as well.

The character's voices were well done and matched the body movement well too.

Anytime you hit the ball you got that nice metal 'tink' sound fromyour club. Hitting the trees or water hazards sounded just right too.Good job with the sound folks.

Graphics:
This is definitely one of the reasons this is an adult oriented game.

Most of the characters are scantily dressed females. Not that I'mcomplaining about that at all. I could even see a tan line on one ofthe characters hips. Body movement was VERY smooth as you'll probablynotice in the opening sequence when they dance for you. How did theyget those hips and other body parts to move so realistically???!!

Background objects were appropriately detailed as well. When theball would roll in some terrain you could actually see the ball beingobstructed by the vegetation.

Another fine job in the graphics department.

Overall:
Looking for a fun game for when the guys are over? This is it! Thecharacters have hilarious personalities along with the announcer. Lotsof different modes make for a lot of game play.

Your professional golfer may or may not like this game. Havingnever played the game of golf in real life before, I had a blastplaying this. Definitely one to add to your Xbox collection.

\"Powered by today’s gaming technology, Delta Force®: Xtreme™ brings the classic Delta Force game back to life to face the enemy once more. As a member of the elite Delta Force, prepare yourself to take on over 60 levels of frantic single and multiplayer FPS action, including graphically enhanced missions from the original game, new maps, improved game features, STATS and much more- all for just $20*!\"That\'s quoted from the Novalogic website. Honestly I would have taken that 20 dollars and done something better with it, like burn it. Maybe if you were a die hard fan of the original Delta Force and don\'t mind Novalogic releasing recycled games all the time this is for you.I knew when I picked this game up that it was the original Delta Force with some added missions and a \"graphical update\" but I was hoping for more of a change. But, Delta Force is still the same old Delta Force. What\'s changed? Nothing really except the graphics. I\'ll get into the review and then get back into my critisms afterwards.Controls:Of course I never seem to have a problem with controls for any PC game and I didn\'t have one for Delta Force Xtreme either. You move just like in any other FPS with W A S D, Z goes prone, X crouches and C stands your numbers change weapons and there\'s a few other controls you\'ll want to get used to. Nothing bad in this category at all.Sound:Well you\'d think if this game is supposed to be so updated they would have thought, \"Hmm, maybe we should change the sounds that sound like the same exact ones from Delta Force 2\". But why do that? Why waste the time when they can just recycle everything and use it over and over again?! And that pretty much sums it up here the sounds are plain and dull and recycled which really takes away from the game for me sadly.Graphics:Now one thing I did notice here was that on my computer I didn\'t see much of an improvment from the Delta Force Blackhawk Down. It could be that it was because I had everything on normal but then again when I played Delta Force Black Hawk down I had a 64MB video card and now I have a 128MB graphics card and I don\'t see much improvment. Yes there\'s definitly an improvment from Delta Force the very first one but I don\'t see much else from the others. The screenshots from the website looked pretty good though so it\'s hard for me to judge in this category. For me it was nothing spectacular at all.Overall:And back to my criticisms we go, like I said much is recycled and I know, I know this is just supposed to be an update of Delta Force 1 with some new missions but the way it was advertised in my opinion was very misdirecting. One thing I can say good about this game though is the loading times were very fast and after you load up you can choose your arsenal after that it\'s just like any other Delta Force game, actually that\'s what it\'s supposed to be.Lets hope soon Novalogic can stop recycling their old work and instead of releasing all these Delta Forces that are the same as the previous ones except with new missions, release something up to par with the newer games comming out.I\'d say this game is not worth picking up unless you really enjoyed the first Delta Force but don\'t expect anything that is up to par with newer games comming out.

Are you ready to be drawn into the front lines of battle? If so, Dangerous Waters is for you. Dangerous Waters is a HIGHLY in depth game which can provide hours upon hours of game play for any military simulation fan. With various types of vessels and craft to control, you won’t want to leave your PC.Dangerous Waters picks up where Jane’s simulations left off and then some. The game comes with a quick start manual as well as a regular manual, which is the size of a small novel itself. Thank you Battlefront for including the quick start manual. The game also includes voice command, which gives you the ability to literally ‘speak’ your commands. It does take a bit to set up, and I did find the use of the keyboard and mouse easier to use.Gameplay/Controls:As I just mentioned Dangerous Waters includes a voice command control system. It does take some time to set up the voice command system, but it does add a pleasant feature to the game. I preferred using the keyboard and mouse controls to the voice command. You’ll definitely want to take your time and read the manual Dangerous Waters comes with. If not the regular manual, at least the quick start manual. The game also comes with different playability modes. You can have the settings so if you’re a novice player, the crew will take over some of the minor details. If you feel adventurous, you can always switch to the more realistic mode and take complete control. Dangerous Waters does take time and effort to learn to play. Don’t expect to just jump right in and start kicking some butt. Once you get going you’ll learn to appreciate the detail and realism of the game. Sound:I found the sound overall to be on the lacking sound at times. The sound isn’t by far the key element of the game, but it could use some improvement. The sound with the voice control on the voice command was well done though. You could almost picture you crew performing your every command. Graphics:As you can tell by the screenshots, the graphics on Dangerous Waters are put together well. Gamers used to a FPS might not be all that enthralled, but keep in mind this is a military simulation and the graphics are done well where it counts. A couple of minor glitches here and there as well as a little lag during some sequences, but other than that, no complaints. Overall: Dangerous Waters has pushed the limits of military type simulation games. Opening the box and seeing the size of the manual should give you a hint for what you’re in for. Take the time to read through the manual and check out the tutorials. Those impatient gamers that like to jump in headfirst might find this game overwhelming. However, the detail put into the controls and the realism is what makes this game a very interactive simulation. This is a MUST own for anyone into military type simulation games. Sonalysts Combat Simulations did a fine job putting this together and you’ll find hours of game play on your hands.

\"Fight Night Round 2\" is the sequel to \"Fight Night\" and it is a big step up from \"Fight Night\". \"Fight Night Round 2\" brings all of the best from \"Fight Night\" plus more.Controls/Gameplay:The controls are just so great on this game. You use your right joystick to throw punches (Straights, jabs, hooks, uppercuts and haymakers) while you use your left joystick to move, R plus your right joystick blocks different ways and L plus your right joystick bobs and weaves. You can always throw your illegal punches, signature move and taunts with the remaining buttons. The newest and one of the real exciting new features in the controls of \"Fight Night Round 2\" is the haymakers and haymaker meter you get now. You can throw haymaker hooks and uppercuts by winding up, just make sure you hit because it\'s easy to get countered.Gameplay was simple, everything was setup pretty well. You can start up right away and go head to head with a friend or you can create a character to use in head to heads or start a career with either one of the characters in the game already or by making your own. When making a character there is so much you can do, it\'s very detailed. You can do the basic stuff like, height, fat, muscle, hair, etc. but you can also adjust how wide the face is, how long the nose is, how the eyes are shaped, how the face is shaped, and more it\'s VERY detailed.When you start off you\'ll start off fighting amateurs for only 300 dollars a fight but it\'s okay because as you go through your first fights it will teach you how to punch, parry, throw haymakers, block and bob and weave. Once you progress to the professional league you start doing training like combo dummies, weight training, heavy bag, etc.Another new feature is you can hire people before your fight for a certain amount of money. You can hire a better cutman, either one that heals swelling faster or one that heals cuts faster. You can hire a entourage to escort you to the ring and this helps boost stats and you can also pay for better trainers.A real neat thing about \"Fight Night Round 2\" is the fact that once the round is over you go to your corner and now you have cutmen. What happens is it will say press A to heal swelling or press B to heal cuts. Once you do that in all for corners it will show numbers of how bad the damage is, the higher the worse. You use your left joystick to choose what you want to work on and you\'re right joystick to move this little white blip to keep up with another meter and it helps heal the swelling and cuts.Sound:The sound on fight night is very well done. The soundtrack they have for the game isn\'t the greatest, in fact some of the songs I found to be completely annoying so I disabled them in options. Other than that the ingame sounds were great. The audience sounded good and the sounds of landing your punches and especially your haymakers.Graphics:WOW! is all I can say, the graphics on \"Fight Night Round 2\" are simply amazing! All the fighters are VERY detailed. When you\'re sitting in your corner with your cutmen now you can see the sweat running down the fighters. You can also see blood running when they have a cut on their eye or their nose is bleeding. The details of the face are amazing as well, some of the best graphics I\'ve seen on XBox so far.Overall:If you like any type of boxing game this is a MUST have no matter what. Though I didn\'t get to try the internet with this game, for the single player alone I would get this game. A lot of improvements from the last \"Fight Night\" and things to keep you busy in between rounds like your cutmen really add to this game. One of, if not, THE BEST boxing game I have ever played. This game gets a straight 5.0 from me. Well worth the money if you like boxing.

Is this the worst game ever? Maybe, maybe not. It all depends on what your definition of worst is. I wanted to try something new, something different. So at random I went to file planet and picked out one of their game demos. I picked Freedom Force VS the 3rd Reich and went OO Nazi and Super heroes, what an original concept; let’s see where this takes us. Sure enough I wasn’t disappointed. The story line goes, man loves wife, wife is freaked out by Neighbor, Neighbor kills wife, husband gets the chair, strange energy flows through him, Man receives super powers, man becomes “Tombstone”, and Tombstone kills the Neighbor. The Neighbor was just luckily in the room watching the execution, laughing.Now the game looks like they tried to make something fun. But, it’s not. The writing of the story line is more annoying then anything, and the super hero Tombstone is a joke. “My Neighbor killed my wife and now I’m a super hero”... I\'m speechless.The plus side is that character movement is good. Simple point and click. Someone should be able to jump right into the game and start playing, although I have no idea why they would.I just am trying to find good things to say about this game at this point, but I can’t. If the goal of \"Irrational Games\" was to make fun of comic books, World War II, and the intelligence of their target audience then they did a good job. Irrational Games surly lived up to their name! I might be a little hard on this demo, but the purpose of a demo is to try to convince people to purchase the game. Not shock them into thinking that some one some where thought that was a quality product. I tried to sit down and give this game a second chance but just couldn’t bring myself to do it. I will be uninstalling this as soon as I’m done writing the review and hopefully will forget I even played it.If some one is craving a game with super heroes, tell them to try “City of Heroes”, I know it has a monthly fee, but it’s better to pay for quality monthly then new garbage.It\'s possible that this game just wasn’t for me, but try it, I DARE you.Oh, and if your looking for top notch graphics to save the day. I’m sorry my friend, this is a comic book game. Good graphics might take away from the novelty of it all.

\"Manhattan Chase will let you choose between Angel, a brave and proud member of the NYPD, and Yasmin, a cold-hearted and sadistic criminal. Reveal the exciting story about these two completely different girls by finishing all episodes from both sides of the law! As if these action-packed story-episodes are not enough to guarantee a long lifetime of this game, there are also 6 multi-play modes and 2 instant-action modes available. Team6 did their best to make this their most challenging game ever: The car-chases are more intense, aggressive and addictive then showed in any other game ever before, and the 3rd person action makes sure there is plenty of variation in game play terms.In 3rd person the girls carry effective but \'ordinary\' weapons such as a machinegun, grenade launcher or sniper: But once inside one of the dozen available cars the mass-destruction weapons become available! Vulcan-cannons, Multi-missiles, homing rockets, mines and even air strikes are yours to use or abuse.\"That was from the official site folks. Please don\'t think I said any of that. I\'m not entirely sure why this game was even created or even more so what some \'other\' review site would give this game an 8/10 score. But I suppose that\'s why you come here, to get the REAL truth on how a game is. Size isn\'t supposed to be everything. So even with Chase Manhattan being roughly 300MB in size comparable to some of today\'s games being 3000MB, I figured I\'d at least give it a shot. Funny thing is, this game took almost as long as a 3GB game would take to install. This game reminded me of when ekim and I used to play the original Carmageddon on my first PC with a Pentium 166! This is going to be short and sweet:Game Play/Controls:Utter garbage! Can you say \"Supersize the suckiness!!?\" Did anyone play this before the final code was released? You use the arrow keys to move, along with some other off the wall keyboard shortcuts to move your character around and use items. As that wasn\'t making things difficult enough...trying to control any vehicle in the game was near impossible. The car would get up to it\'s highest speed in Km/H (why not MPH?) and start barreling down the roadway. Well good luck making a turn EVEN if you tried to slow down. The car would have a terrible under/over steer either way you turned. I especially enjoyed just ploughing through things like trees, park benches, lamp posts and any other type of fixed object that in real life would probably kill me or at least total my car. Not in Chase Manhattan! No sirrie Bob! Their cars must have some type of magical protection where you can just slam head first into a solid brick wall at what feels like 200MPH and your car just flips a couple times in the air like Echo the dolphin. Not a scratch on the car! Wonderful and so unrealistic at the same time! There are some weapons in Chase Manhattan. At first I started out with a police car and a side mounted mini machine gun. Now every police car should have one of those! Off I go watching my radar and trying my hardest to catch up to the bad guy. After finally learning how to semi control my car, I caught up to him. Since I changed the default controls around, I hit my left mouse button and open fire. A couple seconds later, the enemy car blew up and I beat the level. I beat the level??? Yes, I beat the level. Woohoo. Next level and I\'m out of my car now. I carry this nice machine gun that miraculously never runs out of ammo. Must be the same place where I picked up that indestructible car from! Almost immediately some bad guys wwwaaaayyy off in the distance start firing at me and of course hitting me. Now anyone shooting at you from the length of a city block away isn\'t really going to be able to hit you at all. But in Chase Manhattan they can....of course. So I take them out and move forward. This car comes driving up to me from behind and a \"Watch Out!\" appears at the top of the screen. I turn around an open fire on it. The car blows up, but the lower frame of the car and wheels continue down it\'s path killing innocent people and thus failing my mission. I did this about five times until I wanted to shoot the game itself. I finally figured out how to get past that part and moved up some. Then some guy with an automatic unlimited ammo (gotta get one of these things) rocket launcher just opens fire and wipes me and everything around me out. That\'s where I hit my Escape key and ended my self torture. Sound:Now here there was a pleasant surprise. There was some nice upbeat rock \'n\' roll/heavy metal music playing in the background when I was driving around. It sounded nice and clear and is what gave this game it\'s only .5 score. All other audio was pretty mundane. Graphics:Ok, just look at the screenshots. Need I say more? Probably not, but I will. Terrible. Blocky, unfinished and cheaply done. The characters had no dimensions to them. They seemed like moving paper dolls with flat features. Background objects and even those that had some interactivity to them were done poorly. Explosions looked like yellow and red chunks of I don\'t know what flying through the air. They put some type of comic strip scene in between levels. Each of the dialog boxes had some off the wall, stupid comment or phrase inside of it. Overall:What an utter waste of a good CD. Good news is, if you actually bought this game, you now have a fine coaster added to your collection. You can buy this \"game\" online for what looks like $20.00. Although I would highly recommend not purchasing or even renting this game at all.

From the main site:\"Set in the beautiful fantasy world of Equiada, home to magical creatures, mighty leaders, and powerful wizards, Rising Kingdoms, offers players the unique combination of both strategy and adventure modes.In strategy mode the player is able to select 3 major races – treacherous Humans, vicious Foresters and merciless Darklings, and in addition to these three primary races, the player is able to capture, enslave and develop five independent nations – Shades, Nomads, Dragons, Trolls, and Elves. Combined with the player’s main race they provide a valuable asset when clashing with their opponents.In adventure mode the player controls a group of heroes and a small squad of troops uncovering dark secrets and surprising twists as the adventure unfolds. The story spans over several generations portraying powerful ancient artifacts, the rise and fall of mighty leaders and glorious kingdoms, and the birth of new mystic creatures and races.\"Hello all! I\'ve really been on a RTS streak lately. Erik (Stickman373) thinks I\'m starting to like this type of game. I\'ll stick to my FPS\'s thank you very much...:) This was an interesting and fun demo to play. There was a lot of game time, enough to get someone hooked and wanting to play more. So I started it up and selected tutorial since I don\'t fair well in RTS games. The tutorial was simply perfect. I got a popup each time I needed to do something. That in itself helped me learn how to play this game quickly. There were more than a few occasions when I was to quick to clear the popup box, losing my hints. Not to fret, after awhile the game realized that I didn\'t complete what I was supposed to do and kindly reminded me. So there I went along building up my village, people and army so to speak. After awhile I thought I had a big enough army and went on my way to do some conquering of neighboring villages. Hey, nothing like making your real estate grow bigger right?! Off I went with my army. I found a nice little village with about two buildings and about two to three people. My army instantly engaged the enemy and I conquered the village. Nothing like victory to make a gamer want to keep playing. That\'s exactly what I did. Kept playing. I must have played this demo for two hours! That\'s how much I enjoyed playing it.It really takes a lot for a RTS to impress me and Rising Kingdoms definitely did. Here are some reasons why:Game Play/Controls:All that is needed to control your world and characters in Rising Kingdoms is the mouse. Point and click, that simple. There is a feature where you can click your forces and then right click on the character you want them to follow. No more scrolling up and down and trying to keep track of each unit. All of your units can follow one character if you like. It sure made controlling things a LOT easier for me. Moving over the map was as simple as moving your mouse around. Want to add more or different buildings? A nice and easy right click of the mouse on your town hall and you have a wide selection to choose from. Even with adding new units or upgrades. A simple right click on the correct building will give you multiple choices each time.Sound:I really enjoyed the background music while playing. Although it wasn’t\' many tracks to choose from, they were all pretty upbeat and fit the game perfectly. The music had almost a fantasy rhythm to it. Since Rising Kingdoms also takes place in a fantasy time, they worked very well together.The sound when it came to units interacting was a different story though. The sounds were very repetitive here and during a large skirmish became mixed with each other. Almost to a point where it was a big jumble of sounds. Needs some work here. Graphics:Overall the graphics were above average. Keep in mind this is a RTS and graphics aren\'t it\'s strong point. There was a good amount of fine detail. I enjoyed watching the workers run out into open ground, dig a hole, plant a seed, cover it and then stomp on the ground. You could see that small of detail in Rising Kingdoms.Since the game takes place from a slanted overhead view point, you\'re pretty much stuck looking at things from an angle. It\'s not bad for this game, but those of you looking for more in the graphics department might be disappointed.Overall: I was really captivated by this game. Just ask Erik..;) The ease of learning to play the game, the easy to use and understand controls as well as the sound really have me wanting to come back for more.I was also impressed that in the flurry of RTS games lately, this took a step to the side from all the military types and came up with a fantasy RTS. I think that\'s what made it all the more enjoyable for me. Something unique. Unfortunately, there\'s not much info on the game on the official game site. Hopefully, they\'ll update with game specs, release date and so on soon. Any of you RTS fans better keep your eye on this. Definitely worth a purchase.

As most games start off, they have an Intro before going to the menu. Digital Devil Saga\'s intro was nothing but sweet, and the music that went with it was perfect. When you first start the game there\'s a Five (5) minute Cinematic scene which involves a battle between your Tribe and the Vanguard, but during your battle it gets interrupted by some strange power.You start as the leader of the Embryon Tribe. There are a total of Six (6) major tribes which divide up the Junkyard in several different parts. All of the tribes are fighting each other to take over one another, and the tribe that becomes the triumphant out of the Six(6), they get to go to Nirvana, which is suppose to be like paradise and you get whatever you ever wished for.Now onto the battling. Before your first battle there\'s a Cinematic scene of your party turning into Demons a.k.a. Mantra\'s. In battle you can turn from being a demon back into a human again and shoot with pistols/shotguns. You also have to change One (1) or another party member into human to get a new combo. But after you defeat the enemy, the battle is over; your party devours the corpses of the enemy to recover their HP (Health) slightly. When a character levels, you can manually level your leader, Serph. You get 3 Statistic points to go where you choose, and when you hit level 10, you get 2 extra slots for special abilities, and although you don\'t get to level manually the rest of your party it\'s done automatically for you.Controls/Gameplay:The controls are basic. The \'X\' key is your action button, the \'O\' key is to cancel/back, the \'Square\' key is for the menu, and the \'Triangle\' key is for your map. You can use your Left Analog to move and your Right Analog to move your camera.Sound:The sound is great for the game. It fits perfectly nice, but can possibly get a little boring while fighting in the same place for a good hour.Graphics:I don\'t really know if the graphics are Cel Shaded or Polygons. Possibly a little bit of both, but anyways they\'re cool and the fighting graphics are nice also.Overall:You can have fun with this game for up to 40+ hours. The game is a great RPG and it has a good story to fit with it. When it\'s released I recommend giving it a good look, even a Buy. :)

It must be hard to make a good baseball game, it’s not like football, where all you really have to control is the quarter back and a runner, it’s not like basketball, where all you have to control is one person, with a bouncing ball and worry about passing it. It’s not like curling where you have to worry about......rubbing ice with a broom? Anyway, Baseball is not an easy transition to video games, if your the pitcher, you have to worry about the how fast to throw the pitch, where to throw it, what kind of pitch to throw, and what are the batters strengths and weaknesses, \"If I throw a fastball to this guy will he swing and miss, or hit it so hard my grandchildren will cry?\". If your the batter, where is this pitch going, should I swing, maybe a bunt will be best. Then you have the base runner, should he steal or stay where he is? Like I said, it’s a lot more complicated than most of other sport games. As a rule I\'m not a big fan of baseball as a video game, I don\'t even like watching it, but I do love to play. I love the smell of the grass, the feel of the ball smacking into a mitt, and the \"Oh crap\" sound of someone about to be tagged out (short stop was my position). I\'m sure football players feel the same way, and so do basketball players, and so do .......curlers? Anyways on to the game. Major League 2K5 is the latest in the $19.99 titles for the XBOX, You will remember NFL 2K5 taking some thunder away from the Demi-God of football known as Madden. The character maker isn\'t really the best that I\'ve seen, but its not that bad, the play ball option is just what it says, one game between the two teams of your choice. GM Career allows you to be the General Manager of a team, decide who comes up from the minors, who goes down, who gets traded, and when you should check your email. Your able to decide which team you would like to be hired by based on the owner, is he a fan? or an Investor? or a Dictator? It’s up to you who you work for. The other modes are all very standard so I won’t go into them, if you have ever played Madden or any other sports game, your going to pick it up very quickly. The skybox is where you buy different cheats (using tokens you earn from games) Different uniforms/stadiums and even arcade machines, (yes I said arcade machines) bored with baseball and want to play air hockey? No problem, for only a few tokens you can buy an air hockey table, or even darts.Graphics - Graphics are really good, everything is done very well, the fans are actually done fairly well to, most of them are the same models but you can’t get everything. The players all kind of look like there real life counterparts, stadiums are very well done, and the fireworks are pretty. The game board on the field even changes immediately to reflect the base count and the score.Sound - Wow, great job here too, the crack of the bat, the fans, the ump are all very well done. The stadium songs are customizable with your own music from the hard drive. (The Ballad of Chasey Lane, by the Blood Hound Gang, goes really well when your batter is taking the plate.) The only problem I have with this is the same problem I have with Madden, the commentators; I realize they can’t make new phrases for every situation. But hearing about someone trying to catch a fish 50 times a game gets tiresome. (you\'ll understand if you play)Controls - Pretty standard for a baseball game, when pitching, the A-B-X-Y and sometimes black, chooses which pitch in the arsenal to use, while batting you hit with the A button, power swing with the B, and bunt with the Y. The directional pad lets the AI know which base to steal.Game Play - Pretty good, not really any lag or loading screens to mess with, and the controls respond real well. The AI is very well done, they know which plate to throw the ball to, and have no problem in catching you trying to steal. Of course you can dumb them down if you want to with the options menu.Overall - If you hate sports and don\'t like baseball, don\'t get the game. If you do like sports games and are a huge fan of baseball, pick it up. For only 19.99 in a world of 49.99 or more games this is an easy choice, great graphics/sound/game play for only 20 bucks. Of course rent it first so you can compare it to the other Baseball titles before you make your decision.

The game revolves around a special division of the US government dubbed \"Task Force Talon\" which is lead by \"Major Jason Richter\". Task Force Talon has been called up to defend the US and indirectly the entire world from a conspiracy involving the toppling of oil corporations to send the whole world into chaos.Controls/Gameplay: The controls are very similar to the majority of RTS\'; point and click. While the screenshots do not show it, the game has plenty of base building. The games resource are cash and energy, energy is only needed while building Army Buildings. The buildings of Task Force Talon are supplied by the energy from a command centre or forward base. This requires Task Force Talon buildings to be within the range of these buildings unlike the army buildings which can be built anywhere. Energy is gained by building field power plants which is simple enough but to get cash its slightly more complex.There is only a single campaign where you get to play with both the US Army and Task Force Talon. There is little differences between controlling either one on a map, simply a change of buildings and units. Sometimes you have access to both base types on the same map, especially near the end. Bases are constructed using the appropriate constructor unit. The Army uses Excavators where Task Force Talon uses \"drones\" which actually become the building, so you need to build a drone for every building you make.There are a few different ways to get cash, first is to capture an enemy unit; when in combat a unit may bring down an enemy solider\'s life to a level where they surrender. Infantry can now run up to a surrendered unit and capture him. Thus giving you money and if you have a prison or field hospital with free slots they will be sent there automatically. Next you can build oil extraction plants on areas which contain oil, then trucks can deliver this oil to refiners which then converts it into cash. If one of your units occupy specific buildings such as banks they will over time extract the money from the building. Destroyed vehicles may leave behind a pilot, if you return these pilots to your base you then get money, this is the same other units such as POWs.You have a good selection of structures such as; resource buildings, defensive turrets, healing buildings, control centres, energy buildings, unit construction buildings, building add-ons, air control towers, missile silos and prisons. Buildings that hold prisoners generate money over time depending on how many prisoners the building has, you can also exchange these prisoners for map details.Unit combat works in a rock, paper, scissors manner where for example commandos can easily kill other infantry but they will take ages to destroy a tank. Where a tank has a very easy time destroying other tanks but it can have trouble taking out large groups of infantry. Each unit has specific tags saying what they are effective against, these are usually buildings, vehicles, helicopters or infantry. Planes do not stay on the map, they can be called in for an attack run and then they will come in from the edge of the screen to the target, then they fly off the map, assuming they are not shot down. There is also a limit on the amount of active planes you have depending on how many air control towers you have. Similar to Command & Conquer units gain rank as they gain kills, a higher rank means a better unit.The game has a single \"special\" unit, this unit is named \"Jefferson\". Basically he\'s always rank 3, has more life, heals quickly on his own and I suspect he does more damage then regular commandos. You do lose the game instantly if he dies or is captured. Near the end of the game I ended up just stashing him in a corner of my base because every single time I lost it was because I was not paying attention and he was killed.Sound: Gunfire and explosions sound great, voice acting is also very well done. Although one thing that really bugged me is there are warnings for basically every single thing that happens. For example if a unit dies you get told \"a soldier has been killed\" or if you capture a unit it will say \"a unit has been captured\". Say you were to do a full scale assault you are constantly being told a unit has died and you\'ve captured a unit so it just becomes pointless.Graphics: For an RTS Act of War: Direct Action has extremely high detail textures and particle effects. The game does stutter quite often depending on how many units are on screen which can be a lot, as well as the explosions of buildings and vehicles. The buildings often catch fire which drag frame rates to the ground. A very interesting thing is the game uses live acting versus the traditional CG movies. The actors are of daytime TV quality and the blue screening is of the same quality, but it works out fine.Overall: Art of War: Direct Action is a high paced action RTS, the game cares less about resources and base building and far more about combat. The live acting was pulled off quite well and I applaud it for being one of the first games to use live acting rather then CG. Sound was great and there are very few things to complain about it. The graphics like I said are very nice but have a tendency to stutter. Sadly I was not able to try out the multiplayer aspect of the game. Hopefully another reviewer will be able to review it in the future.