I recently started my own blog using wordpress. I'm keeping it simple for now, but may in the future try to up the ante with the site even more.

Its called Gimme Gimme Games, and the address is gimmegimmegames/wordpress.com

I'm using it to focus on publishing stories on sales, specials, and discounts on video games, while also critiquing and reviewing games based off my rating of how much it is worth in dollars (like how much value I felt I got in return)

I'd love it if some of you visit it, I plan to update it as much as possible, multiple times a day when I can.

Look to it for deals on games, special discounts, and also for reviews on the games going on sale to find out if you should put your hard earned money into it!

There are games that redefine their genre, leading the way for that s(tyle) of gaming. Then, there are games that re-invent the game itself. Sometimes, re-inventing the game itself isn't enough for the community, especially when it comes to FPS. Halo Reach successfully retains its position as one of the top FPS for consoles, while changing the formula enough to add new elements to a proven system. The old dog learned some new tricks in this case. You'll find everything you would expect from a Halo in here, and if you're not a fan of the series then this is probably the best game to get you into the series if you haven't tried it yet. If Reach doesn't get you addicted to fraggin' your friends or the pleasure of nailing another player with a sticky grenade on their forehead, then you won't be a Halo player. When you buy this game you are purchasing possibly the deepest online FPS on consoles today.

One of the reasons why the multiplayer is so deep is the new armor abilities. There are several abilities that each have their own advantage and disadvantage. You can deploy a drop shield to protect you from enemy fire for a limited time, or make a copy of yourself that will walk to a specified location drawing fire while you can sneak up on opponents. Also, you can stop and pound the ground with your fist causing anyone near you to take damage while you regenerate your shield. This ability essentially makes you invincible for a few moments and gives you a breather but makes you very vulnerable when it wears off and you are completely immobile. Jet Packs have also made their way to Halo, and they are awesome. You can fly into the air for a small duration of time (your Jet Pack charge regenerates when not in use) to see the play field, or get a shot on someone from a better view. You move rather slowly in the Jet Pack, but its effective for dodging close quarters combat for a second until the other players get their sights on you. Snipers might use this to get to spots on the map that most can't get to. You can become invisible for a short time with another armor ability, and this is one of my favorites as it gives you the ability to creep up on enemies and get instant melee kills from behind. You can't move much without exposing yourself with this ability, and firing your weapon exposes you. I recommend sneaking to the enemy's location with this ability and using a shotgun for close quarters kills. The Sprint ability finally allows Halo players to do something COD players have been doing for years, and that is run for your life.

These abilities are the "big" addition to the Halo online multiplayer formula. All ****c modes like Slayer, King of the Hill, CTF are here along with Firefight and Infection. Firefight can be played with up to 4 people online and offline. it's a fun co-operative way to level up your online profile. The campaign can also be played co-operatively making the story mode not a lonely experience. Infection mode is a favorite of mine where a few players begin the game as zombies and have to infect the other team of Spartans until all are infected while the Spartans must last the whole round without being killed and turned into zombies. Its particularly satisfying to join a horde of zombies and overwhelming a single player. At this point in 2010, every online shooter could have a fun zombie themed mode. I enjoy the chance to play as the zombies themselves and have to approach this mode with a different strategy than other modes. Of course there are multiple variants for each multiplayer mode, like Firefight can be played with everyone using sniper rifles or RPGs. There is normal Slayer mode where you either play in a free-for-all or Team based Slayer, there is ****c Slayer where you don't have armor load outs if you're going old school. The maps are varied and have nice spots for intense battles, each having their own secrets and quirks.

More features carried over from Halo 3 are Theater and Forge. Theater is where you can take screenshots and videos from your online matches. If you wanted to prove to your buddies that you really are good against strangers online when you keep getting your ass kicked in local matches? Record it and prove it! Forge allows you to create your own multiplayer maps and play them online. This promotes creativity and can break the monotony of the normal multiplayer maps. These two modes are improved upon from Halo 3, and as the community builds we will see more comical online videos and more awesome inventive maps.

The game play is nearly the same as past Halos. There is a bit less focus on the "space" jump then in past installments, and overall a grittier feel to the entire experience. Melee attacks from behind provide instant kills, and aside from the new armor abilities it is exactly the same. You have your regular grenades and sticky grenades, and there are numerous weapons. There are enough weapons that it will take you some time getting used to which ones you want to use, while the matchmaking will force you to use variety and try new weapons depending on the map size, mode details, etc.

The graphics are largely the same as Halo 3 with a bit more detail. The environments are well done and the physics are spot on. Driving controls can be finicky at times but this isn't anything new to Halo players and after a while you forget that there might be a better way to steer your vehicles. The soundtrack is fantastic and the music is spot on at the right moments during campaign. Voice acting is good as well with no clear weaknesses for any character. The men sound like men, the ladies sound like ladies. No glaring errors here, though the voice acting doesn't stand out like it would in a title like Mass Effect 2. Explosions look great and sound terrific. The enemy AI has variety and while it can make some stupid decisions at times, it keeps you on your toes for the most part of the entire campaign. In firefight the AI will flank your position and then cover a few Covenant troops as they attempt to storm your position. Getting onto roof tops is a decent strategy in firefight that makes it harder for enemies to shoot you but it makes you very vulnerable every time the enemy receives reinforcements.

Campaign mode is a solid 8 hours depending on your skill level and which difficulty you select. It can be played co-operatively with friends both locally and online. There are intense moments in the story mode, and it never really slows down in pace. You play as Noble 6, a nameless solider who has a "c(lass)ified" past. Without revealing too many details, the story does take on some side stories with supporting characters, but the majority of your time playing the campaign will be shooting. You get to use most if not all of the new armor abilities during the course of the campaign, usually you get the opportunity to use a new ability just before when you need it most. An issue I had in the campaign is that there are moments when the AI of your teammates isn't the best. Often I'd have Kat or another character driving a warthog only to stop somewhere and stay still without getting out of the vehicle. This caused me to traverse some areas on foot when driving would've been much quicker. I could've solved this by driving it myself, but I wanted to man the gun but evidently my AI partners didn't want that.

There is a lot of replay ability in the campaign, but if you're not interested in the online portions of this game then it may not be a good $60 value for you. The campaign is short and though it is fun it isn't worth the price of admission alone. Adding online multiplayer makes Halo Reach instantly worth more than what you're going to pay for it. There are tons of easter eggs, unlockables, and ways to customize your character. The achievements don't feel tacked on like in some games, each representing something incredibly fun or a particularly significant challenge. All in all it is a terrific value if you want the whole experience and Halo diehards will be more than pleased with the additions in Reach.

I'd give the game a solid: A+

Car Jack Streets Review (DSiWare) March 15th, 2010

800 Nintendo Points

"Not a perfect clone"

Car Jack Streets is a top down 2D action game, and it shouldn't take you long to guess which popular game IP its trying to copy. Looking at screenshots you may think this is early beta footage of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars here. Well, if only that was true. To be honest I pretty much wanted this. When the phenomenal Chinatown Wars came out for DS almost exactly one year ago I hoped this would happen. I had hoped that there would be many more GTA-esque titles for the DS as Rockstar had proven the DS was an incredibly capable platform for the franchise. You'd think the problem with a game that's clearly trying to borrow so much from another popular game would be originality. While CJS does lack originality, it also misses the mark on some fundamental game play features that I guess I took for granted in Chinatown Wars.

Lets finish discussing Chinatown Wars. It set the bar really high. Too high for Tag games it seems. GTA:CW's graphics were outright amazing for the Nintendo DS. The action on the 2D plane worked well with detailed 3D environments. Cars were in full 3D and accidents, police chases, explosions were gorgeous. Additionally that game had physics which I thought were just industry standard. It turns out Tag doesn't do physics well at all. Once you get over the huge 2D downgrade to CJS's visuals from CW's graphics you'll notice many more game play changes. In CJS when your car bumps another car, prepare for some of the worst animations and physics seen on the DS. I thought the animation/physics when you're skater wiped out in Skate It was the worst I'd see on DS but somehow this 2D game has outdone it. Cars bump back and forth for seconds in incredibly unrealistic ways. You will often barely touch a car and you're entire vehicle will turn 360 degrees despite not even hitting the car at full speed. It really hurts you when you're rushing to get to a mission, more painful when these spastic physics knock you into a police car.

And here comes the Popo. The man is hunting you down. Like GTA, its fairly easy to get away from the cops in this game though they'll often start chasing you for silly reasons like barely tapping their car with yours. Despite the fact that you rarely see actual cop cars in game, they're apparently invisible and waiting. They come at for virtually anything and everything, but they don't really put up a fight.

Fighting. Key to an action game like this right? Well be prepared to die randomly. My first death was from one shot from an enemy. I thought "hey its just one death". Every death is pretty much a one shot death and aiming is only done horizontally or vertically. You can't aim a weapon diagonally like in CW, or like in most 21st century video games. You're weapons blow up cars extremely easily and that will cause a lot of deaths. Two blasts from a shotgun make cars go boom and all surrounding cars follow suit. Oh, you'll get blamed by the cops for any innocent civilians who die in this random explosion. Often you hit cars with bullets only coz you're having difficulty with the aiming. There is a good variety of weapons and you will enjoy killing gang members and blowing up trucks.

The game world is free roam, but there is a constant annoyance stopping you from freely roaming. You owe a mobster $1 million. You are constantly (and I mean every moment you're playing the game unless you're on a mission) you get offers to complete jobs or missions. This is rather annoying as its unpredictable and it breaks the immersion. If you're having fun on a killing spree you'll get interrupted by a static image of a mobster and text. And it will happen again and again. Until you turn the game off.

The map is large and it does have some cool secrets while you explore but so much of the landscape looks identical. This really grains on you as you play, and the game itself isn't as bright as I'd like. I had to play with brightness turned up and in a well light room for full enjoyment. The missions are varied. Bus driving missions, EMT driving missions, assassinations, races. Everything you'd expect from Grand Theft Auto but a lot more clunky. The variety in the jobs brings your attention away from the issues with the actual game play, and this game can be a lot of fun in short bursts.

Sadly its apparent this game was a rushed iPhone port. Yes, physical buttons are a huge improvement. Its great to have this pick and play title waiting in your pocket without swapping carts. If you can get around the quirky driving controls which are entirely overly sensitive you'll really enjoy this game but I can see a lot of people simply turning off their Dsi and acting like this never downloaded. All in all, it may not be worth you're $8 considering its much cheaper on the Apps Store, but you'll get a game with hours full of content. You're not going to find anything like this on the DSiWare service, but you can find much better games. It has a good amount of replay value, but that all depends on how much you want to play it.

GAMEPLAY: 6.0

GRAPHICS: 6.0

DEPTH: 6.0

ENTERTAINMENT: 7.5

INTANGIBLES: 5.5

OVERALL: 6.3 (not an average)

Resident Evil: Degeneration

iPod Touch/iPhone

Apple Apps Store

$6.99-Third Person Shooter

The post RE4 shooter approach of Resident Evil games works very well on a multi-touch screen. This game leaves me pleased, but wanting more. That isn't due to any faults in its core game mechanics, its a very stream lined pick up and go version of the bigger console games. The controls work great, its just that the game lacks content. For $6.99 I can imagine being slightly displeased with this game, but I've spent more on horrible sandwhichs in college cafeterias that a $7 download for a good 3-4 hour RE-light game is a solid value. (Sorry bad sandwhich today)

The game is inspired by the animated movie of the same name. It focuses on the adventures of Leon S. Kennedy from RE2, RE4, and the film. Although Claire Redfield is a character in the movie, she appears in the game but is never playable. There honestly isn't much variety to this game other than walk down a hallway, then shoot zombie. These aren't the RE4 infected villagers. There is little to no A.I. No knocking down ladders only to discover the zombies found another way to get up onto the rooftop to overwhelm you. Just straight forward zombies. This shows how much of a clear and important evolution in the RE games was made in RE4.

Point and shooting zombies with the TPS over the shoulder camera of RE4 is not challenging at all. Due to the iPhone's limited hardware power, there are rarely more than 4 zombies on screen. I can't help but think that with a 600Mhz-833Mhz CPU, 100Mhz GPU+, and 256MB RAM that with these zombies being as dumb as they are there could at least be 20-30 of them on screen. I understand that the iPhone's screen is small, and the graphics would take a hit (which the graphics are great, but I'll get into that later) but the game's glaring lack of difficulty stands out as much as a zombie would if the next room you walked into was full of them. If the zombies could at least start running at you when you enter a room, instead of slowly pacing towards you only when you get close enough, then the 3-4 zombies per screen could be more tolerated. Additionally, zombies don't re-appear when you reenter rooms. I know, regenerating enemies is a tired, old, and dated staple of gaming that a lot of gamers are glad is gone. When you clear a room of its zombies, they are gone. So you spend so much time running from X place to Y location, and with some backtracking, its gets lonely and boring to not shoot anything for minutes on end.

The game lacks any real direction to where you should be going. It does enough to tell you where you need to go next, but gives no advice after that. There is no log to check what you're comrades said last, no journal to tell you what your objective was when you get lost navigating between the gray hallways and corridoors of the infected airport where the game takes place. You have a map to check, but often your objective marker will lead you somewhere with no clear goal. No cut scene to prompt you to do a particular thing, you just know you're right on top of what you should be doing even if you have no clue what it is.

The game isn't long. This is no marathon, it is very much a sprint. It is split into chapters, and the chapters will often leave you scratching your head when they end. A few times I was like "really? thats the end of this chapter" when i would play maybe 20 minutes of actual gameplay. Some chapters involve nothing but running, shooting a few zombies, then a cut scene. Also, Hunnigan isn't nearly as helpful. She calls Kennedy to tell you the simplest things, like getting used to the controls but offers little plot advancement and no help solving the problematic navigation of the game world.

The boss battles aren't shining RE boss battles at all. While yes, they do help break up the repetition of this adventure, they also present no real challenge. Much like the rest of the zombies, the bosses go down with little fight. They usually just follow you around a room, allowing you to shoot them as much as you want before running from their attacks. While this is standard RE boss fighting, bosses in RE4/RE5 put up more of a fight. With 1 enemy on screen this clear lack of A.I. is inexcusable. Bosses go down with roughly a dozen shots from varying weapons and grenades make the battles even quicker. The iPhone can do better. This is no hardware problem. The platform is more or as powerful as a PS2/GameCube and both those platforms have shown better A.I., boss battles in their RE games. This makes it all the more clear that this is a movie-tie in game. As sad as it is to see the great RE series get a quick cash in, we should be grateful it is a decent one and that there have been no tie ins on major platforms for the horrid RE movies of late.

As I said at the beginning, this game controls well. You move with a virtual analog stick on screen, you press the gun icon on screen when you want to shoot and then aim using the virtual analog stick. The same goes for the knife. This fits very well into the iPhone's multi-touch controls, as the post RE4-gameplay is a stop and shoot affair. With so few enemies on screen, the controls never have any time to become clunky or unresponsive due to the lack of challenge, but they never hint that they would if you did have a harder time beating the game's enemies. The graphics are some of the best 3D graphics on the Apps Store. Leon's animations are solid, so are the enemies. There is solid lighting, and very good fire effects given the GPU on the iPhone. The graphics reach PS2 level in most areas, but fall short at all times of the RE4 GameCube. The visuals can challenge most of the best looking PS2 games, with exceptions like God of War 2. However, the graphics are far better than anything you will find on the Sony PSP and Nintendo DS. Knowing the hardware of this platform that shouldn't come as a shock to many, only to those who've ignored this platform. This game represents why gamers around the world can shift from the Peggle and into more serious games on the iPhone. Games like this, Rise of the Lost Empires, and Hero of Sparta show a good oppurtunity for core gamers to find a solid handheld platform but combined with all the great features of a pocket computer/PDA.

All in all, Resident Evil: Degeneration on the iPhone/iPod Touch is a solid game. Its gameplay may be repetitive, and it may lack difficulty but delivers an experience not found often on the Apps Store. I would stress to most to get the Resident Evil 4: Mobile off the Apps Store for the same price first, as that game has more of the staples of the post-RE4 shooter and is generally more difficult. If you're lucky enough to find the game on sale like I did, grab it. It is a steal for anything lower than its $7 price, but it is still worth its original asking price. Despite its A.I. faults, and lack of navigation help the graphics shine and it delivers everything you'd want in a portable Resident Evil modeled after the newer REs and not the original RE games. Don't expect a scary game, expect a solid shooter with impressive graphics and controls.Gameplay: 7.5

Graphics: 9.0

Depth: 7.0

Entertainment: 8.0

Intangibles: 6.0

Overall: 7.4

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars (Nintendo DS) Released March 17th, 2009 Review

The Grand Theft Auto series has been one of the most controversial IPs in recent gaming history. Its seamlessy transistioned from top down PS1-era classic with niche appeal to mega-killer app for the young PS2, to brewing coffee far too hot for any Starbucks. Grand Theft Auto IV was widely praised last year for its gameplay, story, and multiplayer when it was released. GTA hasn't normally been on Nintendo consoles, its only been on Nintendo's handhelds. GTA Advance was the last GTA to grace a Nintendo console, and it wasn't very well received by consumers. It sported a top down camera that reminded us of where GTA 1 and 2 had taken us. This time, Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars delivers a superb free-roam experience for the first time on a Nintendo handheld.

CW is set in Liberty City, a town GTA veterans know to be filled with scum and some very memorable characters. A young, spoiled Asian immigrant comes to America when his seedy father is brutally murdered. He intends on delivering a family sword, an heirloom handed down each generation. He plans on giving it to his brother so his brother can use it to become the biggest crime lord in Liberty City. Things don't go as planned (When do they in Liberty City?) and Huang gets a warm american welcome with a bullet grazing his head. The game's cutscenes use a comic book style, and they are always filled with plenty of clever dialogue. The story takes time to develop, but its fun and you're usually wanting to see what's next. There are some very colorful characters and a few weird ones. (Like Hot Dog stand operators who need you to spy on their adultering wives)

There is a lot to do here in this game.You're never really out of things to do. For the first time in recent memory, I found myself playing GTA for the missions. Drug selling alone makes it hard to simply boot up the game to shoot cops for endless hours. If you'd like, you can avoid the narrative being told and go straight to offline multiplayer (which is fun but should be online) or play the standard GTA sandbox murder simulator. Stealing cars and running over innocent chumps is a blast. The police are unyielding in their determination to catch you. The wanted level system has changed. For every star you get on your wanted level, you have to knock that many pursuing police cars out. You can do this by causing them to run into other cars, or ramming them into oblivion yourself. You can hide to lose the heat, but you are often assaulted with a flurry of the boys in blue. The cops are always forcing you into confrontation which gives the game a fun and fast feeling.

Like I said, when I get a new Grand Theft Auto game I usually fool around with the city for a while. I like to see how many people I can kill before getting wasted or busted. The story really pulled me in with Chinatown Wars. Huang is a nice, engaging character. He can be funny, as he benefits from some very humorous writing. His uncle Kenny is a tool who only thinks of pleasing other crime lords. Kenny doesn't think about how these actions reflect upon his family, and he often jumps at every chance he gets to kiss up to more powerful crime lords. A relationship blooms between him and Huang that I couldn't wait to see develop.

I found myself passing up the dozens of ramps in LBC, and turning back to experience them. I would steal cars to see how fast and how long I could make my next ramp jump. Motorbikes and fast cars are great. Additionally, the more damage your car takes the harder it is drive accurately. For something as underpowered as the Nintendo DS, its impressive they've gotten such responsiveness out of it. The collisons between cars is superb. It feels and sounds realistic. Your car will overheat from damage as you'd expect. Cars take flips and spins very nice. You can still shoot out of your window just like in console GTAs. You can also dive out of the car while it maintains momentum and veers off in the distance. This is particularly amusing when trying to time when your flaming car will explode. I liked seeing if I could jump out just before it exploded so I could see its fiery explosion inflict a wave of death on pedestrians.

Chinatown Wars bares all the essentials of any GTA adventure. There are hookers, trigger happy police offers, and the classic GTA radio stations. I loved being able to switch through the radio, thus changing the mood of my driving experience. I'm happy to see my favorite stations of past trips in Liberty City have returned with great music. When you shut the DS and open it you're even greeted by spoken dialogue reminding you that you're still playing GTA. The most hilarious of which is a woman asking if "You want a piece of her pie". The game never stops beaming with personality. Every part of the city is alive with detail. You're always entertained, and always at a loss for words. Many of my friends thought it was wrong that you could sell drugs in this game. Once they played it they understood the addictiveness of drug dealing in Liberty City.

That's probably my favorite part of this game, selling drugs. You buys drugs like Cocaine, Downers, Weed, Heroine. You then go to other parts of the massive Liberty City to make big profits by selling them. When you're buying drugs it tells you what the market value of said drug is, and how much you could profit. Shortly after you begin buying and selling you will be making a lot of money. That is essential to this game because the initial missions don't pay a whole lot of money. You will have to deal drugs at a fast rate. So if you don't like the sound of that, this game isn't for you. Dealers will email your PDA with tips on how much the drug market is paying for certain drugs. Sometimes different parts of LBC will pay more for some drugs. Some parts may favor downers, others Cocaine. You'll find yourself hurrying over to far away sides of town to make profits in the tens of thousands of dollars. Be careful though, the cops will try to bust your deals and if you ditch the police just before arriving at the dealer's location he will get scared away. To avoid the cops from busting your deals, you have to take out secuirity cameras laid out across LBC. These are usually near the dealer's area. After these are gone the police raids decrease instantanousely.

The PDA is your hub for everything in CW. It houses your email. You receive email from dealers when good deals arrive. You also get email from characters who need jobs performed to move along the game's plot. It houses your map, which a few easy taps of the stylus will bring up a highlighted path to your desired destination. That makes the driving much simpler. Additionally, you can boot up the game's local multiplayer which is fun. Although it is not online nor does it have single card download play. You can track your statistics in here too and save your game at any time. So no more having to back track all the way to your safehouses from a long distance away. You can save anywhere. That is a very good reason why this game succeeds as an amazing portable game.

To expand upon that, this game pulls off being a great portable experience. It replicates the home console feel of GTA while presenting it an entertaining, pick up and play package. It never takes itself too seriously. Driving, stealing cars, killing people is easy and can be done seconds after booting up the game. There is practically no loading screens in this game. That helps to make the game easier to pick up randomily. Another great feature that may be overlooked by people is being able to replay missions. If you fail a mission you easily restart it. All you have to do is press select to restart the mission and press it again to skip back to where your mission ended before. So you can by pass the repetitive drives across town that can take minutes if you have trouble with a specific mission. This takes out needless frustration that is commonly associated with Grand Theft Auto missions. So if you accidentally bump into the police and they bust you, you can start over and speed up the process.

The graphics may turn off some players at first glance. Don't let it deceive you. This game packs some good graphics. The game is presented in a somewhat top down angle, similar to Pokemon Diamond and Phantom Hourglass. Everything in Liberty City is presented in good 3D graphics from the meager DS hardware. The detail of how well people and cars look is great. The physics react better than any DS game I've ever played. Additionally billboards, ramps, police cars all come to life with a wide range of bright colors. The game uses a much more colorful appearance then previous GTAs. I believe that helps the graphics appear as nice as they do. It plays to the DS's strengths. There is nice shadows and lighting. When your car is launched from a ramp you will see a shadow of your cars exact body shape beneath it. You see lamp posts lighting streets well, and headlights in your path. There is some nice visual effects in Chinatown Wars.

The touch screen is applied very well, with only a few flaws. The biggest of which is hurling projectile weapons such as grenades and molotovs. You perform these actions by dragging the icon on the bottom screen and flicking it upwards as if you're tossing it to the top screen. Huang will toss it into the streets of Liberty City with unreliable accuracy. I can't think of a way a button press would give the same tossing accuracy this method does, but this solution isn't the most graceful method either. It makes you have to take your attention away from what's going on to focus on making sure you throw doesn't land away from your target. You don't want your projectile to land near you either. There are touch screen minigames like assembling weapons and hot wiring cars.These minigames are very short and never slow down the pace of action. If these minigames were expanded upon more, they could slow down the experience. But they never do because they never last more than a few moments. Its a nice way to use everything the DS can, without seeming too gimmicky.

This great game does have flaws.I imagine DS download play doesn't appear because downloading the game world in CW is so huge and so alive I doubt it could be done with DS's having no internal memory. It'd be nice but I can see why it isn't in there. The online multiplayer consists mostly of trading and non-competitve modes of play. The offline multiplayer is fun and you can lose hours with friends. The big minus here is the offline multiplayer would be even better if it was online with voice chat support. It would add even more life to this already addicting game if I could hop online and battle or play missions with my friends and chat it up with them. I'd even be okay with online play strictly reserved with friend codes and no random play. Sadly no competitive online play makes it to the retail release. Makes me wish there could've been a few months extra on the development time to get this feature in. There some missions that can be a tad bit boring, but there aren't as many escort missions as in past GTAs. This again goes to show how much care was taken into making this a great portable game.

Those are really my only gripes with this game. There isn't a whole lot left to be desired except a new game. That is something most games can only hope for. Leaving the player totally satisfied and they want another game instead of nit picking areas where the first game could've added value or gameplay. Graphics are nice and have detail, always brimming with color. Everything from the dialogue, characters, story, music, and missions are oozing with amazing personality. The DS fits unheard of physics for its two screens at all times, combining that with dozens of characters and collisons without any real framerate issues. Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars could very well be the best game on the system. We rarely see a third party game challenge Nintendo for the top spot on their console in terms of quality software. Every Nintendo generation sees a few third party challengers, Resident Evil 4 comes to mind. CW suceeds in this reviewers mind of standing beside the Zeldas and Metroids among the best games available for the DS. The content in here is worth every penny of the $34.99 you will be paying for it. This is a mature adventure, it isn't always difficult but it isn't easy and parts of it require just as much patience and trial and error as past GTAs. Everything is streamlined and made easy to pick up and play here. That does wonders for the GTA formula. This is a console design not trying to tie you down to bench because of its design needing all your attention. The actual gameplay is what gets your attention. You have the ability to simply turn off the game at any point and pick it back up whenever with no consequences, and jumping in with no flaws. That is a significant achievement in itself.

Score: 9.8

1. Super Mario 64

2. Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

3. Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

4. Resident Evil 4

5.Goldeneye 007

6. Sonic the Hedgehog 2

7. Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire

8. Star Fox 64

9. Super Mario Bros. 3

10. Animal Crossing: Wild World

edited: notable mentions Twilight Princess, Okami, Half Life 2, Super Mario Bros, Age of Empires 2, Starcraft, Silent Hill