The frenetic pace and intense (sometimes frustrating) challenges of the 10 levels is absorbing, graphically most satisfying, quite varied and, most of all, funny.

All in all, Anachronox is a long, rich, elegant, worthwhile, and above all satisfying gaming experience. The characters, story, and quests are really loads of fun. The goals are always clear, and if you get sidetracked you have no one to blame but yourself, and ultimately no harm is done.

The Sting! has bite! It's a hit. There may be some rough edges (blocky graphics, clunky camera, spastic movement), but the overall play and fun far outweigh such picky faultfinding.

While Jedi Outcast is firmly entrenched in the action genre, that shouldn't frighten away adventure gamers. If you've ever played an action/adventure game and have an interest in Star Wars, it's imperative to play this game.

Shadow Hearts is in turn tragic and comic, deeply philosophical and completely fluffy, and overall a great gaming experience that I was sorry to see come to an end.

Largely ignored by the mainstream gaming press, this fabulous epic of a game will draw you in with both its warmth and its ever-increasing tale.

With a novel, large and intricate set of societies, coupled with excellent graphics and sound, Gothic becomes one of the most immersive and believable single-play adventure/RPGs ever.

Superb craftsmanship, inventive scripting, wonderful acting, brilliant enemy AI, and sumptuous graphics are all placed in a huge, varied, and intensely colorful 60s setting by a team clearly bestowing care and love on their work and product.

You find a spectacularly violent and wonderfully thrilling adventure composed of epic, earth-shattering battles between deities' champions, fought in a dreamlike landscape as weird and varied as it is beautiful.

Ghosts to Glory is one of the most addicting, angering, exciting, and unforgiving-as-all-get-out (when jumping onto moving targets) games that I have ever played! There is never a dull moment.

This game is the sort of which I'd like to see more: breathtaking attention to detail, deeply satisfying gameplay, and a focus on pure, simple fun that doesn't in any way defeat or diminish a richly powerful thematic narrative.

A magnum opus. Even though it does have some small flaws and a couple of things I would change, it is absolutely breathtaking in all respects. They just don’t get any better than this.

All in all, Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy is a truly fun little romp. While not as long as some games, it's worth the price of admission just to see the Mummy dancing with electricity or flattened like a piece of paper!

Stupid Invaders is fun and funny, a masterful blend of high art and low humor. (I am glad that computer-generated odors are not yet a reality.) It is my new favorite game of all-time, displacing even “The Longest Journey” and “Grim Fandango.”

In an age where you thought everything has been done before, along comes Freedom Force, shattering genre lines, daring to do something different, and instilling fun for all ages into a game—you can't ask for anything more.

If you like ancient Egypt, challenging puzzles with actual clues, and first-person exploration of fascinating environments, “Riddle of the Sphinx” is for you.

Planescape is very, very special. Some might say it's too bizarre and weird, but I found it a refreshingly deep and thoughtful interlude in an otherwise cookie-cutter world of Samegaming.

Presto has raised the bar, taking gaming from a pastime and moving it into the realm of a legitimate art form.

So see the film, take a little break, then turn down the lights, put on headphones, and prepare yourself for the atmosphere, anticipation, apprehension, anxiety and action of The Thing.

Love it or hate it, I believe we will look back in five or ten years and see this as a watershed moment in our brief gaming history, in much the same way as the original 1993 “Myst” is now viewed.

Represents the pinnacle of great action shooters because it strictly adheres to the one rule that makes an FPS great, the one rule that so many developers ignore, or break due to ineptitude and then conceal behind a shroud of tacked-on complexity: in a first person shooter, level design is <I>everything.</I>

It is a beautiful, exciting, rich, and well-written game. It is everything that a great CRPG hopes to be.

A tremendously valuable expansion to the world of “Morrowind,” adding a new story and an environment of real depth and complexity.

If you love the T.V. show and/or have any interest in this kind of detective game, Law & Order: Dead on the Money is a must-purchase.

I always appreciate it when a game treats its players as if they were intelligent adults, and Post Mortem does that in spades.

This is what other adventure games only aspire to be. It is extremely well-written, well-executed, and above all, fun to play.

Yet Mafia oozes class, polish, and style like no other game so far this year. To not "experience" Mafia is a far greater crime than any in the Salieri family ever committed.

Spin aside, for those with a taste for the creepy/weird and a willingness to see through the grime of the world into the heart of the spirit, Bad Mojo is an extraordinary adventure.

It is really hard for a run-of-the-mill writer like me to do justice to Syberia in describing it. Ultimately all I can tell you is this: Play it yourself! It is not likely you will be disappointed.

Frankly, Max Payne 2 makes me confident that the best is yet to come for gaming, that the awesome narrative and creative capability of this medium has yet to be explored to its fullest extent.

This is an entertaining romp with just enough variation, humor and story to hold your attention right to the end.

Dark Cloud 2 has a great story, lots of adventure, unique characters and monsters and Spehda! What's not to love? This one is a keeper!

A fine RPG, very loosely based upon a simplified Dungeons & Dragons motif. The game mechanics are easy, leaving you to focus on the puzzles, the high-adrenaline battles, and the lustful visuals.

With very, very few adventure titles can I say: "If this was a book, I'd like to read it." Journey falls into that category.

SpellForce enlisted my involvement and playing dedication with the incredible opening cinematic, the brilliant tutorial and, ultimately, the absolutely captivating game adventure itself.

DOOM 3 joins the tiny handful of games we've seen this year that really are all they're cracked up to be. It's got fun, excitement, good looks—everything people look for both in a potential mate and in a video game.

I have never seen a game use light the way Deadly Shadows does, nor have I seen such realistic environments rendered on the fly. For those who can get it to work well on their systems, this is an astounding visual experience.

Indeed, A Quiet Weekend exhibits not only two of the hallmarks of fine adventure titles&#151;story accompanied by relevant puzzles&#151;but also adds the unusual component of a real place that can even simply be toured, if you wish!

It is a masterwork when viewed as an exemplar of the video game as art, one of the very best fusions of story and imagery extant in the medium today, and for that reason alone it deserves a place in the eventual Electronic Entertainment Hall of Fame.

A classic. That's what it is. Obsidian may be the most innovative, imaginative puzzle adventure ever conceived.

GK3 is a long, difficult, immersive game with a strong, adult-oriented plot.

However, its extreme nonlinearity, the inclusion of violent scenes, and a sense of being what is in reality a completely timed game set it apart from standard pure adventure fare.

From involving story to eye-popping graphics, very funny script, incredible characters, great voice acting, ultra-smooth gameplay, and an unusual range of extended play options, FFVTR brings it all together better than any PC game I've played in the past year.

Justice is Served is, by far, the best in this illustrious series. It's excellently written, bigger in scope, longer, better looking. It gets my highest recommendation as a must-buy for any fan of the show and really any adventure gamer looking for an involving and entertaining mystery to be solved.

With satisfactory graphics, outstanding audio and acting, involving mystery-like story, smooth gameplay mechanics, The Suffering moves to the top ranks, joining such titles as "Clive Barker's Undying" and "Eternal Darkness."

Warrior Within is not a perfect game. In many ways, it stands as a badly written testament to exactly what is wrong with video games: sexism, teenage hormones, amateurish writing, clumsy franchise handling. But it's entertaining. It's incredibly entertaining.

I haven't had a game eat away at me like this for a long time...For the amount of gameplay in the game, and the breadth of it, I would definitely say that it is worth every cent of the purchase price.

The high production values, unique setting, beautiful graphics, and lack of old chestnuts in terms of puzzles make this a refreshing alternative to the usual generic Egypt-Atlantis-maze-sliding-tiles pabulum we've been force-fed for the past few years.

One of the best adventure games of 2004 and likely the best ever to deal with a futuristic, Orwellian theme of corruption and conspiracy. Story, dialogue, character development, settings, artwork, acting, and music are all superb.

The most amazing thing about Bioshock is that it never comes off as preachy or self-indulgent. For all its many themes, it is, and can be enjoyed as, exactly what Ken Levine has always said it is: a shooter. One of the very cleanest, best-executed shooters ever made.

For those who've never played the original, Bad Mojo Redux is a must-have. Load it up and see what all the shouting was about. For those who've played the Win3.1 version, Bad Mojo Redux is what the game should have looked like and, when coupled with the companion DVD, is the deal of the year.

Seriously scary and atmospheric without being horrifying, more of an elegant Vincent Price scare than an 80s slasher movie. Think Goth Disney, and you've got the right idea.

Simply put, this game is so brilliant that it ought to be fined. Created by the same team responsible for 2001's critically acclaimed "Ico," it follows a similar sort of theme and demands even more sentimental investiture than its predecessor did. Its elegant simplicity, its beauty, its unbelievable capacity to draw you in are without peer. I have never played a game like Shadow of the Colossus, because there are no games like it.

Trace Memory is a cracker-jack adventure game developed and beautifully suited for the DS system. It's not at the level and complexity of the best adventure titles for the PC, but it's not reasonable to expect that from a handheld title. What it does bring to the table is an engaging, wonderfully done and integrated story with facilitating puzzles.

The short version is that Ubisoft has continued its storied tradition of doing nearly everything wrong yet somehow managing to produce a great game. Prince of Persia: The Two Thrones is awesome.

Okami has elements of many genres—platforming, adventure, RPG and action all apply. But there's more to it than that. There's something so ... joyous about it, in Amaterasu's happy barks, in her running, her jumping, her digging of holes. I found myself ignoring the game for stretches, just doing these things. I don't know if it's the way the controls handle, or the graphics, or what, but it's there. Okami is the video game version of Professor Dumbledore, managing somehow to be both gleeful and august.

Wild Earth picked up three prizes at the 2003 Independent Game Festival: Game of the Year, Innovation in Game Design, and Innovation in Visual Arts. All well-deserved. Even three years later, it remains a stunner.

AGON is a lovely game, beautifully constructed, refreshingly different from the usual adventure title. The makers have done everything right. Interface and other technical features are flawless and couldn't be better. Graphics are colorful and clear, if not outstanding. Voice acting and ambient sounds are exemplary. Most importantly, the essential idea of a journey of discovery rewarded episodically by a fascinating new board game leads this reviewer to an enthusiastic Gold Star.

The measure of a puzzle game is not, of course, how pretty it looks or how convincing it sounds. The measure is how well it plays. I am happy to report that Safecracker 2006 plays beautifully. There are some familiar puzzles, some unfamiliar puzzles, and some very clever twists on the whole idea of what constitutes a puzzle.

Half-Life 2: Episode One is really one of the best games I've played in recent months, and I'm eagerly anticipating the next installment. Though it provides little in the way of exposition and does nothing to reduce the opacity of the plot (which would be interesting if it made sense), its mood and design are so elegantly realized that minor complaints about storyline holes can't seriously diminish the accomplishment.

It's the realism that makes the supernatural elements seem so menacing, the beautifully designed, multi-layered puzzles with their much-appreciated clues, the dark atmosphere, lovely graphics, and the restrained, perfectly pitched sounds that make this game an experience.

One way or the other, if you have a glimmer of an iota of a flicker of adventure love left in that congealed lump of moldering paté you call a heart, you owe it to yourself to check this one out. This game only slightly suffers from being too short and otherwise easily bunny hops into gold star adventure game territory.

With a compelling narrative, intriguing setting, stellar acting, gorgeous graphics and character animations, Evil Under the Sun is one of the two finest detective/adventure games I've ever played—the other being Sherlock Holmes: The Awakened.. This isn't a game to be "beaten;" rather, it's a journey to be savored, reflected upon, remembered.

Portal, tucked neatly alongside four other games, outshines them all and ensures itself a place in posterity.

The underlying story is engrossing, thrilling, daring.

The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap is pretty amazing. I have an Xbox 360 and I just got a shiny new PC. I'm on the cutting edge of technology. But when I think of all the games I've played over the past six months, The Minish Cap-a Gameboy Advance game-rises right to the top of my list. It's just that good.

A classic. It's one of the best games of 2001 and a good shot in the arm for 3D shooters and the Xbox.

Knights of the Old Republic is fast-paced, linear, and consistently entertaining, and the goals are always clear. This was a nearly perfect gaming experience, at least by my standards.

An example of what a company can do when it takes an existing genre and reshapes it into something refreshing. If you want to experience a game with a great story, you like FPS games, and you have an open mind, then I highly recommend it.

It's safe to say this game has more monkeys than any game other than Ape Escape. These aren't just any monkeys, either. There are zombie monkeys, robot monkeys, mutant monkeys, lab monkeys, disco monkeys, ninja monkeys and plain old throw-feces-at-you monkeys. If you love monkeys, this game is for you.

Of the 300-plus games I have played, Zelda: Wind Waker ranks in my top three of all time. It's elegant, enchanting, engrossing, beautifully stylized, perfectly polished-a gaming work of art-a masterpiece.

A magnificent tribute to the 1983 coin-op Lair and a highly entertaining game for today's players. It offers a simple, almost relaxing format of fighting/jumping/adventuring set in a huge and vividly colorful castle. What more can one ask from a video game?

If you can overlook the annoying aspect of having to start over and only being able to save at the beginning of a new episode or when you quit the game, you will experience an amazingly hard but also wonderfully fun game.

If you can get past the horrible voice acting and the tedious backtracking, you're in for a good scare. If you dare.

If you've ever wanted to enter the puerile world of your Sims with a team of bizarre spirits, then this is the game for you.

Tactical enough that your play style will be drastically different from a normal shooter, but it's not so ridiculously tactical that they forgot to include a game with the game. In many ways, SWAT 4 strikes the perfect balance between action, tactics, and challenge

I was disappointed that no effort was put into the PC version, and it even lacks any of the extras featured on the console versions, but I found it a fun little action game that kept me entertained for 10 or so hours.

It sports superb writing and voice acting, is laugh-out-loud funny, and brings enough originality to the table that it's worth more than a passing glance by action game fans.

I will say this: those who love &#147;X-Com&#148; will like this game. Those who love strategy will like this game. But no one will ever love this game.

As breathtaking as Clock Tower 3 is to look at, the gameplay is somewhat ... blah. I think it was the sameness of it all&#151;find an item, return said item to its owner, watch incredibly gorgeous cutscene, meet up with mentally unbalanced mini-boss, destroy him/her ... lather, rinse, repeat.

Is this the future of adventure games? If the development community uses this as a launching pad, and what we see here is just the infancy of incorporating interactivity into cutscenes, then we could be witnessing the birth of something truly extraordinary.

There is not much to say. Neverwinter Nights is fun, a lot of fun. It is also bland. Despite its figurative colorlessness, it has an addictive quality to it.

For the moment, Nosferatu is a terrific idea, beautifully realized, that is a just a patch or two away from greatness.

It is vastly enjoyable. It consistently seduces with its vitality, its muscular flex, its postapocalyptic &#233;lan, its vivid, hyperreal environment.

An excellent sequel&#151;with better graphics, twice the length, a greater degree of difficulty. It has a few bugs (get patch 1.01) but should run fine on even minimum-specification systems.

While the repetitive combat and dated graphics keep me from awarding it the FFC Gold Star, I got a lot of mileage out of it on my own personal Fun-O-Meter.

The overall quality of the game far outweighs every one of its shortcomings. In my humble opinion, this game represents a labor of love from people who wanted to pay homage to Lovecraft.

How much do you enjoy puzzles in your adventure games? Do you really, really love them? You had better if you're going to play Rhem 2, because your answer to that question is critical to your enjoyment of this game. Rhem 2 is a game geared toward a very specific audience: adventure gamers who love puzzles and don't need a story.

Overall, Heretic Kingdoms is fun, fun, fun and destined to be a sleeper hit. The few niggles never really affected my enjoyment of the game. With its engaging story and completely different skill system, it's definitely worth your while to pick it up and play.

It is a sweet little game that would likely please any adventure gamer, especially those who play their games more than once.

ER is not a terribly complicated game, with a setting and tasks that are limited in scope. Yet fans of the show, and those desiring a bit different sim experience, will undoubtedly find laughs and enjoyment in this light-hearted depiction of an intern's first days.

Generally speaking, though, the gameplay of Battle out of Hell has the same adrenaline-soaked excitement of the original. Wild firefights, huge minibosses and the occasional challenging puzzle are rolled up into the same tight, clean, delicious package.

The depth of the options menus puts many bigger-budget games to shame. Virtually everything about Mob Enforcer can be tweaked.

It's hard to envision a better first adventure game for a preteen person&#151;girl or boy. The story is "safe," interesting, and in a wide-open western setting replete with legends, romance and novel characters.

The puzzles were challenging, the various ways to end my visit were hilarious, and the minigames added an extra bit of diversion and fun to the game. While the game may be a little difficult and scary for those at the low end of the age requirement, I think the 12+ group will have fun with it. I know that I did.

If you didn't like DOOM 3, well, you won't like Resurrection. The Grabber is fun, but there's one in "Half Life 2." But it still looks amazing, and it's still an enormously gory, satisfying experience for those who just want to blow off some steam.

Its story made me want to find out more about Randolph's search, the puzzles kept me entertained and the hunt for Easter eggs had me clicking like a madwoman.

Gameplay is fun fun fun, with the two caveats that there is too much too-tiresome combat near the end of the game and there are two or three unfair puzzles in the adventuring part, unfair meaning nigh unbeatable by anyone at all without outside help.