Xbox Nation Magazine's Scores
- Games
For 571 reviews, this publication has graded:
-
21% higher than the average critic
-
1% same as the average critic
-
78% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 14.2 points lower than other critics.
(0-100 point scale)
Average Game review score: 59
| Highest review score: |
Critic Score
100
|
|---|---|
| Lowest review score: |
Critic Score
0
|
Score distribution:
-
Positive: 139 out of 571
-
Mixed: 284 out of 571
-
Negative: 148 out of 571
571
game reviews
- By critic score
-
-
Critic Score 50
The worst of these bonus modes is the "new and improved" Konquest mode intended to flesh out the Kombat universe through an RPG-like interface. What you get instead is a shambling mess of an adventure made up of ridiculous fetch quests and crap voice acting. -
-
-
Critic Score 50
There's a good deal of junk included on the disc, and even some of its more beloved titles ("Mortal Kombats II, III" and "Cyberball 2072") have not aged particularly well. [Nov 2004, p.101] -
-
-
Critic Score 50
You realize that Bilbo Baggins' dash maneuver (a sort of pole-vault jump) is faster than running, so you go through the whole game pole-vaulting like a ninny. [Mar 2004, p.98] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Well-designed platforming bits and clever puzzles remind you of what people saw in the original "Tomb Raider," but the game's dismal controls muck up these potentially enjoyable levels. [Oct 2004, p.98] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The game suffers from a handful of setbacks, the least of which is its surprising brevity. [Aug 2004, p.82] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
We’ve simply seen this game too many times on too many systems to really be psyched anymore. [Jan 2002, p.96] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Does little, if anything, to elevate itself past mediocrity. [Spring 2002, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Crappy cutscenes and first generation PS2 visuals are not so cool. [Jan 2002, p.94] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The same-old, same-old: the same static screens, decrepit point-and-click interface, crushingly slow pace, and confusing layout. [Winter 2002, p.105] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
"Diablo" without the story, characters to converse or interact with, variety in graphics or, well, fun. It's just a tired, slow trudge through 10 levels of a dungeon you really have no motivation to enter in the first place. [Winter 2002, p.108] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
More glaring than the minigames' poor quality is their length, as each one takes several minutes to complete, and repeats ad nauseum. [Mar 2004, p.98] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Lacks any sort of range whatsoever. It also lacks fun. [Jan 2002, p.96] -
-
-
-
-
Critic Score 40
Isis strives to be "Resident Evil," but instead ends up as its less-palatable ward, "Resident Unpleasant." [Mar 2004, p.101] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The deep create-a-boxer mode is the only aspect of the game that truly excels, but one good feature doesn't even out a sub-standard title. [Fall 2002, p.120] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 40
An oppressive auto-aim system, weak enemy AI, and simplistic puzzles keep gameplay straightforward and repetitive. [Summer 2002, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Here's some of the stuff you will not laugh at: dogs fornicating, bird poop, aliens anally impaled. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.81] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Choppy movements, mediocre graphics, and limited control options. [Summer 2002, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Take it please, and understand there are absolutely, positively, no returns. [Winter 2002, p.109] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Where the game fails, and fails miserably, is with its choice of enemies and challenges. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.86] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
It's a curse-at-the-controller-how-can-this-be-so-effin'-hard? Game. [Spring 2002, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Uneven graphics, hollow gameplay contrivances, and a wholesale lack of compelling drama mar the enormous effort which was clearly put into the game. [Fall 2002, p.104] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Unfortunately, the game is virtually unplayable. [Summer 2002, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Embarrassing show tunes notwithstanding, it's the game's artificial difficulty that puts this bird in a nose-dive a third of the way through. [Aug 2003, p.81] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The title makes no bones about the unfinished state of the wrasslin' found within. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
At a very basic level, this is a competent racer in desperate need of a better interface and better A.I. [June-July 2003, p.94] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 40
Superfly's physics are unpredictable and frustrating. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
You'd have more fun watching tennis on ESPN...even if the TV is off. [Apr/May 2003, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Trite and laughably cliched in screenshots, Tao Feng simply falls apart in motion. [Apr/May 2003, p.82] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Stupid A.I. ensures that computer-controlled fighters will ignore the grapplers they've supposedly developed a hate for, and stand idly by while pins are being made. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Does a decent job dealing with odd 3D camera angles for its 2D-styled gameplay. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The in-game graphics are acceptable at best, with the cut-scenes barely making the grade. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The real trouble with Ty, however, lies in its camera. Ty dashes at a frenetic pace while the camera does a poor job of keeping up. [Winter 2002, p.103] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The multiplayer games are banal, and while Zapper offers cartoony kid-graphics, it's nothing that can't be done on inferior systems. Yawn. [Winter 2002, p.102] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
This is as stock and uninteresting as it gets, nothing more than the staple prescripted key/switch hunt you've already seen 100 times. [Aug 2003, p.77] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
With little here to massage the mind or engage the heart, Red Faction II becomes nothing more than a linear on-rails twitch-fest. [June-July 2003, p.92] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 40
The list of omissions is epic: decent A.I., car damage, real-life car parts, an in-dash view, analog gas and break buttons - and, well, you get the point. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.84] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
This is so far from fun it might be made of an entirely new substance: antifun. [Apr/May 2003, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
It's baseball done for the mindless MTV generation, and it smells like a turd polished to a high gloss. [Aug 2003, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Sadly, Vengeance's extreme difficulty and arbitrary save system bleed off any entertainment value. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Goals are alternately too easy because the bike's brute speed makes gaps and jumps so simple, or too hard because twitchy steering and excess velocity make delicate maneuvering impossible. [Aug 2003, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
With no map to guide you, these missions are as much fun as trying to solve a Rubik's Cube in the dark. [Aug 2003, p.86] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
An omelette of a game whose eggs are a bit too runny. [May 2004, p.80] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Buggy and unfinished - a shameful, full-priced add-on pack tarnishing the original Battalion's golden legacy. [May 2004, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
It may be realistic to have a fishing game where the fish are all in hiding or killed off by man-made pollutants, but it's certainly not much fun. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
This wonky A.I., coupled with an online component that falls flat on its face, makes Mercury hard to recommend for shooter fans. Just like Hollywood, rote imitation works for a short time only. -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Sadly, Powerdrome is one time trial after another, and even with a real opponent via Xbox Live, there's not much more to it. [Sept 2004, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Ghoulies goes whole hog on its graphics and half-asses everything else. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
A horrid single-player quest mode offers frustrating, ill-designed scenarios. [Mar 2004, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
In what appears to be a rush job, the game is riddled with inexcusable bugs such as persistent crashing and invisible walls that prohibit movement. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
This giant cat that wants to pinch mommy's ass is one ripe for the highway and an oncoming truck.[Mar 2004, p.79] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Given the uninspired play and mechanics, it might be more advisable to drive the cars right into the bowl and flush. [Oct 2004, p.98] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
This is the 21st century. No game should ever make a player fetch a valve handle again. [Nov 2004, p.94] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Sadly, unlike the game Bandai tried so hard to copy ("SSBM"), 2 has no depth whatsoever. [Nov 2004, p.100] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The game reheats the same scenario again and again, with Rayne forced to toss shmoe after shmoe into a killing device until any hint of fun is sucked bone dry. [Dec 2004, p.96] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
On of the game's most unforgivable design flaws is that there is simply nothing to gain or strive for when playing. [Apr 2004, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The bare-bones graphics and simplistic gameplay render this disc a painful walk down memory lane. [Apr 2004, p.83] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Your $40 buys you nothing but a video version of the standard, real-life trading card game. -
-
-
-
Critic Score 40
There are audio glitches galore, with sound effects either missing or repeating themselves over and over for no good reason. [Feb 2005, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
There's no sense of achievement in clearing one of the game's "elite" missions without the faintest effort. [Dec 2004, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
For casual players, Challenge provides all of the tedium of fishing with little of the pleasure, such as napping in the boat. Napping in front of the Xbox doesn't have the same appeal. [Oct 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
A mangle of ugly graphics, repetitive combat, blah bosses, and just plain awkward moments, Robotech: Invasion fails to fire up protoculture-guffing fans of the late-'80s cult cartoon on which the game is based. [Nov 2004, p.100] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The problem is, driving crappy cars around dirt tracks as low speeds isn't very much fun at all. [Nov 2004, p.97] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Pack up this game's troubles in your old kit bag and head for the glorious Live-enabled "Crimson Skies" instead. [Nov 2004, p.96] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The A.I. of your teammates is simply horrendous. [Dec 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
It's virtually the same as last year's "2004 Season," and that wasn't very good either. [Oct 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The game is riddled with more holes than poor Loose Lips Larry. [Feb 2005, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Gross-out style low brow comedy is all it can bank on when you take all of this game's design flaws into consideration. [Winter 2002, p.107] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
The biggest disappointment is the game's multiplayer mode; there's now way to send blocks or any manner of taunts to your opponent. For shame. [Fall 2002, p.121] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
It borrows so heavily from significantly better racing games (especially "SSX: Tricky"), and will probably just remind you you should be playing them instead. [Apr/May 2003, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Although Hero's high concept borders on the brilliant, the game itself is poorly executed and seems as out of place on Xbox as a rump roast at a vegan restaurant. [Aug 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
You can, in practically one extended sitting, blow through the entirety of this dumbed-down, bloodless, sanitized version of America's hard-fought victory. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
Sadly, simplistic landscapes, tacky colors, dorky characters, and an utter lack of polish justify the bargain-bin pricing. The poor graphics even leech the thrill of deformable terrain. [June 2004, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 40
You rarely get a sense of speed or weight while driving, and the controls are so awkward, the slightest steering overcorrection results in a spinout. [Dec 2004, p.83] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Sports one of the most mind-numbingly frustrating camera systems in recent memory. [Spring 2002, p.92] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
KC's four-player mode...is essentially the equivalent of a Yugo with a top-of-the-line 100-disc CD changer and 5.1 surround sound speaker setup. That is, it's useless. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.80] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Fails dramatically... Severe, fundamental flaws permeate the experience, ranging from wince-inducing run-cycle animations to sloppy, unrefined controls. [Aug 2003, p.78] -
-
-
-
-
Critic Score 30
Hitting shots is a random affair rather than a sweet science, and the impressive array of street-ball moves (the highlight of the game) are rendered superfluous due to faulty A.I. and crude, if easily accessible, controls. [Winter 2002, p. 99] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The game's infinitely looped, saccharine-sweet piano music and French-style accordion tunes may in fact turn children into the hockey-mask wearing, ax-wielding maniancs we always see in the movies. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
In many ways this is a blueprint for making a game as annoying as possible. [Summer 2002, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The game's mutants are ugly and lifeless. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Camera angles are absolutely dizzying, and controls are clumsy and unresponsive. [Spring 2002, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
A subpar effort marred by weak graphics and terribly repetitive gameplay. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
A stale and astoundingly pixelated port of a two-year-old Dreamcast game. [Fall 2002, p.121] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The thrill of driving classic Lotus cars is obliterated by its unresponsive handling. [April/May 2003, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Give Acclaim credit: One year after releasing the crappy "All-Star Baseball 2003," the company has come back strong with an even crappier All-Star Baseball 2004. [Apr/May 2003, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Seems to have sprung up from the sharp minds of bored high school students who probably spent too much time playing "Gauntlet." [Winter 2002, p.109] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Let's just say that the only way to ruin a party quicker than loading up Shrek Super Party is to load up "Nickelodeon Party Blast." Stay away! -
-
-
Critic Score 30
At best, Pop is "Bust-A-Move" in 3D, but with useless power-ups and poor visibility on the moving 3D board. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Beyond the lame characters and infantile gameplay, Whiskers' trapping aren't half bad. [Mar 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Consider this a horrible trip down memory lane and use whatever means necessary to repress it. [Sept 2004, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
One begins to wonder where the company found the nerve to release a game that plays as if it were coded by the ultimate beach personality, Jeff Spiccoli. [Mar 2004, p.80] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
IP 2003 is not the worst Xbox game ever developed, but it is certainly the worst Xbox baseball game. [June-July 2003, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The camera alone is enough to condemn Drake to the eigth circle of gaming hell. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
There's not a lot to Big Mutha Truckers, and what exists is forgettable.[Aug 2003, p.81] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 30
There's no solidity to the knight's movement, and the camera is usually twitching around like a plague rat on crank. [Aug 2004, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
This is action at its most basic (see the enemy, press A, repeat) and adventure at its most boring (fetch widget and return to random townsperson). [Oct/Nov 2003, p.85] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
It's just a bad game with crappy cinemas and more than enough frustrating moments to make you weep into your Romulan Ale. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Everything works as it should, but the sum of these parts is booring with as many extra "O"s as you please. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
It's quirky...it's garish...it's horribly annoying...The control is so utterly broken that one has to wonder what the developers were thinking. [Apr 2004, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
A very uninspired shooter... The game is painfully generic. [June-July 2003, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
You'd have to be very sick of "Halo" and "Counter-Strike" to even consider this one. [Mar 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Lacks polish, underwhelms, pales in comparison to the board game that inspired it. [June 2004, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Playing 2005 with its jerky, disorienting fielder cam is akin to slicing up your head on a cheese grater, then taking a vinegar bath. -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Besides its fine-tuned sense of the absurd, this is an undisciplined mess. [Dec 2004, p.86] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
That bane of the 3D platformer, a bad camera, constantly hides fallen-away floors until you're standing where you thought there was solid ground. [Nov 2004, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Like its real-life counterpart, the events here are over almost as soon as they begin, which, in essence, doesn't make for very compelling nore satisfying action. [Feb 2005, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
When all the bullets are spent and the smoke clears, you're left asking, "Sarge's War, what is it good for?" The answer is, well, you already know. [Oct 2004, p.97] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
Game design - in any sense of the phrase - is essentially nonexistent here. Each of the turtles has different attributes - but they're hardly compelling. [Nov 2004, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The racing is limited by choppy graphics and horrible controls. [Feb 2005, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
The game offers 27 different types of games, including slot machines and all types of poker, but does it so poorly you'll cringe at the thought of playing more than one or two. [Feb 2005, p.94] -
-
-
Critic Score 30
This is a fistful of something, all right. And it's not to be stepped in, taken internally, or flung at humans. [Aug 2003, p.81] -
-
-
-
-
Critic Score 20
The twin albatrosses of slowdown and mediocre graphics loom large over Dragon, and shoddy programming allows for honest-to-dreadfulness crashes. [Fall 2002, p.118] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 20
If there was any truth in advertising, Universal would hawk this game as "Lord of the Pointless Fetch Quest" and recommend that potential buyers seek the Fellowship of Many Beers to dull the pain. [Winter 2002, p.103] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 20
Any person who has not played it is, in some subtle way, morally superior to anyone who has. Now, a solemn pact: Let us never speak of SeaBlade again. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.87] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
We're pretty sure that in the very near future, we'll be using Toxic Grind to torture terrorists into revealing their most closely guarded secrets. Such is the game's badness. [Winter 2002, p.106] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Dark Tomorrow is, in a word, abigheapingpileoffeces. It's sloppy, scattered, and illustrates the word "janky" better than any dictionary definition ever could. [June-July 2003, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
The world's videogame players require this monstrosity like they need an extra hemorrhoid, a tattoo of child actor Emmanuel Lewis on their buttocks, and the director's cut of "The Adventures of Ford Fairlaine." [Fall 2002, p.119] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Pulse's worst crime isn't even that it looks hideous (both technically and artistically); the real sin here is its lack of feel. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.88] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Metro3D should invest in one more stake, but it should be one of the wooden variety and plunged directly into the heart of this monstrosity. [Aug 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
We can only imagine the title Nickelodeon Party Blast refers to the fact this game can easily blast any party to smithereens. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89] -
-
-
-
Critic Score 20
The realization that the game looks like crap is essentially an afterthought...This would pass as a minigame mode in "FIFA" or "Winning Eleven," but no way is it ready to stand on its own. [Mar 2004, p.80] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
This one comes straight from the backyard. It should return there, preferably buried deep by the family dog. [Dec/Jan 2004, p.95] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
[Cameron's] going to want to dump every copy of this interactive embarrassment bearing his name into a cold, harsh place that never sees the light of day. [Feb/Mar 2003, p.89] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Pirates is a kick - swift and painful - to the gonads for all who've claimed the Xbox is no PC... This is a junky PC game waiting to be patched. It should be made to walk the plank. [Oct/Nov 2003, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Go easy on yourself here, and watch the only FMV worth watching: the DVD of the film this mercury-like pile of T-1000 excrement is based on. [Mar 2004, p.79] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Anything resembling compelling level design or effective camera control was left on the cutting-room floor. [Mar 2004, p.101] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
This fetid package comes ribbon-wrapped with a horrible, barely adjustable camera that sees to it that Catwoman must guess where her enemies are and where the next in an endless series of platforms sits. [Sept 2004, p.94] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
The enemy A.I. goons perform as if they're all deaf, running directly into your line of fire (or the walls), and the character animation is on par with the old "Mr. Bill" claymation shorts. [Jan 2005, p.93] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
This whole package would have been at home on the Commodore 64 20 years ago. [Feb 2005, p.91] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
If there is an Eskimo in need of ice, surely this huckster will be the one to sell it... To the point, Antz Extreme Racing just plain sucks. [Winter 2002, p.104] -
-
-
Critic Score 20
Smith and Lawrence have nothing to do with Bad Boys: Miami Takedown. And neither should your hard-earned 20 bucks. [Dec 2004, p.90] -
-
-
Critic Score 0
There's absolutely nothing appealing about any of it. Nor does the game possess any redeeming qualities, save for the fact that it won't immediately afflict you with cancer. [Oct 2004, p.97] -
