The light-gun genre is reassuringly old-fashioned: point a replica firearm at your screen and shoot the bad guys. The problem is, how do you improve on a genre that was effectively perfect back when the Time Crisis series first appeared on PlayStation in the 1990s? This sequel takes a riotously maximalist approach. You have a machine gun with infinite ammo. To balance this generosity, the game throws ever more ridiculous numbers of enemies at you. Then, of course, there are the giant tanks and the swarms of attack helicopters. Luckily, you are equipped with a nuke-proof riot shield; thoughtful of your commanders. It’s like an interior-decor show in reverse, as you chase terrorists through a mall: ladies’ hats, replicas of the Venus de Milo, magazines called Vacuous and footballs fly around and burst under the hail of bullets. Cladding flies off pillars (like The Matrix lobby scene); walls disintegrate; and, if you are quick enough, you can cut the tethers of helium balloons.
Once the three main zones are completed, a range of Crisis Missions opens up, in which you are set improbable tasks such as defeating enemies without dodging their fire. You eventually get to play with a shotgun or pistol, too, and then you are reminded that, fun and exhilarating though this mayhem is, it has lost something in its abandonment of precision pistol-shooting for a spray of automatic bullets. Where the first Time Crisis was a satisfying, almost surgical test of the player’s skill, Crisis Zone is a rollercoaster — and you simply need to hang on. Four stars
Steven Poole
DJ Decks & FX
PS2, £39.99; ages 7+
A message to club owners: if you’re still paying Fatboy Slim a king’s ransom to spin the vinyl, look no further than me. After a few minutes with this game’s superb tutorial, I was mixing and fading house tunes so smoothly that my girlfriend now calls me Slimboy Dim. A virtual set of turntables, faders and samplers — though, sadly, no smoke machine — are gracefully joined with the PS2 controller, and there’s a generous, if not exhaustive, stock of 50 songs to play with. Tunes meld seamlessly thanks to the automatic beat-matching, which may render professional DJ skills redundant, but ensures amateurs such as myself can hook a song or two together with gratifying elegance. My mix of the Shapeshifters’ Lola’s Theme with the old De’Lacy classic Hideaway was sublime, even if I say so myself. There is the odd caveat: several of the special audio “effects” have no effect whatsoever, to my untrained lobes, and the limited track selection hampers longevity. For closet DJs, however, this is £40 magnificently spent. Four stars
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Barry Collins
Codename: Panzers
Phase One
PC, £34.99; ages 12+
There has been a second world war real-time strategy renaissance recently, with a clutch of excellent titles released in quick succession. Codename: Panzers is the latest addition to this growing genre, and ranks as one of the best so far. The game features the main sides that battled it out in Europe between 1939 and 45, with 10 unique missions for each group. The graphics are stunning: units have been painstakingly modelled, weather conditions change and the differences between troops are clearly defined (thereby avoiding a mad click-fest when trying to find a specific character). There’s more than a passing nod to historical accuracy, with units looking and behaving like their real-life counterparts. My only criticism is that the game is somewhat incomplete. The German campaign ends in 1940, while the Anglo-American one doesn’t start until the D-day landings of 1944. Codename: Still, Panzers is an excellent game that will have you glued to your computer for days. Let’s hope that the next episode is equally good. Four stars
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Daniel Emery
ShellShock: Nam ’67
PC, £34.99, PS2, Xbox, £39.99; ages 16+
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After the spate of first-person shooters set during the second world war, it’s not surprising that developers have turned their talents to the conflict in Southeast Asia. The Vietnam war was horrific, with no quarter given by either side. ShellShock: Nam ’67 attempts to re-create the brutality with strong language and shocking visuals. While the idea is great in principle, the actual execution (if you’ll excuse the word) is diabolical on almost every count. The game plays like a basic arcade-shooter, with no real thought given to actual gameplay. There’s no stealth, no lifelike movement and no sense of atmosphere. Practically every level consists of suicidal Vietnamese charging blindly, screaming “Yankee go home!”, which soon gets tedious. The game may look pretty, but that’s about its only redeeming feature. Avoid this title at all costs. One star
Daniel Emery