Destructoid

If you are satisfied with having your old Katamari get a new coat of paint, this gets the job done in a big way. But if the visual appearance isn't of a high priority for you, all that's left to weigh are a couple of new moves, a few new levels, another wacky story and a mode where you roll really fast. The amount of new material is not great, but what's here is interesting.

DiRT 2 is an absolute triumph, and anyone who had a hand in its production should be very proud of themselves. Please, keep doing this. Keep honoring the memory of Colin McRae with outstanding videogames that capture the spirit of what he did. Continue this kind of sky-high quality and you've already got my money waiting for the third installment.

Six hours of new story, an optional side story, a new multiplayer mode, 24 maps and new Achievements all comprise Halo 3: ODST. Halo fans are going to like ODST no matter what and Firefight will ensure that Halo continues to dominate the top of the Xbox Live charts for a very long time. The overall package is great, but some of the nagging issues hurt the experience for me.

While a series of timed challenges open up after the game's been completed, Rubi's tale can be completed in a relatively short amount of time. Because of this, even though WET is a blast despite its flaws, it's difficult to recommend the game as anything more than a rental.

NHL 10 is EA Sports’ best hockey title yet, offering considerably improved gameplay and another hour-eating mode in Be A GM. I played two games of NHL 09 at a friend’s house last night, and I found it difficult to go back; I felt hamstrung by its lack of boardplay and precision passing. That alone should tell you that if you’re a fan of the NHL series, or hockey in general, you need to pick up NHL 10.

Please do not play this. It is not just bad, it's painful. Sometimes a bad game is worth playing just to see how horrid it is, but I do not advise you try such an experiment with Darkest of Days. It is capable of ruining an entire evening, and I am actually ashamed that I now have an Achievement on my Xbox Live profile that reads, "Completed Darkest of Days."

For fans of The Beatles -- especially ones who would go as far as to call themselves “Beatlemaniacs” -- the game is absolutely essential. It features a slew of unlockable material, from photos to full videos, some of which have never been seen. Loading screens also feature never-before-heard audio from inside the Abbey Road studio, including the band chatting with one another, tuning, or rehearsing.

With how poorly put together the whole experience is, I doubt this particular game ever had a chance to be anything resembling a halfway decent title. Despite the success of the overall premise, the dismayingly poor quality of the individual elements ruin any sense of accomplishment and amount to a staggering failure of a finished product.

It's fun, it's solid and it even pulls off a few unique tricks, but with an awful single-player campaign and a multiplayer mode that sustains no community whatsoever, Section 8 has been hoist by its own petard. By all means, rent Section 8 if you can and give it a whirl. See if you can get lucky and find a game. But don't buy it, because you'll have wasted your money. A shame, because I really, really do like this poor game.

Overall, Guitar Hero 5 is an improved experience this year, without a doubt the best of Activision's full-band games to date. There's enough here to satisfy fans of plastic instruments, and if you've got four drum sets, this is the only place you'll get to use them all at the same time. Despite its marked improvements, those who have have pledged their allegiance to other music titles likely won't be swayed, but that doesn't mean Guitar Hero 5 isn't worth your time.