Chromehounds

If you don't have Xbox Live, don't bother with this game. Since all the single-player missions are training sessions for the online experience, it really feels like an incomplete, unfulfilling package by itself. That being said, the online modes definitely deserve credit. It's one of the most robust multiplayer packages on the Xbox 360, offering a persistent world within which players can wage numerous sorts of war, make money, buy more parts and assemble more powerful Hounds.

Chromehounds does well with textbook elements of the mech genre, but lacks the appeal of being exciting, dramatic, flashy or innovative. It's nothing we haven't seen done before with more energy and enthusiasm in countless other mech games.

Chromehounds is likely to be a love-it-or-hate-it game for most of those willing to give it a try. Players expecting a conventional mech sim may be put off by the relative simplicity of the combat and will probably wish that there were more to the single-player portion of the game, especially since the story sets up a compelling conflict. At the same time, the online multiplayer portion of this game, while absolutely the highlight of the package, is fairly dense, even if all you want is to jump into combat.