Well fans of Evil Dead will be pleased, as at last there is a game that actually does the film some justice. The game has you playing Ash, complete with chainsaw attached to your severed arm battling various Deadites and trying to get back the Book of the dead from some crazy Doctor who has brought back the Deadites and wants to use the Necronomicon for his evil ways. While the game won't win any awards for originality it does ooze the feelings of the films, there is some great voice work from Bruce Campbell and Ted Raimi as Ash's sidekick and most of it is very funny and doesn't even repeat during the entire game. The graphics are nothing special though, but they do the job, and running the game in Widescreen is an added bonus at a high resolution, So overall its a fun game, its action all the way with a number of funny cutscenes and great voice work, its also out at a budget price on both the PC and the Xbox (PC Version tested) so it's well worth checking out if you are a fan of the films.

76%

X3 - Reunion

We'll be doing a full review of this in the next week or so as I only received my review copy last week and the game is rather in-depth to say the least. The game carries on where the last one left off, you are the captain of a small ship, asked to do various jobs, but you get the chance to do whatever you want in the game, be a pirate, trade, build up factories, there really is so much to do in this game that it will take you an age just to start up. What happened so far: While the Argon fleet is stretched almost to breaking point by the continuing attacks from Khaak, a new enemy is stalking the X-universe. What links a mysterious ship with the power to disappear, the ruthless Yaki pirates and a machine left by an ancient species? Its time to strap yourself in, warm up your laser cannon and get some answers.

Graphically X3 - Reunion is great, but it suffers from a lot of slow down on the review machine (AMD 4000+, 2GB Ram, ATI X850, X-Fi Soundcard) and this is with an already released to press 1.1 patch, admittedly I am trying to play it in widescreen but I would have expected it to run better. Sound is ok, nothing special but does the job just like it did in the previous game. Overall I can recommend the game to fans of both the original and X2, but only to those who have the machines to get the best out of it, but either way the full review will be online next week.

Review Next Week

Football Manager 2006

Once again this is going to be full review next week, but I can tell you now, its excellent and well worth buying for anyone who loves real football (or soccer). I have played the Championship Manager and Football Manager games since they first started to appear on the Amiga years ago and I still buy every single version of it each year. I can say with my hand on my heart that it is the most played title I have in my collection of games and believe me when I say that I have a lot. The game won't attach itself to anyone interested in great graphics, to get an idea of what Football Manager 2006 looks like, this of a colour version of Excel Spreadsheets and you'll get the idea, but the kind of attachment you get to this game if you enjoy football is immense, trying to take a lowly league side and turning them into champions is a great feeling and the new version of Football Manager has once again improved on an already excellent game. Oh and it's coming out on the Xbox 360 too not just the PC version.

Review Next Week

F.E.A.R

Every so often a game comes along that really catches peoples eye. F.E.A.R is that game this year. Graphically the game is fantastic, but its a pig to run even on the higher end systems out right now at full detail, but if you are able to, it looks great and the AI is second to none (even gives Half Life a run for its money). While the story which has been talked up in the magazines and online as being great is nothing more than a second rate B movie plot and dialogue, the Monolith crew have made a very creepy game, something that ID should take note of considering how dire Doom 3 was at having genuine scary sequences.

A paramilitary force infiltrates a multi billion dollar aerospace compound taking hostages, but issuing no demands. The government responds by sending in its best special operations teams, only to have them obliterated. Live footage of the massacre is cut short by an unexpected wave of destruction that leaves military leaders stunned and in disbelief. With U.S. Special Forces in over their heads, the Commander in Chief turns to his final option: you. You've been trained to handle the inexplicable, armed with experimental high tech weaponry, and given full executive authority to end the crisis by any means necessary.

Sound is great though, especially using an X-Fi card from Creative, everything sounds good and in full surround sound, i love hearing my spent shells fall on to the ground behind me. As mentioned the AI is great, enemies duck, roll, push barricades up around themselves, come around corners at you, attack in groups, you name it they do it. It might not be the longest game in the world (took me 12 hours to complete) but its a great ride throughout. So if you want a game that may actually scare you this time instead of assuming you get scared by being left in the dark 95% of the time, give F.E.A.R some of your time, its a very good game, if a little short.