You remember the bits at the end of Police Squad where everyone would freeze frame except for one guy? That's exactly what the passenger in the back there must feel like in the HD port of Crazy Taxi. With all the conversion staff's names making the credits roll way longer, the old 'beckoning to the camera' shot stays on the screen way too long. A passenger hops in, then starts tapping Gina on the shoulder asking why they're not going anywhere. Eventually, she drives off. Into a wall.

Clearly, we were never supposed to see that bit. The original credits sequence was a finite length, so all the 'strings' were hidden behind the scenes. But it got me wondering: What else can we all see in games that we were never supposed to? This is my pick of the forbidden fruit...

Note: A previous version of this feature was posted in April, 2014 but has since been updated.

The developers of Skyrim made a secret room full of awesome. But sadly for console gamers, this room is only accessible in the PC version of the game. I say sadly, because it's amazing. It's got EVERYTHING in it. All the weapons and enchanted versions of them. And all the armour too. In fact, one box in the room contains so many items, you need a massively high-spec PC just to open it. The list alone will crash lesser machines.

How to get it: You need to open up the 'console' prompt by pressing ~. Type in "coc qasmoke" (without the quote marks) and you're in! You're now stuck there forever unless you also use the console to teleport to a different location because there's no exit door. So type "coc rivertown", for example, and you'll arrive at Rivertown, over-encumbered with all your new loot. Yes I know that was Oblivion's wording. I used to be an adventurer too, you know. Before I took... (*gunshot*)

Apparently, there are several pies hidden throughout Dragon Age: Inquisition. Whether you're supposed to find them or not is debatable. The developers responsible have said they didn't expect anyone to find them quite so soon. Graham Kelly, environment artist at BioWare Edmonton, said on YouTube: "It is.... The Lord of the Pies. I may or may not have hidden some of his smaller flock around the rest of Skyhold."

How to get there: Sometimes the scenery doesn't load correctly in Skyhold, allowing you to step through a door and fall through the stonework, where you end up in a glitchy area underneath the castle. There, you can see the Lord of the Pies, biggest of all the hidden pies in the game. Yes, really. Look, it's wearing a top hat. It vanishes when you get too close. It's got its own music, too, which does suggest you're meant to find it… but there's no way to get there 'officially'. It isn't meant to be seen... although I think the team hoped it would be.

Restricted Area demos of unfinished games are always goldmines for anyone seeking extra tidbits of information that hasn't officially been revealed. There was a trick in the original Saints Row demo that allowed you to use a car to get past the demo's boundary… and you know what? The Final Fantasy XV demo suffers from the exact same problem!

How to get it: Simply jump into the path of a car as it drives through the demo's perimeter barrier. Do it correctly, and you can get out of the intended area and into the (unfinished and incomplete) world beyond. And there, you'll find a dinosaur and a titan, among other things you weren't supposed to see just yet. The dinosaur even has animation data. When you're excited about a hidden dinosaur's animation data, a chime should ring and a trophy unlock. "Final Fantasist – you really can't wait for the new game, can you?"

There are loads of extra areas dotted around Destiny. They're not supposed to be accessible, but if you know where to go and what to do, you can glitch through walls and into new areas. Many are simply empty, full of half-finished scenery. But some areas are actually functional. There are enemies, collectibles (dead ghosts you can actually revive) and even never-before-seen foes like this Ultra Captain.

How to get it: While it's a glitchy process, you can follow videos like if you want to get there for yourself, but keep in mind that tricking your way into non-official content runs the (small) risk of Bungie thinking you're a hacker and blocking your account. It's entirely likely this is actually content that was held back for release as part of a future DLC package, so you'll surely be able to play it 'properly' soon. Still, look at that Ultra Captain. Oooo.

This is brilliant. Gothic 2, like pretty much every RPG, gives the impression of a greater world beyond the boundaries of the game through its lore and conversational references. But then, should you manage to somehow get outside of the wall that surrounds the playable area, it's all revealed as being a sham by this single notice. By a 'mighty alien dwarf', which likely refers to a development team member of relatively minor physical stature.

How to get there: Follow the long river down from the old ruins and the stone dragon until it ends at a wall. This wall can be climbed (with practice and regular saving). Once you're over, there's not much to see or do, although there is a cave full of ostensibly dead NPCs. They're actually living NPCs who have travelled from the Valley of Mines to the Khorinis. During the transition, the game's programming 'kills' the first instance and sends it to the cave, before creating a new instance of the NPC that continues to live. You can loot the old versions' corpses. Waste not, want not.

A secret, looped version of the totally normal water level 2-2 is not very exciting. UNTIL you give it a name like 'World -1', which gives it such amazing mystique, it will go down in legend as one of the greatest secrets ever seen in a video game. Maybe that works for everything? Maybe I should call myself 'Minus Justin Towell'... There, my charisma and legendary stats have just skyrocketed. Incredible.

How to get it: Jump backwards through the wall (yes, it is possible) at the end of World 1-2 and enter the first pipe. Having circumvented the regular Warp Zone message, you are sent to the wrong level. Minus World, baby!

This strange area is full of what looks like a playschool's recreational apparatus. Coloured blocks with numbers on them, walls at various angles... it's all just part of the developers' creation process, allowing them to test out new moves for Sonic and set his jump height and acceleration instead of loading a whole level every time. Trouble is, they didn't take it out.

How to get it: There is a convoluted method of jumps too complex to list here, but the simplest way is to play the PS3/360 HD port and pick up a Chao Garden Key while playing as Eggman in his final stage. At the end of the level, you'll find yourself here. Simple!

Sonic isn't the only platform character to have a test level left in his game. Mario 64 and Mario Sunshine both have them too. This one is the second of two in the DS version of Mario 64, allowing you to test out your jumping, character hats and everything else. But all it does is make me realise how flaky DS' polygonal 3D is. Crikey, that's primitive. Hooray for 3DS, eh?

How to get it: On the PAL version, use an Action Replay to input this code, then hold Select while you load an existing save file:
94000130 fffb0000
02097360 00000000
d2000000 00000000

Pre-release versions and developer/journalist hearsay suggested there was another multiplayer level hidden away in Goldeneye on N64. It was then totally denied by Rare, but that didn't stop people trying to find it. Eventually, they did--and it only took six years! Well done, all concerned. But Oddjob is still banned. Shame the level is barely textured, hardly playable and essentially broken. See and hear it in 'action' .

How to get it: You'll need an Action Replay cartridge and the following code:
8005883E FFFF 8005883F FFFF 80058840 FFFF 800588A5 FFFF
800588A7 FFFF 800588AA FFFF 800588AC FFFF 800588AF FFFF
800588B1 FFFF 800588B4 FFFF 800588B6 FFFF 800588B9 FFFF
800588BB FFFF

Before you get all excited, this has long-since been patched out of GTA Online. But, for a time, gamers could revisit the snowy landscape of North Yankton in online multiplayer simply by tricking the game into keeping the area loaded from the prologue mission. It appeared in the sky in the south-east corner of the map, but was totally accessible with a helicopter.

How to get it: As I say, you can't get to it any more. Meh. But explains the sequence of trickery that was required, which is still well worth a look. If only to see (ahem) the world's biggest beaver.

A city filled with the wrong graphics, the wrong collision detection, glitchy (surprise) visual stability and floor that often isn't the floor, actually acting like water instead. Obviously it's completely broken and was never intended to be a place you could visit during normal play. But you can!

How to get it: The trick is to get out of the Safari zone while its step limiter is working. Get into the Safari zone, try to leave but then say you want to stay. Then save your game, reload it, exit the zone, tell the guy at the desk you don't want to play, then head to Cinnabar Island (or some others) and surf until your steps are up. Boom! Glitch City.

Maybe at this point, we should be more surprised to see 3D games that don't have a test room ostensibly hidden away yet easily activated with an Action Replay/Gameshark. But still, it's amazing to see familiar Kiddy Link running around colourful boxes like a kid who's gone on holiday but wants to spend the entire time climbing around in the play area. "Come on, Link, we're going to the beach! You love the beach! Oh fine, stay here then, ya little sod..."

How to get it: Fart on a donkey, whistle Saria's Song while staring into the center of a waning moon and then hold Z while the game loads. Nah, I'm just kidding. Get an Action Replay and input the code ZY1N-AGX5-MMCY0 94HP-XPKH-WQXF7 3Z3C-ZZVX-C21YN 1X90-8QQU-REZG3. Though that is just one test level. There are loads more .

OK, so it doesn't have any textures aside from the racers and it may be whiter than a polar bear who hasn't seen the sun all winter, but that is the Mario Circuit from Double Dash on Gamecube. It's just one of several unfinished tracks hidden away in Mario Kart DS' code. But you can actually drive on it, which is pretty awesome.

How to get it: You guessed it! Action Replay time. Use the code 023cdcd8 00000002 020484a0 d0002a00 020484a4 e0052321 and there it is.

I just *had* to end the article with this one, even though we've had an entry from Mario Kart already. There is no way anyone anywhere would see this by chance. Those numbers and letters up there are used as memory filler (all memory needs to hold data of some sort), but if you squint a bit, you can see that they act as ASCII art and show the Super Mario Bros sprite version of Mario.

How to get it: Um... you just have to look at the picture above. I'm not sure you needed this section on this slide, to be honest. But you're very welcome all the same.

Yeah, that weird white-eyed child is a deleted boss from Mother 3. The developers removed it probably because it shouldn't be viewed by anybody, ever. Having trouble sleeping? Looking at that thing will not help. Having trouble staying awake? Problem solved! Ye gads...

And if you're looking for more, check out .

Every new season of Game Of Thrones is a cause for excitement, much like a royal wedding or trial by combat. The book series, turned premium cable show, turned global phenomenon made everyone and their mother a fantasy fan, meaning there are likely a lot of people in your life who’ll want a GOT gift. But, after getting them an HBO subscription and a Blu-ray of every season, what else is there to buy?

How about a throw pillow? Toys? Statues? Or even some actual books? You’ll find links to all those things and this gift guide that will help you shop for any Game Of Thrones fan. All these work for birthdays, holidays, season premiere parties... but maybe hold off giving these as wedding gifts. It might make people uneasy.

If you want to take your figure game to the next level, forget classy, highly poseable action figures. Your home or office will really shine with a pricey bust or statue of your favorite character. Dark Horse has this , along with this one of . Most go for over $100, and feature a level of detail above most other gifts you’ll see on this list.

So, you’ve read every Song Of Fire And Ice from cover to cover between seasons, and are looking for something more to memorize. Fans of HBO’s GOT interpretation could do with the behind-the-scenes guides to . Both offer up guides on how to prepare different dishes from all over GOT’s many regions, perfect for the potluck your friend schedules for every season finale.

Game Of Thrones may be one of the most adult fantasy series in recent memory, but maybe your giftee prefers GOT wares that are a tad cuter? The popular Funko Pop brand of figures took a stab at the franchise, remolding fan favorites like can look loveable when given the proper makeover.

When following Game Of Thrones many twists and turns, it’s only natural to pick one house over another during all the political maneuvering. If you’d like to show your allegiance whenever you take a drink of your favorite beverage, this series of pint glasses covers just about everything. Houses are all for sale. Get whatever sigil suits you, or get them all to cover every taste for your next viewing party.

Game Of Thrones fans are a particular bunch, but any one of these gifts will be as treasured as a dragon egg. Sure, some of these may rekindle unpleasant memories of the rather inglorious death of one or more favorite characters, but that’s all part of the charm of Thrones. No one lasts for very long - but the memory of a well-planned gift certainly does.

And if you're looking for more nerdy presents, check out .

After years of quiet, we finally know that Adam Jensen's story won't end with Deus Ex: Human Revolution. Square Enix has revealed Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, a direct sequel planned for PC, PS4, and Xbox One that sets Jensen against a new cadre of biomechanically augmented freedom fighters, international politicians, and the good old Illuminati. Just another day in the cyberpunk future, then.

Thanks to , we already know quite a bit about Jensen's next adventure. Click on for more details about Mankind Divided, and check out the debut trailer embedded below to get a feel for how the future's doing two years after Jensen messed it all up.

Human Revolution's final hours held some fairly catastrophic events, regardless of what final choice you made at the end. Square Enix Montreal isn't saying which, if any, ending Mankind Divided will build from (and, no, it won't read your old saves). But suffice it to say that - spoiler alert - augmented people around the world were sent on a brief rampage, the Panchaea geo-engineering plant was destroyed, and the Illuminati have successfully pinned both events on 'transhuman' terrorism.

In other words, Jensen failed, and the world has turned against all augmented people because he couldn't stop the Illuminati. As Mankind Divided begins, Jensen has signed up with Task Force 29, an international police organization dedicated to fighting augmented groups that are chafing against their new position on the bottom of the social order - or, to use the terminology of those on top, terrorists. But serving with Task Force 29 is largely a means to a more familiar end.

Jensen knows firsthand that he doesn't have what he'll need to take down the Illuminati - yet. But by joining Task Force 29, he once again receives access to top of the line augmentations (more on those later), weaponry, and support personnel, not to mention great health coverage. Seriously, good medical is pretty important when your body is liable to start rejecting your arsenal of cybernetic implants if you miss a single dose of Neuropozyne.

As he works for the Task Force, Jensen secretly feeds information to an anti-Illuminati organization called the Juggernaut Collective. The collective is composed of hackers, activists, and the other sorts of people who are inclined to believe that an ancient shadow government runs the world. Unfortunately, Jensen can't fully trust the members of either group, and they'll often give him conflicting goals as he embarks on assignments around the world.

The Deus Ex series has always walked its own path by letting players, well, walk their own paths. Instead of proceeding down a first-person corridor full of pulse-pounding scripted events, you can try to sneak into enemy compounds with some handy stealth augments (we're getting to the augments, promise), or even talk your way through them like a civilized human being.

Mankind Divided will push that freedom even further with stealth options that refine Human Revolution's well-crafted sneaking; one surprisingly important little tweak is a holographic indicator of your last known location, which makes it easier to give guards the runaround. More talkative players will also find their social exploits, including taking on side quests from locals, are much more likely to show up (and potentially bite you in the ass) later on in the story.

Unfortunately, all those social and stealth options previously came at the cost of really solid-feeling combat. With Mankind Divided, Square Enix Montreal is trying to make the guns-blazing approach more of an entertaining option of its own than just a backup for when your other plans go pear shaped. To that end, the whole thing will just be a quite a bit smoother: you can adjust all of your weapon settings on the fly using a quick overlay, you can change up your hotkeyed augment abilities (getting there) at a glance, and more parts of the environment will yield under your fire.

You'll need all that enhanced combat capability if you plan to go Robo-Rambo: enemy forces are meant to be much better at coordinating their attacks, flanking, and using augments or other tools of their own. Hostile forces will also have a lot more variety, setting Jensen against augmented humans, exoskeleton-wearing cops, and killer mechs, to name a few.

Speaking of hostile forces, you needn't worry about slogging through another set of protracted, incongruously inflexible boss encounters. Human Revolution's original bosses didn't really let you sneak around or try to resolve things peacefully - your only option was to dart around and gradually wear down their health bars. Though Square Enix Montreal takes full responsibility for Human Revolution's boss battles-of-attrition, they were actually contracted out to an external developer in interest of shipping the game on time.

The boss encounters in Human Revolution's Missing Link DLC (and the Human Revolution Directors' Cut) were handled in-house, and were much better about letting players fight on their own terms. Expect the climactic battles of Mankind Divided to follow in their example.

And now it’s finally time to talk about the cybernetic heart of the Deus Ex series. Augments in Mankind Divided work basically the same way they did in Human Revolution, with additional abilities unlocked by earning or receiving Praxis kits, upgraded with experience points, and powered by bio-energy. You won't have to worry quite so much about conserving bio-energy this time around, as a fraction of it will regenerate Dishonored-style, but you still won't be able to lean on them exclusively to get the job (whatever it is) done.

You may still be tempted, because Mankind Divided includes twice as many augmentations as Human Revolution. New gadgets enhance every avenue of play: from a mark-and-track optics system that lets you keep an eye on distant enemies, to hand-mounted Tesla darts that let you silently incapacitate foes, to a bullet-deflecting Titan shield that can materialize at a moment's notice. Oh, and that nano blade? He can shoot it like a crossbow now.

That's all we know about Deus Ex: Mankind Divided so far - nope, no release date yet. But be sure to stay tuned right here for formation as soon as we get it. How else do you think Square Enix Montreal can improve on Human Revolution for Jensen's sophomore outing? Let us know in the comments below!

For more cyberpunk goodness, check out our review of .

Spider-Man is one of the most popular fictional characters of all time, even bigger than Sherlock Holmes, Garfield, or Theodore Roosevelt. After some hit or miss films, Peter Parker is gearing up for a whole new reboot in 2017, and with it coming hot off the heels of the lackluster Amazing reboot, the filmmakers really need to get it right. Good thing Spider-Man's many games contain the blueprints for movie success.

The get the wallcrawler as much as any other form of media. It’s about time the filmmakers recognize that. Now, in an ideal situation, the movie producers would set aside the time to play every Spider-Man game ever made, but they’re probably busy. So, with any luck, they’ll find this feature and use these in-game examples to lead them to movie magic.

Despite how often Peter Parker mopes about his loved ones dying, he should be all smiles when he puts on the mask. Ideally, Spider-Man is constantly throwing out one liners, making comments about how goofy a villain’s costume looks, or making some meta comment about a bad guy's complicated plot. This happens occasionally in the movies, but just as often Peter is crying about Uncle Ben/Aunt May/Mary Jane, telling a villain to act rationally, or looking wistfully at someone’s grave. Movie Peter can be a real bummer.

Meanwhile, Spidey’s a regular comedian in his games. The PSone's CD tech allows for Spider-Man to be his talkative self for the first time in his self-titled release, and he hasn't shut up since. Even when a game isn’t that great, Peter's constant quips help cover the action. Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions goes so far as to cast four distinct Spider-Men, all with their own brand of humor, allowing even the weakest moments to flow. A steady stream of comedy can lighten the most boring 'flip three switches' puzzles or villainous exposition delivered by Alfred Molina.

Parker is a 15-year-old high school student when he's bitten by a radioactive spider, and he hasn't aged all that much since. Unlike Batman or Iron Man, Spider-Man is a more relatable age to younger comic fans, and the producers smartly cast younger guys in the role. However, the films often rush through his teen years, getting him closer to adulthood than necessary. Tobey MaGuire's Peter is living in Manhattan halfway through his first movie, and by the trilogy’s end he’s proposing to Mary Jane. Amazing handles his youth better, but is still quick to get him to graduation in the sequel.

Ultimate Spider-Man - based on the comic of the same name - introduces Peter as a teen and keeps him that way. He’s a stressed out kid trying to balance homework and foiling bank robberies. Hopefully the next movie will keep him just as young, but even an adult Parker can feel young. Just be sure to avoid the mistakes of Spidey's Sega CD game - he sounds like a dopey old uncle making bad jokes at Thanksgiving.

Most Spider-Man movies have a scene or two where Peter starts to understand his Spider-Sense, the psychic warning system that alerts him to danger. Unfortunately, he just as often forgets those warnings, sometimes getting shot in the leg by cops, or ambushed by The Lizard, or caught by surprise in one of Green Goblin’s traps. When his Spider-Sense is active, that should never happen. For the most part, the games do their best to keep that in mind.

Often Spidey games use Spider-Sense as the reason he can dodge attacks as well as Kratos or Bayonetta, making his dexterity much more believable than theirs. The Amazing Spider-Man film tie-ins take it a step farther, using Spider-Sense to replicate the kind of enhanced vision seen in Arkham Asylum or Assassin's Creed. The powers are just vague enough in the comics that the tingling sensation can be used in a variety of ways… if you're creative enough.

Up until recent negotiations between movie studios, Spider-Man films were treated like a remote island, kept far away from all the other Avengers. Now we know that Parker will get to meet the likes of Iron Man and Captain America, the real question is just how familiar will they get? Now that the film producers have this opportunity to play with those interpersonal dynamics in more than just a couple scenes. As the games show, Spider-Man is great at playing with others.

Having characters constantly run into one another is core to the Marvel Universe - why do you think they all live in New York? - and a number of Spidey games use that to their advantage. From the original arcade game to Marvel Heroes 2015, Spider-Man fits in with just about any team of Marvel heroes. Plus, Web of Shadows and Marvel: Ultimate Alliance's plots depend on Spidey's connections to guys like Wolverine and Human Torch. Soon Spidey will be just as chummy on film as he is in games, so we need all of Spider-Man and his amazing friends that we can get.

This problem goes beyond Spider-Man, because it's difficult to find any comic book villains that are a big enough threat for an entire film. After facing enemies on the level of Green Goblin or Doctor Octopus, a guy made out of sand just doesn't seem as threatening. Movies like Amazing Spider-Man 2 end up overpowering B-level guys like Elektro for variety's sake, and it just feels weak. However, that doesn’t mean they don’t have a role to fill. Some villains are only worth five minutes of screen time, instead of being excluded entirely.

Spidey’s games find time to explore his dense rogues gallery without overexposing the lesser ones. Each stage in Shattered Dimensions is a contained level that follows a single villain, such as Kraven, Sandman, and The Vulture. Every nemesis gets enough time to make an impact, but aren’t seen so long that you get sick of them. The Beetle, Ringer, Swarm, and similar goofs aren't worthy of a climactic battle, but they're good for a quick back and forth with Spidey before he leaves them webbed to lightpost.

There's at least one Spider-bad guy that gets way less than he deserves on film. For readers in the '90s, Venom was a thing of nightmares. He's faster and stronger than Spider-Man, much more dangerous, and he's constantly threatening to eat people's brains. He isn't a bleach blonde twerp that tries to take Spider-Man's photo and is easily beaten by loud noises. Spider-Man 3 turns a beast into clown, and if Venom ever returns to the films, they need to make him half as menacing as he is in the games.

First seen in Spider-Man Arcade, Venom's vicious in just about every appearance, even when he's on your side in games like Maximum Carnage. His slimy green tongue is a highlight of the Marvel vs. Capcom games, and one of the first things Venom does in Ultimate Spider-Man is eat a child. This is a bad, bad man, and strong enough to fill a whole movie if you treat him right.

This whole article would be more concise with one slide saying 'don't do anything from Spider-Man 3,' but let's dig into this while on the subject of Venom. The black symbiote suit that spawns his arch nemesis is first worn by Spidey, and it changes him. Yes, it makes him more violent, but it also turns him into a bad boyfriend with an emo haircut and an interest in Bob Fosse. All this from a random rock that falls from outer space?

Spider-Man's second-most famous outfit handles much better in Web of Shadows. You can shift into the black costume at any moment, making Spidey's attacks fiercer and more devastating - like a Marvel version of Kratos. The suit's evil influence is also made more obvious in-game moral choices like choosing sides in a gang war or helping the Black Cat steal valuables from the mob. If Spidey's going bad, go all the way.

Spider-Man is a vigilante, one who'll be arrested should the cops ever find out who he is. Having a secret identity prevents that, and it also protects Peter's loved ones from being murdered by every one of his villains. So why in the hell does Spider-Man take his mask off so often in his movies? Whether stopping a speeding train speeding, helping a kid out of a burning car, or simply letting the cops remove it, he can't keep the damn thing on.

So, while you could knock the games for rarely exploring the life of Peter out of costume, he at least keeps his mask on at all times. Even the worst Spidey game - for the record, that's Web of Fire - keeps Peter's identity protected throughout, rarely even animating Parker's face. Sure, in the movies people want to see Spider-Man's handsome face, but save that for dates with Gwen Stacy or conversations in Aunt May's kitchen.

The Amazing Spider-Man films were supposed to be more than just a trilogy of Andrew Garfield's costumed adventures. The original plan was to spin-off into a series of films, including The Sinister Six, and solo pictures starring Venom and Black Cat. The next reboot seems to wash that all away, making Amazing Spider-Man 2 stuffed full of scenes that set up a future that's never coming. Don't count your sequel money before it opens.

Perhaps you could chalk it up to the studio cycle Activision uses for the 15-plus years of Spider-Man games, but sequels are rarely planned for. More often the character bounds from one bang-up to the next, getting a fresh status quo each time. Ultimate Spider-Man, Web of Shadows, and Shattered Dimensions aren't trying to build to some universe-spanning battle that may happen in five years. That urgency means there's much more time for punching The Lizard in the face right now.

Cross your fingers that the next director of Spider-Man reads this, because the world deserves a Spidey film as good as his best games. If any other fans have tips from the games, share it all in the comments!

And if you're looking for more comic book fun, check out the .

That feeling you get when you’re falling over is just awful. When you’ve tripped and there’s nothing to grab onto, and you just seem to crumple in slow motion, knowing that this is gonna hurt and there’s not a damn thing you can do about it. Or when you have a falling dream and wake up going “AAH! Huh? Wha?” from the shock of that brutal, imagined impact with your mattress.

But as harsh as they are, our memories of this feeling and any sense of empathy that goes along with them become as naught when we see someone else falling over. Watching someone flail their arms about in attempt to avoid face-planting a curb is hilarious, and you know it. It’s even funnier in video games, where physics... well, don’t always act like you expect them to. You want some examples? Of course you do. Click on.

Although the Skate series never quite reached the Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater level of mainstream love, it certainly became famous for some other reasons. Namely, what happens when you lose your board and it all goes wrong.

If you type “Skate 3” into YouTube, you probably won’t get many actual gameplay videos. In fact I don’t know if anyone in the world is actually good at Skate, since evidence suggests that its players usually just spend their time trying to injure their rider in as many ways as possible. Its accidents get so savage that there’s a dedicated mode where you just have to cause as much damage to your poor avatar as possible. But the real fun begins when the physics bugs out and things start to get...zany.

Many of the games in this list have a common factor: the ragdoll button. A designated control you can hit to intentionally send your character head first into a suicide dive. When developers put this sort of thing into a game, they must know that players aren’t going to get anything productive done.

In Goat Simulator, a quick button tap turns your goat all floppy. While there’s a lot of fun to be had by going round sticking your tongue to people, and headbutting gas canisters until they explode, there’s a simple joy in just pressing a button and watching your goat tumble down a hill. It’s like having access to your own one of these: (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we9_CdNPuJg )

Gang Beasts is a game about wobbly Jelly Baby men fighting. It’s basically Power Stone, if Power Stone had underwater physics and was populated by drunken babies. It should come as no surprise that it has a dedicated “flop”. I dare you to not laugh within the first few minutes of firing it up

One (or all) of your friends will probably die within the tutorial, and it only escalates from there. You’ll fall off the top of a ferris wheel and crash through the wooden planks below into the water. You’ll witness players knocked off the top of speeding trucks, as road signs leave permanent imprints on their faces. It’s a fighting game where it doesn’t matter who wins. It’s all just about who gets maimed the funniest.

I remember a conversation I had with a friend back in the mid 2000s, to the effect of “Wouldn’t it be cool if one day you were just running along in a game and randomly fell over?” I don’t know why we were talking about that, but it actually happened. Then, a few months later, the first Assassin’s Creed was announced, and one of the early presentations showed Altair running too fast into a bystander and tumbling to the ground.

We thought that was hilarious, and that’s when we finally knew the next generation of gaming was coming. Forget graphics, and huge, vibrant open-worlds. Next-gen falling over. That’s where it’s at. There’s plenty of other plummeting in Assassin’s Creed too, of course. In fact it’s a trademark core mechanic. Jumping off a building into a pile of hay? Not exactly funny perhaps, but brilliantly preposterous all the same. And of course, given the series' additional propensity for sweet, sweet glitches over the years, there preposerousness to spare for all.

I was probably halfway through the story of Grand Theft Auto 5 before I realised that if I pressed the attack button while in mid-air, my character would ragdoll into a self-loathing, diving faceplant. Needless to say, the next hour or so wasn’t spent planning heists or murdering gangsters. I was attempting to do front flips over park benches. Very few of them went well.

But that didn’t matter, because my failed attempts were way funnier than what would’ve happened if I had succeeded. Pro-tip: If you’re going to try this, make sure you target a bench that someone is already sitting on. Watching two bodies become momentarily entwined before the stranger gets up and runs away in fear is great fun. Though to be fair, I was playing as Trevor, so who knows whether it was actually fear, disgust, or the exciting area of the Venn diagram in between?

Back before EA’s FIFA franchise took over the world of the beautiful game, there were quite a few football series around. One such also-ran was Sony’s This Is Football. I can’t remember if the games were actually any good or not, because my fond memories were formed for entirely different reasons.

Number one: Even back then, developers understood the importance of a dive button. In This Is Football, you can use it to try to fool the referee into giving you a free kick. Or, as I did, you can use it when no-one is even near for purely comedic effect, and watch the ref give you a totally-worth-it yellow card. Number two: the two footed tackle button, with which you can impart the falling fun to other players, by way of your most brutal Sunday League fantasies.

Okay so there’s not much funny about the falling in this one, but it deserves a spot on the list for being one of the very, very few games which is entirely about falling off things. Actually, what am I saying? A game whose core concept is essentially ‘plummet from tall stuff’ is hilarious. Especially if you have a friend with a fear of heights, and make them play it for a whole afternoonv for your own amusement. Could actually do them some good. It’s kill or cure, anyway, and either way it’s funny.

Even if you don’t have a monstrous fear of altitude, the game is pretty terrifying. To get the highest score it’s all about getting “hugs” and “kisses”, which sounds lovely and innocent, but bear in mind that they’re actually being imparted by the sides of buildings as you fall.

In Just Cause 2 you do a hell of a lot of flying, falling, tumbling, and rolling. The grappling hook which you use to propel yourself around is probably one of the best additions to any open-world game there’s ever been. Not only can you attach a plane to a car and watch hilarity ensue, it also has some (relatively) practical uses.

Such as entirely breaking the laws of physics. Falling hundreds of metres to your death at terminal velocity? Well if you have a grappling hook, never fear! Just Cause 2 teaches us that you can simply fire the hook into the ground moments before you land, and pull yourself in for a soft landing. Who said video games weren’t realistic? Me. I did.

Video games are known for letting us mere mortals wield ludicrous amounts of power. You are the Master Chief, the Free Man, or the Chosen One, destined to save mankind and somesuch. Over the course of your journey, you unlock increasingly spectacular weapons and abilities. A crowbar gets replaced by a rocket launcher, a puny fireball becomes a gigantic meteor. Eventually, however, things get a little out of hand.

Overkill doesn't begin to describe the magnitude of these video game moves. Each one has the power to end all life as we know it - but only deals 9999 damage. They're breathtaking the first time you see them, but after repeat viewings they leave you wondering about the unspoken consequences. Is it really worth calling down a world-ending meteor strike just to knock off a few random monsters? Whatever you decide, here are the seven most destructive moves that casually end all life as we know it.

Nothing elevates a small-arms skirmish into an international incident faster than nuclear arms. Deploying Call of Duty's tactical nuke is a bit like pulling a gun during a knife fight. It announces to everyone that "shit just got real" and this little tussle is officially over. After calling down the thunder, a ten-second timer appears on the screen, accompanied by an air raid siren. A blinding, all-encompassing flash of white soon follows, and, in the immortal words of '90s metal band Drowning Pool, the bodies hit the floor.

Detonating a tactical nuke is an automatic win for both the user and his or her team, no matter the current score. Of course, everyone dies in the process and the area they were fighting over becomes irritated wasteland, but let's not split hairs. Let's also not split hairs about the long-term environmental impact of nuclear detonations of any size or potential loss of human life in and around the impact zone. You won the match, dammit, and that's what counts.

I'm not sure which would be more destructive to the Earth: the detonation of a small, nuclear warhead or the impact of two giant meteors. And in a way, I'm thankful for that. Naruto villain Madara Uchiha possesses one of the most excessive attacks in the entire series. It's play out in three steps, though it really could stop at step one: imprisoning the opponent inside a giant tree. Step two: a giant meteor descends from the heavens and crushes the magic tree (along with the person inside). Considering this would literally kill anything you'd think the attack was over. But no, it keeps going.

Step three: a second, larger meteor suddenly appears and smashes into the first (which has already smashed into the foe) causing a massive explosion (why?) that would likely blast the entire planet back to the ice age. Little piece of advice: if you have to measure your opponent's strength based on the number of world-ending meteors you need to drop on their head, the maybe it's time to put diplomacy back on the table.

The Novalith Cannon is a giant space gun that fires giant space bullets at planets - like an old six-shooter on an intergalactic scale. Like most strategy game superweapons, it's insanely expensive and wildly impractical to use in an actual game. These arguments feel moot, however, when you're on the receiving end of its bombardment, watching your worlds get reduced to space rubble in two shots.

It's interesting to note that, according to the Sins of a Solar Empire Wiki [LINK], the Novalith Cannon used to have a glitch where it would crash your game if you fired it at one of your own planets. This unintentional safety switch has since been fixed, though I'm not sure if that's really a good thing. As with any firearm, never point the Novalith Cannon at something you don't intend to destroy.

Ah yes, Dragon Ball Z, now here's a cast of characters that knows how to blow up a planet. Namek is the obvious example, but it seems every couple of episodes someone starts screaming about how they're going to blow up the Earth or how they can't let an attack hit the Earth. Towards the end of the series, Super Buu even has a move straight-up called Human Extinction Attack that does just what it says. But let's talk about Broly and his Gigantic Meteor, the attack linked above.

That explosion at the end is freaking huge. Just look at the size of it - and that's the view from space. It's like the size of all of North America. Now, I'm no scientist, but one would assume if the planet was racked by a continent-sized blast like that there would be some repercussions. Massive earthquakes would ripple across the surface, and the amount of dust and particulate matter thrown into the atmosphere would surely usher in a new ice age. But hey, at least Broly won the fight.

Planetary Annihilation is a massive strategy game on a celestial scale, with marathon matches that can take hours - or even days - to finish. But when it finally comes time to call it quits, nothing shuts your opponent down faster than the Annihilaser. This game-ending weapons transforms a specific type of planet into your very own Death Star. It takes ages to build and massive amounts of resources, but once finished this super weapon can vaporize an entire system of planets in mere minutes.

Stopping an Annihilaser rampage is difficult to be sure, but not impossible. One option is to strap a bunch of continent-sized rockets to a nearby moon and ram that sucker straight into it. Yes, that's absolutely something you can do in this game, and it's just as glorious as it sounds. Though, you have to wonder what sort of future is in store when entire planets start getting destroyed wholesale.

Now we really start getting into crazy territory. For those unfamiliar, Super Robot Wars is a long-running series of turn-based strategy games in Japan. Most of these games bring together dozens of popular characters and robots from various anime series, but a handful of these games are comprised entirely of original characters. These "original" games also tend to be the most outrageous when it comes to overpowered attacks, as the developers aren't beholden to any sort of source material.

Enter Shu Shirakawa and his giant robot, Neo Granzon. Shu's strongest attack is to have Neo Granzon generate three micro black holes which it then smashes together with its robot hands to form a single, violent energy orb. Shu then softballs the orb at his opponent, and when it detonates the resulting blast can be seen engulfing the entire universe. And then the two just pop right back into the fight and keep going. What? How is this even a fight when one person can literally end entire realities?

Lo and behold. We have arrived at what is possibly the most over-exaggerated attack in the roleplaying genre - nay, in the entirety of gaming. After transforming into some sort of angel-cloud-monster-thing, Safer-Sephiroth, the penultimate boss of Final Fantasy VII, unleashes his ultimate attack: Super Nova. This move summons a comet that tears through the Milky Way galaxy, destroying multiple planets before detonating our sun. The resulting blast consumes both Safer-Sephiroth and the entire party in the hellfire of an exploding star.

And then he does it a second time and a third time. Enough already, the Milky Way can only handle getting completely annihilated so many times. It doesn't help that this attack takes several full minutes to complete, enough time for a quick bathroom break, grab a sandwich, and file your taxes. It's also a testament to how far Cloud and the party have come: one day they're terrorists blowing up power plants, the next they're having someone explode stars in their face.

Okay, forget this entire list, we have the one true winner right here. All others pale in comparison to the Chaos Dunk, a jam so powerful and destructive it led to the Great B-Ball Purge and the B-Ball Removal Department. Famed b-baller Charles Barkley is one of the few to have successfully performed a Chaos Dunk, though the fallout had a damning impact on b-ball and the future of humanity.

For more great GamesRadar+ content be sure to check out .

As games now rival films in their ability to whip up a shrieking whirlwind of hard cash and column inches, celebrities treat them less like a spoddy hobby and more like serious star vehicles. No more grainy mid-’90s FMV with Mark Hamill – nowadays we’re talking hi-def double bills with Ellen Page and Willem Dafoe. Even ol' Kevin Spacey has gotten in on the action. These are six of the most complete celebrity facial and vocal performances. Total dedication to the craft is all we accept. Recognise!

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007 games entered original territory after The World is Not Enough. This 2004 outing got Brosnan’s face and voice for the first and last time, though both Connery and Craig had a pop later.

Ah, Easter! That time of year when everyone eats chocolate and hot cross buns. What are hot cross buns? They're buns, traditionally served hot, with a cross across the top (sorry to stammer) to celebrate Easter. That may seem like extraneous information, but you never know when such facts may come in handy. What a time to be alive.

So, seeing as it's Easter and this is a video game website, I thought we'd eschew the chocolate (well, actually I chewed the chocolate, by which I mean I've already eaten it all) in favour of bringing you the definitive list of rabbits in games. You might think that's the flimsiest excuse for a list article you ever heard, but you haven't witnessed the incredible jokes yet on every slide. I'm here all week. Well, except Monday. The UK gets Monday off. But the rest of the week, I'm here for all of it.

Rabbits are great in Skyrim. They hop about among the lush, 3D vegetation until they become startled by your presence, at which point they run, flashing their little cotton tails as they go. Some NPCs even have them as pets. Listen closely and some guards will say: "I used to be an adventurer like you, until I took an arrow to bunny". The loss of a loved one - even a pet - can spell the end of any heroic intent. Yes, it is tragic.

But who thinks about consequences when you've got destruction magic in your fingertips? When you start the game, you'll want to start leveling up your Destruction, and rabbits are perfect for that. Can you hit a moving target? Can you make a charred rabbit corpse roll all the way down a hill? Just line up those crosshairs, cast your Flame spell and what have you got? Hot, cross bunny.

Vibri is the star of PSone classic Vib Ribbon. Made of lines and shakier than a drug addict going cold turkey, Vibri is very much 'of her time'. But still, she's become an icon, personifying (or, more accurately, bunnifying) the state of technology at the time. Imagine technology being bunnified. Weird.

Which reminds me of a joke I once heard. Do you know what you get if you turn on Vib Ribbon, put in a CD of the hardest, fastest Death Metal you can find and then leave the controller so that Vibri crashes into all the obstacles? Not a frog or a worm like in the game, that spoils the joke. You get a (cue drum roll, please!) hot, cross bunny!

Cream the Rabbit in a food processor until it's reached the consistency of the clotted Cornish classic. Next, add thyme, garlic, apple liqueur, lemon and seasoning, then leave it to marinate for several hours (overnight if possible).

Preheat the oven to 150C/gas 1. Line a 900g terrine mould or loaf tin with lightly oiled kitchen foil and lay bacon rashers on the bottom. Spoon in the creamed rabbit mixture and wrap with the kitchen foil. Cover with a lid and place the terrine in a roasting pan of water. Bake for 90 minutes. Et voila! Hot Cross Bunny.

Ah, Peppy Hare. He opens his mouth (albeit closing it again in a flappy, Terry Gilliam kind of way) and out comes 'Do a barrel roll'. That phrase is pretty darn legendary around these parts. What a guy. Oh, but I know what you're going to say and I'm not stupid. I do appreciate there is a difference between hares and rabbits: the spelling. Look, he's got ears and everything. How could I leave him out?

Of course, such famous utterances over the intercom make it imperative that you keep him in the fight. Sometimes his ship gets hit, which is unfortunate. Especially if the lasers came from your own Arwing. He starts to burn up, before sodding off home a very (wait for the mic drop!) hot, cross bunny.

MIPS the rabbit was one half of the first ever Mario 64 gameplay prototype. Everyone knows the story by now, so rather than me explain that Miyamoto wanted the core act of controlling Mario to be so fun he made a game where you just ran around as Mario, trying to catch a rabbit, and that rabbit made it into the game as a little Easter Egg, let me tell you a joke I heard about MIPS.

Right, get this. MIPS is named after the N64's internal processor, right? So, what happens when you ask that now-primitive processor to run those landmark 3D graphics at 30 frames a second for, like, twelve hours? You get a hot, cross bunny! I bet you're thinking I can't keep this up for an entire article. YOU'RE SO WRONG.

It isn't easy being a forgotten mascot. People keep telling me that Oswald could have been Mickey Mouse. Yep, that's what I heard. By which I assume they mean he could have bought some yellow shoes, white gloves and some shiny-buttoned red shorts, and had expensive and painful surgery to shorten and widen his ears and augment his nasal protrusion. The lengths people (and rabbits) will go to to get into show business. Tsk. But, perhaps fortunately, Mickey Mouse was Mickey Mouse, so Oswald was spared the whole harrowing process.

But Oswald is still pretty cool. Well, at least to Disney fans. And people who liked Epic Mickey 2. OK, he isn't very cool. In fact, I'm not really surprised that he was fired before his career had even begun. And what do you get when you literally fire a rabbit? That's right! A hot, cross bunny! Damn straight.

Ash is the protagonist in Arkedo's side-scrolling platformer, Hell Yeah! Wrath of the Dead Rabbit. And he is dead, which I suppose officially makes him 'just some bunny that I used to know'. Granted, it's unusual for a dead rabbit to be on a list of 'best rabbits', but hear me out. This rabbit carries a circular buzz saw. Yes, they should have called him Buzz Bunny. Missed opportunity if you ask me.

So we're talking about a zombified, undead, ultraviolent rabbit who is the actual king of hell. Can you imagine meeting a rabbit like Ash in hell? Think about how angry he would be. In fact, that reminds me of a joke I once heard: You know what you get if you meet a buzzsaw-wielding rabbit in Hell? You get… (wait for it…) eviscerated! Yeah, it's not the happiest of situations.

Games can be a welcome escape, one where we steal cars, fly through space, or become anime lawyers. Yet so many licensed sports games force you to play football, baseball, and soccer the way the NFL, MLB, and FIFA want. Those simulations have their place, but there are too few alternatives if you want to color outside the lines of pro sports. That's what makes the too-rare alternatives so appealing.

Without world famous brands, unlicensed sports games have to get creative to entice fans, and so they use the classic rules as more of a guideline than a blueprint. They let you kill the referee, play alongside orcs and elves, or ingest every banned substance you can. These games are truly fantasy sports, embracing the possibilities that fiction opens up. So, which titles best took advantage of that open playing field? Read on...

Despite having Sega in the title, this wild three-on-three soccer game doesn't feature any of the publisher's famous mascots. Developed by folks who’d later work on Need for Speed, Sega Soccer Slam has similar intensity and speed on display. It’s also a bit like Punch Out!! on a football pitch, as friendly international stereotypes battle it out for soccer supremacy. The teams have representatives from each continent, and while their appearances border on caricature, the hard-hitting action is anything but a joke.

What makes it different? The international flavor covers as diverse a group of nations as FIFA, but World Cup commercials won't feature the level of violence seen in Soccer Slam. Punches and kicks are allowed, while boring rules like onsides and corner kicks are left out to focus on the uncomplicated fun. Who wants to bother with penalty cards when they could see a Mexican wrestler bodyslam a British soccer hooligan?

The original NFL Blitz games feel like an anomaly now. John Madden would never approve of the late hits, excessive roughness, and showboating that are all integral to making the classic Blitz games so fun. After Midway no longer had the NFL license, Blitz’s mean streak only grew without the 'No Fun League' overseeing every play.

What makes it different? Blitz: The League not only amps up the violence that series like Madden prefer to tone down, it also makes time for other seedier elements in the campaign. Drugs, prostitution, and graphic, career-ending injuries are all part of a story mode that's fittingly presented by NFL bad boy, Lawrence Taylor. It isn’t for the squeamish, but Blitz and its sequel offer an alternative to the buttoned down action of EA Sports. The series has since gone out to pasture, but it'll always be remembered as perhaps the first game to ever feature a visibly ruptured testicle. Wear that honor with pride, Blitz.

For wrestling fans, it’s obvious when other lovers of sports entertainment worked on a game. You can see a care for detail and history that other titles don't have, and the Fire Pro Wrestling series has that more than most. Whether on Game Boy Advance or the PS2, the isometric in-ring action is always on point, featuring a highly balanced rock-paper-scissor grappling system. Fire Pro Wrestling's graphics might not always impress, but it makes up for it by including a deceptively dense roster and close to every wrestling move known to man.

What makes it different? Some wrestling games depend too much on the star power of groups like WWE or WCW, but Fire Pro didn't bother limiting itself like that. Most entries' rosters are full of folks who are one step removed from the most famous wrestlers ever. Characters fight like Steve Austin and Ric Flair, but don’t look like them - unless you choose the alternate costumes that bear an uncanny resemblance to the headliners’ signature looks. Who knows how they got away with it at the time, but those creative inclusions make each new entry feel like a wrestling crossover that’d otherwise be impossible.

Whether it's football or hockey, the Mutant League games still mean a lot to those who grew up with the humorously morbid games. These Genesis/Mega Drive classics have you play as horror show creatures like skeletons, aliens, and trolls on fields that are strewn with corpses by the end of the game. Though only two of this cheekily violent titles were released, Mutant League spawned its own Saturday morning cartoon, which no doubt helped extend the series' legacy through constant replays in the mid-'90s.

What makes it different? Though EA, the king of official sports, may be the publisher, Mutant League gleefully breaks every rule of sportsmanship. Fighting, bribery, landmines, killing the referee - it's all legal in Mutant League, making it a great outlet for kids sick of the NFL and NHL rules. Plus, Mutant League has the edge on scary puns. Who wants to play as Bo Jackson and Jerry Rice when you could be Bones Jackson and Scary Ice?

Based on a tabletop game of the same name, Blood Bowl repurposes gridiron gameplay for fantasy geeks who may be missing out on the fun. Made by the same folks as Warhammer, Blood Bowl features orcs and goblins engaging in turn-based combat, but the bigger focus is on running a ball from one side of the map to the other, just like in American football. The only difference is this version of the sport has more apothecaries, virtual dice, and parody teams like the Orcland Raiders.

What makes it different? Aside from the NFL lacking in magic and lizardmen (not counting Jerry Jones), Blood Bowl earns its grisly name by being a tad more violent than the mainstream. You can win by scoring the most touchdowns, or you could take the more direct route by killing all 11 players on the opposing team. Much like in XCOM, death sticks in a Blood Bowl match, so you've got to be careful when putting an injured player on the field. This next down could be their last.

Also going by the triguing Muscle Bomber: The Body Explosion in Japan, this is an exciting recreation of pro wrestling no matter the title. The game's characters and attacks are as raucous as anything you'd see in WWE, thanks in part to the colorful designs of manga legend Tetsuo <(i>Fist of the North Star) Hara. His marquee style gets time time in the spotlight, be it the grapplers’ theatrical entrances, how they stand on the top turnbuckle, or posing for the crowd after a hard fought pinfall.

What makes it different? Back in the early '90s, WWE was trying its best with arcade games like Royal Rumble, but it could never match titans like Capcom. Street Fighter 2’s DNA is definitely within Saturday Night Slam Masters’ one-on-one brawls, but it adapts to the rules and legacy of wrestling. Instead of throwing fireballs, fighters routinely toss opponents ten feet in the air to catch them in a finishing maneuver, which is pretty rare in real life. The game also has its share of star power thanks to everyone's favorite politician, Mike Haggar from Final Fight, fitting right in with the rest of the squad.

NEO GEO rightfully earned its reputation for fighting game excellence, but the arcade/console hybrid has its library beyond King of Fighters. Take Super Baseball 2020, one of SNK's more creative approaches to sports. This sci-fi reinterpretation of America's favorite pastime turns the diamond into a battle of man versus machine, when teams of robots take on humans for batting supremacy. I think this is how The Matrix begins.

What makes it different? Major League Baseball prefers to take place in the here and now, not the far-off future of upgradable robots (we’ll get there someday). Unlike similar arcade sports games of the era, 2020 has a leveling and experience system similar to the RPG elements now commonplace in MLB games. Speaking of unexpected progressiveness, Super Baseball 2020 is also one of very few baseball titles to feature women playing the game. MLB is going to have to move fast to implement all this in the next five years.

Some baseball titles have light minigames for training your team in pitching, catching, and the like, but most feel like afterthoughts. Rusty’s Real Deal Baseball has the clever idea of never taking players to a nine inning game, instead focusing all its creativity on how to practice with every piece of baseball equipment there is. And the action gets as varied as carving your own bat from scratch, playing catch with people who have pitching machines for heads, and hitting a series of balls at UFOs.

What makes it different? While Rusty's Real Deal Baseball may be reminiscent of childhood summers spent playing catch in the park, the game has common with WarioWare and Rhythm Heaven. Many of Rusty's best minigames involve tapping buttons along to the music, ultimately teaching players more about keeping tempo than catching fly balls. Also, no MLB game has as humorous a sad sack as Rusty himself, the over-the-hill baseball great who sells you equipment while telling you all about his most recent misadventures.

Those are the most out there sports games for now, but are there any others that took organized recreation to the next level? Surely you have your own favorites you want to tell us all about in the comments.

And if you're looking for more athletics, check out the .

Sonic hasn't had a very good few months. First Sonic Boom tanked, then the bailiffs came round to repossess his All-Stars Racing car. Then he wagered Tails' plane trying to get the car back and ended up losing them both. He hasn't told Tails yet. Then there was the speculation in the press that maybe it was . Even Amy has started only calling twice a day. Needless to say, he blames a lot of other people for the situation he's found himself in… which is where this list comes in.

This is Sonic's hit list. It details all the people he feels have wronged him. The ones who will be first against the wall when the revolution comes. Of course this isn't normal or healthy behaviour; Sonic's gone a bit wrong. He tried so hard for so long, kept up his chipper demeanor and even pretended to enjoy playing tennis. Well, now he's snapped. Writing it all down is likely just his coping mechanism and he'll probably never go through with it for real. Probably.

Sonic read A Clockwork Orange the other day and was struck in particular by the bit about how Dim would be grateful to Alex for being pulled from water, even if it was Alex that had pushed him in. That's how Sonic feels about DK. Indeed, he fantasises about pushing DK into water. Deep water.

But he wouldn't help him out again. He'd stand and watch as the waves took him over, foaming and crashing like an aquatic recreation of Beethoven's 5th Symphony. He'd viddy good. Real horrorshow, like.

The Olympic Games are all about athleticism. Training. Speed. Sheer, glorious speed. It's everything that Sonic stands for. Amy? Not so much. It's not even the fact that Sonic had his speed reduced by the judges so that everyone else had a chance. It's that stupid inane grin on Amy's face when she stands on the top step of the podium, and says "That's right, I'm the best".

That's not even slightly right, Amy! You're slow in Sonic Adventure, slow in Sonic R and painfully slow on the uptake when it comes to the fact that Sonic ISN'T INTERESTED. And enough with trying to get him to babysit lost birdies. You're depriving a buzzard of its dinner.

Shadow represents everything that's gone wrong for Sonic, and is basically the opposite of him. When Sonic still actually gave a flying f*** about anything except self-loathing, he stood for eco-friendly, nature-loving, friend-helping goodness. Shadow? He 'likes guns'. And he was so blown up at the end of Sonic Adventure 2. Sonic even got to say one of his best lines: "Sayonara, Shadow the Hedgehog". It was poignant. It was dramatic. It had freakin' piano behind it. And yet who pops up again in everything a few weeks later? Shadow.

To rub salt into the Shadowy wounds, the utterly abysmal Gamecube/Xbox/PS2 game Shadow the Hedgehog is arguably better than Sonic the Hedgehog 2006. He can't be allowed to get away with that. It must all be... erased.

Got your own game, did you, Knucklehead? Well no-one plays it. It's only worth loads of money on eBay because so few people bothered to buy it in the first place. You know how many people have played the original Sonic the Hedgehog? EVERYONE.

This would have all been resolved much sooner if Knuckles hadn't transformed into a walking advertisement for steroid abuse. But Sonic will have his day. Just when Knuckles least expects it, Sonic's wrath will rain down upon him like a ton of lead. But first he needs to ask if Knuckles will lend him a few Benjamins, just till the rent gets paid.

It's little surprise, but Sonic blames Mario for everything. Every. Thing. The reason it rained during his 14th birthday party? Mario's fault. The reason they keep forcing Sonic to embrace the third dimension? Mario's fault. The reason he can't love Amy? Mario's fault. See, Mario's so under Sonic's skin, he is unable to think of anything else.

That time Princess Elise kissed Sonic to wake him? Sonic only woke up because he dreamed it was Mario. Yes, he is f***ed up. But whose fault is that, really? Mario's.

USURPER! That's what Sonic thinks whenever someone says the word 'NiGHTS'. Actually, he thinks that any time anyone says the words 'PlayStation', 'Knuckles' or 'Boyz II Men'.

Worse still, NiGHTS only ever exists in dreams, and that includes Sonic's. Ironic, really. NiGHTS is supposed to soothe nightmares, yet Sonic's feverish hallucinations are full of him. Him and that stupid invisible flute. It's always the same: NiGHTS plays it, and Sonic dances. He can't stop dancing. Oh god, how he can not stop.

Everyone hates Bubsy, but at least Sonic can least look down on him. The reason Bubsy's on the list is all about power. Sonic is better than Bubsy. Bubsy is worse than Sonic. This mantra helps Sonic sleep at night and he may, or may not, have scratched it into the walls of his house several hundred times. With his fingernails. Yes, some of the words are written in red.

I should probably add that Sonic's house smells funny, too. And all of the light bulbs need replacing. But even so, I hear that's better than Bubsy's doing these days.

Despite what you might think, Sonic and Robotnik actually go for drinks together nowadays. They sit at the bar, clinking their glasses of neat whiskey, reminiscing about all the various buttons that Dr R jumped on to foil Sonic and arguing about whether Sonic's invincibility music was better than Robotnik's boss theme. Happy days.

Sonic still pulls his hand away from Robotnik at the end of the evening, eschewing the manly handshake in favour of blowing a raspberry. 'Gotta blow rasps', right? Robotnik knows it's coming every time, but he still says 'ahh, you got me'. Sonic's toyed with the idea of getting Robotnik to help with the hit list, but the guy's getting on a bit now. He must've been in his late 50s in 1991, and the process of shifting that enormous bulk down from the bar stool looks like a Herculian effort at the end of each evening. Robotnik does a lot of stage work for charity, though. Sonic's considered it, but he can't bear the inevitable humiliation of asking the crowd where his career is.

NXT, Hall Of Fame, Axxess, WrestleMania, Raw: even for the most ardent of WWE Network addicts, the hottest weekend on the wrestling calendar can be a challenging one to keep up with. For four days, an entire city becomes over-run with 6 ft beastmen, beautiful divas and passionate fans, all wanting their super-sized slice of the sumptuous WWE cake. And as you’ll very shortly learn, that cake is an actual thing.

See, GamesRadar headed to San Jose ostensibly to talk video games with the likes of Xavier Woods and Sami Zayn, but couldn’t help noticing numerous happenings that go far beyond the realm of WWE 2K15, Monday Night Raw, and Seth Rollins’ shocking title win at ‘Mania. Here, then, are the 13 must-read secrets from our time spent in Silicon Valley – including Ronda Rousey’s love for Dragon Ball Z and Paige’s admission that she too is a secret glutton…

The New Day hasn’t done much of note since its debut last year. Despite that, trio member Xavier Woods might have just anointed himself GamesRadar’s favourite wrestler. Away from the ring, he’s living his WWE dream exactly as we would. “I have a briefcase that I carry with me when I travel, with a built-in 19-inch TV,” he reveals. “My PS4 straps inside along with the controllers and cords. When I get to hotels I pop that open, I get on the internet, and I play Final Fantasy XIV until I pass out.”

“I wasn’t very social as a kid, but video games were a good way for me to connect with other kids. I was obsessed with everything from Nintendo onwards – Mario, Duck Hunt – and I still have my regular NES. I even had a Virtual Boy – but that thing gives me migraines, so I had to get rid of it.” His favourite game ever? “Mario Kart: Double Dash on the Gamecube. If they put all the options from that into modern Mario Kart, the online game would be unreal.”

WWE wrestlers were housed in the Fairmont Hotel, eight miles from the hosting Levi’s Stadium, for the weekend. To enjoy a drink at the bar on any given evening was to live out every fan’s dream: Bret Hart and Natalya catching up with family and friends, The Miz and Maryse beaming with Hollywood smiles, John Cena’s dad enthusiastically congratulating Rusev and Lana on their bout with his son in the hours after Mania. And then there was… the cake.

Specially commissioned by the hotel and designed to mimic the WWE World Heavyweight Championship, this calorific wonder greeted wrestlers and fans alike upon entry to the building. It contained 50 pounds of dark chocolate, with red fondant and gold and silver dust added for that final jewel-like flourish. And it was being sold off after the show to raise money for Leukemia Lymphoma Society, at a cool $1500. Presumably delicious, /and/ made for a good cause? That is our kind of elevenses.

Friday night saw San Jose State University host a three-hour NXT show featuring what WWE hopes will be its WrestleMania headliners of the future. Japanese import Hideo Itami and Irishman Finn Balor got understandably loud reactions from the 5,000 strong crowd (who seemed especially well-fuelled thanks to an unconventional 10pm start time), but it was New Jersey trio Enzo Amore, Colin Cassidy and Carmella that popped the audience loudest. The trio's call-and-refrain entrance shtick echoes The New Age Outlaws, packing in more catchphrases than Roy Walker. Booked right, this unconventional trio can be huge on the main roster.

Also evident from the show: divas Charlotte, Sasha, Bayley and Becky Lynch are already good enough to compete believably with big stage ladies Paige, AJ Lee and Nikki Bella; Itami's future looks secure now that he's reclaimed the GTS finisher ‘borrowed’ by CM Punk; and Rhyno, the former ECW favourite defeated by Baron Corbin mid-way through this particular card, still has plenty of gore in the tank.

With former indie favourite El Generico – now better known to NXT fans as Sami Zayn – hotly tipped for a main roster debut on Raw which never materialised, GamesRadar was surprised to hear him cut a promo on Friday night in which he stated he was sticking around to reclaim the NXT title from Kevin Owens. Yet he categorically refuted our suggestion that he’s content to stay on the main roster’s periphery.

“I’m not in a rush. This time last year, everyone was telling me ‘I can’t wait until you’re on the main roster’, but this year I’m hearing much more of ‘I love you on NXT’,” he explains. “But I’ll never be happy being sedentary. As long as I’m with NXT my goal is to be champion and leave a void here that when I leave either can’t be filled or is very difficult to fill. The goal is always to move forward.” GamesRadar’s prediction? A WWE call-up and secondary title run (imagine an Intercontinental showdown with Daniel Bryan) at Summerslam.

WWE Axxess at the San Jose Convention Center featured Superstar signings (and ginormous queues for Superstar singings) with close to the entire roster, in addition to the ability to step inside the 16-foot high, ten-ton Elimination Chamber (although security was stepped up after one attention-seeking twonk decided to climb the structure). Its big pull, however, was a curtained-off Hall Of Fame showcase, packed with items familiar to fans young and old.

The casket bearing Brock Lesnar’s name which went up in flames before his WM30 contest with Undertaker was there, next to the real European and Smoking Skull title belts, and countless outfits worn by Randy Savage – most of them signed. Fans also delighted in being photographed next to a daunting life-sized statue of Andre The Giant. Most humbling were the many items taken from Ultimate Warrior’s always kaleidoscopic wardrobe, including – poignantly – the coat he wore for his final Raw appearance, just two days before his untimely passing last April.

Wrestling fans have long accepted that WWE merch is a bit naff. Shirts with noisy (and often senseless) slogans on the rear – made of heavy material that takes on twice its own weight the instant you add a single drop of sweat – have been a company mainstay for longer than Howard ‘The Fink’ Finkel. It never stopped us from buying them; but you had to accept a cloud of existential sadness would accompany every wearing.

Well, not this year. Packed with more than 600 items, the WWE Superstore in downtown San Jose showcased an array of shirt designs that could be worn in public without the threat of city-wide laughter. (The Mecha Powers tee featuring AI versions of Hulk Hogan and Randy Savage? Oh goodness, yes.) Not only that, the $35 tees on show boasted a lighter, thinner material which enabled us to enjoy Mania in comfort //as well as// looking relatively normal. It was an experience almost as miraculous as that main event finish.

WrestleMania weekend tends to be a festival of cosplay. Spotted at Axxess alone were a pint-sized AJ fan wearing matching garb who could have passed for her sister (it felt un-PC to request a photo), and three huge dudes in full-on Shield attire – including bandanas across their mouths – who’d have been arrested for intimidating the public if they went out dressed like that in Croydon.

42-year-old Danny from Sacramento was our favourite, however. In addition to looking (a bit) like Macho Man, he had the voice and mannerisms down pat. He’s been attending events as a Randy Savage looklike for ten years, and has seven Macho-style outfits, all of them self-created. “It takes about two months to make one outfit, and it’s not as expensive as you think. It’s the belts that are expensive.” Do we sort of want him to make us one ahead of Mania 32 in Dallas next year? Ohhhhh yeeeah.

Though some mock its legitimacy – the Bushwhackers, really? - WWE’s annual Hall Of Fame ceremony has become a fixture of WrestleMania weekend. Glitz and glamour is laid on thick, with wrestlers and divas kitted out in all manner of designer suits and expensive gowns. The thing you don’t see on camera: their front row seats are reserved using nothing more than names on pieces of paper, just as yours might be at a local theatre for an amateur production of Battlefield: The Musical.

While we might lament Luke and Butch’s induction, one Hall Of Fame entrant deserves every last ounce of recognition. Connor ‘The Crusher’ Michalek, a young wrestling superfan who passed away from brain cancer at just eight years old, was inducted via a series of moving speeches from Ultimate Warrior’s wife Dana, Daniel Bryan, and his father Steve. It was a stirring reminder of how this fake sport touches very real lives, with the male bravado so commonplace among wrestling fans replaced by humility and tears throughout much of the speeches.

17 minutes, 23 seconds. That’s the total amount of time it would take for you to sit through Ronda Rousey’s catalogue of UFC fights, all of them wins. It’s unsurprising, then, that the most dominant woman on the planet got a near-deafening reaction from the 70,000-plus crowd when shown on the big screen at WrestleMania. But this was a mere hint at what was to come.

Rousey later joined The Rock in the ring to send cocky ownership duo Triple H and Stephanie McMahon packing – and she did it wearing a Dragon Ball Z T-shirt. As reported by , away from the Octagon Rousey is a huge World Of Warcraft fan, and also used to moderate a Pokemon forum. There’s always been a crossover between wresting and games, but this goes down as the most high profile example ever. The only way it can be topped? Goldberg returning at Summerslam in a Cloud Strife tee.

Anyone who’s seen the fantastic Fighting With My Family doc showcasing the Knights of Norfolk will be aware of Norwich lass – and two-time Divas champ – Paige’s initial struggles with homesickness on arrival in Orlando. “I’d lived by myself in England, but here it was so different,” she tells GamesRadar. “I’m different from the rest of the girls, and they weren’t very nice to me for the first six months. They were very territorial. I got a lot of crap, and was crying every night on Skype.”

She says the turning point was realising she wasn’t here to make friends, and in the 18 months since has grown to love her adoptive homeland. “Great food, great company, great people. You get to see so much more than in the England. Desert, mountains…. and the weather’s a little bit better, isn’t it?” As for the American thing she loves most: “I enjoy the junk food, I’m a big cheesecake fiend. When I came over here I put on 40lbs of cheesecake weight.” If only we could look similarly svelte after a twelve-pack of Krispy Kremes.

At a Fairmont Hotel conference call to promote WWE 2K15 on Monday morning, Hulk Hogan openly told journalists that he was meeting Kevin Nash and Scott Hall in the afternoon to go over plans for that night’s Raw. But when the time came, both his NWO troupe and rivals DX – who’d received huge ovations from the crowd when interrupting Sting vs Triple H at WrestleMania – were absent. So too Trips, Undertaker, The Rock, and Bret Hart, all of whom had appeared the previous night.

Instead, on what is essentially the start of a new WWE season, younger bucks and beauties were given a chance the shine, with sparkling results. Every match delivered. Lucha Dragons and Geordie high-flyer Neville’s aerial prowess shone through on their official debuts; both title bouts (Bryan vs Ziggler and Cena vs Ambrose) could believably have headlined most pay-per-views; and despite some unnecessarily base chants regarding their sexual preferences, the six-woman tag bout showcased particularly strong work from Natalya, Naomi, Paige and AJ, proving that the #givedivasachance hashtag has turned heads backstage. A sign that WWE finally recognises wresting fans love /wrestling/? We can but hope.

A full four days after the San Jose State University show, city-wide fan love for NXT showed no sign of dying down. GamesRadar saw more grown men wearing Bayley T-shirts than those bearing many main roster stars, even before AJ Lee adorned that particular purple-and-yellow garment on Raw. Sami Zayn and Kevin Owens merch was omnipresent, too.

Then there were the chants outside hotels, while waiting to head inside Mania and the Hall Of Fame, and – incredibly – throughout the six-man main event of Raw. Bayley, Zayn and Owens were clamoured for alongside Hideo Itami, Tyler Breeze and Sasha Banks, as veterans Big Show and Kane looked exasperated (and Randy Orton furious). But while the big names mightn’t like it, this fan love for its next wave of stars is exactly what WWE needs. Adam Rose and Bo Dallas floundered on the main roster as NXT’s cult-like popularity hadn’t reached wrestling fans’ wider conscience. Now the opposite is true, and names like Owens and Finn Balor should be instant stars as a result.

WWE announced the live attendance as 76,976, which, to our eyes, seemed slightly exaggerated. The stadium was sold out, but one entire side of it housed three massive video screens and the entrance way. Including the pre-show, 39 men and four ladies competed, 9 of them pulling double duty. With 23 matches and 22 wins Undertaker remains the most experienced, and successful, WrestleMania combatant. 11 wrestlers or divas actively participated at Mania for the first time, among them Sting, Paige, Rusev and Hideo Itami.

Three belts changed hands: Daniel Bryan scored his first Intercontinental title victory, while John Cena’s US Championship triumph kicks off his fourth reign with that particular strap. The total wrestling time on the show was two hours, six minutes and 51 seconds, with Sting vs Triple H having the longest match from bell to bell, at 18 minutes and 36 seconds.

That then, was WrestleMania weekend. We’d love to know your views on the event itself, as you saw it back at home. Match of the evening? To our eyes, the honour goes to the Brock Lesnar vs. Roman Reigns main event, chiefly for the impromptu, unconventional title-winning introduction of new world champ Seth Rollins. And that ladder match. Good Lord, that ladder match...

Want more wrassle-related content? Check out our interview with .

Finally, after a few months of stellar-but-familiar sequels and re-releases in 2015, March offered some excellent games with original premises. And funnily enough, our picks for the best games of the month share a fundamental connection, despite being at opposite ends of the ESRB spectrum: they're both really, really hard. The good kind of hard, where you learn from your mistakes and grow as a player with each imposing challenge. But just be ready for a few fits of shouting and/or cursing at some point.

Every month, we look back at the best games of 2015 thus far, sorting out all the must-plays from the rest of the recent releases. That way, you know what to prioritize before you're inundated by all the other amazing . So, without further ado, here's what you should be playing right now to tide you over until next month.

somehow manages to be diamond tough and lovingly tender at the same time, balancing out its demanding difficulty with a story that'll practically yank your heartstrings right out of your chest. Playing this open-world platformer puts you in a wondrous state of conflict: the tight controls inspire you to run free throughout the lush world, but the sheer depth of the beyond-gorgeous backdrop art makes you want to stand still and gaze at the environment for hours.

The protagonist Ori is such a cute li'l critter that it's hard to watch the fuzzball die again and again while you struggle to overcome the many deathtraps and spike pits in this treacherous forest. But you'll get over any bruises to your ego, so long as you remember that you're the one responsible for plunking down checkpoints before delving into the trickier bits. The degree of challenge here may rattle anyone without an affinity for hardcore 2D platformers, but Ori's dazzling presentation has a universal, heartfelt appeal.

You’ve probably heard that is really hard. You might've heard it’s really easy. The reality lies somewhere in between. Yes, it sends an army of writhing, fanged, flayed, terrible, tormented beasts your way, beasts only someone bragging about their perceived gamer cred would ever deem a pushover. But it teaches you how to deal with them expertly, their unique attacks and defenses and behaviors, building you up until you look and feel like a great gothic badass. And when you do, you'll have earned it.

In streamlining some of Dark Souls’ complexities (the weight system, magic attacks, a few character skills here and there), Bloodborne gains a rawer sense of immediacy, with vital combat that require relentless attacking sans the comfort blanket of a shield, and unpredictable bosses that force you to develop reflexes alongside your already honed skills of pattern memorization. Oh, and the world. That mystifying, atmospheric, intricately hewn world. Developed for PS4 from the ground-up, the enigmatic Yarnham looks like a beautiful waking nightmare.

If you've yet to succumb to monster hunting fever, you might wonder what all the fuss is about. Plenty of games let you battle vicious beasties and craft fancy gear - but few can develop the kind of player investment and cooperative dedication typical of Monster Hunter. For the uninitiated, is a great way to educate yourself on its gloriously addictive ways. Not just because it's the most beginner-friendly entry in Capcom's hit series - it's also the best Monster Hunter game yet.

Gathering materials and killing harmless herbivores is really just a build-up to something greater: downing fearsome creatures after incredibly demanding battles that require true mastery of your chosen weapon. Series vets are already familiar with MH's captivating gameplay loop of fighting and looting, but the new Charge Blade and Insect Glaive playstyles offer entirely unique ways to test your prowess. If you're looking to start or join a dedicated hunting party - preferably with an expert as your guide - Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate offers the kind of adventure that can hook you for hundreds of hours.

Majora's Mask is... well, it's a bit weird. Instead of following the familiar formula that Zelda games have stuck to for years, Majora's Mask asks that you play the same three days over and over again, trying to make the world a little bit brighter each time. It's certainly strange, and more than a little stressful - but taking the time to learn its rhythm opens up one of the most intriguing and creative Legend of Zelda games ever made. Perhaps that's why, 15 years and a 3DS port later, it feels even better than ever.

Much of that feeling is thanks to the improvements found in this portable version of the N64 classic. The updated Bomber's Notebook makes tracking numerous sidequests a painless process, boss design has been retooled to make things teresting, and additional save points help make portable adventuring much more palatable. Plus, New 3DS owners even have some improved camera control with the C-Stick. Whether this is your first time playing through those ominous 72 hours or your hundredth, is a master quest that stands the test of time.

Grim Fandango is, without a doubt, one of the most unique video games ever made. The quest of an undead travel agent as he attempts to atone for his sins is a love letter to film noir greats like Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon, but it also transcends its influences to be something truly original. And with , you'll finally get to play this lost classic on your PlayStation 4, complete with (some) updated graphics and a fantastic re-recording of the original score.

Grim Fandango is also one of the most uniquely frustrating games ever made, and the Remastered edition only serves to highlight its many game-ruining bugs. Whether it's glitching out a puzzle, clipping you through a wall, or just flat out crashing, Grim Fandango Remastered actually seems buggier now than it did 17 years ago. Make no mistake: Manny's journey is still definitely one worth revisiting - just remember to save your game. Often.

sounds kinda ridiculous at first - it's literally a remastered HD version of a rebuilt SD version of the original Resident Evil. Turns out the joke's on us, though, because that's all we really needed to enjoy the survival horror staple all over again: the HD Remake gives all the main characters and the Spencer Mansion an enticing facelift but keeps the little quirks that make Resident Evil awesome/a total headache/undeniably unique.

You'll still need to manage eight (at most) inventory slots, and you'll still need to keep your distance from downed zombies - or preferably burn them on the spot. The most major change is the new default control scheme, which makes it handle more like a modern fixed-camera game, but you're free to select the old 'tank' controls if you want. With modern conveniences where it needs them and good old weirdness where it doesn't, Resident Evil HD Remake is a near masterpiece… of unlocking.

Those are the first few games that made their mark in 2015, but they won't be the last. Stay tuned to this page to see what will are the best games for every month this year. Only time will tell!

For formation on 2015's releases, be sure to check out our list of the .

Much has been said about women in games over the last few years, usually loudly and with awe-inspiring amounts of vitriol. As the diversity of the gaming market continues to expand and more people take interest in the medium, the call for more women who are more than glassy-eyed dolls or extensions of the main male character (you know, like actual women) has become tense.

Some developers struggle to pull it off, some insist curves and personality are too difficult to do at once, and some are too busy tweaking their jiggle physics engines to notice. But others have made serious strides toward creating believable women who are every bit as heroic and inspirational as their male counterparts, and just as we give kudos to Master Chief and Gordon Freeman for inspiring us to be awesome, these ladies deserve to be celebrated too. Here you have the 20 most inspirational female characters in gaming, who push us to be better by being so great themselves. You go, ladies!

JRPGs love the gentle healer archetype. A quiet and helpful character who lives to support the team, she (and it's almost always 'she') doesn't fare very well on her own, and unfortunately ends up looking weak and useless as a result. Yuna's been slapped with that label before, dubbed a dispassionate damsel with little to offer. Apparently the folks making that claim forget this girl puts the smackdown on anyone who gets in her way, whether it's bands of kidnappers, a diabolical suitor, or a god she's worshiped her entire life. Screw iron, Yuna has a will of diamond, and a desire to achieve her goals no matter what it takes.

Part of her conviction certainly comes from her time as a summoner, when she went through grueling training to make powerful magic beasts appear out of thin air using nothing but her mind. But even when the doctrine she grew up with turns out to be a lie and everyone she's trying to protect turns against her, she chooses to carve her own path and refuses to give up on what she knows is right. As they say, speak softly and carry a big staff, and Yuna does that with flourish. Yes. That's how that saying goes.

Obvious, right? Well, there’s a reason for that. Although Lara started life as a rather generously proportioned Indiana Jones substitute, after her gender was changed part way through development of the original Tomb Raider, she quickly established herself as the go-to female gaming icon. Why? Because of a lack of competition--back in the 90s, women protagonists were rarer than rocking-horse dung.

Since then, Lara has gone through several transformations. Some Tomb Raiders miss the point completely, overly sexualising Lara and making her ‘sassy’, but the most recent reboot showcases the strongest, most modern Lara Croft. It’s this iteration that earns the spot in this feature. Lara’s mental toughness and drive stands out most, although her ability to drive an arrow through her enemy’s retinas is pretty (straightens tie) eye-catching too.

The devout Cassandra takes a serious blow to her faith when she least expects it, and the hits just keep on coming. The death of her dear friend Divine Justinia would've been enough belief-battering for a lifetime, but that catastrophe only sweeps the dust off previously unknown horrors which threaten her very identity as a Templar and Seeker. While the reasonable reaction to that much tragedy would be to abandon one's faith and take up a new career as a bitter mountain hermit, Cassandra doesn't have time for reasonable. She has a Chantry to rebuild, because she's seen the good inside and knows it's worth fighting for.

While Cassandra can often come off as stubborn and unmovable, one of her main strengths is knowing when to hold fast and when to be willing to bend. She's shaken by the rapid decline of the Chantry, but never tries to deny its failings or abandon it, instead seeking to repair what she believes is broken. She's also the first to root out injustice where it lives, and almost single-handedly calls for the Inquisition while everyone else is too dizzy to think. Cassandra's an unstoppable storm, but one with a calm and quiet eye, too.

Like Lara, Ellie is a survivor; a product of her environment. While she could easily have been designed as a damsel in distress, used to reinforce the surrogate father / daughter relationship in The Last of Us, Naughty Dog was smart enough to dodge such simple stereotyping. It’s not Ellie’s capacity to kill that marks her out as a strong female character, but her ability to accept the world that’s falling apart around her.

Ellie is one of the most modern, realistic characters ever designed--regardless of gender. Obviously, there’s no telling how humanity would react in the face of a fungal apocalypse, but as with any situation, those who grow up knowing nothing different will normalise the world around them no matter how alien it may seem to everyone else. Ellie does that with aplomb.

The first lady to bear the title of Main Character in an Assassin's Creed game, Aveline more than lives up to the legacy of the Assassins that came before. A woman of mixed parentage living in New Orleans at a time when that family history could (and almost does) get her sold into slavery, Aveline isn't above putting herself in perilous situations to fight the oppression rotting her city.

One of the ways she accomplishes her goal is through a series of disguises that can get her access to anything she desires, from the holding cells of the downtrodden to the halls of high society. While some players have been quick to point out that this amounts to her playing dress-up, each outfit has strategic advantages and disadvantages, and she uses all three to great effect. While she can easily climb in a target's window and put a knife through their throat, she can also gather information from their household while posing as a slave, or ruin them socially and financially through the family business. She's a triple-threat, and that's before she starts to mix-and-match her skills between personas. You gotta love a lady who can kill someone with a parasol gun without even putting down her drink.

It says a lot when an eight-year-old girl is so much more capable than any of the adults in her general vicinity that they all turn to her for leadership. Fighting through every snarling, decomposing obstacle that gets in her way, Clementine never, ever, ever, ever gives up on the fight to survive, and the Ice Bucket Challenge would probably give you fewer chills than hearing her say, "Still. Not. Bitten."

Not that Clementine's some fearless automaton that exists outside the realm of human emotion and struggle. It's immediately clear in season one how defenseless she is, and while she does contribute to the group, she still relies heavily on Lee to defend her and makes some emotionally-charged decisions that threaten her survival. But that just makes her more inspirational, showing her growth into someone strong and capable over the course of season two. No matter the trials or the odds she faces, she fights through the pain and never lets her resolve waver. Man, I wanna be like her when I grow up.

If Gordon Freeman is the strong silent type, then Alyx Vance is his perfect--more vocal--female counterpart. She’s an exceptionally well realised character that perfectly dodges the simpering support role, while still retaining emotional depth. Sure, she’s seen and done some serious killing, but you never get the feeling that she’s lost connection with her own humanity. There are some wonderfully tender scenes between both her and her father, and Gordon himself.

Not only that, but she behaves like a normal human being. Many female characters are just convenient narrative devices used to push the story forward, making their behaviour seem less than natural, but everything Alyx does and says has both context and meaning. More like her, please.

At first glance, you’d be forgiven for lumping Bayonetta into the ‘male fantasy’ group of female video game characters. She is impossibly-well proportioned, overly sexualised, and tends to get naked. A lot. Thing is, all the sexy stuff is played for laughs, and once you strip that away (haha etc) there’s a well-rounded character lurking beneath it all.

Then there’s the fact that Bayonetta is a begrudging, but caring 'mother' figure. Instead of coddling her offspring, though, she keeps her daughter (well, er, it's not actually her daughter, it's really a younger version of Bayonetta herself, which creates an interesting paradox and oh my I've lost the thread of where I was going with this...) safe without shielding her from the (admittedly bizarre) dangers within the game. Look, no-ones saying Bayonetta is a classic female role model, but she manages to be realistically inspirational in a very unreal game.

Jaina Proudmoore is a lot of things: highborne, headstrong, so skilled with magic she can wipe your entire neighborhood off the map if you give her sass. But one thing she's not is particularly lucky. Her childhood love turns out to be kind of a monster (even before he becomes a shell for an undead demon king), her father seems intent on ruining her attempts at diplomacy, and her dead enemies have a nasty habit of climbing out of their graves. But if only one word describes her, its 'determined'.

While Jaina is certainly distraught when Arthas falls under the weight of his own corruption and her father can't see past his own pride, she refuses to let either define her life or hold her back. Instead, as a sorceress of immeasurable power, she directs her talents toward changing the world for the better, creating safe havens for the oppressed and working with Thrall to build trust between the Horde and the Alliance. She is also an incredible badass, and when the Horde turns on her and destroys what she holds dear? They couldn't run fast or far enough to escape to hell she brings down on their heads. No passive princess here.

It's clear that Celes would've been happy with a simple life in service to the Empire, and it’s hard to blame her. A skilled fighter and decorated general of the Imperial army by age 18, all she had to do was toe the party line, and she'd have nothing but a life of prosperity and esteem ahead of her. She'd have to take part in some incredible human atrocities as the Empire killed its way across the world, but that's a small price to pay for glory. Except she rejects that notion and gives up everything to fight back against the Empire's oppression and protect the people she loves.

Granted, she does retain a degree of loyalty to the Empire even after she's joined the Returners, and does betray her friends on one infamous occasion. But ultimately this just makes her feel more human, and makes her struggle to do what's right even more admirable. How easy would it have been to kill her friends when they're at their weakest and rule the world at the Emperor's right hand? The answer is very, so when Celes turns around and puts a knife in Kefka's chest instead, you know there are no ulterior motives. She just knows it's the right thing to do, and she does it no matter the personal cost.

Cowering in a corner isn’t the typical behavior of an inspirational hero, and since Amanda Ripley spends a whole lot of time doing just that, you'd think that would get her disqualified from joining from the Badass Heroes club. Sorry, let me rephrase: you'd think that if you knew nothing about Ripley and her terrifying adventures in Sevastopol, where staying hidden for a second more can be the difference between making it to the exit and being eaten alive. When Ripley takes cover, it's not a sign of weakness, but a will to survive, and she's got plenty of it to make it through that hellhole.

Not that all Ripley has on her side is non-squeak soles and a compact frame. She also has the intelligence and skills of a master engineer, and knows how to use any scrap of material she can find to her advantage. MacGuyvering weapons and tools on the fly while being mercilessly hunted, she survives on the back of her own brilliance and ability to keep her cool, even when she's staring at a murderous android through the slits in a locker door. The next time you're taking a tough exam or preparing for an interview or defusing a bomb, just ask yourself What Would Ripley Do?

In a way, Shepard is the ultimate example of equality in games. Regardless of gender, Shep is offered the same options and takes the same route towards saving man-kind from the Reapers during the course of Mass Effect’s story. The choices aren’t made on Shepard’s behalf by gender stereotypes--they’re made by the player. Even character design presents a level playing field--each female Shepard is unique.

This equality would be nothing if Shep was a total weasel, but he / she constantly shows strength and endurance in the face of adversity. In fact ‘adversity’ is too soft a term: 'catastrophe' is often closer to the truth. Shepard experiences loss, betrayal, bad press, and even death during Mass Effect, but fights through it to the bitter end. Regardless of gender, Shep is a proper gaming hero.

Most of the wondrous women are on this list because of how much they stand out. Titanfall's female pilots, on the other hand, are here for the opposite reason: they perfectly blend in. In a world where chainmail bras and armor-free midriffs are Still A Thing, a well-dressed and capable soldier who just happens to be female is a breath of fresh ozone, and they can bring the pain just like anyone else.

While that isn't to say that a lady can't be powerful and feminine - I refer you again to Aveline's assassination by parasol - it's all about the context in which she exists. Is she hunting down a mark in a dance club and has to look the part? Belly shirts and high heels all the way! But in a warzone where the bulkiness of your armor is directly proportional to how strong you are, metal go-go boots and form-fitting chest plates just say you're not meant to be taken seriously. Titanfall knows that and outfits its incredible ladies accordingly, proving that what's below your belt buckle has nothing to do with your military skill. It makes you wish you were nearly as cool as them, and isn't that kind of what inspirational means?

“Hang on… who the hell is Major Greenland?” I hear you ask. She’s the commander of the US base in the Old Town (Tashgar) level, and she appears for all of 3 minutes in a couple of separate cut-scenes. In that time, though, she steals the show by demonstrating how completely in control of her own troops she is. She’s probably the toughest, most commanding character in a game full of ridiculously macho men.

It’s not just cheap stereotyping either. Greenland isn’t over-written or grotesquely butch--she’s just an unfortunate officer who has been handed another shitty, under-resourced assignment. The fact that she does her duty with a foul-mouth and lashings of dry humour is the icing on the cake.

While Chell is the female ‘hero’ of the Portal series, it’s GlaDos who stands out as the stronger character. Look, Chell doesn’t even speak. Yes, you can interpret her actions as ‘strong’ given that she defies instruction in both games and acts on survival instinct, but that just makes her human. GlaDos, on the other hand, gives us more to admire.

GlaDos is smart enough to bide her time when she’s turned into a potato-clock by Wheatley, and rebellious enough to go against her programming when it’s needed. Between both GlaDos and Chell, Portal sends the message that it’s only human to challenge norms and authority, and that makes the pair of them a very compelling female duo.

Faith is a character of few words, but plenty of actions… usually involving death-defying free-running that would make most people feel a little . There’s little doubting her physical strength and toughness, and it’s telling that DICE chose to make her gender a non-issue by making the game first-person. While playing Mirror’s Edge, you could equally be controlling a man.

Throw in Faith’s healthy disrespect for a corrupt government, and her willingness to stick up for weaker characters while putting her own life at risk, and it’s safe to say she’s a first-class female protagonist.

One of the greatest tricks Nintendo ever pulled was convincing the world it doesn't exist. Hang on, wrong cultural reference. One of the greatest tricks it did pull was keeping Samus’ gender a total secret right until the end of Metroid. And not just the regular ending either--you need to finish the game under pretty harsh conditions to earn the knowledge. Or you can just look on YouTube, I guess.

Back in 1986, female protagonists were super-scarce, which perhaps explains why Nintendo kept Samus’ gender ambiguous. On the one hand, it could be a statement about how women shouldn’t be treated differently to men in games. On the other, it could well have been a ploy to avoid alienating a group of players accustomed to seeing leading men in games. In reality, it’s probably a mixture of both.

There’s no shortage of ‘girly’ tropes in No One Lives Forever (lipstick explosive devices, anyone?), but protagonist Kate Archer proves that female leads don’t need to ditch their femininity to be taken seriously. She’s a strangely comfortable half-way house between James Bond and Austin Powers, meaning she can quite happily mix the light hearted stuff with more serious terrorist-fragging.

By more modern gaming standards, No One Lives Forever is a little hammy. It’d be great to see the series revived with a more up-to-date reboot, much like the latest Tomb Raider game. Sadly, that’s hugely unlikely to happen.

Given the often goofy nature of the Yakuza series (and a general trend for Japanese games to feature weaker women), it seems an odd place to find a compelling female character. However, while Kazuma Kiryu--series lead, and total badass--is the star of each game, he owes his life and humanity to his adopted daughter figure, Haruka.

While Kaz is away knocking 7 shades of shit out of his enemies, Haruka essentially runs the Sunshine Orphanage in Okinawa. She cares for kids who are barely younger than her, and the resulting ‘mature outlook on life’ she gets from this allows her to offer Kazuma valuable advice throughout the Yakuza series. Sure, she sometimes plays the damsel in distress, but these moments of fragility only arise from her relationship with Kaz and her youth, not the strength of her character.

Samantha is the only character on this list who doesn’t actually appear in a game at all. Players discover her story while exploring the family house as her sister in Gone Home. However, you actually learn more about Sam than your own character during the game, which probably makes her the real star.

And everything you discover points towards a strong female character, struggling against the rather old-fashioned attitudes of her family. No spoilers here (as the game isn’t yet a year old and it has just been confirmed for console), but the way Samantha kicks back against society and the will of her parents is something to be admired.

Want more amazing ladies in your life? Well, not sure how much we can help with that, but you can sure read about them! Check out .

When Assassin’s Creed Chronicles: China was announced last year as part of Unity’s cancelled Season Pass, it looked like a pretty addition to the franchise but perhaps something that would sit better on mobiles than the intended PS4, Xbox One and PC. Side-scrolling 2.5D stabbing? Really? The AC universe is surely all about exploration and freedom? But, now part of a trilogy that also travels to both India and Russia, it transpires that this is a much more substantial affair than we thought. Going hands on with Chronicles: China and Chronicles: India proves that the series fits 2.5D like the arm of a certain Italian nobleman into a Da Vinci designed gauntlet.

Developed by Climax Studios in association with Ubisoft Montreal, the key pillars of the series haven’t been forgotten. The main focus is on stealthy super-sneaking, but the stylised environments are far teractive than they first seem. Neither has all-out combat been forgotten, watercolour blood spatters spraying the screen during many a satisfying throwdown . Let’s take a look at the ways Chronicles keeps to the Creed without that pesky half dimension. Because it does a very convincing job indeed.

Those familiar with the series will feel instantly at home with Chronicles control scheme. The ol’ free running sits happily on the right trigger while the left is on crouching and sliding duties. The flowing movement of the Brotherhood hasn’t been forgotten here. Protagonist Shao Jun is nimble. Climbing between ledges before yanking an enemy off his feet with a rope dart is effortless and delightfully slick - wait, sick, that should be sick - experience. Sliding under timed doors is consustently fun, and there’s a particularly nifty new slide-and-assassinate motion that looks more than a tad painful for everyone involved.

The side-scrolling action flows nicely into the series' existing play-style, and the lack of a third-dimension almost entirely eradicates any of awkward the ‘Oh Arno/ Ezio/ Edward/ Altair’ climbing moments we’ve all encountered over the years. Shao Jun jumps neatly and happily in and out of windows, and she can leap between hiding spots with a simple tap of a button and slide of the analogue stick. Meanwhile in India, reminiscent of the Ezio trilogy, Arbaaz Mir takes on perilous environmental hazards as he leaps between stalactites crumbling under his weight.

Yes, never fear, haystacks and haycarts clearly have their place in 16th century China too. Climax Studios has intently focussed on stealth - which makes complete sense for Chronicles’ more focused, side scrolling design - and that means plenty of hiding spots to pick off guards. Under ledges, inside shadowy doors, behind pillars, in the long grass like a Lost World velociraptor… Shao Jun can make herself invisible in all of them and pick off enemies with a snap of the neck. Hiding bodies is essential too, and it’s in the little moments where you snatch a corpse just in time before plonking it into the shadows that the stealth shines.

It’s also worth noting how satisfying it is to finally know exactly what guards can see too. Every enemy has an awareness cone, a simple beam of light that means you can stay just out of eyeline if you play your sneaking right. Carrying forward Assassin’s traditional colour coding, get spotted and this goes yellow before quickly turning red if you don’t hot foot it out of sight.

Shao Jun redefines the idea of a hidden blade in one exceptionally delightful, not to mention nasty, move. Sneaking up behind an enemy until a skull indicates that an assassination can occur, she will shake a blade out of her boot and with a swift kick will embed it crunchily in her unsuspecting victim’s face. Nice. Meet the Footblade.

Jun is also armed to the teeth with a Jian sword, throwing daggers for snapping ropes - to drop items and distract guards - and an ultra-useful rope dart that can be used to gain access to the ceiling for Spiderman-style hunting of enemies. Jun also has a handful of firecrackers to throw in villainous faces as a distraction tool before creeping past undetected. In Chronicles: India, Arbaaz Mir has a different set of deadly toys including a traditional disc weapon known as a Chakram for throwing in the same manner as Jun’s daggers. In Russia, the less agile Orelov is armed with a rifle, which is certainly less stealthy but gets the job done when it comes to taking down foes.

The main focus for Chronicles might be on stealth, but that doesn’t mean these Assassins can’t murder folks hand to hand (blade to blade) like the best of them. Combat controls will be familiar to Creed aficionados but they’re not identical. None other than Ezio Auditore himself teaches Shao Jun to brawl in a handy White Room where you learn normal and heavy attacks, as well as how to dodge crossbow bolts, and a stylish leap over the heads of enemies.

The counter button must be pressed at the exact moment an enemy goes to strike, and combat overall keeps you more on your toes than ever before. The lack of that extra third dimension means it might look as though enemies are queueing up to strike, but Shao Jun’s overhead counter move is essential, and the relentlessness of enemies armed with crossbows makes for tough battles overall. Add in an exceptionally low health bar, soldiers armed with shields, and Reinforcement Zones where more guards will hurtle in from doorways, and sneaking in the shadows is far less stressful than a full-on brawl.

Even in 2.5D there’s no escaping the rather useful second sight that travels down the Assassin lineage. Eagle Vision in Chronicles is handy not only for clearly identifying enemies - that’ll be them in red as usual - but now has an essential indicator of enemy paths. Guards have set rotas and you can see their plans to make sure you map your movements accordingly. Enemies need to be predictable if you’re aiming to get by undetected sneaking into a hiding place.

Chronicles will reward you with a stealth rating after each encounter, which adds up bonus unlocks at the end of each level. Setting off distractions - such as cutting the ropes of wind-chimes or throwing a dagger at a caged bird (to make it chirp, you animals!) - work as nice ways to keep enemies busy if you don’t fancy getting blood on your footblade.

Assassin’s lore hasn’t been forgotten here. Despite no mention of the modern day aspect of the series, there are plenty of gentle reminders that you’re still in Animus territory. Those glittering fragments hide in hard-to-reach places for the collect ‘em all fans of the Brotherhood, and will unlock various pieces of Animus lore and juicy character information and history. Plus, in a nice touch and an attractive contrast with the 16th century art style, the awareness cone of enemies is represented by animus fragments.

And plot-wise, there’s no escaping the fact that we’re in the delightfully ridiculous realm of Eden Apples and giant laser temples. Shao Jun is questing not only to avenge the death of her Brotherhood in China, but also to get back an Artifact taken from her, while a section I played of Chronicles: India is set in one of the Vaults of the First Civilisation.

It was never going to be easy to transform the series into a side-scroller, but Chronicles currently seems to nail it. It not only manages to look like Ubisoft concept art come to life, but has managed to get in more than enough AC staples while making them feel entirely right in the new format. Sync points let you unlock extra items on the map - complete with an exclamation mark for your main mission - while Shao Jun’s leap of faith is complete with scattering birds.

This might be a 2D world in practical terms, but the camera glides smoothly around corners, adding new levels of perspective and extra depth as you swing or run cinematically between layers. Instead of the white of the original series, splashes of red show you where to go next, and there’s a surprising amount of choice in the ways you can explore (highlighted spectacularly as I get lost exploring the Great Wall Of China). The Chronicles trilogy looks to play with the conventions of the Creed just enough, and with a beautiful fresh art style for each entry, it’s going to be interesting to see how that feeds into differing gameplay in the different locations. .

If you're a series fan, you know exactly what you're in for with 's slate of upcoming DLC. That's not really a bad thing, mind - the heavyweight shooter series knows how to make a map pack sing, with oodles of new score streaks and timed events to keep players guessing. Not to mention the indispensable Exo Zombies mode, which expands on CoD's fine tradition of cheesy undead survival with super-powered exoskeletons for everybody. Check the trailer for Episode 2: Extinction below to see for yourself.

As per usual, each pack will hit Xbox One and Xbox 360 first, with release on all the other platforms expected about a month later. Each of the four packs is available on its own for $14.99/£11.59 or as part of the $49.99/£34.99 season pass - which includes a few other bonuses such as the Atlas Gorge map and early access to DLC weapons. Click on for more details on the Ascendance and Havoc map packs, and check back in for more as the season rolls on!

Advanced Warfare's Ascendance DLC map pack, set to go live on Xbox 360 and Xbox One on March 31, is all about getting vertical - kind of like those old Mountain Dew commercials, but with a high-tech grappling hook instead of a sailboard. Players can use the new gadget to zoom around Perplex, Site 244, Climate, and Chop Shop, but only in the Exo Grapple playlist.

Ascendance also adds the new OHM directed energy LMG/shotgun hybrid for use in competitive matches (which Xbox season pass owners are already using to shoot through walls) and its customized variant. Meanwhile, the second episode of the four-player co-op Exo Zombies campaign takes John Malkovich and company to the outskirts of an Atlas facility, where they'll (hopefully) overcome new zombie hordes with a unique selection of traps and weapons. Click on for screens of all the maps and details on previous DLC.

You want more competitive maps? Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare's Havoc DLC has more competitive maps. Four more, to be exact: Core, Urban, Drift, and Sideshow, and you can click on to see screenshots and brief synopses for each one. But what good is a bunch of new stages without some new guns to carve them up? Thankfully, Havoc also drops in the AE4 directed energy assault rifle and its customized variant, the AE4 Widowmaker.

Advanced Warfare's first DLC pack also includes the first episode of the Exo Zombies campaign, which sees four civilian employees of the Atlas corporation struggling to survive against an outbreak among the company's elite soldiers. And yes, it amps up the now-standard camp factor, complete with face-captured performances from John Malkovich, Bill Paxton, Rose McGowan, and Jon Bernthal to give Kevin Spacey a run for his PMC money.

We're already halfway through Advanced Warfare's Season Pass, but we'll still be sure to give you all the details on the Supremacy and Reckoning map packs as we get them. Until then, what's your favorite map so far? Let us know in the comments!

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It's a real feat for a game to actually surprise you. We've entered an age where every character reveal, every playable mode, multiplayer feature, or gameplay quirk is carefully calculated and announced at the most opportune moment to build hype to an absolute fever pitch. By the time you've bought the game, you've likely already been exposed to nearly everything except the ending (and sometimes that, too).

But sometimes, the PR machine waves a character in your face with their left hand, while holding the super secret true playable character behind their back with their right. Or we already know who the characters are, but then find out you get to control the sidekick once the main hero finds themselves in quite the pickle. However it happens, a proper fake-out is a rare thing in video gaming, and these are some of the most satisfying switcheroos ever. Needless to say, there will be spoilers.

Ubisoft loves to tell people about its games. It seems that in the weeks leading to an upcoming release that Ubi can't go more than a couple of days without showing some new 'dev diary' or revealing every single, granular gameplay feature. But even after hours of behind-the-scenes footage and character profiles, fans weren't prepared to spend the first six hours of Assassin's Creed 3 as British transplant Haytham Kenway, and not his son Connor.

Say what you will about the pacing of those opening hours (OK, fine, yes, they were a tad slow), but they set the stage for Connor's own tale of revenge and redemption. This posh chap has a hidden blade! He's looking for artifacts from the First Civilization! He's… a templar? What the hell? It's a bold move for Ubisoft, and I'm surprised that the whole thing hadn't been detailed in a five part mini-documentary two months before release.

BioShock 2 puts you in the role of one of Rapture's hulking Big Daddies, but there's a surprising bit near the end that puts you in the shoes of another iconic denizen of the underwater city. After losing consciousness, a particularly adept bit of handwaving puts you in control of a Little Sister, allowing you to wander through Rapture's vents and hidden crevices. With this flip, BioShock 2 turns into a whole different game, as most of the citizens you come across don't even react to you. You even catch a glimpse of Rapture as it was during the old days, before everything went to hell, thanks to the Little Sister's special vision.

Unfortunately, the moment is fleeting, lasting only a handful of minutes. Being forced to wander around Rapture and avoiding splicers while sucking Adam out of the recently deceased could have been a twist that rivalled the 'would you kindly' of the original Bioshock. Instead, you pick up a few items and are back in the Big Daddy suit in the time it takes to watch a commercial break. Still, the brief time spent looking through the eyes of a Little Sister is hauntingly effective, revealing sight into the twisted lore of Andrew Ryan's failed creation.

Following up one of the greatest JRPGs of all time is a tall order, so there was practically no way Chrono Cross could ever hope to escape the shadow of its predecessor. Even so, it certainly has its charm, and it's got a few surprises and fake-outs of its own. Case in point: half-way through this adventure, you end up switching bodies with the main villain of the game.

Yes, technically you're still hero Serge, only now you're stuck inside of the body of an evil talking cat. But this Freaky Friday scenario actually impacts how you play, and not just because you have a different set of techs to use in combat. Now that you're the big bad, all of the heroes you've recruited this far want nothing to do with you, so you have to find a totally new set of companions to help you regain control of your actual body. It's not as bold as killing of the main character like the first game did, but it's pretty damn close.

Oh, no! We've been captured by zombies and tossed into an underground prison with no hope for escape. Though, I suppose that's better than being eaten alive, but still! Who will save us? Only thing we can do now is pray: "You are a friend who I have never met before. If you hear this message, go to the south."

And suddenly, you're not playing as Ness anymore. You're now a boarding school student named Jeff, who lives several continents away from where Ness and Paula are held captive. After receiving this mysterious telepathic message, you break out of school, cross a pond with the help of the Loch Ness monster and a monkey obsessed with bubble gum, and make your way through a dungeon built by a guy who loves to build dungeons. Finally, you find your father, who has been working in his lab on a flying machine. After an awkward exchange of pleasantries, you're off to finally rescue the best friends you've never met before.

What's a list of potential fake-outs without an appearance from Metal Gear Solid 2? You'd be forgiven if you thought you'd be spending most of your time playing as series mainstay Solid Snake. I mean, he was only featured in every E3 trailer, the demo that came with Zone of the Enders, and even the cover of the goddamn box. But nope, as soon as you beat the Tanker chapter (which will likely only take a couple of hours), you're spending the rest of the game as newcomer Raiden.

If you're like me, you probably went through the five stages of grief in real-time. It starts with denial ("Maybe he's just wearing a voice modulator… and grew his hair out… and changed his name…"), moves on to anger ("I can't believe Kojima would trick us like this!"), and trucks right on through to bargaining ("Just let me play as Snake for a few minutes, and I'll buy all your games. Even Boktai!") and depression ("...stupid game."). But then, as we looked back, we realized what a ballsy move it was to drop Snake for the second act, and that Raiden wasn't such a bad character after all. And thus, acceptance.

The Arkham series actually takes more than a few cues from the Metal Gear series, with its emphasis on stealth and its uncanny ability to surprise the player and get inside their head. The Scarecrow bits from Asylum and the Mad Hatter side quest in City both evoke that same sense of "hey, wait, is my game broken" found in the best parts of Metal Gear. They even share a similar character switching moment, though Arkham City is kind enough to give Batman back to us when it's done.

You're given control of Catwoman a few times throughout the course of Arkham City, as she goes on the prowl, looking for thugs to beat up and valuables to steal. She controls similarly to Bats, but she's much more lithe, agile, and her whip can make quick work of her opposition's weaponry. While her inclusion was announced prior to the game's release, the best part wasn't. Near the end of Arkham City, Batman is in mortal danger and Catwoman has a choice: Does she take the cash and walk out of the bank vault, leaving the city behind, or does she reluctantly drop the money and go save Gotham's last hope? Arkham City actually lets you pick option A, complete with a fake roll to credits as she strolls out of the vault.

The Last of Us features not one, but two incredibly impactful character switches. The first happens right at the beginning, when you're put in the shoes of Joel's daughter, Sarah. She wanders bleary eyed and groggy around her house, looking for her dad while teaching you basic movement and interaction controls… and finds herself smack in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. When the perspective finally shifts to Joel, you know that some truly bad shit is going down.

And then, about halfway through the game, it happens again, this time thrusting you in control of Joel's new companion, Ellie. After getting impaled by a piece of rebar, Joel is (understandably) too weak to walk, or even stay conscious. And so now you play as Ellie, as you try to combine all of the skills that Joel taught you over the months to hunt for game, look for medicine, and survive. While she doesn't have Joel's brute strength, she more than makes up for it with her resourcefulness and that knife she carries around.

As outlaw John Marston, you've travelled to Mexico and back, you've finally taken out Bill Williamson and his gang, and gained amnesty for your crimes thanks to a deal with the government. Now that you're back at home, you're running through tutorial missions again, this time teaching your son Jack how to rope horses and wrangle cattle. You've been away for a long time, but now, you can finally settle down and bequeath life lessons to your child and steer him on the right path.

Until the government reneges on their deal, shows up on your doorstep and guns you down in cold blood. This is the part where the credits are supposed to roll… except that they don't, and now you're in control of an older, angrier, hairier Jack as he attempts to get revenge on those who took his father away from him. This character switch is brilliant because it doesn't just set up the post-story free-for-all most open world games provide. It also calls directly back to the cyclical nature of violence and tragedy that Red Dead Redemption's themes have been touching on the entire time.

It's nice to get surprised by a secret playable character, and it's even better when the change makes for a dramatic turn in the story, or reveals some surprising, undiscovered detail about the world around the protagonist. What are some of your favorite character switches? Let me know in the comments!

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One of the best ways to tell a game you love it is to play on the hardest difficulty. It's a show of commitment, a sign of willingness to learn the in's-and-out's of a game in exchange for an engrossing challenge that'll blister your thumbs and rattle your brain. And only a select, dedicated few ever attempt such a feat - let alone succeed. Just look at any global achievement or trophy rankings if you don't believe me. Hell, most players don't typically finish the game in question, regardless of difficulty.

Each entrant on this list has accomplished something most players never will. They stand alone, stoic and proud, having faced horrors and surmounted challenges that have destroyed so many others. But where do you fall within these hallowed halls? Nearly every game out there either has some crazy achievement to unlock or is just innately difficult. Which one rises to the top as your crowning gaming achievement?

Ninja Gaiden is like a Shakespearean romance: beautiful, but cruel and unfair and with a really horrible camera system. Maybe that analogy doesn't work. Point is, Ninja Gaiden isn't just hard because of its unrelenting, swarming enemies and overpowered bosses. It's fundamentally broken - and staying with a broken game is diamond-on-diamond hard. Keeping track of Ryu Hayabusa’s jumping, spinning frame as he runs along walls means the slob on the camera gets left behind, clipping and pin-balling against the environment, trying its best to keep up. Learning the camera’s limitations is just as gruelling as mastering the actual game - how and when to block, exploiting enemy patterns, and budgeting my spend in the shops. Coming out of a fight with an inventory full of potions was a symphony of controller, man and game, with each playing its own movement.

Getting all of this right (or at least learning the technical limitations) was beyond satisfying, and there are parts of this game that are forever burned into my cortex. This was complete mastery, a stubborn, defiant 'up yours' to a gremlin - the sodding camera - that threatened to tank one of the greatest action games ever made. I loved you, Ninja Gaiden, but what should I have expected? The course of true love never did run smooth.

The Game Gear version of Sonic 2 is insane. It's identical to the already-tough Master System version, only there's one crucial difference: the zoomed-in viewpoint. This may make Sonic big and detailed, showcasing the 8-bit handheld's power, but it also makes it impossible to react to anything ahead of you. Maybe Sonic Team forgot during the conversion that 8-bit Sonic 2 also features one of the most ludicrous spring sections in any game ever. Single springs, hundreds of feet apart. No way to see them coming. With insta-death in-between. That's probably why you can rack up countless extra lives in Green Hill Zone. You really need them.

So I actually 'learned' Sonic 2. The exact cloud tiles under which lay an invisible spring to reach a Chaos Emerald way up in the sky. How many microseconds I had to release the d-pad in order to scrub enough speed to reach the next platform in Green Hill's boss level. The sequence of pipe direction changes to beat the boss. I did it all, got all of the Chaos Emeralds, finished the secret level and saved Tails. Can I do that today, some 23 years later? NOPE.

"What," I hear you cry, "the game where you play as a small, sticky blob? The charming LittleBigPlanet-alike where you build the soundtrack as you collect little happy notes?" Yup, that’s the one. The one with Death Mode. The practically impossible Death Mode that must be completed in its entirety in order to gain a shiny platinum trophy. And I wanted that trophy. Badly. So badly that I think, somewhere in the darkness, part of my brain is still playing Sound Shapes.

Twenty unique mini levels unlock once you’ve completed the main campaign. The goal is to collect a number of randomly placed notes within a time limit, dodging various deadly hazards: 20 notes in 30 seconds, 19 notes in 37 seconds, you get the idea. There’s no way to cheat, and no tips. It's just you and your thumbs. Facing death over and over again, I reached a zen-like state. I would do levels 50 times in one sitting. And yes, I won in the end. My last level was Aquatica: a hell spawned combination of underwater flight and spinning blades. I don’t think I could even speak when it was over.

While it may not be a full game, BioShock Infinite's Clash in the Clouds DLC is definitely the hardest stand-alone dollop of game I've ever played. While its baseline goal is pretty simple - clear a given stage of all enemies to advance, rinse and repeat - in a fit of unquenchable achievement thirst, I decided to attempt the Blue Ribbon Challenge.

For those who haven't heard about this study in gaming masochism, it works like this: every stage has a Blue Ribbon condition, where you're rewarded with a bit of colorful digital fabric for abiding by a specific handicap. Sometimes it's easy ("Defeat all enemies with the shotgun"), sometimes it's tricky ("Defeat five enemies with a single Devil's Kiss blast"), and sometimes it's so punishing and exact that you'll want to rip your hair out and eat it because you've gone a bit over the edge. We're talking challenges where you have to make specific enemies kill themselves with a specific move while airborne, or spend ten minutes picking off baddies with environment traps and then lose because two guys shot each other at the last second. Oh yeah, and there's SIXTY STAGES! And yet, somehow, I pulled it off after hours of incredible adversity, ripping victory from the putrid pits of failure. I AM THE BEAST OF AMERICA!

Crushing difficulty doesn't add new variables to Uncharted 2's environmental puzzles, and it doesn't make the wall-scaling, cliff-leaping exploration segments any more death-defying. Actually, that second point isn't entirely true, because you are dead if an enemy catches you climbing that lamppost. Crushing difficulty lets baddies absorb more damage, making fast and frequent headshots essential to your survival, and lets any shmuck with a pistol drop you after a few shots, meaning you either find cover or die outright.

One of Uncharted's common criticisms is that it devotes too much time to stop-and-pop gunfights. I totally agree, but I love Uncharted 2 so much that I still felt compelled to bump up the difficulty and start over every time I finished. Thankfully, Crushing isn't too bad once you learn to always stay near cover, but that final battle / hide-and-seek match with Lazarevic was almost too much - almost. I have a Gold Trophy to prove I could do it, which, according to the timestamp, I earned at 4:19 on a Sunday morning. Priorities.

Imagine if Super Ghouls 'n Ghosts and Rastan had a baby. Now imagine that baby leaping out of its crib, knocking you to the ground, and putting you into a headlock until you blacked out. That aggressive little tyke would be Volgarr the Viking, a hardcore 2D platformer that takes after its brutal forefathers with gameplay that demands your absolute focus. The magnificently bearded protagonist Volgarr takes after Capcom's Sir Arthur in all the best ways, from his weighty, fixed-trajectory double-jumping, to his power-ups (found in hidden chests) that shatter when you take a single hit. If you lose your fire sword and sweet steel shield midway through a level, you may as well jump headlong into the nearest lava pit.

Volgarr's difficulty curve is the best kind: seemingly impossible at first, but full of patterns and predictable enemy movements that you'll pick up on after the first dozen or so deaths. And like a Super Nintendo cartridge with no battery saves or passwords, quitting out means restarting the whole shebang from scratch. Or so I thought, because if memory serves, I finished the game completely oblivious to the fact that you can resume your progress by simply walking to the left at the beginning of each stage. Oh well, still worth it.

This throwback downloadable is one of my all-time favorites, even if it's the most taxing title I've ever completed. The game is agony and ecstasy: the pain of dying dozens, even hundreds of times in the same brutal stage, followed by the joy of finally completing it. Super Meat Boy starts with a modest challenge, then escalates to the point where I'm very close to smashing the controller.

Super Meat Boy's fake-out finale was the moment when I nearly gave up. I spent close to two hours trying to beat what I thought was the last stage, and I was near tears when I beat it. Then SMB goes all Metroid on me, surprising me with an 'escape the exploding stage' challenge. The whiplash of emotions had me cursing the Heavens so loud that I'm surprised my neighbors didn't call the police. It's a credit to the game that I pushed through my rage to ultimately beat the game and about half of the new game +.

"I made it to Shredder in the original TMNT :( But gave up and didn't beat it."

Sophia's story of struggle and loss is a somber tribute to all those who have fallen short of these trying challenges. And, to be fair, we all have more failures than successes in the realm of gaming, but it's those very same failures that make our achievements shine that much brighter. So, what about you? What is the most difficult game (or in-game challenge) you've ever completed? Let us known in the comments below.

For an added challenge on GR+ look up .

Despite what you may have heard, old games aren't crap. In fact, some of them are quite the opposite. The kind of games you could take home to meet your parents, who would later remark at how dashing they were, even with that streak of grey in their perfectly-styled, cartridge-black hair. And you only have to look at our list of the to see that no fewer than four of our top 10 are more than 10 years old (which will be our cut-off point for 'retro' in this article, for argument's sake).

But there's a problem. Modern technology isn't kind to old games. Fuzzy RF connections make playing old consoles on modern TVs a harrowing experience. Modern technology highlights their flaws. Modern technology has pointed out the weird spit stuff at the edges of their mouths and that their shoes are made from mammoth hide. Sure, you can try getting together the right kit like an HD upscaler to help, but the simple fact remains that old games look their best when they're reworked to be the best they can on modern consoles. And that's what we're here to celebrate: the best modern retro conversions money can buy. Get Ready!

Sometimes, developers think it's wise to change a game's art style when re-releasing it. That's only going to annoy long-term fans, unless it turns out to be exactly how they imagined the first game to look in the first place. Well, The Secret of Monkey Island fixes that problem by letting you switch between the two at any moment.

And who can resist doing exactly that, all the time? You can even play a sort of 'spot the difference', as long as you don't just keep saying "well, that one's made of huge pixels and that one isn't". You'll be there a long time if you do. There's also a completely re-recorded soundtrack, made with real instruments (yes, wow!). As for the game itself, Monkey Island is still the funny, charming, lovable point-and-click adventure masterpiece it always was, only now in HD and sat on your dashboard.

Nintendo had the best of intentions when it decided to port a selection of NES games to 3DS, complete with stereoscopic 3D visuals. Turns out it took so much work to convert the games, Nintendo decided it would be just as much effort to make new games instead, so stopped making the conversions. But at least we got this sensational port of Kid Icarus. The handheld world (and humanity's collective awareness of the existence of eggplants) is better for its existence.

But why? Well, it's ultra-hardcore, pixel-perfect platforming action straight from the '80s. That finely honed 2D gameplay never looked or felt this good. There are new backgrounds with variable levels of depth, a full save system instead of the original NES game's passwords, and tweaks to the game's physics. That last one preserves the acceleration effect of the original if you want a more authentic experience, or affords new, super-tight control for those who crave precision. You did good, kid. You did good.

Daytona received no fewer than three separate home conversions before Xbox 360 and PS3 finally . Everything is just as you remember it from the mid-'90s, which is actually nothing like the original actually looks if you play it now in standard definition. 1995's finest chunky 3D car models look superb through HDMI, and the blue sky and green grass are outrageously bold viewed on a decent modern TV. New games are scared of colours like this.

But there are more options and modes to play with that don't appear in the arcade game, including an endurance mode that sees you actively seeking to preserve your tyres, as you'll start struggling for traction unless you pit in. There's also online play, although you'd have to arrange with someone these days as the servers are almost certainly empty. Best of all (disclaimer: may be the opposite) is a karaoke mode so you can sing along with 'Let's Go Away'. All together now: Daytonaaaaaaaaa!

The original Half-Life is rightly held up as a watershed moment for narrative-driven first-person games, but it first came out in 1998. In case you didn't know, that's the same year that dinosaurs became extinct. So to say 3D visuals have 'moved on a bit' is like saying iPhones are a bit better than two cups and a bit of string. Suffice to say, trying to suspend your disbelief enough to enjoy Half-Life now requires a lot of determination.

Or rather a lot of determination to fix it. A group of fans decided to remake Half-Life in its entirety using Valve's Source engine – the one that powers Half-Life 2. Models, textures… the lot. The result is so impressive, Valve gave it their official support and the majority is already available to download (for free) on Steam. The remaining portion's release remains TBA. Even so, the existing part is exactly how it should be and you should play it.

Nevermind all the online issues for a minute (I know, they're unforgivable), let's focus on the great conversion of Halo 2 for Xbox One, as part of . The original Halo had already been given an anniversary edition that rejigged the visuals and added online play, but Halo 2's facelift is a major reason for buying the new collection on its own.

It's so solid. Everything looks like it's actually there and would provide tangible resistance if you could somehow prod it through the TV screen. But, best of all, despite a major cosmetic overhaul, it plays exactly like the original. Nothing's been changed - something that's proven with a toggle button that switches between the old visuals and new in real-time, just like Monkey Island. Of course, Halo 2 was already excellent. Play on the original graphics setting now, however, and you'll be struck by how Spartan everything looks. Which is also an incredible pun. What's that? I'm fired? OK, it's a fair cop.

The wonderful thing about Oddworld: New Tasty is that it's not a 1:1 recreation of the original game, it's a 1:1 recreation of what you remember the original game being like. Why? Because it doesn't look like that anymore. The pre-rendered graphics may have aged better than most PSone titles, but they're no substitute for a powerhouse console actually drawing these detailed environments in real-time.

And the power of new-gen (it's been on PS4 for a while but it's hitting Xbox One, too) means it all looks so beautifully effortless. All the expression in Abe's face, all the animated production lines… it's blissfully slick. And the game is still absolutely lovely, in its own slightly icky way. Follow me. OK. Parp.

What happened to gung-ho 2D side-scrollers? They were everywhere in the arcades of the 1980s. Maybe everyone forgot to take them out of the arcades when they got closed down. Ah well, as long as we have remakes this good, it's no great loss.

is one of the best last-gen PSN/XBLA games you can buy. Amazing, considering it's a pretty straight port of a game from 1987. Why is it so good? Graphical enhancements, control improvements, a new final level and countless other small adjustments that make the experience amazing. Is his arm his wife in this one? It's hard to tell.

The you can buy on the App Store isn't the same Sonic CD that appeared on Mega CD/Sega CD back in 1992. It's a remake. It started life as a proof-of-concept by Christian Whitehead, running on his Retro Engine, and was so impressive that Sega hired him to make an official port that found its way to Android, Xbox 360 and PS3, too. It's brilliantly authentic, yet demonstrably better than the Mega CD original in every way.

The frame-rate has been smoothed out and is so consistent, it would probably run at 60fps if you loaded it on a toaster. The original, famous Japanese/English soundtrack is now available in all territories, but the US version is in there too if that's what makes you happy. There's retina display support for iOS and widescreen as standard, plus the all-new ability to play as Tails, once you finish the game once as Sonic. It's the best handheld Sonic game ever made – and it was never even meant to be on handheld. Funny how things work out, isn't it?

M2 is the team responsible for all of Sega's 3D classics on 3DS, and 3D OutRun represents the pinnacle of its work. You get a pixel-perfect recreation of the 1986 coin-op (except for the unlicensed Ferrari sprite, which has been tweaked), only better. First-off, it now supports widescreen, meaning you can see things you never would have seen in the original. There are two new music tracks that run on the original MIDI sounds from the arcade board. Fully emulated, too. Selectable Old/New and Japanese/International hardware configurations. Oh, and a daft new credits sequence.

But there's much more going on under the surface. The arcade original ran at 30 frames per second, which was always astonishingly smooth as these massive sprites were scaled effortlessly (some say 'rampantly') all over the screen. 3D OutRun runs at 60fps, which will leave your face melted like Jack Black's after that guitar solo in School of Rock. Sixty. Frames. Per. Second. Oh and in 3D too? The original game's sprites were all calculated in 3D space anyway so of course the effect is gorgeous. This is how you do it. Needless to say, you have to buy it right now.

You never know what developer Turtle Rock has cooking in its mad scientist, monster-birthing labs. started off with a fire-breathing Goliath, a lightning-charged flying Kraken, a ghost with razor blades for hands, and twelve unique hunters to fight against those monstrosities. Not enough variety for you? Well, the developers don't think so either. There's DLC to be made, and the designers are busy brainstorming and concocting new creatures and hunters to add to Evolve's competitive multiplayer.

Evolve's first DLC is adding one new monster, four hunters, the Observer mode, and two environments. Not a small amount of content. The DLC characters are made playable to those who purchase the DLC pack, but even if you don't buy in, you can still play alongside the new characters and monsters in the added maps when the DLC releases on March 31 on Xbox One and April 30 for PC and PS4. For more details on the new monster, hunters, and maps, check out the following slides.

The Behemoth is (as you might have guessed from its name) the largest monster in the roster. This giant beast is tall, wide, and covered head to toe in rock armor (except for the exposed guts on its belly), allowing it to absorb more damage than its monster counterparts. The Behemoth may look like a slow, lumbering beast at first glance, but once its special abilities get added to the equation, a skilled Behemoth can get away from and single out members of any hunter team.

One of the Behemoth's most useful skills is the roll, which may be the best way to travel in Evolve. It curls up into a giant, fiery boulder allowing you to traverse the map's flat paths rapidly, making the map's windy roads and paths feel like a giant pinball game. On top of that, the monster can smash the ground to create a towering rock to block off or trap enemies, and grab hunters at a distance with a tongue grab. For damage dealing, lava bombs can be used to ignite areas with precision-thrown fireballs, and the fissure ability sends out a flaming path of destruction directly in front of the Behemoth.

If you mixed the Terminator with a Viking warrior, you'd end up with Torvald. Most of his body is robotic - a result of the monster attack on the planet Shear - but all those mechanical parts just help make him a devastating killing machine who can deal massive amounts of damage at any distance.

Torvald can pour on the pain like no other assault hunter in the game. His back has two artillery cannons attached to it, giving you the ability to hit slow moving targets at long range with an explosive, area-of-effect barrage. When the battle gets up close and personal, he can deploy shrapnel grenades that weaken the monster and enhance the incoming damage from your team. Plus, he has an eight round, auto-fire shotgun that blasts all eight shots in one trigger pull. If you're the monster, you don't want to be anywhere near this guy.

Slim looks like he belongs on the monster side of Evolve's matchmaking given his insect carapace and buggy eyeballs, but, don't be fooled: Slim was once human. His insect body is what you get when gene splicing is motivated by experimental war science. But despite his appearance and insectoid claws, Slim is a pretty badass medic.

Slim is a front lines fighter who charges in and fights his battles up close. His leech gun rapidly builds his healing burst, allowing you to heal nearby teammates every five seconds as opposed to the regular 20 second cooldown. He also carries a healing drone that can be sent to heal a single teammate or pick up a downed ally. For defense, he can deploy a spore cloud, preventing the monster from sniffing and seeing its enemies highlighted on screen. A loss of sniff power might not sound like a huge setback, but it's surprisingly difficult for monster players to attack hunters without being able to key in on their red outlines and health bars.

Sunny is the first female support character to join the fray, but compared to the rest of the new additions to the hunter roster, she seems like a run-of-the-mill support hunter. She doesn't have any weird mutations or tragic stories about being transformed into a cyborg, but the tech-savvy gearhead is sure to win you over with her a big gun and handy set of abilities.

Her fuel booster is the perfect gadget to help your team catch up with monsters in Evolve’s Hunt mode. It projects a jetpack boost bonus to one ally, allowing that player to launch themselves long distances extremely quickly. Once you're in the fight, she can set a stationary, shield projector anywhere on the ground to protect you and your team. Then there's her mini-nuke grenade launcher. This beast shoots grenades that do enormous amounts of damage and explode in satisfying, fiery balls of death. Doesn't get much better than that.

Crow is one of the most interesting additions to Evolve hunters. He has a bit of the "I'm the pointman" look to him with his animal hide clothing and Sam Fisher goggles. As the Tracker, he's responsible for zeroing in on the monster's location. Like Trapper Maggie and her pet Daisy, Crow relies on his animal friend to sniff out his prey, but with this pair, you have more direct control over your pet batray's movements.

Releasing the batray, Gobi, sends it off in a single direction and highlights every living thing in its vicinity. It doesn't point out the monster to you, so you'll have to recognize it by the silhouette. In addition to his tracker bat, Crow has two weapons that have primary and secondary firing modes. His stasis gun can use rapid fire to slow the monster for one second per blast, or charge for a longer lasting ten-second slowing effect. His long rifle will do normal damage if fired rapidly, but a fully charged shot will completely ignore the monster's armor, which may keep monster players from charging hunters with full armor and low health.

Whether you buy into the DLC or not, you'll get access to the two new DLC maps, Broken Hill Mine and Broken Hill Foundry. These are both fully-featured maps, meaning they include the Evacuation environment bonuses for the winning teams, which can provide enhanced jetpacks and extra shield projectors for hunters, and boosted melee damage for monsters.

The Broken Hill maps feel much more confined than the standard environments. The Broken Hill Mine is a series of tight corridors that surround a central chamber. This is an excellent environment to make use of the Behemoth's rock wall and rolling abilities to block off hunters and escape. Broken Hill Foundry feels even smaller, adding verticality and narrow alleyways in favor of wide open spaces. Both maps will definitely keep both teams on their toes.

The first DLC pack also includes Observer mode, a spectator mode built for displaying matches to an eSports audience and shoutcasting. The interface allows you to see everything that's happening including player views, third-person camera angles, and the overworld map. Player status is also displayed so you can see the health and armor of the monster as well as the health of each hunter.

The spectator can also view the survival odds of each team based on the characters' health status, perks obtained, and armor level. Observer's features are catered toward creating better viewing experiences on professional streams, so if you like to sit and watch the pros do their thing, you'll get an even better picture of what's happening in those matches.

That's all we have for the Evolve's first DLC pack. Are you looking forward to taking control of the Behemoth? Did any of the new hunters catch your eye? Looking forward to trying your tactics on the new maps? Let us know your thoughts on Evolve's DLC by leaving a comment below.

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You all know the feeling - that unshakable sense of dread that pervades every single preview, every underwhelming gameplay vid - gnawing away at your lofty expectations, clouding your mind in doubt. Sometimes it can even seem as though we're a little bit clairvoyant, mentally tagging a game with a speculative scoreline, only to later discover that we were bang on the money. I mean really, who hasn't taken one look at an upcoming title and said, "That right there has 6/10 written all over it"?

These feelings may seem like simple paranoia, but I'm here to tell you that simply isn't so. unless of course it is, in which case those curtain rings are definitely not out to get you, Keith Smith of King's Road, Doncaster… Through the time-honoured method of writing gibberish on the internet, I have been able to deduce eight simple signs that may well be influencing that acrid taste in your brain. What are they? Where do they come from, and how do they signal a shoddy hunk of software? Let the text blocks begin!

Let's face it, having a set of gorgeous graphics is great. Just ask any aesthetically challenged chap or chappette on the worldwide dating scene. Given the choice between pretty and plum ugly, any sane soul would clearly opt for the former. It's just how we are as a species/ Hard-wired to recognise beauty before other, rather more meaningful factors. The same thing goes for video games, whereby many folks will become incredibly excited for a title based upon its slick visuals. Of course, the one thing that makes video games video games is their interactivity. What separates a good title from a bad one is simply how effectively enjoyable that interactivity is. Games may be a visual medium, but graphical fidelity isn’t its king.

Sadly it seems that some games forget all about this, opting instead to focus their efforts on producing ever more spectacular graphics. Critics can't help but mention these efforts, which in turn is how we end up with certain quote-heavy advertising campaigns predicated solely on visual. As with many entries on this list, the lesson here is simple. If the ads are heavily talking up one thing, why aren’t they addressing the rest? Hint: because they suck.

If anticipation is a double-edged sword, then the kind of hype that surrounds certain video game franchises is a six-sided, 18-bladed lightsaber. Indeed, nothing hurts a new game's chances quite like hopping aboard the ol' hype train. Even if all goes well, you haven't actually gained anything by waiting in such amplified torment. And if it should fail? Well then, I guess you'll just have to do without that big juicy payoff your brain had been promising... Of course, preventing oneself from becoming excited is never easy, particularly if the stimulant in question looks reaaaaally bloody good. But hopeful anticipation is a natural, healthy thing. Going full-on militant about it, that's another matter entirely.

Enter the mantle of the so-called 'something-killer', a type of hype that's usually targeted at insecure fanboys, hoping against hope that the horse they're backing will not only win the race but somehow kneecap the other mare in the process. Take Haze for example, a run-of-the-mill, PS3-exclusive FPS that somehow earned the toxic label of 'Halo-killer'. By failing to live up to that illustrious title, Haze effectively died two deaths, and it's not alone. While this tag doesn’t always denote an awful game, it does usually herald major disappointment. Be warned.

"Aha!", I hear you cry, "You fools are just jealous that the publisher didn’t choose your quote. For shame! Sneering down from your ivory towers, daring to insult the good names of The Daily Mail, The Sun on Sunday and The North Haverbrook Gazette!". Yes well, that second Faberge egg collection isn't just going to start itself, now is it? Erm, no…ignore that. What I meant to say is that by choosing to ignore the specialist press entirely, a video game's PR company is usually trying to hide something. Something negative. Of course, the inclusion of one or two 'jack-of-all trade' papers does makes sense in terms of mainstream brand recognition, but to plaster an entire campaign with their commendations? Why, that's fishier than a month-old bucket of chum.

To be clear here, I'm not saying that these folks are in cahoots, merely that mainstream press tend to be much less discerningwith their praise. So, if you're seeing their names being advertised over the more recognised specialist publications, it’s probably because those outlets didn't have a single nice thing to say.

Live demos are all well and good, but what about when they fail? When a mean-spirited glitch shows up to spoil the fun, or an avatar convulses uncontrollably? What if the audience's suite of smartphones starts to interfere with the signal, or a narcotics-addled 'celebrity' finds their way on stage? You certainly can't blame developers for wanting to avoid all that, for sticking to a more linear presentation and perhaps forcing a demo down a pre-determined path. If the game's still early in development then that course of action is positively encouraged. After all, we'd rather get a glimpse of your exciting new game in stage-managed action than see absolutely nothing at all.

The problem comes when these sorts of tightly controlled displays start showing up mere months from the game's final release. Common sense would suggest that if you aren't happy to unleash the beast at this point, then you probably never will be. That means that there's something about your wider title that's got you worried. Perhaps there's terrible pop-in, a sketchy frame rate, or maybe the NPCs all look like melted sticks of butter. Whatever the case, if you're worried, then the audience should be too.

Also known as 'Molyneux's disease', this horrifying affliction sends patients into a self-defeating hype-spiral from which few ever emerge. You'd think that after seeing the likes of Hitler, Stalin and Sarah Palin failing to achieve global domination that developers would be just a little less likely to promise us the world. You can't have it. It's too big. a wee bit like your aspirations. "Oh but yes you can plant a seed and watch it grow into a idyllic and bustling metropolis. But wait! That metropolis is actually a living, thinking robot bloke, one of thousands, actually, battling it a out cross the cosmos, and that's just level 1…"

There's no harm in being excited, developers, but by going too far you really are setting yourselves up for a fall. As a gamer, it’s important to keep the above maxim in mind whenever encountering a seriously ambitious title. If it sounds too good to be true it probably is. Said game may not end up being totally rubbish, but your opinion of it will always be coloured by that horribly pervasive feeling of 'What if'.

For all the talk of backroom deals, shady pay-offs, and assorted other scandalous actions it's important to remember that the core concept behind the PR guy/critic relationship is a sound one, and not just in gaming either. One side wants greater press attention - in the hopes of selling more units - while the other is trying hard to appeal to a readership that's uncertain about which games to buy. In short, critics need advance copies in order to have reviews penned in timely fashion, while PR peeps need ever more eyes on product. It's a veritable win-win.

With so much lovely winning to be done, it's a wonder why any publisher would choose to renege on this simple status quo. Oftentimes however, the answer is simple. Poor critical reviews - yes even those tagged with a launch date embargo - can massively hurt a bad title's profitability. So, if you still aren't seeing a flurry of reviews by release day, there's a fair bet that the people in charge of bigging up that particular title don't have a great deal of confidence in it…

Of all the entries on this list, this two-for-one warning is perhaps the most problematic. I say problematic because some great titles have actually escaped from development hell over the years. Look at Resident Evil 4, StarCraft II, and the original Shenmue, each of which took more than 6 years to make release. Generally however, these successes are the exception. A game that experiences repeat delays and/or a last-minute change in developer is likely to end up a whole lot shoddier for the experience. Consider Daikatana, Too Human and the inimitable Duke Nukem Forever. Each of these woeful titles was entirely scrapped and remade at various points in its production.

All three lacked a clear vision, continually adding and subtracting elements to cater to new trends and more powerful consoles. Doing so once would be a gamble, doing so twice - or more - a mistake. Any artist will tell you that a piece of work is never truly finished, that here's always more that can be done. The trick though, is in learning what's good enough, and just stopping. So if you spot an enticing game undergoing a similarly tumultuous dev cycle, best reset those expectations. There's a fairly good chance that that sinking ship is being steered by a crazed perfectionist.

Pulling quotes must be an awfully tricky business. After all, what you're looking for - i.e. snappy, upbeat appraisals - isn't always what you get. Sometimes there simply aren’t any nice things being said about your product. Of course, you can always try to be sly about it, adapting the form, if not the spirit of said assessment. 'Agonising from start to finish' might not fly with an FPS, but if it's written about a crappy new horror game, well then, thank heavens for interpretation… One of the easiest ways around this issue is to simply ignore reviews entirely, and instead draw your quotes from the much more speculative field of preview coverage.

Early-door assessments i.e. 'promises big things' or 'could be the best game of 2015' certainly sound as though they might've appeared in a review. Except of course that they didn't. The peeps in PR just want the public to think that they did. And really, if they're going to those sorts of lengths in order to fool you, you'd better believe that the game in question is complete and utter tripe.

And so, like a moron playing Scrabble, I'm all out of words. If you have any suggestions for further portents of doom, let me know in the comments section below. Until next time, remember the class motto. 'Scrutinize absolutely bloody everything to an almost insufferable degree'. Huzzah!

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