What's New?

Apart from a new breezy sense of confidence in the England camp, there's Mashed, a new .hack game, Mario Golf, Sonic Advance 3, Breakdown, and other odds and sods to keep you out of the sun...

Feature by Kristan Reed Contributor

Updated on 21 Jun 2004

15 comments

Because I'm either stark raving mad or just love you all, I actually spent most of the England match yesterday finishing off my Mashed review, while glancing over during the good bits, such as when Rooney smashed the ball onto a post and watched bemused as the ball ricocheted off the Swiss goalie's bonce at such velocity the poor guy lay in a stunned heap for what seemed like an eternity. Wayne's World, Wayne's World! Party Time! Excellent!

Party time...

Oddly enough, I actually watched the Mike Myer's classic for the first time in ten years only the night before - not even realising the ramifications of such omens. I am England's lucky charmer. Anyone know any good omens for the Croatia game?

Anyway, I'd imagine many of you aren't terribly interested in the fortunes of various overpaid prima donnas in Euro 2004, so best I just get on and tell you what's actually hitting the shelves this week.

Top of the pile is probably Mashed, an exceptionally addictive top down racing title best played with four players while quite drunk we've discovered. What's more is we've got ready in our 1pm review slot for you, because we're like that. Sonic Advance 3 is probably the next best thing for to consider. The last two have been among the GBA's best ever sellers, and adhere to the classic Sonic gameplay principles of 2D side scrolling mayhem - as opposed to the show-off 3D pyrotechnics evident in the disappointing Adventure series. Our review copy was due to show up today, but the postie's either nicked it or eaten it. One of the two.

Heading for a breakdown

Nintendo has chosen to finally put Mario Golf on the shelves after what seems like years in a Cryogenic freeze - and although it's pretty good in it's own right, according to Tom, it's still no substitute for Tiger Woods. Possibly the most intriguing release of the week is Namco's Xbox-exclusive Breakdown. A rather bizarre game that starts off with some first person chundering, and then turns into a hybrid first person beat 'em up/shooter - similar to what Starbreeze were attempting with Chronicles Of Riddick, except nowhere near as good. Again, our copy was due today, so expect a full review shortly.

RPG-fans get the unexpected and long-overdue bonus of .hack: Mutation Pt2. Our man Rob's big fan of these games. Indeed, even Tom bought the first two while he was out at E3 2003, but neither have pulled their finger out and reviewed the beggars have they? Maybe the summer slump will give us the chance eh? Here's hoping.

Here comes the license...

Elsewhere, the biggest commercially minded release is undoubtedly Activision's Shrek 2 (all formats), which most publications have decided isn't all that interesting, sadly, and it's not a game we're expecting Activision to get around to sending to us either, because they know full well we'll either ignore it completely or be beastly to it. How could we?

Codemasters has the third MTV Music Generator in stores today on PS2 and Xbox, while Atari has Asterix And Obelix ready, but we don't imagine too many of you will be filled with excitement about that one. And that's your lot for this week.