Castlevania Order of Ecclesia (DS)

I beat the game. All of the DS Castlevanias are over-rated but this one has been hyped up the most and in my opinion is the weakest of the three. There were some boss encounters that dragged on for too long, such as Death and the horse boss. I don't like how some of the levels just go from left to right, basically long corridors with no secrets to find. The game also didn't explain to me that I needed to rescue all of the villagers before I could unlock Dracula's castle, instead when I beat a certain boss Shanoa gets warped to a place where all she could do was die. Anyway I unlocked Albus mode (play as a guy with a magic firearm) which I've started but don't really intend on finishing, at least not yet.

The King of Fighters XII (Xbox 360)

Single player wise there really isn't that much to do with this one -the arcade mode has only 5 stages with no boss and there aren't any endings either. The only reason to bother with it is to attempt to get the time-challenge achievements, with several on offer for beating the game within a certain time. The hardest is beating all 5 stages within 3 minutes and 30 seconds, which I managed to do thanks to a simple Raiden combo that does a lot of damage. The A.I. for this game is some of the worst I've ever seen in a fighter, with opponents just spamming heavy kicks or punches even when they are at the other side of the screen. Or sometimes they just keep using the roll dodge for no reason.

Online hasn't been much better either. I've won just over 50 games but matches have been so laggy the game often runs like a slide-show. My team usually consists of any of the following characters: Terry, Robert, Ryo, Andy and Raiden. I can at least say the community for this game is pleasant enough, with people actually saying nice things to you! So good games to DarkNemeZis, Zubrow, aoesan and Shink86.

Wolfenstein 3D (Xbox 360)

Finally got round to finishing this one off. I was stuck in a level of the fourth episode and had to watch a Youtube speed run video to find out where I was meant to go. (4:16 in this video, how was I meant to know that one part of a huge, identical wall would open up like that? I don't mind hidden rooms that have stuff like weapons or ammo in them but hiding stuff like keys in difficult to find rooms is a no-no in my book.) I beat episodes 4 and 5 fairly quickly, but I'd say episode 6 was my overall favourite as it was more about the shooting than getting lost all the time. I've now beaten all 6 episodes on the "Bring 'em on!" difficulty.

Wartech Senko no Ronde (Xbox 360)

I beat the story mode with every character. None of the storylines made much/any sense and it doesn't help that characters will start talking to each other during fights. Trying to concentrate on avoiding enemy attacks and reading the text at the same time is impossible so my only hope was to try and watch the endings to understand what was going on, but these made even less sense than anything else in the game. With the story mode done I beat the score attack mode with everyone. I've also tried the online mode a few times and lost every match I've played mainly because I'm useless, plus everyone seems to use hidden characters I don't have so I get destroyed. Not many people play this online either although it does seem quite popular with Japanese players.

Ninja Blade (Xbox 360)

Beaten on normal difficulty. This game was OK for the most part but it relied far too much on quick time events and some of the boss encounters dragged on and on and on, especially the last one. I also didn't like the fact that it reuses some bosses and, even worse, some levels. Overall I'd rather played Ninja Gaiden II but this was worth the £15 I spent on it.

Sonic & Knuckles (Xbox 360)

The latest download offering from SEGA, I've beaten the game with both Sonic and Knuckles. I only bothered to get all of the chaos emeralds with Sonic though. The only time I died was with Sonic in the second act of Flying Battery Zone, I screwed up, forgot how part of the level works (it was just after the laser boss) and got squashed. Smooth sailing otherwise. And at least this game brought back memories of happier times, where one could think of Sonic without having to go and cry in a corner immediately afterwards.