Living in the world's northernmost town means I invariably snag anything with polar bears, seals, penguins and other creatures roaming the extreme ends of the Earth. Saying I can see polar bears from my backyard isn't comic exaggeration – indeed, it's essential to carry a rifle to ward them off when wandering beyond the city limits. That is far, far easier on the nerves than trying to play th... more.

(Full disclosure: This product originally received a scathing "not acceptable" review, which has been completely rewritten due to an update shortly before publication. While this is good news for users, developers who don't adequately playtest software before release tend to make critics surly.) It doesn't happen often, but Intellivision finally won a round against Atari. Mattel's quirky vid... more.

Suggestion for the developer: Rename this Doodle Goes To Hell. One of the first Apps I bought was Doodle Jump, the top-ranked iPhone platform game pretty much since its release. First time I played it I couldn't something so mind-bogglingly simple had a metascore of something like 98 percent. Somehow my disbelief remained through 86 straight games until the numb discomfort of my long-asleep leg... more.

Baseball's a great sport as long as you skip the game. It's endlessly entertaining reading about fantasy fanatics, players' per-pitch pay, the upside of 46th round draft picks, concession prices and anything that is the dugout of despair known as the Washington Nationals. It's possible I have an attitude because I'm so lousy I've hit myself swinging the bat on more than one occasion. So w... more.

A long time ago there was Karateka and it kicked ass, even if the princess killing you at the end was whacked (bow to her or she kills you instantly – why didn't such a warrior save herself?). An avalanche of beat-em-ups followed and, ugh, did they get old fast. This realization hit me shortly after Street Fighter II became the holy grail of fighting games in the latter half of the '80s, spaw... more.

As a longtime dweller of Earth's polar regions (north and south), I have a fondness for penguin games that go beyond the usual "aww, aren't they cute" sentimentality. So for me to spurn one quickly, it has to be really lousy. Meet Rocket Downhill Penguin, a 99-cent scrolling obstacle game that I tired of with...well, rocket speed. Players tilt their iPhones right and left to guide the pengui... more.

Another "unique and exciting puzzle game." Uh-huh, whatever. Thanks to the attack of the clones after Tetris, Bejeweled, et all, finding worthy newcomers amidst the dreck is as much fun as searching for a missing jigsaw piece. Boxisics isn't even an original; it's a port of the online Flash game Blosics with fewer features. But after buying it for reasons not entirely clear – other than the p... more.

One of my favorite review columns was writing about "one-touch" games, designed largely for the handicapped, where all control happened by pressing one key (they could interface with custom on/off devices those with physical impediments could operate). Many of the concepts and control schemes – some allowing navigate-and-shoot spaceships or full platform game movement – were ingenious.  Th... more.

Calling Annihilation Undead a mindless shooter is probably flattering to its developer. It's certainly literally true, since this $1.99 twin-stick gorefest is about killing lots of zombies with lots of weapons, and pretty much nothing else. There's an audience for this stuff, just like there's one for the endless Living Dead movie sequels. But Annihilation Undead stirs about as much horror and ... more.