What's New?

After a plump serving of juicy treats last week, this week's listing feels like a wafer thin mint by comparison, but there's still plenty of options for any paycheques that might be burning a your arse pocket to a cinder.

Top of the list alphabetically and critically is definitely Nintendo's Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising. We don't even have to look further down the list. It'd be top if it were last week, and it's definitely the one we're most concerned with today.

Is it good? Is it different? Although we have acquired a boxed copy in the last couple of days, we've decided to put off reviewing it until we're more thoroughly acquainted, so you can expect to hear about it early next week.

Less interesting is, well, the rest of them. There's an Age of Mythology expansion, The Titans, which Rob covered in some detail recently, and also in the Microsoft column there are a couple of Xbox Live re-releases - TOCA Race Driver (although some retailers reckon not) and Tetris Worlds.

The latter is cheap, and fun to play online (even though we got in a spot of bother for calling someone a "backward-arsed redneck ho" by accident), however we're going to spend a bit of time with it before we decide whether we like them toying with the game's precious formula. So watch out for us online, "Friends"!

Elsewhere, THQ dominates this week's output with no less than six releases. Apart from the aforementioned Tetris Worlds, Alter Echo is a bland-looking platform slash 'em up which we got bored of within half an hour (but will return to next week), ATV Off Road Fury 2 is a reportedly fun but has been stripped of its online component (bastards), Fire Warrior isn't great, and Yager is actually better than the sum of its parts.

As for WWE Wrestlemania XIX, yours truly has been tasked with compiling some sort of wrestling uber face-off, what with WWE RAW 2 Ruthless Aggression on the Xbox making it out recently, and Eidos' Backyard Wrestling landing its muddy boots on our desk.

Finally, a quick mention for home-grown futuristic racer XGRA, which is out on PS2 and Xbox today (with a Cube release due on December 5th). In a week which has seen one of our favourite Britsoft companies fade to nothing, it seems worth drawing attention to Acclaim Studios Cheltenham's achievement.

Have a nice weekend.

• Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising (GBA)
• Age of Mythology: The Titans (PC)
• Alter Echo (PS2, Xbox)
• ATV Off Road Fury 2 (PS2)
• NHL 2004 (PS2, Cube, PC)
• Tetris Worlds (Xbox Live re-release)
• TOCA Race Driver (Xbox Live re-release)
• UFO: Aftermath (PC)
• Wallace and Grommit (PS2, Xbox, Cube)
• Warhammer 40,000: Fire Warrior (PC)
• World Championship Snooker 2003 (PC)
• WWE WrestleMania XIX (Cube)
• XGRA (PS2, Xbox)
• Yager (PC)