UK Release Round-up: Lara's Back

via IGN,

Although the summer months are generally regarded as a barren time for releases, this year there doesn't seem to be the typical drought of new titles. Of course, the games coming out may not be the juggernauts of 2007, but at least shops have something to shove on their shelves each week.

Onto this week's releases and, being the kind-hearted gentlemen that we are here at IGN, we'll let ladies go first and take a look at Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Anniversary, which is released on PC and PS2. If you haven't been following the progress of this game, it's a revamped version of the original Tomb Raider that uses the Legends engine. We thoroughly enjoyed the PS2 edition, scoring it 8.7 and saying: "Anniversary sticks to what it does best and ends up outdoing every Lara game that's been made since. Lara is back on great form, and re-imagining a ten-year-old classic has clearly been a risk worth taking."

Next up is Shadowrun on both PC and Xbox 360. There's been a lot of hoo-hah around this game because it's the first to let 360 owners and PC owners blast each other in the face over Xbox Live. Unfortunately we've yet to review either game but from what we've played on the 360 it seems like a fairly stripped-down arena-based FPS with a rudimentary single-player and some magic spells thrown in for good measure.

Talking of magic, also released this week is Meteos: Disney Magic on DS. It's an updated version of the DS block-swapping puzzling classic but with Disney characters instead of the charming dancing aliens from the original. Despite the likes of Mickey Mouse and Winnie the Pooh making an appearance, we actually enjoyed it, scoring it an 'impressive' 8.0 and concluding that "if Disney put this version online we would have scored it higher, but we're keeping an open mind here: Meteos: Disney Magic does a really good job moving the design forward".

Also out today on DS is Wario: Master of Disguise. Unlike Wario's recent ventures into the mini-game genre with the enjoyable WarioWare series, Master of Disguise is a more traditional platformer that uses the touch screen to execute a range of special powers. Disappointingly this return to Wario's roots wasn't very enjoyable, scoring only a 'passable' 6.0 from IGN US and leaving us to complain that "the implementation of the touch screen elements are so amateurish with concepts that wouldn't have flown in the early part of the Nintendo DS system's life cycle". Oh dear.

Also out this week is Smash Court Tennis 3 on PSP - just in case you like the idea of having Maria Sharapova in your pocket. Anyway, that's it for now and we'll see you next week for a look at Forza Motorsport 2 on Xbox 360 and Pangya! Golf With Style on Wii.