VideoGamer.com Plays

What we've been playing this week.

Welcome to VideoGamer.com Plays, our weekly feature where we give you the inside track on what's been whirring in our disc drives this week. We'll be honest (so if we've been playing Superman on the N64 we'll tell you). But if we've been hammering the latest billion-selling blockbuster we'll let you know about that too.

Tom Orry, Editor - GTA 4, Xbox 360
Other than a few hours with Iron Man (disappointing - I'll leave it at that) it's been business as usual, which means plenty of GTA 4. As well as messing about with friends online I've been browsing through the official GTA 4 Game Guide. I've always had a great deal of admiration for people that put together guides as it seems like a really hard and laborious job. Given the size of Rockstar's latest game, the game guide comes in at almost 300 pages - that's bigger than the last novel I read. The only real disappointment is the size of the fold-out map, which is actually smaller than the map the game comes with. I'll forgive it though; the book includes the locations of all the flying rats - those things will haunt me to my grave if I don't get them all.

Wesley Yin-Poole, deputy editor - Street Fighter 4
That's right folks. I said Street Fighter 4, perhaps the most eagerly awaited beat-em-up of all time. I'm a massive fan of the series, indeed I still play Street Fighter 2 Hyper Fighting on Xbox LIVE regularly. I was there pumping my pocket money into decrepit arcade cabinets in Clapham, honing my fireballs and dragon punches. And now, 15 years later, I found myself once again wrapping my left hand around a stick and right hand poised over six buttons. I can report that it's absolutely wonderful - and feels more like they've taken the best of every version since SF2 and rolled it into one mega SF game rather than reinvent the series. But the absolute best, most fantabulous thing about SF4 is the finishers. My God the finishers. This, my friends, is what hand-eye coordination is all about.

Nick Peres, Video Producer - UEFA EURO 2008, Xbox 360
It's a lucky thing that I still have a back-up team to support in this tournament, and even more lucky that they have a good chance of winning it. Being half Italian has many benefits, but I'm reaping the sweetest one of them all. I'm playing through this game as I type (it's on in the background) and although I still feel like it's far from perfect I'm enjoying it more than any other footy game I've played on next-gen consoles. I suffered a terrible loss as Italy to the Faeroe Islands yesterday. It was both embarrassing and impossible. I'm still wondering how a team of painters and decorators walked over the might of Pirlo and beat the genius of Buffon. After a period of thought I've put it down to not looking at the screen when I left to go for a wiz. I'm off now to get myself a new pair of shorts. See ya.

Simon Hunter, Associate Video Producer - Iron Man, Xbox 360
Iron Man is an absolute treat from start to finish - the action is up to the usual Marvel standard. The humour is fantastic and the girl is pretty hot too. Unfortunately I'm referring to the film - the game is a complete letdown. I often get asked what the worst game I have played is, and it's actually harder to answer than what my favourite game is < Not anymore>. This game is SO bad that it doesn't even deserve the correct punctuation in my column* I literally can't put it in to words. This game is klsajudhcfiusdc (sorry I hit the keyboard just thinking about it).