Exciting gameplay packed with clever mechanics and framed by a compelling artistic vision make Outland a superb experience.

We go underground on the Red Planet in the sequel to 2009′s Red Faction: Guerrilla.

In Red Faction: Armageddon we are on Mars with a shaven-headed Mason once again: Darius Mason this time, grandson of Alex, hero of 2009′s Red Faction: Guerrilla. But where Guerrilla had us rove around on the Martian surface, Armageddon takes us underground. Terraforming has failed since the events of the last game, making Mars uninhabitable aboveground, forcing the human population to relocate into deep networks of rocky caverns. And where Guerrilla was open-world, Armageddon is basically linear, though with some larger, open areas suitable for sandbox-style play linked by the game’s subterranean roads and corridors.

The game’s producer, Jim Boone, tells us Armageddon’s linearity comes from player feedback. Though fans of the previous game enjoyed the vehicles and free-form destruction, he says, they were less keen on trundling long distances through an open environment. He also tells us that some 20 percent of the third-person action still takes place topside, though we didn’t see any sky for the few-hour duration of our hands-on demo, which was taken from early in the game.

As the demo began, the humans were already besieged by huge and vicious insectile beasties. Since these came from deep within the planet Mars and the humans from planet Earth, they are technically the natives. For the purposes of this preview, however, and because they are huge and vicious insectile beasties, we shall call them aliens. Our hero Darius is somehow to blame for the alien uprising–but inadvertently, mind you, and doing his best to make up for it. In the course of the demo, he escorts a convoy through hostile territory, fetches power cells and fixes water pumps for beleaguered civilians, and demolishes all manner of alien-infested structures.

Among the enemies are various brightly coloured red and green creatures, accessorised with organic blades and spikes and ranged bioweapon fire–glowing green globs that explode just after impact. We encountered plenty of ravagers: fast-moving, wall-climbing aliens with bone-bladed arms. Another alien creature, a stealthy variant, is invisible except when attacking but signals its proximity with a blurring effect on Darius’ vision. Others are less subtle and less buglike: one creature was a hulking, horned biped, like a Martian minotaur.

We weren’t short of hardware to see off the alien hordes, with Armageddon forever dropping new weapons in our path, but chief among them was the tremendously fun magnet gun. With this, the game’s signature weapon, you shoot item A (say, the side of a building) and then shoot item B (say, a spiky ravager) to fling the one into the other, as if by magnetic attraction. The quick two-shot operation works a bit like Dead Space’s kinesis module, letting you smash large chunks of the level furniture–girders, walkways, shacks, and the like–into your squishable foes, but also letting you launch enemies up and away, by firing at them and then at the distant cavern ceiling.

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From the team that created the award-winning Greed Corp comes Gatling Gears. Blow stuff up with Gatling Gears this May!

Second installment in EA’s bifurcated series dropping in European markets a day before the film is released this summer; retailers indicate July 12 US bow.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 was released last November alongside the film of the same name to a cold reception. Like the film, the video game adaptations were also bifurcated, and EA will have a chance at critical redemption this summer when Part 2 arrives during the week before the film drops this July.

The release date news stems from a new trailer for the game (embedded below), which is introduced by Emma Watson, who plays the part of Hermione Granger from J.K. Rowling’s magical universe.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 will arrive in theaters worldwide on July 15, which means gamers will have the first crack at the culmination of the Harry Potter universe.

July 14 is a Thursday, and the release date shown in the video is meant for the European market. Traditionally, games are released on Tuesdays in North America, which would make a July 12 release date likely for this region. A number of US retailers, including GameStop, are also listing the game for a July 12 bow.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 will be available for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, DS, and PC.

Dont watch unless you like to see a huger spoiler in action as Wheatley takes over in this clip from Portal 2.

Over-the-top, bloody, and bursting with content, Mortal Kombat is a return to form for the franchise.

Despite spending about a month in 1993 pouring over magazine shots of the arcade cabinet for Mortal Kombat 2, reading character Bios and memorising movelists, I wouldn’t call myself a Mortal Kombat fan. Sure, I loved the first 2 games but so did everyone. They were amazing!

Luckily for me this latest Mortal Kombat game is rebooting the series in hopes of restoring its former glory and recapturing the essence of what made it an early nineties arcade favourite. With a roster of familiar faces, a simplified but robust combat system and all the gore and fatalities that were missing from its predecessor; MK Vs DC Universe, it’s doing a damn good job.

The combat system feels tight and well balanced and whether you’re a beat-em-up veteran or a genre newbie you’ll be performing blood-splattered fatalities and the bone-crunching X-ray combos in minutes. It’s easy enough that you can jump straight in but has the depth to keep you up half the night coming up with new combos and juggles to take online.

With tutorials, Training modes, a narrative driven Story mode, standard Arcade ladders and Tag Team play as well as an extensive array of challenge matches and old skool “Test Your Might” minigames there’s more than enough to keep you occupied, though thankfully they stopped shot of Mortal Chess or Mahjong Kombat. (Though if you’re reading this Netherrealm, I would totally play Mahjong Kombat)

If you’re just after some post-pub nostalgic button-mashing it doesn’t disappoint but equally, if you’re the type to unlock every last alternate costume and piece of concept art then you’ll definitely be getting your money’s worth.

Reprise your role as Tommy and embark on another dark adventure to save the fate of the planet.

We take Lightning McQueen for a spin around the tracks in Disney Interactive’s game based on Pixar’s animated film of the same name.

As far as film-to-video game adaptations go, those based on Pixar’s animated works are on the more easily digestible end of the scale. With Pixar’s Cars 2 set for release later this year, Disney Interactive has knocked up a colourful arcade driving game based on the film, for ages 5 and up. We recently had the chance to sit down with a small demo of a very early build of the game.

At this stage, all the cutscenes we saw were still in the early stages of development (read: slow-moving drawings). but even though this is not what the final game will look like, it added a light and cartoony feel to the whole demo. Little is known about the story so far, but it looks like it will closely follow that of the film.

Because the main campaign is still being worked on, we were shown a few training missions from the start of the game, which are designed to get you acquainted with the different aspects of gameplay and the racing tracks in the game.

There’s an underlying spy theme running through the whole game, and so our first training mission took place in spy school. After picking from a variety of characters (Lightning McQueen, Finn, Sarge, Mater, and so on), we were shown a basic training mission that involves learning the controls of the game–steering, doing jumps and tricks, drifting, boosting, and so on.

Completing the missions well earns you points, which fill up an experience meter that can be used to unlock new missions and car skins. The best part about this bit was hearing actor Michael Caine’s voice giving curt, beautifully sarcastic instructions.

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We hold our breath and try to keep up as we get our first look at classic Sonic meets modern Sonic in Sonic Generations.

For a while now, Sega has been trying to reconcile its two contrasting portrayals of Sonic: the old-school Sonic, characterized by the fast-paced, side-scrolling action of the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis days; and the new 3D Sonic, a brighter, cheekier, and slightly more supersonic version (geddit?).

We’ve had old-school gameplay with 3D looks (Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1); 3D gameplay with a dash of side-scrolling (Sonic Colours); and finally, a Kinect-powered racing game (Sonic Free Riders). Now, still hoping to find the perfect balance, Sega has put the two Sonics together in Sonic Generations, a new platformer designed to celebrate the iconic mascot’s 20th anniversary. We recently had the chance to sit through a short demo of the game’s first two levels at Sega’s offices in Sydney.

At this stage, not much is known about Sonic Generations’ story. The game will encompass the 20 years of Sonic’s history and will be set across three defining eras: the 2D Mega Drive/Genesis era; the introduction of 3D in the Dreamcast era; and the modern-day HD graphics era. Instead of creating new levels, the developers have revamped a bunch of iconic stages throughout these eras in HD and given players the choice of playing each stage in either classic side-scrolling 2D or in modern-era 3D.

There will be two incarnations of Sonic to go with each of these options: a classic Sonic and a modern Sonic. Each incarnation will retain the character’s set of moves from whatever era he comes from, meaning the spin dash and spin attack for classic Sonic and the homing attack and sonic boost for modern Sonic.

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Plentiful new release slate led by puzzle, fighting, and shooting games; Conduit 2, Xbox Live Arcade Triple Pack, Final Fantasy IV: Complete Collection also out.

It’s a busy week at retail, as a slew of high profile new releases make their debut on Tuesday including Valve’s long-awaited puzzle game and Warner Bros.’ fighter reboot.

Leading the pack this week is Valve Software’s Portal 2. The game follows the events of the first Portal, which saw gamers taking on the role of a human lab rat, Chell, who used a portal gun to create interdimensional openings on ceilings, walls, and floors in an effort to escape the Aperture Science labs. Along the way, players were guided through the diabolical tests by the deceptively sincere, yet altogether sadistic, artificial intelligence known as GLaDOS.

The game will feature a single-player campaign billed as being twice as long as the original’s, but the real focus is on the new multiplayer cooperative mode. The co-op mode will tell a parallel story to the single-player adventure and last roughly as long. In it, players will take control of two robots, named simply Blue and Orange, and work together to tackle their own set of portal-related problems.

Also debuting this Tuesday will be NetherRealm’s gruesome fighter reboot Mortal Kombat. The game’s roster will be a throwback of sorts, full of fighters pulled from the first three games in the series. There is one particularly notable exception, as the PlayStation 3 version will feature God of War protagonist Kratos as a playable character.

Gamers looking to pick up a new contemporary shooter can grab SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs this week for the PlayStation 3. The game is set in Southeast Asia after a revolution endangers a vital shipping lane similar to the Strait of Malacca. Players assume the role of the commander of a five-man squad of NATO commandos dispatched to prevent international trade from being disrupted. Their mission will only last six days, a time limit that Sony says will add urgency into the campaign.

As is a staple for the series, SOCOM 4 will have an extensive multiplayer component, allowing for teams of players to shoot it out in 32-player matches. Terrain types will include a hostile jungle and half-ruined cities.

Wii owners wishing to continue their effort through the Conduit universe can grab the often delayed Conduit 2 this week. The single-player mode of Conduit 2 will pick up the original game’s alien invasion storyline, with Sega promising dynamic environments, player customization options, and giant boss enemies. As for multiplayer, Sega will introduce new co-op modes for online play, or offline with up to four players sharing a split-screen. The publisher is also promising “increased multiplayer security” for the game, in light of the cheating that undermined the online play of the original game.

On-the-go Final Fantasy fans can pick up Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection on Tuesday. This set includes Final Fantasy IV–with revamped visuals to take advantage of the PSP’s widescreen format–as well as its epilogue, Final Fantasy IV: The After Years. The episodic series of downloadable titles was originally released in 2009 on the Wii; this will mark the first time it has been available as part of a retail product.

Gamers looking to bundle up this week can pick up the Xbox Live Arcade Triple Pack, which contains Limbo, Trials HD, and Splosion Man, as well as 160 MS points, and a 48-hour Xbox Live Gold card.

Another bundle out this week is the Prince of Persia Classic Trilogy Pack HD for the PS3, which includes Sands of Time, Warrior Within, and Two Thrones.

TUESDAY, APRIL 19
Arcana Heart 3–PS3–Aksys Games
Assassin’s Creed: Ultimate Collection–PC–Encore Software Inc.
Brothers in Arms: Complete Collection–PC–Encore Software Inc.
Conduit 2–Wii–Sega
Final Fantasy IV: The Complete Collection–PSP–Square Enix
Majesty 2 Collection–PC–Paradox Interactive
Mortal Kombat–PS3, X360–Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment
Portal 2–X360, PS3, PC, Mac–Valve Software
Prince of Persia: Classic Trilogy HD–PS3–Ubisoft
SOCOM 4: U.S. Navy SEALs–PS3–SCEA
Triple Pack: Xbox Live Arcade Compilation–X360–Microsoft Game Studios