Red Alert 3 Hands-on PreviewPublisher:Electronic Arts
Platforms:PC and Xbox 360
Release Date: TBA

In all honestly, I’m not a very clever kind of guy. I’m also kind of clumsy and can barely get a muffin in my mouth without getting a black eye, so there are a number of things Tim has made it clear I’m just flat-out not allowed to do at bit-tech.net.

That list of forbidden activities is fairly diverse and includes everything from ‘Touch the graphics cards’ to ‘Go anywhere near the graphics cards’ and ‘Be in the same room as the graphics cards’. And ‘Review RTS games, because you’re really bad at them’.

Crysis: Warhead Hands-On PreviewPublisher:Electronic Arts
Platform: PC Exclusive
Release Date: Q4 2008

It’s been almost a year since Crysis hit shelves across the world and still it doesn’t seem like Crytek’s engine has achieved the full impact it should've done.

Months on, it can be a little hard to remember that building excitement we all had for the game and that’s a shame all in itself. Here was the first game that could really start making claims about being photorealistic on a massive scale, using an advanced custom-built physics engine and levels so big that you could complete

Crysis: Warhead Hands-On PreviewPublisher:Electronic Arts
Platform: PC Exclusive
Release Date: Q4 2008

It’s been almost a year since Crysis hit shelves across the world and still it doesn’t seem like Crytek’s engine has achieved the full impact it should've done.

Months on, it can be a little hard to remember that building excitement we all had for the game and that’s a shame all in itself. Here was the first game that could really start making claims about being photorealistic on a massive scale, using an advanced custom-built physics engine and levels so big that you could complete

WALL-EPublisher:THQ
Platform:PS3, PSP, Xbox 360, Wii, DS, PC, PS2
UK Price (as reviewed):£29.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed):$48.99 (inc. Delivery)

Have you ever had one of those dreams? You know, the one where you're in school taking an exam, only you don't know anything about the subject and for some strange reason, known only to your subconscious, you're completely naked except for your marmite clotted handcuffs?

Facebreaker Hands-on PreviewPublisher:Electronic Arts
Platform:Wii, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3
Release Date: 5th September 2008

I like to prepare quite thoroughly for preview and interviews, if only because there’s nothing more embarrassing than having to stutter through and make up questions on the spot. That’s why, before going to go and do a hands-on preview of Facebreaker, I did a fair bit of research.

On Our Desk – 11A true geek is a person of many, many interests and with very sticky fingers. At bit-tech.net, we know that to be true. We’re true, hardcore geeks ourselves in fact – and that has certain consequences in that we end up slowly accumulating all sorts of junk priceless artefacts.

So, every now and then we have to have a little purging of our desktops – sweeping all those little bits and bobs up into a bag and dumping them down in one place for one big round-up.

The Top 10 Computer Game CharactersIt isn’t all about the Master Chief and Gordon Freeman, you know. Sometimes we have to give some love out to the NPCs and supporting characters too – which is exactly what we’ve tried to do here.

Below, we offer up the list of our top ten supporting characters from computer games. The only rules we imposed on ourselves are that entrants cannot be the main playable character of a game and that each franchise can only feature once. Other than it’s a level playing field – villains and heroes are both welcome!

Multiwinia Hands-On PreviewDeveloper:Introversion
Platform:PC, Mac, Xbox Live Arcade
Release Date: September 2008

Sigh. You know, I love Introversion - like really, really love them. The guys there are smart, helpful and good at what they do. Also, they sent me a little toy Darwinian as a present, which was very nice of them.

But, I have to admit, I sometimes hate writing articles about them. Not in a malicious haha-I-put-tabasco-sauce-all-over-the-only-loo-roll-in-the-flat type way, of course. It’s just that I can never pin down where Introversion falls exactly on the scale of things.

Team Fortress 2 Sentry ModMod and pictures by Ton Khowdee

Foreword by Joe Martin
Here we are again, drooling all over another one of Ton Khowdee, AKA TiTON’s, beautiful Team Fortress 2 themed mods.

Last time we looked at one of TiTON’s mods was with the Team Fortress 2 Dispenser Mod, which blew our socks off. Now, it’s time to look at the next stage of TiTON’s plan – one which now threatens to blow us out of our shoes unless we’re very careful; The Sentry Mod.

The Bourne conspiracyPublisher: Sierra
Platform:Xbox 360, PlayStation 3
UK Price (as reviewed):£30.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed):$58.99 (inc. Delivery)

Sigh – again, with the movie tie-ins. There’s been a fair few movie-game adaptations come across my desk in recent weeks – Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk, for instance.

Each time we have the same burst of hope and the same eventual disappointment. It’s quite tiring after a while. Still, if you’re looking for reasons to get excited over

Battlefield: Bad CompanyPublisher:Electronic Arts
Platform:Xbox 360. PlayStation 3
UK Price (as reviewed): TBC
US Price (as reviewed):$58.99 (inc. Delivery)

Bad Company has, just like the main characters featured within it, had a rough time of it over the past few months. Not only does it bear the stigma of being the first proper Battlefield game to debut on a console, but it’s also singleplayer-focused.

Overlord: Raising HellPublisher:Codemasters
Platform:Playstation 3
UK Price (as reviewed):£39.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed):$59.99 (inc. Delivery)

We've written in the past about how hype can damage a game's reception and about that creeping fear of dread when an over-hyped game lands on your desk for review.

The problem is that most games these days are surrounded by some level of hype, however small, and it's becoming more and more difficult to sort out the decent games from the not so decent games. It's not even possible to assume that a game will be good because it's written by a particular developer, since most have a bastard son of a game that they'd rather keep hidden in the basement.

Top Spin 3Publisher: 2K Games
Platform:Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, DS
UK Price (as reviewed):£29.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed):$58.99 (inc. Delivery)

Something strange happens to Britons at this time of the year. For fifty weeks of the year the sport of choice for most people is football, but then for two weeks in June and July the whole country goes tennis mad.

Thousands of tons of strawberries get eaten and thousands of gallons of Pimms gets drunk – a drink that languishes in the back of the cupboard for the rest of the year.

Top Spin 3Publisher: 2K Games
Platform:Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, DS
UK Price (as reviewed):£29.99 (inc. Delivery)
US Price (as reviewed):$58.99 (inc. Delivery)

Something strange happens to Britons at this time of the year. For fifty weeks of the year the sport of choice for most people is football, but then for two weeks in June and July the whole country goes tennis mad.

Thousands of tons of strawberries get eaten and thousands of gallons of Pimms gets drunk – a drink that languishes in the back of the cupboard for the rest of the year.