Sticky Balls: onwards and upwards

I’ve still not worked out quite how the game works out whether you’ve fouled or it’s game over, but I’ve got further than ever before. I’ve unlocked a couple more arcade tables, as well – but one (the round one where the balls are connected with springs) eludes me.

Richard Burns Rally

Surprisingly decent, in fact. The only thing is that it’s rather hard, so I’m not sure I can beothered to play it again. Maybe it’ll just click sometime.

Pocket Ping Pong 2005

Thank God the Gizmondo died. It means there’ll never be a sequel to this absolutely shit game.

It’s largely uncontrollable. The graphics are glitchy. It doesn’t always respond to button presses. The whole screen bobs up and down (as if you were viewing it from your character’s perspective) but that just makes you feel motion sick. You can’t see your bat, so you have no frame of reference as to whether you can hit the ball. You can’t really control where you hit the ball – often you can be stood still in the middle of the table, receiving a slow, easy ball, and you’ll hit it off the side of the table.

And for some reason you play as a skimpily dressed girl. It’s almost as if the developers heard that the Gizmondo was advertised as a ‘portable Xbox’ and decided to do their own version of DOA Xtreme Beach Volleyball. Except they made it crap.

Out of 14 games, I’ve won 3. And they were flukes. Rubbish.

Trailblazer: easy arcade mode completed

I played this a bit at lunchtime – it was raining so I was loathe to go out much. My challenge was to complete the first few levels; this was very easy indeed. i think it took me five minutes.

The game has two modes: Arcade and Time Trial. Arcade has three difficulty levels – easy, medium and hard – with only the first being available at the start. Easy mode consists of ten stages, each of which you must run through in the shortest time possible. Any remaining time at the end of each stage is rolled onto the next stage, much as Outrun does.

The first few stages are easy, but once barriers and gaps start appearing on and in the track, it’s a bit more tricky. The first time I played I ran out of time in the middle of level 9; the second time I got halfway through level 10, and I completed the game (and unlocked medium mode) on my third time. There’s plenty of scope for improving my times in the Time trial though – I’ve only got two medals so far.

Toy Golf: silver course unlocked

Having struggled to get below 18 for the first three holes (par for each hole is 6), I managed to get an albatross, and eagle and a par to get a total of 13. So, I’ve unlocked the silver course. It’s the same three holes but with another three afterwards. It seems a bit harder, but hole six is masterful – it’s a par 3, but I’ve got a birdie at it a few times. You just need to hit the first ramp with the right amount of power and the ball rolls all the way down to the hole.