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Street racing games are all the rage recently, ever since the start of the 'The Fast And The Furious' franchise till the climax of the Tokyo Drift episode. Sending heavily modified cars screaming down a busy city street while avoiding police - this seems an all-too-familiar scene in racing games like 'Need For Speed'. The latest racer that I got my hands upon cuts a much different scene. Colin McRae: DiRT is one of the better racers that I have played in recent times.

While many might not agree to playing racing games on a computer keyboard, DiRT has provided me endless hours of fun on the virtual outdoor tracks. The most remarkable feature is the breathtaking display of graphics. Overall, scenery, car designs, tracks and weather elements are modeled to near perfection. Watch the tires kick up dirt and burn smoke as a car navigates a sharp turn, blaze through sheets of rain on the tracks in chilly Japan; each individual detail is taken care of. My favourite aspect of detail is the vehicular damage. Taking a slight rub against rails will leave scratches on the paintjob, knocking an opponent racer dislodges his bumper and crashing your car into a barricade turns it into a flattened wreck.

Racing dynamics are standard, although cars feel lighter than they look. It is easy to pick up even for racing novices. Basically the difference between DiRT and games like Need For Speed is that there are no objectives to clear other than clocking the best timing on the track against other racers. In this sense, DiRT focuses more on the racing aspect, whereas games like NFS focus more on developing the plot through racing. With this said, DiRT sacrifices storyline for more race quality. This may be good for hardcore racing fans, but the whole process does get repetitive after some time, especially for the uninitiated. DiRT tries to alleviate this problem by offering us a wide variety of race vehicles of different classes. Each handles different and the range of the vehicles present are quite impressive.

The downside of Colin McRae: DiRT is that the superior graphics and model engine comes at a cost to performance. You will need a relatively high-end machine to run everything smoothly. Solo races will hardly pose any problems, but once you are squaring off beside three or more cars, gameplay gets choppy and frame rates drop to unsatisfactory levels. Although these can be occasional, it is a true annoyance. Furthermore, the multiplayer system on DiRT is largely deplorable. Only two types of races are supported - hillclimb and rally. Basically you can race against 20 or so racers online simultaneously. That sums up the entire online gaming experience on DiRT.

While DiRT will not please many fans of the Colin McRae series, this is sure to 'wow' the crowd with the awesome graphics and will appeal to most racer novices. This game's depth is unparalleled, with the multitude of races and championships. Just make sure your computer has the capability to support the high demands of this graphic-intense racer.

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Remember the times of the immensely popular Puzzle Bubble? I recall spending a large part of my pocket money heading down to the arcade and playing Puzzle Bubble, trying to best the score of the previous player. The whole point is to burst all the bubbles by detonating them with three of the same colour before you run out of time. I recently stumbled upon Zuma Deluxe, a game based on the same principle, but more developed but equally addictive.

Zuma Deluxe is an action puzzle game designed by PopCap Games, the studio that brought us BeJeweled. The interface of Zuma is similar to that of Puzzle Bubble. You take control of a ball-spitting frog with your mouse and the objective is to shoot the coloured balls at the rows of balls that will be rotating around you. The line of balls will edge slowly towards an abyss; you will lose the game when the first ball in the line reaches the hole and drops in. Thus the player will have to detonate like-coloured balls in the snaking line by shooting balls of the same colour to them. Three of more same-coloured balls will explode, shortening the line.

There are various power-ups that add some depth to the game. 'Backwards ball' causes the line to reverse direction and move backwards for a temporary period of time, hence the name. 'Accuracy ball' allows the frog to emit a beam of light from its mouth to allow easier aiming of balls. There are also special explosive balls which detonate on a more massive scale and other bonuses.

This game is easy to understand, easy to play and extremely difficult to stop. The first time I started playing Zuma, I sat there glued to the screen for two whole hours. Stages become progressively harder and levels become more complicated. Also the innumerable levels will keep the average gamer occupied for a significant amount of time. However, since the game mechanics, although impressive compared to other puzzle games, are exactly the same throughout all levels, the gameplay might become monotonous and boring to gamers who crave more excitement.

Zuma Deluxe has given me countless hours of fun and even more hours of hair-yanking frustration and is one of my favourite puzzle games on PC. For a US$20 price tag (you can get it for less than $10 from Amazon), this game is definitely worth the buy.

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Bioshock is a futuristic First Person Shooter (FPS) set in the 1960s. Sounds contradictory? Bioshock is set in the 1960s, in a city called Rapture. This is not, however, any ordinary city. Rapture is an elitist society built secretly and entirely underwater. Founded by a man named Andrew Ryan, he built Rapture, a sprawling underwater metropolis to accommodate the world's elite scientists, artists, doctors and so on, aiming to free these 'superior' individuals from the entrapments of the world that inhibits their technological and social advancement.

Noble his ideals may be, but Rapture eventually was consumed by civil war. Advanced technology in Rapture bred flagrant abuse of genetic modifications through the creation of plasmids. Plasmids gave the people of Rapture power to genetically enhance themselves, even producing special superhuman powers. Excessive use lead to genetic mutation of both the body and mind, turning much of the population into mindless walking corpses, scavenging the streets of Rapture for more EVE and ADAM - the fuel for more genetic splicing.

You play the role of Jack, the survivor of a plane crash who stumbles upon the underwater world of Rapture. You have to fight through the swarms of the mutated Rapture citizens called splicers with weapons that you find, as well as making use of plasmids that grant special abilities. Abilities include telekinesis, giving the user the ability to pick up and throw objects with the sheer power of will; pyrokinesis, the ability to control fire and set foes alight; lightning bolt, the ability to electrocute enemies with electricity coursing through your fingertips.

Theses abilities are fundamentally dependent on ADAM, a substance that is the fuel for genetic changes. The primary source of ADAM is through harvesting of 'Little Sisters' who can be found wandering around the levels. Little Sisters are young girls who have been utilized to process and produce ADAM, by attaching a parasite in their bodies. They are protected by formidable foes called 'Big Daddies' who are large beings clad in iron armor. The morality issue then comes into play - the player has to decide between killing the young girls and coldheartedly harvesting the ADAM, or to cure the girls with a plasmid, in which case, gaining a significantly lower amount of ADAM. This unique aspect of the game will determine the outcome of the storyline ultimately, and is a very interesting change from the standard FPS that I have encountered.

Bioshock has a very interactive gameplay environment. I liked how the combination of using plasmids, weapons and tactics works to effective combat enemies. Choosing the right kinds of plasmids in the correct situations and you will find fights much easier. For example, when fighting a huge group of splicers, it is best to lure them all into a pool of water then hitting them with an electrobolt. This would eliminate all of them in one go, instead of wasting ammunition shooting them down one at a time. If you try to incinerate them with the plasmid, the artificial intelligence (AI) is smart enough to jump into a pool of water, extinguishing the flames. Furthermore, there are a variety of ammunitions to pick for the appropriate circumstances. Anti-armor counters Big Daddies effectively, while anti-personnel rounds have an excellent effect on taking down ordinary splicers.

The graphical engine for Bioshock is rather impressive. Passing by under a stream of water will cause your vision to blur as if water got into your eyes, taking a melee hit from a splicer will cause your vision to blur and shake, your hand becomes scarred and burnt after equipping the Incinerate plasmid. The whole city of Rapture is portrayed in much detail and is quite the visual feast.

Expectedly, the demands on a computer are very high. 2GB of RAM, at least a 8600GTS graphics card, and an Intel Core 2 Duo processor. The game runs best, however, on a Windows Vista operating system to fully utilize the DirectX 10 graphical display. These specifications, though not as demanding as Crysis, are still formidable and something the casual gamer would not be able to provide. Bioshock does not offer graphics as realistic as Crysis, but it is still a milestone in modern games.

The political references in Bioshock to stem cell research as well as morality issues set a very interesting stage for this highly-acclaimed FPS. It has much more of a realistic feel as players now decide on the outcome of the story, and it provides Bioshock with a extra dimension and depth that is missing in other FPSs. The plasmid and weapon system is one of the best I have ever played on and in my opinion it is a very creative concept. I would strongly urge avid FPS-gamers to give Bioshock a try, if you have not already.

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I would classify myself as an avid First-Person Shooter (FPS) gamer, having played games like Half-Life, Doom, Hitman and F.E.A.R. Sure enough, these games are great and much fun to play, but nothing I hav