Fans of Disgaea are already quite familiar with the Penguin-like creatures known as prinnies. Dood is their signature word and they have a tendency to explode, due to the highly unstable nature of the souls which have created them. Prinny is an upbeat character that most players can't avoid falling in love with, and as such, it makes sense that NIS decided to take the character and spin-off an original title based solely around them.

Last year, players were provided with a brand new Space Invaders experience. Rather than the slow moving Arcade classic they were familiar with, a fast-paced, assault on the senses was put in its place. Taito has followed up that title with a brand new one, specifically made for the DS, rather than a variety of platforms. They have used the strenths of the DS to their advantage to produce an even more intense and action-packed title.

Family Feud is a TV game show that began over 30 years ago, back in 1976. The game has had a long history of turmoil, going through over three hosts, and the process of being canceled then brought back on-the-air well over five times. By far the most memorable host, one who left and made a return several times, was Richard Dawson; a charismatic man who couldn't control himself from offering a peck on the cheek to everyone woman to come on the show.

The Price is Right first aired in 1956 and since has featured three different hosts and dozens of versions created by countries all around the globe. It was a game that anyone had a chance to be part of and the only knowledge required to play was general information regarding the price of objects ranging from lavish to everyday. This year Ubisoft created a video game version of the long-running The Price is Right TV show, and while it includes many familiar staples of the game show, the soul of the show is lost in this unpolished rendition.

Mushroom Wars is the seventh PSN game that Creat Studios has released this year, and while I can't say much about their previous efforts, I can say that Mushroom Wars is fantastic. It is an easy-to-pick-up real-time strategy game with an adorable aesthetic and a good deal of content. However, it is not without its flaws, as there is a curious lack of anything online-related outside of leaderboards and the controls have some issues.

It won't take players very long to realize that this isn't the same tale of Oz written by L. Frank Baum over 100 years ago. While the game begins in very much the same way - Dorothy getting swept up by a giant tornado – the tale of Oz as we all know it is not the same tale told here. In fact, the only similarities to the book is the land of Oz itself and the four main characters ... oh and Toto too.

A Boy and His Blob originated as a unique side-scrolling game made by Activision co-founder and Pitfall creator David Crane for NES in 1989. The series made a pit stop on Game Boy in 1990 and languished in development hell for years, with both a Game Boy Advance and DS game announced and cancelled. Finally, the series is returning with WayForward's animated take on the story of how a boy and his blob saved Bloblonia.

Demon's Souls is an unapologetically hard game. For full disclosure, I have played quite a bit of the game, but have not made very much progress. The title, set in a dark dreary medieval land, is split into levels each being of considerable length. Unlike most modern games, Demon's Souls offers no checkpoints mid-level, even though each level can take upwards of an hour to complete.

Muramasa: The Demon Blade, the spiritual successor to developer Vanillaware's Odin Sphere, is a side-scrolling hack-and-slash action game with beautiful hand-drawn artwork and a large world to explore.

I'll admit it; I'm not a big fan of RPGs. I don’t like being forced to spend hours upon hours fighting the same enemies with the same strategy just so I can level up to beat a boss, watch an over-the-top cinematic, and then repeat the entire process in the next area. However, I do like RPGs that don't just rely on battling, but instead require players to explore, strategize, and solve puzzles. I'm also the biggest sucker for Halloween and the dark, non-sugarcoated versions of most fairy tales. Taking all of this into consideration it's no wonder why A Witch's Tale by NIS, worked its magic on me so well I could barely bring myself to stop playing.

Gravitronix is a simple title created by upstart company, Medaverse Studios. Players will control a small device that can both attract and reflect the floating items on the field. They must keep the items from hitting their shields on one quadrant of the circular field, and ultimately keep the items from penetrating their shields. A single item to bypass the shields will result in loss.

The Marvel Universe action RPGs began when Raven Software made X-Men Legends, which was a landmark game for me as it was one of the first comic book games to borrow so heavily from the source material. The fourth entry in that series is Marvel: Ultimate Alliance 2, which is the first in the series not done by Raven. The final product is quite similar to Raven's last effort and brings some new ideas to the table, but also brings some questionable ones.

Thexder is an old PC game released by GameArts back in the late '80s. In order to hopefully bring the title to the NES, GameArts licensed the title to Square. Eventually a sequel was released titled, Fire Hawk: Thexder the Second Contact. Both games sold extremely well in Japan and are still revered by many older gamers today. Clearly, since Square first acquired the license back in the '80s, they have retained the publishing rights to the property since they have just released the download-only PSP game, Thexder Neo, a remake of the first title.

Thorium Wars is a futuristic shooter that reminds me of Star Fox if you took out the anthropomorphic animals and stuck it through the generic science-fiction machine. The story takes a backseat for the most part, but it's centered on a future where robots and humans are warring, hence the "Wars" in the title. The gameplay is fun as the controls work well and you have many vehicle types to choose from, and the best part of it all: this sucker is basically a retail DS game in DSiWare clothing.

South Park has gotten the console video game treatment for the fourth time now, with each game spanning different genres and releasing at different points in the show's history. Their latest outing, South Park: Let’s Go Tower Defense Play!, features, as suggested by the title, Tower Defense play.

I learned two things from my play time with Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days. The first being that sea salt ice cream sounds gross but must be good since the main characters are always eating it, and that even after three installments, the Kingdom Hearts series can still manage to produce a game that is as fun, bright, and full of Disney magic as the very first title.

Spyborgs pretty much went through development hell. It originally surfaced in 2008 and was a cartoony game with interactive commercials. Then it was M.I.A. for a number of months and came back as a comic book-esque beat-'em-up with a decidedly darker feel, story, and tone. On some levels, the new style works, but for the most part, Spyborgs is just a polished endless barrage of enemies with some cool set pieces.

It's impressive to finally see gaming approach a level of complexity in character and story development that parallels what we see in most modern movies. After viewing the very first cutscene in Uncharted 2: Among Thieves I was immediately impressed. Never before had I seen character interaction, dialog, and nuanced expression executed so well in a video game. Uncharted 2 does a spectacular job engaging players in what amounts to be a ten hour interactive movie.

The world (especially the Wii) has enough Wii Sports knock-offs, but Deca Sports 2 is, interestingly enough, above the rest of its competitors. Hudson Entertainment gives you a reason to go third party with this innovative collection of sports games.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, based off of the recent movie, is centered on food and how it can apparently take over the world if you happen to create a machine that makes food rain from the sky uncontrollably. Taking control of Flint, a down-on-his-luck scientist voiced by "Saturday Night Live" star Bill Hader, you work your way through the town of Chewandswallow to eradicate the food menace.

The Beatles have legions of fans that span all age ranges. I was never really a member of that broad group, but I did enjoy some Beatles songs from time to time. However, I am a huge Rock Band fan, so when The Beatles: Rock Band was announced last year, I was interested. After playing the retail copy, I can safely say that The Beatles: Rock Band is an artistically beautiful video game that solidified my fandom of the Beatles.

I'll be the first to admit, I have a giant soft spot for the MegaTen series. Moreover, I especially have a soft spot for the Persona series. Persona 3 was the first title in the series I had the pleasure of experiencing and I loved it to death. I eventually went on to purchase and play all of the MegaTen games on the PlayStation 2, and even Persona 2 on the PlayStation. Needless to say, when I heard that the remake of the original title in the series was due for a US release, my interest was piqued to say the least.

The Family Party series started earlier this year and while it didn't light up the critical world, it was successful enough to spawn a sequel. Once again developer Tamsoft brings about 30 great games, this time with an outdoor theme. In actuality, these games aren't too great as many are incredibly confusing or almost completely broken. The remaining decent games aren't good enough to overshadow the bad ones.

Let's start by saying this: Dead Space: Extraction is a pretty awesome science-fiction movie. It sets a fantastic mood, there's a mystery behind it (granted, it isn't as mysterious if you beat the original), and it has a compelling narrative. As a game, Extraction is also fun. It takes the on-rails shooter genre and makes some changes to it, both good and bad. The end result is a solid experience that lives up to EA's bold claims that it is a "guided first-person experience."

There have been a good number of Scooby-Doo video games in the past, but the series has been dormant since 2005. Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment took the reins of the series and published Scooby-Doo! First Frights, which is developed by Australian-based Torus Games. It is a beat-'em-up in the same vein as the LEGO series, except instead of reliving Star Wars or Indiana Jones movies with LEGOs, you're experiencing four new episodes of Scooby and the gang in a cartoon style.