Infamous (Sony; PS3; rated teen)
In this game, you play as Cole, an urban explorer and free runner. You’ll traverse the entire three-island cityscape of Empire City, which has been quarantined by the authorities following a massive explosion. The citizens are afflicted with a strange illness—it’s caused you to mutate and given you the ability to absorb and discharge electricity. In trying to solve the mystery of what’s happened, you’ll use your new powers to become either a hero or a rogue; it’s up to you. This free-roaming game lets you select the missions you play, but the drawback is that the narrative is all over the place, and you always feel like there’s a big chunk of story missing—usually because there is. But you’ll have fun just climbing the walls and leaping from rooftop to rooftop. Throwing bolts of electricity at enemies and grinding along power lines makes the game even more fun.

Lego Battles (Warner Bros.; DS; rated everyone)
Developed in Burnaby by Hellbent Games, this is an action game in which you build armies and fight other armies in a world of Lego, which makes it an ideal first real-time strategy game. At this year’s Electronic Entertainment Expo, Hellbent creative director Christopher Mair explained that kids don’t want games to lack depth, but they do want them to be accessible and presented in terms that they understand. Lego Battles does this with flair. According to Mair, Battles is actually three different games—Castles, Pirates, and Space—crammed into one package. That means 90 single-player missions, the ability to play on the side of good or not-good (Lego characters just don’t have the capacity for evil), and the freedom to mix and match (spaceships in the Castles game, or dragons in Pirates). Battles is fun and easy to play, and has the winking humour we’ve come to expect from Lego titles. Perfect for any age.

Punch-Out!! (Nintendo; Wii; rated everyone 10+)
This boxing game developed by Vancouver’s Next Level Games is a great update on a Nintendo classic. The original version could be played in arcades circa 1984, while Mike Tyson was the celebrity character in the first console edition, released for the NES in 1987. Tyson doesn’t appear here, but the original hero, Little Mac, is back. Standing five-foot-seven and weighing in at 107 pounds, the scrappy fighter from the Bronx is your alter ego in this game. Now rendered in 3-D with excellent graphics and the same funny character designs as the early editions, Punch-Out!! is as much fun as ever. You can use the Wii remote and nunchuk as your gloves and the Wii balance board to dodge, but this game is best played the way it was originally designed, with a direction pad and two buttons for your left and right punches. It’s not as sophisticated as other boxing simulation games, but Punch-Out!! wasn’t designed to mimic the experience of being in a boxing ring, and it doesn’t even need Mike Tyson. Nice job, Next Level.

EA Sports Active (Electronic Arts; Wii; rated everyone)
Electronic Arts has always had an impressive lineup of sports games. Now it’s adding fitness games to the list with EA Sports Active, the first in its new line of Wii titles, developed at the EA Canada studio in Burnaby. With a range of activities—explained through tutorials and visual aids—this game is all about getting active, natch, even while gaming indoors. Included is a leg band to hold the nunchuk controller and a resistance band for strength exercises. The game makes use of the balance board, if you have one, to enhance some exercises. Its best feature is the preset workouts, which turn this into a personal trainer in a box. The presets range from standard workouts to circuits that focus on your lower body, or legs and lungs, for example. If you want to create your own workout, you can design and add a preset to the list. With goal-setting aids and the kind of pep-talk feedback you get from a personal trainer, this is an easy addition to any fitness regime.

The Bigs 2 (2K; PS3, Wii, Xbox 360; rated everyone 10+)
Sports games come in two flavours, sim and arcade, and The Bigs 2—developed in Burnaby by Blue Castle Games—is a nice blend of the two. The basics of pitching, fielding, and hitting are all here in this baseball game, which has a fairly easy-to-understand control scheme. The experience is enhanced with power moves like Big Slams and Turbo swings. You can play as any of the big-league teams or players, or you can create a player and progress from the Mexican League to the majors. Also included are mini games that help you practise hitting and fielding. I lost hours simply playing Home Run Pinball, in which you work on slamming balls at the flashing lights of Tokyo’s Shibuya district, Times Square, or Las Vegas.