Fuzion Frenzy 2 (Xbox 360)

FUZION FRENZY's Mini games are wrapped in a story that puts a player in the role of one of four futuristic game show contestants. The show takes place over multiple planets, each of which hosts a handful of games. Players can tackle just a few games or engage in a multi-planet tournament.

Fuzion Frenzy 2 boasts a decent number of games (more than 40) with a variety of styles of play. Some games are melees in which players hit each other with weapons, others are races or sporting events, and many are fantastic creations, like one fun example that plays like a sci-fi four-square game. As players progress, they collect and deploy cards that can multiply their score or snag other players' cards. As a result, it's not uncommon to finish third or fourth in a game but vault into first from the effects of a card.

While gamers who are starved for simple games to play with family and friends might get some enjoyment from Fuzion Frenzy 2, the games are disjointed, humorless, and mostly dull. It is best when experienced in full four-player multiplayer games, and the game makes setting up multiplayer matches easy. Unfortunately, any good that comes from the multiplayer games is soon dragged down by the tedium of the games.

The corner-cutting presentation certainly doesn't help. Although the graphics are decent, the sci-fi settings are generic and the game show's host character overseeing the games has a grating voice that doesn't even match the movements of his virtual lips. Players looking for short, simple games will find better examples from the Xbox Live download service, which has a lot of arcade-style games and some popular multiplayer-friendly oddballs, such as Uno.