Parents' Guide to Boxing Star

With solid controls and a good mix of opponents, this arcade-style boxing game will easily appeal to casual fans of the sweet science. In Boxing Star, you play a wannabe professional boxer who, naturally, has to fight his way to the top. Starting in the streets, and then moving through fight clubs, you have to use a series of taps and swipes to throw jabs and uppercuts. You'll also need to duck and block incoming shots, and occasionally launch a special attack. It's all very arcade-like, and a little cartoonish, which is why this will appeal more to fans of such arcade-like boxing video games as Super Punch-Out!! than hardcore followers of the sport.

It doesn't help that, in some fights, your boxer is far weaker than his opponent, and will only win through sheer luck. Also, there's clearly no balance between how the sexes are represented in the game. There's no option to play as a woman, and the so-called "ring girl" is as scantily clad as she is well-endowed, which seems like blatant objectification. Still, even with these problems, Boxing Star has the tight controls and depth to keep fighters plugging away.