Gameplayer

Kevin Caseyon Christmas consoles choices

Lovers are lining up to hand the Nintendo DS handheld device and the Brain Training game out to each other this Christmas. Everyone from granny to the puppy wants to look as clever and pretty as Nicole Kidman, the celebrity ex-Scientologist who is featured in Nintendo's ad campaign.

Meanwhile the hottest console of them all is still Nintendo's Wii, lighting up the gaming battlefield like a parachute flare. Incredibly, demand is still outstripping supply one year into the product's life cycle. Yet while Nintendo's luminous sales results put it on top of gaming's high ground, it's increasingly difficult to justify.

Yes, Wii Sports is sweeping the boards at awards events, but I wish the graphics were better. It's all well and good to hop up and down for a bit, and to crease yourself laughing after knocking over the wine. But when the novelty wears off there isn't much to write home about.

The definitive Wii game has yet to emerge. At the moment, it seems that any game with a bit of promise has been pushed back to 2008. In the meantime, for content, they're peddling the backwards compatibility feature that allows you to run old games on your new box. Not much point in having new hardware, then, unless you're into more nerdy brain games.

Besides, real gamers don't stand up, leap about or think. They sit or slouch in a rigid posture for hours on end and apply their considerable powers of concentration to twiddling their thumbs and twitching their fingers. It's a fairly simple process.

However, gameplay's drift to the soft centre continues as all manufacturers set out to woo the mainstream. Normally dependable for a bit of hardcore, even Microsoft is reaching out to the casual gamer this year.

Among the bewildering array of Xbox editions available now, the latest is the Arcade, aimed at younger players. It comes preloaded with free games and is supplied with candy-flavoured controllers. (Only kidding - you can't eat them really.) Meanwhile, wholesome family fun is guaranteed in the Scene It? movie trivia game, which has special quiz-show controllers for that postprandial party.

Skidding and shooting is still central to the Xbox, thankfully. Halo 3 provides hours of satisfying mayhem, and Project Gotham Racing 4, complete with wireless steering wheel controller, is going to make it difficult to boot dad off the console so that the kids can have a go of The Simpsons Game.

After creating the best hardware of the bunch, Sony has done a remarkable job of not selling PS3s. Yet, they have gradually tweaked and blundered their way to a 17 per cent market share. Sony is hoping that PES soccer and Guitar Hero III will win friends, but with PS2 titles consistently outselling PS3, Sony must be wondering when it's going to happen for their mambo machine.

Still, sleek casing and a catalog of interesting games means the old PS2 console is still worthy of attention this Christmas.