Mountain Sports

MLB Front Office Manager lets gamers do everything a real-life baseball GM can do to develop a team from Spring TrainingTM through a full MLB season, into the playoffs and the World Series. Using Major League teams and players, gamers will create their own fictional baseball universe and build their reputation into elite status. Gamers can replace aging veterans with rookies, scout the Minor Leagues, make blockbuster trades, and even participate in bidding wars for posted players from Japan as they make their way to the Hall of Fame.

Fans of past installments in the Knockout Kings series will be surprised by several changes to the 2002 version. Previously, you had to fight your way up a list of 20 challengers and fine-tune your skills by training between bouts before getting your shot at the champ. But Knockout Kings 2002 scraps all this in favor of a four-tiered pyramid system in which you need to beat just 11 out of 14 challengers before fighting for the title. While it doesn't feel as hard-earned, it's still satisfying to advance your boxer out of dingy gyms and into major venues such as Caesar's Palace. Career mode still offers the opportunity to create your own boxer or choose from the 45 available (21 past and present, 24 fictional). Inexplicably absent, however, are such greats as Rocky Marciano, Jake LaMotta, Larry Holmes, and Marvin Hagler, all of whom appeared on past versions of the game.
Also surprisingly absent this time around is the ability to throw body punches. While some boxers have this punch in their repertoires as a body combination, the best you can do with others is slug away at your opponent's head with a multitude of hooks, jabs, straight punches, low blows, or illegal backhands. And slug away you must if you expect to hold your own against stiffer competition, as finesse options are limited.

Where Knockout Kings 2002 truly shines is in its graphics, thanks to the combination of boxers' well-sculpted physiques and EA Sports's face-mapping technology. The eye-catching detail of the various arenas and rings further enhances the realism, right down to the excitable fans in the seats and the blood flying from fighters' mouths. Satisfying smacks of gloves to the face and thuds of bodies hitting the deck can also be heard in abundance

Hot on the wheels of the wildly successful Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, Sony brings the world Grind Session, a great-looking and -playing skateboard game that features six pro boarders. Can it be that Sony is aiming to give Mr. Hawk a run for his money? That may be a tough trick to pull off--but that doesn't mean that Grind Session isn't worth its salt.
The first thing players will notice about this game is that it contains an extreme number of tricks made simple by an easy-to-learn control scheme. A training session moves players comfortably through the basics and into tournament mode, which offers eight skate parks from around North America and even one in London. A ninth level, known as the dream house, becomes available only after players master all previous levels.

Grind Session throws all sorts of objectives at players. Not only must they rack up trick points and disturb trashcans, pigeons, and other items, but they must also attempt to follow technical lines that will have skaters leaping across buildings, among other feats. For every completed objective, players earn respect points, which can open up photo shoots as well as that bonus ninth level.

As expected, Grind Session is set to rock tunes with a little hip-hop tossed in for good measure. The result may resemble Pro Skater a little too closely, but that doesn't make Grind Session any less fun.

Sony's basketball franchise returns to PSP with new game modes, mini-games, and updated visuals. Going beyond the hardwood courts of traditional hoops action, NBA 07features a new conquest mode that involves claiming "territory" from rival NBA teams. Other additions include a dunk contest, which has you mastering rhythm-based controls to execute a number of high-flying, rim-rattling slams, and a pick-up game, where you select one of ten NBA players in an outdoor playground match. Of course, would-be coaches can still embark on an 82-game NBA season complete with trades, free agents, and injuries.