Quake 3: Revolution

In the usual tradition of this genre, Quake 3: Revolution transports the player into an ultraviolent world where they have to fight with whatever weapon is available to be that last man standing, or as is the case with this game, hold a white flag the longest.

The Quake games have had a long-standing relationship on the PC, dating back to their predecessor Doom and its sequels, and have been considered by many gamers to include some of the best first-person shooters on that platform. The PlayStation2's crack at the whip is executed elegantly, as the hardware hardly breaks a sweat.

The player is placed in a beautifully detailed arena with a bunch of other nasty killers in a variety of do-or-die scenarios. In one, the player must survive all of the other assailants; in another, he must find the flag and keep hold of it for one minute. It sounds simple, though it's anything but.

With stunning graphics, amazing speed, and stomach-churning sounds, this game looks good and plays well, but it lacks the one element that makes the PC and Dreamcast versions of the game so good: namely, the online play. Having said that, it compensates with the multiplayer option--up to four people can play on the same console in four-way split-screen action. Playing this way against real opponents offers the greatest fun, and the graphics hardly suffer at all.