Call of Duty 4 was widely hailed as one of the best games of the show when it was shown at E3 in its Xbox 360 incarnation, but this DS version - developed by the studio behind the GameCube's Geist - certainly doesn't look like a mere afterthought.
With World War II being officially last year's news as far as console games go, this latest CoD brings things bang up to date. This time the enemy is a rogue general in Russia who's funding a coup in the Middle East, and you're the British and US elite special force dudes sent to bring him and his terrorist pals to justice.
Instead of those clunky old rifles that have to be reloaded after every shot, you'll have state-of-the-art hardware at your disposal, including a flying drone that can scout the area and mark the bad guys on a map on the lower screen. While the scenario and equipment are new, the action sticks closely to the usual CoD template, featuring scripted battle scenes and levels where you mow down hundreds of enemies from behind a mounted machine gun.
The game uses the D-pad or buttons to move around and the stylus to look. Icons down the side of the touch screen are used to access inventory or gadgets, and there are minigames for setting and defusing bombs. It runs faster and smoother than similar titles on DS, as well as supporting single-cart four-way multiplayer.
