Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer

From the advance publicity around TV drama Heroes, you'd think it was the first time superheroes had been presented warts 'n' all; as flawed human beings behind the special powers.

It's not a new idea, though. The vast majority of Marvel's superheroes were just as complex: Spider-Man struggles with big identity issues when he's not webslinging, Batman's got a huge hang-up about his dead parents, The Incredible Hulk has anger management issues that'd make Craig Bellamy quail, and Superman famously enjoyed crack-fuelled orgies with prostitutes dressed as Lex Luthor.

Alright, that last one's never been properly confirmed. But you can just tell, can't you?

There is, alas, no drug-based decadence in Fantastic Four: Rise Of The Silver Surfer. Instead, this game of the latest Marvel movie puts you in the shoes of Mr Fantastic, the Human Torch, the Invisible Woman, The Thing and their mate the Silver Surfer, with each character getting their own mini-game.

It's a refreshing idea, considering Hands-On could have taken the easy option of creating a generic platform game. The mini-games are all different, too, providing a good variety of gameplay. You work through them in turn in the Story mode, and whenever you complete one it's made available to play standalone in the Quick Game option.

So, Meteor Dodge is a horizontal-scrolling affair where you, as the Silver Surfer, have to avoid meteors coming at you from the right side of the screen by moving up and down. Bonus points are scored if you manage to 'skim' them (bounce off the top), while the odd power-up slows their speed down, or enables you to warp to a point ahead.

Disarmed, meanwhile, is a simple maze game where you guide Mr Fantastic's extendable arm around the level, shutting off valves and deactivating the security system.

Tank Punch sees The Thing punching a tank (surprisingly) by setting the angle and power, before watching it bounce off various obstacles that help or hinder its trajectory. It's like a cross between Yeti Sports and the javelin bits in old-skool decathlon-based games.

Next, Chain Reaction has you playing the Human Torch amid a wave of missiles falling on the city below, with you having to blow yourself up at the best moment to destroy as many as possible. Whereas Drone Attack involves the Invisible Woman running around a 2D play area, jumping in the air to set off blasts in order to destroy drones.

Finally, Doom Pursuit requires you to chase the evil Dr Doom, first in your Fantasticar, and then as the Silver Surfer himself. After that you're done in Story mode, and left to try and beat your high scores in the Quick Game mode.

Pleasingly, the mini-games show great variety in their design, and they look the part. All use stripped down controls, too, so are immediately accessible. The problem is in the game's wildly varying difficulty, which ultimately prevents it from being a classic.

Disarmed and Chain Reaction are simply too easy, while Meteor Dodge and Doom Pursuit won't stump you for long if you've got half-decent reflexes. Drone Attack is a bit tougher, but the biggest problem is with Tank Punch.

See, among the obstacles that your tank can hit are walls that stop you dead. You get three punches to try and accumulate a total distance of more than 1,250 metres, meaning that hitting one of those walls effectively ruins your chances for that game.

Since it's the third level in the game, and you have to complete it in Story mode to progress to the others, it's a real problem. In fact, we'd go further and say it's pretty shocking design to have a level that's so capriciously hard blocking your path to the rest of the game. We review mobile games for a living, and it took us nearly 90 minutes of swearing to fluke our way through.

It's such a little thing, yet it spoils Rise of the Silver Surfer. If we didn't have to complete this review, we probably would have given up after half an hour of frustrating tank punching, thus missing half of the game. We love the concept of character-based mini-games, but that one flaw lets down the whole title.