PDC World Championship Darts 2010

I always find it impressive when a game company decides to tackle the trickier sports. It still takes a lot of effort to put a good football game together, naturally, but the mechanics of play are far easier to represent on a keypad.

Darts is one of those games that takes some clever design ideas to make things difficult for the gamer without removing the potential for skilful play.

The PDC World Championship Darts franchise has always been a strong contender in this limited genre, though the 2010 edition has gone a little too far in making a crack shot easy to achieve.

It's genuinely difficult to tell whether PDC World Championship Darts 2010 is going overboard with the hand-holding or not. It's still very easy to miss, but careful aiming really isn't in the equation any more.

Aiming your dart is a simple matter of putting crosshairs on the dartboard and hitting the 'throw' button. Obviously, this takes no real skill other than the ability to work a mobile phone, though a fluctuating circumpunct (thank you Mr Brown) at least requires careful timing to ensure your dart hits its mark.

Catching the circle as it shrinks to match the dot in the middle makes for a crack shot, while pressing 'throw' as the circle is expanding sends your arrow wide. But in these days of twitch-gaming and rhythm mechanics it seems overly easy to unerringly hit treble 20.

Despite being overly easy, the game still plays well, and its forgiving nature is probably appreciated when playing on the bus, or in the dentist's chair. And PDC World Championship Darts 2010 makes a concerted effort to expand on that accessibility with lots of variations on the typical 501 game.

Outside of the Tournament mode you can play Killer, Cricket, Clock Turbo and 701 - all of which are quite different in their rules, but all suitably fleshed out so none of them is reduced to being a novelty.

It also includes up to four player pass-to-play multiplayer, which is always welcome in turn-based mobile games, and there's a pub-full of professional players to choose from if you happen to be a darts groupie.

These professional athletes are probably very impressed by their small screen representations, as PDC World Championship Darts 2010 features some top flight graphics. It's not a game that relies much on visuals, but the animations, characters and dart board all fit the screen beautifully and remain very clear at all times.

It really doesn't break much ground over previous version, and its horizontal difficulty level will probably harm the game's longevity, but PDC World Championship Darts 2010's ease of adoption and superb gameplay variations make it surprisingly easy to enjoy, despite a few superficial flaws.