Dexter the Game 2

Everyone knows that criminals get caught because they make mistakes. The first Dexter game had its fair share of mishaps, but in spite of the bugs and glitches it was still a reasonably entertaining adventure.

Times have changed since then, though, and we expect more from our iOS games. Unfortunately, this sequel doesn't fix any of the problems of its predecessor. In fact, it goes further than that by forgetting everything that made the last serial killer game so entertaining.

You play as Dexter, full-time blood splatter analyst for the Miami PD and part-time serial killer who only targets the wrongdoers who fall through the cracks in the system. You have to solve crimes in an open-world recreation of the Florida city, then butcher the people responsible.

The Miami you trawl through is populated by about eight people and four cars. Throw in some appalling draw distances, buildings that can be driven through, and a raft full of invisible walls, and rather than feeling like you're working through the trash of a living breathing city you get the sense that you're butchering friends in a small, tightly knit perma-gated community.

Missions all follow the same template. You examine a crime scene, find the glaringly obvious evidence, analyse it back at your lab by tapping on it, stalk your suspect, and then - when you can prove their guilt - you hunt them down and murder them.

You'll have to make it past their friends before you can get to work at cutting the real villain up, though, which means an interminable stealth section that more often than not ends with you punching everyone until they pass out.

The rest of the Miami police force, made up of famous faces from the TV show, are entirely inept, standing dumbfounded over murder weapons and DNA evidence and leaving all of the detective work to you. It all adds to the sense of solipsistic ennui that courses through Dexter the Game 2 like a poison.

The fact that no one in the city bats an eyelid at your magical self-righting car, even when you've parked it on top of them, is simply the icing on a rancid cake of shoddy mechanics, game-breaking bugs, and unfinished graphics.