Video-game reviews | "Final Fantasy Fables," "The Last Guy"

"Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo's Dungeon"

The second in Square Enix's "Final Fantasy Fables" line starring the series' mascot yellow bird, "Chocobo's Dungeon" is a dungeon crawl in the vein of the "Pokemon Mystery Dungeon" titles.

Chocobo and his master, Cid, find themselves transported to a strange town at the start of the game — a place where nearly everyone loses their memories as they go about their lives. This includes Cid, whose brain is drained by the tolling of the town's central bell.

Chocobo soon finds a way to search for the lost memories of the townsfolk in the form of black fortresses above their heads that lead to randomized dungeons full of monsters. The game play in these is turn-based — whenever Chocobo takes a step or action in a dungeon, monsters follow with their own; if he stands still, nothing happens.

In a nod to the most common battle system in the "Final Fantasy" games, Chocobo can learn to take on several jobs, specialized battle roles with their own sets of powers, such as Black Mage and White Mage.

Each dungeon has several floors and usually a boss monster at the end. The floors are filled with traps, treasures and monsters, and Chocobo must complete a run through a dungeon all at once — leaving or dying resets his progress and causes the loss of all items he's not wearing.

"Chocobo's Dungeon" is detailed and colorful, and the characters are well-animated. The voice acting is decent, but the score is worthy of special note. It consists mostly of gorgeous remixes of classic themes from throughout the "Final Fantasy" series' history.

System: Nintendo Wii

Price: $39.99

Age rating: 10-plus

"The Last Guy"

After the zombie apocalypse, there's only one person who can save the survivors. In "The Last Guy," the player is that person.

The game takes place in levels worldwide that look like they could have come out of Google Maps. The straight-down perspective lets players see their own avatar, any zombies in the area and all the buildings people are hiding inside; a thermal view mode shows the people in each building.

The player runs around each stage, avoiding zombies and gathering a mob of civilians to lead back to a safe escape zone. But there are barriers scattered about, blockages that can be busted through only with the help of a mob of a certain size.

Each level has a tight time limit to rescue a certain number of people, so players must decide whether to risk losing scads of citizens to a raging zombie attack for the possibility of rescuing even more people.

It's fast-paced and fun, and while the visuals are simple, the satellite-style imagery helps make them effective.

System: Sony PlayStation 3

Price: $9.99

Age rating: 10-plus