Ha ha. Look. Funny boxing. Brilliant. See? Laugh, damn you!

First of all, a word of advice. Never - and we mean never - search for Black & Bruised on the Internet. It's not just the name of this game, y'see? Use your imagination...

This Black & Bruised is - thank Christ! - totally different. It's that old favourite, the 'comedy boxing game'. Whoever thought that boxing - the sport of hitting someone in the head until they lose consciousness - made good comedy deserves to be, well, hit in the head. Yet somehow there have been many similarly styled efforts over the years. Each bangs together some stereotypical videogame characters (the muscular retard, the 'sexy' lady, the Mexican superhero) and engages them in a sport that clearly resembles boxing but is made more interesting through outlandish supermoves and power-ups.

B&B is no different, except it employs some neat cel-shading and is clearly not as good as previous 'wacky boxing' champ Ready 2 Rumble Round 2.

It's hard to see who this game is aimed at. Beat-'em-up fans will be more gainfully employed by more serious 'proper' fighting games. Boxing fans will weep at how the noble art has been watered down to the most infantile degree. And fans of 'light entertainment' will be better off wallpapering the spare bedroom.

The game's main event is the boxer's life mode which features unique story cut-scenes and challenges for each character. There are six fights per 'story' and clearly an awful lot of time has been spent designing fight locations, writing scripts and rendering graphics. However, the stories are so lame, the jokes so embarrassing and the actual game of boxing so damn basic, you're left mourning the sheer time and effort that's been wasted in their production.

The power-up system (where a power-up appears on screen and the first fighter to land enough blows nabs it) is unique but only serves to encourage random button bashing as you desperately try to win that health power-up or instant knock out. Meanwhile the camera whirls around in an effort to keep things looking interesting and show off the artists' hard work - usually at the expense of your ability to actually land blows. You frequently get the impression that the game is giving a better view to its boxer rather than your stoved-in, partially obscured fighter.

Each of the four main pad buttons delivers a slightly different blow, and the addition of L1 serves up variations, but the basic cartoony nature of the gaudy visuals makes it hard to see what's different about each punch. And the game 'censors' your attacks, choosing not to throw punches that won't make contact, so you feel like your fighter isn't going what your urgent thumbs are telling him to - it just doesn't work.

Ultimately though, it's the Black & Bruised styling and scrote-tightening humour that will force you out of the ring. It's so bad, it's embarrassing, like a lame punch that you wish had knocked you out. While we have admired B&B's graphics from afar for some time now, we've had our doubts about the game's quality. Sometimes we hate being right.

Graphics 70%
Nice cel-shading but that's nothing new these days.

Sound 60%
Abundant voice acting ruined by a fetid script.

Gameplay 30%
Repetitive and pointless.

Lifespan 50%
A decent portion of an average videogame.

Overall 50%
Not funny enough, not clever enough, not anything enough. Expect to see this 'pre-owned' in a shop near you soon!