Like real paintball, only without the bruising

It's not just failed policemen, TA nuts and frustrated bank clerks who enjoy paint-balling. It's a big professional sport too, apparently, with big professional paintballing stars such as Greg Hastings, Yosh Rau, Nicky Cuba and B-Real! No, we haven't heard of them either, but that didn't stop us squeezing five minutes of fun out of this simulation of the 'sport'. Think simplistic Halo-style deathmatches with one-shot kills (unless you 'cheat' and wipe the paint off!) and plenty of running around muddy forests, peering round trees.

It's all a bit ridiculous, of course, and no substitute for the real thing, but at least there's a touch of strategy involved in building up your character's stats and the whole thing can be played online. A novelty shooter for sure, but certainly not as bad as we expected.

Simplistic and a bit silly, but it does a fairly decent job of recreating the competitive paintball experience on Live.