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> Results: Lair
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The ESRB says
Blood and Gore: GamerDad's dragon was frequently tearing into people, though it's not quite as explicit as the descriptor makes it sound Violence: Your dragon is attacking other dragons, creatures, and humans throughout the game Dragons fighting in high-def. That should be a terrific game. How can you mess it up? By handing the player terrible controls and shipping a product littered with technical problems. In a Tolkien-inspired fantasy world left barren and polluted by emerging volcanoes, the supposedly noble Asylian people are locked in conflict with the opposing Mokai forces. You step into the shoes of one Asylian dragon rider named Rohn, and are immediately thrust into battle to thwart the latest Mokai attack. The game plays out like a Lord of the Rings movie, with a series of set-piece battles and interactive cut-scenes, and the pace never really lets up from the moment you leap onto the back of your dragon. Lair certainly does deliver on atmosphere.  So that's the one positive out of the way. Let's get on to the negatives, and hope I don't run out of words. Perhaps I should cut the part about having to sit through the overly-long THX animation and developer logos every time I booted up, then.. Lair was supposed to be a flagship title for the PS3, making use of the SIXAXIS controller's motion-sensing capabilities. Unfortunately, either the controller itself is just incapable of handling a game like this or the developer failed to implement it properly, because while basic turning and tilting of your dragon works fairly well, other maneuvers (such as a 180 degree turn, rather important in what is essentially a combat flight game) take way too much force to pull off, requiring you to violently jerk the controller upwards. On top of this, the game switches control methods frequently depending on what interactive moments are triggered, and while Lair has several tutorials for each mode and offers on-screen guides for the first couple of levels, it's too easy to forget what you're doing and you resort to hopeful flailing around. You'll be just as hopeful when trying to target specific enemies, all too often locking on to the wrong thing and despairing at having to play the mission again because you failed to pick up the enemy rhinos before they destroyed your troops. In all seriousness, I found Lair physically and mentally exhausting to play because of the controls. But at least the graphics are good, right? It definitely looks great in screen shots. Once things are in motion the game loses its lustre, with horrendously choppy movement and amateurish graphical glitches leaving the view stuck in the middle of a mountain or under the sea while Rohn continues his death plummet to nowhere. I'm lucky enough to be able to game on a high-definition TV and I admired the detail in the textures and environments, but this may lead to excess "business" on older sets, especially in the heat of battle. Perhaps the disc should have just contained all the cut-scenes, because they do look terrific. Unfortunately, a somewhat visceral experience and occasional good looks (plus some rather nice sound) might buy a star-and-a-half, but they do not justify spending $60 on Lair. It's a shame, because the concept works but the execution is dismal, despite the obvious time that went into its creation. 
While the beasts are ferocious and some of their actions quite violent, I don't believe there's nothing that makes this adults-only. The most extreme thing you can do as a player is probably bring down your dragon to the ground and attack Mokai soldiers directly with flames, claws, and tail. I again bring up Lord of the Rings, as while some of the creatures and battles could be too intense or scary for younger children, if your older children could handle the LotR movies they'll have no problem with this. The game does present some interesting questions about human morality and corruption, and as this is set against a religious backdrop (and religion isn't shown in a particularly positive light) you might want to vet the game if this is a sensitive topic in your family.
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