"Killzone" was an ambitious shooter hobbled a bit by the technical limitations of the PlayStation 2 – and even then, it was among the best shooters on that system.

"Killzone 2" is every bit the game the original wanted to be.

Having thrown back the blitzkrieg of the goggled-and-gas-masked Helghast race in the first game, the warriors of the Interplanetary Strategic Alliance have turned the tables and invaded the enemy's home world of Helghan.

The game looks incredible, better even than last year's "Resistance 2," which looked fantastic itself. But where the "Resistance" games pit humans against toothy mutant aliens armed with exotic weaponry, the "Killzone" titles are closer to World War II in space, with a gritty feel to the combat.

The Helghast aren't quite aliens; they're an offshoot of humanity that colonized a hostile world and evolved to live in its harsh environment, and are now trying to expand into more easily habitable systems under the leadership of their fanatical dictator.

The Helghast home world is a gray, dusty and stormy place with a heavily industrialized landscape, bad air and a worse welcome. It's no wonder they're looking for greener pastures.

The ISA has arrived in force with a massive battle fleet encircling the planet, but the Helghast are dug in, their weapons are in place, and they're not about to give up their home.

Players control Sgt. Tomas "Sev" Sevchenko as he makes his way through a series of linear levels, sometimes with squad members, sometimes alone. But solo or with comrades, Sev will be shooting a ton of Helghast. The game's combat is frequent and intense, with grenades going off and bullets flying all over.

The weapons are mostly futuristic extrapolations of present-day rifles, machine guns, shotguns, grenade launchers and such, though there are a handful of exotic weapons to be found, mostly based on the Helghast's mastery of artificial lightning.

Multiplayer allows for up to 32 players to duke it out in several modes, including team-based kill count, VIP assassination, objective destruction and defense, and object retrieval. A multiplayer match typically cycles through some or all of these game types in a single round, so players have a new objective every few minutes. The team that wins the most points in a round claims victory.

There are several multiplayer classes, but they're locked away at the beginning. Players have to earn the right to use them, which is time-consuming and a little aggravating, and puts rookie players at a material disadvantage.

Picks and Pans

Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection

4 stars

"Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection" is similar to the "Sega Genesis Collection" from a few years back, but it includes many more games and replaces a couple of the older set's duds with, well, new duds. But this collection of nearly 50 games from Sega's glory days is mostly good stuff.

It offers all the classic "Streets of Rage" brawlers, the original Sega Master System's "Phantasy Star" as an unlockable bonus to go along with the three Genesis entries, and many more. Some of the titles, like the arcade versions of "Space Harrier" and "Shinobi" and "Fantasy Zone," have to be earned by completing tasks in other games first.

Microsoft Xbox 360, also for Sony PlayStation 3; $29.99

Age rating: 10-plus

Pikmin

3 stars

It's more than eight years old, but "Pikmin" holds up pretty well, as this reissue proves. Updated to take advantage of the Wii's unique controller and given a new widescreen view mode, "Pikmin" remains otherwise unchanged from the GameCube original. The game plays as if it was always meant for the Wii, with the Wii Remote used to point to where the Pikmin need to be, and the buttons used to send them there.

As the tiny, crash-landed alien Captain Olimar, players command an army of this strange planet's tiny life forms, called Pikmin. They grow in the ground and blossom like plants, but they can walk and fight, and willingly follow orders.

Olimar needs the Pikmin to help him find the lost pieces of his ship, and fast – his life support will give out in 30 of the game's days. Each day is on a timer, too, so players must act quickly to find enough parts to blast off in time.

Nintendo Wii; $29.99

Age rating: Everyone

Flower

3 1/2 stars

As relaxing a game as has ever been made, "Flower" is a serene experience.

Each level represents the dream of a flower on a windowsill in a gray, dingy city. Starting out with a single petal, the player uses the tilt-sensitive PS3 controller to catch that petal in the wind, guiding it into other flowers to make them bloom and picking up more and more petals along the way, eventually amassing a long train of color.

There's no score, no death, just a mellow mission to make the landscape bloom, whether it's a green field dotted with buds or a dry hillside that needs rejuvenation. Blooming enough flowers in one part of a stage opens the path to the next, and hitting clumps of certain colors of flowers will create new clusters of buds.

Sony PlayStation 3 (PlayStation Store download); $9.99

Age rating: Everyone

– Justin Hoeger