Yeah, it's a holiday weekend, but I have no life, so I'll still update the ShackReviews database. This week we've got a handful of console games, including an Xbox port of the last game to come out of the now-defunct studio Legend Entertainment and a remake of the original NES Metroid. As usual, if there's a game you want to review but don't see in the database, check first and then submit it! (And don't blame me if a game you never submitted isn't added!)

• Champions of Norrath: Realms of EverQuest (PS2)
• Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles (GC)
• Metroid: Zero Mission (GBA)
• Nightshade (PS2)
• Unreal II: The Awakening (Xbox)

As part of the same firehouse sale that I used to pick up Mac versions of both Fallouts, I also got the Mac port of Wipeout 2097 (also known as Wipeout XL), which as I've said in LNC on a few occasions is one of my favorite games of all time. There are a couple of funny things about this port. For one thing, the soundtrack is remarkably weak. I assume this is because of rights issues, but I wasn't having any of that, so I ripped the audio off my original PlayStation version of the game and dropped those MP3s into the music directory in place of the ones that shipped with the game. But the really funny thing about this version is that when you start up the game, the options screen lets you select your framerate. I figured that you know, framerate == how smooth the game runs, so I chose the highest one available. Big mistake. If anyone ever asks, Wipeout at 100 FPS is absolutely insane. At that speed, it runs so fast that the starting countdown sounds like, "Thretwonego!" And you don't even want to know what it's like to get a speed boost. It's just nuts. Needless to say, I dropped it down to 30 FPS. And if I'm feeling brave, I'll crank it up to 50 or 60. But 100? That's a bit too fast for me (my wife got dizzy just looking at it).