Although we enjoyed Virtua Fighter 5 on the PlayStation 3, its lack of online play made us ditch the game sooner than we wanted to. The superb Xbox 360 version, on the other hand, gives us the full package; a phenomenal game made better with Xbox Live head-to-head.

Fighters from previous games return for more, along with two new faces -- the versatile Eileen and the suave Lucha Libre wrestler El Blaze. Each of these characters sport powerful, unique fighting styles. Shun Di, for instance, wavers around unpredictably with his drunken fighting technique, becoming more impulsive every time he swigs from the bottle. Jeffrey McWild prefers WWE-style wrestling moves, slamming opponents to the ground and howling like a mad man. None of the fighters have that much of an advantage over the others, which in turn keeps things balanced.

"The challenger throws a right hand uppercut."

To get a rundown of moves, simply access a Command List for each character by pausing the game. Here, you’ll discover combos and power moves, along with grapples, described here as "offensive maneuvers". You also get lessons in how to break out of a throw with a quick defensive maneuver, done more realistically here than in the counter-mad Dead or Alive 4. In addition, fighters shift movement upwards and downwards with a double-tap on the directional pad or analog stick. This sets up your foe for a good counter-attack, while dodging their incoming strike.