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This week's video game reviews

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(Wii, $50, Everyone) — Mario and his pals take to the baseball field in this half-hearted redux of the 2005 GameCube baseball game "Mario Superstar Baseball."

You take the zany, obstacle-filled diamond as a team for a quick game, or point and click your way through a story mode that has you round up and refine a team, winning over potential teammates and rivals with your skills on the field. Motion controls let you pitch and swing the bat, similar to the baseball minigame in "Wii Sports."

Players can earn super swings that crush the ball out of the park and pitch nearly unhit-able fireballs. You get exactly the sort of goofy fun you'd expect from a Mario sports game, but "Sluggers" feels stuck in the past because it lacks the online play like its soccer-playing cousin, "Mario Strikers Charged."

If you're jonesing for Mario baseball and can get by without motion controls, you'd do well to search the bargain bins for the GameCube version, which is playable on the Wii if you've got a GameCube controller.

(360, PS3, PS2, $40-$60, Teen) — Set in a borderline racist depiction of Venezuela, with enemies who talk with corny Latino accents, "Mercenaries 2" lets you guide a soldier of fortune through a dynamic war zone. Your enemy is a dictator who is out to control the country's oil.

You pick up cash and weapons on the fly, hijacking vehicles and calling in ammunition drops and airstrikes — which you have to pay for out of the cash you find. Playing various factions off one another, you can befriend or antagonize various groups with side missions. Players can truck through the game cooperatively online, joining another mid-mission.

In a year of strong shooters, "Mercenaries 2" falls in the middle of the pack. It provides some short-lived thrills but not the resonant themes of "Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots" or "Grand Theft Auto IV."

(PS3, $15, Everyone 10+) — The download-only half-sequel to 2007's superb "Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction" has a title that's something of a misnomer. Clank, the robotic sidekick to the furry, gun-toting Ratchet, has been kidnapped.

It's up to the plucky Ratchet to take on pirates in search of his pal. You tackle puzzles involving opening doors and crossing chasms with a grappling-hook-like tool. Without Clank at your side the game-play doesn't have quite as much charm, but the challenges are diverse enough to keep you engaged.

Designed to keep gamers busy between four and five hours, the short, cheap expansion is enough to keep series fans satisfied until next year, when a true sequel is projected to be ready for release.