Day three of the 2008 Beijing Olympic games is over and what a day it’s been. Great Britain (go Team GB!!!) snatched gold and bronze in the women’s Swimming 400m Freestyle, while the US (including the phenomenal Michael Phelps) beat off the French in the 400m Freestyle Relay. All this and the world’s greatest show has barely begun! If you’re not a pumped up athlete or couldn’t get a ticket to the games then you can have fun right here at home. Granted, it’s not as fun as actually being there but it’s a start – and you can give your fingers a good workout!

Here are two games to get you in the mood for more Olympics.

Beijing 2008: The Official Video Game of the Olympic Games

First up is the official video game of the Olympics. The game allows you to experience the thrill of all the Olympics main events without actually being there – or straining your ankle for that matter. Well, at least in theory anyway.

Events available to the player include the regular track and field events, swimming and diving, gymnastics and shooting – all of which have sub-events. You also have archery, weightlifting, cycling, judo etc. and more. All in all there are 36 events for you to grab the gold in. This sounds like a pretty meaty offering, until you consider just how much incredible effort you have to put into each one. Of course, athletes have to put in incredible effort in the Olympics but this is a video game – it’s supposed to be far less difficult.

The main reason for this difficulty is the agonising amount of times you have to repeatedly slam your fingers down on the buttons. For short events – like the 100m sprints – this isn’t all that bad but when you’re competing in an event that could last for up to four minutes it gets incredibly painful. I realise that a lot of track and field games are mostly nothing more than button mashing but the developers of this game are almost willing you to get arthritis. Also, all this button mashing seems pretty pointless when the game doesn’t even seem to register that your hitting them faster than a second ago. Most of the other events are simple rhythm games that, although easier, quickly get repetitive and downright dull. It may be all layered in pretty graphics but what’s the point when your hands are aching and you’re having the most boring time of your life?

You’d have thought the multiplayer would save the game, but even this isn’t that great. Since you’re largely taking part in turn-based events you’ll be sitting there half of the time watching your friends instead of playing with them. Couple that with your friends most likely quickly tiring (because their hands are about to explode with pain) and it’s really not that fun at all.

So if you want the experience of an athlete after running the 400m transferred to your fingers then this game is perfect for you. For the rest of us you’ll probably want to avoid this lacklustre ‘experience’ if you want to keep your fingers. Of course, it doesn’t matter what I say because it’ll still sell like hotcakes regardless.

You can get it for the PC, Xbox 360 or the Playstation 3 - but it’ll hurt your pinkies no matter what platform you play it on.

Let’s hope the next game will put some fun back into the Olympics. Catch part two coming up soon!

Update: Part two is here!