There’s two new demos to try out on Xbox Live if you’re short of pennies in the run up to the Christmas season. They’re not the full games, of course, but you can try them out to possibly put them on your Christmas wish list. This way you can stop wishing that you could actually afford all the games coming out around now and just get someone else to buy them for you instead.  Are the two demos any good? I haven’t tried them yet so I can’t possibly comment, but I’d just like to inform you that they are now available.

Our favourite female video game character Lara Croft returns in Tomb Raider: Underworld. The reason for the ‘Underworld’ part is because the game is all about water this time around, and you’ll also be swimming through old ruins as well as doing the old fashioned Lara way of climbing all over the walls. After you’ve sat through the 1.3GB download you’ll get the chance to find out if this new take on Lara’s adventures is actually worth parting with your hard-earned cash. Hopefully it will be latter, but that’s totally up to you.

The full game arrives for Playstation 2, Playstation 3, Mobile, Nintendo DS, PC, Wii, Xbox 360 on November 21st.

Don’t laugh, but this is one game I’m actually looking forward to. Despite never touching a Banjo-Kazooie game in my life (apart from one in a McDonalds on a holiday to Florida, which didn’t really work) I’m loving the look of  Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts and what you can actually do with the game. The idea is that you’re taking part in a contest against a witch named Gruntilda for control of Spiral Mountain.  She’ll be constantly trying to stop you while you undertake challenges to preserve your home (as Gruntilda wants to build malls everywhere). Anyway, the point is that you can build things, and that’s the big pull (as with many games these days). There’s over 1,600 components that you can build vehicles with, so you can pretty much build a vehicle in any style you want.

The demo will take up 1.07GB of space and will allow you to try and the building and take on ‘Jiggy challenges’, whatever they may be.

The full game will be out for Xbox 360 on November 14th.

Try them out and tell me what you think!