Thursday, January 21, 2010

REVIEW: Army of Two the 40th Day (XBOX360)

Whew haven't updated the blog in quite some time due to changing work schedule, but never fear I am back and coming back at you with a review for Army of Two the 40th Day.

Story:

For those not familiar with the first Army of Two your are put into the shoes of either Salem or Rios two badass mercs who are out to make some money but somehow always find themselves in unfortunate situations. This go around we find them in Shanghai in what should be an easy mission that quickly turns into an all out battle for survival.

Gameplay:

Gameplay has made a vast improvement from the first game, and alot of the elements I found tedious from the first have been removed from the game or have been tightened to be easier to perform. There also have been a few new tricks added to the mix such as taking an officer hostage and have your partner tie up his cronies, or performing a mock surrender while your buddy lines up his shot from his rifle. The only thing that returned that I hated in the first game is the back to back areas while it might seem epic to be fighting with your buddy watching your back spinning around killing countless enemies I just found the back to back thing very tedious and at times extremely cheap.

The game itself is a co-op blast as anyone can guess the entire experience was built from the ground up with co-op in mind and it really shows. I played the entire game co-op with my wife and we have had a blast figuring out how to take down various enemies or planning out or strategies for getting past an area and to me this is co-op at its best.

Controls:

The controls are decent however I did notice at first they seemed very clunky but after a bit of gameplay they seemed really solid and I found myself running and diving for cover quite easily.


Sound:

The sound effects are pretty good. From bullets whizzing past your head or explosions going off around you everything sounded solid, however the background music is decent but not something really remarkable.

Multiplayer:

Tried out the multiplayer a few times and it is really fun if you can find a game without lag. Bascially out of the box if you did not preorder you are given a few game modes: Co-op Deathmatch (2v2v2v2) Warzone (4v4 competing to complete objectives) and Control (4v4 taking over points on the map. I enjoyed the co-op deathmatch the best so far as it pits you and a partner vs others and the teamwork can be nothing short of amazing. If you were smart enough to preorder you get exculsive access to Extraction which is pretty much a Gears of War style horde mode.

So altogether Army of Two the 40th Day is a very solid game to play with a friend, and the multiplayer modes provide a little extra to do when the story mode gets old. With clunky controls at the start but solid gameplay throughout the game I give Army of Two the 40th Day a 4 out of 5.

1 comment:

  1. Good review. You're really missing out without Extraction - in my opinion, it's the most fun of the game, sort of like Halo 3 ODST's Firefight mode. It will be available to all the first week of Feb, though, so it's all good.

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