Reviewed on Xbox 360. Also on PC, PS3. Developed by Ubisoft Montreal. Published by Ubisoft.
In 2007, Ubisoft released Assassin’s Creed, a much hyped open world game set during the Crusades. Known before release equally for producer Jade Raymond’s appealing smile and interesting premise, the game received mixed reviews and sold like gangbusters anyway. Despite the problems (a very by the numbers mission system and repetition), a sequel was assured and two years later, we have Assassin’s Creed II.
Pic- Ezio Auditore- Assassin, lover, pickpocket. Hey! My wallet!
Assassin’s Creed II builds on the strong fundamentals from the original game in a way not seen often enough in videogames. Desmond is now free of Abstergo and working with a fish lipped Kristen Bell avatar and Switch from the Matrix and Wesley Windom Pryce from Angel, using their own Animus to delve into the world of the Templars. Here, Desmond enters the mind of Ezio Auditore, a Renaissance lad-about-town in 15th century Florence. Ezio becomes an Assassin and immediately sets off on a quest of revenge, intrigue and adventure. Make no mistake, this is firmly rooted in the world of Ezio with the ‘modern world’ only coming into a play a few times.
The free-roaming and combat have been refined slightly- they were pretty well done in the first game but polished a bit more here. You have high profile and low profile actions. Low profile means walking and gently pushing people out of the way, high profile means parkour, sprinting and battle and being badder-assed than Charles Bronson on a Jest Ski. It also will pique the interest of guards- they were profiling even back then. Climb on the roof and the fuckers will hunt you down like a dawg. You will gather an array of weapons throughout your playtime such as hidden knives, daggers, swords, etc and can earn money to buy them from Blacksmiths in each town. You can also buy better armour as you progress, change the colour of your robes, buy maps and even paintings to display in your villa (more later).
So if you played the first game you know how it all works. Here you don’t need to go to the Assassin’s Guild in order to be given a target, it happens far more organically. There’s more of a story being told, even if it’s the same deal- kill ‘x’ targets bit it doesn’t feel anywhere as quantized as the original game. Unlike the first one, missions are more asymmetric in that you don’t have three towns each rigidly cut up into three quarters and there are the same numbers of each type of mission in each area. Here you visit half a dozen locations but some are larger and more important than others. You will be spending most of your time in Florence and Venice with some sojourns to other places such as Tuscany, Forli and your family Villa in Monteriggioni.
Story missions are far more varied this time around with a good mix of things to do. Early on at least, you will will want to earn some money so side quests are useful if you want to be a courier, assassinate someone for money, beat-up a straying husband or race someone.
Pic- Ezio hangs out with his homes
If you don’t feel like doing that, the world is ridden with treasure chests, maps of which are available from art dealers. There are many many things to collect such as feathers for your catatonic mother, but most interesting are the six tombs which are necessary for the story’s resolution but not part of the main quest. Some tombs focus on combat, some on puzzles and others on tricky platforming. This mix of things to do and collect means you can spend quite a lot of time in this world or sneakcraft. Another of the non-optional collectibles are the codex pages, which help you on your quest via health and equipment upgrades from your friend, Lenny DV. The beauty of ACII is that the game gives you enormous freedom and lots of ways to achieve your goal (and hide from the law afterward). You can blend with crowds, hire mercenaries, thieves and courtesans to lure guards away, use bombs to get in close to an objective, etc. It’s a well designed game in almost every way. Just one question. WHY COULDN’T YOU HAVE DONE THIS TWO YEARS AGO, UBISOFT ?!?!
Combat has many options such as being able to block, dodge, disarm enemies, etc. But you don’t need half of them since you can have so many health boosts that you can get by with just pressing the same attack button over and over if that’s your bag. I suppose if you want more of a challenge, don’t upgrade your medicine pouch’s carrying ability at the tailor.
Since you earn money, one of the things you can do is upgrade the town of Monteriggioni. Why? Your renovations increase the value of the town and as Lord of the manor, you earn money this way. Later in the game you earn so much from missions and finding treasure and your rental income from the villa exceeds what you need to stock up on consumables like medicine, poison and the like that you can also end up collecting artworks. And that all adds to the brilliant atmosphere conjured by UbiMon. You feel like you’re there so much that some gamers have taken to playing the game with Italian audio on. This option does also cancel out Kristen Bell’s voice in the modern scenes, and unfortunately, Uncharted Guy.
Uncharted 2 has garnered many awards for beautiful graphics but I think ACII is right up there with it’s open world that’s not only technically brilliant but gorgeous to look at. The only major graphical sin is some fairly obvious pop-in when moving though the cities, even with the games fantastic draw distance (evident when you synchronize on a viewpoint). The framerate is smooth throughout though the latter stages of the game (like many games) do tend to have some areas where scripting and cutscenes seems somewhat rushed.
The sound is also worthy of consideration as it’s very slickly produced and although there’s still way too much repetition from some of the NPC’s, it’s not as bad as the first game where you had the exact same lines been repeated in different accents depending on which area you were in. I do know Luigi the fish merchant can’t be beaten for prices or the freshness of his catch. That much I have learned from this game. Here, almost everyone has an Italian accent, mostly convincing ones at that. And no matter what language you play the game in, the script features copious amounts of Italian dialogue which is why the subtitles come in (I did think the line “what, no fucking ziti?” was out of place). Ezio may sound like a reject from The Godfather but it never grates the way Altair’s bland American accent did in the first game. Ezio has passion and sensitivity. Altair was a cock. Of course, in the few short present days scenes outside of the Animus we have the voices of Kristen Bell and Nolan North AGAIN (we was also Prince of Persia and Drake and Shadow Complex guy).
Pic- Of course, Ezio is unlikley to appear in the next game so here he is carrying his stuff home in a cardboard box after he was let go.
If Uncharted 2 hadn’t been so great, I could have seen this is as a GOTY 2009 quite easily. Why? It’s a very good game that fixes almost everything that was broken in the first game. ACII is a must play.
Controller1.com rating 3/3
Controller1.com’s top games of this past year.
Sleeper of the Year (aka The game that came out of nowhere, the one you expected to ignore but couldn’t because of the great word of mouth)
RED FACTION: GUERRILLA. Volition and THQ’s third RF game came out of nowhere to be one hell of a blast of supercharged entertainment. Sure, Volition misunderstood the difference between easy and insane. But the core mechanics of the game and the freedom you had to progress meant few stumbling blocks to gaming nirvana. I have no idea what the story was about so let’s assume it’s rather ordinary and skip to the good bits: blowing things up. I can’t name a game where destruction has been done better.
Runner Up: Borderlands
Overhyped Game of the Year (AKA The game that was expected to make coffee, bend time and rule all but in the end was a bit meh)
KILLZONE 2. Sony and Guerrilla Game’s follow up to the justifiably ignored Killzone was meant to be many things. Here’s what it was and wasn’t.
IT WAS: A decent FPS, put together well and looked beautiful.
IT WASN’T: a system seller, or a particularly great game.
Year of PS3 got off to a false start and was almost disqualified from the race with KZ2.
Runner up: Scribblenaughts
Most Disappointing Game (AKA Games with buzz and hope that just didn’t deliver)
Wolfenstein Coulda, should but didna. Wolfenstein squandered the hope that long term fans had for a worthwhile follow up to Return to Castle Wolfenstein. What they got was a good single player that seemed to need a teeny bit more polish and content and a terrrrrrrrrible multiplayer. Do you get this game? Do you like MP more than SP? Flip a coin.
Runner Up: Modern Warfare 2
MOST IMPROVED (AKA They fixed the shit in the first one that was busted)
Assassin’s Creed II. Oh Lord is it ever so much better than the first game. In every single way, this game is more fun than the original. The content is better organised so that the game is not “here are 10 things you can do, go do each of them 500 times.” The whole concept is still a bit silly and Kristen Bell’s character looks like she had a lip transplant from the original Kryten but overall any game that has Uncharted Guy doing voices is good.
Runner Up: Uncharted 2
BEST DOWNLOADABLE CONTENT: SHADOW COMPLEX
BF1943, GTA episodes and Trials were there but Shadow Complex was by far the best DL only game released in 2009. A Metroidvania that’s probably more palatable to a modern audience (since it has Uncharted Guy doing voices, of course), the game managed to astound, entertain, stir up controversy and offer a good few hours of gameplay.
Runner Up: Halo 3 ODST (no, not really, but it should have been)
Best Game Only on Wii: NEW SUPER MARIO BROTHERS WII
OK, so it was really only one of two Wii games I bought this year. But it was the one I didn’t sell (HotD: Overkill). It’s frustrating as all fuck, has a save system that’s as pointless as the one in Dead Rising and I’m not playing it right now. Why am I not playing this right now? I don’t know.
Best Game Only on PS3: UNCHARTED 2
Sony had two really good games this year. Uncharted 2 and Infamous. Infamous is blown out of the water by Uncharted 2. Uncharted 2 is the quintessential adventure game. Whereas the first game promised platforming but delivered a gears of War Clone, the sequel mixes things up so successfully that you never realise when the game is going to go from one style to another. yes, you know at least once per chapter there will be something you’re standing in collapsing around you leaving you hanging from one arm but that’s beside the point.
Best Game Only on Xbox 360: SHADOW COMPLEX The 360 almost had a gap year with the only big exclusives being Forza 3 (which a LOT of people love and recognise as the driving game of 2009 to play), Halo 3: ODST which really was just a bit too much recycling with such a short single player campaign.
Best Game Only on PC- this is the year 2009.
Best Game on Everything: Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2. IW may have pissed off as many people as they please with MW2. There’s the story that eschews any semblance of realism for moments of turkey-slapping-a-sleeping-lion thrills, OTT Multiplayer perks and combos, poor matchmaking and the various PC issues that made the game into a must play for many into a meh for some.
Best Pissing Away Goodwill. TIE: Infinity Ward and Activision.
Infinity Ward for doing the dirty on PC gamers and Activision for driving Tony Hawk and Guitar Hero into the ground. Oh, and splitting Starcraft II into three different games.
Most Improved: Sony. They cut the PS3 price from hysterical to merely funny (after three years it’s finally at the PS2 launch price), released the Slim and released Uncharted and Infamous. It still takes way too long to download and install a patch and most people still spend more on Blu Ray than they do on PS3 games, and PS3 ports are still often slightly lagging behind 360 in terms of graphics but it’s basically where it should have been three years ago. Just in time for God of War III
Most Potential for 2010: Microsoft. Really, they sold the 360 well but didn’t release that many 1st party games so you’d think game over, but then you see they have Crackdown 2, Halo Reach and Alan Wake. And then there’s Natal.
Least Potential for 2010: Wii
So we have a vitality sensor as the big piece of hardware? Really? Few games still support Motion Plus. Few gamers care and the signs are than grandma doesn’t either.
Game of the Year: Uncharted 2. Are you at all surprised? Naughty Dog redeem themselves after the disasters that were the Jak and Daxter sequels. This is the only game this year that a non-gamer will sit and watch as if it were a movie and enjoy it.
Runner Up: Modern Warfare 2.
It was a pretty good year overall. The only disappointing part of the year was the end. While we had some cracking titles such as Uncharted 2, ODST, Left 3 Dead 2, Assassin’s Creed II, MW2 and Super Mario Wii it still felt like something was missing.Oh that’s right about 2 or 3 more must-haves in the lead up to Christmas that we wouldn’t get to play till 2010 anyway. Having them all come out in the first quarter of 2010 seems to have upset the natural balance.
Reviewed on Xbox 360. Also on PS3 and PC. Developed by Techland. Published by Ubisoft.
I’ll keep this short and sweet. As a fan of the original game, I’ve found this prequel to be highly disappointing. The original filled a gap in gaming- the well done western FPS. The sequel seems half-hearted in many ways while being more assured in execution. It’s rather lacking in something that for the sake of being descriptive I shall call soul.
In BiB you play as Confederate Brothers Ray or Thomas. In the aftermath of the South’s loss, these two become a pale parody of a spaghetti western protagonist. You usually choose which of the two you’ll play as at the start of a level with the other tagging along as a computer controlled ally. Ray (who becomes Reverend Ray, star of the first game) is the stronger of the two, able to dual wield pistols and be generally Cardassian. Thomas replaces Billy and is the more agile of the two, able to jump higher and use a lasso to scale some obstacles. Both characters have concentration mode, which is a fancy bullet-time mode that works differently for each of the brothers.
There are story missions and some optional side missions in this game but to be honest they aren’t particularly compelling to play compared to the original. Seemingly, most end in a one on one duel mechanic that is painful in the extreme to beat. Even though there is a save point just before it you have to move your guy so that your opponent is in a specific point (more or less the centre of the screen) . It’s shittier than a constipated ox that has eaten curry for a week and suddenly been exposed to very cold air.
So apart from the fights, the rest of the game is put together well but it’s just missing that hunger to do stuff that was in the first game. This is too by-the-numbers to be more than a time-waster while you wait for better games to be released. You go somewhere, and basically kill everyone who attacks you. But you don’t do in it an interesting way. The first game had a mix of stealth, climbing, Ray going off his nut and quoting the bible while he killed baddies. Here you just kill everything. In between chapters you are able to go off and do some side missions but these are more of the same- go and kill everyone and often ending in another annoying duel.
The multiplayer is not too bad and with more of a community, could have been a fun diversion for a while. It’s definitely better than the MP portion of Wolfenstein (a wasted opportunity if ever there was one) with multiple modes. I played a few rounds of a mode where you played as either the outlaws or the law. I was an outlaw, sticking it to the man as I blew up various safes and vaults in a delightful western town circa 1890-ish. Of course, know where the next objectives are are just an invitation to the Law -abiding team to just camp with rifles but it was fun while it lasted. Probably the most fun part of the game since it doesn’t rely on Techland’s half-hearted design.
So while the original was a breath of fresh air, the sequel is as stale as a box of donuts left in the back seat for a month. Looks brand new but probably best left unopened
Controller1.com rating 1/3
Today we boot up Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood and God of of War: Chains of Olympus. Yep, we load up these games. We see the splash screens and even the main menu.
E3 will be on us very shortly and Controller1.com would like to prognosticate one what you WON’T be reading about come the first week of June. This is not the result of rumor, heresay or the result of a dodgy phone camera shot of a Best Buy POS terminal. This is pure 100% bullshit. You do know how to spot bullshit, don’t you? It’s easy. Read on…
1- Nintendo will announce the Wii 2 HD console without Motion controllers, merely a redesigned N64 controller with more spikes. The Big N has listened to the whining whims of hard care gamers and is ditching the mass market with millions of easy sales of Wii fit and WiiPlay. Instead, they will focus on the shrinking marketshare that ‘core’ games that are currently divvied up between Sony and MS.
2- A Japanese game without hypersexualised pedo-bait female characters will be released. RE5 will offer new unlockable raincoat costumes for Shiva. DLC for X-Blades will include a petticoats and hoop-skirts. I do declare!Dead or Alive Extreme 3 will feature the ladies in a new environment- Open Cut Coke Mining.
3. EA will be bought by Midway
Take one company that’s big but losing a bit of money. Take another company that’s on its last knees. Midway buying EA would be like Quebec buying France. But that won’t stop Midway’s bat-shit loco insane management from giving it a go.
4. Microsoft announces a new model Xbox 360- The Bulletproof. This new model is guaranteed by Microsoft nit to break down in any way. It will never RROD or display an E74. It also has no DVD Drive, power supply, CPU, GPU or wireless receiver. It is not backwards compatible with Xbox 1 games, but its also not present-compatible with Xbox 360 games. But its not breakable.
5. Ubisoft announces a game produced by Jade Raymond that will not be demoed on stage by Ms Raymond, but by the games’ designer. Jade’s a talented lady but we’ve seen enough. Show us the dirty smelly bearded nerd.
6. Boothbabes who can stand up without developing lower back pain within 10 minutes.
7. A new Super Mario Bros game for the DS will be announced. Yes, Nintendo will actually make a second Mario platforming game on the DS. All New Super Mario Brothers will be more of the same. No Baby Mario, Wario or Yoshi. Just Mario and Luigi jumping on things.
8. a PlayStation 3 killer application. Yes, a reason for you fence sitters will be announced at E3. Unlike Heavenly Sword, Lair, Haze, MGS4, Little Big Planet or Killzone2, this will actually excite no PS3-owning gamers with two jobs to take the plunge.
9. A Twitter feed of a press conference without LOL, OMFG or Woot being used when sequel x91 is announced for mega-successful franchise y39 is announced.
10. Controller1.com’s game of show will be an MMO.
wat?
Reviewed on Xbox 360. Also on PS3, PC. Developed by Ubisoft Montreal. Published by Ubisoft.
Prince of Persia as a game series has one of the more interesting origins stories which we won’t go into. PoP as a Ubisoft franchise has a less interesting background. The formerly 2D Prince made the leap to 3D with Mattel’s PoP 3D. To all intents and purposes, it was rather ordinary. In 2003, Ubisoft (who had acquired some of Mattel’s gaming library a year or two previously) released Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time.
Here, in order to lesson the rather punishing lessons of trial and error the play would often endure in a PoP game, the reversing time mechanic was introduced. It was a great game with fantastic atmosphere, a great story, brilliant platforming based on contextual button presses and some button mashing combat that was neither here nor there. It came out and didn’t sell all that well until Ubi cut the price rather substantially wherein the game found its audience. For the followup a year later, Ubi looked at what the perceived barriers to purchasing the game and decided to lesson the whole Persian aspect, darken it up, more combat oriented and flushed any atmosphere down the toilet. Warrior Within was shash. The trilogy capping two Thrones was better but by then the damage was done.
Flash forward a few years and Assassin’s Creed, flawed it may have been, sold gangbusters is followed by a new Prince of Persia.
The new game is a sort of return to the atmosphere of the first game, with more platforming, less combat, a better story.
And its a great game being held back by TERRIBLE controls
The controls are quite simple and the game likes to do things for you. Which, if you’re a person who likes to have more than minimal control over what you’re doing can be very frustrating. You jump across a gap onto a wall. But you don’t have to press jump again because that will just have you jumping off into a chasm.
Time and time again, the game’s control system will confound your expectations and having you leaping to your doom because your mind can’t accept you don’t need to press so many buttons.
Just as Sands of Time featured the rewind time mechanic so that you didn’t have to constantly restart at checkpoints, this game has your constant companion Elika as a magical princess who can rescue you if you fall.
Many people have praised the removal of death of an obstacle to playing the game. That’s so much bullshit. All it is is a checkpoint system hidden by a cutscene of some chick grabbing your hand.
The game is sort of an open world. You get to a new area, jump for a bit, are confronted by a boss. Once you beat the boss, Elika fertilized the area and there are little glowing lightseeds you much collect. Think of them as Agility Orbs and you’re close to the mark. So the game is frustratingly good in so many ways, but ruined by unintuitive controls that are fairly loose in response to you inputs. But the graphics are rather spectacular with very solid sound. Presentation is obviously Ubisoft Montreal’s strong point. Gameplay, isn’t.
As a fan of Sands of Time, I’m highly disappointed by this title. Fans of Mirror’s Edge and Assassin’s Creed (you know, people you can sell any platformer to as long as you say its parkour) will be just as disappointed as real gamers.
controller1.com rating 1/3 (should have been 3/3 if the damn thing was playable)
In this podcast, we look at the recent Prince of Persia game. Clint asks where’s the Assassin’s Creed, Cam ponders the imponderables and George tries to remember where he put the receipt.
The new Prince of Persia kinda crept on us like a stealth camouflaged Pedo bear. I was expecting a cel-shaded Assassin’s Creed and what we have Prince of Persia Sands of Time with an even more automated control scheme. Its like trying to type something with auto-fill on. Predictive text may be great on phones, but its not so great when you’re trying to pull off complex moves smoothly.
The new PoP apparently does away with death. Bullshit. All it does is put more checkpoints in and cover the fact with a cutscene. You will be watching that short non-skippable cutscene of Elika grabbing your hand many, many, many, many times. Why? Because this is a game that expects you to ignore your instinct whilst playing.
Its hard to describe. In order to pull of the move list, you need to unlearn. Need to double jump? Press A to jump then Y to have Elika use her mojo to give you an extra distance boost. Jump across a chasm and press A to jump up? No the game does it for you automagically. If you press A again, you’re jumping backwards to your temporary death.
I’m very conflicted about playing this game any further. I like it and it shits me to tears within the space of five minutes. Its a great game to play in 20 minute installments. The reason you can’t play it any longer than that is because you realise that you’re spending so much time on one jump sequence because the controls don’t quite do what you need them to. Prince of Persia is in fact the best argument for Mirror’s Edge using a first-person perspective.
PoP is the last 2008 game I have left to play and is the last of my gaming Xmas pressies I had to play. We have a long weekend coming up so it will be interesting to see how much time PoP actually gets. Right now its level pegging with Halo 3 time.
So Grifball. What the fuck is that? I played this as part of the Mythic Map pack last night and its basically a room where two teams are only armed with melee weapons such as the Gravity Hammer and the swords. It was fun apart from one of the few instances of lag I’ve noted in Halo 3. Like, it was really really bad lag. There’s a bomb in there as well but dying when enemies were nowhere near me made it a little confusing.
The other team modes are just plain fun. Its a pity the bigger team games are so objective based as I want to shoot more than I want to capture flags. The question remains, why is Halo 3 easier to play (its P2P just like most live games) online than CoD WaW, where there is a noticeable lag between you shooting and hitting an opponent.
I’m kinda waiting for something to hit me in the face. Hopefully Infamous will be that game as its the only game on my radar for the month of May. Maybe I’ll look at some more DLC stuff like Burnout Paradise Cops and Robbers pack. Part of me wants to replay some faves like Bioshock, Crackdown and even the campaign from Halo 3.
Reviewed on Xbox 360. Also on PC, PS3, DS. Developed by Ubisoft Monteal. Published by Ubisoft
Ubisoft presents a Ubisoft Montreal production…
Assassin’s Creed is an enigma of a game. It looks like a gorgeous open world stealth action game. It looks as though there’s millions of things to do in this [cliche] leaving, breathing city [/cliche]. Well looks can be deceiving. Assassin’s creed has a few tricks up its sleeve. You just have to do them over and over again.
Halo creators Bungie have often said that their games are 10 seconds of fun repeated over and over. Well Ass Creed is about 2 seconds of fun repeated over and over again. It’s like Ubi Montreal got wrapped up in how cool the locale and story was and forgot about making the gameplay varied enough (as GTA does so well). Obviously you can’t have bazookas and helicopters in a game set during the middle ages. Or can you?
SPOILERS (even though this game has been out six months, Flamey still has another 3 years before he can even consider it retro enough for his tastes. This spoiler is not all that much of a spoiler since the menus give it away before you’ve even pressed start and the game doesn’t wait 5 mins before it tells you the big twist)
This game is set in the present. Your character is actually accessing a trace memory on his ancestor (similar to the Matrix). Unfortunately, this serves almost no story purpose, kills the middle age realism by having techno looking menus, computer voices telling you you’re fast forwarding and the like. It even feels grafted on in some ways.
So, hi tech conceits and repetition aside, what has Unisoft done for us? Well, the game is fun to play, the towns are interesting to explore and combat and movement is fun, despite the incredibly wanky tutorial. By incredibly wanky, I mean super incredibly wanky in the vein of Final Fantasy wankery. Its pretty and it sounds very good.I quite liked being able to climb buildings though I found having towers more fun than missions because they were more frustrating than fun to be honest. There’s little skill involved in pickpocketing more luck. Interrogating barely works and stealth kills in order to assist an informant where somewhat more fun.
Metal Gear meets GTA meets the middle ages meets the Matrix meets hype and cute producer meets 5 million in sales. If AC2 managed to fix the basic gameplay issues, I’ll be there, since they’re got most of the elements right. As it is, if you can play it for more than a few hours without getting incredibly frustrated or bored, you might like this.
C1 Rating: 1/3
Reviewed on Xbox 360. Also on: PC, PS3. Developed by Ubisoft, Published by Ubisoft
Not a football score but a game, a sequel in a series that seems to alternate between extremely high quality offerings such as GRAW and the original R6 Vegas title and cheesy expansion packs. Guess which one this is…
The original R6 Vegas title came off four console titles from last gen of descending quality. The first Xbox R6 title was a pretty good game for its time and its follow up Black Arrow was more goodness. Then there was Lockdown and the Classics game (which redid missions from older PC titles). They were shithouse. R6V2 is somewhere in between the two extremes.
GRAW came out shortly after the 360 launch and was a great game with a sequel coming out a year later whose only major shortcomings were its lack of anything new and brevity. It was still kick ass. R6V2 seems to have lost a lot of the sparkle from the original Vegas. Its not so much kick ass as it is suckass.
The gameplay is identical in most respects. The locale is not, as there are health centers in Vegas, Junkyards in Vegas and the convention center, but the casinos are conspicuous by their almost complete absence (I do remember thinking they were a tad overused in the first title, but come on, Ubi. Only one level?). Being able to tag which enemies your fire team will prioritize when you use your snake cam is useful but that’s hardly anything other than expansion pack de rigeur.
With the more prosaic locales in most of the game, the graphics seemto have taken a big hit. Lightning is flat as a pancake most of the time and the frame rate can really struggle on some levels (particularly the health center). The brief MP game I played looked awful, like an early Xbox 1 game. It was even flatter than the Single player campaign after being flattened by a steamroller driven by a very large man.
Sound is a mixed bag as some of the voice work is barely audible and yet more use of the same sound effects these guys have been using since at least 2003 with Rainbow Six 3.MP was pretty ordinary as well. I played a Team Deathmatch game on LIVE – lag was fine but the gameplay seemed like an old R6 3 user map with spawn points almost always in the line of fire from camping whores. So massive fail there.
I ended up stopping playing this game’s SP about two thirds of the way through since it just wasn’t any fun and was frustrating enough to prevent me finishing.
I wouldn’t recommend this unless you looooooooooved the first one so much you need more. It would make ordinary DLC and is quite poor when its supposed to be a sequel that Ubi’s charging full price for.
AVOID LIKE HERPES
C1 Rating: 0/3
