MAG

MAG is an interesting game to try to review as the way that you play games and what you're looking for in a shooter are going to affect your enjoyment, or lack therof, of MAG. The game starts you out with picking a PMC (Private Military Corporation) from 3 choices: SVER, Raven, and Valor. SVER would be essentially the Russian faction with AK-47 type weapons that are a bit more rustic. Raven is a European PMC with great weapons, and Valor is the North and South American contingent that is probably fairly comparable in style to Raven.

At this point, there's no denying it; SVER is the dominating PMC. Their weapons probably aren't as good, but that's made up for by the fact that their maps tend to funnel the attacking force into plain site where SVER just rips them apart and then thinks they've done something brilliant or that the other team doesn' t know what they're doing. There are ways around this and Raven and Valor have been able to take them out, and seem to be getting better at it, but it requires a lot of teamwork and coordination. I'm in Raven, and our clan has been fairly successful in taking out SVER about half of the time. Like I said, at this point SVER is the "easy mode" in this game, but I wouldn't recommend new players joining that PMC as I see a big nerfing or map redesigns coming if these complaints keep up.  
  
There's a friendly rivalry going between the different PMC's, with gamers of one faction giving another a hard time for joining that faction. Whichever faction you join, if you enjoy the core gameplay and what the game is about, I think you're going to have a comparable time.
 
That leads to my next recommendation, which is that if you're not going to join a clan, or use a mic then I'd advise to stay away from this. If you're joining it and playing with random people and not using a mic (or they aren't using a mic), the game will feel overwhelming and you won't have the sense of direction (and the tips from your friends) that you get if you're in a clan. Be prepared to invest a lot of time into this game to get into it, and to ask questions of people that will be helpful to you (hence being in a clan) so that you can improve over time. 
 
Reviews among the gaming media seem to be all over the place with some calling it a great shooter, and others just mediocre. I think a lot of that relates to the previous paragraph that this game requires a lot of time and playing with people that you know to enjoy it, and most of the media doesn't have that kind of time to dedicate to one game. They have to move on to the next one to review. So keep that in mind when you're reading some actual professional reviews out there. 
 
As far as graphics, it looks a little washed out, but the game is actually quite nice looking considering how many people are in the match and the scale of the maps. It won't win any awards for graphics, but it is certainly solid looking. Also, all these spaces are full of trucks, containers, plants, trees, houses, etc so it's not just an open space, in the least. As far as scale goes, you could probably fit 5-10 of any other shooters large maps inside one of MAG's large maps.
 
In summary, if you're looking for an excellent PC style shooter on consoles that requires teamwork and practice, this is it. If you're looking to get a game where you can just jump into team deathmatch and play 1 round for 5-10 minutes and hop off (while still being fairly good at it), I'd advise you to stay away from this and stick with the other shooters out there. Hope you enjoyed my review, and happy gaming!