pill92's Reviews

    Army of two is a 3rd person action shooter for the ps3 and xbox 360. You start out as two men named Rios and Salem who are private military contractors. In English their mercs who are hired by the government to do special jobs. After the first mission you're treated to a cool trailer that time lines you working for this PMC (private military contractor) called SSC.
    I like the premise for being a mercenary yet the overall story isn't very good and the dialogue is laughable with one character calling you **** several times. This is one game you really need to play co-op instead of single player. You can play local co-op or co-op over xbox live with a friend. When playing by your self you pick which character you want to be and the AI controls the other.
    The AI For your partner does an okay job of covering your back and holding position. But when you tell him to heal you he drags you about a mile away from danger besides going around a corner which by that time you're usually dead. Also when you tell him to run forward he just runs straight at the enemy no flanking or running for cover. The enemy AI isn't much better ,enemies will take cover and flank you but then theirs enemies that run straight at you and sometimes right by you.
    If you play with the AI though the whole game instead of playing with a friend you'll have a drastically different experience. The co-op mechanics are simple awesome. When you "die" you fall down and sit up on the ground and your partner needs to drag you to cover to heal you. While your being dragged you can shoot at enemies and so can your partner. You can pick up riot shields and slow walk forward while your ally shoots. You can also give you partner daps, give him a high five or a pound it. This is something that gives the characters a little personality.     
    You can take cover in a sense were you duck behind cover and shoot over a ledge but your never actually attached to it. This is one linear game were your hand is guided though open space but you have to eliminate a seemingly endless amount of enemies to continue. But what is cool is that there are certain objectives you can do for a bonus sum of cash kind of like the game Mercenaries. One very annoying thing that pissed me off every time was when you come to a door to proceed to a next small part of the level their is cut scene were it shows you kicking the door open then theirs another loading screen. Loading screens are plenty and long some as long for 40 seconds! Mid-mission you can buy weapons form special weapon dealers from around the world.
    You carry a primary, secondary, special and grenade weapons that aren't all that satisfying to shoot. Yet all the guns in the game are fully upgradeable which includes, bigger clip, putting shields on guns, better stocks ,You can also buy face masks and new armor. Luckily when you get up-close to an enemy you get to perform a very satisfying melee kill. You either head but a guy (with your metal mask), kick him in the head, choke slam etc. Agro is what Army of Two is all about. Theirs an agro bar on your hud and agro is the more you shoot the more enemies pay attention to you while your partner becomes practically invisible.
    There are some enemies you have to use agro to kill heavily armored guards. But you end up letting your partner stay back behind cover full on agro while you flank your enemy over and over. Army of two is a pretty good looking game if you ignore enemy models. The enemy models all look mostly the same and their faces look really abstract. The cut scenes look great and are actually enjoyable. The multiplayer is a after though with four maps and three game modes. There are vehicles in the multiplayer that aren't in the single player but besides that multiplayer is pretty much single player over xbox live.
    Army of two has some great Co-op concepts that execute rather nicely yet poor AI, shallow single player experience (co-op is a must for this game),a very disappointing final boss and boring multiplayer stop this game form being great.

Graphics-8

Story-6

GamePlay-8(in co-op),6(in single player)

Sound-5

7.7

RENT

Schizoid is truly a one of kind game yet that doesn’t mean it’s for every one.  In schizoid single player mode you play as a blue space ship that is accompanied by a red ship that can only destroy enemy crabs, blobs and stars that are the same color as there ship.  There are 119 levels for you and your space cadet to run into and destroy enemies, while acquiring power up’s, that must be activated by flying into you’re partner to activate.  Power ups in clued hyper speed which makes you’re ship fly faster, a shield that lets you destroy any enemy no matter what color and the creative razor wire were you and you partner share a strand of wire that can destroy enemies.

            Now the A.I in single player is less than perfect and this is what holds the single player back from being great.  You’re ally will countless times get stuck on the environment and die , this wouldn’t be aproblem if you din’t share lives with the A.I.  Yet thankfully there is co-op over Xbox live or local play, just make sure you play with co-op with a good friend who is ready for a serious challenge.  There is also a mode only for the god’s called UberSchizoid mode were you control both ships with the thumb sticks that will truly test you reaction time. 

            The graphics are great, until you run into a different color enemy and you’re ship explodes (same with you’re ally) sending lighting bolts of your ships color on the screen, blending in with enemies and the environments causing countless deaths.  You’re ship has a little misty glow it leaves behind it, and lots of other little details, that show the developers really care about the quality of this game.  The sound is good but unfortunately there are only a few good tracks that replay over and over through out the 119 levels.

            If you own an Xbox 360 and have 800 Microsoft points ($10) to spare and have a friend willing to buy it when you do defiantly pick this gem up.  If you don’t have any friends I’d give this XBLA title a pass.

 

Score 7/10

Try the trail version first!        

            If you enjoyed 2006’s Rainbow Six Las Vegas there aren’t any surprises here.   There is a new A.C.E.S system which rewards you for every special type of kill (killing an enemy using a rope, head shots, close quarter kills).  You gain experience for these special kills which earn you new weapons, camo and amour.  Yes now you can customize your amour and clothes with about 20 types of camo.  It’s a bit disappointing not to be able to start with all your favorite weapons but having to unlock them makes sure you don’t get tired with the 30 so weapons available to you.

            Now the character you create for single player is carried over to multiplayer which feels identical to the first Vegas.  There are 12 new maps but it’s almost impossible to find a solid server.  Vegas 1 had these connectivity problems and you would think they would have fixed it the second time around; hopefully a patch of some sort will be issued.  2 new adversarial modes have been added but if you’re a multiplayer veteran you should appreciate the new maps more.  Now the maps are new in theory but several of them are from the Pc game R6 Raven shield, so their recycled maps.

            Now if this your first time playing a rainbow six game you need to prepared for the different ways of assessing certain situations.  You control two rainbow members and you can have them storm a room, smoke a room, grenade a room etc.  You can have them use sound suppressers and only shoot when being shot at.  Controlling your squad is a bit difficult at time because they get stuck on the environment and they some time don’t respond.  Something that’s new to the squad mechanics is now you can point our places were you want you squad to throw smoke or grenades.  The problem is you and your squad throws grenades about a foot in front of yourselves.  Weapons are still very satisfying to shoot and sound realistic.    

             Fire fights are still exciting and the environments you visit are great.  The story like the first one is forgettable it gets to the point were it is “look for this guy here”.  The campaign starts you out in France 5 years before Vegas 1.  It’s strange why they choose to go back in time but it’s still enjoyable to play.  Even with these flaws you won’t find a better tactical shooter on the360.