Army of Two

In Army of Two, you and a friend (or an AI buddy) take on the role of high risk, high reward soldiers Elliot Salem and Tyson Rios. You start out in the game as enlisted men, but quickly jettison your positions in favor of joining the SSC private military corporation. Going from two ordinary soldiers to two money hungry die-hards in nothing flat, Salem and Rios are assigned reconnaissance and assassination missions in response to the 9/11 terror attacks. There are a few twists and turns along the way, but this isn't a storyline you'll be talking about for long. In fact, it's doubtful you'll really care at all.

The main gameplay in the game is focused from the ground up on the idea that you're a team, and you must act accordingly. Running out guns a-blazing in nearly any situation will have you taking a dirtnap, even on the games lowest difficulty setting, Recruit. Instead, the game provides a shared meter that both players must utilize called the Aggro Meter. Derived from massively multiplayer online game monster patterns, this bar will show which player the enemies are actively pursuing, and which the enemies are ignoring. When you are being focused on, your character will be glowing bright red, as to take the attention off your teammate. Meanwhile, your buddy will become invisible to the enemy and will be able to sneak up and wreak havoc on any unsuspecting foes.

Things aren't all cherries and gumdrops with this system, however, and that's partially due to the games button layout. Often times as the stealth character, you'll find yourself shooting the enemy rather than meleeing, because both actions share the same button. This is a design choice I just can't understand. There are plenty of buttons on the controller, so there's no excuse. In the event that you find yourself victim of this issue, you'll discover that the games shooting and aiming system is not at all meant for close quarters combat.

So as you find you and your partner frequently raising the bar left and right in turn, you'll be prompted to activate the games Overkill mode. This mode grants you unlimited ammo and removes the need to reload your weapon. This can be pretty cool if you're the stealth guy, but the targeted one will sometimes find this harming them more than it helps, because it disables crouching behind cover. You really need to coordinate to use this well, or you'll find yourself dying a bit like myself.

Scattered throughout the game are these cooperative progression moments that are at first pretty cool, but soon feel tacked on and irritating. These actions include kicking a door open together, helping your teammate up a high ledge, pulling a lever, and just about anything short of holding your buddy's hand while he walks. These segments add to the charm at some points, but at other times it's way too overused, and will have you sighing at each instance they show up. There's a section in the game where you have to watch Salem and Rios open up a busted garage door about 6 times in a row within a few minutes. Please go easy on these types of things if you make a sequel, EA. This reminds me of developers of early Wii and DS games that tacked on motion or touch controls for no good reason, and basically ruined their games.

During missions, you'll be prompted if you wish to enter mid-mission shopping or not, and you'll find yourself selecting yes for the majority of the game. There are tons of weapons to choose from, including the AK47, the AUG, and other renamed versions of popular weapons like the M4 or the G36C. There are plenty of pistols and sub-machine guns at your disposal that you can equip as a secondary weapon for your character, but I found that most of these are pretty useless. Pistols can take out some dudes fairly quickly, but you'll have to put forth twice the effort to get them to work effectively. Oddly enough though, despite the plethora of weapons at your disposal, I found myself using the same weapon I started the game with, the AK47, through 90% of entire game, because it felt the most competent.

Within the shop, there are plenty of ways to customize your gear as well, but most of them are throw aways, serving no other purpose but a level 1, 2, or 3 upgrade. You can change the barrel, the silencer, the ammo container, and the stock on most weapons, and you can also "pimp" your gun. This basically blings out your weapon all crazy like, such as plating it with gold, or encrusting it with diamonds. There's no real purpose to this outside of drawing more aggro to your character. Apparently the terrorists get jealous at your success and want to shoot you more sincerely.

You'll find that the shooting in the game mostly feels pretty good, but there are a few gripes with it. The first and foremost being the fact that outside of the sniper rifles, there is no way too zoom in with your gun. This can be a problem because the game likes to pit you a fair distance away from your targets, and it can feel like you're shooting dots on the screen that are constantly bobbing in and out of cover. The other problem being that it takes far too long to actually take an enemy down. Unless you're landing headshots, a lot of ammo is going to be wasted throughout the course of the game.

Breaking up the standard action in the game are a few special sections sprinkled throughout. There are times you'll be guiding a parachute while your teammate snipes, and also times where you'll have to "co-op snipe" a target. There are also these nifty segments where Rios and Salem go back to back. During these, the game goes into a slow, almost bullet time mode, where you unload on guys with an unlimited ammo clip.

There are a few "wow" moments within the game, mostly due to the games terrific graphics engine. Plenty of high dynamic range lighting, beautiful water, and a rock solid framerate to back it all up round out the games visuals. It's too bad that the graphics are about all that sticks out when thinking of memorable moments in the game though. The sound isn't much to squawk about either. From the cheesy dialog to the disappointing sounding weaponry, there's not a whole lot to love here.

So yeah, for the most part, you're hiding behind cover and shooting the same few enemies again and again. It's a shooter, yes, but perhaps if the game had a story you cared at all about, this would become less noticeable. The game actually started to feel a bit tedious 2/3 through the game, which is kind of sad considering the game lasts you only 6 hours before you see the credits roll. As for the multiplayer side of things to extend this, I was actually unable to get into a match that wasn't a total lag fest. I'm not quite sure if the servers were having problems, or if it was the game's fault, but it wasn't running at a playable rate at the time.

Overall, Army of Two is a decent game, but I definitely cannot approve of a full price purchase. It might be an amusing title to play through in a weekend with one of your buddies, but there simply is not enough content to dive into. Not only is the campaign short, but there are only 4 competitive multiplayer maps, and a complete lack of any deathmatch mode. Also, if you don't plan on playing with other actual human beings, I cannot recommend picking up the game at all, honestly. The AI simply isn't smart enough to be your trusted wingman, and you'll be missing out on the fun completely.