It’s only been a couple of months and 2010 is already shaping up to be one of the best ever for gamers. If your wallet hasn’t already been emptied, Electronic Arts and development studio DICE have tossed yet another videogame on the pile that can’t be missed. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 ups the intensity and visual prowess of its predecessor, while still delivering one of the most compelling multiplayer games around.
If you were to buy Bad Company 2 solely for the single-player campaign, you might come away a bit disappointed. That’s not to say it’s particularly bad in any way, but it doesn’t feel impressive enough to stand on its own as a great experience. Once again, the multiplayer game is the star of the Battlefield show.
Ultimate Edition Content
The situation with the Ultimate Edition of Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is pretty simple. If you already have a copy of Bad Company 2, you’ll likely want to skip this release. However, if you were someone who was hesitant to pick up DICE’s latest high-quality creation because a little game called Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was still spinning in your disc drive, then Ultimate Edition is certainly worth your time. Keep reading for the reasons why.
For sixty bucks players get what essentially amounts to the full Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Limited Edition experience (which is to say you get a few weapon and vehicle upgrades along with some fresh maps for multiplayer) as well as the Onslaught co-op mode DLC and the beloved downloadable title Battlefield: 1943.Sadly none of the content in Ultimate Edition is new in any way. Instead, the real attraction of the package is that you get all of this great Battlefield: Bad Company 2 content in one box. It’s a bit of an annoyance that you have to enter in three different download codes on Xbox 360 (two on PS3) to get your hands on everything, but that shouldn’t be a surprise given EA’s new initiative to try to bolster new-game sales through the use of one-time-use codes.
As far as the content itself, everything is just as it was when it was originally released. Given that everything you’ll find here earned high marks in our eyes when it first dropped into the hands of consumers, there’s nothing to knock. Battlefield: 1943 still has an active online following so I never had trouble quickly finding a game. I did encounter a bit of lag which is strange considering I was playing on IGN’s speedy connection, but it dissipated once I switched games. The same goes for Onslaught and the core Bad Company 2 gameplay, which is as enjoyable as ever.
All in all it’s a little disappointing not to get some fresh content in this supposed “Ultimate Edition” but it’s tough to argue with the sheer abundance of quality that you’ll find under this relatively modest (when you consider the fact that you get a free fifteen dollar downloadable game) sixty-dollar price tag. Again, if you played Bad Company 2 when it originally launched then there really isn’t enough original (or any at all) stuff to warrant spending the sixty bucks again, but if you skipped out on DICE’s second iteration of this popular series and want to know what all the hubbub was about, BF: BC2 Ultimate Edition is your answer.
The single-player campaign follows the story of a rag-tag bunch of soldiers as they traipse around the world on the hunt for a mythical weapon of mass destruction which absolutely must not fall into the hands of the Russians. It’s a typical story of unlikely heroes as they attempt to save the world, and it will take you across a great variety of locations that range from frozen mountains to densely packed jungles.
These gorgeous locales are the first thing that will spring out at you as you begin the fight. The vistas and skyboxes look nearly photorealistic in many situations, and DICE did a wonderful job blending the particle effects and game objects in the foreground with the more static backdrops. The result is a sense of depth that few videogame worlds can offer.
Things become more impressive yet when the action kicks in. Returning from the last Bad Company game are nearly fully destructible environments. If an enemy soldier is holed up in a second-story bedroom taking potshots at you, all you have to do is send a rocket at that wall and he’ll either wind up dead or fully exposed. The same line of thinking applies to just about anything you see – send enough firepower at it and you can watch it crumble.
Once you’re done ogling the smoke trails or mountain ranges in the distance, you’ll start to notice that Bad Company 2 has taken a few cues from the Call of Duty franchise. The last Battlefield game was the first to introduce a fully fleshed out storyline and it stumbled a bit in the process. The humor was goofy and over the top, the open mission design was a bit too open, and everything seemed coated in a dense fog. A lot has changed and improved for the sequel.
The big change comes with a more streamlined and cinematic approach to the action. The dialogue is less overtly inane, though it does offer its fair share of humor, and the level design feels more straightforward. While the last Bad Company game couldn’t hold my attention, this one kept me interested and having fun from start to finish.
It shouldn’t come as any surprise that this Battlefield game has some great mechanics. The guns react well, and sound fantastic. The vehicles handle smoothly and really do a great job of making you feel like the king of the battlefield. The instant-respawns and med kit injections of the last Bad Company have been replaced by the more standard checkpoints and regenerative health bar and that makes the challenge of war feel more realistic.
To top things off, the AI squad mates at your side act like real soldiers in battle. They’ll press the attack while you flank and hold off the enemy while you duck behind cover to recuperate. Many games slap you in a squad of largely ineffective soldiers and let you do all of the heavy lifting. Bad Company 2 is a refreshing change of pace in this regard.
Of course, if you want to start nitpicking, there are plenty of instances to call out. Some of the details and little pieces of the environment stream into view a bit late. There still are no arms drawn on screen when driving a vehicle, causing a poltergeist-like steering wheel to move on its own. On the Xbox 360 version, slow loading from the disc causes the player to be locked out for as much as five seconds from throwing grenades or using the knife when picking up a new weapon or changing kits (this issue went away when installing the game onto a hard drive).
These are mostly small complaints and, for me, the campaign’s only real troubles rest with the presentation and pacing. The B-Company (known as Bravo Two in this game) squad returns with you filling the shoes of Preston Marlowe. At your side is a crew of largely one-dimensional characters who are good for a laugh every now and then. This cast exists mainly to deliver one-liners and to direct you through the battlefield to the next objective. It’s hard to even think of them as people after watching them take a rocket propelled grenade to the face and then get up and go right back into the fight.
Though the action has been streamlined, it feels like Bad Company 2 just missed the “epic” feeling that it seems the developers were going for. Part of the problem is in the direction of the cutscenes, but mostly I feel like it rests with the non-stop high-intensity approach to gameplay. In a given level, you can do everything from sniping soldiers to manning a turret on the side of a helicopter to calling in air strikes – all in rapid succession. You’re something of a Rambo super-soldier, well versed in every facet of war. With the constant action, it feels like there is very little tension building outside of the game’s opening moments. There’s tons of variety to the gameplay and all of it is a great deal of fun, but it doesn’t quite come together to be a top-tier experience.
And with such a frantic campaign pace, it is over in short order. I blew through the game in just a few evenings of lazy play, probably clocking in under six hours. A collectible weapon system does offer a reason to go back for a second or third run, but this isn’t the kind of campaign you’ll be returning to again and again.
For many, the shortcomings in the campaign won’t matter one bit. These people come for the multiplayer online game, and that’s where Bad Company 2 delivers. Here the destructible environments of the campaign take on new meaning. Your target might be waiting inside a shack. An enemy squad may be using a tower as a staging point. This can all change with just a few well placed explosives as you literally level the playing field. It adds an extra tier of strategy to the game as you struggle to work through extended fights, adapting your approach to the fight as the world around you crumbles.
That’s just the first level of strategic planning this shooter offers those that work well together. Battlefield has long been known and adored by gamers as the franchise that offers epic, large-scale online fights and plenty of vehicles to take into battle. That tradition continues here. Personally, I’ve always held it in such high regard because of how it is inherently team-based. The very layout of the game is designed to encourage players to work together, straight down to awarding extra points for working with your teammate.
Little squads can be created, segmenting larger teams into strike forces which can each play a specific role. Then within that squad, players can choose between four load-out kits that range from the light machinegun toting medic to the heavy weapon specialist engineer. Each has its own weapons and unique tools that allow you to set yourself up as a small but integral part in the team’s success. It’s a game that requires a cool head and open lines of communication just as much as it does a deft hand, and that just makes the victories that much sweeter.
What struck me as most impressive with Bad Company 2 is how flexible the multiplayer game is. The class system allows you to choose what your approach to battle will be. It’s the maps and modes included in this package that allow you to choose exactly what kind of game you want to play. There is a huge difference between the giant and extended team Rush games – an attack and defend mode which plays out across expansive maps and features vehicles heavily — and the tighter Squad Deathmatch games which can feel just like your standard frantic and close-quarters shooter. If you care for something in between, you can just hop into a Conquest game to try your hand at the classic Battlefield fight over specific areas controlled by raising and lowering flags. Regardless of your mood, it feels like Bad Company 2 has something for you.
And if the game itself isn’t enough reason to keep coming back, perhaps you’ll find yourself hooked on the class upgrade system. New weapons and gadgets can be unlocked, as well as little perks to give you an edge in the fight. Those familiar with Call of Duty (And at this point who isn’t?) will be right at home with the system that rewards players for completing small challenges as well as winning games or simply playing well and getting a lot of kills. (ign)
Published by: Electronic Arts
Developed by: Digital Illusions CE (DICE)
Genre: First-Person Shooter
Number of Players: 1-24
Release Date: US: August 30, 2010
MSRP: $59.99
M for Mature: Blood, Strong Language, Violence
Also Available On: Xbox 360, PlayStation 3
As Altair, you must use your stealth abilities to seek the Chalice. The rooftops, awning, and beams that stretch across the grand cities of the medieval Holy Land are your playground. Careful movement above the sandy streets will keep you out of harm’s way for the most part, although occasionally you must descend to the avenues below and draw blood. Altair has a sword that can be upgraded, but there are other devices and items he uses in his quest, such as a grappling hook and bombs. Altair’s signature weapon, though, is his hidden dagger that is used to silently execute enemies and not raise the alarm of dozens of guards and Templar reinforcements.
As you explore the Holy Land, you will pick up hundreds of blue orbs that can be traded in for upgrades, such as expanding Altair’s health bar or the aforementioned sword. Personally, I tended to lean on sword upgrades because I wanted to make sure I could overpower enemies in any combat situation. I would accidentally blow a stealth situation by walking through a crowd too fast or stumble off a rooftop and land on the street below, just within striking distance of a Templar.
One feature in Assassin’s Creed I do not care for, though, are the minigames. I think they are pointless holdovers from the DS version. They felt tacked-on back then, like Gameloft was trying to integrate the DS touchscreen some way… any way. They don’t fare much better here. They function, but add nothing to the overall game. They feel gimmicky in a game that needs no gimmicks.
I was always a 
I was wrong. Sonic Adventure for XBLA and PSN has successfully driven a stake through the heart of my combined nostalgia/Dreamcast launch blinders/residual SEGA fanboyism. Everything from the original release is in there, from fishing mini-games to Chao raising to awful voice acting, like an evidence folder in a trial against what you thought was ostensibly the Dreamcast’s flagship launch title.
The game was so fast, in fact, that you probably didn’t even realize how broken it actually is. Sonic Adventure is so fundamentally flawed that it borders on unplayable – the sections that move the fastest, that work most, that are even slightly interesting, require the least input from the player. In fact, in many of these sections, input from the player will result in death or catastrophe, and there’s really no way to know which until you either fly through not completely sure what happened or die, also not completely sure what happened.
The controls themselves are another failure. Sonic and co. maneuver poorly, even at slow speeds, and there are bizarre collision detection rules in place that will cause you to become caught in bizarre invisible traps that require some frantic thumbstick jerking to break free of. This extends elsewhere throughout the game, as the world itself seems fragile and pitted with holes in its reality. I fell through floors, was catapulted outside of the game world, and generally murdered without warning or explanation by failures in Sonic Adventure’s ability to hold itself together repeatedly. And this isn’t counting the times the camera literally broke free of the game world itself to exist outside of the engine’s geometry.
Limited Edition
Legendary Edition
Halo means so much to so many people. This is not extraordinary in the culture of videogames. What’s exceptional is how many different things it means to those players. For me Halo has always been a social experience, with lifelong friendships forged over a shared love of the game. Some hop online to randomly test their merit in competitive matches. Others find themselves lost in the fiction, playing through the campaign alone and then poring over the extended story in books and anime. Still others look to Halo for a creative outlet as level forgers or machinima producers. This range in how we play Halo is a testament to how feature-rich development studio Bungie has made the franchise, and 
Noble 6’s tale begins with an introduction to Planet Reach. This colony is the center of humanity’s military might, and home to the Spartan program that produced Master Chief himself. The events of Halo: Reach take place as a prequel to the main Halo trilogy and — though they take small liberties with the established fiction — help to tell the story of the events that lead up to events of Halos 1 through 3. The war with the Covenant is already raging, and things don’t look good for us humans.
These new features and refined, classic design work in concert well enough that Halo: Reach often meets that gaming ideal of pure immersion — the core components that can remind you that you’re playing a game are a nonentity while you focus on the action at hand. While playing I found myself slipping into that state quite often, only occasionally ripped out by nasty difficulty spikes. Halo: Reach is a tough game on the harder settings — easily the most difficult in the franchise — and it only gets more challenging as you add co-op players thanks to a scaling difficulty.
Wrapped around all of this is an addition that Bungie calls player investment. Everything you do — be it play the campaign or complete an online match — earns you credits. Rack up enough and you can unlock customization features to make your Noble 6 look elite, and that look carries through all modes in the game — even cut scenes. Don’t be surprised if you find a goofy, pink-and-blue Noble 6 invading your game like IGN editor-in-chief Hilary Goldstein did. If you make your character look dumb, it’s your own fault.
It’s also incredibly simple to just hop in and edit the rules of the game, both for Firefight and in normal multiplayer games. You can tweak everything from which enemies you face in Firefight to how much damage weapons do, and a whole lot more. Think of a crazy game variant — even one that doesn’t have anything to do with shooting — and you can probably make it and share it with your friends in Halo: Reach. The whole system is incredibly powerful and equally impressive. The only downer is that there is no way to search for a custom game. If a game type isn’t in the predetermined matchmaking hoppers and you don’t have friends online, you’re out of luck.
Radiant Silvergun is generally considered to be one of the best 2D shooters ever made. Released in arcades and on the SEGA Saturn in 1998, it gave players control of seven weapons that are activated by different button combinations. Today during Microsoft’s press conference at the Tokyo Game Show it was announced that a high-definition remake of Radiant Silvergun will arrive on Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA) next year.
Gameyos 