Army Of Two: The 40th Day

8.0

Format Xbox 360

Developer EA Games

Publisher EA Games

Genre Action, Shoot 'em Up

1 Comments

Judging by the difference between the reception from the critics and from the public, most people approached the original Army Of Two as mindless fun - enjoying it in much the same way as Die Hard 4.0, the musical oeuvre of Kiss and the vast majority of reality television.

The sequel is still the very definition of big dumb fun, but fortunately for everyone, including those who won't even notice, it's just a bit less thick this time around.

For a start, Salem and Rios have been fleshed out a bit for this frantic charge through war-torn Shanghai. They're no longer identical clones of each other, which helps make the story more engaging in general, and they've morphed from teeth-gnashingly irritating macho stereotypes into, dare we say it, likeable characters.

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There's still the odd bit of banter that made us cringe, including a very strange discussion about inappropriate relations with endangered pandas, but by and large it's amiable and amusing chat.

The best thing, though, is that this is now a co-op game through and through, and while it's not quite as brilliant as Left 4 Dead, it's similar in that it's been thoughtfully constructed to be an interesting and varied co-op experience.

For a start, while you'll spend a lot of time plugging standard troops, every so often there are enemies that have been specifically designed to require co-ordination and flanking to take out. There are also some brilliant moments when you're forcibly separated, often over surprisingly long distances, and have to fight your way back to each other through entirely different parts of the level - suddenly you're far more vulnerable because you can't rely on your buddy to haul you out of trouble and heal you up.

It's not just built like a single-player shooter with an extra player lobbed into the mix, and the game's scripted moments actually take advantage of the fact that there are two characters in the game, rather than just accommodating them.

What this does mean is that those insisting on going it alone will find it's a far less compelling experience. EA Montreal has actually done a very good job of dodging those moments where your AI partner does something so colossally stupid that you want to send the developer a jiffy bag full of dead rodents in protest.

Still, it feels like half the experience when you don't have a buddy in tow, and it does reveal the fact that occasionally the firefights descend into marathon grunt-plugging sessions. Fortunately, there really is no excuse not to play this with a mate - the developer has even shoehorned a split-screen mode in for the Live-phobic.

The co-op emphasis even extends to the competitive multiplayer - instead of a straight deathmatch that wouldn't stand up against the online titans, the game buddies you up and offers rewards and benefits if you manage to stick together and operate as a slick team. As a result it feels like nothing else around and might well steal a bit of attention away from Modern Warfare 2.

Army of Two: The 40th Day, much like Left 4 Dead, demonstrates just how much difference a tailor-made co-op experience makes to a game. The interaction between the two main characters extends beyond the trivial buddy moves from the first game and becomes an integral part of the journey.

Marry that to some satisfyingly chunky gunplay and the odd spectacular, building-levelling explosion and you have an action game that is far more fun than it has any right to be. You get plenty of co-op games, but not that many 'buddy' games and this is a fine example - a frantic, punchy bullet-storm that's best enjoyed with a friend.

Mike Channell