2008-03-09 | Pc Game Database

Half Life 2 Episode Two Orange Box

Best deal ever?

Valve's reputation as a top tier developer began when Half-Life released in 1998 and was cemented in 2004 when they released the spectacular sequel. Now, they're bringing that magic back with The Orange Box. As we've said in countless previews, this is one of the best deals we've ever seen in gaming, especially for those people that have yet to play Half-Life 2 at all. With Half-Life 2, Half-Life 2 Episode One, and Half-Life 2 Episode Two, players can take the entire Half-Life 2 journey up to now in order. If that was the entire package, it'd be hard to express much discontent even with Half-Life 2 being a three year old game, but Orange Box also comes with two other games: Portal and Team Fortress 2. They're quite a bit different than Half-Life in spirit, but offer up unique puzzle based and multiplayer experiences that have exquisite style and beautiful senses of humor. Everything has the spit and polish that we've come to expect from Valve and nothing in the package disappoints.

We've reviewed Half-Life 2 and Episode One in the past and decided to review Episode Two, Portal, and Team Fortress 2 separately as you can purchase them individually via Steam. You can find the links to all of those reviews directly below followed by our overall thoughts of The Orange Box if you don't care about the individual reviews.

Our recommendation for those of you that have always been interested in Half-Life 2 and haven't tried it is simple: buy this package! Not only do you get the best single player first person shooter ever created, you also get the two next chapters, a 3D puzzle game that also happens to live in the Half-Life universe and a terrifically fun team-based multiplayer first-person shooter. This is a lot of game in one package for only 50 dollars.

As PC gamers, we will have a few more options to purchase each piece than the console guys. Each of parts is available for separate purchase via Steam, though the cost is much more prohibitive than just buying Orange Box. The original Half-Life 2 is 30, Episode One is 20, Episode Two is 30, Portal is 20, and Team Fortress 2 is 30. Aside from the fact that it's likely you can find Half-Life 2 by itself for cheaper elsewhere (actually at the moment it's been reduced to 20 on Steam), all the pieces individually add up to 120-130 bucks. All of the new stuff together is 80. Do the math. Even if you only want two of the new games and don't plan on ever playing the other games, the Orange Box is a better deal, especially since you can give the other games away to friends.

Valve's uber-bundle collects several killer new games into one amazing package.

By: Sal 'Sluggo' Accardo

[Editor's Note: This is one of three separate GameSpy.com reviews for titles included in The Orange Box package, as PC versions are being sold separately via Valve's Steam digital download service. For more details, see our reviews of Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Portal, and Team Fortress 2.]

It's hard to think of a stranger animal than Valve's new Orange Box. Since the launch of GameSpy.com, we've never had a case where a bundle has included three brand-new games, available only as a package deal in stores but separately online. But that's exactly the case with The Orange Box, comprised of Half-Life 2: Episode Two, Team Fortress 2 and Portal, as well as the previously released Half-Life 2 and Episode One. To commemorate the occasion, we've done separate reviews for all the new titles -- which are uniformly stellar -- leading to one conclusion: for $50, The Orange Box is one of the best gaming deals in years.

Oddly enough, the "weakest" new component of The Orange Box, relatively speaking, may be its most prominent. Half-Life 2: Episode Two (4/5 stars) is filled with all the great gameplay of its predecessors, including large-scale battles with the Combine and lots of puzzles involving the gravity gun. Clocking in at around five hours, the adventure continues the story of Gordon Freeman, once again teamed with sidekick Alyx Vance, as they attempt to deliver a packet of Combine data to the human resistance outside City 17. It's basically one big set piece after another, glued together with lots of scripted sequences and exposition to keep the story moving along. Or in other words, it's more Half-Life 2, with only a few inconsistent moments keeping it from reaching the heights of the games that came before it.

There are no such reservations in place about Team Fortress 2 (5/5 stars), the long-awaited resurrection of the classic Quake and Half-Life mod. With nine distinct classes, six tight maps covering a variety of gameplay types, and a sleek cartoonish art style, TF2's action never stops. In many ways, it's the anti-Battlefield, a throwback to the games of ten years ago, ditching huge maps and vehicles in favor of classic gameplay embellished with the physics of the Source engine, stat tracking, and a ton of other little touches that make it a contender for our multiplayer game of the year.

Maybe the biggest surprise of the package is Portal (4.5/5 stars), a "first-person puzzler," so to speak, that places the player as a subject in a test lab employing head-spinning portal technology. The early puzzles basically train you in how the portals work, but before long, you're dodging turrets and flinging yourself across rooms, and while the whole thing can probably be completed in under three hours, it all builds to one of the most epic, satisfying and funniest endings of any game in years.

As if this weren't enough, The Orange Box also includes full versions of Half-Life 2 and Episode One, providing an extra twenty hours of gameplay to help catch you up on the Half-Life 2 story if you're late to the party. All three new games contain developer commentary features (Portal's is particularly worth checking out) as well as Valve's own take on achievements, offering replay incentives once you've completed everything in the package.

On the technical side, everything in the PC version of The Orange Box has been working great for us to date. We've been able to run the game on several older machines dating back to when Half-Life 2 was released; the general rule seems to be if you could get HL2 running, you should be able to get The Orange Box titles going without much fuss. If you want to go the digital download route, Valve's Steam service seems to be holding up to the initial demand, and even offers all the titles separately if you're only interested in one or two of them.

But really, if you're reading this review, how could you not want The Orange Box? Every game in the package is a winner, and the price makes it a no-brainer for anyone remotely interested in Half-Life or PC shooters in general. Our only question now is which of its games we want to go back to first.

Family time made fun.

By: J. Habib

Another six months, another expansion for The Sims 2. Bon Voyage is the sixth expansion for The Sims 2, not counting Stuff Packs, and the 13th overall expansion since Maxis unleashed this digital drug on us years ago. The various expansions have had their hits and their misses in regards to quality, so it's always a bit of a dice roll when installing a new one and taking your Sims for one more spin.

When it comes down to it, The Sims series has been about family. One thing about all the prior expansions, however, is that individuals were favored over whole families. Nightlife, for example, was all about romantic interactions and dates, or groups of friends. As anyone who's married will tell you, it's tough to Woo Hoo with a crying kid in the next room!

Bon Voyage, conversely, really adds a lot to the family dynamic in the game. This is obviously most appealing to role-players and other hardcore players who really get into the generational and familial aspects of The Sims 2. Entire families can go on vacations, upping their relationships with each other. And best of all, while on vacation, the rest of the family's affairs are in a time freeze. That means anyone can take vacations without risking job performance, friendships, grades, and so on.

At this point, it's safe to say that The Sims 2 has one of the best interfaces in gaming. It's simple, elegant, to-the-point, and easily grasped. Setting up vacations in Bon Voyage is perfectly streamlined into the rest of the game, with a simple phone call and a few dialog boxes the only things standing between your family and a sunny beach.

There's a lot to do on vacations, which is really the selling point. After all, if the vacations didn't have enough activities to do, the whole purpose of the expansion would be botched. There are many sights to see and even some secrets to discover, all of which are given to you in a checklist of sorts. If you managed to complete all 45 objectives with a single Sim, which will take at least three vacations to do, you'll receive a pretty decent reward for it.

Once a vacation is over, just like reality, a Sim's enjoyment of the vacation will carry with them to their daily lives. Certainly no one wants to go back to work, but you can choose rewards for your Sims such as temporary improved job performance, or even temporary boosted romantic attraction. Bad vacations result in negative consequences, because your Sims will carry their unhappiness to work and school with them.

Beyond that are souvenirs, which range from buyable items like little collectable statues to photographs of your journey. Vacation spots being the money pits that they are, you actually have to spend Simoleons (the in-game currency) to buy prints of your screenshots. Photographs and other souvenirs can lead to increased social meters, as your Sims' friends will want to talk about the vacation and its memories as well.

The problems with Bon Voyage, if we must be nitpicky, come from the fact that very little was actually changed for a Sim's home life. Granted that the temporary boosts from enjoyable vacations will be felt, but they are temporary and won't exactly make or break families. Also, vacations are very expensive, so it will take new families quite awhile before they can go on a long vacation. Established families, of course, won't have any trouble.

Sound and graphics are unchanged from previous iterations of the series of course, and there's nothing here that will convert you to The Sims if you never liked the series before. For Sims fanatics though, there will be plenty here to keep you entertained for another dozen hours.

Our thoughts after several hours with the retail build.

By: Charles Onyett

If you're thinking of picking up Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, don't expect anything like Quake III Arena. Although it is a fast paced game bearing the Quake name, this is in no way a frenzied arena shooter where twitch skills reign supreme. Teamwork is the focus here, as Quake Wars requires different classes of players on Strogg and Global Defense Force sides to use their varying skills to attack and defend objectives. Anyone who played the Enemy Territory free expansion for Return to Castle Wolfenstein will be instantly familiar with this game, as it's made by the same people, Splash Damage, and retains a very similar feel and style of play. It's also highly entertaining in its own right.

We can't review this product yet since we've only been participating in a few press sessions held earlier in the week. In the last two days more and more servers have been popping up so we'll have the full review next week after we get a chance to mingle with the multitudes continuing to sign on in increasing numbers.

Quake Wars is part FPS, part RTS. You'll be using your guns and grenades quite frequently to blast away the opposition, but also find yourself destroying enemy structures and defenses, as well as constructing your own. Before starting play you create a user profile, the name of which can be colored using an easy in-game editor, instead of having to find out the codes yourself. Next comes server selection, where you pick a campaign to hop in and start earning experience.

Each campaign, of which there are four, is divided into three separate maps, each of which has numerous objectives. Ideally you'd want to join a campaign near the beginning of its three-map cycle, as you'll gain experience to unlock additional class and general skills that last until the cycle's end. You don't have to do it this way - you could just join a single-map game or play one map in a campaign and bail out, but it's much more fun to invest the hour or so it takes to plow through a full map cycle. Upgrades, such as increased health reserves, faster sprints, special items, and better weapons, are isolated to the campaign. This means it's not such a good idea to dive into a server running the third map of a campaign, as all the players will likely have advanced upgrades, whereas you'll have to start from square one. Your actions on the battlefield are not forgotten entirely upon a campaign's completion, as Quake Wars uses an extremely detailed persistent statistics system to track all your accomplishments.

As long as you're playing in ranked servers, the game will track total kills, overall number of rewards unlocked for each class and vehicle, as well as a multitude of numbers for each weapon. You'll also find more long term achievement medals obtained by completing a specific set of objectives which require many hours of play. Acquiring the medals results in profile rank-ups, the symbol for which is displayed on the in-game score lists. It functions as a badge of pride for dedicated players. Splash Damage went even further and built an overall player ranking, located here, where everyone can see how the community's brightest are faring, as well browse a wealth of information on various classes, vehicles, weapons, and their own profile. While this may sound superfluous, it's a much appreciated feature that serves as this game's permanent reward structure, as opposed to the temporary in-campaign unlocks. Such a structure should be familiar to many online FPS gamers, but it's surprising how many other, newer online-focused game, such as Shadowrun, release without such features.

Getting back to the game itself, Quake Wars manages to stand out by requiring players to work together to win, something that's accomplished in few different ways. Every class has unique abilities that either directly complete a map objective, like Strogg Aggressors being the only ones capable of planting dynamite to blow up a structure, or to sustain an assault, like GDC Engineers repairing your team's anti-vehicle turrets or Medics reviving Soldiers on the front lines. There are side quests as well, which dynamically become available depending on the course of battle, and, when completed, net you experience bonuses. These include capturing additional spawn points, reviving teammates if you're a Medic, planting trip or proximity mines if you're an Engineer, destroying enemy turrets if you're a Field Ops, or calling down radar towers as a Covert Ops.

If the goal is for Covert Ops to hack a computer terminal located indoors, it's a good idea to send in some Medics with them for revives / healing, and a Soldier or two for fire support and to blow open additional assault paths. When the battle moves outside, Field Ops and Engineers become more useful. Both can deploy stationary turrets, though with varying effects. Field Ops can call in artillery and other long-range armaments, and can paint targets with a handheld laser device. Bombing runs, or orbital laser strikes in the Stroggs' case, can be initiated by Field Ops as well, making them ideal for wiping out entrenched enemy defenses. Engineers are better for holding territory, as they can set up anti-infantry and anti-vehicle turrets, place mines, and call in interceptor turrets that negate the effects of Field Ops' targeted barrages.

Considering the emphasis on teamwork, it's surprising to see Splash Damage did not include integrated voice chat support. If players want to talk to each other, they'll instead need to use external voice chat programs like Ventrilo or Team Speak. What is present in the game is a detailed chat system, letting players broadcast their positions, call out targets, issue commands, and the like, but it can't compare to the amount of information capable of being communicated with voice chat.

If you're sick of playing against human opponents or are having internet connection issues, some impressively intelligent bots can be added into games. These guys will commandeer vehicles and complete objectives with surprising efficiency, and, depending upon which level of skill you set them at, serve as challenging opponents in firefights. Should you prefer to complete all the objectives yourself, you can even toggle an option for bots to ignore them.

When the beta went live a while back, many complained about the graphics. It's not that they were bad, they're not, but when compared to some of the early screenshots released from Quake Wars, they just didn't and still don't match up. The much-hyped mega-texturing allows for some varied ground textures, but the model animations are still stiff and, in general, the look of the game isn't very inspired. The sound is somewhat disappointing as well, as many of the effects just fall flat. They're still recognizable and distinct, but they lack that elusive element that something like Halo's Needler or Unreal Tournament's Flak Cannon posses. Quake Wars' weapons, in general, just don't sound powerful enough. Then there are the chat commands, which often initiate a voice response. While it's often hilarious to hear GDF soldiers call out "Hi" in an absurdly enthusiastic tone, or their "Yeah yeah…no no no," it's rather jarring to hear "owned" screamed out in a gruff, Stroggish cadence.

That being said, we're still having a lot of fun with the game. You won't be disappointed with the engaging team-oriented gameplay, and the detailed stat-tracking is a nice bonus.

Half Quake, half Enemy Territory, this Splash Damage team shooter is an unmissable choice for action fans. Find out why.

By: Giles Bird

With Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, developer Splash Damage is finally following up on Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory, one of the finest team-based Nazi killing shooters you could play. This time, they've taken id's gorgeous Doom 3 engine and used it to create vast intricate playgrounds for fast and frantic battles between humans and cybernetic alien invaders. Quake Wars are on!

As far as team-based shooters go, this is one of the more frenetic. Don't get too attached to any given situation. It's going to change. Like Quake itself, Quake Wars is hyperkinetic, deadly, and nimble. There's always a vehicle to hop into, the respawns come every thirty seconds, and the location of the fighting is liable to shift in the blink of an eye. This is a game that barely gives you time to breathe. Don't even think about trying to scratch your nose, much less get up and grab a drink from the kitchen.

That's not to say there isn't a lot of strategy in Quake Wars. Each class has a variety of functions, and none of them are at the back of the battle (in fact, accomplishing many objectives requires a particular class to come forward). Unlike the Battlefield series, important functions like radar and artillery are associated with a class rather than a commander. Engineers make a huge difference in terms of building and maintaining defenses, as well as laying mines. The covert ops radar is a must, and their ability to assume disguises makes for some delicious backstabbing. Classes and loadouts are flexible enough to fight in a number of different ways. The mission system keeps everyone informed about what needs doing, as well as what tasks your class can contribute at any time. Quake Wars does a great job of not being confusing.

It's disappointing that the maps don't have more variety. At first blush, they seem distinct, but the more you play, the more the maps blend together. One city or one indoor area feels like any other, and the sci-fi gobbledygook objectives don't add much character. There's room to maneuver around the battlefield, but not to roam or stray. At any point in a match, there's always one attacker and one defender, almost always squaring off over a single location. While this does a great job of giving the gameplay focus, you can't help but sometimes feel a little hemmed in. This is a game about being on the front lines of battle, and not about sneaking around in the enemy's rear to wreak havoc.

In a way, it's hard to believe this is the Doom 3 engine. Using some sort of id-created wizardry called "megatextures", Splash Damage has created huge maps with long viewing distances, which is pretty much the exact opposite of what Doom 3 was. Everything still has a shiny plastic look, but it fits the sci-fi theme well. The special effects are spectacular and the level of destruction gets incredibly crazy. There's nothing quite like watching the amount of gunfire and explosives poured onto one target during the missions that require one team to escort a mobile base while the other tries their hardest to stop it. At times, Quake Wars grinds to an almost oppressive halt when the defenders get dug in, but a simple orbital bombardment or hammer missile can change all that.

There are a lot of little tricks to learn in Quake Wars. For instance, the aliens can spawn out of dead human bodies to instantly get back into the fight. They have a lot of options to move to areas the human side can't reach. The humans, on the other hand, can be resurrected instantly, and they have better weapons. The aliens can swap health for ammo, or vice versa. The basics for both sides are the same, but there are enough important differences that each feels unique. This makes for a gentle learning curve as you pick up the nuances of the gameplay.

To learn these subtleties and to practice, you can play against bots. These bots make Quake Wars stand out among these kinds of games, because they give players an opportunity to get familiar with the game without constantly being picked off by better players (Halo 3 anyone?). In fact, because the AI's difficulty level is adjustable, Quake Wars offers plenty of fun without ever having to go online. It's a rare team-based shooter that can also be played as a single-player game.

There have been plenty of these types of games, ranging from the seminal TRIBES to the underappreciated Planetside to the immensely popular Battlefield series. So it's refreshing to see a team based shooter with a pace and style all its own. Come for the fantastic explosions, interesting weapons, smart AI opponents, and breathless pacing; stay for the in-depth strategy and online matches. Either way, this is a team shooter you won't want to miss.

This massive outdoor multiplayer shooter from id Software and Splash Damage gives the Battlefield a run for its money.

By: Sal 'Sluggo' Accardo

A few years ago, a new developer called Splash Damage -- comprised mainly of mod makers from the Quake community -- was signed by Activision to create a team-based multiplayer component for what was ultimately a cancelled Return to Castle Wolfenstein expansion pack. In a stroke of genius, Activision released the multiplayer portion -- dubbed Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory -- for free to the public, and it became a huge hit. So it seemed like a no-brainer when a full-blown sequel -- Enemy Territory: Quake Wars -- was announced. The result is a game that's far bigger and deeper than its predecessor, more Battlefield than Quake. There's a learning curve involved, but if you hang in there, you'll be rewarded with one of the deeper multiplayer shooters in recent years.

At least in spirit, ETQW is both a sequel to Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory and a prequel to the Quake series. Like the first Enemy Territory, teams are split up into offense and defense, except instead of playing as Axis or Allies, you're playing as Earth's Global Defense Force (GDF) or the invading alien Strogg (the villains of Quake II and Quake IV). Each of the game's twelve maps portrays a "historical" scenario from the early days of the Earth-Strogg conflict, such as the GDF attempting to destroy a Strogg harvesting refinery or stealing a data disc containing information on the Strogg slipgate technology.

Each of the maps generally has three or four major objectives for the attackers to achieve in sequence, often requiring the services of a particular character class. For instance, on "Canyon," engineers are required to build a bridge, covert ops are needed to hack a shield generator, and then soldiers are needed to place explosives at the site of an improved Stroggification device.

On "Ark," the tables are turned, as the Strogg go on the offensive and need to destroy a jamming generator, construct a mining laser to break into a GDF facility and blow up a bioscanner they're using to examine the Strogg. Many of these objectives are repeated in several maps, although there are several unique scenarios like "Quarry," where the Strogg need to deliver three power modules to a downed ship so they can activate a self-destruct device.

All told, there are five classes in ETQW: soldier, engineer, covert ops, medic and field ops. There's a lot of depth within each class: each gets a choice of several default weapons to play with (the soldier, for example, has both a rocket launcher and assault rifle among his choices), and usually has several special abilities. Engineers can place anti-personnel or anti-vehicle turrets, Medics can revive fallen players and hand out medpacks, and Field Ops players can set up artillery launchers and call in devastating airstrikes. In fact, this barely scratches the surface of the character abilities and is not even counting the Strogg counterparts -- which aren't quite carbon copies of the GDF, but basically fall into five similar roles.

As if the character classes didn't have enough toys to start with, ETQW is also loaded up with numerous vehicles on each side. I won't bother with the actual names, but there are tanks, jeeps, APCs, choppers, one-man buggies and even boats. The Strogg generally have their own versions of these, with two exceptions: the Icarus flightpack, which lets any Strogg get airborne and opens the door to all sorts of interesting offensive and defensive strategies, and the Goliath mech walker, which can send GDF players scrambling for cover when it stomps into town (unless you've got an engineer with an EMP handy). Not completely unlike the Battlefield series, some of the air vehicles can take some time to get the hang of, but can be devastating when handled properly. Thankfully, there are options to change the camera view from first- to third-person as well as unlocking it while driving, making life easier all around.

In direct contrast to the just-released Team Fortress 2, the stars of ETQW aren't the classes, but the maps. In TF2, the maps are so small that there's rarely any learning curve -- for most classes, once you know how your class works, you can just follow your team and do your thing. But ETQW's maps play out in stages, and are more like three or four scenarios in one; a surplus of covert ops might not be particularly useful for one objective, but crucial to the next. Learning the ins and outs of each map -- which are all huge -- will take some time, which provides a great deal of depth and replayability, but at the same time might scare off some players looking for a more casual experience.

The reason for that is something that was also a problem with the Battlefield games: spawn camping and constant out-of-the-blue deaths. Because of the size of the maps, it's easy for snipers to set up camp and pick players off as they spawn. It's also possible to set up artillery barrages and camp spawn points, leading to the frustrating scenario where you've barely taken two steps before you're dead and staring down a thirty-second respawn time. Even if you manage to get out of your spawn area, it's easy to get stuck without a vehicle, and it's possible to spend a minute running on foot before getting picked off by an unseen enemy halfway across the map. It's a shame that in shifting from an intimate, infantry-focused game like Wolf: ET to the larger setting of ETQW, the same problems that plagued the Battlefield games appear here as well.

Graphically, Quake Wars uses a revised version of id Software's DOOM technology, with all the benefits and baggage that come along with it. Aesthetically, the game looks solid, looking its best when rendering massive outdoor valleys; few games look as amazing as ETQW when staring across a huge valley and realizing those pixels way off in the distance are actually a tank headed your way. Player models and characters animations also look solid, although the Strogg sometimes look a little goofy.

Interior areas don't fare that well, often feeling somewhat bland both in terms of layout and texturing, but these areas tend to be the exception in Quake Wars rather than the rule. While you won't need a bleeding-edge PC to run ETQW, it won't hurt if you want to crank up all the details; if you're a generation or two behind in the video card department, expect to do a little tweaking to keep the framerate above 30FPS.

One really nice feature of Quake Wars is the addition of computer-controlled bots that allow you to play offline or fill out matches in need of extra players. Creating bots that can understand the subtleties of ETQW's complex maps is a gargantuan task, but the bots put on a good show, even if it becomes obvious over time that some behaviors are scripted for particular maps and eventually become predictable to a degree. If nothing else, it's a great way to learn the ins and outs of the levels so you don't feel like a complete n00b when you go online.

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is a great multiplayer game with a ton of depth: you could spend months learning all the ins and outs of all the maps, the classes on both sides, and all the weapons and vehicles. In many ways, it out-Battlefield's the Battlefield series. And yet, with a few issues like the learning curve, spawn camping and frustrating "gotcha!" deaths, we can't help wondering if maybe it's six months too late: with Team Fortress 2 here and other multiplayer heavies like Unreal Tournament 3, Call of Duty 4, Gears of War and Crysis on the way, it'll be way too easy for players to get distracted and move on to something else. With any luck, that's a fate Quake Wars will avoid.

The British (and Panzer Elite) are coming. To Company of Heroes, that is.

By: Giles Bird

One of the most exciting real time strategy games of the last five years just got bigger. In fact, it pretty much got twice as big. The Opposing Fronts follow-up to Company of Heroes adds two entirely new playable sides, and a pair of new campaigns that add up to being easily longer than the original game's campaign.

The new Germans are the Panzer Elite, who, ironically, are better equipped with halftracks than panzers. They take a Swiss Army knife approach. There are over a dozen different "tools" in the forum of upgrades and unlockable units; you have to decide which ones to unfold. Each of their five different buildings has its own units and techs, and in many games you won't bother to build them all. Among the Panzer Elite tools are some new underhanded tricks, like leeching resources from an enemy territory, sabotaging capture points, and planting booby traps.

The British, on the other hand, are a compact side. They have only three mobile trucks that can unpack into separate field headquarters. To complement these roving installations, they can build numerous defensive emplacements. Their side puts a premium on leadership, whether it's attaching officers to infantry or adding a command tank to their armored vehicles. This side is also the most entertaining for plucky Britishisms such as "wankers" and "Bob's your uncle" (Company of Heroes continues to have some of the best sound design of any real time strategy game, and not just for its booms and bangs).

Each side has a full tree of commander powers, letting you further customize how you play. The British artillery tree, for instance, is one of the best ways to litter the map with indiscriminate destruction. The Panzer Elite Luftwaffe tree introduces their Fallschirmjager paratroopers and tactical air support, something only the Allies enjoyed before Opposing Fronts. Both sides make use of new rules for "buffing" units, improving their performance by keeping them near a particular building or unit. More than ever, Company of Heroes is one of the most tactically intense and flexible real time strategy games you can play.

Unlike the original game, Opposing Fronts gives each side its own unique campaign. The missions are not only challenging and spectacular, but they're fun to replay to try to earn medals. They're flexible enough that losing isn't a matter of trying the same thing a second time and hoping to do better. Instead, you can completely revise your approach. The campaigns are also very well written, with excellent cutscenes and dialogue. If any developer appreciates the finer points of a good war movie, it's Relic.

Opposing Fronts isn't quite an expansion pack, because it contains the entirety of the original Company of Heroes in addition to the new content. It's a full-priced game, to be sure, but it's a generous package of content. The caveat is that owners of the original game will have to pay the cost of a full game to get the additional content. Another potential problem is that there's nothing new for the original sides, which makes them feel a bit drab in comparison. Who wants to play the boring old Americans and Germans now that the Brits and Panzer Elite have arrived on the scene? With Dawn of War, Relic did a great job offering new races while also showing some love for the original races. Too bad that isn't the case here.

Opposing Fronts does a great job of integrating smoothly online with owners of the original game. Whereas many expansions divide the player community into haves and have-nots, Relic has taken pains to make sure owners of the original game aren't shut out from playing with gamers who bought Opposing Forces. If you don't have the new game, you can still play against its content in multiplayer games. Presumably, seeing the Brits and Germans in action will make players more likely to buy Opposing Fronts. It's nice to see a developer and publisher going out of their way for the integrity of the player community.

Overall, it's great to see Relic still pouring so much new gameplay into Company Heroes. Upon playing the original, it was easy to get the sense that this was a complete package, with scarcely any room to squeeze in any innovation. Opposing Fronts clearly proves that isn't the case. Now more than ever, this is the can't-miss real time strategy game of the year.

The new expansion pack for Company of Heroes adds plenty of great stuff at the cost of some of the game's elegant simplicity.

By: Allen 'Delsyn' Rausch

When a game gets as much praise as our 2006 PC Game of the Year, it can't be easy to decide what to do for an encore. Company of Heroes was a revelation when it first released. Not only did it actually make World War II (a badly overused videogame setting) fun again, its strategic depth, elegance and simplicity raised the bar so high for RTS developers it would be tough for anyone to clear it -- even Relic. That's Opposing Fronts in a nutshell. The expansion pack adds more armies and deeper strategy to Company of Heroes which, almost by default, can't help but be a good thing. If only the new depth and the fun new stuff to play with didn't come at the cost of the elegance and simplicity of the original game.

Two new armies are at the heart of Opposing Fronts. First, the defensively-oriented British 2nd Army is built around tough infantry and insanely big guns. Infantry and sapper units are able to quickly build a wide variety of defensive emplacements ranging from machine-gun pillboxes to 25-pound artillery guns to the thoroughly amazing slit trenches which provide a huge defensive advantage. Lieutenant and Captain units attach themselves to infantry companies and offer great defensive bonuses that travel with them as the company moves. They also sport some of the best artillery units in the game, able to reach across entire maps to rain death and destruction down on enemy forces without ever needing to put their precious Tommies in danger.

The stick-and-move Panzer Elite are completely different. They're the army that's never where you expect it to be. While not nearly as tough as the original German or American squads (to say nothing of the Brits), their strategic flexibility and outrageous speed can help them seize map sectors while their opponents are still sorting through their first veterancy upgrades. Their versatile infantry halftracks are at the heart of their strategy since infantry loaded onto the halftrack can shoot out of it. That allows halftracks to be specially kitted based on the type of infantry that climb aboard. Anti-tank troops on a half-track, for example, make it a pretty decent anti-tank vehicle, while one loaded with infantry upgraded with long-range rifles becomes impromptu anti-infantry snipers. They can also be used to capture map sectors simply by loading and unloading their passengers. Other types of vehicles include supply wagons that can drop remote-controlled "Goliath" bombs and a Jagdpanzer tank-killer that's frankly pretty terrifying.

Both armies are a lot of fun and significantly deepen the strategic options available to the player. The British penchant for defense might bring up notions of cheesy "turtle" strategies in which a player would build impregnable barriers until they can overwhelm the opposition with numbers. Such a comment fails to take into account the skill of Relic's designers. In Opposing Fronts, Brits use their defensive might offensively. British players will slowly progress across the battlefield in a "take-and-hold" style using artillery to clear the way and infantry advances to secure the territory. The Panzer Elite, on the other hand, will find themselves scurrying around to everywhere their enemy isn't, using zippy little scout vehicles and seizing and losing territory a lot. Their ultimate goal is to build up the veterancy of their forces until they can bring out the heavy gear like upgraded Panther tanks or tough little Hetzers and grind the opposition under their treads.

Players will first get down and dirty with the new armies in the two single-player campaigns, one for each army. This marks a nice change from the original game, which only allowed the player to play as the Americans. The first campaign re-visits Operation Market Garden from the perspective of the Panzer Elite. This disastrous Allied push for Germany through occupied Holland is detailed through the experiences of two German brothers, each a commander in the mishmash of German forces that delivered a devastating blow to the largest airborne invasion in history. The second campaign covers the British Army's post-D-Day experience as they push through the French countryside on the way to the liberation of Caen.

Each campaign is fun, though the British Army got the more enjoyable experience. The British campaign offers a lot of strategic variety that really shows off what this new army can do. There's an absolutely brutal block-by-block campaign through the shattered street of Caen that stands proudly with the hedgerow fight for Hill 192 in the original game. An earlier mission to defend a particular hilltop was also a standout as it's just fun to be able to set up an insanely deep defensive perimeter and watch the Germans throw themselves at it.

Missions in the Panzer Elite campaign, while also fun, aren't quite as well-designed. Some are defensive, which makes for interesting challenges considering the offensive and fast-moving nature of the units. Some, such as a great one based on a circular assault on a dug-in British force on Highway 69, actually give the Panzer Elite the chance to show what they can do. Many Panzer Elite missions, however, force the player to be more reactive to pre-scripted circumstances rather than allowing them the freedom to plan.

The original game managed to make soldier voice-overs not only entertaining but also a source of strategic information by having units comment on what was going on in their immediate vicinity. Opposing Fronts goes one better by offering information in the very sound effects of the weapons. Every weapon in the game seems to give a distinctly different sound when fired which, assuming the player can identify it, can give a player the edge needed to counteract it. I realized how important that was during a multiplayer game when the sound of the mortars that my British teammate was using seemed to change. It took a moment before I realized that the sound wasn't the mortar used by a Royal Commando, but was the sound of a Panzer Elite mortar halftrack. It was enough to save my infantry and the assault.

The voiceovers themselves are just as good as the original game's. British army units pop off with accents that actually run the geographic gamut from lower-class rural troopers yelling, "Take that, ya wanker!" to their upper-crust lieutenants and captains saying lines like, "Let's take the point, gentlemen," and "Don't put the kettle on just yet." The Panzer Elite, true to their name, actually have different accents than the regular German army troops (it sounds like there were a lot of upper-class "vons" in Panzer tanks). It would be very easy for an American company to assume all British accents sound like the Londoners seen on the BBC or that all Germans sound like the bad guys from "Die Hard," but -- like the Brooklyn accent of the original American army -- the voice-overs manage to impart just enough verisimilitude that these anonymous units become characters without being caricatures.

It's in multiplayer where the promise and the pitfalls of these new forces really show up. On the up side, the new units take what was already an extraordinary multiplayer experience and make it much, much deeper. As in the original game, each army gets a choice of three "doctrines" that they can implement as they build up battle experience. Royal Artillery, for example, offers enhanced artillery powers along with the utterly unholy M7 Priest mobile fire support vehicle, while Royal Commandos offer several different types of Canadian commando teams that should make our Great White Northern brothers proud. The Panzer Elite can choose between Luftwaffe Tactics, Scorched Earth and the Tank Destroyer doctrine that offers the sweet, sweet Jagdpanther. Each of these doctrines turns the generic force that players start with into specialized killing machines that mesh incredibly well with other players using different doctrines in team-based multiplayer.

The result of this is that multiplayer games just got a lot more complicated -- though mostly in a good way. A British player who knows what he or she is doing makes an incredible support system for an American push. A British Army with Royal Artillery can clear out almost any area on the map, leaving it open to be seized by American tanks and soldiers. Sherman's march to the sea is nothing compared with the empty corridor to German HQ a good British player can create for American iron. British sappers repairing American tanks, fixing American HQs and putting static defenses around the American base managed to turn around at least one multiplayer game I was on the verge of losing. The contributions of the Panzer Elite are more subtle, but just as devastating. The roadblocks available with Scorched Earth have funneled many an American tank column into the sights of a German Tiger and Panzer Elite support vehicles take German tanks that were already tough nuts and make them mobile fortresses. The different combinations and strategies available with six different doctrine combinations is just dizzying.

One of the strengths of Company of Heroes was how intelligent unit AI and elegant design would free the player up to focus on the larger strategy and not have to babysit their armies. While Opposing Fronts' new doctrines add a lot to this "macro-strategy," which is great, the two new armies are also pretty heavy on the micromanagement, which is not. British infantry units are hardy and very expensive, and thus quite valuable. Losing one, especially a veteran unit, is devastating for the British player. As a result, the British are critically dependent on the proper placement of artillery in order to soften up opponents. This can be tough to gauge accurately in the heat of battle, especially when playing against the Panzer Elite who frequently have opposing players hopping around the mini-map like a frenzied grasshopper.

This gets even worse playing as the Panzer Elite. Panzer Elite units get offensive or defensive bonuses as their veteran status increases. The problem is that these bonuses need to be individually selected for every unit by the player. It's not like these bonuses are optional, either. Veterancy is absolutely critical for Panzer victory and missing out on these bonuses can easily lose the game. Half-tracks and other vehicles, for all their versatility, need to be carefully managed and separated into control groups because positioning these things is extremely important. Sending a mortar halftrack to the front of a column during combat is a quick way to lose a really valuable unit.

The worst aspect of this problem is "attached" units like the British Captain or the Panzer Elite supply vehicle. This is a game mechanic where a command unit is tied to a basic squad of soldiers (or in the case of the Panzer Elite, two vehicles are paired up). It's adapted from Relic's own Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War series. In that game once the player attached a command unit to a grunt squad, it essentially became part of the squad and added its powers to it. They in effect became a single unit and were used and commanded by the player as such. In Opposing Fronts the player can still lasso-select these attached units separately and give them orders which break their connection to the squad they're supporting, losing them the bonuses the units impart.

In the end, the expansion's problems are far outweighed by its triumphs. Veterans players with plenty of Company of Heroes combat under their belt will eagerly dig into the new expansion pack as the new armies on offer are a lot of fun and will throw plenty of new twists into multiplayer games. They'll also take some getting used to as the level of micromanagement each of them requires make them really only suitable for players willing to put in the time to master them. The result is that the Company of Heroes multiplayer community just became a more unfriendly place for new players. Hopefully that won't keep too many people from joining since the rewards of playing Opposing Fronts are totally worth the effort.

A game that's every bit as generic as its title suggests.

By: Steve Butts

Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power is based on a seemingly popular Russian science-fiction story written during the heyday of the Soviet sixties. We know this not because we've read the original story, but because the game's marketing materials and main title screen says so. The confusing part is how the interesting sci-fi premise behind the Prisoner of Power novel seems not to have had much impact on the story of the game.

Sure, there are some factions at war here and, sure, there are some futurey-type weapons but otherwise the game might as well have been called Generic Assault: Prisoner of Disinterest. Where strategy gamers are sometimes happy to jump into battle on the sole justification that there's someone to fight, we assume that a game based on a book would come with a bit more background and a stronger sense of motivation.

It's kind of a shame too, because with an appropriately dramatic context, the combats and missions might have drawn us in a bit more. There are tons of gameplay options here including a lengthy linear campaign that covers each of the game's factions, a host of single missions and a multiplayer mode.

Given that the game is set in the future on an alien planet, the units seem a bit generic. We're not expecting Tesla towers or tree-smashing robotic walkers here, but except for the Barbarian units, the troops here aren't any more creative than those you'd find in Advance Wars. Basic infantry, tanks, trucks, bombers, rocket artillery, submarines -- these are the best the future has to offer? On the other hand, the familiarity of the units gives players a head start when it comes to planning combined arms assaults. Leveraging our experiences with games like Panzer General, we strategy types already know which units to attack each other with.

Thankfully, there's plenty of tactical flexibility. Infantry can dig trenches or garrison buildings to receive defensive bonuses, engineers can extend the mobility of your vehicles by building pontoon bridges or airfields, and trucks can help slow-moving guns keep up with your advances. Making the most of each unit's strengths and using them in combination with the strengths of other units is where the game is most fun. We've had many tense moments here, from trying to keep our recon infantry from advancing too far ahead of our main force that we couldn't save them if the enemy suddenly appeared, to using fast moving vehicles to lure lone enemies into carefully prepared ambushes.

The modeling of a number of tactically significant factors adds to the excitement here. Your units move faster on roads but keeping them in the forests can help them stay hidden from nearby enemies. Some of your units are very fast, but large hills and river crossings can help your enemy predict where you're going to move. Units that find themselves in danger can even suffer from low morale, making them easy targets for any nearby enemies.

Of course, to make the most of that tactical flexibility, you'd need missions that are a bit more open-ended than those in Galactic Assault. The missions here, particularly in the campaign and solo-missions, seemed designed with only one course of victory in mind. Even the initial briefings and mid-mission updates tell players where to move and how to fight. The new unit recruitment options in your bases are even scripted for you, so you won't have many options to really experiment with unconventional unit combinations. While this kind of hand-holding is welcome in the early stages of the game, it gets downright tedious later on once you've already figured out how the units operate and just want to be turned loose to smash the enemy according to your own plans.

At times it seems like the AI plans are just as scripted. Reinforcement triggers are one thing, but we've had plenty of missions where the AI was simply unable to do more than launch feeble probing attacks at our lines. If they attack in force, it's not because the AI thinks it's a smart decision, but because the designers have created the mission to play out that way. In one mission, we had suffered terrific losses taking an enemy base and then had to turn around and defend it from counterattack. Even though we were obviously weakened, the AI held most of its attacking force in reserve, letting us go on the attack and take them on one-by-one.

On the plus side, the interface never gets in the way of the game. This has to be one of the leanest interfaces we've ever seen in a turn-based strategy game. All the necessary information is right there -- unit stats, movement range, firing radius, morale and health status -- but it never gets in the way of the action or causes confusion. The whole game can be played with the mouse, so you won't ever find yourself hunting and pecking for specific hotkeys.

If there was one thing that the game lacks, it's a way to issue multi-turn move orders to units that need to cross a large distance. Having to remember where each and every unit is heading each and every turn takes up valuable brain space. We'd also like to have seen some indication of which units have and haven't moved or fired in a turn. That annoying popup window that reminds us of the units that can still move and fire is convenient but far too distracting.

We're generally willing to be a bit more forgiving of the graphics in most turn-based strategy games. They are, after all, not really intended to compete with the Warcrafts or Command & Conquers of this world. Even with that in mind, Galactic Assault offers graphics that are muddy and monochromatic, which can make it hard to read the overall strategic situation, especially when day gives way to night. There are some good explosion and weapon effects here, but overall the world of Galactic Assault just seems a bit too lifeless. Some of the later areas get a bit more colorful but the textures are still a bit sloppy. The default "fancy camera" option brings all these weaknesses out much too clearly.

Take to the skies in Ubisoft's much-improved arcade shooter.

By: David Craddock

Players eager to partake in frantic World War II dogfights were largely disappointed by the original Blazing Angels. The mission objectives were lackluster, the artificial intelligence companions were too powerful, and the core of the game, air combat, was simply dull. Has Ubisoft rectified its past mistakes of tedium with Blazing Angels 2: Secret Missions of WWII? Yes, but some minor issues still exist.

Blazing Angels 2's mission variety is quite varied, providing several different objectives in every level. One level has the player and one of his squad mates flying over arctic terrain, testing out a defensive weapon that temporarily blinds enemy planes. The catch: Players must position enemies behind their aircraft for the weapon to work properly. Of course, a short time after the weapon is successfully tested, enemy planes appear with the intent to destroy a friendly submarine that has been stranded somewhere far below. Yes, somewhere; players must fly close enough to the water to properly receive the dying sub's transmissions, with a radar beeping as the player nears their location.

After the submarine has been found, the player must keep enemy crafts away from its location until an escort arrives. Unfortunately, the player's plane is barren of all weapons except for the defensive flash-like equipment. To defeat the planes, the player must lure them behind his own craft, blind them, and cause them to fly into an iceberg.

In another mission that emphasizes stealth, the player is flying a German craft among other German planes, thereby blending in perfectly with his hostile surroundings. Since peace was never meant to last, the player is quickly charged with shooting down all patrolling planes within the area--without raising alarm. A red eye will appear in the lower left corner of the screen to alert players if they're being watched; otherwise, shoot to kill, but make sure no enemies are able to walk--er, fly--away to tell their tale.

In expected and enjoyable arcade flight shooter fashion, Blazing Angels 2 features a couple of boss battles that are enjoyable, if somewhat easy. One mission pits players against a massive German zeppelin after the player has finished an intense dogfight with dozens of enemy planes. Like any good videogame boss, the zeppelin has specific weak spots that must be destroyed before the main structure itself becomes open to attack. Again, this and most of the other boss battles will be simple for most players of adequate or greater skill, but their greater purpose is to mix up the gameplay, and in that regard, they succeed.

Blazing Angels 2's core focus, shooting planes, is handled adequately by way of the keyboard and mouse combination, though a joystick gamepad with dual analog sticks is recommended. Moving the mouse up or down causes the plane to climb or dip, respectively--a difficult change to get used to, as flight controls are typically inverted--while moving it from side to side moves the plane in that direction. Navigation with the mouse is difficult due to not being able to slide the mouse in a direction and hold it there to keep the aircraft moving in that direction until the mouse has been righted. Instead, players have to slide the mouse in their desired direction, then lift it up, set it back, and then slide it again, over and over.

Better control is achieved by using the keyboard without the mouse, but again, a gamepad or joystick is recommended, which shouldn't surprise any PC gamer who has ever played a flight game, whether arcade or simulation.

Though each level's diversity is a blast to experience, Blazing Angels 2's checkpoint system quickly causes tedium and aggravation to set in. Bluntly, many checkpoints are simply spaced too far apart, or are not available in instances where they should be. The player's progress is usually saved after the completion of a Primary Objective, but not after a Secondary. Since completing Secondary Objectives rewards players with Prestige Points, which are used to purchase aircraft upgrades, wouldn't it be logical to have the game enact a checkpoint after the completion of any and all objectives?

Many levels start out with the player being positioned far away from the first objective, which makes repeatedly hearing the same dialogue and having to accelerate toward the objective for two or three real-time minutes a bore. Even worse are instances where players are assigned to do a certain thing--survive for X minutes; shoot down X enemy planes in Y minutes--for a certain amount of time. There were numerous occasions when I was less than 30 seconds away from finally finishing off a large swarm of enemies, only to accidentally crash into a building, or another aircraft, or get gunned down, which resulted in having to try, try again.

Whether dog fighting, stealing enemy aircraft and manning its turrets, or dropping a spy on top of a moving train, Blazing Angels 2's mission maps surpass the high graphical quality set by the original, though only gamers' PCs are able to crank most of the visual options to their highest settings. The aforementioned level where players must rescue personnel onboard a ruined submarine takes place in an arctic zone with massive icebergs floating across a large body of water, while a different mission takes place in Cairo, which features palm trees, pyramids, and lots of bad guys. Minute details such as soldiers scrambling around an attacked base add to the game's immersion, though players will usually be too busy blasting baddies out of the sky to notice.

Blazing Angels 2 doesn't look bad at lower settings, it just isn't that impressive. Textures are bland and smeary, and lower refresh rates result in prolific image tearing. The game never becomes unplayable, but prospective buyers should plan to run Angels 2 on a rig with at least 2BG of RAM, a 2GHz processor, and at least a 128MB video card, though a 256MB card is recommended.

The planes themselves look great and can be aesthetically and mechanically customized to better suit the player's needs. Visually, not too many options are available--three layers of colors, plus symbols for the wings, tail, and body--but they're enough to sate most artistic desires. More important are the mechanical aspects of the crafts, and in this regard, Blazing Angels 2 does not disappoint. As mentioned, players use Prestige Points to purchase upgrades such as increased projectile speed, higher chance for critical strikes, two different types of armor plating--each of which decreases every plane's maneuverability; a third type is available that will cancel out the negative impact on maneuverability, but it's quite pricey--and there's even an upgrade available that increases the amount of Prestige players can earn from every mission.

Though upgrades do exist to advance the effectiveness of the A.I. squad members, such upgrades are almost useless. Just as in the first game, the wingmen are invulnerable, which means there's no risk involved in ordering them to attack over and over again. This also decreases the player's emotional ties to his teammates, as there's really no reason to worry about their safety during any given mission. Along the same line, there aren't many story elements that focus on the camaraderie that apparently exists between the player and his three colleagues. With invincible teammates and a lack of any real emotional ties between them, the wingmen become nothing more than A.I. bots useful for killing enemies.

Gamers can rectify the lack of emotion they don't have for their teammates by jumping online and playing through the campaign with other players via LAN or online servers. Several different modes available for solo, squad-based, and cooperative play. Standard Deathmatch can be experienced through the Dogfight option--there's also a team-based option--but the real fun is found within Angels 2's specialized modes. Seek and Destroy revolves around the goal of killing every other player at least once. Once one player has killed all others, that player receives one point.

Aces High is a dangerous game of tag, where the first player to kill another becomes "it," known as the Ace. Only by killing the Ace can players increase their score. My personal favorite multiplayer mode was Kamikaze, which pits players against waves of kamikaze fighters seeking to destroy a base. Players must shoot down the flyers as quickly as possible to prevent the base from being destroyed.

Killing shouldn't be this much fun.

By: Hilary Goldstein

Stranglehold is John Woo's first foray into videogames. Whether Woo was intimately involved in guiding Stranglehold or more of a watchful father, his influence can be felt in every frame. Midway has managed to capture the essence of a Woo film -- in some ways more than Woo has over the past decade. You get everything a fan could ask for: excessive gunplay, heavily stylized cinematic moments, melodrama, slow-motion dives, dual-fisted pistols, and, of course, doves aplenty. Some have called Woo's films a beautiful ballet of violence. Stranglehold is less ballet and more a mosh pit of bullets. Either way, lots of people die and little in the environment is left standing once the smoke clears.

The spiritual successor to one of Woo's most popular films, Stranglehold puts you in the shoes of famed Inspector Tequila. Chow Yun Fat comes stateside to reprise his role (though this time in English), adding a level of authenticity. The story is convoluted -- something about a kidnapped girl, a dead cop, and drug money. The cut-scenes are sometimes dripping with melodrama. But that's a good thing. Melodrama is a John Woo signature move and, like so much in Stranglehold, it helps immerse gamers in the world of Hard Boiled.

As Tequila, your job is to shoot first and never ask questions. You'll be tasked with storming through seven chapters, each of which is a lengthy expedition of violence. You'll travel through Hong Kong, from the marketplace to an extravagant restaurant/casino and on to the main villain's palatial stronghold. From start to finish every level is overcrowded with enemies and your main objective in almost all of the missions is to kill everyone and proceed towards the exit. Don't worry, Inspector Tequila isn't traveling alone. He's brought friends.

Your buddies in Stranglehold are a reliable pair of Beretta pistols. Though you do have a limited amount of ammunition, you never have to reload. This is a brilliant concept because reloading only slows down the action. And Stranglehold is not the type of game that benefits from any pause in the action. This is a full throttle balls-to-the-wall shooter. In fact, if you had to take the time to hit a button to reload, you'd probably be dead before a fresh clip was in your gun. Even in the pussy-footin' first level, you find yourself surrounded by enemies, being shot from all directions. Good thing Tequila is tough enough to shrug off a few thousand bullets over the course of Stranglehold.

If you get tired of the Berettas, there are several other weapons to choose from as you progress through Stranglehold. Among these are an M4 Carbine assault rifle, shotgun, rocket launcher, and an M249 light machine gun. You only get one weapon type per class (with the exception of the extremely powerful gold Berettas). It would have been nice to have a bit more variety in the weapons (and a flamethrower), but Midway touches on most of the essentials. Though modeled after real weapons, there's no realism in the execution. The shotty can kill from long range, for example. But Stranglehold isn't about realism -- it's about kicking a whole lot of ass.

To assist in this ass-kicking, Tequila gains access to four different powers while progressing through the seven chapters of Stranglehold. These "Tequila Bombs" are all potent powers essential for completing Woo's sequel to Hard Boiled. As you perform stylish kills, you'll begin filling your Tequila meter. As the meter fills, you can call in more powerful Tequila Bombs.

The first level of Tequila juice gets you a boost of health, which is like carrying around a medipack. Second up is Precision Aiming. When initiated, time slows and you zoom in on the nearest enemy. You then have several seconds to aim at any body part and fire a single bullet for massive damage. Each hit location has multiple animations. Shoot someone in the throat and they may clutch the wound and attempt (unsuccessfully) to utter a final word. Or be cruel and shoot a baddie in the good 'n' plenty. He'll grab at his missing member before falling over into a merciful blackness.

The third rung earns you Barrage, the most useful of the Bombs. Once selected, Tequila loads up the weapon of choice with bullets. You now have a good 20 seconds of enhanced firepower and invulnerability. With Barrage, you can tear through the environment (particularly with the shotgun) and lay waste to enemies. While many will drool over Stranglehold's slick slow-motion options and environmental interaction, for my money, Barrage is the most stunning element in the entire game. It's beautifully brutal -- especially with a rocket launcher in hand.

Lastly, you acquire the smart bomb. Hit up this final Tequila Bomb and the good Inspector spins in a circle, firing with stunning accuracy. As doves flutter about, Tequila kills every enemy on screen. It's a useful power, though it does take away the fundamental element of Stranglehold -- killing people yourself.

Each of the Bombs has its uses and initially you may find yourself ignoring them for the satisfaction of using normal gunplay to end the lives of each enemy. However, about halfway through Stranglehold, the difficulty gets a serious ratcheting up and it becomes almost impossible to complete the game without making use of the Bombs. Fortunately, you will be killing so many enemies in the final three levels that your Tequila meter fills quickly, allowing you to make use of the Bombs with great regularity.

Of course, no Woo movie would be complete without some slow-motion kills. These come in bunches. In fact, a good majority of Stranglehold is played at a slower speed. On the HUD, just below your health, is a Tequila Time meter. You can enter this manually with a tap of a mouse button. The screen is washed in a sepia tone, bullets can be seen as they slowly approach, and Tequila can aim more easily. The meter runs out quickly, but fills almost as fast.

Tequila Time also engages any time you interact with the environment or dive. The Space Bar is your greatest ally. Hold the Space Bar to dive in any direction. Time slows and people die. If you're near an object (railing, chandelier, wall, roll cart, etc.) Tequila will interact with that object and (again) time will slow. This allows for some truly cool moments. You'll be sliding down banisters, running up the spines of fossilized dinosaurs, swinging from chandeliers, and sliding across the tops of counters, popping enemies as you go.

Quite a lot of things in the environment are interactive. And you'll know about each one, as Stranglehold has every item flashing. "Hey, over here, Tequila! It's me, your old friend the banister. Come run along me!" I would hope gamers aren't so stupid that they need their hand held through every single level. I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure that after the first "training" level, gamers will get the idea. It gets a little bit obnoxious after a while to see the environment flashing and actually takes away some of the fun of discovering new areas of interaction.

The real problem, however, is that the interactive elements are buggy. You'll be next to a railing, hit the space bar and dive forward instead of hopping onto the rail. Or you will face a wall, expect to plant your feet and push off as you've done in the past, only to find Tequila standing motionless staring at the wall like an idiot. Now, 90% of the time, the interaction works perfectly. But that's still 10% of the time when you will meet frustration. And this is really the greatest flaw in Stranglehold, because the lack of a fluid interaction system hurts one of the title's strongest selling points.

Should you get frustrated at any of the failed interactions, you can always take it out on the environment. Just about everything in Stranglehold is destructible. Tables splinter, support columns shatter, and every spot of cover quickly erodes. Every bullet needs to go somewhere. In the chaos of the many arena battles, the game world is often left in a heaping mess. This affects gameplay, because in later stages you'll be forced to take cover. But almost every piece of cover will be destroyed given time, forcing you to move forward and never allowing the action to slow for too long.

The high level of destruction takes a toll on the visuals. While the environments look great, the characters come off as generic, with a very limited set of animations. Stranglehold has a lot of cinematic flair, but lacks the visual pop I'd expected. Considering that apples scatter when shot off a table and a dozen enemies are on screen at almost every moment, the weakened visual fidelity is forgivable. Even with today's technology, there are still limits to what can be done on screen. And pay heed to the hardware recommendations (Dual Core, 2 GB RAM, GeForce 7800) if you want the game to run smoothly at a decent resolution.

None of this excuses Stranglehold's most pressing issue: the camera. It becomes a considerable problem when leaping off walls or otherwise shifting your body in another direction. You have to manually adjust the camera to follow your movements, which is a real challenge in such a fast-paced game. However, if you turn on the "camera spring" option, this issue largely goes away. Why this wasn't made the default is curious, because Stranglehold is a much better game without the nagging camera concerns.

Another staple of Woo films are standoffs, where Tequila finds himself staring down the barrel of several guns. These moments are recreated in about a half-dozen standoff mini-games during play. For standoffs, the controls change slightly. Tequila stands still, but you can lean left and right to dodge the incoming bullets from enemies. At the same time as you are dodging, you must also aim your shot and take down the other members of the standoff. You only have a couple of seconds to take an enemy out before Tequila spins and faces the next villain and the sequence repeats. This becomes quite challenging towards the latter part of Stranglehold. Though people will come for the fast-paced action, the standoffs were my favorite part of Stranglehold. They're tense and exciting.

The single-player game only lasts 6-8 hours. On the bright side, that's four times the length of Hard Boiled. But, then again, this is $50 we're talking about. Stranglehold features online multiplayer for up to six players. It's only deathmatch and team deathmatch, which take place in a variety of locales from the game. Each match is complete and utter chaos. Every player has access to the various Tequila Bombs and can (sometimes) enter slow motion. None of this really comes together though, as players need to be in slow motion at the same time, so that there's no real advantage to using Stranglehold's primary gameplay element. And the Precision Aiming power still has the same slow-mo reticule movements, but the other players are moving in real time, so it's pretty much impossible to use.

While the multiplayer doesn't come together as well as it should, it's still an interesting experiment. Anyone who picks up Stranglehold should give the multiplayer a shot at least once, just to experience the insanity. But this isn't something that will have people playing Stranglehold for the next year.

The series moves into the future but not without some serious shortcomings.

By: Steve Butts

Battlefront's award-winning Combat Mission series set a high standard not just for the wargame genre but for the developer as well. Over three separate releases covering three different theaters of World War II, the series managed to offer some of the most accurate and intense tactical experiences we've ever seen. So when it was announced that the team would be creating an entirely new engine and focusing on a more modern war for Combat Mission: Shock Force, we were definitely excited.

Unfortunately, while Shock Force manages to capture the high level of realism found in previous games in the series, the poor interface design and lack of a flexible or responsive AI makes it difficult to appreciate the things that the game gets right. Moreover, the graphics, though capable of displaying great until detail in extreme close-ups, don't scale very well and don't run very well at any setting.

The game represents a hypothetical, future conflict between the US and Syria, which bears some unsettling but nevertheless intriguing similarities to current US engagements in the real world. The relevance of the game to our own world has certainly deepened over the past few years of development, but the campaign and mission design wisely focuses on the action without adding on layers of political or moral context. We might have liked a bit more of a narrative here, at least as far as the military progress of the war as a whole, but the individual missions are compelling enough to stand by themselves.

Each mission presents an intriguing tactical challenge, mostly concerned with securing objectives and eliminating a certain fraction of the enemy force. More interesting objectives will ask you to discover intelligence or destroy enemy buildings. Success here is measured in degrees and it's very refreshing that the game lets you continue on to the next mission even when you fail. Most missions however are structured to take quite a bit longer than necessary so there's plenty of downtime.

As with the other Combat Mission games, there are plenty of individual missions you can play outside of the campaign. Scripted missions, a mission generator and a full editor give you more than enough options to extend your enjoyment of the game beyond the campaign. It would have been nice to see a little more variety in terms of the random maps' geography but what really disappoints is the inability to create your own forces for these random battles. You can select general unit types to include, but it would still be preferable to assemble your army by hand.

Each of the units in the game seems to have been modeled in exacting detail, taking note of things like the armor slope and thickness of the vehicles in the game as well as the ammo levels of each and every infantry weapon. Improving over the pattern established by previous Combat Mission games, Shock Force actually renders each individual member of a fire team, so you'll be able to see specifically where each of your soldiers are on the battlefield.

The US makes use of Strykers and Abrams tanks and a range of infantry units. They'll also often have the option to call in off map support in the form of artillery or air strikes. We particularly like the option to set a linear target for this fire; it comes in very handy when trying to bust up trenches. The demands of accuracy mean that the Syrian forces are quite a bit less powerful than the US troops but they do have some interesting units -- technicals, IEDs, RPGs -- that can give them a slight edge.

Shock Force offers up the standard turn-based modes of the previous games, but also introduces a full real-time mode as well. It's exciting to play Combat Mission in real time but it doesn't include the standard RTS conventions, like creating hot groups, creating formations, or drag selecting mixed groups of units. As a result, you'll have to micromanage things a bit too much. On the plus side, you can issue orders in paused mode to get things the way you want them.

Shock Force does away with the convenient right-click menu of previous games in the series and instead relies on a wide range of hotkeys. It's easy enough once you get used to the shortcuts, but being able to draw up an order menu right on the game map would have been much more convenient. Likewise, there are no tooltips at all in the game, which means you'll be referring back to the manual to discover just where all your commands are.

The real killer here with regard to the missions is that the red force AI isn't very active. The missions are designed to hide this by forcing the player to assault fixed positions, but even so, you'll eventually discover that the AI just isn't inclined to move to retake objectives or flank advancing forces. We've blasted through roadblocks and never been pursued; we've left small forces at objectives that were never assaulted by nearby enemies; we've called in artillery strikes on enemies that never even tried to find cover.

This deficiency can be hidden a bit when the player is assaulting fixed defenders but it's really apparent during meeting engagements. Most of the time, the player will be free to march right up to the objective, take it, and then shoot any enemies that he can see from there. An after-action review of the map will reveal enemy infantry and vehicles just sitting idle.

On the friendly side, the AI does a bit better but still benefits from some handholding, particularly with regard to responding to enemy threats while on the move. In most cases, your own units will ignore enemy fire while moving to their objective. It's true that your forces will often fire back and discovered enemies, but they just don't do enough to seek cover when surprised by enemy fire. This lack of self-preservation is especially troubling when you're not paying attention to the units when they come under attack. Vehicle pathfinding presents a number of problems as well when trying to navigate groups of vehicles through narrow city streets.

The levels are very well designed with plenty of tactically significant locations. Crossroads, fortified barracks, narrow defiles and such all make for some interesting playgrounds. On the downside, the game seems married to a very monotonous desert theme and an endless succession of bland, boxy buildings. Perhaps the worst aspect of the maps is that they just give out at the edges and float over a huge sandy texture. We much prefer the way that the battle areas in Theatre of War blended in with more realistic horizons.

Animations and unit detail are really fantastic up close. Infantry outfits and vehicle detailing are very high, so you can definitely get lost in the action when viewing things from ground level. The animations of soldiers running or tanks rocking back and forth after firing their guns definitely adds to the realism here. The interface doesn't really work at this scale, however, so you'll have to bounce back and forth between this and the more traditional high-level view. As you move out, the graphics get scaled way back; textures get blocky and animations for some of the units disappear altogether.

Line of sight and line of fire seems to matter a great deal in the game but it doesn't always match the geometry of the level. So while you might not be able to trace an unobstructed line directly from one unit to another, that doesn't mean that they can't see and fire on each other. Given the scale of the game, it's not a surprise that there's some abstraction going on here, but it can be very disappointing to get your units behind cover only to discover that they can still be shot at by nearby enemies.

The high system requirements for Shock Force are out of line with the quality of the graphics and the game's overall performance. There's apparently an issue with nVidia cards that cause significant stuttering, which can make issuing commands and moving the camera more difficult than it should be, requiring you to pause the game just to get your orders right.

If only polish and presentation were easy to come by.

By: Travis Fahs

You have to wonder why a developer would deliberately position their game in the long shadow cast by a hugely successful title like Oblivion. Sure, the market is obviously there, but it seems like such a cruel fate to thrust upon your brainchild, knowing it will be condemned to labels like "clone" or "rip-off." Nevertheless, Polish developer Reality Pump has stepped up with a confident swagger, proud to steal from the best, and confident it can stand on its own.

It's a tall order. Oblivion wrapped a massive amount of content and overwhelming level of freedom in a package that oozed high-class production value, with an accessibility that helped lure in the console audience that had long eluded computer role-playing games. Two Worlds seems to have all the basics down, with miles of terrain and bustling cities full of more to do than you'll care to explore. For those that like to roam rather than barrel through the adventure, there's a near endless flow of side-quests to take on, and some of these have interesting consequences. All of this comes together in a seamless world, with only the briefest loading pauses.

But it only takes a few minutes to spot the chinks in the armor The visuals are rife with awkward, sometimes glitchy animations and objects that just pop in, seemingly from no where. There doesn't seem to be any physics simulation, and there are plenty of bugs in the collision detection, so expect to occasionally see people walk through each other or pop through walls. Even worse, movement will chug when the action gets too hot and heavy, regardless of whether you're playing on a high-end gaming PC or the 360.

It's not a terribly appealing world, either. You assume the role of a bounty hunter tasked with collecting all the magic doo-dads to stop the resurrection of an evil god. Tired fantasy clichés are flung around like confetti throughout the awkward, Old English dialogue. Like a lot of Eastern European games, it has embarrassingly bad, voice acting, too. Imagine Steven Wright at a Renaissance Fair, and you'll have a pretty good idea of what to expect.

Are you still with us? I know all these problems seem like a tough pill to swallow, but first impressions aren't everything. Despite the copious minor flaws that will chase many away in the first few hours, there is actually a lot to love here. Two Worlds makes some smart decisions that help it stand out just enough to be worth a second look.

One of the biggest flaws with Oblivion was the decision to make enemies automatically scale to your level, so that the challenge level stayed fixed. This gave you the freedom to go where you wanted, but it eliminated the satisfaction of building up your character in preparation of a long and arduous quest. Luckily, Two Worlds avoids this trap. You'll find enemies that kill you in a single hit, and eventually you'll be able to crush those same foes in seconds. It's a satisfying feeling that ought to be a part of any good role-playing game, and it's complimented by a robust system for building skills, giving this game plenty of depth.

The quest itself is very open-ended, at least after the first couple hours or so. Making progress is more than a simple matter of traveling from place to place marked on your map. Instead you'll need to take on many side-quests to build your reputation in order to make the allies you need to achieve your goals. This might not appeal to shotgun players who don't want to roam the countryside or talk to random villagers, but those that prefer a more leisurely pace will enjoy the sense of consequence it lends. Seeing sub-plots unfold and your reputation evolve can be a lot of fun.

The combat is a change of pace. It plays best in third-person, though the option is there for first-person as well. You'll be able to dole out some nifty-looking combos, and a dodge button lets you quickly avoid your enemy's strikes. The fighting is simple, has a nice stick-and-move rhythm to it, and the different weapons lend enough variety to keep things interesting. The AI is straightforward and predictable, so don't expect action on par with Dark Messiah, but it works. I don't like it as much as Oblivion's system, but it isn't really comparable.

Getting around is a snap, thanks to abundant teleports all over the map. You can zip around with ease between any teleports you've passed in your travels, which really helps streamline those endless hikes that have always been my least favorite part of games like this. You'll have access to horses and other mounts as well, but unfortunately these can't go through teleports with you.

Death isn't the cruel fate it once was. Dying in battle will simply find back at the nearest shrine, rarely more than a few hundred yards away, with all of your possessions safe and sound. These shrines will also heal you whenever you walk within range, which can be easily abused for some cheap victories. Of course, if you're looking for more of a challenge, the Hard setting has no re-spawn.

Not all the new additions work well, unfortunately. Much has been made of the horseback combat, a feature sorely lacking in similar games. It's nice to be able to pull out a spear and bust some skulls as your ride by, but the equestrian portion of the game controls so poorly, it's not effective to do so.

In fact, I can say without hyperbole that the horse riding in Two Worlds features the worst controls I've ever experienced in a game. I realize that horses do, indeed, have minds of their own, but perhaps this is not the best aspect of riding to simulate in a game. When your horse doesn't feel he can go a certain way, he goes off on his own, sometimes heading in the opposite direction of the one you're pressing. You learn to work around this and stick to the main roads, but trying to navigate the horse through complex terrain or tight spaces is simply more trouble than it's worth.

And then there's the online co-operative play. The idea of playing a game like this with a band of buddies is an enticing one, but it might not be what you're expecting. You won't be able to just hop into the single player game with a couple of friends. The multi-player portion is like a separate game.

You'll need to make a new character solely for your online exploits. In the PC version you can meet up in a city that acts like a lobby, much like the ones in Phantasy Star Online. Here you can explore shops, talk to other players, and form a party to venture out on a quest. Although the multi-player maps represent only a fraction of the size of the single player game, they're still pretty large. More importantly, they offer the same open-ended gameplay of the single player game, allowing you to explore freely and take on whatever missions you choose. You'll still get all the fun of building up your character, but you'll just need to accept that the badass you powered up in the solo game will never see any co-op action.

To really enjoy the multi-player, you'll need to have some friends committed to regular play, since finding a decent game with strangers can be a bit difficult. If you have reliable buddies, the online portion isn't "broken," as some have declared. It's just a different approach, and in many ways it makes more sense than just dumping more players into the solo game. As long as you understand what you're getting and you have willing friends, it's a great feature.

Oblivion is not a giant easily felled, and Two Worlds is not going to be the game to do it. If you can live with that, this could be a good RPG to spend the end of your summer on. The designers had a good handle on what they wanted and they've created a game with a ton of depth. Unfortunately, the execution is flawed. This game is glitchy and unpolished, and these quirks will prevent it from duplicating the real key to Oblivion's success: mainstream appeal.

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