Well, one of the most hyped games of the year is out, and as I was one of the biggest ones helping to spread the word since I first say this game months ago, I can say that I helped hype it to my own friends. On release day I called my local EB Games to see if it was in yet but they told me, unfortunately, that it would be there later that night and itwould be first come first serve, since they didn’t have all the preorders they needed for the Special Edition I had ordered.  I bit my tongue from using my Frag Doll or Ubisoft connections to ensure that they would hold it for me and instead waited till 5pm and proceeded to call them every half hour to see when it was in. It got there at 8:00pm and I picked it up about five minutes later.

I got home and put that baby in and immediately started on the campaign. When I got in the middle of Act 1 on hardcore I thought to myself, “Maybe I shouldn’t bust right into Hardcore the moment I get the game,” as I seemed to be dying a lot. As I had quite a few friends online, I decided to go see what was up with the multiplayer.  A few minutes later I invited all my friends online and we start going head-to-head.

Let me tell you, “WHEEE” was all I was thinking about as we played. The graphics were absolutely stunning, the gore was absolutely shocking, and the maneuverability simply floored me. We all ran around in a stupor trying to find the good weapons, looking for grenades to blow each other up, and pulling out our shotguns to blow each other’s heads off. I seriously hadn’t had that much fun on a multiplayer game for awhile now. We played all the maps and after a few hours I went to bed dreaming about the game.

The game features the standard type weapons with nothing being new, except for the buzz saw attached to the machine gun. You’ve got your regulars like the shotgun, sniper rifle, and machine gun (which slightly vary if you are Human or Locust). Your default weapon is the human machine gun, and the buzz saw attached to it allows you to cut your enemies in half should you choose to make your final blow with it. It is by far one of the coolest melee attacks I have ever seen, as I can’t even begin to describe to you the gore that surrounds this move.  I also especially like the finishing move of grabbing a downed enemy and breaking their skull across my knee.  It took me a bit to get the reload system down, as there is a bar that gauges your reload time and you have to hit the moving bar at the right time to get a fast reload (you also get some achievements for doing perfect reloads 5 and 25 times in a row). Be careful, because if you don’t get this reload down your gun gets jammed for a bit allowing you to be open and vulnerable because you’re a noob.

Unfortunately, there are only a few modes in the multiplayer and games only hold up to eight players: Warzone, Assassination, and Execution. Warzone is akin to Team Deatchmatch where teams go head to head. You have to choose your sides. The COG are Human and the Locust are the aliens. Then prepare for battle.  The other game types include Assassination, in which the entire team must protect one person who is the leader, and Execution where all the opposing team members must be finished off in all the brutal ways possible:  curb stomp, buzzsaw, or blow up their head with a head shot. Bullets in their body just won’t do in this mode!

The next day I get up to do some work, all the while contemplating on how I was going to beat Hardcore in campaign when it seemed I was having trouble with it. I knew I didn’t want to waste my time on causal mode. That problem was easily solved when my gaming sidekick, Azn PMS, called asking if I wanted to get on and play co-op campaign with her. So, I jump on and we start the campaign on Hardcore mode together. I know what you guys are going to say. “It’s not fair/right/ok that you beat the campaign with someone,” and I only have one response: EAT IT!

The campaign was amazing and we still struggled in spots with the two of us, having to reload checkpoints many, many times.  Luckily Azn and I make a good team as she favors the sniper and I favor the shotgun so we were covered for all circumstances and I think we progressed fast, as the campaign is really not that long. The only disappointment I had was the final boss was too easy. We took him down on our second try, and quite quickly at that. I know this might have been a fluke or maybe because there was two of us, because I had a friend that tried to beat that final boss for 2 days straight by himself on hardcore. But for us at least, it was too easy.

In final words I have to say the game lived up to the hype and I will get many hours of enjoyment on it. I can’t wait to have some more time for the multiplayer and Azn and I have plans today to go back through and play the insane difficulty that we unlocked. This time I’m going to play Dom, as I saw there were some achievements you can only get with him, and this way I can kill 2 birds with one stone. Hope the rest of you enjoy this game as much as I do and if you don’t have it yet you’re a LOSER. =P