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Together Again! Army Of Two : The 40th Day Review
The 40th Day is the second game in the Army of Two series from EA. In it, you can again choose to play as either Salem or Rios as they try and escape a rapidly deteriorating Shanghai.
The “feel” for the game is set very early on. The first level, once you're past the training, pretty much sets the tone for the story. You will spend most of your time trying to escape a grey, poorly textured environment. That's what I'll say at the top of this review, the graphics are poor. This title wouldn't look out of place on the original Xbox. The fire...jeez the fire. It's embarrassing at times. I can't believe EA have looked at the game and said “Yeah, they're good enough”. If you're looking for a graphically awesome game, leave now. Press the back button on your browser and forget The 40th Day.
Good. Now they've gone let's get on with it.
Gameplay is much the same as the first Army of Two. The camera angle, cover system and controls are all pretty much the same. I don't want to be drawn into a debate over the cover systems of this and Gears of War but let's just say Gears is better and leave it at that. What I do like though is the feature of changing your camera angle. If you press down the right analogue stick your over the shoulder view will switch from left to right. This makes it a lot easier to fire over or around cover, depending on the way you're facing. Sometimes the controls can feel a bit clunky and it's easy to make errors. For example, I lost count of the time I tried to help my partner and ended up sprinting past him, or I dived over cover instead of hiding behind it. They take a bit of getting used to but after a while they're not that bad.
The weapon purchasing and customization feature is back and better than before. There are a lot of weapons and a ridiculous amount of upgrades for them. These can range from different stocks to barrels, cartridges to front mounts. Some of them are real upgrades...some of them are home made silencers. It's all a bit unrealistic but it is fun.
Depending on the difficulty level the story is short short and short. I played through the first time on Contractor (the hardest) and it took me about 8 or 9 hours. This included multiple deaths. Thousands of them in fact. Also, this included a bit of achievement hunting because really, who can pass up a good 10G?
The multiplayer consists of, naturally online Co-Op, Team Deathmatch matches. Very simple concept. In these matches you join with a partner, or it finds you a partner, and you kill other teams of 2. Easy peasy.
A really nice feature is the ability to create your own custom masks. These can be made on the website and sent to your character in game. It adds a personal touch to either character you choose to play. Also, you can make them as camp or as funny as possible. My friend has a bright pink mask...to really scare the enemy.
NOW! Good points over. Let the bad times roll. This game is the most buggy I have ever played. I have played games on over a dozen platforms, from the Commodore 64 to the 360 and I have never experienced so many bugs and glitches. The most predominant one is being disconnected from online Co-Op games. The game will randomly remove you both from the game, telling you that the other left. This can happen at any time but it is even more annoying when you've just taken 20 or 30 times to kill a heavily armoured, shotgun wielding tough, only for you to have to do it again because of a disconnect. More bugs or glitches can include, but are not limited to, missing speech by both characters and AI, people's shadows or limbs visible through walls, rolling through doors when they are an inch open and sliding off people when you try and charge them. Some of them don't affect gameplay. Some do.
There is an online statistic tracking feature which, in theory is a nice idea. The website tracks your single and multiplayer progress...poorly. My stats say I completed the game in 10 minutes. Also, my fastest heavy kill was 1 second. Just another bug, this time it's not even in the game.
Overall the game is good. I have to believe EA are planning a huge patch to fix all the bugs and that gives me hope for the future. Right now...it's too buggy to be a great game. If you have a human partner to play with I would still suggest giving this a go just don't expect this to knock Gears down a peg.
Review By: Richard Daniels