Red Faction 2

Ben celebrates the festive season by destroying vast chunks of landscape in this sequel.

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Join the revolution! Destroy Sopot’s terrible regime! Free the enslaved.. actually, would you mind very much if I sat this one out? It sounds rather dangerous..

Red Faction was, in my opinion, quite an enjoyable little game. One of the best FPS games to emerge on the PS2, in fact. So I was quite looking forward Red Faction 2, was I right to get excited? Oh yes my friends… come, join the revolution!

Red Faction 2 takes the original game’s formula, mixes it up a little, gives it a shot of adrenalin and then boots it up the arse and tells it to stop being such a girl. This game is action all the way.

The first major difference is the game’s setting. You are no longer on Mars, you are on Earth, and it’s this major change that means the graphics are much better, too. Goodbye dull greys and reds of the Mars mining facility, Hello vibrant colours and textures of Earth! The graphical improvements are amazing; they travel far beyond the simple spit and polish techniques that we see so often. I love the way this game looks, it’s smooth (60fps) and very well constructed, RF2 seems a whole world away from the drab original, in fact it’s a world, moon and asteroid belt away. To be precise.

There is one particular reason why many will buy this game though. Geo Mod. Yes, it’s back and boy, is it better… Geo Mod is the game engine that allows the characters surroundings to be altered in real-time. If you don’t like the way the bad guys are hiding behind that pillar, shoot it with a rocket. Chances are that it’ll blow apart giving you a clear shot. It’s a novel idea that appeared in the first Red Faction, although this time it has been expanded upon. It’s great fun to blast away with a rocket launcher, taking chunks out of walls and statues! However, the Geo Mod system does have its limitations. For example, some blast proof concrete walls can be demolished, yet a thin metal door can’t. It can be a little annoying at times, but then again, how many games let you destroy anything? Lets just pretend that the un-destroyable bits have some serious reinforcement, eh?

With a game employing the hugely clever Geo Mod system, you would expect the enemy A.I. to be really hot too. Well, it’s good, but not great. The enemies will hide from you, then a split second later wander into your hail of bullets, which is rather stupid, if not unhelpful, to say the least. Their behaviour is still quite good though, as they run around screaming at you, insisting that they know you from juvenile detention. But that’s no excuse not to kill them, is it..