Publisher: EA

Developer: DICE

Release Date: 3/2/2010

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Ahhh, the tired old FPS genre. Everyone loves it, and then everyone hates it. What more can developers do to change the FPS genre to make it interesting? Better graphics? Better sounds? More realistic AI? Realistic physics? Less linear? Keep the linearity? More vehicles? Better story? The list goes on and on, and the answer is yes to all of the above.

Bad Company 2 is a sequel to the first, but the first game was pretty forgettable. You play as a squad of four soldiers who were military rejects and must earn their freedom or face the slammer. They are sent into Africa and other parts of the world to find some sort of scalar weapon that the Russians found in Japan and are using for global domination. Not something we haven’t seen before, but the squad has great characters that you’ll love, and hearing their banter is enough to keep playing.

A lot of people are comparing Bad Company 2 to Modern Warfare 2, and if I were to pick the better game, Bad Company 2 for single-player and realism, and Modern Warfare 2 for multiplayer, but then again, I’m not comparing the two, so let’s get down to it. The first thing you will notice is how real Bad Company 2 feels, more so than any other shooter so far. The sounds are just amazing, with the sound of fire echoing off caverns, the sounds of you reloading echoing in a building, the pinging of bullet shells hitting the floor—everything sounds like it would in life and is placed accordingly to unlock most (if not all) shooters, real or not. The foliage looks real, and everything blows up. You can blow pretty much anything up in the game with anything you can get hold of. This is also used in gameplay when getting around turrets that you can’t shoot through. Find some red barrels and blow the building up, then have it collapse on everyone below it. This goes for radio towers, telephone poles, and large trees. Then again, it’s pretty stupid when you can blow apart small objects like trash cans, chairs, or cardboard boxes, so it’s very strange.

The weapon selection in the game is great, and you get all your real-world guns, and they fire like they should. The guns feel powerful, and everything about shooting feels dead-on. Gone, however, is the whole healing thing, and instead, you just hide in cover to heal. Another element stripped is finding the gold bars, but instead, M-COM stations that you blow up and finding weapons. The M-COM stations are hard to find, and I don’t know where all the hidden weapons could be, but they’re there for people who like that stuff. I personally hate finding crap in shooters like this since it detracts from the experience and pulls you out. Other than that, though, the game is paced nicely and flows just right.

There are some elements that haven’t been down before, like the whole blowing up everything in your path (in an FPS anyway), and there’s even one level where you will freeze to death if you don’t find shelter fast. This level has your knifing doors open as you race down a hillside. There are some epic vehicle sections (that haven’t been done before), but there is one level that isn’t linear that has three checkpoints, and you can choose which ones you want to do first. The opening level is even from WWII in Japan, so the game is full of surprises and is a blast to play.

When it comes to multiplayer, the game is solid with three modes of play, but my favorite is Rush. Like in the original game, you have an attacker and defender side on a huge map (this one supports 64 players). You have five different classes to choose from, and you can customize them as you please. There are three “perks” that you can use at a time, but they must be unlocked, and this takes a while. The multiplayer is fast, intense, and fun, with lots of vehicles zooming around, everything blowing up, and people just being crazy.

My last words here must be how amazing the game looks. Probably being the best-looking shooter around, it looks great technically but has no artistic style and is just “real life” type of stuff, so it’s not for everyone. If you want a really amazing shooter to play and are bored of Modern Warfare 2, pick up Bad Company 2, because it’s one hell of a ride.

LIMITED EDITION: If you pick up the game soon, you can still get the limited edition, which has six multiplayer unlocks and entitles you to upcoming maps for free. A deal? I’d say it’s the standard price with no additional charge. To find a new copy if you can.

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