2OpGaming

Once in a great while a game comes along that doesn’t reinvent the wheel but it does add the 20 inch rims and makes people think, “Hey, how come nobody thought of that before?”. Army of Two is definitely one of those games. Third person shooters with a cover system have been done time and time again but never once has a game focused on taking advantage of the fact that most gamers nowadays would prefer to play socially by inventing gameplay specifically tailored for cooperative play. In this regard Army of Two is a pioneer in the industry.

Army of Two follows the story of Salem and Rios, two mercenaries who in the future work for the now privatized military. Rios and Salem don’t take themselves too seriously as you’ll be able to do things like high five your partner when they do something right and slap them across the face when almost get you both killed. They are sent from mission to mission with one goal in mind, complete the objective of killing off various terrorist leaders in exchange for large sums of money. The campaign mode will have you spanning 6 levels and should take approximately 8 to 10 hours on average. The environments in these levels are very diverse from the desserts of Iraq to the rich foliage of China. You certainly will not feel like you are looking at the same textures over and over again. Play models for Rios and Salem are extremely detailed. The only area of repetition however is in the enemies. There seem to be a few type of enemies depending on the stage and it is wave after wave of that enemy without much variation. Despite this, the game is visually pleasing and provides for a very stable experience graphically. Explosions in the game are also very satisfying. In certain portions of the game helicopters will attack and you will be given the opportunity to shoot them down. For a visual treat and not to mention some added cash I suggest you try it.

Army of Two sets itself apart from other games in the design and gameplay department. The design concept is quite simple and one that most all skilled players attempt to use in any multiplayer shooter. One player grabs the AI’s fire while the other becomes temporarily invisible and flanks the AI. This tactic is commonly used in multiplayer shooters but never has it been implemented successfully in a campaign mode experience such as this. As you draw more fire you gain aggro which is how angry your enemies are with you. The more aggro you gain, the more likely it is you are going to die so you must depend on your teammate to do some damage. Maintain enough aggro for a certain period of time and you can engage overkill by pressing A when prompted. This will slow down time and increase your damage two fold which becomes imparative when dealing with multiple enemies on screen which Army of Two does a great job of. There can be at some point what seems like 20 to 30 enemies on screen at one time.

The cover system in the game works sufficiently well but there are some areas that could have used a little bit more polish. For example, you can slide up against almost any subject to automatically take cover by pressing Y. However, sometimes I found myself trying to lean up against a boulder for cover and instead of leaning I would vault over it. It wasn’t anything to detract significantly away from the experience, but those expecting a flawless system should beware. While the game was obviously meant to be played cooperative with a friend the enemy AI and control wheel while alone work surprisingly well when giving commands. A simple tap on the d pad issues an order to hold, advance, or regroup. A second tap changes the color of each order to denote an aggressive or passive stance. This leads to some interesting strategy choices in fire fights where you will need to plan ahead to succeed. For example, you will face heavy armored foes which can only be killed from behind. Based on this, you will need to tap the d pad to tell your AI teammate to shoot to draw the enemy’s attention while you sneak and go in for the kill. While your enemy AI is great at taking orders he’s not such a great shot. Shooting sequences are broken up nicely by parachute or hang glider portions. Also, you’ll be speeding around one level in a hover craft James Bond style. The campaign is made much more enjoyable by playing with a friend on the same Xbox or over Xbox live.

The next interesting and addicting aspect of the game is in the weapons system. You cannot pick up weapons dropped by enemies in game. Even during boss battles when very appealing pieces of death machine hardware are dropped you can only look but not touch. As you complete objectives in Army of Two you earn money. Mid level checkpoints allow you to enter an arns dealer menu where you can purchase various guns such as assault rifles, hand guns, special weapons, and armor. Once you purchase a weapon you can also upgrade it to improve accuracy, range, or damage. It becomes pretty addicting pushing on through the game to try and strategize out which gun you want and what features you want it to have. There is also a great deal of balance to the weapons so while you can greatly increase the attributes of a weapon you can’t do something unrealistic such as create a chain gun sniper rifle. Aesthetically, you can also pimp out your gun in gold, silver, and platinum which will increase your enemy’s ire to allow for quick aggro aggregation and overkill mode.

Besides the campaign the versus multiplayer component on Xbox live is extensive and will have players playing for quite a while. The four multiplayer modes you will find in the online portion of the game are Versus, Warzone, Extraction, and Bounties. Most of these game types focus on destroying, killing, or defending key targets whether they be objects in the battle field or actual enemy general’s. One neat thing that we are starting to see more of online that Army of Two incorporates as well is the fact that during online play not only is the battlefield just you versus your opponents on PSN or Live. AI enemies are thrown into the mix and cause for a lot of chaos when trying to complete objectives especially when trying to kill off heavily guarded targets. Games online become real interesting as teams jockey for proper position and try to kill each other off to make enough money to win the game. The team with the most money at the end of a round wins. The strategy becomes in spending money to buy better weapons and armor against not having enough money to win once the timer expires.

Presentation 8.5: Great menus and cut scenes. Despite the cheezy story line it does engage the player quite well.

Sound 9.0: Voice acting is very well done. Great sounding weapons and explosions.

Visuals 8.5: Great environment variety as well character models. Frame rate remains solid.

Gameplay 9.0: Great two man game innovation with the aggro system and addicting gun buying and mod system. Gun play itself and cover could use a little work but overall you are treated to a very fun arcade esque shooter.

Last Appeal 8.5: Coop campaign mode is the way to go. A few online modes that mostly do revolve around the same general premise may leave some feeling its repetitive. Maxing out guns and playing matches to earn fat sums of cash is a lot fun.

Overall Score: 8.6 - Worth the purchase

Army of Two is one of my newest favorite games. Army of Two Assistant Producer Matt Turner took some time out to answer some questions from 2Op regarding the new third person shooter from EA. I have been pimping this game everywhere and I definitely think it’s a game everybody who has an Xbox 360 or a PS3 has to check out. Those of who follow the site know, I just don’t say that about any game.

2Op: Army of Two was originally set for release last November. What has the development team focused on in the months since then in terms of improving the game?

Matt Turner: A lot of fine tuning. We really wanted to focus on polishing certain aspects of the game to make it a tighter experience. One of our goals during our extra time was to improve the through the gun experience and make the guns feel more powerful in the hands of the gamer. As well as that we worked on the health system, the lighting and a few other carefully selected issues.

2Op: What differences can a player look forward to when playing either Rios or Salem? Are there any specific skill sets one has the other does not?

Matt: The difference is in their personalities and looks but as far as ‘special abilities’ or performance there is no difference. Rios is bigger. He is your more classic military boy who follows orders and executes by the book. Salem on the other hand is a lippy little punk who takes stupid risks and acts before he thinks.

2Op: The game is obviously focused around cooperative play. However, some of us are loners. What can be said to this in terms of SP? Will the game be as enjoyable in SP as it is in co-op? What can be said about friendly AI in AO2?

Matt: The game is at its best when played with a partner. It’s a pure coop experience. But the PAI can be quite fun as well. We really wanted to try and create a PAI that behaved as much like a real player as possible. He can take care of himself or you can order him around but the orders you have are more loose parameters rather than precise orders.

2Op: The use of tampons to close a bullet wound feature was one that a lot of people in the community really looked forward to. What was behind the decision to remove it from the game?

Matt Turner: It was a great idea and we loved it. But we felt that the mini game not only grew tiresome after the 8th, 9th, 10th times doing it but it also really took the player out of the combat experience and broke the flow of the game. The system we replaced it with works much better in the game as an experience. It was too bad and we were sad to see it go but the game is better without it.

2Op: How long would you estimate the campaign should take?

Matt: For an experienced 3rd person shooter player between 6 and 8 hours.

2Op: If you are playing online co-op with a friend and they get dropped. Will the game automatically switch your partner to EA or will it end the session?

Matt: If it your partner gets dropped you can seamlessly switch over to the PAI and continue playing. Or you can quit out wait from your partner to come back and restart from you last checkpoint.

2Op: How will the save system work? Reading in a preview on IGN, it said the game would end if one of you dies. Will it revert back to a save point or will it be literally game over?

Matt: The game doesn’t ‘end’. You just get a ‘restart from checkpoint’ and that’s exactly what happens. You start again at the last checkpoint you crossed.

2Op: Are all the multiplayer modes going to be 2 on 2? The game has a nice set of multiplayer modes. What mode should a player jump into first? Why was that your answer?

Matt: All multiplayer is 2 vs. 2. I would suggest doing ‘Warzone’ first. It is a variety of all the modes and a beginner get a feel for them all and maybe which one they would like to specialize in if they so choose.

2Op: If you play through the game and like some of the missions to play with friends, will you be able to choose that mission?

Matt: Yes, as long as they have played it too. Once you have played through the game you can start any one of the six maps whenever you want.

2Op: There was a lot of information regarding vehicles a while back. However, most of that seems to have removed. Are there still vehicle missions in the campaign? Will there be any vehicles in the multiplayer portion of the game?

Matt: Yeah, we kept the hovercraft sequences in the campaign mode so look for those. But we also but some of the vehicles we cut into the multiplayer mode so you still get a chance to drive them around.

2Op: One of the achievements is “Retirement savings plan” which asks a player to earn a billion dollars in the multiplayer mode. That seems like quite an accomplishment. For crazy achievement junkies, how many games will that entail on average (I know everyone is of different skill).

Matt: A good team can easily earn 2 million bucks in a single vs. match. So you do the math.

2Op: What is the framerate of Army of Two? Will the game’s performance be even across platforms?

Matt: Performance is very good across both platforms.

2Op: If I look for one thing when I open Army of Two and start playing, what should that be?

Matt: The Air Guitar.

Thank you to Matt and Electronic Arts for hangin with 2Op and talking about Army of Two. Go check it out, it’s on store shelves right now.

In the future the armed forces are no longer controlled by governments, they’re controlled by private corporations. A lot of hype surrounded the game’s release last November before it was delayed. I spent the last few hours playing the campaign with an AI teammate as unfortunately pretty much nobody had the game tonight.

Visually AO2 is well done. It doesn’t do anything extremely well but it gets it done for a next gen title. The character models for Salem and Rios are very well detailed from body to face scratches. The masks the AO2 boys wear are pretty intimidating as well and there’s a ton of them to buy. The frame rate remains pretty constant as well throughout the experience. The environments themselves aren’t anything you haven’t already seen before but the locales never get boring visually. From the story, I can easily see why early reviews with the game toned up on language may have been a disaster about killing a-rabs because quite frankly, that is what the game is about. I have to admit seeing one of the characters watch 9/11 in one of the opening cut scenes for a mission headed for Afghanistan did feel awkward. That is much pretty the story line here. You’ll travel for terrorist hot bed to terrorist hot bed and kill. The enemies don’t vary much between assault rifle wielder, suicide bombers, and a few heavily armored enemies.

I am having a ton of fun with the game play of AO2. It’s far from perfect but it is something that at the least feels different even if it isn’t. The shooting mechanics are pretty nice and do not feel as stiff as they looked in some of the videos for this title. Although bear in mind, this is not CoD4 level accuracy of realism when it comes to gun play. It feels very much more like Mercenaries. The first few levels serve as the training ground and while these first levels are okay the action doesn’t really get intense until the 3rd and 4th levels Iraq and a mission where you have to over take a US aircraft carrier which is overrun by terrorists. Playing with the AI up to this point has been sufficient but I’ll be honest, at least the difficulty I played on the AI was pretty terrible and I did most of the work myself. If you have another human friend playing with you online I would definitely recommend starting at a higher difficulty or else the game may be way too easy. In the later levels when things intensify however the enemy AI does lack and you are out gunned and this became especially apparent on the carrier where there is little to no cover.

Enemy AI however actually managed to surprise me. It’s quite good and the enemy recognizes when and where to take cover and overall does one of the better jobs I have seen at making use of the environment in a game. The game’s squad based controls for two people are also very nicely done and easy to use. Tapping the direction key sends an order on what to do such as advance, hold position, or regroup. Double tapping the direction will also change between aggressive and passive modes which governs how much attention your teammate is going to draw. As many of you know there’s a balance between aggro and stealth that a tandem can use. Aggro is the amount of attention enemies pay to you. The more you have it the more you get shot at and the more likely it is you’re going to die. To counter balance that however, your partner becomes invisible to enemies for a short time while you are in aggro. The whole concept of the game is to draw fire and flank with your team mate. It’s a very simple premise, but a ton of fun and easily executed. When playing with the AI I let him be the bullet magnet while I stealthed my away around enemies for kills. It’s pretty satisfying to me and never got old coming around a group of enemies and unloading. One thing I must point out is that with the buying system of weapons which I will explain below there is no picking up of weapons even though during boss battles (of which there seem to be one terror leader per level) is using a special weapon. For example, the boss of the Somalia opening level was using the gold AK47 we have seen so much of. You work hard to kill him and you can’t pick up his gun. Enemies thankfully however do seem to drop ammo in droves. The cover system is a little buggy and uses the Y button solely to either slide up against cover or jump over it. Yes, that is the problem. Sometimes you’ll mean to be hopping into cover and instead will end up jumping over it. With experience though you do fix that problem.

AO2 does a good job as well of breaking up the monotony of running from scenario to scenario killing all the bad guys and moving on. Sometimes you will open a door and be surrounded by enemies which will trigger a back to back sequence in which a bullet time mode is turned on and you can just unload into a ton of enemies. There are also some portions where you will be parachuting into scenarios and from the ground enemies will fire rockets and sniper bullets at you and your lone defense is a sniper rifle while your buddy vehicles the parachute. These mechanics can be very Ace and Gary at times but they do work pretty well and are fun. The health and healing process is also pretty revolutionary and something I liked and seemed to fit the game. When you or your partner dies you must drag them to safety while still shooting at enemies. Once at safety you can press A to revive them. Wait too long to revive them or die yourself and it’s game over. This leads into another positive point for the game. The game auto saves in just the right places after the right battles so you’ll rarely die and have to go through a ton of fighting over again.

Another primary feature of the game is the fact you get money for completing objectives both main and side. With this money you are able to buy new weapons and armor at certain checkpoints throughout the game. You are taken to a screen where four very from the movie stereotypical people sell you guns. The African warlord sells assault rifles. The gangster from NYC sells handguns and uzis. The chinese guy with a glass eye sells “special weapons” such as an RPG. And last but certainly not least, a guy from Ukraine sells armor upgrades. It’s not the deepest gun customization in a game ever but I found myself previewing almost everything with the money I had earned to buy the perfect combo of damage and accuracy. For example I bought a C2 assault rifle, upgraded the magazine to a 60 bullet clip and added a group for added accuracy. Each gun has its own special set of customization and one thing I liked is that each gun lets you get a little arcadey with attributes but you can never make a rail gun for example with sniper rifle accuracy. Of course, if you have the extra cash laying around you can bling your weapons in gold or platinum depending on the weapon. I stared at the gold RPG launcher for a while but at a quarter mill decided to move on.

I know IGN gave this game a 7.9 and I have only played a few hours not touching the online co-op and multiplayer aspects yet. But I do feel this game is better than a 7.9 and definitely worth people at the least giving it a rent to play with their friends. It is a blast to play. The game knows what it is and tries not to take itself too seriously despite being a commandos versus terrorists 3rd person cover shooter. This is one of those sleeper games that should not be overlooked. 

Click to Download

Awesome looking presentation and great looking cutscene.

A new developer over at the official Army of Two. You can now bling out your gun in Army or Two. Go guns playing with a gold platted assault rifle. Check out the details below.

Hey there AO2 fans. You may already know me as Matt Mcdopeblog from the developer blogs but today I am just Matt from Production. I am sitting with Danny from Design and we are going to tell you guys a little bit about our weapons customization feature in AO2…because it’s awesome.

We have put a new spin on weapons customization. In most other games that have an option like ours, the player can simply buy whole new guns. We took that idea and ran with it. Not only can you buy new guns but you can upgrade every individual part of each gun to fit the way you like to fight. You can upgrade everything from the barrel, the stock, the grip, the cartridge and every feature will not only change the look of the weapon but also change the way it plays in-game.

When we set out to design this feature we really wanted to create an in game economy. As the players are mercenaries and are rewarded for their successes with cold, hard cash, we needed to provide a place where the players could spend their spoils. And “since it would make no sense to buy cars or hookers in a game about mercenaries” (quote, Danny from Design) we decided to go with weapons. We ended up creating a feature that was not only useful and new but also just plain fun to mess around with.

You build your bank-roll by completing as many objectives and sub-objectives as possible. On top of that there are exploratory items that are scattered throughout the maps which yield bonus cash. The more money you make, the more you will be able to upgrade your guns. Upgrading them will quite simply make them better; more accurate, powerful, less recoil and attract more or less aggro (depending on how you like it).

There are 3 main categories of weapons: Primary, Secondary and Special. The primary category is mostly comprised of machine guns. They are the guns that you will use most often in combat and are the best all ’rounders in the game. The secondary guns range from hand guns to Sub machine guns. These are more for when you want to attract less attention or you are low on ammo for your primary and need to conserve. Special weapons are sniper rifles and RPGs (rocket propelled grenades). These are high powered weapons with limited ammo that are best used in long range situations and specific circumstances.

As the design began to take shape and we were making the final selections of the arsenal that the players would be able choose from we thought that the fans out there might have some pretty nifty ideas of their own regarding weapons they might want to use. So we held an open weapon design competition. We received TONS of amazing entries and were really impressed with the creativity and depth of design. It was hard to pick the winners but in the end we were able to single out two designs that were truly different and original and we put them in the game. You’re welcome San Diego .

We had a lot of fun creating the weapons customization feature and it didn’t stop at the functional things. Inspired by real life pictures and shows like “Pimp My Ride” we made a “Pimp My Gun’ feature. When you drop the cool 10 G’s it costs, your gun is plated in gold and/or silver and encrusted in diamonds. Not only is it super-dope but it will also increase how much aggro you pull as the enemies get annoyed by the sheer audacity of a guy with a gold gun. So beware.

You have so much choice that you can really tailor your arsenal to the way you like to fight. You can fight a more close quarter’s style of combat with the selection of shotguns, you can go full heavy weapons and mow down enemies or you can go stealthy sniper if you so choose. It makes for a lot of fun and gives the game another level of replayabilty. All this is to say that we are really proud of this feature and we think that you guys will like it. Keep your head on a swivel and don’t forget that the more bullets you have in your clip, the less time you waste reloading. Thanks for reading!

-Matt from Production and Danny from Design

Be on the lookout for new info up until launch on this title from EA every Army of Tuesday!