Battlefield 3

In the realm of online combat, Battlefield 3 provides thrills that few games can match.

The Good

• Deep and varied multiplayer competition  
• Awesome array of vehicles  
• Many gorgeous environments  
• Rewards teamwork handsomely.

The Bad

• Campaign is disappointing and dull  
• Only six cooperative missions  
• No way to practice jet flight outside of multiplayer. 

When it comes to virtual battlefields, nobody does it quite like the Battlefield series. It has a long history of creating sprawling conflict zones where players have an exhilarating range of ways to make powerful contributions to the war effort. The competitive multiplayer mode in Battlefield 3 stays true to tradition, delivering an online combat experience that is amazingly addictive, immersive, and exciting, with refinements and new elements that make the familiar action feel fresh. Unfortunately, the stale single-player campaign fails to capitalize on the strengths of the series and feels like an off-brand imitation. The six cooperative missions fare better and offer a tougher challenge, but only the competitive multiplayer provides a compelling reason to buy Battlefield 3. With online battles this excellent, though, that reason is all you need. 
There are many factors that combine to make these battlefields as good as they are, most of which will be familiar to series veterans. Nine great maps set the stage for up to 64 players to fight it out in a variety of urban, industrial, and military locations. These places all look beautiful, though the grassy hills and blue skies of the Caspian Border are naturally more appealing than the drab urban corridors of the Grand Bazaar. The maps vary widely in size and offer diverse environmental elements, including claustrophobic tunnels, coastal roads, desert plains, and a variety of multistory buildings. Many man-made structures can be damaged or destroyed by the explosive tools at your disposal, creating new infiltration routes or removing cover positions. The maps are designed to create opportunities for combat at all ranges, and the element of destruction lets you manipulate the environment to create even more.
Combat is not just about where you are, but also about how you get there, and the variety of vehicles is one of the things that makes Battlefield so uniquely engaging. Small maps might only have a Humvee or a light armored vehicle, while larger ones boast buggies, tanks, amphibious transports, helicopters, and jets. There are a few variations within each class of vehicle that make them better suited for troop transport, anti-infantry, antiair, or anti-vehicle combat, and learning how to get the most out of each one is a blast, even if you're sometimes the one getting blown up. Whether you're piloting, gunning, or just going along for the ride, vehicles offer a key tactical element that can change the tide of battle when used by a savvy squad. Using a vehicle well can earn you powerful upgrades and bonus weapons, but it can be tough to get the hang of the flight mechanics for helicopters and jets. It's a shame there's no way to practice flying them outside of active multiplayer matches (with one exception), though you can take comfort in knowing that you are at least entertaining your fellow players when your jet nose-dives into a mountain.

 The maps and vehicles allow for a great degree of strategic freedom, but choosing your class and loadout is the first and most important decision you make before spawning into combat. Abilities and weapons have shuffled around a bit since Battlefield: Bad Company 2, so now the assault class slings health packs and totes defibrillators, while the support class carries light machine guns and ammunition boxes. Engineers still thrive on vehicle support/destruction, and recon delivers long-range death. New gadgets like robots that can arm charges (engineer) and mark targets (recon) give players more to look out for on the battlefield, and claymores and mortars (support) ensure that the engineer class isn't the only one packing an explosive punch. Unlockables include class-specific weapons and gadgets, gun-specific sights and attachments, and specializations that can make you tougher and deadlier. Focusing on one class to unlock higher level gear has its advantages, but so does spreading around your progress in an effort to be more adaptable to the ebb and flow of combat. Regardless of what loadout you choose, there are a lot of ways to earn points for your actions. In addition to kills and kill assists, you can now earn points for suppressing enemies who are subsequently killed by your teammates. When a player is suppressed by enemy fire, they suffer from blurred vision and decreased accuracy. This disorienting tactic can help you mitigate the effectiveness of enemies who are peppering you from a prone position, which returns in Battlefield 3 after being left out of the Bad Company games. Battlefield 3 may be a successor in name to Battlefield 2, but in spirit, the competitive multiplayer is a refined version of that offered in Bad Company 2. Nevertheless, it will be immediately familiar to veteran players of either game, though fans of Bad Company 2 will encounter a few other small but notable differences. Buildings are not easily destroyed in Battlefield 3 and underslung grenade launchers are, as of now, far less prevalent. Furthermore, you can't just run up to someone and stab him in the face for an instant kill; you need to get in two swipes or sneak up from behind. Nor can you simply rely on explosives to destroy M-COM stations in Rush mode because arming and detonating the charge is now the only way to progress.

As with the previous Battlefield games, the focus is on teamwork. Diverse loadouts encourage you and your squad to make complementary choices, and point bonuses reward you for working together. Every vehicle is better with teammates in it, and even the simple act of spotting enemies is an effective way to contribute to your team's efforts. Teamwork is woven throughout the fabric of Battlefield 3's multiplayer action, and when your team is working well together, it's one of the most gratifying experiences you can have in a game.
Battlefield 3 also has six cooperative missions that require teamwork on a smaller scale. These stand-alone sorties have a narrative connection to the campaign, but they are tougher to complete than most campaign missions and you can unlock some nice weapons for use in the multiplayer. Setting up voice chat with your teammate is helpful here, especially in the stealthy sections, because the spotting mechanic doesn't sufficiently differentiate enemies at long distances. Your foes are fairly tough, even on normal difficulty, though some unexpected quick-time events can also catch you off guard. The most notable mission here puts you in the cockpit of a helicopter, which provides the only chance outside of multiplayer to practice your flying skills. Earning all of the weapon unlocks requires repeat playthroughs of these missions, so it's a shame there aren't more of them to keep you busy.
Finally, there's the campaign. Battlefield 3's single-player adventure tells a harrowing tale of a fictional modern conflict. It follows a familiar formula by delivering a short campaign with diverse combat scenarios and dramatic set pieces. The story is solid and has some good acting, but the "Now tell us about this mission" interrogation mechanic makes the structure feel stale (having made a notable appearance in last year's Call of Duty: Black Ops). The focus on realism makes the unrealistic elements like the heavy-handed linearity, quick-time events, and reckless foes even more noticeable, but most disappointing of all is the campaign's utter failure to capitalize on any of the series' strengths. The lively personality of the Bad Company games is nowhere to be found, nor is the operational freedom on which the series has thrived. When you climb into the cockpit of a fighter jet, you are merely the gunner in an on-rails sequence rather than the hotshot pilot. There are some gorgeous environments and a few exciting sequences, but these are outweighed by the overly familiar cityscapes and set pieces that were clearly inspired by other shooter campaigns from the past few years. This contributes to the pervasive sense that this campaign is not only outdated, but also outclassed.

 Fortunately, Battlefield 3's competitive multiplayer is among the best in its class, providing immensely rich and immersive combat zones. These are complemented by the slick browser-based Battlelog, which serves as the hub from which you access each game mode. With EA's Origin software running unobtrusively in the background, Battlelog tracks your unlock progress, displays your stats, and enables you to join parties and launch games easily. Battlefield 3 may not offer much beyond the multiplayer, but there are so many ways to contribute and feel like a powerful soldier that after hours and hours of playing, all you'll want to do is play more.

Source-GAmespot

Crashday

As the title advertises, Crashday has a fair number of car crashes, but the trouble is that it doesn't have much of anything else.
 

The Good

• Combat races contain a certain level of amusement  
• cars crush and break apart quite nicely.

The Bad

• Racing is no fun at all  
• stunt tracks are rather plain  
• nearly impossible to find an online game  
• track editor is underwhelming  
• British voice actor + New York accent = hilariously awful comedy. 

If you were to smoosh together the FlatOut series of demolition racing games and Nadeo's TrackMania stunt-racing franchise, then systematically vacuum out all of the most appealing aspects of both titles, you'd have the basic equivalent of Crashday. It's not that the game is terrible, but so little of it feels genuine or original; it's more of a cheap, hacked-together clone of the aforementioned titles. And what's more, it isn't even a particularly good clone. The game's race modes lack coherency--let alone excitement--and the stunt and combat modes fall flat. 

There's supposed to be a premise to Crashday, but it's anyone's guess as to what it is exactly. Booting up the game's career mode simply drops you right into the middle of a backstory that features up-and-coming racers in some cockamamie imaginary racing league. But the text doesn't explain much, and the guy doing the voice acting is practically indecipherable. Imagine, if you will, a game developer tracking down the man with the thickest British accent in the world, plopping him down in front of a series of bad New York mafia movies, handing him a script, and demanding he talk exactly like the gangsters portrayed onscreen. That's how awful the voice acting is in Crashday.
Once you realize the premise is best ignored and actually jump into the game, you'll find gameplay that's just as clumsy as the voice acting. Racing in Crashday is exceedingly frustrating. Cars are a floaty, slippery mess, sliding out and crashing into random objects on a regular basis. This is an arcade racer, so no one's asking for a devout dedication to realism. But arcade or not, these cars are not fun to drive, nor do they handle well. Of course, the trick is that you have to drive especially fast because the other racers have a preternatural ability to use their speed boosts at all the right moments and will always blaze past you if you screw up. So what you end up having to do is memorize every nook and cranny of each race track just so you can figure out where to use your boost and where not to use it. Another weird thing is that the game's sense of speed isn't all that good. You definitely get the sense that your car is about to go flying out of control at any second, but the visceral thrill of high-speed racing is basically absent.
Only the stunt and combat races are slightly better than the sense of speed. Stunt modes include tracks filled with ramps, jumps, and loops, but there's a highly limited scope to the stunt track designs. The game lacks the sort of "look at how completely insane these tracks are" vibe that such games as TrackMania have all but perfected. They're not kooky or bizarre; they're just a bunch of ramps and loops. And they're not even laid out well. The bonus is that the game does include a track editor, but even its scope is limited, allowing for a few bizarre twists but not much more.
The combat modes come in a couple of forms. There are straight-up demolition races where the goal is to just slam into opponent cars over and over again until everyone has exploded but you. Then there are weapon-based modes that give you a Gatling gun and a missile launcher so you can go nuts. These are, by far, the most entertaining modes in the game because, in stark contrast to the driving physics, the game's crash physics aren't half bad. Cars break apart pretty nicely, and the weapons aren't hard to aim or use, which makes wanton destruction a fairly painless process. The main issue here is the limited array of tracks and weapons. It would be nice if there were more variety to the destruction at hand. But sadly there isn't, and after a few plays against the computer, the action does get a bit tiresome.
Multiplayer would theoretically remedy that issue, but even the multiplayer isn't without problems. The primary problem is that there's nobody online to play against. Sure, the servers list lots of games being played, but they're all being played across the pond by players in Europe. And the European version of the game isn't compatible with the US version for some reason. So you won't be able to play against any of them until Moonbyte patches one version or the other. We spent a considerable amount of time trying to find a US-based opponent but only found one playable online match during that entire span. To make matters worse, lag practically wrecked the experience. Trying to play a crash race while cars skip and jump all over the track is just about the most obnoxious thing you'll ever experience.

 Apart from the awful voice acting, the remainder of Crashday's production value is bit more laudable. As mentioned previously, the crash effects are done quite nicely, and the cars deform and explode about as well as you would hope. The car models aren't exactly impressive, but considering you're just thrashing them over and over again, they don't need to look pristine. The tracks are easily the weakest point of the visuals. The background environments are extremely generic, dressed up with bland-looking towns and set pieces, as well as unattractive textures. They're not hideous, but they're definitely not pleasing to the eye.
Of course, someone could try to justify the plain-Jane gameplay and total lack of originality found in Crashday by simply mentioning that it's only a $20 game. Do you want to know how much a new copy of FlatOut 2 costs on the PC? Yes, that's right, $20. And a copy of TrackMania: Sunrise? It's the same price. Do yourself a favor and go right to the sources of Crashday's inspiration rather than pay for a bargain-basement, bush-league version of the same basic gameplay concepts.

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  Source- Gamespot

Prototype 2

Prototype 2 on the PC is almost identical to its console counterparts, which makes for a brutal and exciting adventure.

A solid port is nothing to scoff at. Prototype 2 finally makes its way to the PC after debuting on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 back in April, and the transition has been kind to this brutal open-world adventure. The biggest difference between this version and its console brethren is the slightly improved visuals. Greater draw distance and a higher frame rate showcase your murderous rampage in a more impressive light. Because the technical aspects have been translated with nary a hitch, it's easy to lose yourself in the destructive glee of this unrepentant sequel. Prototype 2 isn't the least bit novel, but it's so utterly ridiculous that it's hard to wipe the smile from your face.

One thing you should keep in mind is that Prototype 2 is at its best with a controller. The fast-paced fighting and empowering exploration come together seamlessly when you have a couple of analog sticks and responsive buttons. If you're using a keyboard, you can still blow through the papier-mache enemies, but the actions don't play out as smoothly. Holding down three keys to glide through the city takes a bit of finger gymnastics, and zeroing in on one attacker in a crowd is even tougher with a mouse. It's easy enough to get used to these quirks with a little practice, but Prototype 2 doesn't feel as as natural with a keyboard and mouse.
In contrast to the devil-may-care attitude showcased in the majority of the adventure, the story does take itself seriously. A military force has quarantined a major metropolis under the guise of protecting citizens from a viral outbreak, but their occupancy is far from altruistic. In reality, they are conducting bioweapon research, and the people are just unlucky cattle being led to slaughter. It's a morbid situation that makes it satisfying to kill your opposition--defense contractor Blackwatch--as you hunt down the higher-ups who ordered this atrocity.
The initial rush you feel when the central plot comes into focus dissipates as you learn more about the conspiracy. Evil stereotypes permeate the cast of characters, but even though there's proper motivation to murder them all, you rarely feel as if you understand whom you're tracking down. Scenes of redemption toward the end of the story breathe life into some of these individuals, but by that point you won't even care what happens to the villains. While character development is lacking, the storytelling is interesting. Most of the dirty details surface when you consume certain people, and the flashes of memory piece together a terrifying puzzle about the inner machinations of power-obsessed heretics who rarely question their horrific actions.

Dialogue-rich sequences explain your objectives before each mission. Plentiful swearing and unrestrained anger highlight most of these conversations, and the vulgar cutscenes force the carefree action to take a backseat far too often. Furthermore, protagonist James Heller holds his hand to his ear and slowly walks around when a contact talks to him, contrasting wildly with the crazed sprinting and leaping that make up his normal locomotion. Problems with the story aside, the artistic style used in the many cutscenes is certainly eye-catching. High-contrast black and white with flashes of color (blue eyes, red flames) add a dramatic pitch to the proceedings. This style is also used when your health gets low in combat and does a great job of communicating your struggles without obscuring your view.
Prototype 2 takes place in an open-world environment where you can run wherever you wish without artificial barriers reining you in. From the moment you're set loose, you don't need any urging to sprint through this city gone to ruin. Movement is free-flowing and empowering. Running up the sides of buildings, bounding down blocks in a single leap, and gliding like a manic flying squirrel make for quicker transport than a tired vehicle ever could, and the unabashed joy of careening through this virus-plagued town is hard to deny. Things do become a little tricky when precision is necessary, though thankfully you rarely have to move with exactitude. Instead, you sprint pell-mell until you crave the sweet satiation of your bloodthirst, and in a snap you're beating a poor sucker so badly his mother wouldn't be able to recognize him.

The convergence of movement and combat makes for instances of unrepentant brutality. While gliding over occupied streets, you might spy a fear-mongering soldier down below. Lock on to him from your safe vantage in the sky, and with a tap of a button, grab his squirming body before he has a chance to scream for help. With one more tap of a button, you can pound him into the unforgiving cement, hurl him into his fellow troops, or infect him with a viral bomb that causes him to explode in a fountain of blood, and then flee from the scene as if you were never there.
There's little reason to perform such an act other than the delicious enjoyment you get from tormenting those weaker than you. As your opposition becomes better equipped and more plentiful, the door opens for even more ridiculous sequences of gleeful violence. Like an anthropomorphic arrow of hatred, you propel yourself from tormenting tanks on the ground to hellfire helicopters in the air, mashing them into a flaming ball or ripping off their imposing guns to lay waste to those stupid enough to tag along beside them. Eventually, you gain the ability to pilot these craft, and though moving is slow going compared to the chaotic sprinting you're used to, it's a fair trade-off considering the impressive firepower you're given access to. Destruction exists everywhere in Prototype 2; you just have to decide in what way you want those who challenge you to perish. Hand-to-hand combat is just as effective as the murderous weapons. Your arms transform into a bevy of handy killing contraptions such as tendrils, blades, and hammers, and you map two of these to two buttons. Depending on a number of factors, such as whether you tap or hold the button, you perform different moves, and these all finish your enemies in spectacularly bloody ways. The most sadistic of these is a black hole you create with tendrils. Enemies and environmental debris explode at a central point, causing a geyser of blood to shoot from anyone unlucky enough to be at the center. The controls have been streamlined from the original Prototype, so you no longer have to contend with the finger gymnastics the more powerful moves demanded. Instead, your kills are varied and gruesome, and it's so easy to initiate the moves that you happily test out different combinations while dead bodies pile up at your feet.

There's a sadistic joy to brutally murdering your enemies in Prototype 2. You're blessed with such a powerful repertoire that you can cause excruciating pain with ease. Although much of the excitement exists because of this savagery, your enemies are such pushovers that you rarely feel the satisfaction of a hard-fought victory. In many ways, Prototype 2 encompasses the design philosophy normally associated with quick-time events (even though that control method doesn't often surface). In other games, frequent QTEs make you feel like a badass without much work, and that sense of unlimited power is Prototype 2 in a nutshell. Your overpowered enemies keel over after barely even scratching your durable skin, so you tear them to shreds without any fear of dying. Even when you start a New Game+ on the unlockable Insane difficulty, you progress through missions without any serious opposition.
Your biggest challenge comes from overcoming twitchy controls and a camera that falters under certain circumstances. Killing dozens of enemies is no problem in Prototype 2, but when you want to hurt just one attacker, things become a bit more complicated. You move so quickly that homing in on just one man is a crapshoot, and this means you might pick up a box or stray rocket launcher when you desperately need to grab on to a specific person instead. In tight spaces, the camera doesn't know how to properly showcase the actions. Characters become obscured behind obstacles because your view zooms in too tight, making it tricky to get your bearings. Neither of these issues is detrimental because even with hiccups you rarely confront death, but they do get in the way of the freewheeling action during the most intense moments.

These are small problems in a game that's overflowing with simple pleasures. Maybe the best of these flashes of joy come from the way you escape from the military. When you cause too much damage, troops are alerted to your presence and hunt you with extreme aggression. If you escape their line of sight and shape-shift into someone you previously consumed, they immediately call off their manhunt. In theory, this is a fine solution, but in practice, it's so delightfully illogical that it only adds to the ridiculous fun of the rest of the game. The military quits the chase abruptly and is too stupid to understand reality. So, if you transform into a scientist while running up the side of a building, no one will think twice that a medical professional is defying gravity. This leads to a number of hilarious situations in which your pursuers happily ignore gliding hobos and artillery-toting doctors while you giggle at their buffoonery.
The freedom in how you traverse the city and kill your foes is the main draw in Prototype 2, and though the missions give you the flexibility to complete them in unique ways, they lack the inventiveness that could have added variety to your objectives. Just about every mission boils down to exterminating a person of questionable morals, so you rarely have to exert much effort in planning your attacks. At least stealth elements do give you a new way to approach things. Picking off enemies (either by consuming them or planting a viral bomb in their skull) is deviously satisfying and gives some challenge to completing missions even though stealth is usually optional. Plus, secondary objectives give you bonuses for completing missions in specific ways, ensuring you can't just rely on the same technique if you want to excel.
Outside of missions, there are oodles of collectibles to nab. The map sends out a radar pulse in the approximate location of hidden black boxes and secret lairs, so you don't have to explore much to uncover them. But it's fun to traverse the city locating every spare part, and the upgrades you receive for doing so are worth your while. The pacing is handled well in Prototype 2. You learn new abilities every few hours, so you always have something new to play around with, and bumping your stats makes you stronger and faster as you get deeper into the journey. It's a shame the challenge doesn't scale with your newfound powers, but that doesn't detract from the excitement of learning new ways to tear your enemies to pieces.
Prototype 2 is a safe sequel. It doesn't add anything particularly new or inventive to the genre, but small tweaks make it more accessible than the original game. Most importantly, it's an unabashedly fun adventure that doesn't have any doubt about what it wants to be. This is a game about killing enemies in an open-world environment, and little stands in the way to hinder your enjoyment. Mindless violence is all the rage in Prototype 2, which makes for a stupid yet entertaining experience.

By Tom Mc Shea,
source-Gamespot