Growing up on a generation of buddy-cop movies has its advantages. From a young age you’ll learn that, in life, miserable, boot-faced grumble merchants are generally followed around by wisecracking ladies-men who risk the lives of others just to feed their own ego. You’ll learn that tapered mullets are the cut of choice for gun-toting anti-heroes and that three chord power rock has the uncanny ability to transform the most mundane of tasks into action-packed showdowns. You’ll also learn the true value of gut-wrenching moral choices: Buddy Cop A heroically dives in front of a hail of bullets to save a small child, Buddy Cop B swears revenge, conveniently intelligent small child helps save the day etc. The sacrifice of one to save the many. And this is exactly where frat-boy-cum-Duke-Nukem sequel , Army of Two: 40th Day, takes its inspiration. Read the full story »

Despite the universal panning of its Hollywood efforts, the concept of Aliens Vs Predator remains a popular one. After all, with blockbuster epics such as James Cameron’s Aliens and the Schwarzenegger vehicle Predator still considered among the best in the genre, a grudge-match between these horrific characters inevitably plays on the imagination. Read the full story »

How you feel about Serious Sam HD likely depends on how you approach it or, more specifically, how old you are. When it was first released, almost a decade ago, it was a then-modern channelling of nineties shooter nostalgia into a period when, thanks to games like Half-Life and Deus Ex, that once-mighty mould was already on its way out. Read the full story »

When both inFamous and Prototype were released within weeks of each other last year it was considered a freak of scheduling, two open-world adventures remarkably similar in tone, structure and even the syllables in their name just happening to share the same development cycles. The start of 2010 brings with it another such clash, but one that owes less to coincidence, and more to the paucity of real inspiration that afflicts the third-person brawler (Bayonetta seemingly the exception that proves the rule). Read the full story »

Dark Void’s hero, Will Grey, is voiced by actor Nolan North who is most famous for delivering the dulcet tones of a certain Nathan Drake in the Uncharted series. The game opens with a brief prelude, but it’s not long before Will finds his seaplane being knocked out of the sky, plunging him into a series of jungle shoot-outs (ducking and diving behind cover!) before moving on to a spot of platforming. Now, we’re great believers in giving every game we review a fair chance, but after this opening we have to wonder what was going through Capcom and Airtight Games’ minds when they crafted it – to seemingly square-up so blatantly against Naughty Dog’s juggernaut is either supremely confident, or slightly misguided. It’s a comparison that almost inevitably leaves Capcom’s title with a bloody nose and, more importantly, places it in danger of being disregarded as little more than an Uncharted clone. Read the full story »