World of Playstation!

Playstation 4 Release Date

2009-04-29T06:50:00.000-07:00

Playstation 4 Release Date

It seems like the Playstation 4 release date has varied from 2010, 2011, and 2014. The official PS4 release date has not been announnced by Sony but there is no doubt that there will be a system succeeeding the PS3. The Playstation 3 has yet to reach its peak due to heavy competition but when game developers begin to overlook the blu-ray flaws, the best games will be available on the PS3 and Playstation 3 sales will rise. Resources have been primarily focused on the PS3 at present but once the Playstation 3 is where it needs to be in sales, the available resources will begin to turn its attention to the development of the Playstation 4. We will see the PS4 sometime between 2010 and 2020. Some articles have even mentioned that the PS4 might not even need discs. This would be fine if it was possible for you to download large game files in a short amount of time. But who knows it seems you can do almost anything on the internet nowadays.

SAINTS ROW 2 PS3 GAME

2009-04-22T05:23:00.000-07:00

REVIEWS

When the original Saints Row came out two years ago, it served to placate fans until Grand Theft Auto made its next-generation debut. Saints Row's deviant destruction didn't push the boundaries of what to expect from a free-roaming urban assault game, but it did provide an enjoyable outlet for consequence-free chaos while never taking itself too seriously. Since then, Grand Theft Auto IV has injected a dose of maturity into its typical sandbox fare, removing many of its outlandish behaviors to create a more grounded portrayal of the gangster lifestyle. Saints Row 2 is not concerned with growing up. It is a morality-free alternative to GTAIV, an unremorseful descent into mindless mayhem. The lack of any major advancement in gameplay or storytelling may elicit a few flashes of deja vu, but the unrepentant joy of terrorizing this humble metropolis makes this a viable palate-cleanser for anyone willing to embrace the role of amoral dirtbag.

There is some serious fun to be had pedestrian-tossing in Stilwater.

The story begins in a jail hospital, where you've been in a coma ever since a gigantic explosion at the end of the first Saints Row nearly ended your criminal actions permanently. After easily escaping from this lightly guarded compound, you set off to recruit more people to your gang and retake the city of Stilwater. The overarching story is derivative and not easily relatable, but there are some interesting episodes contained within. The Brotherhood missions in particular are quite dark, documenting a tale of vengeance that is sickly satisfying. After putting nuclear waste in their leader's tattoo ink, you find yourself in a constant battle of one-upmanship. Deaths are taken lightly, propelling you to even more outrageous behavior, but it fits within the context of this over-the-top gameworld. The story never reaches beyond the barbaric needs of its protagonist, but the missions do contain a few worthwhile cinematic payoffs.

While you may not be able to affect the outcome of your story, you can design your conqueror in whatever image you desire. The character creation tool is quite extensive. You can drastically change the weight and age of your character, pick from four different races, mold facial features in whatever manner you desire, and even choose if you want a male or female protagonist. With only six different voices to choose from, it can be difficult to accurately match one to whatever look you happen upon, but it's a small price to pay for the wealth of creative options. You can visit a plastic surgeon at any time to tweak your features, but the process is so in-depth, it's easier just to choose a look at the beginning and stay with it.

The missions are predominantly of the drive-and-shoot variety that has become commonplace in the genre. Though there are three different gangs opposing you, as well as various law enforcement agencies, the only difference between them are the colors they wear and the scumbags who lead them. The majority of missions boil down to raiding a building and killing everyone who moves. While these excursions are usually entertaining, taking place in a variety of locations against increasingly ridiculous odds, the repetition of the actions is undeniable. Some objectives do provide an opportunity to do something a little different, though. For instance, when asked to rob a bank, you find out your prize is not a vault of money, but an even more valuable hostage. This leads to a strong detour in both the story and gameplay, and serves to keep things fresh. And since most missions have a midway checkpoint, you'll rarely have to start at the very beginning if you make a mistake.

Remember: you are creating your own character. Choose wisely.

Fortunately, the tight controls keep the missions thrilling, even when they exhibit the same objectives. Combat feels especially gratifying in Saints Row 2. Targeting people is quick and precise, so it's easy to hit someone in the body part of your choosing or whip around to nail an attacker who sneaked up behind you. Without a lock-on ability, the firefights are fast and frantic, relying on your quick fingers to mow down the opposition. The lack of any sort of cover mechanic is disappointing, but its absence places the emphasis on aggression. Though your melee attacks are fairly limited, you do have one extremely handy move in your repertoire. You can grab enemies and use them as a human shield if fights are getting too hectic and just toss them away when you're done. The exaggerated physics here are hilarious, letting you hurl people 20 feet in the air, watching their rag-doll bodies wildly overreact to every collision.

Another reason the missions are fun throughout is the unrestrained freedom in how you can complete them. Enemies can be killed at any time, using any weapon in your arsenal. For instance, the bosses in the game are all just normal human beings. You can choose to pepper them with your pistol if you choose, slowly witling down their life bar as you carefully dodge their attacks. Or you can just ignore typical video game logic and kill them with a few glorious shots from your rocket launcher. This freedom extends to every element in the game, letting you mow down enemies in whatever manner you see fit. Saints Row 2 fully embraces its sandbox moniker, letting you carve your own path of destruction without any arbitrary strings tying you down.

Aside from the main missions, there are a bevy of side quests to take part in. These are much more original than the standard missions, so it's easy to get distracted by these for a while and forget about the story. These activities are where Saints Row 2 completely ignores reality and just lets you have some ridiculous fun. Trail Blazer is probably the most chaotic. Here, you'll ride an ATV wearing a flaming, fireproof suit. You get a time bonus for lighting cars and people on fire, so you just set out to cause as much destruction as possible. There's little challenge here (who would oppose a man wearing a flame-drenched suit?), but lighting the world on fire is utterly satisfying. There are a few other tasks that aren’t as fun, but overall, the minigames in Saints Row 2 are excellent and imaginative additions that go a long way toward extending your gameplay.

How come zombies are always so well dressed?

The best diversion is the terrifying zombie uprising. You can access this on the big-screen TV in any of your cribs, and it provides the some of the most exciting moments in Saints Row 2. As opposed to an emulation of a 2D arcade game from years past, this is a 3D adventure to save your soul from bloodsucking zombies. It takes place in the dilapidated hotel that serves as your headquarters, and you have to mow down wave after wave of these undead creatures. With a limited number of guns and melee weapons that break after a few hits, you'll have to constantly run around to evade the threat of these relentless demons. The slow-moving zombies may not seem too scary at first, but as more fill the screen, this becomes an intense and oftentimes exhilarating experience. Being surrounded by a group of zombies as you try to push them away to resurrect your fallen pals is an awesome divergence from the typical inner city mayhem.

If killing zombies alone sounds too frightening, you can play through Saints Row 2 with a friend. The co-op is extremely well implemented here. You can hop in or out at any time ,and there aren't even any chains tethering you to each other. The entire city is open to your crime-wave whims. You can partake in missions and minigames together, or, if you're not feeling very cooperative, one person can tackle missions while the other drives aimlessly around town buying gas stations. There is a little bit of lag and some problems with cars and pedestrians popping in directly in front of you, but the experience of teaming up with a friend makes these slight hiccups easy to ignore. Just make sure you have an understanding with your cooperative pal; one person's violent actions will set cops loose on both players, so it's easy to ruin your buddy's fun if you set the police on him while he's peacefully trying to spray-paint walls. Regardless of your friend's penchant for attracting unwanted attention, it's preferable to the atrocious friendly AI you have to put up with. These morons get stuck on doors and benches, can't figure out how to get in your car, and lag far behind you in firefights. Teaming up with a friend makes the already great campaign even better.

Competitive multiplayer isn't quite as engaging as the cooperative portions, but it does provide some excitement in brief bursts. The main mode here is Strong Arm, a team-based affair that pits people in a variety of events. You'll randomly be assigned to many of the activities found in the campaign mode and you have a few minutes to best the other team before you move on to another event. The racing and capture-the-flag variants are fairly standard, but there are unique events that add some life to these matches. Insurance Fraud is quite chaotic. Here, each team tries to get into the most horrific car accident. The best way to play defense is to simply shoot them dead, so it's a matter of quickly getting hit by cars before you're unceremoniously dispatched by your competitors. Strong Arm also utilizes the spray paint mechanic in a novel way. If you successful tag a wall while everyone else is worried about killing each other, you grant bonuses to your team such as more health or causing smoke to pour out of your enemies, making them easier to see. The only other mode is deathmatch, which is just too hectic to offer long-term appeal.

That car is about to create a huge explosion.

The visuals in Saints Row are far from cutting-edge, but at least the experience is smooth both online and off. The frame rate is steady throughout, even in the most frantic firefights. There are also no load times when you enter buildings or drive to a new area, which keeps the game moving at a brisk pace. The physics are as over-the-top as the activities you'll compete in. Characters fly around as if they're on the moon, and they flop about like a fish out of water long after you've killed them. Unfortunately, the radio stations that provide the background music throughout your quest are quite limited. With only a handful of stations, you'll be hearing the same songs over and over again. To make matters worse, there aren't any talk stations, so a part of the comedic appeal is lost. At least the dying screams of your countless victims rings true.

Saints Row 2 may not offer a sizable leap in the sandbox genre, but that doesn't diminish its fun. From beginning to end, this is one of the most fun urban chaos games out there. The controls are so tight and the combat so satisfying, you'll frequently find yourself getting distracted from the campaign as you cause terror all over the city. With great cooperative integration, tons of unique activities, and a super cool zombie mode, Saints Row 2 will keep you happily creating havoc for a long time.

PREVIEWS

Saints Row 2 Multiplayer Hands-On

The two-year gap between the original Saints Row and its upcoming sequel is a scant two weeks from closing, with Saints Row 2 scheduled for arrival on October 15. It makes sense that we've seen nearly everything the game has to offer, from hot-dog costumes to zombie-themed minicamps. Everything with one notable exception, that is. It was only last week that we got to see SR2's competitive multiplayer offerings. While not quite as seamless and unrestricted as the co-op experience, the multiplayer side should offer you plenty of ways to eviscerate each other.

Some gangs are less photogenic than others.

In our hands-on session, we played around in a new mode called Strong Arm. This new mode is a collection of activities (read: side missions) taken from the story mode and thrown into a turf war. Two teams of four players compete in randomized missions, such as theft (steal a valuable object and bring it to your fence), mayhem (cause as much destruction as you can), insurance fraud (fling yourself from buildings and moving cars), and standard street races, in an effort to build up a point gauge. When a team has maxed out its point meter, it has officially taken over control of that neighborhood, and the match is over.

Throwing a wrench into all of this is your ability to collect modifiers that affect how quickly you gather points. Tagging buildings, killing rival gang members, and driving stylishly (or recklessly--your choice) are some of the bonuses you can collect to affect how well your team does. This gives you the opportunity to pursue splintering strategies; you might have a pair of teammates attempting to play by the rules, while another pair augments its point-gathering by busting fools up.

Tracking your overall progress in multiplayer is a 12-tiered ranking system. The ranks themselves take on a gang theme, with the likes of New Jack, Soldier, and Assassin standing as examples of levels you can achieve. The game keeps track of your play style, too. You'll earn badges such as Trigger Happy (the type who fires often and usually at random), Brain Surgeon (someone with a penchant for headshots), and Nut Job (use your imagination) that other players can see prior to a match to get a feel for what sort of player you are.

Creating matches is a more streamlined process compared to the original Saints Row. Your invitation options won't be buried deep within confusing menus, you can hop into a quick match more easily, and finding friends to join your game has been made less tiresome. Once you've got it all set up, you can trash-talk in the pregame lobby, which is a mansion loaded with weaponry to goof around with.

As you can probably tell from reviewing our previous Saints Row 2 coverage, this is a game with a lot of stuff to do, and the newly expanded multiplayer offerings confirm that. You'll be able to see for yourself when it arrives on October 15.

Saints Row 2 Hands-On - Story, Co-op, and Zombies

By their very nature, sandbox games are open-ended experiences where the balance between story progression and time-wasting mischief is entirely up to the player. It's hard to take that formula and squeeze it into a short demo, which is why THQ recently invited us to spend an entire day with Saints Row 2. This extended play-through gave us ample time to plug away at the bandages-to-riches storyline, cause some chaos with real and improvised side missions, and take a spin through Stilwater in a co-op setting.

Welcome to the gang-ridden world of Saints Row 2.

The first Saints Row greeted players ready to embark on their journey into gang life with one of the more elaborate character creation systems seen at the time. Saints Row 2 takes that system and beefs it up considerably, giving you the option to customize a truly ridiculous number of attributes. Using sliders adjusting everything from your overbite to your septum width, you can craft an avatar of either gender that looks anywhere between "perfectly normal" and "abomination of nature." Once your base physical attributes are set, you can set the mood of your face with a number of fixed facial expressions to make yourself look confused, joyous, or just plain evil. From there, you have three voice options for each gender (including a wonderfully out-of-place English accent for the gents) and the ability to choose your taunts and walking style.

Your character then begins the game on a prison hospital bed, awaking from a five-year coma caused by the explosion that capped off the first Saints Row. You're whisked away from these confines by a friendly prison mate only to realize that the Saints are no more. Other gangs still roam the newly expanded streets of Stilwater, but the purple-clad clan you worked so hard to build up in the first game has been more or less eradicated. Thus begins the story, with you working to build the 3rd Street Saints back to glory. And because you're ostensibly playing the same protagonist from the first game despite crafting a brand-new avatar, Volition has tossed in plenty of self-deprecating dialogue like, "You look different. Did you get a haircut?"

First on the agenda is rescuing fellow Saint Johnny Gat, who's currently on trial with over 200 counts of homicide to his name. This mission involves storming the court trial with some heavy firepower, taking out the guards, and ushering Johnny out the door. The idea of storming a particular stronghold with guns blazing becomes a familiar refrain for the first few missions of the game, as the next item on your list--securing a base of operations for your gang--involves clearing all the Sons of Samedi and gang members (and a few scattered hoboes) squatting in a local abandoned mission.

Once you've got a base, the story missions begin to offer more than just shooting scads of people. One mission requires you to recruit some fresh blood for the Saints, and you go about this by doing odd favors for some of the local talent. One girl has you proving your worth by flying off a few of the big jumps lurking all throughout Stilwater, while another would-be Saint asks you to take his tow truck and impound the car of someone who owes him some money. But these types of missions are more the exception than the rule, as most tasks require you to exercise extreme prejudice against rival gangs in your quest to take back the city.

Explosions are a way of life in Stilwater.

One of the most compelling features added to Saints Row 2 is the ability to go through the entire story (and any mission in the game, really) in two-player co-op. It's a simple drop-in, drop-out affair that allows for you to set your game to be public, friends-only, or invite-only. The missions are beefed up in difficulty and enemy AI to compensate for your doubled firepower, and are triggered whenever one player chooses to begin. One odd thing about the co-op is that each player only sees his or her own character during the cutscenes rather than both of them, but as long as you're not playing on side-by-side televisions like we were, that shouldn't be a tremendous issue. And thankfully, there's no tether system to be found; you and your friend can exist on completely opposite ends of Stilwater if you so choose.

This time around, dutifully moving the story forward is a bit tougher with all the side missions, additional customization, and opportunities for mayhem vying for your attention. The side missions are broken down into two categories: Activities, which are found in the first game and help you earn some cash and gang respect, and Diversions, smaller actions that can be pulled off almost anywhere. Activities have you taking part in odd jobs for random strangers seeking a favor of you. A few examples of new activities include "FUZZ," where you pretend to be a cop and rough up petty criminals for a reality show, Septic Avenger, which sees you steal a septic truck and spray its contents on the city's major financial establishments, and "Crowd Control," where you act as a bodyguard for celebrities with rabid fans.

In co-op, you can fire rockets from the passenger seat while your buddy drives.

Whereas Activities are deliberate tasks that require you to find a mission marker and begin, Diversions pop up over the course of normal play. If you jack a car with someone in the passenger seat, a pop-up will invite you to part in the "Hostage" Diversion in which you attempt to keep moving through the police for a set amount of time until the hostage pays you to let him go. "Vehicle Surfing" is a Diversion in which you attempt to balance atop a speeding car, and "BASE Jumping" will prompt you with a landing target if you take up the game's offer after leaping from the top of a skyscraper. What might be our favorite, though, is the co-op-only "Cat and Mouse" Diversion, whereby one player cruises through checkpoints in a sports car while the other hunts him down in an attack helicopter.

Also competing for your attention is the ability to put your own personal touch on what you wear, what you drive, and where you live. Clothing can be customized to the same ridiculous degree as your initial character designs. You can adjust the pattern, colors, and fit on nearly every last piece of clothing, while layering several different articles on top of one another. One stripe or three on those socks? Did you want that track jacket zipped or unzipped? Hat backward or at a 5/8 turn? You get the idea.

Cars can also be tweaked to meet your discerning standards. Just bring a vehicle into your personal garage, then head to a mechanic and fiddle with new body mods, paint schemes, rims, window tints, and NOS boosts. You can even create a custom radio station available to listen to in any car you find. To do this, you go to a record shop and buy individual tracks (using in-game currency) at $20 a pop. If you're up to the task, you can pool wildly differing songs from all the game's stations into one huge pirate radio station. For example, you can borrow A-Ha's "Take On Me" from the '80s station, Minus the Bear's "Knights" from the indie station, Run DMC's "Sucker MCs" from the rap station, LCD Soundsystem's "North American Scum" from the electronic station, and Mastadon's "Colony of Birchmen" from the metal station and use them all to create one great, big radio station thoroughly customized to your liking. (And maybe even throw Europe's "The Final Countdown" in there somewhere, if that's your thing.)

Finally, because even the most violent criminal needs a home to call his own, you can also customize your crib. There's the option to simply upgrade your crib's overall theme from something cheap and run down to something much classier, or upgrade your furniture piece by piece. However, even the cheapest of entertainment centers gives you the ability to play one of Saints Row 2's hidden gems: a video game within the game called "Zombie Uprising." Rather than a retro arcade game, this is actually a fully 3D zombie game that applies the look and feel of the regular game to a darker, more zombie-filled setting. In it you need to survive wave after wave of undead with a limited number of weapons and fellow survivors. It may be a poor man's Left 4 Dead, but it's still a very cool throw-in that's indicative of just how much there is to do in Saints Row 2 if you go around looking.

Never let it be said that Saints Row 2 doesn't promote peace between diverse cultures... or at least pirates and ninjas.

Whether you're playing through the story missions in co-op or just beating up a group of pimps with a parking meter while pedestrians take cell phone pictures, it's clear there are a lot of options for absurd entertainment in Saints Row 2. When October 14 arrives, you'll be able to take part in some of that absurdity yourselves. Until then, stay tuned for more coverage.

Saints Row 2 Hands-On - Gang Customization and Side Missions

The original Saints Row certainly didn't revolutionize the sandbox action genre, but in playing it safe, the game pulled off a successful imitation of the Grand Theft Auto formula while still managing to introduce a handful of novel features. Right from the get-go, players were introduced to an impressive and seemingly limitless palette of character customization options. It probably goes without saying that Volition will take that ability to obsessively mold your protagonist and carry it over to Saints Row 2, but now they've expanded the customization options to your entire gang. In addition to a few side missions, we recently took a glimpse at some of the ways you'll be able to design your ideal fraternity of criminals in Saints Row 2.

Ninjas--can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em.

Once you've escaped from prison and recruited a few followers, you'll be given the option to tinker with your gang's overall appearance. The most noticeable change is in the gang's style. With this option, you can choose a visual theme for the followers you see roaming the streets--both lieutenants and thugs--from a pretty hefty list. Among the wardrobes we saw were those listed as '80s, Body Guards, Pimps n' Hos, and last but certainly not least, Ninjas. If you want your gang to look stern but classy, Body Guards might be the look for you. If you want an army of underdressed ladies hanging in your crib, Pimps n' Hos would be a safe bet. But if you're anything like us, you'll immediately choose the Ninja style and never look back.

With this option selected, all the thugs that belong to your gang will resemble stealth assassins of the night. So as not to stand out from your cronies, you can go into your own wardrobe and select your own ninja garb. If you really want to get into the spirit of things, you can also change your fighting style to the Ronin technique. This will change the look of your attacks to more of a nimble martial arts technique--as opposed to the street-tough look of your default character's punches. Thus, with our ninja cycle complete, we could move onto the other gang options.

These additional options include choosing an official gang taunt, graffiti tags, and the types of vehicles you're buddies will be driving. Gang taunts range from vulgar gestures (think everyone's favorite amateurish first-person shooter celebration) to comical Irish jigs. The graffiti tags are all authentic-looking designs, courtesy of one of Volition's concept artists, who we're told has a background in the tagging arts. And finally, the vehicle options let you choose the models, designs, and features of the cars you'll undoubtedly be stealing from your own comrades whenever you need a quick lift.

Once we had our gang done up to suitably absurd levels, it was time to test out a few of the game's side missions--or activities. We went with a pair of stronghold missions: goals where you need to find a rival gang's base and cause a huge ruckus. The first mission had us taking to the air in an attempt to destroy a rival gang's drug farm. Your character sits in a helicopter with an assault rifle in hand, and your goal is to blow up every last structure in the complex from on high. Once you get that done, it ends with you running down fleeing Cadillacs filled with armed thugs doing their best to make a successful escape from your rampaging ways. When successful, you're shown a newspaper clipping (Headline: "Hippies Mourn Loss of Drug Farm") that will adorn the walls of your crib. It's a wistful token of nostalgia, as well as a functional teleport, that gives you the ability to go back and replay that mission whenever you like.

The other stronghold mission we tried involved taking on a gang of a slightly higher stature. Rather than busting up a field of hallucinogenics, this one required plowing through a warehouse, stealing a large sum of money, as well as blowing up all their trucks and airplanes. The action itself feels similar to most third-person shooters, but a variety of guns and death animations help make things interesting. Most strategy requires knowing which weapon to use and when to crouch behind cover to let your health regenerate. The tricky part was the second stage of the mission, where you exit the warehouse and find yourself on an airport tarmac. Thugs are shooting at you from all over, but with the handy aid of a satchel charge and rocket launcher, you can take them and their vehicles out with enough effort.

Weather effects significantly alter the way you drive at sea.

The demo we played was on the PlayStation 3, which gave us our first opportunity to see how the Sixaxis controls work. We tested this functionality on a racing activity, which was a time trial where you need to race through the sewers on a jet ski. The motion controls were a bit more fidgety than we would have liked, but they became easier to deal with as we progressed from the confines of the sewer to the wide-open ocean. At the very least, the Sixaxis controls are purely optional because you can turn them off whenever you like.

Minor control issues aside, Saints Row 2 is looking like a worthy follow-up to its well-received predecessor. It may not be the towering artistic achievement that Grand Theft Auto IV turned out to be, but with even more features added to a game that already boasted lots of hidden surprises, the city of Stilwater should offer plenty to see. You can expect to see the game released on October 14.

E3 2008: Saints Row 2 Hands-On Update

Earlier today, while meeting with members of the Volition development team working on Saints Row 2, we were invited to play through the same prologue mission that we checked out last week. Nothing exciting about that, you might think, but this time we were playing in co-op mode, we took a very different route through the prison escape, and we talked about some other features while we played. Some of you might consider this new info to be a spoiler of sorts, so consider yourself warned.

Unsurprisingly, playing through the prison escape mission in co-op mode seemed a lot easier than in our previous single-player experience. There didn't appear to be any additional enemies thrown into the mix to account for the presence of a second player, and it probably didn't hurt that we were playing alongside someone intimately familiar with the game either. We opted to skip the tutorial on this occasion, so we weren't being nudged in any particular direction as we escaped the prison and were free to explore.

We ended up taking a very different route out of the building, bypassing the rooftop encounter with guards and helicopters completely. On our travels we found the prison's weapon storage room, where we were able to add satchel charges and machine guns to our arsenal. As soon as we stepped outside, we found a quad bike that, while not necessarily very useful in this particular scenario, was fun to ride around on for a while. Incidentally, though you'll have an opportunity to get your hands on some really powerful weapons as you play through the prologue missions, we're told that you'll lose almost all of them when the game proper gets underway--otherwise you'd simply be too overpowered early on.

After beating the mission, we got to talking with the Volition reps that we'd been playing with and were given a sneak peek at one of Saints Row 2's previously unannounced features. When you arrive in the city of Stilwater you'll find that the entire map is unlocked but that many of the annotations on it are simply displayed as question marks until you visit them. Among these are a large number (we'd estimate at least 60 or 70) of different stores that you can not only shop at but, once you raise some capital, can actually purchase and enjoy a steady income from. Furthermore, if you purchase all of the stores from a particular chain your character's likeness will start to appear on billboard advertisements all over the city. We didn't get to see any of the stores on this occasion, but we're told that they include vendors for clothing, tattoos, music, liquor, firearms, cars, bikes, and boats, as well as restaurants.

Finally, when we asked if any of the Stilwater locales were recognizable from the first game we were afforded a quick look at one that is--sort of. The church that the Saints called home in the first game wasn't demolished along with the rest of the neighborhood, it seems, and now stands in the middle of a park flanked by skyscrapers. The building has apparently been restored to its former pre-Saints-Row glory, and is considered a historical monument.

So there you have it. Saints Row 2 looks to be absolutely packed with gameplay features and, considering how wildly different our two plays of the first mission in the game were, there shouldn't be any shortage of replay value, either. We look forward to bringing you more information on Saints Row 2 as soon as it becomes available, though we're unlikely to learn anything more at E3 at this point. Three months and counting...

Saints Row 2 First Look

With the release of Grand Theft Auto IV now less than two months away you could be forgiven for forgetting all about Saints Row 2. After all, Volition's upcoming sequel to the other open-world crime-themed action game doesn't even have a tentative release date yet. We're told that it'll be arriving this year, though, and we recently had an opportunity to check out an early version that already incorporates plenty of new features.

Set a few years after the events of Saints Row, the sequel will see you reprising the role of a Saints gang member who, in the years since the first game, has risen to power and become the leader of the gang. With that said, the first game forced you to play as a male character, but that's not the case in Saints Row 2. We spent some time with the new character customization system during our meeting, and it's clearly something that Volition has spent a lot of time improving. You can not only play as a male or a female but, since those options appear at either end of a sliding scale, you can choose to play as someone whose appearance isn't obviously either of the two. Other sliding scales you can play around with will affect fitness level and age. You'll also be able to determine your character's ethnicity and modify his or her facial features.

You play as the same character you did in Saints Row, regardless of whether you opt for a similar appearance or even the same gender.

Character customization in Saints Row 2 won't end there, though. After settling on a look for your gang leader, you'll want to figure out how he or she moves. You might choose a guy who walks like a gorilla, a ballerina, or any of the numerous options in between. You'll also need to choose a voice, favorite taunt and compliment actions, and fighting style. Available taunts--which are presumably intended for use primarily in multiplayer games--will include such classics as the middle finger, the tea bag, and the wanker. Compliments will include a salute, thumbs-up, riverdance (don't ask), and many more. The number of fighting-style options available to you will increase as you defeat gangs in the story mode and add their moves to your arsenal.

The story mode will pit you against three rival gangs, all of whom are hoping to fill the power vacuum resulting from the Saints' fall from grace. It's a similar setup to that in the first game, but there appear to be plenty of changes and improvements planned for Saints Row 2 that'll make it a worthy sequel. For starters, the city of Stillwater is now considerably larger and barely recognizable as the same location from the first game. This, we're told, is the result of urban renewal efforts on behalf of a large corporation. All of the existing neighborhoods have been given a face-lift, and all-new neighborhoods have been created as a result of the city's expansion to the west. You'll be able to visit the interiors of well over 100 of Stillwater's buildings this time around, including no fewer than nine gang cribs that you can make your own as you progress through the game.

If you've played Saints Row, you might remember that cribs were primarily places that you could save your game, change your clothes, and store your car collections. In Saints Row 2 you'll still be able to do all of those things, and lots more besides. We were shown one of the new cribs during our meeting, a two-story building that looked pretty run-down. It looked so nasty, in fact, that we were surprised to see several gang members hanging out there in the hope that they'd be chosen for an upcoming mission. Fortunately, as you accumulate money you'll have the option to spend it on upgrading the place. The crib customization options don't appear to be nearly as numerous as those for your character, but they're a welcome addition nonetheless. Options for the crib that we visited during our demo included upgrades for the table, the bed, the home theater, and the stripper pole, as well as "cheap," "classy," and "ultra modern" decor. Spending money on your crib will increase the amount of respect that you earn for completing missions and other objectives, and it'll also make your fellow gang members more effective when they're fighting alongside you. Other features promised for cribs include different radio stations to listen to, a more intelligent wardrobe system that lets you group individual items of clothing into outfits, and garages that can store motorcycles as well as cars. (Your Jet Skis, boats, helicopters, and planes will need to be kept elsewhere.)

Your crib doesn't look like anywhere you'd want to spend any time on day one.

Once our guided tour of the crib was over we were treated to a look at one of the early stronghold missions from Saints Row 2, in which you'll be tasked with taking out a base of operations belonging to the drug-running Sons of Samedi gang. The stronghold was a well-guarded trailer park that looked quite different from any location in the first game, and we were pleased to see that you'll have plenty of new moves and weapons in your arsenal when you're taking on enemies on foot. The new over-the-shoulder view for precision aiming will undoubtedly prove useful, as will the option to take other characters hostage and use them as a human shield. Gang members and cops will purportedly react differently to you depending on who your shield is, and the Sons of Samedi certainly seemed a little reluctant to fire at one of their own on this occasion. Your enemies will have the ability to hide behind human shields as well. The only new weapon that we got to see during our demo was a satchel charge, which sticks to anything it's thrown at and can then be detonated manually. The resulting explosions were pretty huge, and the potential for creative uses of the charges (you can turn a car or even an enemy into a moving bomb, for example) have us crossing our fingers that they'll be included in the competitive multiplayer arsenal.

Volition and THQ aren't really talking about the multiplayer features of Saints Row 2 yet, except to say that they've learned a lot from the first game and won't be making any of the same mistakes again. What they did tell us about, though, is the option to play through the entire story mode cooperatively with a friend. That's an exciting prospect, to say the least, especially when you consider some of the other activities and "diversions" that you can earn respect and money from in Stillwater. Saints Row 2 will purportedly introduce a number of all-new activities in addition to "the good ones" from the first game. The insurance fraud game in which you attempt to cause as much damage to property and to yourself isn't going away, of course, and promises to be a whole lot of fun with two players working together. Incidentally, all of the activity missions will be optional, since their function is to provide comic relief from the main story, which deals with revenge and is apparently much darker than the first game's.

Based on what we saw during our meeting, Saints Row 2 is shaping up to be a strong sequel to 2006's Saints Row. We look forward to bringing you more information on the game's multiplayer content and other features as soon as it becomes available.

Saints Row 2 Co-op Hands-On

Earlier today, during a meeting with THQ and Volition, we had an opportunity to play Saints Row 2 for the first time. Joining us in the city of Stilwater was the game's lead designer, James Tsai, who was kind enough to play through a stronghold mission and a helicopter activity with us in the two-player co-op mode before the session degenerated into an infinite-ammo-fueled rampage.

Saints Row 2 promises a user-friendly approach to cooperative gameplay that'll let you jump in and out of online co-op games at any time, regardless of how far into the campaign each player is. You'd have to be pretty dedicated to playing alongside a friend to completely avoid playing solo for fear of getting out of sync with each other, after all. You'll be able to help other players out with missions that you've already beaten, of course, but what's really neat is that when playing alongside someone who's a lot further into the story than you you'll have the option of playing through their missions as well. Said missions would almost certainly be unavailable to you in single-player mode at that time, but the game will remember that you've beaten them in co-op and, when you reach them in your own story, will give you the option to skip them accordingly.

Screenshots of the Sons of Samedi trailer park are in short supply, apparently, so here's one of an unrelated locale.

The mission that we played through during today's session tasked us with taking down the same Sons of Samedi stronghold that we were given a brief tour of the last time we saw Saints Row 2 in action. The stronghold is a trailer park where the Caribbean-influenced gang manufactures a designer drug known as Lower Dust. Our goal was to destroy five trailers being used as labs, and thanks to a cheat that afforded us infinite ammo for every weapon in our arsenal, we had no shortage of toys with which to accomplish it. Favorite weapons on this occasion included a shotgun, an assault rifle, a rocket-propelled grenade launcher, and satchel charges. The two guns were effective at close- and long-range, respectively; the RPG was useful because it locks on to targets pretty quickly if you position your crosshair over them; and the satchel charges are a lot of fun because they adhere to just about anything (or anyone) you throw them at and can then be detonated manually.

While playing through the stronghold mission we were free to work as closely with or as independently from the other player as we liked, though since you'll have the ability to revive each other when you die it's definitely a good idea to stay pretty close. Simply taking the shortest route through the mission and blowing up the five trailer labs wasn't terribly difficult with two players, and even with numerous gang members attempting to stop us we rarely needed to worry about retreating into cover so that our health could replenish. Our first play-through of the mission was a little underwhelming, to be honest, but that's only because it was a little too easy to beat with an overpowered arsenal that we hadn't started to get creative with yet.

That all changed on our second play-through. Landing satchel charges on a stationary target as big as a trailer isn't very challenging or particularly satisfying, but landing those same charges on cars as they drive by or even on unsuspecting pedestrians who then go into a panic is infinitely more enjoyable. By sticking a couple of charges onto a car and then driving it toward one of the trailers before bailing out and hitting the detonate button, Tsai also showed us how seemingly innocuous vehicles can effectively be turned into powerful missiles. The new cruise control feature that lets you keep your vehicle's speed constant while freeing up your accelerator thumb for other things proved useful here, though its intended purpose is really just to make drive-bys easier. By adhering multiple charges to a pedestrian and then detonating them individually it's even possible to "juggle" the target using explosions to keep them in the air, and when the day comes that we're allowed to capture our own footage of Saints Row 2, you can bet that'll be one of the first things we try.

Another fun feature of Saints Row 2 that we experimented with while playing through the stronghold mission is the ability to grab pedestrians and use them as human shields. Gang members and cops are somewhat reluctant to fire at their own people when you're hiding behind them, and even innocent civilians that gang members will fire upon without a second thought do a good job of soaking up bullets for a time. When you no longer need your human shields, you have the option to execute them with a quick headshot (that doesn't work with the RPG, we discovered; you just break their necks instead) or simply push them away--preferably toward a fire or fast-moving vehicle so that there's no danger of them trying to exact revenge.

The helicopter activity that we played through next will, like other activities, be completely optional as you progress through the game. On this occasion we were tasked with providing air support for a friendly vehicle that was being used to complete a drug deal and coming under fire from rival gangs. In co-op mode, helicopter activities have one player jump into the pilot seat while the other uses a chaingun and laser-guided missile system to take out hostiles. The chaingun seemed a little underpowered on this occasion, while the missiles were perhaps just a little too quick and easy to fire and forget.

We completed the activity from the gunner's seat with a minimum of fuss after shooting down a number of enemy helicopters and blowing up plenty of hostile vehicles on the streets below. We were eager to pilot a helicopter for ourselves, though, so we had Tsai show us to a location where we could jack one and just fly around without having to concern ourselves with objectives. Predictably, the controls for the chopper were a little more complex than those for cars and bikes, but they're still quite easy to pick up. Your accelerator and brake buttons are the same as they are on the street, except that they can also be used to influence altitude, you still steer with the left analog stick and move the camera with the right, and you can use the shoulder buttons to rotate left and right.

And here's a great screenshot of the helicopter that we used to explore Stillwater.

The work-in-progress demo version of Saints Row 2 that we were playing on this occasion afforded us the opportunity to explore only a portion of one of islands that make up the gameworld. From our vantage point inside a helicopter flying high above, though, we were still impressed by the scale of the environment and by the variety of the neighborhoods that we could see. As we flew from one end of the island to the other, we left the trailer park behind and headed toward a large, modern-looking city before ultimately ending up at a museum site that incorporated what appeared to be the ruins of an ancient temple. That's where we ditched the chopper (OK, crashed it) and decided to have some more fun with satchel charges before bringing the session to an end. A few hundred explosions later we still weren't bored of them, and we'd managed to attract the attention of several SWAT teams by the time we reluctantly put down the controller.

Saints Row 2 is currently scheduled to ship to stores later this year. No more-specific release date information has been announced at this time, though we're assured that it will be soon. We'll bring you more information on Saints Row 2 as soon as it becomes available.

CHEATS,HINTS AND UNLOCKABLES

Password:	Result:
#cashmoneyz	$1000
#921	.44 Cal
#920	12 Gauge
#35	Add Gang Notoriety
#4	Add Police Notoriety
#947	Annihilator RPG
#922	AR-200
#923	AR-50
#924	AR-50 with Grenade launcher
#925	AS14 Hammer
#926	Baseball Bat
#2	Car Mass Increased
#927	Chainsaw
#sunny	Clear Sky
#955	Crowbar
#15	Drunk Pedestrians
#202	Everybody is Shrunk
#16	Evil Cars
#928	Fire Extinguisher
#929	Flame Thrower
#930	Flashbang
#1	Full Health
#931	GAL 43
#932	GDHC
#711	Get Horizon
#712	Get Snipes 57
#713	Get Tornado
#714	Get Wolverine
#200	Giant
#933	Grenade
#12	Heaven Bound
#201	Itty Bitty
#935	KC
#936	Knife
#934	Kobra
#666	Lighting Strikes
#18	Low Gravity
#937	Machete
#938	McManus 2010
#3	Milk Bones
#939	Mini-Gun
#940	Moltov
#36	Never Die
#941	Nightstick
#50	No Cop Notoriety
#51	No Gang Notoriety
#942	NR4
#19	Pedestrian Wars
#943	Pepper Spray
#969	Pimp Slap
#944	Pimpcane
#945	Pipe Bomb
#5	Player Pratfalls
#20	Raining Pedestrians
#946	RPG
#948	Samurai Sword
#949	Satchel Charge
#950	Shock Paddles
#951	SKR-9
#952	Sledge Hammer
#953	Stun Gun
#7	Super Explosions
#8	Super Saints
#954	TK3
#956	Tombstone
#11	Unlimited Ammo
#9	Unlimited Clip
#6	Unlimited Sprint
#957	Vice 9
#958	XS-2 Ultimax

Vehicles

Dial the Phone Numbers in the phone book.

Password:	Result:
#1040	Ambulance
#1041	Anchor
#1042	Atlasbreaker
#1043	Attrazione
#1044	Backdraft
#1045	Backhoe
#1046	Bag Boy
#1047	Baron
#1048	Bear
#1049	Bootlegger
#1050	Bulldog
#1051	Bulldozer
#1052	Compton
#1053	Eiswolf
#1054	FBI
#1055	Five0
#1057	Hollywood
#711	Horizon Commerical helicopter
#825	Hurricane Speedboat
#1058	Justice
#801	Kaneda Custom street racing motorcycle
#802	Kenshin Street racing motorcycle
#1059	Kent
#1060	Mag
#803	Melbourne Harley-style motorcycle
#826	Miami
#1061	Mixmaster
#1062	Mongoose
#1063	Oring
#1064	Phoenix
#827	Python
#1065	Quasar
#1066	Quota
#1067	Rampage
#1068	Raycaster
#1069	Reaper
#1056	Repair Car
#804	Sabretooth Custom Harley-style motorcycle
#805	Sandstorm Dirtbike
#1070	Septic Avenger
#1071	Shaft
#828	Shark Personal watercraft
#829	Skipper Yacht
#712	Snipes57 Executive private jet
#1072	Stilwater Municipal
#1073	Superiore
#1074	Taxi
#1075	The Job
#1076	Titan
#1077	Toad
#713	Tornado Police helicopter with minigun and anti-tank missiles
#1078	Varsity
#1079	Venom Classic
#1080	Vortex
#806	Widowmaker Moped
#714	Wolverine P-51 Mustang-style airplane with machine gun
#1081	Zenith

Special Vehicles

Dial the Phone Numbers in the phone book.

Password:	Result:
#728237	Destroy UFO
#4976	Gyro Daddy Helicopter
#7266837	Peewee Mini-Bike

Unlockables

Fighting styles

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Brotherhood melee style	The Brotherhood mission 6.
Ronin melee style	Ronin mission 6.
Samedi melee style	Sons Of Samedi mission 6.

Store Discounts

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Clothing store	Crowd Control level 3 in Suburbs.
Clothing store (more)	Crowd Control level 6 in Suburbs.
Crib customization	Mayhem level 3 in Red Light District.
Crib customization (more)	Mayhem level 6 in Red Light District.
Food and Liquor store	Septic Avenger level 3 in Red Light District.
Food and Liquor store (more)	Septic Avenger level 6 in Red Light District.
Mechanic	Demo Derby level 3.
Mechanic (even more)	All Chop Shop lists.
Mechanic (more)	Demo Derby level 6.
Scratch That music store (free)	Collect all 50 CDs.
Weapon store	Heli Assault level 3 in Trailer Park.
Weapon store (more)	Heli Assault level 6 in Trailer Park.

Vehicles

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Akuji's prototype bike	Ronin mission 11.
Attack helicopter	Epilogue mission 4.
Bandit	Multiple driving stunts.
Brotherhood vehicles	Brotherhood Mission 11.
Buggy	One Chop Shop list.
Combine	Two Chop Shop lists.
Demolition derby vehicles	Demolition Derby level 6 in University.
Donnie's vehicle	Brotherhood mission 2.
Escort vehicles	Both Escort instances.
Gang customization cars	15% hoods conquered.
Gang customization cars (even more)	65% hoods conquered.
Gang customization cars (more)	45% hoods conquered.
Julius' car	Bonus mission 1.
Maero's monster truck	Brotherhood mission 11.
Medical helicopter	Ronin mission 7.
News helicopter	Sons Of Samedi Mission 3.
Ronin vehicles	Ronin mission 11.
Saints ambulance	All Ambulance missions.
Saints fire truck	All Firefighter missions.
Septic truck	Both Septic Avenger instances.
Sons of Samedi vehicles	Sons of Samedi Mission 11.
Super Taxi	All taxi missions.
The General's Bulldog (Hummer with unlimited chaingun ammo)	Sons of Samedi Mission 11.
Tornado attack helicopter	Final mission of the Ultor epilogue.
Ultor APC	Epilogue mission 2.

Homies

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Johnny Gat	Ronin mission 11.
Legal Lee	Fight Club Prison level 3.
One follower	Prologue mission 4.
Pierce	Brotherhood mission 11.
Shaundi	Sons Of Samedi mission 11.
Three followers	50% hoods conquered.
Tobias	Sons Of Samedi mission 3.
Troy	Fight Club prison level 6.
Two followers	25% hood conquered.
Vehicle delivery for $1,000	Escort level 3 in Red Light District.
Vehicle delivery for free	Escort level 6 in Red Light District.

Weapons

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Annihilator RPG	Mayhem level 6 in Nuclear Power Plant.
AR-50 XMAC Special (with grenade launcher)	Complete all Combat Tricks.
Chainsaw	Crowd Control level 6 in Hotel and Marina.
Flamethrower	Mayhem Level 3 in Nuclear Power Plant.
GAL 43	Snatch level 3 in Downtown.
Grenades at crib	Complete one Hitman list.
Kobra pistol	Fuzz level 3 in Projects.
Minigun	Brotherhood mission 10.
Pepper spray	Crowd Control level 3 in Hotel and Marina.
Pimpcane	Epilogue mission 2.
Satchel Charges at crib	Three Hitman lists complete.
Shock paddles	Complete all Ambulance missions.
Unlimited pistol ammo	Fuzz level 6 in Projects.
Unlimited rifle ammo	Complete all Hitman lists.
Unlimited shotgun ammo	Drug trafficking level 6 in Airport.
Unlimited SMG ammo	Snatch level 6 in Downtown.
X2 Ultimax shotgun	Drug trafficking level 3 in Airport.

Customization Items

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Avenger jacket	"3 Gold Star" rank in Gang Kills.
Bodyguards gang style	Progress through the game.
Brotherhood personality	Brotherhood mission 11.
Chop shop	One Chop Shop list.
Fireman outfit	Complete the Firefighter missions.
Free Music track	10 CDs.
Free Music track	20 CDs.
Free Music track	30 CDs.
Free Music track	40 CDs.
Free Music track	50 CDs.
Ninjas gang style	Progress through the game.
Pimp suit	Complete of Ho-ing Diversion in Red Light District.
Red Light apartment crib	Prologue mission 2.
Ronin personality	Ronin mission 11.
Saints hideout	Prologue mission 3.
Samedi personality	Sons Of Samedi mission 11.
Traffic cone hat	"3 Gold Star" rank in Vehicle Surfing.
Zombie mask	Complete Zombie Uprising.

Abilities

Complete the indicated activities or tasks to unlock the corresponding reward.

Unlockable:	How to Unlock:
Brotherhood melee	Brotherhood mission 6.
Brotherhood notoriety reduced	Trail Blazing level 3 in Apartments.
Brotherhood notoriety reduced	Trail Blazing level 6 in Apartments.
Health regeneration 2x	Snatch level 3 in Chinatown.
Health regeneration 3x	Snatch level 6 in Chinatown.
Improved weapon accuracy	Septic Avenger level 3 in Suburbs.
Improved weapon accuracy (more)	Septic Avenger level 6 in Suburbs.
No fall damage	Land a perfect base jump.
Police notoriety reduced	Fuzz level 3 in Suburbs.
Police notoriety reduced (more)	Fuzz level 6 in Suburbs.
Pumped up (increased melee damage)	Fight Club level 3 in Arena.
Pumped up (more increased melee damage)	Fight Club level 6 in Arena.
Reduced bullet damage	Heli Assault level 3 in Bario.
Reduced bullet damage (more)	Heli Assault level 6 in Bario.
Reduced explosion damage	Trail Blazing level 3 in Downtown.
Reduced explosion damage (more)	Trail Blazing level 6 in Downtown.
Reduced vehicle damage	Insurance Fraud level 3 in Museum.
Reduced vehicle damage (more)	Insurance Fraud level 6 in Museum.
Ronin melee	Ronin mission 6.
Ronin notoriety reduced	Drug Trafficking level 3 in Hotel and Marina.
Ronin notoriety reduced (more)	Drug Trafficking level 6 in Hotel and Marina.
Sons Of Samedi melee	Sons Of Samedi mission 6.
Sons Of Samedi notoriety reduced	Escort or Snatch level 3 in University.
Sons Of Samedi notoriety reduced (more)	Escort or Snatch level 6 in University.
Sprint increased	Insurance Fraud level 3 in Factories.
Sprint increased (unlimited)	Insurance Fraud level 6 in Factories.

Hints, Tips & Tricks

Easy Snatch activities

For easy completion of Snatch activities, use a Bear (the Police APC). It is virtually impossible to stop once moving because it is nearly invulnerable. It can drive over smaller cars and pickups, the chaingun has unlimited ammunition. It holds three passengers.

Fight against The General

To kill The General in the mall, use the saved rockets to blow up his armored Bulldog then shoot him with any gun until he dies. Do this quickly before he runs away.

Fight against Mr. Sunshine

To kill Mr. Sunshine in the factory, use a rocket on his voodoo doll to knock him down and cause damage. Hit the doll once to break his shield. You can then shoot him until he reaches the bottom floor. Note: If he completes his ritual with the voodoo doll, it will send you flying and do lots of damage.

Fight against Maero

To defeat Maero the first time on top of his hideout, hit him once with an RPG. When scoring a direct hit, he will go on one knee and stay down. You can then shoot him until he is defeated. If he gets up, just shoot him again. To finish off Maero in the arena, use some of the rockets to blow up all the trucks except for his. Use extra rifle ammunition to shoot his Monster Truck.

Zombie Uprising: Easy kills

Use the flaming zombies as a weapon. When they come after you, let them follow you. Run into big crowds of zombies so that the flaming zombies can set the other zombies on fire, which will then count as kills for you. Also, use headshots for the small zombies. This also saves ammunition.

Secret islands

Fly far off the west coast of the prison to find four islands. Their names are "Super Secret", "Ship Wreck", "Bone", "Ruins", and "Look Out".

Blow-up doll

Go north from the lighthouse on the prison island. You will reach a large sewer pipe that will have graffiti on the sides. Go into the pipe to find a blow-up doll on a very dirty mattress. Note: It will disappear after awhile.

Defeating Bosses

Before killing Bosses, take full rocket and rifle ammo from the Brotherhood mission when you are on the ship.

Zombie Uprising: Easy kills

Defeating Veteran Child

To kill Veteran Child in his club, just bring lots of ammunition. Use the stun grenades located around the pillars to separate him and Shaundi, then just run up and shoot him. Repeat this until he has been killed.

Easy money

Find and store a few armored trucks in your garage. When they are destroyed they will respawn in your garage again. Blow a truck up and you should get a decent amount of money. After collecting the money, go back to your garage and get the truck again. It may cost $600 for repairs but you should get at least $1,000 for destroying one.

Hidden And Missable Cars

A list of hidden or missable cars in Saints Row 2:

General's Limo (Hounfor) - In the last samedi mission, run over to the General's limo when he jumps out of it, get in the limo and quit the mission. The Limo is the only one of it's kind in the game.

Military Wolverine - In the mission for the brotherhood "JailBait" after blowing up the prison buses, go to the airport and 2 wolverines will be sitting there. They have unique paintjobs. Get in one and quit the mission. They are black with military stars on each wing and on the fuselage, and a monsterous face on the nose.

Racing Edition Of MonsterTruck - In the Brotherhood mission "Bank Error In Your Favour", once you drive over to the Demolition Derby Arena, don't enter the blue marker. To the right of the blue marker will be a monster truck with racing stripes and a flame on the bonnet. Get in it and quit the mission.

Brotherhood Helicopter - In the brotherhood mission "Enemy Of My Enemy" Once the Brotherhood start arriving, when a helicopter hovers above the ground to drop off Brotherhood, quickly hop into it before it flys away. Fly over to mainland before quitting the mission or you will be warped back to where you start the mission. When you reach land, quit the mission. The helicopter is red with a gold strim and black tinted windows.

Brotherhood Boats and Jetskis - In the Brotherhood mission "Enemy of My Enemy" When the brotherhood start arriving, wait until they arrive in boats, get into any jetski or boat they arrive in, and drive over to mainland, then quit the mission. The boats are red with Brotherhood decals on them. And the jetskis are red with black or white stripes.

Samedi Chopper - In the samedi stronghold "Bavogian Plaza Drug Labs", bring a chopper over with you and start it. Progress through the stronghold, and when the samedi helicopter arrives and you have to destroy it, don't! Instead, get in your helicopter, fly above the samedi chopper, bail out and parachute onto the samedi helicopter. Press Y to enter the chopper and quit the mission. It is green with a silver trim.

Ultor Limo - In the last mission in the game, once Vogel goes into the ultor building and abandons his limo, drive to the ultor building, and his limo will be there for you to steal outside. Get into it and quit the mission. It is black with the Ultor logo written on each side.

Glitches

Taser execution

When you take a human shield, switch to your Taser and press L2. This will save some ammunition.

Enter vehicle instantly

Jump on top of a vehicle or its hood and press Triangle

Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa ps3 game

2009-04-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

REVIEWS

While licensed video games have a dubious history, those targeting the younger set have been particularly uninspired. It is a pleasant surprise, then, that Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa not only makes excellent use of its license, but presents a worthwhile game experience as well. Despite using different voice actors than the movie, the cutscenes capture the essence of the characters quite well, providing a continual string of well-constructed and downright funny moments. The simple gameplay may turn off experienced players, but the sheer variety of enjoyable activities will more than satisfy those looking for a fun romp through Africa.

There is nothing in nature as beautiful as a giraffe twirling around like a propeller.

The story in Madagascar 2 follows the path laid out by the movie it's based on. Julien, king of not only his fellow lemurs but apparently every other species as well, thinks it is cruel to stay hidden away in Madagascar when the whole world should be lucky enough to make his acquaintance. The penguin-piloted plane carrying Julien and the rest of the animals crashes in Africa, though, far short of their New York City goal. The story is consistently goofy and the frequent cutscenes are pretty amusing. Julien is the star here, spouting jokes fueled by his kingly ego, often at the expense of his meek servant Mort. The other characters play off their own quirks, from Melman's lack of confidence to Claire's search for love, with humorous results. Some of the voice acting, most notably Melman's, feels jarring and out of place, but the new cast is generally quite good. This is a silly game, and the tone stays true throughout the adventure.

Though this is primarily a platformer, you'll be doing a lot more than jumping from one precarious platform to another. Through most of the game, you'll be quickly shuttled from activity to activity. The tasks you'll be asked to perform aren't particularly deep, but they're fun in short bursts. For instance, as Alex, you'll attempt to join a herd of wild lions. To prove you're worthy of such a prestigious position, you'll be asked to perform in a variety of seemingly random competitions. Within the span of a half hour, you'll compete in a game of musical chairs, play a variation of Hot Potato that uses the dreaded durian (a type of fruit with gooey, smelly insides), climb walls, avoid vultures, play dodgeball with mangoes, and ride on zip lines. The pacing is fast and furious--just before you tire of tossing around a durian, you'll be whisked off to another event. Because of this, the game is never boring, despite the simplicity of many of these actions.

The breakneck pacing continues throughout most of the game. As Melman, you can ride atop boulders and whack moles intent on stealing suitcases; Marty plays a mean game of soccer and tests his speed in a series of races; the penguins drive around in a truck and build a flying contraption for Julien to ride in; and, of course, there is the quest to cure a herd of giraffes from a nasty outbreak of belly fish. Despite the many twists this game takes, the controls are tight and responsive no matter which ridiculous activity you're competing in. And the punishment for failure is little more than a slap on the wrist, so younger gamers who have never experienced stealth in a game can get through the spy photography mission without worrying about unforgiving failure.

Later in the adventure, you'll come across some longer, more varied quests as well. These are much closer to traditional platforming experiences, with the world opened up for free exploration and a few instances of combat thrown in for good measure. There are monkeys and coins hidden all over the land, and you'll have to use each character's specific abilities to navigate across every inch of the environment. As Gloria, you'll have to get rid of a float of crocodiles by whipping mangoes at them. Once they're banished, you're free to explore the murky depths of the river for hidden chili peppers and fancy pearls. Alex is the most agile, able to double-jump to higher places and balance across narrow walkways. Melman can spin in the air, allowing him to float to faraway platforms. Once again, the variety keeps things interesting, constantly tossing new challenges at you.

Lions are the goalkeepers of the animal kingdom.

There is replay value when you finish the five- to seven-hour main quest. Though some of the events, like musical chairs, are fun only once, there are enough interesting activities to make going back a second time worth it. There are lots of hidden monkeys scattered about and optional side quests to check out. If you feel like decorating, you can buy furniture and other gear for your monkey friends, which provides a quick joke and funny animation. The multiplayer offers some surprising thrills. Most of the activities are plucked straight out of the single-player adventure, which means you can play soccer or hot durian with a few pals. The real draw here is the mini golf. The physics are a little wonky, but the courses are huge and varied, creating a vivid atmosphere for healthy competition. One fancy quirk is being able to put some arc on your shot; if you're daring, you can soar clear over obstacles. When you get three of your friends involved, it makes the games chaotically satisfying.

Madagascar 2 is a surprisingly fun game. The gameplay may be simple, but the variety of your objectives keeps the game flowing at a brisk pace. The cutscenes are really well done, with the oddball idiosyncrasies of the characters providing a consistent stream of enjoyable humor. And when you're done with the main quest, there is plenty of reason to escape to Africa for a few more hours of entertainment. It's a shame all licensed games aren’t of this level of quality, but Madagascar 2 is certainly something younger gamers or those just looking for silly fun can enjoy.

LEGENDS OF WRESTLEMANIA PS3 GAME

2009-04-05T02:50:00.000-07:00

REVIEWS

Although many wrestling games pride themselves on featuring up-to-date rosters and letting you do any move you want during a match, Legends of Wrestlemania takes a different approach. It appeals to nostalgic wrestling fans, giving them the chance to play as classic wrestlers in historic Wrestlemania matches from the '80s and '90s. It also favors accessibility rather than complexity, and its simplified controls and limited moveset make it easy for anyone to pick up and play. However, this simplicity comes at a price, and the action quickly becomes repetitive. Matches feel the same no matter how many shiny, overmuscled legends you bring into the ring. It's good for a quick nostalgia fix, but Legends of Wrestlemania runs out of thrills faster than a Pay-Per-View event.

At the heart of Legends of Wrestlemania's appeal is its robust roster of wrestlers that stretches back a few decades to conjure such legends as Sgt. Slaughter, Ultimate Warrior, and Jake "The Snake" Roberts. It features main events ranging from the first Wrestlemania (Junkyard Dog vs. Greg Valentine) up through Wrestlemania XV (The Rock vs. Stone Cold Steve Austin). There are more than 40 superstars and managers, and even if you've never heard of such wrestlers as King Kong Bundy, you can still get psyched to relive his match against Hulk Hogan in Wrestlemania 2 thanks to the excellent video montages that play before each main event. These videos show clips from the encounters before the event as well as highlights of the matches themselves. They capture the all-important drama of professional wrestling and provide an exciting introduction to the action.

Once the actual match begins, you are introduced to the glistening character models, which appear to be smuggling large cuts of meat under their skin. The Hulkster was always a muscular guy, but in Legends of Wrestlemania he looks like ballooned-up action figure. These overdone characters are particularly jarring when you've just watched a video of the real wrestlers and have seen how they actually looked. This dims the nostalgic glow, but it becomes less pronounced with wrestlers in the mid-to-late '90s, who tended to be much more physically sculpted. Underneath their armored carapaces, the character models are pretty well animated and convincingly capture individual mannerisms such as Stone Cold's swagger and Undertaker's lanky rigidity.

"How'd you get so ripped, Hulkster?"

The gameplay itself is quite simple. Most of the time you'll be using the buttons for strike, grapple, and block to damage your opponent and counter his blows. You can also climb on the turnbuckle, perform an Irish whip, take the action outside of the ring, and, of course, pin your opponent. It's easy to master the basics that you'll need to win matches, and there's not much beyond the basics. Scripted intros, finishers, and certain grapples will trigger quick-time events that challenge you to press the prompted button before your opponent does. These allow Legends of Wrestlemania to show your wrestler doing more-advanced moves, but you won't really get to watch him because you'll be so focused on the button prompt. There are some painful rapid-tapping sequences and a momentum meter that lets you do more powerful grapples, but these don't add much complexity to the gameplay. The action is ultimately shallow, and it's not long before all of your matches start to follow the same repetitive pattern.

One interesting attempt to spice things up can be found in the Wrestlemania Tour mode. Whether you are reliving a past event, rewriting history by competing as the loser, or redefining the event by changing the match conditions, each event has a number of objectives that you can complete to earn a gold medal and unlock small bonuses. These range from simple (taunt your opponent) to complex (attack your opponent from the top of each turnbuckle), and they can add some much needed variety to the proceedings. More-recent events have more-elaborate objectives, but having a longer to-do list doesn't make the match better, just longer.

"It's all about my Hulkamaniac workout routine, brother!"

There is also a Legend Killer mode that lets you pit your created character (or an imported character from Smackdown vs. RAW 2009) against grueling tiers of legendary wrestlers. You have to fight 10 consecutive matches to beat one of the six tiers, three of which are unlocked only with a Smackdown vs. RAW import. Each tier is long and painful. You carry the same health bar throughout the 10 matches, so you will become very familiar with the one taunt that regenerates a fraction of your health. Worse, you can't save your progress, so you have to do it all in one sitting. The action simply can't hold up during such a long session, which makes Legend Killer mode little more than a test of your tolerance for boredom.

Legends of Wrestlemania also sports a full array of exhibition match types and support for online matches. The robust creation toolset from Smackdown vs. RAW 2009 is included, with the notable omission of the fun Create a Finisher tool. Although it's great see so many legendary stars gathered in one game, Legends of Wrestlemania just can't live up to the hype. The gameplay can be fun for a little while, but it soon becomes an exercise in repetition and boredom. The highlight reels are really fun to watch, but when the most entertaining aspect of a game is a 10-year-old video montage, you're dealing with some serious mediocrity. And that's the bottom line.

PREVIEWS

E3 2008: Legends of WrestleMania First Look

If you're of a certain age--above 30 years old or so--and you're a wrestling fan, you no doubt remember WrestleMania III. March 29, 1987. The Pontiac Silverdome. Detroit, Michigan. 93,173 fans. Andre the Giant versus Hulk Hogan. The Hulkster picking up the Giant, slamming him down, and the torch passing from one legend to the next. It's that nostalgic atmosphere that fuels THQ's latest wrestling game, Legends of WrestleMania. We had a chance to check out the game for the first time at E3 2008, looking to see if this retro wrestling game for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 brought back those old memories of classic matches of yesteryear.

While you can expect to see approximately 40 classic characters on the Legends roster, only three have been announced so far: the aforementioned Hulk Hogan, Andre the Giant, and Andre's manager during WrestleMania III, Bobby "The Brain" Heenan. The character models shown during the game were exaggerated versions of the famous wrestlers we all idolized as kids and, it should be noted, are still works in progress. The Hulk Hogan model, for example, still featured the 24-inch--wait, make that about 40-inch--pythons and lats wide enough to make the Hulkster look like a turtle from behind. The virtual Andre was still his 7-foot-4-inch, 500-pound self, with more defined musculature than was the case in real life. Producers told us that the look of the wrestlers has been purposefully designed to represent the "ideal" versions of those wrestlers--the Hogan and Andre we remember, not necessarily the sometimes less-than-heroic realities.

Though Yuke's is developing Legends, and the game is running on a modified version of the SmackDown vs. Raw engine, the game is going to play much differently than the SmackDown series. While THQ's foremost wrestling series is full of complicated moves designed for the more hardcore crowd, Legends looks to pare down the interface and control scheme for more streamlined action. The controls have yet to be finalized, but as of now, all moves are controlled with the face buttons. There's one strike button (tap for a light strike, hold for a heavy punch or kick), one grab button, and a defense button (tap to reverse a move, hold the button to block). Of course, all of the moves will be context sensitive with regard to the position of the wrestlers and their individual wrestling styles.

The interface in Legends is similarly stripped down. There's no location-specific damage meter like in SmackDown, and the many HUD elements found in that game--such as for reverses and submission minigames--are nowhere to be found in Legends. There will be some new wrinkles, however, including a three-tiered level meter that will change your available moves depending on what level your wrestler currently finds himself in. For example, a level-one grab might be a rake of the eyes, while a level-three grab might be a vicious choke on the mat. You'll have access to your finisher only by getting your wrestler to the level-three moves.

Another new feature is the idea of a chain system. By stringing together a number of attacks against an opponent, you'll enter a minigame where time briefly slows down. At that point, both you and your opponent will have the opportunity to do a move on the opposition. The first person to initiate the move will get an advantage and be able to pull out an additional attack on the opponent. For multiplayer matches, the person who initially began the combo will have a slight edge on timing. We're curious to see how the chain system evolves over time.

While managers don't play a big part in the modern WWE, they once were nearly as important as the wrestlers they looked after. During the match shown between Andre and Hulk, Bobby Heenan was active outside the ropes, moving around, climbing up on the apron, and making his presence known every chance he got. Managers will be able to interfere during matches in Legends and even offer advice to their wrestler, which will give him a small boost to his attributes. We're personally hoping for some classic Heenan shtick in the final version of the game, but we'll have to see how it evolves over time.

As with nearly any wrestling game, a big part of Legends' success is going to ride on that all-important roster. While none of the following are official, it wouldn't surprise us at all to see big-name WWE talent like Ricky "The Dragon" Steamboat, Junkyard Dog, and Randy "Macho Man" Savage in the game. Nor would we be shocked to see more recent WWE superstars, like Stone Cold Steve Austin, The Rock, and Triple H--all of whom have had illustrious WrestleMania moments--find their way to this game. Look for Legends of WrestleMania's release next spring, coinciding with WrestleMania XXV, which will be held at Reliant Stadium in Houston, Texas. We'll be bringing you the latest on the game up until then, so stay tuned.

CHEATS,HINTS AND UNLOCKABLES

Unlockable: Match Types

Perform the following actions to unlock additional match types:

Steel Cage Match - Win 1 match in Wrestlemania Tour Mode
Hell in a Cell - Win 2 matches in Wrestlemania Tour Mode
Ironman Match - Win 3 matches in Wrestlemania Tour Mode

Unlockable: Alternate Costumes

The codes below can be entered under "Passwords" in the main menu. Other costumes may be unlocked by performing specific actions, as detailed below.

BrutusTheBarberShop! - Brutus Beefcake's alternate costume
WithManagerJimmyHart - Jimmy Hart's alternate costume
IronSheikCamelClutch - The Iron Sheik's alternate costume
UnlockTheRockBottom! - The Rock's atlernate attire
Complete Legend Tier 1 (Legend Killer) - Animal's alternate costume
UndertakersTombstone - Undertaker's alternate costume
TheBirdmanKokoBWare! - The Birdman's alternate costume
TheRoadWarriorAnimal - The Animal's alternate costume
HawkFromLegionOfDoom - Hawk's alternate costume
ShawnsSweetChinMusic - Shawn Michaels's alternate costume
CobraClutchSlaughter - Sgt. Slaughter's alternate costum

KILLZONE 2 PS3 GAME

2009-04-05T02:18:00.000-07:00

REVIEWS

No one could have suspected that the sequel to 2004's Killzone would be this good. Killzone 2 is a tremendous package, offering an exciting campaign and terrific competitive online play, neither of which create new paradigms for first-person shooters, but rather set new standards in subtle but significant ways. From groundbreaking visuals to well-crafted multiplayer maps, most of Killzone 2's individual elements stand out in a crowded genre, making its meager attempts at storytelling easy to ignore. PlayStation 3 owners looking for a shooter to keep them busy for the rest of 2009 and beyond need look no further: The fierce action will keep you glued to your television screen for some time to come.

The M82: Is there nothing it can't do?

What makes Killzone 2's single-player campaign so much fun? First and foremost, the weapons are a lot of fun to shoot, even the standard assault rifles that form the core of your loadout. The M82's effective scope makes zooming in on your target a breeze, yet this rifle is effective at close range as well, establishing itself from the beginning as a formidable firearm. The LS13 shotgun is also powerful and rewarding to fire; though you may only shoot off a foe's helmet with other weapons, you'll watch entire heads explode with a single blast from this close-range powerhouse. The bolt gun is another favorite, skewering enemy soldiers onto surfaces and exploding a short moment later. Though you're traversing a sci-fi setting, your weapons are decidedly modern-day, from the sniper rifle to the vicious flamethrower, with one exception: the lightning gun. This mighty instrument showers enemies with overpowering jolts of electricity, and though it's not available for long, it makes short work of robotic and humanoid foes. Each of these weapons feels just right; fantastic spurts of blood, outstanding animations, exquisitely detailed weapon models, and explosive sound effects fuse seamlessly and give a satisfying sense of impact every time you land a shot.

Although there's a great variety of weaponry, you won't encounter that many different kinds of enemies as you fight your way across the war-torn landscapes of the planet Helghan. As in the original Killzone, your enemies consist largely of Helghast soldiers, yet though this limited selection led to monotony in the past, an assortment of factors in the sequel hold tedium at bay. The action is constantly pushing forward, leading you from one quality scripted event to the next and pitting you against bright AI opponents that have a remarkable grasp of battlefield tactics. These soldiers put up a fight and exhibit authentic behavior as you rain bullets on them. If you set your sights on a soldier peeking from behind cover and fire off a few rounds in that direction, he'll patiently wait until all signs of fire have vanished. Helghast will flank you and shoot blindly from behind cover, and should you toss a grenade in their direction, they'll quickly scatter. You'll normally be fighting alongside a computer-controlled teammate or even entire squads of fellow infantry. Enemy AI is just as concerned with your comrades as it is with you, so you'll never feel as if you have a bull's-eye plastered on your forehead, as is common with many other team-based shooters. As a result, Killzone 2's thrilling large-scale battles unfold dynamically and offer a legitimate challenge while rarely feeling unfair--a frustrating rocket-heavy final battle serving as the only exception.

Some excellent turret sequences and other segments also provide welcome variations on the shooting theme. At one point, you'll climb into a robotic shell and mow down infantry and tanks with machine gun fire and rockets. The way your transparent protective shield exhibits cracks as you take damage and the remarkable fire and smoke effects that light up the screen add to the excitement of the level. In another fun and visually stunning sequence, you'll use an antiaircraft turret to take down squadrons of enemy fighters. Even operating a standard turret is more appealing than you would expect, which is a result of great map design and well-scripted enemy entrances. If you're just using your standard arsenal, missions are diverse and engaging. You'll take aim at tanks (and in one boss fight, a hovering aircraft) using Killzone 2's potent rocket launcher, and you'll fight your way through a besieged air base in which winding corridors and intersecting passages have you battling multiple enemies on multiple levels.

Most levels take their cue from the usual first-person shooter formulas, and though it takes place in the spacefaring future, Killzone 2 feels more akin to a modern-day day FPS by way of its standard weapons and mostly humanoid enemies. It's an interesting blend of two disparate sensibilities that works far better than in the original, and it's further ripened by gameplay touches that feel authentic within that framework. Movement and turning speeds have a real feeling of weight, which is appropriate considering the heavy armor burdening you. This can make the controls feel somewhat sluggish at first, given that you take a moment to gather momentum. It doesn't take long to get accustomed to this sense of overall bulkiness, though, and it's consistently delivered across multiple mechanics. For example, when you jump, the way that you bend into the leap and cushion the landing with another slight crouch feels surprisingly realistic. That weight also informs movement in and out of cover. Killzone 2's cover system is solid, and it never removes you from a first-person viewpoint. Though some objects can obscure your view if you try to take potshots from behind them, sticking to cover and leaning out from behind walls is generally effective and intuitive.

This armored suit is the ultimate death machine.

Whether you go for a pop-and-shoot approach or just gun your way through, the mission design keeps you constantly moving from one objective to the next. The quick pace is one of Killzone 2's finest facets; battles don't wear on too long, and they aren't so brief as to be anticlimactic. Like many other shooters, mission objectives often involve turning a crank or pushing a button. In Killzone 2, this may mean rotating the controller to simulate the onscreen activity. These moments feel unnecessary and ironically disrupt the sense of immersion, but as tacked-on as they are, the actions are too brief to be especially annoying. You'll also use your gamepad's motion sensitivity to stabilize the sniper rifle, though the implementation here is subtle and therefore relatively harmless.

It's a real pity that there is so little context for the exceptional action. If you're familiar with the original Killzone, you'll at least have an idea why the ISA (International Strategic Alliance) is attacking the Helghast homeworld; if not, it's clear that as Thomas Sevchenko, you are on the side of the good guys--just not clear why they are the good guys. The dialogue is rudimentary (a discussion regarding sandwiches jumps immediately to mind), the characters forgettable, and the plot serves purely as a thin framework to move you from one environment to the next. Yet the cutscenes are top-notch, and unlike their counterparts in fellow PS3 shooter Haze, there's nothing intrinsically offensive or wearisome about the fist-pumping grunts at the core of the story. The story isn't deep or involving--it's just there, neither enhancing nor diminishing Killzone 2's action.

That action is enhanced by groundbreaking visuals that elevate Killzone 2 to the head of its class. Both technically and artistically, this is a real stunner. You'll first notice the obvious expressions of its technical prowess: environments jam-packed with objects and textured architectural details, pipes and crumbling rebar jutting from dilapidated buildings, and gorgeous lighting that drenches market squares and sandy battlefields with an incandescent glow. As you peel away the visual layers, your appreciation will only grow. Soldier animations are the best in the genre: Enemies move so fluidly during battle, and shift from cover to firing stance so smoothly, it's clear that meticulous attention was given to making each limb move authentically. Even the smallest details are striking. Raging fires react to the wind as it blows through the level, lightning flashes across the gloomy skies, and billows of smoke so thick you could choke on them cloud your view--but never so much as to be a gameplay annoyance.

The environments are dripping with grim ambience.

These visuals coalesce beautifully to give Killzone 2 a cohesive look that relies as much on its art design as it does on its technology. A subtle grain filter, a good amount of motion blur, and deep color saturation give most levels a dank, overcast ambience, and asymmetrical architecture and other small stylistic touches make Helghan feel more like a grim alternate-universe Earth than a completely foreign world. The sound design offers an equally intense palette. Explosions are obnoxiously loud, and the din of gunfire spreads across the map. The largest battles, such as one that rages across a decrepit bridge, sound intensely chaotic, and the crack of lightning bolts on Blood Gracht may cause you to jump out of your seat. The stormy soundtrack rages at all the right moments but gets a bit overwrought, which befits the hammy voice acting more than it does the layered sound effects.

Although the campaign is over in eight or nine hours, many levels are eminently replayable thanks to tough enemy AI and multiple difficulty levels, and the game makes it easy to revisit specific sequences within its mission menu. But what gives this shooter legs is its fantastic online play, a fun and competitive extravaganza that issues a constant stream of benefits. Like the most recent Call of Duty games, Killzone 2 rewards you with bonuses as you play, which in this case can mean new weapons, extra grenades awarded upon respawning, and most intriguingly, entire classes. This is done not only via a leveling system that pushes you ever closer to the next reward, but also with ribbons earned by completing specific tasks, such as getting a certain percentage of your team's kills. These bonuses are earned separately from leveling, which makes for two layers of online play enhancements to keep you ever addicted.

These dividends flow in a seemingly endless current, though they aren't the only facet of online play that will keep you gripping your controller; the team-based gameplay itself is outstanding, which serves as reason enough to stick with Killzone 2. The modes themselves offer few surprises, what with variants on Team Deathmatch (Bodycount), Conquest (Capture and Hold), and Capture the Flag (Search and Retrieve), among others. Rather, matches are unique because these modes are strung seamlessly together, forcing teams to move from one objective to the next with barely a breather in-between. Up to five modes mesh into a single game, which keeps teams on their toes and spreads hotbeds of action about the maps. In a single match, you're likely to band with teammates in an exposed courtyard, navigate tight walkways as battles rage in the artificial gulley just beyond, and defend an objective in a claustrophobic alcove. It's unlikely that you'll have trouble finding players online to join you in one of Killzone 2's 32-player engagements, but should you be so inclined, you can fill out the games that you host with up to 15 AI-controlled bots. You can even practice offline in one-off matches with those same bots if you prefer.

The eight maps included are exceptional, largely because they are flexible enough to make every mode feel like a natural fit for the precise layouts. Aspects such as the varying spawn points of the propaganda speaker in Search and Retrieve, and the vulnerable locations of capture points in Capture and Hold, provide focused hot spots and send you to every nook and cranny of the maps. Be prepared to think vertically because the pathways wind up stairwells, through hidden tunnels, and across balconied walkways. The addition of techniques available to each of Killzone 2's seven classes makes the ensuing action even more dynamic. An engineer's turrets can make Pyrrhus Rise's natural chokepoints even more treacherous, whereas a cloaked enemy may pounce on you as you navigate Tharsis Depot's constricted walkways. All the while, visual flourishes such as floating embers on Visari Hammer and distant artillery fire on Salamun Market keep the mood oppressive.

Online play offers an embarrassment of rewards.

Additional features flesh out the robust online play. You can join other teammates in a squad, a la Battlefield 2 and Enemy Territory, a feature that lets you coordinate attacks with ease. Full support for clans and clan challenges should make Killzone 2 a natural destination for competitive teams, and you can use killzone.com to schedule clan matches and tournaments. But whether you're a lone wolf or a clan enthusiast, you'll be happy to find a mostly smooth online experience, with only rare and short bouts of visual slowdown and online lag. In light of this extraordinary suite of online options, it's a pity that there is no cooperative play, and the single-player campaign seems ripe for such an addition, given that you're usually accompanied by an AI teammate.

You'll have to look to the inevitable Killzone 3 to find out if developer Guerilla can dig any diamonds out of this series' rough narrative. Otherwise, Killzone 2 is an exceptional first-person shooter, not because it does anything particularly new, but because it does everything extraordinarily well. There's certainly no doubting its graphical superiority, but though its moody visuals invite incessant superlatives, it's the tight, electric action that will make this an off- and online haven.

PREVIEWS

Killzone 2 Updated Hands-On

Because so much of the gaming public's attention is focused on scrutinizing every Killzone 2 screenshot to see whether the graphics will stack up to that infamous E3 2005 trailer, it's all too easy to forget that it's a real, honest-to-goodness game with a real, honest-to-goodness release date not far off. Sony recently reminded us of this by giving us the opportunity to play through the first six chapters of the campaign. What may not surprise you is that, yes, Killzone 2 is an absolute stunner in motion. But if you haven't been following the progress of the game, you'll be pleased to know that it's also an intense and exciting experience with the potential to work alongside Resistance 2 to provide a serious one-two punch of PlayStation 3-exclusive shooters.

Welcome to the world of Killzone 2. It's a pretty one.

Whereas the first Killzone allowed you to play as a number of Interplanetary Strategic Alliance (ISA) members over the course of the game, Killzone 2 drops you into the shoes of a gruff soldier named Sev and keeps you there for its duration. Throughout the campaign, you'll follow Sev and his similarly rough-and-tumble Alpha Squad buddies as they push deeper into the Helghast home planet in an opposite scenario of the invasion that occurred in the first game. Sev isn't the most vocal guy in the world, but you'll hear plenty of quips from teammates like jokester Dante Garza and the perpetually vulgar Rico Velasquez. Most of the story unfolds in the heat of battle via dialogue delivered from these squadmates, though occasional cutscenes give you fleeting glimpses of what's going on deep within the Helghast quarters.

One thing becomes immediately apparent when you begin Killzone 2's campaign: This is not an easy game. The first chapter, Corinth River--an area Sony has shown several times before--drops you right into a heated firefight with no shortage of heavily armed Helghast soldiers trying to take you out from scattered perches. It feels like every balcony, bridge, and window has a pair of glowing red Helghast eyes staring down at you. Starting you off like this seems like Killzone 2's way of saying that running and gunning won't cut it; you're going to learn to be patient and deliberate with your targets, and you're going to learn right away.

Popping out of cover is a necessary trick you'll become quite familiar with.

To do this, you'll need to become good friends with the game's cover system. It's a sticky cover mechanic where you pull L2 to snap right onto nearby walls or low barriers. From there, you have the standard move set that includes leaning into a doorway or popping up over a barricade, with the ability to look down your gun's iron sights to help you get a bit more precise. What makes this system unique and challenging is that you remain in the first-person perspective at all times, so your vision is partially obscured as you stay out of harm's way. In a third-person shooter you can see almost every target thanks to a wide camera, but here you'll need to poke your head up fast and get to shooting even faster--making that initial moment when you leave cover that much more thrilling.

The cover system is less critical in close quarters when you don't have Helghast soldiers trying to kill you from every which way. The second chapter in the campaign, Blood Meridian, trades in Corinth River's expansive industrial shipping yards and warehouses in favor of tight urban alleyways. In this locale you can become a bit more mobile, charging through the narrow corridors with more close-quarters weaponry, such as shotguns, submachine guns, and your trusty infinite-ammo pistol. But before you get too comfortable, Killzone switches things up in the next chapter, Visari Square, by pitting you against a seemingly endless flood of Helghast in a series of prolonged standoffs. One of these is a small, desperate scuffle with you and two squadmates in a small alley trying to fend off incoming Helghast for 10 or so minutes. However, that's quickly followed by a huge battle in a wide-open city square where you and dozens of newly reunited squadmates need to hold down the fort as Helghast foot soldiers, tanks, and walking piles of metal and Kevlar known as "heavies" come at you in wave after wave.

The fire effects, blood-splattered screen, and red enemy eyes really pop from the bleak gray backgrounds.

These two moments are a nice little microcosm of the way Killzone 2 keeps you guessing by sharply switching up the scale and intimacy of battles. Later chapters perform a similar trick by quickly altering the setting. The first few hours of the game will be spent running through demolished cities, but later you'll find yourself in different locales like an elaborate Visari palace and a windswept mining town that wouldn't feel entirely out of place in a Star Wars movie.

Fights tend to last a while due to clever AI on the part of the Helghast soldiers. They seem to have attended the same school of cover techniques you have, because they'll be spending just as much time behind crates and walls. What makes things interesting is that their behavior seems to change as the odds of their survival are whittled down. You'll see them get brave in a group and pop up quite often, but when they're in a bad spot they'll stay put and frantically blind fire while defiling your good name.

Sometimes you just have to stop and admire the lighting, even if it means staring at a dead body.

Of course, you do have teammates alongside to lend you a helping hand at nearly every point in the game. It can be anywhere between one and several dozen at once, but the ebb and flow of battle is something you determine on your own since you're generally taking the lead and letting the others follow you. You won't need to worry about any sort of squad commands, but a bit of teamwork is required when a buddy goes down. In situations like this, you'll need to pull out your trusty medic gun and zap him back to health with a quick spark of life. It's an oddly simple mechanic, but a critical one because your buddies are expert shots who help a lot in battle. Along with constant banter, this helps to provide a feeling of belonging to a greater group despite the fact that you're taking the fight into your own hands most of the time.

Finally, with this being Killzone 2, we would be remiss if we didn't mention the graphics--or more specifically, how awesome they are. It wouldn't be much of a stretch to say Killzone 2 is the best-looking console game we've seen. The use of lighting is probably the most impressive of the game's technical feats: with so much of the game taking place in demolished urban centers with gray steel, concrete, and asphalt, those moments when you're flushed with color are extremely striking. This might include an orange street lamp, the blue glow of a faulty electrical tower, or the green haze in a sewer tunnel, but the way it all reflects off nearby objects like your gun and character models looks terrific. Add in sharp textures, great smoke and explosion effects, terrific depth of field, and an ominous sky that looks like the world might cave in at any moment and you've got a combination of technical and artistic brilliance that's hard to understate. Best of all: the framerate does a good job of keeping up, with the only noticeable hitches arriving during an autosave between checkpoints.

Later missions will take you from the city to remote locations like this mining facility.

If you were to nitpick the presentation, most people's attention would probably fall on the audio. While the sound effects and music are both great, the voice acting could give Gears of War's Delta Squad a run for its money in terms of smoldering, manly rage. In fact, it can often be difficult to separate one gruff voice from another when your vision isn't fixed on a squadmate's face. It's not exactly an abrasive fault, but it does stick out when you consider how stellar the rest of the presentation is.

Small gripes aside, we had a thoroughly enjoyable experience with Killzone 2's single-player campaign. The combat is intense, the visual aesthetics are amazing, and the level of difficulty provides a rewarding challenge. It seems that PlayStation 3 owners will have a lot to look forward to when the game is finally released. You can expect that to happen on February 27.

Killzone 2 Multiplayer Beta Hands-On

While Sony already has Resistance 2 in the bag this winter, there's no doubt that two triple-A shooter franchises are better than one. Insomniac's World War shooter already has its fair share of fans, but the anticipation for Killzone 2 in February is possibly even greater. The long-awaited follow-up to the PlayStation 2 original will finally launch next year, and as is becoming customary for the genre, Sony has issued a multiplayer beta for the game. We got our dirty little mittens on said code, and wasted no time shooting up the other testers who were populating the servers.

With 32-player online, Killzone 2 is hectically entertaining.

The Killzone 2 beta offers a generous amount of what we'll get on the finished Blu-ray, with three of the eight maps and all of the game modes that will ship next year. The beta also offers the first proper introduction to the class system, which allows players to combine skills and specialise in areas that suit their particular playing style. Then there's the ability to group up into clans of four, allowing you to build a team that supports each other with the different abilities on offer. Combined with support for up to 32 players per map, Killzone 2 multiplayer can be hectic but also highly tactical, and it's an encouraging sign for the full multiplayer offering next year.

Like the original game, Killzone 2 has a very distinct feel to it, with environments, characters, and weapons that feel heavy and robust. You start out with a standard assault rifle, which is much more effective than most default FPS weapons, as well as a pistol and a set of grenades. So far, standard FPS, but the game offers little in the way of extra weapons and ammunition on the battlefield. Your only real option is to take weapons from your fallen enemies, or rifle-butt them if you get close enough. The health system is regenerative, but if you do run out of health you have 10 seconds to be revived by a medic, or for the enemy to finish you off.

The class system is Killzone 2's defining feature, and it allows you to specialise the more you play the game. There are seven different classes to set yourself up in, most of which will be familiar to shooter veterans, such as rifleman, engineer, scout, medic, tactician, assault, and saboteur. The rifleman offers better firepower, the engineer can set up automated turrets, the scout can use camouflage, and the medic can revive downed allies. The other classes are slightly different from the standard FPS--the tactician can throw smoke grenades that act as respawn points, the assault class has better armour, and like a similar class in Team Fortress, the saboteur can disguise himself as a member of the opposite team. What's more, you can choose to specialise in up to two of these classes, which allows you to hedge your bets as well as create someone fairly unique, even in a 32-player game.

Developers Guerilla were kind enough to include every game mode from the finished game in the beta. There's a standard team deathmatch mode in the form of Body Count, but it's a shame to see that there's no option for an every-man-for-himself variety. Capture the flag is called Search and Retrieve, with a Search and Destroy variant turning the tables with explosive results. Finally, Assassination mode sees one person given the role of VIP while everyone on the team tries to keep them alive. While all of these game modes have been seen before, the Warzone option allows the host to change game types without ever having to come out to the lobby, and it's this option that's certainly the most popular online.

With support for up to 32 players, Killzone 2 can get fairly hectic, so it's good to see that clan support has been implemented even on the beta. You can group into teams of four, allowing you to share the class types as well as communicate directly with one another over voice chat. It's also encouraging to see just how many matches online reach their full capacity, with little if any impact on the speed of the game. The maps themselves certainly seem built for this number of people, with Salamun Market and Blood Gracht in particular offering some particularly sprawling streets and multiple levels to fight on, while Radec Academy is much tighter and suited to fewer players.

You can group together in clans of four, spreading out skills from the class system and communicating via voice chat.

Killzone 2 has a distinctive look to it, but the multiplayer maps don't really give the engine much chance to show off. There are lens flare effects and the weapons have plenty of detail to them, but the environments are very static with no movable objects or vehicles. The sound is impressive though, with some really meaty weapon effects from the standard sidearms and automated turrets. And while we sometimes had trouble getting into multiplayer games, the lobby system was quick and painless, allowing us to get into the action immediately after connecting.

The Killzone 2 beta offers a promising first look at what will be a very important part of the overall retail package. There's plenty to like about the class system, and while the skills themselves are nothing new to the genre, the way in which they're rewarded certainly is novel. We also like the clan system, which looks like it will offer some sense of teamwork in the huge 32-player games. Killzone 2 is due for release in February 2009 on the PlayStation 3, and we're as excited as ever about playing the finished game.

GC 2008: Killzone 2 Multiplayer Hands-On

Guerrilla gave us some hands-on multiplayer time with its upcoming shooter at Leipzig, and we jumped headfirst into the bloodbath.

Killzone 2 was one of Sony's key titles at E3 2008, and at the show details on the multiplayer mode were revealed by the game's senior online designer, Eric Boltjes. Killzone 2 has some interesting options available for multiplayer, including customisable character classes, match settings, squads, and community integration with the game's official Web site at killzone.com.

If you're friendless, Killzone lets you add AI bots in local and online matches.

In addition to being able to tweak match settings, you'll have the choice of five different mission types: assassination, bodycount, capture and hold, search and destroy, and search and retrieve. You can also combine mission types when playing; for example, you might play one round of assassination, followed by search and destroy, culminating in a tiebreaking round of search and retrieve.

Boltjes revealed a new multiplayer feature at Leipzig including AI bots. They'll look like and mimic the behaviour of regular competitors and will be available in offline and online matches. In addition to standard run and gun duties, bots will also be able to complete mission objectives, and have access to the same abilities and weapons as regular players. We got some hands-on time with the game but unfortunately didn't get a chance to see any AI participants in action.

Killzone 2 supports up to 32 players, and has eight maps that are designed for between either 2 to 16 players, or 16 to 32 players. You'll be able to have any combination of players on any map, but be prepared for some fast-paced, close-quarters battles if playing on smaller maps with large teams. There are several spawn points available in each map, depending on the size and once you've captured them they'll be available for your team to spawn to. You'll also be able to spawn directly to your leader's position and straight into the heart of battle (if he's doing his job properly).

The first map we tried was one of the smaller ones, and we joined one of the two five-man sides. The level fit the look and feel of what we've already seen of Killzone 2 with the action taking place in a battle-scarred warehouse. There were several levels in the stage with gantries above us and staircases leading down to several underground basements. We started off as a standard ISA soldier, equipped with an assault rifle and sidearm. The rifle worked effectively at short range and we were able to snipe a few enemies across the way using the gun's sights.

We then moved on to a much larger map, designed for up to 32 players, and the level featured a prominent, central outdoor courtyard. This time around we chose a Helghast engineer but combined his abilities with another class to be able to deploy sentry guns and call in AI-controlled air support. Depending on your class you'll have access to other abilities such as being able to heal others (medics) or repair equipment (engineers). Throwing a beacon directs air support in, and the airship will hover over the beacon's coordinates for a short time, attacking any enemies in the immediate vicinity. Because it needs line of sight it's only useful in maps with outdoor areas. Sentry guns, on the other hand, can be deployed in any part of the map and will keep watch until being destroyed by enemy troops. The objective in this map was to assassinate an enemy soldier, chosen seemingly at random by the game. The target's name and health will be displayed on every player's HUD, which makes the pace of each round a bit more hectic. After each round, the game will randomly select another assassination victim.

There were a further six maps that we didn't get a chance to look at but expect those to offer a healthy range of variety and size. If eight maps doesn't sound like a whole lot to you, Guerrilla told us that more are being planned for distribution over the PlayStation Network postlaunch. If you can't wait that long to get your hands on Sony's upcoming off-world shooter, a public beta program is also planned before launch.

Choose from five classes, including engineers, medics and snipers.

Killzone 2 is on track for a February 2009 release, exclusively on the PlayStation 3.

CHEATS,HINTS AND UNLOCKABLES

Killzone 2 Unlockables

Trophies

Complete each condition to get the allotted Trophies. There are 44 Bronze Trophies, 4 Silver Trophies, 3 Gold Trophies, and 1 Platinum Trophy.

Unlockable	How to Unlock
Corinth Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Corinth River on any difficulty level
Blood Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Blood Meridian on any difficulty level
Visari Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Visari Square on any difficulty level
Salamun Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Salamun District on any difficulty level
Bridge Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Salamun Bridge on any difficulty level
Suljeva Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Suljeva Village on any difficulty level
Tharsis Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete Tharsis Refinery on any difficulty level
Cruiser Ribbon(Bronze)	Complete The Cruiser on any difficulty level
Pallbearer - Kill 500 Helghast(Bronze)	Kill 500 Helghast Soldiers
Undertaker - Kill 1000 Helghast(Bronze)	Kill 1000 Helghast Soldiers
Reaper - Kill 1500 Helghast(Bronze)	Kill 1500 Helghast Soldiers
Field Agent - Collect all intel(Bronze)	Collect all intel within the game
Iconoclast - Destroy all symbols(Bronze)	Destroy all Helghast symbols within the game
Babysitter - Revive 25 Buddies(Bronze)	Revive your buddies a total of 25 times
Safari Hunter - Kill each enemy infantry type with a melee attack(Bronze)	Kill one of each enemy infantry type with a melee attack
Killing Spree - Kill 5 Helghast in 15 seconds(Bronze)	Kill 5 Helghast in 15 seconds whilst on foot and maintaining at least 85% health
Bullet Counter - Manually reload 150 times(Bronze)	Manually reload your weapon 150 times
Safety First - Shoot off 100 helmets(Bronze)	Shoot off 100 Helghast helmets during battle
Berserker - Kill 25 Helghast with melee attacks(Bronze)	Kill 25 Helghast using melee attacks
Barrel of Death - Kill 3 Helghast using your environment(Bronze)	Kill 3 Helghast at once using the surrounding environment
Professional - 3 revolver headshots in a row(Bronze)	Get 3 headshots in a row using the same clip of M4 Revolver ammunition
Fragmerchant - Kill 5 Helghast using a single grenade(Bronze)	Kill 5 Helghast at once using a single frag grenade
Fragmartyr - Kill 2 Helghast whilst taking your own life(Bronze)	Kill 2 Helghast at once and take your own life using a single frag grenade
Melonpopper - 15 headshots using the sniper rifle(Bronze)	Get 15 headshots using the VC32 Sniper Rifle
Blade Runner - 75 kills with the knife(Bronze)	Kill 75 Helghast using the knife
Run and Gunner - Kill 3 Helghast with one burst of assault rifle fire(Bronze)	Kill 3 Helghast using an M82 or StA52 assault rifle without releasing the trigger
Defensive Fighter - Kill 30 Helghast with an emplaced weapon(Bronze)	Kill 30 Helghast using the StA3 fixed gun emplacement
Valor Medal(Bronze)	Achieve weekly online honor rank #2
Valor Citation(Bronze)	Achieve weekly online honor rank #1
Cross-Training Ribbon(Bronze)	Acquire all badge specific medals
Veteran Ribbon(Bronze)	Acquire all mission specific medals
Expert Ribbon(Bronze)	Acquire all combat specific medals
Wargod Ribbon(Bronze)	Acquire all remaining medals
Blitzkrieg Ribbon(Bronze)	Win 50 online matches
Maelstra Ribbon(Silver)	Complete Maelstra Barrens on any difficulty level
Elementalslayer - Kill the ArcTrooper within 1 minute 30 seconds(Bronze)	Kill the Tharsis Refinery ArcTrooper in under 1 minute 30 seconds
Giantslayer - Kill the Heavy within 1 minute(Bronze)	Kill the Blood Meridian heavy in under 1 minute
Dragonslayer - Destroy the ATAC within 1 minute 30 seconds(Bronze)	Destroy the Salamun Bridge ATAC in under 1 minute 30 seconds
Demonslayer - Kill Radec within 20 minutes(Bronze)	Kill Radec at Visari Palace within 20 minutes
Stick Around - Nail 20 Helghast to the wall(Bronze)	Nail 20 Helghast to a wall using the Boltgun VC-21
Master Conductor - Electrocute 3 Helghast(Bronze)	Electrocute 3 Helghast with a single burst from the VC5 Electricity Gun
Can Opener - Destroy a Helghast APC(Bronze)	Destroy any Helghast APC during battle
Spare Parts - Destroy all Leech Pods(Bronze)	Destroy all Leech Pods in The Cruiser
Treadhead - Kill 30 Helghast whilst in the tank(Bronze)	Take 30 Helghast lives whilst using the ISA tank
Mechspert - Stomp 10 Helghast(Bronze)	Stomp 10 Helghast with your Exoskeleton in Maelstra Barrens
Survivor(Silver)	Complete all missions on any difficulty level
Untouchable(Silver)	Complete all missions on any difficulty level without dying
Valor Cross(Silver)	Achieve weekly online honor rank #3
Heroic Survivor(Gold)	Complete all missions on Elite difficulty level
Career Ribbon(Gold)	Achieve an online rank of General
Valor Grand Cross(Gold)	Achieve weekly online honor rank #4
War Hero(Platinum)	Collect all Killzone®2 trophies

Unlock Harder difficulty

Unlockable	How to Unlock
Elite Difficulty	Complete the game

Ranks unlock features and weapons.

Unlock higher ranks by earning more points and a higher "Difference" score.

Unlockable	How to Unlock
Corporal	30 points, 30 difference, can create squad option
Sergeant	100 point, 70 difference, can create clan option
Sergeant 1st Class	200 points, 100 difference, unlocks Shotgun and SMG
Master Sergean	Master Sergeant: 350 points, 150 difference, unlocks the medic badge
Sergeant Major	550 points, 250 difference, unlocks HGH and ISA LMG
Lieutenant	880 points, 250 difference, unlocks engineer badge
Captain	1100 points, 300 difference, unlocks VC9 missile launcher
Major	1450 points, 350 difference, unlocks tactician badge
Lieutenant-Colonel	1850 points, 400 difference, unlocks grenade launcher
Colonel	2300 points, 450 difference, unlocks saboteur badge
General	2800 points, 500 difference, unlocks scout badge

Medals

Complete certain tasks to unlock medals and rewards

Unlockable	How to Unlock
Meritorious Unit Award	10x Clan Matches Won with Clan (Unlocks 1000 Valor)
Meritorious Unit Award	25x Clan Matches Won with Clan (Unlocks 10,000 Valor)
Army Superior Unit Award	50x Clan Matches Won with Clan (Unlocks 100,000 Valor)
Black Belt	5x Close Combat Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Melle Kill)
Hawk's Eye	5x Sniper Specialist (Unlocks Second Sniper Zoom)
Head Fetish	5x Headshot Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Headshot)
Quick Draw	5x Sidearm Specialist (Unlocks M4 Revolver 2nd Weapon)
Assassins League	5x Assassination Kill Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Assassination Kills)
Bodyguard Alliance	5x Assassination Defend Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points per Survival)
Bomb Squad	5x Search and Destroy Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Returns/Disarms)
Corpse Counters	5x Body Count Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Defensive Kills)
Defense Initiative	5x Capture and Hold Defend Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Defensive Kills)
Retrieval Corps	5x Search and Retrieve Specialist (Unlocks Increased Points/Return)
Example Soldier	8x Good Conduct (Unlocks Increased Start Ammo Amount)
Natural Born Killer	8x Kill Count (Unlocks Increased Grenade Amount)
Aerial Supportive	8x Air Support Specialist (Unlocks Combine Tactician 2nd Ability)
Defensive Specialist	8x Turret Specialist (Unlocks 2nd Engineer Ability)
Explosives Expert	8x C4 Specialist (Unlocks Combine Saboteur 2nd Ability)
Field Mechanic	8x Repair Specialist (Unlocks Combne Engineer 2nd Ability)
Field Medic	8x Healing Specialist (Unlocks Combine Medic 2nd Ability)
Forward Observer	8x Spot and Mark Specialist (Unlocks Combine Scout 2nd Ability)
Front Runner	8x Boost Specialist (Unlocks Combine Assault 2nd Ability)
Master of Disguise	8x Disguise Specialist (Unlocks Saboteur Ability)
Shadow Marshall	8x Cloak Specialist (Unlocks 2nd Scout Ability)
Spawn Authority	8x Spawn Point Specialist (Unlocks 2nd Tactician Ability)
Trauma Surgeon	8x Revival Specialist (Unlocks 2nd Medic Ability)

Ribbons

Complete certain tasks to unlock ribbons

Unlockable	How to Unlock
Good Conduct	0 Team-Kills/Suicides are made by the player and they have scored at least 20 points
Air Support Specialist	5 kiils by Air Support called
Boost Specialist	Peform 5 Boosts
C4 Specialist	5 kills by placed C4 Explosives
Cloak Specialist	Kill 5 enemies while Cloaked
Disguise Specialist	Kill 5 enemies while Disguised
Healing Specialist	Heal 5 players
Repair Specialist	Repair 5 Objects
Revival Specialist	Successfully Revive 5 players
Spawn Point Specialist	5 players Spawn on Placed Area
Spot and Mark Specialist	Spot and Mark 5 players
Turret Specialist	5 kills by Sentry Turret Placed
Close Combat Specialist	10 kills by Close Combat Melee
Headshot Specialist	10 kills by Headshots
Sidearm Specialist	10 kills by Pistols
Sniper Specialist	10 kills by Sniper Rifle
Assassination Defend Specialist	Stayed alive as Target
Assassination Kill Specialist	1 Assassination Target killed
Body Count Specialist	10 kills made during a mission
Capture and Hold Defend Specialist	10 mission points earned Capturing a Point
Search and Destroy Specialist	2 Objectives placed/disarmed
Search and Retrieve Specialist	2 Objectives returned

Metal Gear Solid 4 PS3 Game

2009-03-31T03:50:00.000-07:00

REVIEWS

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots is the most technically stunning video game ever made. It's also a fine example of storytelling prowess within its medium, combining gameplay and narrative so slickly and beautifully that it's impossible to extricate one from the other. It's likely you will emerge awestruck from your first play-through, wishing the experience would continue yet nonetheless satisfied with its conclusion. It's difficult not to sound hyperbolic when discussing MGS4 because every part of its design seemingly fulfills its vision, without compromise. There is no halfway.

The story is both convoluted and compelling.

Fully realized, lengthy story sequences will come as no surprise to anyone who has played a Metal Gear game. You'll spend a good half of MGS4 watching cinematics, but it would be a grave misinterpretation to assume that great gameplay takes a backseat to the story. Rather, these two elements are tightly intertwined, and this tapestry is held together by an important technical thread: Cutscenes that are rendered fully in real time within the game engine. It's impressive enough that these scenes look as good as any prerendered cinematic you've ever watched. It's even more amazing when those same scenes transition without pause into gameplay, and the same hulking mech you watched lumber about in the cinematic is looming above you. The subtle animations, the lush environments, and the rich textures are the same in and out of story sequences, and the effect is so seamless it may take your breath away. You can skip past the scenes if you prefer, but doing so would soften the experience. The story sequences carry more weight because of the intense gameplay that precedes them--and the gameplay feels more compelling because the story gives you powerful reasons to care about your mission. The high point of this fusion occurs in an exciting and memorable split-screen sequence that simply must be experienced.

Talking about what, exactly, is going on in the plot in the midst of MGS4's grand sweeping gestures is to risk spoiling each little surprise as it emerges. Snake, suffering from the rapid onset of aging, now must cope with stiff joints in addition to the looming specter of Liquid Ocelot's newest plans. This is Snake's final hurrah; yet as the story reaches one height after another, the juxtaposition of huge set piece battles and formidable bosses with Snake's deteriorating body creates tension and gravity even beyond the series' usual pretensions. Some new plot strands emerge while others get tied up, and old friends (and enemies) refuse to be forgotten. You'll also bear witness to a few reunions--some bloody, some teary, and some legitimately shocking. Parts of it are overblown, to be sure. The musical score gets heavy-handed and the voice acting and writing are frequently dogmatic, so while there are plenty of subtle moments, subtlety isn't really MGS4's strong suit. But it doesn't need to be. After all, the fate of the world hangs in the balance, and judging from a few silly attempts at humor that don't work, developer Kojima Productions was wise to err on the side of melodrama.

The gameplay proper is familiar to fans, but it's been cleaned up and expanded, holding as many twists and surprises as the story. For starters, both gunplay and close-quarters combat are more satisfying. Regarding melee, the controls have been streamlined, making it less cumbersome to grab an enemy soldier or perform a stealthy blade kill. Shooting mechanics are even more improved, so much so that shooting your way out of a pickle is just as enjoyable as sneaking around it. There are a huge number of weapons to play with; so many that you'll probably finish the campaign without using many of them. Yet, quality wasn't sacrificed for quantity: Every weapon feels just right, from your handy operator sidearm (best when upgraded with a silencer) and standard issue assault rifles to a powerful railgun. The standard over-the-shoulder view is fine for the most part, but you can gaze down the sights from a first-person perspective. Both views can be further improved with various enhancements, such as laser sights and scopes.

Not that you don't have all the tools for completely avoiding your enemies if you choose that route. Snake's got the basics covered: crawling, hugging walls, peeking around corners, and hanging from ledges, for example. Cover mechanics are tighter than ever, so you can crouch and take potshots from behind cover with ease. There are also a number of important gadgets that will make your life easier in this regard. The most obvious of these is your OctoCamo suit, which takes on the texture of your surroundings when you're prone or pressed against cover. Not only does this make it simpler to avoid watchful eyes, but it's also a cool visual effect. Eventually, you'll be able to camouflage Snake's head, and a few of the available camo options are bound to stir some fans' nostalgia. The Solid Eye is your other major tool, as it expands your compass into a sonic-sensitive radar and allows you to use night vision and a tactical first-person view. These are helpful gadgets indeed, even during boss fights, like a stirring encounter in a blinding blizzard.

Shooting is always a viable option if you don't want to sneak.

Other gadgets, such as portable hiding places (cardboard boxes and rusty barrels) and the Metal Gear Mk. II (a stealthed robot that you can command as a scouting device), are useful to anyone who prefers the sneaky approach. Not every gadget is a welcome addition, though. For example, the much-ballyhooed iPod is a neat touch, but to use it, you cannot have another gadget equipped, so you'll quickly forget the option even exists. But aside from these nitpicks, one of the things that makes the core gameplay so enjoyable is that you're rarely strapped into a single style of play. Shooting your way through requires more thought and care than you'd put into a standard action game, but you never feel as though the gun mechanics are stuffed uncomfortably into a stealth game. If you'd rather sneak, you never have the impression that stealth was shoehorned into a game that's meant to be played as a shooter. Sure, you're Solid Snake--you're not supposed to get caught. But if you're stuck in a jam, breaking stealth isn't a death sentence, and in fact, facing certain enemies head-on is often a heart-pounding, challenging experience. The few levels that do force you into one style, such as one in which you shadow your target through an Eastern European city, are still great, if not quite as impactful.

You'll need to keep an eye on Snake's stress levels and psyche. Though these aspects are more peripheral than health levels, they fit nicely within the plot. When Snake gets stressed (if he gets cold or encumbered, for example), his psyche gauge starts to deplete. The lower the gauge, the slower you will move and the less quickly you replenish health. Generally speaking, the psyche meter is rarely a factor, and should you notice Snake groaning a bit more, there are items like compresses you can use for a pick-me-up. Should the meter get too low, you won't be able to hold up your weapon or rush for cover. This doesn't happen often though, and while you'll need to keep a close eye on your health for obvious reasons, you won't need to pay too much heed to psyche.

Regardless of the tactics you use, the level design and enemy artificial intelligence work in tandem to create unparalleled gameplay. If you go stealth, hiding in that rusty barrel isn't a perfect solution. Your foe may look at it suspiciously, kick it a few times, and eventually blow your cover, so don't expect to be able to trick your way through as you might in other stealth games. In full-on firefights, enemy teams will flank you, use cover to their advantage, and throw grenades with precision to force you out of hiding. Most of your surroundings, inside and out, are littered with objects and cover opportunities, from a trek through a South American jungle to a nostalgic journey through a snowy island base. Each level is more-or-less linear, but within the confines of these areas, you still have remarkable room to explore the various gameplay options and test the limits of your foes. Some enemies are standard soldiers, though many others are wonderfully imaginative. The colossal mechanical Gekkos, for example, are unpredictable and keep you on your toes, while female operatives that pounce from wall to wall intensify an early escape scene.

There are ample cover opportunities.

Later in the game, a few set piece battles deepen the core gameplay even further, including a few peerless on-rails sequences. One of these, a motorcycle chase, is as close as any game has gotten to translating the excitement of similar moments in films to a game format. Another level, which features a gigantic automaton, showcases destructible environments where walkways collapse on top of each other and the screen fills with smoke. In all of these cases, the controls are excellent, with the exception of that same mech's third-person view a bit later on (the first-person view works infinitely better). The interpretation of Metal Gear Solid as an interactive film still applies, but in a way you may not have expected: These levels make you feel like the star of your own action movie.

Boss battles are stimulating, though they aren't all that difficult. Nevertheless, a few of them are tricky and require you to put some thought into your tactics because just riddling the boss with bullets isn't going to ensure victory. Early on, it's clear that you'll be encountering the four members of the Beauty and the Beast unit--female supersoldiers that are as psychologically complex as they are fun to battle. These battles are long and normally require you to fight other enemies in addition to your primary target. In one of them, you can use your night vision to track your target's footprints and use the wind direction to your advantage. In another, you'll dodge missiles from flying creatures while taking on the main boss.

The gameplay and story would, perhaps, not be as effective if Metal Gear Solid 4 did not look and sound so impressive, but truth be told, it's an amazing piece of technology. From the gritty textures of concrete walls to the effective lighting and shadowing, there are few aspects you could reasonably fault. In the biggest battles, billows of smoke fill the screen and blood splatters against the camera--all while meticulously designed helicopters fly overhead and ad-hoc team members take potshots from behind grungy dilapidated vehicles. Yet in the midst of the visual drama, it's the little things that are likely to provoke awe. Small details, such as how Snake rubs his sore back when his stress levels get high or the authentic manner in which he ascends staircases, create as much atmosphere as cluttered underground tunnels and war-torn Middle Eastern cities. You will have to wait through some scattered install periods (just under 20 minutes worth, in total) and the occasional loading screen, and you may find some frame rate drops and low-res textures here and there, but these aren't issues in light of MGS4's impressive graphical accomplishments.

The sound design comes together nearly as well. The soundtrack on its own is rather pompous, but in context, it works just fine to create the appropriate mood for any given cutscene or battle. The voice acting follows suit but succeeds far better. Because the growling voice of David Hayter's Solid Snake is so good, the rare hamming from the mostly excellent supporting cast is easily forgotten. But the sound effects are unforgettable and excellent across the board. The Gekkos emit blood-curdling moos like gargantuan cows, explosions are outstandingly obnoxious, and everything from the clicks of the Solid Eye to the laughter and screams of the beastly bosses are top-notch.

Snake's final hurrah is a remarkable technical achievement.

On top of it all, Metal Gear Solid 4 offers some enjoyable online 16-player action to complement its superb single-player experience. Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch are represented, of course, and they play just fine, assuming you don't approach the online component as a standard shooter. The maps are beautifully rendered and packed with detail, and while not every mechanic is as wonderful in multiplayer as it is in single-player (hiding in your cardboard box won't usually get you far, for example), it's all good fun once you adjust to the pace. The multiplayer star, however, is sneaking mode, a Team Deathmatch variant in which one player plays as Snake and another supports him as the Metal Gear Mk II. Shooting others is amusing--but sneaking enthusiasts will enjoy the violent, stealthy game of hide and seek you play as Snake. Playing support is equally entertaining because as Mk. II, you can go invisible, creep up on other players, and zap them with your electronic tentacle. It's a blast. Other modes include base mission, in which teams compete to conquer bases; a capture and defend mode; and rescue mission, which is similar to the same mode in Metal Gear Solid 3: Subsistence. Unfortunately, the process of creating an online account is laborious, so expect to take a few minutes to enter a litany of information (a pain if you aren't using a keyboard). Thankfully, the variety of customization options and sheer numbers of players online mean that this process is quickly forgotten.

If the story-heavy presentation of previous Metal Gear games taxed your patience, Metal Gear Solid 4 won't change your mind. For anyone who appreciates games that rise above the simple act of pushing a few buttons and pulling a few triggers, Metal Gear Solid 4 is a stimulating ride that you won't soon forget. You'll want to see what happens next, yet when its long campaign draws to a close, you'll wish it would continue. That's not just because it's a well-told tale, but because that tale is woven through a thoroughly impressive game that tops its predecessors.

PREVIEWS

Metal Gear Solid 4 Updated Impressions

TOKYO--With Metal Gear Solid 4's launch just a month away, Konami held a press conference in Japan to celebrate the game's completion. Half of the conference was about speeches and launch promotions, but with the event taking place in a cineplex, we also got to see a lot of game action on the big screen.

To make the cinema experience as real as possible, the press conference started off with a "No Smoking" MGS ad, followed by a few CGI-rendered commercials that were actually fake ads based on the Metal Gear Solid 4 world. It was an interesting way to start off the event because the ads were all supposed to be from the in-game Private Military Companies (PMCs), which subtly hints that they're a major power in the MGS4 world, even outside of the war zone.

Following the ads, the conference started off with MGS4's opening scene in the Middle East, which can be seen at MGS4's new official site together with the aforementioned ads. In the opening, Snake is seen riding on the back of a truck that's heading toward a war zone, and he's disguised in a robe to look just like the other civilian soldiers riding with him. He goes on a monologue about how the war is no longer about nations, ideologies, or ethnicities. It's become an endless series of proxy battles by hired mercenaries and machines, and the consumption of life has become a practical business in the world.

As Snake continues to talk about how the soldiers are completely controlled with nanomachines and ID-tagged weapons, he reaches the war zone and gets off the truck. He finds himself in crossfire as soon as he gets off, as the other soldiers around him are quickly picked off by well-equipped PMC mercenaries. Much to his misfortune, he finds that his gun is totally jammed before he even gets to make a shot, leaving him completely empty-handed. The game switched from the opening scene to gameplay at this point, which was impressively seamless and almost unnoticeable, had it not been for the life bar and other interfaces appearing on the screen.

This time around, Snake actually starts off with a weapon. Unfortunately for him, it totally jams up.

Thereafter, the game seemed to function as a tutorial. As the unarmed Snake sneaks around the war zone to avoid confrontation, he finds a gun on the ground used by one of the civilian soldiers. As Snake picks up the gun, we heard the familiar voice of Otakon, telling Snake how to press the start button to open the game's menu and equip the weapon. Unlike weapons carried by the PMCs, the civilians' primitive arsenals aren't ID-tagged, so Snake can just pick them up and use them without problems.

As Snake moved forward, an elephant-like cry echoed through the sky, silencing the soldiers as they stopped shooting to figure out what was going on. After a few moments of dead silence, a hoard of Gekko units jumped from a far distance and suddenly landed in front of the soldiers, quickly killing them one by one. With Otakon telling Snake not to confront the killing machines, Snake evacuates into one of the buildings shown numerous times in previous game demos and trailers. There, he finds a cardboard box on the second floor, placed too obviously on the middle of the floor (the box ironically says "No place to hide" on one side, and "No place for Hideo" on the other). As Snake goes into hiding, two Gekkos reach the floor, search around, and decide to smash the box, causing red liquid to splatter all over the place. Fortunately, it turns out to be a bunch of watermelons rather than a mashed Snake. After the Gekkos go away, Snake powers off his camouflage and appears from the side of the room. The camera zooms in on Snake's face, Metal Gear Solid 4's logo appears onscreen, and the opening sequence ends there.

After a few words from Konami Digital Entertainment's president and director, Hideo Kojima, a fresh movie-like trailer was shown off, done completely in Hollywood style and narrated by a Don LaFontaine-like voice. The trailer featured new scenes such as Snake confronting Liquid Ocelot (and getting beaten up), a Metal Gear Ray jumping out of the water, and Snake mysteriously turning young. The trailer is viewable at MGS4's official site.

After the trailer, Kojima showed some live MGS4 gameplay and unveiled new information. The demonstration ran for about 40 minutes with an experienced staff playing the game, and Kojima mentioned that they're showing off only about one-fifteenth of the whole game.

Metal Gear?!

First and foremost, Kojima revealed that, unlike any of the previous installments in the series, MGS4 will be chapter-based. Each chapter starts off with a scene in which the small, young heroine Sunny is frying eggs in her room. According to Kojima, the eggs allude to what will happen in each of the chapters, in the way that they're cracked or the way that they're fried.

Kojima showed off the first chapter, Act 1: Liquid Sun. The game started off in the same familiar area from the previous demos. Kojima explained the new changes to the game, such as the threat ring, which replaces the enemy location on the map from previous installments.

In MGS4, the area map can be displayed by pausing the game, though it doesn't show enemies. The map is rendered in 3D so it can be zoomed and rotated, giving you a more accurate judgment on the best course to take to reach a destination. Height seems to be a vital factor in MGS4, given that you can make use of building structures to evade enemy encounters.

As the game progressed, we saw the war zone changing; a vehicle sent in more PMC mercenaries, making situations worse for the civilian soldiers. It's up to you to decide whether to help the soldiers or stay neutral. For the sake of showing off to the press, Kojima decided to help them out and took out a few PMC mercenaries. He took one out by close-quarters combat and showed that your enemies can be hidden in lockers, just like in previous MGS games. He also showed that Snake could give items to the civilian soldiers and get stuff back in return. The game was played in hard mode, in which the enemies patrol in a team of two and wake up faster after they're stunned. Consequently, Kojima and his staff played carefully so as not to make any major mistakes while playing in front of the press. Kojima also took the opportunity to once again show that Snake can blend into the environment using his suit's Octo-cam capabilities. Once he blends, the pattern can be recorded for future use, which is great for gamers who like to keep a collection.

It's also worth mentioning that Kojima's team put in quite an effort to give details and a realistic feel to MGS4's world. A microphone speaker rang out in the middle of the war zone, broadcasting a PMC propaganda announcement. We were also shown the area with the statues where Snake can blend in by use of his Octo-cam. As a small Easter egg, Kojima showed that parts of the statue would eventually fall off if Snake keeps camouflaging and touching them.

As Snake went into a building, we once again saw the demo scene in which he meets up with Otakon's Metal Gear MKII for the first time. There, a small mech supplies him with some additional hardware to survive in the fierce battlefront: the Solid Eye, a gun called the Operator, and a tranquilizer gun. The Solid Eye has multiple functions and modes. It can be used to detect human emotion, detect enemy type, find items on the screen, uncover footsteps, as a telescope, and as a night goggle.

From here on, the Metal Gear MKII can also be controlled by the player. MKII is equipped with stealth camouflage, making it perfect for use in surveillance. It doesn't have any weapons, but it can stun enemies with electrocution wire.

During the dialogue scene, the screen suddenly buzzed like a broken TV when "Metal Gear" was mentioned by Otakon. Although we didn't get to see what it does, Kojima revealed that there's a flashback button that appears when something or someone from the past is mentioned during dialogue scenes. When the button is pressed, you get to see a glimpse of the past that's related to the subject.

After the scene ended, Kojima opened up the menu screen, which has a set of menus on the left side (Code, Weapons, Items, Camouflage, Drebin's Shop, Save), and the area map on the right. In particular, Kojima mentioned the new feature called the Sunny Camera. There's something that looks like a live webcam at the left bottom of the menu screen, and it shows what Sunny is doing in her room, 24 hours of the day.

Going back into the battlefield, Kojima showed that the civilian soldiers have a hideout in one of the houses, which looked pretty vacant and badly funded, with some wounded soldiers lying on the ground. We could hear dialogues between some of the soldiers, and they didn't attack Snake because he's an ally. According to Kojima, Snake can also move around in the hideout wearing the civilian-soldier robe that he starts off the game with, in which case the soldiers won't notice him even if he's made enemies with them.

Walking around a bit more in the hideout, Kojima picked up a Regain energy drink, which is a real-life product in Japan. It looks pretty yellow and gives a nice energy boost to Snake, kind of similar to the Calorie Mate snacks that were in MGS3.

Konami has collaborated with a number of companies, including Apple, to feature their products in MGS4.

What was more surprising was when Snake picked up an iPod music item in the hideout. In MGS4, Snake carries around an iPod player, and he can listen to music whenever he finds a new track in the game. The tracks can be run as background music while playing the game, and what's more, when the game is paused to the menu screen, you can see Sunny dancing to the tune on the Sunny Camera.

It turns out that Konami is doing a bunch of collaborations with multiple companies in MGS4, including Triumph Motorcycles, Sony Ericsson, and Ubisoft. Triumph already collaborated with Konami on MGS3 (Eva rode one of their bikes), and it's going to happen once again. Sony Ericsson's phone is used by Vamp and Naomi during the game. Later during the conference, we were shown an impressive scene in which Vamp just wouldn't let go and stop talking on his phone, even though Snake shoots him in the middle of his forehead. Considering Ubisoft, the Assassin's Creed Altair-style robe that Snake wore in an April Fools MGS4 video on YouTube will actually be an unlockable feature.

Taking the stairs and walking up the hideout, we saw the scene in which Snake meets up with a hairless, gray monkey and the mysterious arms dealer named Drebin, who sells PMC weapons that have been ID-tag unlocked. We were shown an extended dialogue scene in which Drebin reveals that there are weapon launderers all over the world. "Drebin" is a generic name used by all of them, with him being the 893rd Drebin.

The scene continues as Drebin gives a complimentary gun to Snake in token of his new acquaintanceship. After checking to see that there's nothing suspicious with it, Snake pulls the trigger and finds out that it doesn't work. Puzzled, Drebin realizes the possibility that Snake might have an old-generation nanomachine inside his body, which can sometimes clash with even unlocked ID-tagged weapon systems. Snake, suspicious of how Drebin could have such knowledge, questions who he really is. Instead of keeping himself secret, Drebin reveals that his main job is as an employee for Arms Tech Security, which gives him access to ID-tag chips before they get registered. He also mentions that Arms Tech has two faces, just like how Snake isn't officially a soldier in the battlefield, though he's not a civilian either.

After the scene, Kojima went back to the battlefront and used his newly acquired weapon to shoot down a few PMC mercenaries. He also showed how weapons could be customized or newly purchased through the Drebin Shop option from the menu screen. For instance, you can add on a laser sight or a suppressor to a gun, or purchase a sniper rifle if an enemy's too far away. Customization and purchases are all done with Drebin Points, which can be acquired by picking up equipment and weapons in battle. On some days, the Drebin Shop has discounts.

You can purchase new weapons or modify existing ones through the Drebin Shop.

Kojima showed off a few weapons that can be purchased from Drebin's Shop, including a M60E4 machine gun. There was also an XM25 airburst grenade launcher, which lets you adjust the distance of travel before the explosion for an accurate hit to the target.

In the closing of his presentation, Kojima showed off what he called the "ultimate weapon" that is available in Drebin's Shop. For a whopping one million Drebin Points, which should take about three to four loops through the game to accumulate, you can buy a classic Japanese Tanegashima muzzle-loaded firearm. The weapon seemed to be the most impractical firearm in this day and age, with Snake having to painstakingly push a ramrod into the gun's barrel for each reload. However, Kojima showed that, every once in a while, the gun would cause a massive typhoon, annihilating everyone in sight and making items drop all over the screen like rainfall.

After the end of the live gameplay demonstration, Kojima talked briefly about plans for a "Metal Gear Solid 4 World Tour," during which he and his staff will travel around the world to meet up with fans of the series. The tour locations include London; Madrid, Spain; Milan, Italy; Frankfurt, Germany; Amsterdam, Netherlands; Paris; New York; Los Angeles; and San Francisco.

One of the surprises at the press conference came at the very end. As the lights dimmed out for the event to end, a one-way dialogue very similar to the endings in the MGS games took place, hinting at some sort of worldwide live event and a sequel, though it was too vague to make any assumptions.

"Yes, the presentation event has ended. Everything is according to plan."

"We will proceed to the final steps of the mission. The surprise that's planned on launch date, should it be executed?

"Yes. Akihabara, New York, LA...worldwide live broadcast. Yes, there are no problems. The VIP has agreed to come. Yes, that's correct. That person. Understood. June 12."

"And what should we do about that project? Yes, that's right. That man has shattered, but...about the sequel. Yes. Yes... I see. That's understood, Mr. Company President."

Metal Gear Solid 4 Update - The Old Boy's Still Got It

We caught a live demo of Metal Gear Solid 4 at Konami's recent 20th anniversary party commemorating the franchise's longevity. Though the demo was similar to Kojima's earlier presentation of the game at a Sony event last week, it afforded us the opportunity to do a bit of dissecting. We picked up on a number of subtle elements in the game's presentation and gameplay mechanics that have left us intrigued.

The first standout was Snake's animation, which features a number of variations. Some of these are tied specifically to his new moves, and some were put in to help him move more fluidly. Crouched running, the ability to flip onto your back while crawling on your belly (to facilitate shooting fools behind you), and the ability to hang from a ledge all add to your evasive options while playing. They also feed into a system that we like to call the Agile Grumpy Old Man system (or A.G.O.M. for short). Gout, arthritis, and rheumatism be damned, Snake moves like greased (albeit occasionally creaky) lightning in the demo. We have mixed emotions about some of the frisking animations, but punching someone in the junk certainly qualifies as grumpy enough.

The second intriguing gameplay element that caught our eye is the circle that appears around Snake at all times during gameplay. In speaking with Konami reps, it sounds as though it's something players will come to use as a gauge of your surroundings, since it reacts to sounds and activity. As such, it will offer useful (and sometimes key) feedback about your surroundings based on its appearance.

We're also intrigued by the various camera options in the game, be it the standard view we expected, or the new first-person view. In some cases, the action appeared to have a camera that's almost too dynamic, making it a challenge to get your bearings, though it's nice to have so many options. Snake's little remote-controlled Metal Gear is also an interesting mechanic that might make for some unique combat solutions.

It may go without saying, but we kind of want to play this.

As far as the visuals go, the game continues to look better, although we're starting to get tired of the same town environment we've been seeing since the game was first unveiled. Still, the level of detail and interactivity is cool. Snake's various camouflages are rendered nicely and factor into gameplay in some very interesting ways. Particle and smoke effects are all nicely done and all add to the chaos, especially when structures are taken down. There is some of the expected performance weirdness, but we're still hopeful the frame rate will be solidified for the game's release.

There's no doubt that Metal Gear Solid 4 will be one of the most scrutinized PlayStation 3 games when it ships early next year. Given what we've seen and the team working on it, we're going to say that it has a very good chance of being able to stand up to that scrutiny. Kojima Productions is doing some interesting stuff with the gameplay, and the visuals are pretty slick, so we certainly like what we've seen so far. Look for more on Metal Gear Solid 4 later this year at Tokyo Game Show and in the months leading up to its 2008 release.

TGS 06: Metal Gear Solid 4 TGS Trailer Impressions

TOKYO--It's practically a rule at this point that every major game industry trade show needs to have some sort of explosive Metal Gear Solid trailer to get everybody talking before, during, and after the event. Developer Kojima Productions seems equally as talented at putting together amazing trailers as it is at making great games, so with this in mind, we went into this year's Tokyo Game Show eagerly looking forward to anything new on Metal Gear Solid 4 for the PlayStation 3. And, once again, Kojima Productions delivered, this time with a roughly six-minute trailer showcasing what appear to be a lot of new gameplay mechanics from this next game in its popular stealth action series. Back in May, the E3 trailer for MGS4 wowed us with lots of tantalizing new details about the characters and story, not to mention with some really impressive graphics. This new trailer doesn't show off Raiden slicing and dicing or drop any obscure clues about the plot, but instead portrays a weathered old Solid Snake doing what he does best: sneaking, fighting, and surviving against all odds.

The trailer takes place entirely in the war-torn, dusty cityscapes we've seen in previous sequences from MGS4. There's not much preamble before the bullets start flying, and the trailer mostly shows some of the ways in which Snake will be able to elude or dispatch his opponents. And there is some surprising variety on display here, including a bunch of moves never before seen in an MGS game. At first we see Snake performing by-the-numbers military maneuvers, running through the streets while keeping a low profile, ducking around corners to elude foes, and so on. We also see Snake lying prone, rolling from side to side to avoid hostile fire.

Then a surprise appears in the form of the little robot operated by Snake's friend Otacon, which we saw in the very first MGS4 trailer. It turns out this speedy little thing is more than just a recon bot, because in one sequence, it rolls on up to an unsuspecting enemy guard and delivers an electric shock that drops this guy in an instant.

As for Snake, we get to see him climbing into an empty oil barrel and rolling through the streets, plowing through and past enemy soldiers. It's almost comical but thrilling--a new spin on the old cardboard box, if you will. Flashes of first-person-perspective gunplay meanwhile suggest that Metal Gear Solid's traditional point-and-shoot controls will still be intact. Some very impressive motion-captured animations are on display as wild gunfights ensue, and all the while, the environments look completely believable. However, notably, a recent issue of Famitsu magazine revealed that MGS4 will feature a new over-the-shoulder shooting perspective that instantly brings to mind Resident Evil 4. This new perspective doesn't get much screen time during the new trailer, but it brings to mind some exciting possibilities about how MGS4 might play.

Another remarkable sequence in the new trailer has one of the new bipedal Metal Gear robots "sniffing" around with its antenna-like tentacle, apparently trying to spot Snake. Despite Snake's camouflage, he's spotted right underneath the machine's foot, so it tries to stomp him dead with its powerful legs...but of course, Snake rolls out of the way just in time and then fires straight up into the thing's belly with his assault rifle. The Metal Gear unit collapses, a scene that seems to reveal this new model's weak point. Moments later, though, it clambers back to its feet, ready to cause more destruction.

Things only seem to get worse for Snake as the trailer wears on--one of the last sequences has him crawling straight through an enemy firing zone. Here's where the game's "no place to hide" theme seems resoundingly clear--Snake seems completely pinned down and helpless. However, even while lying prone, he's able to chuck a grenade overhead, and it takes out an enemy squad just like that. The various new fighting-while-prone maneuvers seem to be the emphasis of this trailer overall, at least for those of us watching for signs of new gameplay elements.

The trailer doesn't provide a lot of context for all this action but intersperses the visuals with brief oblique phrases that fans who've been keeping up with MGS4 will note clearly tie in to the game's solemn themes:

No beginning, no end. No time, no future. No virtue, no vice. No place for heroes. No time for heroes. No place in time. No time to die. No war for Snake.

The trailer also shows Snake wearing a few variations on his sneaking suit. In one sequence he's concealed within a cloak, and we also get to see him using his new active camouflage, which lets him blend right in with his surroundings as the light refracts around him. Previous MGS games have included stealth camouflage as an unlockable bonus, but it seems to figure more prominently into the gameplay this time.

At the seeming end of the trailer, Snake mercifully holds his fire as one of the last enemy troopers flees for his life. The Metal Gear Solid 4 logo and credits appear...and then a brief epilogue sequence ensues, showing a masked man with Snake's "solid eye system" eyepatch standing in a clearing with a statue in the background, while a few guards lurk nearby. The man evades the guards by blending in with the statue by grabbing onto its, uh...anyway, the guards just walk right on by. The man unmasks as a bird on the statue takes a bit of a poop, and we see none other than the spitting image of a young Solid Snake, sans headband, and he lights up a cigarette just as Snake would. Then another bird poops on him, and he scowls. The end. Huh...? Certainly there's no easy explanation for what a young version of Snake may be doing here. The sequence doesn't appear to be a flashback or anything like that.

Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots won't be shipping until sometime next year, and one can only hope that it'll wind up looking as good as this latest trailer lets on. While the trailer seems to go out of its way to show sequences that might actually occur during gameplay, we'll believe it when we play it. Needless to say, we can't wait to see more of this increasingly impressive-looking game.

E3 06: Metal Gear Solid 4 Extended Trailer Impressions

OS ANGELES--Today at the Konami press conference, Konami showed off the hotly anticipated extended trailer for MGS4. While there was a three-and-a-half minute trailer on display during the Sony press conference on Monday, the big guns were saved for Konami, which dropped a full 15 minutes of apparently in-game footage on us. Stunning? Definitely, but not only for the graphics: Some of the storyline and plot points that were revealed left us reeling. Note that there is a big old SPOILER WARNING on this entire article, for those of you who are waiting for the trailer to hit the Net.

The beginning of the trailer is mostly footage that we've seen before, of ominous text overlaid on a scene of a militia-esque military force heading into battle with a PMC, or Private Military Contractor. A speaker in the background, whom we believe is Colonel Campbell, is talking about how America has exported too much military prowess to these PMC groups, which now have military manpower to rival even that of the US. Unfortunately for the US, the five largest PMC (essentially bands of mercenaries) are actually united under one dummy corporation, called Outer Heaven. And who runs Outer Heaven? None other than Liquid Ocelot himself, whom we'll remember from MGS2 as the personality of Liquid Snake from MGS1 that's inhabited the body of Revolver Ocelot. During all of this text, it's revealed that one of the militiamen who has ridden into the city and engaged the PMC in combat is in fact Solid Snake with a cloak for disguise, somewhat similar to the cloak he wore on the bridge at the beginning of MGS2.

The next few minutes of gameplay consist mostly of the text that was on display in the shorter trailer from the Sony press conference, with some extrapolations. Apparently, while all of the PMC soldiers have nanomachines in their bodies to enhance their combat abilities, they're unable to point their guns at their clients, a Robocop-esque twist of fate with unknown implications. While this text is scrolling, we see Solid Snake, who may've been officially renamed to Old Snake for this installment of the series, standing at attention, saluting at a grave that we recognize from MGS3 as the grave of The Boss. Otacon rather improperly lands a military helicopter in the graveyard, and informs Snake that they've found an old friend. Colonel Campbell (who insists that he's no longer a Colonel), who's in the plane, informs Snake that Liquid Snake has reappeared, in the Middle East. He's taken command of an army, and plans to launch an insurrection.

At this point, Snake is speaking to Naomi on his codec, and she reveals that he has only six months to live, and that his body is starting to decay. Up until this point, all of our views of Solid Snake have shown his face to be relatively normal, but of course that won't last much longer.

As this occurs, an extended action sequence occurs after one of the biomech Metal Gears happens to scout out Snake while he's hiding in a corridor, still in his disguise. Startled, he attempts to fire his rifle at it, but the bullets bounce off the metal shell harmlessly. Without anything left to do, he makes a run for it, and eventually makes it to a set of stairs set into a building. (This sequence was edited into the shorter trailer.) The Metal Gear is on the scene, though, as it grapples Snake with a extended whiplike cord, and begins to pull him down the steps. His formerly useless rifle, however, is able to cut the whip and set him free, after which the MG crashes through the weakened stairs and falls down a bit, allowing Snake to make his escape. Unfortunately, the MG manages to plant its legs into the walls here, making some movements that are distinctly uncomfortable for those of us used to seeing legs remain underneath our bodies; the legs here appear to have a full 360 degrees of rotation available to them.

As Snake hits the upper level of the building, he spots another MG off in the distance, and, startled, spits out his cigarette onto the ground. He quickly hides, but just afterward, the two MG's appear on the scene and begin their search. They quickly happen upon a box in the middle of the room, which is emblazoned with the motto "No Place for Hideo," which astute watchers will remember as one of the phrases used in the trailer for MGS4 from last year's E3. They scan it, and reveal a lumpy form inside the box; one of the MGs smashes it, but all that's revealed is a lump of watermelons. The two MGs look at each other, then apparently give up their search and leap off into the distance.

So where was Snake during all of this? Well, one of the watermelon rinds rolls across the floor and hits something, which instantly turns color to match the watermelon. The camera pulls back, revealing Snake leaning against the wall, having perfectly matched its texture. Apparently, his sneaking suit has morphed into a true camoflage suit. While not offering true invisibility, it appeared to be good enough to evade certain death in this instance.

Now we hit the list of returning characters, starting with Naomi Hunter, who was originally responsible for developing the FOXDIE virus that's been in Solid Snake's body since the original MGS game, and which may be slowly killing him in MGS4. She speaks of each generation's obligations not to leave their sins for future generations. Next up is Colonel Campbell, who says that the Patriots may be involved in Liquid's operations, although he violently opposed them in MGS2, and that Snake is the world's only hope. Meryl Silverburgh, last seen in the ending to MGS1 as she rode off into the sunset with Snake on his snowmobile, appears next, apparently as a new member of a Foxhound unit. What side this new Foxhound is on isn't immediately apparent, but given the history of the series, we'll muse on the possibilities of having Old Snake fight his former love interest Meryl at some point in the game.

Otacon makes his appearance next, telling Snake to "finish it" and asking him to make this their last battle. Liquid Ocelot appears now and compares Snake (we assuming he's addressing Snake, although he never appears in the scene) to Cain of the biblical Genesis story, who killed his own brother. This is apparently a reference to how Liquid Snake was originally infected with FOXDIE after coming into contact with Snake during MGS1. He asks if Snake is prepared to dig his own grave, which apparently sounds like a suggestion that Snake commit suicide. Crazy, right?

Well, in the next sequence, Snake appears to do just that. After brooding over his gun for a few seconds, and implying that his final mission is to erase his genes from the world, he puts a single bullet into his gun and...well, whether he pulls the trigger or not will likely be a topic of debate for the next year or so. We'll leave the speculation to you.

At this point, a fake ending to the trailer begins to play, shortly before the text "Raiden Returns!" appears onscreen. What happens next is difficult to transcribe from memory, but suffice to say that Raiden is definitely the inheritor of the quasi-unkillable Cyborg Ninja inheritance. His suit seems to embue him with superhuman strength, speed, and agility, allowing him to leap atop the six Metal Gears that initially attack him. He manages to dodge their blows, which mostly come as they attempt to kick him, while chopping their legs off and killing them in otherwise incredibly violent ways.

Our personal favorites include the moment where he leaps atop one of the Metal Gears and twists its turret so that it shoots some of its companions, as well as the moment when his sword gets knocked into the air. (Note that the sword appears to be just a normal metallic sword, not the special H.F. Blade that Raiden wielded at the end of MGS2, although we're not positive on this.) At this point, all he can do is jump around and dodge the blows coming his way, until he positions himself underneath the sword as it falls. He grabs it with his foot, and then starts to spin around, slashing at the legs of the Metal Gears until they're good and weakened. After they're stumbling around, he finishes them off by jumping onto their heads and driving the swords into their brains with his foot.

In short, the Raiden section of the trailer is wordlessly awesome, as most of you will find out on Wednesday morning, when the full trailer is supposed to hit the Web. If you've ever seen the film Casshern: The Robot Hunter, then you should have an idea of what Raiden's capable of. Until then, all we can say is that the trailer confirms MGS4 will appear in 2007, at least at this point in development. Stay tuned to GameSpot for more developments as they arrive.

TGS 2005: Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots Trailer Impressions

TOKYO--Fresh from the starting gate of the 2005 Tokyo Game Show, who wouldn't make a beeline straight for Konami's next-generation theater, where the first real trailer for the newly christened Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots for the PlayStation 3 is playing? Certainly not us. We saw the trailer just minutes ago and are happy to report on what looks like one epic stealth action game in the works at Kojima Productions.

It's like a cross between Sam Fisher and Sean Connery from The Rock. But it's all Snake. Or Big Boss. Or something.

The trailer begins with a slightly baffling clip of first-person gameplay, in which an unnamed soldier patrols through a war-torn, ruined city, with futuristic helicopters soaring overhead and the muted sounds of combat ringing in the background. The soldier spies a sleek figure darting behind cover off in the distance, but upon rounding the corner, there's nobody to be seen. All the while, the letters "FPS" are appearing on the screen, forming phrases like "Finally a Policy Shift?"--perhaps indicating that Metal Gear Solid 4 is in fact a shooter. But then the camera pulls back to reveal the soldier caught in the death grip of none other than Solid Snake, who proceeds to dispatch the hapless guard with characteristic aplomb. Then we're treated to the words we've hoped to see "Not FPS - MGS!"

Then again, this might not be the Snake you were expecting. The rumors are true: Solid Snake has gone gray, and he appears to be in his declining years in Metal Gear Solid 4. This time, there doesn't seem to be any question about the placement of the game on the series' timeline, since the trailer wastes no time in announcing that the game is set "X years after Big Shell," which puts it well after MGS2, chronologically the most recent Metal Gear game. After the little first-person fake-out, the trailer fully reveals Snake, still wearing his classic sneaking suit but deeply lined, grizzled, and even sporting gray hair and a rough-looking moustache. He's also got some kind of wicked-looking future eye patch. Shades of Big Boss? At least the mullet is intact.

Otacon's looking a little worse for the wear, but otherwise pretty good!

After his auspicious introduction, Snake stalks through the streets of the city, which has clearly been rendered unlivable by untold months or years of combat. He quickly ducks into the blasted-out shell of a nearby building to avoid the attention of an approaching caravan of foot soldiers accompanied by an imposing line of armored personnel carriers. Snake appears to be uncharacteristically intimidated by this advancing column, a point that's driven home by a title that flashes on the screen: "A new enemy created in battle." Matters only worsen as the procession approaches and it's revealed that a handful of small, bipedal Metal Gears, looking like smaller versions of the Rex model, are accompanying the troops.

As if matters aren't bad enough with this hellish enemy host right on the other side of the wall, Snake is clearly feeling his age. While he's remaining covert and attempting to formulate a plan, he's seized by a coughing spasm that doubles him over and nearly brings him to his knees. The only remedy is some sort of advanced injection system, which he delivers directly to his jugular vein and which seems to cure him temporarily. He then engages his eye patch, which we can see is actually labeled the "Solid Eye System," and we get a glimpse of Snake's own enhanced perspective, which is overlaid with a busy tactical display analyzing the armament and threat level of every major target in the area.

But Snake's not just the watcher--he's also being watched, as we see him brought into the sights of some sort of unseen robotic entity. As the potential attacker rolls up behind him and he whirls around, bringing his rifle to bear, we find that it's just a small, rather cute little robot with a screen on the side bearing none other than the image of Otacon. Yet, Otacon looks to have aged very little since MGS2. Has he been drinking at the fountain of youth? Or could it be that Solid Snake's genetically engineered background may have accelerated his aging, made him sick, and rendered him dependent on drugs to maintain his health? This will certainly be one of many mysteries yet to be revealed in MGS4.

You, too, could have your very own Solid Eye System.

Snake and Otacon then exchange a few pleasantries and agree that it's time to move on, but not before the little robot hands Snake a few clips to load into his advanced, modular assault rifle. It's at this point that Snake lights up his trademark cigarette and heads off through the city, little Otacon robot in tow, as he embarks on whatever his latest (and possibly last?) mission is. It's at this point that the full title of the game--Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots--is revealed, tying the game indelibly to the ending of Metal Gear Solid 2 and, indeed, the overarching storyline of the entire series. Devotees of Kojima's long-running stealth action epic will surely be fanatically interested in where the twisting storyline is going next, and we recently got a small taste of MGS4's gameplay and storyline courtesy of Famitsu magazine.

We don't need to tell you that Guns of the Patriots looks utterly incredible--the screenshots certainly speak for themselves--and unlike what we can say about some other PS3 games shown back at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, we can say with confidence that enough aliasing and pixelated textures were evident in this trailer to indicate that it was running smoothly in real time, and further live demonstrations from Kojima on the show floor at TGS confirm this to be the cast. Given that, this is pretty much one of the best-looking games we've ever seen. Whether or not this footage warrants such a grandiose statement is now for you to decide--Kojima Productions has posted the trailer for public viewing on the MGS4 site. We await further details on this game with bated breath, and we'll bring them to you as soon as we have them.

CHEATS,TIPS AND UNLOCKABLES

Passwords

Successfully complete the game to unlock the "Password" option at the "Extras" menu. Then, enter one of the following case-sensitive passwords to unlock the corresponding bonus when a saved game is resumed or another game is started. Note: The bonuses will become available when the Mk II can first be used.

1911 Pistol: Enter "1aytmmymhk" as a password.

Desert Eagle Long Barrel:

sword.

Patriot: Enter "pkhhnwhsjt" as a password.

Scanning Plug S: Enter "skynytktjp" as a password.

Thor .45-70: Enter "tshsniammr" as a password.

Type 17 Pistol: Enter "jmsotsynrn" as a password.

Altair costume: Enter "aottrykmyn" as a password.

Drebin Facecam

E" as a password.

"Midnight Shadow" iPod song: Enter "THEODORE" as a password.

"Mobs Alive" iPod song: Enter "ABRAHAM" as a password.

"Subsistence Action" iPod song: Enter "smgo2play" as a password.

Otacon codes

In Act 4: Shadow Moses - Nuclear Warhead Storage B2, when at Otacon's office, he will ask you for the code. Enter one of the following codes instead of the one that Otacon mentions to get the corresponding bonus:

100,000 DP: Enter "14893" as a code.

"Opening - Old L.A. 2040" iPod song: Enter "78925" as a code. This song increases Snake's accuracy.

"Policenauts Ending" iPod song: Enter "13462" as a code. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to fall asleep when touched.

Bonus weapons

Successfully complete the indicated task to unlock the corresponding weapon:

Desert Eagle, Long Barrel: Get the Fox Emblem.

MGL-140 grenade launcher: Defeat Raging Raven.

MK 23: Search under the first truck you see in Act 4.

Patriot Future Assault Weapon: Successfully complete the game with a "Big Boss" rank. This weapon has infinite ammunition.

Rail Gun: Defeat Crying Wolf.

Race Gun pistol: Successfully complete the game.

Solar Gun: Collect the five statues (the four Battle Beauties and Frog Soldier/Haven Troopers) with non-lethal means on their respective idols.

Thor 45-70: Get the Fox Hound Emblem.

World War I pistol: Get the Hound Emblem.

Bonus ammunition

Successfully complete the game to unlock the following ammo for purchase from Drebin:

Emotive Cry

Emotive Laughter

Emotive Rage

Emotive Scream

Smoke Grenade Blue

Smoke Grenade Green

Smoke Grenade Red

Smoke Grenade Yellow

Bonus equipment

Successfully complete the indicated task to unlock the corresponding piece of equipment:

Bandanna: Successfully complete the game without killing anyone, including Bosses. Alternately, purchase it from Drebin for 5 million Drebin Points after starting another game session after completing the game. This item gives you infinite ammunition.

Digital Camera: It is found in the Nomad vehicle during the mission intermission. Note: It will contain bonus photos if you wait until Act 4 to get the camera.

Mantis and Sorrow Dolls: Defeat Screaming Mantis.

Scanning Plug S: Log more than ten hours of online play time on the same profile as your single player game to unlock it for purchase from Drebin.

Stealth Suit: Successfully complete the game without instigating an alert. Note: You can trigger a caution. Alternately, purchase it from Drebin for 5 million Drebin Points after starting another game session after completing the game.

Bonus face paint

Successfully complete the indicate task to unlock the corresponding face paint:

Big Boss: Get the Big Boss Emblem. When you wear this mask, it causes enemies near you to cower in fear and/or run away screaming.

Corpse: Use over 41 continues in a single playthrough.

Crying Wolf: Defeat Battle Beauty (human form) Crying Wolf by non-lethal means.

Drebin: Acquire and keep over 60 weapons.

FaceCamo: Defeat Battle Beauty Laughing Octopus. This mask functions like the OctoCamo suit, but just on your head.

Laughing Octopus: Defeat Battle Beauty (human form) Laughing Octopus by non-lethal means.

Successfully complete Act 3.

Otacon: Shock or run into Otacon at high speed with Metal Gear Mk. II during an interactive mission brief.

Raging Raven: Defeat Battle Beauty (human form) Raging Raven by non-lethal means.

Raiden A: Shock or run into Sunny at high speed with Metal Gear Mk. II during an interactive mission brief.

Raiden B: Shock or run into Naomi at high speed with Metal Gear Mk. II during an interactive mission brief.

Roy Campbell: Shock or run into Campbell at high speed with Metal Gear Mk. II during an interactive mission brief.

Screaming Mantis: Defeat Battle Beauty (human form) Screaming Mantis by non-lethal means.

Young Snake: Successfully complete Act 2.

Young Snake with bandanna: Successfully complete Act 2.

Bonus costumes

Successfully complete the indicate task to unlock the corresponding costume:

Altair's Rags (Assassin's Creed): Get the Assassin's Emblem.

Business Suit: Successfully complete the game.

Civilian clothes: Start the Eastern Europe level.

Corpse Camo: Have at least 51 continues in a single playthrough.

Metal Gear Solid optical camo: Successfully complete the game without going into alert phase. Alternately, purchase it from Drebin for 5 million Drebin Points after starting another game session after completing the game. This camo makes you completely invisible.

Middle East militia disguise: Go to the Middle East militia safe house.

South American militia disguise: Go to the South American cove valley village.

iPod songs

Successfully complete the indicated task to unlock the corresponding song on Snake's iPod. Certain songs have an additional secret effect when played during the game.

Beyond the Bounds: In Act 4: Shadow Moses - Tank Hangar, after power is restored, return to the upper catwalk, and explore all the rooms. This song increases stun damage done by Snake from non-lethal weapons.

Big Boss: Get the Big Boss Emblem. This song increases stun damage and Snake's accuracy.

Bio-hazard: In Act 3: Europe - Midtown, hold-up a resistance soldier and body search him. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to scream.

Boktai 2 Theme: During the Act 2 mission briefing, go upstairs in the Nomad.

Bon Dance: Found in Act 2: South America - Marketplace.

Destiny's Call: Received randomly from an allied or neutral militia or rebel soldier after Snake gives them a healing item. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to become enraged.

Flowing Destiny: In Act 4: Shadow Moses - Canyon, before leaving the canyon area, examine the rocky walls for a hole hiding the song. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to weep.

Inorino Uta: During the Act 1 mission briefing, go upstairs with the Mk II.

Level 3 Warning: Found in Act 1: Middle East - Advent Palace.

Lunar Knights Main Theme: During the Act 4 mission briefing, go upstairs in the Nomad.

Metal Gear 20 Years History - Part 2: Found in Act 4: Shadow Moses - Warhead Storage Building B2.

Metal Gear 20 Years History - Part 3: Found in Act 2: South America at the South America Confinement Facility in the room with beds inside the house.

Metal Gear Solid Main Theme (The Document Remix): Found in Act 5: Outer Heaven under the hatch to the left at the start of the area.

MGS 4 Love Theme/Action: Received randomly from an allied or neutral militia or rebel soldier after Snake gives them a healing item. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to weep.

On Alert: Found in Act 3: Europe - Midtown N Sector.

One Night in Neo Kobe City: Found in Act 3: Europe - Midtown; hold-up a PMC soldier.

Opening - Old L.A. 2040: In Act 4: Shadow Moses - Nuclear Warhead Storage B2, input "78925" into Otacon's lab computer. This song increases Snake's accuracy.

Policenauts Ending: In Act 4: Shadow Moses - Nuclear Warhead Storage B2, enter "13462" into Otacon's lab computer. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to fall asleep when touched.

Rock Me: In Act 2: South America - Confinement Facility, search the island in the south-eastern quadrant. This song increases the amount of life recovered from items and other means.

Sailor: In Act 2: South America - Vista Mansion, look between the east wall and a cargo container. This song increases the amount of life recovered from items and other means.

Shin Bokura No Taiyou Theme: During the Act 3 mission briefing, go upstairs in the Nomad.

Show Time: Received randomly from an allied or neutral militia or rebel soldier after Snake gives them a healing item. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to scream.

Snake Eater: Get all 40 game clear Emblems. This song increases the amount of life recovered from items and other means.

Subsistence: Play one game of Metal Gear Online, starting the match with at least two players. This song increases Snake's accuracy.

Test Subject's Duality: Found in Act 3: Europe - Midtown S Sector.

The Best Is Yet To Come: Found in Act 4: Shadow Moses - Snow Field just before the "Disc Change" Codec transmission.

The Essence Of Vince: Found in Act 3: Europe - Echo's Beacon.

The Fury: In Act 2: South America - Cove Valley Village, search inside the fire-ravaged house. This song causes soldiers held by Snake to become enraged.

Theme Of Solid Snake: Found in Act 1: Middle East - Millennium Park.

Theme Of Tara: Found in Act 1: Middle East - Militia Safehouse just before seeing the unmanned flying-bomber on the table.

Warhead Storage: Found in Act 4: Shadow Moses - Tank Hanger, upper floor ventilation shaft.

Yell (Dead Cell): Found in Act 4: Shadow Moses - Casting Facility North.

Zanzibarland Breeze: Found in Act 1: Middle East - Urban Ruins before the intermission sequences.

Emblems

Successfully complete the indicated task to unlock the corresponding Emblem:

Ant: Shake 50 enemies for items.

Assassin: Successfully complete the game with killing more than 50 enemies with the knife, having over 50 CQC holds, and getting discovered less than 25 times.

Bear: Choke 100 enemies to death.

Bee: Use the Scanning Plug S or Syringe on 50 enemies.

Big Boss: Successfully complete the game on the Boss Extreme difficulty without dying, instigating no alerts, killing no enemies (including Bosses), using no life recovery items, using no stealth suit or bandanna special items (can possess, but not activate), and with a completion time of less than 5 hours.

Blue Bird: Give friendly soldiers 50 items.

Centipede: Get fewer than 75 alert phases, fewer than 250 kills, and use over 25 continues.

Chicken: Get over 150 alert phases, over 500 kills, use over 50 continues, use over 50 recovery items, and complete the game in over 35 hours.

Cow: Activate over 100 alerts.

Crocodile: Have over 400 kills.

Eagle: Get 150 headshots.

Fox: Successfully complete the game on the Naked Normal or higher difficulty without dying, instigating no more than five alerts, killing no enemies (including Bosses), using no life recovery items, using no stealth suit or bandanna special items (can possess, but not activate), and with a completion time of less than 6 hours.

Fox Hound: Successfully complete the game on the Big Boss Hard or higher difficulty without dying, instigating no more than three alerts, killing no enemies (including Bosses), using no life recovery items, using no stealth suit or bandanna special items (can possess, but not activate), and with a completion time less than 5 hours and 30 minutes.

Frog: Dive or roll 200 times.

Gecko: Press against walls for a total of one hour.

Giant Panda: Successfully complete the game after 30 cumulative hours of game play.

Gibbon: Hold up 50 enemies.

Hawk: Be admired by 25 friendly soldiers.

Hog: Get 10 combat highs.

Hound: Successfully complete the game on the Naked Normal or higher difficulty without dying, instigating no more than three alerts, killing no enemies (including Bosses), using no life recovery items, using no stealth suit or bandanna special items (can possess, but not activate), and with a completion time less than 6 hours and 30 minutes.

Hyena: Pick up 400 dropped weapons.

Inch Worm: Crawl on the ground for a total of one hour.

Jaguar: Get over 76 alert phases, less than 250 kills, and less than 26 continues.

Leopard: Get over 76 alert phases, less than 250 kills, and at least 26 continues.

Little Gray: Collect all 69 weapons.

Lobster: Crouch for a total of 2 hours and 30 minutes.

Mantis: Use no continues, get no alerts, and have a completion time less than 5 hours.

Octopus: Get no alert phases.

Panther: Get over 76 alert phases, over 251 kills, and less than 26 continues.

Pig: Consume over 40 food items.

Pigeon: Have no kills.

Puma: Get over 76 alert phases, over 251 kills, and at least 26 continues.

Rabbit: Look at 100 Playboy pages.

Raven: Successfully complete the game in less than five hours.

Scarab: Perform 100 dive rolls.

Scorpion: Have less than 75 alert phases, less than 251 kills, and less than 26 continues.

Spider: Have less than 75 alert phases, at least 251 kills, and at least 26 continues.

Tarantula: Have less than 75 alert phases, at least 251 kills, and less than 26 continues.

Tortoise: Hide inside a cardboard box or drum barrel for at least one hour.

Wolf: Use no continues and no recovery items.

Bonus combat vests

Successfully complete the game to unlock new combat vests.

Big Boss Extreme mode

Successfully complete the game to unlock the Big Boss Extreme difficulty.

Replay bonus

Successfully complete the game, and save when prompted to create a cleared saved game file. Start another game session, encounter Mk II in Act 1, and load the cleared saved game file to get your Drebin Points, weapons, ammunition, items, and special items from your previous game.

Alternate ending

If you fight Mantis with a Sixaxis controller, the ending is different than if you were using a DualShock 3 controller.

Easy Drebin Points

First, acquire the drum can. You do this by finding the soldier that is hiding in the can and using it as a bathroom in Act 1: Middle East - Downtown. After that, go up ahead a few feet, where you will see three crates. When you have gone past them, you will see just two crates. You will also see about three rebel soldiers fighting. One is carrying an RPG and the other two have machine guns. They will die and respawn continuously. You will have a chance to pick up the RPG after the soldier has died three times. Do so because each RPG is worth 6,000 Drebin Points. The important thing is to stay anywhere behind the two crates, otherwise the trick will not work. Going further than the two crates will stop the respawning loop of the soldiers dying. The only way to get the RPG without breaking the respawning loop is to use the Mk II.

When you enter the first hangar in Shadow Moses (with all the mini-Gekkos inside), kill all of them, and proceed to the next area past the two large Gekkos outside. Once you get inside, turn around, and go back to the hangar. All the Gekkos should have respawned. You will get approximately 20,000 Drebin Points each time you clear the area, and the entire process takes about five minutes. There is a ration in the room on the other side of the railing when done on the "Naked Normal" difficulty. Do not forget to pick up the guns and kill the big Gekko outside the base on the other side as well as all the mini-Gekkos. The bandana is not required, but if you do not have it, you will use a lot of ammunition. The grenade launcher is recommended for taking out the mini-Gekkos quickly. Be careful with the grenade launcher as it has a slow reload time. If a Gekko gets too close, you will not be able to reload.

Cheaper Drebin prices

Set the PS3 system date to a Wednesday or Sunday, and Drebin will have cheaper prices. Additionally, all of Drebin's prices are cut by 50% during Act 5.

Easy Bandana and Stealth Suit

To unlock the Bandana and Stealth Suit easier, wait until Act 5 (Drebin's prices are 50% off) to get the items for 2.5 million Drebin Points each instead of the 5 million Drebin Points they normally each cost. -From: Dallas4life04

Extra battery

Save the game during Act 1. Go to the Mission Briefing screen, and select the saved game from Act 1. Press Square to control the Mk II while on the plane. Move the Mk II upstairs, and search for an extra battery. Collecting it will double the operating life of all battery-powered devices in the game.

Statue locations

The statues required to unlock the Solar Gun can be found at the following locations:

Frog: In Act 1: Middle East - Advent Palace garage, atop the Nomad vehicle.

Octopus: In Act 2: South America, in the Research Lab Boss room, upper right room.

Raven: In Act 3: Europe, on the top floor of the human phase of the Boss fight.

Wolf: In Act 4: Shadow Moses, behind Snake's starting spot in the human phase of the Boss fight.

Mantis: In Act 5: Outer Heaven, near the northern-most door during the human phase of the fight.

Audio flashbacks

Experience the following audio flashbacks to get 1,000 Drebin Points for some of them:

Find the crop circle near the river while tracking Naomi in Act 2 after the Laughing Octopus fight (flashback of the Colonel acting strangely in Metal Gear Solid 2).

Find the Hind (flashback of the end of the Hind confrontation).

The middle of the helipad (flashback of Hind D speech).

The small shack to the West of the area (flashback of "A surveillance camera?!").

Enter through either of the vents instead of the door (flashback Master Miller's introduction).

Stand near the tank hangar's door (flashback of Meryl's "Where I can see you" speech).

Stand in the decontamination room before the hallway to Otacon's office (flashback of Cyborg Ninja fighting Genome Soldiers).

Inside Otacon's lab (flashback of Grey Fox's introduction).

Stand in the filled-in trench leading up to the Comm Towers (flashback of Meryl telling Snake to continue without her).

Climb as far as you can up the Comm Tower nearest where you enter and walk around (flashback of beginning of the Hind confrontation).

In front of the other Comm Tower, facing the exit (flashback of Otacon's "What are you fighting for?" speech).

Stand near the door leading back to the room where you fought Vulcan Raven (flashback of Raven's final speech).

In Shadow Moses, near the elevator (flashback of Infiltration speech).

Return to the crashed Hind chopper after the Crying Wolf fight (flashback of Liquid Snake being shot down).

Aim the Mk.23 SOCOM while at Shadow Moses (Snake will say "Just like old times").

Move the camera view directly overhead and move around (Snake will say "Just like old times").

Control opening commercials

When starting a new game, you are shown two random commercials. You can change the channel by pressing Up and Down to get new commercials. There is also a Hideo 1 and Hideo 2 channel, which are like Video 1 and 2.

At the start of the game when the commercials are on, you can press X to cycle through different channels. You can see a segment where David Hayter is being interviewed wearing a Solid Eye.

Control intermission sequences

During an intermission sequence, press D-pad Up to zoom the camera in, then use the Right Analog-stick to pan the camera around. The harder you press Up, the more zoomed in the camera view. Also, some intermission sequences have prompts to see it through Snake's eyes by holding L1 (look for the icon at the top left of the screen) or view flashback images by repeatedly tapping X when a prompt appears (look for the icon at the top right of the screen). You can also pause an intermission sequence by pressing Start.

Intermission sequence extras

During the following intermission sequences, press L1 to see secret events:

Laughing Octopus: Laughing Octopus quickly leaps away outside the window during one of the L1 sequences when you first meet Naomi.

Naomi's chest: In Act 2, after Snake loses his Psyche when Namoi tells him how long he has, press L1 to look at her chest and recharge Snake's Psyche.

Naomi upskirt: In Act 2, when Snake's talking to Naomi and drops his cigarette, use the hidden L1 option to look up her skirt.

Psycho Mantis' ghost: During the first intermission sequence with Beauty and the Beast, after using the option to look through L1, look to the left to see the ghost of Psycho Mantis.

Sorrow: During the Psycho Mantis intermission sequence, keep L1 held. When Psycho Mantis disappears, you will hear Sorrow say something. Hold L1 (even though you are not prompted), and you will see Sorrow. Press X to start a flashback.

Listening to radio during briefings

During the mission briefings, touch the the radio on the table upstairs with the Mk II, and it will play music.

By switching the radio on and off in Act 4, you will get different songs, including a remixed version of the "Love Theme" from Super Smash Bros. Brawl and the ending theme from Policenauts.

Reset OctoCamo appearance

Shake the Sixaxis controller to return Snake's OctoCamo to its neutral (black and blue) appearance. Note: This can also be done during intermission sequences.

View motion capture actor

When a character is first introduced, press R2 to view that character's motion capture actor instead of his or her voice actor.

Reducing stress

Sit in a box to reduce stress faster.

Regaining Psyche

If something during an intermission sequences causes Snake's Psyche gauge to decrease, rapidly tap X to replenish it.

Regaining health and Psyche

To regain health and Psyche, hold X go into the prone position with no weapon equipped. Snake's health and Psyche gauges will begin to recover. This is useful when trying for a no rations/recovery items completion.

Switching stances faster

To switch between crawling and crouch-walking (and back) faster, move forward while pressing X. Use this trick to get prone behind cover quickly after crouch-walking past an enemy.

Easy hold-ups

Shoot the tranquilizer gun at your target. Get close to the sleeping target, and go into the crouch position. An icon will appear to wake the target up. Press [Action] to wake your target. When he or she is about to wake up, position yourself at either side or the back of the target. Aim your gun, and Snake should hold-up the target. This is an easy way to do CQC and knife kills if you want to get the Assassin's Creed Emblem and costume.

Shoot from inside a dumpster

There are dumpsters throughout the game which you can use to hide. Move in front of them, and press Triangle when the prompt appears. Once inside, if you have a handgun, The Operator for example, you can hold L1 to lift up the lid of the dumpster and aim your gun from inside.

Throw grenades underhanded

While throwing a grenade, lightly hold L1 (default [Aim]) instead of holding it down completely.

Ignored by PMCs

PMC soldiers will ignore you when wearing Otacon's or one of the Beauty's face paints if you are not attacking or displaying a weapon. This allows you to track the Resistance easier.

Faster iPod navigation

Instead of rotating the Right Analog-stick to control the iPod, use Triangle, Square, Circle, and X.

Secret ghost photographs

Equip the Sorrow Doll, and have the camera from the Nomad. You can use that camera to find thirty ghosts in Shadow Moses. After taking pictures of them, they can be viewed in the photo album with a new option. Note: The doll is only needed to see the ghosts prior to taking the photographs.

In Shadow Moses, when you return to Otacon's office to shut down security and turn on the power, take a photograph of the area to the left of the Policenauts poster. When viewed, there will be a superimposed image of Hideo Kojima's face.

Take a picture of the wolves after the Crying Wolf battle. Sniper Wolf's face will appear in the corner.

Secret Sunny and Naomi pictures

Do not pick up the camera during the briefing when it first becomes available. Wait until Act 4 to get the camera, and it will have some funny pictures of Naomi and Sunny playing around in the kitchen.

Hidden development team autographs

While tracking Naomi, get to where there is a PMC soldier standing next to a claymore. Move northeast from there to find a metal plate on the ground with signatures and handprints from the game's developers. Note: Lay down on it to get the handprint design for your camouflage. Register it to memory, and you can use it whenever desired.

Hidden crop circle

When you are tracking Naomi's footprints in Act 2 after the Laughing Octopus fight, you will arrive to a river. Instead of crossing the river, look to your left. You will see another set of footprints. Follow these, and they will lead you to a crop circle where you will hear some strange dialog by the Colonel about an alien abduction.

Vomiting Snake

If you kill a large enough number of enemies in a conflict zone, you will hear Liquid from Metal Gear Solid say "You enjoy all the killing, that's why!", and Snake will vomit. Note: You can delay the vomiting by hugging the wall. The next time you kill someone, however, it will happen again until you finally vomit.

Glowing eyes

Use the Solid Eye with the Raiden A mask to make Snake's eyes glow.

Posing as statues

In Act 1, go to the place with the two broken statues. Press Triangle to climb up on the empty statue pedestal in that area. Press Triangle again, and Snake will assume a statue position, and the OctoCamo will blend in. Keep pressing Triangle, and Snake will grab the crotch of the statue next to him and eventually break off that part of the statue.

Altair costume posture

When wearing the Altair costume after unlocking it, there are some changes Snake will make to his posture. First, he stands with his hands by his sides and outstretched just like Altair, as opposed to hanging down in front of him with his fists clenched. This change will only occur when you do not have a weapon equipped. Second, where Altair had the ring finger on his left hand missing, Snake bends his up to give a similar visual effect. He will even keep his finger bent during intermission sequences in which the costume you are currently wearing appears.

Beauty And The Beast preview

In Act 1, when in the underground hanger/cave, you can use the Mk II to listen to a wounded PMC soldier's conversation. He will talk about the Beauty And The Beast group before you actually meet them.

Posing Beauties

When fighting any of the Beauties, successfully complete the first Boss phase (Beast form). After that they will come out of their protective suit and try to grapple you. If you run around long enough and prolong the time (usually about five to ten minutes), the screen will fade, and you will enter a white area all alone with the Beauty. Note: A timer will appear at the top of the screen. She will attempt to grapple again. Simply equip the camera, aim it at her, and she will pose for you. Click the camera on and off to get various poses. Eventually the timer will run out (3:00), and the Beauty will die. This works well when you want a new background for your PlayStation 3 because the game allows you to take in-game photos and send them to your homepage.

Play the "Oishii ChuhanSeikatsu" Japanese pop song on your iPod while fighting a Beauty. She will start dancing. If you aim a camera at her, she will pose.

Beauties straddle Snake

During any of the Beauties battles, lie down, and they will straddle Snake, then he will knock them off.

Beauty And The Beast magazine models

You can buy a magazine with pictures of the models that the Beauty And The Beast unit were based on from Drebin.

Japanese models on TV

Flick the TV remote with the Mk II to get Japanese models to appear on the television.

Barely dressed women

Flick the remote for the screen Campbell talks to you on with the Mk II to see pictures of ladies in their underwear.

Naomi's cleavage

When Naomi is in the Nomad and on the computer talking, use the Mk II to look at Otacon's computer. His webcam is focused on Naomi's cleavage.

Alternate Rose's shirt

During the third playthrough of the game, when you first meet Rose she will be wearing a new shirt.

Shake Rose's breasts

When you speak with Rose on the Codec, shake the Sixaxis to make her breasts move.

Reading Playboy magazine

To look through the Playboy magazine, press R1, then go into first person view. Then, hold L1 and press Circle to go through the pages. If the game puts you in third person view, press Triangle to enter first person view to see the models.

Akina Minami posters

There are two posters of Akina Minami in the Vista mansion. Look at them in first person view, and Snake will say her name and his Psyche gauge will increase.

Clearing areas

Clear an area of all enemies in Act 1 or Act 2. All the allied soldiers will begin to cheer. No additional enemies will respawn in those areas if you return.

Keeping Meryl safe

While fighting Psycho Mantis, CQC Meryl, and inject her with the syringe to take her safely out of the fight. Note: Mantis might take control of her again after awhile.

Bypassing Gekkos

Shoot five tranquilizer rounds into the legs of a Gekko. It will collapse and thrash around on the floor. You can walk past without being spotted while that is happening.

Easy Gecko kill

When you are in the basement lab at Shadow Moses and the Gecko appears, send the Mk II to the electric console to the right of the elevator. Note: This is the same console that was destroyed with the rocket in the original Metal Gear Solid. Use the Mk II to reactivate the electric floor and destroy the Gecko.

Defeating Vamp

In the first part of the battle against Vamp, after you get his health low enough, he will fall down. As he gets up, grab him in a CQC hold, and inject him with the syringe that you obtained earlier. This will disable his Nanites and make him mortal.

You do not have to deplete Vamp's health before CQC grabbing him. Hide and sneak up behind him for a CQC.

Instead of depleting his life, use a tranquilizer gun and shoot his head. He will fall down, immediately giving you the chance for the CQC.

Rats

Crawl around the vents in Shadow Moses to encounter Rats. When they see Snake, "!" will appear above their heads, accompanied with a sound. They will run away. Keep chasing them, and they will repeat the "!" alert. Following the rats is a good way to get in. If you call Otacon after you see the rats, Snake will talk about them and how they helped him before.

Long game advisory

If you complete a chapter after 4 a.m., a message will come up during the install screen (Snake smoking), suggesting that you get up and do some stretches, and saying that you have been playing awhile.

Mystery man

When tailing a resistance member, if you look behind Snake, you will occasionally notice a man with a hat and trenchcoat also tailing him. This is how the Scarabs found the hideout. If you try to shoot him, he will duck away around the corner and disappear.

Feminine guile comments

Wear one of the Beauty's face paints in Act 3. The Resistance will ask Snake, "Hey, are you looking for a real man?" The vehicle patrols will also honk at you as they drive by.

Otacon comments

Call Otacon a few times in Shadow Moses at the part where Snake originally fought Vulcan Raven in the tank (and is now where two sleeping Geckos are found). Otacon will say that "Snake is the craziest bad ass who ever lived."

Otacon tech support

Try to access any feature that requires Internet connectivity while not connected. A chat menu featuring Otacon will appear, and he will try to give you technical support.

Naomi reflection

During the Act 5 mission briefing, immediately after Otacon lights Snake's cigarette, he adjusts his glasses. When he does this, you can see a reflection of Naomi on their lenses.

Dancing Sunny

Play the "Oishii ChuhanSeikatsu" Japanese pop song on Snake's iPod. During that song, press Start to see Sunny dancing at the bottom left corner.

Sunny's song

In Act 3, while you are trailing the Resistance member, listen to his whistle. It is what Sunny will hum during mission briefings.

Liquid Ocelot kiss

At the third part of the final fight, when Liquid Ocelot grabs Snake by the neck, allow the controller to idle. After some time, Liquid Ocelot will kiss Snake on the cheek.

Message from Liquid

In Act 5, if you die and wait an extended period to select "Continue" or "Exit", you will hear Liquid say "It's not over yet, brother!", and the "Exit" button will change to read "Exist". Using it will move your selection over to "Continue", but then you will have the option to exit again.

After death messages

After dying, call Rose to hear a conversation about Snake having dreams of being killed or a comment from Snake saying that he feels like he has died once before.

Controlling briefing projector

During the Act 5 mission briefing, use the Left Analog-stick to change the projection's height on the screen. This will make some of the attendees angry.

Trailing wolves

Tranq Crying Wolf, and the wolves in that area will follow you.

Attacking wolves

In Act 4, kill one of the wolves after you defeat Crying Wolf. The others will attack you. Call Otacon, and he will wince. Call Rose, and she will tell you that animal cruelty is the first sign of criminal behavior, and says that she will have you psychologically assessed if you continue to kill them.

FROG soldier reaction to searches

Hold up a FROG soldier, and body search them. When you would normally ball crush a male prisoner, they will say "You men are all the same", "You're disgusting!", or "Ugh" and kick you.

When you search a FROG soldier when they have no items, she will giggle as if ticklish.

When you search a FROG soldier and touch her chest, sometime she will moan or say "You're pretty good at this".

Militia soldier execution

Sneak through the first part after the opening, and go through the buildings. At the building to the right of where the APC shows up, crawl under the rubble. You will see a militia soldier get brutally shot after pleading for his life.

No smoking sign

Whenever Snake is smoking there is always a no smoking sign behind him.

Urination

When tracking Naomi in Act 2, look to the right when crossing the river to see a guard relieving himself.

Follow the resistance member in Act 3 to see him urinating in the fountain in the small park.

In the central park during Act 3, there is a statue that Snake can interact and imitate. Stay in that pose until a resistance member appears, and he will urinate on you.

Boktai: The Sun Is In Your Hands reference

There is a gun called the "Stun Gun" which is actually a reference to one of Hideo Kojima's older games, Boktai: The Sun Is In Your Hands for the Game Boy Advance. This is confirmed when Solid Snake raises the gun towards the sun to recharge and yells out "Sunlight", much like the main character did in Boktai.

Hideo Kojima references

After defeating Screaming Mantis and immediately after Psycho Mantis vibrates your controller, keep pressing X to see Hideo Kojima.

If you prolong the Psycho Mantis fight long enough, the game will show the opening screen, except the word "Kojima" will replace "Konami". The game will then resume the Psycho Mantis fight.

Press L1 to examine the .50 Cal Anti-Material Sniper Rifle to see "Recommended by Hideo Kojima."

When Snake hides from the two Irvings next to the box of watermelons, the box reads "No Place For Hideo."

You can see a ghost image of Hideo Kojima in Otacon's lab using the camera. It is between Policenauts and the poster that from a distance reads "Final Fantasy VI".

On the computer, the term "Video 2" is called "Hideo 2".

Lost reference

When the game first begins, the channels on the television are numbered 15, 16, 23, and 42, which are part of the number sequence from the television show Lost.

Lunar Knights reference

The monitor for the PC used by Sunny has a Lunar Knights screensaver.

Metal Gear Solid references

During the Act 1 FROG attack sequence, attack Meryl. She will say the same things she said when you attacked her in Metal Gear Solid.

The password Johnny puts in to disable the laser trip trap is "MERYL SILVERBURGH".

You fight Crying Wolf in the same area you fought Sniper Wolf.

You can find the Hind D still in the Snowfield where you fight Crying Wolf.

During the Mantis fight, switch your controller ports when your television switches to "Hideo 2". Otacon will come on the Codec and notify you that the trick does not work twice. You will also get a suggestion about destroying the bust.

When you die in Act 4, the "Game Over" music from the first Metal Gear Solid will play.

After you die during the final Boss battle and select "Exit", it quickly changes to "Exist". Liquid Ocelot says "Not yet Snake, it's not over yet" and it moves the pointer back to "Continue". This is a reference to a quote by Liquid in the original Metal Gear Solid.

Metal Gear Solid 2 reference

Call Rosemary with a ration equipped to see a reference to a sequence that happened in Metal Gear Solid 2, when Raiden calls Snake on the Codec with a ration equipped and comments about Rose's cooking.

Metal Gear Solid 3 reference

When Drebin and Little Grey jump off of the Stryker, they will land in Naked Snake's pose from Metal Gear Solid 3, when he first arrives for the Operation Virtuous mission.

Equip the Patriot gun to hear music from Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater.

Press L1 to view the description for the Mosin-Nagant. It mentions The End and his sniper duel with Big Boss.

Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes

If you stare at Meryl's breasts, she will blush similarly to how she did in Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes.

Metal Gear Solid series references

Look at the two puppets dangling from Screaming Mantis. The two puppets appear to be Psycho Mantis and The Sorrow from previous Metal Gear Solid games.

When Snake and Naomi talk about war changing and how it used to be "just a game", all of the Metal Gear Solid titles appear in an indexed list. After MGS4, there are a few boxes titled "In Production."

When you first enter Big Mama's hideout and the guards start talking about Snake, press L1 to see posters from Metal Gear Solid, Metal Gear Solid 2, Metal Gear Solid 3, and Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops.

In the Nomad briefing missions, take control of the Mk II, and go to the right of the helicopter. There are three separately caged chickens, each with its own label: "Solid", "Liquid", and "Solidus". This is a reference to the three Big Boss clones. A further reference to those chickens happens at the very beginning of Act 1 when Sunny is cooking eggs. She says "Only two eggs? Solidus must've taken the day off."

The rubber duck in the upper gantry of the Nomad can also be found in Capture The Flag mode in Metal Gear Online; in the GA-KO camouflage in Metal Gear Solid 3; and floating in the flooded Shell Core in Metal Gear Solid 2.

When you are in the final showdown with Liquid, when it enters the third stage of the fight, Liquid will do Ocelot's signature hand gesture.

Otacon has a model of Rex beside his computer.

Metal Gear Solid VR Missions reference

During a Codec transmission with Campbell, he will talk about the training PMC soldier's went through. Snake says similar to "...better than those VR missions".

The Naked Gun reference

Drebin sells laundered guns, called "Naked Guns". Drebin's name is a reference to Frank Drebin from The Naked Gun movies.

Policenauts reference

One of the backgrounds on Otacon's computer is a scene from Policenauts.

PlayStation 3 references

In the Act 1 briefing, there is a PS3 on the second floor of the plane.

During the Act 1 briefing, go upstairs on the Nomad to see Sunny unpacking her PS3 and PSP.

In the Act 2 briefing, there is a PlayStation 3 on the table.

After you defeat Crying Wolf in Act 4, Otacon will call you as you enter that building and tell you to change discs. He then catches himself and starts talking about Blu-Ray and the PlayStation 3.

When you send out the Mk 2, look over Snake's shoulder by tilting the camera. He is using a PlayStation 3 controller to control it.

Use the Codec to call Rose during the fight with Screaming Mantis. Campbell will tell you to switch controller ports. Rose will get angry and say there are not any controller ports because this is on a PlayStation 3.

If you use a Sixaxis controller against Psycho Mantis he says, "What? No vibration!" and the flashbacks show the Sixaxis.

PSP reference

During the Act 2 briefing, Sunny is playing a PSP. The game is Penguin Adventure, a 1986 title for the MSX computer system, which was Hideo Kojima's first game.

Snatchers reference

The suit Snake wears in Act 3 is a homage to Gillian Seed, from Snatchers.

The "Dr. Madnar" mentioned in Act 3 is a reference to a scientist from Snatchers.

Star Wars reference

In Shadow Moses when Snake is about to get on the lift to fight Vamp, watch as the camera circles around the lift area to see a Darth Vader helmet on the floor.

In the Act 5 briefing, while Mei Ling is explaining the situation to everyone she says something about it being an impenetrable fortress or something similar. Snake then says, "He has his very own Death Star."

World Of Warcraft

Leeroy Jenkins' grave can be seen directly behind Big Boss's. It will come into view when the camera pans around the area before Old Snake puts the gun into his mouth. You can also see it again while Old Snake is carrying Big Boss to The Boss' grave.

Zone Of The Enders reference

When you look at the briefing scene, Otacon's computer desktop picture is the main character from Zone Of The Enders, another game directed by Hideo Kojima.

Weapons list

The following weapons are available in the game:

Pistols

1911 Custom

Desert Eagle (originally used by Meryl)

Desert Eagle Long Barrel

Five Seven (gun used by Snake when he infiltrated Galuade)

Glock 18C

GSR (.45)

Mk 2 Pistol (Tanq)

Mk.23 SOCOM (Snake's main handgun from Metal Gear Solid)

Operator (Colt .45 with extended barrel)

PMM

PSS

Race Gun (fires ricochet bullets)

Solar Gun (causes enemies to drop weapons and does extreme damage to Vamp)

Thor .45-70 (rifle pistol)

Type 17 (broom handle machine pistol)

Sub-machine guns

Bizon

M-10

MP5sd2

Mp7

P90

Patriot (The Boss' weapon; has unlimited ammunition)

VZ. 83 Skorpion

Assault rifles

Ak102

An94

FAL Carbine

G3A3

M4 Custom

Mk.17

XM8

Sniper weapons

DSR-1

Heavy machine guns

HK21E

M14EBR

M60E4

M82A2

MK.46 Mod 1

Mosin-Nagant (The End's sniper rifle)

PKM

RAIL GUN

SVD

Tanegashima (old flint lock that is very slow to reload, 33% of hits causes a whirlwind that carries off enemies making them drop items)

VSS

Shotguns

M870 Custom

Saiga-12

Twin Barrel

Grenade launchers

MGL-140

XM25

Rocket launchers

Fim-92A (Stinger)

Javelin

M72A3

RPG-7

Weapon modifiers

Dot sights

Flashlights

Fore grips

Grenade launchers

Laser sights

Masterkey (under barrel shotgun for assault rifles)

Scopes

Suppressors

Others

Chaff grenade

Claymore

Grenade

Knife

Molotov cocktail

Sleeping gas mine

Sleep gas satchel charge

Smoke grenades (yellow, red, blue, green)

Stun grenade

White phosphorus grenade