Army of Two: The 40th Day improves upon its successor, but by how much?
Outside of Final Fantasy XIII, t’s been an EA month of gaming for me these past several weeks. I’ve played through Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Dante’s Inferno, Army of Two: The 40th Day, and now I’m getting into Mass Effect 2. Fresh off my mediocre time with Dante’s Inferno, I decided to plow through Army of Two: The 40th Day since I had a feeling I wouldn’t be holding onto either game much longer. If you remember my review of the first, I thought it was a relatively decent title, as it presented an interesting aggro mechanic but it was far too short. The second one continues the primary mechanics of the first, but also includes some improvements. Are they enough to make the sequel enjoyable and necessary?
The Rundown
Since Army of Two: The 40th Day is the sequel to the first, I’m not going to spend too much time talking about the premise and gameplay that I wrote about in my original review. Check that out if you’re curious about what the Army of Two franchise is all about. Here’s my quick summary of the sequel: “Army of Two: The 40th Day is about two mercenaries in Shanghai that have to clear through baddies while managing an aggro meter between the two.” That’s really all you really need to know to enjoy the game. You don’t even need to have played through the first really. The storyline is throwaway and stupid, but the game is still an enjoyable co-op and single-player shooter.
Improvements Over the First
Army of Two: the 40th Day introduces several improvements over the first. Some of the minor ones include the removal of having to use any vehicles (unlike the first), better and more intuitive weapon customization, a GPS that gives you the path you need to take if you get lost as well as the ability to tag enemies for your partner to be made aware of.
The first of the more notable improvements is how much better the AI is. While Army of Two: The 40th Day is a co-op game and is best enjoyed that way, I played through it solo and still had a good time with the AI. Unlike my frustration with the Resident Evil 5 AI, Army of Two: TFD’s AI is a beast. Sometimes I struggled to get as many kills as it did, so the AI partner more than carries its weight in this game. It’s odd because in most shooter games, I always feel like the AI doesn’t really do anything but just hang out. It’s like their damage is reduced to a minor fraction and you have to get all the kills. Not so in Army of Two: TFD – I was competing with the AI throughout all the levels over who could get more kills. It’s been years since I played the first so I don’t quite remember how to handle the AI then, but it’s quite intuitive in the sequel. The d-pad allows you to control your AI through three commands: the left button tells the AI to stay near you, the up button tells the AI to advance, and the right button tells the AI to hold position. Hitting any direction button again toggles the AI from not raising aggro to raising aggro. Thus, playing with the AI is effective as it’s a killing machine and the level of control you have over it works quite well.
Next up among the notable improvements is the introduction of morality. I remember when cmfl3x and I discussed morality in games, and how some, such as Fable II tried to address it, but ultimately failed. Army of Two: TFD actually does a suprisingly good job about it. Within each of the game’s level’s, a morality choice shows up and depending on the action you pick, you might get a weapon or money and you also view a short storyline of what happens as a result of your choice. What’s pretty interesting is that some of the choices that you think were the “right choice” end up being worse afterwards, so the line between right and wrong is somewhat muddled and it’s neat to see what transpires because of your choice.
Army of Two: TFD also uses civilians perhaps more than any other shooter game I’ve played in recent memory, as it introduces hostages. Throughout several of the game’s levels, you’ll come across times when the baddies are holding people hostage, and you have to take matters into your own hands to free the hostages if you desire. Clean takedowns will result in no one getting killed, while messier ones will involve the terrorists using the hostages as shields or even simply executing them before you can save them. Unlike Modern Warfare 2, you don’t get a game over if the hostages are executed.
Finally, the last major improvement to Army of Two: TFD is its multiplayer. In the original game, the multiplayer was always 2v2 based, and therefore it was very limiting. Even the servers were terrible – I remembered that when you played a in a 2v2 game, if any player left the game, the game would end. Talk about ridiculous. Army of Two: TFD’s multiplayer does a much better job this time around, and has come around to offering similar modes to the better shooters out there. Wisely enough, every adversarial mode in Army of Two: TFD now has up to 10 or 12 players per game. Modes include Co-op Deathmatch, which pits 5 pairs of partners up in a free-for-all deathmatch game, Control, which pits two teams of six against each other trying to hold onto a zone of a map, and Warzone, which has two teams of 4 playing through various gametypes each round such as one side placing a bomb, one side has VIPs that the other side has to kill etc. Army of Two: TFD also introduces a 4-player co-op mode Extraction, which is quite similar to Halo: ODST’s Firefight mode and Gears of War 2′s Horde mode. All in all, the multiplayer options are certainly more varied this time around than the first, but sadly, not many people are playing the game. I was playing on Saturday afternoon this past weekend and the number of gamers playing multiplayer at that time was a little less than 300. While Army of Two: TFD’s multiplayer is better than the first, it doesn’t really have anything that you can’t get better elsewhere.
Problems that Still Persist
There are two major problems I have with Army of Two: The 40th Day. The first problem is that somehow the developers have chosen to implement even more collectibles that you have to worry about in the sequel. Instead of just the briefcases in the first game, in the second one you have to worry about shooting Chinese lucky cat statues, collecting radios, and finding custom weapon parts. What happened to the good old days when you could just play a shooter as a shooter rather than an Easter Egg hunt?
The second issue I have is a lot more severe than the extra collectibles, and perhaps the biggest problem I have with the game. The campaign is 5 hours long. The demo to the game was basically the first chapter of the game, so I was surprised that the game itself was only seven chapters long. Talk about a sizeable demo then! In any case, it’s quite short. This was one of my major complaints of the first game, and it doesn’t look like the developers fixed that aspect of the game. Maybe the developers felt that by including better multiplayer this time around, the campaign could still be short. After all, isn’t that what games like Modern Warfare 2 did? Unfortunately, people buy Modern Warfare 2 for its multiplayer. (It also happens to have an amazing campaign, even it is a bit short.) People are not (and should not) buying Army of Two: TFD for its multiplayer. You buy an Army of Two game because of the interesting aggro mechanic that the game contains in its campaign. I could play any of Army of Two: TFD’s multiplayer modes elsewhere and enjoy them more.
Final Thoughts
Army of Two: The 40th Day is an enjoyable game and brings a few improvements to the series. Unfortunately, it is far too short to be a $60 title. If you and a buddy can pick the game up cheap or rent it, it’s worth it to go through. It’s even enjoyable to go through alone, as the mechanics behind the game are sound and the AI partner is more than agreeable to play with. Just be aware that you may be done with the game in 6 hours. Whereas I wanted my time with Dante’s Inferno to end as I continued to play through it, I was actually disappointed that Army of Two: TFD ended so soon. A doubling of the game’s length would have definitely raised its score for me as it didn’t seem like the game had enough scope and could have been a lot longer.
Final Score: B-
