Mercenaries 2: World in Flames

August 31,2008 - As the technology of games progresses, so does the desire to tell film-like stories that take games to more serious levels. While Mercenaries 2: World in Flames certainly keeps up with the next generation standard, it provides a lot of simplicity that makes a game fun. Of course, we’re talking of blowing everything you can to hell.

Throughout the bouts of potential massive destruction, the goal of Mercs 2 is to work for a faction to determine the fate of an oil-rich Venezuela in August 2010. After completing work for drug lord Ramon Solano, you are soon screwed over as Solano starts a coup that leaves him as the leader of Venezuela. Bent on revenge, you work with other factions around the country, including returning factions from the original game, to find Solano and make him pay.

The original mercenaries reprise their roles in this game, so you’ll have to choose from Mattias Nilsson, Chris Jacobs and Jennifer Mui. Their standout abilities have been changed around. Mattias can now stand up to more damage, especially when the health bar reads 2, Jacobs holds more ammunition, and Mui runs noticeably faster. Fiona also returns to help run your Private Military Company (PMC) out of a semi-destroyed mansion.

The PMC is a solid addition to the series. As you complete contracts for different factions, you’ll earn access to recruit three members: helicopter pilot Ewan, mechanic Eva, and jet pilot Mischa. Adding these people to your PMC will help you get around the map faster and pick up stacks of cash, oil and weapons. The potential problem with the latter is that if the goods belong to a faction, it will hurt your standing with them. If you don’t care, then prepare for a fight. Still, if you really need the equipment, you can always shoot the guy who tries to call you in.

One of the other big changes to the Mercs series is the open world map. It offers a greater sense of freedom despite not being able to go anywhere from the start. Landing zones, camps, and targets are spread around the Venezuelan map, so be prepared to go long distances to get around.

Speaking of targets, the Deck of 52 from the first game has been replaced by High Value Targets. Each faction has a specific number of targets in a general area that you will get paid to kill or capture. The tricky thing is that each target is a part of a different faction, so going after the HVTs will both hurt and help your standing with a particular faction.

Killing random members of opposing factions will also boost your standing, as will destroying targeted buildings occupied by Solano’s men. Everything becomes a little easier once you fill up your PMC. If you want to boost your standing faster, you’ll need to have Fiona pay off that faction or factions. It costs a lot, but it saves work when trying to advance the story.

There’s plenty of time to be spent in the game, too, and not just because it takes a while to get across the map. Each faction will have different tiered contracts for you to complete. For example, the Jamaican pirates will have you deliver rum to a specific location, and each level will prove to be increasingly difficult. You can go to a few different locations for each faction to gain new contracts.

However, some of it can creepy very close to being busy work, especially during the middle of the game when you need to complete more and more contracts. Mercs 2 definitely has its exciting moments, with plenty of fires, explosions and chaos. But sometimes general excitement is a bit too far between. The last fourth of the game, though, proves to be worthy enough.

And just like the first game, Mercs 2 isn’t without any sense of controversy. The Venezuelan government has claimed this game to a promotion of a United States invasion to overthrow their president, Hugo Chavez. We typically don’t get into politics much here in Gamer 2.0, but we have to touch on this. There is a way to twist the story to see that point, but the thing is, you do not have to work with the United States (or Allied Nations, as the series refers to it as). We won’t say too much as to avoid spoilers, but the game definitely is not propaganda to incite a U.S. invasion.

On the technical side of Mercs 2, it does a solid job. The graphics don’t completely stand out, but it has its high enough sense of detail. For example, when Mattias moves his head, his hair will shake in accordance. Explosions look good but sometimes the chaotic elements gets to be a bit much and it doesn’t look as good as it could. They do, however, sound kick ass. A majority of the voice acting is pretty good but the sayings of random characters gets slightly annoying.

The decision to use drop-in/drop-out co-op play was a good call, though you can only use co-op online. You go into a match through a Quick Match option or you can set it up to play with somebody more to your liking. The blacked-out “option” of using Venezuela as the map brings up thoughts of DLC.

So between all the destruction, Mercenaries 2 is a solid game that lives up to what it is suppose to be. But because of the dragged out middle section of the game, we aren’t going to recommend a buy here. The game is worth a rental and a purchase if you want to keep your destruction going. So if you’re looking for a fun game, check out Mercs 2.

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