Army of Two: The 40th Day - Page 2

Having not played the multiplayer at all on the original since it was so amazingly frustrating to find a game, I can't really ask any good questions. They'd be hitting the obvious one of not having the matchmaking suck ass (especially when you've got a buddy you want to have on your team).

Any chance of matches with 4 teams of 2 or that kind of thing?

Just saw on Kotaku that the demo for this (the first level) is supposed to come out Thursday (for PS3 and 360).

Any more impressions of the game before then?

Was just trying to mess around with the mask creator when I realized that I've got two separate EA online accounts (one that is linked to my XBL account and one to my PSN/PC account). Didn't we learn anything from the Konami ID debacle on the PS3?

Yeah, my buddy who I played through the first one with twice came over and we tried it out split-screen. The obvious annoyance this time being that we couldn't do split screen vertical, we had to do it side by side. I get really annoyed when the screen is that narrow but it was still pretty fun.

There are still frustrating canned animations that happen when you start to heal your teammate (sometimes you'll stand up and get shot before you start healing, or move to a different position to start dragging and end up dying). Plus, it still has the same issue where some checkpoints force you to watch the same cutscene repeatedly if you die.

That said, the weapon customization seems pretty cool and the co-op tactics seem a bit more organic. It's improved enough that I'll be buying it day one.

This was all played on the 360 demo though, I'm downloading the PS3 version to give that a shot as well. Just to see if there are any big differences. The important thing was that I was still able to pimp my gun and do all sorts of stuff.

It is kind of obvious that the 2 main characters have almost completely different personalities this time.

Yeah, played this again over the weekend (this time on the PS3) and I have to say that one really frustrating thing is that they switch what is Bumper/Trigger on the 360 version with Shoulder 2/1 on the PS3 and there is no way to reverse it. Being forced to use L1/R1 for firing is pretty inexcusable.

I long for the day that a console maker requires the ability to completely customize controls be present on every game released.

Some other things I didn't mention ... when playing split-screen only one player can customize a weapon at a time. That means the other player is sitting there with nothing to do. It would have been nice if they'd made it so both players could customize their weapons simultaneously (if playing online this isn't an issue).

When I wasn't playing split screen I actually felt like the gun was less accurate. I have to wonder if they increase aim-assist or something for split-screen. It's hard to tell since I'm not sure if I customized my weapon the same way the different times (and the demo doesn't save that stuff).

I think I might actually not have a lot of time to play this in January/February so I might hold off and see if I can get it for cheaper in a few months. Especially since Mass Effect 2 comes out just 2 weeks later.

Yeah, it should be arriving tomorrow from Amazon. Multiplayer looks good and I'm hoping the matches are easier to get into this time.

For the enemies shooting through walls, I was under the impression that they were doing some sort of material modeling where bullets pass through bullet penetrable stuff.

This way one player could tag enemies from a different vantage point and the other coudl shoot them through the wall.

Yep, that sounds like a pretty annoying glitch.

ETA: If the story is heavy handed and overwrought enough it might circle around back to entertaining.

Yeah, in the demo there's no way to play it single player.

Ok, so I played about 1 1/2 hours yesterday and so far it's been pretty fun. The increased verticality of the early levels has been interesting. I'm not really sure how far I am into the game.

It's been interesting because my friend and I are trying to play through the game as the biggest assholes we can but saving civilians earns you money and we want to upgrade our weapons. Speaking of which, there seems to be tons of stuff scattered about on on levels that you can pick up for improving your weapons. Annoyingly though, if you upgrade your weapon before a checkpoint and then die, all of your weapon changes are lost. It makes you sit there and think twice before you spend time tweaking your stuff.

I haven't tried the non-campaign multiplayer yet but will hopefully do more of that going forward. Unfortunately I'm in the process of getting ready to move and I'm afraid I won't have time to really get serious time with this game until sometime in February (especially with ME2 coming out as well).

Glad you bumped this, I had been wanting to post my impressions as I play through.

Re: the first game. The alternate ending final boss (available via DLC for free) is a much better end fight for the first game. The mods on the secondary weapons in this one are pretty limited and your secondary weapon selection is much smaller than before.

I have not yet completed my first playthrough of the 40th Day (although I've played through the first 70% twice with two different friends) and some of the stuff that frustrated me about the first game is still there. The biggest two are context sensitive melee and weird animations when trying to heal your partner that result in the person doing the healing getting unnecessarily shot. The weapon customization is much more interesting though (the pimped guns are less cool though). The custom masks are nice as well.

I am still just really enjoying playing the campaign though and would gladly play through it a few more times. The morality choices are kind of stupid and the bromance stuff is not particularly well implemented or anything.

The biggest issue I have with the game is the loss of any weapon changes you make before hitting a checkpoint. In the original you could sit around and customize your weapon out of game and save it. In this one, weapon customization is only available in game and if you do it at the start of an area or really just any time before getting to the next checkpoint and you die, all of that is lost.

I've wasted 10 minutes playing around with guns trying to figure out what I wanted to use and then play for 5 minutes and get killed only to have all that effort lost. I can understand WHY they might do that but it doesn't make it any less frustrating. Now it's gotten to the point where I don't upgrade my guns until it feels like I'm right before a checkpoint. Same with any sort of buddy high-fiving relationship stuff. There are achievements for beating the game with various stats but when you spend 5 minutes hugging each other and snuggling and then have all of that lost because a guy with a flamethrower murdered you right before a checkpoint, it's a bit annoying.

Haha, I let him live and it was hilarious. Much better than letting the security guard live (or the merc who is helping you at the beginning).

So I've been trying to play this with 2 friends via co-op and the past couple nights I've just been getting disconnected like crazy. Worse though, since it's not drop-in/drop-out you have to restart from a checkpoint every time that happens. It's especially annoying since my friend and I are usually in a party and are able to stay connected and talking as it happens.

What's worse is that all the random game disconnects often end up crashing the system and I then have to reboot. I had to restart the system twice yesterday, and quit to the dashboard once. If I didn't enjoy the game so much (and now that I have that crazy auto shotgun I am definitely enjoying it) I'd be even more annoyed.

As you get further in the game the graphics may impress you a bit more. I found the zoo to look pretty amazing. I'm still not quite finished with the game (although I've now played through even more of it with 2 different people) but we're all distracted by Mass Effect 2 at the moment.

I'm sure we'll get back to this in a week or two.

You get a slight bonus for having stuff from the first game. Some earlier unlocked weapons or something. I actually love the ridiculousness of the first game so much that I might recommend its co-op campaign over the sequel.

Just finally finished up the campaign for this a few days ago. Definitely a bit disappointed in the ending. It's kind of hilarious that there is basically no plot in the game.

Anyway, still psyched to see that some new campaign DLC (unfortunately still set in Shanghai) is coming out in April.