"Disappointing."

Introduction

One game that I decided to purchase in my return to gameplaying was X Squad, released by Electronic Arts. Now that I have basically played through the game, I would say that it is only worth buying if you can find it for cheap like I did in the used bin at my local EB. I say this because the game becomes quite repetitive after a while because you're basically doing the same thing (Shooting baddies and unlocking doors) the entire time, the graphics are bland for a next generation system, (This game could have been ported to the original PlayStation with little trouble)and the sound is a mixed bag, with the voice acting and effects being okay and the music being incredibly annoying and repetitive.

It's the year 2037, and a deadly plague has spread across your city. As part of a special operations team, you and your squad must enter deep into the city and save a group of scientists held hostage by a group of bio-terrorists.

Gameplay

The setup for X Squad is that you are the head of an anti terrorist group who's mission is to rescue hostages and a high profile scientist from the clutches of evil terrorists (Is there any other kind?). That is really the extent of the plot with much of it being laid out in the opening cinema and not advanced much beyond the aforementioned cinema. Needless to say, character development is at a minimum. You, the player, then must advance through level after level where you shoot at countless baddies in third person view with whatever weapon you have at that point. You are given infinite ammo for your base gun (The one you start with) and can acquire assorted weapons such as a machine gun and a multi-barrel machine gun (Oh the variety). The enemies you encounter are often quite easily dispatched because your guns automatically lock on so it takes much of the challenge out of playing. The art of finding key cards and flipping switches is often made more difficult than it should be because rooms are usually hidden behind some object and therefore are easy to miss. At times, it can become quite frustrating when you are unable to progress because you missed a room way back in the level because of it being hidden. The camera also causes some issues because you have to manually control it with the right joy stick instead of it being somewhat helped along by the game having input on the placement of it.
The game does attempt to differentiate itself from other third person shooters by allowing you to have teammates that you can issue commands such as Assault (Gun blazing) or Stealth (Sneaky sneaky) but this is better on paper than it plays in the game. The reason is that it is quite often that the commands will cause your comrades to run repeatedly into a wall instead of being of use to you. In the end, X Squad features gameplay that is fun in short spurts but it becomes readily apparent rather quickly that there really isn't much to the game other than killing countless enemies and opening doors.

Graphics

The graphics are, on the whole, rather disappointing for a PS2 game. First for the good. The cinemas (however few there are) are nicely rendered and rather cool in execution. The game engine thankfully doesn't suffer too much from slow down, even when there are many characters on screen. Unfortunately, the in-game graphics are not nearly as solid. The characters are bland and mannequin-like in appearance. They are devoid of much detail and are often stiffly animated when moving. The environments are also similarly deficient. They are so dark and ugly, fixed with the same dark green or brown textures that every area soon looks similar to one another.

Sound

The sound is more bad than good. The effects are actually quite nice. So is the voice acting. The problem is, that the music is so excruciatingly terrible, that it cancels out the rest. It is really just one so called hip techno beat played ad nauseum that gets on your nerves within seconds of having to endure it. I was tempted to put the game on mute just so I wouldn't have to listen to it anymore. Furthering the negativity, the music never stops, it's always present in the background.

Conclusion

I would suggest that you only buy this game if you can find it on the cheap and if you're looking for a short game that you don't expect much from.

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 04/18/06