Coded Arms

"At Last a Good FPS for the PSP"

Graphics - pretty darn good. The 1st areas look like simple tunnels in a metallic warehouse, but over time different, fresh-looking areas open. Enemies all look nice, and have some smooth animation for the most part. The game is supposed to take place inside a hacked computer, and the menus and text are all designed well to make it really feel like that. Each room often is a very square design, but there are oddities and extra background features, and most levels have branching paths to go down.

Sound - solid, action sounds, good 3D sfx, some interesting background noises. The music comes in and out and volume changes to fit very well with the action.

Controls - with a few minor tweaks, they are actually quite good. Bump up the responsiveness and it controls a lot like many XBox FPS even without a 2nd analog. Very easy to move around. Using the analog nub to move and square-circle-triangle-x to look is the best method.

Gameplay - This is a a fast moving, easy to play FPS. Slowdown is rare, and backgrounds and enemies all go by at a respectable framerate. Selecting weapons and looking around are easy, so you won't be bogged down by cumbersome controls. Your character walks a tad on the slow side, but you can still dodge missiles if you time it right, and strafing is just as easy as you'd expect in a modern FPS. The enemy AI is good ... different kinds of enemies choose different tactics - some rush to get into melee, while rifle toting enemies will walk around cover to get a better shot. Other enemies will approach when they know an ally has you pinned down, showing some intelligence. And tough enemies seem to know they're tough, so they'll rush in to attack while weaker characters snipe from a distance. But there are some obvious flaws, ie the flamethrower guy who'll start shooting at you when you're not in range, and you can just kill him through his wall of fire.

Difficulty - fairly easy to begin with, with some areas where enemies are beamed in adding a lot of challenge. The AI opponents aim well if you let them, and attack aggressively. My 1 beef is that enemies don't seem to want to open doors, so it's sometimes too easy to run away.

Neat Stuff - good explosions, a lot of destructable background items, some moving elevators, and tons of upgrades and items. It appears there are 23 guns, 10 grenades, and 18 defensive items. You can only carry 5 guns at once - but by pressing start you can boot-up saved weapons you've unlocked at any time. Your character can also find chips to make every gun better, and can get permanent health boosts, and invincibility and other power boosts. But the best, neatest feature is the rez-in effect. Enemies are all programs summoned to get you, and when you enter into new areas, whole rooms and enemies appear as wire-frame models and zoosh into full resolution in less than a second. Very neat.

Load times - very fast. Startup of the game takes not much time at all, and loading between main levels under a minute.

Complaints - no load option in game, only from the main menu. Grenades must be selected, which seems lame after playing Halo type games. No infrastructure mode.

Overall - a very solid FPS. This game, more than any other PSP game I've tried so far, FEELS like a full, complete game. It has tons of stuff to find and unlock, a big single player mode, and lots of things to do in multiplayer.

Buy it.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 06/27/05