Army of Two: The 40th Day Review

Following up on 2008’s Army of Two, EA Montreal set out to up the ante. Released in the dead of winter, Army of Two: The 40th Day improves the core single player gameplay while ratcheting up the multi-player to compete with the likes of Gears of War 2. Still, co-operative action is the name of the game. It’s called Army of Two, afterall. Unless you have a friend to play with at home in split-screen or online, I’ll be upfront with you right now and say that this isn’t worth your time.

That being said, Army of Two: The 40th Day is a significant improvement upon its predecessor. The A.I. is vastly improved and some of the glitches that I saw in the first game don’t seem to be a problem anymore. There was one weird glitch that I ran into where after a cutscene, my friend who was on the same side of a wall as me all of a sudden was stuck on the other side of a locked door and could not get through. Aside from that, I really did not experience many problems.

This is a game of teamwork where the actions of your comrade can determine whether you live or die. Certainly this is a mixed blessing, depending on who you are playing with. Fortunately for you, if you have a gun crazy ally, the game will pull aggro on them and the enemies will start to target at the guy doing all of the firing. This plays strategically into your hands if say you want to pull out a sniper rifle and pick off a few of them. Other strategic moves you can make include taking an enemy hostage.

As far as the weapons go in Army of Two: The 40th Day, you have a pretty sizable number of variations to choose from. I was rather fond of the shotgun, although the P90 and sniper rifle come in handy as well. There are numerous customization options for you to choose, ranging from new scopes to larger clips. You can even change the color of your weapons with various skins, add silencers and stabbing devices like screwdrivers/bayonets.

The single-player is not all that satisfying if you play by yourself. This is probably the biggest flaw with the game, although it is rather clear that it is intended to be played with two people. There aren’t very many games that can demonstrate human-like reaction in their allied A.I. One of the biggest problems comes from the fact that you can’t coordinate simply by saying “pull aggro while I find myself a good sniper’s nest.” Having PSN and Xbox Live for online co-op is a great advantage.

In closing, Army of Two: The 40th Day is a solid sequel to a franchise that has a lot of potential. The gameplay mechanics feel a lot like Gears of War, except I would argue that it is more fun to play co-op in Army of Two. You feel like a team working together to achieve the same objective. The story is a bit out there, a terrorist group essentially levels Shanghai with explosives in buildings across the city, but the gameplay shines where it should. Definitely check this out if you have a fix for some co-op action.