Every soldier needs a war-buddy, a brother-in-arms to swap stories and watch his back when the situation gets hot. True camaraderie is an illusion in most shooters. Whether playing with a friend on the second controller or with a squad of chattering A.I.s, the extra firepower is a privilege, not a prerequisite. Army of Two is different, because it is built wholly around cooperative gameplay. Shanghai is in ruins. In a matter of minutes, the gleaming metropolis of glass-lined towers and decadent neon has been reduced to a maze of ashen derelicts by political militants. In an outlandish twist of fate, Salem and Rios appear to be the only capable men left standing. They are hulking war-machines of beef and testosterone, but smart enough to know that the lone wolf is doomed to an early death. Running and gunning is not an option, nor is there any reward for going home alone. As in the original game, Aggro is the fulcrum of teamwork. While one player draws enemy fire, the other flanks through the alley for a stealthy kill or slips behind the controls of a turret to give his partner breathing room to advance. It is possible to go solo with an A.I. teammate, but highly discouraged.
Despite the ability to issue orders to advance, hold, etc., the A.I. lacks the common sense to realize when a plan is failing, or that he shouldn’t stand his ground while bathing in a flamethrower’s inferno. Veterans of the original have always been divided on Back-to-Back; a slow-motion, 360-degree ballet of bullets reminiscent of the finale in Mr. & Mrs. Smith. Back-to-Back returns, but for better or worse, is limited to a handful of occasions. The tradeoff is a vast improvement to level-design that emphasizes teamwork at every turn. Many of the most powerful sequences are injected into the opening chapters, such as a skyscraper crumbling in half to reveal the night sky as you duke it out between the cubicles. 40th Day struggles to top itself from that point on, but even the more mundane level-designs sit among the upper-echelons of shooters. Although there is always a single path to the objective, each skirmish along the way presents a tactical playground of barriers, cars, corridors, and multi-storied buildings for outmaneuvering your adversaries.
Cover is the crux of survival and, despite their massive statures, Salem and Rios slide, vault, and sprint between obstructions with ease. In a pinch, they can tear the door from an electrical box or grab an opponent’s neck for a make-shift shield. With so much rubble littering the battlefield, it’s a shame that most of the enemies are content to find hiding spots and pop their heads up with methodical regularity. There’s room for ten players online and the emphasis on co-op remains, with systems in place for tracking your best partners and bitter rivals. Unfortunately, the scant six maps do little to impress. They are too claustrophobic and circular to be tactical, so that even if you kill one team, another is sure to respawn directly at your back. Extraction (available to non-pre-orders in February) pits four players against increasing waves of opponents and is the most entertaining mode. Sadly, none of your weapons from the campaign carry over to multiplayer and, as returning players know - weapon-customization is a major selling point of the previous Army of Two game.
Pistols got the shaft this time around, with only three main options, but any assault rifle, shotgun, or sniper rifle can be stripped-down and repurposed into an offensive wet dream. Is the stock M-14 too tame? You could attach the barrel of an AK-47, load up on ammo with a 100-round drum, jury-rig a bayonet from a screwdriver, and paint the contraption with zebra stripes for flair. Army of Two: The 40th Day is a slick-looking game. I mean that figuratively when referring to the detailed textures and slightly destructible environments, and literally when referring to characters drenched in baby oil-shine. While 40th Day isn’t intelligently provocative, unless hearing about Rios’ romantic rendezvous with a panda is somehow stimulating, the bro-factor has been drastically toned down to a tolerable level. Moral choices throughout the game add a little depth and possible rewards, but 40th Day rarely rises above the level of a summer blockbuster. That’s not necessarily a bad thing though. Army of Two: The 40th Day is a constant barrage of bullets and bloodshed from beginning to end, and the perfect excuse for a fist-bumping night of big explosions and even bigger guns.
