Blazing Angels (Xbox)

To say that the Blazing Angels we played last year had "changed" would be a major understatement. The beta code we sampled in 2005 is so far removed from what Blazing Angels now is that it's virtually a whole new game. The extra month's development time have been put to good use by Ubisoft's Romanian team, adding in a slew of new visual features, tightening the controls and gameplay, and of course whipping up an Xbox 360 version of the game!

Blazing Angels has been described as the Brothers In Arms of the skies, and apt analogy for a squad-based, story-driven experience set in the 2nd World War. While we didn't get to see the squad commands in action, the game drips with historical authenticity. And while it's not quite as detailed as Gearbox's research for BIA, everything is in its place geographically, and the planes look great.

We spent an hour with the game's campaign mode, starting from scratch with the tutorial mode. The control-scheme is really intuitive- anyone who has played an Xbox game should find Blazing Angels to pretty much be a pick-up-and-play affair. The coolest new addition is the cinematic lock-on feature. In keeping with the period piece gameplay, Ubisoft were well aware that any sort of modern-day lock-on targeting would be anachronistic and unrealistic, so they've opted for more of an eyes-on approach. Selecting a target with focus the camera's "eye" on the object of your attention, and your plane will change course and controls accordingly. It's similar to riding a bike: you tend to naturally move in whatever direction your head is facing.

The new style of lock-on will be a love/hate feature for some gamers without a doubt, but it certainly fits the context of the game better, at least historically. It also means that if you want better control over your aircraft, you'll need to break lock and focus on flying, just like a real pilot would. Not only that, the aerial acrobatics are borderline nauseating as you bank, roll and pitch like crazy and the world goes topsy-turvy.

Luckily the game starts you off slow with a bit of basic training and a few simple encounters, but from there you'll start progressing through some of the key aerial encounters of the Second World War. Much like Brothers In Arms, the story plays a pretty big part in the gameplay here, and we hope our squad-mates are as lively and useful here. At any rate, we can't wait to strap into the cockpit and take to the skies of Blazing Angels!

Blazing Angels (Xbox 360)

If the most recent build of Blazing Angels on the Xbox was world's apart from the preview code we sampled last year, then the Xbox 360 equivalent is in another galaxy altogether! Although unlike Far Cry and Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter, the difference here is largely cosmetic. Of course this is in part to the joys of HD resolutions like 720p and 1080i that normal Xbox owners in Australia simply won't get. Yet there's a host of other visual and performance enhancements designed to take advantage of the more powerful Xbox 360 hardware: higher resolution textures, anti-aliasing, and more detail on the ground. Fly low over Pearl Harbour and you'll see hordes of terrified people running for cover, vehicles speeding along trying to find safety, and even other aircraft scrambling to get into the air. The smoke and explosions look even better than on Xbox- fly through the thick black smoke and the world takes on an eerie sepia hue, for example.

Another cool feature is the blackout effect- as mentioned in our Xbox hands-on, the lock-on mechanism is designed to mimic a real pilot's efforts to keep his eyes on his quarry, and the physiological effect of this on the player can be quite dizzying. Ubisoft decided to go one step further and build this into the game as well: stay locked on for too long and the screen will start to fade and darkness will creep into the corners of your vision, simulating the real-life blackout effect pilots would have encountered. This should make some incredibly tense battles, and from our brief hands-on, we couldn't spot any framerate issues, which is just as well; this baby should purr on the Xbox 360!

Dollar-for-dollar: The Xbox exclusivity means that Blazing Angels should handle itself like a pro on the big black box, and everything we've seen so far confirms that hypothesis. Call us shallow though- the Xbox 360 version just looks so damn nice that it's hard not to recommend it solely based on the eyecandy! Still, if you're light on coin, the Xbox version will definitely suit your needs and as far as we know you won't be missing out on any extra features.

Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter (Xbox 360)

The original Ghost Recon was a pretty hardcore gaming experience- your average punter couldn't just sit down and get right into it, particularly if they were coming off a Halo high with its recharging shields and crazy physics. Much like they did with the Rainbow Six series, Ubisoft approached their follow-up with a little less realistic vigour; Ghost Recon 2 was still bloody tough, but it was a lot more forgiving, and- at the risk of offending the die-hard fans- we'd have to say a little bit more fun as a result. Now with the third iteration, Ubisoft have taken the best of both worlds, thrown in an experience worthy of a blockbuster film, and called it Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter.

Yes, it sounds kind of silly, but the suite of Advanced Warfighter features that were introduced to players in Ghost Recon 2 are the central theme and the key to survival in the latest game. It's hard to describe just how cool it is to get your squad-mate's battlefield perspective relayed straight into your HUD, or shooting around a corner without so much as exposing a hair on your head to do so. But more on that later!

We were lucky enough to play through the first 3 missions during our latest trip to Ubisoft's Sydney office, and we were blown away by what we saw. Any doubts we may have had about this game during its early stages and interface changes were laid to rest the minute the tutorial loaded. To begin with, it literally looks like a big budget, Jerry Bruckheimer/Michael Bay production- the visuals are simply stunning. The first time you fly over Mexico City is reminiscent of ‘Black Hawk Down', so detailed and realistic is the sprawling metropolis beneath your feet. That's awe-inspiring enough, but when you seamlessly transition down to the ground and start exploring the warren of alleys and buildings you were just looking at from afar, well, it's one of those moments of pure gaming bliss.

Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter puts you in the camouflaged boots of Captain Scott Mitchell, who is, not surprisingly, a member of the elite Ghost light-infantry squadron. In typical Tom Clancy tradition, there's a backstory filled with political intrigue, military misbehaviour and all his other storytelling staples, but as is typical for Ubisoft, this doesn't overshadow the game, and players who just want to get down to business can certainly do so. Still, we found the story to be quite enjoyable as we were playing, and it's always nice to know *why* you're rescuing a president!

Although first-person perspective is included, you really need to be in third-person to fully appreciate Captain Mitchell's skills and abilities. While running at full pelt, clicking down the thumbstick once or holding it down will allow you to execute a slide or dive into the prone position, weapon at the ready! Ditto taking cover, which allows you to see your surrounds in relative safety, as well as lean around corners for a better view. The control-scheme is quite complicated at first, no doubt a legacy from the PC incarnation, but after an hour we were pretty comfortable with things. Before long, you'll have mastered the context-sensitive functions, and be fluent in the quick menus for your weapons and abilities.

The abilities are pretty damn cool too- call in a UAV drone and send it to scout ahead, its camera fed directly into your own helmet, or activate an alternate vision mode that is somewhere between thermal and night-vision to help seek out hostiles. Yes, there's a pretty severe learning curve, especially when it comes to managing your squad-mates, but boy is it rewarding when you finally execute your plans with military precision. Speaking of your squad-mates, not only can you select their weapon loadouts for them, but you will get the chance to command armoured support in some missions, which is even more fun than it sounds. There's an almost Full Spectrum Warrior vibe at times, only a helluva lot better looking, and fully interactive. Pinning down some baddies with your armour and then sweeping behind them with your squad is incredibly satisfying.

Also satisfying is the interactivity found within Mexico City... it's not quite Black in terms of terrain deformation and destruction, but windows will shatter, vehicles will explode as will other things, but we'll leave that up to you to discover! But it's the little touches you notice... shoot a vehicle's tyre and it deflates- nothing new there, but if you shoot at the axle or the suspension, the whole wheel will just fly off! The game is populated with details like this that go a long way to immersing you in the stressful situation in Mexico city.

While the bulk of our time was spent with the stellar singleplayer experience, we had a quick go with the multiplayer features, specifically the co-operative play. Unlike the previous games that allowed two to play through the solo campaign, Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter takes a leaf out of Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory's book by including a separate set of maps designed specifically for co-operative play. These are of course available on Xbox Live, as well as Split-screen, which is great for those of you who may have a spiffy TV but still no broadband! Finding your groove and communicating with a mate is possibly even more enjoyable than the singleplayer campaign, thanks to the well-designed missions with multiple paths to victory. As if that wasn't enough, co-op is customisable and supports up to 16 players, which means it should keep you going for ages!

If that still isn't enough, there's a full range of multiplayer features for the more adversarially-inclined…free for all, team-play, elimination, territory, objective, there's stacks of variety, and with the totally customisable game modes, Ubisoft reckon there's around a thousand ways to play, and we aren't about to argue!

Dollar-for-dollar: Although we didn't get a chance to play the Xbox version of Ghost Recon: Advanced Warfighter, there's no contest- if you want the ultimate experience, you *have* to go for the Xbox 360 version. The Xbox version is heavily modified for the older hardware, and while the story and structure is similar, the scale and scope that the 360 allows for simply isn't present. If there's one game worth shelling out the extra clams for on 360, this is it folks!

Article by Dominic Rozenberg