Fighting Force 2

Release Date: November 30, 1999

"It’s not really a sequel. It’s something completely different..."

Hawk Mason, one of the original Fighting Force, is apparently no longer content with spending his weekends beating people up with baseball bats and iron bars. He’s now a government agent, which basically means he can spend his time beating people up with guns and gadgets instead.

Starting the game with only a few knives and grenades, you have to rely on hand-to-hand combat to deal with the first few bad guys. The controls are easy to pick up, but you’ll instantly realise that the combat system is deeply flawed. When you’re outnumbered, which given that you’re on your own is most of the time, it’s incredibly difficult to turn from one enemy to another without taking a beating. There’s a 180° turn button which helps, but smaller rotations seem to take an age. There’s also the matter of not being able to kick opponents while they’re down. Punches, kicks and even bullets will not connect with enemies unless they’re standing upright. The result is that having beaten an enemy to the ground you have to stand around waiting for them to get back on their feet before you can finish them off. Why?

More tedious still is having to beat up boxes, cupboards, photocopiers and other bits of scenery in order to find weapons or keys. Points are also accumulated by causing damage, effectively making what was a nice incidental feature of the first game a very dull and necessary element of the sequel. However, there’s an excellent selection of weapons on offer, all capable of taking out even the most ferocious of photocopiers, and Hawk is only able to carry a realistic amount of gear. The inventory for selecting weapons ! is a little clumsy, though, and does not pause the game at all. All too often you I find yourself getting beaten up as you ' attempt a change of weapon. With practice you’ll learn to overcome FF2’s ' flaws, but they are flaws nonetheless and will still frustrate you from time to time.

The exclusion of a Two-Player Mode is presumably the result of some of the weapons. The sniper rifle, for example, ' has a First-Person Targeting Mode - not a ; multiplayer friendly feature. This is unfortunate because the best thing about the original was definitely the two-player game. Fighting Force 2 isn’t really a sequel, it’s an attempt at something completely different. With a better control system ; and a few less boxes to beat up it could have been a contender - but it isn’t.